Bourgeois Aspirations: a Biographical Sketch of Hector Ledru, Manufacturer and Inventor (1798 to 1876)

ZUG 2017; 62(2): 257–297 Dirk HR Spennemann* Bourgeois Aspirations: A biographical sketch of Hector Ledru, manufacturer and inventor (1798 to 1876) DOI 10.1515/zug-2017-1001 Abstract: During the first half of the nineteenth century, the French economy underwent a major technological change, with small and medium-scale entrepreneurs driving the industrialisation by developing and exploiting new technologies. This paper examines the life of one such entrepreneur, Hector Ledru (ca. 1798 to 1876), who started out in the sugar industry of the post Napoleonic era. He soon morphed into an entrepreneur exploiting patents in the manufacture of wooden barrel manufacture, galvanised iron and metal pipes, before he settled on the manufacture and installation of central heating systems. Ledru serves as an example of the archetypical small and later medium-scale entrepreneur making his way in post Napoleonic France, never reaching national fame, but all the way adjusting to the various social and economic circumstances. Introduction A substantial body of literature has examined the emergent French industrialisation during the early and middle part of the 19th century.1 There ap- pears to be consensus that the French path of industrialisation differed from that of the United Kingdom and the United States of America, due to both social constraints, and retarded infrastructure development. As a further important difference the conservative attitude of French entrepreneurs has been mentioned together with a lack of investment capital for start-up companies,2 in part caused 1 Maurice Levy-Leboyer/Francois Bourguignon, The French economy in the nineteenth century: an essay in econometric analysis, Cambridge 1990; Colin Heywood, The Development of the French Economy 1750–1914, Cambridge 1995; François Caron, Histoire économique de la France, XIXe- XXe siècles, Paris 1995; Michael Stephen Smith, The Emergence of Modern Business Enterprise in France, 1800–1930, Cambridge 2006. 2 David Landes, French Entrepreneurship and Industrial Growth in the Nineteenth Century, in: The Journal of Economic History (1949),45–61. * Adresse des Autors: Univ.-Prof Dr. Dirk HR Spennemann, Institute for Land, Water and Society; Charles Sturt University; PO Box 789; Albury NSW 2640, Australia, Email: [email protected] 258 Dirk HR Spennemann by huge war reparations in consequence of the defeat of Napoleonic France.3 Innovation, however, was not stagnant, as French scientists and engineers in- vented a range of revolutionary technologies, from gas lighting and galvanised iron, to spinning machines and artificial dyes.4 While these technologies all contributed to the local and national industrial development,5 they ultimately flourished outside France. The period from the 1830s to the 70s saw the most dramatic change. In France it was an age when one scientific discovery followed the other and when inven- tions were patented at unprecedented rates.6 The 1840s and 50s, in particular, were a period of major, yet gradual transition from individual small-scale arti- sanal production to either larger factories or to organized co-operating entities. While the gradual mechanisation of production, which accelerated in the 1850s and 60s, was a major contributor, it could only have an effect if the entrepreneurs espoused new ways of manufacture and thus were willing (and had the capital) to invest in such factory infrastructure. The re-design of Paris and the concomitant building boom and the associated modernisation of construction technologies, materials and processes percolated to other urban centres. While the Central and Departmental governments played a major role in the economic development through the award of contracts, as well as the imposition (or absence) of tariffs and taxes, central to the economic development were in- dividuals who acted as agents of change: scientists, inventors and entrepreneurs. An entrepreneurʼs interest in innovation counted for naught if he was unable to raise the required capital, or if his actions contravened or were constrained by social norms. During the 1830s to 60s, France underwent a social change with the emergence of the self-made man, homo novus. In the shifting social framework, up and coming entrepreneurs, rising above their status, found themselves caught between opposing forces. The emerging industrialist bourgeoisie, which was shaping its own destiny, had to compete with to compete with, and differentiate 3 Eugene N. White, Making the French pay: The costs and consequences of the Napoleonic reparations, in: European Review of Economic History 5 (2001), 337–365. 4 See Leslie Tomory, Progressive Enlightenment: The Origins of the Gaslight Industry, 1780–1820, Cambridge 2010, 50f.; idem., Gaslight, distillation, and the Industrial Revolution, in: History of Science (2011), 397–424; Smith, The Emergence (cf. n. 1), 145, 230f.; H.W. Dickinson, A study of galvanised and corrugated sheet metal, in: Transactions of the Newcomen Society (1944), 27–36;. 5 As argued by F. Crouzet, The historiography of French economic growth in the nineteenth century, in: The Economic History Review (2003), 215–242. 