| Notes |
- http://www.association-gauthier.org/anglais/germaina/germain-beauchampa.html
Germain Gauthier dit St. Germain was born in Beaubec, Bray, Normandy about 1647. He stated being 34 years old at the 1681 census. His father, who was a weaver, named also Germain and his mother was Louise Viollard. The family already lived in the Bray area in the middle of the XVIth century. On March 14, 1575, the prior of the Abbey of Beaubec granted Etienne Gauthier, by an act passed before lawyers in Rouen, an emphyteutic lease on the land of La Balletiere.
The registers of Beaubec, unfortunately, are extremely incomplete and they do not make it possible to trace our Germain to Etienne. They start in 1505 and stop in 1598, then they begin again around 1664. From then on, the enumeration of baptisms, marriages and burials, continues until 1793 and then they stop again. There is thus "a hole" of some 65 years at one crucial period for the identification of the ascendance of close relations of Germain Gauthier. On the other hand, starting in 1664, mention is made of many Gautier or Gauthier, and in particular, of a certain "Antoine Gautier deceased on October 16, 1689, 87 years old, who gave to this church (Beaubec) the sum of fifty livres to say prayers for him". A bronze plate fixed to the wall of the aforementioned church commemorates the foundation of a trust of thirty livers made by "The Honorable Antoine Gautier, merchant and former treasurer of this church."
The registers indicate that many Gautiers were godfathers and godmothers, which proves that this family was well known and surely held in great esteem. It is noteworthy that there were still, in 1975, Gautiers living in this area of Normandy, in particular at Forges-les-Eaux, where M. Alain Gautier, and his father, an antique dealer, resided.
In all probability and according to historian Regis Roy and Gerard Malchosse, Germain Gauthier came to Canada in 1665 as a soldier in the regiment Carignan-Salieres, and would have been in the Companie de M.de Contrecoeur. It, along with seven others, was the last group of soldiers which left La Rochelle at the end of May 1665 under the command of colonel Salieres himself. The crossing was long and difficult and the troops arrived in Quebec only on the 17th of August. Montreal was then the hot point in the war of extermination that the Iroquois were carrying out against the colonist French, and the eight companies had to get there without delay. The first group which had arrived in the middle of June had been employed in the construction of a fort at Chambly, the first obstacle on the road of invasion.
History has given us an account of the work and expeditions of the regiment of Carignan in this country. These were, as is known, made up of half failures. It remains however that if this military intervention did not reach the objectives of Mr. Tracy of destroying the Iroquois, it did cool their quarrelsome ways considerably and raised the moral of the colonists who could from now on expect more peaceful days. But the most positive and long term result of the arrival of the famous regiment in Canada, was the addition to the population provided by those officers and soldiers who chose to remain here as settlers. This is what Germain Gauthier did.
However, one does not find a trace of him before 1677. What happened to him during the nine years following his release from the army? Did he go back to France only to return later? It may be that he preferred the rifle of the adventurer to the axe of the settler. Did he become a coureur des bois? Who knows?
Nevertheless, on June 27, 1677, Germain Gauthier contracted in front of Me Benigne Basset, notary royal on the island of Montreal, a marriage contract with Jeanne Beauchamp, daughter of Jacques Beauchamp and Marie Dardenne. Assisting the groom were: Jean-Baptiste Le Gardeur, esquire, Sieur de Repentigny, Pierre Picard, Roch Thouin, Jean Letellier, and Jean Le Brodeur "all inhabitants of the seigniory of Repentigny". As for the future wife, the witnesses were Jacques Beauchamp and Marie Dardenne, her father and mother, Pierre Dardenne, her grandfather, Pierre Larrivee, her brother-in-law, husband of Denise Beauchamp, her sister, Jean Beauchamp, her paternal uncle, Rene Dardenne, her maternal uncle and Francoise Barbery, his wife, Francoise Bau and Jean Lafond dit Lafontaine.
The couple were marrying under the system in use at the time, that is, of community of goods and the Beauchamp parents promised to pay them in advance of an inheritance, the sum of three hundred livres payable in five equal annual payments. The contract was signed at Point-aux-Trembles in the house of Jacques Beauchamp.
