This post contains a register of the first three generations descending from Claude Guérin dit Lafontaine, my paternal line ancestor, who arrived in Québec between 1690 and 1697. His marriage to Jeanne Cusson in 1697 is the earliest known written record of his arrival. In attendance at his wedding were soldiers of his military unit, the Noyan company of the Compagnie Franches de la Marine, which arrived in Québec in 1690.
The entry for each person in the registry is coded using a modified version of the NGSQ System and is in chronological order by birth and parentage. Each block of information pertaining to the direct ancestor is tagged with a numeric identifier which, except for Claude, can be used as a back reference to their parent’s information. Dates in parentheses are the birth and death years. A ‘[!]’ tag denotes a direct ancestor of my familial line. On the line beneath, their place of birth has been recorded in order to show family migration patterns.
For each person, their spouse(s) is marked with an ‘m’ tag. Dates in parentheses are the spouse’s birth and death years. The year of marriage is in square brackets, ex: [m. 1697].
Children of the marriage are marked with multiple tags. A ‘+’ tag denotes known descendants. The number is a reference index where you may find information related to this person further down the list. If the child did not have descendants, there may not be further information, unless they married. In that case, their birth and death years have been provided. A Roman numeral denotes which child they were in birth order within the family and with that particular spouse. Note that some children in each family list are missing; children who died in infancy are not included in this tally and some children whose fates are unknown are also left off.
Claude and His Children
1 Claude Guérin dit Lafontaine (1668-1708) [!]
(b. Lusignan, France)
m Jeanne Cusson (1662-1738) [m. 1697]
+ 2 i Jacques Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 3 ii Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine [!]
+ 4 iii Ange Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 5 iv Marguerite Guérin dite Lafontaine
2 Jacques Guérin dit Lafontaine (1697-1758)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Anne Sénécal (1704-1743) [m. 1725]
6 i Pierre Jacques Guérin dit Lafontaine (1725-1745)
+ 7 iii Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 8 iv François Xavier Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 9 v Marie Anne Guérin dite Lafontaine
10 vi Albert Guérin dit Lafontaine (1734-1750)
11 vii Marie Josephe Guérin dite Lafontaine (1735-1774)
12 viii Marie Catherine Guérin dite Lafontaine (1736-1755)
13 x Claude Marie Guérin dit Lafontaine (1739-1770)
m Marie Louise Lefetière (1721-1760) [m. 1747]
+ 14 i Jacques Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 15 ii Joseph Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 16 iii Jean-Louis Guérin dit Lafontaine
3 Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine (1699-1783) [!]
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Catherine Bourdeau (1704-1789) [m. 1725]
+ 17 i Marie Marguerite Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 18 iii Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine
19 iv Pierre Marie Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 20 v Louis Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 21 vi Gabriel Amable Guérin dit Lafontaine [!]
+ 22 vii Véronique Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 23 viii Marie Suzanne Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 24 ix Marie Catherine Guérin dite Lafontaine
4 Ange Guérin dit Lafontaine (1701-1770)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Anne Leber (1710-1793) [m. 1729]
+ 25 iii Ange Guérin Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 26 v Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 27 vi Marie Josephe Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 28 vii Marie Anne Élisabeth Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 29 viii Louis Antoine Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 30 x Marie Catherine Guérin dite Lafontaine
31 xi Marie Céleste Guérin dite Lafontaine
32 xv Toussaint Guérin dit Lafontaine (1757-1776)
5 Marguerite Guérin dite Lafontaine (1703-1757)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Joseph Bourdeau (1703-1748) [m. 1728]
+ 33 i Joseph Bourdeau
+ 34 ii Pierre Bourdeau
+ 35 iii Marguerite Bourdeau
+ 36 iv Catherine Bourdeau
+ 37 v Laurent Bourdeau
+ 38 vi Jacques Bourdeau
+ 39 vii Marie Louise Bourdeau
40 viii Véronique Catherine Bourdeau
The Second Generation
The Children of Jacques Guérin dit Lafontaine [2]
7 Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine (1728-1770)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marguerite Bourdeau (1731-1804) [m. 1758]
+ 41 i Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 42 ii Louis Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 43 iii Marguerite Guérin dite Lafontaine
