Jean-Pierre de Lassus

Jean-Pierre de Lassus Saint-Geniuses , Capitoul of Toulouse, Lord of Saint-Geniuses, Lord of Shoe manufacture, 1st Land-surveyor of the King in Louisiana, Large Voyer, born in 1694 with Montréjeau (Haute-Garonne), deceased the October 15th 1758 with Saint-Geniuses (the Dordogne).

Its military life in the New-World

Officer of the Genious of the Navy, having been used three years for Rochefort like junior in the Lhivernam company, " having made countryside in this quality on the vessels of the roy" Jean-Pierre de Lassus was sent on mission by Mister of the Mound, which writes to him of Versailles on July 29th, 1722: " Monseigneur the duke of Antin ordered to you mander to leave to me without delay to return to you near the Sr Matis and to work for luy and to employ you there on his poker as from 1st of this mois". Two years later, at 30 years he sees himself entrusting a mission of land surveying in Louisiana. The 23 Seven the 1724 Company of the Indies specifies " attributions of the sieurs Lassus" , because Jean-Pierre leaves with his younger brother, Joseph de Lassus-Marcilly, whose destiny will consequently remain very attached to his: " The Company makes you pass by the Gironde Sieur Lassus, land-surveyor, to which it grants 2000 pounds of salary without vivres. It carries out with him one of his brothers whom it was committed putting while arriving at the colony at the fact of land surveying, and the Company as gave him a commission of land-surveyor, by regulating only 600 pounds to him of salary, and same the vivres as the graduate employees. When the two men reach you, the Company counts that you occupy them to draw up the statement of consistency in terminals of the grounds conceded with each private individual. They must begin not the places where there are the most inhabitants awaited than it is where there is the most contestations."

Jean-Pierre and Joseph arrive on-site on February 19th, 1725: located on left bank of the Mississippi, to 170 km of his mouth, built on a marshy ground located at 2 Mr. under the sea level, the New-Orleans had been founded 7 years earlier, in 1718, by the sior of Bienville, which wanted to make of it the capital of the French empire of the New World, and a great shopping mall. The first inhabitants had to fight the floods, the storms, and the epidemics of yellow fever, without counting the infestation by the insects, snakes, and alligators. In 1721 one counted only 470 inhabitants, and in 1731, when it passes under direct control of the crown, one counts 8000 inhabitants for all the colony. The first buildings of the city were vulgar huts with the walls of cobs with framework of beams of cypress, and covered with thatch. The bonds are not cut with the family, the mail arrives from France, as testifies to it that Jean-Pierre accepted there from his Picot cousin, gone back to Paris of October 23rd, 1725, where this one written " kiss for us all our cousin junior. You so often do not speak about we that we do you. Good-bye, dear cousins, be persuaded that I will be all my life with sincerity your expensive cousin".

With believing his son of them, Jean-Pierre discharged his task " not without running thousand dangers, by going up the Mississippi with 200 miles (approximately 800 km) in the grounds; it was necessary to be defended with each step of the monstrous reptiles of this terrible river, and of the savages who live these distant regions. He fulfills finally his mission, forwarded to the office Navy the plans and charts where they exist. The minister luy testified to it his satisfaction and luy made dispatch a commission of Large Voyer land-surveyor of the French part of Saint-Domingue" (handwritten note of Jean-François).

