Alejo Peyret was a French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

-born Argentine

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

 writer, agronomist, colonial administrator, and historian. He was a prominent figure in the history of Entre Ríos Province

Entre Ríos Province

Entre Ríos is a northeastern province of Argentina, located in the Mesopotamia region. It borders the provinces of Buenos Aires , Corrientes and Santa Fe , and Uruguay in the east....

.

Youth in France

Peyret was born in Serres Castet, Canton Morlaàs, in the department of Basses-Pyrénées, today Pyrénées-Atlantiques

Pyrénées-Atlantiques

Pyrénées-Atlantiques is a department in the southwest of France which takes its name from the Pyrenees mountains and the Atlantic Ocean.- History :...

,, the son of Alexis Agustin Peyret and Cecile Angelique Vignancour. He entered the Royal College of Pau at the age of ten. In 1844, at the age of eighteen, he earned a bachelor's degree

Bachelor's degree

A bachelor's degree is usually an academic degree awarded for an undergraduate course or major that generally lasts for three or four years, but can range anywhere from two to six years depending on the region of the world...

 in science and letters. He avoided compulsory military service by hiring a paid substitute to serve in his place . He went on to study law at the Collège de France

Collège de France

The Collège de France is a higher education and research establishment located in Paris, France, in the 5th arrondissement, or Latin Quarter, across the street from the historical campus of La Sorbonne at the intersection of Rue Saint-Jacques and Rue des Écoles...

, where his professors included the philosopher Edgar Quinet

Edgar Quinet

Edgar Quinet was a French historian and intellectual.-Early years:Born at Bourg-en-Bresse, in the département of Ain. His father, Jérôme Quinet, had been a commissary in the army, but being a strong republican and disgusted with Napoleon's 18 Brumaire coup, he gave up his post and devoted himself...

 and the historian Jules Michelet

Jules Michelet

Jules Michelet was a French historian. He was born in Paris to a family with Huguenot traditions.-Early life:His father was a master printer, not very prosperous, and Jules assisted him in the actual work of the press...

. He became involved with political radicalism, writing editorials in support of republicanism, democracy, anticlericalism, and socialism, and of the Revolutions of 1848 in particular. He was tried for his activities, but acquitted of wrongdoing .

In the 1852 election

French legislative election, 1852

The 1852 general election organized the first legislature of the French Second Empire. The election was held on 29 February and 14 March. Out of 9,836,043 registered voters, 6,222,983 voted ....

, Peyret stood as a candidate for the Department of Basses-Pyrénées. Following the electoral landslide of the Bonapartists and the establishment of the Second Empire

Second French Empire

The Second French Empire or French Empire was the Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870, between the Second Republic and the Third Republic, in France.-Rule of Napoleon III:...

 under Napoleon III

Napoleon III of France

Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte was the President of the French Second Republic and as Napoleon III, the ruler of the Second French Empire. He was the nephew and heir of Napoleon I, christened as Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte...

, Peyret left the country

Arrival in Argentina

Peyret arrived in Montevideo

Montevideo

Montevideo is the largest city, the capital, and the chief port of Uruguay. The settlement was established in 1726 by Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, as a strategic move amidst a Spanish-Portuguese dispute over the platine region, and as a counter to the Portuguese colony at Colonia del Sacramento...

 on November 4, 1852. Here, he wrote for El Comercio del Plata, a periodical edited by José María Cantilo. Alberto Larroque, president of the College of Uruguay (in Concepción del Uruguay

Concepción del Uruguay

Concepción del Uruguay is a city in Argentina.It is located in the Entre Ríos province, on the western shore of the Uruguay River, some 320 kilometers north from Buenos Aires. Its population is about 65,000 inhabitants .-History:...

) offered him a professorship . The minister of Justice, Worship, and Public Instruction, Juan María Gutiérrez

Juan María Gutiérrez

Juan María Gutiérrez was an Argentine statesman, jurist, surveyor, historian, critic, and poet.He was a major figure in Argentine liberalism and one of the most prominent promoters of Argentine culture during the 19th century...