6 The number of French patents issued per capita has been graphed by B. Zorina Khan, The Democratization of Invention: Patents and Copyrights in American Economic Development, 1790–1920, Cambridge 2005, 46 and shows an increase after 1825 and a rapid increase after 1845. Bourgeois Aspirations 259 themselves from the extreme manifestations of the capitalism of the nouveaux riches.7 In an age still characterised by the bipolar concepts of patrician and plebeian virtues, a new concept, that of bourgeois virtue,8 was gradually emerging, although it was not recognised as such at the time. Most businesspeople were confined with the existing social framework,9 which was further ex- acerbated by the dichotomy between Paris and regions. As businessmen held an inferior position in French society (as opposed to lawyers, administrators and the military and other notable professions), many felt a need to gain social respect- ability. While this could be facilitated by their own entrepreneurial prowess and reputation as reliable manufacturers, it required capital, which could be raised privately or on the stock market. David Landes discussed the role of the French entrepreneur and his influence on French industrial growth during the 19th century.10 Landes characterised the French entrepreneur as a small businessman acting for himself drawing credit from limited clientele of trusted friends, fundamentally conservative and in- dependent. At the same time, as businessmen held an inferior position in French society, most entrepreneurs aspired for social upwards mobility through marriage into aristocracy, either themselves or their children.. To date, we have only very few examinations of such individual careers, with Thomasʼ study of Jean-François Cail being the most detailed.11 In this he showed how a technologically-aware entrepreneur acquired wealth which he could then use to good effect to acquire patents of emerging technologies (e.g. railway locomotives) that filled demand. Further wealth and reputation followed. Not all entrepreneurs, however, were as successful even though they too had unique opportunities presented to them. Some had to overcome self-inflicted hurdles, due to bad business decisions, such as ill-advised investments or pur- chase of patents of doubtful viability, as well as due plain mismanagement of unique opportunities. Some entrepreneurs gave up, while others refocussed their 7 Fernand Braudel, Histoire économique et sociale de la France, Paris 1976. 8 Sensu D. N. McCloskey, Bourgeois Virtue, in: American Scholar (1994), 177–191. 9 André Jardin/André-Jardin Tudesq, La France des notables: La vie de la nation, 1815–1848., Nouvelle histoire de la France contemporaine, Montrouge 1973; André-Jardin Tudesq, La France des notables: Lʼévolution générale, Nouvelle histoire de la France contemporaine, Montrouge 1973. 10 Landes, French Entrepreneurship (cf. n. 2). 11 Jean-Louis Thomas, Jean-Francois Cail. Un acteur majeur de la première révolution industrielle, Paris 2004. 260 Dirk HR Spennemann activities and rebuilt their businesses and careers. The following paper is a case study of one such entrepreneur.12 Hector Ledruʼs starting point In an age where the vast majority of consumer goods were manufactured from a variety of plastics, it is hard to imagine the impact that something coarse and drab as galvanised, i. e. zinc-coated iron would have had on the nature and life-ex- pectancy of household goods and construction materials. While iron was a cheap, strong and ubiquitous material, it suffered from corrosion («rust») which severely limited its uses. The development of a commercially viable process to zinc-coat iron by Stanislas Sorel in 1837 dramatically improved corrosion resistance and thus significantly extended the use life of iron products. Not surprisingly, con- temporary authors opined that the invention «bids fair to be one of the most important of the age».13 The original patent was granted, effective 10 May 1837, to Hector Ledru and Stanislas Sorel14 and is mentioned, in that same order of names, throughout most of the legal references. While Stanislas Tranquille Modeste Sorel (1803 to 1871) is well known as an inventor, with numerous awards and medals to his name, in- cluding the Legion dʼHonneur,15 comparatively little is known about Sorelʼs col- laborator, Hector Ledru. Who was he? As will become evident, unlike Sorel who was primarily an inventor who dabbled in the commercialisation of his inven- 12 The principal data that could be drawn on are patent records as published in the «Bulletin des Lois du Royaume de France,», mentions of company registrations in the «Gazette des Tribu- naux,» listings in various address books, and the notifications in the «Bulletin de la Société d'Encouragement pour l'Industrie Nationale,» as well as commentary in the reports on the various national French industry exhibitions, which were held every five years in Paris: e.g. Cata- logue des Produits de lʼIndustrie Française, admis a lʼexposition publique dans le Palais du Louvre, Paris 1827 etc.

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