The Passengers of La Victoire
The Marquis de La Fayette is a relatively well-known figure - what is great while researching him - but also an absolute pain when researching the people around him. La Fayette’s persona tends to quite naturally overshadow other people. I would so love to know more about his children, his servants, his aide-de-camps (both in America and France), his (military) secretaries, the people who sailed with him on La Victoire or L’Hermione and so on and so forth.
It seems as if more modern books and authors do not touch the question of La Fayette’s shipmates at all or only quite superficial. More dated books and articles dedicated sometimes whole chapters to the matter but sometimes suffer from the lack of digitalized documents.
As I have previously said, the whole matter of going to America was an enormous risk and virtually nobody really wanted La Fayette to go America - there were several times during the preparations of the expedition where it seems that La Fayette would not travel to America after all. However, the other members of his little group were determined to go to America, with or without La Fayette. Sixteen French gentleman, the Marquis de La Fayette not among them, settled into an agreement with Silas Deane, the American agent in Paris, on December 1, 1776.
Only six days later, on December 7, 1776, after La Fayette signed his own agreement with Silas Deane do we find an updated list in Deane’s papers, a list that this time included La Fayette.
While La Fayette is now included, you will notice that de Mauroy, de Senneville, de Holtzendorf (just like de Kalb a German in the French Army), Amariton, de Roth, de Gerard, de Roseval, de Montis and de Grange are now missing from the list. De Mauroy and du Buysson (you find all kind of different spellings of his name, du Buysson, du Boisson, Duboysson, Duboisson, etc.) later made it to America with Mauroy even serving as La Fayette’s aide-de-camp but I do not known what about the other men. Also note that de Bedaulx (who was Swiss by the way) was on the list but not intended as a passenger on La Victoire.
We are now left with a list of 13 men, twelve of them as passengers. Out of these 13 men, five (de Fayols, de Gimat, de Virgny, Capitaine and de La Colombe) would eventually serve as La Fayette’s aide-de-camps. This list though was by no means final. Despite him not being marked on the list, de Bedaulx was in the end a passenger on La Victoire. There was also a last minute edition, a young man named Edmund Brice - he was European-born, presumably the son of American (or at least English speaking) parents and it seems as if he helped La Fayette learn then English language during the voyage. Besides that, du Buysson, who was on the list from December 1, but not on the list from December 7, sailed along on La Victoire.
If some of these men were last-minute additions, how do we know that they truly sailed with La Fayette on his ship - well, we still have the Acts of Embarkation! In France at the time there were strict laws regarding religion. Huguenots (who, in very simple terms, were not Catholic) were prohibited from leaving the country. To enforce this law, every person who wanted to leave France had to attest their Catholicism. La Fayette arrived in Bordeaux on the May 19, and he and his fellow shipmates boarded La Victoire between May 20 and May 24, 1777. Their Acts of Embarkation did actually survive all these many years and the harbour at Bordeaux has digitalized its logs. Acts of Embarkation from 1717 up until 1789 can be found in the Archives départementales de la Gironde, fully digitalized and free for everybody to access. Beside these logs, they have further documentation about maritime history, spanning from 1640 until 1889. If you are interested in social and/or maritime history, this collection might be for you.
