APPENDICES

Acadians Who Found Refuge in Louisiana, February 1764-early 1800s

BLANCHARD

[blonh-SHARD, BLAN-cherd]

ACADIA

Louis Blanchard of La Rochelle, France, a wine maker, came to Acadia aboard the St.-Jehan in 1636--the same ship that brought early colonists Pierre Martin and Guillaume Trahan to the colony.  Evidently Louis did not remain in Acadia, or he may have died there before creating a family of his own. 

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According to Acadian genealogist Bona Arsenault, the first Blanchard to come to Acadia was Guillaume, born in c1590 probably at Martaizé, near Loudun, France, where Acadian governor Charles Menou, sieur d'Aulnay and his mother owned an estate.  Guillaume was married to Huguette Poirier when he came to the colony.  Arsenault says Guillaume and Huguette arrived in Acadia, date unrecorded, with son Jean and Huguette's brother Jean Poirier.  However, Acadian genealogist Stephen A. White, followed here, denies that Guillaume and Huguette were Jean Blanchard's parents.  

Jean Blanchard, the actual progenitor of the Blanchards of Acadia, born in France in c1611, was one of the earliest settlers in the colony.  At age 31, he married 21-year-old Radégonde Lambert at Port-Royal in c1642.  Radegonde gave Jean six children, including two sons who created their own families.  Their daughters married into the Gaudet, Guérin, and Richard dit Sansoucy families.  Radegonde died at Port-Royal in the 1670s or 1680s, leaving Jean a widower.  He never remarried.  He died at Port-Royal on his homestead next to the fort in the early 1690s; he was over 80 years old. 

Older son Martin, born at Port-Royal in c1647, married Françoise, daughter of Daniel LeBlanc and Françoise Gaudet, at Port-Royal in c1671.  He fathered three children, including a son who married into the Landry family.  Martin and Françoise's daughters married into the Doucet and Melanson families.  By 1686, Martin had remarried to Marguerite, daughter of Pierre Guilbeau and Catherine Thériot.  She gave him eight more children, including three more sons who married into the Breau, Dupuis, and Bourg families.  Martin and Marguerite's daughters married into the Bourg and Landry families.  In 1701, Martin helped pioneer the Acadian settlement at Cobeguit, where his sons Martin, fils and Joseph also settled.  Grandson René, fils, married Marguerite, daughter of German Thériot and Anne Richard of Grand-Pré in c1726 and settled at the western end of the Minas Basin.  By 1752, Grandson Anselme, born at Cobeguit, had moved to St.-Esprit, Île Royale, where he farmed for M. Dola Barras, captain of the port. 

Younger son, Guillaume, born at Port-Royal in c1650, married Huguette, daughter of Antoine Gougeon and Jeanne Chebrat, at Port-Royal in c1673.  Guillaume fathered a dozen children, including five sons who married into the Savoie, Thériot, Dupuis, Robichaud, and Girouard families.  Guillaume and Jeanne's daughters married into the Bourgeois, Daigre, Gautrot, Girouard, and Le Prince families.  During the late 1690s, Guillaume, believing he had received a seigneurie from Acadian commander Joseph Robinau de Villebon, pioneered the Acadian settlement along Rivière Petitcoudiac in what came to be called the trois-rivières.  His sons settled there, too.  Guillaume, along with his friend Pierre Thibodeau of Pré-Ronde, who had pioneered the settlement at nearby Chepoudy, became embroiled in a lengthy dispute with Chignecto seigneur Michel Le Neuf de la Vallière et de Beaubassin, and his son-in-law, Claude-Sébastien de Villieu, over who controlled the land in the area.  In the end, La Vallière and de Villieu won the dispute, but Guillaume and his fellow colonists were allowed to remain at Petitcoudiac as censitaires of the Chignecto seigneur. 

[For more of this family in pre- and post-disperal Acadia and Canada, see Book Three]

In 1755, descendants of Jean Blanchard could be found at Annapolis Royal, Minas, Cobeguit, Petitcoudiac in the trois-rivières area, and on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean.  

~

François Blanchard dit Gentilhomme from St.-Marc-le-Blanc, Brittany, France, not kin to Jean, reached Acadia in c1712.  He married Anne Corne at Grand-Pré in c1719, and remarried to Marguerite, daughter of Pierre Carret and Angélique Chiasson of Chignecto, probably at Chignecto in c1725.  He and his family moved to Malpèque, Île St.-Jean, in c1737.  In the summer of 1752, a French official counted François, a widower again, at Malpèque, on the northwestern coast of the island.  Living with him were seven children:  Marguerite, age 20; Catherine, age 17 1/2; François, fils, age 14; Cécile, age 12; Jean, age 10; Rosalie, age 8; and Agathe, age 6.  According to Bona Arsenault, François's sons created families of their own and settled on the island.  Oldest daughter Marguerite married Joseph, son of Jacques Oudy and Marguerite Saulnier, at St.-Pierre-du-Nord on the island in November 1754.  [See also Book Three]

~

According to Bona Arsenault, a third Blanchard progenitor, Toussaint, son of Jean Blanchard and Pétronille Ferrier of Évran, near St.-Malo, France, not kin to Jean and François dit Gentilhomme, married Angélique, daughter of Claude Bertrand and Catherine Pitre and widow of François Martin, at Annapolis Royal in c1727 and also settled at Petitcoudiac.  Arsenault says that Toussaint and his wife had three sons--Ambroise, born in c1734, Michel in c1741, and Joseph in c1746.  They also had at least three daughters--Marguerite, born in c1739; Anne in June 1740; and Madeleine in c1744.  Angélique died in a hospital in Brittany, France, in January 1768, in her early 70s.  Son Joseph married fellow Acadian Marie Granger at Cherbourg, Normandy, France, in August 1769 perhaps after they returned from Île Miquelon, off the southern coast of Newfoundland.  Toussaint died at Cherbourg in September 1769, age 83.  His daughters married into the Bertrand, Comeau, and Mondon families in France and Louisiana, and all of them emigrated to the Spanish colony in 1785.  [See also Book Three]

LE GRAND DÉRANGEMENT

[For the family's travails during the Great Upheaval, see Book Six]

LOUISIANA:  RIVER SETTLEMENTS

Blanchards were among the earliest Acadians to seek refuge in Louisiana.  The first of them to reach Louisiana came from Halifax in 1765.  They settled at Cabanocé/St.-Jacques on the river above New Orleans where 20 Acadians from Georgia had settled the year before:  

Anne Blanchard of Port-Royal, age 40, came with husband, Joseph Richard dit Vieux of Port-Royal, age 48, and four children, ages 6 to newborn.  By 1770, they had moved upriver to Ascension, where Joseph died in the mid-1770s.  Anne took her children to the Attakapas District in the late 1770s and remarried to Jean-Baptiste Cormier, fils in January 1779. 

Amable Blanchard, age 23, came with wife Anastasie Girouard, age 20, and their infant son Marin.  They had more sons in Louisiana.  

Amable's older brother Joseph, still a bachelor, age 26, probably came with him.  

Two other Blanchard brothers, Joseph and Pierre, ages 17 and 16, also came from Halifax in 1765.  

Marguerite Blanchard, age 14, and her brother Victor, age 13, came as orphans.  Marguerite married Simon, son of fellow Acadian Alexandre Broussard dit Beausoleil, at Cabanocé/St.-Jacques in April 1768 and followed her husband back to the Bayou Teche valley.  After he married at Ascension, on the river above Cabanocé/St.-Jacques, in February 1773, Victor followed his sister to the Attakapas District and settled in what became St. Martin Parish, but he and his wife were that rare Acadian couple who had no children.  

Most of the Blanchards who came from Halifax in 1765 remained on the river:  

Descendants of Joseph BLANCHARD (c1739-1778?; Jean, Guillaume)

Joseph, elder son of Pierre Blanchard and Anne Robichaux, born probably at Petitcoudiac in c1739, came to Louisiana as a bachelor in 1765.  He married Anne-Esther, called Esther, Bourgeois, at Cabanocé in c1769, remained there, and raised a family.  Joseph may have died at St.-Jacques in August 1778; he would have been only 39 years old.  His daughters married into the Bourg and Cahier families.  Only one of his three married sons remained on the river.  The other two settled elsewhere, one in the Bayou Lafourche valley, and the other in the Attakapas District, west of the Atchafalaya Basin.  

1

Oldest son Maurice, born at New Orleans in May 1774, married Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Augustin Fontenot and his Acadian wife Isabelle Martin dit Barnabé, at St.-Jacques in August 1800; Marie-Madeleine's mother was a Martin dit Barnabé.  In the 1810s, Maurice moved his family from the river to upper Bayou Lafourche and settled in present-day Assumption Parish.

2

Joseph, fils, baptized at St.-Jacques, age unrecorded, in February 1775, married Angélique-Marie or Marie-Angélique, daughter of Jean-Louis Picou and Marie-Françoise Demoulins, at St.-Jacques in January 1803.  Their son Louis Joseph was born at St. James in April 1804, Jean Louis in March 1809 but died at age 2 in September 1811, and Augustin Sylvain, called Sylvain, was born in St. James Parish in March 1815.  

2a

Louis Joseph died at Bayou Goula, Iberville Parish, in February 1838.  The priest noted in Louis's burial record that he was age 28, but he was 34.  He probably did not marry.  

2b

Sylvain married Adèle LaCroix probably in Ascension Parish in the 1840s.  Their son Joseph Oscar was born in Ascension Parish in July 1847, and Louis in July 1849.  Sylvain remarried to Marguerite Élodie, daughter of fellow Acadians Éloi Hébert and Angèle Hébert, at St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in June 1853.  Their son Sylvain, fils was born near Plaquemine, Iberville parish, across the river from St. Gabriel, in June 1854.  

3

Frédéric-Sylvain, baptized at St.-Jacques, age unrecorded, in September 1777, married Anne, daughter of French Immigrant Pierre Berteau and his second wife Rose Savoie, an Acadian, at St.-Jacques in February 1800, and remarried to Marie, daughter of Creoles Frédéric Bertrand and Geneviève Mayer of New Orleans and the upper German Coast.  They moved upriver first to St. Gabriel in Iberville Parish and then to the Baton Rouge area.  In the 1810s, they left the river and moved to the northern area of the old Attakapas District, where they settled at La Grand Pointe, St. Martin Parish, on upper Bayou Teche. 

4

Youngest son Jean-Pierre, born at St.-Jacques in October 1786, probably did not marry.  

Descendants of Amable BLANCHARD (c1742-?; Jean, Guillaume)

Amable, younger son of Pierre Blanchard and Anne Robichaux, born probably at Petitcoudiac in c1742, and his wife Anastasie, daughter of François Girouard and Marie Guilbeau of Annapolis Royal, who he married probably at Halifax, brought only a single child to Louisiana, an infant son, in 1765.  Their other children were born at St.-Jacques.  Three of Amable's children were sons, but only one of them seems to have created a family of his own.  His sons and grandsons moved upriver to West Baton Rouge and Pointe Coupee parishes.  Amable's daughter married into the Arnaud family.  

1

Oldest son Marin, born c1765 probably on the long voyage from Halifax via St.-Domingue, may not have survived childhood.  

2

Pierre, born at St.-Jacques in c1770, married Élisabeth or Isabelle, daughter of fellow Acadiand Louis Mouton and Marie Bastarache, at St.-Jacques in April 1792.  Their son Pierre-Prosper or Prosper-Pierre was born at St.-Jacques in June 1793, and Jean Privat, called Privat, in August 1804.  Their daughters married into the LeBlanc, Richard, and White families.  Pierre died in West Baton Rouge Parish in July 1829, in his late 50s.  

2a

Pierre Prosper married Élisabeth, daughter of Thomas Courtin and Geneviève Bonvillain, probably in West Baton Rouge Parish in October 1815.  Their daughter married into the McFaddin family.  Pierre Prosper remarried to Madeleine, also called Arsène, Chutz or Chustz first in a civil ceremony in Pointe Coupee Parish, and then sanctified that marriage at the Baton Rouge church, East Baton Rouge Parish, in April 1831.  Their son Pierre Louis Anselme, called Anselme and also Samuel, was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in August 1841.  Their daughters married into the Bernard du Montier (French Creole, not Acadian), Cazes, Nolan, and Richard families.  Pierre Prosper likely died in West Baton Rouge Parish in September 1849; the Baton Rouge priest who recorded the burial, and who did not bother to give any parents' names or even mention a wife, said that Pierre died at "age 50 years," but Pierre Prosper would have been 56.  In August 1850, the federal census taker in West Baton Rouge Parish counted 7 slaves--2 males and 5 females, all black except for a single mulatto, ranging in age from 35 to 1--on Mrs. P. Blanchard's farm; this was Pierre Prosper's widow, Madeleine Chutz.  

Anselme, by his father's second wife, married Cephalide, daughter of Creoles Félix Bernard du Montier, fils and Joséphine Seguin, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in February 1869; Anselme's sister Nathalie married Cephalide's brother Louis.  Anselme and Cephalide's son Joseph Bénoni was born near Brusly in November 1869. 

2b

Privat married French Creole Marie Leocadie, called Leocadie, Barras first in a civil ceremony in Pointe Coupee Parish, and sanctified the marriage at the Baton Rouge church, East Baton Rouge Parish, in June 1830.  They settled perhaps in West Baton Rouge Parish before moving to near Lakeland, Pointe Coupee Parish, among the few Acadians to settle there.  Their son Jean Baptiste le jeune was born in February 1833, Louis Amable in January 1837, and Joseph Sylvanie in June 1849 but died at age 15 in April 1864.  Their daughters married into the Braud and Sicard families.  In August 1850, the federal census taker in Pointe Coupee Parish counted 8 slaves--3 males and 5 females, all black, ranging in age from 18 to 1--on John Blanchard's farm; this may have been Privat, whose first name was Jean.  

Jean Baptiste le jeune married Marie Sophie Alphonsine, called Alphonsine, daughter of Simon Major and Élise Gremillon, at the Pointe Coupee church, Pointe Coupee Parish, in April 1856.  Their son Joseph Amédée was born in Pointe Coupee Parish in February 1857, and Louis Privat in October 1866 after Jean Baptiste le jeune served in the War of 1861-65.  

Louis Amable married cousin Émilie or Amelie, daughter of Ovide Barras and Élose Decuir, at the Pointe Coupee church, Pointe Coupee Parish, in 1857.  Their son Jean Baptiste le jeune was born in Pointe Coupee Parish in March 1858. 

3

Youngest son Jean-Baptiste, baptized at the St.-Jacques church in October 1777, died at St.-Jacques in March 1807, age 30.  He probably did not marry.  

Descendants of Joseph BLANCHARD (c1748-1778?; Jean, Guillaume, Antoine)

Joseph, elder son of Paul Blanchard and Judith Savoie, born probably at Annapolis Royal in c1748, came to Louisiana as an orphaned teenager with his younger brother Pierre in 1765.  Joseph married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Dupuis and Anne Gaudet, at St.-Jacques in November 1772.  Joseph may have died at St.-Jacques in August 1778; he would have been only 30 years old.  His daughters married into the Bernard, Braud, Richard, and Savoie families.  He fathered no sons, so his line of the family, except for its blood, died with him.  Joseph's daughter Henriette, wife of Jean-Baptiste Braud, settled on Bayou Teche in St. Martin Parish, where she remarried to Joseph Savoie of Carencro in May 1810.  She died in St. Martin Parish in 1815.  Her sisters remained on the river.  

Descendants of Pierre BLANCHARD (c1749-?; Jean, Guillaume, Antoine)

Pierre, younger son of Paul Blanchard and Judith Savoie, born probably at Annapolis Royal in c1749, came to Louisiana in 1765 as an orphaned teenager with his old brother Joseph.  Pierre married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Charles Breau and Marie Benoit, at St.-Jacques in February 1778.  They had only a single son, but he bore four sons of his own, who perpetuated this line of the family in St. James Parish.  Their daughters married into the Michel and Thibodeaux families.  

Pierre, fils, born probably at St.-Jacques in c1784, married Marie Françoise Baptiste, called Françoise Baptiste and also Anaïse, daughter of fellow Acadians Baptiste Bernard and Madeleine Dugas, at St.-Jacques in February 1806; the priest who recorded the marriage noted that Pierre, père was deceased at the time of the wedding.  Their son Pierre III was born near Convent, St. James Parish, in March 1809, Evariste in February 1814, Louis in August 1819, and Pierre Sosthène, called Sosthène, "posthumously" in November 1822.  His daughters married into the Escureiux, Lejeune, and Michel families.  Pierre, fils died in St. James Parish in October 1822; he was only 38 years old.  In September 1850, the federal census taker in St. James Parish counted 4 slaves--3 males and a female, all black, ranging in age from 60 to 40--on the Widow Prr. Blanchard's farm in the parish's eastern district; this probably was Pierre, fils's widow, Françoise Baptiste Bernard.  

Pierre III married Carmelite, daughter of German Creole Marcellin Oubre and his Acadian wife Félicité Bourg, at the Convent church, St. James Parish, in July 1840.  Pierre III remarried to Melicere, daughter of Benjamin Fulcher and Modeste Arceneaux and widow of Benjamin Duge, at the Convent church in January 1846.  Their son Pierre IV was born in St. James Parish in March 1848, and Félix Oscar, called Oscar, in December 1849 but died at age 6 in June 1855. In September 1850, the census taker in St. James Parish counted 8 slaves--3 males and 5 females, all black, ranging in age from 45 to infancy--on Pierre Blanchard's farm in the parish's eastern district.  Pierre III died in St. James Parish in September 1853, age 44. 

Evariste married Marguerite, daughter of Michel LeBoeuf and his Acadian wife Scholastique Guidry, at the Convent church, St. James Parish, in July 1840.  Evariste died in St. James Parish in October 1843, age 28.  Did he father any sons?  

Louis died in St. James Parish the following month, age 24, and does not seem to have married.  

Sosthène married Doralise, daughter of Pierre Oubre and his Acadian wife Anne Marie dite Manette Guidry, at the Convent church, St. James Parish, in February 1846.  Their son Pierre Sosthène, fils was born near Convent in January 1847, Louis Adolphe in April 1848, Jean Baptiste Léonard in November 1854, Joseph Alceste in October 1856, and Florian in October 1863 but died at age 6 months in May 1864.  

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The second contingent of Blanchards to reach Louisiana came from Maryland in September 1766, but no new family lines came of it:

Françoise Blanchard, age 19, wife of Jacques Landry, who she had married in Maryland the year before, came with her husband and his younger brother.  She followed them to Cabanocé/St.-Jacques on the river above New Orleans and then to nearby Ascension, where she gave Jacques at least four children, a son and three daughters, before he died in 1783.

Marguerite Blanchard probably of Minas, age 33 and unmarried, came with her 6-year-old orphaned nice Madeleine Blanchard.  They, too, settled at Cabanocé/St.-Jacques, where Marguerite married surgeon Barthélemy Gilion or Gibson in the late 1760s.  They settled at nearby Ascension.  Madeleine disappears from local records after 1769, so one wonders if she survived childhood and married. 

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The next contingent of Blanchards to reach Louisiana also came from Maryland, in July 1767.  These were not Chignecto and Port-Royal Blanchards who had escaped the British roundup of 1755 and ended up as prisoners of war in Nova Scotia.  The 1767 arrivals were Minas Blanchards whom the British had transported to Maryland in 1755 and who had endured a dozen years of exile in that colony:

René Blanchard, fils of Grand-Pré, great-grandson of the Acadian progenitor and now age 66, was one of the oldest Acadians to come to the colony.  He and his wife Marguerite Thériot and their married sons Joseph and Anselme, also born at Minas, helped pioneer the new Acadian community of St.-Gabriel d'Iberville, sometimes called St.-Gabriel de Manchac, where the Spanish officials in New Orleans insisted that they settle.  St.-Gabriel was just upriver from Cabanocé, where some of the Maryland exiles, including the Blanchards, had kin, so the St.-Gabriel Acadians tolerated the arrangement.  René died at Ascension, just downriver from St.-Gabriel, in September 1788, age 87.  

Joseph, René's older son, age 38, came with his wife Marie-Josèphe Landry, age 29, and three children--Firmin, age 9; Marguerite, age 5; and Joseph, fils, age 1. 

Younger son Anselme, age 27, came with his wife Esther LeBlanc, age 22,  two children and an orphan--Rose-Osite-Barbe, age 4; and Jérôme, age 2; and Marguerite Blanchard, age 13.  After serving as commandant of the Isleños settlement of Valenzuéla on upper Bayou Lafourche in the early 1780s and as commissioner to the Acadians who came to Louisiana from France in the 1785, Anselme returned with his family to St.-Gabriel, where two of his sons came of age.

Descendants of Joseph BLANCHARD (1730-1770s; Jean, Martin, René)

Joseph, elder son of René Blanchard and Marguerite Thériot, born at Grand-Pré in June 1730, came to Louisiana in 1767 with his wife Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Alexandre Landry and Anne Flan, who he married in Maryland in c1758, and two sons and a daughter, all born in Maryland.  Two other sons were born to them at St.-Gabriel, where Joseph died in the mid-1770s, in his mid-40s.  His daughters married into the Comeaux, Landry, and LeBlanc families.  Marie-Josèphe remarried to Ignace, son of Dominique Babin and widower of Marguerite Braud, at St.-Jacques in February 1778 and followed him across the Atchafalaya Basin to the Atakapas District.  Her four Blanchard sons did not follow her there, however, but remained on the east bank of the river in the Iberville/Ascension Parish area, where three of them created families of their own, but one of the lines probably died out by the 1850s.  

1

Oldest son Firmin, born in Maryland in c1760, settled at St.-Gabriel with his parents but did not remain there.  In May 1781, he married Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Étienne Bujole and Brigitte Chênet of Île St.-Jean, at Ascension, on the river below St.-Gabriel.  Their son Pierre-Joseph, called Joseph, was born at St.-Gabriel in May 1788, Augustin-Valière at Ascension in October 1797, and Paul-Firmin in January 1803.  Their daughters married into the Landry and LeBlanc families.  Firmin died at Ascension in March 1803, age 45.  

Joseph married Marie Judith, called Judith, daughter of fellow Acadians Anselme LeBlanc and Madeleine Babin, at the Donaldson church, Ascension Parish, in November 1809.  Their son Siffroy was born in Ascension Parish in January 1812, Anselme Faustin or Joseph Faustin, called Faustin, in April 1816, Joseph Martial or Martial Joseph in July 1827 but died at age 10 in June 1837, Hippolyte Adolphe was born in August 1829, and Pierre Ambroise or Pierre Onésime in April 1833 but died at age 4 months the following July.  Theirs daughter married into the Bujole and Landry families.  Joseph drowned in the Mississippi River at Ascension in June 1841, age 54.  

Siffroy married cousin Victorine, daughter of fellow Acadians Victor Blanchard, his great uncle, and Madeleine Richard, at St. Gabriel in July 1834.  Their son Siffroy Victor or Victor Siffroy was born in Ascension Parish in March 1837 but died at age 18 months in October 1838.  Their daughter married into the Warren family.  Siffroy died in Ascension Parish in April 1840, age 28.  

Faustin married cousin Marie Apolline, daughter of fellow Acadians Bernard Sosthène Allain and Marie Appoline Blanchard, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in February 1836.  Their son Sosthène Faustin was born at St. Gabriel in September 1838 but died at age 9 months in Ascension Parish in June 1839, Joseph René was born at St. Gabriel in November 1839, Bernard Enaud in April 1841 but died at age 2 in Ascension Parish in September 1843, Joseph Léonce was born in Ascension Parish in January 1849, Firmin in July 1851 but died at age 3 in September 1854, and Bernard Adrien was born in December 1852.  In early August 1850, the federal census taker in Ascension Parish counted 7 slaves--2 males and 5 females, all black, ranging in age from 52 to 3--on Faustin Blanchard's farm.  Faustin died in Ascension Parish in July 1854, age 38.  