In fact, Jean-Pierre had especially to deny himself the ceaseless attacks of his compatriots. As of on March 21st, 1726, one year hardly after its arrival, it is in conflict with its superior, Adrien de Pauge or Pauger, director of work of the Colony, which complains with the Council about Louisiana that " Srs Lassus, land-surveyors, continue to refuse to be with my orders, though they are judicious to be there absolutely, by state of funds of fortifications of year last It likes council to punish them of their disobedience badly founded, and to cut off their salary which are of more than 3000 pounds on known as funds of fortifications, since they there have still be of no utility, and that I can to have with their place person which will make not only their function of land-surveyor more with liking of the Council, but which will hold me place of assistant engineer, which will take care during my absence of the works of this city, will do them copies of the known as plans, but even of the states, memories and letters, so that I can about it make an account exact to the Company. Because their trade of land-surveyor is not there of no consequence, since it must consist only to measure the length and width of the grounds conceded with the inhabitants Sirs I ask you to defend in known as Srs de Lassus to interfere and go to mark them same limits or terminals which could be only false and badly founded without an instructive order of moi." In other words it is reproached to them for disobeying orders which consist in making another thing that this why one sent them in Louisiana. It is what the Council notes, which déboute Pauge of its complaint a few days later, by referring to the letter of instruction of the Company referred to above " by which she addresses Srs Lassus to the Council; as the terms of this letter contain their functions with the only land surveying, we could not give them other occupations, and we are persuaded that the company would find bad that one obliged Srs Lassus to make intentions by preference with land surveying & L E paper burrow of the Colony which is in a hurry. As for what they are employed on the funds of the fortifications, the company which knows is to it the mistress to order employment of it as it likes it, and the Council can only conform so that she regulates by her states of expenditure sent in this colonie".

The first sleeve seems gained, but Broutin, successor of Pauge, deceased, returns to the load the following year. Jean-Pierre takes the initiative, and as of on April 29th, 1727 written in Paris with the directors of the Company:

