Marie-therese metoyer biography graphic organizer

Wilson, Jr. In the mid's Metoyer and a friend from La Rochelle [Etienne Pavie] ventured to the Louisiana outpost of Natchitoches, where they opened a shop in competition with at least fifteen other 'sellers of alcoholic beverages and owners of cabarets. While Metoyer remained a bachelor throughout these years, he ignited a scandal by renting a slave woman Marie Therese dite Coincoin, q.

Called to account in by a new parish priest, who threatened to seize and sell Coincoin for the benefit of the colony's hospital, Metoyer evaded penalty with the assistance of her owner Marie des Neiges Juchereau de St. Denis de Soto q. Reconstruction was significantly difficult. Cotton markets and the Louisiana economy were unstable, as society adjusted to the new labor systems of share cropping and tenant farming.

Families lost their wealth, property, and a historic way of life. The state remained under Union occupation until Confederate sympathizers took control of the state government, sparking one of the darkest times in Southern history, the Jim Crow Era. However, it was during Reconstruction that Fanny Hertzog established the Freedmen school at Melrose, which provided the first formal education to former slaves on the plantation.

Reconstruction ended in with the election of President Rutherford B. The Hertzogs would continue farming the Melrose property until its sale in The property was briefly owned by a New Orleans businessman, then sold three years later to Joseph Henry. Formal reconstruction ended in with the election of President Rutherford B. The Hertzogs would continue farming Melrose until its sale in Cammie undertook an extensive restoration of the structures located on her new property, including another Big House expansion.

In addition to the expansion of the Big House, Cammie was a true preservationist. She collected historic log cabins from all around the parish, as far as Grand Ecore on Red River, and brought them to Melrose. As a preservationist, Cammie also collected cultural arts and crafts such as weaving techniques, Cane River art, photography, and Louisiana lore that was threatened or at risk of being forgotten.

Melrose became a retreat for visiting artists and a center for creativity.

Marie-therese metoyer biography graphic organizer

As a patron, Cammie Henry hosted many well-known writers and artists of the early 20thcentury. Clementine began as a field hand at Melrose when she was twelve years old. Originally born at Hidden Hill Plantation in , her family moved to Melrose as sharecroppers for the Henry family. Later she became a house keeper, but it was while she was a cook that she found some discarded paints left behind by an artist at Melrose.

Those discarded paints changed her life. Descendants of the Metoyers live along the river today. The Metoyers built Yucca House c. The African House c. The African House has been called the only structure of Congo-like architecture on the North American continent dating back to colonial times. Login to see how you relate to 33 million family members.

Wife of Claude Thomas Pierre Metoyer — married [date unknown] [location unknown]. As a free woman, Coincoin exploited a variety of economic enterprises. She manufactured medicine, planted tobacco , and trapped wild bears and turkeys, [ 6 ] which were sent to the local market and shipping peltry and oil along with indigo that she sourced from the bear skins to New Orleans along with her cured tobacco.

She became a landowner and a taxpayer. As a pious Catholic, she volunteered labor for the upkeep of the parish church. Like many other freed slaves in colonial Louisiana, she eventually acquired slaves in order to protect them from others in the parish purchasing them. Most were related to Coincoin or close friends, she labored alongside of them until her own health began to fail.

Some accounts state that she held one small farmstead of 67 acres. Surviving records document her ownership of somewhat over one thousand acres. The liberal land-grant policies of the Spanish Crown provided a stake for her first farmstead on the Grand Coast of Red River now Cane River , about ten miles below the town. That small tract of 80 arpents 67 acres , alluvial river-bottom land adjacent to Metoyer's plantation, was conceded by the local commandant in January and patented by the Crown in May It is identified on modern land maps as sections 18 and 89 of Township 8 North, Range 6 West.

On the heels of that patent, Coincoin applied for a significantly larger concession — arpents of piney woods on Old River to the west of her farm — a tract identified today as section 55, Township 8 North, Range 7 West, where she established a vacherie cattle range and hired a Spaniard to operate it for her. In , she bought a third tract of already developed farm land the northern portion of sections 34 and 98, T8 North, Range 6 West.

That third holding, adjacent to her homestead, provided a stake for a younger son who had come of age after the Louisiana Purchase, too late to benefit from the more-liberal land policies of the Spanish regime. Coincoin has been credited with the founding of Cane River's fabled Melrose Plantation. Coincoin lived frugally and served others, investing all her income into the purchase of freedom for the children from the slave marriage of her youth.

By the time of her death, she had manumitted three of those children and three grandchildren. Coincoin died in and her grave is no longer marked. In he commissioned his brother Louis to build the structure, St. Augustine Parish Church. It is believed to be America's first church built by free people of color for their own use. The Coincoin—Prudhomme House , or Maison De Marie Therese , a small Creole-style cottage constructed of bousillage and half-timber still stands on her original c.