Joseph René married Marie Élodie, daughter of Bernard Capdeville and his Acadian wife Virginie Landry, at St. Gabriel in January 1861.  Their son Joseph Marie Faustin was born at St. Gabriel in November 1861. 

2

Joseph, fils, born in Maryland in c1766, on the eve of the family's move to Louisiana, may not have survived childhood.  

3

Pierre-Isidore, called Isidore, born at St.-Gabriel in October 1772, followed his older brother Firmin to Ascension, where he married Marie-Sophie, daughter of fellow Acadians Isaac LeBlanc and Marie Melanson, in August 1793.  Their son Pierre-Gilbert was born at Ascension in November 1794, Joseph-Marie in May 1796, Anselme le jeune in March 1800 but died 6 days after his birth, Jérôme, probably Anselme's twin, died at age 5 months and was buried at St.-Gabriel in October 1800, Éloi was born at Ascension in April 1801, Narcisse in August 1808, and Pierre in April 1814 but died 6 days after his birth.  Their daughter married into LeBlanc family.  Isidore remarried to Clothilde, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste LeBlanc and Marguerite Comeaux, at the St. Gabriel church in December 1817.  Their daughter married into the Artaux family.  Isidore died at St. Gabriel in October 1819; the priest who recorded his burial said that Isidore was age 60 when he died, but he was 47.  

3a

Éloi, by his father's first wife, married cousin Marie Louise, called Louise, another daughter of Jean Baptiste LeBlanc and Marguerite Comeaux, at St. Gabriel in January 1821; Louise's sister Clothilde was Éloi's stepmother.  Their son Éloi, fils was born at St. Gabriel in December 1821, and Valsin in June 1828 but died at age 9 in August 1837.  Their daughter married into the Landry family.  Éloi, père, at age 47, remarried to Odile, daughter of fellow Acadians Artoise Babin and Françoise Landry and widow of Marcellin Breaux, at the St. Gabriel church in July 1848.  In early August 1850, the federal census taker in Iberville Parish counted 8 slaves--4 males and 4 females, all black, ranging in age from 40 to 2--on C. Blanchard's farm; the C. may have been a clumsy E, for Éloi, père.  

Éloi, fils died at St. Gabriel in February 1845, age 23, and probably did not marry.  

3b

Narcisse, by his father's first wife, died in Ascension Parish in February 1853.  The priest who recorded his burial said that Narcisse was about age 50 when he died, but he was 44.  He probably did not marry, so this branch of the Blanchard family, except for its blood, probably died with him.

4

Youngest son Victor, born at St.-Gabriel in February 1774, married first cousin Marie-Madeleine, called Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Richard and Anne Landry, at St.-Gabriel in November 1796; their mothers were sisters, so they had to secure a dispensation for second degree of consanguinity in order to marry.  Their son Victor, fils was born at St.-Gabriel in December 1800, Joseph-Hyacinthe in March 1802 but died at age 2 months the following May, Thomasin was born in April 1803, Joseph Joachim, called Joachim, in November 1806, Pierre Valmont, called Valmont, in August 1812, a son, name unrecorded, died at birth in May 1814, and Jean Adrien, called Adrien, was born in January 1815.  Their daughters married into the Allain, Bercegeay, Blanchard, and Scott families.  Victor, père died at St. Gabriel in August 1835, age 61.  

4a

Victor, fils died near St. Gabriel, Iberville Parish, in July 1829, age 29.  Did he marry?    

4b

Valmont married cousin Marie Anne Hermina, called Hermina, Hermine, Alvina, and Malvina, daughter of fellow Acadians Demond LeBlanc and Delphine Landry, at the Donaldsonville church, Ascension Parish, in August 1834; they had to secure a dispensation of second and third degrees of consanguinity in order to marry. They lived near the boundary between Ascension and Assumption parishes.  Their son Pierre Harman was born in July 1841 but died at age 1 in September 1842, Francois Adam Léo was born in July 1845, Joseph André Édouard in December 1846, Joseph Adam Léon Pierre in May 1849, Désiré Edgar in December 1849, Saturin Ducroisil in November 1853, Jean Ducatele in September 1855, and Robertin in c1860 but died at age 3 in January 1863.  Their daughter married into the Claverie family.  Valmont died in Ascension Parish in March 1861, age 48.  

Désiré Edgar may have died in Ascension Parish in June 1868.  The Donaldsonville priest who recorded the burial, and who did not give any parents' names, said that Désiré died at "age 18 years."  Désiré Edgar would have been that age.  Did he marry? 

4c

Joachim married Marie Apolline, called Apolline, daughter of fellow Acadians Sébastien Guidry and Eulalie Breaux, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in June 1835.  Their son Victor le jeune was born at St. Gabriel in September 1836, Joseph Numa, called Numa, in April 1838, Amand in November 1846, and Samuel Adam in July 1855.  Their daughter married into the Blouin family.  In early August 1850, the federal census taker in Iberville Parish counted 19 slaves--10 males and 9 females, 16 blacks and 3 mulattoes, ranging in age from 45 to infant--on J. Blanchard's farm; this was probably Joachim.  Joachim drowned in the Mississippi River "near his home on the island" at St. Gabriel in August 1857; the priest who recorded his burial noted that Joachim was buried at 1 a.m. the day he was found "because of having been in the water for over 56 hours," and that he was age 55 years and 5 months old when he died, but he was 50.  

During the War of 1861-65, Numa served in Company A of the 3rd Regiment Louisiana Infantry, raised in Iberville Parish, which fought in Missouri, Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana.  Numa married Delia Aurelia M., daughter of Valéry Roth and Elizabeth Garlick, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in April 1864, after he left his regiment.  

During the War of 1861-65, Victor le jeune served as a lieutenant in Company D of the 27th Regiment Louisiana Infantry, raised in Iberville Parish, which fought at Vicksburg, Mississippi.  Victor le jeune married Amanda L., daughter of fellow Acadian Jules Comeaux and his Creole wife Victorine Darbois, at the St. James church, St. James Parish, in January 1866.  Their son Francis Numa was born in St. James Parish in February 1868, and Victor Sydney in August [1869].

Amand died at St. Gabriel in February 1866, age 19.  He probably did not marry.  

4d

Thomasin died at St. Gabriel in January 1841, age 38.  He probably did not marry.  

4e

Adrien died at St. Gabriel in March 1841, age 36.  Like his older brothers Victor, fils and Thomasin, Adrien did not marry.  

Descendants of Anselme BLANCHARD (1741-1799; Jean, Martin, René)

Anselme, younger son of René Blanchard and Marguerite Thériot, born at Grand-Pré in May 1741, came to Louisiana in 1767 with his wife Esther LeBlanc, whom he had married probably in Maryland in the early 1760s, and two children, a daughter and a son.  Two more sons were born to them at St.-Gabriel soon after the family reached Louisiana.  His daughter married into the Mollère family.  Though he returned to St.-Gabriel after he completed his duties at Valenzuela, New Orleans, and Bayou des Écores in the 1780s and 1790s, Anselme died and was buried in New Orleans in November 1799; the St.-Louis Cathedral priest who recorded his burial said that Anselme was age 64 when he died, but he was 58.  The priest called him "army lieutenant in the service of His Catholic Majesty, [and] former commandant of LaFourche and New Feliciana districts in this province."  Anselme's two surviving sons and their sons settled on the Acadian Coast at St.-Gabriel or Ascension.  Some of his great grandsons crossed the river and settled near Plaquemine and in West Baton Rouge Parish during the late antebellum and immediate post-war periods. 

1

Oldest son Jérôme, born in Maryland in c1765, married Marie-Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre-Sylvain Clouâtre and Madeleine Boudrot, at St.-Gabriel in February 1787.  Their son Jérôme, fils was born posthumously at St.-Gabriel in April 1793.  Their daughters married into the Capdeville, Lacroix, and Mollere families.  Jérôme, père died at St.-Gabriel in March 1793, age 28.  

Jérôme, fils married Marcellite, daughter of fellow Acadian Joseph Orillion dit Champagne and his Creole wife Clothilde Marrionneaux, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in February 1811.  Their son Ciriaque was born near St. Gabriel in March 1812, Jérôme III in November 1813, Jérôme Ducerviser in December 1815, Joseph Ducatel in December 1819,  Joseph in January 1822 but died at age 1 in July 1823, and Théodore was born "posthumously" in February 1828.  They also had a son named Louis Declousel.  Their daughters married into the Balch and Mars families.  Jérôme, fils died at St. Gabriel in October 1827, age 35.  

Jérôme III married Armeline or Amelina Roth in a civil ceremony in Iberville Parish probably in the mid-1830s.  Their son Ernest was born near St. Gabriel in September 1837, Adonis in January 1840, Ursin Ducatel in September 1842, Mathieu Roseluce near Plaquemine, Iberville Parish, across the river from St. Gabriel, in March 1851, and John Nemour in September 1856.  They also had a son named Émile Jérôme. 

Ernest married Louisa Emma, daughter of Alexandre Esnard and his Acadidan wife Joséphine Broussard, at the Plaquemine church in November 1860. 

Émile Jérôme married Joséphine, daughter of Foreign Frenchman Jacques Caire and his Acadian wife Marie Élodie Bourg, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in August 1869. 

Louis Declousel married Éloise Joséphine, daughter of Arnaud Robert and Louise Vignaud, at the St. Gabriel church in November 1838.  Their son Louis Declousel, fils was born in Iberville Parish in October 1841.  Their daughter married into the Lemarie family.  Louis Declousel, père remarried to Lavinia, daughter of Anglo Americand William Dodd and Elizabeth Pritchett, at the Plaquemine church, Iberville Parish, in May 1854.  

Joseph Ducatel married Euphémie, daughter of Alexandre Hotard and Euphèmie Loriot, at St. Gabriel in January 1843.  Their son Joseph Ducatel, fils was born in Iberville Parish in January 1848, and Joseph Buchanan in August 1856.  Their daughters married into the Holliday and Landry families.  Joseph Ducatel may have remarried to Eulalie Lendor or Landor in a civil ceremony in Iberville or Ascension Parish in the late 1850s, and sanctified the marriage at the Donaldsonville church, Ascension Parish, in October 1861.  Their son Jules Amand was born in Ascension Parish in October 1860 but died 6 days after his birth, and Joseph Manuel was born in September 1870.  

Théodore married Élisabeth, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Denis Landry and Élisabeth Labauve, at the Plaquemine church, Iberville Parish, in September 1855.  Their son William Seymour was born near Plaquemine in June 1847, twin sons Charles Cresselle and Joseph Aramis, called Aramis, in February 1854 but Aramis died at age 7 in May 1861, and Joseph Théodore was born in March 1857.  

2

Antoine, born at St.-Gabriel in c1768, married Marie-Josèphe, called Manon, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Hébert and Marie Landry, at St.-Gabriel in April 1788.  Their children included:  Anselme le jeune born at St.-Gabriel in November 1789; Joseph-Valentin in February 1792; Antoine-Célestin in January 1794; Édouard in November 1797, and twins Jérôme le jeune and Susanne-Monique in May 1800, but Jérôme le jeune died at age 5 months the following October.  Their daughters married into the Dupuis, Frayard, and Newell families.  Antoine died at St. Gabriel in January 1804, age 36.  

2a

Joseph Valentin married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Simon Joseph Dupuis and Ludivine Landry, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in May 1812; Joseph's sister Marie Marcellite married Marguerite's brother Charles on the same day at the same place.  Joseph and Marguerite's son Antoine was born in Iberville Parish in May 1814.  Their daughter married into the Landry family.  Joseph Valentin remarried to Marie Delphine, called Delphine, daughter of fellow Acadians Isaac LeBlanc and Félicité Melançon, at the St. Gabriel church in July 1820.  Their son Joseph Sosthène was born in Iberville Parish in December 1821, and Jean Surville in February 1824.  Their daughter married into the Daigre family.  Joseph Valentin died in Iberville Parish in April 1850, age 58.  

Joseph Sosthène, by his father's second wife, died at St. Charles College, Grand Coteau, St. Landry Parish, in November 1839, a few days short of his 18th birthday.  His body was shipped home for burial the following May.  He did not marry.  

Antoine, by his father's first wife, married Apolline Grasieuse, daughter of fellow Acadians Luc Gaudin and Henriette Landry of St. James Parish, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in December 1839.  

Jean Surville, by his father's second wife, married cousin Victorine, daughter of fellow Acadian Élie LeBlanc and his Creole wife Iréné Hernandez, at the Plaquemine church, Iberville Parish, in March 1851.  Their son Joseph Nemour Ennémond was born in Iberville Parish in July 1856 but died at age 1 in August 1857.  Jean Surville remarried to first cousin Marie Louise, daughter of Célestin Roth and Arthémise LeBlanc, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in August 1861; Marie Louise's mother was Jean Surville's maternal aunt, so he and Marie Louise had to secure a dispensation for second degree of consanguinity in order to marry.   

2b

Édouard married Caroline, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Dupuis and Marie Marine Clouâtre, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in May 1819.  Their son Édouard Valmont was born in Iberville Parish in October 1822, Édouard Gustave, called Gustave, was baptized at the St. Gabriel church, age unrecorded, in May 1827, and Édouard, fils was born in May 1829 but died at age 3 in November 1832.  Édouard, père died in Iberville Parish in August 1829, age 31.  

Gustave married fellow Acadian Rose Julie, called Julie, Babin in the early 1850s probably in Ascension Parish.  Their son Jean Macair Deoscar was born in Ascension Parish in January 1853, Cartir Gustave Édouard, called Édouard, in October 1860 but died at age 1 in January 1862, Talcide was born in late 1864 but died at age 16 months in December 1865, and Joseph Sosthène was born in November 1866. 

3

Youngest son Louis, born probably at St.-Gabriel in 1778, died at age 11 months in July 1779 and was buried at nearby Ascension.  

~

A Blanchard who emigrated to Louisiana from France in 1785 and remained on the river came without a family.  One wonders what was his connection to the other Acadian Blanchards in the Spanish colony:  

Descendants of Jacques BLANCHARD (c1767-1829; Jean?, ?)

Jacques, son of Gabriel Blanchard and Marguerite Conand, born in Brittany, France, in c1767, came to Louisiana in 1785 as an "imigré" aboard La Ville Archangel, the sixth of the Seven Ships.  He married Modeste-Aimée, called Aimée, daughter of Ambroise Bourg, at New Orleans in January 1786 soon after they both reached Louisiana aboard the same ship.  Aimée also was a native of France, born at Le Havre.  The newlyweds followed the majority of their fellow passengers to Bayou des Écores, north of Baton Rouge, now Thompson Creek, West Feliciana Parish, but they did not remain there.  After a series of hurricanes devastated the Bayou des Écores settlement in 1794, Jacques took his family down to the Baton Rouge area and settled in what became West Baton Rouge Parish.  His daughters married into the Broussard, LeBlanc, and Richard families.  Jacques, whom the priest called Pierre in his burial record, died in West Baton Rouge Parish in July 1829, age 62.  He fathered nine sons, five of whom married.  Three of his sons remained in West Baton Rouge Parish and became prosperous planters.  In the early antebellum period, two of his sons crossed the Atchafalaya Basin and settled along Bayou Teche, but one of them returned to West Baton Rouge in the 1840s. 

1

Oldest son Jacques, fils, born probably at Bayou des Écores in May 1789, married Marie Apolline or Pauline, daughter of François Duplessis of Tours, France, and Marianne Rousseau and widow of Pierre Allain, at the Baton Rouge church, East Baton Rouge Parish, in February 1821.  Their daughter married into the Graham family.  Jacques died at Baton Rouge in January 1852; the priest who recorded his burial said that Jacques was age 68 when he died; he was 62.  He seems to have fathered no sons, so this line of the family, except for its blood, probably died with him.  

2

Zéphirin, born probably at Bayou des Écores in c1790 and baptized by the priest from Pointe Coupée, across the river from Bayou des Écores, age unrecorded, in May 1792, married Élise or Lise, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre-Joseph Lebert and Marie-Josèphe Dugas, probably in West Baton Rouge Parish in March 1813.  Zéphirin fought in the Battle of New Orleans under General Andrew Jackson in January 1815.  Zéphirin owned 19 slaves in the early 1820s.  His son Pierre Villeneuve, called Villeneuve, was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in July 1824, Théodore Élie or Élie Théodore in January 1826, Pierre Victorin, called Victorin, in the late 1820s or early 1830s, and twins Anatole Alphonse, called Alphonse, and Jean Baptiste Arthur, called Arthur, in January 1840 but Alphonse died at age 14 in December 1854.  Zéphirin and Lise's daughters married into the Barnett, Bergeron, Borgas, Coony, Foret, and Hébert families.  In August 1850, the federal census taker in West Baton Rouge Parish counted 66 slaves--40 males and 26 females, all black except for 7 mulattoes, ranging in age from 80 to infancy--on Z. Blanchard's plantation, the value of which was assessed at $18,000; this was Zéphirin's holding on the river near Brusly Landing next to Théodore Blanchard.  Zéphirin died in West Baton Rouge Parish in August 1852, age 63.  

2a

Villeneuve married Estelle, daughter of fellow Acadians Joachim Daigre and Dartille Dupuy, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in April 1847 but settled across the river in East Baton Rouge Parish.  They probably had no sons.  In August 1850, the census taker in the city of Baton Rouge, East Baton Rouge Parish, counted 6 slaves--4  males and 2 females, all black, ranging in age from 55 to 18--in Villeneuve Blanchard's household.  

2b

Élie Théodore married Céleste Cephaline, daughter of fellow Acadians Isidore Daigre and Célestine Molaison, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in February 1850, and remarried to Emma, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Paul Babin and Euphémie LeBlanc, at the Brusly church in October 1853.  Their son Henri Daniel was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in September 1854, Joseph Louis in October 1857, and Victor Thomas in January 1861.  In August 1850, the federal census taker in West Baton Rouge Parish counted a single slave--a 49-year-old black male--on Théodore Blanchard's farm next to Z. Blanchard.  

2c

Victorin married Anne Adèle, called Adèle, daughter of Pierre Gassie and Elmire Marson, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in October 1851.  Their son Pierre Alcée was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in May 1854, Philippe in September 1861, and Zéphirin Justin in August 1870.  

2d

Unlike his twin brother Alphonse, Jean Baptiste Arthur survived adolescence, but he did not survive early manhood.  In May 1861, at age 21, he enlisted in Company H of the 4th Regiment Louisiana Infantry, the West Baton Rouge Tirailleurs, at Camp Moore, Tangipahoa Parish.  Arthur fought with his regiment at Shiloh, Tennessee, in April 1862 and was wounded in action at the Chattahoochee River, Georgia, in July 1864 during the Atlanta campaign.  He soon returned to duty.  In the battle of Ezra Church later that month, he was wounded in the head by a wooden sabot fired from a cannon and died three weeks later in a hospital at Forsyth, Georgia, age 24.    

3

Marin, born near Baton Rouge in February 1793, married Sophie, daughter of fellow Acadians Xavier Thériot and Anne Mouton, probably in West Baton Rouge Parish in December 1815.  In the 1820s, Marin moved his family from West Baton Rouge Parish to the old Attakapas District, west of the Atchafalaya Basin, where they settled at Fausse Pointe on Bayou Teche, below St. Martinville.  He remarried into the Broussard family.  Marin and first wife Sophie had four sons on the river, but only one of them created a family of his own.  

Third son Amand Adrien, called Adrien, born in West Baton Rouge Parish in September 1823, remained in or returned to West Baton Rouge Parish, where he married Sophie Elodie, called Elodie, daughter of fellow Acadians Eusilien Broussard and Emerite Thibodeaux, at the Brusly church  in August 1849.  Their son Henry Franklin was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in August 1850, Peter Edgard in October 1854, Paul Alcée in March 1859, Jules Adrien in January 1861, and Louis Albert in July 1865. 

4

Joseph, born at Baton Rouge in April 1796, probably did not marry.  

5

Louis-Amand, called Amand, baptized at the Baton Rouge church, East Baton Rouge Parish at age 1 1/2 in July 1800, married Françoise, another daughter of Xavier Thériot and Anne Mouton, probably in West Baton Rouge Parish in January 1823, and remarried to Céleste, daughter of fellow Acadians Benjamin Landry and Anne Landry, probably in West Baton Rouge Parish in January 1826.  Their son Léon Amand was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in April 1828, and Jean Baptiste in November 1833.  Their daughters married into the Richard family.  Louis Amand died in West Baton Rouge Parish in September 1836, age 38.  

In early August 1850, the federal census taker in West Baton Rouge Parish counted 5 slaves--a male and 4 females, all black, ranging in age from 24 to infancy--on Léon Blanchard's farm.  Léon Amand died in West Baton Rouge Parish in February 1856; he was only 27 years old and evidently did not marry. 

6

Augustin, born near Baton Rouge in April 1802, probably did not marry.  

7

Hyacinthe, born probably near Baton Rouge in c1804, died near Brusly, West Baton Rouge Parish, in January 1864, age 60, and probably never married.  

8

Célestin Valentine, born near Baton Rouge in May 1805, probably did not marry.  

9

Youngest son François Joachim, called Joachim, born near Baton Rouge in June 1807, joined his older brother Marin on Bayou Teche, where he married Émelie or Émelite, daughter of fellow Acadians Valentin Arceneaux and Annette Broussard, at the St. Martinville church, St. Martin Parish, in December 1837.  Their son Jacques Illaive was born near New Iberia, then a part of St. Martin but now Iberia Parish, in February 1839.  Their daughter married into the Drozgrey family.  Joachim remarried to Marie Théotiste, daughter of François Tacneau and Clémence Seguin, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in August 1849, so he must have returned to the river.  Their son Joseph O'Connell was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in September 1850, and Joachim Amédée in November 1857.  In late August 1850, the federal census taker in West Baton Rouge Parish counted a single slave--a 24-year-old black male--on F. J. Blanchard's farm.  

~

In a reversal of the usual Acadian settlement pattern, three Blanchards from Bayou Lafourche settled in West Baton Rouge Parish during the antebellum period:

Descendants of Ambroise BLANCHARD (1800-1860; Jean, Martin, Joseph, Bénoni)

Ambroise, youngest son of Joachim-Jacques Blanchard and Marie-Madeleine Templet, and grandson of Bénoni Blanchard, born at Assumption on upper Bayou Lafourche in July 1800, married Marie, daughter of Thomas Aillet and Jeanne Crunile, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in December 1821 and settled in West Baton Rouge Parish.  Their daughter married into the Cazes family.  Ambroise died probably in West Baton Rouge Parish in December 1860, age 60. 

1

Oldest son Michel Drosin, called Drosin, born in West Baton Rouge Parish in December 1825, married Eliza, daughter of Pierre Tullier and Modeste Daigre, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in January 1847.  Their son Michel Davis was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in July 1851.  Their daughter married into the Castro family.  

2

Valmont Vileor was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in November 1827.  In August 1850, the federal census taker in West Baton Rouge Parish counted a single slave--a 68-year-old black female--on Valmont Blanchard's farm.  Valmont Vileor died in West Baton Rouge Parish in December 1857, age 30, and did not marry.  

3

Ambroise Davis was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in November 1830.  

4

Youngest son Jean Baptiste, born in West Baton Rouge Parish in January 1841, died near Baton Rouge in November 1861, age 20, and did not marry.  One wonders if his death was war-related. 

Joachim BLANCHARD (1826-; Jean, Martin, Joseph, Bénoni, Joachim-Jacques)

Joachim, fifth son of Jean Charles Blanchard and Rosalie Blanchard, grandson of Joachim Jacques Blanchard and nephew of Ambroise Blanchard, was born in Assumption Parish in December 1826.  He married Anathalie, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Daigre and Modeste Babin, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in April 1852.  One wonders if he and his wife had any children. 

