Talk:Marie-Joseph Angélique

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Untitled

Did François Poulin die in the fire ? Why does the judgment say "late François Poulin de Francheville" ? Did he survive the fire but die before her judgment ? Jay 04:57, 21 Jun 2004 (UTC)

He died a few years before the fire, as mentioned in Cooper's book. mvc 18:02, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Not quite accurate. He died in November 1733, about 6 months before the fire.--Ekias (talk) 22:48, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

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A public ceremony that involved her disgrace -- what does that mean? Either "humiliation", or something more precise. 161.114.228.151

Humiliation. 'disgrace' has been replaced by a description, thanks to User:Rmhermen Jay 17:14, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)

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1. What does this line mean ?

"As for all death sentences, she was previously tortured"

It should read "As in all", meaning everyone sentenced to death was tortured.

It is not true that everyone sentenced to death was tortured. See discussion of Torture and execution below. Cooper is not an expert on the judicial system in New France and didn't even bother to read André Lachance's classic work on this (La Justice criminelle du roi au Canada au XVIIIe siècle), only using instead the short introduction to his later work on crime and criminals.--Ekias (talk) 22:48, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

2. "The Conseil Supérieur (Court of Appeal) reduced her sentence." In what way was the sentence reduced ? Jay 16:05, 1 Nov 2004 (UTC) She was not to be put in garbage cart, she was not to carry a sign "arsonist"; she was not to have her hand cut off; she was not to be burnt alive.

But she most certainly suffered the "question préalable" (questioning with torture before execution, to get a confession about possible accomplices), and she did have to stand barefoot and dressed only in her shift in the public square while doing the amende honorable procedure... classic MO when executing arsonists and other outreageous criminals. --Svartalf (talk) 03:39, 6 February 2010 (UTC)

Content

The last edits changed much of the content (and killed all links). Is that justified or POV? Can't say I know the story very well.--Euniana 12:26, 9 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I was just browsing the internet to find something about my birthday, which is june 21.st. It's sad to find a tragic story like this one related to the day you celebrated your hole life unencumbered. My thoughts will be with Marie-Joseph on that day.

I am changing all of the Marie-Joseph's to Angelique. When mentioning a person, the proper way is to use their last name. Also, only slave adults were referred to by first name, since they were not equal to whites and therefore not deserving of the last name title. However, in this article, it is respectful to use her last name, and I will also mention that she was commonly called Marie-joseph at the time.Dkceaser 04:24, 24 January 2007 (UTC)Dkcea Yes it is respectful, but Angelique was actually a nickname given to her by one of her masters after she was christened with the name Marie-Joseph.

"service her master"

To me, especially since it comes after her "duty" to have children with other slaves, this means she was expected to have sex with him. I don't know what the conventions were in 18th-century Canada, but is this really what was meant? If not, it should be changed to "serve her master". PeteVerdon 10:49, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I can't speak to what that user intended to say, but slaves in Canada (as in the US) were certainly expected to do both. See Cooper's book for numerous examples of slaves bearing their owner's children. mvc 18:42, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Set

Is the following sentence in the third paragraph missing the word "set" between "allegedly" & "devastated"?

"She was immediately arrested, but not before the fire she allegedly devastated much of Montreal,"

203.10.224.58 03:32, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Factual accuracy and NPOV

I see that this page has been the subject of numerous NPOV debates. Having recently read Cooper's book and viewed the special exhibit on her at the Centre d'histoire de Montréal, I'm in the process of making several changes, and for the record I think it's ridiculous for either English or French partisans to use this story to bolster their case. Cooper documents horrible treatment of slaves under both colonial rulers. This is not a story of English vs. French, it is a story of colonial racism and slavery, and for anyone to use it otherwise is an offence to the memory of this brave woman who fought all her life against people from Portugal, Holland, England, and France -- all of whom treated her horribly.

