|
Antoine & Etienne HEBERT
The land of Acadia was
owned by France in the 1630's. For years, France wanted to settle the area
with its own people. Although they had sent men to start a settlement as
early as 1604, no women were sent for over 30 years. In the mid 1630's,
France started sending men and women to colonize the land. Among those
settlers were two brothers, Antoine and Etienne HEBERT.
When did they get here?
We don't know exactly
when they arrived in Acadia. Some have placed the date as 1640.
I would place the date closer to 1648, since Antoine's oldest son was born
in 1649. There was a ship, La Verve, that arrived at that
time. Depending on which census (1671/1686) you consult, Antoine
was born in 1614 or 1621. He arrived with his wife, Genevieve LEFRANCE
(b. 1613 or 1606). His brother, Etienne, was supposedly born about 1630
and married Marie GAUDET around 1650. We do not know exactly where these
brothers came from or who their parents were. For a long time, it was thought
that their parents were Jacques and Marie JUNEAU of Haye-Descartes of Touraine;
but that has been shown to be incorrect.
Brothers - Yes ... Children
of Jacques & Marie - No
The misconception
began with Father Adrien Bergeron's article entitled "Deux grandes familles
acadiennes" [Memoires de la Societe genealogique canadienne-francaise
(Vol. VI, No. 8, Oct 1955, pp. 393-394)]. Father Bergeron tried to
say that Antoine and Etienne were brothers of a Jacques HEBERT, son of
Jacques and Marie JUNEAU. The following year, Father Archange Godbout showed
the connection to be incorrect (Vol. VII, No. 2, April 1956, pp. 122-123).
An examination of Jacques' (the son) marriage contract showed his name
to be HABERT, not HEBERT. Thanks to Stephen White
for sending me the dates for the these 2 articles. Godbaut's article also
shows evidence (derived from marriage dispensations) that Antoine and Etienne
were indeed brothers.
Stephen
White sent me a letter in which he said the origin of Acadian
HEBERTs can be summed up in one word: unknown. |
Where were they from?
It has been said that
possibly the brothers were from south of Loudon (LaChaussee, Martaize,
etc.), however, since Charles Menou d'Aulnay's family had land in that
vicinity. If he recruited settlers from that area, there is a chance
that they came from there, but there is no proof of where they (or most
other) Acadians came from. The linguistic studies by Genevieve Massignon
tried to say that they were from the Loudon area, but perhaps she was focusing
too much. It is probably true that they came from western France.
But the lack of documentation in the Loudon region means that perhaps we're
looking in the wrong place. Michael Poirier has suggested they came
from west of Loudon at the coast ... near Baie de Bourgneuf. He bases
this on:
- the location of the monastery of the Assumption (on the island Chauvet),
which was regularly
attended by
Richelieu and was the property of his brother, Alphonse.
- Port-Royal and the church of St Jean-Baptiste
- salt-water marshes in the area were drained ... much like the dyke system
utilized in Acadia
- it was a zone surrounded by Protestants and enclosing Catholics.
Their descendants
The genealogy of Etienne
HEBERT has has seen the most research. Janet Jehn and Purvis Hebert have
both published material on his descendants. Antoine, however, has not had
his genealogy published as a reference work. What appears on these
pages is part of the material that I have put together over the past 10
years.
Dictionnaire
Généalogique des Familles Acadiennes by Stephen
White
There are 19 HEBERT
families in the first part of the Dictionnaire,
released in August 1999. The second section (which extends to families
whose parents married by the end of 1780) contains another 200 HEBERT families.
Of those 200 families, 2 are not related to the Antoine/Etienne lineage
and another 19 still do not have links to the main lineage. Thanks to Stephen
White for providing me with this information. |
This page is a part of
