A Jersey township will create a public park on the lands of a former royal estate.

On top of an uncovered windward cliff contemplating the confluence of Crosswicks Creek and the Delaware River in Bordentown, Joseph Bonaparte - Napoleon's older brother, former king of Spain, self-exiled diplomat and Philadelphia resident - built a homestead named Point Breeze that was a marvel of early 19th-century America. Only the White House was larger than Bonaparte's first dwelling on Point Breeze, where his collections of paintings, books, and birds were also among the finest and largest in the young United States. Swan boats glided across the half-mile-long lake he had created. Tulip poplars rose to the sky from the carefully chosen "picturesque" landscape he created and whose style he helped popularize. And from the parking lot, transportation tunnels allowed horse-drawn wagons to bring food and luxury goods shipped from Philadelphia by river to Bonaparte's sprawling set of homes and gardens.

The estate's grand structures have long since disappeared

in fact, only the gardener's pavilion, built around 1820, still stands. But 55 acres of this outstanding piece of Burlington County real estate now belongs to the public. The $4.6 million purchase agreement, concluded Dec. 18, was finalized by the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, the town of Bordentown and D&R Greenway Land Trust, a nonprofit land conservation organization with the Catholic Order of the Theological Word of God, which has owned the site since 1941.

"For Bordentown, this is a once-in-a-lifetime event. "

- said Mayor James Lynch, who was born and raised in the historic one-square-mile, 3,800-population town founded in 1682, similar to Philadelphia. A $1.6 million grant to Bordentown will allow the city to use a cluster of well-maintained mid-20th century buildings built over the years by the Order of the Word of God to create a new city building, police station headquarters and community center.

• D&R Greenway Land Trust now owns and will restore the gardener's pavilion
• plans to recreate the vegetable gardens that flourished during Bonaparte's stay at Point Breeze between 1816 and 1839.

The remaining 50 acres of fields, dense forests, wagon paths and steep bluffs will become part of New Jersey's state park system; in time, it will feature informational signage, audio tours and walking trails that allow glimpses into tunnel entrances, bridge ruins (there were seven), sand staircases and water views.

"I can't tell you in words how proud I am to pass this on to our residents and future generations," Lynch said. - "It would never have happened if the stars hadn't aligned. "

D&R Greenway Land Trust President Linda Mead expressed the same satisfaction with the historic site, which is the southern entrance to the Abbott Marsh between Bordentown and Trenton. "This wetlands area was the most important Native American settlement east of the Mississippi," she said.

In recent years, developers have looked at the Word of God property as a potential site for a large warehouse like those popping up elsewhere along the New Jersey Turnpike and the I-295 corridor in Central and Southern New Jersey. But an opposing group of local historians, preservationists and environmentalists was determined to keep Point Breeze from becoming another distribution center.

"It's a unique place," said Doug Kiowski, vice president of the Bordentown Historical Society.Only a few places in this country can boast that "a king once lived there. "

Peter Tucci, one of the place's long-term advocates, is a Philadelphia attorney and New Hope resident.He began collecting letters and other materials from Joseph Bonaparte in the 1990s and helped organize a symposium there in 2008 that included Pierre Vimont, then the French ambassador to the United States. The event drew about 300 people and sparked interest in the future of the place.

-You can see why the former king chose this place for his home, said Tucci, who in 2005 was appointed Chevalier (ritter) of the French Legion of Honor, an order established by Napoleon Bonaparte. - Joseph Bonaparte would spend about $50 million to build his first home on Point Breeze, Tucci added.

Joseph Bonaparte and other family members emigrated to the United States after 1815 when Napoleon, who had previously proclaimed himself Emperor of France, abdicated. Joseph was wealthy, educated, and acquainted with humble French immigrants such as Philadelphia banker Stephen Girard.

He hosted Girard and other notables such as Francis Hopkinson, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, naturalist John James Audubon, and Thomas Paine at Point Breeze. With its library - saved from a fire in 1820 by local volunteers who also saved the paintings - and its art collection, Point Breeze nurtured the culture of a new nation. And its landscape design on what was originally an 1,800-acre estate also influenced future public spaces.

- Landscape design in the 18th century was formal and geometric, but in the early 19th century a more natural, picturesque approach began to creep in, said Monmouth University professor Richard Veith. - Point Breeze was a big estate on the American road between New York and Philadelphia, and everyone saw and commented on it. Joseph Bonaparte was a pioneer.

Weit also organized a three-year expedition to Point Breeze that resulted in the discovery of 23,000 artifacts - the final report is still pending - and said the site is one of the most archaeologically significant in the state.

- It's wonderful that a group of people were able to come together and form this great alliance that allowed them to find unconventional solutions and save one of the region's great treasures," he said.

Tucci is especially happy to see Point Breeze preserved because he sees it as having "not only regional, but national and international significance. "

After all, Joseph Bonaparte helped pr negociation rest the commitment between the United States and France signed on his French estate of Mortfontaine in 1800.

The priest Martin Padavani, 89, who belongs to the Society of Theologians of the Word of God and spent 60 years here before selling it, said he was sad to leave but pleased that "the places where I must have planted 50 trees" would be preserved. - "We've always said that if we ever leave this beautiful place, it should be given to the people of New Jersey. "