Adolph Achille Gereau

Who was Adolph Achille Gereau?

Adolph Achille Gereau, or Adolph Gereau, was a United States Virgin Islands civil servant who was the principal founder of the Republican Club and one of the committee of founders of the Republican Party of the United States Virgin Islands.

Gereau was born December 20, 1893 in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas, then Danish West Indies, and died May 24, 1994 in Christiansted, St. Croix. His father was Mederic Gereau, a boat captain and steam engine mechanic from the island of Guadeloupe, French West Indies. His mother was Diana Beale of the island of Anegada in the British Virgin Islands. Although mostly Black, Adolph Gereau was adopted at the age of 11 in 1905 by a white family resident in Charlotte Amalie, the Ffrenches. Marie Leonides Galiber Ffrench and her husband Gustav Augustus Ffrench operated a commercial warehouse and stevedoring contracting firm. Ffrenches second wife was Esther Levy-Maduro who, though a Catholic herself, was of an illustrious Sephardic Jewish family. The Gereau and Ffrench families have been in communication since that time. One of Gereau's foster brothers, Leopold Adelbert Augustus Ffrench, moved to Mexico and a grandson Leonardo I. Ffrench serving in the diplomatic corps eventually became the Director General of the Institute for Mexicans Abroad of the Secretaria de Relaciones Exteriores. Adolph Gereau's wife was Annetta Brewster Gereau of black, Asian Indian and white descent, a seamstress and herbal healer active in the Episcopal Church. Her sister Louise Brewster Siebenhoven was grandmother of Michael S. Fields at one point President of Oracle USA. The Gereaus had three children Iva Liston Gereau, Edith Mercedes Gereau and Gustave Adolph Gereau.