First to board was a group headed by the Baron de Kalb. They boarded on March 21:
I testify that Mr. John baron de Kalb, officer in the service of the King of France, aged 50 years, tall hair chestnut, Mr. Francois Augustin Martin de Barbezieux aged 32 years, medium height hair chestnut; Mr. Louis-Ange de la Colombe depuy envallay aged 25 years, medium height chestnut hair: Mr. Charles Bedoulx native of Neuchâtel in Switzerland, aged 25 years, tall, hair blonde and Mr. Phillipe Louis Candon native of Versailles, aged 26 years tall hair brown, profess the Catholic, Apostolic and Roman religion and embark on the ship the Victoire Captain Le Boursier to go to St. Domingo on business. Bordx. March 21, 1 777
On the same day a second group boarded:
I testify that Sieur Jacque Franval, native of La Reolle aged 26 years. Sieur Louis Gimal of Agen aged 22 years, medium height hair chestnut and Leonard Price native of Sauveterre aged twenty two years medium height chestnut hair, profess the Catholic Apostolic and Roman religion and embark on the ship Victoire, Capn. Leboursier to go to St. Domingo. Bordx. March 21, 1 777
The next day, on May 22, another group boarded:
I testify that Louis de Vregny native of Strasbourg aged thirty six years, tall black hair. Mr. Jean Pierre Rousseau de Fayols native of Notre Dame near Ruffec in Poitou, aged 27 years Mr. Guillaume de Lesserre of Angouleme aged 25 years tall chestnut hair, and Mr. Charles Antoine de Valfort native of Thionville of the department of Metz, aged 27 years tall hair blonde, profess the Catholic Apostolic Roman religion and embark on the ship Victoire Captain Leboursier to go to the Cape. Bordx. March 22, 1777.
Later that same day, La Fayette boarded with his group:
I testify that Sr. Gilbert du Mottie chevalier de Chavaillac aged 20 years, tall, hair blonde, Jean Simon Camu of la Villedieu in the Frenche Conté belonging to the retinue of the chevalier, aged 32 years medium height hair blonde, Michael Monteau of Saclay near Paris aged 27 medium height, hair blonde belonging to the same, Francois Aman Rogé of Nantes, aged 20 years medium height hair blonde belonging to the retinue of the Baron de Caune, and Antoine Redon of Sarlat, aged 22 years, medium height hair chestnut are anciens catholiques who desire to embark on the Victoire Captain Lebourcier, to go to the Cape on business. A Bordx. March 22, 1777.
Two days later, the last group boarded La Victoire:
I testify that Sr. Jean Capitaine Ruffec in Angoumois, aged 38 years medium height hair black, Mr. le Chevalier Dubuisson from Moulin in Bouvarais aged 25 years medium height chestnut hair and Jean and Love Lepas of Ceran near Rouen aged 18 years medium height blonde hair, ancient catolique, who desire to embark upon the ship the Victoire; Captain Leboursier to go to the Cape where they have business. At Bordx. March 24, 1 777.
There are a few mistakes. As you probably already noticed, the clerk(s) could not care less about the correct spelling of names and so there are some names that are spelled funny in the Acts of Embarkation but some of the signatures look also a bit off as well, probably as a means to disguise the signers identity. La Fayette himself used, well, not a feigned name as such, but one of his lesser titles to disguise himself. His age is also given as 20 although he was only 19 at the time. Valfort’s age was also wrong, he was 31 and not 27 at the time. De Kalb, though he declared that he was Catholic, was a Protestant. Brice was most likely also a Protestant and the religious beliefs of Capitaine and du Buysson were not noted at all. De Kalb’s name is also at one point given as the Barone de Caune. “the Cap” refers to the Cap-Haytien, a region of Santo Domingo - but I think we are all aware that Santo Domingo never was the real destination of the travellers. Last but not least, the Acts also give us the names of the servants, who would otherwise be overlooked. Jean Simon Camu(s), Michel Monteau, Francois Aman Rogè, Antoine Redon, Jean Lepas and Love Lepas. Out of the six servants, only one of them signed the papers - a circumstance that indicates that the other five were not able to read and write (although in most cases this was noted accordingly on the papers as a reason for the absence of the signature). De Gimat also did not sign so maybe the clerk was simply careless.
The name of the Captain, Captain Lebroucier, is given here as well. La Victore was originally named La Bonne Mére and was a ship of 220 tons with a crew of 30. De Kalb noted in a letter to his wife from April 6, 1777 that there were six officers, a cook and a surgeon. None of the officers registered (maybe due to the circumstance that they were often in Bordeaux and thus had registered many times before) and there is speculation that Redon and the two Lepas’ were actually not servants but belonged to the crew. We know that Camu(s) and Monteau were La Fayette’s servants and that Rogè belonged to de Kalb. We do not known whoever what connection Redon and the Lepas’ had with the travellers - the absent of a clear link thus lead people to believe that they were members of the crew.