Having rewritten almost the entire article, doubling its length, I've taken the liberty of removing the POV and cleanup tags. I believe the current version to be NPOV but (of course) welcome any comments, criticism, and suggestions. If you think it's not NPOV or still requires cleanup, please tell me why! mvc 20:40, 18 August 2007 (UTC)

Simply put, it seems like the article claims to know too much exact factual information about what Angelique did and said than is possible. She isn't even that prominent a figure in history yet it seems this article knows everything about a nobody slave that wouldn't have been remembered if not for the arson. Maybe I'm just being pessimistic, but I think the article should either site more sources or tone down its content to be less exact. New014 (talk) 03:29, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

It's true that she wouldn't be remembered if not for her trial, but that's exactly why so much information is available. The trial transcripts include lengthy descriptions of her daily activities and interviews with everyone who knew her. Part of why this case has been so widely studied by modern historians is how unusual it is to have this data, which alone is enough to make Angélique worth reading about. mvc (talk) 15:43, 18 November 2008 (UTC)

The Canadian Propaganda

Removed an unacceptably POV addition to the article. Vincent (talk) 23:04, 27 November 2008 (UTC)

Need for French-language sources

This article suffers, I believe, from English-language bias and lack of competing sources, as it appears to be based solely on Afua Cooper's book. There is a very different French-language analysis of the trial of Angélique published two years before Cooper's book that should be taken into consideration in writing a consensual report on the life of this black slave executed for allegedly setting fire to Montreal in 1734. Also, a recent critical review looking at Cooper's book, the French-language book and the website "The Torture and the Truth" at canadianmysteries.ca has come out in the well-established French-language scholarly journal specializing in the history of the French in America. The Revue d'histoire de l'Amérique française is a well-established scholarly journal that applies peer evaluation to such reviews. The author of the article "L'incendie de Montréal en 1734 et le procès de Marie-Josèphe Angélique : Trois oeuvres, deux interprétations" (The Montreal Fire in 1734 and the trial of Marie-Josèphe Angélique : three works, two interpretations" my translation)is Evelyn Kolish, a historian specialized in the legal history of Quebec/Lower Canada, with publications in both English and French in various journals such as the Canadian Historical Review, the McGill Law Journal, the Revue d'histoire de l'Amérique française, Histoire sociale. As a little searching on the web shows, she appears to now be an archivist, specialized in court records, working at the very archives centre that holds the original manuscript transcript of Angélique's trial. (See the portal for Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec (www.banq.qc.ca)for a pdf version of her guide to court records at the Quebec national archives.) Dr. Kolish does not seem to have a very high opinion of Cooper as a historian, calling her book on Angélique "un texte qui se situe à mi-chemin entre le roman historique et l'essai journalistique anti-esclavagiste" (a text situated half-way between a historical novel and a journalistic anti-slavery essay--my translation) (p. 89). Kolish suggests that Cooper's methodology leaves a lot to be desired: Cooper's appears to have made a very cursory and partial use of existing secondary sources on New France in the early 18th century, basing her book primarily on older, English-language works of the survey level, neglecting almost entirely the very considerable historiography in French, including some classics that any serious historian would have consulted. Kolish goes on to point out various errors (some so basic it is hard to believe a conscientious historian could have made them--like confusing the Criminal Ordinance of 1670 with the Custom of Paris (p. 90) and even feels that Cooper traffics the evidence, leaving out passages from the trial transcripts that don't suit her hypothesis, inventing information such as Thibault (Angélique's lover)supposedly being a soldier (p. 90), or even altering testimony (saying for example that Anglélique's owner accused her of setting the fire, when the transcript shows that she actually denied the possibility (p.91). Moreover, Kolish points out that Cooper doesn't even cite the primary sources correctly, as well as very rarely providing specific references to the very lengthy trial transcripts (not very verifiable!!). Thus it seems less than desirable to write an article for Wikipedia based solely on a single secondary work that has been seriously criticized for unreliable methodology. I would like to moderate the existing article by balancing the condensation of Cooper's work with ideas taken from existing French-language sources. I might add that the "Torture and the truth" website provides typescripted translations of the entire trial transcripts, as well as exerpts of a lot of other contemporary sources, published or archival, which I also think should be used. Although the trail transcripts are a primary source, they do not require interpretation to check out someone's testimony there--anyone who can read can see for themselves. I would add, that although en.Wikipedia prefers English-language sources, there are areas of knowledge, such as national histories, where not only most primary sources but also most secondary sources are in the language of the nation concerned and not in English. In fact, unilingual readers are at the mercy of the English-language sources and have no way of verifying their accuracy, when most of the sources are in another language. In these cases, an informed consensus can hardly be reached using only English-language sources. The story of Marie-Josèphe Angélique is one such case.--Ekias (talk) 22:26, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Repeatedly beaten--not in trial transcripts

