Jacques Bourgeois first arrived in Acadia in 1641. I wrote about his journey from La Rochelle in the first chapter, Jacques Bourgeois: Surgeon of Port Royal. Please read that article before this one to obtain a complete view of Jacques’ incredible life.

These articles include many photos, which make them lengthy, but I’m writing with the understanding that many people will never be able to travel to these locations to visit Jacques – so I’m taking you along with me.

A picture really is worth 1000 words.

Beaubassin

In 1671 or 1672, Jacques Bourgeois, with his two older sons and two of his sons-in-law, left Port Royal and pioneered the Acadian settlement of Mésagouèche, later Missaguash, eventually renamed Beaubassin, on the isthmus of Chignecto. Beaubassin represented “the first swarming of the Acadians to establish their hive,” as one historian describes it.

Beaubassin is listed on this 1755 map as Fort Lawrence, which was built on the site of Beaubassin in 1750. We’ll get to that intriguing story in a little bit.

Jacques was the first pioneer to emigrate out of Port-Royal and established a secondary colony, although he went back and forth often, maintaining ownership of his land in Port Royal through the 1693 census. I’ve also seen Beaubassin referred to as Bourgeois village or colony, but I’ve never seen a historical source given for that name. It does make sense, though.

Jacques was the most prosperous Acadian in Port Royal and could afford to self-fund a colony.

An apparent jack-of-all-trades, he decided to strike out and establish a colony in the northern portion of the Bay of Fundy, in a strategic trading location. On the map, you can see the darker brown fingers of the Bay of Fundy, representing shallow tidal areas with conditions similar to salt-marsh farming conditions in and near Port Royal.

Of course, Jacques would have traveled by water, not land. No roads existed then. Water was the roadway and a trip from Port Royal to Beaubassin would take between 8 and 12 days, in the best weather, under the best of circumstances, with a light load. Canoes could travel about 7-9 km per day, but would need to hug the coastline. Jacques probably stopped at known Mi’kmaq villages to rest, spend the nights and find food.

This 1753 map illustrates the strategic importance of Beaubassin as a portage, and why Jacques chose that location.

You can see both Beaubassin and Beausejour at the top of the map, on the Bay of Fundy known as the Baye Francoise, and the Baie Verte about 15 miles on the other side of the isthmus.

This accompanying placard from the Fort Cumberland/Fort Beausejour Visitor’s Center and Museum describes the importance of Chignecto.

This riverine highway was indeed of strategic importance, the gateway connecting the two bodies of water – and the land of opportunity for Jacques.

Beaubassin no longer exists, but the Beaubassin and Fort Lawrence National Historic Site is built nearby today. Fort Lawrence was built by the English at Beaubassin in 1750.

In 1968, archaeologist Pierre Nadon located the remains of Fort Lawrence between the Canadian National Railway tracks, Fort Lawrence Road and a few farm buildings. Thanks to Pierre, we know where Beaubassin was established.

Jacques possessed many skills that lent themselves to colonization, and what he couldn’t do himself, he could purchase.

He knew the area and the Native people well from his younger days in the course of extensive fur-trading activities, and his move was undoubtedly focused on Indian trading in addition to farming. Jacques very likely wanted to continue trading with the English too, out from under the microscopic eye of the Port Royal residents. Everyone there knew everyone, and what they were doing.

While the English controlled Acadia, from 1654 to, functionally, 1670, Jacques traded freely with New England. After the French regained control of Acadia once again, trading with the English would have been frowned upon, and to trade with the English in Port Royal would have meant thumbing his nose at the French authorities as the English ships sailed right past the fort. Literally, right under their noses. No, trading would be much easier in a remote area, and interference much less likely.

Jacques had another ace in the hole – he had a large family, young, newly married children, and money.

Jacques persuaded other families to accompany him on his new adventure, given that the prospects of farming were even better than at Port Royal. His colony would be located on the edge of the largest continuous expanse of dykable marshland in eastern North America. Even without dyking, the resources of salt-marsh hay and of unlimited livestock grazing must have seemed limitless as they looked over the inviting terrain.

At Chignecto, to encourage settlement, Jacques built a flour mill and a saw mill that he had imported from Boston.

Within five years the group was well-established, and as more settlers followed, increasing amounts of land were reclaimed from the saltwater, and the flocks and herds increased.

By any definition, a success.

Beaubassin and the surrounding area would eventually rival, then exceed, Port Royal’s population, but not until long after Jacques’ death.

Beaubassin Settlers

Jacques was accompanied by several people, although it’s unclear whether his wife and minor children joined him initially, or if Jacques ever actually lived in Beaubassin until after 1693..

Beaubassin settlers included:

• Boat pilot, Pierre Arsenault married to Marguerite Dugas
• Jacques’ son, Charles Bourgeois married to Anne Dugas
• Son Germain Bourgeois married to Madeleine Dugas
• Jean Boudrot married to Marguerite Bourgeois
• Pierre Sire (Cyr) married to Marie Bourgeois as her first husband
• Germain Girouard married to Marie Bourgeois as her second husband in 1680
• Thomas Cormier married to Marie Madeleine Girouard
• Jacques Blou married to Marie Girouard
• Claude Dugas married to Marie-Francoise Bourgeois

Some of Jacques children married after he settled in Beaubassin, with only one spending their entire life in Port Royal. Everyone else either settled in Beaubassin, the surrounding region, or traveled back and forth.

The book, Acadia, the Geography of Early Nova Scotia to 1760 by Andrew Clark Hill published in 1968 tells us that:

In 1676, part of Chignecto became the seigneurie of Canadian-born French nobleman Michel LeNeuf de La Vallière, who named his 100-league holding “Beaubassin.” La Vallière brought in French settlers and indentured employees from Canada, in direct competition with the already-established adjacent Bourgeois settlement. According to Acadian tradition, a clause in La Vallière’s land grant title “protected the interests of Jacques Bourgeois and the other Acadian settlers established on the domain,” and “it was not long before the two elements of the population merged into one.”

Beaubassin, beau bassin, means beautiful basin, which is an absolute perfect description, especially in the summer.

The Bourgeois settlement was probably very glad to have some new French neighbors, if not LeNeuf himself and the problems he brought with him.

Beaubassin wasn’t included in the 1678 census, unfortunately, but Jacques is found in Port Royal with his wife Jeanne Trahan, no ages given. They have two daughters still at home, are farming 20 arpents of land and have 15 cattle.

1678 is also the year that Beaubassin, and possibly Port Royal as well, had some type of plague that took the lives of several residents.

Things started to come unraveled a bit in 1682 when Seigneur Michel LeNeuf de La Vallière, expecting to function as French Seigneurs typically functioned, attempted to impose the corvée, obligatory community labor such as building mills or ovens. He summoned 11 inhabitants for refusing to accept the concession contracts. Jacques was not on the list, but two of his sons were.

• Pierre Morin
• Guyou Chiasson
• Michel Poirier
• Roger Kessy
• Claude Du Gast (Dugas)
• Germain Bourgeois
• Guillaume Bourgeois
• Germaine Giroir
• Jean Aubin Mignaux
• Jacques Belou
• Thomas Cormier

It may be that Jacques’ “reserve” was excluded, but that could mean either that the sons had land outside Jacques’ “village,” or La Valliere was attempting to exert control over everyone in the region. This didn’t go well for La Valliere, as the colonists sued and won in a Quebec court.

The following chart shows the development and family status in early Beaubassin. X means “present”, or, in 1682, summoned. Blank means absent or not mentioned, and anything else is a comment.

Name	1672 Founding	1682 Summons	1686 Census
Jacques Bourgeois	X		Port Royal
Pierre Arsenault	X		Resides Port Royal, owns land in Beaubassin
Charles Bourgeois	X	Deceased by April 1679	Deceased
Germain Bourgeois	X	X	X
Jean Boudrot	X	Deceased by Nov 1679	Deceased
Pierre Sire (Cyr)	X	Deceased by June 1680	Deceased
Germain Girouard	X	X	X
Thomas Cormier	X	X	X
Jacques Blou	X	X	X
Claude Dugas	X	X	Resides Port Royal, owns land in Beaubassin
Pierre Morin		X	X
Guyou Chiasson (dit name Lavalle)		X	X Lavalle
Michel Poirier		X	X
Roger Kessy (Quessy)		X	X
Guillaume Bourgeois		X	Resides Port Royal, owns land in Beaubassin
Jean Aubin Mignaux (Mignault)		X	X
Sr. Michel Leneuf		Issued summonses	X
Emmanuel Mirande		Married Marguerite Bourgeois Nov 1679 Beaubassin	X married widow of Jean Boudrot
(Jean) LaBarre		Child baptized in Beaubassin Oct 1681	X
Jacques Cochu		Married Nov 1682 with LeNeuf as witness	X
Robert Cottard		In Quebec in 1681	X
Pierre Mercier		Married April 1679 Beaubassin	X married widow of Francois Pellerin
LaGasse			X
Totals	10	11 summons + Leneuf	16+3 nonresidents

Some historians speculated that the 11 men summoned in 1682 were the only families in Beaubassin at the time, but as we can see, that’s not the case. There were at least 4 additional families in Beaubassin by that time, and possibly a fifth – none of whom were summoned. We know that they were living there because either a marriage or a child’s baptism is recorded in the church records. There were at least a few others as well.

However, the men who are were summoned have one thing in common. They are all Acadian men, or married to Acadian women. The men not summoned were either from Quebec, or elsewhere, meaning they were not Acadian. It’s becoming evident why LeNeuf felt that the Acadians were difficult, recalcitrant and unmanageable. They were!

The fact that in 1686, Jacques’ son, son-in-law, and pilot own land in Beaubassin, but live in Port Royal, suggests that at least some people viewed Beaubassin either as an investment, or a fall-back plan, or maybe both.

It’s also interesting that Jacques himself is not reported as either living in, or owning land in Beaubassin.

Witchcraft

Another incident soon rocked Beaubassin. In 1683, outcast Jean Campagnard, who was known for being “inappropriate” with women and young girls was accused of witchcraft after resident Francois Pellerin died a miserable death in late 1678. To put matters in context, this was the only known witchcraft case in Acadia, so it wasn’t part of a “hysteria.”