8 François Xavier Guérin dit Lafontaine (1730-1798)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Anne Choinière dite Sabourin (1739-1787) [m. 1761]
+ 44 i François Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 45 iii Claude Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 46 iv Marie Anne Guérin dite Lafontaine
47 v Félicité Guérin dite Lafontaine
48 viii Marie Desanges Guérin dite Lafontaine
49 ix Rosalie Guérin dite Lafontaine
50 x Joseph Guérin dit Lafontaine
9 Marie Anne Guérin dite Lafontaine (1732-1781)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m François Picard dit Desforges (1725-1806) [m. 1754]
+ 51 iv Michel Picard dit Desforges
52 ix Marie Anne Picard dite Desforges
+ 53 x Augustin Picard dit Desforges
14 Jacques Guérin dit Lafontaine (1748-1833)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Angélique Giroux (1756-1811) [m. 1773]
+ 54 v Simon Guérin dit Lafontaine
55 vi François Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 56 viii Jacques Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 57 xi Michel Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 58 xii Marie Marguerite dite Lafontaine
15 Joeph Guérin dit Lafontaine (1750-1835)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Anne Trudeau (1740-1820) [m. 1776]
+ 59 ii Rosalie Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 60 iv Joseph Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 61 v Julie Guérin dite Lafontaine
16 Jean-Louis Guérin dit Lafontaine (1753-1810)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Françoise Giroux (1763-1814) [m. 1782]
+ 62 i Louis Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 63 iv Marie Françoise Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 64 xi Raphael Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 65 xii François Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 66 xiii Marie Geneviève Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 67 xiv André Guérin dit Lafontaine
The Cildren of Jean Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine [3]
17 Marie Marguerite Guérin dite Lafontaine
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Jérémie Dupuis (1723-1799) [m. 1750]
+ 68 i Marie Marguerite Dupuis
69 ii Marie Catherine Dupuis
+ 70 iii François Dauphin Dupuis
+ 71 iv Marie Suzanne Dupuis
18 Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Charlotte Dupuis dite Moyse (1736-1811) [m. 1755]
+ 72 i Marie Catherine Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 73 ii Marie Charlotte Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 74 iii Marie Hippolyte Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 75 iv Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 76 v Isabelle Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 77 ix Jean Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 78 xiii Marie Josephe Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 79 xv Amable Guérin dit Lafontaine
19 Pierre Marie Guérin dit Lafontaine Bourdeau (1731-1800)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Catherine Dupuis (1733-1816) [m. 1753]
(no children)
20 Louis Guérin dit Lafontaine
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Jeanne Robidoux (1739-1765) [m. 1757]
+ 80 ii Marie Louise Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 81 iv Joseph Guérin dit Lafontaine
m Marie Louise Amable Riel dite L'Irlande (1738-1824) [m. 1766]
+ 82 i Marie Marguerite Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 83 ii Louis Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 84 iii Catherine Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 85 iv Pierre Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 86 vi François Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 87 vii Marie Josephe Guérin dite Lafontaine
21 Gabriel Amable Guérin dit Lafontaine (1736-1768) [!]
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Hippolyte Boyer (1741-1783) [m. 1760]
+ 88 i Joseph Amable Guérin dit Lafontaine [!]
89 ii Marie Hippolyte Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 90 v Marie Marguerite Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 91 vi Marie Louise Guérin dite Lafontaine
22 Véronique Guérin dite Lafontaine (1738-1767)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Joseph Denault dit Detailly (1733-1810) [m. 1759]
+ 92 ii Louis Denault dit Detailly
+ 93 iii Marie Anne Denault dite Detailly
+ 94 iv Marie Agnès Denault dite Detailly
23 Marie Suzanne Guérin dite Lafontaine (1740-1774)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m François Marie Dupuis (1734-1805) [m. 1760]
+ 95 i François Dupuis
+ 96 iii Constant Dupuis
+ 97 iv Marie Louise Dupuis
+ 98 v Ignace Dupuis
+ 99 vi Marguerite Dupuis
+ 100 vii Marie Catherine Dupuis
24 Marie Catherine Guérin dite Lafontaine (1743-1803)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Pierre Riel dit L'Irlande (1727-1782) [m. 1762]
+ 101 i Marie Catherine Riel dite L'Irlande
+ 102 ii Louise Amable Riel dite L'Irlande
+ 103 iii Pierre Riel dit L'Irlande
+ 104 iv Joseph Riel dit L'Irlande
