John James Audubon (April 26, 1785 – January 27, 1851) was a French-American ornithologist, naturalist, hunter, and painter. He painted, catalogued, and described the birds of North America in a manner far superior to what had gone before. Born in the French colony of Saint Domingue (now Haiti) and raised in France as a youth, in his embrace of America and his outsize personality and achievements, he represented the new American people of the United States.
During the American Revolution, Jean Audubon was imprisoned by the British. After his release, he helped the American cause. A slave rebellion in Saint-Domingue in 1788 convinced Jean Audubon to sell his holdings and return to France with his French son and infant mixed-race daughter, who was very fair (she was the daughter of Sanitte).
The boy was raised by his father and stepmother Anne Moynet Audubon in Nantes, France, who formally adopted both the children in 1794.They renamed the boy Jean-Jacques Fougère Audubon. When Audubon at age 18 boarded ship for immigration to the United States in 1803, he changed his name to an anglicized form: John James Audubon software escrow.
