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IT- 00026
^ U & ^
BILOXI'S O’^EST INHABITANT DIES
110 YEAR OLD MADAME DESPAU SPENT OVER 75 YEARS IN MRS. MYRA CLARK GAINES $15,000,000 LITIGATION September - 1867
N. 0. Times - Thursday, September 26, 1867 - p 1 c ^
DEATH OF A CENTENARIAN M'me SOPHIA DESPAU - HER CONNECTION WITH A CELEBRATED WILL CASE
The death of M'me Sophie Despau, nee Carriere, at Biloxi, at the advanced a^e of 110 years, has added another feature of interest to vhat the United States Supreme Court has decided to be the most remarkable suit ever brought to trial in this country.
Sister Zullroe1s Tvo Marriages
M'me	Despau vas born in 1757, when Louisiana vas held by France,
of an old	Provencal family, and her name vill long be remembered in
connection vith thrt of her sister Zulime Carriere. It vas vhile under M'me. Despau1s dare that Zulime, when thirteen years of age (1796), and already celebrated in Nev Orleans for her beauty, vas married to Des Grange, a French nobleman, who soon after subsided into a barkeeper- or syrup maker.
Some	years after Des Grange proved to have been already married,
and about	the same time an attachment sprang between her and Daniel
Clark, the Congressman, the land speculator and foremost business man of his time.
Marriage to T)?nlel Clark
The attachment resulted in a marriage, according to Mme Sophie Despau and another sister, and, according to all, in the birth of Mrs. Myra Clark Gaines.
Mme Despau, in her evidence in the Gaines case, testified that she vas present when the marriage ceremony was performed in Philadelphia (Pa.), present with a third sister, and it vas upon their evidence that the alleged ceremony rested, for the priest vho officiated subsequently vent to Ireland, the church was burned dovn and the records destroyed.
Third Marriage
What added still complication to the complication of the case vas that Zulime Carriere Dec Grsnco pi-.i.
Dr. Gardette, and this dur!^	SS*?'1*'’*17	U"lted	‘°