Claude Dugas lived more than four score years in Acadia and witnessed a lot of changes during his lifetime. Witnessed is probably far too weak a word.

Claude was born about 1649 in Port Royal to Abraham Dugas and Marguerite Doucet.

He married twice, the first time to Marie Francoise Bourgeois, daughter of Jacques (dit Jacob) Bourgeois and Jeanne Trahan, about 1673, and the second time, after her death, to Marguerite Bourg, the daughter of Bernard Bourg and Francoise Brun, about 1697.

Claude had at least 12 children with his first wife, Marie Francoise, my ancestor, and at least another 10 with his second wife, although the children’s birth years suggest that another 2 or 3 children were born to that marriage.

The early Catholic parish records of Port Royal were destroyed, so we extrapolate Claude and his family members’ birth years from the various census records where they are recorded.

Claude Reaches Adulthood

Immigration into Acadia occurred primarily between 1632, when France regained control of Acadia from the British, and 1654, when France lost control again. Most of the Acadian families, including Claude’s family, arrived during this window of time.

The French regained control of Acadia from the English again in 1667 and wanted a census. Thank goodness they did because the census are the first and sometimes the only records we have to reassemble our Acadian families

In 1671, Claude Dugas is 19 years old and living with his parents, Abraham Dugas (spelled Habraham Dugast) and Marie Judith Doucet. Two of his sisters have married, and Claude is the eldest of his 5 siblings still living at home. His father is an armurier, or gunsmith, and they own 19 head of cattle and 3 sheep. They live on 16 arpents of land.

The census shows them between Thomas Cormier and Rene Rimbault on one side and Michel Richard and Charles Melancon/Melanson on the other.

The village of Port Royal consists of 58 homesteads, quite small by today’s standards. Many of these people are related to each other by now, or soon would be, given that there had been no new French settlers arriving since 1654.

In the Port Royal census of 1678, Claude is missing, but based on where he was in 1679, we can fairly confidently say he had established a home in Beaubassin, a settlement founded by fellow Acadian and his father-in-law, Jacques Bourgeois.

By this time, Claude and Marie would have had two children, with a third probably on the way.

in 1679, in Beaubassin, Claude was a witness to his sister, Anne’s second marriage to Jean-Aubin Mignolt on April 26^th. In that record, her surname is spelled Dugast. Her first husband was Charles Bourgeois, the son of Jacques Bourgeois.

In 1681, Claude’s daughter, Marguerite, was born and baptized at Beaubassin on March 19th. The date of her birth was not mentioned in the register, but she was likely born that day or the day before. Her godparents were “sieur Alexandre LeNeuf sr du Beaubasssin and Marguerite Bourgeois who named her Marguerite.”

The Dugas and Bourgeois families were heavily allied and intermarried.

High Drama!

In March 1682, the recently appointed seigneur of Beaubassin Michel Le Neuf de La Vallière sent a summons to eleven inhabitants to appear before the Sovereign Council of Quebec for having refused to accept concession contracts. These inhabitants, presumed to be heads of household who may have represented the entire settlement, were: Pierre Morin, Guyon Chiasson, Michel Poirier, Roger Kessy, Claude Dugas, Germain Bourgeois, Guillaume Bourgeois, Germain Girouard, Jean-Aubin Migneaux, Jacques Belou and Thomas Cormier. Le Neuf was attempting to impose typical seigneurial dues such as the corvée (obligatory labor), such as bulding mills or bake ovens, but was contested by the settlers who eventually won their case in court.

This fledgling settlement, comprised of three groups: Frenchmen, Acadians who had arrived from Port Royal with Jacques Bourgeois, and a few people imported by Le Neuf, might have been small, but there was still high drama.

One man, Francois Pellerin, experienced a long miserable death. Jean Campagnard was his farmhand. On his deathbed, Pellerin accused Campagnard of being a witch, blowing some mysterious substance into his eyes while they were working in the field as part of a diabolical plot to usurp his place as head of the household. Translated – Pellerin meant that Campagnard wanted to marry his widow. That accusation spurred more accusations, launching a “witchcraft hysteria” of sorts. Campagnard was eventually brought to trial in 1684, in which it was revealed that there was a plague in Beaubassin in 1678 that took the lives of several settlers. Coincidentally, 1678 is when accusations towards Campagnard peaked.

Campanard was apparently an outcast, but it’s unclear if that’s part of what spurred the witchcraft accusations, or was a result of such.

Jean-Aubin Mignaux, Claude Dugas’s brother-in-law, accused Campagnard of casting an incantation on his crops to cause a poor harvest. Campagnard said that if his crops failed, it was Mignaux’s fault for having farmed badly.

The Port Royal Bourgeois group tried to avoid this drama. Of the entire Acadian settlement from Port Royal, Germain Bourgeois was the only one to give a deposition in which he said, as a witness to Pellerin’s death, “The man was obviously delirious with fever. I did not take the accusation seriously.”

The trial in Quebec, which took place after Campagnard had been held in jail for 9 months, revealed a dark secret. Many if not most of the men who had accused Campagnard of sorcery owed him money and/or viewed him as a competitor, in the case of several suitors.

Campagnard was eventually cleared of the accusations and found not guilty, but he was also forbidden from returning to Beaubassin – a “punishment” he probably welcomed and was more than glad to honor.

Return to Port Royal

Whatever happened in Beaubassin, for some reason, Claude Dugas returned to Port Royal, although we don’t know if he intended to stay permanently.

In Port Royal in 1686, Claude, age 38, is living with Francoise Bourgeois, 25, with Marie, 12, Claude, 10, Francoise, 6, Joseph, 6, Marguerite, 5, Agnesse, 1, Jeanne, 3, and Anne, 7. They are living on 8 arpents of land with 25 cattle, 9 sheep, and a few hogs. They own 1 gun.

It looks like Francoise and Joseph might have been twins. Future censuses or eventual parish records might tell us more.

His neighbors are Marie Sale (Martin Aucoin’s widow), Antoine Landry, and Francois Broussard, and on the other side, Germain Terriot, Vincent Brun, and Francois Levron.

However, Claude still had one foot in Beaubassin where at “Chiqnitou dit Beaubassin”, he is recorded as owning 30 arpents of land and 8 cattle. Of the 11 men named in the 1682 summons, only one man, Guyon Chaisson is not listed in 1686. Nineteen other residences are recorded, with a total of 119 inhabitants.

Claude seems to have been the only settler to have returned to Port Royal, at least that we know about.

He might have regretted that decision.

The 1690 Attack

1690 was a banner year, and not in a good way. Claude lived right on the water as ships approached Port Royal, so he had a birds-eye view of everything.

Claude would have been 42 that year – a man in his prime.

The Battle of Port Royal occurred on May 19, 1690. The British attacked, and Port Royal was entirely unprepared. The fort was being rebuilt. They only had 70 soldiers in total, and of those, 42 were absent.

