History of the Acadians
The The settlers whose descendants became Acadians primarily came from the southwestern and southern regions of France, historically known as Occitania, while some Acadians are claimed to be descended from the Indigenous peoples of the region.[1] Today, due to assimilation, some Acadians may share other ethnic ancestries as well.[2]
The history of the Acadians was significantly influenced by the six colonial wars that took place in Acadia during the 17th and 18th centuries (see the four
As French settlers
Port Royal Habitation (1604-1613)
Arrival of the first European families
The survival of the Acadian settlements was based on successful cooperation with the Indigenous peoples of the region. In the early years of Acadian settlement, this included recorded marriages between Acadian settlers and Indigenous women. Some records have survived showing marriages between Acadian settlers and Indigenous women in formal Roman Catholic rites, for example, the marriage of Charles La Tour to a Mi'kmaw woman in 1626.[4] There were also reported instances of Acadian settlers marrying Indigenous spouses according to Marriage à la façon du pays, and subsequently living in Mi'kmaq communities.[5] Settlers also brought French wives with them to Acadia, such as La Tour's second wife, Françoise-Marie Jacquelin, who joined him in Acadia in 1640.
Governor Isaac de Razilly's administration at LaHave, Nova Scotia, prepared the ground for the arrival of the first recorded migrant families on board the Saint Jehan, which left La Rochelle on 1 April 1636. There were a number of sailings from the French Atlantic Coast to Acadia between 1632 and 1636, but this is the only one for which a detailed passenger list has survived.[6] Nicolas Denys, who was stationed across the LaHave River at Port Rossignol (Liverpool Bay), acted as agent for the Saint Jehan.[7] After a 35-day crossing of the Atlantic, the Saint Jehan arrived on 6 May 1636 at LaHave, Nova Scotia. There were seventy-eight passengers and eighteen crew members. With this ship, Acadia began a slow shift from being primarily a matter of explorers and traders, of men, to a colony of permanent settlers, including women and children. While the presence of European women is a signal that settlement was seriously contemplated, there were yet so few of them in this group of migrants that they did not immediately affect the status of Acadia as basically a colony of European transients. By the end of the year, the migrants were moved from LaHave and re-established at Port Royal.[6] At Port Royal in 1636, Pierre Martin and Catherine Vigneau, who had arrived on the Saint Jehan, were the first European parents to have a child in Acadia. The first-born child was Mathieu Martin. In part because of this distinction, Mathieu Martin later became the Seigneury of Cobequid (1699).[8]
Kennedy (2014) argues that the emigrants from the Vienne and Aquitaine regions of France carried to Acadia their customs and social structure. They were frontier people, who dispersed their settlements based on kinship. They optimized the use of farmland and emphasized trading for a profit. They were hierarchical and politically active. The French and the Acadian villages were similar in terms of prosperity, egalitarianism, and independent-mindedness. The emergence of a distinct Acadian identity emerged from the adaptation of traditional French methods, institutions, and ideas to the Indigenous North American methods, ideas, and political situations.[9]
Civil war
With the death of Isaac de Razilly, Acadia was plunged into what some historians have described as a civil war (1640–1645).[10] Acadia had two legitimate Lieutenant Governors.[11] The war was between Port Royal, where Governor Charles de Menou d'Aulnay de Charnisay was stationed, and present-day Saint John, New Brunswick, where Governor Charles de Saint-Étienne de la Tour was stationed.[10]
In the war, there were four major battles. La Tour attacked d'Aulnay at Port Royal in 1640.[12] In response to the attack, D'Aulnay sailed out of Port Royal to establish a five-month blockade of La Tour's fort at Saint John, which La Tour eventually defeated (1643). La Tour attacked d'Aulnay again at Port Royal in 1643. D'Aulnay and Port Royal ultimately won the war against La Tour with the 1645 siege of Saint John.[13] After d'Aulnay died (1650), La Tour re-established himself in Acadia.
English colony (1654–1667)
In 1654, war between France and England broke out. Led by Major Robert Sedgwick, a flotilla from Boston, under orders from Cromwell, arrived in Acadia to chase the French out. The flotilla seized La Tour's fort, then Port-Royal. La Tour, nevertheless, managed to find himself in England, where, with the support of John Kirke, succeeded in receiving from Cromwell a part of Acadia, along with Sir Thomas Temple. La Tour returned to Cap-de-Sable where he remained until his death in 1666 at the age of 73.
