Approve Jeanson as the standard Acadian last name?

Question

The Acadian project adopted a standard last name list because of the variety of spellings in that era.  In his original list, Stephen A White did not have a name for Jeanson/Johnson.  He added Jeanson in a 2003 update and now it is proposed that Jeanson be added to our standard last name list as well.  Is there any discussion about using Jeanson as a standard last name?

Answer 1

This seems reasonable to me since the Acadian Project and WT community long ago decided to standardize the name spelling to what is in the DGFA (Stephen White's monumental dictionary). We know that the family was originally from the Great Britain area (Scotland ?) so Johnson would have been the spelling there. However, we also know that the area he emigrated to was French-speaking and that the family quickly adopted the French customs and language.

Following the deportations (1755-1785), some of the descendants settled in the French-speaking part of Louisiana where Jeansonne became the preferred spelling over time. There are 1088 records for Jeansonne in SW Louisiana church volumes and 43 Jeanson entries). The Wall of Names Booklet contains 5 entries of people with that surname with spelling of Jeanson. This booklet is published by the Wall of Names Committee (at the Acadian Memorial in St. Martinville, Louisiana), which made a valiant attempt to identify ALL of the Acadians who came to Louisiana from 1764 - 1785. There are around 3,000 entries.

Our policy is to include alternate spellings in the Other Last Name field and to Project Protect (PPP) profiles with names that have many variations.

Thanks Cindy for bringing this to the community at large.

Comments

Thank you for that background, Jackie.  I'd like to put some of it on the family profiles so the name relationship is better understood.

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Good idea--edit freely. I edited this to add that it could also be appropriate to have a surname and a current name that has a different spelling when name spelled changed in one generation.

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This happens to some of my Brits in colonial New Amsterdam too. Edward(s) become Eduard(s) etc, as a LNAB. I think it makes sense to assimilate the emigrant into the lingua franca, as it were. When in Rome.

The trick is "timing" any later reversions back to the anglo spellings, correctly.

Answer 2

Guillaume Jeanson (William Johnson) has a profile in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography:

Biography – JEANSON, GUILLAUME – Volume IV (1771-1800) – Dictionary of Canadian Biography (biographi.ca)

The Nova Scotia Archives lists a number of Jeansons who were baptized in St. Jean-Baptiste, Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia from 1702 to 1755:

Nova Scotia Archives - An Acadian Parish Remembered

His son is Charles Jeansonne: 

Charles Jeansonne (1717-bef.1766) | WikiTree FREE Family Tree

Will the alternate spelling be included?

Comments

Yes any record with the alternative spelling (often Johnson) would be included in Other Last Name.

Thank you for the research that supports this Jeanson name.