Cooper gives the impression that Angélique had been repeatedly beaten--but by her mistress, not her master! In fact, there are very few passages in the trial transcripts that refer to the way Angélique was treated by her masters and, with regards to the Sieur de Francheville, Cooper herself admits that “except for Angélique’s baptismal paper, no record showing Francheville as a slave master has come to light”" p. 128. The question of mistreatment or beating comes up only twice in the trial transcripts, once in the Second interrogation of Angélique, audience of 3 PM, 3 May 1734 (see Torture and the Truth, Archives, Court Records) and once in Addition of information from Marie-Françoise Thomelet, 14th witness, audience of 2 PM, 1 May 1734 (same reference). In the first case, Angélique replies to hostile questioning from the judge, trying to establish revenge as a motive for setting the fire, that "when at times Her said Mistress Mistreated Her, Which was Not a frequent occurrence, She Would Get angry, And Leave the House" adding shortly afterwards that "she Had not Mistreated Her since The Death of her Husband [six months before]". In the second case, Marie-Françoise Thomelet reports that she had asked Angélique whether her mistress had beaten her after her escape attempt, and Angélique replies that she had not (Cooper, p. 23; Addition of information from Marie-Françoise Thomelet, 14th witness, audience of 2 PM, 1 May 1734 in Torture and the truth). In fact, while Francheville probably did beat his slave, as this was a fairly violent time when men attacked each other as well as beating wives, children, servants and slaves, there is no proof in the trial transcripts that uphold this statement, so I have deleted it.--Ekias (talk) 23:58, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Alleged "breeding" of Angélique

While Cooper several times insinuates that Francheville may have tried to breed Angélique or even have slept with her himself, she provides absolutely no proof for this, and even admits that while “Francheville may have forced Angélique to be intimate with César” ...'Angélique and César might simply have been attracted to each other” (Cooper 2006,p. 163). No other sources support this hypothesis and it seems to me to be original research or personal opinion and hence against Wikipedia policy.--Ekias (talk) 00:13, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Alleged demand for freedom

Cooper claims that Angélique requested her freedom and even suggests that the deceased Francheville may have promised it to her, however, she provides no references to any document or part of the trial transcripts to prove that there was ever a real “request”. Only at one place in the trial testimony does the judge, in highly leading questioning, suggest this to the prisoner as a reason for her setting the fire (First interrogation of Angélique, afternoon audience, 12 April 1734. “Interrogated to Tell Us Whether or not She menaced to have the widow of the said deceased de francheville Burn If She did not Let her leave. Said no” After all, as Beaugrand-Champagne says (p. 80) why would the widow Francheville free her slave—a slave who was a troublemaker, from her point of view when she could—and did—sell her? Why would her slave even imagine that such a request would be accepted, when she was not on good terms with her owner? Manumission did occur in New France, but generally after longer periods of service. For example, the father of Angélique's children, Jacques César, was eventually manumitted, in 1761, and then married another manumitted black slave(Beaugrand-Champagne 2004, p. 272).--Ekias (talk) 00:44, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Alleged "first fire"

This is Cooper’s interpretation, taking up on an idea that the judge in the trial tried to prove, but Beaugrand-Champagne does not agree. Testimony of various witnesses shows that fires broke out in Angelique’s bedding and near Thibault’s the day before their flight. No one at the time suspected intentional fire setting. Nor was there any attempt that night to escape, both small fires being put out promptly; Catherine Custeau, who put out the fire in Angélique’s blanket, said that the slave was sleeping when the fire burst out (Torture & Truth, Addition of information by Catherine Custeau, 17th witness, audience of 9 AM, 6 May 1734)or Beaugrand-Champagne 2004, p. 147. Jalleteau, testifying next, said that he saw Thibault putting out the other outbreak. Beaugrand-Champagne 2004, p. 148. This is scarcely consistent with deliberately setting fires to cover your escape.