Descendants of Jean Charles Marin BLANCHARD (1827-?; Jean, Martin, Joseph, Bénoni, Joachim-Jacques)

Jean Charles Marin, also called Marin Charles, sixth and youngest son of Jean Charles Blanchard and Rosalie Blanchard and Joachim's brother, was born in Assumption Parish in January 1827.  When he came of age, he followed his older brother to West Baton Rouge Parish, where he married Marie Adéle, called Adéle, daughter of Joseph Aillet and Acadian wife Virginie Doiron, at the Brusly church in January 1854.  

1

Older son Joseph Osémé was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in November 1854.

2

Younger son Jean Baptiste was born in West Baton Rouge Parish in December 1857.   

~

Other BLANCHARDs on the River

Local church and civil records make it difficult to link at least some Blanchards on the river with known Acadian lines of the family there:

Théodora Blanchard died in Ascension Parish in October 1840.  The Donaldsonville priest who recorded the burial did not give her age nor the names of her parents. 

Jean Adonis Blanchard, born in c1837, died near Brusly, West Baton Rouge Parish, at age 10 in March 1847.  The priest who recorded the burial did not give the boy's parents' names. 

Aspasie Blanchard died at age 9 in August 1849.  The Baton Rouge priest who recorded the burial did not give the girl's parents' names. 

Louis Blanchard married Eima Harris "of Virginia," place and date unrecorded.  Daughter Marie Louise was born "near Winterville Wioski (illegible)," date unrecorded, and baptized at the Brusly church in April 1851.  The girl's godparents were Octave Richard and Mary Pamela Blanchard, servant of Mrs. Peter Blanchard. 

Auguste Blanchard "from France" died in Ascension Parish, age 70, in July 1851.  The Donaldsonville priest who recorded the burial did not give any parents' names or mention a wife. 

Marie Eugénia Blanchard died in St. James Parish at age 8 in May 1854.  The Convent priest who recorded the girl's burial did not give any parents' names. 

Anne Marthe Blanchard died in Ascension Parish, age 93, in June 1858.  The Donaldsonville priest who recorded the burial did not give any parents' names or mention a husband.  One also suspects that the age at the time of her death is inaccurate. 

Caroline, daughter of Gaspar Blanchard, died in Ascension Parish, age 10, in August 1864.  The Donaldsonville priest who recorded the burial did not give the girl's mother's name. 

Armantine Blanchard died near St. Gabriel, Iberville Parish, age unrecorded, in February 1866.  The priest who recorded the burial did not give any parents' names or mention a husband. 

Marie Constance, daughter of J. B. Blanchard, died in Ascension Parish, age 2, in January 1867.  The Donaldsonville priest who recorded the burial, true to form, did not give the girl's mother's name. 

Victor Blanchard died near St. Gabriel in August 1867.   The priest who recorded the burial did not give any parents' names, mention a wife, or give the age of the deceased at the time of his passing. 

LOUISIANA:  LAFOURCHE VALLEY SETTLEMENTS

In the 1780s, the commandant of the Valenzuéla District on upper Bayou Lafourche was not a Spaniard but an Acadian.  Anselme Blanchard of St.-Gabriel, a captain in the Acadian Coast militia who had come to Louisiana from Maryland in 1767 as a young husband and father, built the houses and cleared the land for the Canary Islanders, or Isleños, who pioneered the settlement at Valenzuéla in the late 1770s.  He became the commandant of the post in 1781 and remained there until mid-1784, when his unpopularity with the Isleños led to his ouster.  In 1785, Spanish intendant Martin Navarro recruited him to help oversee the arrival of shiploads of Acadians at Balize and New Orleans.  When the first of the Seven Ships reached Balize from France in late July 1785, Anselme Blanchard of St.-Gabriel was the first "Spanish" official on board to welcome his fellow Acadians and to record their names, ages, relationships, and state of health.  Most of the Acadians who reached France aboard the Seven Ships settled on upper Bayou Lafourche in the Valenzuéla District.  Anselme Blanchard did not join them there but returned to St.-Gabriel.  He also commanded the New Feliciana District above Baton Rouge.  

~

The largest group of Blanchards who found refuge in Louisiana came from France at the behest of the Spanish government aboard four of the Seven Ships of 1785.  They chose to go to upper Bayou Lafourche and settle in the district their kinsman had once commanded:

Anne-Symphorose Hébert, age 47, widow of Joseph Blanchard, came to Louisiana aboard La Bergère, the second of the Seven Ships, which reached New Orleans in August.  With her were six children, all born in France--Laurent-Olivier, age 19, Marie-Madeleine, age 17, Pierre-Joseph, age 15, Louis-Suliac, age 13, Élie, age 11, and Anne, age 7.  Anne-Symphorose never remarried and died at Lafourche in September 1793, age 54.  Her daughters married into the Bourg, Comeaux, and Trahan families.  Three of her four sons created families of their own along the bayou, but only two of the lines endured. 

.

Wood polisher Jean-Grégoire Blanchard, age 37, wife Marie-Madeleine Livois, age 31, and three children--Marie-Madeleine, age 9, Jean-Baptiste, age 8, and infant Pierre-Charles--crossed on Le St.-Rémi, the fourth of the Seven Ships, which reached New Orleans in September.  Madeleine gave him no more children in the Spanish colony.  Jean-Grégoire died in Assumption Parish in October 1811; he was 64 years old.  His daughter married into the Landry family.  His two sons created families of their own along the bayou.  

.

Madeleine Blanchard, age 47, widow of Charles Bourg, crossed on L'Amitié, the fifth of the Seven Ships, which reached New Orleans in November.  With her were two sons, ages 11 and 7, and a married son, age 25, and his wife.  In the 1790s, Madeleine and her sons crossed the Atchafalaya Basin to the Attakapas District, where Madeleine died at son Lucien Bourg's home on the upper Vermilion in December 1814, in her late 70s.

François Blanchard, age 54, and wife Hélène-Judith Giroir, age 43, crossed on L'Amitié with four children--Françoise-Hélène, age 20, Eudoxe-Marie-Gillette, age 15, Joseph-François, age 10, and Marguerite-Anne, age 5.  François died at Assumption in January 1794; he was 63 years old.  His daughters married into the Blanchard, Bourg, Comeaux, and Gautreaux families.  His only son, Joseph-François, probably died before he could marry, so this line of the family, except for its blood, died with him.  

François's brother Bénoni Blanchard, age 45, and second wife Madeleine Foret, age 43, crossed on L'Amitié with six children--Marie-Madeleine, age 18, Joachim-James, age 16, Bénoni-Jacques, age 13, Anne-Marguerite, age 11, Céleste, age 8, and Moïse, age 3.  Bénoni died in Assumption Parish in July 1821; the priest who recorded his burial said that Bénoni was age 86 when he died, but he was 80.  His daughters married into the Foret, Moïse, and Pitre families.  His youngest son Moïse seems to have died soon after the family reached the colony, or he may not even have survived the voyage.  Bénoni's older two sons, however, created families of their own along the bayou.  

.

François and Bénoni's brother Charles Blanchard, age 51, a widower, crossed aboard La Caroline, the last of the Seven Ships, which reached New Orleans in December.  With him were two sons--Suliac-François, age 20, and Charles-Pierre-Marc, age 16.  Charles died at Lafourche by January 1788, when his sons were counted in the census there without him.  

.

Neither François, Charles, Bénoni, nor Jean-Grégoire bore any more sons in Louisiana.  One of Bénoni's grandsons and a great grandson moved to West Baton Rouge Parish during the early 1820s and the 1850s, but the great majority of the Blanchards who had gone to Lafourche remained on the bayou.  By the mid-1800s, Acadian Blanchards occupied nearly every corner of the vast Lafourche/Terrebonne country and greatly outnumbered their kin in other parts of South Louisiana.  Soon after the War Between the States, Lafourche/Terrebonne Blanchards moved on to lower Bayou Teche and the southwestern prairies, but the great majority of them remained on the southeastern bayous, near where their immigrant ancestors had settled:

Descendants of Suliac-François BLANCHARD (1764-1808; Jean, Martin, Joseph)

Suliac-François, elder son of Charles Blanchard and Marguerite-Josèphe Dugas, born at St.-Suliac, France, in August 1764, came to Louisiana with his widowed father and younger brother on La Caroline, the last of the Seven Ships, and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche.  His father died at Lafourche before January 1788, when Suliac and his brother were counted in a census there without him.  Suliac married Marie-Gertrude-Josèphe, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Hébert and Laure Bourg, at Lafourche in October 1788.  Marie also was a native of St.-Suliac and had come to Louisiana aboard La Bergère, the second of the Seven Ships.  They settled near his younger brother Charles.  Their children, all born on the upper Lafourche, included:  Marie-Aimée in November 1789; Jean-Charles in March 1790[sic]; Rosalie in January 1792; Firmin in November 1796; Isidore, a twin, in March 1799; Valière in November 1801; Suliac, fils in April 1804.  Their daughters married into the Arceneaux, Cancienne, and Daigle families.  Suliac died in Assumption Parish in August 1808, age 44.  Only two of his five sons had sons of their own.  They remained in Assumption Parish.  

1

Oldest son Jean-Charles married Désirée Anne, sometimes called Anne, daughter of Italian Creole Pierre Cancienne and his Acadian wife Marguerite Landry, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1816.  Their son Pierre Edmond, called Edmond or Edouard, was born in Assumption Parish in October 1816, Firmin Abraham in March 1820, Cyprien Lacroix in May 1827, and Jean Baptiste Honoré in March 1833 but died at age 12 1/2 in September 1845.  Their daughter married into the Boudreaux family.  Jean Charles died in Assumption Parish in June 1833, age 43. 

1a

Cyprien Lacroix married fellow Acadian Esther Boudreaux probably in Assumption Parish in the late 1840s.  Their son Cyprien Alfred was born in Assumption Parish in November 1849 but died at age 9 in November 1858, and Octave Suliac was born in February 1855.  Cyprien Lacroix died in Assumption Parish in November 1858, age 31.  

1b

Edmond married Marie Mathilde, daughter of fellow Acadians Louis André Talbot and Rosalie Dugas, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1847.  Their son Camille Désiré was born in Assumption Parish in September 1850, Louis Oscar in February 1853, Edmond Ursin in September 1854, Alfred Norbert in June 1856, Dion Cyprien in October 1858, and Octave in October 1860.  Their daughter married into the Bergeron family at Attakapas Canal.  In September 1850, the federal census taker in Assumption Parish counted 7 slaves--4 males and 3 females, all black--on Edouard Blanchard's farm in the parish's Second Congressional District.  

2

Firmin may have died near Paincourtville, Assumption Parish, in December 1870.  The priest who recorded the burial, and who did not give any parents' names or even mention a wife, said that Fermin, as he called him, died at "age 70 years."  This Firmin would have been 73.  Did he marry? 

3

Isidore married Léocade, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Aucoin and Rosalie Gautreaux, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in May 1827.  Isidore died in Assumption Parish in April 1832, age 33.  Did he father any sons?

4

Valière died in Assumption Parish in January 1820, age 18.  He did not marry.  

5

Youngest son Suliac, fils married Marie, another daughter of Pierre Cancienne and Marguerite Landry and widow of Édouard Thériot, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1833.  Their son Suliac Marcel was born in Assumption Parish in January 1835.  Marie died soon after Suliac Marcel was born probably from complications of childbirth.  Suliac, fils remarried to Marie Azélie, daughter of Joseph Montet and his Acadian wife Marie Giroir, at the Plattenville church in September 1835.  He remarried again--his third marriage--to Elise, daughter of fellow Acadians François Barrilleaux and Marie Gautreaux, at the Plattenville church in May 1839.  Suliac, fils died in Assumption Parish in September 1845, age 41.  

Suliac Marcel married Celima, daughter of Joseph Gaspard and his Acadian wife Seraphine Gaudet, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in October 1856.  Their son Édouard Benoît was born in Assumption Parish in January 1858, Alexandre Osémé Topson, called Osémé, in March 1865 but died at age 3 months the following July, and Wilson Joseph Alcée was born in December 1858. 

Descendants of Charles-Pierre-Marc BLANCHARD (1768-1810s; Jean, Martin, Joseph)

Charles-Pierre-Marc, younger son of Charles Blanchard and Marguerite-Josèphe Dugas, born at St.-Suliac, France, in March 1768, sailed to Louisiana with his widowed father and older brother Suliac aboard La Caroline, the last of the Seven Ships, and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche, where he married Jeanne-Eléonore, daughter of fellow Acadian Prosper-Honoré Girouard, in February 1791.  Jeanne was a native of St.-Jouan-des-Gurets, near St.-Malo, and had come to Louisiana aboard La Bergère, the second of the Seven Ships.  Charles and Jeanne were counted next door to his older brother Suliac on the upper bayou in December 1795.  Their daughters married into the Aucoin, Blanchard, and Colonna families.  Charles remarried to Marie-Anastasie Aucoin, widow of Joseph Thériot, at Assumption in February 1802.  Marie-Anastasie was a native of Boulogne, France, and had crossed to Louisiana aboard La Bergère.  Charles-Pierre-Marc died by May 1820, when a priest recorded him as deceased in a son's marriage record, so Charles probably died in late 40s or early 50s.   All three of his sons came from his first marriage; only the middle son created a family of his own but fathered many sons who continued this family line.  By the 1850s, Charles's grandsons had left the Lafourche valley and settled near the village of Pierre Part, north of Lake Verret, at the northwestern edge of Assumption Parish.  Two of them moved on to lower Bayou Teche after the War of 1861-65. 

1

A son, age 7 days, name unrecorded, was buried at Lafourche in May 1793.  

2

Élie-Charles, born at Assumption in February 1799, married Émilie, daughter of Pierre Montet and his Acadian wife Félicité Aucoin, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in May 1820.  Their son Joseph Élie was born in Assumption Parish in February 1821, Auguste Jean Baptiste, called Baptiste, in February 1823, Pierre Paul in March 1825, Evariste Théodule, called Calixte, in April 1833, Eusilien Auguste in July 1835, and Charles Pierre in September 1839.  His youngest sons moved on to lower Bayou Teche after the War of 1861-65. 

2a

Baptiste married fellow Acadian Clothilde Thériot probably in Assumption Parish in the early or mid-1840s.  Their son Joseph Désiré was born in Assumption Parish in March 1847, Ambroise Adolphe in May 1850, Adrien Octave in February 1853 but died only a few weeks later, Célestin was born in April 1856, and Ambroise Aurelien in December 1857 but died at age 5 in September 1862.  

2b

Pierre Paul married Augustine or Justine, daughter of fellow Acadians Alexis Aucoin and Rosalie Theriot, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1848.  Their son Basile was born in Assumption Parish in March 1851, Joseph Alexi in October 1852, Cyprien Aurelien in August 1855, Elphége in October 1856 but died at age 11 days, Jean Baptiste was born in July 1857, and Casimir in March 1861.  

2c

Calixte married Marie, daughter of Evariste Freoux and Marie Aucoin, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in June 1855; Marie's mother was an Aucoin.  Their son Joseph Xavier was born in Assumption Parish in December 1856, Joseph Adrien near Pierre Part, Assumption Parish, in March 1859, and Evariste Oscar in January 1861.  

2d

Eusilien Auguste married Zulmé, daughter of fellow Acadians Auguste Roger and Marie Emerante Bourg, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1856.  Their son Joseph Casimir was born near Pierre Part in March 1859, Joseph Ernest in August 1861, and Romain near New Iberia, Iberia Parish, on lower Bayou Teche, in February 1868.  

2e

Charles Pierre married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadian Jean Baptiste Landry and his Creole wife Roseline Simoneaux, at the Pierre Part church, Assumption Parish, in July 1860.  Their son Alexandre Lusignan was born in Assumption Parish in March 1863, Fursi Adam in January 1865, and Jean Baptiste near Charenton, St. Mary Parish, on lower Bayou Teche, in May 1867.  

3

Youngest son Jean-Baptiste, born at Assumption in May 1800, died in Assumption Parish in October 1831, age 30, and does not seem to have married.  

Descendants of Laurent-Olivier BLANCHARD (1765-1816; Jean, Martin, Martin, fils)

Laurent-Olivier, second son of Joseph Blanchard and Anne-Symphorose Hébert, born at St.-Suliac, France, near St.-Malo, in August 1765, crossed to Louisiana aboard La Bergère, the second of the Seven Ships from France, with his widowed mother and siblings, and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche, where he married cousin Anne-Simone, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean-Baptiste Hébert and Madeleine Dugas, in July 1786.  Anne was a native of St.-Coulomb, near St.-Malo, and also had come to Louisiana aboard La Bergère.  They had at least five sons, four of whom created families of their own.  They all remained on the upper Lafourche.  Laurent became captain of the Assumption militia and died there in June 1816, age 51.

1

Oldest son Joseph Laurent, baptized at Lafourche, age unrecorded, in September 1787, died in Assumption Parish in November 1848, age 60.  There is no evidence that he ever married or fathered a child.  

2

Étienne, a twin, born at Assumption in August 1790, married Marine Osite Rosalie, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Landry and Osite Landry, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1814.  Their son Lucien Joseph Étienne was born in Assumption Parish in January 1820, Valéry Florentin in October 1822, Louis in April 1825, Joseph Gédéon in May 1827, and twins Étienne Aristide, called Aristide, and Firmin Osémé in September 1835, but Aristide died at age 3 months the following December.  Étienne died in Assumption Parish in November 1856, age 66.  

2a

Joseph Gédéon married fellow Acadian Apolline dite Pauline Thériot in Assumption Parish in c1844.  Their son Charles François was born in Assumption Parish in August 1844, Jean Baptiste, called Baptiste, in February 1847, Homer Caliste in February 1852, and Justilien Romain in August 1857.  A Joseph son of Étienne Blanchard died in Assumption Parish in January 1847 at age 20.  The birth of two of Joseph Gédéon's sons in 1852 and 1857 shows that, despite the remarkable similarities in age of the two Joseph Blanchards (each born in 1827), the young man who died in 1847 must have been another Joseph Blanchard, not Joseph Gédéon.  His older sons moved on to lower Bayou Teche after the War of 1861-65. 

Charles François married Hélène, daughter of Hermogène Simoneaux and his Acadian wife Emelina dite Menna Crochet, at the Pierre Part church, Assumption Parish, in January 1865.  Their son Joseph Athenadore was born in Assumption Parish in January 1866, and Dorsylva near New Iberia, Iberia Parish, on lower Bayou Teche, in September 1869. 

Jean Baptiste married Élisabeth, daughter of Eugène Borel and Céleste Bonin, at the New Iberia church, Iberia Parish, in January 1868.  They settled near New Iberia. Their son Joseph was born in November 1868. 

2b

Valéry married Augustine, daughter of fellow Acadian Pierre Thériot and his Creole wife Marie Caillouet, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1846.  Their daughter married into the Daigle family.  Valéry remarried to cousin Angelina, daughter of fellow Acadians LaCroix Narcisse Trahan and Marcellite Daigle and widow of Jean Alleman, at the Paincourtville church in February 1854.  In September 1850, the federal census taker in Assumption Parish counted 3 slaves--all female, all black, ages 60, 25, and 3--on Valéry Blanchard's farm in the parish's Second Congressional District.  

2c

Lucien married Euphémie, daughter of fellow Acadians Marius Melançon and Marcelline Gautreaux, probably in a civil ceremony in Assumption Parish in the late 1840s or early 1850s and sanctified the marriage at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in April 1863.  Their son Joseph Lucien was born in Assumption Parish in February 1851, Joseph Ernest in May 1857, and Antoine Artus in March 1860, was baptized in May 1863, and died at age 3 1/2 in September 1863.  Lucien remarried to Stephanie, daughter of fellow Acadians Théophile Landry and Célestine Hébert, at the Plattenville church in February 1866.  Their son Ulysse Stanislas was born near Plattenville in August 1869. 

2d

Louis married Obelline, another daughter of Marius Melançon, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in August 1850.  

3

Louis, Étienne's twin, born at Assumption in August 1790, married Colette, also called Céleste, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Landry and Rosalie Hébert, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in November 1812.  Their son Timothée Arsène, called Arsène, was born in Assumption Parish in August 1818, Adon in December 1828, Joseph Adrien, called Adrien, in February 1831, and Lusignan in April 1833.  Their daughters married into the Copel, Landry, and Michel families.  Louis died in Assumption Parish in January 1860, age 69.  

3a

Arsène married Adeline, daughter of fellow Acadian Amand Crochet and his Creole wife Hortense Friou, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in April 1842, on the same day and at the same place that his sister Clarisse married a Landry cousin.  Arsène and Adeline's son Joseph Anatole, called Anatole, was born in Assumption Parish in September 1845, Jean Baptiste Nicolas in December 1852, Hedvige Joseph in September 1854, and Joseph in February 1858.  Arsène may have died in Assumption Parish in September 1867; the Paincourtville priest who recorded the burial did not give any parents' names, mention a wife, or even give the age of the deceased; Timothée Arsène would have been age 49. 

Anatole married Léocade, daughter of fellow Acadian Godfroi Breaux and his Creole wife Rosalie Coupelle, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in October 1866.  Their son Joseph Émile was born near Paincourtville in February 1869. 

3b

Adon married Justine or Christine, daughter of fellow Acadians Hubert Daigle and Marie Dugas, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1851.  Their son Joseph Edgar was born in Assumption Parish in November 1851, Joseph Arthur, called Arthur, in April 1853 but died at age 14 months in September 1854, Joseph Enoc was born in July 1856, Joseph in February 1859, and Théodore Wuilbroen in April 1860.  During the War of 1861-65, Adon was conscripted into Company B of the 1st Regiment Louisiana Heavy Artillery in October 1862 with other Assumption Parish residents.  The regiment fought at Vicksburg, Mississippi.  However, Adon did not live long enough to fight in the great siege of the Mississippi citadel; he died probably of disease at the Marine Hospital, Vicksburg, in December 1862, age 34.  

3c

Adrien married Élodie, daughter of fellow Acadians Henri Daigle and Emeraude Dugas, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1858.  Their son Joseph Jules was born in Assumption Parish in March 1859, and Lusignan Louis in November 1861.  

3d

Lusignan married cousin Joséphine, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Baptiste Blanchard and Claire Guillot, at the Paincourtville church in March 1867.  Their son Joseph Claiborne was born near Paincourtville in March 1870. 

4

Élie-Magloire, born at Assumption in November 1792, married Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Fabien Guillot and Anne Giroir and widow of Jean Baptiste Bourg, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in November 1826.  Their son Trasimond Élie was born in Assumption Parish in January 1828, Ursin Magloire in May 1829, Jean Baptiste Octave in October 1833 but died at age 2 in December 1835, and Evariste was born in June 1838.  Their daughter married into the Campo family.  Élie Magloire died in Assumption Parish in August 1840, age 47.  In August 1850, the federal census taker in Assumption Parish counted 6 slaves--5 males and 1 female, 2 blacks and 4 mulattoes, ranging in age from 30 years to 1 month--on Widow Élie Blanchard's farm in the parish's Second Congressional District; this was Marguerite Guillot.  A few days later, the same census taker counted 3 more slaves--a 25-year-old female and 2 girls, ages 4 and 2, all black--on another of Widow Élie Blanchard's properties in the same district.  

4a

Ursin Magloire died in Assumption Parish in September 1846, age 17, and did not marry.  

4b

Trasimond Élie married Augustine, daughter of fellow Acadians François Bourg and Adélaïde Bertrand, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in March 1847.  

4c

Evariste married cousin Élodie, daughter of fellow Acadians Étienne Giroir and Adèle Hébert, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in May 1858.  Their son Richard René was born in Assumption Parish in April 1860, Numa Étienne in December 1862 died at age 10 months in October 1863, Charles Trasimond was born in November 1865, and Joseph Prosper Clet in October 1868.  During the War of 1861-65, Evariste was conscripted into Company B of the 1st Regiment Louisiana Heavy Artillery in October 1862 with other men from Assumption Parish.  The regiment fought at Vicksburg, Mississippi.  Evariste was captured with the rest of his unit at Vicksburg in July 1863, and, like most of his fellow conscripts, he refused to be paroled.  The federals sent him and his fellow gunners to Gratiot Street Prison in St. Louis, Missouri, and to Memphis, Tennessee, before transferring them to the prisoner of war camp at Camp Morton, Indiana.  Perhaps to shorten his stay in the prisoner of war camp, Evariste, with other prisoners from his unit, took the oath of allegiance to the United States government in early January 1865--months before the war ended.  The Federals released them after they took the oath, and they made their way home as best they could. 

