Prince Murat House - St. Augustine, FL
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lazyCachers
N 29° 53.384 W 081° 18.728
17R E 469862 N 3306607
Prince Achille Murat, nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, is said to have boarded at the house in 1824 which is located on the NW corner of St. George Street and Bridge St. in the Old St. Augustine Village in St. Augustine, Florida.
Waymark Code: WM486H
Location: Florida, United States
Date Posted: 07/20/2008
Views: 73
One of the oldest surviving Colonial structures in St. Augustine, this coquina dwelling is named after its most famous inhabitant. Prince Achille Murat, nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, is said to have boarded at the house in 1824 when it was owned by the Canova family who owned and occupied most of this block from 1821 to 1877.
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This is one of the oldest surviving Colonial Houses in St. Augustine and the oldest in the village and is of native coquina construction. It was purchased in 1821 by Antonio Canova (not the sculptor) and takes its name from its most famous occupant: Prince Achille Murat, who was a nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte. He was also the Crown Prince of Naples and moved to America in 1824.
He stayed in this house for several months before moving on to Tallahassee where he became a businessman and politician. The house is now furnished with Napoleonic antiques and artifacts such as a beautiful sleigh bed draped with white and red muslin curtains.
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Perhaps St. Augustine’s most celebrated French citizen, and undoubtedly one of its most unusual residents was Charles Louis Napoleon Achille Murat, the crown prince of Naples. The famous prince resembled his powerful uncle, Napoleon Bonaparte, and was known for shared mannerisms as well. Murat came to St. Augustine in the spring of 1824, arriving in America only the year before, in flight from the hardships brought on by the fall of the Napoleonic Empire, and continued to live in the city sporadically from this date through the 1830’s.
In town, Murat quickly became woven into the social fabric of St. Augustine. He joined the Masonic lodge, became a bondsman of the city treasurer and dabbled in local politics until he was involved in controversy when accused of voting fraudulently in an election.
Locally, he was known for his peculiar behaviors. According to St. Augustine folklore, Murat beat the Florida heat and insects by lowering himself into the Matanzas River seated in a chair and with mosquito netting on his head. Another oddity, as a neighbor once noted, was his obsession with the ‘eatibility of the whole animal tribe.’ During meals, Murat was known to consume baked turkey buzzard, boiled owl, roasted crow, stewed alligator, lizards and rattlesnakes – a far cry from the prince’s supposed regal manner. Also noted was his aversion to bath water and his reluctance to change clothes.
While living in New Orleans and Tallahassee, Murat studied and wrote about law and government, publishing A Moral and Political Sketch of the United States of North America (1832) and several other works. After unsuccessfully pursuing the Bonaparte inheritance in Europe in the late 1830’s, Murat and his wife Catherine, relative of George Washington and the first American to become a princess, retired to their Tallahassee plantation. There, Murat’s health declined and he died April 15, 1847 at the early age of 46. He is buried in the Episcopal cemetery in Tallahassee, alongside his wife, who died 20 years later.
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