As for the wedding blessing, it was given less than a month later, at Point-aux-Trembles in the house of Francois Bau which served for the celebration of the worship until the blessing of the first chapel in March 1678. The act is recorded as follows in the register of the parish of Saint-Enfant Jesus.
"On the 19th of July 1677 has been done and solemnized the marriage of Germain Gautier, inhabitant of the seigniory of Repentigny, son of Germain Gauthier, of the parish of Beaubec, diocese of Rouen, Bray, Normandy, and Louise Viollard, his father and mother and of Jeanne Beauchamp, daughter of Jacques Beauchamp, inhabitant of "Cote de St-Jean", on the island of Montreal and of Marie Dardenne, her father and mother. The banns having been published for each side without opposition. The aforementioned marriage made in the presence of Jean-Baptiste Le Gardeur, esquire, Sieur of Repentigny, Roc Toin, Jean Beauchan, Rene Dardenne and other parents and friends of both parties, witness: Seguenot, parish priest of Pointe-aux-Trembles, otherwise known as Enfant-Jesus. "
The young bride was to be fourteen years old on July 30 of the same year and Germain Gauthier was thirty. The Beauchamp and Dardennes were from the La Rochelle area having come to New France to the seigniory of Repentigny.
The two documents mentioned above, the contract and the act of marriage of Germain Gauthier, reveal that he was, in 1677, beholden to Jean-Baptiste Le Gardeur, Sieur de Repentigny. Since when? It has not been possible to establish, the act of concession not having been found. It may well be that his land was conceded to him at the same time as five other colonists by virtue of a contract deposited before the notary Thomas Frerot, on March 20, 1673 and which does not show the names of those who received a concession. What is certain, is that mention is made of our man in a statement produced by Sieur de Repentigny with the "Acte de Foy et Hommage" ( similar to renewing allegiance) received by Benigne Basset on September 15, 1677. In the list of landowners, Germain Gauthier comes in third place, that is, after the seugneurial domain and Pierre Riviere. The paragraph which applies to him reads as follows: "Germain Gauthier has three acres frontage by twenty in depth, he must pay three livres silver and three capons in quota and one sol in rent. )Consent and enumeration of the land, stronghold and seigniory of Repentigny: 1677") And the document continues with the enumeration of the colonists then thirty in number in the seigniory.
Thus, it is on the current site of the village of Repentigny that our ancestor first had hearth and home. The seigniory, where he established himself, had been conceded by the Company of New France to Pierre Le Gardeur on April 16, 1647. It then measured four miles frontage by six in depth and it remained without clearing and without change in area until 1670, the year which it was shared between Jean-Baptiste Le Gardeur and his brother Charles Villiers de La Chenaie. Under the terms of various contracts, Jean-Baptiste Le Gardeur ends up keeping as his seigniory only the spit of land ranging between the St. Lawrence river and the River Assomption. 1670 saw the building of a small manor and it is probably the year where concession of land started. The Consent and enumeration of the land in 1677 made mention, we saw, of thirty grantees but four years later, in the census of 1681, there were no more than 22 households for a population of 114 people. The Gauthier family was among this number. One reads in B. Sulte the following indications:
"Germain Gauthier 34 years;Jeanne Beauchamp, his wife, 20; Denise, their daughter 2; 2 guns, 4 horned beasts; 11 acres of developed land."
In spite of their shortness, these three lines show us invaluable information. It is learned that indeed Denise, the eldest of the children was born in Repentigny in 1679. Since the register of the parish does not mention her baptism, one sees the importance of this note of the census taker. In the second place, it is known that Germain Gauthier had eleven acres in value. However, that year, 1681, of the 21 landowners one counts in the seigniory of Repentigny, two had twelve acres in value and two had eleven, the 17 others, in general, had appreciably less. One can thus reasonably assume that being the most advanced in clearing his concession, Germain Gauthier had been among the first to obtain land from the Sieur de Repentigny.
In spite of its small size, it was a beautiful seigniory where he established himself, but it was prone to frequent incursions of Iroquois. Here is what Gedeon de Catalogne wrote in 1712:
"The coast of the Seigniory of Repentigny is beautifully plain with several islands in front and produces in abundance all kinds of grain and vegetables. The wood, in solid ground, is a mix of many species. The Iroquois have destroyed one of its inhabitants and delayed during several years its establishment and it was on this seigniory that M. le Marquis de Vaudreuil, routed, in 1691, a party of these islanders and who forced all the nation to sue for peace."