5

Youngest son Augustin-Valery, called Valery, born at Assumption in September 1801, married Carmelite, daughter of fellow Acadians Servant Templet and Céleste Aucoin, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1824.  Their son Augustin Désiré, called Désiré, was born in Assumption Parish in April 1833 but died 2 years later in March 1835, Ursin Augustin or Valsin Augustin was born in December 1836 but died at age 8 months the following August, and Arthur Désiré was born in July 1838.   

Arthur Désiré married first cousin Cécilia, daughter of fellow Acadians Godefroi Templet and Godefroi Templet and Carmelite Bourg, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in June 1868; they had to secure a dispensation for second degree of consanguinity in order to marry.  Their newborn child, name unrecorded, perhaps a son, died in Assumption Parish in March 1869, and another newborn, name unrecorded, perhaps a son, died in December 1869. 

Descendants of Pierre-Joseph BLANCHARD (1769-1827; Jean, Martin, Martin, fils)

Pierre-Joseph, third son of Joseph Blanchard and Anne-Symphorose Hébert, born at St.-Suliac, France, in September 1769, came to Louisiana with his widowed mother and siblings aboard La Bergère, the second of the Seven Ships, and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche, where he married Marguerite-Geneviève, daughter of fellow Acadians Olivier Aucoin and his second wife Cécile Richard, in July 1790.  Marguerite was a native of St.-Servan, near St.-Malo, and also had sailed to Louisiana aboard La Bergère.  Their daughters married into the Folley and Landry families.  Pierre died in St. James Parish on the river in August 1827; the Convent priest who recorded his burial noted that Pierre was a resident of Lafourche Parish, which at the time was called Lafourche Interior Parish, and that he was age 55 when he died, but he was 57.  He fathered at least five sons, but only one of them produced sons and grandsons who perpetuated this family line.  They remained on the upper Lafourche.  

1

Oldest son Pierre-Firmin, called Firmin, born at Assumption in July 1798, married Anne, daughter of fellow Acadians Fabien Amateur Guillot and Anne-Josèphe Giroir, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in July 1818.  Their day-old son, name unrecorded, died in Assumption Parish in March 1819, Zéphirin Lucien was born in June 1820, Octave Louis in December 1821, and Ursin Basile, called Basile, in January 1824.  Was Pierre Firmin the Fermin Blanchard who died near Paincourtville, Assumption Parish, in December 1870?  The priest who recorded the burial, and who did not bother to give any parents' names or even mention a wife, said that Fermin died at "age 70 years"; Pierre Firmin would have been 72. 

1a

Basile married fellow Acadian Adélaïde Guillot in either Assumption or Ascension parish probably in the early or mid-1840s.  Their son Octave Basile was born in either Assumption or Ascension parish probably soon afterwards.  

Octave Basile married Anaïs Drivon, widow of Adrien Chiasson, at the Donaldsonville church, Ascension Parish, in July 1865.  

1b

Octave Louis married Uranie, daughter of Honoré Folse, in the late 1840s in Assumption Parish.  Their son Zephirin Arthur was born in Assumption Parish in July 1847, Lucien Tamour in December 1848, Henry Firmin in November 1854, and Paul Octave Robert in Lafourche Parish in July 1860.  Their daughter married into the Walsh family.  In September 1850, the federal census taker in Assumption Parish counted 8 slaves--7 males and 1 female, all black, ranging in age from 28 to 4--on Octave Blanchard's farm in the parish's Second Congressional District.  

2

Élie le jeune, born at Assumption in August 1800, married Marie Judith, called Judith, daughter of Alexandre Thomas and Marguerite Vicknair of St. John the Baptist Parish, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in April 1824.  Their son Élie Olésiphore was born in Assumption Parish in February 1825 but died at age 16 years and 8 months in September 1841, and Maximin Telesphore was born in May 1829.  Élie le jeune died in Assumption Parish in November 1830, age 30. 

3

Édouard, born at Assumption in August 1802, died in Assumption Parish in September 1868.  The Plattenville priest who recorded the burial, and who did not bother to give any parents' names or even mention a wife, said that Édouard died at "age 66 years," so this probably was him.  Amazingly, Édouard died less than a week before his twin brother Pierre, fils died.   Did Édouard ever marry? 

4

Pierre, fils, Édouard's twin, married Adélaïde Marcellite, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Hébert and Marie Madeleine Adélaïde Hébert, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1834.  Pierre, fils died near Plattenville in September 1868; the priest who recorded the burial, and who did not give any parents' names or even mention a wife, said that Pierre died at "age 66 years," so this was him.  Amazingly, Pierre, fils died less than a week after his twin brother Édouard died.  Did Pierre, fils father any sons, or did his family line die with him?  

5

Youngest son Alexis, born at Assumption in March 1805, may have died young. 

Louis-Suliac BLANCHARD (1771-1793; Jean, Martin, Martin, fils)

Louis-Suliac, fourth son of Joseph Blanchard and Anne-Symphorose Hébert, born at St.-Suliac in October 1771, came to Louisiana with his widowed mother and siblings aboard La Bergère and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche.  He died in Assumption Parish on the upper Lafourche in May 1793, age 22, still a bachelor. 

Élie BLANCHARD (1774-1845; Jean, Martin, Martin, fils)

Élie, fifth son of Joseph Blanchard and Anne-Symphorose Hébert, born in Poitou, France, in c1774, sailed with his widowed mother and older siblings to Louisiana aboard La Bergère, the second of the Seven Ships, and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche, where he married distant cousin Eudoxe-Marie-Gillette, called Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians François Blanchard and Hélène-Judith Giroir, in January 1793.  Marie was a native of St.-Suliac, France, and had crossed to Louisiana on L'Amitié, the fifth of the Seven Ships.  Élie and Marie were still childless in 1798, so he probably fathered no sons.  Élie died in Assumption Parish in December 1845, age 71.  

Descendants of Joachim-Jacques BLANCHARD (1768-1825; Jean, Martin, Joseph)

Joachim-Jacques, oldest surviving son of Bénoni Blanchard and his second wife Madeleine Forest, born at St.-Suliac, France, in October 1768, sailed with his parents and siblings to Louisiana aboard L'Amitié, the fifth of the Seven Ships, and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche, where he married Marie-Madeleine, daughter of fellow Acadians André Templet and Marguerite LeBlanc, in August 1793.  Marie-Madeleine was a native of St.-Servan, near St.-Malo, and had crossed to Louisiana aboard Le Bon Papa, the first of the Seven Ships.  Their daughters married into the Galland, Ordoneaux, and Violin families. Joachim died in Assumption Parish in March 1825; he was 57 years old.   He fathered four sons, all of whom created families of their own.  His second son's line was especially robust.  One of his sons and two of his grandsons moved from the Lafourche valley to the Mississippi River and settled in West Baton Rouge Parish, but the others remained on the upper Lafourche.  

1

Oldest son Jean-Charles, called Charles-Joachim-Jean by the priest who baptized him at Assumption, age unrecorded, in November 1796, married cousin Rosalie, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Pierre Marc Blanchard and Jeanne Giroir, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1818.  Their twin sons Jean Charles, fils and Auguste Alexandre were born in Assumption Parish in November 1818, Élie Volusien in October 1819, Jean Baptiste Grégoire in March 1823, Joachim in December 1826, and Marin Charles, also called Jean Charles Marin, in January 1827.  Their daughter married into the Aucoin family.  Jean Charles, père died in Assumption Parish in September 1829, age 34.  Two of his sons settled in West Baton Rouge Parish. 

1a

Élie Volusien died in Assumption Parish in February 1843, age 23, and probably did not marry.  

1b

Auguste Alexandre married Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Isidore Aucoin and Marguerite Daigle, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in May 1846.  

1c

Joachim married Anathalie, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Daigre and Modeste Babin, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in April 1852, and settled there.  

1d

Marin Charles married Marie Adèle, called Adèle, daughter of Joseph Aillet and his Acadian wife Virginie Doiron, in January 1854 at the Brusly, church, West Baton Rouge Parish, and also settled near Brusly. 

2

Augustin, or Auguste, born at Assumption in February 1797, married Florence Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Grégoire Aucoin and Marguerite Aucoin, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in August 1818.  Their son Augustin, fils, called Étienne by the priest who recorded his baptism, was born in Assumption Parish in August 1819, Victor Thomas Simon, called Victor Simon or Simon, in March 1823, Michel Jules in January 1825, Joseph Joachim Adrien in November 1826, Abraham in November 1828, Grégoire Thomas in March 1832, Raymond in January 1834, Mathurin in November 1835, Étienne Sylvain, called Sylvain, in December 1837 but died at age 3 in December 1840, François Maximin, called Maximin, was born in December 1839, and Louis François, called François, in January 1842.  Their daughter married an Aucoin cousin.  Ten of his 11 sons created their own families on the upper Lafourche.  Two of them married to first cousins who were sisters, and three of them married to another set of sisters. 

2a

Augustin, fils married Mathilde, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Barrilleaux and Marcelline Foret, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in June 1843.  Their son Maximin le jeune was born in Assumption Parish in June 1844, Gustave Léon or Léon Gustave in February 1847, and Pierre Augustin in September 1849.  

Léon Gustave married cousin Martilia, daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Boudreaux and Carmélite Barrilleaux, at the Labadieville church, Assumption Parish, in June 1867.  

2b

Victor Simon married first cousin Marie Azéma, called Azéma, daughter of Foreign Frenchman Étienne Ordoneaux and his Acadian wife Marie Aimée Blanchard, Victor Simon's aunt, at the Thibodeaux church, Lafourche Interior Parish, in September 1846.  Their son Victor, fils was born in Lafourche Interior Parish in September 1846, Aurestile Philomène in Assumption Parish in October 1849, Vilman in November 1851, Clet Simon Siméon in February 1853, Xavier Trasimond Numa in September 1855, Sylvain Gédéon in July 1857, and Lucien Onésiphore in October 1861.  

2c

Michel Jules married Marie Rosalie or Rosalie Marie, daughter of Antoine Barras and his Acadian wife Roselie Bourg, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1847; Marie's mother was a Bourg.  Their son Sylvanie Aristide, called Aristide, was born in Assumption Parish in September 1847 but died at age 13 in November 1860, Célestin Ernest was born in July 1853, and Amédée Audressi in August 1865.  

2d

Grégoire Thomas married Carmelite, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Baptiste Arceneaux and Mélanie Gautreaux, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1852. 

2e

Joseph Joachim Adrien married first cousin Marie, daughter of fellow Acadians Rosémond Aucoin and Clarisse Gautreaux, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in April 1852; they probably had to secure a dispensation for second degree of consangunity in order to marry.  Their son Pierre Camille Abraham was born near Labadieville, Assumption Parish, in May 1856.  

2f

Abraham married first cousin Zephire, another daughter of Rosémond Aucoin and Clarisse Gautreaux, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1853; they had to secure a dispensation for second degree of consangunity in order to marry.  Their son Jules Osémé was born in Assumption Parish in May 1854, Elphége Camille Augustin in August 1856, and Myrtil Émile in March 1859.  

2g

Maximin married Armendine Martin probably in the early 1850s in Assumption Parish.  Their son Joseph Clairville Samiramis was born in Assumption Parish in September 1854, Onésiphore in July 1860, and Edgar Alphonse in October 1862.  

2h

Raymond married Mélasie, another daughter of Jean Baptiste Arceneaux and Mélanie Gautreaux, at the Labadieville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1856.  Their son Justilien Augustin was born near Labadieville in April 1869. 

2i

Mathurin married Roseline or Carmélite, yet another daughter of Jean Baptiste Arceneaux and Mélanie Gautreaux, at the Labadieville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1858.  Their son Émile Oscar Savien was born in Assumption Parish in September 1859, Faustin was baptized at the Labadieville church, age unrecorded, in January 1866, and Auguste Amédée was born in November 1870.  During the War of 1861-65, Mathurin was conscripted into Company C of the 1st Regiment Louisiana Heavy Artillery in October 1862 with other Assumption Parish men, including brother François and first cousin Eugène Camille Blanchard, who served in Company B.  The regiment fought at Vicksburg, Mississippi.  Mathurin was captured with the rest of his unit at Vicksburg in July 1863, and, like most of his fellow conscripts, he refused parole.  The federals sent him and his fellow gunners to Gratiot Street Prison in St. Louis, Missouri, and to Memphis, Tennessee, before transferring them to the prisoner-of-war camp at Camp Morton, Indiana.  Perhaps to shorten his stay in the prisoner camp, Mathurin, with other survivors from his unit, took the oath of allegiance to the United States government in early January 1865--months before the war ended.  The federals released them after they took the oath, and they made their way home as best they could. 

2j

During the War of 1861-65, François served as a conscript in Company B of the 1st Regiment Louisiana Heavy Artillery and endured the hardships of that service with his older brother Mathurin and cousin Eugène Camille, including months of captivity as a prisoner of war at Camp Morton, Indiana.  François married Élodie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Baptiste Hébert and Alexandrine Arceneaux, at the Labadieville church, Assumption Parish, in December 1865.  

3

Florentin, born at Assumption in October 1798, married Marie Émilie, called Émilie, daughter of fellow Acadians Eusèbe Arceneaux and Rosalie Bergeron, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in May 1821.  Their son Léandre Valsin was born in Assumption Parish in March 1822, Jean Baptiste, called Baptiste, in January 1827, Alexandre Vincent in December 1829, Eugène Camille in August 1836, Amédée in October 1838, Charles in November 1840, and Jean Florentin, called Florian, in May 1845.  Their daughters married into the Arceneaux, Cancienne, Delaune, and Landry families.  In September 1850, the federal census taker in Assumption Parish counted 5 slaves--2 males and 3 females, all black, ranging in age from 40 years to infancy--on Florentin Blanchard's farm in the parish's Second Congressional District.  

3a

Jean Baptiste married fellow Acadian Virginie Delaune probably in Assumption Parish in the early 1850s.  Their son Pierre Camille was born near Plattenville in October 1853, Xavier Augustin near Labadieville in December 1858, Luc Ernest in December 1864, and Jules Albert in October 1867.  

3b

Alexandre Vincent married Angeline or Angèle, daughter of fellow Acadians Faustin Delaune and Marguerite Aucoin, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in April 1854.  They settled near Labadieville. 

3c

Florian married Odille, daughter of fellow Acadians Auguste Aucoin and Estelle Landry, at the Labadieville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1867. 

3c

Eugène Camille married third cousin Azéma, daughter of fellow Acadian Hubert Arceneaux and his Creole wife Irma Rodrigue, at the Labadieville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1861.  Their son Numa Léoma Philippe was born in Assumption Parish in November 1861, Cyprien Domas in December 1865, and Telema Jean Boe in March 1870.  During the War of 1861-65, Eugène Camille was conscripted into Company B of the 1st Regiment Louisiana Heavy Artillery in October 1862 with other Assumption Parish men, including first cousins François and Mathurin Blanchard, who served in Company C. The regiment fought at Vicksburg, Mississippi.  Eugène was captured with the rest of his unit at Vicksburg in July 1863, and, like most of his fellow conscripts, refused parole.  The Federals sent him and his fellow gunners to Gratiot Street Prison in St. Louis, Missouri, and to Memphis, Tennessee, before transferring them to the prisoner-of war-camp at Camp Morton, Indiana.  Perhaps to shorten his stay in the prison camp, Eugène Camille, with other prisoners from his unit, took the oath of allegiance to the United States government in early January 1865--months before the war ended.  The Federals released them after they took the oath, and they made their way home as best they could.    

3d

During the War of 1861-65, Amédée served in Company C of the 26th Regiment Louisiana Infantry, raised in Assumption Parish, which fought at Vicksburg, Mississippi.  Amédée married Uranie, daughter of Tiburce Barras and Uranie Bonvillain, at the Labadieville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1865.

3e

Charles married cousin Mathilde, daughter of fellow Acadians Théodule Arceneaux and Azélie Aucoin, at the Labadieville church in December 1865; they had to secure a "dispensation for relationship" in order to marry.  Their son Octave Adam Aubert was baptized at the Labadieville church, age unrecorded, in April 1869. 

3f

Florian married Odile, daughter of fellow Acadians Auguste Aucoin and Estelle Landry, at the Labadieville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1867.  

4

Youngest son Ambroise, born at Assumption in July 1800, married Marie, daughter of Thomas Aillet and Jeanne Crunile, at the St. Gabriel church, Iberville Parish, in December 1821.  They settled on the Mississippi River in West Baton Rouge Parish.  

Descendants of Bénoni-Jacques BLANCHARD (1771-?; Jean, Martin, Joseph)

Bénoni-Jacques, second son of Bénoni Blanchard and his second wife Madeleine Forest, born at St.-Suliac, France, in June 1771, came with his parents and siblings to Louisiana aboard L'Amitié, the fifth of the Seven Ships, and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche, where he married Marguerite-Aimée, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Trahan and Marie Boudreaux, in May 1798; Marguerite's mother was Bénoni-Jacques's distant cousin.  Marguerite was a native of Pleudihen, near St.-Malo, and had crossed to Louisiana aboard La Bergère, the second of the Seven Ships.  Their daughter married into the Forestier family.  They had nine sons, most of whom created families of their own.  The oldest surviving son remained in Assumption Parish and became a wealthy planter, but most of Bénoni-Jacque's other sons and grandsons settled farther down bayou in either Lafourche Interior or Terrebonne Parish.  One of Bénoni-Jacques's younger sons moved to St. Landry Parish, west of the Atchafalaya Basin, in the late 1840s or early 1850s.  In late November 1860, the federal census taker in Terrebonne Parish counted 6 slaves--4 males and 2 females, all black, ranging in age from 55 to 22--partly owned by a Blanchard, who may have been from this line of the family.  

1

Oldest son Ignace-Jacques, a twin, born at Assumption in October 1798, died at age 12 in May 1811.  

2

Alexis, born at Assumption in July 1800, married cousin Anne Marguerite, called Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadians Étienne Trahan and Anne Daigle, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in May 1827.  Their son Hilaire was born in Assumption Parish in January 1832, Trasimond Drosin in June 1834, Alexis Joseph in February 1836, Théodule Jean Baptiste in Lafourche Interior Parish in December 1838, Jean Baptiste Ludivic in June 1846, and Osémé Adolphe on Bayou Black, Terrebonne Parish, in October 1850.  Their daughters married into the Bourg, Comeaux, Hébert, Lancon, and LeBoeuf families, one of them in Lafayette Parish.  In late September 1850, the federal census taker in Assumption Parish counted 42 slaves--22 males and 20 females, all black except for a 19-year-old mulatto female--on Alexis Blanchard's plantation in the parish's Second Congressional District.  Alexis died in Assumption Parish in March 1851, age 50.  Two of his sons and one of his daughters moved on the western prairies after the War of 1861-65. 

2a

Hilaire married Azélie, 18-year-old daughter of Romain LeBoeuf and his Acadian wife Phelonise Hébert, in a civil ceremony in Terrebonne Parish in January 1852, and sanctified the marriage at the Houma church, Terrebonne Parish, in May 1854; Azelie's mother was an Hébert; Azélie's brother François Maurice married Hilaire's sister Olympe.  Hilaire and Azélie's son Hilaire Romain was born in Terrebonne Parish in October 1855, Joachim Alexis in May 1857, Edmond Joseph in February 1859, Survillian Justillien in August 1860, Théodule Trasimond in January 1866, and Ursin near Grand Coteau, St. Landry Parish, in February 1868.  They settled probably near Carencro, at the northern edge of Lafayette Parish. 

2b

Trasimond Drosin, called David in his burial record, died in Assumption Parish in October 1853, age 18, and probably did not marry.  

2c

Alexis Joseph married cousin Émelie or Emelia, daughter of Antoine Forestier and his Acadian wife Marguerite Blanchard, at the Vermilionville church, Lafayette Parish, in February 1867.  They remained in Lafayette Parish. 

2d

Théodule married Zulime or Zulema, daughter of Creole Zéphirin Olivier and his Acadian wife Alida Bergeron, at the Houma church, Terrebonne Parish, in January 1870. 

3

Paul-Bénoni, baptized at Assumption, age unrecorded, in November 1801, may have died young.  

4

Charles Marie, born at Assumption in February 1807, married Marie Louise, daughter of fellow Acadian Stanislas Boudreaux and his Creole wife Marie Rosalie Lefere, at the Thibodauxville church, Lafourche Interior Parish, in February 1836.  Their son Émile Amédée was born in Lafourche Interior Parish in September 1840, and Joseph Athéole in October 1843.  Their daughter married into the Dupré family.  

Joseph Athéole married Armantine, daughter of Philippe Esbreese or Elbrece and his Acadian wife Caroline Guillot, at the Montegut church, Terrebonne Parish, in August 1866; Armantine's mother was a Guillot.  Their son Charles Ulysse was born near Montegut in October 1863, and Philippe Joseph in February 1870. 

5

Firmin, born in Assumption Parish in February 1809, married Marie Hélène, another daughter of Romain LeBoeuf and Phelonise Hébert of Terrebonne Parish, at the Thibodauxville church, Lafourche Interior Parish, in January 1838.  Their son Romain Edmond was born in Lafourche Interior Parish in December 1838, Ovil Pielsirll Adam near Bayou Black, Terrebonne Parish, in November 1848, Alur Firmin near Houma, Terrebonne Parish, in April 1853, and Ernest Donatien in July 1857.  Their daughters married into the Duplantis, Gautreaux, Lambert, and Navarre families.  

6

Sylvain or Sylvère, born in Assumption Parish in February 1811, married Marie Célesie, called Célesie, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Martin LeBlanc and Céleste Pitre, at the Thibodauxville church, Lafourche Interior Parish, in May 1835.  Their son Édouard Georges was born in Lafourche Interior Parish in April 1839, Sylvain Jean Baptiste in October 1845, and twins Sylvain Vileor and Sylvère Adam in Terrebonne Parish in December 1857.  Their daughters married into the Adam, Boudreaux, and Chauvin families.  

Sylvain Jean Baptiste married Aspasie, daughter of Louis Toups and Coralie Carlin, at the Houma church, Terrebonne Parish, in January 1870.  

7

Hippolyte married Marie Céleste or Célestine, another daughter of Stanislas Boudreaux and Marie Rosalie Lefere, at the Thibodauxville church, Lafourche Interior Parish, in November 1836.  Their son Amédée was born in Lafourche Interior Parish in December 1841, Clédomire Hippolyte Paschal at Bayou Petit Caillou, Terrebonne Parish, in October 1850, Tany Bénonie near Houma in October 1857, and Alexis Félicien near Montegut, Terrebonne Parish, in November 1865.  Their daughter married into the Authement and Richard families.  

Amédée married Marie Pauline, daughter of fellow Acadians Sylvain LeBlanc and Eléonore Nathalie Thibodeaux, at the Montegut church, Terrebonne Parish, in October 1865.  Their son Pierre Clodomir Hippolyte was born near Montegut in March 1870.  

8

Bénoni Mathurin, born in Assumption Parish in December 1815, married Marie Éloise, yet another daughter of Romain LeBoeuf and Phelonise Hébert, in a civil ceremony in Terrebonne Parish in February 1842.  In the late 1840s or early 1850s, they crossed the Atchafalaya Basin and moved to St. Landry Parish.  

9

Youngest son Jean-Baptiste, born in Assumption Parish in June 1818, probably did not marry.

