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History of Parenteau family in north America

Monday 30 January 2012, by Gilles Parenteau, 5682 visites.

All the versions of this article: [English] [français]

Five Frenchmen and women with the surname Parenteau immigrated to New France or Canada in the seventeenth century. Among them were two young women, both daughters of Antoine Parenteau and Anne Brisson from the city of La Rochelle. The elder sister, Marie-Madeleine, married Robert Gagnon in Quebec City on October 3, 1657. They settled on Orleans Island near Quebec City. The younger sister, Marie, married Antoine Fauvel on October 6, 1671 in Quebec City where they lived. Nicolas Parenteau, a bachelor, also from La Rochelle, abjured his Protestant faith in Quebec City, June 29, 1671. A fourth Parenteau, François, a bachelor of about forty years old, was buried at Sainte-Anne-de-la-Pérade on June 8, 1722.

HISTORY OF PARENTEAU FAMILY IN NORTH AMERICA


GILLES PARENTEAU
Montréal, Québec Canada
2011-03-13

 I PIERRE PARENTEAU AND MADELEINE TISSERAN - FIRST GENERATION-SUMMARY

Five Frenchmen and women with the surname Parenteau immigrated to New France or Canada in the seventeenth century. Among them were two young women, both daughters of Antoine Parenteau and Anne Brisson from the city of La Rochelle. The elder sister, Marie-Madeleine, married Robert Gagnon in Quebec City on October 3, 1657. They settled on Orleans Island near Quebec City. The younger sister, Marie, married Antoine Fauvel on October 6, 1671 in Quebec City where they lived. Nicolas Parenteau, a bachelor, also from La Rochelle, abjured his Protestant faith in Quebec City, June 29, 1671. A fourth Parenteau, François, a bachelor of about forty years old, was buried at Sainte-Anne-de-la-Pérade on June 8, 1722.

Ancestor Pierre Parenteau

Lastly, Pierre Parenteau, also known as Lafontaine, the ancestor of all the Parenteau descendants in North America, came to New France in the summer 1666 at the age of sixteen or seventeen years old. This was the start of a peaceful period with the Iroquois (Mohawks) which would last only twenty years. He bore a second name called war name or war nickname, Lafontaine, which means he has been a soldier before being a farmer. All the soldiers were given a second name. He seldom bore this second war name, only in 1675, and his daughter, Marie-Jeanne, two times in 1708.
He was the son of the late Jean Parenteau and of Marguerite Sauvestre (or Sovestre or Forestier, Forestre, neither Fovestre nor Fouestre nor Sévestre) of the parish of Bazauges, canton of Matha, township of Saint-Jean-d’Angély, cathedral town of Saintes, in France, today the department of Charente-Maritime in France. It is impossible to find his exact date of birth since there are no parish records before 1685. Because he declared his age as seventeen years in January 1667, and thirty two years in 1681, one can deduce that he was born in 1649.

The first years in Canada

The first mention of the presence of Pierre Parenteau in Canada is on January 20, 1667, when he was a witness at an inquiry dealing with trading of liquor with the Amerindians. He was living at that time near Trois-Rivières in Cap-de-la-Madeleine, a small borough fortified by a wooden palisade to protect its inhabitants from Iroquois (Mohawks) attacks. This borough land is now the Notre-Dame-du-Cap Shrine. At this inquiry he declared himself to be a servant of Jean Crevier and gave his age as about seventeen years. He said that he was not aware of the problems of liquor trading. Possibly he did not wish to implicate the people he saw on a daily basis. From the age of seventeen to approximately twenty two years, he earned his living clearing wooded land. In 1670 he probably started to clear his own land.

The marriage in 1673 with Madeleine Tisseran

In Quebec City, at the age of twenty-four on September 12, 1673 he married Madeleine Tisseran who was twenty-three years old, originating from Liancourt, of the French province of Picardie, north of Paris. They met only nine days before their marriage since Madeleine Tisseran arrived in Quebec on September the third of that year. She was the daughter of the late Louis Tisseran and of Louise Destré. The king of France, Louis the fourteenth, sent attractive young women, les «filles du Roy» (King’s daughters) to New France. They were chosen by the clergy, and possessed qualities required to make good wives. On September 9th, Madeleine Tisseran signed with Jean Amaury a contract of marriage that was cancelled. Two days later, on September 11th, 1673 she signed a contract of marriage with Pierre Parenteau, the day before their marriage celebrated in Québec City on September 12th, 1673

Pierre Parenteau and Madeleine Tisseran established themselves in the seignory of Saint-François belonging to Jean Crevier, on the island of Saint-Joseph, opposite the present village of Notre-Dame-de-Pierreville. Their land was officially granted to them on October 3, 1673. They had ten children, five of whom lived to adult age: Marguerite, Marie-Renée, Marie-Jeanne, Charles, and Pierre-Louis.

