Jean Payen de Boisneuf

Jean Payen de Boisneuf (1738-1815), was a French military officer and plantation owner, who had estates in Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) and in Touraine. He was elected deputy of the bailiwick of Touraine for the Estates General of 1789. As a member of a family of plantation owners, he was a pro-slavery activist and a member of the Feuillants. In 1791 he came to the United States and met with Thomas Jefferson seeking American intervention in the Haitian Revolution, which was refused. He returned to the United States in 1793, settling with distant relatives in Maryland, where they attempted to re-create a plantation similar to that with which they were familiar in Saint-Domingue. L'Hermitage Plantation was notable for its large-scale enslavement and for mistreatment of the slaves.

Biography

Birth and family Jean Payen de Boisneuf was born on February 25, 1738, in Les Verettes (now Verettes), Saint-Domingue. His father, from a family of traders, was a knight of the Order of Saint Louis and commander of the militias of the Verrettes parish. His mother was born Marie-Claudine Lezlee, Lezelé, or Leslay. A brother was named Pierre.

Officer in Saint-Domingue and return to France On January 31, 1757, Jean Payen de Boisneuf was when he entered the service of the king as an ensign in the militia commanded by his father. In 1767, he was appointed commander of troops detached to intervene against English privateers who raided the island. He succeeded in effectively countering this enemy, capturing some, and taking them to the prisons of the city of Saint-Marc.

Deputy of the Estates-General and the Constituent Assembly Jean Payen de Boisneuf was elected, on March 24, 1789, deputy of the Third Estate at the Estates-General by the bailiwick of Touraine, with 99 votes out of a total of 162 voters. The intendant gave him the description of "Very rich American" in his report.

A member of the Feuillants, he was a close friend of Médéric Louis Élie Moreau de Saint-Méry, like him, he defended slavery, notably on April 28, 1791, he intervened to highlight the negative impact caused by the declaration of the rights of man on the colonists of Saint-Domingue "the members of the colonial assembly were misled by the fear of a rigorous application of this declaration in a country where existence is inconceivable with the first article." The Vincendriere family owned substantial plantations at l'Hermitage, near Frederick, Maryland.

L'Hermitage Plantation

The l'Hermitage plantation was unusual for its area, having a population of about 90 enslaved people. Crops in Central Maryland did not require so much labor to work them, and comparable properties using slaves generally had a much smaller workforce. L'Hermitage's labor force was similar to that found in Saint-Domingue, where coffee and sugar cane crops were more labor-intensive than in Maryland, where grains were grown.

Jean Payen de Boisneuf died in October 1816, at 78 years. To John Adams from Jean Payen de Boisneuf