François was born between 1616 and 1621, someplace in France.

François’s surname, Girouard was spelled a myriad of ways including Giroir, Girrior, Gerrior, Girouer and Giroud. However, Girouard really wasn’t the name by which he was known. His nickname, Lavaranne, was what he was called by other Acadians.

“Dit” names are translated loosely as “said” or ”called” names. Don’t you just love them. Nicknames with a purpose. Maybe. Maybe a hint as to where the person came from. Or, maybe something about their trade or them personally.

Was François from the La Varenne region of France? La Varenne, an ancient town whose population is still only about 1,700 people, is located Northeast of Nantes on the Loire River.

The people of the town of La Varenne are known as Varennais, Varennaises today.

You can see a lovely view of the town from the top of the old castle, here.

La Varenne is about 100 miles from La Rochelle, where many of the Acadian families originated. In fact, François’s wife, Jeanne Aucoin, and her family were from La Rochelle.

There are also other places in France that incorporate the name La Varenne.

Some researchers say that François was “undoubtedly” born in the La Chaussée commune in the Vienne department in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region in western France. That, too, would explain Lavarenne. Lord d’Aulnay was from this region, which includes Chaussée, Aulnay, and Martaizé in the Loudon region of France. He likely recruited colonists from nearby. D’Aulnay and his cousin de Razilly were responsible for bringing at least 60 French families to Acadia between 1632 and 1636.

D’Aulnay, of noble birth and eventual Governor of Acadia beginning in 1635, established Port Royal as the headquarters by erecting a fort and maintained control of Acadia through 1643 and 1645 attacks from rival French forces. If François was there during this time, he would have been one of the soldiers defending the fort. He was assuredly there before 1654 when Acadia fell to the British again.

D’Aulnay died in 1650 in a boating accident, weakening French control of Acadia before falling to the British in 1654. Three years later, his rival, La Tour married his widow. D’Aulnay’s legacy, though, is the fact that Acadia thrived under his leadership because he focused on encouraging and transporting French families to settle in Acadia.

Where Did François Girouard Come From?

Did the Girouard family immigrate with D’Aulnay from La Chaussee?

My amazing cousin Mark has done a significant amount of trawling through original French records. Thank you so much, Mark.

He notes:

There is a lot of conflicting speculation as to François’ birthplace, and Find-a-Grave, without any evidence or source, states he was born at La Chaussée in 1621. I’m very familiar with La Chaussée records and went back online to confirm that they only go back to 1626.

Is Lavarenne just a nickname, or does it mean something more, indicating a location? Given the lack of records, we may never know – that is – unless a male with a similar surname from France tests and matches a Girouard male descendant of François.

(If you are a Girouard male descending from François or from any ancestor in France, please reach out, I have a Y-DNA testing scholarship at no cost waiting for you.)

Karen Theroit Reader rules out some possibilities on her wonderful tree:

Clarence J. d’Entremont, “The GIROUARD Family,” in LE REVEIL ACADIEN; vol. XII, no. 3 (Aug 1996); p. 63. The head of the Acadian branch of the family is François GIROUARD, but he is not the François who is found in the archives of La Chausse’e, France, since he was there in 1679 as well, in an act from a Loudon notary. (Reference: E453/118-119) He could have been from any of several La Varenne locations in France, since that was the name given him on the Belle-Ile-en-Mer genealogical declarations. According to those, as well, he and Jeanne AUCOIN were already married at the time of their arrival in Acadia, which would place them with the contingent of colonists in the “200 Elite Men” of Jacques de Poix, Sieur de Saint-Mas, brought over in 1651.

If men who descend directly from François Girouard through all males, so carry his Y chromosome, take a Y-DNA test – and so do men from various locations in France – we can tell definitively if they are the same lines. In essence, this means that while this particular man who was born in 1679 in La Chausee cannot be our François, because we know our François was in Acadia by 1671, this could still be the same Girouard line.

The English controlled Acadia from 1654 until 1670, so no French families would have arrived during that time. Therefore, it’s very likely that François and his family arrived before 1654 when Robert Sedgwick, a Puritan Englishman, captured Acadia for the English with about 300 men in three ships. We know for sure that François Girouard had already been married to Jeanne Aucoin for at least 7 years by this time, based on the ages of his children. François would have been one of the Acadian men attempting to fend off the British by defending both the fort and their homesteads.

