Eleuthère Irénée du Pont

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Portrait of Eleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours
signature

Eleuthère Irenee du Pont de Nemours (* 24. June 1771 in Paris ; † 31 October 1834 in Eleutherian Mills in Greenville ) was a French chemist and one in the United States emigrated company founder, in Eleutherian Mills, near Greenville lived .

Live and act

He was the son of Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours and his first wife, Nicole Charlotte Marie Louise Le Dée de Rencourt (1743–1784). Both had two other sons: Victor Marie du Pont de Nemours (1767-1827) and Paul Francois du Pont de Nemours (1769-1770).

His father was in 1784 by King Louis XVI. been raised to the nobility. EI du Pont married Sophie Madeleine Dalmas (1775–1828) on November 26th, 1791. This marriage had eight children: Victorine Elizabeth du Pont, Lucille du Pont, Evelina Gabrielle du Pont, Alfred V. du Pont, Eleuthera du Pont, Sophie Madeleine du Pont, Henry du Pont and Alexis Irénée du Pont. His sons, Alfred V. du Pont (1798–1856) and Henry du Pont (1812–1889), supported by his son-in-law, Antoine Bidermann (1790–1865), took over management of the company after his death.

A descendant of his older brother Victor Marie du Pont de Nemours (1767-1827) and his wife Gabrielle Joséphine de la Fite de Pelleport (1770-1837) was the American naval officer Samuel Francis Du Pont .

Portrait of the son Alfred Victor Philadelphe du Pont (1798-1856)

With Antoine Laurent de Lavoisier he studied the manufacture of gunpowder. Du Pont worked for Antoine Lavoisier in the Arsenal in Paris, across from the Île Louviers . He also worked on a gunpowder mill in Corbeil-Essonnes and managed a saltpeter refinery.

Eleuthère Irénée du Pont (1771–1834) and Antoine Laurent de Lavoisier (1743–1794) in the laboratory

Like his father, Pierre Samuel du Pont de Nemours, he was initially a supporter of the ideas of the French Revolution . He founded a printing company on September 13, 1792 and was commissioned by Pierre Didot (1760-1853) and the National Assembly , Assemblée nationale , to print the assignats .

Assignat over 15 sols from 1792

In November 1792 he founded the magazine Le Républicain universal , later published as Le Républicain français . From May 1793 he worked for Lavoisier and his Académie des sciences . After the coup d'Etat du 9 thermidor (July 27, 1794), the coup d' état of the 9th Thermidor of the year II , he worked with the lawyer and journalist Étienne Mejan (1766-1846) on the journal L'Historien .

Members of the du Pont de Nemours family defended King Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette against the angry crowds in front of the Palais des Tuileries in Paris during the uprising of August 10, 1792.

When the future emperor Napoleon Bonaparte gained political influence in 1799, both he and his father took opposition to his autocratic rule and were imprisoned. They were promised their release if they left France. The entire family left France and immigrated to the United States in 1799.

He and his family landed on Rhode Island on January 1, 1800, along with those of his father and his brother's family , and this date is celebrated by the descendants as the anniversary of the arrival of the du Pont family in America. Du Pont returned to France only once. In 1801 he raised additional capital and the latest powder-making equipment there.

His knowledge and skills in dealing with gunpowder production enabled him and his family to take advantage of the shortcomings of American gunpowder through their own production. His experience in gunpowder production ultimately led to the founding of his company Du Pont de Nemour's Father, Son and Co. on April 21, 1801 in Paris with an office in New York and starting capital of 12 shares at 2,000 dollars. The capital was later increased to $ 36,000 in the form of 18 shares. In 1802 a business, Eleutherian Mills, was established on Brandywine Creek , Delaware , and on July 19, 1802, construction began on the first powder mill on the Brandywine River . On November 3, 1803, he was naturalized in the United States of America .

The first sales of the gunpowder began on May 16, 1804. Thomas Jefferson himself confirmed in a letter dated November 23, 1804 that the army and navy would use his powder. A patent for the production machine is filed on November 27, 1804.

Du Pont de Nemours was heavily involved in the field of general welfare , supported for example poor relief, help for the blind and campaigned for public, free educational institutions. At times he was a bank director at the Farmers Bank of the State of Delaware and the Second Bank of the United States .

He died in Philadelphia on October 31, 1834 , probably as a result of heart failure. He was buried in the family cemetery on the Brandywine River.

Works (selection)

  • Notes on powder making, gunpowder mills and saltpeter (1788)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Genealogy of the mother
  2. ^ Genealogy of EI du pont
  3. ↑ Extracted from: John Beverly Riggs: A Guide to the Manuscripts in the Eleutherian Mills Historical Library (1970) ( Memento from July 18, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 308 kB).
  4. ^ Genealogy by GJ de la Fite de Pelleport
  5. ↑ Jaime Wisniak: The History of Saltpeter Production with a bit of Pyrotechnics and Lavoisier . In: The Chemical Educator . tape 5 , no. 4 , 2000, pp. 205-209 , doi : 10.1007 / s008970000401a .
  6. ↑ George Ingham Brown: The Big Bang: A history of Explosives Sutton Publishing 1998, pp.27-34 ISBN 0-7509-1878-0
  7. ^ The DuPont Company on the Brandywine Project. ( Memento from November 4, 2010 in the Internet Archive )
personal data
SURNAME du Pont, Eleuthère Irénée
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Du Pont de Nemours, Eleuthère Irénée (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French chemist
DATE OF BIRTH June 24, 1771
PLACE OF BIRTH Paris
DATE OF DEATH October 31, 1834
Place of death Eleutherian Mills near Greenville