Talk:Jean Baptiste Baudreau II

Breaking wheel
I removed the information that he was the only person to ever be executed in the Americas by the breaking wheel.

Indeed the article for breaking wheel states that "the breaking wheel was used to execute eleven slaves in Louisiana who revolted against their masters between 1730 and 1754" and gives a source: the Espy file. In addition to that, the fr article cites a Jean Haudecoeur, "executed on 27 mai 1690 in Québec city in New France after being accused of the murder of a merchant from Montréal. He was strangled before receiving the strokes which broke his limbs and exposed on the wheel for twenty-four hours." How nice are these things really. Place Clichy (talk) 11:48, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

Letter regarding his execution
A very lengthy letter, written on the occasion of Baudreau's execution, has been excerpted (complete with associated footnotes) from some source and placed within this article. The inclusion of this letter is inappropriate for several reasons: Please discuss this matter before restoring the letter's text and its footnotes. WikiDan61 ChatMe!ReadMe!! 19:32, 13 March 2014 (UTC)
 * 1) It is a primary source that, without the benefit of reasoned and well-educated analysis, is meaningless to the average reader.  This is why we rely on secondary sources that allow the primary sources to be filtered and interpreted, and for that interpretation to undergo a proper editorial process, before being used in Wikipedia.
 * 2) The text of the letter is certainly in the public domain, but the footnotes almost certainly are not.  The source of the quote appears to be the 1984 book Mississippi Provincial Archives French Dominion.