Sir William Phips, the English commander, sailed into the harbor with 700 men on seven warships. There was absolutely no question about the outcome.

The soldiers burned 28 homes in and around Port Royal along with the church, although they reportedly spared the “upriver farms” and mills. It’s unclear what exactly was meant by upriver at that time. The 1686 census of Port Royal enumerated 95 families that we know were spread from “beneath” Port Royal to today’s Bridgewater. This means that 30% of the homes were burned.

One thing is for sure, Claude’s land, #15 shown here on the Canadian Park Service website positioned in relation to Port Royal and other homesteads, was not upriver.

While the Acadians had been somewhat used to episodic attacks by the English, this was an exceedingly cruel act of warfare bent on devastation and destruction, not on “taking” Acadia so that life as normal could continue, just under English rule. Instead, the English soldiers tore the dikes down, ruined the fields and farms, killed livestock, and torched everything in sight. As if this devastation wasn’t enough, pirates followed shortly thereafter, burning, pillaging, and looting even more.

Phips didn’t want to simply control and occupy Port Royal. He wanted to conquer and destroy it. He succeeded. He kidnapped and loaded the local priest and some of the soldiers onboard his ship and returned with them to Boston.

Before leaving, Phips required a loyalty oath to be signed by the Acadian inhabitants. The priest took the petition with its signatures with him, and it wound up eventually in the Massachusetts archives where I found it in 2008. I transcribed it, here.

Along with his fellow countrymen, “Claude Dugats” signed with his mark. Most Acadians could neither read nor write. A total of 61 men signed. Of those, 45%, or nearly half, had their homes burned and their farms destroyed by pulling down the dikes that kept the seawater out.

I can only imagine the rage and animosity experienced by the signers as they penned their names or made their marks through gritted teeth. Clearly, they only signed under duress, threat of great harm. I was going to say under threat of death, but I’m fully convinced there are fates worse than death – and that’s what they were facing.

They must have truly hated the English.

Claude surely was thinking about his terrified wife and children. His elderly parents were likely burned out, if Claude and his family weren’t too. Claude’s father, Abraham’s signature is missing from the loyalty oath. I’m not sure what to make of this. Either he was incredibly brave in the face of danger, or he was injured or too ill to sign. Maybe he used his advanced age of 70 or 71 as an excuse why he couldn’t sign.

In the 1693 census, Claude and family are still living at Port Royal. He’s 44, his wife, Francoise Bourgeois is 34, and they have 11 children: Marie, aged 17, Claude, aged 16, Francoise, aged 14, Joseph, aged 13, Marguerite, aged 11, Anne, aged 10, Jeanne, aged 9, Agnes, aged 7, Francois, aged 5, Madeleine, aged 4, and Cecile, aged 1.

Claude is living with his parents who are listed as the head of household. Abraham Dugas is 74 and Marguerite Doucet is 66. The combined family owned 4 guns and was living on 26 arpents of land with 20 cattle, 30 sheep, and 15 pigs. I suggest this is evidence that one or both families were burned out in 1690.

Based on the order of the census, they are living very near Port Royal. Beside them we find Michelle Aucoin, the widow of Michel Boudrot and on the other side, Charles Melancon and Marie Dugas, his wife. Jean Bourg is next to them.

You can see Claude’s land at far right, Boudrot to the left of him, and what I believe to be Abraham Dugas’s land at left. Here, he’s referred to as Abraham “armoire”, as best I can make out.

It’s impossible in 1693 to tell if the family is living on Abraham’s original land, or Claude’s, or if that’s really one and the same. Abraham’s land appears to be closer to Port Royal, so he’s more likely to have had his farm burned.

Abraham is now in his 70s, so he’s not likely to be actively farming anymore.

Hard Times

Claude’s wife, Francoise Bourgeois, died sometime between the 1693 census and the baptism of his first child with his second wife, Marguerite Bourg, about 1697. Francoise could have died in childbirth in 1695.

Claude was left with aged parents, no wife, and a dozen children, one of whom might have been a baby. If his fields had been ruined in 1690, they would only be beginning to be productive again as he rebuilt his dikes. After the death of Francoise, he would have wanted to remarry soon. It was a necessity.

He probably remarried about 1696.

Second Marriage

In the 1698 census, Claude is listed as age 49, Marguerite Bourg, noted as his second wife, is age 24, the same age as his eldest daughter who married about 1695. At home is Claude, 21, Joseph, 18, Marguerite, 17, Anne, 15, Jeanne, 13, Agnes, 12, Francois, 11, Madeleine, 10, Cecile, 8, Marie, 7, and Elisabeth, 3 months. Clearly, baby Elisabeth is Marguerite’s daughter. They live on 32 arpents of land with 25 sheep, 25 cattle, and 6 hogs. They have 20 fruit trees and 3 guns.

The ages of his two daughters, Cecile and Marie don’t match the 1693 census, but it’s reasonable to deduce that Marie would have been born later in 1693 or 1694 given that she wasn’t listed in 1693 and Cecile was 1.

They are listed beside Claude’s inlaws, Bernard Bourg and Francoise Brun, and two other Bourg families on one side, and Bonaventure Teriot and Francois Boudrot on the other.

Based on this, Marguerite Bourg clearly joined Claude’s household which was a productive farm. It’s also obvious that the census-taker was traveling by canoe and paddled across the river often. The Bourg family lived on the north side of the river and Claude Dugas lived on the south side beside the Boudrots.

Claude’s parents are not listed in the census which would lead me to surmise that they had both died, but I would be wrong.

In the 1700 census, we find Claude and his family living with his mother who is listed as head of household. Marguerite Doucet, widow of Abraham Dugast (no age given), Claude Dugast, 51, Marguerite Bourg (no age), Claude, 23, Francois, 12, Joseph, 2, Marguerite, 18, Anne, 17, Jeanne, 16, Agnes, 14, Madelaine, 11, Cecille, 8, Marguerite, 3. They have 3 guns, 40 cattle, 25 sheep, and live on 28 arpents of land.

They live between Bonaventure Terriot and Francois Aucoin on one side and Charles Melanson and Marguerite Martin, widow of Jean Bourg, on the other.

In the 1701 census, Claude is listed as 51, wife Marguerite, 30, Claude, 23, Francois, 13, Joseph, 2, Marguerite, 18, Anne, 14, Agnes, 13, Jeanne, 12, Marie, 11, Magdeleine, 10, Cecile, 9, They live on 12 arpents of land, have 3 guns, 20 cattle, 12 sheep, and 10 hogs.

They live beside Pierre Commeau and Germain Savoye on one side and Bernard Bourg flanked by Bonaventure Terriott and Francois Boudrot on the other. Louis Allain, who Allain (Alan) Creek is named for, lives beside Boudrot.

Karen Reader reports Stephen White citing that Claude is an armourer or gunsmith, like his father, as noted in his daughter Marguerite’s marriage record in 1701.

