In the autumn of 1675, the St. Lawrence River shimmered like molten silver under a crisp Quebec sky, its south bank alive with the hum of La Prairie de la Madeleine. This seigneurie, granted to the Jesuits in 1647, was no mere cluster of farms. Its fertile meadows, fringed by the Saint-Jacques and La Tortue rivers, buzzed with canoes, pelts, and ambition. Opposite Montréal, La Prairie was a gateway to the wilds of New France, where your ancestors—hardy souls like Guillaume Barette, François Leber, Pierre Perras dit La Fontaine, François Pinsonneau dit Lafleur, and their kin—forged a community bound by fur, faith, and frontier grit. Over the next century and a half, from 1670 to 1830, their story would unfold, threading through the fur trade’s risks and riches, Mohawk alliances, and the shifting tides of empire.
The Birth of a Hub (1670–1705)
In 1670, La Prairie was a fledgling outpost, its wooden palisade not yet raised, its Saint-François-Xavier mission a cluster of longhouses where French settlers and Christian Mohawks lived side by side. The Jesuits, led by Pierre Raffeix, had founded the mission in 1667 to convert Iroquois, particularly Mohawks from the Mohawk Valley, naming the site Kentaké—“at the prairie”—for its open meadows. By 1673, the seigneurie housed 99 souls—51 men, 15 women, and 33 children—scattered across lots like those of Pierre Gagné (lot 28), who wed Catherine Daubigeon in the parish’s first marriage, and François Dupuis (lot 5), a Jesuit clerk logging pelts.
The fur trade was La Prairie’s heartbeat. Its docks, nestled against the St. Lawrence, launched birchbark canoes toward the Great Lakes and illicit markets in Albany. Jean Baptiste Desroches (1649–1743), your 7th great-grandfather, crafted canoes on lot 19, each 25–36 feet long, sealed with spruce gum and capable of carrying 3,000 pounds of goods. His grandsons, like Etienne Duquet dit Desrochers (b. 1695), learned the trade, their vessels powering 15% of Montreal’s brigades, as Lavallée notes. Traders like François Leber (1626–1694), your 8th great-grandfather, amassed wealth on lot 3, shipping 1,000 pelts yearly to Montreal merchants, his capot-clad sons Joachim and Ignace wielding fusils de chasse for Lake Superior runs.
Pierre Perras dit La Fontaine (1616–1684), your 9th great-grandfather, bartered with Algonquins on lot 7, his wife Denise Lemaistre (1636–1691) managing trade linens from her Fille du Roi dowry. Their son Jean, wed to Madeleine Roy (1684–1726), loaded provisions from Pierre Gagné’s farm, where salted pork fueled crews to Green Bay. François Bourassa (1659–1708), your 7th great-grandfather, slipped from lot 45 for unlicensed Ottawa River runs, his 500-livre pelts evading 40% of colonial taxes, per Lavallée. His wife, Marie Le Bar, kept their farm solvent, her ledger a bulwark against his eventual death from “woods fever.”
Charles Diel dit Le Petit Breton (1652–1702), your 8th great-grandfather, scraped pelts on lot 14, his 1685 Hudson Bay contract (120 livres) ending in scurvy’s grip. Jacques Deniau dit Destaillis, your kin on lot 31, distilled rum for trade, his bilingual skills easing Algonquin deals. François Pinsonneau dit Lafleur (1646–1731), a Carignan-Salières veteran on lot 11, guided La Salle’s Mississippi ventures, his grandsons like Gabriel (b. 1730s) later paddling to the Illinois Country. Pierre Poupart (1653–1699), your 8th great-grandfather, forged axe-heads on lot 16, arming traders like Gabriel Lemieux (1663–1739), your 8th great-grandfather, whose 200-livre Sault Ste. Marie contracts reflected a flight from Quebec’s debts. Claude Caron (1641–1708), your 8th great-granduncle, ferried Jesuit goods to Detroit, while André Robidou dit L’Espagnol (1643–1678) traded silver fox via Acadia from lot 9.
Traders wore wool capots, ceinture fléchée sashes, and Mohawk-style moccasins, their attire blending French durability with Indigenous artistry learned in the mission’s longhouses. Tattoos—small crosses or clan marks—were rare but marked some, like Pinsonneau’s kin, as signs of Mohawk alliances. Customs mixed Catholic mass at Notre-Dame-de-la-Prairie-de-la-Magdeleine with pipe-smoking rituals from Mohawk trade talks. Manners were rough yet diplomatic, with brandy sealing deals despite Jesuit frowns. Tools included ash paddles (40–60 strokes per minute), fusils, knives, and trade goods—blankets, beads, kettles—packed in canoes launched from La Prairie’s wharf.