During Campagnard’s trial in 1684 and 1685, depositions were presented by numerous people who were known residents of Beaubassin, and at least three new names appeared: Jean Rignault, a soldier who served at Fort Pentagouet about 1670 with Campagnard, Pierre Godin from Quebec who built a mill for LeNeuf at Beaubassin, claimed he had been cursed, and died before 1686, and Martin Aucoin.

Jacques’ clan apparently tried to steer clear of the mess.

Campagnard was held for 9 months before being acquitted, but banished from Beaubassin, a fate which probably suited everyone.

Capital of Acadia

During the regime of La Valliere, from 1678 to 1684, Beaubassin was the capital of Acadia, and the only village that had contact with the government. La Valliere and administrative officers in France only encouraged trade with France and actively discouraged contact with New England.

In 1684, Valliere was reassigned to Quebec, and with his departure, Port Royal became the capital of Acadia once again.

in 1685, an intendant inspected Beaubassin and reported that “the grasslands around the settlement was sufficient to fatten thousands of head of cattle, that there were 22 habitations, of which most had a dozen or more cattle and as many each of pigs and sheep, but that not much land was cultivated.”

In 1686, a church was built with cob walls covered with stones, topped by a thatched roof. Benjamin Church burned that church when he “visited” in 1696, and another wasn’t built until 1723.

The cemetery would have been established with the first death, probably shortly after Jacques and his settlers built their homesteads, and the church was probably built beside or near the cemetery.

Beaubassin was included in the 1686 census, with 20 homes and 127 people. By comparison, Port Royal had 95 families and 592 residents. However, Beaubassin had more cultivated land and more guns.

Interestingly, in the 1686 census, Jacques Bourgeois, his name anglicized to Jacob, is 67 years old, living with his wife and son Guillaume, in Port Royal. He still has his 20 arpents of land, but no livestock there. Three others, one of whom is his son, and one is his son-in-law, are noted in Beaubassin as living in Port Royal and owning land in Beaubassin, but Jacques is missing from that list.

By the late 1680s, Jacques had built his mills at Beaubassin, and fruit trees were being grown, except for cherries, due to the harsher winters. Beaubassin had firm roots, and Jacques’ legacy had been established.

The 1687 Document

On October 15, 1687, Jacques Bourgeois must have been going back and forth between Port Royal and Beaubassin when he signed a document, along with others, attesting to the works of former governor d’Aulnay in the colony.

We, Michel Boudrot, Lieutenant-General of Acadia, together with the elder inhabitants of the land, certify that the late Monsieur d’Aulnay Charnisay, formerly the King’s Governor of the coast of Acadia, caused the construction of three forts, namely: one at Pentagouët, another on the Saint John River, and another at Port Royal, all of which were equipped with everything necessary for defense, along with three hundred men maintained for that defense.

We also certify that the said late Sieur d’Aulnay Charnisay had two mills built, one water-powered and the other wind-powered. He also had constructed at Port Royal five pinasses (small sailing vessels), several dories (flat bottom fishing boats), and two small ships of seventy tons each.

Two farms (manors) and their dependencies—buildings, houses, barns, and stables – on which we saw the said late Sieur d’Aulnay conducting large-scale fishing operations and bringing in several families from France to settle there.

In witness whereof, we have signed the present document at Port Royal
on the fifteenth of October, 1687, in the presence of Monsieur de Menneval,
Governor for the King in all of Acadia, and of Monsieur Petit, Grand Vicar of the Bishop of Quebec and missionary in this land.

Present and duly undersigned were all good inhabitants of said Port Royal, namely: Denis Guyon, who had lived with the late Sieur d’Aulnay on the two manors of Port Royal, of which he is still one of the farmers along with his son-in-law Claude Teriot, also a long-time inhabitant of the said place.

We, Gaudens Amirauld, François Gauterot, of Port Royal, all longtime residents of said place, were called to witness this matter, and we affirm and certify that the above is true and that we have been among the twenty or more elders of said place, in the presence of Monsieur de Menneval, of Monsieur Petit, Grand Vicar of the Bishop of Quebec and pastor of the said place Port Royal.

Also having signed: Messrs. Michel Boudrot, Lieutenant-General; François Gauterot, bourgeois; Pierre Martin; Mathieu Martin; Claude Teriot; King’s prosecutor, Sieur d’Entremont; Antoine Bourg; Pierre Doucet; Daniel LeBlanc; Abraham Dugast; and Pierre Babin, the said Guyon.

We certify that all inhabitants who were there at the time, as residents of said Port Royal, saw, knew, and witnessed as above stated and signed hereafter.

Unfortunately, the document did not preserve the actual signatures. The third page of the above document seems to be an official copy made a year later, which explains why the original signatures aren’t there. It’s also interesting that I’ve seen Jacques Bourgeois sign his name three times, and all three times, he only uses his last name – just one word – Bourgeois.

Page three:

By Monsieur Petit, Vicar, Pastor, and Missionary performing his duties in this land and at Port Royal.

Collated with the original and signed by the aforementioned elders in the presence of the King’s notary in said colony, undersigned this day, the twenty-seventh of October, in the year sixteen hundred eighty-eight.

1690 – Port Royal is Brutally Attacked and Falls to the English

In 1690, Port Royal was brutally attacked by the English, but Beaubassin was spared.

However, given that we don’t know exactly where Jacques was living in 1690, or even visiting, we really don’t know how directly this attack affected him.

Jacques would have been about 70 years old.

In May of 1690, Sir William Phipps, armed with 736 men, sailed into the harbor and attacked Port Royal. The night before, a sentry had alerted Governor Meneval who had discharged the cannon to warn the Acadians of imminent danger, and to call men to the fort to his aid. Meneval knew he was in trouble. The French Garrison consisted of only 90 soldiers, and only 70 of those were available. Between them, they only had 19 muskets. The fort was in a miserable state of disrepair, in the process of being torn down to be rebuilt, and none of the cannons were mounted.

It was later reported that 42 Acadians were absent, and only three Acadian men came to the fort to assist after Meneval gave the signal. That was insane!

The Acadians were sitting ducks and they knew it. The English presumably didn’t know quite how unprepared Port Royal was, so they negotiated terms for surrender with the priest that Meneval had sent as his emissary.

After agreeing on the terms, Phipps refused to sign the document the following day, which seems a bit fishy, especially in light of what would happen over the next few days. The terms included that the Acadians could retain their property and continue to worship unmolested, the French garrison and officers would be sent back to France unharmed, and that the fort and “King’s property” would become England’s.

Regardless of the fact that Phipps refused to sign, the surrender continued, as Meneval’s only other option was to fight and be massacred. However, when Phipps saw the state of the fort, he claimed he was shocked and unleashed his men to do as they wished, which meant they plundered the town, church and nearby farms, and burned 28 homes.

It’s difficult to believe that Phipps was unaware of the state of the fort and garrison because:

• He met with Charles Melanson on the way in to Port Royal to inquire about conditions at the fort.
• He had sent his emissary to Meneval when he arrived to request surrender, which was denied, meaning his officer was in the fort and saw its condition.
• You can easily see the fort from the river. It’s literally on the top of the hill and its condition would be obvious. If the fort was torn down and you couldn’t see cannons, they couldn’t be shot at you.

Hence, Phipps’ claims seem very disingenuous.

This 1686 drawing shows that the fort is easily visible from the water and occupies the highest point at Port Royal.

Phipps then rounded up the Acadian men and held them in the church, forcing them to sign a loyalty oath to the English crown. We have that document today, because in 1695, it was transported to Boston and eventually found its way into the archives there.

As a side note, there is some good-natured disagreement among researchers about when this document was signed, 1690 or 1695. I believe it was in 1690 because Claude Petitpas signed the document, using a signature, not his mark, suggesting that the signer had been born in France. People born in Acadia ostensibly did not learn to read and write and could not sign their names. In the 1693 census Claude’s widow had remarried – eliminating 1695 as a possibility. Claude did have a son by the same name, but he traveled extensively with the Native people, married a Mi’kmaq woman and lived at Passamaquoddy Bay, across the Bay of Fundy. Had he been the Claude Petitpas to sign, he would have made his mark.

Jacques Bourgeois’s signature does not appear on the loyalty oath, so it suggests he might have been in Beaubassin at the time. It’s interesting that there are a few other men who didn’t sign the oath and are known to have been living in Port Royal because they are alive at a later date, so the omission of a signature is not conclusive evidence, alone, of anything. At least two other “elderly” men do not sign the oath either, and are unquestionably living because they appear in the 1693 census, so perhaps they were not forced into the church. Plus, there’s the matter of Jacques being well known to the English as a trading partner, so maybe he would not have been required to sign.

What we don’t know about Port Royal is if Jacques’ home was burned in 1690. Church probably could not direct his men to exclude a specific property and hope that his men knew which property he meant. Just a few months later, More English ships, austensibly pirates, arrived and burned even more homes.

If Jacques’s home was burned in Port Royal, he could have joined family in Beaubassin. Few families had that option.

Beaubassin escaped the 1690 attack. There is no record that Benjamin Church or any other English ship attacked Beaubassin until 1696.

1693 

It’s unclear whether another English attack, or the 1693 census happened first. The English, once again attacked Port Royal, burned a dozen homes and three barns full of grain.

Again, there’s no direct record of what happened to Jacques, but given that lived in Port Royal itself, his property might well have been a target – especially if the perpetrators were looking for valuable plunder.

I suspect the census may have occurred before the attack because Jacques seems to be well-off.

In the 1693 census, Jacques is still recorded in Port Royal, and is now listed as age 74. His three-year-old orphan granddaughter, Jeanne, is living with him and his wife, Jeanne Trahan, age 64. Young Jeanne was the only child of their son Guillaume who had married in Beaubassin in 1686. It’s odd that both of her parents perished and makes me wonder about the 1690 initial attack, additional pirate attacks later that year, and subsequent burning of homes. It was reported that a few Acadians were killed, including one woman who was burned in her home with her children, but no names were provided. The last we know about Guillaume, though, was that he married in Beaubassin, so it’s unlikely that his family was in Port Royal in 1690.

In 1693, Jacques owned 40 arpents of land, up from 20 in 1686, 1 gun, 15 cattle, 20 sheep, and 15 hogs.

Beaubassin still has 20 homes, with 119 people, but the Les Mines region, the other “arm” of the Bay of Fundy, has grown dramatically.

1696 – Church “Visits” Beaubassin

In August 1696, an English ship, crewed out of Boston, determined to exact revenge against the Acadians for the Siege of Pemaquid where French and Native forces had captured and destroyed Fort William Henry, now Bristol, Maine.

