My 2019 French ChallengeAZ in 100 Words—or More | Q for Quebec

I love this Challenge for many reasons. Since while I am brainstorming for each letter of the alphabet, I dig a little deeper into my ancestors’ lives and I end up with lots of details that help me enrich my tree.

Indeed, I just discovered that one of my ancestors may have not been deported. I learned that Jean Blanchard and his wife Marguerite Girouard were in Québec City in December 1757—two of their children were buried in Notre-Dame Parish—, hence, it is very much possible that the whole family escaped. Although Jean and Marguerite were married in 1743 in Port-Royal (Saint-Jean-Baptiste Church), I couldn’t find any baptismal records for their children in Acadia. Maybe they moved to another town and church records were eventually lost?

In his book, Les Déportations des Acadiens et leur arrivée au Québec, author André-Carl Vachon mentions that during the year 1757, many Acadians arrived in Québec by ship, mainly from Miramichi (in New Brunswick). The country suffered from a severe famine that year and as people in Miramichi could not afford to take care of Acadian refugees, they sent them to Québec City.

It is also mentioned that lots of Acadians died from smallpox that year. I wonder if Jean Blanchard’s two children were victims of that disease. Not surprisingly, there were numerous burials of Acadians listed in the church register.

Jean’s daughter, Marguerite, my ancestor, was born in Acadia about 1752 and was married to Jean-Baptiste Picard in Montréal in 1781 at age 29.