Peter Faneuil

Portrait of Peter Faneuil (Painter: John Smibert )

Peter Faneuil (* 20th June 1700 in New Rochelle , Province of New York ; † 3. March 1743 in Boston ) was a prolific American Colonial - merchant , slave trader and philanthropist , the Faneuil Hall donated to the city of Boston.

Early life

Peter Faneuil was the eldest son of Anne Bureau and Benjamin Faneuil , one of three Huguenot brothers who fled France with great financial wealth after the edict of Fontainebleau came into force in 1685 . After emigrating to the United States about a decade before Peter Faneuil was born, his father Benjamin and uncle Andrew were early settlers in New Rochelle. In 1691 they were honored as the Freemen of Massachusetts Bay , and shortly afterwards Andrew moved to Boston . Benjamin married Anne Bureau in 1699 and had at least two sons and three daughters who would reach adulthood.

Little is known about Peter Faneuil's childhood. His father died in 1719 when Peter Faneuil was 18 years old, and soon after, Peter Faneuil moved to Boston with his brother Benjamin Jr. and sister Mary. Her widowed and childless Uncle Andrew had become one of the richest men in New England through his trading skills and shrewd investments in Boston real estate . It is not certain whether he formally adopted his two nephews .

Peter Faneuil first came to prominence in 1728 when he helped his brother-in-law, Henry Phillips, flee to France after he killed Benjamin Woodbridge in the first ever duel in Boston.

Activities as a businessman

Peter Faneuil became a member of the Boston Commission and got into the transportation business. He quickly proved that he was a competent and skilful trader and supported his uncle in lucrative deals with, among others, Antigua , Barbados , Spain , the Canary Islands and England . These represent only a small selection of the large number of places about which Faneuil's correspondence has been preserved.

Peter Faneuil was a big part of the Atlantic Triangle Trade , transporting slaves to the British West Indies and, in return, molasses and sugar to the Thirteen Colonies . He traded goods from Europe and the Caribbean , exported rum , fish, fruit and vegetables and even built his own ship . He usually shared the risks for ship and cargo in transatlantic and coastal transports with others. He charged 5% for handling third party shipments and used advanced business methods to do so. He also kept a detailed record of all his activities. Fishmongers kept him informed about current price developments and continued to improve his trading relationships. Not all of it was legal, however, and when in 1736 his ship Providence was intercepted trading fish and oil for French gold, he complained that it was solely the caprice of the judge, a "wretched man", to blame a fair and honest trader like him who never came into conflict with the law would be punished.

The childless widower Andrew Faneuil threatened, for an unknown reason, to disinherit each of his two nephews if they ever married. Benjamin Jr. preferred marriage to his share of the enormous family fortune, which included ships, shops and an estate on Tremont Street, as well as a stake in the East India Company worth £ 14,000 . During the final stages of Andrew's illness, Peter Faneuil continued to run both his own and his uncle's businesses in parallel. He himself, dark-skinned, stocky in stature and physically handicapped since childhood, remained single and inherited most of the family fortune, making him - despite considerable amounts that he passed on to his sisters - one of the richest men in America and in lived in an opulent and sumptuous estate on Boston's Beacon Street that still exists today.

In the five years that remained after the death of his uncle in February 1738, he lived after the name of one of his best ships, the Jolly Batchelor (German: "The teasing bachelor"). He informed his business partners in London of the death of his uncle and at the same time asked for five bottles of Madeira to be sent : "Since this wine is meant for myself, I ask you to make sure that I get the best that is available." A short time later he commissioned a "stately chariot ", which should be decorated with the family coat of arms. As a coachman, he asked for a driver who was “not spoiled by strong drinks such as rum etc.”, as is the case with most European employees. He also asked for "the most up-to-date and best book on the various varieties of cooking, which God forbid has the largest letters so that the maid can read it too."

The Faneuil Hall and other gifts

→ Main article : Faneuil Hall

The Faneuil Hall about 1890-1906

Particularly noteworthy is Faneuil Hall , which Peter Faneuil gave to the city of Boston and which opened in September 1742, barely six months before his death. In July 1740 Faneuil had offered the city to build a large market hall. However, this offer was treated very controversially, as the Bostonians had been discussing since the turn of the century whether a central marketplace was better than peddling in the streets, which brought the goods to the door, but also had disadvantages such as noisy peddlers Handcarts and higher prices.

Marketplaces previously built by the city were destroyed in 1737 by a mob disguised as clergy . The National Assembly voted with 367 yes votes to 360 votes against the narrowest of margins for the acceptance of the offer by Peter Faneuil. The building took two years to build. After Faneuil's death, it was named after him. In 1761 it burned down completely; the outer walls were retained, but the interior had to be completely renewed. In the run-up to the American Revolution , the people's assembly met here regularly to protest British politics. The space above the market stalls became the center of government, hosting so many pre-revolutionary meetings that Faneuil Hall became known as the Cradle of Liberty . The hall still stands today, but is dwarfed by the Quincy Market complex that was built behind Faneuil Hall in the 19th century.

Despite his dissolute lifestyle, Peter Faneuil is highly praised as a public benefactor both by contemporaries and posterity. John Lovell, who gave his eulogy, is quoted as saying that Faneuil “gave food to the hungry and clothes to the naked. He comforted the fatherless and the widows in their distress ”. In an obituary he is described as a "gentleman, blessed with great wealth and a selfless spirit" whose "noble charity and [...] continued employment of a large number of traders, artisans and workers, whom he always a liberal paymaster be had, Making life a blessing to the public and his death a great loss. ”In his particular case, however, such praise was more than routine courtesy to the recently deceased, as he made generous donations to the Episcopal Charitable Society to be passed on to the families of the deceased Clergy at Trinity Church in Boston , of which he was a member. He was also the treasurer of the King's Chapel project . Other wealthy Boston Anglicans appeared to have lacked his zeal, however, as the project made sluggish progress over the next five years after his death and despite his gift of £ 200 (equivalent to around £ 44,300 today).

After his death

Faneuil died of edema in Boston in 1743 and was buried in the Granary Burying Ground . Still unmarried, he left his entire fortune, including five black slaves and 195 dozen bottles of wine, his sister Mary and brother Benjamin Jr., who later joined the Loyalists and, ironically, enjoyed his uncle's legacy far more than his short-lived brother.

The 19th century historian Lucius M. Sargent writes of Peter Faneuil that he "lived like a noble man, hospitable like a bishop and charitable like an apostle".

Individual evidence

1. ^ Peter Faneuil House. Retrieved November 18, 2011 . 

literature

• Samuel Adams Drake: Old landmarks and historic personages of Boston . Ed .: Oliver Wendell Holmes Collection, Library of Congress . James R. Osgood and Co., Boston 1873, OCLC 3012180 ( online in Google Book Search).
• Abram English Brown: Faneuil Hall and Faneuil Hall Market . or, Peter Faneuil and his gift. Lee and Shepard, Boston 1900, OCLC 5781125 ( online in Google Book Search).
• Peter Faneuil: Records: Peter Faneuil ledger, daybooks, invoice book, and letterbook . Ed .: New England Historic Genealogical Society. General Microfilm, Cambridge, MA. 1978, OCLC 7364611 (archival microfilm material).

Web links

Commons : Peter Faneuil  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Peter Faneuil. In: Kurt's Historic Sites. Retrieved November 18, 2011 .