After the New York Times published the article on D&R Greenway’s preservation of Joseph Bonaparte’s estate in Bordentown, N.J., on Jan. 31, people from all over the country have been sending messages.
“People wrote to us of chairs and of China, of their own Bonaparte connections, and with offers to help - from fundraising to organizing to gardening,” said Linda Mead, president and CEO of D&R Greenway Land Trust.
The Philadelphia Inquirer had published a story on Jan. 24.
Joseph Napoleon Bonaparte, former king of Spain and of Naples, whose older brother was the former emperor of France, bought the Point Breeze estate in 1817 from diplomat Stephen Sayre. The land is sited high upon the Bordentown Bluffs, overlooking extensive marshlands and the confluence of Crosswicks Creek and the Delaware River. The location, between the cities of New York and Philadelphia, was documented in many paintings of the era that can be seen today in museums.
In a matter of days after the New York Times’ report, the preservation saga was taken up by the Times of London, and that city’s Daily Mail. The Daily Mail of London leads with: “New Jersey is known for many things: stunning beaches, luscious tomatoes, Bruce Springsteen and Atlantic City. Now, one small town is working to make the state synonymous with something else –European royalty.”
The preservation of the significant property is a partnership among the New Jersey Green Acres Program, the City of Bordentown and the Greenway Land Trust. Working remotely throughout the pandemic, the partners negotiated a contract for purchase from the owners of the property, Divine Word Missionaries. The partners received word from Rome in October that the contract was approved. Two months later, Dec. 18, the property was purchased and permanently preserved.
The story was also covered in Great Britain by Royal Central, the independent source for royal news on the web. Royal Central emphasized, “What is not so well known is what happened to this monarch after the end of Napoleon’s reign. That he ended up moving to the United States is a story that is not well known.
... Point Breeze included sculpture gardens, coach trails, brick bridges, stables, a gardener’s house and a lake that Bonaparte had made by damming a nearby creek. The centrepiece was the palatial, three-story, nearly 38,000-square-foot mansion that contained an extensive wine cellar, an extravagant art collection and a library that contained 8,000 volumes, more than the Library of Congress at the time, and Bonaparte employed hundreds of people at the estate.”
The Spanish news service, EFE, contacted D&R Greenway, arranging to send a reporter and photographer for the purpose of creating a feature news release, as well as a video of this property. Reuters and Agence France-Presse were also interested in the story.
Joseph Bonaparte’s years upon the Bluffs of Bordentown, with daughter Zenaide and nephew and son-in-law Charles Lucien, one of America’s first ornithologists, were the happiest of the ex-king’s life. The habitat of their estate, the creek and the extensive marsh below were ideal for plants and animals discovered and named by Lucien, in continuing correspondence with his scientific colleagues in Europe. Among Lucien’s finds was the Cooper’s hawk, named for his friend, author James Fenimore Cooper, who visited Point Breeze.
Join our readers whose generous donations are making it possible for you to read our news coverage. Help keep local journalism alive and our community strong. Donate today.
