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Louis Pelletier Sansoucy, was
born and baptized in 1713, in Notre-Dame-de-Poitiers, in the former French
province of Poitou. He was the son of François Pelletier and Michelle
Coulon. Although the date of his arrival in New France is still unknown,
it is certain that he was a soldier in the Company of Saint-Ours – where
he was known as “Sansoucy,” undoubtedly due to his carefree personality –,
and it is most likely the case that he was stationed in Montreal.
On October 29, 1742, at Sainte-Agnès in Lachine, Louis wed Marie-Josèphe
Cécyre, daughter of the late Joseph Cécyre and Anne Trottier; the groom
was twenty-eight years old, the bride, twenty. The young couple had signed
their marriage contract the previous day, October 28, in the presence of
Father Vallière, but it was not deposited with notary public Claude
Poirier until January 25, 1743; the contract included no more than the
usual information found in such documents.
During the seven years that Louis and Marie-Josèphe were married, they
brought five children into the world, indicating that they were wealthy in
at least one sense. On December 10, 1749, at the age of 35, Louis died in
Montreal; he was buried there as a soldier, and under the name
“Pelletier.” He left to mourn him his twenty-seven-year-old widow and
their four surviving children; the couple’s second child, Marie-Josèphe,
died at the age of six months on September 29, 1745.
Two years after her husband’s death, on May 21, 1751, by order of the
court, Marie-Josèphe Cécyre obtained joint guardianship of her children
with her uncle, Joseph Cécyre. Shortly thereafter, another soldier, Henry
Miclette Laplume, came into the young widow’s life, and the two married
later that year. Born in 1721, seven years before Louis Pelletier
Sansoucy, Henry was the son of Henri Miclette and Angélique Senet of the
parish of Saint-Nicolas-de-Brème, in Poitou.
Four days after the aforementioned court order, notary public Gervais
Hodiesne penned the fol-lowing inventory, replete with Old French
legalese: “On the afternoon of May 25, 1751, at the request of
Marie-Josèphe Cécyre, widow of the late Louis Pelletier, cobbler, resident
of Faubourg de Saint-Joseph, in the area of this city of Montreal, as much
in her name as for the community between her [late] husband and herself,
who, as guardian of Antoine, age 7 years or about, of Paul, age 6 years or
about, of Jean-Baptiste, age 3 years or about, and of Magdleine, age
twenty months, minor children of the said late Louis Pelletier and
herself: with the exception of, she has accepted, if she should judge it
fitting by council, to renounce the community between them, and in the
presence of Mister Joseph Cécyre, carpenter, living in the said Faubourg
de Saint-Joseph, her maternal uncle and subrogate tutor to the said
minors, by act of guardianship signed by the Lieutenant General of the
Royal Jurisdiction of Montreal, recorded by notary public Blanzy on May 21
of the present year 1751, the said minors, qualified to inherit from their
late father, via the preservation of the property and rights of the said
parties [their parents] and said names and of all others, it is fit, per
the royal notary for the city and royal jurisdiction of Montreal,
underwritten, in presence of witnesses hereafter named, has been done, a
good and loyal inventory and de-scription of all the personal property,
clothes, linen, titles, papers, information and other items left after the
death of the said Louis Pelletier, which were common between him and the
said widow, on the day of his death, December 10, 1749, at the general
hospital of this city, found in the resi-dence of the said widow, as
presented or detailed to the said notary by the said widow, after her oath
to the said notary to present and detail all the said properties, without
hiding or diverting the attention from anything….” The contract continues
by noting that Laurent Surprenant Sanssoucy and Joseph Lombard, both
residents of Faubourg de Saint-Joseph, were chosen to perform the
inventory and appraisal in the presence of Pierre Jussome, tailor, and
Louis Varin, cooper, both residents of Montreal, who, with Joseph Lombard
and the notary, Gervais Hodiesne, signed the contract.
