♂Pierre Charles de Poitiers

Pierre Charles de Poitiers (died before 12 October 1660) was a squire of Picardy, in northern France, who bore the title sieur du Buisson and lived at Davenescourt in the 1640s. His orphaned daughter, Marie Charlotte, was married at Québec in New France in October 1660, and the act of her marriage remembers him as the late Pierre Charles de Poitiers, sieur du Buisson, of the diocese of Amiens. He was the seventh great-grandfather of Floyd Amatus Delahorne (1922–2014), through his daughter Marie Charlotte de Poitiers (born about 1641).

Life at Davenescourt

Pierre Charles de Poitiers married Hélène de Belleau, and their daughter Marie Charlotte was born about 1641. He is said to have been a captain of infantry. By the mid-1640s the family was living at Davenescourt, a village in the Somme, and on 21 December 1645 he stood godfather there to Thomas, a son of Gabriel du Montier. The register styles him escuier, sieur de Buisson: an écuyer^W, or squire, was a gentleman of the lesser nobility.

On 8 July 1646 their son Jehan Baptiste was baptized at Davenescourt, with Jehan de Mailly and damoiselle Jehanne de Monchy as his godparents. Two months later, at noon on 12 September 1646, Hélène died there. The records do not give the date or place of his own death, only that he was dead by October 1660.

His daughter in New France

On 12 October 1660, at Québec, Marie Charlotte married Joseph Hébert. The act names her as the daughter of “feu Mre Pierre Charles de Poitiers Sr du Buisson et défunte damlle Hélène de Belleau de l’évêché d’Amiens”, so that both of her parents were dead and the family belonged to the diocese of Amiens. The records do not say when or how she came to Canada.

Notes

Name and rank

His name is given as it stands in the baptism of 1646 and the Québec marriage of 1660, Pierre Charles. In the godparent entry of December 1645 he is written Pierre Potier. The dictionary of Cyprien Tanguay^W, in its entry for Joseph Hébert, calls him Pierre de Poitiers, sieur du Buisson, captain of infantry, and gives his wife as of Amiens, in Picardy; the military rank rests on Tanguay alone.

His death

The marriage act of 12 October 1660 calls him the late (“feu”) Pierre Charles de Poitiers. Another family tree, citing no source, gives his death as 26 August 1654 at “St-Martin d’Annecour” in Picardy, perhaps Davenescourt, whose parish church is dedicated to Saint Martin.

Their son Jehan Baptiste

Fichier Origine, a compiled file of French emigrants to Québec, identifies the Jehan Baptiste baptized at Davenescourt in 1646 with the Jean-Baptiste de Poitiers du Buisson who married Élisabeth Jossard in 1670. If that is right, a brother as well as Marie Charlotte crossed to Canada.