"Rosette Rochon"(1776-1863)

She was born in Mobile Alabama,the daughter of Pierre Rochon,and early shipbuilder and painter,and his slave Marianne.Freed by her father,she then become the placee (an extra-legal life partner)of  Monsieur Hardy,with whom she relocated to Saint-Domingue.Following the Haitian slave rebellion,she escaped to New Orleans about 1797,where she became the placee of Joseph Forstall.She became one of the earliest investors in the Faubourgh Marigny,acquiring her first lot of from Bernard de Marigny in 1806.Bernard de Marigny refused to sell the lots he was subdividing from his family plantation to anyone who spoke English.He felt comfortable with the French-speaking Catholic free people of color,and consequently much of Faubourg Marigny was built by free African Americans artisans for free people of color or for French speaking white Creoles.She speculated in real estate in the French Quarter and Marigny,owned and rental property,opened grocery stores,made loans,bought and sold mortgages,and owned rental out slaves.Rosette also traveled extensively back to Haiti,where her son by  Monsieur had become a government offcial.Her social circle in New Orleans included Marie Laveau,Jean Lafitte,the free African Americans contractors and real estate developers Ursain Guesnon and the Dolliole brothers.Through her real estate ventures in the Neighborhood,Rosette became closely associated with the free African American Bernard Couvent.His wife Marie later left her fortune to find the best school open to free African Americans in the U.S. before Civil War (succeeded by Bishop Perry Middle School in 1941 Dauphine,also in Faubourg Marigny).It appears that Rosette had her home now known as the Musee built in about the mid 1820s.Eulaie de Mandeville lived next door.