BOOK SIX:  The Acadian Immigrants of Louisiana

 

INTRODUCTION

BOOK ONE:        French Acadia

BOOK TWO:        British Nova Scotia

BOOK THREE:     Families, Migration, and the Acadian "Begats"

BOOK FOUR:      The French Maritimes

BOOK FIVE:         The Great Upheaval

BOOK SEVEN:     French Louisiana

BOOK EIGHT:      A New Acadia

BOOK NINE:        The Bayou State

BOOK TEN:          The Louisiana Acadian "Begats"

BOOK ELEVEN:  The Non-Acadian "Cajun" Families of South Louisiana

BOOK TWELVE:  Acadians in Gray

 

The Acadians Immigrants of Louisiana

The fate of an Acadian family during Le Grand Dérangement was determined largely by how long its members had settled in the colony, and where they settled in greater Acadia.  Generally, the older the family, the more dispersed it became by 1755, and the more scattered it was then the more scattered it would become in the decades that followed.  This held true for many of the Acadian families that settled in Louisiana.  From February 1764 into the early 1800s, nearly 2,900 individuals bearing over 150 Acadian surnames made their way to the lower Mississippi valley from every corner of the Acadian diaspora:  21 from Georgia in 1764; 600 from Halifax and French St.-Domingue in 1765; 600 more from Maryland in 1766, 1767, 1768, and 1769; nearly 1,600 from France in 1785; 18 from Île St.-Pierre in 1788; and dozens more from Canada, the French Antilles, and Haiti via Cuba into the early 1800s.  Every Acadian family, large or small, had its own special tale to tell of how it had endured the Great Upheaval before it finally found refuge in Louisiana.340 

Allain

By 1755, descendants of Louis Allain, the blacksmith and sawmill owner, and Marguerite Bourg could be found not only in the Annapolis River valley, where Louis had done so well, but also at Minas, at Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean. 

When the British rounded up the Acadians at Chignecto and the trois-rivières in the fall of 1755, Pierre Allain's oldest son Louis le jeune and his wife Anne, daughter of Jacques Léger and Anne Amireau, fled from Petitcoudiac north to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they took refuge with hundreds of other Acadians.  Over the next few years, they made their way up to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  When a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked the French stronghold, now a major Acadian refuge, in late June 1760, Louis le jeune and his family escaped another roundup.  After the war, his descendants could be found at Bouctouche, Miramichi, Néguac, and Caraquet in present-day eastern New Brunswick.  Meanwhile, Pierre's third son Benjamin and his wife Marie-Rose, daughter of Joseph Bugeaud and Marie-Josèphe Landry, had escaped the British at Minas in 1755 and also fled northward.  When the British struck Restigouche, Benjamin was serving as a captain in the Acadian militia.  In late October, after the fall of Montréal, he and his family were forced to surrender to a second British force, this one from Québec, and likely were held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  After the war, they chose to remain in greater Acadia.  They resettled at Carleton in the British-controlled fishery at Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, east of Restigouche, and there they remained.  Pierre's youngest son Jean-Baptiste, only age 14 in 1755, also escaped the British roundup at Minas in 1755 but took refuge in Canada.  He married Marguerite dite La Branche, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Cormier and Marie Cyr of Chignecto, at Bécancour across from Trois-Rivières on the upper St. Lawrence in January 1762.  In the decades following exile, some of Jean-Baptiste's descendants moved downriver to St.-Ours on the lower Richelieu northeast of Montréal.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Pierre's second son, Pierre, fils, married to Catherine, daughter of Jacques Hébert and Marguerite Landry of Grand-Pré, was not as lucky as his brothers.  The British captured him and his family at Minas and deported them to Maryland.  For a dozen years, Pierre and his family endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  In July 1763, Pierre, fils and his family at Baltimore appeared on a repatriation list of Acadians who sought to resettle in French territory.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Pierre Allain had no close relatives in Louisiana, nor did his wife, but life had to be better there than in a British colony where they were treated like pariahs.  In April 1767, as part of the second contingent of Maryland Acadians to head to the Spanish colony, the Allains booked passage on the English ship Virgin with 200 other exiles.  With Pierre went a precious package, still carefully hidden, that he and other Minas exiles had carried with them for a dozen years.199

Arbour

Living in territory controlled by France, Acadians on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the islands and deported them to France: 

Jacques Arbour crossed on the transport Duc Guillaume, which left the Maritimes in September and, after a mid-ocean mishap, reached St.-Malo the first of November.  Of the 346 deportees aboard the vessel, 148 died at sea.  Jacques was one of the lucky ones.  One wonders how, or if, he was kin to the other Arbours and what happened to him in France. 

Guillaume Arbour, born in c1749, and Chrysostôme Arbour, born in c1750, were deported from the French Maritimes to Cherbourg in Normandy, where Chrysostôme died in December 1758, age 8, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Guillaume died at Cherbourg in January 1759, age 10.  The priest or priests who recorded their burials did not give the boys' parents' names, so one wonders if they were grandsons of Pierre dit Carrica of Île St.-Jean or younger brothers of Canadian François, fils.    

François Arbour, fils, born in Canada in c1743, may have been deported to France from one of the Maritime islands in 1758, or he may have gone there on his own during the final months of the war with Britain.  He worked as a caulker in the mother country and married Marie, daughter of Acadians Joseph Henry and Christine Pitre, at Le Havre in Normandy in November 1765.  The priest who recorded his marriage noted that both of François's parents were deceased at the time of the wedding and that he had resided at Le Havre for a year and a half.  François, fils and Marie had at least five children in France, all sons, the first three born probably at Le Havre:  François-Henry in c1767; Jean-Louis-Firmin, called Louis, in c1770; and Frédéric-Édouard in c1772.  In the early 1770s, François, fils, Marie, and their three sons became part of a major settlement scheme in the interior of Poitou in which French authorities attempted to settle Acadians on marginal land owned by an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  François, fils and Marie had another son, Louis-Nicolas, born at Archigny, southeast of Châtellerault, in June 1774.  Despite the retreat of most of the Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes in late 1775 and early 1776, François, fils and Marie remained at Archigny, where yet another son, Louis-Joseph, was baptized in June 1778.  Son Louis-Nicolas died at Archigny, age 9, in December 1782.  By September 1784, François, fils and his family had joined their fellow exiles at Nantes.  Youngest son Louis-Joseph died probably at Nantes in late 1784 or early 1785.  When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, François Arbour, fils and his family agreed to take it.200

Arcement

When the British deported the Acadians of Nova Scotia in the autumn of 1755, Pierre-Claude Arcement, wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot, and their children, still on Île St.-Jean, were living in territory controlled by France.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  Pierre-Claude Arcement's son Pierre, age 25, his wife Marie Hébert, age 23, their infant son Pierre, fils, and Marie's sister Anne Hébert, crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November.  After dodging a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, the Supply limped to Bideford, England, for repairs during the third week of December before sailing on to St.-Malo, which it finally reached in early March 1759.  Pierre and his family survived the crossing.  His sister Geneviève, age 35, husband Amand Pitre, age 35, and eight of their children, ages 12 to 3, also crossed on Supply, but they were not as lucky.  Three of their children, ages 12, 4, and 3, died at sea, and a daughter, age 8, died at St.-Malo in April 1759 probably from the rigors of the crossing.  One wonders what happened to Pierre and Geneviève's parents and their other siblings, some of whom may have remained at l'Assomption, Pigiguit, when the rest of the family moved to Île St.-Jean in 1750. 

Pierre and Marie settled at St.-Suliac on the east bank of Rivière Rance south of St.-Malo, where seven more children were born to them in the next dozen years:  Marguerite-Ludivine in September 1760; Marie-Josèphe in October 1762; Charles-Suliac in August 1764; Tranquille-François in June 1766; Victoire-Hélène in March 1768; Perrine-Madeleine in May 1770; and Guillaume-Romain in January 1772.  Two more daughters--Julie-Céleste in c1773; and Françoise in c1776--were born to them probably at St.-Suliac, where they were still living in the early 1780s--10 children, four sons and six daughters, in all in greater Acadia and France.  As the births of their younger children reveal, Pierre did not take his family to Poitou in the early 1770s, nor did they follow other exiles to the lower Loire port of Nantes late in the decade. 

Pierre's sister Geneviève, husband Amand Pitre, and their four surviving children also settled at St.-Suliac, where another daughter was born in February 1761.  In the early 1770s, Amand and Geneviève were part of the major settlement scheme in Poitou.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes, where they subsisted on government hand outs and on what work they could find.  Geneviève died at Nantes sometime in the late 1770s or early 1780s, in her late 50s or early 60s.  Brother Pierre and his family, meanwhile, remained at St.-Suliac. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Pierre Arcement, fils, wife Marie, and seven of their children, two sons and five daughters, agreed to take it.  So did his widowed brother-in-law Amand Pitre and four of his children.201

Arosteguy

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian milita, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Pierre Arosteguy, wife Marie Robichaud, and their family may have been among the refugees affected by this pétit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, dozens of Chignecto Acadians were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  

Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies, Georgia or South Carolina.  Some families eluded the British roundup, however, and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada via the Rivière St.-Jean portage.  Pierre Arosteguy and his family evidently were among those Chignecto Acadians who escaped the British in 1755 and remained in the Gulf region.  Sometime in the late 1750s or early 1760s, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia.  In August 1763, British officials counted Pierre, Marie, and five of their children, called Rostegui--François, Anne, Jean, Marguerite, and Marie--among the 370 Acadians being held at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, near their old home at Chignecto.  Son Pierre, fils evidently married Isabelle Comeau, a fellow Acadian, during exile.  Also called a Rostegui, he, Isabelle, and two children--Marguerite and Joseph--also appear on the August listing at Fort Cumberland. 

At war's end, the Acadians being held in Nova Scotia faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies already had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, seven were Arosteguys.189

Arseneau

By 1755, descendants of Pierre Arseneau, the coastal pilot, and his two wives, Marguerite Dugas and Marie Guérin, could be found not only at the family's home base in the Chignecto area, but also in the French Maritimes, especially at Malpèque on the northwestern shore of Île St.-Jean. 

The Arseneaus who remained at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Abbé Le Loutre and his Mi'kmaq warriors, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Arseneaus probably were among the refugees.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, dozens of local Acadians served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Marie Arseneau, wife of Simon LeBlanc, was one of them. 

Chignecto Arseneaus who escaped the British roundup in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755 hurried north to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Others moved on to Canada.  Paul Arseneau lost two of his sons--Félix, age 6; and Jean-Baptiste, age 1--in a smallpox epidemic that struck the Acadians at Québec from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Other members of  the family congregated at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Still others escaped to French-controlled Île-St. Jean, where their cousins had lived for decades.  Their respite from British oppression there was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France.  Most of the Arseneaus on Île St.-Jean, living at Malpèque on the island's remote northwest coast, escaped the redcoasts and joined their cousins on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore. 

A few Arseneaus on Île St.-Jean could not get away.  Anne-Marie, daughter of Pierre Arseneau and Marguerite Cormier and wife of François Vécot of Boucherville, Canada, was counted with her family on the south bank of Rivière-du-Nord-Est in the island's interior in August 1752.  In September 1758, the British deported them to St.-Malo, France, aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer and suffered a mid-ocean mishap before limping into the Breton port on November 1.  Four of Anne-Marie's five children died in the crossing.  One record notes that Anne-Marie "died in the roadstead at St.-Malo," so she almost made it to the mother country.  She was age 32.  Her husband died on November 4, just three days after the ship made port.  Only son François Vécot, fils, age 13, survived the ordeal.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Pierre Arseneau and Anne Boudrot of Havre-St.-Pierre, Île St.-Jean, and widow of Jean Delaunay of Lacasse, Brittany, was deported from the Maritimes to Cherbourg in late 1758 but moved on to St.-Malo in August 1759.  She lived at St.-Cast on the coast east of St.-Malo, at Corseul southeast of the Breton port, and again at St.-Cast, where she died in October 1763, in her early 40s.  Jean, fils, son of Jean Arseneau and Marie Lamy, a day laborer, married Élisabeth, daughter of Frenchmen Barthélémy Sansovoine and Anne Pasquier of St.-Martin de Péré, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, the naval port on the Bay of Biscay, in May 1771; Jean, fils's brothers Pierre, André, and Élie witnessed the marriage.  One wonders if they were descendants of Pierre the pilot. 

Some of the Arseneaus held by the British in North America came to the mother country by a different route.  After the war, they chose to settled on the French-controlled fishery island of Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  The choice, however, for many of them, proved to be a troublesome one.  Louise, daughter of Abraham Arseneau and Jeanne Gaudet and widow of Jean Vigneau dit Maurice, remarried to Joseph Dugas, fils, widower of Marguerite LeBlanc, in the prison compound at Chédabouctou, Nova Scotia, in October 1762.  At war's end, they chose to remain in greater Acadia, but not under British rule.  The marriage was "reinstated" at Notre-Dame-des-Ardiliers, on Île Miquelon, in May 1766.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of François Arseneau, and husband Jean dit Jeannotte Bourg, were counted on the island in 1767.  Overcrowding on the islands soon led French officials, obeying a royal decree, to send the fisher/habitants on the Newfoundland islands to France.  Louise and husband Joseph crossed on the schooner La Creole and reached St.-Malo in November 1767, but they refused to stay.  They returned to the island the following March with most of their fellow Miquelonnais.  Jean Arseneau, wife Madeleine Boudrot, and their family also went to France in 1767, but they did not return to the islands.  They settled, instead, at Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany with other exiles.  Jean drowned probably off the island in September 1768.  His family chose to remain in France.  Son Basile, now a sailor, married Anne, daughter of Joseph Bourgeois and Marguerite Hébert of Notre-Dame, Île Miquelon, at St.-Jean church, La Rochelle, in April 1780.  Meanwhile, in 1778, during the American war for independence, France joined the Americans against their old enemy, Britain.  The redcoats promptly captured St.-Pierre and Miquelon and deported the Acadians there to La Rochelle.  After reaching the port, Louise Arseneau and husband Joseph Dugas, fils returned to St.-Malo aboard the brigantine La Jeannette in November 1778.  This time they stayed.  They settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Louise died in June 1779, age 63.  Pierre Arseneau and his wife Théotiste Bourgeois of Chignecto also had come to France via the Newfoundland islands.  As a teenager, Pierre, with younger brother Jean-Baptiste, escaped the British roundup at Chignecto in 1755, sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and married Théotiste at Restigouche in July 1760, soon after the British attacked Restigouche in late June but failed to capture the place.  After formal surrender the following October, the British held many of the Acadians captured there and in the surrounding region in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  After the war, Pierre and Théoitiste chose to join their kinsmen on Île Miquelon in c1764.  They likely went to France in 1767 and returned to the island the following year.  They were there in 1778 when the British captured the islands and deported the Acadians to La Rochelle.  Pierre, Théotiste, and their family were still at La Rochelle when their daughter Marie-Anne was born in St.-Jean Parish in February 1779.  Marie-Anne died two months later.  Their daughter Judith, called Julie, was born in St.-Jean Parish in March 1781 and died at La Rochelle in March 1782.  Pierre also died there that year.  Three of his older children--Marie-Scholastique, Pierre, and Charles--refused to remain in the mother country.  They returned to North America and settled on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  If the few Arceneaus still in the mother country were aware that many of their kin had gone to Louisiana two decades earlier and were thriving there, it may not have mattered to them.  None took up the Spanish offer. 

In North America, Arseneaus who had escaped the British roundup on Île St.-Jean in 1758 made their way to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, where they joined their Chignecto cousins already there.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  A number of Arseneau families appeared on a list, including La Vve. [widow of] Pre.[Pierre] Arsouneau and her family of four;  Joseph Arsoneau, fils de Claude, and his family of four; Charles Arsenau, fils, d'autre Charles, and his family of four; La Vve. Arssennau tante [aunt] Nanette and her family of seven; Jean Arsenau, fils de Charles, and his family of five; Charles Arssenneau, père, fils de feu [dead] Pre., and his family of five; Pierre Arssenneau and his family of five; La Vve. Jacques Arscenneau and her family of five; Charles Arssenau, fils de feu Charles, and his family of three; La Vve. Theraise Ve. Abraham Arssenau, alone; and Jean Arssenau dt [dit] Contin and his family of four.  Most were sent to prison compounds in Nova Scotia, including Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, near their old homes at Chignecto, and Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor.  They included Pierre Arsenau, wife Judith, and son Michel, Étienne, and Joseph; Jean Arseneau, wife Madeleine, sons Jean and Bazile and daughter Louise; and François Arsenaux and Jeanot Bourgeois, probaby his wife Anne dite Nanette, all counted at Fort Cumerland in August 1763.  Also that August, British officials counted Arseneaus on Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor.  They included Joseph Arcenos and his unnamed wife; Jean Arcenos, his wife, and four children; and Pier Arsenos, his wife, and their child.  A hand full of Arseneaus may have escaped this latest roundup and moved to Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, or to Île Miscou at the entrance to the bay, or they may have gone there from Nova Scotia after the war. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not before the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  In August 1763, colonial officials in South Carolina counted Marie Arseneau, husband Simon Leblan, and Cormier and Quesy [Caissie] orphans, all from Chignecto, still in the southern colony. 

Most of the Arseneaus still in North America at war's end resettled in Canada or remained in greater Acadia, from the upper St. Lawrence down to the Maritimes.  Though now also a conquered British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Pierre Arseneau began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  After 1766, they could be found in Canada at Québec City; on the upper St. Lawrence at Lotbinière, Bécancour, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, L'Assomption, and Montréal; at St.-Pierre-de-Sorel, St.-Ours, and St. Antoine-de-Chambly on the lower Richelieu; on Île d'Orléans and at Rimouski on the lower St. Lawrence; on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence; at Carleton and Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs; at Île Miscou, Caraquet, Cocagne, and Grande-Digue along the shore of today's eastern New Brunswick; at Louisbourg and Chéticamp on both sides of Cape Breton Island, formerly Île Royale; and at Windsor, formerly Pigiguit, in Nova Scotia.  Some of them managed to return to St. John's Island, which the British renamed Prince Edward Island in 1798.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  

Arseneaus still being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Arseneaus, chose to resettle on Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 18 were Arseneaus.202

Aucoin

By 1755, descendants of Martin Aucoin, père and Marie Gaudet could be found at Rivière-aux-Canards, Grand-Pré, Pigiguit, and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; at Chignecto; at Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Aucoins may have been among the refugees affected by this pétit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto-area Acadians, including those in the trois-rivières, were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local Acadians were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  In the fall of 1755, the British deported Alexis Aucoin of Petitcoudiac to South Carolina. 

Most of the Aucoins from the Chignecto area escaped the British and took refuge in Canada.  Alexis's younger son Jean-Baptiste died in exile in c1760.  His widow, Marie-Anne Saulnier of Petitcoudiac, remarried to a Canadian widower at St.-Thomas-de-Montmagny on the St. Lawrence below Québec in October 1762.  Her Aucoin children likely remained in Canada.  Pierre Aucoin, wife Marguerite Dupuis, and their family sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  By 1760, they may have moved up to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs. 

An Aucoin family from Minas--Alexis's son Pierre and Pierre's wife Isabelle Breau--escaped the roundup there in the fall of 1755.  Pierre died probably in Canada in c1757, victim, perhaps, of a smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of exiles in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 into the spring of 1758.  His widow remarried to fellow Acadian Alexandre Guilbeau of Annapolis Royal, widower of Marguerite Girouard, at St.-Pierre-les-Becquets on the upper St. Lawrence below Trois-Rivières in November 1759.

Minas Aucoins who did not escape the roundup in 1755 ended up on transports bound for Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Virginia.  The Aucoins deported to the Old Dominion endured a fate worse than most of the their fellow Acadians deported from Minas.  In mid-November, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia's authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Acadians from one vessel were moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Virginia's House of Burgesses made its decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Aucoins were held at Liverpool, Bristol, and Gloucester.  Seven years later, more than half of the Minas Acadians sent to Virginia had died in England. 

Meanwhile, the Aucoins on Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the fate of their cousins in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the island and rounded up most of the habitants there.  Some escaped from the remote corners of Île St.-Jean and crossed Mer Rouge to the mainland or made their way north to Canada, but most of them, including Aucoins, were deported to France, with tragic result.  René dit Renauchon Aucoin, wife Madeleine Michel, and all of their children perished aboard the transport Duke William which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and sank in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England on its way to St.-Malo.  Anne Aucoin, age 40, husband Ambroise Dupuis, age 40, and their seven children, ages 16 to 2; Antoine Aucoin, age about 75, wife Anne Breau, age 64, and son Antoine, fils, age 30; Marie Aucoin, age 40, husband Grégoire Maillet, age 32, and seven of their children crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  All survived the crossing except two of the Maillet children, who died at sea.  However, Marie died at St.-Malo in April, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Four childless couples--Michel Aucoin, age 27, and his Élisabeth, or Isabelle, Hébert, age 21; François Bourg, age 20, and wife Anne Aucoin, age 20; Jean Bourg, age 23, and his wife Marie Aucoin, age 25; and Joseph Bourg, age 22, and wife Marguerite Aucoin, age 23--crossed on one or more of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  They all survived the crossing.  Isabelle Amireau, age 50, widow of Antoine Aucoin and mother of Michel, crossed on one of the Five Ships with four of her unmarried Aucoin children.  Three of them--Chrysostôme, age 18; Françoise, age 15, and Hélène, age 12--survived the crossing, but daughter Ursule, age unrecorded, died at sea.  Michel Aucoin, age 50, and wife Marie-Josèphe Henry, age 50, crossed with five unmarried daughters on one of the Five Ships.  They, along with three of their daughters--Marie-Josèphe, age 27; Geneviève, age 15; and Élisabeth or Isabelle, age 14--survived the crossing, but, with two of their other daughters--Marguerite, age 22; and Osite, age 10--Michel and Marie-Josèphe died at St.-Malo within weeks of their arrival, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Their married daughter Madeleine, age 22, and husband Olivier Thibodeau, age 27, also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  The couple lost an 18-month-old son at sea, and Madeleine died along with their weeks-old son soon after reaching St.-Malo.  Joseph Aucoin, age 38, who crossed on one of the Five Ships, lost his wife Anne Blanchard and two of his children--Radégonde, age 5; Joseph, age 2--in the crossing, and daughter Osite, age 8 months, died in a hospital at St.-Malo in April.  Alexis Aucoin, age 42, wife Hélène Blanchard, age 40, and seven of their children crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Hélène and four of their children--Pierre, age 17; Joseph, age 16; Fabien, age 13, and Hélène, age 10--survived the crossing, but Alexis and three of their children--Marguerite, age 9; Marie, age 11; and Théodore, age 6--either died at sea or in a St.-Malo hospital soon after reaching the port city.  Marie Aucoin, husband Chérubin Breau, and five of their children crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Marie, Chérubin, and all of their children except 15-year-old Marie-Osite Breau either died at sea or in a hospital at St.-Malo.  Anne Aucoin, age 54, wife of Pierre Henry, also 54, lost her husband and four of their seven children aboard one of the Five Ships.

Island Aucoins did their best to create a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Antoine, père did not live long in the mother country; he died at St.-Suliac on the east bank of the river south of St.-Malo in June 1759, six months after he reached France.  Wife Anne Breau died at St.-Suliac three weeks later.  Their son Antoine, fils married fellow Acadian Françoise Hébert, widow of Élie LeBlanc, at St.-Suliac in January 1760.  She gave him at least four children there:  Marguerite-Françoise, born in July 1761 but died at age 1 1/2 in February 1763; Pierre-Joseph-Antoine in January 1765; François-Charles in November 1767 but died at Senillé, Poitou, age 7, in July 1774; and Louis-Jean at St.-Suliac in January 1770.  Michel, son of Antoine Aucoin and Isabelle Amireau, and his bride Élisabeth Hébert also settled in the St.-Malo area.  A childless couple when they arrived in France, Michel and Élisabeth had at least 14 children at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo:  Joseph Michel in May 1760; Jean-Charles in July 1761; Françoise in February 1763 but died the following September; Marie-Josèphe in March 1764; Anne-Théodose in May 1765; François-David in August 1766 but died at age 2 1/2 in March 1769; Grégoire-Alexis in October 1767; Michel-Pierre in February 1769; Pierre-Paul in July 1770; Isabelle in July 1772; François-Étienne in December 1773; Jeanne in April 1778 but died at age 9 months in February 1779; Florianne-Marguerite in November 1780; and Constant-Jean-Baptiste in October 1782.  They also lived at St.-Lunaire on the Breton coast west of St.-Énogat.  Michel's younger sister Hélène married Alexis-Grégoire, son of fellow Acadians Alexis Doiron and Marguerite Thibodeau of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, at St.-Énogat in May 1767.  She gave him at least three children there.   One wonders what was the fate of Michel and Hélène's brother Chrysostôme, who was age 18 when he arrived at St.-Malo.  Did he die from the rigors of the crossing?  Did he create a family of his own in the St.-Malo area?  And what of Chrysostôme's younger sister Françoise, who was 15 when she reached the mother country?  Alexis Aucoin, père's son Joseph of Cobeguit, who lost his wife Anne Blanchard and all three of their children in the crossing from Île St.-Jean, promptly remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Hébert and Claire Dugas and widow of Jean Blanchard, in November 1759 at Ploubalay on the west side of the river southwest of St.-Malo.  Anne gave him 11 more children in the area:  Joseph-Yves at Ploubalay in November 1760 but died at La Haute-Marchandais near St.-Malo, age 22, in July 1783; Pierre-Alexis at Ploubablay in May 1762; Anne-Marie at Villou in April 1764; Jean-Charles at Tréméreuc southeast of Ploubalay in July 1766; Françoise-Marie in June 1768 but died the following December; François-Malo in November 1769; Gabriel-Guillaume in March 1772; Marie-Madeleine at La Marchandais in August 1774; Françoise-Victoire at Tréméreuc in May 1777; Julie-Marie-Françoise at La Haute Marchandais in February 1780 but died at age 1 1/2 in September 1781; and Hyacinthe-Laurent in April 1785.  In June 1760, Alexis Aucion, fils's widow, Hélène Blanchard, remarried to Paul, son of Joseph Dugas and Claire Bourg of Cobeguit and widower of Marguerite-Marie Boudrot, at Ploubalay.  She gave him two more daughters.  Her older Aucoin sons, Pierre and Joseph, created families of their own at Tréméreuc.  Oldest son Pierre married Hélène, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Hébert and Claire Dugas, at Ploubalay in May 1763.  At least four children were born to them in and aroundTréméreuc:  Victoire-Hélène at Villou near Tréméreuc in March 1764; Pierre-Joseph at Tréméreuc in May 1766; Anne-Angélique in January 1769; Jean-Joseph in May 1771; and François-Alexis in April 1774.  They also lived at Ploubalay and at St.-Coulomb in the countryside northeast of St.-Malo.  Younger brother Joseph married Marie-Josèphe Hébert, his older brother's younger sister.  Marie-Josèphe gave Joseph at least 10 children at Tréméreuc:  Alexis-Joseph in April 1765; Pierre-Jean at La Croix in May 1766; Charles-Étienne at Tréméreuc in October 1767 but died at age 10 in November 1777; Fabien-Isaac in May 1769; Marie-Madeleine-Julienne in September 1770 but died at age 7 in November 1777 three days before brother Charles-Étienne; Mathurin-Jean in April 1772; Joseph-Marie in April 1775; Anne-Marguerite in December 1776 but died at age 11 months in November 1777; Malo-Jean in February 1778; and Malo-Dieutonne at Villou in March 1780 but died at age 1 in May 1781.  Like their siblings Pierre and Hélène, Joseph and Marie-Josèphe also lived at Ploubalay and St.-Coulomb.  Pierre and Joseph's youngest brother Fabien did not marry until his early 30s, when he was no longer living at St.-Malo.  He married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Dupuis and Marie Trahan, in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, in May 1776.  They were that rare Acadian couple who had no children.  Marie-Josèphe, age 32, oldest daughter of Michel Aucoin and Marie-Josèphe Henry, married Germain, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Blanchard and Anne Dupuis of Cobeguit and widower of Marguerite Bourg, at Langrolay-sur-Rance on the west side of the river east of Tréméreuc in March 1762.  Germain had lost his first wife, along with five of their six children, during or soon after the crossing from Île St.-Jean.  Marie-Josèphe gave Germain four more children, including a set of twins; all four of them died in infancy.  Marie-Josèphe younger sister Geneviève, at age 20 married Paul, son of fellow Acadian Pierre Daigre and Anne-Marie Breau, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo in April 1761.  She gave Paul nine children, four of whom did not survive childhood.  Marie-Josèphe and Geneviève's youngest sister Élisabeth, or Isabelle, married, at age 21, Jean, son of sister Marie-Josèphe's husband Germain Blanchard and his first wife Marguerite Bourg, at Pleudihen in July 1765.  She gave Jean four children, most of whom survived childhood.  They also lived at St.-Suliac and Langrolay-sur-Rance. 

Island Aucoins also ended up in other French ports, including Cherbourg in upper Normandy; Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie; Calais in Artois; and on Île d'Aix south of La Rochelle off the coast of Aunis on the Bay of Biscay.  But not all of them remained in the community where they landed.  Pierre-Fiacre Aucoin, age 29, reached Cherbourg in late 1758 or early 1759 but promptly sailed on to St.-Malo, which he reached in late February.  He lived at St.-Servan-sur-Mer for only a few weeks and then returned to Cherbourg by 9 March 1759, where he evidently remained.  One wonders what happened to him there.  Sylvain Aucoin, père of Cobeguit and Île St.-Jean died at Cherbourg in November 1759, age 48.  His daughter Cécile by wife Catherine Amireau, married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians Jean dit Petit-Jean La Gerne and Josèphe Hébert of Pigiguit and Île St.-Jean, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in October 1759, but Cécile died in November, age 21.  Cécile's brother Sylvain, fils, widower of Rose Henry, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul dit Le Grand Paul Doiron and Marguerite Michel of Pigiguit and Île St.-Jean and widow of Bonaventure Thibodeau, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in February 1760.  Claude Aucoin died at Cherbourg in August 1759, age 31.  Pierre Aucoin of Île St.-Jean died at Cherbourg in August 1759, age 34.  Alexis Aucoin, père, called Lexy by the recording priest, third son of family progenitor Martin, père, had settled at Cobeguit before moving on to Île St.-Jean to escape the British roundup in the Minas Basin.  Alexis died in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in December 1759, age 75.  Son François, age 34, wife Élisabeth Blanchard, age unrecorded, and their son Charles, age 11, also landed at the northern fishing port.  Daughter Marie-Josèphe was born at Boulogne-sur-Mer in 1759 soon after their arrival.  Wife Élisabeth died there in May 1761.  Son Charles, who became a seaman, did not remain at Boulogne-sur-Mer.  He married Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles LeBlanc and his first wife Anne Boudrot, in Ste.-Croix Parish, Nantes, in November 1776.  Their son Joseph-Marie was born at nearby Chantenay in January 1778.  Charles died by September 1783, when his widow Madeleine LeBlanc remarried to Frenchman François Mancel of Lucerne and Chantenay.  Charles's younger sister Marie-Josèphe, at age 24, married Jean, son of François Mancel and her former sister-in-law Madeleine LeBlanc, in St.-Martin de Chantenay Parish near Nantes in January 1783.   Jean Aucoin and Marie-Jeanne Theriot had at least two children in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer:  Marie-Françoise in March 1761; and Jean-Charles in November 1762 but died the following February.  Paul Aucoin, age 47, wife Marie LeBlanc, age 45, and at least six of their children--Marie-Josèphe, age 15; Marguerite-Suzanne, age 14; Joseph, age 10; Tarsille, age 9; Marie-Madeleine, age 6; and Louis-Paul, age 5--also crossed from Île St.-Jean to Boulogne-sur-Mer.  Youngest son Louis-Paul died there in July 1761, age 7.  Paul and Marie's oldest surviving daughter Marie-Joséphe, age 21, married cousin Anselme, 21-year-old son of fellow Acadians Honoré Landry and Hélène LeBlanc, in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in October 1764.  Paul, Marie, and their unmarried children--Marguerite-Suzanne, Joseph, Tarsille, and Marie-Madeleine--did not remain in the northern port.  In May 1766, they sailed aboard the brigantine Hazard to St.-Malo and settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance and at neaby St.-Suliac.  Joseph married Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians François Henry and Marie Dugas, at St.-Suliac in May 1770.  Daughter Marie-Josèphe was born probably at St.-Suliac in c1771; and Isabelle-Jeanne at Village aux Nonnains near St.-Suliac in July 1773.  One wonders what happened to Joseph's sisters Marguerite-Suzanne, Tarsille, and Marie-Madeleine.  Did they follow brother Joseph and his family to Poitou in 1773?  Chérubin Aucoin, son of Alexis, was living at Boulogne-en-Mer in 1767.  Chérubin did not marry.  His older brother François took his family to Île d'Aix south of La Rochelle in 1767.  Marie-Barbe, daughter of Hyacinthe Aucoin (the recording priest called him Joachim, navigateur; he was a son of Alexis Aucoin of Minas) and Marie-Barbe-Antoinette Laidez of Calais, was born at Calais in April 1766.  Hyancinthe was one of the few Acadians who settled there. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  Most of the repatriated Aucoins settled in the St.-Malo area, where they added substantially to the number of their kinsmen already there.  Charles Aucoin's widow Anne-Marie Dupuis and her unmarried children--Madeleine, age unrecorded, Charles, fils, age 16, and Félicité, age 14--along with married daughter Marie, age 26, wife of Michel LeBlanc, and their 4-year-old daughter, arrived at St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée on 23 May 1763.  Charles, fils and Félicité did not marry in France.  One wonders what became of sister Marguerite.  Also aboard La Dorothée was their brother Alexandre, age 23, wife Rosalie Thériot, also 23, who he had married in England in c1761, and their year-old daughter Marie-Geneviève.  Alexandre and Rosalie settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer and at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo, where nine more children were born to them:  Marie-Élisabeth at St.-Servan in May 1764; Marie-Madeleine in March 1766 but died at age 5 at Lannoie near Plouër in March 1771; Jean-Baptiste-Fabien at St.-Servan in March 1768; twins Françoise-Théotiste and Noël-Alexandre at Lannoie in December 1770, but Noël died at Lannoie, age 15 months, in May 1772, and Françoise died at St.-Servan, age 11, in February 1779; Perrine-Marie at La Caillibotais near Plouër in August 1773; Marguerite-Josèphe at St.-Servan in April 1775 but died the following October; Marie-Jeanne in March 1777; Mathurin in c1781; and Marguerite-Josèphe in October 1783 but died at age 1 1/2 in May 1785.  Alexandre's older brother Olivier, age 36, a widower, son Firmin, age 12, and daughter Marie, age 10, arrived at St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition on 23 May 1763.  Olivier remarried to Cécile, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Richard and Cécile Granger, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Cécile gave him four more daughters there:  Natalie-Marie in Sepember 1766; Marguerite-Geneviève in July 1768; Marie-Cécile in September 1770; and Élisabeth-Anne or Anne-Élisabeth in November 1772.  Joseph Aucoin, age 63, seventh son of family progenitor Martin, père, Joseph's wife Anne Trahan, age 69, and two of their unmarried daughters--Anne, age 26, and Marie-Madeleine, age 22--reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  They settled at Plouër-sur-Rance.  Joseph and Anne's married daughter Marie, wife of Victor LeBlanc and Grégoire Maillet, had come to St.-Malo from Île St.-Jean in 1759 with her second husband Grégoire, but she had died from the rigors of the crossing.  Another married daughter, Marguerite, age 35, husband Pierre Duon, age 43, who was widower of Marguerite's cousin Angélique Aucoin, and four of their children, ages 16 to 1, the two youngest Pierre's children by Marguerite, crossed to St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  They also settled at Plouër-sur-Rance, where Marguerite gave Pierre at least two more sons.  Joseph and Anne's son Claude, age 35, wife Marie-Josèphe Saulnier, age 25, and their 5-year-old son Jean-Baptiste, also reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  They had at least seven more children at Pleurtuit on the west bank of the river southwest of St.-Malo and at Plouër-sur-Rance southeast of Pleurtuit:  Perpétué at La Moysias near Pleurtuit in June 1763 (so Marie-Josèphe had been pregnant on the crossing from England); Charles-Joseph at Plouër in September 1765; Anne-Anastasie in September 1767; Pierre-Jean in May 1769 but died at La Metrie Pommerais near Plouër, age 4, in October 1773; Mathurin-Casimir in March 1771; Marie-Gertrude in December 1772; and François-Augustin in October 1779 but died at Sous-Banniene near Plouër six days after his birth.  Claude and Marie-Josèphe's son Jean-Baptiste, now age 26, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Forest and Marguerite Comeau, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in April 1784.  Their daughter Marie-Jeanne was born there in February 1785.  Jean-Baptiste Aucoin, age 42, wife Marguerite Thériot, age 34, and two children--Marie, age 5, and Simon, age 2--reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  They had at least five more children at Plouër-sur-Rance:  Jean-Baptiste in May 1764; Rose-Madeleine in January 1766; Rose-Anastasie in May 1768; Anne-Julienne in April 1771 but died at nearby La Frenelais, age 1, in August 1772; and Pierre-Firmin in May 1774.  Joseph Aucoin, age 39, his second wife Madeleine Gautrot, age 37, and two daughters from his first wife Françoise Breau--Marie-Blanche, age 15; and Marie-Anne, age 12--reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  They settled at Plouër and across the river at Pleudihen-sur-Rance.  Marie-Blanche died at Pleudihen, age 25, in July 1773.  She did not marry.  One wonders what happened to Joseph's younger daughter Marie-Anne.  Charles Aucoin of Rivière-aux-Canards, age 39, wife Madeleine Trahan, age 32, and son Pierre, age 8, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  Charles and Madeleine, who settled at Plouër, had no more children in France.  Son Pierre survived childhood but did not marry in the mother country, though ones suspects that, by the early 1780s, when he was in his late 20s, he had cast his eye on Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Hébert and his second wife Susanne Pitre of nearby Ploubalay; Marie-Josèphe was in her early 20s at the time and also unmarried.  Simon Aucoin, age 35, wife Marie-Geneviève Thériot, age 29, and daughter Perpétué, age 3 1/2, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  Five more daughters were born to them at Plouër:  Marie-Madeleine in April 1764 but died at nearby Du Pres, age 2, in March 1766; Marie-Élisabeth in May 1766; Marguerite-Geneviève in July 1768; Anne-Olive in October 1771; and Rose-Félicité in November 1773.  A younger Charles Aucoin, age 28, son of René, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée, but he died at Village du Rochet near Plouër in December 1763, before he could start a family of his own. 

An Aucoin repatriated from England ended up at Boulogne-sur-Mer but did not remain there.  Jean-Baptiste of Minas, age 49, another son of René Aucoin, reached the northern port in 1763 with wife Jeanne-Anne Thériot, age 40, and six children--Joseph, age 18; Élisabeth, age 15; Michel, age 13; Marguerite, age 11; Marie-Anastasie, age 4; and Marie-Françoise, age 2.  Another daughter, Anne-Félicité, was born probably at Boulogne-sur-Mer in c1765.  In May 1766, Jean-Baptiste took his family aboard the brigantine Hazard to St.-Malo.  They settled near their kinsmen at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  In May 1770, at age 9, daughter Marie-Françoise died "at the home of the incurables of Dinan," the fortified town on the river far south of St.-Malo, where few other Acadians had gone.  The family went to Poitou in 1773 and retreated with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes. 

Another Aucoin repatriated from England did not remain long in the coastal city to which he had been shipped.  Alexis Aucoin's son Alexandre of Cobeguit and second wife Élisabeth Duon of Rivière-aux-Canards, who had married at Liverpool in October 1759, arrived with dozens of other exiles at Ploujean near Morlaix in northwest Brittany during the spring of 1763.  With them were daughters Marie-Josèphe, age 9, by his first wife; and Anne-Marie, age 2.  Another daughter, Geneviève-Nicole, was born probably at Morlaix in June 1765.  The following November, Alexandre and Élisabeth joined other Minas Acadians from England on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, where French authorities hoped the exiles would bring life to the island's sandy soil.  More daughters were born to them at Calatren near Bangor in the southern interior of the island, and at Sauzon on the island's north shore:  Marie-Madeleine in January 1768; Marie-Félicité in February 1770; Élisabeth- or Isabelle-Josèphe in June 1772; and Anne-Augustine in July 1775.  A year or so later, they left Belle-Île-en-Mer for Nantes, where Marie-Rénée was born in St.-Similien Parish in November 1778.  Alexandre died in St.-Similien Parish in October 1780, age 55.  Daughter Marie-Josèphe, by his first wife Marie Trahan, died at St.-Similien a few weeks later, age 28.  She never married.  According to Acadian genealogist Bona Arsenault, Alexandre's younger brother Hyacinthe also settled on Belle-Île-en-Mer, as did Armand Aucoin, tambour [drummer] dans les troupes de Lorient in southern Brittany, and his wife Françoise Canivet or Conivette.  Armand and Françoise were living at Lorient in 1773 on the eve of their movement to Poitou.  

In the early 1770s, several Aucoin families participated in an even grander settlement venture, this one far from the coast.  French authorities were tired of providing for the Acadians languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault in the interior of Poitou.  Aucoins who went to Poitou included Amand and his wife Françoise Conivette from Lorient; Antoine, fils and his wife Françoise Hébert from St.-Suliac; Jean-Baptiste and his wife Jeanne-Anne Thériot from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Joseph and his wife Élisabeth Henry from St.-Suliac; and Olivier and his second wife Cécile Richard from St.-Servan.  Sylvain Aucoin, fils from Cherbourg died in Poitou by May 1774, when his second wife, Marie Doiron, who he had married at the Norman port in February 1760, remarried at Châtellerault to a Moulaison from Cap-Sable.  Antoine, fils and Françoise Hébert lost their 7-year-old son François-Charles at Senillé near Châtellerault, in July 1774.  Amand and Françoise Conivette lost their 2-year-old son François-René at Châtellerault in September 1774.  Their daughter Anne-Françoise was born there in October.  Olivier and Cécile Richard lost their 2-year-old daughter Anne-Élisabeth at St.-Léger, Chauvigny, south of Châtellerault in September 1774.  Their son Pierre-Charles was born at Chauvigny the following December. 

In late 1775 and early 1776, after two years of effort, the Aucoins joined other Poitou Acadians in their retreat from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on the government subsidy and what work they could find.  Joseph Aucoin and wife Élisabeth Henry, who had brought two daughters to Poitou, had four more children at Nantes and nearby Chantenay:  Joseph-Jean baptized in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, age recorded, in September 1776; François-Toussaint in October 1778; Marie-Modeste in St.-Martin de Chantenay Parish in March 1781; and Victoire-Claire in June 1783.  Daughter Marie-Josèphe died at Chantenay in September 1779, age 8 1/2.  Amand and Françoise's daughter Françoise-Victoire was born at Chantenay in April 1777 but died at age 1 1/2 in September 1778.  Marie-Lucie, daughter of François Aucoin and Marguerite Giroir, died at Chantenay in November 1784, age 12.  One wonders where she was born in c1772 and whether her parents had reached France from the Maritimes or from England.  Jean-Baptiste Aucoin, wife Jeann-Anne Thériot, and their children came to Nantes in March 1776.  Daughter Élisabeth married Tranquille, son of fellow Acadians Amand Pitre and Geneviève Arsement, in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in August 1779.  Daughter Marie-Anastasie married cousin Joseph, son of perhaps Jean-Charles Thériot and Marie Boudrot, probably at Nantes in c1783.  Daughter Anne-Félicité, age 19 in 1785, was still unmarried.  One wonders what happened to Jean-Baptiste and Jeanne's children Joseph, Michel, and Marguerite, who would have been ages 40, 35, and 33 that year.  Did they start their own families at St.-Malo or in Poitou and remain there?  Olivier Aucoin, second wife Cécile Richard, and their children settled first at Réze on the south bank of the Loire but crossing to Nantes.  Cécile gave Olivier another son, Olivier-Louis, at Chantenay in August 1777, but the boy died there at age 2 in October 1779.  Olivier's oldest son Firmin by his first wife, having come of age, worked as a sailor at Nantes.  He married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Alexandre Bourg and Marguerite-Josèphe Hébert of Cobeguit, in St.-Jacques Parish in May 1778.  Their son Firmin-Louis was born there in February 1779.  Olivier's oldest daughter Marie by his first wife followed her father and stepmother from Poitou to Nantes in March 1776.  In July 1777, at St.-Martin de Chantenay, Marie, age 24, married Olivier, 22-year-old son of Étienne Thériot and Hélène Landry of Minas.  Olivier, a native of Île St.-Jean, preferred to spell his surname Térriot.  His family had been deported from the Maritimes to St.-Malo aboard one of the Five Ships in November 1758.  Olivier was only age 4 when, in January 1759, his family settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance south of St.-Malo.  In c1770, at age 15, he began studying for the priesthood under Abbé Jean-Louis La Loutre, who had contributed so much to the Acadians' misery.  After the abbé's death at Nantes in 1772, Olivier left his priestly studies and took up the trade of shoemaker.  He was living in St.-Sébastien Parish, Nantes, when he married Marie Aucoin.  She gave him four sons in St.-Jacques Parish between 1778 and 1783.  It was Olivier who assisted the eccentric Frenchman, Henri-Marie Peyroux de la Coudrenière, in coaxing hundreds of Olivier's fellow Acadians to emigrate to Spanish Louisiana. 

An Aucoin ended up in France by a different route.  Michel, son of Pierre Aucoin and Marguerite Dupuis of Rivière-aux-Canards, was taken to one of the British Atlantic colonies in 1755 as an infant and then to French St.-Domingue probably in 1763 or 1764.  In 1769, now age 14, he took the ship Americain from Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, to St.-Malo, which he reached the first of October.  He lived with cousin Jean Aucoin at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer for the next several years and took up the woodworking trade as a joiner.  Later in the decade, he moved south to Nantes, where, at age 24, he married Marie-Rose, called Rosalie or Rose, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean De La Forestrie and his first wife Marie-Madeleine Bonnière of Île St.-Jean, in Ste.-Croix Parish in July 1779.  Rosalie gave him three daughters in or around the lower Loire port:  Marie-Françoise in Ste.-Croix Parish in April 1780; Louis-Adélaïde in St.-Nicolas Parish in September 1781 but died at at age 1 at nearby Chantenay in September 1782; and Rose-Adélaïde, called Rosalie, at Chantenay in April 1784.

Despite their trials and tribulations, Aucoins proliferated in the mother country.  In the early 1780s, however, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 93 Aucoins--including Alexandre, Antoine, two Charless, Claude, Fabien, Firmin's widow, three Jean-Baptistes, three Josephs, two Michels, Olivier, Simon, and their families, many of them still in the St.-Malo area and others at Nantes--followed the entreaties of their kinsman, Olivier Térriot, and agreed to go to the Mississippi valley colony.  But some of the Aucoins--including Pierre, wife Hélène Hébert, and their family at Tréméreuc--chose to remain in the mother country. 

Two brothers who had been deported to Virginia and England and ended up at St.-Malo chose an unusual route back to North America.  Pierre Aucoin, age 26, wife Félicité LeBlanc, age 25, who he had married in England the year before, and their infant son Anselme reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée with hundreds of other exiles in the spring of 1763.  Pierre and Félicité had at least four more children in the St.-Malo area:  Pierre-Simon at Plouër-sur-Rance in August 1765; Jean-Victor at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in May 1767 but died the following August; Jean-Charles at Plouër in February 1769 but died at age 3 in July 1772; and Marie-Félicité in March 1771.  Pierre's younger brother Joseph, age 21 in 1763, and his wife Marie Hébert, who he had married in England in c1762, also reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  They lived with Pierre and his growing family at Plouër until February 1767.  In 1773, while their cousins headed to the fields of Poitou, Pierre and Joseph, along with other Acadian exiles, took their families to the Isle of Jersey, one of the British-owned Channel islands off the western coast of Normandy, from whence they returned to greater Acadia to work in British-controlled fisheries.  With other exiles, they worked at Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs before settling at Chéticamp on the western shore of Cape Breton Island, formerly Île Royale.  In c1782, Pierre remarried to fellow Acadian Marie Doucet probably at Chéticamp.  His son Pierre, fils, by first wife Félicité, married into the Babin and perhaps into the Haché family as well in the 1790s and settled in the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, northwest of Chéticamp.  Pierre's brother Joseph and his wife Marie, a childless couple, adopted a young Irishman, Cyriac Roach, also called Roche, who established a family of his own at Chéticamp.

In North America at war's end, Acadians being held in the British seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not before the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In June 1763 in Pennsylvania, Aucoins were still in the colony, including Olivier Aucoin l'aîné of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, his second wife Marguerite Daigre, and three of their children; Olivier Aucoin le jeune, son of Paul, Olivier's wife Anne Dupuis, and five children; Siméon Aucoin, his wife Isabelle, and their child; and Pierre Aucoin's unnamed widow with her seven children.  Also in the colony was Paul's youngest son Jean-Charles, who, perhaps before the counting, returned to greater Acadia and settled on St. John Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, where, according to one historian, "he became the ancestor of the Aucoin and the Wedge of Prince Edward Island."  The rest of his kinsmen did not follow him to greater Acadia but moved, instead, to Maryland, where they joined their fellow Acadians already there.  Acadians in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians there that the Spanish welcome them in Louisiana, most of them pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Not the Aucoins.  When over 600 of the Acadians in Maryland emigrated to Louisiana in four expeditions from 1766 to 1769, only one of the Aucoins in the Chesapeake colony--Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Paul and Marie LeBlanc from Île St.-Jean, a young orphan--may have joined them.  Surrounded by fellow exiles and French expatriates, most of the Aucoins in Maryland settled at Frenchtown in Baltimore, where their transition from Acadiens to Americains went faster for them than for their cousins who had gone to Spanish Louisiana.  In a generation or so, the family's name in Baltimore no longer was Aucoin but Wedge.  Meanwhile, in August 1763, colonial officials in South Carolina counted Aucoins among the Acadians "who desire to withdraw under the standard of their king his very Christian Majesty."  They included Madeleine Aucoin, wife of Jean Olivau, and their 20-year-old daughter; Anne Aucoin, wife of Pierre Bourgeois, and their 22-year-old son; and 28-year-old Élisabeth Aucoin, perhaps Anne's younger sister.  One wonders in which French-controlled territory these Aucoins resettled. 

Alexis Aucoin of Chignecto, who had been exiled to South Carolina in the fall of 1755, may have been among the exiles who had taken up the South Carolina governor's offer to return to their homes by sea on their own hook in the spring of 1756.  If Alexis and his family were among the lucky refugees who made it all the way back to Rivière St.-Jean, they likely moved up to Canada via the St.-Jean portage and joined their Chignecto kinsmen there.  Alexis remarried to Thècle, daughter of Canadians Simon Leureau and Marguerite Loignon, at Ste.-Famille, Île d'Orléans below Québec in February 1763, the month the war against Britain ended.  He and his family settled on Île d'Orleans and at Rivière-du-Loup farther down the St. Lawrence, at St.-Joseph-de-Beauce on Rivière Chaudière south of Québec, and at Yamachiche and Louiseville on the north shore of Lac St.-Pierre above Trois-Rivères.  From the early 1760s, Acadian Aucoins also could be found at St.-Thomas de Montmagny on the St. Lawrence below Québec, and at St.-Pierre-les-Becquets on the south shore of the upper St. Lawrence below Trois-Rivières.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  

At war's end, some of the Aucoins in the seaboard colonies emigrated not to Canada, where the British ruled, but to the French Antilles, where they did not.  Even while the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged Acadians in the British colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the islands's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  Aucoins were among the hundreds of exiles who emigrated to the sugar colony from the seaboard colonies in 1763 and 1764.  When the opportunity came in the mid- and late 1760s to join hundreds of their fellow Acadians from Halifax and Maryland on their way to New Orleans via Cap-Français, the Aucoins still in St.-Domingue chose to remain at Môle St.-Nicolas.  Jean-Marie, son of carpenter Jean-Charles Aucoin and his wife Françoise Lapierre, was born at Môle in June 1776.  Jean-Charles died there in January 1778, no age given.  Meanwhile, Pierre, fils, son of Pierre Aucoin and Madeleine LePrince of Grand-Pré, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in March 1776, age 25.292

Babin

In 1755, descendants of Antoine Babin of La Chausée and Marie Mercier could be found not only at Port-Royal/Annapolis Royal, but also at Cap-Sable; Grand-Pré, Rivière-aux-Canards, and Ste.-Famille and l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in the Minas Basin; Chignecto; and in the French Maritimes.  They were especially numerous at Minas.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto and in the trois-rivières were the first to fall into the hands of the British, who exiled the ones they could catch to their southermost seaboard colonies.  In the fall of 1755, the British deported Jacques Babin and his family to South Carolina.  A number of Babin families rounded up at Grand-Pré and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin were deported to Massachusetts, Maryland, and Virginia.  The few Chignecto and Minas Babins who escaped the British found refuge at Miramichi and other refugee camps on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada.  Claude Babin of Chignecto settled at Cap-St.-Ignace on the lower St. Lawrence. 

The Babins shipped to Virginia endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas.  In mid-November 1755, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Acadians from one vessel were moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Virginia's House of Burgesses made its decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many of them died of smallpox.  By 1763, more than half of exiles to England from Virginia were dead. 

At least two members of the Babin family who ended up in France did not get there via Virginia and England.  Isabelle Babin, born in c1689, settled on either Île St.-Jean or Île Royale, now Cape Breton Island, in the 1750s.  She lived with her grandson, Charles Benoit.  When the British rounded up the Nova Scotia Acadians in the summer and fall of 1755, the Acadians on the Maritime islands remained unmolested because they were living in territory controlled by France.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the islands and deported most of the habitants to France.  Isabelle Babin, age 70, crossed with her grandson's family on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other vessels, reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  Amazingly, the tough old lady survived the crossing.  Paul, son of Pierre Babin, age 25, ended up on one of the five British transports that also left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  He settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  In 1761, he joined the crew of the corsair Tigre but was captured and held in England until 1763.  He returned to Pleudihen that year and then left for the Île Malouines, today's Falkland Islands, with other exiles aboard L'Aigle in November 1765. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France, Babins among them.  They arrived at St.-Malo in late May and settled in the suburbs and villages of the lower Rance valley.  Marguerite Dupuis, age 60, widow of Claude Babin of Grand-Pré, reached France aboard La Dorothée with her two youngest sons--Laurent, age 24; and Jean-Charles, and 21.  They lived in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer until the fall of 1765, when they went with other Acadian exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southwest coast of Brittany.  Marguerite Dupuis's older son Joseph Babin, a native of Grand-Pré, age 29 in 1763, had married Marine, daughter of Jean LeBlanc and Anne Landry, at Southampton, England, in November 1756.  Joseph, Marine, age 27, and four of their children--Joseph-Nicaise, age 6, Bonaventure, age 4, Marie-Théotiste, age 2, and newborn Marie-Victoire--also crossed to France aboard La Dorothée.  After a short stay at St.-Servan, they followed Joseph's mother to Belle-Île-en-Mer in the fall of 1765 but returned to St.-Servan in 1773.  They did not remain.  Later in the decade, they, along with other exiles in France, re-settled on the French-controlled fishery islands of St.-Pierre and Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Joseph's sister Anne, wife of Alain LeBlanc, followed her widowed mother from England to St.-Servan and then to Belle-Île-en-Mer, but they, too, left the island in 1773.  They did not return to St.-Servan, however, but followed other Acadian exiles to the Channel island of Jersey, from which they returned to greater Acadia to work in British-controlled fisheries there.  Jean Babin of Grand-Pré, age 63 in 1763, Claude Babin's younger brother, came to France as a widower aboard La Dorothée with son Paul, age 31, and daughter Anne, age 18, and also lived at St.-Servan, where they remained.  Jean's son Simon, a native of Grand-Pré, age 28 in 1763, had married Anastasie Thériot at Southampton, England, in c1757; she was age 21 in 1763.  Simon and Anastasie followed his father and siblings to France aboard La Dorothée with three children--Anne, age 5; Marie, age 3; and Simon-Magloire or Magloire-Simon, age 1.  They also settled at St.-Servan, where they buried daughter Anne in July 1765, age 6.  They also had three more children there:  Anastasie-Victoire in October 1764 but died at age 3; François-Marie in November 1766; and Pierre-Joseph in June 1769 but died 18 days after his birth.  Another, much younger Jean Babin, age 25, reached St.-Malo "from other ports" in 1763.  He came alone.  He lived at Pleudihen-sur-Rance before moving on to Morlaix in northwest Brittany in 1764.  

Another Joseph Babin, son of Jean and Marguerite Bourg, ended up in France by a different route.  At age 12, he escaped the British roundup at Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, found refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and ended up in the prison compound at Halifax in the early 1760s.  After the war, he chose to go to Île Miqueon, where, at age 23, he married Françoise, 20-year-old daughter of Joseph Dugas and Marguerite LeBlanc, at Notre-Dame-des-Ardiliers in May 1766.  In 1767, French officials, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on the fishery islands, probably deported them with other fisher/habitants to France.  Along with most of the other islanders, the young couple likely returned to Miquelon in 1768 and created a family there.  In 1778, during the American Revolution, the British, again at war with France, captured Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported the fisher/habitants to France.  Joseph, Françoise, and four of their children--Marguerite-Françoise, age 8, Simon, age 7, Joseph, fils, age 4, and Anne-Adélaïde, age 5--left Miquelon aboard La Jeannette.  They reached St.-Malo that November and settled at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer among their Babin cousins.  

In the early 1770s, Simon Babin, his wife Anastasie Thériot, and their three remaining children--Marie, Magloir, and François-Marie--were part of a major settlement venture far from the sea.  French authorities were tired of providing for the Acadians languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near Châtellerault in the interior province of Poitou.  Anastasie died at Châtellerault in April 1775, leaving Simon a widower.  He promptly remarried to fellow Acadian Anne Poirier, widow of Gabriel Moulaison and Joseph Granger, at Châtellerault that September.  After two years of effort, Simon, his new wife, his three children, and two stepchildren, retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  In October 1780, Simon died aboard the ship Prince Inzare at Chantenay near Nantes.  Daughter Marie married Louis-William, son of Stanislas Stebens and Anne Colcein of Boston, Massachusetts, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in January 1783. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Four of the Babins still in the mother country--François-Marie, Magloire-Simon, and Marie, children of Simon Babin, along with Marie's husband Louis-William Stebens and their three young children; and Bonaventure, son of Joseph Babin and Marine LeBlanc--agreed to take it.  At least one family remained.  Laurent, son of Claude Babin and Marguerite Dupuis, had married Marie-Françoise, daughter of Martin Carrière and Jeanne-Martialle LeGoff of Le Palais, Belle-Île-Mer, at St.-Gérard, Le Palais, on the east coast of the island, in February 1766.  Between 1766 and 1773, Marie-Françoise had given him six children, two sons and four daughters, on Belle-Île.  When his brother Joseph and sister Marie left Belle-Île-en-Mer in 1773, Laurent stayed.  He was still there in 1792, when his fellow citizens elected him a municipal officer at Le Palais, despite the troubles he had experienced with local islanders, including some of his own in-laws, in his first years on the island back in the late 1760s.  Laurent remarried to Marie-Louise Lyot probably at Le Palais in 1797 but divorced her the following year.  He died a "rentier," or annuitant, at Le Palais in 1807, age 47.  Two of his daughters married in France.

In North America, Babins who had escaped the British in the late 1750s suffered more reverses in the final years of the war against Britain.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to captured the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Babins were not among them, but members of the family did end up in British hands.  In the late 1750s or early 1760s, Basile Babin, grandson of Antoine's oldest son Charles, either surrendered to, or was captured by, British forces in the area and held in the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, where he married a Saulnier and was counted with her in August 1763.  Two, perhaps three, other Babins, who had been counted in the Gulf shore refuge at Nepisiguit in 1761 also ended up on Georges Island, where, along with cousin Basile, they were counted in August 1763.  Unlike Basile's widow and daughters, who refused to live under British rule after the war, these Babins chose to remain in greater Acadia, settling at Ste.-Anne-du-Ruisseau northwest of Cap-Sable.  A Babin in the region who may have eluded capture chose to resettle in the British-controlled fishery at Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Another chose to settle first at Minudie, Chignecto, then received landgrants at Scoudouc in southeastern New Brunswick in the early 1800s. 

After the war, Minas Babins who had endured exile in Massachusetts chose to join their cousins in greater Acadia and Canada.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Antoine Babin began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Babins could also be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Deschambault and Troise-Rivières; at Cap-St.-Ignace, St.-Jean-Port-Joli, and St.-Roch-des-Aulnaies on the lower St. Lawrence; at Bonaventure in Gaspésie, now part of Québec Province; on Rivière St.-Jean and at Scoucouc on the southeastern shore in present-day New Brunswick; and at Ste.-Anne-du-Ruisseau in southwest Nova Scotia.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

At war's end, at least one family of Babins in the seaboard colonies emigrated not to Canada, where the British ruled, but to the French Antilles, where they did not.  Even while the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged Acadians in the British colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the islands's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  Victoire, daughter of Chares Babin and Marie Hébert, was born at the new French naval base of Môle St.-Nicolas, St.-Domingue, in c1781. 

Babins being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, which some did, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Babins, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Babins, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, two were young Babin sisters, daughters of Basile and his widow Nanette Saulnier. 

The many Babins in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  In July 1763, after the war had ended, nearly a dozen Babin families at Georgetown, Fredericktown, Princess Anne, Port Tobacco, Upper Marlborough, and Oxford appeared on French repatriation lists.  These were the Babins from the Minas settlements--Grand-Pré, Rivière-aux-Canards, and Pigiguit--whom the British had deported to the colony eight years earlier.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  At least 61 Babins left for the Spanish colony in 1766, 1767, and 1768 and settled in a number of communities there.  Other Babins chose to remain in Maryland.  Surrounded by fellow exiles and French expatriates, some of these stay-behinds settled at Frenchtown in Baltimore, where their transition from Acadien to Americain went faster for them than for their cousins who had gone on to the Spanish colony. 

The last group of Babins to come to Louisiana--six of them--did so in a unique way.  During exile, Marine LeBlanc, wife of Joseph Babin of Grand-Pré, became a widow either in France or after her family returned to North America from France.  In 1788, Marine, now age 52, and five of her children were living on Île St.-Pierre of the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Joseph Gravois of Chignecto, probably a kinsman, was captain of the schooner La Brigite, based at Île St.-Pierre.  Marine and her five Babin children--Marie-Victoire, age 25, François-Laurent, age 22, Pierre-Moïse, age 20, Anne-Marguerite, age 18, and Mathurin-Louis, age 15--and Marine's uncle Charles Babin, age unrecorded, agreed to accompany Gravois and his family to Spanish Louisiana aboard La Brigite, which reached New Orleans in December 1788--the only group of Acadians to travel directly from greater Acadia to Louisiana and some of the last Acadians to reach the bayou country.  Anne-Marguerite married Valentin-Désiré, son of fellow Acadians Amand Richard and Marie Breaux and widower of Susanne Marique, at St.-Jacques on the river in July.  One wonders what became of her siblings. 

Another Acadian Babin came to Louisiana decades after Joseph Babin's children arrived from Île St.-Pierre.  Early in the antebellum period, in 1809, while Louisiana was a territory of the United States, thousands of refugees from Haiti via Cuba and Jamaica arrived at New Orleans.  With them were Acadians who had left the British colonies in the 1760s and settled in the French colony of St.-Domingue, today's Haiti.  Among these refugees may have been Victoire, daughter of Chares Babin and Marie Hébert, who married Anglo American Lewis Morrow of Boston, Massachusetts, at the St. James church, St. James Parish, in September 1816.  The priest who recorded the marriage called Victoire a "nat. of St. Nicolas, Santo Domingo."  One wonders if she was the Victoire Babin who died in Ascension Parish at age 81 in September 1862.  The priest who recorded her funeral did not give her parents' names or mention a husband.203

Babineau

In 1755, descendants of brothers Nicolas and Jean Babineau dit Des Lauriers could be found at Annapolis Royal and at Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family to the winds. 

Younger brother Jean's daughters Marie and Marguerite and their Landry and Melanson husbands escaped the British roundup at Annapolis Royal in the fall of 1755.  After a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed to Chepoudy the following spring and made their way north to Canada probably via the Rivière St.-Jean portage.  The Babineau sisters, now in their 60s, died in late November and mid-December 1757, victims, most likely, of a smallpox epidemic that struck the Acadian refugees in and around Québec between the summer of 1757 and the spring of 1758.  And so ended brother Jean's line of the family.

Some of older brother Nicolas's children and grandchildren were rounded up at Annapolis Royal in 1755 and deported to New England, but most of his descendants, like Jean's daughters, eluded the British and, the following spring, escaped to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or followed their cousins to Canada.  The Babineaus at Petitcoudiac also eluded the British in 1755 and retreated to Cocagne, farther up the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  One family continued on to Canada, where they joined their cousins from Annapolis Royal at Bécancour, Pointe-du-Lac, and St.-Grégoire and Nicolet across from Trois-Rivières on the upper St. Lawrence.  Another family returned to the Petitcoudiac, perhaps to join the Acadian resistance there, and either surrendered to, or were captured by, the British in the early 1760s and held in the prison compound at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto, near their former homes.  After the war, Babineaus being held in the region chose to remain in greater Acadia, settling on the Gulf shore at Bouctouche, Richibouctou, and St.-Louis-de-Kent in present-day eastern New Brunswick, and at Carleton in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, a British-controlled fishery. 

A cousin took a different route to Canada.  At age 30, Nicolas's grandson René, fils had married Marguerite, daughter of Abraham Bourg and Marie Dugas, at Annapolis Royal in January 1755, on the eve of deportation.  The British deported the newlyweds to New England the autumn after their marriage.  Marguerite died in one of the New-English colonies by May 1759, when René, fils remarried to Madeleine, daughter of Jacques Michel and Jeanne Breau.  After the war, René, fils and Madeleine chose to join their cousins in Canada.  Though now also a British possession, the northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, Babineaus began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  René, fils and his family settled at Beauport near Québec City, where he drowned in December 1775, age 50.  His family remained.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

The Babineaus deported to New England included two sisters, Marie-Marguerite, called Marguerite, and Madeleine, daughters of Joseph Babineau dit Des Lauriers of Annapolis Royal.  The sisters used the surname Des Lauriers, not Babineau.  Marguerite married Charles, son of Alexandre Comeau and Marguerite Doucet of Annapolis Royal, probably in Connecticut in c1758.  They, along with their parents, were among the minority of refugees from Connecticut who went not to Canada but to French St.-Domingue at war's end.  During the final months of the war, French officials encouraged Acadians in the British colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Acadians who could be lured to St.-Dominguie would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the labor of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the exiles land of their own in the sugar colony.  When Marguerite and her family arrived from Connecticut, the colony's governor sent them not to Môle St.-Nicolas but to the interior community of Mirebalais, 30 miles northeast of Port-au-Prince, to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  Marguerite and Charles's marriage was blessed at Mirebalais in September 1764.  Their children Joseph, age 5, and Anne, age 2, were baptized there that same month.  Joseph died on the day of his baptism.  Their son Pierre, perhaps Joseph's twin, died at age 5 in October.  Charles and Marguerite had a second son named Joseph at Mirebalais in November 1766.  Evidently this Joseph did not survive infancy.  Meanwhile, Marguerite's father Joseph died at Mirebalais in January 1765, age 65.  Cousin Anne-Marie Babineau, from the sisters's cousin Charles Babineau's first wife, also chose to go to French St.-Domingue.  Anne-Marie married three times, first to Jacques Bruyard, then to Jacques Pincer, and finally to Pierre-Félix Martin of St.-Étienne d'Agde, Languedoc, France, at Môle St.-Nicolas in September 1788.  Her first and second husbands, like her third, seem to have been Frenchmen, and she evidently remained in the sugar colony after her third marriage.  One wonders why she did not follow her Des Lauriers cousins and join her father and stepbrother in Spanish Louisiana when the opportunity arose. 

Anne-Marie's father Louis-Charles, called Charles, had married Marguerite, daughter of René Doucet and Marie Broussard, at Annapolis Royal in January 1745 but lost her either before or during exile.  According to Acadian genealogist Bona Arsenault, Charles and Marguerite had five children at Annapolis Royal:  Jean-Baptiste in c1745; Marie-Josèphe in c1746; Charles, fils in c1749; Marguerite in c1753; and Anne-Marie.  Their experience in exile took them to a different place.  Like most of the Babineaus, Charles and his family escaped the British roundup at Annapolis Royal in 1755, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and escaped to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  By the end of the decade, Charles and his family had taken refuge at the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, where he remarried to Anne, daughter of Joseph Guilbeau dit L'Officier and Marguerite Michel of Annapolis Royal, in February 1760.  A naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche, one of the few remaining French outposts in North America, in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  The following October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, including Charles Babineau and his famiy of three.  The British held these Acadians, along with others who had either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region, in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  Charles and Anne's son Charles-Dominique was born at Fort Edward, overlooking the old Acadian settlement at Pigiguit, in c1761.  British authorities counted them on Georges Island, Halifax, in August 1763.  Only Charles-Dominique was still with them, so Charles's children by his first wife, who would have been age 18, 17, 14 and 10 in 1763, either had died during exile or had gone off on their own, daughter Anne-Marie among the latter.  Anne Guilbeau gave Charles another son, Julien-Joseph, at Halifax in c1764.

At war's end, Charles and Anne faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Babineaus, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, the couple refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, Charles and his family were among them. 

Charles and his young sons were only the first of the Babineaus who went to Louisiana.  In late 1766 or 1767, after their father's death, Marie-Marguerite Babineau dit Des Lauriers, her husband Charles Comeau, their daughter Anne, and Marguerite's sister Madeleine, left Mirebalais, French St.-Domingue, and made their way to New Orleans--among the few Acadian refugees who emigrated to the Spanish colony directly from the French Antilles.204

Barrieau

In 1755, the descendants of Nicolas Barrieau and Matine Hébert could be found on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale, including Île Madame, off the southern coast of Île Royale.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family to the winds, but not at first. 

The islands on which the Barrieaus lived in 1755 were controlled by France, so the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of that year would have touched none of them and their fellow islanders.  Nevertheless, Nicolas's son Antoine and his family left Île St.-Jean in the early- or mid-1750s and moved on to Canada.  For those who remained on the Maritime islands, their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the islands and rounded up the habitants there.  Most of the remaining Barrieaus--children of Nicolas, fils and Jacques--escaped the British, crossed Mer Rouge to the mainland, and followed their kinsmen to the St. Lawrence valley.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, Barrieaus began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  After the war, these descendants of Nicolas Barrieau could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at La Prairie south of Montréal; Champlain above Trois-Rivières; St.-Francois- and St.-Joseph-de-Beauce on Rivière Chaudière in the interior south of Québec; on the lower St. Lawrence at St.-Charles de Bellechasse, Château-Richer, St.-Thomas de Montmagny, Baie-St.-Paul on the northern shore, and St.-Joachim far down on the southern shore at the northern edge of the Gaspé Peninsula.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Other Barrieaus on the islands, mostly the children of Nicolas, père's youngest son Pierre, were rounded up in late 1758 and deported to France.  Pierre, who would have been age 51, died aboard La Picotte on the crossing to France.  His daughter Marie-Blanche, age 23, wife of Charles Daigre, age 25, lost her husband and both of her children--a son, age 3, and a daughter, age 15 months--aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite a storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Marie-Blanche's 13-year-old sister Pélagie, who sailed with them, survived the crossing.  Pierre's other children--Jean-Baptiste, age 25; Agathe, age 24; Olivier, age 21; Anne or Anastasie, age 17; Euphrosine, age 12; and Thérèse, age unrecorded--survived deportation to Cherbourg in Normandy in late 1758.  In July 1759, they moved on to St.-Malo and settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of the Breton port.  Jean-Baptiste married Marie, daughter of Jean Daigre and Marie Breau, at Pleudihen in June 1764 and started a large family there and at nearby Mordreuc:  Jacques-Alain was born in October 1765; Jean-Pierre in June 1767 but died at age 3 1/2 months the following October; Jean-Marie in May 1769; Marie-Rose in September 1770 but died three months later in January 1771; Perrine in January 1772; and twins Charles-Pierre and Anne-Jeanne in November 1773, but Charles-Pierre died the day after his birth and Anne-Jeanne 10 days later.  Jean-Baptiste's sister Agathe had married Isidore Daigre either at Pigiguit or on Île St.-Jean in c1750, but evidently he had died before the island's dérangement.  She remarried to Anselme, son of fellow Acadians Jean Landry and Madeleine Melanson, at Pleudihen in February 1765.  Sister Pélagie married Marin, son of fellow Acadians Étienne Boudrot and Marie-Claire Aucoin, at Pleudihen in May 1765.  Sister Euphrosine married François, fils, son of fellow Acadians François Boudrot and Anne-Marie Thibodeau and widower of Marguerite Landry, at Pleudihen in April 1768.  Sister Anastasie married Joseph, fils, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Dugas and Anne-Marie Hébert and widower of Anastasie Henry, at Pleudihen in May 1770.  The fate of their sister Thérèse is unrecorded.  Brother Olivier evidently signed up for naval or corsair service against the British, was captured, and held prisoner in England for the rest of the war. 

At least one Barrieau from Île St.-Jean landed in the northern fishing port of Boulogne-sur-Mer in late 1758 or early 1759. In November 1764, he chose to accompany other exiles aboard the ship Deux Frères out of Boulogne-sur-Mer to the new French colony of Guiane on the northeast coast of South America.  He did not last long there.  Jean Bariault "of Acadie," although he does not appear on a 1 March 1765 census of Acadians at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district, died in St.-Joseph Parish, Sinnamary, on March 18 of that year, age 24.  One wonders how he was related to the other Acadian Barrieaus who remained in France. 

In the early 1770s, Jean-Baptiste Barrieau and at least three of his sisters and their families signed on to an even grander settlement venture, this one in the interior province of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential French nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  The Acadians tried mightily to bring life to the rocky soil on the nobleman's estate.  Jean-Baptiste and Marie had a son, their eighth child, François, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in January 1775.  The following December, after two years of effort, Jean-Baptiste, his sisters, and their families retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted on government handouts and what work they could find.  Jean-Baptiste and Marie had two more sons in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes:  Joseph-Marie in July 1778 but died 11 days after his birth; and Louis-Constant in July 1779 but died at age 3 1/2 in July 1783--10 children, seven sons and three daughters, between 1765 and 1779, most of whom died young.  Sister Euphrosine's husband François Boudrot, fils died probably at Nantes by June 1784, when she remarried to Charles, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Broussard and Ursule LeBlanc and widower of Bonne-Jacqueline-Françoise Castel, in St.-Martin de Chantenay Parish near Nantes.  

Meanwhile, in 1763, Jean-Baptiste's younger brother Olivier was released from prison in England and settled near his siblings at Pleudihen-sur-Rance.  There he married Anastasie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Boudrot and Agathe Thibodeau, in February 1764.  Their daughter Anne-Marie-Josèphe was born at nearby Mordreuc in April 1765.  Anastasie died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in February 1766, age 20.  Olivier remarried to Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Landry and Anne Thériot, in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in May 1768.  She gave him more children there:  Charles-Olivier in March 1769; Jean-Baptiste in March 1771; and Joseph-Marie in September 1773 but died 10 days after his birth.  When Olivier's older brother and sisters headed to Poitou in 1773, Olivier followed other Acadian refugees to the Isle of Jersey, a British possession in the English Channel, from which they returned to North America by 1774.  They settled in the British-controlled fisheries at Bonaventure and Carleton in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, where Acadian refugees from the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore also had settled.   

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  The Barrieaus still languishing at Nantes--Jean-Baptiste, his wife, and four children; and his sisters Agathe, Anastasie, Euphrosine, and Pélagie and their families--agreed to take it.  They booked passage on four of the Seven Ships from France that reached New Orleans in 1785.205

Bastarache

In 1755, descendants of Jean Bastarache dit Le Basque and Agathe Vincent were still living in the Annapolis River valley and others had moved to Chignecto.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family to the far-flung edges of French America. 

Jean and Agathe's grandsons Michel dit Basque and his older brother Pierre, fils were exiled to South Carolina in the fall of 1755 without their families.  They refused to remain.  In the spring of 1756, they escaped with a number of companions and made their way back through the North American wilderness to Lake Ontario, moved on to Québec, and then joined their families in greater Acadia.  In the final years of the war, they and other refugees on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore ended up in British prison compounds in Nova Scotia.  After the war ended in 1763, Michel settled first in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto before moving to Tracadie on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where he died at age 89 in the early 1800s and where his descendants remained.  Brother Pierre, fils, according to Bona Arsenault, joined fellow exiles on Baie Ste.-Marie in Nova Scotia.  Jean Bastarache, fils's son Anselme took his family to Yamachiche on the St. Lawrence above Québec.  Other Bastaraches could be found at St.-Philippe-de-Laprairie south of Montréal, at St.-Charles-sur-Richelieu on that river east of Montréal, and at Bouctouche on the eastern shore of today's New Brunswick, near Tracadie.

Just before and during Le Grand Dérangement, two of Jean, fils's daughters married Moutons from Chignecto:  Anne married Salvator, and Marie-Modeste married Salvator's brother Louis.  A third daughter, Isabelle, seems to have followed her older sisters into exile at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  After the British broke up the Acadian refuge there in late 1760, the Bastarache sisters probably went to Halifax while their husbands were being held as prisoners of war in Fort Edward, Nova Scotia, formerly Pigiguit.  Isabelle married Jean dit Neveu, a cousin of her Mouton brothers-in-law, at Halifax.  After the war ended and they were released from Fort Edward, the Mouton brothers probably went to Halifax to rejoin their families, and from there they journeyed to Louisiana

In July 1766, Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, son of François-Marie Bastarache of Annapolis Royal, with Henry Claude and his wife Félicité Hébert, arrived at Champflore, Martinique, in the French Antilles.  Jean-Baptiste's older sister Jeanne, her husband Pierre Hébert, and five of their children also came to the island that month.  Jeanne did not remain there, however.  She died at St.-Philippe-de-Laprairie, near Montréal, in September 1782, age 68.190

Belliveau

In 1755, descendants of Antoine Belliveau and André Guyon could be found at Annapolis Royal, Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean.  They were especially numerous in the Annapolis valley.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered them even farther.

Some Annapolis Belliveaus escaped the British roundup in late 1755, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, and made their way north to Rivière St.-Jean and then east to the Gulf of St. Lawrence the following spring.  Some ended up at Restigouche, at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  There they managed to elude a second British roundup in late 1760 and moved even farther north, to Canada.  Other Annapolis Belliveaus fell into British hands and were deported to Massachusetts and North Carolina.  

A British transport sailing from the Annapolis Basin to North Carolina in early December 1755, the Pembroke, under command of a Captain Milton and seven officers and crewmen, carried 232 Acadians but did not make it to its destination.  Soon after it left the basin, the ship fell into the hands of exiles led by 58-year-old Charles Belliveau, a pilot and ship's carpenter.  He and his compatriots sailed the Pembroke first to Baie Ste.-Marie, where they hid for a month, and then crossed the Bay of Fundy to the mouth of Rivière St.-Jean in January 1756.  In early February, they fought off a British attack in the lower St.-Jean, burned the vessel, and retreated upriver to the Acadian settlement at Ste.-Anne-du-Pay-Bas, today's Fredericton, New Brunswick, where they spent the rest of the winter.  That summer, food having run low in the St.-Jean settlements, the Belliveaus and other Pembroke passengers made their way north to Québec, while others--including Charles's daughter Marguerite and her husband, surgeon Philippe de St.-Julien Lachaussée, whom she had married on Rivière St.-Jean--went to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they lingered at Miramichi and Restigouche.  Charles Belliveau, who had gone north to Canada, died at Québec in January 1758, age 60, perhaps in a smallpox epidemic that struck the Acadian refugees in the area that fall and winter.  

Some of the Chignecto Belliveaus escaped the British roundup of 1755 and moved north to the St. Lawrence valley.  However, at least two Belliveau families at Chignecto were transported to South Carolina, and one ended up in Massachusetts with their cousins from the Annapolis valley.  After the war ended in 1763, Belliveaus exiled to Massachusetts joined their cousins in present-day Québec Province, where they settled at Trois-Rivière; at Bécancour, Maskinongé, St.-Grégoire-de-Nicolet, and Nicolet between Trois-Rivières and Montréal; at St.-Jacques-de-L'Achigan, St.-Sulpice, and L'Assomption near Montréal; and at Grande-Rivière on the southern shore of the Gaspé Peninsula.  Members of the family also settled at Memramcook in present-day New Brunswick; at Rustico on Prince Edward Island; at Pubnico, Grosse-Coques, Ste.-Anne-du-Ruisseau-de-l'Anguille, and at St.-Bernard and Pointe-de-l'Église, now Church Point, on St. Mary's Bay in Nova Scotia.  One community along the eastern shore of St. Mary Bay's became L'Anse-aux-Belliveau, now Belliveau Cove.  

Belliveaus on Île St.-Jean in 1755--Jean, père's youngest son Louis and his family at Tracadie--were living on an island controlled by France, so they escaped the fate of their cousins in British Nova Scotia.  However, when the British captured the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, these Belliveaus, also, were subjected to British repression.  Louis and his family were among the island Acadians who escaped the British roundup.  By the 1760s, they had made their way to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, where French officials counted them in 1767.  Louis died on Miquelon in December 1775, age 65.  Another war with Britain--the American Revolution, in which France came in as an ally of the Americans--resulted in British deportation of the Acadians on Île Michelon to La Rochelle, France, in 1778.  Belliveaus were among them.  Two of Louis's children--Athanase, age 30; and Catherine, widow of Michel Doucet, age 40--died at La Rochelle in July and August 1779.  Louis's widow Louise Haché dit Gallant also died there, the following October.  Louis's daughter Rose married Pierre Le Clair of Île Miquelon, widower of Anne Comeau, at St.-Nicholas, La Rochelle, in January 1782.  When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in their Mississippi-valley colony, some of the Belliveaus likely had returned to North America before the Spanish made the offer, or those still in the mother country chose to remain in France.  No Belliveau can be found on the passenger lists of the Seven Ships expeditions of 1785.  One of Louis's daughters, Anne, died at Memramcook, southeastern New Brunswick, in 1820. 

Only one Belliveau, Pierre dit Bideau, seems to have made it to Louisiana.  Judging by his dit, Pierre may have been a descendant of Charles dit Bideau of Annapolis Royal, one of Jean, père's sons by his first wife.  Sadly, the date of Pierre dit Bideau's arrival in Louisiana, the place of exile from whence he came, where he settled in the colony, and who he married there, if he married at all, remain a mystery.  What is certain is that no line of this old Acadian family was established in the Bayou State.193

Benoit

By 1755, descendants of Martin Benoit dit Labrière and Marie Chaussegros had set down roots in nearly a dozen settlements in greater Acadia:  at Annapolis Royal; Rivière-aux-Canards, Grand-Pré, Pigiguit, and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; Memramcook in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; and in the French Maritimes at Anse-au-Matelot and Grande-Ascension on the south shore of Île St.-Jean; and at Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse, Rivière-des-Habitants, and Baie-des-Espagnols on Île Royale.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

When the British rounded up the Acadians at Minas, Pigiguit, and Annapolis Royal in the fall of 1755, they sent many of the Benoits there to Massachusetts.  They included the families of Alexis, Claude, François, Geoffroi, Jean-Baptiste dit Bercasse, and Joseph, who colonial officials held at Boston, Brookline, Cambridge, Dedham, Lancaster, Lunenburg, Medfield, Milton, and Newton.  Other Benoits at Pigiguit found themselves on transports bound for Maryland, and one of them may have gone to Virginia.  Many of the Benoits at Annapolis Royal and in the trois-rivières area, as well as a few of their cousins at Minas, escaped the British and sought refuge in Canada, with tragic result.  Cécile-Marguerite Benoit, wife of Joseph LeBlanc, died at Québec City in March 1758, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of exiles in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Benoits who had settled in the Maritimes islands escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  The fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758 gave the British easy access to the remaining Acadian communities in the region.  Later that year, British forces rounded up most of the island habitants and deported them to France.  Among them were dozens of Benoits.  Some crossed on the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer, suffered a shipboard mishap, and limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Many Benoits perished from the crossing.  Marie-Josèphe Thériot, widow of Jean Benoit, who crossed on the stricken transport, died at sea, but her Benoit sons--Joseph, age 27, a carpenter; Jean-Louis, age 18, a sailor; Baptiste, age 19, also a sailor; and Paul, age 15--reached St.-Malo.  Youngest son Paul died four days after the Duc Guillaume reached port, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Charles Benoit, age 36, his second wife Marie Girouard, age 27, Charles's brother Pierre, nephew Augustin Benoit, age 17, and niece Osite Pitre, also crossed on Duc Guillaume.  Pierre and Osite died at sea, but Charles, Marie, and Augustin made it to St.-Malo, though, in Charles's case, just barely.   Madeleine Benoit, widow of Jean-Baptiste Marcadet, took four children with her aboard Duc Guillaume.  Madeleine, age 18, and Lucas and Modeste, ages unrecorded, survived the crossing, but Louison, whose age also was unrecorded, died at sea.  Madeleine died in a hospital at St.-Malo in late November soon after the ship reached port.  Son Lucas Marcadet was granted permission soon after arrival to continue on to the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, so he must have been at least a teenager.  Three entire Benoit families--those of Paul, age 54, and Abraham, age 49, sons of Pierre le jeune; and Olivier, age 41, son of Jean--also did not make it to France.  They perished with hundreds of other Acadians when two of the British transports bound for St.-Malo, the Violet and Duke William, sank in a North Atlantic storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December 1758.  Charles Benoit, age 47, wife Marie-Madeleine Thériot, age 47, and their four unmarried children--Françoise, age 18; Judith, age 14; Jean-Charles, age 11; and Pierre, age 7--along with Élisabeth LeJuge, Charles's 70-year-old mother, crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the same 12-ship convoy in late November in which the Violet and Duke William had sailed, and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  Every member of the family survived the voyage except for young Pierre, who died at sea.  However, mother Élisabeth, weakened no doubt by the rigors of the crossing, died at Châteauneuf south of St.-Malo in July 1759, six months after she reached the Breton port.  Anne Benoit, age 21, and husband Charles LeBlanc, age 22, also survived the crossing aboard Tamerlane; they brought no children with them.  Marguerite Benoit, wife of Étienne Hamet, age 59, died along with their three children, ages 14, 12, and 10, aboard one of the five transports that left Chédaboutou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January.  Marie Benoit, wife of Charles Dugas, lost her husband and two of their 10 children aboard one of the Five Ships.  Augustin Benoit, age 32, crossed with wife Marguerite Lejeune, age 28, and three children--Marguerite, age 8, Simon, and Élisabeth, called Aizahy, ages unrecorded--on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November 1768, survived the storm off the English coast, took refuge at the English port of Bideford in late December for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  All three of Augustin's children died at sea.  The voyage and the rigors of childbirth proved fatal to wife Marguerite, who was pregnant when she made the crossing.  She died at Châteauneuf in May after giving birth to daughter Perrine-Jeanne at nearby St.-Suliac.  Perrine-Jeanne lived only six days, and then Augustin was alone.  Anne Benoit, age 31, wife of Pierre Hébert, age 27, lost one of her two children--daughter Élisabeth, age 1--in a hospital at St.-Malo two months after they reached the French port aboard Supply.  Françoise Benoit, age 37, wife of Jean Bourg, age 43, crossed with seven of their children on Supply.  Françoise, Jean, and son Théodore, age 5, died in the hospital at St.-Malo in June and July 1759, several months after completing the crossing, leaving the other six children, ages 18 to 7, as parentless orphans. 

Island Benoits did their best to create a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  After they reached the Breton port, brothers Joseph, a carpenter, and Jean-Louis and Baptiste, sailors, moved on to Lorient on the other side of Brittany.  Jean-Louis, evidently while pursuing his trade, died on the French island of Guadaloupe in March 1764.  Charles Benoit and his wife Marie-Madeleine Thériot lived at Châteauneuf on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo, where Charles died in January 1760, age 50.  Daughter Judith, age 15, died at Châteauneuf the following March.  Meanwhile, daughter Françoise married Honoré, son of fellow Acadians Ignace Carret and Cécile Henry, in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in March 1759.  Marie-Madeleine Thériot, who did not remarry, took son Jean-Charles Benoit to St.-Servan, where he married Anne-Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Haché dit Gallant and Anne Olivier, in January 1770.  Jean-Charles and Anne-Marie had at least one child at St.-Servan, Jean-Marie in November 1770.  The younger Charles Benoit, husband of Marie Girouard, also did not last long in France.  He and Marie lived on the Rue des Bouchers in St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo after they disembarked from the Duc Guillaume.  Charles did not recover from the rigors of the crossing.  He died in late November 1758 in the Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, age 36.  Marie Girouard's fate is difficult to ascertain.  Augustin, son of Claude Benoit, who had crossed with his Uncle Charles and Aunt Marie on Duc Guillaume, was only a teenager when he reached St.-Malo in late 1758.  At age 19, he married Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Thériot and Marguerite Guérin, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in February 1760.  Son Nicolas-Jean-Sébastien, called Sébastien, was born at St.-Servan in November 1760.  In 1763, Augustin and Françoise, with little Sébastien in tow, joined other exiles in a risky venture--a long, arduous voyage aboard the ship Aigle to the îles Malouines, today's Falkland Islands, near the southern tip of South America.  There, three more children were born to them:  François in c1764; Adélaïde in c1765; and Anne in c1767.  By the time of Anne's birth, the British had taken over the desolate islands and sent the Benoits and other Acadians there back to St.-Malo, which the Benoits reached in April 1768.  Augustin and Françoise settled again at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where two more daughters were born to them:  Louise-Marie in October 1769; and Anne-Marie in January 1773 but died at St.-Servan, age 5, in September 1772.  The other Augustin, son of Pierre Benoit, who had lost his family on the crossing aboard Supply, lived at Châteauneuf from 1759 to 1760.  In April 1760, he embarked on the corsair Hercules and fell into the hands of the British, who held him as a prisoner in England for the rest of the war.  Back in France in 1763, he moved to St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where he created a second family when he remarried to Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Gautrot and Euphrosine Labauve of Grand-Pré, in July 1763.  Augustin and Marie-Madeleine had at least six children at St.-Servan:  Mathurin in May 1764; François-Jean-Baptiste in October 1765; Jean-Marie-Augustin in January 1767 but died at age 2 in December 1768; Marie-Jeanne in January 1769 but died at age 15 months in March 1770; Françoise-Apollonie in October 1770 but died at age 2 in September 1772; and Victoire-Marie in November 1772.  Grégoire, son of another Claude Benoit, was age 14 when he landed with relatives at Rochefort in October 1759.  Later that year, he followed them to Mégrit in the countryside southwest St.-Malo and then to St.-Servan, where he married Marie-Rose, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Carret and Rose Trahan, in February 1770.  Grégoire and Marie-Rose had two children at St.-Servan:  Joseph-François in October 1771 but died at age 1 in December 1772; and Jean-Marie in September 1773.  Grégoire's younger brother Daniel also followed his relatives to Mégrit and St.-Servan, where he married Henriette, daughter of fellow Acadians François Legendre and Marguerite Labauve, in February 1768.  They had two children at St-Servans-sur-Mer:  Daniel-Henry in October 1769; and Jeanne-Eléonore-Anastasie in January 1772 but died seven months later. 

In 1758-59, island Benoits landed in French ports other than St.-Malo, including Rochefort and La Rochelle on the Bay of Biscay, and at the northern fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer.  Grégoire, Daniel, and Marguerite, ages 14, 11, and 5, children of Claude Benoit and Élisabeth Thériot, reached the naval port of Rochefort with the family of brother-in-law Yves Crochet, husband of their older sister Pélagie, in October 1759, but they soon moved on to St.-Malo.  Élisabeth Benoit, wife of Jean Foretier, died in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in November 1760, age 33.  Marie-Marthe Benoit of Cobeguit and Louisbourg, widow of carpenter Jean Clément, married Nicolas-Gabriel Gerbert or Albert of Île d'Oléron and widower of Marie Garsant, in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in January 1761.  The priest who recorded the marriage noted that Nicolas had lived at Louisbourg and had resided at Rochefort for 10 years before the marriage.  Other Benoits at Rochefort at the time may not have been Acadians.  Marie Benoit, widow of Jacques Catron, married labourer à bras Pierre, fils, son of Pierre Renard or Renaud and Suzanne Barillon of Thonny-Routonne, Saintonge, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in June 1764.  Jacques Benoit, a journalier du port, widower of Angélique Blay, married Suzanne Sicard, widow of Pierre Gainault, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in April 1773.  Catherine Benoit, widow of François LePrince and definitely an Acadian, died at Boulogne-sur-Mer in January 1760, age 74.  Joseph, son of Claude Benoit, described as a "Canadian who died in England in the service of the King," was "buried" in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in March 1763, age 23.  He may have been one of the young Acadians who signed up to serve on a French corsair soon after they reached France and paid dearly for it.  Marie-Anne Benoit, wife of Antoine Giroir, died in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in February 1782, age 40.  One wonders if she was an island Benoit who had landed there in 1759. 

One Acadian Benoit, Lazare, reached St.-Malo in 1763, perhaps one of the hundreds of Acadian exiles held in England who had been repatriated to France in the spring of that year.  If so, Lazare, born perhaps at Pigiguit in c1736, would have been exiled from Minas to Virginia in the fall of 1755 and sent on to England the following spring.  After he reached France, he lived at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, probably still a bachelor in his late 20s.  He refused to remain in the mother country.  In 1764, he returned to North America with other Acadian exiles and settled on Île Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  He then disappears from the historical record.  One wonders how he was related to the other Acadian Benoits. 

In 1764, an island Benoit, Michel, "native of Louisbourg," along with his unnamed wife, took the ship Désirée to the new French colony of Guiane on the northeast coast of South America.  The experience proved fatal.  Michel died in St.-Saviour Parish, Cayenne, in late October 1764.  (The Michel Benoist who appears in the 1 March 1765 census at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district, age 34, was not an Acadian but a Frenchman "de Toulouse.") 

In the early 1770s, Benoits still in the St.-Malo area chose to take part in another, much grander, settlement venture, this one in the interior province of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential French nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  Among them were four Benoit families from St.-Servan-sur-Mer:  Augustin and second wife Marie-Madeleine Gautrot; Grégoire and wife Marie-Rose Carret; brother Daniel and wife Henriette Legendre; and Jean-Charles and wife Anne-Marie Haché.  Daniel and Henriette's son Daniel-Henry died in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age 4 1/2, in June 1774.  But the Benoits also welcomed more children into their families.  Marie-Madeleine gave Augustin another son, Joseph-Marie, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish in November 1774.  Marie-Rose gave Grégoire another daughter, Marie-Rose, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish in May 1775.  Anne-Marie gave Jean-Charles another son, Paul-Frédéric, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish in October 1775. 

In late 1775 and early 1776, after two years of effort, hundreds of Poitou Acadians, including most of the Benoits, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes.  The exception was Anne Benoit, who had come to Cenan, Poitou, in 1773 with a blended family that included her second husband Jean-Baptiste Hébert, a son by her first husband Pierre Hébert, a son by her current husband, and a stepdaughter, who married a local Frenchman at Cenan in October 1776.  Anne's second husband died there in June 1778, and her older son married there to a fellow Acadian in January 1779.  The older son's wife died nine months later, and he, Anne, and her younger son moved on the Nantes during the early 1780s.  At Nantes, the Benoits lived as best they could on government handouts and on what work they could find.  Again, the Benoits welcomed more children into their families.  Marie-Madeleine Gautrot gave Augustin another son, Jean-Marie-Augustin, in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, in June 1777, but he died a few days later.  Marie-Rose Carret gave Grégoire two more sons at nearby Chantenay:  Donatien in c1777; and Rémond-Grégoire in July 1783.  Anne-Marie Haché gave Jean-Charles two more children at Nantes:  François-René in c1778, and Sophie-Renée in c1783.  Daniel and Henriette's daughter Henriette-Renée was baptized in St.-Martin de Chantenay Parish in June 1778.  And tragedy struck another family again:  Augustin, son of Pierre, died in St.-Similien Parish in September 1783, age 55. 

When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, many Benoits agreed to take it.  They included Jean-Charles, Sébastien, François-Jean-Baptiste, brothers Grégoire and Daniel, and cousin Marie-Marthe.  So did twice-widowed Anne Benoit, her older Hébert son, now remarried, and her younger Hébert son--two dozen Benoits in all.  However, some members of the family remained in France, especially the ones who had taken French spouses.  There were exceptions.  Anne-Marie, youngest daughter of Augustin Benoit and Françoise Thériot, who had chosen to remain, married, at age 27, Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Vigneau and Anne Lefergue of îles St.-Pierre and Miquelon, at Ingouville near Le Havre, Normandy, in May 1800.  Husband Joseph was a sailor.  The priest who married them noted that Anne-Marie had been "deported from Isles of St.-Pierre et Miquelon," but he did not say if it was in 1767 or 1778.  Anne-Marie had been only age 12 when older brother Sébastien and other relatives emigrated to Louisiana in 1785, so she had no choice but to remain in France with her parents.

In North America at war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In June 1763 in Pennsylvania widow Magdalaine Benoist and a child; and Joseph Benoist, wife Marie-Josèphe, and two children were still in that colony.  In August 1763 in Massachusetts even more Benoit families were still in the colony, including Claude, wife Anne, and three children, two sons and a daughter; Godefrois, wife Magdelaine, and six children, four sons and two daughters; François, wife Françoise, and a daughter; Joseph, wife Blanche, and a daughters; René, wife Félicitté, three children, two sons and a daughter, and kinswoman Marguerite Benoist; Jean, wife Margot, and seven children, four sons and three daughters; Alexis, wife Hélène, and six children, a son and five daughters.  In June 1766, Benoits still in Massachusetts appeared on a "List of Names of the French Who Wish to Go to Canada."  They included _____ Benoist and his family of five; Godefroi Benoist and his family of eight; and P___ Benois and his family of three.  In August 1763, colonial authorities in Maryland counted a Benoit family, a couple of Benoit wives, and half a dozen Benoit orphans at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac River, all of them refugees from Pigiguit.  They included Pierre-Olivier, called Olivier, Benoit, wife Susanne Boudrot, son Jean-Charles, and daughters Marie and Madeleine (called Marguerite by the colonial scribe).  Also in the same community were Olivier's brother Jean-Baptiste's widow Anne Trahan, now the wife of Louis Latier; Olivier's nieces Marguerite, Marie-Anne, and Marie-Rose Benoit; and orphans Anne and Natalis, probably Nathalie, Benoit.  Marie Benoit, wife of Jean-Charles Breau of Pigiguit, also was at Port Tobacco with her husband, two children, and a Boudrot orphan.  Étienne, orphan son of Claude Benoit of Pigiguit, also may have been living with Marie and the Breaus. 

Benoits who had escaped the roundup on the Maritime islands in 1758 and eluded the British managed to remain in greater Acadia.  After 1763, they settled at Arichat on Île Madame off the southern coast of Cape Breton Island, formerly Île Royale; at Petit-Bras d'Or and D'Escousse on Cape Breton; and on Île St.-Pierre, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Some of the Benoits on Île St.-Pierre had come there from exile in France.  In the 1790s and early 1800s, Benoits from Cape Breton and Île St.-Pierre moved north to Newfoundland, where they settled in the Codroy Valley, at Baie d'Espoir, and especially on Baie St.-George.  Some of these Newfoundland Benoits married anglophone wives and anglicized their surname to Bennett.  Others retained the French spelling of their name, which sometimes appears in the records as Benoite.  Meanwhile, most of the many Benoits held in Massachusetts after the war chose to go to Canada.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Martin Benoit dit Labrière began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, they could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Trois-Rivières, St.-Michel-d'Yamaska, and Yamachiche, and on the lower Richelieu east of Montréal at Chambly and St.-Ours.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  

Acadian Benoits in the seaboard colonies also emigrated to the French Antilles to avoid British rule.  Orphan sisters Anne and Élisabeth, born in Massachusetts, where the British had deported them and their parents in 1755, may have gone to French St.-Domingue with other Acadians from New England in the early 1760s.  If so, they moved on to Louisiana by 1775, when Élisabeth married a Dupuis on the river above New Orleans, and Anne married a widowed son of Joseph Broussard dit Beausoleil at Attakapas west of the Atchafalaya Basin--among the relatively few Acadians who emigrated to the Spanish colony directly from the French Antilles.  Acadian Benoits ended up on other islands of the French Antilles.  Jean-Louis Benoit, a 24-year-old sailor, son of Jean of Île Royale, died "in the home of Mr. Pécou, master surgeon, at Petit-Bourg, Guadeloupe, in March 1764.  Clément Benoit, arpenteur du roi, or land surveyor for the King, and his wife Catherine Eveillard, were living at Petit-Bourg, Guadeloupe, when their daughter Marie-Louise died at age 4 months in April 1764.  They were still there in January 1768, when another daughter was born to them.  One wonders if Clément was Acadian.  Joseph Benoit of Louisbourg, perhaps also a sailor, died at Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe, in April 1764, age 26.  Anne, daughter of Jean Benoit of Cobeguit and widow of Gabriel Darein, ended up at Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe, where she married Jean, fils, son of Jean Maillard and Marie Baja of Petit-Loupy, Lorraine, in April 1768; Jean, fils was a merchant.  Catherine-Josèphe, daughter of Jean Benoit of Cobeguit and wife or widow of Germain Thériot, died at Fort-Royal, Martinique, in November 1766, age 55.  Jacques, son of Jean Benoit and Marie Bertin, born at Blaye, near Bordeaux, a master blacksmith, married Marie-Élisabeth, called Élisabeth, daughter of Acadians Zacharie Richard and Delle Blanchard, at Le Mouillage, Martinique, in February 1771.  Élisabeth had been born in Acadia.  Jacques may have been a French Benoit.  They were still at Le Mouillage when their son Pierre was born in December 1789. 

Benoits in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  First in June 1766 and again in April 1767, exiles languishing in the Chesapeake colony headed for New Orleans via Cap-Français, St.-Domingue.  Benoits were not among these early Maryland emigrants.  Not until December 1767 did any of them book passage for the Spanish colony, this time with the large extended family at Port Tobacco led by Alexis and Honoré Breau of Pigiguit.  Nearly a year later, in January 1769, Olivier Benoit, his wife and children, and his former sister-in-law Anne Trahan and her family, including her Benoit daughters, booked passage from Port Tobacco on the English schooner Britannia bound for the lower Mississippi.207

Bergeron

By 1755, descendants of Barthélémy Bergeron dit d'Amboise and Geneviève Serreau de Saint-Aubin could be found on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered the family to the winds. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Bergerons on Rivière St.-Jean escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the summer and fall of 1755.  The family's respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  In September 1758, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July, the British constructed Fort Frederick at the mouth of the St.-Jean, establishing a military presence there.  Later in the year and in early 1759, British forces, including New-English rangers, struck the lower St.-Jean settlements, including Ste-Anne-du-Pays-Bas and Ékoupag, where Bergerons lived.  River habitants who fell into British hands were transported to Georges Island in Halifax harbor.  In November 1759, Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence deported them, along with Acadians captured at Cap-Sable, to England, but British authorities sent them on to Cherbourg, France, where they landed in January 1760.  None of the captured river habitants seem to have been Bergerons.  Eluding the British, they fled either to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they joined exiles from Nova Scotia, or they continued up the St.-Jean portage to Canada. 

According to Acadian genealogist Bona Arsenault, all three of Barthélémy Bergeron dit d'Amboise, père's sons were captured by British forces during Le Grand Dérangement, held as prisoners at Halifax with their families, made their way to Louisiana in 1765 via Cap-Français, French St.-Domingue, and were thus among the earliest Acadians to reach that colony.  Other sources tell a different story.  Oldest son Barthélemy dit d'Amboise, fils evidently escaped the British roundup on lower St.-Jean in late 1758; moved on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore; either surrendered to, or was captured by, British forces in the region; and held in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war, but the genealogists at the Acadian Memorial in St. Martinville, Louisiana, do not list him as one of the Acadians who went to Louisiana from Halifax in 1765.  Eight of his children, including four sons, did go to the Mississippi Valley colony then, but Barthélemy, fils did not.  Barthélemy, fils's younger brother Michel dit de Nantes also eluded the British in 1758, surrendered or was captured in the early 1760s, and held in Nova Scotia, but the Acadian Memorial does not list him, either, as one of the refugees who reached Louisiana in 1765.  Six of his sons--Pierre dit Nantes, François, Michel, fils, Simon, Joseph dit d'Ambroise, and Étienne dit d'Ambroise--after escaping the British in 1758 sought refuge in Canada, perhaps with their father.  However, three of Michel dit de Nantes's daughters--Anne-Marie, Geneviève, and Marie--did choose to go to Louisiana in 1764-65 probably after they had surrendered to, or been captured by, the British on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore in the early 1760s.  Barthélemy, fils and Michel dit de Nantes's youngest brother Augustin was the only one of Barthélemy dit d'Ambroise, père's three sons who ended up in Louisiana.  With him went his wife and the family of his son Jean-Baptiste dit d'Amboise.  At war's end, Augustin's younger sons Pierre and Charles-André, along with their sister Élisabeth, did not follow their parents and older brother to Louisiana.  They chose, instead, to resettle in the British-controlled fishery at Gaspesié on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs or join their cousins in Canada. 

Many, if not most, of the Bergerons, then, did not go to Louisiana in 1765 but resettled in Canada and greater Acadia in the late 1750s or early 1760s.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Barthélemy Bergeron dit d'Ambroise began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  After the war, they could be found along the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, St.-Grégoire-de-Nicolet, Nicolet, Gentilly, Trois-Rivières, and Yamachiche; at L'Îsle-Verte, Kamouraska, St.-Anne-de-la-Pocatière, and Cacouna on the lower St. Lawrence; and at Carleton, Bonaventure, New-Carlisle, Paspébiac, and Percé in Gaspésie.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

All of the Acadian Bergerons who emigrated to Louisiana came from the prison compounds in Nova Scotia.  In August 1763, British officials counted Jean Bergeron, his wife, and four children; Augustin Bergeron, his wife, and three children; and Cherle Bergeron, his wife, and three children on Georges Island, Halifax.  At war's end, these members of the family faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some exiles in Nova Scotia chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, these members of the family refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 29 were Bergerons.208

Bernard

By 1755, descendants of René Bernard, père and Madeleine Doucet could be found mostly at Chignecto, where René himself had settled.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered them to the winds.   

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Abbé Le Loutre and his Mi'kmaq warriors, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Bernards probably were among the refugees.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local Acadians, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  That fall, the British transported at least two Bernard families to South Carolina with hundreds of others.  One family was headed by René, père's youngest son Michel, who sailed on the British transport Dolphin.  By August 1763, when colonial officials counted Michel and his third daughter Madeleine, now age 21, still in South Carolina, Michel had remarried to fellow Acadian Anne Babineau.  One wonders if, the following year, Michel took his family to French St.-Domingue with other Acadians from that colony.  

Most of the Bernards at Chignecto escaped the British roundup in the fall of 1755 and fled north to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  There, they found refuge at Miramichi, while others moved on to Canada, with tragic results.  René, père's granddaughter Anne, wife of Jean-Baptiste Bourgeois, died at Québec in mid-June 1757, age 40, perhaps soon after she reached the Canadian capital by ship from Miramichi.  Her father René dit Renochet and his younger brother Jean-Baptiste--René, père's first and third sons--died at Québec the following November and December, ages 67 and 61, victims, perhaps, of a smallpox epidemic that struck hundreds of Acadian refugees in and around Québec from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Also a likely victim of the epidemic was Renochet's wife and Anne's mother, Anne Blou, who died at Québec in early December, age 60.   After the war with Britain, many Acadian Bernards could be found in Canada and greater Acadia at Lotbinière between Québec and Trois-Rivières on the upper St. Lawrence. St.-Antoine-de-Chambly, St.-Denis, and St.-Ours on the lower Richelieu east of Montréal; at Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs; and along Baie Ste.-Marie on the southwest coast of Nova Scotia.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Several Acadian Bernards ended up in France.  Marie-Blanche, called Blanche, and Marie-Madeleine, daughters of René Bernard III and Marguerite Hébert, born probably at Chignecto, had followed their family to Île St.-Jean by the mid-1750s.  Living in territory controlled by France, the Bernards and other island Acadians escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean and deported most of the habitants to France.  Blanche, Marie-Madeleine, and probably their parents ended up at Cherbourg, Normandy.  At age 18, Marie-Madeleine married Charles, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Henry and Christine Pitre and widower of Françoise-Josèphe Thériot, in the Norman port in January 1761.  Her mother was dead by then.  Marie-Madeleine's daughter Marie-Madeleine Henry was born the following January, and Rose-Anastasie in c1771.  After moving on to Le Havre across the Baie de Seine from Cherbourg, sister Blanche, age 24, married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians Paul dit Le Grand Paul Doiron and Marguerite Michel of Pigiguit and Île St.-Jean, in January 1766.  Their father René III died between April 1764 and January 1766, place unrecorded.  In the early 1770s, Blanche and Jean-Baptiste, as well as Charles and Marie-Madeleine, became part of the major settlement venture in the interior of Poitou.  Marie-Madeleine gave birth to daughter Cécile in Poitou in April 1774, soon after she and Charles arrived there, and to Ursule in c1775.  In late 1775, after two years of effort, the sisters and their families, along with most of the Poitou Acadians, retreated down the Vienne and the Loire from Châtellerault to the port of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Blanche Bernard and husband Jean-Baptiste Doiron agreed to take it.  Marie-Madeleine, unfortunately, could not make that decision; she had died at Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, in September 1780, age 37.  However, three of her Henry daughters, ages 23, 14, and 10, followed their father and stepmother to Spanish Louisiana. 

Two of René Bernard, père's grandsons--Pierre, married to Marguerite Arseneau; and younger brother Michel le jeune, still a bachelor, both sons of Jean-Baptiste--escaped the British roundup at Chignecto with their parents and siblings.  Unlike many members of the family, who continued on to Canada, Pierre and Michel, along with other kinsmen, sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked the French stronghold at Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Among them were Pre. [Pierre] Bernard and his family of seven; Joseph Bernard, père and his family of nine; Joseph Bernard, fils and his family of four; and Paul Bernard and his family of five.  Michel, son of Jean-Baptiste Bernard and Cécile Gaudet, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph dit L'Officier Guilbeau and Madeleine Michel of Annapolis Royal, at Restigouche in January 1761.  They, along with his older brother Pierre, his family, and other Bernards were held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  An unidentified author in an October 2005 article found in Janet Jehn's Acadian Genealogy Exchange asserts:  "The major portion of the Bernard families of Louisiana comes from two brothers, Michel and Pierre Bernard [sons of Jean-Baptiste of Chignecto] who arrived on the Mississippi shores about 1762 from Ristigouche at the top of the Baie des Chaleurs, where they fled after the deportation of 1755.  They probably sailed on one of the fishing boats that some Acadians of that time built and owned."  Again, we have a family historian who claims that members of his family reached Louisiana before other Acadians did, in this case 1762, two years before the first documented Acadians reached "the Mississippi shores" in February 1764.  The problem with this family historian's assertion is one of simple physics:  people cannot be in two places at the same time.  Brothers Pierre and Michel, their wives and children could not have been in Louisiana in 1762 when British officials counted them among the Acadian prisoners at Halifax in August 1763.  Brother Michel and his wife were counted there with one child; Pierre and his wife with four children; older brother Paul Bernar with a wife and four children; and another Pier Bernar with his wife and six children.

The Bernard brothers of Chignecto did not reach Louisiana on a fishing boat from greater Acadia in 1762.  At war's end, the Acadians being held in Nova Scotia, including the Bernard brothers and their families, faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies already had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, nine were Bernards--eight of them the brothers and their families, along with a female relative.209 

Bertrand

Descendants of Jean-François Bertrand and Ozanne Chevros of Plaisance, Newfoundland, were among the earliest settlers of the French colony of Île Royale.  They were still on the island in 1755.  Meanwhile, descendants of Claude Bertrand and Catherine Pitre, probably not kin to their aristocratic island namesakes, were widespread across greater Acadia.  In 1755, they could be found at Annapolis Royal; Chepoudy and Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; Minas; Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable; and on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered these families even farther. 

Claude Bertrand's son Jean l'aîné and some of his family escaped the British roundup at Chepoudy in the fall of 1755 and fled to Canada.  Jean l'aîné died at Québec in late December 1757, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck the Acadian refugees in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  After the war with Britain, Jean l'aîné's descendants could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Lavaltrie between Trois-Rivières and Montréal, and at Ste.-Thérèse near Montréal.  Meanwhile, Pierre Bertrand, perhaps one of Claude's grandsons, ended up as a widower on Île St.-Pierre, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada and the Maritimes region lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, descendants of Claude Bertrand on Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the fate of their kinsmen on the Fundy shore.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the Maritime islands, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France.  This included descendants of Jean-François Bertrand, still on Île Royale.  Claude Bertrand's older daughter Marie, her second husband Jean Le Breton, and their children crossed aboard the transport Violet with 400 other Acadians from Île St.-Jean.  In mid-December, the Violet, on its way to St.-Malo, sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England.  All were lost.  Anne-Josèphe Bertrand, age 26, and husband Pierre Longuépée, age 30, crossed on the transport Supply, which, like the Violet, left Chédaboutou Bay in an 1-ship convoy in late November for St.-Malo.  The storm that sank the Violet and two other transports full of Acadians drove the Supply to Bideford, England, where it was repaired and re-supplied, and finally reached the Breton port in early March 1759.  The couple survived the crossing.  Their daughter Anne was born at St.-Malo in mid-April, so Anne-Josèphe had been pregnant on the voyage. 

An island Bertrand may have landed not at St.-Malo but at Cherbourg in Normandy in 1758-59.  Eustache, son of the Jean Bertrand l'aîné who had died at Québec in December 1757 and nephew of Marie who had perished on the Violet, did not follow his family to Canada.  From one of the French islands, mostly likely Île St.-Jean, the British deported him to France in late 1758.  He worked as a ship's carpenter there, probably at Cherbourg and Le Havre in Normandy, and married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Benjamin Landry and Marguerite Babin, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in March 1764.  Between 1766 and 1773, Marguerite gave Eustache five children in the Norman ports:  Madeleine-Marguerite probably at Cherbourg in c1766; Jean-Baptiste-Léonor or Léonor-Jean-Baptiste in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in April 1768 but died at Cherbourg, age 6 1/2 months, the following November; Geneviève-Adélaïde at Cherbourg in May 1770; Marie-Geneviève in October 1772; and Marie-Louise in c1773 or 1774.  In 1773, Eustache took his family Poitou, where daughter Marguerite-Lucie was born at Archigny southeast of Châtellerault in October 1774.  In December 1775, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted on government handouts or whatever work they could find.  Daughter Geneviève-Adélaïde, who would have been age 5 in 1775, was not with them on the convoy down the Loire, so she probably had died by then.  Daughter Marie-Louise died at Chantenay near Nantes, age 22 months, in August 1776.  Daughter Marguerite-Lucie also died at Nantes or Chantenay between 1776 and 1785.  However, between 1776 and 1784, at Chantenay, Marguerite gave Eustache four more children:  Guillaume-Eustache in c1776 but died at age 1 in May 1777; Marie-Josèphe in c1778; Charles at Chantenay in July 1780 but died at age 18 months in April 1782; and Louis-Martin in c1784--10 children, four sons and six daughters, between 1766 and 1784, over half of whom died young.  In the summer of 1780, Eustache was in Brest in western Brittany working in the King service as a ship's carpenter while his family remained at Chantenay. 

Marie Bertrand's younger sister Angélique, husband Toussaint Blanchard, and their children ended up in France by another route.  The family, from Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, evidently escaped the British roundup there in the fall of 1755 and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Sometime in the late 1750s or early 1760s, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British authorities counted them at Chédabouctou on the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia in 1764.  Soon afterwards, they resettled on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  In 1767, French officials, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on the island, sent the fisher/habitants on the Newfoundland islands to France.  Angélique died at the Hôpital de St.-Pol-de-Léon, the coastal port for Morlaix in northwest Brittany, in January 1768, in her early 70s.  Her nephew/son-in-law, Jean, fils, only son of Jean Bertrand le jeune and Anne Doucet of Annapolis Royal and Port-Razoir near Cap-Sable, evidently endured a similar fate during Le Grand Dérangment.  His father and mother died during exile, his father perhaps at Chédabouctou, his mother perhaps in France.  Jean, fils married first cousin Marguerite, daughter of Toussaint Blanchard and Angélique Bertrand, his uncle and aunt, in c1762 probably at Chédabouctou, where Marguerite gave him a son, Jean-Nicolas, in c1765.  They followed her family to Miquelon about the time their son was born and then to France in 1767.  Marguerite gave Jean, fils a daughter, Rose-Marthe, in c1767, either on Miquelon or in France.  Jean, fils worked as a day-laborer and sailor in the mother country.  Marguerite gave him another daughter, Marie-Modeste, at Cherbourg in October 1769--three children, a son and two daughters, between 1765 and 1769, in greater Acadia and France.  As the birth of their youngest daughter reveals, Jean and Marguerite did not return to Miquelon with most of the other Miquelonnais in 1768.  In 1773, they also went to Poitou and, in December 1775, after two years of effort, retreated with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes.  Their older daughter Rose-Marthe was not with them in the convoy to Nantes, so she evidently had died by then.  Jean, fils died at Chantenay near Nantes in November 1781, age 50.  Younger daughter Marie-Modeste also may have died at Nantes or Chantenay between 1775 and 1785.  Son Jean-Nicolas, when he was old enough, worked as a sailor and, when he could, watched after his widowed mother. 

Acadian Bertrands ended up in France by yet another route.  As they had done in the Fundy settlements during the summer and fall of 1755, the British struck the Acadians in the Cap-Sable area, determined to deport them to the seaboard colonies.  In the spring of 1756, redcoats from Halifax swooped down on Cap-Sable and nearby Pobomcoup and rounded up many of the habitants and fishermen there, loaded them aboard two sloops, and sent them to New York and Massachusetts.  Many of the Cap-Sable Acadians escaped the roundup, the Bertrands among them, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, 400 British soldiers disembarked at Cap-Sable in late September to search for Acadians still in the area.  Two sailboats manned by British troops sailed along the shore above and below the cape "to prevent the vermin from escaping in canoes," one British officer commented.  Luck had now run out for the Bertrands still at Pobomcoup.  The British burned all of the houses and other buildings in the area to deny the habitants shelter and sustenance.  In late October, they embarked 68 Acadians they had captured at Cap-Sable, plus their priest, on the transport Alexander II.  This probably included Bertrands.  The Alexander II sailed from Cap-Sable to Halifax, which it reached the first week of November.  From Halifax, in December 1758, the British sent the Cap-Sable Acadians to France with the Acadians they were deporting from the Maritime islands.  The Bertrands landed at Cherbourg in Normandy.  Jacques Bertrand, youngest brother of Marie and Angélique, his wife Madeleine Moulaison, and their daughter Marie-Anne survived the crossing to France and ended their days there.  Jacques died in c1766, in his early 60s, place unrecorded, perhaps at Cherbourg.  His wife, who did not remarry, and his daughter, still unmarried, evidently followed other Acadians in the port cities to Poitou in 1773 and remained there when most of the other Acadians abandoned the venture two years later.  Madeleine, age 72, and Marie-Anne, age 40, died at Monthoiron south of Châtellerault in August 1782, only six days apart.  Meanwhile, Marie, daughter of Pierre Bertrand and Marie-Josèphe Moulaison of Pobomcoup and niece of Marie, Angélique, and Jacques, married Jean-Baptiste, fils, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Lamoureaux dit Rochefort and Marie-Claire Potier, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in October 1763.  Marie's brother Pierre-Jacques, who was in his late 20s in 1758 and still a bacehelor, became a manual laborer and a sailor in France.  He married Catherine, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Bourg and Marguerite Landry, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in February 1764.  Son Ambroise-Bénoni was born at Le Havre across the Baie de Seine in October 1766; Jean-Augustin in Cherbourg in September 1769; and daughter Marie-Catherine there in January 1772.  In 1773, Pierre-Jacques and Catherine followed other exiles to Poitou, where they hoped to become farmers again.  Catherine gave Pierre-Jacques another daughter there,  Marie in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellearault, in March 1774.  After two years of effort, they also retreated with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes.  More children were born to them there, and two of them died:  François in St.-Jacques Parish in November 1776 but died the following January; Adélade in December 1777; another François in c1779 but died at age 3 in September 1782; Louis in September 1782; and Anne-Madeleine in March 1785--nine children, five sons and four daughters, between 1764 and 1785, most of whom survived childhood. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Pierre-Jacques, Eustache, and their families, and Jean-Nicolas and his widowed mother, agreed to take it.  However, Pierre-Jacques's sister Marie and her husband Jean-Baptiste Lamoureaux dit Rochefort, fils, chose to remain in France.

Meanwhile, Michel Bertrand, who had worked as a master carpenter at Louisbourg before 1758, ended up at Pointe-à-Pitre on the island of Guadeloupe, where he married Marie-Anne, daughter of Pierre Despres, a master fisherman, and Marie-Anne Groutelle, in July 1769.  Michel died in August, age 30, soon after his marriage. 

Only one descendant of Jean-François Bertrand of Île Royale seems to have emigrated to Louisiana.  Jean-Thomas, son of Jean Bertrand, grandson of Jean-François, and Marie Le Borgne de Bélisle, was born at Havre-la-Baleine, Île Royale, in c1741.  Still in his teens, he likely was deported to France with some of his kinsmen in late 1758.  Sometimes in the late 1700s, he found his way to New Orleans, evidently with a wife named Bernarda.210

Billeray

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, the Acadians on Île St.-Jean were safe for now because they lived in territory controlled by France.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats gathered up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France later in the year. 

Joseph Billeray--called Joseph Billerois, "ploughman, native of Verny Fontaine, bishopric of Besançon," by a French official who counted him with his family at Anse-au-Matelot in August 1752--wife Brigitte Forest, and their two children, Jeanne and Charles, ages 6 and 4, were torn from their home on the island and thrown aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Every member of the family, called Billeret by French officials, survived the crossing, but daughter Jeanne must have been weakened by the ordeal; she died in May 1759 probably in a St.-Malo hospital.   Joseph and Brigitte joined other exiles at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river southwest of St.-Malo, where more children were born to them:  Marie-Jeanne in July 1759, Joseph-Jean or Jean-Joseph in November 1761, and Anne-Brigitte in June 1764.   In late 1765, Joseph was one of the relatively few island Acadians who took his family to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southwest coast of Brittany, where they joined over 300 other Acadians, most of them recently repatriated from England, in a venture they hoped would provide them independence from the government handouts on which they had subsisted at St.-Malo.  They lived in the village of Kervarigeon in the parish of Bangor in the island's southern interior, where, in February 1767, Joseph and Brigitte recounted their respective family genealogies for French authorities.   They also lost two children at Kervarigeon.  Anne-Brigitte died at age 18 months in November 1765, soon after they reached the island.  Joseph-Jean died at age 4 in c1769.  Two years later, in c1771, wife Brigitte Forest died, leaving Joseph with two children--Charles, age16; and Marie-Jeanne, now 12.  Joseph remarried to local Frenchwoman Marie Thomas at Bangor in c1771 and fathered more children:  Marie-Marthe in c1772; Louise in c1774; and Joseph-Clément in c1779.  Nicholas, the "natural" son of Louise Billeray, was born on the island in c1800.  Joseph, meanwhile, died on Belle-Île-en-Mer in c1779, in his early 50s.  Daughter Marie-Jeanne married Frenchman François Le Sommer of Grandchamp probably on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  The record is not clear on how long Marie-Jeanne Billeray remained on the island.  What is known is that her husband died before August 1785.  

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, the Billerays of Belle-Île-en-Mer did not heed the call, except for one.  Marie-Jeanne, still in her late 20s, became a young widow by 1785.  She evidently agreed with her Forest kin that going to Louisiana was a good thing.  Her stepmother Marie Thomas, brother Charles, and her half-siblings, however, remained on Belle-Île-en-Mer, where French officials counted them in 1792 during the early years of the French Revolution.194

Blanchard

In 1755, descendants of three family progenitors bearing this name--Jean Blanchard, married to Radegonde Lambert; François dit Gentilhomme Blanchard and his two wives Anne Corne and Marguerite Carret; and Toussaint Blanchard and Angélique Bertrand, neither of them kin to one another--could be found at Annapolis Royal, Minas, Cobeguit, Chignecto, Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered these families even farther.

Blanchards at Petitcoudiac and Annapolis Royal escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the autumn of 1755 and either fled to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or continued on to Canada.  Charles, son of Guillaume Blanchard, a descendant of Jean, died at Québec in late December 1757, age 60, a victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck the Acadian refugees in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 through the spring of 1758.  Charles's nephew René, fils died at Québec in January 1758, age 33, another victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic.  Blanchards still at Cobeguit in the summer of 1755 would have, that fall, winter, or the following spring, escaped via Tatamagouche and other villages on the North Shore to Île St.-Jean, where their kinsmen already had gone.  When British troops arrived at Cobeguit during the third week of September, the entire village complex had been abandoned! 

Other Blanchards did not elude the British.  Two of Jean's descendants, probably from Petitcoudiac, ended up in South Carolina in 1755 but, with permission of that colony's governor, made their way back to greater Acadia by boat the following spring.  Several Blanchard cousins at Minas, including René, fils, his wife, a daughter, and sons Joseph and Anselme, were deported to Maryland.  They were held at Baltimore.  Two Blanchard sisters from Minas, with their husbands and children, were transported to Virginia, where they endured a fate worse than other fellow exiles deported from Minas.  In mid-November, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Acadians from one vessel were moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Virginia's House of Burgesses made its decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where many died of smallpox.  By 1763, more than half of them were dead.  In May of that year, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including Blanchards, were repatriated to France.  Meanwhile, Blanchards from the Annapolis valley were deported to Pennsylvania, New York, and Massachusetts.  A colonial record dated 6 May 1756 notes that a Blanchard family was among the "French neutrals sent by Gov. Lawrence from Nova Scotia to New York" who, after being blown off course to Antigua, were parcelled out to five counties in the Manhattan area.  Colonial authorities sent Joseph Blanchard and his family of eight to Bushwick, Queens County, on Long Island.  Blanchards also were held at Boston and Roxbury in Massachusetts.

The Blanchards on Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, enjoyed a short respite from the clutches of the British, and then the Great Upheaval caught up to them with terrible consequences.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean, rounded up most of the habitants, and deported them to France.  Étienne Blanchard, age 30, crossed alone aboard the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  He survived the ordeal but died at the Widow Launay's home at Bassablons, a suburb of St.-Malo, the following April, likely from the rigors of the crossing.  Many other island Blanchards perished from the crossing.  Most of them crossed aboard one or more of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November, survived a storm, and reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Pierre Blanchard, married to Françoise Breau, died with his wife aboard one of the Five Ships.  Pierre and Françoise's unmarried son Charles, age 21, also died on the voyage, but a 10-year-old orphan, Ignace Hamon, traveling with them, survived the crossing.  Daughter Hélène Blanchard, age 40, wife of Alexis Aucoin, survived the crossing, but her husband and three of their seven children perished in the ordeal.  Charles's older brother Pierre Blanchard, fils, age 37, crossed with wife Marie-Madeleine Hébert, age 31, and two sons--Jean-Pierre, age 8; and Ambroise, age 4.  Only Marie-Madeleine survived the crossing.  Two entire Blanchard families, headed by brothers, failed to survive deportation aboard the Five Ships, and the rest of their extended family fared almost as badly.  Alexis Blanchard, age 33, died in a St.-Malo hospital in early February soon aftter reaching the port.  All three of his children--Simon, age 4; Isabell-Geneviève, age 3; and Marie-Anne, age 1--died at sea.  Alexis's wife Marie Pitre, age 34, was pregnant during the voyage.  She gave birth to daughter Nicole at St.-Malo in early February.  The baby died at the port's Hòtel-Dieu a week later, and Marie died the same day.  Alexis's younger brother Jean, age 32, died either on the crossing or soon after reaching St.-Malo.  His three children--Anne-Josèphe, age 6; Jean-Grégoire, age 5; and Marie, age 1--died at sea.  His wife Françoise Moyse, age 32, also was pregnant during the crossing and gave birth to son Jean-Antoine at St.-Malo in mid-February, soon after reaching the Breton port.  The baby died a day after his birth, and Françoise died a week later.  Joseph Blanchard, age 64, and wife Anne Dupuis, age 60, of Cobeguit--Alexis and Jean's parents--both died at sea, but their three unmarried sons--François, age 28; Charles, age 26; and Bénoni, age 18--survived the crossing.  In March 1759, less than two months after reaching St.-Malo aboard one of the Five Ships, the family of Germain Blanchard, age 36, one of Joseph and Anne's older sons, lost most of his family from the crossing or its rigors.  Wife Marguerite Bourg and five of their six children--Ambroise, age 9; Charles, age 8; Marguerite, age 5; Marie, age 2; and Perrine, a newborn--died at sea or soon after the ship reached port.  Only oldest son Jean, age 13, was left to him.  Germain's younger brother Joseph, fils, age 34, married to Marguerite-Geneviève Pitre, age 36, also died in the hospital at St.-Malo after burying four of his five children--Guillaume, age 11; Michel, age 8; Joseph-Mathurin, age 6, and Marguerite-Modeste, age 3--at sea.  Only wife Marguerite-Geneviève and son François-Xavier, age 12, survived the crossing.  Germain et al.'s first cousin Joseph Blanchard, age 28, and wife Anne-Symphorose Hébert, age 19, survived the crossing.  They brought no children with them.  Niece Marie Blanchard, age 13, came along and she, too, survived the crossing on one of the Five Ships.  However, Joseph's mother, Élisabeth Dupuis, and Anne's brother Charles Hébert, age 22, died at sea.  Françoise Hébert, age 25, widow of Joseph Blanchard, died at sea, but her daughter Marie-Josèphe Blanchard, age 3, survived the crossing.  Pierre Blanchard died along with two of his children--Jean-Pierre, age 8; and Ambroise, age 4--and an orphan, six-year-old Joseph Hamon.  Only wife Madeleine Hébert, age 29, survived the crossing.  Jean Blanchard and his three-year-old son Jean, fils, died on the crossing.  Only wife Anne Hébert, age 21, and Joseph Blanchard, a relative, survived.  Madeleine Blanchard, wife of Pierre Hébert, died along with her two children.  Angélique Blanchard, age 53, wife of François Naquin, age 54, died with her husband and five of their seven children either at sea or in a St.-Malo hospital soon after they reached the port aboard one of the Five Ships.  Anne Blanchard, wife of Joseph Aucoin, age 38, died at sea with their three children.  Only Joseph survived the crossing.  Anne-Marie Blanchard, age 23, crossed with husband Pierre Robichaux, age 28.  Anne-Marie died at St.-Malo in late May, no doubt from the rigors of the voyage.  Madeleine Blanchard, age 30, wife of Pierre Hébert, age 23, died at sea along with two of their young children.  Only Pierre survived the crossing.  Another Madeleine Blanchard, age 21, and husband Charles Bourg, also 21, survived the crossing.  Marie-Josèphe Blanchard, age 40, crossed with husband Jean Moyse, age 46, and their five children.  Jean, Marie-Josèphe, and three of their children survived the crossing aboard one of the Five Ships, but their two youngest daughters died at sea. 

Island Blanchards did their best to make a life for themselves in the surburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Germain, oldest surviving son of Joseph Blanchard and Anne Dupuis of Cobeguit, remarried to Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Aucoin and Marie Henry, at Langrolay-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo in March 1762.  Marie-Josèphe gave him four more children on the Rance:  twins Julienne-Françoise and Jeanne-Françoise at Langrolay in March 1763, but lthey ived for only two days; Marie-Jeanne at Pleudihen-sur-Rance across the river in March 1764; and Marie-Jeanne at La Gravelle near Pleudihen in November 1765 but lived for only four days--10 children, three sons and seven daughters, by two wives, between 1746 and 1765, in greater Acadia and France.  Of his many children, only Germain's son Jean, from his first wife Marguerite Bourg, survived childhood.  Jean married Élisabeth, another daughter of Michel Aucoin and Marie Henry and his stepsister, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance in July 1765.  Élisabeth gave him four children in two of the villages near Pleudihen:  Jean-Marie at Mordreuc in September 1766; François-Jean in May 1768 but died at age 10 at nearby La Gravelle in January 1778; Marguerite-Françoise in January 1772; and Jacques-Joseph at La Gravelle in December 1773.  Germain's younger brother François worked as a laborer and ploughman at St.-Malo.  He married Hélène-Judith, daughter of fellow Acadians Honoré Girouard and Marie-Josèphe Thériot, at Pleslin on the west side of the river near Langrolay-sur-Rance in October 1763.  Hélène-Judith gave him at least three children at St.-Suliac across the river from Pleslin:  Françoise-Hélène in May 1765; Eudoxe-Marie-Gillette in September 1769; and Rose-Anne in January 1773.  Germain and François's younger brother Charles worked as a shoemaker in St.-Malo.  He married Marguerite-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Dugas and Isabelle Bourg, at St.-Suliac in January 1762.  Marguerite-Josèphe gave Charles four children there:  Suliac-François in August 1764; Rose-Anne in c1765 but died at age 8 in September 1773; Charles-Pierre-Marc in March 1768; and Marie-Françoise in July 1770.  Germain, François, and Charles's youngest brother Bénoni, a sailor, married Agnès, another daughter of Pierre Dugas and Isabelle Bourg, at St.-Suliac in February 1764.  Agnès died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, the following August, age 22, evidently from the rigors of childbirth.  Their unnamed son died two days before his mother passed.  Bénoni remarried to Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Forest and Claire Vincent, at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river from Mordreuc in February 1766.  Madeleine gave him three more children at St.-Suliac across the river:  Marie-Madeleine in February 1767; Joachim-Jacques in October 1768; and Bénoni-Jacques in June 1771.  Blanchard cousins also created families in the Rance valley villages.  Joseph, son of Martin Blanchard and Élisabeth Dupuis of Cobeguit, a seaman, and wife Anne-Symphorose, daughter of Pierre Hébert and Marguerite-Françoise Bourg of Cobeguit, settled at St.-Suliac, where six children were born to them:  Joseph-Jean-François in December 1761; Marie-Anne in February 1764 but died in April; Laurent-Olivier in August 1765; Marie-Madeleine in August 1767; Pierre-Joseph in September 1769; and Louis-Suliac in October 1771.  Another Joseph, son of Anselme, arrived at St.-Malo from the naval port of Rochefort in 1763 and married Gertrude, daughter of fellow Acadians François Thériot and Françoise Guérin of Cobeguit and Île St.-Jean, in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in February 1766.  She gave him two children there:  Joseph in December 1766; and an unnamed girl who died the day after her birth in May 1769.  Gertrude died in August 1772, age 27, and Joseph remarried to Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Henry and Marie Carret, at St.-Servan in January 1773.  She gave him another son, Cirile-Henry, at St.-Servan in February 1774, but he died the following April. 

From the late 1750s into the late 1760s, island Blanchards landed in other French ports, including the northern fishing port of Boulogne-sur-Mer, Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, and Cherbourg in Normandy.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of Guillaume Blanchard and Huguette Gougeon of Petitcoudiac and wife of Charles Gautrot, ended up at Boulogne-sur-Mer, where she died at age 67 (the recording priest said 72) in October 1759, likely from the rigors of the crossing.  Anselme Blanchard of Cobeguit and St.-Esprit, Île Royale, died in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in September 1759, age 42, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  His son Joseph by his first wife, age 16 in 1758, moved on to St.-Malo in 1763.  One wonders what happened to Anselme's other children.  Toussaint Blanchard of Petitcoudiac, wife Angélique Bertrand, and their son Joseph ended up at Cherbourg.  In the early 1760s, after the war with Britain, they had left a prison compound in Nova Scotia and resettled on the French-controlled fishery island of Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  French officials, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, deported them, along with other fisher/habitants, to France in 1767. Most of the islanders returned to St.-Pierre and Miquelon the following year.  Not Toussaint and his famiy.  Wife Angélique died in a hospital in northwest Brittany in January 1768, in her early 70s.  Toussaint died at Cherbourg in September 1769, age 83.  Two of their three daughters, Marguerite and Anne, had married into the Bertrand and Comeau families probably in Nova Scotia in c1762 before following their family to Miquelon and France.  Youngest daughter Madeleine, now in her mid-20s, was still unmarried when her parents died.  Toussaint's son Joseph married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Granger and Madeleine Melanson, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in August 1769 and remained there, where at least two sons were born to them:  Jean-Frédéric in July 1770; and Guillaume-Joseph-Victor in March 1774. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  Jean LeBlanc and his wife Françoise Blanchard of Grand-Pré, with three of their children, sailed from Liverpool to Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  In late 1765, they followed other Acadians from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, where Françoise died at Sauzon on the north end of the island in May 1785, age 84.

In the early 1770s, hundreds of Acadians participated in an even grander settlement scheme in the interior province of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  A French nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  Acadians from the St.-Malo area who ventured to Poitou included brothers François, Charles, and Bénoni Blanchard; and Joseph, son of Martin--all from St.-Suliac.  François's wife Hélène-Judith Giroir gave him a son Joseph-François, at Leigné-les-Bois southwest of Châtellerault in April 1775.  Charles's wife Marguerite-Josèphe Dugas died in Poitou in February 1775, age 36.  Madeleine Forest gave Bénoni another son, Étienne-Charles-Marie, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in April 1775.  Jean-Grégoire Blanchard, a cousin who worked as a woodpolisher perhaps in one of the St.-Malo villages, also went to Poitou, where he married Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Livois and his second wife Marie-Madeleine Poirier, in c1774.  Marie-Madeleine gave Jean-Grégorie a daughter, Marie-Anne, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste, Châtellerault, in February 1775, but she died at age 1 in February 1776.  Joseph, son of Toussaint Blanchard, took his family from Cherbourg to Poitou, where wife Marie Granger gave him another son, Louis-Augustin, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in September 1775.  Joseph's sisters Marguerite and Anne and their Bertrand and Comeau husbands also were a part of the Poitou venture.  In late 1775 and early 1776, after two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians, including the Blanchards, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault to the lower Loire port of Nantes.

At Nantes and nearby Chantenay, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government hand outs and what work they could find.  François Blanchard's wife Hélène-Judith gave him four more children in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes:  Pierre-Sébastien in January 1777 but died the following May; Jean in July 1779 but died in June 1780; Marguerite-Anne in August 1780; and Rosalie-Adélaïde in May 1782 but died at age 1 1/2 in November 1783.  Brother Charles's daughter Marie-Françoise died at age 7 in St.-Similien Parish in July 1777.  Brother Bénoni's son Étienne died in Ste.-Croix Parish, Nantes, at age 1 in April 1776, but Madeleine gave him four more children in the lower Loire port:  Céleste in Ste.-Croix Parish in August 1776; Rosalie in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in May 1778 but died in Ste.-Croix Parish, age 1 1/2, in January 1780; Angélique-Michel  in Ste.-Croix Parish in August 1780 but died two weeks later; and Moïse in February 1782.  Cousin Joseph's son Joseph-Jean-François died in St.-Jacques Parish in June 1776, age 15.  Joseph's wife Anne-Symphorose Hébert gave him three more children in St.-Jacques Parish:  Joseph-Nicolas in June 1776 but died the following February; Anne in February 1778; and Joseph, fils in December 1781 but died four days later.  Joseph, père died in St.-Jacques Parish in December 1783, age 53.  Cousin Jean-Grégoire's wife Marie-Madeleine gave him three more children in St.-Similien Parish:  Marie in July 1776; Jean in March 1778; and Pierre-Charles in c1785.  Joseph, son of Toussaint, also retreated from Poitou to Nantes, where wife Marie Granger gave him another son, and where they buried two at nearby Chantenay:  Louis-Augustin, born in Poitou, died in August 1780, age 5; and Alexandre-Josèphe, born at Chantenay in April 1778, died at age 2 in August 1780, eight days after his older brother.

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Many of the Blanchards, including Toussaint's son Joseph, chose to remain in France, but at least 30 other Blanchards--most descendants of Jean, including brothers François, Charles, and Bénoni and their families, Joseph's widow Anne-Symphorose Hébert and her six Blanchard children, as well as Jean-Grégoire and his family--agreed to take it.  Even Toussaint Blanchard's three daughters agreed to go to the Spanish colony.  

In North America, Blanchards who had escaped the British in the late 1750s suffered more reverses in the final years of the war against Britain.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Among them were Fois, or François, Blanchard and his family of six; and Olivier Blanchard and his family of four.  After the surrender, other Blanchards either captured by, or surrendered, to British forces in the area were held along with the Restigouche captives in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In 1761-62, British officials counted members of the famliy at Fort Edward, Pigiguit:  They included Michel Blanchard, Pierre Blanchard, Paul Blanchard and his family of three, Honoré Blanchard and his family of five, and Guille. Blanchard and his famly of five. 

The war over, the Blanchards still languishing in the British seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intensions.  Even then, colonials authorities discouraged repatriation.  In Pennsylvania in June 1763, Marguerite Vincent, widow of Joseph Blanchard of Minas, and her four children were still in that colony.  One wonders where they resettled after the counting.  That July, colonial officials in Maryland counted another Joseph Blanchard from Minas, his wife Marie-Josèphe Landry, and their two children at Baltimore. 

After the war, Blanchards still being held in Massachusetts chose to resettle in Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, Blanchards from all three branches of the family began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, they could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Deschambault, Repentigny, Nicolet, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, St.-Michel-d'Yamaska, Varennes, Louiseville, and Yamachiche; at St.-Ours on the lower Richelieu; and on the lower St. Lawrence at St.-François-de-la-Rivière-du-Sud, Berthier-sur-Mer, and Kamouraska.  They also settled at Caraquet on the southern shore of the Baie des Chaleurs in present-day New Brunswick; at Chédabouctou, now Guysborough, Nova Scotia; at Rustico on the north shore of Prince Edward Island, formerly Île St.-Jean; and on Île Miquelon.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada and the Maritimes lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  

In the 1760s, members of the family also resettled in the Caribbean basin--in French St.-Domingue, today's Haiti; at Cayenne in French Guiane on the northeast coast of South America; and on Martinique, where they were especially numerous.  Clothilde Blanchard, described as an orphan, died at St.-Joseph, Sinnamary, in the Cayenne district of French Guiane, in January 1765, age 15, where she had gone from France a year or two earlier.  She evidently was the only member of the family to go to that forbidding place.  One wonders who were her parents.  Élisabeth-Félicité, daughter of Marc Blanchard and Félicité Comeau, was born at St.-Pierre, Martinique, in November 1765.  Other Blanchards were recorded at Champflore, Martinique, on 1 January 1766, including Élisabeth, or Isabelle, widow of Zacharie, son of Michel Richard and Agnès Bourgeois, daughter Marie, and four other Blanchards--Marguerite, Élisabeth, Félicité, and Anne--likely her sisters.  Her oldest sister Marie-Josèphe was counted with husband Louis, son of Alexandre Girourd and Marie Le Borgne de Bélisle, and three of their children.  Louis died on Martinique the following March, and son François Girouard died in August.  A third sister, Marie-Madeleine, widow of Michel dit LaFond, another son of Michel Richard and Agnès Bourgeois, was counted at Champflore with three other Blanchards--Agnès, Marguerite, and Michel--probably her siblings.  Their first cousin Joseph, son of René Blanchard and Marie Savoie of the Annapolis valley, was counted at Champflore with wife Marguerite Dupuis and their five children--Joseph, Jean, Anne, Pierre, and Madeleine.  Anne died at Champflore on January 17.  Joseph and his family had been exiles in New York before resettling on Martinique.  Interestingly, their deportation ship, the Experiment, on its way from the Annapolis valley to New York colony in December 1755, had been blown off course to the British-controlled island of Antigua, north of Martinique, before doubling back to New York the following spring.  Evidently the family liked what they had seen during their unexpected sojourn in the Windward Islands and chose to settle in the French Antilles at war's end.  Two Blanchard sisters, daughters of Antoine Blanchard and Élisabeth Thériot of the Annapolis valley, died on Martinique in the early 1770s:  Marie-Josèphe, widow Girouard, at Fort-Royal in December 1772, age 60; and Élisabeth/Isabelle, widow Richard, at St.-Pierre in December 1773, age 53.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of Guillaume Blanchard and Catherine Cyr and widow of Pierre Bouvard, baptized at Restigouche in February 1760, married Jacques, son of vigneron Antoine Jacquemin and Étienette LePage of Port-sur-Soane, Franche-Comte, at Fort-Dauphin, French St.-Domingue, in September 1778.  In June 1783, Joseph Blanchard married Françoise Sire, perhaps Cyr, at Môle-St.-Nicolas, site of a new naval base the Acadians helped build on the northwest tip of St.-Domingue.  Their daughter Marie-Sophie had been born at Môle in March 1776. 

Blanchards being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Blanchards, chose to go to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where exiles from the seaboard colonies, including Blanchards, were going, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least nine were descendants of Jean Blanchard.

Blanchards languishing in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in the Chesapeake colony that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  The first continent of Maryland exiles left the colony for New Orleans in late June 1766 and got there via Cap-Français the following September.  Three Blanchards were part of that expedition, but most, like René and his son Anselme Blanchard of Minas--a dozen more members of the family--were part of  the second contingent that left Baltimore in April 1767 and reached New Orleans via Cap-Français the following July.212

Bonnevie

In 1755, descendants of Jacques Bonnevie dit Beaumont of Paris, Port-Royal, and Île Royale, and Françoise Mius d'Azy of Pobomcoup could still be found on Île St.-Jean, where they had gone in the 1730s and late 1740s.  Living in territory controlled by France, they escaped the British roundup in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  In late 1758, after the fall of the French stronghold at Louisbourg in July, the victorious British rounded up most of the Acadians on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  Sadly, two of the old corporal's daughters--Françoise, married to master tailor Jean, son of Étienne Helie dit Nouvelle and Marguerite Laporte of Poitiers, Poitou, her second husband; and Marie, married to François Duguay of Pluvigné, Vannes, Britanny, one of the first settlers on the island--never made it to France.  They perished with their husbands and children and dozens of other Acadians aboard the Violet, a deportation transport that left Chédabouctou Bay in late November 1758 in a 12-ship convoy and sank in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England on its way to St.-Malo.  

Meanwhile, the corporal's second son, Jacques dit Jacquot dit Beaumont, Jacquot's third wife, and their family, still living at Chignecto, were deported to South Carolina aboard the British transport Edward Cornwallis, which reached Charles Town in November 1755.  They likely were among the Acadians in that colony allowed to return to Nova Scotia by sea, which they accomplished in the spring of 1756--among the relatively few exiles who made it all the way.  After finding refuge on Rivière St.-Jean, they may have been among the Acadians granted permission to move on to Île St.-Jean, where Jacquot's sisters could be found, or, more likely, they moved on to Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Later, they joined other Acadian exiles at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, a major Acadian refuge as well as a French outpost.  Jacquot's third wife, Nannette Melanson, gave him another daughter, Louise-Élisabeth, in October 1759; the baby was baptized at Restigouche in May 1760, so she may have been born at their previous domicile.  Four of Jacquot's children married during the family's year-long stay at Restigouche.  In January 1760, daughter Rose married Jean, fils, son of Jean Gousman and Marie Granielle of Andalusia, a Spanish sailor who had lived at Annapolis Royal.  Jacquot's son Amand dit Beaumont married Catherine, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Gaudet and Anne Girouard, in July 1760.  Jacquot's son Joseph married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel dit Michaud Haché dit Gallant and his first wife Marguerite Gravois of Chignecto, in May 1761.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760 but failed to capture the outpost.  Another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared in October to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians' surrender.  On 24 October 1760, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Among them were Jacques Bonnevie and his family of six.  Jacquot died at Restigouche by 1761, when his third wife remarried there.  By 1762, the British were holding members of his family at Fort Edward, formerly Pigiguit, in British Nova Scotia before transferring them to the larger prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax harbor, where the British counted some of them in August 1763.  When the war with Britain finally ended, some of the Bonnevies, seeking to avoid British rule, moved from Halifax to the French-controlled fishery island of Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland, but not all of them remained.  Some of them doubled back to Chezzetcook near Halifax, some moved from Chezzetcook to Menoudie at Chignecto, near where the father once lived; others moved on from there to nearby Cap-Pelé on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore; and some ended up in France. 

One of Jacques dit Jacquot's sons, Amand dit Beaumont, and his family outdid all his siblings in their wanderings.  He followed his family to South Carolina, back to greater Acadia, to the Gulf shore, Restigouche, where he married, into a prison compound in Nova Scotia, to Miquelon, and was at Port-Louis near Lorient in southern Brittany, France, in 1768, after the French had forced them to leave the Newfoundland fishery to avoid overcrowiding.  He returned to Miquelon later in the year; was deported by the British from Miquelon to France in November 1778 aboard the brigantine La Jeanette; and died at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo in c1779.  His widow Catherine Gaudet returned to Miquelon in 1784 after the war with Britain ended, in favor of France, and moved on to the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence by 1793.  Son Pierre, a fisherman, married Françoise Briand on the isolated islands in c1790 but did not remain there.  They were living at Halifax later in the decade, where a daughter was born to them in c1796.  They moved on to Le Havre in Normandy, where another daughter was born in August 1799 and their older daughter died in September, age 2 1/2.  Brother Amand, fils married Marie LeBorgne, probably a fellow Acadian in the remote Gulf islands, became a carpenter, and also settled at Le Havre.  Between 1797 and 1805, Marie gave Amand, fils at least six children, five sons and a daughter, at the Norman port.  Two of them died in infancy.  Joseph's and Amand, fils's sister Marie-Modeste married into the Doucet family at Le Havre. 

Meanwhile, Jaquot's daughter Rose and her husband Jean Gousman, fils joined other members of her family on Île Miquelon after they were allowed to leave the prison at Halifax.  Pressured by the French government in 1767 to vacate the overcrowded island, they, too, crossed to France, but they did not return to Miquelon with most of the other islanders in 1768.  They were counted at Le Havre in 1772.  Unlike brother Amand's widow, who returned to greater Acadia in 1784, Rose and her family remained in France with the hundreds of other Acadian exiles still living there.  Despite their many relocations, Jean and Rose had at least nine children, including six sons, in greater Acadia and France:  Raphaël in c1762; Rosalie-Charlotte in c1764; Gousman in c1766; Étienne in c1767; Joseph-Antoine in c1768; Jean-Baptiste in c1770; Anne-Marie in c1772; Ludivine baptized at Cenan in Poitou, France, in August 1774; and Jean-Thomas at Chantenay near Nantes, France, in August 1783.  All of these children except two died in childhood, not an uncommon fate for Acadian exiles during Le Grand Dérangement.  In 1773 or 1774, Rose and Jean went to the interior province of Poitou with hundreds of their fellow exiles to settle on land that belonged to an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  The venture failed after two seasons of effort.  In October 1775, Rose and Jean retreated with their fellow Poitou Acadians down the Vienne and the Loire to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on what work they could find and on welfare provided by the French government.  When in the early 1780s the Spanish offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Rose Bonnevie and her Spanish husband agreed to take it.195

Le Borgne de Bélisle

By 1755, descendants of Alexandre Le Borgne de Bélisle and wife Marie de Saint-Étienne de La Tour could still be found at Annapolis Royal and in the Minas Basin.  All were from Alexandre's younger son, Alexandre, fils and his wife Anastasie d'Abbadie de Saint-Castin.  The largest line was that of Alexandre III and his wife Marie, daughter of Jean LeBlanc and Jeanne Bourgeois of Minas, which produced at least nine children, six sons and three daughters, including Alexandre IV, born at Minas in c1736.  Alexandre III died at Minas in August 1744.  His widow and children remained there. 

In the fall of 1755, Alexandre IV, still a teenager, escaped the British roundup at Minas and fled north to Canada.  In April 1773, he married Geneviève Cloutier, a Canadian, at L'Islet, in the lower St. Lawrence valley.  In the early 1800s, their younger son Anselme le jeune moved his family first to Rivière-Ouelle and then to L'Isle-Verte, farther down the St. Lawrence.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the mid-twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Alexandre IV's widowed mother and his siblings were not as lucky.  In the fall of 1755, the British deported them to Maryland, where brother Anselme married cousin Anne, daughter of Paul Babin and Marie LeBlanc of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in the late 1750s or early 1760s; Anselme's mother, also, was a LeBlanc.  They endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  In July 1763, colonial officials counted Anselme and his famiy at Annapolis with other Acadian exiles, including Anselme's widowed mother, younger brother Pierre, and sister Marie-Rose.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that the Spanish would wecolme them to Louisiana, where many of their relatives had gone, most of them pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  In April 1767, as part of the second contingent of Maryland Acadians to head to Louisiana, Anselme, wife Anne, and their infant son Paul booked passage on the English ship Virgin with 200 other Acadians, but Anselme's widowed mother and siblings remained in the Chesapeake colony.191

Boucher

In the autumn of 1755, the British deported Pierre Boucher, his wife Marie Doiron, and their infant daughter Marie-Anne to South Carolina aboard the sloop Dolphin, which left Chignecto on October 13 and reached Charles Town on November 19.  Pierre died in South Carolina, and Marie Doiron remarried to Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Philippe Lambert and Marie-Madeleine Boudrot of Chignecto and widower of Marguerite Arseneau and _____, in South Carolina in c1761.  Two years later, in August 1763, South Carolina officials counted Marie Doiron, daughter Marie-Anne Boucher, Pierre Lambert, his son by a previous marriage, Pierre and Marie's infant son Jean, and three orphans, still living in the colony.  Marie-Anne was nine years old at the time  In the same census, South Carolina officials counted Jean Boucher (they called him Pierre), wife Félicité Breau, son Pierre, age 3, and Anne Breau, age 12, perhaps Félicité's younger sister.  One wonders how Jean was kin to the late Pierre Boucher. 

Later that year or in early 1764, Acadians languishing in the seaboard colonies, including many in South Carolina, emigrated to French St.-Domingue, today's Haiti.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the "war of vengeance" to come.  Acadians like Pierre Lambert and Jean Boucher would provide a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  In return, the French promised the exiles land of their own in the sugar colony. 

Things did not work out there for Pierre Lambert.  After enduring the tropical hell of St.-Domingue for two long years, he was determined to resettle his family in a more salubrious climate.  His chance came in 1765, when hundreds of Acadians from Halifax arrived at Cap-Français, east of Môle St.-Nicolas, on their way to the lower Mississippi valley.  Evidently Pierre and his family, including stepdaughter Marie-Anne Boucher, now age 11, joined up with one of the contingents from Halifax that transshipped at Cap-Français before continuing on to New Orleans. 

Jean Boucher's experience in the sugar colony could not have been more different.  He and his family remained at Môle St.-Nicolas, where, by the early 1780s, he had become maitre de port.  At least six more children were born to him and wife Félicité Breau at the naval base:  Étienne in c1764, Félicité in c1766, Madeleine in c1770, Marie-Hélène in c1775, Marie in March 1777, and Eugène in c1780.  Then tragedy struck.  On 2 April 1783, Jean and Félicité filed a "testimony of marriage" at Môle St.-Nicolas.  Reported as "extremely ill," Jean was attempting to legitimize his children before he died, which occurred the following day.  Evidently his family remained on the island, which was rocked by a bloody slave revolt a decade after his passing.196

Boudrot

By 1755, the many descendants of Michel Boudrot and Michelle Aucoin could be found in most of the major communities of greater Acadia, including Annapolis Royal, Grand-Pré and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin, and Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther.

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Boudrots may have been among the refugees.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Boudrots likely were among the dozens of area Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  At least one Boudrot family from Chignecto--Paul and his wife Marguerite Landry--ended up in South Carolina.  Another ended up in Georgia.  But not all of the Boudrots sent to the southern colonies remained there until the end of the war.  In the spring of 1756, the governors of Georgia and South Carolina encouraged the Acadians in their colonies who were not under arrest to return to their homeland as best they could.  Under the leadership of merchant Jacques-Maurice Vigneau of Baie-Verte, Chignecto, dozens of them--perhaps as many as 200--purchased or built small vessels and headed up the coast.  Some made it all the way back to the Bay of Fundy and found refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  Most did not.  In late August, after weeks of effort, 78 exiles came ashore on Long Island, New York, and, at the insistence of Charles Lawrence, were detained by colonial officials.  On a list of "names of the heads of the French Neutral families, number of their Children returned from Georgia and distributed through the counties of Westchester and Orange," dated 26 August 1756, can be found Francis Bodron, likely François Boudrot, his unnamed wife, perhaps Marguerite Pitre, and two unnamed children, who were sent to the "Orange precincts, south of the Highlands." 

Boudrots still at Minas and Pigiguit in the fall of 1755 were deported to Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and Massachusetts.  The Acadians transported to Virginia suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  In mid-November, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Acadians from one vessel were moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Virginia's House of Burgesses made its decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all.  In England, they were packed into warehouses in several seaports and many died of smallpox.  Boudrots were held at Bristol and Falmouth.  Meanwhile, at least one Boudrot family from Annapolis Royal was deported to New York in late 1755.  Boudrots who escaped the British roundups found refuge with hundreds of other exiles at Shediac, Richibouctou, and Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they fought starvation, hard winters, and British raiding parties.  Some moved on to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Others moved on to Canada. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Boudrots on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale escaped the deportations in Nova Scotia in 1755-56.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the islands, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France.  Many Boudrots did not survive the crossing, and entire families were lost.  Anselme Boudrot, age 39, his wife, and five of his six children--Anselme, fils, age 13; Simon, age 7; Pierre, Madeleine, and Paul, ages unrecorded--died aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Oldest daughter Marie-Henriette, age 10, died a few weeks after the ship's arrival.  Anselme's wife Geneviève Girouard also survived the voyage, but she, too, succumbed from the rigors of the crossing.  She died at St.-Malo in late December, age 38, so the entire family was wiped out.  Petit Paul Boudrot, age 56, and two of his five unmarried children--Basile, age 11; and Mathurin, age unrecorded--perished on Duc Guillaume.  Wife Marie-Josèphe Doiron, age 55, died in a St.-Malo hospital in late November, and son Joseph, age 4, died in December.  Only two of their older children--Jean-Charles, called Charles, age 19; and Anne, age 14--survived the rigors of the crossing.  Marie Boudrot, wife of Louis-Georges Anquetil of Louisbourg, died along with her husband and two of their three chidlren--Jean and Anne--aboard Duc Guillaume.  Only son Louis Anquetil and niece Marie Boudrot survived the crossing.  Marguerite Boudrot, daughter of Paul Boudrot and wife of Joseph Hébert, also crossed on Duc Guillaume.  She died in the hospital at St.-Malo soon after they reached the Breton port, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Her husband Joseph and son Grégoire died at sea.  Marie-Josèphe Boudrot, widow of Pierre-Toussaint Richard, also crossed on Duc Guillaume.  She, along with son Thomas Richard, died at St.-Malo soon after arrival.  Only son Honoré Richard and daughter Marie-Blanche Richard survived the rigors of the crossing.  Many of the island Boudrots crossed on one of the five British transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November with 1,033 Acadians bound for St.-Malo.  Despite the mid-December storm that sank or wrecked three other vessels, the Five Ships remained in convoy and reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  However, only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, many Boudrots among them.  Antoine Boudrot, age 43, crossed with wife Brigitte Apart, age 32, and their young son.  Antoine and Brigitte survived the crossing, but they watched 11-year-old son Jean-Baptiste die in a St.-Malo hospital a month after they reached the port.  Antoine's brother Zacharie Boudrot, age 37, crossed with wife Marguerite Daigre, age 30, five children--Marie, age 9; Paul, age 7; Charles, age 6; Marguerite, age 3; and Benjamin, age 1--Zacharie's half-sister Marie-Madeleine, age 22, and kinsman Pierre Boudrot, age 22.  All of the adults survived the crossing, but all five of Zacharie and Marguerite's children were buried at sea.  Anastasie Boudrot, sister of Marie-Madeleine and half-sister of Zacharie, crossed with husband Joseph Landry, age 30, and three of their children, ages 4, 3, and 1.  Anastasie and the children died at sea, leaving Joseph without a family.  Jean-Baptiste Boudrot, fils, age 30, wife Luce Trahan, age 23, three of their children--Madeleine, age 4; Isabelle, age 2; and Étienne, age 18 months--as well as Jean-Baptiste's parents, Jean-Baptiste, père and Louise Saulnier, also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Jean-Baptiste, fils and Luce lost all three of their children to the sea, and Jean-Baptiste, fils also lost his parents.  Olivier Boudrot, age 47, crossed with wife Henriette Guérin, age 45, and six children--Madeleine-Josèphe, age 15; Anne-Marie, age 13; Basile, age 12; Mathurin, age 10; Charles, age 6; and Jean-Baptiste, age 3.  All of their children but Madeleine-Josèphe died at sea, and wife Henriette died in a local hospital two months after they reached St.-Malo.  Pierre, age 20, son of Joseph Boudrot, crossed "alone" on one of the Five Ships and survived the crossing.  Marie Boudrot, age 48, crossed with husband Paul Dugas, age 48, and five of their children, ages 15 to 6.  Paul and four of their children survived the crossing, but Marie and a 9-year-old son died at St.-Malo within days of their arrival.  Another Marie Boudrot, age 48, crossed with husband François Daigre, age 50, and two of their daughters, ages 17 and 15.  The daughters survived, but Marie and François died from the rigors of the crossing.  Rosalie Boudrot, age 26, crossed with husband Jean Landry, age 31, and a 15-month-old son.  The son died at sea, and Rosalie died in a St.-Malo hospital a few weeks after the ship's arrival.  Anne-Marie Boudrot, wife of Joseph Dugas, also died in a St.-Malo hospital less than a month after she reached St.-Malo.  Anne-Josèphe, 5-year-old daughter of Pierre Boudrot, died on one of the Five Ships.  Honoré Boudrot, age 29, crossed with wife Élisabeth, or Isabelle, Hébert, age 24, son Pierre, age 5, and daughter Geneviève, age 10 months.  The aggrieved parents buried their two children at sea and then died in a St.-Malo hospital in early March probably from the rigors of the crossing.  A number of island Boudrots crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November 1758, survived the mid-December storm, pulled in to Bideford, England, in late December for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  Basile Boudrot, age 41, lost three of his eight children--Euphrosine, age 9; Cyprien, age 2; and Céleste, age 7 months--aboard Supply.  He, wife Marguerite Girouard, age 36, and five of their children--Pierre, age 14; Marie-Josèphe, age 12; Amand and Marguerite, age 6; and Alexis, age 4--survived the crossing.  Anne Boudrot, age 31, husband Jacques Haché, age 31, and four of their children, ages 10 to 5, survived the crossing, but they lost two children, one of them an infant, to the sea, and a 4-year-old daughter died at St.-Malo two months after the family's arrival.  Marguerite Boudrot, an "orphaned niece," age unrecorded, crossed with the family of Louis Longuépée, age 64, his wife Anne Brasseur, age 57, and their three grown children.  All survived the crossing.  Françoise Boudrot, age 20, crossed with husband Joseph Closquinet, age 28, and two sons, ages 2 years and 6 months.  All survived the crossing.  Théodose Boudrot, age 27, crossed with husband Jean-Baptiste Doiron, age 24, and their 7-month-old daughter, who died at sea.  Antoine Boudrot, age 66, wife Cécile Brasseur, age 54, their 17-year-old son Prudent, and 8-year-old nephew Ignace Boudrot, survived the crossing.  Antoine and Cécile's son Victor, age 29, wife Catherine-Josèphe Hébert, age 28, and their three children--Hélène-Marie-Rose, age 6; Madeleine, age 4; and Joseph, age 18 months--also crossed on Supply.  Daughter Madeleine died at sea, but the others survived the crossing.  Most devastating to the Boudrots, three entire families--that of Élisabeth, daughter of René Boudrot, with her husband Joseph Pitre and four of their sons; Anne, daughter of Michel dit Miquetau Boudrot and his first wife Anne Landry, with her husband Christophe Pothier and six of their children; and Madeleine, daughter of Charles Boudrot and his second wife Marie Corporon, with her husband Alain Bugeaud and seven of their children--disappeared without a trace aboard one, or perhaps both, of the transports, Duke William and Violet, that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November but sank in the storm off the southwest coast of England during the second week of December. 

Island Boudrots did their best to create a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Antoine Boudrot, his wife Cécile Brasseur, their unmarried son Prudent, and nephew Ignace Boudrot, settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Antoine and Cécile were in their 60s when they reached the Breton port, so they had no more children there.  Prudent, at age 29, married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Étienne Comeau and Marie Landry, at St.-Servan in October 1763.  She gave him at least two children there:  Marguerite in March 1765; and Jean-Baptiste in November 1767.  Antoine and Cécile's older son Victor, his wife Catherine-Josèphe Hébert, and their remaining children--Hélène-Marie-Rose and Joseph--also had crossed on Supply.  They settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Servan, where Victor worked as a carpenter.  Catherine-Josèphe gave him at least six more children there:  Anne in April 1760 but died at age 1 1/2 in December 1761; Marguerite-Jeanne in March 1762; Pierre in August 1764; Prudent-Olivier in February 1766 but died the following October; Jean-Baptiste in December 1767; and Cécile in July 1770.  Catherine-Josèphe died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in April 1772, age 40.  Victor, at age 45, remarried to Geneviève, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Richard and Catherine Gautrot and widow of Simon Pitre dit Pierre, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in August 1773.  Geneviève gave him at least five more children there:  Geneviève-Sophie in August 1774; Noël-Victor in December 1776; Antoine-Charles in February 1780 but died the following September; René-Antoine in September 1781 but died the following February; and Anne-Jeanne in January 1785.  Antoine's nephew Ignace Boudrot settled near his relatives at St.-Servan but did not remain.  In January 1772, now age 22, Ignace "was given permission to go work at Morlaix" in northwestern Brittany, where he served in the Royal Artillery Corps.  In c1780, still in France, he married Anne Pierson, probably a Frenchwoman, and settled in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, where son Charles was born in September 1783, and son Jean-Baptiste died at age 2 in October 1783.  A year later, in September 1784, Ignace and his family were counted on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, where fellow exiles from the islands and especially from England had settled nearly two decades earlier.  Another of Antoine's nephews, Charles Boudrot, his wife Cécile Thériot, and three of their children--Charles-Olivier, age 23; François, age 21; and Cécile, age 14--had been transported from Île St.-Jean to the northern fishing center of Boulogne-en-Mer, but they did not remain.  In August 1762, Charles remarried to Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Claude Bourgeois and Marie LeBlanc and widow of Joseph-Prudent Robichaud, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, Normandy, but they evidently returned to Boulogne-en-Mer, where son Jean-Charles was born in St.-Nicolas Parish in July 1764.  Meanwhile, Charles's daughter Cécile, by his first wife, now age 18, married Charles, 27-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jacques Richard and Anne LeBlanc, in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer in February 1763.  Then the family moved again.  In May 1766, Charles, Marie-Madeleine, and 2-year-old Jean-Charles took Le Hazard from Boulogne-en-Mer to St.-Malo and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near Charles's uncle and cousins.  In August, Charles's daughter Cécile and her husband joined them at St.-Servan.  Charles died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in November 1766, age 55.  Son Joseph was born posthumously at St.-Servan in May 1767; and Jean-Charles died there at age 3 1/2 in January 1768.  His widow Marie-Madeleine Bourgeois remarried to fellow Acadian Étienne Thériot, a widower, at St.-Servan in February 1770; this made her the stepmother of Nantes shoemaker Olivier Térriot, who, 15 years later, would coax hundreds of his fellow exiles in France to go to Spanish Louisiana.  Charles's younger brother Olivier, after burying his wife Henriette Guérin, took his remaining daughter to Ploubalay on the west side of the river southwest of St.-Malo, to Langrolay farther up the west bank, and then to nearby Trigavou.  At St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo, Olivier, now age 50, remarried to Anne, 29-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Dugas and Marie Benoit, in May 1762.  Anne gave him at least three more children at Trigavou:  Charles-Olivier in November 1763; Marie in June 1766; and Jean-Baptiste in October 1767.  A younger Antoine Boudrot and his wife Brigitte Apart, who survived the crossing aboard one of the Five Ships, also settled at Trigavou, where Brigitte gave Antoine at least eight more children:  François-Xavier in March 1760; Charles-Michel in October 1761; Marie-Madeleine in October 1763; Joseph in February 1765; Étienne in December 1766; Marguerite-Josèphe in April 1768; Brigide-Anne in February 1771 but died at age 1 1/2 in July 1772; and Jean-Pierre in December 1772.  Antoine's brother Zacharie and his wife Marguerite Daigre, now childless, settled at Trigavou, where Marguerite gave him at least six more children:  a second Benjamin in July 1760 but died at age 7 in May 1767; Paul-Dominique in September 1761; Charles in c1764; Jean-Baptiste in August 1766 but died the following March; Marguerite in March 1768 but died at age 5 1/2 in August 1773; and Benjamin-Hilaire in January 1770.  Only three of their 11 children, born from 1749 to 1770, survived childhood.  Basile Boudrot, wife Marguerite Girouard, and their three remaining children--Pierre-Paul; Marie-Josèphe; Marguerite; Amand; and Alexis--settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Marguerite gave Basile three more children there:  Françoise-Anne-Renée in April 1760; Jean-Cyprien at nearby Mordreuc in August 1761; and Marie-Céleste in October 1764.  Basile's younger brother Augustin had landed at Cherbourg but joined his brother at Pleudihen in September 1759.  Augustin, at age 29, married Osite, 29-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Landry and Madeleine Melanson and widow of Jean-Baptiste Broussard, at Pleudihen in August 1760.  Osite gave him at least eight children in Pleudihen area villages:  Marguerite at Mordreuc in June 1761 but died at age 8 in May 1769; Marie in October 1762 but died at La Coquenais, age 14, in April 1777; Agathe-Charlotte at Mordreuc in July 1764 but died at age 5 in June 1769; Isabelle-Rose at Mordreuc in March 1766 but died at La Coqueais, age 11, in January 1780; Paul-Joseph at Mordreuc in March 1767 but died at age 2 in July 1769; Isabelle-Josèphe at Mordreuc in December 1769; Madeleine-Marguerite at La Coquenais in January 1772; and Anne-Jeanne in February 1773 but died at Bas Champs , age 4, in February 1777.  Osite died at La Coquenais in September 1779, age 48.  Augustin remarried to fellow Acadian Madeleine Comeau probably at La Coquenais in c1781.  She gave him another daughter there, Marie-Sophie, in August 1782.  Basile's oldest remaining son, Pierre-Paul, at age 19, married Marie-Josèphe, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Moyse and Marie-Josèphe Blanchard, at St.-Suliac north of Pleudihen-sur-Rance in January 1765.  Marie gave him at least four children at La Chapelle de Mordreuc near Pleudihen:  Marguerite-Jeanne in April 1766; Marie-Bélony in July 1767; Isabelle-Jeanne in September 1769; and Basile-Pierre in November 1771.  Basile's youngest son, Jean-Cyprien, at age 23, while a resident of St.-Donatien Parish, Nantes, married Élisabeth, 35-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Broussard and Madeleine Landry and widow of Joseph Melanson, at Pleudihen in November 1784.  Élisabeth had given her first husband two sons, one of whom already had died.  She gave Jean-Cyprien at least two children in the Pleudihen area, twins Marie-Josèphe and Pierre-Charles at La Coquenais in August 1785.  Pierre Boudrot, fils of Grand-Pré came to St.-Malo with relatives aboard one of the Five Ships but evidently did not care for what he found there.  In early February 1759, the 22-year-old went to the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay to seek employment, but he found none there.  He returned to St.-Malo in October and settled at Trigavou on the west side of the Rance, where, at age 26, he married cousin Françoise, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians François Daigre and Marie Boudrot, in November 1763.  Françoise gave Pierre at least four children at Trigavou:  Isaac in October 1764; Marie-Josèphe in October 1766; Françoise-Mathurine in April 1769; and Rose-Théotiste in May 1771.  Two married daughters of Petit Paul Boudrot and Marie-Josèphe Doiron, unlike their parents and most of their younger siblings, survived the crossing from the Maritimes.  Oldest daughter Marguerite crossed with husband Joseph Hébert, who may have died at sea or from the rigors of the crossing.  At age 24, she remarried to Charles, fils, son of Charles Landry and Marie LeBlanc, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in November 1759.  From 1760 to 1771, she gave him at least seven children there, three of whom did not survive childhood.  Younger sister Françoise had crossed on Supply with husband Joseph, son of Louis Closquinet dit Dumoulin and Marguerite Longuépée, and two sons.  All survived the crossing, though their younger son died the following September.  Joseph, Françoise, and their older son settled at St.-Énogat, where, in 1760 and 1762, she gave Joseph two daughters.  Husband Joseph died in c1764 or 1765, and Françoise, now age 28, remarried to Marin, 19-year-old son of Jean-Baptiste Dugas and Marguerite Benoit, at St.-Servan in November 1766.  Marin had survived the crossing with his family on one of the Five Ships.  From 1767 to 1773, she gave him at least four children at St.-Servan, only one of whom survived childhood.  Two of Marguerite and Françoise Boudrot's younger siblings--Jean-Charles, called Charles; and Anne--had survived the crossing on the Duc Guillaume that had killed their parents and younger siblings.  Charles married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Haché dit Gallant and Cécile Lavergne, at St.-Énogat in November 1763.  The following April, he, Marie-Josèphe, and other Acadian exiles, including, says one historian, Jean Boudrot, took the ship Le Fort to the new French colony of Guiane on the northeast coast of South America.  One wonders what became of them there.  Sister Anne remained in the St.-Malo area.  At age 18, she married Jacques, 27-year-old son of fellow Acadians Charles Haché and Geneviève Lavergne, at St.-Énogat in November 1763.  From 1764 to 1773, she gave him at least six children, only two of whom survived childhood.  Élisabeth, daughter of Pierre Boudrot and Madeleine Hébert and wife of Jean-Baptiste Doiron, reached Cherbourg from Île St.-Jean in early 1759.  She was either a widow at the time of her arrival, or her husband died soon after they reached the Norman port.  Élisabeth moved on to St.-Malo by 1760 and settled near relatives at Pleudihen-sur-Rance.  She remarried to Olivier, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Thibodeau and Marie Bourgeois and widower of Madeleine Aucoin, at Pleudihen in August 1760 and gave him at least four more children there. 

Island Boudrots also landed at, or moved on, to other French ports, including the northern fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer, Cherbourg and Le Havre in Normandy, Morlaix in northwest Brittany, and La Rochelle, Rochefort, and Bordeaux on the Bay of Biscay.  They were especially numerous at Cherbourg and La Rochelle.  Marie and Pierre Boudrot, age 22 and perhaps twins, arrived at St.-Malo aboard one of the Five Ships in late January 1759.  A few weeks later, Marie received permission from French authorities to move on to La Rochelle, and Pierre went on to the nearby naval port of Rochefort.  Madeleine, daughter of Pierre Boudrot and his first wife Marie Doiron of Île Royale, settled at Cherbourg.  One wonders if she was the Madeleine Boudrot, wife of Léonard Cireaud, who died at Cherbourg, age 20, in November 1760.  Madeleine's father Pierre Boudrot died at Cherbourg in June 1759, in his late 40s, soon after he and his second wife Madeleine Gautrot reached the Norman port.  His widow moved on to St.-Malo.  Charles Boudrot, widower of Cécile Thériot, remarried to fellow Acadian Marie-Madeleine Bourgeois in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in August 1762, but they did not remain.  Son Jean-Charles was born in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in July 1764.  In the summer of 1766. they moved on to St.-Malo.  Basile Boudrot of Annapolis Royal married Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Mius d'Entremont and Marguerite Landry of Pobomcoup, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in May 1764.  Madeleine died there in December 1770, age 40.  With other Cap-Sable deportees, she likely had come to the Norman port in early 1760 after months of imprisonment in Halifax.  Pierre Boudrot of Port-Toulouse, Île Royale, died at Cherbourg in September 1771.  The recording priest said Pierre died at age 60.  He was 49.  The priest said nothing of Pierre's first wife Cécile Vécot, who he had married in c1749, or even his second wife Madeleine Bourg, who he had married in c1758 on the eve of the deportations to France.  The priest also noted that Pierre was "de l'Isle St-Jean."  Pierre, in fact, had been counted with his first wife and two children at Tracadie on the island's north shore in August 1752.  Pierre also had been counted on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, in 1765 and 1767.  Under pressure from French officials obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on the fishery islands, Pierre, his family, along with hundreds of other islanders, likely had gone from Miquelon to Cherbourg in 1767.  Most of the islanders returned to the fishery in 1768, but Pierre and his family stayed.  Pierre's sons Jean and Louis, born in c1759, were only ages 12 and 13 when their father died.  Interestingly, a French record notes that son Jean was "born about 1759 in the Parish of Saint-Pierre of Chiboutou[sic] in Acadie."  This may have been the Atlantic fishing center of Chédabouctou in northeast Nova Scotia, where Acadians were held in the early 1760s.  So Pierre and his second wife Madeleine evidently had escaped the British roundup on Île St.-Jean in 1758 and sought refuge in the woods of one of the Maritimes islands or crossed Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Sometime in the early 1760s, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In 1764, Pierre, Madeleine, and their two sons evidentlhy followed other Acadian refugees from Chédabouctou and Halifax to Île Miquelon, and from there they crossed to Cherbourg.  Joseph-Simon Boudrot was born at Morlaix in northwest Brittany in June 1764; the St.-Mathieu Parish priest did not give the boy's parents' names.  Jean-Baptiste, fils of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, and Île St.-Jean, and his wife Luce or Lucie Trahan crossed on one of the Five Ships to St.-Malo.  They buried their three children at sea, reached the Breton port in January 1759, "resided at la Martin on the rue des Forgeurs," but did not remain.  In early February, "they received permission and passage for La Rochelle."  Rosalie, daughter of Jean Boudrot and Françoise Arseneau of Île Royale and Île Miquelon, married sailor François, son of fellow Acadians Jean Cyr and Anne Bourgeois of Chignecto, in St.-Jean Parish, La Rochelle, in January 1781.  Anastasie Boudrot, wife of Amand Vigneau, died in St.-Jean Parish in August 1782, age 32.  Marie-Françoise Boudrot, wife of Nicolas Toussaint, died in St.-Jean Parish in October 1783, age 35.  A Boudrot from the French Maritimes also came to La Rochelle from the Newfoundland fishery.  Claude, fils dit Le Petit Claude married fellow Acadian Madeleine Ozelet in exile probably on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore in c1760.  She gave him four daughters--Marie; Anne; Madeleine; and Geneviève--between 1763 and 1771.  They either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area in the early 1760s, held as prisoners at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, Chignecto, and, at war's end, followed his family to Île Miquelon, where they were counted in 1765, 1776, and 1778.  The British captured the island during the American Revolution and deported Petit Claude, his family, and dozens of other island Acadians to La Rochelle in 1778.  Wife Madeleine died in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in June 1779.  Daughter Marie married into the Vigneau family in St.-Jean's Parish, La Rochelle, in January 1783.  In 1784, after the American had ended, some of the Newfoundland fisher/habitants chose to remain in France, but Petit Claude did not.  He took two of his daughters, Anne and Geneviève, back to Île Miquelon in 1784.  One wonders if daughter Marie and her husband went with them.  One thing is certain:  if Marie and her husband remained in France, they did not go to Spanish Louisiana in 1785.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Boudrot and his second wife Louise Saulnier, younger sister of Jean-Baptiste, fils of La Rochelle and half-sister of Antoine and Zacherie of Trigavou, crossed to St.-Malo aboard one of the Five Ships with brother Zacharie, but she did not remain.  She married Antoine, son of Jean Pineau and Renée Drouet of Mornay-en-Poitou, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in September 1762; the priest who recorded the marriage noted that, at the time of the wedding, Marie-Madeleine had been living in the parish for four years, but it was only three; the priest also noted that both of her parents were deceased when she married.  Cécile, daughter of Charles Boudrot of Anse-à-Pinnet, Île St.-Jean, was in her early teens when she landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer in late 1758.  At age 18, she married Charles-Ignace, 29-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jacques Richard and his first wife Anne LeBlanc of Minas, in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in February 1763.  Charles's family had been deported to Maryland in the fall of 1755, but he somehow ended up in France.  The couple did not remain in the northern fishing port.  In August 1766, they received permission to move to St.-Malo and settle at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  In 1768, they lived briefly on Belle-Île-en-Mer with other Acadian exiles but returned to St.-Servan, where French officials counted them in 1772.  Cécile gave Charles a daughter there in c1771.  By September 1784, she was a widow and living with her daughter and a younger brother in the lower Loire port of Nantes in southeast Brittany.  In June 1775, at age 22, Alexis Boudrot, an Acadian, was admitted to L'Hopital St.-André in Bordeaux.  One wonders what became of him.

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to St.-Malo and other French ports, including Morlaix on the northern coast of Brittany west of St.-Malo.  Arriving in several vessels, the Boudrots who settled in the St.-Malo area added substantially to the number of their kinsmen already there.  Françoise Comeau, age 71, widow of Joseph Boudrot of Grand-Pré, along with two of her unmarried Boudrot sons, twins Jean-Baptiste and Pierre, age 32, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée in late May 1763.  Françoise died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in July, and her sons settled at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer before moving to Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo, where Jean-Bapiste married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Daigre and Marguerite Granger, in March 1764.  They returned to St.-Servan.  Marie-Josèphe gave Jean-Baptiste at least five children in the St.-Malo area:  Marie-Rose at Plouër in December 1764; Marguerite-Josèphe in December 1766 but died at age 1 1/2 at St.-Servan in February 1768; Pierre-Jean in April 1768 but died at age 4 in September 1772; Marguerite-Marie in March 1771 but died at age 1 1/2 in October 1772; and Jean-François in September 1773.  Evidently Jean-Baptiste's twin brother Pierre did not marry.  Alexandre Boudrot's widow Marie-Madeleine Vincent, age 38, had lost her husband at Bristol in August 1756 and remarried to Joseph Breau in c1760.  Her son Joseph Breau, fils was born probably at Bristol in February 1761.  By May 1763, she was a widow again.  She crossed to France aboard La Dorothée with sons Jean-Baptiste Boudrot, age 9, and Joseph Breau, fils, age 2, and settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the Rance south of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  She remarried to a Dugas at St.-Servan in January 1764.  Also aboard La Dorothée were Germain, age 39, Amand, age 33, and Jean-Charles, age 30--Alexandre of Pigiguit's younger brothers.  Germain had lost his first wife, Marguerite Trahan, at Bristol in August 1756 and remarried to Anne, daughter of Jacques Hébert and Marguerite Landry, there in c1758.  Their daughters Marguerite and Marie were born probably at Bristol in c1759 and c1760.  Also with Germain and his family was unmarried cousin Honoré Breau.  At Plouër-sur-Rance, Anne gave Germain at least two more children:  Élisabeth in October 1763; and Joseph-Marie in August 1768.  Meanwhile, daughters Marguerite, age 6, and Marie, age 5, died at nearby La Pommerais on the same day in August 1765, perhaps victims of an epidemic.  In March 1773, Bona Arsenault tells us, Germain, Anne, and their two remaining children returned to England!  What they likely had done was join other exiles on the British-controlled Channel Island of Jersey on their way back to North America to work in a British-controlled fishery there.  In greater Acadia, they were among the first Acadian families to settle in the fishing port of Chéticamp on the west coast of Cape Breton Island, formerly Île Royale.  Blind since age 12, Germain's brother Amand was still a bachelor in 1763.  He lived near, or with, his brothers at Plouër, but, despite his infirmity, he did not remain a bachelor.  He married local girl Marie, daughter of Guillaume Couillard and Marie Hesry of Plouër, in April 1769.  She gave him at least four children in the area:  Jean-Baptiste at Port St.-Hubert in February 1770; François-Joseph in August 1771; Joseph-Jacques in December 1773 but died at La Pommerais at age 3 in January 1777; and Pierre-Mathurin at La Pommerais in July 1776 but died there at age 1 1/2 in May 1778.  Amand evidently did not follow his older brother back to greater Acadia.  Wife Marie died by February 1777, when Amand remarried to another local girl, Marie-Perrine, daughter of Charles Nogues and Françoise Raimond, at La Fresnelais near Plouër, his bride's native village.  She gave him more children in the area:  Jacques-Joseph at La Pommerais in September 1777 but died nine days after his birth; Marie in c1780; and Joseph-Alain in c1781.  Germain and Amand's youngest brother Jean-Charles and wife Agnès, age 21, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Trahan and Charlotte Comeau and younger sister of Jean-Charles's older brother Germain's first wife, also settled at Plouër-sur-Rance with their two children--Jean-Charles, fils, age 3; and Marie, age 1 1/2.  Jean-Charles and Agnès had married at Bristol in c1758.  She gave him at least four more children in the Plouër area:  Joseph-Marie at Port St.-Hubert in May 1765; Pierre in May 1767; Rose-Geneviève in May 1770 but died at age 2 1/2 in February 1773; and Henriette-Charlotte in September 1772.  Three more brothers--Marin, age 31; Charles, age 26; and Étienne, fils, age 21--sons of Étienne Boudrot and Marie-Claire Aucoin, reached St.-Malo on La Dorothée and settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance across the river from Plouër.  Youngest brother Étienne, fils, at age 22, who worked as a seaman and jointer, married first to Marguerite, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Thibodeau and Susanne Comeau, at Pleudihen in May 1764.  Marguerite gave him at least four children in the area:  Joseph-Marie at Mordreuc in September 1765; Cécile-Marguerite in March 1767; Blaise-Julien in January 1769; and Anne-Henriette in May 1771.  Brother Marin, at age 33, married Pélagie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Barrieau and Véronique Girouard, at Pleudihen in May 1765.  Pélagie gave him at least four children at nearby Mordreuc:  Joseph-Marie in July 1767; Anastasie-Marie-Céleste in May 1769 but died the following September; Jean-Basile in July 1770; and Étienne le jeune in May 1772.  In 1767, brother Charles, now age 30 and still unmarried, received permission from French authorities to go to the lower Loire port of Nantes on the other side of Brittany.  He died there in July of that year--one of the first Acadians to go there.  Paul Boudrot and wife Nathalie Pitre, who Paul had married in England in c1758, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée with their 4-year-old son Pierre and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Paul died by February 1766, when Nathalie, now age 32, remarried to Jean-Jacques, son of fellow Acadians Jacques LeBlanc and Cécile Dupuis of Grand-Pré and widower of Ursule Aucoin, at St.-Servan.  Three bachelor brothers--Charles, age 25; Joseph, age 21; and Amand, age 15, sons of Jean dit Lami Boudrot and Agathe Thibodeau of Minas--also came to St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  They "settled" at Pleudihen-sur-Rance.  Evidently none of the brothers married.  Charles, perhaps a sailor, died at sea in September 1770, age 32.  In May 1770, Joseph "was in Guinea, West Africa, on the ship, L'Heureux."  He died at "la Coste," perhaps in Guinea, in January 1771, age 29.  Brother Amand's fate is anyone's guess.  Three siblings--Joseph, age 21; Marguerite, age unrecorded; and Michel III, age 15--children of Michel Boudrot, fils and Claire Comeau of Minas, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  Joseph married Marguerite, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Richard dit Sapin and Cécile Gautrot, at St.-Servan in June 1763; Marguerite and her family had come to St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition in late May, arriving a day or two after La Dorothée, so she and Joseph probably had known one another in England and perhaps at Minas.  She gave him at least seven children at St.-Servan and Plouër:  Marie-Marthe at St.-Servan in May 1764; twins François and Joseph-Marie in June 1766, but François died a month after his birth and Joseph-Marie at age 7 months in February 1767; Jean-Charles in November 1767; an unnamed girl died in February 1771, age unrecorded; an unnamed child died the day of his or her birth at Village du Pré near Plouër in June 1772; and Pierre-Jean-Joseph in August 1773.  Younger brother Michel III settled at Plouër until March 1767, when he "went to England," which means he, too, likely followed his fellow exiles to the lsle of Jersey and returned to North America to work in the British fisheries.  One wonders what happened to him there, and what happened to his sister Marguerite who had come with him to St.-Malo in 1763.  Jean-Zacharie Boudrot, age 33, wife Marguerite Hébert, age 25, and their 8-year-old son Joseph reached St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition.  They settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Marguerite died in July 1764 and Jean-Zacharie in April 1765.  After his parents died, Joseph, age 10, went to live with Joseph Célestin dit Bellemère, whose wife was Marguerite Boudrot.  They, too, had come to St.-Malo from England aboard L'Ambition and settled at St.-Servan.  One wonders what happened to young Joseph.  Jean-Baptiste Boudrot, age 28, oldest brother, perhaps, of Charles, Joseph, and Amand of La Dorothée, his wife Anastasie Célestin dit Bellemère, age 24, who he had married in England in c1758, and two of their children--Jean-Baptiste, age 2 1/2; and Marie-Josèphe, age 1--reached St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition.  Anastasie gave Jean-Baptiste at least four more children at St.-Servan:  Anne-Marie in October 1763 but died seven days after her birth; Joseph-Marie in March 1766; Charles in January 1769; and Pierre-Olivier in January 1772 but died at age 1 in March 1773.  Meanwhile, daughter Marie-Josèphe died at Hôtel-Dieu, St.-Malo, age 9, in January 1771.  Brothers Anselme, age 25, and François, age 22, sons of François Boudrot and Anne-Marie Thibodeau, along with their sister Anne, age 16, reached St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition.  They settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance, where Anselme, at age 26, married Ursule, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Daigre and Anne Breau, in January 1764.  Ursule gave him at least four children in the St.-Malo area:  Jacques-Françoise at Mordreuc near Pleudihen in December 1764; Anne-Marie at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in January 1766; Joseph-Marie in April 1767; and Pierre-Hilaire in October 1768.  Brother François, at age 24, married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Landry and Marie Comeau, at St.-Servan in c1765.  Marguerite died at St.-Servan in January 1767, age 26, before she could give François any children.  At age 27, François remarried to Euphrosine, another daughter of Pierre Barrieau and Véronique Girouard, at Pleudihen in April 1768.  Euphrosine gave him at least four children at St.-Servan:  Joseph-François in March 1769 but died at age 3 in September 1772; Pierre-Jean in May 1770; Paul-Marie in October 1771; and Jean-Louis in October 1773.  One wonders what became of François's younger sister Anne. 

In late autumn 1765, Acadians repatriated from England and island Acadians agreed to become part of a new agricultural settlement off the southern coast of Brittany.  Boudrots from St.-Malo and Morlaix were among the exiles who went to Belle-Île-en-Mer that November, but not all of them remained.  Félix Boudrot of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, age 36 in 1765, wife Marie-Josèphe LeBlanc, age 36, and daughter Félicité, age 13, had been held at Bristol, repatriated to Morlaix in northwest Brittany, where son Joseph was born in June 1764, and settled at Borderun in the Sauzon district on the north end of the island.  Félix and Marie-Josèphe had no more children on the island.  She died there in 1773, age 44.  Félix remarried to fellow Acadian Madeleine Hébert, widow of Pierre Blanchard, later in the decade.  In the late 1770s or early 1780s, Félix and Madeleine moved to La Fosse in the Parish of St.-Nicolas, Nantes.  Daughter Félicité, age 29, married Jean, 27-year-old son of fellow Acadians Amand Lejeune and Anastasie Levron, in St.-Nicolas Parish in November 1782; Jean was a native of Liverpool, England, so his family also had been exiled to Virginia.  A younger Félix Boudrot of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, age 24 in 1765, and his new wife Anne-Gertrude, called Annette, Thériot, age 20, had been held at Falmouth, repatriated to Treguier near Morlaix, and married in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in July 1764.  Their son Simon-Bruno was born at Morlaix in May 1765.  On Belle-Île-en-Mer, they settled at Kerxo near Sauzon, where daughter Geneviève was born in August 1767.  They left the island soon afterwards.  Daughter Marie-Jeanne-Josèphe was born at L'Anildut, Quimper, southwest Brittany, in November 1773, when Félix was serving there as commis des Fermes du Roi in the Parish of Poaspoder.  Son Yves was born at Plougastel-Daoulas, Quimper, in May 1777.  Wife Anne-Gertrude died soon after, and Félix remarried to Marie Lagatu, a Frenchwoman, at Quimper.  Their daughter Marie-Vincente was born at Landerneau, Quimper, July 1783; and Marie-Perrine at Le Faou, Quimper, in July 1792, when Félix was serving as a customs officer at nearby Douanes.  His place in the French bureaucracy evidently compelled him to remain in France in 1785.  Pierre Boudrot, age 28 in 1765, and his wife, cousin Anne Boudrot, age 32, came to Belle-Île-en-Mer by a different route.  Unlike most of the Acadians on the lovely island, who had spent time in the ports of England, Pierre and Anne had come to France from Île St.-Jean aboard one of the Five Ships.  They lived at St.-Énogat across the harbor from St.-Malo until 1765, when they followed their fellow Acadians to Belle-Île-en-Mer.  With them at Kernest near Bangor in the southern interior of the island was son Joseph-Ian, born in October 1765, and four children from Anne's first marriage to Jacques Haché dit Gallant.  Anne gave Pierre more children on the island:  Anne-Marie-Michelle at Bangor in August 1767; a son or daughter in December 1769 but died the following day; and Jean-Marie in April 1771.  Also on the island were Michel Boudrot and his second wife.  Michel and his first wife Angélique Poirier had gone to Nantes, France, from Île Miquelon in 1767.  Angélique died at Nantes soon after their arrival, and Michel moved on to Belle-Île-en-Mer.  At age 26, he remarried to Marie-Anne, 27-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Granger and Françoise LeBlanc, at Bangor in January 1769.  Marie-Anne gave him at least five children on the island:  an unnamed child near Bangor in June 1771 but died the following day; Anne-Françoise at La Palais on the northeast coast of the island in April 1772; Marie at Bangor in June 1774 but died at age 8 1/2 in January 1783; Jeanne-Adélaïde in December 1776; and Pierre in August 1779 but died at age 4 1/2 in January 1784. 

In 1773, Boudrots in the St.-Malo area, most of them exiles from England, chose to take part in another, even grander, settlement venture, this one in the interior of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  A French nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  The Boudrots who went there included Antoine and his wife Brigitte Apart from Trigavou; Étienne and his wife Marguerite Thibodeau from Pleudihen-sur-Rance; François and his second wife Euphrosine Barrieau from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Jean-Baptiste and his wife Marie-Josèphe Daigre from St.-Servan; Jean-Baptiste and his wife Anastasie Célestin dit Bellemère from St.-Servan; Jean-Charles and his wife Agnès Trahan from Plouër-sur-Rance; Joseph and his wife Marguerite Richard dit Sapin from St.-Servan; Marin and his wife Pélagie Barrieau from Pleudihen; Pierre, fils and his wife Françoise Daigre from Trigavou; another Pierre and his wife Madeleine Bourg; yet another Pierre, who may have gone alone or with brother Jean-Baptiste; Pierre-Paul and his wife Marie-Josèphe Moyse from Pleudihen; and Zacharie and his wife Marguerite Daigre from Trigavou.  Françoise Daigre gave husband Pierre Boudrot, fils at least four more children in Poitou:  Jean-Pierre at Châtellerault in December 1773 but died 10 days after his birth; Marguerite-Geneviève at Bonneuil-Matours south of Châtellerault in April 1775 but died at age 3 in May 1778; Benjamin in October 1777; and Paul in January 1780.  Anastasie Bellemère gave husband Jean-Baptiste Boudrot another daughter, Louise, at Châtellerault in January 1774.  Alexandre Boudrot's son Jean-Baptiste married Marie-Modeste, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Trahan and Anne Thériot, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in October 1774.  Their son Jean-Baptiste, fils was born there in September 1775 but died nine days after his birth.  Pierre-Paul Boudrot's son Pierre-Jean was born at St.-André-de-Bonnes, Poitiers, southwest of Châtellerault, in October 1774.  Étienne Boudrot's son David-Valentin was born at Châtellerault in October 1774.  Marin Boudrot and Pélagie Barrieau had another son in Poitou, Pierre-Anne, probably at Châtellerault in c1773.  But they also lost two young sons there:  Jean-Basile at Châtellerault, age 4, in early October 1774; and Joseph-Marie died at age 7 a few days later.  One wonders if the boys were victims of an epidemic.  Marguerite Richard dit Sapin gave husband Joseph Boudrot another daughter in Poitou, Anne-Pélagie, at Monthoiron south of Châtellerault in December 1774, but she died young.  Marie-Josèphe Daigre gave husband Jean-Baptiste Boudrot another son, Joseph-Marie, at Monthoiron in May 1775.  François Boudrot's second wife Euphrosine Barrieau gave him another son in Poitou, François-Xavier, at Châtellerault in November 1775.  Pierre, brother of Jean-Baptiste Boudrot and widower of Marie Thériot, died at Châtellerault in February 1776, age 44.  After two years of effort, most of the Acadians deserted the Poitou venture.  From October 1775 through March 1776, hundreds of them, including most of the Boudrots, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes, but some of the Boudrots remained.  Jean-Baptiste Boudrot, parentage unrecorded, married fellow Acadian Anastasie Benoit in Poitou in c1775.  Their son Jean was born at Cenan southeast of Châtellerault in May 1776, two months after the fourth of the convoys had departed for Nantes.  Jean-Baptiste, fils, son of Jean-Baptiste and Anastasie Bellemère of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, married local girl Marguerite, daughter of François Bedel of Targé, Poitou, at Targé in June 1778.  Their daughter Marie-Marguerite was born near Cenan in September 1779.  They moved on to Nantes by the early 1780s.  As the birthdate of their son Paul reveals, Pierre Boudrot, fils and his wife Françoise Daigre were still in the region in January 1780, nearly four years after the last convoy of Poitou Acadians had left for Nantes.  When chaos and intrigue had shaken the Poitou venture in its final days, Pierre, fils had resisted the blandishments of his fellow Acadians and refused to abandon the colony. One wonders what became of them after 1785, when most of their fellow Acadians still in France left for Spanish Louisiana.  

At Nantes, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Jean-Baptiste Boudrot, now working as a seaman, and wife Marie-Modeste Trahan had at least four more children in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes:  Marie-Félicité in February 1777; Jean-Constant in November 1778; François-Marie in February 1781 but died at age 1 1/2 in September 1782; and Marguerite-Marie in March 1783.  Antoine Boudrot, husband of Brigitte Apart, died in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in April 1776, age 58.  Their son François-Xavier, a seaman and carpenter, married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Claude Dugas and Marguerite Cyr, in St.-Martin de Chantenay Parish near Nantes in May 1785.  Marin Boudrot and his wife Pélagie Barrieau had at least four more children in St.-Jacques Parish, but most of them died young:  Jean-Pierre in April 1776 but died at age 1 1/2 in February 1778; Marie-Pélagie in March 1778 but died at age 2 in June 1780; Joseph in October 1780 but died at age 1 1/2 in March 1782; and Marie-Anne in September 1783.  Meanwhile, son Pierre-Anne, born in Poitou, died at age 8 in St.-Jacques Parish in September 1781.  François Boudrot and Euphrosine Barrieau lost two more sons at Nantes:  François-Xavier, born in Poitou, died in St.-Similien Parish at age 1 1/2 in May 1777; and Pierre-Jean, born at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, died in Ste.-Croix Parish, Nantes, at age 10 1/2 in October 1780.  Jean-Charles Boudrot's wife Agnès Trahan died in St.-Donatien Parish, Nantes, in June 1776, age 34.  Before she died, she gave Jean-Charles another daughter there, Renée, in February 1776.  At age 47, Jean-Charles remarried to Marguerite-Victoire, 28-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Guédry and Madeleine Hébert, in St.-Similien Parish in August 1780.  She gave him at least three more children in that parish:  Marguerite-Renée in June 1781; Pierre-David in April 1783; and Félix-Marie in June 1785.  Meanwhile, son Pierre, by his first wife, died in St.-Similien Parish, age 9, in August 1777; and oldest son Jean-Charles, fils, born in Bristol, England, in January 1760, died there at age 23 in June 1783, evidently still a bachelor.  Jean-Charles's oldest daughter Marie, also born at Bristol, in September 1761, married Jean-François, 23-year-old son of locals Jean Havard and Jeanne Bernardeau of St.-Donatien Parish, in St.-Similien Parish in August 1783.  Their son Jean-Marie was born on the Rué du Martray, St.-Similien Parish, in February 1785.  Étienne Boudrot's son David-Valentin, born in Poitou, died in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, age 2, in June 1776.  Étienne's wife Marguerite Thibodeau gave him four more children in several parishes in Nantes:  Marie in St.-Léonard Parish in September 1776 but died at age 6 1/2 in St.-Similien Parish in July 1783; Jean-Étienne in St.-Clément Parish in April 1779; Marguerite-Susanne in St.-Léonard Parish in May 1782; and Yves-Cyprien in St.-Similien Parish in January 1785.  Joseph Boudrot and his wife Marguerite Richard dit Sapin had at least four more children in nearby Chantenay:  Jean-Joseph in July 1776; Jean-Marie in c1777 but died at age 4 1/2 in December 1782; Henriette-Josèphe in April 1780 but died at age 2 1/2 in December 1782; and Sophie in April 1782.   Pierre Paul Boudrot, a laborer and seaman, and his wife Marie-Josèphe Moyse had at least three more children in St.-Pierre de Rezé Parish across the Loire from Nantes:  Madeleine Cécile in July 1777; André in January 1780; and Anne in August 1783.  Meanwhile, son Pierre Paul, fils, born at Poitiers, died at Rezé at age 3 in November 1777.  Pierre-Paul, père died there in March 1784, age 39.  Louis, son of Pierre Boudrot and his second wife Marguerite Bourg, at age 18, married Perpétué, 26-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Dugas and his first wife Marguerite Benoit, in St.-Similien Parish in November 1777.  Perpétué gave Louis at least two children at Chantenay:  Mathurin in August 1779; and Marie-Adélaïde in August 1780.  They grew up orphans.  Louis and Perpétué died by September 1784, when Spanish officials listed an orphan, probably Marie-Adélaïde, living with her maternal grandfather and his family at Nantes.  Jean-Baptiste Boudrot and his wife Marie-Josèphe Daigre had more sons in several Nantes parishes:  Charles died in St.-Similien Parish in December 1777, less than a month after his birth; Joseph-Marie died there at age 3 in April 1778; and another Joseph-Marie died in St.-Nicolas Parish at age 2 1/2 in October 1781.  Son Louis-Jean-Joseph was born in St.-Nicolas Parish in August 1779; and François-Marie there in August 1782, but they probably died young.  Jean-Baptiste died in St.-Nicolas Parish in November 1783, age 40.  Of the 10 children born since her marriage to Jean-Baptiste at Plouër-sur-Rance in March 1764, Marie-Josèphe Daigre was left with only two Boudrot children--Marie-Rose, born at Plouër in December 1764; and Jean-François at St.-Servan in September 1773.  Zacharie Boudrot lost his wife Marguerite Daigre in St.-Nicolas Parish in October 1780; she was age 51.  In September 1782, when he was age 60, Zacharie remarried to 44-year-old Marguerite Vallois of St.-Nicolas Parish, widow of Pierre Dubois, Olivier Dubois, and Étienne Térriot; Marguerite, for a time, was the stepmother of Nantes shoemaker Olivier Térriot.  Zacherie's older son Paul-Dominique, a seaman, now age 20, married Marie-Olive, 17-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Anselme Landry and Agathe Barrieau, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in May 1783.  Their son Paul-Marie was born at Chantenay in May 1784.  Zacharie's younger son Charles, a carpenter, married, at age 20, Marie, 18-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Gautrot and Anne Pitre, at Nantes in c1784.  Their son Charles-Marie was born in St.-Nicolas Parish in March 1785.  The other Jean-Baptiste Boudrot's French wife Marguerite Bedel gave him two sons at Chantenay:  Jean-Baptiste, fils in c1783; and Jean-Charles in March 1785.  Their daughter Marie-Marguerite, born near Châtellerault in September 1779, may have died in Poitou soon after her birth or soon after the family reached the Loire port.  Jean, age 26, son of Pierre Boudrot and his second wife Madeleine Bourg and Louis's older brother, married Anne-Léonore, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Granger and Madeleine Melanson of Grand-Pré, in St.-Pierre de Rezé Parish in November 1785, a month after the last of the Seven Ships left Nantes for Spanish Louisiana.

During their two and a half decades in the mother country, despite the frustrations of living there, Acadian Boudrot families proliferated, and some even prospered.  Yet, in the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 89 Boudrots agreed to take it.  They included Amand; Antoine's widow; Cécile and brother Joseph; Charles; Étienne; Félix of Belle-Île-en-Mer and Nantes; Ignace; two Jean-Baptistes; Jean-Charles; Joseph; Joseph-Félix-Simon; Marin; Olivier; Paul-Dominique; Victor; Xavier; and Zacharie.  Nevertheless, many of the Boudrots in France--Alexis; Anselme and François of St.-Malo; Augustin, Basile, and Jean-Cyprien of Pleudihen and Nantes; Félix of Quimper; Jean of Rezé; Michel of Belle-Île-en-Mer; Pierre, fils of Trigavou and Poitou; Pierre and Anne of Belle-Île-en-Mer; and Pierre-Paul's widow Marie Moyse--chose to remain in the mother country.  In late February 1791, during the early years of the French Revolution, French officials counted Acadians still receiving government subsidies at Nantes.  Nearly a dozen Boudrots appeared on the list, including Alexis; André; his father Basile; Louis, fils; and Michel.  In the late 1780s, after the Seven Ships had sailed to Spanish Louisiana, Michel Boudrot took his family from Belle-Île-en-Mer to Nantes, where daughter Anne was born in June 1790, but she died there at age 3 1/2 in November 1793.  Members of Pierre and Anne Boudrot's family were counted at Lorient in southern Brittany in 1792.  Other members of the family were still living on Belle-Île-en-Mer during the French Revolution.  In 1801, French authorities counted the widow Marguerite Boudrot with four of her children at Bordeaux.  One wonders who her husband might have been.  During the late 1790s, Acadian Jean Boudrot, his wife Anne ____, and their son Jean left the Newfoundland fishery islands, where they may have gone in the late 1760s or early 1780s, and sailed to Le Havre in Normandy, which they reached in August 1797.  They lived for a time at nearby Les Penitents before asking permisson to move on to La Rochelle in April 1798.  Alexandre, son of Pierre Boudreau and Catherine Mounier, born at St.-Martin-de-Ré on Île de Ré west of La Rochelle in c1769, emigrated to Louisiana, date unknown, and died "at the home of Mr. Dusouchet, medical doctor of Carencros," then in St. Martin Parish, in November 1808, age 39.  The St. Martinville priest who recorded the burial said nothing of a wife for Alexandre.  One wonders how his father Pierre was related to the Acadian Boudrots in France, if at all.

In North America, things only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now as a major Acadian refuge.  A naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and  retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, French officers, on the eve of formal surrender, counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, many Boudrots among them.  They included Joseph Boudrot with a family of eight; the widow of Charles Boudrot and her family of four; Joseph, père and his family of two, and son Joseph, fils and his family of five; the widow of Charles Boudrot l'aîné and her family of six; Claude Boudrot, fils and his family of four; another Claude Boudrot, perhaps père, and a family of six; Olivier Boudrot and his family of five; Pre, that is, Pierre Boudrot and his family of seven; another Charles Boudrot without a family; the widow of Bonaventure Boudrot and her family of six; and Jean Boudrot and his family of two.  Other Acadians, including Boudrots, evidently escaped capture at Restigouche and took refuge in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs east of the French stronghold.  French officials counted the widow of Jean Boudrot and nine dependents at Grande-Rivière, Gaspésie, at the end of July 1761.  The British held the surrendered Acadians in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  One of these compounds was Fort Edward, overlooking the old Boudrot homesteads at Pigiguit.  Another was Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto.  The largest was on Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor.  In August 1762, British officials counted Olivier Boudrot of Grand-Pré and his family, six in all, at Fort Edward.  A year later, in August 1763, British officials counted four Boudrot families--those of Pierre, wife Madeleine, and children Hilaire, Jean, and Joseph; Claude, fils, wife Madeleine, and daughters Marie and Marguerite; Joseph, wife Rosalie, and children Joseph, fils, Charles, Marguerite, Anne, Amand, and Thomas; and Claude, père, wife Judith, and children Michel, Pierre, and Anastasie--at Fort Cumberland.  That same month, British officials counted two more Boudrot families--Jean and his wife Marguerite Guilbeau of Annapolis Royal; and Joseph and his unnamed wife--at Halifax.

At war's end, Boudrots being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In July 1763, colonial officials in Maryland counted Joseph Boudrot and his wife Marie _____ at Newtown on the colony's Eastern Shore.  Also there were five Boudrot "orphans":  Pierre, who would have been age 25; Amand, age 19; Michel, age 17; Marie; and a second Amand, most of them children of Pierre Boudrot and Anne Hébert.  At nearby Georgetown/Frederickstown, also on the Eastern Shore, officials found Marie, 8-year-old daughter of Benjamin Boudrot and Cécile Melanson, living with the family of François Hébert family (Marie would go on to marry an Hébert cousin and become the paternal grandmother of two Confederate generals, one of whom served as an antebellum governor of Louisiana).  At Upper Marlborough, Maryland officials counted Brigitte, age 31, husband Basile Landry, a daughter and a Babin orphan; and her younger sister Marie-Madeleine, age 30, husband Joseph Landry, two sons, and another Babin orphan.  Brigitte and Marie-Madeleine were daughters of Pierre Boudrot and Madeleine Hébert.  At Lower Marlborough, orphans Firmin, Pierre, Joseph, and Marie Boudrot lived with the family of Joseph Leroy.  At Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac, Augustin dit Rémi, age 8, son, perhaps, of Pierre Boudrot and Anne Hébert, was living with the family of Jean-Charles Breau of Pigiguit.  In August 1763, authorities in South Carolina placed Paul Boudrot, his wife Marguerite Landry, and 14-year-old "orphan" Amand Boudrot on a list of "families previously living in Acadia who have been transported to South Carolina and who desire to withdraw under the standard of their king his very Christian Majesty [Louis XV of France.]"  Also on the list were Marguerite Boudrot, wife of François Poirier; and 17-year-old orphan Madeleine Boudrot, living with the Poiriers.  Far to the north in Massachusetts in August 1763, Boudrots were still living in the colony.  They included Charles Boudrot, wife Madeleine, two sons and two daughters, as well as Widow Boudrot; Jean Boudrot; Pierre Boudrot, wife Marguerite, five sons and three daughters; and Claude Boudrot, wife Judic, three sons and three daughters.  Marie Boudrot and her husband René Hébert, along with Marguerite Dupuis, widow of Pierre Boudrot, appeared on a "General List of the Acadian Families Distributed in the Government of Konehtoket [Connecticut] Who Desire To Go To France," compiled sometime in 1763.  In New York in 1763, two Boudrot families--Pierre, his wife, and four children; and François, his wife, and four children--were still living in that colony.  At Boston in June 1766, Rose Boudrot, as well as Charles Boudrot with a family of eight, appeared on a list of "the French who wish to go to Canada." 

Most of the Acadians in New England, New York, and Pennsylvania, including Boudrots like Rose and Charles, chose to resettle in Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Michel Boudrot began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Boudrots could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Deschambault, Ste.-Croix de Lotbinière, Nicolet, Repentigny, Trois-Rivières, L'Acadie, Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pérade, Baie-du-Fébvre, Cap-Santé, St.-Philippe-de-Laprairie, and Ste.-Foy; at St.-Ours, St.-Luc, and St.-Antoine-de-Chambly on the lower Richelieu; at Baie-St.-Paul, St.-Joachim, St.-Charles de Bellechasse, and Île-aux-Coudres on the lower St. Lawrence; and at Carleton, Cascapédia, now New Richmond, and Bonaventure in Gaspésie.  In present-day New Brunswick, Boudrots settled on the St. John River; on Île Miscou at the entrance to the Baie des Chaleurs; at Petit-Rocher on Nepisiguit Bay, an arm of the Baie des Chaleurs; and at Memramcook near Chignecto.  In Nova Scotia, they settled at Baie Ste.-Marie, today's St. Mary's Bay; at Chédabouctou, now Guysborough, on the upper Atlantic coast; at Petit-de-Grat and Chéticamp on Cape Breton Island; at Arichat on Île Madame south of Cape Breton; and at Chezzetcook near Halifax.  Boudrots also settled on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and on St. John Island, later Prince Edward Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, for a time.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  The founder of the movement that led to world-wide reunions of Acadian families--Les Congrés Mondial Acadien, held every five years since 1994--was André Boudreau, a native of New Brunswick living in Alberta, Canada, until his death at age 60 in 2005.  

Boudrots also settled on the French-controlled fishery island of Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland, from which some of them were compelled to return to France in 1767 to relieve overcrowding.  Many returned the following year, but in 1778, during the American Revolution, the British seized Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported the Acadians there to France.  Some of them returned at war's end in 1784, when the islands again were awarded to France. 

Other Boudrots being held in the seaboard colonies did not move on to Canada.  At least one family returned to Nova Scotia to join kinsmen being held there.  Others emigrated to the French Antilles to avoid British rule.  During the final months of war, French officials encouraged exiles in the seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the "war of vengeance" to come.  The exiles would provide a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own if they came to the sugar colony.  Boudrots who reached St.-Domingue in 1764 were sent not to Môle St.-Nicolas but to Mirebalais in the island's interior near Port-au-Prince to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  Anne Boudrot, wife of Antoine Dupuy, died at Mirebalais in October 1764, age 30.  Élisabeth Boudrot, age 15, died there in November 1764.  Joseph Boudrot, age 17, died at Mirebalais in January 1765.  Despite these deaths, when fellow Acadians held in Nova Scotia and Maryland, including Boudrots, came through Cap-Français in the mid-and late 1760s on their way to Louisiana, none of the Boudrots in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  Madeleine, daughter of Pierre Boudrot and Marguerite Dupuis, married Jean, son of François Esnard and Jeanne D'Annette of St.-Vincent, Beru, Perigeaux, France, at Mirebalais in November 1768.  Their son Jean-Charlers was born there in June 1782.  Madeleine's sister Marie married Port-au-Prince notary Jacques-Prosper, son of Pierre Munois or Munios and Marie Lorieux of St.-Martin, Blais, and widower of Marie-Madeleine Lecode, at Mirebalais in July 1774.  Rosalie, daughter of Pierre Boudrot and Madeleine Doucet of Pointe-Beauséjour, Chignecto, married Isidore, son of fellow Acadians Étienne Thériot and Agnès LeBlanc of Pointe-Beauséjour, at Môle St.-Nicolas in June 1777.  Marie Boudrot of Pointe-Beauséjour died at Môle in August 1778, age 55.  Boudrots went to another island in the French Antilles:  Marie Boudrot died at La Carénage on the island of Ste.-Lucie in December 1763, age 18. 

