The Governor, the Merchant, the Soldier, the Nun, and Their Slaves

Home , Fort Senneville, Governor of Montreal, Great Peace of Montreal, Habitants, History of Montreal, Hochelaga (village)

The Governor, the Merchant, the Soldier, the Nun, and their Slaves

Household Formation and Kinship in Seventeenth and Eighteenth-Century Montréal

Alanna Loucks

A thesis submitted to the Graduate Program in History

in conformity with the requirements of the Degree of Master of Arts

Queen’s University

Kingston, Ontario, Canada

Final (QSpace) submission April, 2019

From 1650 onward, the city of Montréal became a crossroads that connected colonial French, Indigenous, and African worlds. A study of the geo-cultural landscapes of Montréal presents an opportunity to analyze the commercial, social, and familial networks of diverse peoples in a space defined by mobility, fluidity, and growing stability. The purpose of this research project is to illustrate how French households in Montréal between 1650 and 1750, which included Indigenous and African descent slaves and other labourers who are generally not considered as a part of family formation, contributes to our understanding of the interconnected nature of the French colonial world. There are different ways to explore the commercial, social, and familial connections that shaped Montréal into a crossroads. This project explores spatial, demographic, and household composition as three interrelated dimensions of Montréal’s networks. I utilize the idea of concentric circles of connection, moving from a macro- to a micro-historical level of analysis. I begin by considering Montréal’s geographic position in North America; next I examine the physical layout of the built environment in Montréal and follow with an analysis of Montréal’s demographic development. The thesis concludes with the reconstruction of the commercial, social, and familial networks that developed in Montréal society and within individual households. I use four different examples of household units to provide a deeper understanding of the types of interaction that contributed to the interconnected colonial world of French Canada. These include a consideration of the households of Governor Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil; prominent Montréal merchant Ignace Gamelin Jr.; decorated soldier Luc de La Corne St. Luc; and nun Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais. These four families can be understood as microcosms of some of the broader fluid and highly mobile commercial, social, intimate, and familial interactions that characterized Montréal and the French colonial world.

ii Table of Contents:

Introduction: 1

Chapter One: The Physical Presence of Montréal 17

- A Crossroads 18

- Built Environment 41

Chapter Two: An Interconnected Colonial Space 61

- The Beginnings of Settlement 62

- The Emergence of Slavery in Montréal 70

- Four Households 86

Conclusion: 118

Bibliography: 142

Appendix One: Genealogical Charts 151

iii List of Figures:

Figure: 1. Map of New France and Louisiana, 1683. Source: BANQ-Q, Louis Hennepin, Carte de la Nouvelle France et de la Louisiane nouvellement découverte – 1688 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244736.

Figure: 2. Distribution of Indigenous nations surrounding Montréal. Source: Maurice Saint-Yves, Atlas de géographie historique, page 5.

Figure: 3. Distribution of French trading posts and the year of their establishment. Source: Saint- Yves, Atlas de géographie historique, page 50.

Figure: 4. Plan of the streets laid out by Dollier de Casson in 1672. Source: Library and Archives Canada, C-28409.

Figure: 5. Plan of Ville-Marie drafted in 1684. Source: Library and Archive Canada, H3/340.

Figure: 6. Plan of Montréal drafted in 1704. Source: Library and Archive Canada, C-21752.

Figure: 7. Château de Ramezay. Source: Library and Archive Canada, PA-036720.

Figure: 8. Plan of Montréal drafted in 1723. Source: Library and Archives Canada, C-28399.

Figure: 9. Plan of Montréal drafted in 1731. Source: Library and Archives Canada, C-15810.

Figure: 10. Area of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, Ignace Gamelin Jr., Luc de La Corne St. Luc, and Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais’s individual dwellings. Source: Library and Archives Canada, C-28399.

iv Introduction

Walking down Rue Saint-Paul in Old Montréal today, one is immediately struck by the architecture and the cobblestone streets. Although many of the original buildings have been renovated, altered, or demolished, there are still many structures, especially churches, that showcase the craftsmanship of the past. It is still possible to imagine the hustle and bustle that characterized the central streets of the city during the century between 1650 and 1750, as merchants bargained with their French and Indigenous trading partners, as nuns prepared their grounds for the arrival of school children, and as birchbark canoes filled with furs drifted into the port at the Place du Marché. People of different social, economic, ethnic, and familial backgrounds came together, both voluntarily and involuntarily, to form one bustling, diverse, and interconnected community.

Let us then imagine that it is a Friday morning in August of 1711. Despite the unseasonably warm weather, a fourteen-year-old Panise named Marie is preparing for a trip to the marketplace to buy the goods she will need to prepare a banquet for her master, a prominent

Montréal merchant, his family, and his business associates. As the most active months of the fur trade season are coming to a close, Marie’s owner is celebrating another successful year of inland fur trading voyages by holding a dinner party for his business associates and investors.

The whole household is abuzz as Marie and other slaves and indentured servants work to prepare food and ready the house for the guests. Marie is tasked with purchasing meat and vegetables and helping to prepare the main food items for the celebration. Marie is always happy to have an opportunity to wander the city streets and thus takes her basket and goes out the side door of her master’s home and heads down the laneway towards the bustling street of Rue Notre-Dame.

1 As Marie walks around the side of the house, she glances up at the beautiful steeple of the

Notre-Dame du Montréal Cathedral that dominates the skyline, which is just down the street from her house. As Marie continues down Rue Notre-Dame she notices that some of her neighbours are also enjoying the sunlight from the front steps of their home or in their gardens, which Marie catches glimpses of as she walks by the laneways between the stone houses.

Despite the early hour, the city of Montréal is already alive with the movement of others pleased to take advantage of market day before the heat becomes too unbearable. Once Marie reaches the little alleyway beside the church she turns towards Rue Saint-Paul.

The streets are especially crowded today, and Marie nearly drops her basket trying to avoid a pair of young boys chasing each other up the alley. Without looking, Marie can tell when she is getting close to Rue Saint-Paul because she hears the familiar and distinct sound of a fur trader bargaining with a merchant over the price of his parcel of beaver pelts. It appears that the fur trader has just arrived with a group of Indigenous trappers who, by the tone of their voices, were evidently disappointed by the merchant’s evaluation of their goods. Marie continues to saunter down Rue Saint-Paul, passing many similar scenes of ongoing negotiation and bartering.

Suddenly, Marie hears her name being called and she looks around to see her friend, Angélique, sweeping the front steps of her master’s home. Angélique lives in the household of Marie’s master’s brother and his family and Marie and Angélique have become close friends. Angélique is older than Marie and has two children, both of whom were brought with Angélique from the

French post at Detroit following her sale and relocation to Montréal. Angélique’s children now live in the house next door. Marie and Angélique stand on the front steps for a few moments and discuss Marie’s preparation for the evening’s dinner party.

2 As Marie says goodbye to Angélique and continues to walk down Rue Saint-Paul, she notices large parties of Indigenous trappers and traders arriving along the Commune. They have come in from the St. Lawrence Valley to trade their furs with the French merchants who are based in Montréal. Having spent six years in the household of a prominent merchant, Marie has learned that the furs being traded will either be stored in Montréal by the government for future distribution, or more likely, will be sold and shipped to France where they are in high demand.

Finally, Marie reaches the Place du Marché and sets about gathering the items that she needs, which includes a rack of venison and some pheasants. Although not a dish appreciated by everyone, Marie’s master had developed a taste for the corn and squash grown in the territory to the west during his early expeditions to Detroit and Michilimackinac. As French colonists’ tastes changed and adapted, these staples were then cultivated on farms outside of the city. French and

Indigenous peoples brought these harvested goods into the city on market day to sell. Marie remembered to get some of these vegetables before leaving the market. After tightly packing her goods in her basket, Marie sets off back towards her home.

The timing of Marie’s departure from the Place du Marché is particularly convenient, because a large group of soldiers have congregated nearby to prepare for an expedition to the west. As Marie walks away, she can hear the superior officer begin to shout at his men to load their supplies. Last night, Marie had overheard her master discussing the deteriorating relationship between the French and an Indigenous nation living in the territory around Detroit, so she wonders if these soldiers are being sent to calm this budding conflict. Seeing the soldiers reminded her of her master’s son, who is a soldier and who always tells her stories of his trips to other French posts. She has also grown close to a Panis man named Joseph, who had become like a father figure to Marie when she had joined her master’s household six years ago at the age of

3 eight and who frequently accompanied her master and some of his business associates to

Michilimackinac. These and other stories have made Marie wish that she could have an opportunity to go and see this far off territory for herself.

To avoid the crowds along Rue Saint-Paul, Marie decides to take a different route home.

She turns up Rue Saint-Gabriel, a street only slightly more subdued. When Marie finally reaches

Rue Notre-Dame she can spot the Governor’s home: one of the largest buildings in the city. She makes a mental note to walk by the Governor’s house on her next trip to the market as the garden has the most beautiful apple trees. As Marie turns to walk back towards her home, she notices a group of people standing in front of the church. As the nun’s choir begins to sing, she realizes that it is the wedding day of the Governor’s daughter.1 Marie pauses as she reaches her house and takes one last look at the wedding procession before going around the back of the house and through the door into the kitchen. As she enters Marie is greeted by her friend Louise. Louise is a slave of African descent who joined Marie’s master’s household three years after Marie. Now eighteen years old, Louise had been brought from Saint Domingue by one of Marie’s master’s business partners as a part of a trade agreement before joining Marie’s master’s household.

Marie and Louise were both responsible for domestic tasks around the house, specifically the preparation of food, and Marie felt as though she and Louise had become like sisters. As Marie put her goods from the market on the table, the pair begin what will likely be a long day of preparations for the dinner celebration.

This imagined scenario of a street scene on market day in Montréal during the early eighteenth-century and the experience of an enslaved young woman of Indigenous descent illustrates the diversity, fluidity, and mobility that characterized colonial Montréal. This was a space in which the lives of the city’s diverse inhabitants of European, Indigenous, and African

4 descent intersected and overlapped, contributing to the complex and interconnected fabric of

Montréal’s societal landscape.

From 1650 onward, the city of Montréal was a crossroads that connected colonial French,

Indigenous, and African worlds. A study of the geo-cultural landscape of Montréal presents an opportunity to analyze the commercial, social, and familial networks of diverse peoples that are usually studied separately in the context of a space defined by mobility, fluidity, and growing stability. Numerous factors contribute to Montréal’s suitability as the setting for a study of societal interconnection, complexity, and household composition. Most of these factors can be categorized as either geographic or demographic. To begin with, the geography of the city shaped its development as a crossroads. The proximity of Indigenous territories and communities and the immediacy of Montréal to the colonial administrative centre of Québec influenced

Montréal’s connected status as the city served as a stopover between the French Atlantic and the pays d’en haut. The location of the city between the administrative centre of Québec and the wilderness to the west also shaped Montréal’s character as a place that resisted strict imperial control and developed independently. The city’s role as a stopover was reinforced by its location along the St. Lawrence River, which served as a major thoroughfare in the North American fur trade. These factors shaped the physically interconnected nature of Montréal and supported its development as a crossroad within the French colonial empire.

The city was a constellation of different peoples and interests which influenced the diversity of the population that came to inhabit this site. As Montréal transitioned from a transient trading post during the middle of the seventeenth-century into a bustling urban centre during the eighteenth-century, the demographic landscape evolved accordingly. Montréal’s population came to include French government officials, merchants, and indentured servants.

5 The centrality of the city in the fur trade and the proximity of Jesuit mission communities in the

St. Lawrence Valley meant that it also included a transient and permanent Indigenous population, such as traders and domiciliés. As the city urbanized and the permanently settled population increased, slaves of both Indigenous and African descent began arriving in Montréal, further adding to the diverse demography of the city and its position as a crossroads within an interconnected French colonial world.

Connections and Connectivity

The purpose of this research project is to illustrate how a consideration of French households in

Montréal, which included slaves, contributes to our understanding of the interconnected nature of the French colonial world. The methodological framework that I have used to decipher the complex layers of connection that linked the inhabitants in Montréal’s households, the members of Montréal society, and the city of Montréal to the rest of the French colonial empire, is influenced by Robert Englebert’s examination of the French river world of North America.2

Englebert uses the phrase “beyond borders” to describe the networks of French merchant families that extended across the North American continent and that transcended territorial boundaries.3 Montréal’s inhabitants, in and outside of their own households – were sometimes inhabitants without borders. They were not bound by the traditional ways by which we have viewed cities: as urbs bordered by walls or rivers. Households, too, were spaces not necessarily circumscribed by traditional gender, familial, or ethnic restrictions. Therefore, an analysis of family formation in Montréal presents a unique opportunity to understand households as microcosms of broader colonial society, which was fluid and highly mobile.

6 There are different ways to explore the commercial, social, and familial connections that shaped Montréal into a crossroads. This project explores spatial, demographic, and household composition as three interrelated dimensions of Montréal’s connectivity. I utilize the idea of concentric circles of connection, moving from a macro- to a micro-historical level of analysis. I begin by considering Montréal’s geographic position in North America; next I examine the physical layout of the built environment in Montréal and follow with an analysis of Montréal’s demographic development. The thesis concludes with the reconstruction of the commercial, social, and familial networks that developed in Montréal society and within individual households. This multi-layered approach exposes the complex layers of interaction and connectivity that formed the societal fabric and demographic landscape of the city. I use four examples of different household units to provide a deeper understanding of the types of interaction that contributed to the interconnected colonial world of French Canada. These include the households of Governor Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil; prominent Montréal merchant

Ignace Gamelin Jr.; decorated soldier Luc de La Corne St. Luc; and nun Marie-Marguerite

Dufrost de Lajemmerais.

My consideration of Montréal as a junction is indebted to Cécile Vidal’s work on French

Louisiana as a crossroads in the Atlantic world.4 Like Vidal, this project seeks to study

Montréal’s particularity as a part of larger “webs of connections” and considers it in relation to the broader French colonial world.5 Montréal was founded along the St. Lawrence River, which flows deep into the continental interior. It was the intermediate point between the pays d’en haut and the ports at Québec that were connected to the Atlantic. As different Indigenous groups and

French citizens interacted, and the North American fur trade grew, so too did Montréal’s relationship with the broader geo-cultural world of North America, the Caribbean, and Europe.

7 Montréal became a space in which socially, economically, and ethnically diverse peoples met and interacted. Beginning with the initial French settlement of Fort Ville-Marie in 1642, the proximity and numerical significance of the Indigenous peoples inhabiting the St. Lawrence

Valley influenced the composition of Montréal’s population. The city’s growth as a hub in the

North American fur trade contributed another dimension to the city’s demographic landscape.

Montréal became a hub for transient European fur traders, who frequently travelled from the city into the continental interior, and for diverse Indigenous peoples, such as the Wendat and the

Odawa, who took advantage of the city’s access to French goods and the French demand for furs.

As the city’s economy grew and its importance in the French colonial empire increased, the population evolved to reflect a growing stability within Montréal society. The stability contributed to an increased colonial administrative presence within the city, which in turn increased permanent settlement and influenced the presence of families in Montréal. Slaves of both Indigenous and African descent eventually came to inhabit the city, adding another layer of social and ethnic complexity to the interactions occurring along the city’s bustling streets.

Despite the city’s growth and urbanization, however, Montréal retained its character as a mobile and adaptable settlement. Montréal remained a place in which itinerant peoples met and interacted, crossing ethnic, economic, and cultural boundaries.

The macro-analysis conducted throughout the first portion of this thesis is in conversation with numerous other academic works, which can be separated into two categories: studies of

French-Indigenous relationships within the North American continent; and works that have analyzed the spatial evolution of the city. The work of Gilles Harvard, Kathleen DuVal,

Claiborne A. Skinner, and Jan Grabowski provide the foundation for my understanding of the complexities that characterized French-Indigenous interactions and relationships across North

8 America.6 I draw on their works as I examine the French dependency on Indigenous allies for survival, navigation, military support, and trade. My project also illustrates the creation of the mutually beneficial relationships that occurred throughout the pays d’en haut between the French and their Indigenous allies which, over the decades, came to include commercial associations and kinship ties, whether real or fictive. Following this important scholarship, I argue for both the fragility of the French colonial presence in the Great Lakes region, and the influence of the region’s Indigenous inhabitants over the commercial and social alliances established with the

French, and between the French and other Indigenous nations.

The proximity of diverse Indigenous peoples influenced how the spatial dimensions of the city of Montréal developed. Specifically, as the city grew and its importance in the North

American fur trade increased, the physical layout of this urban space evolved to facilitate convenient commercial interactions and to encourage the movement of Indigenous peoples into the city and the surrounding territory, both temporarily and permanently. One cannot over emphasize the effect that the St. Lawrence River had on the layout of Montréal as most of the peoples and goods, such as furs, food supplies, and other trade goods, that came into the city arrived by water. I draw on Jean-Claude Marsan’s work on the evolution of the built environment of Montréal to show how the physical evolution of this colonial space came to reflect the changing demographic, commercial, social, and familial nature of Montréal as it transitioned from a transient trading post into a more densely-populated urban centre.7 I argue that it is important to reconceptualize space, spatial boundaries, and the actual influence exerted by ‘real’ boundaries, such as rivers and topography, especially in a space that was characterized by mobility and fluidity. To do so, I use Robert Englebert’s work on the broad spatial connections of French inhabitants throughout the North American French river world, as I

9 shaped my own conception of Montréal as a city that extended beyond its physical borders.

Despite Montréal’s location on an island, and its bounded, fortified presence that physically separated the city from adjoining territory, the city, nevertheless, developed into a complex and permeable social and cultural space.

Many scholars have produced studies that analyze the French population in the city, specifically, J.F. Bosher, Louise Dechêne, and Allan Greer.8 This project elaborates on a dimension of Montréal’s demographic landscape that is absent from Bosher’s work on merchant communities in French Canada and that is only briefly mentioned in Dechêne’s detailed analysis of Montréal’s habitants and merchants and Greer’s study of the people of New France. My work includes a consideration of the enslaved members of this population as active members of a vibrant Montréal society who constructed their own webs of connections that crossed vast territories.

The second half of the thesis then moves into a micro-analysis of family and household formation. My analysis draws on the works of Nancy Christie and Françoise Noël, whose conclusions challenge the prevailing historiographical assumption that the nuclear family was irrevocably normative in western society.9 Although the works of Christie and Noël examine family formation during the nineteenth-century, their conclusions have applicability to my period of study during the late seventeenth and early eighteenth-centuries as these scholars also examine ideas of ‘extended’ social and familial connections. By examining family formation among and between the French, Indigenous, and African descent members of Montréal society, I argue for a need to extend the definition of the family beyond the nuclear form, to include kinship and commercial or social ties that frequently extended across large geographic distances. A consideration of individuals that “fell outside the demographic measure of the conjugal

10 household,” including the widows, spinsters, bachelors, and orphans analyzed by Christie, allows for an expanded consideration of what constituted ‘the family’ in early modern North America.10

Most individuals, as Noël has demonstrated, were immersed in dense social networks of family, neighbours, and kin, which could extend across vast distances and which were connected through correspondence networks.11 I apply the perspectives of Christie and Noël in my examination of the complexities that characterized the family formation and household composition of Montréal’s diverse inhabitants.

This project is also indebted to the work of Marcel Trudel on slavery in French Canada, which provided much of the demographic data that laid the foundation for this research project.12

Studies on Indigenous slavery and the system of slavery which developed in New France completed by Trudel and Brett Rushforth highlight the uniqueness and complexities of slavery as it emerged in New France.13 Monographs by James F. Brooks and Carl J. Ekberg also provide useful insights into the patterns and variety of Indigenous captive-exchange that occurred across

North America.14 They discuss the differing motivations for captive taking and the organization of systems of exchange, furthering our knowledge of slavery in New France. Rushforth and

Trudel’s works also consider African descent slaves in New France. More broadly, David

Greggus’s overview of the French Atlantic slave trade has enabled me to understand how the patterns of the imperial slave trade influenced the fluctuations in Montréal’s Indigenous and

African descent slave population.15

Studies of slave family formation are generally considered separately from approaches toward European family formation in other parts of North America. The works of Emily West,

Brenda Stevenson, Afua Cooper, and Jennifer L. Palmer have provided the foundation upon which I construct my own analysis of slave family networks in Montréal.16 Each author grapples

11 with the difficulty of deciphering and uncovering the experiences of peoples, whose lives, in many cases, left few traces in the historical record. Of the traces that do exist, most highlight actions by or in relation to property owners, and only provide cursory descriptions of individual slaves. Although these authors examine different geographic locations and time periods, they provide insights into how we can approach fragmented records and reconstruct, in a piecemeal manner, larger patterns of family formation in places like South Carolina, the American south, and the French Atlantic.17 Finally, my decision to examine four individual households as microcosms that represent broader societal and demographic changes in Montréal engages this thesis in conversation with Emma Rothschild’s examination of the inner lives of empire, Jennifer

L. Palmer’s analysis of the forced intimacy fostered in the confined physical space of the household, and with Jean-François Lozier’s work on the evolution of the mission communities in the St. Lawrence Valley during the seventeenth-century.18 Ultimately, both Rothschild and

Palmer are concerned with a broader consideration of imperial-wide connections sustained during the eighteenth and nineteenth-centuries throughout the British Empire and the French

Atlantic. However, the micro-historical approaches of these scholars, which utilize individuals, their familial networks, and their communities as tracers, are useful for tracking the activities of and relationships between wider networks occurring outside of a ‘defined’ space or an individual household.

Like many of the scholars mentioned above, I rely on similar kinds of primary source materials to allow for a reconstruction of the built environment of Montréal, an analysis of

French-Indigenous relations, and a consideration of the lives of some of the diverse individual inhabitants of the four households I consider in my thesis. Historical maps and city plans show the city’s changing geography, demography, and the physical dimensions of Montréal. These

12 sources highlight the advantageous geography and evolution of the city’s urban centre. Other sources, including official correspondence between imperial and colonial officials in Montréal, acts of land cession, as well as religious literature, such as The Jesuit Relations, although problematic in their own ways, have contributed to my understanding of the fragile and interdependent relationships that developed between the French and their Indigenous allies between 1650 and 1750. These materials were also crucial to my reconstruction of the physical features of the city that influenced the development of the four households considered throughout this project and the spaces within which inhabitants interacted.

The reconstruction of each individual household drew on an extensive array of archival material. Census material provided the foundational numerical information about occupational and demographic patterns in the city. To dig deeper into the lives of specific individuals inhabiting the city, I was able to access Catholic parish records compiled by L’Université de

Montréal, which include most of the European individuals and a large portion of their slaves living in the St. Lawrence Valley. These records allowed for the uncovering of the personal details that shaped the identities of these individuals. The property records and personal ownership details available in the Adhémar database, which is based on the records of the Centre

Canadien d’Architecture, and the digitized engagé and voyageur contracts available in the collections of the Centre du Patrimoine provided additional information about the location of physical households and enabled me to reconstruct some of the extended commercial, social, and familial networks that developed among the French members of society. Through these sources,

I identified the overlapping nature of the occupations and relationships of Charles, Ignace, La

Corne, and Marie-Marguerite. The painstaking identification and examination of the enslaved members of these four households would not have been possible without Marcel Trudel’s

13 Dictionnaire des esclaves et de leurs propriétaires au Canada français. Additionally, David Eltis and Allen Tullo’s Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database allowed for the tracking of broader trends in the French Atlantic slave trade and presented clues about a slave’s journey across the

Atlantic. An array of commercial correspondence, French travel journals, court, parish, and notarial records, such as wills, provided further details about the lives and relationships between

French individuals and their slaves, as well as the activities of the enslaved members of each household. When considered in their totality, these sources allow us to view the complex relationships that developed between all members of Montréal society and beyond to other locations throughout the French colonial world.

Unfortunately, as is the dilemma faced by many historians, this source material is uneven and contains weaknesses, especially in terms of inclusivity. Most of these sources have been produced by Europeans, which reveal Eurocentric perspectives and biases, and which tell us more about the experiences and lives of the French colonists than about their servants and slaves.

There are also issues of translation and misinterpretation, which further complicates the usage of these sources. Many of the diverse inhabitants of these individual households, including slaves, appear only as vague references in the surviving archival records, if at all. In other cases, as we will see, records of enslaved individuals simply do not exist, whether due to the purposeful erasure of their presence, as the result of an illegal sale, or due to an early death before any recording of a baptism or sale could occur. As a result, one must become tolerant of archival silences. In other instances, slaves receive a single mention in the personal correspondence of their masters, or are recorded in wills, hiring contracts, bills of sale, or in hospital records, noting childbirth or a period of sickness. However, when considered in the aggregate, these sources are rich entry points into seventeenth and eighteenth-century realities. Through the consideration of

14 a broad array of sources, the enslaved members of these households do appear, if only briefly, and one is able to piece together aspects of their experiences and interactions.

My micro-historical analysis of four individual households in Montréal relies on these primary and secondary materials as I re-evaluate forms of interaction and the creation of networks across broad territorial swaths and over a long period of time. The four households, representing a Governor, a merchant, a soldier, and a nun, provide different but overlapping examples of strategies of family formation and interactions that occurred in and outside of the city of Montréal. Although not representative of all households or connections, these four households offer a window through which to understand how Montréal’s population became increasingly more representative of the interconnected French colonial world. These households also showcase the mobility and diversity that came to characterize the societal and demographic landscape of this city at a crossroads. Additionally, these households illustrate another important, but often overlooked layer of connections that contributed to Montréal’s complexity – the relationships that developed among the enslaved members of society. Through the microhistories of the individual inhabitants in these four spaces, these households can be understood as microcosms of the broader commercial, social, intimate, and familial interactions that characterized the city of Montréal as a crossroads in the French colonial world.

Let us now imagine the world entered by the first French settlers following their decision to extend the mission of religious conversion, that had motivated the initial French colonial presence, into the North American continental interior west of Québec. In May of 1642, a small company of French settlers led by Paul de Chomedey de Maisonneuve arrived at the Island of

Montréal. Although other French explorers had travelled up the St. Lawrence River during the early sixteenth and seventeenth-centuries, a permanent French settlement had been

15 unsustainable. This small group of French settlers was a determined lot, and upon their arrival on the island they set about building a fort, named Ville-Marie, that would house fifty early colonists. Located at the base of a mountain and along the continental highway (the St. Lawrence

River), that ran from the Atlantic deep into the continental interior, this lush area must have seemed ideal for settlement and cultivation. However, this island was in a territory dominated by diverse Indigenous peoples, with established communities, who had extensive commercial, social, and familial networks that criss-crossed the North American territory. Therefore, the

French who settled at Fort Ville-Marie occupied a fragile position, since they were especially vulnerable to attacks by the surrounding Indigenous peoples, and specifically to those allied with other imperial powers, such as the English or the Dutch. Fortunately, the French became integrated into other systems of Indigenous alliances in the St. Lawrence Valley. As the French developed alliances and trading relations with many of the Indigenous peoples inhabiting the region, Montréal began to establish itself as an important space for diplomatic interactions and as a commercial hub. As the French fort urbanized and expanded beyond its initial foundation huddled against the St. Lawrence and Mount Royal, the strategic importance of the city’s geography and the French reliance on their Indigenous neighbours retained its centrality.

16 Chapter One:

The Physical Presence of Montréal

First and foremost, the Island of Montréal was a geographic crossroads that linked the French

Atlantic to the Indigenous pays d’en haut. The city’s location along the St. Lawrence River, surrounded by established Indigenous communities, shaped the city’s growth and the role

Montréal played, both diplomatically and commercially, in the French colonial empire. The built environment in this colonial space was constructed to facilitate and encourage the mobility and fluidity that characterized the city’s position along the river. This chapter considers the geography of the city and chronologically examines the development of the city as a hub of diplomatic and commercial interactions between French and Indigenous peoples, the increasingly important role of the city in the French colonial empire, and the evolution of

Montréal’s physical construction. Certain characteristics of this city-at-a-crossroads remained central through this period, while other things evolved and adapted as the small fortified trading post named Fort Ville-Marie, founded in 1642 by a small contingent of French settlers sent by the Société Notre-Dame de Montréal, developed gradually into a bustling urban colonial space.1

By 1750, the city had become a space where diverse peoples of European, Indigenous, and

African descent interacted, cohabitated, and established complex commercial, social, and familial connections that extended beyond the confines of the city.

17 Figure: 1. Map of New France and Louisiana, 1683. Source: BANQ-Q, Louis Hennepin, Carte de la Nouvelle France et de la Louisiane nouvellement découverte – 1688.

A Crossroads

The French colonial empire in North America can be understood metaphorically as a ‘Great

Tree,’ whose roots extended to continental France and whose trunk and branches crossed the

Atlantic and extended towards the western and southern corners of the North American continent. Montréal served as an important location on a branch of this ‘Great Tree’ from which hundreds of smaller tributaries connected French forts and trading posts located throughout the

18 St. Lawrence Valley and elsewhere. The French settlement at Montréal was founded along the

St. Lawrence River, between the Indigenous pays d’en haut, which was the vast and largely unexplored territory located to the west of Montréal, and the administrative centre of Québec

(see Figure 1). The city served as a link between the Atlantic ports at Québec and the extensive commercial and familial networks that stretched throughout the continent connecting French and

Indigenous peoples. The central location of the city led to its development as a crossroads within the connected world of the French empire.

Montréal’s geographically advantageous location proved useful in several ways. Settled and migratory Indigenous communities helped to shape the viability of the colonial city, as the

French extended their presence further into territory that was dominated by Indigenous peoples.

The city’s position along the St. Lawrence River shaped the city’s role as a diplomatic centre and as a commercial hub. In a territory dominated by diverse Indigenous groups, the city grew to serve as a diplomatic centre for inter-Indigenous and French-Indigenous negotiations. This location also meant that French fur traders traveling to and from Québec city and its Atlantic ports would stop in Montréal before traveling farther west. Additionally, Montréal’s access to

French goods brought Indigenous peoples into the city for trade. The city’s infrastructure itself enabled and enhanced diverse and fluid interconnections and an array of diplomatic, commercial, and social activities.

Despite Champlain’s recognition of its ideal location for settlement as early as 1612,

Montréal was not established as a French fort until 1642, due to a lack of financial support and a lack of willing settlers. Prior to the establishment of Montréal, the post at Trois-Rivières had been the venue for the annual gathering of the Indigenous nations allied with the French, including the Montagnais who lived along the St. Lawrence River, the Algonquian who dwelled

19 along the Ottawa River, and the Wendat.2 The establishment of an additional fort named Ville-

Marie at the site where Montréal is today, created an ideal point of connection for French-

Indigenous interaction.3 The French also recognized that the island’s location was well-suited to serve as a gateway between the French Atlantic and the pays d’en haut. Although, as Jan

Grabowski has argued, the territory to the west of Montréal was still largely unexplored by the

French before 1650, the city was located in territory that numerous Indigenous communities considered as their ancestral land, and which had historically served as an meeting ground for

Indigenous communities throughout the Great Lakes region.4 Although Québec retained its position as the administrative capital and the ‘centre’ of New France for most of the seventeenth- century, Montréal, along with the other French settlements along the St. Lawrence, such as

Trois-Rivières, were given unfettered control over the resources of the surrounding territory. In addition, French-Indigenous relationships remained under the jurisdiction of Montréal’s individual inhabitants.5 As a result, Montréal was able to maintain a level of independence from colonial authorities and regulations, which shaped its development as a city with an imperial presence and unregulated growth. Montréal, therefore, enjoyed ‘the best of both worlds,’ serving as an intermediate site between the strict colonial regulations in Québec and the seemingly unrestrained and abundant opportunities available in the pays d’en haut.

The position of Montréal as a crossroads within the French colonial empire in North

America has been recognized by many historians. Jan Grabowski and Jean-François Lozier have examined the role of the city of Montréal as a space that connected the mission communities that emerged throughout the St. Lawrence Valley during the seventeenth-century.6 In particular,

Grabowski and Lozier highlight the influence exerted by these settled Indigenous mission communities over the development and character of the city. Other scholars, such as Robert

20 Englebert and Gilles Havard, have illustrated the importance of Montréal as a point of connection in the French riverine world of North America and as a crucial settlement in the expansion of the French colonial presence into the pays d’en haut.7 Although Montréal tends to be thought of by some as one of the fortified centres in the French colonial world, numerous scholars have illustrated that the itinerant and permanently settled inhabitants of the fortified settlement relied heavily on relationships with the surrounding Indigenous communities.

Scholars, including Peter N. Moogk, Kathleen DuVal, and Michael A. McDonnell, have examined the fragility of the French colonial presence in North America and have emphasized that the strengthened French presence throughout the continent would not have been possible without the strong maintenance and fostering of alliances with Indigenous groups offering support, security, and commercial opportunities.8 My own research concurs with their findings.

There were numerous qualities that contributed to the suitability of the city’s location for

French settlement. On the one hand, authorities thought that the proximity of Montréal to the surrounding Indigenous communities, which included the Algonquians, Wendat, and

Haudenosaunee, would facilitate the development of French-Indigenous diplomatic, commercial, and familial relationships.9 On the other hand, the city’s location along the St. Lawrence River would lessen the travel distance by canoe or boat to and from the colonial administrative centre of Québec located to the east. Thus, Montréal was strategically situated between the Indigenous peoples of the Great Lakes region, including the Haudenosaunee Confederation, the Sioux, the

Odawa, and the Ojibwa, the French colonial administration, and the French Atlantic (see Figure

2). The location of Montréal along the St. Lawrence River also facilitated its development as a major centre in the expanding fur trade. The city served as a stopover point for French traders travelling west, and as the French colonial presence increased in North America, the river also

21 served to connect Montréal to the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers, allowing Montréal to become a commercial hub.10 In combination, the advantageous site of the city shaped Montréal’s future as a crossroads, connecting diverse peoples to Indigenous communities, the expanding networks of the fur trade, and to the French Atlantic.

