sb. and a. Also Vendéan. [f. F. Vendée, the name of a maritime department in western France.]
A. sb. An inhabitant of La Vendée, esp. one who took part in the insurrection of 1793 against the Republic.
1796. Gentl. Mag., May, 407. The Vendeans are extraordinary men.
1837. Alison, Hist. Europe (1847), III. 326. The Vendéans were in that stage of society when ascendancy is acquired by personal daring.
1843. Penny Cycl., XXVI. 201/1. The unhappy Vendeans … were defeated with fearful loss.
1903. W. Bright, Age of Fathers, I. xii. 244. The experience of a fugitive Jacobite or Vendéan.
B. adj. Of or pertaining to La Vendée, esp. in connection with the insurrection of 1793.
1796. Gentl. Mag., May, 408/1. The Vendean generals. Ibid., 412/1. The History of the Vendean War.
1839. trans. Lamartine’s Trav., 149/1. The west … would have been organised once more into Vendean guerillas.
1848. W. H. Kelly, trans. L. Blanc’s Hist. Ten Y., II. 86. The Vendéan insurrection had been combated by means neither suggested nor directed by the executive.
1911. Edin. Rev., Oct., 319. The Breton and Vendéan royalists were still formidable.