In the early 1760s, French officials coaxed Acadians languishing in the coastal cities of France to settle in a new French colony on the northwest coast of South America.  Jean-Charles, called Charles, son of Paul Boudrot and Marie-Josèphe Doiron, had survivied the crossing from the Maritimes to St.-Malo aboard the Duc Guillaume that had killed his parents and most of his younger siblings.  At age 23, he married Marie-Josèphe, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Haché and Cécile Lavergne, at St.-Énogat across the harbor from St.-Malo in November 1763.  In April 1764, they took Le Fort to French Guiane, where they were counted at Sinnamary in the Cayenne District on 1 March 1765.  The census taker noted that Charles was suffering from fever.  He survived the illness, but wife Marie-Josèphe did not survive life in the tropical colony.  Charles, at age 38, remarried to Marie-Marguerite, daughter of François-Robert Du Mesnil and Thérèse Le Botte of St.-Étienne-du-Mont, Paris, and widow of Sr. Regnauldin, "major surgeon of the post of Sinnamary," at St.-Joseph, Sinnamary, in February 1775.  One wonders what became of them there.

Boudrots being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Boudrots, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies, including Boudrots, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least seven were Boudrots. 

The Boudrots in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, in spite of their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Joseph Boudrot and his wife Marie at Newton on the Eastern Shore, as well as the Breau "orphans" at Lower Marlborough, chose to remain in the English colony, but others, including young Augustin dit Rémi Boudrot at Port Tobacco, agreed to go to Louisiana.  Four Boudrots could be found on the two expeditions that left Baltimore and Port Tobacco for New Orleans in April and December 1767. 

A young Boudrot born in France was one of the last Acadians to emigrate to Spanish Louisiana.  Jean-Baptiste, son of Victor Boudrot and his first wife Catherine-Josèphe Hébert of Île St.-Jean, was born at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo, France, in December 1767.  In August 1785, when his father, stepmother, and six of his siblings and half-siblings, left St.-Malo for New Orleans, Jean-Baptiste, probably a sailor, did not go with them probably because he was no longer in France.  He ended up, instead, on St.-Pierre, one of the French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland, where, in 1788, at age 21, he joined 17 fellow Acadians aboard the schooner La Brigite, captained by Joseph Gravois III of Chignecto, who also had spent time as an exile at St.-Malo.  Joseph Gravois III's mother-in-law was an Hébert from Grand-Pré, so Jean-Baptiste would have been considered a kinsman.  He was the only Boudrot on the vessel.  After a long voyage, the Brigite reached New Orleans in December 1788.  Jean-Baptiste followed his fellow passengers first to the Acadian Coast on the river above New Orleans before settling on upper Bayou Lafourche.293

Bourg

In 1755, descendants of Antoine Bourg of Martaizé and Antoinette Landry of Port-Royal could be found at Annapolis Royal; Grand-Pré and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; Chignecto; the trois-rivères area west of Chignecto; and in the French Maritimes, especially on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Bourgs likely were among the refugees.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Bourgs likely were among the 300 area Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Madeleine Bourg and husband Paul Olivier ended up in South Carolina.  In August 1756, they were sent with 30 other Acadians from Charles Town to Prince Frederick Winyaw, a rural Anglican parish farther up the coast at present-day Plantersville.  Madeleine and Paul died there that summer or fall, probably of malaria, a disease unknown in their homeland.  Marguerite, daughter of Michel dit Michaud Bourg l'aîné, and her second husband Jacques Vigneau dit Jacob Maurice, a Baie-Verte merchant, ended up in Georgia, but they did not remain.  In early 1756, the governors of Georgia and South Carolina allowed the Acadians in their colonies who were not under arrest to return to their homeland as best they could.  By the first of March, dozens of them--perhaps as many as 200--had purchased or built small vessels and headed up the coast.  At least 50 of them made it all the way back to the Bay of Fundy and took refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  Most did not complete the long voyage.  One of the largest contingents, led by Jacques dit Maurice, started off from Georgia with 80 exiles aboard barely-seaworthy open boats.  They arrived at Charles Town, South Carolina, by the end of March and pushed on in mid-April.  By the end of June they had reached Shrewsbury, New Jersey.  After a short stop, they continued northward, avoiding Long Island, and made it as far as New England.  In late July, Massachusetts officials, heeding a warning from an irate Charles Lawrence, halted the Vigneau party at Sandwich on lower Cape Cod Bay and sent them to scattered communities in the province, where hundreds of exiles from Minas and Annapolis already were being held.  Marguerite, Jacques dit Maurice, and their many children were sent to Leicester, Roxbury, and then to Boston, where they were counted in 1760 and 1761. 

Bourgs at Annapolis Royal were deported directly to New England in the fall of 1755.  Joseph Bourg and wife Louise Robichaud were sent to Connecticut on the British transport Edward, which left the Annapolis Basin in early December but did not reach New London until late May 1756.  Louise did not survive the crossing.  A storm drove the ship to Antigua in the British West Indies, where a hundred of its passengers died of malaria.  According to a petition Joseph filed in a Connecticut court in October 1758, Louise died in Antigua "de la picote"--from smallpox.  Anne, called Hannah, Bourg, wife of Joseph Doucet, was counted at Salisbury, Massachusetts, in 1758.  Bourgs from Minas ended up in Pennsylvania, including three sons of Alexandre dit Bellehumeur--Paul, Bénoni, and Joseph.  At least one family from Minas--that of Michel, another son of Alexandre Bourg dit Bellehumeur--was transported to Virginia, where, along with hundreds other "French Neutrals," they suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  The Acadians languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships until Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, ordered them dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond, while he and the colony's political leaders pondered their fate.  The following spring, the Virginians sent them on to England in hired vessels.  They were packed into warehouses in several English ports.  Michel Bourg, wife Jeanne Hébert, and their six children were held at Southampton.  Jeanne died by 1759, when Michel remarried to Brigitte, daughter of fellow Acadians René Martin dit Barnabé and Marie Mignier and widow of Séraphin Breau, probably at Southampton.  Marguerite, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Bourg, and her husband Simon LeBlanc of Cobeguit ended up at Falmouth, where smallpox broke out soon after their arrival.  Marguerite died in September or October 1756, age 34, perhaps of the pox, and was buried in nearby St.-Gluvias Parish, Penryn.  Simon promptly remarried. 

Chignecto and Minas Bourgs who escaped the British roundup of 1755, evidently the majority of them, took refuge on Rivière St.-Jean, on the upper Petitcoudiac, or at Shediac, Richibouctou, and Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  There they fought starvation, hard winters, and British raiding parties.  Some of moved on to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Others moved on to Canada via the lower St. Lawrence or the Rivière St.-Jean portage.  Anne, daughter of Michel dit Michaud Bourg l'aîné, wife of François Hébert of Chignecto, died at Québec City in September 1756, age 50.  Anne's older sister Marie dit Louise-Marie, widow of Charles Bourgeois of Chignecto, died there in February 1757, age 62.  Anne and Louise-Marie's younger brother François was counted at Québec in 1758 with second wife Marie Belliveau dit Blondin.  Anne, Louise-Marie, and François's nephew Jacques dit Canique Bourg and wife Marguerite Cormier also were counted at Québec in 1758.  Beginning in late 1750s, members of the family from Île St.-Jean joined their cousins on the Gulf shore or in Canada.  Charles Bourg, formerly of Port-La-Joye, Île St.-Jean, died at Québec in December 1757, age 37, victim, most likely, of a smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of his fellow exiles between the summer of 1757 and the spring of 1758.  Alexandre Bourg dit Bellehumeur, former colonial Council delegate, judge, and notary at Minas, who had escaped to Gulf shore in 1755, died at Richibouctou there in 1760, age 89. 

Bourgs still at Cobeguit in September 1755, learning of the fate of their cousins in the other Fundy settlements, packed up their goods and their loved ones and either hid in the countryside out of British reach or headed up the cattle trail to Tatamagouche and other North Shore settlements.  From there, in what boats they could find, they crossed the Mer Rouge to French-held Île St.-Jean, where they joined their kinsmen who had chosen to go there years, even decades, earlier.  Living in territory controlled by France, none of the established Bourgs on Île St.-Jean were touched by the roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the Maritime islands, Bourgs among them, and deported them to St.-Malo and other French ports.  More members of the family were deported to France, in fact, than to any other corner of the Acadian diaspora. 

Many Bourgs did not survive the crossing to France, and entire families were lost.  Cécile Bourg, with husband Antoine Breau and six of their children, crossed on the British transport Duc Guillaume, which left the Maritimes in late summer and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo the first of November.  Only son Antoine and daughter Cécile survived the crossing.  Wife Cécile died in a St.-Malo hospital on November 15.  Françoise, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Bourg, and husband Paul Doiron; Pierre Bourg, son of Ambroise, wife Madeleine Hébert, and their children, of Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse, Île Royale; and Marguerite, daughter of Pierre Bourg, husband Jacques Vécot, and their children, disappeared without a trace aboard two of the British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November 1758 and sank in storm off the southwest coast of England during the second week of December.  Françoise and Paul and Pierre and Madeleine died aboard the Duke William; and Marguerite and Jacques went down with the Violet.  Isabelle Bourg, age 47, with husband Pierre Dugas, age 50, and six of their children, ages 21 to 3, crossed on the British transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in the 12-ship convoy and reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759 with all but six of its 56 passengers.  Isabelle and her family were among the majority who survived the crossing, but she died a few weeks after she reached the port, age 46.  Most of the island Bourgs crossed on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November and reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The death toll among the 1,033 passengers aboard those vessels reached nearly 50 percent.  Many were Bourgs.  Louis Bourg, age 70, crossed with wife Cécile Michel, age 57, and their youngest daughter Anne-Josèphe, age 15.  Louis died at sea.  His oldest daughter Marguerite, age 38, crossed with husband Jean-Baptiste Guillot, age 38, and six children, ages 12 to 3.  Marguerite, a son, and a daughter survived the crossing, but Jean-Baptiste and four of the other children died at sea.  Louis's son Eustache, age 36, crossed with wife Marguerite Daigre, age 30, and three children--Boniface, age 6; Marguerite-Susanne, age 2; and Janvier, age 1.  Only Marguerite survived the crossing.  Louis's son Louis, fils, age 28, crossed with wife Anne Pitre, age 18, and Anne's sister Marie-Blanche, age 15.  They all survived the crossing, but Louis, fils died in a local hospital in early March probably from the rigors of the voyage.  Louis, père's youngest son Charles, age 21, crossed with wife Madeleine Blanchard, age 21.  They both survived the crossing.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine Hébert, widow of François Bourg of Cobeguit, crossed with three Bourg children--Anselme, age 22; Alain, age 17; and Luce-Perpétué, age 15.  Madeleine and Anselme died from the rigors of the crossing.  Michel Bourg, age 38, crossed with wife Cécile Moyse, age 35, and four children--Marie, age 8; Perpétué, age 5; Michel, age 3; and Simon, age 8 months.  Only Cécile survived the crossing.  Marguerite Bourg, age unrecorded, crossed with husband Germain Blanchard, age 37, and six children.  Only Germain and their 13-year-old son Jean survived the crossing.  Jean Bourg, age 56, crossed with wife Marie Pitre, age 52, and three children--Marguerite, age 26; Marie, age 16, and Charles, age 13.  Only daughter Marie and son Charles survived the crossing.  Jean's older sons Jean, fils, age 22, with wife Marie Aucoin, age 25; and François le jeune, age 20, with wife Anne Aucoin, age 20, also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Both couples survived the crossing.  Jean, père's brother François l'aîné, a widower, age unrecorded, crossed with seven children--Charles, age 15; Jean, age 14; Françoise, age 12; Marguerite, age 10; Antoine, age 6; Marie, age 7; and Osite, age 4.  François l'aîné and the younger children died at sea.  Charles, Jean, Françoise, and Marguerite survived the crossing, but Marguerite died at a hospital near St.-Malo the following April.  Joseph Bourg, age 22, and wife Marguerite Aucoin, age 23, survived the crossing, but Joseph's parents and younger siblings were not so lucky:  Alexandre Bourg, age 49, crossed with wife Ursule Hébert, age 44, and five of their children--Marguerite, age 20; Anne, age 18; Grégoire, age 10; Tarsille, age 4; and Blanche, age 2.  Only Ursule, Marguerite, and Anne survived the crossing.  The others died at sea.  François Bourg of Cobeguit, age 50, crossed with second wife Émilie Thibodeau, age 44, and four of their children--Agnès-Blanche, age 12; Gertrude, age 10; Marie-Sébastienne, age 5; and Jean-Charles, age 3.  Also with them was Athanase, age 17, one of François's son from his first wife.  All four of the younger children died at sea, and François and Émilie died in a St.-Malo hospital a month after their arrival.  Only Athanase survived the crossing.  With François's family were kinsmen Théodore, age 13, son of Jean-Pierre Bourg, and Théodore's sister Marie-Josèphe, age 10.  They both survived the crossing.  François's daughter Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg, age 22, also from his first wife, crossed with husband Alexandre Robichaud, age 32, and three children, ages 6 years to 6 months.  With them also were cousin Théodose Bourg, age unrecorded, and Marguerite-Josèphe's younger brother Joseph, age 15.  All three of the children, along with cousin Théodose, died at sea.  Alexandre, Marguerite-Josèphe, and brother Joseph survived the crossing.  Pierre Bourg, age unrecorded, crossed with wife Marie-Josèphe Gautrot, age 46, and four of their children--Françoise-Josèphe, age 22; Amboise, age 19; Jean-Pierre le jeune, age 14; and Marguerite-Josèphe, age 12--and four relatives--Victor Bourg, age 12, son of Jean-Pierre l'aîné; Victor's paternal aunt Marie-Madeleine Bourg, age unrecorded; Jean-Baptiste Hébert, age 6; and François Gautrot, age 80, Marie-Josèphe's father.  Only Marie-Josèphe, Jean-Pierre le jeune, Françoise-Josèphe, Victor, and Jean-Baptiste survived the crossing.  The other five members of the party either died at sea or in a St.-Malo hospital.  Alexandre Bourg of Cobeguit, age 40, crossed with wife Marguerite-Josèphe Hébert, age 30, and four daughters--Marie-Rose, age 11; Marguerite, age 9; Madeleine, age 7; and Anne-Dorate, age 4--as well as two other relations--François Breau, age 3, and Marguerite-Josèphe's younger brother François-Xavier Hébert, age 10.  Alexandre, Marguerite-Josèphe, Marie-Rose, and Marguerite survived the crossing, but the younger daughters Madeleine and Anne-Dorate, along with François and François-Xavier, either died at sea or in a St.-Malo hospital soon after they reached the Breton port.  Bénoni Bourg, age 23, and his pregnant wife Élisabeth-Josèphe Naquin, age 25, survived the crossing but died in a St.-Malo hospital soon after they reached St.-Malo.  Their newborn son also died, days before his mother passed.  Ursule Bourg, age 46, crossed with husband Joseph Breau, age 47, and nine children, ages 18 to 2.  All survived the crossing except Ursule, who died at Hôpital Rosais, St.-Servan-sur-Mer, a suburb of St.-Malo, a month after reaching port.  Their youngest child, a son, died at sea.  Joseph Bourg, age 26, son of Abraham of Cobeguit, crossed with wife Marguerite-Josèphe Dugas, age 24.  Joseph survived the crossing, but his wife died at sea.  Anne Bourg, age 32, crossed with husband Alexis Dugas, age 32, and six children, ages 10 to newborn.  Only Alexis and his oldest daughter survived the crossing.  Wife Anne and the other children died at sea.  Madeleine-Josèphe Bourg, age 22, crossed with husband Alexis Doiron, age 36, and six children, ages 14 to 3.  Madeleine-Josèphe, Alexis, and their two oldest children survived the crossing, but the four youngest children either died at sea or from the rigors of the crossing.  Marie-Madeleine Bourg, age 35, crossed with husband Jean-Baptiste Guérin, age 36, and four children, ages 9 to 2.  The two younger children died at sea.  Isabelle Bourg, age 37, crossed with husband François Hébert, age 44, and 10 children, ages 20 to newborn.  Isabelle and five of her childern either died at sea or in a St.-Malo hospital.  Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg, age 30, crossed with husband Charles Hébert, age unrecorded, and four children, ages 9 to 1.  Charles and the three youngest children died at sea.  Anne-Josèphe Bourg, age 22, crossed with husband Pierre Henry, age 25, and an 18-month-old son, who died at sea.  Marie-Madeleine Bourg, age 42, crossed with husband Ambroise Hébert, age 47, of Pointe à La Jeunesse, Île Royale, and eight children, ages 17 to 1.  Marie-Madeleine and the youngest three children died at sea.  Anne Bourg, age 30, crossed with husband Joseph Melanson, age 36, and six children, ages 12 to 2.  The three youngest children died at sea, and Anne and one of her daughters died at St.-Malo soon after they reached the port.  Élisabeth Bourg, age 33, husband Ambroise Naquin of Cobeguit, age 34, and five of their children, ages 7 to several months, crossed on the British transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November, survived the mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, pulled in for repairs at Bideford, England, in late December, and did not reach St.-Malo until the second week of March 1759.  Élisabeth, Ambroise, and two of their children survived the crossing, but the youngest children did not.  Françoise Bourg, age 20, brother Pierre, age 29, and her husband Joseph Naquin, age 28, all survived the crossing aboard Supply, but Joseph died the following May probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Cécile Bourg, age 24, crossed with husband Ignace Heusé, age 28, and her 2-year-old daughter Anne-Josèphe Longuépée from her first marriage.  They survived the crossing.  François-Xavier Bourg, age 20, of Cobeguit, traveled with the family of Charles Guédry, and he, too, survived the crossing.  Jean Bourg, age 43, of Cobeguit and Pointe à La Jeunesse, Île Royale, crossed with wife Françoise Benoit, age 37, and seven children.  Daughter Anne-Marie, age 8, died at sea, and the rigors of the crossing contributed to the death of Jean, Françoise, and 5-year-old Théodore.  However, six of their children--Marin or Martin, age 18; Luce-Perpétué, age 14; Gertrude, age 11; Marie, age 10; Joseph, age 9; and Jean-Baptiste, age 7--survived the long voyage aboard Supply. 

Island Bourgs did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  After burying their widowed mother Marie-Madeleine Hébert, as well as their older brother Anselme, who died in February 1759, age 23, from the rigors of the crossing, Alain Bourg and his younger sister Luce-Perpétué settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Early in 1761, Alain, now age 20, embarked probably from St.-Malo aboard the French corsair Tigre, which fell into British hands.  He was reported as a prisoner of war in England in early March of that year and was not repatriated to France from an English prison until June 1763.  Still in his early 20s and working as a day laborer, he married cousin Anne-Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Comeau and Marguerite Hébert of Minas, at St.-Suliac in January 1764.  Anne-Marie may have come to France from England.  She gave Alain at least seven children at St.-Suliac:  Marie-Geneviève in December 1764; Joseph-Alain in February 1766 but died nine days after his birth; Marie-Madeleine in April 1767 but died of smallpox at age 5 in February 1773; Pierre-Alain in August 1768 but died of smallpox in February 1773, age 4; Marguerite-Tarsille in April 1770; Rosalie-Josèphe in September 1771 but also died of smallpox in February 1773, age 15 months; and François in c1773.  Alain's sister Luce-Perpétué married cousin Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Charles Hébert and Marguerite Dugas of Cobeguit and widower of Marie Robichaud, at Trigavou across the river from St.-Suliac in January 1762, while her brother Alain was languishing in an English prison.  Pierre also had crossed to St.-Malo on one of the Five Ships.  The crossing had taken the lives of all four of his children, and his first wife died of smallpox at Ploubalay near Trigavou only a few months after their arrival.  Luce-Perpétué gave Pierre, who was twice her age, eight more children, at nearby Pleslin and Tréméreuc, only half of whom survived childhood.  Pierre died at La Ville Hervy, Tréméreuc, in September 1781, age 37.  Alain and Luce-Perpétué's older sister Anne, widow of Jean-Baptiste Blanchard, settled at St.-Suliac, where she remarried to cousin Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Dugas and Claire Bourg and widower of Marguerite Benoit and Madeleine Moyse, in September 1760.  Jean-Baptiste also had crossed on one of the Five Ships, with his second wife, who, along with both of their young children, had died at sea.  Anne gave him three more children at St.-Méloir-des-Ondes in the countryside east of St.-Malo.  Joseph, son of Alexandre Bourg and Ursule Hébert, and wife Marguerite Aucoin settled at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo, where Marguerite gave him at least 10 children:  Joseph, fils in May 1760; Jean-Christophe on the last day of December 1761; Françoise-Charlotte in January 1764 but died the following April; Hélène-Germaine in March 1765; Marguerite-Josèphe in August 1767; Anne-Françoise in May 1769; Marie-Françoise in September 1771 but died at age 8 in February 1780; Isabelle-Laurence in August 1773; Constance in May 1775 but died 12 days after her birth; and Charles-Simon in July 1777.  Joseph's younger sister Marguerite also settled at St.-Énogat, where she married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Doiron and Anne Forest, in February 1764.  Josseph, a sailor, evidently had signed up for corsair service against the British during the war and fell into enemy hands.  He had returned from to St.-Malo from a prison in England in October 1763, four months before their marriage.  Marguerite gave him at least two children at St.-Énogat, one of whom, son Jean-Charles Doiron, died as an infant.  Joseph and Marguerite were among the Acadians in the St.-Malo area who chose to return to North America.  Joseph died on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, in 1772.  One wonders what became of Marguerite and her daughter Rose-Germaine Doiron.  Marguerite's younger sister Anne married Barthélemy, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Henry and Anne Aucoin, at St.-Énogat in February 1770,  Barthélemy also had crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Anne gave him at least six children at St.-Énogat and Pleurtuit on the west side of the river, and Pleudihen-sur-Rance and St.-Suliac on the east bank.  Alexandre Bourg of Cobeguit, wife Marguerite-Josèphe Hébert, and daughters Marie-Rose and Marguerite settled at St.-Suliac.  Athanase Bourg, son of François, settled first at St.-Énogat and then at St.-Suliac, where, at age 27, he married cousin Luce, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Breau and Ursule Bourg, in February 1768.  Three of their sons were born at St.-Suliac:  Thomas-François-Joseph in December 1769 but died at age 15 months in March 1771; Joseph-Marin in February 1772; and François-Simon in c1773.  Athanase's older sister Marguerite-Josèphe and her husband Alexandre Robichaud, now childless, settled at St.-Énogat, where, between March 1760 and April 1773, seven more children were born to them, but only three survived childhood.  Athanase and Marguerite-Josèphe's younger brother Joseph also settled at St.-Énogat, where he married cousin Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Melanson and Anne Bourg, in January 1767.  Anne gave him 10 children at St.-Énogat:  Marguerite-Théodose in November 1768; Anne-Marie in April 1770 but died at age 2 in May 1772; Isabelle-Charlotte in May 1771 but died the following December; Jeanne-Perrine in August 1772; Josèphe-Marguerite in September 1773; Anne in January 1775; Joseph in June 1776 but died the following September; Rose-Perrine in June 1777 but died in July; Joseph-Pierre in June 1778 but died in October; and Jean in June 1779 but died only six days after his birth.  Théodore and Marie-Josèphe Bourg, who had crossed with Athanase et al., settled at Pleslin on the west side of the Rance, where Marie-Josèphe died at age 13 in December 1762.  A year before his sister's death, Théodore moved to St.-Coulomb near the coast northeast of St.-Malo, where he married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Granger and his second wife Marguerite Gautrot of Minas and widow of Pierre Bonnière.  Anne gave Théodore four children at St.-Coulomb:  Anne-Théodose in April 1765; Madeleine-Julienne in March 1767; Élisabeth-Hélène in April 1769 but died at age 2 in May 1771; and Théodore-Prosper-Étienne in December 1770.  Marguerite Bourg, oldest daughter of Louis of Île St.-Jean and widow of Jean-Baptiste Guillot, remarried to Jean, son of Jacques Metra and Jeanne Veuvre of Bernin, Lorraine, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east bank of the river in February 1765.  She was one of the few Bourgs who married a non-Acadian in France.  She gave him a daughter at Pleudihen.  Marguerite's younger brother Charles and wife Madeleine Blanchard settled at Pleudihen, where seven children were born to them:  Cécile-Jean in April 1760; Marie in November 1761 but died at age 1 1/2 in April 1763; Lucien in October 1763; Jean-Louis in January 1766 but died the following December; Marie-Madeleine in March 1767 but died at age 2 in May 1769; Anne-Françoise in April 1771 but died at age 2 in May 1773; and Jean-Charles in July 1773.  Marguerite and Charles's youngest sister Anne-Josèphe married Ignace, son of fellow Acadians Jean Hamon and Marie Blanchard, at Pleudihen in May 1770.  She gave him a daughter there.  Meanwhile, their brother Louis, fils's widow Anne Pitre remarried to fellow Acadian Joseph, son of François Gautrot and Louise Aucoin and widower of Marie-Josèphe Hébert, at St.-Suliac in November 1764.  She gave him four more children there.  Charles Bourg, son of François of Cobeguit, married Marguerite, daughter of Pierre LeBlanc and Françoise Thériot of Rivière-aux-Canards, at Pleurtuit across the river from St.-Suliac in February 1767.  They settled at St.-Énogat and were that rare Acadian couple who had no children.  Charles's younger brother Jean settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo, embarked probably from St.-Malo on the corsair Biche in March 1760, was captured by the British, held as a prisoner in England, and repatriated to St.-Malo in May 1763 with other Acadians being held in English ports.  Jean married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Ambroise Dupuis and Anne Aucoin, at Plouër-sur-Rance southeast of Pleurtuit in February 1768.  They settled at St.-Énogat, where Marie gave him four children:  Marguerite-Marie in January 1769; Jean-Mathurin at Langrolay-sur-Rance southwest of St.-Énogat in February 1770 but died two days after his birth; Françoise-Geneviève at St.-Énogat in March 1771 but died at age 1 in May 1772; and Isabelle-Germaine in October 1772.  After the family returned from Poitou and Nantes in the late 1770s, among the few Acadians who retunred to the St.-Malo area, Jean and Marie had four more children, including a set of twins, at St.-Énogat:  Françoise-Marie in August 1778; Yves-Jean and Antoine-Yves in April 1780; and Jean-Baptiste-Simon-Louis in c1785.  Charles and Jean's younger sister Françoise married François-Xavier, son of fellow Acadians Jean Henry and Madeleine Thériot, at St.-Énogat in February 1767.  François-Xavier also had crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Françoise gave him at least seven children there, all but one of whom survived childhood.  Jean Bourg, fils and wife Marie Aucoin settled at Le Coquenais near Pleudihen-sur-Mer.  Marie gave him three children in the area:  Joseph-Firmin in April 1760; Rose-Perrine at Ville aux Genilles in July 1761; and Anne-Charlotte at La Coquenais in January 1764 but died the following October.  Marie died at La Coquenais in January 1764, two weeks after Anne-Charlotte's birth, and Jean, fils remarried to Anne-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Daigle and Marie Breau of Grand-Pré, at Pleudihen in May 1767.  Anne-Josèphe gave him 13 more children in the area:  Marie-Josèphe at La Coquenais in March 1768; François-Marie in June 1769; Marguerite-Perrine at La Gravelle in September 1770; Madeleine-Jeanne in April 1772 but died six days after her birth; Madeleine-Perrine in June 1773; Hélène in c1774 but died at age 3 in October 1777; Anne-Jeanne in February 1775; Charles-Alain in July 1776 but died at age 1 in October 1777; Jeanne-Anne in January 1778; Jean-Marie in May 1779; Anne-Josèphe in February 1781 but died the following November; Joseph-Marie in September 1782; and Charlotte-Françoise in May 1785.  Jean, fils's brother François and wife Anne Aucoin also settled near Pleudihen, where they had eight children:  Paul in October 1760 but died the first of November; Marie-Jacquemine at La Ville aux Genilles in April 1762; Hélène at La Coquenais in September 1764; Anne-Grégoire in May 1767; Marguerite-Charlotte in September 1769 but died at age 15 in March 1785; Françoise-Jeanne in May 1772 but died at age 7 in September 1779; and Madeleine-Marie in November 1774 but died at age 4 in September 1779.  Jean, fils and François's sister Marie married Paul, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Henry and Anne Aucoin, at Pleudihen in February 1760.  Paul also had crossed on one of the Five Ships.  They settled at Le Coquenais, where Marie gave him six children.  Jean, fils, François, and Marie's youngest brother Charles married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Thibodeau and Susanne Comeau, at Pleudihen in January 1768.  Three children were born to them at Village de la Villeger near Pleudihen:  Marie-Françoise in April 1769 but died at nearby Mordreuc, age 4 1/2, in September 1773; Pierre-Jean in August 1770; and Anne-Modeste in November 1771.  Joseph Bourg, son of Abraham, now a young widower, settled at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river from Pleudihen, but he did not remain there.  He remarried to Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Granger and Angélique Richard of Minas and widow of Alain Bugeaud, all of Grand-Pré, at Pleurtuit north of Plouër in June 1760 and settled across the river at St.-Coulomb and nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Marie-Madeleine gave him six children, including a set of twins:  Joseph and Pierre at St.-Coulomb in April 1761, but Joseph died at age 1 1/2 in September 1762; Marie-Josèphe in November 1762; Fabien-Joseph in April 1765; Jean-Baptiste at St.-Servan in December 1767; and Élisabeth-Blanche in November 1770.  Jean-Pierre Bourg, son of Pierre, settled with his widowed mother Marie-Josèphe Gautrot and older sister Françoise-Josèphe at Pleslin on the west bank of the Rance, but he did not seek a wife there.  In 1768, he went to Paris to study for the priesthood under Abbé Jean-Louis La Loutre and pursued his studies until the death of the notorious abbé at Nantes in 1772.  Jean-Pierre returned to St.-Malo, where he worked as a foreman, and was still unmarried in 1785, the year he turned 40.  His sister Françoise-Josèphe also was still unmarried in 1785, when she would have been age 48.  Unlike Jean-Pierre, she never married.  Victor Bourg, who had come to St.-Malo with Marie-Josèphe Gautrot and her family, settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where he was still living in 1764, after which he disappears from history.  In May 1760, François-Xavier Bourg embarked on the corsair Jason probably from St.-Malo, was captured by the British, held in an English prison, and, along with other Acadians confined in English ports, was repatriated to St.-Malo in May 1763.  After his release, François-Xavier settled at Pleurtuit, where he married Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre LeBlanc and Anne Thériot of Minas, in September 1763.  She gave him seven children at Créhen on the Rance northeast of Pleurtuit:  Marie-Élisabeth in November 1764 but died at age 2 1/2 in May 1767; Pierre-Marguerite in July 1766 but died the following January; François-Xavier, fils, also called Augustin-Xavier, in January 1768; Félix-Xavier in February 1770; Jean-Joseph-Marie in January 1772 but died at age 1 in April 1773; Marie-Élisabeth in October 1775; and Élisabeth-Félicité in July 1780.  Wife Élisabeth died by July 1781, when François-Xavier remarried to Marguerite-Pélagie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Henry and Marie-Madeleine Pitre, at Pleurtuit.  She gave him another son there, Pierre-Jean-François in November 1783.  Marin Bourg of Cobeguit followed his parents to St.-Suliac and remained there with his younger siblings after their parents died.  In January 1763, Marin married Marie-Osite, daughter of fellow Acadians Olivier Daigle and Angélique Doiron, at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river from St.-Suliac.  Marie-Osite gave him at least nine children there:  Marie-Luce in January 1764; Joseph-Pierre in June 1765; Marguerite-Josèphe in June 1767; Marin-Joseph in July 1769; Rose-Madeleine in March 1771; Pierre-Jean-Baptiste in February 1773; Marie-Françoise-Madeleine-Josèphe in c1775; Françoise-Georges in c1778; and Guillaume-Jean in c1781.  Marin's younger sister Luce-Perpétué married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Hébert and Marguerite Bourg, at St.-Suliac in April 1766.  She gave him at least four children there, all of whom survived childhood.  Marin and Luce-Perpétué's younger sister Gertrude married Marin, son of fellow Acadians Honoré Gautrot and his first wife Marguerite Robichaud of Cobeguit, at St.-Suliac in May 1768.  She gave him at least three children there, two of whom survived childhood.  Their sister Marie did not marry until August 1779, when she was age 31, and she married at Nantes, not in one of the St.-Malo-area villages.  One wonders what happened to Marin et al.'s younger brothers Joseph and Jean-Baptiste.  Pierre Bourg followed his younger sister Françoise and her husband Joseph Naquin to St.-Suliac, where she soon became a widow.  She remarried to René, fils, son of fellow Acadians René Guillot and Marguerite Doiron and widower of Marie-Rose Daigre, at St.-Suliac in August 1760.  She gave him at least eight more children.  At the age of 31, brother Pierre married Anne-Marie, daughter of Jacques Naquin and Jeanne Melanson of Cobeguit, at St.-Suliac in January 1761.  Anne-Marie was Pierre's sister Françoise's first husband's sister.  She gave Pierre six children at St.-Suliac:  Marie-Suline in September 1763 but died of smallpox at age 10 in May 1773; Jeanne-Madeleine-Françoise in June 1765; Pierre-Olivier in April 1767; Marguerite-Victoire in December 1768; Anne-Perrine in January 1771 but died 10 days after her birth; and Ambroise-David in February 1772.  By 1774, they had moved on to La Rochelle on the Bay of Biscay.  Ursule, daughter of Joseph Bourg and Françoise Dugas, married François, fils, son of François Moyse and Marie Brun of Annapolis Royal and widower of Marie-Madeleine Hébert, at St.-Suliac in November 1761.  She gave him seven more children, most of whom died in childhood.

Island Bourgs ended up in other French ports, including Cherbourg and Le Havre in Normandy, the northern fishing port of Boulogne-sur-Mer, and La Rochelle on the Bay of Biscay.  Joseph Bourg, son of Jean-Baptiste, died at Cherbourg, age 47, in December 1758, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Léonard Bourg, age 16, also died at Cherbourg that month, as did Tarsille Bourg, age 15.  One wonders how Joseph, Léonard, and Tarsille were kin.  Ambroise, son of Charles Bourg and Cécile Melanson, now a day laborer, and wife Anne-Josèphe, daughter of Claude Pitre and Isabelle Guérin, also ended up at Cherbourg.  Wife Anne-Josèphe, age 22, died there in December 1759, probably from complications of childbirth; their daughter Louise had been born less than a week before her mother's death.  Ambroise, in his late 20s or early 30s, remarried to Marie-Modeste, 18-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Moulaison and Cécile Melanson of Pobomcoup, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in July 1763.  Marie-Modeste's family were among the Cap-Sable-area Acadians who the British had rounded up there in late 1758 and, after imprisonsing them at Halifax, deported them to Cherbourg in November 1759, which they reached the following January.  Soon after their marriage, Ambroise and Marie-Modeste crossed Baie de Seine to Le Havre.  There, she gave Ambroise three more daughters:  Marie-Victoire in May 1764; Amy-Modeste in April 1766; and Marie-Marguerite-Constance in December 1767.  The family then moved back to Cherbourg, where three more daughters were born:  Madeleine-Adélaïde in February 1770; Thérèse-Julie in November 1771; and Élisabeth-Céleste in March 1774.  Daughter Marie-Marguerite-Constance died at Le Havre, age 5, in March 1773.  By February 1776, the family had moved to Pleurtuit southwest of St.-Malo.  There, five more children, including sons, were born to them:  Maximilien-Ambroise in February 1776 but died two weeks after his birth; Joseph-Faustin in March 1777; Pélagie in June 1779; Modeste in August 1781; and Ambroise, fils in July 1783.  Catherine, daughter of Charles Bourg and Marguerite Landry, married Pierre-Jacques, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Bertrand and Marie-Josèphe Moulaison of Pobomcoup, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in February 1764.  Pierre-Jacques's family also were among the Cap-Sable-area habitants deported to Cherbourg from Halifax.  The couple were living at Le Havre in 1766 but were back at Cherbourg in 1769.  Meanwhile, Abraham Bourg "de quartre Sables" died at Cherbourg in March 1760, age 24, soon after reaching the port from Halifax.  Charles-Joseph, called Joseph, 22-year-old son of Charles Bourg and Marguerite Landry, married Rosalie or Rose, 19-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Paul dit Grand Paul Doiron and Marguerite Michel of Chignecto, in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in January 1764.  Daughter Adélaide-Rose was baptized in Notre-Dame Parish there in October 1765.  Anne-Marie Bourg, daughter of Martin of Port-Royal and wife of Alexis Aucoin, died in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in January 1766, age 75. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England who had gone there from Virginia were repatriated to France.  Michel Bourg, second wife Brigitte Martin dit Barnabé, six of his children by his first wife--Mathurin, age 19; Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, age 17; Victoire, age 16; Charles, age 13; Marie, age 12; and Pierre, age 11--and three of her children by her first husband Séraphin Breau, crossed the Channel aboard La Dorothée, which reached St.-Malo in late May 1763.  They settled at St.-Suliac.  Michel's daughter Marie married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Charles Richard and Catherine-Josèphe Gautrot, at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer in January 1771.  Joseph had crossed from England to St.-Malo aboard the ship Ambition in May 1763.  Marie gave him at least two sons at St.-Servan.  Michel's daughter Madeleine married Joseph fils, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Gravois and Marie Cyr of Chignecto, at St.-Suliac in August 1763.  Joseph, fils, Brigitte Martin's nephew by marriage, had crossed from England to St.-Malo on La Dorothée with Brigitte, Michel, and Michel's children.  Joseph, fils and Madeleine settled at St.-Servan, where she gave him at least two daughters. 

In late fall of 1765, many of the Acadians repatriated from England agreed to become a part of a new settlement on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Madeleine-Josèphe Bourg and husband Alexis Doiron of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, and Pointe-Prime, Île St.-Jean, were counted at Bortereau near Locmaria on the south end of the island in 1765 with five of his children, two of them hers.  They had come to Belle-Île from St.-Énogat near St.-Malo, where they had lived since 1760.  They gave up their concession on the island in the 1770s and returned to St.-Malo.  In April 1783, Alexis, son of Joseph Bourg and Marie-Josèphe Guillerme, was born at Bangor in the southern interior of the island.  Marie, daughter of Ambroise Bourg, and her husband Joseph LeBlanc, and Marie's younger sister Anne and her husband Joseph Pitre, were counted on Belle-Île-en-Mer in 1767.  

Michel Bourg and his family were not among the Acadians from England who went to Belle-Île-en-Mer.  They did not even remain in the mother country.  In late February 1767, Joseph Gravois III took wife Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of Michel Bourg and his first wife, and their two daughters to one of the British-controlled Channel islands, probably Jersey, and from there returned to greater Acadia to work in a British-controlled fishery.  Michel, second wife Brigitte, and other members of the family followed from St.-Malo.  In 1774, Michel, at age 57, died in the fishing village of Carleton in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  His daughter Victoire married Basile, son of fellow Acadians Joseph LeBlanc and Madeleine Girouard, at Carleton in November 1776.  Michel's widow Brigitte Martin moved on to Canada, where she died in the Acadian community of St.-Jacques de l'Achigan northeast of Montréal in April 1779, age 64.  Michel's youngest daughter Luce married Michel, son of fellow Acadians Vincent Arseneau and Marguerite Poirier, at Carleton in November 1784.  Back in France, in 1767, Michel's oldest son Joseph-Mathurin, called Mathurin, and Brigitte's son Jean-Baptiste Breau, "went to Paris to study" for the priesthood under Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre and continued their studies until 1772, when the abbé died at Nantes.  They then followed their family to greater Acadia and Canada.  Mathurin was ordained at Montréal in September 1772, and Jean-Baptiste was ordained there in November, so they evidently had completed their studies in France.  From 1773 to 1795, Mathurin served as a missionary at Carleton and nearby Bonaventure, among his kinsmen.  He died at St.-Laurent near Montréal in August 1797, in his early 50s.  Jean-Baptiste served on the upper St. Lawrence at St.-Jacques de l'Achigan near Montréal and at L'Assomption near Trois-Rivières.  Meanwhile, in March of 1767, Michel Bourg's son Charles, age 17, also "went to Jersey with the intention of returning to Acadie."  One wonders what happened to him and his youngest brother Pierre after that date. 

In the early 1770s, Bourgs at St.-Malo and other port cities chose to become part of  a settlement scheme in the interior of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the Acadians languishing in the port cities.  A French nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  Members of the family who went there included Alain Bourg, wife Anne-Marie Comeau, and their three children from St.-Suliac; Alexandre Bourg, wife Marguerite-Josèphe Hébert, and their two daughters from St.-Suliac; Athanase Bourg, wife Luce Breau, and their two sons from St.-Suliac; Charles Bourg, a laborer, wife Madeleine Blanchard, and their three children from Pleudihen-sur-Rance; another Charles Bourg, this one a sailor, wife Anne Thibodeau, and their two children from Pleudihen; Jean Bourg, wife Marie Dupuis, and their two daughters from St.-Énogat; Joseph Bourg, second wife Marie-Madeleine Granger, and their five children from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Pierre Bourg, wife Anne-Marie Naquin, and their two children from St.-Suliac; and Théodore Bourg, wife Anne Granger, and their three children from St.-Coulomb.  Jean-Baptiste Bourg, a fisherman and carpenter, wife Jeanne Chaillou, and their son Jean, had come to France from Île St.-Pierre or Miquelon, French-controlled islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland, in 1767.  They, too, coming probably from La Rochelle, took part in the Poitou venture.  Church records show no new Bourg families created in Poitou, but some continued to grow there, while others, sadly, continued to shrink during their two years in the region.  Anne-Marie Comeau gave husband Alain Bourg another son in Poitou, Jean-Pierre, at Archigny southeast of Châtellerault in October 1774.  Alexandre Bourg, called a Canadian by the recording priest, died at Senillé outside of Châtellerault in October 1774, age 55.  Luce Breau gave husband Athanase Bourg another son, Charles, at Archigny in May 1775.  Madeleine Blanchard gave husband Charles Bourg another son, Joseph-Florent, in Notre-Dame Parish, Châtellerault, in January 1776 but died in early February.  Anne-Modeste, daughter of Charles Aucoin and Anne Thibodeau, died at Châtellerault in November 1774, age 3.  Meanwhile, Anne Thibodeau gave Charles Bourg another son, Alexis, in St. Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in July 1774.  Marie Dupuis gave husband Jean Bourg another daughter, Anne-Madeleine, in Poitou in c1774 but died in St.-Jean-l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age 15 months, in September 1775.  Jean, son of Jean-Baptiste Bourg and Jeanne Chaillou of Île St.-Pierre, died at Monthoiron southeast of Châtellerault at age 10 in July 1774.  But then Jeanne gave husband Jean-Baptiste another son, Charles, at Monthoiron in June 1775. 

The Poitou venture was short-lived for most of the exiles who went there.  From October 1775 through March 1776, dozens of Poitou Acadians, including the Bourgs, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  However, Jean Bourg and Marie Dupuis did not remain at Nantes.  By August 1778, they had returned to St.-Énogat across from St.-Malo.  The other Poitou Bourgs remained at Nantes and nearby Chantenay.  Alain Bourg, who worked as a day laborer in the lower Loire port, and wife Anne-Marie Comeau had five more children there:  Ambroise in St.-Similien Parish in July 1776 but likely died young; Jacques-Alain in June 1778 but died the following January; Joseph-André in St.-Nicolas Parish in November 1779; Jean-Marie in September 1781 but died at age 1 in January 1783; and Louis-Alexis in September 1783.  Daughter Marguerite-Tarsille died in St.-Nicolas Parish, age 12, in August 1782.  Jean-Baptiste Bourg died at Hôtel-Dieu, Nantes, in August 1777, age 44.  His widow, Jeanne Chaillou, did not remarry.  In her late 20s, Marguerite, daughter of Alexandre Bourg and Marguerite-Josèphe Hébert of Cobeguit, married Firmin, son of fellow Acadians Olivier Aucoin and Marguerite Vincent of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in May 1778.  Firmin's family had been exiled to Virginia in 1755 and deported to England in 1756, where he was born, and he followed them to France in the spring of 1763.  Marguerite gave him at least one child, a son, in St.-Jacques Parish in February 1779.  Firmin died probably at Nantes before August 1785.  Marguerite's older sister Marie-Rose died in St.-Jacques Parish in February 1782, age 33.  She never married.  Athanase Bourg, a seaman and navigator, and wife Luce Breau had two more children at Nantes:  Mathieu-Athanase in St.-Jacques Parish in March in c1779; and Marie-Rose died at Chantenay in June 1785, age 2 months.  Son François-Simon died in St.-Jacques Parish in June 1776, age 3.  Charles Bourg the seaman and wife Anne Thibodeau had two more sons at Chantenay:  Jacques-Charles at Chantenay in April 1776 but died there at age 1 1/2 in December 1777; and François in 1777 but died there at age 2 1/2 in August 1780.  Charles died by December 1781, when wife Anne remarried to Frenchman Yves-Cyprien, son of Jean Rouxeau and Charlotte Pingre of Ste.-Croix Parish, Nantes, in that parish.  Charles Bourg the laborer and wife Madeleine Blanchard had another son at Chantenay:, Joseph-Florent, the second of that name, in October 1777.  Cécile Michel, widow of Louis Bourg and Charles's mother, died at Chantenay in August 1781, age 86.  By 1785, Madeleine Blanchard was a widow with two young sons.  Her and Charles's oldest surviving son Lucien, a carpenter, married Marie-Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Trahan and Marguerite Duhon of Rivière-aux-Canards, at Nantes in the early 1780s.  Marie-Élisabeth had been born in Liverpool, England, in March 1759 and repatriated to Morlaix, France, with her family four years later.  Marie, daughter of Jean Bourg and Françoise Benoit of Cobeguit, had survived the crossing to St.-Malo on the transport Supply, followed her parents to St.-Suliac, watched them die from the rigors of the crossing, and witnessed her three older siblings marry in the St.-Malo area.  Brother Marin did not go to Poitou but remained at Plouër-sur-Rance, but older sisters Luce-Perpétué and Gertrude and their husbands did go to the interior province.  Marie likely had followed them to Poitou and Nantes, where, at age 31, she married Étienne, son of fellow Acadians Jean Hébert and Marguerite Mouton and widower of Marie Lavergne, in St.-Nicolas Parish in August 1779.  She did not live long enough to give Étienne more children.  She died in St.-Nicolas Parish in November 1780, and Étienne remarried within a year. Jean Bourg, a laborer, and wife Marie Dupuis had another child at Nantes, Marie in St.-Similien Parish in October 1776, before returning to St.-Énogat near St.-Malo.  Joseph Bourg and wife Marie-Madeleine Granger had no more children in Nantes.  Their older son Pierre, the twin, now an assistant wood merchant, married Marguerite-Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Dugas and Marguerite Daigle of Cobeguit, at St. Martin de Chantenay in November 1784.  Pierre Bourg and wife Anne-Marie Naquin had two more children at Nantes:  Marie-Madeleine in St.-Similien Parish in April 1779 but died in St.-Nicolas Parish, age 3 1/2, in June 1782; and Jean-Marie in St.-Nicolas Parish in September 1781 but died at age 2 1/2 in January 1784.  The couple also buried more children there:  Ambroise-David died in St.-Nicolas Parish, age 4, in May 1776; and Marguerite-Victoire died at age 16 there in October 1784.  After daughter Marguerite-Victoire's death, of the 10 children Pierre and Anne-Marie had brought into the world in France, only three were still living. 

When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, dozens of Bourgs--at least 95 of them, probably the majority of them still in the mother country--agreed to take it.  Other members of the family chose to remain in France.  During the French Revolution, Ursule Bourg, widow of François Moyse, was counted at Nantes, age 54, in the early 1790s.  Three Acadian Bourgs were counted at Pleurtuit near St.-Malo in 1793:  Françoise, age 52, widow of ____ Henry (probably François-Xavier), was a spinner; Joseph, age 63, perhaps a son of Alexandre, was a fisherman; Charles, son of Joseph, probably Charles-Simon, born in France in July 1777, was a boatman; and Marguerite, age 59, widow of ____ Doiron (probably Joseph), also was a spinner.  At St.-Malo in 1793, Revolutionary officials counted four more Acadian Bourgs:  Anne, a stocking maker, likely daughter of Joseph Bourg and Anne Melanson, born at St.-Énogat in January 1775; Isabelle, a day laborer, born at St.-Énogat in August 1773; Jeanne, a spinner, likely Jeanne-Perrine, Anne's older sister, born at St.-Énogat in August 1772; and Marie, a servant, likely Marie-Jacquemine, daughter of François Bourg and Anne Aucoin and widow of Olivier-Raphael Daigle, born at Pleudihen-sur-Rance in April 1762, who married her husband there in January 1786. 

Meanwhile, in North America, things only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter Joseph Bourg and Marie Girouard, was baptized at Restigouche in September, weeks before another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, Bourgs among them.  Fois, likely François, Bourg was counted probably with his wife; Charles Bourg, le veux, the elder, was counted with a family of 13; Joseph Bourg, neveu, the nephew, had a family of nine; and another Joseph Bourg was counted probably with his wife.  The British held many of them, along other exiles who were captured by, or surrendered to, British forces in the area, in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war, including Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto; Fort Edward at Pigiguit; and Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor.  In 1761 and 1762, British officials counted members of the family at Fort Edward, including Jean Bourg; Joseph Bourg and his family of two; Fran s Bourg; Jos.h Bourg; and Jean Bourque and his family of six.  In August 1763, British officials counted members of the family at Fort Cumberland, including Michel Bourg and his family of five; and Joseph Bourg and his family of nine.  That same month, British officials counted Bourgs on Georges Island including Cherle, or Charles, Bourque with his wife and 11 children; Joseph Bourque with his wife and five children; another Joseph Bourque with a wife and child, recently born; and Nastazie, or Anastasie, Bourque, widow of Jean-Baptiste Godin dit Lincour, with four children.

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In 1763, members of the family still lingering in Massachusetts included Marguerite Bourg, husband Jacques Vigneau dit Jacob Maurice, and five of their married sons and their families at Boston.  Marie-Josèphe Bourg, wife of Jean-Baptiste Pellerin, and Anne Bourg, wife of Joseph Doucet, also were still in the Bay Colony.  Joseph Bourg, fils and wife Marguerite Amireau of Pobomcoup were counted at Boston.  In Connectict that year, a number of Bourgs still living in various communities there.  Joseph Bourg, probably the widower, who would have been age 66 that year, lived with a family of five.  Pierre Bourg lived alone.  Pierre's older brother Charles, widower of Cécile Doucet, also lived alone but remarried to Anne, daughter of Joseph Richard and Anne Bastarache, in Connecticut in February 1764.  Jean and Joseph Bourg lived with their family of seven persons.  Marie Bourg, widow of Charles Landry, headed a family of nine.  Also counted in Connecticut that year was Marie Bourg, widow of Bernard LeBlanc.  In June 1763 in Pennsylvania, members of the family were still in that province.  Among them were three brothers, sons of Alexandre Bourg dit Bellehumeur of Minas:  Paul, his wife Judith Hébert, and five children; Billien, actually Bénoni, Bourg, his wife Françoise LeBlanc, and four children; and Joseph, his wife Marie Landry, and six children.  In July 1763, Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Alexandre Bourg dit Bellehumeur of Minas, her second husband Joseph Landry, and four children, resided at Oxford on the colony's Eastern Shore.  In South Carolina in August 1763, several Bourgs and their families were still living in the colony.  They included  Eustache Comeau, wife Cécile Bourg, daughter Madeleine, age 3, and two Dugon orphans; Joseph Bourg, age 14, and Jean Bourg, age 9, probably orphans; François Bourg, his wife, and a child; another François Bourg, his wife, and two children; and Jean Bourg, his wife, his father, and six children. 

Bourgs from the Nova Scotia compounds, the seaboard colonies, and perhaps even from France joined fellow Acadians on îles St.-Pierre and Miquelon, French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Jean-Baptiste Bourg, a fisherman and carpenter, son of Abraham, married Jeanne, daughter of Claude Chaillou and Marthe Bastrate and widow of Nicolas Cuomel, on Île St.-Pierre in October 1763.  Their son Jean, fils, was born probably on the island in c1764.  They likely were among the Acadians who French officials, obeying a royal decree, deported to France in 1767 to relieve overcrowding on the islands.  From La Rochelle, Jean-Baptiste and his family joined other Acadians in Poitou by the summer of 1774--son Charles was baptized at Monthoiron southeast of Châtellerault in June 1775--and retreated to Nantes the following March.  Jean-Baptiste died there in August 1777.  Françoise, daughter of Michel Bourg, and husband Charles Gautrot revalidated their marriage on Île Miquelon in May 1766.  Anne, daughter of Abraham Bourg dit Bellehumeur and wife of Acadian resistance leader Joseph LeBlanc dit Le Maigre, died on Miquelon in July 1766, age 67.  Le Maigre was sent to France probably in 1767 and reunited with relatives on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, where Minas Acadians from Virginia and England had established an agricultural settlement in 1765.  The old resistance fighter died at Kervaux on the island in October 1772, age 75.  Marguerite Bourg and husband Jacques dit Jacob Maurice Vigneau the merchant, who had gone to Massachusetts from Georgia years earlier, moved their large family from Boston to Île Miquelon in the early 1760s and were counted there in 1767.  Marguerite died on the island in November 1770, age 80.  Husband Jacques dit Jacob died there in May 1772, age 70.  In 1763 or 1765, Michel dit Michaud Bourg le jeune, son of Michel of Chignecto, and wife Marguerite-Josèphe Bourgeois, went to Île Miquelon from captivity at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, and were counted on the island in 1767.  Daughters Françoise, wife of Charles Gautrot, and Marie, wife of Joseph Gaudet dit Chaculo, also were counted on the island that year.  Michaud's older sister Marie and husband Jacques dit Petit Jacques Bourgeois came to the island from Massachusetts in the early 1760s and were counted there in 1767 and 1776.  Michaud and Marie's younger brother Jean dit Jeannotte and wife Marie-Madeleine Arseneau were counted on the island in 1767 but moved on to Cocagne on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore in 1770.  Their youngest sister, a second Marie, wife of Abraham Vigneau, was counted on Miquelon in 1767 and 1776.  Michaud, Marie, and Jeannotte's niece Anastasie, daughter of brother Pierre dit Canique Bourg and his second wife Marguerite Vigneau, married Joseph, fils, son of Joseph Dugas and Margerite LeBlanc, on Miquelon in April 1772.  Anne Boudrot, widow of Michel Bourg, son of Abraham, was counted on the island in 1767 with sons Michel, fils, Joseph, and Pierre, and daughters Anne and Madeleine.  Pierre-Paul, called Paul, Bourg, son of Pierre, married Madeleine, daughter of Paul Cyr and Marie-Josèphe Richard, on Miquelon in January 1764.  They had at least six children on the island:  Jean in c1764; Joseph in c1766; Anne in c1770; Mélem in c1772; Pierre in c1774; and Louise in c1777.  Paul's brother Jean and wife Jeanne Chiasson were counted on the island in 1764 and 1766.  In 1778, after the British seized the islands during the American Revolution, Acadians still living on St.-Pierre and Miquelon were deported to France, most to La Rochelle.  Marie Bourg, wife of Abraham Vigneau, reached La Rochelle that year and died there in c1780.  Paul Bourg, described as a "charpentier de Miquelon," died in St.-Jean Parish, La Rochelle, age 36, in March 1779.  His daughter Louise died in St.-Jean Parish, age unrecorded, in April.  Paul's widow, Madeleine Cyr, returned to North America in 1784 after the war had ended and settled not on Île Miquelon but on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  Three of her sons--Joseph, Mélem, and Pierre Bourg--married into the Haché, Boudrot, and Bourgeois families on the islands and created families of their own.  Marie Bourg, husband Petit Jacques Bourgeois, and their children also were deported to France in 1778.  Petit Jacques died at La Rochelle within a year of their arrival.  Marie did not remarry, nor did she return to North America.  She died at Port-Louis, southern Brittany, in July 1801, age 84. 

Most of the Acadians in New England, New York, and Pennsylvania chose to resettle in Canada, where Bourgs had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Antoine Bourg began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Bourgs could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Batiscan, Bécancour, L'Assomption, Lavaltrie, Nicolet, St.-Grégoire, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, and Trois-Rivières; at Chambly, St.-Antoine, St.-Charles, St.-Denis, and St.-Ours on the lower Richelieu; at Montmagny, St.-François-de-la-Rivière-du-Sud, St.-Joachim, and St.-Joseph-de-Beuce on the lower St. Lawrence below Québec City; at Carleton and Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs (they were especially numerous at Carleton); and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  Bourgs settled at Fortune Bay in southern Newfoundland.  They also could be found on lower Rivière St.-Jean and at Caraquet and Cocagne in present-day New Brunswick; and in Cumberland County, Nova Scotia.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, the Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Other Bourgs being held in the seaboard colonies chose to emigrate to the French Antilles, where they could live not only among fellow Roman Catholics, but in territory controlled by France.  French officials were especially eager for exiles to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their western empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the war of revenge to come.  The Acadians could provide a source of dependable labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the exiles land of their own in the sugar colony.  Despite their troubles there, when fellow Acadians from Nova Scotia and Maryland, including Bourgs, came through Cap-Français in the mid- and late 1760s on their way to New Orleans, none of the Bourgs in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  François Bourg and Rosalie Cormier, settled at Môle St.-Nicolas, where their son François, fils died at age 3 1/2 in July 1776.  According to fils's burial record, his father also was dead by then.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Pierre Bourg and Cécle Cormier of Beaubassin and wife of Charles Gravois, died at Môle St.-Nicolas, age 44, in December 1777.  Another François Bourg, with wife Madeleinette Doucet, settled at Môle St.-Nicolas, where their son Jean-François was born in September 1778.  Perhaps this was the François Bourg who died at Môle St.-Nicolas, age 40, in August 1788.  Marie Bourg, wife of Pierre Hébert, died at Môle St.-Nicolas, age 58, in May 1785.  The colony's governor sent even more Bourgs to the interior community of Mirebalais near Port-au-Prince to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  Cécile, daughter of Madeleine Bourg, born in New England, father unrecorded, was baptized in Mirebalais at age 2 in September 1764 but died there the following December.  Madeleine Bourg, "an Acadian," died at Mirebalais, age 22, in October 1764.  Marguerite Bourg, wife of ____ Boudrot, died at Mirebalais in October 1764, age 55.  Paul Bourg, "an Acadian," died at Mirebalais, age 14, in October 1764.  Jean Bourg, "an Acadian," died at Mirebalais, age 20, in November 1764.  Marie Bourg, widow of Bernard LeBlanc, died at Mirebalais, age 75, in November 1764.  (One wonders if so many deaths from October to November 1764 at Mirebalais resulted from an epidemic, perhaps of malaria or yellow fever, ailments unknown in Acadia.)  Marie-Louise Bourg, daughter of Marie-Louise Comeau, died at Mirebalais, age 14, "on the farm of M. Bourg" near Mirebalais in July 1769.  Marguerite Bourg of "Marain, Acadia," died at age 23 at Croix-des-Bouquets near Port-au-Prince in October 1765.

Bourgs being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Bourgs, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Bourgs, already had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 17 were Bourgs. 

Meanwhile, Acadians in Maryland endured life among Englishmen, who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Marie-Josèphe Bourg, now a widow, and her four LeBlanc children were among the first contingent of exiles to leave Baltimore for the Spanish colony in June 1766.  They arrived at New Orleans via Cap-Français late that September.

A Bourg wife was one of the last Acadians to emigrate to Louisiana.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of Michel Bourg and his first wife Jeanne Hébert, born at Grand-Pré in c1746, was deported with her family to Virginia and England in 1755-56 and was repatriated to St.-Malo, France, in the spring of 1763.  That August, she married Joseph III, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Gravois, fils and Marie Cyr of Chignecto, at St.-Suliac near St.-Malo.  They may have known one another in England.  They did not remain in France very long.  Joseph took his family, including his in-laws, to England in 1767 and was counted at Windsor in 1770.  The following year, Joseph and Madeleine were at Baie St.-Marie--St. Mary's Bay--Nova Scotia, and were still there in 1774.  From 1775 to 1784, he, Madeleine, and their family resided in the British fishery at Carleton in Gaspésie, not far from where his brothers had found refuge 20 years earlier.  Madeleine's father, stepmother, and siblings also had settled there.  Joseph and his growing family were living on Île St.-Pierre, the French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, in the mid-1780s.  It was from there, in 1788, that Madeleine, Joseph, their  eight children, and eight other relatives sailed to New Orleans on Joseph's own ship, the schooner Brigite--the only Acadians who emigrated to the Spanish colony directly from greater Acadia.294

Bourgeois

In 1755, descendants of Jacques dit Jacob Bourgeois and Jeanne Trahan could be found at Annapolis Royal and on Île St.-Jean, but they were especially numerous at Chignecto, which Jacob had founded in the early 1670s, and in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther.  

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Bourgeoiss likely were among the refugees.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Bourgeoiss likely were among the 300 Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Brothers Pierre, Michel, and Jacques dit Petit Jacques, sons of Charles Bourgeois, fils, ended up in South Carolina.  First cousin Olivier, son of Claude Bourgeois, and Olivier's second wife Marie Cormier ended up in Georgia. 

Not all of the Bourgeoiss sent to the southern colonies remained there until the end of the war.  In the spring of 1756, the governors of Georgia and South Carolina allowed the Acadians in their colonies who were not under arrest to return to their homeland as best they could.  Following the example of merchant Jacques Vigneau dit Maurice of Baie-Verte, 200 of the exiles purchased or built small vessels and headed up the coast.  In July, members of Vigneau's party were detained at Sandwich, Massachusettes, near Boston, and dispersed with other Acadian refugees to various communities in that colony.  Petit Jacques Bourgeois and his family may have been among them.  In late August, after weeks of effort, 78 more refugees from South Carolina, led by Michel Bourgeois, came ashore on Long Island, New York, and, at the urging of Charles Lawrence, were detained by colonial officials.  On a list of "names of the heads of the French Neutral families, number of their Children returned from Georgia and distributed through the counties of Westchester and Orange," dated 26 August 1756, can be found Mishel Basua, his unnamed wife, and four unnamed children, at Eastchester in Westchester County; and Peter Bishaur, probably his older brother Pierre, with no wife and children, at North Castle in Westchester County. 

Back in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, Bourgeoiss at Annapolis Royal were herded aboard transports and deported to New England.  In 1757, Jeanne, daughter of Germain Bourgeois, was counted at Cambridge, Massachusetts, with husband Louis Robichaud dit Prudent and their children.  Four years later, in July 1761, Jeanne, called Jane, age 51, was counted with husband Lewis Robishow, age 55, and seven of their children still at Cambridge.  Marie, daughter of Honoré Bourgeois and Marie-Madeleine Richard of Beaubassin, married Pierre, son of François LeBlanc and Marguerite Boudrot, in Massachusetts in April 1760.  Jeanne's brother Claude, called Clode Bausway, age 64, wife Marie, called Mary, LeBlanc, age 51, and five of their children--Charles, age 25; Abab, probably Abraham, age 22; Jeremy, age 10; Marguerite, age 19; and Addla, age 17--were counted at Amesbury, Massachusetts, in July 1760.  The colonial official who counted them noted that Mary and Jeremy were "weakly."  Claude died at Amesbury by August 1763.  Also in July 1760, Claude's older brother Joseph, age 58, called a Bursway, was counted with wife Anne LeBlanc, age 58 (a sister of Claude's wife Marie), and four children--Anne, age 24; Lydia, age perhaps 26; Simon, age 14; and Marguerite, age 15--at Beverly, Massachusetts.  Jeanne, Claude, and Joseph's sister Marguerite, age 61 in July 1760, was counted perhaps with husband Joseph dit Cajetan LeBlanc and their family at Methuen.  Cajetan was a brother of Claude and Joseph's wives Marie and Anne.  Anastasie, daughter of Claude Bourgeois le jeune and wife of Pierre Dupuis; her brother Joseph-Abel; and Claude, fils, son of Claude Bourgeois and Anne Blanchard, also were sent to Massachusetts. 

Chignecto Bourgeoiss who escaped the British in 1755 took refuge at Malpèque on Île St.-Jean, on the upper Petitcoudiac, lower Rivière St.-Jean, at Cocagne and Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and later at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  In 1758, the exiles on the Gulf shore were joined by members of the family who had escaped from Île St.-Jean.  Meanwhile, Annapolis and Chignecto Bourgeoiss who had escaped the British in 1755 moved on to Canada via the Rivière St.-Jean portage or the lower St. Lawrence.  Marie-Agnès, daughter of Guillaume Bourgeois and wife of Pierre Cottard, who she had married at Annapolis Royal in October 1738, died at Québec City in late September 1755, age 36, one of the first Acadian exiles to die in Canada.  Marie-Jeanne, daughter of Charles Bourgeois, fils and wife of Charles Héon, her second husband, who she had married at Beaubassin in May 1748, died at Québec City in January 1758, in her mid-60s, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck Acadian refugees in the area from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758. 

Living in territory controlled by France, none of the Bourgeoiss on Île St.-Jean were touched by the British roundup of their cousins in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean and rounded up most of the habitants there, Bourgeoiss among them, and deported them to France.  Françoise Bourgeois, husband Pierre Hébert, and two of their daughters crossed on the transport Duc Guillaume, which departed Louisbourg in September and, after a mid-ocean incident, reached St.-Malo the first of November.  Françoise, Pierre, and daughter Modeste died at sea.  Daughter Marie-Josèphe died in a St.-Malo hospital, probably from the rigors of the crossing, during the first week of December.  Honoré Bourgeois, age 56, his second wife Marie-Madeleine Pichard, age 54, a native of St.-Léger, France, and two of their children from his first wife perished aboard the transport Violet, which left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in an 11-ship convoy and, along with another transport, sank in a storm during the second week of December off the southwest coast of England.  Evidently no island Bourgeois deported to St.-Malo seems to have survived the crossing or its rigors. 

Island Bourgeoiss did land at other French ports, including Cherbourg in Normandy and Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daugher of Claude Bourgeois and Marie LeBlanc and widow of Joseph-Prudent Robichaud, landed at Cherbourg in Normandy, where she remarried to Charles, son fellow of Acadians Denis Boudrot and Agnès Vincent and widower of Cécile Thériot, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in August 1762.  She gave Charles two sons at Cherbourg and at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo, to where they moved in May 1766.  They also settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Madeleine remarried--her third marriage--to Étienne, son of fellow Acadians Jacques Térriot and Marie LeBlanc, at St.-Servan in February 1770.  After following her husband to the interior province of Poitou in 1773 and to the lower Loire port of Nantes in December 1775, she died in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in May 1780, age 53.  Jean-Baptiste, likely son of  Paul Bourgeois and his second wife Madeleine Cormier, born perhaps at La Planche, Chignecto, in the late 1740s, followed his family to the west, or French, side of Chignecto in 1750 and to Malpèque on Île St.-Jean by 1757.  The following year, when he was still young, he either became separated from his family during the island's dérangement or was deported with them to France.  His parents may have died soon after they reached the mother county, if they survived the crossing, leaving Jean-Baptiste a young orphan.  He either landed at, or moved on, to the naval port of Rochefort, where a local Frenchman, Nicolas-Gabriel Albert, who had lived at Louisbourg, Île Royale, until the early 1750s and whose second wife was an Acadian Benoit, served as Jean-Baptiste's "curator" until he came of age.  Jean-Baptiste had been a resident of Rochefort for at least four years when, in his early 20s, with permission from his "curator," he married 25-year-old Henriette Bonneau of St.-Denis d'Oléron, on Île d'Oléron, east of Rochefort, at the naval port in 1770.  She gave him three children there:  Marie, or Mary, in c1771; Guillaume in c1772; and Jean-Baptiste-Antoine in c1774.  Jean-Baptiste and his family, along with Nicolas Albert and his family, went from Rochefort to Poitou in 1774.  Henriette gave Jean-Baptiste another son, Jacques-Augustin, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in July 1775.  After two years of effort, Jean-Baptiste "and [his] family of 5 persons" were slated in March 1776 to retreat with other Poitou Acadians in the fourth and final convoy from Châtellerault to Nantes, but they did not go there.  They went, instead, to La Rochelle, which was closer than Nantes to Henriette's family on Île d'Oléron.  They then likely returned to Rochefort.  One wonders which of their four children had died by then.  François Moreau Bourgeois, perhaps an Acadian, died in St.-Jean Parish, La Rochelle, in November 1780, age 70. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, none of the Acadian Bourgeoiss still in the mother country agreed to take it, but not all of them remained in the mother country.  A son of Jean-Baptiste Bourgeois of Rochefort--perhaps Jean-Baptiste-Antoine, who would have turned age 15 in 1789--may have returned to North America during the French Revolution and established the Bourgeois presence at Chéticamp on Cape Breton Island between 1790 and 1795. 

In North America, members of the family who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and sought refuge on the Gulf shore and at Restigouche did what they could to make a life for themselves in the most trying of conditions.  Joseph, son of Paul Bourgeois and first wife Marie-Josèphe Brun of Malpèque, married Marie Girouard at Restigouche in November 1759.  Joseph's father Paul died at Miramichi in c1760, in his mid-50s.  Michel Bourgeois, fils, whose parents and sisters had been exiled to South Carolina and were languishing in New York, married Marie Haché at Restigouche in January 1760.  Élisabeth, daughter of Joseph Bourgeois, was baptized at Restigouche that December.  Then the British struck again.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked the French stronghold at Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, a second British naval force, this one from Québec, arrived at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Members of the family appearing on the list included Jean-Jacques Bourgeois and his family of eight; Joseph Bourgeois, fils and his family of six; another Joseph Bourgeois, fils and his family of six; and Michel Bourgeois, counted alone.  During the early 1760s, other Bourgeoiss either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area.  The British held them, along with exiles from Restigouche, in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  Between June and August 1762, British officials counted members of the family at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, including Joseph Bourgeois and his family of four and then five; Michel Bourgeois and his family of five; Benjamin N. Bourgeois and his family of eight and then nine; Jos h Bourgeois and his family of three and then five; Baptiste Bourgeois and his family of two; Jean Jacques Bourgeois and his family of three; and Bon Ie. Bourgeois and his family of two.  In August 1763, British officials counted members of the family on Georges Island, Halifax harbor, includng Michel Bourgois, his wife, and their child; and Jean Jaque Bourgois, his wife, and two children. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not before the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In August 1763, a list of Acadians in Massachusetts included Petit Jacques Bourgeois, wife Marie Bourg, and two children, a son and a daughter; Joseph Bourgeois, wife Anne LeBlanc, and four of their children, two sons and two daughters; Jacques and Marie's daughter Marie-Anne, her husband Joseph, son of Jacques Vigneau dit Maurice, and two daughters; and Jacques and Marie's daughter Marie, her husband Jean dit l'Ecrivain, another son of Jacques Vigneau dit Maurice, and three children, a son and two daughters.  Joseph Bourgeois, who had been reported as "infirm" in July 1760, died at Beverly in 1764.  Claude Bourgeois, fils and two members of his family, as well as Abel Bourgeois, wife Marguerite Doucet, and their child, were living in Connecticut in 1763.  A listing of "Acadian Families Actually Distributed in New England[sic]," issued by the "Government of New York," undated but probably compiled in 1763, includes Paul Bourgeois, his unnamed wife and two unnamed children; Jacques Bourgeois and his unnamed wife; Michel Bourgeois, described as an "old man," and two unnamed children; and a second Michel Bourgeois, his unnamed wife, and seven unnamed children.  In August 1763, members of the family still in South Carolina included Olivier, son of Claude Bourgeois and Anne Blanchard, and second wife Marie Cormier, who had originally been sent to Georgia.  With them at Charles Town were four sons and six daughters.  Also in South Carolina that year were Charles Bourgeois, second wife Marie Pitre, and his daughter Marie, age 18, son Basile, no age given, and daughter Rose, age 12, from his first wife Anne Poirier; Pierre Bourgeois, wife Anne Aucoin, and son Jean-Marie, age 22; Marguerite Bourgeois, a widow; Rose Bourgeois, husband Paul Doiron, and three children; Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Guillaume Bourgeois and his second wife Catherine-Josèphe Thibodeau and widow of Joseph Forest, with a 12-year old son; Marie Bourgeois, son Jacques Hugon, a widower, and two of his children; Madeleine Bourgeois, widow of Jean-Baptiste Thériot, and two of her children; and Catherine Bourgeois, another widow.  In June 1766, Abel Bourgeois and his family of four; Grégoire, perhaps Joseph-Grégoire, Bourgeois, and his family of eight; and Amand Bourgeois and his family of three, appeared on a "List of Names of the French" in Massachusetts "Who Wish to Go to Canada."

Many of these Bourgeoiss in the northern seaboard colonies chose to resettle in Canada, where their kinsmen had gone as early as 1755.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them fellow Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jacques dit Jacob Bourgeois--the majority of the family's survivors--began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, they could be found in the upper St. Lawrence valley at Montréal; Pointe-aux-Trembles just below Montréal; Laval northwest of Montréal; St.-Jacques de l'Achigan and L'Assomption farther down the St. Lawrence from Montréal; La-Prairie-de-la-Magdeleine and St.-Philippe-de-Laprairie across from Montréal; St.-Ours, St.-Antoine, St.-Denis, Chambly, and L'Acadie on the lower Richelieu; Trois-Rivières; Bécancour, St.-Grégoire, and Nicolet across from Trois-Rivières; Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pérade between Trois-Rivières and Québec City; at Québec City; on the lower St. Lawrence at Kamouraska; and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the middle of the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  Bourgeoiss also settled in present-day New Brunswick on lower Rivière St.-Jean, and at Memramcook and Grand-Dingue on New Brunswick's Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  In Nova Scotia, they settled at Chédabouctou near Canso; at Windsor, formerly Pigiguit; and at Grand-Étang near Chéticamp on the northwest shore of Cape Breton Island.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

After the war, Bourgeoiss held in Nova Scotia and the seaboard colonies joined fellow Acadians on St.-Pierre and Miquelon, French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Here they could live among fellow Roman Catholics without fear of religious repression and, just as importantly, reside in territory controlled by France.  Their living there came at a price, however.  In 1767, French officials, obeying a royal decree, sent the islands' fisher/habitants to France to relief overcrowding in the Newfoundland fishery.  Most of the island Acadians returned to the fishery the following year.  The islanders, including Bourgeoiss, were deported again, in 1778, when the British, reacting to the French alliance with the Americans during their war for independence, seized the Newfoundland islands and deported the Acadians there to La Rochelle and other French ports.  Many of the islanders returned in 1784, following the peace between France and Britain, Bourgeoiss among them.  Marie Bourgeois and Pierre LeBlanc, who had married in Massachusetts in April 1760, sanctified their marriage on Miquelon in October 1763.  They were still on the island in 1767.  Jean-Jacques dit Petit Jacques, son of Charles Bourgeois, fils and Marie Blanchard, married to Marie Bourg, was deported to Massachusetts in 1755 and counted there in 1763.  He and his family were counted on Miquelon in 1767 and 1776, so they likely had gone there in the early 1760s.  Petit Jacques's sister Anne was counted on the island in 1767 with husband Jean Cyr, as was sister Madeleine and husband Michel Cyr.  Also on the island that year were Anne, daughter Claude Bourgeois and Anne Blanchard, with husband François Arseneau, and her sister Marguerite-Josèphe, with husband Michel dit Michaud Bourg; Jean-Joseph, called Joseph, son of Michel Bourgeois and Marguerite Girouard, wife Marguerite Hébert, and four of their children--Marguerite, age 11; Victoire, age 9; Anne, age 5; and newborn Joseph.  Marguerite Hébert gave Joseph more children on the island:  Pauline in c1771; and Françoise in c1774.  Daughter Marguerite, now age 18, married Jacques, son of Claude Poirier and Marguerite Cyr, on Miquelon in January 1774.  Another Joseph, this one son of Jacques Bourgeois and Marie Bourg of Beaubassin, was living on the island in January 1774 with wife Angélique, daughter of Jean Boudrot and Françoise Arseneau of Port-Toulouse, Île Royale, who he had married on Miquelon in January 1771.  Their sons Joseph, Jean, Simon or Siméon, and Jacques were born on the island between 1771 and 1778.  Anne, wife of Jean Cyr, died at La Rochelle in February 1779, age 66.  Brother Petit Jacques died there the following April, age 70.  Joseph and Angélique's son Jacques, born on Miquelon on the eve of the 1778 deportation, also died in St.-Jean Parish, La Rochelle, in April 1779, age 6 months.  Joseph and Angélique's daughter Angélique was born in St.-Jean Parish in April 1780.  Anne, 18-year-old daughter of Joseph Bourgeois and Marguerite Hébert and a native of Miquelon, married seaman Basile, son of fellow Acadians Jean Arseneau and Madeleine Boudrot of Île St.-Jean, in St.-Jean Parish in April 1780.  Madeleine, younger sister of Petit Jacques, was back on Miquelon in 1784 and died there in May 1787, in her mid-70s.  Also on the island in 1784 were Marie-Anne, daughter of Petit Jacques Bourgeois and Marie Bourg and wife of Jacques Vigneau; sister Marie, wife of Jean Vigneau; brother Joseph with wife Angélique Boudrot and their sons Joseph, Jean, and Siméon; and Théotiste, daughter of Joseph Bourgeois and Marie Cyr of Beaubassin, and husband Pierre Arseneau dit Bénéry, who she had married at Restigouche in July 1760.  Claude, son of Charles Bourgeois and Madeleine Cormier of Chignecto, first came to Miquelon in 1764, the year he married Marie Vigneau there.  They were among the islanders who ended up in La Rochelle in 1767.  They returned to Miquelon probably the following year, were sent back to La Rochelle in 1778, and returned to Miquelon by 1784 with seven of their children--Jean, Marie, Michel, Charlotte, Victoire, Jacques, and Joseph.  Understandably fearful of being deported to France again, Claude took his family to the St. Lawrence valley, where he died at Nicolet across from Trois-Rivières in October 1801, in his late 60s.  Joseph Bourgeois and wife Angélique Boudrot also left Île Miquelon after they returned from La Rochelle, but they did not move on to Canada.  They settled, instead, on the British-controlled îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, where five of their sons--Joseph, Jean, Siméon, Charles, and Jacque--established families of their own.  Other members of the family remained in the Newfoundland fishery, where they could live as Frenchmen. 

Bourgeoiss held in the British seaboard colonies also chose to emigrate to the French Antilles, where, like their cousins on the Newfoundland islands, they could live not only among fellow Roman Catholics, but in territory controlled by France.  French officials were especially eager for Acadians in the British colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their western empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the war of vengeance to come.  The Acadians could provide a source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's major planters, who hoped to supplement the labor of their slaves.  To entice them to the tropical island, the French promised the exiles land of their own there.  Several Bourgeois families from Chignecto were among the Acadians in the southern British colonies who took up the offer in 1763 and 1764.  Despite the vicissitudes of living in the tropics, it must have worked out for them.  When fellow Acadians, including Bourgeoiss, held in Nova Scotia came through Cap-Français in 1764 and 1765 on their way to New Orleans, none of the Bourgeoiss in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  Henriette, daughter of Olivier Bourgeois and Marie Cormier, a native of Charles Town, South Carolina, married Basile, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Poirier and Marguerite Girouard of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, Chignecto, at Môle St.-Nicolas in May 1776.  The priest who recorded the marriage noted that the bride's mother was deceased at the time of the wedding.  Marie-Geneviève, daughter of Jacques Bourgeois and Marie Brun, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in August 1776, age 2.  François, son of Olivier Bourgeois and Marie Boudrot, was baptized at Môle St.-Nicolas in September 1776 but died there at age 6 in November 1781.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Denis Bourgeois and Marie-Madeleine Poirier, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in November 1776, age unrecorded.  Marie-Angélique, daughter of Olivier Bourgeois, a carpenter, and Marguerite Cyr of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, married Charles, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Breau, laborer, and Anne Dupuis "of Sainte-Croix in Acadia,"at Môle St.-Nicolas in November 1777.  Olivier Bourgeois of Pointe-Beauséjour had been exiled with his second wife Marie Cormier and their family to Georgia in 1755.  He remarried to fellow Acadian Françoise Vincent, herself twice widowed, probably at Môle St.-Nicolas in c1776 and died there in October 1778, age 55.  Suzanne-Émilie, daughter of Olivier Bourgeois and Marie Boudrot, was baptized at Môle St.-Nicolas, age 4 days, in January 1779.  Jacques Bourgeois of Pointe-de-Beauséjour died at Môle St.-Nicolas in August 1779, age 40.  Madeleine, daughter of Olivier Bourgeois and Marie Cormier and widow of Bernard Graport, remarried to cousin Pierre, son of Michel Bourgeois and Marguerite Girouard, at Môle St.-Nicolas in February 1782.  The priest who recorded the marriage noted that both the bride's and groom's parents were deceased at the time of the wedding.  Rosalie, daughter of Olivier Bourgeois and Marie Boudrot, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in August 1783, age 4.  Madeleine, daughter of Michel Bourgeois and Marie Doucet and widow of Jacques Caillard and Louis Marchand of Paris, who she had married at Môle St.-Nicolas in February 1780, remarried yet again--her third marriage--to Michel, fils, son of Michel Monnot and Anne Plomcard of St.-Pierre, Dijon, France, at Môle St.-Nicolas in May 1785; Madeleine was a niece of Olivier Bourgeois l'aîné of Pointe-de-Beauséjour.  The priest who recorded her marriage noted that the groom "was a cannonier of the compagnie of M. Collin La Buissiere."  One wonders what happened to the St.-Domingue Bourgeoiss at Môle St.-Nicolas during the disturbances in French St.-Domingue/Haiti during the 1790s and early 1800s.  At least two Acadian Bourgeoiss ended up in another part of the French Antilles.  Anne Comeau of Annapolis Royal, widow of Sylvain Bourgeois and wife of Charles Mouton of Chignecto, along with two of her Bourgeois children--Joseph born in c1749; and Anne-Esther in c1751--followed her second husband to one of the seaboard colonies, likely Georgia or South Carolina, in the fall of 1755.  They attempted to return to greater Acadia by boat in the spring of 1756 but got no farther than Long Island.  New York authorities held them at La Rochelle.  After the war, they chose to resettle on the French island of Martinique, where colonial officials counted them at Champflore in January 1766.  Joseph Bourgeois, still in his teens, evidently died soon after the counting.  Charles and Anne did not remain.  He evidently learned of his brothers' movement from Halifax to Louisiana via Cap-Français in 1765 and chose to join them in the Spanish colony.  By 1768, Charles, Anne, and their remaining children--Anne-Esther Bourgeois; and Georges Mouton, born in c1756--moved on to New Orleans--among the few Acadian exiles who went to Louisiana directly from the French Antilles.  

Bourgeoiss being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Bourgeoiss, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Bourgeoiss, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 18 were Bourgeoiss.295

Boutin

By 1755, descendants of Joseph Boutin the fisherman and Marie-Marguerite Lejeune dit Briard of Pigiguit could be found on Île Royale, perhaps at Pigiguit and Chignecto, and at Lunenburg on the Atlantic coast southwest of Halifax, where they were among the first Acadians to take an unqualified oath of allegiance to Britain's King George II.  Merchant Jean-François Boutin of Louisbourg, no kin to the fisherman, and his wife Marguerite-Catherine Milly-Lacroix, and their children could still be found in the French citadel when Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered these families to the winds.  

In the summer of 1754, Joseph's youngest son Paul, his wife Ursule Guédry, Paul's older brother Charles and his family, and other Pigiguit kin left Baie-des-Espagnols and sailed from Louisbourg to Halifax, capital of British Nova Scotia.  They explained to British authorities that "the Land there" on the island "being so very bad they were utterly incapable of subsisting their Families, and had applied to the Governor of Louisbourg for leave to return to their former Habitations, to which he had consented."  They beseeched Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence and his colonial Council to let them return to their former lands.  After hearing their case, the Council agreed to the request only if they "voluntarily" took "the Oath of Allegiance to His Majesty" George II "unqualified by any reservation"--a hard request for self-respecting Acadians.  However, the Council minutes noted, "it appearing that they were in very great distress being intirely destitute of all necessitous," they "very cheerfully" took the hated oath and were issued rations to get them through the winter.  But the Boutins were not allowed to return to their home at Pigiguit.  Lawrence ordered them sent with other Île Royale refugees to nearby Lunenburg, a Protestant German settlement near Mirliguèche, former home of the Guédrys.  At Lunenburg, just up the coast from La Hève, where the Boutins had once lived, Paul, Charles, and their families were "victualled" by the British until September 1755, when, despite their having taken the unqualified oath, the British imprisoned them on Georges Island, Halifax, with other Acadians from Lunenburg.  In late December, they were among the 50 Acadians on Georges Island herded aboard the British transport Providence and sent to North Carolina, where, in January 1756, they landed probably at Edenton in Chowan County on the northwest shore of Albemarle Sound.  They remained in the Chowan County area until c1760, when colonial officials allowed them to resettle in Pennsylvania.  Brother Charles and his wife may have died by then.   Paul's daughter Susanne-Catherine, born probably at Philadelphia in December 1761, was baptized at St. Joseph Catholic Church there in June 1762.  The family was still in Pennsylvania in June 1763 after the war with Britain had ended, but they did not remain in the Quaker colony much longer.  By 1764, they had moved to Baltimore to join relatives who had settled in Maryland after leaving North Carolina.

Paul and Charles's Boutin kin who remained on Île Royale, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the British roundup in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, but, like their kinsmen who had gone to Halifax, their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress of Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the rest of the island, rounded up most of the habitants still there, and deported them to France.  Two sisters--Marie-Josèphe, called Josèphe, and Anne, also called Gillette-Théotiste, daughters of Pierre Boutin and Marie-Marcelle Trahan and Paul's nieces--were deported to St.-Malo aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Île Royale in early September, suffered a mid-ocean mishap, and limped into the Breton port the first of November.  With them on the crossing were their mother and stepfather, Jean Pineau, and two Trahan uncles, Claude and Fiacre.  Josèphe, her mother, and one of her Trahan uncles died at sea.  Anne and her uncle Fiacre Trahan survived the crossing but died at the hospital in St.-Malo soon after the ship reached port.  Fiacre was age 18 at the time of his death; Anne was 12.  Jean-Baptiste, Eustache Boutin's oldest son and Paul's nephew, and Jean-Baptiste's wife Marie-Josèphe Savoie, also deported from the Maritime islands, landed at the naval port of Rochefort, where he died in November 1759, age 23.  Marie-Josèphe remarried to a Frenchman there in 1761.  François Boutin, not kin to the Boutins of Pigiguit, who became a merchant like his father and grandfather, also was transported from Île Royale to France, but he did not remain.  He married Rose-Eugènie-Claude-Victoire, daughter of Étienne-Valentin Borde and Justine-Georgette Leroy of Trou-au-Chat, at St.-Pierre, Martinique, in the French Antilles in February 1789.  None of the Acadian Boutins in France emigrated to Spanish Louisiana. 

Meanwhile, back in North America, Paul Boutin and his family found themselves living among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Paul Boutin had no close relatives in Louisiana, but his wife Ursule Guédry had cousins there.213

Brasseur

By 1755, descendants of Mathieu Brasseur dit La Citardy and Jeanne Célestin dit Bellemère could be found at Chignecto, Chepoudy in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean, but they were especially numerous in the Minas Basin, where Mathieu dit La Citardy had spent much of his life.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

The Acadians of Chignecto and the trois-rivières were the first to be rounded up by the British.  Unlike many of their neighbors who found themselves on ships destined for Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Georgia, the Brasseurs at Chignecto and Chepoudy eluded the British in the fall of 1755 and fled north to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Some of them, including Mathieu's son Claude and his family, continued on to the St. Lawrence valley, where the Canadiens treated them with little respect.  The war caught up with them a few years later when the British captured Québec and Montréal in 1759 and 1760.  They nevertheless remained in the far-northern province. 

Their Brasseur siblings and cousins in the Minas Basin did not escape the roundup there.  British forces transported Cosme dit Brasseux, his wife Élisabeth Thibodeau, Cosme's younger brother Jean, his wife Madeleine Roy, and their children to Maryland in the fall of 1755.  Sister Marie-Geneviève, a middle-aged spinster, also ended up in Maryland.  

Brother Joseph Brasseur and his family, also rounded up at Minas, suffered an even worse fate than their kinsmen deported to Maryland.  Joseph, his wife Marie-Rose Daigre, and their 5-year-old daughter Marie were among the Minas Acadians deported to Virginia.  In mid-November, when five transports carrying hundreds exiles appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  The Acadians languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships while Virginia's authorities pondered their fate.  With winter approaching, Dinwiddie ordered them dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond.  The following spring, the Virginians sent them on to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several English ports.  Hundreds died of smallpox.  By 1763, nearly half of them were dead.  Joseph and his family were among the lucky survivors.  In fact, two more daughters were added to the family during their ordeal at Southampton:  Osite in October 1759; and Rosalie in January 1763.  In May 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  Joseph and his family sailed from England aboard the transport Ambition and settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  In 1773, Joseph, Marie-Rose, and their daughters were part of the settlement scheme in the interior province of Poitou.  After two years of effort, in March 1776, the Brasseurs retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government handouts or on what work they could find.  Daughter Rosalie did not go with them to Nantes, so she had either died at St.-Servan or in Poitou.  Wife Marie-Rose died at Nantes in June 1781, in her early 50s.  Joseph may have died about that time, too.  In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Sister Marie and Osite Brasseur, the first in her late 30s, the second in her early 20s, both still unmarried, agreed to take it.  

In North America, the Brasseurs who had moved to Île St.-Jean in the early 1750s, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the roundups of their kinsmen in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the island and deported most of the habitants there to France.  Mathieu dit La Brasseur and his family, probably still living at Anse-du-Nord-Ouest on the south side of the island, were among the lucky few who got away.  They crossed Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and eventually made their way to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked the French stronghold.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian and Mi'kmaq militia played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  Though the British failed to capture Restigouche, they nevertheless cut it off from what was left of French America.  In October, a second British naval force, this one from Québec, arrived at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acdians', surrender.  On October 24, French officers, on the eve of formal surrender, compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, including Mathieu Brasseux and his family of nine; and Pierre Brassus and his family of four.  During the following months, the British sent them and hundreds of other exiles captured in the region to prison compounds in Nova Scotia and held them there for the rest of the war.  At war's end, members of the family in Nova Scotia chose to remain in greater Acadia.  They settled in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, where the British operated a fishery. 

Perhaps one of Mathieu dit La Citardy's descendants ended up in the French Antilles.  Brigitte Brasseur, widow of Martial Tessier, remarried to François, fils, son of François Rousseau, ciselur en argent, and Catherine Paillet of Rouen, at Fort-Royal, Martinique, in September 1769.  Brigitte died on the island two years later, age 40.  

Brasseurs who had escaped the British at Chignecto and Chepoudy in 1755 and sought refuge in Canada remained there.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them fellow Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Mathieu Brasseur dit La Citardy began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  From the late 1750s, they could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Montréal and Ste.-Thérèse de Blainville and at Chambly on the lower Richelieu east of Montréal.  Their Brasseur cousins who had elected to remain in greater Acadia could be found at Carleton, Bonaventure, and Paspébiac in Gaspésie.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, the Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Meanwhile, the Brasseurs in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  By war's end, Cosme had died, leaving Élisabeth Thibodeau a widow.  She did what she could to keep her family together.  A French repatriation list circulated in Maryland in July 1763 shows her and six of her Brasseur children at Georgetown on the colony's Eastern Shore.  Two Brasseur orphans--Paul and Marguerite--were counted with the Joseph Castille family at Upper Marlborough, where Cosme's sister Marie-Geneviève, still unmarried, also lived, alone.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  There were no Brasseurs in Louisiana, but Élisabeth Thibodeau had a younger brother and sister, as well as many cousins, there, refugees from the prison compound at Halifax.  She, six of her unmarried children, son Pierre, his wife, and their infant daughter, left with the second contingent of Louisiana-bound exiles that departed Baltimore in April 1767 and reached New Orleans via Cap-Français, French St.-Domingue, in July.  Cosme's sister Marie-Geneviève was now married to Pierre-Olivier Benoit, a widower five years her junior.  In January 1769, as part of the fourth and final contingent of Louisiana-bound refugees departing the Chesapeake colony, Marie-Geneviève, her husband, and three of her stepchildren boarded the English schooner Britannia at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac, bound for New Orleans.214 

Breau

By 1755, descendants of Vincent dit Vincelotte Breau and Marie Bourg could be found in many of the major Acadian settlements--at Annapolis Royal; Grand-Pré, Pigiguit, and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; at Chepoudy and Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; and on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

Breaus from the trois-rivières who escaped the British in the summer and fall of 1755 took refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean; on the upper Petitcoudiac, at Shediac, Richibouctou, and Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore; and later at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  For several years they fought starvation, hard winters, and British raiding parties.  Others moved on to Canada in the late 1750s.  Jean dit Jean-François Breau of Chepoudy, son of François of Annapolis Royal, Jean's second wife Marguerite Richard, and their many children arrived at Québec in 1757.  Sadly, six of his children died there that year, victims, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck Acadian refugees in the area that fall and winter.  Élisabeth, daughter of Antoine Breau and widow of Pierre Aucoin, remarried to Alexandre, son of fellow Acadians Charles Guilbeau and Anne Bourg and widower of Marguerite Girouard, at St.-Pierre-les-Becquets on the St. Lawrence between Québec and Trois-Rivières in November 1759.  Catherine, daughter of Jean Breau and his first wife Catherine Thibodeau, married Jean-Baptiste, fils, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Landry and Marguerite Melanson, at St.-Joachim on the lower St. Lawrence in July 1760.  Théodore Breau, son of Jean-Baptiste and widower of Marie Michel, remarried to Élisabeth, daughter of Joseph Thibodeau and Anne Savoie, at Québec in February 1762.  Jean-Baptiste Breau, son of Chérubin, married Dorothée, daughter of Canadians Adrien Leclerc and Ursule Noël and widow of Ambroise Quentin at St.-Pierre-de-l'Île-d'Orléans below Québec in February 1763.

The British deported Breaus from Minas and Annapolis Royal to New England, especially Massachusetts.  In late April 1757, a year and a half after the deportations, Bay Colony officials compiled a "List of the names & circumstances of the French Inhabitants of Nova Scotia now residing in the Town of Braintree."  The first family on the list included Pierre Braux, age 87, "invalid" and "incapable" of labor; wife Anne LeBlanc, age 77, "invalid, incapable"; Joseph Braux, age 51, "invalid, incapable"; Joseph Braux, fils, age 18, "capable"; Aman Braux, age 17, "capable"; John Saml. Braux, age 15, "invalid, incapable"; Margaret Braux, age 19, "invalid, subject to fits."  This was Pierre, second son of family progenitor Vincelotte Breau; his second wife Anne LeBlanc; son Joseph, a widower; and four of Joseph's children.  Pierre, père died at Braintree in 1758.  Also counted there in 1757 was Pierre, père's younger son Amand dit Thomas, age 40, described as "capable"; wife Madeleine LeBlanc, age 36, "near her time," so "incapable"; Mary Braux, age 11 or 12, "weakly" and "incapable"; John Braux, age 9, "incapable"; Magdalen Braux, age 5, "incapable"; and Margaret Braux, age 3, "incapable" of work.  Joseph and Amand dit Thomas's brother Paul, age 43, and his family, probably including wife Marie-Josèphe Landry, were counted at Ipswich, Massachusetts, in 1757.  Joseph, Amand, and Paul's brother Pierre, fils, age 44, was being held on the island of Nantucket with wife Marie-Josèphe Dupuis and their children in 1758.  Meanwhile, cousin Alexis Breau, age 34, son of François, was counted at Milton, Massachusetts, in 1757, perhaps with wife Marguerite Barrieau.  Pierre, père's younger brother René was counted at Hanover, Massachusetts, in 1758.  The colonial official noted that René was age 89 at the time; he was 73.  He was not described as a widower, so his wife Marie Hébert may have been with him.  Charles Breau, son of René, also was deported to Massachusetts, where he married Marie-Osite, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Célestin dit Bellemère and Marie Landry.  In 1760, Simon Breau, son of Jean, was counted at Plymouth, Massachusetts, most likely with his wife Marie-Josèphe Michel.  That same year, Massachusetts officials counted Peter, Hannah, Ammon, Maudlin, Margaret, and Zabble Brow "from Braintree," now at Boston.  Still at Braintree that year was another Margeret Brow and Joseph Brow Junr.  At Weymouth that year was Joseph Brow and  "Hannah his wife," as well as Elixes Brow, "Margeret his wife," and "their children" Joseph, Firmin, Baltisar, Charles, Mary, and Betty.  At Hingham, officials counted Ammon Brow Ju. and Samel. Brow.  Paul Breau, wife Marie-Josèphe, and children "Joseph, John, Nanny?, Jno. Batits, Molly, Elizabeth, and Peter," were counted at Ipswich in July 1760.  Antoine Breau, son of Jean, and second wife Marguerite Doucet ended up in Connecticut. 

Breaus from Minas and Pigiguit were deported to Maryland and Virginia.  The ones sent to Virginia endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas in the fall of 1755.  Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, refused to allow the hundreds of Acadians sent to him to remain in the colony.  Exiles died on filthy, crowded ships in the lower James River while the Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  With winter approaching, Dinwiddie sent exiles from one vessel up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and Virginia's House of Burgesses made their decision ... the "papists" must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.   Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports.  Hundreds died from smallpox and other maladies.  By 1763, more than half of them were dead.  The Breaus sent to Maryland remained in that colony for the rest of the war.  As in Massachusetts and other seaboard colonies, colonial officials in Maryland dispersed the "French Neutrals" to scattered communities, which, in the case of the Breaus, included Annapolis on the west side of Chesapeake Bay, Oxford on the Eastern Shore, and Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac, where most of them were held.  

Breaus still at Cobeguit in September 1755, learning of the fate of their cousins in the other Fundy settlements, packed up their goods and their loved ones and headed cross country to Tatamagouche and other North Shore settlements.  From there that fall, winter, and into the following spring, they crossed Mer Rouge to French-held Île St.-Jean, where they joined their kinsmen who had chosen to go there years, even decades, earlier.  Living in territory controlled by France, none of the established Breaus on the Maritime islands, including the widow of Jean Breau of Minas and her six children at Port-Toulouse, were touched by the British roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, in which Pierre, 32-year-old son of Antoine Breau, was killed, the redcoats swooped down on the rest of Île Royale and on Île St.-Jean and rounded up the habitants there, including the dead Pierre's siblings and cousins.  Some of the Acadians escaped from the islands and joined their kinsmen on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, but most of them, including Breaus, were deported to France. 

Many members of the family did not survive the crossing.  Antoine Breau, age unrecorded, crossed with wife Cécile Bourg and six children--Angélique, Cécile, Blaise, Suzanne, Modeste, and Jacques--on the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo the first of November.  Only Antoine and daughter Cécile survived the crossing.  Son Jacques died at sea.  Wife Cécile, Angélique, Blaise, and Suzanne died in St.-Malo hospitals soon after reaching the port.  The fate of daughter Modeste is unknown, but she likely did no survive the crossing.  Charles Breau, age 35, wife Marguerite LeBlanc, age 22, son Dominique, and niece Marguerite Breau, age 12, also crossed on Duc Guillaume.  Son Dominique died at sea.  Charles's wife Marguerite was pregnant on the voyage.  Daughter Jeanne-Françoise died three days after her birth in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in mid-November.  Niece Marguerite died in a local hospital on November 19, and Charles died at St.-Servan in December, likely from the rigors of the crossing, leaving his young widow without a family.  Anne Breau, age 64, crossed with husband Antoine Aucoin, age 65, and son Antoine, fils, age 30, on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédbouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  They all survived the crossing, but Anne died at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo the following July, perhaps from the rigors of the crossing.  Most of the island Breaus crossed on one of the five British transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a storm off the southwest coast of England that sank two other transports, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The death toll among the 1,033 passengers aboard those vessels reached nearly 50 percent, a number of them Breaus.  Chérubin Breau crossed with wife Marie Aucoin and five children--Xavier; Marie-Osite, age 15; Anne; Simon; and Perpétué.  Chérubin, Anne, Simon, and Perpétué died at sea.  Wife Marie and Xavier died in a St.-Malo hospital soon after reaching the port.  Only Marie-Osite survived the crossing.  Félix Breau, age 20, whose family back in Pigiguit had been deported to Maryland three years earlier, survived the crossing.  Françoise Breau, age 65, crossed with husband Pierre Blanchard, son Charles, age 21, and orphan Ignace Hamon, age 10, whose mother was a Blanchard.  Françoise and Pierre died at sea and Charles in a St.-Malo hospital the following April, perhaps from the rigors of the crossing.  Only young Ignace survived the crossing.  Joseph Breau, age 47, crossed with wife Ursule Bourg, age 46, and nine children--Ursule, age 18; Élisabeth-Françoise, called Françoise, age 15; Luce, age 13; Anne-Josèphe, age 12; Angélique, age 9; Marie-Jeanne, age 8; Rosalie, age 7; Joseph-Gabriel, age 6; and Simon-Joseph, age 2.  Simon-Joseph died at sea, and wife Ursule died in a St.-Malo hospital in late February.  The rest of the family survived the crossing.  Anne-Marie Breau crossed with husband Jean Daigre, age 60, and six children, most in their teens.  Anne-Marie and daughter Isabelle died at sea.  Jean and the other five children survived the crossing, but Jean died in a St.-Malo hospital in mid-February.  Marguerite-Josèphe Breau, age 24, crossed on one of the Five Ships with husband Simon Henry, age 30, and a 2-year-old daughter, who died at sea.  Alexis Breau of Cobeguit, age 36, wife Marie-Josèphe Guillot, age 37, age unrecorded, and seven children--Madeleine, age 13; Anne, age 11; Marie, age 9; Victoire, age 8; Charles, age 6; Élisabeth and Saban, ages unrecorded--and brother Joseph, age 21, crossed aboard the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November 1758, survived the mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, pulled into Bideford, England, in late December for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until the second week of March 1759.  All survived the crossing except Élisabeth and Saban.  Wife Marie-Josèphe was pregnant during the crossing.  A daughter, named Élisabeth-Renée after her recently deceased older sister, was born at St.-Malo on 9 May 1759 but died 11 days later.  Marie-Josèphe survived the rigors of childbirth and gave Alexis more children.  Marie-Madeleine Breau, age 12, daughter of Jean, also crossed on Supply, with her mother Madeleine Hébert, age 32, stepfather Charles Guédry, age 33, three stepsiblings, ages 6, 5, and 2, and 20-year-old François-Xavier Bourg.  They all survived the crossing. 

Island Breaus did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Antoine Breau, now a widower, settled with daughter Cécile at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river southwest of St.-Malo and at St.-Suliac across the river, where he remarried to fellow Acadian Marie Dugas, widow of François Henry, in April 1761.  Marie had crossed on one of the Five Ships with her husband and seven children, four of whom survived.  She gave Antoine another child, François-Xavier, at St.-Suliac in March 1762.  Antoine's daughter Cécile, age 18, married stepbrother Joseph, son of fellow Acadians François Henry and Marie Dugas, at St.-Suliac in May 1764.  Cécile gave her stepbrother at least three children there, another child in Poitou, and four more children at Nantes.  Marie-Osite, daughter of Chérubin Breau, only surviving member of her immediate family, still in her teens, went to live with Marie Charpentier, perhaps a kinswoman, at Pleurtuit.  Marie-Osite never married.  Félix, son of the Jean-Baptiste Breau still languishing in Maryland, had crossed "alone" on one of the Five Ships.  In early December, at age 20, he became a sailor on the ship Duc de Choiseul, perhaps a privateer.  He was back at St.-Malo in late January 1760, when he married a local girl, Perrine, 21-year-old daughter of Joseph Thomas and Josseline Hyacinthe of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Félix returned to sea duty, was captured by the British, and held as a prisoner of war in England until the end of the war.  He returned to St.-Malo in May 1763, probably with the Acadian refugees repatriated from England to France, and settled with his wife in her native St.-Servan.  In 1765-66, he was absent at sea aboard the frigate Aigle.  This was the same vessel that made three voyages from St.-Malo to the îles-Malouines, today's Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic, from September 1763 to early 1766, bearing dozens of Acadian colonists.  Félix likely served on at least two of those voyages.  Meanwhile, Perrine gave Félix four children at St.-Servan:  Perrine-Julienne in April 1764; Félix-Mathurin in November 1770 after his father's adventure in the Malouines; Mathurin-Marin in November 1772; and Joseph-Pierre in March 1774.  Joseph Breau, now a widower, and 10 of his children, only one of them a son, Joseph-Gabriel, settled at Pleurtuit.  Joseph did not remarry.  His oldest daughter Marguerite-Josèphe had crossed to St.-Malo with husband Simon, son of Jean Henry and Marie Hébert, who she had married at Port-La-Joye, Île St.-Jean, in January 1755.  With them was 2-year-old daughter Agathe, who died at sea.  Marguerite-Josèphe was pregnant during the crossing and gave birth to a son at St.-Servan in May 1759.  She gave Simon at least eight more children at St.-Servan, most of whom survived childhood.  Joseph's daughter Ursule married François, son of fellow Acadians Charles Pitre and Marguerite Doiron of Cobeguit, at Pleurtuit in March 1762.  François and two of his brothers had come to St.-Malo from Cherbourg, Normandy, in July 1759.  François died probably at Pleurtuit in late 1762.  The following July, his and Ursule's daughter Ursule-Françoise was born posthumously at St.-Bue near Pleurtuit.  Ursule did not remarry.  Joseph's daughter Françoise married Paul, fils, son of fellow Acadians Paul Landry and Marguerite Bourg, at St.-Suliac in January 1766.  Paul, fils had come to St.-Malo from Morlaix in northwest Brittany in 1763.  Françoise gave him at least three children at St.-Suliac before he died there in October 1770, age 24.  Joseph's daughter Anne-Josèphe married Jacques, son of fellow Acadians Thomas Doiron and Anne Girouard, at St.-Suliac in July 1765.  She gave him at least four children there and at St.-Servan.  Joseph's daughter Luce, at age 22, married Athanase, son of fellow Acadians François Bourg and his first wife Marguerite Hébert, at St.-Suliac in February 1768.  She gave him at least three children there.  Joseph's daughter Marie-Jeanne died at St.-Suliac in September 1769, age 20, still unmarried.  Alexis Breau had been a farmer at Cobeguit and on Île St.-Jean, but he worked as a carpenter and day laborer in France.  After infant daughter Élisabeth-Renée died in May 1759, wife Marie-Josèphe Guillot gave him two more children at Trigavou near Pleurtuit:  Pierre in August 1762 but died at age 5 in May 1767; and Marguerite-Blanche in May 1765.  Meanwhile, daughter Marie died at Trigavou in November 1764, age about 15.  Alexis's younger brother Joseph, age 21 when he reached St.-Malo, signed up for duty aboard Le Duc de Choiseul in December 1759.  His service aboard the vessel was short-lived:  he died at Port-de-Paix, French St.-Domingue, in November 1760.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Jean Breau, followed her mother and stepfather Charles Guédry to Bonnaban near St.-Malo, then to Pleurtuit and St.-Suliac, where she died in February 1763, age about 17.

Island Breaus ended up at other French ports, including Rochefort, Bordeaux, and Nantes.  Élisabeth, daughter of Étienne Breau, a boilermaker, and Jeanne Maurice, perhaps a Vigneau, was born at Rochefort in October 1760.  François Breau, a picklock and widower of Marie Seime or Seimet, married local girl Jeanne, daughter of Jean Tresorier and Marie Poinsteau of Muron, northwest of Rochefort, at Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in August 1763.  One wonders if Éteinne and François were Acadians.  Jean-Baptiste, son of Ambroise Breau and Marie Michel, was a resident of Notre-Dame Parish and had been living there for nearly a decade when he married Marie-Élisabeth Girard, widow of Jean Martin, probably a Frenchwoman, in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in January 1768.  Agnès, daughter of the Pierre Breau who had died in the siege of Louisbourg in 1758 and Marguerite Guédry of Cobeguit and Port-Dauphin, Île Royale, married Joseph-Olivier, called Olivier, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Leprince and Marie-Osite Melanson dit Pitre of Minas and Île St.-Jean, at Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort in August 1770.  Oliver was working as a sailor at the time of the marriage.  François, son of Michel Breau, a calker, and Marianne Trujon, was baptized at Notre-Dame Parish, age unrecorded, in October 1771.  Was Michel an Acadian?  Pierre, fils, a sailor, son of Pierre Breau and Anne-François Dupuis of Rivière Ste.-Croix, Pigiguit, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Vincent Deveau and Marie Buot of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, Chignecto, in Ste.-Croix Parish, Bordeaux, in June 1770.  They had at least four children in that parish:  Marie in May 1772; Marguerite in May 1774; Pierre in c1775 but died at age 4 in September 1779; and Jeanne in February 1778.  By 1779, Pierre was serving as maitre d'equipage, or boatswain, in the French naval service.  Pierre, fils, son of Pierre Breau and Marguerite Guédry, either landed at Nantes in 1758 or, more likely, went there from Rochefort in the 1760s.  No matter, he was residing at Nantes by c1770, "one of the first Acadians" to live there. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England who had gone there from Virginia were repatriated to France.  Among them were several Breaus from Minas.  In May 1763, Honoré Breau, age 28, son of Pierre, crossed from England aboard La Dorothée wth the family of Germain Boudrot, his cousin.  Honoré married Élisabeth dite Maillet, daughter of fellow Acadians Victor LeBlanc and Marie Aucoin and stepdaughter of Grégoire Maillet, at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo in February 1766.  She gave him at least four children there and at St.-Servan-sur-Mer:  Jean-Charles-Pierre at St.-Servan in November 1766; Olive-Élisabeth in February 1769; Marie-Madeleine in February 1771; and Pierre-Paul at Plouër in November 1772 but died at age 11 months in October 1773.  Marie-Madeleine Vincent, widow of Alexandre Boudrot, who died at Bristol in August 1756, had remarried to Joseph Breau probably at Bristol in c1760.  Their son Joseph, fils was born there in February 1761.  By May 1763, Marie-Madeleine was a widow again.  At age 38, she crossed to France aboard La Dorothée with sons Jean-Baptiste Boudrot, age 9, and Joseph Breau, fils, age 2, and settled at St.-Suliac.  She remarried to fellow Acadian Pierre Dugas at St.-Servan in January 1764.  Son Joseph Breau, fils became a sailor.  Brigitte Martin dit Barnabé, age 48, widow of Séraphin Breau, who had died in England, crossed aboard La Dorothée with second husband Michel Bourg, six of his children by his first wife, and three of her children by her first husband--Jean-Baptiste Breau, age 20; Marie Breau, age 18; and Marie-Madeleine Breau, age 17.  They settled at St.-Suliac and St.-Servan.  Along with his stepbrother Mathurin Bourg, Jean-Baptiste studied for the priesthood from 1767 to 1772, perhaps under Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre with other young Acadians.  In 1772, Jean-Baptiste followed his mother, stepfather, and stepsiblings to North America to complete his studies at Montréal.  Mathurin was ordained at Montréal in September 1772, and Jean-Baptiste was ordained there in November of that year.  Mathurin served as a missionary at the fishing villages of Carleton and Bonaventure in Gaspésie, both Acadian settlements, from 1773 to 1795.  Jean-Baptiste served on the upper St. Lawrence at St.-Jacques de l'Achigan and L'Assomption near Montréal, also Acadian settlements.  Sister Marie married Jean-Baptiste, fils, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Dugas and Marguerite Benoit, at St.-Suliac in February 1764.  Jean-Baptiste had come to St.-Malo from Île St.-Jean in late 1758 aboard one of the Five Ships.  Marie gave him at least five children at St.-Suliac, St.-Servan, and La Gouesnière and St.-Méloir-des-Ondes in the countryside southeast of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.

In 1773, Breaus at St.-Malo and other port cities chose to become part of a major settlement scheme in the interior of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the Acadians languishing in the port cities.  A French nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  Members of the family who went there included Félix Breau the sailor, wife Perrine Thomas, and their four children from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Honoré Breau, wife Élisabeth LeBlanc dit Maillet, and their three children from St.-Servan and Plouër0sur-Rance; and Joseph Breau and his family, including son Joseph-Gabriel, from Pleurtuit.  Honoré and Élisabeth had at least one more son, Élie, near Archigny southeast of Châellerault in August 1774.  After two years of effort, they, along with cousin Félix, his wife, and most of the other exiles, gave up on the venture.  From October 1775 through March 1776, dozens of Poitou Acadians, including the two Breau families, retreated in four convoys down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes.  Other members of the family remained in Poitou.  Joseph-Gabriel Breau, son of Joseph, married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians André Templé and his first wife Marie Deveau, at Archigny in September 1777.  Marguerite gave Joseph-Gabriel at least three children there:  Joseph le jeune in June 1778; Gabriel in September 1779; and Angélique in April 1781.  After the birth of their youngest child, they joined their fellow Acadians at Nantes.  Meanwhile, Anne Breau died at Archigny in May 1782, age 50.  One wonders who her parents may have been, if she had a family, and why she had remained in Poitou. 

At Nantes and nearby Chantenay, the wayward Acadians subsisted as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Félix Breau, still a sailor, and wife Perrine Thomas had at least three more daughters at Nantes:  Françoise-Perrine at Chantenay in early 1776 but died at age 10 months in November 1776; Marie-Henriette in October 1777 but died at age 1 1/2 years in March 1779; and Marie-Thérèse at Nantes in c1779 but died at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, age 2, in September 1781, so they returned to the St.-Malo area.  Honoré Breau, who worked as a laborer and carpenter, and wife Élisabeth dite Maillet LeBlanc had at least four more children at Nantes:  Jeanne in Ste.-Croix Parish in May 1776; Pierre-Paul in June 1779; and twins Rose-Marie and Charles at Chantenay in October 1781.  Son Élie, born in Poitou, died at Chantenay, age 9, in August 1783.  Pierre Breau, fils, who had lived in Nantes since c1770, married Geneviève, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Chênet dit La Garenne and Anne Potier of Île St.-Jean, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in August 1780.  Anne-Madeleine, 32-year-old daughter of Alexis Breau and Marie-Josèphe Thibodeau of Minas, "resident of the Parish of Saint-Martin of Chantenay for 3 years," married Étienne, son of fellow Acadians Jean Hébert and Marguerite Mouton and widower of Marie Lavergne and Marie Bourg, there in August 1781.  She gave him another daughter in May 1785.  Joseph-Gabriel Breau, now a seaman, and wife Marguerite Templé joined their fellow Acadians at Nantes by May 1782, when they buried their year-old daughter Angélique in St.-Nicolas Parish.  But the couple were blessed with at least two more daughters at Nantes:  Reine-Élisabeth at Chantenay in April 1783; and Eulalie in St.-Nicolas Parish in June 1785.  Joseph-Gabriel's widowed father Joseph, now an invalid, died in St.-Nicolas Parish in May 1782, age 70.  Joseph Breau, fils, son of Marie-Madeleine Vincent and stepson of Pierre Dugas, with whom he had gone to Poitou, married Marie-Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians Louis-Athanase Trahan and Marguerite LeBlanc of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in May 1785.  Marie-Blanche had been born at Borderun, Sauzon, on Belle-Île-en-Mer in August 1767, so, unlike her Breau husband, she had not endured the voyage from England to France.  Joseph, fils's mother, meanwhile, died at Chantenay in January 1785, age 63. 

When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 21 Breaus--including Alexis, Anne-Josèphe, Anne-Madeleine, Cécile, Honoré, Joseph, fils, Joseph-Gabriel, Luce, Marie-Osite, both Ursules, and their families--agreed to take it.  Others chose to remain in the mother country, among them Félix Breau the sailor of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, who had family in the Spanish colony.  Also remaining was Pierre Breau, fils of Île Royale and Chantenay.  Jean-Baptiste Breau the boatswain and his wife Marie Deveau of Ste.-Croix Parish, Bordeaux, also chose to remain.  Their daughter Marie, age 26, married Jean-Baptiste, fils, 31-year-old son of Jean-Baptiste Darrigrand, former postmaster, and Jeanne Gallien of Benesse, Department of Landes, in Ste.-Croix Parish, Bordeaux, in December 1798 (30 Frimaire year 7 on the Revolutionary calendar).  Jean-Baptiste Darrigrand, fils was a ship captain, and, the Bordeaux priest noted, Jean-Baptiste Breau was deceased at the time of the marriage.  Jean-Baptiste Breau's daughter Jeanne married Jean, son of Martin Thiac and Élisabeth Gaudric of Bordeaux, in Ste.-Croix Parish, Bordeaux, in September 1802 (26 Fructidor, year 10, in the Revolutionary calendar).  Jean Thiac was a blacksmith. 

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the redcoats in the late 1750s.  Athanase, son of Ambroise Breau and Marie Michel, married Marie, daughter of Joseph LeBlanc and Isabelle Gaudet of Annapolis Royal, at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs in February 1760.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  Though the British failed to capture Restigouche, they nevertheless cut it off from what was left of French America.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, a second British naval force, this one from Québec, arrived at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  No Breau families appear in the counting.  Over the following months, the British sent these and other exiles captured in the area, including Breaus, to prison compounds in Nova Scotia, where they were held for the rest of the war.  Rosalie, daughter of Joseph Breau, fils of Cobeguit and Anne Arseneau, was baptized at Restigouche in February 1761, months after the surrender there.  Athanase Breau and wife Marie LeBlanc ended up at Fort Edward, overlooking former Breau homesteads at Pigiguit.  The family had grown to five by late 1762.  British officials also counted Paul Breau at Fort Edward in 1762.  British officials counted Jean Breau and his family of three at Fort Cumbeland, formerly French Beauséjour, Chigenecto, in August 1763.  On Georges Island, Halifax, that same month, British officials counted Widower Cycles, probably Charles, Brau with six children; Joseph Brou with a wife and two children; and Jean Brou with a wife and child. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  Alexander Brew, with nine persons in his family, and Joseph Brew with three persons, both families recently living at Hingham, Massachusetts, were counted at Boston in the early 1760s.  Breaus in Massachusetts also appeared on an undated list entitled "... All Those Who Wish to Pass to the French Colonies."  They included Alexis, perhaps Alexandre, Broux with "9 from his family"; Paul Broux also with "9 from his family"; Joseph Broux with "2 from his family"; and Aman Broux with "8 from his family."  In August 1763, a French repatriation list circulating in the Bay Colony, entitled a "General List of the Acadian Families Actually Distributed to New England," in the "Province of Massachusetts, Government of Boston," counted Aman Bodot, probably Breau, wife Isabelle, two sons, and three daughters; Joseph Brox, wife Anne, and a daughter; Jean Bodot, wife Anne, two sons, and three daughters; Aman Breaux, wife Magdelaine, three sons, and four daughters; Joseph Broux; Simon Broux; René Broux, wife Mariee, and a daughter; François Roux, perhaps Breau, wife Nanette, and two daughters; Allexis Braux, wife Margueritte, and four sons; Paul Broux, "his wife," and a daughter; Charle Breux, wife Elizabeth, and two sons; and Pierre Broux, five sons, and four daughters. Many members of the family were still in the Bay Colony three years later.  In June 1766, Massachusetts officials complied a "List of Names of the French Who Wish to Go to Canada."  On it appeared Alexis Bro and his family of nine; Joseph Brau and his family of six; Pierre Bro and his family of nine; Joseph Bro and his family of five; Aman Bro and his family of five; Charles Bro and his family of nine; and Amon Bro and his family of 11.  At least one of the Breaus in Massachusetts chose to remain among the English.  Simon Breau died at Plympton, Massachusetts, in March 1804, age unrecorded.  His burial record called him beau-frère (brother-in-law) of Hannah Mitchell, that is, Anne Michel, sister of his wife Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Joseph Michel and Marie Boudrot.  One wonders what motivated Simon to remain in Massachusetts.  In 1763, Antoine Brau, with "nine persons" in his family; "the widow Brau and one child; and Joseph Brau and "nine persons" in his family, appeared on a "General List of the Acadian Families Distributed in the Government of Konehtoket Who Desire to Go to France."  In June 1763, members of the family appeard on a list of Acadians still in Pennsylvania.  They included Pierre Bro, "boy without a family"; Jean Bro, wife Josette, and four children; and Margueritte Bro, "widow with four children."  In July 1763, a dozen Breau families still languished in Maryland, most of them still concentrated on the lower Potomac.  At Port Tobacco could be found Charles Breau of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, wife Claire Trahan, son Pierre, daughters Marie, Marguerite, Élisabeth, Anne-Gertrude, and Madeleine, and orphan Anne Lejeune; Charles's oldest son Antoine, wife Marguerite Landry, sons Joseph and Charles and daughters Perpétué and Scholastique; Marguerite Landry, called a widow (though her husband Simon-Pierre, another son of Charles Breau, was still very much alive in 1763), son Jean-Baptiste-Pierre (called Pierre) and daughter Marie-Anne; Jean-Charles Breau of Pigiguit, wife Marie Benoit, son Michel, daughter Marguerite, and orphan Augustin-Rémi Boudrot; Jean or Janvier Breau, wife Osite Landry, and daughter Pélagie; Joseph-Charles Breau, wife Marie-Josèphe Landry, son Joseph-Marie, daughter Marguerite, and orphan Marie-Rose Landry; Élisabeth ____, widow of ____ Breau, son Paul and daughter Marguerite; Marguerite Gautrot, widow of Pierre Breau, and daughters Marguerite, Marie-Josèphe (called Josette), and Marie-Rose (called Rose); Honoré Breau of Pigiguit, wife Anne-Madeleine Trahan, daughters Madeleine, Marie, and Marguerite, and orphan Blaise Lejeune; and Honoré's older brother Alexis of Pigiguit, wife Madeleine Trahan, sons Honoré le jeune, Joseph, and Charles, daughters Marie and Anastasie, and orphan Bibianne Breau.  Members of the family at Oxford on Maryland's Eastern Shore included Alexis and Honoré's older brother Jean-Baptiste, second wife Marie-Rose Landry, sons Jean and Amand, and daughters Marguerite, Madeleine, Anne, Cité (probably Esther), and Marie.  At Annapolis could be found Pierre Breau, wife Marguerite, perhaps Marie-Marguerite LeBlanc, and daughter Marie.  In South Carolina that same month, several Breaus still lingered in the colony, including Amant Bro and his unnamed wife with three unnamed children; Félicité Brau with husband Pierre Boucher and a 3-year-old son, along with 12-year-old Anne Brau, perhaps Félicité's younger sister; Vital Brau, age 10, with the family of Michel Doiron; Théotiste Braud with husband François Poirier and three children, ages 15, 13, and 2, as well as Marguerite Braud, age 15, perhaps Théotiste's younger sister. 

A family of Breaus held at Halifax chose to join fellow Acadians on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, where they could escape British rule.  Amand, son of Jean Breau and Anne Gautrot of Minas, had married Théotiste, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Bonnevie and Marguerite Lord of Annapolis Royal, at Halifax, where there was no priest.  They sanctified their marriage on Île Miquelon in October 1765 and were still on the island two years later, when French officials, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on the Newfoundland islands, forced the fisher/habitants there to resettle in France.  Most of them returned to the islands the following year.  One wonders if Amand and his family were still on Miquelon when the British captured the islands in 1778 during the American Revolution.  If so, they would have been deported to France again. 

As the June 1766 Massachusetts "Wish" list indicates, most of the Acadians in the northern seaboard colonies chose to go to Canada, where some of their relatives had sought refuge as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Vincelotte Breau began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Breaus could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at L'Acadie, La-Prairie-de-la-Magdeleine, L'Assomption, St.-Grégoire-de-Nicolet, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, St.-Philippe-de-la-Prairie, St.-Pierre-de-Sorel, and Trois-Rivières; at Québec City; at La Présentation, St.-Antoine-de-Chambly, St.-Denis, St.-Joseph-de-Chambly, and St.-Ours in the lower Richelieu valley; and at Charlesbourg, St.-Charles-de-Bellechase, and St.-Joachim on the lower St. Lawrence.  Breaus also settled at Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs; and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  In present-day New Brunswick, they could be found at Grande-Digue, Néguac, Richiboutou, and St.-Charles-de-Kent on the Gulf of St. Lawrence; and at Memramcook near the family's old settlements in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, the Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Other Breaus languishing in the seaboard colonies chose to go to the French Antilles, where they could live not only among fellow Roman Catholics, but also in territory controlled by France.  French officials were especially eager for Acadians in the British colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their western empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big sugar island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the war of vengeance to come.  Moreover, the Acadians could provide a source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To entice the exiles to the tropical island, the French promised them land of their own.  Breaus were among the Acadians who went there and labored not only at Môle St.-Nicolas, but also in the interior community of Mirebalais near Port-au-Prince, where they worked on indigo and coffee plantations.  Despite the vicissitudes of life in the tropics, it must have worked out for most of them.  When fellow Acadians released from Nova Scotia and Maryland came through Cap-Français in the mid- and late 1760s on their way to New Orleans, the Breaus in St.-Domingue, perhaps with one exception, chose to remain.  Jeanne, daughter of Jean Breau and Anne Chiasson dit La Vallée and widow of Jacques Michel, fils, died at Mirebalais in March 1765, age 56.  One wonders if she would have remained in the sugar colony if she had lived a bit longer.  Her son Pierre Michel, a widower in his late 20s who had just lost his wife, Marguerite Poirier, as well as his mother, moved on to New Orleans later that year, perhaps with the refugees from Halifax.  One suspects that, had she lived, Jeanne would have followed her son to Louisiana.  Félicité Breau, "an Acadien," married Jean, also called Pierre, Boucher probably in South Carolina during the late 1750s.  In August 1763, colonial officials there counted them with a 3-year-old son.  At least six more children were born to them at Môle St.-Nicolas between 1764 and 1780, before the couple filed a "testimony of marriage" at Môle St.-Nicolas on 2 April 1783.  Evidently Jean/Pierre, "maitre de port and extremely ill" at the time, and his devoted Acadian wife, were attempting to legitimize their children before he died, which occurred the following day.  Anne Breau of Annapolis Royal married Frenchman Jean Soucaire or Souchier probably at Môle St.-Nicolas before 1776.  She died there in July 1788, age 39.  She likely was the Anne Brau, age 12, counted with the family of Jean/Pierre Boucher and Félicité Breau in South Carolina in 1763.  Anne's son Pierre-Félix, called Félix, Soucaire had been born at the French naval base the month before her death, so Anne may have died from the rigors of childbirth.  Félix died the following October, joining three of his older brothers--Antoine, Marin, and Jean, fils--into early graves.  Charles, son of Pierre Breau and Anne Dupuis of Rivière-Ste.-Croix, Minas, married fellow Acadian Marie-Angélique _____ of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, Chignecto, at Môle St.-Nicolas in November 1777.  Charles Breau, master carpenter, and Marie-Angélique Bourgeois, had at least three daughters there:   Marie-Madeleine baptized, age 1 month, in November 1778; Marie-Angélique-Geneviève in December 1781 but died the following September; and Victoire-Perpétué born in November 1783.  Vital "of St-Charles in Beausejour," son of Charles Breau and Marie Peltier, married Frenchwoman Marie-Anne Vaudrille, widow of Lise Quatrehommes of St.-Regret, France, "a soldier of the Legion in the Company of d'Usson," at Bombarde south of Môle St.-Nicolas in October 1788.  One wonders where "St-Charles in Beausejour" may have been:  Minas?  Chignecto?  Marie-Modeste Breau of Annapolis Royal, widow of Jean-Claude Monnier, died at Môle St.-Nicolas, age 40, in December 1788. 

Breaus still being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Breaus, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Breaus, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 10 were Breaus.

Meanwhile, the many Breaus in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Breaus were part of the first and second continents from Maryland who reached Louisiana from Baltimore via Cap-Français in September 1766 and July 1767, but the great majority of them were part of the third contingent, which reached New Orleans from Port Tobacco in February 1768.296

Broussard

By 1755, descendants of François Brossard and Catherine Richard of the haute rivière could be found at Annapolis Royal; Grand-Pré and Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, in the Minas Basin; Village-des-Beausoleils on the middle Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; Port-Toulouse on Île Royale; and Rivière-du-Nord-Est in the interior of Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

By the early 1750s, the trois-rivières area long had been the heart of Acadian resistance to British control of Nova Scotia.  Here also lived several bands of the Mi'kmaq nation who did the bidding of Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, the radical priest who French authorities had given substantial powers in the province, especially over the Indians.  Among the abbé's allies were the Beausoleil Broussard brothers of the upper Petitcoudiac, who had participated in the resistance with the abbé and the Mi'kmaq during King George's War the previous decade.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Acadians were again caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour at Chignecto in June 1755, the Broussards from Petitcoudiac were among the area Acadians serving in the fort as militia, though they may have left the fort a few days before it surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French troupes de la marine at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  In mid-October 1755, the British transported Alexandre dit Beausoleil Broussard and his son Victor to South Carolina.  They were transported in chains, under heavy guard, with other 20 other Acadian "troublemakers" aboard the British warship Syren.  They reached Charles Town in late November and were held in close confinement on Sullivan's Island outside of the city.  

Before the deportation ships arrived at Chignecto, some of the Acadians being held at Fort Lawrence managed to escape, Joseph dit Beausoleil among them.  He rejoined his wife and younger children at Petitcoudiac, and they headed into the wilderness north of their home, not only hiding from the British patrols sent out to capture them, but also engaging in what today is called guerrilla warfare, including privateering in the Bay of Fundy and the Gulf of St. Lawrence to harass British shipping.  For a time, Beausoleil's "headquarters" was at Shediac on the Gulf shore, where he coordinated his resistance activities with Canadian Lieutenant Charles Deschamps de Boishébert, who had commanded French forces on lower Rivière St.-Jean. 

Although at first held in close confinement in South Carolina, Alexandre and Victor had been allowed to go to the workhouse in Charles Town, from which, in late January 1756, they escaped with several other Acadians.  They made their way through the coastal swamps and marshes of the Santee River valley, where they raided a plantation for food and supplies, including arms and ammunition, and headed for the Carolina backcountry.  After months of avoiding British settlers and colonial militia, assisted most likely by Indians friendly to the French, they reached French Fort Duquesne on the upper Ohio.  From there, they moved on to Canada and then down the Rivière St.-Jean portage back to greater Acadia.  According to Carl Brasseaux, "Only two Acadians are known to have completed the trek"--Alexandre and his son Victor.  Amazingly, Alexandre was in his late 50s at the time, but the rigors of advancing old age could not stop him from rejoining his family.  He and Victor appeared at an Acadian settlement on lower Rivière St.-Jean in June, about the time that 50 or so other Chignecto Acadians who had been deported to the southern colonies returned to the St.-Jean valley by open boat after a harrowing ordeal of their own.  Alexandre and Victor did not remain on Rivière St.-Jean but moved on to Shediac, where they reunited with their family and re-joined the Acadian resistance. 

Meanwhile, the British deported hundreds of Acadians from Minas in late October 1755, sending them to Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and New England.  The Minas Broussards went to Maryland.  Claude Broussard of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, who had remarried at Annapolis Royal in November 1754, in his late 50s, died in the Chesapeake colony.  Claude's son Jean and his wife Anne Landry were deported to Maryland with son Firmin, age 3, and infant daughter Madeleine.  Anne gave Jean another son, Jean, fils, in the colony in c1760.  In July 1763, Jean, père, Anne, and their three children were counted at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac.  Daughter Élisabeth was born soon after the counting.  Augustin, son of perhaps Charles Broussard of Grand-Pré, was only age 7 when he landed in Maryland in 1755.  He soon became an orphan.  

Broussards at Annapolis Royal escaped the British roundup there in the fall of 1755, spent a terrible winter in the woods along the Fundy shore, and crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring.  After making their way north to the lower Rivière St.-Jean settlements or the upper Petitcoudiac, they joined their kinsmen at Shediac and Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they fought starvation, hard winters, and British raiding parties.  Jean-Baptiste Broussard of Annapolis Royal participated with older brothers Alexandre and Joseph dit Beausoleil in the Acadian resistance.  When his brothers "surrendered" to British forces at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, Chignecto, in late 1759, Jean-Baptiste refused to join them and took his family to Québec.  One account says that his wife, two children, and his mother-in-law died on the way to Canada.  One of his daughters by his first wife remarried at Île Jesus near Montréal in June 1761.  Jean-Baptiste died at Mascouche near Montréal in July 1770, in his late 60s--five years after his older brothers had died in faraway Louisiana.  

 Broussards on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the islands and deported most of the habitants there to France.  The crossing to the mother country devastated the family.  Marie Broussard crossed with husband Honoré Préjean and nine children aboard the transport Queen of Spain, which left Louisbourg in September and reached St.-Malo in mid-November.  Every one of the family died at sea.  Jean-Baptiste, age 37, son of Claude Broussard of Pigiguit, Jean-Baptiste's wife Osite Landry, age 28, and their children--Madeleine, age 9; Joseph, age 7; Marguerite, age 5; Rosalie, age 3; and Grégoire, age 2--crossed on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The death toll among the 1,033 passengers aboard those vessels reached nearly 50 percent, a number of them Broussards.  Jean-Baptiste's son Jean-Baptiste-Paul was born aboard ship in December.  Only wife Osite and three of her children--Madeleine, Joseph, and newborn Jean-Baptiste-Paul--survived the crossing.  Children Marguerite, Rosalie, and Grégoire died at sea.  Jean-Baptiste, père died in a St.-Malo hospital a month after they reached the Breton port, and son Joseph died a month after that.  In August 1760, Osite remarried to fellow Acadian Augustin Boudrot at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo and gave him at least nine children.  Jean-Baptiste-Paul Broussard, the newborn who had survived the 1758 crossing, remained with his mother and stepfather at Pleudihen, where he married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Étienne Melanson and Françoise Granger of Minas and Boulogne-sur-Mer, in June 1784.  Their son Jean-Pierre, called Pierre, was born at La Coquenais near Pleudihen in March 1785.  Charles and Firmin Broussard, ages 26 and 21 in 1758 and younger brothers of Jean-Baptiste, also had crossed to St.-Malo on one of the Five Ships.  Firmin and Charles survived the crossing, but the ordeal proved to be too much for Firmin.  He died at Le Buet near Pleudihen in late April 1759 and was buried at Pleudihen.  Charles settled at Pleudihen and married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Aucoin and Anne Trahan, at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river from Pleudihen in October 1764.  They settled at La Coquenais near Pleudihen, where Anne gave Charles three children:  Marie-Isabelle born in March 1766; Joseph-Charles in November 1767; and Madeleine-Josèphe in December 1769.  Jean-Baptiste and Charles's brother Pierre-Paul Broussard dit Courtiche, age 32 in 1758, crossed on one of the Five Ships with wife Madeleine Landry, age 31, and their children--Jean-Baptiste, age 8; Isabelle, age 6; Marie-Marguerite, age 6; and Pierre, age 1.  Pierre-Paul, Madeleine, and two of their children survived the crossing, but the other children--Jean-Baptiste and Marie-Marguerite--died at Pleudihen-sur-Rance in April 1759 probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Pierre-Paul and Marguerite settled at Pleudihen and had more children in the area:  Joseph-Osithe born at nearby Le Buet in March 1760 but died at Pleudihen in August 1761; Charles-Jean at Bas Champs in June 1763; Jean-Joseph at La Coquenais in March 1766; and Marie-Josèphe at Bas Champs in August 1768.  Jean-Baptiste, Charles, and Pierre-Paul's younger unmarried brother François, age 22 in 1758, also crossed with them.  He died at the hospital in St.-Malo in February 1759.  None of these Broussard families seems to have left the St.-Malo area in the early 1770s or the 1780s, when others moved on to Poitou and Nantes. 

Island Broussards ended up in ports other than St.-Malo.  Joseph Broussard of Minas and Île St.-Jean landed at Cherbourg in Normandy with wife Ursule LeBlanc and their sons Charles, age 15, and Jean, age 13.  Ursule died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in early December 1758, age 46, soon after their arrival.  Joseph died there in late January 1759, age 45.  Son Charles married Frenchwoman Bonne-Jacqueline-Françoise Castel probably at Cherbourg in c1764.  Between 1765 and 1773, Bonne gave Charles at least five sons and a daughter, all born probably at Cherbourg:  Jean-Charles-Joseph in c1765; François in c1767; Jacques in c1769 or 1770; Pierre in March 1771; Joseph-Dominique, called Dominique, in May 1772; and Bonne-Marguerite in September 1773.  Charles's younger brother Jean married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Honoré Comeau and Marguerite Poirier, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in July 1773.  In 1773, Charles, Jean, and their families participated in a settlement venture in the interior of Poitou that attempted to settle Acadians from the coastal cities on an influential nobleman's land near Châtellerault.  Charles's son Louis was born at La Chapelle-Roux southeast of Châtellerault in February 1774.  Jean's sons Jean-Baptiste and Joseph were born at Monthoiron southeast of Châtellearault in May 1774 and November 1775.  In December 1775, after two years of effort, Charles, Jean, and other Poitou Acadians retreated with their families to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Two years later, the Broussard brothers were residing at Chantenay near Nantes, where Bonne-Jacqueline gave Charles two more children:  Guillaume-Médard born in June 1776 but died two months later; and Jean le jeune born in February 1778 but died at age 3 in September 1780--nine children, eight sons and a daughter, between 1765 and 1778, at Cherbourg, in Poitou, and at Chantenay.  Bonne-Jacqueline died by June 1784, when Charles remarried to Euphrosine, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Barrieau and Véronique Giroir and widow of François Boudrot, at Chantenay.  Meanwhile, Marguerite gave brother Jean more children at Chantenay:  twins Florence-Adélaïde and Pierre born in October 1777, but Pierre died at age 10 months in July 1778; and Florence-Adélaïde died by August 1785--four children, three sons and a daughter, between 1774 and 1778, in Poitou and at Chantenay. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, where many of their kinsmen had settled decades earlier.  Brothers Charles and Jean Broussard at Chantenay took up the offer.  However, their Broussard cousins still at Pleudihen-sur-Rance near St.-Malo--brothers Pierre-Paul dit Courtiche and Charles, and their nephew Jean-Baptiste-Paul--chose to remain in France.  In 1793, during the darkest months of the French Revolution, a family of Acadian Broussards, called Brossards--Jean, age not given, actually Jean-Baptiste-Paul, a shoe-maker, in his mid-30s; wife Marie Melanson, age 35; son Pierre, age 8; son Jean, fils, age 6, who would died in 1797; and daughter Marie, age 3--were still living at Pleudihen.  Wife Marie would give birth to another daughter, Rosalie, that year.  One wonders what happened to Jean-Baptiste-Paul's uncles Courtiche and Charles after 1785.

In North America, Joseph dit Beausoleil Broussard and his fellow Acadians harassed the British as best they could first from their homesteads on the upper Petitcoudiac and then from Shediac up the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  In late 1756, they abandoned their "headquarters" at Shediac and moved north to a new camp at Miramichi, also on the Gulf of St. Lawrence, to put more distance between themselves and the British garrison at Fort Cumberland.  Their resistance exacted a terrible price.  Obtaining food, clothing, and shelter for their families, especially during the winter, continually burdened the resistance fighters and limited their effectiveness against a well-fed, well-supplied, and comfortably-sheltered foe.  Joseph's wife Agnès Thibodeau was among the many Acadians who died of sickness or starvation at Miramichi during the terrible winter of 1756-57.  Some historians insist that all of the children at Miramichi died that winter.  Victor Broussard's twin sons Jean and Joseph may have been among them.  After the terrible ordeal at Miramichi, some of the resistance fighters retreated farther up the coast to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  The Broussards moved south, instead, to the woods north of Rivière Petitcoudiac, an area they knew intimately, and continued their forays into British Nova Scotia, on sea as privateers as well as on land as hit-and-run partisans.

By the autumn of 1759, after four years of unimaginable hardship made worse by the fall of Louisbourg and Québec, which cut them off from French assistance, the Broussards and their compatriots responded to a British offer of amnesty.  They agreed to surrender to Colonel Joseph Frye, the commander at Fort Cumberland, to spare their families the horror of another Gulf coast winter.  Older brother Alexandre volunteered to be held as a hostage at Fort Cumberland until Joseph and other resistance leaders surrendered the following spring.  However, the British reneged on their amnesty offer, and the Broussards and their fellow partisans continued their struggle.  Joseph, in possession of a privateer's commission issued by Governor-General Vaudreuil, may have preyed on British shipping from Restigouche.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked the remnants of a French squadron there in late June 1760.  After a two-week struggle, the British, having neutralized the French naval force but failing to capture the garrison, returned to their base at Louisbourg.  After the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche during the third week of October to secure the outpost's surrender.  On the eve of formal surrender, a French clerk, on orders from the British commander, made a census, dated October 24, of the 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  The Broussard brothers and their families were not among them.  After the fight there, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and transported to prison compounds in Nova Scotia with Acadians captured at Restigouche and other places of refuge.  The Broussards were held at Halifax.  Joseph also spent time in confinement at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, near his cousins' old habitants.  There, he managed to communicate with Acadian partisans still on the loose, who imparted to him French offers of settling the Acadians in French territory after the war.  The British returned him to Halifax, where he could be more closely confined and where he and his extended family spent the next few years waiting for peace to come. 

In the prison compounds in Nova Scotia--at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour; Fort Edward at Pigiguit; Halifax; Annapolis Royal; and Chédabouctou up the Atlantic coast--the Broussards were among the hundreds of Acadians whom the British had rounded up in greater Acadia both before and after the surrender of Restigouche.  Many were kin to the Broussards by blood or by marriage and thus were part of their extended family.  They included Acadians named Arseneau, Babineau, Bergeron, Bernard, Boudrot, Bourg, Bourgeois, Breau, Brun, Caissie dit Roger, Comeau, Cormier, Darois, Doucet, Dugas, Gautrot, Girouard, Godin, Guénard, Guédry, Guilbeau, Hébert,  Hugon, Landry, LeBlanc, Léger, Martin, Michel, Pellerin, Pitre, Poirier, Prejean, Richard, Robichaud, Roy, Saulnier, Savoie, Semer, Surette, Thibodeau, Trahan, and Vincent.  The Broussards, still led by Joseph dit Beausoleil, did what they could to keep communications open with their kinsmen. 

Ironically, beginning in the summer of 1761, dozens of the young Acadians being held in the Nova Scotia prisons--only men who had not been part of the partisan resistance, so none were likely Broussards--were enticed to return to their former lands on the Bay of Fundy and rebuild and maintain the earthen barriers that had transformed these settlements into an agricultural paradise.  The New-English "planters" who in 1760 had begun to occupy Acadian farmland in the Annapolis and Minas basins had no idea how to maintain or rebuild the dykes and aboiteaux that kept the fertile fields along the Fundy basin from becoming tidal marsh again.  The young Acadians worked diligently for their New-English "masters" and were paid in Canadian currency.  Despite their plunge from landowners to mere laborers on their former lands, many of them harbored the forlorn hope of living on their fathers' farms again. 

This was not to be.  Charles Lawrence, the great nemesis of all Acadians, died at Halifax in late October 1760, but he was succeeded by Jonathan Belcher, Jr., who hated and feared the Acadians as much as Lawrence ever did.  In July 1762, encouraged by Belcher and responding to an attack on St. John's, Newfoundland, by the French, the Nova Scotia Council ordered the deportation of the Acadian prisoners from the colony--over 900 men, women, and children at Halifax; as well as 150 workers from Fort Edward and Annapolis Royal, without their families!  In late August, seven ships carried the Acadians to Boston, but the Massachusetts authorities refused to take them.  In mid-October, the prisoners returned to Halifax, Broussards likely among them. 

The war with Britain finally ended with the Treaty of Paris of February 1763.  Article IV of the treaty gave all persons dispersed by the war 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia or other parts of greater Acadia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas, away from their lands along the Fundy shore, or continue to work for low wages on their former lands, now, or soon to be, controlled by the New-English "planters."  If the Acadians stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance, without reservation, to the new British king, George III.  In August 1763, Broussards appeared on a French repatriation list circulated among the exiles at Halifax, but the French ignored the petition, sent along with the list, pleading to send ships to take them to France. 

They were on their own again. 

Most of the Acadians held in Nova Scotia were still there in the autumn of 1764.  The province's new governor, Montague Wilmot, "tender'd to them" the oath of allegiance as well as "offers of a settlement in this Country."  Most of the Acadians rebuffed the oath as well as the offer.  British leaders in Halifax, led by former lieutenant-governor and current colonial chief justice Jonathan Belcher, Jr., still felt threatened by the Acadian presence in Nova Scotia.  They were especially fearful of the Beausoleil Broussards and other resistance leaders.  Belcher encouraged Governor Wilmot to remove the Acadians from the province despite orders from London to keep them in Nova Scotia and entreaties from the New-English "planters" to retain them as cheap but highly skilled labor.  Wilmot resisted Belcher at first, so the chief justice hatched a scheme to send the Acadians from Halifax to Baskenridge, New Jersey, to work as indentured servants on an English nobleman's land; Belcher's father just happened to be the governor of New Jersey, and the nobleman was one of his father's political allies.  Governor Wilmot also received a proposal to send 30 Acadian families to New York colony to work as indentured servants there.  Luckily for the Acadians, neither scheme came to fruition.  Infected, finally, by Belcher's fear of Acadian treachery, Wilmot proposed to his uncle, the powerful Earl of Halifax, the deportation of the Acadian "prisoners" in Nova Scotia to the British West Indies, but the earl ignored his nephew's scheme.  Determined to be rid of the Acadians, Wilmot conceived a plan that he was certain would discourage them from remaining in Nova Scotia.  First, he crafted a new ironclad oath for them that insulted their Roman Catholic faith.  Most compellingly, and against every directive from his superiors in London, he gave the resistance leaders and their families a hard choice:  either submit to deportation to the British West Indies or remain imprisoned in Nova Scotia. 

Nova Scotia was no longer a welcome place for the descendants of its original settlers.  Too proud to work for wages, unwilling to work as indentured servants in colonies where they could lose their religion as well as their culture, unable to return to their precious farms in the upper Fundy basins, and determined not to take the hated oath, the Broussards and their kinsmen had to find a suitable place to put down new roots.  The St. Lawrence valley seemed to be a poor choice; they were hearing stories of how the French Canadians treated with contempt Acadian refugees who had settled among them as early as 1756.  Besides, Canada was as much a British possession now as Nova Scotia, and settling on the St. Lawrence would require them to take the unqualified oath.  Nor was it likely that Wilmot would allow the troublesome Broussards and their partisan compatriots to settle as close as Québec to their former lands in greater Acadia.  The Illinois country on the upper Mississippi was a viable option, but the British would not let them take the shortest route there via Canada, and France had just ceded the eastern part of Illinois to Britain.  Moreover, Indian uprisings, including one led by the Ottawa chief Pontiac, were ravaging the western frontier, and the fighting there could last for years.  But there were other regions of North America still controlled by France, such as the west bank of the Illinois country in today's Missouri, which they would have to reach via New Orleans.  The French cession of western Louisiana to Spain, secured in a secret agreement between the allies at Fontainebleu, France, in November 1762, was still a well-kept secret in the early fall of 1764, but the Acadians in Nova Scotia would have been aware that French authorities controlled New Orleans and the west bank of the lower Mississippi in what was left of French Louisiana.  France still controlled Martinique, Guadaloupe, and St.-Domingue in the French Antilles, where hundreds of Acadian exiles from the seaboard colonies recently had gone to escape British rule and live among fellow Catholics.  However, letters from Acadians in St.-Domingue detailed the horrors of the climate and maltreatment there at the hands of French officials.  There was always the mother country itself, where the British had deported hundreds of Acadians from the French Maritime islands during the war and to where the Acadians held in England had been recently repatriated.  But even with permission from the French crown to go to the mother country, a cross-Atlantic voyage would be difficult and expensive, as would a voyage from Halifax to the French Antilles.  There was much for the Broussards and their kinsmen to consider, and time was running out.  

After much deliberation, the old resistance fighters and their kin chose to go to St.-Domingue.  No higher authority planned their move from Halifax to the Caribbean Basin, though Wilmot was happy to provide them with rations for the long voyage down the coast.  Pooling the money their sons had saved from months of labor on their former lands, the Broussard party left Halifax in late November 1764 aboard an English schooner--slightly over 200 men, women, and children crowding the chartered vessel.  They reached Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, in January and could see even in that winter month that the island's climate was unsuitable for them.  They had hoped to reunite with relatives there, but many of the St.-Domingue Acadians were either dead or dying from tropical diseases, starvation, and overwork.  Others refused to endure another voyage, even a relatively short one.  Just as disturbing, there was little chance of acquiring productive farm land in the island's plantation-slave economy.  They could see no future for their children in St.-Domingue, despite its being a French colony.  So, before resuming their voyage, the Broussard party welcomed aboard the few St.-Domingue relatives willing to join them.  They then sailed west through the Florida Strait into the Gulf of Mexico and on to the lower Mississippi River, gateway to the Illinois country.  They reached Louisiana in early or mid-February 1765, their arrival at La Balize at the mouth of the great river a complete surprise to the French caretaker government still in control of the colony.  By the third week of February, they had completed the 100-mile upriver voyage to New Orleans, where they sanctified marriages and baptized children who had been born in the Nova Scotia prisons and on the months-long voyage from Halifax via Cap-Français.  

The Broussards in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, where many of their relatives had gone, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Jean Broussard, père died in Maryland in c1766 on the eve of his family's departure for Louisiana.  Wife Anne Landry was pregnant at the time of his death.  She and her four Broussard children, two sons and two daughters, along with orphan August Broussard, and a Broussard wife and her Melanson family were part of the first contingent of exiles from Maryland who reached Louisiana from Baltimore via Cap-Français in September 1766.  Anne Landry's son Paul was born at New Orleans in late November, and she soon remarried.198

Brun

By 1755, most of the descendants of Vincent Brun and Renée Breau were still in the Annapolis River valley, where they had lived for generations, but one family was at Chignecto.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The first Acadians rounded up by British forces in the fall of 1755 were the ones in the Chignecto area.  Nova Scotia Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed that some of the Chignecto Acadians had fought with the French in the defense of Fort Beauséjour that summer, he ordered them deported to the southern-most seaboard colonies.  One Brun wife ended up in South Carolina, where she was counted as a widow in 1763.  Other Bruns eluded the British at Chignecto in 1755 and escaped north to French-controlled Île St.-Jean or to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  The Brun who went to Île St.-Jean escaped to the Gulf shore after 1758 and joined his younger brother there.  The younger brother married a Boudrot at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs in January 1760, a few months before a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked the French stronghold.  

Acadians rounded up in the Annapolis River valley in the fall of 1755 were deported to Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, and North Carolina.  The ship headed for North Carolina, the Pembroke, never made it to that colony.  The Acadians seized the vessel, took it to Baie Ste.-Marie and then crossed the Bay of Fundy to the lower Rivière St.-Jean and escaped into the interior of present-day New Brunswick.  Bruns may have been aboard the Pembroke.  The ships bound for New England and New York, however, reached their destinations.  Bruns were definitely on some of the vessels that landed at Massachusetts and Connecticut.  Colonial authorities in Massachusetts counted Joseph Brun, called Broyn, and his family six at Newbury in 1760.  Charles Lebrun and his family of five; Aman Brun and his family of six; and Simon Brun and his family of four were still being held in Connecticut in 1763. 

Other Bruns at Annapolis Royal escaped the British roundup there in 1755, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, and crossed to Chepoudy the following spring.  From there, they made their way to the upper Petitcoudiac, lower Rivière St.-Jean, or the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where, at Shediac, Cocagne, and Miramichi, they fought starvation, more hard winters, and British raiding parties.  Some moved on to Canada.  A great-granddaughter and a great-grandson of Vincent Brun died at Québec City in November 1757 and May 1758, respectively, victims, perhaps, of the yellow fever epidemic that killed hundreds of Acadian refugees in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the hand full of Bruns on Île St.-Jean escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Charles Brun and Anne Caissie of Pointe-à-Beauséjour, Chignecto, was among the deportees.  She married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Jean Labauve and Agnès Saulnier of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, France, in September 1770.  She died in France by October 1784, when her husband remarried at St.-Martin de Chantenay near Nantes.  

Back in North America, the Bruns who had found refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore suffered even more in the fight against Britain.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, British forces attacked the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  In October 1760, after the fall of Montréal in September, the garrison at Restigouche surrendered to a British naval force from Québec.  Some of the Acadians there managed to escape, but others fell into British hands.  About that time, Acadians who had resisted the British in present-day southeastern New Brunswick also surrendered or were captured and held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  One of them was Anne Brun, wife of Jean-Baptiste, son of Acadian resistance leader Alexandre Broussard dit Beausoleil and his wife Marguerite Thibodeau.  They were held on Georges Island in Halifax harbor. 

In the early 1760s, even before the war with Britain ended, French authorities encouraged exiles in the seaboard colonies to emigrate to St.-Domingue, where the French hoped to use them as cheap labor on a new naval base on the northwest end of the island.  Anne-Marie, another daughter of Charles Brun and Anne Caissie of Pointe-des-Beauséjour, who had been held in South Carolina, married Jacques Godichon of Gonnave, Anjou, d'Angers, France, at Môle St.-Nicolas, the site of the new naval base, in February 1782.  

At war's end, one Brun wife, Agnès, widow of Paul Doucet, left Massachusetts in 1764 with an infant daughter and joined her fellow Acadians at Halifax.  Most of the Bruns being held in New England, however, chose to join their relatives in Canada, where some had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Vincent Brun began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Bruns could be found on the upper St. Lawrence or along the lower Richelieu at St.-Anne-de-la-Pérade, Bécancour, Nicolet, St.-Philippe-de-Laprairie, L'Acadie, Maskinongé, St.-Michel-d'Yamaska, Yamachiche, Verchères, Pointe-du-Lac, and St.-Denis-sur-Richelieu; at Québec City; on the lower St. Lawrence and the lower Chaudière at St.-Marie-de-Beuce, Ste.-Famille and St.-Pierre on Île d'Orléans, Rivière-Ouelle, Cap-St.-Ignace, Rivière-du-Loup, and Kamouraska; and at Carleton in Gaspésie on the northern shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Bruns also settled in present-day New Brunswick on Rivière St.-Jean and at Memramcook, and in Nova Scotia on Baie Ste.-Marie.  

The Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma. The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including a Brun wife, chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies, including a Brun, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, two were Bruns.197

Bugeaud

By 1755, descendants of surgeon/notary Sr. Alain Bugeaud and Élisabeth Melanson could be found at Grand-Pré and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin and on Rivière-du-Nord-Est and Rivière-du-Moulin-à-Scie in the interior of Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

Joseph, fils and Étienne Bugeaud, the two sons of Joseph, père who had remained at Pigiguit when the rest of their family moved to Île St.-Jean, were rounded up by the British in the fall of 1755 and deported to Maryland.  The surgeon's son Paul l'aîné, who also had remained at Minas, was deported with members of his family to Pennsylvania.  

When the British rounded up their cousins in the Minas Basin, the Bugeauds on Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French stronghold at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France.  Joseph Bugeaud's younger sons Paul le jeune, Charles, François-Placide, and Mathurin escaped the British roundup on the island, crossed Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and eventually found refuge at the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  But most of their Bugeaud kinsmen fell into British hands. 

The result was devastating to the extended family.  Alain Bugeaud, père, wife Madeleine Boudrot, and seven of their children were deported to France, but they never made it.  They were among the hundreds of Acadians who disappeared without a trace when two of 11 British transports bound for St.-Malo, the Violet and the Duke William, foundered in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England.  Alain, père's son Alain, fils, age 34, wife Marie-Madeleine Granger, age 28, and two of their children--Simon, age 8; and Marie-Louise, age 3--crossed aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The voyage destroyed this family, too:  Marie-Louise was buried at sea, and Alain, fils and Simon died in St.-Malo-area hospitals in February and March 1759, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Only wife Marie-Madeleine survived the ordeal.  She remarried to fellow Acadian Joseph Bourg, a survivor of the crossing, in June 1760 and helped create a new family.  Alain, fils's first cousin Jean Bugeaud, a widower, lost two of his three young children--Joseph, age 5; and Xavier, age 3--aboard one of the Five Ships.  Jean died in a French hospital two months after he reached France, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Only his daughter Marie-Rose, age 6, survived the ordeal.  She resided probably with relatives in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer from 1759 to 1761.  After 1761, she disappears from history, probably into an early grave.  Alain, fils and Jean's cousin Marie-Madeleine Bugeaud, wife of Sr. Charles Jousseaume, lost two of her four children aboard one of the Five Ships.  She, her husband, and her surviving children left St.-Malo for La Rochelle, his native city on the Bay of Biscay, in March 1759.  In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, nearly 1,600 Acadians accepted the offer, but none of them were Bugeauds.  Marie-Madeleine Granger, once married to Alain Bugeaud, fils, was among the Acadians who went to Louisiana, with her second husband Joseph Bourg and four of their children, but none of them were Bugeauds.  

Back in North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British attacked the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  A naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  The following October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, including Bugeads, some of them were serving as officers of militia:  Amand Bujeau, père, with a family of three, served as a captain; Amand Bujeau, fils, with a family of six, served as a lieutenant.  Also on the list were Charles Bujeau and his family of four; and Paul Bujo and his family of eight.  The British held them in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted Amand Bujeau, wife Marie, and children Adélaïde and Jean, at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto.  One wonders if this was Amand, père or his son Amand, fils.  At war's end, most, if not all, of the Bugeauds being held in Nova Scotia chose to remain in greater Acadia.  They settled at Carleton and Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, where they worked in a British-controlled fishery.  During the following years, Bugeauds from Gaspésie moved south to Caraquet and Néguac on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore in present-day northeastern New Brunswick.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In June 1763, Pennsylvania officials counted Paul Bugeaud, wife Marguerite Doucet, and three of their children, as well as one of their sons and his family, still in the colony.  Paul's daughter Marguerite married into the Dreux family at Philadelphia in September 1772, so the family may have remained there instead of following most of their fellow exiles to Canada. 

The Bugeauds in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  In July 1763, colonial authorities, calling them Bigeos, counted family members at Oxford on the colony's upper Eastern Shore, including Joseph, fils and his younger brother Étienne and their families.  Joseph, fils and his wife Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean LeBlanc and Jeanne Bourgeois, who had married at Pigiguit in c1750, now had a son and three daughters at Oxford:  Marguerite born at Pigiguit in c1751; Augustin in c1753; Félicité-Perpétué in c1755; and Anne in Maryland in c1759.  Anne gave birth to another daughter, Marie-Madeleine, in the colony less than two years later.  Étienne and his wife Brigitte, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Chênet and Anne Potier of Île St.-Jean, who he had married probably at Pigiguit in c1750, had four young children at Oxford:  Mathurin born at Pigiguit in c1752; Pierre in c1755; and Marie and Marie-Madeleine in c1761.  Also in their household was Marie Bresseau, probably Brasseur, a widow.  Étienne's wife Brigitte died probably at Oxford soon after the July 1763 counting.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  The Bugeauds had no close relatives in Louisiana, though Joseph, fils's wife Anne LeBlanc may have had cousins there.  No matter, the brothers signed up with the first contingent leaving the colony, which left Baltimore for New Orleans in June 1766.  Étienne remarried to a fellow Acadian two years after his arrival.211

Caissie dit Roger

In 1755, descendants of Roger dit Jean Caissie and Marie-Françoise Poirier could be found at the family's base at Chignecto, at Minas, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family to the winds. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Caissies may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, area Acadians, perhaps including Caissies from nearby Pointe-de-Beauséjour, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Caissies were among them.  Joseph Caissie, his wife, and five children, as well as Alexandre Caissie, his wife, and six children, were shipped to South Carolina aboard the British transport Edward Cornwallis, which reached Charles Town in mid-November.  Aboard the transport Endeavor, which arrived in Charles Town harbor at the same time, was Marie-Josèphe Caissie, wife of François Lapierre, and their three children.  In August 1756, colonial officials dispatched 30 Acadians from Charles Town to Prince Frederick Winyaw, a rural Anglican parish farther up the coast at present-day Plantersville, South Carolina.  Among the party was Pierre Caissie.  Chignecto Caissies were sent to other colonies.  Joseph Caissie and his second wife Marie Gaudet ended up in Pennsylvania.  But most of the Chignecto Caissies escaped the British roundup there in the summer and fall of 1755 and found refuge at Shediac and Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and later at the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Others moved on to Canada.  Madeleine Gaudet, widow of Roger Caissie's youngest son Michel, died at Québec in November 1757, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of Acadians in and around the Canadian captial from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Rosalie, 27-year-old daughter of Jean Caissie and his second wife, married Raymond dit Sansrémission, son of François Léger and Marie-Louise Lapierre of Bordeaux, at Montréal in October 1760. 

Not all of the Caissies sent to the southern colonies remained there until the end of the war.  In the spring of 1756, the governors of Georgia and South Carolina, ignoring Governor Lawrence of Nova Scotia, allowed the Acadians in their colonies who were not under arrest to return to their homeland as best they could.  Following the example of merchant Jacques Vigneau dit Maurice of Baie-Verte, 200 of the exiles purchased or built small vessels and headed up the coast.  In late August, after weeks of effort, 78 exiles from South Carolina, led by Michel Bourgeois, came ashore on Long Island, New York, and, at the insistence of the Nova Scotia governor, were detained by colonial officials.  On a list of "names of the heads of the French Neutral families, number of their Children returned from Georgia and distributed through the counties of Westchester and Orange," dated 26 August 1756, can be found John Kase, likely Jean Caissie, at Westchester; and Peter Cassing, likely Pierre Caissie, in Orange County. 

From Minas, Marguerite Caissie, granddaughter of Roger, with husband François Mangeant dit Saint-Germain of Paris, former collector of rents at Minas, and their son Anselme dit Samuel Mangeant, ended up in Maryland.  In the late 1750s, they were among the "French Neutrals" assisted by the influential Carroll family, including a future signer of the Declaration of Independence.  In c1762, probably in Maryland, Anselme married Rose ____.  He was the only one of his parents' seven children to create a family of his own. 

The Caissies on Île-St. Jean, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress of Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean and rounded up most of the habitants there.  Some members of the family escaped to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, but others fell into British hands.  The crossing to France destroyed entire families.  Marie, daughter of Roger and widow of Pierre Deveau; Jacques, son of Roger's son Jean by Jeans's second wife, Jacques's wife Marie-Josèphe Olivier, and their children; Jacques's sister Marie-Blanche, husband Charles Pothier, and their children; and their younger sister Jeanne, her husband Jean-Baptiste Butteau, and their children died aboard one of the two British transports heading to St.-Malo--either the Violet or the Duke William--that sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December.  Other members of the family crossed aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in the same 11-ship convoy in which the Violet and the Duke William had sailed, and, despite the mid-December storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  They included Marie, age 51, daughter of Jean Caissie, husband Michel Grossin, and seven children, ages 21 to 5.  Marie and five of her children survived the crossing.  Husband Michel and two of the children either died at sea or in a local hospital not long after the family reached the Breton port.  Marie's younger sister Cécile, age 45, crossed with husband Pierre Grossin, Michel's brother, and nine children, ages 22 to 2.  Cécile, Pierre, and seven of their children survived the crossing, but two of the children died at sea or in a local hospital.  Marie and Cécile Caissie's younger brother Michel, age 38, crossed with wife Marguerite Henry, age 27, and five children--Marie-Osite, called Osite, age 8; Marie-Gervaise, age 7; Jean, age 5; Paul, age 3; and Pierre, age 1.  Michel, Marguerite, and daughter Osite survived the crossing, but the four youngest children died at sea.  Marie, Cécile, and Michel Caissie's sister Madeleine, age unrecorded, widow of Jean-Baptiste Habel dit Duvivier and wife of Louis Le Monnier, age 35, crossed with six of her children from her first marriage, ages 23 to 5.  (Her second husband Louis had fought in the siege of Louisbourg, was captured by the British, and would be held as a prisoner in England for the rest of the war.)  Madeleine and four of her children survived the crossing, but two of the children died at sea.  Marie, Cécile, Michel, and Madeleine Caissie's sister Marguerite, widow of Christophe Delaune, along with their brother Paul, age 27, a widower, and his son Paul, fils, age 2, landed not at St.-Malo but at Cherbourg in Normandy.  Paul and his son soon joined their kinsmen at St.-Malo, but Marguerite remained at Cherbourg.  She remarried to Joseph, son of fellow island Acadians Guillaume Le Prieur dit Dubois and Madeleine Poitevin and widow of Marie Quimine, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in October 1759.  They were still at Cherbourg in 1761 and 1772 but moved on to the lower Loire port of Nantes by 1785. 

Island Caissies did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Michel Caissie settled with wife Marguerite Henry and their daughter Osite in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Marguerite gave him at least eight more children there:  Michel-Claude in July 1760; Jean-Baptiste in January 1762; Pierre-Paul in September 1764; Marie-Marguerite in April 1766; Françoise-Théodose in March 1768; Henriette-Victoire, also called Marie-Victoire, in December 1769 but died at age 2 1/2 in May 1772; Amand-Louis in October 1771; and Geneviève-Sophie-Ulalie in October 1774.  After moving from Cherbourg, where he had been transported with older sister Marguerite and her family, Michel's younger brother Paul and his son Paul, fils settled at St.-Servan and then at nearby Paramé on the coast east of St.-Malo.  Paul remarried to Marie-Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Haché and Cécile Lavergne and widow of François Chiasson, at Paramé in June 1760.  Marie-Anne also had crossed from Île St.-Jean aboard one of the Five Ships and had lost her husband and three children at sea.  She gave Paul at least two more children at Paramé:  Marie-Geneviève in March 1761 but died at nearby St.-Méloir-des-Ondes, age 1 1/2, in December 1762; and an unnamed girl, age unrecorded, died at home in Paramé in August 1762.  Marie-Anne died at Paramé in August 1762, age 31, and Paul remarried again--his third marriage--to Françoise, daughter of locals François Cadieux and Marie Blanchard of St.-Servan, at St.-Servan in July 1763.  She gave Paul no more children.  He died in a hospital in St.-Malo in October 1763, age 32.  Son Paul, fils, only age 7 when his father died, remained at St.-Servan.  Michel and Paul's older sister Marie, at age 56, remarried to Charles, son of fellow Acadians Jacques Hébert and Marguerite Landry and widower of Marguerite LeBlanc, at St.-Malo in March 1764.  Charles, age 54 at the time of his remarriage, also had crossed from the Maritimes on one of the Five Ships and lost his wife at sea.  They settled not only at St.-Malo, but also at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Servan, and at St.-Servan.  Marie, Michel, and Paul's sister Cécile, now a widow, settled at Paramé, where, in June 1760, at age 46, she remarried to Nicolas, fils, son of Nicolas Bouchard and Anne Veau dit Sylvain of St.-Thomas, Canada, and widower of Acadian Marie-Anne Chiasson.  Nicolas had been counted on Rivière-du-Nord-Est in the interior of Île St.-Jean in August 1752, so one wonders if he had known Cécile and her husband back on the island.  He also had crossed from Île St.-Jean aboard one of the Five Ships and lost his wife at sea.  Cécile gave him no more children.  In 1763, sister Madeleine's husband Louis Le Monnier arrived at St.-Malo from a prisoner-of-war camp in England and rejoined his family at Paramé. 

In April 1764, Cécile Caissie, husband Nicolas Bouchard, and their children, as well as sister Madeleine Caissie and her husband Louis LeMonnier, left France aboard Le Fort for the new French colony of Guiane on the north coast of South America, with tragic result.  Madeleine was pregnant when the family left France; daughter Marie-Jeanne Le Monnier was baptized at age 6 weeks "by a midwife ... because of necessity" aboard Le Fort in September 1764.  Cécile's husband Nicholas was an early casualty of the venture; he died at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district in February 1765, age 42.  Cécile remarried again--her third marriage--to Frenchman Alexis, son of Jean-Isaac Hilairet and Marie David of Lansac, Sainte, France, at St.-Sauveur, Cayenne, in July 1765.  Cécile died at St.-Sauveur in August 1768, age 54, surrounded by her loved ones.  Meanwhile, younger sister Madeleine also died in Guiane, at St.-Joseph, Sinnamary, in August 1765, age 45. 

No Caissie family still in France went to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany in November 1765, nor to the interior province of Poitou in 1773.  Nearly all of them remained in the St.-Malo suburbs.  When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, none of the Caissie's still in the mother country agreed to take it.  Marguerite Caissie, wife or widow of Joseph Le Prieur, died at Chantenay near Nantes on the lower Loire in January 1787, age 71.  In c1790, Michel Caissie's son Michel-Claude and his wife left France for the British-controlled fishery at Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  In 1793, French Revolutionary officials counted a number of Caissies, called Quessy, "in the area around St.-Malo," most of them siblings of Michel-Claude:  Marie-Osite, age 46, no husband mentioned; Jean-Baptiste, age 31, a sailor, no wife mentioned; Pierre, age 29, also a sailor, no wife mentioned; Françoise, age 25, wife of ____ Jouanne, described as poor; Geneviève, age 18, wife of _____ Tardier; Bonaventure, also a native of St.-Servan, age 6; Marguerite, age 5; and Marie, age 3.  Pierre-Michel Quessy, born at St.-Servan in October 1787, also may have been a son of Michel.  Counted in the St.-Malo area that year was their first cousin Paul Quessy, fils, age 36, also a seaman, no wife and children mentioned. 

In North America, conditions got only worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, a second British naval force, this one from Québec, arrived at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  No Caissie appears on the list.  However, Jean-Baptiste Perial and his family of seven do appear on it.  Perial's wife, Rosalie Comeau, was the second wife and widow of Michel Caissie dit Roger le jeune, a grandson of Roger, and her son Joseph Caissie, who would have been age 15, probably was included in the family.  Sometime in the early 1760s, these and other members of the family still in the area either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces, who held them in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted nine members of a Caissie family at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, only a stone's throw from their old homesteads at Chignecto.  The official called Joseph, son of Michel Caissie and Madeleine Gaudet of Chignecto, a Quessy.  With him was his wife Marie-Josèphe Lapierre and seven of their children:  Marie, Jean-Baptiste, Anastasie, Madeleine, Pierre, Joseph dit Maître, and Étienne. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, like their kinsmen in Nova Scotia, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions,.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In June 1763 in Pennsylvania, Joseph Quisse, likely Caissie, his wife Marie Gaudet, and a child were still living in that colony.  In July 1763, at Annapolis, Maryland, colonial officials counted Marguerite Caissie, age 67, widow of François Mangeant dit Saint-Germain of Paris and former collector of rents at Minas, her son Anselme, and his wife Rose.  In South Carolina that August, colonial officials counted Marie-Josèphe Quessy, husband François Lepierre, and a 13-year-old son; and Française Quesy, age 12, with the family of Simon LeBlanc and Marie Arseneau. 

In the early 1760s, to avoid British rule, at least one Caissie chose to follow dozens of her fellow Acadians in the seaboard colonies to French St.-Domingue.  Françoise, daughter of Jean Caissie and wife of Claude Tandeau of Montauban, France, and Chignecto, died at Port-au-Prince in May 1764, age 40. 

Most of the Caissies in the seaboard colonies chose to resettle in Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Roger Caissie began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Caissies could be found at Québec City, and at Batiscan and Champlain on the upper St. Lawrence between Québec City and Trois-Rivières.  They were especially numerous at Bastiscan.  They also could be found at Bonaventure, Carleton, Miguasha, Newport, and Paspébiac in Gaspésie; and at Baie-de-Vins, Cocagne, Grande-Digue, and Richibouctou in present-day southeastern New Brunswick.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada, who called themselves Caissie, lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, who called themselves Roger, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of the February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to go to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including a Caissie, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least four were Cassie dit Rogers.

The Acadians in Maryland endured life among Englishmen, who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their resouches to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Marguerite Cassie, widow of François Mangeant, her son Anselme, and daughter-in-law Rose were not among.  They chose, instead, to remain in the Chesapeake colony, where, in the late 1750s, when François was still alive, they had been assisted by the influential Carroll family.  Marguerite's son Anselme was counted by federal census takers at Baltimore in 1790 and 1800, one of the remarkable number of Acadians still residing in the state of Maryland.297

Carret

When the British struck at Chignecto in the summer of 1755, captured Fort Beauséjour, and deported the local Acadians to British colonies along the Atlantic coast, most of the sons of Pierre Carret, père, the old soldier, and Angélique Chiasson ended up in South Carolina.  Jean and Germain Carret and their families sailed aboard the British ship Edward Cornwallis, which left Chignecto in October 1755 and reached Charles Town a month later.  Brother Joseph and his family sailed on the British sloop Endeavour, which accompanied the Edward Cornwallis to South Carolina.  Pierre, fils's family, however, seems to have escaped the deportation of October 1755 and made their way north to the St. Lawrence valley, where one of Pierre's daughters married at St.-Laurent, Île d'Orleans, just downriver from Québec, in June 1763.  

In South Carolina, the old soldier's descendants endured the prejudice and neglect they encountered there as best they could.  In late January 1756, not long after he had reached the British colony, Charles-Ignace Carret was declared a lunatic; he had perhaps become unhinged by his experiences aboard one of the British transports.  When the war with Britain finally ended in early 1763, the Acadians remaining in South Carolina were allowed to leave the colony.  Many of them emigrated to French St.-Domingue, today's Haiti, where they hoped to make a new life for themselves away from British rule.  Among them were descendants of Pierre Carret.  Marie-Thérèse Carret, wife of Jean Grisard or Guisard, whom she had married in St.-Domingue in February 1776, died of a fever at Môle St.-Nicolas, on the north shore of the island, in July 1788, age 45.  Likely born at Chignecto, she probably was the daughter of one of the younger sons of Pierre Carret.  

The old soldier's daughters and their families who had emigrated to Île St.-Jean in the late 1740s or early 1750s lived in territory controlled by France, so they escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the island, rounded up most of its habitants, and deported them to France.  One of Pierre Carret's daughters, Marie, age 40, made the crossing aboard one the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in a 12-ship convoy and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  With her was her husband, Jean Henry, and six of their children.  All of the family survived the terrible crossing except the youngest, daughter Anastasie, age 6.  Pierre Carret's daughters and their families remained in France, enduring life there as best they could.  When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, most of the Acadians took it, but none were descendants of Pierre Carret the soldier.  

The Carrets who did go to Louisiana were descendants of the old soldier's namesake, Ignace dit Saint-Jacques Carret of Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse, Île Royale, and his wife Cécile Henry.  Like their namesakes on Île St.-Jean, their respite from British oppression ended after the fall of the French fortress at nearby Louisbourg.  The Acadians and Frenchmen on Île Royale also were packed off to France in late 1758.  The deportation devastated this branch of the Carret family.  They, too, sailed on one or more of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in late November and reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Ignace, père, age 84 according to the passenger list, and his wife Cécile, age 65, survived the crossing despite their advanced ages.  So did unmarried sons Honoré, age 25, and Ignace, fils, age 13, who traveled with them.  But eight members of the family did not survive the crossing, including three other unmarried sons who traveled with them:  Joseph, age 31, died in the hospital at St.-Servan, near St.-Malo, in March 1759, soon after reaching the Breton port.  François, age 21, died in a local hospital in February 1759.  And Zénon, age 20, died probably in a St.-Malo hospital three days after his brother François died.  Son Charles, age 37, a widower, traveled with three children--daughters Susanne, age 5, and Rosalie, age 2, and son Pierre, age 4.  All three of the children died at sea.  Charles died in the hospital at St.-Servan in early March 1759.   Ignace's married son Jean, age 35, also a widower, accompanied his two daughters--Marie-Rose, age 9, and Thérèse, age 7--aboard one of the Five Ships.  The girls survived, but Jean died in the hospital probably at St.-Malo in February 1759.  

Ignace, père and his remaining family settled in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Honoré married Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Benoit and Marie-Madeleine Thériot, in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in March 1759.  They lived for a while at Châteauneuf on the east bank of the river south of St.-Servan, where Honoré worked as a day laborer.  They returned to St.-Servan in 1760 and were still there in 1772.  Son Pierre-Marin was born at St.-Servan in July 1761; and Jean-Marie in February 1765 but died at age 2 1/2 in November 1767.  Brother Ignace, fils, also a day laborer, married Mari-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Clémençeau and Françoise Gautrot, at St.-Servan in October 1767.  Daughter Marie-Madeleine was born at St.-Servan in September 1768 but died soon afterwards.  Son Eustache-Ignace was born at St.-Malo in March 1770; and Jean le jeune a year later.  Honoré and Ignace, fils's brother Jean's daughter Marie-Rose married Grégoire, son of fellow Acadians Claude Benoit and Élisabeth Thériot, at St.-Servan in February 1770.  Meanwhile, Ignace, père's wife Cécile Henry died at St.-Suliac near Châteauneuf in August 1761, age 65.  Ignace, père died at St.-Suliac three months later, age 74.  

In the early 1770s, French officials came up with a scheme to settle Acadians languishing in the port cities on farmland owned by an influential French nobleman in the interior province of Poitou near the city of Châtellerault.  Honoré and Ignace, fils remained at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, but their niece Marie-Rose Carret and her husband Grégoire Benoit went to Poitou with hundreds of other Acadians.  After two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians, including Marie-Rose and Grégoire, retreated to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they lived on government subsidies and what work they could find.  By 1784, Honoré and Ignace, fils and their families also had left St.-Servan and joined their fellow Acadians at Nantes.  When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, members of this branch of the Carret family jumped at the opportunity.215

Célestin dit Bellemère

In 1755, descendants of André Célestin dit Bellemère and Perrine Basile still could be found at Grand-Pré.  The British rounded up son Antoine Célestin's family that autumn and deported them to Maryland.  Like other Minas families in the colony, the Célestins endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care very much for the French "papists" who had been thrust upon them.  In July 1763, colonial authorities counted the families of Charles, Pierre, and Joseph Célestin and their single brothers Honoré and Antoine at Annapolis.  Amazingly, when over 600 of the Maryland Acadians sailed to New Orleans in four expeditions from 1766 to 1769, none of the Célestins joined them.  Surrounded by fellow exiles and French expatriates, they settled at Frenchtown in Baltimore, where their transition from Acadien to Americain went faster for them than for their Acadian cousins who had gone on to the Spanish colony. 

Antoine's older brother Jacques dit Jacob Bellemère and his family also were rounded up by the British in the fall of 1755, but they were sent to Massachusetts and Virginia.  Jacques's daughter Marie-Osite married a Breau in Massachusetts and followed him to Canada in 1767.  Meanwhile, her cousins in the Old Dominion suffered a fate much worse than she and her kinsmen who had been sent to Maryland.  Governor Robert Dinwiddie and Virginia's House of Burgesses refused to allow the exiles to remain in the Old Dominion.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Dinwiddie and the burgesses made their decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all.  In England, the Acadians were packed in warehouses in several coastal cities, where many died of smallpox.  Until the Acadians in England were repatriated to France in the spring of 1763, Jacques dit Bellemère's family was held at Southampton.

One of Antoine's descendants seems to have gotten to France before his kinsmen.  Pierre Bellemer, age 22, died at Cherbourg, Normandy, in December 1758, perhaps soon after he arrived aboard a deportation ship from one of the French Maritime islands.  The Très-Ste.-Trinité parish priest who recorded Pierre's burial did not give his parents' names or his place of birth, so one wonders how, or if, he was kin to the Célestin dit Bellemères.

Several of Jacques dit Bellemère's children survived the ordeal at Southampton and ended up in France.  Jacques's son Bruno, born probably at Grand-Pré in c1723, married fellow Acadian Anne Breau, widow of ____ Gautrot, in England in 1759.  After repatriation, they and two of their children--Pierre, born in c1760, and Marie-Marguerite in c1763, plus two of Anne's sons by her first marriage--reached St.-Malo aboard the transport Ambition in late May 1763 and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo.  Son Pierre died at St.-Servan in June 1763, age 3 1/2.  Bruno and Marie had at least five more children at St.-Servan between 1765 and 1773:  Jean-Pierre in March 1765 but died at age 4 in March 1769; Josèphe-Marie in November 1766; Rosalie-Geneviève in August 1768 but died at age 4 1/2 in February 1773; Michelle-Françoise in April 1771 but died 10 months later; and Perrine-Victoire in January 1773 but died the following March.  In the early 1770s, Bruno and Marie became part of a settlement scheme in the interior province of Poitou that also ended tragically for them.  Daughter Marie-Marguerite died near Châtellerault at age 11 1/2 in August 1774.  After Marie-Marguerite's death, only daughter Josèphe-Marie remained.  Bruno died at L'Hopital de Châtellerault in December 1774, in his early 50s.  Wife Anne Breau may have died by then:  When most the Acadians abandoned the Poitou venture in late 1775 and retreated to the port city of Nantes, Josèphe-Marie traveled not with her widowed mother but as an orphan with the family of François Boudrot and his second wife Euphrosine Barrieau. 

Jacques dit Bellemère's son Joseph, born probably at Grand-Pré in c1728, also came to France aboard L'Ambition, with his wife Marguerite Boudrot, who he had married in England in c1759, and two children:  Joseph, fils, born in c1760, and Marie in c1762.  Also with them was Joseph, père's younger sister Félicité, born at Minas in c1741.  They settled at St.-Servan near St.-Malo, where Marguerite gave Joseph three more children:  Marie-Marguerite, born in October 1763 but died the following August; Anne-Marie, born in December 1765; and Jean-Baptiste in February 1767 but died the following May.  Joseph, père died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in August 1767; he was 39 years old.  Wife Marguerite died at St.-Servan the following October.  Félicité, who may have raised her two nieces and a nephew, bore a "natural son," Jean-Jacques Bellemère, at St.-Servan in June 1768.  The boy's baptismal record says nothing of who his father might have been.  Félicité was still at St.-Servan in 1772. 

Jacques dit Bellemère's daughter Marguerite, born at Grand-Pré in c1735, married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians François LeBlanc and Jeanne Hébert and widower of Marie Landry, at Southampton, England, in August 1758.  Their son Moïse was born at Southampton in September 1761.  They, too, were repatriated to France aboard L'Ambition in May 1763.  Marguerite and Jean-Baptiste had more children in France, at least three more sons and two daughters.  Jean-Baptiste died at Chantenay, near Nantes, in September 1782; he was 58 years old.  One wonders what happened to Marguerite.  She did not go to Louisiana. 

Jacques dit Bellemère's daughter Anastasie, born at Grand-Pré in May 1739, married fellow exile Jean-Baptiste Boudrot probably at Southampton and went with him and two of their children to France aboard L'Ambition in May 1763.  She gave Jean-Baptiste at least five more children in France, including a daughter born in Poitou in 1779 who died at Archigny a year and a half later.  Jean-Baptiste also may have died in Poitou.  Anastasie did not remain there.  At age 45, in August 1784, she remarried to Honoré, 70-yar-old son of Jean-Baptiste Comeau and Anne-Marie Thibodeau of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, and widower of Marguerite Poirier, at St.-Martin-de-Chantenay. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Anastasie Bellemère, her husband Honoré Comeau, and three of her Boudrot sons, one of them married, agreed to take it.  Anastasie's niece, Josèphe-Marie, the only surviving child of brother Bruno, also agreed to go there.  The other Bellemères chose to remain in France.192

Chaillou

Jeanne Chaillou, born in c1733, place unrecorded, married Jean-Baptiste, son of Abraham Bourg le jeune and Marie Dugas, on Île St.-Pierre, a French-controlled island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, in October 1763.  Their son Jean was born perhaps on Île St.-Pierre in c1764, and daughter Marie-Geneviève was born on nearby Île Miquelon in c1767.  

Soon after Marie-Geneviève's birth, French authorities determined that îles St.-Pierre and Miquelon were overcrowded and that the Acadian refugees there must be transported to France.  The first of them left in early October 1767 and landed in the ports of St.-Malo, Brest, Lorient, and Rochefort.  More followed in November.  Jean-Baptiste Bourg, wife Jeanne Chaillou, and their children evidently were among the deportees.  Between 1769 and 1775, Jeanne gave Jean-Baptiste three more children, all sons:  Jean-Baptiste, fils at La Rochelle in c1769; André in c1771; and Charles at Monthoiron, Poitou, in January 1775.  The family's presence in Poitou in the early 1770s reveals that it was part of the Acadian settlement venture near the city of Châtellerault, which had commenced in early 1773.  In March 1776, Jean-Baptiste, Jeanne, and their children retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the port city of Nantes.  Jean-Baptiste died there in August 1777, age 44. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Jeanne Chaillou and her four Bourg children agreed to take it.216

Chiasson

By 1755, descendants of Guyon Chiasson dit La Vallée of La Rochelle and his two wives Jeanne Bernard and Marie-Madeleine Martin could be found in the St. Lawrence valley, where they had gone as early as the late 1690s; at Chignecto; and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Abbé Le Loutre and his Mi'kmaq warriors, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river, Chiassons probably among them.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local Acadians, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  That fall, the British transported Abraham, son of Gabriel dit Pierre Chiasson, Abraham's wife Marie Poirier, and their five children, including son Paul, to South Carolina aboard the British transport Cornwallis.  Also aboard that vessel were Anne Chiasson, her husband Charles Doucet, and their nine children.  Jean Chiasson, a bachelor, went to South Carolina aboard the sloop Endeavor.  Madeleine Chiasson, wife of François Cormier, also ended up in South Carolina.  The experience took its toll on the family.  Meanwhile, Acadians who had escaped the roundup at Chignecto fled to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they took refuge at Shediac and Miramichi.  By 1760, some had moved up to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Two of Abraham Chiasson's older son--Pierre and his new wife Osite Landry; and Joseph and his wife Annette Saulnier--were among the escapees. 

When the British rounded up their cousins at Chignecto, the many Chiassons on Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the island and deported them to France.  Some, perhaps most, of the island Chiassons, especially Jacques of Tracadie and his large family, escaped the redcoats and sought refuge on the mainland, but many members of the family were rounded up and shunted aboard hired British transports.  Entire Chiasson families were lost in the crossing to St.-Malo.  Two Chiasson wives--Judith, daughter of Gabriel dit Pierre and wife of Pierre Le Prieur dit Dubois l'aîné, and her cousin Marie, daughter of Sébastien and wife of Jean-Baptiste Vécot--along with their families, died at sea when their transport, the Violet, sank in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England .  Most of the island Chiassons crossed to St.-Malo on one or more of the five transports which, like the Violet, left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in an 11-ship convoy, but, despite the mid-December storm off the coast of England, reached the Breton port together in late January 1759.  Most of the Chiassons did not survive the crossing or its rigors.  François Chiasson, père, age 60, crossed on one of the Five Ships with wife Anne Doucet, age unrecorded, and their younget sons--Louis, age 17; and Chrysostôme, age 12.  François and son Louis died in St.-Malo hospitals soon after they reached the Breton port.  Wife Anne Doucet died at sea.  Only son Chrysostôme, age 12, survived the ordeal.  Son François, fils, age 31, along with five of his children--Marie, age 12; François III, age 6; Marie-Geneviève, age 4; Jean-François, age 3; and an unnamed infant, probably Marie-Madeleine, age 1--crossed on one of the Five Ships and died at sea.  Only François, fils's wife Marie-Anne Haché dit Gallant, age 26, survived the ordeal.  Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, age 30, another of François, père's sons, survived the crossing on one of the Five Ships, but he lost his wife Louise Precieux, age 25, in a St.-Malo hospital in February.  Two of their children--Jean, age 6; and Anne, age 4--died at sea.  Marie Chiasson, age 27, wife of Nicolas Bouchard, age 32, crossed on the one of the Five Ships and died at sea along with two of their four children.  Françoise Chiasson, age 54, her husband Guillaume Patry d'Evran, age 53, and their three children survived the crossing aboard one of the Five Ships.  Not so Marie-Josèphe, another daughter of Gabriel dit Pierre Chiasson, who died at sea along with husband Jacques Quimine, age 60.  Only their 23-year-old daughter Françoise survived the crossing.  Marie-Josèphe, called Josèphe, age 24, daughter of François Chiasson, père, and her husband Michel Grossin, age 25, survived the crossing on one of the Five Ships.  Josèphe was pregnant when she left Île St.-Jean and gave birth to a son at St.-Malo in early February, soon after they reached port.  The baby died three weeks after his birth, and Josèphe died at Paramé northeast of St.-Malo in June 1759.  

An island Chiasson created a new family in the St.-Malo area.  Jean Chiasson, who had lost his wife and two children aboard one of the Five Ships, settled at Paramé.  At age 32, he remarried to Marguerite-Josèphe, 17-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Dugas and Marguerite Benoit, at nearby St.-Méloir-des-Ondes in June 1761.  She gave him two more sons at Paramé and nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer:  Jean-Baptiste at La Blanche in January 1763; and Joseph-François at St.-Servan in November 1765.  Marie-Josèphe died at St.-Servan in June 1766, age 22, and Jean, at age 40, remarried--his third marriage--to Anne-Perrine, 31-year-old daughter of Jacques Joanne and Perrine Charpentier of St.-Malo, at St.-Servan in January 1769.  She gave him another son, Pierre-Louis, at St.-Servan in October 1769.  Jean's youngest brother Chrysostôme, age 12 when he survived the crossing to St.-Malo, joined his older brother at Paramé after the death of their father and likely accompanied Jean and his new family to St.-Servan in 1763. 

Island Chiassons landed at other French ports, including Cherbourg in Normandy and Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of family progenitor Guyon dit LaVallée and his second wife Marie-Madeleine Martin, had married, at age 70, Joseph De La Forestrie of Île St.-Jean.  She died at Cherbourg in August 1759, not long after she made the crossing from Île St.-Jean.  A much younger Madeleine Chiasson died at Cherbourg in August 1762, age 25.  Anne, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Chiasson, was at Cherbourg in March 1767.  Basile, son of Pierre Chiasson of Pointe-des-Beauséjour, Chignecto, was still a child when he was taken to Île St.-Jean in the 1750s.  He also ended up at Cherbourg, where he married fellow Acadian Monique Comeau in c1772.  Their unnamed child died there in April 1773.  Pierre Chiasson, a butcher, died in the naval port of Rochefort in August 1763, age 61.  Catherine Chiasson, widow of Pierre Fragneau, married French day laborer Jacques, son of Gabriel Rayne and Anne Bouchet of Gane, Bourbonois, at Rochefort in August 1764. 

In 1773, Jean Chiasson from St.-Servan-sur-Mer, perhaps his younger brother Chrysostôme, and their cousin Basile Chiasson from Cherbourg, agreed to take part in a major settlement venture in the interior of Poitou.  Monique gave Basile two daughters there:  Anne-Adélaïde in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in April 1774; and Anne-Marie-Marthe in October 1775.  Jean's third wife Anne-Perrine gave him another daughter, Anne-Rosalie, in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in May 1775--seven children, four sons and three daughters, by three wives, between 1753 and 1775, in greater Acadia and France.  In November and December 1775, after two years of effort, Basile, Jean, and perhaps Chrysostôme retreated with other Poitou Acadians down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes, where they lived on government handouts and what work they could find.  By then, Jean, who worked as a carpenter at Nantes, had only three children left--two sons and a daughter by two of his wives.  He and Anne-Perrine evidently had no more children at Nantes but lost their daughter Anne-Rosalie probably in St.-Jacques Parish by 1785; born in Poitou, she was still a child at the time of her passing.  Cousin Basile worked as a sailor and a cooper at Nantes.  Monique gave him at least three sons in Ste.-Croix Parish:  Louis-Basile in December 1780 but died at age 21 months in August 1782; Charles-Albert in c1783; and Louis-Joseph in September 1784--six children, at least two daughters and three sons, between 1773 and 1784, at Cherbourg, in Poitou, and at Nantes.  Their second daughter Anne-Marie-Marthe, born in Poitou, had gone with the family to Nantes, but she likely died in Ste.-Croix Parish before September 1784, when Basile and Monique, along with hundreds of other exiles in France, had chosen to go to Spanish Louisiana. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Jean as well as Basile Chiasson, at Nantes and nearby Chantenay, agreed to take it.  Both families originally booked passage on L'Amitié, the fifth of the Seven Ships, and Jean, wife Anne-Perrine, and two of their sons crossed to New Orleans on that vessel.  Basile's infant son Louis-Joseph was too ill to travel when L'Amitié left Paimboeuf, the lower port Nantes, in late August 1785.  Louis-Joseph died at Chantenay the following month, and Basile and his family sailed on La Caroline, the last of  the Seven Ships, which left Nantes in late October.  Jean's brother Chrysostôme, who would have been in his mid-30s at the time, did not go with them.  One wonders if he had died by then or had created a family of his own in France and chose to remain. 

A Chiasson family came to France by a different route but likely did not remain.  Joseph, oldest son of Pierre Chiasson and Marie-Josèphe Boudrot of Chignecto and grandson of Jacques Chiasson of Tracadie, Île St.-Jean, had been born probably at Tracadie a few years before the island's dérangement.  Joseph's family were among the islanders who escaped the roundup there in late 1758 and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  By the early 1760s, they had either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area, who held them in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted Joseph and his family at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, near the family's old home at Chignecto, where his father Pierre died in 1764.  Soon after his father's death, Joseph followed his widowed mother to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Also there were his grandfather Jacques Chiasson and some of his aunts and uncles who the British had held in the old fishing center at Chédabouctou on the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia during the war.  In 1767, French officials, obeying a royal decree to reduce overcrowding in the northern fishery, deported the fisher/habitants on the Newfoundland islands to France.  Joseph and his family likely were among them.  With royal permission, most of the islanders returned to Miquelon the following year.  In late 1778, soon after the French became allies of the Americans in their fight against the British, the Royal Navy captured Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported the fisher/habitants to La Rochelle, France.  Joseph, now age 24, married Anne, daughter of fellow island Acadians Jean Vigneau and Marie Bourgeois, soon after he reached the French port.  Their son Jean-Joseph was born at La Rochelle in February 1781; and another son, Étienne-Isidore, died there eight days after his birth in April 1783.  Joseph and his family evidently returned to Miquelon in 1784 after the British returned the islands to France.  One thing is certain--they did not follow his Chiasson cousins Jean and Basile to Spanish Louisiana in 1785. 

In North America, other island Chiassons who had escaped the British in the late 1750s suffered a similar fate.  Another Joseph, this one son of François Chiasson, père, fled from Île St.-Jean to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore with his wife Anne Haché dit Gallant, and they made their way up to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche, destroyed the remnants of a French fleet there, but failed to capture the post itself.  The French and Acadians at Restigouche were nevertheless cut off from the rest of New France.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Joseph à François Chiason and his family of four were on the list.  Joseph and Anne's son Jean-Baptiste was baptized at Restigouche in February 1761.  They and other Chiassons from Chignecto and Île St.-Jean who had either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area were held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war, or perhaps Joseph à François and his family remained at Restigouche.  In August 1763, British officials at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto, counted two Chiasson families in the prison compound there:  Pierre, wife Marie-Josèphe [Boudrot], son Joseph, and daughter Lucie, from Île St.-Jean; and another Pierre, wife Ozite [Landry], and sons Michel and Joseph, from Chignecto.  The first Pierre died at Fort Cumberland in 1764, in his late 30s.  Meanwhile, in 1760, British officials in Nova Scotia counted Jacques Chiasson, the deceased Pierre's father, and members of his family at the fishing center of Chédabouctou on the Atlantic coast, where captured exiles also were held, before moving to Île Miquelon. 

Joseph à François Chiasson and his family at Restigouche also chose to remain in greater Acadia, but they selected a different fishery.  Sometime in the 1760s, they settled on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore at Nipisiguit, now Bathurst, where the British counted them in 1772.  Later in the decade, they moved on to Miscou, an island on the southern end of the Baie des Chaleurs, but they did not remain there either.  Their sons settled at Carleton and Paspébiac in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, and at Caraquet on the Gulf shore west of Miscou, where they likely worked in British-controlled fisheries.  After the war, other members of the family, most of them sons and daughters of Jacques Chiasson of Tracadie, settled at Rustico and Tignish on the north shore of St. John Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, renamed Prince Edward Island in 1798; at Chéticamp, Grand-Étang, and Margaree on the northwest coast of Cape Breton Island, formerly Île Royale; and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence--all British fisheries.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  Perhaps not surprisingly, considering how long they had been separated, none of the Chiassons who settled in the fisheries of greater Acadia chose to join their many Giasson cousins in the St. Lawrence valley.  

Chiassons being held at Fort Cumberland, Nova Scotia, at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in Nova Scotia, they could live only in the interior of the peninsula in small family groups and work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the hated oath if they joined their cousins in the St. Lawrence valley.  After all that they had suffered on the question of the oath, no self-respecting Acadian would consent to take it if it could be avoided.   Some Nova Scotia exiles, including a family of Chiassons, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including at least one Chiasson, had gone; or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France; or to French Louisiana, which was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, four were Chiassons.

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In August 1763, Chignecto Chiassons appearding on a French repatriation list circulating in South Carolina included Jean-Marie Chiasson, age not given, evidently a widower, and sons Charles, age 13, and Jean, age 2; Anne Chiasson, her husband Charles Douset, and no children; Magdeleine Chiasson, evidently a widow, and her 10-year-old son Pierre Cormier; and orphan Paul Chiasson, age 18, with the family of Jean Olivau.  Evidently Paul's parents had not survived their ordeal in the southern colony.  Pierre Chiasson, while at Fort Cumerberland, may have heard through the Acadian grapevine that his parents, who had been deported from Chignecto to South Carolina in 1755, had died in that British colony but that his youngest brother Paul, now in his teens, had survived the ordeal.  Pierre also may have learned that in 1763 or 1764 his brother had emigrated from South Carolina to French St.-Domingue with hundreds of other exiles in the seaboard colonies to work on a new French naval base on the northwest coast of the island.  If Pierre was aware that his brother Paul was still in the sugar colony, he likely resolved to search for him as soon as he and the other Halifax exiles reached Cap-Français.  As it turned out, he did try to find his younger brother there, and the search was a fruitful one.  Paul, now age 19, accompanied his older brother and his family to the Mississippi valley in 1765.217

Clémençeau

By 1755, descendants of Jean Clémençeau dit Beaulieu and his legitimate wife Anne Roy could be found at Port-Toulouse, Île Royale; on Île St.-Jean; and at Chignecto.  Jean's "natural" son Jean-Pierre and his family were at Grand-Pré.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther.

In the fall of 1755, British forces deported the Acadians at Minas to Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and New England.  Jean-Pierre Clémençeau, his second wife Françoise Gautrot, and at least two of their daughters--Marie, age 4; and Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, age 3--ended up in Virginia.  In mid-November, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, refused to allow the hundreds of Acadians sent to him to remain in the colony.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships in the lower James River while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Dinwiddie ordered Acadians from one vessel to be moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Governor Dinwiddie and Virginia's House of Burgesses made their decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 total exiles.  The English held them in warehouses in these crowded ports, where many died of smallpox during the following months. 

One of Jean Clémençeau's daughters, Marguerite dit Beaulieu, wife of Jean-Baptiste Lejeune dit Briard, who had been counted with her family Anse-aux-Matelot on the southern shore of Île St.-Jean in August 1752, died at St.-Jean, Île d'Orléans, below Québec City in November 1756.  She and her family may have returned to Nova Scotia after the 1752 counting and escaped the British roundup there in the fall of 1755, or they may have left Île St.-Jean for Canada when they learned of the Nova Scotia deportations.  

Jean Clémençeau's other descendants on Île St.-Jean and those on Île Royale, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758 the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the islands and transported them to France.  Jean's daughter Marie-Anne, widow of Nicolas Lavigne, and five of her children crossed to St.-Malo on the transport Queen of Spain, which left Louisbourg in late summer and reached the Breton port in late November.  Marie-Anne died on the crossing, along with three of her younger children.  Marie Clémençeau, age 20, wife of Antoine Haché dit Gallant, and two of his relatives, crossed on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  They all survived the crossing and settled in the St.-Malo area.  

Meanwhile, the Acadians in England endured life in the port cities as best they could.  By 1763, more than half of them were dead, including most likely Jean-Pierre Clémençeau and his second wife Françoise Gautrot.  In May of that year, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  Among them were Jean-Pierre's two daughters--Marie, age 12, and Marie-Madeleine, age 11--who sailed to St.-Malo aboard the transport Ambition with relatives.  The sisters lived with separate families in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where at least one of their cousins had gone.  Marie moved on to Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo in 1764.  Marie-Madeleine, the first to marry, remained at St.-Servan.  She wed Ignace, fils, son of fellow Acadians Ignace Carret and Cécile Henry, there in October 1767.  Sister Marie returned to St.-Servan in 1765 and was still there, unmarried, in 1772.  Later in the decade or in the early 1780s, she joined hundreds of other exiles in the lower Loire port of Nantes, where, in her early 30s, she married Pierre, fils, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Trahan and Madeleine Comeau and widower of Marguerite LeBlanc, Élisabeth Darois, and Madeleine Vincent, in St.-Donatien Parish, Nantes, in February 1783.  Pierre, fils was old enough to be her father.  She gave him another daughter, Louise-Renée, at Chantenay near Nantes in January 1784.  Sister Marie-Madeleine, her husband, and their children also moved to Nantes by September 1784. 

In the early 1770s, their cousin Marie Clémençeau, her husband Antoine Haché dit Gallant, and their children were part of an attempt by French authorities to settle hundreds of exiles languishing in the port cities on marginal land in the interior province of Poitou owned by an influential nobleman.  In November 1775, after two years of effort, Marie and her family retreated with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes.  Marie died at nearby Chantenay in November 1782, age 40.  

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Sisters Marie and Marie-Madeleine Clémençeau and their husbands agreed to take it.  The sisters, in fact, may have been the only Acadian Clémençeaus still living in the mother country.218

Clément

Two, perhaps three, families bearing the surname Clément lived in greater Acadia.  The largest "Clément" family, in fact, were Vincents who took their ancestor's given name as a dit and then transformed it into a family name.  In 1755, descendants of Clément, youngest son of Pierre Vincent and Anne Gaudet of Port-Royal, lived on Île St.-Jean, where they had gone in c1750 probably to escape British authority in Nova Scotia.  Jean Clément, a fisherman, native of Jeffrets, Diocese of Coutances, Normandy, France, not kin to the Vincent dit Cléments, had come to Île Royale in the early 1720s, married Marie-Josèphe Druce, an Acadian from Minas with an English father, at Port-Toulouse in c1726, and was with his family at St.-Esprit on the island's Atlantic coast in February 1752.  

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, the Cléments on the Maritime islands, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British rounded up most of the island habitants and deported them to France.  Vincent dit Cléments escaped the British roundup on Île St.-Jean and made their way north to Canada.  Others fell into British hands and were deported to the mother country, where they settled at St.-François du Havre in Normandy; at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo; and at Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  By the early 1770s, some of them had returned to North America and settled on Île St.-Pierre, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  No male member of this family emigrated to Spanish Louisiana, so no Vincent dit Clément family lines were established there. 

Jean-Baptiste Clément, a carpenter, born probably in France in c1744, likely was not a kinsman of the Vincent dit Cléments or of Jean Clément of Île Royale.  According to French church records, he and his wife Josette Mirande had come to France from Île Miquelon, near Île St.-Pierre, date unrecorded.  In 1778, during the American Revolution, the British captured the two Newfoundland islands and deported the habitant/fishermen there to France.  Jean-Baptiste and Josette ended up at La Rochelle, where two children were born to them:  Louise in August 1780; and Michel in January 1782.  Jean-Baptiste died at La Rochelle in June 1782, age 38.  No member of this family emigrated to Spanish Louisiana. 

Hilaire, son of Jean Clément and Marie-Josèphe Druce, was only age 5 in late 1758 when the British rounded up most of the Acadians on Île Royale and deported them to St.-Malo.  Hilaire, his older sister Marguerite, her husband François Hardy, and their six-year-old son Hilaire le jeune made the crossing aboard the transport Queen of Spain, which left Louisbourg in late summer and reached St.-Malo in mid-November 1758.  Marguerite died at sea, but the other members of the family survived the crossing.  Hilaire Clément lived in France for over a quarter century.  From 1759 to 1761, he lived probably with relatives at St.-Malo.  In 1761, when he was age 8, he moved to Trigavou on the west side of the river south of the Breton port and was still there in 1772, working as a domestic.  The following year, now age 20, he followed other Acadians in the port cities to the interior province of Poitou, where he found a wife.  While living at Monthoiron southeast of Châtellerault, he married Tarsile, daughter of fellow Acadians François Naquin and Angélique Blanchard, at nearby Leigné-les-Bois in October 1774.  Their daughter Marie was born at Bonneuil-Matours south of Châtellerault in July 1775.  In March 1776, Hilaire, Tarsile, and their daughter retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where Hilaire resumed worked as a domestic servant and also worked as a carpenter.  Tarsille gave him three more children at Nantes:  Jean-Hilaire at nearby Chantenay in November 1776; Madeleine in February 1779 but died in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, the following August; and François at Chantenay in October 1780--four children, two daughters and two sons, between 1775 and 1780.  Wife Tarsile died in St.-Nicolas Parish in April 1784, age 38.  Son François died at Chanteany by September 1784, when Spanish officials counted Hilaire at Nantes and noted that he had only two children in his household.   

About the time of Tarsile's death, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Hilaire Clément, widower, with his two young children, agreed to take it.219

Closquinet

Descendants of Louis Closquinet dit Dumoulin of Île St.-Jean and Marguerite Longuépée, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French stronghold at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  Marie Closquinet, age 34, who was pregnant, her husband Pierre-Mathurin Girard, age 39, along with two of their children, ages 6 and 4, and a domestic servant, crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November, was damaged in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, put in at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  Also aboard the Supply were Marie's brother Louis, fils, age 29, and his wife Anne Jacquimin, age 26; brother Joseph, age 28, his wife Françoise Boudrot, age 20, and their sons Grégoire, age 2; and Pierre, age 1; and sister Marie-Louise, called Louise, age 24, her husband Charles Savary, age 31, and their sons Jean-Charles, age 2 1/2, and infant Charles, fils.  All of them survived the crossing except for Louise's infant son Charles, fils, who died at sea.  Louise's husband Charles Savary died in a St.-Malo hospital in late April, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Joseph's son Pierre died in September 1759, age 1, probably from the rigors of the crossing.

During their time in France, the family's name evolved from Closquinet to Clossinet.  Marie and her family lived at Châteauneuf on the east bank of the river south St.-Malo in 1759-60, where a daughter was born in March 1759 but died less than two months later.  They lived in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer from 1760-64, where another daughter was born in April 1760.  In April 1764, aboard Le Fort, the entire family left France for the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  They were counted at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district on 1 March 1765.  The census taker noted that Marie and husband Pierre Girard were suffering from fièvre at the time.  Pierre may have died in Cayenne.  Marie likely returned to France and remarried to Charles, son of fellow Acadians Jean Comeau and Marguerite Turpin, place and date unrecorded.  Charles also had gone to Guiane aboard Le Fort, so they likely had known one another there.  Amazingly, Marie was 20 years older than he was.  He worked as a carpenter in France. 

Louise Clossinet remarried to Charles, son of fellow Acadians Étienne Trahan and Marie-Françoise Roy, at Châteauneuf  in August 1759.  A daughter was born there in October 1760, and another daughter at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer in March 1764.  Meanwhile, in April 1760, Louise's husband Charles shipped out on the corsair Hercules to fight the British but was promptly captured and held as a prisoner of war.  He remained in England until June 1763, when he was repatriated to France with hundreds of other Acadians being held there.  In April 1764, also aboard Le Fort, Louise and her family left for French Guiane.  When French authorities counted the settlers at Sinnamary in March 1765, Charles Trahan and his two daughters were not on the list.  Louise appeared in the census with her sister Marie-Madeleine's family, so one suspects that Louise's second husband and her daughters had died by then.  Louise remarried to Antoine-Joseph-Christophe Verge, place unrecorded--her third marriage.  One wonders if she remained in Guiane returned to France. 

Louis Clossinet, fils and his wife Anne Jacquemin lived at St.-Servan-sur-Mer from 1759-64.  Anne died there by November 1774, when Louis, fils remarried to Marie-Marguerite, called Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Daigre and his second wife Anne-Marie Breau and widow of Amand Giroir, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the river south of St.-Malo.  They remained in the area. 

Joseph Clossinet and his family also lived in the St.-Malo area.  From 1759 to 1765, they were at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo; at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in 1765-66; at St.-Méloir-des-Ondes in the countryside east of St.-Servan in 1767; and back in St.-Servan in 1767.  They were still there in 1772.  Daughter Jeanne-Marguerite was born at St.-Énogat in April 1760; and Marie-Marguerite in July 1762 but died at age 18 months in February 1764--four children, two sons and two daughters, between 1756 and 1762, in greater Acadia and France.  Joseph died at St.-Énogat in 1764 or 1765, and wife Françoise remarried to Marin, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Dugas and Marie Benoit, at St.-Servan in November 1766.  She gave him four sons there between 1767 and 1773.  In the early 1770s, Marin, Françoise, and their children, including Grégoire and Jeanne-Marguerite Clossinet, who would have been ages 17 and 13 in 1773, became part of the attempt to settle exiles languishing in the port cities on an influential nobleman's land in the interior province of Poitou.  After two years of effort, Marin, Françoise, and their blended family retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Jeanne-Marguerite Clossinet, at age 24, married Frenchman Étienne, son of Jean Peltier and Renée Prime of Baune, Angers, France, at nearby St.-Martin de Chantenay in August 1784; Étienne was a stonecutter.  Their son Jean was born at L'Hermitage, Chantenay, in May 1785.  One wonders what happened to her older brother Grégoire, who would have been in his late 20s in 1785. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Most of the Acadians still in France took up the offer, including Jeanne-Marguerite, her uncle Louis, fils, and her aunt Marie Clossinet and their spouses.  If Jeanne-Marguerite's brother Grégoire Clossinet was still living, he chose to remain in the mother country.220

Clouâtre

In 1755, Pierre Cloistre dit Clouâtre, the gunsmith, wife Marguerite LeBlanc, and their family could still be found at Minas.  Le Grand Dérangement of 1755 scattered the family to the winds. 

When the British rounded up the Acadians at Minas in the fall of 1755, they deported Dominique Clouâtre and his wife Françoise Boudrot, as well as Dominique's sister Marie-Josèphe and her husband Pierre Hébert, to Massachusetts.  Colonial officials counted Marie-Josèphe and her family at Newton in 1761.  After the war, Dominique and Françoise followed hundreds of other exiles from Massachusetts to Canada.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, the siblings and their families began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  They settled at Trois-Rivières on the upper St. Lawrence before moving upriver to St.-Philippe-de-Laprairie across from Montréal.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

In 1755, the British deported the old gunsmith, his wife Marguerite LeBlanc, and the rest of his family to Maryland.  For over a dozen years, they endured life among British colonists who, despite their province's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  In July 1763, Marguerite LeBlanc, now a widow, appeared on a repatriation list at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac.  With her were sons Louis, Pierre-Sylvain, and Joseph, and daughters Anne and Marthe-Marie.  Son Georges, who had married fellow Acadian Cécile Breau in Maryland, their children Joseph le jeune and Madeleine, and orphan Joseph Breau, also were living at Port Tobacco that month.  Georges died probably at Port Tobacco sometime between July 1763 and December 1767.  Older brother Louis married fellow Acadian Marguerite Landry in Maryland after July 1763.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  The first contingent of Acadians left Baltimore in late June 1766, and the second in April 1767, but the Clouâtres were on neither of those expeditions.  They departed with their widowed mother in the third contingent of exiles from the Chesapeake colony, which left Port Tobacco for New Orleans in December 1767 and reached the river city the following February.221

Comeau

In 1755, descendants of Pierre Comeau the cooper and Rose Bayon could be found in the Minas Basin at Grand-Pré, Rivière-aux-Canards, and Pigiguit; at Chepoudy and Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; at Malpéque on northwestern coast of Île St.-Jean; on Île Madame off the southern coast of Île Royale; at Annapolis Royal, where they were especially numerous; and in Canada.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of  1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local Acadians, perhaps including Comeaus from the trois-rivières, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the local Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Comeaus, including Joseph, his wife Marie-Josèphe Cormier, and their daughter Anne, were sent to South Carolina.  Other Comeaus at Chepoudy escaped the British roundup and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada. 

Later that fall, the British deported Acadians in the Minas Basin to Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, Massachusetts, and Connecticut.  Étienne Comeau, age 75, and second wife Élisabeth, or Isabelle, Levron, age 65, of Pigiguit ended up in Massachusetts, where they were mentioned in "an acct of Sundrys provided by the Select men of Medfield for the Support of twelve of the Late Inhabitance of Noveschoca, which were ordered to the Town of Medfield from November 10th (1756) to the first day of June 1757."  The report stated that "Stephen Commour an old Man a Eighty two years old [was] unfit for any Buisness" and that "Elisaby Commour his wife seventy four years old [was] Capeable of but Little Buisness ...."  A similar evaluation was made of "Achan Commo age 83" and "Elisabeth Commo age 72" early the following year.  On 21 June 1758, the frugal Yankees of Medfield noted in "the account of what was Expended towards the maintanence of the French Neutrals formerly Inhabitance of Noveschoscha ordered to Medfield by authority from the Sixth day of January to this Date" that "For 12 weeks Bording an old French man Nursing and other expenses in his Last Sickness & Fenural" the town incurred "Charges L2-14s-2d."  The "old French man" no doubt was Étienne, grandson of the family's progenitor.  Comeaus from Minas also ended up in Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. 

Minas Comeaus deported to Virginia endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas.  In mid-November 1755, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested the deportation of so many "Neutral French" to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while the Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Acadians from one vessel were moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Virginia's House of Burgesses made its decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many of them died of smallpox.  At war's end in 1763, more than half of them were dead. 

