Don Diego Morphy Last Will and Testament August 27, 1813

In the City of New Orleans, on the 27th day of August of the year 1813, and 36 of the Independence of the United States of America, before me Pedro Pedeschaux, Notary Public of the State of Louisiana, and of the undersigned, Don Diego Morphy, Consul for the Catholic Majesty, says: that finding himself sick in bed but in the perfect exercise of his mental faculties, fearing death, natural to all creatures, and its time also uncertain, and foreseeing his, he wants to make his testament and order his last will, for which reason he dictates literally as follows:

In the first place I declare my name and surname to be Don Diego Morphy, a native of the city of Malaga, legitimate child of Don Miguel Morphy and Doña Maria Porro: the first of them being now dead.

Item: I declare to be a catholic, apostolic, roman Christian, and as such I commend my soul to God, praying that it may find rest with the selected ones; I bequeath my body to the earth from which it was formed, to be placed whenever I should die, where by testamentary executors may decide, as I leave to their discretion my funeral and burial.

Item: I order that three masses for the dead be said in praying for the rest of my soul.

Item: I declare to have been married in first nuptials to Doña Maria Creagh, from which marriage I have three children, named: Don Diego, 23 years of age; Doña Elena Diego, 17 years; and Doña Matilde Morphy, 18 years of age.

Item: I declare to have been married in second nuptials to Doña Luisa Peire, from which marriage I have 5 children, named: Don Alonzo, 15 years of age; Don Tomas Augusto [Ernest], 6 years; Doña Ana Esmeralda, 3 years; Doña Magdalena Antonietta, 15 months; and one girl of two months who has not yet been named, because she has not yet been baptized [Emma, who married D. O’Hinks, collector of the Port of New Orleans]; and all of them I declare to be my legitimate children and of my above mentioned wife.

Item: I appoint and name for guardian of my minor children my above mentioned wife; and for curator ad litem Don Pablo Francisco Gallion Preval; relieving them from giving security.

Item: I appoint and name as my testamentary executors and trustees the above mentioned Don Pablo Francisco Gallion Preval and Doña Luisa Peire, my wife, to whom I confer and grant all power as may be required in law to the end that after my death and without any intervention of any court and obligation to give security, they proceed to administer my properties, making an inventory and valuation of them, appointing appraisers, forming the account of the testamentary executors and that of division of properties, and finally, doing all that may be necessary for the liquidation and winding up of my estate, till presenting the whole to the proper court for its approbation; for all which I extend the one year of testamentary execution to the time that they may need; as this is my express and last will.

Item: I order that my mentioned testamentary executors proceed to make separately and in the presence of a Notary Public the Inventory of the papers and other documents belonging to the Spanish Government, which are put aside in a desk, and that having done so, they remit them to the Spanish Minister. I omit all recommendation on the exactitude of this inventory, as I have full confidence in their sufficiency. Item: I appoint and name as my sole and universal heirs my above mentioned 8 children: Don Diego, Doña Elena, Doña Matilde, Don Alonso, Don Tomas Augusto, Doña Ana Esmeralda Ciriaca, Doña Magdalena Antonieta Morphy, and the girl that is not yet baptized; so that after my death, they may have and inherit my properties in equal shares to use them as their own, with God’s blessing and mine also, and that is my will.

Finally, I repeal and annul any other testaments, codicils, powers or testamentary dispositions that I may have made previously, verbally or in writing, as I invalidate them, granting in their stead in the most legal form, this expression of my last will.

I the Notary having read this writing to the testator, in high and intelligible voice in the presence of documentary witnesses, he states that he affirms and ratifies its contents, as it is well and faithfully written in the same words in which he dictated it; and signed it with the three witnesses, who are Don Joseph Rufinaco, Don Pedro Collet and Don Juan Longrre, present neighbors.

[RESEARCH NOTE: from the style, which is not how a lawyer who was a native English speaker would draft a will, this would appear to be a literal translation into English, probably from Spanish given the titles of Don and Doña apparently retained from the original and the spelling of his French wife's first name as Luisa. Louisiana, previously French, became a possession of Spain a after the Seven Years' War by the Treaty of Paris of 1763. It was recovered by France in 1800 and sold to the United States in 1803. This was much larger than the present state of Louisiana. See Louisiana purchase (Wikipedia) ]

Sources

• Lawson, David "Paul Morphy, The Pride and Sorrow of Chess". (1976) McKay. ISBN 978-0-679-13044-4. According to the Wikipedia article on the chess player Paul Morphy, grandson of Diego, the only English-language book-length biography of Morphy, correcting numerous historical errors that have cropped up. A version edited by Thomas Aiello and published by the University of Lousiana at Lafayette Press in 2010 is available on Kindle. The will is in the Appendix, item no. 3.