Ignace-Joseph Vanlerberghe

Ignace-Joseph Vanlerberghe (* 1758 in Douai ; † September 27, 1819 ) was a specialist in the procurement and trade of grain in France during the consulate and empire .

Life

Ascent with obstacles

Vanlerberghe had his origins in Douai in common with several personalities in the financial world in the days of the French Revolution , and he was already doing major business before the end of the Ancien Régime . The occupational field may have been dictated by his stepfather, named Lefèvre, who was the general inspector of catering in Lille . There is a report of speculation with 250,000 quintals of grain, with which Vanlerberghe had 125 houses filled in the ports of Le Havre and Dunkirk in 1789 in order to successfully save Flanders and its neighboring provinces from famine. He was involved in the establishment of a warehouse for the Halles de Paris wholesale market and he stood out with his skill in the procurement of wheat for the Armée du Nord (1792-1793), where he also became acquainted with the banking brothers and draperies Pierre Narcisse Dorothée Michel (l'aîné) and Marc Antoine Grégoire Michel (le jeune) emerged. Despite this, he was repeatedly accused of hoarding grain, after which he had to flee in the days of the reign of terror . He was able to return to France in 1795, but although he was a protégé of Cambacérès , he was only removed from the list of emigrants in 1798 and remained under police supervision until 1799.

The Chartreuse of the Folie Beaujon estate, inhabited by the Vanlerberghe couple

This did not affect the development of his business, he worked as a supplier of food bread together with the companies Wouters & Godard (1796) as well as Rochefort (1799) and 1802 for the Italian army and the domestic supply company Maurin, behind which a merger is involved hid from the merchant Gabriel-Julien Ouvrard , who was little suffered by Napoleon . Vanlerberghe also approached what was possibly the richest French at the time in his lifestyle: extensive land acquisitions, including the magnificent Folie Beaujon estate in the Parisian district of Faubourg-du-Roule , and brilliant receptions, the kindness and generosity of which earned him respect. In 1798 he had given the treasurer of the board of directors a loan of four million francs , for which he was given the diamond "le Régent" as pledge . Legend has it that Ms. Vanlerberghe wore the gemstone in a setting and that a rock crystal copy was the object of curiosity among the guests on Beaujon foil .

Loss deals in the time of the consulate and empire

The separation of the spouses in the following year was only a sham divorce with the aim of bringing about a separation of property - wise foresight, as would turn out to be. Napoleon had an aversion to army suppliers during his service, few suffered more from it than General Provisioner Vanlerberghe. Then the advisor Joseph Fiévée wrote to Napoleon about the grain dealer:

"Vanlerberghe was delighted to be seen by the Ministry of Economic Affairs to look after the consumables of some more suffering departments than others, and even more delighted to see that the businesses for which he was responsible had the results he had promised."

Napoleon, however, proceeded the other way around, as noted by his general Jean Rapp :

“If it was a matter of paying off a believer whose rights were inviolable, then one aroused in him (precisely because he wanted it so much) that the claim was justified; he was induced to reduce the amount by half, to a third, often to - nothing at all. "

Vanlerberghe had similar experiences in 1802 together with Ouvrard, when Napoleon called for help after bad harvests and the first hunger riots. The two were able to use their connections, pulled out all the stops and after three weeks had the bread price at the old level. It then took a year and a half of warning and urging to get Napoleon to reimburse at least the 26 million submitted. Days in which it did not seem advisable to turn down a six-year contract for the maintenance of the French navy from June 1803. In addition, there was food for the so-called landing army in Boulogne , which was intended for an invasion of England. The payment behavior was also bad in these enterprises and it is likely - at least for Ouvrard - a gain in prestige ranked before a financial gain when Vanlerberghe organized himself with him and the Michel brothers in the company of the merchants .

