♀Marie-Anne Quintal

Marie-Anne Quintal (13 July 1720 – 15 December 1792) was a woman of Boucherville, on the south shore of the St. Lawrence opposite Montréal, where she was born, married three times and died. She was the sixth great-grandmother of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006), through her son Joseph Seraphin Tougas dit Laviolette (1743–1793).

Early life

She was born at Boucherville on 13 July 1720 and baptized the next day in the parish of Sainte-Famille, the daughter of François Quintal (born 1682) and Marie Guertin (1696–1766). She was the second daughter of that name: an elder sister, also Marie-Anne, had been born in December 1718 and buried the following August at eight months old. Her parents had at least thirteen children between 1713 and 1732, three of whom died in infancy.

Her grandfather, also named François Quintal, was baptized at La Rochelle in January 1644, the son of Michel Quintard, a carter and later a tavern-keeper, and Marie Genin. He came to New France in 1662, married Marie Gautier at Québec in 1678, settled at Boucherville, and was buried there in 1715 at about seventy. His marriage record gives his parish as Saint-Sauveur in La Rochelle; the register of Sainte-Marguerite holds his baptism.

Marriages

On 25 November 1739, at Boucherville, she married Guillaume Tougas dit Laviolette (1699–1756), a widower living in the neighboring parish of Longueuil. The register names her parents as François Quintal and Marie “Quentin”. Two banns were read in the groom’s parish and the third was dispensed. Their son Joseph Seraphin, born in 1743, later went west to Vincennes, and the family line runs through him.

Guillaume was buried at Boucherville in December 1756. Five months later, on 2 May 1757, she married François Chicot, a widower, at Boucherville; the register calls her the widow of Guillaume Tougast, and her father François Quintal was present. A genealogy of the French families of the Detroit River region, which spells the name Cicotte, records a son Francis by this marriage.

Three children were baptized at Boucherville to the Chicot marriage. The eldest, François, was baptized on 6 March 1758, and he is the Francis of the Detroit compilation. Two sons were each named Toussaint: the first was baptized on 1 November 1759 and buried on 12 March 1760, and the second was baptized on 22 November 1760 and buried on 26 November 1760.

On 18 February 1765, at Boucherville, she married Jean Morel dit de La Durantaye, a widower. Tanguay’s dictionary gives him as born about 1729, the son of Louis Morel and Marguerite Dumont, and calls her the widow of François Chicot. No children of this marriage are known.

Death

She died at Boucherville on 15 December 1792, aged seventy-two. She was buried at Boucherville on 16 December 1792, and the burial record names her husband Jean Morel dit de La Durantaye.

Notes

The Detroit compilation gives her birth as 14 July 1720, which is the day of her baptism; the register gives her birth as the 13th.