As is seen, the start of the seigniory of Repentigny were difficult and the incursions of the Iroquois surely contributed to create and maintain a climate of uncertainty. However, at the same time, on the opposite bank of the St Lawrence, opposite Longue-Pointe, another seigniory, that of Boucherville, was being colonized. Its owner, Pierre Boucher, was actively working to ensure its settlement and progress. Moreover, there was communication between these two groups of pioneers. From 1687 or so, the territory of Repentigny was generally served by a missionary who, at the beginning at least, was that of Boucherville, so that people of the northern bank of the river heard about what occurred on the southern bank.
Lastly, among the first settlers of Boucherville was Pierre Larrivee, brother-in-law of Germain Gauthier. Thus he had reason to think it would be to his advantage to move to a surer place and a more promising future.
It should be said here that two children: Jean, baptized on January 10, 1682 and Pierre, baptized on November 10, 1684, now brought to five the number of the members of the Gauthier family dit St-Germain.
When precisely did he move from Repentigny to Boucherville? It was a deed done at the beginning of the summer of 1687. Certainly, the register of the parish of the Holy Family indicated that on June 13 of that year, Marie-Francoise Gauthier, daughter of Germain Gauthier, inhabitant of Boucherville, and Jeanne Beauchamp, his wife was baptized there.
However, it is only in the autumn of the year 1687, that he sold his land in Repentigny. Indeed, by an act received by M. Michel Moreau, he ceded to Jean Rumilly, a soldier of the company of Mr. Dorvilliers, "a dwelling situated within the seigniory of Repentigny consisting of three acres frontage by twenty in depth on the shore of the St Lawrence river, on which there is a house, adjoining on one side Pierre Rumilly and on the other Jean-Baptiste Fleuricort, in front on the aforementioned river, and behind on land not yet conceded."
This sale was made for the sum of 300 livres in funds.
However, it seems that Jean Rumilly, who was unmarried, died shortly after this deal, so that not having been paid or only in part, Germain Gauthier took back his land in Repentigny as stipulated in the contract. Thus he sold it a second time. The buyer was Antoine Brane dit Bourdelais and the contract was received by Jean-Baptiste Fleuricourt, on April 2, 1688, under No. 20 of his minutes.
It is obvious that Germain Gauthier had definitively left Reptigny. Boucherville will be, from now, on his new home, the land where his family will grow new roots and to which his descendants will refer with pride as the cradle of their Canadian ancestors.
In 1681, there was, in Boucherville, 39 families and 79 souls. Three hundred and twenty-two acres of land where seed could be sown: "it was one of the most seignories of New France". Where did Germain Gauthier first settle his home? No contract, lease, engagement or sale dated that year reveal it. If, at that time, as was the case at the beginning of the seigniory, the colonists still lived "at the fort" to shield their families from the attacks of the Iroquois, he may have lived at Pierre Larrivee's place, his brother-in-law, who had his land close to the borough. One knows however, with certainty that in the spring of 1690 the family at the Cote de St-Joseph. ( St Joseph's Hill ). Indeed, in that year, Jacques Foucher dit Laviolette sold, to Louis Temoings dit Jolibois, his dwelling located at Cote St-Joseph neighboring on one side Germain Gauthier. One year later, March 14, 1691, the act of baptism of a boy, Francois, is shown in the register of the parish St. Famille, confirming that his parents, Germain Gauthier and Jeanne Beauchamp lived on the Cote St-Joseph.
The name of "Cote de St-Joseph" does not exist anymore and has not for a long time. At the time of Pierre Boucher, and still in the middle of the 18th century, it applied to the dwellings and lands along the river and some 25 miles inland in back of farms at the "front" and to the east of the borough. This row was then indicated by the name of Chemin-du-Lac or Second Rang ( road to the lake or second road). It has now been renamed Boulevard General Vanier.
