Descendants of pioneers in Canada

A few years ago, an article appeared in the genealogy publication "Mémoires"^*, which listed the 12 most prolific early pioneers couples. I completed this list by adding data from "Dictionnaire généalogique des familles du Québec des origines à 1730" by René Jetté, (how to obtain it) namely the individuals' place of origin, their year of arrival in New France, and the date and place of marriage, where it was known. For current updates, you may check the Complement to Jetté.

As on can see, the majority of these early pioneers came from the former province of Perche. We also know that in 1730 the population of New France was 35 297 people. If we estimate the total number of descendants produced up to that date to be approximately 50 000, it then means these twelve couples are responsible for about a third of all descendants. A truly impressive feat! It's no wonder these family names are now so common place in Canada, and even in North America.

For those that would like to know more, it would prove useful to compare the total number of descendants at two other times, that is until 1760 ^a, and until 1800 ^b.

Descendants of pioneers in New France:   1608 - 1730
Name	Origin	Spouse	Origin	Year of arrival	Marriage	Descendants
Jean Guyon dit du Buisson	St-Jean-de-Mortagne Perche	Mathurine Robin	St-Jean-de-Mortagne Perche	1634	02-06-1615	2 150
Zacharie Cloutier	St-Jean-de-Mortagne Perche	Sainte Dupont	St-Jean-de-Mortagne Perche	1634	18-07-1616 Mortagne, Perche	2 090
Jacques Archambault	Dompierre-sur-Mer Charente-Maritime	Françoise Tourault	Dompierre-sur-Mer Charente-Maritime	ca. 1645	24-01-1629 Chantonnay, Vendée	1 825
Marin Boucher 1	St-Langis-les-Mortagne Perche	1) Julienne Baril 2) Perrine Mallet	Courgeout Perche	1634	1) m. 07-02-1611 St-Langis 2) m. ca. 1629 St-Langis, Perche	1 454
Noël Langlois	Alençon Perche	Françoise Grenier	unknown	1634	25-07-1634 Québec	1 388
Abraham Martin 2 dit l'Écossais	unknown	Marguerite Langlois 3	unknown	1619	ca. 1620 France	1 363
Pierre Miville dit le Suisse	Fribourg Suisse	Charlotte Maugis	St-Germain Charente-Maritime	1649	ca. 1629 or 1631 Brouage Saintonge	1 331
Pierre Gagnon 4	Tourouvre, Mortagne Perche	Renée Roger	unknown	n/a 4	ca. 1597 France	1 250
Pierre Desportes 2	évêché Lisieux Normandie	Françoise Langlois 2	unknown	1619	ca. 1619 France	1 117
Louis Hébert 2	Paris	Marie Rollet	Paris	1617	ca. July 1602 Paris	1 053
Nicolas Pelletier	St-Pierre de Gallardon arr. Chartres Beauce	Jeanne Voisy	St-Pierre de Gallardon arr. Chartres Beauce	ca. 1637	ca. 1632 St-Pierre de Gallardon	939
Pierre Gareman 1 dit le Picard	Bagneux, arr. Soissons Picardie	Madeleine Charlot	Bagneux, arr. Soissons Picardie	ca. 1639	ca. 1628 Bagneux	891
Total number of descendants						16 851

¹ François Boucher, son of Marin from the first marriage, marries Florence Gareman, daughter of Pierre. Perrine Mallet is Marin's second wife.
² Hélène Desportes, daughter of Pierre, marries Guillaume Hébert, son of Louis.  According to Dict. Jetté, Hélène is baptised in Québec on 7 July 1620, thus making her the first European child born in New France. She also comes ahead of Eustache Martin who was born on 24 October 1621 in Québec.
See also the story of the "Plains of Abraham".
³ Marguerite and Françoise Langlois are sisters of one another.
⁴ Died in France; only his wife and 3 children came to Canada.

province of Perche:  now in the department of Orne (61)
province of Saintonge:  now in the department of Charente-Maritime (17)
province of Normandie:  now in the department of Calvados (14)
province of Beauce:  now in the department of Eure-et-Loir (28)
province of Picardie:  now in the department of Aisne (02)

^*  Marcel Fournier, "L'immigration européenne au Canada des origines à 1765", Mémoires de la Société généalogique canadienne-française, vol. 42, #2, p. 106-124 (1991). In 1989, he published a book under the same title at Éditions du Fleuve.

^a MSGCF, vol. 48, #2, p. 158 (1997)   ;   ^b MSGCF, vol. 48, #1, p. 53 (1997).

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