Dictionnaire Généalogique des Familles Acadiennes, Première Partie 1636-1714 – Stephen A. White – 2 vols., Moncton, New Brunswick: Centre d’Études Acadiennes, 1999 – p. 1156 Listed on daughter Marguerite DUGAS marriage contract (LOPPINOT) dated 11 Jan 1701 at Port Royal to be an “armurier.”

The Port Royal parish records don’t begin until 1702, so I’m curious where this record was found. I can’t locate it.

Claude Dugas is reported by researchers to be an armorer in the 1701 census as well, but Tim Hebert did not reflect that in his translation nor did I find it at the Canadian Archives Heritage site. This makes absolute sense, but needs confirmation. If anyone has a source or the documents, please let me know.

The 1703 census only provides the name of the head of household, if he has a wife and the number of boys and girls. Claude had 2 boys and 7 girls. One person in the houshehold is an arms-bearer. The family is listed beside Guillaume Blanchard and Germain Savoie on one side and Jacques Bonnevie and Jacques Michel on the other.

1705 Letter

This 1705 letter from Claude Dugas, found in the Acadian collection in the French archives, provides interesting information, including that Claude lived on his land for 60 years.

I asked ChatGPT to translate and transcribe this letter. If anyone can clarify either the translation or the meaning, please let me know. I’m all ears!

The named Claude Dugas
Heard in the council ordered by
an ordinance of the King’s prosecutor,
rendered on the fifth of March
that he and three other inhabitants
will have to transport a number of four men, the
King’s prosecutors of the country
on the 25th of October last,
in the arrest of the 24th of October in his
own name and by reading
and tending. What he has
he and his obliged the said
complainant to the said country. His
counterpart, he expects the amount
of the high mass and ill-treatment
of the parties and threats of the King.
To stop the bag and dispensation
Rousseau which passes in the middle.

of his lands which he has enjoyed
for sixty years fearing
that he might not make any ob.
threats he offered him payment
which is the currency of sales in
this country but the
prosecutor of the King never wanted
to receive it and he had to.
obliged to seek this money
in cash to satisfy him
which cost him a lot which
makes him a bad subject of
the country. The King does not pay
what he owes to the inhabitants except
in bills and above mentioned.

M. Lomag. T. Henry
begs to give order to the Capt. from
outside who must go to Acadia
to report what I have seen.

I don’t know if the last portion beginning with “M. Lomaq” is part of the Dugas entry or the beginning of the next one. I suspect it’s the following entry.

I sure would like to know what happened, and to better understand the meaning of this letter, including why it was written.

If indeed, Claude Dugas had lived on his land for 60 years, that meant he was also living on his father’s land. In 1705, Claude would have been about 55 or 56. He’s not even 60 years old. However, his father, Abraham was born about 1616, so this tells us that Abraham probably was living on this land in 1645, or even earlier. Maybe the letter-writer, assuming it actually was written on behalf of Claude, was trying to convey that Claude had lived his entire life on this land.

1707 – The Map Year

In the 1707 census in Port Royal, Claude Dugast is shown with his wife, 1 boy 14 or older, 2 younger boys, 2 girls 12 or older, and 4 younger girls. They live on 10 arpents of land with 30 cattle, 35 sheep, and 18 hogs. Claude has 3 guns.

They live beside Abraham Dugast, Vincent Terriot, and Francois Boudrot on one side and Alexandre Robicheau, La Libertie (aka Roy), and Charles Melanson on the other.

This Abraham Dugast is not his father, but his nephew, the son of his brother, Martin. He is reportedly the man labeled Grivois. Marais de grivois means swampland of grivois. You can see that it’s located just beneath his grandfather, Abraham’s land and not far from his uncle, Claude Dugas.

This amazing map was drawn in 1708 from the 1707 census.

It shows Claude Dugas’s land in detail, including which way his crops were growing and the path of the streams. He had significant holdings. You can also see his neighbor, Boudrot.

Zooming out, you can see Claude’s father-in-law, Bernard Bourg across the river, and then at left, what I believe is his father, Abraham, followed by what I believe is “armoire”.

Zooming out a little more, you can see the Melanson settlement at bottom right. Charles Melanson married Claude’s sister.

The provenance of the map is disheartening, though.

Port Royal was a lightning rod. It simply wasn’t safe. No one ever forgot what happened in 1690.

This could explain why Claude’s son, Claude Dugas, with wife Jeanne Bourg, is shown with 2 boys less than 14, 1 girl less than 12 on 6 arpents of land with 10 cattle, 7 sheep and 6 hogs in Cobequid.

He had left Port Royal for the next, hopefully safer, frontier.

Cobequid

Cobequid, now Masstown, was founded by the Bourg family and a few others. In 1707, there were two Dugas men married to Bourg females and one Bourg Male married to a Dugas female. Additionally, there were three other Bourg males and three other males married to Bourg females. Other surnames were familiar Acadian families: Blanchard, Theroit, Hebert, Guerin, Aucoin, Gautrot, and more.

Claude’s sons were responsible for founding the Dugas Village in Cobequid, very near the Bourg and Hebert Villages.

The Archaeology in Acadia Facebook group published the following:

What happened in 1707?

What fresh Hell was Claude living through?

Twice in 1707, the English tried to conquer Acadia. The French troops and Acadian men, assisted by the Wabanaki Confederacy, stymied their attempts, but it wasn’t without damage.

The first siege attempt began on June 6^th and lasted 11 days. Inexperienced English commanders and their 1000 men could not land their cannons to fire upon the Acadian fort at Port Royal. Once again, Claude had front-row tickets.

As luck would have it, about 100 French soldiers were stationed at the fort, plus another 60 who were due to take command of a recently built frigate. Fortuitously, about 100 Abenaki Indians had arrived at the fort just hours earlier, a Native force that often defended Acadia. The local militia consisted of about 60 men and was quickly summoned.

The English attempted to form a siege line around the fort but were too distant. They marched towards the fort but wound up establishing camps about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) from the fort. Canadian Governor Subercase, whose horse had been shot out from under him the previous day, sent parties out of the fort to harass English foraging parties, giving rise to rumors that additional militia forces were en route from northern Acadia.

This map shows the approximate location of Claude Dugas’s homestead in relation to the fort.

The English departed, regrouped, and returned on August 22^nd. This had given the Acadians time to prepare, and they were spitting mad. Luck was also with the Acadians. Pierre Morpain, a legendary French commander and pirate, or so-called privateer, arrived, adding his crew to the defenses, along with the “prize ships” and their cargo that he had captured. Those supplies were needed for the fort.

The English, now about 250 men less than in June, sailed into the bay on warships and dispatched 300 men to try to mount their cannons on land near the fort, but were unsuccessful. Subercase, now prepared, sent forces to harass them. Using guerrilla-style tactics and fire from the fort’s cannons, the English were forced to retreat to their camp

Nine English men were killed while cutting brush, whereupon their commander wrote that they were “surrounded with enemies and judging it unsafe to proceed on any service without a company of at least one hundred men.”