The death of Pierre Parenteau

In 1688, the Iroquois (Mohawks), already at war with those Amerindians allied with the French, and encouraged by the English in New England, started attacking French settlements along the St. Lawrence River, between Montréal and Trois-Rivières. It was during the last attack that Pierre Parenteau was killed in August 1693. The seigneur Jean Crevier was captured and was saved from a violent death near Schenectady on Mohawk River, when some Dutchmen from Albany were able to buy him back with money sent by the Crevier family, but it was too late and he died there. His wife, Madeleine Tisseran, left the seignory of Saint-François, before that last attack, between 1690 and 1692 with her five children, to live in Québec City, on Champlain Street. Her eldest daughter, Marguerite, 17 years old, had a first illegitimate child in Québec city, on December 9, 1692, and the father was a soldier. On July 27, 1695, the widow of Pierre Parenteau remarried. Her new husband, Jean Charpentier, nicknamed Pythagoras, would later be arrested for a robbery in a private home in Lauzon and banished from Québec City for three years after being whipped in the public squares of the city on March 4, 1697.

Back to the paternal land, Madeleine Tisseran died

Between 1700 and 1705, the Parenteau family and the second husband, Jean Charpentier, came back to live in the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac, on the paternal land of the island of Saint-Joseph with two children, Marie-Renée and Pierre-Louis. Madeleine Tisseran died there at the age of fifty-five years old after receiving the last sacraments of the church, and was buried October 13, 1705. Two of her daughters lived in Québec City where they married. Her son, Charles, a bachelor, also lived in Québec City. In 1706 Marie-Renée, the second daughter married Pierre Bibeau who purchased the land on Saint-Joseph Island from the Parenteau heirs.

Jean Charpentier must move from the land of Parenteau heirs

Jean Charpentier also known as Pythagoras, Madeleine Tisseran’s second husband, had bought some property on Île-du-Fort (Fort Island) almost directly opposite from the Parenteau land. In 1706 after the death of Madeleine Tisseran he remarried in Varennes. Some time later he was arrested for severely wounding a soldier. His punishment was working in the King’s galleys. He escaped from prison and fled the country. His land on Île-du-Fort (Fort Island) which he had never paid for was resold. He died in Lavaltrie, opposite of Varennes, near Montréal, on April third, 1731.

The son Pierre-Louis Parenteau in Yamaska

Pierre-Louis Parenteau, the youngest of the five children, was granted a large piece of land at Yamaska the tenth of April 1710. When he was twenty-one, he married Marguerite Saint-Laurent, who was seventeen years old, in the seignory of Saint-François, on July 28, 1711. They settled in the county line of Petit-Chenal of Yamaska. They had fourteen children, eleven of whom lived to adult age.

Translated by Susan Berry in 1990 and updated by Gilles Parenteau in 2010.

 THE CHILDREN of PIERRE PARENTEAU - TEN CHILDREN OF WHOM FIVE SURVIVED

- MARIE

  • Born in the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac, St. Joseph Island facing the village of Notre-Dame-de-Pierreville;
  • baptized June 22nd, 1674 (Christening recorded in the parish the Saint-Pierre-de-Sorel and extra in the index only. The act itself valuation missing person);
  • died before the census of 1681.

- MARGUERITE

  • Born on April 23rd, 1675 in the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac. Christening recorded in the parish of Saint-Pierre-de-Sorel, on May 7th, 1675; godfather: Laurent Philippe known as Lafontaine l’Outaouais; godmother: Marguerite David;
  • she was godmother of an Amerindian on February 11th, 1689 in Saint-François-du-Lac;
  • she had two children before getting married: 1° Jean, baptized at Québec, on December 10th, 1692, whose father was a soldier and who was adopted by a family of Lauzon at the age of 3 years, and 2° Jacques, baptized at Québec, on March 11th 1695;
  • married to Jacques Berthelot, a casual laborer and seaman native to Paris, December 1st, 1696 in Quebec. Fourteen children come from their marriage;
  • they remained on the street Petit-Champlain at Quebec, at the bottom of the actual Chateau Frontenac hotel;
  • she died in Quebec on March 24th, 1732 at the age of 56 years and was buried the following day; her husband died at the main hospital (Hôtel-Dieu) of Québec, on May 15th, 1721 at the age of 50 years.

- MARIE-RENÉE

  • Born April 4th, 1677 in the seignory of St-François-du-Lac;
  • baptized on April 29th, 1677 in the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac (Christening registered in the parish of St-Pierre-de-Sorel); godfather: René Fort; godmother: Marguerite Hertel, wife of the lord Jean Crevier;
  • married at Saint-François-du-Lac on November 28th, 1706 to Pierre Bibeau.
  • The priest called her Madeleine, in the religious registry. Seven children came from their marriage;
  • They were established on Saint Joseph Island, on the ancestral land of Parenteau;
  • Pierre Bibeau died drowned in the Saint-François Bay and was buried on November 3rd, 1744 in Saint-François-du-Lac;
  • Marie-Renée died at the age of 79 years, on June 9th, 1756 in Saint-François-du-Lac.

