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Antoine le Blanc (c. 1800 – September 6, 1833) was a 19th-century murderer and a French immigrant to the United States.
Le Blanc went to New York to seek his fortune after being disowned by his family in France. He spoke little to no English and committed the crime only a few weeks after he arrived in the United States.
In 1833, a few weeks after his arrival in the country, le Blanc was allowed to live in the small, dank basement of the Morristown, New Jersey farmhouse of the Judge Samuel Sayre family, in exchange for chopping wood and feeding hogs. He was unpaid. After two weeks of taking orders and hard work, he became angry and murdered the farmer by hitting him in the back with an ax, his wife Sarah, whom he killed with a club, and their servant Phoebe, who may have been a slave. He proceeded to ransack the house for valuables.
After the crime was discovered, le Blanc was tracked down, captured and tried. The local judge ordered him hanged and dissected. Le Blanc was hanged for his crime before over ten thousand witnesses on September 6, 1833. After his death, le Blanc was taken to a medical lab and experimented on with electrical currents. Later, his skin was "dissected" to be made into wallets, purses, lampshades, and book jackets. His face was made into a plaster mask. The death mask of Antoine le Blanc and some other products eventually passed to Carl Scherzer, a collector of 19th-century artifacts.
References
- ^ Center, North Jersey History and Genealogy (September 26, 2014). "Antoine Le Blanc: A shocking story of murder and a community's revenge | Morristown Green".
- "Antoine LeBlanc | Weird NJ". weirdnj.com.
- Fabian, Ann (January 3, 2000). The Unvarnished Truth: Personal Narratives in Nineteenth-Century America. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-92803-9.
- A History of Morris County, New Jersey: Embracing Upwards of Two Centuries, 1710-1913 ... Lewis Historical Publishing Company. 1914.
- Report, Breaking Local News (September 16, 2024). "This Small New Jersey Park Allegedly Hosted First Public Execution in America". www.shorenewsnetwork.com. Retrieved January 7, 2025.
External links
- Sayre family: lineage of Thomas Sayre, a founder of Southampton, by Theodore Melvin Banta
- S.P. Hull's report of the trial and conviction of Antoine Le Blanc for the murder of the Sayre family : at Morristown, N.J., on the night of the eleventh of May, 1833 : with his confession, as given to Mr. A. Boisaubin, the interpreter.
- 1833 deaths
- People from Morristown, New Jersey
- French people executed abroad
- People executed for murder
- People executed by New Jersey by hanging
- 19th-century executions of American people
- People convicted of murder by New Jersey
- 19th-century executions by the United States
- French emigrants to the United States
- French people convicted of murder
- 1833 murders in the United States