It is thus on land not yet conceded that, with the accord of Mr. Boucher and perhaps on approval, Germain Gauthier settles on his arrival at Boucherville in 1687. However, fourteen years would go by before he obtained a concession in due form. And still, the contract contained certain preliminary arrangements which perhaps clarify the reason for this length of time. Indeed, on April 6, 1700, an agreement was reached between Mr. Boucher and our man by virtue of which the lord of Boucherville recognized: "having promised and given to the said Gauthier dit St. Germain, one hundred acres of land, for which he will give him a Contract at the earliest, sitting at the end of the land of Roger Latouche, after the four acres in front, which will then make ten acres, will then be taken, starting at the boundary mark laid by M. de Ratisson between the aforementioned St-Germain and Francois Picard and all those things. The whole will belong to the said St-Germain in accordance with the agreement he made with the aforementioned Latouche and the brook which flows into the "Lac au Cotte" (Lake on this side ) of the front separating the said Germain Gauthier and Latouche and the end of the "poutente" ( them things) terminating at the line of Joseph Charbonneau, providing the aforementioned St-Germain holds his bargain with the said Latouche all this being one hundred acres in area."
This typical part of the prose of the notary Tailhandier, in spite of its absence of punctuation, its whimsical orthography, its archaic syntax and its repetitions and its confusion informs us that Germain Gauthier was, at the time of this agreement, in possession of most of the land of the Cote St-Joseph, then, that Mr. Boucher had promised to him and all intents and purposes, conceded verbally or by promissory note, one hundred acres of land; then that the concession of Roger Latouche ended before that which had been promised to Gauthier, finally, that to carry out his promise, Sieur Boucher was to recover from Latouche a parcel of land to be taken at the end of his concession to be given to Germain Gauthier.
Two days after the signature of this agreement, Pierre Boucher and Roger Latouche proceeded with an exchange thus: "The aforementioned Latouche has leased from the Sieur Boucher here present and accepting all the land on the other side of the middle of the Lake and other side of the lake and creek which is in the roadway of the said Lake....finally, all the land in the island of the three ash trees to able the Sieur Boucher to cede it to Germain Gauthier dit St-Germain the said land adjoins land that Sieur Boucher wants to give to the said St-Germain so that the said St-Germain will be able to enjoy and use it as he will as his own good and real heritage."
In a mutual exchange Roger Latouche received another piece of land equivalent to that which he had yielded.
It must be, undoubtedly, that Mr. Boucher did not hold Germain Gauthier in low esteem to agree thus in his favor with these steps and these arrangements. One notes to which degree he wanted to see his people established with suitability and convenience. No other impediment was in the way of making a contract for the promised concession. The act was signed on the following day, April 9, 1701. Mr Boucher granted to Germain Gauthier: ".....a concession located on the Cote de St-Joseph containing one hundred ten acres of land or approximately in surface of four acres frontage on twenty five in depth being on the front and at the end of the Concessions of the aforesaid notary and Bernard Joachim dit Laverdure and Roger Latouche living at Ladevanture....."
In addition, to make the one hundred and ten acres, a point delimited in the North-East by the brook which is in the area of the small lake, called the Island of the Three Ashes. The concession was dependant upon a non-redeemable seigniorial rent of one hundred "sols" and twelve "deniers" in rent and four live capons or their true value as the lord wishes, and moreover, for the aforementioned point of land, payable each one year on the day of St-Martin, eleventh of November.
Germain Gauthier was to remain eleven more years on his land on the Cote de St-Joseph. He had to continue clearing with even more diligence because the land henceforth belonged to him in good and due form and he could still count for a few years on the young and solid arms of his older sons, Jean and Pierre.
One would like to be able to visualize how these years at the end of the 17th century and the beginning of the 18th were like, the everyday life of our ancestors and the particular framework of life. One would like especially to know what they thought, what they felt in their hearts and as said Montaigne "their morals and manners, their perseverance, their daily thoughts." Our time is, in so many aspects, so far and so different from theirs and so many bridges have been cut with the past that it is quite difficult for us to imagine what it was like. It could, in no way be an easy, idle and comfortable existence. To cut down the forest, to clear the ground, remove the stones, to drain it. To 'make new land" has never been an entertainment, it was their hard, ungrateful and ceaseless occupation.