Joseph-François BLANCHARD (1775-?; Jean, Martin, Joseph)

Joseph-François, only surviving son of François Blanchard and Hélène-Judith Giroir, baptized at Leigné-les-Bois, Poitou, France, in April 1775, accompanied his family to Louisiana aboard L'Amitié, the fifth of the Seven Ships, in 1785 and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche.  A Spanish official counted him with them at Valenzuéla on the upper bayou in January 1788, age 12.  He then disappears from the historical record. 

Descendants of Jean-Baptiste BLANCHARD (1778-1848; Jean, Martin, Joseph, Jean-Baptiste?)

Jean-Baptiste, elder son of Jean-Grégoire Blanchard and Marie-Madeleine Livois, born at Nantes, France, in March 1778, sailed with his parents and siblings to Louisiana aboard Le St.-Rémi, the fourth of the Seven Ships, and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche, where he married Marie-Modeste, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph Aucoin and Élisabeth Henry, in January 1802.  Marie-Modeste was a native of Chantenay, near Nantes, and had crossed to Louisiana aboard Le Bon Papa, the first of the Seven Ships.  Their daughter married into the Sause family.  Jean-Baptiste remarried to Marie Adélaïde, daughter of fellow Acadians Louis Boudreaux and Perpétué Dugas and widow of Eustache Carret, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in July 1813.  Marie Adélaïde also was a native of Chantenay and had crossed to Louisiana aboard Le Bon Papa.  She gave Jean-Baptiste no more sons.  Only two of his four sons lived long enough to marry, but both had sons of their own.  Jean Baptiste, père died in Assumption Parish in December 1848, age 70.  His sons remained on the upper Lafourche.

1

Oldest son Jean-Baptiste, fils, called Baptiste, born at Assumption in November 1802, married Clarisse or Claire Pauline, daughter of fellow Acadians Fabien Thomas Guillot and Pauline Aucoin, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in July 1832.  Their son Jean Baptiste III was buried in Assumption Parish, age unrecorded, in March 1834, Jean Baptiste Joseph, called Joseph, was born in April 1835, Zéphirin Dorville, called Dorville or Orville, in August 1836, Augustin Evariste in February 1839, Firmin Édouard in October 1844 but died at age 11 in October 1855, Désiré Evariste was born in March 1849, and Octave Adrien in February 1853.  Their daughters married into the Blanchard, Girouard, and LeBlanc families.  In August 1850, the census taker in Assumption Parish counted 7 slaves--5 males and 2 females, all black, ranging in age from 49 to 1--on Jean Baptiste Blanchard's farm in the parish's Second Congressional District.  Jean Baptiste, fils died in Assumption Parish in May 1861; he was 58 years old.  In August 1860, the census taker in Assumption Parish counted 6 slaves--4 males and 2 females, 3 blacks and 3 mulattoes, ages 40 years to 6 months, living in 1 house--on Jn Bte Blanchard's farm in the parish's 9th Ward, along Bayou Lafourche, near Jn Bte Blanchard Jr.  Two of his sons died in Confederate service. 

1a

Orville died in Assumption Parish in October 1855, age 19, and probably did not marry.  

1b

Jean Baptiste Joseph married Clementine, daughter of fellow Acadian Jean Baptiste Landry and his Creole wife Euphrosine dite Froisine Malbrough, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1859.  In August 1860, the federal census taker in Assumption Parish counted 9 slaves--6 males and 3 females, all black, ranging in age from 59 to 1, living in 1 house--on Jn Bte Blanchard Jr's farm in the parish's 9th Ward, along Bayou Lafourche, near Jn Bte Blanchard; these probably were Jean Baptiste Joseph's slaves.  During the War of 1861-65, Jean Baptiste Joseph was conscripted into Company B of the 1st Regiment Louisiana Heavy Artillery in October 1862 with other Assumption Parish men, including younger brother Augustin Evariste.  The regiment fought at Vicksburg, Mississippi.  Jean Baptiste was captured with the rest of his unit at Vicksburg in July 1863, and, like most of his fellow conscripts, he refused parole.  The Federals sent him and his fellow gunners to Memphis, Tennessee; St. Louis, Missouri; and to the prisoner-of-war compound at Camp Morton, Indiana.  Jean Baptiste died at Camp Morton, probably of disease, in May 1864, age 29.  His family line may have died with him. 

1c

Augustin married Mélanie, another daughter of Jean Baptiste Landry and Euphrosine dite Froisine Malbrough, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1861.  Their son Elphége Gervet Eugène was born in Assumption Parish in November 1861.  During the War of 1861-65, Augustin Evariste was conscripted into Company B of the 1st Regiment Louisiana Heavy Artillery with older brother Jean Baptiste Joseph and suffered a similar fate.  Augustin Evariste died in the spring or summer of 1863 during the Siege of Vicksburg, cause and date of his death unrecorded, in his mid-20s.  

2

Joseph Jean, baptized at Assumption in November 1804, died at age 9 months in July 1805.  

3

Hippolyte Charles, born at Assumption in May 1806, died in Assumption Parish in May 1849.  Though he was age 43 when he died, he seems to have never married.  

4

Youngest son Thadée Martin, called Martin, born in Ascension Parish in November 1808, married Constance Carmelite, daughter of fellow Acadians Pierre Bourg and Marie Rose Livois, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1832.  Their son Arsène Thadée was born probably in Assumption Parish in the early 1830s.  Their daughter married into the Guillot family.  Thadée Martin died in Assumption Parish in February 1837, age 28.  

Arsène married Noemi, daughter of fellow Acadians Henry Breaux and Marie Duon, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in January 1854.  Their son Joseph, age unrecorded, died in Assumption Parish in March 1859, and Joseph Arsène was born perhaps posthumously in January 1868.  Arsène may have died in Assumption Parish in September 1867; the Paincourtville priest who recorded the burial did not give any parents' names, mention a wife, or even give the age of the deceased. 

Descendants of Pierre-Charles BLANCHARD (1785-1835; Jean, Martin, Joseph, Jean-Baptiste?)

Pierre-Charles, younger son of Jean-Grégoire Blanchard and Marie-Madeleine Livois, was a nursling when he reached Louisiana with his parents and siblings aboard Le St.-Rémi, the fourth of the Seven Ships, and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche.  Called André-Pierre by the recording priest, he married Julie, daughter of fellow Acadian Jean Baptiste Dupuis and Élisabeth Benoit of St. Gabriel, at St. Gabriel in August 1804.  Julie was a native of Louisiana.  Their daughter married into the Breaux family.  Pierre-Charles remarried to Carmelite Euphémie, daughter of French Immigrant Étienne Peltier and his Acadian wife Jeanne-Marguerite Clossinet of Chantenay, France, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in February 1819; Carmélite's mother was a Clossinet.  Their daughter married into the Dugas family.  Pierre Charles died in Assumption Parish in March 1835, age 50.  He had seven sons by both wives; all of his sons married and remained on the upper Lafourche.  

1

Oldest son Pierre, by his father's first wife, born in Ascension Parish in December 1807, married Elisa, daughter of fellow Acadians Édouard Hébert and Eléonore Giroir, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in November 1836.  Their son Joseph Elphége was born in Assumption Parish in September 1840 but died at age 14 in June 1854, Pierre Adolphe, called Adolphe, was born in August 1844, Pierre Neuville, called Neuville, in December 1846 but died at age 16 months in April 1848, Edouard Dufroissel was born in February 1854, and Pierre Devillier in September 1856.  Their daughters married into the Achée and Marroy families.  In August 1850, the federal census taker in Assumption Parish counted 5 slaves--2 males and 3 females, 4 blacks and 1 mulatto, ranging in age from 35 to 2--on Pierre Blanchard's farm in the parish's Second Congressional District.  Pierre died in Assumption Parish in January 1864, age 56. 

Adolphe married Oliva, daughter of fellow Acadians Henry Daigle and Emerante Dugas, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in April 1869.  Their son Pierre Henri was born near Paincourtville in December 1870. 

2

Jean Rosémond, called Rosémond, by his father's first wife, born in Assumption Parish in January 1812, married Adélaïde, daughter of fellow Acadians Jean Baptiste Guidry and and Eléonore Giroir, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in August 1839.  Their son Pierre was born in Assumption Parish in April 1843.  Rosémond remarried to Octavie, another daughter of Édouard Hébert and Eléonore Giroir, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in June 1855.  Their son Joseph died in Assumption Parish at age 3 days in December 1828.  Rosémond died in Assumption Parish in April 1860; the priest who recorded his burial said that Rosémond was age 45 when he died, but he was 48. 

3

Faustin Amand, called Amand, from his father's first wife, born in Assumption Parish in March 1814, married Clarisse, also called Claire, daughter of fellow Acadians Charles Breaux and Céleste Arceneaux, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in November 1836 five days after his older brother Pierre married in the same church.  Their son Jules Meno was born in Assumption Parish in December 1837, a son, name unrecorded, died in Assumption Parish at age 13 days in November 1839, Joseph Séverin, called Séverin, was born in December 1840, Joseph, age unrecorded, died in February 1852, Antoine Deville was born in January 1854, and Joseph Hermogène in September 1858 but died 2 days after his birth.  Their daughters married into the Bergeron, Gautreaux, Gilbert, and Newchurch families.  Amand, at age 49, remarried to Adoisca, daughter of fellow Acadian Marcellin Hermogène LeBlanc and Eléonise Landry, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in December 1863.  

3a

During the War of 1861-65, Séverin, by his father's first wife, served in the Donaldsonville Artillery, raised in Ascension Parish, which fought in Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania--one of General R. E. Lee's Louisiana Tigers.  Except for a brief detachment as a teamster with an ordnance train, he was present on every roll of his unit from his enlistment in September 1861 until he surrendered with General Robert E. Lee's army at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia, in April 1865.  Séverin married Lorenza, daughter of fellow Acadian Bienvenu Landry and his Creole wife Lorenza Capdevielle, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in November 1865.  Their son Thomas Ange was born in Assumption Parish in September 1866.  

3b

During the War of 1861-65, Jules, by his father's first wife, served probably as a conscript in Company H of the 29th (Thomas's) Regiment Louisiana Infantry, raised in Assumption Parish, which fought at Vicksburg, Mississippi.  Jules married Coralie, daughter of fellow Acadians Pharon LeBlanc and Coralie Landry of Ascension Parish, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in November 1865. 

4

Gratien or Gatien Olivier, by his father's second wife, born in Assumption Parish in December 1819, married Anaïse, another daughter of Marcellin Hermogène LeBlanc and Eléonise Landry, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in April 1842.  Their son Pierre Nichols, called Nichols,  was born in Assumption Parish in June 1843, Paul Necomide or Nicomede, in September 1848, Joseph Ernest in March 1856, and Joseph Léoni in March 1860.  

4a

Nichols married Alida, another daughter of Acadian Bienvenu Landry and Lorenza Capdevielle, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in October 1867.  

4b

Nicomede married cousin Cordelia, daughter of fellow Acadians Augustin Melançon and Mélanie Hébert, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in July 1870; they had to secure a dispensation for third and fourth degrees of consanguinity in order to marry. 

5

Clément Neuville, called Neuville, from his father's second wife, born in Assumption Parish in November 1825, married Félicie, daughter of fellow Acadian Paul Savoy and his Creole wife Félicité Maroi, at the Plattenville church, Assumption Parish, in July 1849.  Their son Jean Joseph Samuel was born near Paincourtville, Assumption Parish, in February 1855, Jean Randolph in December 1856, Antoine Paul in June 1859, Joseph Lefranc in Ascension Parish in November 1861, and a son, name unrecorded, died a day after his birth in May 1864.  Their daughter married into the LeBlanc family. 

6

Joseph Osémé, called Osémé, from his father's second wife, born in Assumption Parish in November 1827, married Félicie, daughter of fellow Acadians Lazare Hébert and Céleste Landry, at the Paincourtville church, Assumption Parish, in October 1851.  Their son Théodore Demophon was born in Assumption Parish in October 1853. 

7

Youngest son Joseph Amédée, called Amédée, from his father's second wife, born in Assumption Parish in June 1832, married Clementine, daughter of Dufossard Mollere and Basilisse Rousseau, at the Donaldsonville church, Ascension Parish, in January 1855.  Their son Alphonse Fernant was born near Paincourtville, Assumption Parish, in January 1861, Jean Amédée in August 1864, Georges Eugène in November 1866 but died at age 2 1/2 in September 1869, and Eugène Édouard was born in January 1869.  During the War of 1861-65, Amédée served in Company C of the 26th Regiment Louisiana Infantry, raised in Assumption Parish, which fought at Vicksburg, Mississippi.  

~

A Blanchard from the river, son of an immigrant from Halifax, moved to upper Bayou Lafourche during the early antebellum period:

Descendants of Maurice BLANCHARD (1774-?; Jean, Guillaume, Pierre)

Maurice, son of Joseph Blanchard and Esther Bourgeois of St.-Jacques, was born at New Orleans in May 1774 and grew up at St.-Jacques, now St. James Parish, on the river above New Orleans.  During the 1810s, he took his wife, Marie-Madeleine, daughter of Augustin Fontenot and his Acadian wife Isabelle Martin dit Barnabé, and their children to upper Bayou Lafourche and settled in Assumption Parish.  Their daughters married into the Martin, Pitre, and Robichaux families.  Maurice and Marie-Madeleine had six sons, most of whom created families of their own.  All but one of them moved down bayou into Lafourche Interior and Terrebonne parishes.  One of them moved to the old Opelousas District, west of the Atchafalaya Basin, and settled in St. Landry Parish.  In late November 1860, the federal census taker in Terrebonne Parish counted 6 slaves--4 males and 2 females, all black, ranging in age from 55 to 22--partly owned by a Blanchard, who may have been from this line of the family.  

1

Oldest son Maurice-Augustin, called Augustin and also Jean Maurice, born at St.-Jacques in May 1803, married Marceline, daughter of fellow Acadians Étienne Robichaux and Henriette Arceneaux, in a civil ceremony in Lafourche Interior Parish in May 1843, and sanctified the marriage at the Thibodeaux church, Lafourche Interior Parish, in August 1844.  The may have had a son named Valmont, who moved to the western prairies after the War of 1861 finally ended.  Their daughter married into the Arcement family.  Augustin died near Raceland, Lafourche Parish, in February 1862, age 56. 

Valmont married Adelina Dies, Dias, or Diaz in a civil ceremony in Lafourche Parish in January 1861.  Their son Gustave was born near Raceland in November 1861, Louis Lasty in August 1863, and Cléopha near Church Point, then in St. Landry but now in Acadia Parish, in August 1867. 

2

Jean Baptiste, born at St.-Jacques in June 1805, married Suzette, daughter of fellow Acadians Cyril Thibodeaux and Adélaïde Chiasson and widow of Pierre Pariseau, at the Opelousas church, St. Landry Parish, in April 1833 and settled in St. Landry Parish.  

3

Alexandre, born in St. James Parish in February 1808, may have died young.  

4

Pierre Élie, born in St. James Parish in August 1812, married Susanne Adéle, called Adéle or Adélie, 17-year-old daughter of Jean Laurent Pellegrin and Catherine Andra, in a civil ceremony in Lafourche Interior Parish in February 1834.  Their son Pierre Alcée was born in Lafourche Interior Parish in September 1843, Théophile near Bayou Petit Caillou, Terrebonne Parish, in December 1847, Zenon in July 1850, Pierre Telesse in November 1856, and Pierre Clairville in December 1859.  Their daughters married into the Charpentier, Guidry, and Mataire families.   

4a

Théophile married cousin Lydia, daughter of Fortune Pellegrin and Elizabeth Lauff, at the Montegut church, Terrebonne Parish, in August 1870.  

4b

Zénon married Onesille, daughter of fellow Acadians Euphrosin Guidry and Cléonise Arcement, at the Houma church, Terrebonne Parish, in October 1870.  

5

Michel Archange, called Archange, born in Assumption Parish in January 1819, married Justine, daughter of Gabriel Rodrique and Geneviève Dufresne, in a civil ceremony in Lafourche Interior Parish in April 1841.  Valmont may have been Archange's son, not older brother Augustin's son, Augustin Michel was born in Lafourche Interior Parish in September 1848, and Joseph near Raceland, Lafourche Parish, in November 1856.  Archange's daughters married into the Araby, Boudreaux, Monnier, and Robichaux families.  

6

Youngest son Basile, born in Lafourche Interior Parish in June 1823, probably did not marry. 

~

Other BLANCHARDs in the Lafourche Valley

Local church and civil records make it difficult to link some Blanchards on upper Bayou Lafourche with known Acadian family lines in the area:

Jean Blanchard married Joséphine Martin, perhaps a fellow Acadian, place and date unrecorded.  Their daughter Marie Jeanne was born in Lafourche Interior Parish in May 1827. 

Joseph, son of Étienne Blanchard, died in Assumption Parish at age 20 in January 1847.  Which Étienne Blanchard was this?  The Plattenville priest who recorded the burial did not give Joseph's mother's name. 

Joseph Blanchard died in Assumption Parish, age 1 day, in March 1848.  The Plattenville priest who recorded the infant's burial did not give any parents' names. 

Marie Blanchard died in Assumption Parish, age 80, in August 1851.  The Plattenville priest who recorded the infant's burial did not give any parents' names or mention a husband. 

Auguste Blanchard married Joséphine Boudreaux, place and date unrecorded.  Daughter Augustine was born in Assumption Parish in May 1852, and Rosalie Marcelite Angela in March 1864. 

Adone Blanchard married Joséphine Barriot, perhaps Barrilleaux, place and date unrecorded.  Daughter Zoémilie Émilia was born in Assumption Parish in January 1854. 

Siméon Blanchard married ____ Delaune, place and date unrecorded.  Daughter Philomena died in Assumption Parish, age 1, in May 1854.  Who was Siméon's father? 

Octave Blanchard died at "age a few hours old" in Assumption Parish in November 1854.  The Plattenville priest who recorded the newborn's burial did not give any parents' names. 

Jean Baptiste Blanchard married Hyrma or Irma Hébert, place and date unrecorded.  Daughter Malvina Julienne was born in Assumption Parish in June 1855, and Evellina Zéolide in March 1858. 

Helena Blanchard died in Assumption Parish, "age 20 years, 6 months," in September 1855.  The Plattenville priest who recorded the burial gave no parents' names nor mentioned a husband. 

Firmin Blanchard married Marie Clement, place and date unrecorded.  Daughter Marie Odile was born in Assumption Parish in July 1857. 

Élisabeth, daughter of Simon Blanchard, died in Assumption Parish, age 16 months, in August 1860.  The Platteville priest who recorded the burial did not give the girl's mother's name.  Was Simon an Acadian? 

Rosalie Blanchard married Gassien Authement in a civil ceremony in Terrebonne Parish in August 1860.  The parish clerk who recorded the marriage did not give any parents' names.  Was Rosalie Acadian? 

Virginie Blanchard "from Terrebonne Parish" married Joseph, son of Joseph Arigonie and Marie Annel Aostali, "from Italy and now lives in Terrebonne Parish," at the Houma church in July 1863.  Neither the parish clerk nor the priest who recorded the marriage give the bride's parents' names.  Was she an Acadian? 

Marie Blanchard died in Assumption Parish at age 5 in December 1863.  Sadly, the Paincourtville priest who recorded the burial did not give the girl's parents' names. 

Célina Blanchard married Pierre Deterville Justilien, son of Pierre Deterville Foret and Mélanie Autin, in a civil ceremony in Lafourche Parish in March 1864.  The parish clerk who recorded the marriage did not give any parents' names. 

Euphrosine Blanchard's sons Ernest Louisan and William Rodolphe, age 3, were baptized at the Houma church, Terrebonne Parish, in April 1864.  The recording priest did not give the boys' father's name nor Ernest's age at the time of his baptism. 

Marguerite Blanchard, "wife of Adolphe Loret," died in Assumption Parish, age 35, in March 1868.  The Plattenville priest who recorded the burial did not give Marguerite's parents' names. 

Jacob Blanchard married Elizabeth Arrison, perhaps Harrison, place and date unrecorded.  Their son Louis Félix was born near Labadieville, Assumption Parish, in October 1868. 

Désiré Blanchard married Eugénie _____, place and date unrecorded.  Their son, name and age unrecorded, died near Plattenville, Assumption Parish, in October 1869, and son Octave was born near Plattenville in September 1870. 

LOUISIANA:  WESTERN SETTLEMENTS

No Blanchards from either Halifax or Maryland went directly to either of the prairie districts when they came to Louisiana in the late 1760s.  In the mid-1770s, not long after he married, Victor Blanchard from the Acadian Coast crossed the Atchafalaya Basin and followed his older sister, Marguerite, who had married a Broussard, to the Attakapas District, but he fathered no children.  

Anne, daughter of Antoine Blanchard of Port-Royal and widow of Joseph dit Vieux Richard, crossed the Basin from St.-Jacques on the river and married Jean-Baptiste, fils, son of Jean-Baptiste Cormier, at Attakapas in January 1779.  

Victor BLANCHARD (1752-1822; Jean, Guillaume, René)

Victor, son of René Blanchard, fils and Isabelle Comeau, was born in Acadia in c1752 on the eve of Le Grand Dérangement.  He and older sister Marguerite came to Louisiana from Halifax as teenage orphans in 1765 and settled at Cabanocé/St.-Jacques, on the river above New Orleans.  Marguerite married Simon, son of Acadian resistance fighter Alexandre Broussard dit Beausoleil, at Cabanocé in April 1768 and followed him to the Attakapas District, where the Broussards had settled in early 1765.  Victor remained on the river and married Anne-Perpétué, called Perpétué, daughter of fellow Acadian Honoré Duhon, at Ascension, upriver from St.-Jacques, in February 1775.  Two years later, in May 1777, he and his wife, sans children, were counted in the general census at Attakapas, where they settled near his sister.   His will was filed at the St. Martinville courthouse in July 1818.  He died a widower in Lafayette Parish in December 1822, age 70.  He seems to have fathered no children, so his family line probably died with him.  

~

More Acadian Blanchards came to Louisiana from France in 1785, but, again, none of them went directly to the western prairies.  But two of them crossed the Atchafalaya Basin later in the colonial period.  No family lines came of it, however: 

Madeleine, daughter of Toussaint Blanchard of Petitcoudiac, came to Louisiana aboard L'Amitié, the fifth of the Seven Ships from France, which reached New Orleans in November.  She crossed with the family of Benoît Comeau, husband of her sister, Anne Blanchard. and followed them to upper Bayou Lafourche, but she did not remain there.  She crossed the Atchafalaya Basin to the Opelousas District, where she married André, son of French Creole Jean Mondon of Domville, Rouen, France, in August 1790; she was 45 years old when she married and died at age 85 at her home along Bayou Plaquemine Brûlé, on the prairie west of Opelousas.  

Madeleine Blanchard, widow of Charles Bourg, also came to Louisiana aboard L'Amitié in 1785.  She and her two young sons, Jean-Charles and Joseph-Florent Bourg, followed the majority of the passengers from their ship to upper Bayou Lafourche, but, like the other Madeleine Blanchard, she did not stay there.  In 1798, they moved to the Attakapas District, where Madeleine's sons married Trahan sisters on the same day in October 1798.  Madeleine died in St. Martin Parish in December 1814; the priest who recorded her burial said she was age 85.  

~

Not until the antebellum period did Acadian Blanchards from the river and from Bayou Lafourche establish a western branch of the family.  They settled at La Grand Pointe near present-day Breaux Bridge on upper Bayou Teche, at Fausse Pointe on the Teche below St. Martinville, and on the Opelousas prairies in present-day St. Landry and Acadia parishes.  