The following are but a few of the items inventoried, and their estimated
values:
• One old frying pan: 30 sols
• One small pot: 30 sols
• One small rotisserie skewer: 20 sols
• One folding pine table: 50 sols
• One very old bed, straw mattress, down blanket, and a pair of sheets: 24
pounds
• One very old cherry table with turned feet, drawers and cloth: 8 pounds
What becomes very interesting, later in the contract, are the property
holdings declared by the widow, translated below from the Old French
legalese:
Before notary Antoine Adhémar, on June 6, 1728, a bill of sale by Louis
Guillet and his wife, Françoise Bardet Lapierre, for a property measuring
forty feet of frontage by eighty feet deep;
Before notary Pierre Raimbault, on May 26, 1736, François Bardet and his
wife sell to Agathe Larchevesque, widow of Jean-Baptiste Brunet, a
property hereafter described. Then, a bill of sale from Agathe
Larchevesque, widow of Jean-Baptiste Brunet, for a property measuring
forty feet of frontage by eighty feet deep, with a house on it, to Louis
Pelletier, by act of notary Donne de Blanzy, December 14, 1745, at the end
of which the perfect and entire payment of the price of the sale is borne.
Later on in the inventory, the property is described as follows: “The real
estate of the community, which consists of a land measuring forty feet
along its front by eighty feet deep, abutting by its front the [land of]
Glassis, at its end, in Montreal, on one side, [the land of] the widow
Larivière, and on the other side, [the land of] Chevautier, on which
property is a house measuring eighteen square feet, with a floor and
ceiling, the roof heavily worn, two little windows with sashes and one
outside shutter, at one of the gables of which is a chimney of stone and
masonry, and lastly, behind the said house, is a little stable measuring
eighteen feet, at the end of the house, without a floor …, and covered
only by its boards, and behind the said house is a little garden
surrounded by old cedar stakes.”
Marie-Josèphe Cécyre also mentions a bill of sale from Claude Cécyre.
Louis Pelletier, from his rights of succession of his inheritance from his
late father and mother, by act of notary Donne de Blanzy and his
colleague, notary royal in Montreal, on November 18, 1745.
The inventory also mentions a fourth part of the land of the late father
and mother of the said widow, and in the structures thereupon, situated in
Lachine, following the contract of acquisition made by the said late
Pelletier, above inventoried.
On September 6, 1751, widow Marie-Josèphe Cécyre and soldier Henry
Miclette Laplume wed in Montreal. They had signed their marriage contract
before notary public Gervais Hodiesne on August 29, 1751, “before noon.”
This contract states that the “future husband” is a soldier in the Company
of “Fort de Cabana” in Montreal, and that his father, a wine merchant, was
already de-ceased by this time. As for the “future wife,” she lived in
Faubourg de Saint-Joseph, close to Montreal. Later in the contract, Henry
Miclette promises expressly that “the children of the said future wife and
of the late Louis Pelletier, her husband, will be provided for and
educated in the Apostolic Roman Catholic faith, in the care of the said
future husband and at the expense of the said future community stipulated
between the said future couple, until they are each eighteen years old.”
Henry Miclette is therefore quite special to the descendants of Louis
Pelletier, as he is responsible for having established this family in the
area of Chambly.
On October 4, 1755, the court permitted the sale of the house located in
the Faubourg de Saint-Joseph, detailed above, in order that the couple be
able to acquire land in the Seigneury of Cham-bly, on which Marie-Josèphe
Cécyre’s children obtained “privileges and special mortgage rights.” At
the time of this ruling, Henry and Marie-Josèphe were already in Chambly,
as they had bap-tized their daughter, Marie-Joseph Miclette, on April 6,
1755, at Saint-Joseph de Chambly. Two other children followed,
Joseph-Amable, baptized August 15, 1756, and Charlotte, baptized No-vember
25, 1757.
At this same time, the Pelletier children, Antoine, Paul-Louis,
Jean-Baptiste, and Marie-Madeleine, were growing up. At the age of
nineteen, the eldest, Antoine, married Marie-Josèphe Poulin, the
fourteen-year-old daughter of Berthélémy Poulin and Marie-Josèphe Monette.
Their marriage took place November 19, 1764, at Saint-Antoine de
Richelieu. Paul-Louis Pelletier, bap-tized July 13, 1746, in
Notre-Dame-de-Montréal, married Hypolyte-Pauline Poirier in Saint-Joseph
de Chambly on August 20, 1770. Marie-Madeleine, baptized in Montreal on
August 25, 1749, married François Denis-Laporte in Chambly on June 30,
1766, at the age of seventeen. As for Jean-Baptiste Pelletier, the sole
evidence of his existence is his baptism at Notre-Dame-de-Montréal,
February 18, 1748.
Digest of a text written
by Germain F. Pelletier
Translation : B.J. Shoja 2003
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