- JEAN-BAPTISTE

  • Baptized in the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac, August 8th, 1679, (Christening recorded in Saint-Pierre-de-Sorel);
  • died before the census of 1681.

- MARIE-JEANNE

  • Born September 8th, 1680 in the seignory of St-François-du-Lac; baptized September 16th, 1680. (Christening recorded in Saint-Pierre-de-Sorel); godfather: Jean Poirier; godmother: Marguerite Girard;
  • died before the inventory of 1681.

- MARIE-CHARLOTTE

  • Born October 22nd, 1681 in the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac;
  • baptized November 16th, 1681. (Christening recorded in Saint-Pierre-de-Sorel); godfather: Martin Giguère; godmother: Charlotte Giguère
  • died as a juvenile.

- MARIE-JEANNE

  • Baptized the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac on May 6th, 1684. (Christening recorded to Saint-Pierre-de-Sorel. The register was lost, but the name and the date appear in the index);
  • she carried the nickname of his father twice, " dit Lafontaine ", during christening and of burial of his first child, on February 21st and March 29th, 1708, in Beauport;
  • married in Beauport on February 26th, 1708, to Guillaume Lavigne, soldier. Eleven children are born in their marriage;
  • died in Quebec on May 22nd, 1755 at the age of 71 years and buried the following day;
  • she resided on St-Charles street, now called street Saint-Vallier, at the bottom of the actual main hospital of Old Quebec;
  • her husband, Guillaume Lavigne, was soldier and a day laborer.

- MARIE-MADELEINE

  • Baptized the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac on February 28th, 1686. (Christening recorded in Saint-Pierre-de Sorel. The act of christening disappeared, but the name and the date appear in the index);
  • died juvenile.

- CHARLES

  • Born July 10th, 1687 in the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac;
  • baptized July 12th, 1687 in Saint-François-du-Lac. (Christening recorded in Saint-Pierre-de-Sorel); godfather: Laurent Philippe; godmother: Marguerite Maugras;
  • single person or married elsewhere than in New-France. Without posterity in Canada; he lived Quebec in 1713 and 1718 at least; date and place of deceases not known in Quebec.

- PIERRE-LOUIS

  • Born between January 2nd and 12th, 1690 in the seignory of Saint-François-du-Lac;
  • Baptized January 12th, 1690, in Saint-François-du-Lac, in the domestic chapel of the manor of Jean Crevier, lord of Saint-François-du-Lac; godfather: Louis Crevier, son of the lord; godmother: Marie-Marthe Forcier;
  • Raised during his childhood in Quebec where he has gone with his remaining family after the death of his father;
  • 1710, April 10th, he takes possession of land in the Petit-Chenal (the Small Channel) of the Yamaska River;
  • married to Saint-François-du-Lac, on July 28th, 1711 with Marguerite Laurent known as Saint-Laurent;
  • They had 14 children among whom 11 live to adulthood;
  • died accidentally on June 4th, 1745 in Yamaska. Burial the following day in Yamaska;
  • His widow died on September 5th, 1775 and was buried the following day in Yamaska;
    - Pierre-Louis is the forefather of all Parenteau of North America Quebec.

NOTE: One called François Parenteau, buried â Saint-Anne-de-la-Pérade, on June 8th, 1722. He would not be the son of Pierre Parenteau and Madeleine Tisseran. The 5 minor survivors of Pierre Parenteau are named in the bill of sale of the land of Parenteau, on October 29th, 1713.
The genealogists Tanguay and Jetté mistakenly indicate him as the son of Pierre Parenteau.
PRDH pretends now that this François would be in fact Charles, the 9th child and 5th surviving child of Pierre Parenteau and Madeleine Tisseran.

 II PIERRE-LOUIS PARENTEAU and MARGUERITE SAINT-LAURENT - SECOND GENERATION-SUMMARY

Birth in the seignory of Saint-François

Pierre-Louis Parenteau, the youngest of the five surviving children of Pierre-Louis Parenteau and Madeleine Tisseran, was born at the beginning of January 1690, in the seignory of Saint-François. He was baptized in the family chapel of the manor of Jean Crevier, on January 12, 1690. His godfather was Louis Crevier, son of the seigneur, and his godmother, Marie-Marthe Forcier. His sisters were Marguerite, Marie-Renée, Marie-Jeanne and his brother Charles. In the parish records of official acts he was never designated by his father’s war name: Lafontaine. Only his sister Marie-Jeanne used this surname Lafontaine on two occasions, at the baptism and the burial of her first child in 1708 at Beauport.

His father, Pierre Parenteau, was originative of Bazauges, the canton of Matha, township of Saint-Jean d’Angély, department of Charente-Maritime, in France. He came in Canada in 1666. On September 12, 1673 in Québec City he married Madeleine Tisseran, originally from Liancourt, north of Paris. They settled on the island of Saint-Joseph in the seignory of Saint-François across from the village of Notre-Dame-de-Pierreville, where today one can see an abandoned house from the nineteenth century. It was on this island that Pierre-Louis came into this world in January 1690.