Descendants of Frédéric-Sylvain BLANCHARD (1777-1823; Jean, Guillaume, Pierre)

Frédéric Sylvain, son of Joseph Blanchard and Esther Bourgeois, baptized at St.-Jacques on the river, age unrecorded, in September 1777, married Anne, daughter of French Immigrant Pierre Berteau and his second wife Rose Savoie, an Acadian, at St.-Jacques in February 1800.  Anne also was a native of St.-Jacques.  Frédéric Sylvain remarried to Marie, daughter of Creoles Frédéric Bertrand and Geneviève Mayer of New Orleans and the upper German Coast, either late in the 1800s or the early 1810s.  Frédéric Sylvain moved his family upriver first to St. Gabriel in Iberville Parish and then to the Baton Rouge area.  In the 1810s, he moved from the river to the northern edge of the old Attakapas District and settled at Grand Pointe on upper Bayou Teche near present-day Breaux Bridge.  His daughters, from both his wives, married into the Doré, Guidry, Latil, Lormand, Martin, McNeel, and Menard families.  Frédéric Sylvain died at his home at Grand Pointe, St. Martin Parish, in March 1823; he was only 45 years old.  All seven of his sons were from his second wife.  Almost all of them married, some of them twice, and most of them produced sons of their own.  Three of them remained in St. Martin and Lafayette parishes.  Four of them moved north and west to the old Opelousas District, where they settled in present-day St. Landry and Acadia parishes. 

1

Oldest son Pierre Édouard, born near Baton Rouge in May 1814, married Marguerite Elmire, daughter of fellow Acadians Julien Poirier and Céleste Theriot, at the St. Martinville church, St. Martin Parish, in December 1835.  Their daughters married into the Trahan family and perhaps into the LeBlanc (French Canadian, not Acadian) family as well.  Pierre died in St. Martin Parish in December 1842, age 28, and probably fathered no sons.  

2

Norbert, born either near Baton Rouge or in St. Martin Parish probably in the 1810s, married Delphine, daughter of John Peter McNeil and Marie Laviolette, at the St. Martinville church, St. Martin Parish,  in October 1832.  Their son Jean Vileor was born in St. Martin Parish in November 1840.  Norbert remarried to Carmelite, daughter of perhaps fellow Acadians Rosémond Richard and Anastasie Poirier, at the Grand Coteau church, St. Landry Parish, in July 1846.  Their son Norbert, fils was born near Grand Coteau in April 1853.  Their daughter married into the Benoit family.  Norbert, père remarried again--his third marriage--to Spanish Creole Célestine or Clementine Plaisance and his Acadian wife Henriette Breaux and widow of Valéry Roy, in a civil ceremony in St. Landry Parish in April 1862.  Norbert, père remarried yet again--his fourth marriage--to fellow Acadian Joséphine Broussard; he was 41 years older than she was, old enough to be her grandfather!  They settled near Church Point, then in St. Landry but now in Acadia Parish.  Their son Telesphore was born in May 1870. 

Jean Vileor, by his father's first wife, may have married Marie Denise Bergeron, probably a French Creole, and settled near Arnaudville.  Their son Paul was born in April 1866. 

3

Alexis, a twin, born in St. Martin Parish in October 1816, married Émilia N., daughter of fellow Acadians Narcisse Dugas and Céleste Cormier, in a civil ceremony in St. Landry Parish in August 1851, and remarried to fellow Acadian Céleste Thibodeaux at the Grand Coteau church, St. Landry Parish, in September 1860. 

4

Dosité, Alexis's twin, married Marie Azélie, called Azélie, daughter of fellow Acadians Michel Dupuis and Marie Azélie Poirier, at the Vermilionville church, Lafayette Parish, in July 1838.  Their son Dosité, fils, was born in Lafayette Parish in July 1839, and Pierre Telesphore in January 1846.  Their daughters married into the Benoit, Laviolette, and Prejean families. 

Dosité, fils married fellow Acadian Marie Annette Martin in a civil ceremony in St. Landry Parish in July 1861.  They settled near Church Point, then in St. Landry but now in Acadia Parish.  Their son Joseph Telesphore was born in December 1862, and Jean Dupleci in April 1866.  

5

Placide, born in St. Martin Parish in October 1818, married Marie, daughter of Charles Combe or Cohem and Marguerite O'Henry, at the St. Martinville church, St. Martin Parish, in April 1839.  Their son Frédéric was born in St. Martin Parish in November 1841, and Charles in September 1842.  Their daughter married into the Guidry family.  Placide remarried to Modeste, daughter of probably fellow Acadian Joseph Lejeune, in a civil ceremony in St. Landry Parish in March 1858, and sanctified the marriage at the Church Point church, then in St. Landry but now in Acadia Parish, in November 1864.  They settled near Church Point.  Their son Martin was born in September 1867. 

6

Séverin, perhaps Placide's twin and "resident of Atchafalaya," died near Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, in March 1848, age 30.  His was the first burial recorded at the Breaux Bridge church.  He probably did not marry.  

7

Youngest son Olivier, born in St. Martin Parish in February 1821, married Élizabeth, daughter of John Talley or Tolle and Marie Artache, at the St. Martinville church, St. Martin Parish, in April 1839.  Their son Joseph was born in St. Martin Parish in June 1847.  They also had a son named Olivier, fils.  Their daughters married into the Cassadey and Champagne families.  Olivier, père remarried to Élise, daughter of Paul Champagne and Élise Piard, in a civil ceremony in St. Martin Parish in June 1854.  Their son Désiré was born in St. Martin Parish in February 1865, and Albert Joseph in January 1868.  During the War of 1861-65, Olivier served as a conscript from St. Martin Parish.  One of his older sons moved to Iberville Parish on the river. 

Olivier, fils, by his father's first wife, married Malvinia or Malvina, daughter of J. F. Rils and D. A. Barbay, at the Plaquemine church, Iberville Parish, in February 1869.  They remained at Plaquemine. 

Descendants of Marin BLANCHARD (1793-?; Jean?)

Marin, third son of Jacques Blanchard and Modeste-Aimée Bourg of West Baton Rouge Parish, born near Baton Rouge in February 1793, married Sophie, daughter of fellow Acadian Xavier Thériot, probably in West Baton Rouge Parish in December 1815.  In the 1820s, Marin moved his family from the river to the Bayou Teche valley and established another line of Blanchards on the western prairies.  Marin and Sophie settled at Fausse Pointe in present-day Iberia Parish.  Their daughter married into the Ducharme family.  Marin remarried to Annette dite Nanon, daughter of fellow Acadians Joseph dit Josaphat Broussard and Françoise Trahan and widow of Valentin Surville Arceneaux, at the St. Martinville church, St. Martin Parish, in May 1827.  Their daughters married into the Angèle, Cormier, Guidry, LeGrand, and Zimmerman families.  Most of Marin's sons came from his first wife, and most of them died before they could marry.  Two of them, however, created families of his own.  One remained in St. Martin Parish, and the other returned to West Baton Rouge Parish in the 1840s.  

1

Oldest son Marin Sosthène, called Sosthène, from his father's first wife, born in West Baton Rouge Parish in October 1818, died probably in St. Martin Parish in November 1839.  His burial record said that he was age 19, but he was 21.  He probably did not marry.  

2

Achille, by his father's first wife, born either in West Baton Rouge or St. Martin Parish in c1819, died in St. Martin Parish in September 1837, age 18, and probably did not marry.  

3

Amand Adrien, called Adrien, from his father's first wife, born in West Baton Rouge Parish in September 1823, married Sophie Élodie, called Élodie, daughter of fellows Acadian Eusilien Broussard and Emerite Thibodeaux, at the Brusly church, West Baton Rouge Parish, in August 1849.  They remained in West Baton Rouge Parish.  

4

Louis Désiré, called Désiré, from his father's first wife, born in St. Martin Parish in September 1825, died at age 2 in August 1827.

5

Youngest son Marin Drosin or Drauzin, by his father's second wife, born in September 1828 and baptized as "Rose" at the St. Martinville church, St. Martin Parish, in August 1829, married Félicienne, daughter of Charles Combe, Comes, or Cohil and his Acadian wife Céleste Poirier and widow of Ursin Talley, at the St. Martinville church, St. Martin Parish, in October 1855; Félicienne's mother was a Poirier.  They settled near Breaux Bridge.  Their son Éloi was born in December 1856, Julien in c1858 but died at age 3 in February 1861, Adolphe Eusèbe was born in May 1864, and Joseph Adam in March 1866.  During the War of 1861-65, Drosin served in Company C of the 8th Regiment Louisiana Infantry, raised in St. Martin Parish, which fought in Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania--one of General R. E. Lee's Louisiana Tigers.  Drosin enlisted in March 1862 probably to avoid conscription.  His daughter Apolline was born five days after he enlisted.  He was absent sick from his regiment from April 1862 to February 1863 before returning home on sick furlough in March.  He did not return to his regiment.  

6

Daughter Virginie Odile, called Odile, from her father's second wife, gave birth to son Joseph Gabriel Blanchard near Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, in February 1859.  The priest who recorded the boy's baptism did not name the father. 

Descendants of Jean Baptiste BLANCHARD (1805-?; Jean, Guillaume, Pierre, Joseph)

Jean Baptiste, son of Maurice Blanchard and Marie Madeleine Fontenot of Assumption, was born at St. Jacques on the river in June 1805 but grew up in Assumption Parish.  In the early 1800s, he moved from the Lafourche valley to St. Landry Parish, where he married Suzette, daughter of fellow Acadian Cyril Thibodeaux and widow of Pierre Pariseau, at the Opelousas church in April 1833.  Their daughters married into the Bergeron and Breaux families.  Jean Baptiste may have remarried to Marie Barousse probably in St. Landry Parish in the 1830s or 1840s.   

1

Oldest son Edmond, a twin, by his father's first wife, born in St. Landry Parish in October 1833, probably never married.

2

Valmont, Edmond's twin, married Célise Louise Servant probably in St. Landry Parish in the late 1850s.  Their son Valmont Roy was born in St. Landry Parish in January 1859. 

3

Youngest son Paul, by his father's second wife, born probably in St. Landry Parish in the late 1830s or early 1840s, married Marie Denise, daughter of French Creole Baptiste Bergeron and Delphine Guidroz and widow of Caliste Marks, at the Grand Coteau church, St. Landry Parish, in May 1862.  They settled near Arnaudville.  Their son Jean Baptiste le jeune was born in March 1863. 

Descendants of Bénoni Mathurin BLANCHARD (1815-?; Jean, Martin, Joseph, Bénoni)

Bénoni Mathurin, eighth son of Bénoni Jacques Blanchard and Marguerite Trahan, born in Assumption Parish in December 1815, married Marie Éloise, daughter of French Creole Romain LeBoeuf, in a civil ceremony in Terrebonne Parish in February 1842.  During the late 1840s or early 1850s, they moved from Terrebonne to St. Landry Parish. 

1

Oldest son Jouville Isidore, called Isidore, born in Lafourche Interior Parish in June 1846, likely married fellow Acadian Clarice Hébert and settled near Abbeville, Vermilion Parish, by the late 1860s.  

2

François was born near Grand Coteau, St. Landry Parish, in February 1853.  

3

Youngest son Mathurin Laurent was born in St. Landry Parish in July 1856.

~

Other BLANCHARDs on the Western Prairies

Local church and civil records make it difficult to link some Blanchards in the western parishes with known Acadian lines of the family there:

Jeanne Blanchard married Joseph Petitin, perhaps a Foreign Frenchman, place and date unrecorded, and settled in St. Landry Parish during the early antebellum period.  Her son Eugène Petitin married Onezia, daughter of Acadian Jean Guilbeau, fils, at the Opelousas church, St. Landry Parish, in June 1845.  Was Jeanne herself an Acadian? 

Elerzina Blanchard died in St. Martin Parish, age 22, in March 1854.  The St. Martinville priest who recorded the burial did not give any parents' names or mention a husband. 

Firmin S. Blanchard married Marie Clément, place and date unrecorded.  Daughter Adèle Louisiane was born in Assumption Parish on the upper Lafourche in April 1855, Alice Clémence in Lafayette Parish in June 1859, and Louise in Terrebonne Parish in February 1868. 

Marie Malvina Blanchard married Pierre Adelma Comb in a civil ceremony in St. Martin Parish in June 1866.  The parish clerk who recorded the marriage did not give the couple's parents' names. 

Élodie, daughter of Olivier Blanchard and Carmélite Boudreaux, married Manuel Migues Maria Dellano or De Llano at the Abbeville church, Vermilion Parish, in June 1867. 

Hilaire Blanchard died in Lafayette Parish in October 1868.  The Vermilionville priest who recorded the burial, and who did not give any parents' names, said that Hilaire died "at age 9 mths." 

Robert Blanchard died in Lafayette Parish "at age 15 days" in January 1869.  The Vermilionville priest who recorded the burial did not give the boy's parents' names. 

Rosémond Blanchard died in Lafayette Parish in April 1869.  The Vermilionville priest who recorded the burial, and who did not give any parents' names or mention a wife, said that Rosémond died "at age 24 yrs."

Euranie Blanchard married Louis D. LeBlanc in a civil ceremony in St. Landry Parish in December 1870.  The parish clerk who recorded the marriage did not give the couple's parents' names. 

NON-ACADIAN FAMILIES in LOUISIANA

Blanchard is a common surname in France and French Canada.  Blanchard also is an Anglo name, so it can be found throughout the United States, including South Louisiana.  The majority of non-Acadian Blanchards in Louisiana, however, were French, not Anglo-American.  Members of the family settled in Louisiana throughout the colonial period.  These French Blanchards were workers, soldiers, sailors, even criminals, but none of them seems to have started a family that endured: 

Catherine, daughter of Pierre Blanchard, married Mathurin Roger at "Old Biloxi," now in the state of Mississippi but then part of the Louisiana colony, in April 1721.  

Marie Blanchard, native of Lanevoix, near La Rochelle, France, married master cannoneer Hillaire Cheneau at New Orleans in January 1726.  

Michel Blanchard, a sailor and native of St.-Brieuc, France, was buried at New Orleans in September 1726.  

Guy Blanchard, born at St.-Brieuc, northern Brittany, in c1720, came as a French soldier in the early years of the colony.  After he was discharged from service in 1753, he took his wife, Catherine Maroy, to St.-Charles des Allemands on the First German Coast above New Orleans.  Their son André was born at St.-Charles des Allemands in May 1753.  Guy and Catherine evidently had no more sons.  By 1755, Guy had moved downriver to Chapitoulas, now on the western edge of the city of New Orleans.  In July 1766, Guy remarried to Marie-Anne Paulerman at New Orleans.  Guy died at Opelousas, west of the Atchafalaya Basin, in April 1786; the priest who recorded the burial said that Guy was age 66 when he died.  Son André, meanwhile, remained on the German Coast, evidently as an indentured servant, and died there in 1791.  He seems to have left no descendants.  

Charles Blanchard, probably an Englishman, engaged in unlicensed trading on the lower Mississippi in the early 1770s.  He ran afoul of Lieutenant John Thomas, deputy superintendent of Indian affairs for British West Florida, at Fort Bute on Bayou Manchac in early 1772.  Was he the Charles Blanchard who died at Cabahannocer on the river below Manchac in March 1779?  The priest who recorded the burial did not give Charles's parents' names, mention a wife, or give his age at the time of his death. 

Antoine Blanchard lived in New Orleans in 1782 and held property on the German Coast.  One wonders if he was the Antoine Blanchard married to Acadian Anne-Marie-Josèphe Hébert, whose son Anselme was born at St.-Gabriel November 1789.  If so, was he also an Acadian? 

Henri Blanchard died at Ascension on the river above the German Coast in October 1783.  The priest who recorded the burial, and who did not give any parents' names or mention a wife, said that Henrrique, as he called him, was age 60 when he died.  Was Henri French Creole or a French immigrant?  He likely was not Acadian. 

Olivier Blanchard, born in Canada in c1763, died at Opelousas in May 1788, age 25 and single.  

Joseph, son of Jacob Blanchard and Barbe Forion of Toul, Lorraine, France, was a soldier in the royal corps, Louisiana artillery, when he died at New Orleans in September 1788.  He was a bachelor, so he did not start a family of his own.

Madama Blanchard, age unrecorded, died at New Orleans in March 1800.

~

During the antebellum period, Blanchards from France emigrated to Louisiana, where they were known as Foreign French:

Victor Blanchard, age unrecorded, a harness maker from France, reached New Orleans aboard the ship Andelle out of Le Havre, France, in November 1839.  

_____ Blanchard, a 23-year-old musician from France, reached New Orleans aboard the ship Tampa out of Nantes, France, in November 1839.  

_____ Blanchard, a 29-year-old merchant from France, reached New Orleans aboard the ship Amerika out of Bordeaux, France, in February 1840.  

Victor Blanchard, a 31-year-old watchmaker from France, reached New Orleans aboard the ship Camanche out of Veracruz, Mexico, in May 1841.  

Jean Blanchard, a 33-year-old mechanic from France, reached New Orleans aboard the ship Governor Davis out of Le Havre in January 1842.  

_____ Blanchard, age 40, occupation unrecorded, a native of France, and _____ Blanchard, age 8, probably his son, reached New Orleans aboard the ship Rubicon out of Le Havre in February 1843.  

Mme. Blanchard, age 43(?)[sic], another Mme. Blanchard, age 42, and a third Mme. Bertrand, age 37, all natives of France and perhaps sisters, reached New Orleans aboard the ship Rubicon out of Le Havre in November 1844.  

Julia Blanchard, a 26-year-old native of France, reached New Orleans aboard the ship Narragansett out of Le Havre in January 1848.  

.

Anglo-American Blanchards settled in Louisiana during the antebellum period.  Some of them were quite prominent in the Bayou State:

Absolom, son of Josiah Blanchard of South Carolina, married Susanna, daughter of Alexadre McArthur of North Carolina, at Baton Rouge in January 1805.  Although Absolom and Susanna were Protestants, a Baton Rouge priest recorded their marriage in the St. Joseph parish registry. 

One of the most prominent Blanchard families of Louisiana produced Newton C. Blanchard, who served as the Bayou State's governor from 1904-08; he was neither Acadian nor French Creole but Anglo American.  His ancestor, Thomas Blanchard of Virginia, married Amy Newton probably in Virginia.  After Thomas died, Amy took her family to Louisiana in the mid-1820s and settled in the northern part of Rapides Parish on Bayou Jean de Jean.  Roselawn Plantation belonged to this family, members of whom in subsequent decades moved up and down the Red River valley from Alexandria to Shreveport.  In late September 1850, the federal census taker in Rapides Parish counted 73 slaves--35 males and 38 females, all black, ranging in age from 70 to infancy--held by the estate of A. Blanchard.  

Albert Gallatin Blanchard of Massachusetts, another Anglo American, came to New Orleans in the early 1840s.  He had graduated from West Point in 1829, a classmate of Robert E. Lee, and served in the U.S. Army for 11 years before resigning his commission and moving to Louisiana.  He fought in the Mexican War, and, when war erupted in 1861, offered his services to his adopted state.  During the war, he rose to the rank of brigadier general and returned to New Orleans after the Southern Confederacy collapsed.  He died in New Orleans in 1891, age 80, and was buried in St. Louis Cemetery No. 1.

George Blanchard married Elizabeth Edwards probably at Baton Rouge in the 1830s.  Their children, born near Baton Rouge, included Martha Anne in January 1834; and John Farland in August 1836.  

Frederick Blanchard married Elizabeth Cooper, place and date unrecorded, and settled near Baton Rouge.  Daughter Mary Elizabeth married into the Latil family in July 1848. 

Marguerite Seraphine Blanchard, born in March 1833, place unrecorded, married Adolphe Loret, place and date unrecorded.  She was baptized Roman Catholic at Plattenville, Assumption Parish, in August 1861.  The Plattenville priest who recorded the baptism did not give her parents' names but did say the she was "previously protestant," so she likely was Anglo. 

Dr. Joseph A. Blanchard of Assumption Parish married Annie M. Gladish of Lafourche Parish at the First Methodist Church in Thibodeaux, Lafourche Parish, in March 1866.  

Emily Blanchard married F. H. Perkins at the Episcopal Church in Thibodaux, Lafourche Parish, in February 1868.  The minister who recorded the marriage did not give any parents' names.  The bride likely was as Anglo-American as the groom. 

.

Some non-Acadian Blanchards who lived in South Louisiana during the antebellum period were the result of the family's participation in the South's peculiar institution:

Étienne, son of Adélaïde, slave of Élie Blanchard's widow, Marguerite Guillot, was born in Assumption Parish in August 1841.  Étienne's godparents were Ursin Blanchard, his mother's owner's 12-year-old son, and Marie Bourg, probably his mother's owner's grown daughter by a previous marriage.

CONCLUSION

Blanchards settled early in Acadia, and they also were among the earliest Acadians to find refuge in Louisiana.  They came to Spanish Louisiana in three waves, first in 1765 from Halifax via St.-Domingue, then in 1767 from Maryland, and, finally, in 1785 from France.  The 1765 arrivals did not go to the Attakapas District with the Broussard dit Beausoleil party but settled on the river at Cabanocé/St.-Jacques.  In the 1770s, a few of these early arrivals crossed the Atchafalaya Basin to the western prairies, but most remained on the river.  The Blanchards from Maryland went where Spanish authorities told them to go, to St.-Gabriel d'Iberville on the river above Cabanocé.  Most of them remained there.  One of them, Anselme Blanchard of Grand-Pré, became a shaker and mover in the Acadian community and for a few years commanded the Spanish district of Valenzuéla on upper Bayou Lafourche.  

If the Acadians in France had remained in the mother country, the Blanchard family, thanks to the exiles from Maryland, would still have been a respectable-sized family in South Louisiana, but five Blanchard families, including 30 individuals, grabbed at the offer made by the Spanish government to join their fellow Acadians in Louisiana.  They crossed on four of the Seven Ships of 1785.  One of them settled in what became West Baton Rouge Parish, and some of his sons became prominent planters there, but most of the Blanchards from France settled on upper Bayou Lafourche, where they became one of the largest families in the region.  

Not until the early antebellum period did Acadian Blanchards establish a western branch of the family.  Although four successful lines set down roots in St. Martin and St. Landry parishes, compared to the centers of family settlement on the river and especially in the Lafourche/Terrebonne valley, the Bayou Teche and prairie Blanchards remained relatively few in numbers.  Some Lafourche/Terrebonne valley Blanchards moved on to lower Bayou Teche and the western prairies after the War of 1861-65, but the great majority of them remained on the southeastern bayous. 

During the late colonial, antebellum, and immediate post-war periods, then, Blanchards emulated the settlement patterns of their Acadian ancestors by moving to every corner of South Louisiana.  They could be found as far up the Mississippi as Pointe Coupee Parish and as far down the river as St. James Parish.  They settled along Bayou Lafourche from Ascension down to Thibodaux and Raceland, moved down to Houma and Montegut in Terrebonne Parish, settled along the lower Teche in St. Martin, St. Mary, and Iberia parishes, and ventured out into the southwestern prairies as far west as present-day Acadia Parish.  Most of them remained east of the Atchafalaya Basin, however, concentrating in the old Acadian Coast parishes and in the Lafourche/Terrebonne valley. 

Blanchard is a common surname in France and French Canada as well as old Acadia.  It can be found throughout the United States as well because Blanchard also is an Anglo name.  The majority of non-Acadian Blanchards in Louisiana, however, were French, not Anglo.  Members of the family settled in Louisiana throughout the colonial period.  These French Blanchards were workers, soldiers, sailors, even criminals, but none of them seems to have started a family that endured.  During the antebellum period, Blanchards from France emigrated to Louisiana, where they were known as Foreign French, but none of them started families in today's Acadiana.  During the antebellum period, at least one non-Acadian Blanchard was neither Anglo nor French.  Étienne, son of Adélaïde, slave of Élie Blanchard's widow, Marguerite Guillot, was born in Assumption Parish in August 1841.  Étienne's godparents were Ursin Blanchard, his mother's owner's 12-year-old son, and Marie Bourg, probably his mother's owner's grown daughter by a previous marriage.  ...

Dozens of Acadian Blanchards served Louisiana in uniform during the War of 1861-65, and a number of them died in Confederate service.  The war was especially hard on the Blanchards of the Bayou Lafourche valley. ...