That much is fact. The rest of the story varies a bit, but taken together, the outcome is the same.

I wondered why Col. Benjamin Church would focus on Beaubassin in retribution for the attack in Maine. One version tells us that the residents of Chignecto posted a proclamation on the church door celebrating the success of the French. That apparently was true, but how would Church have known?

Another historian says Beaubassin was chosen because it had been left undefended. In other words, they didn’t have a fort. That’s probably more likely.

One account says that Church surprised the Acadians. Another says that the Acadians and Mi’kmaq opened fire as the English came ashore, then fled into the woods. A third says that the Acadians were forced to flee to the woods; however, the English respected the Acadians’ capabilities as marksmen and refused to chase the Acadians out of the reach of their ship’s cannons.

In some versions, Jacques Bourgeois, now in his late 70s, was reportedly asked by the settlers to negotiate with the English. I think we can agree that this is probably true, for two reasons. First, his command of English and knowledge of English ways, and because he was, after all, the patriarch of the village. The English were probably less likely to hurt an old frail man whom they knew and had traded with for decades.

One version says Jacques found Captain Benjamin Church on his boat and presented him with a parchment, by which all the inhabitants pledged to remain faithful to King William. This parchment, reportedly written by Phipps which suggests the document followed the 1690 attack on Port Royal, ensured the protection of people to Beaubassin by the English. According to that story, Church then prohibited his troops from looting the homes and limited the killing of animals to that necessary for food. However, based on other evidence, that’s certainly wasn’t the outcome.

Another source says that Church, with his officers, went to Jacques Bourgeois’ home for lunch. Jacques obtained a promise from Church that the residents would be left in peace, but Church reneged on his promise and the soldiers from Boston burned most of the homes in the region. The truce was short-lived and the looting which began while they were eating and drinking lasted for nine days. It was then that the Church presented a new loyalty statement in English for them to sign, adding that it would serve them as safeguard against those who “disembark on the coast.”

Another variation says that Church found the declaration celebrating the success of the French at Fort William Henry nailed on the church door. It infuriated him, and that’s what started the nine days of rampaging and burning. Church and his men burned a number of buildings, killed inhabitants, looted their household goods, and slaughtered their livestock.

Governor Villebon reported that, “the English stayed at Beaubassin nine whole days without drawing any supplies from their vessels, and even those settlers to whom they had shown a pretence of mercy were left with empty houses and barns and nothing else except the clothes on their backs.” The governor’s statement is probably true.

An expanded version is told in this History of the Bourgeois Family by researcher, Marc Bourgeois. We learn that in 1696, “the Massachusetts General Court criminalized intercolonial trade, declaring it “very evident that the French and Indian Enemy are relieved and succoured by the supplies transmitted from hence unto Port Royal and other places” and offered a bounty of 50 pounds on the scalps of Native enemies.” This high price on scalps motivated Benjamin Church to gather 400 fighting men and fifty Iroquois warriors to sail to Acadia in pursuit of the “enemy.”

In fact, Church said as much in his enlistment proclamation, here.

July 14, 1696, proclamation made by Benjamin Church to encourage volunteers to enlist as “private sentinels” on his fourth expedition against the French and Indians, which sailed for Portsmouth, Me., and St. John, Nova Scotia (later New Brunswick) a month later. Church pledges that enlisted men act like soldiers will share equally with the officers the proceeds from scalp money, prisoners, and plunder.

Aha, we may finally be at the core of what happened, and why Beaubassin was targeted. Not only were scalps valuable, Beaubassin was an easy mark with no fort.

Yes, this is sickening, but it wasn’t the first time, as Governor-General Frontenac of New France established the first bounty in 1688.

What has been found and published by Marc Bourgeois is a document that provides Benjamin Church’s account of this event, published by Church’s son. Of course, Church’s version is only one side of the story. I encourage you to read Marc’s detailed account, keeping in mind that Germain Bourgeois managed to be recorded as “Jarman Bridgway.” Otherwise, the story is recognizable from the other accounts. 

The various family histories continue, although I’m summarizing and condensing different versions here:

Church arrived on September 20, 1696 in Beaubassin, but couldn’t land until high tide. That gave the Acadians and their Indian allies time to prepare, at least somewhat.

The inhabitants fled into the woods. Apparently the Acadians took the opportunity to fire weapons in the direction of the ships, and by the time the English men came ashore and made their way to the Acadian settlement, they were angry and ready for a fight.

The English men ran into an Acadian man on the trail, with a musket and a paper in his hands. The man became frightened of the advancing New England soldiers, and turned to run, but stopped when Church order that he stop or be shot. He laid down his musket and when the men reached him, he introduced himself as Germain Bourgeois, who was Jacques’ son.

This tallies well with Church’s son’s account, although he said that:

“Jarman Bridgway came running towards our forces, with a gun in one hand, and his cartridge-box in the other, calling to our forces to stop that he might speak with them.”

According to Church’s son, Church did otherwise, but others report a slightly difference sequence of events.

Germain handed Church the paper which was described as “a treaty of neutrality”, which did two things. First, it attested to their oath of fidelity to the English King, but also a declaration of their intention to remain neutral.

Church reportedly reassured Germain that if that was the case, then they had nothing to fear.

If this occurred, then it wasn’t quite true.

Germain invited Church into his home to meet his parents, which tells us that Jacques and Jeanne were living with him by September of 1696, or at least visiting, although they had been in Port Royal in 1693.

Church and the Bourgeois family visited and shared drinks in the house, but the other soldiers began plundering homes, slaughtering livestock, and burning homes and barns.

How could they not hear the uproar?

Church’s account says that Germain, after being told to stop or he’d be shot, laid his gun down and expressed “his desire that Church would make haste with him to his house, lest the savages would kill his father and mother, who were upward of fourscore years of age and could not go,” meaning go into the woods to escape.

Although their age is a bit exaggerated, ages seemed to be fluid in Acadia, and it’s close enough – the point was made.

If in fact Church was eating, drinking and enjoying pleasantries with the Bourgeois family while his soldiers ran amok, the Bourgeois would have eventually heard the ruckus and the shared pleasantries, which apparently only served as a decoy distraction, would have abruptly ended.

Church joined his men and personally ordered the burning of the church, while his men finished burning the houses of everyone who had fled into the woods. From there, it got even worse.

Church demanded to know where the Mi’kmaq lived. He wanted to collect those scalp bounties. Germain declared that he dared not tell, because if he did, they would take their first opportunity to kill him and his.

This part is corroborated by Church’s son. Additionally, they took three Frenchmen hostage, but the hostages told them that the Indians had all run away into the woods..

Warning – the next paragraph is graphic, so brace yourself.

Church felt justified, because although the Acadians were “troubled to see their cattle, sheep, hogs and dogs lying dead about their houses, chopped and hacked with hatchets,” that it was nothing compared to what the poor English, on their frontier had been forced to witness. Church stated that “the English colonists’ men, women and children were chopped and hacked so, and left half dead, with all their scalps taken off.”

While the Acadians had not engaged in those brutal acts, Church made it clear that “the root from whence all the branches came that hurt us” rested with the Acadians.

If the raids in New England continued, Church vowed to return and “kill, scalp, and carry away every French person.” Church then demanded a new oath of allegiance from the inhabitants before leaving.

Unfortunately, the paper that Germain, or Jacques, carried with the list of oath signers prior to Church’s 1696 visit no longer exists, nor does the 1696 freshly-signed oath, assuming there was one. At least not that I know of or has been found.

We know for a fact that the Bourgeois men were not on the 1690 (or 1695) list of loyalty-oath signers from Port Royal. In fact, only two men known to be in Beaubassin signed the 1690 oath in Port Royal – Claude Dugas who went back and forth, and Pierre Sire (Cierre, Cyr). Therefore, a separate oath document had to have been signed by the Beaubassin residents. The 1690 document signed in Port Royal had been taken to Boston by 1695, so it’s clearly not the 1696 document referenced.

If Jacques’ home in Beaubassin was not burned in 1696, it was nothing short of a miracle – perhaps the “pretense of mercy” that Villebon alluded to was for Jacques decades’ of trade with New England. Or, perhaps, their homes weren’t burned because, as Marc reported, Germain Bourgeois acted as pilot, guiding Church in his attack on other Acadian villages “over a river.” Germain may have had no choice, or he may have been attempting to save the residents of Beaubassin – including his elderly parents – by getting Church and his violent men out of there.

Germain probably knew that since Church had been in Beaubassin for 9 days, that the Mi’kmaq had probably warned the other Acadian settlements days ago.

Church went on to attack other locations.

It’s very difficult to reconcile the emotions and actions in all of these events – especially given that we only have snippets of very incomplete information.

One thing is indisputable, it was a time of unbridled terror for the Acadian families. Some people were reportedly killed at Beaubassin, but we don’t know who, or how many. And now, they had to worry about Church, or other English, returning.

The 1698 Census

Two years later, in the 1698 census, Sieur Jacques Bourgeois, now 82, and Jeanne, 72, are heads of household in Beaubassin, and their son, Germain Bourgeois, 48, his wife Madeleine Dugas, 34, and their family are living with them. This might suggest that either Jacques’ home, or Germain’s home, was burned in 1696, and they had simply combined households. I don’t care who you are, by age 80, you need help with things and physical labor, such as working in the fields is probably out of the question.

In addition to the four adults, one of Germain’s sons, and one daughter remain alive, but 5 of Germain’s children have died since 1693, plus probably three babies born since the 1693 census. There is so much evident grief in this family. My heart aches for them.

While Villebon painted a dire picture of what occurred two years earlier, the Bourgeois family is still well-off, as they have 22 cattle, 15 hogs, 21 arpents of land, 3 guns and an unnamed servant, as do two of Jacques’ children.

The 1699 Deposition

A deposition dated July 31, 1699, signed by Jacques himself, states that Jacques Bourgeois came to Canada in 1642. Jacques would have been 79 or 80 at the time, and his beautiful signature looks incredible for a man of that age.

As with all the older inhabitants of Acadia, Mathieu Desgoutins requested that Jacques Bourgeois make himself present on July 31, 1699, and after taking an oath, tp make a declaration about the history of the province since his arrival in 1642.