The geographic factor that truly defined Montréal’s development, facilitating the city’s connections to the pays d’en haut and Québec, was its position on the St. Lawrence River.

Whether for the purposes of diplomacy and trade or the transportation of goods and peoples, the

St. Lawrence facilitated the mobility that characterized Montréal society. The St. Lawrence was a gateway to the Atlantic that connected the three major French settlements of Québec, Trois-

Rivières, and Montréal, while the river and its tributaries also flowed into the interior of the

North American continent.11 The Island of Montréal itself came at a junction in the St. Lawrence

River.12 To the west of the city, the St. Lawrence splits, with the Ottawa River flowing off to the northwest, and the St. Lawrence continuing to flow southwest towards Lake Ontario. Through

Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence is then connected to a huge network of secondary waterways that gradually flow into the other Great Lakes and the Mississippi River.13 Contemporary maps of

North America show the centrality of the St. Lawrence River as a waterway into the North

American continent (see Figure 1). Its extensive drainage basin encompassed a large region of both geographic and economic importance in the French colonial empire and the tributaries of the river stretched about 2000 kilometres inside of the continent.14 As the French colonial presence expanded westward and to the south, these waterways served as highways, creating the web that knit together the French colonial world.

The strategic establishment of a French settlement on this island was influenced by numerous other external factors that were shaped by the city’s geography. Prior to contact with

22 the French, the Indigenous nations that inhabited the Great Lakes region had developed complex webs of diplomatic, defensive, commercial, and familial interactions. As the French moved to establish a fort on the Island of Montréal in the early 1640s, their presence reached further into the territory that was dominated by these established groups, including the Algonquians,

Montagnais, Abenakis, Wendat, and the members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy (see

Figure 2). As a result, when the French came to permanently settle on the island, they were overwhelmingly outnumbered by their Indigenous neighbours.

In May of 1642 when the French established Fort Ville-Marie, Paul de Chomeday de

Maisonneuve, the first governor of Ville-Marie, set out from Québec with thirty French inhabitants, including Jeanne Mance, to establish what was initially imagined as a missionary colony.15 At that time, this small group was surrounded by approximately 80,000 Indigenous peoples who lived within an 800 kilometre radius of what would eventually become the city of

Montréal.16 Within a 250 kilometre radius, which was the only area of relatively high population density, the Haudenosaunee territory contained a total of some 50,000 people, with some individual villages containing 1,000 inhabitants.17 Additionally, about 4,000 members of the

Algonquian nation lived along the north shore of the St. Lawrence and were the closest neighbours of the newly established French settlement.18 Given Montréal’s relative isolation, this demographic imbalance meant that interactions between the French settlers and their Indigenous neighbours, whether welcoming or hostile, were inevitable and unavoidable. The continual proximity meant that the French had to constantly negotiate with their Indigenous neighbours to secure their own safety and remain settled there.19

23 Figure: 2. Distribution of Indigenous nations surrounding Montréal. Source: Maurice Saint-Yves, Atlas de géographie historique, page 5.

Almost immediately following the construction of Fort Ville-Marie, diplomatic and commercial links began to develop between the Indigenous nations to the north, east, and west and the French peoples that came to settle seasonally or permanently at the junction of the St.

Lawrence River.20 As Jesuit Paul Ragueneau explained in his annual report of 1651, the location of Montréal was “a very advantageous place for all the upper nations who wish to trade with [the

French]” because it was centred in the territories of diverse Indigenous groups that were connected by extensive waterways.21 Within the region, there were three main linguistic groups with whom the French came into contact; the Algonquians, the Haudenosaunee, and the Sioux.22

Although individual Indigenous nations shared linguistic similarities, each group functioned independently and developed their own webs of alliances and hostilities with other surrounding

24 Indigenous communities, regardless of their common language. Allegiances within these broad linguistic groups also shifted continually over the course of the seventeenth-century. The earliest allies of the French were comprised of both Algonquian and Haudenosaunee speakers. These allies included the Algonquian speaking Montagnais, Nipissing, Algonquian, Maliseet, and

Abenakis, as well as the Iroquoian speaking Wendat.23 Unfortunately, the development of French alliances with the Algonquian and Haudenosaunee groups exacerbated inter-Indigenous conflicts, and the French, being the weaker of all the parties, had no choice but to follow the lead of their Indigenous allies.

The French relationship with the Haudenosaunee is a case in point. Upon Jacques

Cartier’s arrival at Stadacona in 1534, which was located at present day Québec city, Cartier had been welcomed by the resident Haudenosaunee peoples.24 As Cartier’s journey continued down the St. Lawrence to Hochelaga, located at present day Montréal, Cartier met another

Haudenosaunee settlement and initially experienced a similarly welcoming reception.25

However, following Cartier’s attempts to claim the territory of the Haudenosaunee in the name of France and his kidnapping of several Haudenosaunee, including their chief Donnacona,

French relations with the Haudenosaunee peoples quickly deteriorated.26 By the time Samuel de

Champlain returned to the St. Lawrence Valley over seventy years later in 1608, the Indigenous communities at Stadacona and Hochelaga that Cartier had encountered no longer existed at

Québec or on the Island of Montréal.27 However, Champlain encountered other Indigenous peoples. During Champlain’s initial interactions with the surrounding friendly Indigenous groups

– the Wendat, Algonquian, and the Montagnais – he was told of hostilities that had developed between these Indigenous groups and the Haudenosaunee Confederacy.28 The two factions, the

Wendat, Algonquian, and Montagnais, on the one hand, and the Haudenosaunee, on the other,

25 had different perspectives on who should control access to fur trade routes and in which territories hunting could occur. Champlain’s subsequent decision in 1609 to ally the French with the Wendat, Algonquians, and Montagnais immediately ostracized the French from the

Haudenosaunee and by extension, put the French into conflict with the Dutch and the English who had aligned themselves with the Haudenosaunee.29

This was dangerous because the Haudenosaunee Confederacy controlled vast swaths of territory in what is now New York State and beyond and had established trading relations (and procured weapons) from the Dutch and the English. The proximity of the Haudenosaunee territory to the southern side of Montréal proved to be especially problematic for the French inhabitants of the city. Following the beginning of what would culminate in the fall of Huronia to the Haudenosaunee between 1643 and 1649, the recently-established fortified site of Ville-Marie became even more vulnerable to Haudenosaunee attacks.30 At that point, some members of the

Wendat and Algonquian nations sought the protection of the French and began to resettle around the newly established French fort.31 Other displaced members of the Wendat nation recognized the vulnerability of Montréal to the attacks of the Haudenosaunee in 1649 and continued up the

St. Lawrence to settle near the more secure French settlement at Québec.32 This susceptibility increased after 1655 when members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy forced nearly all of the

Indigenous nations of the eastern Great Lakes and the Ohio River Valley to move west towards

Illinois, Wisconsin, Missouri, and Arkansas. To the east of the Mississippi, Haudenosaunee power and sovereignty had become consolidated.33

Throughout the first half of the seventeenth-century, ongoing French-Haudenosaunee conflicts, in combination with the harsh climate and the lack of financial support from the imperial centre discouraged settlement in New France.34 Small contingents of French settlers

26 arrived at Montréal throughout the 1650s, including the 95 French settlers that arrived in 1653 and the 91 who came six years later.35 Nevertheless, a large portion of the fort’s population was itinerant. Following the emergence of royal control in the colony in 1663, which was deemed necessary to counter the increased threat of the British and to a lesser degree, the Dutch, to the south, the trajectory of the colony’s fate seemed to improve. However, despite changes in imperial policies toward the still-nascent colony, the settlement at Montréal remained marked by the unstable and hostile climate in the Great Lakes region. As a result, the French at Montréal were faced with the task of fortifying and continually defending their fragile position along the

St. Lawrence River.

Fort Ville-Marie on the Island of Montréal was constructed as a fortified settlement, which contained, as historian Marcel Trudel has pointed out, a small, isolated population that lived in a constant state of fear of attacks from the Haudenosaunee.36 The fort itself, as Jan

Grabowski argues, was physically surrounded, encased if you will, by villages of Mission

Indians within proximity to the fort, including La Montagne and Sault St. Louis.37 Domiciliés

(resident Indigenous population), which included members of the Wendat, Algonquian, and

Montagnais nations, contributed to the defence and security of the city during the mid- seventeenth-century.38 These warriors were experts in Indigenous warfare practices, consisting mostly of guerilla tactics, which most other French colonists were not accustomed to, and were instrumental in protecting the city during this period of instability. Despite the erection of physical boundaries and the support from Indigenous allies, the threat of the Haudenosaunee attacks continued unabated. The fears of French residents were well grounded: between 1642 and

1662, the Haudenosaunee were responsible for 51.6% of the deaths of Montréal inhabitants.39

Martine Messier, the grandmother of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, one of the central

27 characters of this thesis, narrowly avoided death during an attack outside of the fort in 1652.40

Fortunately, Messier was able to fight off her attackers until other French inhabitants came to her aide. Messier’s experience highlights the necessity to maintain a well-fortified French settlement on the Island of Montréal. Despite their relocation closer to the city and the perceived protection by the French, France’s Indigenous allies also remained susceptible to attacks by the

Haudenosaunee. Jesuits reported that a minimum of forty Wendat were captured or killed near

Montréal between 1650 and 1653.41 Attacks on the French settlers in Montréal continued throughout the later decades of the seventeenth-century and French and Indigenous peoples outside of the walled fortification were especially vulnerable.

The experience of Charles’s grandmother, the Wendat, other French settlers, and the recollections of brutality relayed by the Indigenous allies of the French to the Jesuits certainly reinforced a desire to maintain a strong fortified space. However, two factors impacted the effectiveness of these fortifications.42 Sébastian Le Prestre de Vauban, who had been responsible for the creation of the defensive system in New France during the mid-1650s and early 1660s, designed a logical and comprehensive system of defense, that would, in principle, give the defenders an advantage against an organized military attack.43 In reality, however, Indigenous attackers in North America were unpredictable, and the wooden palisades with gates to control entrances and exits, could scarcely protect against a sustained attack.44 The idea of a fortified post was also contrary to the commercial interests (and attraction to the city because of its lack of regulation) of the French who chose to settle in Montréal during the late 1650s and early 1660s.45

However, the location of the city in an unstable and tumultuous environment, surrounded by ever-changing inter-Indigenous relationships, eventually contributed to the city’s role as a diplomatic centre.

28 Beginning in 1651 and continuing intermittently until the Great Peace of Montréal in

1701, repeated attacks by the Haudenosaunee Confederacy plagued the city.46 It was during this time that Montréal began to serve as a centre for diplomatic negotiations. Beginning in 1653, despite the French having pledged their allegiance to the Wendat, Algonquian, and Montagnais, a conference was held in Montréal, where members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy attempted to persuade the French to remain neutral in the ongoing conflict between the

Haudenosaunee nations and France’s Indigenous allies.47 However, the French relied too heavily on their Indigenous allies to refrain from providing them with military support. Because

Haudenosaunee attacks directly impacted the French, particularly at Montréal, neutrality proved to be unrealistic (see Figure 2).48 Almost two decades later, a temporary peace was concluded in

1667, which seemed to calm the St. Lawrence Valley.49 This peace did not last, however. Inter-

Indigenous conflicts continued until the next attempt at negotiation occurred in Montréal in

1684.50

Ultimately, the first real peace talks that would eventually lead to the Great Peace of 1701 began in 1688. The conflict with the Haudenosaunee was recognized by France’s colonial administration as an obstacle to the growth and economic development of the colony. The growing French desire for peace with the surrounding Indigenous communities led to three disjointed attempts to negotiate peace between 1688 and 1695.51 In June of 1688, a delegation of

Onondaga, Oneida, and Cayuga arrived in Montréal to unsuccessfully negotiate a conclusion to the ongoing conflicts.52 The following year, the Governor of New France, Louis de Buade,

Comte de Frontenac was rejected again by the delegations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy.

The last attempts were made between June 1693 and April 1695 and consisted of numerous efforts by the French, their Indigenous allies, and members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy

29 to voice their own conditions for peace. Unfortunately, no consensus was reached, and peace talks stalled yet again.53 Throughout these continuous negotiations, French inhabitants in

Montréal, French fur traders traveling the St. Lawrence and Ottawa Rivers to the west, and the communities of the Indigenous allies of the French continued to experience attacks by members of the Haudenosaunee nations.

During the last two decades of the seventeenth-century, when Indigenous emissaries and convoys were increasingly frequenting Montréal, Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil’s father,

Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil et de Châteauguay, played a significant role in military actions and diplomatic negotiations aimed at undermining the power of the Haudenosaunee. Longueuil et de Châteauguay’s role as a diplomatic negotiator had begun decades before the final negotiations of the Great Peace of 1701, as his extensive relationships with the Indigenous allies of the French, including the Wendat, had allowed him to learn numerous Indigenous dialects. In the early 1670s, Longueuil et de Châteauguay acted as an interpreter for the chiefs of the

Haudenosaunee Confederacy during a diplomatic encounter, and in 1683, he was commissioned to meet with Haudenosaunee chiefs near Montréal in order to renegotiate the terms of their

French-Indigenous alliance and fur trading relationship.54 In the summer of 1684, shortly before his death, Longueuil et de Châteauguay negotiated a ‘temporary’ peace between the French and the Haudenosaunee.55 Although the 1684 negotiation proved to be short-lived, French interpreters like Longueuil et de Châteauguay and, eventually, Charles LeMoyne and some of his brothers, engaged in dialogue with the numerous members of the Confederacy frequenting

Montréal.56 These visits included the Onondaga who came to Montréal on June 24, 1694 to declare that Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, who had followed his father as an ambassador and peace delegate for the French, and who had been adopted by the Confederacy as a sign of

30 goodwill, should serve as an official interpreter.57 These visits, including visits from the Oneidas, continued over the next few years.58

Throughout 1698 and 1699, French-Haudenosaunee negotiations remained inconclusive and conflicts between the Indigenous allies of the French, particularly those living west of the

Great Lakes, and the members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy intensified, which further strained peace negotiations.59 In January of 1699, delegations of the Onondaga and the Oneida again returned to Montréal, this time to meet with Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil’s brother,

Paul LeMoyne de Maricourt, who had also been adopted by the Onondaga.60 Finally, after nearly a century of conflict between the French, their Indigenous allies, and the Haudenosaunee

Confederacy, a preliminary peace was concluded in Montréal in September of 1700.61 The eleven months leading to the conference in the summer of 1701 were filled with diplomatic activity as the French at Montréal arranged for both their Indigenous allies to the west and the members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy to come to the city.62 On August 4, 1701, the representatives of forty Indigenous nations, representing more than 1,300 Indigenous peoples, signed the Treaty of Montréal.63 The peace, symbolized by the Tree of Peace, resulted in the establishment of a secure and peaceful trading relationship between the French, their Indigenous allies, and the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and ensured the safety of the inhabitants within the city of Montréal.64

Despite the vulnerability of the city to attacks from enemy peoples between 1650 and

1701 and the diplomatic instability in the St. Lawrence Valley and the Great Lakes region,

Montréal gradually developed into a hub of French-Indigenous commercial exchange. Just as the geographic location of the city along the St. Lawrence River proved advantageous for visiting

Indigenous delegations, its location along the River also facilitated and encouraged the growth of

31 the city as a commercial centre. This is in part because of the economic viability of the European fur trade and the interest of various Indigenous groups in participating in this growing commercial enterprise.65 Historically, before the fifteenth-century, European hatters had made felt hats from European beaver pelts, but over-trapping had decimated the European beaver population. Towards the end of the sixteenth-century, Europeans fishing along the eastern coast of North America, where the St. Lawrence opened into the Atlantic, began to interact with

Indigenous trappers who were willing to sell beaver pelts at a good price.66 The discovery of this new source of beaver furs led to an enormous comeback of the beaver hat fashion. As Timothy

Brook illustrates, the fashion first caught on among European merchants and eventually the style spread to “courtly and military elites.”67 As the French colonial presence expanded into the St.

Lawrence Valley and the Great Lakes region at the beginning of the seventeenth-century, French colonists began to build commercial relationships with the Indigenous communities inhabiting the region.68 These commercial relationships continued to expand as the French colonial presence moved further into the continental interior and as the French demand for furs in Europe increased. This resurgence of demand provided the colonists with the capital to finance further colonial exploration.

As French demand for beaver furs increased, Montréal served as a conducive space to conduct fur trade transactions. The city’s proximity to the west gave Montréal traders access to the commercial networks of the Indigenous communities living in the pays d’en haut, which brought numerous Indigenous traders with the best quality furs into the city.69 The presence of these Indigenous traders increased throughout the seventeenth-century, in part because of an excellent Indigenous canoe transport system and their ability to hunt in inclement weather. The

Montagnais, for example, excelled at navigating the waterways of the continent in their light

32 birchbark canoes and used snowshoes to hunt and trap in the deep snow.70 They, and others, taught the French trapping techniques, including setting up nets under the ice to capture beavers in search of food.71 As the French became involved with Indigenous trappers and developed a deeper understanding of the methods used to secure the most valuable furs, they quickly realized that it would be easier to buy the furs directly from the proficient Indigenous trappers rather than hunt for furs themselves, given that the numbers of French settlers were so few.72 In 1654, the

Odawa who inhabited the territory southwest of the city, came to trade within the walled settlement for the first time, and in 1681, thirty-six Odawa and Wendat traders arrived by canoe to trade their furs.73 Later, following the foundation of the French fort at Michilimackinac in

1688 and the French fort at Detroit in 1701, these forts became the initial point for the intake and bundling of furs before they were sent east to the French merchants in Montréal.74

Another factor that contributed to the city’s commercial growth was the resident

Indigenous population (domiciliés), who came to inhabit the mission communities surrounding

Montréal. As previously mentioned, some members of the Wendat, Algonquian, Montagnais, and other Indigenous nations chose to settle in the mission communities that surrounded the

French settlement. These Indigenous peoples brought with them extensive commercial, social, and familial ties that contributed to the trading activities within the city. As historian Jan

Grabowski has identified, the French inhabitants recognized the importance of these Indigenous residents and both the French and the domiciliés sought to construct what Grabowski refers to as a ‘common ground,’ which developed into a series of trade, business, and personal relationships that bridged the gap between these communities.75 Many of these mission communities, such as the one on Île-aux-Toutres which catered principally to the Nipissing, encouraged members of their own nations who were residing throughout the pays d’en haut to come to the city to trade.76

33 For example, in the spring of 1676 members of the Wendat nation living north-west of Montréal, who had kinship ties to some of the Wendat living in the Lorette mission community, came to

Montréal to trade and visit their kin.77 The appeal of the city was compounded by the easy access of its French inhabitants to French goods, such as brandy and firearms, on which the Indigenous communities were becoming increasingly reliant.78

It was not always easy for France’s Indigenous allies to reach Montréal, given the vulnerability of river routes to Haudenosaunee attacks during the second half of the seventeenth- century. During times of inter-Indigenous conflict, the French suffered economically, as

Montréal was dependent on the fur trade, which was only accessible when the waterways could be sufficiently protected. In 1653, Jesuit François Le Mercier reported that, before the displacement of the Wendat from the region north of the Great Lakes in 1649, one hundred canoes carrying large quantities of pelts used to arrive to Montréal each year, and that

Algonquians also brought pelts to the city from all over the region.79 But in 1653, the warehouse in Montréal contained not a single beaver pelt from an Indigenous trader, because the

Haudenosaunee had expanded the territory that they controlled during the 1650s and 1660s and the remaining Wendat traders had been unable to travel to the French settlements along the St.

Lawrence to trade.80 The Algonquians had also been depopulated by conflicts with the

Haudenosaunee, and other Indigenous nations with commercial interests were retreating further into the interior of the continent and to the west of the Mississippi.81 Fortunately for the French, their Ojibwa allies emerged in the 1660s as a formidable military force able to counter the

Haudenosaunee.82 The temporary peace in 1667 also allowed for a brief phase of colonial expansion as fur traders, missionaries, and explorers traveled west beyond the St. Lawrence

Valley.83 Meanwhile, on the other side of the ocean, a concerned Louis XIV officially took

34 control of the colony of New France in 1663 and began to invest more heavily in bolstering the military, demographic, and economic presence in the beleaguered colony.

It was during the 1660s that Montréal’s importance within the French colonial empire began to grow. The city’s access to the pays d’en haut and the Great Lakes naturally shaped its growth as a centre along the highway of the fur trade (the St. Lawrence River). Within this growing matrix, Montréal emerged as a necessary “stopping point” for both those travelling inward towards the pays d’en haut and anyone returning from a western expedition. Two waterways in particular, the Ottawa River and the Upper St. Lawrence River, led directly to the pays d’en haut.84 To circumvent the ongoing hostilities between the Haudenosaunee nations to the south of Montréal, French and Indigenous traders, including the Wendat and Algonquian peoples to the north-west, began using the Ottawa River as a safer route to travel to Montréal to trade their furs.85 Increasing numbers of French traders also used this route to travel west as their allies were more willing to engage in trading activities along this waterway.86

By 1667, the commercial future of the colony of New France looked bright.87 Louis

XIV’s enhanced political and economic interest in the colony and the increasing military presence of the Ojibwa to the west allowed for a revitalization of the fur trade. Colonial and imperial administrators viewed the French colony as a source of raw materials and a market for

French merchandise.88 Louis XIV was particularly keen on assuming control over all colonial commercial activities. For example, rather than having the French traders explore the west in search of more trade opportunities, the new Minister of Finance of France, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, preferred that the Indigenous allies of the French come into the city of Montréal to trade under the watchful eye of the colonial administrators.89 In order to put this policy into effect, Colbert established commercial fairs along the commune in the city. However, as Montréal was a French

35 settlement that largely remained on the periphery of imperial control, Colbert’s policies soon backfired. In response to this policy, Montréal merchants began to outfit larger numbers of expeditions traveling towards the pays d’en haut.90 By the early 1670s, despite several attempts to centralize control and to monitor the flow and price of beaver pelts, the number of beavers brought legally or illegally from the territory west of the city and the number of pelts being exported to France exploded and oversaturated the market.91 In yet another attempt to exert control over the fur trade, the Finance Minister Colbert inaugurated a system of congés (fur trading contracts) in 1681, which meant that the administration would be responsible for distributing trade permits.92 Beginning in 1681, twenty-five permits were issued annually.93

However, as Montréal merchants continued to resist colonial regulation, far more than twenty- five permits circulated in the upper country and channels of illegal trade expanded.94

Unfortunately by 1696, both the market and the depleted beaver population had yet to recover.95

Out of desperation the Minister gave orders to suspend the beaver trade and to abandon all the

French posts to the west. However, the posts to the west were ultimately not abandoned, given their military significance as a line of defense against the English and the role that these forts played in the maintenance of French-Indigenous alliances. By 1715, the market for these furs and the supply had recovered.96 Then came a period of revitalization, which affected the careers of both Ignace Gamelin Jr. and Luc de La Corne St. Luc who became involved in the French fur trade, and who will be considered in detail in Chapter Two.

Figure: 3. Distribution of French trading posts and the year of their establishment. Source: Saint-Yves, Atlas de géographie historique, page 50.

37 The growing position of Montréal as a commercial hub throughout the second half of the seventeenth-century was also facilitated by its location in the expanding web of the French colonial empire (see Figure 3). Almost immediately after French settlement at Montréal, the city’s proximity to the administrative centre of Québec encouraged its growth.97 Québec had been established in 1608, and at the time of Montréal’s settlement in 1642 Québec was the centre of colonial administration and regulation.98 The administrative responsibilities of Québec included the regulation of imports from France and exports from the continent. Québec’s role as a connection point to France made its proximity to Montréal to the west commercially advantageous for the city of Montréal’s inhabitants. As ships could not reach the isolated settlement of Montréal during the seventeenth-century, Québec was the destined port for all

Atlantic goods.99 Therefore, as Montréal became the primary hub of the fur trade, the North

American furs that had become popular in France were collected in Montréal and then shipped to the ports at Québec to be transported across the Atlantic. In exchange, many of the bulk French goods, such as clothes, blankets, tools, guns, gunpowder, and brandy, that flowed into Québec were forwarded to Montréal for diplomatic and commercial distribution.100 The connections that developed between the French in Québec and in Montréal allowed for direct access to the

European goods that were becoming central in French-Indigenous relations, which the

Indigenous allies of the French were willing to accept as a sign of loyalty and in exchange for furs.101 The enhancement of commercial channels and administrative channels between the two centres facilitated Montréal’s growth and progress.

As the French colonial presence expanded to the west, Montréal also became a collection point for furs gathered at the satellite posts of Michilimackinac (1668), Niagara (1676), and

Detroit (1701) (see Figure 3).102 As the French colonial presence extended further to the west and

38 south, Indigenous communities, such as the Odawa and the remaining Wendat who had frequented the fur trading fairs along the commune in Montréal, began to relocate closer to

French outposts like Michilimackinac and Detroit. This contributed to an increase in French access to furs at these western posts and influenced Montréal’s growing importance as an administrative collection point during the final decades of the seventeenth-century.103 This role was reinforced by the logistical reality of travel distances between posts and space for supplies.

For example, on average a well-supplied expedition could travel the distance between Montréal and Michilimackinac, which could take around five-months to complete a round-trip.104

Although Montréal’s geography and population remained out of the realm of complete and centralized administrative control, the growing role of the city as a point of connection between numerous smaller French forts and the Atlantic shaped the need for more regulated and coordinated organization. This increasingly administrative role was also reflected in the growing presence of colonial officials and administrative apparatuses, as there was an increasing need for the regulation of trade and public order that the French inhabitants of Montréal had resisted during this middle of the seventeenth-century.105

After 1701, the French colonial presence began to extend to the south and Montréal became connected to the French settlements along the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers. Furs

(and slaves) from Illinois Country flowed into Montréal through the Chicago Portage at Detroit and from the Lake of the Illinois into Lake Huron.106 Through these relationships with the major settlements of the Illinois Country, including Kaskaskia, Cahokia, and Ste. Genevieve,

Montréal’s links then extended to Louisiana. Goods and traders could easily flow from the south along the Mississippi or the Missouri into the Great Lakes region.107 The networks established by

Montréal inhabitants became more extensive and came to serve numerous purposes. As French

39 trading posts grew, interactions between the French inhabitants of Montréal, the French in other parts of the continent, and other Indigenous groups in North America also increased. For example, the French colonial presence in Illinois Country expanded because the French missionaries and traders pursued a strategy that was similar to the one utilized in the Great Lakes region, which facilitated and encouraged cooperation and collaboration between the French and the surrounding Indigenous communities.108 Kathleen DuVal highlights the necessity of the

French alliance with the Quapaw during their exploration of the Mississippi Valley.109

As the extensive commercial, social, and familial networks of Montréal’s inhabitants extended further into the continent, the economic and demographic composition of the city changed. As Robert Englebert and Louise Dechêne have illustrated, the development of familial networks in Montréal and along this expanding riverine system was foundational for the economic and cultural success of the French, especially in terms of diplomacy and the fur trade.110 During the first decades of the eighteenth-century, the city’s population grew, its economic wealth increased, and more French, Indigenous, and European traders travelled through and settled in the city. The commercial, social, and familial networks that had once connected Montréal to Québec, now connected Detroit and Michilimackinac to Montréal. This shift towards the interior of the continent modified the importance of Montréal, as the city now worked to collect furs and distribute French goods across the extensive diplomatic and commercial channels that criss-crossed the interior and the Atlantic coast, effectively surpassing

Québec as the administrative heart of the colonial economy. As the city emerged and grew into a diplomatic and commercial hub along the St. Lawrence River, its built environment also developed to reflect Montréal’s position as a crossroads. Like the ways in which the geography and the proximity of diverse Indigenous communities influenced the city’s role in the French

40 colonial empire, the built environment of Montréal grew to reflect the mobility that characterized

Montréal’s position as an important point of connection and shaped the spaces in which the city’s diverse inhabitants interacted.

The Built Environment

The geography of the Island of Montréal influenced the growth and character of the city, but the spatial organization of the French settlement of Ville-Marie also reflected the city’s advantageous location along the St. Lawrence waterway. An examination of the evolution of the spatial dimensions of the city allows for the visualization of the spaces where the dwellings of

Charles, Ignace, La Corne, and Marie-Marguerite appear. Additionally, the built environment allows for the imagined reconstruction of the spaces in which the lives of the diverse individual inhabitants of these households overlapped and intersected.

The development of this colonial space occurred under the dual influences of religion and commerce. The city’s initial inhabitants and administrative organization can also be separated into these two categories – religious and commercial – since these were the individuals who exerted the most influence over the success of this budding city. Paul de Chomedey de

Maisonneuve, Jean Mance, and the other initial French settlers were motivated by religion to settle in Montréal in 1642. But, as historian Claiborne A. Skinner noted, French fur traders quickly turned what had begun as essentially a religious community into a commercial settlement.111 A few years after the fort’s foundation, the commercial character of the city emerged with the foundation of the merchant organization, the Communauté des Habitants

(Community of Inhabitants), which was a group of colonial merchants who had obtained the

41 monopoly of the fur trade, which included all trade with Indigenous peoples and control over exports to the metropolis, from the Cent-Associés (One Hundred Associates) on May 6, 1645.112

The city was located on the eastern side of the Island of Montréal, close to one of the most considerable branches of the St. Lawrence River.113 As Champlain had noted in 1612, the island was ideal for trade, and easily defensible with the St. Lawrence to the south and Mount

Royal to the north.114 As discussed earlier, Montréal was established as a small, fortified riverside settlement in 1642. However, it wasn’t until after the 1650s that the built environment of the city began to change as French colonists began to establish permanent residences there. In

1650, there were seven property owners responsible for nine plots of land within the walls of the fort.115 The largest plots belonged to religious organizations, which included the Hôtel-Dieu founded by Jeanne Mance in 1644 and the Congregation of Notre-Dame de Montréal founded by

Marguerite Bourgeoys in 1653. Other large plots of land belonged to wealthy members of the

Communauté des Habitants (Community of Inhabitants), whose financial success had also allowed for these merchants to take responsibility of many administrative aspects of the small island settlement.116 Although the city remained ‘unregulated’ throughout the second half of the seventeenth-century, the dual influences of the religious and commercial authorities in the city shaped the initial spatial organization of Montréal and religion and commerce retained their centrality well into the eighteenth-century.

The shared control of the city of Montréal between the religious and commercial authorities continued until the Communauté fell into financial disarray at the beginning of the

1650s. As a result, and to establish commercial equality, the Conseil de Québec declared in 1652 that trade was open to all colonists. In principle, this allowed all French settlers to participate in the fur trade. However, this declaration still promoted a predominantly transient male population

42 of French and Indigenous peoples. It was King Louis XIV’s decision on February 24, 1663 to take over direct control of his colonial settlements in New France that brought an influx of 1,200 soldiers, settlers, and money into the St. Lawrence Valley.117 The colony now became more administratively centralized, organized, and established. The region was divided into three districts, which included Québec, Trois-Rivières, and Montréal, and each district was given their own civil and criminal jurisdiction overseen by administrators appointed by the Crown.118 In

1663, the Sovereign Council of New France also came into being, to serve as the representative of the King’s authority in the colony. Finally, in 1664 the Custom of Paris, which was the law applied in Paris and its surrounding regions, was formally applied as the main source of legal instructions for civil matters in France’s overseas empire.119 However, in Montréal, the Society of St. Sulpice, a Catholic religious organization based in Paris that had trained priests for the colony of New France, continued to control the judicial system in the city.120

Following Louis XIV’s takeover in 1663, the built environment of Montréal changed dramatically and quickly. The plans of Montréal from 1672, 1684, 1704, 1723, and 1731 illustrate the city’s growth and urbanization and highlight those aspects of the city’s spatial organization that remained constant over time. The first plan of 1672, drawn by François Dollier de Casson, a superior at the Sulpicians Seminary in Montréal, emphasized the two major thoroughfares; Rue Notre-Dame and Rue Saint-Paul, which ran parallel to each other, with the latter running alongside the St. Lawrence River to the south (see Figure 4).121 These streets were purposefully laid out to connect the church square in the centre of the city and the marketplace located at the west end of city, both fundamental institutions within the settlement. The other streets were laid out from west to east; Rue Saint-Pierre, du Calvaire, Saint-François, Saint-

Joseph, Saint-Lambert, Saint-Gabriel, and Saint-Charles.122 Rue Saint-Gabriel, Saint-Pierre, and

43 Saint-François were connected to Rue Saint-Paul, and the others were drawn extending north from Rue Notre-Dame.123 All of the streets in Montréal were named after Catholic Saints.124

These two squares were the only fixed features presented on the 1672 plan. By designing this colonial space around two central streets and two major centres, Dollier de Casson purposefully concentrated the diverse population of the city into the specific spaces that symbolized the religious and commercial character of the initial settlement.

Figure: 4. Plan of the streets laid out by Dollier de Casson in 1672. Source: Library and Archives Canada, C-28409.

45 The concentration of peoples, and by extension, spaces of interactions, was particularly evident along the growing thoroughfare of Rue Saint-Paul. Due to its proximity to the St.

