Agate Barriot Daigre Landry

My Sixth Great-Grandmother

(About 1731 to about 1810)

Probably daughter of Pierre Barriot (Barriaud) and Veronque Giroir

Widow of Isadore Daigre

Wife of Anselme Landry

Mother of Firmin Daigre (1751), Marie Agathe Daigre (1752) Marguerite Blanche Daigre (1754), Alexis Daigre (1756)

Marie-Olive Landry (1766), Charlotte-Blanche Landry (1770), Joseph Charles Landry (1771)]

Introduction

Like many of the Acadian women of Agate Barriot’s generation, she was deported by the British from Île St. Jean (now Prince Edward Island). The deportation likely led to the deaths of her first husband and children. About one-third of the Acadians died during the years of forced deportation from L’Acadie. Along with many other Acadians, Agate struggled to make a new life in various parts of France and ultimately returned to North America twenty-five years later.  With her second husband and only surviving child, Agate immigrated to Louisiana. Other Acadian and ancestral mothers from my maternal grandmother’s line who shared a similar experience as Agate were Anna Landry LeBlanc, Magdalena Henry Thibodeau and Marguerite LeBlanc Templet.

Agate Barriot’s Early Life

Details of Agate’s early life are mostly assumptions. At this time, her baptismal record has not been found, but based on Agate’s age in various census records, she was probably born between 1730 and 1731 in L’Acadie.^[1]Agate Barriot’s year of birth is based on six different census records between 1752 and 1795 that provide her age. All are consistent with her date of birth between 1730 and 1731. Sindi Broussard … Continue reading Her parents were probably Pierre Barriot (Barriaud) and Veronique Giroir.^[2]Without a baptismal or marriage record that identifies Agate’s parents, the assumption has been made that Pierre Barriaud and Veronique Giroir are Agate’s parents based on a 1752 census that … Continue reading Pierre and Veronique moved to Île St. Jean around 1750. Her husband to be, Isidore Daigre, also arrived there about the same time.^[3]Tour of Inspection Undertaken by Le Sieur De La Roque,” Report Concerning Canadian Archives for the Year 1905, 2 (1906): p.85, Isidore Daigre and 102, Pierre Barriaud; … Continue reading It is not know if she and Isidore married in L’Acadie or on Île St. Jean. Using the baptismal record of her son Firmin, she probably married Isidore Daigre about 1750.^[4]Depot Des Papiers Publics Des Colonies Etat Civil Amerique Septentrional Ile Saint-Jean 1725-1758; “Canada, Nova Scotia Births and Baptisms, 1702-1896”, … Continue reading

Life on Île St. Jean

As a young married couple on Île St. Jean,  Agate and Isidore had two oxen, two cows, one mare, three ewes, two sows, three pigs, and four fowls or chickens and “they have made a clearing for the sowing of six bushels of wheat.”  Like many other Acadians on Île St. Jean, they were living on land given by Monsieur de Bonnaventure.^[5]“Tour of Inspection Undertaken by Le Sieur De La Roque,” Report Concerning Canadian Archives for the Year 1905, 2 (1906): p.85; digital image, archive.org … Continue reading They had one child, Firmin who was one year old when Le Sieur De La Roque was ordered by the King of France to take a census of the island. Three more children followed Firmin between 1752 and 1756: Marie Agathe, Marguerite Blanche and son Alexis.^[6]Depot Des Papiers Publics Des Colonies Etat Civil Amerique Septentrional Ile Saint-Jean 1725-1758; “Canada, Nova Scotia Births and Baptisms, 1702-1896”, … Continue reading Alexis’s baptism was in Port La Joye on Île St. Jean.

Could Agate have known another one of my ancestors, Magdalena Henry who had married Charles Thibodeau at Port La Joye in 1752? They lived at Rivière du Ouest while Agate lived at Rivière du Nord-Est.

Forced Deportation from Île St. Jean to France

The deportation on Île St. Jean took place in 1758. The British were determined to remove all Acadians from Île St. Jean. Most likely, Isadore, Agate, and her young family boarded a boat bound for France. It is very probable that Agate’s husband and their children died of small pox while in the suffocating hold of an overcrowded ship crossing the Atlantic Ocean. Like many Acadians who shared Agate’s tragedy, Agate had to find a way to honor her first family, but give herself permission to start a new life in a country that was foreign to her, though France was the motherland of the Acadians. 

Monument to those deported from Île St. Jean at the deportation site at Port La Joye. Photos taken 6 June 2022 and held privately by Sindi Broussard Terrien.

At twenty-eight years of age, Agate was the head of a new household in 1759 in Cherbourg, France. She lived there with three of her sisters, Anne, twenty-three years old, Therese, twenty-one years old, and Euphrosyne, sixteen years old, and her brother Jean Baptiste, twenty-six years old.^[7]Rieder, Milton P, The Acadians in France, 1762-1776; Rolls of the Acadians living in France distributed by towns for the years 1762 to 1776 (Metaire, Louisiana, 1967) p. 74; digital image, … Continue reading From Cherbourg, they made their way to Pleudihen, a town on the River Rance near Saint-Malo.

Agate’s Second Family

While in Pleudihen, Agate married Anselme Landry, an Acadian eight years younger than she. He too had been deported and probably arrived from Boulogne, France, in 1763. About a hundred Acadians arrived in Boulogne when a storm took their ship off course during the deportations. Agate and Anselme married 12 February 1765.^[8]Albert J. Robichaux, Jr., The Acadian Exiles in Saint-Malo 1758-1785: Acadian Marriages (Eunice, Louisiana: Hebert Publications, 1981) 3:844. How did Agate keep herself occupied those six years between arriving in France and her marriage to Anselme? 