Minutes of a declaration given by Jacques Bourgeois to Mathieu de Goutin at Fort Saint John, July 31, 1699:

Today, thirty first and last day of July 1699, before us, Mathieu de Goutin, Advisor to the King, Lieutenant General for civil and criminal matters in the province of Acadia, has appeared Sir Jacques Bourgeois, anciently established in this country. After having sworn to tell the truth, he acknowledged that he came here in 1642 in order to settle and to practice surgery; that Mr. D’Aulnay was at the time Governor General in this country.

He said that Port-Royal had firstly been settled by Mister de Poutrincour and Biencour, subjects of his Majesty, as is written in a report done by Mr. de Champlain, who was the first to settle in Canada. He does not know for sure at what time they began this establishment, but he knows that they had been dispossessed of it thereafter and forced to evacuate the place by the invasion of the Scots, who later returned it because of a treaty between the Crowns.

He knows positively that about 1642, when he came to this country, that the commission Mr. D’Aulnay received gave him authority from the Cap-des-Rosiers on the Gulf of St-Lawrence to the Cap-de-Mallebarre; and that Mr. D’Aulnay, having gone to France in 1648 or 1649, had returned in this country with a new commission which extended to Virginia.

Sir Bourgeois also says he had heard as a certainty that Commandor de Razilly, who came to this country about the year 1635, had received a grant from the Court to settle the bay where is presently situated Boston, there being at the time merely eight to ten English families, but having landed with his ship at Cap-de-Sable, he found Sir de La Tour living there who spoke with such enthusiasm of the advantage of fishing along these coasts and of the location of La Heve that Sir de Razilly examined these places, found them to his liking and added fortifications while giving up his intent to settle the Bay of Boston.

According to Mr. Bourgeois, since the beginning, the English agreed with everything and did not object to the plans or settlements by Mr. D’Aulnay and de Razilly. But he has no knowledge that these gentlemen, having decided to extend their borders further than River St. George, where the English had a store, had immediately been driven from there, with their houses burnt. Rather Mr. D’Aulnay tolerated that they settle at Pisiguit where they traded for furs.

Mr. Bourgeois says that the English from Boston had sent to Mr. D’Aulnay a sedan chairs. He does not know if it was a gift or an act of gratitude

After Mr. D’Aulnay’s death, says Mr. Bourgeois, he was left in the care of all titles of honour, of grants and commissions that Mr. D’Aulnay had received from his Majesty. Having entrusted these to a Mr. Nelson of Boston to have them bounded properly, this Mr. Nelson took the papers for this purpose, but has not relinquished them since, even though he had requested such many times. That, having quoted what he had said and declared to be his knowledge of the matters discussed, and having read what was written, he agreed that it was the truth and signed with us at the Fort on the mouth of the St-John River, on the above-mentioned day and year.

(signed:)

Bourgeois

De Goutin

The River St. George is in Maine and was part of Acadia at that time.

Given that this deposition was given at Fort Saint John, at the mouth of the St. John River, Jacques must have returned to Port Royal at some time.

Fort Saint John, now Fort Howe National Historic Site, is directly across the Bay from Port Royal.

I’m sure it wasn’t the first time he had been there since d’Aulnay took it that long ago Easter Sunday in 1645, killing all the soldiers, and possibly La Tour’s wife three weeks later. At 23, she assuredly didn’t just succumb to natural causes.

I wonder where Jacques was when that happened. Had he been on d’Aulnay’s ship?

Did he think about that 54 years later when he sat, revisiting his past, giving his deposition?

1700 census

Jacques died sometime between July 31, 1699, when he gave his deposition, and the 1700 census where neither he nor his wife are listed. He would have been about 80, or maybe slightly older, and she would have been in her early 70s. Both have apparently died by 1700, but we don’t know if that took place in Beaubassin or Port Royal. My guess, and that’s all it is, would be Beaubassin because that’s where they were living in 1698, and while Jacques might have been willing to travel back and forth between Beaubassin and Port Royal by ship, often, I’m not so sure an older woman would have been nearly as keen about that idea.

Only one of their children, daughter Jeanne, was living in Port Royal. The rest of their children and adult grandchildren were living in Beaubassin.

Of course, Jacques could also have died while away from home. He was clearly still traveling in 1699.

In 1702, the commandant of the fort at Port Royal referred to him in an official report as the late Jacques Bourgeois.

Summoned to Beaubassin

As I was researching and compiling this information, I wished we knew where the cemetery was in Beaubassin. Then, I accidentally stumbled across an obscure hint that unleashed a torrent of research, and a trip.

All of Beaubassin was burned in 1750. Realizing what was about to happen, given that 700 English soldiers had arrived, and that they would assuredly lose Beaubassin, the Acadians, along with their Mi’kmaq allies, burned Beaubassin themselves, thereby denying its use to the invading English. I can’t even imagine how difficult that must have been – how they probably prayed, took a deep breath, closed their eyes, and torched their own homes.

My God, the steely resolve of those people!

At least they would have been able to move their animals and belongings, probably into temporary “homes” in the woods. There’s a difficult footpath through the marsh between Beaubassin and where they would build Fort Beausejour.

When the English arrived, the Acadians had already evacuated to the next ridge, just over the border in French territory, and no spoils were left in Beaubassin for the English to use. The English then built Fort Lawrence at Beaubassin, in the village area, but a bit higher and overlooking the Bay of Fundy.

For the next five years, the English at Fort Lawrence and the French and Acadians at Fort Beausejour watched each other nervously, literally, less than two miles apart as the seagull flies, across the river. Skirmishes broke out regularly.

Hatred probably seethed.

This map from the Fort Cumberland/Fort Beausejour Museum shows the region during this timeframe, including where La Valliere had his headquarters, and “Butte a Roger,” the abode of Roger Caissie.

It’s actually amazing that anything at Beaubassin was found hundreds of years later, but we were fortunate that the location is remote and very little building or development had taken place.

No preservation had occurred either.

For a long time, Beaubassin was lost to the ages.

Perhaps the most tangible item we have from Beaubassin is the parish register, saved a second time by faithful Acadians who took them with them as they escaped in 1750. Jacques would have been proud.

He assuredly touched this book.

These records are now housed in the Archives at La Rochelle .

The Acadian Museum in La Chaussee houses a tiny piece of the wooden aboiteau that dyked the fields in Jacques’ colony in Beaubassin, a remnant unearthed during archaeological excavations.

It so touched my heart.

I knew, standing there, that I had to make my way to Beaubassin.

Life in Beaubassin

Jacques spent the last 26 years of his life establishing Beaubassin, going back and forth between there and Port Royal. I don’t know if Beaubassin was a passion, a business opportunity or an investment, or perhaps some of each. Clearly, it was the legacy he left his children and grandchildren.

I made the journey to Beaubassin in the summer of 2024. Before my trip, I researched and read everything I could find about archaeological excavations at Beaubassin, so first, I’m going to discuss those to put the trip in perspective. Truthfully, I found even more after I returned that I wish I had known when I was there.

And yes, like always, I’m taking you along on my visit.

Our Itinerary

While Beaubassin may have been peaceful from time to time, it was never peaceful for long.

The Mi’kmaq had hunted in this region for time immemorial and utilized both the waterway and land that connected the Bay of Fundy with the Bay Verte, calling it Siknikt. Of course, traders followed, including Jacques Bourgeois, who settled alongside the Mi’kmaq, forming strong alliances between the two peoples.

Eventually, though, the English wanted not just a part of the action, but complete control of the region. The Missaguash River became a “line in the sand”, separating the French and English, and today, the border between Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.

Not only did the English incursions serve to ignite or at least throw gasoline on a war, but they also split traditional Mi’kmaq territory and the Acadian village of Beaubassin.

During my trip to Beaubassin, I visited two locations that are located within sight of each other, less than 2 miles apart, but in many ways, they represented two separate worlds.

Beaubassin, where Jacques established the village is the location where the English built Fort Lawrence in 1750, inhabiting it between 1750 and 1755. A museum and interpretive center is located just north of the actual fort site.

On the next “ridge” over, across the swampy marshes, which was also across the border between England and France, was Fort Beausejour, renamed Fort Cumberland by the English in 1755 after they raised 2000 troops, attacked Fort Beausejour, and expelled the Acadians.

The Acadians had built Fort Beausejour in 1750, along with a new church, and established new homes just outside the fort after Beaubassin was burned just before being taken by the English. This must have been excruciating for the Acadian people, as the Beausejour site is higher than the Beaubassin ridge where the Acadian village had been located, meaning they could see the rubble of their burned-out homes, along with English activity, every day.

Every. Single. Day.

The lives they used to live on ever-present display.

Five years later, the Acadians’ homes at Beausejour would be burned yet again. They would save those cherished parish registers a third time!

While nothing remains of Fort Lawrence today, there are significant remains of Fort Beausejour, renamed Fort Cumberland, and her armaments. The accompanying visitor center holds items found during normal living in the area, and archaeology excavations as well.

I’m going to start with these finds at the visitor center, then move to the archaeology digs themselves, then take you along with me to Beaubassin.

Fort Beausejour

Let me introduce you to how I visit my ancestors.

My visits are sacred, spiritual communions with my ancestors and whatever is left of their spirits in that place and time.

While I absolutely do seek their homesites, I also yearn to share as much as I can of the essence of their lives. That means walking where they walked, sitting where they sat, and breathing in the air that gave them life too.

It often means holding space with them and experiencing their pain as well.

I know that my DNA waters this ground.

My eyes see the very same vistas that their eyes saw. While it may have been “just there”, routine, somewhat insignificant, and nothing special to them – to me, it’s a golden opportunity that I relish. It’s part of them. A tiny piece of their life I can touch and share. A fragment of a broken plate clutched to one’s heart so dearly because of who it belonged to.

Understanding the history of what happened in that time and place helps me feel what they felt – even if just a little.

Joining them on their land facilitates an immersion, empathy and understanding of the challenges they faced, the joys they experienced, and perhaps even the fears as they watched the English disembark their ships and climb the hills in order to burn their homes. Not just once in 1696 when Jacques was still alive and witnessed that horror, but again in 1704 when he was surely watching from above, and again in 1750, then in 1755 just before they were forever exiled. Jacques’ children were all deceased by then, but many of his grandchildren suffered during and as a result of the 1755 expulsions. Many simply disappeared. We don’t know when or how they perished.

To say this is all emotionally heavy would be an understatement.

I can often feel their trauma deep in my soul.