Childhood in Québec City

Pierre Parenteau, Pierre-Louis’s father, was killed by the Iroquois (Mohawks) in August 1693. Before , in 1691 or 1692, his wife and his five children went to live in Québec City temporary, far from the danger of the Iroquois, on Petit-Champlain Street just below the present hotel Chateau Frontenac. Pierre-Louis grew up in Québec City where his mother remarried on July 27, 1695. Her second husband was Jean Charpentier nicknamed Pythagoras. It was also in Québec City that Marguerite, the eldest daughter, married a sailor called Jacques Berthelot on the first of December 1696. Charpentier and Berthelot were arrested for robbery on January on January 28, 1697. Their wives were questioned on the following February the twelfth. Charpentier was banished from the city of Québec for three years. Thus Pierre-Louis grew up in a world of sailors, soldiers and merchants, near the port of Québec, in a poor part of the lower town. On May 16, 1701, in Québec City, the bishop administered rite of confirmation sacrament to Pierre-Louis Parenteau, eleven years old.

Adolescence in the seignory of Saint-François

Between 1700 and 1705, Madeleine Tisseran and her second husband, Jean Charpentier, came back to live in the seignory of Saint-François accompanied by two of her five children, Pierre-Louis and Marie-Renée. Her daughter, Marguerite, stayed in Québec City with her husband. The other two children from her first marriage, Marie-Jeanne and Charles Parenteau, probably remained in the Québec area since their names can be found in the parish registers of Québec City and of Beauport.

Madeleine Tisseran died in the seignory of Saint-François at the age of fifty-five, and was buried on October 13, 1705. Her second husband, Jean Charpentier, moved from the land belonging to the Parenteau heirs and bought some land nearby on Fort Island in 1706. He remarried another widow on the ninth of October, 1706 in Varennes. In time he returned to Quebec City where he fought with and seriously wounded a military man. He was condemned and imprisoned but managed to escape and fled the country. During all these years Pierre-Louis lived on the paternal land with his sister, Marie-Renée, and her husband, Pierre Bibeau, whose marriage had taken place on November 17, 1706. Charpentier died in Lavaltrie, on April 3, 1731.

Settling in Yamaska

At the age of twenty on April 10, 1710, Pierre-Louis came into possession of a piece of land on Petit-Chenal road of Yamaska, civic number 299 (lots nos. 513 to 516 and 530 in the land registry of Yamaska). He obtained this land through an order signed by the seigneur of Yamaska, Pierre Petit. Pierre-Louis married Marguerite Saint-Laurent, seventeen years old, on July 28, 1711 in the seignory of Saint-François. He sold his inherited land on Saint-Joseph Island to his brother-in-law on January 20, 1712.

On March 5, 1721 Pierre-Louis was present at a meeting of the inhabitants of Yamaska. This meeting, which took place at the manor of the seigneur of Saint-François, dealt with the frequency of religious services needed in Yamaska.

An enumeration made by the seigneur Pierre Petit on June 3, 1723 showed that Pierre-Louis possessed, apart from his land, a house, a barn and a stable. According to several contracts from that period in Yamaska, the house was constructed of posts planted in the ground, with a small roof made of hay and measuring about seventeen feet by fourteen feet. This type of house called a «settlement house» was temporary. In 1723 Pierre-Louis had cleared six acres of land which could then ploughed and sown. In 1732, 1738 and 1739 he appeared in court to settle minor disputes; for instance, a quarrel about a fence, a complaint against neighbors who were accused of destroying his marten traps and mutual name-calling with the Desrosiers family. In the later case the two families were summoned by the judge to declare each other «honorable people». As was the custom, Pierre-Louis participated in militia exercises which were held on Pierre Morneau’s land at the far south of the island «Du Domaine» near Petit-Chenal.

Pierre-Louis Parenteau and Marguerite Saint-Laurent had fourteen children of whom eleven reached adult age, seven boys and four girls. One of the three children died prematurely drowned at the age of eight with a boy of the same age. The three elder sons, Pierre, Augustin and Joseph founded well known families. The eldest son was the ancestor of the Parenteau Métis from Manitoba and Saskatchewan as well as of descendants in the province of Québec. The second son, Augustin, had a son, Gervais, who joined the Acadian community of Saint-Grégoire, a city of Bécancour, and was the founder of most of the Parenteau line in the Trois-Rivières area and Abitibi. The third son, Joseph, was the link with approximately 75% of all existing Parenteau descendants in North America, and of many Parenteau and Parranto and Peronto clan from Minnesota, USA. The fourth son, Mathurin, became (through his son Joseph) the ancestor of the Parenteau Métis in Manitoba, the Parenteau descendants known as Parenteau-Mathurin.