Depositions

Two of François’ descendants gave detailed depositions a dozen years after the 1755 removal when some of the Acadian people were first exiled to Virginia, then to England, then after 1763 to Belle-Ile-en-Mer in France. The French government wanted to know as much as possible about the origins of the earliest family members of the Acadian refugees in order to determine who, by virtue of their French ancestry, was eligible for assistance.

Lucie LeBlanc Consantino’s website provides the translation of the depositions. We find two depositions from descendants of François Girouard and his wife, Jeanne Aucoin:

On February 9, 1767, appeared Louis Courtin, farmer, living in the village of Aprens de Triboutons, Parish of Sauzon, who, in the presence of Simon P. Daigre, Joseph Babin, Jean Baptiste Le Blanc, and Armand Granger, all Acadians living on this island, stated that he was born in St. Nicolas de Prete Vales, County of Dunois, Diocese of Blois of Jean Baptiste (Courtin) and Marie Anne Pellereau, born at Blois, St. Honore Parish, married at Cork, Ireland on Sept 15, 1761, to Marie Josephe Martin, born at Port Royal in 1740, of Michel Martin and Magdeleine Girouard. Michel Martin issued from Etienne and Marie Comeau, and Etienne issues from Rene Martin, who came from France and married at Port Royal to Marguerite Landry. Both died there. Madeleine Girouard was born at Port Royal of Guillaume and Anne Renauchet. Guillaume issued from Jacques Girouard and Anne Gautrot of Port Royal and Jacques Girouard descended from another Jacques who came from France with Jeanne Aucoin, his wife; both died at Port Royal.

On February 9, 1767, appeared Pierre Richard, from Kbellec, in this Parish, who, in the presence of Honore LeBlanc, Joseph LeBlanc, Oliver Daigre, and Laurent Babin, all Acadians living on this island, witnesses and states that he was born at Port Royal principal town of Acadia on November 15, 1710, of Pierre (Richard) and Madeleine Girouard. Pierre Richard, Sr., died at Port Royal in 1726, son of Rene Richard and Magdeleine Landry, both died there. Rene Richard was the son of another Rene de San Souci who came from France, married at Port Royal to Magdeleine Blanchard, and both died there. Magdeleine Girouard died at Port Royal in 1752 and was the daughter of Jacques (Girouard) and Anne Gautrot, Jacques Girouard is issue of another Jacques dit La Varanne who came from France with his wife Jeanne Aucoin, who settled at Port Royal and both died there.

First, you might notice that these depositions state François Girouard’s name as Jacques. We can verify the accuracy of his wife’s name and his children’s in the census, thereby confirming that his name was François. In the intervening generations, a lot of devastating events had occurred, and their family had literally been torn apart- children ripped from their mother’s arms. We can forgive their descendants this error three and four generations later.

What’s interesting here is the phrasing of the information regarding their arrival.

• “…descended from another Jacques who came from France with Jeanne Aucoin, his wife.”
• “Jacques dit La Varanne who came from France with his wife Jeanne Aucoin.”

Given that both of these descendants had been exiled together for a dozen years, it’s certainly possible that they had jointly misremembered François’s name or that somehow it hadn’t been passed down correctly. Perhaps his middle name was Jacques, or maybe genealogy just wasn’t that important when the English, then other French commanders, and then the English again, were continually attacking.

How are these people descended from François Girouard? I had to draw this out.

Louis Courtin was the husband of Marie Josephe Martin, the great-great-granddaughter of François Girouard and Jeanne Aucoin. Note that Marie was born in 1740, which means that she would have been 15 when the Acadians were rounded up and forcibly deported in 1755. Families were indiscriminately divided. Marie’s father had died in 1747, but her mother, Magdalene, was deported with her children and died in 1765 in Ireland, four years after Magdalene was married to Louis Courtin.

This tells us that at least Marie and her mother, Magdalene, were together. It also tells us that Magdalene was separated from her aged father, Guillaume, who would have been 70 years old when the deportation occurred. It’s amazing he survived at all.