, designated him head of the French and Geography departments beginning June 5, 1855 . He remained in this position until September 4, 1856 . He served as an editor of the biweekly El Uruguay under the direction of Benjamín Victorica . He spearheaded the creation of La Cosmopolita Society of Mutual Aid on August 31, 1856 in Concepción del Uruguay. In September of that year, Peyret relocated to Paraná

Paraná, Entre Ríos

Paraná is the capital city of the Argentine province of Entre Ríos, located on the eastern shore of the Paraná River, opposite the city of Santa Fe, capital of the neighbouring Santa Fe Province...

 to assume control of El Nacional Argentino, an organization in support of the Confederation. He remained in Paraná until July 1857 "except for one month's interruption (May - June) which I spent in Uruguay [Concepción del Uruguay] to see Euristela" . "Euristela" is a reference to Josefa Auristela Caraballo, with whom Peyret had his first two sons, Nieves Emilia and Luis Alejo.

Colonialism and agriculture

On July 11, 1857, he was appointed administrator and director of San José

San José, Entre Ríos

San José is a city in the center-east of the province of Entre Ríos, Argentina, located some 10 km northwest from Colón, near the Uruguay River. It has about 15,000 inhabitants as per the ....

 Colony by President Justo José de Urquiza

Justo José de Urquiza

Justo José de Urquiza y García was an Argentine general and politician. He was president of the Argentine Confederation from 1854 to 1860.He was governor of Entre Ríos during the government of Juan Manuel de Rosas, governor of Buenos Aires with powers delegated from the other provinces...

 . In fulfillment of his instructions, he published a series of articles in El Uruguay during April, May, and June 1860 in which he called upon the colonists to be hardworking, "whatever may be their religious opinions or the beliefs to which they subscribe" . The notes were translated into French and collected in a pamphlet entitled Emigration et Colonisation: La Colonie San José .

Under his direction, the colony began cultivating peanut

Peanut

The peanut, or groundnut , is a species in the legume or "bean" family , so it is not a nut. The peanut was probably first cultivated in the valleys of Peru. It is an annual herbaceous plant growing tall...

s, potato

Potato

The potato is a starchy, tuberous crop from the perennial Solanum tuberosum of the Solanaceae family . The word potato may refer to the plant itself as well as the edible tuber. In the region of the Andes, there are some other closely related cultivated potato species...

es, sweet potato

Sweet potato

The sweet potato is a dicotyledonous plant that belongs to the family Convolvulaceae. Its large, starchy, sweet-tasting, tuberous roots are an important root vegetable. The young leaves and shoots are sometimes eaten as greens. Of the approximately 50 genera and more than 1,000 species of...

es, bean

Bean

Bean is a common name for large plant seeds of several genera of the family Fabaceae used for human food or animal feed....

s, onion

Onion

The onion , also known as the bulb onion, common onion and garden onion, is the most widely cultivated species of the genus Allium. The genus Allium also contains a number of other species variously referred to as onions and cultivated for food, such as the Japanese bunching onion The onion...

s, sugar beet

Sugar beet

Sugar beet, a cultivated plant of Beta vulgaris, is a plant whose tuber contains a high concentration of sucrose. It is grown commercially for sugar production. Sugar beets and other B...

s, maize

Maize

Maize known in many English-speaking countries as corn or mielie/mealie, is a grain domesticated by indigenous peoples in Mesoamerica in prehistoric times. The leafy stalk produces ears which contain seeds called kernels. Though technically a grain, maize kernels are used in cooking as a vegetable...

, and tobacco

Tobacco

Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of plants in the genus Nicotiana. It can be consumed, used as a pesticide and, in the form of nicotine tartrate, used in some medicines...

. Peyret also introduced superior techniques for growing wheat

Wheat

Wheat is a cereal grain, originally from the Levant region of the Near East, but now cultivated worldwide. In 2007 world production of wheat was 607 million tons, making it the third most-produced cereal after maize and rice...

 and he lobbied Urquiza for new land on which to establish an experimental station for growing cotton

Cotton

Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective capsule, around the seeds of cotton plants of the genus Gossypium. The fiber is almost pure cellulose. The botanical purpose of cotton fiber is to aid in seed dispersal....

. He experimented with caper spurge and the adaptability of silkworms to the local climate. He built a factory for the manufacture of peanut oil

Peanut oil

Peanut oil is an organic material oil derived from peanuts, noted to have the aroma and taste of its parent legume....

. For his work with potato farming, he received an honorable mention at the National Exposition of Córdoba held between October 15 and January 21, 1872. On January 3 he sent the chief commissioner of the Exposition a report on the state of Colonia San José and Villa de Colón and the prospect of future colonization of Entre Ríos Province .

