Léon Guillaume Mégy, identified on the reverse, was a mechanic and militant Blanquist who became one of the organizers of resistance in Montmartre at the Commune’s outbreak on March 18, 1871. The carte de visite was produced by E. Appert’s Paris studio at 24 Rue Taitbout.

He is shown in profile, head turned fully to the left, his wavy hair swept back and a full beard covering his jaw. He wears a dark coat buttoned over a waistcoat, with a striped cravat visible at the open collar.

A skilled mechanic who had worked on the Suez Canal and the Paris railways before his arrest for killing a police officer in 1870, Mégy was freed by amnesty that September and threw himself into the Commune’s cause, taking command of the fort d’Issy and later serving as chief of staff under General Eudes during the defense of the Faubourg Saint-Antoine. Condemned to death in absentia after the Commune’s fall, he escaped first to Switzerland, then the United States, and died in Colón, Panama, in 1884.

The reverse is inscribed in pencil, “Mégy / Leon Guillaume Megy (1841-1884) / Paris Commune,” over the printed studio imprint of E. Appert, Peintre Photographe, 24 Rue Taitbout, Paris, with the archival notations “3/21/07,” “LOFGEZ,” and “Eb.”