ANTILLES Contrat relatif à une construction.

Document signed Barrault de Narçay, notary. Contract drawn up between the Merceron brothers, building contractors in Port-au-Prince, and Sieur Gouin, representing the Damien sugar factory. It concerns the construction of a cofferdam (temporary dike or dam) on the house, under the following conditions: the pilars will be made of pitch pine 22 to 27 feet long, supplied by the house but chosen by the contractor; the contractor will choose the planks and other utensils needed for the work, but the fittings will be supplied by the house, etc.

The contractor will choose the timbers and other utensils needed for the work, but the ironwork will be supplied by the house, etc.

There is also mention of personnel: ‘The white workers will be fed at the expense of the house and the said lord of the fiefdom undertakes to give each of the Negro workers two gourds per week for their food’. As for payment, the Merceron brothers were to receive 6600 livres within a fortnight of the start of the work, and half of the remainder was to be paid at the end of the current year, the other half at the end of July 1790. In all, 6 conditions make up this construction contract.

Located in the valey of Cul-de-Sac, near Port-au-Prince, the habitation Damien would later be occupied by General Rochambeau in 1802 (see : François Blancpain, La colonie française de Saint-Domingue, de l’esclavage à l’indépendance, p. 207).

Very interesting piece of local history in the French colonies.