The three youngest sons, François, Jacques and Michel frequently travelled in the region of the Great Lakes and Central Canada for the fur traders of Montréal and the La Vérendrye brothers. Theirs descendants are not known.

Pierre-Louis Parenteau died accidently on the fourth of June 1745, at the age of fifty-five years old under circumstances which remain a mystery. He was buried the next day in Yamaska. His widow, Marguerite Saint-Laurent, lost no time in sending for a notary to record the gifts of land Pierre-Louis had verbally left to two of his sons. Then on the eleventh of July 1747, she summoned her eldest sons and sons-in-law to the notary, Louis Pillard of Trois-Rivières. They were to discuss the choice of a son to whom would be given personal and real estate, in return for promising to look after his mother in her old age. Joseph, the third of the seven boys, was chosen. On the fourteenth of July the goods, albeit modest, were enumerated. Marguerite Saint-Laurent died on the fifth of September 1775, at the age of eighty-one, at the home of Joseph married to Marie-Jeanne Georgeteau also known as Jolicoeur. She was buried the next day in Yamaska. In her lifetime she had been called upon to act as a midwife for some of the pioneer women of Yamaska.

Translated by Susan Berry.

 III AUGUSTIN PARENTEAU and
- 1° MARGUERITE VALENTIN also known as GUILLAUME
- 2° ANGÉLIQUE VANASSE also known as BASTIEN

THIRD GENERATION – FIRST BRANCH - SUMMARY

Augustin Parenteau, the fourth of the eleven surviving children of Pierre-Louis Parenteau and Marguerite Saint-Laurent, was born in September 1719 in the Petit-Chenal of Yamaska. His baptismal act cannot be found in the registry of Saint-François-du-Lac. It was an omission on the part of the parish priest or «curé» who did not bring the register with him when he visited Yamaska.

On may 25, 1741, in Montréal, Augustin Parenteau, then about twenty-one, signed up to go to Lake Superior on a mission to deliver merchandise and to bring back a canoe filled with fur pelts. With the salary earned from this trip he was able to marry upon his return. He married eighteen years old Marguerite Guillaume also known as Lafontaine, on July 30, 1742 in Louiseville. A contract of marriage was signed the same day, in the presence of his parents, his brother, Pierre, his sisters, Marguerite and Geneviève, and the seigneur of Yamaska, Pierre Petit. The bride’s dowry consisted of half of her father’s land situated near the town center of Louiseville. The other half would be given after the demise of the bride’s parents. The young couple had their first child the following spring on April 23, 1743. Only one child of their four children reached adult age. Two others died at the ages of ten and sixteen.

Augustin’s father, Pierre-Louis, died accidently on June 4, 1745, at the age of fifty-five at Yamaska. Two years later, July 11, 1747, his mother, Marguerite Saint-Laurent, convoked her eldest sons, including Augustin, and her sons-in-law to the office of the notary, Louis Pillard, in Trois-Rivières. After consultation it was decided that paternal land in Yamaska should go to Joseph, the third of the seven sons. Three days later the family assembled in Yamaska for an inventory of the paternal goods. Godefroy de Tonnancour, the procureur of Trois-Rivières, authorized the cure to act as notary to reduce expenses. Augustin declared himself to be twenty-seven and gave his share of goods, as did his brothers and sisters to Joseph, who vowed to look after their mother for the rest of her life.

In 1748, Augustin Parenteau was granted another piece of land in Louiseville. The following year his wife died at the age of twenty-five. Two years later, on February 15, 1751, he married Angélique Vanasse also know as Bastien, of Maskinongé. Eight children were born from this second marriage, of whom three died under ten years of age, and another at the age of seventeen in Chambly.

In 1758, Augustin Parenteau came to an arrangement with his mother-in-law concerning goods which his wife had inherited. In 1759 he relinquished his right to any further goods from the Vanasse family.

About 1760, after the conquest of New France by England, Augustin was nominated postmaster of Louiseville. He hired a Scotchman, Gregory MacGregor, to work for him on his farm and as employee in the post service. Augustin still lived on the land given by his first wife dead eleven years ago. Her parents lived in the same house with the Augustin’s second wife, but not harmoniously. A strong disagreement between Augustin and his ex-in-laws brought them to court. On October 7, 1761, the notary Louis Pillard of Trois-Rivières separated their common goods: house, buildings, lands, animals etc. Fences were suggested to their respective lands. The following year Augustin had to settle in another home. Perhaps the ex-in-laws resented the presence of MacGregor or of the second wife of Augustin.

Fourth generation: Gervais Parenteau, Augustin’s son

On May 11, 1778, Gervais Parenteau, another son of Augustin, born December 27, 1755 in Louiseville was given land in Saint-Grégoire, Ville de Bécancour, in the fief Roquetaillade, on the present Boulevard des Acadiens. He resold this land in 1780 after having cleared a few acres. On March 7, 1780 he received another piece of land in Saint-Grégoire, in the fief of Godefroy, situated today on the North-west side of the Boulevard des Acadiens, east of highway 55, where one can see a two-story square house built on the foundation of a stone house constructed by Gervais Parenteau in 1812. The stone house was demolished in 1911. The land continued to be transmitted from father to son until recent years.

