APPENDICES

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

CLOSSINET

[CLAWS-ih-nay]

ACADIA

Louis Closquinet dit Dumoulin, a carpenter, born at Verrier, Reims, France, in c1700, married Marguerite Longuépée at Louisbourg on Île Royale, now Cape Breton Island, in c1722.  They settled at Rivière-du-Nord-Est on Île St.-Jean, today's Prince Edward Island, where they had at least eight children, all born on Île St.-Jean--Francois in c1723, Pierre in c1725, Marie-Madeleine in c1727, Louis, fils in c1730, Joseph and Jean-Baptiste in c1732, Louise-Geneviève, also called Marie-Louise, in c1735, and Amable in July 1739.  Pierre married Marie-Josèphe, daughter of Paul Boudrot, at Port-Lajoie, Île St.-Jean, in January 1751; Marie married Pierre-Mathurin, son of Pierre Girard of Nantes, France, at Port-Lajoie in September 1751 and settled on Rivière-de-Peugigut; Louis, fils married Anne Jacquemart or Jaquemin; Joseph married Francoise, another daughter of Paul Boudrot, in c1756; and Louise married Charles Savary in c1755.  

LE GRAND DÉRANGEMENT

The Closquinets of Île St.-Jean, living in territory controlled by France, escaped the British roundup of Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1755.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French stronghold at Louisbourg in July 1758, the British rounded up most of the Acadians on Île St.-Jean and deported them to France.  Marie Closquinet, age 34, who was pregnant, her husband Pierre Girard, age 39, two of their children, ages 6 and 4, and a domestic servant; brother Louis, fils, age 29, and his wife Anne Jacquimin, age 26; brother Joseph, age 28, his wife Francoise Boudrot, age 20, and their sons Pierre le jeune, age 6, and Grégoire, age 2; and sister Louise, age 24, her husband Charles Savary, age 31, their sons Jean-Charles, age 2 1/2, and infant Charles--all crossed on the British transport Supply, which left the Gut of Canso in late November but did not reach St.-Malo until early March 1759.  All of them survived the crossing except for Louise's infant son Charles, who died at sea, and husband Charles, who died in a St.-Malo hospital in late April.  

In France, the Closquinets suffered along with hundreds of other Acadians the indignities of life in the mother country.  During their time in France, the family's name evolved from Closquinet to Clossinet:  

Marie Clossinet and her family lived at Châteauneuf, a suburb of Nantes, in 1759-60, where a daughter was born in March 1759 but died less than two months later, and at nearby St.-Servan from 1760-64, where another daughter was born in April 1760.  In April 1764, the entire family left France for Cayenne in South America aboard the ship Le Fort.  They were counted at Sinnamary, Cayenne, in March 1765; the census taker noted that Marie and Pierre were suffering from fièvre at the time.  

Louise Clossinet remarried to Charles, son of fellow Acadian Étienne Trahan, at Châteauneuf, near St.-Malo, in August 1759.  A daughter was born at Châteauneuf in October 1760, and another daughter at nearby St.-Servan in March 1764.  Meanwhile, in April 1760, Louise's husband Charles shipped out on the corsair L'Hercules to fight the British but was promptly captured and held as a prisoner of war.  He remained in England until June 1763, when he was finally repatriated to France.  In April 1764, Louise and her family also left for Cayenne aboard the ship Le Fort.  When French authorities counted the settlers at Sinnamary, Cayenne, in March 1765, Charles Trahan and his two daughters were not on the list, only wife Louise, who was counted with her sister Marie's family.  

Louis Clossinet, fils and his wife Anne Jacquemin lived at St.-Servan from 1759-64.  Anne died at St.-Servan by November 1774, when Louis, fils remarried to Marie-Marguerite, called Marguerite, daughter of fellow Acadian Jean Daigle and widow of Amand Giroir, at Pleudihen, near St.-Malo.  

Joseph Clossinet's family lived in the St.-Malo suburbs of St.-Enogat from 1759-65, St.-Servan in 1765-66, St.-Melior in 1767, and back in St.-Servan from 1767-72.  Daughter Jeanne-Marguerite was born at St.-Énogat in April 1760, and Marie-Marguerite in July 1762 but died at age 18 months in February 1764.  Joseph died at St.-Énogat in 1764 or 1765, and Francoise remarried to Marin, son of fellow Acadian Jean-Baptiste Dugas, at St.-Servan in November 1766.  She gave him four sons, born at St.-Servan between 1767 and 1773.  In the early 1770s, Marin, Françoise, and their children, including Grégoire and Jeanne-Marguerite Closquinet, became part of the attempt to settle Acadians on a French nobleman's land in the Poitou region.  When the venture failed after two years of effort, Marin and Françoise joined dozens of other Poitou Acadians in an exodus to the port city of Nantes, where they subsisted as best they could on government hand outs or on whatever work they could find.  Jeanne-Marguerite married Frenchman Étienne, son of Jean Peltier of Baune, Angers, France, at St.-Martin-de-Chantenay, in a suburb of Nantes, in August 1784; Étienne was a stonecutter.  Their son Jean was born at L'Hermitage, Chantenay, in May 1785.  

