Pellerin

dit Colbec

The immigrant ancestor is François Pellerin, born about 1636 in the parish of St-Étienne-de-Bacilly (above) in Normandy. This town is near Avranches and Mont-St-Michel, and is also the home of the Bouchard family of Québec. François had a younger brother, Étienne, who also emigrated to Acadia, as did other Pellerins from the same town in the eighteenth century. We do not know their parents' names.

François was in Acadia by 1654, and died in Port-Royal in 1678. About 1665 he married Andrée Martin (daughter of Pierre, and sister of our ancestor Marguérite Martin Bourg). An interesting story about this couple has survived, from Port-Royal court records. Hector de Grandfontaine, who came to Acadia as governor in 1670, brought with him an astronomer named Jean Campagna. Settling at Beaubassin, this Campagna soon was regarded as a sorcerer by the whole neighborhood, and was tried in 1684 for causing several deaths by witchcraft. One of the witnesses who testified was our ancestor Andrée Martin Pellerin, then a widow. She told the court that some nine years earlier, she had seen Campagna in the street "insulting" a young girl, and had struck him with her walking stick. He told her that she would regret it. In 1678 at beaubassin, Campagna "breathed into the eye" of her husband François, who immediately fell ill and died soon afterwards. Several relatives, including her sister-in-law and her new husband Pierre Mercier, corroborated the story. Her future son-in-law, Pierre Gaudin, testified that Campagna had "bewitched" him, but withdrew the spell when Gaudin threatened him. Campagna was acquitted.

François and Andrée Martin Pellerin had six children: Anne (married Germain Terriot or Thériault); Catherine (c1673-1758, married Pierre Gaudin); Isabelle (married Michel Hébert, whose sisters Marie and Marguérite are our ancestors too); Jeanne (c1672-1744, married Guillaume Quessy and Jacques Moyen); Marie (married Alexandre Trahan); and Pierre (married Marie-Anne Bélanger; 2 children).

See Gaudin for descendants.