In late autumn of 1755, the British shipped the Acadians in the Annapolis Basin to Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, and North Carolina.  Many Comeaus were on these vessels.  However, the ship heading to North Carolina never got there.  Soon after the Pembroke swung into the lower Bay of Fundy with 232 exiles aboard, the Acadians seized the vessel, sailed it to Baie Ste.-Marie on the western coast of Nova Scotia and then crossed the Bay of Fundy to lower Rivière St.-Jean, where they abandoned the ship and escaped into the wilds of present-day New Brunswick.  The rest of their Annapolis valley brethren were not so lucky.  After their ships had reached their destinations, the Acadians who ended up in New England and New York eventually were allowed to come ashore and endure the disdain of the British colonists.  A colonial record dated 6 May 1756 notes that two Comeau families--Francis Commo and his family of eight; and John Commo and his family of seven--were among the "French neutrals sent by Gov. Lawrence from Nova Scotia to New York" and parcelled out to five counties in the Manhattan area.  Colonial authorities sent François and his famiily to Brookhaven, Suffolk County, on Long Island, and Jean's family to nearby Flushing.  Meanwhile, the Comeaus who escaped the British roundup at Annapolis endured a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and found refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac, lower Rivière St.-Jean, or the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Others moved on to Canada, where their fellow Frenchmen treated them with disdain.  Church records show that Comeaus from Annapolis Royal and Chepoudy were buried at Québec in the late 1750s, some of them victims of a smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of exiles in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Comeaus in the French Maritimes escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the islands and deported most of the habitants there to France.  Comeaus at Malpèque on the northwest shore of Île St.-Jean escaped the redcoats, crossed Mer Rouge, and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Others were not so lucky.  Marguerite Comeau, age unrecorded, with husband Jean Dupont of Louisbourg and her brothers Charles and David, made the crossing to St.-Malo aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into the Breton port the first of December.  Marguerite survived the crossing but died in a hospital at St.-Malo soon after the ship reached port.  Her brother Charles lived at St.-Malo from 1758 to 1761, and then at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo from 1761 to 1764.  In April 1764, while still in his teens, Charles left France aboard Le Fort for the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  He does not appear in the census of inhabitants at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district taken on 1 March 1765, so he may have returned to France by then.  He married Marie, daughter of fellow island Acadians Louis Clossinet dit Dumoulin and Marguerite Longuépée and widow of Pierre-Mathurin Girard dit Crespin, place and date unrecorded, probably in France; she was 20 years his senior.  She, too, had gone to Guiane aboard Le Fort in 1764 and returned to France.  They likely lived in the St.-Malo area before following other exiles to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Brother David lived at St.-Malo probably with brother Charles from 1758 to 1760.  In March 1760, he was at Lorient in southern Brittany, where he embarked on the corsair Travignon, which the Royal Navy soon captured.  David languished in an English prison for the rest of the war.  He returned to St.-Malo in 1763 and was still living there when his brother Charles shipped out to Guiane in 1764.  He then disappears from the historical record. 

Island Comeaus ended up in ports other than St.-Malo.  Simon Comeau died at Cherbourg, Normandy, in April 1760, age 30.  One wonders if he was one of the Acadians the British had deported from the Cap-Sable area in November 1759 and who landed at Cherbourg in mid-January.  At least one Comeau family lived at Bordeaux.  Élisabeth Lord, widow of Pierre Comeau, remarried there to a Derayer from Chignecto.  Daughter Anne married fellow Acadian Joseph Haché dit Gallant, a carpenter.  Her brother Pierre, fils married a Mouton at Bordeaux.  

In May 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the British and French goverments, Comeaus and hundreds of other Acadians who had endured seven years of exile in England were repatriated to France.  Most of the Comeaus landed at St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  Alexis Comeau, wife Dorothée Richard, whom he had married in England in c1757, and their 5-year-old son Jean-Baptiste resided in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Alexis died in April 1767.  Dorothée remarried to fellow Acadian Claude LeBlanc at St.-Servan in June 1768.  Alexis's son Jean-Baptiste married Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Landry and Blanche LeBlanc, in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in southwest Brittany, in January 1783.  Claire Landry, widow of Claude Comeau and Alexis's mother, came from England with two unmarried children, Jean and Marguerite, ages 20 and 13.  They also resided at St.-Servan.  Simon Comeau, his wife Marguerite-Geneviève Aucoin, whom he had just married in England, and two of his younger unmarried brothers, Joseph and Charles, lived at Plouër-sur-Rance.  There and at St.-Servan, between 1764 and 1785, Marguerite-Geneviève gave Simon 11 children, six daughters and five sons:  Marie-Luce at Plouër in January 1764; Élisabeth-Madeleine in November 1765; Marie-Madeleine at St.-Servan in March 1767; Félicité-Augustine in May 1769; Jean-Baptiste in May 1771; Claire-Sophie in May 1773; Alexandre-Simon in March 1775; Pierre-Paul in August 1776; Marguerite-Françoise in April 1778; Charles-Simon in January 1781 but died at age 2 in January 1783; and Joseph-Marie in March 1785.  Brother Joseph married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Thériot and Françoise Landry, at Plouër in October 1764 and also moved to St.-Servan, where, between 1765 and 1779, she gave him nine children, six sons and three daughters:  Élie-Marie, a son, in November 1765; Joseph-Mathurin in September 1767; Simon-Pierre in October 1769; Charles-Marin in December 1771 but died at age 1 in February 1773; Jeanne-Marie in December 1771 but died in January; Jeanne in November 1773; Jean-Baptiste-Élie in August 1775; Bazile-Toussaint in November 1777; and Marie-Élisabeth in August 1779.  Brother Charles remained single and probably became a sailor.  In 1770, he embarked on the ship Americain but deserted his vessel at a port in French St.-Domingue, where he evidently remained.  Marie-Madeleine Térriot, widow of another Simon Comeau, came from Bristol, England, aboard La Dorothée with 3-year-old son Mathurin and lived at Plouër before moving to St.-Servan, where, in July 1765, she remarried to cousin Olivier, son of Jacques Térriot and Marie Robichaud of Minas and widower of Marguerite LeBlanc.  Marie-Madeleine died at St.-Servan in May 1766, age 28, and young Mathurin likely was raised by relatives there.  He became a sailor in France and was still a bachelor in 1785.  Unmarried sisters Madeleine, Marguerite, and Marie-Josèphe, daughters of Étienne Comeau, came from England with different families and resided at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Marguerite died there in March 1764, age 24; and Marie-Josèphe died there in April 1769, age 19.  Anne-Marie, daughter of Joseph Comeau and Marguerite Hébert, who may have come to France from England, married Alain, son of fellow Acadians François Bourg and Marie-Madeleine Hébert, at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Servan in January 1764.  She gave him six children there, most of whom did not survive childhood.  She accompanied him to Poitou in 1773, where she gave him another son, and to Nantes in March 1776, where she gave him five more children.  Comeaus repatriated from England also landed at the naval port Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay.  Élisabeth, daughter of deceased ship's carpenter Jean Comeau, married Frenchman Jacques Le Roy of Poitiers in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in May 1765.  Surprisingly, none of Comeaus from England followed their fellow exiles to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany in late 1765. 

Comeau cousins from Pigiguit and Chepoudy ended up in France by another route.  Honoré Comeau of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, and Malpéque escaped the British roundup on Île St.-Jean in late 1758.  He, his wife Marguerite Poirier, and their children may have waited out the war somewhere in the Maritimes, or, more likely, crossed Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  In the late 1750s or early 1760s, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area, who held them in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  At war's end, determined to resume their lives as fisher/habitants and to avoid British rule, these Comeaus chose to resettle on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, where they were counted in 1767.  Soon Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre became overcrowded, and French officials, obeying a royal decree, sent many of the fisher/habitants to France.  Most of the islanders returned to Miquelon the following year, but some of the Comeaus evidently did not.  Honoré, now a widower, was living with son Joseph and his family, as well as his daughter Marguerite, at Cherbourg in Normandy in 1772.  Honoré's daughter Anne, widow of Grégoire Morin, remarried to Pierre, son of Jean Le Clerc and Claudine Rouy of St.-Malo, on Île Miquelon in October 1774, so some of his family must have returned there in 1768, dividing the family.  Honoré's daughter Marguerite married Jean, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Broussard and Ursule LeBlanc, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in July 1773.  Later that year, Honoré and his son Joseph, now married to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians François Doucet and Marie Carret, and father of a son, Jean, left Cherbourg for the interior of Poitou as part of a settlement scheme that lured hundreds of Acadians in the port cities to marginal land owned by an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  After two years of effort, Honoré and Joseph, and perhaps Marguerite and her Broussard husband, retreated with other Poitou Acadians down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes.  Honoré's son Joseph died in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, France in September 1782, age 33, so he had not remained at Nantes.  He likely had returned to Île Miquelon before 1778, when the British captured the Newfoundland islands during the American Revolution and deported the fisher/habitants there to La Rochelle and other French ports.  Meanwhile, Honoré, at age 70, remarried to Anastasie, 45-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Célestin dit Bellemère and Marie Landry and widow of Jean-Baptiste Boudrot, at St.-Martin de Chantenay near Nantes in August 1784, on the eve of their going to Spanish Louisiana.  Cousin Benoît Comeau, his wife Anne Blanchard, and their family had a similar experience during Le Grand Dérangement.  They escaped the roundup at Chepoudy in 1755, sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, also ended up in a prison compound in Nova Scotia--in their case, at the fishing center of Chédabouctou on the peninsula's upper Atlantic shore--and followed other exiles to Île Miquelon after 1763.  They, too, were counted on the island in 1767 and were sent to France that year.  When most of the islanders returned to Miquelon in 1768, Benoît and his family, like his cousin Honoré, remained in France.  French officials counted them at St.-Pol-de-Léon near Morlaix in northwest Brittany in 1768, after which they joined their kinsmen at Cherbourg.  Between 1769 to 1773, Anne gave Benoît three daughters there:  Marie-Anne-Victoire; Anne-Eléonore, and Marguerite-Anastasie, the last two baptized in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in February 1771 and May 1773.  Benoît worked at Cherbourg as a carpenter, but he did not remain in the Norman port either.  He and his family were counted at Nantes in southwest Brittany in September 1784, so they may have gone to Poitou soon after Marguerite-Anastasie's birth and retreated with cousin Honoré and other Acadians in late 1775 or early 1776 to the lower Loire port.  Honoré's younger brother Jean-Baptiste, now a widower, who had remained on Île Miquelon, ended up at La Rochelle in 1778 after the British captured the island during the American Revolution.  But Jean-Baptiste did not remain in France.  After the war against the Americans and France ended badly for Britain in 1783, Jean-Baptiste returned to Île Miquelon the following year, remarried to a much younger woman, and started another family.  Honoré and Jean-Baptiste's youngest brother Joseph, widower of Anne Doucet, remarried to Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Lejeune and Marie-Marthe Roy of Miquelon, in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in February 1781.  Joseph did not remain in France either.  He died on Miquelon in April 1785, age 55.  Other Comeaus who were deported from Miquelon to France in 1778 remained in the mother country.  Anne Comeau of Miquelon, widow of Pierre Sellers, died in St. Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in July 1779, age 36. 

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a better life in faraway Louisiana, many of the Comeaus--Honoré and Benoît from Île Miquelon and Charles from Guiane, now at Nantes; and Simon and Mathurin at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo--along with their families, agreed to take it.  Simon's younger brother Joseph was unable to make the voyage.  He had died at St.-Servan in June 1784, age 40, leaving his wife Marie Thériot a widow with five children (four of their nine children having died before Joseph's passing).  Marie agreed to take her children to Spanish Louisiana with brother-in-law Simon's family.  Other Comeaus chose to remain in France.  Anne Comeau, widow of fellow Acadian Joseph Haché dit Gallant, died at Bordeaux in March 1791, age 45.  Louise, daughter of Joseph Comeau and his first wife Anne Doucet, died at Bordeaux in March 1808, age 42. 

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British prepared to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  Although the British failed to capture the post itself, the French and Acadians at Restigouche were nevertheless cut off from the rest of New France.  The following October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  They included Jean Bte. Commeau and his family of seven; Ambroise Commeau and his family of six; and Victor Commeau and his family of two.  During the following months, most of these Acadians, along with others who had escaped capture at Restigouche but either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region, were sent to prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In 1761-62, British officials counted members of the family at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, near the old Comeau homesteads there.  They included Jean Comeau and his family of two; Fras or François Comeau and his family of three; Joseph Comeau; and Jos. H. Comeau and his family of five.  In August 1763, British officials counted members of the family on Georges Island, Halifax harbor.  They included Michel Coumos, his wife, and three children; and another Michel Coumos, his wife, and three children.  Comeaus also were held at Chédaboutou up the Atlantic shore. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In 1763, Comeaus still in Connecticut included Jean-Baptiste Commeau and his family of 12; and Charles Coumaux, his wife, and two children.  In 1763, members of the family in New York included Joseph Commo, his wife, and eight children; Widow Commo and three children; and François Commo, his wife, and 10 children.  In June 1763, Comeaus in Pennsylvania included Baptiste Commeau, wife Jeanne, and two children.  In August 1763, the many Comeaus still in South Carolina included orphans Marguerite Caumau, age 12, and Anne Comau, age 14, perhaps sisters, with the family of Pierre Deraier and Isabelle Lord; Marie-Josèph[e] Coumau, her husband Joseph Babineau, and their newborn son; Joseph Comau, wife Marie Cormie[r], daughter Anne, age 15, and a Grange[r] orphan; Tranquille Coumau, wife Élizabet Lanou, and no children; Eustache Comau, wife Cécille Bourg, daughter Magdelaine, age 3, son Enselm, age 3, and two Dugon orphans; Margte. Coumau, her husband Germain Doucet, and three sons; Benony Coumau, wife Marie Girouard, and two Girouard orphans; Margte. Coumau, husband Joseph Salette, two twin infants, and two Doucet orphans; and Ursule Comau, husband Pierre Blanchard, and a Masson orphan.  In August 1763, no Comeaus appeared on a list of exiles still in Massachusetts.  Three years later, in June 1766, Massachusetts officials compiled a list entitled "Names of the French Who Wish to Go to Canada."  No Comeau appeared on that list either.  One wonders if the Comeaus the British had sent there in 1755 and who colonial officials had counted there in the late 1750s had either died or gone to Canada or to some other place before or soon after the war had ended. 

Most of the Comeaus in New England, New York, and Pennsylvania chose to resettle in Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Pierre Comeau the cooper began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Acadian Comeaus could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, Nicolet, St.-Grégoire, L'Acadie, Trois-Rivières, Gentilly, La Prairie, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, St.-Pierre-de-la-Becquets, Pointe-du-Lac, and Yamachiche; at St.-Denis, St.-Ours, and Chambly on the lower Richelieu; and on the lower St. Lawrence at Berthier, St.-Charles de Bellechasse, St.-Roch-des-Aulnaies, and Montmagny.  Many Comeaus were determined to live as closely as they could to their old homes in greater Acadia.  They settled at Carleton in the British-controlled fishery at Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, and at Pointe-de-l'Est in the remote îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence; on the St. John River in what became western New Brunswick; at Caraquet, Nipisiguit, now Bathurst, and Petit-Rocher on the Gulf shore in northeastern New Brunswick; and at Memramcook in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, not far from their old haunts at Chepoudy and Peticoudiac.  Comeaus returned to Nova Scotia, where they settled at Yarmouth and Chédabouctou, now Guysborough, on the Atlantic coast; and at Windsor, formerly Pigiguit, on the Fundy side of the peninsula, before moving on to Baie Ste.-Marie, today's St. Mary Bay, on the west coast of the peninsula, a few dozen miles southwest of their old homes in the Annapolis Basin.  One of the towns on the mainland shore of St. Mary Bay was founded by Jean-Baptiste Comeau of Chepoudy and is still called Comeauville.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Comeaus who had been exiled to the seaboard colonies chose to go to the French Antilles, where they could escape British rule as well as live among fellow Catholics.  During the final months of the war, French officials did their best to lure these exiles to St.-Dominique, which the British had not taken.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the war of vengeance to come.  The Acadians could provide a ready source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for island's major planters who hoped to supplement the labor of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the exiles land of their own if they came to the sugar colony.  Charles Comeau and his wife Marguerite Babineau dit Deslauriers were among the refugees from Connecticut who went there in 1763.  Colonial officials sent them not to Môle St.-Nicolas but to the interior community of Mirebalais near Port-au-Prince to work on indigo and coffee plantations.  Their marriage was blessed there in September 1764.  Their children Joseph, age 5, and Anne, age 2, were baptized at Mirebalais that same month.  Joseph died on the day of his baptism.  Their son Pierre, perhaps Joseph's twin, died at age 5 in October.  A year later, Charles and Marguerite had a second son named Joseph, born at Mirebalais in November 1766.  Joseph Comeau, wife Anne Bourgeois, and their son Charles also went to the colony.  When in the late 1760s fellow exiles came from Maryland through Cap-Français, down the coast from Môle St.-Nicolas, on their way to New Orleans, Joseph and son Charles joined them.  Wife Anne evidently had died by then.  A few years later or perhaps in the early 1770s, Charles Comeau, Marguerite Babineau dit Deslauriers, and their daughter Anne also moved on to Spanish Louisiana, a testament to the family's struggle in St.-Dominguie.  Jean-Baptiste Comeau of Annapolis Royal died at Môle St.-Nicolas in June 1788, age 94, so some of the Comeaus had remained in St.-Domingue.  Comeaus also ended up on other islands in the French Antilles.  Joseph-Anne, son of Joseph Comeau, was born on Martinique in December 1764.  Félicité, 21-year-old daughter of another Joseph Comeau, married Marc, 30-year-old son of Frenchman André Marchant of Chandenier, Poitou, at St.-Pierre, Martinique, in January 1765.  François Comeau of Annapolis Royal, married to Françoise Lapierre, died at Champflore, Martinique, in June 1766, six months after his family was counted there with dozens of other Acadians.  Daughters Anne and Ludivise died on the island in June and July of that year.  Also counted at Champflore in January 1766 were François's daughters Marie and Françoise and son Jean.  Joseph Comeau and his children--Rosalie, Marie-Joséphine, and Charles--also appear in the January 1766 Champflore census, with the notation that their rations were "suppressed" in February, and another Joseph Comeau is listed, with the notation that he died the following June.  Anne Comeau of Annapolis Royal was counted at Champflore in January with her second husband Charles Mouton, son Joseph and daughter Anne-Esther from her first marriage to Sylvain Bourgeois, and two of her Mouton children, Georges and Abraham.  A year or so after the census was taken, Charles, Anne, son Georges, and perhaps daughter Anne-Esther, also emigrated to Spanish Louisiana, where two of Charles's brothers had gone from Halifax via St.-Domingue in 1765.  Marie Comeau, her husband Anselme Hébert, their son Joseph and Marie's sister Marguerite reached Martinique in August 1766.  Another Félicité Comeau got there the following November.  A daughter of Joseph Comeau of Annapolis, widow of Antoine Hébert, died at Au Carbet, Martinique, in February 1774, age 30.  Marie, daughter of François Comeau of Île St.-Jean, married Joseph, son of Jean Cotillon and Pierrette Caille of St.-Symphorien, Trevilly, Bourgogne, France, at Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe, in June 1783.  Marie was a merchant at St.-François on the island, and Joseph was a fourrier d'Artillerie stationed there.  

Comeaus still being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Comeaus, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Comeaus, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, French St.-Domingue, at least nine were Comeaus.

Meanwhile, the Comeaus in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  No Comeaus were part of the first contingent of exiles that left Baltimore in late June 1766, but they were part of the second and third expeditions that departed Baltimore and Port Tobacco in April and December 1767.222

Cormier

In 1755, descendants of Robert and Thomas Cormier could be found on the west side of Rivière Missaguash at Chignecto and perhaps on one of the French Maritime islands.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large but compact family to the winds. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Abbé Le Loutre and his Mi'kmaq warriors, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Cormiers were among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Cormiers were among the Chignecto Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies. 

One of the Acadian fighters captured at Beauséjour, Pierre dit Pierrot, son of Pierre dit Palette and Cécile Thibodeau and grandson of Thomas's son Pierre, escaped from a British transport headed for South Carolina and rejoined his family at Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto.  Pierrot led them to Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas on lower Rivière St.-Jean, where they lingered.  In late 1758, after the fall of the French fortress of Louisbourg on Île Royale, British raiding parties attacked the Acadian settlements on the lower St.-Jean and drove the Cormiers and other refugees up the St.-Jean portage to Kamouraska on the lower St. Lawrence.  Pierrot and other exiles fought alongside the French and Canadians at Québec in 1759 and managed to escape capture by the Royal Navy.  By the early 1760s, Pierrot and his family had moved up the St. Lawrence to L'Islet, closer to Québec City, but they did not remain.  At war's end, Pierrot and some of his brothers moved back down the St.-Jean to Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas.  They likely would have stayed there if British authorities had granted them title to their land.  After the British lost their fight against the Americans and their French allies in the early 1780s, American Loyalists came to the Ste.-Anne area and demanded title to the land on which the Acadians lived.  Exiled again, Pierrot and his family, with dozens of other Acadians, returned to the trois-rivières area and settled along the lower Memramcook, not far from their old homesteads at Chignecto.  Pierrot's mother Cécile Thibodeau, in her mid- or late 70s, died "on the path between" Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas and Memramcook, where descendants of Pierrot Cormier live to this day. 

While Pierrot and his family dodged British forces in the St.-Jean valley, two of his younger brothers--Joseph, age 15 in 1755, and Michel, age 14--along with a younger first cousin, Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 13, became separated from the rest of the family in the chaos of displacement.  They may have fallen into British hands during the family's wanderings from greater Acadia to Canada and back, or became separated early in the family's movements and joined fellow refugees in the trois-rivières area led by Joseph Broussard dit Beausoleil of Petitcoudiac.  The Cormier boys' relationship to the Broussards was not a tenuous one.  Joseph and Michel's mother was a Thibodeau, the family into which the Beausoleil Broussards had married.  Cousin Jean-Baptiste, fils's mother was a Richard.  The Beausoleil brothers' mother also was a Richard.  So the Cormier boys may have become part of the Broussards' extended family and may even have participated with their kinsmen in the Acadian resistance.  In the late 1750s or early 1760s, the Cormier boys either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and, like the Broussards and hundreds of other exiles, spent the rest of the war in a prison compound in Nova Scotia.  Some of their Cormier cousins, meanwhile, like brother Pierrot, also had escaped the British at Chignecto and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada. 

Not all of the Cormiers escaped the roundup at Chignecto or slipped quietly off a British transport.  In the fall of 1755, following Lawrence's orders, British commanders deported several Cormier families to South Carolina.  At least one family, that of Jean-Baptiste Cormier, père, brother of Pierre dit Palette and father of Jean-Baptiste, fils, ended up in Georgia with his wife and daughters and his wife's Richard kin.  In the spring of 1756, Jean-Baptiste Cormier, père and his Richard kin may have been among the exiles in the southern colonies who, with permission from the colonial governors, left Georgia and South Carolina in open boats to return to their homes in greater Acadia.  If so, Jean-Baptiste and his famliy got no farther than Long Island, New York, where, on the insistence of Charles Lawrence, the British held them for the rest of the war.  Kinsman François à Germain Cormier died in New York in January 1760.  After the war, his widow Madeleine Doucet and their children chose to resettle in Canada, at L'Assomption near Montréal.  Jean-Baptiste, père and his family, along with three related families, left New York in 1763 and headed back south. 

According to Bona Arsenault, Anne Cyr, widow of François Cormier, fils, now remarried, and some of her younger Cormier children, were deported to England in 1755.  Actually, the Acadian exiles who ended up in England were deported from Minas, not Chigneco, and to Virginia in the fall of 1755, not to England.  Virginia authorities sent them on to England the following spring.  Arsenault's narrative is especially suspect when one considers that Anne Cyr's second husband, François Arseneau dit Brélé, died at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs in November 1759, when she was supposed to have been in England.  In May of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British government, the Acadians in England, including Anne Cyr and her Cormier children, if we follow Arsenault's narrative, were repatriated to France, but Anne and her children refused to remain there.  In 1764, Arsenault insists, they returned to North America and settled on the French-controlled fishery island of Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  But there is a more likely route taken by Anne Cyr and her Cormier children to Île Miquelon:  they escaped the British at Chignecto in 1755; sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and at Restigouche, where her second husband died; were captured by, or surrendered to, British forces in the area; imprisoned in Nova Scotia until war's end; and resettled on Île Miquelon.  Although Le Grand Dérangement ended for most Acadians in North America by the late 1760s, this was not the case for the Acadians who chose to resettle on the Newfoundland islands.  They included not only Anne Cyr and her Cormier children, but other Cormiers who had been held in Nova Scotia prisons and chose to resettle in the French-controlled fishery.  Their troubles there began in 1767 when French officials, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, "deported" the fisher/habitants to France.  They were allowed to return in 1768, Cormiers likely among them.  In 1778, France joined the Anglo-American struggle against their old red-coated enemy, who controlled every part of the Maritimes region except for the two French fishing islands.  The British wasted no time seizing the islands and deporting the fisher/habitants to France.  Cormiers were among the unfortunates who endured yet another Atlantic crossing on hired British transports.  Ironically, the Cormiers deported from Miquelon landed at La Rochelle, the port from which their ancestor Robert had sailed to French Acadia 134 years earlier.  The 1778 crossing must have been a terrible one:  Pierre Cormier of Miquelon died at La Rochelle in April 1779, age 36.  Simon, fils, son of Simon Cormier and Modeste Cyr, died at La Rochelle, age 14 months, in April 1779.  François Cormier's sons Alexandre, age 4, and Thomas, age 1, died at La Rochelle in May 1779.  François died at La Rochelle that same month, age 53.  But life went on for these wayward Cormiers.  Jean Cormier and his wife Rosalie or Modeste Vigneau had more children at La Rochelle:  Madeleine, born probably on Miquelon on the eve of the crossing, died at La Rochelle at age 1 in May 1779; Pierre born in c1778 probably at La Rochelle but died there at age 3 in January 1782; Rose born in July 1780; Germain in May 1781; Jean-Baptiste in August 1782 but died two days after his birth; and Joseph born in January 1783.  Jean remarried to fellow Acadian Anne Poirier, widow of Pierre Aunels, at La Rochelle in September 1783.  Meanwhile, Madeleine Cormier, at age 30, married Pierre Vigneau of Miquelon at La Rochelle in June 1779.  Joseph Cormier and his wife Marie, also called Anne, Vigneau had more children in the Cormiers' ancestral city:  Marie, born probably on Miquelon in c1776, died at La Rochelle at age 3 in May 1779; Gratien was born at La Rochelle in December 1780 but died there at age 10 months in October 1781; and Élisabeth was born in November 1782.  After the war ended badly for the British in 1783, the island Acadians still in France were allowed to return to Miquelon and St.-Pierre.  One wonders if any the Cormiers at La Rochelle returned to their island homes. 

Two, maybe three, Cormiers ended up in France by another, earlier route.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France.  Two Cormiers made the crossing aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo harbor on the first of November.  Jacques Cormier, age 17, and his sister Marie, age 21, survived the crossing despite the high death toll aboard the vessel, but Marie died in a hospital at St.-Malo a week after the ship reached port.  At the end of February 1760, Jacques embarked on the ship Prince Édouard, probably a corsair.  He was back at St.-Malo in June 1762, when he stood as godfather to Renée-Catherine, daughter of fellow Acadians Augustin Doucet dit Justice and Marie-Anne Précieux, at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from the Breton port.  He then disappears from the historical record.  Another Marie, this one daughter of chirurgien major Jacques Cormier, died at La Rochelle in September 1777, age 49.  One wonders when, and from where, she had come to France, or if she had been born there. 

When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, most of the Acadians still in the mother country agreed to take it.  No Cormiers were among them.  Jean Cormier, native of Île Miquelon and husband of Anne Briand, died at La Rochelle on 23 Messidor, year 10 of the Revolution (12 July 1802), age 42.  His daughter Marie was born posthumously at North Bordeaux on 14 Fructidor year 10 (1 September 1802) and was baptized the same day.  Her uncle François Cormier, perhaps François, fils, stood as her godfather.  Marie died at Bordeaux five and a half years later, in May 1808.  

In North America, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies at war's end were encouraged by French officials to go to St.-Dominique.  There, like their cousins on Île Miquelon, they could live not only among fellow Roman Catholics, but also in territory controlled by France.  Although driven from North America, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the war of vengeance.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who wished to supplement the labor of their slaves.  To entice them to the tropical colony, the French promised them land of their own there.  In the summer of 1763, most of the Cormiers in the seaboard colonies could still be found in South Carolina.  Many of them moved on to the sugar colony later that year and the next to labor on the new naval base.  Those who survived the ordeal chose to remain.  When fellow exiles from Halifax and Maryland, including Cormiers, transhipped at Cap-Français in the mid- and late 1760s on their way to New Orleans, none of the Cormiers in St.-Domingue agreed to join them.  However, judging by the number of children they lost, the price of remaining was a high one.  Amand, also called Laurent and Lemand, Cormier, a ship's carpenter like his ancestor Robert, married fellow Acadian Anastasie LeBlanc.  Their children, born at Môle St.-Nicolas, included Marie in c1773, who died at age 12 in September 1785; Barthélémy in July 1776; Nicolas in September 1779; Charles in December 1782; and Daniel in November 1783.  Charles, also called Claude, Cormier, also a carpentier de marine, married fellow Acadian Angélique or Augustine Carret.  Their children, born at Môle, included Jean-Charles, called Charles, in May 1778 but died at age 1 1/2 in February 1780; Marie-Angélique born in June 1780 but died at age 2 in September 1782; Marie-Madeleine born in May 1782 but died at age 18 months in November 1783; Félicité born in c1784 but died at age 10 months in July 1785; and François-Alexis born in June 1786.  Rosalie, daughter of Jean Cormier and widow of cousin Joseph Cormier of Pointe-à-Beauséjour, Chignecto, remarried to Barthélémy Acinolo of St.-Lazare, France, at Môle St.-Nicolas in May 1777.  Joseph, son of Charles Cormier, died at Môle in October 1778, age 25.  Beginning in the summer of 1765, after several years of what they saw as fruitless effort, Acadians sought permission to leave Môle, but French officials refused to let them go.  Some Acadians, including Cormiers, left the project anyway and settled at nearby Jean-Rabel.  Jean, son of Alexis Cormier and Madeleine de Liglen of Pointe-à-Beauséjour, who had come to the colony from South Carolina, married Élisabeth, daughter of Louis Morel and Agnès Danigrand of nearby Pointe-de-Paix, at Jean-Rabel in February 1783.  Their son Jean-Baptiste was born at Jean-Rabel in March 1784.  They also had daughters named Marie-Victoire, born at Jean-Rabel, and Marie-Renée at Môle St.-Nicolas.  Jean, called by the priest a native of Acadia and "widower of an Acadienne," died at his father's home at Caracol in April 1785, age 30.  Jean and Élisabeth's daughter Rose-Marguerite, perhaps Élisabeth, was born posthumously at Jean-Rabel in September 1785.  

Most of the Cormiers who had escaped the British in 1755, and a few still languishing in the seaboard colonies, chose to resettle not in St.-Domingue but in Canada, where some of their relatives had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, the majority of the family's survivors began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  From the late 1760s, Cormiers could be found in the upper St. Lawrence valley at St.-Ours and St.-Antoine-de-Chambly on the lower Richelieu; and at St.-Grégoire-de-Nicolet and Bécancour on the St. Lawrence across from Trois-Rivières.  None seem to have remained on the lower St. Lawrence, but they could be found at Cascapédia, now New Richmond, and Bonaventure, British-controlled fisheries in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  They also settled on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  In Nova Scotia, Cormiers could be found at Chédabouctou, now Guysborough; and at Chéticamp, Grand-Étang, and Margaree on the northwest coast of Cape Breton Island, formerly Île Royale.  Some of the Cape Breton Cormiers moved north to Newfoundland, where they settled on Baie St.-George.  In present-day New Brunswick, they settled at St.-Basile and Madawaska on the upper St. John River at the boundary between New Brunswick and Maine; at Caraquet on the south shore of the Baie des Chaleurs; at Barachois, Bouctouche, and St.-Antoine down the Gulf shore; at Cormierville overlooking Mer Rouge, now Northumberland Strait; and at Memramcook near Chignecto, where members of the family had begun their odyssey in the fall of 1755.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

In Nova Scotia at war's end, Jean-Baptiste, fils and his cousins Joseph and Michel Cormier, now in their early 20s, lingered in the prison compound on Georges Island in Halifax harbor, no doubt wondering what had happened to the rest of their family.  Joseph, the oldest of the cousins, had married Marguerite, daughter of Jacques Saulnier and Anne Hébert of Petitcoudiac, in c1759 during exile.  Jean-Baptiste, fils and Michel were still bachelors.  With the war over, the young Cormiers in Nova Scotia, along with hundreds of fellow refugees, faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian still in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Cormiers, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Cormiers, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  One suspects that Jean-Baptiste Cormier, fils, through the Acadian grapevine, managed to communicate with his wayward parents, who he had not seen in nearly a decade.  In his final days at Halifax, Jean-Baptiste, fils likely knew that his parents and sisters, who had been deported to Georgia in the fall of 1755, had ended up in New York the following summer.  He may have learned that his family had left that colony at war's end and made their way down to Charles Town, South Carolina, that they returned to Georgia later that year, and, along with 14 other kinsmen, had left Savannah in late December for Mobile, which was thought to be a part of French Louisiana.  Jean-Baptiste, fils may even have learned that, after revalidating a marriage at Mobile, his family and their kinsmen had moved on to New Orleans, which they reached in February 1764.  His father may have told him that the caretaker government in Louisiana had treated them well and would welcome other Acadians to the colony.  This may have motivated the Broussards and their related families to lease a transport at Halifax in late 1764 and head south to Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, the gateway to French Louisiana.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax for Cap-Français in late 1764 and early 1765, six of them, including the three cousins, were Cormiers. 

Cormiers also were among the last Acadians to emigrate to Louisiana.  Jean Baptiste, son of Jean Cormier and Élisabeth Morel of Jean-Rabel, evidently was among the St.-Domingue French who fled to Cuba during the Haitian rebellion in late 1803; he would have been age 19 that year.  As a bachelor or a newlywed, he most likely came to New Orleans with the flood of refugees from Cuba a few years later.  Oddly, some Louisiana records call him Eugène-Baptiste.  His three sisters--Marie-Renée; Marie-Victoire, called Éloise; and Rose-Élisasbeth, all of whom married at New Orleans and remained there--probably came with him from Cuba.  Jean-Baptiste did not remain in the city but settled near his Cormier cousins on the Opelousas prairies.  Nicolas, son of Amand Cormier and Anastasie LeBlanc of Môle St.-Nicolas, also joined his cousins at New Orleans in the early 1800s.  He married Marie Soltero perhaps in Cuba, or he may have married her at New Orleans soon after his arrival.  Nicolas's older brother Barthélémy, born at Môle St.-Nicolas, may have accompanied him to Louisiana.187  

Corporon

In 1755, descendants of Jean Corporon and Françoise Savoie could be found at Mirliguèche on the Atlantic coast southwest of Halifax, perhaps in the Minas Basin, at Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable, and especially in the French Maritimes on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

Two of Martin Corporon's daughters by his second wife were deported from Minas to two of the British seaboard colonies during the fall of 1755.  Françoise, wife of Jean Roy, was deported with her family to Massachusetts.  Youngest sister Marie-Osite-Anne, called Anne, was shipped off to Maryland, where she married François Simoneau, a native of Lorraine, in c1759.  They were counted at Oxford on Maryland's Eastern Shore in July 1763. 

Their oldest sister Marie, wife of Honoré Trahan outdid her Corporon kin in bouncing from one place to another, although they, too, ended up in Maryland.  In 1749, on the eve of Le Grand Dérangement, Marie and Honoré moved from Pigiguit to Baie-des-Espagnols on Île Royale, where son Pierre was born the following year.  Dissatisfied with conditions in the isolated fishing village, in the fall of 1754, fearing starvation, they followed other Acadians from Baie-des-Espagnols to Louisbourg and sailed from there to Halifax in British-controlled Nova Scotia.  After taking the hated oath of allegiance without reservation, Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence sent them not back to Pigiguit, where they wanted to go, but to Mirliguèche on the Atlantic coast southwest of Halifax, near the Foreign-Protestant community of Lunenburg.  When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia during the summer of 1755, Honoré, Marie, and Pierre, despite having taken the unqualified oath, were among the first Acadians held at Georges Island in Halifax harbor.  In December 1755, the British loaded them, along with other Acadians from Mirliguèche, most of them kin, aboard the sloop Providence and deported them to North Carolina, where they landed probably at Edenton on Albemarle Sound in January.  They remained in the Chowan County area of North Carolina until c1760, when colonial officials allowed them to leave.  Most of their relatives found their way to Philadelphia, but Honoré, Marie, and Pierre moved to Maryland instead, where colonial officials counted them at Port Tobacco in July 1763.  Soon afterwards, relatives who had gone to Pennsylvania joined them at Port Tobacco. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Corporons on the Maritime islands escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the Acadians on the islands and deported them to France.  The result was a disaster for the Corporon family.  Martin's widow Marie-Josèphe Viger, age 55, with her second husband Paul Benoit and her 25-year-old son Jean-Charles Corporon, were deported to St.-Malo aboard the tranport Duke William, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and sank in a mid-December in a storm off the southwest coast of England, taking most of its passengers with it.  Martin and Marie-Josèphe's daughter Marie-Josèphe-Marguerite, called Marguerite, age 24, wife of Joseph Lejeune, perished with her husband and two young children in a cross-ocean voyage aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy and, despite the mid-December storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759. 

Island Corporons did survive the crossing to France, but few, if any, made it to St.-Malo.  In April 1762, Anne Corporon married day laborer Jean Thubert, a widower, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort; the priest who recorded the marriage did not give the couple's parents' names, but he did note that the bride and groom were "anciens habitants de l'Île Royale."  In June 1784, Anne-Madeleine, daughter of Jean Corporon, whom the recording priest described as an "officier sur les navires," and Jeanne Pichot of Louisbourg, married carpenter Jacques Dixmier, a widower, in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle.  Another Corporon ended up in France by a different route.  Pierre, son of Martin Corporon by his first wife Cécile Joseph, Pierre's wife Marie-Josèphe Viger (not to be confused with his stepmother of the same name), and their children were living at Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable in 1755.  They escaped the roundup there in early 1756 and remained unmolested until after the fall of Louisbourg, when a British force landed at the cape in late 1758 and rounded up many of the habitants in the area, including the Corporons.  The British held them briefly in the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, before deporting them to England.  The English sent them on to France, and they landed at Cherbourg in Normandy in January 1760.  Daughter Marie-Blanche died in the Norman in February 1760, age 11; and daughter Anne died there in April 1760, age 18.  Wife Marie-Josèphe died by November 1761, when Pierre remarried to Marie Simon, perhaps a fellow Acadian, in Trés-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg.  Pierre died there before September 1772, in his mid- or late 50s.  When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, none of the Corporons still in the mother country agreed to take it.

Eustache, son of Jean-Baptiste Corporon, Eustache's wife Angélique Viger, and their children evidently escaped the British roundup on Île Royale in late 1758, so they were not deported to France.  They sought refuge either in a remote corner of the islands or, more likely, crossed Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Sometime in the late 1750s or early 1760s, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region and held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British officials counted Eustache Corp, likely Corporon, his unnamed wife, and five unnamed children on Georges Island, Halifax, in August 1763.  The war over, they did not follow their fellow exiles to Louisiana, Île Miquelon, or the French Antilles but chose to remain in British Nova Scotia. 

At least one Corporon ended up in the French West Indies by the early 1760s.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Corporon and Charlotte Roy, actually Marie-Charlotte Bourhis, born at Louisbourg in c1737,  died at Fort Royal, Martinique, in November 1764, in her early 30s.  Her father had died on Île Royale in c1749, before the deportations there, and she married Jean Pitard "de Libourne," perhaps Lisbon, at Louisbourg in October 1752.  They likely were deported to France with her widowed mother and siblings in late 1758 and may have landed in the naval port of Rochefort, where, in July 1760, Madeleine remarried to Jean, son of Antoine Borde and Marguerite Faur, also of Louisbourg, in Notre Dame Parish.  Jean was a "garçon ferblantier," or apprentice to a tinsmith.  They did not remain at Rochefort.  Soon after their marriage, they resettled on Martinique in the French Antilles.  When Madeleine died there in November 1764, the Fort Royal priest said nothing of a husband, so one wonders if she was a widow at the time of her passing and if she had given either of her husband children. 

At war's end, most of the Acadians being held in New England chose to resettle in Canada.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jean Corporon began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Françoise Corporon and her family from Massachusetts settled at Repentigny on the St. Lawrence above Québec, where she remarried to Canadian Antoine Dupuis dit Raymond in February 1785.  She died at Repentigny in February 1799, age 79.  Her cousin Eustache, who remained in greater Acadia after the war, chose to settle in a future part of Canada.  By 1770, he and his family were living at Pointe-de-l'Est near Halifax, Nova Scotia.  His older son Joseph married a Boudreau and remained in the Halifax area.  His younger son Abraham-Gilbert married a Doucet and moved on to Bas-de-Tousquet, today's New Tusket, at the northwestern end of Nova Scotia, in the early 1800s. 

Meanwhile, Françoise's sisters Marie and Anne and their Trahan and Simoneau families, still languishing in Maryland, also spurned life in a British colony when the war finally ended, but they did not go to Canada.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.223

Cousin

Living in territory controlled by France, Jean Cousin of St.-Malo, Brittany, his wife Judith Guédry, and their family on Île Royale escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France. 

In c1768, Jean's daughter Marie-Blanche married Michel, fils, son of fellow Acadians Michel Doucet and Angélique Pitre, probably at Le Havre in Normandy.  In the early 1770s, the couple and three of their children were part of an attempt by French officials to settle exiles languishing in the coastal cities on an influential nobleman's land near Châtellerault in the interior province of Poitou.  After two years of effort, the Doucets retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Meanwhile, Jean Cousin, back in his native St.-Malo, may have remarried to fellow island Acadian Thérèse Savary there in c1775.  If so, he would have been in his late 50s at the time of the wedding.  In June 1776 and June 1780, two sons--Louis-Mathurin-Jean and Jean-François--were born to the couple at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of the Breton port. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  If he was still alive, Jean Cousin did not take up the offer.  Daughter Marie-Blanche and her husband Michel Doucet, however, jumped at the chance, but they almost did not make it to the Spanish colony.  They booked passage aboard the fifth of the Seven Ships, L'Amitié, that left Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, in late August 1785, but for some reason they did not cross on that vessel.  They took, instead, the seventh and final ship, La Caroline, which left Nantes on October 19.224

Crochet

Yves Crochet of Mégrit, Brittany, near St.-Malo, perhaps a soldier or sailor, married, at age 25, Pélagie, 17-year-old daughter of perhaps Claude Benoit and Élisbeth Thériot of l'Assompion, Pigiguit, at Louisbourg, Île Royale, in February 1758.  Later that year, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July, the British rounded up most of the habitants on Île Royale and deported them to France.  Yves and his teenage bride survived the crossing to Rochefort, where they landed in early 1759.  In October, they sailed around to St.-Malo.  Later that year or in 1760, they made the short trip to Yves's hometown area in the countryside southwest of the Breton port.  Pélagie gave Yves eight children, five sons and three daughters, in northern Brittany:  Jean-Guillaume at Quesny northwest of Mégrit in September 1760; François-Louis in December 1761; Jean-Joseph or Yves-Joseph at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo in March 1763 but died 11 days after his birth; Françoise-Pélagie in May 1764; Marguerite-Perrine back at Quesny in May 1766; Yves-Jean in December 1767; Julien in March 1770; and Pélagie in February 1772.  Yves died at Quesny in November 1773, age 41, and was buried at Mégrit.  Despite the size of her family, Pélagie did not remarry. 

Soon after Yves died, Pélagie Benoit and her children followed hundreds of other exiles languishing in the port cities to the interior province of Poitou, where they settled on land belonging to an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  Pélagie was pregnant when she left Quesny for Poitou.  Her ninth and final child, son Jean-Marin Crochet, was born posthumously in early May 1774, six months after her husband died, and was baptized in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault.  Youngest daughter Pélagie died in St.-Jacques Parish at age 2 a few weeks after her brother was born.  In November 1775, Pélagie and six of her children, along with her recently married sister, Marguerite Benoit, retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lowe Loire port of Nantes.  Pélagie's oldest son, Jean-Guillaume Crochet, who would have been age 15 in November 1775, was not on the convoy from Châtellerault to Nantes with the rest of the family.  He may  have become a sailor, perhaps like his father, and gone to sea.  Daughter Marguerite-Perrine, who would have been age 9 in 1775, also was not in the convoy with her mother and siblings.  She did not die young, so she may have gone to Nantes with another family.  

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Pélagie Benoit and her family, still at Nantes, agreed to take it.  In August 1785, when the family left for Louisiana, Pélagie's second son François-Louis, if he were still living, would have been age 24, and youngest son Jean-Marin would have been age 11.  Neither of the two sons accompanied their mother and five siblings, three brothers and two sisters, to the Spanish colony.225  

Daigre/Daigle

In 1755, descendants of Olivier Daigre, père and Marie Gaudet could be found at Annapolis Royal; Grand-Pré and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin; Chignecto and in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; and on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale in the French Maritimes.  By then, the family's name had evolved from Daigre to Daigle, though some members of the family retained the original spelling.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Daigres may have been among the refugees.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Daigres may have been among the 300 local Acadians serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Jean Daigre, his wife Rosalie Richard, and four children were transported to South Carolina aboard the transport Edward Cornwallis, which reached Charles Town on November 19.  Also aboard one of the south-bound transports was Marguerite Daigre, widow of Pierre Forest, and three of her sons.  The following August, Jean, Rosalie, and their remaining son, Jean-Baptiste, as well as Marguerite and her three sons, were sent with two dozen other Acadians from Charles Town to Prince Frederick Winyaw, a rural Anglican parish farther up the coast at present-day Plantersville. 

Daigres from Minas ended up on transports bound for Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia in the fall of 1755.  The first of five transports filled with exiles from Minas, including many Daigres, reached Hampton Roads, Virginia, during the second week of November.  For weeks they languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships.  As winter approached, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie, with the approval of his council, ordered the "French Neutrals" dispersed to the ports of Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond.  The following spring, the colony's Burgesses debated the question of what to do with them and concluded that the papists must go.  Virginia authorities hired more vessels and sent the Acadians on to England--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all.  In England, they were packed into warehouses in several ports.  Charles Daigre, son of Joseph, died during the crossing to England, age 35.  Most of the Daigres in England were held at Falmouth in Cornwall, but others were held at Southampton and up in Liverpool.  Marie, daughter of Olivier, fils and wife of Jean Thériot, died in early December 1756; her death was recorded at St.-Gluvius Parish church, Penryn, northwest of Falmouth.  Marie's younger brother Olivier III of Rivière-aux-Canards, age 53, died at Penryn a few days later, as did their youngest brother Jean-Baptiste, age 47--victims, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck the Acadians at Falmouth during their first year there.  Their sister Jeanne, wife of Pierre Trahan, died at Liverpool in June 1757.  Meanwhile, brothers Pierre and Joseph, sons of Bernard, fils, died at Southampton in 1756.  But life went on, even amidst the squalor of the prison compounds.  Pierre Daigre's widow Marie-Madeleine Gautrot remarried to fellow Acadian Charles Landry of Grand-Pré, widower of Anne Boudrot, at Southampton in c1758.  Charles helped Madeleine raise three of her children, two sons and a daughter, by Pierre Daigre.  Olivier Daigre III's son Honoré, widower of Françoise-Osite Dupuis, remarried, at age 31, to Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Landry and Marie Melanson and widow of Cyprien Thériot, at Falmouth in September 1757, and remarried again--his third marriage--to Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Trahan and Marie Hébert and widow of Charles Thériot, at Falmouth in September 1762.  Honoré's younger brother Olivier IV, widower of Marie Landry, remarried, at age 26, to Marie-Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles LeBlanc and Élisabeth Thibodeau, at Falmouth in November 1758.   Honoré and Olivier IV's younger brother Simon-Pierre, at age 23, married Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Thériot and Marie Landry, at Falmouth in 1758.  Younger brother Jean-Charles, at age 20, married Marie-Josèphe, another daughter of Jean Thériot and Marie Landry, at Falmouth in February 1760.  Meanwhile, Pierre and Joseph's younger brother Jean-Baptiste, at age 25, married Marie-Flavie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean dit Lami Boudrot and Agathe Thibodeau, at Southampton in 1758.  The following year, brother Eustache, at age 31, married Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Dupuis and Marie-Madeleine Trahan, at Southampton, where they had at least two children,  Pierre and Marie-Marguerite, in c1760 and  September 1761.  In November 1761, at Southampton, the brothers' youngest sister Angélique, at age 24, married Joseph, fils, 39-year-old son of fellow Acadians Joseph LeBlanc and Anne Bourg and widow of Marie Landry and Marguerite Babin.  Charles, age 24, son of Jean-Baptiste Daigre, married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Granger and Françoise LeBlanc, at Falmouth in February 1761.  Younger brother Olivier, at age 20, married Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Robichaud and Claire LeBlanc of Cobeguit, in England in c1758.  Charles and Olivier's older sister Madeleine, meanwhile, at age 22, married Charles, fils, son of Charles Granger and Françoise LeBlanc, at Falmouth in December 1757. 

Minas Daigres landed in other seaboard colonies.  Newlyweds Charles Daigre, son of Bernard, fils, Charles's wife Marie-Josèphe Babin, and their infant son Jacques ended up in Maryland during the third week of October 1755.  Charles and Marie-Josèphe had at least four more children in the Chesapeak colony:  Charles, fils in c1755; Simon in c1757; Marie in c1759; and François in c1761.  Unlike in Virginia, colonial authorities in Maryland held on to the Acadians until the end of the war with France.  At least one Daigre family, that of Alain of Minas, was sent to Pennsylvania, which they reached in late October 1755.  Charles Daigre of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, son of Bernard, père, Charles's wife Françoise Doucet, and their family, including married son Jean-Baptiste and his wife Marie-Josèphe Vincent, landed at Massachusetts in December 1755.  In August 1760, Charles's widow Françoise, daughter Françoise, youngest son Odon, and oldest son Jean-Baptiste, his wife, and their children, were among the Acadians at Milton, Massachusetts, being transferred to Boston; Charles evidently had died in the Bay Colony during the late 1750s.  His daughter Françoise married François, son of fellow Acadians Claude Benoit and Jeanne Hébert, at Boston in February 1761.  Michel Daigre with a family of two; widow Françoise Daigre with a family of two; and Jean-Charles Daigre with a family of five appeared on an undated list of Acadians probably being held in New England. 

Daigres from Chignecto, the trois-rivières, and Minas who escaped the British in 1755, as well as members of the family from the Maritimes who left the islands before 1758, took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada.  Louis-René of Petitcoudiac died at St.-Michel de Bellechasse below Québec, in November 1757, age 48; and his older brother Joseph of Minas and Île St.-Jean died at nearby St.-Charles de Bellechasse in December, age 61--victims, perhaps, of a smallpox epidemic that struck Acadian refugees in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Joseph's son Jean-Baptiste of Île St.-Jean, widower of Blanche Trahan, remarried, at age 26, to Marie-Thérèse, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Trahan and Marie Boudrot, at St.-Charles de Bellechasse in February 1759.  Meanwhile, Charles, son of René of Petitcoudiac, widower of Marguerite Comeau, remarried, at age 23, to Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Bastarache dit Basque and Angélique Richard of Annapolis Royal, at Québec in November 1758 (he went on to marry two more times, at Charlesbourg, below the city). 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Daigres who remained on the Maritime islands were untouched by the British roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats gathered up most of the habitants on the islands, Daigres among them, and deported them to St.-Malo and other French ports.  One Daigre family may have eluded the British.  Paul Daigre of Chignecto, wife Marie Hébert, and their three young children, living at Malpèque on the northwest coast of Île St.-Jean, evidently escaped with the majority of their neighbors across Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and made their way to Miramichi or to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs. 

Paul Daigre's many cousins on the islands, however, were not so lucky.  The 1758 crossing to France devastated the family.  Grégoire Daigre, wife Élisabeth Vincent, and nine of their children--Amand, Simon, Marguerite, Madeleine, Osite, Pierre, and three unnamed--crossed on the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer, suffered a mid-ocean mishap, and limped into St.-Malo the first of November.  Only Grégoire survived the crossing.  His sister Marie crossed on the same vessel with husband Casimir LeBlanc, and four of their children, and four LeBlanc relatives.  Only Casimir and a male relative survived the crossing.  Marie died in a St.-Malo hospital the day after Christmas, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Two of her children died at sea, and two died in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer soon after they reached the port.  Grégoire and Marie's cousin Félicie Daigre crossed on the Duc Guillaume with husband Jean-Baptiste Pitre, age 25, and a son.  Félicie and Jean-Baptiste survived the crossing, but their son died at sea.  She and Jean-Baptiste moved on to the naval port of Rochefort soon after they reached St.-Malo.  Grégoire Daigre, age 15, son of Charles, crossed on the Duc Guillaume and lived to tell it.  Anne, 79-year-old daughter of family progenitor Olivier Daigre, and her family, as well as niece Marie-Claire, age 58, daughter of Anne's brother Bernard, Marie-Claire's husband Charles Hébert dit Manuel, and their children, perished aboard the transport Violet, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and sank in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England on its way to St.-Malo.  Most of the island Daigres crossed on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the same 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The crossing on the Five Ships was nevertheless a terrible one.  The death toll among the 1,033 passengers aboard those vessels reached nearly 50 percent, including many Daigres.  Marguerite Daigre, age 30, crossed with husband Zacharie Boudrot, age 37, five children, ages 9 to 1, and two Boudrot relatives, including Zacharie's sister Marie, age 22.  All of the children died at sea.  Jean Daigre, fils, age 26, crossed with wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot, age 24, and two of their children--Marie, age 4; and Madeleine, age 2.  The children were buried at sea.  Charles Daigre, age 25, crossed with wife Marie-Blanche Barrieau, age 23, two children--Jean-Baptiste, age 3; and Gertrude, age 1 1/2--and Marie-Blanche's sister Pélagie, age 13.  Charles's two children died at sea, and he died in a St.-Malo hospital in late March, likely from the rigors of the crossing.  Jean Daigre of Grand-Pré, age 60, crossed with second wife Anne-Marie Breau, age 51, and six of their unmarried children--Marie, age 20; Paul, age 17; Ursule, age 15; Marie-Marguerite, called Marguerite, age 14; Anne- or Jeanne-Josèphe, age 12; and Élisabeth, or Isabelle, age 9.  Anne-Marie and daughter Isabelle died at sea.  Jean died in a St.-Malo hospital in February, soon after reaching the port.  Jean and Anne-Marie's older daughter Catherine, age 30, crossed with husband Blaise Thibodeau, age 30, four children, ages 5 to 1, and Mathurin Hébert, age 16, a relative.  The four children died at sea, and Mathurin died a month after reaching St.-Malo.  Marguerite Daigre, age 35, crossed with husband Pierre Dugas, age 31, three children, ages 6, 4, and 2, and Pierre's brother Amand, age 12.  The youngest child died at sea.  Olivier Daigre of Cobeguit, age 41, crossed with wife Angélique Doiron, age 39, and 11 children--Maguerite, age 18; Miniac, age 15; Marie-Osite, called Osite, age 13; Rose, age 11; Charles, age 10; Joseph, age 8; Jean-Pierre, age 6; Paul, age 2; and Jean-Baptiste, Firmin, and Geneviève, ages unrecorded.  Olivier, Angélique, Marguerite, Miniac, Osite, and Rose survived the crossing, but the other seven children died at sea.  Angélique died in a St.-Malo hospital a month after reaching the Breton port, and Olivier died a few days later.  Pierre Daigre, age 66, crossed with second wife Marie-Louise Testard dit Paris, age 53, widow of Charles Pinet, fils.  They survived the crossing but died soon after reaching port.  François Daigre, age 50, crossed with wife Marie Boudrot, age 48, and three unmarried children--Olivier, age 18; Hélène-Catherine, age 17; and Françoise, age 15.  They all survived the crossing, but François and Marie died soon after reaching St.-Malo.  François and Marie's son Marin, age 23, crossed with wife Françoise Hébert, age 22.  They survived the crossing, but Françoise died in a local hospital soon after reaching port.  François and Marie's daughter Marie-Rose crossed with husband René Guillot, age 32, and two sons, ages 3 and infant.  The boys died at sea, and Marie-Rose died in a St.-Malo hospital in early March, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Marie-Rose's sister Théotiste, age 33, crossed with husband Ambroise Guillot, age 30 (he was Marie-Rose's husband's brother), and five children, ages 7, 5, 4, 2, and unrecorded.  The four youngest children died at sea.  Olivier Daigre, age 24, crossed with wife Marie-Blanche Robichaud, age 28, whom he had married earlier in the year.  Both survived the crossing.  Charles Daigre, age 28, and wife Anne-Marie Vincent, age 29, also survived the crossing.  Françoise Daigre, age 32, widow of François Gautrot, crossed with two children, ages 3 and 2.  The children died at sea, and Françoise died in a St.-Malo hospital soon after reaching port.  Anne Daigre, age 20, crossed with husband Pierre Robichaud, age 24.  Anne was pregnant on the voyage and gave birth to twin daughters Anne-Marie and Marguerite on May 10.  She died from the rigors of childbirth, and the twins died three days after their birth, leaving Pierre without a family.  Marguerite Daigre, age 30, crossed with husband Eustache Bourg, age 36, and three children, ages 6, 2, and 1, aboard one of the Five Ships.  Eustache and the three children died at sea, leaving Marguerite without a family.  Amand Daigre, age 46, son of Bernard, died in the crossing to St.-Malo aboard an unnamed vessel.  

Island Daigres did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Grégoire Daigre settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer and married, at age 19, Marguerite-Josèphe, 19-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Henry and Marie Carret, there in September 1762.  Marguerite-Josèphe gave Grégoire at least seven children at St.-Servan:  Marie in November 1763; Marguerite-Anastasie in January 1765; Olive-Victoire in June 1766; Geneviève-Simone in October 1767 but died at age 3 in August 1770; Françoise-Jeanne in May 1769; Jean-Joseph in December 1770; and Geneviève-Sophie in December 1772.  Charles Daigre and his wife Anne-Marie Vincent settled at Trigavou on the west bank of the river southwest of St.-Malo, where he worked as a pulley maker.  He and his wife were that rare Acadian couple who had no children.  Marie-Blanche Barrieau, widow of another Charles Daigre, still in her early 20s, resided at Pleuidhen-sur-Rance on the east bank of the river south of St.-Malo.  One wonders if she remarried.  Théotiste, daughter of François Daigre, with husband Ambroise Guillot, settled at Trigavou and gave him at least six more children there between 1760 to 1770.  Théotiste's youngest sister Françoise, age 20, married Pierre, fils, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Boudrot and Anne Hébert, at Trigavou in November 1763.  Between 1764 and 1771, she gave him at least four children there.  Théotiste and Françoise's brother Marin remarried to Thècle, daughter of fellow Acadians Claude Thériot and Marie Guérin, at Pleslin near Trigavou in June 1764.  Thècle gave Marin at least four children at Trigavou:  Romain in August 1765; Brigide in May 1767; and twins Marin, fils and Marie-Anne in March 1769, but Marie-Anne died at age 2 in April 1771, and Marin, fils died in June 1771.  Théotiste, Françoise, and Marin's sister Hélène-Catherine, age 22, married François-Hilaire, 19-year-old son of fellow Acadians Alexandre Gautrot and Marguerite Hébert, at Trigavou in November 1764.  She gave him at least four children there between 1766 to 1773.  Catherine, daughter of Jean Daigre, settled with husband Blaise Thibobeau at Pleudihen-sur-Rance, where, between 1760 and 1770, she gave him at least eight more children at nearby Mordreuc.  Catherine's younger brother Paul, at age 19, married Geneviève, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Aucoin and Marie-Josèphe Henry, at Pleudihen in April 1761.  She gave him at least nine children in nearby villages:  Jean in July 1762; René-Jean at Les Villes Morvues in February 1764; twins Joseph-Charles and Marie-Anne at La Gravelle in March 1766, but Marie-Anne died at age 9 in August 1775; Marguerite-Jeanne was at Ville de la Chapelle in May 1768 but died at La Gravelle at age 1 1/2 in September 1779; Anne-Geneviève at La Gravelle in April 1770 but died at age 5 in August 1775; twins Geneviève-Jeanne and Marie-Françoise in March 1772; and Paul-Olivier in April 1774 but died at age 5 in September 1779.  Catherine and Paul's younger sister Marie-Marguerite, called Marguerite, married Amand, son of fellow Acadians Jacques Giroir and Marie Boisseau, at Pleudihen in May 1764.  She gave him at least seven children at Mordreuc between 1765 and 1773, most of whom died in childhood.  Amand "drowned on a ship off the coast of Guernsey in January 1769."  Marguerite remarried to Louis, fils, son of fellow Acadians Louis Clossinet dit Dumoulin and Marguerite Longuépée and widower of Anne Jacquemin, at Pleudihen in November 1774.  She gave him no children, at least none who appear in French church records.  Catherine, Paul, and Marguerite's sister Marie married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Barrieu and Véronique Giroir, at Pleudihen in June 1764.  Between 1765 and 1769, she gave him at least four children at Mordreuc and La Gravelle.  Catherine et al.'s youngest sister Anne-Josèphe married Jean, fils, son of fellow Acadians Jean Bourg and Marie Pitre and widower of Marie Aucoin, at Pleudihen in May 1767.  She gave him 13 more children at nearby La Coquenais and La Gravelle between 1768 and 1785.  Jean Daigre, fils and wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot settled at Pleudihen, where she gave him at least six more children:  Jean-Pierre at Les Villes Morvues in September 1760; Anne-Marie in January 1762; Marie-Jeanne at La Coquenais in October 1763 but died at age 10 at La Gravelle in August 1773; Jeanne-Madeleine at La Gravelle in May 1766 but died there at age 7 in July 1773; Madeleine-Françoise in March 1768; and Françoise-Modeste in November 1771.  Olivier Daigre of Cobeguit's four surviving children--Marguerite, Miniac, Marie-Osite, and Marie-Rose--settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west bank of the river across from Mordreuc.  Marguerite, age 20, married Jean-Baptiste, 33-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jean Landry and Madeleine Melanson and widower of Rosalie Boudrot, at Plouër in November 1760.  Before Marguerite could give him anymore children, Jean-Baptiste died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in February 1763, age 36.  Marguerite, at age 27, remarried to Honoré, 22-year-old son of fellow Acadians Pierre Richard and Marie-Josèphe Boudrot, at Plouër in January 1767.  Between 1767 and 1773, she gave him at least four children, only one of whom survived childhood.  Marguerite's sister Marie-Osite, at age 18, married Marin, 22-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jean Bourg and Françoise Benoit of Cobeguit, at Plouër in January 1763.  She gave him at least six children between 1764 and 1773, all of whom survived childhood.  Marguerite and Marie-Osite's brother Miniac, still unmarried, became one of the few island Acadians who chose to go to Belle-Île-en-Mer in late 1765.  Marguerite, Marie-Osite, and Miniac's younger sister Marie-Rose, at age 21, married Joseph, 22-year-old son of fellow Acadians Charles Dupuis and Marie-Madeleine Trahan, at Plouër in February 1768.  In May 1763, Joseph had crossed from England aboard L'Ambition with the family of Marie-Rose's cousin Eustache Daigre.  Sadly, Marie-Rose died at Lizenais near Plouër the December after her wedding.  Olivier Daigre and wife Marie-Blanche Robichaud settled at Trigavou and St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where she gave him at least 10 children:  twins Olivier-Raphael and Marie-Louise in August 1759, but Marie-Louise died the following November; Michel-Grégoire in October 1760 but died at age 11 months in September 1761; Jean-Charles in December 1761; Françoise-Apolline in August 1763; Casimir-Théodore in July 1765; François-Joseph in July 1767; Marie-Blanche in June 1771 but died at age 8 in August 1779; and Geneviève-Marie in July 1773.  In September 1759, Charles Daigre, now a widower, probably with his two daughters, reached St.-Malo from Rochefort.  They settled at Plouër-sur-Rance.  Charles remarried to Marie-Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Aucoin and Catherine Comeau, at Plouër in October 1763.  Marie-Blanche gave Charles another daughter there, Marie-Madeleine in October 1766.  Marie-Blanche died at Gallienne near Plouër in April 1772, age 36.  In May 1766, Alexandre Daigre, wife Élisabeth Granger, and three of their children, with permission from French authorities, left Boulogne-sur-Mer for St.-Malo aboard the brigantine Hazard.  They settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Élisabeth gave Alexandre at least four more children:  Marguerite-Félicité in September 1767; twins Joseph and Marie in March 1770; and Charles-Marie, also called Charles-Daniel, in October 1773. 

Island Daigres ended up in French ports other than St.-Malo, including Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie, and Cherbourg and Le Havre in Normandy.  Charles Daigre, age 34, wife Cécile Landry, age 32, and two daughters--Marguerite-Cécile, age 8; and Marie, age 7--landed at the naval port of Rochefort.  Cécile either died during the crossing or soon after they reached the naval port.  Charles and his daughters moved on to St.-Malo, which they reached the first of September 1759.  Alexandre Daigre, age 29, wife Élisabeth, or Isabelle, Granger, age 26, and son Charles, age 6, landed in the northern fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer, where Alexandre and Isabelle had four more children in St.-Nicolas Parish:  Jean-Charles-Alexandre in July 1759 but died the following December; Isabelle-Luce in January 1761; Alexis-Jean-Mathurin in January 1763; and Jean-Baptiste-Alexandre in May 1765.  In May 1766, the family left Boulogne-sur-Mer for St.-Malo.  Son Charles, who would have been age 14, was not with them.  Olivier Daigre, age 26, landed first at Cherbourg in Normandy, moved on to St.-Malo, which he reached in late February 1759, and returned to Cherbourg a week or so later, where he died the following November.  Joseph Daigre died at Cherbourg in April 1760, age 12; the Très-Ste.-Trinité parish priest who recorded the boy's burial did not give his parents' names.  Jean Daigre, a fisherman, and his wife Marie-Judique Durel also landed at Cherbourg, where they had at least three children:  Jean-Baptiste in December 1759; Charles-Lazare baptized by a priest named Raimond LeBlanc in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in August 1761; and Firmin in April 1763.  Still in his late teens, François-Marie Daigre, son of Abraham of Minas and Île St.-Jean, married Jeanne, 23-year-old daughter of Thomas Holley and Scholastique Le Gentilhomme, "bourgeois de Cherbourg," in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in January 1761.  Jeanne gave her young Acadian husband at least four children there:  Marie-Thérèse in December 1761; François-Alexandre in February 1763; Louis-François in August 1766; and Marie-Jeanne-Jacqueline in September 1769.  They crossed the Baie de Seine to Le Havre, where daughter Flore-Adélaïde was born in c1770.  François's sister Marie-Rose married Guillaume, 20-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste dit Jeannit LaBorde and Marie Prieur of Île St.-Jean, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in July 1761.  Guillaume was a sailor.  Before she could give him any children, Marie-Rose died at Cherbourg in December 1763, age 25.  François and Marie-Rose's sister Marguerite, widow of Eustache Bourg, who had died at Plymouth, England, during exile, also landed at Cherbourg, but she also crossed the Baie de Seine.  She remarried to Pierre, 34-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jacques Lavergne and Françoise Pitre of Chignecto and widow of Anne Lord, in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in November 1763.  Pierre had resided in that port since early 1759, having been deported there from Île St.-Jean. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England who had gone there from Virginia were repatriated to France, many Daigres among them.  Most, if not all of them, landed at St.-Malo and Morlaix in northern Brittany.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, Gautrot, age 44, widow of Pierre Daigre of Grand-Pré and wife of Charles LeBlanc of Grand-Pré, crossed the Channel with her husband, three LeBlanc children, ages 4, 3, and 2, and four Daigre children--Jean-Baptiste-Amand, age 19; Marie-Rose, called Rose, age 12; and Paul, age 11--aboard the transport Ambition, which reached St.-Malo on May 22.  They settled at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Jean-Baptiste-Amand, at age 25, married Marguerite-Ange, 16-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph-Ange Dubois and Anne Michel of Cap-Sable, at St.-Servan in January 1770.  Their son Jean-Joseph was born at Créhen near Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo in April 1771 but died at St.-Servan at age 1 in July 1772.  Eustache Daigre, age 35, crossed on L'Ambition with wife Madeleine Dupuis, age 21, and two children--Pierre, age 3; and Marie-Marguerite, age 1 1/2.  With them was Madeleine's 17-year-old brother Joseph.  They settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river, where Madeleine gave Eustache at least four more children:  Madeleine-Marguerite at nearby Lizenais in February 1765 but died there at age 6 in June 1771; Victoire-Marie in January 1767 but died at age 6 in August 1773; Jean-Joseph in January 1770; and Charles-Marc in February 1772.  Eustache's brother Jean-Baptiste, age 20, wife Marie-Flavie Boudrot, and infant daughter Madeleine, also crossed on L'Ambition and settled at Plouër.  Marie-Flavie gave Jean-Baptiste at least five more children there:  Jean-Baptiste at Lizenais in October 1765 but died there at age 1 1/2 in March 1767; Joseph-Marie in July 1767 but died at Lizenais at age 4 1/2 in December 1771; Anne-Marie in September 1769; and an unnamed child died the day of his/her birth at Lizenais in December 1771.  Meanwhile, daughter Madeleine died at Lizenais, age 4, in February 1767.  Joseph Daigre, fils of Grand-Pré crossed on L'Ambition, settled at Plouër, and married Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Comeau and Marguerite Aucoin, at St.-Servan in January 1766.  She gave him at least one son there, Joseph-Silvain in February 1767, but he died at age 1 in March 1768.  Joseph, fils's younger sister Marguerite also crossed on L'Ambition and settled at Plouër before moving on to St.-Servan in 1766.  Simon Daigre, age 13, crossed on L'Ambition and settled at Plouër before moving to St.-Servan.  Joseph Daigre, fils, age 11, crossed the Channel aboard La Dorothée with the family of Alain LeBlanc and settled at St.-Servan, but he did not remain.  In 1765, in his early teens, he moved on to Belle-Île-en-Mer, likely with the LeBlancs, and then disappears from the historical record. 

In late autumn 1765, Daigres repatriated from England to Morlaix, along with an island Daigre from St.-Malo, agreed to become part of a new agricultural venture on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Five of the Daigres who went to Belle-Île-en-Mer were sons of Olivier III and Françoise Granger of Rivière-aux-Canards.  The brothers had been held at Falmouth for seven long years and crossed to Morlaix in northwestern Brittany in the spring of 1763.  Honoré, age 40 in 1765, came to Belle-Île from Tréguier northwest of Morlaix with third wife Élisabeth Trahan, age 40, four sons--Pierre, age 16; Jean-Pierre, age 11; Joseph, age 9; and Jean-François, age 2--and Élisabeth's daughter by an earlier marriage, Marie Thériot, age 16.  They settled at Chubiguer in the district of Le Palais on the island's east coast.  Two more children were born to them there, including a second son named Joseph in October 1766; and Marie-Catherine in February 1769.  Honoré's older son named Joseph died at Le Palais in June 1779, age 22.  Meanwhile, Honoré's oldest son Pierre from his first wife, Françoise Dupuis, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Thériot and Isabelle Trahan of Rivière-aux-Canards, at Le Palais in September 1773.  Honoré's brother Olivier IV, age 34 in 1765, came to Belle-Île-en-Mer with second wife Marie-Blanche LeBlanc, age 24, and son Victor, age 4.  They also settled at Chubiguer.  At least 11 more children were born to them there:  Michel in October 1763 but died at age 2 1/2 in May 1766; François in December 1765; Simon-François in December 1767; Jean-Baptiste in February 1770; Olivier V in February 1772 but died 15 days after his birth; Marie-Geneviève in July 1773; Pélagie in June 1775; Marie-Madeleine in May 1777 but died at age 1 in June 1778; Eulalie in March 1779; and twins Honoré le jeune and Marguerite in August 1781, but Marguerite also died young.  By September 1784, Olivier IV and younger brother Simon-Pierre had left Belle-Île and moved their families east to Paimboeuf in southwest Brittany.  Simon-Pierre, age 30 in 1765, came to Belle-Île with wife Marie-Madeleine Thériot, age 27, and three children--Marie-Marguerite, age 6; Anne-Geneviève, age 4; and Édouard, age 2.  They settled at Kervellant in the district of Sauzon on the north end of the island.  More children were born to them there, including Simon-Pierre, fils in June 1766; Jean-Pierre in August 1768; Marie-Madeleine in July 1774; and Joseph-Michel in April 1776.  By September 1784, Simon-Pierre and his family had followed older brother Olivier IV to Paimboeuf.  Brother Jean-Charles, age 25 in 1765, came to the island with wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot, age 23, and two sons--Charles-Augustin, age 5; and Mathurin, age 3.  They settled at Kerzo near Sauzon.  More children were born to them there:  Constance in August 1766; and Marie-Jeanne in April 1768.  They, too, left the island, but not for Paimboeuf.  They moved, instead, to the southern coast of Brittany, where Jean-Charles worked as a laborer on one of the King's farm.  Daughter Marie-Françoise was born in St.-Coustan Parish, Auray, east of Lorient, in June 1772; the priest who recorded her baptism noted that Marie-Françoise's father was working on the King's farm and that the family was "demeurant sur le quai"--living on the wharf.  They did not remain at Auray but returned to Belle-Île-en-Mer, settling at Le Palais, where son Pierre-Joseph was born in March 1775.  Honoré, Olivier IV, Simon-Pierre, and Jean-Charles's youngest brother Paul, age 23 in 1765, was the only brother still unmarried when the family landed at Morlaix.  Typically, he did not remain a bachelor.  He married Agathe, daughter of fellow Acadians Honoré LeBlanc and Marie-Josèphe Trahan of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Mathieu Parish, Morlaix, in October 1764.  Paul and Agathe may have known one another in Acadia.  She, with her family, also had been deported to Virginia, sent on to England, held at Liverpool, and crossed from there to Morlaix in the spring of 1763.  Paul and Agathe joined two of his older brothers at Chubiguer near Le Palais.  The couple had at least two daughters there:  Anne-Marie in December 1765; and Anne-Apolline in March 1768.  Like older brother Jean-Charles, Paul took his family to the southern coast of Brittany, perhaps also to work as a laborer on one of the King's farms.  Son Vincent-Auguste was born at Erdeven southeast of Lorient in November 1770.  They were living near Lorient in 1772.  Returning to Belle-Île-en-Mer soon afterwards, daughter Marie-Louise was born at Le Palais in May 1773.  The family then returned to southern Brittany.  Son Louis-Joseph was born at Port-Louis, at the entrance to Lorient harbor, in February 1776.  The five brothers' sister Françoise, age 36 in 1765, came to Belle-Île with second husband Pierre Richard, age 54, two daughters from her first marriage, a son from her current marriage, and two stepchildren.  They settled at Kerbellec in the district of Le Palais.  Two other Daigre wives settled on the island.  Marie-Madeleine Daigre of Rivière-aux-Canards, age 31 in 1765, came to Belle-Île from Morlaix with husband Charles Granger of Rivière-aux-Canards, age 28, and three sons, ages 6, 4, and 2.  They settled at Tyneve in the district of Bangor in the island's southern interior, where five more children were born to them.  Angélique Daigre of Grand-Pré, age 30 in 1765, came to Belle-Île from St.-Servan-sur-Mer with husband Joseph LeBlanc of Grand-Pré, age 44, two of her sons, ages 3 and 2, and an 18-year-old stepson.  Angélique was Joseph's third wife.  Four more children were born to them on the island before they returned to St.-Malo in 1772.  The lone Daigre from the Maritimes who went to Belle-Île-en-Mer was Miniac, son of Olivier of Cobeguit.  Miniac had crossed from Île St.-Jean to St.-Malo in late 1758, settled at Plouër-sur-Rance with his sisters, and then followed Marie, eldest daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Melanson and Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc of Minas, to Le Palais, where, at age 23, he married her in November 1765, soon after they reached the island.  A native of Rivière-aux-Canards, she had followed her family to Virginia, Southampton, and St.-Malo, and was age 20 at the time of their marriage.  She and Miniac settled at Le Cosquet in the district of Locmaria on the southeast end of the island, where she died in May 1771, age 25.  Before her passing, she gave Miniac at least three children at Locmaria:  Paul-Olivier in May 1767; Marie-Josèphe-Marguerite in December 1768; and Luc-Julien-Pascal in October 1770 but died at age 3 in May 1774.  Miniac, at age 32, remarried to Marie, daughter of Nicolas Couriacault and Jeanne Henry, at Locmaria in October 1774.  They soon left the island for the southern coast of Britanny, where Miniac worked on the King's farm at Kerouriec southeast of Lorient.  Marie gave Miniac more children in southern Brittany, including Anne-Françoise at Erdeven near Kerouriec in January 1775; and children born at nearby Île-aux-Moines and Vannes. 

In the early 1770s, Daigres in several port cities chose to take part in another, even grander, settlement venture, this one in the interior province of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  Hundreds of Acadians, including Daigres, went there in 1773 and 1774.  Like their cousins on Belle-Île-en-Mer, they would do their best to become productive farmers again.  They included Alexandre Daigre, wife Élisabeth Granger, and four children from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Eustache, wife Madeleine Dupuis, and four children from Plouër-sur-Rance; Jean Daigre, a fisherman, wife Marie-Judith Durel, and three sons from Cherbourg; Jean-Baptiste Daigre, wife Marie-Flavie Boudrot, and two daughters from Plouër; Marguerite-Ange Dubois from St.-Servan, the pregnant wife of Jean-Baptiste-Amand Daigre, who likely was at sea; and Jean-Baptiste-Amand's mother Madeleine Gautrot, widow of Pierre Daigre and wife of Charles LeBlanc, with two younger Daigre children from St.-Servan.  Marguerite-Ange Dubois gave birth to a son, Jean-Louis Daigre, at Pouthume near Châtellerault in October 1774.  His father may have still been at sea.  Marie-Flavie Boudrot gave Jean-Baptiste Daigre a son as well, Jean-Pierre, in St.-Jean-Baptiste l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in July 1775. 

According to Acadian genealogist Bona Arsenault, Olivier, son of Jean-Baptiste Daigre of Rivière-aux-Canards, Olivier's wife Marie-Blanche Robichaud, and their children, did not go to Poitou from St.-Servan in 1773 but joined, instead, an expedition of other exiles led by ship captain Charles Robin to the British-controlled Channel island of Jersey in 1774.  From Jersey, home base of the Robin brothers, the Acadians recrossed the North Atlantic and settled at the Robin-controlled fishery in Gaspésie on the north coast of the Baie des Chaleurs, where, Arsenault says, members of the family were counted in 1791 and 1792.  They also settled, according to Arsenault, at St.-Basile-de-Madawaska on upper Rivière St.-Jean, and at Richibouctou on the eastern shore of New Brunswick.  Albert J. Robichaux, Jr.'s study of the Acadians in France, however, shows that Olivier Daigre, husband of Marie-Blanche Robichaud, died at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in July 1774, and that at least his oldest son Olivier-Raphaël remained in the mother country.  The death of Marie-Blanche Robichaud's 8 1/2-year-old daughter Marie-Blanche Daigre at St.-Servan in August 1779 hints that Olivier's widow also remained in France with her younger children.  If any of her Daigre children "returned" to North America, they likely did not do it in the 1770s. 

Meanwhile, the settlement venture in Poitou was largely abandoned after only two years of effort.  From late October 1775 through mid-March 1776, hundreds of Poitou Acadians, including Daigres, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Eustache Daigre, who worked as a day laborer and carpenter at Nantes, and wife Madeleine Dupuis, had at least four more children in St.-Nicolas Parish there:  Fabien in August 1776 but died at age 1 in November 1777; Joseph-Grégoire in February 1779; Isaac-Joseph in September 1780 but died at age 1 in November 1781; and Étienne in December 1784.  Eustache's aughter Marie-Marguerite, age 19, married Isaac, son of fellow Acadians Ambroise Hébert and Marie-Madeleine Bourg of Cobeguit, in St.-Nicolas Parish in July 1780.  Jean-Baptiste-Amand Daigre worked as a sailor at Nantes.  Wife Marguerite-Ange Dubois gave him another son there:  Paul-Marie at nearby Chantenay in August 1778 but died there at age 2 in July 1780.  Charles-Daniel, son of Alexandre Daigre and Élisabeth Granger, died in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, in September 1779, age 6.  Jean-Baptiste Daigre worked as a laborer and wood-polisher at Nantes.  Wife Marie-Flavie Boudrot gave him another son , Jean-Augustin, in July 1781 in St.-Similien Parish, but the boy died there at age 2 1/2 in April 1784.  Marie-Rose, called Rose, daughter of Pierre Daigre and Marie-Madeleine Gautrot of Grand-Pré and Southampton, England, came to Nantes with her mother and stepfather, Charles LeBlanc.  At age 32, Rose married Jean, a mason, son of André Fougeraud and Gabrielle Suehard of St.-Vaury, Diocese of Limoges, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in June 1782.  Before Rose could give Jean any children, however, hee died at Chantenay in June 1784, age 34.  

Some of the Daigres who settled at Nantes did not come there from Poitou.  Olivier Daigre IV, second wife Marie-Blanche LeBlanc, and their many children moved from Belle-Île-en-Mer to Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, by November 1783, when son Jean-Pierre-Toussaint was baptized there.  Daughter Marguerite, a twin born at Le Palais on Belle-Île, died at Paimboeuf in November 1784, age 3.  Olivier IV's younger brother Simon-Pierre also came to Paimboeuf from Belle-Île-on-Mer with wife Marie-Madeleine Thériot and their children.  She gave him another son at the lower Loire port:  François in May 1779 but died the following November.  Son Jean-Pierre, born at Sauzon on Belle-Île, died at Paimboeuf in February 1783, age 13 1/2.  Wife Marie-Madeleine died there in January 1784, age 45.  Simon-Pierre remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Michel and Marguerite Forest, at St.-Martin de Chantenay just outside of Nantes in February 1785.  Daigres came to Nantes from other places by the early 1780s.  François-Alexandre, son of François Daigre and Frenchwoman Jeanne Holley of Cherbourg, a native of that city, married, at age 20, Rose-Adélaïde, 16-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Bourg and Rose Doiron, probably at Nantes in c1782.  Daughter Émilie-Adélaïde was baptized at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1783; and son François-Joseph in April 1785.  Jean-Baptiste, son of Jean Daigre and Marie-Judith Durel of Cherbourg, also a native of the city, married, at age 23, Marie, 25-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre LeBlanc and Marie Landry, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in March 1783.  Marie was a native of Bristol, England.  She gave Jean-Baptiste two daughters at Chantenay:  Marie-Judith in April 1784; and Marguerite-Louise in April 1785.  Another Jean-Baptiste Daigre, parentage unrecorded, born in greater Acadia in c1740, appeared at Nantes in the early 1780s and married, or perhaps remarried to, Marie-Claudine, daughter of Guillaume Valet and Ursule-Perrine Catot of Kemperlain, Val, France, probably at Nantes in c1783.  Their son Jean-René was baptized in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, April 1784.

During their two and a half decades in the mother country, Acadian Daigres proliferated, even prospered, despite the frustrations of living there.  Yet, in the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 58 Daigres agreed to take it.  They included Charles, Eustache, François, François-Alexandre, three Jean-Baptistes, brothers Olivier IV and Simon-Pierre, and their families, plus five children of Alexandre.  But many other Daigres chose to remain in the mother country.  Brothers Honoré, Jean-Charles, and Paul, along with cousin Miniac Daigre, remained on Belle-Île-en-Mer or in southern Brittany.  Daigres in the St.-Malo area also remained.  Olivier-Raphaël Daigre married Marie-Jacquemine, 24-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians François Bourg and Anne Aucoin, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance south of St.-Malo in January 1786, less than a year after his fellow Acadians sailed for the Spanish colony.  Cousin Jean Daigre, fils, at age 27, married 25-year-old Hélène, another daughter of François Bourg and Anne Aucoin, at Pleudihen in February 1789.  Both Marie-Jacquemine and Hélène were natives of the Pleudihen area.  Grégoire Daigre and his large family at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer also eschewed the Spanish colony.  During the French Revolution, in 1791 and 1792, officials counted Charles Daigre, age 56, with wife Marie-Marguerite Granger, and Marie-Josèphe Daigre, age 42, at Morlaix.  In 1792, French officials found Honoré Daigre, age 66, and his third wife Élilsabeth Trahan, also age 66, still on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  In that same year, French authorities counted Honoré's younger brother Paul and his family at Île St.-Michel near Lorient, where they had moved in the 1770s.  In 1797, French officials counted Geneviève Daigue, likely Daigre, widow Daroguy, age 75, an Acadian exile from the French fishery islands of St.-Pierre and Miquelon, at Le Havre.  In December of that same year, French officials counted Françoise Daigle, widow of Pierre Boudrot, age 50, "at Aux Huit maisons," Poitou, southeast of Châtellerault; and Marin Daigle, age 64; Marie Daigle, age 35; and Romain Daigle, Marin's son, age 32, "at La Grand Ligne," Poitou, near the Eight Houses, where they likely had remained in 1776 after other Poitou Acadians had retreated to Nantes. 

In North America at war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriaton.  In June 1763 in Pennsylvania Alain Daigre, wife Euphrosine Deschamps, and three children were still being held in that colony.  That July, colonial officials in Maryland counted Charles Daigre, wife Marie-Josèphe Babin, son Charles, fils, and daughter Marie, along with orphan Marie Granger, at Newtown on the Chesapeake colony's Eastern Shore.  In August, colonial officials in Massachusetts noted that Jean, probably Jean-Baptiste, Daigre, wife Marguerite ____, two sons, and a daughter; and François Daigre, evidently still a widower, along with a son, were still living in the Bay Colony. 

Two young Daigre siblings emigrated to very different places from a prison compound in Nova Scotia.  Agnès and Fabien, children of Paul Daigre of Chignecto, were living with their family at Malpèque on the northwest shore of Île St.-Jean in August 1752.  Six years later, in late 1758, they escaped the British roundup on the island and followed their family and many of their neighbors to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  By 1760, they had made their way to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  Though the British failed to capture the place, they nevertheless cut it off from what was left of French America.  In October, a second British naval force, this one from Québec, arrived at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  On it were Paul Daigre of Chignecto and Malpèque and his family of 10.  Over the following months, the British sent these and other exiles either captured by, or surrendered to, British forces in the area to prison compounds in Nova Scotia, where they held them for the rest of the war.  In early 1765, at age 14, Paul's daughter Agnès joined other Acadians from the prison compounds in their search for a new home in the Mississippi valley.  She was, in fact, the first Acadian Daigre to emigrate to Spanish Louisiana.  According to Bona Arsenault, in 1767 her brother Fabien, who would have been age 11 that year, was living as an orphan with fellow Acadians Abraham Dugas and his wife Marguerite LeBlanc of Minas on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Arsenault hints that boy's parents had died in Nova Scotia during imprisonment and that Fabien, instead of following his older sister to Louisiana in 1765, chose to go, or was taken, to Île Miquelon.  If so, he did not remain.  In 1767, French authorities, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on the Newfoundland islands, "deported" the fisher/habitants to France.  Most of them returned to Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre the following year, Fabien, perhaps, among them.  If he did return to Miquelon, he did not remain.  According to Arsenault, he settled in the British-controlled fishery at Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, where he married Rose, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Robichaud and Anne Michel, at Bonaventure in November 1780.  According to Arsenault, between 1783 and 1789, Rose gave Fabien three sons at Bonaventure. 

After the war, most of the Acadians in the northern seaboard colonies, Daigres among them, chose to resettle in Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Olivier Daigre began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Daigres could be found at Québec City; on the upper St. Lawrence at St.-Ambroise, today's Loretteville, and St.-Jacques de l'Achigan north of Montréal; at St.-Ours on the lower Richelieu, where they were especially numerous; at Charlesbourg and Montmagny on the St.-Lawrence below Québec City; and at Bonaventure and Carleton in Gaspésie.  In what became New Brunswick, Daigres also settled at Richibouctou and Nipisiguit, today's Bathhurst, on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore; and at St.-Basile-de-Madawaska on upper Rivière St.-Jean on the northwestern edge of the province.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, the Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

At war's end, the few Daigres remaining in South Carolina and a Daigre family from Pennsylvania chose to go not to Canada but to French St.-Domingue, where they could live not only among fellow Catholics, but also in territory controlled by France.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of St.-Domingue would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the war of vengeance to come.  The exiles could provide a source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the labor of their slaves.  To entice them to the tropical island, the French promised the Acadianss land of their own there.  It must have worked out for the Daigres who chose to go there.  When fellow refugees from Nova Scotia and Maryland, including a Daigre, came through Cap-Français in the mid and late 1760s on their way to New Orleans, none of the Daigres in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  Cécile, daughter of Alain Daigre and Euphrosine Deschamps and widow of Jean-Marie-François Tafaud, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in April 1776, age 22; the priest who recorded Cécile's burial noted that her father was deceased at the time of her death.  One wonders if he died in Pennsylvania, where the family had been held, or in St.-Domingue.  Marguerite Daigre, widow of Pierre Forest, formerly of South Carolina, died at Côtes-de-Fer on the island's south coast in October 1778, age 50.  Jean-Baptiste Daigre, a mason, probably the son of Jean of Chignecto who had been deported to South Carolina, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in December 1780, age 26.  A Daigre also ended up on another island in the French Antilles.  Marguerite Daigle, widow of one Legueule, and seven children appear on a list of Acadians at Champflore, Martinique, in January 1766. 

Meanwhile, Acadians in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholics roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Four expeditions from Baltimore and Port Tobacco converged on the Spanish colony from 1766 to 1769.  Charles Daigre and his family, however, were among the minority of Maryland Acadians who chose not to go to the Mississippi valley colony.  According to Bona Arsenault, Charles settled at St.-Ours in the lower Richelieu valley, between Trois-Rivières and Montréal, so one wonders when the family left Maryland for Canada.  If they did go to the Richelieu valley, one of their sons did not join them.  An historian of the Acadians in Maryland notes that Simon à Charles Daigle served as "the captain of the Baltimore-Norfolk packet line who figures so prominently in city records."298

D'Amours/de Louvière

When British forces rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, Jean-Baptiste d'Amours dit de Louvière, scion of one of greater Acadia's noble families, his wife Geneviève Bergeron, and their children remained unmolested.  Their home near Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas on lower Rivière St.-Jean lay in territory controlled by France, so they escaped the fate of their cousins across the Bay of Fundy.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  In late 1758 and early 1759, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg the previous July, British forces raided the Acadian settlements on lower Rivière St.-Jean, burned the villages along a 35-mile stretch of the river, including Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas, and imprisoned and deported the Acadians they managed to capture.  Michel Bergeron dit Nantes, Jean-Baptiste's father-in-law, had escaped from Annapolis Royal three years earlier with some of his family and had taken refuge with his daughter and son-in-law on the lower St.-Jean.  Michel dit Nantes eluded the British again and, via the St.-Jean portage, led a group of Acadians all the way up to Canada, where they settled at St.-Grégoire and Bécancour on the upper St. Lawrence across from Trois-Rivières.  Jean-Baptiste dit de Louvière, wife Geneviève, and their children were not so lucky; they evidently were among a hand full of Acadians captured on the lower St.-Jean who the British transported to Boston, Massachusetts.  

Life in Massachusetts for the exiled Acadians was not a happy one.  The Puritans treated the Catholic francophones with unalloyed contempt.  But life was not all bad for the d'Amours dit de Louvières.  At least two of sons, François and Isidore, were born to them at Boston in c1759 and c1763.  After the war with Britain ended in 1763, Jean-Baptiste and Geneviève, understandably, chose not to remain in a New-English colony where they had been treated like pariahs.  They returned to greater Acadia, where their family had lived as colonial elites.  British authorities, intolerant of Acadians remaining in or returning to their former homeland, held the Louvières and other exiles in prison compounds in Nova Scotia despite the war having ended. 

The postwar situation in Nova Scotia presented these wayward Acadians with a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, greater Acadia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their kinsmen in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, like one of the D'Amours brothers, chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 or early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, six were children of the now deceased Jean-Baptiste D'Amours dit de Louvières. 

Another member of the family, a niece of Jean-Baptiste D'Amours dit de Louvière, also emigrated to Spanish Louisiana, but her route there was a very different one.  Marie-Rose, younger daughter of Joseph D'Amours de Chauffours and Geneviève Leroy, was born at Ste.-Anne, Meductic, just upriver from Ste.-Anne-du-Pay-Bas, in c1760, after the British raided the river communities in 1758-59, so the family evidently eluded the British but took their time moving on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Sometime in the early 1760s, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, for the rest of the war.  British officials counted Joseph, his wife, and eight children at Halifax in August 1763.  In 1764, Joseph and his family did not follow his brother Jean-Baptiste to Cap-Français and New Orleans but chose, instead, to re-settle on Île Miquelon, where French officials counted him and his family in 1767.  That same year, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, French officials ordered the fisher/habitants there to emigrate to France.  Most of the islanders, with royal permission, returned the following year.  Evidently Joseph and his family chose to remain in France.  He died there in the late 1760s or early 1770s.  In 1773, if he was still living, he and Geneviève and at least three of their children, two sons and a daughter, followed hundreds of other exiles languishing in the coastal cities to the interior province of Poitou, where they worked the land of a influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  Joseph certainly was dead by December 1775, when Geneviève, now called a widow, and her three children retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Daughter Marie-Rose married into the Rassicot and Thibodeau families there.  She and her second husband Pierre Thibodeau emigrated to Spanish Louisiana in 1785 with hundreds of other Acadians--the only member of her immediate family to go there.  While the family was at Nantes, the British had seized Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre in 1778 after the French became allies of the revolutionary Americans.  The British promptly deported the fisher/habitants to France.  The Miquelonnais were forced to remain in the mother country until the islands reverted to France in 1783.  One wonders if Geneviève Leroy and her two D'Amours de Chauffour sons, also fed up with life in the mother country, were among the former residents of Île Miquelon who returned to the island in 1784.  In Spanish Louisiana, daughter Marie-Rose settled with her husband on upper Bayou Lafourche and died there by November 1804, when he remarried again.226

Dantin

Living in territory controlled by France, Marguerite Marres dit La Sonde, widow of Louis dit La Joye Dantin of Port-Toulouse, Île Royale, and her many children escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at nearby Louisbourg in July 1758, the British rounded up most of the habitants on Île Royale and deported them to France.  

The crossing was a disaster for the Dantin family.  Marguerite La Sonde, now a widow, and nine of her children crossed on the transport Queen of Spain, which left Île Royale probably in August.  When the ship reached St.-Malo in late November, only sons Louis, fils, age 13, and Barthélémy, age 10, were still alive.  Marguerite and her seven other children had died at sea!  Louis, fils and Barthélémy settled first at St.-Thual in the Breton interior between Dinan and Rennes, south of St.-Malo, away from other exiles, and then in St.-Malo itself.  In early 1766, Barthélémy, now age 18 and still unmarried, agreed to go to Guinea in west Africa, perhaps as a sailor.  Older brother Louis, fils, who was age 21 and also unmarried, did not go with him.  Barthélémy traveled from St.-Malo to Le Havre, from which he departed in May 1766 aboard La Tamire.   Remaining in France proved to be a wise choice for Louis, fils, and going to Guinea a fatal one for his younger brother.  According to Captain Thomas Domet of La Tamire, Barthélémy died in Guinea.  

Louis, fils became a house carpenter in France.  He moved to Bécherel south of St.-Thual, even farther from his fellow exiles in the Rance valley, and lived there in 1766-67.  In January 1767, at age 22, he married Jeanne, 21-year-old daughter of locals Gilles Gesmier and Maurille Beaupied, at St.-André-des-Eaux on the upper Rance northwest of St.-Thual.  Jeanne was a native of Tressaint on the upper Rance between St.-André-des-Eaux and the medieval stronghold of Dinan.  She gave Louis, fils four children in the St.-André-des-Eaux area:  twins Louis III and Jeanne born in August 1768, but Louis III died 12 days after his birth; another Louis III born at Ville de la Desvrie in December 1770 but died at age 3 months the following March; and Florian-Gilles born in May 1772.  In 1773, Louis, fils and Jeanne were among the hundreds of Acadians in Brittany who ventured to the interior of Poitou to settle on land owned by an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  Daughter Marie-Anne was born in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in March 1774.  After two years of effort, Louis, fils, Jeanne, and their three remaining children retreated with other Poitou Acadians down the Vienne and the Loire from Châtellerault to the port of Nantes, where Anne gave Louis, fils three more daughters:  Anne born in c1776; Judith- or Julie-Geneviève in Ste.-Croix Parish in June 1778; and Perrine in August 1781--eight children, three sons and five daughters, between 1768 and 1781.  Wife Jeanne died at Nantes in the early 1780s, not quite age 40.  Younger daughter Perrine and remaining son Florian-Gilles died there before September 1784.  In November of that year, at age 39, Louis, fils remarried to Hélène, 41-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Aucoin and Élisabeth Amireau and widow of Alexis-Gégoire Doiron, in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes.  The marriage brought two more children into the family:  stepdaughters Françoise-Josèphe Doiron, born at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo, age 16 at the time of her mother's remarriage; and Marie-Victoire Doiron, age 12.  

When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Louis Dantin, fils, his new wife, and their extended family, including his four daughters by first wife Jeanne Gesmier, agreed to take it.227

Darembourg

Living on an island controlled by France, descendants of Pierre Darembourg and Marie Mazerolle, as well as descendants of Jean Rambourg and Marie-Anne Pichot, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the summer and autumn of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the Maritime islands, including members of these two families, and deported them to France. 

Jean-Noël and François, sons of Jean Rambourg, crossed to St.-Malo aboard the transport Queen of Spain, which left Louisbourg in September and reached the Breton port in November 1758.  They both survived the crossing.  Jean-Noël married Marie, daughter of locals François Mazurier and Claudine Augustin, in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in October 1761.  Marie gave Jean-Noël at least three children there:  Marie-Jeanne in September 1762; Jean-François-Étienne in February 1764; and Jeanne-Françoise in April 1765.  Jean-Noël died at St.-Servan in May 1768, age 33.  Meanwhile, in October 1760, younger brother François joined the crew of the French corsair Favory, was captured by the Royal Navy, and held in England with other Acadian exiles for the rest of the war.  He returned to St.-Malo in 1763 and married Jeanne, daughter of locals Claude Laisne and Jeanne Le Gentilhomme, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in October 1765.  They had at least three children there:  François-Noël-Guillaume in December 1766; Françoise-Renée in November 1767; and Guillaume-Michel in July 1772.  Jean-Noël and François's younger brothers Jean-Pierre and Jérôme Rambourg also crossed from Île Royale to St.-Malo but on another vessel.  Jean-Pierre died in the hospital at St.-Malo in November 1758, age 24, soon after he reached the Breton port.  Jérôme, along with his mother, a widow again, and half-sister Élisabeth Hecquart, survived the rigors of the crossing, but they did not remain in France.  In April 1764, Jérôme, his mother, and sister sailed aboard Le Fort with other exiles for the new Frency colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  In March 1765, in a count of the Acadians at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district, the census taker noted that Marianne Pichot de Plaisance was age 65 and suffered from the fievre.  She did not live much longer; she died at Sinnamary the following September.  Jérôme married Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Grossin and Cécile Caissie dit Roger of Île St.-Jean, at St.-Sauveur de Cayenne in August 1765.  Their fate, and that of half-sister Élisabeth, is anyone's guess.  One wonders what happened to Jérôme's older brothers Félix and Martin.   No member of Jean Rambourg's family emigrated to Spanish Louisiana from either France or French Guiane. 

Pierre Darembourg's family on Île St.-Jean also were rounded up by the British in late 1758 and deported to Cherbourg, Normandy, France, where son Jean-Baptiste married Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Henry and Claire Hébert of Grand-Pré, in May 1759.  Jean-Baptiste worked as a navigator, sailor, and day laborer in the Norman port.  He and Madeleine had at least four children there:  Jean-Baptiste, fils in c1761; Marie-Madeleine in c1762; Jean-Pierre in c1765 but died at Cherbourg, age 6, in August 1771; and Marie-Jeanne in c1768--two sons and two daughters, between 1761 and 1771.  In 1773, Jean-Baptiste and Madeleine followed hundreds of other exiles languishing in the coastal cities to the interior province of Poitou, where they settled on an influential nobleman's land near the city of Châtellerault.  After two years of effort, Jean-Baptiste and his family retreated with other Poitoiu Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  In February 1781, remaining son Jean-Baptiste, fils died at Chantenay near Nantes, age 20.  At about that time, older daughter Marie-Madeleine married Jean-Pierre, son of locals François Lirette and Michaela Chaillou, in one of the Nantes parishes.  Meawhile, Jean-Baptiste, père's older sister Marie-Josèphe died by c1772, when her Langlois husband remarried.  One wonders what was the fate of Jean-Baptiste's other siblings during exile.  Was the Jacques Duborg of Île St.-Jean, age 21, who was counted at Sinnamary, Cayenne, French Guiane, in March 1765 his younger brother?

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Jean-Baptiste Darembourg, his wife, and two daughters took up the offer.228

Darois

In 1755, descendants of Jérôme Darois and Marie Gareau could be found at Minas, Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

Marie Gareau was a widow in her late 70s when the British deported her from Minas to Virginia in the autumn of 1755.  Acadians transported to the Old Dominion suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  For weeks they languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships until, with winter approaching, Governor Robert Dinwiddie ordered them to be dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond, while he and the colony's political leaders pondered their fate.  The following spring, the Virginia authorities sent them on to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several ports.  Marie Gareau died either in Virginia, on the voyage to England, or in one of the English seaports soon after her arrival.  At least two of her married daughters--Ursule Darois, wife of Sylvestre Trahan; and Madeleine Darois, wife of Alexis Trahan--landed at Liverpool.  Madeleine's husband died in exile, and she remarried to Claude, son of fellow Acadians Marc Pitre and Jeanne Brun and widower of Élisabeth Guérin, at Liverpool in May 1760.  Marie Gareau's son Étienne Darois and his wife Anne Breau also were exiled to Virginia.  With them were son daughter Élisabeth, age 25 in 1755, and son Étienne, fils, age 17.  They, too, were held at Liverpool.  Élisabeth, at age 28, married fellow Acadian Pierre Trahan, fils at Liverpool in February 1758 but died, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth, by May 1760, his her late 20s, when her husband remarried.  Étienne, fils, at age 21, married Madeleine Trahan probably at Liverpool in c1759.  Their daughter Élisabeth, or Isabelle, named after his recently deceased sister, was born probably at Liverpool in c1761. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, Étienne Darois, fils, wife Madeleine, his daughter, and his paternal aunts, along with other Acadians in England, were repatriated to France.  The Daroiss were sent to Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  Étienne, fils's parents probably had died in England.  Étienne, fils became a tanner at Morlaix.  He and his family lived in St.-Martin des Champs Parish.  Madeleine gave him at least five more children there:  Simon-François in November 1766; Marie-Madeleine in June 1767; Susanne in October 1778; Anne-Françoise in July 1771; and Marie-Anne-Louise in August 1773.  Soon after the birth of their youngest daugher, Étienne took his family to interior province of Poitou as part of a major settlement scheme near the city of Châtellerault.  He and Madeleine had another daughter, Rose, born at Pouthumé near Châtellerault in August 1775, but she died only five weeks after her birth.  After two years of effort, Étienne, fils and his family retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  They settled at nearby Chantenay, where Marguerite gave him at least three more children:  Marie-Élisabeth in September 1776; Joseph-Étienne in September 1780 but died at age 1 in September 1781; and Jacques-Étienne in March 1783 but died at age 11 months in February 1784--10 children, three sons and seven daughters, between 1761 and 1783, in England and France.  By then, oldest son Simon-François and daughters Marie-Anne-Louise and perhaps Anne-Françoise had died, leaving them with no sons and only four daughters--motivation, most likely, to take up the Spanish government's offer to join their fellow exiles in Louisiana. 

Other members of the family repatriated to Morlaix went not to Poitou in 1773 but to an island surrendered by the British after the war, where, like in Poitou, French authorities offered Acadians a chance to become productive farmers again.  In late 1765, Étienne, fils's aunts Ursule and Madeleine Darois followed their husbands and other exiles recently repatriated from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Madeleine's second husband, Claude Pitre, died at Sauzon on the north end of island in March 1775.  When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in their Mississippi valley colony, Ursule Darois did not have the opportunity to go there.  She had died at Sauzon in December 1776, in her early 50s.  Husband Sylvestre Trahan, however, was still alive, but he refused to go to the Spanish colony.  He died on Belle-Île-en-Mer in 1786, the year after 1,600 of his fellow Acadians, including his Darois nephew, sailed on Seven Ships to New Orleans.  Sylvestre's children remained on island, where French officials counted some of them in 1792 during the early years of the French Revolution.  Members of Madeleine Darois's family--perhaps Madeleine herself--were counted by French officials at Sauzon in 1792, so they, too, remained in France.  Her son Paul Trahan from her first marriage died on the island in 1826, in his mid-70s.

In North America, Daroiss from Minas and Petitcoudiac who had escaped the British in 1755 made their way up to Canada via the Rivière St.-Jean portage or the lower St. Lawrence.  Jérôme and Marie's second son Pierre-Jérôme died at Québec in September 1757, age 56, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck the exiles in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Pierre-Jérôme's oldest brother Jean died there, too, in December, age 57, perhaps also a victim of the pox.  Jean's oldest son Simon may have lost his wife Anne Thibodeau to the pox in 1758.  Simon remarried to a Canadian in c1760 and the following year settled in the Acadian enclave at Bécancour across from Trois-Rivières on the upper St. Lawrence.  Jean's youngest son Basile also married a Canadian and settled at L'Islet on the lower St. Lawrence.  He and some of his descendants spelled their surname Deroy.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

At least two Daroiss--Jérôme and Marie's oldest daughter, Isabelle, wife of Sylvain Breau; and Pierre, middle son of Jean Darois and Isabelle's nephew--also escaped the British roundups of 1755, but they did not go to Canada.  They sought refuge, instead, on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and then perhaps in the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  In the late 1750s or early 1760s, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region and held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  Pierre Daroy appears alone on a list of prisoners at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in October 1762.  Pierre married Marie, daughter of Paul Bourgeois and Anne Brun of Chignecto, perhaps at Fort Edward after the 1762 counting.  Isabelle Darois and her second husband Sylvain Breau, now an elderly couple, likely were held on Georges Island, Halifax. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previous unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, two were Daroiss.229

David

Étienne-Michel David, a native of Louisbourg, Île Royale, like his father a blacksmith, was living with his wife Geneviève Hébert and four of their children--Anne, born in November 1744; Michel-Luc in c1746; Joseph in November 1748; and Paul in c1754--at Minas when the British deported them to Maryland in the fall of 1755.  Eight years later, in July 1763, they were counted with other exiles at Snow Hill on Maryland's Eastern Shore.  By then, four more children had been born to them in the Chesapeake colony:  Marie in c1756; Marie-Madeleine in c1757; Jean-Baptiste in c1759; and Claude in c1761.  Daughter Angélique was born in c1765, perhaps at Snow Hill. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the rest of Étienne-Michel's family on Île Royale escaped the fate of their fellow Acadians on peninsula Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British rounded up most of the fisher/habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France.  Étienne-Michel's father, Jean-Pierre David dit Saint-Michel, now a widower, two of his daughters and their families landed at La Rochelle on the Bay of Biscay.  Jean-Pierre, in his late 50s, died at the local hospital soon after they reached the military port and was buried in the hospital cemetery.  Daughter Jeanne did not remain in France.  In 1764, after the war had ended, she followed other exiles to the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  That December, in St.-Sauveur Parish in the Cayenne district, she married Sr. Pierre, "major, master wheelwright, living in this city for several years...," son of Sr. Théodore Le Clerc and Marguerite Duquesnois of Armoy, Diocese of Senlis, France.  Three and a half years later, in May 1768, Jeanne remarried to M. Guillaume, "habitant of the coastal district, parish of Remiré, native of Virelade, diocese of Bordeau," son of M. Arnauld Paquenault and Pétronille Blaugan.  The marriage record did not reveal Guillaume's profession.  Meanwhile, Jeanne's younger brother Louis married, at age 30, fellow Acadian Anna, also called Jeanne, Trahan in c1762 probably at La Rochelle.  Louis also left France, but he did not follow his sister to Guiane.  In 1765, he and his family returned to North America and settled on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  In 1778, during the American Revolution, after France became an ally of the United States, the British captured Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and rounded up this family along with the other French fisher/habitants and deported them to La Rochelle, where Louis's father lay buried for 20 years.  One wonders if Louis and his family remained in France after 1784, when the Newfoundland islands reverted to France and the islanders were allowed to return.  One thing is certain:  if they remained in France, they did not go to Spanish Louisiana in 1785 with most of the Acadians still in the mother country. 

Meanwhile, in Maryland, Étienne-Michel and his family endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Étienne-Michel had no David relatives in the colony, but his wife Geneviève Hébert, a member of one of the largest Acadian families, probably had many kinsmen there.  In the early summer of 1766, the first contingent of Maryland Acadians left Oxford on the Chesapeake for the Mississippi valley colony, where many of their relatives from the prisons in Nova Scotia had settled the year before.  Étienne-Michel, a master blacksmith like his father, in spite of being an Acadian exile, must have been a man of means even during the Great Upheaval.  He booked passage for New Orleans on his own sometime that summer, and he and Geneviève, with eight of their children in tow, got there by early October, a week behind the others.  Geneviève gave Étienne-Michel more children in the Spanish colony. 

Another, unrelated David family from Minas, no kin to Étienne-Michel, had their own tale to tell.  Jean-Baptiste David, fils of Grand-Pré, his wife Marguerite Landry, and their children, including son Jean-Baptiste III, called Baptiste, born at Grand-Pré in May 1748, were deported to Pennsylvania in the autumn of 1755.  Jean-Baptiste, fils died in that colony before June 1763, when his widow and four children were counted there.  Marguerite Landry did not remain in Pennsylvania.  In August 1763, she had moved on to Massachusetts, probably to Boston, with the family of cousin Paul Landry; there were only two persons left in her household, so not all of her children followed her there.  Son Jean-Baptiste III evidently was among the Acadians in Pennsylvania who moved south to Maryland in the 1760s.  He married Marie Ritter or Kidder of Germany in c1770 probably in the Chesapeake colony.  Jean-Baptiste III's son Jean-Baptiste IV, also called Baptiste, fils, was born in c1774.  Bona Arsenault does not say if the boy was born in Maryland or Louisiana, but the baptismal record of one of Jean-Baptiste IV's daughters calls him "native of Maryland."  The last contingent of Maryland Acadians departed for Louisiana from Port Tobacco in January 1769.  Evidently Jean-Baptiste David III, like his namesake Étienne-Michel, went to Louisiana on his own hook, taking his family there sometime after 1774--recruited perhaps in the early 1790s by agents sent to the American seaboard colonies by Spanish Governor Carondelet to lure Europeans settlers, perferrably Roman Catholics, to immigrant-starved Louisiana.

One wonders who was the Jean David, with wife Marie-Josette ____, son Joseph-Marie, and orphan Marie-Rose ____, counted at Lower Marlborough, Maryland, in July 1763.  Jean-Baptiste David III would have been age 15 at the time, too young to have had a wife and child.  Perhaps Jean was a kinsman of Étienne-Michel or from an entirely different branch of Davids.230

De La Forestrie

In the summer and fall of 1755, the Acadians on Île St.-Jean, living in French territory, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France. 

Joseph LaForest, fils, his second wife Marie-Anne Duvivier, and his two daughters, Anne and Marie-Madeleine, reached St.-Malo, France, from "other ports" in 1760.  They settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Wife Marie-Anne died there by 1761, when Joseph remarried again at La Gouesnière in the countryside southeast of St.-Malo in August 1761.  His third wife was Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of Pierre Duboscq and Suzanne Lemercière of Rouen.  The Duboscqs also had lived on Île St.-Jean and had endured the deportation to France.  Madeleine gave Joseph at least four more children, most of them at Plouër:  Jean-Charles-Joseph in January 1763; twins Jean-Joseph and Jeanne-Charlotte April 1766, but Jean-Joseph died the following August; and Joseph III in June 1777 at the naval port of Rochefort. 

Meanwhile, Joseph's younger brother Jean, age 28, whose surname was spelled LaForesterie on the passenger list, his wife Marie-Madeleine Bonnière, age 25, and their daughters Jeanne, age 5, Marie-Rosalie, age 4, and Marguerite, age 6 months, also crossed to France, aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Jean, Marie-Madeleine, and two of their daughters survived the crossing, but infant daughter Marguerite died at sea.  They settled at Plouër-sur-Rance near his older brother Joseph, fils and his family.  Marie-Madeleine gave Jean two more daughters at Plouër:  twins Angélique-Madeleine-Marie and Renée-Laurence in January 1760, but Renée-Laurence died 10 days after her birth.  Jean's oldest daughter Jeanne married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Charles Hébert and Marguerite LeBlanc, at Plouër in July 1772.  Jean's wife Marie-Madeleine died by 1773, when he remarried to Michelle, daughter of locals Julien Hervé and Gilette Lorre, at Plouër in February of that year. 

In 1773, soon after his second marriage, Jean, his new wife, his two unmarried daughters by his first wife, Marie-Rosalie and Angélique, and oldest daughter Jeanne and her family, with hundreds of other Acadians languishing in the coastal cities, ventured to the interior province of Poitou to settle on marginal land near Châtellerault owned by an influential nobleman.  Jean's brother Joseph, fils and his family remained at Plouër-sur-Rance before moving on to Rochefort.  After two years of effort, Jean and his family retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they survived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Michelle gave Jean more children at Nantes and nearby Chantenay:  Paul-Michel in St.-Similien Parish in January 1776 but died at age 4 1/2 at nearby Chantenay in June 1780; Marie-Madeleine at Chantenay in May 1778 but died there at age 14 months in July 1779; Jean-Michel in June 1780; Jean-Marie-Michel in c1783 but died at Chantenay, age 6 1/2, in June 1780; and Marie-Adélaïde in September 1785.  Daughter Marie-Rosalie married Michel, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Aucoin and Marguerite Dupuis of Rivière-aux-Canards, in Ste.-Croix Parish, Nantes, in July 1779.  Daughter Angélique married Moïse, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc and Marguerite Bellemère, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1780.  By then the family name had evolved from LaForest and LaForestrie to De La Forestrie. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Joseph De La Forestrie, fils and his third wife Madeleine Duboscq, perhaps still as Rochefort, as well as brother Jean and his second wife Michelle Herve at Chantenay, chose to remain in France.  Not so Jean's married daughters, Jeanne, Marie-Rosalie, and Angélique, and their Acadian husbands.  They booked passage on two of the Seven Ships from France that reached New Orleans in the summer of 1785.231

De La Mazière

Living in territory controlled by France, Jean-Baptiste dit Ladouceur Mazière and Marie Poirier of Île St.-Jean, if they were still living, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  The family's respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the island and deported them to France.  The fate of Jean-Baptiste, his wife, and most of his children has been lost to history.  Two of the children are happy exceptions.  Son Jean-François--called François Maricre on the passenger roll, no age given, but he would have been age 11--made the crossing to St.-Malo with some of his maternal kin aboard the transport Duc Guillaume.  The vessel left Louisbourg in late summer and, after a mishap at sea, limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  The family with whom François had been living at Rivière-du-Nord-Est on Île St.-Jean in August 1752--his maternal great aunt Marie-Madeleine Haché, her husband Pierre Duval, and five cousins--all died at sea.  François and cousin Jacques Haché survived the crossing.  Jean-François's older sister Marguerite, age 17 in 1758, also crossed to France. 

Jean-François De La Mazière, as he was called in France, settled at St.-Malo until July 1760, when French authorities granted him permission to move to Cherbourg in Normandy, where he worked as a navigator, blacksmith, and carpenter.  Probably at Cherbourg in c1768, he married Véronique, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Renaud dit Arnaud and Marie-Madeleine Pothier of Île St.-Jean.  Véronique likely had come to France also in 1758 but had landed at Cherbourg.  Their son Jean-François, fils may have been born at Cherbourg in the late 1760s or early 1770s.  In 1773, Jean-François and his family, with hundreds of other Acadians languishing in the port cities, ventured to the interior province of Poitou to settle on an influential nobleman's land near the city of Châtellerault.  Daughter Marguerite was baptized at La Chapelle-Roux southeast of Châtellerault in July 1775.  In October 1775, after two years of effort, Jean-François and his family retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  They settled at nearby Chantenay, where at least four more children were born to them:  Jean-Baptiste le jeune in April 1777; Louise-Cécile in November 1778; Rose-Jeanne in November 1781; and Marie in January 1783 but died the following June.  Two more of their children died at Chantenay:  Marguerite at age 5 in October 1780; and Jean-François, fils, date of his passing unrecorded.  

Jean-François's sister Marguerite also may have landed at St.-Malo in 1758, but she ended up in the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay by 1761.  She married Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Granger and Marguerite Thériot of Minas, in St.-Louis Parish there in February 1764. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Jean-François De La Mazière, wife Véronique Renaud, and their remaining children agreed to take it.  Sister Marguerite, if she was still living, evidently chose to remain in France.232

Delaunay/Delaune

Marie-Madeleine Arseneau, widow of Jean Delaunay of La Casse, Brittany, and her children; and Marguerite Caissie, widow of Christophe Delaune of Avranches, Normandy, and her children, all living on an island controlled by France, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the summer and fall autumn of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France. 

Marie-Madeleine Arseneau and her Delaunay children ended up at Cherbourg in Normandy.  In August 1759, she took a ship from Cherbourg to St.-Malo.  From 1759 to 1763, she lived at St.-Cast-le-Guildo and Corseul, west and southwest of the Breton port, apart from other exiles.  She died at St.-Cast in October 1763, age 43. 

Marguerite Caissie and her Delaune children also ended up at Cherbourg, where she remarried to Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Guillaume Le Prieur dit Dubois and Madeleine Poitevin of Annapolis Royal and widower of Marie Quimine, Marguerite Olivier, and Madeleine-Anastasie Gautrot, in c1759.  Marguerite's second son Jean Delaune married Marie-Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Eustache Part and Anastasie Godin dit Bellefontaine, at Cherbourg in February 1773 and became a sailor and a carpenter in the Norman port.  Marie-Anne's mother and three of her siblings had been murdered by New-English rangers on Rivière St.-Jean in early 1759.  Marie-Anne and her father, who also survived the massacre, were held in the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, before the British deported them to Cherbourg via England later in the year.  Marguerite Caissie's fifth son Christophe, fils became a navigator and a ship's carpenter at Cherbourg.  Marguerite's third son Jacques, who would have been age 20 at the time, stood as godfather to a Dubois son in Très-Ste.-Trinité church, Cherbourg, in January 1766, so he must have crossed with his family was well. 

In 1773, the year of his marriage, Jean Delaune and younger brother Christophe, fils followed other exiles languishing in the port cities to the interior of Poitou, where they settled on land owned by an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  Christophe, fils, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Boudrot and Cécile Vécot, at Archigny south of Châtellerault in June 1774.  Jean's son Jean-Baptiste was baptized at nearby La Chapelle-Roux that same month.  Christophe, fils's son Jean-Baptiste was baptized at the same place the following month.  In October 1775, after two years of effort, Jean, Christophe, fils, and their families retreated with other Poitou Acadians down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes.  Both families expanded dramatically at nearby Chantenay.  Four more children were born to Jean and Marie-Anne there, and four more to Christophe, fils and Marie, all baptized at St.-Martin de Chantenay, but most of the Delaune children died young.  Jean and Marie-Anne's children were: Christophe le jeune baptized in September 1776; Pierre-Basile in December 1779 but died at age 2 in February 1782; Louis-Auguste in October 1782 but died at age 1 in August 1783; and Marie-Céleste in February 1785.  Christophe, fils's and Marie's children were Michel baptized in January 1777 but died the following December; Marie-Céleste in September 1779 but died at age 2 in February 1782; Christophe III in October 1782; and Louis-Augustin in June 1784.  Jean's older sons Jean-Baptiste and Christophe le jeune died at Chantenay.  Christophe, fils's son Christophe III also died there.  

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  The Delaune brothers and their families were among the majority of Acadians in the mother country who took up the offer.  One wonders what happened to their brother Jacques.  Jean Delaunay's descendants, if they were still in France, chose to remain. 

Meanwhile, in French America, Nicolas-Pierre, a tailleur d'habits, son of merchant Nicolas Delaunay of Cholet, Vendée, France, married Marguerite, daughter of Acadians Pierre Granger and Madeleine Belliveau, at Mirebalais, an interior settlement near Port-au-Prince, French St.-Domingue, in June 1765.  Nicolas-Pierre likely was not kin to either Jean Delaunay or Christophe Delaune.  He must have died soon after the marriage.  Marguerite, whom the recording priest called his widow, died at Mirebalais the following December, age 35.233

DesRoches

In the fall of 1755, two brothers maried to first cousins--Louis DesRoches and his wife Marguerite Arseneau, and Julien DesRoches and his wife Marie Arseneau--were living at Malpèque on the northwest shore of Île St.-Jean.  A third brother, or perhaps a couisn, Herbe Desroches, a fisherman, was living with his wife Marie Berbudeau at St.-Esprit on the Atlantic coast of Île Royale.  Living on islands controlled by the French, the DesRoches escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British swooped down on the Maritime islands and deported most of the habitants there to France.  However, the DesRochess--Louis and Julien at least--were among the island Acadians who slipped through the British dragnet on Île St.-Jean.  Louis, Marguerite, and their children, as well as Julien and Marie's orphaned children, crossed Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  They then made their way up to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche but failed to capture the Franch stronghold.  They nonetheless cut it off from the rest of New France.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 exiles still at Restigouche.  No DesRoche family appears on the list, but there was at least one young member of the family who was counted with Arseneau relatives.  Other DeRochess may have eluded yet another roundup and taken refuge in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  After the war, DesRochess returned to St. John Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, where they became one of the largest families in the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island.  They were especially numerous at Miscouche on the western side of the province, not far from the family's original settlement at Malpèque.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Julien DesRoches and his wife Marie Arseneau died on the eve of Île St.-Jean's fall, so their children were raised by relatives.  One of the younger ones, Basile, was only age 3 in 1758 when the British struck the island.  He was raised by his maternal aunt Judith Arseneau, 19 years older and still unmarried when she took her nephew into her care.  Judith and her charge escaped the roundup on the island and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  She married Charles dit Jean-Charles, son of fellow Acadians François Savoie and Marie-Josèphe Richard of Annapolis Royal and widower of _____ and Marie-Madeleine Richard, at Restigouche in January 1761, so some of the exiles there were not sent to prison compounds in Nova Scotia until weeks after their surrender the previous October.  In August 1763, Cherl Savois, his unnamed wife, and three unnamed children appeared on a French repatriation list at the prison compound in Halifax.  Basile DesRoches, now age 8, likely was one of the children. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 or early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, one was a young DesRoches.234

Doiron

In 1755, the many descendants of Jean Doiron and his wives Marie-Anne Canol and Marie Trahan could be found at Pigiguit and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin, at Chignecto, and on Île Royale and especially Île St.-Jean in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther.

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Doirons may have been among the refugees.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Doirons may have been among the 300 Acadians serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost British seaboard colonies.  Doirons were among the locals the British deported to South Carolina aboard the sloop Dolphin, which left Chignecto on October 13 and reached Charles Town on November 19.  They included Joseph Doiron, wife Anne Lambert, and one of their daughters; Joseph's brother Jean III, wife Madeleine Poirier, and six of their children; their brother Pierre, wife Marguerite Girouard, and their three children; their brother Paul, wife Marie, and three children; cousin Paul, wife Rose Bourgeois, and three children; and Marie Doiron, husband Pierre Boucher, and their infant daughter.  Jean Doiron III died at St. Helen Parish, South Carolina, in 1756, soon after he reached the colony.  That spring, the governors of Georgia and South Carolina allowed the exiles in their colonies who were not under arrest to return to their homeland as best they could.  After purchasing or building small vessels, hundreds of them headed up the coast.  Some made it all the way back to the Bay of Fundy and found refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  Most did not.  In late August, after weeks of effort, 78 exiles came ashore on Long Island, New York, and, at the insistence of Charles Lawrence, were detained by colonial officials.  On a list of "names of the heads of the French Neutral families, number of their Children returned from Georgia and distributed through the counties of Westchester and Orange," dated 26 August 1756, were Paul Divon, likely Doiron, his wife, and two children, and John Divon, his wife, and one child, detained at Westchester Town, Westchester County.  A John Divan, his wife and one child, were held at North Castle, Westchester County.  By 1760, Paul Doiron secured permission to move on to Pennsylvania, perhaps after his wife Marie died, and he remarried twice at Philadelphia in 1761 and 1764.  Back in South Carolina, Marie Doiron's husband died, and she remarried to fellow Acadian Pierre Lambert, a widower, in c1761.  Joseph Doiron's wife Anne Lambert also died in the colony, and he remarried to Marie-Josèphe Lord, widow of Claude Bourg. 

Pierre Doiron, age 22, probably from Chignecto, escaped the British roundups in 1755 and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  He married fellow Acadian Marie Bourgeois in exile.  By 1760, they had made their way up to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, where hundreds of other exiles had gathered.  Other Doirons who had escaped the deportations in greater Acadia moved on to Canada.  Charles Doiron III and his large family, counted by a French official on Île Madame south of Île Royale in February 1752, escaped the roundup on Île Royale by leaving the island before the fall of Louisbourg in July 1758.  The decision to seek refuge in Canada, however, proved a fatal one for some members of the family.  Charles died at Québec in early January 1758, age 42, victim, perhaps, of a smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of his fellow refugees in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Charles's wife Marie-Madeleine Thibodeau, age 40, likely was another victim of the pox; she died in late February 1758. 

A Doiron family from Pigiguit ended up in Maryland.  Alexandre Doiron, wife Anne Vincent, and most of their seven children were held at Oxford on Maryland's Eastern Shore.  Younger son Alexandre, fils, age 17, in 1755, evidently escaped the roundup at Pigiguit and made his way to Canada, where he created a family of his own on the upper St. Lawrence. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the many Doirons on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British rounded up most of the habitants on the islands and deported them to France.  The crossing devastated the family, ending a number of lines.  Charles Doiron, wife Françoise Gaudet, and members of their family, including married daughter Marie-Josèphe, died aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Charles's younger brother Thomas, five of his 10 children--Françoise, Marie, Élisabeth, Marguerite, and Paul--as well as a Bourg niece, also died aboard the vessel.  Thomas's wife Anne Girouard and five of their children--Charles, Jacob, Anne, Marie-Rose, and Alexandre--survived the crossing but ended up in a local hospital to recuperate from the voyage.  Thomas's oldest son Bénoni lost two of his children, Grégoire and Élisabeth, aboard the same vessel, and Bénoni died in the St.-Malo surburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer later in November from the rigors of the crossing.  Bénoni's wife Marguerite Boisseau and two of the couple's sons, Pierre and Olivier, survived the ordeal.  Their brother Noël's family sufffered even greater loss--perhaps the greatest loss of a single family during the entire Grand Dérangement.  Now in his 70s, Noël, wife Marie Henry, five of their children, over 30 of their grandchildren, and "many of their great-grandchildren"--oldest son Louis-Mathieu, his wife Madeleine Pitre, their oldest son Charles, his wife Anne-Gertrude Benoit, and their children; Noël's second son Paul, his wife Marguerite Benoit, and their children; Noël's fourth son François, his wife Madeleine Tillard and their children; Noël's youngest son Joseph, his wife Marguerite Tillard and their children; and Noël's oldest daughter Marie-Madeleine, her husband Michel Pitre, and their children--all died aboard the transport Duke William, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy late November 1758, filled with Acadians from Pointe-Prime, Île St.-Jean, bound for St.-Malo.  In mid-December, off the southwest coast of England, the ship and its consorts were struck by a storm that sank two of the vessels and drove several others to England and the Portuguese Azores.  The captain of the Duke William averred that an Acadian patriarch aboard the vessel was "a hundred and ten years old" at the time of the mishap, but Noël, who was that patriarch, was 74.  After all efforts had failed to save the vessel, and no other ship had come to its rescue, Noël embraced the captain and insisted that he and his crew take to the boats and save themselves, knowing full well that the ship, with all its passengers, soon would plummet to the bottom of the Atlantic.  The Pointe-Prime priest, Father Jacques Girard, and the ship's officers and crew escaped in a ship's boat, as did a few young Acadians, but the rest of the passengers went down with the vessel.  The transport Violet also sank in the storm, with the loss of everyone aboard, but no Doirons were lost on that vessel.  Noël's grandson Jean-Baptiste by oldest son Louis-Mathieu, Jean-Baptiste's wife Théodose Boudrot, and their infant daughter Marguerite crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay on the same day in late November and in the same 11-ship convoy that included the Duke William.  The Supply survived the mid-December storm and put in at Bideford, England, on December 20 for repairs.  Daughter Marguerite died at sea.  Some Acadians disembarked and went on to Bristol, but Jean-Baptiste and Théodose, with most of their fellow passengers, continued on to St.-Malo aboard the refitted Supply, which finally reached the Breton port in early March 1759.  Alexis Doiron and his third wife Madeleine-Josèphe Bourg, who was pregnant on the voyage, crossed with six children aboard one of the five transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy and, despite the mid-December storm that devastated his family, reached St.-Malo together in late January.  Their four youngest children, including a newborn--Théodore, age 10; Marie-Blanche, age 5; Joseph-Marie, age 4; and Françoix-Xavier, age 4 months--died at sea or in a St.-Malo hospital from the rigors of the crossing.  Alexis, Madeleine-Josèphe, and two of their older sons--Alexis-Grégoire, age 14; and Joseph dit Josaphat, age 12--survived the crossing.  Alexis's younger brother Jean, wife Anne Thibodeau, and their four children--Gervais, age 5; Simon, age 3; and twins Modeste and Durate, age 4 months--also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Jean and Anne survived the crossing, but all of the children died at sea or from the rigors of the crossing.  Alexis and Jean's older sister Angélique crossed with husband Olivier Daigre and their 11 children on one of the Five Ships.  Her seven youngest children died at sea.  Alexis et al.'s cousin Marie crossed on one of the Five Ships with her husband Pierre Haché dit Gallant and their four children.  Marie and all of her children died at sea or in local hospitals soon after arrival.

Island Doirons did their best to make a life for themselves in the villages and suburbs of the St.-Malo area.  Jean-Baptiste, grandson of Noël Doiron by his first son Louis-Mathieu, and his wife Théodose Boudrot, now childless, settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Théodose gave Jean-Baptiste a son there, Guillaume-René in May 1760, within a year of their arrival.   Thomas Doiron's widow Anne Girouard and her five remaining children, who had crossed on the Duc Guillaume, went to St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Servan.  Anne, who did not remarry, died at St.-Suliac in December 1761, in her early 50s.  Pierre, her surviving grandchild by oldest son Bénoni, age 18 and still unmarried at the time of the crossing, evidently followed relatives to St.-Servan.   He then disappears from the historical record.  Anne Girouard's oldest surviving son Charles, age 20 when he crossed, chose to settle at St.-Servan with his nephew Pierre and brother Jacques before rejoining his mother and other siblings at St.-Suliac.  Charles died there in June 1764, age 26, still a bachelor.  Anne's son Alexandre followed her to St.-Suliac and married Ursule, daughter of fellow Acadians François Hébert and Isabelle Bourg of Cobeguit, at Pleslin across the river in January 1763.  Ursule gave Alexandre five children at Pleslin:  Marie-Rose in November 1763; Madeleine-Ursule in August 1765; Isaac-Alexandre in October 1767; Charles-Adrien in April 1770 but died at nearby La Ville au Conte, age 4, in October 1773; and Maturin-Luc in October 1772.  Anne Girouard's youngest surviving son Jacques dit Jacob lived with his older brother Charles at St.-Servan before rejoining his mother at St.-Suliac.  Jacques married Anne-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Breau and Ursule Bourg, at St.-Suliac in July 1765.  Anne-Josèphe gave Jacques four children at St.-Servan and St.-Suliac:  Jean-Jacques, called Jacques, at St.-Servan in August 1768; Simon-Joseph in April 1770; Ursule-Olive in December 1771; and Jacques-François at St.-Suliac in April 1774.  Only one of Thomas Doiron's daughters married.  Anne, her mother's namesake, married Charles, son of fellow Acadians François Naquin and Angélique Blanchard of Cobeguit, at St.-Suliac in November 1765.  Between 1766 and 1773 at St.-Suliac, Anne gave Charles five children, two daughters and three sons, two of whom died as infants.  Alexis Doiron, son of Thomas's older brother Louis, Alexis's third wife Madeleine-Josèphe Bourg, and his surviving sons Alexis-Grégoire, called Grégoire, and Joseph dit Josaphat, still in their early teens, settled at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo.  Between 1760 and 1764, Madeleine-Josèphe gave Alexis three more children at St.-Énogat:  Jean-Charles in August 1760; Marie-Madeleine in 1762; and Marie-Rose in September 1764.  In late 1765, Alexis, Madeleine-Josèphe, and their young children joined other Acadian exiles, most of them recently repatriated from England, in a settlement venture on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Alexis's oldest son Grégoire by first wife Marguerite Thibodeau remained at St.-Énogat, where he married Hélène, daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Aucoin and Élisabeth Amireau, in May 1767.  Hélène gave Grégoire three children at St.-Énogat:  Françoise-Josèphe in April 1768; Grégoire-Michel in October 1769; and Marie-Victoire, called Victoire, in October 1772.  Alexis's younger son Josaphat by first wife Marguerite also remained at St.-Énogat when his father, stepmother, and younger half-siblings moved on to Belle-Île-en-Mer.  In August 1766, Josaphat married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Duon and Angélique Aucoin, at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west bank of the river south of St.-Énogat.  Marguerite gave Josaphat three sons in the area:  Pierre-Josaphat at St.-Énogat in March 1768; Joseph-Grégoire in July 1769; and Basile-François at Pleurtuit on the west bank of the river between St.-Énogat and Plouër in November 1770.  They returned to Plouër in 1771.  Alexis's younger brother Jean and his wife Anne Thibodeau, now childless, went first to St.-Suliac and then settled near his brother at St.-Énogat.  Anne gave Jean four more children at St.-Énogat:  Jean-Baptiste in April 1760; Anne-Dorothée in June 1761; Pierre in August 1762; and Marguerite-Josèphe in February 1764.  They followed older brother Alexis to Belle-Île-en-Mer in late 1765.  In October 1763, Joseph, son of Pierre dit Pitre Doiron of Chignecto, reached St.-Énogat from England by an unusual route.  Joseph, age 9 in 1755, had escaped the British roundup at Chignecto that year and followed his family to Canada.  Still in his teens, he had become a seaman, perhaps serving on a corsair, was evidently captured by the Royal Navy, and imprisoned in England.  He married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Alexandre Bourg and Ursule Hébert, at St.-Énogat in February 1764.  Ursule gave the sailor two children at St.-Énogat:  Jean-Charles in January 1765 but died 11 days after his birth; and Rose-Germaine in July 1766.  In 1767, Joseph evidently left his family at St.-Énogat and went back to sea.  He died on Île Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, in 1772, age 26.  One wonders what became of his widow Marguerite Bourg and their daughter.  Another Doiron settled in the St.-Malo area.  Séverin, with his wife Geneviève LeBlanc, probably a fellow Acadian, and their younger daughter sailed from Boulogne-sur-Mer, the northern fishing port, to St.-Malo aboard the brigantine Hazard in May 1766.  Séverin had come to France probably from the Maritimes in 1759 and married Geneviève at Boulogne-sur-Mer in c1761.  They settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where they were still living in 1772.  They then disappear from the historical record. 

In 1759, island Doirons landed in other French ports, including Le Havre and Cherbourg in Normandy, Boulogne-sur-Mer up in Picardie, and the naval ports of La Rochelle and Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay.  Paul dit Grand Paul Doiron of Chignecto and Rivière-du-Nord-Est, wife Marguerite Michel, and members of their family ended up at Le Havre.  Grand Paul died probably at Le Havre by February 1760, in his 40s.  Daughter Rosalie, age 19, married Joseph, 22-year-old son of fellow Acadians Charles Bourg and Marguerite Landry, at Le Havre in January 1764.  Grand Paul's son Jean-Baptiste, in his early teens when he crossed from Île St.-Jean, also ended up at Le Havre, where he worked as a sailor.  He married Marie-Blanche, called Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians René Bernard and Marguerite Hébert of Chignecto, at Le Havre in January 1766.  Blanche gave Jean-Baptiste thee daughters there:  Émelie in October 1766; Marie-Honorine-Hypolithe in July 1768; and Rose-Lucie in c1772.  Émelie may have died in childhood.  Grand Paul's daughters Anne-Appoline, Marie-Blanche, called Blanche, and Rose ended up at Cherbourg, just across the Baie de Seine from Le Havre, so they were still fairly close to their parents.  Anne-Appoline, age 20 when she crossed in 1758, married Jean-Baptiste, fils, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Chesnay dit La Garenne and Anne Potier of Île St.-Jean, either on Île St.-Jean or at Cherbourg soon after her arrival.  Blanche was age 16 in 1758, so she likely married fellow island Acadian Bonaventure Thibodeau soon after she and her sisters reached the Norman port.  At age 18, Blanche remarried to Sylvain, fils, son of fellow Acadians Sylvain Aucoin and Catherine Amireau and widower of Rose Henry, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in February 1760.  Rose, only age 8 in 1758, joined her parents at Le Havre by January 1764, when, at the tender age of 14, she married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Charles Bourg and Marguerite Landry, in Notre Dame Parish, Le Havre.  Grand Paul's oldest daughter Marguerite-Josèphe and her husband Jean-Baptiste Dugas landed in the northern fishing port of Boulogne-sur-Mer in 1759.  In 1765, they moved south to La Rochelle and were living at nearby Rochefort in 1770.  Séverin Doiron, parents unrecorded, was exiled from the Maritime islands to Boulogne-sur-Mer in 1758.  He married Geneviève LeBlanc, probably a fellow Acadian, there in c1761.  Geneviève gave Séverin two daughters in the fishing port:  Marie-Jacquelin-Florentin in May 1762 but died at age 3 in August 1765; and Marie-Geneviève in July 1764.  In May 1766, they resettled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo.  Suzanne Doiron, parents unrecorded, widow of Pierre Guitard, married Paul Mercier, widower of Madeleine Blanchard, in Notre Dame Parish, Rochefort, in February 1763. 

In late 1765, two Doiron brothers from St.-Énogat, Alexis and Jean, agreed to become part of a new agricultural settlement on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany--among the few island Acadians to go there.  By November, Alexis, third wife Madeleine-Josèphe Bourg, and their three youngest children took up residence on a land concession at Bortereau, today's Borduro, near Locmaria on the island's eastern shore.  Younger brother Jean, wife Anne Thibodeau, and their four young children also took up a concession at Bortereau.  Between 1766 and 1773, Madeleine-Josèphe gave Alexis seven more children on the island:  Joseph in April 1766; Sébastienne in February 1768; Henriette-Catherine in July 1769; Pierre in c1770; Marie-Ange in c1771; François-Xavier dit Mico in c1772; and Élie in c1773.  Brother Jean and wife Anne had no more children there.  In the early 1770s,  Alexis and Madeleine-Josèphe abandoned their concession at Bortereau and returned to St.-Énogat.  They and their youngest children, in 1773, may have followed Alexis's second son Josaphat and his family to the Channel Island of Jersey, from which they returned to British-controlled greater Acadia.  Alexis and Madeleine-Josèphe, or their younger children at least, settled on St. John's Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, from where Alexis and Madeleine-Josèphe had been exiled a decade and a half earlier.  They likely settled at Rustico on the north shore of the island.  Alexis's younger brother Jean also left Belle-Île-en-Mer in the 1770s, but he did not return to greater Acadia.  He sold his concession at Bortereau to a local in 1777 and moved to Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, in southwest Brittany. 

In 1773, Doirons in several port cities chose to take part in another settlement venture, this one in the interior province of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential French nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  The Doirons who went to Poitou included Thomas's sons Alexandre and his wife Ursule Hébert from Pleslin, and Jacques and his wife Anne-Josèphe Breau from St.-Suliac; Alexis's son Grégoire and his wife Hélène Aucoin from St.-Énogat; Grand Paul's son Jean-Baptiste and wife Marie-Blanche Bernard from Le Havre, his sisters Marie-Blanche and her second husband Sylvain Aucoin, fils from Cherbourg, Rose and her husband Joseph Bourg from Le Havre, and perhaps Marguerite-Josèphe and her husband Jean-Baptiste Dugas from Rochefort.  Jacques and Anne-Josèphe Breau lost a son in Poitou:  Jacques-François was buried at Archigny south of Châtellerault, age 11 months, in March 1775.  Ursule Hébert gave Alexandre another son, Marin, at Bonneuil-Matours south of Châtellerault in February 1775.  Marie-Blanche Bernard gave Jean-Baptiste a son, Jean-Baptiste-Cesar, at Cenan southeast of Archigny in May 1775.  Hélène Aucoin gave Grégoire another son, Pierre, in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in June 1775.  Two of Jean-Baptiste's sisters remarried in Poitou:  Marie-Blanche, in a third marriage, to Jacques, fils, son of fellow Acadians Jacques Moulaison and Cécile Melanson of Cap-Sable, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in May 1774; and Rose to Jean-Baptiste, son of locals Robert Loiseleur and Marguerite Legendre of Châtellerault, at Targé southeast of Châtellerault  in August 1775. 

After two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians, including the Doirons, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they rearranged their lives as best they could.  Ursule Hébert gave Alexandre another son, Joseph, at nearby Chantenay in November 1777.  Son Marin, born in Poitou, died at Chantenay, age 2 1/2, later that month.  Anne-Josèphe Breau gave Jacques four more children in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, but they all died young:  Jean-Baptiste in January 1776 but died at age 20 months in September 1777; Eulalie-Élisabeth in February 1778 but died at age 5 in August 1783; Benjamin in April 1780 but died at age 2 1/2 in January 1783; and another Jean-Baptiste in November 1783 but died a month later.  Hélène Aucoin gave Grégoire two more sons in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, but they all died young:  Jean-Pierre in November 1777 but died at age 5 in February 1781; and Jean in December 1779 but died at age 2.  They also lost a son born at St.-Énogat:  Grégoire-Michel died in St.-Similien Parish in November 1778, age 9.  Grégoire, who worked as a sailor at Nantes, may have died there or at sea before November 1784, when Hélène remarried to an Acadian Dantin in St.-Similien Parish.  Marie-Blanche Bernard gave Jean-Baptiste Doiron four more children at Nantes and Chantenay, most of whom survived childhood:  Jean-Louis in St.-Nicolas Parish in March 1777 but died there the following December; Amable-Ursule, a daughter, at Chantenay in May 1779; Louis-Toussaint in November 1781; and Jean-Charles in July 1784.  Jean-Baptiste's oldest sister Marguerite-Josèphe, her husband Jean-Baptiste Dugas, and their family were counted at Nantes in September 1784.  Grégoire's uncle Jean Doiron, who, in the late 1770s, moved his family from Belle-Île-en-Mer to Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, lost wife Anne Thibodeau in the lower port in December 1783; she was 53.  His daughter Anne-Dorothée, born at St.-Énogat before they moved to Belle-Île-en-Mer, married Jean-Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Hébert and Anne Benoit and widower of Marguerite Moulaison, at Paimboeuf in March 1784. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Most of the Doirons still in the mother country--30 of them--agreed to take it.  They included Jean, a son, and two of his daughters, one them married; brothers Alexandre and Jacques and their families; Jean-Baptiste and his family; his sisters Marguerite-Josèphe, now a widow, Anne-Appoline and Blanche and their husbands, and Rose, who left her French husband in France; Grégoire's widow, now remarried, and two of her Doiron daughters; and one of Séverin's daughters and her husband.  Others remained.  In February 1784, Jeanne-Élisabeth, daughter of Pierre Doiron and Barbe-Jeanne Lance, was born at Le Havre.  Their daughter Marie was born at Le Havre in August 1787, two years after most of the Acadians in France had left for Spanish Louisiana.  In 1801 and 1803, the sisters, still at Le Havre, applied for assistance from the French government, "Having the Right to Aid" as Acadians.  In March 1803, the city clerk noted that both sisters, now ages 18 and 16, were orphans "at Sessous of 20 yrs." 

Meanwhile, in North America, things only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the redcoats in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On 24 October 1760, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  On the list was Pre. Douairon and his family of two--perhaps Pierre Doiron of Chignecto and his wife.  The British held them, along with hundreds of other exiles, including Doirons, who had been captured by, or surrendered to, British forces in the area, in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In July and October 1762, British officials at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, counted members of the famly near their old homesteads there.  They included Pierre Douairon and his family of five, six, or eight; perhaps another Pierre Douairon, counted alone; Jos. Douairon counted alone; and Fran[çois] Douairon counted alone.  In August 1763, British officials at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, counted members of the family in the prison compound there, not far from their old homesteads at Chignecto.  They included Pierre-Paul with Marguerite, Marie, Magdelaine, Pierre, another Marguerite, Jacques, and Charles; and Pierre with Marguerite, Joseph, and Charles--all called Douaron. 

After the war, some of the Doirons in the Nova Scotia compounds chose to remain in greater Acadia or join their kinsmen in Canada, where some had gone there as early as 1756.  Though the British, by conquest, gained Canada in the Treaty of Paris of February 1763, the far-northern province was populated largely by French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jean Doiron began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the early 1770s, Doirons from greater Acadia and exile in France could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Nicolet; at St.-Ours on lower Rivière Richelieu; at Napanne in present-day Ontario; on the lower St. Lawrence on Île d'Orléans, and at Beaumont, St.-Charles de Bellechasse, and St.-Michel de Bellechasse near Québec City; at Richibouctou in present-day eastern New Brunswick; at Rustico on the north shore of Prince Edward Island; and on Baie Ste.-Marie, today's St. Mary's Bay, on the western coast of Nova Scotia.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, the Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

At war's end, Acadians held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repartriation.  In June 1763, Paul Doiron, his second wife Marie Blanchard, and their three children were counted in Pennsylvania, probably at Philadelphia.  After remarrying again in 1764, Paul took his family to Maryland.  In July 1763, in Maryland, Alexandre Douairon, wife Anne Vincent, and six of their children--son André daughters Agathe, Élisabeth, Anne, Pélagie, and Véronique, and an unamed child--were counted at Oxford on the colony's Eastern Shore.  Théotiste Doiront was counted at Baltimore.  In August 1763, in South Carolina, Paul Duron, actually Doiron, wife Rose Bourgeois, and their three children--Pierre, age 15; Rose, age 12; Anne-Marie, age 4 months--were still in the colony.  Also there were Michel Doiron and his wife Marie Dupuy; Joseph Doiron, his second wife Marie-Josèphe Lord, and four of their children--Joseph Bourg, age 14 and Jean Bourg, age 9, from Marie-Josèphe's first marriage to Claude Bourg, and Joseph's children Marie-Josèphe, age 2, and Pierre, age 1.  Also in the southern colony were Marie Doiron, husband Pierre Lembert, actually Lambert, her daughter Marie-Anne Boucher by a previous marriage, Pierre's son Pierre, fils by a previous marriage, Marie and Pierre's infant son Jean, and three orphans.

Doirons still in South Carolina at war's end chose to go not to Canada but to French St.-Domingue, where they could live not only among fellow Roman Catholics, but also in territory controlled by France.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean Basin and help in the war of vengeance to come.  Moreover, the exils could provide a source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To entice them to the sugar colony, the French promised the exiles land of their own there.  Joseph Doiron, his second wife Marie-Josèphe Lord, and their children; Michel Doiron and his wife Marie Dupuy; Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, Doiron and his wife Madeleine Forest; and Marie Doiron, her second husband Pierre Lambert, his son Pierre, fils, and Marie's daughter Marie-Anne Boucher, were among the takers.  The promises did not work for at least one member of the family.  When fellow exiles from Nova Scotia and Maryland came through Cap-Français in the mid- and late 1760s on their way to Louisiana, Marie Doiron and her family followed one of the parties to New Orleans.  The other Doirons were among the majority of Acadians who remained in the sugar colony.  Joseph Doiron died there by c1775, in his late 50s or early 60s, when wife Marie-Josèphe Lord remarried probably at Môle St.-Nicolas.  Marguerite Doiron married fellow Acadian Pierre Doucet, a carpenter, probably at Môle before February 1777.  Barthélemy Doiron, son of Antoine Vitelly and Marie-Josèphe Doiron, widow of Jean-Baptiste Aucoin and not yet remarried, was born at Môle in c1777 and baptized there in November 1779.  The boy died at Môle in January 1780, age 2.  The couple's daughter Catherine was born at Môle in January 1780 but died a week and a half after her birth.  Antoine and Marie-Josèphe married at Môle in February 1783.  Meanwhile, Jean Doiron, now carpenter for the king, and his wife Madeleine Forest welcomed daughter Marie-Madeleine at Môle in May 1778.  Their daughter Victoire was born there in December 1780; and Anne in April 1783.  Marie, daughter of Michel Doiron and Marie Dupuy, married Noël, son of André Kuntz, soldier of Cambresis, and Catherine Selvenn Holerin of Langogne, Gévaudan, in the south of France, at Môle St.-Nicolas in May 1785. 

Doirons being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the hated oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, no self-respecting Acadian would consent to take it if it could be avoided.   Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where exiles in the seaboard colonies, including Doirons, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadians.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, four were Doirons. 

For a dozen years, the Doirons in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  The Doirons had few relatives in the Spanish colony, but that was of little consequence.  Anne Vincent, widow of Alexandre Doiron, and three of her Doiron daughters--Agathe, age 30; Élisabeth, age 20; and Pélagie, age 16--followed a party of 150 exiles who left Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac in late December 1767 and reached New Orleans via Cap-Français the following February.  (One wonders what happened to Anne's son and two other daughters counted at Oxford four years earlier, and to Théotiste Doiron who had been counted at Baltimore.)  At least one Doiron family chose to remain in Maryland.  Paul, son of Jean, fils of Chignecto, with a wife and three children, had been deported to South Carolina in 1755.  The following spring, they had made their way up the coast to Long Island, New York, where they were held.  Perhaps after his wife died, Paul secured permission to move on to Pennsylvania, where he remarried at Philadelphia in 1761.  He, his second wife, and three children were still in the Quaker Colony in June 1763.  Paul dit Gold, as he was called, remarried again--his third marriage--to Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Bourg and Judith Hébert, at Philadelphia in May 1764.  They moved on to Maryland probably soon after their marriage.  For reasons of their own, they were among the relatively few Acadians in the Chesapeake colony who refused to emigrate to Spanish Louisiana later in the decade.  In 1773, Paul was one of the first Acadians at Baltimore to secure a lot--number 36--on Charles Street in the city's French Town Quarter.  Paul dit Gold's succession was filed at Baltimore in June 1785, when he would have been in his late 50s or early 60s.  His descendants used the surname Gold, an English iteration of Doiron.299

Doucet

In  1755, descendants of Germain Doucet de La Verdure and his two wives could be found at Annapolis Royal, Minas, Cap-Sable, Chignecto, Chepoudy in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean, and in Canada.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther.

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Doucets may have been among the refugees.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Doucets may have been among the Chignecto-area Acadians serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies, many Doucets among them. 

At least one Doucet family from Grand-Pré was transported to Maryland in the fall of 1755.  The Doucet family shipped to Virginia--that of Jean dit Jean Prudent of Grand-Pré--endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas.  In mid-November, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  The exiles languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships until, with winter approaching, Governor Dinwiddie ordered them to be dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond, while he and the colony's political leaders pondered their fate.  The following spring, the Virginia authorities sent them on to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several ports.  The Doucets who survived the Virginia debacle ended up at Southampton, where their ordeal only worsened.  By 1763, more than half of the exiles in England were dead.  Pierre, son of Jean Prudent Doucet of Grand-Pré, married Marie-Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadian Joseph Richard, also from Minas, at Southampton in April 1763. 

At Annapolis Royal, where most of the Doucets still lived in 1755, many haute-rivière Acadians, including Doucets, escaped deportation by hiding in the hills above the Fundy shore.  They crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring and sought refuge on the mainland.  Nevertheless, in mid-October and early December 1755, the British were able to send off half a dozen transports filled with Annapolis Acadians to Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, and North Carolina.  The ship bound for North Carolina, the Pembroke, fell into the hands of its Acadian "passengers," who took it to the mouth of Rivière St.-Jean, escaped upriver, and joined fellow exiles from Annapolis Royal in the lower St.-Jean settlements.  Meanwhile, the five New England- and New York-bound ships that made it out of the Bay of Fundy sailed on to their destinations.  Many Annapolis Doucets were on these vessels.  A colonial record dated 6 May 1756 notes that a Doucet family was among the "French neutrals sent by Gov. Lawrence from Nova Scotia to New York" and parcelled out to five counties in the Manhattan area.  Colonial authorities sent Glode Doucet and his family of eight to Jamaica, Queens County, on Long Island.  In July 1760, colonial officials in Massachusetts counted three Doucet families still languishing in the colony.  At Gloucester, they recorded Joseph Doucett and Anne Doucett, ages unrecorded, and 10 of their children, ages 26 to 2.  This was Joseph, son of Claude Doucet and Marie Comeau of Annapolis Royal, wife Anne Surrette, and their children.  Also with them was Widow Eliza. Janvire, age 72 and infirm.  Colonial officials counted Peter Dossett, age 50, his wife Mary, also age 50, and nine children, six sons and three daughers, ages 27 to 6, one of them sick, at Marblehead.  This was Joseph's younger brother Pierre, wife Marie-Josèphe Robichaud, and their children.  At Duxbury, colonial officials counted Joso. Dosset, age 47, wife Nanny, age 41, and four of their children, three daughters and a son, ages 26 to 6.  This was Joseph, son of Mathieu Doucet and Anne Lord, wife Anne Bourg, and their children. With them was Maria Gould, age 78, probably a Doiron, who the English called Gold.  Two more Doucet families from Annapolis Royal--that of brothers Pierre and his wife Françoise Dugas, and François and his wife Marguerite Petitot--also were deported to Massachusetts in 1755.  The British deported Annapolis Doucets also to Connecticut. 

Doucets who escaped the roundups at Chignecto and Annapolis Royal sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac and at Cocagne and  Shediac on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  In 1756, hundreds of exiles from the Chignecto, the trois-rivières, and Annapolis gathered on Rivière Miramichi, farther up the shore, which had boasted only a hand full of Acadians before Le Grand Dérangement, while others moved on to Canada.  During the second winter of exile, 1756-57, food, clothing, and shelter were in short supply, and many of the refugees perished at ironically-named Camp Espérance--Camp Hope, on Boishébert's, today's Beaubears, Island in the middle of the Miramichi estuary.  When spring finally came, some families moved farther up the shore or followed their kinsmen to the St. Lawrence valley, where the Canadiennes treated them with contempt.  Most of the Gulf-shore exiles, including Michel Doucet and his family, remained at Miramichi and tried desperately to create a permanent settlement there despite thin soil, harsh winters, and a short growing season.  In late 1758, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July, the British sent search-and-destroy missions to the Gulf shore to protect their lines of communication there.  Unable to tend their fields or maintain their pitiful shelters, the Acadians at Miramichi faced another starvation winter before retreating north to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Doucets on the French Maritime islands escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of islands' habitants, including Doucets, and deported them to France.  Irishman Jean Doucet dit Lirlandois of Louisbourg, no kin to the descendants of Sieur Germain, and his second wife Thérèse Dauphin crossed aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Jean and his wife were among the passengers buried at sea.  Acadian Joseph Doucet, a 15-year-old seaman from Île St.-Jean, reached St.-Malo in 1759.  In Apirl, with official permission, he moved on to Brest on the other end of Brittany, where he served on at least two vessels before returning to St.-Malo in May 1760.  Anne Doucet, her husband François Chiasson, and two of their sons crossed on one of the five transports that left Chédaboutou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three of the transports, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Anne was buried at sea.  Marie-Anne Précieux, wife of Augustin Doucet dit Justice, and two of their children--Pierre, age 5; and Marie, age 3--crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which also left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy, dodged the mid-December storm, and reached St.-Malo in mid-January.  They survived the ordeal.  Augustin dit Justice crossed on another, unidentified vessel that took him to St.-Malo. 

Island Doucets did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Augustin dit Justice, his wife Anne, and children, settled at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo, and in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer across from St.-Énogat, where Anne gave Justice more children:  Rose in April 1760 but died at age 6 in November 1766; Renée-Catherine in June 1762 but died at age 5 in October 1767; Augustin-Sylvestre in July 1764; Jean-Baptiste in September 1766; François-Adrien in April 1768 but died 11 months later; and François in September 1770.  Augustin dit Justice's son Pierre married Jeanne, daughter of locals Jean Dautoville and Perrine Bellotte, at St.-Servan in January 1775, where at least two sons were born to them:  Auguste-Pierre in October 1775; and Pierre-Michel in September 1779.  Françoise, daughter of  François Doucet and widow of Alexis Renaud, married Louis, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Haché dit Gallant and Marie-Ange Gentil and widower of Anne Benoit, at St.-Servan in February 1770 and gave him more children. 

Island Doucets, along with members of the family captured in Nova Scotia, landed at other coastal cities, including Le Havre and Cherbourg in Normandy and the naval ports of La Rochelle and Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay.  They were especially numerous at Le Havre and Rochefort.  Joseph Doucet, son of Charles of Île Royale, came to Le Havre from the Maritimes in 1759 with his wife Marie or Marguerite Robichaud and their unmarried daughter Marguerite, age 28.  Joseph died at Le Havre in July 1764, age 66.  While the British were deporting the island Acadians to France, Joseph's son Joseph Doucet, fils, his wife Marguerite Moulaison, and their infant daughter Marie were rounded up by a British raiding force sent to Cap-Sable and nearby Pobomcoup in late 1758.  The redcoats held them in the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, and then, via England, deported them to Le Havre, which they reached in mid-January 1759.  Daughter Marie died in the Norman port in February, age 2 1/2, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Joseph, fils and Marguerite had at least six more children at Le Havre:  Emmanuelle-Victoire in May 1759; Joseph-Benjamin in October 1761; Adélaïde-Véronique in December 1763; Marie-Marguerite in January 1766; Madeleine-Geneviève-Émilie in January 1768; and Ange in c1770.  Joseph, père's daughter Marguerite was age 34 when she married Jacques Bunel of Lunerey, France, widower of Marie-Josèphe Poirier, probably an Acadian, at Le Havre in July 1765.  Joseph Doucet, père's younger brother Michel and his wife Angélique Pitre landed at Le Havre with several children--Joseph le jeune, age 16; twins Michel, fils and Euphrosine, age 15; Catherine, age 14; and Élisabeth, age 6.  The family suffered terribly in the Norman port:  Michel, père died in February 1760, age 53.  Daughters Élisabeth and Catherine died in February and September of the same year; and Joseph le jeune died in 1764, age 21.  Michel, fils became a carpenter and a sailor and married Marie-Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Cousin and Judith Guédry, probably at Le Havre in c1766.  They had at least three children there:  Marie-Rose in May 1767, Honorine-Eleonore in February 1768; and Jean-Baptiste-Michel in c1773.  Louis Doucet and his wife Jeanne Moulaison of Cap-Sable also landed at Le Havre.  Their daughter Marie-Madeleine-Susanne was born there in April 1760.  Marie-Josèphe Doucet and her husband Pierre Moulaison, also of Cap-Sable, landed at Le Havre.  Anne, daughter of Joseph Doucet and Marie Robichaud and wife of Philippe-Joseph Demar, perhaps a Demarets of Île Royale, died at Le Havre, age 22, in July 1764.  François Doucet ended up at Cherbourg, across the Baie de Seine from Le Havre.  His daughter Marie-Renée-Adélaïde died at Cherbourg, age 17 months, in January 1770.  Jacques Doucet, a cabaretier or inn-keeper, and his wife Marguerite or Marianne Gerard ended up at La Rochelle.  They had at least three children there:  Catherine-Thérèse in October 1766; Marie-Anne-Pélagie in January 1768 but died at age 5 months the following May; and Jacques-Charles in July 1769.  Élisabeth Doucet married Frenchman Jean Durier, a serrurier or locksmith, at nearby Rochefort in April 1760.  Pierre Doucet, a day laborer or a tailleur d'habits, and his wife Marie-Madeleine Goineau also were at Rochefort.  Their son Pierre, fils was born there in November 1760.  Joseph remarried to Marie Naud, probably at Frenchwoman, at Rochefort in June 1762 and died by February 1764, when Marie remarried there.  Jean Doucet and his wife Marie-Anne Merenand came to Rochefort with daughter Marie-Anne, age 1.  Marie-Anne died there at age 5 in August 1763.  Pierre Doucet died at Rochefort in May 1764, age 80.  The St.-Louis Parish priest who recorded his burial did not give Pierre's parents' name or mention a wife and children.  Jacques Doucet, a day laborer, and his wife Marie David landed at Rochefort.  Their son Jacques died there at age 5 in July 1765; daughter Marie was born in November 1765 but died at age 1 in October 1766; another daughter, name and age unrecorded, died in October 1767; and Marie-Marguerite was born in July 1777.  Marie, daughter of Jean Doucet and Jeanne Paris, married Frenchman Joseph Cayra or Querat, a day laborer, at Rochefort in May 1767, and remarried to another day laborer, Frenchman Antoine, son of Louis Bourgoin and Léonarde Brosset of Bourdelle, Perigard, at Rochefort in July 1771.  Charles Doucet, whose port of arrival is not known, was just a teenager when he came to France.  He became a carpenter, remained a bachelor, and later moved on to Nantes in southwest Brittany.  

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  Pierre Doucet and his wife Marie-Blanche Richard, reached St.-Malo aboard the transport Ambition that May and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near their island cousins.  Their son Joseph-Basile was born at St.-Servan in February 1764.  In November 1765, Pierre and Marie-Blanche followed other exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany and settled at Anvort near Sauzon on the north end of the island.  Pierre and Marie-Blanche had more children there:  Marie-Blanche at Le Palais on the east coast of the island in January 1766; Pierre at Sauzon in August 1768; Jean-Pierre-Marie in October 1772; Jeanne-Gabrielle at Locmaria on the south end of the island in March 1775 but died at age 1 in August 1776; and Marie-Perrine in September 1777.  

Doucets came to France by a different route and also congregated at Le Havre.  After the war with Britain ended in 1763, members of the families being held in Nova Scotia chose to resettle on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  In 1778, during the American Revolution, soon after France joined the American struggle against their old red-coated enemy, the British, who controlled every part of the Maritimes region except the Newfoundland islands, rounded up the fisher/habitants on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported them to France.  Doucets were among the unfortunates who endured the crossing on hired British transports.  Michel Doucet and his wife Louise Belliveau of Île Miquelon landed at La Rochelle.  Their son Jacques-Marc was born there in April 1779 but died the following August.  Michel died at La Rochelle that August, age 42.  Wife Louise died only a few days later.  Some of their children evidently returned to North America probably in 1784, after the war had ended badly for the British and they were forced to retrocede the Newfoundland islands to France.  If they returned to Miquelon, the Doucet children did not remain there.  They moved on to Rustico on the north shore of St. Johns's Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, today's Prince Edward Island, near their parents' old home at Malpèque.  Joseph Doucet, age 32, probably Michel's oldest son, wife Modeste Bonnevie, age 29, and their four daughters--Renée, age 10; Louise, age 6; Joséphine, age 3; and Gratieuse, age 3 months--appeared on a list of "Acadian Exiles from St.-Pierre et Miquelon at Le Havre" in 1797, so Joseph and his family may not have returned to greater Acadia in 1784.  One wonders how long he and Modeste had been living at the Norman port.  In 1801, French authorities counted four Doucets--Cécile, Félicité, Jean, and Marguerite, no ages given--at Le Havre, with the notation that they and other Acadians were "receiving aid from the Marine during the month of Vendemaire year 10," that is, September-October 1801.  The notation adds:  "They were deported from the colonies and are living in the city."  Also on this list was Joseph Doucet, wife Modeste Bonnevie, their four daughters counted in 1797, and son Joseph-Prosper, no age given.  The family also appeared on a list entitled "Acadians and Canadians:  Refugees from St.-Pierre et Miquelon Wishing to Leave Le Havre for Lorient" in southern Brittany, dated 1802. 

In 1773, several Doucet families--those of Augustin dit Justice, and Françoise Doucet and her husband Louis Haché from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; and Joseph, fils and Michel, fils from Le Havre--became part of an even larger settlement venture, in the interior of Poitou.  Augustin dit Justice, in fact, was one of the Acadian leaders in the St.-Malo area invited by the Marquis de Pérusse des Cars to inspect his lands near the city of Châtellerault and then to coax his fellow Acadians to join the Poitou venture.  Augustin reported favorably on what he saw.  Despite his dit, he likely had been paid to exaggerate the quality of the soil on the marquis's estate.  Michel, fils's daughter Marguerite-Bénoni was born at Cenan southeast of Châtellerault in March 1775.  In late 1775 and early 1776, after two years of effort, Michel Doucet, fils and his family, and Françoise Doucet and her family, retreated with most of the Poitou Acadians down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes.  They settled at nearby Chantenay.  Michel, fils's son Jean-Baptiste was born at Chantenay in February 1777 but died only two months later.  Michel, fils's sister Euphrosine, who seems to have remained a spinster, died at Chantenay in June 1784, in her early 40s.  Françoise bore at least four more children for Louis Haché at Chantenay.  The other Doucets who had gone to Poitou, Joseph and Augustin dit Justice, were among the 300 or so Acadians who remained in the area.  Augustin dit Justice's daughter Marie married Frenchman Anne, son of Pierre Samie and Catherine Jacaud, at Cenan in April 1777.  Joseph's daughter Emmanuelle-Victoire married Frenchman Louis-Joseph, son of Jean Jaunon and Marie-Anne Leroy, at Cenan in September 1778; and his other daughter, Adélaïde, married Jacques, son of Frenchman Pierre Arnaud, there in January 1781.  Joseph, fils's wife Marguerite Moulaison died at Cenan in April 1784, in her late 50s, leaving Joseph with three teenaged children.  Augustin dit Justice died probably at Cenan in the late 1770s or early 1780s.  By September 1784, Joseph, fils, as well as Justice's widow Marie-Anne Précieux, had left Poitou with their unmarried children and joined their fellow Acadians at Nantes. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  At least thirteen of the Doucets still in the mother country agreed to take it.  They included Michel, fils and Joseph, fils and members of their families, and Marie-Anne Précieux and her two Doucet sons.  Other Doucets, perhaps the majority, chose to remain in the mother country.  They included Pierre and his family on Belle-Île-en-Mer; most of their kinsmen at Le Havre, Rochefort, and La Rochelle; and the Doucet wives who remained in Poitou. 

In North America, things got only worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Among them were Michel Doucet of Annapolis Royal and his family of nine; and the widow of François Doucet and her family of three.  The British held them and other exiles captured in the area in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In 1761 and 1762, British officials at Fort Edward, Halifax, counted Paul Doucet there.  He evidently had no family.  In August 1763, British officials at Halifax counted Michelle Dousain, actually Doucet, his wife, and eight children on Georges Island, Halifax harbor. 

At war's end, Acadians still being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial leaders discouraged repatriation.  Doucets were still living in Massachusetts in August 1763.  They included  Benoît Doucet and wife Marie; François Doucet, wife Marguerite, and nine children, five males and four females; Joseph Doucet, wife Anne, and 10 children, seven males and three females; and Dominique Doucet, wife Madeleine, and one child, a male.  In 1763, Doucets were counted in Connecticut, including Pierre Dousset with eight persons; widow Doucet with six persons; Joseph Doucet with four persons; widow Margueritte Doucet with six persons; and another Joseph Doucet, his wife, and nine children.  That same year, Doucets in New York included Pierre Dousset, his unnamed wife, and eight children.  In June 1763, Jean Doucet, a widower, with four children were still in Pennsylvania.  In August 1763, the largest concentration of Doucets in the seaboard colonies could be found in South Carolina.  They included Paul Doucet, wife Marie Doucet, their 18-year-old daughter Nastazie, and 16-year-old orphan Marine Doucet; Germain Doucet, wife Margte. Coumau, and sons Joseph, age 20, Enselm, age 15, and Simon, age 12; Charles Douset, wife Anne Chiasson, and no children; Anne Doucet, husband Michel Cormier, and their 2-year-old son; Margte, age 18, and Marie, age 1, children of another Germain Doucet; orphans Anne, Magdelaine, and Froisine Doucet, ages 18, 16, and 14, counted with Joseph Salete and his wife Margte. Coumau; Widow Margte. Poirier and her son François Doucet, age 13; and Margte. Doucet, widow, with Madelaine Doucet, age 15.  In June 1766, officials in Massachuetts counted Doucets still lingering in the colony who wished to repatriate to Canada:  Françoise[sic] Doucet with three or five members of his family; Joseph Doucet with six in his family; another Joseph Doucet with nine in his family; widow of Mathieu Doucet and five members of her family; and Benoni Douces and three members of his family. 

Most of Doucets in the northern seaboard colonies chose to resettle in Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Sr. Germain Doucet began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Doucets could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Trois-Rivières, Bécancour, Pointe-du-Lac, La-Prairie-de-la-Magdeleine, St.-Pierre-du-Sorel, Île Dupas, Batiscan, Pointe-aux-Écureuils, St.-Pierre-les-Becquets, St.-Grégoire-de-Nicolet, Nicolet, Maskinongé, Rivière-du-Loup now Louiseville, Deschambault, L'Assomption, Cap-Santé, and Yamachiche; at St.-Ours on the lower Richelieu; at Québec City; on the lower St. Lawrence at Charlesbourg, Beauport, Rivière Ouelle, Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pocatière, St.-Francois-de-la-Rivière-du-Sud, St.-Pierre-de-la-Rivière-du-Sud, and Kamouraska; at Bonaventure in Gaspésie, and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  In eastern New Brunswick, they settled at Nipisiguit, now Bathurst; and on Île Miscou on the far northeastern shore.  In Nova Scotia, they could be found on Baie Ste.-Marie, today's St. Mary's Bay, not far from their old homes at Annapolis Royal; at Yarmouth south of Baie Ste.-Marie, not far their old habitants in the Cap-Sable area; and at Windsor in the Minas Basin, once the Acadian settlement of Pigiguit.  They also settled on the French-controlled island of Île Miquelon before moving on to Rustico on the north shore of Prince Edward Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, not far from the old Doucet homesteads at Malpèque.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten that the others existed.  

While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, Acadians exiled in the seaboard colonies were encouraged by French officials to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean basin and help in the "war of vengeance" to come.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  In 1763 and 1764, many of the Doucets in South Carolina emigrated to St.-Domingue.  Their experience there must have been tolerable, at first.  When Doucets from Halifax came through Cap-Français in 1765 on their way to New Orleans, only one Doucet in the sugar colony may have joined them.  Nevertheless, beginning in the summer of 1765, after several years of what they saw as fruitless effort, Acadians sought permission to leave the naval base, but French officials refused to let them go.  Some Acadians, including Doucets, left the project anyway and settled at nearby Jean-Rabel.  Marie, daughter of François Doucet, was living at Port-de-Paix down the coast from Môle when she married Pierre Dumas of Morlass, Bearn, France, at Jean-Rabel in August 1786.  Étienne Doucet married François Valois.  Their daughter Françoise-Louise was born at Jean-Rabel in November 1786.  Most members of the family remained at the naval base.  Anselme, son of Germain Doucet, married fellow Acadian Marie-Josèphe Melanson probably at Môle St.-Nicolas in the 1770s.  She gave Anselme at least four children there:  Jean in July 1777 but died at age 6 in July 1783; Victoire baptized there, age 12 days, in March 1780; Marie-Félicité in April 1782; and Olive-Eugènie in August 1785.  Simon, another son of Germain Doucet, married Madeleine LeBlanc of Grand-Pré at Môle in February 1776.  Their daughter Claire dite Clairette was born there in May 1777 but died at age 25 months in June 1779; son Joseph was baptized at the Môle church, age 6 days, in November 1778; and daughter Claire-Élisabeth was born posthumously in August 1780.  Simon died at Môle St.-Nicolas in August 1780, age 30.  Pierre Doucet, a carpenter, married fellow Acadian Marguerite Doiron.  Their daughter Marie-Antoinette was born at Môle St.-Nicolas in February 1777; Marie-Sophie was baptized at the church there, age 3 months, 12 days, in September 1779; and Marguerite-Eléonore was born at the naval base in November 1783.  Madeleine Doucet of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, Chignecto, widow of _____ Demoulin, married Pierre Mauge of Bordeaux, France, at Môle St.-Nicolas in August 1778.  François, a carpenter, son of Bénoni Doucet of Chignecto, married Marie-Anne Paris of Rochefort, France, at Môle St.-Nicoas in May 1779.  Their son Charles died at Môle, age 1 1/2, in October 1782; Émilie was born there in May 1783; and Antoine in October 1786.  Jean, son of Pierre Doucet, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in May 1782, age 31.  Doucets also ended up on other islands in the French Antilles.  Cécile, wife of Jacques Bourg, died on Guadeloupe in October 1765, age 51.  Pierre, son of Germain Doucet of Annapolis Royal, was a sailor when he died at Basse-Terre on Guadeloupe in November 1771, age 30.  Anne-Hélène Dousset, and Armand, Pélagie, and Charles-Isaie Dousset were counted at Champflore, Martinique, in 1766.  Charles-Isaie died there in December 1766, no age given. 

Doucets being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Doucets, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered resettling in French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Doucets from South Carolina, were going, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, nine were Doucets.235

Dubois

In 1755, Duboiss from two unrelated families could be found at Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, at Cap-Sable, and on Île St.-Jean.  A member of only one of those families emigrated to Louisiana, from France. 

Marguerite-Ange, daughter of French fisherman Joseph Dubois and his Acadian wife Anne, daughter of Louis Michel and Marguerite Forest of La Famille, Pigiguit, was born in c1757 probably at Cap-Sable a year after her parents' marriage there.  Although the British had rounded up Acadians in the Cap-Sable/Pobomcoup area in the spring of 1756, Joseph and Anne evidently had eluded them.  After the fall of the French fortress of Louisbourg in July 1758, a second British force descended on the area, and this time the young family fell into enemy hands, unless they were among the cape Acadians who escaped again, took to the woods, and surrendered to British forces the following summer.  They were held in the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, until late 1759, when the British deported them aboard the transport Mary to France via England.  Anne was pregnant when the family left Halifax, and daughter Louise-Marie was born aboard ship on 16 December 1759.  They reached Cherbourg, France, in the middle of January 1760.  Anne gave Joseph two more daughters in the Norman port:  Marie-Blanche in August 1761; and Madeleine in March 1763.  Madeleine probably died young.  In the mid-1760s, they crossed the Baie de Seine to Le Havre and then moved again.  In July 1768, Joseph, Anne, and three of their daughters landed at St.-Malo in northeast Brittany.  They settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer and at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of the Breton port.  Joseph died by November 1773, when Anne remarried to an Acadian LeBlanc at St.-Servan.  Meanwhile, daughter Marguerite-Ange, still in her teens, married Jean-Baptiste-Amand, called Jean, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Daigre and Madeleine Gautrot, at St.-Servan in November 1770.  She gave him a son at St.-Servan, but the boy died in infancy.  In 1773, Marguerite-Ange and her husband were part of the grand settlement venture in the interior of Poitou.  She gave him another son there.  In December 1775, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes, where Marguerite-Ange gave Jean another son, who also died in infancy.  When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Jean and Marguerite-Ange agreed to take it.  Jean died at Nantes in late 1784 or early 1785, so when Marguerite-Ange left Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, for New Orleans in June 1785, she was a widow with a child, son Jean-Louis Daigre, age 10 1/2.  Her mother, meanwhile, remarried twice in France, to a Landry at Nantes in October 1777, and to a Daigre at nearby Chantenay in February 1785--four marriages in all.  Marguerite-Ange sailed to Louisiana on the same vessel as her mother, her new stepfather, and seven Daigre step siblings.  One wonders what happened to Marguerite-Ange's younger sisters Louise-Marie and Marie-Blanche.  Did they marry Frenchmen and choose to remain in France, or, like sister Madeleine, did they also die young? 

Another Dubois, not kin to Marguerite-Ange, also emigrated from France to Spanish Louisiana in 1785.  However, his connection to greater Acadia is difficult to determine.  Jacques-Olivier, called Jaco or Jacos and Olivier, age 19, son of Olivier Dubois and Marguerite Vallois, was born in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in January 1766.  His mother was a native of Nantes, France, so she was not Acadian.  His godparents, however, were Acadians--Jacques Delaune and Dorothée Gaudet.  Jaco was an unmarried sailor when he came to Louisiana aboard one of the Seven Ships, which reached New Orleans in November 1785.  With him was his mother, his stepfather Zacharie Boudrot (her fourth husband), and a 15-year-old Boudrot stepbrother.  Within days of his arrival at New Orleans, Jaco married an Acadian exile there and settled with her on upper Bayou Lafourche.300

Dugas

By 1755, descendants of Abraham Dugas the master gunsmith and Marguerite Doucet could be found at Annapolis Royal, Chignecto, Minas, and Cobeguit in British-controlled Nova Scotia; and at Ékoupag on Rivière St.-Jean and on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale in areas controlled by France.  Dugass were especially numerous at Annapolis, Cobeguit, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Dugass may have been among the refugees.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Chignecto-area Acadians, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the local Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies, Dugass among them.  Later that summer, when the Cobeguit Acadians learned of the British roundups at Chignecto and at nearby Grand-Pré and Pigiguit, the entire population abandoned their settlements, crossed Mer Rouge that fall or the following spring, and joined their kinsmen on Île St.-Jean, now crowded with hundreds of other refugees from British Nova Scotia. 

In late autumn of 1755, the British shipped Acadians in the Annapolis Basin to Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, and North Carolina.  Dugass ended up on the Helena, bound for Massachusetts.  However, the ship heading to North Carolina, the Pembroke, never got there.  Soon after the Pembroke embarked from Goat Island in the lower basin and entered the lower Bay of Fundy with 232 exiles aboard, the Acadians, among them Charles Dugas, took advantage of a storm.  They seized the vessel, sailed it to Baie Ste.-Marie down the coast of Nova Scotia, and then crossed the Bay of Fundy to the lower Rivière St.-Jean, where they abandoned the ship and escaped upriver to the settlements where Dugas cousins lived.  The rest of their Annapolis brethren were not so lucky.  After their ship reached Boston, Dugass deported to Massachusetts were parcelled out to other communities in the colony.  In 1756, colonial officials counted four "Nova Scotia French" families at Marblehead, including that of Joseph Degan, actually Dugas, a widower, his children Anne, Mary, Elizabeth, Mohach? [Monique], and Peter; and Isadore Gordo, "his wife & one child."  In July 1760, officials in Essex County, Massachusetts, counted Michael Dugoy, perhaps Dugas, age 44, "a sickly man"; his wife Eliza [Robichaud], age 44; and their children Amon, age 15; Mary, age 12; Joseph, age 7; Modesty, age 9; and Anna, age 5.  In August 1761, officials in Massachusetts counted more Dugass being held in the colony:  Glaud, or Claude, Dugast, wife Margaret [Boudrot], and their son John, or Jean, were at Grafton; Charles Dugat, Mary, Margaret, and Joseph at Oxbridge; Gould, probably another Claude, Dugar "and his wife" at Huxbridge; Margaret Dugar, Matten, and Félicité at Oxford; Charles and Joseph Dugar at Charlton, probably Charlestown; and Elizabeth Dugar and Hannah Dugar at Dudley.  Also that year, Massachusetts officials counted Joseph Dugau? and his daughters Mary and Monique at Sherbourn, and Anne Dugua, Eliz. Dugua, and Margt. Gordeau at Hopkinton, both in Middlesex County (the same family that had been counted at Marblehead five years earlier).  According to genealogist Bona Arsenault, the British deported Marie-Josèphe Girouard, widow of Louis Dugas, and her three children to Connecticut in 1755.  Meanwhile, Dugass who had escaped the British at Annapolis Royal spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac or on lower Rivière St.-Jean among their Dugas cousins.  Some moved on to Miramichi and other places of refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or endured the long trek up the St.-Jean portage to Canada.  

Living in territory controlled by France, the many Dugass on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale, and the Dugas families on Rivière St.-Jean, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the Maritime islands and rounded up most of the habitants there, Dugass among them.  The British also attacked the Acadian settlements at Cap-Sable and on lower Rivière St.-Jean, including the Dugas enclave at Ékoupag, after Louisbourg fell.  No Dugass lived at Cap-Sable.  The river Dugass, unlike some of their hapless neighbors, eluded the redcoats and the New-English rangers and escaped upriver or to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore. 

Meanwhile, the British packed hundreds of island Acadians into hired merchant vessels and shipped them to St.-Malo and other French ports.  The deportation devastated the family.  Marguerite Dugas, husband Charles Hébert, and seven of their children perished with hundreds of other exiles on one of the two British transports, the Violet or the Duke William, that sank in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England on its way to St.-Malo.  Pierre of Anse-à-Pinnet, son of Claude Dugas, fils of Cobeguit, age 50, wife Isabelle Bourg, age 47, and six of their children--Marguerite-Josèphe, age 21; Isabelle, age 19; Agnès, age 17; Pierre, fils, age 12; Prosper, age 7; and Rémy, age 3--crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in the same 11-ship convoy in which the Violet and Duke William sailed, and, despite the mid-December storm, reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759 with all but six of its 56 passengers.  Pierre, Isabelle, and all of their children survived the crossing, but Isabelle and son Pierre, fils died in local hospitals in mid-February and March probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Most of the island Dugass crossed on one or more of the five transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November with 1,033 Acadians bound for St.-Malo.  Despite the mid-December storm that sank or wrecked three other vessels, the Five Ships remained in convoy and reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  However, only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, many of them Dugass.  Charles Dugas, age 57, older brother of Pierre of the Tamerlane, crossed on one of the Five Ships with wife Anne-Marie Benoit and 10 unmarried children--Anne, age 26; Marie-Madeleine, age 24; Jean-Baptiste, age 22; Marie-Josèphe, age 19; Pierre-Ignace, age 16; Pierre, age 14; Antoine, age 12; Victoire, age 10; and Marguerite and Joseph, ages unrecorded.  Charles and the two youngest children died at sea.  Anne-Marie and the eight older children survived the crossing.  Pierre, age 31, son of Claude Dugas III and nephew of Pierre and Charles, crossed with wife Marguerite Daigre, age 35, and four children--Anne-Osite, called Osite, age 6; Marguerite-Blanche, age 4; and Victoire-Osite, age 2--and his brother Amand, age 12.  They all survived the crossing except the youngest, Victoire-Osite, who died at sea.  Joseph dit Petit Jos Dugas, age 59, crossed with wife Anne-Marie Hébert, age 54, and their three unmarried children--Joseph, fils, age 15; Jean, age 14; and Anne, age 10.  Petit Jos, Anne-Marie, and son Jean died at sea.  Joseph, fils and his sister Anne survived the crossing.  Petit Jos's oldest son Charles, age 35, crossed with wife Euphrosine Thériot, age 34, and a Dugas niece--Perpétué, age 5.  Charles and his niece arrived with their health intact, but Euphrosine died in a St.-Malo hospital in February.  Charles's brother Alexis, age 32, crossed with wife Anne Bourg, age 32, and six children--Anne-Josèphe, age 10; Josaphat, age 8; Grégoire, age 6, Joseph, age 4, and Perpétué, age 2.  Anne was pregnant on the voyage and gave birth at sea.  She and the newborn, along with four of the other children, died at sea.  Only Alexis and 10-year-old Anne-Josèphe reached St.-Malo.  Charles and Alexis's brother Ambroise, age 30, crossed with wife Marguerite Henry, age 29, and four children--Ambroise, fils, age 7; Marguerite-Josèphe, age 5; Françoise, age 3, and Joseph, age 15 months.  Ambroise, père and Ambroise, fils survived the crossing, but Marguerite and the other children died either at sea or in a St.-Malo hospital in February and March.  Charles et al.'s brother Pierre, age 26, crossed with wife Anne-Josèphe Henry, age 27, and three children--Jean-Pierre, age 5; Anne-Josèphe, age 4; and Marie-Rose, age 2.  Pierre and wife Anne-Josèphe survived the crossing, but all three of their children died at sea.  Françoise Dugas, age 20, daughter of Petit Jos and sister of Charles et al., crossed with husband Antoine Henry, age 22, and her 9-year-old first cousin Olivier Dugas.  The young couple died in a St.-Malo hospital in January and February probably from the rigors of the crossing, but Olivier survived the voyage.  Paul, age 48, younger brother of Petit Jos and uncle of Charles et al., crossed with wife Anne-Marie Boudrot, age 48, and five children--Marguerite, age 15; Marie, age 12; Simon, age 11; Paul, fils, age 9; and Isabelle, age 6.  Anne-Marie and son Paul, fils died in a St.-Malo hospital in January and February.  Paul, père and the four youngest children survived the crossing and its rigors.  Paul's daughter Marguerite-Josèphe Dugas, age 24, crossed with husband Joseph Bourg, age 26.  He survived the crossing, but she died at sea.  Paul's daughter Eulalie, age 20, crossed with husband Basile Henry, age 17.  They both survived the crossing.  Paul's daughter Madeleine, age 17, crossed with husband Jean-Baptiste Hébert, age 26.  They also survived the crossing.  Paul's younger brother Jean-Baptiste, age 40, crossed with his second wife Madeleine Moyse and six of his children from her and his first wife Marguerite Benoit--Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 17; Marguerite-Josèphe, called Josèphe, age 15; Marin, age 12; Marie, age 10; Perpétué, age 6; Mathurin, age 3; and Anastasie, age 1 (son Olivier, age 9, had crossed with a cousin and her husband).  Jean-Baptiste, père and the five older children survived the crossing, but Madeleine and their two youngest children died at sea.  Marie-Claire Dugas, age 62, sister of Petit Jos, Paul, and Jean-Baptiste and widow of Jean Hébert, crossed with four children, age 19 to 14.  The 19-year-old son died at sea, and Claire died in a St.-Malo hospital in February.  The other three children made it to St.-Malo with their health unimpaired.  Marie Dugas, age 35, crossed with husband François Henry, six children, ages 14 to 2, and her sister Eulalie, age 21.  François and the three youngest children died at sea.  The others reached St.-Malo safely.  Isabelle Dugas, age 21, crossed with husband Jean-Baptiste Landry, age 35, two children from his first marriage, ages 8 and 5, and Jean-Baptiste's cousin Charles Robichaux, age 23.  They all survived the crossing.  Élisabeth Dugas, age 24, and husband Jérôme Lejeune, age unrecorded, crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in the 12-ship convoy, survived the mid-December storm , put in to Bideford, England, in late December for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until the second week of March 1759.  Jérôme died at sea, and Élisabeth died at St.-Malo in August 1759 probably from the rigors of the crossing. 

Island Dugass did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  The largest extended family consisted of the four surving sons of the recently-deceased Petit Jos Dugas and Anne-Marie Hébert of Cobeguit.  Oldest son Charles, now a widower, settled at St.-Sulaic on the east bank of the river south of St.-Malo, where he remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians François Naquin and Angélique Blanchard of Cobeguit and widow of François Gautrot, in September 1765.  She gave him no more children, but he helped raise his stepdaughter, Rose-Marie Gautroit, who had been born at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river in December 1762.  Charles's younger brother Alexis, now a widower, and his daughter Anne-Josèphe also went to St.-Suliac, where he worked as a carpenter.  He remarried to Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians François Moyse dit Latrielle and Marie Brun of Cobeguit, there in June 1760.  In May 1762, Marguerite gave Alexis another daughter at St.-Suliac, but Marguerite died the same day, age 37, probably from complications of childbirth.  Alexis did not remarry.  Daughter Anne-Josèphe married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians Jean Hébert and his first wife Madeleine Doiron, at St.-Suliac in February 1768.  Charles and Alexis's brother Ambroise, also now a widower, took his son Ambroise, fils to St.-Suliac, where Ambroise, père died in October 1760, age 32.  His son was age 9 at the time of his father's death, so his uncles probably raised him.  Ambroise, fils became a sailor and married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Amand Pitre and Geneviève Arcement of Cobeguit, at St.-Suliac in March 1773.  Charles, Alexis, and Ambroise's brother Pierre and his wife Anne-Josèphe Henry, their children gone, also went to St.-Suliac, where Anne-Josèphe gave Pierre three more children:  Marie-Rose in February 1760 but died at age 1 in March 1761; Joseph in April 1762; and Marie-Madeleine in January 1764 but died 19 days after her birth.  Wife Anne-Josèphe died at St.-Suliac in May 1766, at 35.  Pierre remarried to Cécile, another daughter of François Moyse dit Latrielle, fils and Marie Brun and widow of Michel Bourg, at St.-Suliac in June 1768.  She gave him no more children.  Pierre's youngest surviving brother, Joseph, fils, joined his older brother at St.-Suliac, where he worked as a pit sawyer.  He married Anastasie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Henry and Anne Aucoin, at St.-Suliac in June 1761.  Anastasie gave Joseph, fils four children there:  Joseph III in May 1762; Marie in March 1764; Cécile-Anne in September 1765; and Élisabeth-Eulalie in March 1768.  Anastasie died at St.-Suliac in March 1769, age 29, and Joseph, fils remarried to Anastasie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Barrieau and Véronique Giroir, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance south of St.-Suliac in May 1770.  They settled at St.-Suliac, where this Anastasie gave Joseph, fils two more children:  François-Basile-Étienne in April 1771; and Anastasie in February 1773.  Charles et al.'s youngest sister Anne married Joseph-Ignace, another son Jean Hébert and his first wife Madeleine Doiron, at St.-Suliac in February 1768, on the same day her niece Anne-Josèphe, daughter of brother Alexis, married Joseph-Ignace's brother Jean-Baptiste.  Another extended family consisted of the two younger brothers of Petit Jos of Cobeguit, who were uncles of Charles et al.  Paul Dugas, also now a widow, and his three unmarried children--Marie, Simon, and Élisabeth--settled at Pleurtuit across the river from St.-Suliac.  Paul remarried to Hélène, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Blanchard and Françoise Breau and widow of Alexis Aucoin, at Ploubalay near Pleurtuit in June 1760.  They settled at St.-Coulomb in the countryside northeast of St.-Malo, where Hélène gave Paul two more daughters:  Marie-Osite in June 1761; and Anne in December 1764.  Paul's daughter Marie married Prosper-Honoré, son of fellow Acadians Honoré Giroir and Marie-Josèphe Theriot, at St.-Coulomb in February 1764.  Her younger sister Élisabeth married Ambroise, son of fellow Acadians Amand Pitre and Geneviève Arcement, at Pleurtuit in April 1774.  Paul's younger brother Jean-Baptiste, a widower again, took his six children by first wife Marguerite Benoit--Jean-Baptiste, fils, Marguerite-Josèphe, Marin, Marie, Olivier, and Perpétué--to St.-Suliac, where he remarried again--his third marriage--to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians François Bourg and Madeleine Hébert and widow of Jean-Baptiste Blanchard, in September 1760.  They settled south of St.-Coulomb at St.-Méloir-des-Ondes, where Anne gave Jean-Baptiste, père three more children:  Françoise at La Pahorie near St.-Méloir in July 1761 but died at age 16 months in November 1762; and twins Mathurin and Anne at La Pahorie in May 1764.  Jean-Baptiste, père's oldest daughter Marguerite-Josèphe married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians François Chiasson and Anne Doucet and widower of Louise Précieux, at St.-Méloir in June 1761.  After giving him two sons, she died at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer in June 1766, age 22.  Jean-Baptiste's oldest son Jean-Baptiste, fils followed his father and siblings to St.-Suliac, where he married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Séraphin Breau and Brigitte Martin of Minas, in February 1764.  Marie had come to France with her family from England via Virginia the year before.  In 1765, she and Jean-Baptiste, fils settled near his father's family at St.-Méloir-des-Ondes, returned to St.-Servan in 1766, were back at St.-Méloir in 1768, at La Gouesnière south of St.-Méloir in 1770, and at Château Malo in 1771.  Marie gave Jean-Baptiste, fils five children in the St.-Malo area villages and suburbs:  Joseph-Firmin at St.-Suliac in December 1764; Pierre-Cyrille in November 1766 but died at La Ville de Haut-Chemin near La Gouesnière at age 3 in October 1769; Marie-Josèphe at St.-Méloir in December 1768; Marie-Anne-Julienne at La Gouesnière in October 1770; and Pierre-Cyrille at St.-Servan in May 1772.  Jean-Baptiste, père's son Marin followed his father and siblings to St.-Suliac and married Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Boudrot and Marie-Josèphe Doiron, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in November 1766.  Françoise gave Marin four sons there:  Joseph-Augustin in August 1767 but died at age 5 in October 1772; Jean-Baptiste le jeune in May 1769 but died at age 3 in October 1772; Olivier-Marc in April 1772 but died the following October; and Jean-Pierre-Marin in October 1773.  Another extended family in the St.-Malo suburbs consisted of Pierre, son of Claude Dugas, fils of Cobeguit and his recently-deceased older brother Charles's children.  Pierre, now a widower, took his five surviving children--Marguerite-Josèphe, Élisabeth or Isabelle, Agnès, Prosper, and Rémy--to St.-Suliac.  Daughter Marguerite-Josèphe married Charles, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Blanchard and Anne Dupuis, there in January 1762.  Pierre's daughter Élisabeth married Anselme, son of fellow Acadians Jean Pitre and Marguerite Hébert of Cobeguit, at St.-Suliac in February 1763.  Pierre's youngest son Rémy died at St.-Suliac, age 8, in March 1763.  Pierre, at age 53, remarried to Marie-Madeleine, 39-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Vincent and Marie Granger and widow of Alexandre Boudrot and Joseph Breau, at St.-Servan in January 1764.  They settled there.  She gave him no more children.  Pierre's daughter Agnès married Bénoni, another son of Joseph Blanchard and Anne Dupuis, in February 1764, but she died the following August, age 22, from complications of childbirth; her unnamed son had died two days earlier.  Pierre died in April 1771, age 60.  One wonders what became of his youngest surviving son Prosper, who would have been age 20 at the time of his father's death.  Pierre's older brother Charles's widow, Anne-Marie Benoit, and her eight surviving Dugas children--Anne, Marie-Madeleine, Jean-Baptiste, Marie-Josèphe, Pierre-Ignace, Pierre, Antoine, and Victoire--settled at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo and St.-Servan.  Daughter Anne married Olivier, son of fellow Acadians Denis Boudrot and Agnès Vincent and widower of Henriette Guérin, at St.-Énogat in May 1762.  In 1766, Charles's son Jean-Baptiste, who had become a fisherman, was reported absent at sea aboard the ship Aimable-Thérèse and that he had deserted his vessel at New Orleans in July 1765.  Interestingly, he would have been in the Louisiana city about the time some of his Dugas cousins would have arrived there from Halifax via Cap-Français, French St.-Domingue.  He did not remain in the Spanish colony.  He was back in France at Le Havre in October 1767 and at St.-Malo in November.  One wonders if he brought back letters from Louisiana to Acadian families in the mother country, which would have made him a part of the exiles' communication grapevine.  His sister Marie-Madeleine married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Jacques Quimine and Marie Chiasson and widower of Marie-Louise Grossin, at St.-Énogat in January 1770.  Mother Anne-Marie Benoit died at St.-Énogat in September 1772, age 70.  Jean-Baptiste, now age 31, recently returned from his two-year venture to Louisiana and back, married Marie, 29-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Grossin and Marie Caissie, at St.-Servan in February 1768.  They settled at St.-Énogat, where Marie gave Jean-Baptiste four children:  Marie-Jeanne in December 1768 but died at age 4 in March 1773; Victoire-Marie in July 1770 but died at age 2 in July 1772; Jean-Grégoire in March 1772; and Marie-Josèphe in January 1774.  Jean-Baptiste's younger brother Antoine married Véronique, daughter of locals Énogat Cholus and Anne Jagoux, at St.-Énogat in June 1775.  Youngest sister Victoire also married a French local, Thomas Aillet, place and date unrecorded.  One wonders what happened to their siblings Marie-Josèphe, Pierre-Ignace, and Pierre.  Another extended family of island Dugass consisted of brothers Pierre le jeune, Charles, and Amand of Cobeguit.  Pierre le jeune, wife Marguerite Daigre, and their two surviving daughters--Anne-Osite and Marguerite-Blanche--settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west bank of the river, where Pierre le jeune worked as a carpenter.  Marguerite gave him two more daughters there:  Anne-Marie in July 1761; and Marie-Victoire in August 1764.  Pierre le jeune's brother Amand remained with them until 1766, when he moved to St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  He was back at Plouër in 1771.  Meanwhile, their brother Charles, who had been deported from Île St.-Jean to Boulogne-sur-Mer in late 1758, arrived at St.-Malo aboard the brigantine Hazard in May 1766 and settled at St.-Servan.  With him was his wife Marguerite Granger, who he had married at Boulogne-sur-Mer, and two of their children, born in the northern fishing port.  Marguerite gave Charles four more children in the St.-Malo area:  Pierre-Olivier dit Pierrot at St.-Servan in November 1766, within months of their arrival; Joseph-Simon in January 1769; Félicité-Marguerite at Plouër in February 1771 but died at age 2 1/2 in August 1773; and Victoire-Ange in August 1772.  Marguerite died at la Ville de La Croix Giguel near Plouër in March 1773, age 35. 

In 1758-59, island Dugass landed in other French ports, including La Rochelle and Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, and especially at the fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie.  Charles Dugas of Cobeguit landed at the northern fishing center and married fellow Acadian Marguerite Granger there in c1761.  She gave him two children at Boulogne-sur-Mer:  Marie-Josèphe in February 1762; and Jean-Charles in July 1764.  In May 1766, they sailed on the brigantine Hazard to St.-Malo and settled near his brothers at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Marguerite gave him four more children in the St.-Malo area.  Claude Dugas le jeune, brother of Paul and Jean-Baptiste of St.-Malo, landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer with second wife Marguerite Cyr and children from his first wife.  Daughter Anne died there in January 1759, age 19, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Marguerite gave Claude le jeune more children in the northern port:  Charles in November 1759 but died the following February; Marie-Marguerite in July 1761; and Jean-Pierre in March 1764.  They moved down the coast to Île d'Aix near La Rochelle.  Son François was born there in July 1766 but died the following day.  Claude le jeune's second son Jean-Baptiste, by first wife Marie-Josèphe Aucoin, and Jean-Baptiste's wife Marguerite-Josèphe Doiron, also ended up at Boulogne-sur-Mer, where Jean-Baptiste worked as a sailor.  Their son Claude-Bernard was born there in August 1759; Marie-Margeruite-Pélagie in August 1761 but died at age 4 in August 1765; Jean-Marie-Alexis in June 1763; and Jean-Pierre le jeune in July 1764.  They followed his father and stepmother to Île d'Aix, where Marie-Josèphe gave Jean-Baptiste two more children:  Marie-Josèphe in August 1765 but died at age 9 months in April 1766; and Pierre in September 1766.  They moved on to the nearby naval port of Rochefort, where son Jean-Baptiste, fils was born in January 1770.  Jacques Dugas, ship's carpenter and sugar refiner, and wife Catherine Edoux, Hedoux, Heden, or Ledou, also lived at Boulogne-sur-Mer.  Their son Louis-Joseph was born there in March 1760 but died eight days after his birth; and Jean-Louis in September 1762 but died five days after his birth.  Jacques died in the northern fishing port, age 43, in May 1763.  Was Jacques an Acadian?   Jean Dugas, a day laborer, and his wife Jeanne Greleau ended up at Rochefort.  Their son François was baptized in Notre-Dame Parish there, age unrecorded, in December 1771.  Was Jean an Acadian? 

By the early 1770s, French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault in the interior of Poitou.  Dugass who went there in 1773 included those of Paul Dugas and his second wife Hélène Blanchard from St.-Coulomb; Paul's daughters Marie-Madeleine and her husband Jean-Baptiste Hébert from St.-Méloir-des-Ondes, Marie and her husband Prosper-Honoré Giroir from St.-Jouan-des-Guérets south of St.-Malo, and Élisabeth and her husband Ambroise Pitre from St.-Suliac; Paul's younger brother Jean-Baptiste the carpenter and his third wife Anne Bourg from St.-Méloir; Jean-Baptiste's son Marin and his wife Françoise Boudrot from St.-Servan-sur-Mer (but not son Jean-Baptiste, fils and his wife Marie Breau of Château Malo); Paul and Jean-Baptiste's nephew Pierre and his second wife Cécile Moyse from St.-Sulaic; Pierre's younger brother Joseph, fils and his second wife Anastasie Barrieau from St.-Suliac; the brothers' nephew Ambroise Dugas, fils and his wife Marie-Victoire Pitre from St.-Suliac; the brothers' niece Anne-Josèphe Dugas and her husband Jean-Baptiste Hébert from St.-Suliac; Paul and Jean-Baptiste's brother Claude le jeune and wife Marguerite Cyr from Île d'Aix; Pierre Dugas the carpenter and his wife Marguerite Daigre from Plouër-sur-Rance; Pierre's younger brother Charles from Plouër, who had just become a widower; Jean-Baptiste Dugas the sailor and his wife Marie Grossin from St.-Servan; and Marie-Madeleine Vincent, widow of Pierre Dugas from St.-Suliac.  More children arrived, more loved ones were buried, and new families were created in Poitou.  Marie Pitre gave husband Ambroise Dugas, fils a daughter, Anne-Marie, at Leigné-les-Bois southeast of Châtellerault in December 1774.  Charles of Plouër lost a daughter, Victoire-Ange, age 2, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in July 1774.  He remarried to Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Daigre and Marguerite Granger, in that parish in September 1775.  Anastasie Barrieau gave Joseph Dugas, fils another son, Jean-Pierre, at Leigné-les-Bois in January 1775.  Françoise Boudrot gave Marin Dugas a daughter, Marie-Rose, at Senillé near Châtellerault in May 1775.  Claude le jeune's wife Marguerite Cyr died during their time in Poitou. 

In late 1775 and early 1776, after over two years of effort, the Dugass, with most of the other Poitou Acadians, retreated in four convoys down the Vienne and the Loire from Châtellerault to the port of Nantes, where they lived once again on government hand outs and what work they could find.  Some of the families grew at Nantes.  Marie Grossin gave Jean-Baptiste Dugas another son, Étienne, in St.-Similien Parish there in December 1775, but he died at age 2 in March 1778.  Marie-Victoire Pitre gave Amboise Dugas, fils four more children at Nantes:  Marguerite-Josèphe in St.-Nicolas Parish in May 1776; Constant-Ambroise in St.-Léonard Parish in December 1777 but died in St.-Jacques Parish, age 21 months, in September 1779; Louis-Ambroise in St.-Jacques Parish in May 1780; and Céleste in May 1784.  Marguerite Daigre gave Charles Dugas of Plouër two more sons at Nantes:  Jean-Baptiste in St.-Similien Parish in July 1776 but died at age 2 there in October 1778; and Blaise in 1778, who also died young.  Françoise Boudrot gave Marin Dugas two more children at Nantes:  Marie-Louse in St.-Similien Parish in March 1777 but died at age 5 in March 1782; and Jean-Marie in St.-Nicolas Parish in June 1779 but died at nearby Chantenay, age 14 months, in August 1780.  Anastasie Barrieau gave Joseph Dugas, fils three more children in St.-Similien Parish:  Anne-Marguerite in January 1778; Olivier-Marie in February 1781 but died at age 1 1/2 in November 1782; and Margeruite-Euphrosine in August 1783.  Families also lost more loved ones.  Marin Dugas lost his only daughter Marie-Rose, also called Marie-Françoise, in St.-Nicolas Parish, age 15 months, in July 1776.  Pierre Dugas's second wife Cécile Moyse, age 52, died in St.-Similien Parish in December 1776.  Ambroise Dugas, fils lost his oldest daughter Anne-Marie, age 4 1/2,  in St.-Pierre-de-Rezé Parish on the south bank of the Loire in August 1779.  Jean-Baptiste Dugas the carpenter lost son Mathurin, age 17, at Chantenay in August 1780.  Jean-Baptiste Dugas the sailor lost son Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 9, at Chantenay in April 1781.  And new families were created.  Carpenter Pierre Dugas's daughter Anne-Ostie married Charles, fils, son of fellow Acadians Charles Hébert and Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg, in St.-Similien Parish in October 1778.  The carpenter's daughter Marguerite-Blanche married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Bourg and Marie-Madeleine Granger, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1784.  Another Pierre Dugas remarried--his third marriage--to Rose, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques LeBlanc and Marguerite Labauve, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in August 1779.  Rose gave him two more children at Chantenay:  Rose in February 1782; and Anne-Perrine in January 1785.  Paul Dugas's daughter Marie-Osite married Étienne, son of fellow Acadians Charles Dupuis and Marie Trahan, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1784.  Claude Dugas le jeune's daughter Marguerite married François-Xavier, son of fellow Acadians Antoine Boudrot and Brigitte Part, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in May 1785.  Other Dugass at Nantes had gone there before 1775.  Jean, fils, son of Jean Dugas and Anne dite Jeanne, daughter of François Bonfils and Marie Sevin of St.-Martin Parish, Cheix-en-Retz, on the south side of the lower Loire between Nantes and Paimboeuf, was born in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in c1772.  His father, who must have been one of the earliest Acadian exiles to settle at Nantes, died there by October 1784, when wife Jeanne remarried to an Acadian Labauve at Chantenay.  In May 1785, Marie, 18-year-old daughter of Michel Dugast and Françoise Durand, married Jean, 43-year-old son of Pierre Thibodeau and Hélène Gautreau of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, and widow of Frenchwoman Françoise Huere, at St.-Martin de Chantenay.  Marie, according to her marriage record, was born at Trellières north of Nantes, which would give her a birth year of c1767--nearly a decade before the other Dugass retreated to Nantes from Poitou.  One wonders, then, if she was a local girl and not an Acadian Dugas.  Frenchwoman or not, only a few weeks after her marriage she accompanied her middle-aged Acadian husband and two of his teenaged children to Spanish Louisiana.  Her stepson Jacques-Joseph-Nicolas Thibodeau, in fact, was a few months older than she was! 

A Dugas family from Port-Toulouse, Île Royale, came to France by a different route.  After the war with Britain ended in 1763, hundreds of Acadians from the prison compounds in Nova Scotia, including Joseph Dugas, fils, the privateer and militia major, and his younger brother Abraham Dugas, the militia captain, were determined to escape British rule, but they did not follow fellow exiles to Louisiana.  They migrated, instead, with other exiles to Miquelon, one of two French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Within a few years, French authorities despaired that the islands' dwindling resources would be unable to support such a large population.  In 1767, obeying a royal decree, French authorities compelled most of the fisher/habitants living on the islands to emigrate to France.  Joseph Dugas, fils, who had escaped the British deportation to France in late 1758, along with his second wife Louise Arseneau and two of his children, Joseph III and Marie, from his first marriage, were among the island Acadians who went to France.  In November 1767, with dozens of other islanders aboard Joseph, fils's schooner La Creole, including brother Abraham and his family, they landed at St.-Malo, where they no doubt were welcome by their many cousins in the area.  It did not take them long to see that conditions in the French port and its suburbs and villages were no better that what they had endured on the crowded fishing islands.  They returned to Miquelon the following March.  But another war forced them from their island homes again.  In 1778, France joined the United States in its fight for independence against Britain.  The islands by now, were a chief source of salted cod for the European market, which made them a tempting target.  British forces from Newfoundland seized Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre later in the year.  "In scenes reminiscent of the deportations of 1755," wrote one historian, "the inhabitants of St. Pierre and Miquelon were forced aboard vessels, without being given time 'to even save their clothes,' while soldiers went from house to house, burning the structures and their contents.  Once again, the Miquelonnais were forced to sail to France."  Most of the islanders landed at La Rochelle on the Bay of Biscay.  Joseph Dugas, fils, wife Louise Arseneau, his son Joseph III's widow Anastasie Bourg, and three of her Dugas children, along with brother Abraham and his family, made the crossing back to France aboard the brigantine Jeannette, which reached St.-Malo in early November 1778.  Joseph, fils died at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo, France, in January 1779, age 63, perhaps from the rigors of the crossing.  Louise died at St.-Servan the following June, age 63.  Joseph III's widow Anastasie died at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in June 1779, age 27.  Joseph, fils's daughter Adélaïde Dugas died at St.-Servan the following September, age 1 1/2.   Evidently brother Abraham and his family returned to Miquelon in 1784, after the British were forced to return the islands to France. 

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 55 of the Dugass still in the mother country--including brothers Charles, Alexis, Pierre, and Joseph; their uncles Paul and Jean-Baptiste; the Jean-Baptiste who had jumped ship in New Orleans two decades earlier; and Claude-Bernard of Boulogne-sur-Mer--agreed to take it.  Others--including Jean-Baptiste's sons Jean-Baptiste, fils and Olivier; the other Jean-Baptiste's brother Antoine, who had married a French girl; and Claude-Bernard's younger brothers--chose to remain in France.  In 1793, during the French Revolution, French officials counted Marie-Josèphe Dugast, "a girl" and "a spinner," born "in Acadie in 1744" and "entered France in 1758," at Pleurtuit southwest of St.-Malo.  One wonders if she was a daughter of island Acadians Charles Dugas and Anne-Marie Benoit whose widowed mother settled at St.-Énogat north of Pleurtuit in 1759.  That same year, French officials at St.-Malo counted Pierre Dugas, "an Acadian" and "a sailor" who had been born at Cobeguit, no age given. 

In North America, Dugass from Annapolis Royal, Minas, and Rivière St.-Jean who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore suffered more reverses in the final years of the war against Britain.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late 1760, a naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Among them were Joseph Dugas, fils of Port-Toulouse, the notorious privateer, now major of the Acadian militia, and his extended family of 20; Abraham Dugas, one of the seven militia captains, and his familly of 10; and Jean Dugas "fils de Pre." of Ékoupag with eight people in his household.  The British held them, and other exiles captured in the area, in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In 1761-62, British officials at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, counted Dugass being held there, including Jean Dugas, who was listed alone; and Paul Dugas and a family of five.  In July 1762, Paul Dugas with a family of four was still being held at Fort Edward.  Paul and his family were still there in August, along with Chals. Dugas and his family of four.  The following October, there more Dugas families were being held at the fort:  Cha Dugas with a family of two, Paul Dugas with a family of five, and Ch. Dugas with a family of three.  In the prison barracks at Halifax, in August 1763, Jean Dugas, his wife, and eight children; Joseph Dugas, his wife, and five children; Abraham Dugas, his wife, and seven children; and another Joseph Dugas, his wife, and three children, appeared on a list of Acadian exiles there who desired to go to France.  That same month, British officials counted a family of Dugass--Charles, Pierre, Mazarin, Ozitte, and Jean--in the prison compound at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, near their old homesteads at Chignecto. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In August 1763 in Massachusetts, members of the family still in that colony included Claude Dugas, wife Margueritte, and five children, three boys and two girls.  In June 1766, Jean-Baptiste Dugas and his family of five, Claude Dugas and his family of nine, and Glaude Dugas and his family of seven, were listed among "the French" still in Massachusetts "Who Wish to go to Canada."  In August 1763 in South Carolina, Dugass still in that colony "who desire to withdraw under the standard of their king his very Christian Majesty [Louis XV]" included  Élisabeth Dugas, her husband Aimable Landry, and no children; Angélique Dugas with husband Joseph Moreau, actually Marant, and two Ovilion, actually Orillon, orphans; and Rose Dugua with husband Jean Gautier, a Gautier son, and two Dugua orphans, Joseph, age 15, and Jean, age 12.  In 1764, Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Louis Dugas of Annapolis Royal, married into the Lanoue family in Connecticut, so her family was still in the colony.  This included her brother Joseph and his family. 

Most of the Dugass being held in the northern seaboard colonies chose to join their kinsmen in Canada, where their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Abraham Dugas began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, they could be found in present-day Canada on the upper St. Lawrence at Ste.-Foy, Bécancour, Batiscan, Louiseville, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, and St.-Paul-de-Lavaltire; at Québec City; on the lower St. Lawrence at Rimouski, St.-Charles de Bellechasse, Rivière-du-Loup, and Cap-Chat; at Carleton and Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs; and at Caraquet in present-day northeastern New Brunswick.  In Nova Scotia, they resettled at Chédabouctou on the Atlantic side of the peninsula; at Pointe-de-l'Église now Church Point, Grosses-Coques, L'Anse-aux-Belliveau, and Meteghan on Baie Ste.-Marie, today's St. Mary's Bay, on the western end of the peninsula; at D'Escousse and Nureichak on Île Madame; and at Chéticamp on the western shore of Cape Breton Island, formerly Île Royale.  Dugass also settled in Newfoundland.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  

During the final months of the war, French officials encouraged Acadians in the seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle-St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean basin and help in the war of vengeance to come.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who wished to supplement the labor of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  And so, in 1763 and 1764, Acadians, including Dugass from New England and South Carolina, chose to go to St.-Domingue.  The colony's governor sent Dugass not only to Môle-St.-Nicolas, but also to the interior community of Mirebalais near Port-au-Prince to work on indigo and coffee plantations.  Anne Dugas, widow of Étienne Hébert, died at Mirebalais in December 1764, in her late 70s.  Marguerite Dugas, wife of Joseph Babineau dit Des Lauriers, died there in April 1765, in her early 60s.  One of the Dugass in St.-Domingue refused to remain in the tropical colony.  Angélique, daughter of François Dugas and Claire Bourg of Annapolis Royal, had married Joseph Marant there on the eve of deportation, and the British had deported them to South Carolina aboard the transport Hodson in late 1755.  After being counted there in August 1763, they moved on to Môle St.-Nicolas, but life there was not to their liking.  In early 1765, when fellow Acadians, including Dugass, from Halifax changed ships at Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans, Angélique and Joseph joined them.  With them went two Orillion orphans whose mother was Angélique's sister Marguerite.  But many Dugass remained in the sugar colony. 