In the early 1780s, the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France a chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana.  Most of the Acadians took it, including a hand full of Clossinets and their spouses.  

LOUISIANA:  RIVER and LAFOURCHE VALLEY SETTLEMENTS

Three Clossinets and their families came to Louisiana in 1785 aboard two, perhaps three, of the Seven Ships from France:

Marie Clossinet, age unrecorded, and husband Charles Comeau, age 37, a childless couple, came to Louisiana aboard Le Beaumont, the third of the Seven Ships, which reached New Orleans in August.  They settled at Baton Rouge.  

Louis Clossinet, fils, age 54, second wife Marguerite Daigle, age 37, and stepdaughter Geneviève Giroir, age 16, sailed to Louisiana aboard La Ville d'Archangel, the sixth of the Seven Ships, which reached New Orleans in December 1785.  They followed the majority of their fellow passengers to the new Acadian community of Bayou des Écores, today's Thompson Creek in West Feliciana Parish, north of Baton Rouge.  After a series of hurricanes devastated the settlement in 1794, they moved to upper Bayou Lafourche and settled among the hundreds of Acadians already there, including niece Jeanne Clossinet and her husband Étienne Peltier.  Louis and Marie-Marguerite brought no children with them to Louisiana and bore none there, at least none who survived childhood.

The only member of Louis, fils's brother Joseph's family to emigrate to Louisiana was daughter Jeanne-Marguerite Clossinet, age 25, her husband Étienne Peltier, and their infant son Jean.  If they sailed to Louisiana aboard one of the Seven Ships, they appear on none of the passenger lists.  They settled at Baton Rouge on the river above New Orleans, where Spanish officials counted them in 1788.  Jeanne and Étienne had more children in Louisiana.  By the mid-1790s, they had moved to upper Bayou Lafourche, where Jeanne died in October 1800; she was only 40 years old.  

CONCLUSION

Louis Clossinet, fils and his wife, who came to Louisiana from France in 1785, had no surviving children.  The many children of Louis, fils's niece, Jeanne-Marguerite Clossinet, were Peltiers.  And the children of Marie Clossinet, probably a cousin, would have been Comeauxs.  Except for its blood, then, the Acadian branch of the Clossinet family did not survive in the Bayou State.

The family's name also is spelled Clausinee, Clausinet, Clausquinay, Clauxinet, Cloccine, Clocine, Clocinet, Clocsinet, Clocsiney, Cloecinet, Cloguesiner, Cloosinet, Cloquesinel, Closinet, Cloxinet, Cloxinete, Cossinet, Croesinet, Croisinette, Crostine, Croixinet, Croixinette, Croxinet.

Sources:  Arsenault, Généalogie, 2081-82; BRDR, vol. 2; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 81, 586, 593; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, vol. 1-A; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family Nos. 2,  9, 20, 21; Robichaux, Acadians in Chatellerault, 39; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 62; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 202-03, 300, 356-57, 726-27, 761.  

Settlement Abbreviations 
(present-day parishes that existed during the War Between the States 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.  Not in Wall of Names.  Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 202-03, Family No. 248, her birth/baptismal record, calls her Jeanne-Marguerite CLOSSINET, gives her parents' names, says her godparents were Charles BOUDROT, her uncle, & Renée JUXTAUX, & that her family resided at St.-Énogat from 1759-65, at St.-Servan in 1765-66, at St.-Melior in 1767, & at St.-Servan again from 1767-72; Robichaux, Acadians in Châtellerault, 39, Family No. 78, the family of stepfather Marin DUGAST & her mother Françoise BOUDROT, calls her Anne CLOSSINET, a diminutive for Jeanne, & details the family's participation in the Poitou settlement of the early 1770s; Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 1-A:192, 616 (Book of Chantenay 1784: Nantes, France: Archives Dept. de la Loire Atlantique), her marriage record, calls her Jeanne-Marguerite CLOCINE, calls her husband Étienne PELTIER/PELLETIER, "tailleur de pierre (a stone cutter), native of the parish of Baune, Diocese of Angers, living in Sarigue in the same Diocese," gives her & his parents' names, says both fathers were deceased at the time of the wedding, & gives no witnesses to her marriage; BRDR, 2:192 (ASM-3, 25), her death/burial record, calls her Juana CLOSINET, "age 41 years, wife of Estevan PELLETIER," but does not give her parents' names.  See also Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth-Century Louisianians, 526; Kinnaird, "Problems of Frontier Defense, 1792-94," 95; Robichaux, Bayou Lafourche, 1770-98, 57, 88, 139.