Lawrence and the location of the Place du Marché at its west end, Rue Saint-Paul was ideal for conducting trade. It became known as the “merchant street,” and much of the fur trading that took place within the city happened at the Place du Marché.125 This street enhanced interactions between the diverse members of colonial society, including French merchants and their

Indigenous and European trading partners. As previous mentioned, the fur trading fair that took place along the commune in the 1670s, which ran parallel to the St. Lawrence River, was adjacent to Rue Saint-Paul and had access to the city’s wharf. Given the fair’s proximity to the

River and the concentration of the commercial activity which took place around it, Rue Saint-

Paul emerged as the preferred place of settlement for French traders and merchants.126 These merchants would set up storefronts along the street, such as Charles LeMoyne’s father’s bakery, to take advantage of the proximity of large concentrations of diverse peoples and commercial opportunities.127 For example, in 1674 some 800 visitors attended Montréal’s trade fair, which included Indigenous traders and French interpreters who traveled to the city to offer their linguistic services to the French shopkeepers along the busy street.128 Rue Saint-Paul exemplified the mobile, fluid, and connected nature of the city.

Prior to 1672, the population of Montréal remained relatively small growing only from

596 inhabitants in 1663 to 624 inhabitants in 1665.129 The number of property owners increased in Montréal between 1663 and 1665 from 54 to 64.130 Although the King hoped to shore up the fortifications at Montréal with more solid architectural structures, this proved to be difficult to achieve because of the limited access to stone.131 Most dwellings were constructed out of timber and mortar, and were durable and functional, rather than ornate.132 Timber was the most

46 abundant and inexpensive resource available to the French in the city which explains the prevalence of its use as a building material, but occasionally domestic dwellings included red clay bricks, made from the clay that lined the edge of the river.133 Roofs were usually constructed of boards or simple thatch and looked nothing like the dwellings in France.

By 1672, stone was becoming more readily available. This was particularly evident in the case of the parish church of Notre-Dame, whose construction had begun in 1672, which had also been designed by François Dollier de Casson.134 This large stone parish church resembled the cathedrals in Europe and unlike many of the personal dwellings that existed in the city the roof of the church was covered in plates of tin, which was a far more durable product than the wood shingles that were frequently used.135 Its design and construction emphasized the centrality of religion and the dominance of the church in this growing city. The ornate building stood out in the centre of the roughly laid out muddy streets of Montréal.

Although no large, ornate trading centre that could rival the Notre-Dame Cathedral was ever built, the city’s economy occupied the minds of the city’s administrators. To foster the continued development of the city as a commercial centre, the Council enforced regulations in

1669, 1672, and 1678 that minimized or prohibited the commercial activities of French traders with Indigenous peoples outside of the city’s boundaries.136 Additionally, to promote more permanent settlement, the Council determined in 1675 that fur trading and hunting permits would only be permitted to those owning property within the city of Montréal.137 This decision provided an effective incentive for French merchants and traders and property ownership in

Montréal increased from 54 owners in 1665 to 101 by the end of 1675.138 However, as

Indigenous peoples increasingly settled closer to the city, Indigenous traders began to join

French farmers, whose land was located outside of the city’s walls, as they brought their food

47 stuffs and furs into the city to sell on market-day.139 This change meant that many French inhabitants, regardless of temporary or permanent residency, became more inclined to trade directly with the resident or visiting Indigenous peoples rather than conducting commercial interactions according to the guidelines set by the colonial administration.140

In other instances, the stricter regulations contributed to the growth of illicit commercial activities. Marie-Marguerite’s father-in-law, Pierre You de la Découverte, is an example of someone who turned to illicit activities to skirt stricter regulations. Specifically, the proximity of the Island of Montréal to the English settlements at Albany along the Richelieu River and the port of Manhattan, and the remoteness of You de la Découverte’s property near Fort Senneville, helped him evade the Council’s trade regulations.141 As for those who chose to leave the city altogether, it was not uncommon for former French soldiers or indentured labourers to join the fur trade once their contracts had ended. In many cases, these individuals would relocate to live among the surrounding Indigenous communities and accompany their Indigenous acquaintances on trips to English settlements or occasionally to Montréal to sell their own furs.142 The continuation of these activities meant that, although Montréal’s position within the empire was growing and its importance was increasing, this settlement continued to resemble a transient trading post.

The 1684 plan of Montréal replicated the one of 1672 in many ways, and only a few new dwellings appeared along the four most prominent city’s streets of Rue Saint-Paul, Rue Notre-

Dame, Rue Saint-François, and Rue Saint-Joseph (see Figure 5).143 The large stone parish church of Notre-Dame retained its centrality within the city and its extensive property continued to dominate the urban centre. Despite the continued rough appearance of the city streets, they were becoming increasingly symmetrical, which appeared to be influenced by the Governor-General

48 of New France, Louis de Buade, Comte de Frontenac’s, continued criticism of the asymmetrical organization of Québec throughout the 1670s.144 By 1684, the major architectural changes appeared to have been occurring within the rural areas of Montréal rather than in the urban centre. The increasing numbers of rural inhabitants outside of the city walls was reflective of a shift in the mentality of the French settlers. Previously, during the particularly violent decades of the French conflict with the Haudenosaunee, the inhabitants of Montréal had preferred fur trading to farming as it allowed them to stay within the fort.145 However, by 1684, the French-

Haudenosaunee relationship was slowly moving towards peace and as a result, the French felt more comfortable establishing themselves outside of the walled city.

Figure: 5. Plan of Ville-Marie drafted in 1684. Source: Library and Archive Canada, H3/340.

50 During the 1680s, rural houses increased in number and were better built. The foundations of the once squat windowless homes gradually rose above ground-level to accommodate the large quantities of snow in the winter.146 Although rarely made of glass, windows began to appear as a part of these dwellings, usually covered by a thick paper-like material.147 As for the urban dwellings, their general construction appears to have remained like those of the 1670s. Although timber remained the most commonly used building material, urban homes were neatly built and many of the thatch roofs had been replaced with wooden shingles, and in some cases with plates of tin.148 In terms of housing concentration, in 1685, there were

125 property owners within the city; ten years later this number had increased to 258 property owners with 311 available plots within the confines of Montréal.149 The numbers of urban dwellings had increased more significantly following the relinquishing of control over the administration of the city of Montréal by the Sulpician Fathers in 1693.

Despite the growth experienced by the city during the last decade of the seventeenth- century, the central influences of religion and commerce, which had motivated the city’s initial settlement remained intact. The city’s role as a diplomatic and commercial centre was however becoming increasingly evident during the final decades of the seventeenth-century. The character of this urban space as a crossroads, despite its physical changes, is emphasized by the nearly twenty days, July 21 to August 7, 1701, of negotiations, rituals, and activities which culminated in the Great Peace of Montréal. The Great Peace signified the end of nearly a century of conflict and signified the revival of the fur trade fairs that had taken place in the city throughout the

1670s.150 However, rather than the 800 visitors who came to the city in 1674, this fair included nearly 1,300 Indigenous peoples, some of whom settled in the city in the sheds that had been built along the commune by the Communauté des Habitants in 1663 and others who settled

51 outside of the city.151 The expanding physical dimensions of the city could better accommodate this large influx of peoples. The gates surrounding the city were opened and visiting Indigenous peoples entered the town freely throughout the day to trade and interact along the commune.152

Despite signs of urban transformation, Montréal remained a small palisaded town at the beginning of the eighteenth-century (see Figure 6).153 Once the peace treaty of 1701 had concluded, the city walls appeared to be more symbolic than protective, especially since

Montréal’s inhabitants seemed more interested in embracing commercial opportunities with the

Haudenosaunee and others. By 1704, prominent wooden fortifications had been refurbished, and appear on the plan in a much more organized manner. Gates were now monitored by army officers under the jurisdiction of the King.154 However, despite the change in appearance, the city’s fortifications in 1704 remained more symbolic as Montréal retained its character as a commercial centre, largely governed by the commercial interests of the city’s inhabitants rather than by colonial authority. New streets had been added, including the Rue Saint-Jean-Baptiste and Rue Saint-Vincent, which were located on the west and east side respectively of Rue Saint-

Gabriel. Fundamentally, however, the city’s design continued to emphasize the characteristics and central institutions evident in the 1684 plan.

Figure: 6. Plan of Montréal drafted in 1704. Source: Library and Archive Canada, C-21752.

53 Architecturally, more buildings and homes were now built in stone, but many dwellings continued to resemble those that had been built in 1672, or resembled variations of earlier timber dwellings, which included the addition of stucco on their half-timbered wood surfaces.155 Homes built near the end of the seventeenth and during the beginning of the eighteenth-centuries also tended to include a door facing the street with a small ledge that protected entrances from the build-up of snow and could be used for amusement during the warmer months of the year.156

Although the urban environment remained similar to that which had appeared in 1672, architectural examples that highlighted the city’s adoption of an increasingly administrative character began to appear. An interesting example that highlights this transition is the Château de

Ramezay, which was built in 1705 as the residence of the Governor of Montréal (see Figure 7). It was a large rectangular stone building built with thick walls and divided horizontally between the front and back rooms that had two large chimneys. This building included aspects of both the urban houses that lined Rue Saint-Paul, the squat durable rural dwellings that dotted the landscape outside of the city’s centre, and architectural components that were consistent with continental French tastes.

Figure: 7. Château de Ramezay. Source: Library and Archive Canada, PA-036720.

By the 1720s and 1730s, numerous French engineers, commissioned by the King, created plans that showed an established metropolitan centre. By this time, the city had reached the physical size that it would maintain until the beginning of the nineteenth-century and the streets had become well delineated because of the continuous and increasing alignment of buildings.157

A plan of the city drafted in 1723 (see Figure 8) introduced a division between the upper and lower town. The upper town included a concentration of religious buildings and the increasing number of civil administrative buildings, including the Château de Vaudreuil, which was built between 1723 and 1726 and became the official residence of the Governor-General.158 As noted by Peter Kalm in 1749, “the governor-general commonly resides at Québec; but frequently goes to Montréal, and generally spends the winter [at his residence] there.”159 The lower town was the commercial sector of the city, centred around the Place du Marché. Although on earlier plans the

55 area surrounding Rue Saint-Paul appears to have boundaries almost identical to that of the ‘lower town,’ this section of the city appeared more urban in character by 1723.160 As Father Pierre-

François-Xavier de Charlevoix noted when he had visited the city in 1721, similar to the 1670s, this remained “the quarter in which the merchants for the most part have their houses” and businesses.161 This separation appears to inscribe a symbolic separation of the two influences that had characterized Montréal since its foundation – religion and commerce. Another visual difference which appears on the plans during this period are the regulated and ordered properties that appear to line the city streets.162

As the dwellings along the city streets were built in an increasingly close and regulated manner, the colonial administration also worked to implement strategies to ensure the safety of the city’s inhabitants, particularly against the threat of fire, to which Montréal’s timber houses, which were tightly pressed against each other, were especially vulnerable. City ordinances in the

1720s and 1730s worked to protect houses from the fires that had destroyed numerous properties in the city, especially a fire that had taken place in 1721.163 The specific ordinance of 1721 ordered that all dwellings must be rebuilt using stone. The Intendant forbid the construction of any building with timber if stone was available and added that all homes should be two storeys, to protect their foundational beams and the floors in their cellars from rotting.164 This did inspire some architectural alterations, as was noted by Edward Allen Talbot, who travelled into

Montréal during the middle of the eighteenth-century. He observed that some dwellings were built of a durable kind of limestone and that many dwellings had reinforced foundations that were above ground.165 Despite this change, many dwellings continued to be constructed of timber, even as late as 1749.166

Figure: 8. Plan of Montréal drafted in 1723. Source: Library and Archives Canada, C-28399.

Both the plan of 1723 and the plan of 1731 (see Figure 9) show the addition of stone fortifications around the city, with walls eighteen feet high, three feet wide at the top, expanding to four feet wide at the base.167 Four main gates provided access into the city: Porte Saint-

Laurent, Porte des Récollets at the end of Rue Notre-Dame, Porte Saint-Martin at the end of Rue

Saint-Paul, and Porte du Port on the side of the St. Lawrence River which provided direct access to the Place du Marché.168 These substantial fortifications appeared to reinforce the increasingly administrative character of Montréal as the colonial authorities were able to exert more effective control over the city. Although the plans drafted in 1723 and in 1731 share many similarities, one of the most striking contrasts that appears between them is the overwhelming increase in the concentration of housing that appears by 1731. Like the first dwellings that appeared on the 1684 city plan, housing continued to remain concentrated along Rue Saint-Paul and increasingly along

Rue Notre-Dame. The city’s main thoroughfares retained their centrality as spaces of interaction along which the lives of the city’s inhabitants overlapped.

Figure: 9. Plan of Montréal drafted in 1731. Source: Library and Archives Canada, C-15810.

By 1750, Montréal no longer resembled the small fortified river side settlement of the

1650s. Despite the changes that the city had undergone, the fundamental ideas that had driven the city’s layout in 1672 remained intact, even as Montréal gradually lost its character as a transient trading post and took on more urban and permanent characteristics during the first decades of the eighteenth-century.169 The city had been constructed as a place that facilitated and encouraged interactions between the diverse members of its society. Over time, the physical dimensions, concentration of settlement, surrounding neighbours, and fortifications adapted to the changing realities within the St. Lawrence Valley and the French colonial empire. However,

Montréal never lost its position as a crossroads and this colonial space continued to diversify as the city’s role and place within the complex web of the French empire evolved. The diverse peoples who came to inhabit this complex, colonial community also shaped Montréal’s development. The next chapter will explore the city’s inhabitants, changing demographic trends, occupations, and the introduction of slaves into the city. It will reconstruct the lives of some of the people who took advantage of the city’s geography, interacted with Indigenous peoples, walked the city’s streets, and created networks that traversed the city and the French colonial empire. The commercial, social, and familial networks of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil,

Ignace Gamelin Jr., Luc de La Corne St. Luc, and Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais and their households, contributed to the growth of Montréal as a centre of French colonialism that worked to connect disparate and distant sites in the continent and the French empire.

60 Chapter Two:

An Interconnected Colonial Space

As the number of households and families began to increase in the late seventeenth-century,

Montréal gained status as an important city within the French colonial empire. As the population grew, so too did the demand for labourers. French men and women could not keep pace with demands for work, so settlers turned to enslaved labourers of Indigenous and African descent.

Many of these slaves resided in or near the homes of their French masters and mistresses. Thus, households became a microcosm of the broader economic, diplomatic, social, and demographic changes occurring in French colonial society throughout North America and in continental

France. In this chapter, I examine the households of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, Ignace

Gamelin Jr., Luc de La Corne St. Luc, and Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais to illustrate the geographic, gender, and ethnic diversity of household development at the colonial crossroads of Montréal between 1650 and 1750.

Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil was born on December 10, 1656 and was the eldest of thirteen children born to Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil et de Châteauguay.1 Charles went on to become the first Canadian born Baron in New France, and he served as the Governor of Trois-

Rivières in 1720, becoming the Governor of Montréal in 1724, and finally serving as the acting administrator of New France in 1725.2 Ignace Gamelin Jr. was born on December 10, 1698, the second of eleven children born to prominent Montréal merchant Ignace Gamelin and Marguerite

Lemoyne.3 Ignace began his career as a fur trader, and maintained his position as a prominent merchant throughout his life, while also becoming involved in an extensive array of other commercial activities. Luc de La Corne St. Luc was born in the autumn of 1712 in Québec, into

61 the large and successful family of Jean-Louis de La Corne de Chaptes.4 Similar to Ignace, La

Corne participated in numerous occupations throughout his lifetime, but his most prominent profession was his role as a military leader.5 By the end of his life, La Corne was considered to be one of the wealthiest Frenchmen in the colony. Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais was born on October 5, 1701 and was the eldest of six children born to Christophe Dufrost de La

Gemerais.6 Her father had been a member of an old noble family in France and her mother was the daughter of the Governor of Trois-Rivières. Later in her life, Marie-Marguerite became extremely devoted to Catholicism, and in August of 1747 she officially took control of the

Hôpital-Général du Montréal and founded the Sisters of Charity, known as the Grey Nuns.7

The four individual households and their diverse inhabitants analyzed throughout this chapter present a window into an array of economic, social, gender, and ethnic experiences within Montréal society. The reconstruction of the household of a Governor, a merchant, a solider, and a nun, although not universally representative of every experience or avenue of commercial, social, or familial interaction, presents an opportunity to examine the ways that factors such as status, wealth, gender, ethnicity, or occupation influenced and shaped the composition of individual households and the development of broader connections in Montréal.

These households were microcosms of broader migration and marital patterns, changing occupations, ethnic diversity, slave ownership, while also reflecting distinct expressions of family formation among the French, Indigenous, and African descent inhabitants of Montréal.

The Beginnings of Settlement

Following the King’s official decision to take direct control of his overseas colonies in 1663, the numbers of French immigrants began to increase. The bulk of these individuals embarked from

62 the Atlantic ports of La Rochelle, Normandy, Rouen, and the Perche, but originated from disparate villages and towns scattered throughout continental France.8 The families considered in this chapter highlight the diversity of the French individuals who chose to cross the Atlantic.

Charles’s father, Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil et de Châteauguay, was among the first French individuals to cross the Atlantic in 1641 and he chose to settle permanently within the region of

Fort Ville-Marie a few years after his arrival. When he departed from Normandy, the thriving port was the major place of departure for overseas travelers. By 1663, however, after commercial ties between Normandy and New France had weakened, the port at La Rochelle emerged as the major port for immigration and overseas French commercial activity.9 The other families considered within this chapter illustrate the range of locations from which the French who came to settle within the North American continent had immigrated. The Gamelin family migrated across the Atlantic from Orléans, located in central France, when Ignace’s grandfather, Michel

Gamelin, decided to search for commercial opportunities in New France.10 The La Corne family originated in the commune of Beauregard-Vendon, also located in central France, and La

Corne’s father, Jean-Louis de La Corne de Chaptes, arrived in New France in 1685.11 Finally,

Marie-Marguerite’s father, Christophe Dufrost de La Gemerais, was born in 1661 in Médréac, a commune located in northwestern France.12

A variety of motivations propelled settlers across the ocean. Religious beliefs, and, specifically, a desire to convert the heathen ‘sauvages’ in New France drove some to pick up stakes.13 Some sought new opportunities for employment and the potential for economic success in the North American continent, while others travelled across the Atlantic in the footsteps of their kin who had previously established themselves in the city. According to the 1665 census, however, the largest portion of Montréal’s settler population was in contractual bondage. That is,

63 the majority migrated from France as servants.14 Servants accounted for 74 of the 137 individually recorded occupations in 1665.15 In a manner that was consistent with this occupational trend, Charles’s father crossed the Atlantic to serve as an indentured servant for the

Jesuits who were working to establish mission communities among the Indigenous peoples that inhabited the area surrounding New France.16 Contracts of indentured servitude offered French men and women the necessary funding for their journey across the Atlantic. These contracts could be the result of recruitment by religious organizations that offered to pay for an individual’s voyage in exchange for labour upon their arrival in the colony. In other cases, trading companies and a few financially secure colonists personally recruited labourers by subsidizing their crossing. Once the contracts ended, some chose to return to France, while others established themselves in the growing colonial communities. Charles’s father’s occupational trajectory illustrates the latter decision. Charles’s father had initially been encouraged to cross the Atlantic by the presence of his uncle within the colony and after a few years in Québec, Charles’s father relocated to Montréal in 1646. He remained there because, by then, he had gained experience and established a reputation as a talented interpreter and translator while working for Jesuit missionaries who had established permanent missions throughout the St. Lawrence Valley.17

In Montréal, and in New France more broadly, interpreters were a valuable profession.

Within a territory dominated by Indigenous peoples, French individuals who were able to learn

Indigenous languages and build personal or commercial relationships within surrounding

Indigenous communities had numerous opportunities to achieve success.18 At the time that

Charles’s father arrived in Montréal, during a period of intensifying Haudenosaunee attacks on

Fort Ville-Marie, the importance of interpreters was particularly evident. During Charles’s

64 father’s time in Montréal, his knowledge of Indigenous languages helped the French to cultivate and maintain alliances with surrounding Indigenous communities against their common enemy, the Haudenosaunee. Because of his journeys, Charles’s father was also able to achieve economic success through the fur trade, in large part because of the relationships he was able to build with the Indigenous allies of the French, including the Wendat, during diplomatic negotiations.

Charles’s father presents an example of one of several occupational trajectories that allowed individuals to establish themselves in this new territory.

A large portion of those who chose to settle in Montréal in the 1660s, whether as indentured labourers or as fur traders, were unattached males attracted to commercial opportunities.19 Unlike those bound by familial responsibility, single men were able to relocate frequently. It was uncommon at that time for families to relocate together across the Atlantic, although sometimes single men returned to France to marry and then returned to America.20

According to Louise Dechêne, only twenty-four of the 111 families living in Montréal by 1666 had already been established in France and kinship groupings formed only fifteen percent of the arrivals in the city before this time.21 In the cases of separated families, many family members did eventually cross the ocean to join their other family members once the first immigrant had comfortably established himself in North America.

Prior to and following the King’s decision in 1663 to encourage more permanent settlements in New France, some French men created intimate and familial relationships with women from nearby Indigenous communities.22 The King’s decision to take direct control also influenced a resurgence of the fur trade in France’s overseas colonies, which led to increased interactions between French merchants, fur traders, and the Indigenous communities surrounding

Montréal. These relationships could serve numerous purposes. As scholars Sylvia Van Kirk and

65 Gilles Havard have shown, such unions could extend kinship ties with Indigenous allies like the

Wendat, Algonquian, Montagnais, and Ojibwa, and connect communities in commercial enterprises.23 In her work, Sylvia Van Kirk specifically analyzes marriages “after the custom of the country,” that is relationships that followed Indigenous ideas of kinship and marriage rites.24

Generally, these relations occurred between French fur traders and voyageurs and the Indigenous women that the French would encounter during trade expeditions. As Van Kirk illustrates, as the

French involvement in the fur trade expanded into the Great Lakes region, the frequency with which intimate relationships developed among French men and Ojibwa women increased.25

During the mid-seventeenth-century, some members of French religious communities, specifically the Jesuits, and the imperial administration thought that this cultural mixing could be beneficial for French settlement and the eventual assimilation of the surrounding Indigenous peoples.26 Others, as scholar Guillaume Aubert has shown, were more circumspect. During the seventeenth-century, the elite sector of continental French society expressed concerns about the mixing and dilution of ‘pure’ French blood.27

To placate the concerns of the French elite, the King sponsored a program between 1663 and 1673 called the “filles du Roi” (the King’s Daughters), meant to bring marriageable young

French women across the Atlantic to settle in New France. In 1663, there were 365 men and 212 women living in Montréal.28 Although French women had arrived in New France earlier than

1663, the 800 or so women who were sponsored by King Louis XIV as filles de la Roi and who arrived in Montréal during this ten-year period, were meant to provide wives for the itinerant male workers and soldiers.29 Although a few of the new arrivals became nuns, the increased presence of women did bring a spike in marriages in Montréal. The total number of married couples in Montréal increased from 210 in 1665, to 233 in 1667, and reached 410 married

66 couples by the end of 1681.30 Itinerancy in previous years had not necessarily deterred French colonial merchants from starting families, but this incentive persuaded some men to establish families and permanent households in Montréal.

It is during this period of increased family formation that the other families considered throughout this project began to appear in Montréal. As previously mentioned, Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil’s father appears in the record as one of the earliest French settlers in Montréal.

Charles’s father had married the Norman, Marie Catherine Primeau Thierry, on May 28, 1654 in

Montréal.31 The Gamelin family established themselves in New France later than the

LeMoyne’s, as Ignace’s grandfather married his wife, Marguerite Crevier, on October 10, 1661 in Québec.32 But other families came later in the century. The La Corne and the Dufrost de

Lajemmerais families appeared in New France closer to the end of the seventeenth-century and during the first decade of the eighteenth-century. Luc de La Corne’s father married Marie Anne

Pecaudy de Contrecour on June 11, 1695, and Marie-Marguerite’s father was betrothed to Marie-

Renee Gaultier de Varennes on January 18, 1701 (see Appendix 1).33

The increasing presence of wealthier and well-connected families brought more economic and social stability to the fortressed city. By the turn of the eighteenth-century, the change in the administrative character, and the growing presence of permanent households in the city contributed to another societal change within Montréal – a change in the occupations of the city’s inhabitants. During the mid to late seventeenth-century, trade had been the most common means of social promotion available to members of society.34 However, by the end of the seventeenth-century, the number of local merchants within Montréal began to decrease. Those who retained their commercial activities in the city were the now-professionalized class of merchants. These were men who imported European goods directly from France, and who now

67 worked as trade agents and expedition outfitters, rather than participating directly in long- distance trade expeditions. Ignace Gamelin Jr.’s occupational trajectory highlights this shift. He began his career as a fur trader, then began to finance trading expeditions to the pays d’en haut, and eventually established a wholesale and retail business in Montréal with business partners in the French West Indies and France.35 Louise Dechêne found that by 1700, only one-quarter of the adult male population in the city was taking part in inland trading expeditions.36

This occupational shift also led to the emergence of a new type of fur trader. From the late seventeenth-century onward, voyageurs, a term which had evolved to mean engagé or indentured servant by the eighteenth-century, emerged as the trusted fur traders hired by merchants to make trips inland to trade with the Indigenous nations that either lived near or traveled to French trading posts.37 These voyageurs were similar to the coureurs de bois (runners of the woods), who had participated in the less regulated trading activities that had characterized

Montréal’s initial fur trade. Despite the decrease in merchants themselves traveling to the interior, expeditions by voyageurs continued; Dechêne identified a total of 1,120 recorded departures from Montréal to the upper country during the 1710s, the majority of which took place between 1713 and 1717.38 Thus, Montréal was becoming a city with a small but strong permanently established core, but also maintained a large itinerant population of men who still traveled regularly to the interior. By the turn of the eighteenth-century, Montréal’s transition from a transient trading post was well underway.

By the end of the seventeenth-century, the city’s transition was evident in terms of population growth, increased property ownership, and a growing number of marital relationships.

By the end of the 1690s, the population of Montréal had increased substantially, growing seventy-one percent between 1698 and 1706.39 During the 1690s, the number of marriages also

68 increased by sixty-four percent between 1692 and 1698.40 Although the increased presence of women in the city did not automatically mean that every woman in the city was married and started a family, as some women joined religious organizations, the number of children or unmarried members of society also increased by forty-one percent between the same period of

1692 to 1698, which could indicate an increase in the presence of families.41 Between 1700 and

1725, a dramatic forty-two percent increase in property holding also occurred. During this same period, the number of married property owners increased by seventy-one percent, evidence of the increasingly permanent character of Montréal.42 By this time, property lines in Montréal were being regulated to maximize the number of buildings that could be constructed, also contributing to the urbanization of the city.43

As the population and the presence of households grew, the demand for inexpensive labour also increased. Although the itinerant population that had occupied the city throughout the second half of the seventeenth-century had needed agricultural and other forms of labour, these needs increased as the city’s population became more settled. Other more speciality labourers, such as contractors and artisans, were also needed to expand the built environment within the city, to accommodate the changing tastes of a diversifying commercial and social landscape, and to adapt to the increasingly administrative character of the city. The increasing expense of bringing coveted French labourers from across the ocean led French settlers to follow the example set by the systems of forced-labour operating in the French settlements in the West

Indies. During the last decades of the seventeenth-century a small number of Indigenous and

African descent slaves started arriving to the city from disparate locations throughout North

America and the Caribbean Islands.44

69 The Emergence of Slavery of Montréal

A study of Montréal’s societal development and the city’s population would not be complete without the inclusion of the slaves of both Indigenous and African descent who came to inhabit the city. These individuals added another layer of complexity to the social, gender, and ethnic diversity that characterized this mobile and interconnected city, and their labour was crucial to the growth and success of Montréal. Although the presence of slaves is well recorded throughout the French colonial empire, the system of enslavement that developed in Montréal was different.45 As examined by Brett Rushforth, the slavery that developed in New France was driven by the dual demands of alliance politics and economic profits, and the system developed under the dual influences of European conceptions of enslavement and the existing systems of

Indigenous war captive-exchange.46 These differences influenced the position of slaves within the city, the roles they played, and how they interacted with both the free and enslaved members of society.

Slavery in Montréal was not unusual, and it echoed practices occurring across French

North America and the French Caribbean. Theoretically, slavery in France’s overseas colonies contradicted the imperial “free soil policy,” which stated that it was illegal to own slaves within continental France.47 Although this policy predated the French involvement in the Atlantic slave trade, it provided what Samuel L. Chatman has characterized as “a romanticized view of racial egalitarianism in French society.”48 In reality, French colonies were governed by their own laws, as their distance from the imperial centre made the strict centralized and unified governance of these settlements unrealistic. In fact, the Code Noir, which was applied to regulate slave ownership in the French West Indies in 1685 and in Louisiana in 1724, recognized that slavery within France’s colonies was necessary and authorized.49 The free soil policy for continental

70 France did not deter the development of the lucrative practice of slavery within North America and the Caribbean. These contradictions and a lack of any singular regulation against slavery meant that a diversity of slave practices emerged in the French colonial empire. Historian Brett

Rushforth has argued that the captive taking and diplomatic motivations that defined the system of Indigenous slavery that emerged in Montréal contrasted with the institutionalized chattel slavery that developed in the French West Indies.50 In Montréal, the forms of slavery that emerged were inextricably linked to practices of inter-Indigenous and French-Indigenous diplomacy, warfare, and captive taking, all practices which lacked regulation and systematic control.

The first Indigenous slaves to appear in Montréal during the 1670s were most likely acquired through the diplomatic and commercial channels of exchange that connected the French to surrounding Indigenous communities, as examined in chapter one. Historian Marcel Trudel suggests that the first Indigenous captives were introduced to the French by the Indigenous peoples themselves.51 The first ‘official’ slaves from the pays d’en haut (recorded in documents) were given as a diplomatic gesture from the Haudenosaunee to the French in 1671, to encourage peaceful relations.52 War captives also came into French hands as the French established economic, social, intimate, and familial relationships with other Indigenous neighbours.53

Captive-exchange was a central feature of Indigenous warfare and involved the taking of prisoners, particularly women and children, during raids of other Indigenous villages. However, due to the variety of settlement and hunting patterns among the Indigenous communities in the

St. Lawrence Valley and the pays d’en haut, the centrality of captive taking was not universal.

Captive taking was more central for Haudenosaunee nations than for Algonquian communities.

Algonquian communities were highly mobile, and captives could be a hinderance or liability to

71 the flexible nature of the family bands within these communities.54 These captives could serve numerous purposes once in the hands of their enemies. As James F. Brooks, Brett Rushforth,

Gilles Havard, and Carl J. Ekberg have shown, many male captives were either tortured or killed ritualistically, while others were adopted into the victor’s society to replace deceased members and augment the victor’s decreasing population.55 Additionally, captives served as incentives for future diplomatic negotiations, and would be exchanged with other captives once hostilities had ceased.

In a manner consistent with the culture of the fur trade, captive-exchanges required the creation of suitable connections. As no official slave market ever appeared in Montréal, the expansion of the fur trade into the pays d’en haut contributed to the addition of captives to the channels of exchange that connected French merchants in Montréal to their Indigenous trading partners. The fur trade and the increasing numbers of Indigenous slaves beginning to appear in

Montréal were inextricably connected. By the 1660s, French settlers and their Indigenous allies were already constructing elaborate commercial and cultural networks that pulled the French farther into the interior of the North American continent. As these alliances continued to expand and began to include Indigenous nations located further to the west, such as the Odawa near

Michilimackinac, French merchants and fur traders began to extend their contacts and began accepting enslaved Indigenous peoples as symbolic gifts to solidify newly formed French-

Indigenous alliances.56 The expansion of these relationships during the 1670s brought Indigenous captives from these “new” areas into the city of Montréal.57

The commercial activities, personal relationships, and slave ownership of Marie-

Marguerite’s father-in-law, Pierre You de la Découverte, illustrate the relationship between the fur trade and the increasing numbers of Indigenous slaves that were beginning to appear in the

72 city of Montréal by the 1680s. Pierre You, a prominent French fur trader, had developed commercial associations with the Indigenous nations of the Upper Mississippi Valley during the early 1680s. He traded extensively with the Illinois nation, who were described by French explorer and missionary Jacques Marquette in 1670, “as warriors who take a great many slaves.”58 During You’s frequent travels from Montréal to the Mississippi Valley during the last two decades of the seventeenth-century he developed an intimate relationship with a Miami woman and married her in 1693.59 As a result of his relationships, Pierre You acquired an

Indigenous slave named Pascal during an expedition in the pays d’en haut and brought him to

Montréal in 1703.60

Although many of the Indigenous slaves that were appearing in Montréal during the late seventeenth-century had been acquired through trade, many others came into the hands of the

French as gifts. The classification of Indigenous slaves as gifts created a technicality that allowed slave owners to justify the presence of these initial slaves, despite a lack of regulation and their theoretical illegality. The frequency with which enslaved Indigenous peoples arrived within the city increased after 1687, especially after inter-Indigenous and French-Indigenous violence escalated with French expansion farther into the pays d’en haut. Increased conflict created more opportunities for raiding enemy villages for war captives, which was a central method of obtaining the captives that would become slaves.61 Therefore, during periods of increased conflict, the channels carrying slaves from the west into the city swelled to accommodate the influx of war captives.

As discussed earlier, increasing urbanization, a need for farm labourers, and the growing presence of households during the early eighteenth-century led to a growing demand for

Indigenous slaves. But the legalization of slavery in 1709 also explains the sudden increase.

