THE PATH OF THE FRANCO-AMERICANS
THE PATH OF THE FRANCO-AMERICANS
Genealogy, your Ancestors and their Story
By Richard Hebert
Visit my web-site at : http://www.cam.org/~hebertr/http://www.cam.org/~hebertr/
The path of the French people from France to Canada, Acadia
and……the United States of America
Genealogy becomes more and more popular in North America, but nowhere like in
the Province of Quebec is a people more equipped to trace back its family roots.
The reasons being the French Catholic System of recording the marriages, births
and deaths of its people, and giving the maiden name of the spouse. In the
Anglo-Protestant System, the minister did not usually register the maiden
names of the wives and mothers of their parishioners : Mr. Jones had a Mrs. Jones
for a mother ...making it very difficult for one to trace back his family, having to
haunt the cemeteries and shaking tombstones in the hope of finding one's blood
relatives.
Sometimes there are only one, two or three first ancestors bearing the same family
name that established themselves in the New World. But that is not always the case ;
it often happened that around 20 individuals with the same family name, but not at
all related, crossed the Atlantic Ocean between 1602 and 1760, which is the period
of France's presence in North-America. They came as soldiers, adventurers,
tradesmen or more simply as farmers with a contracted engagement of three years.
At the end of their contract, they took the next boat back to France. But a majority
staid on and established themselves as farmers, tradesmen. Some of them came with
their wives, a few went back to France and brought back a new bride but most of
them got married in Canada. Genealogical research is full of ambushes : the
nickname becoming the name, the transformation or translation of it in English,
etc... It is important to understand that man has not changed much physically,
except for height. The same needs and desires moved them and they had the same
problems and preoccupations as you and I today.
Three separate periods must be considered as for the migration of the
French-Canadians to the territory today called the USA. The first ones to migrate
moved for fur-trade or adventure purposes all over America, like in the Detroit area
in the 1720s and married local Indian women. With the Expulsion of the Acadians
and their dispersion in the American Colonies some of them reached Louisiana in
1765-69, then a French territory. In 1785, they were joined by some of their kin's
who, after years of misery, had decided to leave France under the invitation of the
king of Spain and acquire land in Louisiana.
The second migration period starts in the 1820s and spreads to 1920, when the USA
closed its borders to immigrants from the north. These were the years of
industrialization when the sons of the Quebec farmers could no longer acquire land
easily because it was scarce or distribution was limited to Loyalists running away
from the now seceded United States. One million French-Canadian citizens from
Quebec left their country for ever ...that was a third of the population who migrated
first to Vermont and Maine but mostly to New-England. They formed what they
called Little-Canadas, where they recreated the same environment they had left
behind, their churches, schools, etc...all in French ; but hardships and time took
over and, now assimilated, very few still speak the language of their ancestors. Up
to the 1950s there was still numerous social and cultural exchanges between the
Franco-Americans and French-Canada.
You must add to those all the Acadians from the Maritimes who crossed over to
Maine and then to New-England. Other French-Canadians had left for the western
Canadian provinces and also crossed over to the USA which attracted the farmers
to vast lands in the conquest of the West.
The third migration is still going on ; it started before the Second World War and
each day the attraction to the biggest and the best takes its toll on our population.
Most of the time, the immigrants are the best elements of a country, with more guts
and determination, who bring their driving forces to their new country. History has
showed the US of A has always been the principal beneficiary of this migration.
There are still over 6 million French-Canadians, now calling themselves QUEBECOIS
living in FRENCH, north of the USA, where today over 20 million citizens can
claim their FRENCH-CANADIAN, ACADIAN or CAJUN roots.
Today, these FRATERNAL relations should be revived...we have the same
ROOTS...the same BLOOD....WE are FAMILY.
Let us communicate...in any language.
ON AN OLD YELLOWISH PICTURE,
YOU RECOGNISE A PART OF YOU.
YOU ARE PART OF YOUR ANCESTORS
AND THEY ARE PART OF YOU.
BE PART OF THE SAME RENDEZ-VOUS.
By Richard Hebert,
Your Professional Genealogist in Montreal
Visit my web-site at : http://www.cam.org/~hebertr/http://www.cam.org/~hebertr/