My day started at Beaubassin, then progressed to Fort Beausejour, and truthfully, I needed a break to regroup a bit. So, I did what I often do.

I had a picnic and broke bread with my ancestors. I stopped at the local filling station,  grabbed the freshest sustenance I could find, and proceeded to the picnic tables outside the Visitor Center, down just slightly from Fort Beausejour.

Here, I could listen to the wind and feel the breeze off of the Bay of Fundy, overlooking the dyked fields, just as they would have done.

I could watch for ships’ sails in the distance, or perhaps storms on the horizon.

Here’s my “Hi, I’ve come to see you,” obligatory selfie. Just me and my ancestors, or what’s left of them that’s outside of me. I’ve brought Jacques’ DNA home to find him.

Turning around, looking uphill, I can see the remnants of the fort, with the Visitor Center to the right.

I love that the Canadian National Park Service provides what I’d term meditation chairs at historically significant locations throughout Canada. You’re invited to sit a spell and ponder. Maybe the scenery, or the significance of the historical events, or in my case, my ancestors.

Is that Jacques paddling on the horizon?

If any one historical event had played out differently, my ancestors might well not have been my ancestors.

After a lovely respite staring mindlessly over the shimmering water, I was ready to go inside the Museum.

I was confused about why the Acadians only escaped to the next ridge. That made no sense to me, until I realized that this border represented far more than is initially apparent.

When the English held Acadia, it represented the border between England and France. When the French held Acadia, Beaubassin and the hill where they would one day build Fort Beausejour was just one neighborhood, all held by France.

Plans for Fort Beausejour. The Acadians would no longer be sitting ducks for the English, defenseless.

A sign outside showing the construction of the fort, with historic features

Model of Fort Beausejour, the most modern fort in 1750, but nothing could withstand the full-on onslaught of the English army.

Thick, reinforced wooden palisades from the original fort.

Many artifacts recovered tell the story of the mundane daily lives that the Acadians led on this frontier.

Their wooden sabot shoes remind us that they needed these to not sink in the mucky fields.

The Acadians were extremely innovative, certainly out of necessity. Lacking the means to make candles, they improvised with cattail piths and animal fat that they combined to create thin candles called rushlites. They installed them into a clothespin-type assembly called a lighting taper, which was held closed with a rock tied on a rope. Ingenuous.

This cross belonged to La Valliere, but all Acadians were Catholics, so every family would have had a cross of some sort.

As a well-to-do Acadian, Jacques would have been able to afford any cross he desired. It’s easy to half-close my eyes and see Jacques and his family touching their cross as they said their daily prayers. Perhaps when there was no church, Jacques had an altar in his home where the Acadians gathered to pray. There wasn’t always a priest available, so I imagine he was the one who stepped in when necessary.

This storied Acadian church bell has a unique history all of its own. Made in France in 1734, it was installed in the church in Beaubassin and was most likely the pride of the community. Of course, the church, along with the village burned in 1750.

Initially, a small chapel was constructed at Fort Beausejour, but the new church, with a steeple, wasn’t completed until 1755.

You can see both the new church and the smaller chapel in this 1755 drawing.

At the time the new church was consecrated, the bell was rescued from the ruins of the old church and installed for a new life at Beausejour – except that wasn’t to be.

One month later, Moncton arrived, and realizing what was about to happen, the Acadians burned the church on orders from Abbe Le Loutre – but the bell was once again saved.

In 2004, the bell was brought back to Beaubassin where an outdoor mass was celebrated to welcome home their the old Acadian friend. This article was written about the bell in 1938.

Can you close your eyes and hear it ring, while picturing the Acadians making their way to church?

How did the Acadians dress?

Typical clothing for an Acadian woman. All I can say is that all this looks very hot.

In these drawings, you can see the Acadians going about their daily lives with their outside bake ovens and fenced gardens to keep the critters out.

Farming here and farming in Port Royal wasn’t much different. Both locations employed dyking salt marshes and harvesting the hay using the same techniques.

An Acadian woman, wearing her cross, possibly on her way to church. Note her practical moccasins.

Beaded moccasins and pipe bowls speak to daily life in the integrated community of Beaubassin. Acadian women wore leather moccasins when they didn’t need to wear sabots.

A pipe, musket balls and English buttons, along with musket remnants remind us of the conflict with the English. They were either trading or fighting, and maybe sometimes both.

Ceremonial or at least decorate Native gorgets from 1500-3000 years ago and pipe bowls from 500-1000 years ago were found along with French earthenware fragments from 1750-1755.

Beaubassin was a blended community, with over 1500 Acadians and several Mi’kmaq families at its peak.

Gaming pieces from a traditional Mi’kmaq game were cut from a broken tin-glazed plate. The Acadian and Mi’kmaq children would have played together, and nothing went to waste. Both groups were probably bilingual. Some Acadians, specifically, the traders like Jacques Bourgeois, would also have spoken English. He was trilingual.

Buttons of bone were hand made for daily use.

Europeans introduced iron which was quickly adapted for spear points to improve hunting.

Daub, the two red blobs, above, was made from mud mixed with both plant fibers and animal hair for stability, then used to fill in spaces and gaps between logs in houses.

I’m particularly fond of the personal tools, such as scissors and thimbles that speak to me of the work women did making clothes and probably quilts for their families. Not only were these items useful, utilitarian and necessary, they fostered camaraderie and served as a creative outlet as well for women whose lives had little artistic or creative opportunity.

While Beaubassin was indeed remote, it was not disconnected from France, because we find shoe buckles and silver trade brooches in addition to things like gunflints and sword pommels, none of which could be made locally.

I didn’t realize that cloth imported into the colonies was marked with a maker’s seal. A dozen seals have been found in excavations, suggesting that imported cloth was probably fairly common. I wonder if imported cloth was class-related.

While most of this is Englishware, it’s not immediately evident that the Acadians weren’t using some English items. Jacques Bourgeois traded regularly with New England.

With some items such as these French coins that are dated between 1726 and 1747, one can tell with specificity when the item was created, so we know that these coins arrived sometime between then and when the Acadians were expelled in 1755.

With other items, such as pottery what was manufactured similarly for a long time, it’s impossible to date the item unless it’s found in context with something else more definitive.

For example, the iron strap hinge is associated with the palisade of Fort Lawrence, so we know it represents the time between 1750 and 1756 when the fort was abandoned.

Jacques would assuredly have owned several French muskets.

Muskets in the late 1600s were about 60 inches long with a 44 inch barrel and could be used for both hunting and defense. Perfect for Acadian men.

Let’s go outside.

I’m going to post these photos in the order I took them to share the excitement of discovery with you.

I felt like an excited child at the ancestor version of Disney World!

The Park Service does a wonderful job with signage. You may need to click to enlarge these photos.

Where we are standing, we are overlooking the Beaubassin settlement in the distance. Keep track of the wind turbines. You’ll see them again and they are a great landmark because you can see them from anyplace.

This panoramic photo, above, at the bottom was taken before the wind farm was erected, which is now in the distance beyond the canal.

This is today’s view from the Fort Beausejour parking lot near that sign, with the wind farm visible in the distance..

Most of the Acadian homes at Beaubassin were just to this side of the wind farm, and to the right. Of course, the marshes and dyked fields would have been located between the ridge and the bay.

The great irony is that I was tired that day and not feeling 100%, so I very nearly decided to skip Fort Beausejour because I knew my ancestors weren’t here. The Park Ranger told me, “No, you really need to go. The archaeology artifacts are there, and you’ll see Beaubassin from a very different perspective.”

I’m incredibly glad that I did.

While Beaubassin did not have a fort and was left essentially undefended, the French didn’t make the same mistake at Beausejour.

In this panoramic view, the rampart ruins of Beausejour are to my left and behind me, while Beaubassin is directly in front of me, and the bay glistens to the right behind the Visitor’s Center.

The marshland below the fort, between the fort and the Bay. The Acadians would have nervously watched English ships come and go, probably always wondering if this was the time an entire fleet would arrive.

The French fleet they needed never arrived.

On this side of the leftmost part of the wind farm marks the approximate location of Fort Lawrence.

The Acadian homes, for the most part, based on infrared images and archaeological digs were located to the right of the fort. The wind farms stand in the marshes behind the Acadian homes from this perspective and between the Acadian and Mi’kmaq homes.

Fort Beausejour foundation remains from 1750. This fort was meant to last!

A photo from the museum of excavating the ramparts and revealing what looks to be a gate.

Fort Beausejour rampart remains from “inside” the fort.

The well, is, of course, inside the walls of the fort. The orange is a form of lichen.

Freshwater well – lifegiver to all.

Beaubassin would have had a communal well too, at least to begin with. No one needed a private well, and there was safety in homes clustered close to one another. Generally, the well was in the center of several homes.

Standing on top of the rampart. It’s much higher than it looked.

High up on what I thought was a rampart, and may be, is a marker. Of course, I had to climb up to see what it said.

Ile de La Valliere, Tonges Island, is the location where Michel LeNeuf, Jacques Bourgeois’ arch-rival, lived and tried to rule. This is where LeNeuf discovered that the Acadians weren’t good at taking orders. In fact, they refused to do so – first by simply politely ignoring them, as if they hadn’t heard, and if that didn’t work, by outright insubordination.

Worse yet, there were far more of them than his men – and the Acadians were a LOT more familiar with the swamps into which men could disappear into the mists and fog at will.

They just might have outsmarted LeNeuf too! He was probably glad to be reassigned to Quebec.

Looking down from the ramparts across the beautiful Bay of Fundy. The Acadians could see every ship approaching.

This region, Beaubassin, and Beausejour, are breathtakingly beautiful, defying description, and photos simply cannot do it justice.

Beaubassin Archaeology

Now that we know what was unearthed during archaeology digs, it’s time to turn to the fascinating excavations at Beaubassin.

This English map at the Fort Beausejour/Cumberland museum shows both forts, with additional homes below Fort Lawrence/Beaubassin. I can’t tell if the homes below the La Planche represent Acadian or English, but I think the final word below the group at left is “the Indians” and the last word at right is “burnt,” so these were probably Acadian and Indian homes.

This 1755 map shows the paths between the various locations. Fort Lawrence and Beausejour may have been within sight of each other, but substantial marshlands and the river stood between them, forcing anyone wanting to cross that divide to detour significantly to the east.