On the difficult terrain of the public financiers

This consortium served to finance the state, but was used by Ouvrard to speculate with precious metal from Spanish colonies. Afterwards, the then Treasury Minister Barbé-Marbois stated that Vanlerberghe, who “understood nothing but the catering service, found himself involved in other business almost without knowing it”. In contrast to his co-lenders, Vanlerberghe was not temporarily represented in the predecessor associations formed since 1800. In 1805, his business was made more difficult by Napoleon's decision to pay open bills of the army suppliers with national goods they had left with them . Vanlerberghe, for example, owned 37 farms in the Rur , four in the Donnersberg department and 30 from the arrondissement of Koblenz . When the method of issuing drafts of convenience among trusted merchants also no longer brought in cash, Vanlerberghe had to inform the government in September 1805 that he was unable to continue to secure the stage and garrison service. With a clumsy hand Napoleon finally tore up the entire finely woven fabric of Ouvrard's Mexico business, but since the account of "van Lerberghe & Ouvrard" was in the books of the involved trading company Hope & Co. , it was also up to the grain dealer, the one from the new treasury minister Nicolas-François Mollien in the amount of 143 million francs in damage.

After the imprisonment that had now taken place, the contracts for deliveries to the army and navy were strangely extended in 1806: In order to bring about the controversial millions, he had to carry out the deliveries in full as before, but only got half or a third paid, the rest was viewed as debt repayment. Shortly before processing the claim, Vanlerberghe only had to file for bankruptcy on December 31, 1807. After Napoleon's departure from the united merchants , Vanlerberghe eked a life in prison or hospital from 1809. The restoration only brought him a reinstatement with the safety of grain supply of Paris. But even after 1815, the state treasury harassed him with old demands, when Vanlerberghe believed that he himself had outstanding bills for deliveries to Boulogne. One last, fateful collaboration with Ouvrard was on the way. Although they had succeeded in bringing the remaining amounts owed for supplies in preparation for a landing in England into the French budget from 1814–1819, Ouvrard now felt it appropriate to have his friend, Duke of Wellington , confirm the demand . The matter was thus viewed as a foreign interference in internal affairs of the country and the request of the two by the State Council on September 25, 1819 finally rejected. The loss of nine million francs was apparently such a severe blow to Vanlerberghe that he died two days later.

A delicate legacy for the descendants

With his wife, a née Lemaire, he had a son and three daughters. They were such good matches that even Napoleon suggested to General Rapp in 1805 that they marry Vanlerberghe's eldest daughter. In her second marriage she married the Comte de Villoutreys. Her two younger sisters married the real estate agent Jean-Baptiste Paulée (later the Viscount Jacqueminot) and the son of Senator Cornudet. Unlike their brother, they turned down the inheritance. In 1823 Armand Seguin still received a bill for 1.67 million francs, a remnant from the affair surrounding the Society of the United Merchants . Still on this matter, the Royal Court of Justice ruled in 1833, according to which Vanlerberghe's widow had fraudulently and improperly tried to evade her obligations to Seguin by transferring ownership. At the Château Lafite-Rothschild winery , after the death of Vanlerberghe's son, the refined concealment of ownership was revealed again. It was not until 1868 that Vanlerberghe's daughters or their descendants could finally get rid of the state claims by paying three million.

literature

• Michel Bruguière: Vanlerberghe (Joseph-Ignace),? - 1819 . In: Jean Tulard (ed.): Dictionnaire Napoléon . Arthème Fayard, Paris 1987, p. 1701