On November 13, 1786 Gervais Parenteau, thirty, married Marie Desrosiers also known as Dargis, of Bécancour, who would be in 1778 the beneficiary of an inheritance estimated at 105 pounds. Eleven children were born from their union of whom three died at a young age. Five of the sons had descendants. Gervais and his family lived in a wooden house built on the east side of the land. This house was demolished after the construction of the stone house on the west side of the land.

On March 10, 1797 Gervais struck a bargain with the Harts of Trois-Rivières agreeing to provide then with wood for the construction of a warehouse adjoining their brewery between the St. Lawrence River and of the convent of the Ursulines nuns. In 1803 Gervais was visited by his sister, Marie-Anne. She had married Lawrence Flürher, a demobilized German soldier who belonged
to the German armies engaged by England during the War of Independence. Marie-Anne asked Gervais to give her his part of the inheritance since she took care of their mother. Gervais accepted this proposition in front a notary.

In 1811 Gervais arranged to have his son, Jean-Baptiste, hired as an apprentice to a master carpenter of Saint-Grégoire. The following year the stone house, which measured thirty feet by thirty feet, was built for Gervais.

In 1816 according to his will, Gervais left his personal and real estate to his two sons, Michel and Jean-Baptiste. Michel would receive the stone house and Jean-Baptiste the wooden one. The inheritance of the other children was foreseen in this gift. Later on Jean-Baptiste and Antoine, both carpenters, would receive different contracts for building houses and warehouses in Saint-Grégoire and Trois-Rivières.

The wife of Gervais Parenteau was buried on May 23, 1831 in Saint-Grégoire. Gervais made a final will and testament on March 7, 1833 and named his son, Antoine, as executor of the will. He died on May 6, 1837 at the age of eighty-one in Saint-Grégoire and was buried two days later. Some of his grandchildren settled in Saint-Célestin, Notre-Dame-Mont-Carmel near Shawinigan and Grand’Mère.

Translated by Susan Berry

 IV PIERRE PARENTEAU
- 1rst WIFE MADELEINE RONDEAU
- 2nd Wife MARIE GEORGETEAU also known as JOLICOEUR

THIRD GENERATION – SECOND BRANCH - SUMMARY

Pierre Parenteau, the eldest son of Pierre-Louis Parenteau and Marguerite Saint-Laurent, was born on July 31, 1717 in the Petit-Chenal of Yamaska and baptized, August 22. His godparents were Pierre Couturier and Angélique Saint-Laurent.

At the age of 25 Pierre attended the wedding of his brother, Augustin, in Louiseville. His turn came on April 27, 1745, when he married Madeleine Rondeau, daughter of Joseph Rondeau and Marie Passerieu, of Saint-Ours. Among the guests were Pierre Petit, the seigneur of Yamaska, and Louis Giguère, a friend of the family. The evening before the young couple had signed the marriage contract in the presence of the militia captain from Saint-Ours. Five weeks later Pierre’s father died accidently and was buried the next day. January 17, 1746 Pierre officially registered some land his late father had left him. This land was next to the paternal land in Petit-Chenal (lot # 518 in the land registry of Yamaska). Madeleine, their first child, was born January 26, 1746. The paternal land was granted to Pierre’s brother, Joseph, July 11, 1747, with the agreement of the other brothers and brothers-in-law. Three days later a detailed inventory was made of all the paternal goods which would be divided equally among the brothers and sisters. All of them, come of age, gave their shares to Joseph who had to look after their mother for the rest of her days.

On December 30, 1751, Pierre Parenteau was chosen to verify the quality of the construction of a house built for the widow of Jean Petit by Joseph Deguire. A month later, in Louiseville, he attended the marriage contract ceremony of his brother, Joseph, and Marie-Jeanne Georgeteau also known as Jolicoeur. He returned the seventh of February for their marriage celebration. Winter travel to Louiseville was made easier because Lake Saint-Pierre was frozen over.

In 1753 or 1754, his wife, Madeleine Rondeau, died. One or two years later, January 13, 1755, Pierre remarried. His second wife was Marie Georgeteau also known as Jolicoeur, twenty-one, half-sister of Marie-Jeanne Georgeteau, Joseph’s wife. She had been living in Yamaska for three years. The following December their first baby was born. It was a stillbirth and the infant was buried the next day. In all, they raised six children including two surviving children from the first marriage.

On the third of May, 1763, Pierre and his wife legally received the property titles of their land in the Petit-Chenal from the new seigneur of Yamaska, Godefroy de Tonnancour. Pierre owned a small house and a small stable. He sold this farm the day after receiving the titles. They lived there until September 1763. His name does not appear on the Yamaska census nor on that of Sorel.

