Etienne Cabet was a French communist. He was born in 1788 at Dijon and died in 1856 at St Louis. He went to Paris, became an advocat, and was for some time editor of the Journal de Jurisprudence. As a result of his ideas a colony was founded at Nauvoo, Illinois of mainly Parisian working-men. Research Etienne Cabet
The Icarians were followers of the 19th-century French social reformer Etienne Cabet, whose book 'Voyage en Icarie' published in 1840 describes his idea of a perfect commonwealth. Influenced by the British social reformer Robert Owen, Cabet wrote that this ideal community would have progressive taxation and compulsory work. Moreover, all property would be held in common, and all products of labour would be distributed according to need. The Icarians tried to put these theories into practice in the USA, making their first effort in 1848, in Fannin County, Texas. When this colony failed, a second one, under Cabet, was founded at Nauvoo, Illinois, in 1849. For a short time, the colony prospered, but because of internal dissension, Cabet was expelled in 1856 and died the same year in Saint Louis. Some of Cabet's followers settled in Cheltenham, Iowa, and this colony lasted until 1864. Other emigrants from Nauvoo established a settlement near Corning, Iowa, in 1860, which, with some interruptions, lasted until 1895. There was another
Icarian community in Cloverdale, California, from 1881 to 1887. Research Icarians
Icaria was a communistic settlement founded in 1856, in Iowa, by the followers of the Frenchman, Etienne Cabet. Etienne Cabet in 1848, had persuaded a number of persons to settle with him in the Red River country of Texas. This colony failed because of Etienne Cabet's extravagant ideas. In 1850 the colony moved to Nauvoo in Illinois, a deserted village of the Mormons. Thence they moved again in 1856 (Etienne Cabet dying that same year at New Orleans), to their last settlement near Corning, Iowa, calling it the Icaria Commune, in reminiscence of Cabet's book, Icarie. Most of the people, less than 100 in all at the end of the 19th century, were French, though there were a few Germans. Research Icaria
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Research Etienne Cabet
