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Gabriel-Mathieu Francois D'ceus de Clieu (c. 1687 – 29 November 1774) was a French naval officer and the governor of
Gabriel-Mathieu Francois D'ceus de Clieu (c. 1687 – 29 November 1774) was a French naval officer and the governor of Guadeloupe
Guadeloupe is an Overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department and region of France in the Caribbean. It consists of six inhabited islands—Basse-Terre Island, Basse-Terre, Grande-Terre, Guadeloupe, Grande-Terre, Marie-Galant ...
from 1737 to 1752 and the founder of Pointe-à-Pitre
Pointe-à-Pitre (; , , or simply , ) is the second most populous commune of Guadeloupe (after Les Abymes). Guadeloupe is an overseas region and Overseas department, department of France located in the Lesser Antilles, of which it is a ''Subprefectu ...
. He was awarded the rank of commander of the Royal and Military Order of Saint Louis.
De Clieu is celebrated for his claim to have introduced coffee
Coffee is a beverage brewed from roasted, ground coffee beans. Darkly colored, bitter, and slightly acidic, coffee has a stimulating effect on humans, primarily due to its caffeine content, but decaffeinated coffee is also commercially a ...
to the French colonies of the Western Hemisphere in the 1720s and his support for its cultivation.
Introduction of coffee to Martinique
De Clieu was born inDieppe
Dieppe (; ; or Old Norse ) is a coastal commune in the Seine-Maritime department, Normandy, northern France.
Dieppe is a seaport on the English Channel at the mouth of the river Arques. A regular ferry service runs to Newhaven in England ...
.While Di Clieu was not the first to transport coffee plants to the Caribbean islands, he is largely credited due to close timing and his dramatic journal accounts. The story of his introduction of coffee comes from his account in the ''Année littéraire'' of 1774. According to this account, he arranged to transport three offshoots from coffee plants from the greenhouses of the Jardin royal des plantes (which had originally received two plants from lieutenant général d'artillerie M.Ressou who brought them back from Holland in 1713) to Martinique
Martinique ( ; or ; Kalinago language, Kalinago: or ) is an island in the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies, in the eastern Caribbean Sea. It was previously known as Iguanacaera which translates to iguana island in Carib language, Kariʼn ...
in 1720. According to de Clieu's account, water was rationed on the voyage, and he shared his ration with the seedlings. The story is repeated in many histories of coffee. However, a recent history points out that though it may well be true that de Clieu brought a seedling to Martinique, and perhaps even that he shared his water ration with it, coffee was already growing in the Western Hemisphere: in the French colony of Saint-Domingue since 1715 and in the Dutch colony of Surinam since 1718.
Museum
De Clieu died inParis
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...
. His descendants in Dieppe
Dieppe (; ; or Old Norse ) is a coastal commune in the Seine-Maritime department, Normandy, northern France.
Dieppe is a seaport on the English Channel at the mouth of the river Arques. A regular ferry service runs to Newhaven in England ...
plan to open a museum to commemorate the legend of De Clieu.Stewart Lee Allen, ''The Devil's Cup'', New York: Ballantine, 1999, 158.
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