Agate and Anselme Landry had three children, Marie-Olive, born about 1766 in Pleudihen,  Joseph Charles born in 1770, and Charlotte-Blanche born in 1771.^[9]For Marie-Olive Landry’s birth and baptism, see Albert J. Robichaux, Jr., The Acadian Exiles in Saint-Malo 1758-1785: Family Genealogies H-Z (Eunice, Louisiana: Hebert Publications), 2:522. Joseph … Continue reading

In 1772, Agate was known as a dressmaker and her husband was a seaman in the Saint-Malo area. A census of the Acadians in France noted their occupations. Agate’s sewing skills must have been superb because over 132 Acadian women could sew or weave while twenty-six women were described as “dressmaker.”^[10]Rieder, Milton P, The Acadians in France, 1762-1776; Rolls of the Acadians living in France distributed by towns for the years 1762 to 1776 (Metaire, Louisiana, 1967) pgs. 34-97; digital image, … Continue reading  The following year tragedy visited once more when Joseph Charles, her three-year-old son, died.^[11]Rieder, Milton P, The Acadians in France, 1762-1776; Rolls of the Acadians living in France distributed by towns for the years 1762 to 1776 (Metaire, Louisiana, 1967) p. 74; digital image, … Continue reading

Agate’s Family Attempts Farming in France

Along with many other Acadian families, Agate and Anselme left the Saint-Malo area sometime later and traveled to the Poitou region. The Acadians participated in a farming project at La Ligne Acadienne in Chatellerault that was meant to provide the Acadians with land. Did Agate know the elderly Cecile Dupuis LeBlanc or Cecile’s daughter Marguerite Leblanc Templet  (other ancestral mothers of mine) who were also in the Chatelleraut venture? After a few years, the project failed when the Acadians realized the land was not fertile. Agate and Anselme, as well as most of the Acadian families, left Chatellerault for Nantes. They were in the third of four convoys leaving 7 December 1775.^[12]Albert J. Robichaux, Jr., The Acadian Exiles in Nantes, 1775-1785 (Harvey, Louisiana: Albert J. Robichaux, Jr., 1978) p.102. Agate’s family remained in the Nantes area for ten years.

A New Home in Chantenay

Chantenay, a  neighborhood near Nantes, was the new home for Agate’s family. Since Chantenay is on the River Loire, Anselme probably worked again as a seaman. Sadly, Charlotte-Blanche died when she was nine years old. She was buried 13 July 1780 at Saint-Martin of Chantenay.^[13]Chantenay – Saint-Martin – BMS – 1780-3E250/8, Archives départementales de Loire-Atlantique, cedex 1, p. 36, Sept. 140 Charlotte-Blanche Landry; digital image 37 of 76 … Continue reading Many of the Acadians who lived in Chantenay attended Saint-Martin Catholic Church. Agate must have suffered greatly having lost so many children, four from her first marriage and two from her second marriage; but Marie Olive, her only surviving child, would give her eleven grandchildren and she probably witnessed several of their births.

Agate Immigrates to Louisiana

In May 1785, Agate and Anselme relocated once again. Traveling about thirty miles to Paimbœuf from Nantes, most likely by boat on the River Loire, Agate and Anselme boarded Le Bon Papa for Louisiana. Agate’s family decided to accept the offer the Spanish government presented to the Acadians in France to populate Louisiana and agreed to fund their travel expenses. They were on the first of seven ships to depart from France and arrived in Louisiana on 29 July 1785. (That is 237 years ago today.) Surely, Agate sat with Marguerite LeBlanc Templet during their second crossing of the Atlantic Ocean. Agate’s daughter Marie-Olive, their son-in-law, Paul Dominique Boudreaux, and grandson Paul-Marie were also on board.^[14]Albert J. Robichaux, Jr., The Acadian Exiles in Nantes, 1775-1785 (Harvey, Louisiana, Albert J. Robichaux, Jr., 1978), pgs. 25-26. Agate was about fifty-four years of age.

When Agate’s family arrived in New Orleans, Louisiana, they stayed in camps for about a month near New Orleans to recuperate from the Atlantic crossing. Then they set out to Manchac with others who were on board Le Bon Papa to work the land and build their homes and farms. The Spanish government gave them tools and supplies to start their new lives.

A census was taken in Louisiana in 1795. Agate and Anselme were living in Valenzuela in Lafourche near her daughter and son-in-law with their five children.^[15]Albert Robichaux, Colonial Settlers along Bayou Lafourche 1770-1798 (Harvey, Louisiana, 1974) 2:51. Did Agate or Marie Olive visit Marie Magdelaine Templet Blanchard who also lived in Valenzuela at that time?

Anselme Claims Land in Louisiana

When the United States purchased Louisiana, property owners submitted paperwork to the U.S. Commissioner of Claims to confirm their claim to their property. Agate’s husband claimed the more than 279 acres land that he had cultivated on the left bank of the bayou La Fourche. He was able to prove they lived on the land for more than ten consecutive years and had improved it. Their land was bounded by a Paul Boudreaux, presumably their son-in-law.^[16]Walter Lowrie, Early Settlers of Louisiana as Taken From Land Claims in the Eastern District of the Orleans Territory (Easley, South Carolina: Southern Historical Press, 1986) p. 353.

Conclusion

Though Agate life was full of hardship, she and her husband were able to prosper, having over 279 acres of land. But the greatest riches were the eleven Boudreaux grandchildren who produced more than sixty great-grandchildren and numerous other descendants, all from one daughter, Marie Olive.

Since certainty cannot be established that Veronique Giroir is Agate Barriot’s mother, Agata’s biography will be the last in her ancestral line. There are nine generations from Agate Barriot to me, Sindi Broussard Terrien in just under three hundred years.