Guillaume wound up in Quebec City somehow, and his death is recorded in the Parish register there two years later, in 1757. Since Marie Joseph’s only sister, Marie Anne, born about 1744, was married outside Quebec City in 1780, she got separated in 1755 from her mother and sister. Oh, what terror and grief they each must have felt. I can see their mother, Magdalene, screaming in the insanity of the human roundup, trying desperately to find both of her daughters – her only two children – to no avail. She only found one, Marie Josephe, and probably held on like steel. Her other daughter, Marie Anne, was herded away by the soldiers, never to see her mother again or even know if she lived or died. Magdalene, I’m sure, always wondered about her father and daughter.

Can you imagine the cacophony? The blood-curdling screams as Acadian families were separated?

Let’s pray that her other daughter, Marie Anne, somehow wound up with her grandfather, Guillaume Girouard, and that neither of them was alone.

Therefore, other than knowing her mother, after age 14, Marie Girouard had no contact with her grandparents or other ancestors. It would not be unexpected for Marie’s husband only to know what perhaps was told to him by her mother and her first cousin once removed (1C1R), Pierre Richard, who gave the other deposition.

Pierre Richard was born in 1710, much earlier than Marie. He would have known his grandmother, Anne Gautrot, until age 17 had the family remained in Port Royal, even though his grandfather, Jacques Girouard, died in 1703, seven years before he was born.

By the 1714 census, Pierre’s father, also Pierre Richard, is living about 65 miles further northeast, in Les Mines, a general area surrounding the Minas basin that includes Grand Pre, so Pierre Jr. would not have known his grandmother personally nor Jeanne Aucoin.

Furthermore, assuming they had lived near enough, Pierre Richard would have known his great-grandmother, Jeanne Aucoin, who did not die until 1718. Had she been able, she would have told him stories and her remembrances of France, where she was born. By the time Pierre was born, his grandfather, François Girouard, would have been dead for roughly 20 years. The 1751 census shows three Pierre Richards, a widower with 5 children in Les Planches next to Pierre Jr. with a wife and one child. I believe this is the correct Pierre, although another one is shown with a wife and 5 children in Riviere de Nanpan. Regardless, none were living near Port Royal and François Girouard.

Pierre was attempting to remember three generations back in time, through his grandfather Jacques Girouard to his father. The extreme trauma events of the 1755 deportation could well explain why Pierre Richard misremembered his great-grandfather’s first name and called him Jacques rather than François. He did remember his nickname, though. That’s probably how François had been referenced all of Pierre’s life.

La Varenne.

What was life like in Acadia when François, dit LaVarenne, arrived?

Fort Anne

Life in Acadian revolved around the Fort in Port Royal, the capital of the New France colony of Acadia. Built as Charles Fort in 1629, it is known today as Fort Anne. Soldiers were stationed at the fort, trading took place there, and the church was built nearby. In essence, this piece of land on the Bay of Fundy was the hub of life in Acadia.

Soldiers manned the fort, and the residents had to be able to reach it fairly quickly to defend it.

Prior to 1654, most people probably lived near the fort. There was safety in numbers, and their numbers weren’t great. Plus, the Catholic church and cemetery were nearby. Church attendance was incredibly important to the Acadian people.

1654

In 1654, Port Royal was still small, with 270 residents, as estimated by Nicholas Denys, a prisoner at Port Royal.

Denys did us the immense favor of describing Port Royal in 1653:

There are numbers of meadows on both shores, and two islands which possess meadows, and which are 3 or 4 leagues from the fort in ascending. There is a great extent of meadows which the sea used to cover, and which the Sieur d’Aulnay had drained. It bears now fine and good wheat, and since the English have been masters of the country, the residents who were lodged near the fort have for the most part abandoned their houses and have gone to settle on the upper part of the river. They have made their clearings below and above this great meadow, which belongs at present to Madame de La Tour. There they have again drained other lands which bear wheat in much greater abundance than those which they cultivated round the fort, good though those were. All the inhabitants there are the ones whome Monsieur le Commandeur de Razilly had brought from France to La Have; since that time they have multiplied much at Port Royal, where they have a great number of cattle and swine.