The family's name also is spelled Blanchar, Blanchart, Blancher. [See Book Ten for the Acadian family's Louisiana "begats"]

Sources:  1850 U.S. Federal Census, Slave Schedules, Ascension, Assumption, East Baton Rouge, Iberia, Lafourche Interior, Orleans, Pointe Coupee, Rapides, St. James, St. Martin, Terrebonne, & West Baton Rouge parishes; 1860 U.S. Federal Census, Slave Schedules, Ascension, Assumption, East Baton Rouge, Iberville, Jefferson, Lafourche, Orleans, Pointe Coupee, Rapides, St. James, St. Martin, Terrebonne, & West Baton Rouge parishes; Arsenault, Généalogie, 431-37, 1105-06, 1471-73, 1540-43, 1654, 2067-68, 2207-08, 2423-25; Baudier, The Catholic Church in LA, 387; Brasseaux, Foreign French, 1:55, 2:34-35; BRDR, vols. 1a(rev.), 2, 3, 4, 5(rev.), 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11; De La Roque, "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:11, 85, 161; Griffiths, From Migrant to Acadian, 192; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 32-33, 165, 341, 567, 598-99; Hébert, D., South LA Records, vols. 1, 2, 3, 4; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, vols. 1-A, 1-B, 2-A, 2-B, 2-C, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 25, 56, 158, 193, 217, 235-36, 251, 308-09; NOAR, vols. 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Tamerlan.htm>, "Family" No. 12; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family Nos. 4, 5, 10, 15, 27, 29, 38, 39, 40, 41, 44, 45, 46, 118, 147, 149, 185; Rea, "The Career of Lt. John Thomas," pp. 23-24; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 11-13; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 13-17; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 15, 62-75; Warner, Generals in Gray, 27; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 31-32, 153-54; White, DGFA-1, 143-56; White, DGFA-1 English, 32-34; Winston De Ville, "Isleños at Valenzuela in 1784," in Harper, Mississippi Valley Mélange, 9:74-75.

Settlement Abbreviations 
(present-day civil parishes that existed in 1861 are in parenthesis; hyperlinks on the abbreviations take you to brief histories of each settlement):

For a chronology of Acadian Arrivals in Louisiana, 1764-early 1800s, see Appendix.

The hyperlink attached to an individual's name is connected to a list of Acadian immigrants for a particular settlement and provides a different perspective on the refugee's place in family and community. 

NOTES

01.  Wall of Names, 11, calls him Amable BLANCHARD; Arsenault, Généalogie, 436, the Port-Royal section, calls him Amable BLANCHARD, & says he was deported to SC.

In his son Pierre's baptismal record, dated 1767, in BRDR, 2:100 (SJA-1, 1), why is the boy's grandfather called Joseph BLANCHARD, not Pierre BLANCHARD?  Was Amable's older brother Joseph the boy's godfather?

If, according to Arsenault, Amable had been deported to SC, he likely would not have been with the exiles from Halifax via St.-Domingue who came to LA in 1765.  Very few, if any, Acadian exiles to SC made it to LA.  See Brasseaux, Scattered to the Winds, 45.  On p. 2424, in his section on LA, Arsenault does not repeat the claim that Amable was deported to SC.  West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 31, follows Arsenault.  Milling, Exile Without End, a study of the Acadian exiles to SC, lists no Pierre BLANCHARD & Anne ROBICHAUX among the Acadians who were sent to that colony, only a Jean BLANCHARD, who did not go to LA.  See p. 43.  If Amable and his older brother Joseph were deported to SC in 1755, they may have been among the dozens of exiles the colony's governor allowed to return to greater Acadia by boat in the spring of 1756 & among the relatively few who made it all the way to Rivière St.-Jean.  See Book Five. 

02.  Wall of Names, 30 (pl. 7L), calls her Anne [BLANCHARD], & lists her with her widowed mother & 5 siblings; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 16, Family No. 29, her birth/baptismal record, calls her Anne BLANCHARD, but does not give her godparents' names; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 16-17, calls her Anne, sa [Anne HÉBERT, veuve BLANCHARD's] fille, age 7, on the embarkation list, does not include her on the debarkation list, calls her Anne BLANCHARD, her [Anne HÉBERT, widow BLANCHARD's], daughter, age 7, on the complete listing, says she was in the 25th Family aboard La Bergère with his widowed mother & 5 siblings, & details her marriage, including the names of her & her husband's parents, says she was from Nantes & that her husband was from St.-Malo but gives no place of marriage; BRDR, 2:91, 127 (ASM-2, 31), her marriage record, calls her Ana [BLANCHARD] of Nantes, France, calls her husband Pedro BOURQUE of St.-Malo, France, gives her & her husband's parents' names, & says the witnesses to her marriage were Pierre BLANCHARD (her brother), Laurent BLANCHARD (her brother), & Ambroise HÉBERT; BRDR, 4:58 (ASM-3, 179), her burial record, calls her Anne [BLANCHARD], "age 46 yrs., married to Pierre BOURG," & gives her parents' names.

03.  Wall of Names, 40, calls her Anne BLANCHARD; Arsenault, Généalogie, 1540, the Chipoudy/Petitcoudiac section, her father's profile in the Petitcoudiac section, calls her Anne [BLANCHARD], & says she was born in 1740; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 72-73.  See also Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 41-42. 

The clue to her parents' identities comes from her sister Madeleine's marriage record, dated 7 Aug 1790, in Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 1-A: 67 (Opel. Ch.: v.1-A, p.31). 

Since she was a daughter of Toussaint BLANCHARD, she & her sisters Madeleine & Marguerite were not related to the other Acadian BLANCHARDs in LA, most, if not all, of whom were descendants of Jean. 

04.  Wall of Names, 24, calls her Anne-Catherine BLANCHARD; Arsenault, Généalogie, 2423, the LA section, calls her Anne-Marie BLANCHARD; White, DGFA-1, 150-51, followed here, calls her Anne BLANCHARD.  See also Bourgeois, Cabanocey, 164, 174; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 1-A:66-67, 206, 658; Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 1.  

Arsenault gives her the improbable birth year of 1710, which would have made her 7 years older than her first husband & 24 years older than her second husband.  Moreover, if, according to Arsenault, 2464, she had a son by her second husband in 1779, this would have meant she gave birth at age 69, so her birth year of 1710 is ridiculous.  White, DGFA-1, cited above, straightens out the mess created by Arsenault.  White documents an Anne-Marie born to Antoine BLANCHARD & Élisabeth THERIOT on 26/27 Jul 1710, but there are no more entries for this child, implying that she died young.  Another daughter of the couple, named simply Anne, was born at Port-Royal 29 Dec 1725/26, & this is our girl.  She would have been 53 or 54 when she gave birth to her last child, Jean-Baptiste CORMIER III, still remarkable but not impossible.  The Cabanocé censuses of 1766 & 1769 back up White.

05.  Wall of Names, 41, calls her Anne BLANCHARD.  Her middle name is from the Ascension census of 1791 in Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 173.  Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 14, calls her Anne.  Her death/burial record in BRDR, 6:71 (ASM-10, 51), calls her Anne [BLANCHARD], "age 72 yrs., wife of omitted (Josef) MOYSE.  She actually was Joseph Pierre's widow. 

She should not be confused with a much younger niece with the same name. 

06.  Wall of  Names, 11 (pl. 1R), calls him Anselme BLANCHARD, & lists him with his wife, 2 children, & a female orphan; Arsenault, Généalogie, 2423, calls him Anselme BLANCHARD, says he was born in 1741, gives his parents' names, says they were from Grand-Pré, gives the name of his wife but not the date or place of their marriage or her parents' names, lists his children as son Jérôme, born c1765, & son Antoine, born c1766, says he was deported to MD, & that he was lieutenant of militia at Valenzuéla, now Plattenville; BRDR, 1a(rev.):25 (SGA-3, 9a), his birth/baptismal record, calls him Anselme BLANCHARD, gives his parents' names, & says his godparents were Antoine LEBLANC & Claire LEBLANC; NOAR, 6:28 (SLC, F4, 83), his death/burial record, calls him Anselmo BLANCHARD, "native of Mines, St. Charles Parish in Acadia, army lieutenant in the service of His Catholic Majesty, former commandant of LaFourche and New Feliciana districts in this province," gives his parents' names, says he was widower of Ester LE BLANC, & that he was age 64 at the time of his death.  See also De Ville, "Islenos at Valenzuela in 1784," 75; De Ville, St. Gabriel Census, 1777, 4; Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 158; Tate & De Ville, Baton Rouge & New Feliciana; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 430. 

For his work at Valenzuela in 1779 & his appointment as commandant of the post in Aug 1781, see Din, Canary Islanders of LA, 67, 71-73.  According to Din, 74, BLANCHARD was not popular with the Isleños.  Ethnic differences probably helped sour the relationship.  

Winzerling, Acadian Odyssey, 144, writes:  "To the Acadians of La Fourche, BLANCHARD not only showed himself a deeply interested commander and advisor in the successful establishment of the colony, but also a kind, sympathetic, and able administrator.  In his patronage of the Acadians he was next to Martin NAVARRO as a promoter and colonizer of Louisiana."  For BLANCHARD's appointment as commissioner in New Orleans to welcome the Acadians, see Winzerling, 132. 

For his tenure as commandant of the New Feliciana District north of Baton Rouge in the early 1790s, see Tate & De Ville. 

His birth at Minas is documented, so he was age 58, not 64, when he passed. 

07.  Wall of Names, 41, calls him Bennoit BLANCHARD; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 27, shows that in the crossing to St.-Malo in 1758-59, he & his brothers lost both of their parents; Robichaux, Acadians in St. Malo, 63-64, Family No. 79, calls him Benony BLANCHARD, & details his second marriage; Robichaux, Acadians in Chatellerault, 11, Family No. 21, calls him Benony BLANCHARD, says he was a seaman, & that his first wife died on 20 Aug 1764 at the Hotel Dieu, St.-Malo, at age 22, & was buried the same day in St.-Malo; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 13-14, Family No. 25, calls him Belony BLANCHARD, & says he was a day-laborer & seaman; BRDR, 4:59 (ASM-3, 144), his burial record, calls him Belloni BLANCHARD, "age 86 yrs. of Acadia," but does not give his parents' names or mention his wives. 

St.-Suliac, Pleslin, & Plouër all were suburbs of St.-Malo where many Acadian exiles lived during the 1760s & 1770s. 

08.  Wall of Names, 41, calls him Marie-Bénony BLANCHARD; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 64, Family No. 79, his baptismal record, calls him Bénony-Jacques BLANCHARD, gives his parents' names, & says his godparents were Jacques FOREST & Marguerite DUGAST; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 14, calls him Marie-Bénony BLANCHARD, but does not state the child's gender; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 80-81, calls him Marie-Bénnony BLANCHARD, son [Bennoit's] fils [son] on the embarkation list, & Marie-Bennony BLANCHARD, daughter [of Benoit], on the complete listing; BRDR, 2:92, 706, his marriage record, calls him Belonio BLANCHARD of St.-Malo, says his parents were Belonio BLANCHARD & Magdalena FORET, calls his spouse Margarita TRAHAN, & says the witnesses to his marriage were Luis VERRET & Ambrosio HEBERT.  See also Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 495; Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 41, 61, 96, 173.  

His baptismal record in Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, the original French record of the passenger list of L'Amitié, as cited in Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, & his marriage record prove that he was male, not female.  Moreover, the French report at Nantes, France, in Sep 1784, says that Benoit & Madeleine BLANCHARD had 3 sons & 3 daughters, not 4 daughters & 2 sons, as found in Wall of Names & the English version of Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785; also, the Ascension censuses of 1788 & 1791 & the Assumption censuses of 1795 & 1797 are clear that this child was not a daughter but a son.  It was not unusual for French parents, including Acadians, to give their sons the middle name Marie.  The birth name of one of the most famous Frenchmen of the age, for instance, the philosopher Voltaire (1694-1778) was François-Marie AROUET.  But his middle name was Jacques, not Marie, so one wonders how his name got twisted to Marie-Bénoni, especially since his mother was a Madeleine.

09.  Wall of Names, 11 (pl. 1R), calls her Catherine BLANCHARD, & lists her singly; BRDR, 2:92(SJA-1, 56a), her death/burial record, calls her Catherine BLANCHARD, but says nothing of her parents, a husband, or even her age at the time of her death.  

Who was she?  When did she reach the colony?  Was she even Acadian?  See Baudier, The Catholic Church in LA, 192, for her distinction as the first funeral recorded at the St.-Jacques church ... 7 years after the church was founded! 

10.  Wall of Names, 41, calls her Céleste BLANCHARD.  BRDR, 8:65 (ASM-10, 147), her death/burial record, calls her Céleste BLANCHARD, "widow of Paule PITRE," says she died "last night," "age 70 years," but gives no parents' names.  See also Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 14.

She actually was age 78 when she died & was one of the last of the Acadian immigrants in LA to join her ancestors. 

11.  Wall of Names, 47, calls him Charles BLANCHARD, & lists him & his sons Soulliac & Charles only on La Caroline; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 27, shows that in the crossing to St.-Malo in 1758-59, he & his brother lost both of their parents; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 11-12, gives his wife's full name, says she was born c1739, died at age 36, & was buried 12 Feb 1775, St.-Jean L'Evangeliste, Châtellerault; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 14, says that he & his 2 sons were listed as passengers also on L'Amitié, which means they missed the departure of that ship & caught the last ship to sail to LA in 1785, La Caroline. 

12.  Wall of Names, 47, calls him Charles BLANCHARD; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 12; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 14.  

13.  Wall of Names, 30 (pl. 7L), calls him Élie [BLANCHARD], & lists him with his widowed mother & 5 siblings; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 16, calls him Étienne BLANCHARD; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 16-17, calls him Élie, son [Anne HÉBERT, veuve BLANCHARD's] fils, imprimeur, age 11, on the embarkation list, does not include him on the debarkation list, calls him Élie BLANCHARD, her son [Anne HÉBERT, widow BLANCHARD's], son, printer, age 11, on the complete listing, & says he was in the 25th Family aboard La Bergère with his widowed mother & 5 siblings; BRDR, 2:93, 97 (ASC-2, 51), probably his marriage record, calls him David BLANCHARD, calls his wife Maria BLANCHARD, gives his & her parents' names, & says the witnesses to his marriage were Élie BLANCHARD [probably the groom], Laurent BLANCHARD [his brother], & Marie BLANCHARD [probably the bride]; BRDR, 6:73 (ASM-10, 61), his burial record, calls him Elie [BLANCHARD], "age 72 yrs., bn. in St. Malo, France," says he was buried on 30 Dec 1845 & died "yesterday," but does not give his parents' names or mention a wife.  

The marriage record cited above for David BLANCHARD & Marie BLANCHARD matches this fellow, but note that one of the witnesses to this marriage was ... Élie BLANCHARD.  So who was David BLANCHARD?  Why does a David BLANCHARD appear in none of the Ascension/Assumption/Lafourche censuses of 1788, 1791, 1795, 1797, & 1798?  But Elias/Élie BLANCHARD does appear in the censuses of 1795, 1797, & 1798 & is married to David's wife Marie BLANCHARD!  See Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 27, 58, 89, 140, 158.  I have found no David BLANCHARD among the Acadian immigrants to LA.  So I am convinced that Marie's husband was Élie despite the confusion of names found in the marriage record at Ascension.  Was Élie's first or middle name David, or was the priest simply misinformed?  I need a BLANCHARD family historian to help me here.

Evidently Élie & his wife were that rare Acadian couple who had no children of their own. 

14.  Wall of Names, 11, calls him Firmin BLANCHARD; Arsenault, Généalogie, 2423, the LA section, says he was born in 1760; BRDR, 2:94, 168 (ASC-1, 142), his marriage record, calls him Firmin BLANCHARD, calls his wife Maria Magdalena BIJEAUD, gives his & his wife's parents' names, says all of the parents were from Acadia, & that the witnesses to his marriage were Anselmo BLANCHARD, Abraham LANDRY, & Josef BIJEAUD; BRDR, 2:94 (ASC-4, 44), his death/burial record, calls him Firmino BLANCHARD, age 45 years, & gives his parents' names but not his wife's name.  See also De Ville, St. Gabriel Census, 1777, 4; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 431. 

15.  Wall of Names, 41, calls him François BLANCHARD.  See also <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 27, which shows that he & his brothers lost both of their parents in the crossing to St.-Malo in 1758-59; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 12; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 15. 

Why is his wife not listed with him in the Sep1784 Spanish report at Nantes when she was still very much alive?  Where are his daughters?  Was the François BLANCHARD in the Nantes report another fellow, one who did not make it to LA?  See Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth Century Louisianians, 501. 

16.  Wall of Names, 20, calls her Françoise BLANCHARD; Arsenault, Généalogie, 2526, the LA section, says they were married c1767. 

Wall of Names is clear that Jacques & Françoise were married & even had son Victor when they reached LA, which likely was in Sep 1766.  Jacques was still single in Jul 1763, as the British report at Oxford, MD, shows, so they likely were married c1764 or c1765, & Victor was born soon afterwards.  See Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 158, for her possible listing at Baltimore in 1763, which could be a clue to her parentage.

Was her full name Marguerite-Françoise or Françoise-Marguerite?  If so, she & her putative sister Marguerite may have been the same person.  See note 36, below. 

17.  Wall of Names, 41, calls her Françoise BLANCHARD; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 65-55, Family No. 82; Robichaux, Acadians in Chatellerault, 12; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 15; BRDR, 6:74 (ASM-10, 62), her death/burial record, calls her Francoise BLANCHARD, gives her age at the time of her burial, but does not give her parents' names or mention a husband.  

18.  Wall of Names, 47, calls him Santiage BLANCHARD, & lists him with the imigrés aboard La Ville d'Archangel; NOAR, 4:32, 43 (SLC, M5, 44), his marriage record, calls him Santiago BLANCHAR, says his parents were _____ [BLANCHAR] & Margarita CONAND, that he was native of Brittany in the Kingdom of France, calls his wife Modesta BURQUE, calls her parents Ambrosio [BURQUE] & Modesta M[*], & says the witnesses to his marriage were Vicente LLORCA & Josef MARTINEZ; BRDR, 4:65 (SJO-11, 28), probably his burial record, calls him Pierre BLANCHARD, age 62 yrs., res. of West Baton Rouge parish, but does not give her parents' names or mention his wife.  See also Tate & De Ville, Baton Rouge & New Feliciana; West, Atlas of LA Surnames, 154.

His name may have been Jean-Jacques or Pierre-Jacques.  The baptismal record of son Luis-Arman, dated 13 Jul 1800, in BRDR, 2:96-97 (SJO-1, 109), calls the father Juan [BLANCHARD], son of Gabriel [BLANCHARD] & Margarita BLANCHARD.  The baptismal record of son Celestino Valentino, dated 20 May 1805, in BRDR, 3:104 (SJO-1, 249), calls the father Jacobo & says Jacques's parents were Gabriel [BLANCHARD] & Margarita CONNAN of Brittany, France.  

Was he even Acadian?  I will consider him one until I find evidence to the contrary, which is looking more & more likely.  A thorough perusal of Bona Arsenault's genealogy on the BLANCHARDs--the hand full of descendants of François dit Gentilhomme & Toussaint, as well as the many descendants of Jean--have turned up no reference to a Gabriel BLANCHARD.  See Book Three.  Nor does a Gabriel BLANCHARD appear in Albert J. Robichaux, Jr.'s 3-volume study of the Acadians in France, or Fr. Hébert's Acadians in Exile.  Perhaps Stephen White's DGFA-2, not yet published, will provide the link.  Was he a young Breton sailor who became engaged to an Acadian girl in St.-Malo & just happened to have a surname that also belonged to a large Acadian family? 

Note that he & his wife married less than a month after their ship reached New Orleans & that they chose to settle with other Acadians from their ship at Bayou des Écores, where they still could be found in 1793. 

19.  Wall of Names, 36 (pl. 9L), calls him Jean-Baptiste [BLANCHARD], & lists him with his parents & 2 siblings; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 15-16, Family No. 28, his birth/baptismal record, calls him Jean BLANCHARD, gives his parents' names, does not give his godparents' names, &, calling him Jean-Baptiste, details his family's voyage to LA in 1785; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 50-51, calls him Jean-Bte, son [Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD's] fils, age 8, on the embarkation list, & Jean-Baptiste BLANCHARD, his [Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD's] son, age 8, on the complete listing, & says he was in the 32nd Family aboard Le St.-Rémi with his parents & 2 siblings; BRDR, 7:59 (ASM-10, 89), his burial record, calls him Jean Bte. BLANCHARD, "age 73," gives his burial date but does not give his parents' names or mention a wife.

20.  Wall of Names, 36 (pl. 9L), calls him Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD, & lists him with his wife & 3 children; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 12, Family No. 24, calls him Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD, says he was born c1748 but gives no birthplace, does not give his parents' names, says he was a wood-polisher, details his marriage but does not give a place of marriage nor his wife's parents' names, includes the birth/baptismal record & death/burial record of daughter Marie-Anne, baptized 8 Feb 1775, St.-Jacques, Châtellerault, goddaughter of Pierre LIVOIS, uncle, & Anne BOURG, grandmother, died age 1 & buried 6 Feb 1776, St.-Jean-Baptiste, Châtellerault, & details the family's participation in the Poitou settlement of the early 1770s; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 15-16, Family No. 28, calls him Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD, says he was born c1748 but gives no birthplace, does not give his parents' names, says he was a wood-polisher, details his marriage but does not give a place of marriage nor his wife's parents' names, includes the birth/baptismal records of daughter Marie, baptized 14 Jul 1776, St.-Similien, Nantes, & son Jean, baptized 26 Mar 1778, St.-Similien, Nantes, & details the family's participation in the Poitou settlement in Poitou of the early 1770s as well as its voyage to LA in 1785; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 50-51, calls him Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD, perelleur, age 37, on the embarkation list, & Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD, wood polisher, age 37, on the complete listing, says he was in the 32nd Family aboard Le St.-Rémi with his wife & 3 children, details his marriage but does not include his or his wife's parents' names or place of marriage, says daughter Marie-Madeleine was born in 1775 but gives no birthplace, & that he owned 6 arpents of land but does not say when or where; BRDR, 3:107 (ASM-3, 72), his burial record, calls him Juan Grégorio BLANCHARD, age 64 yrs. of Acadia, married to Maria LIBOIS, but does not give his parents' names.   See also De La Roque "Tour of Inspection," Canadian Archives 1905, 2A:85. 

21.  Wall of Names, 11, calls him Jérôme BLANCHARD; BRDR, 2:94 (SGA-18, 17, #88), his burial record, calls him Geronimo BLANCHARD, but does not give his parents' names, his wife's name, or his age.  

22.  Not in Wall of Names.  See Arsenault, Généalogie, 2424, 2425, the LA section; De Ville, St. Gabriel Census, 1777, 4, 10.    

The St.-Gabriel census of Mar 1777 is clear that there were 2 Jérôme BLANCHARDs there that year, one on each side of the river.  The younger Jérôme BLANCHARD, though unnamed, is clearly the son of Anselme BLANCHARD & was still living with his father, being too young to have a homestead of his own; he is listed in Wall of Names, but the older Jérôme BLANCHARD is not.  Why not?   Was the older Jérôme BLANCHARD a French Creole & not Acadian?  Was he the Jeronimo BLANCHART who stood godfather for Anselme, son of Antoine BLANCHARD & Anne-Marie-Josèphe HÉBERT, at St.-Gabriel on 14 Mar 1790?  See BRDR, 2:91 (SGA-11, 43, #160).  Probably not.  Antoine was a son of Anselme BLANCHARD the commandant & a younger brother of Jérome (see n21.), who was married by then & who likely was the one who served as godfather to Antoine's son Anselme le jeune. 

23.  Wall of Names, 41, calls him Joachim BLANCHARD; BRDR, 4:62 (ASM-3, 182), his death/burial record, calls him Joachin BLANCHARD, age 57 yrs., gives his parents' names but not his wife's name.  See also Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 14.