" Dear Sirs, as Mr. de Pauge died, I hope that you will have regard to my services, and so that you promised to me, you will never find a servant more saddened than me, my advance will not cut down my land surveying or the execution by paper burrow on the ground. I followed exactly the precepts of Mrs Vodeau and of Lalos, by not taking any party in this civil small war, I was not any better, because Mr. de Luctrain having asked me for my works after being prohibited itself of the function S of his employment, I say to him that the Council my asked them absolutely. Indeed I did not know with whom to obey. However the things having changed I continued to give my works to Mr. of the Chair while putting all my confidence in him. The Sr Broutin being gone down from Natchez, believed that I was not to speak about a work of land surveying which it made in Chapitoulas where it injures the concession of Mr. de Colly, as you can see Sirs in the chart of Mr. of the Chair you sending E by St Andre. It is with Mo 9 B, the punctuated line is transcribes it Sr Broutin, with the place which this limit was to run parallel in North, I am well astonished while raising my second chart by the burrow, to see a similar work, no matter what it is a stop of the Council which authorizes it for Sr of Frimire, the stop was marked only on the report/ratio of the Sr Broutin, land-surveyor named of office in this time there; it shows today with the head fortifications, it used of all kinds of carried out unworthy to be avenged while making hear with the inhabitants that I misled them. The Council was obliged to impose silence to him, and not to continue a quarrel which could be only prejudicial with the Colony. Because it is of course the ground of the competence which the new attack will be carried out. By precaution, Jean-Pierre had been made issue, as of on February 15th, 1727, a certificate of the general commander of the Province of Louisiana, in the absence of Mr. de Bienville, certifying " that the Sr of Lassus, first land-surveyor and employee with the fortifications of this province was used to with it usefully for various works which we saw without it coming to us no subject from complaint against him, on the contrary, was always made there estimate of all the decent people, there having held very a good behavior, in faith of whom gave we to him the present and makes affix the seal of our armes." To make good measure, on April 20th, 1727, Mr. Divon, Ordering strong Cop of the Mobile, certifies that " Mister de Lassus, first land-surveyor of the colony, came at the height Condé from the Mobile to raise the chart of the same river, and be T discharged in spite of contrary times which it made, where it made appear his experiment and capacity to fill all the duties, with honor, in witness whereof we signed this present certificate to be useful to him and be worth in time and place, and affixed the seal of our weapons. " In spite of these eulogistic certificates emanating from the more high ranking authorities of the Colony, Broutin, its direct chief, shows it incompetence throughout an indictment of several pages addressed to Paris and dated of New-Orleans, of May 6th, 172 7 and of which here some extracts: " I could not exempt to me, Sirs, to speak to you here about land surveying of this colony which makes pity. The council sent me to seek one day to ask me for my feeling there above, in the presence of the Sr Lassus to which I say that he did not work as it is necessary, and than land surveying nothing was worth, because they made lose with the ones and gain with the others, defect by addressing the word to me: " you know well that it is necessary that those which are in the points of the rivers lose, and on the contrary those which are in the handles gagnent". What I answered that I did not hear this language, and that it was necessary to survey so that everyone has its account in surface To entirely prove to you the incapacity of the sior of Lassus, Sirs, I will say to you that he said as a full council and to Mr. Périer, that one could not raise the chart geometrically, nor trigonometrically of the Mississippi. He as said as O N could not survey in wood, he still said that the Mississippi trigonometrically had 8 arpents of width in New-Orleans, while he has 330 measuring apparatuses (630 meters, which is exact, at least at the XXe century), while having made the operation myself. Do not believe Sirs that it is by recrimination, nor which I want badly of nothing with the Sr Lassus, but that all that I say is to discharge, so that one cannot me charge of it the fault, the Council having invited me to say my feeling of it, and what I do is only for the good of all the colony and the inhabitants, and to inform you whom you give 3000 pounds of salary to the two brothers to muddle land surveying and to put in lawsuit all the S inhabitants. It has not been ashamed only for 2 years that they are here, they did not do still so to speak anything as it is necessary on the contrary. I ensure you of honor that it is not able to do it. He dared to say that he is land-surveyor and geographer of Roy, and that he had left his certificates to Mr. of the Salvo. If you inform yourselves some well, you will see, Sirs, that it forever worked, at least only, at most if it had worked. And there, it reveals that it is well a quarrel of nobody, and that it wants any rival on his ground: " When you are persuaded that I have the honor to ensure you in honor, you will have to only make put to you in sorrow to send anybody, waited until I will have a pleasure of making them without that disturbing me ". And to complete its rival, it still adds: " I believe that it would be by the way, Sirs, to make the land-surveyor responsible for the faults, which would be as in France, because otherwise you run great risk not to have never but land-surveyors ignoramuses " Broutin, hierarchically superior direct of Jean-Pierre, declares it inefficient, claims that its land surveying will draw up the inhabitants the ones against the others, whereas the Commander Général, Bienville, and its assistant, as well as the Commander of the Strong Cop, rent his services. Intervenes then the decisive event which will make the loss of Jean-Pierre: Etienne de Périer (or of the Perrier), replaces Bienville at the post of general Commander and President of the council of Control. He is favorable to Broutin. November 2nd, 1727 Périer E T the Chair marry the theses of Broutin, and write at the office of Louisiana: " the sior Lassus, land-surveyor, that you sent here, does not understand anything with this trade. He will cause immense lawsuits thereafter. " Jean-Pierre is overcome, and decides D E to return to France. But Périer continues: " He wants to pass by again, but it is necessary to pay what it owes. As we do not have any order for that, we let us not can consentir." there; It will be done on November 3rd, 1728, dates to which Mr. of the Chair written in Paris: " We revoked the sior Lassus. It must pass by the first vessel which will go to France in uprightness. And we receive his obligation of what it will be able owe with the Company after having returned the effects that it has here; Mr. Broutin currently makes land surveying since the edge of the river up to now, and will make the remainder while going up in Natchez. We do not think that Mr Périer and need the Sr Baron to him to overcome the difficulties that would be in land surveying, the Sr Broutin being strong with the fact of this kind of arpentage." Broutin, through intrigue, thus gained, and obtained that Lassus is évincé with its profit. And when Bienville, itself revoked in 1727, for probably similar reasons of competition, returns the head high in 1731 as Gouverneur of Louisiana, become Colonie of the