+ 105 v Marguerite Riel dite L'Irlande
+ 106 viii Jean-Baptiste Riel dit L'Irlande
+ 107 x Madeleine Riel dite L'Irlande
+ 108 xi Basile Riel dit L'Irlande
The Children of Ange Guérin dit Lafontaine [4]
25 Ange Guérin dit Lafontaine (1732-1781)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Suzanne Lanctot (1758-1810) [m. 1776]
+ 109 iii Marie Josephe Guérin dite Lafontaine
26 Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine (1736-1779)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Anne Gervais (1740-1766) [m. 1765]
m Marie Josephe Brosseau
110 ii Jean-Baptiste Guérin dit Lafontaine
111 iii Simon Guérin dit Lafontaine
112 v Ange Guérin dit Lafontaine
113 vi Pierre Guérin dit Lafontaine
27 Marie Josephe Guérin dite Lafontaine (1738-1777)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Pierre Sénécal (1732-1783) [m. 1760]
+ 114 i Pierre Sénécal
+ 115 ix Laurent Sénécal
116 x Jean-Baptiste Sénécal
117 xii Amable Sénécal
28 Marie Anne Élisabeth Guérin dite Lafontaine (1740-1821)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m François Brosseau (1734-1812) [m. 1760]
+ 118 i Marie Anne Brosseau
+ 119 ii Marie Louise Brosseau
+ 120 iii François Brosseau
+ 121 iv Marie Rosalie Brosseau
+ 122 v Raphaël Brosseau
+ 123 vi Marc Brosseau
+ 124 viii Jean-Baptiste Brosseau
125 x Marie Reine Brosseau
+ 126 xiii Joseph Brosseau
+ 127 xv Agnès Brosseau
29 Louis Antoine Guérin dit Lafontaine (1742-1797)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Anne Sénécal
+ 128 i Paul Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 129 iii Pierre Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 130 iv Marie Anne Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 131 v Josephe Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 132 vi Marie Céleste Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 133 vii Marguerite Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 134 viii Ange Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 135 x Casimir Guérin dit Lafontaine
+ 136 xi Charlotte Guérin dite Lafontaine
+ 137 xii Réné Guérin dit Lafontaine
30 Marie Catherine Guérin dite Lafontaine (1746-1784)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Joseph Dubois dit Rondel (1731-1801) [m. 1763]
+ 138 iv Louis Dubois dit Rondel
+ 139 v Marie Anne Dubois dite Rondel
31 Marie Céleste Guérin dite Lafontaine (1748-1805)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Amable Gibouleau dit Lafleur (1738-1809) [m. 1772]
(no children)
The Children of Marguerite Guérin dite Lafontaine [5]
33 Joseph Bourdeau (1728-1794)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Catherine Piedalue dite Prairie
+ 140 ii Félicité Bourdeau
+ 141 iv Laurent Bourdeau
+ 142 v Marie Bourdeau
+ 143 vi Marie Angélique Bourdeau
+ 144 vii Marie Louise Bourdeau
+ 145 viii Marie Céleste Bourdeau
+ 146 ix Pierre Bourdeau
+ 147 xi Jean-Baptiste Bourdeau
+ 148 xii André Bourdeau
+ 149 xiii Joseph Bourdeau
34 Pierre Bourdeau (1730-1786)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Félicité Paquelin cite Comtois (1745-1836) [m. 1761]
+ 150 ii Jean-Baptiste Bourdeau
+ 151 iv Félicité Bourdeau
+ 152 vi François Bourdeau
+ 153 viii Charlotte Bourdeau
+ 154 x Catherine Bourdeau
155 xi Jacques Bourdeau
35 Marguerite Bourdeau (1731-1793)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Pascal Pinsonnault dit Lafleur (1729-1802) [m. 1753]
+ 156 iv Joseph Marie Pinsonnault dit Lafleur
+ 157 vi Pascal Pinsonnault dit Lafleur
+ 158 viii Louis Pinsonnault dit Lafleur
+ 159 ix Raphaël Pinsonnault dit Lafleur
160 x Étienne Pinsonnault dit Lafleur
+ 161 xi François Pinsonnault dit Lafleur
36 Catherine Bourdeau (1733-1762)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Louis Laurent Roy (1728-1795) [m. 1751]
+ 162 i Catherine Roy
+ 163 iii Louis Laurent Roy
37 Laurent Bourdeau (1737-1784)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Marie Julie Dupuis (1740-1819) [m. 1760 ]
+ 164 i Pierre Marie Dupuis
+ 165 ii Paul Dupuis
+ 166 vi Marie Catherine Dupuis
+ 167 vii Godefroy Dupuis
168 viii Julie Dupuis
+ 169 x Marguerite Dupuis
38 Jacques Bourdeau (1739-1801)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Jeanne Clothilde Paquelin dite Comtois (1742-1776) [m. 1761]
170 iii Pierre Bourdeau
+ 171 v Rosalie Bourdeau
+ 172 vi Marie Louise Bourdeau
+ 173 vii Augustin Bourdeau
+ 174 viii Josephe Bourdeau
39 Marie Louise Bourdeau (1741-1773)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Joseph Lemieux (1739-1807) [m. 1764]
+ 175 i Joseph Lemieux
+ 176 iii Amable Lemieux
+ 177 v Pierre Lemieux
40 Véronique Catherine Bourdeau (1744-1840)
(b. La Prairie, Canada, Nouvelle-France)
m Simon Campeau (1739-1803) [m. 1761]
(no children)
Summary: A Difficult Start
Claude Guérin dit Lafontaine, and his wife Jeanne Cusson, had four children, ~30 grandchildren and ~140 great-grandchildren who survived childhood. While these numbers may seem large by contemporary standards, they are dwarfed in comparison to their peers. A look at various vital statistics can provide clues as to why.
