Jean-Pierre Pescatore
Jean-Pierre Pescatore (11 March 1793 - 9 December 1855) was a Luxembourgish-French businessman, banker, art collector, and philanthropist.
Born in Luxembourg City as the fourth child of Dominique Pescatore, a merchant in the city, and Marie-Madelaine Geschwind, he came from a family of colonial commodity traders, originally from Ticino, who had settled in Luxembourg in 1736. In 1811, at the age of 18, he enlisted in the army of Napoleon. Promoted to Maréchal des logis in 1813, after several campaigns he deserted and returned to Luxembourg in 1814.
He then entered the world of business and took to selling tobacco like his father and grandfather. Together with his brother Antoine, he was the director from 1814 to 1816 and then again from 1822 to 1844 of the tobacco factory in the Fishmarket neighbourhood which had been founded by their grandfather Jules Joseph Antoine Pescatore.
In 1816 he married Marguerite Beving, and settled with her in Luxembourg City. She died of illness, and without children, in 1821.
In 1837 Pescatore met the Swiss Anne-Cathérine Weber, with whom he lived together and whom he married in 1851 in the church (but not civilly), in order to render this relation acceptable to the public. Due to this confusion there were arguments after his death about the inheritance.
In 1817 he received long-term permission from the French authorities to import Havana tobacco to France. Pescatore's good relations with the Régie française des tabacs, the Belgian annexation of the French-speaking part of Luxembourg in 1839, and Luxembourg's accession to the Zollverein (the German customs union), exposing Luxembourgish tobacco manufacturing to strong competition from abroad, were damaging to Pescatore's business interests in the Grand-Duchy. He therefore established himself in Paris, in order to concentrate solely on the French markets, and would become a naturalised French citizen on 3 September 1846. In addition to trading in tobacco, he also dabbled in finance, founding the bank "J.P. Pescatore et Cie" on 27 December 1844 with the Austrian Frédéric Adolphe Grieninger.
On 11 August 1844 he bought the Château de la Celle Saint-Cloud from the Viscount de Morel-Vindé's heirs. In 1849 he also bought a vineyard at Médoc, near Giscours. In 1852 he became mayor of La Celle-Saint-Cloud, which he remained until his death.
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