Over the course of thirteen years Peyret served as administrator, director, justice of the peace, commissioner, president of the municipality of San José and officer of the first civil registry

Civil registry

Civil registration is the system by which a government records the vital events of its citizens and residents. The resulting repository or database is called civil register or registry, or population registry. The primary purpose of civil registration is to create legal documents that are used to...

, which was created in 1873 in Colón

Colón, Entre Ríos

Colón is a city in the . It is located in the east of the province, on the western shore of the Uruguay River, and has about 21,000 inhabitants...

 to settle disputes between brides belonging to different religions . Beginning in 1865 he was a member of the Public Works Commission of Colón, whose function was to oversee the construction of the church, collecting funds and reporting to the government on their investment . Peyret resigned from the commission on December 31, 1872 . When President Domingo Faustino Sarmiento made a visit to Colón and San José on February 6, 1870, it fell to Peyret, as chief of the "party committee", to arrange the official welcome .

Peyret was married on July 7, 1866 to María Celerina Pinget, born in Vinzier, Haute-Savoie

Haute-Savoie

Haute-Savoie is a French department in the Rhône-Alpes region of eastern France. It borders both Switzerland and Italy. The capital is Annecy. To the north is Lake Geneva and Switzerland; to the south and southeast are the Mont Blanc and Aravis mountain ranges and the French entrance to the Mont...

, the daughter of Gabriel Pinget and Luisa Viollaz .

Freemasonry

Initiated into Freemasonry

Freemasonry

Freemasonry is a fraternal organisation that arose from obscure origins in the late 16th to early 17th century. Freemasonry now exists in various forms all over the world, with a membership estimated at around six million, including approximately 150,000 under the jurisdictions of the Grand Lodge...

 in France, Peyret became an active member of George Washington Lodge #44 in Concepción del Uruguay , which he joined in 1864 . In 1868 he received the third degree and became a master mason . He served two consecutive terms as Orator, from 1877 to 1878 and 1878 to 1879. On October 25 he inaugurated the public conferences of the lodge . In Buenos Aires he had already assisted, on January 16, 1887, in inaugurating the Lodge L'Amie des Naufrages, and had been named an honorary member .

Political activism

In August 1871 he drafted a plan for a Constitution for the French Republic, dedicated to president Louis-Adolphe Thiers and with a preface founded in his juridico-political theory . The preface was later published in La República in November 1871 .

Beginning on June 9, 1873, he sent a series of unsigned letters to the Buenos Aires daily La República in which he denounced the assassination of Urquiza on April 11, 1870, and condemned the federal intervention

Federal intervention

Federal intervention is an attribution of the federal government of Argentina, by which it takes control of a province in certain extreme cases. Intervention is declared by the President with the assent of the National Congress...

 against the Province of Entre Ríos, arguing that it violated the principles of federalism and provincial autonomy. He declared that Ricardo López Jordán

Ricardo López Jordán

Ricardo Ramón López Jordán was an Argentine soldier and politician, one of the last influential "caudillos" in the history of Argentina...

 had embodied the hopes of the people of Entre Ríos, at the same time maintaining that the true aim of the armed intervention ordered by Domingo F. Sarmiento  had been to assure the success of the presidential candidacy of Nicolás Avellaneda

Nicolás Avellaneda

Nicolás Remigio Aurelio Avellaneda Silva was an Argentine politician and journalist, and president of Argentina from 1874 to 1880. Avellaneda's main projects while in office were banking and education reform, leading to Argentina's economic growth...

. He argued that although Dr. Leónidas Echagüe could not have remained in control of the government of Entre Ríos, Ricardo López Jordán should not have replaced him so soon after Urquiza's violent death . Peyret used this argument in response to accusations of crypto-Jordanism .

As only six of the fifteen letters sent were published, Peyret collected them into Letters on the Intervention against the Province of Entre Ríos, which he published under the pseudonym "A foreigner" . The author's identity did not stay secret to his contemporaries, and this error in judgment cost him the job of administrator of San José and forced him to leave the province where he had spent eighteen years . In a letter to Benjamín Victorica written in Buenos Aires on March 3, 1874, he wrote "...It would have been better not to concern myself with politics. I don't know how I forgot the advice of Mr. Pedro de Angelis. I gave in to a moment of irritation and impatience, seeing that we had been thrown into yet another war which was to last an entire year. I am always at your service and believe you will remain always at mine, despite my recklessness" . In March 1874 he resigned his position as head of the colony and was replaced temporarily by Rodolfo Siegrist until April 30 ; in June, in Buenos Aires, Dolores Costa de Urquiza designated him the agent in charge of selecting and transporting colonists to the colony of Caseros .

