Édouard Thouvenel

Édouard Antoine de Thouvenel (11 November 1818 – 18 October 1866) was France's ambassador to the Ottoman Empire from 1855 to 1860, and French Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1860 to 1862.

Édouard Thouvenel in The Guns of the South
After the Second American Revolution ended in 1864, Édouard Thouvenel, France's Foreign Minister, told Confederate Ambassador John Slidell that France would have been willing to recognize the Confederacy in 1862, but had delayed for two years because of the problem of slavery.