On March 2, 1769, his first son, also called Pierre (born June 29, 1748), renounced his part of the inheritance from his father’s first marriage. This son had just signed up in Montréal to spend a winter working in Michillimackinac on Lake Huron. Upon his return he settled in the suburb of Saint-Laurent in Montréal and married a young widow, Marie-Louise Lefebvre, April 27, 1772. His sister, Madeleine, married Jean-Baptiste Querry, originally from Martinique, August10, 1772. They made their home in the seignory of Sorel.

Pierre Parenteau, son of Pierre-Louis, was buried May 1, 1782 in Yamaska. He was sixty-four and eight months. His wife, Marie Georgeteau-Jolicoeur, died March 27, 1799 in Yamaska at the age of sixty three. He is the ancestor of a branch of Parenteau who settled in the suburb of Saint-Laurent in Montréal, near the intersection of Saint-Laurent and de Maisonneuve Streets. These Parenteau were carpenters and masons. They made many trips to the Great Lakes and West Canada for fur trading. In 1832, Joseph Papineau (father of the leader of the Patriots of 1837-38), gave alms to a young lady from this Parenteau family to help her sick father during a cholera epidemic. This Parenteau family from Montréal had Metis descendants in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and in Alberta, of whom Pierriche Parenteau, who fought alongside Louis Riel in 1870 and 1885 and who is the grandson of Pierre Parenteau and his first wife, Madeleine Rondeau.

Pierre Parenteau is also the ancestor of a branch of the family who lived in Sorel, and travelled to the Great lakes and West Canada. His son, Chrysostome, even owned a master canoe.

Pierre Parenteau has many descendants through his son, Joseph who married Elizabeth Lavallée, January 29, 1787 in Sorel. Joseph’s descendants settled on farm lands at Saint-Aimé, Saint-Robert, Saint-David, Saint-Guillaume d’Upton, Saint-Bonaventure and Sawyerville.

 V JOSEPH PARENTEAU and MARIE-JEANNE GEORGETEAU also known as (SAID) JOLICOEUR THIRD GENERATION – THIRD BRANCH - SUMMARY

Joseph Parenteau, son of Pierre-Louis Parenteau and Marguerite Saint-Laurent, was born June 23, 1721 in Yamaska. He was baptized the following day in the presence of his godfather, a friend and neighbor named Joseph Desrosiers, and as godmother, his aunt, Gabrielle Saint-Laurent. He was the fifth child and the third son.

During his youth, Joseph helped to develop the family farm. It was partly because of his great efforts that, after the accidental death of his father on June 4, 1745, his mother wasted no time to summon a notary and to sign a document giving Joseph the land which his father had promised him verbally. Marguerite Saint-Laurent knew she could count on him to look after her and the six younger children. The whole family agreed with giving Joseph also the fatherland if he would accept this responsibility. The inventory of all goods was made on July 14, 1747 and the inheritance was to be divided among the family members. All of them willingly relinquished their inheritance to their brother, Joseph, in order to free themselves from any responsibility toward their mother.

On January 29, 1752, at the age of thirty, Joseph signed a marriage contract with a twenty-two years old widow, Marie-Jeanne Georgeteau also known as Jolicoeur, who had a young child, Marie-Rose Bellegarde. Marie-Jeanne was the widow of Joseph Gerbeau also known as Bellegarde and lived in Louiseville in the Maskinongé County where she was born September 12, 1729. She was the daughter of Claude Georgeteau also known as Jolicoeur, a corporal, and Françoise Desrosiers. Marie-Jeanne had a half sister, Marie, born in her father’s second marriage who would marry Joseph’s brother, Pierre. As mentioned in the marriage contract, Marie-Jeanne brought, as her dowry, her garments, her bed, two cows, and two sheep. The wedding took place on February 7, 1752 in the Louiseville church across from Yamaska on the north shore of the St. Lawrence River or Saint-Pierre (St. Peter) Lake.

At the time of the 1765 census taking, Joseph Parenteau had a home on his land of about 125 acres in the Petit-Chenal of Yamaska, of which 15 acres were cultivated. He owned two cows, two bulls, three sheep, one horse and five pigs. He had, at that time, five boys and three girls. That same year he was given other property titles. His father, Pierre-Louis, had originally received only one document signed by the seigneur of Yamaska in 1710.

Joseph left this land in 1774 to settled three kilometers higher along the west coast of the Yamaska River. Today, in this area, Parenteau descendants can still be found. It was at this new farm that Marguerite Saint-Laurent, Joseph’s mother and Pierre-Louis’ widow, died on September 5, 1775. She was 81 years of age.

In 1780, Joseph Parenteau gave some land to his eldest son called Joseph. On May 6, 1784 he offered part of his personal and real estate to his children in exchange for an annuity. Most refused his offer feeling unable to meet its demands. Eventually a son-in-law, Michel Petit-Gobin, married to his eldest daughter, accepted.

