[Saint Domingue] 'Plan de l'habitation de Sr. Fleuriau depuis 1743 qu'il a commencé a l'Etablir, Jusq'en 1749 ... Suivant Le Nouveau Plan Tire par Mr. Delagrené En 1753 ....'

by FLEURIAU, Aimé-Benjamin (1709-1787)

Price: $9,750.00
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Book desription: [No date, but circa 1753]. Manuscript, in black ink, with touches of colour, on laid paper, in very good condition. 20 1/2 x 28 1/4 inches. A unique early image from Saint Domingue, present day Haiti near Port-au-Prince: a manuscript plan of a plantation which was the foundation of a colonial fortune built on sugar by La Rochelle-born, Aimé-Benjamin Fleuriau, with images of the house and sugar mill A detailed plan of the "habitation de Mr. Fleuriau." The property is apparently divided into outlots, each measuring approx. 200 x 300 [metres?], and each devoted to a specific crop or purpose; for example, "orengere" (orange grove?), "citronniere" (lemon grove?), "Indigoterie" (Indigo?), etc. At the centre, the main house and outbuildings are carefully rendered to the front and right of the house is what appears to be a large outdoor sugar mill. A long canal and numerous regular roads crisscross the property. The various plans (those of 1749 and 1753, etc.) are superimposed upon each other. Aimé-Benjamin Fleuriau was born in La Rochelle in 1709. In 1729, at the age of 20 he sailed to Saint Domingue (Hispaniola) to join his uncle, leaving behind family debts of more than 120,000 'livres'. He worked hard and prospered and impressed his uncle so much that he was made a beneficiary of his uncle's will. Aimé-Benjamin Fleuriau bought the property pictured here on 12 April 1743, less than a month after his uncle's death. It was described as a habitation, the property of 'Sieur Claude-Alexis Mathieu, sise à la Croix-des-Bouquets, canton de Bellevue, plaine de Cul-de-Sac', and it was apparently the first step leading quite rapidly to Fleuriau's accumulation of a fortune made from sugar. Fleuriau departed for France in 1755, and returned to La Rochelle where he cleared his family's debts and lived in some splendour until his death in 1787, when his personal fortune was put at '4 millions de livres'. His main residence in La Rochelle is now the 'Musée du Nouveau Monde'.

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