Saint-Domingue (2)
Géricault Life
Un Moulin à sucre tourné par l’eau…, au Brésil (detail) Frans Post, 1650-1655 Louvre.
Pierre-Antoine Robillard is known as one of the founders of the family tobacco concern at the Hôtel de Longueville. In our second discussion of Saint Domingue and the slave trade, we examine the key role Pierre-Antoine Robillard played in promoting the family’s interests in the colony of Saint Domingue.
Dieppe & Grand Boucan
When Théodore Géricault was born in 1791 the family’s Robillard relations owned several plantations in the slave colony of Saint Domingue in the French Antilles. The largest property, a sugar plantation situated in the mountains of Grand Boucan in the northern part of the colony, was purchased in 1772 by Jean-Guillaume Robillard, Pierre-Antoine Robillard’s brother.
Until February, 2019, Géricault scholars knew almost nothing about the family’s connections to the slave trade beyond the obvious connection linking the family fortune to tobacco often grown on slave plantations, and vague references to the Robillard plantations in Saint Domingue. In my February issue, I provided the first public account of the 1772 Grand Boucan purchase, and of family life in Saint Domingue – describing the time line of the sale, the sad state of the slaves of the Bonnet plantation at the time, and the steps Jean-Guillaume Robillard likely took to improve their health and, thus, the economic viability of the property. I also argued that Géricault’s immediate and extended family had a keen interest in the health and activities of all of their relations in Saint Domingue, an interest which sharply increased after August, 1791, when rebel slaves attacked and burned the Grand Boucan plantation.
I can now confirm that family members in France actually assisted in the 1772 acquisition and that Pierre-Antoine Robillard, based in Dieppe, played a particularly important role. In our initial discussion of the purchase we described Jean-Guillaume Robillard’s first attempt to purchase the Grand Boucan plantation in 1769. This property had fallen into disrepair and was effectively “owned” by a number of creditors in France and in the Caribbean island colony in 1769. Jean-Guillaume Robillard, himself, belonged to the latter group. As we noted then, when Jean-Guillaume Robillard attempted to purchase the Grand Boucan plantation at this time, creditors in France blocked the sale, fearing that creditors on the island colony would receive preferential treatment.
I can confirm that Pierre-Antoine Robillard was instrumental in winning support from key creditors in France when Jean-Guillaume launched his second (successful) attempt to purchase the plantation in 1772. I have also learned that Pierre-Antoine Robillard and other family members based in France actively supported and monitored the efforts of Jean-Guillaume Robillard in Saint Domingue to purchase the Grand Boucan plantation. Letters from various creditors confirm that Pierre-Antoine’s good relations with creditors based in Dieppe, and the active role he took in promoting the purchase, tipped the scales in the Robillards’ favor when Jean-Guillaume submitted his second offer in 1772.
We have long known that the Robillard tobacco concern was a family business. Théodore’s grandmother Louise-Thérèse de Poix counted shares in the family tobacco firm as part of her fortune. Until now, however, we possessed no clear evidence that Robillards based in France had any direct interest in the purchase of plantations, or slaves. Géricault scholars have long known that Marie-Therese de Poix, the wife of Pierre-Antoine Robillard, was a blood relation of Théodore Géricault, the sister of Louise-Thérèse de Poix, Géricault’s maternal grandmother. Given what we know of the Robillard family tobacco business, with individual family members holding shares in the family concern, we cannot rule out the possibility that Pierre-Antoine Robillard and other family members in France had some financial interests in the Robillard plantations in Saint-Domingue, either as direct investments, or as agents acting to further family interests in the island colony.
Finally, the direct role Pierre-Antoine Robillard played in the purchase of the Grand Boucan plantation compels us to rethink the role he played in the lives of his Rouen relations, and not just in regards to the slave trade, especially after the death of Jean-Vincent-Charles Caruel in 1779.