Joseph’s wife, Marie-Jeanne Georgeteau also known as Jolicoeur died May 1, 1797, at Yamaska. Joseph Parenteau died July 5, 1801 at the age of eighty. He had spent his entire life working the land and his sons imitated him by living on the land in all parts of Yamaska. About 75% of the Parenteau in America are descendants of Joseph Parenteau, of whom the Parenteau and Parranto living in Minnesota.

Translated by Susan Berry.

 VI MATHURIN PARENTEAU and MARIE-MADELEINE BADAILLAC also known as Laplante

THIRD GENERATION – FOURTH BRANCH – SUMMARY

Mathurin Parenteau, fourth son of Pierre-Louis Parenteau and Marguerite Saint-Laurent, was born at Yamaska in the rank of Petit-Chenal May 25, 1723 and was baptized on June 6th. His Godfather was his uncle Mathurin Berthelot who remained in front n the other side of Petit-Chenal, on the Du Domaine Island, and the godmother was Isabelle Forcier.

Mathurin Parenteau signs a marriage contract On February 1st, 1750, with Marie-Madeleine Badaillac-Laplante. The act was drafted by François Carry, Captain of the militia of Yamaska, in the presence of Jean Petit, then ill militia Captain. (Notary Louis Pillard 1750, April 1st). They married On February 2nd, 1750, church of Yamaska. They had their first child nine months later, on November 7th.

Three months later, February 11, 1751 Mathurin was granted a land located in the Grandmesnil settlement in Yamaska (Notary Louis Pillard ANQTR). But on August second of that year, he was unable to pay a debt of 51 pounds to a merchant of Montréal: then he asked the Court time to sell his cattle (ANQ…). He sold finally his land to the blacksmith François Bibeau, March 2nd, 1753 (Notary Rigaud ANQTR), in reserving however pine beams there. The selling price was 475 pounds that were paid to Mathurin in tickets printed order (Notary Rigaud ANQTR). We don’t Know where he lived after that in 1753, due to financial problems. Is it in Western Canada or at Saint-Sulpice, between Yamaska and Montréal, along the St.Lawrence River, where was living in 1757-58 his younger brother Jacques, a traveler for fur trade?

Ten years later Mathurin was granted another land on the south-west side of the Yamaska River, at Saint-Aimé-de Massueville. There he built a house and farm buildings. Census 1765: house, his wife and children, 4 sowed acres, 2 beefs, 2 cows, 4 sheep, one horse and 2 porks (Rapport de l’Archiviste de la province de Québec 1936-37, p.103). Their second child, Madeleine, was born January 1st, 1769 at Yamaska, 18 years after the first child. We can wonder if Mathurin had absent for ten years because he sold his first land in 1753 and got a new one only in 1763. More, the couple had no children from 1751 to 1768. His wife was she waiting for him while he would have been in Western Canada for fur traders?

We know that he went to live at Saint-Sulpice with his wife probably because of fur trade. Two of their sons were born in Saint-Sulpice in 1774 and 1776 and went in West Canada for fur trade. He is suspected to have travelled in West Canada in that purpose.

Mathurin Parenteau died at 68 years old and was buried August 1791 at Yamaska.

Children of Mathurin Parenteau
and Marie-Madeleine Badaillac-Laplante

1- Pierre-Mathurin: born at Yamaska November, 1750, and baptized the day after

2- Madeleine: born and baptized January 1st, 1769 and buried 3 weeks later, January 22, 1769 at Yamaska. Born 18 years after the first child.

3- Marie: born and baptized May 10, 1771 at Yamaska. Married to Germain Pelletier, «voyageur» (traveler) for the fur trade, January 24, 1791 at Yamaska. Died at Montréal February 9th, 1818 and buried the day after at Montréal.

4- Joseph: born and baptized June 5th, 1774 at Saint-Sulpice. Godfather: François Perrault. Godmother: Marie-Josephte Langlois. He was engaged on March 9, 1792 to go in the North and to live there one year (Notary Chaboillez ANQM). Settled and married in Manitoba to a Metis woman whose name is not known.
His son Joseph Mathurin, Metis, married Suzanne Richard Daigneault in Manitoba: they had at least 3 children whose family name was Mathurin or Parenteau dit Mathurin:
a) Élie Mathurin, married to Marie Bériault-Boisclair on November 25, 1862 at Saint-Boniface, Manitoba;
b) Marguerite Mathurin, married to William Racette on February 9, 1864 in Saint-Boniface, Manitoba;
c) Mathurin, married to Madeleine Lapointe on April 23, 1872 at Saint-Boniface, Manitoba.

5- François: born and baptized on January 1st, 1776 at Saint-Sulpice. Godfather and godmother: Basile Picher and Marguerite Langlois. Died on February 29, 1776 at Yamaska.

Translated by Gilles Parenteau


View online : Parenteau Heritage

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