M.V. Fort Richepanse The M.V. Fort Richepanse was a steel refrigerated cargo vessel completed in 1949 by Alexander Stephen and Sons of Govan, Scotland for Cie. Generale Transatlantique, Le Havre. This "bananier ("banana carrier") was 383.7 feet long and 52.4 feet wide with a gross weight of 5038 tonnes. The ship was named for a fortress in Basse Terre, Guadeloupe that was named after General Antoine Richepance who was sent by Bonaparte to re-establish slavery, which had been abolished during political turmoil resulting from the French Revolution. Today the fort is named Fort Delgrés after a martyred leader of the resistance to the pro-slavery forces. In 1965 the ship was sold to the Plate Shipping company and renamed Maronia. In 1972 she was sold again and rechristened the Golfo Degli Angeli. In 1985 she was broken up.
According to the website Photographers of America and the Antilles (1840-1944), P. Candalen was a professional photographer whose views of Guadeloupe and its dependencies were well-known. Those images as well as others of of day laborers and sugar cane industry workers were often published on postcards. The example above is typical in that it is signed in the lower left corner, with captions in French and English (in this case on the back of the post card).
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