The English retreated to an unfortified camp protected by their ships, but even that didn’t work since the Acadians and Indians swarmed them with sniping attacks, probably appearing out of and disappearing into the marshes.

On the 31^st, the English tried to make a second landing in a different location. Subercase himself led 120 soldiers out of the fort, where about 70 soldiers engaged the New Englanders in hand-to-hand combat. The Acadian men were outnumbered but relentless, wielding axes and musket butts.

The Abenaki leader and 20 of his men were wounded and five killed, but the English were cowed. They retreated onto their ships and high-tailed it back to Boston.

The French and Acadians, with their Indian friends, drove the English out of town and Acadia.

The Acadians and French, in their reports, claimed to have killed 200 English men, which would explain their rapid retreat, but the English claimed 16 killed and another 16 wounded.

The English were completely humiliated and embarrassed. They were met with jeers upon their arrival in Boston. Dudley’s commissioners were sarcastically called “the three Port Royal worthies” and “the three champions. Dudley pointed out that many plantations around Port Royal had been destroyed during the two sieges, so all was not a failure.

This assuredly could have meant Claude’s home and lands.

Claude would have been about 57 or 58. Being the feisty Acadian man that he assuredly was, I’m sure he was right there in the fort defending Port Royal along with the rest of the Acadian families. Still, I’m sure he dreaded starting over yet again.

According to the 1707 census, there were 102 married men in Port Royal. The English warships that had their butts whipped by French farmers returned to Boston among ridicule. Unfortunately for Acadia, all this did was strengthen the reserve of the English.

The Acadians had defended Port Royal and won the battle, but…

1710 brought the end of French rule in Acadia with the heartbreaking Siege of Port Royal, in which the French were overpowered and surrendered to the English.

This time, it was the English who were prepared. Despite requests for reinforcements, France did not send additional ships nor troops. They should have.

This 1710 map shows the details of the Riviere du Dauphin just west of the fort.

I suspect that today’s Ryerson Brook is the former Dugas Creek or River on the 1710 map, across from the Melanson Village.

This map showing the 1710 siege plan includes the Dugas habitation. The area looking like fields on the map is noted as “large areas of morrases that by draining and daming out the high tides have made a great part arable.”

The 1710 census shows Claude with his wife, 4 male children, and 3 female children living beside Francois Bodrot (Boudrot) on one side and the Allain family on the other.

Here’s a contemporary map showing the Melanson settlement, a red star by the Ryerson Brook, and Allain’s Creek.

I bet someone in Nova Scotia knows exactly where the old Dugas village was actually located. I wonder if wildflowers grow among the remnants of the foundation stones of their homes.

In 1714, Claude Dugas is listed with his wife, 4 sons, and 5 daughters. They live beside Bernard Bourg and Abraham Bourg on one side and Francois Dugas and De Laurier on the other.

The last census was taken in 1714. The English were now in charge, and no further censuses were taken. However, beginning in 1702, we have parish records that record births, marriages, and deaths.

In 1714, Claude would have been about 65 years old, and his wife, 40. They may have lost a child in 1714, as the previous child was born in 1712. Marguerite would bring their last child into the world in November of 1715 when Claude was about 66.

We know little about what happened in Claude’s world for the next several years except that he and Marguerite were raising his second family of children.

Claude’s Children

Claude’s children scattered throughout Acadia and his descendants, across the globe.

Claude is unusual in that he was literally begatting children for more than 40 years and had 22 children that we know of.

Amazingly, all 22 lived to marry and produce offspring.

His oldest child married about 1694 and blessed him with his first grandchild in 1696, about the same time he remarried to his second wife. He had grandchildren older than his younger set of children.

His daughter, Marie Anne, married on October 14, 1732, just two days before the priest penned Claude’s burial record.

All but three of his children married before his death, which is pretty remarkable given that his last child was born when he was 66.

We’re nearly certain that a few of his children died as infants or were stillborn, given the gaps in birth years.

Five of Claude’s adult children died before he did. None of them lived in Port Royal which would be renamed to Annapolis Royal in 1710, so while he probably heard about their deaths, he would not have been able to attend their funerals and celebrate their lives. Or mourn their deaths.

Two children died someplace in Acadia before the deportation. We don’t know what happened to four more, or where. An amazing 11 and probably 12 survived to the 1755 deportation. I don’t know if that was a blessing or not. I surely hope so, but I fear otherwise.

Of course, that gut-wrenching legendary expulsion was horrific. Rounded up like livestock, losing everything, watching your homes and farms burn as you were forcibly separated from your family and loaded onto ships, setting sail for destinations unknown.

Some of Claude’s children were themselves elderly by that time. Francoise would have been about 76, and Joseph was about 77. No spring chickens. Yet, Joseph lived another decade and died about 10 years later in St. Martinville, Louisiana. Sadly, we lose Francoise entirely.

Claude’s children were indeed scattered to the winds of fate.

We know that six eventually made it to Quebec, but that doesn’t mean they even knew their siblings were there. The locations were distant.

We know that Claire was in Massachusetts, but we don’t know anything else, so we should probably presume that she died there.

Three made it to Louisiana. I can’t help but think of Louisiana, then held by the Spanish, ironically, as the Acadian promised land, where the Acadian survivors, at least some of them, gathered and reunited once again.

Charles either died at Fort Beausejour on the Isthmus of Chigneco, where his family was held, or in Louisiana, where some of his children later found refuge. Fort Beausejour, near Fort Lawrence, was where the families from Beaubassin were imprisoned.

Marie and her family were held hostage in Halifax where they were listed as such in 1763, then shipped to Haiti where we find them in 1765, then found their way to Louisiana where she died in 1777. I wonder if she was able to connect with any of her siblings or their children.

What an incredibly joyful reunion that would have been – but oh, the heartache of not knowing the fate of your family members.

For Claude’s children, their days in Acadia, even though they were difficult and fraught with challenges, would turn out to be the good old days. At least they were together. At least they knew if each other was alive.

Claude had an amazing 192 known grandchildren. Assuredly, there were more, especially by his younger children who were still actively having children in 1755 when Le Grand Derangement began, and their lives went up in smoke. It’s a sure bet that Claude had more than 200 grandchildren and quite possibly quite a few more than 200.

The Genealogy Sin

Claude committed one of the great sins of genealogy – he named children with both wives the exact same name. The children probably had nicknames, and they may have had middle names when they were baptized, but since many were born before the existing church records kick in, we have no way of knowing.

I guess both wives wanted a daughter named Marie – but it’s even worse than that. EACH WIFE had two daughters named Marie. Seriously. At least one of them was named Marie Anne.

I guess if you called Marie, either four people answered or no one answered.