Dugass being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the hated oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all that they had suffered on the question of the oath, no self-respecting Acadian would consent to take it if it could be avoided.   Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Dugass, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies, including Dugass, were going, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to lower Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least two dozen were Dugass.301

Dumont

When the British deported the Acadians of Nova Scotia in the autumn of 1755, Joseph dit Dumont, widower of Marie-Madeleine Vécot, and their daughters, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on Île St.-Jean, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France.  Joseph and three of his daughters--Anne, age 20; Marie, age 17; and Hélène, age 12--made the crossing aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England,  reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Joseph, age 46, died at sea, but his daughters survived the crossing.  

In France, Hélène Dumont grew up an orphan.  At age 20, she married Grégoire, son of fellow Acadians Jean Lejeune and Françoise Guédry of Minas and widower of Frenchwoman Charlotte Des Croutes, in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in June 1767 and moved on to Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of the Breton port.  Between 1768 and 1772, Hélène gave Grégoire a son and two daughters there.  The son died in March 1769 three months after his birth.  In 1773, Hélène, Grégoire, and their daughters followed other Acadians languishing in the port cities to the interior province of Poitou, where they were part of a major settlement venture centered around the town of Châtellerault.  Another daughter was born there in May 1774, but she died the following August.  Their second daughter died later that month, age 2.  By December 1775, after two years of effort, Grégoire, Hélène, and their remaining daughter retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where Grégoire, a sailor, found work when he could.  Between 1778 and 1784, Hélène gave Grégoire three more sons and another daughter at nearby Chantenay.  The oldest of the three sons died at age 6 in March 1784 and the daughter in October 1784 a month after her birth, leaving the couple only two sons and a daughter.  At about that time, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Hélène Dumont and her husband Grégoire Lejeune agreed to take it.237

Duon

In 1755, descendants of Jean-Baptiste dit Lyonnais Duon and Agnès Hébert could be found at Annapolis Royal, Minas, and Cap-Sable.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family to the winds. 

In the fall of 1755, The British transported the Acadians at Minas to Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and New England.  Jean-Baptiste Duon, fils's widow and children, and brothers Pierre and Cyprien and their families ended up on ships bound for Virginia.  Later that fall, the British transported the Acadians at Annapolis Royal to New England, New York, and North Carolina.  The ship to North Carolina, the Pembroke, was seized by the Acadians soon after it left the Bay of Fundy.  No Duons were on this vessel.  Abel dit Tibel Duon of Annapolis Royal, still unmarried, ended up in Massachusetts, where he married Anne, daugther of fellow Acadians Jacques Mius d'Entremont and Marguerite Amireau of Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable, at Boston in c1756.  He and his family were being held at Medfield in 1760-61.  Brother Louis-Basile of Annapolis Royal and his family, along with his widowed mother Agnès Hébert and youngest sister Rosalie, were deported to New York, where Agnès probably died.  Meanwhile, Abel dit Tibel and Louis-Basile's brothers Honoré, Charles, and Claude-Amable escaped the roundup at Annapolis, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac or lower Rivière St.-Jean before moving on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore. 

The Duons shipped to Virginia endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas.  In mid-November 1755, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered Acadians from one vessel moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  In the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and Virginia's House of Burgesses made their decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  Duons ended up in warehouses at Liverpool, Bristol, and Southampton.  By 1763, half of the exiles in England were dead.  Although their seven years in England were filled with misery, the family did find occasion to celebrate, including at least five marriages to fellow Acadians.  Pierre Duon remarried to another Aucoin, Marguerite, daughter of Joseph Aucoin and Anne Trahan, at Bristol in c1757.  Brother Cyprien married Marguerite, daughter of René Landry and Marie-Rose Rivet, at Liverpool in January 1758.  Niece Marguerite, Jean-Baptiste Duhon, fils's daughter, married Pierre, son of Pierre Trahan and Jeanne Daigre of Pigiguit, at Liverpool in May 1758.  Her brother Honoré le jeune married Anne-Geneviève, 17-year-old daughter of François Trahan and Angélique Melanson of Pigiguit, at Liverpool in October 1758.  Their sister Marie married Joachim Trahan, widower of Marguerite Landry, at Liverpool in October 1759.  Sister Élisabeth, or Isabelle, married Alexandre, son of Alexis Aucoin and Anne-Marie Bourg and widower of Marie Trahan, at Liverpool also in October 1759.  The Duon family also celebrated births in England, at least three of them at Liverpool.  Pierre Duon's daughter Françoise was born in c1758; and son Jean-Charles in c1762.  Cyprien's son Jean-Baptiste was born in October 1759.  Honoré le jeune's daughters Marie and Anne were born in England in c1760 and c1761. 

In May 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  Pierre Duon and his family, traveling from Southampton, disembarked from the transport Dorothée at St.-Malo on May 23 and settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of the Breton port.  Pierre Duon and second wife Marguerite had more children at Plouër:  Cyprien-Pierre in September 1765; and Pierre-Jean in January 1770 but died the following November.  They also buried another child there:  oldest son Jean-Charles, born in England, died at age 3 in October 1765.  Meanwhile, Pierre's daughter Marguerite by first wife Angélique Aucoin married Josaphat, son of fellow Acadians Alexis Doiron and Marguerite Thibodeau, at Plouër in August 1766.  Pierre and his family did not join their kinsmen and other exiles from England on Belle-Île-en-Mer in late 1765.  Perhaps as a reaction to the ill-treatment of Acadians in the mother country, Pierre, wife Marguerite, daughter Françoise, son Cyprien-Pierre, and daughter Marguerite and her family, returned to North America via the Channel Island of Jersey in 1773 to work in a British-controlled fishery there.  Meanwhile, brother Cyprien, nephew Honoré le jeune, and the other Duons from Liverpool landed at Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  Honoré le jeune's son François-Marie was born at Morlaix in March 1764 but died there at age 1 1/2 in October 1765.  

Cyprien, nephew Honoré le jeune, and the other Duons remained in the mother country, but they did not remain at Morlaix.  In late 1765, they followed other Acadians repatriated from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, where they helped create an agricultural settlement on the recently-liberated island.  Cyprien and wife Marguerite Landry had at least three more children at Bangor in the southern interior of the island:  Joseph, later called Joseph dit Grois, in April 1766; Jean-Pierre in March 1769; and Marie-Élisabeth in June 1771.  Honoré le jeune and his wife also had more children at Bangor:  Augustin-Marie in June 1766; Honoré-Jacques-Marie-Louis, called Jacques, in August 1768; Jean-Charles in June 1772; Philippe-Marie in June 1774; and Marie-Françoise in March 1777.  The Duons also buried children on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Honoré le jeune's son François-Marie died at Le Palais on the eastern end of the island, age 20 months, in October 1765.  Cyprien's daughter Marie died at Bangor, age 20 years, in October 1781.  And the Duons celebrated at least one marriage there.  Honoré le jeune's teenaged daughter Marie married Antoine, 26-year-old son of locals Jacques Maitrejean and Christine La Roche, at Bangor in June 1777.  By 1782, Honoré le jeune and his family had abandoned the settlement on Belle-Île-en-Mer and joined hundreds of fellow exiles from Poitou in the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Son Robert-François was born at nearby Chantenay in February 1782 but died the following November.  Another son, Louis-Désiré, died at Chantenay, age three weeks, in May 1784.  

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Honoré le jeune and his wife, sisters Élisabeth and Marguerite and their husbands, and Cyprien's sons Jean-Baptiste and Joseph dit Gros, now grown, agreed to take it.  Honoré le jeune's daughter Marie, the one who had married a local islander, and brother Cyprien and the rest of his family, chose to remain on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Cyprien died at Calestrene near Bangor in c1798, in his late 60s.  

Meanwhile, in North America, the Duons who had escaped the British at Annapolis Royal in 1755 found refuge at Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence, where they celebrated a marriage.  Claude-Amable married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Vincent and Anne-Marie Doiron of Pigiguit, in c1757; Marie-Josèphe was a sister of brother Honoré's wife Anne-Marie.  Their stay at Miramichi proved to be short-lived.  The camp there, called Espérance--Camp Hope--soon became so crowded with refugees its limited resources could not support them all.  In the late 1750s, many of the exiles at Miramichi, including Honoré, Charles and Claude-Amable Duon, surrendered to the British to avoid starvation.  The British held them in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British officials counted the Duons at Fort Edward, formerly Pigiguit, in 1761 and 1762.  

At war's end, colonial officials in New England and New York allowed the Acadians still in their colonies to petition French authorities for resettlement in French territory, but the British were reluctant to let them go there.  In August 1763, Abel Duont, wife Anne, and three children, a son and two daughters, were still in Massachusetts.  When the exiles in the northern seaboard colonies finally were allowed to go, most chose to resettle in British Canada, but not the Duons.  Abel dit Tibel and his family chose, instead, to resettle at Cap-Sable, where his wife, a Mius d'Entremont, had been born and where his sister Jeanne had once lived.  In 1763, brother Louis-Basile, his wife, and four children were still in New York.  They, along with his sister Rosalie, chose to resettle not in Canada or even greater Acadia but on the French island of Martinique.  Louis-Basile, now a widower, remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Savoie and Françoise Martin, at Champflore on the island in c1766.  Rosalie married twice, to Frenchmen Jean Landieu and Pierre Loustaneau.  And there they remained.  

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their fellow Acadians in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue or other islands in the French Antilles, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies, including Duons, already had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, eight were Duons from Annapolis Royal.236

Duplessis

Living on an island controlled by France, Claude-Antoine Duplessis, wife Catherine Lejeune, and their family escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the autumn of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  Claude-Antoine, now age 49, wife Catherine, age 60, François-Marin, age 9, and a 16-year-old surgeon's apprentice made the crossing on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  For some reason, oldest daughter Anastasie-Adélaïde, age 21, was not with them, but she did end up in France.  Claude-Antoine and Catherine survived the crossing, but their son died at sea.  The apprentice--Louis Labauve, age 16, called Louis La Bore on the passenger list--died in a hospital probably at St.-Malo several months after they reached the Breton port.  Claude-Antoine and Catherine settled first at Châteauneuf on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo before moving to nearby St.-Suliac in 1762.  A year later, they moved to the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Claude-Antoine died in September 1772, age 62.  

Older daughter Anastasie-Adélaïde, who would have been age 35 at the time of her father's death, made her way to the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America probably from France in the early 1760s.  In December 1790, when she was age 53, Anastasie-Adélaïde married Louis-Auguste, son of Bonaventure Dardet and Antoinette Blin of St.-Jacques la Boucherie, Paris, in St.-Sauveur Parish, Cayenne, in the South American colony.  One wonders if this was her first marriage. 

Claude-Antoine and Catherine's younger daughter Marie-Louise had married Pierre, fils, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Gautrot and Marie Bugeaud of Grand-Pre, on Île St.-Jean in c1758, on the eve of the island's dérangement.  They, too, fell into the hands of the British later that year and were deported to France aboard one of the five British transports in an 11-ship convoy that reached St.-Malo together in January 1759, perhaps the one on which her family crossed.  Pierre and Marie-Louise survived the crossing, she despite her pregnancy.  A son was born probably at St.-Malo in March 1759, two months after they reached the Breton port, but he died a few months later.  Pierre worked as a farm hand and a carpenter near her famiy at Châteauneuf.  Between 1761 and 1772, Marie-Louise gave Pierre, fils eight more children, four daughters and four more sons.  Most of them died young, five of them at Châteauneuf and St.-Servan-sur-Mer, and two of them when the family was part of the settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou, where their tenth child, a daughter, was born at Châtellerault in July 1774.  In December 1775, after two years of effort, Pierre, Marie-Louise, four of their children, two sons and two daughters, and Marie-Louise's widowed mother, retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Their eleventh and final child, another daughter, was born in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in c1778 but died at age 22 months in November 1780.  In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Marie-Louise Duplessis and husband Pierre Gautrot agreed to take it, but only one of their 11 children went with them to the Spanish colony.  Three of their older children, ages 20, 18, and 13 in 1785, if they were still alive, did not accompany their family to Louisiana.238

Dupuis

By 1755, descendants of Michel Dupuis and Marie Gautrot could be found at Annapolis Royal, Minas, Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre and his Mi'kmaq warriors, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  The Dupuiss may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, hundreds of local Acadians served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Jean-Charles Dupuis was not among them.  He and his wife escaped the roundup there later that summer and sought refuge in Canada.

The Dupuiss were hit especially hard when New-English forces rounded up hundreds of Acadians at Minas and Annapolis Royal that fall.  Dupuiss at Minas were deported to Massachusetts, Maryland, and Virginia.  Dupuiss at Annapolis ended up on transports bound for Massachusetts, Connecticut, and South Carolina.  The Dupuiss shipped to Virginia endured a fate worse than most of the Acadians deported from Minas.  In mid-November, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered Acadians from one vessel moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Dinwiddie, his council, and Virginia's House of Burgesses made their decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 total exiles.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Dupuiss were held at Penryn near Falmouth and at Southampton.  Madeleine Dupuis married into the Daigre family at Southhampton.  Her parents, Charles Dupuis and Marie-Madeleine Trahan of Rivière-aux-Canards, did not survive their time there. 

Some of the Dupuiss at Annapolis Royal, like their cousin at Chignecto, escaped the British in 1755 and sought refuge in Canada.  Jean-Pierre Dupuis and members of his family, after spending a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, made their way to the Acadians settlements on the upper Petitcoudiac or lower Rivière St.-Jean, and, either via the St.-Jean portage or the Gulf of St. Lawrence, continued on to Canada.  Jean-Pierre died at Québec in October 1757, age 60, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck the refugees in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  His sons Michel, Justinien, and Cyprien and their families evidently had not followed their parents to Canada but took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they endured starvation, brutal winters, and British raiding parties.  By 1760, they had made their way to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Dupuiss on Île St.-Jean escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean and rounded up most of the habitants there, Dupuiss among them.  Ambroise Dupuis, wife Anne Aucoin, and their seven children--Ambroise, fils, age 16; Anne, age 15; Augustin, age 14; Marie, age 12; Marguerite, age 10; Jean-Baptiste, age 3; and Isabelle, age 2--were placed aboard the hired transport Tamerlane, which, along with 14 other transports, escorted by a Royal Navy frigate, left Port-La-Joye, Île St.-Jean, on November 4.  (One wonders why son François, who would have been age 11, was not on the Tamerlane's passenger list.)  The flotilla then headed into the Gut of Canso.  No sooner had the flotilla entered the treacherous passage than a storm drove two of the tranports aground.  The Tamerlane was one of them.  The ship was salvaged and repaired and joined its sister vessels in the shelter of Chédabouctou Bay later in the month.  On November 25, 11 of the transports, including the refitted Tamerlane, set sail from Chédabouctou for ports in the south of England, where they would replenish their food and water before continuing on to their common destination, the Breton port of St.-Malo.  During the second week of December, the ships became separated by a North Atlantic storm.  Two of them founderd off the southwest coast of England, and a third crashed into the rocks off an island in the Portuguese Azores.  Luckily for the Dupuiss, the Tamerlane survived the storm intact and was the first among the dozen transports to reach St.-Malo, on January 16.  Only six of the vessel's 56 passengers died at sea.  The Dupuiss were among the lucky ones--every member of the famliy survived the crossing that took the lives of hundreds of their fellow Acadians. 

 Ambroise Dupuis took his family to Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo, where Anne gave him another daughter, Françoise-Geneviève, in December 1761--nine children, four sons and five daughters, between 1743 and 1761, in greater Acadia and France.  Ambroise, père died at nearby La Ville de la Moynnerie in March 1763, in his mid-40s.  Second daughter Marie married into the Bourg family at Plouër in February 1768.  Oldest son Ambroise, fils also married at Plouër, in July 1764, and settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer on the east side of the river before returning to Plouër.  Between 1765 and 1780, Ambroise, fils's wife Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Thériot and Françoise Landry, gave him nine children in the two communities:  Jean-Baptiste at St.-Servan in July 1765 but died there at age 18 months in October 1766; Jean-Charles in June 1767; an unnamed son died the day after his birth in January 1769; Jean-Simon-Raphaël at Plouër in October 1770 but died at nearby La Boisanne at age 3 in May 1773; Pierre-Ambroise in October 1772 but died at La Boisanne the following December; Marie-Anne-Claire "at night" in August 1774 but died at St.-Servan the following March; Marguerite-Marie in May 1777; Laurent-Charles in August 1778; and Amand-Pierre in March 1780.  As the birth dates of his children reveal, Ambroise, fils did not take his family to Poitou with most of Acadians from the St.-Malo area in 1773, nor did they join hundreds of their fellow exiles, including Dupuiss, in the lower Loire port of Nantes later in the decade.  They remained, instead, in the St.-Malo area, where Ambroise, fils worked at whatever skills he possessed.  Two of his younger brothers, however, did not remain at St.-Malo or even in France.  In February 1769, Augustin, in his mid-20s, and François, in his early 20s, journeyed aboard Le Créole to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Augustin died at nearby Île St.-Pierre that November, but François survived the ordeal.  The war long over, and perhaps no longer interested in working in a French fishery, he made his way to New England.  He married Monique, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Richard and Marguerite Robichaud, at Boston, Massachusetts, in October, years after most of the Acadians in that province had moved on to Canada. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including Dupuiss, were repatriated to France.  Jean-Baptiste, son of Antoine of Minas, who had been held at Penryn, was a bachelor in his late 20s when he crossed to St.-Malo with a widowered brother-in-law.  Jean-Baptiste died at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in March 1783, in his late 40s.  He never married.  Joseph Dupuis, a 20-year-old bachelor, crossed from England aboard La Dorothée, which reached St.-Malo in late May 1763.  He also went to St.-Servan, but he did not remain.  In February 1769, he embarked on L'Antoine-Joseph, perhaps in convoy with Le Créole, for Île Miquelon and disappears from the historical record.  Madeleine Dupuis, husband Eustache Daigre, and her younger siblings Joseph, Étienne, and Marguerite, who had been held at Southampton, crossed to France aboard L'Ambition, which landed at St.-Malo in late May.  They settled at Plouër-sur-Rance.  A Dupuis widow also was repatriated to St.-Malo.  Marie, also called Marguerite, Dupuis, widow of Charles Babin, held at Southamtpon, crossed to St.-Malo with two grown Babin sons.  Other Dupuiss were sent to Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  Marie-Josèphe Dupuis, widow of Pierre Thériot of Rivière-aux-Canards, crossed with five children, three daughters and two sons.  Germain Dupuis le jeune of Minas, wife Marguerite Granger, and their infant son Jacques-Guillaume, held at Penryn, also landed at Morlaix.  Between 1764 and 1778, Marie-Marguerite gave Germain le jeune six more children in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix:  Marie-Josèphe in February 1764; Marie-Marguerite in July 1766; Théotiste-Marie or Marie-Théotiste in September 1768; Jean-Marie-Germain in August 1773; Amand-Charles in 1775; and Marie-Josèphe-Esther in March 1778.  In late 1765, the two widows who had gone to St.-Malo and Morlaix, but not their Dupuis kin in those ports, followed dozens of fellow exiles to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany. 

Two young Dupuis brothers at St.-Malo created their own families there, but they also did not remain.  Joseph Dupuis married twice at Plouër-sur-Rance, first to Marie-Rose, daughter of fellow Acadians Olivier Daigre and Angélique Doiron, in February 1768.  She died at nearby Lizenais the following December, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth.  Joseph remarried to Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Landry and Élisabeth Aucoin, in November 1771.  Their son Pierre-Joseph was born at Plouër in October 1772 but died at age 10 months in August 1773.  Later that year, Joseph, Marie, and his younger brother Étienne were the only Dupuiss who became part of the grand settlement venture in Poitou.  Marie gave Joseph a daughter, Élisabeth, in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in May 1774.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, Joseph, Marie, Élisabeth, and Étienne retreated with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes.  Marie gave Joseph two more daughters in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes:  Marie-Madeleine in October 1776 but died at age 1 in October 1777; and Marie in May 1779 but died at age 2 in June 1781--four children, a son and three daughters, between 1772 and 1779, only one of whom survived childhood.  Wife Marie died in St.-Similien Parish in January 1781, age 30.  Joseph did not remarry.  Brother Étienne settled at nearby Chantenay and worked as a seaman in the Breton port.  At age 35, he married Marie-Osite, 24-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Dugas and his second wife Hélène Blanchard, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1784.  Marie-Osite, whose family had come to France from the Maritime islands in 1759, was a native of St.-Coulomb on the coast northeast of St.-Malo. 

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, nine of the Dupuiss agreed to take it.  They included siblings Joseph, Étienne, Marguerite, and Madeleine and their families at Nantes and Chantenay; and Ambroise, fils and his family at St.-Malo.  Germain le jeune and his family at Morlaix chose to remain in France.  In June 1791, early in the French Revolution, French authorities counted him, wife Marie-Marguerite, their 18-year-old son Jean-Marie-Germain, and four of their daughters--Marie-Josèphe, age 26; Marie-Théotiste, age 22; Marie-Marguerite, age 20; and Marie-Josèphe-Esther, age 13--still at Morlaix.  One wonders what happened to their sons Amand-Charles and Jacques-Guillaume and their daughter Élisabeth-Marie-Thérèse. 

In North America, Dupuiss from Annapolis Royal and Minas who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and found refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and at Restigouche on the Baie des Chaleurs suffered more hardships during the final years of the war against Britain.  Cyprien Dupuis married a Préjean from Annapolis Royal at Restigouche in June 1760.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Mi'kmaq warriors and Acadian militia helped defend the remote outpost and prevent its capture, the blue jackets returned to their base at Louisbourg.  Restigouche, however, was now cut off from the rest of New France.  The following October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  No Dupuiss, not even the recently-married Cyprien, were on it.  Nevertheless, during the following months, members of the family either surrrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and, like their fellow exiles who had surrendered at Restigouche, were held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British officials counted Cyprien's older brother Michel, wife Anne Gaudet, and their family at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in 1762.  British officials counted Cyprien, wife Françoise-Rosalie, and their family at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto, in August 1763.  Brother Justinien and his wife Anne Girouard may have died in exile by then, so their young son Joseph lived with either Michel or Cyprien. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  In Massachusetts, colonial officials in July 1760 had counted Amand Dupuis, wife Blanche Landry, and three children--Mary, Margaret, and Ferman--of Minas at Andover; and Peter Dupee, perhaps Dupuis, and his wife at "Rowrey."  In August 1761, Massachusetts officials found Sylvain Dupuis, wife Françoise LeBlanc, and seven children--Paul, Frances, Jason, John, Margaret, Joseph, and Elilza--in Worcester County on the eve of their relocation to Hampshire County.  Two years later, in August 1763, at least seven Dupuis families were still in the Bay Colony:  Lichaine, actually Sylvain, wife Françoise, six sons and three daughters; Amand, wife Blanche, a son and four daughters; Germain, père, a widower, a son and two daughters; son Germain, fils, his unnamed wife, four sons and four daughters; brother Olivier, wife Anne Boudrot, three sons and two daughters; brother François, wife Françoise, actually Marguerite, Préjean, two sons and three daughters; and Jean, wife Josette, and a son.  That same year, in Connecticut, at least 10 Dupuis families in that colony expressed a desire to go to France or French territory:  Charles with eight persons in his family; Jean-Baptiste with four persons; another Charles and his wife; another Jean-Baptiste and his wife; his brother Alexandre and two children; Simon-Pierre, his wife, brother Charles, a sister, and six children; yet another Charles with his wife and child; Fabien, a widower, with seven children; Antoine, fils, his wife, and nine children; and Pierre, his wife, and four children--perhaps the largest concentration of Dupuiss in the Acadian diaspora.  In July 1763, Dupuiss in Maryland were concentrated at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac.  They included Anne Breau, widow of Jean-Baptiste Dupuis, her daughters Marie, Marguerite, and Monique, and son Pierre; and Jean-Baptiste Dupuis, wife Anne Richard, son Firmin and daughter Marie.  Also counted in the Chesapeake colony were Anne-Madeleine Dupuis, wife of Jean Guidry, with four of their children, at Port Tobacco; and Marguerite Dupuis at Port Tobacco.  Down in South Carolina in August 1763, Anne Brun, widow of Joseph Dupuis of Annapolis Royal, and her 20-year-old son Joseph, fils, were still in that colony. 

Most of the Dupuiss held in the northern colonies chose to repartriate in Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Michel Dupuis of La Chaussée and Port-Royal began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, they could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, Nicolet, St.-Grégoire, Trois-Rivières, Repentigny, Contrecoeur, L'Assomption, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, Rivière-du-Loup now Louiseville, St.-Philippe-de-La-Prairie, St.-Anicet, Châteauguay, Le Cèdres, and Montréal.  They also settled at Laprairie and L'Acadie on the lower Richelieu; at Kamouraska and L'Islet on the lower St. Lawrence.  In greater Acadia, they settled on Rivière St.-Jean and at Memramcook in present-day western and eastern New Brunswick; and at Windsor, formerly Pigiguit, in Nova Scotia.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  

During the final months of the war, French officials urged exiles in the seaboard colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean basin, as well as help in the "war of vengeance" to come.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own if they came to the sugar colony.  And so by 1764 Dupuiss from Connecticut and South Carolina followed hundreds of their fellow exiles to St.-Domingue.  French officials sent most of the Dupuiss not to the naval base but to the interior community of Mirebalais near Port-au-Prince to work on indigo and coffee plantations.  The experience for many of them there was short and tragic.  Pierre, son of Antoine, fils of Connecticut, age 7, died at Mirebalais in September 1764.  Two more of Antoine, fils's sons--Antoine III, age 4; and Félix, age 10--died there the following month.  Antoine, fils himself died at Mirebalais in August 1765, age 46.  His wife Anne Boudrot likely had died by then.  Other Dupuiss in St.-Domingue also paid a heavy price for going there.  Simon-Pierre from Connecticut, younger brother of Antoine Dupuis, fils, lost two sons--François, age 6; and Firmes, age 3--at Mirebalais in September 1764.  His son Pierre was baptized there, age 2 1/2, in August or September.  Simon himself died at Mirebalais in November 1764, age 35.  Joseph, the 2-1/2-year-old son of Michel Dupuis and Marie LeBlanc, died at Mirebalais in October 1764.  Another Joseph, son of Fabien Dupuis, who had died in Connecticut, died at Mirebalais in October, age 8.  Fabien's widow Judith Hébert died there in November, age 39.  Yet another Joseph Dupuis, age 15, died at Mirebalais the following December.  Four young Dupuis men, one married, the other three bachelors, sons perhaps of Charles-Olivier of Annapolis Royal who had been deported to Connecticut, died at Mirebalais within weeks of another:  Charles, husband of Rosalie Préjean, in October 1764, age 26; Pierre-Poncy in November, age 23; Paul, age 20, in November; and Simon, age 18, in November.  Charles and Rosalie's son Jean-Baptiste was baptized at Mirebalais, age 2, a week after his father's death.  Étienne Dupuis died at Mirebalais in January 1765, age 17.  Euphrosine, called Froisine, daughter of Amand Dupuis and Marie Dugas, had married Gabriel, son Guillin Vincent and Catherine Teizan, at Mirebalais in September 1764.  Euphosine died there the following January, age 28.  Jean-Baptiste Dupuis from Connecticut also died at Mirebalais in January 1765, age 41.  His 5-year-old son Étienne had died there the previous October, at the same time and the same place his son Jean-Baptiste, fils had been baptized at age 6.  Marie-Anne Dupuis died at Mirebalais in January 1765, age 12.  Ephigenie Dupuis, widow of ____ Hébert, died at Mirebalais in June 1765, age 36.  Madeleine Dupuis, age 13, died at Mirebalais in July 1766.  Despite the staggering loss to the family during its first two years in the colony, most of the Dupuiss chose to remain on the tropical island.  Not so Antoine and Simon-Pierre Dupuis, fils's younger brother Joseph, still a bachelor, who witnessed the deaths of his older brothers at Mirebalais.  In the spring of 1767, accompanied by a niece and three nephews, children of Antoine, fils, one of them an infant, Joseph evidently hooked up with the Acadian expedition aboard the ship Virgin, which had left Baltimore, Maryland, in April, bound for New Orleans.  The ship lingered at Cap-Français for 17 days, giving Joseph and his charges an opportunity to cross the island to Cap and escape what had befallen their loved ones at Mirebalais.  The Virgin reached La Balize at the mouth of the Mississippi on July 12 and New Orleans on July 23, the same day Joseph and his brother's children appear on a Spanish list of new arrivals in the city.  Still, others remained.  Marguerite, daughter of the deceased Fabrien Dupuis and Judith Hébert from Connecticut, died at Mirebalais in May 1775, age 15.  François Soline, son of Jean-Baptiste Dupuy and Rose Rifaud, was born at Môle St.-Nicolas, site of the naval base, in October 1777.  One wonders if Jean-Baptiste was an Acadian Dupuis. 

The Dupuiss being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the hated oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada.  After all that they had suffered on the question of the oath, no self-respecting Acadian would consent to take it if it could be avoided.   Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-owned fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where exiles in the seaboard colonies, including Dupuiss, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to lower Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least four were Dupuiss.

Meanwhile, the Dupuiss in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Nearly 600 Maryland exiles took up the offer, including the Dupuiss.  Two large parties left Baltimore for New Orleans in June 1766 and April 1767 with six members of the family aboard.  Nine more Dupuiss left Port Tobacco in late December 1767 in a third expedition, this one led by the Breau brothers of Pigiguit.  They reached New Orleans the following February, nearly doubling the number of Dupuiss who had gone to the colony.302

Durel

In 1755, descendants of Charles Lacroix dit Durel and Judith Chiasson could still be found on Île St.-Jean, where Charles and Judith had settled in c1730.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family to the winds. 

Living in territory controlled by France, they and other Acadians on the island escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  In late 1758, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France.  Charles and Judith's daughters Anne-Marie and her husband Charles Pinet dit Pinel, and sister Judith ended up on a crowded ship that took them to Cherbourg, Normandy, where they landed safely.  Other members of the family were not so lucky.  The sisters' mother Judith Chiasson, her second husband Pierre Le Prieur dit Dubois, with whom the sisters had been counted at Havre-de-la-Fortune on the east shore of Île St.-Jean in August 1752, and their younger siblings and half-siblings, all perished aboard the transport Violet, which left Chédaboutctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December on its way to St.-Malo.  Judith married Jean, son of perhaps fellow Acadians Abraham Daigre and Marie Boudrot of Havre-de-la-Fortune, in c1759 perhaps at Cherbourg, or she may have married him on Île St.-Jean on the eve of the island's dérangement. 

Charles dit Durel's daughter Marguerite and her husband Joseph Préjean, fils of Chepoudy managed to elude the British dragnet on Île St.-Jean, cross Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and eventually made their way to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  In the late 1750s or early 1760s, Marguerite and Joseph either were captured by, or surrendered to, British forces in the region and were held as prisoners at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in British Nova Scotia, with dozens of other exiles.  Daughter Victoire was born there in c1761.  In late 1764 or 1765, the war now over, Marguerite and Joseph chose to accompany 600 of their fellow exiles from the Nova Scotia compounds to Cap-Français, French St.-Domingue, to get themselves clear of British rule.  From Cap-Français they moved on to New Orleans, which they reached sometime in 1765. 

Meanwhile, in France, Marguerite's younger sister Anne-Marie and her husband Charles Pinet dit Pinel had at least three children, a son and two daughters, at Cherbourg, between 1763 and 1771.  Judith and her husband Jean Daigre, who worked as a fisherman, also had at least three children, all sons, in the Norman port, between 1759 and 1763.  In 1773, Anne-Marie and Charles followed hundreds of other exiles languishing in the port cities to the interior province of Poitou as part of a major settlement venture around the city of Châtellerault.  Their second son was born at La Chapelle-Roux near Châtellerault in January 1775.  Evidently sister Judith, Jean, and their sons did not follow them to Poitou.  After two years of effort, Anne-Marie and her family retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Older daughter Marie-Modeste Pinet dit Pinel married Jean-Baptiste-Charles, son of fellow Acadians Charles Haché and Marie Hébert, at nearby St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1784.  

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Anne-Marie, no doubt fully aware that her older sister Marguerite had been living in the Spanish colony for two decades, husband Charles Pinet, their remaining son Louis, unmarried daughter Marie-Madleine, and married daughter Marie-Modeste and her Haché husband, agreed to take it.  Sister Judith and husband Jean, if they were still alive, chose to remain in France but their oldest son, Jean-Baptiste Daigre, his LeBlanc wife, and their two daughters, followed his aunt and her family to the Spanish colony in 1785.239

Flan

In 1755, the three married daughters of Jean-François Flan of Paris and Marie Dupuis were living with their families at Minas.  In the fall of that year, British forces deported Jean-François's second daughter, Anne, her husband Alexandre Landry, and their children to Maryland, where Alexandre died in the late 1750s or early 1760s.  Jean-François's youngest daughter Marguerite, her husband Abraham dit Petit Abram Landry, and their children, some from his first marriage, also ended up in Maryland.  In July 1763, members of the family were counted in two places in the Cheaspeake colony:  the widowed Anne and six of her children, four sons and two daughters, at Baltimore; and Marguerite and her family, including 10 children, at Oxford on Maryland's Eastern Shore.  Marguerite died in Maryland in the mid-1760s, in her late 40s, leaving her husband Petit Abram a widower again. 

When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Petit Abram Landry and nine of his children, six of them from second wife Marguerite Flan, were among the first of the Maryland Acadians to emigrate to Louisiana, in 1766.  In April 1767, Anne Flan, still a widow (she never remarried), left Baltimore for Louisiana in the second expedition from Maryland with most of her Landry children and 200 other exiles.

One wonders where Jean-François's oldest daughter Marie-Josèphe Flan, her husband Charles-André LeBlanc, and their children, also living at Minas in 1755, ended up during Le Grand Dérangement.  According to Bona Arsenault, Charles-André died in exile between 1756 and May 1764, but he does not say where.  At least one of Charles-André's older brothers ended up in Maryland with his family.  Were Marie-Josèphe and Charles-André also deported to Maryland, along with her younger sisters Anne and Marguerite?  Did Marie-Josèphe and Charles-André end up in Pennsylvania, Virginia, Connecticut, or Massachusetts with other Minas Acadians?  Or did they escape the roundup at Minas and seek refuge in Canada?240

Forest

In 1755, descendants of Gereyt dit Michel de Forest and his first wife Marie Hébert, mother of his four sons, could be found at Annapolis Royal; Ste-Famille, Pigiguit, and Cobeguit in the Minas basin; Chignecto; Memramcook and Chepoudy in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; and on Île St.-Jean and Île Madame in the French Maritimes.  By then, members of the family had shortened their name to Forest.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre and his Mi'kmaq warriors, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Forests may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local Acadians, perhaps including Forests, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto and trois-rivières Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  That fall, a widow and her three Forest sons ended up in South Carolina.  Colonial officials sent them to Prince Frederick Winyaw Parish, north of Charles Town, near present-day Plantersville.  Judith Forest, wife of Joseph Poirier, and Marguerite Forest, also were deported to the southern colony.  Another Forest family, if they were still at Chignecto, ended up in Pennsylvania.  But most of the Forests at Chignecto and the trois-rivières escaped the British and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada.  One of them, Jean-Joseph Forest of Chepoudy, died at Québec in December 1757, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck the Acadian refugees there from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758. 

The Forests were hit especially hard when British and New-English forces rounded up hundreds of Acadians at Minas and Annapolis Royal in late fall of 1755.  Forests living in the Minas Basin, especially those at Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, ended up on transports destined for Virginia, Maryland, and Massachusetts.  A young Forest from Pigiguit escaped the British roundup there and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawerence shore.  Forests at Annapolis were deported to Connecticut, Massachusetts, and South Carolina.  They were especially numerous aboard transports bound for Connecticut.  Some members of the family escaped the roundup at Annapolis, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed to Chepoudy the following spring, and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac or lower Rivière St.-Jean before moving on to the Gulf shore or to Canada. 

Forests shipped to Virginia endured a fate worse than most of the Acadians deported from Minas.  In mid-November, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered one vessel moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and Virginia's House of Burgesses made their decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Forests were held at Southampton. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the two Forest families on Île St.-Jean and Île Madame escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the islands and rounded up most of the habitants there, Forests among them.  The British deported Victor Forest and his family, which included his second wife and two of her siblings, from Île St.-Jean to Cherbourg, Normandy.  The British deported Victor's younger brother Pierre, his wife Anne-Blanche Robichaux, infant daughter Anne-Marie, and younger brother Jacques, fils, aboard one of the five transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November, and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Pierre's infant daughter died at sea.  The British deported Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, widow of the brothers' cousin Jean-Baptiste Forest, fils, and three of her children from Île Madame to St.-Malo aboard one of the Five Ships.  The crossing devastated her little family.  Marie-Madeleine, her oldest son, and her youngest daughter died in a St.-Malo hospital soon after they reached the Breton port.  Only younger son Étienne Forest, age 8 in 1758, survived the rigors of the crossing. 

Island Forests did their best to make a life for themselves at Cherbourg and in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Young Étienne lived with relatives in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer until he came of age.  Cousin Pierre Forest and his wife Anne-Blanche Robichaud had three more children, all sons, at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo and at St.-Servan:  Pierre-Joseph at Plouër in June 1760; François-Jean in April 1762 but died at St.-Servan in June 1764; and Jean-Joachim at St.-Servan in February 1766 but died there in July 1767.  Pierre, père drowned in July 1768, age 34, and was buried at St.-Servan.  Meanwhile, older brother Victor took his family from Cherbourg to St.-Malo in June 1759 and settled at Pleurtuit, on the same side of the river north of Plouër.  Second wife Anne-Josèphe Hébert gave Victor half a dozen children in the Rance valley:  Joseph-Victor at St.-Suliac across from Pleurtuit in May 1760; twins Jean-Baptiste-François and Amand-Olivier in December 1761, but Amand-Olivier died in January 1763; and triplets Victor, Marie, and Anne-Perrine at Port St.-Hubert near Plouër in March 1764.  Almost miraculously, all three of the triplets survived childhood, but their mother did not survive their birth.  She died at Port St.-Hubert the day of their birth.  Victor remarried to Frenchwoman Julienne Rosereux probably at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in c1766.  She gave him six more children there:  Pierre-Guillaume in March 1767 but died eight days after his birth; Servanne-Julienne in May 1768; Marie-Adélaïde in August 1770; Jeanne-Élisabeth in February 1772; Jean-Jacques in September 1774; and Étienne-Gilles in c1778.  Victor, at age 51, remarried again--his fourth marriage!--to Marie-Jeanne-Catherine, daughter of locals André Richer and Madeleine Renoux and sister of his soon-to-be stepmother Angélique Richer, at St.-Servan in February 1784.  Meanwhile, Victor and Pierre's younger brother Jacques, fils married Tarsille, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Guérin and Marguerite Henry, at St.-Servan in August 1774.  One wonders if they had any children.  None of the brothers were part of the major settlement venture in Poitou in 1773. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including Forests, were repatriated to France.  Victor, Pierre, and Jacques, fils's parents and their younger siblings crossed from England aboard La Dorothée and settled at Plouër-sur-Rarnce near their loved ones.  Likely because they wished to remain near their kin, Jacques, père's and wife Claire Vincent did not follow their fellow exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany in November 1765.  Claire died at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in March 1769, age 64.  Jacques, père, along with his sons, did not go to Poitou in the early 1770s, nor did they join hundreds of other Acadian exiles in the lower Loire port of Nantes later in the decade.  Jacques, père's youngest son Ignace married Jeanne-Cécile, daughter of locals Pierre Descrouttes and Élisabeth Calisan, at St.-Servan in May 1777.  One wonders if they had any children.  Jacques, père, in his mid-70s, remarried to Angélique, daughter of locals André Richer and Madeleine Renoux and sister of his oldest son Victor's fourth wife, probably at St.-Servan in late 1784 or early 1785.  Another Forest family led by a Jacques also arrived at St.-Malo from England in May 1763 aboard La Dorothée.  This Jacques Forest, age 24 when the British deported him from Minas to Virginia in 1755, married Marguerite, daughter perhaps of fellow Acadians Maurice Comeau and Marguerite Thibodeau, in England in c1759.  Their son Benjamin was born there the following year.  They settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Marguerite gave Jacques three more children:  Marie in July 1764; Élisabeth-Marie in November 1766; and Pierre-Nicolas in September 1769.  As the birth dates of their children reveal, they also did not go to Belle-Île-en-Mer in November 1765.  However, they did go to Poitou in 1773.  Marguerite gave Jacques another daughter, Marguerite, in the interior province in c1774.  After two years of effort, in December 1775, Jacques and his family retreated with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes, where daughter Marguerite died in September 1777.  They returned to St.-Malo by April 1784, when oldest daughter Marie married into the Aucoin family there.  Daughter Élisabeth-Marie married into the Bedel family there the following month. 

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, 17 Forests agreed to take it.  They included Jacques, père and his son Victor and married daughters Anne-Rosalie and Madeleine and their families, and cousins Étienne, now a middle-aged bachelor, and Jacques and his family, including a married daughter, all at St.-Malo, and a Forest wife at Nantes.  However, Jacques, père's younger sons Jacques, fils and Ignace and their families, son Pierre's widow and her surviving Forest son, and cousin Jacques's daughter who married a local Frenchman, chose to remain in the mother country. 

In North America, Forests who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and found refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore suffered more hardships in the final years of the war with Britain.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Mi'kmaq warriors and Acadian militia helped defend the remote outpost, the blue jackets returned to their base at Louisbourg, but, for all intents and purposes, Restigouche was now cut off from the rest of New France.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, Charles Forest of Chignecto and his family of eight among them.  The British held them in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  By the early 1760s, other members of the family either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and also held in Nova Scotia.  In July 1762, British officials counted two of Charles's cousins, Joseph Forest and his family of three and his brother Charles and his family of six, at Fort Edward, across from the old Forest homesteads at Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit.  Joseph died soon after the counting.  In August 1763, British officials counted Charles Forest and his family of eight at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, near their old homes at Chignecto. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatraition.  In August 1763, in Massachusetts, members of the family still living  there included Antoine Foret, his wife Margueritte, their six children, and "Widow Elizabeth mother-in law of Foret"; Simon Foret, his wife Marguerite Gautrot, their seven children, and "Widow Forait," perhaps his mother Madeleine Babin; Michel Forait, wife Magdelaine, and their five children; Charlot Foret, perhaps a widower, four children, and the "Widow of Michel Foret," likely his mother.  Sometime in 1763, in Connecticut, members of the family still there included Benoît Forest and his family of five; Victor Forest and his family of five; Jean-Pierre Fouret and his family of seven; Jacques Fourest and his family of 10; and Mathieu Forest and his family of six--perhaps the largest concentration of Forests in the Acadian diaspora.  In June 1763,  in Pennsylvania, members of the family still being held there included Pierre Forrest, his wife Marguerite, and two children; and Jean Forrest, his wife Anne, and their child.  That July, members of the family counted in Maryland included Bonaventure Foray, his wife Claire Rivet, their four daughters, and a Boudreau orphan, and Jean Foray, his wife Margueritte Richard, and a Prince orphan at Upper Marlborough; Osite Forest, actually Gautrot, widow of Olivier Forest, and her daughter Marie at Snow Hill on the colony's Eastern Shore; and Pierre Forreit, his wife Marguerite Blanchard, and their son Pierre, fils at Baltimore.  Down in South Carolina in August 1763, member of the family counted there included Judith Forest, her husband Joseph Poirier, and their family.  One wonders what happened to the other Forests who had gone to the southern colony in 1755. 

Most of the Forests being held in New England chose to repatriate to Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Geyret dit Michel de Forest began the inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, they could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, L'Assomption, Nicolet, St.-Grégoire, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, St.-Michel-d'Yamasaka, Laprairie, and Pointe-aux-Trembles; on the lower St. Lawrence at St.-Charles de Bellechasse, St.-Michel de Bellechasse, St.-Pierre-du-Sud, and Montmagny; and at Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  In Nova Scotia, they settled at Minoudy south of Chignecto; Windsor, formerly Pigiguit; and at Arichat on Île Madame.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  

During the final months of the war, French officials encouraged Acadians still in the seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years's War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the war of vengeance to come.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, French officials promised the exiles land of their own if they came to the sugar colony.  Forests were among the Acadians in the seaboard colonies who chose to go to the tropical island in 1763 or 1764.  When, in the mid- and late 1760s, exiles from Halifax and Maryland, including Forests, came through or transshipped at nearby Cap-Français, none of the Forests still in St.-Domingue accompanied them to New Orleans.  Joseph, son of Athanase Forest and Marie-Josèphe Fouchard, was baptized at Môle St.-Nicolas, age 3 1/2 months, in November 1777.  Paul, son of Germain Forest and Marguerite Daigle of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, Chignecto, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in June 1779, no age given.  Joseph, fils, son of Joseph Forest and Jeanne Delon, was born at Môle St.-Nicolas in September 1781. 

The Forests being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the hated oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all that they had suffered on the question of the oath, no self-respecting Acadian would consent to take it if it could be avoided.   Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies, including Forests, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to lower Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, a dozen of them were Forests.

Meanwhile, the Forests in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  The first and second contingents of Acadians from Maryland that reached New Orleans in 1766 and 1767 contained at least 16 Forests.303

Fouquet

When British forces rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the autumn of 1755, Charles Fouquet, fils, wife Marie-Judith Poitevin, and their family, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on Île St.-Jean, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France. 

Charles Fouquet, père and four of his sons--Louis, age 30; Jean-Aubin, age 26; Martin, age 20, and Simon, age 11--ended up on a transport that landed at Cherbourg in March 1759.  Sons Jean-Aubin and Martin reached the Norman port, but of Charles, père and his other sons the record says only, "The fate of their father is unknown," which means he probably did not survive the crossing.  One wonders what became of sons Louis and Simon.  Jean-Aubin and Martin did not remain at Cherbourg.  Soon after they landed there, they sailed down to St.-Malo in northeast Brittany, which they reached in late March.  Their mother Marie-Judith Pointevin, age 50, and five of their siblings--Marie-Judith, age 23, Anne, age 17, Françoise, age 12, Élisabeth, age 14, and son Charles III le jeune, age 8--had become separated from Charles and the older boys during the chaos of deportation and had crossed on one of the five transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January.  They all survived the crossing, but not its rigors.  Daughter Élisabeth died in a St.-Malo hospital two months after she reached the Breton port.  Her mother also must have have been fatally weakened by the voyage.  When Marie-Judith's daughter Marie-Judith Fouquet married Honoré, son of fellow Acadians Charles Thériot and Angélique Doiron and widower of Isabelle Bergeau, in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in February 1760, both of the bride's parents were recorded as deceased.

Marie-Judith Fouquet and husband Honoré Thériot settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo, where they had at least seven children.  Sister Anne married a French sailor, Georges, son of Nicolas Pollin and Jeanne Label of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, at the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay in June 1764.  Brother Jean-Aubin married, or rather remarried to, Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Quimine and Marie-Josèphe Chiasson of Chignecto and Île St.-Jean, probably in the late 1760s, place unrecorded.  This evidently was Jean-Aubin's third marriage.  His first was to Marie Chevalier, date and place unrecorded, but it likely was after he reached St.-Malo, and the second to Madeleine , daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Savary and ____ and widow of Jean Audaire, perhaps in Notre Dame Parish, Rochefort, in September 1763.  Evidently they gave him no children.  If he and Marguerite married in the St.-Malo area, they did not remain.  She gave him at least two daughters at Port-Louis near Lorient in southern Brittany:  Marie-Charlotte in c1770; and Jeanne-Madeleine in c1774.  They resettled in the lower Loire port of Nantes by September 1784. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Jean-Aubin Fouquet and his wife Marguerite agreed to take it.  The rest of his family remained in France.241

Gaudet

In 1755, descendants of Jean Gaudet and his two wives could be found at Annapolis Royal; Beaubassin, Veskak, and Tintamarre at Chignecto; at Petitcoudiac and Memramcook in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; at Grand-Pré and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin; at Anse-du-Nord-Ouest on Île St.-Jean and Port-Toulouse on Île Royale; and in the St. Lawrence valley, where the first of them had gone in the 1720s.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Gaudets were among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Gaudets likely were among the area Acadians serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the local Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  At least one Gaudet family ended up in South Carolia.  Most of the Gaudets at Chignecto and in the trois-rivières, however, escaped the British that fall and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or in Canada. 

Some of their cousins at Annapolis Royal were not so lucky.  In the fall of 1755, the British deported Germain Gaudet, second wife Marguerite Thibodeau, and their children, as well as François Gaudet and his wife to New York.  A colonial record dated 6 May 1756 notes that Jerema Gouder and his family of two were among the "French neutrals sent by Gov. Lawrence from Nova Scotia to New York" and parcelled out to five counties in the Manhattan area.  Colonial authorities sent Germain and his wife to Huntingon, Queens County, on Long Island.  Charles Gaudet, second wife Nathalie Robichaud, and their children ended up in Connecticut.  But, like their kinsmen up the bay, most of the Gaudets at Annapolis Royal escaped the British in 1755.  They spent a long winter in the hills overlooking the Bay of Fundy, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac, lower Rivière St.-Jean, the Gulf shore, or in Canada. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Gaudets on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the islands, rounded up most of the habitants there, Gaudets among them, and deported them to France.  Most of the island Gaudets did not survive the crossing to France.  Marie-Rose Gaudet, husband Joseph Thériot, and three of their children were deported from Île Royale to St.-Malo aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Two of the children died at sea, and Marie-Rose died in a St.-Malo hospital in early December.  Françoise Gaudet, called Josèphe on the ship's passenger lists, who by then was in her late 80s, perished on the same transport with husband Charles Doiron.  Jean-Baptiste Gaudet, age 56, and two of his sons--Joseph-Ignace, age 15, and Paul-Marie, age 9--also crossed on Duc Guillaume.  Joseph-Ignace survived the crossing, but brother Paul-Marie died in a local hospital soon after arrival.  Father Jean-Baptiste died at Hôtel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in November 1759, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Jean-Baptiste's daughter Marie-Blanche, age 22, crossed with husband Louis-Julien Brousse, age 23, and a year-old daughter on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Marie-Blanche and Louis-Julien survived the crossing, but their daughter died at sea.  Dominique, son of Pierre Gaudet and Marie-Madeleine Pitre, and his wife Marie Boudrot, who he had married on Île St.-Jean in 1755, were rounded up with most of the other Acadians on the island, but the British did not send the newlyweds to St.-Malo.  Crossing with Dominique and Marie was his younger brother François, still unmarried, who landed with them at Cherbourg in Normandy. 

Island Gaudets did their best to make a life for themselves in several of the mother country's coastal cities.  At Lamballe near St.-Brieuc in northern Brittany southwest of St.-Malo, Marie-Blanche Gaudet gave husband Louis-Julien Brousse, a tailor, three more children, a son and two daughters.  None survived childhood.  Louis-Julien died at Lamballe in January 1766, age 31.  After his death, Marie-Blanche moved to the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer and remarried to Frenchman Jean-Clément Boullot.  She was still at St.-Servan in 1772.  In October 1761, the war still on, younger brother Joseph-Ignace, now in his late teens, embarked on the ship Duchesse de Grammont probably as a privateer, was captured by the Royal Navy, and held as a prisoner in England for the rest of the war.  Back in France in the spring of 1763, he settled near his sister at St.-Servan and worked probably as a sailor.  He, too, was still there in 1772.  He did not marry.  François Gaudet died at Cherbourg in December 1759, age 22, within a year of his arrival.  Older brother Dominique and his wife Marie Boudrot were still at Cherbourg the month before, when twin sons Dominique, fils and Prosper died a day after their birth.  Daughter Madeleine-Geneviève was born at Cherbourg in March 1763, but she also died young.  Dominique moved his family across the Baie de Seine to Le Havre by 1765, when son Jean-Charles was born there.  Marie gave Dominique two more daughters there:  Marie-Adélaïde in August 1768; and Élisabeth-Flore-Dorothée in c1771.  Meanwhile, at age 15, Théodoz, probably Théodose, Gaudet "de Cadie" married in Très Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in December 1759.  The published record of the marriage fails to name her parents or even her husband.   One wonders if she was a younger sister of Dominique and François. 

Acadian Gaudets arrived in France during the 1760s and 1770s.  Although exile ended for most Acadians in North America by the late 1760s, this was not the case for those who, after the war with Britain finally ended, had chosen to live on St.-Pierre and Miquelon, French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  So many Acadians chose to go there, in fact, that the islands became overcrowded, prompting French officials, obeying a royal decree, to pressure the fisher/habitants on the islands into moving on to France.  Pierre, Louis, and Paul, sons of Augustin Gaudet, and their cousin Joseph Gaudet, fils, were among the Newfoundland-island Acadians who took their families to the mother country in the fall of 1767.  Most of the islanders returned the following year, but most of the Gaudet brothers remained in France.  Pierre worked as a sailor at La Rochelle, where wife Anne Girouard died in April 1770.  In 1773, Pierre and his three daughters--Marguerite, Modeste, and Marie--with hundreds of other Acadians languishing in the coastal cities, ventured to the interior province of Poitou to work the land owned by an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  Pierre lost daughter Marie at Archigny south of Châtellerault in September 1774, age 12 1/2.  In October 1775, he remarried to fellow Acadian Marie-Henriette Pothier, a widow, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault.  A month later, after two years of effort, Pierre, his new wife, and his remaining daughters retreated other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Pierre died at Nantes in 1781, age 61.  His remaining daughters, Marguerite and Modeste, evidently remained in the mother country.  Unlike older brother Pierre, Louis Gaudet survived his time in France.  He and wife Marie Hébert also had landed at La Rochelle, where French officials counted them in 1770 and 1772.  They chose not to follow Pierre to Poitou but moved on the Nantes by 1773, when their youngest son François-Louis was born there.  Two years later, they were joined in the port city by older brother Pierre and his family.  Meanwhile, other Acadians from the Newfoundland islands chose to return to North America, Gaudets among them.  Pierre and Louis's youngest brother Paul and his second wife Rose Gautrot, who he had married on Île Miquelon in August 1767, were back on the island in 1776, as was cousin Joseph Gaudet, fils and his wife Charlotte Lavigne.  In 1778, France joined the Anglo-American struggle against their old red-coated enemy, who controlled every part of the Maritimes region except the two French islands.  Later that year, the British seized the Newfoundland islands and deported the Acadians there to France.  Gaudets, some of whom had returned from France, were among the unfortunates who endured yet another crossing, this time on hired British transports.  Like his oldest brother Pierre, Paul Gaudet did not survive his time in France.  He died at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo in April 1779, age 48.  His widow Rose and her children returned with other Acadians to the Newfoundland islands in 1784 and settled on Île St.-Pierre.  Paul's second son Joseph, after he came of age, moved on to the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  Joseph Gaudet, fils met a similar fate.  He died at La Rochelle before 1784, when his widow Charlotte returned to Île Miquelon with two of their daughters, Marie-Rosalie and Anne-Perrine.  Charles dit Chayé, son of Denis Gaudet le jeune of Annapolis Royal, had remained with his family on Île Miquelon in 1767 when his cousins had gone to France, but Charles, wife Marguerite Bourg, and their children could not evade the British in 1778.  The forced deportation devastated the family.  Charles died at La Rochelle in February 1779, in his early 50s.  His oldest son Félix, who had married on Île Miquelon in 1774, also died at La Rochelle that month, in his 20s.  Charles's second son Pierre, a sailor, died at La Rochelle in September 1782, age 24.  Luckily for the family line's survival, Félix's widow, Marie-Anne Cormier, took her children Jeanne and Pierre back to North America, where son Pierre settled in the île-de-la-Madeleines and created his own family. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians still in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, only two Gaudet men chose to take it.  Louis Gaudet, wife Marie Hébert, and three, perhaps four, of their children were still at Nantes in September 1784.  The following year, along with bachelor cousin Joseph-Ignace Gaudet of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, Louis and his family emigrated to Spanish Louisiana, the cousin on the sixth of the Seven Ships, Louis and his family on the last ship.  Most of the Gaudets in the mother country, however, especially the ones at Le Havre, chose to remain.  One of those who chose to stay in France was Louis Gaudet's oldest daughter Marie, who had married French surgeon Guillaume Gaubert at Nantes in January 1783, was counted there in 1797, and, with a son and two stepsons, joined her family in Louisiana probably as a widow in the early 1800s.  Meanwhile, French officials counted Marie Gaudet, age 55, widow of Clément Boulot, at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo in 1793, during the early months of the Reign of Terror.  Marie-Victoire, 35-year-old daughter of Dominique Gaudet of Le Havre, married day laborer Jean-Louis-François, son of Jean La Perrelle and Marie-Josèphe Kyrie, at Le Havre in October 1796, after the Revolution had cooled down a bit.  Brother Jean-Charles, a 32-year-old sailor, married Marie-Rose, 49-year-old daughter of Guillaume-Antoine L'Hurier and Anne-Geneviève LeVerdier, at Le Havre in March 1797.  Jean-Charles's sister Élisabeth-Flore-Dorothée, at age 29, married sailor Issac-Taurin, son of sailmaker Michel Robert and Marie-Rose-Susanne Lecointre of Fecamp, at Le Havre in March 1800, early in Napoléon's rule, and died there in April 1806, age 35, after France had become an empire.  Sister Marie-Adélaïde, at age 32, married sailor André, son of Jacques Heurtevent and Jeanne Bouvier of St.-Germain de Livet, Calvados, Normandy, at Le Havre in June 1801.  Cousin Anastasie-Doratte Gaudet of Annapolis Royal and Île St.-Jean, widow of Alexandre Boudrot, died at Le Havre in September 1802, in her late 60s. 

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  The following October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, arrived at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, dozens of Gaudets among them.  They included Pierre Godet and his family of four; Charles Godet and his family of six; Jean Godet and his family of seven; Marie Doucet, widow of Bernard Godet, and her family of three; another Jean Godet; Louis Godet and his family of six; Joseph Godet and his family of six; Paul Godet and his family of three; and another Pierre Godet and his family of seven.  Other members of the family either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and, along with some of their kinsmen from Restigouche, were held them in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  One of these compounds was Fort Edward, overlooking the old Gaudet homesteads at Pigiguit.  Another was Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, near the old Gaudet homesteads at Chignecto.  The largest was on Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor.  In July 1762, British officials counted Joseph Gaudet, his wife, and children at Fort Edward.  In August and October of that year, British officials counted Joseph, along with Charles, Claude, Pierre, and Jérôme Gaudet, with their families at Fort Edward.  In August 1763, British officials counted families headed by Joseph, Pierre, Paul, Louis, Charles, Pierre, Jean, and Jean-Baptiste Gaudet at Fort Cumberland. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In 1763, Germain Gaudet (called Gade), wife Marguerite Thibodeau, and six of their children were still in New York.  Also still in that colony were François Gaudet (called Gauet), his wife, and a child.  That same year, in Connecticut, Charles Gaudet and eight members of his family still languished in the colony. 

Charles and his family, along with most of their fellow Acadians exiled to New England and New York, chose to repatriate to Canada, where some of their kinsmen had fled as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, more descendants of Jean Gaudet began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes. Especially after 1766, Gaudets could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, St.-Grégoire, Gentilly, L'Assomption, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, Nicolet, St.-Pierre-les-Besquets, Pointe-aux-Trembles, St.-Sulpice, Lotbinière, and Yamachiche; at St.-Ours, St.-Denis, St.-Charles, St.-Antoine, and Chambly on the lower Richelieu; on the lower St. Lawrence at Berthier-sur-Mer, Montmagny, and L'Islet; at Boudreau Village, Memramcook, Upper Sackville, Jolicure, and Cap Maringouin in present-day southeastern New Brunswick; at Malpèque on the northwest shore of St. John's Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, later renamed Prince Edward Island; on St. Mary's Bay and Île Madame in Nova Scotia; and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten that the others existed.  

During the final months of the war, French officials encouraged exiles in the seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years's War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the war of vengeance to come.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the exiles land of their own if they came to the sugar colony.  And so Acadians, including Gaudets, went to St.-Domingue in 1763 and 1764.  Joseph Gaudet, a cooper, and his wife Osite LeBlanc were still at Môle St.-Nicolas in the late 1770s when their son Jacques was born there.  Their daughters Marie-Anne, Marguerite, and Marie Élisabeth were born at Môle in January 1776, June 1780, and July 1782.  A Gaudet who had been held in one of the seaboard colonies also ended up on another island in the French Antilles.  Germain Gaudet and his wife Marie-Josèphe Giroir were living on Martinique in December 1764, when their daughter Josèphe-Anne, born "in New England" in May 1758, was baptized at St.-Pierre on the island.  Marie, daughter of Germain Gaudet and his first wife Marguerite Bastarache, perhaps a sister or cousin of the younger Germain, was a merchant on Martinique when she married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow merchant Jean-Joseph Framery and Marie-Madeleine Duval, at Le Mouillage on the island in July 1782; according to the marriage record, Jean-Baptiste was "commis dans les bureaux du roi."  Marie died on the island the following October, age 34, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth. 

Gaudets being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Gaudets, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Gaudets, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, 13 were Gaudets.304

Gautrot

In 1755, descendants of François Gautrot of Martaizé and Port-Royal and his two wives Marie _____ and Edmée Lejeune could be found at Annapolis Royal; Grand-Pré, Rivière Gaspereau, Rivière-aux-Canards, Pigiguit, and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther.

Gautrots still living at Minas and Pigiguit in the summer of 1755 were the first members of the family to suffer the indignities of deportation.  The British sent most of them to Maryland.  Some found themselves on transports headed to Connecticut and Virginia.  Others eluded the British and made their way north to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  The Gautrots shipped to Virginia endured a fate worse than most of the Acadians deported from Minas.  In mid-November, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Dinwiddie ordered Acadians from one vessel moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and Virginia's House of Burgesses made their decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Perhaps Jean Gautrot's wife Euphrosine Labauve was one such victim. 

In September 1755, the habitants at Cobeguit, learning of the fate of their cousins on the other end of the Minas Basin, packed up their goods and their loved ones and abandoned their settlements.  Many of them headed cross country to Tatamagouche and other North Shore settlements.  From there, through the following spring, they crossed the Mer Rouge to French-held Île St.-Jean, where they joined their kinsmen who already had gone there.  By the end of that terrible year of upheaval, and certainly by the spring of 1756, thanks to the abandonment of Cobeguit, more Gautrots could be found on Île St.-Jean than in any other refuge in greater Acadia. 

Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean and rounded up most of the habitants there.  Some Gautrots managed to cross Mer Rouge and join their cousins on the Gulf of St. Lawrence, but most of the Gautrots who had taken refuge on the island fell into British hands.  Gautrots rounded up at Anse-à-Pinnet, Anse-au-Comte-St.-Pierre, and Rivière-du-Moulin-à-Scie were transported aboard one of the five hired transports that left Chédaboucto Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Many of the families suffered terribly in the crossing, especially from the loss of their children:  Marie-Josèphe Gautrot, age 46, lost her husband Pierre Bourg and two of their four children aboard one of the Five Ships.  Her father François Gautrot III of Cobeguit survived the crossing on the same vessel but died in a St.-Malo hospital, in his early 80s, a few weeks after reaching the Breton port.  Françoise Daigre, age 32, widow of François Gautrot IV, crossed with two of her sons--Bénoni, age 3, and Romain, age 2.  Her sons died at sea, and she died in a St.-Malo hospital soon after arrival.  Pierre Gautrot, age 27, crossed with wife Marie-Louise Duplessis, age 18.  They both survived the ordeal.  Marie was pregnant on the voyage.  Their son Nicolas was born at St.-Malo the end of March 1759 but died the following June.  Alexandre Gautrot, age 41, crossed with wife Marguerite Hébert, age 31, and six of their children--François-Hilaire, age 14; Julienne, age 12; Alexandre, fils, age 10; Marin, age 7; Étienne, age 5; and Madeleine, age 3.  The five youngest children died at sea.  François Gautrot le jeune, age 34, crossed with wife Anne Naquin, age 24, and four children--Jean-Baptiste, age 12; Marie-Rose, age 6; François-Xavier, age 4, and Catherine, age 2.  All four children died at sea.  Madeleine Gautrot, age 34, widow of Pierre Boudrot, survived the crossing.  Joseph Gautrot, age 36, crossed with wife Marie-Josèphe Hébert, age 28, and their five children--Marie-Françoise, age 15; Hélène, age 9; Marguerite, age 7; Joseph, age 4; and Marie-Josèphe, age 2--and Marie's 12-year-old brother Jean-Baptiste.  Joseph, Marie-Josèphe, and Jean-Baptiste survived the crossing, but all five of Joseph and Marie-Josèphe's children died at sea.  Marie-Josèphe was pregnant on the voyage; daughter Marie-Françoise was born at sea on January 10 but died at St.-Malo a month after their arrival.  Honoré Gautrot, age 43, a widower, crossed with three of his children--Marin, age 12; Joseph-Simon, age 10; and Agnès, age 5--and his 31-year-old sister Madeleine.  All of them survived the crossing, but sister Madeleine died in a St.-Malo hospital a month after they reached the Breton port.  Other Gaudrots, including the families of Charles dit Maringouin and his cousin Charles, fils of Minas, crossed aboard the Neptune, also a part of the 12-ship convoy that left Chédabouctou Bay in late November.  Thanks to the storm, the Neptune reached Plymouth, England, in distress in late December before moving on to the northern fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer, which it reached three days later.

Island Gautrots did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Alexandre Gautrot and wife Marguerite Hébert, with surviving son François-Hilaire, settled at Ploubalay, Trigavou, and Pleslin on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo, where Marguerite gave Alexandre six more children:  Pierre-Gregoire at Trigavou in March 1760; Marie-Josèphe in January 1762 but died at Pleslin in November 1767, age 4 1/2; Jean-Alain in September 1764; Victoire-Josèphe in June 1766 but died the day after her birth; Victoire-Andrée in December 1768; and Joseph-Mathurin in October 1772.  Oldest son François-Hilaire married Hélène-Catherine, daughter of fellow Acadians François Daigre and Marie Boudrot, at Trigavou in November 1764.  She gave him four children there:  Charles in January 1766; Rosalie-Anne in September 1767 but died at age 4 1/2 in July 1772; Marie in March 1771; and Simonne-Marie-Rose in March 1773.  Alexandre's older brother Honoré, the widower, settled at Pleslin with his three children.  He remarried to Jeanne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Lebert dit Jolycoeur and Jeanne Breau, at nearby Plouër-sur-Rance but settled at Pleslin.  Jeanne gave Honoré three more children there:  Jean-Charles in November 1761; Pierre-Joseph in March 1763; and Marguerite-Geneviève in April 1765.  Honoré's oldest son Marin married Gertrude, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Bourg and François Benoit, across the river at St.-Suliac in May 1768.  Gertrude gave him at least five children there:  Marie-Anne in September 1769 but died at age 2 in November 1771; Jean-François in March 1771; Joseph-Marin in August 1773; Jean-Louis in c1774; and Marie in c1776.  Alexandre and Honoré's youngest brother Joseph and wife Marie-Josèphe Hébert, now childless, also settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Marie-Josèphe gave Joseph three more children there:  Marie-Anne in December 1760 but died nine days after her birth; Joseph-Antoine in November 1761 but died at age 2 in February 1764; and Rose-Sébastienne in December 1763.  Marie-Josèphe died at St.-Suliac in February 1764, age 30.  Joseph remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Germain Pitre and Marguerite-Josèphe Girouard and widow of Louis Bourg, at St.-Suliac in November 1764.  Anne gave Joseph four more children there:  another Marie-Anne in December 1765; Suliac-Charles in June 1767; Joseph-Marin in November 1769; and Pierre-Olivier in December 1771.  François Gautrot le jeune and wife Anne Naquin, now childless, settled at Plouër-sur-Rance west of the river, St.-Suliac, and St.-Méloir-des-Ondes in the countryside southeast of St.-Malo.  Anne gave François le jeune two more daughters at Plouër:  Marie-Anne in February 1761; and Rose-Marie in December 1762.  Pierre Gautrot and wife Marie-Louise Duplessis, now childless, settled at Châteauneuf south of St.-Suliac on the east side of the river and in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Marie-Louise gave Pierre eight more children there:  Marie-Angélique at Châteauneuf in January 1761 but died there the following November; Jean-Pierre at St.-Servan in August 1763; Reine-Anastasie in March 1765; François-André in June 1766 but died two days after his birth; Joseph-Marie in October 1767; Henriette-Jacquette in February 1769 but died the following September; another Marie-Angélique in December 1770; and Louise-Modeste in November 1772. 

The island Gautrots who landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer either died there or moved on to Breton ports.  Charles Gautrot, fils of Annapolis Royal and Minas died in St.-Nicolas Parish in November 1759, age 75.  His youngest son Alexis, age 30, married Marguerite-Louise, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Haché and Anne-Marie Gentil and widow of Pierre Deveau, in St.-Nicolas Parish in January 1761.  Marguerite-Louise gave Alexis at least three children there, all daughters:  Marie-Madeleine-Marguerite in March 1763 but died a week after her birth; Marie-Marguerite-Pélagie in February 1764; and Madeleine-Rosalie in November 1765.  In May 1766, aboard Le Hazard, Alexis took his family to St.-Malo and settled at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Marguerite-Louise gave Alexis two sons there:  Alexis, fils in November 1767; and Louis-Marie in January 1770.  Charles, fils's daughter Madeleine, wife of Honoré Landry, died in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in November 1765, age 39.  Charles Gautrot dit Maringouin of Cobeguit and Minas died in St.-Joseph Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in July 1760, age 48.  His daughter Anne-Marie, born at Minas, had died in St.-Joseph Parish, age 17, in May 1759 soon after their arrival.  Maringouin's older son Charles, fils, age 23 1/2, married Anne-Pélagie, called Pélagie, 18-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians René Trahan and Marguerite Melanson, in St.-Joseph Parish in August 1763.  Their first child, daughter Marie-Josèphe-Pélagie, was born in St.-Joseph Parish in July 1764 but died eight days after her birth.  Their other children, however, were born not at Boulogne-sur-Mer but in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in northwest Brittany:  Jean-Charles-Joseph in June 1765; Marie-Madeleine-Pélagie in December 1766; Louis-Marie in January 1769; Jean-Louis-Laurent in August 1771; Anne-Barbe in December 1773; Nicolas in September 1775; Jean-Marie in May 1777; Pierre-Isidore in September 1780; Anastasie-Marguerite-Marie in August 1782; and Jean-Baptiste-Simon in June 1784.  Maringouin's younger son Gervais also did not remain at Boulogne-sur-Mer.  At age 22, he married Marguerite, 19-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Leprince le jeune and his fist wife Judith Boudrot, on Île d'Aix near La Rochelle in February 1766.  Louis Gautreau, a farmer, died at the naval port of Rochefort in August 1761, age 22; he may not have been Acadian. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including Gautrots, were repatriated to France:  Cécile Gautrot, 47-year-old widow of Jean-Baptiste Richard dit Sapin of Minas, six of her children, and three Gautrot nephews--brothers Jean-Baptiste, in his early 20s and Michel, age 12; and the brothers' first cousin Mathurin, age 7--crossed from England to St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition.  The Gautrot nephews settled with their aunt and Richard cousins at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Jean-Baptiste worked as a seaman there and married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Lejeune and Françoise Guédry, at St.-Servan in September 1764.  Anne gave Jean-Baptiste five children, all daughters, at St.-Servan:  twins Marie-Geneviève and Anne-Angélique in October 1765; Marie-Anne-Renée in January 1768 but died at age 4 in August 1772; Pélagie-Marie in April 1770; and Hélène in August 1773.  Brother Michel was still at St.-Servan in 1772, when he would have been age 19.  One wonders what happened to him after that date.  He did not go to Belle-Île-en-Mer with other Acadian exiles from England in late 1765 or accompany his older brother to Spanish Louisiana in 1785.  Cousin Mathurin, who would have been age 16 in 1772, also disappears from the historical record after that date.  He also did not go to Belle-Île-en-Mer or Louisiana.  Jean Gautrot, a 46-year-old widower, crossed with two of his children--Marie-Madeleine, age 22, and Joseph, age 16--on L'Ambition.  Daughter Marie-Madeleine married Augustin, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Benoit and Élisabeth LeJuge and widower of Marguerite Lejeune, at St.-Servan in July 1763, soon after their arrival.  In April 1764, Jean and son Joseph embarked on Le Fort to settle in the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  Neither of them appears on the list of Acadians at Sinnamary in the district of Cayenne, dated 1 March 1765.  One wonders what happened to them there.  They did not go with other Gautrots to Spanish Louisiana.  Charles Gaudrot of Rivière-aux-Canards, a childless widower in his late 20s, crossed from England on La Dorothée with the family of Jean Melanson of Minas and settled with them at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Charles married Madeleine, daughter of Jean Melanson and Cécile Aucoin, at nearby St.-Suliac in September.  Madeleine gave him a son, Jean-Charles, at St.-Servan in July 1764.  In late 1765, Charles, Madeleine, and their infant son followed her widowed father to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany and settled at Le Coquet near Locmaria at the southern end of the island.  Madeleine gave Charles five more children there:  Jean-Pierre in January 1766 but died at age 3 in April 1769; Marie-Madeleine in February 1767; Joseph-Benoît in October 1768; François-Marie in February 1771; and Rosalie-Charlotte in April 1781.  In 1784, oldest son Jean-Charles married local woman Marie-Madeleine Galoudec or Galuduy at Bangor in the island's southern interior.  She gave him a daughter, Marie-Josèphe, at nearby Locmaria in April 1787.  Charles's oldest daughter Marie-Madeleine married into the Rohan family at Locmaria in June 1784.  Meanwhile, two young Gautrot brothers--Joseph, age 12; and Charles, age 9--crossed from England on L'Ambition with their mother Anne Breau and her second husband, Bruno Célestin dit Bellemère.  The brothers settled with their kinsmen at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  One wonders what became of them.  They did not go to Belle-Île-en-Mer or to Spanish Louisiana. 

Gautrots also reached the mother country by another route.  During the mid-1760s, following the war with Britain, Acadians being held in Nova Scotia chose to resettle on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Pierre Gautrot of Cobeguit and Rivière-aux-Canards, and wife Agnès LeBlanc, parents of Charles Gautrot of England, St.-Malo, and Belle-Île-en-Mer, had been held at Chédabouctou on the Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia during the final years of the war.  Pierre and Agnès were counted with other members of their family on Miquelon in 1767.  That year, to alleviate overcrowding on the island, French officials, obeying a royal decree, ordered the fisher/habitants, including the Gautrots, to move on to France.  Pierre died in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in September 1769, age 61.  Pierre and Agnès's youngest son Honoré, if he went with his family to La Rochelle, did not remain.  Perhaps after his father's death, he returned to Miquelon, where he married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Comeau and Anne Doucet, in May 1771.  In 1771 and 1773, Anne gave him two children, a son and a daughter, on the island.  In 1778, after the French joined the Americans in their struggle against Britain, the redcoats captured Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, destroyed their habitations, and deported the islanders to France.  Honoré and Anne's son Joseph was born in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in December 1779 and died 12 days after his birth; and son Jean-Baptiste was born in St.-Nicolas Parish in June 1783.  But the family did not remain.  After the war, they were back on Miquelon in 1784 and moved on to nearby Île St.-Pierre. 

By the early 1770s, French authorities were weary of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near Châtellerault in the interior province of Poitou.  Hundreds of Acadians went there in 1773 and 1774, Gautrots among them, and did their best to become productive farmers again.  Gautrot familes who went to Poitou included Alexis Gautrot and his wife Marguerite-Louise Haché from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; François-Hilaire Gautrot and his wife Hélène-Catherine Daigre from Trigavou; Joseph Gautrot and his second wife Anne Pitre from St.-Suliac; Jean-Baptiste Gautrot and his wife Anne Lejeune from St.-Servan; and Pierre Gautrot and his wife Marie-Louise Duplessis from St.-Servan.  Alexis and Marguerite-Louise lost their two sons there:  Louis-Marie in October 1773, age 3; and Alexis, fils, in February 1775, age 8.  Anne gave Joseph another son, his thirteenth child, in Poitou:  Charles at Archigny south of Châtellerault in June 1774.  Marie-Louise gave Pierre another child at Châtellerault--daughter Marguerite-Adélaïde was born in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish in July 1774--but they also lost two of their children there:  second daughter Marie-Angélique died at age 3 in August 1774; and Jean-Pierre at age 11 that September.  From November 1775 to March 1776, after two years of effort, three of the families--those of Alexis, Joseph, and Pierre--retreated in three convoys with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  One family, however, that of François-Hilaire, chose to remain in Poitou, where their family had grown, not shrunk:  Jean-Baptiste had been born at Leigné-les-Bois southeast of Châtellerault in November 1774; Jacques in June 1777; and Joseph in August 1780 but died two months later.  Then tragedy struck the family hard:  Wife Hélène-Catherine died at Liegné-les-Bois in September 1780, age 40, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth.  The following year, François-Hilaire remarried to fellow Acadian Marie Carret.  Their son François was born at Leigné-les-Bois in November 1781 but died a month and a half later.  François-Hilaire died at Leigné-les-Bois in April 1782, in his late 30s.  By September 1784, at least one of his children, oldest son Charles, who would have been age 18 at the time, had joined his paternal grandmother Marguerite Hébert and three of his younger siblings at Nantes. 

The Gautrots at Nantes subsisted as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Marin Gautrot, a carpenter from St.-Suliac, wife Gertrude Bourg, two of their children, and some of his siblings joined their fellow Acadians at Nantes, either directly from St.-Suliac or via Poitou.  Alexis Gautrot died at Chantenay near Nantes in July 1782, in his early 50s.  Wife Marie-Louise Haché died there in June 1784, age 55.  Their remaining daughters, Marie-Marguerite-Pélagie and Madeleine-Rosalie, were both in their late teens at the time of their parents' death.  Sailor Jean-Baptiste Gautrot's wife Anne Lejeune died at Chantenay in November 1782, age 40.  Jean-Baptiste's three surviving daughters--twins Anne-Angélique and Marie-Genevière, and younger sister Pélagie-Marie--were still in their teens when their mother passed.  Jean-Baptiste also may have died at Nantes in the early 1780s.  Marie-Louise Duplessis gave Pierre Gautrot another child, their eleventh, at Nantes, Marie-Eléonore in 1778, but she died in St.-Jacques Parish, age 22 months, in November 1780.  Joseph Gautrot and wife Anne Pitre had at least two more sons in St.-Nicolas Parish:  twins François and Jean-Guillaume in c1777.  In late 1784 or early 1785, Pierre-Grégoire Gautrot married Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Michel and Marguerite Pitre, at Nantes.  The young couple were soon expecting a child. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, most of the Gautrots there--at least 41 of them--agreed to take it.  Others, including Gautrots still on Belle-Île-en-Mer, chose to remain. 

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s were soon caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, two Gautrot families among them.  They included Pre., or Pierre, Gautrau and his family of 10; and another Pre. Gautrau and his family of 10 (one wonders if this was a double counting).  The British held them along with other members of the family captured in the region in prison compounds in the Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  Pierre Gautrot of Cobeguit and his large family, counted at Restigouche, were held at Chédabouctou on the Atlantic coast.  In August and October 1762 at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, near their former homes in the Minas Basin, British officials counted Simon Gautreau, his unnamed wife, and their child; and Basil Gautreau, counted alone.  In August 1763, British officials counted Paul, Anne, and Joseph Gautrot in one household, and Charles and Françoise Gautrot in another, in the prison compound at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Beauséjour, at Chignecto. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In 1763, Marguerite Gautrau was counted in Connecticut, living alone.  In July of that year, in Maryland, a number of Gautrots were counted at Newtown on the colony's Eastern Shore:  Amant Gautrot, wife La Blanche [Marie Landry], daughter Marie-Madeleine, and a LeBlanc orphan; and Marie-Josèphe LeBlanc, widow of Charles Gautrot, and sons Jean and Marin.  Euphrosine Gautrot, widow of Pierre Granger, and six of her children were counted at Snow Hill, also on the Eastern Shore.  Marguerite Gautrot, widow of Pierre Breau, was counted at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac with four of her children. 

Perhaps because there were so few of them in New England at war's end, no Gautrot exiles chose to resettle in Canada after the war.  One family, however, that of Pierre of Cobeguit, did, after a sojourn in France, remain on Île St.-Pierre off the southern coast of Newfoundland, which, along with nearby Miquelon, were dependencies of France, not of British Canada, for most of their history. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in the interior of the peninsula or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the hated oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, no self-respecting Acadian would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including the Gautrots at Chédabouctou, chose to go to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to lower Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least three were Gautrots. 

Meanwhile, the Gautrots in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  The first and third contingents of Acadians from Maryland that reached New Orleans in July 1766 and February 1768 contained at least five Gautrots.  Other members of the family chose to remain in the Chesapeak colony, settling at Frenchtown in Baltimore with other Acadian expatriates.305

Girouard/Giroir

In 1755, descendants of François Girouard dit La Varanne of La Chaussée and Jeanne Aucoin of La Rochelle could be found at Annapolis Royal, Chignecto, Grand-Pré and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin, and on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq fighters led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Girouards likely were among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Girouards likely were among the area Acadians serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the local Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  At least one Girouard family and a number of Girouard wives were shipped to South Carolina.  Most of the Girouards at Chignecto, however, escaped the British and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or in Canada. 

That fall, the British deported Girouards at Grand-Pré and Pigiguit to Connecticut and Pennsylvania and perhaps to Virginia.  Girouards in the Annapolis valley ended up on vessels bound for Massachusetts, South Carolina, and New York.  The ship headed for New York, the Experiment, with 250 Acadians aboard, did not leave Goat Island in the lower basin until early December.  At sea, a storm blew the transport all the way down to Antigua in the British West Indies.  The Experiement did not reach New York Harbor until the following May.  Colonial officials promptly counted the 200 survivors and parcelled them out to various communities in the lower part of the colony.  Louis Girouard, his wife, and six of their children were sent to Huntington, Queens County, on Long Island.  However, like their kinsmen at Chignecto and Minas, most of the Girouards in the Annapolis valley escaped the British roundup.  After spending a hard winter in the woods overlooking the Bay of Fundy, they crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring and sought refuge among other exiles on the upper Petitcoudiac or lower Rivière St.-Jean.  From there they moved on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence or followed the St.-Jean portage to Canada.  Between the summer of 1757 and the spring of 1758, a smallpox epidemic struck the refugees in and around Québec, killing dozens of them, including Girouards from Chignecto, Minas, and Annapolis Royal.  They included Guillaume Girouard of Annapolis Royal and Marie-Madeleine Girouard, widow of Claude Gaudet, of Chignecto, on the same day in late November 1757; Marguerite Girouard, wife of Alexandre Guilbeau of Annapolis Royal, on Christmas Day 1757; and Marie Girouard and her husband Jean Trahan of Minas and Baie-des-Espagnols, Île Royale, in March 1758. 

Living in territory controlled by France, Girouards on the French Maritime islands escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the islands and rounded up most of the habitants there.  The Girouards at Malpèque on the northwest coast of Île St.-Jean were among the islanders who escaped this latest British roundup by crossing Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  The others were not so lucky.  That autumn, the British deported most of the island Acadians to St.-Malo, France.  The crossing devastated entire families.  Geneviève Girouard crossed with her Boudrot husband and five children aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in September and, after a mishap at sea, limped into the Breton port the first of November.  Only Geneviève and a daughter survived the crossing.  Her husband and four of their children died at sea, but the dying had not ended.  Geneviève's daughter died in a St.-Malo hospital in late November from the rigors of the crossing, and Geneviève also died there in December.  Anne Girouard crossed on the same vessel with her Doiron husband, their 10 children, a Bourg niece, and Anne's bachelor nephew Charles Girouard.  Anne, Charles, and five of her children survived the crossing, but her husband, her five other children, and the niece died at sea.  Anne's younger sister Marie also crossed on Duc Guillaume with her Benoit husband, a brother-in-law, a nephew, and a niece.  Marie, her husband, and the nephew survived the crossing, but the brother-in-law and niece died at sea.  Another Anne Girouard crossed on Duc Guillaume with her Richard husband and their six children.  She, her husband, and all but one of her children died at sea, and the son died in a St.-Malo hospital a month after he reached the Breton port.  Anne Lambert, "wife of Paul Giroire," crossed alone on Duc Guillaume and survived the crossing.  Albert J. Robichaux, Jr., in his study of the Acadians in France, noted that "her husband was absent due to his imprisonment in England."  One wonders if he was an Acadian privateer captured by the Royal Navy or if he had been captured in North America and sent to England.  (Records indicate that Anne remarried at St.-Joseph Parish, Sinnamary, French Guiane, in January 1765, so Paul must have been declared dead by then.)  Girouards also crossed on one of the five transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November, bound for St.-Malo and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three of the other transports, reached the Breton port together in late January 1759.  Honoré Girouard, age 45, crossed with wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot, age 39, and six of their children--Hélène-Judith, age 17; Prosper-Honoré, age 14; Eudoxile, age 12; Marie, age 7; David, age 5; and Joseph, age 2 months.  Honoré, Marie-Josèphe, and the three older children survived the crossing, but the three younger children died at sea.  Members of the family also crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy, survived the mid-December storm, but was forced to seek repairs at Bideford, England, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March.  Aboard were Honoré Girouard's younger sister Marguerite, age 36, her Boudrot husband, and their eight children.  She, her husband, and five of her children survived the crossing.  Three of the chldren died at sea.  A young Girouard, Domingue, son of Pierre Girouard and Marguerite Gaudet of Chignecto and Port-La-Joye, also ended up in France.  Dominique would have been only age 7 in 1758, so one wonders who he crossed with and on which transport.

Island Girouards did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Charles Girouard married local Frenchwoman Michelle Patru, widow of Pierre Pirou, in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in June 1761.  She likely gave him no children.  Honoré Girouard, wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot, and their remaining children settled at Pleslin on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo before crossing the river to St.-Suliac in 1764.  Marie-Josèphe gave Honoré another daughter, Marie-Rose, at Pleslin in September 1761--seven children, four daughters and three sons, between 1742 and 1761, in greater Acadia and France.  Oldest daughter Hélène-Judith married into the Blanchard family at Pleslin in October 1763.  Son Prosper-Honoré married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Dugas and Marie Boudrot, at St.-Coulomb near the coast northeast of St.-Malo in February 1764.  Between 1765 and 1771, at St.-Coulomb and at St.-Jouan-des-Guérets north of St.-Suliac, Marie gave Prosper five children:  Marie-Paule at St.-Coulomb in January 1765; Anne-Josèphe in June 1766; Joseph-Magloire in January 1768 but died at St.-Jouan at age 4 1/2 in September 1772; Jean-Baptiste at St.-Coulomb in December 1769; and Jeanne-Eléonore at St.-Jouan in August 1771.  Meanwhile, Amand Girouard, in his early 20s, reached St.-Malo in 1763 from prison in England; perhaps he had been an Acadian corsair captured by the Royal Navy.  He settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer and, in May 1764, he married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Daigre and Anne-Marie Breau, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Suliac.  Between 1765 and 1769, at nearby Mordreuc and La Gravelle, Marguerite gave Amand four children:  Charles-Jean at Mordreuc in January 1765; Jean-Yves in May 1766; Michel-Jean in July 1767; and Geneviève-Charlotte-Marguerite at La Gravelle in May 1769.  Tragedy struck the family in January 1769, when Amand "drowned on a ship off the coast of Guernsey," so his youngest child was born posthumously. 

By the early 1770s, French authorities were weary of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near Châtellerault in the interior province of Poitou.  Hundreds of Acadians went there in 1773 and 1774, Girouards among them, and did their best to become productive farmers again.  Prosper-Honoré Girouard of St.-Jouan-des-Guérets took wife Marie Dugas and their four children to Poitou.  Marie gave him two more children there:  François in c1773; and Marie at Leigné-les-Bois southeast of Châtellerault in December 1774 but died a day after her birth.  Prosper's older sister Hélène-Judith, her Blanchard husband, and their children also went to Leigné-les-Bois.  Domingue Girouard went to Poitou as a young bachelor.  He was living in Cenan southeast of Châtellerault when he married Agnès, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Broussard le jeune and Ursule LeBlanc of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, and Île St.-Jean, at nearby Archigny in February 1775. 

That November and December and the following March, after two years of effort, Prosper, Hélène-Judith, Dominigue, and their families retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Prosper's parents Honoré and Marie-Josèphe also may have gone there.  Marie Dugas gave Prosper two more sons in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes:  Joseph-Magloire in January 1777 but died there at age 7 in December 1783; and Pierre in October 1778--nine children, four daughters and five sons, between 1765 and 1778.  Agnès Broussard gave Dominique Girouard two children at nearby Chantenay:  Marie-Agnès-Adélaïd baptized at St.-Martin de Chantenay, age unrecorded, in March 1776 but died at age 5 1/2 in January 1782; and Jean-Dominique baptized in August 1778.  Dominique died at Chantenay in December 1778, age 27.  Agnès remarried to a Pothier widower there in November 1783.  Honoré Girouard died by September 1784, in his 60s, when a Spanish official counted his wife and their two younger daughters at Nantes without him and called Marie-Josèphe Thériot a widow.  When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, a dozen Acadian Girouards, now calling themselves Giroir--most of the family still in the mother country--agreed to take it. 

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, including Pre., that is Pierre, Girouard and his family of six.  The British held them and other members of the family captured in the area in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In the summer and fall of 1762 at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, near the old Girouard homesteads, British officials counted at least four Girouard families in the prison compound there:  Joseph Girroir and his family of three; Guillaume Giro and his family of six; another Joseph Girroir and his family of two; yet another Jos. Girouard and his family of three; and a fourth Jos. Girroir counted alone.  In August 1763, British officials counted two families of Girouards being held at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Beauséjour, at Chignecto, from which Girouards also had fled eight years earlier:  Jean, Magdelaine, Marie, Françoise, Joseph, and Modeste Girouard; and Amant, Marguerite, and Joseph Girouard.  That same month, Paul Gripeoire, actually Louis dit Paul Girouard, a widower, and his five children, were counted on Georges Island in Halifax harbor. 

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In Massachusetts in August 1763, Joseph Guiroire, wife Natalis, actually Nathalie, and their five children were still in that colony.  Jacque Guirroire, his wife, and five children were still in Connecitcut in 1763.  Louis Girouart, his wife, and five children were still in New York.  A Giroir wife was counted with her family in Pennsylvania in June 1763.  In South Carolina in August 1763, a Girouard widow and her family; François Girouard, wife Marguerite Poirier, and their sons Joseph and François; five Girouard wives; and two Girouard orphans were still in the colony.

Most of the Acadians exiled to New England, including Girouards, chose to resettle in Canada, where dozens of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of François Girouard of La Chausée and Port-Royal began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Girouards could be found on the upper St. Lawrence and lower Richelieu at Bécancour, Deschaillons, Deschambault, Gentilly, L'Assomption, Yamachiche, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, Présentation, Repentigny, St.-Ours, St.-Antoine-de-Chambly, St.-Denis-sur-Richelieu, St.-Hyacinthe, and Ste.-Croix-de-Lotbinière; on the lower St. Lawrence at Beaumont, St.-Charles de Bellechasse, St.-Pierre-du-Sud, Cap-St.-Ignace, and L'Islet; and at Carleton in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  In what became New Brunswick, they settled at Bouctouche and Richibouctou on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  In Nova Scotia, they could be found at Halifax, Windsor, formerly Pigiguit, Tracadie, and Pointe-de-l'Église, now Church Point, on Baie Ste.-Marie, today's St. Mary's Bay.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  

During the final months of the war, French authorities encouraged exiles in the seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the war of revenge to come.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the offer, the French promised the Acadians land of their own if they came to the sugar colony.  And so hundreds of Acadians, including Girouards from Connecticut and South Carolina, came to St.-Domingue in 1763 and 1764.  Members of the family were sent not only to the naval base, but also to Mirebalais in the interior near Port-au-Prince to work on indigo and coffee plantations.  Marguerite, daughter of Jacques dit Jacob Girouard le jeune of Pigiguit and Connecticut, died at age 8 at Mirebalais in September 1764.  Jacob's daughter Marie-Josèphe married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Germain Richard and Marguerite Daigre, at Mirebalais that same month.  Jacob died at Mirebalais the following December, in his late 50s.  Marie-Josèphe, widow of Germain Pitre, died at Mirebalais in November 1764, age 42.  Despite these deaths, in the mid- and late 1760s, when exiles from Halifax and Maryland, including Girouards, came through Cap-Français on the island's north shore on their way to New Orleans, none of the many Girouards still in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  Jacob's daughter Marguerite married Frenchman Denis, son of Michel Delahaye and Françoise De Corbier of Boucassin, at Mirebalais in October 1770.  Joseph, also called Guillaume, son of François Girouard of Annapolis Royal and South Carolina, married fellow Acadian Madeleine Poirier probably at Môle St.-Nicolas in the late 1760s.  Son Joseph was born there in c1770 but died at age 7 in January 1778; and son Jean-Baptiste died there in November 1776, age unrecorded.  Joseph remarried to Marie, daughter of Stephen Hosmin or Hoffman of Speyer, Germany, at Môle St.-Nicolas in May 1780.  Son Joseph Mathieu was born there in January 1781; son Jean-Baptiste in May 1783 but died three weeks after his birth; and daughter Angélique-Jeanne-Josèphe was born posthumously at the naval base in April 1785.  Joseph died at Môle St.-Nicolas in May 1785, age 40.  Marguerite-Sophie Girouard, wife of navigator François Barilas of Genoa, Italy, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in October 1770.  Jeanne, daughter of Charles Girouard, fils and Madeleine Thibodeau of Annapolis Royal, widow of Anselme Poirier, married Frenchman Joseph Bonnefon of Bayonne at Môle St.-Nicolas in November 1778.  Josèphe, daughter of Pierre Girouard and Jeanne Martin of Annapolis Royal and Pennsylvania, married Simon Joseph Castille of Bouchain, Hainaut d'Arras, France, at Môle St.-Nicolas in September 1783.  Acadian Girouards also ventured to another part of the French Antilles after the war.  Louis Girouard of Annapolis Royal and New York died at Champflore on the French island of Martinique in March 1776, age 61.  His daughter Marie-Josèphe, widow of Germain Gaudet, married Christophe-Alexis, son of Christophe Dumont and Madeleine Froment of St.-Pierre de Marsilly, La Rochelle, and widower of Marie-Anne Conte, at St.-Pierre, Martinique, in July 1770.  Louis's daughter Élisabeth, widow of Pierre Breguera, died at Front-Royal on the island in November 1776, age 35.

Girouards being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in the interior of the peninsula or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the hated oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada.  After all that they had suffered on the question of the oath, no self-respecting Acadian would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies, including many Girouards, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to lower Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, five were Girouards.306

 Godin

In 1755, descendants of Gabriel dit Châtillon Godin, sieur de Bellefontaine, and Andrée-Angélique Jeanne could be found in Canada and at Minas, but most of them were still living at Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

Only one Godin remained at Minas on the eve of the Great Upheaval.  In the fall of 1755, the British deported Marie-Josèphe Bourg, widow of Pierre-Joseph Godin dit Châtillon dit Préville, her second husband Joseph Landry, his children by a previous marriage, and her Godin daughter Susanne to Maryland.  Colonial authorities held them at Oxford on Maryland's Eastern Shore. 

Living in territory still controlled by France, the Godins of Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas escaped the roundups of their fellow Acadians in British Nova Scotia.  In 1756, Michel dit Beauséjour, a navigator and militia officer, son of Joseph dit Bellefontaine dit Beauséjour, married Marguerite Guilbeau, a native of the Annapolis valley who had escaped the roundup there and found refuge with her family on the lower St.-Jean.  The couple settled among his many kinsmen at St.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas.  The extended family's respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  In September 1758, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg the previous July, British forces established a fort at the mouth of Rivière St.-Jean and raided up the lower river.  Some of the Godins fled north to Canada or east to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, while others remained at Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas, where the British had not yet gone.  Unfortunately for those who remained, in early 1759 New-English rangers under Lieutenant Moses Hazen moved farther up the St.-Jean and struck Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas and other settlements in the area.  In the mélée that followed the destruction of the village, including its church and 147 houses, rangers fell upon a house that lay apart from the others, killed and scalped six Acadians hiding there, and captured six others.  Five of the Acadians got away.  Though the British insisted that the dead habitants were all men, eyewitness depositions made to French authorities in Québec, and other contemporary sources, confirm that the six Acadians who the rangers killed were actually two women and their four children!  One of the women was Anastasie, daughter of militia leader Joseph Godin dit Beauséjour and the wife of Eustache Part.  Three of the dead children belonged to this couple.  The other murdered woman was Marguerite Guilbeau, wife of Joseph's son Michel dit Beauséjour, and the other murdered child was the couple's infant son.  The British transported the captured habitants, including Joseph dit Beauséjour and the grieving husbands Michel dit Beauséjour and Eustache Part, to the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax.  That November, Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence deported them, along with Acadians captured at Cap-Sable, to England, but British authorities sent them on to Cherbourg, France, where they landed in January 1760.  Meanwhile, Joseph dit Beauséjour's younger brother Jacques-Philippe dit Bellefeuille and his family dodged the British onslaught on the lower river and fled north along the St.-Jean portage to Canada.  Joseph and Jacques-Philippe's sister Marie-Yvette, wife of Michel Saindon, also dodged the British.  After the war, she returned to Rivière St.-Jean perhaps from the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore but moved on to Canada, where she died in April 1795, age 86. 

Godins who sought refuge at Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore--among them Joseph and Jacques-Philippe's younger brothers Jean-Baptiste dit Lincour, Charles dit Bellefontaine dit Boisjoli, and Bonaventure dit Bellefontaine, and their families--may have joined other exiles farther up the shore at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Their sisters Marie-Charlotte, wife of Jean Dugas, and Angélique, wife of Pierre Part, also sought refuge on the Gulf shore.  In the late 1750s, Acadians still at Miramichi, to avoid another hard winter and mass starvation, began to surrender to British forces in the area.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In June1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians' surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  No Godins appeared on the list.  In the following months, more exiles in the region either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted five Godin families on Georges Island, Halifax.  They included Bonneavanture Gauden, actually Joseph dit Beauséjour's son Bonaventure Godin le jeune, wife Théotiste Breau, and their child, daughter Marie-Anne-Barbe; Barthélemy Bellfontaine, actually Bonaventure le jeune's older brother Barthélemy dit Bellefontaine, wife Marie-Claire Martin, and their child; Cherle Bellefontaine, his wife, and eight children, perhaps their uncle Charles dit Bellefontaine dit Boisjoli, wife Marie Melanson, and their children; Bonnaveantier Gauden, actually Bonaventure dit Bellefontaine, Gabriel's youngest son, second wife Marguerite Bergeron, and seven children; and Alexandre Lencour, actually Alexandre dit Lincour, wife Marie-Anne Bergeron, and their five children. 

The Godins who ended up in France endured life there as best they could.  Joseph dit Bellefontaine dit Beauséjour and his wife Marie-Anne Bergeron dit d'Amboise landed at Cherbourg in January 1760.  He died there, age 81, in December 1776.  François, son of Jean Godin and Marguerite Lapointe, born in Canada in c1740, ended up in England during the war with Britain, perhaps as a Canadian prisoner of war, and was repatriated to St.-Malo, France, in the spring of 1763.  He married Marie, daughter of Frenchman Julien Deslandes of Mesnil-Ozanne, diocese of Avranches, and widow of Pierre Collar, in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in November 1764.   None of the witnesses to their marriage were Acadian.  François and his wife were still at St.-Servan in 1770.  Another François Godin married Marie Souquet, likely a Frenchwoman, in c1768, probably at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Their daughter Marie-Françoise was baptized at St.-Suliac in March 1769.  Neither of her godparents was Acadian.  Some of the Godins in France spelled their surname Gaudin.  Jeanne Gaudin, widow of Jean Le Brun, married day laborer Élie, son of Michel Blanchet of Charente, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in September 1763.  Marguerite Gaudin married Olivier Michel, probably not an Acadian, at St.-Servan in c1773.  Four of their children were baptized at St.-Servan between 1774 and 1780.  Only one of their godparents was Acadian.  Louise Gaudin died at age 62 at La Rochelle in December 1780.  When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, none of the Godin/Gaudins in France chose to take it--perhaps because most of them were not Acadians, and the ones who were had married into French families.  Andrés, son of Étienne Bernard and Marguerite Gaudin of St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, married a native of Metz, Lorraine, at New Orleans in August 1792.  The priest who recorded Andrés's marriage did not say if his parents were in the city with him.  His father likely was a Frenchman, but one wonders if his mother was an Acadian Godin who had remained in France.  Pierre, son of Joseph Gaudin and Marie Dupuy, probably Acadians, was born at Bordeaux in September 1770.  He married Élisabeth Foucaud, probably a Frenchwoman.  They had at least three children.  In February 1815, during the final days of the First French Empire, Pierre remarried to Anne, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Giffard of Île Miquelon, in a civil ceremony at Bordeaux.  

At war's end, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  No Godins from Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas appear on lists of Acadian exiles being held in New England, New York, Pennsylvania, or South Carolina in the early 1760s.  In August 1763, colonial officials in Maryland counted Marie-Josèphe Bourg, her second husband Joseph Landry, and three of his chldren from his first marriage at Oxford on Maryland's Eastern Shore, but they failed to list Marie-Josèphe's daughter Susanne by her first husband Pierre-Joseph Godin dit Châtillon dit Préville.  That Susanne was still in the colony is attested to by her marriage to stepbrouther Vincent Landry probably at Oxford in October 1765.

To put as much distance as they could between themselves and the British forces on the lower St.-Jean, many of the Godins from Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas had gone on to Canada in the late 1750s .  After the war, some of the Godins being held in Nova Scotia joined their kinsmen there, forming, along with their cousins who had been there for decades, the largest concentration of Godins anywhere in the Acadian diaspora.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, the Godins of Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas also began the inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  The river exiles settled near their cousins at Québec City; at Batiscan, Bécancour, Gentilly, and Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pérade on the St. Lawrence above Québec; and at Beauport, Île d'Orleans, Kamouraska, Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pocatière, and L'Isle-Verte on the St. Lawrence below the city.  Godins who chose to remain in greater Acadia could be found in present-day New Brunswick at Petit-Rocher, Caraquet, Grand-Digue, and Memramcook on the Baie des Chaleurs and the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore; at French Village and Sunbury near their former homes at Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas in the interior of New Brunswick; and St.-Basile-de-Madawaska up and down Rivière St.-Jean.  In Nova Scotia, river Godins settled at Halifax and at Arichat on Île Madame.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.  

The Acadians still languishing in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue and other islands in the French Antilles, where exiles in the seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  One Godin family did choose to remain, but the others gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, French St.-Domingue, 20 were Godins from Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas.

Meanwhile, the Acadians in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  In June 1766, newlyweds Susanne Godin and Vincent Landry left Maryland for Louisiana as part of the first contingent of exiles to depart Baltimore and arrived at New Orleans via Cap-Français late that September.242

Gousman

Jean Gousman of Andalusia, Spain, was living with his Acadian wife Marie Barrieau at Annapolis Royal in 1755.  One wonders how long he had been in the colony, and if he was a sailor. 

Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s complicated the life of this new "Acadian."  The Gousmans eluded the British at Annapolis during the autumn of 1755 and, along with other Acadian refugees, spent a hard winter in the woods along the Fundy shore, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and headed north to a refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  In January 1760, at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge, Jean remarried to Rose, daughter of Acadians Jacques dit Jacquot Bonnevie dit Beaumont, fils and his first wife Marguerite Lord of Annapolis Royal and Île St.-Jean, so first wife Marie did not survived exile.  Late that June, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at the outpost, but Jean and his family were not among them.  The British held them and hundreds of other exiles surrendered or captured in the area in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  Rose gave Jean two children during confinement at Halifax:  Raphaël in c1762; and Rose Charlotte in c1764. 

At war's end, Jean and Rose, probably to escape British rule, chose to go to the French-controlled fishery island of Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Rose gave Jean more children on the island, including Gousman in c1766; and Étienne in c1767.  By 1767, French authorities were concerned that Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre had become overcrowded, so, obeying a royal decree, they coaxed the island fisher/habitants, including the Gousmans, to resettle in France.  In late autumn of 1767, Jean, Rose, and their children crossed to Le Havre in Normandy.  Most of the islanders returned to the Newfoundland islands the following year.  The Gousmans were not among them. 

Rose gave Jean more children probably at La Havre:  Joseph-Antoine in c1768; Jean-Baptiste in c1770; and Anne-Marie in c1772.  In 1772, French officials declared that "'Jean Gussman, native of Seville,'" was "'European,'" not Acadian, and he was denied the King's solde, or six-sol daily allowance, that sustained Acadian families in France.  In spite of this setback, in 1773 Jean, along with hundreds of other exiles languishing in the port cities, took his family to the interior of Poitou, where they hoped to become productive farmers again on a prominent nobleman's land near the city of Châtellerault.  Daughter Ludivine was baptized at Cenan south of Châtellerault in August 1774.  In October 1775, after two years of effort, Jean and his family, with other Poitou Acadians, down the Vienne and the Loire retreated to the port of Nantes, where they survived as best they could on what work Jean could find.  Son Jean-Thomas was born at nearby Chantenay in August 1783--nine children, six sons and three daughters, between 1762 and 1783, in greater Acadia and France. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Jean Gousman and his wife Rose Bonnevie agreed to take it.  That the French allowed Jean to go there, in fact, attested to his status as an Acadian.243

Granger

In 1755, descendants of Laurent Granger and Marie Landry could be found at Annapolis Royal, Minas, and in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Grangers at Minas were the first of the family to suffer the indignities of deportation.  In the fall of 1755, the British deported members of the family to Maryland and Virginia.  After reaching the Old Dominion in late fall and early winter, the exiles sent there suffered the indignity of being held in the lower James River aboard disease-infested transports until Virginia authorities decided what to do with them.  As winter approached, Governor Robert Dinwiddie ordered the exiles dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond, while he and the colony's political leaders pondered their fate.  The following spring, the Virginians sent their Acadian charges on to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several English ports.  The Grangers were held at Falmouth, with tragic consequences.  Between September 1756 and January 1757, most of the Granger family heads and many of their loved ones died of smallpox.  Over the next seven years, the sons and daughters of these departed family heads buried more of their loved ones and created families of their own in the Cornish port. 

Back in Nova Scotia, a few Granger families escaped the British at Minas and sought refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean or moved on to Canada.  At Annapolis Royal, at least two families ended up on a transport bound for Connecticut, but most of the Grangers in the Annapolis valley escaped the roundup there.  After enduring a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac, lower Rivière St.-Jean, or moved on to Canada. 

Living in territory controlled by France, Grangers on the French Maritime islands escaped the deportations in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the islands, rounded up most of the habitants there, including Grangers, and deported them to France.  Joseph Granger, fils, age 21, crossed to St.-Malo aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in September and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into the Breton port the first of November.  Joseph, fils was one of the lucky ones who survived the crossing.  His younger brother Jean also was deported from Île Royale to France, but he ended up at the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, not St.-Malo.  Marie-Madeleine Granger, age 27, crossed with husband Alain Bugeaud, age 30, and two of their children, age 7 and 3, on one of the five transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three of the ships, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Marie-Madeleine was the only member of her immediate family to survive the crossing aboard the Five Ships. 

Island Grangers did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Marie-Madeleine Granger remarried to Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Abraham Bourg and his second wife Marie Thériot and widow of Marguerite-Josèphe Dugas, at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo in June 1760.  She helped her second husband create a large famiy in the area.  Joseph Granger, fils settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  On 6 December 1759, he embarked on the ship Duc de Choiseul, probably as a privateer, was captured by the Royal Navy, held in England for the rest of the war, and repatriated to St.-Malo in 1763 with other Acadian exiles in England.  He married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Cyr and Marie-Josèphe Hébert, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in June 1763.  In April 1764, Marie gave Joseph, fils a son, Joseph-Contans, at St.-Servan.  In 1765, Joseph, fils, Marie, and their infant son, with other Acadian exiles, left St.-Malo aboard the frigate Aigle for Port-Louis in the Îles Malouines, today's Falkland Islands.  On one of the remote islands, Marie gave Joseph, fils three more children:  Marie in c1766; Anne in c1767; and Ignace, another daughter, in c1769.  In late December 1771, after the French abandoned the colony, Joseph, fils and his family returned to St.-Servan, where Marie gave him two more sons:  Jullien-Joseph in March 1773; and Jean-Baptiste in November 1774 but died the day of his birth.  Marie died at St.-Servan in February 1775, age 36, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth.  Joseph, fils remarried to fellow Acadian Anne Thériot, widow of Pierre Landry, at St.-Servan in February 1776.  Anne gave Joseph, fils three more children there:  Jeanne-Marie in November 1776; Françoise-Eulalie in May 1778; and Pierre-Marie in December 1779--nine children, four sons and five daughters by two wives, between 1764 and 1779, in France and the Malouines.  Joseph, fils died probably at St.-Servan-sur-Mer before September 1784, when a Spanish official counted Anne with two of their children in the lower Loire port of Nantes and called her a widow.  They evidently returned to the St.-Malo area soon after the counting.

Grangers from Minas also ended up Cherbourg in Normandy and the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, deported there either from a French Maritime island or directly from Nova Scotia.  Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Charles Granger of Minas, married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians François Testard and Marie Doiron of Île Royale, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in May 1759, and died there in May 1760, age 27.  Jean-Baptiste moved on to Martinique and died at Fort-Royal on the island in September 1763.  Joseph, Marie-Josèphe's older brother, had married Anne Dupuis probably at Minas.  They either had moved on to the French Maritimes in the 1750s and were deported to Cherbourg in late 1758, or they escaped the British roundup at Minas in the fall of 1755, sought refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean, were captured there by British forces in late 1758 or early 1759, and deported to Cherbourg from Halifax in 1759-60.  Anne succumbed to the rigors of exile, and Joseph remarried to another Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Porlier and Anne-Marie de St.-Étienne de La Tour of Annapolis Royal and widow of Gabriel Moulaison, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in August 1763.  They moved on to St.-Malo in early 1764 and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Anne gave Joseph a son there, Jean-Baptiste-Marie, in May 1764.  The family returned to Cherbourg in 1765.  Son Joseph-David was born there in May 1766.  Older son Jean-Baptiste-Marie died there in July 1766, age 2.  Joseph died at Cherbourg in May 1768, in his late 30s.  Daughter Madeleine-Luce was born posthumously in late May 1768.  Jean, a sailor, son of Pierre Granger and Marie-Anne Belliveau of Annapolis Royal, married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians René Landry and Marie-Josèphe Mius d'Entremont, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in April 1763.  Jean may have escaped the British roundup at Annapolis Royal in the fall of 1755, sought refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean, was captured by the British there, and, like Joseph of Minas, was deported to Cherbourg, or, judging by the surname of wife Marie-Josèphe, was captured at Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable in late 1758, held at Halifax, and deported to Cherbourg via England.  Son Louis was born at Cherbourg in September 1764; Isaac Aimable in May 1765; and Pierre-Clair-Amable in July 1772.  Another Jean, son of Laurent Granger, fils and Marie Bourg of Annapolis Royal, wife Madeleine Melanson, and their children evidently had escaped the British roundup at Annapolis in the fall of 1755, sought refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean, and ended up at Cherbourg.  French officials counted them at Cherbourg in 1761 and 1767.  Oldest son Jacques, called Jean de Port Royal by the recording priest, married Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Mius d'Entremont and Marie-Josèphe Moulaison of Cap-Sable, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in May 1764.  Madeleine and her family also had been captured by the British in 1758, at the Mius d'Entremont seigneurie at Pobomcoup, and deported to Cherbourg with the Rivière St.-Jean captives in 1759-60.  She gave Jacques at least three children in the Norman port:  Jean-Siriacq in December 1766; Sophie-Euphrosine in June 1770; and Polinne-Marie-Félicité in January 1773.  Jean and Madeleine's oldest daughter Marie-Josèphe married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Toussaint Blanchard and Angélique Bertrand, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in August 1769.  "Anonime" (Jean) Granger died at Cherbourg in April 1765.  The Très-Ste.-Trinité priest who recorded the burial did not name "Anonime's" parents, give his age, or mention a wife.  Yet another Jean, son of Joseph Granger, père of Minas, evidently followed older brother Joseph, fils to Île Royale after August 1752.  In late 1758, the British deported his brother to St.-Malo, but Jean ended up at Rochefort, where he made his living as a journalier, or day worker.  He married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Mazière and Marie Poirier of Île St.-Jean, in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in February 1764.  Meanwhile, Marguerite Granger died at Rochefort in October 1760, age 75, her age probably an exaggeration.  Marie-Madeleine Granger, widow of André Cirou, remarried to Pierre Robert, widow of Jeanne Arnauld, in St.-Louis Parish in April 1761.  Her brother Michel witnessed the marriage.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Claude Granger and Brigitte LeBlanc of Minas and widow of Jean-Baptiste Le Porteur, who had come to Rochefort probably from Belle-Île-en-Mer in c1766, married Laurent, fils, son of Laurent Bornicq and Marie Mounier of Sables d'Olonne, France, and a resident of Rochefort for 30 years, in St.-Louis Parish in February 1770.  Laurent, fils worked as a journalier. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including many Grangers, were repatriated to France.  Laurent Granger l'aîné, a widower, his brother Charles, Charles's wife Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, and Laurent and Charles's unmarried sisters Claire, Élisabeth-Luce, and Marie-Madeleine, arrived at St.-Malo from Southamption aboard L'Ambition in late May 1763.  They settled at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  A cousin named Laurent--called le jeune--also crossed from England to St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition, but he did not remain.  Soon after his arrival, Laurent le jeune and his wife Marie Thériot moved on to northwest Brittany to join their cousins at Morlaix.  Meanwhile, Laurent l'aîné, who did not remarry, died in a St.-Malo hospital in April 1765, age 37.  Charles-Benoît Granger, age 12, crossed on L'Ambition with his mother, Marguerite Gautrot, stepfather Simon Landry, 11-year-old brother Joseph Granger, a Leroy half-brother, and a Landry stepbrother, and settled at St.-Servan, where Charles, and perhaps brother Joseph, became sailors. 

The largest contingent of Grangers repatriated from England were the widows, sons, and daughters of the Granger heads of families who had died of smallpox at Falmouth in 1756-57.  In the spring of 1763, dozens of these Grangers, all cousins of the Laurents at St.-Servan, were sent not to St.-Malo but to Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  They included the three sons of Joseph Granger and their families:  Joseph-Simon, wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot, and their five children; Jean-Baptiste, wife Marie-Madeline Thériot, and their two children; and Amand, wife Marie-Marguerite Thériot, and their three children.  The three brothers' wives were sisters.  Brigitte LeBlanc, widow of Claude Granger, crossed to Morlaix with her daughters and three sons:  Joseph le jeune, wife Élisabeth Thériot, and their infant daugther; Mathurin, wife Marie-Geneviève Thériot, and their daughter; and Charles, still unmarried.  Amazingly, the two older brothers' wives were sisters of their first cousins' Thériot wives!  Two sons of François-Marie Granger also crossed to Morlaix:  Jean, wife Marie-Blanche Thériot (sister of the other five Thériot wives!), and their son; and Pierre, still a bachelor.  Françoise LeBlanc, widow of Charles Granger, crossed with her two daughters and two sons:  Charles, fils, wife Marie-Madeleine Daigre, and their two sons; and Jean-Jacques, still unmarried.  The grown children of Jean-Baptiste Granger also crossed to Morlaix, and cousin Laurent le jeune and his wife Marie Thériot joined them there from St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Mathurin Granger and Marie-Geneviève Thériot's daughter Anastasie-Prudence, born in England in May 1763 on the eve of their departure, died in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in July 1764, age 15 months.  Mathurin's daughter Marie-Modeste was born in that parish in August 1765.  Jean-Baptiste Granger and Marie-Madeleine Thériot's daughter Anastasie-Prudence was born in St.-Mélaine Parish, Morlaix, in June 1763 soon after the family's arrival, and their son Jean-Joseph was born there in August 1764.  Joseph-Simon Granger and Marie-Josèphe Thériot's twins Félix and Marie-Geneviève were born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in March 1764.  Laurent Granger le jeune and Marie Thériot's daughter Marie-Marguerite was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in March 1764.  Charles Granger, fils and Marie-Madeleine Daigre's son Pierre-Mathurin was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in July 1764.  Jean Granger and Marie-Blanche Thériot's daughter Anne-Marie was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in December 1764.  Amand Granger and Marie-Marguerite Thériot's son Luc was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in April 1765.  Marguerite, daughter of Claude Granger and Brigitte LeBlanc, married Jacques, son of Hypolithe Constant and Françoise Gautier of Angers, France, in St.-Martin de Champs Parish in November 1763.  Pierre, son of François-Marie Granger, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Germain Thibodeau and Judith LeBlanc of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in April 1765. 

The Grangers at Morlaix did not remain there.  One member of the family had much to do with their leaving.  Joseph-Simon Granger, one of the "deputies" among the exiles at Morlaix, had not cared much for the Breton port despite being welcomed by the city fathers when they arrived in the spring of 1763.  In July of that year, Joseph-Simon and two other deputies, Honoré LeBlanc and Joseph Trahan, with the urging of the Acadians' champion, Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, had gone to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany to look at land there.  The island had just been released from British capture and lay in ruin.  Despite this and other reservations, including local officials' insistence that the exiles be settled not in one place but in all four of the island's districts, the deputies recommended resettlement there.  Morlaix Acadians were nonetheless reluctant to go.  Finally, in early 1765, enough of them, along with fellow exiles in the St.-Malo settlements, agreed to the agricultural venture.  In November 1765, two and a half years after they had reached Morlaix, most, if not all, of the Grangers there followed dozens of fellow exiles to Belle-Île-en-Mer--78 families in all, a good portion of them Grangers.  There, they established nine enduring family lines--the largest concentration of Grangers not only in France, but in the entire Acadian diaspora.  As their handlers directed, they settled in the four major districts on the island:  Sauzon on the north coast, Le Palais on the east coast, Bangor in the western interior, and Locmaria on the southeast coast.  The were especially numerous in Le Palais.  Many more children were born to them, and many died.  Françoise LeBlanc, widow of Charles Granger, took her three unmarried children--Anne and Françoise, ages 24 and 18, and Jean-Jacques, age 13--to Kernest near Bangor.  Her married son Joseph-Simon also settled on the island near Le Palais, where his wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot gave him many more children in the district:  a second Félix in March 1766; Jean-Marie in November 1768; Jean-Simon in June 1771; Simon in December 1772; Marie-Françoise in July 1773[sic]; Pélagie-Félicité in May 1775 but died at age 10 months in February 1776; and a third Félix died at age 14 months in June 1785.  Marie-Marguerite Granger, born at Morlaix, died at Le Palais, age 19 months, in November 1765.  Her mother Marie Thériot gave her father Laurent Granger le jeune more children at Le Palais, Sauzon, and Bangor:  a second Marie-Marguerite at Le Palais in February 1766; Laurent, fils at Sauzon in January 1768; and Jean-Baptiste at Bangor in February 1770.  Son Luc, born at Morlaix, died at Le Palais, age 5, in March 1770.  One wonders why the family settled in so many districts.  Marie-Madeleine Thériot gave Jean-Baptiste Granger more children at Le Palais:  Jean-François in June 1767 but died the day after his birth; a second Jean-François in May 1769; and Jean-Baptiste, fils in December 1772.  Marie-Marguerite Thériot gave Amand Granger more children at Borstang near Le Palais:  Marie-Josèphe in March 1767; Marie-Élisabeth in January 1769; François-Xavier in February 1771; and Anne in November 1772.  Élisabeth Thériot gave Joseph Granger le jeune more children at Le Palais and Bangor:  Jean-Baptiste and a twin sister in January 1766, but Jean-Baptiste died at Bangor at age 7 1/2 in October 1773; and twins Charles-Benjamin and Marie-Modeste at Le Palais in September 1769, but Marie-Modeste died at Bangor at age 4 in September 1773.  Marie-Geneviève Thériot gave Mathurin Granger more children at Le Palais:  Joseph-Augustin in June 1767; Marie-Blanche in April 1771; Paul-Marie in June 1774; and Marie-Françoise in April 1776.  Marie-Blanche Thériot gave Jean Granger many more children at Bangor and Sauzon, where he raised tobacco and worked as a sous brigadier dans les fermes du Roy:  Jean-Baptiste at Bangor in March 1767 but died at Sauzon at age 6 1/2 in October 1773; twins Jean-Marie and Jean-Marie-Louis at Bangor in November 1768, but Jean-Marie died at Sauzon at age 12 in January 1780, and Jean-Marie-Louis died there at age 14 in September 1782; Joseph at Bangor in March 1771; Mathias at Sauzon in February 1773 but died there at age 5 in May 1778; Constance at Sauzon in April 1775 but died at age 4 in June 1779; Pierre-Marie in January 1777 but died at age 14 months in March 1778; Marie-Françoise in January 1779; Louis-Jean-Marie in July 1781; René-Marie in October 1783; an unnamed son in January 1785 but died at birth; and Élisabeth-Josèphine in July 1787.  Marie Thibodeau and Pierre Granger, recently married at Morlaix, had many children at Le Palais and Bangor:  Jean at Le Palais in January 1766; Pierre-Marie at Bangor in August 1768; Charles-François-Louis in July 1770; Marie-Marguerite in July 1772; Joseph-Simon in September 1774; Marie-Françoise in January 1776 but died at age 6 months the following July; Jean-Simon in February 1777; a second Marie-Françoise in January 1780 but died three days after her birth; Charles-Marie in February 1781; a third Marie-Françoise in March 1783; and Marie-Jeanne in December 1784.  Marie-Madeleine Daigre gave Charles Granger, fils more children at Bangor:  Jacques-Étienne in December 1766; Pierre-Michel in February 1769; Marie-Madeleine in October 1771; Marguerite-Susanne in August 1774; and Mathurin-Laurent in August 1777.  More new famillies were created, some of them marrying fellow Acadians:  Marie-Anne, 27-year-old daughter of Charles Granger, père, married fellow Acadian Michel Boudrot, 26-year-old widower of Angélique Poirier, at Bangor in January 1729.  Augustin-Vital, son of Joseph-Simon Granger, married Marie-Marthe, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Melanson and Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, at Locmaria in July 1783.  The couple farmed at nearby Antourneur, and then Augustin became an innkeeper at Le Palais.  Their son Simon was born at La Palais in June 1784.  Other Grangers married local islanders:  Marie-Josèphe, only daughter of Jean-Baptiste Granger, married Pierre, son of Julien Le Came and Catherine Querel, at Le Palais in January 1779.  Jean-Charles, son of  Charles Granger, fils, married Marie-Anne, also called Marie-Jeanne, Illiaquer at Bangor in c1783.  Their daughter Rosalie was born at Sauzon in September 1784; Marie-Marguerite at Bangor in November 1784[sic]; and Marguerite died in September 1786 two months after her birth.  And, of course, older folks passed on to their ancestors:  Joseph le jeune, son of Claude Granger, died at Bangor of complications from asthma in October 1773, age 41.  Françoise, daughter of René Granger, père and widow of Olivier Daigre III of Rivière-aux-Canards, died at Le Palais in May 1780, age 79.  Jean-Baptiste, son of Joseph Granger l'aîné, died at Le Palais in October 1785, age 56. 

By the early 1770s, French authorities were weary of providing for exiles still languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near Châtellerault in the interior province of Poitou.  Hundreds of Acadians went there in 1773 and 1774, a family of Grangers among them.  Like their cousins on Belle-Île-en-Mer, they hoped to become productive farmers again.  From Cherbourg came Jean Granger, wife Madeleine Melanson, and their children, but their experience in Poitou was not to their liking.  In December 1775, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower port of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government hand outs and what work they could find.  Jean Granger died at nearby Chantenay in May 1785, age 68.  Two of his daughters married into the Moulaison and Boudrot families there and at Nantes. 

When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 13 Grangers, a small fraction of the family still in the mother country, agreed to take it.  Most of the Grangers at Cherbourg and Rochefort chose to stay.  Only three of the many Grangers on Belle-Île-en-Mer elected to go to the Spanish colony, all of them wives married to fellow Acadians.  Charles-Benoît Granger, now a widower and still a sailor, and his brother Joseph, still a bachelor, had moved from St.-Servan to Chantenay in the 1770s and were crossing with two of their half-sisters and a nephew.  The only Granger family of any size that chose to go to Louisiana was led by a widow, Anne Thériot, whose young charges included a Granger son, two Granger daughters, and two Granger stepchildren from her husband's first marriage. 

Meanwhile, at war's end in North America, Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In 1763 in Connecticut, Charles Granger and his family of seven; the widow Granger and her family of three; Magdelaine Granger; widow Anne Belivaux and her daughter Margueritte Granger; and Magdelaine Granger, husband Jean-Baptiste Pourie, actually Poirier, and their dozen children appeared on a repatriation list circulating in the colonay that expressed the Acadians' desire "to go to France."  In July of that year in Maryland, Baptiste Grangé, wife Marie-Josèphe Gautrot, two sons--Baptiste, fils; and Joseph--and nine daughters--Madeleine, Marie, Françoise, Marguerite, Anastasie, Osite, Elizabeth, Modeste, and another Marie--appeared on a repatriation list that placed them at Georgetown/Fredericktown on the colony's Eastern Shore.  Baptiste, Marie-Josèphe, and at least one of their children died soon after the list was compiled, and the remaining children, "victims of small pox and twelve years of exile, asked officials to help in returning to Canada."  One wonders if they received it.  Also counted in the Chesapeake colony were Pierre Granger, wife Frausin Gautrot, two daughters--Anne and Marie--and four sons--Joseph, Jean-Baptiste, Pierre, and Claude--at Snow Hill, also on the Eastern Shore; and widow Magdne. Grangé at Oxford on the Eastern Shore.  In South Carolina in August 1763, Charles Granger, age 15 and evidently an orphan, was living with the family of Joseph Cormier and his wife Marie-Josèphe Girouard from Chignecto.  They, too, expressed their wish to resettle in French territory. 

Most of the Grangers exiled to New England chose to resettle in Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Laurent Granger began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Grangers could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Terrebonne, St.-Philippe-de-La-Prairie, L'Acadie, La-Prairie-de-la-Magdelaine, Trois-Rivières, L'Assomption, and St.-Jacques de l'Achigan; St.-Augustin on the lower St. Lawrence; Carleton in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs; Memramcook in present-day southeastern New Brunswick; and Windsor, formerly Pigiguit, in Nova Scotia.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten that the others existed.  

While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the war of vengeance to come.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's major planters, who hoped to supplement the labor of their slaves.  To sweeten the offer, they promised the exiles land of their own in the sugar colony.  And so hundreds of Acadians, including Grangers, came to St.-Domingue in 1763 and 1764.  The French sent the Grangers not to the naval base but to the interior community of Mirebalais near Port-au-Prince to work on indigo and coffee plantations.  Their experience there tended to be tragic, especially during the first year after their arrival.  Marie-Josèphe Granger of Annapolis Royal married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Germain Richard and Marguerite Daigre of Annapolis Royal, at Mirebalais in September 1764.  The marriage contract established the legitimacy of their two children.  Sadly, Joseph died in November, age 38.  Marie-Josèphe remarried to Antoine Machard of Fue, Burgogne, France, at Mirebalais in January 1766.  Marguerite Granger died at Mirebalais in November 1764, age 19.  Marie Granger, wife of Charles Perrier, died there in December, age 40.  Madeleine Granger, wife of Jean-Baptiste Poirier, died at Mirebalais in March 1765, age 46.  Marguerite Granger, Marie-Josèphe's older sister, married Nicolas-Pierre, son of merchant Nicolas Delaunay, at Mirebalais in June 1765 but died there the following December, age 35.  Another Marie-Josèphe Granger, wife of Jean-Baptiste Dupuy, died at Mirebalais in October or November 1765, age 35.  Nevertheless, when Acadians, including Grangers, from Halifax and Maryland came through Cap-Français in the mid- and late 1760s on their way to New Orleans, none of the Grangers still in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  Jean Granger died at Mirebalais in February 1770, age 14.  One wonders how many of his Granger kinsmen were still in the colony after 1770. 

Meanwhile, the Acadians in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Six Grangers were part of the first two contingents of exiles who reached the Spanish colony from Baltimore in 1766 and 1767.307

Gravois

In 1755, descendants of Joseph Gravois of Port-Royal could be found at Chignecto and Minas.  None had moved on to the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this small family to the winds. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Descendants of Joseph Gravois, fils and Marie Cyr may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Gravoiss may have been among the local Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  The fate of many of them in the fall of 1755 was exile to Georgia or South Carolina. 

The Gravoiss, however, were among the Chignecto Acadians who escaped the British and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Later in the decade, some of them joined hundreds of other Acadian refugees at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Jean Gravois's son Joseph le jeune was born at Restigouche in November 1759 and baptized there the following May.  The boy's godfather was Marin Gravois.  Their respite from British oppression ended soon after the boy's baptism.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, Gravoiss among them.  They included militia Lieutenant Pre., or Pierre Gravois, and his family of six; and brother Jean and his family of three.  The British held them and other exiles captured in the region in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted Pierre, wife Marie-Rose Bourgeois, and five children; and brother Jean, wife Marie-Anne Bugeaud, and two children in the compound on Georges Island, Halifax harbor.  Joseph, fils may have died at Halifax before the counting, and older sons Pierre and Jean soon after. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, three were sons of former lieutenant Pierre Gravois. 

Meanwhile, Pierre and Jean Gravois's younger brother Joseph III fell into British hands.  While still in his teens, he evidently had moved from Chignecto to Minas, with tragic consequences.  In the fall of 1755, when he was 16, the British deported him along with hundreds of other Minas Acadians to Virginia.  In mid-November, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered Acadians from one vessel moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and Virginia's House of Burgesses made their decision ... the Acadians must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and many died of smallpox.  In May 1763, after prolonged negotiations between British and French authorities, Joseph III and hundreds of other Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  By then, nearly half of the Acadians in England had died.  Joseph III, one of the lucky survivors, now in his early 20s and still unmarried, crossed from Bristol, where he may have been held, to St.-Malo on La Dorothée.  He settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of the Breton port, where he married Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Bourg and his first wife Jeanne Hébert of Grand-Pré, in August 1763, not long after his arrival.  They may have known one another in England.  They settled in the nearby suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, but they did not remain.  In February 1767, Joseph took his family, including his in-laws, to England and was counted at Windsor on the upper Thames in 1770.  By the following year, they had returned to greater Acadia.  They settled first at Baie St.-Marie--today's St. Mary's Bay--in western Nova Scotia, where Joseph III may have engaged in fishing and the coastal trade.  They were still there in 1774.  Again, they did not remain.  From 1775 to 1784, Joseph and his family resided at the British-controlled fishery center of Carleton in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, not far from where his brothers had found refuge 20 years earlier.  And, again, they did not remain.  Perhaps unwilling to live under British rule any longer, Joseph and his growing family moved to another fishing center, this one on Île St.-Pierre, a French-controlled island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, in the mid-1780s.  It was from there, in 1788, that they sailed to Spanish Louisiana on Joseph's own schooner, the Brigite--the only Acadians to emigrate to Louisiana directly from greater Acadia.  

The youngest Gravois brother, Augustin, did not go to France or Louisiana.  He and his family were among the Acadians who had remained in Nova Scotia after the war.  By c1775, they had settled at St. Mary's Bay, where brother Joseph III and his family had lived before moving on to Gaspésie.  One wonders if Augustin and his family remained in Nova Scotia.  One thing is certain--they did not join his brothers Pierre and Joseph III in Spanish Louisiana.244

Grossin

In 1755 descendants of brothers Michel and Pierre Grossin and their wives, sisters Marie and Cécile Caissie, could be found on Île St.-Jean.  Living on an island controlled by France, the Grossins escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, but they did not escape the terrors of Le Grand Dérangement.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France. 

The Grossins were among the families who were packed aboard one or more of the five hired transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Most of the Grossins survived the crossing, but Michel, père did not; he died at sea.  Two of his children who survived the crossing--Jacques-Christophe, age 20, and Françoise, age 9--died in the hospital at Paramé, a suburb of St.-Malo, in April 1759, a few months after they reached the Breton port.  Michel, père's daughter Marie-Louise, called Louise, age 25, wife of Pierre Quimine, crossed on one of the Five Ships with two of young daughters.  Louise and Pierre survived the crossing, but both of their daughters died at sea.  Pierre Grossin, père and his family also crossed in one of the Five Ships and lost two of their children:  Pierre, fils, age 7, died at sea; and Rose, age 11, died in the same hospital as her cousins in April 1759.  Pierre, père, his wife, and their seven other children survived the crossing, but Pierre, père died at St.-Malo soon after they got there.  Pierre, père's son Michel le jeune and his wife Marie-Josèphe Chiasson also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  She was pregnant when they left Chédabouctou in late November.  Son Michel, fils was born on 2 February 1759, soon after they reached the Breton port but died 18 days later.  Wife Marie-Josèphe died in the hospital at Paramé in early June 1759, leaving Michel le jeune a widower. 

Pierre Grossin, père's widow Cécile Caissie settled at Paramé, where, in June 1760, at age 46, she remarried to Nicolas, fils, 37-year-old son of Nicolas Bouchard and Anne Veau dit Sylvain of St.-Thomas, Canada, and widower of Acadian Marie-Anne Chiasson.  Nicolas and his family had been counted at Rivière-du-Nord-Est on Île St.-Jean in August 1752, when Cécile and her family were counted at nearby Étang-St.-Pierre, so one wonders if he had known the Grossins back on the island.  Cécile gave him no more children.  Her son Michel Grossin le jeune also settled at Paramé and remarried to Frenchwoman Françoise, daughter of Augustin Renault and Marguerite Dagorne, at St.-Malo in February 1760, less than a year after his first wife died.  Françoise gave him at least two children at Paramé:  Pierre-Michel in April 1761; and Jeanne-Françoise-Nicolle in January 1763. 

The war over, in April 1764 Cécile Caissie, second husband Nicolas Bouchard, and their blended family left France for the new French colony of Guiane on the north coast of South America aboard Le Fort.  Michel Grossin le jeune, his wife, and children followed his mother and stepfather to Guiane aboard the same ship.  His unmarried brothers Jacques and Louis and unmarried sisters Cécile, Madeleine, and Marguerite also went to the tropical colony, along with married sister Anne and her husband François-Jean, son of Jean-Baptiste Bard and Josèphe Talon of St.-François, Québec, who she had married in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in April 1764, on the eve of their departure.  Cécile's husband Nicholas was an early casualty of the venture.  She remarried--again--to Frenchman Alexis, son of Jean-Isaac Hilairet and Marie David of Lansac, Sainte, France, in St.-Sauveur Parish in the Cayenne district in July 1765.  Cécile died at St.-Sauveur in August 1768, age 54, surrounded by her loved ones.  The decision to go to the jungles of South America proved to be a fatal one for son Jacques Grossin as well; he died at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district in March 1765, age 22.  He did not marry.  In that same month, French officials took a census of the settlers at Sinnamary.  Among them were Marie Grossin, veuve Belier, age 40, of St.-Servan, and her children Pierre, age 16; Julien, age 14; and Jacqueline, age 12, all named Cousin and all born at Louisbourg.  One wonders how Marie and her children were kin to Michel le jeune and his family.  Michel le jeune and Françoise had at least one more child in the tropical colony, Joseph, born at St.-Sauveur, Cayenne, in November 1766.  Brother Louis survived the rigors of life in the tropics and married Madeleine Lope, widow of Jean dit Maroc Guilbert, at St.-Joseph de Sinnamary in May 1781.  One wonders what was the fate of Michel le jeune and his sisters in the distant colony.  Anne died probably at Cayenne.  Husband François-Jean Bard returned to St.-Malo via Brest in July 1769 and remarried to a widow at St.-Servan in January 1770. 

Meanwhile, Michel Grossin, père's daughter Marie married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians Charles Dugas and Marie Benoit, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in February 1768.  Marie's older sister Louise died probably at St.-Servan by January 1770, when husband Pierre Quimine remarried to Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Charles Dugas and Marie Benoit, at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Servan, so Marie became her former brother-in-law's sister-in-law again.  Marie, husband Jean-Baptiste, and two of their children were part of the settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou in the early 1770s and were among the Poitou Acadians who, after two years of effort, retreated to the lower Loire port of Nantes in November 1775.  They survived there on government handouts and whatever work Jean-Baptiste could find as a day laborer.  Meanwhile, Marie's brother Michel, fils married Frenchwoman Cécile-Julienne, daughter of Pierre Troude and Suzanne Picart, at St.-Malo in December 1768.  Their son Michel-Pierre was born at St.-Malo in December 1769.  They were still in that city in 1772. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Marie Grossin and husband Jean-Baptiste Dugas agreed to take it.  Other members of her family--the ones who took French spouses or had not gone to Guiane--chose to remain in France.  This included Marie's younger sister Henriette, wife of Frenchman François Galien.  Henriette and François had signed up to go to Louisiana aboard La Ville d'Archangel, which left St.-Malo in mid-August 1785, but a note on the passenger list states:  "la famille Gallien n'embarque pas," that is, the Galien family did not embark, so older sister Marie Grossin was the only member of her family to emigrate to the Spanish colony.245

Guédry

In 1755, descendants of Claude Guédry dit Grivois dit La Verdure and his second wife Marguerite Petitpas could be found at Annapolis Royal; l'Assomption, Pigiguit, and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; Mirliguèche/Lunenburg on the Atlantic coast; and on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Guédrys at Pigiguit were the first of the family to suffer the indignities of deportation.  In the fall of 1755, the British deported two families, one of them recently returned from Île Royale, to Maryland.  A large family of Guédrys from Annapolis Royal ended up on a transport bound for Massachusetts.  Most of their kinsmen at Annapolis, however, eluded the redcoats.  After a hard winter in the hills above the Fundy shore, they crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac or lower Rivière St.-Jean before moving on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or to Canada via the St.-Jean portage.  In the late 1750s, after years of suffering in overcrowded refugee camps along the Gulf, at least one family made its way north to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Things got only worse for them in the following years. 

One cluster of Guédrys in British Nova Scotia had no chance to escape the British dragnet.  In 1749, heeding the threats of Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, the French agitator, about what would happen to them if they remained under British rule, Guédrys from l'Assomption, Pigiguit, and Annapolis Royal followed dozens of other peninsula Acadians to French-controlled Île Royale.  In March and April 1752, a French official counted members of the family at Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse in the big island's interior and at Baie-des-Espagnols and Rivière-de-Miré on the Atlantic shore.  Not all of these volunteer refugees were content with their new home in the French Maritimes.  As the Guédrys at Baie-des-Espagnols explained to British authorities two years later, "the Land there" on the island "being so very bad they were utterly incapable of subsisting their Families, and had applied to the Governor of Louisbourg for leave to return to their former Habitations, to which he had consented."  By 9 October 1754, they had made their way by boat from Louisbourg to Halifax.  They and their kinsmen beseeched Lieutenant-Governor Lawrence and his Council to let them return to their former lands.  After hearing their case, the Council agreed to the request only if they "voluntarily" took "the Oath of Allegiance to His Majesty," George II, "unqualified by any reservation"--a hard request for self-respecting Acadians.  However, "it appearing that they were in very great distress being intirely destitute of all necessitous," the Council minutes noted, they "very cheerfully" took the hated oath and were issued rations to get them through the winter.  Lawrence sent them not to Pigiguit but to Mirliguèche on the coast west of Halifax, where Guédrys and their Mi'kmaq kin had lived decades earlier and where Foreign Protestants had built the settlement of Lunenburg the year before.  When Lawrence and his Council authorized the deportation of the Acadians in Nova Scotia the following July, the Guédrys and their kinsmen at Mirliguèche, despite having taken the unqualified oath, did not escape the hard hand of British oppression.  In September 1755, as their cousins at Minas and Annapolis were being herded onto transports, redcoats from Halifax gathered up the Acadians at Mirliguèche, including Guédrys, and held them in the prison compound on Georges Island in Halifax harbor.  In December, during the second round of deportations, the British herded 50 of the captives from Mirliguèche, including Guédrys, aboard the sloop Providence and deported them to North Carolina--the only Acadians who actually made it to that seaboard colony.  They landed at Edenton on Albemarle Sound in March 1756 and remained there for at least four years.  In c1760, probably after learning of the fall of Canada, colonial authorities, perhaps tired of the expense of caring for them, allowed them to join their fellow exiles in Pennsylvania. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Guédrys remaining on the French Maritime islands were untouched by the roundups of their cousins in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the islands and deported them to France.  Like their cousins at Minas and Annapolis, some of the island Guédrys managed to elude the British.  Jacques dit Grivois and his family at Bédec on the southwest coast of Île St.-Jean evidently crossed Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore with other Acadians living in the island's remote western communities.  Younger brother Jean dit Grivois and his family, perhaps living near Jacques in one of these communities, also escaped the British and sought refuge on the mainland.  The Guédrys at Baie des Espagnols and Rivière-de-Miré were gone, languishing in North Carolina, but members of the family still at Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse in the interior of Île Royale and at several other points on the coast of Île St.-Jean were not as lucky.  Claude Guédry le jeune, age 34, wife Anne Lejeune, age 34, and their five sons--Jean-Baptiste, age 8; Joseph-Marie, age 6; Pierre-Janvier, age 5; Charles, age 3, and Augustin, age 10 months--were rounded up at Anse-au-Matelot on the southern shore of Île St.-Jean.  They crossed aboard one of the five deportation transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  All of the family survived the voyage, but wife Anne and the two youngest sons died in February and April 1759 from the rigors of the crossing.  Marie-Josèphe Guédry, age 40, wife of Benjamin Mius d'Azy, was rounded up at Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse with her second husband and five children, ages 10 to 2, were evidently transferred to Île St.-Jean, if they had not already gone there, and also placed aboard on one of the Five Ships.  She was the only one who survived the crossing.  Her husband and all of her children died at sea.  Marie-Josèphe's brother Charles le jeune, age 33, wife Madeleine Hébert, age 32, and their two children--Marguerite-Victoire, age 6; and Antoine, age 4--also were rounded up at Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse.  They, too, were evidently transferred to Île St.-Jean, if they had not already gone there, and put aboard the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy, survived the mid-December storm, took refuge at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until the second week of March 1759.  Madeleine was pregnant when they left the Maritimes.  Daughter Laurence-Anne was born aboard ship on New Year's Day.  All of the family survived the crossing, though wife Madeleine's health may have been ruined.  She died a year and a half later.  A Guédry from Cobeguit, deported to France from Île St.-Jean, ended up at the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay. 

Island Guédrys did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area and at Rochefort.  Claude le jeune took his family to Châteauneuf on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo, where he and his oldest sons watched their mother and younger brothers die.  Claude remarried to another Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians François Moyse and Marie Brun and widow of Joseph LeBlanc, at nearby St.-Suliac in February 1762.  This Anne gave Claude eight more children there:  Marie-Cécile in May 1763; François-Xavier in September 1764; Suliac-Charles in November 1765; Malo-Bénonie in January 1767; Pierre-Olivier in March 1768; Anne-Josèphe in August 1769 but died at age six weeks the following October; Pierre-Claude in June 1771; and Olivier in c1777.  Meanwhile, Claude's three oldest sons created families of their own in the area.  Second son Joseph married Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Comeau and Marguerite Hébert, at St.-Suliac in November 1772.  Third son Pierre-Janvier married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Lebert and Marie Lapierre, at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river in February 1773.  Oldest son Jean-Baptiste married Marguerite, another daughter of Paul Lebert and Marie Lapierre, at Plouër in January 1774.  Cousin Charles le jeune took his family to Bonaban near La Gouesnière in the countryside east of St.-Malo, where wife Madeleine died in April 1760, age 34.  Charles remarried to Agnès, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Bourg and Françoise Dugas, at St.-Suliac in January 1761.  She gave him five more children at La Gouesnière and in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer:  Pierre-Jean in February 1762, Joseph in March 1766, Jean-Pierre in January 1768, Jacques-Servais in March 1770, and Théodore-Félix in November 1773.  Marie-Josèphe Guédry, widow of Amand Breau and Charles-Benjamin Mius d'Azy, and the only member of her immediate family to survive the crossing to St.-Malo on one of the Five Ships, remarried, in her early 40s, to Claude, son of fellow Acadians Jean LeBlanc and Jeanne Bourgeois and widower of Marie-Josèphe Longuépée, at St.-Servan in February 1763.  Claude, a former delegate to the Nova Scotia Council in Halifax, had crossed from the Maritimes to St.-Malo with his family aboard the transport Tamerlane, also a part of the 12-ship convoy.  His first wife died at St.-Malo the year before their marriage.  In late 1765, he took Marie-Josèphe and his three sons from his first marriage to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of England, where many of the exiles from England, recently repatriated, were going.  The move proved fatal for Marie-Josèphe.  She died at Bordicado near Sauzon on the north end of the island in August 1767, age 47. 

Meanwhile, at Rochefort, Marguerite Guédry, widow of Pierre Breau, remarried to French colonial soldier Claude-Gabriel, called Gabriel, Chaperon in Notre-Dame Parish in January 1761.  Marie, daughter of Pierre Guédry, fils and Agnès Triel dit Laperrière of Cobeguit, Charles le jeune's sister and Marguerite's niece, married local Frenchman Pierre Camus, a journalier, or day laborer, widow of Marie Cornet, in Notre-Dame Parish in November 1763.  They did not remain at Rochefort.  Soon after their marriage, the couple ventured to the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  The move proved fatal for husband Pierre Camus, if he had not died at Rochefort.  On 1 March 1765, French officials at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district of Guiane counted Marie Guédry, widow, age 20, with her 17-year-old sister Marguerite, along with another Marguerite Guédry, age 36, likely her aunt who had married the French soldier at Rochefort.  The census said nothing of the older Marguerite's husband, so she, too, may have been a widow at the time of the counting.  The following July, Marie remarried at Sinnamary to François, 23-year-old son of August Cadet and Marie-Louise Des Roziers of St.-Louis Parish, Québec.  Two years later, in July 1767, at Sinnamary, younger sister Marguerite, described as a "minor daughter," married François, fils, son of fellow Acadians François Vécot and Marie Dubocq of Île St.-Jean.  Both sisters bore children for their respective husbands, and many of the children died young.  In September 1778, sister Marguerite, "habitant of the Anse de Mapebo under the leeward side of the said parish" of Sinnamary, died there at age 28.  Sister Marie's second husband François Cadet died in "the district of Iracoubo," age 42, in June 1784.  Marie, called Marie-Josèphe, died at Sinnamary in April 1787, age 43.  One wonders what happened to her and sister Marguerite's aunt Marguerite Guédry.  Did the older Marguerite return to France after the March 1765 counting, as did many of the Acadians who had gone to the tropical colony, or, like her nieces, did she spend her final days in South America.

Back in France, by the early 1770s, French authorities, weary of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities, offered to settle them on land owned by an influential nobleman near Châtellerault in the interior province of Poitou.  Hundreds of Acadians went there in 1773 and 1774, Guédrys among them, and did their best to become productive farmers again.  Claude le jeune of St.-Suliac did not go to Poitou in 1773 and 1774, but his married sons did.  Wife Marie-Josèphe Lebert gave Pierre-Janvier Guédry a son, Pierre-Joseph, in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in October 1774.  Wife Madeleine Comeau gave Joseph Guédry a daughter, Anne-Rosalie-Marguerite, at Monthoiron south of Châtellerault in December 1774.  Wife Marguerite Lebert gave Jean-Baptiste Guédry a daughter, Marie-Jeanne, in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in January 1775. 

In November and December 1775, after two years of effort, the Guédrys retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted on governments handouts and what work they could find.  Charles le jeune's youngest son Théodore died at Nantes in January 1776, age 2.  His oldest daughter Marguerite-Victoire, by first wife Madeleine, married Jean-Charles, son of fellow Acadians François Boudrot and Angélique Doiron of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, in August 1780.  Charles le jeune's second son Pierre-Jean, by second wife Agnès, married local woman Louise Blandin at Nantes by September 1784.  Meanwhile, Charles le jeune lost second wife Agnès Bourg at Les Haut-Pavee in St.-Similien Parish in October 1782; she was 46.  He did not remarry.  His oldest son Antoine, by first wife Madeleine Hébert, had followed the family to Poitou and Nantes, but he did not remain in the lower Loire port.  In the late 1770s, Antoine went to North America, perhaps as a privateer, and married an Hébert widow at New Orleans in December 1780.  Meanwhile, at Nantes, cousin Joseph Guédry's wife Madeleine Comeau gave him more children in and around the port:  Marie-Jeanne in St.-Donatien Parish in May 1776; Joseph at nearby Chantenay in July 1783; and Reine-Élisabeth at Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, in January 1775.  Their oldest daughter Marguerite died at Chantenay in March 1778, age 3.  Brother Pierre-Janvier Guédry's wife Marie-Josèphe Lebert gave him more children at Chantenay:  Jean-Charles in October 1776 but died at age 6 1/2 in March 1783; Marie-Rose in April 1779; Jean-Pierre in July 1781; and Joseph-Firmin in October 1784.  Brother Jean-Baptiste's wife Marguerite Lebert gave him more children at Nantes and Chantenay:  Pierre-Jean-Marie in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in November 1776; Louise-Geneviève in January 1779; and Marguerite-Félicité at Chantenay in February 1785.  Jean-Baptiste's oldest daughter Marie-Jeanne, born in Poitou, also died at Nantes, age unrecorded. 

One Guédry family came to France by a roundabout way.  Jean dit Grivois Guédry and wife Marie LeBlanc of Île St.-Jean, after escaping the British on the island in 1758, took refuge at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  After they surrendered there, the British held them in the prison compound at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Beauséjour, Chignecto, where they were counted with two sons in August 1763.  When they were free to go, they chose to resettle not in greater Acadia, Canada, or Louisiana, but on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  French officials counted Jean dit Grivois and his family on the island in 1766, but they did not remain.  The following year, overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre compelled French authorities, obeying a royal decree, to send the fisher/habitants to France, Jean and his family among them.  Many of the island Acadians returned to Miquelon the following year, but Jean and his family remained in France.  Son Jacques was born there in c1768.  In September 1784, Spanish officials counted Jean dit Grivois and his family at Nantes, near their Guédry cousins already there.

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 31 Guédrys--all of the ones at Nantes, including Charles le jeune and Jean dit Grivois; and Claude le jeune and his family at St.-Servan-sur-Mer--agreed to take it.  One suspects that Charles le jeune and his children were especially eager to get to New Orleans, where son Antoine had been living for at least five years. 

Meannwhile, in North America, Guédrys who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and found refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore suffered more hardships in the final years of the war with Britain.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On 24 October 1760, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 exiles still at Restigouche, Guédrys among them.  Jean dit Grivois of Annapolis Royal, Baie des Espagnols, and Île St.-Jean--the officials used Jean's dit as his surname--appears on the list with his family of five.  The British held them and other exiles captured in the region at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, Chignecto, until the end of the war.  They then chose to resettle on Île Miquelon. 

At war's end, Guédrys being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In June 1763 in Pennsylvania, several Guédrys appeared on a repatriation list circulated in the Quaker colony, all of them close kin and recently arrived from North Carolina:  Ursule Guédry, husband Paul Boutin, and their six children; her younger brother Joseph, wife Magdelaine, and their three children; and their youngest brother Pierre, described as a "boy" (he would have been age 21!).  There also was a large Guédry family--that of Jean of Annapolis Royal--counted in Massachusetts that year.  In August 1763 in Maryland, two Guèdry families appeared on a repatriation list circulated at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac:  Joseph Gaidris, wife Marie Benoist, sons Gabriel and Joseph, and daughter Geneviève; and his cousin Jean Gaidris, wife Anne Dupuis, sons Firmin and Jean and daughters Magdelaine and Monique.  The Guédrys and Boutins recently counted in Pennsylvania joined their cousins in the Chesapeake colony soon after the August list was compiled. 

Most of the Acadians in New England, including the Guédrys, chose to go to Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Claude Guédry dit Grivois dit Laverdure began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, they could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at L'Assomption, Repentigny, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, and Montréal.  In Nova Scotia, they settled at Windsor, formerly Pigiguit; and at Météghan near the mouth of Baie Ste.-Marie, today's St. Mary's Bay, on the province's western shore.  One of the Guédrys who grew up on the upper St. Lawrence did not remain there.  In the late 1780s or early 1790s, after he came of age, Olivier, son of Jean Guédry of St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, ventured probably via the Great Lakes and the upper Mississippi to Spanish Louisiana, where he married an Acadian widow in the Attakapas District and created a family of his own.  His prairie neighbors called him Olivier dit Canada to distinguish him from a Guédry couisn with the same given name.  However, the Acadiennes of Canada who remained in their far-northern homes typically lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles to the south, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

The Guédrys still in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including a family of Guédrys, chose to go to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least two were Guédrys.

Meanwhile, the Acadians in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  In April 1767, as part of the second expedition of Acadians leaving Maryland for the Spanish colony, Ursule Guédry, her Boutin husband, and their children left Baltimore for New Orleans, which they reached in July.  That December, Ursule's younger brother Pierre and his Dupuis wife, along with the widow of brother Jean and her Guédry children, left Port Tobacco in the third expedition from Maryland and reached New Orleans in February 1768.  Ursule, Pierre, and Jean's other brother Joseph and his wife Madeleine also emigrated to the Spanish colony in the late 1760s.  Another Joseph Guédry, wife Marie Benoit, sons Gabriel and Joseph, and daughter Geneviève either remained in Maryland or emigrated somewhere other than Louisiana.308

Guénard

In July 1712, James, son of Andrew Gainier and Margaret Benard of Dublin, Ireland, was serving as a soldier with the British army when he married Cécile, daughter of Pierre Cellier and Marie-Josèphe-Aimée Lejeune of Minas, at Beaubassin.  James later called himself Jacques Guénard dit Gaudereau, signifying his entry into Acadian society.  Jacques and Cécile had at least three children, a son and two daughters.  Their older daughter Marie-Rose married into the Bastien family.  Jacques and Cécile died before 13 July 1742, when their daughter married at Beaubassin.  Son Timothée, born in Maryland and baptized at Annapolis Royal in October 1716 and again in November 1718, married Anne-Marie, daughter of Pierre Thibodeau le jeune and Anne-Marie Aucoin, probably at Annapolis Royal in c1744.  Le Grand Dérangement of 1755 scattered this small family to the winds. 

One historical record hints that in the autumn of 1755, British forces deported Timothée Guénard and his family from Annapolis Royal to Massachusetts, where colonial officials counted them in 1761.  The colonial record notes that Timthy Symno, age 40 (Timothée Guénard would have been age 45); Nanny his wife, age 38; Ta___, age 15; Joseph, age 12; Peter, age 10; Oliver, age 8; Philemn., age 6; Ollex, age 5; and Paul, age 6 months," resided at Marlborough, west of Boston, that year.  Following this scenario, one can surmise that when the war with Britain ended in 1763, the family made its way back to Nova Scotia to reunite with fellow Acadians there.  Timothée may not have had close relatives in the prison compounds of Nova Scotia, but wife Anne-Marie Thibodeau was kin to Acadian resistance fighters Alexandre and Joseph Broussard dit Beausoleil of Petitcoudiac, whose wives, her first cousins, were Thibodeau sisters. The Broussards, Thibodeaus, and many of their kin were being held with dozens of other exiles on Georges Island, Halifax, and in other compounds at Chignecto, Pigiguit, Annapolis Royal, and Chédabouctou as they contemplated their collective futures.

Another, more likely scenario, is that Timothée, Anne-Marie, and their children escaped the British roundup at Annapolis Royal in the fall of 1755, spent a hard winter in the woods above the Fundy shore, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac or lower Rivière St.-Jean before moving on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  They may have been among the survivors of the terrible winter of 1756-57 in Camp Espérance at Mirmamichi.  By 1760, they made their way north to the French stronghold at Restgouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  And then the war caught up to them in earnest.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British marshaled their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restgouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, a French officer, on the eve of formal surrender, counted 1,003 exiles still at Restigouche, including Timothée Guemard and his family of six.  Along with hundreds of other Acadians captured or surrendered in the region, the British held them in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In October 1762, British officials counted Timothée Guenar and his family of five at Fort Edward, Pigiguit. 

However they may have gotten there, at war's end, the Guénards and other Acadians being held in Nova Scotia faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, three were Guénards.246

Guérin

By 1755, most, if not all, of the descendants of François Guérin and Anne Blanchard were living in the French Maritimes, so when the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the summer and fall of 1755, the island Guérins were safe for now.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the islands and deported them to France. 

The crossing to St.-Malo devastated the family.  Jérôme's daughter Marguerite, wife of Pierre Thériot, lost her husband and three of their five children aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in late summer and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limpted into St.-Malo harbor at the beginning of November.  The rigors of the voyage soon caught up to her:  she died in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer soon after her ship reached the Breton port.  According to the Duc Guillaume passenger list, sister Françoise, wife of François Thériot, also died on the same vessel (in truth, she survived the crossing).  Of Françoise's dozen Thériot children, only three of them survived the crossing!  Six children of Jérôme's son Pierre also crossed on Duc Guillaume.  Two of them--Josèphe and Agricole--perished, while Gertrude, Joseph, Louis, and Pierre, fils survived the crossing.  Soon after reaching the mother country, Louis and Pierre, fils moved from St.-Malo to Lorient in southern Brittany to work as sailors.  Pierre's sister Isabelle and her family also died aboard Duc Gillaume.  Brother François, his wife Geneviève Mius, and all their children perished on the transport Duke William, which that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December.  François's sister Henriette, age 45, wife of Olivier Boudrot, age 47, sailed with her family aboard one of five transports in the 11-ship convoy that, despite the mid-December storm that sank the Duke William, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Like brother François and so many of her nieces and nephews, Henriette also perished on the voyage, along with four of her own children.  Only husband Olivier and a 15-year-old daughter survived the crossing.  Brother Jean-Baptiste Guérin, age 36, his wife Marie-Madeleine Bourg, age 35, and four of their children also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Jean-Baptiste and Marie-Madeleine survived the crossing, but two of their children--daughter Marie-Madeleine, age 4; and son Xavier, age 2--died at sea.  Sons Jean-Pierre, age 9, and Jérôme, age 6, survived the crossing.  Jean-Baptiste's younger brother Dominique, age 36, his wife Anne LeBlanc, age 31, and six of their children crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Dominique and Anne survived the crossing, but two of their children--Anastasie, age 10; and Françoise, age 3--died at sea, and two more daughters--Anne-Josèphe, age 12; and Marie, age 3 month--died in a hospital at St.-Malo soon after reaching the Breton port.  Only daughter Marguerite, age 8, and son Joseph, age 6, survived the rigors of the crossing.  Youngest brother Charles Guérin, age 34, his wife Marguerite Henry, age 34, and four of their children also sailed aboard one of the Five Ships.  Charles died in a St.-Malo hospital two months after his arrival.  Marguerite survived the crossing, but half of their children--sons Marin, age 8; and Alexis, age 5 months--did not.  Only daughters Tarsile, age 11, and Marguerite-Josèphe, age 5, made it to France.  Marie, age 59, one of Jérome Guérin's oldest daughters and wife of Claude Thériot, ended up not at St.-Malo but at Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, where she died at the Hôpital des oprhelins soon after she reached the naval port. 

The island Guérins lived as best they could in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  After brothers Louis and Pierre, fils left St.-Malo for Lorient in January 1759, they disappear from history, unless Louis was the Guérin who went to French St.-Domingue and died there in January 1776.  Dominique Guérin and wife Anne LeBlanc settled first at Ploubalay on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo and then at nearby Trigavou and had more children there:  Élisabeth, or Isabelle, in October 1760; another Françoise in May 1763; another Anastasie in February 1766 but died at age 1 1/2 in June 1767; and Brigide in August 1769.  During the early 1770s, Dominique and his family were part of the settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou near the city of Châtellerault and, after two years of effort, were among the Poitou Acadians who retreated to the lower Loire port of Nantes in March 1776.  Dominique, Anne, and their younger children lived in St.-Jacques Parish across the river from Nantes and survived on government handouts and whatever work Dominique could find as a day laborer.  Son Joseph settled in the parish of St.-Similien on the northwest side of Nantes, where he married Agnès, daughter of fellow Acadians Benjamin Pitre and Jeanne Moïse, in April 1776.  Two daughters were born to them at Nantes:  Marie-Joséphine in St.-Similien Parish in January 1777; and Françoise in St.-Jacques Parish in April 1784.  Dominique's wife Anne died in St.-Jacques Parish in May 1782, age 56.  Daughter Françoise married Jacques, son of fellow Acadians Étienne Thériot and Hélène Landry, in St.-Jacques Parish in November 1784.  Meanwhile, after the crossing from the Maritimes, Dominique's older sister Françoise settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  She was a widow when she came to France and did not remarry.  Dominique's older brother Jean-Baptiste and wife Marie-Madeleine Bourg settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo, where they had more children:  Joseph in September 1760; and Ambroise in August 1762.  Jean-Baptiste died at St.-Suliac in December 1771, age 50.  His son Jérôme le jeune married fellow Acadian Marie Pitre perhaps at St.-Suliac in the late 1770s.  Dominique's niece Tarsile, daughter of younger brother Charles, married Jacques, fils, son of fellow Acadians Jacques Forest and Claire Vincent, at St.-Servan in August 1774.  Jacques, fils also had come to France aboard one of the Five Ships.  The fate of Tarsile's younger sister Marguerite-Josèphe is lost to history. 

Gabriel, son of Jacques Guérin and Anne Guillot, married cousin Marie-Rose, daughter of René Guillot and Françoise Bourg, at Cenan south of Châtellerault in Poitou in October 1780.  The priest who recorded the marriage noted that Gabriel's father, as well as Marie-Rose's mother, were deceased at the time of the wedding.  One suspects that Gabriel and Marie-Rose had been part of the settlement scheme in Poitou during the early 1770s and were among the relatively few Acadians who remained there when the other Poitou Acadians, including Guérins, left for Nantes.  One also wonders how Jacques and Gabriel were kin to the other Guérins in France. 

A study of Acadian exiles in France documents other Guérins who lived at Rochefort, France, during Le Grand Dérangement.  One wonders how, or if, they were kin to the Guérins of Île St.-Jean and Île Royale:  Marie-Agathe Guérin or Guirin, widow of Pierre Monineau, married day laborer Mathieu, son of Claudien Lekom of Schetenborg, Haute Alsace, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in August 1763.  Marguerite Guérin, widow of Pierre Masson, married day laborer Pierre, daughter of Jean Soleau of Breuil, Magne, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in July 1765.  Antoine Guérin, a journalier or day worker, married Jeanne Peraudeau.  Their son Jean was born in Notre Dame Parish in May 1768.  Jeanne, daughter of Pierre Guérin, a tisserand or weaver, and Marie Marsais, was born at Geay in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, date unrecorded.  She had been living in Notre-Dame Parish for seven years when she married Pierre Tesse, widower of Henriette Recteau, there in May 1769. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Several of the Guérins, including Dominique, a sister, and a nephew, agreed to take it.  Other members of the Acadian family chose to remain. 

Meanwhile, a Guérin, perhaps an Acadian, lived on one of the fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Marie, daughter of Pierre Guérin and Élisabeth Moreau, married Hubert dit Lafleur, son of Nicaise Collin, on either Île St.-Pierre or Île Miquelon in April 1772.  One wonders what became of her. 

Louis Guérin, described as a garçon navigateur or sailor "of Mines," age 34, died at the home of Joseph Casselin at Môle St.-Nicolas, French St.-Domingue, in January 1776.  Judging by his age, he could have been the Louis, son of Pierre Guérin, père of Cobeguit and Île St.-Jean, who went with his brother Pierre, fils from St.-Malo to Lorient in January 1759.  Honoré Guérin, a navigateur, married Françoise Lapierre.  Their son Louis-Olive was born at Môle St.-Nicolas in October 1780.247

Guilbeau

In 1755, most of the descendants of Pierre Guilbeau and Catherine Thériot still lived in the Annapolis River valley.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this small family to the winds. 

In the fall of 1755, the British deported Joseph Guilbeau of Annapolis Royal to South Carolina, but he evidently did not remain there.  He likely was among the Acadians in that colony and in Georgia who colonial officials encouraged to return to Acadia by boat in the spring of 1756.  Not all of them made it back to their homeland.  By August 1756, Joseph, called a Gilboa, was counted at Eastchester, Westchester County, New York, his expedtion having gotten no farther than Long Island.  At war's end, he evidently moved from New York to Halifax.  One wonders who was the Joseph Guillebeau with a wife and eight children counted by colonial authorities in South Carolina in August 1763. 

In December 1755, the British at Annapolis Royal forced two sons of Charles Guilbeau, père and their families--Alexandre, wife Marguerite Girouard, and seven of their children; and Joseph, wife Madeleine Michel, and nine of their children--with dozens of other exiles, aboard the transport Pembroke, destined for North Carolina.  Soon after the ship left Goat Island in the lower Annapolis River, high winds in the Bay of Fundy separated the Pembroke from the other transports filled with Annapolis valley Acadians.  The exiles aboard the ship, led by Charles Belliveau, a pilot, and including the Guilbeau brothers, overwhelmed the ship's officers and crew, who numbered only eight, seized the vessel, sailed it to Baie Ste.-Marie on the western shore of Nova Scotia, hid there for nearly a month, and, in January 1756, sailed across the Bay of Fundy to the lower Rivière St.-Jean.  There, in early February, they were discovered by a boatload of British soldiers and sailors disguised as French troops.  The Guilbeaus and the others managed to drive off the British force, burn the Pembroke, and make their way with the ship's officers and crew to the St.-Jean settlement of Ste.-Anne-du-Pay-Bas, today's Fredericton, New Brunswick, where they spent the rest of the winter.  When most of the family moved on the following summer, Marguerite Guilbeau, probably one of the Pembroke refugees, having married widower Michel, son of Joseph dit Bellefontaine dit Beauséjour Godin and Marie-Anne Bergeron dit d'Ambroise of Rivière St.-Jean, remained at Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas, with tragic consequence.  

When food ran short on the lower St.-Jean in the summer of 1756, Joseph Guilbeau and his family moved on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they survived the terrible winter of 1756-57 in Camp Espérance at Miramichi, and then made their way up to the Acadian refuge at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, where Joseph served as a lieutenant in the post's militia.  It was there that he may have earned his dit, L'Officer.  Son Charles married to a fellow Acadian probably at Restigoche in c1760.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in the region.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, a French officer counted 1,003 exiles still at Restigouche, among them Joseph Guilbeau and his family of seven; and another Joseph Guilbeau and his family of 10.  After the counting, Joseph dit L'Officer and his family either fled to or were led down the coast to Nipisiguit, where they were counted in 1761.  To relieve overcrowiding in the refugee camp, the British sent some of the exiles, including the Guilbeaus, to prison compounds in Nova Scotia, where they were held for the rest of the war.  Joseph dit L'Officier, his wife, and six children appeared on a French repatriation list circulated in the prison compound at Halifax in August 1763.  With them was his nephew Joseph Guilbeau le jeune, his wife, and two children. 

Meanwhile, in the summer of 1756, Alexandre Guilbeau and his family also chose to move on, but they went not to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore but up the St.-Jean portage to Canada.  Wife Marguerite Girouard died at Québec in December 1757, age 42, victim, most likely, of the smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of refugees in the area from the summer of 1757 to the summer of 1758.  Alexandre remarried to Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Breau and Marguerite Dugas and widow of Pierre Aucoin, at St.-Pierre-les-Becquets below Trois-Rivières in November 1759.  Alexandre died at St.-Pierre-de-Sorel, today's Sorel, on the St. Lawrence between Trois-Rivières and Montréal, in May 1776, in his late 60s.  Evidently older brother Pierre had escaped the roundup at Annapolis Royal in 1755.  Like Alexandre, Pierre took his family to Canada, where he died at St.-Charles de Bellechasse on the St. Lawrence below Québec in April 1758, age 54, probably from smallpox.  Members of Alexandre and Pierre's oldest brother Charles, fils's family also had escaped the British at Annapolis Royal and fled to Canada.  Charles, fils's daughters settled at St.-Pierre-les-Bequets near their uncle Alexandre, while their brother, Joseph le jeune, followed Guilbeau kinsmen from Halifax to Spanish Louisiana.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

In late 1758, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg on Île Royale, the British rounded up most of the Acadians on the Maritime islands and deported them to France.  Guilbeaus may have been among them.  Pierre, son of René Guilbeau and Marie-Anne Melaize, was born at Rochefort in October 1759.  Marie-Jeanne Guilbeau died at Cherbourg, Normandy, in November 1763, age 62.  Pierre-François Guilbeau died at La Rochelle in June 1780, age 51.  Were they descendants of Pierre Guilbeau and Catherine Thériot of Annapolis Royal? 

After securing their hold on the Maritime islands, British forces invaded the lower Rivière St.-Jean valley in the winter of 1758-59.  In early 1759, New-English rangers under Major Moses Hazen fell on Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas and killed or captured the refugees there who could not flee.  Among the victims of the bloody raid were Marguerite Guilbeau, wife of Michel Godin, and their infant son, who, the Acadians insisted, the rangers killed and scalped.  The British moved Michel Godin and other river Acadians to the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax harbor, held them there until November, and then sent them to England and Cherbourg, France, where they landed in January 1760. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previous unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia prisoners, including Guilbeaus, chose to settle on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies were going, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, 10 were Guilbeaus. 

In 1764, a Guilbeau--Joseph dit L'Officier's son, Joseph, fils, a navigator--did not follow his family from Halifax to Cap-Français but chose to go, instead, to Île Miquelon.  His younger brother Basile-David, called David, joined him.  Joseph, fils had married Anne-Charlotte, called Charlotte, daughter of Charles de Saint-Étienne de La Tour le jeune and his second wife Marguerite Richard, probably at Halifax in c1763.  Charlotte was a descendant of seventeenth-century Acadian governor Charles La Tour.  Between 1765 and 1777, Joseph, fils and Charlotte had at least five children on Miquelon, including son Joseph III, born in c1765.  In 1767, to relieve overcrowdeding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, French authorities, obeying a royal decree, transported the fisher/habitants to France, but Joseph, fils and his family either were not among them or, more likely, went to France and promptly returned to Miquelon the following year with most of their fellow islanders.  In late 1778, during the American Revolution, after France joined the United States against its old redcoated rivals, British forces seized îles St.-Pierre and Miquelon and transported the Acadians there to France.  Joseph Guilbeau, fils and his family probably were among them.  Church records show them at La Rochelle as early as April 1779, when daughter Charlotte died in St.-Jean Parish at age 2.  The following September, another daughter, Élisabeth, died in St.-Jean Parish a day after her birth.  Son François was born in St.-Jean Parish in May 1782.  Members of the family returned to Île Miquelon in 1784 after Britain returned the islands to France.  It was perhaps from La Rochelle that son Joseph III, now grown, left for Louisiana in the late 1780s or early 1790s.  He may have gone to the Spanish colony with hundreds of other Acadians in 1785, but none of the passenger lists of the Seven Ships expedition includes his name.  Meanwhile, Joseph, fils's brother David married Victoire, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph-Nicolas Gauthier and Anne LeBlanc, on Île Miquelon in October 1783, probably after a second sojourn in France.  According to Bona Arsenault, Victoire gave David a son, Joseph le jeune, in 1784.  He worked either as a fisherman or a navigator and died in the sinking of the ship Batterie Verte off the village of Riantec, Morbihan, Brittany, France, in January 1804, in his early 50s.248

Guillot

By 1755, descendants of René Guillot l'aîné and Marguerite Doiron no longer lived in British Nova Scotia.  They could be found, instead, on the south shore of Île St.-Jean, at Pointe-Prime and Pointe-au-Bouleau, where they had gone from Cobeguit in c1750.  Living in territory controlled by France, the Guillots escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was a short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and transported them to France. 

The rigors of the crossing devastated the family.  Marie-Josèphe Guillot, sister of Jean-Baptiste, Ambroise, and René, fils, crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November, survived a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, put in for repairs at Bideford, England, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759, having lost 25 of its passengers at sea.  With Marie-Josèphe, age 37, was husband Alexis Breau, age 36, and seven children, six daughters and a son.  Marie, Alexis, and five of their children survived the crossing, but three of their children, including one born soon after they reached St.-Malo, did not.  The two older girls died at sea, and the newborn died probably in a St.-Malo hospital in late May 1759, only 11 days old.  Jean-Baptiste Guillot, age 38, his second wife Marguerite Bourg, age 38, and six of their children sailed on one of the five transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January.  Marguerite and two of the children--Charles-Olivier, age 12; and Marie-Josèphe, age 6--survived the crossing, but Jean-Baptiste and four of the younger children--Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 3; Thomas, age 4; Euphrosine, age 13 months; and Isabelle, age 7--died at sea.  Jean-Baptiste's brother Ambroise Guillot, age 30, his wife Théotiste Daigre, age 33, and five of their children, also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Ambroise, Théotiste, and a daughter, Marguerite-Blanche, age 7, survived the crossing, but the other four children--Gertrude, age 5; Paul, age 4; Fabien, age 2; and Charles, age not given--died at sea.  Youngest brother René Guillot, fils, age 27, his wife Marie-Rose Daigre, age 26, and two sons--Jean-Charles, age 3 or 4; and Alexis, an infant--also endured the crossing to France aboard one of the Five Ships.  René, fils survived the crossing, but Marie-Rose and his young sons did not.  The boys died at sea, and Marie-Rose, no doubt weakened from the rigors of the crossing, died in the hospital at St.-Malo in early March 1759, less than two months after she and René, fils reached France.  

The island Guillots did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  In February 1765, Jean-Baptiste Guillot's widow, Marguerite Bourg, remarried to Jean Metra, a German-Frenchman from Lorraine, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east bank of the river south of the Breton port.  In November 1766, across the river at Trigavou, Marguerite's 19-year-old stepson Charles-Olivier Guillot married Madeleine-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Olivier Boudrot and Henriette Guérin; Marie-Josèphe's mother, like Charles-Olivier's father, had died on the crossing to St.-Malo.  Charles-Olivier and Madeleine-Josèphe had at least four children at Trigavou:  Isidore-François in September 1767; Jean-Michel in September 1769; Simon-François in February 1772; and Élisabeth-Madeleine in February 1774.  In 1774, Charles-Olivier may not have taken his family to the interior province of Poitou to participate in the major Acadian settlement there.  However, he and his family were counted in the lower Loire port of Nantes in September 1784, where most of the Poitou Acadians, including some of his Guillot relatives, had retreated in late 1775 and early 1776.  

Ambroise Guillot, his wife Théotiste Daigre, and their surviving daughter, Marguerite-Blanche, also settled at Trigavou.  Ambroise and Théotiste had at least six more children there:  Anne-Gertrude in May 1760; Paul in March 1762; Fabien-Amateur in November 1763; Jean-Baptiste in June 1766; Dominique in March 1768; and Geneviève-Anne in April 1770--11 children, four daughters and seven sons, between 1752 and 1770, in greater Acadia and France.  In 1773, Ambroise took his family to Poitou, where he and hundreds of other exiles from the port cities worked the land owned by a influential French nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  After two years of effort, Ambroise, Théotiste, and most of their children retreated with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes, where they survived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  But not all of their children followed them there.  In November 1780, son Paul, at age 18, married local girl Marie, daughter of Gabriel Sauvion and Reancoise Roui, at Archigny south of Châtellerault.  Their son Dominique was baptized at Archigny in August 1784.  Ambroise's son Jean-Baptiste le jeune, also in his late teens, married Jeanne, perhaps a sister of Marie Sauvion, at Archigny c1783.  Their daughter Jeanne was baptized there in March 1784.

Ambroise's brother René, fils, soon after his wife died, remarried to Françoise Bourg, widow of Joseph Naquin and perhaps a kinswoman of his oldest brother's widow Marguerite Bourg, at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo in August 1760.  They had at least eight children there and at Trigavou across the river:  Jean-Charles in June 1761; Alexis in July 1762; Marie-Rose in November 1763; Pierre in September 1765; Françoise-Gertrude in March 1767; René-François in May 1769; Isabelle-Julie in June 1771, and Anne-Marguerite in July 1773.  Later that year, René, fils also took his family to Poitou.  Youngest daughter Isabelle-Julie died there in December 1773, age 3, and was buried in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault.  Wife Françoise, age 35, died in September 1774 and was buried at Archigny.  When most of the Acadians in Poitou abandoned the settlement in late 1775, René, fils did not join them or his brother Ambroise on the retreat to Nantes.  Oldest son Jean-Charles, age 18, married a young Frenchwoman, Jeanne, daughter of Silvain Clerc and Jeanne Blouin of Archigny, at nearby Cenan in July 1779.  René, fils and his family were living at Cenan in June 1781 when he died there at age 50. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, only eight Acadian Guillots agreed to take it.  Most members of the family remained in the mother country.  Ambroise Guillot, wife Théotiste, and most their children stayed at Nantes, but fifth son Fabien-Amateur, age 22, chose to follow relatives to the Spanish colony.  René Guillot, fils's children, some of them grown, evidently remained in Poitou after his death, except for fifth son Pierre, age 20, and second daughter Françoise-Gertrude, age 18, who also followed relatives to Louisiana.  Ambroise and René, fils's sister Marie-Josèphe, her husband Alexis Breau, and their daughter chose to go to the Spanish colony.  Another nephew, Charles-Olivier, son of Jean-Baptiste Guillot, wife Madeleine-Josèphe Boudrot, and their children, two sons and a daughter, also emigrated to Spanish Louisiana in 1785.249   

Haché dit Gallant

Michel Haché dit Gallant of Chignecto, his wife Anne Cormier, and their seven sons were the first Acadians to leave British Nova Scotia and settle on the French-controlled island of Île St.-Jean.  The oldest son, Michel dit Gallant, fils returned to Chignecto in the early 1740s, while his brothers and their families remained on the island.  According to genealogist Stephen A. White, Michel, fils's returning to Chignecto "is important because it permits one to conclude that on the eve of the Acadian dispersion all the Hachés in the Beaubassin area belonged to [his] family."  Members of the family may have been subjected to the petit dérangment of the spring and summer of 1750, when, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Abbé Le Loutre and his Mi'kmaq warriors, forced the Acadian habitants east of Rivière Missaguash to remove themselves to the French-controlled area west of the river. 

Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther.  After the fall of Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at the fort he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Two brothers, Michel dit Michaud and Pierre le jeune, sons of Michel Haché dit Gallant, fils, ended up on the sloop Endeavor, which left Chignecto on October 13 and reached Charles Town, South Carolina, on November 19.  Evidently they were among the exiles in South Carolina who colonial officials encouraged to return to Acadia by boat the following spring.  After a long, trying journey to Rivière St.-Jean, which they reached that summer, Michaud and family continued on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, eventually finding refuge at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs. 

Other members of the family at Chignecto escaped the British there in the fall of 1755 and took refuge in Canada.  Françoise, sister of Michel dit Michaud and Pierre le jeune's and wife of Jean Doucet, died at Québec in November or December 1757, in her late 20s, victim, most likely, of the smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of exiles, including Jean's father, in and around Québec from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Sister Marie-Anne, called Anne, wife of Jean's brother François Doucet, fils, died at Trois-Rivières on the upper St.-Lawrence in August 1762, in her early 40s, during the final months of the war. 

The Hachés living on French-controlled Île St.-Jean in 1755 escaped the roundup of their loved ones at Chignecto.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the island habitants and deported them to France.  Most of the Haché dit Gallants and Île St.-Jean escaped the British, crossed Mer Rouge, and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, making their way eventually to Restigouche, where they joined their cousins from Chignecto.  The escapees included the families of Charles, Pierre, François, and Jacques dit Gallant.  Some of their cousins, however--descendants of brothers Joseph and Jean-Baptiste dit Gallant--were deported to France. 

Some did not escape.  The crossing to France devastated entire families.  Jacques Haché, a young bachelor, crossed on the transport Duc Guillaume, which, left the Maritimes in September.  After a mid-ocean mishap, the vessel limped into St.-Malo harbor in early November.  Jacques was one of the lucky survivors.  Another kinswoman who crossed on the same transport was not so lucky.  Jacques's aunt Marie-Madeleine Haché, her husband Pierre Duval, and five of their children all died at sea.  Other kin fared just as badly on the crossing to St.-Malo.  Marguerite Haché, her second husband Robert Hango dit Choisy, and their three children were lost at sea on the British transport Violet, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and sank in a North Atlantic storm in mid December off the southwest coast of England.  All were lost.  Jacques-René Haché, age 31, and wife Anne Boudrot, age 31, and their seven children--Pierre, age 10; Marie, age 9; Geneviève, age 7; Anne, age 5; Henriette, age 4; Louise, no age given; and N., born at sea--crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy, survived the storm that sank the Violet, put in at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  The couple lost two of their seven children--Louise and newborn N.--during the crossing.  The family's suffering did not end on the high seas:  Jacques-René and daughter Anne died at Châteauneuf on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo the following May, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Anne Haché, age 50, husband Joseph Précieux, age 67, and their two sons, age 19 and 16, crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo in mid-January.  They all survived the crossing.  Pierre Haché le jeune, age 33, and wife Marie Doiron, age 28, crossed with four children--Pierre, age 7; Marguerite-Louise, age 5, Ambroise, age 3; and Michel, age 6 months--on one of the five transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy and, despite the storm off coast of England that sank three other shipsin the convoy, reached St.-Malo together in late January.  They lost three of their children.  Son Pierre survived the crossing only to die in a hospital probably at St.-Malo at the end of January.  Wife Marie died probably in the same hospital in late March.  Marie-Anne, called Anne, Haché, age 26, wife of François Chiasson, fils, age 31, lost her husband and all three of their children, ages 6 years to 4 months, aboard one of the Five Ships.  Another Anne Haché, age 24, survived the crossing on one of the Five Ships, as did Antoine Haché, age 24, wife Marie Clémenceau, age 20, his brother Georges, age 14, and Antoine and George's widowed mother Marie-Anne Gentil, age 60. 

Island Hachés did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Jacques Haché settled at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo, where he married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Boudrot and Marie Doiron, in November 1763.  They crossed the harbor to the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where at least half a dozen children were born to them, most of whom died in childhood:  Marie-Modeste in August 1764 but died at age 8 in November 1772; Jacques-Augustin in May 1766 but died in June; Marin-Jean, also called Marin-Baptiste, in February 1768 but died at age 1 in February 1769; Marie-Jeanne was born in December 1769; Pierre-Jean in September 1771 but died at age 20 months in May 1773; and Marguerite-Marie was born in August 1773.  Jacques's first cousin Pierre Haché le jeune, who lost his entire family aboard one of the Five Ships, remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph dit Dumont and Marie-Madeleine Vécot, at St.-Énogat in July 1759.  She gave him a new family there and at St.-Servan, three sons and a daughter:  Joseph-Hyacinthe was born at St.-Énogat in April 1760 but died at St.-Servan, age 7, in June 1767; Guillaume-Servan was born at St.-Servan in February 1762; Louis le jeune in January 1764; and Marie-Anne in October 1765.  Pierre  remarried again--his third marriage--to Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Dingle, a Flemish surgeon and former resident of Grand-Pré and Louisbourg, and Marguerite Landry, at St.-Servan in September 1766.  She gave him three more children there, two sons and a daughter:  Pierre-Alexis, born in March 1768; Madeleine-Françoise in March 1770; and Joseph-François in June 1772--11 children, eight sons and three daughters, in all by three wives from 1752 to 1772.  Pierre le jeune's younger brother Antoine and his wife Marie Clémenceau settled near his brothers at St.-Énogat.  They had at least six children there and at St.-Servan, but few survived childhood:  Marguerite at St.-Énogat in February 1760; Marie-Servanne at St.-Servan in May 1861 but died a month after her birth; Antoine-François in May 1762 but died at age 4 in September 1766; Charles-Julien in January 1765 but died at age 1 1/2 in September 1766; Marie-Jeanne in October 1766; and Marie-Rose in June 1769 but died at age 1 in May 1770.  Pierre le jeune and Antoine's youngest brother Georges, with their widowed mother, settled at St.-Servan near his brothers, but he did not remain there.  He ended up in England in 1763, probably as a captured corsair with brother Louis, who had joined them at St.-Servan from Cherbourg in April 1759.  Back in France, Georges married Perrine, daughter of Pierre Basset and Louise Mace, at St.-Servan in January 1768.  They had at least three children there:  Perrine-Françoise in November 1768; Marguerite-Guillemette in July 1770 but died two months later; and Georges, fils was born in December 1771.  The brothers' aunt Anne Haché, wife of Joseph Précieux, died at St.-Énogat in August 1763.  Anne Boudrot, widow of the brothers' first cousin Jacques-René Haché who died at Châteauneuf on the river in May 1759, remarried to her cousin Pierre, son of Joseph Boudrot and Anne LeBlanc of Pigiguit, at St.-Énogat in November 1763.  In late 1765, Anne and her Haché children--Pierre, born on Île St.-Jean in c1748; Marie in c1750; Geneviève in c1752; and Anne-Henriette, called Henriette, in c1754--followed her second husband to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany--among the relatively few island Acadians who went there.  French officials counted them at Keruest near Bangor in the island's southern interior in February 1767.  Daughter Marie Haché, age 29 or 30, married Nicolas-Joseph, 34-year-old son of Frenchman Nicolas Bajolet and Anne Dupont, at Bangor in January 1780; Nicolas-Joseph's father was the secretary of the comte de Behague, governor of the island.  Anne's daughter Geneviève Haché married into the Bouron family, date and place unrecorded.  Daughter Henriette Haché married into the La Galoudec and Girardeau families on the island, dates and places unrecorded.  Anne and her children were still on Belle-Île-en-Mer in the early 1790s, so they did follow Haché kin to Spanish Louisiana. 

Island Hachés also landed at the northern fishing port of Boulogne-sur-Mer, but few remained.  Jean-Baptiste Haché, called Baptiste, oldest brother of Pierre le jeune, Antoine, and Georges of St.-Malo, Baptiste's wife Anne Olivier, and four of their children--Anne-Marie, Pierre-Paul, Héleine, and Isaac--landed at the northern port, where daughter Héleine died in January 1759, age 5.  Anne gave Baptiste four more children in St.-Nicolas Parish:  Éloi-Paul, born in January 1761; François-Joseph in February 1763 but died 8 days after his birth; François-Basile was born in January 1764; and another François-Joseph in March 1766.  They remained at Boulogne-sur-Mer until May 1766, when they took the brigantine Le Hazard to St.-Malo.  They settled at St.-Servan near his younger brothers.  Their widowed mother Marie-Anne Gentil also may have been alive then.  Two of Baptiste's children died at St.-Servan:  Isaac in May 1767, age 9; and François-Basile in July 1768, age 2.  Meanwhile, Baptiste died "at his house" in St.-Servan in February 1767, age 39.  Daughter Anne-Marie married Jean-Charles, son of fellow Acadians Charles Benoit and Madeleine Thériot, at St.-Servan in January 1770.  Baptiste's younger brother Joseph le jeune also landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer, and, like his brother, did not remain there.  He in fact moved on to St.-Malo in November 1759, years before his brother did, and settled near his other brothers Pierre, Antoine, and Georges.  Joseph le jeune married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Dumont and Marie-Madeleine Vécot of Île St.-Jean, at St.-Énogat in June 1760.  They moved to nearby St.-Servan in 1761, where at least seven children, including a set of twins, were born to them:  Jean-Baptiste in May 1761; Hélène in March 1764; Joseph-Hyacinthe in September 1765 but died the following December; François-Mathurin in October 1767; Marie-Josèphe in December 1769; and twins Madeleine-Apolline and Jean-Louis in November 1771.  Baptiste and Joseph le jeune's sister Marguerite-Louise, widow of Pierre Deveau who had died at Boulogne-sur-Mer in December 1759, remarried to 30-year-old Alexis, son of fellow Acadians Charles Gautrot and Madeleine Blanchard, St.-Nicolas Parish there in January 1761.  The recording priest called Alexis a "Canadian" but he actually was an Acadian from the Minas Basin.  .

Island Hachés also landed at Cherbourg in Normandy, but none of them remained.  Jean-Charles, called Charles, Haché landed there, a widower.  His wife Anne Deveau, who he had married at Port-La-Joye in November 1751, died either during the crossing or soon after they reached France.  A son Louis, also called Charles, had been born on Île St.-Jean in October 1754 but may not have survived the crossing.  Charles remarried to Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Hébert and Claire Daigre, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in January 1761.  Between 1761 and 1772, she gave him at least 10 more children at Cherbourg:  Marie-Modeste was born in November 1761 but died at age 2 in February 1764; Jean-Baptiste-Charles was born in December 1762; Anastasie in March 1764; Bonne-Marie-Madeleine in March 1765; Marie-Rose in c1767; François-Isaac, called Isaac, in March 1768; Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, in February 1769; Frédéric in c1770; Joseph in June 1771; and Jean-Joseph in October 1772 but died 15 days after his birth.  They moved on to Poitou in 1773.  Charles's first cousin Louis Haché, brother of three of the Hachés who were deported to St.-Malo, also landed at Cherbourg, but he did not remain.  Louis reached St.-Malo in April 1759 and lived at St.-Énogat near his brothers.  In November 1760, Louis joined the crew of the French corsair Le Français.  The Royal Navy captured the vessel soon after it left St.-Malo harbor, and the British held Louis and his fellow crewmembers as prisoners of war in England until May 1763.  Louis married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Claude Benoit and Madeleine Thériot, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer across from St.-Énogat in February 1765.  Louis and Anne had two children at St.-Servan:  Louis, fils, born in March 1766; and Marguerite-Yvon at nearby Quesny in September 1767 but died at age 15 months in March 1769.  Louis remarried to Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians François Doucet and Marie Carret, at St.-Servan in February 1770.  She gave him two more children there:  Jean-François in January 1771; and Osithe-Françoise-Thomasée in April 1772.  They also moved on to Poitou. 

Members of the family ended up at the southern port of Bordeaux.  Michel Haché dit Gallant, fils entered L'Hoptial St.-André-Admissions at Bordeaux on 18 May 1764 and left four days later; he was 71 years old.  He died in Ste.-Croix Parish, Bordeaux, in September 1765, age 74.  Strangely, his wife Madeleine LeBlanc had died at Trois-Rivières on the upper St. Lawrence in October 1761, so one wonders how he and Madeleine had become separated and how he ended up in France.  Michel, fils's son Joseph le jeune and his wife Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Comeau and Élisabeth Lord, also ended up in France, perhaps following his father there.  Joseph le jeune and Anne remained near his father at Bordeaux, where Joseph le jeune worked as a ship's carpenter.  They had at least five children in the busy French port:  Pierre was born in c1768 but died in St.-Michel Parish, age 13, in June 1781; François was born in 1773; another Pierre in 1776; Marie-Angélique was baptized in Ste.-Croix Parish, age unrecorded, in August 1778; Jacques-Denis was born in Ste.-Croix Parish in October 1781 but died in St.-Michel Parish, age 4, in April 1785; and Antoine was born in St.-André Parish in May 1783.  Joseph le jeune died in St.-Michel Parish in January 1785, age 57. 

Hachés lived in the port of Le Havre, but they may not have been descendants of Michel dit Gallant.  Marie-Madeleine-Ester, daughter of Pierre Haché and Marie-Madeleine Vacquerie, died in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in April 1769 and was buried in the "Cemetery de la Croix," age 15.  The priest who recorded her burial said that Marie was a "native of this parish," which means that she was born there in c1754, before exile, so she may not have been an Acadian Haché. 

One of Michel's descendants made it to France by a different route.  Louise, daughter of Michel Haché dit Gallant, père, sister of Anne, and widow of Louis Belliveau, evidently had followed her husband to Île Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  One wonders if she and her family went to Miquelon from imprisonment in Nova Scotia at war's end, or if they were deported from the French Maritimes to France in 1758-59 and followed other Acadians to the Newfoundland island in the 1770s.  No matter, the British would have deported them to France in the summer of 1778 during the American Revolution.  Louise died in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in October 1779, age 65. 

In the early 1770s, Hachés languishing in the port cities chose in even greater numbers to take part in another settlement venture, this one in the interior province of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  A French nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  They included Jacques Haché and wife Anne Boudrot of St.-Énogat, whose son Jean-Louis was baptized in St.-Jean L'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age unrecorded, in August 1775.  Jacques's older brother Charles and second wife Marie Hébert of Cherbourg also went to Poitou, where daughter Marie-Henriette was baptized in St.-Jean L'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age unrecorded, in February 1774.  Jacques and Charles's first cousin Pierre Haché and third wife Marguerite Dingle of St.-Servan-sur-Mer also took their family to Poitou, as did his younger brother Antoine and his wife Marie Clémenceau of St.-Servan.  Their youngest brother Georges and wife Perrine Basset of St.-Servan also ventured to the interior province, where at least one child was born to them:  Marguerite-Henry was baptized in St.-Jean L'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age unrecorded, in May 1774.  Anne Olivier, widow of their oldest brother Jean-Baptiste, and her Haché children from Boulogne-sur-Mer and St.-Servan also went to Poitou.  Pierre, Antoine, and George's brother Joseph and his wife Marie Dumont from St.-Servan also went to Poitou, where another son, Joseph-Marie, was baptized in St.-Jean L'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age unrecorded, in November 1774.  Pierre et al.'s brother Louis and his second wife Françoise Doucet of Cherbourg and St.-Servan also were part of the Poitou misadventure.  Son Pierre-Charles was baptized in St.-Jean L'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age unrecorded, in November 1774.

Beginning in October 1775, after two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians, including the Hachés, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government handouts and on what work they could find.  Jacques Haché and Anne Boudrot had three more children at nearby Chantenay:  Jean-François in December 1776 but died there at age 1 1/2 in March 1778; Jean-Marie in March 1781; and Pierre in May 1782--11 children, seven sons and four daughers, in all from 1764 to 1782.  Sons Jean-Marie and Pierre also died young, but their burial dates have been lost.  Jacques died at Chantenay after 1782, in his mid- or late 40s.  Jacques's older brother Charles, second wife Marie Hébert, and seven of their children went to Nantes, where Charles worked as a ship's carpenter and a fish monger.  Marie gave him another daughter at Nantes:  Floré-Adélaïde in St.-Jacques Parish in January 1776 but died the following April--13 children, six sons and seven daughters, by two wives between 1754 and 1776.  Daughter Marie-Henriette died in St.-Nicolas Parish in April 1776, age 2.  Daughter Marie-Rose died at nearby Chantenay in October 1784, age 17.  Meanwhile, wife Marie Hébert died in St.-Nicolas Parish in March 1780, age 42.  Son Jean-Baptiste-Charles married Marie-Modeste, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Pinet dit Pinel and Anne-Marie Durel, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1784.  Charles, père died probably at Nantes before 1784, in his 50s or early 60s.  Jacques and Charles's first cousin Pierre Haché le jeune worked as a seaman at Nantes and died there in June 1777, age 52.  His third wife Madeleine Dingle died at Chantenay in October 1784.  Pierre le jeune's younger brother Antoine, wife Marie Clémenceau, and their familly also went to Nantes.  Son Jean-Marie was born at Chantenay in July 1777 but died there at age 1 1/2 in November 1778--seven children, three sons and four daughters, in all between 1760 and 1777, most of whom died young.  Antoine died probably at Chantenay before 1785, in his late 40s or early 50s.  Youngest brother Georges and wife Perrine Basset also went to Nantes, where two more children were born to them:  Marie-Renée at Chantenay in July 1776; and Jean-Adrien in March 1781 but died at age 15 months in June 1782--five children, two sons and three daughters, in all between 1768 and 1781.  Georges worked as a seaman at Chantenay and died there, or at sea, in c1782, in his early 40s.  Anne Olivier, widow of oldest brother Jean-Baptiste, and her Haché children also retreated to Nantes.  Pierre, Antoine, and George's brother Joseph le jeune worked as a master ship's carpenter at Nantes.  Another daughter, Élisabeth- or Isabelle-Marie, was born at nearby Chantenay in August 1776--nine children, five sons and four daughters, in all between 1761 and 1776.  Joseph le jeune drowned probably at Paimboeuf, the port of Nantes, in January 1778, age 35.  Wife Marie died at Chantenay in July 1784, age 43.  This left her and Joseph's many children without any parents.  Joseph's brothers, however, lived nearby and took them in.  Pierre et al.'s brother Louis, second wife Françoise Doucet, and four of their children went to Chantenay, where four more children were born to them:  Joseph le jeune in May 1776 but died the following October; Ange-Frédéric in c1777 but died at age 2 1/2 in June 1780; Barbe-Michelle in November 1779; and Jean-François in June 1781 but died at age 2 1/2 in February 1784--nine children, six sons and three daughters, between 1766 and 1781.  Unlike his four brothers who had retreated to Nantes, Louis was still alive in 1785.

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in Louisiana.  At least 17 Hachés agreed to take it--the only members of the family to go to the Spanish colony.  They included Louis, wife Françoise, and their youngest son; Louis's niece Anne-Marie, daughter of brother Jean-Baptiste, fils, and her family; a daughter of brother Antoine; four daughters of brother Joseph le jeune; three of brother Pierre le jeune's unmarried children; several of cousin Charles's children, including Jean-Baptiste-Charles and his bride; and two daughters of cousin Jacques.  Some of the island Hachés, however, chose to remain in the mother country.  They included the widow and children of Jacques-René Haché dit Gallant, who remained with her second husband on Belle-Île-en-Mer or moved on to Lorient in southern Brittany.  Anne Comeau, widow of the Joseph Haché le jeune who died at Bordeaux in January 1785, remained in the port with her Haché children.  Daughter Marie-Angélique Haché, age 21 years, 8 months, married 22-year-old Jean-Baptiste, son of Frenchman Balthazar Demeurs and Raymonde Gayral of Montaigne, Department of Lot-et-Garonne, at Bordeaux in May 1800.  Son Pierre Haché, "born at Bordeaux" in c1776, "celibate, a seaman on the English parlementary ship Le Marguerite," died "at the civil hospital of Morlaix, dept. of Finistere" in Brittany in May 1811; he was age 35 and perhaps a casualty of the Napoléonic wars.  Nicolas-Laurent, son of Jacques Haché and Marie-Jeanne Caty, "21 yrs. in the Artillery Corp of the Colonies, native of Eu en Seine Maritime," evidently a Frenchman, married Anne, daughter of Frenchman Julien Le Galle and Jeanne-Françoise Fumet and widow of René Gillet, at Lorient in April 1793, during the French Revolution.  One wonders if the cannoneer's father was a kinsman of the Haché dit Gallants of greater Acadia.

In North America, things got only worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and taken refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.   After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and  retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians at Restgouche, many Haché dit Gallants among them.  They included Louis Larcher and his family of three; Jean Galand and his family of 10; Charles Galand and his family of five; François Haché dit Galand and his family of 13; Louis Haché and his family of three (perhaps a double counting); Pre., that is Pierre, Aché and his family of seven; Jacques Aché and his family of 10--one of the largest family groups still at the refuge.  They, along with other exiles captured in the region, were held in prison compounds on the Gulf shore or in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  Jean Haché's youngest daughter Marguerite had been baptized at Restigouche in February 1760, before the attack, and two of his daughters married there in January 1761 after the surrender--Marie-Josèphe to a fellow Acadian, Anne to a Frenchman.  Louis Haché's child, name and gender unrecorded, was baptized at Restigouche n February 1761, so it took months to transfer so many of the exiles to the prison compounds.  In August 1763, Michel dit Michaud and his family appeared on a French repatriation list at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, near their old family homesteads at Chignecto.  Like their kinsmen held on the Gulf shore, at war's end they chose to remain in British-controlled greater Acadia. 

After the war, Haché dit Gallants from Chignecto and Île St.-Jean who had taken refuge in Canada and at Restigouche could be found in scattered communities from the upper St. Lawrence down to Cape Breton Island, all part of present-day Canada.  Though a conquered British possession after the fall of Montréal, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them fellow Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Michel Haché dit Gallant and Anne Cormier began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  From the 1760s, members of the family could be found at Pointe-du-Lac, Louiseville, St.-Grégoire, Nicolet, Gentilly, and St.-Antoine-de-Chambly on the upper St. Lawrence; Barachois in Gaspésie; Shippagan, Caraquet, Nepisiguit, now Bathurst, Richibouctou, Grande-Digue, Shédiac, Cap-Pélé, and Memramcook in present-day eastern New Brunswick; Amherst and Nappan in northwestern Nova Scotia; Mont-Carmel, Egmont Bay, Cascumpec, and Rustico on St. John Island, renamed Prince Edward Island; Margaree on the western coast of Cape Breton Island; and in the îles de la Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

At least one island Haché ended up in the French Antilles.  Geneviève, daughter of Pierre Haché dit Gallant and Cécile Lavergne of Île St.-Jean and widow of Jacques Hamel, craftsman in the King's service, remarried to Marie-Anne[sic] Fouche of Notre-Dame, Saintes, France, widower of Angélique Robino, at Fort-Royal, Martinique, in February 1768.188

Hamon

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, the habitants on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the deportations.  This included two families, likely unrelated, descended from two men named Jean Emond or Hamon.  The families' respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the island Acadians and deported them to France.  

Jean Hamon of Dol, France, wife Marie Daguerre, and at least one of their children were deported from Louisbourg to the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay in 1758-59.  In October 1759, Jean took his family to St.-Malo, where the majority of the island Acadians had been deported.  Jean and his family settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer from 1760 to 1763.  His third and youngest son Mathurin, age 20 in 1760, served probably aboard a corsair in the war against Britain.  He was captured, held as a prisoner in England, and returned to St.-Servan in the spring of 1763.  Later that year, Mathurin and his father left France aboard Le Marie-Charlotte, returned to greater Acadia, and settled on one of the French-controlled fishery islands, St.-Pierre or Miquelon, off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Mathurin did not remain on the island but returned to France by January 1766, when he married Marie, daughter of locals René Renault and Élisabeth Lelardon, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  They had at least two children there:  Mathurin, fils in c1768; and Julien in c1772.  Mathurin and Marie sailed from France back to the Newfoundland islands in the late 1760s or the 1770s, but, again, Mathurin did not stay there long.  During the American Revolution, after France joined the war on the side of the Americans, the British seized St.-Pierre and Miquelon and deported the fisher/habitants to France.  Mathurin and his family made the crossing aboard the schooner Modeste, which reached St.-Malo in November 1778.  One wonders if they returned to the Newfoundland islands in 1784, after the war had ended. 

The other Jean Hamon, this one from Trois-Rivières, Canada, who had married an Acadian Blanchard and settled on Île St.-Jean, had died on the island before the British struck in late 1758, as did his wife.  Their oldest son Pierre, age 26 in 1758, escaped the British, crossed Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and fled to Canada, where he married Marie-Thérèse, daughter of French Canadian Jacques Fradet, at St.-Vallier on the south bank of the St. Lawrence below Québec City in November 1767.  Pierre, called Le Cadien by his family and neighbors, died at St.-Charles de Bellechasse near Québec in 1831, purportedly at age 99.  His many descendants in Canada call themselves Emond.

Pierre Hamon's younger brothers--Joseph, age 6; and Ignace, age 10, in 1758--were not so lucky.  The British deported them to St.-Malo, France, aboard one or more of the five transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached the Breton port together in late January 1759.  Joseph crossed with the family of Pierre Blanchard, age 37, Pierre's wife Madeleine Hébert, age 29, and two of their children.  Joseph did not survive the crossing but died along with Pierre Blanchard and both of his children aboard the transport; only Pierre's wife Madeleine made it to St.-Malo.  Ignace crossed with the family of another Pierre Blanchard, age 66, his wife Françoise Breau, age 65, and their 21-year-old son Charles.  Pierre and Françoise died at sea.  Their son Charles made it to France but died in a St.-Malo hospital three months after he reached the port.  Only young Ignace Hamon endured the crossing without losing his health.  He lived probably with relatives at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo from 1759 to 1760 before moving to Pleudihen-sur-Rance across the river.  French officials counted him at Morlaix in northwest Brittany in 1764-65, though he claimed to be a resident of Pleudihen.  He was back at Pleudihen in May 1770, when, at age 22, he married Anne-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Bourg and Cécile Michel.  Ignace and Anne-Josèphe's daughter Anne-Madeleine was born at Pleudihen in July 1773.  Soon after her birth, Ignace and Anne-Josèphe followed hundreds of other exiles languishing in the port cities to the interior province of Poitou, where they worked an influential nobleman's land near the city of Châtellerault.  Anne-Josèphe gave Ignace another daughter there, Marie-Modeste in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in May 1775.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, Ignace, Anne-Josèphe, and their daughters retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they survived on government handouts and what work Igance could find as a quarryman.  At least three more children were born to them at Chantenay, where the Nantes-area quarries were located:  Catherine-Françoise in c1777 but died at age 5 in August 1782; Jean-Étienne in June 1780 but died a few weeks later; and an unnamed child, gender and unrecorded, buried in November 1782--a dreadful year for the family. 

Guillaume, son of Joseph Hamon and his French wife Marie Dameue, born perhaps at Chantenay in c1761, married Marguerite, daughter of Acadians Charles Saulnier and Euphrosine Lalande of Rivière-aux-Canards, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1780.  Guillaume, evidently not kin to Ignace, may have been a Frenchman and not an island Acadian.  He worked as a carpenter in Nantes, where Spanish agents counted him with his wife and hundreds of other Acadians in September 1784.

When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Ignace Hamon and his wife Anne-Josèphe Bourg agreed to take it.  Also consenting to go to the Spanish colony was Guillaume Hamon and his Acadian wife Marguerite Saulnier.250

Hébert

By 1755, descendants of Antoine and Étienne Hébert and their wives Geneviève Lefranc and Marie Gaudet could be found at Annapolis Royal; Grand-Pré, Pigiguit, and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; Chignecto, where one of the communites south of the Cumberland Basin was named Rivière-des-Héberts; Chepoudy and Memramcook in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable; and on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this huge family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Héberts likely were among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Héberts probably were the among the Acadians from Chignecto and the trois-rivières who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Hébert families were shipped to South Carolina and Georgia.  However, most of the Chignecto-area Héberts escaped the British that summer and fall and made their way north to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada. 

Many of the Héberts still living at Minas and Pigiguit in the fall of 1755 found themselves on transports bound for the northern seaboard colonies of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania.  Minas Héberts were especially numerous in the Bay Colony.  In 1756, Massachusetts officials counted Pierre Hébert, wife Marie-Josèphe Clouâtre, and five children, two sons and three daughers, at Waltham, with the notation that Pierre was "fit for business," but Marie-Josèphe was "unfit for business by reason of her being with child."  Also at Waltham were Pierre's parents, Augustin, père and Anne Boudrot.  They, too, were "unfit for business" and were still at Waltham the following year.  In July 1760, Massachusetts officials counted Charles Bear, actually Hébert, age 36, wife Marguerite-Monique Landry, age 24, and three of their children--Modly, age 4; Charles, fils, age 2, and Marguerite, age 1, all born in the colony--at Andover.  The following year, officials in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, counted Héberts living there:  Auge., actually Augustin, Hibbert, fils, age 48, wife Marguerite-Bonne Landry, age 48, and four children--Mary or Marie, age 21; Joseph, age 19; Marguerite, age 11; and Mathurin, age 8--at Watertown.  Peter Hibbert, age 17, and Charles Hibbert, age 12, Augustin, fils's sons, were counted at Stow but, a colonial official noted, were "bound out at Watertown."  Another Peter Hibbert, age 41, Augustin, fils's brother, Pierre's wife Marie-Josèphe Clouâtre, age 37, and seven children--Pierre, fils, age 12; Mary, age 10; Joseph, age 8; Marguerite, age 6; Marte, age 4; Jean-Baptiste, age 2; and Madeleine, age 4 months--were counted at Newton.  Augustin Hibbert, père, age 68, and his wife Anne Boudrot, age 68, were now living at Lexington.  Marguerite Hibbert, age 24, and Marguerite-Josèphe Hibbert, age 23, Augustin, père and Anne's younger daughters, were still at Waltham.  John Hibbert, age 22, was at Bedford.  Joseph Hibert, age 33, one of Augustin, père's younger sons, wife Anne dite Nanny Dugas, age 27, and three daughters--Marie, age 6; Madeleine, age 4; and Marguerite, age 5 months--were at Lincoln.  Jean Hébert of Pigiguit, wife Élisabeth Granger, and some of their children were counted at Worcester in 1760. 

Minas Héberts also were sent to the Chesapeake colonies of Maryland and Virginia.  In Maryland, as in Massachusetts, the "French Neutrals" were dispersed throughout the colony.  Héberts were held at Baltimore, Annapolis, and Princess Anne on the mainland, and at Georgetown and Newtown on the colony's Eastern Shore.  They were especially numerous at Georgetown.  The hundreds of Acadians transported to Virginia, the first contingent of which reached Hampton Roads during the second week of November, suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  For weeks, the exiles, including Héberts, languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships while colonial leaders pondered their fate.  Later that autumn, with winter approaching, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie, with the approval of his council, ordered the "French Neutrals" dispersed to the ports of Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond.  The following spring, the colony's Burgesses debated the question of the their fate and concluded that the papists must go.  Virginia authorities hired more vessels and sent the Acadians on to England--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool, 1,225 exiles in all by one count.  There they were packed into warehouses in several English ports, and many of them died of smallpox, espeically at Bristol.  Héberts were held at Southampton and Liverpool.  Back in Nova Scotia, the few Minas Héberts who escaped the redcoats joined their cousins on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or in Canada. 

Most of the Héberts still at Annapolis Royal escaped the roundup there and on the haute rivière.  After a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring and joined their fellow refugees on the upper Petitcoudiac or on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  They, too, moved on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or to Canada.  At least one family of Héberts at Annapolis Royal was deported to New York. 

In September 1755, the habitants at Cobeguit, learning of the fate of their cousins on the other end of the Minas Basin, packed up their goods and their loved ones and abandoned their settlements.  Many of them headed cross country to Tatamagouche and other North Shore settlements.  By the following spring, in what boats they could find, they crossed Mer Rouge to Île St.-Jean, where they joined their kinsmen from Annapolis Royal, Minas, and Cobeguit who had been there since the late 1740s. 

