French, A. B. [Alexander], Capt.

Submitted by Mike Miller

Capt. A. B. French, the head of the well-known firm of A. B. French & Co., Equitable building, New Orleans, La., is a native of Liverpool. The ancestors of Mr. French have been for generations among the wealthiest and most influential people of the province of Connaught, Ireland, Great Britain. They belonged essentially to the nobility and for years several members of the family were sent to parliament. The father of Mr. A. B. French, Henry J. French, Esq., was born at Broadfield House, County Mayo, Ireland, the country residence of A. B. French's grandfather. He received a classical education in the college of Maynooth, and although a stanch Roman Catholic he held positions of trust in Her Majesty's customs service most of his life. The demands of his position necessitated his location in England, and after a career of honorable service he died in Liverpool, England, at the age of seventy-nine years. The maiden name of our subject's mother was Mary Thornton McCarter, of Burncrauch, near Londonderry. TheMcCarters were ultra-Orangemen, but Mrs. French became a convert to the Catholic church after marriage. She died in Hartlepool, England, in 1864. To the marriage of Henry French and Mary Thornton McCarter there were born four children--three sons and a daughter: Capt. Andrew F. J. French, nautical assessor of Liverpool, England, who married Miss Elizabeth Hargraves of Durham Hall near Liverpool; Henry W., now in Quebec, Canada, who married Miss Titue, a niece of L'atillia, late lieutenant governor of Quebec; our subject, A. B. French; Mary Louise French, who became the wife of M. Stafford, of Liverpool, an official in the postal service of that city, in which she herself was employed prior to her marriage.

A. B. French was educated in Eycmonth, and also at Berwick-on-Tweed, on the borders of Scotland and Hartlepool, during his father's stay in England. He entered the ship-brokerage business as an apprentice with a Netherland firm in Hartlepool, England, and finished with a Danish firm by the name of C. Nielsen. He subsequently entered the employment of a ship-building and steamship firm, and afterward went to the west coast of Africa as supercargo and trading master, later taking charge of the bulks on the Camaroons river. Returning to Liverpool, he opened a business in that city on his own account, and his operations were extensive in ship brokerage, speculations and buying and selling ships.

The panic of 1867 unsettled business affairs, and retiring he came to America, and after two years of travel in Canada and the United States located in New Orleans, and in 1869 established the ship-brokerage firm of A. B. French & Co., his partner being his brother, H. W. French, of Quebec, Canada. H. W. French was formerly connected with E. Chaloner, timber broker of Liverpool; Wade & Co., of Hull; and afterward with Messrs. Ross & Co., Quebec, Canada. The business experience of the French brothers gave them at once the confidence of the public, and the firm has become one of the best known in America, both at home and abroad. As cotton and grain exporters, steamship agents, exporters of lumber, staves, etc., and importers of cork, wood and wines, the concern has done an extensive and lucrative business from its organization.

As exporters of staves to England and Ireland, Spain and the north, its operations are large, and it is the only firm in New Orleans that does a business direct with Portugal, since l872. The firm ships large cargoes of staves, lumber and flour to that country every year. Mr. A. B. French gives the minutest details of this business his strict personal supervision, making visits to Europe and elsewhere when his affairs demand it.

Mr. A. B. French was married first in New York to Miss Shannon, of Brooklyn, N. Y. There are three children living by this marriage: Henry, Alexandria and John F. After the death of his first wife he married a Miss Mary Magdalene Claiborne, a daughter of Colonel Claiborne, son of General Claiborne, who was a brother of Governor Claiborne, first governor of Louisiana. By this marriage there is issue one son and daughter: Mary Magdalene; the son, T. P. L. French, died in 1886.

Mr. French and family are stanch Catholics. Captain French is of magnificent personal physique, having a commanding presence, and is always to be found the ideal gentleman and the possessor of entertaining conversational powers. A well-read gentleman, and having traveled extensively, his views are always to be found broad ganged and highly interesting. He saw service in the volunteers in England, and being a lover of military tactics, he is distinguished among his acquaintances for his skill and as a drill master.

Biographical and Historical Memoires of Louisiana, (vol. 1), pp. 424-425. Published by the Goodspeed Publishing Company, Chicago, 1892.