There were two sons named Claude, two named Joseph and two daughters named Marguerite too. There was Anne and Marie Anne, but do you call that poor girl Marie or Anne because she already has siblings by both names?

Only 11, or half of the children, didn’t have a duplicate name with a sibling.

Good Heavens!

Claude’s Death

It’s difficult to mourn the death of a man who was in his late 80s or maybe even 90 and had survived so very much to die as an old man surrounded by his family. I think of it more as the final chapter of a well-worn and much-loved book closing.

Claude was able to watch all of his children grow to adulthood, at least the ones who survived beyond infants. His parents lived to be elderly as well. He visited the cemetery less often than his contemporaries, despite having more children. In that respect, he was a very fortunate man.

He probably narrowly escaped death more than once himself, but escape he did.

He did bury his first wife and perhaps a baby with her, which had to have stabbed him in the heart.

Still, he had to go on because animals needed to be fed, crops needed to be sewed and harvested, and there was no time for lingering grief after the funeral.

Claude died and was buried in the cemetery by the church in Port Royal, as shown on this 1686 map, on October 16, 1732. He was approximately 86 (one translation says 90) years old, which means that he was born about 1646 – or perhaps as early as 1642.

Just two days before his death, his daughter, Marie Anne, had married Charles Belleveau, spelled Belivau in the record. I checked to see if Claude had been a witness, but he was not. I do wonder if the priest performed the marriage at Claude’s home so that he could be in attendance, presuming he was frail.

Of course, Claude might not have been frail or ill at all. He could have been healthy right up until the end.

Claude’s burial entry from the registers of St. Jean-Baptiste, the parish church in Annapolis Royal, reads:

L’an mil sept cents trente deux et le sesieme
de octobre je — soussigné ay inhumé
dans le cemitiere du le paroisse de St. Jean
Baptiste Claude Dugast agé ? quatre
vingt-six ans. Le que a donné les marque ?
bon chrestien.

Jacque La Lache missionnaire

Google translation:

The year one thousand seven hundred and thirty two and the sixteenth
of October, by the undersigned priest has been buried
in the cemetery of the parish of St-jean
Baptiste Claude Dugast aged around four
twenty and ten years the quey gave marks of a
good christian

jacque lessclache missionary

Dugas Village

When you have 22 children and upwards of 200 grandchildren, and you live on land adjacent to your father and brothers – it’s no wonder that you wind up having a village named after your family.

The location of the Dugas Village is still shown on this 1741 map, as are the Fort and Allen’s Mill, seen at far bottom right.

I can’t help but wonder if the crosses are chapels, but there seem like an awful lot of crosses for that if you view the larger map.

A 1757 map shows the Dugas Village as Ryersonville, which today either is or is near Upper Clements, or Clementsport, an English settlement founded after Clements Township was set out in 1784. The early name for the community was Ryersonville after early settlers.

I love MapAnnapolis, and I mean LOVE in all caps. They have a wonderful Facebook page, here, where I found this detailed description of the location of both Abraham and Claude’s land. Hallelujah!!!

The rail trail cuts through this land, which means visitors today can drive down the Evangeline Highway or ride or hike the trail, which is located closer to the coastline.

Claude may be gone, buried in an unmarked grave in the churchyard, and his village dissipated after the Acadian removal in 1755 – but he still lives on in the memory and DNA of his descendants.

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Françoise was born about 1679 in Port Royal, the daughter of Claude Dugas and Françoise Bourgeois.

The first record we find of Françoise Dugas is the 1686 census, where she is living with her parents and seven siblings on eight arpents of land in Port Royal, on the peninsula of what is now Nova Scotia. They have 25 head of cattle, 9 sheep, and 11 hogs. She is 8 years old. The family is doing well.

It looks like they may be living near or even in the Melancon/Melanson Settlement, today a historic site, given that in the census, they are living beside Charles Melancon who has married Marie Dugas, a sibling to Claude.

The 1690 Upheaval

In 1690, Françoise was about 10 years old, give or take a year.

Warfare between England and France on the soil of Acadia was just the way life was. An odd form of normal. Always on edge. Always watchful but at the same time carrying out the routines of everyday life. Everyday life is what fed your family. Protecting your farm enabled you to feed your family. The English were always trying to take Acadia, and then the French were always trying to take it back. Rinse and repeat.

Having reverted to French control in 1670, English warships attacked Acadia once again in May of 1690, surprising the unprepared Acadians.

Before approaching the town, William Phips, the fleet’s commander, made contact with Pierre Melanson dit Laverdure, a bilingual French Huguenot. Phips determined the town’s condition, then weighed anchor and sailed further into the bay and up to the town, today’s Annapolis Royal, where the fort was located.

Given where they lived, Françoise would have seen the huge ships passing by. Was she fascinated or terrified?

Fort Anne, which normally stood sentry over the town and harbor, was being torn down and rebuilt. Less than 70 French soldiers were in the garrison, 42 of whom were absent at that time. The French couldn’t defend themselves and surrendered.

After the surrender, the English breached the surrender terms, plundered and burned the town and fort, and desecrated the church after promising they wouldn’t.

In Phips own words, “We cut down the cross, rifled the Church, pulled down the High-Altar, breaking their images,” and on May 23rd, “kept gathering Plunder both by land and water, and also under ground in their Gardens.”

Clearly, the English meant business and behaved in an incredibly cruel manner – unlike the style of warfare the Acadians had been used to in the past. 28 homes and the church succumbed to flames, but the mills and upriver farms were spared, whatever “upriver” meant. Was the Dugas home burned? I would guess that it was, given that we know they lived near the fort and town.

Many Acadians hid in the forest. Françoise may well have been among them. Phips threatened them, and fearing slaughter, they came out of the woods and returned to their homes.

Following the devastation, the English required a loyalty oath to the English King. Phips ordered that his soldiers “burn, kill and destroy” anyone who refused to take and sign the oath.

Men signed out of self-preservation. Françoise’s father, Claude Dugas, and her future husband, René Forest, both signed. They had little choice if they wanted to keep their farms, livestock, and their lives – or whatever of that was left.

Françoise witnessed all of this as a young child.

Later Censuses

Changes from the 1686 to the 1693 census may well have resulted from the English burning so many homes in 1690 and the subsequent pirate attacks that resulted in more devastation.

In 1693, Françoise was 14 and is listed in the census with her parents and her elderly grandparents, Abraham Dugast and Marguerite Doucet, on 26 arpents of land – quite a bit more than in 1686. She now has 10 siblings. The family owns 4 guns but only owned one 7 years earlier and has 20 cattle, 30 sheep, and 15 pigs. This is clearly a combined household. In the 1686 census, her grandparents had been living alone.

In 1697, the French once again took control of Acadia.

The next census in which Françoise appears is 1698, after she married René Forest. His age is listed as 28, and hers as 20, which, based on their children’s ages, means she married at about 17 in about 1695. Daughter Marie is 2, and Marguerite is 1. They are doing well, especially for a young couple, with 18 cattle, 22 sheep, and 2 hogs. Unlike before, the census lists 40 fruit trees, and her husband owns 2 guns.