That’s VERY interesting, because La Have was the first capital of Acadia. D’Aulnay moved to the capital to Port Royal in 1635 from La Have. If this is accurate, then the settlers in 1653 arrived between 1632 and 1635 when D’Aulnay was importing settlers into La Have.

Denys also said that Robert Sedgewick of Boston had been ordered by Robert Cromwell to attack New Holland (New York). As he got ready, a peace treaty was signed between the English and the Dutch. Since Sedgewick was “all dressed up with nowhere to go,” he attacked Acadia in August 1654 and destroyed most of the settlements (even though it was peacetime), including Port Royal, La Have, and the Saint John River. He left the area but appointed an Acadian council with Guillaume Trahan in charge. At this point, some of the French may have returned to France, but clearly François Girouard and family did not.

After the initial 1654 attack, the Acadians were allowed to retain their lands, goods and to continue worshiping as Catholics. However, if your home had been burned, this turn of events would have provided motivation to perhaps move a little further upriver. Given that the Girouard Village was clearly upriver, this is probably the timeframe when they established their homestead, although they are still shown adjacent to Julien Lor, who was also upriver, living on the north side of the Dauphin River, which is now the Annapolis River.

Of course, who knows the path that the census-taker, who would have been paddling a canoe, would have traveled.

The First Census Records

The first definitive contemporaneous record that we have of François Girouard is found in the 1671 census, where the entire census near Port Royal consisted of 392 people in 60 homes in Port Royal. From 1654 to 1670, Acadia had been under the control of the English, and no new French colonists had arrived. After the reversion to French control, the first thing the new governor did was to take a census. How many Acadians were living there, and where? He was surveying his new domain and probably wanted tax revenue as well.

In the 1671 census, François Girouard, a farmer, age 50, is shown with wife Jeanne Aucoin, 40. They had three married children, Jacob, 23, Marie, 20 and Marie Magdeleine 17. Unmarried children include Germain 14 and Anne 12. They lived on 8 arpents of land with 16 cattle and 6 sheep.

Of course, Acadian farmers didn’t just build a cabin and begin plowing. It wasn’t that simple. First, they needed to cooperatively build dikes and reclaim the marshland along the river from the saltwater. Three or four years later, the land was ready to begin farming. Acadia was an investment any way you looked at it. 

Jacques Belou, a cooper, age 30, lives next door with his wife, Marie Girouard, age 20, with one daughter, Marie, 8 months, 7 cattle, 1 sheep, and no land.

Next to Jacques is Jacob Girouard, age 23, a farmer, and his wife, Marguerite Gautrot, age 17, one son, Alexandre, no age, and 7 cattle, 1 sheep, and no land.

Seventeen houses away on the list, we find Thomas Cormier, a carpenter, age 35, married to Magdelaine Girouard, 17, with one daughter, age 2, 7 cattle, 7 sheep, and 6 arpents of land.

It looks for all the world like François, Jacques, and Jacob are all living in separate houses on François’s land.

This census indicates François’s birth year as 1621, plus or minus a year, and his marriage to Jeanne Aucoin happened in approximately 1647, presuming that Jacques was their firstborn child.

Acadia hadn’t seen any new settlers in roughly two decades, so the 70 families on the census would have known each other very well.

The 1678 census shows François Girouer and Jeanne Aucoin, no ages given, with 15 “acres” and 18 cattle, according to Lucie LeBlanc Consentino. Additionally, Germain, age 22, is shown in the household.

By 1680, son Germain had made his way to Beaubassin with a small group of Acadians, where, on June 9th, he married Marie Bourgeois.

His surname was spelled Girouer in the parish marriage record, as was his surname in the 1686 census. Names during that time were spelled as they sounded. Spelling wasn’t standardized. Today, the name is pronounced similarly to Girard.

Life was good, at least comparatively, in Acadia. A new governor in 1684 reported that “the Acadians lived better than the Canadians, never lacking for meat or bread.” But, he added, they also weren’t as industrious.

