Delphine, a free woman of color, claims that she is being held as a slave and deprived of her right to earn a living. She is suing Raymond Deveze, the man who currently holds her in servitude. She presents to the court the following facts that led to her current predicament. While living in Saint Domingue, the French part of the island of Hispaniola, she, her now-deceased mother, Caroline, and her two aunts, Luce and Florence, as well as her grandmother, Marie Catherine, were freed by one Marie Therese Duroc, her great-aunt, who was then their then owner. After her mother's death, Delphine continued to live with Marie Therese. But in 1803, during a period of violent upheaval on the island, the four women, a young male relative named Leger, as well as Marie Therese's companion, Mr. Belzons, were evacuated from Cap Français. Marie Therese died during the voyage and Belzons brought the other women and the young boy to Louisiana. Delphine claims that Belzons treated them well until, "shocking it is to state," he "inhumanly" sold her in spite of her representation that she was free. She is now the property of Deveze, from whom she has "suffered unjust corporal punishments." She prays the court to decree her free and to order Deveze to pay her compensation at the rate of $10 for each day that she has been "detained" in slavery [Original in English and French].
Result: Granted; appealed.
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Repository: University of New Orleans
