Château Pichon-Baron: Pichon is Divided
Although Jean-Pierre de Pichon had been barely thirty years old at the time of his death, he had sired five children, and it was the eldest, Joseph (born 1755), who inherited the title and the estate. Of the other four children two died in infancy, although one named Jean-Jacques and another Jeanne Germaine lived until 1811 and 1814. Joseph de Pichon-Longueville only took over the running of the estate after the death of his mother Marie, and so it was only in 1777 that he assumed this responsibility.
In 1784 Joseph married Marguerite Rosalie Sophie de Narbonne Pelet d’Anglade, and together they also had five children. It was Joseph and Marguerite who held tenure during the French Revolution, a process which saw him incarcerated for a short period of time, but ultimately released. He was also the last member of the Pichon family who held sway over all the vines, as upon his death in 1850 the estate was divided between his children, the old rule of primogeniture by which he had inherited the estate having been replaced by the Napoleonic laws of inheritance, which determined that the estate of the deceased had to be divided equally between all conceivable beneficiaries.