The Beaubassin Village Site

The Facebook group, Archaeology in Acadie, which I highly recommend, posted the following in 2018, which I’ve partially extracted. After introducing Jacques Bourgeois and his establishment of Beaubassin, the poster goes on to say:

One of these traders, Robert Hale of Beverly, Massachusetts, made a voyage to Beaubassin in 1731 and recorded his observations in a journal. There are several descriptions of the settlement in the pre-Deportation period, each offering its own insights, but I’ve always found Hale’s among the most well-rounded and stimulating, despite its often judgmental tone.

Hale refers to the Beaubassin village as Mesequesh, a reference to the creek – or river – that borders the site and still bears this name, and says it was the largest village in the bay. He and his crew had difficulty guiding their vessel into the muddy creek on account of the high wind, and were ignominiously “bedaubed with Clay in coming ashore.” Either the wharves were full, or there were no wharves. The local tavern keeper, Guillaume Cyr, “let us in & gott water to wash our Legs & feet.”

Hale saw Chignecto as very different from his home. The inhabitants spoke French and were Catholics, and even this small community had two churches, “on one of which they hang out a Flagg Morning & Evening for Prayers.”

The land itself seemed alien, verging on hostile. His journal is attentive to the perils of navigation in this extremely tidal environment, swept as it was by capricious winds, and he remarks that even the diminutive trees were often “blown up by the Roots.” As a Maritimer who has driven to Massachusetts several times, I have often observed the way in which the roadside forest gradually changes character as one moves south. The conifers fall back in favour of the deciduous varieties, the trunks grow stouter, and the canopy reaches higher and higher. Hale would have experienced this process in reverse, and he seems to have found the effect slightly unsettling.

To Hale’s eyes, even the architecture seemed to cower from the dominant winds, and “the people build all their Houses low, with large Timber & sharp Roofs (not one house being 10 feet to the Eves).” On his first morning in Beaubassin he “walk’d about to see the place & divert myself,” noting “There are but about 15 or 20 Houses in this Village.” We can imagine him casually strolling the length of the community, observing roof lines, glancing into doorways and over fences.

“The women here differ as much in ye Cloathing (besides wearing of wooden Shoes) from those in New Engld as they do in Features & Complexion,” he writes, “wc is dark eno’ by liuing in the Smoak in ye Summer to defend ymselves against ye Muskettoes, & in ye winter against ye Cold.” The persistent torment of the mosquito is frequently encountered in primary accounts of the early colonial period. Remarkably, Capt. John MacDonald commented on the smoake-blackened interiors of Acadian houses at neighbouring Minudie in 1795. The houses MacDonald described seem to have changed little from those described in the pre-Deportation period, or indeed from those archaeologists have excavated: “The premises of every one seem to be a house from 18 to 25 feet long & as many in breadth without porch or partition but the outer door opening immediately into the sole room.”

The houses Hale saw at Beaubassin seem to have been built to a similar plan. “They have but one Room in yr Houses besides a Cockloft, Cellar, & Sometimes a Closet,” he wrote, and “Their Bedrooms are made something after ye Manner of a Sailor’s Cabbin, but boarded all round about yr bigness of ye Bed, except one little hole on the Foreside, just big eno’ to crawl into before which is a Curtain drawn & as a Step to get into it, there stands a Chest.”

Hale is less impressed by the material wealth of the settlement, which he seems to regard as rather limited. “They have not above 2 or 3 chairs in a house, & those wooden ones, bottom & all. I saw but 2 Muggs among all ye French & ye lip of one of ym was broken down above 2 inches.” We know from archaeological excavations that the inhabitants had access to a range of imported ceramics and glass object, so this observation of Hale’s has always struck me as somewhat puzzling. It is probably best read in reference to his social context and expectations, for he came from a place with perhaps better access to, and interest in, European ceramics.

For all of this, what may have been odd or occasionally disquieting for the visitor was home to the inhabitants, and creature comforts could readily be found. At Cyr’s Hale dined on “Bonyclabbler, soop, Sallet, roast Shad, & Bread & Butter,” and at Pierre Arsenault’s brother’s place he remarked on the “roast Mutton, & for Sauce a Sallet, mix’d with Bonyclabber Sweetned with Molasses.” Bonny clabber, a kind of thickened, sour milk, was apparently a commonplace of early colonial cookery. The Rev. Dr. Andrew Brown, who in the late 18th century compiled evidence of pre-Deportation Acadian traditions by interviewing many visitors to old Acadie, wrote “Supper was a lighter meal, consisting wholey of different preparations of milk in which cream was not spared.” We certainly see plenty of coarse earthenware milk pans in the archaeological ruins of the inhabitants’ houses.

As a Protestant from New England, it is understandable that Hale also took an interest in the religious practices of his Catholic hosts, some of which were communal, while others were more personal. “Just about Bed time wee were surpriz’d to see some of ye Family on their Knees paying yt Devotions to ye Almighty, & others near them talking, & Smoaking &c. This they do all of them (mentally but not orally) every night & Morning, not altogether, but now one & then another, & sometimes 2 or 3 together, but not in Conjunction one with the other.”

Beaubassin is a storied community in a storied landscape. Today it is a wind-swept field and a national historic site of Canada. Archaeological investigations of the site began in 1967 and continue to the present. In recent years, LiDAR imagery has been captured that offers a new perspective on the site. The high land to the right contains the village, while the old map, dating to 1755, shows the site after the village had been destroyed and Fort Lawrence built nearby.

I love these descriptions, because they allow us to view Beaubassin as a visitor did. It would be as foreign to us today as it was to Hale then. Probably more so.

This 1755 contemporaneous map shows the location of both forts.

In this closeup, you can see the locations of various homes near Fort Lawrence, marshes and fields under cultivation.

The Fort Beausejour-Fort Cumberland National Historic Site created a blog, here, in 2010, specifically focused on archaeology. If your family was here, I really encourage you to read each article.

In the article titled Review of Archaeological Work for the Beaubassin and Fort Lawrence National Historic Sites, we find the first aerial map of the Beaubassin area.

In 1928, they report that a local history recorded that at least 30 Acadian cellars were found in the pastures south of the rail line, but that in the 1940s, they were filled in. This hurts my heart, but I understand. I’m actually surprised it took that long – almost 200 years.

A hand-drawn map that incorporates a 1948 infrared aerial map, and a 1958 map known as the “Cameron Plan”, buoyed by a 1967 archaeological survey complete with test pits, confirmed that Acadian homes had indeed been located.

It’s a bit difficult to see, so you’ll have to enlarge the image, but pay particular attention to the legend. Current buildings are black, old foundations are red, fences and trenches are both shown, as is the outline of Fort Lawrence. Of course, you can see current roads, and the bridge crossing the railroad which is pink.

These landmarks are incredibly important.

Pierre Nadon’s 1968 drawings and photos of the excavations are included as well.

In 1991, a landowner unknowingly began construction of a barn where Fort Lawrence had been located which exposed thousands of Acadian artifacts.

In 2004, the Park Service was able to make more test excavations when the property came up for sale.

This map combines all of the sources into one, including subsequent Park Service work.

The Park Service, thankfully, now owns the land where Fort Lawrence once sat, and the contemporary farm buildings covering ruins have been removed.

In the article titled Aerial Photography at the Fort Lawrence National Historic Site of Canada, we see additional photos clearly showing the outline of the fort.

In the second-to-last photo, we can see the 1991 excavation for the barn, along with the road and the bridge crossing the railroad tracks.

In the last photo, we see the same location in 2006, with the barn in place.

While you’re at it, don’t miss this photo gallery of the digs, additional Acadian foundations and artifacts found there.

I particularly love the photos of the finds with the rainbow in the background. It surely makes me wonder if Jacques Bourgeois, or another Acadian, maybe whose home had been rediscovered after three centuries, was smiling.

A wink perhaps.

The Cemetery

Yes, it has taken me a long time to get to this part of the story, but you needed all of the preceding information, in order, because the location of the cemetery was accidentally discovered – and I think I’ve further refined the location.

I’m not the only Acadian descendant with strong ties to my ancestors’ homelands. The report states that as early as the 1790s, descendants of the former Village were known to dig for mementos in the ruins.

In the late nineteenth century, construction of the main rail line into Nova Scotia cut through the Beaubassin/Fort Lawrence area, exposing human remains associated with the Beaubassin cemetery.

That’s the all-important clue that started this entire ball rolling.

This description is extremely specific, and based on the known location of Fort Lawrence, the known location of the Acadian homes, and the very clear location of the railroad that runs between the two, it’s easy to identify the general location of the cemetery today.

Overlaying the relevant portion of the original map with the infrared foundation locations, prior to the construction of the barn, we can see the faint outline of the fort with the red arrows. However, the fort was constructed in 1750, and the red structures showing foundations were probably there prior to 1750.

Regardless, there are three historic infrared areas that show buildings significantly larger than the rest. One is where the fort was later built, one just above that field, and one is further south, all framed in black. Recalling descriptions of pre-deportation homes, they were all about the same size. If any building would have been larger, it would probably have been Jacques’ home, or his son’s, and perhaps the church.

I initially thought that the red structure inside where the fort was later built might have been the church, but I recalled that the Acadians rescued the bell from their church and reinstalled it in Beausejour in 1755, and they could not have done that if the bell was inside the ruins of the church inside the fort. I thought we had eliminated at least one location, but then I remembered that they burned the church themselves in 1750, so they could have, and probably did, remove their cherished bell prior to the fire, or maybe after.

The cemetery would have been built on high ground so that there was no chance of the graves being disturbed by a very high tide combined with a severe storm.

The cemetery would also have been very close to the village. Literally part of the village, just like the church. In several Acadian villages that I have visited, the church is always at a higher elevation than the homes, which are located above the marshes. And of course, the cemeteries are always beside the church.

While there were a few homes in the bottom right quadrant to the right of the road and bridge, it’s also clear that the majority of the village was above today’s road, just below the tracks. It’s also probable that at least some homesites were disturbed when excavation for the railroad was underway, possibly along with the original church.

The cemetery had to be in the portion of the railroad shown on the map, and was most likely in the area that I’ve enclosed in the red square.

We know that the railroad disturbed the remains. How I wish we had anything from those remains today. We would probably be able to identify whose burial was disturbed and would be able to rebury them, with an appropriate marker.

We can see the cemetery area on Google Maps today. The disturbed graves had to have been in this roughly 500-foot section. For perspective, the bridge over the railroad, including the right of way, is just over 100 feet, so this isn’t a very large area.

