Antoine Zacharie Adrien d’Épinay was born on Isle de France on 6 February 1794. Barrister, banker, sugar estate owner and newspaper editor, he was the uncontested leader of the French inhabitants in the newly founded British colony of Mauritius.
Adrien d’Épinay started his career as a lawyer in Port Louis in 1816 and became a prominent political figure when he was 27 in 1821.
In early 1822, D’Épinay was part of a private militia which captured Malagasy escapee and political prisoner Ratsitatanina before the British colonial soldiers could find him.
In 1824 he took a leading role in the controversy between traders and planters over the reduction of the duty of entry on Mauritian sugar into England.
In 1827, D’Epinay founded the Colonial Committee which express object was to “conciliate the views of His Majesty’s Government with the interests of the colony. The Comité Colonial consisted of agricultural societies and was particularly active in urging the adoption of a steam-power in sugar factories.
In 1829, he was a founding member of the Société d’Histoire Naturelle de l’Ile Maurice which gathered about 30 naturalists of the island.
Adrien d’Épinay made representations to the British Government in London in 1831 and in 1833 on behalf of sugar planters. He fought against British slave amelioration laws and successfully campaigned for slaveowners to be compensated for the loss of their slaves due to the abolition of slavery in 1835.
He also secured the right of colonists to serve on the Legislative Council, the abolition of monopoly, the establishing of a police force, the prosecution of abuse related to alcohol, and the lifting of censorship of the press.
Adrien d’Épinay co-founded the first ‘independent’ and daily newspaper in Mauritius, newspaper Le Cernéen, whose first issue appeared on 14 February 1832.
In 1832, Adrien D’Epinay succeeded in obtaining the capital necessary from British Associates for the establishment of the Mauritius Bank.
Adrien d’Epinay became the owner of the Mon Plaisir estate in 1836. He had the ambition to devote time to horticulture, but he passed away three years later in 1839 and was not able to complete his project.