Despite the USA still being neutral in the French Revolutionary Wars, it was captured by the British and declared a legitimate prize, ruining Burnel.
Dropped off at an American port, he took the chance to visit Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Alexandria, meeting several French émigrés, including Talleyrand.
Arriving at Cayenne in October, he had to face the landowners' hostility to the central government and to the large number of men deported, victims of the Thermidorian reaction (Billaud-Varenne) and the coup of 18 Fructidor (general Pichegru, Tronsson-Ducoudray, Laffon-Ladebat, Barbé-Marbois and Job Aymé).
Barbé-Marbois attacked him in letters to his close friends in France, published 36 years later under the title Journal d'un déporté.
Denounced as a "former terrorist", a "septembriseur" and secretary to "Robespierre", he was convoked by the marquis de Vioménil, commander of the 13th military division, to whom he could demonstrate that the accusations were unfounded.