La Mulatresse Solitude (the Mulatto Solitude) is a national hero on the French Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe. Although very little is known about her life, she is remembered as a brave fighter against the reimposition of slavery on her homeland. It is believed that Solitude’s … Read MoreLa Mulatresse Solitude (ca 1772-1802)
Clémence Botino, born to an Indo-Caribbean mother, Katia Botino, and an Afro-Caribbean father, Oliver Botino, on January 22, 1997, in Baie-Mahault on the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe, was named Miss France 2020. Her parents encouraged her interest in fashion, dance, music (she plays piano), … Read MoreClémence Botino (1997- )
Paul B. Cornely is remembered today as a public health pioneer and civil rights leader whose activism contributed to the desegregation of national healthcare. Dr. Cornely was born on March 9, 1906. on the island of Guadeloupe in the West Indies and grew up in … Read MorePaul B. Cornely (1906-2002)
Gustavia is the capital and main seaport of the island of Saint Barthélemy, also known as “St. Bart’s.” The Caribbean island is said to have been discovered by explorer Christopher Columbus in 1493, who named it after his brother Bartolomeo. The Taino Indians were the … Read MoreGustavia, Saint Barthélemy (1648- )
French teacher and politician Gratien Candace was born on December 18, 1873 in Guadeloupe, a French overseas territory. His father Edouard was born in Guadeloupe as well, only two years before slavery was formally abolished in France, in 1848. Candace is the first French black politician to hold office as a deputy … Read MoreGratien Candace (1873-1953)
Image Ownership: DocAnciens/docpix.fr French naval hero Camille Mortenol was born November 29, 1859 in Pointe-à-Pitre, the largest city in the French island colony of Guadeloupe in the Caribbean Sea, the son of former slave André Mortenol, a sailor, and his wife, Julienne Toussaint, a seamstress. … Read MoreCamille Sosthène Héliodore Mortenol (1859-1930)
William Henry Hunt, African American U.S. diplomat, was born a slave in Tennessee in 1863. Hunt claimed to have been born on June 29, 1869, so he could get into school at the age of twenty-six posing as a twenty-year-old, a lie he kept to … Read MoreWilliam Henry Hunt (1863-1951)
Fencing champion and multiple Olympic medalist Laura Flessel-Colovic was born November 6, 1971, in Pointe-à-Pitre, the largest city on the French Caribbean island of Guadeloupe, one of four children of Edouard Flessel, a meteorologist, and Marie-Éva Flessel, a school teacher. Self-described as a tomboy in … Read MoreLaura Élodie Flessel-Colovic (1971- )
One of the few painters from the Americas with a degree of African ancestry who was active in the 1800s and has representative works in the Louvre Museum in Paris, France is Guillaume Guillon-Lethière. Born January 10, 1760, near Sainte-Anne on the island of Guadeloupe … Read MoreGuillaume Guillon-Lethière (1760-1832)
“Image Ownership: Public Domain” Born in Cayenne, French Guiana to parents Marc Saint-Yves Monnerville and Marie-Françoise Orville, Gaston Monnerville was the grandson of a slave. His family was from Case-Pilote in Martinique, but moved to French Guiana where two sons were born: Pierre and Gaston. … Read MoreGaston Monnerville (1897–1991)