The 1686 census at Port Royal (and nearby) shows Françoise Girouard, now age 70, along with Jeanne, 55. None of their children remain in the home, but they have 1 gun, 13 cattle, 16 sheep, and 8 hogs on 5 arpents of land. His age indicates his birth year is 1616. By now, he has lived more than half of his life in Acadia, and France must seem like a distant memory. I can’t help but wonder if any of his siblings were still living, and if he even knew when his parents died. Did he set sail for New France because he was an orphan and his new wife’s family wanted to go? Most, if not all, of his children were born in Acadia.

Next door, daughter Charlotte (called Anne in 1671), age 26, had married and was living with Julien Lord, age 33, along with their four children, ages 1-10. No land or livestock is shown. This does suggest that both families are living together on what became the Lor (Lord, Lore) Village or what became the Girouard Village.

Twenty houses away, François’ son, Jacques Girouard, age 38, is living with his wife, Marguerite Gotro, age 32, with their 9 children on 6 arpents of land with 13 cattle and 15 sheep.

In the past 8 years, three of François Girouard’s children had left for Beaubassin. Every parent wants their children to do better than they did – to have more opportunities, which often meant more land or increased safety in that time and place. It still must have been incredibly bittersweet to see those children leave. Perhaps exactly as his own parents and family had felt about him as he set out for the untamed New World.

While not as far away by water, which was the highway of the day, the distance to Beaubassin was still prohibitive. Regular visits simply didn’t happen. François certainly would not have known his grandchildren.

Son Germain Girouard, age 30, had relocated to Chignouctou/Beaubassin with his wife Marie Bourgeois, age 34, her 3 children by her first husband, and two children by Germain. They live on 4 arpents of land and have 8 cattle, 3 sheep, 4 hogs, and one gun.

Jacques Blou, age 47, along with his wife, Marie Girouard, the same age, have also relocated and lived 12 houses from Germain with their 3 children on 40 arpents of land with 15 cattle, 18 sheep, 20 hogs, and 3 guns.

Next door, we find Thomas Cormier, 55, married to Magdelaine Girouard, 37, along with their 9 children, including 1-year-old twins. They live on 40 arpents of land with 30 cattle, 10 sheep, 15 hogs and 4 guns.

The entire Beaubassin census consists of only 20 homes, 127 people, and 102 guns, which would have been used for both hunting and protection. They are cultivating a total of 426 arpents of land, or an average of 21 arpents a piece. They have 236 cattle, 111 sheep and 189 hogs. Everything else, they had to fish for, hunt or grow.

Twenty households could have been wiped off the face of the earth in an instant if attacked.

The largest Beaubassin landholder, Michel Leneuf Sr., the Seigneur, with 60 arpents of land has five servants, one of whom is a gunsmith. Leneuf also has 70 guns. Most families have one or two guns. Two families have 3 guns, one has 4 guns, and one has none.

Hell in 1690

François Girouard was listed as 70 years old in 1686, a quite respectable age for any man in that place and time. He had to posses some combination of skills and luck to reach that ripe old age.

François and his family had been settled on their land, living relatively pastorally since the English returned Acadia to the French in 1670. A lot would happen in the next few years. Change, like wisps of smoke from a distant fire, began wafting in the air in 1688.

François would soon find himself living in a war zone – a situation that dwarfed anything he had ever faced. That war on the horizon with the English may well have killed him. Or, perhaps François had already died of natural causes.

The Acadians were unprepared for what was coming. In 1689, the fort at Port Royal was razed to build a new one. At about the same time, Massachusetts authorized an expedition against Acadia after Fort William Henry fell at Bristol, Maine to French and Indian forces.

The stars were aligning against the Acadians.

In April of 1690, Sir William Phips was commissioned as a Major General and given command of an expedition against Acadia.

The fort at Port Royal was unfinished, essentially wide open, with incomplete walls and towers. Her 18 cannons were unmounted. Only 79 soldiers were present, and 42 men were absent from the community. A paltry 19 muskets were present. Resistance was not only futile, but impossible. The fort, town, and farms upriver were entirely undefended.