I’m very nearly positive this is exactly where the cemetery is located.

Can we narrow this down any further? What evidence do we have?

The area framed in blue is the only area that fits all of the criteria that we have:

1. Disturbed by the railroad line
2. Near/adjacent the settlement
3. On high, dry ground
4. No homes or historical structures in the cemetery

Looking at these maps, I realized that this is the only area that meets the first three criteria that doesn’t have a foundation for a building.

It’s unlikely that the top portion of the red square held the remains, because the houses on both sides suggests the village extended across that area.

It is certainly possible that the church is the building where the fort was built, and the cemetery began outside the church and extended across what is today the railway line.

You will see for yourself that it even looks different there. I hope the Park Service is using LIDAR in this location. I’m not a betting person, but I’d bet a lot that this is the missing cemetery where Jacques children, and possibly Jacques himself, and his wife, are buried.

Better yet, we can see this area clearly, up close and personal, so let’s go to Beaubassin!

Visiting Beaubassin

I wish I had known all of this information BEFORE I traveled to Beaubassin, but unfortunately, I didn’t. Trust me, had I been aware of the disturbed cemetery, I would have been walking right down that railroad track and you’ve have photos from there.

I arrived at Beaubassin on a beautiful, breezy August day and was greeted by a… bagpiper.

Who would ever have guessed that?

Still, the haunting melody, threading through the marshes, drifting across the fields, and into my heart, was just perfect.

I did stop in the Visitor’s Center for a few minutes, but I was way too excited to get to the actual site, so I didn’t tarry long.

Behind the center, overlooking the Bay of Fundy in the distance, stands a monument honoring the last known families to reside in Beaubassin.

As I walked up to the marker, I realized there was something else. Do you see it?

Look – there’s a cross.

It’s not on park land, and no one seems to know anything about it, but I’m sure it’s a tribute to our ancestors.

It’s huge – taller than a utility pole – more like antennae size.

And very evocative!

Appropriately, the bay is in the background, and the cross itself looks to be planted in the marshland.

The front provides the history of Jacques Bourgeois founding Beaubassin.

The back tells visitors that the inscribed names are the last known inhabitants of Beaubassin when it fell to the English in 1750. These Acadians escaped to Beausejour, based on a refugee list of 1751.

Some of Jacques’ grandchildren are among the refugees.

The Acadians crossed a river and traveled less than two direct miles, but in doing so, became refugees, escaping before they were killed. So near, but so far…

These are the 56 adult refugees, some of whom were married to each other, and some who were widows, widowers, or single who made their way across the river and build Fort Beausejour.

Would Jacques have founded Beaubassin had he known what the future held?

The actual site of Fort Lawrence is a half a mile or so down the road from the visitor’s center.

It looks like lots of people stop at the center, but few drive on down the road. The road is entirely nondescript, and you would never guess that a village, or fort had ever been there, or the complex history that unfolded on this land.

In 2013, when the Google car last drove this route, the barn was still there, but that’s not the case today.

For perspective, you can see how close this barn sat to the railroad which is where the cemetery was located.

At least two of the homesteads or historic structures sat here, one under the barn, and one behind.

This is the location where the 7783 artifacts were recovered during the emergency salvage operation in 1991 when the barn was being built.

Signs warn visitors not to take anything. You never know what piece of the puzzle you might be removing.

I turned into the driveway and saw this stand of trees on the left.

The grass in front was nicely mowed, inviting one to read the historical marker about Fort Lawrence, literally where I was standing.

I was grateful that the signs were in both French and English.

Fort Lawrence was abandoned in 1755 when Beausejour was captured, and the English moved up the hill to the better location and renamed Fort Beausejour to Fort Cumberland.

Thankfully, the Park Service owns this land now.

The parking lot is to the right of the entrance, so not over any historic remains, and today, a pavilion and markers replace the barn.

The granite markers, one in English, and one in French, honor Jacques Bourgeois while overlooking the village he established.

Perhaps we are standing near the church, and we are assuredly very near or even on the edge of the cemetery.

This plaque in the center honors Jacques and was placed by his descendants. Behind the marker, you can see the railroad bridge to the left, along with the blade of a wind turbine. Behind the marker stands a pavilion, inviting descendants, and other visitors of course, to enter Jacques world.

To the right, the fields where the village once bustled with life, and the Bay of Fundy in the distance.

Of COURSE I walked that path. Was there any doubt? I would have crawled that path.

Inside the picnic pavilion, a wooden bench invites visitors to sit a spell and commune.

I stopped to just drink in this peaceful scene overlooking the marsh and fields that had once belonged to Jacques. His legacy. The village he built for his children and their children. For forever. Except forever didn’t last very long.

The peaceful landscape today belies what was taking place here 350 years ago. Beaubassin was coveted real estate for numerous reasons. Not only was the farming profitable, so was trading.

The sign informs us that a total of 940 Acadians escaped to the other side of the River in 1750, and as many Mi’kmaq were displaced from their village as well. Both the Acadian church and the Mi’kmaq chapel were burned, along with the homes.

As I stood on Jacques’ land, the wind whipped brutally, my hair stinging my face – and this was on a warm summer day.

I could only image the brutal winters with the relentless wind blowing from the west, across the isthmus, to the Atlantic on the other side.

How did these extremely hardy, tenacious people survive?

Of course, I explained to Mom, by proxy of her ring, where we were and that some part of Jacques remains in and with us today.

Perhaps that’s where we got our “spunkiness,” termed by others less charitably as stubbornness. My preference is tenacious, or perhaps unyielding.

A few have described us as “cussed.” 🙂

I’m just sayin’, Jacques would be proud.

I didn’t realize that in 1755, the Acadians at Fort Beausejour, after being captured for expulsion, were brought back to Fort Lawrence for holding before deportation. That’s just cruel.

In the spirit of everything Acadian, 86 tunneled under the wall and escaped, but another unfortunate 1100 were separated, forced upon ships and sent to God-knows-where in the colonies two weeks later.

We don’t know who escaped, or where they went, but I’d wager it was with the Mi’kmaq.

Jacques was probably rolling over in his grave, assuming he is buried here.

Salt marshes reach as far as the eye can see.

The landscape portrayed in a 1755 map, along with nearby settlements.

When Jacques established his village in 1672, there was only one settlement, but over time, other hamlets of people sprang up nearby, also in family group clusters. This sign shows the locations of nearby villages by 1755 and which families sought refuge there, more than 80 years after Beaubassin’s first cabins were built.

I stood surveying the now-silent fields, imagining the homes in the distance, with children playing nearby. The cemetery was located where the railroad lays today, with more graves and homes on the other side.

Turning slowly to the left, facing the bay, I surveyed Jacques lands.

The path led along the edge of the Park Service land, providing a wonderful view of the homestead sites. In this photo, the railroad bridge is to the left, so the cemetery is, or was, here, where the train tracks run today – and probably on both sides.

The Acadians wanted their homes dry, above the marshes, but near them because their animals grazed there, and they worked the reclaimed fields within walking distance.

Conversely, the fort site was high – great for a view but less practical for farming. Perfect for a church and cemetery.

Standing near the railroad embankment, I turned to make my way along the southwestern part of the property. The Park Service has built a blockhouse type structure in one corner, but the center of the property has been returned to nature.

There’s a small grove of trees near the road, permanently bent towards the east by the relentless, battering winds.

I don’t think any of these trees are original. Trees are extremely rare here because of the saltwater, the winds and the storms. Early explorers and travelers commented that most of the trees had been uprooted. These were extremely resilient people to live in a landscape barren of most trees – a maritime savannah.

Still, this tree is interesting, and I very much wish now that I had picked up a little piece of dead wood to create a small cross from Jacques’ land.

We think of forts as being large, but this one wasn’t. The area between the blockhouse to the right, which is beside the road, and the parking lot edge to the far left, is wider than the actual fort.

Surveying the dyked lands between the fort and the bay.

I love it here, although I don’t have the stamina to survive the notoriously hellish winters far from civilization.

How did Jacques ever live to be 80 years old?

An inviting mowed path paralleling the road with the block house at right.

The wildflowers, or what some would consider weeds, are beautiful. I’m reminded that Jacques and his family would have seen this same colorful carpet every late summer and fall. Before the snow flew and ice encompassed all.

The blockhouse would have been the lookout. This building doesn’t appear to have been recreated in a historic style, so I’m not sure exactly what it’s supposed to be. It was not there in 2013.

Regardless, it has a rustic charm, and you can see the wind turbine farm on the other side of the road in the marshes to the southeast.

The fields where the Acadian homes were located is to the southwest.

The fort location serves as the gateway into their ancient domain.

Facing back towards the bay, even though no fort existed on this hill when Jacques founded Beaubassin, he assuredly stood here, perhaps among the few trees in the area, and looked at the bay, across their homes in the village, ever watchful, surveying the horizon. Storms, friends, enemies, ships – what was approaching? The bay was their front door.

Did Jacques feel a sense of satisfaction that he had established a peaceful trading outpost, with enough amenities, like two mills and a church, to attract settlers?

Until I read the history of Fort Lawrence, my assumption was that the Bourgeois clan had built the fort for defense. I’m actually stunned that they had no fort. Apparently, they didn’t feel they needed one, or perhaps the cannons couldn’t reach from this location to the Bay. But they built a fort on the next ridge, in 1750, and Beausejour had cannons – so that argument doesn’t seem to hold water.

Why did Beaubassin have no defensive protection? In addition to military action, residents, women and children, sheltered in the fort where the they could be protected. Why did they feel it wasn’t necessary? Did Jacques, for some reason, believe they would never be attacked?

It’s extremely difficult to keep one’s bearings here. Nothing is true north and south, and the meandering landscape is deceptive. It’s exceptionally easy to get lost in the marshes.

On this map, you can see the Beaubassin Visitor’s Center, Fort Lawrence, the locations of the Acadian homes, the marsh area and where the wind turbines are located, with the bay to the far left.

It’s worth noting that the bay is not blue. The bay and rivers are shades of brown due to the mud and the boar tides that literally move everything in their path – powerfully rushing in, and then out of narrow inlets, like rivers.

I’ve never met a road that I left untaken if something was beckoning me from afar – and Jacques was crooking his finger at me – “Come hither my daughter.”