Let us not forget either that Boucherville just like Repentigny, Pointe-aux-Trembles, Longueuil, and Ville-Marie, had to undergo, from 1691 especially, many and forceful attacks from the Iroquois. The year 1695 was particularly harmful for the inhabitants of this seigniory. According to tradition, the attackers, after having come up the Richelieu River up to Sorel, went up the St Lawrence to the mouth of the Riviere-au-Pins near the boundary between Varennes and Boucherville, then they followed it up to the small lake. From there, they passed by a short portage to the Sabrevoix river thus circumventing the borough from behind and then they returned to the river upstream of Boucherville. However, the Gauthier family whose habitation faced the small lake were particularly exposed to surprises from the Indians and one can imagine the alarm that Germain and his wife had to feel in these dangerous years. Did they know, at the time, that they were making history?
However, the years passed. Denise the oldest of the children reached her 21st year, it was time to marry her. On November 8, 1700 she married at Boucherville, Philippe Payet, son of Pierre Payet dit St. Amour and of Louise Tessier, of Pointe-aux-Trembles. Philippe was the oldest of the Payet children and his father had spent three years as a captive of the Oneyouths after having fallen into their hands at the time of the attack on Fort Coulee in 1690. As for his mother she was the sixth child of Urbain Tessier, one of the pioneers of Ville-Marie. This first marriage established between the Gauthier-St. Germain and two highly regarded families of Montreal, the Payet and the Tessier, the links which were going to be tightened by the union of three of the brothers of Denise with grandaughters of Urbain Tessier.
Unfortunately Philippe Payet died three years after marriage and Denise Gauthier remained widowed and childless. She returned a few years later to live in Boucherville with her parents and her presence and assistance were undoubtedly invaluable to her mother whose family duties were heavy. In the year 1703, Agnes, the youngest was two. Michel was four; Jacques seven; Francois, 12; Marie-Francoise, sixteen; Pierre and Jean 19 and 21 respectively. Another boy, Joseph was to be born the following year. One can easily imagine the domestic tasks which fell on Jeanne Beauchamp even damaging her health and how her daughter Denise hastened to take up and increasingly necessary role.
For the decade from 1701 to 1711, except for the mention in the archives made of the marriage of Pierre in 1707, those of Jean and Marie-Francoise in 1708, the files are silent on Germain Gauthier and his wife. These marriages which delighted the Gauthier family in those years, were, according to the contracts which united them in front of the law, good matches for the period. Pierre, the junior of the boys, married in Ville-Marie, on May 5, 1707, Marie-Anne Tessier, daughter of the late Laurent Tessier and Anne-Genevieve Lemire and niece of the Sieur Gedeon de Catalogne, who along with the paternal ancestor of the wife the "honorable lady Marie Archambault", attended the signature of the contract received by M. Michel Lepailleur, on April 28, 1707. Jean, the eldest of the boys, married in Boucherville on November 26, 1708, Marie Storer, daughter of Joseph Storer and Ann Hill, of Wells in New England. Lords Antoine Meriel, of the Seminar of St. Sulpice of Ville-Marie and Rodolphe Guybert de La Saudraye, priest of Boucherville, Siuer Pierre Boucher, esquire, Sieur of Boucherville, Jean Boucher, Sieur de Montbrun and his wife were among the witnesses for Marie Storer to the marriage contract which was accepted by the notary Tailhandier on the same day as the wedding. As for Marie-Francoise, she married in Boucherville on September 24, 1708, Pierre Botquin dit St. Andre, son of a soldier of the Carignan Regiment.
The register of the parish of Ville-Marie reveals that on November 22, 1711, Michel Gauthier thirteen years old, son of Germain Gauthier and Jeanne Beauchamp was buried in the cemetery of this parish. The loss of a child of this age was a hard blow, but another test, crueler still, was going to strike the family. One month later, December 20, 1711, it was Jeanne Beauchamp whom death ravished from her husband and his children. She was buried on the same day in the cemetery in Boucherville. She was only 48 years old. Married at fourteen, she had eleven children, including three, Jacques, Joseph, and Agnes, who were minors at her death.