In May 1690, the British, who significantly outnumbered the Acadians, dropped anchor in the Bay and demanded surrender. From their vantage point, they couldn’t see how unprepared the Acadians were. In other words, they couldn’t see the fort, or lack thereof.

The priest, Louis Petit, went aboard the British ships and negotiated the terms of surrender, as the Acadians had no other choice. Terms included the protection of both the Acadian people and their personal property, along with the preservation of their right to Catholic worship. After decades of back and forth, these terms were pretty much the norm by now.

When the British saw the condition of the fort, they were apparently furious, feeling they had conceded far too much and, essentially, had been bested by the priest into giving anything at all. They knew they could have walked in and just taken everything.

What followed in no way resembled the negotiated agreement. There were differing stories, of course. Who said what, to whom, and when – and drinking might have been involved.

Ten days after their arrival, on May 19, 1690, the English attacked brutally.

Phips had the soldiers imprisoned in the church and confined the governor to his house, under the guard of a sentry. Then organized pillaging began. For the next 12 days the militiamen ransacked houses and gardens, seized the wheat and clothes of the Acadians, killed their cattle, sacked the church, and demolished, then burned the stockade.

Undefended Acadian farms and homes were burned for no reason and counter to the negotiated agreement. Belongings were stolen, and farmland was destroyed, severing any remaining shred of trust.

Because François lived upriver, his farm may possibly have been spared, but based on later census where households have combined, it’s doubtful.

Additionally, the English required that the Acadians sign an oath of loyalty to the British Crown. Fortunately, the priest somehow protected that oath document, taking it along with him, which tells us which male Acadians were present. I found the petition in 2008 in the Massachusetts archives, dated 1695. When I first transcribed the signatures, I didn’t understand the document’s history (or value) – that it had been signed in Acadia in 1690. The signatures and the original petition can be found here, but François Girouard is not among the signatories.

When the soldiers were finally finished, Phips sailed away, taking 65 Acadian prisoners, including the priest who was subsequently imprisoned in Boston. I can just see the priest hiding that petition beneath his frock, thinking it might prove valuable in defending the Acadians. Proof that they were indeed “loyal subjects,” an argument that might spare their lives.

François may have died in those fires or died in captivity. He may also have perished at the hands of the English pirates that followed, like vultures, after the soldiers departed, plundering anything remaining of value and killing any surviving livestock.

Many of the surviving men, and one would presume their families, fled to Les Mines.

I don’t know how François perished, but some part of me sees a 73- or 74-year-old man going down swinging, even in the face of insurmountable odds. Acadians are tenacious and gritty like that. I actually hope he died peacefully in his sleep before all that madness unfolded.

After 1690

By 1693, living arrangements had changed a bit, although families were still living in clusters. Protection was probably more essential than ever. Of course, the new arrangements could have been precipitated by the 1690 devastation, by François death, or both. Rebuilding could have occurred in a different location as well.

The 1693 census confirms François’ death and the combination of households by showing Jean Aucoin, his widow, age 60, living in the same household with Julien Lord, her son-in-law, age 41, Charlotte, age 33, their 5 children, 20 cattle, 40 sheep and 10 hogs on 20 arpents of land. They have two guns.

Jacob Giroud, age 46, is still living two houses away with his 11 children, 25 cattle, 30 sheep and 15 hogs on 20 arpents of land, with two guns.

In Beaubassin, we discover that François’ son, Germain Girouard, had died approximately 8 years earlier, according to the age of their youngest child, but his widow is living. I wonder if François knew that his son died not long after the 1686 census.

François’ daughter, Marie Girouard, wife of Jacques Blou, has 5 children, 34 cattle, 22 sheep, 10 hogs, 2 guns and 16 arpents of land.

François’ daughter, Madeleine Girouard’s husband, Thomas Cormier, has also died within the last five years. She has 7 children, 16 cattle, 4 sheep, and 12 hogs, but no land is listed.

The entire Beaubassin community consists of exactly the same number of homes with 119 people. That community hasn’t grown since 1686. But it hasn’t shrunk or perished either.

These same families are shown in the 1698 census and 1700 census as well.

The Girouard Village – Tupperville

MapAnnapolis has placed the Girouard Village on the map near what is present-day. Tupperville.