Crown, it is too late for Jean-Pierre. This one leaves Louisiana for France, leaving his/her Marcilly brother on the spot. But contrary to the instructions, its boat makes slackening in Saint-Domingue: it will be the revolving one of its life. At that time, Santo Domingo, French part of the island, become from Haiti, are the pearl of the Antilles. The culture and the trade of sugar and the indigo make the fortune of the more French big families which there have dwellings, Ain if that traders and ship-owners of Nantes, La Rochelle or Bordeaux. The port of the French Cape (become Haitian Cape), then capital of the colony, swarms with activity: it is not rare to see 150 boats with the anchor there! February 14th, 1730, Jean-Pierre aspires to a military command, the post of Assistant medical officer of Bayaha, and is made deliver for this purpose a certificate of recommendation of Dujarry, major to the Government of the Cape, island of Santo Domingo, which writes " that the sior of Lassus passing by here, being turned over some from the Mississippi, where there had been sent general land-surveyor, which he exerted four years, knowing his capacity in the geometry, fortifications and in the drawing, we committed it to remain da NS the country, where, since more than one year that he remains there, it was to us of a great help by his lights, while getting busy free to trace main road, liftings, fitted, and to lead the other public works to which our employment urges us to make work daily, and which, to reward this zeal for such a good subject, and to attach it to the service of Roy, his majesty having ordered a state major in Bayaha with a garrison, one could not make a better choice, nor more necessary, awaited work which one must make in known as Bayaha, that of the person of the known as sior of Lassus to fill the station of major assistance of the troops to which it does not appear that the court still has nommé." Pointing out his past of junior, the major stresses that " since its stay in this city, only by the taste which it has for the service, it is regularly with the exercises that one makes make with the troupes" but also " that it makes exactly to its court with Mister the Governor of which it is received as well as all officers of this garrison of which it gained the estime." In the negative answer addressed to Mister of Hitte, gone back to Fontainebleau on May 16th, 1730, Mr. de Maurepas, Minister for the Marine written: " I would have wished, Sir, to get to the sior of Lassus the use of assistance major de Bayaha that you ave Z requested for him, but Roy laid out about it in favor of an officer of the troops which are useful in the colony. Thus I could not propose it. Furthermore, you mark me that it is well informed in land surveying and the geography, that it is besides S active and intelligent, I see that it can get busy more usefully for him by making use of its talents " Fortunately, after so much of vexations, Jean-Pierre marries in 1732, at 38 years, Catherine Pasquier, creole rich person and charming, cohéritière of vast properties which will make its fortune and that of his until the revolution. It is about a sugar refinery named henceforth " Lassus dwelling, located flat of North, Saint-Jacob parish, of 91,5 squares of surface (approximately 103 ha), distant of 2 miles (8 km) of the Cape, which was its landing stage, limited to the South and the East by the river Top of the Cape, and manufacturing white sugar of 1st and 2nd qualité". The locality exists always, deformed in Lassis or even Switzerland, as on the chart drawn up by the American geographical services in the years 1980. from their union which lasted 8 years are born 4 children. Catherine dies in Saint-Domingue in 1740, whereas the family was on the point of returning to France, that the two elder children had already joined. The summer 1740, widowed, Jean-Pierre returns in his turn to France " to live between his/her parents the remainder of sound âge" : its absence will have lasted 15 years. He lives initially in Paris, then in Toulouse, renonçant in an act of June 18th, 1741 to the habitanage of Montréjeau for that of the pink city of which he was elected Capitoul for the year 1742: he is 48 years old. Each end of the year, Toulouse elected 4 Capitouls louse R one year, one by district. This prestigious supreme municipal load was very coveted, would be this only by its anoblissant character. Its election, Jean-Pierre obtains it thanks to the support of L.A. of Bourbon, prince of Dombes which answers S thanks in a letter gone back to Versailles on March 26th, 1742: " I was made a pleasure, Sir, to get to the place of Capitoul of Toulouse that you to you avés désiré". With his older brother he writes on Nov. 29, 1741 " I have just taken opinion of my nomination to the capitoulat, also I prepare to row in this galère. If you want to come to see the ceremonial, you were born prié". He will report later (14 Seven 1754) an incident which will be worth the bad graces of the Parliament to him, ayan T " wounded the vanity of Mr. 1st President (Jean-Gaspard de Maniban) when I made leave his delivered comédie". He buys, partly with credit, the seigniory and the castle of Saint-Geniuses to the powerful family Bertier (act of 16 DEC 1742). Francoise Plantey reports that the train of Jean-Pierre house was " almost princely. He had made build a theater at the end of the right wing, concerning the terrace. He enjoyed largely his opulence, being made follow D E his actors in his displacements, and treating them with generosity ". It is at that time, 1742, which Jean-Pierre requests from his brother, Joseph de Lassus-Marcilly, remained after him in Louisiana, to manage its interests in Saint-Domingue, which the latter will make until its death in 1749. It sets out again then in Saint-Domingue of June 1751 in May 1753. " Useless of you mander the dreadful disorders which I found in this dwelling; after the earthquakes that was overflows and rains continuelles" he with his children writes (letter of Feb. 14, 1752). At the time of this voyage it takes along Clotilde Berrurier, controlling her children, 27 years his junior, and will announce on her return that she was his wife since 1743! It is established then in Paris, initially more than one year in the Saint-Cosme parish and Damien, then street of Vaugirard where they had remained both for more than 6 months at the time of their official nuptials the 20 Seven 1755; Clothilde gives him 2 new X children, whereas it has more than 60 years. It maintains a regular correspondence with his remained son with Saint-Geniuses, 25 letters were preserved, all annotated " my expensive père". They milked with financial considerations and legal S as for the contentions which opposed it to his/her son-in-law, Lassus-Barsous, and with the husband of its pupil Elisabeth Lelong, Faubeau de Mallet, said marquis de Castelbajac, avid to recover American fortune. One reads also recommendations morals and family with the future household head. " I see with pleasure that you are content with your S the USSR and that your S the USSR are to it you. Continue, my son, to practice the virtue. The goods and the honors are frivolities. In comparison, malicious little wind to remove us goods, but not good the m the USSR. I knew in you your childhood of it, and I always flattered myself that you would be honest a homme" (June 2nd, 1753). The end of its life, if it is brightened by the children whom his second wife gives him, is obscured by rheumatisms. " I have well sorrow to go to Luxembourg, no matter what I of it would be distant that like park at the end of the vigne" (August 16th, 1754). He dies in 64 years with Saint-Geniuses, and rests there in the church, without one knowing at which exact place its tomb is located.