Denise took charge of the house after the death of her mother but Germain Gauthier however, having reached the age of sixty-four started to feel the weight of his days; thus he decided it was time to withdraw to the village of Boucherville. But before, it was necessary for him to dispose of his land. This he did by renting it for three years on a share-crop basis to Denis Baron. The lease is filled of interesting details concerning the farm of the Cote de St-Joseph. One reads there that it was located between that of Jolibois and of Dagueil, that it had: "house, barn, stable, the whole in a livable state except for a few small details, with the cattle sheds well cleaned of manure and all the arable lands and meadows that; to add value to said land, the lessor provides to the lessee two oxen, a horse, and a mare, five milk cows, two pigs, three geese and a gander, two dozen hens and two roosters, two young bulls and a colt." Then follows the estimate of the cattle and of the rolling stock of the farm for which the lessee was obliged to pay his share in the case of natural or accidental loss or to give back in good condition to the owner at the end of the lease.
Germain Gauthier could thus count on his share of the income from his land for his subsistence and as such, he was able to retire. He had to find himself another residence. On December 17, 1712, he obtained a concession from Pierre Boucher. Located on Notre-Dame street in the borough of Boucherville. This land measured seventy-two feet wide by as much in depth. On this site our ancestor had a small house built, measuring 25 feet in length by 18 feet wide during the preceding summer. It is there he will spend the remainder of his days.
The lease he had granted to Denis Baron ended on St. Michel's Day, September 29, 1711. He agrees to another on October 1, for the same three years duration, with Jean Cazavant, who lived in LaValtrie. The contract contains, according to custom, a meticulous list of cattle, agricultural tools, buildings, and he specifies the conditions of the lease and the reciprocal obligations of the contractors.
What prevented the first tenant from honoring the first contract as agreed? One does not know.... but one year later Germain Gauthier passed another contract with Jacques David, a weaver-ploughman, living at the Cote de St-Joseph in the seigniory of Boucherville.
At her death in 1711, Jeanne Beauchamp had left three minors. A tutor had not then been named for them. The father takes on the task during the seven years taking care of the best interests of his children with the, at least tacit, assent of the older ones: Denise, Jean, Pierre, Marie-Francoise, and Francois. Being seventy-one years old, he perhaps felt the weight of the illness which would eventually take his life. The meeting of the parents and friends convened for this purpose on June 17, 1718, by order of the Sieur Francois-Marie Bouat, Lieutenant General in the royal jurisdiction of Montreal, elects Jean Gauthier, paternal uncle of the minors as tutor and Pierre Botquin, husband of Francoise Gauthier and their uncle, as substitute tutor.
Germain Gauthier had only one more year to live. He died in his small house on Notre-Dame street in Boucherville on May 9, 1719. The register of the parish of St-Famille reports that: "In the year of our Lord, one thousand seven hundred and nineteen and the tenth of the month of May, I undersigned, priest-curate of the parish of St-Famille of Boucherville have buried in the cemetery of the said parish the body of Germain Gauthier native of Normandy aged approximately eighty years, deceased the day before, in the communion of our mother the Holy Church, after having received the sacraments of penitence, last sacrament, and extreme unction, in witness thereof, I signed. Saladin, priest."
The settlement of the succession of Germain Gauthier and Jeanne Beauchamp could not be differed much longer especially because of the three minors for whom guardianship had to be ensured. Thus, it was decided to proceed with the inventory of the goods of the community of the deceased before the notary Tailhandier on November 16, 1719 at the request of Jean Gauthier and Pierre Botquin. The document, the original of which is in the Quebec National Archives in Montreal, enumerates, according to custom: "..... all and each movable and Real good, cattle and other effects, titles, papers, and other things remaining after the death of the said deceased and which were held in common between them on the day of their death and being in the house of the said deceased located in the borough of Boucherville and on their concession of the Cote de St-Joseph"
This list shows us, across the years, by means of the details it contains, intimate details of the home and everyday life of the ancestor. We have the impression, upon reading it, of a country museum with its antiquities or to have made a great jump behind in time.
The same document also tells us that Denise remained with the minors of whom she took care, in the house on Notre-Dame street, and that Francois lived at the Cote de St-Joseph on the paternal concession which he worked as a farmer for half profit. Thus it was only natural that the inventoried material was left: "what was at the house in the borough to the capacity and guard of the said Denise Gautier dit St Amour and what was in the buildings which are on said concession to the capacity and guard of said Francois Gautier who promised good guardianship....until such times and for whom it will belong."
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1647 - 1719 (72 years)