Alos, one cannot really say that Monière stopped the escape that night, but simply that he smelled the smoke, inspected the house and went back to bed (Cooper2006 p. 178). --Ekias (talk) 01:21, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

The fire

There seems to be no doubt that rumours were flying through the city on the night of the fire and in the following days, since almost all the witnesses believe that Angélique set the fire because of hearsay, mostly based on what the panis slave said to her master. However, there is only one witness who actually testifies that he spoke to Angélique about this--the gardener LaRuine, as can be seen in his testimony May 15 1734, as you can verify quickly at Torture and the truth. Cooper also says that an army surgeon accosted Angélique saying she had set the fire (p. 196), but in his testimony, this surgeon, Jean-Joseph Boudard, says that he reproached Angélique about consorting with two men in the hospital garden and drinking with them but never mentions his accusing her of setting the fire.(Once again--see Torture and the Truth http://www.canadianmysteries.ca/sites/angelique/archives/courtdocument/1887en.html• As for Thibault, in contradiction with Cooper's claims, according to Beaugrand-Champagne (p. 67),Thibault was last seen by the bailiff Marchand on the 12th of April, two days after the fire, when he appeared at the prison to reclame some clothing he had left there the day of his release; Angélique also testified that she had seen him the morning of her arrest http://www.canadianmysteries.ca/sites/angelique/archives/courtdocument/1909en.html --Ekias (talk) 02:19, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Trial

The discussion of the trial in this article seems weak to me, especially as it depends on Cooper, whose understanding of the pre-revolutionary French legal system is deficient, according to the review by Kolish. Indeed, how can one place any confidence in the information Cooper provides on the legal system when she consistently confuses the Custom of Paris, a 16th century compilation of customary substantive civil law that applied to the Ile-de-France region and later to New France, with the Criminal Ordinance of 1670, a 17th century royal edict aimed at providing uniform application of criminal procedure throughout the kingdom? The prosecutor would not have asked for preliminary torture (not to be confused with "la question préalable", which comes after judgment, not before) if he had felt that the evidence was satisfactory. The use of preliminary torture (la question préparatoire) was limited to cases when the proof was not adequate, as Lachance explains in his classic work on the criminal justice of the king in Canada during the 17th century (pp. 79-80). --Ekias (talk) 02:55, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Torture and execution

The original article wrote that "She was beaten by the colony’s executioner" before being tortured, but there is nothing in any of the sources, neither Cooper nor Beaugrand-Champagne nor the documents at Torture and the truth, to support this.

Also, there is some confusion here as to when the question préalable was used. To apply torture prior to execution, the crime had to be a serious one involving the death penalty, but torture was not automatically and “customarily” applied to everyone sentenced to death, even for crimes such as arson. It was applied when the accused had not confessed or in order to discover who were the accomplices, in situations where the court had reason to suspect that the accused had not acted alone, but not all the time. (Beaugrand-Champagne 2004, p. 225; Diderot, in Torture and the truth at http://www.canadianmysteries.ca/sites/angelique/archives/books/2140en.html). In fact, as André Lachance shows, from 1712 to 1748, only 6 people were condemned to the question préalable in New France, and the Superior Council only upheld this sentence in 3 cases, one of which was Angélique’s (Lachance, p. 97) This is out of a total of 38 death sentences during the same period (p. 107).--Ekias (talk) 03:36, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Legacy

This section seemed somewhat disjointed to me and parts of it were either related to other topics, such as historiography (the mention of whether Canadian slaves had a less harsh life because they were mostly domestic slaves rather than plantation workers). The reference to beliefs in Haiti needed, I felt, to be introduced more clearly as an effect of Angélique entering into legend or myth. I therefore introduced it in such a way, although I am not familiar with the source for this comment and would appreciate the original author providing a source for this. One of the sentences I deleted " Having tried twice to run away, she was clearly not willing to calmly accept her slavery and instead fought against it fiercely with her words and her actions her entire recorded life" had some errors in it. Angélique ran away once (in February, before the fire in Montreal). She may have intended to run away again, but in fact did not attempt to do so. Thibault ran away twice, but not Angélique. Also, while Cooper claims that the trial transcripts can be considered the first known autobiographical slave narrative, she does not say that this was the first known rebellion of a slave. There is no proof in any of the sources (1) that she did in fact light the fire or (2) that, if she did, she did so as an act of rebellion or (3) that no other slave had previously carried out something that might be considered an act of rebellion. Moreover, one would think that had she really intended to rebel, she would have claimed so, at least after she had been condemned--she might then even have been spared the torture. --Ekias (talk) 04:46, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

no footnotes

I removed the heading {{Nofootnotes|article}} although perhaps I shouldn't have--I'm not sure of wikipedia etiquette on this. However, as I added a lot of inline citations, I felt it was no longer appropriate. Certainly more could be added, but I don't know yet what kind of code I should insert to put in a more appropriate inital heading.--Ekias (talk) 02:39, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

NPOV tag

I added the NPOV tag because much of the section on the trial is written from the POV that the trial was unfair. This is not a fact; it is an opinion. Knowing only what I've read in this article, I tend to agree with the opinion but that doesn't make it any less an opinion or any more a fact.