73 Before 1709, the numbers were minimal; Trudel identified the presence of 86 enslaved individuals in New France.62 Following Intendant Jacques Raudot’s ordinance on April 13, 1709, which reclassified slaves of both Indigenous (Panis) and African descent as movable property in

French Canada, their presence in the city began to increase.63 According to Brett Rushforth’s calculations, after 1709, about thirteen or fourteen percent of Montréal’s households owned at least one Indigenous slave.64

As the settlement of Montréal expanded during the first decades of the eighteenth- century, the Indigenous systems of captive-exchange grew to accommodate the increasing

French demand for enslaved labour in the city and in other French colonies.65 Additionally, the increasingly stable presence of the French settlements to the west and to the south and the extensive commercial, social, and familial connections that developed between the French colonists in Montréal and other parts of the empire gave the French in Montréal access to the growing slave markets in the south of the continent. This included the markets in Louisiana, which were directly connected to the booming slave system now operating in the French West

Indies. It also included increasing access to the systems of captive, turned commodity, exchange occurring between the French and their Indigenous neighbours in the Illinois Country. As the presence of slaves in Montréal (and elsewhere) grew, the colonial administration and local authorities worked to regulate ownership and protect the human property of the French inhabitants in the city. The 1709 legalization of slavery resulted from the perceived need for standardization and regulation of ownership of both Indigenous and African descent slaves.

Due to the necessity of “knowing the right people” in the fur trade, it is not surprising that a large portion of the slaves in the city belonged to members of the merchant class. These were

French individuals who tended to have the most extensive familial connections throughout the

74 French colonial empire and were most heavily involved in the commercial networks that frequently carried human commodities across the North American continent. Those merchants who traded in the pays d’en haut around the Great Lakes region had access to slaves at better prices.66 The occupations of other slave owners seem to correlate with an individual’s exposure to the trade channels criss-crossing the pays d’en haut, the southern North American continent, and the Atlantic. Public officials occupied a distant second to merchants in terms of slave ownership, and military officers with their exposure to the fur trade and their interactions with

Indigenous peoples while stationed at French trading posts or during military campaigns were third.67

Despite legalization and the regulation of French access to the existing systems of

Indigenous captive-exchange, availability was the factor that ultimately continued to influence who was enslaved and when. Regardless of expanding French commercial, social, and familial networks and the increasing attempts by the colonial administration to regulate slave ownership within the city, French access to Indigenous slaves always remained linked to the ever-changing patterns of inter-Indigenous conflict in the Great Lakes region and throughout North America.

This volatility impacted the ethnic composition of the slaves arriving in Montréal. Although the

French had strong relationships with the Wendat, Algonquians, and the Montagnais dating back to the initial French settlement in the St. Lawrence Valley during the early seventeenth-century, the French only received a few captives from these groups. They did not value captives as symbolic or diplomatic gifts in the same manner that other Indigenous nations did.68 However, these Indigenous allies of the French did participate in some captive taking. For example, throughout the 1670s to the 1690s, Wendat war parties collaborated with the Anishinaabeg and the Illinois in staging raids against the Fox nation in the pays d’en haut.69 Other slaves were

75 supplied to the French by their Algonquian allies and from the Sioux.70 By the end of the seventeenth and into the early eighteenth-centuries, the Illinois emerged alongside the Odawa as the main providers of slaves to the French as they sought to capture enemies of the western nations as trade items for the French.71

By the beginning of the eighteenth-century, as the French began to demand more captives, their Indigenous allies adapted their diplomatic and wartime practices to provide more slaves. Relationships with the Fox, generally located in the territory west of Detroit, and the other enemies of the Wendat, Illinois, Odawa, Ojibwa, and Miami, worsened around 1710 (a year after slavery was declared legal), as the Fox and their ally, the Mascouten began to hunt in

Anishinaabeg territory, which was located northwest of Montréal. To retaliate, the Anishinaabeg recruited the Wendat nation to join their attacks against the Fox. As these inter-Indigenous relationships continued to worsen, the French living in the Detroit region and other Frenchmen who travelled to the west joined their Indigenous allies participating in raids against the Fox nation.72 It was during this period that Fox men, women, and children became the primary source of enslaved labour in the St. Lawrence Valley, a pattern which continued well into the 1720s.73

According to Rushforth, between 1713 and 1716, about eighty Fox slaves appear in the parish and court records of New France.74

This recorded number of enslaved peoples of a single ethnicity like the Fox is significant, as the accurate identification of an enslaved individuals’ ancestry was often not recorded in parish records. So thorough was the enslavement of the Fox people, that by the end of the 1730s, only about 450 members of the Fox nation were still alive, and most of these were captives in the hands of the French or France’s Indigenous allies.75 Despite French attempts during the 1720s

76 and early 1730s to encourage an alliance between their Indigenous allies to the west and the Fox, inter-Indigenous relations between these nations continued to deteriorate.

This period of French conflict with the Fox also highlights the difficulties in regulating slavery in many areas of New France. Fox captives, for example, were often sold to or captured by French military officers stationed at the posts of Detroit or Michilimackinac, which were in proximity to Fox territory. These slaves could then be brought to Montréal to serve in the households of their captors or bought and sold somewhere within the St. Lawrence Valley. Even after the conflict between the French and the Fox reached its conclusion in the early 1730s,

French slave owners and prospective owners were hesitant to abide by the rules of captive return, which had been negotiated as a sign of goodwill during the peace process.76 Nor were French merchants and post commanders eager to see a peace treaty concluded, since they had vested interests in profiting from the sale of Fox men, women, and especially children.77 In fact, they continued to exchange and purchase Fox slaves even after the conflict had ended. French officers and merchants were not the only ones responsible for the continued acquisition of Fox slaves.

The Illinois, Odawa, Wendat, and Ojibwa continued to give or sell Fox captives to the French as slaves after the peace treaty.78 This strategy employed by these nations was meant to deter the creation of French alliances with Indigenous nations that were the enemies of the French’s existing Indigenous allies.79

The French employed another strategy to protect their enslaved property and their access to Indigenous slaves. Whether purposefully or out of negligence, slave owners misidentified or failed to identify the nation, place of origin, or ethnicity of their slaves in documents such as wills, bills of sale, etc. Some of this confusion arose as increasingly mobile Indigenous peoples throughout North America began to influence the development of new channels of exchange that

77 criss-crossed the continent. Of the 2,692 Indigenous slaves with culturally identifiable ethnic identities located in the archives by Marcel Trudel, who appeared between 1632 and 1834,

63.5% or 1,709 are identified as Panis, 126 Fox, 51 Patcocas, 46 Sioux, 24 Montagnais, 18

Cicachas, 13 Eskimo, 6 Cree, 5 Sauteux, 2 Têtes-de-Boules, 2 Ottawa, 1 Naskapi, and 1

Nipissing.80 The ethnicity of hundreds of other slaves remains unknown or was not recorded.

Because many slaves passed from village to village before reaching French hands, their places of origin were often obscured.81 Frenchmen also generally annotated Indigenous peoples as slaves, which, by the 1720s, had become synonymous with the legally inscribed ethnic identifier, Panis.

Whether the result of a lack of ability to differentiate between the different Indigenous nations or a Eurocentric generalization, many Indigenous peoples were misidentified. For example, as late as 1749, Swedish botanist Peter Kalm continued to project Eurocentric attitudes, suggesting that the Indigenous peoples who “have inhabited North America since time immemorial, seem to be all of one nation, and speak the same language.”82

However, it should be noted that due to the historical familiarity and close contact between French settlers in New France and their Indigenous allies in the surrounding territory and the pays d’en haut, it is unlikely that French individuals would have been unable to identify diverse Indigenous peoples. Therefore, it would appear more likely that specifics regarding ethnicity were ignored or purposefully misidentified. It was also possible that records of slave sales simply did not exist, since extralegal slave trades and sales occurred throughout New

France, the western Great Lakes region, and the Upper Mississippi Valley. As a result, Trudel suggests that sixteen percent of the slaves identified throughout his work, which included individuals of both Indigenous and African descent, have remained without identifiable origins or names. Other slaves died before being baptized and do not appear in any civil registry.

78 Rushforth found that despite the existence of nearly 2,000 individually identifiable Indigenous slaves within church and court records, fewer than thirty notarized sales survive.83 All of these factors contributed to the purposeful or neglectful misidentification of Indigenous slaves’ origins.

Ironically, prior to European contact, the Pawnee, considered by some scholars to have been the nation from which the largest number of Indigenous slaves originated, were some of the most central peoples in the captive-exchange networks that criss-crossed the North American continent.84 However, following the engagement of Europeans in the cross-continental system of captive-exchange, the term ‘Panis,’ which was considered by many Europeans as interchangeable with the Pawnee nation identifier, became a generalized ethnic categorization applied indiscriminately to large numbers of Indigenous peoples who were enslaved and transported from the southern continent, or elsewhere, into New France.85 Even Raudot’s 1709 ordinance classified Indigenous slaves as ‘Panis.’86

The objective of the implementation of the term Panis in the 1709 legislation was not to provide specific or accurate insight into the ethnic identification of slaves, but instead to allow for standardized regulation and legal clarity. In theory, the term came to include any Indigenous peoples that were not formally allied with the French, including the Fox, Sioux, or the Arkansas.

However, even those Indigenous peoples belonging to nations that were formally allied with the

French could find themselves reduced to slavery.87 The seemingly indiscriminate nature of this enslavement contributed to the desires of French slave owners to purposefully identify their

Indigenous slaves as Panis. The Fox Wars present an interesting example that highlights the inclination of French slave owners to misidentify their Indigenous slaves. During the Fox Wars

(1712-1738), 103 Indigenous slaves, identified as members of the Fox nation, appear to have been recorded throughout all of New France, and twenty-seven appear in Montréal specifically.88

79 During this same period, the yearly average of recorded Indigenous slaves, identified as Panis, entering the city of Montréal was eight point five slaves per year.89 As was common throughout many peace negotiations between Indigenous communities and between Indigenous peoples and the French, captive return was established as part of the peace agreement that ended the Fox

Wars.90 In theory, the French and their Indigenous allies were to return their Fox slaves to the

Fox nation as a sign of good will. However, many Indigenous and French peoples were not keen on giving up the slaves that had been integrated into their communities or households. Because of this hesitance, many of the Fox captives that continued to arrive in Montréal during the last years of this conflict were purposefully misidentified to protect the property of the French slave owners.91

Regarding the arrival of Fox and Panis slaves in the city during this time, a curious pattern emerges. Except for the arrival of one Fox slave in Montréal in 1753, the arrival of enslaved members of the Fox nation appears to have ceased in the city after 1733. Curiously, between 1733 and 1751, twenty-five Fox slaves arrived in Québec and eight arrived in Detroit.92

Due to the extensive commercial, social, and familial connections between Montréal and Detroit, and the role of Montréal as a stopover between Detroit and Québec, it seems unlikely that these slaves would have simply passed through the city without any interest of ownership from the

French colonists in Montréal. Additionally, during the final years of the conflict there was a significant spike in the recorded arrival of Panis. In 1730, fourteen Panis arrivals were recorded, in 1733 twenty were recorded, and in 1735 another fifteen arrivals were recorded.93 During this period, the minimal numbers of Fox arrivals in comparison to the surge in the recorded arrival of

Panis suggests an inclination to identify slaves with the generic moniker, Panis.

80 Despite the expanding channels of exchange that were bringing African descent slaves towards the north during the first decade of the eighteenth-century, Indigenous slavery continued to dominate trafficking practices. Cross empire exchanges of slaves increased as Indigenous peoples were sold from northern North America to the southern plantations, or they were transported in small numbers to the French West Indies, including Martinique. These avenues of exchange also worked in the other direction, bringing members of southern Indigenous nations and slaves of African descent north towards Montréal. Because family members were sometimes located in either Montréal, Louisiana, or even Martinique, they would pass on slaves to the next generation in dowries or in wills. For example, one of the first slaves that appear under the ownership of Ignace Gamelin Jr.’s, a Panis named Jean-Baptiste, was inherited by Gamelin Jr. from his father in 1730.94

Until the second decade of the eighteenth-century, the number of African descent slaves in Montréal remained minimal. In 1688, the King approved Governor-General, Jacques-René de

Brisay de Denonville’s request to import African descent slaves from the French West Indies into French Canada for the purposes of cultivating and clearing land. However, excessive transportation costs made this proposition unrealistic. Prospective property owners turned to

Indigenous peoples that continued to enter the city as ‘gifts’ as their principle labourers.95

Because an active and regulated slave market, such as those operating in the English colonies in southern North America, was never established in Montréal and no slave ships ever reached the city’s ports, acquiring African descent slaves remained more difficult and expensive than acquiring Indigenous slaves. By the 1730s, however, African-descent slaves began to arrive in greater numbers to Montréal.

81 Although the numbers of African-descent slaves increased during the eighteenth-century, the reality of expense and limited availability remained a factor in their limited presence in

Montréal. There were, however, several alternative channels through which African descent slaves could be supplied to prospective French owners. Although illegal, African descent slaves could enter New France as war booty or through casual trade relationships with Indigenous groups, the English, or Europeans in the Caribbean.96 Perhaps the most reliable option open to the French in Montréal for securing slaves was the creation of commercial, social, or familial connections with other French colonial settlements, particularly Louisiana, which after 1699 had quickly become a slave market. Slaves could then follow the Mississippi north with their new masters.97 Nonetheless, it was the English colonies and their connections to extensive slave markets which proved to be useful for prospective French owners.98 Frenchmen or Indigenous allies captured slaves from other European settlements in North America, including Albany, during periods of conflict as spoils of war. According to David Eltis’s Trans-Atlantic Slave

Trade Database, 157 slave voyages docked in New York between 1676 and 1700.99 New York’s direct connection to the African ports across the Atlantic, and the city’s connections to the

English markets in southern North America and the Caribbean provided avenues for French individuals to secure African descent slaves. Only rarely, did Frenchmen travel directly to West

Africa to secure slaves.100

The historical records attesting to the presence of African descent slaves pose many of the same problems of accurate identification. In most cases, African descent slaves were identified as ‘negre’ or ‘negresse,’ without many specifics about their African origins. Using the trends of French slave-ship departures from Africa, it is possible to provide some information about the likely origins of the African descent slaves that appeared within North America.

82 According to David Greggus, the African port most frequented by the French was Whydah on the Bight of Benin, followed by Malembo in West Central Africa.101 Senegambia, the Bight of

Benin, and West Central Africa formed the main sources of captives for the French Atlantic slave trade.102 However, these potential African ports of origin are complicated further by the fact that many of the French voyages that left records during the seventeenth-century originated in France.103 In the majority of Montréal parish records, when African descent slaves do appear, the most common ancestral reference suggests that African descent slaves were brought from either Martinique, Saint Domingue (the most prosperous French colonies), or from Louisiana, without providing a definitive location. For example, an African descent slave named Jacques-

César, who was a member of Ignace Gamelin Jr.’s household, was originally from Madagascar.

According to the ancestral location noted on his baptism certificate, however, Jacques-César was originally from either Louisiana or the Antilles.104

Although obtaining accurate origins of many of the Indigenous and African descent slaves in Montréal remains elusive, there are other identifiable patterns that emerge within the records. These patterns are related to gender, age, and the tasks required of slaves once they arrived within Montréal. Although the traditional systems of Indigenous captive-exchange favoured the integration of captured women and children into a victor’s village, eighty-seven percent of the slaves brought into Montréal and Québec were male.105 Greggus’s findings support this gender ratio as he found that two thirds of all recorded African descent slaves transported by the French across the Atlantic were male.106 Of these slaves, on average, they were aged fourteen.107 Another pattern that emerged within the enslaved population was the average life expectancy. Slaves of Indigenous descent died on average at the age of eighteen,

83 while slaves of African descent tended to live longer, on average dying at twenty-five years old.108

The tasks performed by slaves related to their gender and age. Initially, slaves primarily were desired to work in rural communities to perform agricultural tasks, which could include land clearing, harvesting, milling, or tending animals, or for domestic work.109 However, unlike the plantations that were operating in the southern part of the continent, agricultural labour was not the primary occupation assigned to slaves in Montréal. As a result, slaves performed a diverse array of work, which could include tasks differentiated by gender. For example, male slaves might bear the responsibility of performing larger agricultural tasks, such as plowing fields, while domestic tasks inside the house or related to maintaining the surrounding property, such as tending a garden, would be assigned to female slaves. Within a household, domestic work might include a variety of tasks, such as washing, cooking, and cleaning, and in some cases, slaves might supervise their owners’ children or children from numerous different households within the neighbourhood. However, domestic service was not restricted to the female members of the enslaved population as some tasks, such as carrying water or performing routine maintenance around a household, could require difficult labour. In many cases, slaves worked alongside European servants or indentured labourers while performing these tasks.110

Due to the importance and centrality of the fur trade in Montréal, slaves often performed tasks related to this enterprise. Fortunately for the French and their slaves, a large portion of the labour-intensive catching, killing, skinning, and tanning of beaver hides was done by their

Indigenous trade partners, but slaves would participate in the fur trading activities of their owners in other ways.111 For example, slaves accompanied their owners on expeditions to other trading posts, such as Detroit or Michilimackinac, or were leased out to accompany other French

84 merchants and traders on similar voyages. During these expeditions, slaves could work alongside

French voyageurs and engagés (servants) unloading and loading canoes, or serve as navigators, hunters, and translators.112 In the city, slaves could also be leased out to work as shopkeepers, semi-skilled labourers, fishermen, or dock workers.113

Although the legalization of slavery and the changing access to markets did increase the number of African descent slaves in Montréal, Indigenous slaves predominated, given their proximity and lower purchase cost.114 African descent slavery never took root in Montréal the way it did in Louisiana, as a lack of direct connection to the French West Indies or Africa made these slaves difficult and expensive to obtain.115 Overall, the slaves of both Indigenous and

African descent that appeared in New France equalled only a few thousand, no more than five percent of the total population.116 This percentage appears microscopic in comparison to the ninety percent of French ships carrying slaves that were destined for France’s Caribbean Islands, including Saint Domingue.117 However, the extensive connections that continued to develop between the French in Montréal and other parts of the empire ensured that an increasing number of human commodities of Indigenous and African descent were accompanying furs and other goods across the continent. In turn, slaves of both Indigenous and African descent added a layer of complexity to the demographically diverse and interconnected nature of Montréal society and the households that lined the city’s busy streets.

Four Households

Despite the growing urbanization, occupational diversification, administrative stability, and diversification of the population, Montréal retained the fluidity and mobility that had influenced its early days of settlement, making the enforcement of rigid societal boundaries difficult. The

85 French population of Montréal lacked many of the traditional attributes that contributed to the societal divisions of ancien régime France. Although social and ethnic boundaries distinguished different French occupations, and social and class hierarchies were evident within each occupation, the enforcement of strict hierarchies was difficult in this colonial context. There were many opportunities for upward social mobility in this city that were not available to French individuals in continental France. The prevalence of the fur trade and the lucrative nature of this enterprise contributed to the blurring of boundaries as a large portion of Montréal’s inhabitants participated in the fur trade as well as in other occupations. For example, members of the

LeMoyne, Gamelin, La Corne, and Dufrost de Lajemmerais families had ties to the fur trade.

However, each family was involved in different ways and occupied different social positions within society. Charles LeMoyne became a Governor, Ignace Gamelin Jr. was a merchant, Luc de La Corne was a soldier, and Marie-Marguerite was a nun. But their location in Montréal meant that people of different classes and occupations interacted in different capacities more regularly than in continental France. Although Charles LeMoyne became a member of the emerging noble class within New France, he continued to interact with members of different social statuses due to his commercial, diplomatic, and familial connections. Ignace Gamelin Jr. eventually emerged as one of the most prominent merchants in Montréal, and continually interacted with peoples of diverse social and ethnic backgrounds. La Corne began his career as a soldier and then became a prominent member of the commercial sector of society. This occupational shift drew La Corne into a complex web of extended connections. Finally, Marie-

Marguerite’s decision to marry the son of a prominent fur trader connected her family, who were descendants of an old noble family in France, to a successful member of Montréal’s commercial sector. These multifaceted occupational patterns, combined with the extensive overlapping of

86 familial lineages of different ‘traditional’ statuses with newly emerging prominent figures in

Montréal, meant that the rigid social boundaries that shaped society in continental France were more fluid in the context of this colonial space.

Another factor that contributed to the difficulty of enforcing rigid traditional boundaries within the city was the presence of Indigenous and African descent slaves. The proximity of the daily lives of the city’s inhabitants - rich or poor, free or enslaved - contributed to the overlapping nature of the tasks performed by the diverse inhabitants of this colonial space.

Although equality between the different social, economic, and ethnic positions in Montréal was not realistic, opportunities existed for more integrative interactions between peoples of

European, Indigenous, and African descent. Although the proximity of the lives of diverse peoples could create circumstances which could allow for integration or closer interaction, it is necessary to distinguish that inequalities continued to exist. Despite slaves contributing to the diverse composition of individual households, slaves of both Indigenous and African descent remained the property of their French owners. After 1709, the status of slaves as moveable property was inscribed into law and as analyzed by Jennifer L. Palmer, the lives of slaves were oriented towards the economic success of their owners and not towards themselves.118

Ultimately, enslaved individuals in Montréal contributed substantially to the wealth of their owners and to the wealth of the colony under circumstances that differed from the systems of slavery that existed throughout North America. However, like other systems of enslavement, the economic contribution of these individuals was coerced and could occur under devastating conditions and circumstances. Nevertheless, slaves contributed dynamically to the complex and fluid society that developed in the city of Montréal.

87 Household composition reflected the complex social, ethnic, and demographic landscape of Montréal. In a manner that is consistent with Jennifer L. Palmer’s examination of French colonial households, families in Montréal would typically include multiple generations of blood relations who were involved in a diverse array of occupations, non-family members, such as business partners, indentured servants, and slaves.119 Religious communities also formed households that included family and non-family members. Members of these households tended to live under the same roof. In a typical French colonial house, the central spaces of interaction that were frequented by all members of the household, such as the kitchen, pantry, and parlour were typically located on the ground floor. Bedrooms were located on the second floor or in the attic, and slaves would usually sleep on the floor in the kitchen or outside of the house.120

Despite a physical proximity and frequency of interaction within individual households that was similar to that which characterized the city’s streets, members of individual households were not considered as equals. As previously acknowledged, slaves were the property of their French owners. This inequality was reinforced by the spatial organization of the household itself. The spaces in which slaves lived and slept illustrated the control held by a master over their slaves.121

Spaces such as the kitchen floor or an outside area were spaces which enforced a slave’s position as a possession. Despite the physical proximity, divisions within individual households continued to exist.122

The physical layout of a household also meant that a level of physical intimacy was unavoidable. The members of a household were forced to become acquainted with intimate aspects of the lives of the other inhabitants. Unfortunately, this physical intimacy could also reinforce the brutality and violence of this system of slavery and the vulnerability of enslaved members of individual households to the desires of their owners. As many scholars of slavery

88 have shown, sexual violence is a particular example that illustrates this vulnerability as the physical intimacy in a household meant that masters’ would claim the right to rape female servants or slaves and could force involuntary intimacy between slaves under their ownership.123

Although the physical intimacy within individual households could create opportunities for more amicable interactions between its diverse inhabitants and could blur social boundaries, this proximity could also reinforce the inequalities that continued to exist throughout the city.

The same intimacy spilled out on to the streets, especially in a city as small as Montréal, where houses were in close proximity to each other and neighbours were aware of each other’s business, especially in proximate households.124 Watchfulness was also particularly useful for

French slave owners who wanted to limit the mobility and monitor the activities of their slaves, which further enforced the lower social position of slaves in the city.125 As much as households were worlds of their own, they were connected to the external Montréal community through economic, social, and familial relations.

Households were also units that contained the other foundational aspect of colonial society: the family. However, family in early modern French colonial society was distinct from the idea of the nuclear family that we have today. French law treated the family as a basic unit of society, and individuals were expected to think of family first.126 The families that emerged in

New France were usually large and included cross-continental and transatlantic bonds. However, as Jennifer L. Palmer has examined, perceptions of ‘the family’ in the imperial centre differed from the familial reality that developed within the colonial city of Montréal.127 The imperial perception of the ‘ideal family’ was a patriarchal one, and an ideal marriage was hierarchal, with the husband and father at the head of the household, asserting control over his wife and providing for the other members of his household.128 In France, this patriarchy was prescribed in

89 the Roman Law of marriage through the concept of manus, in which the husband exercised power over his wife.129 However, the mobility, French-Indigenous interdependency, and demographic diversity that characterized Montréal made the application of this imperial perception difficult. Additionally, households functioned as a single economic unit, within which its diverse inhabitants functioned together to produce goods for sustenance and sale.130 The presence of diverse peoples in household, and the nature of interactions that occurred among people of different social, economic, and ethnic distinctions re-enforces the need to broaden our definition of ‘the family.’

The composition of the households in Montréal challenges the notion of what Nancy

Christie describes as “normative family structures” and the nuclear form.131 The members of nuclear families in Montréal were seldom isolated from a larger community of relatives in other locations and in many cases, the dense social networks of families, neighbours, kin, and business partners extended beyond the confines of a household or immediate family.132 In contrast to the traditional imperial perception of the French family, the notion of an amended family form, as established by Emily West, captures the variety of relationships that developed to suit everyone’s reality in this mobile and transient locale.133 Extended families might include relations among

French peoples from different parts of France, or from other parts of the French colonial empire, such as Québec, Detroit, Louisiana, or the French West Indies. Rather than the idea of a self- contained and isolated nuclear family, the amended family form that emerged in Montréal best reflects the realities of diversity and mobility that characterizes colonial society. An extended familial network could transcend vast distances and extend across blood ties and fictive and real kinship networks.

90 An examination of the households of a Governor, a merchant, a solider, and a nun provides insights into different and overlapping patterns of family formation in colonial Montréal in part, because each household included inhabitants of European, Indigenous, and African descent. Whether through commercial, social, or familial channels, each household embodied the vast networks in Montréal and in the French settlements in North America, and illustrated the ways by which families merged, blended, and adapted in a colonial setting where mobility was the norm.

The families of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, Ignace Gamelin Jr., Luc de La Corne St.

Luc, and Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais occupied differing positions within society, experienced different financial circumstances, had different levels of involvement in the slave trade, and had different familial backgrounds. Although not representative of every household in

Montréal or every family, these individuals do present a window into some of the experiences, interactions, and extended families of those involved in administrative occupations, commercial enterprises, military campaigns, and religious leadership. Following the framework set forth by

Emma Rothschild’s work, “to proceed, encounter by encounter, from the history of a family to the history of a larger society or empire,” the reconstruction of individual households and the connections of their inhabitants provides insight into the inner life of empire.134 The microhistories of these individuals, their households, and their extended families highlight the interconnected nature of the larger French colonial empire and illustrate the complexity of

Montréal society and the difficulties of enforcing and maintaining strict social or class boundaries within this colonial space.

In colonial Montréal, Indigenous and African descent slaves are an integral part of our understanding of family formation, household composition, and growth. Slaves could enter

91 ‘extended’ families as prisoners of war, diplomatic gifts, war captives from the nations of the enemies of the Indigenous allies of the French, trade commodities, and as purchased property brought north from Louisiana or the French West Indies. These individuals became a part of the households that lined the streets of the bustling city. A consideration of the enslaved members within each household and the relationships that developed between these enslaved individuals present an opportunity to view and understand the complex layering of interactions that occurred in Montréal. A consideration of all the diverse members of individual households and the strategies of interaction and the networks of connections that were created by these individuals, allows for a more complete understanding of the larger interconnected French colonial world.

Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil’s extended family shows the most extensive and expansive familial connections in France’s North American colonies. The LeMoyne family members were able to achieve immense financial and social success in Montréal and elevated themselves to positions of influence in places scattered throughout the French colonial empire.

This continued success presented the members of the family with an array of opportunities for diverse interaction and connection. Charles’s family illustrates three aspects of extended familial development in Montréal: having different family members in different parts of the empire; developing fictive kinship ties with surrounding Indigenous communities; and how offspring and the following generations aided in the creation and maintenance of familial networks, whether real or fictive.

After the arrival of Charles’s father, Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil et de Châteauguay, to Montréal, he managed to achieve social and financial success through his work and reputation as an interpreter for the Jesuits.135 Charles’s father’s earlier success in North America allowed

Charles and his brothers the opportunity to establish themselves throughout the French colonial

92 empire. Charles’s younger brother, Pierre LeMoyne d’Iberville, became the founder of

Louisiana, and Charles’s other brother, Jean-Baptiste LeMoyne de Bienville, eventually succeeded Pierre as Governor of Louisiana, becoming the founder of New Orleans.136 Some of

Charles’s brothers became involved in French-Indigenous conflicts to the west, while others were involved in inter-imperial conflicts with the English.137 Charles’s extensive familial ties across the continent meant that through his extended family, he was connected directly to the slave trade as his younger brother, Pierre LeMoyne d’Iberville, had been responsible for bringing the first African descent slave to the settlement of Louisiana.138 Following Pierre’s death,

Charles’s other brother, Jean-Baptiste, had also been in favour of the development of a standardized policy of bringing slaves into Louisiana from the French West Indies to augment the agricultural growth of the settlement.139 Jean-Baptiste was specifically in favour of exchanging Indigenous slaves from Louisiana, such as those captured during conflicts with the

Natchez and the Chickasaw, for African descent slaves.140 These familial connections contributed to the presence of nine African descent slaves in Charles’s Montréal household.

The next dimension of Charles’s extended family was his extensive kinship ties with the surrounding Indigenous communities, specifically the Onondaga. Figurative kinship ties were symbolic rather than biological and were a central feature of Indigenous diplomatic rituals, which utilized familial notions to invoke symbolic connection.141 Throughout the beginning of

Charles’s career in New France, his father’s relationships with the surrounding Indigenous communities provided Charles with the opportunity to become involved in French-Indigenous affairs. Initially, Charles’s proved himself militarily during the intensifying French-

Haudenosaunee conflict of the late 1680s. However, as peace negotiations between the French and the Haudenosaunee increased during the 1690s, Charles distinguished himself

93 diplomatically.142 Charles’s involvement in these negotiations led to his kinship ties with the

Onondaga, one of the Indigenous nations that had resettled between 1682 and 1686 on the south shore of the St. Lawrence across from Montréal.143 On June 24, 1694, the great Onondaga chief

Teganissorens declared that the Haudenosaunee Confederacy had adopted Charles and his brother Paul LeMoyne de Maricourt as their children.144 Charles’s diplomatic interaction with the Onondaga continued throughout the early eighteenth-century, when he served as their ambassador, and Charles maintained and benefitted from his kinship connections with the

Onondaga as he became more involved in the colonial administration in Montréal.145 Charles’s relationships with the Haudenosaunee Confederacy also gave him access to the Indigenous systems of war captive-exchange that were operating in the St. Lawrence Valley and in the pays d’en haut. An Illinois woman named Marie was brought from Haudenosaunee country to join

Charles’s household in the early 1700s.146 Charles also received a Panis named Gabriel from the

Haudenosaunee in 1721 to replace another Indigenous slave that had been killed.147 These

Indigenous peoples then joined Charles’s household with African descent slaves brought from the French West Indies. Throughout Charles’s life, his kinship ties with the Onondaga, and eventually the Oneida nations, remained an important part of his extended family.148

Finally, the role of Charles’s children within his large family highlight another aspect of the extended family in Montréal and generational continuity in creating household and familial wealth. Charles had married his first wife, Claude-Élisabeth Souart d’Aboucourt on May 21,

1681 and the couple had seven children.149 Just as Charles’s father had provided opportunities for his children, Charles’s own success allowed his children similar opportunities.150 Charles’s children maintained their familial connections to the south, and some utilized Charles’s relationships with the surrounding Indigenous peoples to shape their extended families or further

94 their careers. Charles’s son, Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil II, who would eventually inherit his father’s title as Baron de Longueuil, began his career in the military as commandant of Fort

Niagara, where he utilized his family’s reputation and connections with the Indigenous allies of the French to become involved in the fur trade.151 Charles’s other son, Paul-Joseph LeMoyne de

Longueuil, continued his father’s connections with the Haudenosaunee nations, and was eventually adopted by the members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy.152 Unlike Paul-Joseph’s father and his brother Charles, whose careers eventually turned to colonial administrative work,

Paul-Joseph spent the majority of his life immersed in the Indigenous communities surrounding the city and other French posts, such as Detroit, and his associations worked to continue to extend the LeMoyne de Longueuil’s kinship ties from Montréal deep into the pays d’en haut.153

Over three generations, the LeMoyne de Longueuil family built commercial, social, and extended familial networks that stretched across the entirety of the North American continent.

Ignace Gamelin Jr.’s extended family and connections provide a window into the activities and dynamics of a merchant family involved in the fur trade in various capacities.

While many individuals worked in the fur trade – either as itinerant voyageurs or were involved in the fur trade in addition to other occupations – very few were able to achieve success like

Gamelin Jr. Merchant families are also interesting, because, as J. F. Bosher and Robert Englebert have illustrated, trade was a family affair during the seventeenth and eighteenth-centuries. The merchant family operated like a business unit that relied on extended kin networks to expand their commercial connections and to reach new markets.154 Extended kin networks could include blood relatives, but because merchants were particularly fond of extending commercial ties through strategic marital relationships, these networks could also include distant relatives and in- laws. In other cases, merchant families would grow to include non-consanguineal relations, also

95 connected by commercial networks of communication and exchange.155 Unlike the success of

Charles’s immediate family members, Ignace’s extended family grew to include many non- consanguineal and extended family connections based on commercial ties. Ignace, for example, strategically married a member of a prominent French family, thus expanding his commercial relationships far into the western continent. His diverse occupations as an expedition outfitter, wholesale retailer, and cross-Atlantic importer allowed for the construction of successful networks in France and in the French West Indies.