There is no doubt that Jeanne-Marguerite's parents were Acadians from Île St.-Jean.  They are listed as Family No. 20 on the passenger roll of the British transport Supply.  See <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>.  One of her children's burial records says that her parents were Acadians.  Another says that she was from St.-Malo, France.  See BRDR, 2:583-84.  All of this evidence points to an arrival date in LA of 1785.  So why is she not on any of the Seven Ships passenger lists?  See Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785.  Another of her children's baptismal records says that Étienne PELTIER's parents were Acadians, but I have not found this family in Arsenault or White.  As his marriage record indicates, he was born in France.  Neither of his parents was an Acadian.  His baptismal record, which says he was born on 22 Nov 1759 & includes his parents' names, is in Hébert, D., Southwest LA Records, 1-A:616 (Book of Baune 1759: Archives Departmentales Maine-35-Loire, 64 rue Saint-Aubin, Angers, France).  

02.  Wall of Names, 43, calls him Louis CLAUSINET, & lists him singly; Arsenault, Généalogie, 2082, profile of his father in the Île St.-Jean section, called him Louis [CLOSQUINET], gives his parents' names, lists his siblings' names & birth years, & says he was born in 1730; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 9, shows that in the crossing to St.-Malo in 1758-59, he & his first wife had no children & that she, too, survived the crossing; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 203, Family No. 249, calls him Louis CLOSSINET, does not give his parents' names, says he was born in c1730 but gives no birthplace, calls his first wife Anne JACQUEMIN, says they married in c1758 but gives no place of marriage, says he & his first wife "disembarked at St. Malo on March 9, 1759 from the ship, du Supply," that they resided at Châteauneuf in 1759, at St.-Enogat from 1759-64, & at St.-Servan from 1764-72, details his second marriage, including his wife's parents' names & her first husband's name; Robichaux, Acadian in St.-Malo, 860, his marriage record, calls him Louis CLASTINET, gives his first wife's name, but not his second wife's parents' names, & says the witnesses to his marriage were Guillaume MENIAC, Delatouche DESAULNAIS, Louis HUETAUD, Pierre RUCET, & Giles RAFFRAY, all of whom signed; <acadian-cajun.com>, calls him Louis CLOSSINET & lists him on La Ville d'Archangel with his wife & stepdaughter, Geneviève GIROIR.  

Why are his second wife & stepdaughter not listed with him in Wall of Names?    

03.  Wall of Names, 33 (pl. 8L), calls her Marie CLAUSINET, & lists her with her husband & no children; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 32-33, calls her Marie CLAUSINET, no age given, on the embarkation list, Margarita Josef, su [Carlos COUMMEAU's] muger, on the debarkation list, & Marie CLOSSINET, no age given, on the complete listing, & says she was in the 9th Family aboard Le Beaumont with her husband & no children.  

So was her name Marie or Marguerite-Josèphe?  Or was it Marie-Marguerite-Josèphe?  Who were her parents?  Why was her age not given on the passenger list of Le Beaumont when almost everyone else aboard had their age recorded? 

Was she the Marie-Madeleine CLOCCINET of Louisbourg, Île Royale, age 34, daughter of Louis CLOSQUINET dit Demoulin & Marguerite LONGUÉPÉE of Rivière-du-Nord-Est, Île St.-Jean, wife of Pierre-Mathurin GIRARD of Nantes, age 39, & mother of Mathurin GIRARD, age 6, Jean GIRARD, age 4, & Anne-Marie GIRARD, born at Châteauneuf, France, on 28 Mar 1759, who crossed on the ship Supply to St.-Malo in 1758-59?  See <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 1; Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 356-57, Family No. 434. 

Charles COMMAUX, born in c1747, son of Jean COMMAUX & Marguerite TURPIN, came to France in 1758 with is sister Marguerite & brother-in-law Jean DUPONT aboard the ill-fated British transport Duke William.  Charles lived at St.-Malo from 1758-61 & at Plouër from 1761-64.  Like Marie-Madeleine CLOSSINET, her husband Pierre-Mathurin GIRARD, & their children, Charles COMMAUX left France for Cayenne aboard Le Fort in Apr 1764.  See Robichaux, Acadians in St.-Malo, 206, "Family" No. 253.  This may have been the Charles COMEAUX who married the Marie CLOSSINET who emigrated to LA in 1785.  Note that he would have been 20 years younger than the Marie CLOSSINET married to Pierre-Mathurin GIRARD. 

What happened to her in LA?  

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