An Hébert family at Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable, along with the other Acadians there, remained unmolested during the initial round of deportations in 1755.  The following April, however, a New-English force from Halifax under Major Jedidiah Preble descended on the Cap-Sable villages, including Pobomcoup, and rounded up 72 Acadians, including Alexandre Hébert, fils, his second wife Marie-Josèphe Amireau, and their five children.  The New Englanders took them to Georges Island, Halifax, and British officials ordered them to board the ship Mary.  Their destination was North Carolina, but they landed, instead, at Manhattan in late April 1756.  They refused to be taken to the southern colony aboard H.M.S. Leopard.  New York authorities agreed to let them stay.  The Héberts were sent to Southampton, Suffolk County, on Long Island. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the many Héberts on the Maritime islands escaped the fate of their cousins in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the islands and deported them to France.  The crossing devastated the family.  Héberts crossed aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg sometime in September with 346 exiles aboard, suffered a mid-ocean mishap, and limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Only 283 exiles were still on board; 37 more died in local hospitals.  Four Hébert families perished from the crossing aboard the ill-fated vessel:  Joseph Hébert and his son Grégoire died at sea, and wife Marguerite Boudrot died in a St.-Malo hospital in early December.  Michel Hébert, wife Claire Boisseau, sons Jean and Théodore, and daughter Adélaïde died at sea; sons François, age 10, and Joseph, age 8, and daughter Michelle-Marie, age 7, died in a St.-Malo hospital during the first and second weeks of November.  Another Joseph Hébert, wife Françoise LeBlanc, and their daughters Marie, Marguerite, and Rosalie died at sea.  Pierre Hébert, wife Françoise Bourgeois, and daughter Modeste died at sea, and daughter Marie-Josèphe died in a St.-Malo hospital in early December.  But an Hébert wife survived the crossing:  Marie-Josèphe Hébert crossed with husband Jean Cyr, eight children, and two Borny orphans.  Miraculously, they all survived the terrible crossing aboard Duc Guillaume.  Charles Hébert l'aîné of Cobeguit and Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse, age 55, his wife Marguerite Dugas, and their younger children died aboard the transport Duke William, which left Chédaboutou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November with 364 Acadians aboard and sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December.  Other members of Charles's family, including a married daughter and two married sons, crossed to St.-Malo on other vessels, so the entire nuclear family, unlike many others on Duke William, was not wiped out.  Another Charles dit Manuel Hébert, age 52, his wife Claire Daigre, and their younger children, died on a second transport--the Violet, 400 exiles aboard, also part of the 11-ship convoy--that foundered in the same North Atlantic storm, taking all of the ship's crew and its passengers down with it.  Like the family of his namesake cousin, one of Charles dit Manuel's daughters and his oldest son crossed on other vessels, so, again, an entire nuclear family was not wiped out.  The oldest son, Charles dit Manuel, fils, his wife Marie Poirier, and their young children, crossed on the transport Ruby, which also left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy destined for St.-Malo.  The mid-December storm drove the Ruby to the Portuguese Azores, where it was wrecked on the rocks of Pico Island.  Wife Marie and the children perished in the mishap.  Charles dit Manuel, fils was among the 87 survivors the Portuguese transported aboard Santa Catarina to Portsmouth, England, which they reached in early February 1759.  The British loaded them aboard the Bird and sent them on to Le Havre in Normandy, where they arrived a week and a half later.  From Le Havre, Charles, fils crossed the Baie de Seine to Cherbourg and then moved on to St.-Malo, which he finally reached in mid-September, 10 months after he and his family had left Chédabouctou Bay.  The great majority of the island Héberts crossed on one or more of the five transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy with 1,033 Acadians aboard.  Despite the mid-December storm that sank or wrecked three other vessels, the Five Ships remained in convoy and reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  However, only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, many of them Héberts.  Isabelle Hébert, age 21, crossed on one of the Five Ships with husband Michel Aucoin, age 27, and no children.  They both survived the crossing.  Isabelle Hébert, age 24, crossed with husband Honoré Boudrot, age 29, and two children.  The children died at sea, and Isabelle and Honoré died in a St.-Malo hospital soon after their arrival.  Madeleine Hébert, widow of François Bourg, crossed with three grown children.  One of the children died in a local hospital, the other two survived, and Madeleine died "en rade," that is, in the roadstead, as the ship approached the St.-Malo docks.  Ursule Hébert, no age given, crossed with husband Alexandre Bourg and six children.  Alexandre and four of the children died at sea.  Ursule and two of her older children survived the crossing.  Anne Hébert, age 19, crossed with husband Joseph Blanchard, age 28, her older brother Charles, age 22, Joseph's mother, and a 13-year-old Blanchard niece.  Joseph's mother and brother Charles died at sea.  Françoise Hébert, age 25, widow of another Joseph Blanchard, crossed with a 3-year-old daughter.  The girl survived the crossing and its rigors, but Françoise died in a local hospital soon after they reached the Breton port.  Jean-Baptiste Hébert, age 6, son of Jean, crossed with the family of Pierre Bourg and Marie-Josèphe Gautrot, probably relatives.  Pierre, three of his children, and Marie-Josèphe's 80-year-old father died at sea or in a local hospital.  Young Jean-Baptiste, along with Marie-Josèphe and three of her children, survived the crossing.  Marguerite-Josèphe Hébert, age 30, crossed with husband Alexandre Bourg, age 40, four daughters, her 10-year-old brother François-Xavier, who was crippled in one leg, and a Breau orphan.  Marguerite, Alexandre, and their older daughters survived the crossing.  The two younger daughters and the young Breau died at sea.  François-Xavier Hébert died in a local hospital in June.  Marie Hébert, age 54, crossed with husband Joseph Dugas, age 59, and three children.  Only two of the children survived the crossing.  Françoise Hébert, age 22, crossed with husband Marin Daigre, age 23.  She died in a local hospital in early February probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Marguerite Hébert, age 31, crossed on one of the Five Ships with husband Alexandre Gautrot, age 41, and six children.  Only she, Alexandre, and one of their children survived the crossing.  Marie Hébert, age 28, crossed with husband Joseph Gautrot, age 36, five children, and her brother Jean-Baptiste, age 12.  Marie, Joseph, and Jean-Baptiste survived the crossing, four of the children died at sea, and the oldest one died in a local hospital soon after they reached St.-Malo.  Pierre Hébert, age 35, oldest son of Charles l'aîné of the ill-fated Duke William, crossed on one of the Five Ships with wife Marie Robichaud, age 32, and four children--Pierre, fils, age 9; Charles le jeune, age 7; Jean-Chrysostôme, 6; and Marie, age 3.  Pierre, père, Marie, and their oldest son were the only ones who survived the crossing.  The three younger children died a sea.  Pierre's younger brother Ambroise Hébert le jeune, age 29, crossed with wife Félicité Lejeune, age 20, and two children--Marie, age 3; and Tersile, age 1.  Ambroise le jeune and Félicité survived the crossing, but their daughters died at sea.  Pierre and Ambroise le jeune's uncle Ambroise Hébert, age 47, crossed with wife Marie-Madeleine Bourg, age 42, and eight children--Basile, age 17; Françoise, age 14; Ambroise, fils, age 12; Jean-Pierre, age 10; Isaac, age 8; Rémy, age 5; Pélagie, age 3; and Timothé, age 1.  Marie-Madeleine and the three youngest children died at sea.  Ambroise l'aîné and the five older children survived the crossing.  His oldest daughter Marie-Madeleine Hébert, age 21, crossed with her father-in-law François Moyse dit Latreille, fils, age 70, husband François Moyse III, age 27, and a sister-in-law.  They all survived the crossing, but the elderly François, fils died in a local hospital within a month of their arrival.  Marie Hébert, age 19, crossed with husband Joseph Moyse, age 27, one of François, fils's sons.  The young couple survived the crossing.  Ambroise Hébert l'aîné's brother François, age 44, crossed with wife Isabelle Bourg, age 37, and 10 children--Olivier, age 20; Ursule, age 17; Joseph, age 15; François-Xavier, no age given; Tarsille or Thérèse, age 12; twins Marcel and Jean, age 10; Isabelle, age 7; Isaac, age 5; and Deriel, age 4.  Isabelle was pregnant when their ship left Chédabouctou Bay and gave birth aboard ship.  Isabelle, the newborn, and three of the older children--Isabelle, Isaac, and Derial--died at sea.  Son François-Xavier died in a local hospital soon after their arrival.  Ambroise l'aîné and François's younger brother Charles, age 34, crossed with wife Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg, age 30, and four children--Charles, fils, age 9; Athanase, age 7; Marie-Rose, age 4; and Théodore, age 1.  Only Marguerite-Josèphe and oldest son Charles, fils survived the crossing.  Another Charles Hébert, age 32, crossed with wife Marguerite LeBlanc, age 23, and two children, Marie and Pierre, no ages given.  The children died at sea, and Charles and Marguerite died in a local hospital soon after they reached the Breton port.  Yet another Charles Hébert, age 49, crossed with wife Marguerite LeBlanc, no age given, and three sons--Charles, fils, age 19; Joseph, age 10; and Jean-Pierre, age 4.  Only Charles, père and sons Charles, fils and Joseph survived the crossing.  Newlyweds Jean-Baptiste Hébert, age 26, and Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, Dugas, age 17, crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Both survived the crossing.  Joseph Hébert, fils, age 24, crossed alone and survived the ordeal.  Pierre Hébert, age 23, crossed with wife Madeleine Blanchard, age 30, and two daughters--Marie-Josèphe, age 3; and Anne-Josèphe, age 1.  The daughters died at sea, and Madeleine died probably in a local hospital soon after reaching St.-Malo.  Pierre's mother Marie-Claire, called Claire, Dugas, age 62, widow of Jean Hébert III, crossed with four of her younger Hébert children--Jean IV, age 19; Hélène age 18; Marie-Josèphe, age 16; and Victoire, age 14.  The daughters survived the crossing, but brother Jean IV died at sea, and mother Claire died in a local hospital soon after they reached St.-Malo.  Pierre's older sister Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, age 29, crossed with husband Pierre Blanchard, two children, and a Hamon orphan.  Only she survived the crossing.  Their younger sister Anne, age 21, crossed with husband Jean Blanchard, their young son, and a Blanchard relative.  Only Anne and the relative survived.  Françoise Hébert, age 21, crossed with husband Charles Henry, age 23, and their 8-month-old daughter.  They all survived the crossing.  Marie Hébert, age 60, crossed with husband Jean Henry, age 71, and an 18-year-old son.  Marie and her son survived the crossing, but her husband died in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer two months after they reached port.  Osite Hébert, age 25, crossed with husband Joseph Robichaud, age 29, a young son, and a young Landry orphan.  Osite and Joseph survived the crossing, but the children died at sea.  Mathurin Hébert, age 16, crossed with the family of Blaise Thibodeau and Catherine Daigre.  All four of the couple's children died at sea, and Mathurin died in a local hospital soon after they reached St.-Malo.  Pierre Hébert, in his early 20s, with the family of Louis Talbot and Marie-Françoise Douville.  Two of the couple's seven children died at sea, and two more of them died in a local hospital soon after arrival.  Pierre, along with the middle-aged couple and three of their children, survived the crossing.  Marguerite Hébert, age 50, crossed with husband Joseph Vincent, age 45, and seven of their children.  Marguerite, Joseph, and four of their children survived the crossing, but three of the children died at sea.  Louis Hébert, age 18, crossed perhaps on one of the Five Ships.  He survived the crossing but died at Châteauneuf on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo in February 1759 probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Héberts also crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédaboutou Bay in the 11-ship convy in late November, 163 Acadians aboard.  It, too, was battered by the mid-December storm and limped into the harbor at Bideford, England, for repairs a week later.  A few of the passengers transhipped to Bristol, but most of them, including Héberts, went on to St.-Malo, which they finally reached during the second week of March 1759.  Most survived the crossing:  Jean Hébert le jeune, age 52, crossed with second wife Véronique Cyr, age 27, and five of his children--Rosalie, age 14; Joseph-Ignace, age 12; Jean-Baptiste, age 11; and Marguerite-Blanche and Marguerite-Tarsille, ages unrecorded.  Véronique, Marguerite-Blanche, and Marguerite-Tarsille died at sea or in a local hospital soon after they reached St.-Malo.  The others survived the crossing.  Jean le jeune's oldest daughter Catherine-Josèphe, called Josèphe, age 28, crossed with husband Victor Boudrot, age 29, and three children.  A daughter died at sea, but the others survived.  Jean le jeune's second daughter Marie, age 24, crossed with husband Pierre Arcement of Île St.-Jean, age 25, their 16-month-old son, and Marie's 18-year-old sister Anne.  They all survived the crossing.  Théotiste Hébert, age 15, crossed with her uncle Jean Lejeune of Île St.-Jean, her aunt Françoise Guédry, and their four children.  Two of the children died in St.-Malo hospitals in May, but the others, including Théotiste, survived the rigors of the crossing.  Madeleine Hébert, age 32, crossed on Supply with husband Charles Guédry, age 33, three children, and a Breau and a Bourg orphan.  They all survived the crossing.  Pierre Hébert, age 27, crossed with wife Anne Benoit, age 31, and two children--Jean-Pierre, age 5; and Élisabeth, age 1.  They all endured the long crossing to France but, like so many others, not all of them survived its rigors. 

Island Héberts did their best to create a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Ambroise Hébert l'aîné, now a widower, and his surviving children, including his married daughter, settled at Pleslin on the west bank of the river south of St.-Malo.  Oldest daughter Marie-Madeleine died in a St.-Malo hospital in February 1760, age 22, perhaps from the complications of childbirth.  Her Moyse husband remarried to a Bourg the following year.  Ambroise l'aîné's oldest son Basile died at Pleslin in June 1760, age 20, and his second daughter Françoise died there in April 1762, age 19.  One wonders if their health was wrecked by the crossing to France.  In March 1764, at age 52, Ambroise l'aîné remarried to Hélène, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Aucoin and Catherine Comeau and widow of Claude Trahan, at nearby Plouër-sur-Rance.  They settled at Pleslin.  She gave him no more children.  Ambroise l'aîné's younger sons Ambroise, fils, Jean-Pierre, and Isaac settled with their father at Pleslin.  In 1768, youngest son Isaac, with other young exiles, studied for the priesthood under Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre at Nantes on the other side of the Breton peninsula.  His studies ended in September 1772 with the abbé's death.  Isaac then returned to Pleslin.  Ambroise l'aîné's brother François, now a widower, and his surviving children settled at Pleslin.  François, now in his mid-50s, did not remarry.  Oldest son Olivier, age 20, died at Pleslin in December 1759, his health probably ruined by the crossing.  Second daughter Ursule married Alexandre, son of fellow Acadians Thomas Doiron and Anne Girouard, at Pleslin in January 1763.  She gave him many children.  François's youngest surviving son Marin died at Pleslin in June of that year, age 14.  François's second son Joseph married Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Aucoin and Anne Trahan of Rivière-aux-Canards, at Plouër-sur-Rance in March 1764.  Eight children were born to them in the St.-Malo area over the next 14 years:  Marguerite-Anastasie at Plouër in December 1765; Marie-Madeleine at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in August 1767; Félix-Augustin at Plouër in January 1770 but died at nearby La Mettrie Pommerais 13 days after his birth; Victoire-Geneviève in April 1771; Joseph-Madeleine in November 1772; Charles-Adrien in December 1774; Julienne-Madeleine in March 1776 but died at La Bouillie near Plouër in March 1777, age 1; and Françoise-Anne in February 1778 but died at nearby Port St.-Hubert, age 1, in October 1779.  Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg, widow of Ambroise l'aîné's and François's brother Charles, and her 9-year-old son Charles, fils also settled at Pleslin.  Ambroise l'aîné and François's nephew Ambroise le jeune and wife Félicité Lejeune, now childless, settled at Ploubalay near Pleslin before moving closer to their kin.  They promptly recreated a family in the area:  Isaac-Joseph born at Laurodel near Pleslin in April 1760; Jean-Marguerite at Pleslin in November 1761; Alexis-Pierre in July 1763; Jean-Baptiste in November 1764 but died at age 2 1/2 in July 1767; Marie-Jeanne in February 1766 but died at age 1 1/2 in July 1767; Marie-Félicité in February 1768 but died at age 1 in March 1769; Gertrude-Anne in September 1769, Ambroise-Alexandre-Baptiste in February 1771; Victor-François in September 1772 but died at age 6 months the following April; and Marie-Jeanne in February 1774--10 more children, six sons and four daughters, only half of whom survived early childhood.  Charles Hébert, now a widower, and sons Charles, fils and Joseph, settled at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo.  Charles, père, at age 55, remarried to Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Caissie and Cécile Hébert and widow of Michel Grossin, at St.-Malo in March 1764.  She gave him no more children.  They moved to nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer in 1770.  Older son Charles, fils married Marguerite-Louise, daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Valet dit Langevin and Brigitte Pinet of Île St.-Jean and widow of Paul Pitre, at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo in January 1770.  Marie-Louise gave Charles, fils two children at St.-Suliac in their first two years of marriage:  Marie-Josèphe in November 1770 but died there, age 2, in September 1772; and Joseph in December 1772.  Charles, père's younger son Joseph married Jeanne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean De La Forestrie and his first wife Marie Bonnière of St.-Pierre-du-Nord, Île St.-Jean, at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river in July 1772.  She gave him a son, Joseph-Marie, there in July 1773.  After arriving at St.-Malo from Cherbourg in September 1759, Charles Hébert dit Manuel, fils, now a widower and childless, settled at St.-Servan, where he remarried to local Frenchwoman Jeanne Lucas in May 1763.  She gave him two more daughters there:  Théotiste-Marie in October 1763; and Marie-Jeanne in January 1765 but died 16 days after her birth.  Jeanne died in February 1765 probably from the complications of childbirth, and Charles, fils remarried again--his third marriage--to Frenchwoman Marie-Jeanne-Louise-Madeleine, daughter of Jacques Le Coq and Madeleine Laurent of Châteauneuf on the east side of the river south of St.-Servan, at St.-Servan in July 1765.  Jean Hébert le jeune, a widower again, settled at St.-Suliac north of Châteauneuf with his surviving children, including two married daughters.   Daughter Anne married fellow Acadian Pierre Robichaud, widower of Anne-Marie Blanchard, at St.-Suliac in November 1761.  Oldest daughter Josèphe, wife of Victor Boudrot, died at the Hôtel-Dieu in St.-Malo in April 1772, age 40.  Daughter Rosalie married Pierre-Olivier, son of fellow Acadians Germain Pitre and Marguerite Girouard, at St.-Suliac in October 1775.  Jean le jeune's second son Jean-Baptiste married Anne-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Alexis Dugas and Anne Bourg, at St.-Suliac in February 1768.  She gave him three children there:  Alexis-Toussaint in November 1768; Jean-Joseph in April 1771; and Ambroise-Mathurin in November 1772.  Jean le jeune's third son Joseph-Ignace married cousin Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph dit Petit Jos Dugas and Marie Hébert, at St.-Suliac in February 1768 on the same day his older brother Jean-Baptiste married there.  Anne gave Joseph-Ignace four children at St.-Suliac:  Pierre-Joseph in March 1769; Anne-Marie in January 1771 but died the following May; Louis-Joseph in May 1772 but died the following November; and Olivier-Constant-Mathias in February 1774.  A widowed daughter and three of the unmarried daughters of Jean Hébert III and Claire Dugas, after their mother's death at St.-Malo, settled at Ploubalay on the west side of the river near Pleslin.  Anne, recently widowed, remarried to Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Alexis dit Lexy Aucoin and Marie Bourg and widower of Anne Blanchard, at Ploubalay in November 1759.  They resettled at nearby Tréméreuc in 1763.  Youngest sister Victoire married local Frenchman Julien, son of Laurent Briand and Gugonne Guguen of Ploubalay and Tréméreuc, at Ploubalay in January 1763.  Sister Hélène married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Alexis Aucoin, fils and Hélène Blanchard, at Ploubalay in May 1763.  They also settled at Tréméreuc.  Sister Marie-Josèphe married Joseph, another son of Alexis Aucoin, fils and Hélène Blanchard, at Ploubalay in March 1764.  Brother Pierre and wife Madeleine Blanchard, now childless, joined his sisters at Ploubalay, where Madeleine died in March 1759, in her late 20s, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Pierre remarried to Susanne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Pitre and Marguerite Thériot and widow of Jean-Baptiste-Olivier Henry, at nearby Pleurtuit in June 1760.  They settled at Ploubalay.  Over the next 15 years, Susanne gave Pierre seven more children there:  Marie-Josèphe, the second of his daughters with the name, at nearby Laurodel in April 1761; Pierre-Jean in February 1763; Anne-Josèphe, the second with the name, in February 1765; François-Étienne in February 1767; Joseph-Yves in May 1769; Mathurin-Pierre-François in October 1771; and Anne-Perrine at Tréméreuc in November 1775 but died there, age 7 1/2, in March 1783.  Jean-Baptiste, called Baptiste, Hébert, still in his early teens, and sister Élisabeth reached St.-Malo from Cherbourg in July 1759.  He died at Hôtel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in May 1768, age 23, still a bachelor.  One wonders what happened to his sister Élisabeth.  Newlyweds Jean-Baptise Hébert and Marie-Madeleine Dugas settled at Pleurtuit.  Over the next 13 years, at Pleurtuit, St.-Servan-sur-Mer, and St.-Coulomb and St.-Méloir-des-Ondes in the countryside east of St.-Malo, Marie-Madeleine gave Jean-Baptiste seven children:  Jean-Baptiste, fils at St.-Coulomb in April 1760; Marie-Madeleine in July 1761; Anne-Simone in April 1764; Pierre-Michel in April 1766; Anne-Marie at St.-Servan in April 1768; Joseph-Servan in May 1770; and Isabelle-Jeanne at St.-Méloir in June 1772.  Jean-Baptise, père worked as a laborer and farmhand in the area.  Jean-Baptiste Hébert, also still in his early teens, followed his sister and brother-in-law to St.-Suliac south of St.-Servan, where he married Luce-Perpétué, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Bourg and Françoise Benoit, in April 1766.  Luce gave him four children at St.-Suliac:  Marie-Gertrude in May 1767; Jean-Olivier-Marie in March 1769; Félicité-Jeanne in July 1771; and Françoise-Luce in March 1774.  Joseph Hébert, fils of Cobeguit, still a bachelor, settled at St.-Énogat before moving south to Pleurtuit, where he married Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians Étienne Comeau and Marie Landry, in August 1763.  They settled across the river at St.-Suliac before moving downriver, that is, north, to St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  At St.-Servan and in the Plouër-sur-Rance area west of the river, Françoise gave Joseph, fils 10 children:  Marie-Madeleine at St.-Servan in December 1764; Françoise-Pélagie in March 1766 but died at La Chiennais near Plouër at age 7 in January 1773; Marie-Josèphe in April 1767 but, according to Albert J. Robichaux, Jr.'s study of the Acadians in France, died at La Metrie Pommeray near Plouër at age 14 in October 1779; Pierre-Jean in June 1768; Alain-Mathurin at Plouër in August 1769 but died at La Chiennais at age 3 March 1772; Marguerite-Geneviève in March 1771 but died at La Chiennais at age 2 1/2 in August 1773; Thérèse-Anne in July 1772; Jean-Joseph-Laurent-François in March 1774 but died at La Pommerais at age 5 in October 1779; Anne-Madeleine in May 1775 but died at La Mettrie Pommerais at age 3 in February 1778; and Julien-Joseph in April 1777 but died at La Mettrie Pommerais the following January.  Although Pierre Hébert, wife Marie Robichaud, and oldest child Pierre, fils survived the crossing to St.-Malo, not all of them survived the rigors of the crossing.  In May 1759, only three and a half months after they reached the Breton port, Marie and her son died within two days of one another at La Gonais near Ploubalay.  The priest who recorded her burial said Marie died of smallpox.  The 8-year-old Pierre, fils also may have been a victim of the dread disease.  Pierre, père remained at Ploubalay until 1760, when he resettled at Pleslin to the south.  He remarried to cousin Luce-Perpétué, daughter of fellow Acadians François Bourg and Madeleine Hébert, at nearby Trigavou in January 1762.  Luce gave Pierre eight more children at Pleslin and nearby Tréméreuc:  Pierre-Joseph at Pleslin in June 1763; Victoire-Luce at Tréméreuc in February 1765 but died at nearby La Village Trehosal, age 2 1/2, in September 1767; another Victoire Luce in January 1768; Jean-Baptiste-Marie in July 1770 but died at Tréméreuc at age 1 in August 1771; Mathurine-Marguerite in August 1772 but died the following November; Anne-Marie-Julienne in December 1773; Jean-Charles in December 1775 but died the day after his birth; and Julienne-Perrine at La Ville Aubé near Tréméreuc in January 1780.  Another Pierre Hébert, wife Anne Benoit, and their two children settled at Châteauneuf across the river east of St.-Suliac.  Pierre died at Châteauneuf in late April 1759, age 27, his health probably wrecked by the crossing.  Daughter Élisabeth died there in May, age 2.  Anne remarried to another Hébert--Jean-Baptiste, son of Jean, fils of Pigiguit and Belle-Île-en-Mer--at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in January 1770.  Jean-Baptiste had recently returned from French Guiane, a widower with a daughter.  That August, Anne and her teenage son Jean-Pierre followed Jean-Baptiste and his daughter to La Rochelle, but they soon moved on to Sauzon on the north shore of Belle-Île-en-Mer to join his father and younger brother there.  Pierre Hébert, a bachelor in his early 20s and native of Île St.-Jean, settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, but he did not remain there long.  In May 1760, he signed up for corsair duty aboard Le François, from which he deserted, no place given, in March 1761.  He returned to St.-Malo, perhaps not until after the war had ended, and married Frenchwoman Françoise, daughter of Joseph Dudouit and Laurence Hervi and widow of Niclas Zezecal, at St.-Servan in October 1765.  She gave him a son the following year, Pierre-François, in September 1766, but the boy died in October.  He then went back to sea.  From 1768 to 1770 he was at Newfoundland.  He returned to St.-Malo in December 1770 and fathered another child at St.-Servan, Françoise-Perrine, in July 1772. 

From late 1758 to early 1760, island Héberts, as well as Héberts captured at Cap-Sable after the fall of Louisbourg, ended up in other coastal cities, including Cherbourg and Le Havre in Normandy, Morlaix in northwest Brittany, and Rochefort and Bordeaux on the Bay of Biscay.  Claire Hébert, widow of Antoine Henry, of Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse, Île Royale, died at Cherbourg in mid-December 1758, age 60.  Anne-Josèphe Hébert, age 24, crossed to Cherbourg with husband Victor Forest, age 24; her sister Élisabeth, age 16; and her brother Jean, age 14.  Jean, son of Jean-Clément Hébert, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in December 1759, age 1 month.  Angélique Hébert landed at Cherbourg and married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Jacques Devaux and Marie Potier of Île St.-Jean and widower of Marie-Josèphe LaCroix, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in August 1760.  Marie, daughter of Charles dit Manuel Hébert and Claire Daigre of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, and Île St.-Jean, married Charles, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Haché and Marie Gaudet and widower of Anne Deveau of Île St.-Jean, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in January 1761; Marie's parents and most of her siblings had perished on the crossing from Île St.-Jean to St.-Malo aboard the ill-fated transport Violet in mid-December 1758.  Charles-Paul Hébert, wife Claire Mius d'Azy, and their children, both married and unmarried, were captured at Cap-Sable by a British force from Louisbourg in September 1758.  The British held them at Georges Island, Halifax, until November 1759, when they deported them to France via England.  Charles-Paul and his family landed at Cherbourg in January 1760.  Joseph-David, son of Joseph Hébert and Félicité Savoie, probably a grandson of Charles-Paul, was baptized at Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in late January.  Charles-Paul died there in March, age 52.  His oldest son Charles, fils also died there, age 30, four days before his father died.  Charles, fils's son Isidore died in April, age 5.  Charles-Paul's second son Joseph died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in August 1760, age 28, five months after his wife died there.  Charles-Paul's older daughter Rosalie, age 23, married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Charles La Pierre and Marie Pitre and widower of Marie-Josèphe Bourg, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in March 1761.  Joseph also had landed at Cherbourg in 1759 and evidently was a sailor.  He died at Port-de-Paix, French St.-Domingue, in October 1766, age 33.  Surviving members of Charles-Paul's family did not remain at Cherbourg.  Second daughter Marie-Anastasie, age 22, married cousin Alexis, 22-year-old son of fellow Acadians Charles Hébert and Claire Daigre, in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, across the Baie de Seine, in May 1765.  Alexis had crossed from Île St.-Jean in 1758 and landed at Cherbourg, where he worked as a sailor. Their son Jean-Baptiste-Alexis was born in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in June 1765; François-Dominique in April 1767; and Pierre-Bénoni in July 1768.  Charles-Paul's youngest son Dominique married Marie-Marguerite, 22-year-old daughter of locals Philippe Viard and Marie-Marguerite-Geneviève Barois, in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in July 1765.  Charles-Paul's youngest daughter Susanne, age 24, married Jean-François, son of Pierre Le Breton and Jeanne Adrien of the Diocese of Luçon near La Rochelle, in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in May 1767.  Susanne's oldest sister Rosalie, the 29-year-old widow of Joseph La Pierre, had been living at Le Havre for four years when she remarried to Louis, 33-year-old son of Pierre Mercier and Louis La Treille of St.-Thomas, Canada, in Notre-Dame Parish in January 1768.  Louis was a carpenter.  Charles-Paul's younger brother Jean, wife Marguerite Mouton, and their children, also had been captured at Cap-Sable in September 1758 and landed at Cherbourg in January 1760.  Marguerite died there later that month, age 35, and Jean died in March, age 46.  Son Joseph died in April, age 7.  Daughter Anne, born at Cap-Sable in November 1758, was baptized at Très-Ste.-Trinité church in December 1760.  Jean's teenage daughter Marie married Louis, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Lamoureux and Marie-Claire Pothier of Île St.-Jean, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in August 1763; the priest who recorded the marriage noted that both of the bride's parents and the groom's father were deceased.  Probably after his parents' death, Jean's older son Étienne also moved to Le Havre in the early 1760s.  At age 21, he married Marie, 27-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Lavergne and Françoise Pitre, in Notre-Dame Parish in January 1767.  Marie gave Étienne four children there:  Marie-Cécile-Rose in October 1767; Jean-Louis-Étienne in May 1769; Guillaume-Bénoni in c1772; and Marie-Marguerite-Julie.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Jacques Hébert and Marie Doucet, married Pierre, son of Guillaume Thomasse and Renée Moitier, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in February 1766.  Marie, daughter of Jean-François Hébert, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, age 16 months, in February 1770.  Ferdinand Hébert, a day laborer probably from Pigiguit, landed in the naval port of Rochefort in late 1758.  Three years later, at age 20, he married Marie-Modeste, daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Leber and Marie Lebeau, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in May 1761.  Jean-Charles-Louis Hébert was born in St.-Mathieu Parish, Morlaix, in April 1767.  Jean Hébert of Minas, age 25, entered L'Hôpital St.-André, Bordeaux, in June 1775 and left the following August. 

One wonders if any of the other Héberts living at several French ports from the late 1750s into the 1780s were Acadians.  Considering the prominence of the family in many regions of France, one suspects that many were not.  Jacques Hébert and Marie-Madeleine Liot's son Jacques-Amand was born in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in April 1759.  Was Jacques's wife's actual name Marie-Madeleine Doucet?  Marie-Françoise, daughter of Michel Hébert and Marie-Jeanne Leber or Lebert, was born in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in April 1760.  Marie-Marguerite, 27 1/2-year-old daughter of Jacques Hébert, a day laborer, and Marie-Anne Lespinge, married Henri, 24-year-old sailor son of Nicolas Bouton and Marie-Barbe Cauge, Conge, or Lange of Ste.-Anne, Québec, and widower of Rosalie Vincent of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, at St.-François Parish, Le Havre, in June 1767.  Yvonne Hébert, widow of François Collette, died at Lorient in southern Brittany in September 1767, age 80.  François-Serge Hébert, age unrecorded, died in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in northwest Brittany, in August 1768.  One wonders when he arrived there, if he was married, and if he was Acadian.  Pierre, negociante et receveur de la Choncellarie persidiales, son of François-Benjamin Hébert and Marie-Anne LeBreton of Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, married Suzanne-Françoise, daughter of Jean Faillofais or Faillofaix, conseilleur du roi and notaire and Suzanne Coussot, also of Notre-Dame, Le Havre, in St.-Sauveur Parish, La Rochelle, in February 1772; none of the marriage witnesses were Acadian; the recording priest noted that both of the groom's parents and the bride's father were deceased.  Pierre and Suzanne-Françoise's children, born in St.-Sauveur Parish, included Suzanne-Françoise in November 1772; George in March 1774; Thérèse-Suzanne in July 1775; Françoise-Madeleine-Sophie in July 1776; Suzanne-Adélaïde in November 1777; Suzanne-Reine-Élisabeth in April 1779; and Françoise-Lucie in September 1780.  François-Yves Hébert and wife Perrine Rio were living at Lorient, southern Brittany, in the late 1770s.  Their children, born there, included Jeanne-Françoise in February 1775 but died at age 4 1/2 in December 1779; Guillemette-Louise in April 1777; and Léonard-François in April 1778.  Sieur Gilles Hébert and wife Angélique La Martinerie also lived at Lorient in the late 1770s and early 1780s.  Their children born there included Louis in April 1777 but died at age 4 in January 1781; and René-Jean in April 1778.  Toussaint Hébert, sailor on the warship Palmier out of Dieppe, died at the hospital in Lorient in September 1779, age unrecorded.  Jean-Baptiste-Michel Heber, perhaps an Acadian Hébert, married Gabrielle Ninon in St.-Mélaine Parish, Morlaix, in February 1781. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including Héberts, were repatriated to several ports in France.  Bénoni Hébert, now a widower in his early 40s, reached St.-Malo aboard the transport Ambition in late May and settled at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  He did not remarry and died at St.-Servan at the end of February 1767, age 46.  Bénoni's younger brother Charles, wife Élisabeth LeBlanc, and their two teenage daughters Marie-Josèphe and Marie-Yvette also reached St.-Malo in late May 1763 and settled at St.-Servan.  Their daughters married into the Landry and Henry families there.  Joseph-Marie Hébert, wife Marguerite Richard, and their son Joseph crossed from England to St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition and also settled at St.-Servan.  Marguerite was either pregnant when they reached the Breton port or conceived soon after their arrival.  She gave Joseph-Marie four more children at St.-Servan:  Geneviève-Marie in February 1764; Sophie-Marie in April 1769; Marie in November 1771 but died at age 1 in December 1772; and an unnamed girl in November 1773 who died the day after her birth.  Pierre Hébert, a widower, reached St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition with four children--Marie-Marguerite, age 16; Olivier, age 15; Jean-Baptiste, age 14; and Joseph-Nicolas, age 11.  They settled at St.-Servan, but they did not remain there.  In May 1772, they received permission to work at Morlaix down the coast. 

Héberts from England also landed at Morlaix in the spring of 1763.  Joseph, son of Pierre Hébert and Marie Trahan, was born in St.-Mathieu Parish, Morlaix, in May 1764.  Later that year, the family followed other Acadians to the new French colony of Guiane.  Magdalen, or Madeleine, daughter of Olivier Hébert and Anne LeBlanc, was born in St.-Mathieu Parish in July 1764 on the eve of the family's departure for Guiane.  Daughter Marie-Barbe was born in St.-Mathieu Parish in August 1770 after they returned.  A large family led by Jean Hébert, fils of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, and his second wife Esther Courtenay, an Englishwoman, also landed at Morlaix.  The family included oldest son Alain, his second wife Françoise Saulnier, and their children; second son Jean-Baptiste Hébert, wife Anne LeBlanc, and their two children; third son Pierre-Pascal, called Pascal, wife Françoise Trahan, and their children; and youngest son Amable, wife Marie-Anne Richard, and their infant daughter.  Jean-Baptiste Hébert, perhaps Jean, fils's grandson, was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in November 1763.  Pascal and Françoise's daughter Marie-Élisabeth was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in December 1763.  Amable's daughter Marie-Modeste was born in St.-Mathieu Parish in early January 1764; and Élisabeth died in St.-Mathieu Parish in June 1764, age 1 1/2.  Later that year, Amable's older brothers Alain, Jean-Baptiste, and Pascal and their families also followed other Acadians to French Guiane.  Alain and Pascal and members of their families, as well as brother Jean-Baptiste's teenage son, died there within a year.  Jean-Baptiste and his daughter returned to France, where he remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Benoit and Élisabeth LeJuge and widow of Pierre Hébert, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in February 1770.  In August, they received permission to move on to La Rochelle. 

From December 1763 through November 1764, Acadians left France for French Guiane on the northeast coast of South America.  Héberts, including three brothers from Morlaix, were among them.  Like most of the settlers who ventured to this newest French colony, their experience there was not a happy one.  Oldest brother Alain Hébert, his wife, and children died there, dates unrecorded, but it probably was before the census taken at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district the first of March 1765.  Brother Jean-Baptiste's son Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 15, died there in December 1764.  In March 1765, French officials counted a number of Héberts still at Sinnamary:  Anne, age 18; Élisabeth, age 17; Firmin, a 19-year-old "orphan"; Alain's older brother Jean-Baptiste, age 35, wife Anne Blin, actually LeBlanc, age 36, and daughters Anne, age 8, and Marie, age 6; Olivier, age 28, wife Anne LeBlanc, age 32, and daughters Cologique, age 7, and Marguerite, age 6; Jean-Baptiste's younger brother Pascal, age 21[sic, probably 31], wife Françoise Trahan, age 20, and daughter Élisabeth, age 13 months; Pierre, age 13; and another Pierre, age 28.  Pascal's daughter Élisabeth died at Sinnamary in April 1765.  Pascal, age 32 (his burial record says 22), died a week later.  His widow Françoise Trahan returned to France and remarried in Spanish Louisiana.  Jean-Baptiste's wife Anne LeBlanc and younger daughter Marie evidently died in Guiane after March 1765; and Jean-Baptiste and older daughter Anne returned to France, where he remarried.  Olivier Hébert and wife Anne LeBlanc also returned to Morlaix.  Pierre Hébert and wife Marie Trahan were counted at Sinnamary in March 1765, but the French official who compiled the list did not count them together.  Their infant son Joseph also was not on the list, so he likely had died by then.  Marie died at Sinnamary in late May 1765, age 22.  Unlike most of his Hébert kin, Pierre remained in the tropical colony, but his time there was cut short.  He drowned in Rivière Sinnamary the first of February 1773, age 36, and was buried in the local cemetery.  His burial record notes that at the time of his death he was married to Marie Dischant, perhaps a corruption of Marie Trahan's name.  If a second wife existed, one wonders if she gave him any children.

In late autumn 1765, Acadians repatriated from England, and a few who had been deported from the French Maritimes, agreed to become part of a new agricultural settlement on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Most of the Hébert families from England who landed at St.-Malo remained there, but one of them from that port and two from Morlaix were among the exiles who ventured to Belle-Île in late November 1765.  None of the Héberts remained on the island after 1773.  Charles Hébert dit Manuel, fils, his third wife Marie-Jeanne-Louise-Madeleine LeCoq, and his surviving daughter Théotiste-Marie from St.-Servan-sur-Mer settled at Kervarigeon near Bangor in the island's southern interior.  Marie-Jeanne gave him three more children on Belle-Île, including Marie-Julie at Bangor in June 1767; and Pierre-Charles-Joseph in February 1769.  In February 1767, Charles, fils gave his declaration to French authorities on his line of the Hébert family in Acadia (he was a fifth-generation descendant of Étienne via oldest son Emmanuel, Emmanuel's second son Jean-Emmanuel, and his oldest son Charles dit Manuel).  Charles, fils died on the island before 1773, when his widow and children moved to Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  Jean Hébert, fils, who was age 66 in 1765, and his second wife Esther Courtenay from Morlaix settled at Borderhouat near Locmaria on the island's southeast coast.  They were still there in 1767, when, that November, Jean, fils gave a declaration on his family lineage to French officials (he was a third-generation descendant of Étienne via third son Jean, and was Jean's third son).  Jean, fils died on the island in March 1773, age 74.  His widow Esther evidently moved in with a stepson.  Jean, fils's youngest son Amable, who worked as a carpenter in the mother country, wife Marie-Anne Richard, and their daughters--Marie-Modeste, born in St.-Mathieu Parish, Morlaix, in January 1764; and Brigitte-Josèphe in St.-Mélaine Parish, Morlaix, in September 1765--followed his father and stepmother from Morlaix to Belle-Île-en-Mer in November 1765 and settled at Locmaria and then at Sauzon on the island's northern coast.  Amable fathered three more children on the island:  Marie-Geneviève, called Geneviève, in February 1768 near Locmaria; Élisabeth, the second with the name, in May 1770 near Sauzon; and Louis-David in March 1772.  Amable and his family did not remain on the island either.  In 1773, probably after his father's death, French officials counted Amable and his family, perhaps including his stepmother, at Quimper in southwestern Brittany.  Son Louis-David died in St.-Mathieu Parish, Quimper, in March 1774, age 2; and daughter Hélène was born in St.-Mathieu Parish in April 1774.  Later that year, they moved again.  Jean, fils's second son Jean-Baptiste, having returned from French Guiane a widower with a daughter in the late 1760s, remarried to Anne Benoit, widow of Pierre Hébert, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo in January 1770.  That August, he took her, his daughter, and her teenage son Jean-Pierre from her first marriage to La Rochelle.  They left La Rochelle for Belle-Île-en-Mer by January 1772, when son Jean-Charles was born near Locmaria, but their stay on the island was brief.  By late August, Jean-Baptiste and his blended family had moved on to the naval port of Rochefort down the coast from La Rochelle. 

In the early 1770s, Héberts in France chose in even greater numbers to take part in another settlement venture, this one in the interior province of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the Acadians languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  Héberts who took their families to Poitou included Amable Hébert and Marie-Anne Richard from Quimper; Ambroise Hébert l'aîné and second wife Hélène Aucoin from Pleslin; Ambroise Hébert le jeune and Félicité Lejeune from Pleslin; Charles Hébert, fils and Marguerite-Louise Valet from St.-Suliac; Charles Hébert's widow Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg and her son Charles, fils from Pleslin; Étienne Hébert and Marie Lavergne from Le Havre; widower François Hébert and his unmarried daughter Tarsille from Pleslin; Jean-Baptiste Hébert and second wife Anne Benoit from Rochefort; Jean-Baptiste Hébert and Marie-Madeleine Dugas from St.-Méloir-des-Ondes; Jean-Baptiste Hébert and Anne-Josèphe Dugas from St.-Suliac; Jean-Baptise Hébert and Luce-Perpétué Bourg from St.-Suliac; Joseph Hébert and Jeanne De La Forestrie from Plouër-sur-Rance; and Joseph-Ignace Hébert and Anne Dugas from St.-Suliac.  Étienne Hébert's sister Anne died at Cenan south of Châtellerault in October 1774, age 15.  Marie Lavergne gave Étienne another son, Louis-Gabriel, at Cenan in February 1775.  Anne-Josèphe Dugas gave Jean-Baptiste Hébert another son, Firmain-Joseph, at Leigné-les-Bois east of Châtellerault in October 1774, but the boy died four days after his birth.  Jean De La Forestrie gave Joseph Hébert another son, Charles, in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in May 1775.  Marie-Madeleine Dugas gave Jean-Baptiste Hébert another daughter, Françoise-Louise, at Leigné-les-Bois in August 1775.  Marguerite-Louise Valet gave Charles Hébert, fils a daughter, Marie-Louise, at Archigny south of Châtellerault in September 1775.  Félicité Lejeune gave Ambroise Hébert le jeune a daughter, Heleine--their thirteenth child--in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in December 1775.  After two years of effort, most of the Acadians deserted the Poitou venture.  From October 1775 through March 1776, hundreds of them, including most of the Héberts, retreated in four convoys to the lower Loire port of Nantes, but one Hébert family remained in Poitou:  Jean-Baptiste Hébert, second wife Anne Benoit, her son Jean-Pierre Hébert from her first marriage, and his daughter Anne, who married laborer François, fils, son of locals François Martin and Françoise Bareau of St.-Silvain de Mere Parish, at Cenan in August 1776, remained in the interior province.  Jean-Baptiste died at Cenan in June 1778, age 50.  Jean-Baptiste's stepson Jean-Pierre married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Moulaison and Marie-Josèphe Doucet, at Cenan in January 1779.  Marguerite died at Cenan the following October, age 30, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth.  Jean-Pierre followed his twice-widowed mother to Nantes soon after his wife's death.  Anne Hébert and her French husband did not follow them to the lower Loire port. 

At Nantes and nearby Chantenay, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Anne Dugas gave Joseph-Ignace Hébert four more children in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, the last one their eighth child:  Élisabeth-Jeanne in March 1776; Joseph in January 1779 but died the day after his birth; Louis-Marie in February 1781 but died at age 2 in February 1783; and Louis-Ambroise in November 1783.  Jean-Baptiste Hébert and Anne-Josèphe Dugas lost a son in Ste.-Croix Parish, Nantes:  oldest son Alexis-Toussaint died there at age 8 in March 1776.  But Anne-Josèphe gave Jean-Baptiste four more children at Nantes, the last one their eighth child:  Anne-Marie-Augustine in Ste.-Croix Parish in August 1776 but died at 8 months in May 1777; Simon in St.-Similien Parish in April 1778; Marie-Jeanne in March 1781 but died the following June; and Alexis-Thomas in December 1782.  Luce-Perpétué Bourg gave another Jean-Baptiste Hébert two more children in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes:  Marguerite in July 1776, but she probably died young; and Rose-Jeanne in June 1778 but died at age 3 in December 1781.  Jean-Baptiste died in St.-Nicolas Parish in September 1779, age 33.  Two teenage children of an older Jean-Baptiste Hébert and his wife Marie-Madeleine Dugas died in St.-Similien Parish:  Jean-Baptise, fils at age 17 in October 1776; and Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, at age 15 in November.  And Marie-Madeleine Dugas gave Jean-Baptiste Hébert four more children in that parish, the last one their twelfth child:  Alexis-Médard in June 1777 but died at age 6 in August 1783; Prosper-François in December 1779; Firmain in February 1782 but died at age 1 1/2 in July 1783; and Étienne in December 1784.  Meanwhile, Jean-Baptiste, père died in St.-Similien Parish in July 1784, age 52.  Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg, widow of Charles Hébert, died in St.-Nicolas Parish in December 1776, age 49.  Her only surviving child, son Charles Hébert, fils, married Anne-Osite, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Dugas and Marguerite Daigre, in St.-Similien Parish in October 1778.  Anne-Osite gave Charles, fils three children there:  Charles dit Charlot born in August 1779; Anne-Victoire in February 1781; and Marguerite-Sophie in October 1782.  Charles, fils died probably in St.-Similien Parish between September 1784 and May 1785, in his early 30s.  Jeanne De La Forestrie gave Joseph Hébert two more children at Nantes and Chantenay:  Marie-Rose in St.-Similien Parish in February 1777; Louis-Jean in June 1779; and Anne-Marguerite in St.-Martin de Chantenay Parish in March 1785.  Félicité Lejeune gave Ambroise Hébert le jeune three more children at Chantenay, a total of 16 for the couple:  Sophie in June 1777 but died at age 5 in March 1782; Marie-Madeleine in July 1779 but died at age 3 1/2 in November 1782; and Jean-Louis in September 1781 but died at age 14 months in December 1782.  Son Ambroise-Alexandre-Baptiste, born at Pleslin, died at Chantenay, age 6 1/2, in October 1777.  Marguerite-Louise Valet gave her second husband, another Charles Hébert, fils, two more children at Nantes:  Jeanne-Eulalie in St.-Léonard Parish in December 1777; and Marguerite-Louise baptized in Ste.-Croix Parish, age 15 months, in May 1780.  Charles, fils and wife Marguerite Louise may have died at Nantes before October 1785.  Ambroise Hébert l'aîné's second wife Hélène Aucoin died in St.-Nicolas Parish in December 1777, age 56.  Ambroise l'aîné died in the same parish the following January, age 66.  His youngest son Isaac by first wife Marie-Madeleine Bourg, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Eustache Daigre and Madeleine Dupuis, in St.-Nicolas Parish in July 1780.  Marie gave Isaac three children there:  Rémi in January 1782; Marie-Marguerite in June 1783 but died in May 1784; and Reine-Eulalie in May 1785.  Marie-Anne Richard gave Amable Hébert three more children at Chantenay:  André in c1776; Marie-Jeanne in March 1778 but died the following July; and Paul-Pierre in May 1780 but died in October.  Paul-Pierre's birth proved to be fatal for his mother.  Marie-Anne died the day after his birth, age 38.  Amable did not remarry.  Marie Lavergne gave Étienne Hébert two more children, twins Marguerite-Adélaïde and Charles-Lazare, in St.-Nicolas Parish in September 1778, but Charles-Lazare died eight days after his birth.  Giving birth to the twins probably killed Marie.  She died in St.-Nicolas Parish during the second week of October 1778, age 40.  Their daughter Marie-Marguerite-Julie, born at either Le Havre or in Poitou, also died at Nantes.  Étienne Hébert remarried to Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Bourg and Françoise Benoit of Cobeguit, in St.-Nicolas Parish in August 1779.  She died there in November 1780, age 32, perhaps also from the rigors of childbirth.  Étienne remarried again--his third marriage--to Anne-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Alexis Breau and Marie-Josèphe Thibodeau, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in August 1781.  She gave him another daughter, Marie-Madeleine, there in May 1785.  Tarsille, youngest daughter of François Hébert of Cobeguit, married Jean, son of fellow Acadians Simon LeBlanc and Marguerite Bourg of Minas, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in April 1782.  She gave him a daughter there in June 1784.  Day laborer Pierre Hébert, fils of Chignecto, who had lived in St.-Nicolas Parish, married Charlotte, daughter of fellow Acadians Christopher Pothier and Anne Boudrot and widow of Paul Patry, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1783.  Charlotte gave Pierre, fils a son, Pierre-Joseph, at Chantenay in March 1785.  Élisabeth LeBlanc, Charles Hébert's wife, died in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in February 1784, age 63.  Jean-Pierre Hébert, a young widower who had lost his wife at Cenan, Poitou, in October 1779, remarried to Anne-Dorothée, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Doiron and Anne Thibodeau, at Paimboeuf, the lower port for Nantes, in March 1784.  Anne-Dorothée gave him a daughter at Paimboeuf in January 1785.

Members of the family ended up in France by a different route, but most of them did not remain.  After the war with Britain ended in 1763, exiles being held in Nova Scotia and the northern seaboard colonies chose to resettle on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland that offered them an opportunity to escape British rule.  Jacques dit Boudiche Hébert, wife Anne Arseneau, and their large family went from Massachusetts to Miquelon in 1764.  French officials counted them there in 1767 and 1776, which means they were among the islanders who returned to Miquelon in 1768 after being coaxed by French officials, obeying a royal decree, to re-settle in France in 1767 to avoid overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre.  In late 1778 during the American Revolution, the British seized Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported the fisher/habitants there to France, Jacques and his family among them.  Jacques died in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in June 1779, age 75.  His son Jacques, fils died there in July, age 35.  Jacques dit Boudiche's widow Anne returned to North America in 1784, after the Newfoundland islands reverted to France.  Jacques dit Boudiche's youngest son Ambroise and wife Marie Poirier followed his family from Massachusetts to Miquelon.  They likely went to France in 1767 and returned to the island in 1768, and they were deported to La Rochelle along with their extended famliy in 1778.  Son Jean-Baptiste was born in St.-Jean Parish, La Rochelle, in June 1781; and daughter Marie-Victoire in June 1783.  They returned to Miquelon in 1784.  Jean dit Gros Jean Hébert, wife Marie Hébert, and their family also went from Massachusetts to Miquelon, where they were counted in 1765 and 1776.  In 1778, the British deported them to La Rochelle.  Gros Jean died in St.-Nicolas Parish there in September 1779, age 56.  His widow and children returned to North America in 1784.  Paul Hébert dit Laprade of Chignecto had followed his family to Massachusetts in 1755 and to Miquelon in 1764.  Paul married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Marc Villalong and Marie-Jeanne Ozelet of Île Royale, on the fishing island in January 1765.  She gave Paul a daughter, Cécile, there in January 1766.  Paul dit Laprade and his family were among the islanders who went to France in 1767 and returned the following year.  Son Charles was born at sea in July 1768.  Wife Marie gave Paul dit Laprade five more children on the island:  François in May 1770; Jean in April 1772; Paul in January 1774; Rosalie in January 1776; and Marie in c1778.  The British deported Paul dit Laprade, his family, and other islanders aboard the schooner Marie-Anne, not to La Rochelle but to St.-Malo via nearby Cancale in November 1778.  They settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where daughter Marie died at age 1 in January 1779.  Paul dit Laprade died there in March 1779, in his early 50s.  Son Gabriel-Simon was born there posthumously in October.  One wonders if Paul dit Laprade's widow and her children were among the islanders who returned to North America in 1784.  Jean Hébert of Chignecto went from Massachusetts to Miquelon and married Rose, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Cyr and Anne Bourgeois, on the island in March 1764.  She gave him a son, Jacques, on Miquelon in 1765.  They were among the island Acadians who went to France in 1767.  Their second son Jean, fils was born at La Rochelle in c1768.  They, too, returned to Miquelon that year.  Rose gave Jean four more children on the island--Amand in c1770; Joseph in c1772; Rose in c1774; and François in c1776--before the British deported them to La Rochelle in 1778.  Three more daughters were born there:  Marie in c1780; Louise-Félicité in 1781; and Adélaïde in December 1782.  In 1784, Jean and his family returned to North America and re-settled not on Île Miquelon but in the British-controlled fishery at Gaspésie on the north shore of Baie des Chaleurs, where at least two more sons were born to them in c1784 and c1792.  Their son Jean, fils, also called Jean-François, a sailor, did not remain in Gaspésie.  He married Geneviève Briand, a native of Miquelon, at Halifax, Nova Scotia, in the mid-1790s and returned to France, where he worked as a ship's carpenter as well as a sailor at Le Havre in Normandy.  Geneviève gave him at least four children at nearby Ingouville:  Jean-François in March 1799 but died there at age 1 in November 1800; Joseph-Hippolyte in November 1800; Pierre-Prosper in August 1802; Pauline-Rose in May 1807; and Alphonse-Honoré in May 1810 but died at age 9 in July 1819.  Jean, fils died at Maison des Penitents, Ingouville, in October 1811, in his early 40s.  Second son Pierre-Prosper died at his widowed mother's house in Ingouville in June 1824, age 23.  Magloire Hébert and wife Anne Cyr of Chignecto went from Massachusetts to Miquelon in 1764 and were counted there in 1773 and 1776.  Son Félix, a carpenter, married Esther, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Vigneau and Anne Poirier, on the island in November 1771.  She gave him two sons there:  Félix, fils, in c1773; and Amand in c1776.  The British deported the extended family to La Rochelle in 1778.  Daughter Marie was born aboard a British transport in late November 1778 and baptized perhaps on the same ship two weeks later.  Generally, however, the deportation was a tragic one for the family.  Félix's son Amand died in St.-Jean Parish, La Rochelle, in May 1779, age 3; infant daughter Marie died in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, age 9 months, the following September; Félix's younger brother Charles died in St.-Jean Parish in October 1780, age 30; their father Magloire died there in December, age 66; and their mother Anne died there in January 1781, age 57.  Félix's daughter Rose was born in St.-Jean Parish, La Rochelle, in September 1780; Marie-Esther in c1782; and son François in July 1783.  Félix and his family evidently returned to North America in 1784 and resettled in Canada.  Between 1786 and 1795, Esther gave Félix six more children at Bécancour on the upper St. Lawrence near Trois-Rivières.  Charles Hébert came to Miquelon from Massachusetts in the early 1760s and, probably after going to France in 1767 and returning to the island in 1768, married Rosalie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Vigneau and Madeleine Cyr, on Île Miquelon in January 1771.  They were still on the island in 1776.  The British deported them and their children to La Rochelle in 1778.  Son Étienne was born in St.-Jean Parish there in April 1780; and Louis-Jean, called Jean, in June 1782 but died in St.-Nicolas Parish, age 1, in September 1783.  The family returned to Miquelon the following year and moved on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  Josèphe Hébert, "a girl," died in St.-Jean Parish, La Rochelle, in January 1779, age 40.  On wonders if this "girl," evidently an exile from Miquelon, was married.  The British deported Joseph Hébert, wife Louise Boudrot, and their family from Miquelon to La Rochelle in 1778.  Their daughter Louise married Louis, son of Jacques Turgot and Louise Chauvin of Mont-St.-Michel, in St.-Sauveur Parish, La Rochelle, in August 1781.  Joseph and his family, perhaps including daughter Louise and her husband, returned to Miquelon in 1784.  In the summer of 1794, during yet another war erupted between France and Britain, the British recaptured the Newfoundland islands and detained the islanders at Boston and Halifax for three years.  In 1797, the British deported the islanders at Halifax to Bordeaux and Le Havre, where they arrived in July and August.  Joseph Hébert and his family were sent to Le Havre.  They were living at Les Pentents, Le Havre, in April 1798 when they petitioned the French government to allow them to return to La Rochelle.  Daughter Louise died at Ingouville near Le Havre in November 1799, age 39, so one wonders if the French government granted the family's request to return to La Rochelle and if they returned to Miquelon in the 1810s with other Acadian refugees in France. 

During their two and a half decades in the mother country, island and repatriated Héberts proliferated, and some even prospered, despite the frustrations of living there.  Yet, in the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 106 Héberts agreed to take it--the largest family group to take part in the Seven Ships' expedition of 1785.  They included Amable, Ambroise le jeune, the older Charles, Étienne, Isaac, Jean-Baptiste's widow Marie-Madeleine Dugas, another Jean-Baptiste's widow Luce-Perpétué Bourg, yet another Jean-Baptiste, Jean-Pierre, Joseph, another Joseph, Joseph, fils, Joseph-Ignace, Pierre, another Pierre, and yet another Pierre's widow also named Luce-Perpétué Bourg and their families, as well as Joseph Hébert and his younger sister Marie-Louise--nearly all of the Héberts at Nantes and some of the ones still living near St.-Malo.  Other members of the family--including Anne Hébert and her French husband at Cenan, Poitou; the surviving children of Paul Hébert of St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Pierre Hébert and his French wife at St.-Servan; and Héberts at Morlaix, Cherbourg, Le Havre, and Rochefort, such as brothers Alexis and Dominque at Le Havre, and Basile Hébert, now a second capitaine de bateau marchand out of Morlaix, and wife Anne-Marthe Dupuis--chose to remain.  Basile and Anne-Marthe's daughter Anne-Marie-Étiennette was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in July 1786, nine months after the last of the Seven Ships left France for Spanish Louisiana.  Their daughter Marie-Angèle-Nicole was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in April 1788.  Rose, daughter of Olivier Hébert and Anne LeBlanc, married Jean-Pierre, son of Pierre-Louis Le Bechee and Marie-Jeanne Pedron, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in August 1786; the priest who recorded the marriage noted that the fathers of both the bride and the groom were deceased.  In June and December 1791, during the early days of the French Revolution, a dozen or so Acadian Héberts were still living at Morlaix.  They were still there in July 1792.  In 1793, Élisabeth Hébert, a widow, lived in the St.-Malo area, and François Hébert, a native of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, also was still there, now in his early 20s.  In 1797, officials at Le Havre counted Acadians from îles St.-Pierre and Miquelon living in the city.  They included Madeleine Hébert, age 46, widow of Étienne Coste, and her seven children, four sons and three daughters, ages 15 to 1.  She was still there in 1801.  In December 1797, French officials counted Héberts still "Living on the Establishment at Poitou":  Anne, age 40; Marie, age 38, at Leigné-les-Bois; Marie-Marguerite, born in Nova Scotia in October 1748, "mother of a family," who had entered France on 12 May 1763 probably from England; and Pierre, born probably in Nova Scotia in February 1718, "a sabot maker," living at Châtellerault, who also had entered France on 12 May 1763.  In 1801, two Héberts sisters, Rosalie and Susanne from Île Miquelon, daughters of Charles-Paul Hébert and Claire Mius d'Azy of Pobomcoup and Cherbourg, were still living at Le Havre.  Rosalie, widow of Joseph La Pierre and Louis Mercier, died in the Norman port in April 1802, age 63.  Younger sister Susanne, widow of Jean-François Le Breton, died in her house on rue d'Edreville, Le Havre, in October 1808, age 65.  In 1801, Geneviève Briand, wife of Jean Hébert, Acadians from Île Miquelon, was living at Le Havre with her daughter Gracieuse.  In 1802, authorities at Le Havre compiled a list of Acadian and Canadian refugees from îles St.-Pierre and Miquelon "wishing to leave Le Havre for Lorient" in southern Brittany and from there perhaps return to greater Acadia.  Heberts on the list included Anastasie Hébert, age 47, wife of Jean Coste, age 55, and their seven children, three sons and four daughters, ages 24 to 10; Madeleine Hébert, age 45, widow of Étienne Coste, and her nine children, six sons and three daughters, ages 24 to 8; and Jean Hébert, age 35, wife Geneviève Briand, age 28, daughter Gracieuse, age 6, and son Pierre-Prosper, age 6 months. 

Héberts, perhaps some of them Acadians, were living in and around Le Havre in coastal Normandy years after most of the Acadians in France had emigrated to Spanish Louisiana.  At age 35, Marie-Madeleine, cultivarice, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Hébert and Marie Hapdey of Octeville-sur-Mer just north of Le Havre married Louis-Jean, 33-year-old son of Guillaume Bourdel and Madeleine Bin of Taillebois, Orne, canton d'Athis, and resident of Bleville, at Ingouville northeast of Le Havre in October 1799.  Louis-Jean was a journalier, or day worker.  At age 50, Marie-Anne-Catherine, daughter of Louis Hébert and Françoise Capelle, both deceased, married Emmanuel-Joseph Saint-Clair at Ingouville in May 1801.  Jean-Baptiste Hébert, a sail maker, and wife Madeleine-Aimée Champagne were living at Le Havre when son Jean-Pierre-Alphonse died there at age 3 years, 3 months, in November 1803.  Son Louis-Alphonse died there in May 1804, age 2 months.  Another son, Jean-Baptiste-Isidore, was a 23-year-old sail maker when he married Rose-Caroline, 26-year-old daughter of Jacques-Françoise Rolland, a cooper, and Anne Pinson of rue du Grand Croissant, Le Havre, in that city in February 1821; both the bride and groom were natives of Le Havre.  Jean-Baptiste Hébert and wife Angélique-Rose Brulin or Bulin were living in Ingouville when their son Jean-Prosper died there in October 1801, age 2 days.  Son Jean-Baptiste, fils died at Ingouville in September 1803, age 4 months.  Charles Hébert, a day laborer, and his wife Marie-Madeleine-Julie Chevalier were living at Le Havre when their son Auguste-Louis died there in July 1803, age 3 months.  Pierre-Nicolas Hébert, a day laborer, and his wife Marie-Françoise LePort, were living at Le Havre when their son Nicolas-Adolphe died there at age 1 in October 1803.  Pierre-Alexandre, son of Barnabé-Placide Hébert and Marie-Marguerite Renard, born at Le Havre, died there in July 1805, age 5 1/2 months.  Le Havre native Marie-Thérèse, daughter of Louis Hébert and Françoise Capelle and widow of Michel-Alexis Heurtevent, died at her married daughter Marie-Anne Huertevent's home at rue du Grand Croissant in May 1806, age 56. 

Meanwhile, in North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or in Canada, where they gathered at Québec.  Life in the crowded Canadian capital came with a price.  For the first time in their lives, Acadians were exposed to the hazards of an urban environment.  A number of them died at Québec in September 1756, not long after their arrival, including Marie-Anne Bourg, wife of François Hébert of Memramcook, and their daughter Marie-Anne, age 15; and Marie-Josèphe Hébert, wife of Antoine-Bénoni Bourg of Chignecto, age 22.  Her father Jacques Hébert of Chignecto, age 80, died at Québec in November.  Beginning the following summer, Acadian refugees in the Québec area began to die in ever greater numbers.  Smallpox, a disease scarcely known on the Fundy shore, killed hundreds of Acadians, including a few Héberts, in and around the Canadian citadel from the summer of 1757 into the early spring of 1758.  This did not endear the survivors to their Canadian hosts, who saw them more as burdens than as reliable compatriots in their struggle against the British. 

After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  The following October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians' surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, Héberts among them.  They included Amand Hébert, a captain in the Acadian militia, with his family of four; and Pierre Hébert counted alone.  During the following months, the British held them, along with other exiles who had either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region, in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  One of these compounds was Fort Edward, overlooking the old Hébert homesteads at Pigiguit.  Another was Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto, also near former Hébert homesteads.  The largest was at Halifax.  Héberts were among the hundreds of Acadians held in these compounds.  In 1761-62, British officials at Fort Edward counted Étienne Hébert and probably a wife; Joseph Hébert, alone; Jean Hébert, alone; and another Jean Hébert probably with a wife.  In June 1762, British officials counted at Fort Edward Étienne Hébert with a family of three; Béloni Hébert with a family of seven; Marie Hébert with a family of four; and Baptiste Hébert with a family of eight.  The following August, British officials at Fort Edward counted Joseph Hébert with a family of three; Jean Hébert with a family of three; Étienne Hébert with a family of six; and Béloni Hébert with a family of two.  In August 1763, at Fort Cumberland, Joseph, Louise, and Marguerite Hébert; and Paul and Marguerite Hébert appeared on a repatraition list circulating in the colony.  That same month at Halifax, Jean Batis Eber, his wife, and two children; and Joseph Ebert, his wife, and three children also appeared on a repatriation list. 

At war's end, Héberts being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  In August 1763, in Massachusetts, many Héberts, hoping to resettle in French territory, appeared on a French repatriation list circulating in that colony, including Magloire Heber, wife Anne, three sons, and two daughters; Jacques Hebaire, wife, Anne, five sons, and a daughter; Jean Ebert, wife Mariee, a son, and a daughter; Paul Ebert; Jean Helbert, wife Elizabeth, and a son; Jean Hébert, wife Elizabeth, three sons, and a daughter; Jacques Hébert, wife Mariee, two sons, and six daughters; Joseph Hibaire and wife Josette; Olivier Heber, two sons, and four daughters; Augustine Heber, wife Anne, and two daughters; Pierre Hébert, wife Josèphe, three sons, and five daughters; Augustine Hébert, wife Margueritte, four sons, and a daughter; and Charle Hébert, wife Margueritte, a son, and three daughters.  Members of the family were still in the Bay Colony three years later, when colonial officials compiled a "List of Names of the French Who Wish to Go to Canada," where many of their relatives already had gone.  On this June 1766 list were Charles Hébert and his family of seven; Jacques Hébert and his family of 11; Jean Hébert and his family of six; and Jean-Baptiste Hébert.  In 1763, in Connecticut, many Héberts appeared on a repatriation list in that colony, including Pierre Hébert and his family of 11; Alexis Hébert, his wife and child; Manuel Hébert, his wife, and three children; Pierre Hébert, his wife, and seven children; Simon Hébert, his wife and child; Pierre Hébert, wife Elizabeth Dupuy, and nine children; Fabien Hébert, wife Anastazie Landry, and a son; Joseph Hébert, wife Anne Bourg, and nine children; Victor Hébert and Marie-Josèphe Hébert, perhaps siblings; Olivier Hébert, his wife, and six children; Charles Hébert, his wife, and five children; René Hébert and wife Marie Boudrot; and siblings Joseph and Anne Hébert.  In June 1763, in Pennsylvania, Héberts still in that colony appended their names to another repatriation list, including Paul Ebert, wife Marie, and five children; and Siméon Ebert, wife Elaine, and four children.  In July 1763, in Maryland, dozens of Héberts appeared on repatriation lists circulating in that colony, including Amant Hébert, wife Geneviève Babin, and four of their children--Anne-Geneviève, Joseph (actually Marie-Josèphe), Charles, and Marguerite--at Newtown on the colony's upper Eastern Shore; François Hébert, wife Marie-Josèphe Melanson, eight children--Alexandre, Amant, Jean-Baptiste, Étienne, Pierre-Caieton, Joseph, Charles, and Marie-Madeleine--and two orphans at Newtown; Paul Hébert, wife Marguerite-Josèphe Melanson, and 10 children--Joseph, Marie-Madeleine, Anne-Marie, Ignace, Marie, Jean-Baptiste, Amant-Valéry, Antoine, and Paul, fils--at Newtown; Paul, père's son Pierre-Paul, wife Marguerite LeBlanc, and their son Charles at Newtown; Ignace Hébert, a widower, and two children, Jean-Baptiste and Marie; and orphan Joseph Hébert at Georgetown/Fredericktown, also on the upper Eastern Shore; Guillaume Ebert, wife Marie-Josette Thibodeau, and three children--François, Marie-Lablanche, and Joseph-Aimable--at Princess Anne on the lower Eastern Shore; Anne Caissie, widow of Germain Hébert, and two children, Madeleine and Baptiste at Annapolis; and François Eberd and wife Marie LeBlanc at Baltimore.  In August 1763, in South Carolina, members of the family appeared on another repatriation list, including Jean Hébert, his wife, and 12 children, five sons and seven daughters; widow Anne Hébert with eight children; Paul Hébert, his wife, and six children, two sons and four daughters; and Paul Hébert, his wife, and 12 children, five sons and seven daughters.

Despite their appearance on repatriation lists expressing their hope of resettling in French territory, most of the Acadians in the northern seaboard colonies, including many Héberts, chose to re-settle in Canada, where kinsmen from Nova Scotia and Île St.-Jean had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Antoine and Étienne Hébert began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Héberts could be found on the upper St. Lawrence and the lower Richelieu at Baie-Fébrve, Bécancour, Cap-de-la-Madeleine, Champlain, Châteauguay, Deshaillons, L'Acadie, La Chine, La-Prairie-de-la-Magdeleine, L'Assomption, Les Cèdres, Loretteville, Lotbinière, Nicolet, Rivière-du-Loup, St.-Antoine-de-Chambly, St.-Denis-sur-Richelieu, St.-François-du-Lac, St.-Grégoire-de-Nicolet, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, St.-Michel-d'Yamaska, St.-Ours, St.-Philippe-de-la-Prairie, Ste.-Thérèse-de-Blainville, Trois-Rivières, and Yamachiche; on the lower St. Lawrence at Baie-St.-Paul, Charlesbourg, Kamouraska, Île d'Orléans, St.-Charles de Bellechasse, St.-François-du-Sud, and St.-Joachim; at Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs; and in the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  In what became New Brunswick, Héberts settled at Cocagne, Nepisiguit, and Shippagan on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore; and at Madawaska on upper Rivière St.-Jean.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Héberts still languishing in the seaboard colonies emigrated, instead, to the French Antilles to avoid living in territory controlled by the British.  During the final months of the war, French officials encouraged the exiles to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles who could be lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the labor of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  The first of them reached Cap-Français in late 1763.  The colony's governor sent the many Héberts from New England not to Môle St.-Nicolas but to the interior community of Mirebalais, 30 miles northeast of Port-au-Prince, to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  They arrived at Mirebalais in August 1764.  Marie Hébert died there in October, age 24.  Françoise Hébert, "an Acadian," died there in October, age 22.  "[A]n old Acadian" Hébert, no first name given, perhaps Étienne Hébert III of Rivière-aux-Canards, died at Mirebalais in December, age 78.  If this was Étienne Hébert III of Minas, he had witnessed the deaths of three of his sons and two grandsons at Mirebalais:  Emmanuel le jeune died there in September, age 45; Simon in October, age 55; and Pierre the same month, age 51.  Emmanuel le jeune's sons Joseph, age 13, and Alexis le jeune, age 10, died in September and October.  Emmanuel le jeune's son Paul, baptized in late September, died in late December, age 5 or 6.  Michel, son of Étienne III's youngest son Alexis Hébert and wife Rosalie Richard, was baptized at Mirebalais in early September 1764, age 4 or 5 months and died 10 days after his baptism.  Alexis died at Mirebalais in November, age 40.  His widow Rose remarried twice to Frenchmen at Mirebalais.  Judith Hébert of Minas and Connecticut, widow of Fabien Dupuis, died at Mirebalais, age 40, in November 1764.  Charles Hébert died at Mirebalais in December, age 24.  Joseph Hébert died at Mirebalais in December, age 18.  Joseph Hébert, "an Acadian," died at Mirebalais in January 1765, age 38.  Marie Hébert, "an Acadian," died at Mirebalais in January, age 10.  Jean-Baptiste Hébert died there in February, age 11.  Marie-Josèphe Hébert, widow of ____ Roussin, died at Mirebalais, age 36, in March.  Pierre Hébert, age 7, died there in June.  Jean Hébert, age 14, died at Mirebalais in December 1765.  A younger Étienne Hébert's unnamed 5-year-old daughter died at Fort-Dauphin, today's Fort-Liberté, Haiti, in October 1767.  But not all of the Acadians' church records generated at Mirebalais were burials:  Emmanuel le jeune's son Joseph-Alexis was baptized there, age unrecorded, in August 1764, soon after his family arrived at the settlement and a month before his father died.  Simon Hébert's son Jean-Pierre was baptized at Mirebalais, age 2 months, in October 1764.  Marguerite, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Hébert and Euphrosine Dupuis of Minas and Connecitcut, was baptized at Mirebalais, age 6, in September 1764; son Pierre at age 5 in September; and son Joseph at age 18 months (though a copy of his baptismal records says 18 years) in December.  Alexis Hébert's daughter Marie-Josèphe was baptized at Mirebalais in November 1764, age 2. 

When fellow Acadians from Halifax and Maryland, including many Héberts, came through Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans from late 1764 through 1769, none of the Héberts still in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  They evidently had found a place for themselves in the colony's slave-based plantation economy.  Pierre, fils, son of Pierre Hébert and Marguerite Richard, married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Babineau and Marguerite Dugas, at Mirebalais in June 1767; the priest who recorded the marriage noted that the groom's father was deceased.  Their son Jean-Pierre was born at Mirebalais in November 1768.  According to historian Gabriel Debien, Pierre Hébert and his wife Anne Bourg had become "planters" at Mirebalais by 1773, the first Acadians in the area to be so designated.  Their daughter Marguerite-Élisabeth was baptized there in August 1773, age 1 month.  Élisabeth, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Hébert and Euphrosine Dupuis, married Louis, son of François Delphin and Madeleine Chevalier of Nantes, France, at Mirebalais in February 1775.  Jean Hébert's daughter Françoise was born there in January 1776.  Paul, another son of Pierre Hébert and Marguerite Richard, married Anne-Marie, daughter of Pierre Repuce or Repussard and Élisabeth Lefevre, at Mirebalais in May 1776.  Their children, born there, included Élisabeth-Apolline in July 1778; Joseph in November 1781; and Louis-Marc in November 1785.  Pierre Hébert, age 47 or 48, died at Mirebalais in August 1780; one wonders which Pierre Hébert this might have been.  Mrs. Pierre Hébert died "on farm of Jacques Dubuisson" at Mirebalais in July 1782, in her late 30s.  Héberts also settled at Môle St.-Nicolas, site of the new naval base on the island's northwest coast.  Pierre, fils, son of Pierre Hébert and Marie Hébert of Minas, both deceased, died at Môle in August 1776, no age given.  Marie, daughter of Pierre Hébert and Marie-Josèphe Clouâtre of Minas and widow of Joseph Poirier, remarried to François, son of Jean Guenewer and Lorin Goarde of Morlaix, France, and widower of Marie Forest, at Môle in January 1777; the recording priest noted that the bride's father was deceased.  Marie's brother Jean married cousin Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Hébert and Marie Bourg of Chignecto and "Colony Sud," that is, South Carolina, at Môle St.-Nicolas in November 1777; the recording priest noted that both the bride's and the groom's fathers were deceased.  Marie died at Môle in August 1783, age 30.  Another Marie, daughter of Jean dit Laprade Hébert and Isabelle Bourg of Chignecto and widow of Jean Poirier, remarried to surgeon Pierre-François, son of Antoine Flamerie de Marquisant and Anne-Marie Dupuget, at Môle in October 1777.  Anne Hébert of Menoudie, Chignecto, widow of René Chalet, remarried to Augustin-Antoine, son of Manuel Pittalugue and Marie Bonfante of Gênes, present-day Italy, at Môle St.-Nicolas in December 1778.  Adélaïde, daughter of Joseph Hébert, was baptized 12 days after her birth at Môle in September 1779; another daughter of Joseph Hébert, name and age unrecorded, died at Môle in August 1780; and Marie-Josèphe, daughter of master mason Joseph Hébert and Marie-Madeleine Hébert, was born at Môle in October 1781.  One wonders if these were daughters of the same Joseph Hébert.  Simon Hébert, "an Acadian," died at Môle St.-Nicolas in July 1780, age 50 or 60. 

Héberts also ended up on other islands in the French Antilles, including Martinique and Guadaloupe.  Marie-Josèphe, 26-year-old daughter of Pierre Hébert le jeune and Élisabeth Samin, actually Isabelle Saulnier, of Annapolis Royal and New York, married Michel, 32-year-old son of Jean Rebin and Jeanne-Marie Foque, at St.-Pierre, Martinique, in January 1765.  The priest who recorded the marriage noted that the bride's parents and the groom's father were deceased.  Pierre Hébert l'aîné and his family, after being held in Connecticut for nearly a dozen years, also chose to resettle on Martinique, where they were counted in 1766.  Pierre l'aîné died before November 1773, perhaps on the island.  Anne-Perpétué Hébert of "la Police Royale" married Jean, son of Pierre Courison and Marie Paynon of Grande, diocese of Lyon, France, a tailor, at Fort-Royal, Martinique, in November 1767.  Anne-Perpétué died at Basse-Pointe, Martinique, in April 1780, age 40, a widow.  Anselme Hébert died at Au Carbet, Martinique, in July 1769, age 36.  Pierre Hébert, "an Acadian," died in the military hosptial at Basse-Terre, Guadaloupe, in May 1768, age unrecorded.  Anne Hébert, widow of André DeCresnes, remarried to George, son of William Man and Rebecca Walton of Warwick, England, and widower of Catherine Ebard, at Basse-Terre, Guadaloupe, in June 1768.  They moved on the Martinique, where Anne died "a sudden death" in September 1770, age 30. 

Héberts being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to resettle on Île Miquelon, where Héberts from Massachusetts had gone.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including many Héberts, were going, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, 17 were Héberts. 

The dozens of Héberts in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Two Héberts were part of the first contingent of exiles from Maryland that reached New Orleans in September 1766, and 35 of them were part of the second contingent that arrived there in July 1767--one of the largest single Acadian family groups to go to the Spanish colony.309

Henry

In 1755, descendants of Robert Henry of Rouen and Marie-Madeleine Godin dit Châtillon could be found at Minas, at Cobeguit at the east end of the Minas Basin, and on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

Most of Robert's descendants, living in French-controlled territory in 1755, escaped the roundups in British Nova Scotia that summer and fall.  Robert's fourth son Pierre, however, had remained at Minas and was still there when a New-English force arrived that summer.  He and his family escaped the roundup that soon followed and found refuge in Canada.  Pierre died at Chambly east of Montréal in 1770, age 70.  His only child, daughter Madeleine, married a Girouard and settled at L'Islet on the lower St. Lawrence--perhaps the only descendants of Robert of Rouen to settle in the St. Lawrence valley.  Any Henrys still at Cobeguit in the summer of 1755 abandoned their homes before the British arrived and sought refuge in the surrounding woods and hills.  That fall or winter or the following spring they would have followed the cattle trail to Tatamacgouche and other villages on the North Shore, crossed Mer Rouge, and joined their many relatives on Île St.-Jean. 

The islanders' respite from British oppression was painfully short.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the Maritime islands and deported most of the habitants to France, including dozens of Henrys.  The deportation devastated the family.  Henrys crossed on the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in mid-September with 346 exiles aboard, suffered a mid-ocean mishap, and limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Françoise Henry, wife of Jean Pitre, fils, survived the crossing, but her husband and daughters Marguerite-Bibianne and Tersile died at sea.  Robert's third son Germain Henry of Port-La-Joye, Île St.-Jean, who would have been in his early 70s, crossed with wife Cécile Deveau, age 58, and four of their younger children--Rose or Rosalie, age 16; Joseph, age 17; Madeleine, age 15; and Amand, age 13.  Germain and son Joseph died at sea.  Cécile and daughter Rosalie died from the rigors of the crossing three months after they reached St.-Malo.  Charles Henry of Mégrit, Brittany, who had settled at Louisbourg, age 50, probably not kin to Robert of Rouen and his descendants, also crossed on the Duc Guillaume, with wife Jeanne Perez, age 43.  She may have died at sea.  Charles received permission in mid-November 1758 to move on to La Rochelle on the Bay of Biscay.  Marie Henry and her husband Noël Doiron from Pointe-Prime, Île St.-Jean, "five of their children, more than thirty of their grandchildren, and many of their great-grandchildren" perished aboard the transport Duke William, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November, bound for St.-Malo, and sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December.  Marie's nephew Jean-Baptiste Henry, his wife Madeleine Mius d'Azy, and their children from Pointe-Prime also perished aboard the Duke William.  Martin Henry, fils of Pointe-à-la-Jeunesse, Île Royale, his wife Marie-Josèphe Benoit, and their children perished on either the Duke William or, more likely, its consort the Violet, which sank in the same mid-December storm, taking everyone down with it. 

Most of the island Henrys crossed on one or more of the five transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy with 1,033 Acadians aboard, bound for St.-Malo.  Despite the mid-December storm, all five of the ships reached the Breton port together during the third week of January 1759.  Only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, many of them Henrys.  Marie-Josèphe Henry, age 50, crossed on one of the Five Ships with husband Michel Aucoin, age 50, and five daughters, age 27 to 10.  Two of the daughters died from the rigors of the crossing.  Cécile Henry, age 65, crossed with husband Ignace Carret, age 84, and five sons, age 32 to 13.  Three of the sons died from the rigors of the crossing.  Marguerite Henry, age 29, crossed with husband Ambroise Dugas, age 30, and four children, age 7 years to 15 months.  Two of the younger children died at sea, and Marguerite and the youngest child died from the rigors of the crossing.  Anne-Josèphe Henry, age 27, crossed with husband Pierre Dugas, age 26, and three children, ages 5, 4, and 2.  All of the children died at sea.  Marguerite Henry, age 34, crossed with husband Charles Guérin, age 34, and four children, ages 11 years to 5 months.  One of the children died at sea, and husband Charles and the youngest child died from the rigors of the crossing.  Martin Henry, père, age 80, a widower and Robert of Rouen's oldest son, died at sea.  Martin's oldest son Jean dit Neveu of Rivière-de-l'Ouest, Île St.-Jean, age 58, also a widower, crossed with three unmarried children--Marie, age 26; Laurent, age 18; and François-Xavier, age 11--and kinsman Joseph Henry, age 26.  Jean dit Neveu died from the rigors of the crossing.  Neveu's son Jean, fils, in his late 20s, crossed with wife Marie Pitre, age 24, and three children--Jean-Baptiste, age 12; Charles, age 4; and Marie, age 2.  The two youngest children died at sea, and Jean-Baptiste died from the rigors of the crossing.  Neveu's son Pierre, age 25, crossed with wife Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg, age 22, and 18-month-old son François-Marie.  Their son died at sea.  Neveu's son Charles, age 23, crossed with wife Françoise Hébert, age 21, and their eight-month-old daughter Marie.  They all survived the crossing.  Neveu's brother Pierre of Anse-de-la-Boullotière, Île St.-Jean, age 54, crossed with wife Anne Aucoin, age 54; and seven children--Paul, age 24; Jeanne, age 20; Anastasie, age 18; Élisabeth, age 16; Barthélemy, age 14; Timothée, age 12; and Marie-Josèphe, age 7.  Anne and her youngest daughter died at sea.  Pierre and four of the children, including son Timothée, died from the rigors of the crossing.  Pierre's son Antoine, age 22, crossed with wife Françoise Dugas, age 20, and a Dugas kinsman, age 9.  The young Dugas survived the ordeal, but Antoine and Françoise died in a St.-Malo hospital soon after reaching port.  Neveu and Pierre's brother François of Grande-Ascension, Île St.-Jean, who would have been in his early 40s that year, crossed with wife Marie Dugas, age 35, oldest son Basile, age 18, Basile's wife Eulalie Dugas, age 21, and six younger children--Joseph, age 14; Anne-Marguerite-Josèphe, age 14; Élisabeth, age 8; Victoire, age 6; Alexis, age 5; and François, age 2.  François and his three youngest children died at sea.  Neveu, Pierre, and François's youngest brother Paul of Anse-à-Pinnet, Île St.-Jean, age 35, crossed with wife Théotiste Thibodeau, age 33, and six children--Athanase, age 12; Marguerite-Josèphe, age 10; Firmin, age 8; Anne-Théotiste, age 7; Ambroise, age 3; and Isabelle, age 1.  Five of the children died at sea.  Paul, Théotiste, and oldest son Athanase died three months after they reached St.-Malo, so the entire family perished from the voyage.  Martin, père's brother Jean dit Le Vieux of Rivière-de-l'Ouest, age 71, crossed with wife Marie Hébert, age 60, and unmarried son François, age 18.  Le Vieux died from the rigors of the crossing.  His oldest son Pierre, age 40, crossed with wife Marie-Madeleine Pitre, age 32, four children--Anne-Josèphe, age 10; Charles le jeune, age 5; Pélagie, age 3; and Pierre, fils, age 3--and brother Charles, age 23.  Son Charles le jeune died at sea, and Marie-Madeleine died from the rigors of the crossing.  Le Vieux's son Jean dit Le Fils of Rivière-de-l'Ouest, age 39, crossed with wife Marie Carret, age 40, and six daughters--Marguerite-Josèphe, age 15; Marie-Rose, called Rose, age 13; Marie, age 12; Marguerite, age 9; Osite, age 7; and Anastasie, age 6.  The youngest daugther died at sea.  Le Vieux's son Simon, age 30, crossed with wife Marguerite-Josèphe Breau, age 24, and daughter Agathe, age 2.  Agathe died at sea.  Marguerite-Josèphe was pregnant during the voyage and gave birth to son Simon, fils the following May.  Le Vieux's brother Germain's oldest son Jean-Baptiste Henry, age 31, crossed with wife Élisabeth dite Titante Pitre, age unrecorded, and three of their children, names unrecorded.  Jean-Baptiste and Êlisabeth survived the crossing, but all of their children died at sea.  Jean-Baptiste's brother Baptiste-Olivier, age 32, crossed with wife Suzanne Pitre, age 28, and five children--Marie, age 9; Marguerite-Josèphe, age 8; Marie-Madeleine, age 6; Isabelle, age 4; and Osite, age 3.  Three of the children died at sea, and Baptiste-Olivier and daughter Marie-Madeleine died from the rigors of the crossing.  Jean-Baptiste and Baptiste-Olivier's brother Pierre, age 27, crossed with wife Marguerite Trahan, age 29, and son Pierre, fils, age 9.  Their son died at sea.  Marguerite also was pregnant during the voyage.  Son François was born in February but lived only 12 days.  Anne Henry, age 29, crossed with husband Charles Pitre, age 30, and three children, age 6, 4, and 2.  The children died at sea.  Marguerite Henry, age 27, crossed with husband Michel Caissie, age 38, and five children, ages 8 to 1.  The four youngest children died at sea.  Madeleine Henry, age 30, crossed on one of the Five Ships with husband Charles Thibodeau, age 35, and two daughters, ages 7 and 4.  The daughters died at sea. 

Island Henrys did their best to create a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Robert of Rouen's oldest son Martin, who did not survive the crossing, had many sons and grandsons who did.  Oldest son Jean dit Neveu died soon after reaching the Breton port, but Neveu's oldest son Jean, fils survived the ordeal.  He, wife Marie Pitre, and surviving son Jean-Baptiste settled at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Jean-Baptiste died there in March 1765, age 12.  Meanwhile, Marie gave Jean, fils five more children at Pleurtuit:  Maximilien in May 1760; Marie-Jeanne-Madeleine in April 1762; Marguerite in March 1764 but died at age 4 1/2 the following August; Isabelle-Modeste in May 1765; and Marie-Rose in July 1768.  Jean, fils worked as a wheelwright, and in the late 1760s and early 1770s he plied his trade "in the Indies" while Marie minded the children at Pleurtuit.  Neveu's second son Pierre and wife Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg, now childless, settled near his brother at Pleurtuit.  She gave him eight more children there, all sons:  Pierre in March 1760 but died at age 11 in June 1711; Daniel-Jean in July 1762 but died at age 1 1/2 in January 1764; Jean-Vincent in December 1764; François-Pierre in May 1767 but died at age 8 in September 1775; Joseph-Joachin in October 1769 but died at age 6 in September 1775; Charles-Isaac in October 1772 but died at age 4 in August 1776; Pierre-Laurent in September 1775 but died the following December; and Pierre-Isaac in July 1778.  Neveu's third son Charles, wife Françoise Hébert, and daughter Marie-Madeleine also settled at Pleurtuit.  Marie-Madeleine died there at age 5 in January 1763.  Meanwhile, Françoise gave Charles 10 more children at Pleurtuit:  Joseph-Jean in March 1760; Charles-Guillaume in July 1761 but died at age 1 1/2 in January 1763; Amateur-François in December 1762 but died at age 3 1/2 in May 1766; Rémy-Charles in November 1764 but died at age 2 1/2 in July 1767; another Amateur-François in November 1766 but died at age 2 1/2 in January 1769; Françoise-Victoire in February 1769; Marguerite-Toussainte in November 1772; Charles, fils in c1775; Perrine-Jeanne in December 1776 but died at age 1 1/2 in May 1778; and another Perrine died at age 9 months in October 1779.  Neveu's fourth son Laurent settled at St.-Malo but died in May 1763, age 21, before he could marry.  Neveu's fifth and youngest son François-Xavier settled near his brothers at Pleurtuit.  In February 1767, he married Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians François Bourg and Marie-Josèphe Hébert, at nearby St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo.  Françoise gave François-Xavier seven children at St.-Énogat and Pleurtuit:  Jean-Pierre at St.-Énogat in April 1768; François-David in July 1770; Allain-Pierre at Pleurtuit in January 1772; Marguerite-Françoise at St.-Énogat in September 1773; Yvonne-Germenne in October 1775; Joseph-Yves in January 1777 but died at age 2 in January 1779; and Émilie-Augustine in December 1778.  Jean dit Neveu's brother Pierre's second son Paul settled at St.-Suliac across the river from Pleurtuit and married fellow Acadian Marie Bourg at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the river south of St.-Suliac in February 1760.  Marie gave Paul six children at La Coquenais near Pleudihen:  Jean-Charlotte in February 1764; Madeleine-Marie-Françoise in September 1765; Marie-Anne in November 1767; Anne-Louise in July 1769 but died at age 2 1/2 in October 1771; Olivier-Paul in January 1772; and Françoise-Madeleine in January 1783.  Pierre's fourth son Barthélemy followed his brother to St.-Suliac, moved to Pleurtuit in 1761, to Pleudihen-sur-Rance in 1763, and back to St.-Suliac later that year.  He married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Alexandre Bourg and Ursule Hébert, at St.-Énogat in February 1770.  Anne gave Barthélémy six children there and in the Pleudihen area:  François-Barthélemy at La Coquenais in December 1770; Jacques-François at La Ville Ger near Pleudihen in September 1772; Barthélemy-Charles in May 1775; Anne-Marguerite at St.-Énogat in December 1777 but died at age 1 in December 1778; another Anne-Marguerite in September 1779 but died at age 1 1/2 in January 1781; and Marie-Jeanne in February 1782.  Jean dit Neveu and Pierre's brother François's widow Marie Dugas remarried to a Breau widower at St.-Suliac in April 1761.  Her and François's oldest son Basile and wife Eulalie Dugas also settled at St.-Suliac, where Eulalie gave him eight children:  Alexis in July 1760; Cécile in October 1761 but died at age 11 months in September 1762; Jean-Joseph in June 1764; François-Nicolas in December 1765; Anne-Hélène in November 1767 but died at age 5 in December 1772; Cécile-Marie in July 1769; an unnamed boy died at birth in January 1772; and Élisabeth-Jeanne born in April 1773.  François and Marie's second son Joseph followed his widowed mother to St.-Suliac, where he married Cécile, daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Breau and Cécile Bourg, in May 1764.  Cécile was Joseph's stepsister, his mother having married her father three years earlier.  Cécile gave Joseph three children at St.-Suliac:  Jean-Laurent in August 1765; Marie-Josèphe in April 1769 but died the following June; and Joseph-Suliac in August 1770.  Meanwhile, Basile and Joseph's mother Marie died in March 1764, age 40, at St.-Suliac, and their sisters Marguerite-Josèphe and Élisabeth married into the Longuépée and Aucoin families there.  Robert of Rouen's second son Jean dit Le Vieux also did not survive the crossing, but his wife did.  Marie Hébert did not remarry and died at Pleurtuit in February 1764, in her late 60s.  Most of her and Le Vieux's sons also made it to St.-Malo and either created or re-created families of their own in the valley of the Rance.  Oldest son Pierre, now a widower, brought his three surviving children to Pleurtuit, where he remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Philippe Thibodeau and Élisabeth Vincent and widow of Charles Pitre, in August 1759, less than five months after his first wife's death.  Anne gave Pierre three more daughters at Pleurtuit:  Marie-Hélène in May 1760 but died at age 10 months in March 1761; Françoise in November 1761; and Angélique in May 1763.  Le Vieux's second son Jean dit Le Fils and wife Marie Carret settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer with their five surviving daughters.  The couple had no more children in France, and they lost two more of their daughters there:  Marie-Rose at St.-Servan in October 1762, age 18; and Marguerite in August 1765, age 18.  Two of their daughters, Marguerite-Josèphe and Marie, married into the Daigre and Blanchard families at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Le Vieux's fourth son Simon and wife Marguerite-Josèphe Breau also settled at St.-Servan, where she gave him nine more children:  Simon-Jean in May 1759 (his mother had been pregnant with him during the crossing, and he may have been one of the relatively few children born in such circumstance to survive infancy); Charles in February 1761; Grégoire-François in November 1764; Marguerite-Josèphe in May 1776 but died at age 1 in September 1767; Angélique-Françoise in May 1768; Joseph-Amateur in July 1770 but died eight days after his birth; Marie-Magloire in September 1771; and Madeleine-Suzanne in December 1773.  Le Vieux's fifth son Charles followed brother Pierre to St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where he married Marguerite-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians François Thériot and Françoise Guérin, in January 1761.  She gave Charles five children there:  Marie-Josèphe in May 1762; Pierre-Charles in May 1764 but died at age 3 in July 1767; Jean-Baptiste-Théodore in July 1766; Jeanne-Françoise in March 1769; and Marguerite-Angélique in December 1770 but died the following June.  Le Vieux's sixth and youngest son François, who had crossed with his aging parents, followed his widowed mother and brothers to St.-Servan but did not remain there.  Even before his mother Anne Hébert died at nearby Pleurtuit at age 67, François went his own way in life.  At age 20 or 21, he evidently volunteered for privateer duty soon after reaching St.-Malo, was captured by the Royal Navy, and held as a prisoner in England until the end of the war, when he was repatriated to St.-Malo with hundreds of other Acadians in England in the spring of 1763.  He returned to St.-Servan-sur-Mer and remained there until November 1765, when he joined an expedition of Acadian exiles going to Port-Louis in the îles Malouines, today's Falkland Islands, aboard the frigate Aigle.  Robert of Rouen's third son Germain, like his older brothers, also perished in the crossing to St.-Malo, and two of his two older sons died soon after reaching the Breton port, but his younger sons survived the ordeal, and one of them created a large family there.  Germain's third son Jean-Baptiste and wife Élisabeth Pitre, now childless, settled at St.-Servan.  Jean-Baptiste died there the following March 1759, age 33, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  His widow Élisabeth settled at Pleurtuit, where, in 1761, she remarried to a twice-widowered Landry and gave him more children.  Germain's fourth son Baptiste-Olivier's widow Susanne Pitre and her surviving daughters, Marguerite-Josèphe and Marie-Madeleine, settled at St.-Servan, where Marie-Madeleine, at age 6, died in March 1759 from the rigors of the crossing.  At Pleurtuit in June 1760, Susanne remarried to an Hébert widower.  She gave him many more children at nearby Ploubalay and Tréméreuc.  Susanne's daughter Marguerite-Josèphe Henry remained with her mother's new family and did not marry.  Germain's fifth son Pierre and wife Marguerite Trahan settled at St.-Servan, where they buried their newborn son.  Marguerite gave Pierre eight more children there:  Pierre-Marin in February 1760; Jean-Félix in May 1761; Joseph-Philippe in July 1762; Amand le jeune in July 1764; Marguerite- or Marie-Sophie in October 1765; Cyrille-François in August 1767; François-Michel in February 1769; and Adélaïde-Marie in March 1770.  In late February 1772, "the family was given permission to go reside at Morlaix" on the northwest coast of Brittany.  Son Augustin, their elventh child, was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in May 1773.  Germain's seventh and youngest son Amand followed his widowed mother and sisters to St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  After his mother and sister Rosalie died in February 1759 from the rigors of the crossing, he and his remaining sister Madeleine, still teenagers, lived alone.  Amand married Marie-Jeanne, daughter of Jacques Convenance, Convenans, or Couvenance and Euphrosine Labauve of the Maritimes, at St.-Servan in May 1770.  Marie-Jeanne gave Amand two daughters there:  Anne-Marie in April 1774; and Rose-Eulalie in August 1775.  By 1777, they had moved to Le Havre, Normandy, where son Michel-Amand-Alexandre was born in July of that year. 

Island Henrys also landed in Normandy in 1758-59.  Robert of Rouen's fifth son Antoine and his extended family landed at Cherbourg with other island Acadians.  Antoine died there by May 1759, in his mid-50s, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Antoine's son Paul married Cécile-Clotilde, called Clotilde, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Langlois and Marie-Josèphe Darembourg, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in August 1763.  Clotilde gave Paul a daughter, Marie-Jeanne-Adélaïde, in the parish in July 1766.  Robert of Rouen's sixth and youngest son Joseph dit Petit Homme, wife Catherine Pitre, and their many children also landed at Cherbourg.  Joseph died there by January 1761, in his early 50s.  Wife Catherine likely died there, too.  Oldest son Charles of Rivière-de-l'Ouest would have been age 26 in late 1758.  He crossed from Île St.-Jean with wife Françoise-Josèphe Thériot and their two children--Maximin, age 4; and Marie-Josèphe, age 1--and also landed at Cherbourg.  Françoise-Josèphe gave him another son, Joseph, in November 1759, but the boy died the following January.  Charles remarried to Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians René Bernard and Marguerite Hébert, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in January 1761.  At Cherbourg and across the Baie de Seine at Le Havre, Marie-Madeleine gave Charles six more children:  Marie-Madeleine at Cherbourg in January 1762; Anastasie-Blanche in May 1763 but died at Le Havre at age 5 in July 1768; Pierre-Charles in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in June 1765; Victoire-Adélaïde or Adélaïde-Victoire in April 1767 but died at age 1 1/2 in July 1768; Benjamin-Louis in St.-François Parish, Le Havre, in May 1769 but also died young; and Rose-Anastasie in c1771.  Charles's younger brothers Basile and Jean-Baptiste, ages 19 and 12 in late 1758, the older one still a bachelor, also landed at Cherbourg.  Basile evidently died there in December 1758, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Brother Joseph, fils, age 23 in late 1758, had landed at St.-Malo aboard one of the Five Ships in January 1759.  The following month, he received permission from French authorities to move to the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, where he thought his brothers had gone.  Not finding them there, he moved on to Cherbourg.  Like older brother Charles, Joseph, fils worked as a seaman and died at Cherbourg in November 1759, age 24, still unmarried.  Brother Jean-Baptiste followed brother Charles to Le Havre, where he worked as a journeyman carpenter in the lower Seine port.  He likely was the Jean-Baptiste Henry who married Félicité, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Moulaison and Cécile Melanson, at Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in July 1764.  Félicité gave Jean-Baptiste two sons--Jean-Charles in May 1765; and Joseph-Guillaume in April 1767--in Notre-Dame Parish before returning to Cherbourg, where, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Félicité gave Jean-Bapiste two more children:  Pierre-David in March 1769; and Aimable-Sophie in December 1772.  Charles, Joseph, and Jean-Baptiste's sister Marie married into the Arbour family at Le Havre.  Henrys from other families also landed at Cherbourg.  Élisabeth Henry of Île St.-Jean died there in December 1758, age 33.  Bonne-Modeste, daughter of Nicolas Henry, perhaps an island Acadian, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, age 14 months, in August 1773.

In the early 1770s, Henrys chose to take part in a major settlement venture in the interior of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  Most of the island Henrys were still living in the St.-Malo area, and most of them refused to be a part of the venture.  However, a hand full of their kinsmen from St.-Malo and other ports chose to follows hundreds of their fellow exiles to Potiou.  They included Basile Henry and wife Eulalie Dugas from St.-Suliac; his brother Joseph and wife Cécile Breau from St.-Suliac; Charles Henry and wife Marie-Madeleine Bernard from Le Havre; his brother Jean-Baptiste and wife Félicité Moulaison from Cherbourg; and Pierre Henry and wife Marguerite Trahan from Morlaix.  Marie-Madeleine Bernard gave Charles Henry another daughter, Cécile, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in April 1774.  Cécile Breau gave Joseph Henry another child, Pierre-François, their fourth, at Bonnes south of Châtellerault in August 1774.  Eulalie Dugas gave Basile Henry another child, Marie, their ninth, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in June 1775, but she died 10 days after her birth. 

After two years of effort, most of the Acadians abandoned the Poitou venture.  From October 1775 through March 1776, hundreds of them, including the Henrys, retreated in four convoys to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  There and at nearby Chantenay and Paimboeuf, as they had done at St.-Malo, Cherbourg, and Le Havre, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government handouts and on what work they could find.  Charles Henry's second wife Marie-Madeleine Bernard gave him another daughter, Ursule, at Nantes in c1775, soon after their arrival.  Marie-Madeleine died at Paimboeuf, the lower port for Nantes, in September 1780, age 37.  Charles, in his early 50s, remarried again--his third marriage--to fellow Acadian Marie LeBlanc, widow of Charles Robichaud, at St.-Martin de Chantenay, then on the outskirts of Nantes, in October 1784.  Charles's brother Jean-Baptiste, a carpenter, died at Chantenay in December 1776, age 33.  Jean-Baptiste's widow Félicité Moulaison remarried to a Vallet from Verdun, Lorraine, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in 1781.  Joseph Henry and Cécile Breau lost a child and had more of them in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes:  Pierre-François, born in Poitou, died at age 2 in June 1776; Marie-Josèphine, their fifth child, was baptized at St.-Similien in February 1777; Pierre-Similien in May 1779; and Anne-Françoise in May 1781.  Pierre Henry and Marguerite Trahan lost a child at Chantenay:  Marie- or Marguerite-Sophie, born at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, died in January 1778, age 13.  Pierre and Marguerite's fourth son Joseph-Philippe married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Thibodeau and Hélène Gautrot and widow of Frenchman Nicolas Metra, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in April 1785.  Basile Henry and wife Eulalie Dugas were especially prolific at Nantes, but they suffered more than their share of anguish there, too:  Cécile-Marie, born at St.-Suliac, died in St.-Similien Parish in August 1778, age 9; Marie-Madeleine, their tenth child, was baptized in that parish in July 1776 but died six days later; Pierre, baptized in July 1777, died there at age 6 in October 1783; Joseph-Agapit, baptized in August 1779, died there at age 3 1/2 in June 1783; Marie baptized in April 1781, died at age 2 in June 1783; and Anne-Dorothée was baptized in February 1783.  Of their 14 children born at St.-Suliac, Châtellerault, and Nantes, only five of them seem to have survived childhood.  Despite so much personal tragedy, the family thrived economically.  According to a study of Acadian exiles in the mother country, " ... a certain Basile Henry made a request to the Nantes municipal council in November 1782, asking to be exempted from a tax for relatively affluent people.  This shows that he was reasonably prosperous, as were other Acadians who succeeded in opening small businesses."  Basile also served as "Deputy of the Acadians in Nantes and also Deputy-Inspector of Public Works in Nantes." 

During their two and a half decades in the mother country, Henrys proliferated, and some even prospered, despite the frustrations of living there.  Yet, in the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 48 Henrys agreed to take it.  They included Barthélemy à Pierre at Pleudihen-sur-Mer; Charles à Jean dit Neveu at Pleurtuit; Charles à Jean dit Le Vieux at St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Charles à Joseph dit Petit Homme at Chantenay; Jean, fils à Jean dit Le Neveu at Pleurtuit; Joseph à François at Chantenay; Pierre à Germain at Chantenay; Joseph-Philippe à Pierre at Chantenay; and Pierre à Jean dit Neveu at Pleurtuit and their families.  Also going were Pierre, fils and his sisters at Pleurtuit.  A surprising number of their kinsmen chose to remain.  They included Amand à Germain at St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Amand and François-Michel à Pierre at Le Havre; Basile à François, the Nantes notable; François à Jean dit Le Vieux at St.-Servan (if he returned to France from the îles Malouines); François-Xavier à Jean dit Neveu at St.-Énogat; Jean dit La Fils à Jean dit Le Vieux at St.-Servan; and Paul à Pierre at Pleudihen-sur-Rance and their families.  In 1793, during the French Revolution, Marie Henry, widow of ____ Beaumont, age 53, was counted at St.-Malo, where she died in 1797, in her late 50s.  In 1795, more Acadian Henrys were counted in several of the St.-Malo villages:  Alain Henry, age 23, a sailor, at Pleurtuit; Marguerite Henry, age 20, a day laborer, at St.-Énogat; another Marguerite Henry, widow of ____ Quessy or Caissie, a fellow Acadian, age 66, an embroiderer; and Yvonne Henry, age 20, a servant, at St.-Énogat.  Acadian Henry's also settled at Le Havre in Normandy long after their relations had moved on to Louisiana.  Amand à Germain's son Michel-Amand-Alexandre, born at Le Havre in July 1777, became a sailor and a ship captain in France.  He married Marie-Madeleine-Élisabeth, 21-year-old daughter of Augustin-Félix Le Masson and Madeleine Le Prevost of Le Havre, in that port in January 1800.  Marie-Madeleine-Élisabeth gave him a daughter, Anne-Élisabeth-Zoé-Juliette, at Le Havre in c1801, but the girl died there at age 2 in October 1803.  In 1801, French officials at Le Havre counted "widow" Henry and two of her daughters there, noting that they were from St.-Pierre et Miquelon, two French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  François-Ambroise Henry, a day laborer, married Marie-Marguerite-Madeleine Henry.  Their daughter Berenice-Adèle died at Le Havre, age 2, in November 1802.

Meanwhile, in the early 1770s, a Henry family at St.-Malo had chosen to participate in a settlement venture more perilous than the one in Poitou.  Simon of Rivière-de-l'Ouest, Île St.-Jean, a younger son of Jean dit le Vieux, Simon's wife Marguerite-Josèphe Breau, and their infant daughter had crossed on one of the Five Ships and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  While their kinsmen were struggling with the thin, rocky soil of Poitou or maintaining their humble homes in the St.-Malo villages, Simon and Marguerite-Josèphe, now the parents of seven children, including a newborn, joined an expedition led by sea captain Charles Robin that gathered in 1774 on the British-controlled Channel island of Jersey, the home of Robin and his brothers.  From Jersey, Simon, Marguerite-Josèphe, and dozens of other exiles returned to North America and settled in the British-controlled fishery at Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs--evidently the only descendants of Robert Henry of Rouen who returned to greater Acadia after deportation.  Four of Simon's daughters married into the Daigle and Barriault families at Bonaventure in Gaspésie, three of them to Barriault brothers.  His oldest son Simon-Jean created a substantial family line at Bonaventure, and two of his younger sons, Pierre and Grégoire-Françoise, settled down the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore in present-day eastern New Brunswick.310

Heusé

Ignace Heusé, son, perhaps, of Robert Heusé or Huezé and Marie Girardeau of Île St.-Jean, born probably on the island in the 1720s, worked as a seaman as well as a farmer there, but he did not remain.  In March 1748, he stood as godfather at Beaubassin for Joseph Caissie.  Ignace married Marie-Josèphe Renaud in c1752, place unrecorded.  They had at least one son, Jacques, at Rivière-aux-Canards, Minas, in c1753 and evidently returned to Île St.-Jean soon after their son's birth. Oddly, no member of the family appears in the French survey/census of the French Martimes islands in 1752.

By returning to Île St.-Jean during the early 1750s, Ignace Heusé and his family, the only ones with the surname in greater Acadia, escaped the British roundup at Minas during the autumn of 1755, or they may have returned to the island after escaping the British at Minas.  Ignace remarried to fellow Acadian Cécile Bourg, widow of Joseph Longuépée, on Île St.-Jean in c1758.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  Later in the year, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean and deported most of the habitants there to France.  Ignace, age 28, wife Cécile Bourg, age 24, Ignace's son Jacques, age 5, by his first wife Marie-Josèphe Renaud, and Cécile's daughter Anne-Josèphe Longuépée, age 2, from her first marriage, made the crossing aboard the deportation transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November 1758, survived a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, put in at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  All four of them survived the crossing that took the lives of so many of their fellow exiles.  

Ignace and Cécile did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  She gave him more children there:  Pierre-Ignace born at La Gouesnière in the countryside southeast of St.-Malo in February 1760; Mathurin-Charles, called Charles, in the nearby suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in September 1761; Marie-Anne in February 1764; Cécile-Marguerite in September 1766 but died the following June; Jean-Baptiste in May 1768; Gilles-François at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo in April 1771; and Joseph-François in January 1774.  Later that year, Ignace and his family followed other Acadians in the St.-Malo area and in other French ports to the interior of Poitou, where they settled on lands owned by an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.   Third son Gilles-François died in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, at age 3 in July 1774; and youngest son Joseph-François died in the same parish at age 3 months the following August.  In November 1775, after two years of effort, the Heusés retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government handouts and on what work they could find.  Son Grégoire-Ignace was born at Nantes in c1776--nine children, seven sons and two daughters, by two wives, between 1753 and 1776, in greater Acadia and France.  Oldest son Jacques, age 25, married Manuela, daughter of Bertrand Peroucho and Savine Soga of Pamplona, Spain, and widow of Louis-Antoine Ferdinand, at Paimboeuf, the lower port for Nantes, in November 1778.  Ignace died at Chantenay near Nantes in November 1783.  The St.-Martin Parish priest who recorded the burial said that Ignace was age 60 when he died.  He probably was in his late 50s.  Second son Pierre-Ignace, age 25, married Marie-Perrine, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Quimine and his first wife Marie-Louise Grossin, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in April 1785. 

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Cécile Bourg, her married son Pierre-Ignace Heusé, and her unmarried Huesé children Mathurin-Charles, Marie-Anne, Jean-Baptiste, and Grégoire-Ignace, agreed to take it.  Ignace's son Jacques Heusé and his Spanish wife chose to remain in France.251

Hugon

In 1755, Louis Hugon and Marie Bourgeois and their descendants could still be found at Chignecto, where Louis had settled in the early 1700s.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this small family to the winds.

The first Acadians in Nova Scotia rounded up by the British during the fall of 1755 were the ones at Chignecto.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local Acadians, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with the French at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Hugons were among them.  In the fall of 1755, British forces deported Louis Hugon and his family to South Carolina aboard the English sloop Endeavour.  Louis must have died in South Carolina.  His widow Marie Bourgeois, son Jacques, Jacques's daughter Marie-Madeleine, and Jacques's son Joseph, appeared on a French repatriation list circulating in the southern colony in August 1763.  Jacques's wife was not on the list with them, so she, too, probably had died before the census was taken. 

Jacques's younger brother Joseph and his wife Marie-Théotiste, called Théotiste, Broussard, escaped the British roundup at Chignecto and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac probably with Théotiste's Broussard kin (some historians say she was an older daughter of Alexandre Broussard dit Beausoleil).  Joseph and Théotiste's daughter, Anne-Marie, called Marie, was born on the Petitcoudiac in February 1756 and baptized there in June 1757.  Joseph may have served in the Acadian resistance with his Broussard in-laws.  In the late 1750s or early 1760s, Joseph, if he was still living, and his family either were captured by, or likely surrendered to, British forces in the area and were held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of war.  Joseph did not survive exile and imprisonment.  When Théotiste and daughter Marie followed her Broussard relatives from Halifax to New Orleans via Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, Théotiste was a widow. 

While negotiating the end-of-war treaty in the early 1760s, French officials encouraged exiles in the seaboard colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of vengeance" to come.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own if they came to the sugar island.  Jacques Hugon was one of three South Carolina Acadians who, in August 1763, communicated with the French ambassador in London seeking permission from the King to move to French soil.  Receiving the go-ahead, many South Carolina Acadians, including Jacques and his family, emigrated not to France but to St.-Domingue in February 1764 to take up land at Môle St.-Nicolas.  Jacques's son evidently died there soon after arrival.  The loss of his loved ones, as well as the dismal state of the venture, prompted Jacques to quit the place as soon as they could.  The opportunity came in January 1765 when refugees from Halifax led by the Beausoleil Broussards and including Jacques's widowed sister-in-law, Théotiste Broussard, came through Cap-Français, east of Môle, on their way to New Orleans. 

Not all of the remaining Hugons in the tropical colony moved on to Louisiana.  Jacques's daughter Marie-Madeleine remained in St.-Domingue, where she married three times, first to Félix Thibault, then to François Regnault, and then to Jean-Baptiste Chaumette, son of Nicolas, bourgeois, and Catherine Bardin of St.-Didier, Sommeil en Barrois, France, at Môle St.-Nicolas in June 1785.253

Jeanson

In 1755, descendants of "Billy" Johnson dit Jeanson and Isabelle Corporon could still be found at Annapolis Royal.  Le Grand Derangement of the 1750s scattered the family to the winds. 

The British deported at least two Jeanson families, those of Jean-Baptiste dit Jeanson and his younger brother Thomas dit Jeanson, to Connecticut in the fall of 1755.  In the late 1760s, they chose to follow other Acadians in New England to the St. Lawrence valley, where Jean-Baptiste dit Jeanson died in the Acadian settlement at St.-Jacques de l'Achigan northeast of Montréal in June 1785, age 70.  Thomas dit Jeanson remarried at nearby L'Assomption, another Acadian settlement, in October 1768.  A widower once again, he died at St.-Jacques de l'Achigan in May 1797, age 77.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Meanwhile, brothers Charles and Guillaume dit Billy and their families eluded the British at Annapolis Royal.  After a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring and, with other Annapolis Acadians, found refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac, lower Rivière St.-Jean, or on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Guillaume dit Billy became a leader in the Acadian resistance in the Gulf area.  In early December 1757, after recrossing the Bay of Fundy, he and his fellow Acadians, along with Mi'kmaq fighters, ambushed and nearly destroyed a party of British soldiers near Bloody Creek on the upper Annapolis River.  By the early 1760s, however, the Jeansons and their families either were captured by, or surrendered to, British forces in the region and were held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British officials counted Guillaume dit Billy and his family at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in August 1762.  British officials counted a Charles Jeanson and two of his "children" at Halifax in August 1763.  This probably was Charles, fils and two of his younger siblings.  Their parents likely had died by then.

At war's end, the Acadians being held in Nova Scotia faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of the previous February stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to go to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where exiles in the seaboard colonies were going, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 or early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, five were grandchildren of "Billy" Johnson dit Jeanson. 

Their uncle Guillaume dit Billy Jeanson at Fort Edward did not go to Cap-Français with his nephews and niece at Halifax but chose to remain in greater Acadia, British rule be damned.  After the war, he took his family to the British-controlled fishery in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, where they were counted at Carleton in 1777.  They, too, likely lost touch with their kinsmen in faraway Louisiana.  Billy died at Carleton in December 1806, reportedly at age 95.  He was 84.254

Labauve

In 1755, descendants of Louis-Noël Labauve and Marie Rimbault could be found at Minas, Chignecto, Chepoudy and Peticoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by the Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Labauves may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local habitants, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the Canadians and French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the local Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  No Labauves ended up in Georgia or South Carolina, so evidently most, if not all, of them still in the area took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore. 

Labauve families also escaped the British at Minas in the fall of 1755, but some of their kinsmen were not so lucky.  The British rounded up Joseph Labauve and his family and deported them to Pennsylvania.  Jean Labauve of Rivière-aux-Canards, his wife, and children, were among the hundreds of Minas Acadians transported to Virginia.  The first contingent of exiles reached Hampton Roads during the second week of November and suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  The exiles, including Labauves, languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships while the governor and his council pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie ordered the "French Neutrals" dispersed to the ports of Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond.  The following spring, the colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the papists must go.  Virginia authorities hired more vessels and sent the Acadians to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several English ports and many died of smallpox.  The Labauves were held at Liverpool. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Labauves on the Maritime islands escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia during the summer and fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the islands and transported them to France.  The Labauves suffered terribly in the crossing.  Madeleine-Josèphe Labauve crossed with husband Pierre Varenne and five children, a son and four daughters, on the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in September 1758 and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  With the family was Marie-Josèphe's younger half-sister Anastasie, age 20.  Anastasie and two of Madeleine-Josèphe's daughters survived the crossing, but Madeleine-Josèphe, her husband, and three of the children died at sea.  Also crossing on Duc Guillaume was Madeleine-Josèphe and Anastasie's sister Euprhosine, her husband Jacques Convenans, and six of their children, a son and four daughters.  Euphrosine, her son, and a daughter survived the crossing, but husband Jacques and their other three daughters died at sea.  A family of Labauves crossed on the transport Duke William, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy bound for St.-Malo in late November.  The Duke William sank in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England.  Louis Labauve le jeune from Rivière-du-Moulin-à-Scie, Île St.-Jean, his wife Marie Landry, and their five children, along with dozens of other exiles, all went down with the ship.  Labauves also crossed on one or more of the five transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November with 1,033 Acadians aboard, also bound for St.-Malo.  Despite the mid-December storm that sank the Duke William, the five transports reached the Breton port together during the third week of January 1759.  Louis Labauve, age 16--called Louis La Bore, son of René, on the passenger list--a surgeon's apprentice, crossed on one of the Five Ships with the family of surgeon Claude-Antoine Duplessis of Havre-St.-Pierre, Île St.-Jean, whose wife, Catherine Lejeune, had been married to Louis's uncle Antoine Labauve.  The surgeon's young son died at sea, but the surgeon, Louis's aunt Catherine, and the young apprentice survived the crossing and settled at Châteauneuf on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Young Louis, however, did not recover from the rigors of the crossing.  He died in a St.-Malo hospital in mid-June 1759, five months after reaching the Breton port.  Marguerite Labauve, age 32, sister of Madeleine-Josèphe of Duc Guillaume, crossed on one of the Five Ships with husband François Legendre, age 36, and three children, two daughters and a son, ages 8, 5, and 2.  Marguerite, Firmin, and their older daughter survived the crossing, but the two younger children died at sea.  Marguerite and Firmin settled at Meillac near Combourg in the countyside southeast of St.-Malo, moved to Châteauneuf in 1760, and then to the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in 1765.  In 1769, they returned to Châteauneuf and were back at St.-Servan in 1771.  

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including the Labauves, were repatriated to several ports in France.  Jean and his family landed at Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  Jean died in the hospital there in September 1771, age 55.  Son Pierre, meanwhile, married Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Brun and Anne Caissie of Chignecto and Port-La-Joye, Île St.-Jean, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in September 1770.  Madeleine gave him two daughters there:  Marie-Madeleine in c1770; and Madeleine-Augustine in June 1773.  

Later that year, Pierre, along with cousin Marguerite Labauve and her husband François Legendre from St.-Servan-sur-Mer, chose to take part in a major settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  In November 1775, after two years of effort, the Labauves retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on government handouts and on what work they could find.  Pierre and Marguerite and their families settled in the parish of St.-Martin de Chantenay on the western outskirts of Nantes.  Pierre's older daughter Marie-Madeleine died there in March 1778, age 8.  Wife Madeleine Brun gave Pierre three more children at Chantenay:  Pierre-Marie in April 1779 but died at age 5 in February 1784; Jeanne-Eulalie in March 1781 but died the following December; and Victoire-Reine in December 1782 but died at age 1 1/2 in March 1784.  Wife Madeleine died at Chantenay in December 1783, age 38.  Pierre remarried to Anne, or Jeanne, daughter of François Bonfils and Marie Sevin of St.-Martin-de-Cheix, today's Cheix-en-Retz, west of Nantes, and widow of Acadian Jean Dugas, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in October 1784.  About that time, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Pierre, wife Anne, his unmarried sister Marie, and their cousin Marguerite, now a widow with two grown sons, agreed to take it. 

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and  retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  They included Honoré Labauve and his family of four; and Simon Labauve and his family of three.  By the early 1760s, Acadians who had escaped capture at Restigouche either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region and also were held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia.  At Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in July and August 1762, British officials counted Simon Labauve and his family of five.  Also counted there in October were two middle-aged bachelor brothers, François, fils and Claude Labauve, whose brother Louis le jeune and his entire family had perished on the crossing to St.-Malo, France.   At Georges Island, Halifax harbor, in August 1763, British officials counted Entoine Labauve, as he was called, wife Anne Vincent, and five children.  One of Antoine's "children" likely was his nephew Jean-Baptiste Labauve, who would have been in his early 20s.  Also counted at Halifax that month was Simon Labauve, his wife, and child, who had been counted at Fort Edward the previous summer. 

At least one family of Labauves escaped capture in the Gulf region several times and, after the war, remained in greater Acadia.  Charles, also called Thomas, Labauve and his second wife Marie-Josèphe Dubois of Petitcoudiac escaped the British first in the trois-rivières area in the fall of 1755, after which they took refuge on Île St.-Jean.  They escaped from the island in late 1758, and perhaps yet again from Restigouche two years later.  They either did not wait around for the British to strike the remote outpost, or they were among the hundreds of exiles captured in the area and held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In 1765, they were living among other Acadian exiles on lower Rivière St.-Jean, present-day New Brunswick.  They were still there in 1769. 

At war's end, the Acadians being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In June 1763 in Pennsylvania, Joseph Labos, his first wife Marie, and their four children were still in the colony.  Wife Marie must have died soon after the counting.  Joseph remarried to Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians François LaVache and Anne-Marie Vincent and widow of Simon Breau, at Philadelphia in April 1766.  One wonders what happened to them after that date.  Did they follow most of their fellow exiles there to Canada, or did they take up an offer to resettle in the French Antilles?  One thing is certain--they did not join their relatives in Spanish Louisiana. 

Labauves being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of the previous February stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now held by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the hated oath if they joined their cousins in other parts of greater Acadia.  After all that they had suffered on the question of the oath, no self-respecting Acadian would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to go to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where exiles in the seaboard colonies, including Labauves, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 or early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, four were Labauves.

At least one Acadian Labauve, perhaps a descendant of Louis-Noël, did go to the French Antilles in the 1760s.  Marie-Aimée-Françoise, daughter of Honoré Labauve and Madeleine Boton, both deceased, died "on [the] farm of M. Gourge à Mariboroux," French St.-Domingue, age 14, in October 1781.  The Fort-Dauphine priest who recorded the burial called the teenager an Acadienne.311

Lachaussée

In the summer and fall of 1755, when the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia, they sent only a raiding party to lower Rivière St.-Jean.  The Acadian settlements farther upriver remained unmolested for now, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  In the early autumn of 1758, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg on Île Royale, a force of redcoats under Colonel Robert Monckton struck the Rivière St.-Jean settlements, with tragic results.  By then, Surgeon Philippe de Saint-Julien de Lachaussée, second wife Marguerite Belliveau, and infant daughter Louise-Françoise from his first wife Rosalie Godin dit Lincour, had moved on to Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where Philippe took care of his fellow refugees in the overcrowded camp.  By early 1760, the family had moved north with other refugees to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, where Philippe served as chief surgeon for the Acadian militia.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces in the region to subdue the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian and Mi'kmaq militia played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and  retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Philippe, called "chirurgien major entretenu," and his family of five were among them.  Philippe's son Pierre-Philippe was baptized at Restigouche in March 1761, so some of the exiles evidently were allowed to remain at the refuge before the British shipped them off to prison compounds in Nova Scotia.  One wonders where the surgeon and his family were held for the rest of the war. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada or other parts of greater Acadia.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, two were the surgeon, a widower again, and his 10-year-old daughter Louis-Françoise.  His other children, including son Pierre-Philippe, evidently had died by then.255

La Garenne

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, those on French-controlled Île St.-Jean, including the descendants of Louis Chenet dit La Garenne and Jeanne Martin dit Barnabé, were safe for now.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France. 

Marie-Josèphe Chênet (she did not take her father's dit as her brother Jean had done), now age 60 and twice widowed, and three of her Charpentier sons crossed to St.-Malo aboard the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November, survived a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, took refuge at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until the second week of March 1759.  Marie-Josèphe and her sons survived the crossing.  They settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, from which Marie-Josèphe, her son Louis, and other members of the family ventured to the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America aboard Le Fort in 1764.  She does not appear on the 1 March 1765 census at Sinnamary in the Cayenne District with her family, so she may have died in the tropical colony by then. 

Meanwhile, brother Jean Chênet dit La Garenne, age 58 in 1758, wife Anne Pothier, and their children crossed to France from the Maritimes probably on a British packet that carried them first to Portsmouth, England, and then to Cherbourg in Normandy.  Jean died there perhaps during a small pox epidemic that struck the Acadians at Cherbourg in late 1759.  Daughter Cécile married Germain, son of fellow Acadians François Landry and his first wife Marie-Josèphe Babin of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in July 1767.  In April 1774, Anne Pothier and daughter Geneviève Chênet, age 30 and single, were among the Acadians transported from Cherbourg to the naval port of La Rochelle aboard the ship Thomas.  Geneviève evidently moved on to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where she married Pierre, fils, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Breau and Marguerite Guédry, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in August 1780.  At the time of their wedding, Pierre, fils had been living at Nantes for 10 years.  He was, in fact, one of the first Acadians to reside in that city, where hundreds of his fellow Acadians, escaping their adventure in Poitou, had gathered in the mid- and late 1770s.  Jean and Anne's son Jean-Baptiste dit La Garenne and his wife Anne-Hippolythe Doiron lived perhaps at Cherbourg with his widowed mother and sister.  He and his wife also were living at Nantes in September 1784. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Jean-Baptiste and Anne-Hippolythe agreed to take it.  Two of sister Cécile's children--Bonne-Marie-Adélaïde and Jean-Jacques-Frédéric Landry, ages 16 and 15 in 1785--followed their paternal grandfather, François Landry, to the Spanish colony, so Cécile and her husband must have died in France.  Other members of Jean-Baptiste's family remained in the mother country, including sister Geneviève Chênet and her Breau husband.256

Lalande

In 1755, descendants of Pierre Lalande, alias Blaise des Brousses dit Bonappétit, and Anne Prétieux could be found at Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto and on one of the Maritime islands.  Another Lalande, François, no kin to Pierre, was living at Louisbourg on Île Royale, perhaps serving in the citadel's garrison. 

Pierre dit Bonappétit's oldest son Joseph and two of his children were recorded at Halifax in August 1763, a typical fate for Acadians from Petitcoudiac who had escaped the British roundup there in summer and fall of 1755 and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  At war's end, Joseph did not emigrate to Louisiana from Halifax, though where he resettled is anyone's guess.  The fate of his younger brothers Jean-Baptiste, Sylvestre, and Jacques also is anyone's guess.  What is certain is that Sylvestre's daughter Madeleine by his wife Marguerite Saulnier did end up in Louisiana, though exactly when she got there, and with whom, is uncertain.  She probably sailed from Halifax via Cap-Français, French St.-Domingue, with hundreds of other Acadians from the prison compounds of Nova Scotia in 1765.  Only seven years old at the time, she likely was watched over by her mother's Saulnier relatives.  No matter, she was the first member of the family to go to Louisiana. 

The story of Joseph et al.'s youngest brother Pierre dit Bonappétit, fils is more easily guessed at.  Pierre, fils and his family probably moved from Petitcoudiac to one of the French Maritime islands in the 1740s or early 1750s.  When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in 1755, Pierre dit Bonappetit and his family, living in territory still controlled by France, would have escaped deportation.  Their respite from British oppression would have been short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the French islands and deported them to France. 

Most of the island Acadians ended up in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area, but many were scattered to other French ports during the 1758-59 crossing.  Pierre dit Bonappétit, fils and his family landed at Le Havre in Normandy in early February 1759.  Tragedy stalked the family there.  The year 1768 was especially hard.  In September 1768, Pierre dit Bonappétit, fils, now a widower, died at Le Havre, age 45.  In October, his 25-year-old son Sylvain died.  And in November, 19-year-old son Joseph le jeune followed his father and brother to the grave.   One of Pierre dit Bonappétit, fils's nephews may have accompanied him to France.  Joseph, fils, son of Pierre dit Bonappétit's older brother Joseph, born probably at Petitcoudiac in c1746, somehow became separated from his parents during the 1755 roundup and most likely joined his uncle in the French Maritimes, from which the British deported him to France in 1758-59.  Joseph, fils would have been age 13 when he reached Le Havre.  When he came of age, he became a sailor and married fellow Acadian Marie-Pélagie Doiron at Le Havre in c1772.  The following year, Joseph and Marie-Pélagie followed other exiles languishing in the port cities to the interior province of Poitou, where they attempted to become productive farmers on an influential nobleman's land near the city of Châtellerault.  Their daughter Émilie, also called Eulalie, was born in St.-Jean l'Evangelise Parish, Châtellerault, in January 1774.  In October 1775, after two years of effort, Marie-Pélagie retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Joseph, fils was not with her and their daughter in the convoy, so he probably had returned to the sea to provide for his family.  When Joseph, fils returned to France, Marie-Pélagie gave him more children at Nantes:  Joseph-Édouard in St.-Nicolas Parish in January 1777; and Jacques-Jean in c1779 but died at age 2 at nearby Chantenay in 1781--at least three children, a daughter and two sons, between 1774 and 1779.  Joseph, fils died probably at Nantes in the late 1770s or early 1780s, in his 30s.  Meanwhile, Marie Lalande, perhaps a descendant of Pierre dit Bonappétit, married Jean-Baptiste-Toussaint, son of Acadians Joseph-Simon Granger and Marie-Josèphe Thériot of Minas and Belle-Île-en-Mer, at Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, in c1774.  She gave him two sons there. 

François Lalande of Louisbourg made the crossing from Île Royale to St.-Malo aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left the island in late summer of 1758 and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Two weeks later, François departed for La Rochelle on the Bay of Biscay. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Marie-Pélagie Doiron, still an unmarried widow, and two of her Lalande children--Émilie, age 11; and Joseph-Édouard, age 8--agreed to take it.  François Lalande, on the other hand, evidently remained in France.257

Lambert

In 1755, descendants of René Lambert could be found on Île Royale, while descendants of Philippe Lambert and Marie Boudrot could still be found at Chignecto.  Le Grand Dérangement of 1755 scattered these families to the winds. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1850, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Philippe Lambert's widow and probably some of her children and their families were among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local habitants, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with Canadians and French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with the French at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  

In October 1755, the British deported Philippe Lambert's younger son Pierre, Pierre's second wife, and seven children to South Carolina aboard the ship Edward Cornwallis, which reached Charles Town in late November.  In January 1756, Pierre, his wife, and two children appeared on a list of Acadians "incapable of Labor, Sick or Infirm."  Colonial officials counted Pierre at Prince Frederick Parish, Winyah, South Carolina, in 1756.  Once again he was a widower.  In c1761, he remarried again--his third marriage--to Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Doiron and Anne LeBlanc and widow of Pierre Boucher.  Two years later, in August 1763, Pierre, Marie, son Pierre, fils, and infant son Jean, were still living in the colony.   With them were a Boucher stepdaughter from Marie's first marriage and three Doiron orphans, children of Pierre's older sister Anne, who had died at Prince Frederick probably of malaria in October 1756. 

During the final months of the war, French officials encouraged the exiles in the seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique, where they could escape British rule. Although driven from North America by the Seven Years's War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the war of vengeance to come.  French officials saw the exiles as a ready source of cheap labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own if they came to the sugar colony.  In late 1763 or 1764, Pierre Lambert and his family evidently followed other exiles from South Carolina to French St.-Domingue.  After a year or more of effort, however, Pierre and his family, still without land, looked for the first opportunity to leave the island.  This occurred in 1765 when Acadian refugees from Halifax came through Cap-Français, east of Môle St.-Nicolas, on their way to New Orleans and the Mississippi valley.  Pierre, wife Marie Doiron, son Pierre, fils, and stepdaughter Marie-Anne Boucher were among the relatively few exiles who ventured to Louisiana directly from the French Antilles.

Meanwhile, René Lambert, fils, and his family, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia in the summer and fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British rounded up most of the habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France.  René and his family evidently were among the hundreds of Acadians lost without a trace aboard one of the two British transports that sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England during the second week of December.258

Lamoureaux

In 1755, descendants of Jean Lamoureux dit Rochefort and Marie-Madeleine Pichot could still be found on Île St.-Jean.  When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, the Acadians on the island, including the Lamoureauxs, living in territory still controlled by France, were safe for now.  Their respite from British oppression was a short one.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  

Jean's son Jean-Baptiste Lamoureaux dit Rochefort died at St.-Pierre-du-Nord in May 1758, age 54, on the eve of the island's dérangement.  The British deported most of the island Acadians to St.-Malo.  Not so Jean-Baptiste dit Rochefort's widow and children, who ended up on a transport that sailed first to Portsmouth, England, and then to Cherbourg in Normandy.  Jean-Baptiste dit Rochefort's older sons both married fellow Acadians in Cherbourg.  Jean-Baptiste, fils married Marie, daughter of Pierre Bertrand and Marie-Josèphe Moulaison, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in October 1763.  Louis, who became a sailor, married Marie, daughter of Jean Hébert and Marguerite Mouton, at Tres-Ste.-Trinité in August 1763.  Louis and Marie's son Jean-Louis was born at Cherbourg in c1765.  Eight years later, in 1773, despite Louis's occupation as a sailor, he and Marie became part of a major settlement scheme in the interior province of Poitou, where hundreds of exiles from the port cities tried to become productive farmers again on an influential nobleman's land near the city of Châtellerault.  Daughter Marie-Adélaïde was born there in June 1774.  In November 1775, after two years of effort, Louis and his family retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted again on government handouts and whatever work they could find.  In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Louis and Marie agreed to take it.  However, Jean-Baptiste, fils and his family remained in France.259 

Landry

In 1755, descendants of the two Landry progenitors, René l'aîné and René le jeune, and their wives Perrine Bourg and Marie Bernard, could be found at Annapolis Royal; Cap-Sable and Pobomcoup on the Atlantic shore; Grand-Pré and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin; Chignecto; Chepoudy and Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; and on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of 1755 scattered these large families even farther.  

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Landrys may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto and trois-rivières Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Landrys may have been among the local Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the Canadians and French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the local Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Landry families were shipped to South Carolina and Georgia.  One of the Chignecto families sent to Georgia, that of Olivier Landry and his wife Cécile Poirier, evidently took advantage of an opportunity to return to greater Acadia via boat in the spring of 1756 but, along with other deportees, they got no farther than Long Island, New York.  Meanwhile, most of the Landrys at Chignecto and in the trois-rivières escaped the British roundups there and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada, with tragic results. 

In the fall of 1755, many Landrys at Minas and Pigiguit found themselves on transports bound for Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania.  They were especially numerous in the Bay Colony.  In 1756, Massachusetts officials counted Simon Landry and wife Mary Lannew at "Brewno."  At Brookline, Samel. Landree was counted with the large Binneway, probably Benoit, family.  At Boston, Germain Landry was counted with the Pilbros, probably Pellerin, family.  At Chelsea, Paul and Rose Landry "from Dedham" were counted with the family of Joseph Dautromont, that is, D'Entremont.  In July 1760 in Essex County, Massachusetts authorities counted Jno., Joseph, and Mary Landry at Andover; Amon Landry, his wife, and children Joseph, Mary, Margaret, and Anna at Middletown; Rene, Paul, Eliza, Maria, and Margret Landry at Bexford; Joseph, Jno. Bapt?, and Rapale Landry at Danvers; François Landry, listed as "infirm," age 67, wife Mary Landry, age 65, also "infirm," their two grown children Charles and Ozela, and Jno. Landry, wife Margt. Landry, and their eight chldren at Ipswich; and Michael Landry and wife Felicity Prejean "fr. Midleton" at Salem.  In August 1760, Masschusetts authorities found Simon Landry and wife Mary Lanne still at "Bruno"; Saml. Landree still with the Brineway family at Brookline; German Landry still with the Pilbrains at Boston; and Paul and Rose Landry "from Needham" with the Dautrimonts at "Chelsam."  In 1761, Jane or Lane Landry, age 64, wife Madlain, age 62, and their son Alain, age 18, were counted at Chelmsford; Peter Land___, wife Sarah, and son Peter at Dunstable; Peter's children Mary, Sarah, and Elzabeth Landere at an unnamed village; and his children Mary, Magdaline, and Jane Landere at Tewksbury.  An undated Massachusetts report located John Landrie and his family of three at Chelmsford; Joseph Landrie and his family of seven at Billerica; Paul Landrie and his family of five at Acton; and Charles Landrie and his family of four at Concord. 

Minas Landrys also were deported in substantial numbers to the Chesapeake colonies of Maryland and Virginia.  In Maryland, as in New England, the "French Neutrals" were dispersed throughout the colony.  Landrys were held at Baltimore, Annapolis, Upper Marlborough, and Port Tobacco on the mainland, and at Newtown and Oxford on the colony's Eastern Shore.  They were especially numerous at Oxford.  The hundreds of Acadians transported to Virginia, the first contingent of which reached Hampton Roads during the second week of November 1755, suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  Exiles languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships while the governor and his council pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie ordered the "French Neutrals" dispersed to the ports of Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond.  The following spring, the colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the papists must go.  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone:  299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool, a total of 1,225 exiles by one count, many of them Landrys.  In England, they were packed into warehouses in several ports, where many died of smallpox.  Landrys were held at Falmouth, Southampton, and Liverpool. 

The few Minas Landrys who escaped the British in 1755 joined their cousins on lower Rivière St.-Jean or the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and some moved on to Canada via the Rivière St.-Jean portage.  At least one family of Landrys at Annapolis Royal found themselves on a transport headed to New England.  The following year, Massachusetts authorities counted Peter Landra, his unnamed wife, and seven children, six daughters and a son, from Annapolis Royal at Marblehead.  Four years later, Massachusetts authorities counted Peter Landry and his family of six still in the colony at Milton.  Most of the Landrys at Annapolis Royal escaped the roundup there.  After a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and joined their fellow refugees on the upper Peticoudiac or the lower St.-Jean before moving on to Canada or the Gulf shore. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the many Landrys on the Maritime islands escaped the fate of their cousins in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the French islands, Landrys among them, and deported them to France.  The crossing devastated some of their families.  Cécile Landry and her children died aboard a transport that landed at the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay; only husband Charles Daigre survived the crossing.  Anselme Landry, wife Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, and their younger children from Rivière-du-Moulin-à-Scie on Île St.-Jean perished aboard the transport Duke William, which left Chédabouctou Bay for St.-Malo in an 11-ship convoy in late November and sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December.  Most of the island Landrys crossed on one or more of the five transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy with 1,033 Acadians aboard, also bound for St.-Malo.  Despite the mid-December storm that sank three other vessels, the Five Ships remained reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  Only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, some of them Landrys.  Charles Landry, fils, age 28, crossed on one of the Five Ships with the family of widower Jean Bugeaud, a kinsman.  Charles, fils survived the crossing.  Madeline Landry, age 31, crossed with husband Pierre Broussard, age 32, four children, two sons and two daughters, ages 8 to 1, along with Pierre's younger brother François Broussard, age 25, and Madeleine's younger brother Joseph Landry, age 23.  Madeleine, husband Pierre, brother Joseph, and two of her children survived the crossing, but the two other children and François Broussard died in St.-Malo area hospitals soon after they reached the Breton port.  Osite Landry, age 28, crossed with husband Jean-Baptiste Broussard, age 37, six of their children, three daughters and three sons, ages 9 years to 2 months, and two of Jean-Baptiste's younger brothers, ages 27 and 23.  Jean-Baptiste and a younger brother, along with four of the children, died at sea or in St.-Malo-area hospitals.  Joseph Landry, age 30, crossed with wife Anastasie Boudrot and three children--Amand, age 4; Zacharie-Joseph, age 3; and Marie, age 1.  Only Joseph survived the crossing.  Jean-Baptiste Landry, age 31, crossed with wife Rosalie Boudrot, age 26, and their 15-month-old son Firmin.  Jean-Baptiste survived the crossing, but his son died at sea.  Wife Rosalie died in a local hospital two months after their arrival.  Jean-Baptiste Landry, age 35, crossed with second wife Isabelle Dugas, age 21, two children from his first marriage--Marie, age 8; and Joseph, fils, age 5--along with Jean-Baptiste's cousin Charles Robichaud, age 23.  They all survived the crossing.  Joseph Landry, age 2, crossed with the family of Joseph Robichaud and Osite Hébert.  Along with the Robichauds' 4-year-old son, young Joseph died at sea.  Hélène Landry, age 35, crossed with husband Étienne Thériot, age 24, and four of their children, three sons (one of them 4-year-old Olivier) and a daughter, ages 8 years to 20 months.  They all survived the crossing.  Brothers Charles, age 26, and Joseph Landry, age 20, of Rivière-de-Peugiguit, Île St.-Jean, crossed together on one of the Five Ships and survived the ordeal.  

Island Landrys did their best to create a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Not all of them remained.  Joseph Landry, who lost his wife and three children on the crossing to France, received permission from French authorities to move on to La Rochelle on the Bay of Biscay in February 1759, a few weeks after he reached St.-Malo.  He then disappears from the historical record.  However, most of his Landry kinsmen remained at St.-Malo.  Charles Landry, fils, who crossed with kinsman Jean Bugeaud, settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where his widowered kinsman died soon after their arrival.  Charles, fils married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Boudrot and Marie-Josèphe Doiron, at St.-Servan in November 1759.  Marguerite gave Charles, fils seven children there:  Charles-Pierre-Alain in September 1760 but died at age 2 in August 1762; Firmin Pancrase in May 1762; Jean-Pierre in January 1764 but died the following July; Marguerite-Françoise in October 1765; Jean-Sébastien in August 1767; Charles III in June 1769 but died age 1 1/2 in November 1770; and Louis-Abel in April 1771.  Another Charles Landry, who had crossed with his younger brother, settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo, where, at age 30, he married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Girouard and Marie Doiron, in January 1763.  Marie gave Charles six children in the Pleudihen area:  Euphrosine-Josèphe at nearby Bas Champ in December 1763; Pierre-Joseph at La Coquenais in July 1765; Joseph at La Coquenais in March 1767; Olivier-Charles in October 1768; Alexis-Charles at Cains in July 1770; and Charles-Marie at Cains in March 1774.  Charles's brother Joseph also settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance, where he married Charlotte-Laurence, daughter of locals Julien Flaud and Laurence Duhal, in January 1768.  Charlotte-Laurence gave Joseph 10 children there:  Julien-Joseph at La Coquenais in September 1768; Jeanne-Perrine in August 1770; Charlotte-Joseph in March 1772; Madeleine-Olive in January 1774 but died at La Coquenais, age 6, in September 1779; Isabelle-Joseph at Cains in October 1775 but died at La Coquenais, age 5, in September 1779; Marie-Perrine at Cains in March 1777; Anne-Yvonne at La Coquenais in December 1778; Joseph Charles in January 1781; François-Mathurin in April 1783; and Jean-Pierre in February 1785 but died in March.  Jean-Baptiste Landry, second wife Élisabeth, or Isabelle, Dugas, daughter Marie and son Joseph, settled at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river from Pleudihen.  Élisabeth gave Jean-Baptiste five more children at Plouër:  Élisabeth-Augustine in March 1760; Jean-Baptiste, fils in January 1762; Marguerite-Geneviève in February 1765; Rosalie-Marguerite in September 1769; and Pierre-Isaac in May 1771.  Another Jean-Baptiste Landry, who had lost his wife and child from the rigors of the crossing, settled at Pleurtuit on the west bank of the river north of Plouër before moving down to Plouër.  He remarried to Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Olivier Daigre and Angélique Doiron, at Plouër in November 1760.  Before Marguerite could give him another child, Jean-Baptiste died at Hotel-Dieu in St.-Malo in February 1763, age 36.  Marguerite remarried to a Richard at Plouër in January 1767 and gave him four children. 

Island Landrys shipped to other ports converged on the St.-Malo area months, even years, after they reached France.   Honoré Landry of Minas and Grande-Anse, Île St.-Jean, age 45, his second wife Marie-Madeleine Gautrot, and their children landed at the northern fishing port of Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie, probably aboard the transport Neptune, part of the 11-ship convoy, in early 1759.  The decision to remain there proved to be a tragic one.  Daughter Marie-Madeleine died in St.-Nicolas Parish in July 1760, age 10; son Pierre died two weeks later, age 2; and son Honoré, fils died in August, age 13--victims, perhaps, of an epidemic that often plagued the ports of France.  Honoré's oldest son Anselme refused to remain in the northern port.  At age 21, he married Marie-Josèphe, 21-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Aucoin and Marie LeBlanc, in St.-Nicolas Parish in October 1764.  Marie-Josèphe gave Anselme a son, Jean-Baptiste, in the parish in April 1766, but the boy died seven days after his birth.  The following July, they followed her family from Boulogne-sur-Mer to St.-Malo aboard the brigantine Hazard and settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance.  Marie-Josèphe gave Anselme six more children at La Gravelle near Pleudihen:  Marie-Marguerite in June 1767; François-Marie in September 1769; twins Jean-Marie and Joseph-Pierre in July 1773, but Jean-Marie died a month later, and Joseph-Pierre died at age 6 in September 1779; Charles-Marie in November 1776; and Perrine-Tarsile in January 1781.  Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, Landry, wife Marie-Blanche, called Blanche, LeBlanc, their daughter Marguerite-Gertrude and son Étienne also landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer in 1759.  Marguerite-Gertrude died in St.-Joseph Parish there in January 1759, age 5 1/2, soon after their arrival.  Marie-Blanche gave Jean-Baptiste five more children in the fishing port:  Jean-Frédéric-Gabriel in c1760; Marie-Louise in St.-Joseph Parish in November 1761; Marie-Madeleine-Marguerite in St.-Nicolas Parish in August 1763; Marguerite-Luce in November 1764; and Firmin-Grégoire in April 1766.  Soon after Firmin's birth, the family also sailed to St.-Malo aboard the Hazard and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Marie-Blanche gave Jean-Baptiste two more children there:  Marguerite-Gertrude in July 1768 but died at age 1 in August 1769; and Isabelle-Bertranne in April 1771 but died at age 1 1/2 in September 1772.  Meanwhile, son Firmin-Grégoire died at St.-Servan-sur-Mer at age 3 in July 1769.  Prosper Landry, second wife Marie-Josèphe Bourg, and two children--6-year-old daughter Marguerite from his first wife; and a 2-year-old son from his second wife--crossed from Île St.-Jean to the naval port of Rochefort.  Wife Marie-Josèphe died either during the crossing or in the naval port soon after their arrival.  His two children also seem to have died before October 1759, when Prosper, now a widow, having received permission to move on to St.-Malo, arrived there.  He settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river before crossing to Pleurtuit, where, at age 35, he remarried again--his third marriage--to Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Pitre and Marguerite Thériot and widow of Jean-Baptiste Henry, in October 1761.  Élisabeth gave Prosper five more children in the Pleurtuit area:  Jean-Pierre at St.-Antoine in July 1762; Marie-Madeleine at Créhen in January 1764; Simon-Joseph in November 1765; Marguerite-Geneviève in May 1768 but died at Créhen in July; and another Marguerite-Geneviève in August 1769--seven children, four daughters and three sons, by three wives, between 1752 and 1769, in greater Acadia and France.  René Landry, a 20-year-old bachelor from l'Assomption, Pigiguit, also landed at Rochefort and moved on to St.-Malo in September 1759.  He settled at Plouër-sur-Rance south of Pleurtuit.  In February 1765, he married Euphrosine, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Barrieau and Véronique Girouard of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance across the river.  The marriage was a short one.  René died at Mordreuc near Pleudihen in March 1766, age 27. 

Island Landrys who landed at Cherbourg in Normandy remained where they landed, at least for a decade or so.  Benjamin Landry of Pigiguit and Rivière-du-Nord, Île St.-Jean, age 60 in late 1758, came to Cherbourg with wife Marguerite Babin and some of their younger children.  Benjamin and Marguerite died at Cherbourg by March 1764, when daughter Marguerite married Eustache, son of fellow Acadians Jean Bertrand and Françoise Léger, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish there.  François Landry of Rivière-du-Nord, age 42 in late 1758, wife Marie-Josèphe Babin, and their six children also landed at Cherbourg.  François worked as a carpenter.  Jean-Pierre Landry, perhaps a son, died at Cherbourg in December 1758, age 7, soon after reaching the Norman port.  Wife Marie-Josèphe also died soon after their arrival.  François remarried to Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Carret and Angélique Chiasson and widow of Barthélemy Martin, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in June 1763.  A French record dated 1772 notes that François was asthmatique.  Son Germain from first wife Marie-Josèphe Babin worked as a navigator at Cherbourg, where he married Cécile, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Chênet dit La Garenne and Anne Pothier, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in July 1767.  Cécile gave Germain three children in the Norman port:  Bonne-Marie-Adélaïde in July 1769; Jean-Jacques-Frédérique in July 1770; and Marie-Victoire in July 1772.  The following year, the family moved on. 

Other Landrys made it to France by a different route.  Soon after the fall of Louisbourg in July 1758, a British force attacked the settlements at Cap-Sable and nearby Pobomcoup in late September, captured many Acadians there, including Landrys, shipped them to the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax harbor, and held them for a year.  In late 1759, the British deported them to France via England, and they landed at Cherbourg in January 1760.  Pierre Landry, fils, age 76 when he landed in the Norman port, crossed with wife Marguerite Mius d'Entremont and their three unmarried sons, Joseph, Pierre III, and Grégoire, all in their middle age, only one of whom may have married.  Pierre, fils died at Cherbourg by 1775, in his early 90s.  In that year, French officials noted that youngest son Grégoire was living at Cherbourg with "son Pierre," though the official said nothing about the boy's mother.  Pierre, fils's younger brother François dit Micas Landry of Pobomcoup was an elderly widower when he landed at Cherbourg.  François Landry "de quartre Sables," probably Micas's second son François, fils, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in March 1760, age 55.  René Landry, parents and age unrecorded, died there the same month.  François dit Micas, called François Landrin by the recording priest, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in April, age 60.  Marie Landry of Pobomcoup, perhaps Micas's daugther, also died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in April, age 30.  René Landry of Pobomcoup, probably Micas's nephew René, fils, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in May, age 32.  Marie-Marguerite, daughter of another Marie Landry of Pobomcoup, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in November 1760 two days after her birth.  Despite these deaths, Cap-Sable Landrys remained in the Norman port.  Micas's oldest son Jean married Anne-Théotiste, daughter of fellow Acadians François Vigé and Claire Lejeune and widow of Charles Hébert, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in November 1768.  Anne-Théotiste gave Jean three children there:  Anne-Marie in April 1771; Jean-François in August 1773 but died at age 1 1/2 in February 1775; and Adélaïde in February 1775.  In 1775, French officials noted that Anne-Théotiste's sister Hélène-Françoise Vigé also was living with them at Cherbourg.  François dit Micas's youngest son Joseph married cousin Madeleine-Helli, daughter of fellow Acadians René Landry and Marie-Josèphe Mius de Pleinmarais of Pobomcoup, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in June 1771.  Madeleine-Helli gave Joseph at least three daughters in the Norman port:  Geneviève born soon after their marriage but died in July 1772; Anne-Marie-Madeleine in March 1772 but died at age 16 months in July 1773; and Marie-Madeleine-Adélaïde in May 1774.  Finally, after living at Cherbourg for a decade and a half, Mica's sons Jean, Pierre, and Joseph, and perhaps other members of the family, chose to leave.  After 1775, when many of their kinsmen were living either in Poitou or at Nantes, Jean and his brothers returned to North America, perhaps via the Channel Isle of Jersey, and became codfishermen in greater Acadia, in the case of Jean on the Petit-Nord peninsula of British Newfoundland.  Meanwhile, François dit Micas's nephew Joseph Landry, age 31, wife Cécile Mius d'Entremont, and their three children, two sons and a daughter, also landed at Cherbourg from Halifax via England in January 1760.  Cécile died soon after their arrival, and Joseph remarried to Jeanne-Marie-Madeleine, 22-year-old daughter of locals Antoine Varangue and Jeanne Le Terrier of Cherboug, in Très-St.-Trinité Parish in April 1763.  Jeanne-Marie-Madeleine gave Joseph six more children there:  Aimable-Étienne in December 1765; Bonne-Marie-Louise in April 1767; Madeleine-Geneviève in October 1769; Anne-Adélaïde in February 1771; Abraham-Isaac in February 1772; and Jean-Baptiste-Léonar in January 1773--nine children, five sons and four daughters, by two wives, between 1751 and 1773, in greater Acadia and France.  Joseph's sister Anne also landed at Cherbourg in 1760 and married Jean, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Granger and Anne Belliveau, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in April 1763.  They also left the Norman port in the early 1770s.

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including many Landrys, were repatriated to St.-Malo and other French ports.  Considering the number of Minas Landrys deported to Virginia in the autumn of 1755, it should not be surprising that more members of the family went to France from England in 1763 than from the Maritime islands in 1758-59.  Anselme à Jean dit Jane Landry, age 20, landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer and received permission to move on to St.-Malo.  He settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance, where he married Agathe, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Barrieau and Véroniqe Girouard of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, and widow of Isidore Daigre, in February 1765.  Agathe gave Anselme three children in the Pleudihen area:  Marie-Olive at La Chapelle in July 1766; Joseph-Charles at La Gravelle in February 1769 but died at La Ville Ger at age 4 1/2 in August 1773; and Blanche-Charlotte at La Gravelle in May 1771.  Paul Landry, age 17, landed at Morlaix in northwest Brittany and received permission to move on to St.-Malo.  He settled at St.-Suliac, where he married Isabelle-Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Breau and Ursule Bourg, in January 1766.  Isabelle-Françoise gave Paul three children at St.-Suliac:  Joseph-Paul in November 1767 but died the following February; François-Jean-Théodore in January 1769; and Marguerite-Josèphe in November 1770 but died of smallpox in May 1773, age 2/12.  Paul died at St.-Suliac in October 1770, age 24.  Brothers Antoine, age 31, and René Landry, age 33, René's wife Marguerite Babin, age 22, and their infant daughter Marie-Madeleine reached St.-Malo from England aboard the transport Dorothée in May 1763.  They settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Antoine did not marry and died at St.-Servan in July 1782, age 48.  Marguerite gave his brother René eight more children at St.-Servan:  Servanne-Laurence in October 1764; Jean-Baptiste-Raphaël in February 1767; Marguerite-Josèphe in February 1769; Pierre-Marie in April 1771 but died at age 1 in July 1772; Anne-Marie-Jeanne in May 1773; Pierre in November 1775; Joseph-Marie in April 1778; and Jeanne-Guillemette in January 1781.  Benjamin Landry, age 12, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée with his uncle Laurent Granger.  In 1765, still in his teens, Benjamin received permission from French authorities to go to Cherbourg, where he disappears from the historial record.  Joseph Landry, age 56, wife Marie-Josèphe Comeau, age 58, and three of their unmarried children--Marie, age 30; Marguerite, age 22; and Pierre, age 19--reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée and settled at St.-Servan.  Joseph died there in June 1764, age 57.  His daughter Marguerite married a Boudrot at St.-Servan in 1765 and died there in January 1767, age 26.  Daughter Marie died at St.-Servan in March 1766, age 33.  Son Pierre married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians François Thériot and Françoise Guérin, at St.-Servan in June 1767.  Anne gave Pierre two daughters there:  Marie-Anne in May 1768; and Jeanne-Perrine in December 1769 but died the following April.  Pierre died at St.-Servan in November 1770, age 26.  Charles Landry, age 44, wife Cécile LeBlanc, 43, and their daughters--Marguerite, age 22; Marie-Madeleine, age 17; Geneviève, age 15; and Marie-Josèphe, age 13--reached St.-Malo from England aboard the transport Ambition in May 1763.  They settled at St.-Servan, where daughter Marguerite married into the Oselet family in February 1766.  Hilaire Landry, age 35, wife Marie-Josèphe Richard, age 22, who he had just married in England, Hilaire's widowed mother Marguerite Comeau, age 68, and his unmarried brother Eustache, age 44, reached St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition and settled at St.-Servan.  Marie-Josèphe gave Hilaire four children there:  Jean-Pierre in June 1764 but died at age 2 in September 1766; Marie in March 1767; Anne-Marguerite in March 1769; and Jean-Baptiste in June 1771 but died at age 1 1/2 in October 1772.  Older brother Eustache did not marry, but he may have fathered a "natural" son by a much younger Landry cousin at Plouër-sur-Rance:  Jean-Charles Landry was born in May 1767 to Marie Landry.  Hilaire and Eustache's brother Simon, age 28, wife Marguerite Gautrot, age 40, their infant son Jean, and three of Marguerite's sons from her two previous marriages, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée and settled near his family at St.-Servan.  Marguerite gave Simon no more children.   His, Hilaire, and Eustache's brother Jean, age 31, and wife Marie Forest, age 30, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée and settled near his family at St.-Servan before moving upriver to St.-Suliac in 1769.  They may have been that rare Acadian couple who had no children.  In March 1773, Jean Landry, perhaps a widower, joined other exiles on the Channel island of Jersey who intended to return to North America to work in British fisheries there.  One wonders if he made the crossing or, rather, the re-crossing.  Anne Thériot, age 55, widow of Pierre Landry, and five of her unmarried children--Jean-Charles, age 23; Joseph, age 19; Françoise, age 17; Élisabeth, age 16; and Marie, age 14--reached St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition and settled at St.-Servan.  Also aboard the vessel was Anne's oldest son Pierre Landry, fils, age 27, wife Marthe LeBlanc, age 27, and their infant son Joseph le jeune.  Marthe gave Pierre, fils four more children at St.-Servan:  Joseph-Giroire in January 1766; Jean-Raphaël in April 1768; Marie-Madeleine-Adélaïde in Novembe 1770; and Louis-Pierre or Pierre-Louis in October 1773.  Meanwhile, brother Jean-Charles married Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Claude LeBlanc and Jeanne Dugas, at St.-Servan in June 1765.  Sister Françoise married into the Robichaud family at St.-Servan in February 1767; and sister Élisabeth married into the Barrieau family there in May 1768.  In the early 1770s, Anne and her younger children, with other Acadian exiles in France, returned to North America via the Isle of Jersey, perhaps with the expedition led by sea captain Charles Robin, a native of Jersey.  Anne and her children resettled in Robin's fisherie at Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Pierre à René Landry, age 23, reached St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition with the family of his maternal uncle Jean-Jacques Thériot and settled with them at St.-Servan, where he married Marie-Josèphe, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Hébert and Élisabeth LeBlanc, in January 1769.  Marie-Josèphe gave Pierre a son, Pierre-Joseph, at St.-Servan in January 1770.  Pierre died at St.-Servan in December 1772, age 32. 

In late 1765, Acadians repatriated from England and a few who had been deported from the French Maritimes agreed to become part of an agricultural venture in French territory recently returned by the British.  Most of the Landrys from England remained where they had landed, but a few chose to join their fellow exiles on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Marie-Rose Rivet, age 56, widow of René Landry III of Rivière-aux-Canards, reached St.-Malo from Liverpool with four unmarried children--Madeleine, age 22; Jean, age 16; Marie-Josèphe, age 14; and another daughter--in the spring of 1763.  In November 1765, they settled at Bordrehouant in the Bangor district in the southern interior of the island.  In February 1766, daughter Madeleine, at age 24, married René, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Trahan and Jeanne Daigre and widower of Anne LeBlanc, at Le Palais on the island's east coast.  Son Jean married Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Simon Thériot and Françoise Daigre, at Le Palais in January 1774.  Élisabeth gave Jean at least eight children on the island, including Marie-Élisabeth in November 1775; Jean-Étienne in February 1777 but died the following April; Jean-Pierre in May 1779; Marie-Auguste in July 1780; Catherine-Reine-Victoire in February 1782 but died at Chantenay near Nantes, where the family was living temporarily, in January 1783; Marie-Rose at Bangor in September 1763 but died the following month; Jean-Joseph in January 1785 but died the following April; and Jean-François in September 1786, after most of the Acadians in France had moved on to Spanish Louisiana.  Marie-Rose's daughter Marie-Josèphe married Christophe, son of French soldier Joseph Puguet dit Vadan and his wife Anne Nicod, at Bangor in March 1778.  Marie-Rose's other Landry daughters married into the Duon and LeBlanc families on the island and also remained there.  François Landry and wife Françoise Landry also went to Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Their daughter Françoise was born near Le Palais in March 1766.  One wonders if they remained. 

In 1773, Landrys in France, in greater numbers, agreed to become part of another settlement venture, this one in the interior of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  Landrys who took their families to Poitou included seaman Anselme Landry and wife Agathe Barrieau from Pleudihen-sur-Rance; Charles Landry and wife Cécile LeBlanc from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Charles Landry, fils and wife Marguerite Boudrot from St.-Servan; François Landry and second wife Madeleine Carret from Cherbourg; François's son Germain and wife Cécile La Garenne from Cherbourg; Hilaire Landry and wife Marie-Josèphe Richard from St.-Servan; Hilaire's widowed mother Marguerite Comeau and his older bachelor brother Eustache Landry from St.-Servan; Jean-Baptiste Landry and wife Marie-Blanche LeBlanc from St.-Servan; Jean-Baptiste Landry and second wife Élisabeth Dugas from Plouër-sur-Rance; Joseph Landry and second wife Jeanne-Marie-Madeleine Varangue from Cherbourg; Pierre Landry, fils and wife Marthe LeBlanc from St.-Servan; and Prosper Landry and third wife Élisabeth Pitre from Pleurtuit.  Joseph Landry's son Jean-Baptiste-Léonor by second wife Jeanne-Marie-Madeleine Varangue, born at Cherbourg, died in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age 11 months, on the last day of December 1773.  Charles Landry's wife Cécile LeBlanc died in the same parish in May 1774, age 60.  Charles died there in June, age 58.  Marie-Josèphe Richard gave Hilaire Landry another daughter, Marie-Rose, in that parish in June 1774.  Jean-Baptiste Landry's son Étienne died in St.-Just Parish, Chavigny, south of Châtellerault, in September 1774, age 19.  Ange Landry, age 18 1/2, died at Archigny south of Châtellerault in October 1774.  Cécile La Garenne gave Germain Landry a daughter, Anne-Appoline, their fourth child, at Archigny in October 1774.  Joseph Landry died at Archigny in November 1774, age 53.  The older Charles Landry's unmarried daughter Madeleine died in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age 26, in November 1774.  Marguerite Boudrot gave Charles Landry, fils another son, Jean-Jacques, their eighth child, in that parish in January 1775.  Marie Landry died there, age 18, in May 1775.  Hilaire Landry died there in August 1775, age 48.  Joseph dit Bernardeau, son of Joseph Landry by his first wife Cécile Mius d'Entrement, married Marie-Théotiste, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Girouard and Marguerite Gaudet, at Cenon-sur-Vienne on the southern outskirts of Châtellerault in August 1775.  Second wife Élisabeth Dugas gave Jean-Baptiste Landry another daughter, Marie-Anne, his eighth child, in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in November 1775. 

After two years of effort, most of the Acadians deserted the Poitou venture.  From October 1775 through March 1776, hundreds of them, including the Landrys, retreated in four convoys down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes.  In many of the parishes there and at Chantenay on the western edge of the city and Rezé south of the Loire, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Cécile La Garenne gave Germain Landry three more children at Nantes and Chantenay, their fifth, sixth, and seventh:  Marie-Rose in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in July 1776; Pierre-Élie at Chantenay in May 1778; and Marguerite-Modeste in October 1779 but died at age 1 in October 1780.  The couple also lost two of their daughters there:  Anne-Appoline died in St.-Nicolas Parish in August 1776, age 2; and Anne-Marie-Victorie at Chantenay in October 1780, age 9.  Germain died probably at Chantenay by January 1785, when Cécile remarried to a French Guénard in St.-Martin Parish in January 1785.  Marthe LeBlanc gave Pierre Landry, fils another child at Nantes, their sixth:  Anne-Suzanne in St.-Jacques Parish in July 1776.  They also lost a son there:  Louis-Pierre or Pierre-Louis died in St.-Jacques Parish in September 1776, age 3.  François Landry's second wife Madeleine Carret died probably at Chantenay soon after they came to the lower Loire port, and François, age 61, remarried again to Marguerite, 54-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Pitre and Marguerite Thériot and widow of Joseph Blanchard, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in February 1777.  Marguerite Boudrot gave Charles Landry, fils two more sons, their ninth and tenth children, at Chantenay:  another Charles III in March 1777; and François-Marie in November 1779.  Rose, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Landry and his second wife Élisabeth Dugas, died in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, in June 1777, age 8; and the couple's son Pierre died there in February 1778, age 8.  In October 1780, Élisabeth gave Jean-Baptiste another daughter, Rose-Adélaïde, their eighth child, in St.-Similien Parish, but the girl died there in October 1783, age 3.  An older Jean-Baptiste Landry's wife Marie-Blanche LeBlanc died in St.-Jacques Parish in June 1777, age 48.  Jean-Bapitiste remarried to Anne, 50-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Michel and Marguerite Forest and widow of Joseph Dubois and Félix LeBlanc, in St.-Nicolas Parish the following October.  She gave him no more children.  Jean-Baptiste's daughter Marie-Madeleine-Marguerite, by first wife Marie-Blanche LeBlanc, married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians Alexis Comeau and Dorothée Richard, in St.-Jacques Parish in January 1783.  Her father Jean-Baptiste died in that parish the following August, age 66.  His widow Anne Michel remarried again--her fourth marriage--to a Daigre at St.-Martin de Chantenay in February 1785.  Marguerite-Geneviève, youngest daughter of Prosper Landry and his third wife Élisabeth Pitre, died in St..-Jacques Parish in July 1777, age 8.  Anne-Adélaïde, daughter of Joseph Landry and his second wife Jeanne-Marie-Madeleine Varangue, died in St.-Jacques Parish in September 1777, age 6.  Marie-Théotiste Girouard gave Joseph Landry dit Bernardeau, Joseph's son by first wife Cécile Mius d'Entremont, three children at Chantenay:  Joseph-Claire in October 1777 but died there the following month; Julien-Rolland in January 1781; and Agnès-Julie in October 1782.  Marguerite Comeau, widow of Jean-Baptiste Landry, died in St.-Jacques Parish in May 1779, age 90.  Her bachelor son Eustache Landry died in St.-Pierre de Rezé Parish, across the Loire from Nantes, in August 1780, age 72.  Her younger son Hilaire Landry lost his second daughter Anne-Marguerite at Rezé in December 1782, age 13.  According to the girl's burial record, her father Hilaire had died by then.  Marie-Josèphe Comeau, widow of Joseph Landry, having buried her husband and three married children at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, may have gone to Nantes directly from the St.-Malo suburb or, more likely, via Poitou perhaps with a widowed son- or daughter-in-law.  Marie-Josèphe died "at the 'Bastille" in St.-Similien Parish in December 1779, age 78.  Charlotte-Blanche or Blanche-Charlotte, Anselme Landry's younger daughter, died at Chantenay in July 1780, age 9.  Anselme's older daughter Marie-Olive married a Boudrot at St.-Martin de Chantenay in May 1783.  Reine-Catherine, daughter of Jean Landry and Élisabeth Thériot of Bangor, Belle-Île-en-Mer, died at Chantenay in January 1783, age 11 months. 

During their two and a half decades in the mother country, Acadian Landrys had proliferated, and some had even prospered, but many still felt the burden of living in a mother country that seemed to neglect its Acadian children.  In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 54 Landrys agreed to take it.  They included most members of the family still at Nantes and its suburbs:  Anselme Landry; Charles Landry and his family; François Landry, now in his late 60s and three times widowered; Jean-Baptiste Landry and his family; the four orphan children of Joseph Landry of Cherbourg, now at Nantes; Pierre Landry and his family; Prosper Landry and his family; widower René Landry and his many children; Simon Landry and his wife; and many Landry wives, widows, and orphaned daughters.  Other members of the family chose to remain.  They included Charles Landry and his family at Pleudihen-sur-Rance; Charles's brother Joseph and his family at nearby La Coquenais; Honoré Landry of Boulogne-sur-Mer and son Anselme at Pleudihen-sur-Rance; Joseph Landry dit Bernardeau and his family at Chantenay; Pierre Landry, fils's three unmarried sons at Cherbourg; and Rose-Marie Rivet's many Landry children and grandchildren on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  In 1793, during the French Revolution, French officials counted at St.-Malo a Jean Landry, "day labourer," born in "Acadie" on 21 February 1746, who "entered France in 1758."  One wonders which Jean Landry this may have been.   Jean à René III of Rivière-aux-Canards, Marie Rivet's only son, died on Belle-Île-en-Mer in 1830, in his 80s. 

In North America, conditions did not improve for the hundreds of Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada, where they gathered at Québec.  Life in the crowded Canadian capital came with a price.  For the first time in their lives, Acadians were exposed to the hazards of an urban environment.  A number of them died at Québec in September 1756.  Later that summer and in early autumn, Acadian refugees in the Québec area began to die in ever greater numbers.  Smallpox, a disease scarcely known on the Fundy shore, killed more than 300 Acadians, including Landrys from Annapolis Royal, in and around the Canadian citadel from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  This did not endear the survivors to their Canadian hosts, who saw them more as burdens than as reliable compatriots in their struggle against Britain.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, including Renné Landry and his family of five.  During the following months, most of these Acadians, along with others who had escaped capture at Restigouche but either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region, were held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  One of these compounds was Fort Edward, overlooking the old Landry homesteads at Pigiguit.  In 1762, British officials counted Olivier and Charles Landry; Pierre Landry and René Landry at Fort Edward in August.  In October, they counted Pierre Landry and his family of three, another Pierre Landry and his family of two, and René Landry and his family of two still there.  Another prison compound was Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto, near the family's former homes.  In August 1763, a British official counted Paul, Magdelaine, Modeste, and Jean Landry there.  Still another compound was at Chédabouctou on the upper Atlantic coast, where British officials counted Jean-Baptiste Landry, wife Marguerite Gautrot, and some of their children at war's end.  The largest and oldest British prison in Nova Scotia was on Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor, where Landrys from Cap-Sable had been held.  In August 1763, a British official counted Joseph Landry, his wife, and two children; and Pierre Landris, his wife, and three children in the island prison.

The war over, Landrys being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Landrys from both branches of the family were especially numerous in the Bay Colony.  In 1763 in Massachusetts, a list of Acadians "Who Wish to Pass to the French Colonies" included Paul Landry and his family of five; Jean Landry and his family of two; Joseph Landry and his family of six; Charles Landry and his family of four; René Landry and his family of six; Aman Landry and his family of seven; François Landry and his family of three; Germain Landry and his family of two; Pierre Landry and his family of seven, another René Landry and his family of four; another Paul Landry and his family of six; Jean Landry and his family of 10; and another Jean Landry and his family of five.  In August 1763, a French repatriation list of Acadians circulating in Massachusetts included René Landry, wife Anne, two sons, and two daughters; Pierre Landry, wife Sesille (Cécile), a son, and five daughters; Jean Landry, wife Magdelaine, and a son; Paul Landry, wife Roze, a son, and a daughter; Joseph Landry, wife Magdeleine, two sons, and two daughters; Charle Landry, wife Mariee, and a son; Germain Landry, wife Sesille, two sons, and a daughter; Jean Landry, wife Mariee, and two daughters; François Landry, wife Mariee, and a son; Jean Landry, wife Margueritte, two sons, and six daughters; Germain Landry, wife Margueritte, and a daughter; René Landry and three sons; Amant Landry, wife Magdelaine, a son, and four daughters; and Paul Landry, wife Anastazie, and four daughters.  Colonial officials did what they could to prevent them from leaving.  As a result, members of the family were still in the Bay Colony three years later, when colonial officials compiled a "List of Names of the French Who Wish to Go to Canada," where many of their relatives already had gone.  On this June 1766 list were an unnamed Landry with a family of five; another unnamed Landry with a family of four; René Landry and his family of six; an unnamed Landry with a family of three; Charles Landry with his family of four; Joseph Landry with his family of seven; Jean Landry with his family of nine; Pierre Landry and his family of seven; Marguerite Landry and her family of seven; Aman Landry and his family of 10; Paul Landry and his family of six; Pierre Landry and his family of five; and Michel Landry and his family of two--evidence, in light of earlier counts, that most of the Landrys deported to Massachusetts in 1755 still lived there.  Landrys also were being held in Connecticut at war's end.  In 1763, a "General List of the Acadian Families Distributed in the Government of Konehtoket Who Desire to Go to France" included Anastazie Landry, husband Fabien Hébert, and a son; Mariee Bourg, widow of Charle Landry, and her family of nine; Michel Landry, wife Mariee LeBlanc, and their two children; Marie Joseph Landry, husband Pierre LeBlanc, and their son; Joseph Landry and two Hébert males; and Paul Landry, his unnamed wife, and five children.  In June 1763, members of the family appearing on a repatriation list in Pennsylvania included Pierre Landry "the Younger," wife Josette Aucoin, and their child; another Pierre Landry, wife Anne Landry, and five children; Margueritte Landry and four brothers and sisters; Pierre à René Landry, wife Nanette Landry, and two children; widow Claire Landry and two children; yet another Pierre Landry and three children; and Placit Landry, "boy."  Landrys were especially numerous in Maryland, where many of the Minas families had been deported eight years earlier.  In July 1763, members of the family appearing on repatriation lists in the Chesapeake colony included Marie La Blanche Landry, husband Amant Gautrot, a daughter and a LeBlanc orphan at Newtown on Maryland's Eastern Shore.  At Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac lived Marguerite [Landry], husband Antoine Braux, and four children; Anne [Landry], husband Jean Broussard, and three children; Catherine [Landry], husband Antoine Babin, and seven children; Marie-Josette [Landry], husband Joseph Braux, two children, and Marie-Rose Landri, probably an orphan; Joseph Landry, wife Marie [Richard], daughters Anne-Magelaine, Geneviève, Cécile, and Magdelaine, and sons Augustin, Alexandre, and Pierre; Margueritte [Landry], widow Braux, and two children; and Mathurin Landry, wife Marie [Babin], and daughter Ludivine.  Étienne Landry, wife Margte., daughters Margete. and Marie, and son Joseph were living at Annapolis.  At Upper Marlborough in the colony's interior could be found Augustin Landry, wife Marie [Babin], daughters Marie and Margueritte, and sons Joseph, Joseph-Ignace, and Mathurin; Bazile Landry, wife Brigite [Boudrot], daughter [Susanne-]Marie, and a Babin orphan; Joseph Landry, wife Magdelaine [Boudrot], sons Joseph and Simon, and a Babin orphan; and Osite [Landry], husband Joseph Castille, their daughter and two Brausard orphans.  The many Landrys still at Oxford on the colony's Eastern Shore included François Landry, daughter Pélagie, and sons Charles, Jacques, Georges, and Joseph; Joseph Landry, wife Marie [Bourg], daughters Magdne., Margte., and Gertrude, and son Joseph, fils; Marie-Rose [Landry], husband J. Bte. Braux, and seven children; Jean Landry, wife Ursule [Guédry], daughters Élizabeth and Marie, son Joseph, and a LeBlanc male, probably an orphan; Anne [Landry], husband Pierre LeBlanc, and their three children; Firmin Landry, wife Élizabeth [Thibodeau], daughers Éleine and Magdne, and sons Joseph and Saturnin; Marie [Landry], widow Babin, and her children; Ursule [Landry], widow Babin, and two daughters; widower René Landry, daughter Félicité, and sons Olivier, Joseph dit Dios, and Firmin; Marie-Madeleine [Landry], husband Désiré LeBlanc, and 10 children; Pierre Landry, wife Élizabeth [Dupuis], daughters Anne and Sophie, and sons Joseph and Pierre; widow Marie Landry, Fabien, and Pélagie Landry; Marie [LeBlanc], widow of Charles Landry, daughters Marie and Anne, and son Amant-Pierre; François Landry and wife Margte.; Joseph Landry, "Le Sourd," that is, deaf; Jean[-Baptiste] Landry, daughters Margte., Anne, Magdne., and Rose, and sons Hyacinthe and Jean, fils; [Marie Landry], widow [Alexis] Grangé, and daughter; siblings Pierre, Élixabeth, Athanas, Germain, Anne, and Mary Landry; Pierre Landry, wife Geneviève [Broussard], daughter Ozith, and sons Jean, Olivier, and Firmin; Abraham Landry, wife Margte. [Flan], daughters Nathalie, Anastazie, Marie, Margte., Élizabeth, and Magdne., and sons Étienne, Simon, Pierre, and Joseph.  At Baltimore could be found Juditte Landry, husband Jean LeBlanc, and four children; François Landry, wife Marguerite LeBlanc, and a female LeBlanc; Étienne Landry, wife Marie-Josèphe Landry, and daughter Anastasie; Ann Blanc [actually Flan], widow of Alexandre dit Petit Abram Landry, daughters Marguerite and Anne, and sons Enslme, Paul, Firmin, and Jean; and Marie-Joseph Lendry and husband Joseph Blanchard.  Landrys were still languishing in South Carolina at war's end.  In August 1763, Olivier Landry, his wife, and three children appeared on a repatriation list at Port Royal down the coast from Charles Town.  In and around the colony's capital, other members of the family appearing on a repatriation list included Joseph Landry, wife Marie Richard, daughter Marie, age 4, and son Joseph; Aimable Landry and wife Élizabet Dugas; Margete. Landry, husband Paul Boudrau, and a Boudrau orphan; sisters Natalie and Modest Landry with mother Marie Girouard and stepfather Zacarie Thibodeau; and Marie Landry, husband Joseph Thibodeau, and two sons. 

Most of the Acadians in New England, New York, and Pennsylvania, including many Landrys, chose to resettle in Canada, where kinsmen from Annapolis Royal, Chignecto, Minas, and the French islands had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of the Landry cousins began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Landrys could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, L'Acadie, La Chine, La-Prairie-de-la-Magdeleine, St.-Philippe-de-La-Prairie, L'Assomption, Lavaltrie, Maskinongé, Montréal, Nicolet, Pointe-du-Lac, St.-François-du-Lac, St.-Grégoire-du-Nicolet, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, St.-Sulpice, and Yamachiche; on the lower St. Lawrence below Québec at Charlesbourg, Cap-St.-Ignace, St.-Joachim, L'Islet, and Kamouraska; in Gaspésie at Bonaventure and Carleton; and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  In what became New Brunswick, Landrys settled at Caraquet, Grande-Anse, and Memramcook on or near the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  In Nova Scotia, they could be found at Pigiguit now Windsor; Pointe-de-l'Église or Church Point on St. Mary's Bay; Chezzetcook; D'Escousse on Île Madame; and L'Ardoise on Cape Breton Island, formerly Île Royale.  They also could be found on Newfoundland.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

After the war, Landrys also settled on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland that offered them an opportunity to elude British jurisdiction.  Jean-Baptiste Landry, his wife Marguerite Gautrot, and some of their children had escaped the roundup on Île Royale in 1758 and took refuge perhaps in a secluded corner of British Nova Scotia.  By the early 1760s, the British either captured them or accepted their surrender.  At war's end, they, along with married son Joseph and his family, were being held at Chédabouctou on the upper Atlantic shore, but the rest of Jean-Baptiste's family had been scattered to the winds.  The British had deported son Jean-Baptiste dit Labbé and his family to Massachusetts in 1755, son Pierre and his family to Pennsylvania that year, and son Alexis and his family to France in 1758.  After the war, Pierre took his family to Canada; Labbe and his family chose to resettle on Île Madame, once part of the French colony of Île Royale, now a part of British-controlled Cape Breton Island; and Alexis made his way back to North America and settled in Canada.  Meanwhile, Jean-Baptiste, père attempted to reunite as much of his family as he could on Miquelon.  One of Labbés sons, Jean, joined his grandparents and uncle Joseph on the island, but the others remained scattered across North America.  Jean-Baptiste, père, Joseph, and their families likely were among the islanders sent by French officials to France in late 1767 to relief overcrowding on Miquelon.  If so, they likely left France soon after their arrival there, perhaps on the ship Créole owned by Joseph's wife's kinsman, Abraham Dugas, which returned to Miquelon in May 1768.  In September 1778, during the American Revolution, the British captured Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported the islanders, including Jean Landry and his family, to La Rochelle, France.  They were not among the islanders who returned to Île Miquelon in 1784.  One wonders what happened to the other island Landrys in September 1778. 

At war's end, Landrys languishing in the seaboard colonies also emigrated to the French Antilles to avoid living in territory controlled by the British.  While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged the exiles there to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles who could be lured to the tropical island could serve as a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar island.  The first of them reached Cap-Français in late 1763.  The experience proved an unhappy one for many of the exiles, including Landrys.  French officials sent Charles Landry of Minas and Connecticut, wife Anne LeBlanc, and their children to Mirebalais in the island's interior near Port-au-Prince to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  Sons Charles-Mathurin and François, perhaps twins, died there in October 1764, age 20, only 10 days apart.  Daughter Marie also died there that month, age 11.  Charles died there in November, age 42.  His younger son Joseph died the next day, age 15.  French officials also sent Charles's younger brother Michel, wife Marie LeBlanc of Minas and Connecticut, and their children to Mirebalais.  Their son Joseph was baptized there in October 1764, age 2.  One wonders if this was the Joseph Landry who died "on the farm of Gimbal" at Mirebalais in January 1765, age 2.  Michel died at Mirebalais in July 1765, age 40.  French officials also sent Paul Landry of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, wife Théotiste Girouard, and their children to the interior community.  Paul died there in November 1764, age 30.  Daughter Victoire died at Mirebalais in August 1766, age 8.  Orphan Gabriel Landry, "born in New England," parents unrecorded, was baptized at Mirebalais in November 1764 and died there the following March, age 13 months.  Michel Landry, parents unrecorded, died at Mirebalais in December 1764, age 12.  Marguerite Landry, parents unrecorded, also died there in December, age 15.  Jean-Baptiste Landry, parents unrecorded, died at Mirebalais in October 1765, age 7.  However, when fellow Acadians from Halifax and Maryland, including many Landrys, came through Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans during the mid- and late 1760s, none of the Landrys still in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  Perhaps they had found a place for themselves in the colony's slave-based plantation economy, or they may have lacked the resources to make their way across the island to Cap-Français.  Hélène, daughter of Paul Landry and Théotiste Girouard of Ste.-Famillie, Pigiguit, married Pierre, son of Jacques Barille and Marie Hart of Bauge, Anjou, at La Croix-des-Beguets near Port-au-Prince in February 1770.  Joseph Landry, "living at Haut-Moustique" near Port-de-Paix on the island's north coast, died there in September 1774, age unrecorded.  Marie Landry, married to Pierre Felgere, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in October 1785. 

A Landry still languishing in New York at war's end, perhaps after communicating with a distant kinsman, consulted with three other Acadian family heads on where they should resettle.  The four family heads and their wives all were closely kin to one another:  Olivier à Joseph Landry's wife was Cécile Poirier, whose brother, Jean-Baptiste Poirier, was married to Marie-Madeleine Richard, whose parents were Jean-Baptiste Richard and Catherine Cormier.  Catherine was a first cousin of Jean-Baptiste Cormier, whose wife Madeleine Richard was a sister of Jean-Baptiste.  Moreover, Olivier Landry's paternal grandmother was Marie, daughter of Pierre Thibodeau and Jeanne Thériot.  Marie's younger sister Jeanne had married French official Mathieu de Goutin at Port-Royal in the late 1680s.  The De Goutin's youngest son, Joseph de Goutin de Ville, born at Port-Royal in 1705, like his older brother François-Marie, became an army officer.  Joseph was still a middle-aged bachelor when he was posted to New Orleans in the 1740s.  He was, a far as the records show, the first native of French Acadia to settle in Louisiana.  In July 1747, at age 42, he married a 15-year-old Creole girl at New Orleans.  After his retirement, Joseph de Ville became a merchant in the city and an officer in the colonial militia.  In the late 1750s or early 1760s, he received a grant of land in the newly-created Attakapas District on the Louisiana prairies.  It may have been about that time that he communicated with his cousin Olivier in the Acadian diaspora and sold him on the qualities of the Gulf Coast region.  Sometime in early 1763, perhaps after hearing from cousin Joseph, Olivier Landry, Jean-Baptiste Cormier, Jean-Baptiste Poirier, Jean-Baptiste Richard, their wives, and children--21 exiles in all, four of them Landrys--left New York, where they may have been held since the summer of 1756, and headed back to the southern seaboard colonies, to which they had been deported from Chignecto in the fall of 1755.  In South Carolina late that August, colonial officials counted three of the families at Charles Town and the Landrys at Port Royal down the coast, closer to Savannah, Georgia, than to Charles Town.  Later that year, perhaps after securing more funds, the families came together at Savannah.  From there, in late December 1763, they took the Savannah Packet to Mobile in eastern Lousiaina, which they likely thought was still a part of New France.  It was not.  They in fact arrived in the Gulf Coast citadel just as the caretaker governor of French Louisiana was transferring jurisdiction of the eastern part of the colony to a British force from Cuba.  Lingering at Mobile in late January, the four families rehabilitated one of their marriages there before moving on to New Orleans, which they reached in February 1764--the first documented Acadian exiles to settle in Louisiana. 

Landrys being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada or other parts of greater Acadia.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Landrys, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where exiles in the colonies, including Landrys, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least nine were Landrys. 

The many Landrys in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Dozens of Landrys were part of the three contingents of exiles from the Chesapeake colony that reached New Orleans in September 1766, July 1767, and February 1768--130 Landrys in all, more than any other family from any one place that settled in Spanish Louisiana.312

Lanoue

In 1755, descendants of Pierre Lanoue, père, the cooper and Jeanne Gautrot could still be found at Annapolis Royal, Grand-Pré, and Chignecto.  Le Grand Dérangement of 1755 scattered this family to the winds. 

The Acadians of Chignecto were the first to be rounded up by the British during the summer and fall of 1755, but many of them escaped.  Pierre, fils's younger sons Honoré and Michel and their families eluded the British and found refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  They then moved on to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Honoré and Michel died either on the Gulf shore or at Restigouche before 24 October 1760, when their widows and families were counted at Restigouche with hundreds of other Acadians on the eve of the stronghold's surrender.  The British sent many of the exiles at Restigouche to prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted Amand Lanoue and wife Marie Melanson at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, near the family's old homesteads at Chignecto; and Marie-Judith Belliveau, widow of Michel Lanoue, and five of her children on Georges Island, Halifax.

The British pounced on the Acadians at Minas and Annapolis Royal later in the autumn of 1755.  Most of the Lanoues in those communities did not escape.  The British deported Pierre, fils's older sons Joseph and Pierre III at Annapolis Royal and Charles at Minas, along with their families, to Connecticut.  A grandson, Joseph, fils, and his family ended up in Massachusetts.  At least one Lanoue eluded the British roundup at Annapolis Royal, spent a hard winter on the Bay of Fundy shore, crossed to Chepoudy the following spring, and escaped to Canada probably via the Rivière St.-Jean portage.  Pierre, fils's daughter Marie-Josèphe, wife of Jean Melanson, died at Québec in January 1758, age 40, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck the Acadians in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758. 

At war's end, Lanoues being held in the British seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  In August 1763, Joseph Lanous [fils], wife Nanette, their two sons and a daughter were still in Massachusetts.  That same year, a number of Lanoue families were counted in Connecticut, including Pierre Lanau and his family of eight; Pierre Lanau, "the young," and his family of six; Michel-[Poncy] Lanau and his family of four; Joseph Lanau and his family of seven; and Charles Lanau and his family of three.  Most of the Acadians in New England, including the Lanoues, chose to resettle in Canada, where kinsmen from Annapolis Royal had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Pierre Lanoue the cooper began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Lanoues could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at St.-Philippe-de-Laprairie and L'Acadie across from Montréal; and at St.-Jacques de l'Achigan and L'Assomption on the north shore of the St. Lawrence between Montréal and Trois-Rivières.  In Nova Scotia, they settled at Grosses-Coques on Baie St.-Marie, today's St. Mary's Bay.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Some of the Lanoues captured at Annapolis Royal in the fall of 1755 ended up in one of the southernmost colonies, with tragic consequences for one family.  The British deported Élisabeth Lanoue and husband Tranquille Comeau; Rose Lanoue and husband Jean Poirier; and Marguerite Richard, widow of René Lanoue, and four of her younger sons--Jean-Baptiste, age 17, Grégoire, age 14, Basile, age 9, and François, age 5--to South Carolina aboard the British transport Hobson, the only vessel from Annapolis Royal to go to that distant colony.  Marguerite and youngest son François died "of stranger's fever," probably smallpox, "at the plantation of a Mr. Vanderhorst" soon after they reached the colony, but the other three boys survived.  Henry Laurens, the future hero of the American Revolution, became young Basile's patron and helped him become a tanner at Charles Town.  Basile taught the trade to his older brother Jean-Baptiste.  (One wonders what became of brother Grégoire.)  Under the influence of the Laurens and other wealthy Carolinians, and remembering the faith of their ancestors, the Lanoue orphans converted to Protestantism:  Basile became a Huguenot, and Jean-Baptiste an Anglican/Episcopalian.  Basile, in fact, became an elder in his Huguenot congregation and later became a member of the Circular Congregational Church, also called the Old White Meeting House.  In South Carolina, their name evolved from Lanoue to Lanneau--Basile became Basil Lanneau, and Jean Baptiste John Lanneau.  They were among the relatively few Acadian exiles who remained in the British colonies after 1763.  John died at Charles Town in 1781, in his early 40s.  He did not marry.  Basil became a man of substance in the new home he had chosen.  A descendant notes that he "became a wealthy and prominent citizen of Charleston.  He served three terms in the Legislature of South Carolina, 1796, 1798, and 1802."  Basil's first wife and their five children perished in a yellow fever epidemic and were all buried in the Huguenot churchyard.  From his second marriage, Basil created "an extensive progeny, the most distinguished of whom was his grandson, Basil Lanneau Gildersleeve, doubtless the greatest classical scholar America has produced."  The descendant continues:  "In 1793, after the loss of his first family, Basil Lanneau made the tedious journey to his childhood home [Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia] in the hope of finding one of his elder brothers.  He had nearly given up when he accidentally discovered his long-lost brother Amand, who had returned from exile" and settled on nearby Baie Ste.-Marie.  "Through Amand he located the widow of his brother, Pierre IV [called Pierre le jeune here], and after much persuasion she allowed her son, Pierre V [Pierre, fils], and her daughter, Sarah, to return with him to Charleston.  From this Pierre, the fifth of the name, is descended the second branch of the family in South Carolina.  Known in Charleston as Peter Lanneau, he was the father of Fleetwood Lanneau, the latter a prominent merchant, banker, member of the legislature, officer of Governor Gist's staff and Captain of the Palmetto Guard."  One wonders if the Lanneaus of Charleston were even aware that their Cadien kinsmen in South Louisiana even existed. 

Meanwhile, the Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, two were descendants of Pierre Lanoue the cooper. 

After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up the habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France.  Perrine Lanos, no kin to Pierre Lanoue of Nova Scotia, was the widow of François Dauphin.  She and six of her children ended up on the transport Duc Guillaume, which sailed from Île Royale to St.-Malo later that summer.  Half way across the Atlantic, the ship suffered an onboard mishap, and many of its passengers perished.  Among them were every one of Perrine Lanos's children.  Although she made it to St.-Malo the first of November, she must have suffered fatal injuries at sea.  She died in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer not long after she reached the Breton port.260

Latier

According to an historian of the Acadian exiles in Maryland, Louis Latier, or Lasté, born in c1730, married Anne, daughter of Étienne Trahan and Marie-Françoise Roy and widow of Jean-Baptiste Benoit, at Louisbourg, Île Royale, in c1751, but the marriage likely took place at Port Tobacco, Maryland, in c1761, soon after the death of Anne's first husband.  Louis may have been a soldier serving in the French fortress at Louisbourg in the early 1750s before he ended up in Maryland, though most of the military and naval personnel at Louisbourg were deported to France in late 1758. 

In July 1763, colonial officials counted Louis, Anne, and their children--son Antoine Lantier and three Benoit "orphans," likely daughters from Anne's first marriage--at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac.  Considering that the great majority of the Acadians deported to Maryland had come from the Minas Basin, one wonders how a family from Louisbourg got to the Chesapeake colony.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them south to New Orleans.  The Latiers, following their Trahan and Benoit kin, were among the last to go there.261

Lavergne

Living in territory controlled by France, descendants of Pierre Lavergne and Anne Bernon escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  

Jacques Lavergne and his family landed at Le Havre in Normandy, where he died in December 1759, age 53, perhaps from the rigors of the crossing.  Son Pierre le jeune, wife Anne Lord, and daughter Marguerite, age 5 in 1758, survived the crossing.  Anne gave Pierre two more children at Le Havre:  Jean-Baptiste-Alexandre in c1760; and Victoire-Bellarmine in c1763.  Anne died soon afterwards, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth.  Pierre le jeune remarried to Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Abraham Daigre and Anne-Marie Boudrot and widow of Eustache Bourg, in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in November 1763; Marguerite's first husband Eustache had died at Plymouth, England, so she had come to France in the spring of 1763 with other exiles who had been held in England and landed with them at Le Havre.  Pierre le jeune earned his living in the Norman port as a carpenter.  Marguerite gave him more children at Le Havre:  Pierre-Benjamin in August 1764 but died at age 18 months in March 1766; Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, in March 1767; and another Pierre-Benjamin in March 1768--at least six children, three daughters and three sons, by two wives, between 1753 and 1768, in greater Acadia and France.  In 1773, Pierre le jeune took his family with hundreds of other exiles to the interior province of Poitou.  In November 1775, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes and settled at Paimboeuf, the lower port for the city.  Oldest daughter Marguerite, by Pierre le jeune's first wife, married into the Trahan family in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in October 1778.  Second wife Marguerite Daigre died at Paimboeuf in September 1782, age 50.  Pierre le jeune remarried again--his third marriage--to Gillette, daughter Marc Caudan and Perrine LeBiede of Lanvaudan, diocese of Vannes in southwest Brittany, and widow of Claude Bigot, at Paimboeuf in January 1785.  She gave him no more children.    

Meanwhile, Pierre le jeune's sister Marie-Josèphe married Étienne, 21-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jean Hébert and Marguerite Mouton, in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in January 1767; Marie was six years older than her husband.  They, too, went to Poitou, where a son was born to them at Cenan near Châtellerault.  They also retreated to Nantes in November 1775.  Marie died by August 1779, when Étienne remarried in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes.  Meanwhile, Pierre and Marie's sister Rose, age 24, married sailor Guillaume, 27-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Laborde and Marie Prieur of Île St.-Jean and widower of Marie-Rose Daigre, in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in November 1767.  Pierre le jeune et al's younger sister Cécile married François Jacquet, a watchmaker, in France.  In October 1778, Pierre le jeune's oldest daughter Marguerite, from his first wife, married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Claude Trahan and Anne LeBlanc of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Pierre Lavergne le jeune grabbed it, but he did not take his third wife with him.  Only a few weeks after they were married, Gillette died at Paimboeuf in late March 1785, age 36, leaving Pierre le jeune a widower once again.  His oldest son Jean-Baptiste-Alexandre, who would have been age 25 in 1785, if he was still living (he was counted with the family on the convoy from Châtellerault to Nantes in November 1775), did not accompany his family to the Spanish colony.  Pierre le jeune's sisters also chose to remain in France.  As a result, only Pierre and three of his children, two daughters and a son, went to the Spanish colony.262

Lebert

In 1755, the descendants of Jean dit Jolycoeur Lebert and Jeanne Breau could still be found at Minas.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family to the winds.  The fate of Jolycoeur's oldest son Jean-Baptiste and youngest son Honoré has been lost to history, but the records allow one to follow middle sons Paul and Charles, as well as two of their sisters, into exile. 

Paul Lebert and his family, living at Rivière-aux-Canards at the northern end of Minas Proper, suffered terribly for it.  In the fall of 1755, the British rounded up most of the Acadians in the Minas settlements and transported them to Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, and several New England colonies.  Paul and his family ended up on one of the deportation transports headed for Virginia, where they endured a fate worse than most of the other Acadians exiled from Minas.  In mid-November 1755, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Dinwiddie and his council pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered Acadians from one vessel moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses made their decision ... the "papists" must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone:  299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool, at total of 1,225 exiles by one count, including Leberts.  In England, they were packed into warehouses in several ports, where many died of smallpox. Paul Lebert and his family--wife Marie-Madeleine Lapierre and their three children, son Pierre, born in c1748; daughter Marguerite, born in c1753; and daughter Marie-Josèphe, born in c1754, all at Rivière-aux-Canards--were held at Liverpool.  Sons Jean-Baptiste and Joachim were born in that port city in c1758 and c1760. 

Brother Charles Lebert and his family escaped the British roundup at Minas probably by fleeing to one of the Maritime islands still controlled by France.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the British fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île Royale and nearby Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  Charles and his family were among the island Acadians whom the British deported on one of the five transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite a storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The result was disaster for the family.  Charles, age 38, took with him wife Anne-Marie Robichaud, age 31, and four children--Anne-Josèphe, age 12; Marie, age 9; Michel, age 6; and Jean-Charles, age 3.  Charles and Anne-Marie survived the crossing, but most of their children perished.  Sons Michel and Jean-Charles died at sea.  Daughter Marie died in June 1759, a few months after the family reached the Breton port, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Only Anne-Josèphe, the oldest child, survived the crossing with her parents.  They settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo.

Paul and Charles's younger sister Jeanne also endured the crossing to St.-Malo in one of the Five Ships.  She was age 36 at the time, still single, and traveled with the family of widower Jean Bugeaud.  Two of the Bugeaud children, ages 5 and 3, died at sea, but Jean and Jeanne survived.  Jeanne also settled at Plouër-sur-Rance, where she married Honoré, son of fellow Acadians François Gautrot and Louis Aucion and widower of Marguerite Robichaud, in January 1761.  They settled at nearby Pleslin.  Jeanne's husband Honoré Gautrot also had endured the crossing to St.-Malo aboard one of the Five Ships.  His first wife had died in greater Acadia, and he had crossed with three children and a sister.  He lost his sister, who died in a St.-Malo hospital, but his three children survived the crossing.  Jeanne gave Honoré three more children before she died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in February 1767, age 45.  

Paul and Charles's youngest sister, Marie-Josèphe dit Jolycoeur, born probably at Minas in c1726, had married Jean-Désiré, son of Louis dit Baguette Hébert and Anne-Marie Labauve of Annapolis Royal, at Grand-Pré in October 1746.  In  August 1752, a French official counted the couple and their two young children at Rivière-du-Moulin-à-Scie in the interior of Île St.-Jean, where they had gone in c1749 to escape British rule in Nova Scotia.  The family was counted at Québec in 1757, so they evidently had left the island before its dérangement.  Mary-Josèphe died at Québec in December 1769, when brothers Paul and Charles and sister Jeanne were still lingering in France.  

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including Paul Lebert and his family, were repatriated to several ports in France.  Paul and his family landed at Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  In October 1765, when Paul sailed from Morlaix to St.-Malo to settle near his brother, his wife was not with him; she had died either in England or at Morlaix.  Paul and his children--Pierre, Marguerite, Marie-Josèphe, Jean-Baptiste, and Joachim--settled near his brother Charles at Plouër-sur-Rance.  Paul's son Joachim died at nearby La Ville de La Croix Giguel in September 1766, age 5.  Son Jean-Baptiste also died young.  Oldest son Pierre, now a sailor, married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Boudrot and Claire Comeau, at Plouër in February 1770.  Marguerite gave Pierre three children there:  Marguerite-Marie in November 1770; Pierre-Jean-Joseph-Joachim in June 1772; and Marie-Jeanne in November 1773.  Paul's younger daughter Marie-Josèphe married Pierre-Janvier, son of fellow Acadians Claude Guédry and his first wife Anne Lejeune of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, at Plouër in February 1773.  His older daughter Marguerite married Pierre-Janvier's brother, Jean-Baptiste Guiédry, at Plouër in January 1774.  Paul died at nearby La Mettrie Paumerais in August 1770, age 52.  

Paul's younger brother Charles and his wife Anne-Marie Robichaud, meanwhile, had more children at Plouër:  Pierre-Jean in June 1760 but died at nearby La Ville de La Croix Giguel eight days after his birth; Marie-Madeleine in June 1761; another Jean-Charles in March 1764; Marguerite-Françoise in August 1766 but died at La Ville de La Croix Giguel at age 2 months; and Pierre-Joseph in December 1767--nine children, four daughters and five sons, between 1746 and 1767, in greater Acadia and France, most of whom died young.  Oldest daughter Anne-Josèphe married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Victor LeBlanc and Marie Aucoin of Grand-Pré, at Plouër in February 1767.  

In 1773, Charles, wife Anne-Marie, three of their unmarried children, married daughter Anne-Josèphe, nephew Pierre and his family, and nieces Marguerite and Marie-Josèphe and their families, followed other exiles in the St.-Malo area to the interior of Poitou, where they hoped to become productive farmers again on land owned by an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  Charles died at Archigny south of Châtellerault in August 1775, age 55.  Four months after his death, in December 1775, the remaining Leberts retreated with other Poitou Acadians down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Pierre Lebert and wife Marguerite Boudrot had another son, Joseph, in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in late March 1778.  Pierre, at age 30, died at La Gour Bannien near Plouër a week before son Joseph was baptized at Nantes, so he evidently had returned to the St.-Malo area without his family and was unable to rejoin them on the lower Loire.  Wife Marguerite Boudrot died in St.-Nicolas Parish in April 1778, age 34, perhaps from the rigors of childburth, so the infant Joseph and his older siblings--Marguerite-Marie, Marie-Jeanne, and Pierre-Jean-Joseph-Joachim, ages 8, 5, and 6 when their parents died--were raised by relatives at Nantes.  Joseph and Marie-Jeanne may not have survived childhood.  Marguerite Lebert and her husband Jean-Baptiste Guédry "adopted" niece Marguerite-Marie.  Marie-Josèphe Lebert and her husband Pierre-Janvier Guédry "adopted" nephew Pierre-Jean-Joseph-Joachim.  Charles Lebert's daughter Marie-Madeleine, who, with her widowed mother and siblings, had left Poitou after her father's death there, married her sister Anne-Josèphe's husband's brother, Olivier LeBlanc, in St.-Léonard Parish, Nantes, in June 1781.  

Then everything changed for the long-suffering Leberts.  In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Most of the Leberts and their spouses agreed to take it.263

LeBlanc

By 1755, descendants of Daniel LeBlanc and Françoise Gaudet had, according to a leading genealogist, created the largest family in greater Acadia.  They could be found at Annapolis; Grand-Pré, Rivière-aux-Canards, Pigiguit, and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; Chignecto; Chepoudy in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; and in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this huge family to the winds. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  During the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  LeBlancs may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, at least one LeBlanc was among the local Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies, some of them without their families.  LeBlancs ended up in South Carolina.  Other LeBlancs escaped the British roundup at Chignecto and took refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean, in camps on the Gulf of St. Lawerence shore, or moved on to Canada. 

A Chignecto LeBlanc shipped to South Carolina did not remain there.  According to testimony that Félix LeBlanc gave to French officials in France during the early 1770s, he served in the Acadian militia at Fort Beauséjour in the summer of 1755, after which the British deported him, likely without his family, to South Carolina.  According to his account, he "escaped" from Charles Town, likely as part of one of the small-boat expeditions South Carolina Governor James Glen sanctioned in the spring of 1756 to rid the colony of Acadians.  Félix succeeded in reaching lower Rivière St.-Jean with other Acadian refugees.  There, if he had been apart from them, he reunited with his family.  According to Félix's account, Lieutenant Charles des Champs des Boishébert, in command of the French resistance in the region, appointed Félix as a royal courier to relay messages between Louisbourg and Québec from his new domicile on Île St.-Jean. 

Meanwhile, dozens LeBlancs from Minas and Annapolis Royal ended up on ships bound for the seaboard colonies of Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, and Pennsylvania.  In late April 1757, a year and a half after the deportations, Bay Colony officials compiled a "List of the names & circumstances of the French Inhabitants of Nova Scotia now residing in the Town of Braintree."  One family on the list was that of François Leblond, age 75, son of René, "invalid" and "incapable" of labor; Jeanne LeBlond [Hébert], his wife, age 72, also an invalid incapable of labor; James, actually Jacques, LeBlond, age 51, their son, "weakly," "capable of" labor "in part"; Catharine LeBlond [Landry], Jacques's wife, age 49, "weakly" but also "capable of" labor "in part"; Mary Magdalen LeBlond, age 14, "capable"; John Baptist LeBlond, age 12, "capable of his age"; and Béloni LeBlond, age 7, "incapable" of labor.  In 1760, authorities in Suffolk County, Massachusetts, surveyed the "the Inhabitants of Nova Scotia" living in the county.  They included James LeBlanc, "his wife and his child" at Dorchester, having come "from Houghton"; François LeBlond, Joan his wife, James LeBlond, Katherine his wife, John Batis LeBlond, Bénoni LeBlond, and Maudlin or Margaret LeBlond still at Braintree; another François LeBlanc, Margaret [Boudrot] his wife, and their sons Peter and Simeon at Needham; Sibbel LeBlanc at Needham; and Charles LeBlanc, "his wife and 5 children" at Houghton.  In late August 1760, Suffolk County authorities issued another report on "French People" in the county.  They included the same LeBlancs counted in the previous report with the addition of Anne Liblane at Needham.  In July 1760, authorities in Essex County, Massachusetts, made their own list of "the French Inhabitants" in their county.  They included Brizzel LeBlong, age 31, Joseph LeBlong, age 4, and Anne LeBlong, age 3, at Rowrey; Joseph LeBlond and Margaret LeBlond, ages unrecorded, at Meridien; and Jno. LeBlanch, at 36, "ptly. lame," Mary [Landry] his wife, age 30, and their children Molly [Marie-Anne], age 10, Collect [Scholastique dite Colastie], age 7, Sarah [Marie-Séraphine], age 3, and Peter [Pierre-Marie], age 2, of Annapolis Royal at Lynn.  In 1761, colonial officials in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, counted "the French Neutrals" in their community.  They included Joseph White, age 30, Mary his wife age 29, Mary, a daughter, age 4, and an unnamed infant of Annapolis Royal at Charlestown.  In August 1761, colonial officials in Worcester County, Massachusetts, counted "the French People" in their community.  They included Simon Bland, Jane [Dupuis] his wife, Peter Bland, Amor Bland, Magdalen Bland, and Mary Bland of Annapolis Royal at Westboro; Justin [Augustin] White, his wife, Justin White, John White, Clarles White, and Elizabeth White at Rutland; Joseph LeBlain, Mary his wife, Isabel, Samuel Charles, and Margt. LeBlain at Sutton; Mary LeBlain at Braintree; Richard LeBlain at Petersham; Peter DeBlanc, Frances his wife, Mary Rose DeBlanc, and Peter DeBlanc Jr. at ____bury; Renny LeBlan, Mary [Babin] his wife, Charles, Joseph, Ru_d [René, fils], John, Mary, and an infant, recently ordered to move to Hampshire County, farther to the west, along with René's first cousin Francis LeBland, fils, Isabel [Dugas] his wife, Joseph, Mary, Joz-bit [Élisabeth], Francis, Peter, and an infant.  Members of the family also were dispersed to many communities in the other northern colonies. 

LeBlancs from Minas and Pigiguit also were deported to the Chesapeake colonies of Maryland and Virginia.  As in Masschusetts and the other northern colonies, the "French Neutrals" sent to Maryland were dispersed throughout the province.  LeBlancs were held at Baltimore and Annapolis on the mainland, and at Georgetown, Fredericktown, Oxford, and Snow Hill on Maryland's Eastern Shore.  They were especially numerous at Oxford.  The many LeBlancs shipped off to Virginia endured a fate worse than the other refugees the British deported from Minas.  In mid-November 1755, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Acadians from one vessel were moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  The following spring, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the papists must go.  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone:  299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 total exiles by one count.  They were packed into warehouses in the English ports, where many died of smallpox.  The English held LeBlancs at Falmouth, Southampton, and Liverpool. 

Like their cousins at Chignecto, the few members of the family who escaped the roundup at Minas made their way to lower Rivière St.-Jean, to camps on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, or to Canada.  LeBlancs at Annapolis Royal, descendants of Daniel's youngest son Pierre, who escaped the British in the fall of 1755 spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore.  The following spring, they crossed the bay to Chepoudy and joined their cousins on the lower St.-Jean, the upper Peticoudiac, or in the Gulf shore camps.  A few may have moved on to Canada via the St.-Jean portage. 

Living in territory controlled by France, LeBlancs residing in the French Maritimes in 1755 escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia that summer and fall.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  LeBlancs crossed to St.-Malo on Le Duc Guillaume, which left Louisbourg in September with 346 exiles aboard.  After a mid-ocean mishap, the transport limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Nearly half of the passengers, including LeBlancs, perished in the crossing or died from its rigors soon after reaching the Breton port.  Françoise LeBlanc, age unrecorded, crossed with husband Joseph Hébert and three daughters.  The entire family died at sea.  Ursule LeBlanc, age unrecorded, crossed with husband Augustin Boisseau and four children, two sons and two daughers.  Only one of the sons reached St.-Malo.  Marguerite LeBlanc, age unrecorded, crossed with husband Charles Breau and two children, a son and a Breau niece.  Only Marguerite and the niece survived the crossing.  Jacques dit Petit Jacques LeBlanc, age 63, crossed with son Casimir, age 24, Casimir's wife Marie Daigre, 22, and seven more LeBlancs, five males and two females, two of them perhaps older sons of Petit Jacques, the others perhaps nieces and nephews.  Only Casimir, Marie, and three of the LeBlanc relatives, perhaps one of them a son of Petit Jacques, survived the crossing aboard Duc Guillaume.  Marie died in a local hospital in late December probably from the rigors of the crossing, and two of the LeBlanc relatives died in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, dates unrecorded.  All of the others, including Petit Jacques, died at sea.  LeBlancs also crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November with 56 exiles and reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  Four LeBlanc siblings--Élisbeth/Isabelle, age 17; twins Pierre and Amand, age 16; and Olivier, age 14--crossed with their mother Marie Aucoin, age 40, stepfather Grégoire Maillet, age 32, and Grégoire and Marie's blended family of seven LeBlanc and Maillet children.  All four of the LeBlanc siblings survived the crossing, as did one of the Maillet children.  The other two young Maillets died at sea.  Claude LeBlanc, age 36, crossed with wife Marie-Josèphe Longuépée, age 36, and four children--Hélène, age 8; Jean, age 7; Romul, age unrecorded; and Marguerite, age unrecorded.  Claude, Marie-Josèphe, and the two older children survived the crossing, but the younger children died at sea--among the six Acadians who died aboard Tamerlane.  However, the couple's older daughter Hélène died in a St.-Servan hospital in late January, age 8, leaving them only a single child.  Charles LeBlanc, age 24, crossed with wife Anne Benoit, age 27.  They both survived the crossing aboard Tamerlane.  Most of the island LeBlancs crossed on one or more of the five transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November with 1,033 Acadians aboard, bound for St.-Malo.  Despite the mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other vessels, the Five Ships remained in convoy and, a week behind the Tamerlane, reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  However, only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, some of them LeBlancs.  Joseph LeBlanc, age 33, crossed with wife Anne Moïse, age 26, and two sons--Joseph, age 3; and François, age 1.  The two children died at sea, and Joseph died at St.-Malo in late February.  Marie LeBlanc, age 19, oldest sister of the four young LeBlancs who crossed with their mother and stepfather on Tamerlane, crossed on one of the Five Ships with husband Jean-Jacques Bonnière, no age given.  Marie survived the crossing, but her husband died at sea.  Madeleine LeBlanc, age 36, widow of Jean-Baptiste Forest, crossed with three sons, ages 14, 9, and 7.  Madeleine and her middle son survived the crossing, but other two sons died in mid-April 1759, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Marguerite LeBlanc, age 23, crossed with husband Charles Hébert, age 32, and two children, a daughter and a son.  The children died at sea, Marguerite died in late January, and Charles in late February.  Another Marguerite LeBlanc, age unrecorded, crossed with her husband, another Charles Hébert, age 49, and three sons, age 19, 10, and 4.  Charles and two of his sons survived the crossing, but Marguerite and their youngest son died at sea.  Rosalie LeBlanc, age 18, crossed with the large family of her older sister Marguerite and Marguerite's husband Jean Lejeune.  Rosalie and Jean survived the crossing, but Marguerite and all five of her Lejeune children died at sea.  Jean died at St.-Malo in March, probably from the rigors of the crossing, leaving Rosalie the sole survivor in the immediate family.  Claire LeBlanc, age 50, crossed with husband Joseph Robichaud, age 55, and nine of their children, ages 26 to 4.  Claire and eight of her Robichaud children survived the crossing, but the youngest child died at sea.  Joseph died at St.-Servan in early March. 

Island LeBlancs did their best to create a life for themselves in the villages and suburbs of the St.-Malo area.  Casimir LeBlanc, who had lost his wife to the crossing aboard Duc Guillaume, settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  After February 1767, he "went to England," perhaps to the British-controlled Channel island of Jersey on his way back to greater Acadia.  One wonders if he settled in one of the British-controlled fisheries there and if he remarried.  Charles LeBlanc and wife Marie Benoit settled at Châteauneuf on the east bank of the river south of St.-Malo before moving north to St.-Servan in 1762.  In September 1761, Marie gave Charles a son, Charles-Jean, at Châteauneuf, and died from the rigors of childbirth at age 30.  At age 29, Charles remarried to Rosalie, 18-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Claude Trahan and Marie Tillard, at St.-Servan in February 1763.  There, between 1763 and 1772, Rosalie gave Charles six more children:  Marie-Rose in November 1763; Pierre-Honoré in July 1765; André-Marie in November 1766; Marie-Françoise in January 1769; Grégoire-Charles in May 1771 but died at age 14 months in July 1772; and Barbe-Anne in December 1772.  Claude LeBlanc, wife Marie-Josèphe Longuépée, and their son Jean, age 7, settled at La Gouesnière in the countryside southeast of St.-Servan before moving to nearby St.-Méloir-des-Ondes in 1760.  Marie-Josèphe gave Claude two more sons in the two communities:  Joseph-Firmin in March 1760 at La Gouesnière; and Pierre-Michel in September 1762 at St.-Méloir.  Wife Marie-Josèphe died at la Pahorie near St.-Méloir three days after Pierre-Michel's birth.  Claude remarried to Marie-Josèphe, 43-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Auguste Guédry and Anne Lejeune and widow of Benjamin Muis d'Azy, at St.-Servan in February 1763.  She gave him no more children.  In late 1765, Claude took his family to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, where many of his cousins repatriated from England were going.  Wife Marie-Josèphe died near Sauzon on the north end of the island in August 1767, age 47, and Claude took his sons back to St.-Servan, where, at age 45, he remarried again--his third marriage--to Dorothée, 36-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians François Richard and Marie Martin and widow of Alexis Comeau, in June 1768.  She also gave him no more children.  Marie LeBlanc, now a young widow, settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west bank of the river south of St.-Malo, where she remarried to Charles, 26-year-old son of fellow Acadians Joseph Robichaud and Madeleine Dupuis of Minas, in July 1760.  They moved on to St.-Servan in 1776.  Marie gave Charles a son there in 1768.  Marie's younger sister Élisabeth dite Maillet also settled at Plouër, where she married Honoré, 31-year-old son of fellow Acadians Pierre Breau and Marguerite Gautrot of Minas, in February 1766.  Honoré had come to St.-Malo from England in May 1763.  Élisabeth gave him four children, two sons and two daughters, at Plouër between 1766 and 1772.  Marie and Élisabeth's brother Pierre followed his widowered stepfather Grégoire Maillet, his three siblings and two half-siblings to Plouër, moved on to St.-Méloir-des-Ondes in 1761, and back to Plouër in 1763.  Pierre married Anne-Josèphe, 21-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Lebert and Anne Robichaux of Rivière-aux-Canards, at Plouër in February 1767.  Between 1768 and 1773, at Plouër, Anne gave Pierre four sons:  Joseph-Olivier in May 1768; Pierre-Paul in February 1770; Jean-Cléandre in September 1771; and François-Joseph-Marc in March 1773.  Marie, Élisabeth, and Pierre's brother Olivier was a 26-year-old bachelor in 1773.  Their brother Amand, if he was still living, would have been a 29-year-old bachelor that year.  Sole-survivor Rosalie LeBlanc also settled at Plouër, moved on to Châteauneuf later in 1759, and to St.-Servan in 1760.  She was still there in 1772. 