Ignace was the son of a prominent Montréal merchant and was introduced to trading activities at an early age.156 In a manner consistent with the pattern of merchant marriages,

Ignace married Marie-Louise Dufrost de Lajemmerais, on January 31, 1731, and the couple had fifteen children.157 Marie-Louise’s brother, Christophe Dufrost de Lajemmerais, and her uncle,

Pierre Gaultier de La Vérendrye, were at the forefront of French colonial expansion during the first half of the eighteenth-century into the territory west of Lake Superior, towards the mouth of the Saskatchewan River. Because of this familial connection, in 1731, Ignace participated in a venture to fund La Vérendrye’s role as the commandant of the poste de l’Ouest (Western Post), a venture motivated by La Vérendrye’s desire to discover the Mer de l’Ouest (Western Sea).158

The most extensive portion of Ignace’s web of connections was made up of commercial associations in the city of Montréal and in the pays d’en haut, which came to include diverse individuals involved in fur trading activities. These included both merchants, with commercial operations based in Montréal, and voyageurs, who participated in expeditions to western French posts, such as Detroit and Michilimackinac, where interactions with the Indigenous communities in the pays d’en haut were crucial to the success of operations. In 1721, Ignace entered into a partnership with prominent Montréal merchant, Charles Nolan Lamarque to invest in and outfit

96 voyageurs for the pays d’en haut.159 It was through this partnership that Ignace further extended his commercial network to include relationships with voyageurs and engagés. It is notable that throughout Ignace’s career, he signed more than 370 contracts for voyageurs travelling to the pays d’en haut, particularly to Michilimackinac.160 Through his partnership with Lamarque,

Ignace also became connected to the Lamarque familial network that included extensive social and commercial relationships with the Indigenous communities surrounding the city.161

Ignace’s extensive involvement with expeditions to the west also connected him to the channels of war captive-exchange occurring in the pays d’en haut. For example, the voyageurs and engagés hired for expeditions by Ignace would travel among those Indigenous groups that exchanged human commodities for goods or to establish and maintain peaceful relations.

Voyageurs also occasionally worked with traders in the English settlements to the south to bring furs and slaves back to Montréal following trading expeditions.162

The final explanation for the growth of Ignace’s extended family is based on commercial activities developed later in his career. Ignace’s family members and associations came to include French individuals involved in diverse occupations across the French colonial empire and the Atlantic. As Ignace Gamelin Jr.’s career became more established, he diversified his commercial activities and entered into manufacturing operations developing in Montréal during the late seventeenth and early eighteenth-centuries. In 1729, Ignace became involved with

François Poulin de Francheville in an undertaking to exploit the iron deposits along the St.

Maurice River.163 As a result, Ignace became acquainted with high ranking members of the colonial administration in Québec who also invested in the project.164 During this period, Ignace also established a wholesale and retail business, which transported goods between Montréal, the

French port at La Rochelle, and the French West Indies, through Louisbourg.165 As Ignace

97 became one of the main suppliers of various products to the colonial government in Montréal, he solidified the extension of his commercial connections across North America and the Atlantic.

Ignace Gamelin Jr.’s commercial activities also had an impact on the ethnic composition of his household in Montréal. Because of his associations with individuals in the west, which brought him into existing systems of captive-exchange, and his role as an intermediary, connecting France, Montréal, and the French West Indies, Ignace had access to transportation and economic channels that could bring enslaved individuals to him. For example, Ignace acquired his African descent slave Jacques-César from the French West Indies. In addition,

Ignace’s connections to La Rochelle gave him access to slaves of African descent, since despite the ‘free soil policy,’ slaves arrived at this port directly from West Africa, and the city’s economy relied heavily on trade with the French Caribbean colonies.166 Although Ignace’s immediate family remained in Montréal and the pays d’en haut, his extensive network of commercial connections enhanced the acquisition of slaves from other parts of the world who then entered his household.

Much like Ignace Gamelin Jr., Luc de La Corne St. Luc was involved in the commercial activities of the fur trade. However, La Corne was predominantly involved in military activities, and he was able to construct a different set of networks from Gamelin Jr. La Corne’s household illustrates broader connections in Montréal in two interconnected ways. La Corne’s military activities, which brought him into the pays d’en haut, allowed for the development of long- lasting military and personal relationships with members of the French colonial military and with the Indigenous peoples that he encountered. In turn, La Corne’s military experience and the connections he developed gave him opportunities to pursue his commercial interests in the fur trade. Additionally, throughout La Corne’s career, he married three members of prominent and

98 well-connected families in Montréal, which, ultimately, allowed him to accumulate immense wealth.

Following the tradition of the La Corne family, La Corne’s career began when he joined the colonial regular troops in the 1730s. Because of La Corne’s family’s reputation in the French military, beginning with his father’s journey across the Atlantic as a second lieutenant, La Corne became an officer very early in his career.167 It was during La Corne’s initial years of military service that he built the foundational connections that would shape his future commercial, social, and familial relationships. The regimental organization of the military in New France was the first factor that influenced La Corne’s interactions. Traditionally, the French colonial army consisted of a mix of regular soldiers from the Carignan-Salières Regiment in France, and the

Troupes de la Marine (French Navy), who were supported by a small volunteer militia unit made up of the local colonial inhabitants.168 By the time La Corne joined the army, its composition was still diverse and the men under La Corne’s command and those who acted as La Corne’s superiors included men from various social and familial backgrounds.

La Corne’s involvement in the military also exerted a strong influence over his future commercial opportunities. Throughout the height of La Corne’s military career, he spent time travelling across the North American continent, specifically in the west. During these travels, La

Corne participated in numerous military campaigns and he fought alongside the Indigenous allies of the French, such as the Odawa and the Ojibwa, against both their Indigenous enemies and against the English.169 For example, throughout the 1730s, La Corne participated in raids against the Fox nation in the territory surrounding Detroit.170 Extended periods of travel around the St.

Lawrence Valley and the pays d’en haut, allowed La Corne to develop extensive military and personal relationships with the Indigenous communities surrounding Montréal, including

99 members of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and the Abenakis, and with the communities surrounding the western French posts of Detroit and Michilimackinac.171

As La Corne continued to distinguish himself militarily, his reputation among his commanding officers and the colonial administration in Montréal increased.172 It was during this period of La Corne’s career that he married his first wife, the daughter of a prominent Montréal merchant, Marie-Anne Hervieux in 1742.173 This was also the period when La Corne began to capitalize on the extensive networks that he had created through his military endeavours and expand his position within the fur trade.174 In a manner that was typical among many French military officers and post commanders, La Corne took advantage of the proximity of his military activity to the Indigenous nations involved in the fur trade and began to transport goods between

Montréal and the western posts, such as Michilimackinac.175

La Corne’s prolonged contact with the Indigenous communities of the St. Lawrence

Valley and in the west, and his budding commercial enterprise also led to La Corne’s more frequent appearances as an interpreter. Interpreters served an important role in the military, especially in the pays d’en haut where the French were reliant on their Indigenous allies, such as the Algonquian, Wendat, and Odawa, for military support and also for many of the navigation and survival skills that allowed for the expansion and maintenance of the French colonial presence in the wilderness of the west.176 The extensive personal connections that La Corne had been able to develop with different Indigenous communities, such as the Seneca, had allowed La

Corne to become familiar and fluent in four Indigenous languages.177 As a result, La Corne served as an interpreter for Indigenous peoples visiting French forts and at an important conference between the French and the Seneca in 1755, and at another conference the following year.178 La Corne also escorted Indigenous delegations towards Montréal.179

100 Unfortunately, La Corne’s first wife died in 1753, but in 1757 La Corne married his second wife, Marie-Josephe Guillimin, who was a widow of one of La Corne’s military comrades.180 This enabled him to extend his personal connections to include the military and commercial contacts that Marie-Josephe’s husband had developed throughout his career.

Throughout the later years of La Corne’s career, he continued to participate and distinguish himself through his military activity and he was eventually awarded the Military Order of Saint

Louis in 1759.181 Additionally, La Corne grew his commercial enterprise, professionalizing his activities in a manner that was like Ignace Gamelin Jr., and eventually becoming an expedition outfitter.182 This shift added another layer of complexity to La Corne’s commercial network because of his close associations with voyageurs.

La Corne’s continued participation in diverse and overlapping occupations and the relationships that he had developed through his first two marriages allowed La Corne to maintain his complex network of connections that criss-crossed the city of Montréal and the western continent and included peoples of European and Indigenous descent. La Corne’s extensive connections also allowed him to elevate his position in colonial society. After the death of his second wife in 1768, La Corne’s final marriage to Marie Marguerite Boucher de Boucherville in

1774 solidified La Corne’s position as an elite member of Montréal society.183 Marie Marguerite was the granddaughter of one of the founding fathers of Fort Ville-Marie and her own father had a sterling reputation as a military officer, participating in the establishment of a French post in the territory of the Sioux located to the west of Montréal and had also participated in raids against the Fox nation.184

The culmination of La Corne’s activities allowed him to construct a web of connections that traversed occupational, social, and ethnic boundaries. La Corne’s three marriages also

101 allowed him to create an extended familial network that was larger than that of the other examples examined throughout this chapter. La Corne took advantage of the opportunities presented by his family’s history in the military to expand his commercial and diplomatic interests, and ultimately his extended familial relationships. Because of La Corne’s military activities in the pays d’en haut and in the St. Lawrence Valley, the relationships he developed with the Odawa, Ojibwa, Abenakis, and members of Haudenosaunee Confederacy, and his immense wealth, La Corne became involved in the channels of exchange that were carrying human commodities of both Indigenous and African descent across the continent. As a result, La

Corne became one of the most prominent slave owners in Montréal, owning a total of twenty- four slaves over his lifetime.185

The development of Marie-Marguerite’s family, household, and network of connections diverges slightly from that of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, Ignace Gamelin Jr., and Luc de La

Corne St. Luc. Although Marie-Marguerite’s immediate family and her own marriage follow similar patterns to the other three French individuals, her gender and role as administrator of the

Hôpital-Général du Montréal, presents a different perspective. At the Hôpital, she created a religious community that presents an example of a different type of an extended family, as women from all social, familial, and ethnic backgrounds came together and interacted within a single fluid space to create a collective. Additionally, the Hôpital itself took in a diverse array of patients, which contributed another layer of contacts with residents, many of whom were transient. The composition of Marie-Marguerite’s immediate and extended family illustrates the development of connections in Montréal in three ways. First, the activities of her family members connected Marie-Marguerite to the western territories and diverse peoples; second, her family and network of connections expanded because of her marriage; and third, her involvement

102 in founding and administering a religious institution and hospital facilitated the development of an extended family of women.

Marie-Marguerite was born into a very connected family. Marie-Marguerite’s father was a member of the French nobility, while her mother was the daughter of the Governor of Trois-

Rivières. Like Charles LeMoyne, the elite position of Marie-Marguerite’s family offered her many opportunities. Marie-Marguerite was the eldest of six children, and through her siblings’ activities, she became connected to other institutions, activities, and families in Montréal and elsewhere in the empire. For example, Marie-Marguerite’s sisters married into the prominent

Gamelin family. Marie-Louise married Ignace Gamelin, and her other sister, Marie-Clémence, married Ignace’s cousin, Pierre Gamelin Maugras (see Appendix 1).186 Additionally, Marie-

Marguerite’s brother, Christophe frequently accompanied their uncle, Pierre Gaultier de La

Vérendrye, on his western expeditions in the pays d’en haut.187 Christophe was also involved in raids against the Fox and Sioux in the west during the late 1730s.188 It was through the activities of Marie-Marguerite’s family members that she became indirectly connected to different webs of interaction in Montréal and in the west.

Marie-Marguerite’s extended family also developed as a result of her marriage in 1722 to

Francois-Madeleine D’Youville, the son of prominent French merchant Pierre You de la

Découverte.189 Similar to the purposeful marital strategies employed by members of Montréal society, Marie-Marguerite’s marriage was considered by her parents to be a very advantageous match.190 As a result of her marriage, Marie-Marguerite became a part of the expansive commercial networks of her father-in-law, Pierre You, who would frequently travel to the

Illinois Country to trade with Indigenous peoples, such as the Miami. The Miami, in turn, traded with other Indigenous peoples, such as the Nipissing, a large portion of whom lived in the

103 mission community located across the Lac des Deux Montages on Île-aux-Toutres, who would frequent You’s remote property near Fort Senneville.191 Pierre You would also occasionally participate in illegal trade with the English at Albany.192 François-Madeleine also utilized Pierre

You’s remote property to trade furs and to participate in the illegal sale of alcohol to Indigenous peoples.193 Much in the same way that Marie-Marguerite had become connected to numerous families and institutions through the actions of the immediate members of her own family, her marriage allowed her to insinuate herself into the upper merchant class of Montréal.194

The fluid and inclusive character of the religious community and transient hospital population that developed in the Hôpital-Général, contributed to the uniqueness of Marie-

Marguerite’s extended family. This dimension of Marie-Marguerite’s extended family, however, is perhaps the most representative of the development of Montréal’s interconnected society. Prior to the death of her husband, François-Madeleine, Marie-Marguerite had become increasingly devoted to Catholicism. Beginning in 1730, Marie-Marguerite joined the female charitable sisterhoods working to ease the suffering of the poor. Eventually, Marie-Marguerite, with a few other pious women, created a community in her marital home devoted to taking care of the poor.195 This community became a part of Marie-Marguerite’s extended household. After facing difficulties and severe opposition from many members of Montréal’s elite, Marie-Marguerite and what became the founding order of the Grey Nuns took control of the Hôpital-Général du

Montréal in 1747.196 The institution’s mission was to care for the sick, injured, poor, unwanted, and orphaned, and the hospital population came to include slaves of both Indigenous and African descent, whether as property or patients.197 Additionally, the Hôpital served as a place in which female members of the upper levels of Montréal society could board temporarily or indefinitely during the later years of their lives. For example, the Baroness de Longueuil, who was the widow

104 of Charles LeMoyne’s grandson, raised her children in the Hôpital immediately following the death of her husband.198 After taking control of the Hôpital-Général, Marie-Marguerite’s web of connections grew to include individuals involved in different occupations, of different genders, different social status, both free and enslaved, and of different ethnicities.

Throughout the entirety of the eighteenth-century, 121 slaves, including 101 Indigenous slaves and 20 slaves of African descent appear in the Hôpital-Général records, as both property of the institution and as patients. Unlike other hospitals in New France, such as the Hôtel-Dieu in

Québec, especially following Marie-Marguerite’s take-over in 1747, slaves tended to stay longer at the Hôpital-Général as it also served as a refuge for members of Montréal society. Many slaves who were either disabled or could no longer remain in the homes of their owners were admitted to the Hôpital-Général, where they would remain until their deaths. Typically, the family that a slave had served would send their slave, at the expense of their owner, to the

Hôpital to stay for the remainder of their lives.199 The Hôpital also opened its doors to abandoned slaves.200 In addition to the wounded French soldiers and the widowed wealthy French women that appeared in the Hôpital, whether temporarily or permanently, Marie-Marguerite’s will attests to the presence of five Panis under her personal ownership and the presence of four

Indigenous slaves who appear to have belonged to the Hôpital-Général du Montréal.201

Marie-Marguerite was also connected to channels of exchange that were carrying slaves across North America. For Marie-Marguerite, her immediate familial network, her extended marital network, and the diverse interactions that occurred in the Hôpital-Général shaped the ethnic composition of her extended family. For one, because of the activities of Marie-

Marguerite’s brother against the Sioux in the western territory surrounding Detroit in the late

1730s, a Sioux woman named Marie-Josephe entered Marie-Marguerite’s household in 1739.202

105 Additionally, Marie-Marguerite’s uncle, Pierre Gaultier de La Vérendrye, became one of the most influential slave traders in the 1730s and 1740s.203 As a result of Marie-Marguerite’s marriage, she became connected to the transportation circuits that criss-crossed the Mississippi

Valley, and extended south towards Louisiana and the French West Indies where the enslavement of African peoples was common.204 Finally, through the religious community created at the Hôpital-Général, Marie-Marguerite constructed relationships with other women from diverse familial backgrounds and social positions in Montréal, some of whom were descendants or widows of very prominent members of society. In some cases, these connections led to the gifting of property, which could include slaves, to the Hôpital. For example, one prominent French widow, who had spent time in the hospital, donated an anonymous Panis to the

Hôpital in 1763 and a French merchant donated another Panise named Marie-Marguerite in

1764.205 The extended family networks established by Marie-Marguerite’s family share similarities with the other three individuals examined in this chapter. However, the ways in which Marie-Marguerite’s extended family eventually diverged to include diverse individuals, frequently related not by blood but by religious devotion or social interaction, illustrates yet another type of family and household that developed in colonial Montréal.

Despite the occupational, familial, and gender factors that distinguished these four individuals, other types of marital, commercial, and social connections developed between these households (see Appendix 1). Ignace Gamelin Jr. was married to Marie-Marguerite’s sister

Marie-Louise Dufrost de Lajemmerais on January 31, 1731.206 Ignace’s cousin, Pierre Gamelin

Maugras, solidified the connection between these two families, when he married Marie-

Marguerite’s other sister, Marie-Clémence Dufrost de Lajemmerais on November 16, 1735.207

As Ignace entered into a commercial relationship with Marie-Marguerite’s uncle Pierre Gaultier

106 de La Vérendrye familial and business ties blended. The entrance of slaves into households was also facilitated by family/commercial interactions. For instance, Marie-Marguerite’s father-in- law sold an enslaved Patoca named Pierre to Ignace’s business partner, Charles Nolan Lamarque in 1733.208 Luc de La Corne had connections with both Marie-Marguerite’s family and Ignace

Gamelin Jr.’s family. La Corne also participated in trade activities with La Vérendrye, most frequently engaging in trade expeditions with La Vérendrye’s son, Louis-Joseph Gaultier de La

Vérendrye. Although La Corne’s direct connections to the Gamelin family were more tenuous,

La Corne appears in an excerpt from Gamelin’s accounting ledger in 1741, in relation to Ignace’s annual expenses for the St. Maurice Ironworks.209 Through his association with the Ironworks,

La Corne had access to forged iron and molded products, such as pots and pans, which he used not only for his personal use, but to trade with his Indigenous associates. Additionally, La

Corne’s brother-in-law from his first marriage, Louis François Hervieux, married Ignace

Gamelin’s second cousin, Marie-Angélique, on November 21, 1747.210 The positions of both

Ignace and La Corne as expedition outfitters meant that they gathered for business meetings in the homes of Montréal’s top merchants or occasionally at the French posts to the west, where they hired voyageurs. Finally, when Ignace became the trustee for the Montréal’s merchant community in the 1740s, he worked to preserve their interests as he represented their concerns to the colonial administration.211 La Corne was an integral part of the merchant community in

Montréal.

There are also social links, albeit indirectly, between Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil and

Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais. Because of the age difference between Charles and

Marie-Marguerite, most interactions involved Charles’s children. On June 10, 1748, Marie-

Marguerite’s uncle, La Vérendrye, hired Charles’s slave Gabriel to assist him on an expedition to

107 a French trading post in the west.212 At this time, Gabriel belonged to Charles’s son, Charles

LeMoyne de Longueuil II.213 In addition, when the Hôpital-Général was under threat of demolition in 1752, Charles’s son, Charles LeMoyne II, petitioned to have the courts reverse their order to ensure the protection of Marie-Marguerite’s religious centre.214 There are also generational linkages between Charles and Luc de La Corne. Again, due to the age difference, La

Corne’s interaction with the LeMoyne’s involved Charles’s grandson, as the pair served as captains together in the French colonial army against the English in the 1750s.215 Finally, due to the centrality of religion in the city, these inhabitants interacted with each other in different church organizations. Ignace Gamelin Jr. became a church warden in his parish in 1734 and interacted with the diverse members of Montréal’s population, by serving as an arbitrator, guardian, appraiser, and legal representative.216

Throughout this chapter, I have emphasized the social and familial connections of the four families under consideration that were, in many ways, representative of the larger population. But, spatial proximity, as scholars have shown, is another way of demonstrating interconnectedness in the walled city.217 As Jennifer L. Palmer and Jean-François Lozier have shown, an analysis of the physical structure of the household or of a community can illuminate methods and motivations for interaction.218 A consideration of the spatial layout of a city, as highlighted in chapter one, shows how families concentrated in houses along the central streets of Rue Saint-Paul and Rue Notre-Dame could become connected socially or commercially.219

More broadly, Montréal’s relative proximity to the French trading posts of Detroit and

Michilimackinac to the west, made the city a geographic intermediary between the pays d’en haut and the French Atlantic port at Québec.

108 To begin with, an analysis of the spatial proximity of the physical dwellings of these individuals allows for the visualization of the avenues of interaction that connected these diverse individuals. Just as households were designed to force interactions between servants and masters, children and adults, blood relatives and others, the physical dimensions of the urban centre of

Montréal, meant that elite households with more than one plot were still close enough to enhance interactions on the streets, at the markets, and in other public spaces (see Figure 10). For instance, for Charles’s father’s service, the Governor of Montréal, Paul de Chomedey de

Maisonneuve, awarded him 90 acres of land and a plot along Rue Saint-Paul, located between

Rue Saint-Sulpice and Rue Saint-Joseph.220 As shown in Figure 10, Charles himself owned property along Rue Saint-Paul, between Rue Bonsecours and Rue Saint-Charles.221 Ignace

Gamelin Jr. lived very close to the Hôtel-Dieu on Rue Saint-Amable, which ran parallel to the north of Rue Saint-Paul, between Rue Saint-Vincent and what is now Place du Jacques-

Cartier.222 Although the records do not indicate the specific location of Luc de La Corne’s residence until the middle of the eighteenth-century, he also lived along Rue Saint-Paul, between

Rue Saint-François-Xavier and Rue Saint-Sulpice.223 Finally, following Marie-Marguerite’s marriage into the You de la Découverte family, it appears that she moved into the home of the widowed Madame You de la Découverte, which was located along Rue Saint-Paul near the Place du Marché.224 Pierre You owned an enormous amount of property along Rue Saint-Paul, in addition to his remote property near Fort Senneville, so it is possible that Marie-Marguerite spent time in both locations during her marriage and following the death of her father-in-law.225 The

109 Hôpital-Général, which Marie-Marguerite took control of and inhabited in 1747, was located south of Rue Saint-Paul, along present-day Rue Normand and Rue Marguerite D’Youville.

Figure: 10. Area of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, Ignace Gamelin Jr., Luc de La Corne St. Luc, and Marie- Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais’s individual dwellings. Source: Library and Archives Canada, C-28399.

An examination of the families and the commercial and religious ties established by

Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, Ignace Gamelin Jr., Luc de La Corne St. Luc, and Marie-

Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais shows the ways in which different networks not only evolved in complex ways in the city of Montréal, but throughout the French colonial empire. The connections established by these individuals were formed through familial contacts and occupational channels and crossed ethnic and gender boundaries. In Charles’s case, he was fortunate enough to construct a familial network that extended across the empire, and which shaped his success in the colonial administration. Ignace built his extended family through marriage and the development of commercial connections with French merchants and fur traders

110 across the North American continent and the Atlantic. La Corne’s military involvement shaped his interactions with diverse European and Indigenous individuals. Marie-Marguerite’s extended family in the Hôpital-Général included diverse peoples connected through religious commitment and providing for infirm and abandoned slaves. The families of all four individuals included immediate and extended blood relations, real and fictive kinship bonds, and individuals who worked as servants, slaves, and laborers. Family formation in Montréal involved much more than simple blood ties. Moreover, kinship ties extended across broad swaths of territory and were reflections of the interconnected French colonial world.

Analyzing the relationships that could develop between slaves adds another dimension to our understanding of the complexity of family formation in colonial Montréal. Although slaves possessed limited freedom and had an inscribed inferior social status, they still formed broader webs of connections that exhibited the characteristics of a highly mobile and fluid society. The relationships between slaves in Montréal were very different than the slave couples in

Antebellum South Carolina analyzed by Emily West.226 Slaves in Montréal did not live on isolated or self-sufficient plantations, but rather in proximity to their masters and other slaves and bonded laborers with whom they interacted.227 Unlike slaves in other parts of the French

Atlantic, slaves in Montréal had more independence and autonomy.228

Just as Charles, Ignace, La Corne, and Marie-Marguerite could interact in their homes, on the streets, in public locations, or in distant territories, enslaved individuals also benefitted from the connected and mobile nature of these micro- and macro-colonial spaces. According to

Rushforth, the area between Rue Saint-Paul and Rue Notre-Dame, which was occupied by these

French individuals and by many other leading French families, could also be characterized as a slave neighbourhood, because of the high concentration of households with slaves.229 Half of the

111 property owners in the commercial sector of Montréal, between Rue Saint-Paul and Rue Notre-

Dame, owned Indigenous peoples.230 Additionally, over half of the most prominent French slave owners in New France resided within this area of the city.231 The prevalence of slaves of both

Indigenous and African descent in this colonial space offered them unique opportunities for interaction, intimacy, and friendship with slaves and servants. Intimate relationships could develop between the enslaved members of individual households, between enslaved members of different households, and between slaves and free members of Montréal society.

Slaves were most likely, however, to develop relationships with individuals within their own households as these were the individuals with whom they interacted most frequently.232 This proved advantageous to slave owners, but it also meant that couples could live together. It is also possible that relationships between the enslaved members of Montréal households followed this pattern of interaction because masters wanted to control the intimacy and reproduction of their slaves, which would increase their property. Logistically, slaves within the same household were more likely to receive permission to marry, as their owner could benefit from maintaining control over the labor and use value of the offspring of their slaves.233 In the households of

Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil and Luc de La Corne, for example, evidence from parish records shows relationships developing among slaves. Charles LeMoyne’s African descent slaves

Charles and Charlotte-Élisabeth, were most likely responsible for the performance of domestic tasks at Charles’s extensive property along Rue Saint-Paul. They married on August 29, 1719, and had seven children born between 1721 and 1733.234 In La Corne’s household, his African descent slaves, Jacques and Anne married and had two children born in 1748 and 1749.235 It appears that the couple remained together in La Corne’s household until Anne’s death, when

Jacques remarried another enslaved member of La Corne’s household, Marie, on May 24, 1757,

112 and had two children born in 1757 and 1759.236 Another example of a slave family in La Corne’s household is seen in the marriage in 1767 between the Panis named Joseph Nicolas and the

Panise Marie-Joseph.237 Two years later the couple had twins.238

Slaves could also become integrated into broader commercial webs formed among families, merchants, and soldiers. The African descent slave Jacques-César had entered into the household of Ignace Gamelin Jr. at the age of nineteen in 1730, most likely through a commercial interaction.239 Jacques-César soon began an intimate relationship with an African descent slave named Marie-Angélique, who lived across the street in the household of Ignace’s business partner François Poulin de Francheville.240 Ignace had created a partnership with

François in 1729, which meant that they frequently interacted commercially and socially, thus drawing the inhabitants of their households into proximity. Although the relationship between

Jacques-César and Marie-Angélique never appeared to be formalized by an official act of marriage, there is no record of any encouragement or discouragement of their informal match by either of their owners. The couple had three children together; a son in 1731 and a set of twins in

1732.241 Unfortunately, none of the children survived infancy.

Shortly after the birth of the twins, the couple appeared to part ways. Marie-Angélique found a new partner: an indentured French servant working in the Poulin de Francheville household. On the other hand, it appears that Jacques-César waited nearly thirty years before beginning another personal relationship and requested permission from Ignace Gamelin Jr. in

1761 to marry an African descent slave named Marie-Élisabeth.242 Marie-Élisabeth’s owner was the widow of Charles-Jacques LeMoyne de Longueuil III, Charles LeMoyne’s grandson. It is unclear whether Ignace Gamelin Jr. was personally connected to the LeMoyne de Longueuil family, however, his sister-in-law, Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais, was responsible

113 for the accommodation of Marie-Élisabeth’s owner during her time in the Hôpital-Général immediately following the death of her husband in 1755.243 More likely, the lives of Jacques-

César and Marie-Élisabeth overlapped along the busy streets of Montréal because of the connections of Ignace’s extended family. The couple eventually married on February 5, 1763 with the consent of both of their owners, and the couple had two children; one born in 1763 and the other in 1766.244 Interestingly, following the decision to marry, their owners agreed to free the couple and their children. It was stipulated that the couple would continue to work in the household of Marie-Élisabeth’s owner for three years with an annual salary of 200 livres, after which, the couple would be free.245

Unfortunately, not all relationships between the enslaved members of Montréal society concluded with freedom. Although some of the enslaved members of Montréal society were able to take advantage of the fluidity and mobility that characterized this colonial space, others were exposed to the limitations posed by their enslaved position and the involuntary mobility and violence that characterized slavery. As Emily West, Jennifer L. Palmer, and Brenda Stevenson have acknowledged, ultimately, the lives of slaves were shaped by the economic interests of their owners.246 Slaves sometimes lived apart, or in other locations, which shows a lack of control over conjugal relations and the inability of slaves to keep their families together.

Even official marriage certificates which emphasized the right of married couples to cohabitate, and the fact that they had had children, did not exempt slave families from being forcibly separated and relocated to distant locations. For example, following the death of an owner, slave families might be split up according to specifications indicated in a will, or families could simply be sold apart. Within the households of Charles LeMoyne and Luc de La Corne, there were two examples of slave families that experienced similar fates. Following the death of

114 Charles LeMoyne in 1729, his property, which included his slaves, Charles and Charlotte-

Élisabeth, was split among his children and his other family members. In accordance with

Charles LeMoyne’s will, Charles, Charlotte-Élisabeth, and five of their children became the property of Charles LeMoyne’s son, Paul-Joseph LeMoyne de Longueuil, while the other two children became the property of Charles LeMoyne’s other son, Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil

II.247 Although this enslaved family remained under the ownership of members of the same family, it is unclear whether they would have continued to see or interact with each other following their integration into the households of Charles’s children. As Charles LeMoyne de

Longueuil II became involved in the colonial administration in Montréal, he continued to live within the city, whereas, Paul-Joseph’s involvement in the military and his relationships with the

Indigenous communities surrounding the western posts of Detroit and Michilimackinac meant that Paul-Joseph spent more time at the French post at Detroit than in the city of Montréal.

Therefore, it is unlikely that the family of Charles and Charlotte-Élisabeth would have spent much time together once they became a part of these new households.

Being sold to someone traveling or living outside of Montréal was even more dramatic.

Luc de La Corne’s household included a couple of African descent, who had been captured in

Saratoga during King George’s War and sold to La Corne in 1745.248 Unfortunately, the couple’s four or five year old daughter, Étiennette, who had also been captured in Saratoga in 1745 was sold to Pierre Nicolas, a member of the Abenaki nation, and was then re-sold to Jacques-Joseph

Gamelin, Ignace’s cousin in 1746.249 Following this sale, it appears that Étiennette was baptized in Montréal during the same year. However, due to Jacques-Joseph’s profession as a fur trader and merchant, he frequently participated in expeditions towards the French posts in the west.

Although it is possible that Étiennette lived within proximity of her parents in the La Corne

115 household and that there were opportunities for these slaves to interact due to the overlapping professions of their owners, Étiennette’s young age would have made the separation from her parents particularly devastating.250

Despite the unpredictability that characterized the nature of intimate and familial relationships between the enslaved members of Montréal society, the presence of enslaved families and children within these households attests to the creation and maintenance of family connections. Bonds created between spouses or friends could provide members of the enslaved population with mutual support. Slaves in Montréal created what Emily West has described as their own “social space,” to assert control over some aspects of their personal lives and create distance between their lives as laborers and their lives as family members.251 Although the decision of a slave to create a family was influenced by masters’ choices, there are examples of slaves making their own choices.252 Of all of the recorded relationships that involved enslaved individuals in Montréal, thirty-three percent more relationships developed between enslaved individuals and other free or enslaved peoples within society than the relationships that developed between enslaved members in the same household. Relationships between slaves most commonly occurred between slaves in the same household and these individuals were more likely to receive permission to marry. However, when all relationships that involved enslaved individuals are considered, including those that occurred between slaves in different households, between slaves and free individuals of Indigenous and African descent, or relationships between slaves and French members of society, the image of a distinct ‘social space’ is highlighted. In terms of social interaction, enslaved individuals in Montréal would have also developed friendships with other members of this society. For example, due to the character of the Hôpital-

Général as a refuge for all members of Montréal society, it is likely that many of the 116

116 enslaved individuals who spent time in the institution, following Marie-Marguerite’s take-over in

1747 until the end of the eighteenth-century, would have developed social relationships and extended their networks of connections.253 Whether by choice or through forceful relocation, extended families developed among both the free and enslaved members of Montréal society.

The community that developed in this evolving city reflected the mobility and fluidity that had defined the city from its initial days of settlement. From a small group of French settlers isolated in a territory dominated by numerous Indigenous communities, Montréal’s population grew to include diverse peoples of European, Indigenous, and African descent from across the

French colonial empire in North America. As the city urbanized and the population expanded, overlapping connections and interactions developed across gender, social, and ethnic boundaries.

The microhistories of the individual households of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, Ignace

Gamelin Jr., Luc de La Corne St. Luc, and Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais, and their diverse inhabitants were microcosms of the broader societal, demographic, and ethnic changes occurring in this colonial space and present a lens through which to view the growth of Montréal from a transient trading post into a bustling urban centre between 1650 and 1750.