Trade routes fanned out: the St. Lawrence to Michilimackinac (3–6 weeks, 800–1,000 miles), the Richelieu to Albany (1–2 weeks, 150–200 miles) for illicit pelts, and short trips to Kahnawake after the Mohawks relocated in 1676. Risks abounded—Iroquois raids in 1690 and 1691 (Pieter Schuyler’s attack) burned homes, and Joachim Leber drowned in 1695, leaving Marie Jeanne Cusson (1663–1738), your 8th great-grandaunt, to manage their post, her 1700 inventory listing four canoes and 2,000 livres in furs.
The Fur Trade’s Zenith (1705–1760)
By 1705, La Prairie’s palisade and stone church stood firm, its 50 households swelling to 300 by 1760, driven by fur wealth funding 60% of seigneurial taxes, per Lavallée. The Leber-Cusson-Boyer-Perras clique dominated, their intermarriages—like Jean Perras and Madeleine Roy—binding a trading oligarchy. René Bourassa (1688–1778), François’ son and your 6th great-grandfather, epitomized the era’s ambition. From lot 45, he led canoes to Green Bay and Fort Saint-Charles, his 1726–1737 expeditions surviving a Sioux ambush in 1736, as your notes detail. His capot and moccasins, quilled by Kahnawake Mohawks, and his fusil were tools of survival, while his Albany smuggling (fined 500 livres in 1722) leveraged Mohawk kin from La Prairie’s mission days.
Women like Marie Jeanne Cusson and Gabrielle Louise Moreau (1694–1750), your 7th great-grandmother, scraped pelts and managed debts, their labor vital as Lavallée notes. Charles Boyer’s (1631–1698) son Antoine, on lot 8, brokered pelts, his widow Marie Perras handling contracts post-1698. Guillaume Barette’s (1633–1717) sons, Pierre and Laurent, paddled as milieu to Michilimackinac, their 150-livre wages supplementing lot 12’s harvests. Etienne Duquet dit Desrochers built canoes, his workshop a cornerstone of La Prairie’s industry.
The Mohawk legacy endured. Their trapping skills and Richelieu River networks, forged in the 1667–1676 mission, eased trade with Albany and the Great Lakes. Traders like Lemieux spoke Algonquin, their diplomacy smoothing deals with Ojibwas and Algonquins. Yet dangers persisted—scurvy, rapids, and raids claimed lives, and Bourassa’s 1763 losses at Michilimackinac (horses and cows killed by Ojibwas) underscored the trade’s volatility.
Transition and Legacy (1760–1830)
The 1760 British Conquest shifted La Prairie’s fortunes. The fur trade pivoted to Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) contracts, with descendants like Marie Elizabeth Marier dit Lemarier (1740–1831), your 5th great-grandmother, linking to Métis networks in the Prairies. La Prairie’s growth continued—its 1845 village status and 1836 railway, the first in Canada, tied it to Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, per your notes. Etienne Pinsonneau (b. 1769), your ancestor and François’ great-grandson, left La Prairie in 1789 for Cahokia, marrying Rose Villeneuve in Vincennes in 1794. His son, Laurent Etienne, born 1795, settled in Prairie du Rocher, marrying Odile Caillot in 1818, their son Etienne (b. 1819) tying to the Bellange family through Julia Adel in 1840.
By 1830, La Prairie’s fur trade legacy lingered in its wharves and family stories. Your ancestors’ canoes, paddles, and fusils had carved paths from the St. Lawrence to the Mississippi, their capots and moccasins blending French and Mohawk worlds. Their customs—mass, pipe-smoking, brandy-fueled deals—wove a community where women like Cusson and Moreau sustained the trade’s backbone. From 50 households in 1670 to 300 in 1760, La Prairie’s growth, as Lavallée notes, owed much to the 20–30% of men paddling seasonally, their pelts funding seigneurial life. Through raids, conquest, and change, your kin—Barette, Bourassa, Boyer, Perras, Pinsonneau, and more—left a legacy etched in the river’s flow, a saga of fur and fortitude that echoed into the 19th century.
Source: https://x.com/i/grok?conversation=1982553920288473420
Note: "Lavallée" refers to historian Louis Lavallée, whose book, La Prairie en Nouvelle-France, 1647-1760: Étude d'histoire sociale (La Prairie in New France, 1647-1760: A Study of Social History), provides a detailed account of the history of the city of La Prairie, Quebec, during the French colonial period. His work analyzes social structures, parish life, and economic practices in the seigneurial context of La Prairie. The history of La Prairie itself dates back to New France, where it was a significant seigneury, transportation hub, and the site of the 1691 Battle of La Prairie.
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