Academic and literary career

Peyret published Bearnese Stories in Concepción del Uruguay in 1870. The work was translated into French and Occitan in Paris in 1890 . He did as much as he could to preserve the language of his native region and his Bearnese Stories won the praise of Pierre-Jean de Béranger

Pierre-Jean de Béranger

Pierre-Jean de Béranger was a prolific French poet and chansonnier , who enjoyed great popularity and influence in France during his lifetime, but faded into obscurity in the decades following his death...

 .

On July 13, 1874 he was nominated by Dr. Vicente Fidel López

Vicente Fidel López

Vicente Fidel López was an Argentine historian, lawyer and politician. He was a son of writer and politician Vicente López y Planes.-Biography:...

, president of the University of Buenos Aires

University of Buenos Aires

The University of Buenos Aires is the largest university in Argentina and the largest university by enrollment in Latin America. Founded on August 12, 1821 in the city of Buenos Aires, it consists of 13 faculties, 6 hospitals, 10 museums and is linked to 4 high schools: Colegio Nacional de Buenos...

, to occupy the vacant chief professorship of the French department, in the Faculty of Humanities and Philosophy ; dean Andrés Lamas

Andrés Lamas

Andrés Lamas Bervejillo is a Uruguayan professional footballer who plays for Recreativo de Huelva in the Spanish second division, as a centre back.- Career :...

 expressed his agreement and communicated with Peyret . On April 13, 1876, Peyret sent his resignation from Concepción del Uruguay. On March 31, 1876 he was named professor of world history for all six grades of the National College of Uruguay, and was subsequently appointed - in 1879 - to teach a special course on the history of free universities. He continued at the college until August 17, 1883, when he resigned in order to relocate to Buenos Aires .

The George Washington Lodge agreed in 1877 - at Peyret's proposal - to form a commission headed by Peyret to study "the situation afflicting numerous students who cannot pursue their studies due to lack of resources". This led to the establishment of the educational society La Fraternidad, which sought to protect and provide housing for students of the College of Urugay . On August 23, 1880, he was named president of the provisional directive commission of the French Mutual Aid Society of Concepción del Uruguay and in 1882 was named its honorary president . The Office of Territories and Colonies commissioned him in 1881 to make a study of the possibilities of the territory of Misiones

Misiones Province

Misiones is one of the 23 provinces of Argentina, located in the northeastern corner of the country in the Mesopotamiсa region. It is surrounded by Paraguay to the northwest, Brazil to the north, east and south, and Corrientes Province of Argentina to the southwest.- History :The province was...

, a study which inspired him to write thirty letters published in the daily La Tribuna Nacional under the title Letters on Misiones .

A decree signed by president Julio Argentino Roca

Julio Argentino Roca

Alejo Julio Argentino Roca Paz was an army general who served as President of Argentina from 12 October 1880 to 12 October 1886 and again from 12 October 1898 to 12 October 1904.-Upbringing and early career:...

 on August 18, 1883 authorized Peyret, having relocated to Buenos Aires, to teach the history of the free universities at the National College of Buenos Aires. He served this role until February 11, 1887 . He wrote Contemporary History , a textbook which would be used in normal school

Normal school

A normal school is a school created to train high school graduates to be teachers. Its purpose is to establish teaching standards or norms, hence its name...

s and national colleges. In 1885 his book The Origins of Christianity was serialized in the Buenos Aires University Review, and the following year his work The American Thinker was published. At the same time he published History of Religions, which comprised a history and philosophical critique of prehistoric and historical religions and of Christianity. Another work on the subject was The Evolution of Christianity.

Colonial administration

He was named Inspector of Colonies by a decree of president Miguel Juárez Celman on February 12, 1887 . As a consequence of this role, he wrote A visit to the colonies of the Argentine Republic , written in Spanish in two volumes and submitted by the government to the Exposition Universelle

Exposition Universelle (1889)

The Exposition Universelle of 1889 was a World's Fair held in Paris, France from 6 May to 31 October 1889.It was held during the year of the 100th anniversary of the storming of the Bastille, an event traditionally considered as the symbol for the beginning of the French Revolution...

 in Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

. It was simultaneously published in French as Une visite aux colonies de la République Argentine .