The early years of the family history of Claude Guérin dit Lafontaine were marked by misfortune that in some ways is a reflection of early colonial life. Claude himself passed away at the early age of 40 of unknown cause. He was his wife’s third husband. Jeanne Cusson’s first husband was Jean Barreau. Like Claude, Jean was born in the Poitou region of France, in Jean’s case, the town of Béceleuf. Jean was only 39 years old when he was killed by the Iroquois in 1690, leaving Jeanne a widow with four children. Her second husband was Joachim Jacques Leber, a first generation Québecois. They were wed in 1692. Joachim was a voyageur and was frequently hired to do dangerous trips into the hinterland, usually to First Nations tribes, such as the Outaouais (Odawa,Ottawa). At some point prior to January 1696, when Jeanne settled the estate, he died; no funeral record has be found. The couple had one child together. When Claude married Jeanne in 1697*, he also became father to her five children.
Side Note: There may be an additional wrinkle regarding the union of Claude and Jeanne. Their first child, Jacques Guérin dit Lafontaine, was born and baptized on 16-Aug-1697. Reputable online sources, such as Généalogie Québec and PRDH, list Claude’s marriage as occurring on 19-Nov-1696. However, a look at the marriage record (the feature photo of this blog post), as well as an associated index that I’ve found in my research, seem to list the year as 1697, meaning that Jacques’ birth was out of wedlock. The text of his baptismal record does not state this; it simply lists Claude and Jeanne as his parents, but this wording is not out of the ordinary when compared to other records.
The death of Claude left Jeanne with seven children to take care of, ranging in age from 21 to 5; the two eldest Barreau daughters had already married. While the other eldest children would also be married off, the eldest Guérin child was only 11 years old at the time of Claude’s passing and there were many years eking out a modest living before they came of age and left home.
The travails endured by Claude’s children did not end with his death, though the fortunes were not uniformly bleak among them. The family of Claude’s eldest son, Jacques [2], suffered numerous tragedies. Of the ten children born to Jacques and his first wife, Marie Anne Sénécal, two died in infancy and three died in their teens. Of the five remaining, only three married and had families of their own. Marie Anne would herself pass away at the early age of 38. Jacques would remarry and father four more children, three of whom would survive to adulthood, marry and have families of their own.
Fortune also did not smile on the family of Ange Guérin dit Lafontaine [4] and Marie Anne Leber. Of the fifteen children born to the couple, seven would not survive their childhood and an additional child, Toussaint, passed away at the age of 19. The remaining seven, however, would survive, marry and have families of their own.
The later decades of the 1760s and 1770s were also not happy ones for the Guérins and their extended families. Buried in the cold, hard data in the register are the unlisted names, the names of children who did not survive to adulthood. A reckoning of the missing Roman numerals in quite a few family registries will tell a tale of high infant mortality brought on by a variety of factors, including, but not limited to, chronic illness, malnutrition and other health issues related to poverty and/or the influence of the French and Indian War. The most extreme example can be found in the family of Pierre Sénécal and Marie Josephe Guérin dite Lafontaine [22]. Married in 1760, by May 1770, out of eight children born to the couple, seven died in infancy or childhood. Their story is the worst, but not the only difficult one.
While my previous research work has focused solely on tracing backwards along family lines, this work is my first foray downward from an ancestor to determine how other families can trace backwards to Claude. With only one daughter, most of Claude’s grandchildren were still Guérins. The others were in the Bourdeau family, making us ancestral kin. With the marriages of the female grandchildren, we see other family names enter the mix: Brosseau, Denault, Dubois, Dupuis, Lemieux, Picard, Pinsonnault, Roy, Sénécal, and Riel, that latter name carrying a bit of additional Canadian historical weight.
For the most part, all of the families registered here were still living in, or at least baptized in, La Prairie. As later generations are added to the registry, we will see families migrate to other parts of Québec and beyond.