117 Conclusion

Montréal was a crossroads in an interconnected French colonial world. The city’s position as a crossroads was influenced by its geographically advantageous location along the St. Lawrence

River. The proximity of the city to its Indigenous neighbours also allowed for the creation of diplomatic and commercial connections, and its proximity to Québec provided the city with access to the colonial administration, French goods, and Atlantic markets. Over a century, the physical layout of the city developed to accommodate and reflect the increasing importance of this site, as commercial, social, and familial connections grew to connect the city to the entire

French colonial world. What began as a transient trading post in the seventeenth-century became a bustling urban centre by the middle of the eighteenth-century. The community that developed in Montréal reflected the fluidity and diversity that had defined the city’s initial days of settlement. From a small group of French settlers, Montréal’s population grew to include diverse peoples of European, Indigenous, and African descent. As the city urbanized and the population expanded, connections and interactions developed across gender, social, and ethnic boundaries.

By 1750, although Montréal no longer visually resembled the small fortified river side settlement of the 1650s, the fundamental characteristics that had motivated its initial development remained intact.

To understand Montréal as a crossroads and to grasp the complex layers of connections that criss-crossed the city and traversed the French colonial empire, we must re-think how we conceptualize colonial urban spaces such as Montréal. This thesis has illustrated the necessity of expanding the ways in which we consider social and economic relations that develop in and across different spaces. As much as households were worlds of their own and a microcosm of the broader societal landscape of the city, they were also connected through economic, social and

118 familial ties to other parts of the French colonial empire. Rather than conceiving of Montréal as a city in a territorially bounded space on an island, it is more fruitful to consider it as part of a much larger riverine, territorial, and interactive web of human contact, both violent and peaceful.

Montréal and its inhabitants cannot be viewed in isolation within the walled quarters of the city, but instead must be viewed as part of a larger interconnected French colonial world.

The methodological framework applied in this thesis, which has centred on the relationships established by individual inhabitants, regardless of their occupation, gender, or ethnicity, provides a framework that can be applied to future studies of colonial spaces. Using individuals as tracers of broader trade networks, including slave trade activities, can illuminate broader societal, colonial, and imperial trends and changes as well as continuities which impacted social relations in Montréal. By moving concentrically from the macro- to the micro- level of analysis, and by bringing together spatial, demographic, and household composition analysis, we can see how connections were established and maintained across long distances and over generations. As a part of this endeavor, it is crucial to include details of the lives of underrepresented people who often get left out of larger historical narratives about colonialism, slavery, or family.

My project has presented the household as a microcosm of the broader colonial society by reconstructing the households of four French individuals with different social and occupational trajectories. Examining the networks of connections created by the diverse individual inhabitants in their households illustrates different forms of mobility, diversity, and interconnectedness that characterized Montréal and the French colonial empire’s inhabitants.

Although not representative of all families in Montréal, the household of Governor Charles

LeMoyne de Longueuil, prominent Montréal merchant Ignace Gamelin Jr., decorated soldier Luc

119 de La Corne St. Luc, and nun Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais show overlapping networks of interaction, business exchange, and interactions with people in bondage. A consideration of the commercial, social, and familial relationships that developed between the members of these households, their immediate family members, and their slaves of both

Indigenous and African descent, also expands our understanding of ‘the early modern family.’ In

Montréal, the extended family was the norm, which came to include individuals connected by blood ties, but also through commercial associations and kinship ties - whether real or fictive.

Creating and maintaining these ties involved different strategies to promote commercial interactions, set up marriages, and enhance wealth or status across all levels of society and outside of the city’s walls.

Although many scholars have worked and continue to work against the grain of writing

“the history of great men,” there are still peoples and groups who remain invisible in the historical narratives of French Canada. This thesis has insisted that slaves and ‘ordinary’ individuals be considered a part of family formation. When considered through a more inclusive perspective, a study of family formation and networks in Montréal allows for a more complete and complex view of colonial society. Each of the individual connections were the bricks that built society and allowed Montréal to grow and progress. Although the diverse peoples in the city were not considered equal, due to gender, ethnicity, or occupation, everyone contributed and played a role in shaping this space. Examining the relationships that developed between slaves and other members of Montréal society, illustrates how both violent and peaceful interactions occurring elsewhere brought diverse peoples of European, Indigenous, and African descent, both free and enslaved, into this space. Ultimately, this project reimagines Montréal as a joint creation and as a part of an interconnected colonial world.

120 By developing the themes of interdependence and cooperation between the French and

Indigenous peoples, this project asks readers to re-evaluate the idea that Montréal was, from its inception, the symbolic, albeit fortified, centre of French settlement and culture in North

America. The French presence on this island was, in fact, fragile and its survival uncertain.

Settlers continually adapted to changing external forces, whether brought about by Europeans or

Indigenous people. This was not a blank slate onto which a dominant French presence was imposed – rather, it was a territory dominated by established Indigenous communities. Out of necessity, the French created extensive commercial, social, and familial relationships with the

Wendat and Algonquian speaking peoples to ensure their survival in the St. Lawrence Valley and on the North American continent. As Louise Dechêne has noted, Montréal developed under the dual influences of the French inhabitant’s traditional cultural backgrounds and their adaptation to the North American environment.1 The commercial, social, and in many ways, familial practices that developed in and around Montréal were the product of interchanges between European and

Indigenous traditions.

Most importantly, this project contributes to the conversations that are debunking the myth of Canada as being a society without slaves or as a haven for slaves escaping from the

United States.2 It is true that the system of slavery that developed in Montréal was different from the institutionalized system that developed in the Caribbean and in what would become the

United States and that this system was heavily influenced by the existing systems of Indigenous captive-exchange that criss-crossed the North American continent. Throughout the almost two centuries of slavery that existed in the French colonies, between 1632 and the abolition of slavery in the British Empire in 1834, the largest numbers of slaves, particularly slaves of

African descent, were transported to the southern regions of North America and the French West

121 Indies. Those who appeared in New France totalled only five percent of the total population, which pales in comparison with the slaves destined for France’s Caribbean Islands.3 Despite these small numbers, slavery thrived in Montréal, and people in bondage experienced inhospitable living conditions, forced displacements, brutal workloads, and the removal of one’s freedom. Although many of the enslaved individuals of both Indigenous and African descent in

Montréal remain anonymous or invisible, the 3,604 slaves identified by Marcel Trudel made important contributions to the development of commerce and families in the city. This project has attempted to grant visibility to people who have been hidden from history, by bringing together all members of Montréal society as participants in the historical dialogue.

122 Endnotes:

Introduction:

1 This imagined street scene is based on historical facts, but also includes some imagined details. Particularly regarding the Governor’s daughter’s wedding some clarification is necessary. No wedding between the Governor’s daughter and another member of Montréal society occurred in 1711, but that detail in the context of this imagined scene helps to emphasize the overlapping nature of this colonial society. During the first decade of the eighteenth- century, most couples would become officially engaged in their parish church, in the presence of their priest and other witnesses, which usually included family members and close friends. Some couples would then go in front of a notary to sign a marriage contract. These official ceremonies were usually proceeded by three banns of marriage, which were public announcements in a Catholic parish church or in the town council of an impending marriage between two specified persons. Although this marriage is a fictional example, its location at the Notre-Dame Cathedral and Marie’s prior knowledge of the event are consistent with the marital practices of the time. See also; Landry, Yves. Orphelines en France prionnières au Canada: Les filles du roi au XVIIe siècles. Montréal: Leméac Éditeur Inc., 1992; Lanctot Gustave. Filles de joie ou filles du roi. Montréal: Les Éditions Chateder Ltée, 1952. 2 Robert Englebert, “Beyond Borders: Mental Mapping and the French River World in North America, 1763-1805,” (PhD diss., University of Ottawa, 2010), p. 270. 3 Englebert, “Beyond Borders,” 7. 4 Cécile Vidal ed., Louisiana: Crossroads of the Atlantic World (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014), p. 304. 5 Vidal, Louisiana, 3. See also; David Armitage, “Three concepts of Atlantic History,” in The British Atlantic World, 1500-1800, ed. David Armitage and Michael J. Braddick (New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002), 21-22, for the original quotation. 6 Gilles Havard, Empire et métissages: Indiens et Français dans le Pays d’en Haut, 1660-1715 (Sillery, QC: Les éditions du Septentrion, 2003), p. 858; Kathleen DuVal, The Native Ground: Indians and Colonists in the Heart of the Continent (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006), p. 320; Claiborne A. Skinner, The Upper Country: French Enterprise in the Colonial Great Lakes (Baltimore, MA: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008), p. 202; Jan Grabowski, “The Common Ground: Settled Natives and French in Montréal, 1667-1760,” (PhD diss., Université de Montréal, 1993), p. 445. 7 Jean-Claude Marsan, Montréal in Evolution: Historical Analysis of the Development of Montréal’s Architecture and Urban Environment (Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1981), p. 456. 8 Louise Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants in Seventeenth-Century Montréal, trans. Liana Vardi (Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1992), p. 428; J.F. Bosher, The Canada Merchants, 1713-1763 (Oxford, UK: Claredon Press, 1987), p. 234; Allan Greer, The People of New France (Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1997), p. 137. 9 Nancy Christie and Michael Gauvreau ed., Mapping the Margins: The Family and Social Discipline in Canada, 1700-1975 (Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2004), p. 424; Françoise Noel, Family Life and Sociability in Upper and Lower Canada, 1780-1870: A View from Diaries and Family Correspondence (Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2003), p. 372. 10 Christie and Gauvreau, Mapping the Margins, 4. 11 Noël, Family Life and Sociability, 4. 12 Marcel Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves et de leurs propriétaires au Canada français (Montréal, QC: Hurtubise HMH, 1990), p. 490. 13 Marcel Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves: Two Centuries of Bondage, trans. George Tombs (Chicago, IL: Independent Publishing Group, 2013), p. 323; Brett Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance: Indigenous and Atlantic Slaveries in New France (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2012), p. 424. 14 James F. Brooks, Captives and Cousins: Slavery, Kinship, and Community in the Southwest Borderlands (Chapel Hill, NC: University of California Press, 2002), p. 419; Carl J. Ekberg, Stealing Indian Women: Native Slavery in the Illinois Country (Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2010), p. 236. 15 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves; Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance; David Greggus, “The French Slave Trade: An Overview,” The William and Mary Quarterly 58, no.1 (January 2001): 119-138. 16 Emily West, Chains of Love: Slave Couples in Antebellum South Carolina (Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2004), p. 200; Brenda E. Stevenson, Life in Black and White: Family and Community in the Slave South (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1996), p. 496; Afua Cooper, The Hanging of Angélique: The Untold Story of

123

Canadian Slavery and the Burning of Old Montréal (Toronto, ON: HarperCollins Canada, 2011), p. 368; Jennifer L. Palmer, Intimate Bonds: Family and Slavery in the French Atlantic (Philadelphia, PA: Pennsylvania University Press, 2016), p. 267. 17Afua Cooper’s work tells the story of one of the most well-known slaves in Canada, Marie-Angélique, who was charged, convicted, and executed for her alleged role in the burning of Old Montréal in 1734. 18 Emma Rothschild, The Inner Life of Empire: An Eighteenth-Century History (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011), p. 483; Palmer, Intimate Bonds; Jean-François Lozier, Flesh Reborn: The Saint Lawrence Valley Mission Settlements through the Seventeenth Century (Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2018), p. 448.

Chapter One: The Physical Presence of Montréal

1 Dale Miquelon, “Ville-Marie (Colony),” The Canadian Encyclopedia, Historica Canada, February 7, 2006, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/ville-marie-colony. The settlement that developed around Fort Ville-Marie retained its name until 1705 when the city officially became Montréal. For the purposes of this analysis, this project refers to this colonial space according to the name that appears on each city plan under consideration. 2 Marcel Trudel, Introduction to New France (Montréal, QC: Holt, Rinehart and Winston of Canada, Limited, 1968), 41. 3 Newton Bosworth, Hochelaga Depicta: The Early History of Montréal and Present State of the City and Island of Montréal (Congdon & Britnell, 1839), 50. 4 Grabowski, “The Common Ground,” ii. 5 Havard, Empire et métissages, 269. 6 Lozier, Flesh Reborn, p. 436; Grabowski, “The Common Ground,” p. 445. 7 Havard, Empire et métissages, p. 858; Englebert, “Beyond Borders,” p. 270. 8 DuVal, The Native Ground, p. 338; Peter N. Moogk, La Nouvelle France: The Making of French Canada: A Cultural History (East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press, 2000), p. 340; Michael A. McDonnell, Masters of Empire: Great Lakes Indians and the Making of America (New York, NY: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2015), p. 402. 9 Reuben Gold Thwaites ed., The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents: Travels and Explorations of the Jesuit Missionaries in New France, 1610-1791 (Cleveland, OH: Burrows Brothers, 1896-1901), 6: 210-13, 228-235, 296- 99; 10: 210-235, 254-261; 27: 246-273; 30: 280-295; Marie de L’Incarnation, Word from New France: The Selected Letters of Marie de L’Incarnation, ed. Joyce Marshall (Toronto, ON: Oxford University Press, 1967), 86. 10 Pierre Gaultier de Varennes et de La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters of Pierre Gaultier de Varennes de La Vérendrye and his Sons: With Correspondence Between the Governors of Canada and the French Court, Touching the Search for the Western Sea, ed. Lawrence J. Burpee (Toronto, ON: The Champlain Society, 1927), 8. 11 Carl J. Ekberg, French Roots in the Illinois Country (Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1998), 12; BANQ-Q, Nicholas de Fer, Le Canada, ou Nouvelle France, la Floride, la Virginie, Pensilvanie, Caroline, Nouvelle Angleterre et Nouvelle Yorek, l’Isle de Terre Neuve, la Louisiane – 1702 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244624; BANQ-Q, Guillaume de L’Isle, Carte du Canada ou de la Nouvelle France et des découvertes qui y ont été faites – 1730 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244644. 12 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 48: 167, 169. 13 Louis Hennepin, A New Discovery of a Vast Country in America (London: Printed by M. Bentley, 1698), 1: 33; Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 65; BANQ-Q, Guillaume de L’Isle, Carte du Canada – 1730 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244645; BANQ-Q, Samuel de Champlain, Le Canada faict par le Sr de Champlain où sont la Nouvelle France, la Nouvelle Angleterre, la Nouvelle Holande, la Nouvelle Suede, la Virginie, & c. – 1677 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2246831. George Heriot provides a very detailed description of the extensive waterways that surrounded the city of Montréal on page 89 and 90. 14 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 4. 15 François Dollier de Casson, A History of Montréal, 1640-1672 (London & Toronto: J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd., 1928), 69. 16 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 4; Skinner, The Upper Country, 45; Maurice Saint-Yves, Atlas de géographie historique du Canada (Boucherville, QC: les éditions françaises, 1982), 5. Saint-Yves’s Atlas includes a map of the patterns of Indigenous settlement throughout the northern territory of North America during the eighteenth-century, until the Conquest in 1760.

124

17 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 4; Skinner, The Upper Country, 45. 18 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 4; Saint-Yves, Atlas de géographie historique, 5. This was the Algonquian nation, not to be confused with the broader Algonquian linguistic group. Although this nation was an Algonquian speaking Indigenous group. 19 Pierre Gaultier de Varennes et La Vérendrye, North-Western Explorations: Journal of La Vérendrye (1738-1739) (Toronto, ON: Canadiana House, 1967), 147-148. 20 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 22: 205-207. 21 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 36: 201. 22 Allan Greer, The Jesuit Relations: Natives and Missionaries in Seventeenth-Century North America (Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2000), 7; L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 34; Havard, Empire et métissages, 116; Hennepin, A New Discovery, 1: 25-26. 23 Havard, Empire et métissages, 206-207; BANQ-Q, P. Coronelli, Partie Occidentale du Canada ou de la Nouvelle France – 1688 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2246864. 24 Marcel Trudel, “Jacques Cartier,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/cartier_jacques_1491_1557_1E.html. 25 Jacques Cartier, The Voyages of Jacques Cartier, trans. Henry Percival Biggar (Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1993), 168. 26 Marc Lescarbot, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France contenant les navigations, découvertes, &habitations faites par les François és Indes Occidentales & Nouvelle-France souz l’avœu & authorité de noz Rois Très-Chrétiens, & les diverse fortunes d’iceux en l’exécution de ces choses, depuis cent ans jusques à hui: en quoy est comprise l’histoire morale, naturelle, & géographique de ladite province: avec les tables et figures d’icelle (Paris: Chez Jean Milot, 1609), 598. 27 Lescarbot, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France, 749. There are several theories about the fate of these peoples. Some suggest they were driven out by their enemy the Algonquian, others suggest that they suffered from a series of poor harvests, but there is no consensus. 28 Marcel Trudel, “Samuel de Champlain,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/champlain_samuel_de_1E.html. 29 For a discussion of the creation of Samuel de Champlain’s multinational alliance system with the Indigenous communities in the St. Lawrence Valley, see; Timothy Brooks, Vermeer’s Hat, 34. 30 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 34: 122-137; L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 50; Marcel Trudel, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France (Montréal, QC: Éditions Fides, 1963), 3, 2: 92. 31 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 30: 220; 42: 92, 116-118, 135. 32 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 35: 208-214. 33 L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 26; Skinner, The Upper Country, 9. 34 L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 70. 35 Statistics of Canada, Censuses of Canada, 1665 to 1871. Recensements du Canada (Ottawa: Printed by I.B. Taylor, 1876), 4: xvi, 2. 36 Trudel, Introduction to New France, 58-59; L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 27. 37 Grabowski, “The Common Ground,” 6, 16. 38 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 34: 122-137; George Heriot, Travels Through the Canadas. To Which is Subjoined a Comparative View of the Manners and Customs of Several of the Indian Nations of North and South America (London: J.G. Barnard, 1805), 52. 39 Marcel Trudel, Montréal: La formation d’une société 1642-1663 (Montréal, QC: Éditions Fides, 1976), 32. 40 André Vachon, “Martine Messier,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/messier_martine_1E.html; Dollier de Casson, A History of Montréal, 165. 41 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 35: 58; 36: 118-122, 132-134, 148, 188-190; 37: 94-96, 100, 104-110, 114-116; 38: 48, 52, 168-170, 176-178. Other examples of these attacks appeared throughout this period and in areas outside of the immediate vicinity of Montréal. For example, on July 12, 1689, a sixteen-year-old French girl was killed by Haudenosaunee warriors outside of Montréal and on June 27, 1691 many French peoples were massacred by Haudenosaunee peoples at Lachine, which was located ten miles to the west of the city. See; Cyprien Tanguay, À travers les registres (Montréal, QC: Librairie Saint-Joseph, Cadieux & Derome, 1886), 68, 75. 42 Moogk, La Nouvelle France, 67. 43 Moogk, La Nouvelle France, 67. 44 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 83; Heriot, Travels Through the Canadas, 49. 45 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 10: 165-167.

125

46 BANQ-Q, Nicolas Sanson, Amérique septentrionale – 1650 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2246846; Pierre-François-Xavier de Charlevoix, History and General Description of New France, ed. John Gilmary Shea and Noah Farnham Morrison (New York, NY: F.P. Harper, 1990), 3: 18; “Éléments chronologiques de l’histoire de Montréal – Événements,” ADHÉMAR, Montréal Centre Canadian d’Architecture, http://www.remparts.info/adhemar_php/chrono_mont.html; L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 181. 47 Charlevoix, History and General Description, 1: 319. 48 Charlevoix, History and General Description, 4: 218-219. 49 Lozier, Flesh Reborn, 153. 50 By 1684, the Governor of New France, Antoine Lefèbvre de La Barre, had conducted a failed expedition against the Seneca and the French were forced to abandon their support for their allies, the Illinois and Miami, who were now becoming the victims of increasingly brutal Haudenosaunee attacks. See; Francis Jennings, The Ambiguous Iroquois Empire: The Covenant Chain Confederation of Indian Tribes with English Colonies from Its Beginnings to the Lancaster Treaty of 1744 (New York, NY: W.W. North & Company, 1984), 184-185. 51 Claude Charles Le Roy Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique septentrionale qui contient (Paris: Chez Nyon fils, 1753), 4: 160. 52 Charlevoix, History and General Description, 1: 528-529. 53 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 3: 191, 204-218, 248-250; Charlevoix, History and General Description, 2: 201-202. 54 Jean-Jacques Lefebvre, “Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil et de Châteauguay,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/le_moyne_de_longueuil_et_de_chateauguay_charles_1E.html; Dollier de Casson, A History of Montréal, 133; Alex Jodoin and J.L. Vincent, Historie de Longueuil et de la famille de Longueuil (Montréal, QC: Impr. Gebhardt-Berthiaume, 1889), 6, 9. There are other examples of Longueuil et de Châteauguay’s diplomatic interactions with Indigenous peoples that appear earlier than 1670. For example, during a military ambush in 1665, Longueuil et de Châteauguay took six Haudenosaunee prisoners, and then negotiated their release in exchange for French prisoners. See; Dollier de Casson, A History of Montréal, 143; Jodoin and Vincent, Historie de Longueuil, 8. 55 Lefebvre, “Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil et de Châteauguay.” 56 “Mémoire de La Barre concernant son expedition au Lac Ontario, 1 October 1684,” Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New-York, ed. John Romeyn Brodhead (Albany: Weed, Parsons, 1853), 9: 254. 57 Céline Dupre, “Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/le_moyne_de_longueuil_charles_1729_2E.html. 58 “Éléments chronologiques,” ADHÉMAR; Charlevoix, History and General Description, 3: 243; 5: 50. 59 Charlevoix, History and General Description, 1: 502, 513, 521; 2: 214; Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 2: 201, 301; 3: 186, 299; 4: 66. 60 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 4: 164, 186, 192. 61 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 4: 125, 133-135, 164-175; Charlevoix, History and General Description, 2: 244. 62 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 3: 101-103; 4: 175. 63 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 3: 201-202; 4: 195, 197, 200, 219, 241; Charlevoix, History and General Description, 2: 273-274. The nations whose signatures appear on the Treaty of Montréal included the French and the Indigenous nations inhabiting the territory from Acadia to the eastern edge of the Great Plaines. Only four of the five Haudenosaunee nations in the Confederacy signatures appear on the Treaty as the Mohawk who were allied with the Dutch and the English in New York were not present at these negotiations. The Montagnais were not present at the conference because they had only been peripherally affected by the Haudenosaunee Wars of the second half of the seventeenth century and had not taken part in any peace negotiations. The Sioux were not included because the allies of the French who were at war with the Sioux did not want to include the Sioux. 64 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 4: 140, 144, 151, 166, 168, 173, 177-178, 182, 249-251, 256, 260. 65 Havard, Empire et métissages, 219. 66 Timothy Brook, Vermeer’s Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World (New York, NY: Bloomsbury Press, 2008), 42-43. 67 Brook, Vermeer’s Hat, 43; Lescarbot, Histoire de la Nouvelle France, 679. 68 Helen Hornback Tanner, Atlas of Great Lakes Indian History (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1987), 18-19; Peter Kalm, Travels Into North America: Containing its Natural History, and A Circumstantial

126

Account of its Plantations and Agriculture in General, with the Civil, Ecclesiastical, and Commercial State of the Country, the Manner of the Inhabitants, and Several Curious and Important Remarks on Various Subjects, trans. John Reinhold Forster (Warrington: W. Eyres, 1770), 387. 69 Claude Charles Le Roy Bacqueville de la Potherie, “Adventures of Nicholas Perrot,” in Early Narratives of the Northwest, ed. Louise Phelps Kellogg (New York, NY: C. Scribner’s sons, 1917), 90. 70 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 7: 106-115, 210-213, 296-299. 71 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 6: 297-299; 7: 106-115, 210-213, 296-299. 72 Skinner, The Upper Country, 7. 73 “Éléments chronologiques,” ADHÉMAR. 74 La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 179, 192. 75 Grabowski, “The Common Ground,” viii. 76 Grabowski, “The Common Ground,” 57, 58. 77 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 60: 306. 78 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 34: 122-137; Heriot, Travels Through the Canadas, 52; Kalm, Travels Into North America, 490. 79 L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 25; Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 40: 211. There are numerous opinions on when the destruction of Huronia actually occurred, however the most consistent time frame appears to suggest that the destruction began in 1643 and culminated between 1647 and 1649. In 1646, the Jesuit’s had brought smallpox to the Wendat communities located north of the Great Lakes, which had weakened the Wendat communities. Capitalizing on the weakness of the communities, the Haudenosaunee Confederacy launched a massive attack against the Wendat peoples in the summer of 1647 and by 1649 the Haudenosaunee had all but destroyed the Wendat nation. The few Wendat peoples who survived the onslaught abandoned their territory and resettled near Québec. See also; Kathryn Magee Labelle, Dispersed But Not Destroyed: A History of the Seventeenth-Century Wendat People (Vancouver, BC: UBC Press, 2013), p. 273. 80 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 40: 211. 81 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 40: 211. 82 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 2: 64. 83 Lozier, Flesh Reborn, 153. 84 Marcel Trudel, Atlas historique du Canada français, des origines à 1867 (Québec, QC: Presses de l’Université Laval, 1961), 91; Kalm, Travels Into North America, 414. 85 Trudel, Atlas historique du Canada français, 91; “Narratives of….” NYCD, 9: 648. 86 Trudel, Atlas historique du Canada français, 91. 87 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 50: 237. 88 “Jean Talon to Louis XIV, October 10, 1670,” NYCD, 9: 63-64. 89 Skinner, The Upper Country, 16. Kenneth J. Banks, Chasing Empire across the Sea: Communications and the State in the French Atlantic, 1713-1763 (Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2002), 25. 90 Skinner, The Upper Country, 27. The Société historique de Saint-Boniface’s Le Centre du patrimoine Database includes digitized versions of many of the contracts that were signed by Montréal merchants and other French individuals involved in the fur trade, including Ignace Gamelin Jr. and Luc de La Corne St. Luc, who funded expeditions and hired voyageurs to travel to other French posts to trade furs and other goods. https://archivesshsb.mb.ca/en. Despite continued attempts to control the flow and price of beaver pelts, protests from the merchant community continued to appear throughout the eighteenth century. For an example see; LAC, “Requête des négociants et habitants du Canada – s’opposent à…” 1728, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 279-280, which includes Ignace Gamelin Jr.’s signature among the Frenchmen that were protesting. 91 “Return of Beaver from Canada from 1675 to 1685,” NYCD, 9: 287; Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 4: 203, 207. As a result of the glut in the fur trade market, in 1674 the Domaine de l’Occident (Company of the Farm) created a monopoly over the fur trade. See; Skinner, The Upper Country, 27. 92 John E. Foster and William John Eccles, “Fur Trade,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, July 23, 2013, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/fur-trade. Interestingly, as discussed by Peter Kalm in Travels Into North America, the concern about control over trade was almost exclusively directed at the trade of beaver pelts. Other trade tended to be open to all French inhabitants in the city of Montréal, p. 509. 93 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 93; Banks, Chasing Empire, 25. 94 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 93; Banks, Chasing Empire, 25. 95 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 503. 96 John E. Foster and William John Eccles, “Fur Trade,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, July 23, 2013, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/fur-trade.

127

97 Samuel De Champlain, The Works of Samuel de Champlain, ed. Henry Percival Biggar (Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1971), 1: 175. The trip downstream from Québec was efficient, only taking between four to eight days, including overnight stops to reach the city of Montréal. See also; Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 66. 98 Havard, Empire et métissages, 269; L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 81; Dollier de Casson, A History of Montréal, 101; BANQ-Q, Guillaume de L’Isle, Carte du Canada ou de la Nouvelle France et des découvertes qui y ont été faites – 1730 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244645. The importance of the settlement of Québec is highlighted by the red mark indicating the settlements location on this map. 99 Bosher, The Canada Merchants, 411. Although canoes could reach the shores of Montréal along the St. Lawrence River, the Lachine rapids, a series of rapids that flow between the Island of Montréal and the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, made it difficult for any larger vessel to make the trip further downstream. Therefore, Québec’s location at the point where the St. Lawrence narrowed before continuing into the continent made it the necessary docking spot for ships coming across the Atlantic. 100 Bosher, The Canada Merchants, 14. 101 Hennepin, A New Discovery, 2: 52; Baron Louis-Armand de La Hontan, New Voyages to North America, ed. Reuben Gold Thwaites (Chicago, IL: A.C. McClung and Co., 1905), 1: 145-146. 102 Skinner, The Upper Country, 12; Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 50: 237; “Jean Talon to Louis XIV, October 10, 1670,” NYCD, 9: 63-64; David R. Farrell, “Anchors of Empire: Detroit, Montreal, and the Continental Interior, 1760-1775,” American Review of Canadian Studies 7, no.1 (March, 1977): 44; Skinner, The Upper Country, 38; Saint-Yves, Atlas de géographie historique, 50. Saint-Yves’s Atlas includes a map that illustrates the distribution of French trading posts throughout what is now Canada and the United States, including their year of establishment. 103 Charlevoix, History and General Description, 2: 272; 4: 12, 272; Hennepin, A New Discovery, 1: 65; Kalm, Travels Into North America, 489; “Proceedings of the Council of Marine, January 6, 1717,” Collections of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, ed. Reuben Gold Thwaites (Wisconsin: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1902), 16: 345-346. 104 La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 57; Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 124; Bosworth, The Early History of Montréal, 90; Hennepin, A New Discovery, 1: 33, 64. To provide some perspective with regard to distances, Samuel de Champlain recorded that if one left Québec on May 21, they could reach the Lachine Rapids on May 28. See; Champlain, The Works of Champlain, 1: 175. 105 Jacques Mathieu, “Sovereign Council” The Canadian Encyclopedia, Historica Canada, May 28, 2007, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/sovereign-council. 106 Hennepin, A New Discovery, 1: 64, 86; Winstanley Briggs, “Le Pays des Illinois,” The William and Mary Quarterly 47, no. 1 (January 1990): 34. 107 Englebert, “Beyond Borders,” 19; Trudel, Atlas historique du Canada français, 93; BANQ-Q, Louis Hennepin, Carte de la Nouvelle France et de la Louisiane nouvellement découverte – 1688 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244736. 108 Robert Michael Morrissey, Empire by Collaboration: Indians, Colonists, and Governments in Colonial Illinois Country (Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015), 4. 109 DuVal, The Native Ground, 1. 110 Englebert, “Beyond Borders,” 22; Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 44. 111 Skinner, The Upper Country, 16. See also; Banks, Chasing Empire, 19. 112 Trudel, Introduction to New France, 53, 57; Banks, Chasing Empire, 20; Hélène Bernier, “Marguerite Bourgeoys,” The Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/bourgeoys_marguerite_1E.html; L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 41, 99. This land included the narrow strip of land that separated the city from the river and accommodated the annual fur trade fair, on which merchants rented out stalls, which the Communauté des Habitants had received in 1651. See; LAC, “Concession de quarante arpents de terre, par le gouverneur Paul…,” October 2, 1651. Série II. MG.17-A7-2, P6495-6497. The commune was recovered by the Société de Notre-Dame in 1677. In theory, the monopoly of the fur trade had passed from the Cent-Associés in 1645 to all of the inhabitants of New France, but in practice it was only the wealthy members of the Communauté who benefitted from this commercial enterprise. 113 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 394. 114 Champlain, The Works of Samuel de Champlain, 1: 177; BANQ-Q, Jacques Nicolas Bellin and Guillaume Dheulland, Carte de L’Isle de Montréal et de ses environs – 1744 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244776; Dollier de Casson, A History of Montréal, 101. 115 “Analyse des données sur la population,” ADHÉMAR, Montréal Centre Canadien d’Architecture, http://www.remparts.info/adhemar_php/anapop.php. 116 “Communauté des habitants,” Canadian Encyclopedia.