On May 10, 1889, the national government commissioned Peyret to study the agricultural machinery displayed at the Exposition. He received six thousand pesos to cover his expenses and was to present a descriptive report before the end of the Exposition . His report was titled The Agricultural Machines at the Universal Exposition of Paris.

He left for France on June 5, 1889 aboard the Río Negro with his wife Celerina Pinget and daughter Alfonsina. Thirty-seven years had passed since his self-imposed exile to Argentina. The International Socialist Congress met in Paris between July 14 and 21, during which it established the Second International

Second International

The Second International , the original Socialist International, was an organization of socialist and labour parties formed in Paris on July 14, 1889. At the Paris meeting delegations from 20 countries participated...

. Peyret reported his activities during these days in a letter addressed to the governor of Entre Ríos, Clemente Basavilbaso, published on July 28 in a Paraná daily. According to his letter, he spent only the 20th at the Socialist Congress, whose sessions lasted the entire day. He left a more detailed account in his personal diary: on July 20, Saturday, he went to the congress, at the salon de Folies Parisiennes on the Boulevard Rochechouart. "I was announced as a delegate from the Argentine Republic, there was applause, but at that very moment I was leaving the room." The day's speaker was a member of the House of Commons

British House of Commons

The House of Commons is the lower house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom, which also comprises the Sovereign and the House of Lords . Both Commons and Lords meet in the Palace of Westminster. The Commons is a democratically elected body, consisting of 650 members , who are known as Members...

, who spoke on the eight-hour workday On behalf of the Italian republicans of Buenos Aires, Peyret delivered a plaque commemorating the French Revolution

French Revolution

The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...

 to the Paris city council .

On April 1, 1892 he recorded: "I would have liked to have had the money I spent without reason in Concepción del Uruguay and Colonia San José. Had I put that money in a bank, I would be able to live off those savings. And my father: what he spent in Serres Castet! When I came to France the current owner of the property proposed to sell it to me, and I told him that no, he had taken me for a millionaire" .

Peyret was named the representative of the Province of Entre Ríos to the 1st Provincial Agricultural Congress held in Esperanza, Santa Fe

Esperanza, Santa Fe

Esperanza is a city in the center of the province of Santa Fe, Argentina. It has about 36,000 inhabitants as of the and it is the head town of the Las Colonias Department....

 from May 24 to June 2, 1892 . He was commissioned on June 1892 to write the history of Argentine colonization and was for a year granted a monthly salary of $500 "including his salary as Inspector of Colonies" . In 1898 he decided that he had collected the necessary research to write the history and had begun the work, "to be completed when my health permits" . He served as Inspector General of Colonies from early 1895 until January 16, 1900, when he retired .

Retirement and death

On June 13, 1893, he was unanimously elected the first president of the French Alliance of Buenos Aires, whose committee met at the French Club . On December 13, 1885, in the presence of the federal judge Juan del Campillo, he swore the oath of citizenship on the Constitution

Constitution of Argentina

The constitution of Argentina is one of the primary sources of existing law in Argentina. Its first version was written in 1853 by a Constitutional Assembly gathered in Santa Fe, and the doctrinal basis was taken in part from the United States Constitution...

 . He requested retirement benefits on October 14, 1889, on the justification of his advanced age and poor health, naturalized Argentine citizenship, and physical infirmity after thirty-one years of service. President Julio Argentino Roca granted his request with a decree signed on February 19, 1900 .

In his final year of life, he recorded his agronomic reminiscences in an article, "Colonia San José - How it was Founded", written in October 1901 and published in the review Urquiza . He died at his home at 176 General Urquiza Street in Buenos Aires on August 27, 1902, of chronic myocarditis . His internment in the Western Cemetery was attended by Julio Argentino Roca, his aide-de-camp Colonel David Marambio Catán, and a large audience.

The Masonic Review, an independent organ of international freemasonry, published "In memoriam, the Illustrious and Honorable Dr. Alejo Peyret: this Republic and more immediately Argentine freemasonry have lost one of their greatest thinkers, an indefatigable apostle of liberalism. By special decree, the Argentine Orient elects the Powerful and Honorable Francisco F. Fernandez to speak in the name of national freemasonry. The name of the Honorable Peyret is engraved in the memory of those he has taught to cultivate knowledge and love justice and truth" .

At the request of his heirs, Peyret's ashes were moved to the cemetery of San José on November 26, 1995 . The only items in his will were a plot of land in San José and a fraction of the homestead zone at the same colony .