In 1758-59, island LeBlancs landed at other coastal cities, including Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie, Cherbourg in Normandy, and Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay.  They were especially numerous in the northern fishing port of Boulogne-sur-Mer, which they likely reached aboard the transport Neptune, part of the 11-ship convoy.  Some of them moved on to other ports, including St.-Malo.  Claude-André LeBlanc of Minas and Anse-au-Matelot, age 63 in 1759, a widower, landed at the northern fishing port with members of his family.  Claude-André died in St.-Nicolas Parish there in October 1765, in his late 60s.  Pierre LeBlanc of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, and Île St.-Jean, age 44, landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer with wife Marguerite Gautrot, age 43, and their four children--Bibianne, age 14; Jean-Baptiste, age 12; Joseph, age 11; and Élisabeth, age 6.  Pierre died in St.-Nicolas Parish in November 1759, age 45.  Daughter Bibianne, at age 20, married Augustin, 28-year-old son of fellow Acadians Claude Trahan and Marie Tillard, in St.-Nicolas Parish in July 1764.  Pierre's younger son Joseph, who did not remain at Boulogne-sur-Mer, died on Île d'Aix near Rochefort in October 1766, age 18, probably before he could marry.  Royal courier Félix LeBlanc of Minas, Chignecto, South Carolina, and Île St.-Jean, age 40, wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot, age 38, and their six children--Amand-François, age 16; Pierre-Marin, age 14; Étienne, age 11; Joseph, age 9; Marie, age 8; and Élisabeth, age 2--landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer aboard the transport Neptune.  Marie-Josèphe gave Félix another son, Jean-Pierre, in St.-Nicolas Parish in December 1759.  The boy died two days after his birth, and his mother died the following day.  In 1764, Félix took his family to St.-Malo and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Second son Pierre-Marin, at age 24, married cousin Marguerite, 21-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean LeBlanc and Madeleine Thériot, at St.-Servan in November 1769.  Marguerite gave Pierre-Marin two daughters there:  Marguerite in November 1770; and Anne-Julie in September 1772.  That year, Félix and his younger children moved to Plélo in northern Brittany between St.-Malo and Morlaix, where few other Acadians lived.  In 1772, Félix learned that he had been removed from a "general roll" of Acadian exiles in France eligible for a royal subsidy.  After recounting to French officials his adventures in North America and securing witness testimony from fellow Acadians that he was a native of Minas, he was granted his subsidy.  In October 1772, his younger daughter Élisabeth married into the Le Tollierec family at Plélo; her husband was a local Frenchman.  At age 54, Félix remarried to Anne, 53-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Michel and Marguerite Forest and widow of Joseph Dubois, at St.-Servan in November 1773, so his stay in Plélo had been a short one.  Anne gave Félix no more children.  His oldest son Amand-François, by first wife Marie-Josèphe, married, at age 30, Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Duon and Angélique Aucoin, in c1773, place unrecorded.  Paul LeBlanc of Minas and Anse-au-Matelot, age 16 in 1759, landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer, where he became a carpenter and a day laborer.  In 1766, he sailed to St.-Malo and settled near his older brother Charles at St.-Servan.  Paul married cousin Anne, 24-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians François Boudrot and Anne-Marie Thibodeau, at St.-Servan in May 1770.  Anne-Marie gave Paul two daughters at St.-Servan:  Anne in March 1771; and Marie-Anne in March 1773.  Antoine LeBlanc, perhaps an island Acadian, landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer with wife Jeanne-Marguerite Pitre.  Their son Jacques-Antoine-Benoîr was born in St.-Nicolas Parish in November 1764.  Ursule LeBlanc of Minas and Île St.-Jean, wife of Joseph Broussard, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, Normandy, in early December 1758, age 46, soon after her arrival.  Madeleine LeBlanc of Île St.-Jean died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in late December 1758, age 40.   Ambroise LeBlanc died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in November 1759, age 25.  Nicolas LeBlanc of Périgeaux and Île Royale, age 29, no kin to the descendants of Daniel LeBlanc, crossed to Rochefort with wife Jeanne-Geneviève Mieu, age unrecorded, and three children--Louise, age 4; Jacques, age 3; and Bernard, age 2.  Nicolas worked as a day laborer and a cook in the mother country.  Son Jacques died in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in August 1759 soon after they reached the naval port.  Twin daughters Jeanne-Geneviève and Madeleine-Victoire were born in St.-Louis Parish in September 1763, but Jeanne died at age 1 in September 1764.  Son Bernard died in St.-Louis Parish in November 1763, age 6.  The family moved to nearby La Rochelle by September 1777, when son Éloi, their sixth child, was born in St.-Sauveur Parish there.  Wife Jeanne-Geneviève was a native of La Rochelle, which may explain the move. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including many LeBlancs, were repatriated to France.  Considering the number of Minas LeBlancs deported to Virginia in 1755, it is no wonder that more members of the family went to France from England in 1763 than from the Maritime islands in 1758.  LeBlancs crossed on L'Ambition, which reached St.-Malo on May 22.  Charles LeBlanc, age 46 in 1763, crossed with second wife Madeleine Gautrot, age 41, and six of their own children--Madeleine, age 17; Marie, age 14; Charles, age 8; Joseph, age 4; Jean-Baptiste, age 3; and Simon, age 2.  Also with them were three Daigre children from Madeleine's first marriage.  They settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Madeleine gave Charles two more daughters:  Françoise in October 1763; and Marguerite-Geneviève in September 1765.  They remained at St.-Servan in late 1765 and lost three of their children there.  Son Jean-Baptiste died at age 8 in March 1768.  Son Charles drowned at Pont-Nicau near St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo, in May 1770, age 15.  And son Simon died at St.-Servan in October 1771, age 10.  Jeanne Dugas, age 63, widow of Claude LeBlanc, crossed alone on L'Ambition and settled at St.-Servan, near several of her children.  Blanche LeBlanc, age 41, Jeanne Dugas's oldest daughter, crossed with husband Joseph Richard, age 45, and five of their children and settled at St.-Servan.  Marthe LeBlanc, age 27, Jeanne Dugas's third daughter, crossed with husband Pierre Landry, age 37, and an infant son and settled at St.-Servan.  Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, age 22, Jeanne Dugas's youngest daughter, crossed with husband Charles Granger, age 22, and settled at St.-Servan.  Marie-Madeleine was pregnant when she crossed.  A daughter was born at St.-Servan in early June, within days of their arrival.  Husband Charles died at St.-Servan the following December, age 23.  Marie-Madeleine remarried to Jean-Charles, called Charles, 25-year-old son of fellow Acadians Pierre Landry and Anne Thériot, at St.-Servan in June 1765.  Charles also had crossed on L'Ambition, with his widowed mother.  Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc of Rivière-aux-Canards, age 48, a widower, crossed with son Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 17, and settled at St.-Servan.  Another Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc, this one age 38, crossed with second wife Marguerite Célestin dit Bellemère, age 28, and four of their children, the oldest ones by Jean-Baptiste's first wife Marie Landry--Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 16; Joseph, age 15; Pierre, age 10; and Moïse, age 1 1/2.  They settled at St.-Énogat, where Marguerite gave him a daughter, Marie-Marguerite, in April 1764.  Jean-Jacques LeBlanc, age 40, a widower, crossed on L'Ambition with two children--Crespin, age 12; and Claire, age 10.  Also with them was his widowed mother, Cécile Dupuis, age 67, who followed them to St.-Servan.  At age 43, Jean-Jacques remarried to Nathalie, 32-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Pitre and Anne Comeau of Rivière-aux-Canards and widow of Paul Boudrot, at St.-Servan in February 1766.  Between 1767 and 1772, Nathalie gave Jean-Jacques four more children there:  Marie-Madeleine in February 1767 but died the following August; Jean-Baptiste in March 1768; Marie-Geneviève in March 1770; and Angélique-Cécile in February 1772.  Joseph LeBlanc, fils, age 41, son of the resistance fighter Joseph dit Maigre of Minas, crossed with third wife Angélique Daigre, age 26, and two of their sons--Simon, age 15; and Victor, age 1.  They settled at St.-Servan, where Angélique gave Joseph, fils another son, Moïse, in February 1764.  Joseph LeBlanc, age 32, still unmarried, crossed on L'Ambition with his two unmarried brothers--François, age 27; and Augustin-Marie, age 21.  They settled at St.-Servan.  LeBlancs also crossed on La Dorothée, which reached St.-Malo on May 23.  Alain LeBlanc, age 31 in 1763, son of Jeanne Dugas of L'Ambition, crossed with wife Anne-Marie Babin, age 37, and a Daigre orphan.  They settled at St.-Servan.  Charles LeBlanc, age 10, crossed with the family of René Landry and followed them to St.-Servan.  Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc, fils, age 23, crossed with wife Élisabeth Aucoin, age 29, and three of his siblings--Simon, age 17; and Élisabeth and Marguerite, ages unrecorded.  They settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river before moving to St.-Servan.  Simon, who worked as a seaman in the mother country, married Anne-Rosalie, 18-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Forest and Claire Vincent of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, at St.-Servan in November 1766.  Anne-Rosalie gave Simon two sons there:  Pierre-Simon in September 1767; and Jean-Baptiste-Caliste in April 1780 but died in May.  Simon died either at sea or at St.-Servan before September 1784, when Anne-Rosalie was called "widow LeBlanc" in a Spanish survey of Acadians in France.  Another Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc, this one age 40, crossed with second wife Ursule Breau, age 42, and three of their children--Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 14; Daniel, age 3; and Simon, age 2.  They settled at St.-Servan, where son Daniel died in September 1763, age 3.  Son Jean-Baptiste, fils married Andrée-Françoise, daughter of locals Françoise Le Bourgeois and Jacquémine Chevalier, at St.-Servan in May 1774.  Andrée gave Jean-Baptiste, fils a daughter, Rosalie-Josèphe-Aimée, in her hometown in June 1778.  Michel LeBlanc, age 26, crossed on La Dorothée with wife Marie Aucoin, age 26, and their daughter Marie-Josèphe, age 4.  They settled at St.-Servan.  Michel was a sailor and was absent from home much of the time during the following years.  Between 1763 and 1768, he was either in England or elsewhere.  In December 1768, he returned to St.-Malo from Spain.  Daughter Olive-Michelle was born at St.-Servan in September 1769, while her father was away again.  The previous February, Michel had shipped off on La Comtesse d'Argonne, which was wrecked off the coast of England late that August.  He returned to St.-Malo at the end of October, a month after his daughter's birth.  In April 1770, Michel arrived in Newfoundland aboard Le Triton and returned to St.-Malo in October.  Son Jean-Félix, conceived on the eve his father's departure, was born at St.-Servan in January 1771 but died at age 21 months in November 1772.  Meanwhile, Michel shipped out aboard La Marie Françoise.  In March 1771, he arrived at Île Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland and returned to St.-Malo that December.  Daughter Apolline-Eulalie was born at St.-Servan in September 1772; and Jeanne-Marie, their fifth child and fourth daughter, in November 1773.  Pierre LeBlanc, age 27, crossed on La Dorothée with wife Marie-Blanche Landry, age 35, and their daughters--Marie, 5; and Marguerite-Geneviève, age 3.  They settled at St.-Servan, where Pierre worked as a carpenter, before moving on to Le-Légué near St.-Brieuc, west of St.-Malo, in 1771.  Daughter Marguerite-Geneviève died at St.-Servan in July 1767, age 7.  Meanwhile, at St.-Servan, Marie-Blanche gave Pierre seven more children:  Joseph in early June 1763, so his mother was pregnant on the crossing, but he died at St.-Servan at age 1 1/2 in December 1764; Pierre in January 1765; Marie-Élisabeth in April 1766 but died at age 1 1/2 in October 1767; twins Joseph-Marie and Marguerite in June 1767, but Joseph-Marie died at age 7 months in January 1768; a second Marguerite-Geneviève in January 1769 but died at age 2 in December 1770; and Jean-Baptiste in May 1770 but died at age 1 1/2 at Le-Légué in February 1772. 

LeBlancs from England, including several extended families, landed also at Morlaix in northwest Brittany in the spring of 1763.  Jean dit Dérico LeBlanc of Minas, age 60, landed at Morlaix with wife Françoise Blanchard, age 58, and three children--Alexis, age 21; Charles, age 18; and Marguerite, age 17.  Also with them was son Pierre, age 29, his wife Françoise Trahan, age 26, and their daughter Marie, age 1 1/2.  Their daughter Marguerite-Geneviève, called Geneviève, was born in St.-Mathieu Parish, Morlaix, in September 1763, so Françoise had been pregnant during the crossing.  Another daughter, Marie-Anne, was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in October 1773, after the family returned from their sojourn on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Dérico's youngest sister Marie-Josèphe, age 34, landed at Morlaix with husband Félix Boudrot, age 34, and their daughter.  Marie-Josèphe gave Félix a son in June 1764.  Dérico's nephew Joseph LeBlanc, fils, age 32, landed at Morlaix with wife Marie-Modeste Hébert, age unrecorded.  Marie-Modeste gave him a daughter, Marguerite-Modeste, in St.-Mélaine Parish, Morlaix, in August 1763, so Marie-Modeste also was pregnant during the crossing from England.  Son Simon-Paul was born in St.-Mélaine Parish in March 1765.  Four of Joseph, fils's younger siblings also landed at Morlaix.  Sister Anne, age 30 in 1763, crossed with husband Olivier Hébert, who she had married in England.  Sister Marguerite, age 25 in 1763, crossed with husband Louis-Athanase Trahan, who she had married in England.  Brother Désiré-Gaspard, age 23, joined the royal artillery and was serving at Brest, southwest of Morlaix, in 1767.  Youngest sister Blanche-Cécile, age 21, married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Levron and Françoise Labauve, in St.-Mélaine Parish in September 1765.  Honoré LeBlanc of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, age 53, recently a widower, crossed to the Breton port with three unmarried children--Agathe, age 19; Paul, age 12; and Joseph, age 10.  With them was married son Charles le jeune, age 29, and wife Anne dite Annette Landry, age 24.  Charles le jeune's daughter Marie was born at Morlaix in August, so Annette was pregnant on the crossing from England.  Their son Claude-Marie was born in St.-Mathieu Parish in May 1765.  Honoré's daughter Agathe married Paul, 22-year-old son of fellow Acadians Olivier Daigre III and Françoise Granger of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Mathieu Parish in October 1764.  Honoré's son Raymond, age 21, crossed with wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot, age 23.  Honoré's brother Charles, age 45, crossed with wife Élisabeth Thibodeau, age 45, and five unmarried children--Marguerite, age 19; Jean-Baptiste, age 17; Olivier, age 15; Marie-Anne, age 13; and Anselme, age 11.  Charles's oldest daughter Marie-Blanche crossed to Morlaix with husband Olivier Daigre IV.  Charles's second daughter Marguerite married cousin Joseph-Ignace, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Richard and Josèphe LeBlanc of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in February 1765.  Honoré and Charles's youngest brother Simon, age 40, crossed with second wife Marie Trahan, age 40, and four children from his first marriage--Françoise, age 18; Jean, age 17; Basile, age 15; and Simon, fils, age 13.  Son Joseph was born in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in November 1764.  In 1767, at age 22, Simon's daughter Françoise, having remained at Morlaix in 1765,  joined the Ursuline order of nuns there.  Françoise LeBlanc, age 47, widow of Charles Granger, landed at Morlaix with three children, two daughers and a son, ages 21, 15, and 10.  Marie, 37-year-old daughter of notary René LeBlanc of Grand-Pré, landed at Morlaix with husband Cyprien Le Prince, unless she was a widow by then.  Marie remarried to Eustache, son of fellow Acadians René Trahan and Marguerite Melanson of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in February 1766.  Joseph dit Jambo LeBlanc, age 34, landed at Ploujean near Morlaix with second wife Anne, also called Agnès, Hébert, age 37, and two of his children--Jean-Baptiste, age 11; and Odile, age 9.  Jambo worked as a seaman and carpenter at Ploujean and Morlaix.  Anne gave him two more children there:  Pierre-Étienne in St.-Mathieu Parish in January 1764 but died the following September; and Marguerite-Blanche-Ian in May 1765.  Anne LeBlanc, age 24, wife of René Trahan, died in St.-Mathieu Parish in September 1764, age 25.

A LeBlanc and his family came to France in late 1763 not from England but from one of the British seaboard colonies.  Jean, son of ship's carpenter Joseph LeBlanc and Marie Brun, born in South Carolina in March 1761 while his parents were in exile there, was baptized in Ste.-Croix Parish, Bordeaux, on 7 December 1763.  Joseph and Marie's son Gabriel, born aboard the ship Ameriquein "of Bordeaux, captain Dufau," date unrecorded, also was baptized in Ste.-Croix Parish that day.  Later in the decade, the couple moved on to Morlaix, perhaps to be closer to family.  Son Joseph-Olivier was baptized in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, the day of his birth in January 1767; the recording priest noted that the family lived on Rue Longue Bourret in the Breton port.  François-Mathurin was baptized in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in October 1768 the day after his birth; the family was still living on Rue Bourret.  Marie-Marguerite was born in July 1771; Jeanne-Barbe in August 1773; twins Marguerite and Marguerite-Victoire in April 1775; and Joseph, fils in August 1777, all in St.-Martin des Champs Parish--nine children, five sons and four daughters, including a set of twins, between 1761 and 1777.  As the birth dates of their children reveal, Joseph took his family neither to Belle-Île-en-Mer in late 1765 nor to Poitou in 1773.  Nor did any member of the family emigrate to Spanish Louisiana in 1785.

From December 1763 through November 1764, Acadians left France for the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  At least three LeBlanc wives were among them.  For most of the exiles who ventured to the tropical colony, the experience was not a happy one.  Two of the LeBlancs who went there were among the lucky ones.  On 1 March 1765, colonial officials at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district counted Anne LeBlanc, called Blin, age 36, with husband Jean-Baptiste Hébert, age 36, and two daughters, ages 8 and 6; another Anne LeBlanc, age 32, with husband Olivier Hébert, age 28, and two daughters, ages 7 and 6; and Élisabeth LeBlanc, age 30, with husband Jean-Baptiste Trahan, age 40, and four children, a son and three daughters, ages 14 to 4.  Anne, wife of Jean-Baptiste Hébert, died in the colony.  Jean-Baptiste returned to France with their older daughter and remarried there.  The other Anne, husband Olivier Hébert, and their daughters survived the ordeal and returned to Morlaix.  Élisabeth, husband Jean-Baptiste Trahan, and their children also returned to Morlaix.  Yet another Anne LeBlanc, this one wife of Alexandre Trahan, died at Sinnamary in March 1765, age 50. 

In late 1765, Acadians repatriated from England and a few who had been deported from the French Maritimes agreed to become part of a new settlement venture, this one on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany  As a result, most of the LeBlancs who ended up in France settled in all four of the island's municipal districts, most at the north end of the island near Sauzon.  The LeBlancs, in fact, were the largest Acadian family group to go to Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Not all of them remained.  Alain LeBlanc and wife Anne Babin left St.-Servan-sur-Mer in 1765 and settled a Kerlédan near Sauzon.  They remained childless.  They were still on the island in March 1767, when Alain gave his declaration to French officials about his family's origins and their recent activities.  In the early 1770s, they left the island and made their way back to greater Acadia.  Honoré LeBlanc, still a widower, left Morlaix in 1765 with two unmarried sons and three married children and their families:  Charles le jeune, his wife Annette Landry, and their two children; Raymond and his wife Marie-Josèphe Thériot; and Agathe and her husband Paul Daigre.  Honoré and Raymond settled at Bordustart near Le Palais on the east end of the island, Charles le jeune at Bordrehouant near Bangor in the southern interior of the island, and Agathe at Chubiguer between Sauzon and Le Palais.  Honoré did not remarry.  Annette Landry gave Charles le jeune three more children at Bangor:  Marie-Françoise in August 1768; Julie in August 1773; and Claude-Marie-Auguste in May 1779.  Marie-Josèphe Thériot gave Raymond six children at Le Palais:  Marie-Madeleine in February 1767; Marie-Josèphe-Marguerite in January 1769; Simon-Augustin in October 1771; Pierre-Paul in March 1774; Jean-Baptiste-Guillaume in June 1777; and Jean-François in June 1781.  Agathe LeBlanc gave Paul Daigre three children on the island before they moved on to southern Brittany.  Honoré's third son Paul married Marie-Anne, daughter of locals Paderne Matelot and Anne Quelec, at Le Palais in July 1774 and settled near brother Raymond at Bordustart.  Marie-Anne gave Paul three children there:  Raymond le jeune in July 1775; Martin in March 1777; and Marie-Madeleine in June 1779 but died at age 11 months in April 1780.  Honoré's brother Charles LeBlanc, called maitre by his neighbors, wife Élisabeth Thibodeau, and four of their children left Morlaix in 1765 and settled at Keroude near Bangor.  Oldest daughter Marie-Blanche, her husband Olivier Daigre IV, and their children left Morlaix in 1765 and settled at Chubiguer between Sauzon and Le Palais.  Marie-Blanche gave Olivier IV nine more children on the island.  Charles's second daughter Marguerite and her husband Joseph-Ignace Richard settled near her parents at Keroudé.  Marguerite gave Joseph-Ignace 13 children on the island.  Charles le maitre died probably at Keroudé in April 1772, age 60.  His youngest daughter Marie-Anne married Jacques, son of Jacques Cholet and Marie-Anne Briomaut of Xaintes in central France and widower of Marie-Catherine Loreal, at Le Palais in April 1774.  Charles le maitre's oldest son Jean-Baptiste left the island and married Françoise-Charlotte, daughter of Maitre François Lavanant and Mme. Barbe-Anne Ferroc, at Guerlesquin near Morlaix in June 1781.  Jean-Baptiste served as notaire royal et procureur fiscal de jurisdiction, as well as maire of Guerlesquin, quite an accomplishment for an Acadian exile.  Françoise-Charlotte gave him at least two sons at Guerlesquin:  Jean in June 1784; and Joseph-Auguste in September 1786.  Charles le maitre's youngest son Anselme remained on the island with his widowed mother and married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of locals Jean-Marie Houin and Marie-Josèphe Le Luc, near Le Palais in May 1782.  Marie-Josèphe gave Anselme at least three children there:  Jeanne-Marie-Charlotte in March 1783; Jacques-Joseph in March 1784; and Jean-Marie in September 1785, on the eve of the families move to Lorient in southern Brittany, where they lived on Rue de l'Église.  Charles le maitre's second son Olivier may have been the Olivier LeBlanc who died near Bangor in May 1783.  The priest who recorded the burial did not give Oliver's parents' name, his age, nor mention a wife.  If this was Olivier à Charles le maitre, he would have died in his mid-30s.  Honoré and Charles's brother Simon, wife Marie Trahan, and their four sons, three from his first wife, left Morlaix in 1765 and settled near brother Charles at Keroudé near Bangor.  Marie gave Simon four more children there:  Pierre-Marie in December 1766; Marie-Anne in July 1769; Jacques-Pierre-Marie in June 1771; and Marguerite in January 1776.  Island Acadian Claude LeBlanc, wife Marie-Josèphe Guédry, and his three sons left St.-Servan-sur-Mer in 1765 and settled at Bordicado near Sauzon.  Marie-Josèphe died near Sauzon in August 1767, age 47.  Claude and his sons promptly returned to St.-Servan, where he remarried.  Françoise LeBlanc, still a widow, left Morlaix in 1765 with her three Granger children and settled at Kernest near Bangor.  Brigitte LeBlanc, widow of Claude Granger, left Rochefort in 1765 and settled at Kergoyet near Le Palais.  Jean dit Dérico LeBlanc, wife Françoise Blanchard, and their three unmarried children left Morlaix in 1765 and settled at Brenantec near Sauzon.  Dérico's son Pierre, wife Françoise Trahan, and their daughters settled at Le Palais before moving to Borderun near Sauzon.  Françoise gave Pierre three more children on the island:  Marie-Thérèse near Le Palais in January 1766 but died near Sauzon at age 4 in April 1770; Yves in June 1768; and Simon near Sauzon in February 1771 but died two days after his birth.  Pierre and Françoise returned to Morlaix by October 1773, when daughter Anne-Marie was born there.  Dérico's daughter Marguerite-Anastasie married Laurent, son of locals Germain Le Port or Le Pont and Julienne Thomas of Borgrois, at Sauzon in January 1777.  Dérico died at Brenantec near Sauzon in September 1779, age 76.  His widow Françoise Blanchard died on the island in 1785, in her early 80s.  Dérico's sister Marie-Josèphe LeBlanc, husband Félix Boudrot, and two of their children left Morlaix in 1765 and settled at Bordéry near Sauzon.  Marie-Josèphe died there, age 44, in March 1773.  Dérico's nephew Joseph LeBlanc, fils, wife Marie-Modeste Hébert, and their two children left Morlaix in 1765 and settled at Brenantec near his uncle.  Marie-Modeste gave Joseph, fils five more children there:  Reine-Victoire in December 1766; Marie-Marguerite in February 1768; Joseph-Mathurin in April 1769; Marie-Jeanne in February 1771; and Madeleine-Félicité in September 1772 but died the following November.  Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc, a widower, and son Jean-Baptiste, fils, called Jean, left St.-Servan in 1765 and settled at Locqueltas between Sauzon and Le Palais.  Jean-Baptiste, père died there in September 1766, age 51.  The following year, son Jean, now in his early 20s, gave information to French officials about his family and his native Rivière-aux-Canards.  One wonders if he married.  Another Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc, wife Marguerite Célestin dit Bellemère, and four of their children left St.-Énogat in 1765 and settled at Kernest near Bangor.  Marguerite gave Jean-Baptiste five more children on the island:  Joseph near Le Palais in March 1766; Jacques-Hippolyte near Bangor in March 1768; François-Marie in March 1770; Marie-Madeleine in January 1773; and Anne-Geneviève in June 1775.  Jean-Baptiste's oldest son Jean-Baptiste, fils, from first wife Marie Landry, died near Bangor in October 1773, age 26, still a bachelor.  Jean-Baptiste, père's sister Marine, her husband Joseph Babin, and four of their children left St.-Malo in 1765 and settled at Kervarijon near Bangor before moving on to Locqueltas by March 1767.  Joseph dit Jambo LeBlanc, wife Anne Hébert, and their three children left Morlaix and settled at Kerlédan near Sauzon.  Anne gave Jambo three more children there:  Marie-Françoise in March 1767; Joseph-Marie in April 1768; and Simon-Louis-Marie in April 1771.  They moved on to Quimper in southwest Brittany by 1773.  Joseph LeBlanc, fils, third wife Angélique Daigre, and three of their sons left St.-Servan in 1765 and settled at Kervaux near Le Palais.  Angélique gave Joseph, fils six more children there:  Firmin in June 1766; Anselme in c1767; twins Paul and Charles-Ignace in c1768; Euphrosine in c1770; and Augustin in May 1771.  In February 1767, Joseph, fils furnished information to French authorities on the history of his family.  That same year, coming from overcrowded Île Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland, Joseph, fils's father, Joseph dit Le Maigre, the old resistance fighter from Minas, and Joseph, fils's younger brother Alexandre, a former captain of militia at Restigouche, joined Joseph, fils and his family at Kervaux.  His father died there in October 1772, age 75.  Perhaps before his father's death, Joseph, fils moved his family back to St.-Malo.  Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, husband Pierre Melanson, and seven of their children left St.-Malo in 1765 and settled at Le Cosquet between Bangor and Locmaria on the southeast end of the island.  Marguerite LeBlanc, husband Louis-Athanase Trahan, and three of their children left Morlaix in 1765 and settled at Bordrun near Sauzon.  Marguerite LeBlanc, widow of Joseph Granger, came to the island in late 1765 in her late 50s and died there in 1777, age 70. 

LeBlancs who lived in French coastal communities during the 1760s, 1770s, and 1780s may not have been Acadians--not surprising when one considers the commonality of the surname in the francophone world.  They were especially numerous at Lorient in southwest Brittany, headquarters of the Perpetual Company of the Indies until 1769.  Yves LeBlanc, called sieur by his neighbors, and wife Jacquette Hervel lived in St.-Louis Parish, Lorient.  Their daughter Jeanne-Françoise was born there in February 1760; Marguerite in c1763 but died at age 5 in July 1768; and Catherine in January 1767.  René LeBlanc and Marie Dauvert also lived in St.-Louis Parish.  Their son François died there in May 1763, age 9 months.  Julien LeBlanc, husband of Françoise Boncorse, died at Lorient in November 1765, age 26.  François LeBlanc and Marie Renaud lived in St.-Louis Parish.  Their daughter Marie-Françoise was born there in March 1767.  Pierre LeBlanc, husband of Jeanne Sony, died at Lorient in September 1770, age 57.  Guillaume LeBlanc and Cécile Gobin lived in Lorient.  Their daughter Jeanne-Françoise died there in late January 1774, age 3 1/2; Marguerite-Jacquette died in early January 1774, age 2; and son Julien died in August 1779, age 3.  One wonders if these Lorientais LeBlancs were kin.  Jean-François LeBlanc and Thérèse Goeslle settled near Le Palais on the east end of Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Their son Jean-Baptiste died there at age 20 days in December 1765; Jacques-Philippe was born in April 1767 but died at age 13 months in March 1769; and son Jean died in March 1769, age 3.  Claude-Antoine LeBlanc, cordonnier, or shoemaker, and Jeanne-Marguerite Bilz lived in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer.  Their twins Marie-Marguerite-Antoinette and Pierre-Anointe were born there in January 1766, but the son died three days after his birth.  Catherine-Élisabeth, 27-year-old daughter of Jean LeBlanc and Françoise-Marguerite L'Etibaudois of Rouen, married Jean-François, 37-year-old son of Guillaume Grandchamp and Françoise Dupuis of Bleville, in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, Normandy, in November 1766.  The priest who recorded the marriage noted that the bride's father was deceased.  Christine-Élisabeth died at Ingouville near Le Havre in July 1800, age 62.  Marie-Anne LeBlanc of Île-d'Aix died in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in February 1761, age 19.  Jean, fils, son of Jean LeBlanc and Marie Jambon of "la paroisse d'Angoulême," married Anne Fevre of "cette paroise," widow of Pierre Meslau, in St.-Martin de Ré Parish, La Rochelle, in January 1769.  Louis Pascale, son of Pierre LeBlanc and Marie Jelusseau of La Rochelle, "procureur au siege royal de cette ville," that is, a city attorney, married Marie Tourjon in St.-Martin de Ré Parish, La Rochelle, in January 1769.  Both bride and groom were natives of the island.  Antoine LeBlanc, journeyman, and Marie Amand lived in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle.  Their son Jean-Baptiste was born there in December 1784 and died three days after his birth.  One wonders if these Rochelais LeBlancs were kin. 

Acadian LeBlancs deported to France managed to make their way back to greater Acadia, most to work in British-controlled fisheries there.  In the late 1760s or early 1770s, Joseph LeBlanc, fils, son of resistance fighter Joseph dit Le Maigre of Minas, left Belle-Île-en-Mer and returned to St.-Malo.  From there, he seems to have moved on to Île Miquelon, from where his father and brother Alexandre had been sent to France in 1767.  In April 1772, six months before Le Maigre's death on Belle-Île-en-Mer, Joseph, fils's second son Simon, who had been with his family on Belle-Île, married a Cyr from Chignecto on Île Miquelon.  From there, the family seems to have moved on to Arichat on the north shore of Île Madame, Nova Scotia, where Joseph, fils's sons Victor, Firmin, Anselme, twins Paul and Charles-Ignace, and Augustin, and daughters Euphrosine and Angélique settled in the fishery there.  Joseph, fils's nephew Anselme LeBlanc had gone to France in 1767 from Île Miquelon with uncle Alexandre, his grandfather Joseph dit Le Maigre, and other Acadians to alleviate overcrowding on the island and likely stayed for a time on Belle-Île-en-Mer with his kinsmen.  Still a bachelor, Anselme returned to Île Miquelon in the 1770s, perhaps with his uncle Joseph, fils.  In 1778, during the American Revolution, the British deported Anselme with other Miquelon Acadians aboard the brigantine Jeannette to St.-Malo, which he reached in November.  He married a Cyr at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer in December 1779 and was still there in October 1782.  They either returned to Île Miquelon after 1783, when the war with Britain ended in France's favor, or remained in France.  Alain LeBlanc and Anne Babin left Belle-Île-en-Mer and joined an expedition sponsored by fishery manager Charles Robin of the Isle of Jersey that transported more than a hundred Acadians in France to Robin's British-controlled fishery at Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  In April 1774, the couple crossed on one of two vessels, the Hope or the Bee, from St.-Helier on the south coast of Jersey.  A month later, they reached Robin's headquarters at Paspébiac in Gaspésie.  They settled at nearby Carleton and remained that rare Acadian couple who had no children. 

In the early 1770s, LeBlancs in France, including some who had gone to Belle-Île-en-Mer, chose to take part in another, even grander, settlement venture, this one in the interior of Poitou, where they hoped to become productive farmers again.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the coastal cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault.  French authorities endorsed the scheme, and most of the Acadians still in France signed on.  LeBlancs who took their families to Poitou in 1773 or 1774 included Charles LeBlanc and second wife Madeleine Gautrot from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Charles LeBlanc and his second wife Rosalie Trahan from St.-Servan; Félix LeBlanc and second wife Anne Michel from St.-Servan; Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc and his wife Ursule Breau from St.-Servan; Jean-Jacques LeBlanc and his second wife Nathalie Pitre from St.-Servan; Joseph dit Jambo LeBlanc and second wife Anne Hébert from Belle-Île-en-Mer and Quimper; sailor Michel LeBlanc and wife Marie Aucoin from St.-Servan; Paul LeBlanc and his wife Anne Boudrot from St.-Servan; Pierre LeBlanc and his wife Anne-Josèphe Lebert from Plouër-sur-Rance; Pierre LeBlanc and Françoise Trahan from Belle-Île-en-Mer and Morlaix; Pierre LeBlanc and Marie-Blanche Landry from Le-Légué; and Marguerite Gautrot, widow of Pierre LeBlanc, from Boulogne-sur-Mer.  Rosalie Trahan gave Charles LeBlanc a son, Jean-Baptiste, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in June 1774, but the boy died there the following month.  Marie-Anne, daughter of Paul LeBlanc, died in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, age 17 months, in August 1774; and his son Sylvestre was born at nearby Cenan in April 1775.  François Trahan, parents unrecorded, probably François-Joseph-Marc, fourth son of Pierre LeBlanc and Anne-Josèphe Lebert, died at Archigny south of Châtellerault in September 1774, age 17 months.  Marie Aucoin gave Michel LeBlanc a son, Joseph-Théodore, at Chauvigny south of Châtellerault in March 1775.  Anne Hébert gave Jambo LeBlanc a son, Charles-Marie, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in August 1775.  Félix Trahan died in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in November 1775, age 56.

Many of the Acadians who had gone to Poitou had been reluctant to go there from the beginning.  One of them, Jean-Jacques LeBlanc of Grand-Pré, who had come to France from England via Virginia in May 1763, proved to be an especially sharp thorn in the sides of the settlement's promoters, which included Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, now living in Nantes, who had done so much to bring on the war with Britain in 1754.  Back in March 1772, Jean-Jacques, "one of the Acadian representatives of the Saint-Malo department," had submitted a petition to the French government to pay for the emigration of Acadian families to Spanish Louisiana.  Like an earlier entreaty by other Acadians in 1766, Jean-Jacques's petition also was rejected.  Perhaps responding to Acadian frustrations, a council meeting of the King's ministers that summer sparked the idea of settling the exiles on land belonging to Louis-Nicolas, marquis de Pérusse des Cars, near Châtellerault.  Jean-Jacques and his family "were among the St.-Malo Acadians who grudgingly went to Poitou, but he did not give up on the idea of going to Louisiana....  [F]rom this date more or less"--March 1772--Jean-Jacques "constantly argued in favor of an emigration to Louisiana, an option that for him seemed as being the most politically acceptable for the government and thus the most likely to succeed."  In November 1774, at Versailles, the smooth-talking Acadian managed to meet with Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot, King Louis XVI's new Minister of Marine and Controller-General of Finances.  One suspects that LeBlanc discussed not only Acadian emigration with the noted physiocrat, but also informed the minister of the many problems plaguing his countrymen in the rocky fields of the marquis's land in Poitou.  Beginning in October 1775, after two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians, including Jean-Jacques and his family, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes.  Jean-Jacques and Nathalie took the fourth and final convoy out of Châtellerault in March 1776. 

At Nantes and in the western suburb of Chantenay, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Rosalie Trahan gave Charles LeBlanc five more children in Ste.-Croix Parish, Nantes, only one of whom survived infancy:  Rosalie Geneviève in February 1776 but died at age 18 months in August 1777; Marie-Appoline in October 1777 but died the following December; Louis-René in April 1779 but died at age 29 months in September 1781; Rosalie in January 1782 but died the following October; and Jean-Baptiste in October 1784.  Charles's oldest son Charles-Jean by first wife Anne Benoit married Brigitte-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Amable Hébert and Marie-Anne Richard, at Nantes in the early 1780s.  Anne-Josèphe Lebert gave Pierre LeBlanc four more children, including a set of twins, at Nantes and Chantenay, only one of whom survived childhood:  Victor-Charles in Ste.-Croix Parish in March 1776; twins Charles-François and Marie-Modeste in St.-Léonard Parish in October 1777, but Marie-Modeste died the following January, and Charles-François died at age 1 1/2 in May 1779; and Anne-Marguerite at Chantenay in February 1782 but died in March.  Nathalie Pitre gave Jean-Jacques LeBlanc, the Acadian spokesman, a son, Jean-Jacques, fils, at Chantenay in June 1776, but the boy died in January 1779, age 2 1/2.  Cécile Dupuis, widow of Jacques dit Petit Jacques LeBlanc and spokesman Jean-Jacques's mother, died at Chantenay in February 1780, age 85.  Jean-Jacques died there a year and a half later, in November 1781, age 58.  Charles-Martin, son Joseph dit Jambo LeBlanc and his second wife Anne Hébert, died at Chantenay in August 1776, age 11 months.  Anne Boudrot gave Paul LeBlanc five more children at Nantes and Chantenay, most of whom died young:  Paul, fils in Ste.-Croix Parish in November 1776 but died the following July; Geneviève in St.-Jacques Parish in January 1779 but died at age 19 months in August 1780; Adélaïde at Chantenay in October 1780 but died there at age 3 1/2 in March 1784; Marguerite in May 1782; and Rosalie in March 1785.  Sadly, their two older children also died in the Loire port:  Sylvestre in Ste.-Croix Parish, age 2 1/2, in September 1777; and Anne at Chantenay, age 14, in January 1784.  Anne, daughter of Pierre LeBlanc and Françoise Trahan of Morlaix, Belle-Île-en-Mer, and Poitou, died in St.-Jacques Parish in August 1777, age 4.  Pierre and Françoise's son Yves died at Chantenay in December 1784, age 13.  Meanwhile, Françoise gave Pierre three more children at Nantes and Chantenay, only one of whom survived childhood:  Françoise in Ste.-Croix Parish in July 1778 but died before September 1784; Anne-Marie in St.-Sébastien Parish in June 1780 but died before September 1784; and Mathurine-Françoise at Chantenay in November 1784.  Marguerite Gautrot, widow of Pierre LeBlanc of Île St.-Jean and Boulogne-sur-Mer, died at Chantenay in July 1779, age 63.  Marguerite and Pierre's 31-year-old daughter Élisabeth married Joseph, fils, 30-year-old son of Joseph Caillouet and Marie Metot of Cap-St.-Ignace, Canada, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1784.  According to the marriage record, Joseph, fils was a carpenter and had been a resident of Chantenay for five years.  His and Élisabeth's son Jacques was baptized at St.-Martin de Chantenay in January 1785.  Joseph-Théodore, son of Michel LeBlanc and Anne Aucoin, died at Chantenay in February 1780, age 5.  Charles LeBlanc's 31-year-old daughter Marie, by first wife Anne Boudrot, married Charles-Benoît, 29-year-old son of fellow Acadians Joseph Granger and his second wife Marguerite Gautrot, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in September 1780.  Charles's older daughter Madeleine, age 37, also by his first wife and widow of Charles Aucoin, was residing in Ste.-Croix Parish when she remarried to François, son of Louis Mancel and Marie Lecomte of Lucern, bishopric of Avranches, France, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in September 1783.  Moïse, 19-year-old son of Jean-Baptiste and his second wife Marguerite Célestin dit Bellemère, married Angélique, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean De La Forestrie and Marie Bonnière of Île St.-Jean and Plouër-sur-Rance, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1780.  Their daughter Marie-Josèphe was born at Chantenay in January 1782; and son Jean-Martin in November 1783.  Moïse's father Jean-Baptiste died at Chantenay in September 1782, age 58.  Joseph, son of Claude LeBlanc and his first wife Marie-Josèphe Longuépée, died in St.-Similien Parish in February 1781, age 19, before he could marry.  Olivier, 34-year-old son of Victor LeBlanc and Marie Aucoin of Île St.-Jean and Plouër-sur-Rance, a carpenter and joiner, married Marie-Madeleine, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Lebert and Anne Robichaud of Plouër-sur-Rance, in St.-Léonard Parish in June 1781.  Marie-Madeleine gave Olivier two children at nearby Chantenay:  Marie-Anne in May 1782; and Pierre-Olivier in April 1784.  Jean, 36-year-old son of Simon LeBlanc and his first wife Marguerite Bourg, a seaman and a caulker, married Tarsille, 35-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians François Hébert and Élisabeth Bourg, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in April 1782.  Their daughter Marie-Rose was born at Chantenay in June 1784.  Two of Jean's younger half-siblings by his father's second wife Marie Trahan died at Chantenay:  Marguerite at age 7 in October 1783; and Pierre-Marie at age 17 in February 1784.  Marie, 25-year-old daughter of Pierre LeBlanc and Marie-Blanche Landry of Le-Légué, married Jean-Baptiste, 23-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jean Daigre and Marie-Judith Lacroix dit Durel of Île St.-Jean and Cherbourg, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in March 1783.  Marie gave Jean two daughters at Chantenay in 1784 and 1785.  Jean-Baptiste, son of Pierre LeBlanc and husband of Ursule Breau, died in St.-Jacques Parish in February 1784, age 64. 

The Poitou fiasco and hardships at Nantes must have motivated spokesman Jean-Jacques LeBlanc all the more to take his family to Louisiana.  His name appears on another petition for emigration to the colony in 1777, but this petition also was rejected.  After Jean-Jacques's death in November 1781, "the Louisiana destination gathered even less support among the Acadians than in his lifetime, as he had been the main promoter of this emigration."  A few years later, Frenchman Henri-Marie Peyroux de la Coudrenière, long-time resident of French Louisiana, and Acadian Olivier Terrio, a master shoemaker living in Nantes, took up the cause.  By the summer of 1785, they had coaxed over 1,500 of Terrio's fellow Acadians into going to Spanish Louisiana.  Among them were Nathalie Pitre, Jean-Jacques LeBlanc's widow, and two of their teenage children.  At least 71 other LeBlancs in France--most of them languishing at Nantes and Chantenay, and at least one at Paimboeuf, recently arrived from Morlaix--agreed to go to the Spanish colony.  They included two Charless, Charles-Jean, Claude, Jean, Jean-Baptiste, Joseph, Joseph dit Jambo, Michel, Moïse, Olivier, Paul, three Pierres, and Simon LeBlanc and their families, as well as many LeBlanc wives and widows, along with bachelor Joseph à Honoré of Belle-Île-en-Mer--the largest group of Acadian LeBlancs to emigrate to Louisiana.  Many members of the family, however, chose to remain in the mother country.  They included most of the LeBlancs on Belle-Île-en-Mer, including the families of two Charless, Honoré (minus youngest son Joseph, now at Paimboeuf), Jean dit Dérico, Joseph, fils, and Raymond LeBlanc.  In June and December 1791, during the early days of the French Revolution, authorities counted nearly two dozen Acadian LeBlancs still living at Morlaix.  Many were still there in July 1792. 

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia, some commanded by LeBlancs, and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, a second British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, including several families of LeBlancs:  militia captain Paul LeBlanc and his family of five; militia captain Alexandre LeBlanc and his family of four; René LeBlanc and his family of four; and Marcel LeBlanc.  During the following months, these Acadians, along with others still in the area, either surrendered to, or were captured by, the British, who held them in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  One of these compounds was Fort Edward, overlooking the old LeBlanc homesteads at Pigiguit.  In 1762, British officials counted Charles LeBlanc and his family of two; Bonaventure LeBlanc and his family of two; Joseph LeBlanc, père and his large family; Charles LeBlanc and his family of seven; René LeBlanc and his family of five; Bonan LeBlanc and his family of two; another Charles LeBlanc; Joseph LeBlanc and his family of two; Marcel LeBlanc and his family of three; Joseph LeBlanc and his family of three; and Charlie or Charlit LeBlanc and his family of two at Fort Edward.   Another prison compound stood at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto, where, in August 1763, members of the family appeared on a list of Acadians hoping to leave the colony for French territory.  They included Joseph LeBlanc and his family of seven; and Étienne LeBlanc and his family of nine.  Still another compound stood at Annapolis Royal, where Charles dit Chat LeBlanc and his family appeared on another French repatriation list in 1763.  The largest and oldest prison compound was at Halifax, where, in August 1763, LeBlancs appeared on another repatriation list of Acadians, including Simon LeBlanc, his wife, and three children, one of whom likely was his teenage brother Petit René; René LeBlanc, his wife, and four children; Pieraute, probably Pierrot, LeBlanc, his wife, and child; the old resistance fighter Joseph dit Le Maigre LeBlanc, his wife, and one of their younger children; Le Maigre's son Paul LeBlanc (the militia captain at Restigouche) his wife, and six children; and Le Maigre's son Alexandre LeBlanc (the other militia captain at Restigouche), his wife, and three children. 

The war over, LeBlancs being held in the seaboard colonies also, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Many LeBlancs nevertheless appeared on French repatriation lists in several of the colonies in the summer of 1763.  They were especially numerous in the Bay Colony, where a list was compiled in August.  On it were Pierre LeBlanc, wife Claire, two sons and six daughters; widower Claude LeBlanc, five sons, and six daughters; Charle LeBlanc, wife Mariee, two sons and four daughters; Jacque LeBlanc, wife Natalie, two sons and two daughters; François LeBlanc and wife Janne; Honoré LeBlanc, wife Anne Baben, and a son; Widow LeBlanc, three sons and a daughter; Paul LeBlanc, wife Mariee, four sons and two daughters; Simon LeBlanc, wife Margueritte, three sons and a daughter; another Widow LeBlanc with no children; Widow of François LeBlanc, a son and a daughter; Pierre LeBlanc, wife Mariee, a son and a daughter; Pierre LeBlanc, wife Magdelaine, two sons and five daughters; Joseph LeBlanc, wife Magdelaine, four sons and four daughters; René LeBlanc, wife Mariee, five sons and a daughter; François LeBlanc, wife Elizabeth, four sons and five daughters; Augustin LeBlan, wife Elizabeth, three sons and two daughters; Pierre LeBlanc dit Pinou and wife Françoize [Landry]; Pierre LeBlanc, wife Margueritte, and a son; Widow of Paul LeBlanc, three sons and five daughters; Simon LeBlanc, wife Jeanne, two sons and two daughters; and Jean LeBlanc, wife Marie, two sons and five daughters.  Members of the family were still in the Bay Colony three years later, when colonial officials compiled a "List of Names of the French Who Wish to Go to Canada," where many of their relatives had gone.  On this June 1766 list were an unnamed LeBlanc; Augustin LeBlanc and his family of eight; Jean LeBlanc and his family of 12; Joseph LeBlanc and his family of two; Basile LeBlanc and his family of eight; Pierre LeBlanc and his family of nine; François LeBlanc and his family of 11; Joseph LeBlanc and his family of nine; Pierre LeBlanc and his family of four; Simon LeBlanc and his family of five; and Jean LeBlanc and his family of nine.  LeBlancs being held in Connecticut in 1763 appear on a repatriation list there.  They included Pierre-Hilaire LeBlanc, wife [Marie-]Elizabeth Dupuy [actually Hébert], and nine children; Mariee LeBlanc, husband Michel Landry, and four children; Pierre LeBlanc, fils, wife Marie-Josèphe Landry, and a son; widower Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc and five children; and Bazille LeBlanc, his wife, and two children.  In June 1763, members of the family appear on a list compiled in Pennsylvania.  They included Pierre LeBlanc, wife Marie Bicho, probably Bijeau, and three children; Charles LeBlanc, wife Anne, and three children; Paul LeBlanc, wife Izabelle, and three children; Marain LeBlanc, wife Isabelle, and two children; Allexis LeBlanc and wife Nanette; Daniel LeBlanc, wife Margueritte, and four children; and Charles LeBlanc, a boy.  LeBlancs were numerous in Maryland, especially at Baltimore, where, in July 1763, a repatriation list contained the names of Olivier LeBlanc, Marguerite LeBlanc his wife, son Joseph, and daughters Anne, Marthe, and Marguerite; Jean[-Charles] LeBlanc, Juditte[-Marguerite] Landry "my wife," sons Jean-Baptiste, Joseph, and Simon, and daughter Marie; Marguerite and Simon Varize LeBlanc with the family of Pierre Poirrier and Marie Joseph Mellancont; Joseph LeBlanc; Marguerite LeBlanc, wife of François Landry, and Marie LeBlanc, perhaps her sister Marie-Madeleine; Marie-Josèphe Trahan, widow of Michel dit Michaud LeBlanc, daughters Élisabeth and Marguerite, and son Joseph[-Michel]; Esther LeBlanc and husband Enslme [Anselme] Blanchard; siblings Paul, Rose, and Pierre LeBlanc; Bonaventure LeBlanc, Marie Thevreaux [Thériot] "my wife," son Joseph [dit Adons], daughters Anne, [Marie-]Madeleine, and Esther, and orphan Joseph Richard; and siblings Joseph, Enselme, and Marguerite LeBlanc.  At Annapolis, the list included Joseph LeBlanc, Marie his wife, and daughters Anne and Magdne.; and Joseph LeBlanc the Younger, Marie his wife, daughter Marie Magdne., and son Joseph III.  At Snow Hill on the Eastern Shore, the list included Pierre, actually Jean-Pierre, LeBlanc, wife Osite LeBlanc [actually Melanson], and sons Isaac and Zozinne [Joseph dit Josime].  And at Oxford, also on the Eastern Shore, appeared Jacques LeBlanc, [Catherine-Marie-]Josèph[e Forest] his wife, daughters Catherine, Marte., and Ozith, and sons Silvin and Paul; Pierre LeBlanc, wife Anne LeBlanc [actually Landry], son Simon, and daughters [Anne-]Rose and Ludivine; Désiré LeBlanc, Marie[-Madeleine Landry] his wife, daughters Magdne, Marie, Elizabeth, Anne, and Ozith, and sons Isaac, Jérôme, Désiré, fils, Benjamin, and Anselme; and Simon LeBlanc, Marie Josèphe his wife, and son Paul.  A repatriation list appeared in South Carolina in August 1763.  On it were Marain LeBlanc, who signed his own name, wife Anne Cormie, daughters Magdelaine, age 8, and Marie, age 2; Simon LeBlan, wife Marie Arsenau, and two orphans; orphan Madelaine LeBlanc, age 13, with the family of Michel Cormier and Anne Doucet; and orphan Théotiste LeBlan, age 12, with the family of François Cormier and Magdelaine Chiasson.

Most of the Acadians in New England, New York, and Pennsylvania, including dozens of LeBlancs, chose to repatriate to Canada, where some of their kinsmen from Annapolis Royal, Chignecto, and Minas had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Daniel LeBlanc began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, LeBlancs could be found on the upper St. Lawrence and the lower Richelieu at Bécancour, Chambly, Contrecoeur, L'Acadie, L'Ancienne-Lorette, L'Assomption, Lavaltrie, Maskinongé, Montréal, Nicolet, Québec City, Rivière-du-Loup, St.-Anicet, St.-Denis-sur-Richelieu, St.-Grégoire, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, St.-Ours, St.-Polycarpe, St.-Sulpice, Soulanges, Trois-Rivières, and Yamachiche; at Bonaventure, Carleton, and Cascapédia in remote Gaspésie; and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the middle of the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  In what became the province of New Brunswick, LeBlancs settled at Birch Cove, Bouctouche, Memramcook, Nepisiguit (now Bathurst), Ruisseau-des-Renards (now Fox Creek), and at St.-Louis-de-Kent.  In Nova Scotia, they could be found on Baie Ste.-Marie at Pointe-de-l'Église, at Cap-Sable and Chezzetcook on the Atlantic coast, and at Arichat on the north shore of Île Madame.  A few also settled in Newfoundland.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, led by Louisiana state senator Dudley LeBlanc, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

At war's end, Acadians in Nova Scotia and the seaboard colonies chose to go to St.-Pierre and Miquelon, French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland that offered an opportunity to elude British rule.  Most of LeBlancs settled on Île Miquelon.  Marguerite Boudrot, widow of François LeBlanc, led some of her children from Massachusetts to Miquelon.  They included son Charles LeBlanc, his wife Marie Barrieau, and their children; son Pierre LeBlanc, his wife Marie Bourgeois, and their children; son Jacques LeBlanc, his wife Nathalie Breau, and their children; and unmarried son Simon LeBlanc.  Each of Marguerite's married sons had more children on the island.  Marguerite LeBlanc, her husband Abraham Dugas, and their children went to Miquelon from the prison compound at Halifax.  Also from Halifax came Acadian resistance fighter Joseph LeBlanc dit Le Maigre, his wife Anne Bourg; their son Alexandre, his wife Marguerite Boudrot, and their children; Le Maigre's son Paul, his wife Anne de Saint-Étienne de La Tour, and their children; and Le Maigre's grandson Anselme, who had followed his family to Maryland in 1755, when he was age 3.  He evidently became an orphan there, managed to hook up with his grandfather and uncles at Halifax, and followed them to Île Miquelon.  His grandmother Anne Bourg died on the island in July 1766, age 67.  Simon LeBlanc also had followed his family to Maryland in the fall of 1755, when he was age 6.  His parents died in the Chesapeake colony, and four of his siblings moved on to Spanish Louisiana in 1767.  Simon did not go with them.  He may have been living on Miquelon as early as 1763, when he would have been in his early teens.  Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc, another teenager, also found his way to Miquelon in the early 1760s.  In 1767, the Newfoundland islands had become so crowded that French officials, obeying a royal decree, deported the fishermen/habitants to France.  Most of them promptly returned to the islands the following year.  Le Maigre LeBlanc and two of his sons were not among them.  From St.-Malo, they joined Le Maigre's oldest son on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, where the old resistance fighter spent his final days.  Son Paul, his wife Anne, their children, and nephew Anselme returned to Île Miquelon in 1768.  Anne died there in 1769, and Paul died in 1771, in his late 30s.  Four of their children--Paul, fils; Charles-André, called André; Étienne; and Anne-Adélaïde, all young and unmarried--were still on the island in 1776.  Simon LeBlanc also retured to the island, where, at age 25, he married Rosalie, 22-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Cyr and Madeleine Poirier, at Notre-Dame-des-Ardiliers on Île Miquelon in April 1772.  Between 1773 and 1778, Rosalie gave Simon three children there:  Simon, fils in July 1773; Jean-Baptiste in February 1776; and Rosalie in c1778.  In September 1778, during the American Revolution, the British captured St.-Pierre and Miquelon and deported 900 islanders, most of them Acadians, to Nantes, La Rochelle, Rochefort, Cherbourg, and St.-Malo, where their Acadian cousins in France had settled.  On November 6, LeBlancs arrived at St.-Malo aboard the brigantine Jeannette and settled near kinsmen at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Passengers aboard the Jeannette included Anselme LeBlanc, now age 26; newlyweds Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc, age 31, and Angélique Dugas, age 20; and Jean-Baptiste's niece Marie Landry.  During their stay in the mother country, Angélique gave Jean-Baptiste three children at St.-Servan:  Jean-Baptiste-René in August 1780; Étienne-Simon in September 1781; and Marie-Marguerite in April 1783, who died 15 days after her birth.  Anselme LeBlanc married Victoire, another daughter of Pierre Cyr and Madeleine Poirier, at St.-Servan in November 1779.  Victoire and her family also had come to St.-Malo aboard the Jeannette.  Anselme and Victoire's daughter Victoire-Félicité was born at St.-Servan in October 1782.  Simon LeBlanc and his family reached St.-Malo in late November 1778 aboard another transport and also settled at St.-Servan.  Their daughter Rosalie died at St.-Servan in February 1779, age 9 months; son Joseph-Amand was born there in September 1780 but died at age 1 1/2 in May 1783; and François-Xavier was born in September 1782.  After the war ended in 1783 and France regained possession of the Newfoundland fishery, 600 of the fishermen/habitants returned to the islands the following year.  Simon LeBlanc and his family settled on Île St.-Pierre, but they did not remain there.  Sometime in the early 1780s, they moved on to Martinique in the French Antilles.  One wonders if Anselme and his family returned to Île Miquelon in 1784.  At least one of his first cousins did.  Charles-André, son of Paul LeBlanc, married Anne Lavigne on Île Miquelon in March 1785, and remarried to Anne Laforge probably on the island, date unrecorded.  In December 1788, Marine LeBlanc of Minas, age 52, widow of Joseph Babin, and five of her unmarried children, all late-comers to the Newfoundland islands, reached La Balize at the mouth of the Mississippi River aboard La Brigitte.  The schooner, captained by fellow Acadian Joseph Gravois III of Chignecto, had left Île St.-Pierre in October, its 18 passengers the only immigrants from greater Acadia to sail directly from there to Spanish Louisiana.  Marine and her husband, also from Minas, had been deported to Virginia in 1755, married in England in 1756, and, from 1763 to the 1780s, had lived at St.-Malo and on Belle-Île-en-Mer in France, where most of their children were born.  Marine, probably a widow now, may have been among the 600 exiles allowed to "return" to the Newfoundland fishery in 1784, though she and her children had never lived there.  They chose to settle on Île St.-Pierre, but they were determined to move on to the Spanish colony.  Marine's oldest son, Bonaventure Babin, born at Southampton, England, in November 1759, did not go with his family to greater Acadia.  He chose, instead, to go directly from France to Louisiana probably aboard one of the Seven Ships of 1785, and his mother and siblings were determined to be with him.

Other LeBlancs in the seaboard colonies emigrated, instead, to the French Antilles to avoid living in territory controlled by the British.  While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean region and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to the island would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  The first of them reached Cap-Français in late 1763.  More followed in 1764.  Among the LeBlancs who went to Môle St.-Nicolas were Madeleine Cormier, widow of François LeBlanc, and her daughters; and Marin LeBlanc, wife Anne Cormier, and their daughters--both families from South Carolina.  The experience at the naval base proved an unhappy one for many of the exiles; however, according to local church records, the few LeBlancs who worked there survived the ordeal, at least in its early days.  French officials sent Acadian LeBlancs also to interior community of Mirebalais northeast of Port-au-Prince to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  The family's experience there was not always a happy one.  Pierre, fils, son of Pierre LeBlanc and Marie-Josèphe Landry of Minas and Connecticut, was baptized at Mirebalais in August 1764, age 2, but died there the following September.  Anne LeBlanc, wife of Charles Landry, died at Mirebalais in October 1764, age 42.  Marie LeBlanc, widow of Simon Dupuy, died at Mirebalais in February 1765, age 36.  Nommee LeBlanc, widow of Michel Landry, died at Mirebalais in September 1765, age 45.  However, when fellow Acadians from Halifax and Maryland, including many LeBlancs, came through Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans from late 1764 through 1768, none of the LeBlancs still in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  They evidently had found a place for themselves in the sugar colony's slave-based plantation economy.  Madeleine, daughter of François LeBlanc and Madeleine Cormier of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, Chignecto, and South Carolina and wife of Basile Bivier, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in January 1776, age 23.  Madeleine, daughter of Pierre LeBlanc and his second wife Marie-Claire Benoit of Minas and Massachusetts, married cousin Simon, son of fellow Acadians Germain Doucet and Marguerite LeBlanc, at Môle St.-Nicolas in Februray 1776.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Marin LeBlanc and Anne Cormier of Pointe-de-Beauéjour, Chignecto, and South Carolina, married Joseph, son of Thomas Ferraud and Anne Pellissier of St.-Pierre, Martinique, a merchant, at Môle St.-Nicolas in April 1776.  Marguerite, another daughter of François LeBlanc and Madeleine Cormier, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in July 1776, age 21, before she could marry.  Anselme, son of Jacques LeBlanc and his second wife Marguerite Labauve of Minas, husband of Marie-Madeleine Martin dit Barnabé of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, Chignecto, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in August 1776, in his late 30s.  Anselme's widow Marie-Madeleine remarried twice at Môle, in 1779 and 1782.  Marguerite, daughter of Joseph LeBlanc and Marie Dupuy, was baptized at Môle St.-Nicolas, age 3 days, in August 1776 but died the following day.  Acadian Anastasie LeBlanc died "on the farm of Mr. Barquet" near Jean-Rabel east of Môle St.-Nicolas in July 1778, age 26.  Marie-Josèphe, oldest daughter of François LeBlanc and Madeleine Cormier, "wid. of Second marriage to Joseph Poirier," remarried to George, son of François Lingre and Marie Tarier of Palatin, residing at Jean-Rabel, at Môle St.-Nicolas in February 1779.  Marie LeBlanc, widow of ____ Poirier, died at Môle St.-Nicolas in April 1779, age 62.  Marguerite, daughter of Anselme LeBlanc and Marie Martin, died at Môle in July 1779, age 4.  Élisabeth, another daughter of Pierre LeBlanc and Marie-Claire Benoit of Minas and Massachusetts, married Huet, son of Alexandre De La Chelle, conseilleur du roi and notaire honoraire au Chatelet, and Marie-Claire Legrand of Paris, at Môle St.-Nicolas in May 1780.  At the time of the marriage Huet was serving as écuyer conseilleur due roi, avocat au conseil superieur du Cap, notaire en cette ville, substitut du procureur du roi de Port-de-Paix--quite a catch for a simple Acadian girl.  Anne, actually Marie-Blanche, another daughter of Pierre LeBlanc and Marie-Claire Benoit, married Jean-Baptiste-Henry D'Ambreville, either a local or a Frenchman, at Jean-Rabel in March 1781.  Joseph LeBlanc died at Môle St.-Nicolas in December 1782, age 40.  Jeanne-Victoire LeBlanc died at Môle St.-Nicolas in February 1783, age 25.  Another Anastasie LeBlanc, this one wife of Laurent Cormier, died at Môle in January 1786, age 40.  Paul, son of Marguerite LeBlanc of Plaine d'Orange, was born at Bombarde, today's Bombardopolis, south of Môle and near Plaine d'Orange, in September 1788.  Not all of the LeBlancs who lived in the sugar colony were Acadian exiles.  Marie-Antoinette LeBlanc of Brûlage, perhaps in France, died at Ouanaminthe in the island's interior southeast of Cap-Français in May 1771, age 60.  Henri, son of Louis LeBlanc and Catherine Veiselin or Vesselin of St.-Christophe near Port-au-Prince, was born at Môle St.-Nicolas in November 1776 but died four days after his birth.  Acadian LeBlancs also ended up on another island in the French Antilles.  Jean-Baptiste, son of Simon LeBlanc and Rosalie Cyr of Île Miquelon, age 9 1/2, was found drowned near St.-Pierre on Martinque in January 1786.

LeBlancs being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including LeBlancs, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon or French St.-Domingue.  Others considered going to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 26 were LeBlancs. 

Meanwhile, the many LeBlancs still in Maryland endured life among Englishmen, who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  At least 60 LeBlancs were part of the three contingents of exiles from Baltimore and Port Tobacco that reached New Orleans in September 1766, July 1767, and February 1768.  A few others decided to stay in the Chesapeake colony, where many of their descendants called themselves White.313

Legendre

Living on an island still controlled by France, François Legendre, Marguerite Labauve, and their two children escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and transported them to France. 

François, wife Marguerite, and their three children--Henriette, age 8; Jean-François, age 5; and Anastasie-Angélique, age 2--endured the crossing to St.-Malo aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached the Breton port together in late January 1759.  (For some reason, François was called Firmin on the ship's passenger list.)  The voyage proved tragic for the family:  Younger children Jean-François and Anastasie-Angélique were buried at sea.  The family settled frst at Meillac in the countryside southeast of St.-Malo near Combourg, next at Châteauneuf on the east side of the Rance south of St.-Malo, and then in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer before returning to Châteauneuf.  Marguerite gave François at least three more children, all sons, in the St.-Malo area:  Jean-Baptiste at Meillac in January 1760; Louis-Joseph at Châteauneuf in c1763; and Yves-François at St.-Servan in c1758--six children, two daughters and four sons, between 1751 and 1758, in greater Acadia and France.  Daughter Henriette, at age 17, married Daniel, son of fellow Acadians Claude Benoit and Isabelle Thériot, at St.-Servan in February 1768. 

In 1773, François and his family followed other exiles in the St.-Malo area to the interior province of Poitou, where they worked on an influential nobleman's land near the city of Châtellerault.  In November 1775, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  François died at Chantenay near Nantes in July 1781, age 59.  Marguerite did not remarry.  Son Jean-Baptiste married Marie-Rose, daughter of René LeTullier of Normandy and Collette Renaud of Île St.-Jean, at St.-Martin de Chantenay near Nantes in September 1783.  When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Marguerite Labauve and her four remaining Legendre children, including her two married ones, agreed to take it.264

Léger

In 1755, descendants of Jacques Léger dit La Rosette and Madeleine Trahan could be found at Annapolis Royal, at Chepoudy and Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

By the early 1750s, the trois-rivières area had become the heart of Acadian resistance to British control of greater Acadia.  Here also lived several bands of the Mi'kmaq nation who did the bidding of Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, the radical French priest who had become the leader of the resistance.  The Légers at Chepoudy and Petitcoudiac, who by 1755 were the majority of the family, could not have escaped the consequences of living in such a place.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Légers may have been among the area Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  If so, they, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Nova Scotia Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  None of the trois-rivières Légers were sent to South Carolina or Georgia, so most, if not all, of them escaped the British roundup that summer and fall and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Their cousins at Annapolis Royal were not so lucky.  The British deported François Léger and his large family to New York.  In the late 1750s or early 1760s, they moved on to Connecticut, where they remained for the rest of the war.

Living in territory controlled by France, the Légers on Île St.-Jean escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the island and transported them to France.  Legers ended up at La Rochelle.  Catherine, daughter of Jean Léger and Marguerite Comeau of Annapolis Royal, Chepoudy, and Île St.-Jean, married Pierre Girardin, a French ship's carpenter deported from Louisbourg, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in August 1762, so the family may have moved there from La Rochelle after 1760.  The priest who recorded the marriage noted that the bride's father was deceased at the time of the wedding.  Catherine and her husband settled at La Rochelle. 

Jean Léger's son Michel dit Richelieu took an unusual route to France.  He evidently did not follow his parents to Île St.-Jean in the 1750s, when he would have been in his mid- or late teens.  He married Angélique, daughter of Charles Pinet and Marie Marchand of Minas, in c1760, no place recorded, perhaps in greater Acadia during exile.  The couple evidently fell into British hands soon after their marriage.  The British took them to Louisbourg, where, in c1762, Angélique gave Michel a son, Michel-Prosper, also called Michel, fils.  In November of that year, the British deported the family to La Rochelle aboard the transport Windsor.  After the war, Michel and his family followed other Acadian exiles in France to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Their daughter Jeanne was born there in c1767.  That year, to alleviate overcrowding on the island, French officials, obeying a royal decree, forced most of the fisher/habitants in Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre to emigrate to France.  Michel and his family went, instead, to French St.-Domingue, where some of their relatives already had gone.  They arrived in the sugar colony in c1768, but they did not remain.  By May 1769, they had returned to La Rochelle and then evidently moved on to Cherbourg in Normandy, where son Louis was born that year and son Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, in c1770.  Michel died in c1770, in his early 30s.  By September 1784, widow Angélique and her three Léger sons had moved on to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  In 1785, she and two of her younger sons, Louis and Jean, crossed to Spanish Louisiana aboard the first of the Seven Ships from France, which sailed out of Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes.  Her oldest Léger son, Michel, fils, followed on a later vessel also out of Paimboeuf.  No other members of this branch of the family emigrated to the Spanish colony.  Michel dit Richelieu's sister Catherine died at La Rochelle in March 1805, age 70. 

A number of Légers also lived at Cherbourg in the 1760s and 1770s.  None of them seem to have been descendants of Jacques Léger dit La Rosette and Madeleine Trahan.

In North America, conditions got only worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and  retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  The following October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  None of the Légers were among them.  During the following months, Acadians still in the area either surrendered to, or were captured by, the British, who held them in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  One of these compounds was Fort Edward at Pigiguit.  In 1762, British officials counted brothers Joseph Léger and his family of six, Paul Léger and his family of three, and Jean Léger and his family of three at Fort Edward.  Another compound was at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, Chignecto, where, in August 1763, British officials counted two Léger families, including that of brother Jacques III and his family of five, and cousin Pierre and his family of three.  The largest and oldest prison compound was on Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor, where, in August 1763, British officials counted Paul Léger, his wife, and four children, who evidently had been moved there from Fort Edward. 

The war over, Légers being held in the British seaboard colonies also, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intensions.  Even then, colonials authorities discouraged repatriation.  François Léger and his family of 10 were living in Connecticut in 1763.  Most of the exiles being held in New England, beginning in 1766, chose to go to British-controlled Canada.  The Légers were not among them.  They went, instead, to the French Antilles to avoid living in territory controlled by Britain.  During the final months of the war, French officials encouraged Acadians in the British seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean region and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  The first of them reached Cap-Français in late 1763.  More followed in 1764.  They included at least three children of François Léger and Madeleine Comeau, who had been held in Connecticut.  The family's experience was not a happy one there.  When fellow Acadians from Halifax, including Légers, came through Cap-Français on their way to Louisiana in 1765, three of the Légers still languishing in the sugar colony chose to join them. 

The Légers being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada or remained in greater Acadia.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Île Miquelon, where Légers had gone.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Légers, were going, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least four were Légers

Three Léger brothers being held in Nova Scotia chose not follow their fellow Acadians, including some of their kinsmen, to St.-Domingue and Louisiana but to remain in greater Acadia.  Joseph lived at Windsor, formerly Pigiguit, before moving on to Rivière St.-Jean.  Olivier, who may have escaped the British at Restigouche, took his family to Bonaventure in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs before crossing the bay to Caraquet in present-day northeastern New Brunswick.  Brother Jacques III took his family from Fort Cumberland to nearby Memramcook in the trois-rivières area, not far from where they had been forced into exile in 1755.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of what became Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.314

Lejeune

In 1755, descendants of Pierre Lejeune dit Briard, père and _____ Doucet could be found in small numbers at Annapolis Royal and in the Minas Basin at Pigiguit and Cobeguit, but most of them had moved from Pigiguit, where they had congregated over the decades, to the French-controlled Maritime islands.  They were especially numerous at Baie-des-Espagnols on Île Royale, where they had gone in 1749 and 1750, but they also could be found at Grande-Ascension and Bédec on Île St.-Jean and on Île Madame off the southern coast of Île Royale.  By 1755, some of the Baie-des-Espagnols families had returned to peninsula Nova Scotia, where they secured permission to live not at their old homes at Pigiguit but at Mirliguèche on the Atlantic coast southwest of Halifax.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large, peripatetic family even farther. 

The first of them to suffer the terrors of deportation was a young family still living at Pigiguit.  Amand Lejeune had just married Anastasie Levron.  Soon after their wedding, the British deported the newlyweds to Virginia.  Minas Acadians also were sent to Maryland, Pennsylvania, and New England, but the ones shipped off to the Old Dominion endured a fate worse than the others.  In mid-November 1755, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered Acadians from one vessel moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  The following spring, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the papists must go.  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone:  299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  They were packed into warehouses in the English ports, where many of them died of smallpox.  Amand Lejeune and his bride were held at Liverpool, where sons Jean and Joseph were born to them in 1756 and 1763. 

The Lejeunes at Mirliguèche also were deported from their homes despite having co-operated with the British.  In 1754, while they were still at Baie-des-Espagnols, Jean-Baptiste Lejeune, his wife Marguerite Trahan, and dozens of their kinsmen--Boutins and Guédrys, as well as Lejeunes and Trahans--had come to the realization that "the Land there" on the island "being so very bad they were utterly incapable of subsisting their Families, and had applied to the Governor of Louisbourg for leave to return to their former Habitations, to which he had consented."  In the fall of 1754, they left Spanish Bay, as well as French-controlled territory, and, along with dozens of fellow Acadians, ventured from Louisbourg to Halifax by boat.  They beseeched Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence and his colonial Council to let them return to their former lands.  After hearing their case, the Council agreed to the request only if they "voluntarily" took "the Oath of Allegiance to His Majesty," George II, "unqualified by any reservation"--a hard request for self-respecting Acadians.  However, the Council minutes noted, "it appearing that they were in very great distress being intirely destitute of all necessitous," they "very cheerfully" took the hated oath and were issued rations to get them through the winter.  Lawrence evidently changed his mind about allowing them to return to Pigiguit.  He sent them, instead, to Mirliguèche on the Atlantic coast west of Halifax, near where Lejeunes and their Mi'kmaq kin once lived and where Foreign Protestants had built the settlement of Lunenburg the year before.  When Lawrence and his Council authorized the deportation of the Acadians of British Nova Scotia the following July, the Lejeunes and their kin at Mirliguèche, despite having taken the unqualified oath, did not escape the hard hand of British oppression.  In September 1755, as their cousins at Minas were being herded onto transports, redcoats from Halifax gathered up the Acadians at Mirliguèche and held them in the prison compound on Georges Island in Halifax harbor.  In December, the British herded 50 of them, including Jean-Baptiste Lejeune and his family, aboard the sloop Providence and deported them to North Carolina--the only Acadians who actually made it to that seaboard colony.  They landed at Edenton on Albemarle Sound in March 1756 and remained in the area for at least four years.  In c1760, colonial authorities, probably tired of the expense of caring for them, allowed them to join their fellow exiles in Pennsylvania.  By then, Jean-Baptiste and his wife Marguerite Trahan probably were dead.  Their children, at least five of them, chose to follow a Trahan uncle to Maryland. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the great majority of Lejeunes still on the Maritime islands escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British rounded up most of the habitants still living on the islands and deported them to France. 

Some members of the family escaped this latest deportation.  Joseph Lejeune had married Anne-Théotiste Brasseur at Bédec on the southwest shore of Île St.-Jean soon afer the August 1752 counting there, but they did not suffer the fate of their many siblings and cousins.  They left the island before the capture of Louisbourg and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore before moving on to Canada.  Joseph remarried to Canadian Madeleine Deblois on Île d'Orléans below Québec in April 1757, so Anne-Théotiste Brasseur did not survive the first years of exile.  Joseph and his new wife settled at Charlesbourg and St.-Michel de Bellechasse on the St. Lawrence below Québec.  First cousin Jean-Baptiste Lejeune, wife Marguerite Clémenceau, and most of their children, who had been counted at Anse-aux-Matelot on the south shore of Île St.-Jean in August 1752, managed to escaped the British roundup on the island in 1758 and find refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  His younger brothers Chrisophe, Germain, fils, and Paul, counted at Baie-des-Espagnol in April 1752, evidently escaped the roundup on Île Royale.  Jean-Baptiste and his family moved on to Québec, but his three brothers may have remained on the Gulf shore with hundreds of other exiles.  Eustache Lejeune dit Briard and his wife Marie-Anne Barrieau, who had been counted at Point à Jacob on the north coast of Île Madame in February 1752, also managed to escape the 1758 roundup and seek refuge on the Gulf shore. 

Most of the island Lejeunes, however, were not so lucky.  After rounding them up, the British placed them on transports bound for St.-Malo, France.  The crossing devastated the family.  One is hard put, in fact, to find another Acadian family that lost a higher percentage of its members to deportation than the Lejeunes of Île Royale and Île St.-Jean.  Siblings Bruno, Anne, Brigitte, and Augustin Lejeune and their families crossed aboard the British transport Duke William that left Chédaboutou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November with 364 Acadians aboard and sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December.  All of the Lejeunes aboard perished.  Cousin Joseph Lejeune, wife Cécile Pitre, and seven of their unmarried children, along with the families of several of their sons, crossed on the transport Violet, which sailed in the same convoy and sank in the same storm.  All were lost.  Island Lejeunes also crossed on one or more of the five transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy with 1,033 Acadians aboard, bound for St.-Malo.  The Five Ships survived the mid-December storm that sank three other transports and reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  However, only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, including many Lejeunes.  Catherine Lejeune, age 60, crossed on one of the Five Ships with husband Claude-Antoine Duplessis, age 49, head surgeon at Havre-St.-Pierre on Île St.-Jean, along with one of their sons, age 9, and an apprentice surgeon.  The son died at sea, and the apprentice died in a St.-Malo hospital six months after their arrival.  Anne Lejeune, age 34, crossed with husband Claude Guédry, age 33, and five children, ages 9 years to 10 months.  Claude and the three older children survived the crossing, but Anne and her two younger children died in a Châteauneuf hospital south of St. Malo soon after they reached the Breton port.  Joseph Lejeune, age 26, crossed with wife Marguerite Corporon, age unrecorded, and two children--Théotiste, age 3; and François, age 3 months.  Marguerite and the children died at sea.  Joseph died probably in a local hospital four months after reaching St.-Malo.  Jean Lejeune, age 32, crossed with wife Marguerite LeBlanc, no age given, Marguerite's sister Rosalie, age 18, and five children--Rosalie, age 10; Mathurin, age 8; Marie, age 7; Étienne, age 2; and François, age 7 months.  Also with them were Jean's younger brother Éloi, who would have been age 31, his wife Rosalie Mius d'Azy, and their five children--François, age 12; Jean-Baptiste, age 10; Marie-Josèphe, age 7; Euphrosine, age 5; and Osite, age 7 months--15 adults and children in the extended family.  Only Jean, sister-in-law Rosalie, and Éloi's older son François survived the crossing.  All the others died at sea.  Jean, however, died in May, four months after he reached the Breton port.  Eustache Lejeune, age 26, crossed with wife Marie Carret, age 26, and two daughters--Marie-Madeleine, age 5; and Marguerite, age 14 months.  Eustache and Marie survived the crossing, but their daughters died at sea.  Eustache's younger sister Félicité, age 20, crossed with husband Ambroise Hébert, age 29, and two daughters, ages 3 and 1.  Félicité and Ambroise survived the crossing, but their daughters died at sea.  Marie-Josèphe Lejeune, age 31, crossed with husband Pierre Le Roy, no age given, and six children, ages 10 to 1.  Only Marie-Josèphe survived the crossing.  Her entire family died at sea.  Lejeunes also crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédaboutou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November, 163 Acadians aboard.  It, too, was battered by the mid-December storm and limped into the harbor at Bideford, England, a week later.  A few of the Acadians transhipped to Bristol, but most of them, including Lejeunes, went on to St.-Malo, which they finally reached during the second week of March 1759.  More family members perished in the crossing.  Élisabeth Lejeune, age 32, crossed with husband Olivier Trahan, age 28, and three children, a son and two daughters.  Élisabeth and Olivier survived the crossing, but all of their children died at sea.  Jean Lejeune, age 60, and wife Françoise Guédry, age 50, Élisabeth's parents, crossed with five of their unmarried children--Grégoire, age 22; Barnabé, age 18; Hélène, age 16; Anne, age 14; and Jean-Charles, age 9--and an Hébert niece.  They all survived the crossing, but Jean and his children Hélène and Barnabé died in local hospitals two months after reaching St.-Malo.  Jérome Lejeune, no age given, another son of Jean, crossed with wife Élisabeth Dugas, age 24.  Jérôme died at sea, and Élisabeth died in a local hospital the following August.  Marguerite Lejeune, age 28, another of Jean's daughters, crossed with husband Augustin Benoit, age 32, and three children, two daughters and a son, ages unrecorded.  Marguerite and Augustin survived the crossing, but their children died at sea. 

The island Lejeunes did their best to create a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Eustache Lejeune and his wife Marie Carret, now childless, settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  There and in the nearby suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, Marie gave Eustache more children:  Jean-Baptiste at St.-Suliac in April 1760; Marie-Jeanne-Perrine-Madeleine in January 1772; François-Zenon at St.-Servan in January 1764 but died at age 4 in February 1768; Geneviève-Charlotte in December 1765; Françoise-Eugènie in November 1767 but died the following February; Servan-Mathurin in July 1769; and François-Marie in May 1771.  Marie died at St.-Servan in November 1772, age 39, and Eustache, at age 41, remarried to Jeanne-Perrine, 33-year-old daughter of locals Jean Gicquel and Perrine Le Couet of nearby Plouër-sur-Rance, at St.-Servan in June 1773.  Eustache's younger brother Grégoire followed their ailing father and siblings to Châteauneuf south of St.-Suliac and, after his father died, probably looked after his mother.  He did not remain at Châteauneuf very long.  In April 1760, he left St.-Malo aboard the corsair Hercules, which the Royal Navy promptly captured.  The British held Grégoire and his shipmates in an English prison until the war ended in early 1763.  Grégoire returned to St.-Malo in June of that year and joined his brother, now at St.-Servan.  Grégoire married Charlotte, 17-year-old daughter of locals Pierre Des Croutes and Élisabeth Galisson of St.-Servan, in February 1764.  She gave him no children, at least none who appear in local church recods.  Charlotte died at St.-Servan in January 1767, age 20.  Grégoire, now age 30, promptly remarried to Hélène, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Dubois dit Dumont and Madeleine Vécot of Île St.-Jean, at St.-Servan in June 1767; Hélène called herself a Dumont.  At St.-Servan and Pleurtuit on the other side of the river southwest of St.-Servan, Hélène gave Grégoire three children:  Grégoire-Eustache in December 1768 but died the following March; Marie-Josèphe in May 1770; and Jeanne-Olive-Élisabeth in July 1772.  The moved to nearby St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo, in 1772.  François Lejeune, the only surviving member of his immediate family, age 12 in 1759, resided with a M. Baude at St.-Thual in the countryside southwest of St.-Malo in 1759 and remained there until 1766, when he moved even farther away, to Lamballe east of St.-Brieuc on the Breton coast west of St.-Malo.  He married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Richard and Cécile Gautrot, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in August 1767, returned to St.-Thual after the marriage, and then went back to St.-Servan.  Anne gave him a daughter, Anne-Marie, at St.-Servan in August 1769.  In December 1771, he received permission to take his family to Morlaix on the Breton coast west of St.-Brieuc.  Anne gave him a son, Jean, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish there in May 1772.  François died by January 1776, when his widow Anne remarried to a Levron widower at Morlaix.

At least one island Lejeune landed at the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay.  Joseph Lejeune's family, counted at Anse-au-Matelot on Île St.-Jean in August 1752, evidently escaped the British in late 1758, but the British deported Joseph, still in his teens, to France.  He married Marie-Marthe or -Martine Roy, perhaps a fellow Acadian, date and place unrecorded, but it may have been at Rochefort soon after his arrival.  If so, he would have been in his late teens at the time of the wedding.  Marthe/Martine gave him two children in the naval port:  Marie-Charlotte in St.-Nicolas Parish in October 1759; and Paul in St.-Louis Parish in February 1761, but he died the following July, age 5 months.  After the war, Joseph took his family back to greater Acadia.  They were counted on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, in 1764.  In 1767, in an attempt to relieve overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, French officials, obeying a royal edict, ordered the islands' fisher/habitants to emigrate to France, Joseph and his family probably among them.  If they went to France, they likely returned to Miquelon the following year, as most of the islanders did.  In 1778, during the American Revolution, the British captured îles Miquelon and St.-Pierre and deported the islanders to France.  Joseph and his family ended up at La Rochelle, where daughter Marie-Charlotte married into the Caumeau family in St.-Nicolas Parish in February 1781.  Marthe/Martine gave Joseph another daughter, Marie-Anne, in St.-Nicolas Parish in May 1779, but the girl died in nearby St.-Jean Parish, age 4, in January 1784.  One wonders if Joseph and Marthe/Martine returned to Île Miquelon with other islanders after the death of their daughter, or if they remained in France. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including a family of Lejeunes, were repatriated to France.  Amand Lejeune, wife Anastasie Levron, and their two sons--Jean, age 7, and Joseph, a newborn--landed at Morlaix in northwest Brittany and settled in St.-Martin des Champs Parish.  Anastasie gave Amand four more children there:  Pierre-Paul in December 1764; Marie-Rose in September 1767; Marie-Marguerite in August 1769; and Alexis-Simon in March 1773.  As the birth dates of his children reveal, Amand and Anastasie did not follow other Acadian exiles repatriated from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany in late 1765, nor did they remain at Morlaix. 

Meanwhile, from December 1763 through November 1764, Acadians left France for the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America, at least two Lejeunes among them.  Anne, daughter of  Paul Lejeune dit Briard, had married into the Morland family at Rochefort in July 1763.  Her sister Hélène, who accompanied them to Guiane, married into the Rigaud family at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district in August 1767.  The sisters evidently remained in the tropical colony. 

In 1773, Lejeunes in France, including the family at Morlaix, chose to take part in yet another, even grander settlement venture, this one in the interior of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the coastal cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault, and the French government endorsed the scheme.  Lejeunes who took their families to Poitou included Amand from Morlaix, and brothers Eustache, Grégoire, and Jean-Charles, the latter still a bachelor, from St.-Servan.  Jean-Charles married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Trahan and Anne Thériot, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in August 1774.  Their son Jean-Charles-Joseph was baptized there in August 1775.  Grégoire's second wife Hélène Dumont gave him another daughter, Geneviève, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish in May 1774, but the girl died the following August.  In that same month, August 1774, Grégoire and Hélène buried their daughter Jeanne-Olive-Élisabeth, who died at age 2 in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish.  Beginning in October 1775, after two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians, including the Lejeunes, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes.  The Lejeune brothers took the third convoy that left in December 1775.  With them was their widowed mother Françoise Guédry, now in her mid-70s.  Amand and his family took the final convoy that left for Nantes in March 1776. 

There and at nearby Chantenay, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Jean-Charles's son Joseph-Jean-Charles died in Ste.-Croix Parish, Nantes, in February 1776, age 6 months.  Jean-Charles and Marguerite's son Jean-Charles, fils was baptized at St.-Martin de Chantenay in March 1777 but died there the following November.  Jean-Charles, père died at Chantenay in November 1778, age 28.  His widow Marguerite Trahan, now without husband or children, remarried to a French weaver in St.-Donatien Parish, Nantes, in December 1782 and remained with him in France, where she gave him many children.  Brother Grégoire's wife Hélène gave him five more children at Chantenay:  Marie in February 1776 but died at age 5 in April 1781; Jean-Marie in c1768 but died at age 6 in March 1784; Grégoire-Alexis in February 1781; Julien in February 1783; and Hélène-Sophie in October 1784 but died in November--nine children, four sons and five daughters, between 1768 and 1784, only three of whom, a daughter and two sons, survived childhood.  Older brother Eustache and his second wife Jeanne Gicquel had three more children at Chantenay:  Jeanne-Marie in July 1781 but died in August; Pierre-Alexis in April 1783 but died at age 1 in April 1784; and Rosalie, also called Marie-Rose, in April 1784--a dozen children, seven daughters and five sons, by two wives, between 1754 and 1783, in greater Acadia and France, only three, perhaps four, of whom, two daughters and two sons, survived childhood.  Meanwhile, Françoise Guédry, mother of the three brothers, died in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in March 1780, age 80.  The brothers' cousin Amand Lejeune and his wife Anastasie Levron also had more children at Nantes and Chantenay:  Anastasie-Jeanne in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in May 1776; Anne-Adélaïde at Chantenay in October 1779; and Rosalie there in August 1783--nine children, four sons and five daughters, between the 1756 and 1783, in England and France, most of whom survived childhood.  Amand's oldest son Jean married Félicité, daughter of fellow Acadians Félix Boudrot and Marie-Josèphe LeBlanc, in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in November 1782.  Amand died at Chantenay in May 1784, age 54.  Anastasie did not remarry. 

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, 17 Lejeunes agreed to take it.  They included all of the Lejeunes at Nantes and Chantenay.  The family of François Lejeune of Minas and Île St.-Jean who had taken his family from St.-Servan-sur-Mer to Morlaix in December 1771 and died there a few years later, evidently remained at Morlaix when their cousins moved on to the Spanish colony.  Joseph Lejeune, wife Marthe/Martine Roy, and their family, who returned to France from Île Miquelon in 1778, were still in the mother country in 1784 and did not join his cousins in Louisiana. 

In North America, the war finally over, Acadians who had eluded the British in the late 1750s could emerge from hiding and choose, more or less, where they wanted to settle.  Children of Eustache Lejeune dit Briard who had escaped from Île Madame in 1758 settled on Rivière St.-Jean and at Petit-Rocher and French Village on the Gulf of St. Lawrence in what became the province of New Brunswick.  Brothers Chrisophe, Germain, fils, and Paul Lejeune, who had escaped the British roundup on Île Royale in 1758, evidently returned to the island, which the British called Cape Breton.  The older brothers married into the Gallant and Lasonde families there, the youngest to a Mik'maq, and each of them "rehabilitated" their families at the Mi'kmaq settlement of Petit-Bras-d'Or in the center of the big island in August 1771.  None of them seem to have joined their oldest brother Jean-Baptiste and their cousin Joseph and their families at Charlesbourg, St.-Charles de Bellechasse, St.-Gervais de Bellechase, and St.-Michel de Bellechasse near Québec City.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of what became Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Acadians being held in the British seaboard colonies at war's end, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intensions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Lejeunes who, in the early 1760s, had moved from North Carolina to Pennsylvania and then to Maryland--five children of Jean-Baptiste Lejeune and Marguerite Trahan of Pigiguit and Baie-des-Espagnols--were still in the Chesapeake colony in July 1763, when they appeared on a count of the exiles there.  Anne dite Nanette, "orphan," appeared on a repatriation list at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac with the family of Charles Breau and his wife Claire Trahan.  Also at Port Tobacco was her brother Joseph, perhaps her twin, also described as an "orphan," and Antoine Lejeune, another orphan and perhaps a sibling, with the family of their uncle Honoré Trahan.  Nanette and Joseph's older brother Blaise were listed at Port Tobacco with the family of Honoré Breau and his wife Madeleine Trahan.  One wonders why brother Jean-Baptiste, fils and sister Marguerite do not appear in the July 1763 countings.  The Lejeune siblings were still in the colony three years later, enduring life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  None of the Lejeunes and their Trahan relatives were part of the first three Acadian expeditions that reached New Orleans from Baltimore and Port Tobacco in September 1766, July 1767, and February 1768.  That changed in January 1769, when the Lejeune orphans, under the care of their uncle Honoré Trahan, booked passage on a British vessel that would take them from Port Tobacco to the Spanish colony. 

No group of Acadians who came to Louisiana suffered as much as this last group of exiles from Maryland who sailed to their Mississippi-valley promised land in 1769.  The Britannia (sometimes spelled Britania) left Port Tobacco for New Orleans on January 5 with seven Acadian families aboard--Benoits, Rivets, Trahans, and Lejeunes--along with a couple from Canada.  Also on the ship were eight Catholic German families who, for reasons of their own, no longer wanted to live in a British colony.  The crew of the Britannia sighted the coast of Louisiana on February 21, but the ship's master, either through bad luck or incompetence, missed the mouth of the Mississippi because of heavy fog.  Strong winds drove the ship westward, and, repeating the plight of La Salle and his expedition in the previous century, the Britannia ran onto the Texas coast at Espiritu Santo Bay.  The crew went ashore and located a Spanish officer, who suspected them of being spies or smugglers.  Instead of giving them food and fresh water, he arrested them and ordered his men to escort everyone on the ship to the nearby post of La Bahía.  The passengers and crew of the Britannia remained at La Bahía for six long months, waiting for the Spanish authorities to decide their fate.  While they waited, the Spanish commander forced them to work as semi-slaves around the presidio and on nearby ranches.  Finally, in early September, a Spanish officer arrived at the presidio with instructions for the commandant there to send the captives overland to Natchitoches in Louisiana. They could not return to the abandoned Britannia because the Spanish and the coastal Indians had stripped the vessel so thoroughly it was no longer seaworthy.  On September 11, the Acadians joined the other passengers and the English crew on the 420-mile trek via El Camino Real de Los Tejas to Natchitoches on Red River, which they did not reach until late October.  For some reason, Honoré Trahan and the four older Lejeunes allowed 13-year-old Anne dite Nanette Lejeune to remain at the Spanish mission at El Orcoquisac on the Trinity River, about a third of the way to the Red River post.  Soon after reaching Natchitoches, the older Lejeune daughter, Marguerite, married into the Croque, Crook, or Crooks family there.  Spanish Governor-General Alejandro O'Reilly, meanwhile, had decided that the Acadian families in the group would settle at Natchitoches because of their familiarity with the growing of rye and wheat.  Natchitoches settlers welcomed the newcomers and supplied them with food, tools, and animals.  The Germans were ordered to continue to New Orleans via the Red and Mississippi rivers.  After they would pick up supplies in the city, they would settle at San Gabriel on the Mississippi south of Baton Rouge, where Acadians from Maryland had recently settled.  Most of the Acadians at Natchitoches, meanwhile, even Marguerite Lejeune and her new husband, refused to remain at the Red River post, which was too far away from their kinfolk to the south.  They, too, left Natchitoches and joined their fellow exiles at San Gabriel and nearby Ascension on the Acadian Coast.  In the 1770s, the Lejeunes and their relatives resettled on the Opelousas prairies, perhaps, as one historian speculates, to be closer to their sister Nanette in East Texas.315

Leprince

In 1755, descendants of Jacques Le Prince and Marguerite Hébert could be found at Annapolis Royal, Pigiguit, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

In the fall of 1755, the British herded members of the family at Pigiguit onto transports bound for several seaboard colonies.  Charles Leprince, wife Anne Thibodeau, and their family ended up in Pennsylvania.  Madeleine Leprince, wife of Pierre Aucoin, and her sister Anne-Josèphe, wife of Basile Thibodeau, also were exiled to Pennsylvania.  Anne-Josèphe died soon after reaching the Quaker Colony.  Madeleine remarried to Pierre, son of fellow Acadian Antoine Landry and widower of Marie-Josèphe LeBlanc, at Philadelphia in May 1762.  

Members of the family also ended up in Maryland.  Anne Leprince, the first born of the family's progenitor and wife of Étienne Rivet, died in the Chesapeake colony, date unrecorded, probably in her late 70s.  Her nephew Olivier Leprince and his wife Marguerite Boudrot also ended up in Maryland.  With them went their infant daughter Marguerite, born at Pigiguit in c1753.  In Maryland, Olivier and Marguerite had at least one son, Joseph, born in c1756. 

Tranquille Leprince and his wife Susanne-Marie-Josèphe Bourg ended up in Virginia, where they endured a fate even worse than other Acadians deported from the Minas settlements.  Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, refused to allow the hundreds of Acadians sent to him to remain in the colony.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered Acadians from one vessel to be moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  The following spring, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses made their decision ... the "papists" must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians left for England, and in two weeks all of the rest of them had gone.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were herded into warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Tranquille, his wife, at least two of their daughters, and younger brother Cyprien were held at Liverpool.  With Cyprien was his bride Marie, daughter of Grand-Pré notary René LeBlanc and his second wife Marguerite Thébeau.  Cyprien and Marie had been married for only a year when the British sent them to Virginia.  Tranquille's sisters Anne, wife of Sylvain LeBlanc, and Marguerite, wife of Alexis Trahan, and their children also were held at Liverpool.  Cyprien died there in the late 1750s or early 1760s.  Anne's husband also died there.  

Members of the family at Annapolis Royal, along with most of the Acadians there, escaped the British roundup in the fall of 1755.  After a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac or the lower Rivière St.-Jean, from which some of them moved on to Canada via the St.-Jean portage.  Honoré Leprince died probably in Canada in 1756, among the first Acadian refugees to go there.  His widow, Isabelle Forest, and their children moved on with other exiles to Bécancour on the upper St. Lawrence across from Trois-Rivières, where the family's progenitor had lived 90 years earlier.  Honoré's younger brother Joseph, his wife Anne Forest, who was Isabelle's sister, and their family also fled north to the St. Lawrence valley, where, in October 1761, Joseph remarried to fellow Acadian Madeleine LeBlanc, widow of Joseph Richard, at Ste.-Croix-de-Lotbinière on the upper St. Lawrence between Québec and Trois-Rivières.  Jean's son Jean-Baptiste, his wife Judith Richard, and their family also escaped to Canada.  Jean-Baptiste remarried to fellow Acadian Marie-Madeleine Bourg, widow of Pierre Richard, at Bécancour in February 1762.  Jean's youngest son Pierre, his wife Félicité Bourgeois, and their children also settled at Bécancour, where Pierre died in January 1758.  Pierre's widow Félicité remarried to fellow Acadian Antoine-Bénoni Bourg at Bécancour in November 1760. 

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, Leprinces on Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the fate of their kinsmen at Pigiguit and Annapolis Royal.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  The crossing to St.-Malo destroyed at least one Leprince family from Pointe-Prime.  François's youngest son Claude, his wife Madeleine Doiron, and their children, along with many of Madeleine's Doiron kin, crossed aboard the transport Duke William, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November, bound for St.-Malo.  In mid-December, the Duke William, along with another transport, the Violet, sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England.  None of the Leprinces and Doirons aboard the transport survived the mishap. 

Most of the island Leprinces landed not at St.-Malo but at the northern fishing port of Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie before moving on to other coastal cities, including including Rochefort and La Rochelle on the Bay of Biscay, and St.-Malo in Brittany.  Catherine-Josèphe Leprince, age 36, wife of Alexandre dit Misguecess Chauvet dit La Gerne, died at Boulogne-sur-Mer in November 1759 soon after she reached the fishing center.  Her mother, Francois Leprince's widow Catherine Benoit, died at Boulogne-sur-Mer in January 1760, in her early 70s.  François's third son Antoine le jeune's family suffered more than its share of tragedy after it reached the mother country.  Son François le jeune by his second wife Cécile Arsement died at age 5 at Boulogne-sur-Mer in December 1759, a week after Antoine's newborn son, Jean-Marie, died there at age 4 days.  Daughter Madeleine, age 12, from Antoine le jeune's first wife Judith Boudrot, died at Boulogne-sur-Mer in May 1761.  But the family also was blessed by marriages.  Daughter Marie-Sophie, age 20, by Antoine le jeune's first wife, married Joseph, fils, 24-year-old son of fellow Acadians Joseph Trahan and Anne Thériot, at Boulogne-sur-Mer in November 1762.  Daughter Marguerite, by his first wife, age 19, married Gervais, son of fellow Acadians Charles Gautrot and Marie Hébert, at L'Île-d'Aix, La Rochelle, far down the coast, in February 1766.  Antoine le jeune died at the naval port of Rochefort near La Rochelle by 1770, probably in his late 40s.  Daughter Judith, by his second wife, left Rochefort in September 1772, sailed to St.-Malo, and settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of the Breton port.  Joseph-Olivier, called Olivier, son of François's second son Joseph, became a seaman in France and married Margerite-Pélagie dite Agnès, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Breau and Marguerite Guédry of Cobeguit, at Rochefort in August 1770. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  Among them were Tranquille Leprince, wife Susanne-Marie-Josèphe Bourg, their daughters Marie-Marguerite, then age 11, and Isabelle, age 8, and Tranquille's widowed sisters Anne and Marguerite and their families, who landed at Morlaix in northwest Brittany in May.  Also landing at Morlaix was brother Cyprien's widow Marie LeBlanc and at least one of her Leprince daughters.  In late 1765, none of them followed other exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  At age 23, Tranquille's daughter Marguerite married Irish-Frenchman Thomas Houardon, son of Jean-Thomas Calegan and Françoise Le Traon of Landerneau, France, at Morlaix in September 1775.  Cyprien's daughter Marie Ludivine, age unrecorded, married Antoine, son of Jean Charles Romain, platrier de profession of Dole, Franche-Comté, and Étienette Sourine, in St.-Martin de Champs Parish, Morlaix, in February 1777.  Cyprien and Tranquille's sister Marguerite died at Morlaix in April 1778, age 53.  Her husband Alexis Trahan promptly remarried to a local widow.  Cyprien and Tranquille's sister Anne did not remarry.  

In 1764, Marie-Sophie Leprince and her sister Osite and their families followed other Acadians to the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America, but they returned to Rochefort in 1765.  In 1773, Olivier Leprince and wife Agnès, still at Rochefort, became part of the major settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou.  After two years of effort, the couple, still childless, retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Their son François-Firmin was born at nearby Chantenay in January 1777 but died there a year and a half later in October 1778.  

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Tranquille Leprince, his wife, two daughters, one of them married, a seven-year-old granddaughter, and three nieces, one of them a widow, likely aware that two of their Leprince kinsmen had settled in Louisiana 18 years earlier, agreed to go to the Spanish colony.  They were compelled to travel from Morlaix, where they had lived for 22 years, and catch one of the transports headed for Louisiana at Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes.  Most of the Acadian Leprinces still in France, however, chose to remain.  The decision proved fatal for at least one of them.  On 1 July 1794, during the Reign of Terror, Tranquille's sister Anne, widow of Sylvain LeBlanc of Pigiguit, and Anne's daughter Anastasie LeBlanc, a nun, were guillotined by Revolutionaries at Brest in western Brittany for having sheltered a priest.  One wonders if Tranquille, then living on upper Bayou Lafourche, ever learned of his sister's fate.

In North America, at war's end, Acadians being held in the British seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  Members of the family nevertheless appeared on reparation lists compiled in several colonies.  Jean Leprince, his wife Marie-Osite LeBlanc, and their nine children were still in Pennsylvania in June 1763.  Soon after the counting, Jean and his family left Pennsylvania and moved north, first to Boston in 1764 and then to Connecticut, where Jean remarried to an Acadian Darois in c1764.  In 1767, trudging on snowshoes through the winter forest, they followed other exiles in New England to Canada and settled at Bécancour on the upper St. Lawrence, where Leprince cousins from Annapolis Royal had lived for years.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jacques LePrince of Trois-Rivières, Port-Royal, and Pigiguit began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  From the late 1760s, members of the family, some of them now calling themselves Prince, could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, Nicolet, St.-Grégoire, Trois-Rivières, Yamachiche, Lotbinière, and St.-Jacques de l'Achigan north of Montréal; and in the lower Richelieu valley at L'Acadie east of Montréal.  An Acadian Prince married at La Baie on the Saguenay River north of Québec City in 1812.  Later in the 1800s, Princes moved away from the upper St. Lawrence into the southern interior of Québec Province, where they settled at St.-Calixte-de-Somerset now Plessisville, and at St.-Hyacinthe on RivièreYamaska.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

After the war, at least one Leprince in the seaboard colonies emigrated not to Canada, where the British ruled, but to the French Antilles, where they did not.  While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the islands's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  Marguerite, daughter of Charles Leprince and Anne Thibodeau of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, who had been exiled to Pennsylvania, married a Mr. Favreau, matelassier, or mattress stuffer, probably in St.-Domingue and died at La Trou, today's Trou-de-Nord, southeast of Cap-Français, now Cap-Haitien, in June 1785, age unrecorded. 

Acadians still in Maryland at war's end endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  By July 1763, Olivier Leprince and wife Marguerite Boudrot were dead, and daughter Marguerite and son Joseph were living at Upper Marlborough in the colony's interior with two Forest families.  The head of one of those famliies, Bonaventure Forest of Pigiguit, was married to Claire Rivet, Marguerite and Joseph's cousin.  When word reached the Acadians in the Chesapeake colony that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, Marguerite and Joseph Leprince prepared to join their kinsmen for the voyage to New Orleans.  They arrived in the city in July 1767, ages 14 and 11--the first descendants of Jacques LePrince to settle in Louisiana.265 

Levron

By 1755, descendants of François dit Nantois Levron and Catherine Savoie could be found at Pigiguit, Chepoudy in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, on Île St.-Jean, and in Canada.  One of François's daughters died at Louisbourg, Île Royale, in January 1733, so the family scattered early.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered the family even farther. 

By the early 1750s, the trois-rivières area long had been the heart of Acadian resistance to British control of Nova Scotia.  Here also lived several bands of the Mi'kmaq nation who did the bidding of Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, the radical French priest who had become the leader of the resistance.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians, including members of this family, were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Lévrons may have been among the area Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  If so, they, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  The British sent no Levron from Chepoudy to Georgia, South Carolina, or Pennsylvania, where they deported Acadians in the area in the fall of 1755, so most, if not all, of the members of the family escaped the British roundup in the trois-rivières.  Brothers Joseph, Jacques, fils, and Simon dit Nantois Levron and their families, and cousin Jean-Baptiste Levron, fils and his family, sought refuge in Canada most likely via the Rivière St.-Jean portage that ran up to Rivière-du-Loup on the lower St. Lawrence.  From there, they moved up to Québec.  One of the brothers, Simon dit Nantois, died at Québec in December 1757, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that killed several hundred exiles in and around the Canadian capital from the fall of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Joseph Levron's wife Anne Comeau also died that December, and Jacques, fils's infant son Guillaume-Gaspard died at Québec in January 1758.  Younger brothers Louis dit Luci, age 31 in 1755, and François, age 29, both bachelors, evidently did not follow their brothers to Canada but sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore. 

A Levron wife, Anastasie, daughter of Jean-Baptiste, père, was living with her new husband Amand Lejeune at Pigiguit when, soon after their wedding, the British deported them to Virginia in the fall of 1755.  The Acadians shipped off to the Old Dominion endured a fate worse than the other exiles deported from the Minas settlements.  In mid-November 1755, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Acadians from one vessel were moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  The following spring, the governor, his council, and colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the papists must go.  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone:  299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  They were packed into warehouses in the English ports, where many of them died of smallpox.  Anastasie and Amand were held at Liverpool, where she gave him two sons. 

 Living in territory controlled by France, the Levrons of Île St.-Jean escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  In late 1758, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and nearby Île Royale and deported them to France.  The transport carrying Michel Levron, his wife Marguerite Trahan, and their two children--Marie-Madeleine, age 2, and newborn Joseph--to St.-Malo, the Neptune, was driven off course by a North Atlantic storm, and they landed in the northern fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer.  Between 1759 and 1764, Marguerite gave Michel four more children in St.-Nicolas Parish there:  Michel-François-Joseph in 1759; Alexis in c1761; Marie-Josèphe-Françoise in October 1762; and Marie-Madeleine-Pélagie in July 1764.  Oldest son Joseph died in St.-Nicolas Parish in June 1760, age 2.  In 1764, soon after the birth of their youngest daughter, Michel and Marguerite moved to Morlaix in northwest Brittany to live near his younger brother Pierre, who, as a teenager in 1758, had ended up on a transport that took him to the Breton port.  Marguerite gave Michel two more sons in St.-Martin de Champs Parish, Morlaix:  Jean-Marie in April 1767; and Pierre-Marie in January 1771--eight children, three daughters and five sons, between 1757 and 1771, in greater Acadia and France.  Meanwhile, in September 1765, brother Pierre married Blanche Cécile, called Cécile, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph LeBlanc and Madeleine Lalande, in St.-Mélaine Parish, Morlaix.  Between 1766 and 1770, Cécile gave Pierre four children, including a set of twins, in nearby St.-Martin des Champs Parish:  Marie-Marthe in July 1766; twins Anne-Marguerite and Pierre-Paul in May 1768; and Pierre-Mathurin in July 1770.  Pierre remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Richard and Cécile Gautrot and widow of François Lejeune, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in January 1776.  Between 1780 and 1785, Anne gave Pierre three more children in that parish:  Anne-Marguerite in July 1780; François-Pierre in July 1783; and Marie-Josèphe in March 1785.  Michel's third son Alexis, perhaps his oldest surviving son, married cousin Anne dite Nanette, 23-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Trahan and his second wife Françoise Thériot, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in February 1785.  Neither Michel nor Pierre followed other exiles in the coastal cities to Poitou in 1773, nor, as the dates of their childrens' births and marriages attest, did they join other exiles in Nantes later in the decade. 

Meanwhile, in the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  Anastasie Levron, husband Amand Lejeune, and their two sons landed at Morlaix and settled in St.-Martin des Champs Parish near her cousins Pierre and Michel Levron.  Between 1764 and 1773, Anastasie gave Amand four more children, two sons and two daughters.  As the birth dates of their children reveal, Anastasie and her husband did not follow other exiles repatriated from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany in late 1765, but, unlike her Levron cousins, Anastasie and her family did not remain at Morlaix.  In 1773, they ventured to Poitou with hundreds of other exiles languishing in the port cities.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Between 1776 and 1783, the couple had three more daughters at Nantes and nearby Chantenay.  Anastasie's oldest son married into the Boudrot family in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in November 1782.  Husband Amand Lejeune died at Chantenay in May 1784, age 54.  Anastasie did not remarry. 

When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Michel Levron, his married son Alexis, his cousin Anastasie Levron, recently widowed, and most members of their families agreed to go there.  Michel's daughters Marie-Madeleine and Marie-Madeleine-Pélagie and sons Michel-François-Joseph and Pierre-Marie, who, if they were still living, would have been ages 28, 26, 21, and 14 in 1785, did not follow their family to the Spanish colony.  Michel's brother Pierre and his wife also chose to remain in the mother country.  One wonders why the brothers chose different paths.  Generally, if an Acadian man or woman remained in France in 1785 it was because he or she had married into a local French family.  This was not the case for Pierre Levron--both of his wives were fellow Acadians.  Between June 1791 and July 1792, during the early days of the French Revolution, officials counted Pierre, age 49, described as a carpenter, wife Anne Richard, age 41, described as a "boutiquière," or shopkeeper, and four of their children--Marie-Marthe, age 25; Pierre, fils, actually Pierre-Mathurin, age 21; Anne, actually Anne-Marguerite, age 11; and Marie-Josèphe, age 6--still at Morlaix.  In December 1791, Anne gave Pierre another son--Pierre-Grégoire-Noël, his eighth child by two wives--in St.-Martin des Champs Parish.  Looking at Pierre's and Anne's occupations, and considering the fact that Pierre was only in his late teens when he reached Morlaix in 1759 and that he did not take his family to Poitou to work on a nobleman's estate there, one suspects that the couple spurned the life of farmers, which they would have been encouraged to pursue in Spanish Louisiana.  They preferred, instead, to live as city dwellers in a busy Breton port.  

In North America, the Levrons from Chepoudy who had found refuge in Canada began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the late 1760s, these latter-day arrivals (some of their Levron cousins had settled in Canada as early as the 1720s) could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Maskinongé between Trois-Rivières and Sorel, at St.-Cuthbert north of Sorel, and at Lachine and Pointe-Claire just upriver from Montréal.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

The Levron brothers from Chepoudy who had taken refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore did not fully escape the British.  In fact, conditions only got worse for these Acadians.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, a second British force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, but none were Levrons.  Sometime in the late 1750s or early 1760s, Louis dit Luci and François Levron either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In July and August 1762, British officials counted Luci and François, now middle-aged bachelors, at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, with dozens of other exiles. 

 At war's end, the Acadians being held in Nova Scotia faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Île Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British seaboard colonies ahad gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, one of them, the older of the two brothers at Fort Edward, was a Levron.316

Livois

Living in territory controlled by France, the Livoiss of Île St.-Jean escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  In late 1758, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and nearby Île Royale and deported them to France.  

For Pierre Livois and his family, the crossing to France was a disaster.  Pierre, in his 40s, and second wife Marie-Madeleine Poirier, in her 30s, lost four of their five children on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Marie-Anne, age 6, from his first wife Marie Boudrot; and his and Marie-Madeleine's children Pierre, fils, age 3; and Judith, age 14 months--all died at sea.  Marie-Madeleine was pregnant during the crossing.  On 5 February 1759, soon after they reached the Breton port, son Ambroise-Pierre was born to them, but he died four months later, in June, another victim of the deportation.  Only the couple's daughter Marie-Madeleine, age 5 in 1758, survived the ordeal.  

Pierre, Marie-Madeleine, and their daughter settled in the suburb of Paramé northeast of St.-Malo and then moved to nearby St.-Ideuc in 1771, among the relatively few Acadians who lived there.  Marie-Madeleine gave Pierre five more children in the St.-Malo area:  Pierre-Joseph-Jean at Paramé in March 1760; Perrine-Françoise at nearby La Barbinais in January 1762; twins Françoise-Nicole and Marie-Rose at Paramé in March 1764; and Jeanne-Céleste at La Barbinais in May 1766.  Pierre died at St.-Ideuc in October 1772.  The priest who recorded the burial noted that Pierre was age 55 or 56 when he died.  

Soon after Pierre died, Marie-Madeleine Poirier followed other exiles languing in the port cities to the interior province of Poitou.  Daughter Marie-Madeleine Livois married fellow Acadian Jean-Grégoire Blanchard there in c1774.  Their daughter was baptized in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in February 1775, but died a year later and was buried in nearby St.-Jean-Baptiste l'Evangeliste Parish.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, Jean-Grégoire and Marie-Madeleine, a month after burying their daughter, retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  They settled in St.-Similien Parish there and had two more children, a daughter and a son, in July 1776 and March 1778.  Happily, both children survived childhood.  Another son was born at Nantes in early 1785.  Marie-Madeleine's mother Marie-Madeleine Poirier and five of her Livois children--Pierre-Joseph-Jean, Perrine-Françoise, Marie-Rose, Françoise-Nicole, and Jeanne-Céleste--likely followed her older daughter and son-in-law to Nantes.   

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Jean-Grégoire Blanchard, wife Marie-Madeleine Livois, and her sister Marie-Rose, age 21 in 1785 and still unmarried, agreed to take it.  Marie-Madeleine Poirier, still very much alive in 1785, chose to remain in France, as did at least two of her other daughters and perhaps her remaining son.  Marie-Madeleine was counted at Nantes, age 84, in 1797.  Daughter Marie-Rose's twin, Françoise-Nicole, married Pierre Testard, perhaps a fellow Acadian, and was counted at Nantes, a widow now, in February 1791.  Her sister Perinne-Françoise married a Frenchman named Melliard or Mesléard and was counted at Nantes in February 1791 and 1794, during the French Revolution.  She was still at Nantes, a widow, in 1820, when she would have been in her late 50s.266

Longuépée

In 1755, descendants of Vincent Longuépée and Madeleine Rimbault could be found at Cobeguit on the east end of the Minas Basin and in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered the family even farther. 

When British forces began rounding up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the summer and fall of 1755, Vincent's only son Louis, Louis's wife Anne, their six children, and their children's families, joined the exodus from Cobeguit to the North Shore settlement of Tatamagouche, from which they crossed Mer Rouge, today's Northumberland Strait, to the south shore of Île St.-Jean.  Amazingly, by the spring of 1756 the entire village of Cobeguit had escaped the clutches of the British.  Since Île St.-Jean was still controlled by the French when the British struck in Nova Scotia, the Longuépées and their neighbors avoided the fate of their fellow Acadians in the other Fundy settlements.  Louis's oldest son Pierre married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Pierre Bertaud dit Montaury and Marie Martin of Havre-St.-Pierre on the north shore of Île St.-Jean in c1758.  About the same time, Louis's son Joseph died on Île St.-Jean, and his widow, Cécile Bourg, remarried to a Heusé.  

The family's respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and nearby Île Royale and deported them to France.  Louis Longuépée, age 64, wife Anne Brasseur, age 57, and three of their unnmarried sons--Ambroise, age 24; Jean, age 20; Louis, fils (called Louise on the passenger list), age 17--and Marguerite Boudrot, an orphaned niece, made the crossing to France on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November 1758, survived a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three of the transports, put in at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  Oldest son Pierre, age 30, and his pregnant wife Anne-Josèphe Bertaud, age 26, as well as second son Joseph's widow Cécile Bourg, her second husband Ignace Heusé, and Joseph and Cécile's 3-year-old daughter Anne, also crossed on Supply.  Everyone in the three families survived the crossing, though not its rigors.  Fifth and youngest son Louis, fils died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in August 1760, age 17, perhaps never having recuperated from the rigors of the crossing.  Louis, père and Anne's daughter Marie-Josèphe, age 32, her husband Claude LeBlanc, age 55, and their children, a daughter and a son, ages 7 and 6, crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which also left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November and, despite the storm, reached St.-Malo in mid-January.  Their daughter died two weeks after she reached the Breton port, but Marie-Josèphe, Claude, and their son survived the crossing. 

Louis Longuépée, père, wife Anne Brasseur, and their extended family settled in several of the villages and suburbs of the St.-Malo area.  In March 1760 and September 1762, daughter Marie-Josèphe gave husband Claude LeBlanc two more sons at La Gouesnière and nearby La Pahorie in the countryside southeast of St.-Malo.  The birth of the younger child was too much for her; she died at La Pahorie on September 27, age 36, four days after her she gave birth   Louis, père's son Pierre's wife Marie-Josèphe Bertaud gave birth to a daughter, Anne-Louise, at La Bonaban near La Gouesnière in April 1759, a little over a month after the family reached France, but the girl died the following August, only four months old.  Marie-Josèphe gave Pierre six more children there and in the nearby suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer:  Jean-Pierre at Bonnaban in June 1761; Louis-Joseph at St.-Servan in April 1764; Marie-Barbe in February 1766; Olivier-Théodore in November 1767; Hélène-Rosalie in June 1769; and Louis-Toussaint in October 1772.  Meanwhile, Louis, père died at St.-Servan in June 1763, age 69.  His third son Ambroise married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians François Henry and Marie Dugas, at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Servan in February 1763.  They settled at St.-Servan, where Marguerite gave him three children:  Janvier-Pierre in April 1765; Jean-Louis in January 1767 but died the following August; and Marguerite-Josèphe in July 1768 but died at age 4 in October 1772.  Louis, père's fourth son Jean married Marie-Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Bourg and Françoise Dugas, at La Gouesnière in May 1762.  They, too, settled at St.-Servan, where Marie-Françoise gave him 10 children:  Marie-Françoise-Jeanne in July 1764; Anne-Josèphe in September 1766; Marguerite-Olive in October 1769; Jean-Jacques in August 1771; Jean-Jacques in August 1771; Pierre le jeune in c1773; Laurentine-Urienne in July 1776; Hélène-Apolline in November 1778 but died the following April; Louis le jeune in c1779; Jean-Baptiste in c1781; and another Hélène in January 1785.  Meanwhile, Louis, père's granddaugher Anne, by his son Joseph, died at St.-Servan in December 1767, age 12.  She had been Joseph's only child.  Louis, père's widow, Anne Brasseur, died at St.-Servan in May 1782, age 82. 

Evidently none of Louis, père's remaining sons participated in the large settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou during the early 1770s, nor did they join their fellow exiles to the lower Loire port of Nantes later in the decade.  They remained, instead, in the St.-Malo area, where they raised their families and did what they could to adjust to life in the mother country.  But life in France must not have been very appealing to two of the Longuépée brothers.  When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Ambroise and Jean Longuépée, along with hundreds of their fellow Acadians, agreed to take it.  The Longuépée's older brother Pierre and his family chose to remain in France.267

Marant

According to the Acadian Memorial in St. Martinville, Joseph Marant, born in c1729, was Acadian.  He married Angélique Dugas in c1755 probably at Chignecto.  Soon after their marriage, the British deported them to South Carolina.  In August 1763, colonial officials, who for some reason called him him a Moreau, counted Joseph and Angélique still in the colony.  With them were two Ovillion, actually Orillion, orphans, ages 13 and 11.  They evidently went to French St.-Domingue with other Acadians from South Carolina in 1764, and they were among the hand full of Acadians on the sugar island who hooked up with refugees from Halifax heading to New Orleans via Cap-Français in early 1765.338

Martin dit Barnabé

By 1755, descendants of Barnabé Martin and Jeanne Pelletret could be found at Annapolis Royal, Chignecto, Chepoudy in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered the family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Barnabé Martins may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  By then, the trois-rivières area had become the heart of Acadian resistance to British control of Nova Scotia, so the Barnabé Martins at Chepoudy could not have escaped the consequences of living in such a place.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Barnabé Martins may have been among the area Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  If so, they, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  The British rounded up Paul dit Barnabé's two daughters and their families--Marguerite and her husband Joseph Olivier, and Marie-Madeleine and her husband Anselme LeBlanc--at Chignecto and deported them to South Carolina.  Paul dit Barnabé, his wife Marguerite Cyr, and two of their sons escaped the British and sought refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean before moving to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Their Barnabé Martin cousins at nearby Chepoudy also escaped the British and sought refuge up the shore or moved on to Canada.

The Barnabé Martins still living in the Annapolis valley suffered a similar fate.  The British deported two younger sons of Étienne dit Barnabé--François, wife Françoise Lord, and their children; and brother Jean and his wife Madeleine Richard--to New York in December 1755, but most their siblings and cousins at Annapolis Royal escaped the redcoats.  After a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed to Chepoudy the following spring and followed their cousins to the refuge on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  Some continued up the St.-Jean portage to Canada and resettled in various communities below Québec,  where at least two of them died in a smallpox epidemic that struck the exiles in and around the Canadian capital between the summer of 1757 and the spring of 1758.  Other Barnabé Martins from Annapolis Royal sought protection in several refugee camps on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore. 

Living in territory controlled by France, Acadians on Île St.-Jean escaped the fate of their cousins in Nova Scotia during the summer and fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats gathered up most of the habitants on the island and transported them to France.  If Ambroise dit Barnabé, twice a widower, and his many children were still at Malpèque on the northwest shore of Île St.-Jean in 1758, they would have been among the dozens of islanders who escaped the British and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Records show that no Barnabé Martin was deported to France from Île St.-Jean or Île Royale. 

However, Barnabé Martins did end up in the mother country, but by a different route.  Michel, son of Étienne dit Barnabé, and his wife Marie-Madeleine Girouard of Annapolis Royal had daughters but no sons.  Michel died at Annapolis Royal in September 1747, age 34.  Marie-Madeleine remarried to Michel Aubois of Pobomcoup at Annapolis Royal seven years later, and they evidently settled in the Cap-Sable area.  In the fall of 1755, according to Bona Arsenault, Marie-Madeleine's Barnabé Martin daughter Marguerite, who would have been age 12, escaped to Canada with an uncle.  According to Arsenault, the British deported Marie-Madeleine's daughters Marie-Josèphe and Françoise, ages 15 and 13, to England, no date given, which implies that they had been sent to Virginia first.  No British deportation vessel went from Annapolis Royal to Virginia in the fall of 1755, so the girls were either at Minas then, perhaps with their mother and stepfather, or, more likely, they reached England via another route, perhaps directly from Nova Scotia.  A possible scenario is that, while the Barnabé girls were living with their stepfather and mother at Pobomcoup, British Rangers arrived in September 1758 after the fall of Louisbourg, captured many of the habitants in the Cap-Sable area, and transported them to Georges Island, Halifax, where they were held for a few weeks before the British sent them on to France.  These Cap-Sable exiles reached Le Havre in early 1759 with some of the Acadians deported to France from the Maritime islands.  Michel Aubois and his charges, however, may have been among the Cap-Sable habitants who escaped into the woods when the Rangers struck the area that autumn.  If so, they did not remain free for long.  In late June 1759, unable to survive in the wilderness, they surrendered to another British force and were held on Georges Island until early November, when they were shipped aboard the transport Mary to England, which they reached in late December.  Most of these Cap-Sable exiles were trans-shipped from England to Cherbourg and other French ports, where they arrived in mid-January 1760.  The Barnabé Martin girls, their mother, and stepfather evidently remained in the British Isles.  Oldest daughter Marie-Josèphe married French surgeon Louis Courtin of Dunois, north central France, probably a fellow prisoner of war, at Cork, Ireland, in September 1761.  One suspects that the rest of her sisters, other than Marguerite, who had gone to Canada, were with her in Ireland as well, having gone there from England--among the few Acadian exiles to sojourn in the Emerald Isle.  In the spring of 1763, after the war finally ended, the sisters likely were repatriated to Morlaix in northwest Brittany with the Acadians who had been held in England since 1756.  They were still at Morlaix in 1764.  Their mother, and perhaps their stepfather, remained in Ireland.  Marie-Madeleine Girouard died at Kinsale, Ireland, in September 1765, age 51.  Late that year, in France, the Barnabé Martin sisters followed other exiles repatriated from the British Isles to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Louis Courtin and Marie-Josèphe Martin were counted with two daughters, ages 6 and 1, on the island that November.  Also counted there in 1765 were sisters Françoise, age 23, and Anastasie, one of the twins, age 15.  Françoise, at age 35, married Sylvestre, 53-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jean Trahan and Marie-Charlotte Comeau and widower of Ursule Darois, of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, near Sauzon on the north end of the island in June 1777 and died there in January 1781, age 39.  In May 1778, Anastasie, at age 28, married Jean-Baptiste-Joseph, 32-year-old son of Joseph Cordouan and Jeanne Rousset of Velay in southeastern France, at Sauzon.  Jean-Baptiste-Joseph worked on a tobacco farm.  Anastasie died near Sauzon in April 1779, age 33, perhaps from complications of childbirth.  One wonders what happened to the younger Barnabé Martin sisters Anne and Nathalie, who would have been ages 20 and 17 in 1765.  They likely had followed their mother, stepfather, and older sisters into exile, but they may not have made it to France.  One record insists that Marie Martin, wife of Louis Courtin, died on Belle-Île-en-Mer in May 1804.  Other records, followed here, show that, as a widow with four Courtin children--three daughters and a son, ages 22 to 11--Marie-Josèphe Martin dit Barnabé emigrated to Louisiana from France aboard the third of the Seven Ships in 1785.  From New Orleans, she and her children followed their fellow passengers to Baton Rouge.  She was, in fact, the only member of her immediate family to go to the Spanish colony, and the only Barnabé Martin to go to Louisiana from France. 

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, one of which was Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and  retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the Acadians and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  Antoine Marin, perhaps Martin, and his family of three were among the 1,003 exiles who appear on a list, dated October 24, complied by French officers on the eve of formal surrender.  During the following months, other exiles in the area either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces and, along with their compatriots from Restigouche, were held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British officials counted Pierre, perhaps a Barnabé Martin, at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in July 1762.  A year later, in August 1763, British officials counted Barnabé Martins on Georges Island, Halifax harbor:  Aulenoize, probably Ambroise dit Barnabé, père, and three children; EnbeRoize, probably Ambroise dit Barnabé, fils, his wife, and six children; and brother Joseph dit Barnabé and his wife.

At war's end, most of the Barnabé Martins still in North America were not languishing in Nova Scotia compounds or being held in a British seaboard colony.  They were liviing, instead, in Canada, where many of them had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles such as themselves.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Barnabé Martin began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the late 1760s, they could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at L'Assomption, Repentigny, and St.-Jacques de l'Achigan; and on the lower St. Lawrence on Île d'Orléans and at Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pocatière and Kamouraska.  In present-day New Brunwick, they settled at Baie-des-Ouines, now Bay du Vin, on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and at Madawaska on upper Rivière St.-Jean along the western border of the province.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Barnabé Martins still languishing in seaboard colonies at war's end, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Most of the Acadians in New England and New York chose to repatriate to Canada, but Barnabé Martins there chose to go elsewhere.  Back in May 1756, colonial officials in New York counted Francis Martain, wife Françoise Lord, and five children at Easthampton, Long Island, in Suffolk County; and John Martin, his first wife Madeleine Richard, and two children at Oyster Bay, Long Island, not far from his brother François.  Both families were still in the colony in 1763, Jean now remarried to fellow Acadian Marie-Élisabeth Maillet.  To escape British rule, the brothers chose to resettle on Martinique in the French Antilles, which they reached by September 1764, when François's son Jean-Baptiste was baptized "dans la paroisse du Fort" at age 4.  François's daughter Marie-Jacqueline was baptized at St.-Pierre on the island in October 1764, age 6 1/2.  François's son Pierre-Marthe died at Au Cabet, today's Le Cabet, on the northwest shore of the island in May 1765, age 1.  Jean's son Joseph died at Au Cabet the following October, age 4.  François's daughter Rosalie, also called Rose, married Pierre, son of Michel Merloteau or Merlateau and Catherine Lacombe of Mondacom, Sarlat-la-Canéda, France, east of Bordeaux, at Au Carbet in February 1767, and died at Le Carnéage on the neighboring island of Ste.-Lucie the following December.  François died on Martinique between February and December 1767, in his early 50s.  His daughter Marie-Madeleine married Alexis, son of Jean Beranger and Françoise Villar of Surillac, Vavarais, France, at Au Cabet in November 1770.  Alexis was a sergeant in the Company Senzy, regiment of Modoc, and was working in the pottery of M. Thomazeau at the time of the wedding.  François's second son Joseph married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Zacharie Richard and Élisabeth Blanchard, at La Mouillage, today's Le Marin, on the south shore of Martinique in June 1771.  Their daughter Adélaïde died at Au Carbet in February 1780, age 7 months.  Joseph, a widower, died at La Mouillage in April 1783, age 36.  François's fourth son Jean-Baptiste married Madeleine-Eulalie, daughter of Gilles-Yves Renaud and Anne-Marguerite Maubillon, at La Mouillage in October 1780.  François's daughter Marie-Anne also married a Renaud on the island and remarried to Vincent, son of Élie Bouteiller and Françoise-Rose Douet of Prêcheur, Martinique, at La Mouillage in November 1789.  Vincent was a silversmith.  Meanwhile, François's younger brother Jean worked as a master carpenter before becoming a merchant on the island.  His daughter Louise-Robertine married Alexandre, son of Jean Gautier and Marie-Anne Tessier of St.-Germain, Falaise, France, at La Mouillage in February 1779.  Alexandre, like his father-in-law, was a merchant on the island.  Other Acadian exiles went to Martinique, but no other Acadian family could match in size the two branches of the Martin family who settled there. 

Two Barnabé Martin sisters deported with their husbands to South Carolina in 1755 decided at war's end that, in order to escape British rule, they, too, would resettle in the French Antilles, but they did not go to Martinique.  While the end-of-war  treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean region and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  The first of them reached Cap-Français in late 1763.  More followed in 1764.  The Barnabé Martin sisters and their husbands went to Môle St.-Nicolas, but their experience there was not a happy one, at least not for older sister Marguerite.  She, husband Joseph Olivier, and their infant son joined one of the expeditions from Halifax or Maryland that came through Cap-Français in 1765 or 1766 on their way to New Orleans--among the relatively few Acadian exiles who emigrated to Louisiana directly from the French Antilles.  Spanish authorities counted the couple at New Orleans in July 1767.  Younger sister Marie-Madeleine and her husband Anselme LeBlanc remained in St.-Domingue.  Anselme died at Môle St.-Nicolas in August 1776, in his late 30s.  Marie-Madeleine remarried to René, fils, son of René Pointier and Françoise Laroche of St.-Martin d'Angers, France, at Môle St.-Nicolas in January 1779.  René, fils was a master bricklayer.  Marie-Madeleine remarried again--her third marriage--to Louis, fils, son of Louis Faligaud and Perrine Morillon of Bordeaux and widower of Anne Ragot, at Môle in August 1782. 

Barnabé Martins being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to the French Antilles, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Barnabé Martins, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 16 were Barnabé Martins.317

Mazerolle

In 1755, descendants of Louis Mazerolle dit Saint-Louis and Geneviève Forest could be found at Grand-Pré in the Minas Basin and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered the family even farther. 

When the British rounded up the Acadians at Minas in the autumn of 1755, they deported them to Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New England.  Joseph Mazerolle, second wife Anne Daigre, and most of their children ended up in Massachusetts. Son Simon, age 12, became separated from the family and ended up on a ship headed for Virginia.  In mid-November 1755, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in the lower James River while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Acadians from one vessel were moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk. The following spring, the governor, his council, and colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the papists must go.  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone:  299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  They were packed into warehouses in the English ports, where many of them died of smallpox.  By 1763, more than half of them were dead.  Simon Mazerolle, age 20 that year, was among the survivors. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  While his family was still languishing at Boston, Simon Mazerolle landed at St.-Malo in May 1763 aboard the transport Dorothée.  He crossed with the family of Pierre Aucoin, described on the ship's roll as Simon's "brother," but they were not kin.  Simon, now age 20, followed the Aucoins to Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of the Breton port and became a rope maker.  He married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Claude Trahan and Hélène Aucoin of Rivière-aux-Canards, at Plouër in November 1763.  Marguerite also had endured exile in Virginia, deportation to England, and had come to France aboard La Dorothée, so she and Simon may known one another since childhood.  They lived at nearby Pleslin from 1764 to 1766 before moving to the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in 1767.  Their son Simon-Pierre, born at Pleslin in June 1765, died at St.-Servan in April 1767, age 22 months.  Simon and Marguerite had at least four more children at St.-Servan:  Marie-Perpétué in April 1767; Élisabeth-Marie in August 1769; Anne-Françoise in July 1771; and Étienne in c1777--five children, two sons and three daughters, between 1765 and 1777.  During the 1760s and 1770s, they did not participate in the settlement schemes on Belle-Île-en-Mer with other exiles from England nor in an even larger settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou.  By September 1784, they had left St.-Malo, crossed Brittany, and were living in the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Despite the loss of only one child and long-time residence in the St.-Malo area, life in the mother country must have had its terrors for Simon and his family.  When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Simon Mazerolle and wife Marguerite, like most of the Acadians in France, agreed to take it. 

In North America, Joseph Mazerolle, wife Anne Daigre, and the rest of his family languished with hundreds of other exiles in Massachusetts.  They do not appear on the list of Acadians in that colony in August 1763, but a Joseph ____ with a family of seven appears on a list of "the French Who Wish to Go to Canada" from Massachusetts compiled in June 1766.  (He may have been the ___ Ma ____ on the same list with a family of four, or the Joseph ____ with a family of eight.)  Later that year or in early 1767, Joseph and his family repatriated not to Canada but to greater Acadia.  Oldest son Joseph, fils's marriage to fellow Acadian Rosalie Thibodeau, made at Boston in January 1764, was "rehabilitated" at Québec in February 1767, or at least the rehabilitation was recorded there.  The family settled at Madawaska on upper Rivière St.-Jean on the border of present-day Maine and New Brunswick.  Joseph, père's youngest son Pierre, by second wife Anne Daigre, married fellow Acadian Brigitte Trahan in November 1776 (the marriage, too, was recorded at Québec) and also settled at Madawaska.  Joseph, père died there by 1783, in his late 60s or early 70s.  Another branch of the family, recorded on lower Rivière St.-Jean in the mid-1780s, settled on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore in what became eastern New Brunswick.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of what became Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Joseph, père's oldest sister Cécile, her husband Philippe Roy, and their family, like brother Joseph, had remained at Minas, but they were not deported to Massachusetts or Virginia in the fall of 1755.  They were among the many Minas habitants who ended up in Maryland.  When colonial officials counted the Acadians there in July 1763, Cécile LeRoy, a widow, was living at Lower Marlborough in the interior of the province with two of her Roy children, Bonaventure and Élisabeth.  None of them followed hundreds of their fellow Acadians to Louisiana later in the decade. 

One wonders what was the fate of Joseph and Cécile's sister Marie.  Unlike her parents and siblings, she remained in the French Maritimes, where she married twice, into the Darembourg and Philippe dit La Roche families, and settled on Rivière-du-Nord-Est in the interior of Île St.-Jean with her second husband by August 1752.  After the fall of the French fortress of Louisbourg in July 1758, the British deported most of the island Acadians to France.  Marie either had died by then or did not survive the crossing to France.268

Melanson

In 1755, descendants of brothers Pierre, fils and Charles dit La Ramée Melanson, sons of Pierre Laverdure the Huguenot and his English wife Priscilla _____, could be found at Annapolis Royal, in the Minas Basin, at Chignecto and Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and on Île St. Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Melansons may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, area Acadians served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  The family of Ambroise Melanson, fils of Chignecto were among the exiles sent to Georgia. 

Melansons at Minas and Pigiguit were deported to Connecticut, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia that fall.  The Acadians shipped off to the Old Dominion endured a fate worse than the other Minas Acadians deported from the region.  In mid-November 1755, when five transports appeared unexpectedly at Hampton Roads, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie protested their deportation to his colony without his consent.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia the colony's leaders pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Acadians from one vessel were moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  The following spring, the governor and his council and the colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the papists must go.  In May, the first shipment of Acadians in hired vessels left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone:  299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exles in all by one count.  They were packed into warehouses in the English ports.  Melansons were held at Bristol, where some of them died in a smallpox epidemic soon after their arrival, and at the Channel port of Southampton. 

The British rounded up Melansons at Annapolis Royal in the fall of 1755 and shipped them to Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York.  However, most of the Melansons at Annapolis Royal escaped the British.  After enduring a hard winter on the Bay of Fundy shore, they crossed to Chepoudy the following spring and took refuge either on the upper Petitcoudiac or on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  Some of them joined hundreds of other exiles in refugee camps at Shediac, Richibouctou, and Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they fought starvation, hard winters, and British raiding parties in the following years.  Others moved on to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs or to Canada via the lower St. Lawrence or the Rivière St.-Jean portage.  At least 10 Melansons from Annapolis Royal and Chignecto perished in a smallpox epidemic that struck Acadian exiles in and around Québec city between the summer of 1757 and the spring of 1758.

Living in territory controlled by France, the few Melansons on Île St.-Jean escaped the fate of their cousins in Nova Scotia.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up the habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France.  Most of the island Melansons escaped the British and joined other refugees on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, but some of them ended up on transports headed to St.-Malo.  Joseph Melanson, fils of Minas, age 36, wife Anne Bourg, age 40, and their six children--Anne-Josèphe, called Josèphe, age 12; Germain, age 10; Marie, age 7; Joseph III, age 4; Osite, age 3; and another Joseph III, age 2--crossed on one of the five British transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, and John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November with 1,033 Acadians aboard, bound for the Breton port.  Despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other vessels, the Five Ships reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  Only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels.  Joseph, fils and his two oldest children, Josèphe and Germain, survived the crossing, but the three youngest children died at sea, and Anne and daughter Marie died in a St.-Malo hospital in February and March 1759, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Joseph, fils and his children settled at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo, where Joseph, fils remarried to Ursule, 47-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Hébert and Marguerite Landry and widow of Alexandre Bourg, in April 1761.  She gave him no more children.  Daughter Anne-Josèphe, by first wife Anne, married fellow Joseph, son of fellow Acadians François Bourg and Marguerite Hébert, at St.-Énogat in January 1767.  She gave him 10 children there.  One wonders what happened to Joseph, fils's son Germain.  Did he also marry in France? 

Two Melanson families from Île St.-Jean ended up at another French port, but they did not remain.  Étienne Melanson of Minas, age 34, wife Françoise Granger, age 30, and their three children--Joseph, age 11; Marie, age 7; and Élisabeth, age 6--landed at the northern fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie probably aboard the transport Neptune, also part of the 11-ship convoy that left Chédabouctou Bay in late November 1758.  Between 1759 and 1763, Françoise gave Étienne three more children in St.-Nicolas Parish at Boulogne-sur-Mer:  Marie-Geneviève, called Geneviève, born soon after their arrival; Marguerite-Françoise in January 1761; and Marie-Josèphe-Lucie in September 1763.  In May 1766, Étienne and his family went to St.-Malo aboard the brigantine Hazard.  They settled in the surburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where daughter Françoise-Dorothée was born in August.  In 1770, they moved on to Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Servan, where son Joseph married Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Broussard and Madeleine Landry, in January 1772.  Élisabeth gave Joseph two sons in the Pleudihen area:  Joseph-Marie born at la Ville de Cain in November 1772, but he died at nearby La Coquenais in March 1780, age 8; and Charles-Marie born at La Coquenais in December 1776.  Joseph died probably at Pleudihen by November 1784, when Élisabeth remarried there to a Boudrot from Nantes.  Meanwhile, Étienne's wife Françoise Granger died at La Tourniolle near Pleudihen in September 1778, in her mid-50s.  Étienne, at age 60, remarried to Frenchwoman Charlotte Launay, who was in her late 30s, probably at La Tourniolle in c1784.  She gave him another daughter, Françoise-Guillemette, at La Tourniolle in February 1785, but the baby--his seventh child by two wives--died three days later.  Charlotte died eight days after their daughter's birth, probably from complications of childbirth.  Étienne evidently did not marry again.  Pierre Melanson III of Minas, age 24, wife Marie-Madeleine Aucoin, age 21, and their infant daughter Marie-Madeleine also landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer in 1759.  Pierre III worked there as a sailor.  Their daughter died in St.-Nicolas Parish in January 1759 probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Wife Marie-Madeleine died in St.-Nicolas Parish in January 1760, age 22.  Pierre III remarried to Marie-Louise, 27-year-old daughter of locals Charles Guilbon and Marie-Marguerite _____, in St.-Nicolas Parish in September 1761.  Marie-Louise gave Pierre III four more children in the parish:  Marie-Louise born in July 1762; Pierre-Louis-François in September 1764; Louis-François-Marie in November 1765 but died at age 8 months in July 1766; and Charles born in April 1768.  In 1773, this family also left Boulogne-sur-Mer for St.-Malo. 

A large Melanson family, that of Jean dit Jani of Annapolis Royal, youngest son of Charles dit La Ramée, ended up in France in January 1760 by a different route.  Most members of the family were deported to Cherbourg in 1759-60, but, as these dates suggest, they were not sent there with their island cousins in late 1758.  The movements of Jani's family from 1755 to 1759 are difficult to determine.  A possible scenario could be that in the fall of 1755, Jani and his family escaped the British roundup at Annapolis Royal and, after spending a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed to Chepoudy the following spring and took refuge at the Acadian settlements on lower Rivière St.-Jean.  In 1756 and 1757, while other exiles, including Jani's siblings, moved on to Canada, Jani and most members of his family may have remained on the St.-Jean, probably at Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas.  Their respite from British oppression would have been short-lived.  In September 1758, after the fall of Louisbourg, British forces struck the Acadian settlements at Cap-Sable and then established a garrison, Fort Frederick, at the mouth of Rivière St.-Jean.  In October, the British transported the Acadians they had captured at Cap-Sable to the prison compound on Georges lsland, Halifax harbor, and, a few weeks later, deported them to Le Havre, France.  In November 1758, British forces moved up Rivière St.-Jean, burning their way through the lower Acadians settlements.  The following February, Moses Hazen's New-English rangers pillaged and burned Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas and other villages and, in early March, murdered two Acadian women and their children at Ste.-Anne.  The rangers captured several families in the area, perhaps including Jean dit Jani and his family.  Along with more Acadians captured at Cap-Sable, the British transported the St.-Jean exiles to the prison compound at Halifax.  In November 1759, along with other prisoners on Georges Island, the Melansons would have been shunted aboard the transport Mary and deported to England, and English authorities would have sent them on to Cherbourg, France, where they would have landed during the second week of January 1760.  Jani's wife Marie-Madeleine Petitot died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in late January 1760, age 60, two weeks after she and her family would have reached the Norman port.  Jani's fourth son Pierre, called Jean by the recording priest, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in early February 1760, age 30, still a bachelor.  Jani died there a few weeks later, in his early 70s. Most of his family, including two ummarried daughters, a daughter married to a Granger, and three more sons, one of them married, had followed him and Marie-Madeleine to Cherbourg.  Second daughter Anne married Eustache Part, husband of the wife and father of three of the young children the New-English rangers had murdered on Rivière St.-Jean the previous year.  Jani's second son Claude le jeune, described by the recording priest as "de quartre Sable," died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in May 1760, age 33, also still a bachelor.  A Joseph Melanson who died there in May 1760, age 45, may have been an older son.  Youngest daughter Isabelle, called Élisabeth, counted at Cherbourg with the family in 1761, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in July 1763, age 27, still unmarried.  Jani's third son Jean, fils and his wife Anne Landry, whose mother was a Mius d'Entremont from Cap-Sable, also ended up at Cherbourg in January 1760.  French authorities counted them there in 1761, 1767, 1772, and 1775.  Jean, fils worked as a ship's carpenter in the Norman port.  Jean, fils may have died by September 1790, when French authorities counted his wife Anne at Le Havre across the Baie de Seine without him.  One wonders if they had any children.  Jani's youngest son Denis, in his early 30s, married Frenchwoman Jeanne-Françoise, daughter of Jean Langlois and Marie-Madeleine Coupex, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in January 1765.  Jeanne-Françoise gave Denis at least two children at Cherbourg:  Anne-Marie, also called Jeanne-Marie, born in December 1765; and Charles-Louis-Denis or Louis-Charles-Denis in September 1769.  In 1767, French officials counted Denis and his family still in the Norman port and noted that he was a 35-year-old disabled fisherman.  Son Charles-Louis-Denis died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in March 1772, age 2 1/2.  The rest of the family was still at Cherbourg the following September, when Denis was described as a fisherman and day laborer and wife Marie-Madeleine as a spinner, but they did not remain. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including many Melansons, were repatriated to France.  In late May, Jean Melanson of Minas, age 53, a widower, and two of his children--Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, age 27; and François, age 23--crossed from Bristol to St.-Malo aboard the transport Dorothée and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near some of their Melanson cousins.  Daughter Madeleine married Charles, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Gautrot and Agnès LeBlanc and widower of Catherine Michel, at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Servan in September 1763.  Pierre Melanson le jeune of Minas, age 50, wife Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, age 44, and their seven children--Marie, age 17; Marguerite, age 15; Joseph, age 13; Jean-Baptiste, age 11; Anne-Marie, age 6; Marie-Madeleine, age 4; and Marie-Marthe, age 2--also crossed from England on Dorothée.  They settled near Melanson cousins at St.-Énogat, where daughter Rose-Rosalie, their eighth child, was born the following October.  Also in late May, Paul Melanson, age 16, crossed to St.-Malo from Southampton aboard the transport Ambition with the family of his uncle, Joseph Hébert.  Paul lived with them at St.-Servan until February 1766, when he returned to greater Acadia to work in a French-controlled fishery on one of the islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland. 

In November 1765, cousins Jean and Pierre le jeune Melanson (Jean a descendant of Charles; Pierre le jeune of Pierre, fils) joined dozens of other exiles from England, as well as some island Acadians, in a settlement venture on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Jean and his son François settled at Le Cosquet near Locmaria on the southwest end of the island.  Pierre le jeune, wife Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, and seven of their children also settled there.  Their oldest daughter Marie married into the Daigre family at Le Palais on the east end of the island in November 1765 and died near Locmaria in May 1771, age 26.  Meanwhile, Pierre le jeune died at Locmaria in November 1766, age 51.  By the mid-1770s, his widow Marie-Madeleine and some of her children had resettled at Concarneau near Quimper in southwest Brittany, where a daughter and two of her sons married locals, created families of their own, one of them a large one, and the sons worked as sailors for the French Republic.  Marie-Madeleine died at Concarneau in June 1791, age 71.  Daughter Marie-Marthe, who had remained on Belle-Île-en-Mer, married into the Granger family at Locmaria in July 1783.  Meanwhile, Jean Melanson died probably at Le Crosquet on the island in April 1782, age 71.  One wonders what happened to his son François. 

In 1773, Melansons from two of the coastal cities participated in another, even grander, settlement scheme, this one in the interior province of Poitou near the city of Châtellerault.  Pierre III, a sailor no more, second wife Marie-Louise Guilbon, and their children from Boulogne-sur-Mer settled at St.-Phele-de-Maillé southeast of Châtellerault.  When, after two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault to the lower Loire port of Nantes, Pierre III and his family remained in Poitou.  Marie-Louise gave him another son, Cherubain, born at St.-Phele-de-Maillé in c1776.  In March 1778, at age 42, Pierre III remarried again--his third marriage--to Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Renault and Marie-Anne Barbudeau, at Archigny south of Châtellerault.  Madeleine gave him two more children at St.-Phele-de-Maillé:  Jérôme-Marie born in February 1779; and Perrine in May 1780 but died the following September--six children, three daughters and three sons, by three wives, only two of whom seem to have survived childhood.  Wife Madeleine died at St.-Phele-de-Maillé in August 1780, age 37, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth.  Pierre III's son Pierre-Louis-François, by second wife Marie-Louise Guilbon, died at St-Phelle-de-Maillé in December 1780, age 16.  Pierre III died at St.-Phele-de-Maillé, in January 1781, age 45.  Daughter Marie-Louise, by Paul III's second wife, married Jean, son of locals Silvin Debien and Madeleine Bery of Ste.-Radegonde Parish, at St.-Phele-de-Maillé in June 1784.  Disabled fisherman Denis Melanson from Cherbourg, his wife Jeanne-Françoise Langlois (if she were still living), and their daughter also went to Poitou in 1773.  In November 1775, after two years of effort, Denis, now a widower, and his daughter Jeanne-Marie chose to retreat with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes.  They settled in the suburb of Chantenay, where Denis died in August 1776, age 43.  One wonders what became of his daughter. 

When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, most of the Acadians still residing in the kingdom agreed to take it.  Not the Melansons.  Of the dozens of them still living in France in 1785--in the St.-Malo area, at Cherbourg, Concarneau/Quimper, Chantenay, St.-Phele-de-Maillé, and on Belle-Île-en-Mer--only two elected to go to the Spanish colony where many of their kinsmen from Halifax and Maryland had settled two decades earlier.  Island Acadian Joseph Melanson, fils of St.-Énogat, age 64, went to Louisiana with second wife Ursule Hébert, age 69, but none of his children followed.  Madeleine Melanson of Belle-Île-en-Mer, age 49, went to Louisiana with husband Charles Gautrot, also age 49, and two of their children, a son and a daughter, ages 14 and 5.  One wonders if the many Melansons who chose remain in France, especially the ones in southwest Brittany, retained their Acadian identity.

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  A British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouiche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  No Melansons appeared on the list.  Meanwhile, other refugees, including Melansons, either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  One of the compounds was Fort Edward at Pigiguit, near the old Melanson homesteads.  Here, in July 1762, British officials counted Jean dit Jeannotte Melanson and his family of three; and Pierre Melanson and his family of three.  The following month, they counted Pierre Melanson and his family of four; Charles dit Litan Melanson; Amand Melanson; and Jean Melanson.  Another prison compound stood at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto, where Melansons also had lived.  Here, in the summer of 1763, British officials counted Pierre dit Parrotte Melanson and his family of four; Charles dit Charlot Melanson and his family of six; and the Pierre Melanson who had been counted at Fort Edward the previous year and his family of five.  Exiles were held also at Annapolis Royal, probably in old Fort Anne, near old Melanson homesteads; and in the fishing center at Chédabouctou on the northeast Atlantic coast, where Joseph Melanson languished in the early 1760s.  The oldest and largest compound was on Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor, where, in the summer of 1763, British officials counted Honoré Melanson and his family of eight. 

The war over, Melansons still living in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intensions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Prompted by French efforts to lure them away, many Melansons appeared on French repatriation lists circulated in Atlantic colonies during the summer of 1763.  In Massachusetts, Melansons still in the colony that August included Benoist, actually Bénoni, wife Marie, and their five children, four sons and a daughter; Jean, wife Françoise, and their son; and Simon and wife Marie.  In June 1766, colonial officials in Massachusetts listed Acadians still in the Bay Colony seeking to go to Canada.  They included Jean Melanson and his family of three; and Marie Benois, widow of Benony Melanson, and her family of six.  In Connecticut in June 1763, widow Melanson--Anne Granger, widow of Charles Melanson III--and her family of four were still in the colony.  In Pennsylvania that June, Marie Melançon, "a girl," still resided in the colony.  Most of the Melansons still living in the seaboard colonies at war's end could be found in Maryland, where they appear on a repatriation list compiled in July 1763.  They included, at Snow Hill on the colony's Eastern Shore, Alexandre Melanson, wife Osite Hébert, sons Jean, Jacques, Joseph, and Étienne, and daughter Madeleine; Marguerite Broussard, widow of Jacques Melanson, and daughters Madeleine, Élisabeth, and Marguerite; Madeleine LeBlanc, widow of Jean-Baptiste Melanson, and sons Honoré and Charles and daughters Marie and Élisabeth; Paul Melanson, wife Marie Thériot, daughters Madeleine and Anne and sons Jean and Paul, fils; and Joseph Melanson, wife Anne Landry, and son Olivier.  At Annapolis could be found Joseph Melanson, second wife Marguerite Hébert, daughters Marie, Anne, Madeleine, Marie-Josèphe, Marguerite, Rose, and Geneviève, and sons Baptiste and Pierre; and another Joseph Melanson and wife Anastasie.  At Baltimore were Marie-Josèphe Melanson, husband Pierre Poirier, and two LeBlanc children, perhaps from a previous marriage; and Amand Melanson, wife Anne Babin, son Joseph, and daughters Anne and Marguerite. 

Most of the Acadians in New England, New York, and Pennsylvania chose to resettle in Canada, where many of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of the Melanson brothers began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Melansons from both families could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Rivière-aux-Glaises now Gentilly, Iberville, Laprairie, Lotbinière, Louiseville, Maskinongé, Montréal, Nicolet, St.-Grégoire, St.-Étienne-de-Grès, St.-Guillaume d'Upton, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, St.-Jean-sur-Richelieu, St.-Luc, and Yamachiche.  On the lower St.-Lawrence, they settled at Kamouraska, L'Isle-Verte, Montmagny, and St.-Vallier de Bellechasse.  They also could be found in present-day New Brunswick at Barachois, Cap-Pelé, Memramcook, Prés-d'en-Haut, Nepisiguit now Bathurst, Richibucto, Scoudouc, Shemouge, and St.-Louis-de-Kent on the Gulf of St. Lawrence; and on Rivière St.-Jean.  In Nova Scotia, they settled on St. Mary's Bay at Grosse-Coques and Church Point; and at Chezzetcook, Météghan, Minudie, Ste.-Anne-du-Ruisseau-de-l'Anguille, and Windsor in other parts of the province.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies, in an effort to escape British rule, chose to resettle in the French Antilles, especially St.-Domingue, but only one Melanson was among them.  François Melanson, called Menançon, "of Sabans, native of Acadie," no age given, died "on the farm of M. Lesmesy" near Fort-Dauphin, French St.-Domingue, in October 1763, probably soon after he reached the sugar colony.  One wonders who his parents may have been, if he was married, and from whence he had come to the French colony. 

Other exiles from the Nova Scotia compounds and the New-English colonies, including Melansons, chose to escape British rule by resettling on St.-Pierre and Miquelon, French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  After the war, Joseph Melanson left the prison compound at Chédabouctou and followed other exiles from Nova Scotia to Île Miquelon, where he married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Hébert and Anne Arseneau, in July 1765.  Anne gave Joseph a daughter, Anne-Adélaïde, born on the island in October 1766.  French officials counted him, his wife, and their daughter still there in May 1767.  They likely were among the habitants/fishermen on the Newfoundland islands who French officials, obeying a royal decree, sent to France later in the year to relieve overcrowding in the fishery.  If so, they were among the majority of the islanders who returned to Miquelon the following year.  Their second child, Marie, was born on Miquelon, not in France, in December 1769.  Anne gave Joseph three more children on the island:  Joseph born in May 1772; Anne-Marie-Josette in May 1775; and Pierre in March 1778.  Later that year, after France became an ally of the Americans during their strugge for independence against Britain, the redcoats captured the Newfoundland islands and deported the Acadians there to France.  Joseph and his family landed at La Rochelle, where he died in February 1779, age 42, perhaps from the rigors of the crossing.  After the Revolutionary War ended in 1783, another Treaty of Paris returned the Newfoundland fishery to France, and the Acadians were allowed to return to their island homes.  Joseph's widow Anne and her five children were among them.  French officials counted them on Miquelon in 1785.  Oldest daughter Anne-Adélaïde married into the Sire, probably Cyr, family on the island in February 1789.  One wonders if any of Anne Hébert's other Melanson children also created families there.  Meanwhile, in February 1766, Paul Melanson, who had been exiled from Minas to Virginia and England as a child and repatriated to St.-Malo, France, as a teenager, left France at age 19 aboard La St.-Pierre "to go reside at St. Pierre and Miquelon" to work "as a fisherman."  One wonders if he married or remained in the islands. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including a Melanson, chose to go to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including a Melanson, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, six were descendants of Pierre Melanson, fils. 

Meanwhile, the many Melansons still in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in the Chesapeake colony that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  At least 30 Melansons--the largest number of them who would go to Louisiana--were part of the first two contingents of exiles from Baltimore that reached New Orleans in September 1766 and July 1767.  Some members of the family, however, decided to remain in Maryland.  Perhaps uniquely, three of the Melansons who remained in the Chesapeake colony--a widowed father and two married daughters--having second thoughts about their decision back in the late 1760s, joined their many cousins in Spanish Louisiana during the mid-1780s.318

Michel

In 1755, descendants of François Michel dit La Ruine and Marguerite Meunier could be found at Cap-Sable and on Île St.-Jean, and those of Sr. Jacques Michel dit Saint-Michel and Catherine Comeau at Annapolis Royal, Minas, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered these large families even farther. 

In the fall of 1755, the British deported several Michel dit Saint-Michel families at Annapolis Royal to New England.  Joseph, wife Marie-Anne Boudrot and their large family ended up at Boston; and younger brother Jacques, fils, his wife Jeanne Breau, and their many children landed in Connecticut.  Their younger brother Pierre, a widower, and some of his children also went to Massachusetts.  Pierre's sons Joseph le jeune and Jean-Baptiste, one recently married, the other still in his late teens, escaped the British roundup at Annapolis Royal, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed to Chepoudy the following spring, moved on to lower Rivière St.-Jean, and followed other exiles to Canada.  In 1760, the brothers were living at St.-Pierre-les-Becquets on the upper St. Lawrence below Trois-Rivières.  Another escapee from Annapolis Royal--Anne, Jacques, fils's second daughter, also recently married--crossed the Bay of Fundy with husband Michel Brun and took refuge not in Canada but on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they and hundreds of other exiles endured more terrible winters as well as starvation.  Anne's aunt Madeleine Michel dit Saint-Michel, her husband Joseph dit L'Officier Guilbeau, and their children were rounded up at Annapolis Royal, but they did not end up in a seaboard colony.  The British placed them aboard the transport Pembroke, bound for North Carolina, but, soon after the vessel entered the Bay of Fundy, the passengers overwhelmed the officers and crew and sailed the Pembroke to the mouth of Rivière St.-Jean.  Madeleine and her family also sought refuge in the lower river settlements before moving on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore. 

Meanwhile, a cousin--François, son of Joseph, who was living at Minas in 1755--ended up on a ship bound for Virginia, where he and hundreds of other exiles sent to the Old Dominion suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  After their arrival in November and December, they languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships until, with winter approaching, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie ordered them dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond, while he and the colony's political leaders pondered their fate.  The following spring, the Virginians sent them on to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several English ports and where many died of smallpox.  François was held probably at Southampton.  He married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Daigre and Madeleine Gautrot of Minas, in c1762. 

Their cousins on Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia in 1755, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoasts rounded up most of the habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France.  One family, that of Paul dit La Ruine, fils, left Île St.-Jean before its dérangement and took refuge in Canada, but most the Michels still on the island fell into British hands.  Pierre Michel dit Saint-Michel, wife Marguerite Pitre, and their infant son crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  They all survived the crossing, but son Joseph died the following November perhaps from the rigors of the crossing.  Marie Michel, age 31, and her husband Joseph Robichaud, age 31, along with a 4-year-old orphan, crossed on one of the five British transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, or the John Samuel--which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November with 1,033 Acadians aboard, bound for St.-Malo.  Despite the mid-December storm that sank three other vessels in the convoy, the Five Ships reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  Marie and Joseph survived the crossing, but the young orphan, Anne-Josèphe Boudrot, died at sea.  Cécile Michel dit La Ruine, age 57, husband Louis Bourg, age unrecorded, and daughter Anne-Josèphe, age 15, also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  Cécile and her daughter survived the crossing, but Louis died at sea.  Cécile's niece Marguerite Michel dit La Ruine, her husband Jacques Prieur, and their children crossed aboard the Violet, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy November 1758 with the Tamerlane, the Five Ships, and other vessels, but the family did not reach St.-Malo.  In mid-December, the Violet and another transport sank in the storm off the southwest coast of England.  All 400 passengers aboard the Violet were lost. 

The island Michels did their best to create a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Pierre dit Saint-Michel and wife Marguerite Pitre, now childless, settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo, where Pierre worked as a day laborer and a carpenter.  Marguerite gave him six more children there:  Joseph-François in March 1760; Anne-Marguerite in January 1762; Marie-Madeleine in June 1764; Gertrude-Olive in February 1766; Suliac-Germain in October 1768; and Pierre-Thomas-Marie in October 1771.  Amazingly, all but one of them survived childhood. 

A member of one of the Michel families also ended up in the St.-Malo area, but she went there by a different route.  Anne, daughter of Louis dit La Ruine of Annapolis Royal married Joseph Dubois, a sailor, probably on the eve of Le Grand Dérangement and settled at Cap-Sable, which the British did not attack in 1755.  Daughter Marguerite-Ange was born there in c1757.  In September 1758, after the fall of Louisbourg that July, a British force struck the settlements in the Cap-Sable area, rounded up Acadians there, transported them to the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, and deported them to Le Havre, France.  Some of the Cap-Sable Acadians, however, likely including Anne and her family, took to the woods when the British appeared.  After enduring a terrible winter, they, along with dozens of other exiles, surrendered to the British the following summer.  They, too, were held at Georges Island.  In November 1759, the British deported them to England aboard the transport Mary.  They reached England in late December, and British authorities sent them on to Cherbourg, France, which they reached in mid-January 1760.  Another daughter, Louise-Marie, was born on the crossing aboard the Mary.  Daughter Marie-Blanche was born in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in August 1761; and Madeleine was born there in March 1763.  They crossed the Baie de Seine to Le Havre, and, in July 1768, Joseph, Anne, and their three younger daughters sailed aboard the Joseph from Le Havre to St.-Malo and settled first in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer and then at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of the Breton port.  Joseph died by November 1773, when Anne, at age 39, remarried to Félix, son of fellow Acadians Claude LeBlanc and Jeanne Dugas and widower of Marie-Josèphe Thériot, at St.-Servan. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including a Michel dit Saint-Michel, were repatriated to France.  François Michel and wife Anne Daigre, recently married, crossed from Southampton aboard L'Ambition and landed at St.-Malo in May 1763.  They settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Anne gave François eight children:  Joseph-Marie in October 1763 (so Anne must have been pregnant on the crossing from England), but the boy died at age 4 in April 1767; Marie-Madeleine in February 1765; Rose-Marguerite in March 1766; Jean-Pierre in June 1767 but died at age 5 in August 1772; Anne-Marguerite, called Marguerite in July 1768; Anne-Josèphe in January 1770; Victoire-Euphrosine, called Euphrosine, in June 1771; and François, fils in October 1773.  As the birth of their children reveal, François and Anne were not among the Acadian exiles from England who followed other exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany in late 1765. 

In 1773, the Michels at St.-Malo from both branches of the family chose to take part in yet another, even grander, settlement venture, this one in the interior of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the coastal cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault, and French authorities endorsed the scheme.  Pierre dit Saint-Michel and wife Marguerite Pitre settled near Bonneuil-Matours south of Châtellerault, where she gave him another son, Jean-Louis, in September 1774.  Cousin François dit Saint-Michel and wife Anne Daigre settled at Châtellerault, where daughter Rose-Marguerite died in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish November 1774, age 8 1/2.  Anne Michel dit La Ruine, her second husband Félix LeBlanc, and their children also settled near Châtellerault, where Félix died in November 1775.  After two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians abandoned the venture and retreated in four convoys to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  François and his family of seven, along with Anne dit La Ruine and two of her Dubois children, traveled in the third convoy, which left Châtellerault in December 1775.  Pierre and his family of nine traveled in the fourth convoy, which left Châtellerault in March 1776.

At Nantes and nearby Chantenay, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  François dit Saint-Michel and his family settled at Chantenay, where Anne gave him another son, François, fils, in March 1780--their ninth child and fourth son.  Sadly, the family lost four children there:  Marguerite died in January 1776, age 8; the first François, fils in October 1777, age 4; the second François, fils in January 1784, age 3 1/2; and Euphrosine in April 1784, age 12 1/2.  François, père also died at Chantenay, after September 1784, in his early 50s.  Cousin Pierre dit Saint-Michel and his family settled in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, where Marguerite gave him another daughter, Marie-Louise, in March 1781--their eighth child and sixth daughter.  The family also lost children at Nantes:  Jean-Louis in December 1777, age 3; and Pierre-Thomas-Marie in October 1780, age 9.  Wife Marguerite died probably in St.-Nicolas Parish by September 1784, in her early 40s.  Pierre did not remarry.  His second daughter Marie-Madeleine married into the Gautrot family at Nantes in the early 1780s.  Anne dit La Ruine also settled in St.-Nicolas Parish, where, at age 43, she remarried again--her third marriage--to Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, son of fellow Acadians René Landry and Madeleine Melanson of Grand-Pré and widower of Marie-Blanche LeBlanc, in October 1777.  Jean died by February 1785, when Anne, at age 50 or 51, remarried yet again--her fourth marriage!--to Simon-Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Olivier Daigre and Françoise Granger of Minas and widower of Marie-Madeleine Thériot, at Chantenay. 

When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, most of the Acadians still residing in the kingdom agreed to take it, Michels among them.  Pierre, now a widower, three of his unmarried children--Joseph-François, Gertrude, and Marie-Louise--and his married daughter Marguerite and her Gautrot husband; François's widow Anne Daigre and her daughters Marie-Madeleine and Anne-Josèphe; and the redoubtable Anne dit La Ruine, her fourth husband Simon-Pierre Daigre, and seven of his children, chose to go.  Two of Pierre's children--Anne-Marguerite, who would have been age 23 in 1785, and Suliac-Germain, who would have been age 17--if they were still living, did not accompany their father to the Spanish colony.  Nor did Anne dit La Ruine's two Dubois daughters. 

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and  retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to oppose a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In late October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, appeared at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Among them was Joseph Guilbeau dit L'Officier, a lieutenant of mililita (hence his dit), wife Madeleine Michel dit Saint-Michel, and their children; and Michel Brun, wife Anne Michel dit Saint-Michel, and two children.  They, along with hundreds of other exiles in the region, were held in the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, for the rest of the war.  British officials counted them there in August 1763.  Anne dit Saint-Michel, a widow with one child in August 1763, remarried to fellow Acadian Victor Comeau at Halifax soon after the counting. 

At war's end, Michels being held in the seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  In 1763 in Connecticut, Jacques Michel dit Saint-Michel, fils and his family of six, and Jacques's son Pierre Michel and wife Jean Miniot, actually Marguerite Poirier, were still in the colony.  In August of that year in Massachusetts, Widow [of Joseph, père] Michel with five sons and six daughters, and Jean Michelle, wife Nanette, and four sons were still in the Bay Colony.  Also there were Jacques dit Saint-Michel, fils's oldest son Joseph and his family, who had been counted at Newburyport two years earlier.  In June 1766, Joseph Michel, fils and his family of five appeared on a "List of Narmes of the French" still in Massachusetts "Who Wish to Go to Canada." 

As the size of the list reveals, most of the Acadians in New England, including the Michels in Massachusetts, chose to go to Canada, where some of their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of François dit La Ruine and Jacques dit Saint-Michel began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Michels from both families could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, Deshaillons, Gentilly, Pointe-aux-Trembles, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, and St.-Pierre-des-Becquets, where they were especially numerous and had been living since 1760; and on the lower St.-Lawrence at St.-Charles de Bellechasse across from Québec city.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies also chose to resettle in the French Antilles, away from British rule.  Even while the end-of-war treaty was still being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle-St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean region and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for colony's major planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  Among the Acadians who chose to go to St.-Domingue were Jacques Michel dit Saint-Michel, fils and his family, including married son Pierre, from Connecticut.  In August 1764, they arrived at Port-au-Prince and were sent not to Môle-St.-Nicolas on the other end of the island but to nearby Mirebalais in the interior to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  The move proved disastrous for the family:  Jacques, fils's youngest son Isidore died in September 1764, age 12; Jacques, fils died in October, age 60; his daughter Marguerite died in December, age 24; and son Pierre's wife Marguerite Poirier died in February 1765, age 24.  Soon after Marguerite's death, Pierre left Mirebalais and hooked up with Acadian exiles from Halifax coming though Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans--one of the few Acadians to go to Louisiana directly from the French Antilles.  Pierre's brother Basile remained in the sugar colony, at least for a time.  He married Cécile, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Doucet and Marie Robichaud, probably at Le Havre, France, date unrecorded.  Cécile and her family had been deported from Île Royale to France in 1758 and landed in that port, where they remained.  One wonders what compelled Basile to leave St.-Domingue for Le Havre, and when did he make the voyage.  In 1785, despite having a brother in the Spanish colony, Basile and his wife did not follow their fellow exiles in France to Louisiana.  Basile died "at his home on Petit Quai Notre Dame, Le Havre," in September 1807, in his early 60s.

Michels being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to go to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Michels, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, two were descendants of Jacques dit Saint-Michel.319

Mire

In 1755, descendants of Pierre LeMire dit Mire and his two wives could be found at Pigiguit in the Minas Basin.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this small family to the winds. 

One authority hints that Pierre dit Mire took his family to Montréal before 1755, but this is unlikely.  The family evidently escaped the British roundup at Pigiguit in the fall of 1755, made their way to the Bay of Fundy shore, spent a hard winter there, and crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring.  Some of them continued on to Canada via the Rivière St.-Jean portage.  Pierre dit Mire died before 1757, in his 50s, probably in exile.  His son David died at Québec in December 1757, age 14, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck hundreds of the exiles in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Daughter Marie married André, son of Joseph Terrien, perhaps Terriot, and Françoise Benoit, at Nicolet on the upper St. Lawrence across from Trois-Rivières in February 1761.  And younger daughter Élisabeth married Joseph, daughter of René Coltret and Marguerite Terrien, at Nicolet in April 1765.  They remained in Canada.  Typically, these Acadiennes of Canada would have lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Oldest son Joachim dit Bénoni and Bénoni's half brothers Joseph and Simon became separated from the rest of the family during the British roundups and sought refuge not in Canada but on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Evidently Bénoni, during the late 1750s or early 1760s, married a daughter of Pierre Part and Angélique Godin of Rivière St.-Jean on the Gulf shore.  About the time of his marriage, Bénoni, his wife, and his half-brothers either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region and held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted Beleaunie Mir, his wife, and two "children"--probably his brothers, now ages 21 and 19--in the prison compound on Georges Island in Halifax harbor.  Bénoni's wife died soon after the counting. 

The British deported most of the Acadians at Pigiguit to Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts in the fall of 1755.  In June 1763, colonial officials in Pennsylvania counted Pierre Mire, wife Madeleine, and three of their children in that colony.  One wonders if Pierre was a son of Pierre dit Mire of Pigiguit. 

At least one family of Mires ended up in French St.-Domingue, the destination of hundreds of exiles who at war's end sought an escape from British rule.  While the end-of-war treaty was still being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean region and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for colony's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  Hundreds took up the challenge.  They converged on the island in 1763 and 1764, but not all of them were happy with the experience.  In the mid- and late 1760s, a few of them hooked up with Acadian exiles from Halifax and Maryland who changed ships at Cap-Français on the coast east of Môle St.-Nicolas as they made their way to New Orleans.  Others simply stayed and endured.  Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, Mire, a master carpenter, married Madeleine Mouton, perhaps a fellow Acadian, probably in St.-Domingue.  Their daughter Marie-Jeanne was born at Môle St.-Nicolas in March 1776.  Son Jean, fils was born in c1779; Pierre in December 1781; and Henri in December 1782.  Henri died the day he was born, and Jean, fils died at age 6 in February 1785.  One wonders how Jean was kin to Joachim dit Bénoni et al. 

Mires being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including a Mire, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, three were sons of Pierre dit Mire.269

Mius d'Entremont

In 1755, descendants of Philippe Mius d'Entremont and Madeleine Hélie could be found at Annapolis Royal, on Île St.-Jean, and in France, but they were especially plentiful in the family's barony at Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable.  Le Grand Dérangement scattered this family even farther.  

While the British were gathering up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, Marguerite Mius d'Azy of Port-La-Joye, Île St.-Jean, and her new husband, Jean Delâge dit Langlois, left the island for Québec, where Marguerite died in early October 1755, age 36, among the earliest Acadian refugees to go there.  

Descendants of the seigneur's youngest son Philippe Mius d'Azy still could be found at Annnapolis Royal in 1755.  One of them, granddaughter Marie-Josèphe, with her husband Jean-Baptiste Raymond, was deported to North Carolina aboard the Pembroke in December.  Soon after the ship left Goat Island in the lower Annapolis River, a storm in the lower Bay of Fundy separated the Pembroke from the other transports filled with Annapolis-valley Acadians.  The exiles aboard the ship, led by Charles Belliveau, a pilot, and including Jean-Baptiste Raymond, saw their opportunity.  They overwhelmed the officers and crew of the Pembroke, who numbered only eight, seized the vessel, sailed it to Baie Ste.-Marie on the western shore of Nova Scotia, hid there for nearly a month, and then, in January 1756, sailed across the Bay of Fundy to the mouth of Rivière St.-Jean.  There, in early February, they were discovered by a boatload of British soldiers and sailors disguised as French troops.  Raymond and the others managed to drive off the British force, burn the ship, and make their way with the ship's officers and crew upriver to the Rivière St.-Jean settlement of Ste.-Anne-du-Pay-Bas, today's Fredericton, New Brunswick, where they spent the rest of the winter.  When food ran short there in the summer of 1756, Jean-Baptiste and his family continued their journey up the St.-Jean valley to Canada.  Marie-Josèphe died in a smallpox epidemic at Québec in December 1757, two weeks before her husband died probably of the same disease.  

Most of the Mius d'Azys at Annapolis Royal, however, had remained in British hands.  Philippe Mius d'Azy's grandson Joseph and his wife Marie-Josèphe Préjean, according to Bona Arsenault, ended up at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in late 1755.  Three of Joseph's younger brothers--Charles dit Charles-Amand and his wife Marie-Marthe Hébert; François and his wife Jeanne Duon; and Jean-Baptiste and his wife Marie-Josèphe Surette--along with their families, were deported to Massachusetts.  In October 1761, according to Arsenault, Joseph remarried to widow Marie Vincent at Philadelphia. 

Members of the family still living on the family's seigneurie at Pobomcoup and Cap-Sable escaped the British roundups in the rest of Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  During the following spring, however, the British swooped down on Cap-Sable and Pobomcoup, rounded up many of the habitants and fishermen there, and sent two English sloops, the Mary and the Vulture, with approximately 170 Acadians from the area to New York and Massachusetts.  One of these Cap-Sable deportees was Jacques Mius d'Entremont, fils, his wife Marguerite Amireau, and some of their children.  They sailed aboard the Vulture to Boston.  Jacques, fils died at Walpole, Massachusetts, in July 1759, age 80, and was buried at nearby Roxbury.  Jacques, fils's daughter Anne married Abel, son of fellow Acadian Jean-Baptiste Duon and Agnès Hébert of Annapolis Royal, at Marblehead, Massachusetts, in 1756.  Jacques, fils's son Joseph married Agnès, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Belliveau and Agnès Gaudet, in Massachusetts in 1763.  

The other Mius d'Entremonts of Pobomcoup, including children of the captured Jacques, fils, escaped the 1756 roundup.  Again, their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg, Île Royale, in July 1758, 400 British soldiers disembarked at Cap-Sable in late September to search for Acadians still in the area.  Two sailboats manned by British troops sailed along the shore above and below the the cape "to prevent the vermin from escaping in canoes," one British officer commented.  Luck had now run out for the Mius d'Entremonts still at Pobomcoup.  The British burned all of the houses and other buildings in the area to deny the habitants shelter and sustenance.  In late October, the British embarked 68 Acadians they had captured at Cap-Sable, plus their priest, on the transport Alexander II.  This may have included Mius d'Entremonts.  The Alexander II sailed from Cap-Sable to Georges Island, Halifax, which it reached the first week of November.  From Halifax, in December 1758, the British sent the Cap-Sable Acadians to Le Havre, France, with Acadians they were deporting from the Maritime islands.  Meanwhile, several Acadian families, likely including Mius d'Entremonts, who had escaped the ruthless rangers in September 1758, sought refuge in the woods near Pobomcoup, but, after a hard winter, surrendered to British authorities the following June.  They, too, were held as prisoners at Georges Island, Halifax, until November, when the British deported them to England and then sent them on to Cherbourg in Normandy, which they reached in January 1760.  One family head, Charles of Pobomcoup, "crippled in one leg," received a special pension from the French government not because of his handicap but because of the stature of his family in Acadia.  

Among the family members sent to France in late 1758 were three daughters and a son of Joseph Mius d'Azy and Marie Amireau dit Tourangeau of Pobomcoup who had resettled in the French Maritimes in the early 1750s and chose to remain there.  Living in territory controlled by France, the Mius d'Azys of Île St.-Jean and Île Royale escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  But, like their kinsmen at Cap-Sable, their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French stronghold at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the island and deported them to France.  The crossing devastated the Mius famiy.  Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Joseph Mius d'Azy, and her husband Jean-Baptiste Henry of Pointe-Prime, Île St.-Jean; sister Geneviève and her husband François Guérin, and sister Rosalie and her husband Éloi Lejeune, of Grande-Ascension, Île St.-Jean, were deported aboard the British transport Duke William, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and sank in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England.  Every member of these families went down with the ship.  Cousin Charles-Benjamin Mius d'Azy, age 30, and wife Marie-Josèphe Guédry, age 36, of Pointe-à-la-Jeunnesse, Île Royale, crossed with five of their children--Marie-Josèphe, age 9; Anastasie, age 7; Jean-Baptiste, age 6; Véronique, age 4; and Firmin, age 2--on one of the so-called Five Ships, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite the mid-December storm that sank the Duke William and two other transports, arrived at St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Charles-Benjamin and all five of his children died at sea.  Widow Marie-Josèphe remarried--her third marriage--to a LeBlanc widower at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer in February 1763 and followed him to Belle-Île-en-Mer, off the southern coast of Brittany, in late 1765, where she died in August 1767, age 47.  Meanwhile, Marie-Madeleine Mius d'Entremont, widow of Jean Lafitte of Île Royale, also was deported to France in 1758.  She ended up in the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, where she died in August 1760, age 70.  

That Cap-Sable Mius d'Entremonts were at Cherbourg by late January 1759 is attested to by the baptism of Abraham, younger son of Jacques Mius d'Entremont III and Marguerite Landry of Pobomcoup, at Tres-St.-Trinité, Cherbourg, in late January 1759; Abraham's baptismal record states that he was born "aux quatre Sables," that is, at Cap-Sable, the previous December, so this gives an idea of when the family was transported from Nova Scotia to France.  The following year, 1760, was especially tragic for the Cap-Sable Mius d'Entremonts at Cherbourg:  Marie-Jeanne-Charlotte, age 3 weeks, daughter of Simon Mius d'Entremont and his first wife Marie Amireau, and Simon, age 5, perhaps another child of Simon and Marie, died in February.  Claire Mius d'Entremont, wife of Charles-Paul Hébert, age 50; and Joseph, age 72, son of Jacques Mius d'Entremont, père, died in March.  Charles, age 33, a bachelor, son of Joseph Mius d'Entremont; Anne Mius d'Entremont, age 30; and Marguerite, age 45, daughter of Charles Mius d'Entremont, died in May.  Two more bachelor sons of Joseph--Jean, age 27, and Abraham, age 38--died in June.  Jacques Mius d'Entremont III also died at Cherbourg in 1760.  The rigors of deportation probably contributed to so many deaths in the family that year.  Also, French ports were hotbeds of ship-borne epidemics such as smallpox and plague.  Nevertheless, there were also moments for the family to celebrate, such as the baptism of young Abraham Muis d'Entremont in January 1759.  But tragedy was always near.  Cécile, daughter of Joseph Mius d'Entremont, died at Cherbourg in c1762, in her late 30s.  Still, there were marriages to celebrate.  Simon, son of Joseph Mius d'Entremont and Cécile Boudrot and widower of Marie Amireau, married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Gabriel Moulaison and Marie Aubois of Pobomcoup and widow of François Viger, in September 1763.  Joseph le jeune, son of Charles Mius d'Entremont and Marguerite Landry, married cousin Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians François Landry and Marie Belliveau, in February 1764, soon after Joseph le jeune's parents died at Cherbourg.  His son Joseph-David was born that December, and Pierre-Marin was born posthumously in August 1766; Joseph le jeune had died at Cherbourg in March.  Madeleine, daughter of Joseph Mius d'Entremont and Marie-Josèphe Moulaison, married Jean, fils, son of fellow Acadians Jean Granger and Madeleine Melanson of Annapolis Royal, in May 1764.  That same month, Madeleine, Joseph le jeune's sister, married Basile, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Boudrot and another Madeleine Melanson of Annapolis Royal, but Madeleine, the bride, died in December 1770, age 40.  Pierre, brother of Joseph le jeune and Madeleine, joined his siblings in death at Cherbourg in July 1778, age 47.  He never married.  

Not all of the Muis d'Entremonts remained at Cherbourg.  By the early 1780s, Jacques IV, now in his 20s, had moved to the Breton port of St.-Malo, where he married Frenchwoman Marie Hervé of nearby St.-Brieuc, widow of Louis Landromon dit Langlinais of St.-Malo, in the early 1780s.  Jacques IV signed as a witness to a marriage in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in February 1784, about the time the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Jacques IV, wife Marie, and his widowed mother, Marguerite Landry, were the only members of his extended family who agreed to take it, but Jacques IV, aware of his aristocratic roots, put a price on his emigration to the Spanish colony.  Before he and his family set sail for Louisiana from St.-Malo in August 1785, the Spanish made him a captain in recognition of the noble status of his family in old Acadia.  

Meanwhile, the Mius d'Entremonts and Mius d'Azys who had been exiled to Massachusetts and Pennsylvania waited patiently for the war with Britain to end.  When it did, in early 1763, the British attempted to discern their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  Most of the Acadians in New England, New York, and Pennsylvania chose to go to Canada.  However, Jacques Muis d'Entremont, fils's children and grandchildren returned to their home at Pobomcoup.  They no longer held the seigneurie there--that ended with their exile--but at least they were home again.  One of Jacques, fils's younger sons, Bénoni, died at Pobomcoup, now Pubnico, Nova Scotia, in February 1841, in his late 90s.  

Joseph Mius d'Azy and his family left Philadelphia for Massachusetts in 1763 to join his younger brothers and his cousins there.  One of Joseph's daughters, Marie-Cécile, married Frenchman Pierre Rinard of Granville, Normandy, in Massachusetts in c1765.  By 1767, the Mius d'Azys also had returned to their home at Cap-Sable--to Ste.-Anne-du-Ruisseau-de-l'Anguille, Pointe-à-Rocco, Pointe-des-Ben, and Bas-de-Tousket, now Tusket, near Pobomcoup.  In the 1780s, one of Charles Mius d'Azy's sons, Barthélemy, and his wife Madeleine Doiron moved to Arichat on Île Madame off the southern coast of Cape Breton Island, formerly French Île Royale.  In the 1790s, they moved on to Prince Edward Island, formerly French Île St.-Jean.  But most of the Mius D'Entremonts and Mius d'Azys remained in the Cap-Sable area.270

Moulaison

This family was relatively new to Acadia, so its members were more or less together in the Cap-Sable area on the eve of Le Grand Dérangement.  Family patriarch Gabriel Moulaison dit Recontre, père and wife Marie Aubois witnessed the marriages of their younger sons Joseph and Gabriel, fils at Cap-Sable on the same day in July 1753, but the old man died soon afterwards, perhaps at Pobomcoup, in his late 60s or early 70s.  The Great Upheaval following his death ended his family's long residence in this corner of British Nova Scotia.  

In the spring of 1756, during the end of the first phase of deportations in Nova Scotia, British forces from Halifax swooped down on Cap-Sable and Pobomcoup and rounded up many of the habitants and fishermen in the area.  Two English sloops, the Mary and the Vulture, transported approximately 170 Acadians from the Cap-Sable area to New York and Massachusetts.  The Moulaisons probably were not among them.  The likely had eluded the British and remained at Cap-Sable. 

Their respite from capture was short-lived.  In late September 1758, two months after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg on Île Royale, 400 British soldiers disembarked at Cap-Sable to search for Acadians still in the area.  Two sailboats manned by British troops sailed along the shore above and below the cape "to prevent the vermin from escaping in canoes," one British officer quipped.  This time luck ran out for the Moulaisons of Pobomcoup.  The British burned all of the houses and other buildings in the area to deny the Acadians shelter and sustenance.  In late October, the British embarked 68 Acadians they had captured at Cap-Sable, plus their priest, on the transport Alexander II.  This probably included Moulaisons.  The Alexander II reached Halifax the first week of November, and the British sent the Cap-Sable Acadians to England four days later.  In December, the English sent them on to France along with Acadians they were deporting from the Maritime islands.  Moulaisons, along with fellow exiles, landed in the Norman ports of Le Havre and Cherbourg in mid-January 1759. 

At Cherbourg, Gabriel dit Recontre Moulaison's youngest son, Gabriel, fils, age 36, was buried in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in March 1760, the same year a number of his D'Entremont relatives perished in that city, perhaps in an epidemic.  Older brother Jacques's third son Joseph le jeune burned to death aboard a ship at Cherbourg in December 1770, age 16.  But there were moments for the Moulaison family to celebrate during their exile in the Norman ports.  Gabriel dit Recontre's second son Jacques, now a sailor, and his wife Cécile Melanson oversaw the baptism of their 8-month-old daughter Madeleine at Très-Ste.-Trinité church in January 1760.  From 1760 to 1770, in the parish, Cécile gave Jacques four more children:  Marie-Anne-Françoise-Thérèse in c1761; Étienne in February 1763; Victoire-Marguerite in September 1765; and Jean-Baptiste in January 1770.  Jacques's oldest daughter Marie-Modeste, called Modeste, age 18, married Ambroise, son of fellow Acadians Charles Bourg and Cécile Melanson and widower of Anne Pitre, at Cherbourg in July 1763.  They moved on to St.-Malo in 1773 and settled at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of the Breton port, where they remained.  Jacques's sisters Marie-Josèphe, wife of Joseph Mius d'Entremont; and Anne, wife of François Viger, were counted at Cherbourg in 1761.  Six years later, in 1767, when Anne was age 37, she was counted again at Cherbourg.  By then, she had remarried to Simon, son of fellow Cap-Sable Acadians Joseph Mius d'Entremont and Cécile Boudrot and widower of Marie Amireau, in September 1763.  Jacques's second son François, age 23, married Thérèse, daughter of locals Bon Antoine Quoniam and Jeanne Le Cam of Cherbourg, in October 1771.  Their daughter Marie-Thérèse-Julie was born at Cherbourg in October 1772.  Marie-Josèphe Moulaison, age 62; brother Jacques, now 60; and sister Anne, age 42, were still at Cherbourg in 1772. 

Meanwhile, across the Baie de Seine at Le Havre, Gabriel dit Recontre's daughter Jeanne, age 30, wife of Louis Doucet, was buried in Notre-Dame Parish in April 1760 soon after her arrival in the Norman port.  Pierre Moulaison died in Notre-Dame Parish in February 1769, age 60.  But there were moments for the family to celebrate here as well.  Caesar-Auguste, son of Gabriel dit Recontre's oldest son Pierre Moulaison and Marie-Josèphe Doucet, was born in Notre-Dame Parish in May 1761 or 1762.  Pierre's brother Jacques's second daughter Félicité married fellow Acadian Jean-Baptiste Henry in Notre Dame Parish in July 1764.  Pierre and Jacques's sister Madeleine, age 57, wife of Jacques Bertrand, was still at Le Havre in 1772.  

During the early 1770s, when French officials attempted to settle Acadians on an influential nobleman's land in the interior province of Poitou near the city of Châtellerault, the historical record becomes flush with Cap-Sable Moulaisons.  Jacques Moulaison, père and his married son François were among the Acadians from Cherbourg who took their families to Poitou in 1773.  François's daughter Thérèse-Adélaïde was born at Archigny south of Châtellerault in October 1774.  Jacques's oldest son, Jacques, fils, age 27, married Marie-Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Doiron and Marguerite Michel of Pigiguit and widow of Bonaventure Thériot and Sylvain Aucoin, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in May 1774.  Their daughter Marie-Rose, called Rose, was born at nearby Cenan in July 1775.  Also with the family in Poitou were Jacques, père's unmarried sons Pierre le jeune, Étienne, and Jean-Baptiste, and his unmarried daughters Luce-Divine, Marie, and Victoire from Cherbourg.  By late 1775, after two years of effort, most of the Acadians in Poitou abandoned the venture and retreated in four convoys to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  The Moulaisons took the first and third convoys out of Châtellerault in October and December 1775. 

At Nantes and nearby Chantenay and Paimboeuf, the Moulaisons celebrated births and marriages but also buried some of their own.  Jacques, père's married sons Jacques, fils and François made their livings at Nantes as carpenters and seamen.  In St.-Nicolas Parish, Marie-Blanche gave Jacques, fils two more children:  Marie-Sophie in December 1776; and Jacques III in May 1779.  At Chantenay and in St.-Nicolas Parish, Thérèse gave François two sons:  Jean-Louis-François at Chantenay in May 1777 but died the following November; and François-Joseph in St.-Nicolas Parish in December 1778.  Meanwhile, their daughter Thérèse-Adélaïde died in St.-Nicolas Parish in March 1778, age 3 1/2.  Jacques, père died at L'Hermitage, Chantenay, in August 1780, in his late 60s.  Two months later, his fifth son Étienne, now a sailor, died at age 17 at Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes.  Jacques, père's younger daughter Marie-Anne-Françoise-Thérèse, age 20, married Louis, son of Joseph Morel and Marie Ernault of Fourgères near Rennes, Brittany, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in January 1781.  Jacques, père's older daughter Félicité, age 35, remarried to Nicolas, son of Henry Vallet and Anne Stopul of Rieville, Lorraine, and a resident of St.-Viau Parish, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in February 1781.  Jacques, père's third son Pierre le jeune, age 29, married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Granger and Madeleine Melanson, at St.-Martin de Chantenay, in July 1784.  Their son Jean-Pierre was born at Chantenay in June 1785. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana. Six of the Cap-Sable Moulaisons--Jacques, fils, his wife, their son Jacques III and two daughters; sister-in-law Marguerite-Josèphe Doucet, now a widow, and her unmarried son Joseph Moulaison by Jacques, fils's brother Pierre; and Jacques, fils's sister Marie-Modeste, her Bourg husband, and their 10 children at Pleurtuit near St.-Malo--took up the Spanish offer.  But some did not.  François Moulaison, his French wife, and their daughter and son; younger brother Pierre le jeune, his wife, and their infant son; sister Félicité and her French husband; and sister Marie-Anne and her second husband, also a Frenchman, chose to remain in France, as did their widowed mother Cécile Melanson, who died at Nantes in January 1796.  Her youngest son Jean-Baptiste Moulaison and her other children may have been there to bury her.273

Mouton

In 1755, the children and grandchildren of  Sr. Jean Mouton and Marie Girouard could be found at Chignecto, Minas, Annapolis Royal, and Cap-Sable.  Le Grand Derangement of the 1750s scattered this small family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq warriors led by the Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Moutons, who likely lived in the village of Beaubassin, would have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Chignecto Acadians, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with the French at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies. 

The British deported Sr. Jean Mouton's eldest son, Jean, fils, to South Carolina aboard the British transport Edward Cornwallis, which reached Charles Town on 19 November 1755.  With him were his wife Marguerite Poirier and 10 children, some of whom may have been nieces and nephews.  Jean, fils's brother Jacques, his wife Marguerite Caissie, and their family suffered the same fate; they were transported to South Carolina aboard the Endeavor, which reached Charles Town the same day the Edward Cornwallis arrived.  Jacques died before July 1763, place unrecorded.  Younger brother Charles, his wife Anne Comeau, and her two children by her first marriage to a Bourgeois do not appear on the passenger lists of any of the vessels going to Charles Town, so they may have been among the Chignecto Acadians the British transported to Georgia.  If so, they did not remain there.  They, along with brother Jacques's only son Jean, evidently were among the exiles in Georgia and South Carolina allowed by the governors of those colonies to return to greater Acadia by boat in the spring of 1756.  If so, Charles and Anne got no farther than Long Island, New York, where colonial officials refused to allow them to go any farther and held them in the colony until the end of the war.  A Charles Lamottin with a wife and child were sent to New Rochelle northeast of Manhattan in May 1756; this may have been Charles, Anne, and infant son Georges.  Nephew Jean was luckier.  Traveling perhaps in an earlier expedition, he made it all the way to Rivière St.-Jean and joined his uncles Pierre, Salvator, and Louis on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where the three brothers had taken refuge after escaping the British at Chignecto. 

One of Sr. Jean's daughters, Anne, her husband Joseph Richard, and their family, escaped the British roundup at Annapolis Royal in 1755, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed to Chepoudy the following spring, and fled north to Canada probably via the Rivière St.-Jean portage.  The move proved fatal for the family.  At age 30 and now a widow, Anne died in a smallpox epidemic in November 1757 that struck hundreds of Acadian refugees in and around Québec that summer and into the following spring.

Anne's older sister Marguerite, husband Jean Hébert, and their family, still at Cap-Sable in 1755, suffered a different fate.  In the spring of 1756, late in the first phase of deportations, British forces from Halifax swooped down on Cap-Sable and Pobomcoup and rounded up many of the habitants and fishermen there.  Two English sloops, the Mary and the Vulture, transported approximately 170 Acadians from the Cap-Sable area to New York and Massachusetts.  Marguerite and her family probably were not among them.  The likely eluded the British and remained at Cap-Sable.  Their respite from capture was short-lived.  In late September 1758, two months after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg on Île Royale, 400 British soldiers disembarked at Cap-Sable to search for Acadians still in the area.  Two sailboats manned by British troops sailed along the shore above and below the cape "to prevent the vermin from escaping in canoes," a British officer quipped.  This time luck ran out for Marguerite and her family.  The British burned all of the houses and other buildings in the area to deny the Acadians shelter and sustenance.   The Héberts likely escaped again, but they, along with other Acadians, after a hard winter in the woods, surrendered to the British the following June.  They were held in the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, until November, when the British deported them to England and sent them on to Cherbourg, France.  Marguerite Mouton died there in January 1760, age 35, soon after they landed in the Norman port--the only descendant of Sr. Jean Mouton to have gone to France.  Husband Jean died there two months later.  In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Marguerite and Jean's son Étienne Hébert, a sailor, in his late 30s now and living at Nantes, agreed to go to the distant colony.  He took with him his third wife Anne-Madeleine Breau and five of his children.  Étienne's sister Marie Hébert, age 36 in 1785, at Nantes, also went to Louisiana with her husband Jean-Baptiste Lamoureaux dit Rochefort and their two children. 

In North America, things got only worse for the Moutons who had taken refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  By the late 1750s, Sr. Jean's sons Pierre, Salvator, Louis and their families had moved north to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  With them was Jean dit Neveu, the Nephew, son of older brother Jacques, whose family had gone to South Carolina.  Louis married Marie-Modeste, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Bastarache and Angélique Richard and a sister of brother Salvator's wife Anne, perhaps soon after reaching the bay refuge.  The Moutons' time at Restigouche did not last long.  In late June 1760, after the fall of Québec the previous September, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouiche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  Pierre Mouton died in the fighting, but his brothers Salvator and Louis survived the attack.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British force, this one from Québec, arrived at Restgouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  Among them were Louis Mouton and three members of his family.  Brother Salvator and his family were not on the list, but they, too, ended up in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British officials counted brothers Louis and Salvator and nephew Jean and their families in the prison compound at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in July, August, and October 1762.  The following year, British officials counted Salvator and Louis and perhaps Jean dit Neveu at Annapolis Royal, where they may have been working as laborers on Acadian dykes now owned by the so-called New-English Planters. 

The Moutons being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by the Planters.  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to the French Antilles, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Moutons, were going, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, eight were Moutons. 

At war's end, members of the family, to avoid British rule, chose to resettle in the French Antilles.  While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean region and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the labor of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  The first of the exiles reached Cap-Français from South Carolina in late 1763.  More followed in 1764.  Among them were François Mouton, son of Jean, fils, who married Marguerite Poirier either in South Carolina or on the sugar island.  Four of their sons were born at Môle St.-Nicolas:  Louis in March 1776; Denis-François in November 1778; Antoine in January 1781; and Julien in June 1785.  As the birth dates of the children reveal, when, in the mid- and late 1760s, Acadians from Halifax and Maryland, including Moutons, came through Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans, François and his family did not join them; they evidently had found a tolerable place in the island's slave-based plantation economy.  A Marguerite Mouton married master carpenter Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, Mire, perhaps a fellow Acadian, probably in St.-Domingue; one wonders how she was kin to François of Chignecto.  From March 1776 to 1782, Marguerite gave husband Jean four children probably at Môle St.-Nicolas.  Meanwhile, an Acadian Mouton chose to resettle in another corner of the French Antilles.  After the war, Charles Mouton, wife Anne Comeau, and their children did not follow other exiles languishing in New York to British Canada but chose, instead, to go to Martinique, where French officials counted Charles, Anne, two of her Bourgeois children from her first marriage, and two of their Mouton sons at Champflore in January 1766.  They did not remain on the island.  Charles evidently learned of his brothers' movement from Halifax to Louisiana via Cap-Français the year before.  Later in the decade, he and his family also moved on to New Orleans--among the few Acadian exiles who went to the Spanish colony directly from the French Antilles.  

Meanwhile, a Mouton who had lived in greater Acadia, 24-year-old artilleryman Jean dit Fleury, son of Antoine Mouton and Catherine Boucher of St.-Michel-de-Carcassone in the south of France, probably not kin to Sr. Jean of Marseille, married Angélique, daughter of François Héningre and Marie-Anne Esterin of Lindeau, France, on Île Miquelon in November 1760, before the war against Britain had ended.  Angélique gave Fleury at least seven children, four sons and three daughters, on the fishery island:  Charles-Jean in c1765; Jean-Baptiste in c1767; Joseph-Jérôme, called Jérôme, in May 1769; Angélique in c1771; Thérèse in c1774; Louis in c1776; and Apolline in c1778.  One wonders if they were among the fisher/habitants on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre compelled by French officials, obeying a royal decree, to emigrate to France in 1767 to relieve overcrowding on the Newfoundland islands.  If so, as the birth dates of their children reveal, they returned to Miquelon the following year with most of their fellow islanders.  Daughter Apolline died at La Rochelle, France, age 16 months, in July 1779, so Jean dit Fleury and his family evidently were among the Miquelonnais the British deported to France in the fall of 1778 during the war for American independence.  Another daughter, Louise-Catherine, was born in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in September 1780.   Daughter Antoinette, their ninth child and fifth daughter, was born at La Rochelle in c1783, the year the islanders were allowed to the return to Miquelon, but Jean dit Fleury and his family remained in France.  In 1785, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in Louisiana, none of the Moutons of Île Miquelon chose to go there.  (All of the Moutons of South Louisiana, then, are descendants of Sr. Jean of Marseille, not Jean dit Fleury of Carcassonne.)  Jean dit Fleury's son Jérôme, a cod fisherman, married Anne, daughter of Célestin Briand, at Bordeaux in 1794, and three of his sons were born there between 1796 and 1805.  Jean dit Fleury died in North Bordeaux in February 1804, age 67.  His oldest daughter married into the Hiriart family and settled at North Bordeaux.  At age 47, son Jérôme remarried to Joséphine-Madeleine, daughter of Jean Chevalier and Joséphine Petitpas of Miquelon, at Bordeaux in February 1816.  The bride's parents were Acadians, and two Acadians, a Gaudin and a Cyr, witnessed the marriage, so whatever Acadian indentity Jean dit Fleury and his family may have acquired during their brief time on Île Miquelon evidently persisted in the mother country, at least into the second and third generations.274

Moyse

In 1755, descendants of François Moyse dit Latrielle and Madeleine Vincent could be found on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther.  Living in territory controlled by France, the Moyses on the Maritime islands escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the island habitants and deported them to France. 

François dit Latreille, fils, now a widower, and his unmarried daughter Marguerite, age 34, along with his married sons and daughters, crossed aboard one of the five British transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, or the John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November with 1,033 Acadians aboard, bound for St.-Malo.  Despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, the Five Ships reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  Only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, including many Moyses.  Son Jean-Baptiste, age 46, crossed with wife Marie-Josèphe Blanchard, age 40, and their children Marie-Josèphe, age 13; Bénoni, age 11; Cécile, age 9; Jean-Baptiste, age 8; and Gertrude, age 4.  Son François III, age 27, crossed with his new wife Marie-Madeleine Hébert, age 21, whom he had married on Île St.-Jean in September.  And son Joseph, age 27, crossed with his new wife Marie Hébert, age 19, whom he had married earlier that year.  The crossing was a disaster for the extended family.  François dit Latreille, fils, Marguerite, Jean-Baptiste, Marie-Josèphe, François III, Marie-Madeleine, Joseph, and Marie, all survived the crossing, but Francois dit Latreille, fils, age 70, died in a St.-Malo hospital a few weeks after the family reached France.  Two of Jean-Baptiste's children--Cécile and Gertrude--died at sea.  François dit Latreille, fils's married daughters fared even worse on the crossing:  Jeanne Moyse, age unrecorded, wife of Benjamin Pitre, and two of their three children, ages 10 and 4, died at sea.  Madeleine Moyse, wife of Jean-Baptiste Dugas, and the youngest of their six children, ages 3 and 1, died at sea.  Françoise Moyse, age 32, lost her husband Jean Blanchard, also age 32, and three children, ages 6, 5, and 1, to the sea, and then she died in a St.-Malo hospital a month after she reached the Breton port.  Anne Moyse, age 26, wife of Joseph LeBlanc, age 33, lost her husband and both of their children, ages 3 and 1, at sea.  Cécile Moyse, age 35, crossed with husband Michel Bourg, age 38, who died in a St.-Malo hospital a few weeks after the couple reached France.  Their four children--ages 8, 5, and 3 years, and 8 months--had died at sea. 

François dit Latreille, fils's son Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, and his family settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo, where wife Marie-Josèphe Blanchard gave him at least two more children:  Joseph-François in March 1760 but died eight days after his birth; and Perpétué in March 1762.  Oldest daughter Marie-Josèphe, age 20, married Pierre-Paul, son of fellow Acadians Basile Boudrot and Marguerite Giroire, at St.-Suliac in January 1765.  They baptized four children at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the same side of the river south of St.-Suliac.  Jean's oldest son Bénoni, age 23, married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Basile Boudrot and Marguerite Giroire and sister of his sister's husband, at Pleudihen in November 1770.  Bénoni's daughter Marguerite-Jean was born at St.-Suliac in 1772.  In 1773, Bénoni and wife Marie-Josèphe, along with his parents, chose to be part of the major settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Marie-Josèphe gave Bénoni at least five more children there:  Basile-Jean in St.-Pierre de Rezé Parish across the Loire from Nantes in December 1776; Cyprien-Bénonie in March 1779 but died the following July; Pierre-Bénoni in October 1780; Louis in St.-Donatien Parish, Nantes, in November 1782; and Charles in November 1784.  Meanwhile, Jean died and at Rezé in September 1781, in his early 60s.  Wife Marie-Josèphe Blanchard was buried at St.-Pierre de Rezé also, in May 1782, age 70. 

Jean's younger brother François III and his wife Marie-Madeleine Hébert also settled at St.-Suliac.  Their daughter Perpétué was born there in January 1760 but died three days after her birth.  Wife Marie-Madeleine died two weeks later, age 22, probably from complications of childbirth.  François III remarried to Ursule, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Bourg and Françoise Dugas, in November 1761 at St.-Suliac.  Ursule gave him at least seven more children there, but most of them died young:  Jean-Joseph in June 1763; Simon-Basile in March 1765 but died at age 13 months in April 1766; François-Alexandre in February 1767 but died at age 2 1/2 in June 1769; twins Bénoni-Étienne and Perrine-Ursule in March 1768 but died two days after their birth; Basile-Ignace in June 1769; and François-Jean in January 1773 but died of smallpox at age 4 months the following April.  They also went to Poitou in 1773 and retreated to Nantes in March 1776.  François III died there in St.-Similien Parish in July 1779, age 47.  

Jean and François III's brother Joseph Moyse and his wife Marie Hébert also settled at St.-Suliac, where three children were born to them:  Anne-Marie in July 1768 but died at age 1 in July 1769; Marie-Josèphe in May 1771; and Joseph-Pierre in June 1773.  The year Joseph-Pierre was born, Joseph took his family to Poitou.  They, too, retreated to Nantes in March 1776.  At least two more children were born to them there:  Jean in St.-Léonard Parish in January 1777 but died at age 4 in November 1780; and Marie-Joséphine in St.-Similien Parish in June 1779.  Oldest remaining daughter Marie-Josèphe died at age 6 in November 1777 and was buried in St.-Léonard Parish.  Joseph, age 37, died in St.-Similien Parish in January 1779.  His widow Marie Hébert, though left with two young children, did not remarry. 

Joseph et al.'s sister Cécile, who had left Île St.-Jean with a husband and four children but ended up a childless widow, remarried to Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Dugas and Anne-Marie Hébert and widower of Anne-Josèphe Henry, at St.-Suliac in June 1768.  She gave him no more children.  They went to Poitou in 1773 and retreated to Nantes in March 1776.  Cécile died in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, in December 1776, age 52.  Her husband remarried a second time and took his family to Spanish Louisiana in 1785. 

Joseph et al.'s sister Anne, who also ended up a childless widow, remarried to Claude, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Guédry and Madeleine Mius d'Azy of Cobeguit and widower of Anne Lejeune, at St.-Suliac in February 1762.  Claude, age 36 at the time of their marriage, already had five children by his first wife, two of whom had died young, but his other three children, the oldest age 12, were still living.  Between 1763 and 1771, Anne gave Claude seven more children at St.-Suliac, two daughters and five sons.  Anne and Claude did not join other Acadians in the Poitou venture in 1773, nor did they join her kinsmen at Nantes later in decade.  They chose, instead, to remain at St.-Suliac, at least until 1785. 

One, perhaps two, members of the family made it to France by a different route.  Marie, daughter of Louis dit Latreille, born on Île Royale in c1741, married Olivier, son of fellow Acadians Claude Pitre and Marguerite Doiron, at Louisbourg on Cape Breton Island, formerly Île Royale, in August 1763, so Louis and his family probably had escaped the British roundup on the island in 1758, fell into the hands of the British on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and were held in a prison compound in greater Acadia for the rest of the war.  Olivier Pitre had been deported from the Maritimes to St.-Malo, France, in late 1758, worked as a carpenter in a St.-Malo suburb, likely signed up for privateer duty, was captured by the British, and held at Louisbourg for the rest of the war.  He and Marie had two children, a son and a daughter, on Cape Breton Island in June 1764 and December 1765, both baptized privately because there were no more Catholic priests there to perform the ritual.  Wishing to free themselves of British rule, by 1766 the Pitres had followed Marie's widowered father to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, where their marriage was sanctified and their children's baptisms were recorded in the church register at Notre-Dame-des-Ardiliers.  But Marie and Olivier did not remain on the island.  In 1767, French authorities, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, ordered most of the fisher/habitants there to emigrate France.  Marie and Olivier sailed to the mother country aboard the schooner Créole and arrived at St.-Malo in mid-November 1767.  Most of the islanders returned to Miquelon the following year, but the Pitres chose to settle near Anne's Moyse cousins at St.-Suliac, where they had more children, three daughters, between 1767 and 1772.  The youngest daughter died of smallpox at age 9 months in June 1773.  Soon after they buried her, Marie and Olivier followed her kinsmen to Poitou.  In November 1775, after two years of effort, the family followed other Poitou Acadians to Nantes, where Olivier worked as a carpenter.  They had two more daughters at Chantenay near Nantes in 1772 and 1779 but lost them both.  Olivier died probably at Chantenay by September 1784, when a Spanish official counted Marie in the lower Loire port with two sons and two daughers and called her a widow. 

When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, not all of the Moyses grabbed it.  Bénoni and his wife Marie-Josèphe Boudrot at Nantes chose to remain in France.  Evidently his uncle François III's widow Ursule Bourg and her remaining Moyse children also chose to remain.  But Bénoni's aunt Anne Moyse and her second husband Claude Guédry, still at St.-Suliac, jumped at the chance to take their large family to Spanish Louisiana.  Joseph Moyse's widow Marie Hébert and their children, son Joseph-Pierre and daughter Marie-Josèphine, at Nantes also went to the Spanish colony, as did Anne and Joseph's cousin Marie, widow of Olivier Pitre, and three of her children at Chantenay.

Meanwhile, Louis dit Latreille's son Charles, born at Port-Toulouse, Île Royale, either became separated from his family during exile or chose to leave them and make his way to the French Antilles to live near paternal uncle Pierre Moyse, who had gone to the French island of Guadaloupe on the eve of Le Grand Dérangement.  While the war with Britain was still on, Charles married Anne-Françoise Beduneau at Capesterre-de-Marie-Galante on the southeast coast of Guadaloupe in January 1762.  The marriage record gives Charles's birthplace and his parents' names but not his birth date.  The recording priest noted that both of the groom's parents were deceased, which implies that his father Louis and his mother Marie-Louis Petitpas had died during exile, not in France, where his sister Anne and her family had gone.   One wonders if Charles created a family on the sugar island.  On thing is certain--he did not join his sister in Spanish Louisiana.272

Naquin

In 1755, descendants of Jean Naquin dit L'Étoile and Marguerite Bourg--sons Jacques and François and their families--could be found at Anse-à-Pinnet on the southeast shore of Île St.-Jean.  When the British rounded up the Acadians of Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, the Naquins, living on an island controlled by France, escaped deportation.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats seized Île St.-Jean, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France.  Most of the Naquins were among the deportees, and many of them died in the crossing. 

Jacques's son Ambroise, age 34, his wife Élisabeth Bourg, age 33, and five of their children--Élisabeth, age 7; Jean-Baptiste, age 5; Pierre, age 4; and Marguerite, age 2--made the crossing on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November 1758, survived a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, put in at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  Ambroise, Élisabeth, and their two older children survived the crossing, but the two younger children died at sea.  Élisabeth was pregnant when she left Île St.-Jean.  Daughter Marguerite was born probably at St.-Malo in April 1759, less than a month after the family reached the Breton port, but the newborn died in May.  Jacques's son Joseph, age 28, his wife Françoise Bourg, age 20, and Françoise's brother Pierre Bourg, age 29, were luckier.  They, too, crossed on Supply, but all of them survived the ordeal.  Jacques's oldest daughter Marguerite, age 35, crossed on one of the five British transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, or the John Samuel--that also left Chédabouctou Bay in the 11-ship convoy in late November, survived the mid-December storm, and reached St.-Malo together in late January.  Only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, including Naquins.  With Marguerite were husband Émilien dits Sans-Chargrin Segoillot, age 45, and two of their children, a son age 5 1/2, and a daughter age 21 months.  Marguerite, Émilien, and their son survived the crossing, but their daughter died at sea.  Other Naquins were not so lucky.  Jacques, age 63, a widower, called Jean-Baptiste on the passenger list, crossed on one of the Five Ships with two of his younger children.  His health no doubt ruined by the voyage, Jacques died soon after the ship reached port.  Son Pierre, age 18, died in a hospital probably at St.-Malo in March 1759 a few weeks after his father was buried.  Only one child who crossed with Jacques--daughter Anne-Marie or Marie-Anne, called Marie, age 16--survived the ordeal.  Jacques's daughter Élisabeth, age 25, crossed with husband Bénoni Bourg, age 23.  They both died at St.-Malo in February 1759 probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Jacques's younger brother François, age 54, his wife Angélique Blanchard, age 53, and seven of their children also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  François, Angélique, and five of their children--unmarried son François, age 26; and daughters Marie-Anastasie, age 17; Ursule, age 14; Marie-Anne, age 8; and Marguerite, age 6--died either at sea or in hospitals at St.-Malo soon after reaching the Breton port.  Only son Charles, age 21, and daughter Tarsile, age 10, survived the crossing and its rigors.  François's daughter Anne survived the crossing to St.-Malo on one of the Five Ships with her husband François Gautrot, but they lost all four of their children, ages 12 to 2, at sea. 

The Naquins did their best to make a life for themselves at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Ambroise worked as a plowman, and he and wife Élisabeth Bourg had more children at St.-Suliac:  Marguerite-Suline in October 1760 but died at age 1 in December 1761; Ambroise-François in May 1763 but died at age 11 in March 1774; twins Joseph-Jacques and Pierre-Paul in January 1766; and Madeleine-Hélène in October 1768 but died at age 8 in 1776.  Ambroise's sister Marie married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians François Bourg and Madeleine Hébert, at St.-Suliac in January 1761.  They raised a large family, but most of their children also died young.  Ambroise's cousin Charles, François's son, married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Thomas Doiron and Anne Giroire, at St.-Suliac in November 1765.  Charles worked there as a day-laborer.  He and Anne had at least four children in the riverside village:  Anne in c1767; Ives or Olive in September1769; Jean-Charles in September 1771; and Joseph-Suliac in June 1773 but died 15 days after his birth.  Charles's sister Anne and her husband François Gautrot had a daughter, Rose-Marie, at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river from St.-Suliac in December 1762, but in less than a year Anne was a widow with an infant daughter to support.  She remarried to Charles, son of fellow Acadian Joseph Dugas and widower of Euphrosine Thériot, at St.-Suliac in September 1765.  

Not all of the Naquins in France remained in the St.-Malo area.  In November 1765, Jacques's daughter Marguerite and husband Émilien Ségoillot went to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, where dozens of Acadians, mostly exiles recently repatriated from England, chose to go.  Marguerite and Émilien settled at Borbren, Locmaria, on the southeast end of the island.  A French official described Émilien as "an invalid, former sargent[sic] of the Troops of the Marine at Louisbourg, Canada, widr. from a first marriage."  With them was Émilien's son François-Dominique from his first marriage, age 13; and Émilien and Marguerite's daughter Marie-Françoise, age 2.  Another daughter, Marguerite-Josèphe, was born on the island in c1766.  Marguerite died probably at Locmaria in December 1773, age 47. 

Earlier that year, some of the Naquins still in the St.-Malo area--Marguerite's siblings Ambroise and Marie and cousin Charles and their families--participated in an even grander settlement venture, this one in the interior province of Poitou in and around the city of Châtellerault.  Charles's younger sister Tarsile married Hilaire, son of fellow Acadians Jean Clément and Marie-Josèphe Druce, at Leigné-les-Bois southeast of Châtellerault in October 1774.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, Ambroise and Marie, with their families, retreated with other Poitou Acadian to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Charles and his family were among the minority of Acadians who remained in Poitou, where more children were born to them:  Marguerite-Ludivine at Leigné-les-Bois in February 1775; Renée in February 1777; and Paul at Archigny south of Châtellerault in May 1780.  By the early 1780s, however, Charles, too, now a widower, had joined his kinsmen at Nantes.  His younger sister Tarsile died in St.-Nicolas Parish there in April 1784, in her late 30s.  She left behind her husband Hilaire Clément and two young children.  