Five years later, in 1701, Françoise, now 22, has two more children: Marie is 5, Marguerite is 4, Joseph is 3, and Francois is 1. They farm 6 arpents of land, have 1 gun, 23 cattle, 18 sheep, and 3 hogs.

Two years later, in 1703, they reportedly have 4 sons and 4 daughters with one arms-bearer, who is clearly René.

In 1707, they had 4 males under 14, 2 girls less than 12, 8 arpents of land, 14 cattle, 24 sheep, and 15 hogs. They also had one gun.

In 1714, the last census, which, unlike the others, was ordered by the English, they had 10 children, 5 boys and 5 girls. Very little information is contained in the census, probably due to what happened in 1711,

Acadia Falls

In our mind’s eye, we see a peaceful census taker visiting each farm, climbing out of his canoe, waving as he approaches the house, and chatting with his neighbors. That belies what was actually going on in Acadia during this entire time. Acadia was never peaceful.

For example, let’s look at what happened in 1711 that clearly affected all of the Acadians.

Françoise Dugas’s aunt, Madeleine Dugas (1664-1738) married Germain Bourgeois (1650-1711) about 1682 in Port Royal. By 1686, they were living in Beaubassin with the other Bourgeois family members, who had created a village there.

The men from this village, eventually called Bourgeois Village, visited Port Royal from time to time. Among other reasons, their family members lived there.

On September 24, 1710, the English once again attacked Port Royal with 5 warships and 3400 troops. The Acadians, with 300 soldiers, which consisted of all able-bodied men, stood absolutely no chance. A siege began. The English blockaded Port Royal. Battles ensued for the next month, but on October 12^th, the beleaguered Acadians surrendered. The British allowed the soldiers, which would have assuredly included René Forest and the rest of the Acadian men, to surrender the fort and leave, with their flag flying,

One of the terms of surrender stated that inhabitants within cannon-shot, 3 English miles, could stay for 2 years. This meant they had two years to move their “moveable items” to a French territory, which at that time was any of the rest of Acadia, including the Minas Basin. 481 Acadians pledged allegiance to the Queen of England, and the French troops left Port Royal, now renamed by the English to Annapolis Royal.

It would always be Port Royal to the Acadians.

450 English soldiers remained, but they clearly didn’t want to be there. By June of 1711, only 100 were left – the rest having either deserted or died.

By Verne Equinox – Own work, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=10531352

On June 21^st, a contingent of British soldiers was ambushed and killed at “Bloody Creek,” upriver about 15 miles, and ironically, where René Forest’s Village would later be drawn on a map.

Sixteen British were killed, 9 injured, and the rest captured, supposedly by the Mi’kmaq – although the Indians and Acadians were very closely allied.

About this same time, Acadians Guillaume Bourgeois, Jean Comeau, and Pierre LeBlanc of Annapolis, Germain Bourgeois of Beaubassin, and Francois Brassard of Chipody (who were passing through Annapolis) were arrested, reportedly for capturing a British soldier.

A descendant reports that Germain was held in the subterranean Black Hole at Fort Anne, originally a powder magazine, for several weeks. While his son, Guillaume, and the others were released, Germain died as a result. I can’t even begin to fathom that torture.

Writ large, we don’t know the outcome of this incident, but I decided to see if I could locate any corroborating evidence. As it turns out, the parish death records provide a clue.

Germain Bourgeois 1711 death

The priest, Father Durand, had been kidnapped and taken to Boston in January 1711, so deaths during his absence were not recorded on the day that they occurred. Nonetheless, we find that the priest later entered a burial record for Germain Bourgeois and the others who had perished during this time. “Died 1711, died during Durand’s captivity at Boston.”

A Bourgeois book by Paul-Pierre Bourgeois, page 72, states that Germain “d 1711, Port Royal, en prison comme hôtage du serment d’àllégence (61a)”. This translates into something like “he died in prison as a hostage for the oath of allegiance.”

To add insult to injury, without a priest, there was no one to perform the traditional Catholic Mass for Germain. The family would have made do, somehow, and buried him in the cemetery near his parents, who had died just a few years earlier – if they were able to have a funeral at all.

Françoise would have attended whatever service they had, standing by her mother and aunt who had children ranging in age from 28 to the baby, who was just three.

He died for being in the wrong place at the wrong time – and Acadian. There was no evidence he had been involved in the capture of the soldier.

Organizing the Census Data

The only avenue we have to discern birth dates of individuals born before parish records began is to correlate their ages across multiple census years. That’s also how we determine how many children were born to a family.

Françoise is with her parents in 1686 and 1693, but married before the 1698 census.

The number of children listed in the census, especially in 1703 is confusing. If they had four named children with ages listed in 1701, two males and two females –  how did they have 8 children, four of each, two years later?

Four years later, in 1707, they had six children, but we know that children died often.

I suspect 1703 is simply wrong, or someone else’s children were counted as theirs that day. Unfortunately, 1703 doesn’t include the children’s names and ages.

As best we can tell, Françoise had at least 15 children, probably 18 and possibly 20. We only know the names of 13. We know for sure that four died as children, and another four may have died as adults before Françoise.

After their marriage, René and Françoise have the following resources listed in the census.

It’s interesting that in 1698, they have 16 arpents of land under cultivation and 40 fruit trees. Almost every family has fruit trees listed. Champlain’s men brought apple seeds with them in 1605, and by 1633, trees were planted in the Annapolis Valley.

In 1701, less land is listed, and no fruit trees – but neither are fruit trees listed for any other family. Maybe that accounts for the difference in the amount of land under cultivation, too. No fruit trees are listed in 1707 either, so 1698 provides us with a special glimpse of life in Acadia.

Françoise’s Children?

Like most women of that era, Françoise spent most of her adult life caring for her husband and children. Life, especially life with children, required a partnership between two people. One worked the fields and took care of things, literally, outside the house, and the other bore and nursed the children, made clothes, cooked, and kept the household in order. Families were large, in part due to the lack of modern birth control and the tenets of the Catholic church, combined with the need for children to become “hands” to help their parents.

Children raised in a farm culture looked forward to being old enough to help in some capacity. Being permitted to do different chores were rites of passage.

Marie de Forest was born about 1696, died Feb 1, 1770, in Montreal, Quebec, married Joseph Robichaud (Robichaux) (c 1794-1768) on Feb 7, 1718, in Port Royal, and had 9 children.

Marie Forest Robichaux marriage

Marguerite Forest was born about 1697 (per the 1698 census) and died May 27, 1747 in Port Royal, about 47 years old (per her death record). Witnesses were Claude Bourgeois and Francois Forest, her brother, and she was buried the following day.

