Count de Custine-Sarreck, General in Chief French Army
During the American Revolution, Newporters were introduced to two foreign concepts: French Noblemen and Catholics. The officers sent by King Louis XVI to assist the American cause were wealthy aristocrats, of royal descent, with all of the trappings of the Court at Versailles. They were also practicing Catholics, a religion never encountered before by the descendants of radical Quakers and Baptists. The role of the French forces in the Revolution is widely known, but as Bastille Day approaches, we are reminded that life in Paris in the 1790s was far more frightening than anything experienced on the streets of Newport. The following is a list of some of the Officers who were in Newport who lost their lives to the Guillotine:
COLONEL ADAM-PHILLIPE, MARQUIS, COMTE DE CUSTINE-SARRECK – Marechal de Camp and quartered at Joseph Durfey’s house on Griffin Street (lower Touro Street).
COLONEL ARMOND-LOUIS DE GONTAUT, DUC DE LAUZON – Inspector of the Legion of Volunteers quartered at Deborah Malbone Hunter’s house on Thames Street.
MAJOR GENERAL ANTIONE CHARLES DU HOUX, BARON DE VIOMENIL – Second in Command after Rochambeau, quartered with his son Charles at Joseph Wanton’s house on Thames Street (currently the site of the Banana Republic store). Died of gun shot wounds during Royalist uprising at the Tuileries.
Marquis de Viomenil, Marshal of France
LT. COLONEL LOUIS-MARIE-ANTIONE, VICOMTE DE NOAILLES – Regimental leader quartered with “Quaker” Thomas Robinson family on Water Street (now Washington Street). He maintained a close relationship with the family until his death in 1804, as chronicled by his correspondence in the Newport Historical Society’s collections. His wife was the sister-in-law of Lafayette. She lost her life, as did her mother and grandmother, as well as his parents, by the Guillotine at the Conciergerie in Paris on 27 June 1794.