Its succession

Its succession being found obérée of very many debts, his/her children gave up it, to stick to the maternal goods. After its Saint-Geniuses death was thus sold by order of the Judgment of the Court of the requests of the Parliament of Toulouse of the 1 0 July 1760; Jean-François, his son went contracting, so that the ground did not leave the family. If Pierre de Lassus, the grandfather, is the stock of the branch junior by Lassus, Jean-Pierre is the true founder; his/her Polonis older brother envisaged it by addressing to him his letters with the superscription " Mister de Lassus the ancien" ? It is indeed him which establishes this branch of Lassus with Saint-Geniuses, ground which in residence always the stronghold 250 years later; all its descendants, except notable for its Marcilly grandson, since, accurately added the name of Saint-Geniuses to their Lassus patronym. Itself had taken for its own armorial bearings " mouths with a man laid down under a sinople tree, the whole on an of the same terrace, with the bent chief of gueules". They are it weapons which are reproduced on the beautiful portrait of him that one can admire with Saint-Geniuses, where it poses out of dress of Capitoul. This heraldic car-representation indicates a direction of humor; admittedly it refers to the Latin significance of the word lassus , tired, but one can also see also there the proclamation of a rest deserved well, after an adventurous life in the New-World, and that of an art of living very XVIIIe century.

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