She married on January 19, 1724 to Pierre Bastarache (1702-1751) and had 6 children. The last child was born in 1738 when she would have been 41 years old.

One of her sons, Michel Bastarche, was deported to SC with his brother, but they returned to Acadia quickly by 1756. He died there at age 89. Apparently, his two sisters remained in Acadia.

Joseph Forest was born about 1698, died January 10, 1732 in Port Royal, aged about 32, married Marie Jeanne Guillebaud (1701-1763) on November 25, 1720 and had 4 children. His wife remarried in 1737 to Francois Girouard and had two additional children. She was buried on November 27, 1763 in Cherbourg, Manche, Normandy.

Joseph Forest Guilbaud 1720 marriage

On July 6, 1723, Marie Joseph Forest was born to Joseph Forest and Marie Guilbaud with godparents Charles Guilbaud, father of Marie Guilbaud, and her grandmother, Françoise Dugas, mother of Joseph Forest.

Francois de Forest was born about 1701, died October 22, 1777 and was buried two days later at L’Assomption, Quebec, Canada, aged about 77. He married Jeanne Girouard (1709-1767) on October 20, 1727, age 26, with witnesses Alexandre Girouard, Antoine Blanchard, René Forest and Pierre Le Blanc, son of the late Pierre Le Blanc. They had 9 children.

1701/1702 child or children unknown

Parish records in Port Royal begin in 1702. Four years between children tells us that a child was born about 1702 and died.

The first child whose birth is recorded in the church records is Mathieu.

Mathieu René Forest was born January 11, 1704, and was baptized on April 20^th with godparents Mathieu de Goutin, lieutenant general of this province, and Renee Bertrant dit de Forest (who is this person?). Is the name Bertrant a clue to a different surname and is Forest entirely a dit name?

Forest Mathieu 1704 birth

Mathieu married on January 19, 1728, to Marie Madeleine Guilbeau (born 1712) with witnesses René Forest, Joseph Forest, brother of the groom, Jacques Forst, son of the said René Forest and brother of the groom, Charles Guilbaut, and Charles Guilbaut, the son, brother of the bride. They had two known children, born in 1728 and 1740. He appeared on the 1763 census of Connecticut.

Jacques Forest was born June 21, 1707 and baptized on July 19^th in Port Royal with godparents Sieur de Teinville, lieutenant of a company and Jeanne Dugast, wife of La Forest.

He married on January 25, 1734, to Marie Josephe LePrince (born in 1715) with wintesses Claude Granger, Pierre Lanoue, Ambroise Beliveau, René Forest, Pierre Granger.

Jacques Forest and his family were deported to Connecticut in 1755 where he appears on the 1763 census.

Marie Madeleine (Magdelaine) Forest was born June 30, 1709, and was baptized on July 3^rd with godparents Francois Dugast and Magdelaine Dugast, wife of Jean Hebert.  She married Pierre Guilbeau (1704-1758) on January 21, 1731, with witnesses Charles Guilbaut, son of Charles Guilbaut, brother of the groom, Alexandre Guilbaut, son of Charles Guilbaut, brother of the groom, René Forest and Jacques Forest, his son.

Forest Marie Madeleine Guilbaut 1731 marriage

She died on March 27, 1758, the day after Easter, in Quebec, age 48, and was buried the next day in Bellechassse. Her husband and three children died in the same week. Her son, Jean-Baptiste, age 16, died the same day as his mother. Her husband died 9 days later, on April 5, 1758. Joseph died three days before his father, on April 2^nd, about age 7, and Ursule, 14 years old, died the day after her father, on April 6^th. What an incredibly grief-filled week. I wonder what took the family and if neighbors were dying, too. I can’t imagine being the two barely adult children left and having to deal with the magnitude of this loss. 

Elisabeth (sometimes Isabel) Forest was born about 1710 and died on September 12, 1767 in Becancour, Nicolet, Quebec. She married under the name of Isabelle to Honore LePrince (1717 – c 1756), son of Jean Le Prince and Jeanne Blanchard on November 24, 1738, in Port Royal with witnesses René Forest, father of the bridge, Jean Le Prince, father of the groom, Pierre Forest, Paul Blanchard, Joseph Le Prince.

Forest Isabelle LePrince 1738 marriage

They had two known children. Their daughter, Marie Jeanne Victoire, married Francois Cornier in Becancour, Nicolet, Quebec, on January 7, 1760, so they were there by then. Another daughter married another Cormier male in the same place in 1771.

Catherine Josephe Forest was born on May 17, 1713 in Port Royal and was baptized the same day with godparents Claude Girouard and Isabelle Broussard.

She married Claude Gaudet (1713-1786) on August 18, 1737 with witnesses René Forest, father of the bride, Bernard Godet, father of the groom, Pierre Forest, Paul Blanchard, Isabelle Forest and Madelene Tibaudot.

Forest Catherine Josephe Godet 1737 marriage

They had 8 known children. Some may have been born after the deportation. This family is on the list of Refugees at Camp L’Esperance in 1756 and 1757. They are at Fort Edward in 1761/1762 with three in their household and settled at St-Jacques-de-Cabahannocer, Louisiana.

Karen Theriot Reader reports that Catharine Josephe died in Louisiana, and her name is recorded on the Acadian memorial Wall of Names where she is listed along with Claude and one child as early Acadian immigrants to Louisiana. Two of their children are known to have died in Louisiana, but the balance are unknown. She does not appear on the January 1, 1777 census at St. James, LA, but Claude died there before May 2, 1786.

Anne Forest was born May 3, 1715, and was baptized the following day with godparents Claude Brossard and Marie Forest.

She married on January 25, 1740, to Joseph LePrince (1719-1781) in Port Royal, son of Jean LePrince and Jeanne Blanchard, with witnesses René Forest, Jean Le Prince, and Simon Le Blanc. He died on May 24, 1781, in Becancour, Nicolet, Quebec, aged 62.

Forest Anne LePrince 1740 marriage

This family escaped the deportation by fleeing to Miramichi in New Brunswick. Her husband and children are noted on the passenger list in Quebec in July 1757, but Anne is not. Anne had died by the time her daughter, Marie-Joseph, born in October 1753 in Port Royal, died in Quebec on January 5, 1758, and probably died during their time in Miramichi.

Pierre Forest was born July 10, 1717 and was baptized provisionally by Claude Teriot. On August 1^st he was baptized by the priest in Port Royal with godparents Guillaume Blanchard and Jeanne Richard.

Forest Pierre 1717 baptism

He married on June 30, 1744 to Marie Madeleine Richard (1718-1761) in Port Royal with witnesses René Forest, Prudent Robichaux, Etienne Robicheaux, Simon Richard, and Joseph Richard.

According to the Belle-Ile-en-Mer depositions, he died in 1750 inthe Memramcouk village of Beaubassin.

Jean Pierre de Forest was born July 22, 1719, and was baptized the next day in Port Royal with godparents Francois de Forest and Agnes Godet.