During the English occupation of Acadia, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, Louis XIV's minister, forbade the Acadians from returning to France. As a result of the English occupation, no new French families settled in Acadia between 1654 and 1670.
Post Treaty of Breda
The Treaty of Breda, signed 31 July 1667, returned Acadia to France. A year later, Marillon du Bourg arrived to take possession of the territory for France. The son of LeBorgne, Alexandre LeBorgne, was named provisionary governor and lieutenant-general of Acadia. He married Marie Motin-La Tour, the eldest child of the marriage between La Tour and d'Aulnay's widow.
In 1670, the new governor of Acadia, the chevalier Hubert d'Andigny, chevalier de Grandfontaine, was responsible for the first census undertaken in Acadia. The results did not include those Acadians living with local First Nations. It revealed that there were approximately sixty Acadian families with approximately 300 inhabitants in total. These inhabitants were predominantly engaged in aboiteau farming along the shores of the present-day Bay of Fundy. No serious attempt was made to increase the population of Acadia.
In the spring of 1671, more than fifty colonists left La Rochelle aboard the l'Oranger. Others arrived from Canada (New France) or were retired soldiers. During this time, a number of colonists married with the local First Nations. Some of the first to marry were Charles de Saint-Étienne de La Tour, Martin, Pierré Lejeune–Briard, Jehan Lambert, Petitpas and Guedry. The captain, Vincent de Saint-Castin, the commander at Pentagoet, married Marie Pidikiwamiska, the daughter of an
In 1674, the
During the last decades of the seventeenth century, Acadians migrated from the capital, Port Royal, and established what would become the other major Acadian settlements before the Expulsion of the Acadians: Grand Pré, Chignecto, Cobequid and Pisiguit. Although not common, on occasion epidemics ravished the population of Ile St.-Jean, Ile Royale and Acadia. In 1732/33 more than 150 people died of smallpox on Ile Royale.[15]
The history of the settlers of Ile St.-Jean prior to the expulsion includes extreme hardship. For almost every good harvest year it seems that there was one in which crops failed. In one or two instances widespread fires destroyed crops, livestock and farms. Famine and starvation were common and frequently occasioned desperate pleas for supplies from Louisbourg, Québec and even France itself. In 1756, famine on Ile St.-Jean prompted authorities to relocate some families to Québec.[15]
Prior to the founding of Halifax (1749), Port Royal/ Annapolis Royal was the capital of Acadia and later Nova Scotia for most of the previous 150 years.[b] During that time the British made six attempts to conquer Acadia by defeating the capital. They finally defeated the French in the Siege of Port Royal (1710). Over the following fifty years, the French and their allies made six unsuccessful military attempts to regain the capital.
Colonial Wars
There was already a long history of Acadian and
While many Acadians traded with the New England Protestants, Acadians' participation in the wars clearly indicated that many were reluctant to be ruled by the British. During the first colonial war, King William's War (1688–97), the crews of the very successful French privateer Pierre Maisonnat dit Baptiste were primarily Acadian. The Acadians resisted during the Raid on Chignecto (1696). During Queen Anne's War, Mi’kmaq and Acadians resisted during the Raid on Grand Pré, Piziquid and Chignecto in 1704. The Acadians also assisted the French in protecting the capital in the Siege of Port Royal (1707) and the final Conquest of Acadia. The Acadians and Mi’kmaq were also successful in the Battle of Bloody Creek (1711).[16]
During
During
When Charles Lawrence took over the post following Hopson’s return to England, he took a stronger stance. He was not only a government official but a military leader for the region. Lawrence came up with a military solution for the forty-five years of an unsettled British conquest of Acadia. The French and Indian War (and Seven Years' War in Europe) began in 1754. Lawrence's primary objectives in Acadia were to defeat the French fortifications at Beausejour and Louisbourg. The British saw many Acadians as a military threat in their allegiance to the French and Mi'kmaq. The British also wanted to interrupt the Acadian supply lines to Fortress Louisbourg, which, in turn, supplied the Mi'kmaq.[22]
French and Indian War
The British Conquest of Acadia happened in 1710. Over the next forty-five years the Acadians refused to sign an unconditional oath of allegiance to Britain. During this time period Acadians participated in various militia operations against the British and maintained vital supply lines to the French Fortress of Louisbourg and Fort Beausejour.[23] During the French and Indian War, the British sought to neutralize any military threat Acadians posed and to interrupt the vital supply lines Acadians provided to Louisbourg by deporting Acadians from Acadia.[24]
Many Acadians might have signed an unconditional oath to the British monarchy had the circumstances been better, while other Acadians did not sign because they were clearly anti-British.[
In the Grand Dérangement (the
Acadian and Mi’kmaq resistance
With the Expulsion of the Acadians during the
In the April 1757, a band of Acadian and Mi'kmaq raided a warehouse near
Some Acadians escaped into the woods and lived with the Mi'kmaq; some bands of partisans fought the British, including a group led by Joseph Broussard, known as "Beausoleil", along the Petitcodiac River of New Brunswick. Some followed the coast northward, facing famine and disease. Some were recaptured, facing deportation or imprisonment at Fort Beausejour (renamed Fort Cumberland) until 1763.
