Memoir of Pierre Toussaint, Born a Slave in St. Domingo… Second Edition

Memoir of Pierre Toussaint, Born a Slave in St. Domingo… Second Edition

Author: Lee, Hannah

12mo.(4.5" x 7")1854. Lee, Hannah. Boston. Crosby, Nichols, and Company. Ex-library. Full faded maroon pebbled cloth with embossed frames and centered device to each board. Sun-faded spine with gilt title/author towards head, gilt filigree design to balance of spine, manuscript shelf no. to foot of spine. Yellow endpapers, remnants of stickers to front pastedown and first endpaper, remnant of card pocket to rear pastedown. Library numbers in pencil to rear of title page. Edgewear, corners bumped and rubbed with loss to tips, sun-fading and scuffs to covers, spine sun-faded with head and foot of spine chipped with small loss, greater to head where .75" of head of spine lacking.

From Wiki: Pierre Toussaint (June 27, 1766 – June 30, 1853) was a formerly enslaved Haitian-American hairdresser and philanthropist, brought to New York City by his enslavers in 1787. He was declared Venerable by Pope John Paul II in 1996. Freed in 1807 after the death of his mistress, Pierre took the surname of "Toussaint" in honor of Toussaint Louverture, a leader of the Haitian Revolution. Toussaint also became a successful barber and used his wealth for various philanthropic causes. He also helped finance the construction of St. Patrick's Old Cathedral. Credited as the de facto founder of Catholic Charities New York, Toussaint is the first and only layman to be buried in the crypt below the main altar of the current St. Patrick's Cathedral on Fifth Avenue, generally reserved for bishops of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York. Pierre was born into slavery on June 27, 1766, in what is now known as Haiti. He was the son of Ursula and resided on the Artibonite plantation owned by the Bérard family. The plantation was located on the Artibonite River near Saint-Marc on the colony's west coast. His father's name is unknown. He was known to have a sister, Rosalie. His maternal grandmother, Zenobe Julien, was also enslaved and was later freed by the Bérards for her family service. His maternal great-grandmother, Tonette, had been born in Africa, where she was sold into slavery and brought to Saint-Domingue. He was raised as a Catholic. Pierre was educated as a child by the Bérard family's tutors and was trained as a house slave. The senior Bérards returned to France, taking Pierre with them, and their son Jean Bérard took over the plantation. As the tensions rose, which would lead to enslaved and free people of color rising in Haitian Revolution, in 1787, Bérard and his second wife left the island for New York City, taking five of the people they enslaved with them, including Pierre and Rosalie. Upon their arrival in New York, Bérard had Pierre apprenticed to one of New York's leading hairdressers. Bérard then returned to Saint-Domingue to see to his property. After Jean Bérard died in St. Domingue of pleurisy, Pierre, who was becoming increasingly successful as a hairdresser in New York, voluntarily took on the support of Madame Bérard. Jean Bérard had allowed him to keep much of his earnings from being hired out. (Pierre's kindness to his mistress was noted by one of her friends, Philip Jeremiah Schuyler's second wife Mary Schuyler, whose notes were a source for the 1854 memoir of Toussaint.) Madame Bérard eventually remarried to Monsieur Nicolas, also from Saint-Domingue. On her deathbed, she made her husband promise to free Pierre from slavery. Toussaint earned a good living as a very popular hairdresser among New York society's upper echelon. He saved his money and paid for his sister Rosalie's freedom. They both still lived in what was then the Nicolas house. He was freed in 1807. Catherine ("Kitty") Church Cruger, two years older than Toussaint, would become one of his key clients and friends. She was the daughter of John Barker Church (who would give the pistols to Hamilton for the duel in Weehawken) and Angelica Schuyler, the muse and confidante of Hamilton and Jefferson. Due to connections among the French emigrant community in New York, Toussaint met people who knew the Bérards in Paris. He began a correspondence with them that lasted for some decades, particularly with Aurora Bérard, his godmother. The Bérards had lost their fortune in the French Revolution, during which Aurora's father died in prison and her mother soon after. Her other siblings had married in France. Toussaint also corresponded with friends in Haiti; his collected correspondence filled 15 bound volumes as part of the documentation submitted by the Archdiocese of New York to the Holy See to support canonization.

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