24.  Wall of Names, 11, calls him Joseph BLANCHARD, & lists him singly; Bourgeois, Cabanocey, 161. 

25.  Wall of Names, 11, calls him Joseph BLANCHARD 2; Arsenault, Généalogie, 435.

26.  Wall of Names, 11, calls him Joseph BLANCHARD 3; BRDR, 1a(rev.):26 (SGA-2, 98), his baptismal record, calls him Joseph BLANCHAR, gives his parents' names, says his godparents were Joseph TÉRRIOT & _____ TÉRRIOT, & that is father signed the register.  See also Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 158. 

Was his full name Joseph-Pierre-Olivier BLANCHARD?  Not according to his baptismal record, but he is called all 3 of those names in various baptismal records of his BLANCHARD grandchildren in BRDR, vol. 2.  

Arsenault, Généalogie, 2423, the LA section, says wife Marie-Josèphe was probablement daughter of Joseph LANDRY & Marie-Josèphe COMEAUX.  For the true identity of his wife's parents, see the explanation in her profile. 

27.  Wall of Names, 11 (pl. 1R), calls him Joseph BLANCHARD.  

28.  Wall of Names, 41, calls him Joseph BLANCHARD; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 12; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 15.

29.  Wall of Names, 30 (pl. 7L), calls him Laurent [BLANCHARD], & lists him with his widowed mother & 5 siblings; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 16-17, calls him Laurent, son [Anne HÉBERT, veuve BLANCHARD's] fils, menuisier, age 19, on the embarkation list, does not include him on the debarkation list, calls him Laurent BLANCHARD, son [of Anne HÉBERT, widow BLANCHARD], woodworker, age 19, on the complete listing, & says he was in the 25th Family aboard La Bergère with his widowed mother & 5 siblings; BRDR, 3:107 (ASM-3, 118), his burial record, calls him Lorenzo BLANCHARD, age 51 yrs., "capt. of militia of this state," married to Ana HÉBERT, but does not gives his parents' names.  See also Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 16.

30.  Wall of Names, 11, calls her Madeleine BLANCHARD, niece [of Marguerite BLANCHARD].

According to Arsenault, Généalogie, 1540, the Chipoudy/Petitcoudiac section, her parents lived at Petitcoudiac before Le Grand Dérangement of 1755.  The Sep 1766 arrivals came from MD.  Petitcoudiac was an unusual home settlement for Acadian exiles sent to MD; most MD exiles came from the Minas Basin.  So this may not be the Madeleine BLANCHARD who married at Opelousas, hence the qualifying language & question marks.  But none of the other Madeleine BLANCHARDs in Wall of Names fit, so I need a BLANCHARD family historian to help me here.

31.  Wall of Names, 12, calls her Madeleine BLANCHARD; BRDR, 4:65 (SGA-8, 111), probably her burial record, calls her Marie Madeleine [BLANCHARD], "age 75, wid. of Paul CHIASSON," but does not give her parents' names.  See also De Ville, St. Gabriel Census, 1777, 4.  

Who else could it have been?

32.  Wall of Names, 41, calls her Magdeleine BLANCHARD veuve Charles BOURG; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/5bateaux.htm>, Family No. 10, shows that in the crossing to St.-Malo in 1758-59, she & her husband had no children, that her husband also was 21, so they probably had married on Île St.-Jean not long before they were deported to France; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 2-A:88-89 (SM Ch.: v.4, #934), her death/burial record, calls her Magdeleine BLANCHARD, "wid. of Charles BOURG, native of Acadie," says she was 85, a typical exaggeration, calls her son Lucien, though it probably was Joseph-Florent, says she was buried "in the parish cemetery," which may or may not have been the one in St. Martinville, & that her burial record was signed by Jean MONTET & Jh. BOUDREAUX.  See also Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 130-31, Family No. 161, which shows how many children, she & Charles lost at Pleudihen; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 20-21, Family No. 42; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 30, Family No. 55.

Both of her sons, Jean-Charles, called Charles, & Joseph-Florent, had moved to the Attakapas District by October 1798, when they married TRAHAN sisters on the same day.  Madeleine never remarried, which was unusual for Acadians of Le Grand Dérangement.  She evidently followed her younger sons to the prairies & died at oldest son Lucien's house on the upper Vermilion.  Lucien also had crossed on L'Amitié but, from New Orleans, he followed his wife's family to the prairies, not his mother and brothers to the upper Lafourche.  See Book Ten.

33.  Wall of Names, 40, calls her Magdeleine BLANCHARD belle soeur [sister-in-law, of Benoît COMMEAU]; Arsenault, Généalogie, 1540, her father's profile in the Petitcoudiac section, calls her Madeleine [BLANCHARD], & says she was born in c1744; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 72-73; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 1-A:67 (Opel. Ch.: v.1-A, p.31), her marriage record, calls her Magdeleine BLANCHARD, of Acadie, gives her & her husband's parents' names, says his parents were "natives of Domville, 'opado' [diocese] of Room [Rouen]," & that the witnesses to her marriage were Jean DOUCET, Fabien RICHARD, & Vital GOYO; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 2-B:85-86 (Opel. Ch.: v.1, p.179), her death/burial record, calls her Magdelaine, "widow of Mr. MONDON, [d]ied at her home in the Plaqmine Boule (Plaquemine Brulee) area after being strengthened twice by all the sacraments," typically exaggerates her age, but does not give her parents' names; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 2-B:86 (LSAR: Opel. 1819), the record of her will, calls her Magdeleine [BLANCHARD] "of Acadie, wid. of André MONDON," & gives her parents' names; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 2-B:86 (Opel.Ct.Hse.: Succ.#134)), her succession, calls her Magdeleine [BLANCHARD] "wid. André MONDON," & says her sole heir was Anne Eleanore COMEAU wid. of Pierre HÉBERT [a niece, daughter of sister Anne].   See also Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 499.  

Why does the Sep 1784 Spanish report at Nantes, France, call her Marguerite?  Was her name Madeleine-Marguerite?   

The Arsenault entry, cited above, gets her sister Anne's birth year right, too--1740.      

Since she was a daughter of Toussaint BLANCHARD, she & her sisters Anne & Marguerite were not related to the other Acadian BLANCHARDs in LA, most, if not all, of whom were descendants of Jean. 

34.  Wall of Names, 11, calls her Marguerite BLANCHARD.

35.  Wall of Names, 16, calls her Marguerite BLANCHARD.  See also Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 158. 

36.  Wall of Names, 11, calls her Marguerite BLANCHARD, orpheline. 

The identity of her husband is pure speculation.  I have not found a burial record for her, which also could link her to Jean-Baptiste ALLAIN.  See Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 158, for her possible listing at Baltimore in 1763.  Was her first or middle name Françoise?  If so, she & her putative sister Françoise may be the same person.  See note 16, above. 

37.  Wall of Names, 11, calls her Marguerite BLANCHARD; BRDR, 2:97 (SGA-14, 18, #61), her marriage record, calls her Margarita [BLANCHARD], calls her husband Esteban COMAU, gives her & his parents' names, & says the witnesses to the marriage were Miguel GARIVEL, Juan LEBLANC, & Olibero BRASET; BRDR, 3:108 (SGA-8, 84, her burial record, calls her Marguerite [BLANCHARD], "age 64, spouse Etienne Comeau," but does not give her parents' names. 

Why does her burial record exaggerate her age?  She would have been "only" age 55 at the time of her death. 

38.  Wall of Names, 12 (pl. 1R), calls her Marguerite BLANCHARD, & lists her with her brother Victor; Bourgeois, Cabanocey, 171, & Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 425, her marriage record, calls her Marguerite/Margueritte BLANCHARD, calls her husband Simon BROUSSARD, does not give any parents' names, & gives no witnesses to her marriage.   See also Arceneaux, D. J., Attakapas Post in 1769, 17, 37. 

Her parents' names are from younger brother Victor's marriage record, dated 13 Feb 1775, in BRDR, 2:101, 262 (ASC-1, 129).  See the footnote for her brother's profile for details about her parents.  Sadly, not a single one of the baptismal records of her BROUSSARD children in Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, vol. 1-A, gives the grandparents' names.  Not a one. 

When did she & her brother reach LA?  In 1765 from Halifax via St.-Domingue?  See the footnote to her husband's profile for speculation on why a BROUSSARD from the Bayou Teche valley married a girl at Cabanocé/St.-Jacques on the river.

39.  Wall of Names, 40, calls her Marguerite BLANCHARD veuve BERTHRAND; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 12, says she was born in c1739 but does not give her parents' names or birthplace; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 72-73, says she was age 60.

For her parents' names, see Arsenault, Généalogie, 1540, the Chipoudy & Petitcoudiac section; White, DGFA-1, 138. 

The age given in the passenger list of L'Amitié, 60, seems way off.  See D. Hébert.  Did she survive the crossing from France? 

40.  Wall of Names, 41, calls her Marguerite BLANCHARD; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 15, her baptismal record, calls her Marguerite-Anne BLANCHARD, used here.

42.  Wall of Names, 18, calls her Marie BLANCHARD orpheline.

43.  Wall of Names, 41, calls her Marie BLANCHARD; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 65-66, Family No. 82; Robichaux, Acadians in Chatellerault, 12; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 15; BRDR, 2:93, 97 (ASC-2, 51), her marriage record, calls her Maria BLANCHARD, calls her husband David BLANCHARD, gives her & his parents' names, & says the witnesses to her marriage were Élie BLANCHARD [probably the groom], Laurent BLANCHARD [groom's brother], & Marie BLANCHARD [probably the bride]. 

44.  Wall of Names, 30 (pl. 7L), calls her Marie [BLANCHARD], & lists her with her widowed mother & 5 siblings; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 16-17, calls her Marie, sa [Anne HÉBERT, veuve BLANCHARD's] fille, age 17, on the embarkation list, does not include her on the debarkation list, calls her Marie BLANCHARD, her [Anne HÉBERT, widow BLANCHARD's], daughter, age 17, on the complete listing, & says she was in the 25th Family aboard La Bergère with his widowed mother & 5 siblings; BRDR, 6:75 (ASM-10, 37), her death/burial record, calls her Marie [BLANCHARD," age 76 yrs., widow of Joseph COMEAUX."    See also Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 16.  

Her middle name is from the Ascension census of 1791.  See Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 157.

45.  Wall of Names, 36 (pl. 9L), calls her Marie [BLANCHARD], & lists her with her parents & 2 brothers; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 15-16, Family No. 28, her birth/baptismal record, calls her Marie BLANCHARD, gives her parents' names but not her godparents' names, & details her family's voyage to LA in 1785; Hébert, D., Acadians Families in Exile 1785, 50-51, calls her Marie, sa [Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD's] fille, age 9, on the embarkation list, & Marie BLANCHARD, his [Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD's] daughter, age 9, on the complete listing, says she was in the 32nd Family aboard Le St.-Rémi with her parents & 2 brothers, &, calling her Marie-Madeleine, says she was born in 1775 but gives no birthplace; BRDR, 2:98 (ASM-3, 12), her death/burial record, calls her Maria Magdalena BLANCHARD, age 22 years, married to Arman LANDRY, but does not give her parents' names.

Did she die from childbirth?

46.  Wall of Names, 41, calls her Marie-Magdeleine BLANCHARD; BRDR, 5(rev.):75 (ASM-3, 217), her burial record, calls her Marie Madeleine [BLANCHARD], "age 60 yrs., widow of Charles FOREST," but does not give her parent's names.  See also Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 14; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 62.

She was age 64 when she died. 

47.  Wall of Names, 11, calls him Marin BLANCHARD.

What happened to him in LA?

48.  Wall of Names, 30 (pl. 7L), calls him Moïse [BLANCHARD], & lists him with his widowed mother & 5 siblings; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 16, calls him Moyse BLANCHARD; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 16-17, calls him Moïse, son [Anne HÉBERT, veuve BLANCHARD's] fils, imprimeur, age 15, on the embarkation list, does not include him on the debarkation list, calls him Moïse BLANCHARD, son [of Anne HÉBERT, widow BLANCHARD], printer, age 15, on the complete listing, & says he was in the 25th Family aboard La Bergère with his widowed mother & 5 siblings; BRDR, 2:96 (ASM-3, 1), his death/burial record, calls him Luis BLANCHARD, gives his age as 22, & calls his parents Josef BLANCHARD & Ana HÉBERT.  See also Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 27, 158.  

Why was he sometimes called Moïse (pronounced mo-EEZ)?  Because it sounded like Louis (pronounced loo-EE)?

49.  Wall of Names, 41, calls him Moise BLANCHARD; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 14, Family No. 25, his baptismal record, calls him Moyse BLANCHARD.

What happened to him in LA? 

50.  Wall of Names, 11, calls him Pierre BLANCHARD.  Arsenault, Généalogie, 435, 2424, says he was born c1749, which agrees with the Cabanoce census of 1769, though not with the St.-Jacques census of 1777.  See Bourgeois, Cabanocey, 178;  De Ville, St. James Census, 1777, 13.  He seems to be double-listed in the Cabanoce census of 1766.  See Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 114.

52.  Wall of Names, 30 (pl. 7L), calls him Pierre [BLANCHARD], & lists him with his widowed mother & 5 siblings; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 16-17, calls him Pierre, son [Anne HÉBERT, veuve BLANCHARD's] fils, imprimeur age 15, on the embarkation list, does not include him on the debarkation list, calls him Pierre BLANCHARD, son [of Anne HÉBERT, widow BLANCHARD], printer, age 15, on the complete listing, & says he was in the 25th Family aboard La Bergère with his widowed mother & 5 siblings; BRDR, 4:65 (SMI-4, 73), his burial record, calls him Pierre [BLANCHARD], "age 55 yrs., nat. of Nantes & res. of Lafourche Parish," but does not give his parents' names or mention his wife.  

Despite what his burial record says, he was not a native of Nantes but of St.-Suliac near St.-Malo, though, as most Acadians who sojourned in France, he spent time in the lower Loire port.  See Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 72; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 16.

53.  Wall of Names, 36 (pl. 9L), calls him Pierre-Charles [BLANCHARD], & lists him with his parents & 2 siblings; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 16, Family No. 28, calls him Pierre-Charles [BLANCHARD], & details his family's voyage to France in 1785; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 50-51, calls him Pierre-Charles, son [Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD's] fils, à la mamelle, on the embarkation list, & Pierre-Charles BLANCHARD, son [of Jean-Grégoire BLANCHARD], nursling, on the complete listing, & says he was in the 32nd Family aboard Le St.-Rémi with his parents & 2 siblings; BRDR, 3:103, 303 (SGA-14, 53), the record of his first marriage, calls him André Pierre BLANCHARD, calls his wife Julie DUPUIS, gives his & his wife's parents' names but does not give his mother's surname, says his parents were from St. Nicolas Parish, Nantes, France, "now res. Ascension of Lafourche," & that the witnesses to the marriage were Marcelle DUPUIS & Francoise DILHAE; BRDR, 3:111, 683-84 (ASM-7, 45), the record of his second marriage, calls him Pierre Charles BLANCHARD, calls his wife Carmelite Euphemie PELLETIER, give his & her parents' names & the name of his first wife, says his father was deceased at the time of the wedding, says his parents were from St. Nicolas, Nantes, France, & that the witnesses to the marriage were Firmin AUCOIN, ___ PERREYA, & Jean Baptiste BOURQUE; BRDR, 5(rev.):76 (ASM-3, 251), his burial record, calls him Pierre Charles [BLANCHARD], "age 50 yrs., husband of Carmelite PELTIER, but does not give his parents' name.  . 

Why did the priest at St.-Gabriel in 1804 calls him André Pierre?   

54.  Wall of Names, 12, calls him René BLANCHARD; White, DGFA-1, 148, calls him René BLANCHARD, gives his parents' names, estimated date of birth, marriage information, & death place & date.  See also Jehn, Acadian Exiles in the Colonies, 158.

56.  Wall of Names, 11, calls her Rose BLANCHARD; BRDR, 2:99, 550-51 (ASC-1, 149), her marriage record, calls her Osita Barbara BLANCHARD, gives her parents' names, her husband's parents' names, & says the witnesses to her marriage were Luìs JUDICE, Jérôme LEBLANC, & Joseph LANDRY; NOAR, 6:28 (SLC, F4, 83), her death/burial record, calls her Osite Barbara BLANCHARD, "native of Baltimore in North America, resident of LaFourche des Chetimachas," gives her parent's names, says she was age 35 at the time of her death, & that she was the spouse of José MOLER, also resident of LaFourche des Chetimachas.  See also De Ville, St. Gabriel Census, 1777, 4; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 430. 

57.  Wall of Names, 47, calls him Souillac BLANCHARD; Robichaux, Acadians in St. Malo, 64-65, Family No. 80, his birth/baptismal record, calls him Suliac-Francois BLANCHARD, gives his parents' names, says his godparents were Francois BLANCHARD & Marie-Madeleine VINCENT, & says his family resided at St.-Suliac from 1759-72; Robichaux, Acadians in Chatellerault, 11-12, Family No. 22, gives his parents' names & details his family's participation in the Leigne-les-bois settlement in Poitou during the early 1770s; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 14, Family No. 26, calls him Souillac BLANCHARD, gives his parents' names, & details his family's participation in the Leigne-les-bois settlement in Poitou during the early 1770s as well as its voyage to LA in 1785, including their appearance on 2 separate passenger lists; BRDR, 2:100, 370 (ASC-2, 10), his marriage record, calls him Suliac BLANCHARD, "an Acadian," calls his wife Marie HÉBERT, "an Acadian," does not give his or her parents' names, says the witness to his marriage was Ambroise GARIDEL, & notes that this was a "double marriage with Juan Olivier HÉVERT & Natalia OCUAN"; BRDR, 3:111 (ASM-3, 54), his death/burial record, calls him Suliac BLANCHARD, age 44 yrs., but does not give his parents' names or mention a wife.  See also Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 28. 

He & his family obviously crossed to LA on the latter ship, La Caroline. 

The census taker at Ascension in Jan 1788 may have been confused when he called this young carpenter "Julia," or did Suliac have an actual sister named Julia, & this was not Suliac?  I have found no Julia BLANCHARD among the Acadian immigrants in LA.  The age given in this census for "Julia" fits Suliac's birth year perfectly.  Also listed with "Julia" was "Charles her brother," so I am confident that "Julia" was really Suliac, that this was the best the Spanish census taker could make of the name Suliac.  Why was Suliac not listed in this census with a wife?  He had remarried in late Oct 1787, or so his marriage record says.  Perhaps the date for the marriage should be 1788, not 1787. 

Something else makes no sense here.  If he married  Marie HÉBERT at Ascension in October 1787 or 1788, who is the Céleste BOUDREAUX, daughter of Pierre BOUDREAUX & Madeleine BOURG of Île St.-Jean, who married Suliac BLANCHARD at St.-Jacques in Feb 1786?  BRDR, 2: 100, 110 (SJA-2, 2), a marriage record for a Céleste, daughter of Pierre BOUDREAUX & Madeleine BOURG "of St. John in Acadia," gives the date "30[sic] Feb 1786 (sic)," calls the bride Célest BUDRO, calls the husband Suliac BELANSHAR, gives his parents' names also, says his parents were from St.-Malo, & that the witnesses to the marriage were Josef BURSUA & Francisca SABA.  The date of this marriage for Suliac BLANCHARD (BELANSHAR was the St.-Jacques priest's clumsy way of spelling BLANCHARD), as given in the church record, was obviously wrong as recorded, but it is not the only thing that makes no sense here.  There is a marriage record for a Céleste BOUDREAUX, daughter of Pierre BOUDREAUX & Madeleine BOURG, dated 8 Mar 1786, in BRDR, 2:110 (SJA-2, 2), that says she married Jaun Femia, son of Juan GEDRI & Maria LEBLANC "of St. John Island."  This was only a little over a week after she married Suliac BLANCHARD!  But wait.  Céleste BOUDREAUX, "widow of Juan GUÉDRY," remarried to Luis, son of Juan AUGERON & Luisa LEVRON "of Diocese of d'Ologne in France," on 28 Oct 1794 at Assumption.  See BRDR, 2:110 (ASM-2, 10).  Suliac BLANCHARD was fathering children with Marie HÉBERT from the early 1790s into the early 1800s.  See BRDR, vols. 2 & 3 & the Lafourche valley censuses of 1791, 1795, 1797, 1798.  Was Suliac's marriage to Céleste BOUDREAUX annulled?  If so, how could she have remarried to Jean-Firmin GUIDRY so quickly?  I am going to assume here that the Suliac BLANCHARD/Céleste BOUDREAUX marriage did not actually exist, that the church record in SJA-2, 2, is somehow mistaken.  It is probably a clumsy repeat of the Céleste BOUDREAUX/Jean GUIDRY marriage of 8 Mar 1786.

58.  Wall of Names, 12 (pl. 1R), calls him Victor BLANCHARD, & lists him singly.  See also Bourgeois, Cabanocey, 161; Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 201-14.

Who was he?  What happened to him in LA?.  Was he the same person as Victor BLANCHARD 2, below?  Probably not, because Victor BLANCHARD 2 would have been only 14 years old in 1766, too young to have served in the LA militia.  I agree with Wall of Names that there must have been 2 Victor BLANCHARDs at Cabanocé/St.-Jacques in the late 1760s. 

59.  Wall of Names, 12(pl. 1R), calls him Victor BLANCHARD 2, & lists him with sister Marguerite; Arsenault, Généalogie, 2425; BRDR, 2:101, 262 (ASC-1, 129), his marriage record, calls him Victor BLANCHARD, calls his wife Anne-Perpétué DUHAM (DUHON), gives his & her parents' names, says both sets of parents were Acadians, & that the witnesses to his marriage were Étienne LEBLANC, Athanas TRAHAN, & Maturin LEBLANC; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 1-A:67 (SM Ct.Hse.: OA-4 1/2-78), another marriage record, dated 22 Sep 1786, calls him Victor BLANCHARD m. ... Perpétué DUHON, but does not give his or her parents' names or any witnesses to the marriage; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 2-A:89 (SM Ct.Hse.: Succ. #297), his succession record, calls him Victor BLANCHARD, & says his will was dated Jul 1818, but does not give his wife's name or the names of any children; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 2-B:86 (Laf. Ch.: v.1, p.6), his death/burial record, calls him Victor [BLANCHARD], "widower of Perpétué DUON [DUHON] died without children, buried ... in the parish cemetery at age about 60 yrs.[,] he received the sacraments," but does not give his parents' names.  See also De Ville, Southwest LA Families, 1777, 15.

See White, DGFA-1, 153, for details about his parents.  His father, René, fils, son of René BLANCHARD & Marie SAVOIE, was born at Annapolis Royal on 26 Nov 1724 & baptized there on 27 Dec (his father's godparents were Guillaume BLANCHARD & Marie-Joséphe SAVOIE, daughter of Germain).  His mother was Élisabeth, daughter of Jean COMEAU & Madeleine AMIREAU.  His parents were married in c1747, but White gives no place of marriage.  His father's burial was recorded at Québec in Jan 1758; he was age 35 at the time of his death & victim, most likely, of smallpox.  His father's ending up in Canada in the late 1750s hints that the family was from Annapolis Royal or the Chignecto area.  So how did Victor & older sister Marguerite get separated from their parents, especially when they were so young?  Marguerite was age 7 & Victor age 6 at the time of their father's death in Canada.  Most likely they were not separated from their parents but were taken back to greater Acadia by their widowed mother, who, along with her children, either surrendered to, or was captured by, British forces in the region & held in a NS prison compound until the end of the war, hence their going to LA in 1765. 

So when did he & his sister get to LA?  From Halifax via St.-Domingue in 1765?  With whom?  Their mother did not come to LA.  See the footnote for his sister's profile providing a link to a discussion about her marriage to a Bayou Teche BROUSSARD that may help answer the question of their arrival. 

The marriage record at Attakapas in Sep 1786 evidently is a civil recording of an existing marriage, not the marriage itself.  He & his wife were that rare Acadian couple who had no children. 

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