Page:Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography (1900, volume 5).djvu/63

Rh tility of the English party, and Gen. Prescott, the governor of tin- province, opposed the appointment, but he finally yielded to the demands of public opinion. Plessis was consecrated bishop in the cathedral of Quebec on 25 Jan.. 18(11, in presence of the governor and officials of the province. The death of Bishop Denault raised him to the episcopal see of Quebec in 1806. He began his administration under difficult circumstances. Efforts were made to appropriate the property of the Jesuits and of the Seminary of Montreal to the uses of the state, to organize an exclusively Protestant system of public instruction, and to give a power of veto on the nomination of priests and the erection of par- ishes to the English crown. An unsuccessful attempt was made to prevent him from taking the oath of allegiance in his rapacity of bishop of Quebec. In 1810 Gov. Craig sent a messenger to England to complain of the bishop's conduct ; but the authorities adopted a conciliatory policy, Craig was recalled, and Sir George Prevost was sent to replace him. The new governor had seM-ral interviews with the bishop, who refused to make any concessions, and finally all his demands in behalf of the Roman Catholic church in Canada were conceded. The part that he took durinir the war of 1812 in exciting the loyalty and warlike spirit of the French Canadians gained him the good-will of England. He received letters from the government recognizing his title and jurisdiction as Roman Catholic bishop of Quebec, and granting him a pension of a thousand louis a year with a seat in the legislative council. Bishop Plessis was the first to introduce the gospel into the vast terri- tory of Red river, and founded religious and edu- cational institutions in I'pper Canada and the provinces along the Gulf of St. Lawrence. His great work was the organization of his church in Canada. In 1818 he was nominated archbishop of Quebec, and the rest of British America was formed into four suffragan sees. In the legislative council he was an ardent defender of the religious and civil rights of his co-religionists, and in 1*22. when the English government tried to force a union bet ween Upper and Lower Canada, his energetic resistance counted for much in the failure of the plan. The reformation and development of Canadian educa- tion formed the great end of his life. lie resisted successfully efforts to weaken the force of French- Canadian nationality through the medium of a system of popular education. The colleges of Nicolet and St. Hyacinth were founded through his encouragement, and schools and academies were established in every direction. Hespent histimeand income in searching out young men and educating them at his own expense. Some of the most emi- nent men of Canada owed their training to him. The passage of the education law of 1824 was to a freat extent his work, and his correspondence with jord ISathurst on this subject proves him a man of great diplomatic force.

PLESSYS, or PLESSIS, Paciflcns de, French missionary, b. in France in the latter part of the 10th century ; d. in Quebec in the first part of the 17th. He was one of the four Recollet mission- aries that accompanied Champlain to Canada in 1015. and was employed to instruct the children of the French and Indians that had settled at Three Rivers. His influence over the Indians enabled him to render a great service to the French colony. In 161* a conspiracy wa.- formed to cut off all the French, and 8(10 Indians assembled near Three Rivers to carry out the plot. Brother Pacificus was warned by a friendly siagc. He gained over some of the chiefs, and with their help prevailed on the others to agree to a treaty of peace, which he undertook to negotiate with Champlain. He sailed with the latter for France the same year, but afterward returned to Canada. His body was dis- covered near the vault, of Champlain in 1866.

PLEVILLE LE PELEY, Georgres René (play-veel), French naval officer, b. in Granville, 26 June, 1726; d. in Paris, 2 Oct.. 1805. He ran away from school when he was twelve years old, and enlisted as a cabin-boy at Havre, under the name of Du Yivier. on a ship bound for the Newfoundland fisheries. At the beginning of the war of 1742 he joined a privateer as lieutenant, and did good ser- vice off the coast of Canada. In 1746 he was taken prisoner by the English near Louisburg, but he was soon released and entered the royal navy as sub-lieutenant under his uncle, Commander Tilly Le Peley. During the war of 1755 he was again employed in Canadian waters, and, as commander of the brig " Hirondelle," forced three ships to sur- render in 1759, after a desperate action. In 1770, being stationed in Marseilles, he saved an English frigate which had grounded on a sand-bank in a hurricane. The English admiralty presented him with a purse of $10.000. and when afterward, dur- ing the war of American independence, his two sons were captured by the English, the admiralty issued orders to release them. In 1778 he became second captain of the "Languedoc," the flag-ship of Admiral d'Estaing, and during the gale that dis- persed the French fleet off Newport he saved his vessel. After serving creditably in the attack on St. Lucia, and participating in the capture of St. Vincent and Grenada in the West Indies, he urged D'Estaing, whose confidence he had gained, to utilize the momentary French superiority on the sea in undertaking some great enterprise for the American cause, and was charged with convoying captured English vessels to the United States. "The Baltimore merchants were so satisfied with their dealings with him that, after the siege of Savan- nah, when D'Estaing opened negotiations for a loan of $60,000 to repair his vessels, they consented to advance the sum upon the personal security of Pleville le Peley. This conduct is the more niem- orable when it is remembered that Lafayette, the acknowledged owner of a large fortune, was able to raise only $10.000 in 1781 from those same mer- chants. In the assault on Savannah, 9 Oct., 1779, he commanded a company, and was conspicuous in his efforts to reform the column when it lost its way in a swamp and became exposed to the British batteries. In 1780 he served under De Guichen, and he fought also at Yorktown under De Grasse in October, 1781. After the defeat of that admiral. 12 April, 1782, he rejoined Yau- dreuilles. and served under him till the conclusion of the campaign. He was promoted commodore in 1 7M!. and employed in several cruises in North America. Adopting in 1789 the principles of the French revolution, he was appointed minister plenipotentiary to Ancona in 1795, and afterward given a like mission to Corfu. In 1797 he was pro- moted rear-admiral, and in March, 1798, vice- admiral. He held also the naval portfolio from April till July, 17IIS. was rivaled a senator in 17i)9, and given the grand cross of the order of the Legion of honor by Napoleon in 1*04.

PLUMB, Joseph, pioneer, b. in Paris, Oneida co.. N. Y.. 27 June. 1791 ; d. in Cattaraugus. N. Y., 25 May. 1*70. He settled in Predonia, N. Y.. in 1816, and after removing to New York city, and subsequently to Ithaca and Geneva, he finally established himself in Gowanda, Erie co., N. Y., on the border of the Cattaraugus reservation of Seneca