Guillaume Daoust and Marie Madeleine Angele LaLonde
5x great grandfather of Caroline Lavigne
A tailor by trade, he was originally from Picardie, France. Although it is not known when he arrived in New France, on January 12th 1675 he signed a document with Benigne Basset, a Montreal notary. He spent most of his life living on Lake St Louis at the western end of the island of Montreal. Several of those years were spent in Lachine. His signature is found on many entries in the first church register of the Parish of Saints Anges of Lachine (1676 - 1707) as a bridegroom, as a proud father, as a witness to events such as the Lachine massacre and a smallpox epidemic of 1703.
Jean de Lalonde and Marie Barbary dit Bahan
6x great grandfather of Caroline Lavigne
A soldier with the imfamous Carignan-Salières regiment (and possibly former Musketeer for King Louis XIV), Jean arrived in New France in 1665. In 1666 he enrolls in a college of the Jesuit Fathers in the parish of Sillery, near Quebec City. On September 30, 1687 tragedy strikes. Jean and four others are working in the fields near their home when they are attacked and killed by the Iroqouis Indians. This started a new period of unrest and uncertainty in New France. The victims were buried at St. Louis shortly afterwards and the inhabitants abandoned the area and closed down the parish. Marie was left widowed with two boys to care for, Jean- Baptiste 12 and Guillaume 3. Madeleine married Guillaume Daoust, who owned the neighboring farm, the previous year.
reference: http://web.uvic.ca/~lalonde/history/history.html
Jean Valiquet dit LaVerdue was banned for life from L'Ile de Montreal for incest.
5x great grandfather of Evangeliste Joseph (Jean) Girard
Pierre was the son of a farmer, Etienne Girard and Marguerite Gibouleau, from "des Sables D'Olonne", in Poitou, France. Pierre was a sailor. In 1666 the census noted that Pierre Girard working for the Jesuits. He married in 1669 the widow Suzanne Lavoie (also researh showed DeLavoye). Possibly choosing to marry rather than returning to sea, seems he was a naval notary. He first 2 sons were born in Quebec city, and he eventually settled in the seignory of Maur (today called Saint-Augustin-de-Desmaures) where 6 other children are born (one in Neuville). Three of these sons start their own families. His legacy left a lasting impression on the church. By 1959 over 65 Girard descendants entered religious life to include nuns, fifteen priests, two seminarians, and five brothers.
reference: http://bibeau.citeglobe.com/girard.htm
Honore Martel dit Lomanotagne and Marie Barbe Duchesne
7x great grandfather of Fred Leo Amo
The son of Jean Martel and Marguerite L'Amiraut, a Soldier of Carignan company of the L-Allier regiment( and possibly former Musketeer for King Louis XIV), and later in life a horse merchant in Paris on Richelieu Street. Honore Martel dit Lomanotagne (Lamontagne being his military alias), arrived in Quebec on September 30, 1665 as a soldier of Alexander Berthier company of the L'Allier regiment.
great grandfather of Sophia Hart
Moses was a philanderer who had a few children with his wife (who also was his first cousin) and then engaged in over a dozen known affairs and sired an unknown number of children ... (about 20 identified and others not).
Moses father, Aaron Hart, married Dorothea Judah (also his cousin) in London in 1768. They arrived with the English army in 1760. Aaron Hart was a merchant and landowner in Three Rivers (now Trois Rivieres) area. He was the patriarch of the Hart dynasty, who, besides their business activities, fought for, and finally succeeded in obtaining, full civil rights for Jews in Canada. The family story takes almost two chapters in 'A Coat of Many Colours', Two Centuries of Jewish Life in Canada, by Irving Abella. All indications point to Moses Hart, part of a very prominent Jewish family in Trois-Rivieres, Quebec, Canada as being the father of Louis Hart, but we have no knowledge about his mother.
Flora Sophia Macdonald Primeau
Grandmother of Sophia Hart
Flora MacDonald, daughter of John MacDonald, was born before March 1, 1804 near the village of Alexandria in Eastern Ontario, Canada.
The John MacDonald family had moved from Scotland to the New World Empire being established there by the English. The purpose was to create a buffer zone between the French in the Province of Quebec and the English in the Province of Ontario.
When Flora was four months old, it being summertime and was the custom then, her mother and a neighbor were washing clothes at the river with baby Flora sleeping in a blanket nearby. While they were thus preoccupied some Indians took the little girl and carried her home to their village and subsequently farther away to a more remote area. As a teen age white girl she was noticed by a fur trader named John Campbell Primeau – His family name Campbell and his foster parents Primeau – He was a forty year old widower with two sons and one daughter. Flora was being considered by her Indian family as a prospective bride for the chief’s son. The fur trader was obviously interested in the rehabilitation of the "White Princess" as she was referred to and he proceeded to arrange for her release. In order to make certain of his possession and rights he decided to marry her immediately. Not knowing her given name she was rebaptised Sophia.
John Campbell Primeau’s family consisted of the following children:
Amanda, Ezra, and Lily by his first wife (at least two, possibly three children missing) and
Adeline, Rose, Elizabeth, Mary and Louis by his second wife (Sophia)
The family eventually moved south from the Hudson Bay area to a place called French Mills where the Salmon River enters the St. Lawrence, now named Fort Covington, Franklin Co. U.S.A. Flora’s (now Sophia) father regularly visited French Mills for the purpose of having his corn and grain ground. He was told about the new family in town and the wife that looked like him. He told them his lost daughter had a crescent birthmark on her left wrist and on the next trip it was confirmed that Sophia Primeau was his long lost daughter, Flora MacDonald.
Louis Primeau, Sophia’s youngest child and only son, married Sarah A. McGrath July 27, 1873 and his mother eventually came to live with grandfather and grandmother Primeau (or Premo) as it is sometimes spelled in the United States. She lived until 1895 and died at the fine old age of 91 in March, shortly after her 91st birthday.
Louis’s daughter was born in July 1889 and was able to learn of the life and times of her grandmother Flora Sophia MacDonald Primeau in her many conversations with her even though Grandma Primeau preferred to speak in the French language.
Flags courtesy of ITA's Flags of All Countries used with permission.