You can easily see the road past the fort and beside the Acadian homes, but south of that, the road becomes a very rough path, then mud in Jacques’ marshes. The wind is so strong here that it blows mud through the air.

But I didn’t know that yet.

Back in the Fort Lawrence parking lot, I can see the roof of the Visitor’s Center in the distance, with verdant fields behind the fort.

Looking directly behind the fort, the Visitor’s Center is to the right, and Beausejour would be to the left, slightly out of the picture. These fields probably wouldn’t have needed to be dyked. Animals grazed here or perhaps it was originally covered with scrub.

What is that I see beside the tree line? Why yes, it’s that cross that no one seems to know anything about. It’s HUGE!

A wink and a nod from Jacques, perhaps.

Let’s go see his marshes.

Jacques’ Marshes

There’s good news and bad news about Jacques marshes and the road, if you can call it that, leading us there. The bad news is that it gets pretty rough after we cross the bridge. The good news is that even the two-track is “somewhat maintained” so that trucks can service the wind turbines.

The other bad news is that my cell phone was receiving a very faint signal, when any signal at all, and there wasn’t anyone who would be looking for me should I disappears. Oh well – at least I’d be with Jacques.

I should have crossed myself before I left!

Turning right out of the Fort Lawrence site, we immediately reach the bridge. The Acadian homesites located by infrared were on the other side of the railroad, where we can see the marshes and a few scrub bushes today.

The cemetery is along this section of track, probably someplace between the bridge, and substantially before you get to the white barn – most likely before the end of the green bushes along the ravine

My bet, based on the village location, and the fact that they would want to bury their deceased on a hill, if possible, or at least a higher elevation, would be between the bridge and the green bush on the right, before the white spec near the tracks.

I drove across the bridge, and in front of me, Beaubassin.

The entire area to the right of the road, before the house in the distance, is the village.

It might have been about here that I discovered tears streaming down my cheeks. Just raw emotion. It had been a long two years to here. I can’t believe I found it.

I knew, beyond any doubt, that I was looking at Jacques handiwork. The location of homesteads he and his sons and sons-in-law cleared out of fields.

Turning my head slightly to the right, the cemetery site again, from the other side of the bridge – which means that the greenest part of the field in front of me, near the railroad, is probably the rest of the cemetery. If one person a year per family died, and we know there were sometimes more, there would be 100 graves in just five years or so. That might be on the high side for the first few years, but the size of the village grew with time. The cemetery must have been rather large.

I’d like to go back and walk here, but it’s not park land.

The farm in the distance, across marshlands.

After passing a contemporary home on the immediate left, near the road, all you can see is an expanse of marshland. The pavement ended by the house, but it’s a nice dirt road – 2 vehicles could even pass.

The Bourgeois village was located on the right, then dyked marshlands on the left where the wind farm is located today.

I just sat here for a bit, absorbing the scene – trying to burn it into my memory forever.

Looking immediate left. I must say, given that Jacques was quite the innovator for his time, I bet he’d be pleased as punch to find a way to monetize the wind.

Not only that, the land can still be cultivated. How does it get better than that?

Looking ahead and to the right. These fields are between the wind turbines and the Bay, in the distance.

Looking right, just before the only farm on the right side of the road, about two-thirds of the way to the end of the homestead area.

The second farm has a red roof, and the right red arrow points to a turn around area. Let me translate – the real road ends there.

From a governmental perspective, there’s no reason to maintain a public road beyond the last residence. You’ll also notice this is where it begins to get really marshy. In other words, no one could build here. The furthest west Acadian homes, based on the infrared survey, was just beyond those green trees, too.

To the left, this is also the southern edge of the wind farm because the turbines need stability too.

The road is not maintained beyond the turnaround, and became more challenging.

I took this panoramic from the turnaround.

Did I turn around?

Are you kidding?

I must admit, though, I was getting a bit nervous because I didn’t have my trusty Jeep.

The minivan I had rented would just have to suffice. I got out, laid down in road and calculated my ground to chassis clearance.

I’m so glad I continued. The undisturbed marshes were simply indescribably beautiful and serene.

From time to time, signs asked people to leave the area undisturbed.

This place should be a World Heritage Site, except then it would attract too many visitors.

Below the turnaround, there are two turnoffs. The first, to the right, heads towards the river. That’s probably where the English soldiers in 1686 landed and walked up to the Bourgeois home.

We’ll take that road first.

You can see the farm in the distance, across the river, and you’ll notice that the road has become a two-track. It’s still a foot or so above the fields. So far, so good.

You can see the little rivulets where no vegetation is growing and some water in the field the distance.

It’s stunningly beautiful, but it’s also getting a mite squishy.

The road has now disappeared into nothing, and now the only “thing” is the top of the dyke. I don’t think driving here is a good idea, so I’m turning around, although there’s a part of me that desperately wants to get to the river. I also don’t know if I’m on private property, or not.

I want to see where Jacques docked his boats and where the visitors docked before climbing up to the Acadian homes, as described in the historical documents.

I would have walked the rest of the distance to the Missaguash River, had it not been so hot and remote.

The “road” wasn’t much wider than my van, so I turned around by inching back and forth several times and headed back to the road before I took the turnoff.

On this aerial map, you can see there the road disappears and the top of the dyke becomes evident.

On the way back to Fort Lawrence Road, this view shows the land behind the present-day farm, which had some historical village structures. You can see the slight elevation in the land.

Homestead area just south of the farm. No homes to my right because it’s marsh.

Approaching the “road” again, and preparing to turn right, which will take us below the marshes.

There has to be a road, because there are wind turbines. This is what I’m telling myself.

Sometimes “roads” aren’t really roads.

We’ll find out.

Fort Lawrence road bears to the southeast. The marshes are between the Missaguash River, at left, and the La Planche River, at right.

Some marshlands are still used to pasture livestock. We saw in the census that some men lived in Port Royal, but had land and livestock here. This is probably exactly what they were doing, although without the fences.

Dyked land to the right of the road, with the bay visible in the distance. The road is level with the fields, so if the fields are wet, so is the road. I imagine this is a mess in the spring.

Stunningly beautiful horses. We know that the Acadians had a few horses, but not many. During the expulsion the Acadian’s horses were confiscated and some were taken to Sable Island, later becoming part of the feral horse population there

Looking to the left at the marshes with the first (southwesternmost) of the turbines.

The river flowing lazily through the saltgrass, dancing like waves in the wind.

Things I’ve never thought about before for $500, Alex.

I’ve now angled left again, and am headed back northeast in the middle of the turbine farm.

The channels cut beside the fields and the “road” are meant to drain the land.

The road is starting to get a bit dicey, as in wet and muddy. I can’t get stuck, because I have no way to call anyone and it’s now a LONG walk out. I have not seen another human since the Park Ranger hours ago.

The land to the right can apparently no longer support the weight of the turbines. A dyke can be seen at left.

The Acadian dykes were not “replaced.” They are incredibly stable and well-built, and they are simply maintained.

I wonder if this was Jacques’ dyke. Of course, I wonder that with every dyke. At one time, they were all Jacques’ dykes – or dykes on what was originally Jacques’ land.

Now the cattails are as tall as I am, and I have a new problem.

I had to “power through” the last mudhole or two in the road. I thought that would be fine because I know, based on the map, that the road has an exit onto the main highway.

What I didn’t count on is that the “exit” probably hasn’t been used in decades – or – people reach those turbines either from the north, or from the south through the marsh, but they know they can’t make it THROUGH the marsh.

So, in essence, I can’t get there from here and there is no exit afterall

Each turbine has an area where trucks can pull in to work, so I know I can turn around. But I have another problem.

I don’t have this “map” with me on my phone, and my phone is intermittently getting no signal, or one bar. I have no idea where the next turnaround is, if there is one, and I have no idea what I’m facing. I assumed (and yes I know what that means) that the road would be passable because of the turbines, but it’s not.

I was afraid to try to power through the increasingly deep, watery ruts because once mired deeply in the mud, the only way out is with a tractor or tow truck. Also, the mosquitos had begun to lick their lips and rub their little hands together, while looking longingly at me.

I was about where the right red arrow is, and the turnaround behind me is the left red arrow. You can see the top of the turbine and you can tell how far I drove because I am nearly back to the railroad track.

The road turns dark brown in the picture because of the meandering river, the mud, and the swamp. There’s no way I can make it through there, even if it’s just a few feet, and you can tell it’s a lot more than a few feet – but I can’t see that far.

Nope, I was just going to have to BACK UP THROUGH A CURVY ROAD IN THE MUD.

Is this a recipe for disaster, or what? If I slip off the road, I’m in that marsh or the channel.

Maybe now I know why that really tall cross exists!

Ok, steeling my courage…

One.

Two.

Three.

Fingers crossed…

And GO!

Yes, I made it, but there was mud all over everything. Needless to say, I was very relieved to be headed back to the welcoming dry dirt road.

Approaching the bridge once again. I pulled over to say my goodbyes.

Jacques’ marshes with their current resident, behind a windbreak.

The fields where the Acadians lived. The southernmost home is located in Jacques field, near this clump of bushes, but the majority of the homes were in this field – the center of Beaubassin.

I stopped one last time, drinking in the golden elixir of the field where Jacques built his village with his sons and daughters. Where they endured the hardships of the biting winters to forge a new life in the sun-drenched fields where Jacques’ grandchildren played. They built a church where they walked to worship and baptized their babies, just out of the photo at right, and buried their dead in the consecrated field, now covered with grasses.

Their homes are ghost-like structures that we can only see on moonlit nights with high clouds, as the salty wind whispers their names.

Goodbye Jacques, for this lifetime.

 

Additional Beaubassin resources:

https://tantramarheritage.ca/

https://tantramarheritage.ca/archive/historicsites/hs17_1672a.php

https://tantramarheritage.ca/archive/historicsites/index.php

A wonderful site with historically accurate stories about Beaubassin and her families.

Additional Bourgeois Resources

Histoire-de-Bourgeois by Marc Bourgeois in both French and English

https://archive.org/details/historycountyan00savagoog/page/642/mode/2up?q=Bourgeois

https://web.archive.org/web/20160320222341/http://cyberacadie.com/index.php?/acadie_hier_biographie/Jacques-Bourgeois.html

https://archive.org/details/acadiageographyo0000clar/page/288/mode/1up?q=bourgeois

https://histoire-de-bourgeois.ca/histories/Les_Bourgeois_-_Jacques_Nerrou.pdf

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