Adrien-Nicolas Piédefer, marquis de La Salle

Adrien-Nicolas Piédefer, marquis de La Salle, comte d'Offrémont (1735 — 1818) was a French writer and cavalry officer who saw service in the Seven Years War, a writer of comedies and libretti, and a Masonic brother of Benjamin Franklin.

He was appointed "maréchal de camp" in 1791; ["Tableau de la vie militaire d'Adrien-Nicolas La Salle, maréchal de camp le 1er avril 1791, depuis commandant de la province de l'ouest de S. -Domingue, et deux fois gouverneur général, par intérim des isles sous le vent. [Paris?] , 1794. (John Carter Brown Library, Providence, Rhode Island).] He was appointed Governor of the west province of Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) the following year, and twice governor-general. [ [http://rulers.org/rulh.html ] Haiti/Saint-Domingue: governors] His official papers, from family archives, were published as "Les papiers du général A.-N. de La Salle (Saint-Domingue 1792-93). Publiés avec des annotations par le Dr A. Corre. Une page d'histoire coloniale." (Quimper: Cotonnec) 1897. It included a "Notice biographique" [http://www.galaxidion.com/home/catalogues.php?LIB=hatchuel&CAT=134945&sortOrder=alpha] .] He was eventually a brigadier general.

In lighter moments he wrote a successful comedy in verse, in three acts, "L' oncle et les tantes" ("Uncle and aunts"), which was reprinted in 1786. [A copy is in the Biblioteca Labronica, Livorno [] . ] Previously he had supplied the libretti for at least two one-act operas for which the music was composed by François-Joseph Gossec. One, "Le périgourdin" ("The man from Périgord") was an "intermède", a between-acts intermezzo that was presented at the private theatre of the prince de Conti at the Château de Chantilly, 7 June 1761. [ [http://www.musicologie.org/Biographies/g/gossec.htm F.-J. Gossec, catalogue des oeuvres] ] His one-act pastoral comedy "Les Pêcheurs", ("The Fishermen") was presented to a Parisian public at the Comédie-italienne, 23 April 1766 and repeated 7 July. [ [http://www.operone.de/komponist/gossec.html François Joseph Gossec ] ] His translation of an English novel "Histoire de Lucy Wellers", by "Miss Smythies of Colchester" was printed at The Hague in 1766.

The marquis de La Salle was a member of two Masonic lodges in Paris, that of St-Jean d’Ecosse du Contrat Social, then that of Les Neuf Sœurs (1778-1785), where he succeeded Benjamin Franklin as "vénérable" in 1781. [ [http://www.franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedNames.jsp?ssn=001-63-3711 Correspondence with Franklin, 1782-83, is among the Franklin papers] ]

A "Mémoire justificatif pour le marquis de la Salle" was printed in 1789.

The Château de Piédefer, Viry-Chatillon, Essonne, near the Seine south of Paris, traditionally attributed to Charles Perrault, is known for its late-seventeenth-century vaulted nymphaeum or grotto encrusted with rock and shellwork in compartments, and an orangery, both listed as Monuments historiques since 1983 [ [http://www.ville-viry-chatillon.fr/decouvrir/patrimoine.htm Le domaine du Piedefer] ] . The seventeenth-century architecture of the château was modified in the eighteenth century; a parterre survives, with a water jet in a fountain, in the nineteenth-century wooded landscape park.

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