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, all of the remaining Naquins--cousins Ambroise, Marie, Charles, Anne, and their families--agreed to take it.  Also going were Charles's brother-in-law Hilaire Clément with two of sister Tarsile's children; and niece Marguerite-Josèphe Ségoillot, daughter of Ambroise and Marie's sister Marguerite.  All 12 of them crossed to New Orleans on the same vessel, a testament to the closeness of this long-suffering island family.275

Neveu

According to Acadian genealogist Bona Arsenault, Laurent, son of Jean Neveu and Catherine Cayer of Santon, La Rochelle, France, a widower, probably not kin to Pierre, fils of Bordeaux, emigrated to Île St.-Jean, today's Prince Edward Island, in the early 1700s.  In November 1721, Laurent married Jeanne, daughter of Pierre Robin of St.-Jean, La Rochelle, at Port-La-Joye on the island.  Laurent and Jeanne settled at Tracadie on the island's north shore.  One wonders why no one in this family was counted on Île St.-Jean in August 1752. 

After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the Maritime islands and deported them to France.  Descendants of Laurent Neveu of Île St.-Jean may have been among these hapless Acadians.  Vincent, fils, son of Vincent Neveu and Marie Bernard, born probably in France in c1765 and perhaps a descendant of Laurent Neveu, was the only member of the family to emigrate to Louisiana with the Acadians from France.337 

Noël

In the late summer of 1755, Pierre Noël, along with dozens of his fellow Acadians, was rounded up by New-English forces under Lieutenant-Colonel John Winslow and held in the church at Grand-Pré.  Winslow's list calls him Pierre Noails and says he had a daughter, so he must have been married, or perhaps he was a 30-year-old widower by then.  Winslow's list does not name or even count the settlers' wives.  The list also reveals that Pierre owned no "bullocks," no "cowes," and no hogs, only five sheep. 

Pierre, perhaps with his daughter, ended up on a British transport bound for Virginia.  The Acadians sent to the Old Dominion suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  After their arrival in November and December, they languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie ordered them dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond.  The following spring, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses decided that the papists must go.  The Virginians sent them on to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several English ports and where many died of smallpox.  Pierre remarried to Marie-Madeleine Barbe, perhaps a fellow Acadian, soon after he reached England.  Two children were born to them in one of the coastal prison compounds where they were kept:  Marie-Madeleine in c1757; and Jean-Baptiste in May 1759. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including the Noëls, were repatriated to France.  In May 1763, Pierre, now age 38, Marie-Madeleine, age 25, and their two children were sent to St.-Malo, France, aboard the ship Ambition.  They settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where two more daughters were born to them:  Marie-Marguerite in February 1764; and Perrine-Rosalie posthumously in March 1766.  Pierre died at St.-Servan in late August 1765, "at age about 40 years."  Daughter Perrine-Rosalie died there in May 1766, only seven weeks after her birth. 

In 1773, Marie-Madeleine Barbe, still an unmarried widow, took her three surviving Noël children to the interior province of Poitou as part of the large settlement venture there.  In late 1775, after two years of effort, Marie-Madeleine and her children, retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they lived on government hand outs and on what work they could find.  Widow Marie-Madeleine died at nearby Chantenay in February 1779, age 41.  Her orphaned children--Marie-Madeleine, Jean-Baptiste, and Marie-Marguerite Noël--were ages 22, 20, and 15 at the time of her death.  The first of the Noël daughters to marry was not the older Marie-Madeleine but the much younger Marie-Marguerite.  Now 20 years old, she married 56-year-old Frenchman Guillaume-Jean Roquemont of St.-Vivien, Rouen, probably at Chantenay in c1784.  Guillaume-Jean died either later that year or in 1785.  They probably had no children.  

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  The Noël sisters, one a young widow, the other still unmarried, agreed to take it.  Brother Jean-Baptiste, however, now in his mid-20s, chose to remain in France.  "A mariner by profession," he married Luce, daughter, perhaps, of fellow Acadians Joseph Granger and Anne Poirier, probably at Nantes, date unrecorded.  Luce had been born at Cherbourg in Normandy in March 1768, so she was nine years younger than Jean-Baptiste.  Their son Pierre was born at Nantes in April 1789, and a second Pierre in October 1790.  In 1794, during the French Revolution, Jean-Baptiste, his wife, and two sons appeared on a list of Acadians and Canadians still at Nantes who, according to "the law of 25 February 1791," were entitled to a subsidy from the Revolutionary government.  One hopes they survived the Reign of Terror with their heads intact.276

Olivier

In 1755, descendants of Pierre Olivier the tailor and Françoise Bonnevie could be found at Chignecto and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered the family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Oliviers may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local habitants, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with the French at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  

In the fall of 1755, the British deported Joseph Olivier and his wife Marguerite Martin dit Barnabé to South Carolina.  In the spring of 1756, they evidently were not among the Acadians who took advantage of the South Carolina governor's permission to return to greater Acadia by boat.  In August 1763, six months after the war had ended, Joseph and his family appeared on a list of Acadians in South Carolina "who desire to withdraw from under the standard of their king ...."  Joseph was able to sign the repatriation list, indicating that he was literate.  Soon afterwards, he and his family, along with hundreds of other exiles in the seaboard colonies, emigrated to French St.-Domingue.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years's War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to what was left of their possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue could provide a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  Joseph Olivier and his family emigrated to St.-Domingue in late 1763 or 1764, but they found no farmland at the naval base, only misery and death.  Evidently Joseph and Marguerite settled for a time at Cap-Français on the coast east of Môle, where their son Jean-Baptiste was born in the mid-1760s.  Fed up with life in St.-Domingue, Joseph and Marguerite looked for an opportunity to leave the tropical colony.  Their opportunity came in 1765 or 1766, when refugees from Halifax and Maryland came through Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans.  The Oliviers were among the relatively few Acadians who emigrated to Louisiana directly from the French Antilles.  Spanish officials counted them at New Orleans in July 1767, so they likely had joined up with refugees from Maryland. 

Living in territory controlled by France, Joseph's older brothers Paul and Jean-Baptiste, sister Anne, and their families, still on Île St.-Jean, escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in 1755, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the island and transported them to France.  Sister Anne and her husband Jean-Baptiste Haché dit Gallant, fils, landed at the northern fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie probably aboard the transport Neptune, which had left Chédabouctou Bay in an 11-ship convoy in late November and was blown off course.  Her brothers may have landed there, too.  They then moved on to St.-Malo in northeast Brittany and settled in the suburb of St-Servan-sur-Mer, where Anne's husband Jean-Baptiste died in February 1767.  Anne did not remarry, but brother Jean-Baptiste, a 39-year-old widower, did remarry, to Marie-Josèphe, 40-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Haché dit Gallant, père and Marie Gentil of Île St.-Jean, at St.-Servan in January 1767.  Marie was sister Anne's dead husband's sister.  When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, hundreds of them, including Anne Olivier and her 10-year-old daughter, agreed to take it, but her brothers, if they were still in France in 1785, chose to remain.277

Orillon

In 1755, descendants of Charles Orillon dit Champagne and Marie-Anne Bastarache could be found at the family's home base at Annapolis Royal, at Chignecto, and perhaps on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Orillons may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, local Acadians, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Joseph Orillon dit Champagne of Pointe-à-Beauséjour, wife Marguerite Dugas, and their children, along with Joseph's younger brother Jean-Baptiste le jeune, wife Marguerite Deveau, and their children, ended up in South Carolina that fall. 

Many of the habitants at Annapolis Royal escaped the British roundup there in the fall of 1755.  After a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac or on lower Rivière St.-Jean before moving either to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or to Canada via the St.-Jean portage.  Charles Orillon dit Champagne, fils, wife Anne Richard, and their large family were in the group of exiles who followed Abbé La Guerne to Canada.  But members of the family also were among the Annapolis Acadians who did not escape the British there.  Charles's younger brother Pierre, wife Brigitte Brun, and their large family were thrown aboard one of the three deportation transports bound for Connecticut.  Charles's oldest brother Jean-Baptiste l'aîné, wife Cécile Labauve, and their younger children were among the Annapolis Acadians deported aboard the transport Hobson to South Carolina, which reached Charles Town in mid-January 1756.  They soon reunited with l'aîné's younger brothers Joseph and Jean-Baptiste le jeune. 

Jean-Baptist l'aîné's older sons, however, did not go to the southern colony.  Oldest son Jean-Baptiste, fils either had moved to one of the French Maritime islands when he came of age or escaped the British roundup at Annapolis and sought refuge on Île St.-Jean.  While his parents and younger siblings were languishing in South Carolina, Jean-Baptiste, fils married Louise-Charlotte, daughter of Guillaume Poitiers Dubuisson de Pommeroy and Jeanne-Philippe de Catalogne of Montréal, at Port-La-Joye on the island in August 1756.  Louise-Charlotte's uncle was Robert Poitiers Dubuisson, a French official on Île St.-Jean in its early years who died at Port-La-Joye in 1744.  One wonders what happened to the young couple during the island's dérangement in late 1758.  Louis-Charlotte's mother died at Trois-Rivières on the upper St. Lawrence in March 1769, so Jean-Baptiste, fils and Louise-Charlotte may have escaped the roundup on the island and joined her family in Canada.  Jean-Baptist l'aîné''s second son Charles le jeune evidently escaped the roundup at Annapolis Royal and followed his uncle Charles and his family to Canada.  Charles le jeune married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Paul Lauzet and Marie-Anne Renault, at Québec in February 1762, exactly a year before the war with Britain ended.  They likely remained in British Canada and may have joined Charles le jeune's many Orillon relatives in the Trois-Rivières area. 

In the spring of 1756, Governor James Glen of South Carolina urged the Acadians in his colony to return to greater Acadia by boat, money for which was eagerly raised by the colonial Council.  The governor, however, refused the Acadians' demand for pilots to guide their "'ancient' vessels" up the coast.  Brothers Jean-Baptiste l'aîné and Jean-Baptiste le jeune Orillon were among the exiles who took advantage of the governor's offer.  Though at least one of the "ancient vessels" made it all the way back to the Bay of Fundy and the refugees joined other exiles on lower Rivière St.-Jean, subsequent expeditions were not so lucky.  One of the expeditions from Georgia made it to Massachusetts, where, following the protests of Nova Scotia's Governor Lawrence, they were allowed to go no farther.  The Orillon brothers and their families, on a separate expedition of 78 exiles, got no farther than Long Island, New York, where colonial officials, also honoring Lawrence's request, sent them to Eastchester in Westchester County north of Manhattan.  And there they remained for the rest of the war.  Brother Joseph and his family remained in the southern colony, where Joseph and wife Marguerite Dugas died before August 1763, and their children were raised by relatives. 

At war's end, the Orillon brothers and their families were scattered from the upper St. Lawrence at Nicolet across from Trois-Rivières to the far-flung colony of South Carolina, with families in Connecticut and New York in between.  Brother Charles, fils's presence at Nicolet drew brother Pierre and his family from Connecticut and brother Jean-Baptiste l'aîné and members of his family from New York.  Over the following year, Orillons settled also at nearby Troise-Rivières, St.-Maurice, and Louiseville.  Typically, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

That is because members of the family still in South Carolina did not join their kinsmen in British-controlled Canada.  When the Acadians still in South Carolina appeared on repatriation lists in August 1763, Joseph Orillon and wife Marguerite Dugas were not among them.  Two of their children, however--13-year-old Joseph and 11-year-old Marguerite--were counted with the family of Joseph Moreau, actually Marant, and his wife Angélique Dugas, the Orillon orphans' maternal aunt.  Soon after the counting, hundreds of Acadians in the seaboard colonies, including South Carolina and New York, emigrated to French St.-Domingue, Orillons among them.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for colony's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  Later in 1763 or in 1764, the Marants and their charges went to St.-Domingue.  Jean-Baptiste Orillon le jeune and his family also ventured to the sugar colony from New York.  They settled at Bombarde, today's Bombardopolis, near Môle St.-Nicolas, and there they remained.  In the mid- and late 1760s, when fellow exiles from Halifax and Maryland came through nearby Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans, the Orillon family from New York chose not to join them.  Jean-Baptiste le jeune, "living at Belin," died there in January 1785, age 63.  One of his daughters married into the Clenet family at Bombarde, so the blood of the family line may have endured in the colony. 

Meanwhile, Jean-Baptiste le jeune's Orillon niece and nephew had long abandoned St.-Domingue when their uncle had breathed his late.  In 1765, not long after they reached the colony, they and their Marant uncle and Dugas aunt hooked up with fellow Acadians from Halifax who transshiped at Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans--among the few Acadian exiles who emigrated to Louisiana directly from the French Antilles.320

Ozelet

In 1755, the only remaining male descendant of Jean Ozelet and Madeleine Beaufet of Newfoundland and Île Royale was their grandson Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, Ozelet, age 12, living with his mother and stepfather at Cobeguit on the eastern end of the Minas Basin.  When the British began rounding up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the summer of 1755, Jean, his mother Jeanne Moyse, stepfather Benjamin Pitre, three Pitre half-sisters, and most, if not all, of the habitants at Cobeguit fled to Île St.-Jean, still controlled by the French, that fall, winter, or spring.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean and transported most of the habitants there to France.  Jean Ozelet, now in his mid-teens, crossed with his stepfather, his mother, and three half-sisters aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in an 11-ship convoy and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Only Jean, stepfather Benjamin Pitre, and his half-sister Agnès Pitre, age 11, survived the crossing.  Jean-Baptiste's mother died at sea along with his half-sisters Françoise Pitre, age 10, and Canuse Pitre, age 4. 

In France, Jean Ozelet followed his stepfather to St.-Suliac on the east side of the river souith of St.-Malo, where he came of age and became a pit sawyer.  Jean married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Landry and Cécile LeBlanc, at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer in February 1766.  Marguerite gave Jean five children there:  Jean-Charles in March 1767; twins Marie-Marguerite and Jeanne-Olive in January 1769 but died within days of their birth; Pierre-Henry in July 1770 but died at age 2 in July 1772; and Mathurin-Joseph in August 1772.  In 1773, Jean and Marguerite, with hundreds of other exiles languishing in the port cities, became part of the grand settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou near the city of Châtellerault.  Another daughter, Marie-Charles or -Charlotte, was baptized in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in September 1774.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, Jean, Marguerite, and their three remaining children retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government subsidies and what work they could find.  They lived at Chantenay near Nantes, where another son, Julien, was born in September 1780--seven children, four sons and three daughters, between 1767 and 1780, most of whom died young.  

Jean was not the only member of his family to end up an exile in France.  According to Bona Arsenault, Jean's older sister Madeleine, born probably at Annapolis Royal in c1735, followed her family to Cobeguit in the early 1740s and her mother, stepfather, brother, and half-siblings to Île St.-Jean after the summer of 1755.  Unlike her mother, brother, and stepfather, however, she escaped the British roundup on the island in 1758 and fled to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  She married André-Claude dit Le Petit Claude, son of fellow Acadians Claude Boudrot le jeune and Judith Belliveau of Beaubassin and Tracadie, Île St.-Jean, in c1760 while in exile.  Soon after their marriage, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, Madeleine and her family appeared on a French repatriation list at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, at Chignecto.  After the war, in 1764, they followed his family to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  In late 1778, during the American Revolution, the British captured Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported Petit Claude, Madeleine, their children and other fisher/habitants to La Rochelle, France.  Madeleine died in St.-Nicolas Parish there in June 1779 soon after their arrival.  One wonders if she was aware of her brother's presence at Nantes when she reached the Biscay port. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Jean Ozelet, wife Marguerite Landry, and their four remaining children agreed to take it.  Jean's widowed brother-in-law Petit Claude Boudrot and two of his daughters chose to return to Île Miquelon in 1784, after the war with Britain ended.  A year later, Jean, Marguerite, and their children left Nantes for the Spanish colony.278

Part/Apart

In 1755, descendants of Pierre dit La Forest Part and Jeanne Dugas could be found at Annapolis Royal, on Rivière St.-Jean, and on Île Royale, while Michel Apart and his family, no relation to the Parts, could be found at Cobeguit and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered these families even farther. 

After the death of his wife at Cobeguit in the early 1730s, Michel Apart did no remarry.  If he did not follow his children to Île St.-Jean in the early 1750s, he certainly joined them after the summer of 1755, when the entire population of Cobeguit escaped to the island to elude the British in Nova Scotia that fall, winter, and spring.  Michel, along with his oldest son and his family, evidently left Île St.-Jean before the roundup there in late 1758 and took refuge in Canada.  Michel died at St.-Jean, Île d'Orléans, below Québec, in September 1758, in his mid-60s.  His son likely remained in Canada.  His daughter Brigitte and younger son Alexis were not so lucky.  Living in French-controlled territory, they had escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in 1755, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on Île St.-Jean and deported most of the habitants there to France.  Brigitte, her husband Antoine Boudrot, their son, and perhaps her brother Alexis ended up on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, depite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The son survived the crossing but died in a St.-Malo hospital in mid-February, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  From 1760 to 1772, at Trigavou on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo, Brigitte gave Antoine eight more children, five sons and eight daughters, all but one of whom survived childhood.  In 1773, Brigitte and her family went to Poitou with hundreds of other exiles languishing in the port cities.  In December 1775, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Antoine died in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, in April 1776, age 58, leaving Brigitte with a large family to raise.  She never remarried.  In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Brigitte, her five unmarried Boudrot children, and her married Boudrot son and his wife agreed to take it. 

Meanwhile, descendants of Pierre dit La Forest Part also were scattered to the winds.  Second son Jean and his family, still living at Annapolis Royal, escaped the British roundup there in the fall of 1755, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed to Chepoudy the following spring, and, probably via the Rivière St.-Jean portage, sought refuge in Canada.  Jean died by late May 1758, probably in Canada.  His family waited out the war there while their relatives endured exile in greater Acadia.  By 1764, they had settled on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour across from Trois-Rivières, which in a few years would become one of the largest Acadian settlements in the far-northern province.  Typically, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Jean's older brother Pierre, fils and younger brother Eustache, who had married Godins on Rivière St.-Jean, were still living on the lower river when the British struck in Nova Scotia.  Luckily for these Parts, the British lacked the resources to attack the river Acadians after they dispersed or deported the peninsula Acadians, and the brothers likely welcomed brother Jean in their river settlement after his escape from Annapolis Royal, but they did not follow him to Canada.  Pierre, fils and Eustache's sisters Jeannette and Marie-Anne, still living on French-controlled Île Royale, also escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, but, like their brothers on Rivière St.-Jean, their respite from the British was short-lived.  After the fall of Louisbourg, the redcoats swooped down on the rest of Île Royale and deported the French and Acadians there to France.  Marie-Anne and her family were thrown aboard the transport Duke William, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November, bound for St.-Malo, they did not make it.  The Duke William, along with another transport, foundered in a storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December.  Nearly all of the Acadians went down with the vessel, including Marie-Anne, her Benoit husband, and their children.  One wonders what happened to sister Jeannette and her family. 

After they captured Louisbourg, the British also struck on lower Rivière St.-Jean in late 1758 and early 1759.  Pierre, fils and his family eluded capture and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence Shore.  Brother Eustache and his family suffered a different fate.  Like brother Pierre, fils, Eustache and his family evidently escaped the first attack on the lower St.-Jean.  Unlike brother Jean, fils, Eustache and his family remained.  The British struck the Acadians again, in the dead of winter, and the result was one of the darkest moments of Le Grand Dérangement.  In early March 1759, Moses Hazen's New-English rangers murdered Eustache's wife Anastasie Godin and three of their children in a raid on the settlement of St.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas (some sources say the rangers scalped Anastasie and another Acadian woman).  Eustache likely was a witness to the murders.  The rangers spared at least one of his children, daughter Marie-Anne, and transported her and Eustache, along with other captives, to the prison compound on Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor.  The following November, Governor Charles Lawrence ordered their deportaton, along with Acadians captured at Cap-Sable, to England, but English authorities sent them on to Cherbourg, France, where they landed in mid-January 1760.  After Church authorities, probably with the help of witnesses, certified his status as a widower, Eustache remarried to cousin Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Melanson and Marie-Madeleine Petitot dit Saint-Seine, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in February 1761.  She evidently gave him a son, Laurent, probably at Cherbourg.  Eustache took his family to Poitou in 1773.  Wife Anne died at Archigny south of Châtellerault in November 1774, age 58.  In October 1775, Eustache and son Laurent retreated with other Poitou Acadians to Nantes.  Meanwhile, his daughter Marie-Anne by his murdered first wife married Jean, son of fellow Acadians Christophe Delaune and Marguerite Caissie dit Roger of Île St.-Jean, at Cherbourg in February 1773.  They also went to Poitou and retreated to Nantes.  In 1785, Marie-Anne and her family emigrated to Spanish Louisiana.  Eustache and son Laurent, if they were still alive, remained in the mother country. 

In North America, Eustache's older brother Pierre, fils and his family also suffered at the hands of the British.  Sometime in the late 1750s or early 1760s, after escaping to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, Pierre, fils and his family either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia until the end of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted Pierre Paré, his wife, and five of their children in the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, where his brother Eustache had been held four years earlier. 

Parts being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the hated oath if they joined their relatives in Canada.  After all that they had suffered on the question of the oath, no self-respecting Acadian would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their meager possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Evidently Pierre, fils and his wife Angélique died at Georges Island not long after the count in August 1763.  However, among the 600 exiles who left Halifax for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, in late 1764 and early 1765, five of them were the orphaned children of Pierre Part and Angélique Godin.321

Patry

Living in territory controlled by France, Guillaume Patry, wife Françoise Chiasson, and their family escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France. 

Guillaume, age 53, wife Françoise Chiasson, age 54, and their children--Georges, age 17, Angélique, age 15, and Paul, age 12--crossed on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Amazingly, all of Guillaume's family survived the crossing.  They settled at La Gouesnière in the countryside southeast of St.-Malo, just south of Guillaume's family's home base of St.-Coulomb, and, in 1761, moved to the nearby suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where they were still living in 1765.  In March of that year, the war now over, Guillaume took his family to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland aboard Le Duc de Choiseul, but they did not remained.  In 1767, French authorities, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, coaxed the fisher/habitants to resettle in France.  The Patrys landed at La Rochelle.  Most of the islanders returned to Miquelon the following year, but Guillaume and his family remained at La Rochelle and returned to St.-Malo in March 1768.  Guillaume's wife Françoise may have died by then.  He remarried to Jeanne, daughter of Mathurin Joucan and Charlotte Rouault of Bauger-Morvan, Dol, and widow of Pierre Beaugendre, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in October 1769.  She gave him no more children.  Guillaume was still alive in November 1770, when he served as godfather to his son Paul's oldest daughter at St.-Servan.  Guillaume's family was reported as still residing in the St.-Malo area in 1772. 

Guillaume's younger son Paul was still a child when his family settled at La Gouesnière and St.-Servan-sur-Mer and in his teens and early 20s when he accompanied them to Île Miquelon and back.  At age 23, he married Charlotte, daughter of fellow Acadians Christophe Pothier and Anne Boudrot, at St.-Servan in January 1770.  Charlotte's family had been aboard the ill-fated Violet, which sank in the storm off the southwest coast of England on the way to St.-Malo.  Somehow she had become separated from her family at Havre-St.-Pierre, where the Patrys had lived, and crossed on one of the Five Ships, perhaps on the same transport on which Paul and his family had crossed.  She gave Paul at least three children at St.-Servan:  Jeanne-Charlotte-Rosalie in November 1770; Paul-Charles in December 1771 but died the following September; and Anne-Perrine in August 1773.  Either on the eve of, or soon after, Anne-Perrine's birth, Paul and his family, with hundreds of other exiles languishing in the port cities, became part of the major settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou.  After two years of effort, Paul and his family retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they again had to subsist on government handouts and what work they could find.  Daughter Marie-Modeste was baptized at nearby St.-Martin de Chantenay in June 1777--four children, three daughters and a son, between 1770 and 1777.  Paul died in his early or mid-30s probably at Chantenay before November 1783, when his wife Charlotte remarried to Pierre, fils, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Hébert and Marie Bernard of Chignecto, at Chantenay. 

One wonders what happened to Paul's older siblings, Georges and Angélique, after the family reached St.-Malo in 1759.  Angélique served as godmother to Barthélemy, fils, twin son of Barthélemy Cosset and his third wife Françoise Gallais, at Bonnaban near St.-Malo in the spring of 1762, so she survived not only the crossing, but also its rigors.  Brother Paul served as godfather to Barthélemy, fils's twin sister, Louise-Geneviève.  The twins' mother, Françoise Gallais or Gallet, was Angélique and Paul's half-sister by their mother's first marriage.  Paul, himself, was a twin of his sister Françoise before the family was deported from Île St.-Jean to St.-Malo. 

Soon after Paul Patry's death at Chantenay in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  His widow Charlotte Pothier and her second husband Pierre Hébert, fils agreed to take it.  Her Patry in-laws, if they were still alive, chose to remain in France.  Daughters Jeanne-Charlotte-Rosalie and Marie-Modeste Patry, who would have been ages 14 and 8 in 1785, also did not go to Louisiana, so, like their father, they probably had died at Chantenay.  But daughter Anne-Perrine, age 12 that year, did accompany her mother and stepfather, along with an infant half-brother, to the Spanish colony.279

Pellerin

In 1755, descendants of Étienne Pellerin and Jeanne Savoie could still be found at Annapolis Royal, on Île St.-Jean, and on the St. Lawrence below Québec.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

In December 1755, after British and New-English troops rounded up the Acadians at Annapolis Royal, they forced three sons of Bernard Pellerin--Pierre, with wife Marie-Josèphe Belliveau and their four daughters; Grégoire, with wife Cécile Préjean and their daughter; and Charles with wife Madeleine Thibodeau--aboard the transport Pembroke, destined for North Carolina.  Soon after the ship left Goat Island in the lower Annapolis River, a storm in the lower Bay of Fundy separated the Pembroke from the other transports filled with Annapolis Acadians.  The exiles aboard the Pembroke, led by Pierre's father-in-law Charles Belliveau, a pilot, and including the Pellerin brothers, saw their opportunity.  They overwhelmed the officers and crew of the Pembroke, who numbered only eight, seized the vessel, and sailed it to Baie Ste.-Marie on the western shore of Nova Scotia.  They hid there for nearly a month, and then, in January 1756, sailed across the Bay of Fundy to the mouth of  Rivière St.-Jean.  There, in early February, they were discovered by a boatload of British soldiers and sailors disguised as French troops.  The Pellerins and the others managed to drive off the British force, burn the ship, and make their way with the ship's officers and crew to the Rivière St.-Jean settlement of Ste.-Anne-du-Pay-Bas, today's Fredericton, New Brunswick, where they spent the rest of the winter.  When food ran short at Ste.-Anne-du-Pay-Bas the following summer, Grégoire and Charles took their families to Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and then to Restigouche at the head of the Baie de Chaleurs, while Pierre and his family went on to the St. Lawrence valley probably via the St.-Jean portage, where a first cousin had gone in the late 1740s.  Charles remarried to Élisabeth, or Isabelle, daughter of Paul Thibodeau and Marguerite Trahan, at Restigouche in c1759.  A son, François, was baptized there in June 1760, on the eve of the British attack on the refuge by a naval force from Louisbourg.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouiche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to land his redcoats and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, arrived at Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On 24 October 1760, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 exiles still at Restigouche.  They included Grégoire Pellerin and his family of six; and Charles Pelerin and his family of four.  From Restigouche, the Pellerin brothers fled to Nipisiguit down the coast, where they were counted in 1761, and then they were taken to the prison compound on Georges Island, Halifax, with other captured Acadians from the area.  In August 1763, British officials counted Grégoire, his wife, and two children, as well as Charles and his wife, with no children, still at Halifax.  Meanwhile, in 1762, brother Pierre remarried to Cécile, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Boudrot and Cécile LeBlanc, at Lotbinière on the St. Lawrence above Québec City.  Pierre's daughters also settled on the upper St. Lawrence. 

Descendants of Étienne Pellerin also were deported from Annapolis Royal to Massachusetts, New York, and South Carolina in 1755.  In 1760, colonial officials in Massachusetts counted Magdalen Pilbrain, perhaps a widow, and six children at Boston.  François Pellerin, who was deported to South Carolina, died there in c1762.  One wonders what happened to his family after his death.  After the war, in 1763 in New York, Marguerite Pellerin, now a widow, and her family were still in that colony.  In August 1763 in Massachusetts, members of the family still in the Bay Colony included Pierre Pellerin, wife Anne Girouard, and five sons and two daughters; and his brother Jean-Baptiste Pellerain, fils, wife Mariee Bourg, and five sons and a daughter.  The Pellerins in Massachusetts chose to resettle in Canada, where members of the family had gone in the late 1740s and in 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Étienne Pellerin began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, they could be found at Québec City; at Bécancour,Yamachiche, Yamaska, Lotbinière, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, Louiseville, Nicolet, and St.-Grégoire on the St. Lawrence above Québec; and on Île d'Orléans below the city.  They also could be found at Memramcook in present-day southeastern New Brunswick; and in Nova Scotia at Chezzetcook, Halifax, and Pointe-de-l'Est. 

After the war, descendants of Étienne Pellerin ecaped British rule by resettling on the island of Martinique in the French Antilles.  Agathe "of Acadie," 40-year-old daughter of Jean-Baptiste Pellerin and Marie Martin and a granddaughter of Étienne, died at St.-Pierre on the island in October 1764.  Despite her age, Agathe was still unmarried.  Her older sister Marguerite, widow of Claude Doucet, who had come to the island from exile in New York, died at St.-Pierre the following December, age 54.  One suspects that sister Agathe also had come to the island with her sister. 

The Pellerins being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French Antilles, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Pellerins, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, two were descendants of Étienne Pellerin.

A Pellerin, perhaps a descendant of Étienne who had been deported to France, settled on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Britanny.  In April 1781, Pierre Philippe, son of Marc Pellerin and Thérèse Brun, was born at Le Palais on the east shore of the island.  They did not follow other Acadians to Spanish Louisiana in 1785.280 

Pinet

In 1755, descendants of Philippe Pinet and Catherine Hébert still in greater Acadia could be found on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale and perhaps at Minas.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

Members of Philippe's third son Noel's family--second son Joseph, his wife Madeleine Bertrand, and their children--may have been the only members of the extended family who remained in British Nova Scotia.  Joseph's daughter Marie was born at Minas in c1752, so the family likely was still there in the fall of 1755.  If so, they ended up on a deportation transport bound for one of the British seaboard colonies. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the many Pinets living on the Maritime islands escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on the islands and deported most of the habitants there to France.  The crossing to St.-Malo and Cherbourg devastated the family.  Charles, fils of Port-Toulouse, 33-year-old son of Charles l'aîné, Charles, fils's wife Jeanne Samson, and their four children--Jean, age 7; and Charles, Jeannette, and Marie, ages unrecorded--crossed on the transport Queen of Spain, which left Île Royale in September and reached St.-Malo during the third week of November 1758.  Charles, fils, Jeanne, their yonger son, and their daughters died at sea.  Son Jean was the only survivor.  He went to live with a Mlle. Delien on Rue St.-Sauveur at St.-Malo soon after his arrival and moved to the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in 1760.  He died there in February 1763, age 11 or 12.  Noël's son Pierre, age 30, wife Geneviève Trahan, and their children crossed on the transport Duke William, which left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November 1758, bound for St.-Malo.  In mid-December, a storm off the southwest coast of England sank the Duke William and two other transports, and Pierre and his family were lost.  His older sister Marie-Brigitte, called Brigitte, age 41, her second husband Martin Porcheron of Lyon, age 28, their year-old daughter, and four of Brigitte's daughters from her marriage to Louis Vallet dit Langevin, crossed one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite the mid-December storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Brigitte was pregnant when the transport left Chédabouctou.  She, her husband, and two of her Vallet daughters, ages 15 and 10, survived the crossing, but her Porcheron daughter, her newborn, name and gender unrecorded, and her oldest Vallet daughter died at sea.  Another Vallet daughter, age 12, died at St.-Malo the first of March, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  They settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of the Breton port, where Brigitte gave Martin a son in November 1760, but the boy died at age 11 in 1770.  In 1773, Martin and his family agreed to be part of the major settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou.  The move proved fatal for Brigitte.  She died at Archigny south of Châtellerault in September 1774, age 60.  Martin promptly remarried to a fellow Acadian who was the community's midwife.  When most of the Acadians abandoned the Poitou venture in 1775-76 and retreated to the lower Loire port of Nantes, Martin Porcheron and his new family remained in Poitou. 

Charles, fils's sister Angélique took an unusual route to France.  In 1758, she escaped the deportation at Port-Toulouse and took refuge in greater Acadia.  Two years later, she married Michel dit Richelieu, son of Jean Léger and Marguerite Comeau of Chepoudy, no place recorded, but it may have been at the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, which also served as a major refuge for Acadians who had fled to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Michel evidently had not followed his parents to Île St.-Jean in the 1750s, when he would have been in his mid- or late teens, but had remained at Chepoudy and escaped the British roundup there in 1755.  The couple evidently fell into British hands soon after their 1760 marriage, perhaps after the attack at Restigouche that summer by a British naval force from Louisbourg.  Angélique gave Michel a son, Michel-Prosper, also called Michel, fils, at Louisbourg in c1762.  In November of that year, the British deported the family to La Rochelle, France, aboard the transport Windsor.  After the war with Britain ended, Michel and his family followed other exiles in France to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, where she would have reunited with a cousin who also had escaped the British in 1758.  Michel and Angélique's daughter Jeanne was born on Miquelon in c1767.  That year, to alleviate overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierrre, French officials, obeying a royal decree, coaxed most of the fisher/habitants to emigrate to France.  Michel and Angélique went, instead, to French St.-Domingue, where some of their relatives had gone.  They arrived in the sugar colony in c1768, but they did not remain.  By May 1769, they had returned to La Rochelle.  Son Louis was born there that year; and son Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, in c1770.  Michel died at La Rochelle in c1770, in his early 30s.  Angélique and her children moved on to Cherbourg in Normandy, and then to the lower Loire port of Nantes by November 1784. 

Other island Pinets deported to France in 1758 landed at Cherbourg in Normandy.  Noël's son Philippe, still a bachelor, survived the crossing from Île St.-Jean but not its rigors.  He died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in early November 1759, in his late 20s, before he could marry.  Philippe's younger brother Charles dit Pinel, his wife Anne Durel, and their three children also landed in the Norman port, where he worked as a mariner.  One wonders if any of their children--Anne-Charlotte, age 4; Lazare, age 2; and newborn Françoise--survived the crossing.  Anne gave Charles four more children at Cherbourg and Le Havre across the Baie de Seine:  Jeanne-Charlotte at Cherbourg in October 1760; Louis in October 1762; Marie-Modeste at Le Havre in c1765; and Marie-Madeleine at Cherbourg in February 1771.  Charles continued his work as a mariner in the mother country, yet, like his sister Brigitte and her family at St.-Suliac, he took his family to Poitou in 1773.  Anne gave him another son, Marin-Charles, at La Chapelle-Roux, Poitou, in January 1775--eight children, five daughters and three sons, between 1754 and 1775, in greater Acadia and France.  Like sister Brigitte's widower, Charles dit Pinel and his family remained in Poitou when most of their fellow Acadians moved on to Nantes.  By September 1784, however, Charles and his family were living among fellow exiles at Chantenay near Nantes.  Daughter Marie-Modeste married Jean-Baptiste-Charles, called Jean-Charles, son of fellow Acadians Charles Haché and his second wife Marie Hébert, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1784. 

An Acadian Pinet landed in another French port in 1758.  Jeanne Pinet of Île Royale, wife of René Robin, died in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in August 1759, probably soon after reaching the naval port.  One wonders how she was kin to Philippe, Charles, and Angélique. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, most of the Pinets still languishing in the mother country--Charles dit Pinel, wife Anne, three of their children, an unmarried son, an unmarried daughter, and their married daughter and her family; and Charles's widowed cousin Angélique and her two Léger sons--agreed to take it.  Charles's daughter Jeanne-Charlotte and son Martin-Charles, who would have been ages 25 and 10 in 1785, or any of his and Anne's older children, if they were still living, did not accompany their family to the Spanish colony. 

Other Pinets on the Maritime islands, like Angélique, escaped the British roundups there, either by leaving the islands before late 1758 or by eluding the redcoats and blue jackets when they descended on the islands that autumn.  None of the others, however, ended up in France.  Petit Charles's son Pierre and his wife Monique Trahan, recently married, evidently left Île St.-Jean before the island's dérangement.  The move up to Canada proved fatal for Monique; she may have been one of the victims of the smallpox epidemic that struck the exiles in the Québec area from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Pierre remarried to Canadian Marie Vienneau at St.-Charles de Bellechasse across from Québec in October 1758.  Between 1765 and 1773, she gave Pierre three children, two sons and a daughter, probably in Canada, but their sons did not remain there.  By the late 1780s, perhaps with their parents, they had moved on to New Brunswick, created out of Nova Scotia in 1784, and settled in the fishing villages of Nepisiguit, now Bathurst, and Caraquet on the new province's northeastern shore.  Pierre's older brother Charles, fils, his second wife Marguerite Lavaudier, and their two young sons were still at Port-Toulouse in 1758, but they also escaped the British roundup.  They evidently found refuge on the mainland, but their respite there would have been a short one.  In the late 1750s or early 1760, they either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  Marguerite gave Charles, fils another son in c1760.  Soon after the war ended, they followed other Nova Scotia exiles to Île Miquelon to escape British rule.  There Charles, fils would have reunited with his cousin Angélique.  Then tragedy struck Charles, fils's family hard.  On 6 September 1767, Charles, fils's three sons--Jean-Baptiste, age 16; Charles, age 10; and Louis, age 7--drowned "in the pond" on Miquelon.  A few weeks later, French authorities sent the Newfoundland islanders to France.  One wonders if Charles, fils and Marguerite were among them or if they chose to remain in greater Acadia.  One also wonders if they had more children. 

Other Pinets chose to resettle in French St.-Domingue.  However, unlike cousin Angélique, they chose to remain.  Joseph's daughter Marie, and perhaps Joseph and wife Madeleine Bertrand as well, did not follow the majority of their fellow exiles in the seaboard colonies to British-controlled Canada or Spanish Louisiana.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of St.-Domingue would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Acadians lured to the big island would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for colony's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  If Joseph and Madeleine were still on St.-Domingue in the mid- or late 1760s, when other exiles from Halifax and Maryland came though nearby Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans, they chose not to join them.  And if they were still alive then, their time on the island was short.  Daughter Marie died at Môle St.-Nicolas in July 1776, age 24.  The priest who recorded her burial noted that her parents were deceased and said nothing of a husband.322

Pitre

In 1755, descendants of Jean Pitre and Marie Pesseley could be found at Annapolis Royal; Chignecto; Chepoudy in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; Minas Proper and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; and on Île Royale and especially Île St.-Jean, where many of them had moved from the Nova Scotia settlements in the early 1750s.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by the Abbé Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Pitres have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians, including members of this family, were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Pitres may have been among the area Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  If so, they, too, along with the Canadians and the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  One Pitre family ended up in South Carolina.  Other members of the family still in the area evidently escaped the roundup that summer and fall and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada.  At least one member of the family who escaped to Québec--Flavien, the 11-year-old son of Joseph of Chepoudy--died in the smallpox epidemic that killed several hundred exiles in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758. 

Pitres still in Minas settlements in the summer and fall of 1755 found themselves on transports bound for at least two seaboard colonies.  Pitres from Minas went to Connecticut and Virginia.  The Acadians sent to the Old Dominion suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  After their arrival in November and December, they languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships until, with winter approaching, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie ordered them dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond, while he and the colony's political leaders pondered their fate.  The following spring, the Virginians sent them on to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several English ports and where many died of smallpox. 

In late summer, while the British were rounding up their cousins on the other side of the Minas Basin, Pitres still at Cobeguit followed their fellow habitants--the community's remaining population--into the surrounding hills before making their way to Tatamagouche, Remsheg, and other North Shore villages.  From there, during the fall, winter, and spring, they crossed Mer Rouge to the south shore of Île St.-Jean to join their many kinsmen already there. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the many Pitres living on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean escaped the roundups in Nova Scotia in 1755 and 1756, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on the islands and deported most of the habitants there to France.  The crossings to St.-Malo devastated the family.  Three small families crossed on the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Île Royale in September and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Jean-Baptiste, age 25, son of Claude-Jean Pitre, crossed with wife Félicie Daigre, age unrecorded, and son Jean-Baptiste, fils.  The parents survived the crossing, but the son, age unrecorded, died at sea.  French authorities sent them on to the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay, but they did not remain.  Jean Pitre, fils's son Jean III, age 59, wife Marguerite Thériot, age 57, and youngest son Anselme, age 20, also crossed on the ill-fated vessel.  The parents died at sea, and the son was sent on to Rochefort, but he also did not remain.  Jean Pitre IV, age 26, wife Françoise Henry, age 26, and their daughters Marguerite-Bibianne, age 4, and Tersile, age 1, crossed on Duc Guillaume.  Jean IV and his daughters died at sea.  Wife Françoise survived the crossing.  Claude Pitre's daughter Marguerite, age 46, her fisherman husband François Fardet or Fardel, age 61, and their four children, a son and three daughters, ages 12 to 2, crossed on the Queen of Spain, which left Île Royale with the Duc Guillaume in September but did not reach St.-Malo until mid-November.  Over half of the Queen of Spain's 108 passengers died in the crossing.  Marguerite, François, and their 2-year-old daughter survived the crossing, but one of their daughters died at sea.  Over the following weeks, Marguerite and her three other children died in a St.-Malo hospital from the rigors of the crossing.  By the Christmas season, François Fardel, back in his native France, no longer had a family.  Meanwhile, a convoy of 12 more transports left Chédabouctou Bay in late November 1758, also bound for St.-Malo.  Pitres crossed aboard many of these vessels, and many of them, including entire families, perished in the crossing.  Jean Pitre, fils's son Joseph, his wife Isabelle Boudrot, and their three unmarried sons, along with Joseph's son Pierre, his wife Anne Bourg, and their three children, and son François, wife Rose Henry, and their daughter crossed aboard one of the two transports in the convoy, the Duke William or the Violet, that sank in a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England and took 800 Acadians down to their deaths.  Also aboard the Duke William was Jean, fils's fourth son Michel, wife Marie-Madeleine Doiron, and their seven children.  Aboard the Violet was Jean, fils's daughter Cécile, her Lejeune husband, and their large family.  Two Pitres crossed on the small transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy late November and, despite the mid-December storm, reached St.-Malo in mid-January, a week ahead of the other vessels in the convoy.  Germain-Jean Pitre's older daughter Marguerite, age 20, husband Pierre Michel, 22, their infant son Joseph, and Marguerite's brother Charles, age 8, survived the crossing, but little Joseph died in an area hospital the following November.  Pitres also crossed on one or more of the five transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, or the John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy late November with 1,033 Acadians aboard.  Despite the mid-December storm that sank or wrecked three other vessels, the Five Ships remained in convoy and reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  However, only 694 exiles were still aboard, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, many of them Pitres.  Jean Pitre III's son Pierre, age 21, still unmarried, crossed alone on one of the Five Ships.  He survived the crossing but died in a nearby hospital a few weeks after his arrival.  Germain-Jean Pitre's younger daughter Anne, age 18, husband Louis Bourg, age 28, and her sister Marie-Blanche, age 15, crossed on one of the Five ships.  Anne and Marie-Blanche survived the crossing, but Louis died in a St.-Malo hospital two months after their arrival.  Their older brother Pierre-Olivier, age 22, crossed evidently alone and survived the crossing.  Marc Pitre's daughter Marie, age unrecorded, crossed with her husband Jean Bourg, age 56, and three of their children, ages 26, 16, and 13.  Marie died at sea, and her husband and oldest daughter died in a St.-Malo hospital a few months after their arrival.  Marguerite-Geneviève Pitre, age 36, crossed with husband Joseph Blanchard, fils, age 41, and five of their children, ages 12 to 3.  Only the parents and their oldest son survived the crossing, but Joseph, fils died in a St.-Malo hospital a month and a half after their arrival.  Marie Pitre, age 35, crossed with husband Alexis Blanchard, age 33, and three of their children, ages 4, 3, and 16 months.  Their three children died at sea.  Alexis died in a St.-Malo hospital a few weeks after their arrival.  Marie was pregnant on the voyage.  She gave birth to a daughter in a St.-Malo hospital in early February.  The baby died soon after her birth.  Marie died a week later, victim of the crossing as well as the rigors of childbirth.  Another Marie Pitre, age 25, daughter of the Joseph who perished in the mid-December storm, crossed on one of the Five Ships with her husband Jean Henry, fils, age 30, and their three children, ages 6, 4, and 2.  The two younger children died at sea, but the rest of the family survived the crossing.  Marie's older brother Charles, age 30, crossed with wife Anne Henry, age 29, and three children--Anne-Blanche, age 6; Marin, age 4; and Pierre, age 2.  Charles and Anne survived the crossing, but their children died at sea.  Marie-Madeleine Pitre, age 32, crossed with husband Pierre Henry, age 40, four of their children, ages 10 to 5, and one of Pierre's younger brothers.  The youngest child died at sea, and Marie-Madeleine died in a St.-Malo hospital two and a half months after their arrival.  Susanne Pitre, age 28, crossed with husband Baptiste-Olivier Henry, age 32, and five children, age 9 to 2.  Three of the children died at sea, and one of the children and Baptiste-Olivier died in a St.-Malo hospital two months after their arrival.  Claude-Jean Pitre's oldest son Benjamin, age 34, crossed with wife Jeanne Moyse, age unrecorded, their three children--Agnès, age 11; Françoise, age 10; and Canuse or Canute, age 4--and Jeanne's Ozelet son, age 16, by a previous marriage.  Jeanne and two of her children by Benjamin, Françoise and Canute, died at sea.  Marie-Josèphe Pitre, age 27, crossed with husband Joseph Thériot, age 30, and three of their children, ages 7, 5, and 3.  Marie-Josèphe and her three children died at sea, and Joseph, without a family, moved on to Cherbourg in Normandy in early March, where he died the following December.  Anne Thibodeau, age 38, widow of Jean Pitre, fils's sixth son Charles, who had died on the eve of the islands' dérangement, crossed on one of the Five Ships with five of her Pitre children--Marie-Marthe, age 12; Osite, age 9; Jean-Baptiste, age 8; Anne, age 6; and Josèphe, age 5--and Charles's teenaged nephew Olivier, son of Claude-Jean Pitre.  Anne and Olivier survived the crossing.  Four of her children died at sea, and the oldest daughter died in a St.-Malo hospital three months after their arrival.  Jean Pitre, fils's youngest son Amand, age 35, wife Geneviève Arcement, age 35, and their eight children--Basile, age 12; Tranquille, age 11; Ambroise, age 9; Anne Ludivine, age 8; Marie-Victoire, age 6; Zozine, age 4; Tersile, age 3; and Charles, age 9 months--crossed on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November 1758, was damaged by the mid-December storm, limped to Bideford, England, for repairs, and reached St.-Malo in early March 1759.  Three of the children--Basile, Zozine, and Tersile--died at sea, and Anne-Ludivine died in a St.-Malo hospital three and a half months after their arrival. 

Not all of the island Pitres who crossed to France landed at St.-Malo.  Four of Claude-Jean Pitre's sons, one of them married--Claude, fils, age 30, and his wife Rosalie Henry, and brothers Paul, age 26; François, age 24; and Raphaël, age 19, still bachelors--landed at Cherbourg in late 1758, but they did not remain.  At least one Pitre wife, Claude's daughter Angélique, wife of Michel Doucet, landed at Le Havre across the Baie de Seine from Cherbourg. 

Island Pitres did their best to create a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Jean-Baptiste Pitre and wife Félicité Daigre, who crossed on Le Duc Guillaume, left Rochefort soon after French authorities sent them there and settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo to be closer to their extended families.  Félicité gave Jean-Baptiste 15 more children at Mordeuc on the river west of Pleudihen:  Marguerite in December 1759 but died at age 3 1/2 in May 1763; Jean in January 1761 but died the following April; Jean-Marie in February 1762; Charlotte-Marie in March 1763; Joseph in August 1764; Pierre in October 1765; Augustin-François in November 1766 but died the following January; Jacques-François in November 1767; Françoise-Madeleine in May 1769; Félicité in July 1770; Marguerite-Marie in November 1771; Marie-Perrine in January 1773 but died the following September; Prudente-Jeanne in March 1774; Augustin in February 1775; and Charles-Paul in Novembe 1776.  Jean-Baptiste's oldest brother Benjamin and his 11-year-old daughter Agnès settled St.-Suliac, on the same side of the river north of Pleudihen.  In November 1759, at age 34, less than a year after arriving aboard one of the Five Ships, Benjamin remarried to Marguerite, 18-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Boudrot and Catherine Brasseau, at La Gouesnière in the countryside southeast of St.-Malo, but they settled at St.-Suliac, where Marguerite gave him six more children:  Marie in November 1761; Madeleine-Modeste in July 1763; Jean-Baptiste in December 1765 but died at age 13 months in January 1767; Cécile-Oliver in January 1768; Marguerite-Charlotte in January 1770; and François-Jean in August 1773.  Four of Benjamin's younger brothers, who had landed at Cherbourg, moved on to St.-Malo in July 1759 and settled in several villages on the east side of the Rance.  Claude, fils and wife Rosalie Henry settled at Pleudihen.  Rosalie died by September 1764, when Claude, fils remarried to Marie-Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Richard and Marie Boudrot, at Pleudihen.  She gave him three children at nearby Chapelle de Mordreuc:  Honoré-Marie in June 1765 but died at Mordreuc, age 4, in August 1769; Olivier-Charles in January 1767 but died at Mordreuc, age 7, in November 1773; and Marie-Charlotte in February 1779.  Brother François married Ursule, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Breau and Ursule Bourg, at Pleurtuit across the river from St.-Suliac in March 1762.  François died probably at Pleurtuit the following September.  Ursule gave him a daughter, Ursule-Françoise, born posthumously at Pleurtuit in July 1763.  Brother Paul married Marguerite-Louise, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Valet and Brigitte Pinel, at St.-Suliac in February 1763.  Marie-Louise gave Paul two children there:  Marguerite-Geneviève in November 1763 but died at age 3 1/2 in January 1767; and Martin-Bénoni in May 1767.  Paul died at St.-Suliac in January 1767, age 36.  Marie-Louise remarried to an Hébert at St.-Suliac in January 1770.  Brother Raphaël died at Mordreuc near Pleudihen in June 1763, age 24, before he could marry.  Jean Pitre III's youngest son Anselme, who also crossed on Le Duc Guillaume and was sent to Rochefort, left the naval port in c1760 and settled at Pleurtuit, where he worked as a day laborer.  He married Isabelle, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Dugas and Élisabeth Bourg, at St.-Suliac across the river in February 1763.  Élisabeth gave Anselme seven children at Pleurtuit and St.-Suliac:  Jean-Pierre at Achen near Pleurtuit in December 1763; Joseph-François at St.-Suliac in January 1765; Marie-Françoise in July 1766; Judith-Marguerite at Pleurtuit in April 1768 but died at nearby Moysias in February 1771; Joachim-Charles at Créhen near Pleurtuit in Septemer 1769; Marguerite-Ludivine at Moysias in February 1771; and Elisabeth or Isabelle-Olive at Ville Rays near Pleurtuit in February 1773.  Amand Pitre and his family, who crossed on Supply, settled at St.-Suliac, where wife Geneviève Arcement gave him another daughter, Marguerite-Tarsille, in February 1761.  Their third son Ambroise married Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Paul Dugas and Marie Boudrot, at Pleurtuit across the river in April 1774.  Charles Pitre and wife Anne Henry, now childless thanks to the crossing aboard one of the Five Ships, settled at Pleurtuit, where they re-created their family.  Anne gave Charles six more children in the area:  Jean-Charles born at nearby St.-Antoine in May 1760 but died at age 2 1/2 in October 1762; another Jean-Charles born at nearby La Moisiais in July 1763; Joseph-Pierre at Pleurtuit in October 1765; Anne-Geneviève in March 1768 but died at age 7 in May 1775; Marguerite-Josèphe born in October 1770; and Élisabeth-Modeste at La Moisiais in December 1773.  Pierre-Olivier Pitre, who survived the crossing aboard one of the Five Ships, settled at Pleurtuit before crossing the Rance to St.-Suliac.  He spent 1761 to 1763 in England, a hint that he had signed up for corsair duty while the war was still on, was captured by the Royal Navy, and held as a prisoner for the rest of the war.  After returning to St.-Suliac in 1763, he worked as a day laborer and married Rosalie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Hébert and Madeleine Doiron, there in October 1765.  Rosalie gave Pierre-Olivier four children at St.-Suliac:  Marie-Rose in August 1766; Euphrosine-Françoise in October 1767 but died at age 11 months in September 1768; Grégoire-Marie in January 1770; and Anne-Ludivine in February 1772.  In 1771, the family was living at Châtelaudren in northern Brittany west of St.-Brieuc but returned to St.-Suliac the following year.  Pierre-Oliviers's younger sisters Anne and Marie-Blanche also settled at St.-Suliac.  Anne, at age 23, remarried to fellow Acadian Joseph Gautrot, widow of Marie-Josèphe Hébert, there in November 1764 and gave him more children.  Sister Marie-Blanche, still in her teens, settled near her siblings but may not have married. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including Pitres, were repatriated to France.  Marie-Anne Comeau, widow of Antoine Pitre, four of her unmarried children--Marie, age 27; Simon, age 23; Agnès, age 20; and Joseph, age 14--and widowed daughter Nathalie, age 29--crossed from England to St.-Malo aboard the transport Dorothée in late May and settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where they remained.  Nathalie, at age 32, remarried to Jean-Jacques, son of fellow Acadians Jacques dit Petit Jacques LeBlanc and Cécile Dupuis of Grand-Pré and Île St.-Jean and widower of Ursule Aucoin, at St.-Servan in February 1766.  Jean-Jacques, who also had come to France via Virginia and England, was looked up to as a leader among the exiled Acadians at St.-Malo.  Nathalie gave him four more children at St.-Servan.  Her brother Simon, called a Pierre, married Geneviève, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Richard and Catherine Gautrot of Minas, at St.-Servan in January 1767.  Geneviève gave him a daughter, Geneviève Marguerite, there in May 1768.  He did not live long enough to see her grow up.  Simon died in the hospital at Pontorson in Normandy south of Mont-St.-Michel in October 1770, age 30.  One wonders what he was doing there, so far away from other Acadians.  Geneviève remarried to a Boudrot widow at St.-Servan in August 1773 and gave him more children.  Meanwhile, Claude-Marc Pitre, age 63, his second wife Madeleine Darois, age 44, and her Trahan son Paul, age 8, from a previous marriage, crossed from Liverpool to Morlaix in northwest Brittany, but they did not remain there.  In late 1765, two years after they reached the Breton port, Claude-Marc and his family followed dozens of fellow exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  They settled at Triboutoux near Sauzon on the north shore of the island.  Claude-Marc died there in March 1775, age 75. 

Another Pitre came, or, rather, returned to France by a different route.  In late 1758, the British deported Olivier, son of Claude-Jean Pitre, from Île St.-Jean to St.-Malo.  Olivier, still in his teens when he reached the mother country, worked in a St.-Malo suburb as a carpenter, but he did not remain.  In the early 1760s, while the war was still on, he found his way back to greater Acadia, perhaps on privateer duty.  He again fell into the hands of the British, who held him at Louisbourg until the war ended.  He married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Moyse dit Latrielle and Marie Petitpas, a kinswoman of his oldest brother Benjamin's first wife, at Louisbourg in April 1763, two months after the war officially ended.  On what was now being called Cape Breton Island, Marie gave Olivier two children:  Jean-Baptiste le jeune in June 1764; and Victoire in December 1765.  In early 1766, to escape British rule, they chose to follow Marie's widowered father and other exiles to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Their children's baptisms, along with their marriage, were recorded at Notre-Dame-des-Ardilers Parish, Miquelon, at the end of May 1766.  The following year, French officials, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, ordered the fisher/habitants to resettle in France.  Olivier and his family, perhaps including his father-in-law, sailed to St.-Malo aboard the schooner Créole and reached the Breton port the second week of November 1767.  Olivier and his family settled at St.-Suliac near his older brothers, who had not left France.  Marie and her father also had relatives there.  Marie was pregnant on the voyage and gave birth to another daughter, Marie-Cécile, at St.-Suliac in late December 1767.  The following year, they did not return to Île Miquelon with most of the island Acadians but remained in France.  In 1770 and 1772, at St.-Suliac, Marie gave Olivier two more daughters:  Françoise-Olive in November 1770; and Marie-Ludivine in September 1772 but died of smallpox at St.-Suliac in June 1773. 

In 1773 and 1774, Pitres in the St.-Malo area chose to take part in another, even grander, settlement venture, this one in the interior of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the coastal cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault, and French authorities endorsed the scheme.  Pitres who took their families to the interior province included Amand and wife Geneviève Arcement from St.-Suliac; Ambroise and wife Élisabeth Dugas from Pleurtuit; Anselme and wife Isabelle Dugas from Pleurtuit; Benjamin and second wife Marguerite Boudrot from St.-Suliac; Oliver and wife Marie Moyse from St.-Suliac; and Pierre-Olivier and wife Rosalie Hébert from St.-Suliac.  Isabelle Dugas gave Anselme Pitre another son, Jean-Charles, at Archigny south of Châtellerault in August 1774, but the boy died 18 days after his birth.  Pierre-Olivier Pitre's son Grégoire-Marie died at age 4 at Leigné-les-Bois east of Châtellerault in September 1774.  Marie Moyse gave Olivier Pitre another son, Louis-Constant, in St.-Roman Parish, Poitiers, southwest of Châtellerault, in c1775.  Marguerite Boudrot gave Benjamin Pitre another daughter, Geneviève-Louise or Louis-Geneviève, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in July 1775.  Élisabeth Dugas gave Ambroise Pitre a son, Paul-Ambroise, at Leigné-les-Bois in July 1775. 

Beginning in October 1775 and continuing through the following March, after two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians, including the Pitres, retreated from Châtellerault in four large convoys down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes.  Most of the Pitres traveled in the fourth convoy.  At Nantes and at nearby St.-Sébastien, Rezé, and Chantenay, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  April and May 1776 proved to be a trying time for Anselme Pitre.  Only a few weeks after reaching Nantes, his second son Joseph-François died in St.-Jacques Parish, age 12.  A few days later, wife Isabelle Dugas gave birth to twins, Joseph-René and Élisabeth.  Isabelle died in St.-Jacques Parish, age 37, at the end of the month, probably from the complications of childbirth.  One of the twins, Joseph-René, died in May.  Anselme, at age 38, remarried to Madeleine, 28-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Mathurin LeBlanc and Élisabeth Babin of Minas, at St.-Sébastien-sur-Loire across the river from Nantes the following October.  The other twin, Élisabeth, died at nearby Chantenay in October 1778.  That year and in 1780, at St.-Sébastien, Madeleine gave Anselme two more daughters:  Madeleine in July 1778; and Geneviève in January 1780--11 children, four sons and seven daughters, by two wives, between 1763 and 1780.  His youngest daughters died young.  His third son Joachim-Charles died at St.-Sébastien in May 1785, age 16, leaving him only four children, a son and three daughters, all by his first wife.  In April 1776, in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, Benjamin Pitre's 28-year-old daughter Agnès, by first wife Jeanne Moyse, married Joseph, 24-year-old son of fellow Acadians Dominique Guérin and Anne LeBlanc of Île Royale.  Benjamin's youngest daughter Louise-Geneviève died at Rezé across the Loire from Nantes in September 1777, age 2.  In 1778 and 1783, at Rezé, second wife Marguerite Boudrot gave Benjamin three more sons:  Étienne in June 1778; Jean in October 1780; and Mathurin in January 1783 but died a week after his birth--13 children, seven daughters and six sons, by two wives, hetween 1748 and 1783, in greater Acadia and France.  Meanwhile, Benjamin and Marguerite's son François-Jean-Baptiste died at Rezé in September 1781, age 8.  Benjamin died at Rezé in September 1782, in his late 50s, leaving Marguerite with seven children, four daughters and two sons, six of them unmarried, from both his wives.  Élisabeth Dugas gave Ambroise Pitre four more children at Chantenay:  Élisabeth in December 1776; Marie in February 1779; Jean-Louis in March 1783 but died in April; and Jean-Marie in April 1784.  Ambroise's younger brother Tranquille, age 31, married Élisabeth, 31-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Aucoin and Jeanne Thériot of Minas, in St.-Jacques Parish in August 1779.  She gave him two sons in the lower Loire port:  Jean-Baptiste in St.-Jacques Parish in June 1781; and Joseph-Vincent in St.-Nicolas Parish in April 1783.  Rosalie Hébert gave Pierre-Olivier Pitre five more children at Nantes and Chantenay:  Olivie-Julie in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, in June 1776 but died at age 2 1/2 at Chantenay in October 1778; Romain in St.-Similien Parish in February 1778 but died at age 1 1/2 at Chantenay in October 1779; Madeleine-Rose at Chantenay in April 1780; Anne-Henriette in February 1782; and Pierre-André in April 1784.  Marie Moyse gave Olivier Pitre two more daughters at Chantenay:  Julie-Aimée in March 1777 but died the following December; and Marie-Martine in November 1779 but died at age 3 1/2 in June 1783--eight children, two sons and six daughters, between 1764 and 1783, in greater Acadia and France.  Olivier died at Chantenay by September 1784, in his early 40s, when Marie was called a widow in a census of Acadians there.  Her and Olivier's older son Jean-Baptiste le jeune died at Chantenay in March 1785, age 21, leaving her with only three unmarried children, two daughters and a son. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a better life in faraway Louisiana, most of the Pitres still living in the mother country--53 of them, most in and around Nantes--agreed to take it.  Among them were Amand Pitre and his family, including married sons Tranquille and Ambroise and their families; Anselme Pitre and his family; Benjamin Pitre's widow Marguerite Boudrot and six of their children; Benjamin's brother Jean-Baptiste Pitre and his large family; brother Claude-Jean Pitre, fils's widow Marie-Blanche Richard and her Pitre daughter; brother François Pitre's widow Ursule Breau and her Pitre daughter; brother Paul Pitre's son Martin-Bénoni, still a bachelor; brother Olivier's widow Marie Moyse and her Pitre children; Charles Pitre and his family; Pierre-Olivier Pitre and his family; sister Anne Pitre, her Gautrot husband, and their family; and Nathalie Pitre, a widow again, and two of her LeBlanc children.  The few stay-behinds included a Pitre daughter on Belle-Île-en-Mer, and Jean-Baptiste Pitre's older sons at St.-Malo.  While the rest of their family was moving upriver to a new Spanish settlement above Baton Rouge, Jean-Marie and Joseph Pitre, two years apart in age, married an Acadian and a local girl at Pleudihen-sur-Rance south of St.-Malo on the same day in January 1786.  

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, Pitres among them.  They included Charles and his family of two; François, fils and his family of five; Jean-Baptiste and his family of four; and Joseph and his family of four.  The British held them in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  Pitres were counted at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in 1762.  They included Joseph and his family of four; Fra.s, or François, without a family; and another Joseph and his family of three.  Pitres also were counted on Georges Island, Halifax harbor, in August 1763.  They included Joseph, his wife, and five children; Charles and wife Angélique Blanchard, still without children; and Pierre, wife Agathe Doucet, and four children, probably including younger son François, who had been held at Fort Edward the year before. 

At war's end, Pitres still living in the seaboard colonies, like their cousins being held in Nova Scotia, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Pitres nevertheless appeared on reparation lists compiled in several of the colonies in the summer of 1763.  Germain Piteve, his wife, mother-in-law, and three children were still in Connecticut.  In c1760, Marguerite Pitre of Minas had married in one of the New-English colonies, so she and her husband probably were still there in 1763.  Marie Pitre, husband Charles Bourgeois, three of their children, two daughters and a son, and two Girouard orphans, were still in South Carolina in August 1763. 

However, in 1763 most of the Pitres still in North America were living not in Nova Scotia or in British seaboard colonies but in Canada, where many of them had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jean Pitre began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the late 1760s, they could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Nicolet, St.-Pierre-les-Becquets, St.-François-du-Lac, and at Châteauguay above Montréal; on the lower St. Lawrence at Île-aux-Coudres; on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore in present-day northeastern New Brunwick at Caraquet and Nepisiguit, now Bathurst; and on St. John Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, now Prince Edward Island.  One Pitre even settled at Détroit in the 1770s, then a part of the British-Canadian pays d'en haut.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Pitres still living in the British colonies at war's end chose to go to the French Antilles to escape British rule.  As the end-of-war treay was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the seaboard colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles who could be lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  A young Pitre wife from New England and a family of Pitres from Connecticut reached St.-Domingue by September 1764.  French authorities sent them to the interior settlement of Mirebalais in the hills northeast of Port-au-Prince to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  The experience proved fatal for most of them.  Germain-Jean Pitre's younger sons were baptized at Mirebalais in early September 1764, Joseph at age 4, Michel at age 8 months, but the boys died there the following February, a day apart.  Meanwhile, Germain-Jean, age 50, and daughter Madeleine, age 20, died on the same day at Mirebalais in October 1764.  Wife Marie-Josèphe Girouard, age 42, and son Pierre, age 13, died there in November 1764.  Daughter Camille, age unrecorded, married Frenchman Pierre, fils, son of Pierre Bidaut and Marie Legrand of Belleville near Paris, at La Croix-des-Bouquets near Port-au-Prince in May 1766.  Her sister Élisabeth died at La Croix-des-Bouquets in April 1769, age 26; her burial record says nothing of a husband.  Meanwhile, Marguerite, older daughter of Simon-Eustache Pitre of Minas and her husband Antoine Faurne baptized their three children at Mirebalais on 16 September 1764.  Their marriage, consumated in New England in c1760, was "attested to" at Mirebalais later in September 1764.  Another daughter, their third, died at Mirebalais in October, age 4 months.  Their fourth daughter was born at Mirebalais in c1766 but died there, age 2 years and 4 months, in February 1769.  A second son was born at Mirebalais in January 1770.  Marguerite died there the following April, age 32, perhaps from the rigors of childhood.  Thanks to her, at least the blood of Simon-Eustache's line of the family endured in what became Haiti.

Pitres being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada or other parts of greater Acadia.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Île Miquelon, where a Pitre from Louisbourg was about to go.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Pitres, were going, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least five were descendants of Jean Pitre the edge-tool maker.323

Poirier

In 1755, descendants of Jean Poirier and Jeanne Chebrat and Jean's nephew Michel dit de France Poirier and his wife Marie Chiasson could be found at Annapolis Royal, Minas, in the French Maritimes, and especially at Chignecto.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq warriors led by Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Poiriers were among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Poiriers were among the area Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the ChignectoAcadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Poirier families ended up on transports bound for South Carolina and Georgia.  In the spring of 1756, one of the young Poiriers--Jean-Baptiste, fils--took advantage of an opportunity to return to greater Acadia by boat but, along with other deportees in the expedition, got no farther than Long Island, New York.  Other Poiriers remained in South Carolina and Georgia.  Most of the many Poiriers at Chignecto, however, escaped the British roundup there and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada. 

Poiriers at Annapolis Royal also escaped the British roundup there in the fall of 1755, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudianc or lower Rivière St.-Jean.  From there, they moved on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or followed their kinsmen to Canada.  One of them--Jean-Baptiste, son of Michel, fils--died in 1756 on the trek to Canada.  His widow, Marie-Josèphe Savoie, died at Québec in December 1757, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of her fellow Acadians in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Poiriers from Annapolis remained in Canada with their many cousins from Chignecto.  Some of their kinsmen in Nova Scotia, however, did not escape the roundups there.  From Minas, the British deported Joseph, son of Jean-Baptiste, to Pennsylvania, and another family to Maryland. 

Living in territory controlled by France, Poiriers still on the Maritime islands escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on the islands and rounded up most of the habitants there.  A few Poiriers escaped the British and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, while others were deported to France.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, Poirier, age 34, a granddaughter of Michel dit de France, crossed with husband Pierre Livois, age 41, and four of their children, ages 6 years to 14 months, on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The three younger children died at sea.  Madeleine was pregnant on the voyage.  A son was born soon after they reached St.-Malo in late January 1756 but died the following June.  Joseph dit Gourdiec Poirier, age 38, a great-grandson of Jean the fisherman, crossed to St.-Malo with second wife Ursule Renaud, age 37, and five children--Marguerite, age 6; Marie-Josèphe, called Josèphe, age 3; Antoine, age 3; Madeleine, age 9 months; and Marie, their oldest, age unrecorded--aboard the transport Supply, which also left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy but, because of damage suffered in the storm, did not reach St.-Malo until March 1759.  Joseph, Ursule, and two of the children, Marguerite and Josèphe, survived the crossing, but Marie and Antoine died at sea, and 9-month-old Madeleine died in April, a month after they reached the Breton port. 

Island Poiriers did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Joseph dit Gourdiec took his family to St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo.  Ursule gave Gourdiec three more children there and in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer across the harbor:  Joseph, fils in March 1760; Pierre-Alexis in April 1762; and Françoise-Marie in September 1764--eight children, five daughters and three sons, between 1750 and 1764 in greater Acadia and France.  In late 1765, Gourdiec and his family were among the few island refugees who followed recently-arrived Acadian exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Gordiec, Ursule, and their five children settled at Kersau near Locmaria on the north shore of the island, and there they remained. 

Even more island Poiriers landed at another French port in 1758.  Joseph dit Gourdiec's older brother François, fils, wife Cécile Labauve, and their large family crossed from the Maritimes to Cherbourg in Normandy.  Daughter Clothilde died there in December 1758, age 9, soon after their arrival.  François, fils's daughter Bonne-Marie-Françoise, born in Cherbourg in c1762, died there in January 1764, age 15 months.  Meanwhile, son Louis-Jacques, born in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in December 1763, died 15 days after his birth in January, two days before his older sister died there.  Pierre Poirier, a younger son of Michel dit de France, also crossed to Cherbourg, with wife Louise Caissie and some of their seven children.  They had been counted at Malpèque on the northwest coast of Île St.-Jean in 1752, among the relatively few Acadians counted there who fell into British hands.  Michel Poirier, perhaps an older son of Pierre, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in November 1759, age 24.  Pierre Poirier died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in October 1760, age 50.  His youngest son Joseph-Isidore remained in France but not at Cherbourg.  In 1772, Joseph-Isidore married Jeanne-Françoise Daudet, probably a local girl, in the lower Loire port of Nantes in southeast Brittany, where an uncle and his family had gone in 1765 but did not remain. 

Poiriers from both branches of the family came to France by a different route, but none of them remained.  Chignecto families who had escaped the roundup in 1755 had taken refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and later at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  By the early 1760s, most of them either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  After 1763, Poiriers there, seeking to avoid British rule, chose to resettle on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  French officials counted Claude dit Glodiche, a great-grandson of Jean the fisherman, on the island in 1767.  That year, obeying a royal decree to relieve overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, the French transported the fisher/habitants to France, but Glodiche and his family, like the majority of their fellow islanders, returned to Miquelon the following year.  French officials counted them on Miquelon in 1776.  Two years later, during the American Revolution, the British captured the Newfoundland islands and deported the Acadians still there to France.  In 1784, after the war had ended and the British retroceded the islands, Glodiche and his family returned to Île Miquelon a second time.  Glodiche and Marguerite celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of their marriage on Miquelon in 1790.  Glodiche died on the island in June 1791, in his late 70s.  His oldest son Alain married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Boudrot and Françoise Arsenault, on Île Miquelon in September 1770.  They, too, were still on the island in 1776, deported to La Rochelle in 1778, and returned to the island in 1784, where they remained.  Glodiche's second son Jacques married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Bourgeois and Marguerite Hébert, on Île Miquelon in January 1774.  They, too, were counted on Miquelon in 1776, deported to La Rochelle in 1778, returned to the island in 1784, and remained.  Glodiche's third son Louis followed his family to France in 1768, returned, went back to France, and married Jeanne, 19-year-old daughter of Bernard Arroguy and Geneviève Dingle of Rochefort, in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in April 1780.  They followed his family back to Miquelon in 1784.  One of Michel dit de France's younger sons also went to Miquelon.  René Poirier and his large family moved to the island from Nova Scotia by 1765, but, perhaps sensitive to the overcrowded conditions there, moved on to Nantes, France, aboard Les Deux Amis, where they landed in December 1765, among the first Acadian exiles to settle in that port.  René died in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in March 1766, age 47.  His widow Anne Gaudet took her children back to Île Miquelon soon after René's passing.  Among them was her oldest son Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, who married Agathe, daughter of fellow Acadians François Blanchard dit Gentilhomme and Marguerite Carret, on Miquelon in August 1767.  The French sent them back to France later that year, but they returned in 1768.  In 1778, the British deported them to La Rochelle, where one of their sons died and two of their daughters were born.  They, too, returned to Miquelon in 1784 but moved on to the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, where they remained.  René and Anne's youngest son Alexis followed his widowed mother back to Île Miquelon in 1766, to France in 1767, and back to Miquelon in 1768.  He married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Jacques Vigneau dit Meniac and Rose Cyr, on the island in 1777.  They, too, were deported to La Rochelle in 1778 and returned to Miquelon in 1784, where they remained. 

In 1773-74, none of the Poiriers at Cherbourg or on Belle-Île-en-Mer participated in the major settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou.  Except for Joseph-Isidore from Cherbourg, who had already gone there, none of the Poiriers still in France joined their fellow exiles from Poitou at Nantes in the mid- or late 1770s or the early 1780s.

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians still in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  None of the Poiriers recently arrived from Île Miquelon agreed to take it.  The majority of the Acadian exiles still in France--nearly 1,600--did move on to the Spanish colony, but none of the Poiriers on Belle-Île-en-Mer or in any of the French ports were among them.  They chose to stay.  One Poirier from Miquelon returned to France on the eve of the French Revolution.  Louis, son of Claude dit Glodiche, whose wife Jeanne was a native of Rochefort, became a ship's carpenter and "captain of ships," and his work took him back to his wife's native France.  He and his family settled at Ingouville northeast of Le Havre in coastal Normandy by 1790.  Two of Louis's nephews also returned to France.  Jacques, fils and Joseph, son of Louis's older brother Jacques, married into the Blin and Leard families at Ingouville and Graville near Le Havre in 1800 and 1816, respectively.  Jacques, fils worked as a sailor and a ship's carpenter like his uncle, and his wife Marguerite Blin was a native of Île St.-Pierre, Newfoundland.  Joseph's wife, like his uncle's, was French.  Each created a large family at the Normandy port. 

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, Poiriers among them.  They included Michel Poirier and his family of five; Joseph Poirier and his family of four; Pierre Poirrier and his family of seven; Claude Poirie and his family of 10; René Poirié and his family of nine; and Charles Poirier and his family of seven.  The British held them and other exiles surrendered or captured in the region in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted Poiriers at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, near their old homes at Chigneco.  They included René Poirier and his family of 10; Claude Poirier and his family of 10; and Cyprien Poirier and his family of three.  Poiriers being held on Georges Island, Halifax harbor, in August 1763 included Pier Poirye, his wife, and six children; Jean Poirye, his wife, and five children; Michel Poirye, his wife, and two children; and another Michel Poirye and his four children. 

The war over, Poiriers still living in the British seaboard colonies, like their cousins being held in Nova Scotia, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intenstions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Members of the family nevertheless appeared on reparation lists compiled in several of the colonies in the summer of 1763.  In Connecticut, Jean-Baptiste Pourie, his wife Magdelaine Granger, and their 12 children were still in that colony.  In Pennsylvania that June, Jean Poirie, wife Magdelaine Forain, actually Marie Forest, and their three children appeared on a list there.  Jean-Baptiste Poirier, fils, now married with two sons, was still in New York, unless they had already moved on to South Carolina.  Pierre Poirrier, wife Marie-Josèphe Mellancont, and two LeBlanc orphans were living at Baltimore, Maryland, in July 1763.  Given that so many had been deported from Chignecto, Poiriers were especially numerous in the southern colonies.  In August 1763 in South Carolina, they included Guillaume Poirier, evidently a widower, with five children; Michel Poirier, his wife, and four children; Joseph Poirier and his wife; another Joseph Poirier, his wife, and seven children; Widow Anne Poirier and her two children; a third Joseph Poirier, his wife, and three children; Widow Madeleine Poirier and her three children; Jean Poirier and his wife; another Jean Poirier, his wife, and four children; Paul Poirier, his wife, and three children; a third Jean Poirier, probably Jean-Baptiste recently arrived from New York, his wife, and three children; François Poirier, his wife, and three children; and Marguerite Poirier, husband François Girouard, and two sons.  Poiriers also were counted in Georgia that summer. 

At war's end, most of the Poiriers still in North America were living not in Nova Scotia or the British seaboard colonies but in Canada, where many of them had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jean Poirier and his nephew Michel dit de France began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the late 1760s, they could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, L'Assomption, Lotbinière, Nicolet, Pointe-du-Lac, Rivière-du-Loups now Louiseville, St.-Grégoire, and Sorel; at Beauce on upper Rivière Chaudière; on the lower St. Lawrence at St.-Charles de Bellechasse, St.-Anne-de-la-Pocatière, Cap-St.-Ignace, Montmagny, Rivière-Ouelle, Rimouski, and on the north shore across from Rimouski; in Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs at Bonaventure, Carleton, and Cascapédia now New Richmond; in present-day northeastern New Brunwick at Caraquet and Grande-Digue; on St. John Island, formerly Île St.-Jean, now Prince Edward Island; in the îles-de-la-Madeleine; and in Nova Scotia at Windsor and at Arichat on Île Madame.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Many of the Poiriers in the seaboard colonies emigrated not to Canada, where the British ruled, but to the French Antilles, where they did not.  Even while the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British seaboard colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles who could be lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  Many Poiriers took up the offer.  French officials sent them not only to Môle St.-Nicolas, but also to Mirebalais in the island's interior near Port-au-Prince to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  Their life events soon became part of local church records.  The marriage of Marguerite, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Poirier and Madeleine Granger of Annapolis Royal, to Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Jacques Michel and Jeanne Breau, was "attested to" at Mirebalais in September 1764, soon after the couple reached the colony.  Jean-Baptiste and Madeleine's daughter Marie-Louise, born "in New England," was baptized at Mirebalais, age 3, in September.  Charles, fils, son of Charles Poirier and Marie Granger, also born "in New England," was baptized at Mirebalais in September, age 9.  Marie-Josèphe Poirier, widow Granger, died at Mirebalais in November 1764, age 45.  Anne Poirier died at Mirebalais in February 1765, age 16.  Charles Poirier, père died there a few weeks later, age 47.  Marguerite Poirier, wife of Jacques Michel, died at Mirebalais that month, age 24.  Perhaps surprisingly, considering how many loved ones they buried in their first months in the colony, when fellow exiles from Halifax and Maryland, including Poiriers, came through Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans from late 1764 through 1768, none of the Poiriers still in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  They evidently had found a place for themselves in the colony's slave-based plantation economy.  Charles, père's son Jean-Pierre married Anne-Marie-Caroline, daughter of Jacques Lorrain and Anne-Marie Denizard, at Mirebalais in November 1776.  Anne-Marie-Caroline gave Jean-Pierre at least five children, including a set of twins, in the interior community:  Marie-Élisabeth baptized, age 2 months, in November 1777; Jean-Jacques born in August 1778; twins Balthasar and Marguerite-Élisabeth in February 1786; and François in April 1788.  Jean-Baptiste Poirier of Annapolis Royal, husband of Madeleine Granger and perhaps an older brother of Charles, père, died at Mirebalais in April 1765, age 50.  His son Jean-Baptiste, fils married Marie-Louise, daughter of Louis Baillif and Marie-Catherine Poussard, at Mirebalais in Feburary 1774.  Marie-Louise gave Jean-Baptiste, fils at least four children there, including a set of twins:  Jean-Baptiste III in August 1776; Louis in November 1778; and François and Marie-Adélaïde in August 1787.  Marie-Félix Pudens gave Georges Poirier a daughter at Mirebalais, Anne-Marguerite in July 1777.  Members of the family living at or near the north shore naval base, who were even more numerous than their cousins at Mirebalais, also appeared in substantial numbers in local church records.  Jean, son of Pierre Poirier and Marguerite Boney, probably Bourg, of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, Chignecto, while residing at Môle St.-Nicolas, married Marie-Marthe, daughter of Philippe Peinier, a mulatre libre, and Marie Lefebvre, at Port-de-Paix east of Môle in January 1769.  Jean died at Môle in February 1776, age 30.  Basile, son of Joseph Poirier and Judith Forest of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, married Henriette, daughter of fellow Acadians Olivier Bourgeois and Marie Cormier, at Môle St.-Nicolas in May 1776; Henriette was a native of Charles Town, South Carolina.  Henriette gave Basile at least five children at Môle, including a set of twins:  Joseph baptized, age 8 months, in February 1778; Hélène baptized, age unrecorded, in June 1780; Jean-Claude and Olivier born in July 1783, but Jean-Claude, called Charles, died at Môle in July 1786, age 3; and Jean-Pierre born in May 1786.  Madeleine, daughter of Guillaume Poirier and Marie Forest of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, married Joseph, son of fellow Acadians François Giroir and Claire Richard, at Môle St.-Nicolas in August 1776.  Madeleine died probably at Môle by May 1780, when Joseph remarried to a Frenchwoman there.  Marie-Louise, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Poirier and Madeleine Granger of Annapolis Royal and Mirebalais, married cousin Pierre, son of fellow Acadians François Poirier and Marguerite Boudrot of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, at Môle St.-Nicolas in September 1776.  Another Basile, son of Joseph Poirier and Marguerite Giroir, died at Môle in October 1776, age unrecorded.  Marie Poirier, wife of Jean Delorme, died at Môle in October 1776, age 37.  Joseph Poirier, husband of Marguerite Giroir, died at Môle at the end of October 1776, age 59.  Joseph, fils, son of Joseph Poirier and Joséphine LeBlanc, died there in May 1777, age 5.  Rosalie Lanoue gave Jean Poirier a daughter, Élisabeth, at Môle St.-Nicolas, but the girl died there in June 1777, age 2 1/2 months.  Anne-Esther Giroir, called Esther and also Anne-Marie, gave Anselme Poirier at least two sons at Môle:  Jean in c1773 but died at age 5 in September 1778; and Charles born in October 1776 but died at age 2 in September 1778, two and a half weeks after his older brother.  Marie-Josèphe Cormier gave Joseph Poirier a son at Môle, Joseph-Thomas in March 1777.  Anne-Marie Babin gave Jean Poirier a son at Môle, Jean, fils in July 1777.  Michel, fils, a carpenter, son of Michel Poirier and Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, married Victoire dite Delle, daughter of Jean-Baptiste Jourdain and Marie-Anne Werling, at Môle St.-Nicolas in February 1783.  Delle gave Michel, fils a daughter at Môle, Marie in October 1786.  Michel, fils's sister Marie, widow of Jean Cormier, remarried to Georges, "ancient soldier" and master shoemaker, son of François Michaut, deceased farm laborer of Monmet, Champagne, and Claudine Dimanche, also deceased, at Môle St.-Nicolas in June 1783.  Rosalie, daughter of Pierre Poirier and Marguerite Bourg and widow of Jean Thioulet, remarried to André, a sailor, son of François Bordassy and Marie-Élisabeth Bardesire of Florence, Italy, at Môle St.-Nicolas in November 1785.  Joseph, son of François Poirier and his second wife Madeleine Dugas of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, married Marie-Louise, daughter of Marie-Catherine Dubay, at Bombarde south of Môle St.-Nicolas in November 1787.  At least one Chignecto Poirier ended up on the French island of Martinique.  Théotiste dite Catherine Breau, third wife of François Poirier of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, died at Fort Royal on the island in September 1769, age unrecorded.  François died there in September 1772, in his late 50s or early 60s.  He was the father of the Joseph Poirier who would marry a local girl at Bombarde, French St.-Domingue, in November 1787. 

Meanwhile, at war's end, a Poirier still living in one of the seaboard colonies consulted with three other related families on where they should resettle.  The four family heads and their wives all were closely kin to one another:  Olivier Landry's wife was Cécile Poirier, sister of Jean-Baptiste Poirier, whose wife, Marie-Madeleine Richard, through her Cormier mother, was a first cousin of Jean-Baptiste Cormier, whose wife Madeleine Richard was a sister of Jean-Baptiste Richard, married to Marie-Catherine Cormier.  Moreover, Olivier Landry was a kinsman on his mother's side to Joseph De Goutin de Ville, native of Port-Royal, now a retired army officer and merchant living in New Orleans.  Sometime in early 1763, perhaps after hearing from cousin Joseph de Ville about the qualities of the Gulf Coast region, Olivier Landry, Jean-Baptiste Cormier, Jean-Baptiste Poirier, Jean-Baptiste Richard, their wives, and children--21 exiles in all--left New York, where they likely had been held since the summer of 1756, and headed back to the southern seaboard colonies, to which they had been deported from Chignecto in the fall of 1755.  In South Carolina late that August, three of the families--the Cormiers, Poiriers, and Richards--appeared on repatriation lists at Charles Town, while the Landrys appeared on a similar list at Port Royal down the coast, closer to Savannah than to Charles Town.  Later that year, perhaps after securing more funds, the families moved on to Savannah, Georgia, from where, in late December 1763, they took the Savannah Packet to Mobile in eastern Lousiaina, which they likely thought was still a French possession.  It was not.  They arrived in the Gulf Coast citadel just as the caretaker governor of French Louisiana, Jean-Jacques-Blaise d'Abbadie, was transferring jurisdiction of eastern Louisiana to a British force from Cuba.  Lingering at Mobile in late January, the exiles "rehabilitated" one of their marriages, that of Jean-Baptiste Poirier to Madeleine Richard, before moving on to New Orleans, which they reached in February 1764--the first documented Acadian exiles to settle in Louisiana. 

Poiriers being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Poiriers, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including many Poiriers, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least five were descendants of Jean Poirier the fisherman. 

Meanwhile, a Poirier and his wife still in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in the Chesapeake colony that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, most of the Maryland Acadians pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  From June 1766 to January 1769, nearly 600 of them left Baltimore and Port Tobacco for Spanish Louisiana.  Pierre Poirier and wife Marie-Josèphe Melanson, probably still living at Baltimore, were not among them.324

Pothier/Poitier

In 1755, descendants of Jean Pothier and his two wives Anne Poirier and Marie-Madeleine Chiasson could be found at Chignecto, in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, on Île St.-Jean, and perhaps at Minas.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq warriors under Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Pothiers may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Pothiers may have been among the local Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Amazingly, considering how many of them there were at Chignecto and in the nearby trois-rivières settlements, no Pothiers were deported to South Carolina or Georgia.  They escaped, instead, to the settlements on the upper Petitcoudiac or lower Rivière St.-Jean, from which they ventured up to Canada or to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and, later, Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs. 

 A young bachelor whose connection to Jean Pothier of Chignecto has not been determined evidently was living at Minas in 1755.  That fall, the British deported 22-year-old Pierre Poitier, as he spelled his name, and hundreds of other Minas Acadians to Virginia, where they suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  After their arrival in November and December, the exiles languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships until, with winter approaching, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie ordered them dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond, while he and the colony's political leaders pondered their fate.  The following spring, the Virginians sent the Acadians on to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several English ports and where many of died of smallpox.  Pierre married fellow Acadian Marie Comeau in one of the English ports in c1757.  She gave him three children, two sons and a daughter, there:  Joseph in c1758; Catherine in c1761; and Sylvain in c1762.

Living in territory controlled by France, the many Pothiers still on Île St.-Jean escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia in 1755, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on Île St.-Jean and rounded up most of the habitants there.  A few Pothiers escaped the British and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, but most were deported to France.  The crossing proved fatal for most of the family.  When the British struck, brothers Christophe and Charles Pothier and their sister Marie-Angélique and her husband Claude Oudy were living at Havre-au-Sauvages and Havre-St.-Pierre on the north shore of Île St.-Jean and on Rivière-du-Nord-Est in the island's interior.  They and their families, Chistophe's a fairly large one, were packed aboard the transport Violet, which, as part of a 12-ship convoy, left Chédabouctou Bay in late November for St.-Malo.  In mid-December, off the southwest coast of England, a storm struck the convoy, and two of the transports, the Violet and the Duke William, were lost.  No one--not even the vessel's captain and crew--survived the sinking of the Violet. 

One of Christophe Pothier's children--Charlotte, age 15--escaped the fate of her loved ones by crossing on a different vessel.  She somehow became separated from her family and was placed aboard one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November but, despite the mid-December storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Charlotte settled probably in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  In January 1770, now in her late 20s, she married Paul, 23-year-old son of fellow Acadians Guillaume Patry and Françoise Chiasson, at St.-Servan.  They remained there, where she gave him three children, two daughters and a son, between 1770 and 1773. 

A young Pothier deported from Île St.-Jean landed not at St.-Malo but at Le Havre in Normandy.  Pierre, fils, Charlotte's first cousin, was age 18 when the British deported him to France in late 1758.  He worked as a sailor in the Norman port and married Anne-Marie, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Bernard and Marguerite Hébert, there in April 1764.  Anne-Marie gave Pierre, fils at least three children in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre:  Charles-Victor in October 1768; Marie-Constance in c1771; and Anne-Apolline in c1773.

A first cousin of Charlotte and Pierre, fils, and other members of the family, landed at Cherbourg, Normandy, across the Baie de Seine from Le Havre.  Marie-Henriette, daughter of Louis Pothier, age 19 in 1758, had married Jean-Baptiste dit Ratier, 23-year-old son of René Rassicot and Marie Haché of Île St.-Jean, at St.-Pierre-du-Nord on the island in January 1754, when she was only 15.  They were still a childless couple when the British deported them to France.  Marie-Henriette gave Ratier five children, three sons and two daughters, in Trés-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, between 1761 and 1770.  They did not remain.  In June 1771, the family arrived at St.-Malo aboard La Jeanne-Marguerite and settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo.  Jean-Baptiste dit Ratier died at Ville de Port St.-Hubert near Plouër in June 1771, age 40.  In September, Marie-Henriette took her family back to Cherbourg aboard the schooner Fortune.  Another member of the family landed at Cherbourg, but her fate was much different.  Marguerite Pothier, wife of Paul Dauphine, died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in December 1759, age 23. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including Poitiers, were repatriated to France.  In May, Pierre Poitier, wife Marie Comeau, and their three children crossed to St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée and settled at Plouër-sur-Rance.  They did not follow many of their fellow exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany in late 1765.  Marie gave Pierre three more sons at Plouër:  Pierre-Paul in March 1765 but died at nearby Port St.-Hubert at age 1 1/2 in October 1766; Jean-Baptiste in September 1766; and Pierre-Charles in August 1768.  Wife Marie died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in January 1770, age 33.  Pierre, at age 38, remarried to Anne-Marie-Madeleine, 29-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Bernard Savary and Madeleine Michel of Minas, at Pleudihen-sur-Rance across the river from Plouër in May 1771, but they returned to Plouër.  Anne-Madeleine gave Pierre three more children there:  Baptiste-Olivier in February 1772; Françoise-Marie in January 1774; and Jacques-Sylvain in c1778--nine children, seven sons and two daughters, between 1758 and 1778, in England and France.  As the birth of their younger sons reveal, Pierre and Anne-Madeleine were not among the hundreds of other exiles in France who ventured to the interior province of Poitou in 1773. 

That year, other Acadians still in France chose to take part in the Poitou venture.  French authorities were tired of providing for the Acadians languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault, and French authorities endorsed the venture.  Pierre Poitier and his family remained at Plouër, but the Pothiers there and at St.-Servan and Le Havre followed hundreds of their fellow exiles to Poitou in 1773 and 1774.  Anne-Marie Bernard gave Pierre Pothier, fils another son, Pierre-Laurent, in St.-Hilary Parish, Cenan, near Châtellerault, in August 1774.  Cousin Charlotte, husband Paul Patry, and their children also went to Poitou, as did cousin Marie-Henriette, still a widow, and her Rassicot children.  Marie-Henriette did not remain unmarried.  At age 36, she remarried to Pierre, 58-year-old son of fellow Acadians Augustin Gaudet and Agnès Chiasson of Chignecto and widower of Anne Giroir, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in October 1775.  Beginning in October 1775 and continuing through the following March, after two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians, including the Pothiers, retreated in four large convoys down the Vienne and the Loire to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  All of the Pothiers traveled on the second convoy, which left Châtellerault in November.  At Nantes and nearby Chantenay, the wayward Acadians lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  All three cousins lost their spouses at Nantes, and on the same day in November 1783, cousins Pierre, fils and Charlotte remarried in St.-Martin de Chantenay Parish:  Charlotte, now age 40, to Pierre, fils, 44-year-old son of fellow Acadians Pierre Hébert and Marie Bernard of Chignecto, amazingly his first marriage; and cousin Pierre, fils, now age 43, to Agnès, 30-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Broussard and Ursule LeBlanc and widow of Dominique Giroir.  Agnès gave Pierre, fils another son, François-Constant, at Chantenay in August 1785--five children, three sons and two daughters, by two wives, between 1768 and 1784.  Amazingly, all of his children survived childhood.  Cousin Charlotte gave her husband a son at Chantenay in March 1785.  Cousin Marie-Henriette's Gaudet husband died at Nantes before 1785. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  The Pothier cousins and their families at Chantenay agreed to take it.  Pierre Poitier of Plouër-sur-Rance had no choice in the matter.  He had died probably at Plouër by the early 1780s, in his late 40s or early 50s.  His second wife and widow Anne-Madeleine Savary did not remain.  By September 1784, she and her two Poitier sons, Baptiste-Olivier and Jacques-Sylvain, had joined their fellow exiles at Nantes.  They, too, agreed to endure the long voyage to Spanish Louisiana. 

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including the Acadian refugee camps at Restigouche and on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Sometime in the late 1750s or early 1760s, members of at least one Pothier family from the trois-rivières area surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region, who held them in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In the summer and fall of 1762, British officials counted Domingue Pothier, wife Anne Surette, and three of their children, along with many of Anne's family, at Fort Edward, Pigiguit.  After the war, they chose to remain under British rule in greater Acadia.  By the late 1760s, they had resettled on Rivière St.-Jean in present-day New Brunswick, perhaps at Madawaska on the upper river, where first cousin Paul Pothier settled. 

Until 1785, most of the Pothiers in North America could be found in greater Acadia or Canada, where some of them had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles such as themselves.  So in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jean Pothier began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the late 1760s, they could be found on the lower St. Lawrence at Ste.-Anne-de-Pocatière and especially in present-day northwestern New Brunwick at Madawaska on the upper St.-Jean.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.325

Précieux

When British forces rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, the descendants of Joseph Précieux and Anne Gautrot on Île St.-Jean were living in territory controlled by France, so they remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  In late 1758, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg the previous July, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the island and deported them to France.  Marie-Anne and husband Augustin Doucet made the crossing aboard separate ships.  Marie-Anne and her children Pierre, Marie, and Augustin, fils crossed on the British transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  Marie-Anne and her older children survived the crossing, but little Augustin, fils died at sea.  Marie-Anne's father Joseph Précieux, fils, age 67, her mother Anne Haché, age 50, and brothers Joseph III, age 19, and Louis, age 16, also made the crossing on Tamerlane.  One wonders what happened to brother Pierre, who would have been age 21 in 1758.  Joseph, fils, Anne, and their two younger sons made it to St.-Malo, but Louis died at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer in late February, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Joseph, fils took his family to St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Servan.  Daughter Louise-Marguerite, wife of Jean-Baptiste Chiasson, did not cross with her family.  The Chiassons crossed on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite the mid-December storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  Two of their children, ages 6 and 4, died at sea.  Louise, age 26, survived the crossing but died in a hospital at St.-Malo in early February.  Only husband Jean-Baptiste survived the ordeal.  Meanwhile, Augustin dit Justice Doucet, who had landed at the naval port of Rochefort in early 1759, was determined to reunite with his wife and children.  He sailed from Rochefort to St.-Malo in April 1759, and he and Marie-Anne settled at St.-Énogat near her family.  

In France, Marie-Anne and Augustin had more children, including two sons.  In 1773, they, along with hundreds of other Acadians languishing in the port cities, ventured to the interior province of  Poitou where they settled on land belonging to an influential nobleman in and around the city of Châtellerault.  Marie-Anne's brother Joseph Précieux III married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Claude Benoit and Élisabeth Thériot, in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in February 1775, but Joseph III died soon afterwards.  After two years of effort, 900 of the Poitou Acadians retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Marie-Anne and Augustin dit Justice, however, were among the 300 Acadians who remained in Poitou, but Marie-Anne did not remain there long.  Augustin died there in the late 1770s or early 1780s.  Marie-Anne moved on to Nantes by September 1784, when she was counted there with her Doucet sons, now in their teens.

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Marie-Anne Précieux, widow of Augustin dit Justice Doucet, was the only descendant of Joseph Prétieux left in France who could agree to take it.  Her former sister-in-law Marguerite Benoit, still unmarried, along with Marguerite's sister Pélagie Benoit, widow of Yves Crochet, also took up the Spanish offer.  The widows, with seven children in tow, sailed to New Orleans on the same vessel in August 1785.281

Préjean

In 1755, descendants of Jean Préjean dit Le Breton and Andrée Savoie could be found at Annapolis Royal, Chepoudy in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and at Port-Toulouse on Île Royale.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

By the early 1750s, the trois-rivières area long had been the heart of Acadian resistance to British control of Nova Scotia.  Here also lived several bands of the Mi'kmaq nation who did the bidding of Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, the radical French priest who had become the leader of the resistance.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians, including members of this family, were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Préjeans may have been among the area Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  If so, they, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  The British sent no Préjean from Chepoudy to Georgia, South Carolina, or Pennsylvania, where they deported Acadians in the area in the fall of 1755, so most, if not all, of the members of the family escaped the British roundup in the trois-rivières.  Préjeans at Chepoudy--mostly sons of Le Breton's fourth son Joseph--took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and, later, at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  One of them Joseph, fils, found refuge on French-controlled Île St.-Jean. 

Many of the Préjeans still at Annapolis Royal were not as lucky as their cousins up the bay.  Members of several families, including Le Breton's oldest son Pierre l'aîné, then in his mid-60s, some of brother Jean-Baptiste's children, and one of his brother Joseph's two children, a son and a daughter, ended up on a transport, perhaps the Helena, bound for Massachusetts.  Colonial officials counted Pierre l'aîné, called Peter, age 78 and "infirm," daughter Anne, age 30, and son Joseph, age 24, at Bradford in July 1760, while his nephew Amable, called Ganah, age 20, and niece Susan, age 32, were being held at Lyn.  One of the Annapolis Royal families that did escape the roundup evidently sought refuge in Canada. 

Two of Jean dit Le Breton's younger sons, Nicolas and Honoré, still living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested at Port-Toulouse during the roundups in Nova Scotia in 1755-56.  Cousin Joseph, fils of Chepoudy, who had escaped the roundups there in 1755, was still on Île St.-Jean, where he married.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants in the French Maritimes and deported them to France.  The crossing to St.-Malo devastated the family.  Both brothers and their families crossed on the transport Queen of Spain, which left Île Royale in September and reached the Breton port in mid-November.  Of the 108 passengers aboard the small tranport, 58, or over half, died in the crossing or from its rigors, including most members of the two Préjean families.  Nicolas, age 54, crossed with second wife Anne Samson, married daughter Marie, age 22, from his first wife, and her Samson husband, three other children by his first marriage--Louis dit Louison, age 24; Jeanne, called Anne, age 15; and Gabriel, age 7--two children from his second marriage--Jean-Baptiste, age 4; and Charles, a newborn--along with two of Anne's younger brothers.  Anne, her younger son, and Louis and Jeanne by Nicolas's first wife, died at sea.  Son Gabriel by his first wife died in a local hospital soon after they reached St.-Malo.  Amazingly, things fared even worse for Honoré and his family.  Now age 47, he crossed on Queen of Spain with wife Marie Broussard, and their nine remaining children--Félix, age 17; Marie-Anne, age 15; Félicité, age 13; Cyprien, age 11; Madeleine, age 8; Julien, age 8; Pierre, age 7; Paul, age 6; and Marguerite, age 5.  Honoré, Marie, and all nine of their children died at sea!  Meanwhile, cousin Joseph, fils and his bride, Marguerite Durel, managed to elude the British on Île St.-Jean, cross Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and make their way to the Acadian refuge at Restigouche. 

In France, Nicolas and his remaining children, including daughter Marie and her husband, and youngest son Jean-Baptiste, settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Marie, age 22 and still childless, died in a local hospital in March 1759, perhaps from the rigors of the crossing.  Nicolas remarried again--his third marriage--to Euphrasie or Euphrosine, 39-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Labauve and Catherine Lejeune and widow of Jacques Beaulieu dit Convenance, at St.-Servan in January 1760.  She gave him no more children.  He worked as a carpenter and pilot in the mother country and died at Laudivisiau, western Brittany, in March 1765, age 60, one of the few Acadian exiles to go there.  One wonders what happened to his surviving son Jean-Baptiste.  If he was still living in 1785, when he would have been age 31, he did not follow his fellow Acadians to Spanish Louisiana.  No Préjean who had been deported to France, in fact, ventured to the Spanish colony.

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British roundups in the late 1750s were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formaol surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, Préjeans among them.  Amand, Joseph's oldest son, who served as a lieutenant in the Acadian militia there, was counted with his family of six.  The British sent them and hundreds of other exiles captured in the region to prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British authorities counted Amand and his family of six; brother Joseph, fils and his family of three; and brother Charles at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in the summer and fall of 1762.  Youngest brother Basile may have been with them.  Charles married to a fellow Acadian soon after the counting.  British officials counted Joseph, fils, his wife, and a daughter at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Fort Beauséjour, Chignecto, in August 1763.  

Préjeans still in Massachusetts, like their cousins being held in Nova Scotia, also, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Members of the family nevertheless appeared on reparation lists compiled in the Bay Colony in the summer of 1763.  In June 1766, Amable Préjean and his older sister appeared on a list of "the French Who Wish to Go to Canada," where Préjean cousins from Annapolis Royal had gone a decade earlier.  Later in 1766, Amable and his sister followed other exiles in New England to the new Acadian community of St.-Jacques de l'Achigan in the interior northeast of Montréal, where Amable married fellow Acadian Jeanne-Basilice Landry soon after his arrival.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles such as themselves.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jean Préjean dit Le Breton began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the late 1760s, they could be found not only at St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, but also at Québec City.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Other Préjeans in the seaboard colonies emigrated not to Canada, where the British ruled, but to the French Antilles, where they did not.  While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British colonies to go to St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles who could be lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  At least one family of Préjeans took up the offer and headed to St.-Domingue in 1763 or 1764.  French officials sent them not to Môle St.-Nicolas but to Mirebalais in the island's interior near Port-au-Prince to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  The experience proved fatal for some of them.  Charles Préjean, fils died at Mirebalais in January 1765, age 23.  The recording priest said nothing about a wife.  His brother Anselme, evidently also still a bachelor, died at Mirebalais, age 25, in April.  When fellow exiles from Halifax and Maryland, including Préjeans, came through Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans from late 1764 through 1768, none of the Préjeans still in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  They evidently had found a place for themselves in the colony's slave-based plantation economy.  Charles, fils and Anselme's sister Rosalie, widow of Charles Dupuy, remarried, at age 27, to François, son of Pierre Pecaud or Pecot and Marie Estere Touches of Nantes, France, at Mirebalais in January 1768.  A "Mr. Préjean" died at Mirebalais, age unrecorded, in February 1787.  If this was Rosalie's father Charles, père, he would have died in his early 80s.  Rosalie and her family remained in St.-Domingue until the Haitian slave revolt of the 1790s drove them to Spanish Cuba.  By 1805, they and four of their children, two sons and two daughters, moved on to New Orleans, now part of the United States, and settled near her cousins on the western prairies.  She died on lower Bayou Teche in February 1813, in her early 70s. 

Préjeans being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Halifax exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Préjeans, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, 15 were descendants of Jean Préjean dit Le Breton.326

Quimine

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, Jacques Quimine and Marie-Josèphe Chiasson and their family, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France. 

The deportation devastated the family.  Jacques, age 60 on the ship's roll, but probably closer to 66, wife Marie-Josèphe, age unrecorded but she was age about 64, and unmarried daughter Françoise, age 23, crossed on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, reached St.-Malo together in late January.  Jacques and Marie-Josèphe died at sea, but daughter Françoise survived the crossing.  Jacques's daughter Anne, age 40, and husband Louis-Aubin Le Buffe, age 43, also made the crossing aboard one of the Five Ships.  One of their children--daughter Marguerite, age 2--died at sea.  The other three, ages 10, 8, and 5, survived.  Jacques's unmarried daughter Marguerite, age 20, crossed with sister Anne's family and also made it to St.-Malo.  Daughter Judith, age 28, and husband Jacques Douville sailed aboard one of the Five Ships with two of their children and servant Pierre Cosset.  All of them survived the crossing.  Jacques's older son Pierre Quimine, age 32, wife Louise Grossin, age 25, and daughters Marie-Josèphe, age 3, and Geneviève, age 2, also made the crossing aboard one of the Five Ships.  Pierre and Louise survived the ordeal, but their daughters died at sea.  Jacques's daughter Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, and husband Jacques Bertaud dit Montaury sailed with six children aboard the transport Supply, which also left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy, survived the mid-December storm, put in at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  Two of their children--a 3-year-old son and a son born aboard ship--died at sea. 

Jacques's younger son Jean-Jacques Quimine, wife Madeleine Thériot, and their children do not appear on the rolls of the St.-Malo-bound ships nor in any church records in France.  One wonders, then, if they escaped the British roundup on Île St.-Jean and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or made their way north to Canada.  

From France, Jacques Quimine's daughters scattered to the winds.  Madeleine Quimine and husband settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, but they did not remain.  In 1763, at war's end, "the entire family went to reside at St. Pierre and Miquelon," French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Sister Judith Quimine was pregnant when she crossed to St.-Malo.  A daughter was born to her and husband Jacques Douville at St.-Servan in January 1759 less than a week after they reached the Breton port.  Another daughter was born at St.-Servan in December 1761.  They followed Judith's sister Madeleine to St.-Pierre and Miquelon.  Anne Quimine and husband Louis-Aubin Le Buffe also settled at St-Servan, where a son was born to them in January 1760 but died the following month.  Louis-Aubin died "at the hospital" probably at St.-Servan in June 1762.  The following year, Anne and her children, following her sisters, took Le Marie Charlotte to St.-Pierre and Miquelon.  Marguerite Quimine, still unmarried, followed her sisters to the fishery islands but did not remain there. 

Meanwhile, Jacque's daughter Françoise Quimine married Louis, son of Charles Charpentier of Havre-St.-Pierre, Île St.-Jean, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer in February 1760.  They did not follow her sisters to St.-Pierre and Miquelon.  In 1764, "the entire family," including infant son Louis-Jacques-Laurent, followed other Acadians in France aboard Le Fort "to Cayenne" in the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  When colonial authorities conducted a census of the inhabitants at Sinnamary in the Cayenne District in March 1765, they counted Louis but not Françoise and Louis-Jacques-Laurent.  Next to Louis's name was the word dissentaire, so one wonders if any member of the family survived the rigors of the tropics.  Also in French Guiane was Françoise's kinswoman, perhaps a niece, Marie-Jeanne Quimine, who would have been age 9 in 1765.  She does not appear in the March 1 census at Sinnamary, so one wonders when she reached the tropical colony.  In February 1771, when she was age 15, she married Jean-Louis, 30-year-old son of Guillaume Busson and Françoise Guillot of Sinnamary.  The recording priest noted that Marie-Jeanne was a daughter of Yves Quenine, as he spelled it, and Marie Grossin.  One wonders if this was Françoise Quimine's older brother Pierre and his wife Marie-Louise Grossin, who had remained in France.  The Sinnamary priest who recorded Marie-Jeanne's marriage also noted that "The said Quenine has stated she does not know how to sign."  In April 1776, at age 20, Marie-Jeanne remarried to Étienne, 27-year-old son of fellow Acadians Pierre Saulnier and his first wife Marguerite Vincent of Minas, at Sinnamary.  Their daughter Perrine was born at there in October 1777 but died at age 3 on L'Anse Mapbo near Sinnamary in July 1780.  Son Joseph le jeune was born at Anse Mapbo the following October; and Antoine in February 1782.  

Pierre Quimine was the only member of the family who remained in France after the war with Britain ended.  He made his living as a carpenter first at Paramé on the coast northeast of St.-Malo, and then at nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where his sisters had lived for a time.  He and wife Louise Grossin had more children in France:  Anne-Louise at Paramé in May 1760; and Marie-Perrine in January 1762.  Wife Louise died at St.-Servan in September 1765, in her early 30s, and Pierre remarried to Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Dugas and Marie Benoit, at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo, in January 1770.  Marie-Madeleine gave him at least one more daughter, Victoire-Françoise, at St.-Servan in March 1771--at least five daughters, by two wives, between 1756 and 1771, in greater Acadia and France.  In 1773, Pierre and his family became part of the grand settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes and settled at nearby Chantenay.  Daughter Marie-Perrine married Pierre-Ignace, son of fellow Acadians Ignace Heusé and his second wife Cécile Bourg, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in April 1785.  Daughter Anne-Louise remained unmarried in France. 

Meanwhile, Pierre's youngest sister Marguerite returned from îles St.-Pierre and Miquelon, where she had gone with her sisters.  She married Jean-Aubin, son of fellow Acadians Charles Fouquet and Marie-Judith Poitevin of Île St.-Jean and widower, perhaps, of Marie Chevalier and Madeleine Savary, probably in France in the 1760s.  In 1770, they were at Port-Louis near Lorient in southern Brittany and moved on to Nantes by September 1784. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Pierre Quimine, his wife, and three daughters, and sister Marguerite Quimine and her family were among the hundreds of exiles still in France who agreed to take it.282

Rassicot

When the British rounded up Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, the children of René Rassicot and Marie Haché, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France. 

René Rassicot, fils, age 25, and wife Marie Benoit, age 22, crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  Both survived the crossing and settled at Châteauneuf on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  They seem to have been that rare Acadian couple who had no children.  In 1760, René, fils volunteered for service aboard the corsair Hercules, was captured by the Royal Navy, and held as a prisoner of war in England.  Meanwhile, in 1761, wife Marie moved from Châteauneuf to the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, perhaps to be closer to the port when her husband returned from corsair duty.  He did not return.  She was listed at St.-Servan as a widow in 1764.  In January 1766, she remarried to Joseph, son of fellow Acadians Jacques Hébert and Marguerite Landry and widower of Marguerite Richard, at St.-Servan. 

In 1759, René, fils's older brother Jean-Baptiste dit Ratier and wife Marie-Henriette Pothier landed at Cherbourg in Normandy, where Marie-Henriette gave Ratier at least five children in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish:  Jean-Baptiste, fils in c1761; Louis in c1763; Jean-François in June 1765; Anne-Marguerite in c1768; and Marie-Henriette in c1770.  In late May 1771, they sailed from Cherbourg down and around to St.-Malo, arriving there the first of June.  They settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of the Breton port, across from where younger brother René had settled before moving up to St.-Servan.  Jean-Baptiste dit Ratier died at Port St.-Hubert near Plouër in June 1771, age 40.  In 1773, Marie-Henriette and her Rassicot children followed hundreds of other St.-Malo-area Acadians to the interior province of Poitou, where French authorities attempted to settle them on land owned by an influential nobleman near the city of Châtellerault.  Marie-Henriette remarried to Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Augustin Gaudet and Agnès Chiasson of Chignecto and widower of Anne Giroir, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in October 1775.  The following month, after two years of effort, she, her new husband, and her Rassicot children retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  By 1785, Marie-Henriette was a widow again.  Her son Jean-Baptiste Rassicot, fils married Marie-Rose, called Rose, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph D'Amours de Chaufours and Geneviève Leroy of Meductic, Rivière St.-Jean, at St.-Martin de Chantenay near Nantes in May 1781.  Jean-Baptiste, fils died soon after the wedding, and Rose remarried to a Thibodeau. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Hundreds of them, including Marie-Henriette Pothier and three of her Rassicot children, and Marie Benoit and her second husband, agreed to take it.  

Jean-Baptiste dit Ratier and René, fils's younger brother Dominique evidently did not go to France.  He appears on a list of 1,003 Acadians, dated 24 October 1760, compiled by French officers at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs on the eve of the garrison's formal surrender.  There was no one else in his household.  He would have been age 25 at the time.  He evidently had escaped the British roundup on Île St.-Jean two years earlier, made his way to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and then moved on to the French stronghold at Restigouche, which had become a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, after the fall of Québec the previous September, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  Most of the Acadians surrendered at Restigouche ended up in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  One wonders if, at war's end, Dominique remained in greater Acadia.  One thing is certain:  he did not follow other Acadians from the prison camps of Nova Scotia to Louisiana. 

Sister Marie, widow of Nicolas Laporte, either did not go to, or did not remain, in France.  She remarried to Prosper, son of architect Jean Meunier and Marguerite Simonet of Macon, France, at Môle St.-Nicolas, French St.-Dominique, in November 1780.  How, and when, she got to the sugar island the records do not say.  Like brother Dominique, she did not go to Spanish Louisiana.283

Renaud

Acadian Renauds from several unrelated families could be found at Minas and especially on Île St.-Jean in 1755.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered them to several corners of the Acadian disaspora, including France, greater Acadia, perhaps the French Antilles, and Spanish Louisiana.  None of the Renauds who had lived in greater Acadia seems to have settled in Canada. 

François Renaud, parentage undetermined, married Marie-Anne Peltier of Gaspé probably on Île St.-Jean in c1757.  Their son Renault, also called Jean, was born in c1758, the year of the island's dérangement.  François died before the British roundup that year.  His widow and infant son made the crossing to France aboard the transport Antelope, which left the Maritimes in August and reached St.-Malo the first of November.  The infant Renault, doubtlessly weakened by the rigors of the crossing, died in a hospital probably at St.-Malo on New Year's Day 1759. 

Another François Renaud, parentage undetermined, was living in one of the Minas settlements in 1755.  That fall, the British transported him with hundreds of other Acadians to Virginia, where they suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  After their arrival in November and December, the exiles languished in the lower James River aboard disease-infested ships until, with winter approaching, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie ordered them dispersed to Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond, while he and the colony's political leaders pondered their fate.  The following spring, the Virginians sent them on to England, where they were packed into warehouses in several English ports and where many died of smallpox.  In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, François and other exiles in England was repartriated to France.  He landed St.-Malo aboard the ship Dorothée in late May and settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where he was still living in 1764.  After that, he disappears from the historical record.  One thing is certain:  if he was still alive in 1785, when he would have been in his late 40s, and still living in France, he did not go to Spanish Louisiana that year with over 1,500 other Acadians.

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, Marie-Madeleine Lapierre dit Laroche, widow of Louis dit Provençal Renaud, and her many children were still living in territory controlled by France, so they remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on the island, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France. 

Louis dit Provencal's oldest daughter Ursule, age 37, her husband Joseph dit Gourdiec Poirier, age 38, and five of their children, crossed to St.-Malo on the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November, survived a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, put in at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  Ursule and Joseph survived the crossing, but three of their children did not.  Joseph dit Gourdiec took his family to St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo.  Between 1760 and 1764, Ursule gave Gourdiec three more children at St.-Énogat and at St.-Servan-sur-Mer across the harbor--eight children, five daughters and three sons, between 1750 and 1764, in greater Acadia and France.  In late 1765, Gourdiec and his family were among the few island refugees who followed more-recently-arrived Acadian exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Gordiec, Ursule, and their five children settled at Kersau near Locmaria on the north shore of the island, and there they remained. 

Pierre Renaud, perhaps the eighth son of Louis dit Provençal, and Pierre's wife Marie Jacquement, also endured the crossing to France.  They landed at Cherbourg in Normandy, where Marie soon died.  Probably soon after his wife's death, Pierre sailed from Cherbourg down and around to St.-Malo and lived at St.-Énogat near his sister from 1759 to 1760.  In the latter year, he crossed the harbor to St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where he remarried to Frenchwoman Françoise Toinon, widow of Claude Olliver, in January 1760.  She gave him at least seven children, six sons and a daughter, there, all but two of whom died young:  Charles in November 1760; Guillaume in April 1762 but died at age 9 months the following January; Yves-Joseph in May 1764 but died at age 11 months in April 1765; Jean-Baptiste-Julien in 1766 but died at age 13 months in 1767; Jeanne-Laurence in September 1767; Louis-François-Jean in May 1769 but died at age 3 in August 1772; and Pierre-Jean-Baptiste in December 1771 but died at age 8 months the following September.  Like older sister Ursule, no member of Pierre's immediate family emigrated to Spanish Louisiana in 1785. 

Alexis Renaud, sixth son of Louis dit Provençal, managed to escape the British roundup on Île St.-Jean in 1758, when he would have been in his mid- or late 20s.  He took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and made his way north to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, which became a major Acadian refuge.  He married Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians François Doucet and Marie Carret, probably at Restigouche in c1760.  Son Jean was baptized there in February 1761, four months after the French and Acadians at Restigouche had surrendered to a British naval force from Québec following the fall of Montréal.  In the early 1760s, Alexis and his family joined other surrendered or captured exiles in a prison compound in Nova Scotia, where the British held them for the rest of the war.  More sons were born to them in c1764 and c1766 either in Nova Scotia or on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, where French officials counted them in 1767.  To relieve overcrowding on the fishing island, French officials, obeying a royal decree, likely "deported" them with other fisher/habitants to France later that year, but, along with most of their fellow islanders, they returned to Miquelon in 1768.  Meanwhile, at war's end, Alexis's nephew, Jean-Jacques Renaud, born at Grand-Pré in c1752, also chose to settle on Miquelon, where he married Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-François Cormier and Marie Cyr, in c1770.  Jean-Jacques died on the island in 1776, and his widow moved in with her sister.  In 1778, during the American Revolution, when France allied with the United States, the British captured Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported the fisher/habitants to France, Alexis's family probably among them.  His son Jean, born at Restigouche in c1761, married fellow Acadian Marguerite Poirier on îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence in c1785, after the family would have returned to Miquelon in 1784 following the retrocession of the Newfoundland islands from Britain to France.  Jean's son Jacques married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Nicolas Cormier and Rosalie Hébert, on îles-de-la-Madeleine in September 1817. 

Renauds also ended up in the Caribbean Basin during the Great Upheaval.  Jeanne-Félicité, daughter of François Renaud and Marie-Thérèse Arsonneau, perhaps Arseneau, of Moule, married Antoine, son of ____ Boisson and Marguerite Terrier, perhaps Thériot, of Louisbourg, at Le Moule, French Guadeloupe, in February 1770.  Madeleine-Eulalie, daughter of Gilles-Yves Renaud and Anne-Marguerite Maubillon, married 20-year-old Jean-Baptiste, son of François Martin and Françoise Lanes of du Fort, at Le Mouillage, French Martinique, in October 1780.  One wonders if any of them were Acadian. 

When the British captured Île St.-Jean in 1758, at least one of Jean Renaud dit Arnaud's sons, Jean, fils, and two of Jean dit Arnaud's daughters, Colette and Véronique, no relation to Louis dit Provençal, also ended up at Cherbourg, France.  There, Colette married Frenchman René Le Tuillier of Roville, bishopric of Constances, Normandy, in c1762.  Jean, fils worked as a sailor and  married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Poirier and Madeleine Granger of Annapolis Royal, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, in January 1764.  Véronique married Jean-François, called François, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste De La Mazière dit Ladouceur and Marie Poirier of Île St.-Jean, at Cherbourg in c1768.  Jean-François worked a navigator, a blacksmith, and also as a carpenter.  The siblings and their spouses had a number of children in their years at Cherbourg.  Colette and husband René had at least seven children, four sons and three daughters.  Jean, fils and wife Marie had at least four children:  Jean III or Jean-Baptiste, born in July 1765; Isidore-Marin; Pierre-David; and Marie-Anne, born in April 1772.  Véronique and husband Jean-François had at least two children, a son and a daughter.  In 1773, all three families chose to become a part of the grand settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou in and around the city of Châtellerault.  Colette and her husband lost a son there, who died at age 2.  Jean, fils and his wife had another son, Louis-Auguste, baptized at St.-Jean-l'Evangeliste, Châtellerault, in February 1775.  Véronique and her husband also had another child, a daughter, baptized at La Chapelle-Roux near Châtellerault in July 1775.  That October, after two years of effort, the Renaud siblings and their families retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  Colette and her family left Poitou on a similar convoy from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire two months later.  At Chantenay near Nantes, the three families lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Colette and her husband buried a son, age 9, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in July 1776.  Their daughter Marie-Rose Le Tullier married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians François Legendre and Marguerite Labauve of Meillac near St.-Malo, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in September 1783.  Jean, fils's son Joseph-Abraham was baptized at St.-Martin de Chantenay in April 1777.  Véronique and her husband had four more children, a son and three daughters, at Chantenay between 1777 and 1783, but the youngest daughter died at age 5 months in June 1783.  Meanwhile, in October 1780, they buried a 5-year-old daughter.  In January 1784, at age 50, Colette's husband René Le Tullier died, leaving her a widow with three teenage children to look after.  

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in Louisiana, the majority of the Acadians there, but very few Renauds, agreed to take it.  Jean, fils, for instance, though married to a fellow Acadian, remained at Nantes.  However, sisters Colette and Véronique and their husbands, and Colette's married daughter Marie-Rose Le Tullier and her family, chose to go to the Spanish colony. 

Renauds were living in the Biscay ports of Rochefort and La Rochelle when Acadian Renauds lived in other parts of France.  Pierre, fils, son of Pierre Renaud and Suzanne Barillon, born at Thonnay-Boutonne in Saintonge, a labourer à bras, married Marie, daughter of Pierre Benoit and Suzanne Barillon also of Thonnay-Boutonne and widow of Jacques Catron, at Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in June 1764.  Marie, daughter of Laurent Renaud and Marie Clopeau, born at St-Pierre of Jullé in Saintonge, married Laurent Poinot, widower of Jeanne Jousseame, at Notre-Dame, Rochefort, in July 1767.  Louis Renaud, "gardien of the port" and widower of Marie Jamet, married Marie Escuyer or Lecuyer, widow of Jean Monnier, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in November 1767.  Marie Renaud, widow of Nicolas Pierrot, married René Dufresne, a day worker and widower of Marthe Levequot or Leveque, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in January 1772.  Marguerite-Victoire, daughter of Louis Renaud and Marguerite Bousas of Île Miquelon, was born in St.-Nicolas Parish, La Rochelle, in August 1779.  When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, none of these Renauds agreed to take it, perhaps because most, if not all, of them were French, not Acadian.284

Richard

In 1755, descendants of both Michel Richard dit Sansoucy and Madeleine Blanchard, and François Richard of Vannes and his wives Anne Comeau and Marie Martin dit Barnabé, could be found at Chignecto and Minas, including Pigiguit, and on Île St.-Jean, but most of them remained at Annapolis Royal, where their family progenitors had settled.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered these families even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, along with Mi'kmaq warriors led by the Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Richards may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, the Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, area Acadians, pressured by the French, served in the fort as militia.  They, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Jean-Baptiste Richard and his wife Catherine Cormier were deported to Georgia, perhaps the only members of the family to be sent so far south.  The rest of the Chignecto Richards eluded the British and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada. 

One Richard's escape from the British at Chignecto became the stuff of family legend.  René, son of René dit Beaupré, fils, married a Bourgeois at his native Annapolis Royal but settled at Chignecto, where his family and friends gave him the ironic dit, Petit René.  Evidently Petit René was among the dozens of area Acadians gathered up by the British that summmer and fall and held under guard at Fort Lawrence on the Missaguash to await deportation to one of the southern colonies.  On 1 October 1755, during a driving rainstorm, Petit René, because of his size, was the last man allowed to escape from a tunnel the prisoners had dug beneath the fort.  Petit René escaped with 85 other Acadians, including his cousin Joseph Broussard dit Beausoleil, and likely became part of the Broussard-led resistance that plagued the British for the next several years. 

Most of the Richards in the Minas settlements were not as lucky as their kinsmen at Chignecto.  That fall, New-English forces at Grand-Pré and Pigiguit rounded up many Richard families in the area and shipped them off to Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia.  The many Richards packed off to the Old Dominion endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas.  Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, refused to allow the hundreds of Acadians sent to him to remain in the colony.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Dinwiddied ordered Acadians from one vessel to be moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Governor Dinwiddie, his council, and the colony's Burgesses made their decision ... the "papists" must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Richards were held at Falmouth, Liverpool, and Southampton.

Most of the many Richards at Annapolis Royal escaped the British roundup there in the fall of 1755, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac or lower Rivière St.-Jean.  From there, they joined their cousins on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada.  Some of the Annapolis Richards, including two sons of François of Vannes and their families, ended up on transports bound for Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York.  In May 1756, colonial authorities in New York counted two Richard families on Long Island:  Michael, his wife, and six children at Southold; and his brother Zakare, his wife, and six children at Hempstead.  That August, New York officials counted John, probably Jean-Baptiste, Richard among the Chignecto Acadians sent to Georgia who, with permission of that colony's governor, had tried to return to greater Acadia by boat that spring but got no farther than Long Island.  New York authorities held John/Jean-Baptiste and his family at Courtland Manor in Westchester County.  Colonial authorities in Massachusetts counted Joseph Richard, age 49, Mary Richard, age 13, Alexandre Richard dit Boutin, age 70, "infirm," and a Widow Richard, age 29, at Bradford in 1761.  The following year, Massachusetts authorities counted Margt. Richard, widow, age 55, and five of her children at Charlestown.  One wonders who her husband had been.  That same year, Massachusetts authorities counted Margaret Maud Robinshow, age 44, perhaps Marguerite Robichaud, widow of Jean-Baptiste Richard, Eliz. Richaid, age 17, and Mary Richard, age 11, at Westford; and Frederick Richard, age 20, Marguerite Robichaud's second son, at Littleton. 

Some of the Richards who eluded the British in Nova Scotia and sought refuge in Canada in 1756 failed to escape an even greater menace that killed several hundred of their fellow exiles in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  François Richard of Annapolis Royal, age 30, died of smallpox at Québec in September 1757.  Marie Richard of Chignecto, age 34, wife of Pierre Bourgeois, died of the dread disease in November.  Marguerite Richard dit Boutin of Annapolis Royal, age 36, wife of Jean dit Jean-François Breau, died at Québec in December.  Later that month, Joseph dit Canadien Richard of Annapolis Royal, age 39, died at Québec; as did Simon Richard of Annapolis Royal, age 36; Simon's younger brother François dit François Magdelaine Richard of Annapolis Royal, age 30; and Joseph-Grégoire Richard of Annapolis Royal, age 33.  Angélique Richard of Annapolis Royal, age 60, wife of Jean Bastarache who had died in December, died at Québec in January 1758; as did Pierre Richard, fils of Chignecto, age 30. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Richards on Île St.-Jean in 1755 escaped the British roundups in Nova Scotia, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on the islands and rounded up most of the habitants there.  Most of the Richards at Malpèque on the island's remote northwest shore escaped the British and sought refuge on the mainland, but their cousins in the interior and on the eastern shores were herded onto transports, sent through the Gut of Canso to Chédabouctou Bay, and deported to France.  The crossing proved fatal for many of them.  Joseph Richard, wife Anne Girouard, and five of their children--Marie, age 25; Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, age 18; Anne, age 17; Amand, age 12; and Pierre--crossed on Le Duc Guillaume, which left the Maritimes in September 1758.  After a mid-ocean incident, the transport limped into St.-Malo harbor on the first of November.  Joseph, Anne, and four of their children died at sea.  Son Amand died in a St.-Malo hospital in early December, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  Marie-Josèphe Boudrot, widow of Pierre-Toussaint Richard, and three of her children--Honoré, Thomas, and Marie-Blanche--also crossed on Duc Guillaume, with tragic result.  Marie-Josèphe died in a St.-Malo hospital three days after their arrival, and son Thomas died perhaps in the same hospital in late November.  Other island Richards, including another son of Pierre-Toussaint, landed at Cherbourg in Normandy and at the northern fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie. 

Island Richards sent to Brittany did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Honoré, age 13 in 1758, and his older sister Marie-Blanche, age 21, settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of the Breton port.  Marie-Blanche married Claude, son of fellow Acadians Claude Pitre and Marguerite Doiron and widower of Rosalie Henry, at nearby Pleudihen-sur-Rance in September 1764.  She gave him three children, two sons and a daughter, there between 1765 and 1769, but only the daughter survived childhood.  Marie-Blanche became a widow in February 1769, when her husband, age 40, died at nearby Mordreuc less than two weeks after their daughter was born.  Meanwhile, brother Honoré, at age 22, married Marguerite, 27-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Olivier Daigre and Angélique Doiron and widow of Jean-Baptiste Landry, at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river from Mordreuc in January 1767.  Marguerite gave Honoré four children at Plouër, but only one of them survived childhood:  Pierre in October 1767 but died at age 12 at nearby Ville du Bas Bout in October 1779; Marguerite-Marie in January 1769; Firmain-Amateur in September 1770 but died at age 5 at Ville du Bas Bout in January 1775; and Jean-Baptiste in February 1773 but died at age 6 1/2 at Ville du Bas Bout in September 1779.  Marie-Blanche and Honoré's brother Paul, age 21 when he landed at Cherbourg in late 1758, did not remain there.  He hurried on St.-Malo in April 1759, where he likely learned of the fate of his widowed mother and younger brother Thomas.  But Paul did not remain with his siblings in the St.-Malo area.  In April 1760, he moved on to Brest in western Brittany, where he worked as a sailor.  An island cousin who ended up at Boulogne-sur-Mer also moved on to St.-Malo.  Charles Richard, age 22 in late 1758, was living at the northern fishing center in the early 1760s, perhaps having landed there several years earlier.  In February 1763, at age 27, he married Cécile, 18-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Boudrot and his first wife Cécile Thériot, in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer.  Still childless, the couple moved on to St.-Malo in August 1766 and settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Cécile gave Charles a daughter, Marie-Rose, there in March 1771.

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England who had gone there from Virginia were repatriated to France, many Richards among them.  Most of them landed at St.-Malo, adding substantially to the number of Richards exiled to the mother country.  Charles Richard, age 53 in 1763, second wife Anne Comeau, age 54, and his adult children from his first marriage to Catherine-Josèphe Gautrot--Joseph, age 23; and Geneviève, age 17--crossed aboard the transport Ambition and landed at St.-Malo in the third week of May.  They settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where they were still living in 1772.  Also crossing on L'Ambition was Charles's older daughter Marguerite-Josèphe, age 25, and her husband Jean-Jacques Thériot, age 23, who she had married in England the year before.  Marguerite-Josèphe was pregnant when she reached the Breton port.  The couple's first child, a daughter, was born at St.-Servan the following November.  Sister Geneviève, at age 21, married Simon dit Pierre, 27-year-old son of fellow Acadians Antoine Pitre and Anne Comeau, at St.-Servan in January 1767.  She gave Simon a daughter the following year.  Simon died at the hospital at Pontorson on the border of Brittany and Normandy east of St.-Malo in October 1770; one wonders why he was there, so far from other Acadians.  Geneviève, at age 27, remarried to Victor, 45-year-old carpenter son of fellow Acadians Antoine Boudrot and Cécile Brassaux and widower of Catherine-Josèphe Hébert, at St.-Servan in August 1773.  Victor was an island Acadian who had lost his wife the previous year; she had given him nine children.  Between 1774 and 1785, at St.-Servan, Geneviève gave him five more children, most of whom survived childhood.  Geneviève's brother Joseph, at age 30, married Marie, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Bourg and his first wife Jeanne Hébert, at St.-Servan in January 1771.  Blanche gave Joseph two sons there:  Jean-Joseph in October 1771 but died at age 1 1/2 in February 1773; and Pierre-Michel in June 1773.  Widower Jean Richard, age 42, and his three children--Pierre, age 17; Rose, age 14; and Marguerite, age 9--also crossed from England aboard L'Ambition and settled at St.-Servan.  Pierre married Marguerite-Pélagie, 23-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Robichaud and Claire Babin, at St.-Servan in the fall of 1767.  Marguerite-Pélagie gave Pierre two daughters at St.-Servan:  Marguerite-Josèphe in July 1770; and Marie-Claire in December 1771.  Pierre died on the last day of 1773, age 27, when he fell into the sea from the deck of the ship Gracieuse and drowned.  Meanwhile, younger sister Marguerite died at the hospital probably at St.-Malo in January 1768, age 14.  Their father Jean died at St.-Servan in December 1777, age 56.  Daughter Rose, age 28 and still unmarried at the time of her father's death, was the family's only survivor.  Another Jean Richard, probably in his late 20s or early 30s, and wife Marguerite Landry, age 26, crossed on L'Ambition and settled at St.-Servan.  With them were two children--Marie, age 4; and Joseph, an infant.  Joseph died the following July, age 15 months, and Marie in September.  Marguerite gave Jean three more children, two sons and a daughter, at St.-Servan:  Joseph-Marie in February 1765 but died at age 1 1/2 in October 1766; Marguerite in May 1767 but died the day after her birth; and Jean-Pierre in July 1770, the only one of the couple's five children who survived childhood.  The family was still at St.-Servan in 1772.  Cécile Gautrot, age 47, widow of Jean-Baptiste Richard dit Sapin, crossed on L'Ambition with six children--Marguerite, age 20; Anne, age 18; Marie, age 16; Marie-Josèphe, age 13; Jean-Baptiste, age 11; and Anselme, age 7--and settled at St.-Servan.  Marguerite promptly married Joseph, 21-year-old son of fellow Acadians Michel Boudrot and Claire Comeau, at St.-Servan in late June.  She gave him seven children over the next decade, only two of whom survived childhood.  Anne, at age 22, married François, 20-year-old son of fellow Acadians Éloi Lejeune and Rosalie Mius d'Azy, at St.-Servan in August 1767.  François was an island Acadian who, along with his mother, were the only members of their immediate family to survive the crossing from the Maritimes.  Anne gave him a daughter in 1769.  In December 1771, they moved on to Morlaix in northwest Brittany, where Anne gave François a son in 1772.  Anne, at age 31, remarried to Pierre, son of Baptiste Levron and Françoise Labauve of Minas and widower of Blanche-Cécile LeBlanc, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in January 1776.  Joseph Richard, age 45, and wife Marie-Blanche, called Blanche, LeBlanc, age 41, crossed on L'Ambition with five children--Joseph-Amand, age 17; Marguerite, age 14; Marin, age 10; Susanne, age 6; and Marie-Blanche, age 1.  They also settled at St.-Servan, where Blanche gave Joseph two more children:  Marie-Esther in June 1764; and Grégoire in March 1767 but died the following September--seven children in all at Minas and in England and France.  The family moved on to Morlaix by 1786, and there they remained.  Cécile Granger, age 54, widow of Pierre Richard, fils, crossed on L'Ambition with married son Pierre III, age 27, and his wife Marie-Blanche LeBlanc, who he had married in England the year before. Marie-Blanche gave Pierre III five children in the St.-Malo suburbs:  Marie-Esther at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor form St.-Malo, in December 1763 but died at nearby St.-Servan the following April; Marie-Marguerite at St.-Servan in September 1765; Pierre-Joseph in March 1766; Joseph in May 1770 but died at age 2 in October 1772; and Marguerite-Geneviève in July 1773.  Also crossing with Pierre III and his mother aboard L'Ambition was his younger sister Marie-Josèphe, age 24, her husband Hilaire, son of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Landry and Marguerite Comeau, who Marie-Josèphe had just married in England; and unmarried sister Cécile, age 21.  Marie-Josèphe gave Hilaire four children at St.-Servan, only half of whom survived childhood.  Cécile, at age 23, married Olivier, 38-year-old son of fellow Acadians Charles Aucoin and Anne-Marie Dupuis and widower of Marguerite Vincent, at St.-Servan in November 1765.  Olivier's first wife had given him two children at Minas in the early 1750s.  Cécile gave him four more children at St.-Servan between 1766 and 1772, all but one of whom survived childhood. 

Richards repatriated from England also landed at Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  Widower Pierre Richard, fils of Annapolis Royal and Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, age 53 in 1763, and five of his children from his first wife Marie-Josèphe LeBlanc--Joseph-Ignace, age 20; Jean-Charles, age 18; Catherine, age 16; Brigitte, age 14; and Simon, age 11--crossed from Liverpool to Morlaix.  Pierre, fils remarried to Françoise, 33-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Olivier Daigre and Françoise Granger of Rivière-aux-Canards and widow of Simon-Joseph Thériot, at Morlaix in October 1763 soon after his arrival.  Françoise gave Pierre, fils at least one more son there, Anselme in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in February 1765.  Pierre, fils's oldest son Joseph-Ignace, at age 22, married cousin Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles LeBlanc and Élisabeth Thibodeau of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Martin de Champs Parish in February 1765.  Pierre, fils's daughter Catherine, at age 18, married Simon, son of fellow Acadians Paul Trahan and Marie Comeau of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in June 1765.  Françoise Thériot of Rivière-aux-Canards, widow of Michel Richard, fils of Annapolis Royal and Rivière-aux-Canards and Charles Trahan of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, age 41, crossed from Falmouth to Morlaix with three of her Richard children.  Françoise died at Morlaix in August 1773, age 51.  Her younger son Charles Richard married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Trahan and Marguerite Trahan, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in February 1785.  Basile Richard of Annapolis Royal and Minas, age 30, and wife Marie Granger of Rivière-aux-Canards, age 27, crossed from Falmouth with son Joseph, age 4.  Joseph Richard, age 14 in 1763, married Frenchwoman Marie-Jeanne Daniel and remained at Morlaix. 

In November1765, Acadians repatriated from England and a few of their island cousins agreed to become part of an agricultural venture on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  None of the Richards from England living at St.-Malo took up the offer, but three Richard families from Morlaix agreed to go.  Pierre, fils and his blended family settled at Kerbellec near Le Palais on the east coast of the island.  Son Joseph-Ignace and his wife settled at Keroude near Bangor in the island's southern interior.  Basile and his family settled at Bedex near Bangor.  All three of the families had more children on the beautiful island on the sea.  Françoise Daigre gave Pierre Richard, fils four more children near Le Palais:  Simon-Joseph born in October 1766; Julien-Marie in November 1768; Gabriel-Pierre-Joseph in c1769 but died at age 5 in March 1774; and Pierre-Auguste born in January 1774.  Marguerite LeBlanc gave Joseph-Ignace Richard 13 children near Le Palais and Bangor, including Jean-Charles born near Le Palais in January 1766; Basile-Marie near Bangor in April 1767; Marie-Anne-Marguerite-Olive in October 1768; Pierre-Ange in May 1770; Jacques-Julien-Marie in August 1772; Perrine in November 1774; Marie-Josèphe, perhaps also called Sophie-Élisabeth-Joséphine, in February 1777 but died the following December; Françoise-Émilie born in June 1778; Marie-Marthe in June 1780; Jacques-Anselme in September 1781; and Marie-Renée in January 1784.  Marie Granger gave Basile Richard seven more children near Bangor:  Pierre-Jean-François-Marie born in July 1766; Marie-Anne in July 1768; Jean-Marie in July 1770; Élisabeth-Josèphe in September 1772 but died at age 10 months in June 1773; Charles-Grégoire born in October 1774; Marguerite in November 1776; and Marie-Élisabeth, called Élisabeth, in February 1780 but died at age 2 1/2 in October 1782.  Pierre, fils's daughter Brigitte from his first wife married Pierre Guillemont on the island in the 1770s but soon became a widow.  Her son Louis-David, born near Sauzon on the north shore of the island in December 1779, perhaps posthumously, was baptized a Richard and died near Sauzon, age 2, in December 1781.  Basile's daughter Marie, probably Marie-Anne, age 15, gave birth to son Pierre-Étienne near Bangor in December 1783.  The priest who recorded the boy's baptism did not name the father.  Pierre-Étienne died near Bangor the following March. 

In 1773, two Richard families from St.-Malo, one of them headed by a widow, chose to take part in an even grander settlement venture, this one on an influential nobleman's estate near the city of Châtellerault in the interior of Poitou.  Cécile Gautrot, widow of Jean-Baptiste Richard dit Sapin, went to Poitou from St.-Servan-sur-Mer with married daughter Marguerite, her husband, and unmarried daughter Marie-Josèphe, who married François, son of Jacques-Philippe Basse or Basset and Louise Giguault of Bonneuil-Matours, Poitou, at Monthioron southeast of Châtellerault in October 1776.  Between 1777 and 1780, Marie-Josèphe gave François three children, a son and two daughters, at nearby Cenan.  Mother Cécile Gautrot died at Cenan in March 1780, age 65.  Pierre Richard III and wife Blanche LeBlanc and their two surviving children from St.-Servan, along with his mother Cécile Granger, also went to Poitou.  In March 1776, after two years of effort, Pierre III and his family retreated with other Poitou Acadians down the Vienne and the Loire from Châtellerault to the port of Nantes.  They settled across the river at Rezé, where Blanche gave Pierre III four more children:  Joseph born in c1776 but died at age 3 in August 1779; Marguerite-Geneviève born in June 1779 but died the following July; Jean-Baptiste born in October 1780 but died at age 2 1/2 in July 1783; and Charles-Pierre-Paul born at Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, in May 1785--nine children, four daughters and five sons, between 1763 and 1785, most of whom had died young.  Pierre III's mother Cécile Granger also died at Rezé, in December 1776, age 73.  Cousin Marie-Josèphe Richard and her family did not move from Poitou to Nantes until the early 1780s, probably soon after her mother's passing.  They settled in the suburb of Chantenay on the north side of the Loire, where her husband François Basset likely died.  By the summer of 1784, some of their kinsmen--including Pierre Richard, fils and his family from Belle-Île-en-Mer; and Jean Richard and his family from St.-Servan-sur-Mer--had joined their kinsmen at Nantes and Paimboeuf. 

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 31 Richards agreed to take it--by far the largest contingent of the family to go to Louisiana.  The takers included Pierre Richard, fils, now age 72, second wife Françoise Daigre, and their younger children from Belle-Île-en-Mer and Paimboeuf; two of Pierre, fils's unmarried grandsons, Basile-Marie and Jean-Charles, by oldest son Joseph-Ignace from Belle-Île-en-Mer; Charles Richard, wife Marie-Josèphe Trahan, and his three older, unmarried sisters from Morlaix; Jean Richard, wife Marguerite Landry, and their family from St.-Servan-sur-Mer and Nantes; Joseph Richard of Morlaix, now a widower, and his daughter; Pierre Richard, wife Blanche LeBlanc, and their family from Rezé; and various Richard wives, widows, orphans, and unmarried women.  Dorothée, daughter of François Richard of Vannes and Annapolis Royal, with her second husband Claude LeBlanc from St.-Servan and Nantes, was the only member of her branch of the family to go to the Spanish colony.  Other Richards chose to remain in the mother country, including Joseph-Ignace and cousin Basile still on Belle-Île-en-Mer, and various Richard wives.  French officials were still counting Acadian Richards on Belle-Île-en-Mer and at Vannes and Morlaix in Brittany during the early years of the French Revolution.  A Pierre Richard, age 34, was living in Poitou in 1797.  Joseph-Ignace and Basile died on Belle-Île-en-Mer in the mid- and late 1810s. 

In the early 1770s, a Richard family in one of the St.-Malo suburbs had gone not to Poitou but back to greater Acadia to fish, not to farm, probably via the Channel Island of Jersey.  Joseph Richard, a sailor from Minas now at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, wife Marie Bourg, and their remaining son Pierre-Michel followed other exiles in France to the British-controlled fishery at Gaspésie along the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs.  Marie gave Joseph four more children at the fishing village of Carleton there:  Esther in c1775; Janvier-Constant in c1777; Thérèse in c1778; and Rébecca in c1780--six children, three sons and three daughters, between 1771 and 1780, in France and greater Acadia.  Their daughters married into the Legalet, Allard, and LeBlanc families at Carleton.  Second son Pierre-Michel also married and settled in what became northeastern New Brunswick. 

Elsewhere in North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to accept the French garrison's, and the Acadians's, surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, many Richards among them, including Madeleine Doucet, widow of Joseph Richard, and her family of nine; Charles Richard and his family of three; the widow of Paul Richard and her family of six; Joseph Richard, fils, "de Michel," and his family of five; Pierre Richard and his family of 10; another Joseph, fils, this one "de Pitre," and his family of five; and Pitre Richard and his family of two.  The British held these exiles, and others who surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region, in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In 1761 and 1762, Richards counted at Fort Edward near the family's old homesteads at Pigiguit included Joseph Richard; Joseph "h" Richard and his family of four; another Joseph Richard and his family of six; and René Richard and his family of four.  Members of at least one family, that of Pierre dit Pitre Richard, may have been held in the fishing center at Chédabouctou on the Atlantic coast.  In August 1763, Richards at Fort Cumberland, formerly French Beauséjour, near the family's old homesteads at Chignecto, included Joseph Richard and his family of seven; Jean Richard and his family of four; and Pierre Richard and his family of nine.  At least one family, that of Amand Richard, was held near their former home at Annapolis Royal.  Others could be found on Georges Island, Halifax harbor, including Pierre Richard, his wife, and four children; and Claude Richard, his wife, and their child. 

The war over, Richards still living in the British seaboard colonies, like their cousins in Nova Scotia, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Members of the family nevertheless appeared on reparation lists and censuses compiled in several of the Atlantic colonies in the summer of 1763.  In August in Massachusetts, Victor Richard, wife Mariee, and their daughter; and René Richard, wife Margueritte, and their daughter were still being held in the colony.  Three years later, in July 1766, René Richard and his family of three were still in the Bay Colony, when they appeared on a list of the "French Who Wish to Go to Canada."  In 1763 in Connecticut, Joseph Richard and his family of 13; the widow of François Richard and her seven children; another Joseph Richard, his wife, and two children; Pierre Richard, his wife, and child; and Germain Richard, a widower, and his four children were still in the colony.  That same year in New York, Pierre Richard, his wife, and four children; and Michel Richard, his wife, and three children were still in the colony.  One suspects that Jean-Baptiste Richard and wife Marie-Catherine Cormier of Chignecto, along with three other related families who had been held in New York since 1756, had left the colony before the counting.  In August 1763 in Maryland, Joseph Richard, his wife Marie, and Marguerite, probably their daughter; Madeleine LeBlanc, widow of Paul Richard, and her sons Mathurin, Amand, Pierre, and Jacques; Joseph Richard, Marie-Madeleine Richard, Élisabeth Richard, and Marguerite Richard, perhaps siblings; Marguerite, third wife and widow of Jacques Richard, his two sons Joseph and Paul, and seven of her Gautrot children from a previous marriage; and Jacques's daughters Élisabeth and Anne appeared on a repatriation list at Newtown on the colony's Eastern Shore.  At Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac, Pierre Richard, a widower, and Anne-Marie Richard, probably his daughter; and Pierre's son Amand and his wife Marie Breau appeared on another list.  At Upper Marlborough in the colony's interior, Marie-Josèphe LeBlanc, widow of Simon Richard, and her son Paul appeared on a list.  At Baltimore, Joseph Richard with the family of Bonaventure LeBlanc appeared on a list there.  That same month, in South Carolina, Jean, probably Jean-Baptiste Richard, and his wife Marie-Catherine Cormier, recently arrived from New York, with four children; and Marie Richard, husband Joseph Landry, and two children appeared on a repatriation list in the southern colony.  

At war's end, many of the Richards still in North America were living not in Nova Scotia or in the British seaboard colonies but in Canada, where Richards from Chignecto and Annapolis Royal had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles such as themselves.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, Richards from both branches of the Acadian family began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the late 1760s, when kinsmen from the seaboard colonies joined them, Richards could be found on the upper St. Lawrence and the lower Richelieu at Batiscan, Bécancour, Champlain, L'Assomption, Lotbinière, Nicolet, Repentigny, Ruisseau Vacheur, St.-Antoine-de-Chambly, St.-Antoine-sur-Richelieu, St.-Charles-sur-Richelieu, St.-Grégoire-de-Nicolet, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, St.-Ours, St.-Philippe-de-la-Prairie, St.-Pierre-les-Becquets, Ste.-Angèle-de-Laval, Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pérade, Trois-Rivières, and Verchères; on the lower St. Lawrence at Matane, Rimouski, and Ste.-Anne-de-Pocatière; in Gaspésie at Bonaventure and Carleton; at Aboujagane, Cap-Pelé, Memramcook, Petitcoudiac, Richibouctou, Rivière St.-Jean, Shédiac, Shippagan, and Tracadie in present-day western and eastern New Brunwick; and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  They were especially numerous on the upper St. Lawrence across from Trois-Rivières.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

A Richard family being held in Nova Scotia chose to remain in greater Acadia, in the only place in the region that allowed them to escape British rule.  By 1767, Pierre dit Pitre Richard, second wife Marguerite LeBlanc, and members of their family chose to resettle on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  To relieve overcrowding on the island, French officials, obeying a royal decree, likely compelled them and other islanders to move on to France later that year, but they returned to Miquelon in 1768.  Pitre was still there in 1776, living with his youngest son.  Pitre died on Miquelon in January 1778, in his early 80s.  His many children did much to populate the fishing island during the family's stay there.  Two of his daughters married into the Cyr and Vigneau families on the island.  Three of his sons also settled there.  Second son Joseph's wife Anne Poirier gave him six more children on the island.  Pitre's fifth son Germain married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-François Cormier and Marie-Josèphe Cyr of Chignecto, on the island in September 1767.  They, too, were sent to France later that year and returned in 1768.  Marie gave Germain six children on the island.  Pitre's youngest son Pepin dit Menouche married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians René Poirier and Anne Gaudet, in May 1770 after returning from France.  She gave him three children on the island.  The burgeoning family was still there in 1776.  Two years later, during the American Revolution, after France became an ally of the United States, the British captured Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported the fisher/habitants to France.  The crossing to La Rochelle took a terrible toll on the extended family.  Joseph's daughter Marie, wife of Étienne Vigneau, died in St.-Jean Parish, La Rochelle, in November 1778, age 19.  Joseph's youngest son Étienne died in St.-Jean Parish in April 1779, age 7 months.  Germain died there in early May, age 35.  Joseph died there later in the month, age 45.  Germain's son Jean died there in June, age 2.  But the family also grew in the Atlantic port.  Joseph's oldest son Mélème married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Vigneau and Marie Bourgeois, in St.-Jean Parish in March 1783, on the eve of the family's return to Île Miquelon in 1784 after the British returned the Newfoundland islands to France.  Mélème and his youngest brother Pépin remained on Miquelon, but most members of the family did not.  One family led by a widow moved on to Canada, and others, especially Joseph's four middle sons, resettled on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. 

Some of the Richards in the seaboard colonies emigrated not to Canada, where the British ruled, but to the French Antilles, where they did not.  While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles who could be lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  French officials sent the wayward Acadians not only to Môle St.-Nicolas to work on the naval base, but also to the interior community of Mirebalais near Port-au-Prince to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  Most, if not all, of the Richards who ventured to St.-Domingue went to Mirebalais, where their life events soon became part of local church records.  The experience proved fatal for most of them.  Louis-Isaac, son of Pierre Richard and Marie-Josèphe Girouard, "born in New England," was baptized at Mirebalais in August 1764, age 6 months.  In late September, the marriage of his parents--Pierre, another son of Germain Richard and Marguerite Daigre, and Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Jacques Girouard and Marie Boisseau--was "recognized" at Mirebalais.  Louis-Isaac, now "legitimized," likely was the Louis-Jean, son of Pierre Richard and Marie Girouard, who died at Mirebalais, age 8 months, the following November.  Joseph, fils, son of Joseph Richard and Marie Granger, also "born in New England," was baptized at Mirebalais in August 1764, age 38 days.  Joseph, fils's sisters Marie-Josèphe, age 4 1/2, and Marguerite, age 3, also were baptized there that day and the day before.  In late September, the marriage of their parents--Joseph, oldest son of Germain Richard and Marguerite Daigre, and Marie, daughter of Pierre Granger and Anne Belliveau, all from Annapolis Royal--was "recognized" at Mirebalais, and Joseph, fils and his sisters were legitimized in the eyes of the Church.  Alexandre, son of Paul Richard and Théotiste Girouard, "born in New England," was baptized at Mirebalais in September 1764, age 2, and died there in November.  In late September, the marriage of Rose, daughter of Michel dit Lafond Richard, fils and Marie-Madeleine Blanchard, who had gone to Martinique, and Alexis, son of Étienne Hébert and Anne Dugas, was "recognized" at Mirebalais, along with the legimization of their son Michel, who had died a few weeks earlier.  Madeleine, daughter of Germain Richard of Annapolis Royal and Connecticut and Joseph, père's sister, died at Mirebalais in October 1764, age 22.  Her and Joseph, père's sister Françoise, age 20, died there two days later.  Germain and his son Joseph, père died at Mirebalais in November, the father age 61, the son in his mid-30s.  Marguerite Richard, widow Hébert, died at Mirebalais that same month, age 64, as did René Richard, "an Acadian," age 40.  Charles Richard, "an Acadian," died at Mirebalais in December 1764, age 29.  Marguerite, daughter of Joseph Richard and Marie Granger, died at Mirebalais in March 1765, age 3.  Her brother Joseph, fils died at Mirebalais the following October, age 14.  Despite the number of deaths the family suffered in their first year in the colony, when fellow exiles from Halifax and Maryland, including Richards, came through Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans from late 1764 through 1768, no Richard who had gone to St.-Domingue chose to join them.  They either had found a place for themselves in the sugar colony's slave-based plantation economy, or none were left to go there--with at least one exception.  Rose Richard's husband Alexis Hébert died at Mirebalais in February 1766.  She remarried to Jean-Charles-Satis LaGarenne of St.-James Parish, Lisieux, Normandy, France, at Mirebalais, date unrecorded.  Jean-Charles died by April 1779, when Rose remarried again--her third marriage--to Jean-Baptiste, son of Joseph Dubuisson and Élisabeth Lizaac of Dax, Gascony, France, at Mirebalais in April 1779.  After the war, Acadian Richards went to another island in the French Antilles.  Two Richard brothers from Annapolis Royal--Michel dit Lafond, fils and Zacharie--took their families from New York to Martinique.  Zacharie's daughter Marie-Anne-Françoise, born "in Nogac in New England," was baptized at Le Mouillage, Martinique, in September 1764, age 5 1/2, an indication of when the famliy reached the island.  Michel, fils died at St.-Pierre on the sugar island in October 1764, age 55.  One of his daughters married into the Saint-Jean family there in 1770, and another died at St.-Pierre in January 1771, age 2.  Michel dit Lafond III, "tailleur d'habits," died at La Mouillage in May 1783, age 30.  The priest who recorded the burial said nothing of  the tailor's wife or children.  Michel, fils's brother Zacharie died at St.-Pierre in November 1764, age 43, three weeks after his older brother died there.  Three of Zacharie's daughters married into the Benoit, Martin, and Eymar families at Le Mouillage, the last one in 1782. 

Meanwhile, a Richard still living in one of the seaboard colonies consulted with three other related families on where they should resettle.  The four family heads and their wives all were closely kin to one another:  Olivier Landry's wife was Cécile Poirier, sister of Jean-Baptiste Poirier, whose wife, Marie-Madeleine Richard, through her Cormier mother, was a first cousin of Jean-Baptiste Cormier, whose wife Madeleine Richard was a sister of Jean-Baptiste Richard, married to Marie-Catherine Cormier.  Moreover, Olivier Landry was a kinsman on his mother's side to Joseph De Goutin de Ville, native of Port-Royal, now a retired army officer and merchant living in New Orleans.  Sometime in early 1763, perhaps after hearing from cousin Joseph de Ville about the qualities of the Gulf Coast region, Olivier Landry, Jean-Baptiste Cormier, Jean-Baptiste Poirier, Jean-Baptiste Richard, their wives, and children--21 exiles in all--left New York, where they likely had been held since the summer of 1756, and headed back to the southern seaboard colonies, to which they had been deported from Chignecto in the fall of 1755.  In South Carolina late that August, three of the families--the Cormiers, Poiriers, and Richards--appeared on a repatriation list at Charles Town, while the Landrys were counted at Port Royal down the coast, closer to Savannah than to Charles Town.  Later that year, perhaps after securing more funds, the families moved on to Savannah, Georgia, from where, in late December 1763, they took the Savannah Packet to Mobile in eastern Lousiaina, which they probably assumed was still a French possession.  It was not.  They arrived in the Gulf Coast citadel just as the caretaker governor of French Louisiana, Jean-Jacques-Blaise d'Abbadie, was transferring jurisdiction of eastern Louisiana to a British force from Cuba.  Lingering at Mobile in late January, the exiles "rehabilitated" one of their marriages there, that of Jean-Baptiste Poirier to Madeleine Richard, before moving on to New Orleans, which they reached in February 1764--the first documented Acadian exiles to settle in Louisiana. 

Richards being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles, including Richards, chose to relocate to Île Miquelon.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Richards, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 16 were Richards. 

Richards still in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in the Chesapeake colony that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, most of them pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  From June 1766 to January 1769, in four expeditions, nearly 600 exiles left Baltimore and Port Tobacco for the Spanish colony, 14 Richards among them in three of the expeditions.327

Rivet

In 1755, descendants of Étienne Rivet and his first wife Marie-Jeanne Comeau still living in greater Acadia could be found at Pigiguit in the Minas Basin and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered the family even farther. 

The first of the family to be deported from British Nova Scotia were those of brothers Michel and Étienne Rivet and their aunt Claire, married to Bonaventure Forest, all from Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit.  After being rounded up with hundreds of other Acadians from the area, the British placed them on one or both of the two transports bound for Maryland that reached Annapolis via Boston, Massachusetts, at the end of November 1755.  After they were finally allowed to land, colonial officials sent both families to the interior settlement of Upper Marlborough southwest of Annapolis. 

Meanwhile, Claire Rivet's older sister Marie-Rose, widow of René Landry III of Rivière-aux-Canards, and her children ended up on a transport bound for Virginia, where they endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from the Minas basin.  Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, refused to allow the hundreds of Acadians sent to him to remain in the colony.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered Acadians from one vessel to be moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses made their decision ... the "papists" must go!  In May, the first shipment of exiles left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.   Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Marie-Rose and her children were held at Liverpool. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the two Rivet families on Île St.-Jean--those of brothers Augustin dit Justin and Jean, recently arrived from Pigiguit--escaped the roundup of their kinsmen in Nova Scotia, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on the island and rounded up most of the habitants there.  The British deported Justin and his wife, if she was still living, to Cherbourg in Normandy.  Jean and his wife Rosale Bonnière, recently married, crossed on one of the five British transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, or John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November with 1,033 Acadians aboard, bound for St.-Malo, France.  Despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other vessels, the Five Ships reached St.-Malo together during the third week of January 1759.  Justin and Rosalie survived the crossing and settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Rosalie gave Jean a daughter, Rose-Pélagie-Julienne, in May 1760.  The following September, Jean signed up for privateer service on the corsair Élisabeth and was promptly captured by the Royal Navy.  Only 10 days into his service, perhaps while in British hands, he drowned on 30 September 1760, age 33.  Rosalie remarried to Frenchman Pierre Deline of Rouen at St.-Servan in January 1764.  She gave him two daughters there, but they did not remain.  In November 1765, Pierre took his family, including his Rivet stepdaughter Rose, to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, where they settled at Kervarigeon near Bangor in the island's southern interior.  By 1772, Rosalie Bonnière was a widow again and living at Morlaix in northwestern Brittany.  She remarried again--her third marriage--and gave her new husband a son at Morlaix.  Meanwhile, Justin Rivet, if he was not a widower when he made the crossing to Cherbourg, was definitely one when he moved on to St.-Malo in February 1759.  He died at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of the Breton port the following May, age 36.  One wonders if he and his wife had any children.  In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France, a Rivet among them.  Marie-Rose Rivet and her four Landry children were repatriated from Liverpool to St.-Malo, but they did not remain.  In November 1765, they, too, followed their fellow exiles from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer and settled at Bordrehouant in the Bangor district, near her nephew Jean's widow, now married to a Frenchman.  And there they remained.  Marie-Rose died near Bangor in December 1784, age 75.  When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, the only Acadian Rivet remaining in France, Rosalie, daughter of Jean, along with her Landry cousins on Belle-Île-en-Mer, chose to remain in the mother country. 

In North America, the Rivets in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  In July 1763, five months after the war had ended, both families appeared on a list entitled "State of the Neutral Acadians Who Are in Upper Marlborough":  Étienne Rivette, "widower," and five of his children, Étienne, François, Jean, Pierre, and Théodore; and Michel-Maxime Rivette, "orphan", and his siblings Anne, Sirille, Blaise, and Pélagie, all children of Étienne III's older brother Michel.  Also at Upper Marlborough was Claire Foray, actually Rivet, Étienne III's aunt and wife of Bonaventure Foray, actually Forest, and four of their children.  When word reached the exiles in the Chesapeake colony that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, most of the Maryland Acadians pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  From June 1766 to January 1769, nearly 600 of them left Baltimore and Port Tobacco for Spanish Louisiana in four expeditions, 11 Rivets among them.328

Robichaud

In 1755, descendants of Étienne Robichaud and Françoise Boudrot could be found at Annapolis Royal, Minas Proper and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

When the British struck in Nova Scotia in the summer and fall of 1755, the few Robichauds still at Minas, with one exception, escaped the British roundup there and sought refuge in Canada.  Marie Robichaud, her second husband Jacques Thériot, and their family were packed off to Virginia, where they endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas.  Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, refused to allow the hundreds of Acadians sent to him to remain in the colony.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the govneror ordered Acadians from one vessel to be moved up to Richmond, while two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses made their decision ... the "papists" must go!  In May, the first shipment of exiles left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.   Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were kept in warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Marie's family was held at Southampton, where, in her 60s, she likely died. 

The Robichauds still at Cobeguit escaped deportation that terrible autumn.  When they learned of the roundups at Chignecto and then at Grand-Pré on the other side of the Minas Basin, every family in the remote settlement destroyed what they could not take with them, packed up their children and what belongings they could carry, and hid in the woods or followed the cattle trail to Tatamagouche and other North Shore villages.  From there, through the fall, winter, and spring, they escaped across Mer Rouge to the south shore of Île St.-Jean, where some of their kinsmen had gone in the early 1750s. 

Their cousins at Annapolis Royal were not so lucky.  Although many of the Acadians there escaped the British roundup and made their way to the Fundy shore, where they spent a hard winter before crossing the bay to Chepoudy the following spring, most of the many Robichauds at Annapolis fell into British hands and were shunted aboard transports bound for Massachusetts, Connecticut, and North and South Carolina.   Most of them landed in Massachusetts, where colonial officials held them at Cambridge, Wrentham, Haverhill, Westford, Littleton, and in faraway Hampshire County.  At least two of the deportation vessels sailing from Annapolis Royal did not reach their destinations.  The snow Two Sisters, bound for Connecticut with 250 exiles aboard, never reached that colony, having been lost at sea.  The snow Pembroke, carrying 232 Annapolis Acadians destined for North Carolina, suffered a different fate.  Soon after the Pembroke left the Bay of Fundy, a heavy wind separated the vessel from the other south-bound transports.  Taking advantage of the opportunity, the exiles, led by shipbuilder/navigator Charles Belliveau, overwhelmed the Pembroke's officers and crew and made their escape Rivière St.-Jean.  Aboard was 85-year-old Prudent Robichaud and members of his family.  After eluding capture by British sailors at the mouth of the St.-Jean, the exiles spent the rest of a hard winter at Ste.-Anne-du-Pays-Bas farther upriver.  Prudent died there the following spring, and his loved ones joined the Acadian exodus up the St.-Jean portage to Canada.  Annapolis Robichauds who had escaped the roundup, including two of Prudent's grandsons, sought refuge not in Canada but on the upper Petitcoudiac or on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where some of them may have joined the Acadian resistance. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Robichauds on Île St.-Jean escaped the roundup of their kinsmen in Nova Scotia and then welcomed their kin from Cobeguit who also had escaped the redcoats.  The family's respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on the islands and rounded up most of the habitants there.  Others, especially those living in communities on the western shores of Île St.-Jean, including René Robichaud and his family at Bédec on the southwest shore, escaped the British and sought refuge with their kinsmen on the mainland.  The Robichauds who fell into British hands were herded aboard hired transports and shipped off to France.  Most were deported aboard one or more of the five transports--the Yarmouth, Patience, Mathias, Restoration, or the John Samuel--that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-winter storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, reached St.-Malo, France, together in late January 1759.  Only 694 exiles were still aboard the Five Ships, 339 having died at sea.  During the following weeks, 156 of the Five-Ships survivors died in local hospitals from the rigors of the crossing--nearly 500 deaths aboard these vessels, including many Robichauds.  The crossing was especially hard on the children.  Anne-Marie Robichaud, age 31, crossed with husband Charles Lebert, age 38, and four children, ages 12 to 3.  She, her husband, and their oldest daughter survived the crossing, but their three younger children died at sea.  Marie-Blanche Robichaud, age 28, crossed with husband Olivier Daigre, age 24.  They both made it to St.-Malo.  Anne Robichaud, age 31, crossed with husband Pierre Forest, age 24, their 8-month-old daughter, and Pierre's brother Jacques, age 12.  Their daughter died at sea.  Marie Robichaud, age 32, crossed with husband Pierre Hébert, age 35, and four of their children, ages 9 to 3.  Marie and all of her children died at sea.  Charles Robichaud, age 23, a bachelor, crossed with the family of his married cousin Jean-Baptiste Landry.  Charles, his cousin, his cousin's Dugas wife, and their two children all survived the crossing. Alexandre Robichaud, age 32, crossed with wife Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg, age 22, and their three children--François-Xavier, age 6; François-David, age 5; and Théodose, age 6 months--and two Bourg relatives.  Alexandre, Marguerite-Josèphe, and her brother Joseph Bourg, age 15, survived the crossing, but all three of their children and the other Bourg relative died at sea.  Joseph Robichaud, age 29, crossed with wife Ozite Hébert, age 25, and their two sons--Bénoni, age 4; and Joseph-Landry, age 2.  Joseph and Ozite survived the crossing, but their sons died at sea.  François Robichaud, age 60, crossed with wife Agathe Turpin, age 50, and seven children--François, fils, age 25; Mathurin, age 18; Jean-Pierre, age 15; Joseph age 13; Geneviève, age 9, Marie-Josèphe, age 8; and Alexandre, age 6.  The two youngest children died at sea.  François and son Joseph died "of smallpox" at Ploubalay near St.-Malo in May 1759, not long after reaching the Breton port.  François's older brother Augustin, age 70, crossed perhaps with François's family and died in a St.-Malo hospital in March.  Pierre Robichaud, age 24, crossed with wife Anne Daigre, age 20.  Anne was pregnant on the voyage.  She gave birth to twin daughters Anne-Marie and Marguerite in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer in May but died in childbirth.  The babies died later in the month, five days apart.  Another Joseph Robichaud, age 55, the grieving Pierre's father, crossed with wife Claire LeBlanc, age 50, and nine of their unmarried children--Marie-Josèphe, age 26; Anne-Théodose, age 23; Françoise, age 20; Marguerite-Pélagie, age 15; Michel, age 13; Isidore, age 10; Jean-Baptiste, age 8; Charles, age 6; and André, age 4.  Son André died at sea, and Joseph died at St.-Servan in March.  Joseph's oldest son Joseph Robichaud, fils, age 31, crossed with wife Marie Michel, age 31, and a Boudrot orphan, who died at sea.  Another Pierre Robichaud, age 28, son of Jean dit Cadet, crossed with wife Anne-Marie Blanchard, age 23, who also was pregnant during the voyage.  Pierre survived the crossing.  Anne-Marie gave birth to daughter Françoise-Marguerite at St.-Suliac near St.-Malo in May.  The baby died three days after her birth, and Anne-Marie died six days later.  Joseph-Prudent Robichaud, age 36, and his second wife Marie-Madeleine Bourgeois, landed not at St.-Malo but at Cherbourg in Normandy. 

Island Robichauds did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Made childless by the crossing, Alexandre Robichaud and Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg created a new family at St.-Énogat, today's Dinard, across the harbor from St.-Malo.  Marguerite-Josèphe gave Alexandre seven more children there:  a second François-Xavier in March 1760 but died at age 5 in April 1765; Marguerite in March 1762; Anne-Théodose in June 1764; Marie in July 1766 but died at age 3 1/2 in May 1769; Anne-Josèphe in March 1768; Renée-Rose in June 1770; and Marie-Madeleine in April 1773, but she died five days after her birth.  Charles Robichaud, now working as a seamn, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Victor LeBlanc and Marie Aucoin and widow of Jean-Jacques Bonnière, at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Énogat in July 1760.  Marie gave Charles a son, Charles, fils, in the St.-Malo surburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, across the harbor from St.-Énogat, in October 1768.  Agathe Turpin, widow of François Robichaud, took her family to Ploubalay south of St.-Énogat, moved on to Plouër in 1760, and settled at St.-Servan in 1763.  Oldest son François Robichaud, fils, at age 31, married Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Hébert and Élisabeth Benoit, at St.-Servan in April 1765.  Élisabeth gave François, fils two children there:  François-Joseph in March 1766; and Marguerite-Geneviève in September 1767, 8 1/2 months after her father died at St.-Servan in January 1767, age 33.  His widow Élisabeth may not have remarried.  Anne Turpin's second son Mathurin Robichaud died at St.-Servan in May 1766, age 26, before he could marry.  Joseph Robichaud and wife Anne-Osite Hébert, who also had been made childless by the crossing, settled at St.-Énogat and recreated their family with the birth of four more children there:  another Joseph-Landry in July 1760; Jean-Baptiste in November 1763; François-Xavier in July 1768; and Anne-Marie in September 1770.  Pierre à Jean dit Cadet Robichaud, whom the crossing made a widower and childless, settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo, where he remarried to Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Hébert and Madeleine Doiron, in November 1761.  She gave him six more children there:  Jean-Pierre in March 1763 but died "of smallpox" at age 10 in April 1773; Joseph-François in September 1764 but died at age 7 in December 1771; Laurant-Xavier in April 1766; Marie-Josèphe in February 1768; Anne-Théotiste in March 1770; and Joseph-Gervais in June 1772.  Claire LeBlanc, widow of Joseph Robichaud, led her large family to St.-Servan, where six of her children created, or recreated, families of their own.  Second son Pierre Robichaud, rendered a childless widower by the crossing, remarried to fellow Acadian Anne Michel, widow of François LeBlanc, at St.-Servan in August 1761.  She gave him eight more children there:  Anne-Blanche in May 1762; Marie-Rose in August 1763; Joseph-Servan in May 1765; Olive-Victoire in May 1767; Pierre-Ignace in October 1768; Marthe-Élisabeth in October 1770; Jean-Baptiste in December 1771 but died at age 11 months in November 1772; and Jean-Louis in January 1774.  Claire's oldest daughter Marie-Josèphe Robichaud married Abraham, son of Guillaume Gendre and Catherine Fourtoune of Beaumont, diocese of Auch near Toulouse in the south of France, at St.-Servan in January 1764.  Claire's third son Michel Robichaud married Françoise, daughter fellow Acadians Pierre Landry and Anne Thériot, at St.-Servan in February 1767.  Françoise gave Michel four children there:  Michel-Jean or Jean-Michel in December 1767 but died in January; Pierre-Marie in March 1769 but died in April; Anne-Marie in July 1770; and Marguerite-Françoise in July 1772.  Claire's fifth daughter Marguerite-Pélagie Robichaud married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Jean Richard and Marguerite Landry, at St.-Servan in November 1767.  She gave him two daughters before he died there in December 1773.  Claire's fourth son Isidore Robichaud married Marguerite, daughter of Joseph Boudrot and Hélène Landry, at St.-Servan in April 1769.  Marguerite gave Isidore three children there:  Jean-Isidore in July 1770; Marguerite-Marguerite in February 1772; and Angélique-Rosalie in April 1773.  Claire's fifth son Jean-Baptiste married Félicité, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Cyr and Marie-Josèphe Hébert, at St.-Servan in February 1773.  Félicité gave Jean-Baptiste a son, Jean-Baptiste, fils, at St.-Servan in November 1773. 

Meanwhile, at Cherbourg, Joseph-Prudent Robichaud died in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish in January 1759, age 36, soon after reaching the Norman port.  His widow remarried to a Boudrot widower at Cherbourg in 1762.  Joseph-Prudent's daughter Marguerite, by his first wife Marie Comeau, married a Belliveau on St. Mary's Bay, Nova Scotia, in October 1774, age 24, so she either had not gone to France with her father and stepmother, or, more likely, she returned to greater Acadia after her father's death and her stepmother's remarriage. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France.  Only one Robichaud, an elderly wife, had ended up in England, and she likely died there.  In November 1765, Acadians repatriated from England and a few who had been deported from the French Maritimes agreed to become part of an agricultural venture on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  A Robichaud wife from St.-Servan-sur-Mer--Marie-Josèphe, oldest daughter of Claire LeBlanc, widow of Joseph Robichaud--chose to follow her French-born husband to the island, but she did not remain.  After he died there, she returned with their young daughter to St.-Servan to live with her widowed mother and siblings.  In 1774, her widowed mother Claire LeBlanc and her large Robichaud family, probably via the Channel island of Jersey, followed other exiles in France to the British-controlled fishery at Gaspésie on the north shore of the Baie des Chaleurs, taking with them perhaps half the Robichauds still in France.  British officials counted Claire and her family at Bonaventure in Gaspésie later in the year.  Beginning in the early 1790s, her Robichaud children and their families moved on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore in what had become the province of New Brunswick.

In 1773, Robichauds still living in the St.-Malo area chose to take part in an even larger agricultural venture, this one on an influential nobleman's estate near Châtellerault in the interior province of Poitou.  Robichaud families who went there included those headed by Alexandre Robichaud from St.-Énogat; Charles Robichaud from St.-Servan-sur-Mer; Agathe Turpin, widow of François Robichaud, from St.-Servan; Joseph Robichaud from St.-Énogat; and Pierre Robichaud from St.-Suliac.  Second wife Anne Hébert gave Pierre Robichaud another daughter, Madeleine-Anne, at Leigné-les-Bois east of Châtellerault in July 1774.  The couple's son Laurent-Xavier died there in April 1776, age 9.  Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg gave Alexandre Robichaud another daughter, Angélique-Rose, at Leigné-les-Bois in September 1774, but their 6-year-old daughter Anne-Josèphe died there that October.  Agathe Turpin's third son Jean-Pierre Robichaud married Geneviève, daughter of fellow Acadians Claude LeBlanc and Madeleine Boudrot and widow of Séverin Doiron, in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish, Châtellerault, in September 1774.  Agathe herself died at Châtellerault in September 1774, age 70.  Anne-Osite Hébert gave Joseph Robichaud another daughter, Reine, at Châtellerault in August 1775. 

After two years of effort, the Robichauds retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on the government subsidy and what work they could find.  Alexandre Robichaud and wife Marguerite-Josèphe Bourg lost two more children in St.-Donatien Parish, Nantes:  Angélique-Rose died in February 1776, age 1 1/2; and Anne-Théodose in October 1776, age 12 1/2.  A daughter, Reine-Rose, was baptized in St.-Donatien Parish in May 1776.  Jean-Pierre Robichaud and wife Geneviève LeBlanc gained three sons and lost two of them in Ste.-Croix Parish, Nantes:  Jean-Baptiste was baptized there in March 1776 but died at age 7 in May 1783; François-Joseph in November 1778; and Pierre-Josèphe in March 1781 but died at age 1 the following March.  Wife Geneviève died in Ste.-Croix Parish in October 1782, age 44.  Joseph Robichaux's wife Anne-Osite Hébert died in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, in December 1782, age 50.  He did not remarry.  Charles Robichaud, still working as a sailor, died in the suburb of Chantenay in July 1783, age 49.  His widow Marie LeBlanc remarried to a Henry widower at Chantenay in October 1784.  Anne Hébert gave Pierre Robichaud two more children at Nantes:  Élisabeth in St.-Nicolas Parish in July 1779 but died there in March 1783, age 3 /1/2; and Jean-Pierre perhaps posthumously in c1783.  Pierre died in St.-Nicolas Parish in August 1783, age 51.

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 11 Robichauds agreed to take it.  The takers included widower Joseph Robichaud and four of his children, two sons and two daughters; Anne Hébert, widow of Pierre Robichaud, and four of her Robichaud children, two daughters and two sons; Marie LeBlanc, third wife of Charles Henry and widow of Charles Robichaud, and her son Charles Robichaud, fils; and Anne-Marie Robichaud, widow of Charles Lebert, and her son.  Those who chose to remain in France included Alexandre Robichaud, his wife, and their two or three remaining children; Jean-Pierre Robichaud and his surviving son François-Joseph; and Élisabeth Hébert, widow of François Robichaud, fils, and her two children, François-Joseph and Marguerite-Geneviève.  In 1793, during the French Revolution, republican officials counted François-Joseph Robichaud, now a carpenter, and his sister Marguerite, wife of a Frenchman named Pochet, still "in the area around St.-Malo."  The official said nothing of a wife and children for François-Joseph the carpenter, nor did he count Élisabeth Hébert among the Acadians still in the Breton port. 

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  The following October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, Robichauds among them.  They included Joseph Robichau and his family of two; Charles Robichaud and his family of seven; and Renné Robichaud and his family of five.  After the counting, the British held these exiles, and other Robichauds who either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area, in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British officials counted members of the family at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in 1761-62.  They included Bruneau Robicheau and his family of four; Joseph Robicheau and his family of three; Jacques Robicheau; Charles Robicheau and his family of seven; René Robicheau and his family of five; Pierre Robicheau and his family of four; Olivier Robicheau; and Prudent Robicheau and his family of five.  Members of the family, some of the same ones counted at Fort Edward, could be found on Georges Island, Halifax harbor, in August 1763.  They included Amable Robicho, his wife, and three children; René Robichos, his wife, and four children; Charle Robicho, his wife, and four children; and Joseph Robicho and his two children. 

The war over, Robichauds still living in the British seaboard colonies, like their cousins being held in Nova Scotia, also, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  Members of the family nevertheless appeared on reparation lists and censuses compiled in several of the Atlantic colonies in the summer of 1763.  In August in Massachusetts, members of the family still in the Bay Colony included Widow Robichau; Joseph Robichaud, wife Mariee, two sons and a daughter; and Estienne Robichot, wife Mariee, two sons and two daughters.  In Connecticut that year, Dominique Robichaud and his family of eight; Paul Robichau, his wife, and two children; and Salette Robichau and his daughter were still there.  In South Carolina in August, colonial officials counted Widow Anne Robichau.  In June 1766, members of the family in Massachusetts appeared on a list entitled "Names of the French Who Wish to Go to Canada."  They included Estienne Robichaux and his family of nine; Frs? Robichaux and his family of four; and ____ Robichaux and his family of three. 

At war's end, many of the Robichauds still in North America were living not in Nova Scotia or the British seaboard colonies but in Canada, where many of them had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles such as themselves.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Étienne Robichaud began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after the late 1760s, when kinsmen from the seaboard colonies joined their cousins in Canada, Robichauds could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, Boucherville, Deschambault, Nicolet, Pointe-aux-Trembles, Repentigny, St.-Denis-sur-Richelieu, St.-Hyacinthe, Varanne, and Yamachiche; on the lower St. Lawrence at Cap-St.-Ignace, Kamouraska, L'Islet, L'Isle-Vert, Rivières des Capes, and St.-Jean-Port-Joli; in Gaspésie at Bonaventure; in eastern New Brunwick at Aldouane, Bay du Vin, Bouctouche, Caraquet, French Village, Inkerman, Kouchibouigouac, Memramcook, Pointe-Sapin, Pokemouche, Richibucto, Shippagan, Ste.-Anne-de Burnt Church, St.-Charles-de-Kent, St.-Louis-de-Kent, and Tracadie; in the interior of New Brunswick at Petitcoudiac, Kennebecasis, and Rivière St.-Jean; and in Nova Scotia on Baie Ste.-Marie and at Bas-de-Tousket, Bear River, Dartmouth, Halifax, and Tusket Wedge.  They were especially numerous on the eastern New Brunswick shore.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Robichauds being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Île Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 13 were Robichauds.329

Roy

In 1755, descendants of Jean Roy dit La Liberté and Marie-Christine Aubois could be found at Annapolis Royal, Grand-Pré and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin, and in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

In the fall of 1755, the British deported a Roy family to Maryland, perhaps the only Roys at Minas who had not moved on to the French Maritimes.  Colonial officials sent Philippe Roy, wife Cécile Mazerolle, and at least two of their grown children to the interior community of Lower Marlborough on the upper Patuxent River, where Philippe died in the late 1750s or early 1760s, in his 60s.  Their many cousins at Annapolis Royal were luckier.  Most, if not all, of them escaped the roundup there in the fall of 1755, spent a hard winter on the Fundy shore, crossed to Chepoudy the following spring, and sought refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac and lower Rivière St.-Jean before moving on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or to Canada via the St.-Jean portage. 

Living in territory controlled by France, Roys in the French Maritimes escaped the roundup of their kinmen in Nova Scotia, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on the islands and rounded up most of the habitants there.  Again, members of the family eluded capture either by leaving the islands before the fall of Louisbourg and crossing Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or escaping the patrols sent out to capture them and escaping to the mainland. 

The Annapolis Royal and island Roys who had gone on to Canada were the first of the family to suffer the fatal effects of exile.  After slipping away from Île St.-Jean in the months before the island's dérangement, René Roy, youngest son of family progenitor Jean dit La Liberté, René's wife Marie-Josèphe Daigre, their children, and members of his and her family, made their way to Québec, where the family was counted in 1757.  French authorities placed them at St.-François-du-Sud below Québec, with tragic result.  René died there in January 1758, age 49, victim, most likely, of the smallpox epidemic that was raging among the refugees in the area.  Wife Marie-Josèphe's parents, Josèphe Daigre and Madeleine Gautrot, as well as René's older sister Marie-Françoise and her husband Étienne Trahan, also died in the epidemic that struck the Acadians in and around the Canadian capital between the summer of 1757 and the spring of 1758.  Despite the tragedy, Marie-Josèphe and her Roy children remained in Canada. 

One of the strangest stories of the Acadian expulsion was that of René's oldest brother Jean, fils and his family.  They were among the many Roys who escaped the roundup at Annapolis Royal in the fall of 1755 and sought refuge in Canada.  Sometime in the late 1750s, perhaps after the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British deported Jean, fils and his family to faraway Massachusetts.  In 1760, colonial officials counted eight of his children, ages 13 to 6 months, at Dunstable in the northeastern part of the colony just below the boundary with New Hampshire.  One wonders where the other members of the family were being held.  Jean, fils, Françoise, and nine of their children, five sons and four daughters, were still in the Bay Colony in August 1763.  They were still there in June 1766, when colonial officials noted that the family numbered an astonishing 17, likely an extended family by now.  Along with dozens of other exiles sent to New England, they returned to Canada that year.  Jean, fils died at Champlain on the upper St. Lawrence between Québec City and Trois-Rivières in April 1770, in his late 70s. 

Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles such as themselves.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jean Roy dit La Liberté began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the late 1760s, when Jean, fils and his large family joined their many cousins still there, Acadian Roys could be found in several regions of what, a century later, became the Dominion of Canada:  on the upper St. Lawrence and lower Richelieu at Bécancour, Champlain, Repentigny, Rivière-du-Loup now Louiseville, St.-Ours, St.-Pierre-les-Becquets, Trois-Rivières, and Yamachiche; at L'Islet on the lower St. Lawrence; on the southeastern shore of present-day New Brunwick at Baie-des-Ouines now Bay du Vin, Bouctouche, Cormierville, Memramcook, and Petit-Rocher; and in the interior of New Brunswick on upper Rivière St.-Jean.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Other Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the French garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, but no Roys appear on the list.  After the counting, the British held these exiles, and other Acadians who either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area, in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted several closely-related Roy families on Georges Island in Halifax harbor:  Benoît, called Benois, Roy, his wife Euphrosine Bourg, and three children; younger brother Joseph, his wife Marie-Anne D'Amours, and eight children; and younger brother Abraham, a widower, and seven children.  Benoît and Joseph chose to remain in greater Acadia, taking their families to upper Rivière St.-Jean before crossing the new province of New Brunswick to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Brother Abraham and two of his children chose a very different path. 

Roys being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Halifax exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, three of them were descendants of Jean Roy dit La Liberté.

The few Roys still in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in the Chesapeake colony that the Spanish would welcome them in Louisiana, most of the Maryland Acadians pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  From June 1766 to January 1769, nearly 600 of them left Baltimore and Port Tobacco for Spanish Louisiana.  None of the Roys still in Maryland were among them.330

Saulnier

In 1755, descendants of Louis Saulnier and Louise Bastineau dit Peltier could be found at Minas, Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières region west of Chignecto, Annapolis Royal, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto and in the trois rivières were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour at Chignecto in June 1755, Saulniers from Petitcoudiac may have been among the local Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  If so, they, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport these Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Residents of the trois-rivières ended up in South Carolina and Georgia, Saulniers from Petitcoudiac among them.  Others, after escaping the British roundup, sought refuge in Canada.  Joseph, son of René Saulnier, died at Québec in December 1757, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck Acadian refugees in and around the Canadian capital between the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Joseph's first cousin, Pierre, fils of Annapolis Royal, and members of his family also escaped to Canada.  Three of Pierre, fils teenage daughters died at Québec in 1757, victims, perhaps, of the smallpox.  Evidently most of the trois-rivières Saulniers who escaped the British at Chignecto, including Étienne Saulnier, his second wife, and their large family, went not to Canada but to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they likely joined their fellow exiles at Shediac and Miramichi.  By 1760, some of them had made their way to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  One suspects that some of these Saulniers may have joined their cousins in the Acadian resistance. 

Not all of the Saulniers who escaped the British were from the trois-rivières and Annapolis Royal.  In 1755, most members of the family were still living at Minas, where the family's progenitor had settled in the 1680s.  Pierre, son of René, his wife, and their son also escaped the British and fled to Canada, where Pierre remarried at St.-Joachim on the lower St. Lawrence below Québec.  Pierre's younger brother Claude and his family also escaped but likely sought refuge with their cousins on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore. 

Some of the Saulniers at Minas were not so lucky.  Pierre le jeune of Rivière-aux-Canards, wife Marguerite Vincent, and their children; older sister Anne and her husband Joseph Hébert; their younger brother Charles and his wife Euphrosine Lalande; and their cousin Marie-Josèphe Saulnier and her new husband Claude Aucoin were deported to Virginia, where they endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas.  Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, refused to allow the hundreds of Acadians sent to him to remain in the colony.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered exils from one vessel to be moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses made their decision ... the "papists" must go!  In May, the first shipment of exiles left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 total exiles by one count.   Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  For seven years, Pierre, Anne, Charles, and Marie-Josèphe and their families languished at Liverpool.  Charles's daughter Marguerite evidently was born in the English port in c1758, and cousin Marie-Josèphe gave birth to a son there that year.  Pierre le jeune remarried to Dorothée Trahan at Liverpool in September 1762.  Oldest son Pierre, fils married Élisabeth Trahan, and oldest daughter Françoise married Alain Hébert, at Liverpool.  The following spring, in May 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, Pierre, père, brother Charles, cousin Marie-Josèphe and their families were repatriated to France with the other exiles who had endured the ordeal in England. 

Already in France were hundreds of Acadians from the Maritime islands, including Saulniers from Île St.-Jean who, after the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British had deported to St.-Malo and other French ports.  Not all of the island Saulniers survived the crossing.  One of Pierre's aunts, Marguerite Saulnier, her husband Jacques Oudy, and their entire family perished aboard the deportation transport Violet, which left Chédabouctou Bay in late November 1758 in a 12-ship convoy and sank in a storm off the southwest coast of England in mid-December.  One of the island survivors seems to have been Pierre's cousin Marie-Marguerite Saulnier, who would have been in her late teens in 1763 when her kinsmen reached France from England.  Where she landed in France in 1758 is anyone's guess.  She married Frenchman Antoine Boutary of Quercy, west of Bordeaux, in c1768, place unrecorded.  She followed him to the interior province of Poitou in 1773 and to the lower Loire port of Nantes in December 1775.  Between 1776 and 1785, she gave him three sons at Nantes.  Meanwhile, Marie-Josèphe Saulnier and husband Claude Aucoin settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo, where, between 1763 and 1779, she gave him seven more children. 

Pierre Saulnier, second wife Dorothée Trahan, and their family chose to participate in another settlement venture soon after they were repatriated from England, but not in the mother country.  In 1765, when many of the Acadians from England chose to go to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, Pierre and his family followed other exiles in France to the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  French officials counted them at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district on March 1.  With Pierre and Dorothée were his older sister Anne, now a widower; son Pierre, fils, his wife Élisabeth Trahan, and their 2-year-old daughter Marguerite; daughter Françoise, now a widow; and four of his younger children--Charles, Joseph, Étienne, and Marie, all by his first wife Marguerite Vincent.  The tropical climate took its toll on the family during their first months in Guiane.  Françoise, whom the census taker noted was suffering from fever, died 11 days after the counting; daughter Marguerite died in April; and Anne in May.  Pierre, père's daughter Marie, age 11, also had been noted as suffering from fever, so she may have died as well.  Pierre, père, perhaps a widower again, returned to France later in the decade, remarried--again--to Marie Coulonge, a Canadian widow, at Rochefort in August 1769, and died a few years later.  His second son Charles may have accompanied him back to France, but not sons Pierre, fils, Joseph, and Étienne.  Pierre, fils's wife Élisabeth gave him three sons in the South American colony between 1767 and 1782, though only one of them, Jean-Baptiste, may have survived.  Pierre, fils died in the King's hospital at Sinnamary in July 1787, age 45.  Wife Élisabeth died in August.  Meanwhile, brother Joseph married a young widow, Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Trahan and Anne Boudrot of Rivière-aux-Canards, at Sinnamary in January 1773.  She gave him a daughter soon after their marriage.  Madeleine died at Sinnamary in July 1775, age 25.  Joseph, who did not remarry, died at Ircoubo near Sinnamary in May 1784, age 36.  Youngest brother Étienne married Marie-Jeanne, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Yves Quimine and Marie Grossin of the French Maritimes, at Sinnamary in April 1776.  Marie-Jeanne gave Étienne three children, a daughter and two sons, between 1777 and 1782.  The family likely remained in French Guiane. 

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, only three of the Saulniers still in the mother country agreed to take it.  Among the takers were Marie-Josèphe Saulnier, husband Claude Aucoin, and five of their children, who were still in the St.-Malo area.  Marguerite Saulnier and her new husband Guillaume Hamon, and Marie-Marguerite Saulnier, her husband Antoine Boutary, and their three sons also sailed to the Spanish colony.  Others remained.  Margueritie, daughter of Charles Saulnier and Euphrosine Lalande, married Guillaume, son of Joseph Hamon and Marie Dameue of Chantenay, at St.-Martin de Chantenay near Nantes in November 1780.  She and her husband did not go to the Spanish colony.  Her parents, if they were still living, also may have chosen to remain in the mother country. 

In North America, Saulniers who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  The following October, after the fall of Montréal,, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  No Saulniers appeared on the list.  The British held other refugees who either were captured by, or surrendered to, them during the following months in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In 1761-62, British officials counted Saulniers at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, including René Saunier and his family of four; Claude Saunier and his family of six; Charles Saunier and his family of six; and another Charles Saunier and his family of three.  In August 1763, British officials counted two families on Georges Island in Halifax harbor:  Étienne Sauniae, his wife, and nine children; and Joseph Sauniae, his wife, and two children. 

At war's end, Saulniers still in North America were living not only in Nova Scotia, but also in Canada, where some of them had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles such as themselves.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Louis Saulnier began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  By the late 1760s, they could be found at St.-Joachim and Baie St.-Paul on the St. Lawrence below Québec.  In Nova Scotia, they settled on the Baie Ste.-Marie, today's St. Mary's Bay, along the peninsula's southwest coast.  Saulniers were especially plentiful at Pointe-de-l'Église, today's Church Point, and, one suspects, at nearby Saulnierville on the bay.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and, until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, as some of the Saulniers were about to do, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New England "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all that they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, 13 were Saulniers.331

Savary

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755, descendants of François Savary, Geneviève Forest, and their only son André, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean, rounded up most of the habitants there, and deported them to France. 

Some of the Savarys on Île St.-Jean managed to elude the British.  Old André, perhaps sensing the futility of remaining on the island during a full-blown war in greater Acadia between Britain and France, fled north to Canada even before the fall of Louisbourg.  He was buried at St.-Jean, Île d'Orléans, just downriver from Québec City, in November 1757, age 65, a year before the British deported the Acadians from the Maritime islands--victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of his fellow Acadians in and around the Canadian capital between the summer of 1757 and the spring of 1758.  Son Joseph and his family must have gone to Québec with him; Joseph died at St.-Charles de Bellechasse across from Québec City in January 1758, age 37, perhaps also a victim of the pox.  Oldest son Bernard and his family, except for daughter Anne-Marie-Madeleine, also may have escaped the British roundup on Île St.-Jean. 

Other Savarys on Île St.-Jean did not escape the British in 1758.  André's son Charles, age 31, wife Louise Clossinet, age 34, and their sons Jean-Charles, age 2 1/2, and Charles, fils, age unrecorded, made the crossing to St.-Malo, France, aboard the deportation transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November, survived a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, put in at Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until the second week of March 1759.  Charles, père, Louise, and Jean-Charles survived the crossing, but Charles, fils died at sea.  Charles, père died at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo in late April 1759, probably from the rigors of the crossing.  His widow Louise remarried to fellow Acadian Charles Trahan at Châteauneuf south of St.-Suliac in August 1759.  Another Charles Savary, age 18, probably André's youngest son Charles-Olivier, crossed alone on one of the five deportation transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November, survived the mid-December storm, and reached St.-Malo together in late January.  Young Charles survived the crossing.  In February 1760, perhaps having become a sailor, he embarked on the ship Prince-Édouard, perhaps a privateer vessel, and disappears from history.  Charles, père's and Charles-Olivier's niece--oldest brother Bernard's daughter Anne-Marie-Madeleine, age 17--made the crossing on a deportation transport that took her to Cherbourg in Normandy.  One suspects she crossed with relatives who looked after her.  She did not remain at Cherbourg. 

Two Savarys--Madeleine, daughter of Louis Savary and the wife of Jeanne Audaire; and Marie, wife of Pierre Loumeau--also lived in France.  One wonders how, or if, Madeleine and Marie were kin to André et al. and if they, too, were island Savarys.  Madeleine, now the widow Audaire, remarried to day laborer Jean, son of perhaps Charles Fouquet and Marie Poitevin of Île St.-Jean and widower of Marie Chevalier, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in September 1763; Madeleine's father Louis and brother François witnessed the marriage.  Marie, also a widow now, remarried to Charles, son of Frenchmen François Foubert and Renée Hurtaud of Marsay, Aunis, at Rochefort in October 1763.  Charles also was a day laborer.  Thomas Savary of Louisbourg, no kin to the other island Savarys, remarried to Marguerite, daughter of Frenchman Roch Fabre and widow of Julien Denion, in St.-Martin de Chantenay Parish, near the lower Loire port of Nantes, in October 1782. 

Meanwhile, Andre's granddaughter Anne-Marie-Madeleine Savary, after leaving Cherbourg, lived probably with relatives at Pleudihen-sur-Rance south of St.-Suliac from 1759 to 1771 and was at Plouër-sur-Rance across the river from Pleudihen in 1772.  Still in her teens, she married fellow Acadian Pierre Pothier, widower of Marie Comeau, at Pleudihen in May 1771.  One wonders if they joined hundreds of other Acadians in the settlement venture in Poitou in the early 1770s and moved on to the lower Loire port of Nantes in the mid-1770s.  By September 1784, Anne was living at Nantes, a widow with two young Pothier sons:  Baptiste-Olivier, born in c1773; and Jacques-Sylvain in c1778.  When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Anne-Marie-Madeleine Savary and her Pothier sons agreed to take it.  The other Acadian Savary who might have still been n France--first cousin Jean-Charles, who, if he was still alive, would have been age 29 in 1785--chose to remain.285

Savoie

In 1755, descendants of François Savoie and Catherine Lejeune could be found at Annapolis Royal, Chepoudy in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and at Malpèque on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther.

The Acadians at Chignecto and in the trois-rivières were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour at Chignecto in June 1755, Savoies from Chepoudy may have been among the local Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  If so, they, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport these Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  A young Savoie from Chepoudy may have ended up Georgia, but he did not remain there.  In the spring of 1756, the governors of South Carolina and Georgia encouraged the exiles in their colonies who were not under arrest to return to greater Acadia on their own hook.  Several expeditions left those colonies on boats they built or purchased, and one actually made it to the mouth of Rivière St.-Jean.  Most did not.  One expedition landed on Long Island, New York, during the third week of August.  Having been chastised by an irate Lawrence, colonial authorities in that colony refused to allow the exiles to continue their voyage and promptly deposited them in Westchester County, north of Manhattan.  Francis Savoy, listed with no wife or children, was sent to the town of Eastchester. 

Most of the Savoies at Chepoudy escaped the British roundup that summer and fall.  Some sought refuge in Canada, where French officials counted them as early as 1756.  Others retreated to the upper Petitcoudiac or continued on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they joined their fellow exiles at Shediac and Miramichi.  By the late 1750s, at least one Savoie family had made its way up the shore to the French stronghold at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, where they may have joined the Acadian resistance if they weren't part of it already. 

Most of the many Savoies still at Annapolis Royal escaped the British roundup that terrible autumn.  After a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed to Chepoudy the following spring, and took refuge on the upper Petitcoudiac or lower Rivière St.-Jean before following their cousins to Canada or the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  At least three of the Savoie families at Annapolis Royal were not so lucky.  Pierre Savoie, his wife, and children ended up on a transport bound for Connecticut but evidently moved on to Pennsylvania later in the decade.  Another family endured an even more harrowing experience.  Pierre's uncle Charles Savoie, his wife, and most of their children were thrown aboard the transport Experiment bound for New York.  A North Atlantic storm drove the ship to Antigua in the British Antilles, where the exiles spent the winter.  The Experiment finally reached Manhattan in early May 1756.  Colonial officials promptly sent the family of 10 to New Rochelle, Westchester County, where local authorities watched them closely.  Amand-Grégoire Savoie, his wife, and four young sons were deported from the Annapolis Royal to South Carolina probably aboard the transport Hobson. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the two Savoie wives living in the French Maritimes escaped the roundup of their kinsmen in Nova Scotia, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on both of the Maritime islands and rounded up most of the habitants there.  One Savoie wife was lucky, the other was not.  Marie-Josèphe Savoie, her Arceneau husband, and their many children, living at Malpèque on the remote northwest shore of Île St.-Jean, escaped perhaps in their own fishing boat across Mer Rouge to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Another, younger Marie-Josèphe Savoie had married Jean-Baptiste Boutin of Baie-des-Espagnols at Louisbourg on Île Royale before the island's dérangement.  The British deported them to Rochefort, France, in late 1758.  Jean-Baptiste died there in November 1759, and Marie-Josèphe remarried to Jean, son of Pierre Boileau and Jeanne Delaisse of Pau, France, in January 1761.  If she was still living in 1785, she did not follow other Acadian exiles in France to Spanish Louisiana. 

Another young Savoie wife ended up in France by a different route.  Félicité, daughter perhaps of Charles Savoie and Françoise Martin of Annapolis Royal, married Joseph, son of Charles Hébert, fils and Anne-Théotiste Viger of Pobomcoup near Cap-Sable, in the mid- or late 1750s and settled at Pobomcoup while her parents and siblings were languishing in Westchester County, New York.  In the spring of 1759, after the fall of Louisbourg the previous summer, British forces rounded up Joseph, Félicité, and his extended family with other Cap-Sable-area families and held them on Georges Island in Halifax harbor, where Félicité gave Joseph a son in October.  The following month, the British deported the Cap-Sable families to England, and English authorities promptly sent them on to Cherbourg in Normandy, which they reached in mid-January 1760.  Joseph and Félicité baptized their son in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, soon after their arrival.  Félicité died there in March 1760, age 25.  Joseph died there the following August, age 28.  If son Joseph-David was still living and in France in 1785--he would have been in his mid-20s--he did not follow other Acadians to Spanish Louisiana. 

In North America, the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore were quickly caught up in the lingering war between the imperial rivals.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the French garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  A Joseph Savoye with a family of four appears on the list.  Joseph's older brother Charles, twice widowed, remarried to Judith, daughter of Claude Arseneau and Marguerite Richard, of Malpèque, Île St.-Jean, at Restigouche in January 1761, a few months after the garrison's surrender.  By 1762, the British sent the brothers and hundreds of their fellow exiles to prison compounds in Nova Scotia, where they held them for the rest of the war.  Two Jean Savoies, one of them counted alone, another with a family of six, appear on a list of exiles at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in 1762.  British officials counted brothers Charles and Joseph and other Savoies with their families on Georges Island, Halifax, in August 1763. 

The war over, the hand full of Savoies still living in the British seaboard colonies, like their cousins being held in Nova Scotia, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  In 1763 in New York, Françoise Martin, widow of Charles Savoie of Annapolis Royal, and eight of their children, were still in the colony.  In June of that year in Pennsylvania, François Scavoy, wife Anne Scavoy, and their two children; and Pierre Scavoy, wife Marie Scavoy, and their three children were still in that colony.  In August, colonial officials in South Carolina counted Aman Savoy, wife Victoire Blanchard, and two of their sons--Joseph, age 14; and Marain, actually Marin, age 10--still there.  One wonders what became of them after the counting. 

At war's end, most of the Savoies still in North America were living not in Nova Scotia or the other seaboard colonies but in Canada, where some of them had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of François Savoie began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Savoies could be found in present-day Canada at Berthier-en-Haute, Deschambault, Île Dupas, Rivière-du-Loup now Louiseville, and St.-Cuthbert on the upper St. Lawrence; at Bouctouche, Miramichi, Néguac, and Pointe-du-Chêne on the Gulf shore of what became eastern New Brunswick; and in the interior of New Brunswick on Rivière St.-Jean.  They were especially numerous on the upper St. Lawrence between Trois-Rivières and Montréal.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed.

Members of at least one Savoie family in the seaboard colonies went not to Canada, where the British ruled, but to the French Antilles, where they did not.  At least two of the many children of Charles Savoie and Françoise Martin held in New York chose to resettle on French Martinique  A Joseph Savoie "of Acadie" died at St.-Pierre on the island in November 1764, age 20.  The priest who recorded the burial did not give the young Acadians' parents' names.  Joseph à Charles would have been age 17 at the time.  His youngest sister Ludivine dite Divine, at age 18, married Georges, tailleur d'habits, 28-year-old son of Guillame Man and Rebecca Wardon of Ourarich, England, at St.-Pierre in November 1770.  One wonders what happened to their widowed mother and other siblings after 1763. 

Savoies being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New England "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada.  After all that they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to the French Antilles, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Savoies, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, 14 were Savoies.332

Ségoillot

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, Émilien Ségoillot dit Sans-Chagrin, his second wife Marguerite Naquin, and their two children, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, where Sans-Chagrin once served as a senior sergeant, the redcoats swooped down on Île St.-Jean and deported most of the habitants there to France. 

Émilien dit Sans-Chagrin, age 45, wife Marguerite, age 35, son François-Dominique, age 5 1/2, and daughter Marie, age 21 months, made the crossing aboard one of the five deportation transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England, arrived at St.-Malo together in late January.  All of the family survived the crossing except little Marie, who died at sea.  

In France, Émilien dit Sans-Chagrin and his family settled at St.-Suliac on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo.  In January 1764, Marguerite gave the old soldier another daughter, Marie-Françoise, there.  The year after Marie-Françoise's birth, the family followed other exiles, most of them recently repatriated from England, to Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Britanny, among the relatively few island Acadians who went there.  Another daughter, Marguerite-Josèphe, was born on the island in c1766--four children, a son and three daughters, between 1753 and 1766, in greater Acadia and France.  A French official counted the family at Borbren in the parish of Locmoria on the southeast coast of the island in February 1767.  Émilien dit Sans-Chagrin and Marguerite died on Belle-Île-en-Mer, he in c1769, in his late 50s, she in December 1773, in her late 40s.  After his parents died, François-Dominique, age 20 in 1773, if he was still living, may have resolved to remain on the island.  His sisters did not. 

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Marie-Françoise and younger sister Marguerite-Josèphe evidently agreed to take it.  In September 1784, Spanish officials counted Marie Sigoliau, probably Marie-Françoise, and an unnamed orphan, probably Marguerite-Josèphe, in the lower Loire port of Nantes in southeastern Brittany.  They would have been ages 20 and 18 at the time of the survey, and they were recorded on a list of Acadians in the city who expressed interest in going to Louisiana at the expense of the Spanish crown.  When it was time to board a ship for New Orleans, however, Marie-Françoise did not go.  Perhaps she married a Frenchman at Nantes who insisted that they remain in the mother country, or she may have died before the first of the Seven Ships set sail from Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, in May 1785.  Younger sister Marguerite-Josèphe evidently had no reason to stay.  She "embarked for Louisiana in 1785."286

Semer

In 1755, Jean Semer of Guernsey, wife Marguerite Vincent, and their sons and grandchildren were still at Minas.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this small family to the winds. 

On 5 September 1755, the commander of New-English troops at Minas, Lieutenant-Colonel John Winslow, ordered the local men and older boys to gather at the Grand-Pré church, where his soldiers held them under armed guard until enough transports could be gathered to take them and their families into exile.  According to a list compiled for Winslow, Jean Semer's third son Joseph was one of the local habitants held in the church.  Neither his father nor any of his brothers appeared on the list.  

Joseph, wife Anne Landry, son Michel, and oldest brother Germain and his wife Marie Trahan--but not Germain's 11-year-old son Jean-Baptiste le jeune--were exiled to Virginia in late October, arriving there a month later, where they endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas.  Virginia governor Robert Dinwiddie refused to allow the hundreds of Acadians sent to him to remain in the colony.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered exiles from one vessel to be moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses made their decision ... the "papists" must go!  In May, the first shipment of exiles left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.   Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were held in warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Joseph and Anne's daughter Marine was born in England in c1758.

Evidently Jean Semer and Marguerite Vincent, along with youngest son Amand and his wife Anne ____, and perhaps second son Jean-Baptiste l'aîné and his family, were deported from Minas to Massachusetts in December 1755.  Colonial officials, calling them Lemaires, counted them at Boston in August 1763, soon after the war with Britain had ended.  By 1766, most of the Acadians in New England moved on to Canada.  Some returned to greater Acadia to join relatives being held there.  Others chose to go to French St.-Domingue to work on a new naval base on the island's northwest coast.  Basile-Romaine Semeure "of Saint-Charles in Acadie," no parents or spouse given, died at Môle St.-Nicolas, site of the French naval base, in July 1778, age 25.  An unnamed girl, no age given, daughter of ____ Semeure and Geneviève Renoche, died at Môle the following September.  Judging by Basile-Romaine's place of origin, the Semeures in the sugar colony likely were descendants of Jean Semer. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England were repatriated to France, Semers among them.  Joseph and his family crossed on the transport Ambition to St.-Malo in late May 1763 and settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Anne gave Joseph two more daughters:  Anne-Françoise in August 1763; and Marie-Marguerite in April 1766.  Wife Anne Landry died at St.-Servan in June 1766, age 38.  Meanwhile, brother Germain and his wife Marie Trahan either landed at, or moved on to, Le Havre in Normandy, where more children were born to them:  Marie-Françoise in c1763; and Grégoire-Dominique in c1768.  In 1766, Germain received a letter from his older son Jean-Baptiste le jeune, who had sent it from New Orleans that April.  Jean-Baptiste urged his parents to join him in Spanish Louisiana, where he had gone with the Broussards the year before, but French authorities refused to let Germain and his family go.  In 1773, six years after their son had married in Louisiana, Germain, Marie, and their younger children became part of the major settlement venture in the interior province of Poitou.  After two years of effort, they retreated with other Poitou Acadians to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they subsisted on government handouts and what work they could find.  Germain worked as a carpenter at the Hôpital du Sanitat in Nantes, where wife Marie Trahan died in October 1776, age 56.  Germain died at Nantes in December 1782, in his early 60s, three months after witnessing the marriage of a cousin at St.-Nicolas Parish church there. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Joseph Semer, now a widower in his late 50s, agreed to take it.  With him would go three of his daughters--Marine, age 27 in 1785; Anne-Françoise, age 22; and Marie-Marguerite, age 19, none of them married--and two of his brother Germain's children--Marie-Françoise, age 24, who married fellow Acadian Joseph Boudrot at Nantes in May 1785; and Grégoire-Dominique, age 16.  Joseph had known for nearly 20 years that his nephew Jean-Baptiste Semer le jeune had been living in Louisiana at a place called Attakapas.  Also with Jean-Baptiste le jeune in Louisiana were two of his Trahan uncles, Jean and Michel, one of them married to a Beausoleil Broussard.  The Semers were determined to reunite with their kinsmen along the banks of Bayou Teche. 

One of the many mysteries of the Acadians' Greast Upheaval is how Germain Semer's son Jean-Baptiste le jeune, only a boy of 11 in 1755, became separated from his parents and remained in greater Acadia.  Two possible scenarios present themselves:  After escaping the British at Minas, perhaps with his Trahan relatives, Jean-Baptiste le jeune may have followed them to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore and on to Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs.  By the early 1760s, now in his mid-teens, he may have been captured by, or surrendered to, British forces in the area, who held him with his Trahan relatives in a prison compound in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  There is also the possibility that he did not escape the British at Minas in 1755 but became separated from his parents during the chaos of deportation and ended up in Massachusetts with his Semer grandfather and his Semer uncles Jean-Baptiste l'aîné and Amand.  At war's end, now in his late teens, Jean-Baptiste le jeune may have chosen to return to greater Acadia to join his relatives there.  Or, from Massachusetts, he may have followed Semer kinsmen to French St.-Domingue with hopes of escaping British rule and making a new life in the sugar colony.  He may have found conditions there so unbearable he looked for an opportunity to escape.  When the Broussards, with three of his Trahan uncles, reached Cap-Français from Halifax in December 1764, Jean-Baptiste le jeune, now age 21, may have joined them on their way to New Orleans. 

Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New England "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Semers, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, one of them may have been a grandson of Jean Semer of Minas.287

Surette

In 1755, descendants of Pierre Surette the sailor and Jeanne Pellerin could be found at Annapolis Royal, Minas, and Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto and in the trois-rivières were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in the early 1750s, area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, Surettes were among the trois-rivières and Chignecto Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia, though they may have left the fort a few days before it surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French troupes de la marine at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport the Chignecto-area Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Evidently the Surettes, led by Pierre II, escaped this first round of deportations.  They instead helped form an Acadian resistance that both attacked the British in their Missaguash forts and protected their homes in the area.  The British managed to capture some of the resistance fighters, including Pierre II, who was confined in Fort Cumberland, formerly Beauséjour, but he did not remain in British custody for long.  In late February 1756, Pierre II, who had ingratiated himself with his British captors, led a daring escape from Fort Cumberland.  Eighty Acadians squeezed through a tunnel they had dug with discarded horse bones.  They escaped to the woods and managed to elude the British, but they paid a terrible price in doing so. 

At Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence they suffered almost as much as they had done in the woods north of Chignecto.  In November 1759, near Memramcook, Pierre II and two other Acadian resistance leaders, Jean and Michel Bourg, "surrendered" to the British, but Pierre Surette II, at least, escaped again.  The following spring, he rejoined the resistance movement at Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge, which a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked in late June 1760.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militiia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the French garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers compiled a list of 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  No Surettes appeared on the list, not surprising when one considers the stealthy nature of the Acadian resistance.  However, the French in Canada had surrendered that colony after the fall of Montréal, and the resistance could no longer expect assistance of any kind from that quarter.  During the following months, the refugees at Restigouche, along with hundreds of other exiles who either were captured by, or surrendered to, British forces in the area, were held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  British officials counted Pierre II with a family of five in the prison compound at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, in October 1762. 

At war's end, Pierre II and members of his family decided to remain in Nova Scotia, at Chezzetcook near Halifax.  They stayed there until c1770, when they moved down the coast to Ste.-Anne-du-Ruisseau de l'Anguille, present-day Pointe-à-Rocco, northeast of Cap-Sable.  Meanwhile, Pierre II's sons Charles-Amand, Joseph, and Paul, along with some of their Surette cousins, settled on Rivière St.-Jean in the late 1760s, but some of them joined Pierre II near Halifax by 1769.  Pierre II's nephew Pierre le jeune, son of Joseph, settled at Pointe-du-Diable near the British settlement of Dartmouth across from Halifax.  Surettes, especially descendants of Pierre II, also settled at Météghan and other communities on Baie Ste.-Marie, today's St. Mary Bay, along the western shore of Nova Scotia.

Other members of the family who had escaped the British in 1755 sought refuge in Canada.  Pierre II's widowed mother Jeanne Pellerin died at Québec in late January 1758, age 70, victim, perhaps, of the smallpox epidemic that struck Acadian refugees in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Pierre II's brother Joseph's daughter Anne, widow of Paul Doucet, remarried to fellow Acadian Jean-Baptiste Pitre at St.-Pierre-les-Becquets on the St. Lawrence above Québec in March 1761.  Pierre II's youngest sister Françoise, widow of Joseph Petitot dit Saint-Seine, remarried to Jacques, fils, son of Jacques Gignac and Marie-Anne Richard and widower of Anne-Françoise Lafond dit Mongrain, at Ste.-Foy near Québec City in October 1764.  Joseph's daughter Marguerite married Jacques, fils, son of Jacques Tessier and Marie-Louie Monet, at La Chine above Montréal in January 1766.