128

117 There is a reconstructed map that illustrates the distribution of the French soldiers brought across the Atlantic by Louis XIV in Marcel Trudel’s Atlas historique du Canada français, p. 118. 118 Edmond Lareau, Histoire du droit Canadien depuis les origines de la colonie jusqu’à nos jours, Vol. I: Domination Française (Montréal, QC: A. Périard, 1881), 244-246. 119 Lareau, Histoire du droit Canadien, 248. 120 Lareau, Histoire du droit Canadien, 253. 121 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 73. 122 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 73. 123 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 73. 124 Bosworth, The Early History of Montréal, 92. 125 Bosworth, The Early History of Montréal, 91; Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 79. 126 Heriot, Travels Through the Canadas, 49; Pierre-François-Xavier de Charlevoix, Journal of a Voyage to North America Undertaken by Order of the French King: Containing the Geographical Description and Natural History of that Country Particularly Canada, Together with an Account of the Customs, Characters, Religion, Manners and Traditions of the Original Inhabitants (London: Printed for R. and J. Dodsley, 1761), 1: 214. 127 “Éléments chronologiques,” ADHÉMAR. 128 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 1: 364-365; La Hontan, New Voyages to North America, 1: 94; Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 10. 129 Marcel Trudel, La Population du Canada en 1663 (Montréal, QC: Éditions Fides, 1973), 11; “Éléments chronologiques,” ADHÉMAR; Greer, The People of New France, 6; L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 279. 130 “Analyse des données sur la population,” ADHÉMAR. 131 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 100. Lucie K. Morisset and Luc Noppen, “Architectural History: the French Colonial Regime,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, Historica Canada, September 15, 2006, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/architectural-history-the-french-colonial-regime.. 132 Morisset and Noppen, “Architectural History.” 133 Champlain, The Works of Samuel de Champlain, 2: 178; William Bennett Munro, Documents Relating to the Seigniorial Tenure in Canada, 1598-1854 (Toronto, ON: The Champlain Society, 1908), 97-98. 134 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 76. See also; Étienne Michel Faillon, Historie de la colonie française en Canada, Vol. 3. (Villemarie: Bibliothèque paroissale, 1865). 135 Bosworth, The Early History of Montréal, 93. 136 “Éléments chronologiques,” ADHÉMAR. 137 “Éléments chronologiques,” ADHÉMAR. 138 “Analyse des données sur la population,” ADHÉMAR. 139 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 395, 396. 140 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 90; La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 114. 141 BANQ-Q, Henry Popple, A Map of the British Empire of America with the French and Spanish Settlements Adjacent Thereto – 1733 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244553; BANQ-Q, Jacques Nicolas Bellin and Guillaume Dheulland, Carte de l’Amérique Septentrionale pour server à l’Histoire de la Nouvelle France – 1743 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244695; BANQ-Q, P. Duval, Le Canada faict par le Sr de Champlain où sont la Nouvelle-France, la Nouvelle Angleterre, la Nouvelle Holande, La Nouvelle Suede, La Virginie & c. – 1664 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244623; Albertine Ferland-Angers, “Pierre You de La Découverte,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/you_de_la_decouverte_pierre_2E.html; BANQ-Q, Jacques Nicolas Bellin and F. Desbruslins, Carte du détroit entre le Lac Supérieur et la Lac Huron, avec le Sault Sainte Marie et le Poste de Michillimackinac – 1744 (map), http://collections.banq.qc.ca/ark:/52327/2244702. 142 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 93. 143 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 76. 144 Pierre-Georges Roy, La ville de Québec sous le régime français (Québec, QC: Publié par le service des Archives du gouvernement de la province de Québec, 1930), 1: 389. 145 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 135. 146 See; Michel Lessard and Huguette Marquis, Encyclopédie de la maison Québécoise: 3 siècles d’habitants, Montréal: Éditions de l’homme: distributeur exclusive, Agence de distribution populaire, 1972. This Encyclopédie provides a very thorough discussion of housing design in Québec, p. 250-310. 147 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 397, 398. 148 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 395; Bosworth, The Early History of Montréal, 93. 149 “Analyse des données sur la population,” ADHÉMAR.

129

150 Gilles Havard, The Great Peace of Montréal of 1701: French Native Diplomacy in the Seventeenth Century (Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2001), 126. 151 La Hontan, New Voyages to North America, 1: 94; Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 4: 200. 152 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 4: 200-205. 153 Trudel, Atlas historique du Canada français, 173. 154 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 77. 155 “Architectural History,” The Canadian Encyclopedia. 156 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 395, 157 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 79. 158 Heriot, Travels Through the Canadas, 49. 159 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 392. Although Kalm was writing in 1749, the residence pattern of the Governor-General remained consistent after the construction of the Château Vaudreuil during the 1720s and throughout the eighteenth-century. 160 Charlevoix, Journal of a Voyage to North-America, 1: 213. 161 Charlevoix, Journal of a Voyage to North-America, 1: 213. 162 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 80. 163 France. Conseil d’Etat and New France. Conseil superior de Québec, Édits, ordonnances royaux, declarations et arrêts du Conseil d’état du Roi, concernant le Canada (Québec: Imprimés par Pi.E. Desbarats, 1803-1806), 2: 292- 294. 164 Edward Allen Talbot, Five Years’ Residence in the Canadas: Including a Tour Through Part of the United States of America, in the Year 1823 (London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown and Green, 1824), 1:65. France. Conseil d’Etat and New France. Conseil superior de Québec, Édits, ordonnances royaux, 2: 314-321. 165 Talbot, Five Years’ Residence in the Canadas, 1: 66. According to Louise Dechêne, by 1731 about forty-four percent of urban dwellings were made of stone, page 204. 166 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 3: 73; Heriot also noted this continuing trend in his travel journal on page 49. 167 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 82. Throughout the entire history of the French colonial presence in the upper North American continent, many French-Indigenous, inter-colonial, and inter-Indigenous conflicts threatened the stability of New France. Following the start of the eighteenth-century, numerous conflicts created instability within the continent, including King William’s War, which ended in 1697, Queen Anne’s War, which was the counterpart of the War of the Spanish Succession in Europe and which ended in 1713, and Father Rale’s War, during which the residents of New England fought against the Wabanaki Confederacy who were allied with New France and which ended in 1725. Stone fortifications built around other French settlements during the eighteenth-century, such as Louisbourg, repeating conflicts, and the growing ability of the colonial administration to assert control over Montréal inspired a desire to reinforce the fortifications around the city during the early years of the eighteenth- century. See also; Trudel, Atlas historique du Canada français, 189. 168 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 395. 169 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, 82.

Chapter Two: An Interconnected Colonial Space

1 Research on the European, Indigenous, and African descent, both free and enslaved, population is based on a consideration and cross-referencing of Marcel Trudel’s Dictionnaire des esclaves et de leurs propriétaires au Canada français and the Université de Montréal’s database “Programme de Recherche en Démographique Historique,” hereafter referred to as PRDH. PRDH Individual #47059. 2 Céline Dupré, “ Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ L’Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/le_moyne_de_longueuil_charles_1729_2E.html. 3 PRDH Individual #76089. 4 PRDH Individual #114227; UM, “Extraits généalogiques des de La Corne,” 1675, P0058, A 2/2, mf66. 5 Pierre Tousignant and Madeleine Dionne-Tousignant, “Luc de La Corne,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ L’Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/la_corne_luc_de_4E.html. 6 PRDH Individual #17655. 7 Bosworth, The Early History of Montréal, 140; Rev. D. S. Ramsay, Life of the Venerable M.M Dufrost de Lajemmerais, Mde D’Youville, Foundress of the Sisters of Charity (Called the Grey Nuns) of Montréal Canada (Montréal, QC: The Grey Nunnery, 1895), 19. 8 L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 22. 9 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 18; Kalm, Travels Into North America, 508.

130

10 PRDH Individual #31257. 11 Céline Dupré, “Jean-Louise de La Corne de Chaptes,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ L’Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/la_corne_de_chaptes_jean_louis_de_2E.html. 12 PRDH Individual #17653. 13 Québec, Collection de documents relatifs à l’histoire de la Nouvelle-France (Québec, QC: A. Coté, 1883-1885), 1: 30-31; “Article 17 of the Charter of the Company of One Hundred Associates from 1627,” Edits, ordonnances royaux, 1:10. 14 Statistics, Censuses of Canada, 4: 3. 15 Statistics, Censuses of Canada, 4: 4-5. 16 Jean-Jacques Lefebvre, “Charles Le Moyne de Longueuil et de Châteauguay,” University of Toronto/ L’Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/le_moyne_de_longueuil_et_de_chateauguay_charles_1E.html. 17 Lefebvre, “Charles Le Moyne de Longueuil et de Châteauguay.” 18 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 68: 224, 264; La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 114; Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 1: 364-365. 19 Trudel, La population, 139. 20 Greer, The People of New France, 6; L’Incarnation, Word from New France, 279. 21 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 18. 22 Raudot, “Memoir,” in The Indians of the Western Great Lakes, ed. W. Vernon Kinietz and Antoine Denis Raudot (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2007), 367. 23 Sylvia Van Kirk, Many Tender Ties: Women in Fur-Trade Society, 1670-1870 (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1983), 36; Havard, Empire et métissages, 231. 24 Van Kirk, Many Tender Ties, 4. 25 Van Kirk, Many Tender Ties, 36. See also; Kalm, Travels Into North America, 492. 26 G.P. de T. Glazebrook, The Hargrave Correspondence 1821-1843 (Toronto, ON: The Champlain Society, 2013), 24: 310-311; William Stewart Wallace, Documents Relating to the North West Company (Toronto, ON: The Champlain Society, 2013), 22: 211; Lescarbot, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France, 159, 183; Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 5: 2 11; 10: 27. 27 Guillaume Aubert, ““The Blood of France”: Race and Purity of Blood in the French Atlantic World,” The William and Mary Quarterly 61, no. 3 (July 2004): 446. 28 Trudel, La population, 60. 29 Tom Wien and Suzanne Gousse, “Filles du Roi,” The Canadian Encyclopedia, Historica Canada, December 6, 2011, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/filles-du-roi. 30 Statistics, Censuses of Canada, 4: 2, 6, 11. 31 PRDH Individual #47057, Individual #47058. 32 PRDH Individual #31257, Individual #27638, Couple #94203. 33 PRDH Individual #19201, Individual #19202, Couple #47635, Individual #17653, Individual #17654, Couple #91728. 34 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 220. 35 Raymond Dumais, “Ignace Gamelin,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ L’Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/gamelin_ignace_1698_1771_4E.html. Throughout his career, Ignace Gamelin signed over 370 voyageur contracts on his own behalf or on the behalf of his business partners. The Voyageur Contracts Database created by the Société historique de Saint-Boniface provides details about over 200 of these contracts. 36 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 119. 37 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 94; La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 8; Heriot, Travels Through the Canadas, 103. 38 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 118. 39 Statistics, Censuses of Canada, 4: 40, 48. 40 Statistics, Censuses of Canada, 4: 40, 48. 41 Statistics, Censuses of Canada, 4: 28, 40. 42 “Analyse des données sur la population,” ADHÉMAR. 43 “Analyse des données sur la population,” ADHÉMAR. See Figure # 4 to #9 in chapter one to view the changing property lines and their increasing delineation. 44 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 35. As recorded by Trudel, prior to 1700, 25 Indigenous and five African descent slaves were recorded as having arrived in the colony of New France. 45 La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 52, 172, 173, 188; Charlevoix, History and General Description, 5: 260.

131

46 Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 9. 47 Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 45; William Renwick Riddel, “Before the Conquest,” The Journal of Negro History 5, no. 3 (July 1920): 265; Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 45; Ekberg, Stealing Indian Women, 9. 48 Samuel L. Chatman, ““There are no Slaves in France”: A Re-Examination of Slave Laws in Eighteenth-Century France,” The Journal of Negro History 85, no. 3 (Summer 2000): 144. 49 Chatman, “There are no Slaves in France,” 145. The Code Noir was originally passed by King Louis XIV in 1685. The Code defined the conditions of slavery within the French colonial empire, including the forbidding of the exercising of any religion other than Roman Catholicism, the stipulation that all children born to enslaved females were to remain slaves, behavioural prohibitions for the slave population, and the appropriate punishments of enslaved members of society. 50 Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 13. 51 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 21; Ekberg, Stealing Indian Women, 9; Brett Rushforth, ““A Little Flesh We Offer You”: The Origins of Indian Slavery in New France,” The William and Mary Quarterly 60, no. 4 (2003): 788. 52 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 21; Ekberg, Stealing Indian Women, 9; Rushforth, “A Little Flesh,” 788. 53 Hennepin, A New Discovery, 1: 45, 78; Brooks, Captives and Cousins, 6; Ekberg, Stealing Indian Women, 11; Havard, Empire et métissages, 158; Lescarbot, Histoire de la Nouvelle-France, 772; Rushforth, ““A Little Flesh,” 779; Brett Rushforth, “Slavery, the Fox Wars, and the Limits of Alliance,” The William and Mary Quarterly 63, no. 1 (January 2006): 61; Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 63. 54 Lozier, Flesh Reborn, 100. 55 Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 46; Brooks, Captives and Cousins, 33-34; Ekberg, Stealing Indian Women, 12; Havard, The Great Peace of Montréal, 71, 88. 56 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 28: 49-51; 54: 177, 191, 59: 127. 57 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 70: 316. 58 Jacques Marquette and Louis Jolliet, Voyage et découverte de quelques pays et nations de l’Amérique septentrionale (Paris, 1681), 21. 59 Albertine Ferland-Angers, “Pierre You de La Découverte,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/you_de_la_decouverte_pierre_2E.html; PRDH Individual #42745. 60 Ferland-Angers, “Pierre You;” Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 41-121; PRDH Individual #42745. 61 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 4: 22, 216, 225, 244, 246. As Gilles Havard states in The Great Peace of Montréal, prisoners were central to the Indigenous culture of war and peace. War made possible the taking of prisoners and peace made possible their recovery. 62 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 43. 63 To see M. Raudot’s Ordinance, see the transcription in Brett Rushforth’s Bonds of Alliance, Appendix B, pages 393 to 395. Although the Pawnee nation lived in present-day Oklahoma, the term Panis became synonymous with Indigenous slaves and that is why this Ordinance refers specifically to “the Negroes and the Indians called Panis.” 64 Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 178. 65 Rushforth, “A Little Flesh,” 808. 66 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 106. 67 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 116. 68 Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 139. 69 McDonnell, Masters of Empire, 71, 72; “Father Allouez, 1670,” CHW, 16: 70; “News from the Ottawas, 1695,” CHW, 16: 165. Throughout Marcel Trudel’s Dictionnaire there are numerous examples of slaves recorded as entering into French hands as a result of diplomatic interactions with the Indigenous allies of the French. In addition, Pierre Gaultier de La Vérendrye records in his journal that he received Indigenous captives from the allies he encountered during his exploration of the west. 70 Rushforth, “A Little Flesh,” 789; Catherine Desbarats, “Deux pas vers une histoire du politique décolonisée: les problèmes de la souveraineté et de l'esclavage amérindien en Nouvelle-France,” Bulletin d’histoire politique 18, no. 3 (2013): 6. 71 Marquette and Jolliet, Voyage et découverte, 21; Rushforth, “A Little Flesh,” 793. 72 “Vaudreuil to the Council of Marine, October 14, 1716,” CHW, 16: 342-343; “Beauharnois to the Minister of Marine, October 16, 1737,” CHW, 17: 275-276.” 73 Rushforth, “Slavery, the Fox Wars, and the Limits of Alliance,” 54. 74 Rushforth, “Slavery, the Fox Wars, and the Limits of Alliance,” 66. 75 McDonnell, Masters of Empire, 88.

132

76 LAC, “Vaudreuil au minister,” 1723, octobre, 02, Correspondance general; Canada, série C11A, vol. 45, fol. 136- 141v; “Vaudreuil to the Council of the Marine, October 14, 1716,” CHW, 16: 341-344; ‘Proceedings in French Council of Marine, March 28, 1716,” CHW, 16: 340. The same hesitance and problems surrounding the return of war captives was also evident during the negotiation of the Great Peace of Montréal in 1701 when the Indigenous nations of the west, such as the Wendat and the Odawa, were not keen to release the Haudenosaunee prisoners whom they had adopted into their communities. See also; Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 4: 175, 224. 77 “Vaudreuil to Council, October 30, 1718,” CHW, 16: 379. 78 “Vaudreuil to French Minister, October 2, 1723”, CHW, 16: 428; Hennepin, A New Discovery, 1: 134; LAC, “Lettre de Beauharnois et Hocquart concernant la saisie…” 1733, octobre, 04, série C11A, Correspondance général; Canada, fol. 108-112, P94-98. 79 La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 172-173. 80 Brooks, Captives and Cousins, 15. 81 La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 50. 82 Kalm, Travels Into North America, 418-419. 83 Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 291. Slaves most commonly appeared in church records as eighty percent of all slaves of both Indigenous and African descent were baptized. 84 Brooks, Captives and Cousins, 14. 85 James F. Brooks, Brett Rushforth, and Marcel Trudel have identified throughout their work the position of the term ‘Panis’ as a generalized category, which was equated with any Indigenous individual eligible for enslavement. 86 BANQ-Q, Jacques Raudot, “Ordonnance rendüe au sujet des neigres et des Sauvages nommez Panis,” April 13, 1709, E1, S1, P509. 87 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 67. 88 The dates I have chosen for the timeline of the Fox Wars are based on the dates recorded by Alan Gallay in Colonial Wars of North America, 1512-1763: An Encyclopedia. For the recorded numbers of Indigenous slaves from the Fox nation, the entirety of Marcel Trudel’s Dictionnaire was considered. 89 This annual average of recorded Panis slaves is the result of the consideration of Marcel Trudel’s Dictionnaire, p. 41-121. 90 For other examples of this aspect of peace negotiations, see Gilles Havard’s discussion of the negotiation of prisoner return during the Great Peace of Montréal in 1701 in The Great Peace of 1701, p. 52-98. 91 Catherine Desbarats, “Following “The Middle Ground,” The William and Mary Quarterly 63, no. 1 (January 2006): 92; LAC, Vaudreuil au minister, October 2, 1723, Correspondence Générale, Canada, série C11A, vol. 45, fol. 136-41V. 92 These numbers are the result of the consideration of Marcel Trudel’s extensive records in his Dictionnaire, specifically his section on Detroit and Québec, and the consideration of Cyprien Tanguay’s Dictionnaire généalogique, volume 7, p. 129-140. 93 These numbers are the result of the consideration of Marcel Trudel’s extensive records in his Dictionnaire and the consideration of Cyprien Tanguay’s Dictionnaire généalogique, volume 7, p. 129-140. 94 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 64. 95 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 35, 40. 96 Greer, People of New France, 87; Michael J. Foret, “War or Peace? Louisiana, the Choctaws, and the Chickasaws, 1733-1735,” The Journal of Louisiana Historical Association 31, no. 3 (1990): 275. 97 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 74; French explorer Robert Cavelier de La Salle named the region of Louisiana in honour of the King of France, Louis XIV, in 1682. However, the first permanent settlement, Fort Maurepas, was founded by Charles’s brother, Pierre LeMoyne d’Iberville, in 1699. This fort is not to be confused with Fort Maurepas established by Pierre Gaultier de La Vérendrye at the mouth of the Winnipeg River. 98 Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 163. 99 David Eltis and Allen Tullos, “Voyage Database,” The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database: Voyages, Emory University, http://www.slavevoyages.org/voyage/search. 100 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 75. 101 Greggus, “The French Slave Trade,” 122. 102 Greggus, “The French Slave Trade,” 122; Banks, Chasing Empire, 24, 36. 103 Greggus, “The French Slave Trade,” 122. For more about the role of La Rochelle and the role of other French ports in the French Atlantic slave trade see; Banks, Chasing Empire, 35. 104 PRDH Individual #204479. 105 Rushforth, “A Little Flesh,” 799.

133

106 Greggus, “The French Slave Trade,” 122. 107 Rushforth, “A Little Flesh,” 799. 108 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 96, 136. As acknowledged by Trudel, these calculations are based upon estimated ages. The recorded age of enslaved individuals that do appear within the historical record are themselves rough estimates, so therefore the average age of slaves and their average age at their time of death are estimates. 109 Greer, People of New France, 87; Rushforth, “Slavery, the Fox Wars, and the Limits of Alliance,” 71; Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 144. 110 Robin William Winks, The Blacks in Canada: A History (Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1997), 10; Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 20. In terms of the numerical significance of indentured labourers within individual households, a wealthy member of Montréal society like Charles LeMoyne might employ five to nine indentured men, while less wealthy members of Montréal society might employ three to five indentured men, see Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 26. Interestingly, due to the frequency of interaction with diverse peoples of French, Indigenous, and African descent, and the fact that the majority of the slaves that appeared in Montréal had been taken as children, Indigenous slaves were the only Indigenous group who appeared to master the French language. 111 Harold A. Innis, The Fur Trade in Canada: An Introduction to Canadian Economic History (Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1966), 12-14. 112 “Lettre de Jolliet à Monseigneur de Laval, October 10, 1674,” in Louis Jolliet: vie et voyages, 1645-1700, ed. Jean Delanglez (Montréal, QC: Les Études de l’Institute d’Histoire de l’Amérique française, 1950), 403; La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 309; Hennepin, A New Discovery, 2: 181; Rushforth, “Slavery, the Fox Wars, and the Limits of Alliance,” 71; Ekberg, Stealing Indian Women, 36. Many examples of contracts such as this appear throughout Trudel’s Dictionnaire. For example, La Corne hired a Panis named Joseph Larose to assist him on an expedition to the west in 1738, and Charles LeMoyne’s slave Gabriel was loaned out consistently throughout his life to various French merchants travelling to the west. In total, thirty-one enslaved individuals of Indigenous descent and ten enslaved individuals of African descent are recorded in Trudel’s Dictionnaire as being ‘engaged’ by French individuals to perform various tasks. 113 Jean Baptiste Du Tertre, Histoire générale des isles de S. Christophe de la Guadeloupe, de la Martinique, et autres dans l’Amérique (Paris: Chez Jacques Langlois et Emmanuel Langlois, 1654), 480-181; Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 184, 190. 114 Prior to legalization, there appears to have been 36 Indigenous slaves and five slaves of African descent within the city of Montréal specifically. Overall, between 1686 and 1713, Marcel Trudel identified 145 Indigenous and thirteen African descent slaves within New France. Following legalization these numbers did increase throughout the colony and between 1715 and 1730, Trudel recorded the arrival to New France of 377 Indigenous slaves, compared to 37 African descent slaves. In Montréal, during the same period, there appears to have been the recorded presence of 195 slaves of Indigenous descent, over fifty percent of the total number of Indigenous slaves recorded in the colony of New France, compared to the recorded presence of eighteen African descent slaves. 115 Greggus, “The French Slave Trade,” 126; Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 40. 116 Catherine Desbarats, “Deux pas vers une histoire du politique décolonisée, 5; Greggus, “The French Slave Trade,” 119, 125. 117 Desbarats, “Deux pas vers une histoire du politique décolonisée,” 5; Greggus, “The French Slave Trade,” 119, 125. 118 Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 3. 119 Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 13. It should be noted that different types of households including single parent households, and single or widowed individuals also appeared in Montréal. 120 Cooper, The Hanging of Angélique, 131; Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, 221; Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 334. 121 Nancy E. van Deusen, Global Indios: The Indigenous Struggle for Justice in Sixteenth-Century Spain (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015), 81. 122 van Deusen, Global Indios, 81. 123 van Deusen, Global Indios, 81; Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 4, 48, 132-134. See also; Wendy Anne Warren, ““The Cause of Her Grief”: The Rape of a Slave in Early New England,” The Journal of American History 93, no. 4 (2007): 1031-1049. 124 Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 324. 125 The same desire to monitor the activities of enslaved members of ones’ community appeared in Indigenous communities, see Louis Hennepin’s description of his experience as a captive in Sioux society in; Louis Hennepin,

134

Nouvelle découverte d’un très grand pays situé dans l’Amérique, entre le Nouveau Mexique et la mer glaciale (Utrecht, 1697), 320-321, 362, 463. 126 Moogk, La Nouvelle France, 216. 127 Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 71. 128 Moogk, La Nouvelle France, 229. 129 James Frederick Traer, “Marriage and the Family in French Law and Social Criticism from the End of the Ancien Regime to the Civil Code” (PhD diss., The University of Michigan, 1970), 9. 130 Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 14. 131 Nancy Christie, “Introduction: Interrogating the Conjugal Family,” in Mapping the Margins: The Family and Social Discipline in Canada, 1700-1975, ed. Nancy Christie and Michael Gauvreau (Montréal & Kingston: McGill- Queen’s University Press, 2004), 4. 132 Noël, Family Life and Sociability, 4, 14. 133 West, Chains of Love, 159. 134 Rothschild. The Inner Life of Empires, 7. 135 LAC, “Lettre d’érection en baronie de la terre et seigneurie de…” 1699, mai, 19, Série B. Lettres envoyées, fol. 191v-194v. 136 Jodoin and Vincent, Histoire de Longueuil, 104. 137 Skinner, The Upper Country, 67. Charles’s brothers were also involved in relationships with the surrounding Indigenous communities. For example, as a result of his familiarity with Indigenous dialects Charles’s brother, Paul LeMoyne de Maricourt, served as an interpreter for Indigenous peoples who appeared in court in Montréal. See; René Jetté, Dictionnaire généalogique des familles du Québec (Montréal, QC: Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 1983). 138 Jodoin and Vincent, Histoire de Longueuil, 115; Dayna Bowker Lee, “From Captives to Kin: Indian Slavery and Changing Social Identities on the Louisiana Colonial Frontier,” in Native American Adoption, Captivity, and Slavery in Changing Contexts, ed. Max Carocci and Stephanie Pratt (London, UK: Palgrave Macmillian, 2012), 81. D’Ibeville was also involved in other activities that worked to bring slaves into the French colony of Louisiana, including raids of English settlements in the Caribbean. For example, in 1697, d’Iberville was involved in a raid on the Island of Nevis, from which he captured 1,400 slaves, who were then sold in Martinique. See; Banks, Chasing Empire, 30. 139 Jodoin and Vincent, Histoire de Longueuil, 115; Lee, “From Captives to Kin,” 81. 140 Ekberg, Stealing Indian Women, 13; Albert Valdman, “Creole, the Language of Slavery,” in Slavery in the Caribbean Francophone World, ed. Doris Y. Kadish (Athens, GA: The University of Georgia Press, 2000), 144; Pierre-François-Xavier de Charlevoix, Histoire et description générale de la Nouvelle France: avec le journal historique d’un voyage fait par ordre du Roi dans l’Amérique septentrionale (Paris: Chez la Veuve Ganeau, 1744), 6: 79; McDonnell, Masters of Empire, 129; Foret, “War or Peace?” 273. 141 For other works that examine the centrality of figurative kinship ties see; Brooks, Captives and Cousins, p. 419; DuVal, The Native Ground, p. 320; Havard, Empire et métissages, p. 858; McDonnell, Masters of Empire, p. 402; Lozier, Flesh Reborn, 94, 99, 206. 142 LAC, “Lettre de La Barre au minister – craint de ne…” 1683, novembre, 04, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 136, 140. 143 Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 63: 180. For a specific example of Charles serving as an interpreter between the Onondaga chief Otreouti and the French Governor Antoine Lefèbvre de La Barre during the initial peace negotiations between the French and the Haudenosaunee in 1684, see quote in Baron Louis-Armand de La Hontan, New Voyages to North America, 1: 84. 144 Havard, The Great Peace, 76; Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 3: 207; Dupré, “Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil.” 145 LAC, “Diverse demandes concenant le Canada,” 1695, Correspondance general, Canada; Série C11A, fol. 1-12v, P1-20; LAC, “Délibération de Conseil de Marine…” 1716, mars, 28, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 144v-145; “Letter of Colonel Nicholason to Secretary Popple, 1715,” NYCD, 5: 414-415. 146 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 371. 147 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 371. 148 The lateness of Charles’s relationship with the Oneida may have been the result of the historical particularly tumultuous relationship between the French and the members of the Oneida nation. See; Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 54: 113. 149 PRDH Individual #47059, Individual #47074, Couple #40774.

135

150 LAC, “Délibération du Conseil de Marine sur des demandes concernant des…” 2 mai 1722, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 520; LAC, “Extraits de lettres concernant le Canada avec commentaires…” 1706, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 100v-101. 151 LAC, “Lettre de Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil au minister…” 1733, septembre, 20, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 345-346v; LAC, “Notariat de l’Acadie et du Canada,” 1738, décembre, 13, Dépot des papiers publics des colonies; notariat, Série G3, P1; LAC, “Lettre de La Galissonière au minister – propose Charles…” 1748, octobre, 12, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 201; LAC, “Journal anonyme d’un voyage d’un groupe de français partis de…” 1745, Archives du Séminaire de Québec, Fonds Viger-Verreau, P12; André Lachance, “Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/le_moyne_de_longueuil_charles_1687_1755_3E.html. 152 LAC, “Lettre de Vaudreuil de Cavagnial au minister concernant la mission…” 1758, août, 04, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 164-165; Andrew Rodger, “Paul-Joseph LeMoyne de Longueuil,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/le_moyne_de_longueuil_paul_joseph_4E.html. 153 LAC, “Bordereau par extrait de la recette et dépense contenue au…” 1732, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 471v; LAC, “Certificat de Paul-Joseph LeMoyne de Longueuil, commandant de Détroit…” 1744, juin, 28, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 387. 154 J.F. Bosher, The Canada Merchants, 23; Englebert, “Beyond Borders,” 97. 155 Englebert, “Beyond Borders,” 97. 156 PRDH Individual #76089. 157 Dumais, “Ignace Gamelin.” 158 La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 39; Dumais, “Ignace Gamelin.” 159 Dumais, “Ignace Gamelin;” LAC, “Requête des négociants de la ville de Québec à Beauharnois,” 1727, Correspondance Générale; Canada, fol. 168-171v, P182-193; LAC, “Copie d’un ordre de Beauharnois à Verchères, commandant de Michilimackinac,” 1742, juin, 22, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 149-150, P162-165; LAC, “Permission accordée par M. le gouverneur général au sieur Ignace…” 24 mai 1725, Congés et permis enregistrés à Montréal, P574-577. 160 LAC, “Copie d’un ordre de Beauharnois à Verchères, commandant de Michilimackinac…” 22 juin 1742, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 149-150; Dumais, “Ignace Gamelin.” Almost 300 contracts signed by Ignace or by his business partners appear in the Voyageur Contracts Database, which was created by the Société historique de Saint-Boniface. 161 Charles Nolan Lamarque’s grandfather served as a very prominent interpreter for Indigenous peoples in Montréal, particularly those Indigenous peoples that appeared in court, and was familiar with numerous Indigenous languages. See; E.Z. Massicotte, “Les interprètes à Montréal sous les régime français,” Bulletin des recherches historique 34 (1928): 140-150. 162 “Count de Frontenac to Colbert, November 2, 1672,” NYCD, 9: 63-64. 163 Dumais, “Ignace Gamelin;” LAC, “Lettre de François-Étienne Cugnet, Ignace Gamelin et Thomas-Jacques Taschereau..,” 1740, Octobre, 19, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 178-187v, P132-147; LAC, “Extrait des comptes du sieur Ignace Gamelin,” 1741, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 81v, P181-187. 164 LAC, “Offre faite au roi par Olivier Vézin, Ignace Gamelin…” 23 octobre 1735, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 198-199, P152-157. 165 Dumais, “Ignace Gamelin;” LAC, “État des lettres de change tirées triples la présente année…” 1745, octobre, 30, Correspondance Générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 200-205, P419-429; LAC, “Étude Bonniot: Desbarres,” 1737, octobre, 11, Correspondance Générale; Canada, Série C11A; BANQ-M, “Inventaire des biens de la communauté de Louise Dufros de Lajemmeraye…” 8 mai 1771, Greffes de Notaires, M-620-327, P0829-0864; LAC, “Lettre d’Ignace Gamelin à Claude-Pierre Pécaudy de Contrecoeur…” 20 avril 1753, Archives du Séminaire de Québec, Fonds Viger-Verreau, P3; LAC, “Etude Bonniot: Desbarres,” 11 octobre 1737, Notaires; “Police passé entre René Legardeur de Beauvais, commandant…” 1 avril 1740, Série 6B-Amirauté de Guyenne: attributions judiciaries. 166 Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 1, 8; Hennepin, A New Discovery, 2: 6. 167 LAC, “Lettre de Beauharnois au minister – promotion sollicitée pour…” 12 novembre 1733, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 49-50v, P40; LAC, “Le président du conseil de marine à M. de Beauharnois…” 20 avril 1734, Série B. Lettres envoyées, fol. 529. 168 Leslie Choquette, Frenchmen into Peasants: Modernity and the Tradition in the Peopling of French Canada (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997), 14.

