I’ll be watching the movie Napoleon with lovely Dianne this week, all the while thinking about the first Professor of French at Austin College nearly 150 years ago. And also, the Professor of French during my years at AC. Dr. Bernice Melvin.
Dr. Melvin passed in 2020. From an Austin College notice announcing her passing:
“Bernice joined the faculty in 1980, and in 1984 was installed in the Margarett Root Brown Chair of Foreign Languages and Literatures. She served for several years as the Dean of Humanities and, later, as Director of the Johnson Center for Faculty Development and Excellence in Teaching. Giving attention to the scholarly work and accomplishments of her faculty colleagues was always a priority of her work. As one colleague wrote, ‘Bernice defined the very best aspects of what a small liberal arts college could be, and she taught (her colleagues) by example.’”
Austin College is an historic Presbyterian school, which means its ties with similar Presbyterian schools are strong. Presbyterian schools know Presbyterian schools after all, and there’s one you should know about: Davidson College in North Carolina.
The list of AC faculty with ties to Davidson both before and after their days in Sherman is a long one. And those ties began with a man named Dr. Wilson Gaines Richardson. After receiving his Ph.D. in languages, Dr. Richardson taught at AC from 1878 to 1881. Like our dearly departed Dr. Bernice Melvin, Dr. Richardson was a professor of French.
Alongside Dr. W. D. Vinson, Richardson was one of only two faculty members at Austin College in the 1870s. Richardson had left a faculty position at Davidson College for AC in 1878; his colleague Vinson later departed AC for a faculty position at Davidson.
It was an era when Austin College had just moved to Sherman and was finally establishing a solid academic foundation. From “Austin College: A Sesquicentennial History,” by Dr. Light Cummins:
“Both of these men were stellar educators of great reputation. Their appearance at Austin College constituted a new era for the school since they were the first professionally trained educators with graduate degrees to serve on its faculty. Richarson was the first Austin College faculty member with an earned Doctor of Philosophy degree to be on the teaching staff.”
Before teaching French at AC, Richardson taught French at Davidson; he joined their faculty in 1866. The study of French at Davidson was alive and well in 1866, thanks to a man named Peter Stuart Ney. In addition to teaching French, Ney also created the official Davidson seal at the school’s founding in 1837. The first Davidson graduates received diplomas with the Ney seal, which is still in use today.
Peter Stuart Ney’s pre-Davidson past was a mysterious one. He arrived from Europe in the 1810s and made the Presbyterian community surrounding Davidson his home. As a community leader he was accepted, albeit cautiously for someone with so many past question marks.
Rumors began to spread that his past involved ties to a well-known historical figure: Napoleon Bonaparte. On his deathbed in 1846, Peter Stuart Ney was asked if this connection was true. His last words made clear that the answer was indeed yes. “I will not die with a lie on my lips! I am Marshall Ney of France!”
Marshal Michel Ney was one of Napoleon’s most trusted military commanders; Napoleon referred to him as “the bravest of the brave.” Ney played pivotal roles in conquests throughout Europe, including the calamitous invasion of Russia. He sided with Napoleon after the emperor’s return from exile but was defeated at Waterloo. After this final fall, a restored King Louis XVIII executed Ney by firing squad.
Because of Michel Ney’s death in Paris, he and the Peter Stuart Ney of Davidson cannot be one and the same. Or can they? A local Davidson legend says perhaps they are the same person:
“The rumored identity of Ney trickled out. By the 1880s it had become a local legend. The idea that a hidden Napoleonic marshal lived, labored, and worshipped among Rowan County’s Presbyterians was too interesting to dismiss outright. In 1895, James Weston gathered the evidence into a book and to his surprise Weston began to think the strange legend might actually be true.”
“When Napoleon died in 1821, Peter Stewart Ney apparently tried to kill himself. He claimed to be Marshal Ney on his deathbed. Ney had Huguenot (reformation, Presbyterian-like) ancestors. The Duke of Wellington’s open hatred for Louis XVIII and respect for Ney figure prominently in Weston’s surprisingly sophisticated theory for how Ney survived a feigned execution.”
The Ridley Scott blockbuster “Napoleon” opens nationwide this week. I’ll be catching the movie with lovely Dianne. The part of Marshal Michel Ney is played by actor John Hollingworth. I’ll be watching Hollingworth very closely.
Why? Because if anything, Roo Tales are fun historical ties that require a small suspension of belief. And if we suspend just enough, we might convince ourselves that the first Austin College Professor of French honed his craft in a North Carolina foreign language program established by Marshall Michel Ney, the right-hand man of Napoleon Bonaparte.
Like Napoleon, little Austin College may be short in stature. But like Napoleon, the school’s ties to history are a “fait accompli.” How I do wish Dr. Bernice Melvin, AC professor of French, were still with us to both enjoy the movie Napoleon and read this little French “Conte de Kangourou.”
https://www.austincollege.edu/in-memoriam-bernice-melvin
