Jean-Joseph de Laborde

Biography

Originating in a modest family inhabitant of Béarn , it joined at the age of adolescence his cousin who is with the head of a maritime company of import-export to Saint-Jean-with-Luz. With died of the cousin, it takes again the reins of the family company and builds its immense richness on this basis. It grows rich thus thanks to the transatlantic trade supplying the colonies out of raw materials and bringing back the most interesting products financially: tropical fruits, rare tree of gasoline and of course the treats blacks. Besides it has grounds with Saint-Domingue (Haiti) which it makes exploit for sugar.

This fulgurating rise, comparable with that of many middle-class men at the Age of Enlightenment, enabled him to rise among the noble ones. In the same way, its richness enabled him to acquire many fields. He becomes farmer general (1759-1767) on the proposal of his friend duke of Choiseul.

He settled in 1764 in the Château of Ferté-Vidame which he arranged with his taste while being surrounded of many artists, but he was driven out by it in 1784 by the duke of Penthièvre following a set of musical chairs, itself being driven out of sound field of Rambouillet by the king Louis XV which coveted its giboyeuses grounds. He is then named marquis.

The castle of Méréville

Its adventures will give the opportunity to him to acquire the castle of Méréville and its formal garden in 1784. It thus decided to create in these marshy places, a large landscape park with its suitability. For that it is surrounded by large artists: François-Joseph Bélanger, famous in this decade to have built in two months Trifle for the count d' Artois, Hubert Robert left the prestigious school of Rome and already known like the painter of the ruins, and other great names like the Leuleu cabinetmaker, the sculptor Augustin Pajou or the painter Claude Joseph Vernet. The construction of this park will require a titanic task. Nearly 700 workmen, including one most of specialized craftsmen, will work during ten years under the supervision of the architect. They thus will carry out the park of Méréville, a romantic jewel that Chateaubriand will qualify oasis.

In 1786, after depression of bridge of rocks (superb bridge double deck which does not count from now on more but one of them after it was inserted in the Juine), François-Joseph Bélanger was congédié of its role of architect as a chief. Other reasons were also evoked for this reference, in particular the financial aspect. Indeed, Bélanger would have taken the practice to spend without counting, which the marquis, as a warned manager, could not accept. It was replaced by Hubert Robert. François-Joseph Bélanger remained on the building site for the construction of the round temple of the filial devotion.

The following year, whereas the diversion of the Juine had for a long time been undertaken, at the same time as of hydrographic work exceptional for the time, a manufactures unforeseen was built: the column rostrale. That Ci was built in homage to its two sons, Edouard (1762-1786) and Ange Auguste (1766-1786), whose news of disappearance arrived in 1787. The two young men perished together with broad of Vancouver, in bay of the French during forwarding Perugia. This column was built on an small island in the middle of the big lake.

The temple of the filial devotion was dedicated to his/her Natalie daughter, and the interior decorated by a marble bust with its image carved by Augustin Pajou.

The passion of the marquis will be noted for what made his time, this park is with his image, the admiration of navigation and of the discovery is everywhere (the column rostrale and the cenotaph of Cook are the most obvious homage), the love of nature and the beautiful plants joined the preceding topic in this century of botany and its classification. The park is thus truffle of imported rare species then acclimatized in the rich person grounds of the valley of Méréville.

The youth of the marquis in the Basque Country also feels: the caves in which one can go down by extirpated staircases, made uneven, the cascade and its rocks gave to the marquis the feeling to find his Pyrenees.

Lastly, its richness is present everywhere. Bridges with the evocative names " with the balls of or" , of the solitary caves of which the interior is avoided thousands of gold sheets or invaluable stones or at least brilliant and especially this paved way of roller which gives a so imposing seal to the park of Méréville.

Romantic name that one crosses everywhere to define the style of this field finds in this sometimes Anglo-Chinese style (the view-point), but especially by this return to the nature and the illusion of nature (the ruined bridge, or the fact that all the trees were planted with the concern of surprising the visitor, or the fact that all the caves were cut by the hand of the man) due to the genius of its creators and those which took part in it.

But if this work is what the marquis left us moreover shining, it is good to know that with orée of the Revolution, this one had already given an opinion in the events of its time. Thus he did not forget anything of his past of baited worker, and its convictions that he knew to transmit to his son will do this one one of the only deputies (of the bailliage of Étampes) noble, at the time of the Revolution, to have joined the Tiers state as has to do it Mirabeau). But this will not save it when, in the name of the law of the suspects, Saint-Just guillotiner in one of the last carts of the Terreur in May 1794 does it.

Its descent

Pauline de Laborde (1765-1782) married Jean-François Pérusse 1st duke of the Bus
Nathalie de Laborde (1774-1835), married to Charles de Noailles, duke of Mouchy, was one of the many mistresses of Chateaubriant the small fly .
Alexandre de Laborde archeologist and politician

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