Baptiste-Pierre-François Bisson joined the French army and rose rapidly in rank during the French Revolutionary Wars. He served as a division commander in the Grande Armée of Emperor Napoleon in 1805 and 1807, playing a leading role at the Battle of Friedland. He was captured by Tyrolean rebels in 1809. Known as a gourmand, he became very fat before dying prematurely. His surname is one of the Names inscribed under the Arc de Triomphe.

The Battle of Friedland was a major engagement of the Napoleonic Wars between the armies of the French Empire commanded by Napoleon I and the armies of the Russian Empire led by Count von Bennigsen. Napoleon and the French obtained a decisive victory that routed much of the Russian army, which retreated chaotically over the Alle River by the end of the fighting. The battlefield is located in modern-day Kaliningrad Oblast, near the town of Pravdinsk, Russia.