Some Acadians became indentured servants in the British colonies. Massachusetts passed a law in November 1755 placing the Acadians under the custody of "
In 1758, after the fall of Louisbourg, over 3,000 Acadians were deported to northern France. Resettlement attempts were tried in
Re-establishing in Nova Scotia
After the end of the Seven Years' War in 1763, Acadians were allowed to return to Nova Scotia as long as they did not settle in any one area in large numbers; they were not permitted to resettle in the areas of Port Royal or Grand-Pré. Some Acadians resettled along the Nova Scotia coast and remain scattered across Nova Scotia to this day. Many dispersed Acadians looked for other homes. Beginning in 1764, groups of Acadians began to arrive in Louisiana (which had passed to Spanish control in 1762). They eventually became known as Cajuns.
Beginning in the 1770s, many
Milestones of Acadian return and resettlement included:
- 1767 St. Pierre et Miquelon
- 1772 census
- 1774 Founding of Saint-Anne's church; the Acadian school at Rustico and the abbey Jean-Louis Beaubien; the Trappistinesin Tracadie
- 1785 Displacement from Fort Sainte-Anne to the upper
Nineteenth century
Milestones of Acadian return and resettlement included:
- Jean-Mandé Sigogne (6 April 1763 – 9 November 1844) was a French Catholic priest, who moved to Canada after the Revolution and became known for his missionary work among the Acadians of Nova Scotia.
- 1836 Simon d'Entremont and Frédéric Robichaud, MLAs in N.S.
- 1846 Amand Landry, MLA in N.B.
- 1847, Longfellow publishes Evangeline
- 1854, Stanislaw-Francois Poirier, MLA in P.E.I
- 1854, the seminary Saint-Thomas in Memramcook, New Brunswick, becomes the first upper-level school for Acadians
- 1859, the first history of Acadia, "La France aux colonies" is published in French by Edme Rameau de Saint-Père ; Acadians begin to become aware of their own existence
Acadian renaissance
- 1864 founding of the Farmers' Bank of Rustico, the earliest known community bank in Canada, under the leadership of Rev. Georges-Antoine Belcourt
- 1867, first Acadian newspaper, Le Moniteur Acadien (The Acadian Monitor) is published by Israël Landry
- 1871, Common Schools Act of 1871 prohibiting the teaching of religion in the classroom
- 1875, the death of Louis Mailloux, 19 years old, in Caraquet by government forces only stokes Acadian nationalism
- 1880, the Society of Saint John the Baptiste invites Francophones from all over North America to a congress in Quebec City
- July 20–21, 1881, Acadian leaders organize the first Acadian National Convention in Assumption of the Virgin Mary, would be chosen to celebrate Acadian culture as National Acadian Day. Other debates at the convention centered around education, agriculture, emigration, colonization, and newspapers, and these same issues would arise at subsequent conventions.
- At the second convention, on August 15, 1884, in Ave Maris Stella, and a motto - L'union fait la force were adopted.
- 1885, John A. Macdonald nominates Pascal Poirier from Shediac as the first Acadian senator; a second Acadian newspaper published, Le Courrier des Provinces Maritimes
- 1887, the newspaper L'Evangéline begins being published from Digby, later, in 1905, moves to Moncton
- 1890, third Acadian convention
-
A picture of four Acadian women, 1895
Twentieth century
Milestones of the Acadian Renaissance
- 1912, Monsigneur Edouard LeBlanc is the first Acadian bishop in The Maritimes
- 1917, the Conservative Aubin-Edmond Arsenault becomes the first Acadian premier of P.E.I.
