Francois Voyer (1801 - 1882)

After spending more or less two months writing about the historical Parent family houses in Beauport, Quebec I think it is only fair that I write a post about François Voyer. This where I  left off before I went to Beauport, Quebec back in June of 2019.

 The story about François Voyer will take a few posts because there seems to be much more that I can say about him. In one post. This post I will go from François' birth to his marriage.

François Xavier Voyer was born on February 18, 1801 to François Voyer (1774 - 1851) and Madeleine Vandal ( 1779 - 1815). As was the custom, François was baptised the next day, February 19, 1801, in L'Ancienne Lorette at Notre - Dame - de - l'Annonciation. François' godfather was Joseph Voyer, his father's brother and his uncle. I had difficulty trying to make out the godmother's name. her first name was Marie but the second name was not clear. It looks like 'Gottin' or 'Godin'. I found references to both of these last names but I cannot determine who this person is. she must be a person of significance to the Voyer family or else she would not be the godmother. This will have to be a research project at some future time.

After François Xavier Voyer's birth and baptism there is no information that I could find until 1825 - 1826. François' mother, Madeleine Vandal, died in 1815 when François was only fourteen years old. His father, François Voyer, remarried in 1816 to Judith Bertrand. This was not unusual in those days because a father could not be without a wife to look after the children and household while he worked.

In the Census of Lower Canada for 1825 François Xavier Voyer is listed as living in Neuville. His name appears in the same column as his future father - in - law Nicolas Faucher. the Census also states that François Voyer was a 'charron' which translates as wheelwright. A wheelwright was someone who built and repaired carriages. This was a trade that was critical to the functioning of the economy in a community. You could say that in 1825, a wheelwright was key to literally keeping the economy moving. All transportation was mainly with a horse and some kind of carriage. A wheelwright would have been the one who would have manufactured the carriages and repaired them. Since François was living and working in Neuville in 1825 and he was located close to Nicolas Faucher in the census it would stand to reason that his residence was close to the residence of the Faucher family in 1825. In fact, he may have been living in the Faucher residence before his marriage to Marie delphine Faucher dit Châteauvert!

The marriage record of François Xavier Voyer and Marie Delphine Faucher dit Châteauvert shows that they were married on August 8, 1826 in Neuville, François was twenty - five years old and Marie Delphine was twenty years old. they were married by the parish priest, Joseph Claude Poulin-Cresse de Courval. who was a person of interest that I will write about in the next post about François Xavier Voyer. This marriage record is a little different than other marriage records in that it mentions the presence of a monseigneur from Quebec City who presented François and Marie Delphine with a 'certificate' on July 29th. I have not heard of married couples being presented with a certificate for their marriage and the marriage records does not mention the nature of this certificate. I could not decipher the name of the monseigneur but I found a few candidates that will require further investigation. The marriage record goes on to say that François Xavier Voyer was a 'maître charron' or master wheelwright. This is the first that I have come across the phrase 'maître charron'. Many of my ancestors have been wheelwrights or 'charron' but this is the first 'maître charron' Either father Couval was being overly generous in his description of François Xavier's profession or it meant that he had already attained a high level of skill in his profession at the age of 25. The record also says that he was a resident of Neuville so he had already been living in Neuville and was probably well established in his wheelwright business before he married Marie Delphine.

The rest of the marriage record us pretty much a boilerplate description. It mentions that François Xavier was the oldest son of François Voyer and Madeleine Vandal of Notre Dame parish in Quebec. Marie Delphine was the youngest daughter of Nicolas Faucher and Marie Angelique Bernard of Neuville. I should mention that Madeleine Vandal was also born in Neuville and that François and Madeleine had been married in Neuville so there was a definitely a familiarity with Neuville for the Voyer family. In the marriage record it states that Nicolas Faucher was a 'cultivateur' or farmer.

In the next post I will continue the story of François Xavier Voyer.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Joseph Joachim Ulric Voyer and Marie Louise Alice Bedard

Francois Parent (1774 - 1851)

The Parent Family in New France