Using Google Maps, I was able to “drive by,” using the location of the school to pinpoint the Girouard land.

Today, the land originally occupied by Jacques Girouard (1648-1703) and, by inference, probably also by François Girouard is noted on the marker erected by the Congres Mondial Acadien in 2004 as having belonged to Charles d’Aulnay from 1636 to 1650. That alone may suggest that the Girouard family obtained possession of this land through d’Aulnay and may have arrived as some of his settlers.

The marker also states that Jacques was the son of François Girouard and Jeanne Aucoin of La Montagne (Granville Ferry.)

Let me introduce you to cousin Milt, who was kind enough to provide the photo above and the ones below. Thank you so much!

A decade ago, Milt drove cross-country to find his way back to the Girouard Village. You can see for yourself in his YouTube video, taken on his pilgrimage back to find his Girouard roots in Acadia.

I found Milt on WikiTree, where he has been fleshing out the biographies of our ancestors, and we began corresponding. I had lots of questions about his pictures since Milt has actually been there.

Roberta, yes, there is a stone in Tupperville for the Jacques Girouard and Girouard Villages area. It is in front of the old Tupperville school house, which now is the Girouard and Acadian museum, but it’s more like a visitor center. If you look at the photo, [above], you’ll see the old schoolhouse behind the Girouard stone. They have volunteers that work at the old schoolhouse during the summer to help tourists and those seeking genealogy information. There is also a place at Annapolis Royal that helps people with the Acadian history of the area.

The Jacques Girouard’s property area is now “Inglis Orchardview Farm” where they grow organic apples and other goodies. When I visited in 2013, I got to meet the matriarch of the family, Marion Inglis, who was 95 at the time, and her son Jim. She passed just a few years later. I believe they told me they were only the second family to own the old Girouard property area since the expulsion in 1755.

With Marion’s help, Milt found not only the original land, but the outlines of the foundations of their homes and perhaps the farm buildings as well.

Milt explained that the flowers inside the outline of their homes, including the medicinal hert Tansy, were flowers that survived from original seeds, potentially from France.

Here’s a closeup provided by Milt of the Tansy growing in the cellars of our ancestors. The Inglis family may have stored their own Tansy in those cellars as well. You can read about a traditional Acadian garden, here. The Mi’kmaq adopted the use of Tansy from the Acadians, where it was used in poultices and medicinal purposes for bee stings, flu, and intestinal problems.

Tansy has died out or perhaps been cultivated away as weeds elsewhere, but not here where it has self-seeded for generations.

Tiny bits, remnants of our Girouard family remain. But there’s more from Milt.

I believe Granville Ferry was where François and his wife Jeanne lived after marriage and I believe that is the same property Charlotte Anne and Julien Lord lived afterwards. There is a person on Facebook, The Acadian Peasant, that lives in Annapolis Royal who took a photo of François’s water well on that Granville Ferry property site. I will attach that to this email as well.

Be still my heart. The very well that served up the water that sustained generations of my ancestors.

I cannot stop looking.

I cannot stop…

I Must Journey

You may have guessed by now that I must go.

I must travel this path.

I must walk in their footsteps.

I must find this well and drink from its knowledge.

I hear them calling so loudly that I cannot silence their voices.

I am going home.

This is the year of the Acadians.

Buckle up and hold on tight, because you’re going with me.

_____________________________________________________________

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• MyHeritage FREE Tree Builder – Genealogy software for your computer
• MyHeritage Subscription with Free Trial
• Legacy Family Tree Webinars – Genealogy and DNA classes, subscription-based, some free
• Legacy Family Tree Software – Genealogy software for your computer
• Newspapers.com – Search newspapers for your ancestors
• NewspaperArchive – Search different newspapers for your ancestors

My Book

• DNA for Native American Genealogy – by Roberta Estes, for those ordering the e-book from anyplace, or paperback within the United States
• DNA for Native American Genealogy – for those ordering the paperback outside the US

Genealogy Books

• Genealogical.com – Lots of wonderful genealogy research books
• American Ancestors – Wonderful selection of genealogy books

Genealogy Research

• Legacy Tree Genealogists – Professional genealogy research