136

169 LAC, “Procès-verbal d’une assemblée des officiers du détachement de Canadiens…” 1746, mars, 22, Archives du Séminaire de Québec, Fonds Viger-Verreau; LAC, “Relation par M. de Boishébert, d’une expedition de Français et…” 1747, juin, 23, Première série, P204-208. 170 LAC, “La Corne de Saint-Luc. Enseigne des troupes du Canada. 1747,…” Série E. Dossiers personnels, P4-5. 171 LAC, “Feuille au roi..” 1748, janvier, 28, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 114-115, P98-100. See also; J. A. Maurault, Histoire des Abénakis depuis 1605 jusqu’à nos jours (Sorel, QC: Atelier, Typographique, 1866). 172 LAC, “Lettre de Beauharnois au minister…” 1741, novembre, 01, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 238v-239; LAC, ““Projet de promotion”” contenant les noms des gens recommandés…” 1748, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 221v; LAC, “Remplacement d’officiers à faire dans les troupes du Canada…” 1754, octobre, 10, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 282. 173 PRDH Individual #114227, Individual #114228, Couple #150142. 174 William R. Nester, The French and Indian War and the Conquest of New France (Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2014), 1-7. 175 BANQ-M, “Enregistrement d’une permission accordée par Charles de Beauharnois,” Juin 1735, TL4, S34, P424. 176 Bernd Horn, “La Petite Guerre: A Strategy of Survival,” in Perspectives on the Canadian Way of War: Serving the National Interest, edited by Bernd Horn (Toronto, ON: Dundurn Press, 2006), 10; LAC, “Extrait de la dépense qui a été faite dans les…” 1 septembre 1747, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 176v-196v. 177 Tousignant and Dionne-Tousignant, “Luc de La Corne.” The most common Indigenous languages that were known by the French inhabitants were Haudenosaunee, Abenakis, and Odawa, and a variety of other dialects were understood by French individuals depending on which Indigenous nations they interacted with most frequently. See; Thwaites, The Jesuit Relations, 68: 224, 264; La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 114. 178 Bacqueville de la Potherie, Histoire de l’Amérique, 1: 364-365; Tousignant and Dionne-Tousignant, “Luc de La Corne.” 179 Tousignant and Dionne-Tousignant, “Luc de La Corne.” 180 PRDH Individual #114227, Individual #83077, Couple #298730: LAC, “Liste des officiers, cadets et soldats detaches…” 22 octobre 1745, Archives du Séminaire de Québec, Fonds Viger-Verreau, P4. 181 LAC, “Le Président du Conseil de Marine à M. de Vaudreuil…” 20 janvier 1759, Série B. Lettres envoyées, fol. 17. The Ordre Royal et Militaire de Saint-Louis is a dynastic order of chivalry founded on April 5, 1693 by King Louis XIV. It was intended to be rewarded to exceptional officers and it is notable because it is the first decoration that could be granted to non-nobles. 182 Tousignant and Dionne-Tousignant, “Luc de La Corne.” Beginning in 1738 until the end of the French regime in 1763, La Corne signed more then 80 hiring contracts for voyageurs traveling to other French posts, including Detroit, Michilimackinac, and Sault Ste. Marie. Contracts signed by La Corne also appear in the Voyageur Contracts Database, which was created by the Société historique de Saint-Boniface. 183 PRDH Individual #114227, Individual #105930, Couple #213372; LAC, “Contrat de mariage entre Luc de Chapt de La Corne…” 1774, mars, 17, Série II, P8464-8467. 184 In Collaboration, “Pierre Boucher de Boucherville,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://biographi.ca/en/bio/boucher_de_boucherville_pierre_3E.html. 185 Of the approximately 4,000 slaves who are known to have existed, owned by around 1,500 individuals, only about 30 owners held more than ten slaves. Of these large owners, La Corne was second only to Governor Charles de Beauharnois de la Boische. 186 PRDH Individual #76089, Individual #76090, Couple #149699; PDRH Individual #92542, Individual #92543, Couple #146546. 187 La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 8, 71; LAC, “Documentation relative au commerce du castor pendant la période 1718-1744…” 1744, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 181v. 188 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 81; Pierre-Georges Roy, La Famille Dufros de Lajemmerais (Levis, 1937), 9; LAC, “Le president du conseil de marine à M. de Beauharnois…” 20 avril 1734, Série B. Lettres envoyées, fol. 529. As the French were attempting to encourage peaceful relations between their Indigenous allies and the Fox in the territory surrounding Detroit, other Indigenous people who inhabited the pays d’en haut, including the Odawa, Cree, Assiniboine, and Monsonis, banded together against the Sioux nation, whose territory was located west of Montréal on the other side of Lake Superior. See; La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 76, 104. 189 Ramsay, Life of the Venerable M.M Dufrost de Lajemmerais, 6; LAC, “Liste et qualité de ceux qui ont signé la requête…” 1725, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 436-437, P236-237. 190 At the time of Marie-Marguerite’s marriage, her mother had just remarried and the family moved to Montréal. The marriage contract of Marie-Marguerite and François-Madeleine attests to the significance of the match and

137 includes signatures from many prominent members of French colonial society, including the Governor of Montréal, and Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, who was serving as the Governor of Trois-Rivières at the time. 191 LAC, “Lettre de Vaudreuil au Conseil de Marine – commente les…” 1722, octobre, 15, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 346v-347; LAC, “Lettre de Ramezay au minister avec commentaires dans la marge…” 1723, octobre 15, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 333v-334; Lionel Groulx, “Un Seigneur en Soutane,” Reuve d’histoire de l’Amérique français 11, no. 2 (1966): 210; “La Barre au ministre, 12 novembre 1682,” NYCD, 9: 798. Pierre You’s property at Fort Senneville was located at a narrowed portion of Lac- des-Deux-Montagnes across from the mission community at Île-aux-Toutres. 192 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 58; Ferland-Angers, “Pierre You;” Rushforth, “A Little Flesh,” 799; Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 73; Bosworth, The Early History of Montréal, 50; Kalm, Travels Into North America, 322, 332. 193 Ferland-Angers, “Pierre You.” 194 Marie-Marguerite remained a part of the commercial networks of the You de la Découverte family following her husband’s death in 1730, and in a manner consistent with the activities of many of the wives of men involved in commercial activities, attempted to continue François-Madeleine’s commercial activities after his death until she went bankrupt. However, Marie-Marguerite went bankrupt because of her husband’s activities prior to his death. Following the death of her husband, Marie-Marguerite was left an estate burdened with debts since her husband had spent his time squandering his own inheritance and spending the money that he earned from his trading activities. 195 BANQ-Q, “Donation par Marguerite [Catherine] Damien…” 30 août 1741, CR301, P2168. 196 Claudette Lacelle, “Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/dufrost_de_lajemmerais_marie_marguerite_4E.html. 197 Bosworth, The Early History of Montréal, 141; Colleen Gray, “Power, Position and the pesante charge: Becoming a Superior in the Congrégation de Notre-Dame of Montreal, 1693-1796,” Histoire Sociale/ Social History 40, no. 79 (2007): 478; Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 136; Ferland-Angers Albertine, Mère d’Youville: Première Fondatrice Canadienne (Montréal, QC: Libraire Beauchemin, 1945), 333; Trudel’s Dictionnaire references numerous examples of slaves who passed through the hospital during times of sickness and other examples of slaves who passed away while in the care of the hospital. Prior to taking her position as the Superior of the Hôpital-Général, Marie-Marguerite’s household included a number of slaves, and Trudel recorded that Marie- Marguerite owned three or four of the forty-three slaves owned by the clergy and other religious communities in New France and that she had more slaves than any other women’s religious community. See also; Mary Corley Dunn, “The Miracles at Sainte-Anne-du-Petit-Cap and the Making of a Seventeenth Century Colonial Community,” The Canadian Historical Review 91, no. 4 (2010): 611-635. 198 Louis Lemoine, “Marie-Charles-Joseph LeMoyne de Longueuil,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, University of Toronto/ Université Laval, http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/le_moyne_de_longueuil_marie_charles_joseph_7F.html. 199 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 135-136. Numerous examples of these types of circumstances appear throughout Trudel’s Dictionnaire, for some specific examples see; Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 55, 95. For another example of a similar religious institution see; Nancy E. van Deusen, “The ‘Alienated’ Body: Slaves and Castas in the Hospital de San Bartolomé in Lima, 1680 to 1700,” The Americas 56, no. 1 (1999): 1-30. 200 Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 135-136. Numerous examples of these types of circumstances appear throughout Trudel’s Dictionnaire, for some specific examples see; Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 55, 95. 201 BANQ-M, “Testament de Marie-Marguerite Dufros de Lajemmeraye…” 14 décembre 1771, Greffes de Notaires, M620-327, P1437-1456. This last will and testament also included the slaves that Marie-Marguerite had inherited from her husband following his death, including a Panis around ten or eleven years old, and the slaves that had been donated to the Hôpital-Général du Montréal. See also; Ferland-Angers, Mère d’Youville, 286. 202 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 81. In a manner similar to the persistent enslavement of the Fox nation during the Fox Wars, by the mid-1730s and during the 1740s, those allies of the French who had depleted the Fox population now turned to enslave the Sioux of the upper mid-west. 203 Pierre-Georges Roy, Inventaire des ordonnances des intendants de la Nouvelle France conserves aux archives provinciales de Québec (Beauceville, QC, 1919), 2: 146-147. 204 Two months after the official legalization of slavery in New France, the first notarized sale of a Panis slave took place. On June 15, a notary drew up the first known contract for the sale of a Panis: Madeleine Just, the wife of Pierre You de la Découverte, sold her Panis Pascal for the sum of 120 livres to a Lieutenant. See; Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, 47. 205 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 347. The anonymous Panis given to the Hôpital-Général in 1763 came from the household of Marie-Catherine Duverger D’Aubusson, who was the widow of the nobleman Paul-François

138

Raimbault de Saint-Blin. The second Panise, Marie-Marguerite, who was given to the Hôpital in 1764, came from the household of André-Grasset de Saint-Sauveur, who was a successful merchant in Montréal and served as the secretary to the Governor. 206 PRDH Individual #76089, Individual #76090, Couple #149699. 207 PDRH Individual #92542, Individual #92543, Couple #146546. 208 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 86. 209 LAC, “Extrait des comptes du sieur Ignace Gamelin… des recettes et dépenses…” 1741, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 81-81v. Pierre Gaultier de La Vérendrye attests to the centrality of Montréal as a provider of supplies that were taken to trade and gift to the Indigenous allies of the French who inhabited the pays d’en haut. See; La Vérendrye, Journals and Letters, 162. 210 PRDH Individual #110569, Individual #132823, Couple #25888. 211 LAC, “Ordonnance de La Calissonière et Hocquart – les négociants de…” 15 octobre 1747, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 140-145v. 212 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 60. 213 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 60. 214 Jodoin and Vincent, Histoire de Longueuil, 241; Bosworth, The Early History of Montréal, 142. 215 LAC, “Remplacement d’officiers à faire dans les troupes du Canada en…” 10 octobre 1754, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 282. 216 Dumais, “Ignace Gamelin.” 217 Marsan, Montréal in Evolution, xxi; Skinner, The Upper Country, 5, 8, 14, 16. 218 Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 3, 13-14; Lozier, Flesh Reborn, 10-11. 219 Englebert, “Beyond Borders,” I, 4-5, 42, 55, 88. 220 Lefebvre, “Charles Le Moyne de Longueuil et de Châteauguay.” 221 “Recherche par nom,” ADHÉMAR, http://www.remparts.info/adhemar_php/bio.php?I_NUMERO=LEM0027. All of the locations of the property owned and inhabited by these French individuals has been approximated according to the information provided by the ADHÉMAR database, which has compiled the records of the Centre Canadien d’Architecture. Due to the changing property lines and the realignment of city streets, the property ownership of these individuals sometimes includes numerous locations, within proximity, under their ownership at the same time. For this project I have chosen to refer to the general location of the residence that appears to have been occupied for the longest period of time, without any reference to a specific side of the street, to provide a general picture of the proximity of these households. Charles LeMoyne also inherited his father’s extensive seigneur in 1684, which was located on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River, directly across from Montréal. BANQ-M, “Cession et transport de la seigneurie de Longueuil…” 1 janvier 1684, Greffes de Notaires, M-620-8. 222 Cooper, The Hanging of Angélique, 146. 223 “Recherche par nom,” ADHÉMAR. 224 Lacelle, “ Marie-Marguerite.” 225 Ferland-Angers, “Pierre You.” 226 West, Chains of Love. 227 West, Chains of Love. 228 Palmer, Intimate Bonds. 229 Rushforth, Bonds of Alliance, 324. 230 Desbarats, “Deux pas vers une histoire du politique décolonisée,” 5. 231 Marcel presented a list of the twenty-five ‘top’ slave owners in New France in Canada’s Forgotten Slaves. Top slave owners in the context of New France refers to the French individuals who appeared to have owned more than ten slaves. Fifty-six percent of these individuals lived in the city centre of Montréal, either along the main streets of Rue Saint-Paul and Rue Notre-Dame or along the streets that ran perpendicular connecting the main thoroughfares. This percentage was reached through the cross-referencing of the names identified by Trudel in Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, p. 107, with the owners that appear in the Montréal section of Trudel’s Dictionnaire, p. 41-121, and then identifying the location of everyone’s property in the city using the ADHÉMAR database. 232 Overall the number of recorded relationships and marriages between members of the enslaved population in Montréal remained minimal. However, there are many factors that complicated the recorded appearance of intimate, marital, and familial relationships among slaves in the city. For example, relationships between slaves may not have been condoned by owners, intimacy, whether consensual or forced, between slaves and free members of society may have been discouraged so the presence of these interactions was hidden, children might be recorded as illegitimate or without recognition of their parents, a family could be separated prior to their arrival in the city, or a couple might not have had any children. Prior to the legalization of slavery in 1709, there are no relationships between slaves

139 recorded in Trudel’s Dictionnaire. Following legalization, the numbers do not increase significantly, and between 1710 and the end of the French regime in 1763 only one relationship between Indigenous slaves was recorded and nineteen relationships between African descent slaves were recorded. More relationships between the enslaved members of Montréal society appear to have occurred following the British takeover of the city. Of the enslaved children that appear in the historical records, the majority born to enslaved mothers are recorded as illegitimate. As identified by Trudel, many illegitimate children were born to enslaved women in New France, the majority of whom were fathered by masters rather than by male slaves. Trudel recorded out of 1205 enslaved women aged fourteen and over, seventeen percent gave birth to one or more illegitimate children. Seventeen percent of 921 Indigenous women bore children out of wedlock and nineteen percent of 284 African descent mothers gave birth to illegitimate children. 233 Jean de La Croix de Saint Vallier, Catechisme du Diocese de Québec (Paris, 1702), 298. 234 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 96; PRDH Individual #15, Individual #16, Marriage #13231, Individual #35165, Individual #41176, Individual #204480, Individual #53681, Individual #53801, Individual #61543, Individual #83660. This number of children to survive infancy was uncommon in colonial Montréal. Although the infant mortality rate was high for all members of colonial society, with one out of every five newborns dying before their first birthday, infant mortality was increased by the harsh living conditions of slaves. Twenty-five percent of all Indigenous infants died within their first year, while twenty-nine percent of African descent newborns died within their first year. 235 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 102. 236 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 103. 237 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 67. 238 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 67. 239 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 103. 240 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 103; PRDH Individual #204479, Individual #76963. 241 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 113; PRDH Individual #75525, Individual #80517, Individual #80518. 242 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 113; PRDH Individual #204479, Individual #204480, Marriage #40132. Marie-Élisabeth was the daughter of the slave couple of Charles and Charlotte-Élisabeth that appeared in the household of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil. However, by the time of her marriage to Jacques-César, Marie- Élisabeth had been inherited by Charles’s grandson, Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil III, and was under the ownership of his widow, Marie-Anne Catherine Fleury d’Eschambault. 243 PRDH Individual #149978. 244 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 103-104; PRDH Individual #204481, Individual #463614. 245 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 103; Jodoin and Vincent, Histoire de Longueuil, 247. The livre was the currency within the Kingdom of France until the end of the eighteenth-century. 246 West, Chains of Love, 159; Palmer, Intimate Bonds, 3; Stevenson, Life in Black and White, 206, 208-209. 247 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 96. 248 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 89. During the late 1740s, La Corne participated in numerous raids of the English garrison at the fort of Saratoga. Additionally, during the 1740s the Abenakis’ were forced from their traditional territory in New England by the English and the community was invited by the French to winter on the south side of the St. Lawrence. La Corne’s military activities and the proximity of the Abenakis community most likely created the channels through which this African descent couple came under the ownership of La Corne. See; NYCD, 10: 342; LAC, “Feuille au roi (rapport de La Galissoniére sur les partis…” 28 janvier 1748, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 114v-115; LAC, “Mémoire des partis de guerre qui ont été équipes à…” 10 août 1747, Correspondance générale; Canada, Série C11A, fol. 2v. 249 Trudel, Dictionnaire des esclaves, 89. 250 I could not find any direct connections between the household of Luc de La Corne and Jacques-Joseph Gamelin that would have suggested their households would have interacted within the city. 251 West, Chains of Love, 20, 157. 252 West, Chains of Love, 13, 158. 253 As previously stated, 121 slaves appear in the Hôpital-Général from 1690 throughout the entirety of the eighteenth-century. Additionally, following Marie-Marguerite’s take-over of the Hôpital, nineteen slaves appear to have entered the institution, either temporarily for injury or illness or permanently, and for ninety-seven slaves of both Indigenous and African descent the Hôpital-Général appears to have been their final resting place.

Conclusion:

140

1 Dechêne, Habitants and Merchants, xvii, xviii. 2 See also; Trudel, Canada’s Forgotten Slaves, p. 323; James Walker, A History of Blacks in Canada: A Study Guide for Teachers and Students (Hull, QC: Minister of State, Multiculturalism, 1980); Harvey Amani Whitfield, North to Bondage: Loyalist Slavery in the Maritimes (Vancouver, BC: UBC Press, 2016), p. 192; Natasha Henry, “Slavery in Canada? I Never Learned That!” ActiveHistory.ca, October 23, 2013, http://activehistory.ca/2013/10/slavery-in- canada-i-never-learned-that/; Robert Everett Green, “200 Years a Slave: The Dark History of Captivity in Canada,” The Globe and Mail, February 28, 2014, https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/200-years-a-slave-the-dark- history-of-captivity-in-canada/article17178374/; Daniel Tseghay, “A forgotten history of slavery in Canada,” Ricochet, February 16, 2015, https://ricochet.media/en/331/a-forgotten-history-of-slavery-in-canada. 3 David Greggus, “The French Slave Trade,” 119, 125; Catherine Desbarats, “Deux pas vers une histoire du politique décolonisée, 5.

141 Bibliography:

Abbreviations:

BANQ-M – Bibliothéque et Archives Nationales du Québec – Vieux Montréal BANQ-Q – Bibliothéque et Archives Nationales du Québec – Québec CHW – Collections of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin. LAC – Library and Archives Canada NYCD – Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New York: Procured in Holland, England, and France. UM – Université de Montréal

Printed Primary Sources:

Bacqueville de la Potherie, Claude Charles Le Roy. Histoire de l’Amérique septentrionale qui continent. Paris: Chez Nyon fils, 1753.

Bosworth, Newton. Hochelaga Depicta: The Early History of Montréal and Present State of the City and Island of Montréal. Congdon & Britnell, 1839.

Brodhead, John Romeyn. Documents Relative to the Colonial History of the State of New-York: Procured in Holland, England, and France. Edited by E.B. O’Callaghan, and Berthold Fernow. 15 vols. Albany, NY: Weed, Parsons, 1853-1887.

Cartier, Jacques. The Voyages of Jacques Cartier. Edited by Henry Percival Biggar. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1993.

Champlain, Samuel de. The Works of Samuel de Champlain. 6 vols. Edited by Henry Percival Biggar. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1971.

Charlevoix, Pierre-François-Xavier de. Journal of a Voyage to North America Undertaken by Order of the French King: Containing the Geographical Description and Natural History of the Country Particularly Canada, Together with an Account of the Customs, Characters, Religion, Manners and Traditions of the Original Inhabitants. 2 vols. London: Printed for R. and J. Dodsley, 1761.

_____. Histoire et description Générale de la Nouvelle France: avec le journal historique d’un voyage fait par ordre du Roi dans l’Amérique septentrionale. Paris: Chez la Veuve Ganeau, 1744.

_____. History and General Description of New France. Edited by John Gilmary Shea and Noah Farnham Morrison. 6 vols. New York NY: F.P. Harper, 1990.

Dollier de Casson, François. A History of Montréal: 1640-1672. London & Toronto: J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd, 1928.

142

Du Tertre, Jean Baptiste. Histoire Générale des isles de S. Christophe de la Guadeloupe, de la Martinique, et autres dans l’Amérique. Paris: Chez Jacques Langlois et Emmanuel Langlois, 1654.

France. Conseil d’Etat and New France. Conseil superior de Québec. Édits, ordonnances royaux, declarations et arrêts du Conseil d’état du Roi, concernant le Canada. 2 vols. Québec, QC: Imprimés par Pi.E. Desbarats, 1803-1806.

Hennepin, Louis. A New Discovery of a Vast Country in America. London: Printed by M. Bentley, 1698.

Heriot, George. Travels Through the Canadas. To Which is Subjoined a Comparative View of the Manners and Customs of Several of the Indian Nations of North and South America. London: J.G. Barnard, 1805.

Kalm, Peter. Travels Into North America: Containing its Natural History, and a Circumstantial Account of its Plantations and Agriculture in General, with the Civil, Ecclesiastical, and Commercial State of the Country, the Manner of the Inhabitants, and Several Curious and Important Remarks on Various Subjects. Translated by John Reinhold Forster. Warrington: W. Eyres, 1770.

L’Incarnation, Marie de. Word from New France: The Selected Letters of Marie de L’Incarnation. Edited by Joyce Marshall. Toronto, ON: Oxford University Press, 1967.

La Croix de Saint Vallier, Jean de. Catechisme du Diocese de Québec. Paris, 1702.

La Hontan, Baron Louis-Armand de. New Voyages to North America. 2 vols. Edited by Reuben Gold Thwaites. Chicago, IL: A.C. McClung and Co., 1905.

La Vérendrye, Pierre Gaultier de Varennes et de. Journals and Letters of Pierre Gaultier de Varennes et de La Vérendrye and his Sons: With Correspondence Between the Governors of Canada and the French Court, Touching the Search for the Western Sea. Edited by Lawrence J. Burpee. Toronto, ON: The Champlain Society, 1927.

_____. North-Western Explorations: Journals of La Vérendrye (1738-1739). Toronto, ON: Canadiana House, 1967.

Lescarbot, Marc. Histoire de la Nouvelle-France contenant les navigations, découvertes, & habitations faites par les François és Indes Occidentales & Nouvelle-France souz l’avœu & authorité de noz Rois Très-Chrétiens, & les diverse fortunes d’iceux en l’exécution de ces choses, depuis cent ans jusques à hui: en quoy est comprise l’histoire morale, naturelle, & géographique de ladite province: avec les tables et figures d’icelle. Paris: Chez Jean Milot, 1609.

143 Marquette, Jacques, and Louis Jolliet. Voyage et découverte de quelques pays et nations de l’Amérique septentrionale. Paris, 1681.

Québec. Collection de documents relatives à la histoire de la Nouvelle-France. 2 vols. Québec, QC: A. Coté, 1883-1885.

Ramsay, Rev. D.S. Life of the Venerable M.M Dufrost de Lajemmerais, Mde D’Youville, Foundress of the Sisters of Charity (Called the Grey Nuns) of Montréal Canada. Montréal, QC: The Grey Nunnery, 1895.

State Historical Society of Wisconsin. Collections of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin. 28 vols. Madison, WI: Historical Society of Wisconsin, 1854-1920.

Statistics of Canada. Censuses of Canada, 1665 to 1871. Recensements du Canada. Ottawa, ON: Printed by I.B. Taylor, 1876.

Talbot, Edward Allen. Five Years’ Residence in the Canadas: Including a Tour Through Part of the United States of America, in the Year 1823. 2 vols. London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, Brown and Green, 1824.

Tanguay, Cyprien. À travers les registres. Montréal, QC: Librairie Saint-Joseph, Cadieux & Derome, 1886.

_____. Dictionnaire généalogique des familles canadiennes. 7 vols. Montréal, QC: E. Sénécal, 1871-1890.

Thwaites, Reuben Gold, ed. The Jesuit Relations and Allied Documents: Travels and Explorations of the Jesuit Missionaries in New France, 1610-1791. 73 vols. Cleveland, OH: Burrows Brothers, 1896-1901.

Trudel, Marcel. Dictionnaire des esclaves et de leurs propriétaires au Canada français. Montréal, QC: Hurtubise HMH, 1990.

Secondary Sources:

ADHÉMAR. Montréal Centre Canadian d’Architecture. http://www.remparts.info/adhemar_php/.

Albertine, Ferland-Angers. Mère d’Youville: Première Fondatrice Canadienne. Montréal, QC: Libraire Beauchemin, 1945.

Aubert, Guillaume. ““The Blood of France”: Race and Purity of Blood in the French Atlantic World.” The William and Mary Quarterly 61, no. 3 (July 2004): 439-478.

Banks, Kenneth J. Chasing Empire across the Sea: Communication and the State in the French Atlantic, 1713-1763. Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2002.

144

Bosher, J.F. The Canada Merchants, 1713-1763. Oxford, UK: Claredon Press, 1987.

Briggs, Winstanley. “Le Pays des Illinois.” The William and Mary Quarterly 47, no. 1 (January 1990): 30-56.

Brooks, James F. Captives and Cousins: Slavery, Kinship, and Community in the Southwest Borderlands. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2002.

Brook, Timothy. Vermeer’s Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World. New York, NY: Bloomsbury Press, 2008.

Chatman, Samuel L. ““There are no Slaves in France”: A Re-Examination of Slave Laws in Eighteenth-Century France.” The Journal of Negro History 85, no. 3 (Summer 2000): 144- 153.

Choquette, Leslie. Frenchmen into Peasants: Modernity and the Tradition in the Peopling of French Canada. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1997.

Christie, Nancy, and Michael Gauvreau, ed. Mapping the Margins: The Family and Social Discipline in Canada, 1700-1975. Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2004.

Cooper, Afua. The Hanging of Angélique: The Untold Story of Canadian Slavery and the Burning of Old Montréal. Toronto, ON: HarperCollins Canada, 2011.

Dechêne, Louise. Habitants and Merchants in Seventeenth-Century Montréal. Translated by Liana Vardi. Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1992.

Delanglez, Jean, ed. Louis Jolliet: vie et voyages, 1645-1700. Montréal, QC: Les Études de l’Institute d’Histoire de l’Amérique française, 1950.

Desbarats, Catherine. “Following “The Middle Ground”.” The William and Mary Quarterly 63, no. 1 (January 2006): 81-96.

_____. “Deux pas vers une histoire du politique décolonisée: les problèmes de la souveraineté et de l’esclavage amérindien en Nouvelle-France.” Bulletin d’histoire politique 18, no. 3 (2015): 1-8.

Dictionary of Canadian Biography. University of Toronto/ Université Laval. http://www.biographi.ca/en/.

DuVal, Kathleen. The Native Ground: Indians and Colonists in the Heart of the Continent. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania, 2006.

145 Ekberg, Carl J. French Roots in Illinois Country. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1998.

_____. Stealing Indian Women: Native Slavery in the Illinois Country. Champaign, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2010.

Eltis, David, and Allen Tullos. The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database: Voyages. Emory University. https://slavevoyages.org.

Englebert, Robert. “Beyond Borders: Mental Mapping and the French River World in North America, 1763-1805.” PhD. diss., University of Ottawa, 2010.

Farrell, David. “Anchors of Empire: Detroit, Montréal, and the Continental Interior, 1760-1775.” American Review of Canadian Studies 7, no. 1 (March 1977): 33-54.

Foret, Michael J. “War or Peace? Louisiana, Choctaws, and the Chickasaws, 1733-1735.” The Journal of Louisiana Historical Association 31, no. 3 (1990): 273-292.

Gallay, Alan. Colonial Wars of North America, 1512-1763: An Encyclopedia. London, UK: Routledge, 2015.

Glazebrook, G.P. de T. ed. The Hargrave Correspondence 1821-1843. Vol. 24. Toronto, ON: The Champlain Society, 2013.

Grabowski, Jan. “The Common Ground: Settled Natives and French in Montréal, 1667-1760.” PhD. diss., Université de Montréal, 1993.

Gray, Colleen. “Power, Position, and the peasante charge: Becoming a Superior in the Congregation de Notre-Dame de Montreal, 1693-1796.” Histoire Sociale/ Social History 40, no. 79 (2007): 75-113.

Greer, Allan. The People of New France. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1997.

_____. The Jesuit Relations: Natives and Missionaries in Seventeenth-Century North America. Boston, MA: Bedford/ St. Martin’s, 2000.

Greggus, David. “The French Slave Trade: An Overview.” The William and Mary Quarterly 58, no. 1 (January 2001): 119-138.

Groulx, Lionel. “Un Seigneur en Soutane.” Reuve d’histoire de l’Amérique français 11, no. 2 (1966): 155-306.

Havard, Gilles. Great Peace of Montréal of 1701: French Native Diplomacy in the Seventeenth Century. Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2001.

146 _____. Empire et métissages: Indiens et Français dans le Pays d’en Haut, 1660-1715 (Sillery, QC: Les éditions du Septentrion, 2003.

Horn, Bernd. “La Petite Guerre: A Strategy of Survival.” In The Canadian Way of War: Serving the National Interest. Edited by Colonel Bernd Horn. 9-36. Toronto, ON: Dundurn Press, 2006.

Innis, Harold A. The Fur Trade in Canada: An Introduction to Canadian Economic History. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 1966.

Jennings, Francis. The Ambiguous Iroquois Empire: The Covenant Chain Confederation of Indian Tribes with English Colonies from Its Beginnings to the Lancaster Treaty of 1744. New York, NY: W.W. North & Company, 1984.

Jodoin, Alex, and J.L. Vincent. Histoire de Longueuil et de la famille de Longueuil. Montréal, QC: Impr. Gebhardt-Berthiaume, 1889.

Kellogg, Louise Phelps. Early Narratives of the Northwest, 1634-1699. New York, NY: C. Scribner’s sons, 1917.

Kinietz, William Vernon, and Antoine Denis Raudot, ed. The Indians of the Western Great Lakes, 1615-1760. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2007.

Lareau, Edmond. Histoire du droit Canadien depuis les origines de la colonie jusqu’à nos jours, Vol. 1: Domination Française. Montréal, QC: A Périard, 1881.

Lee, Dayna Bowker. “From Captives to Kin: Indian Slavery and Changing Social Identities on the Louisiana Colonial Frontier.” In Native American Adoption, Captivity, and Slavery in Changing Contexts. Edited by Max Carocci and Stephanie Pratt. 79-96. London, UK: Palgrave Macmillian, 2012.

Lozier, Jean-François. Flesh Reborn: The Saint Lawrence Valley Mission Settlements through the Seventeenth Century. Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2018.

Marsan, Jean-Claude. Montréal in Evolution: Historical Analysis of the Development of Montréal’s Architecture and Urban Environment. Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1981.

McDonnell, Michael A. Masters of Empire: Great Lakes Indians and the Making of America. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2015.

Moogk, Peter N. La Nouvelle-France: The Making of French Canada: A Cultural History. East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press, 2000.

Morrissey, Robert Michael. Empire by Collaboration: Indians, Colonists, and Governments in Colonial Illinois Country. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015.

147

Munro, William Bennett. Documents Relating to the Seigniorial Tenure in Canada, 1598-1854. Toronto, ON: The Champlain Society, 1908.

Nester, William R. The French and Indian War and the Conquest of New France. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 2014.

Noël, Françoise. Family Life and Sociability in Upper and Lower Canada, 1780-1870: A View from Diaries and Family Correspondence. Montréal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2003.

Palmer, Jennifer L. Intimate Bonds: Family and Slavery in the French Atlantic. Philadelphia, PA: Pennsylvania University Press, 2016.

Programme de Recherche en Démographie Historique. Université de Montréal. https://www.prdh-igd.com/en/home.

Riddel, William Renwick. “Before the Conquest.” The Journal of Negro History 5, no. 3 (July 1920): 263-272.

Rothschild, Emma. The Inner Life of Empire: An Eighteenth-Century History. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2011.

Roy, Pierre-Georges. Inventaire des ordonnances des intendants de la Nouvelle France conserves aux archives provinciales de Québec. 4 vols. Beauceville, QC, 1919.

_____. La ville de Québec sous le régime français. Vol. 1. Québec: Publié par le service des Archives du gouvernement de la province de Québec, 1930.

_____. La Famille Dufros de Lajemmerais. Levis, 1937.

Rushforth, Brett. ““A Little Flesh We Offer You”: The Origins of Indian Slavery in New France.” The William and Mary Quarterly 60, no. 4 (2003): 777-808.

_____. “Slavery, the Fox Wars, and the Limits of Alliance.” The William and Mary Quarterly 63, no. 1 (January 2006): 53-80.

_____. Bonds of Alliance: Indigenous and Atlantic Slaveries in New France. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2012.

Saint-Yves, Maurice. Atlas de géographie historique du Canada. Boucherville, QC: les éditions françaises, 1982.

Skinner, Claiborne A. The Upper Country: French Enterprise in the Colonial Great Lakes. Baltimore, MA: John Hopkins University Press, 2008.

148 Stevenson, Brenda E. Life in Black and White: Family and Community in the Slave South. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 1996.

Tanner, Helen Hornback. Atlas of Great Lakes Indian History. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1987.

The Canadian Encyclopedia. Historica Canada. https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en.

Traer, James Frederick. “Marriage and the Family in French Law and Social Criticism from the End of the Ancien Regime to the Civil Code.” PhD. diss., The University of Michigan, 1970.

Trudel, Marcel. Atlas historique du Canada français, des origins à 1867. Québec, QC: Presses de l’Université Laval, 1961.

_____. Introduction to New France. Montréal, QC: Holt, Rinehart and Winston of Canada, Limited, 1968.

_____. La population du Canada en 1663. Montréal, QC: Éditions Fides, 1973.

_____. Montréal: La formation d’une société 1642-1663. Montréal, QC: Éditions Fides, 1976.

_____. Histoire de la Nouvelle-France. 6 vols. Montréal, QC: Éditions Fides, 1963-1999.

_____. Canada’s Forgotten Slaves: Two Centuries of Bondage. Translated by George Tombs. Chicago, IL: Independent Publishing Group, 2013.

Valdman, Albert. “Creole, the Language of Slavery.” In Slavery in the Caribbean Francophone World. Edited by Doris Y. Kadish. 143-163. Athens, GA: The University of Georgia Press, 2000. van Deusen, Nancy E. Global Indios: The Indigenous Struggle for Justice in Sixteenth-Century Spain. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015.

Van Kirk, Sylvia. Many Tender Ties: Women in Fur-Trade Society, 1670-1870. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1983.

Vidal, Cécile, ed. Louisiana: Crossroads of the Atlantic World. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014.

“Voyageurs Contract Database.” Le Centre du partimoine. Société historique de Saint-Boniface. https://archivesshsb.mb.ca.

Wallace, William Stewart. Documents Relating to the North West Company. Vol. 22. Toronto, ON: The Champlain Society, 2013.

149 West, Emily. Chains of Love: Slave Couples in Antebellum South Carolina. Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press, 2004.

Winks, Robin William. The Blacks in Canada: A History. Montréal & Kingston: McGill- Queen’s University Press, 1997.

150 Appendix One: Genealogical Charts

Legend:

Indicates Family Member Indicates Marital Relationship

** For the purpose of clarity, these genealogical charts include only the names of the family members referenced throughout this project. They are not representative of the entirety of the family trees of Charles LeMoyne de Longueuil, Ignace Gamelin Jr., Luc de La Corne St. Luc, and Marie-Marguerite Dufrost de Lajemmerais.

151

152

153