- 1920, 2nd Acadian bishop, Mgr Alexandre Chiasson in Chatham and later Bathurst; la Société nationale de l'Assomption undertakes a campaign to build a commemorative church in Grand-Pré, Nova Scotia
- 1923, Pierre-Jean Véniotbecomes the first Acadian premier of N.B. but was not elected
- 1936, the first Caisse Populaire Acadien in Petit-Rocher is founded; the committee France-Acadie is founded
- 1955, the first Tintamarre occurs.
-
An Acadian lady spinning wool, 1938
-
An Acadian lady making a rug, 1938
The Equal Opportunity program
Louis Robichaud, popularly known as "P'tit-Louis" (Little Louis), was the first elected Acadian Premier of New Brunswick, serving from 1960 to 1970. First elected to the legislature in 1952, he became provincial Liberal leader in 1958 and led his party to victory in 1960, 1963, and 1967.
Robichaud modernized the province's hospitals and public schools and introduced a wide range of reforms in an era that became known as the New Brunswick Equal Opportunity program, at the same time as the Quiet Revolution in Québec. To carry out these reforms, Robichaud restructured the municipal tax regime, expanded the government and sought to ensure that the quality of health care, education and social services was the same across the province—a programme he called equal opportunity, is still a buzzword in New Brunswick.
Critics accused of Robichaud's government of "robbing Peter to pay Pierre" with the assumption being that rich municipalities were Anglophone ones and poor municipalities were Francophone ones. While it was true that the wealthier municipalities were predominantly in certain English-speaking areas, areas with significantly inferior services were to be found across the province in all municipalities.
Robichaud was instrumental in the formation of New Brunswick's only French-speaking university, the Université de Moncton, in 1963, which serves the Acadian population of the Maritime provinces.
His government also passed the
1977, official opening of the Acadian Historic Village in Caraquet, New Brunswick.
Antonine Maillet
Born 1929 in Bouctouche,
Twenty-first century
In 2003, at the request of Acadian representatives, a proclamation was issued in the name of Queen Elizabeth II, as the Canadian monarch, officially acknowledging the deportation and establishing July 28 as a day of commemoration. The day of commemoration is observed by the Government of Canada, as the successor of the British Government.
Acadian Remembrance Day
The Fédération des Associations de Familles Acadiennnes of New Brunswick and the Société Saint-Thomas d'Aquin of Prince Edward Island has resolved that December 13 each year shall be commemorated as "Acadian Remembrance Day" in remembrance of all Acadians who died as a result of the deportation. The date December 13 was chosen to commemorate the sinking of the
Acadian World Congress
Beginning in 1994, the Acadian community gathered for an Acadian World Congress in New Brunswick. The congress has been held every 5 years since then: in Louisiana in 1999, in Nova Scotia in 2004, in the Acadian Peninsula of New Brunswick in 2009. The 5th Acadian World Congress was hosted in 2014 by a gathering of 40 different communities located in three different provinces and different states in two countries. Northwestern New Brunswick and Témiscouata, Quebec, in Canada as well as Northern Maine in the United States joined hands to host the 5th CMA.
See also
- Military history of the Acadians
- Military history of Nova Scotia
- Acadians
- Cajun
- Occitans
- Fort Beauséjour and Fortress of Louisbourg
- Henri Peyroux de la Coudreniere
- List of governors of Acadia
- List of conflicts in Canada
- Military history of Canada
- Southern France
- New Brunswick
- Nova Scotia
- Prince Edward Island
- List of years in Canada
- History of Nova Scotia
Notes
- Saint Croix River between present-day Maine and New Brunswick, the Saint Croix settlement failed because the surrounding river became impassable in the winter. It cut off the settlers from necessary supplies of fresh food, water, and fuel wood.
- Fredericton, New Brunswick (1691-1694), and present-day Saint John, New Brunswick (1695-1699). (Dunn (2004))
Citations
- )
- ^ Exiles and Islanders: The Irish Settlers of Prince Edward Island By Brendan O'Grady, McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP, Aug. 17, 2004, page 81, [1]
- JSTOR 10.3138/j.ctt15jjfrm.9.
- ^ Buckner, P. and Reid J. (eds), The Atlantic Region to Confederation: A History, Toronto University Press. 1994.