As Pierre II could attest, Acadians being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If, like Pierre II and his family, they chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their loved ones in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many, including one of Pierre Surette II's kinsmen, refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, three were Surettes.288

Talbot

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, Sr. Louis-Charles Talbot, wife Marie-Françoise Douville, and their children, living in territory controlled by France, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean, and, regardless of their social status, deported them to France.  Louis-Charles, age 45, called "Louis de Paris, 17 ans à l'Isle Saint Jean," on the passenger list; wife Marie-Françoise, age 37; and seven of their children--Charles-Louis, age 15; Joseph, age 13; Jean, age 10; François, age 6; Charles, age 5; Marie-Henriette, age 3; and Marie-Louise, age 3 months--crossed on one of the five deportation transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other vessels, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.   The crossing nearly destroyed the family.  François and Marie-Henriette died at sea.  Two months after the family reached the Breton port, Marie-Françoise Douville died in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer from the rigors of the voyage.  Jean and Charles also died at St.-Servan in March 1759.  Only Sr. Louis-Charles, Charles-Louis, Joseph, and infant Marie-Louise survived the crossing and its effects.

Sr. Louis-Charles Talbot and his three children lived at St.-Servan from 1759-64.  Marie-Louise, born on Île St.-Jean, was baptized at St.-Servan in April 1759.  In May 1760, Sr. Louis-Charles remarried to Marie-Julienne, daughter of Julien Benoist and Laurence Tehen, probably French, not Acadian, at St.-Servan.  Marie-Julienne gave the sieur another daughter, Françoise, at St.-Servan in April 1762--nine children, four daughters and five sons, by two wives, between 1740 and 1762, in greater Acadia and France.  

In 1764, as part of the French effort to strengthen its empire in the Caribbean Basin after the disaster of the Seven Years' War, Sr. Louis-Charles, Marie-Julienne, and their children--Charles-Louis, now age 21, Joseph, age 19, Marie-Louise, age 6, and Françoise, age 2--were supposed to have joined other Acadians in a settlement near Cayenne in the new French colony of Guiane on the northeast coast of South America.  But they did not go to the tropical colony.  They went, instead, to La Rochelle and then to the island of Martinique in the French Antilles.  Son Charles-Louis, now grown, remained on Martinique, but the rest of the family returned to France.  Sr. Louis-Charles died on the return voyage to St.-Malo in September 1764, age 50.  

The sieur's daughter Marie-Louise, now age 15, was living in an orphanage in November 1773 when her uncle, François Bonnière, husband of her maternal aunt, Louise Douville, took her on his ship Marie Françoise to St.-Pierre, one of the French-controlled fishery islands off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  There she lived with her uncle Jacques Douville and her widowed grandmother Marie-Élisabeth Rogé, a native of La Rochelle.  But Marie-Louise's adventures were far from over.  In 1778, during the American Revolution, soon after France joined the American struggle against their old red-coated enemies, the British, who controlled every part of the Maritimes except the two French fishing islands, rounded up the Acadians on Île St.-Pierre and nearby Miquelon and deported them to France.  This was Marie-Louise's second deportation and the fifth time she had crossed the Atlantic; she was only age 20.  At Bordeaux in c1791, when she was in her early 30s, she gave birth to a son, Louis-André, fathered by André Lafitte, scion of a shipping and insurance family who had been born on either St.-Pierre or Miquelon in November 1764, so he was younger than she was.  She raised her son at Bordeaux.  According to family tradition, Marie-Louise sailed the Atlantic twice again, her sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth crossings.  In the late 1790s, in her 40s, she sailed to the United States to visit Douville relatives in Rhode Island.  Two decades later, in her 60s, she sailed to Louisiana to see her first grandchild, and then she returned to France.  This sturdy, much-traveled lady died at Bordeaux in July 1831, age 72.  André Lafitte died at Bordeaux in December 1842, age 78.  Meanwhile, in the 1810s, their son Louis-André, who called himself a Talbot, left his native France and emigrated to Louisiana, now a part of the United States.289

Templé

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755, André Templé, wife Marie Deveau, and their four children, two daughters and two sons, still living on a French-controlled island, remained unmolested.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at nearby Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the big island and deported them to France.  André's family endured the crossing aboard the deportation transport Queen of Spain, which left Île Royale in the fall of 1758 and reached St.-Malo in late November.  Wife Marie, called a Royer on the ship's manifest, and three of their children--Marie, René, and Modeste, ages unrecorded--died at sea.  Only André and daughter Marie-Marguerite, called Marguerite, age 6, survived the crossing. 

André and his daughter settled in the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where he remarried to Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians François LeBlanc and Marguerite Boudrot and widow of Charles Breau, in September 1759.  Wife Marguerite, at age 22, had crossed from Île Royale aboard the Duc Guillaume with her husband, a young son, and a niece.  Her son died at sea, and the niece and her husband died in local hospitals soon after they reached St.-Malo.  Marguerite had been pregnant on the voyage; her daughter died in a local hospital three days after her birth.  Between 1760 and 1773, Marguerite, still a young woman, gave André nine more children in the St.-Malo area:  Élisabeth-Marguerite at St.-Servan in September 1760; Jean-André-Grégoire-Marie in December 1761; Charles-Casimir in March 1763; Jacques-Olivier in January 1765; Marie-Madeleine in October 1766; Dominique-Pierre in August 1768; Servan-François in January 1770; Hyacinthe-François-Joseph at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo in October 1771; and Olivier-Marcellin in April 1773.  

In 1773, André took his large family to the interior of Poitou as part of a major settlement venture near the city of Châtellerault.  Marguerite gave him another son there, François-Joseph, baptized in St.-Léger Parish, Chauvigny, south of Châtellerault, in January 1775.  In early 1776, after two years of effort, André and his family, at least most of them, retreated with other Poitou Acadians from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on government subsidies and what work they could find.  Marguerite gave André two more sons there:  André-Joseph at nearby Chantenay in April 1777; and François-Marie in May 1780--16 children, five daughters and 11 sons, by two wives, between 1752 and 1780, in greater Acadia and France.  The couple buried four of their sons at Nantes:  Hyacinthe died at age 4 and was buried in St.-Jacques Parish in May 1776; François-Joseph died at age 19 months and was buried at St.-Pierre-de-Rezé Parish, across the Loire from Nantes, the following August; Dominique-Pierre, also called Pierre-Dominique, died at age 12 and was buried at Chantenay near Nantes in September 1780; and François-Marie died probably at Chantenay in 1784 or 1785.  But there were reasons for the family to celebrate.  André's oldest daughter Marie-Marguerite, by first wife Marie, married Joseph-Gabriel, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Breau and Ursule Bourg, at Archigny, Poitou, in September 1777.  Joseph, like his father-in-law, was a sailor.  As the date and place of their wedding reveal, the couple remained at Archigny after her family moved on to Nantes. 

By 1777, André Templé, despite being a Norman, was fed up with life in his native country.  He and fellow exile Jean-Jacques LeBlanc, a distant kinsman of wife Marguerite, petitioned the government of France to pay their passage to the Spanish colony of Louisiana.  Jean-Jacques, in fact, had been bearding French authorities about going to Louisiana since March of 1772.  Hundreds of their fellow Acadians had settled in Louisiana since the mid-1760s, and André and Jean-Jacques were willing to risk the transatlantic passage with their wives and children.  French authorities rejected their plea "on the grounds that the cost would be too great," so André and his family remained in France.  But not for long.  When, in the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, André Templé and wife Marguerite were still willing to emigrate to the Mississippi valley colony.  They were accompanied not only by their many unmarried children, two daughters and six sons, but also by André's daughter Marguerite, her husband Joseph Breau, and two of their children.290

Thériot

In 1755, descendants of Jean Thériot and Perrine Rau of Martaizé and Port-Royal could be found at Annapolis Royal; Grand-Pré, Rivière-aux-Canards, and Cobeguit in the Minas Basin; Chignecto; and on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by the Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Thériots may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, several hundred local Acadians serving as militia, along with the garrison of French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport these Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Jean-Baptiste Thériot and his family ended up in South Carolina, where, in September 1756, local officials approved of their living with a Huguenot family in St. Philip's Parish, Charles Town.  Most Thériots still at Chignecto, however, escaped the British roundup there that summer and fall and fled to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada.

The Thériots still at Cobeguit also escaped deportation.  When they learned of the roundups at Chignecto and at Minas Proper and Pigiguit on the other side of the basin, every family in the remote settlement destroyed what they could not take with them, packed up their children and what belongings they could carry, and either hid in the woods or followed the cattle trail to Tatamagouche and other villages on the peninsula's North Shore.  That fall, winter, and the following spring, they escaped across Mer Rouge to the south shore of Île St.-Jean, where many of their Cobeguit kinsmen already had gone. 

Many of their cousins on the other side of the basin were not so lucky.  Minas Thériots found themselves on transports headed for Massachusetts, Virginia, and Maryland.  In 1760, colonial officials in Massachusetts noted that Anthony Terry, perhaps Antoine Thériot, wife Margaret, and their six children at Hingham would be moved to Boston.  On the same list, it was noted that Simeon Terrau, probably Thériot, wife Margaret, their five children, and his mother Magdlen would be sent from Boston to Weymouth, Hingham, or Hall.  In August 1760, Simon Terrau, his wife Margaret, their five children, and his mother Magdalen were residing in Weymouth.  In Maryland, colonial officials sent Thériots to Baltimore and to Oxford and Snow Hill on the colony's Eastern Shore. 

The Minas Acadians deported to Virginia, the first contingent of which reached Hampton Roads during the second week of November, suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  Exiles died aboard disease-infested ships anchored in Hampton Roads while colonial leaders pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie, with the approval of his council, ordered the "French Neutrals" dispersed to the ports of Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond.  The following spring, the governor, his council, and the colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the "papists" must go.  Virginia authorities hired more vessels and sent the Acadians on to England--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were packed into warehouses and forced to subsist on a government subsidy.  Four Thériot brothers from Rivière-aux-Canards--Jean dit Janis, age 47; Pierre, age 42; Cyprien, age 38; and Charles, age 36, all with wives and children--along with their widowed mother Agnès Aucoin, 74, and their sister Marie-Josèphe, age 49, wife of Jean LeBlanc, died at Falmouth in the summer and fall of 1756 perhaps from smallpox, which struck many of the exiles soon after their arrival.  Thériots also were held at Bristol, Southampton, and Liverpool.  By 1763, more than half of the Minas Acadians sent to Virginia had died in England. 

Living in territory controlled by France, Thériots on the Maritime islands escaped the fate of their cousins in Nova Scotia during the summer and fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the islands' habitants and deported them to France.  Several Thériot families and two wives crossed on the deportation transport Duc Guillaume, which left Île Royale in September 1758 and, after a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo harbor the first day of November.  The crossing devastated the family.  Pierre Thériot of Cobeguit and Baie-de-Mordienne crossed with wife Marguerite Guérin, and five children--Anne, age 23; Françoise, age 21; Anselme, age 20; Brice, actually Brisset, age 14; and Geneviève, age 10.  Pierre, daughter Anne, and son Anselme died at sea.  Son Brisset died in a St.-Malo hospital soon after their arrival.  Pierre's second son Joseph, age 29, crossed on Duc Guillaume with wife Marie-Rose Gaudet, age 40, and three daughters--Marie-Rose, called Rose, age 5; and Anne and Josèphe, ages unrecorded.  Joseph and daughter Rose were the only survivors.  Pierre's younger brother François of Cobeguit and Baie-de-Mordienne crossed with wife Françoise Guérin, who was Pierre's wife Marguerite's younger sister, and 11 children--Marguerite-Josèphe, age 26; Pierre, age 24; Élisabeth or Isabelle, age 20; Perpétué, age 18; Théodore, also called Théodose, age 16; Cyrille, age 14; Gertrude, age 12; Anne, age 10; Joseph, age 8; and Modeste and Jean-Baptiste, ages unrecorded.  François and five of the children--Joseph, Élisabeth, Perpétué, Modeste, and Jean-Baptiste--died at sea.  Son Théodore died in a St.-Malo hospital in early December, soon after the family's arrival.  Marguerite Thériot, age 57, crossed on Duc Guillaume with husband Jean Pitre, age 59, and son Anselme, age 20.  Only Anselme survived the crossing.  A Thériot crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in a 12-ship convoy and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other vessels, reached St.-Malo in mid-January 1759.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, Thériot, age 47, crossed with husband Charles Benoit, age 47, four children, ages 18 to 7, and Charles's 70-year-old grandmother Isabelle Babin.  All survived the crossing except the youngest son Pierre.  More Thériots crossed on one of the five deportation transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in late November in the 12-ship convoy and, despite the mid-December storm, reached St.-Malo together in late January, with tragic result for the family.  Marie-Josèphe Thériot, age 24, crossed on one of the Five Ships with husband Jean Daigre, age 26, and two daughters, ages 4 and 2.  Both daughters died at sea.  Another Marie-Josèphe Thériot, age 39, crossed with husband Honoré Girouard, age 45, and six children, ages 17 years to 2 months.  The three youngest children, ages 7, 5, and 2 months, died at sea.  Joseph dit Le Bonhomme Thériot of Minas and Bédec, age 30, crossed with wife Marie-Josèphe Pitre, age 27, and three children--Pierre-Paul, age 7; Isabelle-Osite, age 6; and Anne, age 3.  Only Joseph dit Le Bonhomme survived the crossing.  In early March, he received permisson to move to Cherbourg in Normandy, where he may have died in December, age 31.  Étienne Thériot of Minas and Rivière-du-Moulin-à-Scie, age 33, crossed on one of the Five Ships with wife Hélène Landry, age 34, and four children--Joseph, age 8; Françoise, age 6, Olivier, age 4; and Pierre, age 20 months.  They all survived the crossing.  Euphrosine Thériot, age 34, crossed with husband Antoine Boudrot, age 43, and a Dugas niece, age 6.  Charles and the niece survived the crossing.  Euphrosine died in a St.-Malo hospital in mid-February, probably from the rigors of the crossing. 

Island Thériots did their best to make a life for themselves in the villages and suburbs of St.-Malo area.  Étienne Thériot and his family settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east side of the river south of St.-Malo, where wife Hélène gave him two more sons:  Jacques in June 1760; and Jean-Charles in February 1765.  Hélène died at nearby La Ville de Coquenais in August 1769, age 45.  Étienne, at age 45, promptly remarried to 43-year-old Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Claude Bourgeois and Marie LeBlanc and widow of Charles Boudrot, at St.-Servan-sur-Mer near St.-Malo in February 1770.  They settled at Pleudihen.  She gave him no more children.  Étienne's only daughter Françoise, age 22, married Jacques, son of locals Dominique Valoir and Olive Noury, at Pleudihen in November 1773.  Françoise Guérin, who had lost her husband François Thériot and five of her children on the crossing from Île Royale, settled with her remaining children at St.-Servan and did not remarry.  Oldest son Pierre Thériot, age 26, married Jean-Louise, daughter of locals Louis-Laurent Le Blond and Marie-Anne Feste, at St.-Servan in November 1760.  They were still childless in 1772.  Françoise's oldest daughter Marguerite-Josèphe Thériot, age 29, married Charles, 25-year-old son of fellow Acadians Jean dit Le Vieux Henry and Marie Hébert, at St.-Servan in January 1761.  Françoise's seventh daughter Anne Thériot, age 19, married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Landry and Marie-Josèphe Comeau, at St.-Servan in June 1767.  Françoise's second son Théodore Thériot, age 35, married Anne-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Henry and Marie-Madeleine Pitre, at Pleurtuit on the west bank of the river across from Pleudihen in February 1777.  They settled at St.-Servan.  Anne-Josèphe gave Théodore two daughters there:  Marie-Modeste in October 1778; and Anne-Angélique in June 1780.  Françoise Guérin's nephew Joseph Thériot and his daughter Rose, who had survived the crossing aboard Duc Guillaume, also settled at St.-Servan.  In March 1760, probably leaving his daughter, age 7, in the care of relatives, Joseph signed up for corsair duty aboard Le Hardy, was promptly captured by the Royal Navy, and held as a prisoner in England until the end of the war.  Sadly, daughter Rose died in the hospital at St.-Malo in June 1762, age 9 1/2, while her father was being held in England.  Joseph returned to St.-Malo in 1763, and, at age 35 at St.-Malo in February 1764, remarried to Jeanne-Françoise, 36-year-old daughter of Robert Guilbert and Gilette-Anne Visez of Plevenon in the diocese of St.-Brieuc, down the Breton coast from St.-Malo.  Joseph worked as a sailor out of St.-Malo.  Jeanne-Françoise gave him a daughter there, conceived soon after their marriage, Jeanne-Françoise in January 1765.  In March 1764, a month after his marriage, Joseph had sailed to the French-controlled fishery island of Miquelon off the southern coast of Newfoundland aboard Les Trois Frères and did not return to his wife and daughter until January 1766.  He likely had spent time on Miquelon with his oldest brother Jean-Baptiste, who had taken his family there from Massachusetts after 1763.  Jeanne-Françoise gave Joseph another daughter, Marie-Modeste, at St.-Malo in November 1766--five children, all daughters, by two wives, between 1753 and 1766, in greater Acadia and France.  In 1770-71, Joseph was reported to be in the Indies, probably the French Antilles, "in the capacity of a wheelwright."  He was back with his wife and two daughters at St.-Malo in 1772.  Joseph's sister Marie-Madeleine and her husband Jean-François Blain of Louisbourg settled at St.-Servan, where she gave him six children, four daughters and two sons, between 1761 and 1777.  Their younger sister Françoise, age 20, married Augustin, 19-year-old son of fellow Acadians Claude Benoit and Anne Comeau, at St.-Servan in February 1760.  She gave him a son, Nicolas-Jean-Sébastien, called Sébastien, at St.-Servan the following November.  In 1763, Françoise, Augustin, and son Sébastien followed other exiles from St.-Malo to the îles Malouines, today's Falkland Islands, aboard L'Aigle.  Between 1764 and 1767, Françoise gave Augustin three more children, another son and two daughters, on the remote islands.  They returned to St.-Malo in April 1768 and settled at St.-Servan, where, in 1769 and 1773, Françoise gave Augustin more children.  Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, Thériot and her husband Charles Benoit settled on the east bank of the river between St.-Servan and Pleudihen at Châteauneuf, where Charles died in January 1760, age 50.  After his death, Madeleine settled near her grown children at St.-Servan.  She did not remarry.  Honoré Thériot, a young widower and first cousin of Pierre and Joseph of St.-Servan, reached St.-Malo from Cherbourg in February 1759.  At age 27, Honoré remarried to Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Fouquet and Marie Pointevin of Île St.-Jean, at St.-Servan in February 1760.  They settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance, where, between 1761 and 1774, Marie gave Honoré seven more children:  Pierre-Jacques at nearby Bas Champs in August 1761 but died at age 10 in June 1771; Mathurine-Marie in November 1762; Françoise-Jeanne at Bas Champs in March 1766 but died at nearby La Coquenais the following June; Madeleine-Marie at La Coquenais in July 1768; Charles-Pierre in January 1770 but died at age 1 1/2 in June 1771; Anne-Jeanne in May 1772; and Perrine-Mathurine in January 1774--nine children, six daughters and three sons, by two wives, between 1755 and 1774, in greater Acadia and France.  Honoré's youngest brother Joseph, still a bachelor, reached St.-Malo from Cherbourg in July 1759.  At age 26, he married Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Broussard and Osite Landry, at Pleudihen in November 1767.  Madeleine gave Joseph two sons there:  Honoré-Charles at La Coquenais in September 1769 but died at nearby Ville de la Villeaubel at age 6 in November 1775; and Joseph-Jean in June 1771 but died the following March.  Madeleine died at La Coquenais in January 1772, age 24.  Joseph, at age 33, remarried to Marie, daugher of fellow Acadians Étienne Melanson and Françoise Granger, at Pleudihen in February 1774.  She gave him three more children there:  twins Joseph and Isabelle at La Coquenais in December 1774 but died three and four days after their birth; and Charles-Joseph at nearbyVilleaubel in February 1776--five children, four sons and a daughter, by two wives, between 1769 and 1776.  Meanwhile, Honoré and Joseph's middle brother Jean, his wife Charlotte Le Baron, and their daughter Madeleine-Marie reached St.-Malo from Cherbourg in October 1769 and settled near his brothers at Pleudihen, where Charlotte gave him two more children:  Marie-Charlotte in February 1770 but died at age 1 in April 1771; and Joseph-Jean-Marie in November 1772--three children, two daughters and a son, between 1768 and 1772.  Isaac Thériot, a widower, reached St.-Malo from Cherbourg in February 1759.  By the following December, he had signed up for corsair service aboard Le Duc de Choiseul.  The ship was "disarmed" in February 1761.  He was back at St.-Malo the following August, where, at age 31, he remarried to Marie, 26-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians François Priou and Marie Lemordant of Louisbourg.  They settled at St.-Servan, where he worked as a sailor.  Isaac died at Hotel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in January 1769, age 38.

Island Thériots landed also at Cherbourg in Normandy, but none remained, at least not among the living.  Charles Thériot of Cobeguit and Anse-aux-Morts died on the crossing to Cherbourg in 1758.  His oldest son Honoré lost wife Isabelle Bugeaud and their two children either on the crossing or at Cherbourg soon after their arrival.  In February 1759, Honoré, now a widower with no children, received permisson to move on to St.-Malo, where he arrived later in the month.  His younger brother Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, remained at Cherbourg, where, at age 33, he married Charlotte Le Baron of Normandy in 1769.  Their daughter Madeleine-Marie had been born in the Norman port the year before.  They, too, moved on to St.-Malo, but not until October 1769.  Honoré and Jean's youngest brother Joseph, still a bachelor, also landed at Cherbourg.  He, too, moved on to St.-Malo, in July 1759.  Meanwhile, Isaac Thériot of Minas and Île St.-Jean evidently lost his wife Madeleine Broussard on the crossing to Cherbourg.  He also received permission to move on to St.-Malo, in February 1759.  Joseph Thériot, probably an island Acadian, died at Cherbourg in early December 1759, age 27.  François-Joseph Thériot, also probably an island Acadian, died at Cherbourg in late December 1759, age 26.  One wonders how the young men were kin to the other members of the family who landed in the Norman port. 

Island Thériots also landed at the northern fishing center of Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie and at the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay.  Marie-Josèphe Thériot, wife of Félix LeBlanc of Minas, Chignecto, and Île St.-Jean, described as a Canadienne by the recording priest, but she was an island Acadian, died in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in December 1759, in her late 30s.  Cécile Thériot, age 50, wife of Charles Boudrot, died at Boulogne-sur-Mer in August 1761.  Marie, daughter of Claude Thériot, a carpenter, and Marie Guérin of Cobeguit and Île Royale, married Joseph, son of Raymond Lacase and Jeanne Labadie of Sombrun Parish, Diocese of Tarbes in Gascogne, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in June 1763.  Joseph worked as a garçon tailleur d'habits--a tailor of boy's clothes. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including many Thériots, were repatriated to several ports in France, most of them to St.-Malo.  Étienne Thériot of Pleudihen's younger brother Jean-Jacques Thériot, age 35, and wife Marguerite-Josèphe Richard, age 25, reached St.-Malo aboard the transport Ambition on 22 May 1763.  They settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Marguerite-Josèphe gave Jean-Jacques eight children:  Geneviève-Catherine in November 1763; Marie-Josèphe in December 1765; Marguerite-Josèphe in January 1768 but died at age 4 in September 1772; twins Auguste-Jean and Jeanne-Marie in June 1770, but Auguste-Jean died at age 5 1/2 in February 1776; Rosalie-Pauline in June 1772; Joseph-Marie in February 1775 but died the following October; and Marguerite-Perrine in August 1778.  Jean-Jacques's younger brother Olivier, age 33, and wife Marguerite LeBlanc also reached St.-Malo aboard L'Ambition and settled near his brother at St.-Servan, where Marguerite soon died.  Olivier, at age 35, remarried to cousin Madeleine, 27-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Thériot and Françoise Landry and widow of Simon Comeau, at St.-Servan in July 1765.  Madeleine gave Olivier a daughter there in April 1766.  Madeleine died in May, age 28, probably from the rigors of childbirth.  The daughter, Natalie-Marie, died at St.-Servan in November 1772, age 6 1/2.  Olivier, who did not remarry, died at St.-Servan in June 1773, age 42.  Jean-Charles Thériot, age 26, wife Marie Boudrot, age 28, and their children--Joseph, age 5, and Perpétué, age 3--reached St.-Malo from England aboard the transport Dorothée on 23 May 1763.  They settled at St.-Servan, where Marie gave Jean-Charles four more children, two daughters and two sons:  Marie-Madeleine in November 1764; Françoise-Perrine in May 1769 but died in June; François-Pierre in November 1770 but died at age 2 in November 1722; and Louis-Alexandre in October 1773.  Jean-Charles's sister Marie-Geneviève, age 20, and her husband Simon Aucoin, crossed on La Dorothée and settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west side river south of St.-Malo, as did younger sister Anne, 18, and younger brother Jean-Baptiste, age 17.  Anne married Ambroise, fils, son of fellow Acadians Ambroise Dupuis and Anne Aucoin, at Plouër in July 1764.  Their youngest brother evidently was the Jean-Baptiste Thériot who married Frenchwoman Anne-Angélique Briand in c1772, probably at Plouër.  Their son Jean-Baptiste, fils was born there later in the year. 

Thériots from England also landed at Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  Jean Thériot and wife Marguerite Granger settled in St.-Mathieu Parish, where Marguerite gave Jean their first child, Jean-Baptiste, in August 1763.  Anne Thériot married Félix, son of fellow Acadians Jean Boudrot and Marguerite Comeau of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in July 1764.  Jean-Baptiste Thériot and wife Marie Granger settled in St.-Mélaine Parish, where she gave him another daughter, Marie-Marguerite, in April 1764.  Marie-Josèphe Dupuis, widow of Pierre Thériot, came to Morlaix with at least five children--Marguerite, age 22 in 1763; Marie-Madeleine, age 21; Marie-Blanche, age 16; Pierre, age 13; and Charles-Grégoire, age 12.  Daughter Marie-Blanche married Raymond, son of fellow Acadians Honoré LeBlanc and Marie Trahan of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in St.-Mathieu Parish in September 1765.  Most of the Morlaix Thériots left the Breton port in late 1765, but some remained.  Pierre, son of Cyprien Thériot and Marguerite Landry, married cousin Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Trahan and Élisabeth Thériot of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in January 1766.  She gave him three children there:  Pierre-Marie in July 1769; Marie-Jeanne in August 1771 while the family was living on Rue Bourret, but she probably died young; and Joseph-Marie in July 1773.  Marie-Marguerite Thériot, age unrecorded, died in St.-Mathieu Parish in December 1766.  Élisabeth Thériot promised to marry fellow Acadian Paul Trahan in St. Martin des Champs Parish in March 1767.  One family returned to the city after their sojourn on Belle-Île-en-Mer and more than doubled its size in the Breton port.  Between 1772 and 1783, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Marie Granger gave Jean-Baptiste Thériot six more daughters:  Anne-Marthe-Divine in January 1772; Marie-Élisabeth in July 1773; Marie-Josèphe in October 1777; Marie-Yvonne in February 1781; Marie in March 1783; and Marie-Simone in December 1783--10 children, eight daughters and two sons, from 1761 to 1783, in England and France.  Well-versed in English, Jean-Baptiste worked in Morlaix as an interpreter for, among others, Jean Rosten, "who abjured Calvinism." 

In late 1765, Acadians repatriated from England agreed to become part of an agricultural venture on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, Thériots from Morlaix among them.  Jean Thériot and his family settled at Bortémont near Bangor in the southern interior of the island before moving on to Le Palais on the island's east coast.  Wife Marguerite Granger gave Jean seven more children on the island:  Marie-Catherine near Bangor in May 1766; Joseph in July 1768 but died seven days after his birth; Charles-François in June 1771; Marie-Modeste in July 1774; Marie-Jeanne in May 1776; Jean-Louis near Le Palais in February 1779 but died there, age 2, in December 1780; and Marie-Augustine in October 1783--eight children, four sons and four daughters, between 1763 and 1783, in England and France.  Jean-Baptiste Thériot and his family from Morlaix settled at Le Cosquet near Locmaria at the southeast end of the island.  Before they returned to Morlaix by 1772, wife Marie Granger gave Jean-Baptist two sons at Locmaria:  Victor in November 1766; and Étienne-Baptiste in February 1769.  Marie-Josèphe Dupuis and her Thériot children from Morlaix settled at Parlavan near Bangor.  Daughter Marie-Madeleine married French grenadier Jean-François, son of André Juguier and Jeanne La Croix, at Le Palais in October 1780.  Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Charles Thériot and Élisabeth Trahan, married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Honoré Daigre and François Dupuis of Rivière-aux-Canards, at Le Palais in September 1773, and remarried to Jean-François, son of locals François Ferry and Marguerite Eslin and widow of Marie-Josèphe Bedex, at Le Palais in April 1776.  Élisabeth, daughter of Simon-Joseph Thériot and Françoise Daigre, married Jean, son of fellow Acadians René Landry and Rose Rivet, at Le Palais in June 1774.  Élisabeth, daughter of Jean Thériot, fils and Marie Daigre and widow of Joseph Granger, remarried, at age 44, to Yves, 29-year-old son of locals Pierre Querel and Marie-Renée Guegon, at Bangor in September 1778.  Marguerite Thériot died near Le Palais in May 1784, age 42.

By the early 1770s, French authorities were weary of providing for the exiles still languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned in the interior of Poitou near the city of Châtellerault.  Hundreds of Acadians went there in 1773, a hand full of Thériots among them.  Jean-Charles Thériot and wife Marie Boudrot of St.-Servan-sur-Mer took their children there, as did Étienne Thériot and second wife Marie-Madeleine Bourgeois of Pleudihen-sur-Rance.  Pierre Thériot and wife Élisabeth Trahan of Morlaix went to Poitou instead of following most of their fellow Acadians from England to Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Élisabeth gave Pierre another son in the interior province, Augustin, baptized at Pouthume near Châtellerault in July 1775, age unrecorded, but died there the following February. 

After two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians deserted the venture.  From October 1775 through March 1776, hundreds of them, including the Thériots, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Étienne Thériot's oldest son Olivier, once a student for the priesthood under Abbé Le Loutre at Nantes but now a 22-year-old shoemaker, married Marie, 24-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Olivier Aucoin and Marguerite Vincent, residing at Réze across the river from Nantes, at nearby St.-Martin de Chantenay in July 1777.  Marie gave the shoemaker four sons in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes:  Olivier-Marie in July 1778; Joseph-Olivier in April 1780 but died at age 1 1/2 in January 1782; Jacques-Julien in January 1782 but died the following July; and Jean-Toussaint in November 1783.  Olivier's younger brother Jacques, a 24-year-old calico-printer, married Françoise, 23-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Dominique Guérin and Anne LeBlanc, in St.-Jacques Parish in November 1824.  Françoise gave Jacques a daughter, Françoise-Élisabeth, there in April 1784.  Meanwhile, Marie-Madeleine Bourgeois, Étienne Thériot's second wife, died in St.-Jacques Parish in May 1780, age 53.  Étienne, at age 55, promptly remarried--his third marriage--to local Frenchwoman Marguerite Vallois, 42-year-old widow of Pierre Dubois and Olivier Dubois, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1780.  Like his second wife, she gave him no more children.  Étienne died in St.-Jacques Parish in November 1781, age 56.  Marguerite Vallois remarried to a Boudrot widower at Chantenay in September 1782.  Jean-Charles Thériot died at Nantes before 1785.  His widow Marie Boudrot did not remarry.  Their younger son Louis-Alexandre died at Chantenay in July 1783, age 10.  Older son Joseph, age 26, married cousin Marie-Anastasie, called Anastasie, 24-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Aucoin and Jeanne-Anne Thériot, at Nantes in c1783.  Anastasie gave him a son, Joseph, fils, in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, in April 1784, but the boy died a few weeks later.  Joseph's younger sisters also married in St.-Similien Parish.  Osite-Perpétué, called Perpétué, age 22, married Christian, 33-year-old son of Antoine Spiger of Sion, Vallais, Switzerland, and widower of Stiagia Bergle, in October 1782.  Christian, a carpenter, called himself Jean Garnier in France.  Perpétué gave him a daughter in St.-Similien Parish in March 1785.  Perpétué's sister Marie-Madeleine, age 18, married Firmin, 23-year-old son of fellow Acadians Blaise Thibodeau and Catherine Daigre, in St.-Similien Parish in February 1783.  She gave him a son at Chantenay the following November.  Pierre Thériot and wife Élisabeth Trahan also settled in St.-Similien Parish.  Élisabeth gave Pierre three more children there and in St.-Jacques Parish:  Anne-Marie in St.-Jacques in 1777, but she probably died young; Marie-Rose in December 1778 but died at age 2 1/2 in February 1781; and Similien in October 1781 but died at age 2 in October 1783--seven children, four sons and three daughters, between 1769 and 1781.  Pierre's second son Joseph-Marie died in St.-Similien Parish in July 1777, age 4.  Wife Élisabeth died in St.-Similien Parish in July 1784, age 38.  Son Pierre-Marie, his oldest child, age 15 at the time of his mother's death, was his only child who survived childhood (he would, in fact, live to age 85 and become one of the last of the Acadian immigrants in Louisiana to join his ancestors). 

The Poitou fiasco and hardships at Nantes motivated one member of the family to address the plight of his fellow Acadians in France.  Shoemaker Olivier Térriot, as he preferred to spell his surname, still at Nantes, joined Frenchman Henri-Marie Peyroux de la Coudrenière, long-time resident of French Louisiana, in persuading many of the exiles to resettle in Spanish Louisiana.  By the summer of 1785, they had coaxed over 1,500 exiles--more than half of the Acadians in France--into making the transatlantic crossing, at least 32 Thériots among them.  The takers included Oliver and his Aucoin wife, younger brother Jacques and his Guérin wife, and youngest brother Jean-Charles, still a bachelor, at Nantes; their widowed uncle Jean-Jacques Thériot of St.-Servan-sur-Mer and his five daughters; stepmother Marguerite Vallois and her Boudrot husband at Nantes; Françoise Guérin, widow of François Thériot, her daughter Marie-Josèphe and her Henry husband, daughter Anne, Widow Landry, and their older daughter, and Anne-Josèphe Henry, widow of son Théodore, and their younger daughter, all at St.-Servan; Marie-Madeleine Thériot and her Benoit husband at St.-Servan; Madeleine Thériot, Widow Benoit, and three of her grown children and their families at St.-Servan; Joseph Thériot, his Aucoin wife, and widowed mother Marie Boudrot, sister Osite-Perpétué and her Swiss husband, sister Marie-Madeleine and her Thibodeau husband at Nantes; their uncle Jean-Baptiste Thériot, his French wife, and son, and aunt Anne Thériot and her Dupuis husband at Plouër-sur-Rance; widower Pierre Thériot and his son at Nantes; Jeanne-Anne Thériot and her Aucoin husband at Nantes; and Rosalie Thériot and her Aucoin husband at St.-Servan.  But despite the efforts of their kinsman many, if not most, of the Thériots in France refused to abandon the mother country.  They included Olivier's sister Françoise and her French husband at Pleudihen-sur-Rance; Olivier's older brothers Joseph and Pierre, if they were still living; Pierre Thériot and his French wife at St.-Servan; Jean-Baptiste Thériot and his Granger wife on Belle-Île-en-Mer; Jean Thériot and his Granger wife on Belle-Île-en-Mer; Marie-Anastasie Thériot and her Thibodeau children on Belle-Île-en-Mer; Marie-Josèphe Dupuis and her Thériot children on Belle-Île-en-Mer; Marie-Josèphe Thériot and her French husband on Belle-Île-en-Mer; Honoré Thériot and his Fouquet wife, brother Jean and his French wife, and brother Joseph and his Broussard wife, at Pleudihen; Joseph Thériot the sailor and his French wife at St.-Malo, his sister Marie-Madeleine and her French husband at St.-Servan, and his sister Françoise and her Benoit husband, also at St.-Servan.  However, Françoise's well-traveled oldest son Nicolas-Jean-Sébastien Benoit, age 25, spurned his parents' choice and followed his fellow exiles to Louisiana.

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada, where they gathered at Québec.  Life in the crowded Canadian capital came with a price.  For the first time in their lives, Acadians were exposed to the hazards of an urban environment.  A number of them died at Québec as early as 1756.  The following summer, Acadian refugees in the Québec area began to die in ever greater numbers.  Smallpox, a disease scarcely known on the Fundy shore, killed hundreds of Acadians in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758, at least one Thériot among them.  This did not endear the survivors to their Canadian hosts, who saw them more as burdens than as reliable compatriots in their struggle against the British.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France, including Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still there, Thériots among them.  They included Joseph Therieau and his family of seven; Jacques Therieau and his family of four; Étienne Theriau and his family of five; and Alexis Theriau and his family of seven.  During the following months, the British transported many of these Acadians, along with others in the region who either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces, to prison compounds in Nova Scotia, where they held them for the rest of the war.  In 1761-62, British officials counted members of the famliy at Fort Edward, Pigiguit, including Joseph Terriau and his family of four; another Jos h Terriau and his family of nine; Ch s Terriau and his family of two; Alexis Teriau and his family of five; Étienne Terriau and his family of six; Jacques Terriau and his family of four; René Terriau and his family of 10; and René Terriau and his family of nine.  In August 1763, British officials counted members of the family on Georges Island in Halifax harbor, including René Theriau, his wife, and eight children; widower Alexy Teryo and five children; Joque Terau, his wife, and two children; Étiene Terau, his wife, and five children; and Joseph Terau, his wife, and six children. 

The war over, Thériots being held in the British seaboard colonies, like their kinsmen in Nova Scotia, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial officials discouraged repatriation.  In August 1763 in Massachusetts, Jean, actually Jean-Baptiste, Terriau, wife Marie Cyr, and their son were still in the colony.  One wonders what happened to Simeon/Simon Terrau and his family who had been counted at Weymouth three years earlier.  In June 1766, Massachusetts officials compiled a "List of Names of the French Who Wish to go to Canada."  On it was Germain Terrio, with a question mark next to his name, head of a family of 15.  In July 1763, French repatriation lists circulating in Maryland found members of the family still there:  At Baltimore, Marie Thériot was counted with husband Bonaventure LeBlanc and their children; and Marguerite Thériot with husband René Blanchard and their children.  At Snow Hill, colonial officials counted Marie Thériot with husband Paul Melanson and their children.  At Oxford, also on the Eastern Shore were Anne Thériot, called Widow Babin, with her children.  In August 1763, in South Carolina, Thériots were still in that colony.  Jacques Thiriot, no age given but called "a child," was listed with his unnamed brother; Joseph Teriau, age 13, and Magdelaine Teriau, age 8, with Margte. Bourgois, their mother, widow of Jean-Baptiste Thériot of Chignecto; and Joseph Teriau, age 12, was listed with the family of Gabriel Gauselain.

Most of the Acadians in New England, including Thériots, chose to resettle in Canada, where kinsmen from Chignecto, Minas, and the Maritime islands had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Jean Thériot began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Thériots could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour across from Trois-Rivières and L'Assomption below Montréal; at Québec City; on the lower St. Lawrence at Montmagny, L'Islet, St.-Jean-Port-Joli, Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pocatière, Rivière-Ouelle, and Kamarouska; at Carleton in Gaspésie on the northern shore of the Baies des Chaleurs; and on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.  They were especially plentiful in the Kamarouska area and on the Madeleine islands.  In what became New Brunswick, Thériots settled at Caraquet on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, and on Rivière St.-Jean in the interior of the province.  In Nova Scotia, Thériots could be found on Baie Ste.-Marie, now St. Mary's Bay, and at Arichat on the south shore of Île Madame.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

At war's end, a Thériot family held in Massachusetts chose to resettle not in Canada but on Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland, which offered them an opportunity to elude British rule.  Jean-Baptiste Thériot of Cobeguit and Île Royale left that island soon after being counted with his family at Baie-de-Mordienne in April 1752.  Sometime in the late 1750s, the British deported him to Massachusetts, where, in his early 30s, he married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Cyr and Madeleine Poirier of Chignecto, in November 1760.  Marie gave Jean-Baptiste two children in the Bay Colony:  Louis at Roxbury in October 1762; and Marie probably after August 1763.  At war's end, Jean-Baptiste took his family to Miquelon, where his and Marie's marriage was "rehabilitated" at Notre-Dame-des-Arsiliers in November 1763, and daughter Marie was baptized the following month.  In 1765 and 1767, Marie gave Jean-Baptiste two more children:  Jean-Baptiste, fils in August 1765; and Victoire in September 1767.  Later that year, to relieve overcrowding on Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre, French officials, obeying a royal decree, coaxed the fisher/habitants to resettle in France.  Jean-Baptiste and his family sailed to St.-Malo aboard the schooner Creole, reached the Breton port in November, but, in spite of many of their kinsmen still living in the area, returned to Miquelon aboard the same vessel the following March.  Between 1770 and 1776, Marie gave Jean-Baptiste five more children on the island:  Laurent-Guillaume in January 1770 but died the following July; Simon-Pierre in May 1772; twins Pierre and Xavier in April 1774, but Xavier died two weeks after his birth; and Adélaïde in July 1776.  In 1778, during the American Revolution, after the French allied with the Americans, the British captured Miquelon and nearby Île St.-Pierre and deported the fisher/habitants to France.  In November 1778, Jean-Baptiste and his family returned to St.-Malo aboard the Jeannette and settled near his kinsmen at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Marie gave him two more children:  Anselme-Jean in December 1778 but died of smallpox two months later; and Madeleine-Louise in July 1781 but died at age 1 in May 1782--11 children, seven sons and four daughters, including a set of twins, between 1762 and 1782, in New England, greater Acadia, and France.  The family also buried 6-year-old Adélaide at St.-Servan in November 1782.  Jean-Baptiste and his family could not return to Île Miquelon until 1784, after the British retroceded the island to France.  When they did, they did not remain.  By the 1790s, they joined other Acadians from the Newfoundland islands on the îles-de-la-Madeleine in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, now a part of Québec Province.  At least three of Jean-Baptiste's sons married there. 

Other Thériots languishing in the seaboard colonies emigrated not to Canada, where the British ruled, but to the French Antilles, where they did not.  While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the British colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean Basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles who could be lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the island's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  The first of the exiles reached Cap-Français in late 1763, perhaps Thériots among them.  When fellow Acadians from Halifax and Maryland, including Thériots, came through Cap-Français on their way to Louisiana from late 1764 through 1768, none of the Thériots still in St.-Domingue chose to join them.  They evidently had found a place for themselves in the sugar colony's slave-based plantation economy.  Isidore, a carpenter, son of Étienne Thériot and Agnès LeBlanc of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, Chignecto, married Rosalie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Boudrot and Madeleine Doucet of Pointe-de-Beauséjour, at Môle St.-Nicolas in June 1777.  Rosalie gave Isidore at least three children in the area:  Paul at Môle in May 1779 but died at age 4 in August 1783; Marie-Jeanne in c1781 but died at nearby Jean-Rabel at age 5 1/2 in August 1787; and Marie-Josèphe at Môle in June 1782.  Joseph Thériot and Madeleine Bourg also settled at Môle St.-Nicolas, where their daughter Marie-Madeline was baptized at age 2 1/2 months in April 1780.  Joseph Thériot and Rosalie Bourgeois settled at Jean-Rabel, where their son Gabriel-Léonard was born in June 1787.  Thériots also chose to resettle on the French island of Martinique.  Madeleine Thériot, at age 38, married Joseph Lacaze "of Acadie, évêche of Canada," in August 1764 at Fort-Royal on the island.  Marie-Théodose, 27-year-old daughter of Germain Thériot III, "carpenter," and Catherine Benoit of Cobeguit and Île Royale, married Michel, son of François Georges or Georget, a tailor of Tours, and Marie Camet, at Fort-Royal in April 1765.  Michel, like his father, was a a taillandier, or "cutter."  Marie-Théodose died at Fort-Royal in April 1767, in her late 20s.  Her older sister Marie-Josèphe, age 33, married André-Joseph Dailli or Duhier of Catignes, Hainaut, Diocese of Cambrai, France, at Fort-Royal in May 1766.   Marie-Josèphe died at Lamentin on the island in February 1789, in her mid-50s.  Their younger sister Victoire, age 23, married Antoine, fils, son of Antoine Perchet and Anne Marchand of Grande-Champs, Diocese of Sens, France, at Fort-Royal in August 1766.  One wonders if the rest of their family settled on the island. 

Meanwhile, Thériots being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New England "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Île Miquelon, where Thériots had gone.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies, including Thériots, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least seven were Thériots. 

The hand full of Thériots in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  Two Thériots were part of the first contingent of exiles from the Chesapeake colony that reached New Orleans from Baltimore in September 1766, and two more were part of the second contingent that reached the Spanish colony from Baltimore in July 1767.333

Thibodeau

In 1755, descendants of Pierre Thibodeau and Jeanne Thériot could be found at Annapolis Royal; Grand-Pré and l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in the Minas Basin; Chignecto; Chepoudy and Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto and in the trois-rivières were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  In the spring and summer of 1750, in response to the British building a fort at Beaubassin village, Canadian militia, assisted by Mi'kmaq warriors led by the Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre, burned Acadian homesteads in the British-controlled area east of Rivière Missaguash, forcing the habitants there to move to the French-controlled area west of the river.  Thibodeaus may have been among the refugees in this petit dérangement.  After yet another war erupted between Britain and France in 1754, Chignecto-area Acadians were caught in the middle of it.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour at Chignecto in June 1755, several hundred area Acadians serving as militia, along with the garrison of French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport these Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colony.  Among them was likely Timothée Thibodeau of Chepoudy, a young bachelor, and brothers Joseph and Michel Thibodeau, who escaped with two Broussard kinsmen from the workhouse at Charles Town in late January 1756 and may have attempted to return to greater Acadia with them via the Carolina back country.  Timothée Thibodeau may have been among the exiles sent to South Carolina and Georgia who, with the permission of those colonies' governors, managed to make their way by sea back to greater Acadia in the spring of 1756.  However, most of the Thibodeaus at Chignecto and in the trois-rivières escaped the British roundups there and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada. 

Many of their cousins at Minas and especially Pigiguit were not so lucky.  Minas Thibodeaus found themselves on transports headed for Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Maryland.  The hundreds of Minas Acadians deported to Virginia, the first contingent of which reached Hampton Roads during the second week of November, suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  Exiles, including Thibodeaus, languished aboard disease-infested ships while the colony's leaders pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Virginia's Governor Robert Dinwiddie, with the approval of his council, ordered the "French Neutrals" dispersed to the ports of Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond.  The following spring, the colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the "papists" must go.  Virginia authorities hired more vessels and sent the Acadians on to England--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool, 1,225 exiles in all by one count.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were packed into warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Thibodeaus were held at Liverpool, Bristol, and Falmouth, where one of them died of smallpox in November 1756.  Seven years later, more than half of the Minas Acadians sent to Virginia had died in England. 

Most of the Thibodeaus at Annapolis Royal, like with their cousins at Chignecto and the trois-rivières, escaped the British roundup.  After a hard winter on the Fundy shore, they crossed to Chepoudy the following spring and took refuge on the upper Petitcoudaic or lower Rivière St.-Jean before moving on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or to Canada.  Some the Annapolis Thibodeaus were not so lucky.  Early in December, brothers Zacharie and Joseph and their families ended up on a transport, probably the Hobson, bound for South Carolina.  They reached the southern colony in mid-January and remained. 

Some of the Thibodeaus who sought refuge in Canada paid a heavy price for going there.  For the first time in their lives, Acadians were exposed to the hazards of an urban environment.  Some died at Québec as early as 1756.  The following summer, Acadian refugees in the Québec area began to die in ever greater numbers.  Smallpox was a disease scarcely known on the Fundy shore.  Marie-Claire Thibodeau and husband Amand Comeau of Minas died at Québec in 1757, victims, most likely, of a smallpox epidemic that struck the exiles in and around the Canadian capital from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758.  Marie-Rose Thibodeau, wife of Pierre Blanchard, died at Québec in November 1757.  Olivier Thibodeau of Chignecto and Chepoudy, Marie-Rose's brother, and Olivier's wife Élisabeth Melanson, died at Québec that December.  Widower Joseph Thibodeau of Annapolis Royal also died there that December.  Widow Marie-Madeleine Thibodeau of Annapolis Royal died at Québec in January 1758.  This did not endear the exiles to their Canadian hosts, who saw them more as burdens than as reliable compatriots in their struggle against the British. 

Living in territory controlled by France, Thibodeaus on Île St.-Jean escaped the fate of their cousins in Nova Scotia.  Some of them left the island after 1755, crossed Mer Roue, and took refuge with their kinsmen on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Most remained.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  Most of the island Thibodeaus crossed on one of the five deporatation transports--the so-called Five Ships--that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The crossing devastated the family nonetheless.  Émilie Thibodeau, age 44, crossed with husband François Bourg, age 50, four of their children, ages 12 to 3, and two Bourg relatives, ages 13 and 10.  All of their children died at sea, and Émilie and François died in a St.-Malo hospital in February from the rigors of the crossing.  Only the Bourg relatives survived the crossing.  Anne Thibodeau, age 31, crossed with husband Jean Doiron, age 32, and four of their children, ages 5 years to 4 months.  All of the children either died at sea or in a St.-Malo hospital in February.  Théotiste Thibodeau, age 33, crossed with husband Paul Henry, age 35, and six of their children, ages 12 to 1.  Five of the children died at sea, and Théotiste, Paul, and their oldest daughter died in March and April at St.-Malo and nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Blaise Thibodeau, age 30, crossed with wife Catherine Daigre, age 30, and four children--Firmin, age 5; Marie, age 4; Charles, age 2; and Jean-Baptiste, age 1.  With them was an Hébert kinsman, age 16.  Blaise and Catherine survived the crossing, but all of their children died at sea.  Their Hébert kinsman died in February from the rigors of the crossing.  Charles dit Charlie Thibodeau, age 35, crossed with wife Madeleine Henry, age 30, and two children--Hélène, age 7; and Anastasie, age 4.  Charlie and Madeleine survived the crossing, but their daughters died at sea.  Olivier Thibodeau, age 27, crossed with wife Madeleine Aucoin, age 20, and two children--Thomas, age 18 months; and Jean-Baptiste, age 1 month.  Also with them were five of Olivier's younger siblings--Joseph, age 23, Basile, age 18; Charles, age 17; Rose, age 15; and Firmin, age 12.  Olivier's older son and three of his brothers died at sea.  His younger son and his sister died in a St.-Malo hospital in February, and Madeleine and a brother died in March, so only Olivier survived the crossing and its rigors!  Anne Thibodeau, age 38, widow of Charles Pitre, crossed with five children, ages 9 to 5, and a Pitre nephew, age 20.  Only Anne and the nephew survived the crossing or its rigors.  At least one island Thibodeau landed at Le Havre in Normandy.  Marie Thibodeau, described as an "orphan from Acadie," died at Hôpital General, Le Havre, in May 1760, age 20.  One wonders who were her parents. 

The island Thibodeaus did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Blaise Thibodeau and wife Catherine Daigre, now childless, settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance on the east bank of the river south of St.-Malo.  Catherine gave Blaise eight more children at nearby Mordreuc:  Firmin-Charles in April 1760; Marie-Marguerite in September 1761 but died at age 1 1/2 in July 1763; Olive-Félicité in July 1763 but died at age 5 in July 1768; Jeanne-Antoinette in December 1764; François-Bélony in August 1766 but died there the following month; François-Jean in October 1767; Joseph-Marie at nearby La Ville Ger in April 1769; and Élisabeth-Jeanne at La Ville Ger in November 1770--a dozen children, seven sons and five daughters, between 1753 and 1770, in greater Acadia and France.  Blaise's younger sister Marguerite, who may have crossed on one of the Five Ships, also settled at Pleudihen, where, at age 22, she married Étienne, fils, son of fellow Acadians Étienne Boudrot and Marie-Claire Aucoin, in May 1764.  Between 1765 and 1771, she gave him four children, two sons and two daughters, at Mordreuc, all of whom survived childhood.  Charles dit Charlie Thibodeau and wife Madeleine Henry, now also childless, settled at Pleurtuit across the Rance from Pleudihen.  Madeleine gave Charlie six more children in the Pleurtuit area:  François at nearby La Moisiais in February 1760 but died at age 3 1/2 in June 1763; Marguerite-Josèphe at La Moisias in April 1762; twins Pierre-Charles and Jeanne-Tarsille at La Moisias in July 1764; Hélène at St.-Antoine in November 1766; and Marie-Victoire at St.-Antoine in April 1769--eight children, six daughters and two sons, between 1752 and 1769, in greater Acadia and France.  In 1760, Olivier Thibodeau, now alone in the world, settled at Langrolay-sur-Rance on the west bank of the river near Pleurtuit.  He worked as a seaman.  In August 1760, he remarried to Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Boudrot and Madeleine Hébert and widow of Jean-Baptiste Doiron, at Pleudihen across the river.  Élisabeth gave Olivier four more children in the area:  Élisabeth-Jeanne at Pleudihen in August 1761 but died at age 1 1/2 in November 1762; René-Marie at nearby La Chapelle de Mordreuc in May 1763; Jean-Baptiste-Pierre at La Chapelle de Mordreuc in April 1765; and Élisabeth-Marie at La Chapelle de Mordreuc in August 1768--six children, four sons and two daughters, by two wives, between 1757 and 1768, in greater Acadia and France.

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including Thibodeaus, were repatriated to St.-Malo and Morlaix in northwest Brittany.  Alexis Thibodeau, age 11, with his cousin Élisabeth Thibodeau, age 23, and her French husband Jacques Bourbon of Caen, age 38, who she had recently married, reached St.-Malo from Southampton aboard the transport Dorothée during the third week of May.  Élisabeth and Jacques settled in the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer before crossing the Rance estuary to St.-Énogat, now Dinard, in 1765. They returned to St.-Servan in 1767 and to St.-Énogat in 1768.  Meanwhile, cousin Alexis went to Pleudihen-sur-Rance, perhaps to live with other relatives.  Benjamin Thibodeau, in his early 30s in 1763, had lost his second wife and two children in England.  He arrived aboard La Dorothée and settled at St.-Coulomb in the countryside northeast of St.-Malo.  He was still there in 1772, still living alone.  One wonders if he remarried.  Jean Thibodeau, in his early 20s in 1763, and his sister Marie-Josèphe, called Josèphe, age 16, also arrived from Southampton aboard La Dorothée.  They settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance, where Jean worked as a seaman.  He married Françoise, daughter of locals Guillaume Huere or Huert and Marie Ameline, at Pleudihen in February 1764.  Françoise gave Jean four children there:  Jeanne-Nicole-Damase in December 1764; Jacques-Joseph-Nicolas in September 1766; Françoise-Jeanne in March 1769 but died at age 2 in March 1771; and Marie-Jacquemine in August 1772.  Sister Josèphe also settled at Pleudihen, where she married retired French army sergeant and tailor Nicolas, son of Jacques Metra and Jeanne Veuvre of Bernin, Lorraine, in January 1774.  Madeleine Thibodeau, age 7 in 1763, reached St.-Malo aboard Le Dorothée and followed a Thériot cousin to Pleudihen-sur-Rance.  Osite Thibodeau, age 11 in 1763, arrived from Southampton aboard La Dorothée with her mother Hélène Gautrot and stepfather Jean-Baptiste Buard, a young Frenchman from Paris.  They also settled at Pleudihen.  Anastasie Thériot, widow of François Thibodeau, and four, perhaps five of her children--Martin-Joseph; François-Éloi, called Éloi, age 19 in 1763; Charles-Joseph, called Joseph, age 17; Marguerite, age 15; and Marie, age 15--held at Liverpool, landed not at St.-Malo but down the coast at Morlaix.  Son Éloi's wife Anne Hébert, who he married probably at Morlaix soon after their arrival, gave him a daughter, Marie, in St.-Mathieu Parish there in January 1764.  Three daughters of Germain Thibodeau and Judith LeBlanc of Rivière-aux-Canards, Minas--Marie, age 20 in 1763; Élisabeth, age 18; and Anne, age 16--who lost their parents in England, also landed at Morlaix.  Marie married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians François Granger and Anne Landry of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in April 1765. 

In late 1763 and early 1764, Acadians repatriated from England, including Thibodeaus, agreed to help settle the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  They included Alexis Thibodeau, age 12, and Marguerite Thibodeau, age 8, who sailed to the tropical colony aboard Le Fort in April 1764.  Also aboard the vessel were Hélène Gautrot, age 40, widow of Pierre Thibodeau, her second husband Jean-Baptiste Buard of Paris, age 27, and most likely Hélène's daughter Osite Thibodeau, age 12.  According to a census taken at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district on 1 March 1765, other Thibodeaus, called Thibaudots in Guiane, living in the tropical colony included Angélique, age 48, widow of Pierre-Charles La Pierre, a fellow Acadian, her son Charles, age 18, and daughter Marie, age 14, both of whom had "fievre"; Éloi, age 23, perhaps recently widowed; and Marianne, age 9, "du Boston," perhaps his younger sister (if so, she likely would have been born in England, not New England).  Also in the March 1 census was Jean-Baptiste Buart, age 28, and wife Helenne Gotro, age 39, but daughter Osite Thibodeau was not with them. 

Éloi Thibodeau, for one, did not remain in the colony.  Later in the year, he followed his widowed mother and siblings to Belle-Île-en-Mer, so he likely had returned to Morlaix soon after the census at Sinnamary was taken.  He did not remain on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  He remarried to Marie-Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians François Léger and Jeanne Provost of Île St.-Jean, at Lorient in southern Brittany in February 1776.  With him in the company port was older brother Martin-Joseph, who had married Marie-Louise, daughter of Yves Morvan and Marie-Josèpe Caillette, perhaps locals, at Lorient in January 1770. 

As the comings and goings of Éloi Thibodeau reveal, Acadians repatriated from England, along with a few island Acadians at St.-Malo, agreed to become part of a new agricultural settlement on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany, Thibodeaus among them.  In the fall of 1765, Marie Thibodeau, her husband Pierre Granger, and her sisters Élisabeth and Anne of Morlaix settled at Bortemont near Bangor in the southern interior of the island.  Anne married local widower Jean-Louis Loréal at Bangor in September 1769.  She gave him a daughter near Le Palais on the east end of the island in January 1774 and became a widow the following September.  Anastasie Thériot, with her Thibodeau children, ventured from Morlaix via Vannes in southern Brittany to Belle-Île-en-Mer and settled at Le Coquet near Locmaria on the southeastern tip of the island.  And, as the wanderings of Éloi and his brother Martin-Joseph attest, not all of the Thibodeaus who went to Belle-Île remained there. 

By the early 1770s, French authorities were weary of providing for the exiles still languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned in the interior province of Poitou near the city of Châtellerault.  Hundreds of Acadians went there in 1773, Thibodeaus among them.  They included Blaise Thibodeau, wife Catherine Daigre, and their children from Pleudihen-sur-Rance; sister Marguerite, husband Étienne Boudrot, fils, and their children from Pleudihen; Jean Thibodeau, wife Françoise Huert, and their children from Pleudihen; Josèphe Thibodeau, husband Nicolas Metra, and their children from Pleudihen; Olivier Thibodeau, second wife Élisabeth Boudrot, and their children from Pleudihen; Joseph Thibodeau, still single, from Lorient in southern Brittany; and Élisabeth Thibodeau and her French husband Jacques Bourbon from St.-Énogat.  Marguerite Thibodeau gave husband Étienne Boudrot, fils another son in Notre-Dame Parish, Châtellerault, in October 1774.  Josèphe Thibodeau gave husband Nicolas Metra a daughter in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault, in October 1774, but the baby died there the following January. 

After two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians deserted the venture.  From October 1775 through March 1776, hundreds of them, including most, if not all, of the Thibodeaus, retreated in four convoys down the Vienne and the Loire from Châtellerault to the lower Loire port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Between 1776 and 1784, Joséphe Thibodeau gave husband Nicolas Metra three sons at Nantes and nearby Chantenay, but the older son died at age 2 in April 1778.  Blaise Thibodeau's daughter Jeanne-Antoinette died in St.-Pierre de Rezé Parish across the Loire from Nantes in June 1778, age 14.  In February 1783, while living at Chantenay, Blaise's oldest remaning son Firmin-Charles, age 22, married Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Thériot and Marie Boudrot, in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes.  Their son Firmin-Blaise was baptized at St.-Martin de Chantenay the following November.  Meanwhile, in June and September 1776, Marguerite Thibodeau and husband Étienne Boudrot, fils, buried a son and a daughter, ages 2 and 6, in St.-Nicolas and St.-Similien parishes.  Between 1779 and 1785, Marguerite gave Étienne, fils three more children, two sons and a daughter, at Nantes.  In January 1781, Jean Thibodeau's wife Françoise Huert died at Chantenay.  Jean, in his early 40s, remarried to Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Dugas and Françoise Durand, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in May 1785.  In January 1782 in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, Olivier Thibodeau died in his early 50s.  His youngest son Jean-Baptiste-Pierre dit Alequin married Marie-Rose, called Rose, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph D'Amours de Chauffours and Geneviève Leroy of Rivière St.-Jean and widow of Jean-Baptiste Rassicot, fils, probably at Chantenay by 1785.  Jean's sister Josèphe lost her husband Nicolas Metra at Hôtel Dieu, Nantes, in December 1784 and remarried to Joseph-Philippe, son of fellow Acadians Pierre Henry and Marguerite Trahan of Île St.-Jean, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in April 1785.  Élisabeth Thibodeau's French husband Jacques Bourbon died at Chantenay in 1783, age 58.  After 20 years of marriage, the couple had no children. 

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 23 Thibodeaus at Nantes and St.-Malo agreed to take it.  They included, from Nantes and Chantenay, Blaise Thibodeau, wife Catherine Daigre, and three of his unmarried children, two sons and a daughter, and married son Firmin, wife Marie-Madeleine Thériot, and their young son.  Marie-Madeleine was pregnant on the crossing and gave birth to another son either aboard ship or soon after reaching New Orleans.  Jean Thibodeau crossed with second wife Marie Dugas and two of his children, a son and a daughter, from his first marriage.  With them was cousin Élisabeth Thibodeau, childless widow of Jacques Bourbon.  Jean's younger sister Marie-Josèphe crossed with second husband Joseph-Philippe Henry and two sons from her first marriage, one of them an infant.  Élisabeth Boudrot, widow of Olivier Thibodeau, crossed with unmarried daughter Élisabeth-Marie.  Élisabeth's married son Jean-Baptiste-Pierre dit Alequin Thibodeau crossed with wife Rose D'Amours, who gave birth to a son on the crossing.  Marguerite Thibodeau crossed with husband Étienne Boudrot, fils and seven children.  A large family from St.-Malo also chose to go to the Spanish colony.  Charlie Thibodeau, wife Madeleine Henry, and five of their children, four daughters and a son, crossed on a ship that sailed directly from St.-Malo to New Orleans.  However, other Thibodeaus in France, including all the ones who had gone to Belle-Île-en-Mer or moved on to Lorient in southern Brittany, chose to remain in the mother country.  They included Éloi Thibodeau and Marie-Françoise Léger at Lorient; his brother Martin-Joseph and his French wife Marie-Louise Morvan, still at Lorient; and their brother Joseph, who had gone to Poitou from Lorient in 1773 and may have remained there.  A Pierre Thibodeau, married to Marguerite-Renée Lecoeur, at Lorient, buried a son, Simon, age 20 months, there in September 1778, as well as a 6-month-old daughter, Marie-Élisabeth, in November of that year.  One wonders if he was another brother of Éloi et al., or if he was a French Thibodeau.  The two married daughters of Germain Thibodeau, Marie and Anne, also remained in France.  Their sister Élisabeth married into the Merlin family at Le Palais on Belle-Île-en-Mer in 1790 and died on the island in 1808, in her early 60s.  The oldest sister, Marie, died on the island in 1811, in her late 60s.  The youngest, Anne, died there in 1812, in her mid-60s. 

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to captured the garrison and lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the French garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  No Thibodeau head of family appeared on the list.  During the following months, Acadians who had escaped capture at Restigouche, perhaps including Thibodeaus, or who remained in other Gulf-shore camps, either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the region and held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In August 1763, British officials counted Thibodeaus on Georges Island in the middle of Halifax harbor, including Cherle, actually Charles, Tibaudo, his wife, and three children; Pier, or Pierre, Tibaudo, his wife, and three children; another Pier Thibaudo, "widow"er, and four children; Aulivie, actually Olivier, Tibeaudau, his wife, and three children; Paul Tibaudau, his wife, and eight children; and Anne Tibaudau, widow, and two children.

The war over, the many Thibodeaus being held in the British seaboard colonies, like their kinsmen in Nova Scotia, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  In August 1763 in Massachusetts, according to French repatriation lists circulating in the colony, many Thibodeaus were still in that colony.  They included Castain, actually Alain-Castin, Thibaudot, wife Natalie, and two sons; Germain Thibaudot, wife Magdelaine, and six children, three sons and three daughters; René Thibaudot, wife Anne, and a son; Widow of Batiste Thibaudot with the family of Allexis Braux; Philipe Thibaudot, wife Isabelle, and two daughters; Jean Thibaudot, wife Isabelle, and a daughter; Charles Thibaudot, no wife, and six children, five sons and a daughter; and Dominique Thibodeau, wife Anne, and a daughter.  In June 1766, reflecting the relunctance of British officials to let the Acadians go, Thibodeaus still in Massachusetts appeared on a "List of Names of the French Who Wish to go to Canada."  They included Jean-Baptiste Tibodo and his family of five; ____ Tibodo and his family of three; Jean La Croix Tibodo and his family of eight; Dominique Tibodo and his family of four; and Alexis Tibodo and his family of five.  In June 1763 in Pennsylvania, members of the family were still in that colony, including Ollivier Thibodeau, second wife Marie Poirié, and one child; Joseph Thibodeau, "Marie Joseph Thibodeau his wife," and seven children; another Ollivier Thibodeau, "Magdelaine Thibaudeau [Melanson] his wife with six children and an orphan"; and Allexis Thibodeau, "Catherine Thibodeau [LeBlanc] his [second] wife and seven children."  In July 1763, repatriation lists in Maryland counted Charles Tibodot, "widower," and children Cécile, Anne, Pierre, Osite, Magdelane, and Jean-Baptiste at Snow Hill on the colony's Eastern Shore; Élizabeth Thibodeau, a widow, and six of her Brasseux children at Georgetown, also on the Eastern Shore; and Margueritte Thibodeau, husband Charle Trahan, and two daughters at Princess Anne in the southern part of the colony.  In August 1763, repatriation lists in South Carolina counted orphans Marie Thibodeau, age 12, and Jean Thibodeau, age 3, probably siblings, with the family of Jean Cormier and Marie Lanou; Zacarie Thibodeau, wife Marie Girouard, and two Landry daughters from her first marriage; brother Joseph Thibodeau, wife Marie Landry, and sons Jean, age 3, and Joseph, age 5 days; and "orphan" Anne Thibodeau, age 30, still in that colony. 

Most of the Acadians in New England and Pennsylvania, including many Thibodeaus, chose to resettle in Canada, where their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Pierre Thibodeau of Pré-Ronde and Chepoudy began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Thibodeaus could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at Bécancour, Cap-Santé, Deschambault, L'Assomption, L'Orignal, Louiseville, Maskinongé, Montebello, Montréal, Nicolet, Pointe-Claire, Québec City, Rigaud, St.-François-du-Lac, St.-Jacques de l'Achigan, Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pérade, Ste.-Foy, Trois-Rivières, and Yamachiche.  On the lower St.-Lawrence and on Rivière Chaudière they could be found at Beauport, Kamouraska, Île d'Orléans, L'Islet, L'Isle-Verte, St.-François-de-Beauce, St.-Joachim, St.-Joseph-de-Beauce, Ste.-Anne-de-la-Pocatière, and Ste.-Marie-de-Beauce.  In what became New Brunswick, Thibodeaus settled at Ékoupag now Meductic, Sunbury, and St.-Basile-de-Madawaska on the lower and middle stretches of Rivière St.-Jean; at Néguac, Richibouctou, and Tracadie on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore; and at French Village in the Kennebecasis valley between the St.-Jean and the Gulf shore.  In Nova Scotia, Thibodeaus could be found on Baie Ste.-Marie, now St. Mary's Bay.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Thibodeaus being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New England "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their many cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 29 were Thibodeaus. 

The Thibodeaus in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, most of them pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  A Thibodeau widow and her six Brasseaux children were part of the second contingent of exiles from the Chesapeake colony that reached New Orleans from Baltimore in July 1767.  A Thibodeau wife and her Trahan family joined a third contingent, this one from Port Tobacco, that reached New Orleans in February 1768.334

Trahan

In 1755, descendants of Guillaume Trahan the edge-tool maker and his second wife Madeleine Brun could be found at Rivière-aux-Canards, Grand-Pré, and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin; Chepoudy and Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto; and on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale in the French Maritimes.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this large family even farther. 

The Acadians in the Chignecto and trois-rivières settlements were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour in June 1755, several hundred local Acadians, perhaps including Trahans, were serving in the fort as milita.  They, along with the garrison of French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport these Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  The few Trahans still living in the area evidently escaped the roundup there.  Some fled to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, where they may have participated with their Broussard in-laws in the resistance against the British.  Others moved on to Canada. 

Some of the many Trahans in the Minas settlements eluded the British and also made their way to the Gulf shore or to Canada.  Most, however, did not escape the British that fall.  Trahan families were loaded aboard transports bound for Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, but most of them were shipped to Virginia.  The hundreds of Minas Acadians sent to the Old Dominion, the first contingent of which reached Hampton Roads during the second week of November, suffered the indignity of being turned away by the colony's authorities.  Exiles, including Trahans, perhaps the largest family sent to Virginia, languished aboard disease-infested ships anchored in Hampton Roads while the colony's leaders pondered their fate.  As winter approached, Virginia's governor Robert Dinwiddie, with the approval of his council, ordered the "French Neutrals" dispersed to the ports of Hampton, Norfolk, and Richmond.  The following spring, the colony's Burgesses debated the question and concluded that the "papists" must go.  Virginia authorities hired more vessels and sent the Acadians on to England--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool, 1,225 exiles in all by one count.  Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where they were packed into warehouses and where many died of smallpox.  Trahans were held at Liverpool, Bristol, and Falmouth, where some of them died of smallpox soon after their arrival.  Seven years later, more than half of the Minas Acadians sent to Virginia, including many Trahans, had died in England. 

Living in territory controlled by France, most of the Trahans on Île St.-Jean and Île Royale escaped the fate of their cousins in Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  A family who left the island before 1755 and returned to British-controlled Nova Scotia was the sad exception.  Honoré Trahan, wife Marie Corporon, and their children, as well as several related families from Pigiguit, had been counted at Baie-des-Espagnols on the Atlantic coast of Île Royale in April 1752.  In the fall of 1754, in fear of starvation, they left Spanish Bay, as well as French-controlled territory, and, along with dozens of fellow Acadians, ventured from Louisbourg to Halifax by boat.  The refugees beseeched Lieutenant-Governor Lawrence and his Council to let them return to their former lands.  After hearing their case, the Council agreed to the request only if they "voluntarily" took "the Oath of Allegiance to His Majesty" George II "unqualified by any reservation"--a hard request for self-respecting Acadians.  However, "it appearing that they were in very great distress being intirely destitute of all necessitous," the Council minutes noted, they "very cheerfully" took the hated oath and were issued rations to get them through the winter.  Lawrence evidently changed his mind about allowing them to return to Pigiguit.  In late 1754, he sent them, instead, to Mirliguèche on the Atlantic coast west of Halifax with other Acadians from Pigiguit and Baie-des-Espagnols.  Their oath did not protect them from the British roundups in Nova Scotia the following year.  In September 1755, the British gathered up the Acadians at Mirliguèche, including the Trahans, and sent them to the prison compound on Georges Island in Halifax harbor.  That December, the British deported them to North Carolina aboard the sloop Providence--the only exiles actually to go to that colony.  They likely were held at Edenton on the Albemarle Sound.  Other Trahans who left the islands after 1752 took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada. 

Most of the Trahans on the Maritime islands remained, but their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the islands and deported them to France:  Claude Trahan, age 65, his daughter Marie, her husband Jean Pineau, Claude's son Fiacre, age 19, and younger daughter Rosalie crossed on the transport Duc Guillaume, which left Île Royale in September, suffered a mishap at sea, and limped into St.-Malo harbor the first of November.  Only Jean and Rosalie survived the crossing or its rigors.  Paul-Benjamin Trahan, age 33, wife Cécile Lejeune, son Jacques, age 1, Paul-Benjamin's sister Geneviève, age 28, her husband Pierre Pinet, and their children, crossed on the tranport Violet, which left Chédaboutou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November, bound for St.-Malo.  The ship foundered in a storm off the southwest coast of England on December 12.  There were no survivors.  Olivier Trahan, age 28, wife Isabelle Lejeune, age 25, and their three children--Jérôme, age 6; Cécile, age 3; and Thérèse, age 1--crossed to St.-Malo aboard the transport Supply, which left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship conovy, was battered by the mid-December storm, limped to Bideford, England, for repairs, and did not reach St.-Malo until March 1759.  Olivier and Isabelle survived the crossing, but all of their children died at sea.  Charles Trahan, age 23 and still unmarried, crossed on the transport Tamerlane, which also left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy, survived the storm, and reached St.-Malo in mid-January.  Charles, along with most of his fellow passengers, survived the crossing.  Luce Trahan, age 23, husband Jean-Baptiste Boudrot, age 30, three of their children, ages 4 years to 18 months, and Jean-Baptiste's parents crossed on one of the five deporation transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in the 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite the mid-December storm, arrived at St.-Malo together the third week of January.  Only Luce and Jean-Baptiste survived the crossing.  Marguerite Trahan, age 29, husband Pierre Henry, age 27, and their 9-year-old son also crossed on one of the Five Ships.  The son died at sea.  Marguerite was pregnant on the voyage.  She gave birth to a daughter in February, but the baby died 12 days after her birth. 

Island Trahans also landed at the northern fishing port of Boulogne-sur-Mer in Picardie, but few remained there after the early 1770s.  Anne-Pélagie Trahan, at age 18, married Charles, fils, son of fellow Acadians Charles dit Maringouin Gautrot and Marie-Josèphe Hébert, in St.-Joseph Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in August 1763.  They moved on to Morlaix in northwest Brittany in 1765 and settled near her older brother Alexis, who had gone there from England in 1763.  Auguste or Augustin Trahan, age 24, whose father and younger brother had died aboard Le Duc Guillaume, reached Boulogne-sur-Mer aboard a different vessel; he evidently traveled alone.  At age 29, Augustin married Bibianne, 20-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre LeBlanc and Marguerite Gautrot of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in St.-Nicolas Parish, Boulogne-sur-Mer, in July 1764.  They moved on to Île d'Aix near Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay by March 1767, when a daughter, Marie-Josèphe, was born there.  Claude Trahan le jeune, age 40, landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer with wife Anne LeBlanc, age 34, and their five children--Jean-Baptiste, called Baptiste, age 12; Joseph-Firmin, called Firmin, age 11; Joseph, age 8; Marguerite, age 6; and Anne, age 4.  Anne gave Claude two more children in St.-Nicolas Parish:  Pierre- or René-Jacques in 1761; and Marie-Anne-Josèphe, also called Marie-Jeanne, in April 1764--seven children, four sons and three daughters, between 1747 and 1764, in greater Acadia and France.  Claude le jeune and his extended family moved on to St.-Malo in May 1766.  Joseph Trahan, age 46, landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer with wife Anne Thériot and their five children--Joseph, fils, age 22; Mathurin, age 14; Marie-Modeste, age 11; Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, age 10; and Marguerite, age 5.  Joseph, père died in St.-Nicolas Parish in November 1759, in his mid-40s, victim, perhaps, of an epidemic that struck the northern port that fall and winter.  Son Joseph, fils married Marie-Sophie, daughter of fellow Acadians Antoine Leprince le jeune and his first wife Judith Boudrot of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in St.-Nicolas Parish in November 1762.  In 1764, still childless, they were among the exiles in France, including a Trahan family from St.-Malo, who ventured to the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  The other Trahan family stayed, but Joseph, fils and his bride did not remain.  By 1766, they were back in France.  They settled not at Boulogne-sur-Mer but at Rochefort and nearby Île d'Aix.  Joseph, fils died at Rochefort by September 1772, in his late 20s or early 30s, when Marie, called a widow, and one of theirs son arrived at St.-Malo from the Biscay port.  Joseph, fils's widowed mother Anne Thériot died by October 1774, when she was listed as deceased in daughter Marie-Modeste's marriage record.  One wonders where Anne breathed her last.  Joseph, père's sons Mathurin and Jean, who worked as sailors, also left the northern fishing port and settled at Rochefort.  Mathurin married Thérèse-Marguerite, daughter of locals Pierre Lahaye and Thérèse Chevallier, in Notre-Dame Parish, Rochefort, in August 1773; younger brother Jean was a witness to the marriage.  Older sister Marie-Modeste married Jean-Baptiste, son of fellow Acadians Alexandre Boudrot and Marie-Madeleine Vincent, in c1774, place not given, but it may have been in the interior province of Poitou, where, in 1773 or 1774, the couple had followed hundreds of other Acadians from the Atlantic ports as part of a major settlement venture there.  One wonders what happened to Joseph, fils et al.'s younger sister Marguerite.  Marin Trahan, age 27, landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer with his wife Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, age undetermined.  They were living at Baincthun, Artois, east of the port,in 1765 and moved on to Morlaix in northwest Brittany by November 1767.  At Boulonge-sur-Mer and Morlaix, Marie-Madeleine gave Marin a large family:  Madeleine in c1762; Jean-Baptiste in c1764; Joseph-Olivier in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in August 1765; Élisabeth in November 1767; Marie-Marguerite in November 1768; Marie in March 1771; Françoise-Barbe in January 1774; Jean-Joseph-Marie in October 1776; and François-Marie in May 1779--nine children, five daughters and four sons, between 1762 and 1779.  Marin was a widower by September 1784, when he was listed with six children but no wife at Morlaix.  In his early 50s, Marin remarried to Marguerite, 20-year-old daughter of Jean Juon and Anne Le Borgne, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in January or February 1785.  She gave him no more children, at least none who survived infancy.  Pierre Trahan, age 25, married Marguerite-Blanche, daughter of fellow Acadians François La Vache and Anne-Marie Vincent of Pigiguit and Île St.-Jean, either on the Maritime island before its dérangement or in the northern fishing port.  Marguerite-Blanche had been born in c1741, so she would have been age 17 or 18 when she reached Boulogne-sur-Mer.  She gave Pierre a daughter, Marguerite-Catherine, in St.-Nicolas Parish in early December 1759, but the girl died four days after her birth.  Marguerite-Blanche died later in the month, age 19, victim, evidently, not only of the rigors of childbirth, but of an epidemic that killed her father, three siblings, and a nephew between November 1759 and January 1760.  Pierre, who did not remarry, died in St.-Nicolas Parish in April 1762, age 28. 

Island Trahans landed also at Le Havre in Normandy and at Rochefort in 1759 and were joined by other members of the family from Boulogne-sur-Mer and French Guiane during the following years.  Paul Trahan of Minas and Petitcoudiac, whose brothers had escaped to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore in 1755, somehow became separated from them.  He died in Notre-Dame Parish, Le Havre, in late November 1759, age 36.  Luce or Lucie Trahan, wife of Jean-Baptiste Boudrot, died in St.-Louis Parish, Rochefort, in July 1760, age 24, perhaps from the rigors of the crossing from Île St.-Jean.  Élisabeth Trahan of Ste.-Famille, Pigiguit, whose family members landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer and St.-Malo, landed at Rochefort in 1759.  She married Jean-François, son of François Seillon and Raymonde Guillem of St.-Étienne Parish, Toulouse, in St.-Louis Parish in August 1767.  Joseph Trahan, fils, a sailor from Minas, and wife Marie-Sophie Leprince, who he had married at Boulogne-sur-Mer, returned from French Guiane in 1765 or 1766 and landed at Rochefort.  They moved on to nearby Île d'Aix, where she gave him two children:  Antoine-Joseph in c1766; and Marie-Hélène in February 1767.  They then returned to Rochefort, where another son, Firmin, was baptized at Notre-Dame Parish in April 1769--three children, two sons and a daughter, between 1766 and 1769.  Joseph, fils died at Rochefort, in his late 20s or early 30s, by September 1772, when Marie-Sophie, called a widow, and their older son Antoine-Joseph landed at St.-Malo.  Their passport said nothing of younger son Firmin and daughter Marie-Hélène, so those children likely had died at Rochefort, too.  By 1775, Marie-Sophie and son Antoine-Joseph Trahan moved again, to Poitou.  Augustin Trahan and wife Bibianne LeBlanc, who had landed at Boulogne-sur-Mer in 1759 and married there in 1765, moved to Île d'Aix by March 1767, when daughter Marie-Josèphe was born there and baptized the day after her birth "in danger of death."  They moved to Rochefort by November 1768, when their son Jean-André was born in Notre-Dame Parish.  Their daughter Marie-Modeste was born in c1773, perhaps at Rochefort.  Later that year, Augustin's family also went to Poitou. 

Island Trahans who landed at St.-Malo in 1758-59 and who came there from other French ports did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  In August 1759, soon after they reached St.-Malo on separate transports, Charles Trahan married Marie-Louise, called Louise, 24-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Closquinet dit Demoulin and Marguerite Longuépée of Louisbourg and widow of Charles Savary, at Châteauneuf on the west bank of the river south of St.-Malo.  They remained at Châteauneuf, where, in October 1760, their daughter Louise was born.  Charles was not there to witness his daughter's birth.  In April 1760, he had embarked on the corsair Hercules, which the Royal Navy promptly captured.  The British held him in England as a prisoner until the end of the war.  In 1762, while Charles was away, Louise moved to the suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer to be closer to the corsairs' port.  Charles returned from captivity in June 1763.  Second daughter Marie-Josèphe was born at St.-Servan in March 1764.  Exactly a month after her birth, Charles took his family to French Guiane.  They did not return.  Charles's first cousin Claude Trahan le jeune, wife Anne LeBlanc, and their seven children reached St.-Malo from Boulogne-sur-Mer aboard the brigantine Hazard in late May 1766 and settled at St.-Servan.  Oldest son Jean-Baptiste, age 21, married Marguerite, 16-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Marguerite Vincent dit Clément and Marguerite Hébert, at St.-Servan in February 1768.  Marguerite gave Jean-Baptiste two children there:  Jean-Paul in March 1769; and Marie-Anne-Julienne in December 1770.  Jean-Baptiste's younger brother Firmin married Anne, daughter of locals Michel Tardivet and Marie Pointel of St.-Servan, at St.-Servan in January 1770.  Claude le jeune's family did not remain at St.-Servan.   In April 1771, he, Anne, their younger children, married sons Jean-Baptiste and Firmin, their wives and children took the ship Bonne-Marie to Morlaix in northwest Brittany, where, in a general census of the Acadians in France in 1772, a royal official noted that Claude Trahan had been blinded, where and when the official did not say.  At Morlaix, Marguerite Vincent gave Claude's son Jean-Baptiste two more daughters in St.-Martin de Champs Parish:  Anne-Barbe-Josèphe in July 1772; and Marie-Anne in March 1774.  Olivier Trahan and wife Isabelle Lejeune, made childless by the crossing aboard Supply, settled at Châteauneuf before moving to St.-Servan in 1762.  Between 1760 and 1766, Isabelle gave Olivier three more children in the area:  Marie-Madeleine at Châteauneuf in October 1760 but died at St.-Servan, age 7 1/2, in March 1768; Anne-Marie at St.-Servan in February 1763; and Grégoire-Olivier there in March 1766--six children, two sons and four daughters, between 1752 and 1766, in greater Acadia and France.  They were still at St.-Servan in 1772.  A year later, they moved on to Poitou. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England, including many Trahans, were repatriated to ports in northern Brittany, including St.-Malo, where many of their fellow exiles had settled.  Madeleine Aucoin, widow of Charles Trahan, age 47, and four of her children--Marie, age 27; Marguerite, age 23; Laurent, age 13; and Joseph, age 10--reached St.-Malo aboard the transport Dorothée on May 23 and settled at Plouër-sur-Rance on the west bank of the river south of St.-Malo.  Madeleine did not remarry.  She and her children moved to nearby St.-Servan-sur-Mer in 1767 and returned to Plouër in 1768.  They were still there in 1772.  Hélène Aucoin, widow of Claude Trahan, age 44, and her daughter Marguerite, age 18, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  They also settled at Plouër, where Marguerite married Simon, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Mazerolle dit St.-Louis and his first wife Marie-Josèphe Doiron of Minas, in November 1763.  They moved to nearby Pleslin in 1764 and to St.-Servan in 1767.  They were still there in 1772.  Meanwhile, Marguerite's mother Hélène remarried to an Hébert widower at Plouër in March 1764 and also moved to Pleslin.  Jean-Baptiste, called Jean, Trahan, age 13, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée with brother-in-law Charles Aucoin and his sister Madeleine and settled with them at Plouër, where he remained until 1770.  When he came of age, he evidently worked as a sailor.  The 1772 census of Acadians in France noted that Jean had "died at America," whatever that means.  He likely did not marry.  Joseph Trahan, age 37, wife Marie Boudrot, age 35, and two of their children--Joseph, fils, age 8; and Mathurin, age 3--also reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  They settled at Pleudihen-sur-Rance across the river from Plouër.  Between 1766 and 1774, in several hamlets near Pleudihen, Marie gave Joseph more children:  Anselme-Marie at La Chapelle de Mordreuc in January 1766; Marie-Madeleine at Mordreuc in May 1768; Anne-Modeste at Mordreuc in April 1771; another Joseph, fils in c1772; and Marguerite-Aimée at Landes in January 1774--seven children, four sons and three daughters, between 1755 and 1774, in greater Acadia, England, and France.  Another Joseph Trahan and wife Marie Aucoin may have reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée.  Their son Joseph, fils was born at Pleudihen in March 1764 but died the day of his birth.  Simon Trahan, age 22, reached St.-Malo aboard La Dorothée with brother-in-law Jean-Charles Boudrot and sister Agnès.  The couple settled at Plouër, but brother Simon moved on to Morlaix in northwest Brittany. 

Even more Trahans from England were repatriated to Morlaix in the spring of 1763.  Alexis or Alexandre Trahan, age 46, wife Marie-Françoise Levron, age 46, and three of their children--Isabelle, age 15; Thomas, age 6; and Alexandre, fils, age 3--were among them.  In 1764, they followed other exiles to French Guiane, where French officials counted them at Sinnamary in the Cayenne district on 1 March 1765.  They likely remained.  Alexis Trahan, in his late 30s, and wife Marguerite Leprince, age 38, landed at Morlaix in 1763.  One wonders if they brought any children with them.  Marguerite gave Alexis a daughter, Anne-Pélagie, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in February 1765.  Marguerite died there in April 1778, age 53.  Alexis promptly remarried to Françoise-Thomase Menier, perhaps a local, widow of Guillaume-Gilles Poupon, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in April 1779.  Alexis's younger brother Eustache evidently followed his brother to Morlaix in 1763 and married Marie, daughter of Grand-Pré notary René LeBlanc and his second wife Marguerite Thébeau and widow of Cyprien Leprince, in St.-Martin de Champs Parish in February 1766.  They were still at Morlaix in September 1784.  Alexis and Eustache's sister Marie-Josèphe also landed at Morlaix in 1763 and married cousin Paul Trahan of Rivière-aux-Canards in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in March 1767.  Alexis, Eustache, and Marie-Josèphe's sister Anne-Pélagie and her husband Charles Gautrot, fils came to Morlaix from Boulogne-sur-Mer in 1765 and were still there in 1784.  Françoise Thériot, widow of Charles Trahan, and her 2-year-old daughter Anne dite Nanette landed at Morlaix in 1763.  Françoise died there in August 1773, age 51.  Anne dit Nanette, who remained at Morlaix, married fellow Acadian Alexis Levron in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in February 1785.  Élisabeth Trahan married Pierre, son of fellow Acadians Cyprien Thériot and Marguerite Landry, also of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in January 1766.  Honoré-Joseph, called Joseph and perhaps also Michel, Trahan, wife Marguerite Trahan, age 27, and their 2-year-old daughter Marie landed at Morlaix in 1763.  Little Marie died in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, age 3, in October 1764.  Marguerite gave Joseph seven more children there:  Élisabeth-Josèphe in May 1764; Marie-Josèphe in March 1766; Jean-Marie in April 1767; Paul-Joseph in July 1768; Pierre-Grégoire in November 1769; Augustine-Pélagie in August 1772; and Joseph-Marie in June 1774--eight children, four daughters and four sons, between 1761 and 1774, in England and France.  By September 1784, Marguerite was a widow and living with two of her Trahan daughters, Marie-Josèphe and Augustine-Pélagie, at Morlaix; the other children born at Morlaix may have died by then or moved out on their own.  Third daughter Marie-Josèphe, at age 19, married Charles, son of fellow Acadians Michel Richard and Françoise Thériot, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in February 1785.  Jean-Baptiste Trahan, age 40, his second wife Élisabeth LeBlanc, age 29, and five of their children, three by his first wife and two by Élisabeth--Jean-Charles, age 12; Marie, age 9; Joseph, age 8; Rosalie, age 5; and Anne, age 3--also landed at Morlaix in 1763.  Élisabeth gave Jean-Baptiste another daughter, Jeanne (Albert J. Robichaux, Jr. says the child's name was Charles), in St.-Mathieu Parish, Morlaix, in January 1764, but she/he died there the following July.  Later in the year, the family also went to French Guiane, where French officials counted them at Sinnamary on 1 March 1765.  Typical for them, they did not remain.  They returned to France later in the year or in early 1766, landed at Bordeaux, moved on to St.-Malo in October 1766, and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where Élisabeth gave Jean-Baptiste two more sons:  Jean-Pierre in December 1766 but died at Hôtel-Dieu, St.-Malo, in May 1770, age 3 1/2; and Mathurin-Pierre in July 1769.  Again, they moved on.  Jean-Baptiste took his family back to Morlaix aboard Le Bonne-Mere in April 1771, where Élisabeth gave him another son, Jean-Baptiste-Marie, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in February 1772.  Jean-Baptiste's brother Joseph, 33, wife Anne Boudrot, age 33, and their three children--Madeleine, age 13; Paul, age 10; and newborn Jean-Joseph--followed his older brother from England to Morlaix.  They, too, went to French Guiane, but, unlike brother Jean-Baptiste and his family, Joseph and Anne remained in the tropical colony.  Jean-Baptiste and Joseph's youngest brother Pierre-Isidore, called Isidore, age 31, wife Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc, age 32, and two of their children--Jacques, age 10; and Madeleine, age 2--also landed at Morlaix in 1763.  Daughter Madeleine died in St.-Mathieu Parish in July 1764, age 3.  Marie-Madeleine gave Isidore two more children at Morlaix:  Paul-Isidore in St.-Mathieu Parish in March 1764; and Jean-Baptiste in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in February 1766 but died there less than a month after his birth.  Isidore and Marie-Madeleine did not follow his brothers to French Guiane, nor did they remain at Morlaix.  In November 1766, they and their surviving sons moved on to St.-Malo and settled at St.-Servan-sur-Mer, where, between 1767 and 1772, Marie-Madeleine gave Isidore four more children:  Alexandre-Jean-Baptiste in March 1767 but died there at age 4 in April 1771; Marie-Jeanne in July 1769; Joseph-Olivier in March 1771 but died at age 1 1/2 in January 1773; and Simon-Augustin in June 1772.  Joseph Trahan, age 30, wife Anne Granger, age 27, and their two daughters--Madeleine, age 4; Marguerite, age 2--landed at Morlaix.  Anne was pregnant on the crossing from England and gave Joseph a son, Joseph, fils, in St.-Mathieu Parish in September 1763.  Landing with them were Joseph's brother Pierre-Simon, age 28, wife Marie-Josèphe Granger, age 24, and their two sons--Jean-Baptiste, age 3; and Joseph-Simon, age 1 1/2.  Marie-Josèphe gave Pierre-Simon two more sons at Morlaix:  Pierre-Simon, fils in June 1763 soon after their arrival; and Paul-Raymond in St.-Mathieu Parish in August 1765.  Landing with Joseph and Pierre-Simon were brother Chrysostôme, age 23, and wife Anne-Françoise Granger, age 19 or 20.  Anne-Françoise gave Chrysostôme a daughter, Anne-Julie, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in July 1765.  Also with the three brothers were sister Anne, age 18; and youngest brother Paul, age 12.  The brothers' first cousin Louis-Athanase Trahan, age 29, wife Marguerite LeBlanc, age 25, and their 2-year-old daughter Marie also landed at Morlaix.  With Louis and Marguerite were his younger sister Cécile-Pélagie, age 14; and younger brother Philippe, age 12.  Marguerite gave Louis-Athanase two sons at Morlaix:  Simon-Laurent in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in October 1763; and Jean-Marie in June 1765.  Daughter Marie died in St.-Mathieu Parish, age 3, in July 1764.  After spending eight years near Sauzon on Belle-Île-en-Mer, Louis and Marguerite, with four more children, returned to Morlaix in 1773.  First cousin Sylvestre Trahan, age 39, wife Ursule Darois, age 49, and their five sons--Joseph, age 15; Mathurin, age 13; Jean-Charles, age 11; Simon, age 9; and Romain, age 7--landed at Morlaix in 1763.  With them was Sylvestre's brother Simon, age 23, who married Catherine-Josèphe dite Josette, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Richard and Marie-Josèphe LeBlanc, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in June 1765 on the eve of their going to Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Madeleine Trahan, age 59, widow of Joseph Hébert, her second husband, landed at Morlaix in 1763 with two of her Hébert children--a son, age 18; and a daughter, age 17.  Pierre Trahan, age 67, was perhaps a widower when he landed at Morlaix in 1763.  His second son Pierre, fils, age 40, third wife Madeleine Vincent, age 49, and young kinsman François Trahan, age 9, who Pierre, fils was raising, followed Pierre, père there.  Pierre, père's youngest son Joachim-Hyacinthe, age 28, second wife Marie-Madeleine Duon, age 24, and three of their children--Marie-Blanche, age 8, from his first wife Marguerite Landry; Joseph, age 2; and Simon, age 1--also followed.  Marie-Madeleine gave Joachim-Hyacinthe another daughter, Anne-Isabelle, at Morlaix in Sepember 1764.  René Trahan, age 28, wife Anne LeBlanc, age undetermined, and son Raphaël, age 1 1/2, landed at Morlaix.  Anne died there in 1764, age unrecorded.  René remarried on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Landing with René and Anne were his brother Pierre, age 26, wife Marguerite Duon, age 21, and infant daughter Geneviève.  Marguerite gave Pierre a son, Jean-Baptiste, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in April 1764.  René and Pierre's first cousin Jean-Baptiste Trahan, age 28, wife Madeleine-Modeste Hébert, age 22, and son Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 2, landed at Morlaix.  Madeleine gave Jean-Baptiste another son, Jean-Michel, in St.-Mathieu Parish in August 1764.  A Jean-Baptiste Trahan, age 9, died at Morlaix in February 1765.  The St.-Mathieu Parish priest who recorded the burial did not give the boy's parents' names.  One wonders if he was Jean-Baptiste, fils.  Jean-Baptiste's brother Paul landed at Morlaix in 1763 and married cousin Marie-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians René Trahan and Marguerite Melanson of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish in March 1767.  Marie-Josèphe gave Paul at least six children there:  Paul-Alexis in November 1768; Jean-Baptiste in March 1772; Marie-Jeanne in August 1775; Joseph-Marie in March 1778; Pierre-François in November 1779; and Marguerite-Basile in October 1781.  They were still at Morlaix in September 1784 with only two of their sons, Paul-Alexis and Pierre-François.  The other children evidently had died by then. 

In late 1763 and early 1764, island Acadians and Acadians repatriated from England, including Trahans, agreed to help settle the new French colony of Guiane on the northern coast of South America.  Alexandre or Alexis Trahan from Morlaix, age 49, wife Marie-Françoise Levron, age 49, and their three children--Isabelle, age 17; Thomas, age 8; and Alexandre, fils, age 6--appear in the 1 March 1765 census at Sinnamary in the Cayene district.  One wonders what happened to them after the counting.  Charles Trahan, the sailor from St.-Servan-sur-Mer, wife Louise Closquinet, and their two daughters sailed to the South American colony aboard Le Fort in April 1764.  None of them appear in the March 1765 census at Sinnamary, so they may have settled in another part of the district.  Charles died by August 1765, in his early 30s, when Marie-Louise remarried to Frenchman Antoine-Joseph-Christophe Verge of Perpignan in St.-Saviour Parish, Cayenne.  One wonders what happened to her Trahan daughters, who would have been ages 5 and 1 at the time of their mother's remarriage.  Élisabeth Trahan, age 26, husband Pierre Saulnier, age 23, and daughter Marguerite, age 2, appear on the 1 March 1765 Sinnamary counting.  They remained.  Élisabeth, a widow, died in St.-Joseph Parish, Sinnamary, in August 1787, age 50.  Françoise Trahan, age 17, husband Pierre-Pascal Hébert, and their year-old daughter Élisabeth from Morlaix appear in the March 1 counting.  The census taker noted that Pascal was suffering from "fievre."  It must have killed him soon afterward because when Françoise returned to France in the 1765 or 1766 and went to live with older brother Pierre on Belle-Île-en-Mer, she was a widow.  She also was childless, because, according to Bona Arsenault, daughter Élisabeth had died in the tropical colony.  Jean-Baptiste Trahan from Morlaix, age 40, wife Élisabeth LeBlanc, age 30, and four of their children--Jean-Charles, age 16; Joseph, age 14; Marie, age 12; Rosalie, age 6; and Anne, age 4--were counted on March 1 at Sinnamary, but they did not remain.  Later in the year or in 1766 they returned to France and landed at Bordeaux.  Joseph Trahan, fils from Boulogne-sur-Mer, a sailor, and wife Marie-Sophie Leprince, recently married, went to Guiane without children and do not appear in the March 1 Sinnamary census.  By 1766, they were back in France.  Joseph Trahan from Morlaix, age 36, called Jean by the recording official (he was Jean-Baptiste's younger brother, perhaps the origin of the confusion), Joseph's wife Anne Boudrot, age 36, and their three children--Madeleine, age 16; Paul, age 13; and Jean-Joseph, age 2--appear in the March 1 Sinnamary census and remained there.  Son Jean-Joseph, called an "Englishman of nationality," another way of saying he was born in England, died at Sinnamary in November 1765, age 3.  Joseph died near Cayenne in c1767, in his late 30s.  Daughter Madeleine, at age 20, married Canadian André-Joseph Jacquet in July 1769 in St.-Joseph Parish, Sinnamary, and remarried, at age 24, to Joseph, 25-year-old son of fellow Acadians Pierre Saulnier and Marguerite Vincent of Rivière-aux-Canards, in St.-Joseph Parish in January 1773.  Madeleine died at Sinnamary in July 1775, age 26.  Her mother Anne had died by then.  Marie Trahan, age 22, and husband Pierre Hébert, age 28, appear separately on the 1 March 1765 Sinnamary census, so they may have married soon afterwards.  Marie died in St.-Joseph Parish, Sinnamary, that May. 

In the fall of 1765, Acadians repatriated from England, and a few island Acadians, agreed to become part of an agricultural venture on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany.  Of the Acadian families who went to the island, only the LeBlancs outnumbered the Trahans, and the Trahans likely would have been the largest Acadian family on Belle-Île-en-Mer if any of their relatives from St.-Malo had gone there.  Trahans settled in three of the island's four districts:  Sauzon on the north, Bangor in the southern interior, and Locmaria on the southeast coast.  Many of them did not remain.  Madeleine Trahan, age 61 in 1765, widow of Joseph Hébert, her second husband, and two of her Hébert children, ages 20 and 19, settled at Kervargeon near Bangor.  Madeleine died near Sauzon in November 1766, age 62.  Her son moved on to Paimboeuf, the lower port of Nantes, by 1773.  Her daughter had returned to Morlaix by then.  Pierre Trahan, age 70, probably a widower, settled at Bordehouat near Locmaria.  He died on the island in 1772, in his mid-70s.  His second son Pierre, fils, age 43 in 1765, third wife Madeleine Vincent, age 51, and kinsman François Trahan, age 12, who Pierre, fils was raising, settled at Gouélan near Bangor.  They did not remain on the island.  By 1782, Pierre, fils and Madeleine, at least, moved on to the lower Loire port of Nantes in southeast Brittany.  Pierre, fils's younger brother Joachim-Hyacinthe, age 31 in 1765, second wife Marie-Madeleine Duon, age 26, and four of their children, two daughters and two sons, settled at Magouric near Locmaria.  Marie-Madeleine gave Joachim seven more children on the island:  Cécile-Pauline in August 1766 but died the following October; Augustin in c1767; Marie-Félicité in January 1770; Catherine in April 1773; Jean-Marie in c1775; Marie-Victoire in July 1781 but died the following February; and Marie-Vincente in April 1784--11 children, seven daughters and four sons, by two wives, between 1755 and 1784, in greater Acadia, England, and France.  Meanwhile, Joachim's sons created their own families on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Oldest son Joseph married Marie-Françoise, called Françoise, daughter of locals Luc Thomas and Françoise L'Hermite of Kerdonis, at Locmaria in June 1783 and settled there.  Françoise gave Joseph at least three children at Kerdonis:  Marie-Augustine in February 1784; Jean-Marie-Barnabé in June 1786; and Luc in November 1788.  Joachim's second son Simon married Marie-Josèphe or -Jeanne, daughter of Michel Droual and Marie-Michelle Galonne or Gallen of Liverpool, England, at Locmaria in June 1783; the marriage also was recorded at Lorient in southern Brittany.  They settled at Magouric near Locmaria.  Marie gave Simon at least three children there:  Marie-Louise in August 1784 but died at age 3 in November 1787; Marie-Josèphe in April 1786 but died at age 1 1/2 in November 1787; and Jean-Marie-Luc in October 1787.  As the birth dates of their children reveal, both Joseph and Simon remained on the island when their parents and younger siblings moved on to Nantes in c1784.  Sylvestre Trahan, age 43 in 1765, wife Ursule Darois, age 41, and their five sons settled at Triboutoux near Sauzon.  Ursule died on the island in 1776, in her early 60s, and Sylvestre, at age 53, remarried to Françoise, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Martin and Madeleine Girouard, at Sauzon in June 1777.  Françoise gave Sylvestre twins sons, Joseph and Mathurin le jeune, in January 1781--seven sons, by two wives, between 1748 and 1781, in greater Acadia, England, and France.  The twins died soon after their birth, as did wife Françoise.  Sylvestre did not remarry again.  He died near Sauzon in April 1786, in his early 60s.  Four of his older sons, all by first wife Ursule, married on the island, two of them to sisters.  Second son Mathurin l'aîné married Nicole-Marie-Louise, daughter of locals Pierre LeLuc or Le Luch and Jeanne Thomas, at Sauzon in January 1777.  After living at Lorient in southern Brittany, where Mathurin worked on a royal farm, they returned to Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Nicole gave Mathurin at least six children in both places:  Charles-Marie in either Lorient or Sauzon in December 1777; Simon-Marie near Sauzon in January 1780 but died at age 5 1/2 in November 1785; Andrés in December 1781; Marguerite in October 1783; Jeanne-Marie in July 1785; and Pierre-François in June 1787.  Sylvestre's fifth son Romain married local girl Anne Kédonis at Sauzon in February 1783.  They settled at Triboutoux near Sauzon, where she gave him at least two daughters:  Ursule in January 1784; and Pélagie in September 1785.  Third son Jean-Charles married Marie-Renée, another daughter of Pierre LeLuc and Marie-Jeanne Thomas, at Sauzon in May 1783.  They settled at Kergostio near Sauzon and had at least two daughters there:  Hélène in March 1784 but died at age 1 1/2 in December 1785; and Marie-Anne in August 1787.  Fourth son Simon le jeune married local girl Marie-Françoise Querel at Sauzon in October 1788.  As these birth and marriage dates reveal, all four brothers remained on the island in 1785  Sylvestre's brother Simon, age 26 in 1765, and wife Catherine-Josèphe dite Josette Richard, age 18, newlyweds, settled at Triboutoux near Sauzon.  Josette gave Simon five children on the island:  Pierre-Simon in June 1766; Marie-Josèphe in March 1767; Pierre-François in September 1770 but died died at age 1 1/2 in July 1772; Simon-Nicolas in October 1775; and Rose-Victoire in January 1777.  Simon died near Sauzon in c1780, in his late 30s.  His family also remained on the island.  Sylvestre and Simon's first cousin Joseph Trahan, age 32, wife Anne Granger, age 28, and their three children, two daughters and a son, settled at Kerguenolay near Bangor.  Anne gave Joseph five more children on the island:  Jean-Baptiste in c1766 but died at age 6 1/2 in July 1773; Anne-Marie-Françoise in July 1768; Marie-Julie in March 1771; François-Marie in August 1773; and Nicole-Julie in May 1776--eight children, five daughters and three sons, between 1759 and 1776, in England and France.  Joseph sold his concession at Kerguenolay in 1776 and took his family to Paimboeuf.  Brother Pierre-Simon, age 30 in 1765, wife Marie-Josèphe Granger, age 24, and their four sons settled at Kerguenolay near Bangor.  Son Simon-Pierre died near Bangor in December 1768, age 6.  Marie-Josèphe gave Pierre-Simon five more children on the island:  Étienne-Augustin in c1767; Marie-Madeleine in June 1769; Reine-Marie or Marie-Renée in September 1771; Élisabeth-Marguerite in November 1773; and Marie-Françoise in February 1775.  Pierre-Simon also sold his concession at Kerguenolay and followed brother Joseph to Paimboeuf.  Brother Chrysostôme, age 26 in 1765, wife Anne-Françoise Granger, age 22, and their infant daughter settled at Kerlan near Bangor.  Anne-Françoise gave Chrysôstome four more children on the island:  Marie-Madeleine in January 1768; Marie-Marthe in October 1770; Jean-Chrysostôme in August 1774; and Joseph-Rose in April 1777.  In 1777, Chrysostôme sold his concession at Kerland and took his family to Nantes.  Sister Anne, age 20 in 1765, and youngest brother Paul, age 13, settled at Kerguenolay near two of their brothers.  One source says Anne and Paul were back at Morlaix in 1773, "destiny unknown."  Another source says Paul, at age 35, married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Arsenault and Madeleine Boudrot, at Bangor in 1786 and remained.  One wonders what happened to Anne.  The brothers' first cousin Louis-Athanase Trahan, age 31 in 1765, wife Marguerite LeBlanc, age 27, and their two sons, along with his sister Cécile, settled at Borderun near Sauzon.  Marguerite gave Louis Athanase four more children there:  Marie-Blanche in August 1767; Marie-Marguerite, called Marguerite, in July 1769; Joseph-Simon in June 1771 but died the following January; and Anne, birth date not given.  Louis-Athanase took his growing family back to Morlaix in 1773.  René Trahan the widower, age 30 in 1765, and his son Raphaël, age 4, by first wife Anne LeBlanc settled at Calastren near Bangor.  René remarried to Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians René Landry and Marie-Rose Rivet of Grand-Pré, at St.-Gérand-du-Palais on the island in February 1766.  Madeleine gave René two more children there:  Marie-Marguerite in July 1767; and Pierre-René in October 1770 but died at age 1 1/2 in July 1772--three children, two sons and a daughter, by two wives, between 1761 and 1770, in England and France.  René died near Bangor in January 1770, age 35.  Only his older son Raphaël, by his first wife, survived childhood.  Well into middle age, Raphaël married on the island.  René's brother Pierre, fils, age 29 in 1765, wife Marguerite Duon, age 24, and their two children, a daughter and a son, settled at Calastren near Bangor.  His younger sister Françoise, widowed in French Guiane, came to live with them in 1766 or 1767.  Marguerite gave Pierre, fils eight more children on the island:  Élisabeth Apolline near Bangor in January 1767; Marie-Marguerite in November 1768; Catherine-Marguerite in c1769; Marie-Jeanne in May 1770; Marie-Anne, called Anne, in March 1772; Marie-Françoise in January 1774; Marie-Madeleine in July 1775; and Joseph-Marie in April 1777--10 children, eight daughters and two sons, between 1763 and 1777, in England and France.  In 1777, Pierre, fils and Marguerite sold their island concession to uncle Cypien Duon and moved on to Nantes.  One wonders if sister Françoise went with them.  First cousin Jean-Baptiste Trahan, age 30 in 1765, wife Madeleine-Modeste Hébert, age 25, and their two sons--Jean-Baptiste, fils, age 4; and Jean-Michel, age 1--settled at Bormanahic near Locmaria.  Madeleine gave Jean-Baptiste six more children on the island:  Pierre-Marie in September 1766; Marie-Louise in August 1768; Jeanne-Félicité in August 1770; Marie-Perrotte in March or May 1772 but died a day after her birth; Jean-François in July 1774; and Charles-Marie in February 1777.  They, too, sold their concession in 1777 and moved to Nantes. 

By the early 1770s, French authorities were weary of providing for the exiles still languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned in the interior province of Poitou near the city of Châtellerault.  Hundreds of Acadians went there in 1773 and 1774, Trahans among them, including Augustin Trahan and wife Bibianne LeBlanc from Boulogne-sur-Mer and Rochefort; Claude Trahan le jeune, a widower from Boulogne-sur-Mer, St.-Servan-sur-Mer, and Morlaix; Claude le jeune's oldest son Jean-Baptiste and wife Marguerite Vincent dit Clément from Boulogne-sur-Mer, St.-Servan, and Morlaix; and Olivier Trahan and wife Élisabeth Lejeune from Châteauneuf and St.-Servan.  Jean-Baptiste Trahan and second wife Élisabeth LeBlanc from Morlaix, French Guiane, Bordeaux, and St.-Servan settled at Châtellerault, where son François was baptized in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish in March 1775, age unrecorded.  Jean-Baptiste's younger brother Pierre-Isidore and wife Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc from Morlaix and St.-Servan also settled at Châtellerault, where son Alexis-Romain was baptized in St.-Jean l'Evangeliste Parish in March 1774, age unrecorded.  Joseph Trahan and wife Marie Boudrot from Pleudihen-sur-Rance settled near Bonnes south of Châtellerault, where son Joseph, fils, evidently the second with the name, died at age 3 in July 1774.  Louis-Athanase Trahan and wife Marguerite LeBlanc from Morlaix and Belle-Île-en-Mer settled at Châtelleraualt, where daughter Élisabeth-Adélaïde was baptized in St.-Jacques Parish in July 1775, age unrecorded.  Louis-Athanase died there in September 1775, age 41.  Newlyweds Mathurin Trahan, the sailor, and wife Thérèse-Marguerite Lahaye from Boulogne-sur-Mer and Rochefort settled at Châtellerault, where Thérèse gave Mathurin two daughters in St.-Jacques Parish:  Marie-Modeste in July 1774; and Thérèse-Sophie in August 1775.  Marie-Sophie Leprince from Boulogne-sur-Mer, French Guiane, Île d'Aix, Rochefort, and St.-Servan, widow of Joseph Trahan, Mathurin's older brother, and her son Antoine-Joseph also settled in St.-Jacques Parish, Châtellerault. 

After two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians deserted the venture.  From October 1775 through March 1776, hundreds of them, including the Trahans, retreated in four convoys from Châtellerault down the Vienne and the Loire to the port of Nantes, where they lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Bibianne LeBlanc gave Augustin Trahan four more children at Nantes and nearby Chantenay:  Félix in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in March 1776 but died by June 1785, age about 9; Pierre in c1777 but died at Chantenay, age 8, in February 1784; Rosalie-Bibianne at Chantenay in March 1778 but died the following July; and Jacques-Augustin in May 1779 but died the following September--seven children, three daughters and four sons, between 1767 and 1779, in France.  Only second daughter Marie-Modeste, born at Rochefort, remained.  Claude Trahan le jeune, who never remarried, died at Chantenay in November 1777, in his late 50s.  His oldest son Jean-Baptiste, a sailor, and wife Marguerite Vincent dit Clément, also settled at Chantenay, where she gave him another son, Frédéric, in March 1777--five children, two sons and three daughters, between 1769 and 1777.  Jean-Baptiste and Marguerite's second and third daughters, Marie-Anne and Barbe-Josèphe, ages 3 and 5, born at St.-Servan and Morlaix, died at Chantenay in February and April 1777, leaving them only a daughter and two sons.  Claude le jeune's third son Joseph married Marguerite, 25-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Lavergne and his first wife Anne Lord of Chignecto, in St.-Nicolas Parish in October 1778.  Marguerite gave Joseph two children there:  Joseph-René in November 1780; and Antoinette in November 1782.  Claude le jeune's second daughter Anne married Gilbert-Bon, son of Jean Brety and Jeanne Barry of Herisson Parish, Chateloy, Diocese of Bourg, France, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in August 1780.  Claude le jeune's younger brother Jean-Baptiste, his second wife Élisabeth LeBlanc, and their large family settled in several parishes at Nantes and Chantenay, where two more of their sons died:  Mathurin in June 1777 at age 8 in St.-Jacques Parish; and François in July 1777 at age 2 1/2 in Ste.-Croix Parish.  Élisabeth gave Jean-Baptiste two more daughters in the lower Loire port:  Marie-Modeste in Ste.-Croix Parish in April 1778 but died at age 4 at Chantenay in September 1782; and Marie-Sophie at Chantenay in February 1782 but died there three weeks after her baptism--a dozen children, seven sons and five daughters, by two wives, between 1751 and 1782, in greater Acadia, England, and France, most of whom died young.  Claude le jeune and Jean-Baptiste's youngest brother Pierre-Isidore and his wife Marie-Madeleine LeBlanc had two more daughters at Nantes:  Rosalie in St.-Jacques Parish in November 1776; and Anne-Oliver in February 1778 but died at age 5 in Ste.-Croix Parish in September 1783--11 children, seven sons and four daughters, between 1753 and 1783, in greater Acadia, England, and France, fewer than half of whom survived childhood.  Pierre-Isidore died in Ste.-Croix Parish in August 1782, age 50.  Thérèse Lahaye, wife of Mathurin Trahan the sailor, who likely was at sea, setted in Ste.-Croix Parish, where younger daughter Thérèse-Sophie died at age 9 months in May 1776.  After Mathurin returned to his family, Thérèse gave him two more children at nearby Chantenay:  Mathurin, fils in July 1777 but died the following October; and Rose-Michelle in January 1779 but died at age 1 1/2 in July 1780--four children, three daughters and a son, between 1774 and 1779, only one of whom, oldest daughter Marie-Modeste, survived childhood.  Olivier Trahan and wife Élisabeth Lejeune settled in St.-Jacques Parish, where Élisabeth died in September 1783, age 50.

Trahans who had retreated from Poitou in 1775-76 were joined at Nantes, Chantenay, and Paimboeuf by many of their cousins from Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Most of the Trahans who had gone to the lovely island, in fact, moved on to Nantes and other Breton ports in the 1770s or early 1780s.  Pierre Trahan, fils and his third wife Madeleine Vincent from Bangor settled in St.-Similien Parish, Nantes, where Madeleine died in September 1782, age 58.  At age 59, Pierre, fils remarried yet again--his fourth marriage--to Marie, 32-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Clémenceau and his second wife Françoise Gautrot, in St.-Donatien Parish, Nantes, in February 1783.  Marie gave him a daughter, Louise-Renée, his only child by four wives, at Chantenay in January 1784.  One wonders what happened to Pierre, fils's charge, François Trahan, who had landed with him and wife Madeleine at Morlaix in 1763, when he was age 9.  The boy settled with them at Gouélan near Bangor in late 1765, and would have been age 31 in 1785.  Did he marry and remain on Belle-Île-en-Mer, or did he accompany Pierre, fils and Madeleine to Nantes and then disappeared from the historical record?  Pierre, fils's brother Joachim-Hyacinthe and second wife Marie-Madeleine Duon from Locmaria settled at Chantenay.  Joachim's oldest daughter Marie-Blanche from his first wife Marguerite Landry married Germain, son of Guillaume Caillo and Perrine Guymar of d'Evan, diocese of Vannes, Brittany, in St.-Similien Parish in November 1784.  Marie-Madeleine Duon died at Chantenay in April 1785, in her late 40s.  Joachim-Hyacinthe did not remarry.  Joseph Trahan and wife Anne Granger from Bangor settled at Paimboeuf, where their youngest daughter Nicole-Julie died at age 1 in April 1777.  Joseph died at Paimbouef in December 1778, age 45.  Anne did not remarry.  Her and Joseph's oldest daughter Marie-Madeleine married Antoine-Julien, son of François Archier and Marie-Anne Julian of St.-Sauveur Parish, Archbishopric of Aix, and resident of Paimboeuf, in the lower port in April 1785.  She gave him a son only a few weeks after their marriage.  Joseph's brother Pierre-Simon and wife Marie-Josèphe Granger from Bangor also settled at Paimboeuf, where two more children were born:  Marie-Marguerite, called Marguerite, in March 1777; and Jean-Baptiste in May 1779 but died the following December--11 children, six sons and five daughters, between 1760 and 1779, in England and France.  Pierre-Simon died at Paimboeuf in February 1781, age 45.  A son and a daughter died within days of one another at Paimboeuf that April--Étienne-Augustine at age 14; and Marie-Madeleine at age 11--leaving the widow with only four children, two sons and two daughters.  She did not remarry.  Joseph and Pierre-Simon's brother Chrysostôme and wife Anne-Françoise Granger from Bangor settled at Chantenay, where she gave him two more children:  Marguerite in January 1780; and Reiné- or Renée-Sophie in March 1784--seven children, five daughters and two sons, between 1765 and 1784, all of whom survived childhood.  Marguerite LeBlanc, widow of the brothers' first cousin Louis-Athanase Trahan, and her six children from Sauzon settled at Chantenay.  At age 44, Marguerite remarried to Jean, Jr., son of Jean Scott and Elizabeth Belly of St.-André, Isle of Guernsey, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in November 1782.  Her oldest Trahan daughter Marie-Blanche married Joseph, fils, son of fellow Acadians Joseph Breau and Marie-Madeleine Vincent, at St.-Martin de Chantenay in May 1785.  Pierre Trahan, wife Marguerite Duon, and their eight remaining children from Bangor setted in St.-Similien Parish, where youngest daughter Marie-Madeleine died in May 1779, age 4.  They moved to nearby Chantenay, where their oldest son, Jean-Baptiste, died in March 1785, age 21.  First cousin Jean-Baptiste Trahan and wife Madeleine-Modeste Hébert from Locmaria settled at Chantenay, where their youngest son Charles-Marie died in March 1778, age 13 months.  The following year, Marie-Modeste gave Jean-Baptiste another daughter there, Marguerite-Jeanne, in August 1779,  but she died at age 1 in September 1780--nine children, five sons and four daughters, between 1760 and 1779, in England and France, only half of whom survived childhood.  Sometime in the early 1780s, oldest son Jean-Baptiste, fils, perhaps a sailor, emigrated to Spanish Louisiana, where some of his cousins had gone two decades earlier.  One family of exiles from England seems to have moved to Nantes directly from the Rance valley south of St.-Malo.  Joseph Trahan and wife Marie Boudrot from Pleudihen-sur-Rance settled in St.-Jacques Parish, Nantes, by November 1784, when second son Mathurin married Perrine-Marguerite, daughter of locals Charles Orry and Perrine Herve of St.-Jacques Parish, there.

When in the early 1780s the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least 98 Trahans at Nantes, Chantenay, Paimboeuf, and Morlaix agreed to take it.  They were, in fact, one of the largest families to fill the holds of the Seven Ships expeditions; only the Héberts outnumbered them.  Not just larger in number and more peripatetic than most of the Acadian families in France, these Trahans, the majority of the family there, agreed to endure yet another trans-Atlantic voyage, for some of them their fourth ocean crossing.  Nevertheless, many Trahans in France, especially the ones who had married locals on Belle-Île-en-Mer, chose to remain.  Some of the Trahans who had moved from the Belle-Île-en-Mer to Nantes and other Breton ports also remained. 

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and sought refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or moved on to Canada, where they gathered at Québec.  Life in the crowded Canadian capital came with a price.  For the first time in their lives, Acadians were exposed to the hazards of an urban environment.  A number of them died at Québec as early as 1756.  The following summer, Acadian refugees in the Québec area began to die in ever greater numbers.  Smallpox, a disease scarcely known on the Fundy shore, killed hundreds of Acadians in and around the Canadian citadel from the summer of 1757 to the spring of 1758, at least four island Trahans among them.  This did not endear the refugees to their Canadian hosts, who saw them more as burdens than as reliable compatriots in their struggle against the British.  After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In late June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to resist a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche.  None were Trahans.  In the following months, more Acadians either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area and held in prison compounds in Nova Scotia for the rest of the war.  In October 1762, British officials counted Michel Trahan and his family of six at Fort Edward, near the family's old homesteads at Pigiguit.  In August 1763, the British counted more members of the family on Georges Island in Halifax harbor, including Eursule, actually Ursule, Trahan, widow of Joseph-Grégoire Broussard, with three unnamed Broussard children; Jean Trahan, "widow," with four unnamed children; and René Trahan, his unnamed wife [Isabelle Broussard], and two unnamed children. 

The war over, exiles being held in the British seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  At least four Trahan families--those of Jean and sons Pierre and Joseph, and Jean's nephew Charles, all from Rivière-aux-Canards--appeared on French repatriation lists in Massachusetts in August 1763.  In June of that year in Pennsylvania, Bruneau Trahan, "widower," of l'Assomption, Pigiguit, was still in the colony with five children.  A cousin from Minas--Grégoire, son of Charles Trahan, who had been held with his family in Massachusetts, married a fellow Acadian, Marguerite Bourque, at Philadelphia in September 1780 and died there in September 1811, in his late 50s.  One wonders if he had followed his family to Yamachiche on the upper St. Lawrence in the mid-1760s, when he would have been in his early or mid-teens, and resettled in the Quaker City after he came of age.  In July 1763, repatriation lists circulating in Maryland counted Charles Trahan, wife Margueritte [Thibodeau], and daughters Margueritte and Brigitte at Princess Anne on the lower Eastern Shore.  Even more Trahans were being held at Port Tobacco on the lower Potomac, including Claire [Trahan], husband Charles Braux, and six of their children; and Marguerite [Trahan], husband Antoine Braux, and their four children.  Also at Port Tobacco were Honoré Trahan, wife Marie [Corporon], daughter Marie and son Pierre; Honoré's sister Anne, husband Louis Latier, their son, and three Benoit daughters from Anne's first marriage; and five Lejeune orphans.  After a four-year sojourn in North Carolina beginning in December 1755, they had been allowed to leave that colony in 1760 and join their relatives in Maryland. 

Most of the Acadians in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, including Trahans, chose to resettle in Canada, where their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Guillaume Trahan began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Trahans could be found on the upper St. Lawrence at St.-Philippe and Laprairie across from Montréal, Yamachiche above Trois-Rivières, and Québec City.  On the lower St.-Lawrence, they could be found at St.-Charles de Bellechasse, St.-François-du-Sud, and St.-Thomas de Montmagny.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

After the war, at least one Trahan chose to resettle in the French Antilles, at Le Cardénange on Île Ste.-Lucie south of Martinique, where they could escape British rule.  Agathe-Blanche, daughter of Jean Trahan and Marie Girouard of Pigiguit, was age 15 when she was counted with her parents and her siblings at Baie-des-Espagnols, Île Royale, in April 1752.  Agathe remained on the Maritime island and married carpenter Jean Princhard dit Potvin at Louisbourg in May 1754.  The rest of her family deserted Île Royale and took refuge in Canada by the fall of 1756.  One wonders if Agathe-Blanche and her husband went with them.  Her parents died in the spring of 1758 during the yellow fever epidemic at Québec.  By November 1770, Agathe, now a widow in her early 30s, was living on Ste.-Lucie, where she remarried to another carpenter, Nicolas Grenard, a widower from Louisbourg, at Le Cardénage.  She died there in January 1777, age 41. 

Trahans being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the British colonies had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765 bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least 13 were Trahans. 

The Trahans in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians in Maryland that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  In April 1767, Marie-Josèphe Trahan, widow of Michel dit Michaud LeBlanc, and two of her children left Baltimore aboard the ship Virgin in the second expedition from the Chesapeake colony to New Orleans.  The following December, eight Trahans--Charles, second wife Marguerite Thibodeau, and their three children; Anne Trahan, husband Honoré Breau, and their three children; Claire Trahan, widow of Charles Breau, and her four children; and Madeleine Trahan, husband Alexis Breau, and their six children--left Port Tobacco for New Orleans in the third expedition to the Spanish colony.  Charles's wife was pregnant when they left Maryland and gave birth to a daughter at New Orleans in June 1768.  In early January 1769, four more Trahans--Honoré, wife Marie Corporon, and their son Pierre; Honoré's daughter Marie, her husband Antoine Bellard, and their son; Honoré's sister Anne, her second husband Louis Latier, their three children, and three of her Benoit daughters from her first husband; and five Lejeune orphans--departed Port Tobacco aboard the British schooner Britannia on what proved to be the fourth and final expedition from Maryland to Louisiana.335

Villejoin

In 1755, the descendants of Gabriel-Louis Rousseau, sieur de Villejoin, also Villejouin, of Blois, France, and Marie-Josèphe Bertrand of Plaisance, Newfoundland, could be found on the Maritime islands of Île Royale and Île St.-Jean.  Living in territory controlled by France, the Rousseau de Villejoins and Rousseau d'Orfontaines escaped the roundups in British Nova Scotia during the fall of 1755.  Gabriel-Louis and Marie-Josèphe's older son Gabriel, fils, in fact, had been commandant of Île St.-Jean for a year when Nova Scotia's Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence and the colonial council in Halifax ordered the deportations of the Acadians under their control in late July 1755.  Three years earlier, in 1752, a French official had counted 2,223 inhabitants on Île St.-Jean, up from 735 four years earlier.  It was Gabriel Rousseau de Villejoin, fils's sad duty, as commandant of the island, to care for the hundreds of refugees who fled from Nova Scotia to Île St.-Jean in the autumn and winter of 1755, most of them with little more than the shirts on their backs.  (The entire population of Cobeguit, for instance, escaped to Île St.-Jean that autumn and into the following spring when they heard the British were rounding up their fellow Acadians north and west of them.)  Governor-General Vaudreuil at Québec did his best to send relief to the island.  In an August 1756 letter to the Minister of Marine, Vaudreuil painted a dismal picture of conditions on the island:  "Misery is great on Île Saint Jean," he wrote.  "Most of the inhabitants are without bread, M. de Villejoin having fed 1,257 refugees since last autumn."  That same year, Commandant de Villejoin informed the governor that there were now 4,400 Acadians on the overcrowded island! 

The suffering of the Acadians on Île St.-Jean had only just begun.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats rounded up most of the habitants on the island and deported them to France.  Commandant de Villejoin and his family did not escape the deportation.  In August 1758, soon after the fall of Louisbourg, the British arrested him and his fellow officers at Port-La-Joye and held them at Louisbourg as prisoners of war.  In September and October, the British transported them to Spithead near Portsmouth, England.  Gabriel, fils was repatriated to France by the following July.  Wife Barbe Le Neuf de La Vallière, meanwhile, remained at Louisbourg with their children.  They, too, were sent on to France.  Their infant son Louis-Melchior, called N. on the passenger list, age 18 months, crossed to France with the family of Nicolas Bouchard on one of the five British transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-day convoy in late November 1758 and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The boy died at sea.  One wonders how he became separated from his mother.  Gabriel, fils's younger brother Michel, his wife Angélique Le Neuf de La Vallière, and their family were deported directly to France from Île Royale. 

Most of the island Acadians exiled to France settled in the kingdom's port cities, relying largely on royal subsidies to feed their families.  Not so the Rousseau de Villejoins.  Their status as nobles and their good service in greater Acadia led to promotions, not penury.  In May 1760, after his repatriation, Gabriel, fils succeeded his predecessor on Île St.-Jean, Major Claude-Élisabeth Denys de Bonnaventure, as inspector of colonial troops at the naval port of Rochefort on the Bay of Biscay.  In December, Major de Villejoin was named commander of the troops from Canada being garrisoned at Rochefort.  In January 1763, on the eve of the signing of the Treaty of Paris, Gabriel, fils, now a lieutenant-colonel, was named governor of Désirade in the Leeward Islands.  There, he secured commissions for three of his sons and other scions of families who had served with him in the French Maritimes.  When Île de la Désirade was subsumed by the government of Guadaloupe in 1768, Gabriel, fils returned to France and was promoted to brigadier of the King's troops that November.  He retired not long afterwards and died at his home at St.-Jean-d'Angély, Aunis, France, in November 1781, in his early 70s.  Meanwhile, Gabriel, fils's younger brother Michel served as capitaine dans les troupes nationales in French Guiane, on the northern coast of South America, before retiring from the King's service in 1765.  Michel died probably in France after1789, in his 70s. 

Gabriel-Michel, called Michel, Gabriel, fils's second son by his first wife Anne-Angélique de Gannes de Falaise, while in his 20s, had fought in greater Acadia during the war with Britain.  After the war, in the late 1760s, Michel emigrated to French St.-Domingue in the French Antilles probably from France.  Like his father and grandfather, he served as an officer in both the militia and the King's forces.  During his long military career, he was lieutenant pour le roi and capitaine aide-major des milices du quartier at Cayes du Fond and major commandant pour le roi at Tiburon on the big sugar island.  He married Anne-Félicité, called Félicité, daughter of Joseph-Cyprien Reynaud, a prominent planter and militia officer, and Marthe Nicolas, at Cayes du Fond, today's Les Cayes, on the southwest coast of St.-Domingue in October 1771.  Michel and Félicité had at least three children there, including two sons.  Michel was still alive when the slave revolt in St.-Domingue erupted in 1791.  He died at Cayes du Fond in February 1799, age 65.  His children left St.-Domingue, soon to be renamed Haiti, probably soon after their father's death and sought refuge in Cuba.  Three of them emigrated to Louisiana from Cuba perhaps in 1809 with hundreds of other refugees from Haiti.291

Vincent

In 1755, descendants of Pierre Vincent and Anne Gaudet could be found at Annapolis Royal, Rivière-aux-Canards and Pigiguit in the Minas Basin, at Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area west of Chignecto, and on Île St.-Jean.  Le Grand Dérangement of the 1750s scattered this family even farther. 

The Acadians at Chignecto and in the trois-rivières settlements were the first to endure a disruption of their lives.  When British and New-English forces attacked Fort Beauséjour at Chignecto in June 1755, Vincents from Petitcoudiac may have been among the local Acadians who were serving in the fort as militia.  If so, they, too, along with the French troupes de la marine, became prisoners of war when the fort surrendered on June 16.  Lieutenant-Governor Charles Lawrence was so incensed to find so-called French Neutrals fighting with French regulars at Beauséjour he ordered his officers to deport these Acadians to the southernmost seaboard colonies.  Acadians from the trois-rivières ended up in South Carolina and Georgia, including a Pierre Vincent, perhaps Pierre à Michel, who escaped from the workhouse at Charles Town in late January 1756 with several other Acadians and may have attempted to return to greater Acadia via the Carolina back country.  However, most of the Vincents at Petitcoudiac escaped the British and moved on to the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore, while others moved on to Canada, as did the Vincents at Annapolis Royal. 

Few of the Vincents in the Minas Basin escaped the roundup there.  The British deported Joseph Vincent and his large family to Massachusetts.  Pierre Vincent IV and his family; his aunt Marguerite, her husband Joseph Blanchard, and their children; and François-Joseph Vincent and his family went to Pennsylvania.  Anne Vincent and husband Alexandre Doiron, ended up in Maryland.  Minas Basin Vincents also were packed off to Virginia, where they endured a fate worse than most of the other refugees deported from Minas and Pigiguit.  Virginia's governor, Robert Dinwiddie, refused to allow the hundreds of Acadians sent to the Old Dominion to remain in the colony.  Exiles died on the filthy, crowded ships anchored in Hampton Roads while Virginia's authorities pondered their fate.  As winter approached, the governor ordered Acadians from one vessel moved up to Richmond, two of the vessels were unloaded at Hampton, and two more at Norfolk.  Finally, in the spring of 1756, Dinwiddie, his council, and the colony's Burgesses made their decision ... the "papists" must go!  In May, the first shipment of Acadians left for England, and in two weeks all of them had gone--299 to Bristol, 250 to Falmouth, 340 to Southampton, and 336 to Liverpool--1,225 exiles in all by one count.   Their ordeal only worsened in the English ports, where many, including brothers Charles and Joseph Vincent of Minas, died of smallpox at Bristol soon after their arrival.  Vincents also were held at Plymouth, Southampton, and Liverpool.  Seven years later, more than half of the Minas Acadians sent to Virginia had died in England. 

Living in territory controlled by France, the Vincents on Île St.-Jean escaped the fate of their kinsmen in Nova Scotia in 1755.  Several of the Vincents on the island crossed Mer Rouge and took refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore after hearing of the roundups on the British-controlled peninsula, but others remained.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the redcoats descended on both of the Maritime islands, rounded up most of the habitants there, and shipped them to France.  Élisabeth Vincent, her husband Amand Daigre, and their eight children perished aboard the transport Duc Guillaume, which left the Maritimes in late summer and, after suffering a mid-ocean mishap, limped into St.-Malo habor the first of November.  Élisabeth's older half-sisters Marie and Agnès also died on the crossing.  Most of the island Vincents crossed on one of the five deportation transports that left Chédabouctou Bay in a 12-ship convoy in late November and, despite a mid-December storm off the southwest coast of England that sank three other transports, reached St.-Malo together in late January 1759.  The death toll among the 1,033 passengers aboard the Five Ships reached nearly 50 percent, a few of them Vincents.  Anne-Marie Vincent, age 29, crossed with husband Charles Daigre, age 28.  They both survived the ordeal.  Joseph Vincent dit Clément, age 45, crossed with wife Marguerite Hébert, age 50, and seven of their children--Joseph, fils, age 18; Marguerite, age 17; Alexis, age 14; Agathe, age 9; Firmin, age 8; Baptiste, age 4; and Janvier, age 3.  Marguerite and three of the youngest children--Agathe, Baptiste, and Janvier--died at sea.  Brothers Germain Vincent, age 29, and Simon, age 18, crossed together on one of the Five Ships and survived the ordeal. 

Island Vincents did their best to make a life for themselves in the suburbs and villages of the St.-Malo area.  Joseph Vincent dit Clément settled with his children at Pleurtuit on the west side of the river south of St.-Malo before moving on to the St.-Malo suburb of St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  In August 1761, at age 46, Joseph remarried to Marie, 43-year-old daughter of Yves Gratien and Marie Dequel and widow of François Marquis, at Pleurtuit.  She gave him more children in the area:  Joseph-Arnault at Pleurtuit in June 1762; Marie at St.-Servan in October 1763; and Yves-Charles in April 1765--a dozen children, seven sons and five daughters, by two wives, between 1741 and 1765, in greater Acadia and France.  Oldest son Joseph, fils married Perrine, daughter of locals Julien Bodeneuf and Louise Bourges and widow of Mathurin Hoguigue, at Pleurtuit in January 1766.  They were still there in 1772, without any children.  Second son Alexis married Renée, daughter of locals Michel Hoguigue and Marie Erault and widow of Jean Beaumanoir, at Pleurtuit in July 1766.  Renée gave Alexis a small family there:  Guillaume-Julien-Alexis in January 1767; Pierre-Julien in January 1769 but died at age 1 1/2 in November 1770; Perrine-Charlotte died two days after her birth in January 1772; and Renée-Perrine, birth date unrecorded--four children, two sons and two daughters, between 1767 and 1772.  Joseph dit Clément's third son Firmin married Eugènie-Marie, 18-year-old daughter of locals Charles Tardivet and Marie Printel of St.-Jouan-des-Guérets, at St.-Servan in November 1769.  Eugènie-Marie gave Firmin three children there:  Firmin-François in March 1771 but died at age 1 1/2 in October 1772; Jean-Baptiste in June 1772; and Marie-Josseline in February 1774.  Meanwhile, bachelor brothers Germain and Simon Vincent settled at St.-Servan, where Simon, a dozen years younger than his brother, married, at age 31, Théotiste, 25-year-old daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Cyr and Marie-Josèphe Hébert, in February 1772.  Théotiste gave Simon a daughter, Félicité-Jeanne, at St.-Servan in March 1773. 

Island Vincents also landed at Cherbourg and Le Havre in Normandy in 1758-59.  Jean dit Clément, older brother of Joseph Vincent dit Clément of Pleurtuit and St.-Servan, died in the sinking of the transport on which he and his family were sailing, perhaps the Ruby, which was driven by the mid-December storm to the Azores, where it crashed on the rocks of Pico Island, taking 190 Acadians with it.  Jean dit Clément would have been in his mid-40s at the time of his death.  His second wife Marguerite Hébert, at least three of his daughters, and a son and his family may have been among the 120 survivors of the mishap.  If so, they were among the 87 survivors taken to England by the Portuguese ship Santa Catarina, which reached Portsmouth in early February 1759.  The British ship Bird took them on to Le Havre later in the month.  Daughter Élisabeth, by Jean dit Clément's first wife Isabelle Michel, married, at age 18, Pierre, fils, 26-year-old son of Pierre Gueret and Marie-Catherine Hueret of Coutance, Normandy, in St.-François Parish, Le Havre, in May 1764; the recording priest noted that the bride had been a resident of the city for four years.  Daughter Rosalie, also by Jean dit Clément's first wife, married, at age 23, Henri, 22-year-old sailor son of Nicolas Bouton, a mariner, and Marie-Barbe Lange, Conge, or Cauge of Ste.-Anne Parish, Québec, in St.-François Parish in September 1765, about the time of her father's death.  Rosalie died in December 1766, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth.  Jean dit Clément's daughter Marie, probably also from first wife Isabelle, also married to a local Frenchman, Jean Boileu, probably at Le Havre in the early 1760s.  Meanwhile, Jean dit Clément's son Jean, fils, wife Ursule Hébert, and their 2-year-old daughter Blanche landed at Cherbourg, across the Baie de Seine from Le Havre, where he worked as a sailor and "artisan."  Between 1759 and 1763, in Très-Ste.-Trinité Parish, Cherbourg, Ursule gave Jean dit Clément, fils three more children:  Charles in December 1759; Anne-Blanche in March 1761; and Jacques in May 1763 but died at age 1 1/2 at St.-François Parish, Le Havre, in June 1764.  As young Jacques's burial record reveals, by 1764 Jean dit Clément, fils had joined his stepmother and sisters across the bay at Le Havre, where, in St.-François Parish, Ursule gave Jean, fils at least three more children:  Jean-Baptiste-Bernard in January 1765 but died 13 days after his birth; Jean-Baptiste-Henry in March 1766 but died six days after his birth; and Marie-Victoire in June 1767. 

In the spring of 1763, after prolonged negotiations between the French and British governments, the Acadians in England who had gone there from Virginia were repatriated to St.-Malo and to Morlaix in northwest Brittany, Vincents among them.  Antoine Vincent of Pigiguit and Rivière-aux-Canards, age 54, who had lost his wife Madeleine Landry at Southampton during their ordeal there, crossed from Southampton to St.-Malo with his only son Jean, age 21, aboard the transport Ambition.  They settled near their kinsmen at St.-Servan-sur-Mer.  Jean married Jeanne, daughter of locals Jean-Barthélemi Baste and Jeanne Offroy, at St.-Servan in June 1765.  Jeanne gave Jean four children there:  Antoine le jeune in October 1766; Jeanne-Charlotte-Jacquémene in November 1768 but died in December; Alexis-Louis in September 1770; and Perrine-Jeanne in April 1772.  Meanwhile, Marguerite Bodart, age 45, widow of Antoine's younger half-brother Joseph Vincent of Rivière-aux-Canards, who had died of smallpox at Bristol, also was repatriated to France, but she and her family landed at Morlaix down the coast, not at St.-Malo.  With her were daughter Marie-Josèphe, age 17, who had married Frenchman Guillaume Monté or Montet of Périgord at Liverpool the month before their departure, and son Pierre, age 15, her only children.  Marie-Josèphe gave Guillaume Montet a son, Pierre-Vincent, in St.-Martin des Champs Parish, Morlaix, in January 1764.  Another family that had been devastated by their sojourn in Virginia, the four orphans of Antoine and Joseph's youngest brother Charles Vincent, another smallpox victim, also may have landed at Morlaix.  Son Jean was age 17 in 1763, and his sisters Marie-Élisabeth, Rose-Pélagie, and Élisabeth were 15, 10, and 9. 

From December 1763 through November 1764, Acadian exiles departed France for the new French colony of Guiane on the northeastern coast of South America.  Marie, daughter of Jean Vincent dit Clément, père, and her husband Jean Boileau do not appear in the 1 March 1765 census at Sinnamary in the district of Cayenne, so they may have gone to the colony later than most.  Marie first appears in the tropical colony's records on 17 June 1766, when she remarried to Pierre, fils, son of Pierre Devievre and Laurence Gaye of Bordeaux, in St.-Sauveur Parish, Cayenne.  Six years later, in August 1772, she remarried again--her third marriage--to Henry Cauriol of Lhuitre, Champagne, at St.-Sauveur Parish.  In August 1777, Marie, called wife of Louis Camus, so she may have married a fourth time, died in the hospital at Cayenne, no age given. 

In late 1765, Acadians repatriated from England and a few who had been deported from the French Maritime islands agreed to become part of a new agricultural settlement, this one on Belle-Île-en-Mer off the southern coast of Brittany. Vincents were among them.  Marguerite Bodart and her family settled at Kervarigeon near Bangor in the island's southern interior, and the four orphans of Charles Vincent settled in the same district.  Between 1765 and 1779, Marie-Josèphe Vincent gave husband Guillaume Montet seven more children on the island:  Marie-Françoise near Le Palais on the island's east coast in November 1765 soon after their arrival and probaby on the eve of their assignment to the Bangor district; Joseph-Adam at Bangor in July 1767; Marie-Élisabeth in September 1769 but died at age 2 in August 1771; Jean-Baptiste-Guillaume in November 1771; Marguerite in January 1774; Pierre-Paul in June 1776; and Jean-Marie in April 1779 but died at age 1 in April 1780--eight children, five sons and three daughters, between 1764 and 1780, in France, six of whom survived childhood.  Marie-Josèphe died at Bangor in June 1779, age 33, perhaps from the rigors of childbirth.  Guillaume died there in November 1781, age unrecorded--leaving his 63-year-old mother-in-law, Marguerite Bodart, and his 33-year-old bachelor brother-in-law, Pierre Vincent, to look after his and Marie-Josèphe's six orphans.  The other set of orphans, those of Charles Vincent, also made a life for themselves on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  Jean Vincent, age 19 in 1765, if he remained on the island, probably did not marry there.  Sister Pélagie, at age 18, or so it was recorded, married Charles, 29-year-old son of locals Nicolas Lhermite and Marie Lorec, at Bangor in May 1769.  Sister Marie, at age 21, married Joseph-Espiau, 35-year-old son son of locals Jean-François De La Mestre, a "noble homme," and Marie Abadie, at Bangor in October 1770.  In 1771, Abbé Jean-Louis Le Loutre of Acadian resistance fame, now a patron of the Acadians in France, petitoned the govenor of Belle-Île-en-Mer to send the youngest daughter, Élisabeth, age 17, to the convent at Vannes in southern Brittany.  If she went, she did not remain. 

In the early 1770s, Vincents at St.-Servan and on Belle-Île-en-Mer chose to take part in another, grander settlement venture, this one in the interior province of Poitou.  French authorities were tired of providing for the exiles languishing in the port cities.  An influential nobleman offered to settle them on land he owned near the city of Châtellerault, and French authorities sanctioned the scheme.  Members of the family from St.-Servan who ventured to the interior province included Antoine Vincent, in his mid-60s and still unmarried, and son Jean and his family; brothers Germain, still a bachelor, and Simon Vincent, married with children; Firmin Vincent, his wife, and their children; and Jean Vincent dit Clément, fils, his wife, and children.  Ursule Hébert gave Jean dit Clément, fils another son, Jean-Louis, at Cenan southeast of Châtellerault in November 1774--eight children, three daughters and five sons, between 1757 and 1774, in greater Acadia and France.  The lone Vincent from Belle-Île-en-Mer who went to Poitou was Élisabeth the orphan.  Now in her late teens and striking out on her own, she followed other exiles to the distant province, perhaps from Vannes, and married sailor Pierre-François, 29-year-old son of Jacques Le Coq an Madeleine Laurant of St.-Malo, at Leigné-les-Bois southeast of Châtellerault in July 1774.  Their daughter Marie was born soon after the marriage, and son Guillaume was baptized at Leigné-les-Bois, age unrecorded, in May 1775.  

Between November 1775 and March 1776, after two years of effort, most of the Poitou Acadians retreated from Châtellerault in four crowded convoys down the Vienne and the Loire to the lower Loire port of Nantes.  The Vincents took the second, third, and fourth convoys.  At Nantes and nearby Chantenay, they lived as best they could on government handouts and what work they could find.  Antoine Vincent died in St.-Nicolas Parish, Nantes, in September 1776, age 70, having never remarried.  Jeanne Baste gave Jean, son of a different Antoine Vincent, another son, Jean-Pierre, at Chantenay in September 1784--five children, three sons and two daughters, between 1766 and 1784.  Eugènie-Marie Tradivet gave Firmin Vincent four more children at Nantes and Chantenay:  Jean-Firmin in May 1776; Marie-Eugènie in March 1778 but died at age 5 in July 1783; Jeanne in January 1783 but died in February; and Marie-Françoise in March 1784--seven children, three sons and four daughters, between 1771 and 1784.  Élisabeth Vincent gave her sailor husband Pierre-François Le Coq at least two more daughters at Nantes:  Victoire in c1784; and Françoise in c1785.  Germain Vincent died at Chantenay in April 1784, age 55 and still a bachelor.  Jean Vincent dit Clément, fils, in his late 40s, died at Nantes before September 1784, when wife Ursule Hébert appeared as a widow on a list of Acadians in France who agreed to go to Spanish Louisiana. 

In the early 1780s, when the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, at least seven Vincents agreed to take it.  The takers included not only Ursule Hébert and her four Vincent children, but also Élisabeth Vincent, her sailor husband, and their four children; Pierre Vincent of Belle-Île-en-Mer, still a middle-aged bachelor, and his four of Montet nieces and nephews; and childless couple Anne-Marie Vincent and Charles Daigre, who had come to France from the Maritimes in 1759, settled in one of the St.-Malo suburbs, and were at Nantes by September 1784, when they appear on the Spanish listing there.  Most of the Acadian Vincents still in France, however, chose to remain.  They included Firmin and his French wife at Nantes; his brothers Joseph, fils, and Alexis and their French wives at Pleurtuit; their stepmother Marie Gratien and their younger half-siblings at Pleurtuit; Simon and his Acadian wife at Nantes; Jean à Antoine and his French wife at Chantenay; and Élisabeth's older sisters and their French husbands on Belle-Île-en-Mer.  French Revolutionary authorities counted Élisabeth's sister Pélagie and her family still on Belle-Île-en-Mer in 1792.  Firmin et al.'s stepmother and half-siblings were still at St.-Malo in 1793.  One wonders what became of the others who chose to remain. 

In North America, conditions only got worse for the Acadians who had escaped the British in the late 1750s and taken refuge on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore or in Canada, where they gathered at Québec.  Life in the crowded Canadian capital came with a price.  For the first time in their lives, Acadians were exposed to the hazards of an urban environment.  Many of them died in and around Québec in the late 1750s, Vincents among them.  Pierre à Michel Vincent of Petitcoudiac died in Canada before 1757, in his late 40s.  One wonders if any members of the family perished in the smallpox epidemic that killed hundreds of Acadians in and around the Canadian capital between the summer of 1757 and the spring of 1758, many of them from the trois-rivières area.  François Vincent dit Clément died at Beaumont below Québec City in May 1760, age 35.  The family also had reasons to celebrate in their Canadian refuge.  François's older brother Pierre Vincent dit Clément of Annapolis Royal and Île St.-Jean, at age 33, remarried again--his third marriage--to Marie-Françoise, daughter of Canadians Philippe Paquet and Dorothée Plante, at St.-Jean, Île d'Orléans, below Québec, in February 1757. 

After the fall of Québec in September 1759, the British gathered their forces to attack the remaining French strongholds in New France.  In June 1760, a British naval force from Louisbourg attacked Restigouche at the head of the Baie des Chaleurs, now a major Acadian refuge.  After a spirited fight in which Acadian militia and Mi'kmaq warriors played an important role, the French commander blew up his larger vessels and retreated up Rivière Restigouche, leaving the militia and the Indians to prevent a British landing.  Unable to capture the garrison or lay waste to the area, the British commander ordered his ships to return to their base at Louisbourg.  In October, after the fall of Montréal, another British naval force, this one from Québec, returned to Restigouche to accept the garrison's, and the Acadians', surrender.  On October 24, on the eve of formal surrender, French officers counted 1,003 Acadians still at Restigouche, including La Veuve Vincens and her family of seven.  With other Acadians on the Gulf shore who had either surrendered to, or were captured by, British forces in the area, they were shipped off to prison compounds in Nova Scotia, where the British held for the rest of the war.  One of the largest compounds was at Fort Edward, overlooking the old Vincent homesteads at Pigiguit, where, in 1761-62, British officials counted Pierre and Joseph Vincent without families.  One wonders if they were bachelor brothers.  

The war over, Vincents being held in the British seaboard colonies, theoretically, were free to go, but not until the British discerned their intentions.  Even then, colonial authorities discouraged repatriation.  During the summer of 1763, Vincents appeared on repatriation lists that circulated through many of the seaboard colonies.  In Massachusetts in August 1763, Joseph Vainsant and his family of six were still in the colony.  In Pennsylvania in June 1763, Pierre Vincent IV, wife Geneviève Boudrot, and their four children; his aunt Marguerite Vincent, the widow Blanchard, and her four children; and François-Joseph Vincent, his wife Geneviève, and their five children were still in that colony.  In Maryland that July, colonial officials counted Anne Vincent, husband Alexandre Doiron, and their six children at Oxford on the colony's Eastern Shore. 

Most of the Acadians in New England and Pennsylvania, including Vincents, chose to resettle in Canada, where their kinsmen had gone as early as 1756.  Though now also a British possession, the far-northern province was populated largely by fellow French Catholics, many of them Acadian exiles.  So, in a colony nearly as old as Acadia, descendants of Pierre Vincent began the slow, inexorable process of becoming Canadiennes.  Especially after 1766, Vincents could be found on the upper St. Lawrence below Montréal at Vechères, Louiseville, and Yamachiche; at St.-Ours on the lower Richelieu east of Montréal; at Québec City and nearby St. Charles de Bellechasse and St.-Gervais de Bellechasse; and on the lower St. Lawrence at Beaumont, Trois-Pistoles, and Kamouraska.  In present-day New Brunswick, they settled at Miramichi on the Gulf of St. Lawrence shore.  Typical of most, if not all, Acadian families, these Acadiennes of Canada lost touch with their Cadien cousins hundreds of miles away, and until the Acadian reunions of the twentieth century, may even have forgotten the others existed. 

Vincents still languishing in the seaboard colonies emigrated, instead, to the French Antilles to avoid British rule.  While the end-of-war treaty was being negotiated, French officials encouraged exiles in the seaboard colonies to resettle in St.-Dominique.  Although driven from North America by the Seven Years' War, the French were determined to hang on to what was left of their shrinking empire.  A new naval base at Môle-St.-Nicolas on the northwest end of the big island would protect the approaches to their remaining possessions in the Caribbean basin and assist in the "war of revenge" to come.  Exiles who could be lured to St.-Domingue would prove a ready source of labor not only for the naval contractors, but also for the colony's wealthy planters, who hoped to supplement the work of their slaves.  To sweeten the deal, the French promised the Acadians land of their own in the sugar colony.  The first of them reached Cap-Français in late 1763, and more poured in the following year, Vincents among them.  Some went to Môle-St.-Nicolas to work on the naval base, and others to the interior community of Mirebalais near Port-au-Prince to work on coffee and indigo plantations.  Gabriel, son of Guillin Vincent and Catherine Teizan, perhaps Acadians, had married Froisine, daughter of Acadians Dupuy Dupuy and Marie Duga, probably Dugas, in exile.  The couple's son Joseph had been born in c1761 in an unnamed colony, and they baptized him "privately at home" in early September 1764.  Both their marriage and their son's legitimacy were recognized by the priest at Mirebalais later that month.  Son Joseph died at "Mr. Ernest Driant's of Blondin" near Mirebalais in December 1764, age 3.  His mother Froisine died at Mirebalais in December 1765, age 28.  Dominique-Antoine-Rosalie, son of Élisabeth Vincent, no father recorded, perhaps an Acadian, was born at Mirebalais in July 1765.  When fellow exiles from Halifax and Maryland, including Vincents, came through Cap-Français on their way to New Orleans from late 1764 through 1768, no Acadian Vincent who had gone to St.-Domingue chose to join them.  They evidently had found a place for themselves in the sugar colony's slave-based plantation economy.  Madeleine-Luce, daughter of Joseph Vincent and Catherine Fatre, perhaps Acadians, died at Môle-St.-Nicolas in June 1778, no age given.  Geneviève Vincent, perhaps an Acadian, wife of François-Robert Thariot, perhaps Thériot, died at Môle-St.-Nicolas in October 1778, no age given.  Élisabeth Vincent, "native of the River St.Croix in Acadia," which was Pigiguit, wife of Jean Tilly, died at Môle-St.-Nicolas in June 1783, age 52. 

Vincents being held in Nova Scotia at war's end faced a hard dilemma.  The Treaty of Paris of February 1763 stipulated in its Article IV that persons dispersed by the war had 18 months to return to their respective territories.  However, British authorities refused to allow any of the Acadian prisoners in the region to return to their former lands as proprietors.  If Acadians chose to remain in, or return to, Nova Scotia, they could live only in small family groups in previously unsettled areas or work for low wages on former Acadian lands now owned by New-English "planters."  If they stayed, they must also take the hated oath of allegiance to the new British king, George III, without reservation.  They would also have to take the oath if they joined their cousins in Canada.  After all they had suffered on the question of the oath, few self-respecting Acadians would consent to take it if it could be avoided.  Some Nova Scotia exiles chose to relocate to Miquelon, a French-controlled fishery island off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Others considered going to French St.-Domingue, where Acadian exiles in the seaboard colonies, including Vincents, had gone, or to the Illinois country, the west bank of which still belonged to France, or to French Louisiana, which, thanks to British control of Canada, was the only route possible to the Illinois country for Acadian exiles.  Whatever their choice, many refused to remain under British rule.  So they gathered up their money and their few possessions and prepared to leave their homeland.  Of the 600 exiles who left Halifax in late 1764 and early 1765, bound for Cap-Français, St.-Domingue, at least five were Vincents. 

The Acadians still in Maryland endured life among Englishmen who, despite their colony's Catholic roots, did not care much for the French "papists" thrust upon them.  When word reached the Acadians there that fellow exiles had been welcomed in Louisiana, they pooled their meager resources to charter ships that would take them to New Orleans.  From 1766 to 1769, four separate expeditions brought hundreds of Maryland exiles to Spanish Louisiana.  Anne Vincent of Annapolis Royal, now a widow, and three of her Doiron daughters were part of the third contingent from the Chesapeake colony that reached New Orleans from Port Tobacco in February 1768.  Sadly, their initial experience in the Spanish colony proved as irksome as their sojourn in Maryland.336

.

So what was this place, Louisiana, that drew so many Acadians to it?  What was its story?  How long had it been settled by fellow Frenchmen?  How was it different, or similar, to their precious Acadie?  Was it true the Spanish controlled only the western half of Louisiana, while the hated British held the eastern part?  Could these much-abused Acadians tolerate living so close to their red-coated tormentors?  Would the Spanish, though they were fellow Catholics, try to rob them of their culture?  As they gathered up their loved ones and their few belongings and girded themselves for another dérangement, these questions must have haunted the hundreds of exiles who prepared to make their way to the Mississippi valley. 

 

INTRODUCTION

BOOK ONE:        French Acadia

BOOK TWO:        British Nova Scotia

BOOK THREE:     Families, Migration, and the Acadian "Begats"

BOOK FOUR:      The French Maritimes

BOOK FIVE:         The Great Upheaval

BOOK SEVEN:     French Louisiana

BOOK EIGHT:      A New Acadia

BOOK NINE:        The Bayou State

BOOK TEN:          The Louisiana Acadian "Begats"

BOOK ELEVEN:  The Non-Acadian "Cajun" Families of South Louisiana

BOOK TWELVE:  Acadians in Gray

 

 SOURCE NOTES - BOOK SIX

187.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 494, 909-28, 2221-22, 2275-76, 2297, 2463-66; Brasseaux, ed., Quest for the Promised Land, 16, 114-15, 128; <thecajuns.com>, "Acadians Who Arrived in New Orleans in 1764"; La Famille Cormier genealogy database; Faragher, A Great & Noble Scheme, 430-31; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 3, 84-86, 332; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 231-36, 249; "Mi'kmaq Families at St. George Bay," AGE, May 2008, 44; Milling, Exile Without End, 41-42; NOAR, vols. 4, 7, 8, 11, 12, 13, 14, 18; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 51; Robichaux, Acadian in St. Malo, 213-14, 277; Surette, Mésagouche & LaButte; Surette, Tintamarre & Le Lac; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 52-53, 160; Stephen A. White, "Cormier, Pierre, in DCB, online; White, DGFA-1, 28, 400-10, 434; White, DGFA-1 English, 89-92; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Cormier family page. 

188.  Quotations from White, DGFA-1 English, 163; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 179.  See also Arsenault, Généalogie, 983-88, 1659, 2097-2116, 2237, 2302, 2350-51, 2505-07; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; Hébert, D., 78, 105, 112, 140, 150, 176-78, 295, 555; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jobb, The Cajuns, 162; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 18, 20; Milling, Exile Without End, 42; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 7; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family No. 5; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 62, 108, 116, 130; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Chatellerault, 50-53; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 78-82; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 54, 115, 187, 428-40; White, DGFA-1, 535, 791-94; White, DGFA-1 English, 162; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Achée family page.  

189.  See "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; White, DGFA-1, 1405; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Arosteguy family page. 

190.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 401-05; Faragher, A Great & Noble Scheme, 388; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 601; Historical Atlas of Canada, 1: plate 29; Corinne LaPlante, "Michel Bastarache dit LeBasque," in DCB, online; "The Origins of the Bastarache, Bastrash and Basque Families," AGE, May 2008, 45; White, DGFA-1, 80-82; White, DGFA-1 English, 17; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bastarache family page. 

191.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 405-08, 1100-01, 2415; Clark, A. H., Acadia, 107, 119, 132-34; Clément Cormier, "Le Borgne de Belle-Isle, Alexandre," in DCB, 1:435-36; Griffiths, From Migrant to Acadian, 77; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 154; Mason Wade, "Le Borgne, Emmanuel," in DCB, 1:433-35, & online; White, DGFA-1, 6, 136, 1024-31, 1100-01; White, DGFA-1 English, 218-19; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 37, 83; Books One, Two, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bélisle family page. 

192.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 469, 1133-34; Brasseaux, Scattered to the Wind, 8; Faragher, A Great & Noble Scheme, 381-83; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 25; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 154; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 7, 15, 17; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 42, 115; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 45-46, 104-05, 341, 350, 565-66; White, DGFA-1, 325-26; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 30, 37-38, 50-51, 105-06; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bellemère family page. 

193.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 408-27, 842-45; 2206-07; Brasseaux, "Scattered to the Wind," 55-61; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives, 2A:148; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 24; Historical Atlas of Canada, 1: plate 29; Milling, Exile Without End, 41-42; Wall of Names, 11; White, DGFA-1, 96-104, 792; White, DGFA-1 English, 19-20; Appendix; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Belliveau family page. 

194.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2320-21; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:109; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 554-55; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 18; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 58-59; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Billeray family page. 

195.  Arsenault, Généalogie, 437-41, 1654-55, 2209, 2271; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 37-38, 117; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 252; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 505; White, DGFA-1, 178-79; White DGFA-1 English, 37; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bonnevie family page. 

196.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 441, 1107-08, 1806; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 41, 53; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 234-35; White, DGFA-1, 182-84, 1469-72; White, DGFA-1, English, 38, 309; Books One, Three,  Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Boucher family page. 

197.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 474-81, 884-85; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 61, 262, 293; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 78, 204, 234, 267; White, DGFA-1, 270, 289-98; White, DGFA-1 English, 64-66; Taylor, D. J., "Bruns-Lebruns," 33; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Brun family page. 

198.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 471-74, 1349-50, 1545-46, 2444-56; Beattie & Pothier, Battle of Restigouche, 19; Brasseaux, Foreign French, 1:82, 2:50, 3:43; Brasseaux, Founding of New Acadia, 33; Brasseaux, "Scattered to the Wind," 12-14; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Clément Cormier, "Brossard, Jean-François," DCB, 2:105, & online; Debien, "The Acadians in Saint-Domingue"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:88; C. J. d'Entremont, "Brossard (Broussard), dit Beausoleil, Joseph," DCB, 3:87-88, & online; Faragher, A Great & Noble Scheme, 133-34; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 60, 83, 618-19, 622; Higginbotham, Old Mobile, 144, 179, 222, 271, 365; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Marshall, Acadian Resistance; Milling, Exile Without End, 12, 46; Perrin, W. A., Acadian Redemption, 143n3; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, Family No. 5; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 51, 52; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 25; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 38-39; Robichaux, Acadians in St. Malo, 173-78; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 41-43, 156-57; White, DGFA-1, 284-88; White, DGFA-1 English, 63-64; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 103-04; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Broussard family page. 

One wonders who Alexandre & Victor's companions may have been on the overland trek from SC to Rivière St.-Jean. 

199.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 391, 1081-86, 1535-38, 2054, 2401; BRDR, 1a:1-2; De La Roque "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:87; Harrison Thomas LaTour Genealogical Collection; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 158; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; White, DGFA-1, 12-14; White, DGFA-1 English, 3-4; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Allain family page.  

For Pierre Allain's precious package, see BRDR; Book Eight. 

200.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2055, 2402; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 12; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, "Family" No. 58; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 53-54; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 505; White, DGFA-1, 796-97; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Arbour family page.

201.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1319; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905; 2A:114, 122; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 10, 12; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 140; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 3-4, 655-56; Books Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Arcement family page.

202.  See also Arsenault, Généalogie, 393, 827-41, 1653, 2055-63, 2203-06; 2263-64; 2314-15; 2402-05; Brasseaux, In Search of Evangeline, 30-31, 53-56; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:167, "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Genealogy of the Families of the Island of Orleans," 2A:8; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 13-14, 49; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 233, 249, 252, 279; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>,  Family No. 40; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux,  Acadians in St.-Malo, 4, 297, 776-77; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 17-18, 148; White, DGFA-1, 23-31, 576-77; White, DGFA-1 English, 6-8; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Arceneaux family page. 

203.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 394, 1092-1100, 1320-22, 1654, 2206, 2316-17, 2408-13; BRDR, vol. 1a(rev.); Hodson, Acadian Diaspora, 166-67; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 554, 560, 565; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 56, 150-58, 217-18, 231, 233-34; Mouhot, Acadian Refugees in France, 61;  <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family No. 9; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, "Family" No. 48; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 5; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 8-9; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 29-37, 366; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 23, 149-50; White, DGFA-1, 57-58; White, DGFA-1 English, 13-14; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 73-82; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Babin family page. 

204.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 395-401, 1654, 2413-14; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Historical Atlas of Canada, 1: plate 29; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 205, 232-34, 251; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 23-24, 150; White, DGFA-1, 65-69; White, DGFA-1 English, 14-15; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Babineaux family page; Appendix.

205.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1322-29, 2415; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 20; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:27, 102-04; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 20, 584; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 64; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 38-40, 98, 110, 298, 522; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 5; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 9, 38; White, DGFA-1, 76-77; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Barrilleaux family page. 

207.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 427, 1101-04, 1330-35, 1470, 2185, 2415-18; "Benoits of Bay St. George," AGE, May 2008, 42-44; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:35, 48-50, 56, 112-13, 118, 121; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 25-27, 153, 313, 378, 383, 436, 584; Hodson, Acadian Diaspora, 138-40; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15-16, 57, 65, 67, 109, 119, 152, 175, 177-78, 217-18, 267-68, 274, 279-80, 289, 291; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 31, 32, 42; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 19, 22, 30; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family Nos. 2, 9, 10; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 70, 120; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 7-9; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 10-11; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 47-55, 609; White, DGFA-1, 111-12; White, DGFA-1 English, 20-26; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 24-25, 150-51; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 29, 36, 84-85; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Benoit family page. 

208.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 427-28, 1104, 1614-26, 2418-21; Historical Atlas of Canada, 1: plate 29; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 249, 251; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 26-27, 151; White, DGFA-1, 122-24; White, DGFA-1 English, 26-27; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bergeron family page. 

209.  See AGE, Oct 2005, 64 (source of quotation); Arsenault, Généalogie, 428-29, 846-58, 1654, 2011, 2066, 2421-23; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 27-28; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 58, 110, 232, 236, 251-52, 282, 285; Milling, Exile Without End, 40; raymondjohnson.net/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I1595&tree=stewart; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 35, 58-59; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 57, 95; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 27-28, 151-52; White, DGFA-1, 124-30, 821; White, DGFA-1 English, 28-29; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bernard family page; Shane K. Bernard, Ph.D., descendant. 

210.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 429-30, 1105, 1539-40, 1685, 2185, 2207; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905," 2A:59; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 30-32, 47, 273; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 25; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 10-11; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 11-13; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 29-30, 152-53; White, DGFA-1, 134-39; White, DGFA-1 English, 30; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bertrand family page; Gerald Bertrand, descendant; Velia Bertrand, Jr., descendant (Bertrands in Louisiana). 

211.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1132-33, 1350-64, 1656, 2456-57; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:87-88, 100; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 156, 217; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 8, 25, 137; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 146, 179-80, 515-16; White, DGFA-1, 301; White, DGFA-1 English, 67; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bijeaux/Bujole family page. 

212.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 431-37, 1105-06, 1471-73, 1540-43, 1654, 2067-68, 2207-08, 2423-25; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A: 11, 85, 161; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Griffiths, From Migrant to Acadian, 192; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 32-33, 165, 567, 598-99; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 25, 56, 158, 193, 217, 235-36, 251, 308-09; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>;  <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, "Family" No. 11; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 4, 5, 10, 15, 27, 29, 38, 39, 40, 41, 44, 45, 46, 118, 147, 149, 185; Rea, "The Career of Lt. John Thomas," 23-24; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 11-13; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 13-17; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 15, 62-75; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 31-32, 153-54; White, DGFA-1, 143-56; White, DGFA-1 English, 32-34; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Blanchard family page. 

213.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1346-47, 2004, 2437; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:47; Guidry, "Guédrys Exiled to North Carolina"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 51, 404; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 218, 239; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 35; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 161, 763; White, DGFA-1, 264-65; White, DGFA-1 English, 58; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Boutin family page. 

214.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1121-25, 1656, 2437-38; BRDR, vol. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:147; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 52; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 155; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 34; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 161; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 92-93; White, DGFA-1, 268-70; White, DGFA-1 English, 59; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Brasseaux/Brasset family page. 

215.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 895-96, 1481-82; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:38-39; 118-19; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 65, 66; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Milling, Exile Without End, 41, 42, 43; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 59, 60, 61, 105, 139; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 52-53, 186-89; White, DGFA-1, 319-21; White, DGFA-1 English, 71-72; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Carret family page. 

216.  See Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 16-17; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 21-22; Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 40, 172; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 489; Books Five, Eight, & Ten; Chaillou family page. 

217.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 897-908, 1657, 2219-20, 2272-74, 2458-59; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:143-44, 148; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 78-79; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 234, 236; Milling, Exile Without End, 41-42; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 53, 57, 58, 62, 152, 156, 182; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760";  Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 26; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 40-41; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 198-202; White, DGFA-1, 347-58; White, DGFA-1 English, 78-80; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Chiasson family page. 

218.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 483, 908; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:112; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, Family No. 8; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 108; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 78, 169; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 188-89, 202, 428-29, 549, 696; White, DGFA-1, 362-64; Books, One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Clémençeau family page. 

219.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 819, 1454, 1457-58, 2009, 2187; "Census for Ile Royale by Sr de la Rocque," in <acadian-home.org>; De La Roque "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:10; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 80; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, Family No. 15; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 27; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 41; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 202; White, DGFA-1, 552, 1575, 1582-83; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Clément family page. 

220.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1338, 1344, 2081-82; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 81, 586, 593; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:96; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, vol. 1-A; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 2,  9, 20, 21; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 39; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 62; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 202-03, 300, 356-57, 726-27, 761; White, DGFA-1, 1098; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Clossinet family page. 

221.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1136-37, 2459-60; Brasseaux, ed., Quest for the Promised Land, 133; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 93, 153, 176, 182. 267; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 107-09; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Clouâtre family page. 

222.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 484-93, 1137-38, 1365-66, 1546-57, 1657, 2220-21, 2296-97, 2460-63; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A: 26, 155-56, 159; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 60, 82-83, 294, 308, 585-86, 598, 600-01; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 25, 66, 204-05, 175-78, 193, 218, 232-36, 251-52, 267-68; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 48; <porttoulouse.com/html/1717a.html>; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 19-20; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 28-29, 42-43, 560, 749; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 123-24, 206-13, 311, 356-57, 560, 749; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 50-52, 159-60; White, DGFA-1, 369-93; White, DGFA-1 English, 83-88; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 109-10; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Comeaux family page. 

223.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 494-95, 1366-68; Guidry, "Guédrys Exiled to North Carolina" in The Guédry-Labine Family website; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 86; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:49, 75; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 252; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 135; White, DGFA-1, 363, 411-17, 620, 1033; White, DGFA-1 English, 92-93, 130, 220; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Corporon family page. 

224.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1593, 2011; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 90; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 36-37; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 58; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 219; Voorhies, J. Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 505; White, DGFA-1, 427-28; White, DGFA-1 English, 95; Books Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Cousin family page. 

225.  See De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:121; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 62-65; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 27-28; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 222-23, 824; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Crochet family page. 

226.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1626-32, 2469-70; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 251; White, DFGA-1, 453-66; White, DGFA-1 English, 100-01; Books One, Two, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Louvière/Damour family page. 

227.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2012-13; De La Roque "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:17;  <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, Family No. 7; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 29; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 49-50; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 253-56; White, DGFA-1, 1120-22; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Dantin family page. 

228.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2012, 2017, 2083; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 98, 193, 586, 593-95; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, Family No. 14; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 67; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 684-87; White, DGFA-1, 468, 954, 1144, 1306; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Darembourg family page.

229.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1150-51, 1558-59; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert,  D., Acadians in Exile, 99, 571-72, 578-79; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 41; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 30; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 50; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 125; White, DGFA-1, 469-71, 1558-59; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Darois family page. 

230.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1151-52, 1834, 2083, 2188, 2229, 2470-71; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); <familyheritageresearchcommunity.org/david-dna.html>; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 99-100; Jehn, Acadian exiles in the Colonies, 151, 155, 178, 187, 218, 274-75, 280-81; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 47; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 82; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 426; White, DGFA-1, 473, 1216; White, DGFA-1 English, 103; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 31, 111-12; Books Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; David family page. 

231.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2120-21; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:143; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 102; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 86; Robichaux, Acadians in Chatellerault, 57-58; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 7, 51-52, 117; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 259-62, 899, 901; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; De La Forestrie family page. 

232.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2091, 2130; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A: 93; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 162, 322; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 20; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 32-33; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 52-53; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 613; White, DGFA-1, 791-92; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; De La Mazière family page.

233.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2084; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:126-27, 141; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 103-04, 164; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 33, 99; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 53-54; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 4; Books Four, Five, Six, Eight, & Ten; Delaune family page. 

234.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1688, 2014, 2086, 2188, 2298, 2471; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:9-10, 153; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 252; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; White, DGFA-1, 503-05; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Deroche family history. 

235.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 505-24, 953-59, 1153-55, 1560-61, 2230, 2278, 2334, 2473-75; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:90, 94, 96, 158; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 61, 115-19, 126, 286, 337, 345, 559-60, 599, 618, 632, 637, 639, 642; Hodson, Acadian Diaspora, 185-86, 196, 243n82; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 17, 25, 79, 81, 83-84, 175, 177, 204-06, 217, 233-36, 252, 267-68; <pagesperso orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 57; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 35-37, 42, 60, 91, 121-22, 127, 158; Robichaux, Acadians at Nantes, 58, 81-82; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 198, 276-79, 437-38; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 60-61, 162-63; White, DGFA-1, 526-51; White, DGFA-1 English, 112-16; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Doucet family page. 

236.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 535-37, 1158-59, 2335, 2481-86; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 125-26, 560; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 57, 67, 178, 193; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 65-66; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 273-74, 309-10; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 66-67, 164-65; White, DGFA-1, 581-84; White, DGFA-1 English, 125; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Duhon family page. 

237.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 534-35, 2090; BRDR, vol. 3; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:137; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 81; Robichaux, Acadians in Chatellerault, 70; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 126-27; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 586; White, DGFA-1, 554-55; White, DGFA-1 English, 117; Books One, Three, & Four; Dumont family page. 

238.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1159-60; BRDR, vol. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:139; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 296; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 72, 97; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 44; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 69-70; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 256, 310-11, 351-53; Books Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Duplessis family page. 

239.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2119-20; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:127; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 93-94, 131-32; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Robichaux, Acadians in Chatellerault, 82; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 78-79; White, DGFA-1, 351, 1075; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Durel family page. 

240.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 542-43; BRDR, vol. 1a(rev.); Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies; White, DGFA-1, 619-20, 991; White, DGFA-1 English, 130; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Flan family page. 

241.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2092; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:140; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 141; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No.87; NOAR, vols. 4, 5, 6; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 331-32, 737-39, 973; White, DGFA-1, 645, 1338-39; Books Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Fouquet family page. 

242.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 579, 1632-43, 2494-96; Baudier, The Catholic Church in LA, 397; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 149; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 156, 249, 251; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 363, 623-24, 1011; White, DGFA-1, 740-50; White, DGFA-1 English, 153-54; White, "Acadians on the St. John River 1755-1760," <acadian-home.org>; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Godin/Gaudin family page. 

243.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 583, 1659, 2096, 2236; Hodson, Acadian Diaspora, 171; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 45-46; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 71; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Gousman family page. 

244.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 587, 982-83, 1659; 2498-99; Brasseaux, Founding of New Acadia, 105, 208; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 251; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 369; White, DGFA-1, 770-71; White, DGFA-1 English, 157; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Gravois family page. 

245.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2096; BRDR, vol. 3; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:49, 72, 144; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 169-70, 586, 592-94; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 6-7, 102-93; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 90, 95, 157, 182; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 37-38, 83-84, 370-76, 512, 1045; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 61; White, DGFA-1, 306-07; Book Four; Grossin family page. 

246.  See "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 96; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; White, DGFA-1, 775, 1521; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Guénard family page. 

247.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 594-95, 1492-93; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:39-40, 56, 80-81, 118; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 172; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr./froux/St_malo_arrivees/Antelope.htm>, Family No. 10; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 1, 3, 4; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 22, 94, 98, 104; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 47; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 77-78; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 326, 381-85; White, DGFA-1, 775-79; White, DGFA-1 English, 158-59; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Guérin family page.

 248.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 595-99, 1643-46, 2237, 2502-04; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 173; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 26, 231, 252; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; White, "Acadians on the St. John River 1755-1760," <acadian-home.org>; White, DGFA-1, 780-82; White, DGFA-1 English, 159; Books Two, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Guilbeau family page. 

249.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1493-94, 2504-05; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:119, 122; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 174; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 311; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 8; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 92, 93; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 47-50; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 387-93, 621, 908; Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 43; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 84-85, 170-71; White, DGFA-1, 783-84; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Guillot family page. 

250.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2191, 2351; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 179; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 44, 46; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 442-44; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 53; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 82-83; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Hamon family page. 

251.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2116; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 17; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A: passim; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 59-60; Robichaux, Acadian in Nantes, 98-100; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 509-11; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Usé family page. 

253.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1006, 2614; Hodson, Acadian Diaspora, 110-16, 233n126; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 72, 197; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 235; Milling, Exile Without End, 42; Musheff, "Exile: Acadians in SC," 88-89; White, DGFA-1, 260; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Hugon family page. 

254.  See AGE, May 2005, 10; Arsenault, Généalogie, 607-09, 2517-19; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 249; White, DGFA-1, 416, 620-21, 873-75; White, DGFA-1 English, 130, 185; online Wikipedia, "Guillame Jeanson," "Battle of Bloody Creek (1757)"; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Jeansonne family page. 

The Dec 1757 battle was fought on the site of the Jun 1711 battle of Queen Anne's War.  See online Wikipedia; Book One. 

255.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1660, 2119, 2520; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Books Three, Five, Six, Eight, & Ten; Lachaussée family page. 

256.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 482-83; 2081; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:137, 145; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 2, 74-75, 268, 272, 585; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 4; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 63; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 37; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 190-91; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 495; White, DGFA-1, 339-41, 1129; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; La Garenne family page.

257.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 611-12; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Hébert, Acadians in Exile, 269; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 249, 253; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, "Family" No. 58; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 61; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 73, 101-02; White, DGFA-1, 907-08; White, DGFA-1 English, 192-93; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Lalande family page.   

258.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1008, 2028, 2520-21; Bunnell, French & Native North American Marriages, 66; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:25; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 234; Milling, Exile Without End, 21, 41, 43, 44; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 49; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, Family No. 16; White, DGFA-1, 909-11; White, DGFA-1 English, 193; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Lambert family page. 

259.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1896, 2122; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 31, 187, 270; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 61-62; White, DGFA-1, 913-14, 1304-05; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Lamoureaux family page. 

260.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 628-34, 2535; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 274-75; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 176, 204, 234-35, 249; Milling, Exile Without End, 10-12, 30-32; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 46; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 545; White, DGFA-1, 958-60; White, DGFA-1 English, 204; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Lanoux family page. 

261.  See Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 152; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 154; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Latier family page. 

262.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 643-45, 2535-36; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:18, 92; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 95, 280; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 55; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 109-10; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 95-96, 175-76; White, DGFA-1, 978-79; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Lavergne family page. 

263.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 646-47; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Hébert, Acadians in Exile, 281; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 8, 36; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 66; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 110-11, 118; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 345, 549-52; White, DGFA-1, 981-82; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Lebert family page. 

264.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2125; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:133; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 262, 295; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 181; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 123-24; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 581-82; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Legendre family page. 

265.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 738-49, 1423-27, 2573-74; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:114-16, 120; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 302, 423; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 155, 218; <perso.orange.fr./froux/St_malo_arrivees/Antelope.htm>, Family No. 15; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 128; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 592; White, DGFA-1, 1077-82; White, DGFA-1 English, 232-33; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 118-19; Books, One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Prince/Leprince family page. 

266.  See Arceneaux, Généalogie, 2127; Braud, From Nantes to LA, 108, 114, 120; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:145; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 306-07, 365; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 142; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 12; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 15-16, 161; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 597-99; White, DGFA-1, 209-11; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Livois family page. 

267.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1505-06; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 16, 17, 25; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family No. 7; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 559-560, 599-604; White, DGFA-1, 1098-99; White, DGFA-1 English, 236; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Longuépée family page. 

268.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 686, 1261-62, 1524-25; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:89; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 352; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15, 154, 267-68; Robichaux, Acadian in St.-Malo, 27-28, 612; White, DGFA-1, 1144-45; White, DGFA-1 English, 247; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 165; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Mazerolle family page. 

269.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1419-20, 2558-60; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 329; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 218, 249; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 111-12, 181-82; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Mire family page. 

270.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 502, 1593-1605, 2471; Braud, From Nantes to LA, 25; Bunnell, French & Native North American Marriages, 83-84, 157; Clément Cormier, "Mius (Muis) D'Entremont, Philippe," in DCB, 1:510, & online; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 41, 106-07, 162, 271, 329, 334; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 184; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 560-61, 625; Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 43, 175; White, DGFA-1, 1201-11; White, DGFA-1 English, 190 (source of quotation), 256-57; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Mius d'Entremont family page. 

272.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 701-02, 2131-32, 2193, 2247; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 329; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 14, 15, 21, 74, 145, 146, 147, 151; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 80; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 64, 135-37, 143-44; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 115-16, 306-07, 378-80, 628-33, 671-72; White, DGFA-1, 1241-44; White, DGFA-1 English, 263-64; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Moïse family page. 

273.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1607-08; Cormier, "Mius (Muis) D'Entremont, Philippe," in DCB, 1:510; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations," & online; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 47, 334-35, 374; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 79-80; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 133-35, 171; White, DGFA-1, 1236-38; White, DGFA-1 English, 262; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Molaison family page. 

274.   See Arsenault, Généalogie, 702, 1026-27, 2247-48, 2306, 2560-64; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 335-36, 600; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 25, 29; Milling, Exile Without End, 41, 42; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 112-13, 182-83; White, DGFA-1, 811, 1238-40; White, DGFA-1 English, 263; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Appendix; Mouton family page. 

275.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 702-03, 1506-07, 2564; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:123-24; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 337, 573-74; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 6, 11; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 50, 100, 149, 150, 187; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 27, 80-81, 132; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 32-33, 41, 138; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 391-93, 534-39, 634-39; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 113-14, 183; White, DGFA-1, 1247-48; White, DGFA-1 English, 265; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Naquin family page. 

276.  See AGE, May 2004, 116, a printed copy of Colonel Winslow's Grand-Pré list; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 12-13; Robichaux, Acadian in Châtellerault, 5, 155, 163; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 8-9, 138, 151; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 640-41; Winslow's 1755 List; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Noël family page. 

277.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 703, 1029; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 232, 234; Books Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Olivier family page. 

278.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1507, 1696; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 151; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 81; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 139; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 641-43; White, DGFA-1, 1262-63; White, DGFA-1 English, 268; Books Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Ozelet family page. 

279.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2133-34; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:134-35, 142; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 346; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 152; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 27; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 139-40, 200; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 214-16, 644-46, 1054, 1057; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Patry family page. 

280.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 710-17, 1662, 2565-66; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 348; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 66, 176, 251; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 646-47; White, DGFA-1, 1277-80; White, DGFA-1 English, 271-72; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Pellerin family page. 

281.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1278-79; Hodson, Acadian Diaspora, 19-20, 185-86, 196, 243n82; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family Nos. 5, 8; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 58; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 35-36, 86, 121, 138; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 200-01, 276-78, 942, 943, 1084; White, DGFA-1, 1353; Book One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Précieux family page. 

282.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1006-07, 2136, 2574; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:139-40, 143; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 373-74; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 311, 316-19; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 3; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 7, 83, 156, 157; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 100; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 192-93, 282, 516-19, 580-81, 626-27; Books Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Quimine family page. 

283.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2136; De La Roque "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:94; Hébert, Acadians in Exile, 326, 375; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family No. 2; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 463, 687-89; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 49, 187; White, DGFA-1, 791; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Rassicot family page. 

284.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1279-80, 1663, 2137, 2252, 2284; BRDR, vol. 1a(rev.); Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 26, 317, 364, 377-78; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A136, 162; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr./froux/St_malo_arrivees/Antelope.htm>, Family No. 4;  <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, "Family" No. 58; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 29; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 32-33, 73, 86-87; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 52-53, 129, 147; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 690-92; White, DGFA-1, 1370-71; White, DGFA-1 English, 290; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Renaud family page. 

285.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 793-94, 2139-40; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 140-41, 404; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:105-06; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 21; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 167; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 152; Robichaux, Acadians in St. Malo, 725-27, 761, 855; White, DGFA-1, 1454-56; White, DGFA-1 English, 305-06; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Savary family page. 

286.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2140, 2382-83; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:115; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 573-74; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 26-27, 29; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 187; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 727-28; Winzerling, Acadian Odyssey, 131, 133-37; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Ségoillot family page. 

287.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1260, 1309; BRDR, vol. 1a(rev.):155; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 405; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 176-77; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 118; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 191; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 728-29; White, DGFA-1, 1448, 1541, 1578; Winslow, "French Inhabitants," 39; Winslow's 1755 List; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Semere family page. 

288.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 802-03, 1289-93, 2594; BRDR, vol. 1a(rev.); "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Marshall, Acadian Resistance; <museeacadien.ca/english/archives/articles/72.htm>; White, DGFA-1, 1476-78; White, DGFA-1 English, 309-10; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Surette family page. 

289.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2141; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:141; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 67-68, 411, 583-97; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 171.  Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 729-31; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Talbot family page. 

Descendant Mike Talbot speculates that Louis-André took his mother's surname, not his father's, because in 1816 the Laffites of Barataria, as they preferred to spell their name--Jean and his brothers, the famous "pirates" and smugglers--had been declared outlaws again by LA governor W.C.C. Claiborne, & being a Lafitte in LA, despite having no connection to the famous smugglers, may not have been a good idea at the time for a young immigrant.  According to Davis, W. C., The Pirates Laffite, 2, the Laffite brothers were from Pauillac, which was "perched on the west bank of Gironde estuary exactly midway between Bordeaux and the Bay of Biscay at Pointe de Grave some thirty miles distant."  Louis-André's father, André dit Guillaume Lafitte, like his mother, also was Acadian, born on either Île St.-Pierre or Île Miquelon in Nov 1764.  If the Lafittes, who were in the shipping & insurance business, were still residing on St.-Pierre & Miquelon in 1778, they would have been deported to France with the other Acadians there when the British seized the islands during the American Revolution.  André dit Guillaume probably met Louis-André's mother in Bordeaux.  Mike Talbot adds that Louis-André could have been born illegitimate, which would have been another reason to assume his mother's surname.  

290.  See <acadian-home.org>; Arsenault, Généalogie, 2046; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:21; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, Family Nos. 12, 13 (listed twice); Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 93-94; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, viii, 154-55; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 164-65, 731-34; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 525; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Templet family page. 

291.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1698, 1966-67, 2138; Brasseaux & Conrad, eds., The Road to LA, 39; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 392; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A: passim; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <lagenealogy.net/RousseauVillejoin.aspx>; Lockerby, Deportation of the PEI Acadians; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 53; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 777; Andrew Rodger, "Rousseau de Villejouin (Villejoin, Villejoint), Gabriel," in DCB, online; <rootsweb.ancestry.com/~htiwgw/familles/fiches/004820.htm>; White, DGFA-1, 1070, 1422-23; Books Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Villejoin family page. 

292.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1086-92, 1465-70, 2264, 2315, 2405-08; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportation"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:86, 101, 110, 125; Hébert, D., Acadian in Exile, 15-16, 113, 144, 271, 554; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 56, 217-18, 232-33, 236; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family Nos. 1, 3, 4; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 24, 32, 33, 34, 117, 174; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 3-4; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 2-8, 130, 157-58; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 5-30, 66-70, 250-52, 268-69, 301, 303, 309-10, 571-72, 605, 758-59; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 19-20, 148; White, DGFA-1, 41-51; White, DGFA-1 English, 9-11; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 38; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Aucoin family page. 

293.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 441-48, 859-63, 1108-16, 1336-46, 1655, 2209-12, 2265-69, 2294, 2321-23, 2425-31; BRDR, vol. 1a(rev.); Brasseaux, "Scattered to the Wind," 38; Debien, "The Acadians in Saint-Domingue," 68; De La Roque "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:17, 20, 22, 84-85, 102-03, 105, 115-16; 122, 136, 146-48, 157, 161-62; Faragher, A Great & Noble Scheme, 95-96; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 41-44, 50, 106, 134, 165, 336, 380, 406, 413-14, 434, 555, 585; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 1-B: 81-82; Hodson, Acadian Diaspora, 192-93; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15-16, 26 (source of quotation), 30, 150, 152, 155, 176-77, 193-94, 205, 233, 251-52, 267-68, 282, 315-16; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 7, 8, 9, 10, 38; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 5, 7, 16, 20, 24, 26, 27; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 16, 17, 19, 22, 23, 71, 79, 140, 141, 189; <porttoulouse.com>; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 14-19, 156; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 17-19, 20-27, 83, 108, 127; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 85-107, 109-121, 167, 202-03, 235-36, 300-01, 303, 431-32, 525-26, 567-69, 617-18, 694, 734, 758-60; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 34-36, 154-55; White, DGFA-1, 184-217, 701; White, DGFA-1 English, 38-47; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 91, 100, 130, 139, 145-46; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Boudreaux family page. 

294.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 448-56, 863-75, 1116-21, 1474-80, 1656, 2004, 2078, 2212-14, 2269-70, 2431-34; Brasseaux, "Scattered to the Wind," 11-12, 35-36; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations,"  in <acadian-home.org>; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:38-39, 79, 85, 147, 163-64; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile,  30-32, 47-49, 114, 559, 616, 620, 622; <islandregister.com/1752.html.>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 55, 59, 65, 156, 175-76, 204-05, 217, 231, 249, 252; Milling, Exile Without End, 21, 44; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 21; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 6, 11, 17, 18, 19; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family No. 6; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 9, 10, 20, 21, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 42, 43, 49, 50, 54, 55, 67, 68, 92, 94, 109, 114, 123, 133, 143, 161, 179, 180; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 19-22, 157; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 4-5, 28-33, 87-88, 152; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 80-81, 123-54, 155-59, 250, 266-68, 273, 291-93, 303, 347-51, 369, 390-93, 442, 461-62, 472-75, 481-82, 488-89, 498-99, 621, 628-31, 639, 699-700, 705-07; White, DGFA-1, 221-51, 990, 998, 1133, 1569; White, DGFA-1 English, 48-56; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 146-47; Books, One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bourg/Bourque family page.   

295.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 456-66, 875-84, 1655-56, 2214-16, 2270-71, 2434-37; Brasseaux,"Scattered to the Wind," 12, 35-36; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations,"  in <acadian-home.org>; De La Roque "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:93; Faragher, A Great & Noble Scheme, 46, 71-72, 73, 95, 100-01, 104, 129, 133, 169, 171, 379; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 13, 49-50, 53, 206, 330, 360; <histoire-de-bourgeois.ca>; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15, 18, 26, 59, 77, 82-84, 93, 99, 175, 178, 180, 193, 203, 206, 231-37, 249, 251, 258, 267-78; Marshall, Acadian Resistance, 8, 11; Milling, Exile Without End, 14, 30, 42-43, 46; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 13; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 22; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 156; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 95-96, 300, 734, 1064; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 36-38, 155; White, DGFA-1, 251-63; White, DGFA-1 English, 56-57, 113; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Bourgeois family page; Marc Bourgeois, family historian, <www.histoire-de-Bourgeois.ca>.

296.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 466-71, 1125-32, 1347-49, 1480-81, 1543-45, 1656, 2216-17, 2271, 2295, 2438-44; Brasseaux,"Scattered to the Wind," 50-54; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations," in <acadian-home.org>; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:18, 39-40, 79, 115; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 41, 53-54, 155, 409, 424, 431, 576; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 47, 55-56, 65, 67, 89, 118-20, 152-54, 156, 175-76, 178, 204, 217-18, 231, 234-35, 251, 267-68; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 21, 22; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 8, 18; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family No. 3; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 24, 37, 46, 49, 54, 65, 134; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 23-25, 59; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 34-37, 63-64, 167; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 129, 154-55, 161-71, 270-71, 295-96, 376-78, 487-89, 496-97, 506-07, 537-38, 664-65; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 38-40, 155-56; White, DGFA-1, 270-82; White, DGFA-1 English, 59-63; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 93-103; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Breaux family page.

297.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 481, 886-95, 2583-84; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:79, 101, 144-45; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 63, 389, 584, 587-88, 620, 627; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 26, 154, 217, 233, 273, 276, 281, 308, 319; Milling, Exile Without End, 21, 41, 45; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 90, 95, 158, 176; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 83-84, 182-85, 199-200, 374-76; 449-50, 591-92; White, DGFA-1, 305-12, 1115-16, 1418-19; White, DGFA-1 English, 68-69, 297; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 25, 166; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Roger/Caissie family page. 

298.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 500-01, 946-47, 1143-50, 1368-74, 1557-58, 2228, 2328-32, 2467-69; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.); "Census for Ile Royale by Sr de la Rocque," in <acadian-home.org>; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:15, 84-85, 103, 106, 112, 116, 119, 128, 115; Hébert, D., 89, 93-97, 196, 263-64, 280, 324, 415, 556-58, 562, 565, 569, 573, 599, 608, 610, 613, 631, 635; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15-16, 65-66, 69, 150, 175, 217; Milling, Exile Without End, 21, 41, 44; NOAR, vols. 1, 2, 5, 6, 7; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>;   <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 17, 63, 64, 65, 75, 77, 78, 79, 80, 84, 85, 91, 93, 165, 169, 180; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 23, 24, 25; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 28-29; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 43-49, 68, 89, 111-12; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 38-39, 114-15, 141-44, 153-54, 203, 231-53, 316, 344, 359-60, 387-89, 391-93, 533, 554-55, 753-55; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 54-55, 160-61; White, DGFA-1, 446-52; White, DGFA-1 English, 100; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 110-11; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Daigle/Daigre family page. 

299.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 505, 952-53, 1374-82, 1482-84, 2333-34, 2471-73; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:9, 27, 86, 101-02, 109, 115, 120-21, "Genealogy of the Families of the Island of Orleans," 2A:113-14; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 16, 48, 113-14, 117-18, 261, 326, 559, 637, 644; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 26, 156, 158, 184, 186, 217, 233-37, 253, 258; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 9, 14, 15, 16; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 24; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 68, 69, 77, 116; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 34-35; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 54-57; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 265-76, 636; White, DGFA-1, 513-26, 1103; White, DGFA-1 English, 109-112, 177; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 38, 113-14; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Doiron family page. 

300.  See Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations," in <acadian-home.org>; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 121; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 28-29, 67; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 45; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 242, 283, 561; Books Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Dubois family page. 

301.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 524-34, 959-60, 1155-58, 1484-88, 2230-32, 2299, 2475-81; Brasseaux, Scattered to the Wind, 60; Brasseaux & Conrad, eds., The Road to LA, 79n165, says "The Dugas were very numreous in Saint-Domingue"; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations," in <acadian-home.org>; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:16-17, 19, 22, 86, 116-17, 124, 153; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62";  <genforum.genealogy.com/dugas/messages/549.html>; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 123-25, 616, 624; Hébert, D., LA Families in Southeast TX; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 39, 78, 96-97, 107-08, 120, 178; 209, 232-34, 249, 252, 263, 267; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 15; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family No. 6; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 55, 66, 67, 70, 71, 73, 74, 75, 76, 111, 113, 119, 144, 190, 192; Bernard Pothier, "Dugas (Dugast), Joseph," DCB, online; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 37-39; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 19, 33, 58-66, 86; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 63-64, 111-12, 146, 200-201, 285-307, 361-62, 460-61, 469, 480, 482-83, 518-19, 531-33, 589-90, 656; White, DGFA-1, 562-80; White, DGFA-1 English, 119-24; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Dugas family page. 

302.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 538-42, 1160-70, 1658, 2486-87; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 128-30, 186, 370, 439, 560-61, 608; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15-16, 77-78, 109, 152-54, 158, 177-78, 204-06, 217, 233-34, 267; Milling, Exile Without End, 41-42; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family No. 1; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 27, 39; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 39-40; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 66-67; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 144-47, 313-17; White, DGFA-1, 596-607, 1542; White, DGFA-1 English, 126-27; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 37, 50, 114-16; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Dupuis/Dupuy family page. 

303.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 544-49, 960-64, 1383-86, 2488-90; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:26-27; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 140; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 16, 109, 151, 155, 158, 175-76, 204, 218, 234; Milling, Exile Without End, 45; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 13, 18, 88, 89; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 68; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 14, 43, 63-64, 324-31, 576-77; White, DGFA-1, 621-40; White, DGFA-1 English, 131-35; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 117-20; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Foret family page. 

304.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 554-61, 964-76, 1386-87, 1658, 2232-34, 2278-79, 2339, 2490; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:56, 85, 102, 164-65; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 98-99, 106-07; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 147-49, 617; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 25, 193, 205, 236; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 2, 14, 45; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 28; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 41; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 178-79, 334-37; White, DGFA-1, 271, 312-13, 666-86; White, DGFA-1 English, 139-44; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Gaudet family page. 

305.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 566-67, 1170-74, 1388-89, 1488-90, 1658, 2235, 2339-40, 2490-92; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:99, 107-08, 112, 125; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 45-46, 150-52, 561, 570, 636; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 150-51, 153, 205; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 43, 91, 97, 99, 100, 101, 102, 191; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 41-44; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 69-70; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 47-48, 338-53, 697, 762-63, 1010; White, DGFA-1, 691-705; White, DGFA-1 English, 145-48; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 50, 122-23; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Gautreaux family page. 

306.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 567-79, 976-82, 1389-92, 1659, 2236, 2492-94; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:25-26, 31,158-59; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 66, 156-57, 196, 383; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 25, 178, 193, 205-06, 217, 231, 233-36, 251, 263, 308; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 8, 15, 32, 37; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 5; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 96; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 12, 44-45; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 70-71; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 65-66, 359-62; White, DGFA-1, 718-39; White, DGFA-1 English, 150-53; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Girouard/Giroir family page. 

307.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 583-87, 1174-82, 2302, 2341-49, 2496-98; Braud, From Nantes to LA, 22, 29; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:114; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 33, 40, 84, 104, 161-67, 293, 322, 381, 413, 561-64, 566-67, 580-81, 603, 608, 610, 612-13, 615; Hébert, D., South LA Records, vols. 1, 2, 4; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 150-51, 157, 204-05, 234; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, "Family" No. 58; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 25; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 71-73; Robichaux, Acadian in St.-Malo, 146-67, 179-80, 364-69; White, DGFA-1, 761-70; White, DGFA-1 English, 157; Wood, 123-25, 126-27; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Granger family page. 

308.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 588-92, 1490-92, 2236, 2499-2502; Brasseaux, ed., Quest for the Promised Land, 146n; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:40, 46-47, 61, 80, 111, 160; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; Guidry, "Guédrys Exiled to North Carolina," The Guédry-Labine Family website; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 64-65, 69, 173, 566, 586-87; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15, 152, 218, 239, 279, 309-10, 312-22; McMichael, Atlantic Loyalites, 48; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 14, 18; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 103, 184; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 46-47; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 74-76; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 376-81; 560; White, DGFA-1, 771-74; White, DGFA-1 English, 158; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 79-81, 169-70; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 120-22; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Guidry family page; Marty Guidry, family historian. 

309.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 599-606, 989-1002, 1183-95, 1392-1401, 1494-96, 1561-62, 1659, 2237-39, 2279-80, 2352-53, 2507-17; Adrien Bergeron, "Hébert, Étienne," in DCB, online; Brasseaux, ed., Quest for the Promised Land, 100n144; Debien, "The Acadians in Saint-Domingue," 68; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:38-41, 78, 100, 102, 106-07, 116, 134, 147; Eccles, Canadian Frontier, 24, 34; Faragher, A Great & Noble Scheme, 358-59; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 19, 46, 51-52, 90, 105, 111, 137, 139, 171, 177, 181-91, 270, 272, 276, 280-81, 292, 326, 338, 358, 376, 379, 390, 404, 406, 418, 432-33, 564-65, 587, 608-11, 613-14, 619, 625, 632, 636-39, 641-42; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15, 25, 31, 77, 93-94, 96, 119, 150-51, 151a, 154, 158, 175-78, 204-06, 217, 231, 249, 267, 276, 278, 307-08, 313; Milling, Exile Without End, 40, 43; <pagesperso-orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/AutresPorts.htm>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 10, 11, 12, 13, 36; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 12, 14, 18, 23, 26, 30; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 1, 16, 20, 35, 39, 41, 43, 44, 45, 49, 66, 80, 99, 102, 106, 107, 109, 110, 111, 112, 114, 118, 119, 124, 125, 127, 133, 145, 146, 162, 169, 171, 177; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 54-58, 74-75; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 84-94; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 15-20, 22-24, 28-29, 68-69, 74-75, 117-20, 172, 347-50, 445-79, 539, 629, 673, 714-16; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 85-87, 171-72; White, DGFA-1, 798-840; White, DGFA-1 English, 163-76; "Winslow's Journal 2," 166; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 116-17, 127-33; Books One, Three, Four, Eight, & Ten; Hébert family page. 

310.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 606, 1496-1504, 2116, 2191, 2302; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:39, 41, 72, 77-78, 80-83, 117, 119, 121, 124-25; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 28, 192-94, 619, 625, 637; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Mouhot, "Emigration of the Acadians from France to LA," 145 (source of quotation on Basile Henry); <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 27, 28, 29, 30; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 3, 59, 73, 76, 104, 105, 113, 117, 121, 122, 123, 124, 126, 127, 128, 129, 131, 132, 134, 154, 158, 173, 192; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 58-59; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 94-98; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 163-64, 219-20, 476-78, 480-507, 540-42; White, DGFA-1, 840-45; White, DGFA-1 English, 177-8; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Henry family page. 

311.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 610, 1007-08, 1195-98, 1660, 2519-20; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:105-06; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 262; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 33, 34; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Families No. 72, 181; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 100-01; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 310-11, 519, 775; White, DGFA-1, 884-90; White, DGFA-1 English, 188-89; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Labauve family page. 

312.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 612-26, 1009-10, 1198-1215, 1401-11, 1562, 1606-07, 1660, 2241, 2280-81, 2355-56, 2521-35; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:35, 83-84, 97-98, 113-14; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 21, 30, 270-74, 372, 414, 427, 431, 433, 573, 603-05, 619; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15-17, 39, 55-57, 65-66, 68, 77-81, 94, 97, 118-20, 152-53, 155-58, 175, 177-78, 205-06, 217-18, 231-33, 236, 249, 252, 263, 267-68, 284; Milling, Exile Without End, 40; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 8, 51, 52, 140, 141, 144, 162, 172, 183; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 39-40, 62-66; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 66-67, 76, 102-09; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 98, 364, 366-68, 522-44, 557-59, 663, 736-37; White, DGFA-1, 914-52; White, DGFA-1 English, 194-204; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 134-54; Books One, Two, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Landry family page. 

313.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 647-58, 1216-60, 1411-14, 1564, 1661, 1904, 2243-44, 2282, 2304, 2357-62, 2536-46; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:22, 38, 97-98, 112, 127, 159; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 79, 96, 102, 118, 137-39, 160, 196, 279-89, 301, 305-06, 319, 322, 382, 415, 420, 422, 554-55, 557-58, 565-70, 572-73, 576, 581, 587, 590, 608-11, 613-14; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15-17, 47, 55-58, 66-69, 78-80, 93, 107-09, 118-20, 151, 154, 156-58, 175-78, 205-06, 217-18, 232-34, 236, 251-52, 263, 267-68, 275, 290, 307; Mouhot, "Emigration of the Acadians from France to LA," 141-44, 167 (source of quotations about Jean-Jacques LeBlanc); <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 12, 17, 22, 23; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family Nos. 4, 7, 10; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 14, 47, 89, 98, 107, 110, 136, 166; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 66-69; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 39, 46, 71-72, 111-22, 130; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 167, 228-29, 364, 533-34, 538-39, 553-79, 589, 698-99, 707-08; White, DGFA-1, 983-1022; White, DGFA-1 English, 209-17; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 4-5, 17, 37-38, 41, 46, 48-52, 56-58, 154-64; online Wikipedia, "Anne Robert Jacques Turgot," "Physiocracy"; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; LeBlanc family page. 

314.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 660-62, 1564-65, 2244-45, 2546-47; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:159; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 156, 295-96; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 204, 249; White, DGFA-1, 1041-44; White, DGFA-1 English, 221-22; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Léger family page. 

315.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 662-64, 1415-19, 1504-05, 2245, 2547-50; Brasseaux, Founding of New Acadia, 104; Brasseaux, "'Grand Texas,'" 274; Bunnell, French & Native North American Marriages, 70-71; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:27, 46, 46, 50-52, 112, 117-18, 160-61; Guidry, "Guédrys Exiled to North Carolina" in The Guédry-Labine Family website; Guidry, Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 297-98, 305; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 6-7; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 152-53, 239 (source of quotation), 279, 296; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 13, 14, 15, 22; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 72, 103, 106, 135, 136, 139, 159; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 70-71; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 40, 124-28; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 582-90; White, DGFA-1, 1048-58; White, DGFA-1 English, 223-28; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 98-99, 186; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Lejeune family page. 

316.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 665-68, 1565-66; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.), 2, 3; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 282, 305-06, 380, 609, 611-12, 615; Hébert, D., South LA Records, vols. 1, 2, 3, 4; White, DGFA-1, 1092-95; White, DGFA-1 English, 234-35; Books One, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Levron family page. 

317.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 673-85, 1013, 1420-21, 1506, 1566, 2370, 2550-53; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:93-94; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 21, 89, 137, 316-20, 359, 427, 556, 581; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 16, 25, 193, 217, 249, 251-52, 267; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; White, DGFA-1, 737, 1125-40; White, DGFA-1 English, 219, 243-46; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Martin family page. 

318.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 686-95, 1262-72, 1662, 2246, 2371-73, 2553-57; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:83, 114, 123-26; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 37, 149-51, 173, 275, 323-25, 346, 433, 557, 570-71; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 16, 107, 151, 153-54, 157-58, 175, 177, 204, 217, 249, 267-68; Melanson, Melanson-Melançon; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 143; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 30, 75-77; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 106-07, 125-26, 613-19, 638-39; White, DGFA-1, 1145-67; White, DGFA-1 English, 247-50; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 166-73; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Melançon family page. 

319.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 695-700, 1421-22, 2557-58; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:89, 106-07, 123, 163-64; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 115, 121, 326-37, 364; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15, 176-77, 204-05, 252, 267; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 179; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 67, 77-78; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 48-49, 105, 131-32; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 283, 561-62, 621-25; White, DGFA-1, 1182-85; White, DGFA-1 English, 253; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Michel family page. 

320.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 703-07, 1030-31, 2457, 2564; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 340; Brasseaux, "Scattered to the Wind," 14 (source of quotation); Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 26, 193, 204, 233; White, DGFA-1, 1254-56; White, DGFA-1 English, 267; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Orillion family page. 

321.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 708-10, 1273, 1636n9, 2565; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:123, 162; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 323, 346; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 249; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 189; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 33, 81-82; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 17; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 90-91; White, DGFA-1, 808, 1268-70; White, DGFA-1 English, 269-70; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Part/Apart family page. 

322.  See Arsenault, Généaologie, 769-70, 1273-76, 2249; De La Roque "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:15-16, 128; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 355-56; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, Family No. 11; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 153; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 82, 85; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 654-55, 679; White, DGFA-1, 1310-17; White, DGFA-1 English, 279-80; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Pinet/Pinel family page. 

323.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 726-29, 1276-78, 1507-10, 1566-68, 1663, 2250, 2566-68; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:80-82, 85, 114, 121, 124; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 32, 143, 157, 357-58, 571-72; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 205, 232, 251-52; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 25, 26, 27; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>; Family No. 1; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 10; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 9, 30, 38, 40, 122, 126, 128, 151, 154, 155, 170, 188; Pitre, Windows into Yesteryears; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 37, 54-55, 78, 82-84; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 58-59, 87, 132, 140-46; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 114, 117-20, 126-27, 152-53, 288, 322, 347-50, 453, 493-94, 500-01, 567-69, 624-25, 655-74, 701-02, 745-46; White, DGFA-1, 699, 1288-89, 1318-26; White, DGFA-1 English, 280-82; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Pitre family page. 

324.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 729, 1031-51, 1663, 2250-52, 2283-84, 2376, 2568-69; Delaney, "Chronology of the Deportations"; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:21-22, 96, 105, 154, 157; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exiles, 19, 49, 99, 121, 156, 258, 326-27, 359-66, 572; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colony, 157, 205, 217, 231, 233-36, 249, 252; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 142; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 29; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 675-77; White, DGFA-1, 1327-38; White, DGFA-1 English, 282-84; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 174-75; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Poirier family page. 

325.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1054-57, 2569-70; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:91-92, 142-43;  "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 367-69; <islandregister.com/1752.html.>; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, "Family" No. 26; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 41, 84-85; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 94, 146-47; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 645-46, 677-79, 687-88; White, DGFA-1, 1252-53, 1346-48; White, DGFA-1 English, 285-86; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Potier family page. 

326.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 733-36, 1568-69, 1663, 2570-73; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:19, 22; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 347, 370; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 17, 78, 80, 95, 119, 176, 263, 268; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, Family Nos. 2, 5, 6; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 681-84, 724; White, DGFA-1, 1351-52; White, DGFA-1 English, 286; Books One, Three Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Préjean family page. 

327.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 752-69, 1057-67, 1280-84, 1427-30, 1663-64, 2252-53, 2284-85, 2377-80, 2574-81; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:154-56, 158; "Fort Cumberland, 24 Aug 1763"; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, Acadians in Exile, 42, 122, 286, 305, 379-84, 424, 428, 572-73, 609, 612, 615, 633, 636; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 17, 25-26, 77, 79, 81-82, 93, 96, 150, 152-53, 155, 158, 176, 178, 193, 204-05, 231-32, 249, 263, 268; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 37, 38; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 6, 87; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 147-48; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 25-27, 108-09, 117-20, 527-28 585-86, 663-64, 674, 692-704, 744-45; White, DGFA-1, 1373-95, 1499; White, DGFA-1 English, 290-92; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 176-80; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Richard family page. 

328.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1430-32, 2380, 2581; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 385, 558-59, 573; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 155; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 160; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 263, 704-05; White, DGFA-1, 929, 1399-1402; White, DGFA-1 English, 182, 293; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 180-81; Books One, Two, Three, Five, Eight, & Ten; Rivet family page. 

329.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 770-84, 1284-85, 1511-28, 1664, 2581-83; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:159-60, 162-63; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 386, 627; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 57, 68, 79, 81, 93, 96, 109, 175, 177, 204, 206, 235, 249, 251, 267; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 36, 84, 88, 125, 144, 161, 162, 163, 164, 165, 166, 185, 186; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 87-90; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 149-51; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 703-18; White, DGFA-1, 1402-12; White, DGFA-1 English 293-95; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Robichaux family page. 

330.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 785-89, 1432-34, 2253, 2584-85; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:50-51, 111; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 303, 393; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 154-55, 252; White, DGFA-1, 1425-28; White, DGFA-1 English, 298; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 165; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Roy family page. 

331.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 1285-88, 1569-72, 2585-88; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:107, 132; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 402-03, 589; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 249, 251, 307-08, 310-13, 315-20, 322; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 82; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 11-12; White, DGFA-1, 1446-51; White, DGFA-1 English, 304-05; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Sonnier family page. 

332.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 794-99, 1572-74, 1664, 2588-92; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:156; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 404; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 25-26, 193, 217-18, 235, 249, 252; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; White, DGFA-1, 1456-63; White, DGFA-1 English, 306-07; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Savoie/Savoy family page. 

333.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 804-06, 1067-70, 1293-1302, 1528-31, 2254, 2285-86, 2384-86, 2594-96; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:55-57, 81-82, 98, 160, 165; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 42, 44, 96-97, 138, 259, 272, 289, 413-16, 421, 555-58, 561, 563-64, 569, 573-74, 609, 612, 615, 628, 636; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 55-56, 67, 151, 156, 158, 175, 231, 233, 236, 249, 252, 267; Milling, Exile Without End, 21-22, 46-47; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family Nos. 1, 2, 3, 26, 31; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Reine_d_Espagne.htm>, "Family" No. 17; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, Family No. 9; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 63, 96, 170, 172, 190; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 94-95; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 152-53, 155-60; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 49-51, 61-62, 73, 314-15, 331-32, 486-87, 540, 734-52, 774; White, DGFA-1, 777, 1483-1506; White, DGFA-1 English, 312-18; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Thériot family page. 

334.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 807-13, 1302-08, 1434-41, 1574-80, 2309, 2386-87, 2596-1601; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:81, 98-99; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 167, 296, 308, 417-18, 564, 574-75, 581, 585, 589, 591, 593, 597; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15-16, 66, 79, 118-19, 151-151a, 175-78, 217-18, 235-36, 249, 252, 267, 313; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 42, 69, 132, 169, 173, 174, 175, 188; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 14, 77; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 18, 27-28, 49, 130-31, 147, 159-60; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 97-98, 123, 621, 752-60; White, DGFA-1, 1508-23; White, DGFA-1 English, 319-22; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 184-85; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Thibodeaux family page. 

335.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 816-17, 1308-13, 1395, 1441-54, 1581, 2389-95, 2602-11; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:48-51, 110-12; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Guidry, "Guédrys Exiled to North Carolina" in The Guédry-Labine Family website; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 269, 299, 305, 405, 416, 420-28, 575-79, 581-82, 587, 589-90; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15-16, 118-19, 151a-52, 175, 177, 218, 249, 251, 267, 276, 282, 307-10, 313-16, 318-20, 322; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 35;  <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 19, 129; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 13; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, "Family" No. 13; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 96-98; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 2, 36-37, 39, 152, 161-70; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 105-06, 445-46, 760-70; White, DGFA-1, 1081, 1535-48; White, DGFA-1 English, 323-27; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 185-86; Books One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Trahan family page. 

336.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 819, 1454-61, 1991, 2396, 2611; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:104, 107, 109; "Fort Edward, 1761-62"; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 51-52, 103, 172, 306, 330-31, 439-40, 571, 582, 620, 629; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 15, 119, 156, 175, 217-18, 278, 285, 288, 313, 316, 322;  <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Duc_Guillaume.htm>, Family No. 24; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 85, 177, 178; "Ristigouche, 24 Oct 1760"; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 69, 98; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 171-73; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 223, 777-83; White, DGFA-1, 161, 1575-85; White, DGFA-1 English, 332-34; Wood, Acadians in Maryland, 113; Books One, Three, Four, Five, Eight, & Ten; Vincent & Clément family pages. 

337.  See De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2-A; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 62-63, 84-85; <islandregister.com/1752.html>; Books Four, Five, Eight, Ten; Neveu family page. 

338.  See Brasseaux, Scattered to the Wind, 15; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 233; Marant family page. 

340.  See Book Eight for the names of individuals in the various expeditions that came to LA beginning in 1764. 

[top of page - Book Six]

Copyright (c) 2001-24  Steven A. Cormier