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Indeed, the name "Henri" seemed like some rare jewel which was bequeathed from father to son in never-failing regularity, for there was always a "Henri" among the Fourdriniers from 1575 until 1766. It was during the lifetime of this Henri Fourdrinier, the son of Admiral Fourdrinier, that the family fled from France to Groningen, in Holland.
Of course it is possible that he did not leave France until 1685, when the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes took place. But at whatever date he actually went, his reasons for going were certainly no small ones. For more than a hundred years the Huguenots and the Fourdriniers were noted Huguenots had found France more and more an impossible country to live in.
Biography there occurs the name of Peter Fourdrinier, of whom no mention at all is made in the Miscellanea Genealogica et Heraldica, amongst the record of the other Fourdriniers. It is therefore not very clear to what branch of the family he belonged. But as far as I can make out, he and Paul Fourdrinier seem to have come to England about 1720.
Then, in 1814, the Emperor Alexander of Russia promised to pay them L700 per annum during the space of ten years if he could use two of their paper-making machines. Of this sum they saw not a penny. In 1840, Parliament voted the sum of L7000 to the Fourdriniers as a tardy recognition of the great service they had rendered their adopted country by their invention.
To me, everything seems to point to the fact that the Fourdriniers and Grolleaus were in some way connected, either in friendship or relationship. First, we find them resident at Caen: later, at Groningen; and then again, later on still, members of both families marry at Wandsworth, and there both Paul Fourdrinier's wife and her sister, who married the son of a Captain Lloyd, are buried.
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