Gaudry

dit Bourbonnière

René Gaudry and his wife Léonarde Blondeau lived in Feings, a village in Perche very near Tourouvre, St-Langis and other towns where many French-Canadian families originated. They attended the parish church of SS Gervais and Protais (above), where several generations of the family are recorded. Their son Jacques Gaudry was born there in 1594, and worked as a tanner and leather-good dealer. In December 1621 he married Charlotte Chevalier (daughter of Gilles Chevalier and Nicole Pineau). Jacques died sometime between May and September of 1637.

The Chevalier family were minor Norman gentry (with the title "Sieur de Marres" - see Chevalier).

There were two sons that we know of: Nicolas and Jacques; both emigrated to Québec, but there is some question about Jacques' parentage or birthdate: if his death record is correct, he was born in 1641 (after his father's death) and was a great deal younger than Nicolas. In any case, it is Nicolas we are descended from. He was born about 1623, and came to Québec in 1652, bringing his widowed mother with him (Charlotte died sometime after the census of 1681, when she was reported to be 82 and living in St-Michel à Sillery). Nicolas married Agnès Morin, daughter of Noël Morin and Hélène Desportes, at Québec city in November 1653. They had eight children: Hélène (1656-1712, married Pierre Boucher, brother of our ancestor Denis Boucher); Jacques (1658-1700, married Jeanne-Françoise Guillory); Christine-Charlotte (1660, married Jean Hamel); Marie-Françoise (1662, married Jean Pilote when she was 15); Nicolas (1664, married Anne Pigeon); Agnès-Marguérite (born and died 1666); Agnès-Madeleine (1667, married Joseph Lemay dit Delorme; and Joseph-Alphonse (1670, went west as a courer du bois and not heard from again after 1694).

Nicolas Gaudry died at Sillery in June 1669. His widow Agnès married Ignace Bonhomme in January of 1671, had more children, and died in August 1687.

See Pilote for Marie-Françoise's descendants. Their daughter Agnès was an ancestor of Madonna. Agnès' sister Marguérite was a great-great-great-grandmother of Joseph Arthur Martin.