- ^ Griffiths (2005), p. 36
- ^ a b Griffiths (2005), pp. 54–55
- ^ Griffiths, 2005, p. 50
- ^ Griffiths (2005), p. 193
- ^ Gregory M.W. Kennedy. Something of a Peasant Paradise? Comparing Rural Societies in Acadie and the Loudunais, 1604-1755 (MQUP, 2014)
- ^ a b M. A. MacDonald, Fortune & La Tour: The civil war in Acadia, Toronto: Methuen. 1983
- ^ Griffiths (2005), p. 47
- ^ Dunn (2004), p. 19.
- ^ Dunn (2004), p. 20.
- ^ "Mi'kmaq Portraits Collection".
- ^ a b Lockerby, Earle (Spring 1998). "The Deportation of the Acadians from Ile St.-Jean, 1758". Acadiensis. XXVII (2): 45–94.
- ^ a b c d e Faragher (2005), pp. 110–112.
- ^ a b Plank (2001), pp. 67–72.
- ^ Grenier (2008), pp. 46–73.
- ^ (William Pote's Journal, 1745, p. 34)
- ^ Bell, Winthrop Pickard (1961). The Foreign Protestants and the Settlement of Nova Scotia: The History of a Piece of Arrested British Colonial Policy in the Eighteenth Century. University of Toronto Press.
• DesBrisay, Mather Byles (1895). History of the County of Lunenburg (second ed.). Toronto: W. Briggs. - ^ Faragher (2005), p. 271.
- JSTOR 10.3138/j.ctt15jjfrm.
- ^ Grenier (2008).
- , p. 144
- ISBN 978-1-55266-325-7.
- ^ a b Grenier (2008), pp. 199–200.
- ^ Webster as cited by bluepete, p. 371
- ^ Faragher (2005), p. 398.
- ISBN 978-1-4411-0654-4.
- ^ Fischer, L. R. (1979). "Francklin, Michael". In Halpenny, Francess G (ed.). Dictionary of Canadian Biography. Vol. IV (1771–1800) (online ed.). University of Toronto Press.
- ^ Michaud, Scott. "History of the Madawaska Acadians". members.tripod.com. Retrieved 6 April 2018.
- ^ Pioneer Journal, Summerside, Prince Edward Island, 9 December 2009.
References
- Arsenault, B. (1994). Histoire des Acadiens. Gasp: Fides.
- Cuthbertson, B.C. (Autumn 1977). "Thomas Beamish Akins: British North America's Pioneer Archivist". Acadiensis. 7 (1): 86–102.
- Dupont, Jean-Claude (1977). Héritage d'Acadie. Montreal: Éditions Leméac.
- Dunn, Brenda (2004). A History of Port-Royal-Annapolis Royal, 1605-1800. Nimbus. ISBN 978-1-55109-740-4.
- ISBN 978-0-393-05135-3.
- Grenier, John (2008). The Far Reaches of Empire: War in Nova Scotia, 1710-1760. University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 978-0-8061-3876-3.
- ISBN 978-0-7735-2699-0.
- Plank, Geoffrey (2001). An Unsettled Conquest: The British Campaign Against the Peoples of Acadia. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-0-8122-0710-1.
- ISBN 978-0-86492-373-8.
External links
- Thematic project on the Acadians at the Dictionary of Canadian Biography
- Acadian Ancestral Home - a repository for Acadian History & Genealogy
- Poitou, Acadie, Bretagne
- Acadian-Cajun Genealogy & History
- CyberAcadie — Site Web sur l'histoire des Acadiens
- Le Pays De La Sagouine
- "Records of the Deportation and Le Grand Dérangement, 1714-1768". Acadian Heartland. Nova Scotia Archives. Retrieved 16 March 2019.
Further reading
- Reid, John G. (1981). Acadia, Maine, and New Scotland: Marginal Colonies in the Seventeenth Century. University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-0-8020-5508-8.
- Reid, John G. (2004). The "conquest" of Acadia, 1710: Imperial, Colonial, and Aboriginal Constructions. University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-0-8020-8538-2.
- Jobb, Dean W. (2005). The Acadians: A People's Story of Exile and Triumph. John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-0-470-73961-7. (published in the United States as "The Cajuns: A People's Story of Exile and Triumph" at Google Books)
- ISBN 978-0-665-25914-2.
- Deveaux Cohoon, Cassie (2013). Jeanne Dugas of Acadia. Cape Breton University Press. ISBN 978-1-897009-71-0.
- Marshall, Dianne (2011). Heroes of the Acadian Resistance:The Story of Joseph Beausoleil Broussard and Pierre II Surette 1702-1765. Formac Publishing Company Limited Halifax. ISBN 978-0-88780-978-1.