At first blush, the historiography section of this article is reasonably well-done (I scanned it lightly and I don't know the works of the historians). The problem I see is that the opinions of the revisionist historians bleeds over into the narrative of the trial. For example, the phrase "supposed eyewitness evidence" and the assertion "too many people had lost too much and a scapegoat was necessary" are interpretations, not facts; therefore, these should be presented as interpretations. We should say "Historians X, Y and Z challenge the credibility of the eyewitness evidence because..." and "Historian X suggests that the willingness to accept the eyewitness evidence uncritically is due to the fact that...".

I am being conservative in editing this article since I am not familiar with the subject matter. However, the NPOV slant in favor of Angelique's innocence is way too strong in the narrative and should be toned down. Present the facts as facts and the opinions as opinions and let the reader decide for himself whether she is innocent or not.

--Richard (talk) 15:06, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

"Montreal court's sentence considered severely punitive"

I have changed the wording of this to read 'The sentence of the Montreal court is characterized as harsh, even given the nature of the offence and the standards of punishment applied in the 18th century." This is not a "fact"; it is an opinion. Although it may be hard to argue against it; it is still an opinion involving subjective judgment. This assertion should be attributed to a reliable source or written along the lines of "Recently, historians have argued that the sentence of the Montreal court was harsh, even given the nature of the offence and the standards of punishment applied in the 18th century." I am inserting this latter text in the article with a {{citation needed}} tag. Feel free to change it to name the specific historians who have made this argument. --Richard (talk) 16:11, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Three Centuries?

From the intro to the article: "For more than three centuries, it was generally accepted that Angélique was guilty of the crime of which she was accused. However, it has recently been argued that she was, in fact, innocent of the crime and convicted more on the basis of her perception as a rebellious runaway slave than on the basis of factual evidence." Considering 1734 was 275 years ago, it seems impossible for the opinion to have changed more than three centuries afterward when that is still at least 26 years away. Just nitpicking. --24.150.27.219 (talk) 00:11, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Heh, heh (blush). Oooops. That's what I get for editing in a hurry. I obviously can't do simple arithmetic. Next time be bold and fix it yourself. --Richard (talk) 00:44, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

removing POV tag with no active discussion per Template:POV

I've removed an old neutrality tag from this page that appears to have no active discussion per the instructions at Template:POV:

This template is not meant to be a permanent resident on any article. Remove this template whenever:

1. There is consensus on the talkpage or the NPOV Noticeboard that the issue has been resolved
2. It is not clear what the neutrality issue is, and no satisfactory explanation has been given
3. In the absence of any discussion, or if the discussion has become dormant.

Since there's no evidence of ongoing discussion, I'm removing the tag for now. If discussion is continuing and I've failed to see it, however, please feel free to restore the template and continue to address the issues. Thanks to everybody working on this one! -- Khazar2 (talk) 02:34, 27 June 2013 (UTC)

Name

Is it spelled Marie-Josèphe or Marie-Joseph? —howcheng {chat} 07:24, 20 June 2015 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Marie-Joseph Angélique/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

This article has a bit too much bias. It makes it appear that she did commit the fire, but simply lied to avoid punishment, whereas I feel that so little of her side of the story is available that it is uncertain what exactly led to the town being burned (i.e. faulty lamp, maybe she was lighting something and was in a daze-perhaps after being beaten to do work- and accidently lit a curtain, get my drift?) And if it is provable that she did commit the fire, then it should be stated, as well as more depth about what would have led her to do such an act. Not simply that she was beaten, but details. That way we get a fuller picture of exactly what happened.Dkceaser 04:31, 24 January 2007 (UTC)Dkceaser

Last edited at 04:31, 24 January 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 23:09, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

Liking this to "Slavery in Canada" is ridiculous

It should always be remembered by any author in this article that this all happened in New France, not in Canada. New France had laws based on French law. It has little relation to British or Canadian law. I plan to make an edit to the "Conflicting interpretations" section, removing the link to Slavery in Canada, and changing it to "New France". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.29.4.43 (talk) 15:16, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

Don't delete or manipulate RS'd information based on your opinion - you'll need sources to make such changes.HammerFilmFan (talk) 20:53, 21 June 2017 (UTC)