Individual evidence

1. ^ Louis Bergeron: Banquiers, négociants et manufacturiers parisiens du Directoire à l'Empire , Mouton Éditeur, Paris a. a. 1978, p. 344. The information about his place of birth differ:
   • "Vanlerberghe, of Belgian descent, ..." ("Vanlerbeghe, Belge d'origine, ..."), Arthur Lévy : Un grand profiteur de guerre sous la revolution, l'Empire et la restoration, G.-J. Ouvrard , Calmann-Lévy, Paris 1929, p. 83
   • "The beginnings of Vanlerberghe (Dutch? From Douai?) Are mysterious, ..." ("Les débuts de Vanlerberghe (néerlandais? Douaisien?) Sont mystérieux, ..."), Michel Bruguière: Vanlerberghe (Joseph-Ignace), ? -1819 , in Jean Tulard (Ed.): Dictionnaire Napoléon , Paris 1987, p. 1701
   • "Born in Douai in 1758, ..." ("Né à Douai en 1758, ..."), Maurice Payard: Le financier G.-J. Ouvrard. 1770-1846 , Académie nationale de Reims, Reims 1958, p. 89
2. ↑ Maurice Payard: Le financier G.-J. Ouvrard. 1770 - 1846 , Reims 1958, p. 89
3. ↑ Michel Bruguière: Vanlerberghe (Joseph-Ignace),? - 1819 , in Jean Tulard (Ed.): Dictionnaire Napoléon , Paris 1987, p. 1701
4. ↑ Maurice Payard: Le financier G.-J. Ouvrard. 1770 - 1846 , Reims 1958, p. 89
5. ↑ Michel Bruguière: Vanlerberghe (Joseph-Ignace),? - 1819 , in Jean Tulard (Ed.): Dictionnaire Napoléon , Paris 1987, p. 1701
6. ^ Arthur Lévy: Un grand profiteur de guerre. Paris 1929, p. 81
7. ^ Arthur Lévy: Un grand profiteur de guerre. Paris 1929, p. 83
8. ↑ Maurice Payard: Le financier G.-J. Ouvrard. 1770 - 1846 , Reims 1958, p. 89
9. ^ Arthur Lévy: Un grand profiteur de guerre. Paris 1929, p. 83
10. ↑ Michel Bruguière: Vanlerberghe (Joseph-Ignace),? - 1819 , in Jean Tulard (Ed.): Dictionnaire Napoléon , Paris 1987, p. 1701
11. ^ Correspondance et relations avec Bonaparte , Volume 3, quoted from Maurice Payard: Le financier G.-J. Ouvrard. 1770-1846 . Reims 1958, p. 89
12. ↑ On a vu avec plaisir Vanlerberghe chargé par le ministère du commerce de pourvoir à la consommation de quelques départements plus soufrants que les autres et avec plus de plaisir encore que les opérations dont il s'est chargé aient eu le résultat qu'il avait promis .
13. ↑ Quoted from Otto Wolff : The business of Mr. Ouvrard. From the life of a brilliant speculator . Rütten & Loening, Frankfurt am Main 1932, pp. 94-95
14. ↑ William Berdrow: book of famous merchants. Men of energy and enterprise . 2nd Edition. Verlag Otto Spamer, Leipzig 1909, p. 165
15. ↑ (... il n'ait "entendu bien que le service des vivres, et se soit trouvé engagé dans d'autres opérations presque sans le savoir".) Quoted from Michel Bruguière: Vanlerberghe , in Jean Tulard (ed.): Dictionnaire Napoléon , Paris 1987, p. 1701
16. ↑ "Vingt Négociants Réunis", "Dix Négociants Réunis" and "Association of Bankers du Trésor public". Louis Bergeron: Banquiers, négociants et manufacturiers parisiens du Directoire à l'Empire , Paris a. a. 1978, p. 149
17. ^ Gabriele B. Clemens: Real estate dealers and speculators. The socio-economic and historical significance of the large buyers at national property auctions in the Rhenish departments (1803 - 1813) , Harald Boldt Verlag, Boppard am Rhein 1995, p. 49
18. ↑ Georges Lefèbvre : Napoleon , Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2003, p. 207
19. ↑ Otto Wolff: The business of Mr. Ouvrard. Frankfurt am Main 1932, p. 143
20. ↑ Otto Wolff: The business of Mr. Ouvrard. Frankfurt am Main 1932, p. 162
21. ↑ William Berdrow: book of famous merchants. 2nd edition, Leipzig 1909, p. 171
22. ↑ Otto Wolff: The business of Mr. Ouvrard. Frankfurt am Main 1932, p. 194
23. ↑ Arthur Lévy: Un grand profiteur de guerre sous la Révolution, l'Empire et la Restauration, G.-J. Ouvrard , Paris 1929, p. 218. According to Ouvrard's memoir, Vanlerberghe committed suicide.
24. ↑ Otto Wolff: The business of Mr. Ouvrard. Frankfurt am Main 1932, p. 197. Rapp wrote in his memoir: “Unfortunately, the marriage was not a happy one.” (Ibid .: p. 198)
25. ↑ Maurice Payard: Le financier G.-J. Ouvrard. 1770 - 1846 , Reims 1958, p. 90
26. ↑ Otto Wolff: The business of Mr. Ouvrard. Frankfurt am Main 1932, p. 296