APPENDICES

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

Chenet or Chesnay dit LA GARENNE

[lah-gah-REN]

ACADIA

Louis Chenet or Chesnay dit La Garenne, son of Bertrand, Sieur de Lothainville and Elisabeth Aubert, was born at Québec in August 1678.  He moved to Port-Royal and married Jeanne, daughter of Barnabé Martin, at Port-Royal in c1697.  They had two children, daughter Marie-Josèphe, born at Port-Royal in c1698, and son Jean dit La Garenne, born at Port-Royal in c1700.   Marie-Josèphe married Charles Charpentier at Port-Toulouse, Île Royale, today's Cape Breton Island, in c1723.  After Charles died, she remarried to Jean-Francois Morel at St.-Pierre-du-Nord on Île St.-Jean, today's Prince Edward Island, in August 1739.  Her brother Jean married Anne, daughter of Jean Potier, at St.-Pierre-du-Nord in October 1728.  Jean and Anne raised seven children on Île St.-Jean, including four sons, all born at St.-Pierre-du-Nord:

Oldest son Jean-Baptiste, born in October 1732, took his father's dit as his family name and married Anne-Hippolythe, daughter of Paul Doiron and Marguerite Michel.

Charles was born in September 1734.  His godparents were Charles Tranquerel and Angélique Poitier.  

Lange was born in May 1738 and died at St.-Pierre-du-Nord 10 months later.  His godparents were ____ Lange and Cécile Nuirst, wife of Louis Potier.  

Youngest son Joseph was born in May 1740.  His godparents were Claude Chatel and Marie-Josèphe Charpentier.  

LE GRAND DÉRANGEMENT

When the British rounded up the Acadians in Nova Scotia in the fall of 1765, the Acadians on Île St.-Jean, including the Chenet dit La Garennes, were safe for now because they lived in territory controlled by France.  Their respite from British oppression was short-lived, however.  After the fall of the French fortress at Louisbourg in July 1758, the victorious British gathered up most of the Acadians on Île Royale and Île St.-Jean and deported them to France later in the year.  Marie-Josèphe Chenet (she did not take her father's dit as her brother Jean did), now 60 years old and twice widowed, and three of her Charpentier sons crossed to St.-Malo aboard the British transport Supply.  They somehow survived the terrible crossing and remained in France.

Brother Jean Chenet dit La Garenne, his wife, Anne Potier, and their children also crossed to France probably on an English packet boat that carried them first to Portsmouth, England, then on to Cherbourg in Normandy.  There, Jean died, perhaps during a small pox epidemic that struck the Acadians at Cherbourg in late 1759, leaving Anne a widow.  Daughter Cécile married Germain Landry of L'Assomption, Pigiguit, at Tres Ste.-Trinité, Cherbourg, in July 1767.  In April 1774, Anne Potier and daughter Geneviève Chenet, 30 years old and single, were among the Acadians transported from Cherbourg to La Rochelle aboard the ship Le Thomas.  Geneviève married Pierre Breaux at St.-Martin-de-Chantenay, near Nantes, France, in August 1780, where Paul had been living for 10 years, one of the first Acadians to reside in Nantes.  The couple remained in France.  

Meanwhile, Jean and Anne's oldest son, Jean-Baptiste dit La Garenne, and his wife, Anne-Hippolythe Doiron, endured life in the mother country as best they could, not an easy task for most Acadians.  When the Spanish government offered the Acadians in France the chance for a new life in faraway Louisiana, Jean-Baptiste and Anne-Hippolythe agreed to take it.  

LOUISIANA:  RIVER SETTLEMENTS

Jean-Baptiste Chenet dit La Garenne, now age 55, and his wife, Anne-Hippolythe Doiron, age 46, sailed to New Orleans aboard Le Beaumont, the third of the Seven Ships of 1785.  They settled probably at Baton Rouge, on the river above New Orleans, with the majority of the passengers from their ship.  They brought no children with them from France and had no children in Louisiana.  

CONCLUSION

Jean-Baptiste Chenet dit La Garenne was the only member of his family who settled in Louisiana.  He died by August 1788, still childless, so the Chenet dit La Garenne family of Île St.-Jean never took root in the Bayou State.

The family's name also is spelled Lagaranne, Lagarelle.

Sources:  Arsenault, Généalogie, 482-83; 2081; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 2, 74-75, 268; <perso.orange.fr/froux/St_malo_arrivees/Supply.htm>, Family No. 4; Robichaux, Acadians in Nantes, 37; White, DGFA-1, 341.

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.  Wall of Names, 33 (pl. 8L), calls him Jean-Baptiste LAGARENNE, & lists him with his wife & no children; Arsenault, Généalogie, 2081, profile for his father in the Île St.-Jean section, calls him Jean-Baptiste [CHESNAY dit LA GARENNE], says he was born in 1732 but gives no birthplace, says his father, Jean-Baptiste CHESNAY dit LA GARENNE, was born in 1700, son of Louis [CHENET or CHESNAY] & Jeanne MARTIN of Port-Royale, that his mother was Anne POITIER, daughter of Jean [POITIER] & Marie-Madeleine CHIASSON, that his parents were married 19 Oct 1728 at Port-Lajoie, Île St.-Jean, & that he was the oldest of his parents' 6 children, his siblings being Charles, born in 1734, Claire, born in 1736, Joseph, born in 1740, Geneviève, born in 1744, & Élizabeth, born in 1750; Hébert, D., Acadians in Exile, 268, his birth/baptismal record, calls him Jean-Baptiste LAGARENNE, gives his parents'  names, calling his father Jean, & says his godparents were Augustain GENET & Marie CHIASSON; Hébert, D., Acadian Families in Exile 1785, 34-35, calls him Jean-Baptiste LAGARENNE, laboureur, age 55, on the embarkation list, Juan Bautista LAGARINE, on the debarkation list, & Jean-Baptiste LAGRENNE, plowman, age 55, on the complete listing, & says he was in the 20th Family aboard Le Beaumont with his wife & no children.  See also Voorhies, J., Some Late Eighteenth Century Louisianians, 495, 528.

Did he & his wife ever have children?  Did they go first to the Baton Rouge district with the majority of the passengers from Le Beaumont then move downriver to St.-Jacques a couple of years later, or did they go from New Orleans straight to St.-Jacques?  Very few Acadians who came to LA in 1785 chose to settle at St.-Jacques.  See Appendix. 

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