Forest Jean Pierre 1719 baptism

On November 11, 1743, he married Anne Richard (born in 1720) with witnesses René Forest, Bruno Robicheaux, Simon Richard and Joseph Richard.. He was listed in 1763 in the Connecticut census.

Space for 1721 child – unknown

Charles Forest was born On October 23, 1723 and baptized the next day in Port Royal.

Forest Charles 1723 birth

He married on May 10, 1745 to Marie Chaisson in Beaubassin, Acadia, but was then married about 1746 to Marie Josephe Poirier, with whom he had 5 known children. In 1763, he was listed on the Fort Beauséjour census. In 1792, he married again to Marie Josephe Girouard. Karen Reader shows his death in 1805 in Menoudie, Cape Breton, at age 82.

There is significant confusion surrounding two men by the same name – see here.

What Happened to Françoise’s Children?

We have some information about what happened to Françoise’s children by the time the deportation occurred.

The more we are able to learn about the destination of her children and where they eventually wound up, the more hints about where Françoise may have eventually been laid to rest.

Keep in mind that known children does not necessarily equate to all children, especially not for grandchildren born in remote locations in Acadia, or after deportation. Many were simply “lost.”

Françoise had at least 75 grandchildren and probably several more. Unless they were exiled in the same location that she was, she would never have known about any born after the summer of 1755. Furthermore, she would have grieved the absence of every one of these sweet souls. They were ripped away from her. Grandchildren are the light in the life of grandmothers, and hers were gone. She probably prayed every single day for them and that their separation would not be forever.

Many of the deported Acadians never accepted that they weren’t one day going back home

Two of Françoise Dugas’s grandchildren were documented in depositions on Belle-Ile-sur-Mer in France in 1766 and 1767 after deportation. Marie, the daughter of Pierre Richard and Marie Girouard, married Pierre Forest. Her sister, Anne. married Jean Forest.

Françoise’s family was literally tossed to the winds, with leaves falling across the globe. 

Godmother

After the 1714 census, information about Françoise is sparse but some information is found in the Catholic parish registers.

On what must have been an incredibly joyful day, Françoise Dugas stood as the godmother for her first grandchild, a boy, Prudent Robichaux (also spelled Robicheau and Robichaud), born to her eldest daughter, Marie, on Monday, December 19, 1718.

She was probably present for the child’s birth too.

The original parish records were recopied once, above, and they are much more legible than the original below. I always check both. Sometimes whoever made the copy can make out words in the original that I can’t.

Robichaux Prudent 1718 original

Françoise Dugas was mistakenly noted as the wife of René Robichaux instead of René Forest, but it’s clear who was meant. There is no René Robichaux or similar spelling in the St. Jean-Baptiste parish records between 1702 and 1755.

Forest, Marie Josephe 1723 baptism

On Tuesday, July 6, 1723, Françoise stood as the godmother for Marie Josephe Forest, her son Joseph’s first daughter, where she is noted as Joseph’s mother.

Fortunately, the Nova Scotia Archives records are indexed by the name of the primary individuals, meaning those who are being buried, baptized or married. Unfortunately, there’s no every-name index published, even though the individual record transcriptions do show that information.

If we were to check the baptismal records for Françoise’s grandchildren born in Port Royal, beginning with the ones born closest to the 1755 deportation date and working backward, we might discover more instances of her serving as Godmother.

1755 – The Final Battle

You might think that Françoise’s final battle was death, but in this case, it wasn’t.

The final battle was the horrific genocidal eviction of the Acadian people from their homelands in 1755. At least all of the Acadians that the English could find.

By 1755, Acadia reached throughout most of Nova Scotia, stretching entirely across the peninsula from Pubnico through Port Royal, past Halifax, northeast past Louisbourg, and back to the Les Mines basin, including Truro, Grand Pre, and Beaubassin.

The English were determined to take Acadia once again. Not just to oversee or rule the land but literally to “take” all of the land and property, evicting, removing, and essentially robbing the Acadian people of all of their belongings. Their intent was to settle English families who would, of course, be much easier to control.

If Acadian lives were lost in the process – so what.

Ships were sent to round up and forcibly deport the Acadians. No effort was made to keep families together, either on ships or relative to their final destinations.

Many were sent to the colonies, but the colonies weren’t prepared, and some rejected shiploads of destitute people.

For many families, the only connecting glue is if someone was baptized in Acadia and some two decades later, is once again found in the parish records elsewhere, say, Louisiana or Quebec, for example.

My ancestors either died or made it to Quebec, south of Montreal. Many families were simply never heard from again.

Several overloaded ships headed back to ports in Europe, and some sank en route.

Where was Françoise? Was she alive? Where did she go? Was she entirely separated from her family? Did she ever see any of them again?

Françoise’s Death

Françoise died sometime after October 12, 1723, when she stood as godmother. That much we know for sure. She was about 43 then and could certainly have lived many more years.

Françoise may still have been alive when René died and was buried in Port Royal on April 20, 1751. She would have been about 70.

His burial record in Port Royal indicates that two sons and a son-in-law were witnesses on his burial entry: Claude Godet, Mathieu Forest, and François Forest. That tells us that at least these three children were still living in Port Royal, although they would be separated during the deportation 4 years later.

Rene Forest 1751 burial

It doesn’t say he’s the widower of Françoise Dugas, although it does mention her, so she may have outlived him. If so, that means she also outlived at least four of her adult children, plus the ones who died young.

There’s no death record for Françoise before the deportation, Le Grand Dérangement, which probably means she was rounded up and deported at 75 or 76 years of age.

Let’s hope that she managed to get on a ship with at least one of her children.

How her heart must have ached for the children and grandchildren who would disappear into the mists of time, ghosts on other ships, screaming across the water until their voices could no longer be heard. Frantic outstretched arms.

Mémère!

Mémère!

Grandchildren she would only reunite with in the hereafter. She probably heard them in her nightmares, still screaming for her – unable to reach them.

The church where her entire spiritual life had been spent – joys and sorrows – elation as a bride, and tears as she buried those dear to her heart, including that groom more than half a century later. Now, simply disappearing as she could see it behind the fort and garrison, an ever-smaller dot and spire on the horizon, slipping away.

René’s grave – those of her parents, brothers, sisters, their children, her children, and, yes, grandchildren too. The grave where she was supposed to rest beside her beloved family members for eternity. She would never rest in peace now.

There would be no comfort. No peace ever again.

If Françoise lived to see this horrific day, she slowly sailed out of sight of everything she had ever known – into the yawning jaws of the inky abyss. I hope she didn’t realize…but in my heart, I know that that she did.

Goodbye, Port Royal.

_____________________________________________________________

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• NewspaperArchive – Search different newspapers for your ancestors

My Books

• 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
• The Complete Guide to FamilyTreeDNA – Y-DNA, Mitochondrial, Autosomal and X-DNA

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