Unknown Doucet (abt. 1635 - abt. 1704)

Born about 1635 in Coupru, Picardie, France [uncertain]

Ancestors

Wife of Pierre Lejeune — married about 1650 in Port-Royal, Acadie, Nouvelle-France

Descendants

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Biography

Unknown Doucet migrated from France to Acadia.

Unknown Doucet was born about 1635, perhaps in Coupru, Picardie, France, daughter of Unknown Doucet and Unknown Bourg, and niece of Germain Doucet dit La Verdure. ^[1] She does not appear in any of the censuses in Acadie therefore her name and exact date of birth are unknown.

It is possible that her parents arrived in Acadie at the same time as her uncle, Germain Doucet dit Laverdure, as early as 1632 (AC Vachon), with the "300 elite men" ^[1] but certainly by 1640. The earliest historical reference that Germain Doucet was in Acadia is in 1640 from Stephen White ^[2] and Massignon. ^[3] They were among the families residing in Pentagouët, Acadie, in 1641. ^[1]

She married Pierre Lejeune (born in France) around 1650 in Port-Royal, Acadie, Nouvelle-France. ^[2] According to Vachon, it is likely that the marriage took place around 1654, in the presence of her uncle, Germain Doucet, before he returned to France. It is also closer to the birth of their first child around 1656. Pierre was possibly a soldier, as suggested by his "dit" name. ^[1]

Their children were: ^[2]

1. Pierre Lejeune (about 1656–after 1708) .
2. Martin Lejeune (about 1661–after 1729)

They were among the 34 families that chose to remain in Acadie after the destruction and capitulation of Port-Royal in 1654. ^[1]

Research Notes

It had long been established by genealogists that Unknown Doucet was the daughter of Germain Doucet, sieur de La Verdure born in 1595 in France, and his first unidentified wife, and that she was the sister of Germain Doucet, married to Marie Landry.^[2]

Recent discoveries of the Doucet family (see New Doucet Tree) have shed new light on family relationships and disproven several claims:

1) Historian André-Carl Vachon makes the case in his book La Colonisation de l'Acadie : 1632 à 1654 - of what Stephen White long suggested - that Menou d'Aulnay clearly states in his will the Doucet children are Germain's "nieces and nephews" and not his own. Beside the 200£ he left Germain, there is another equivalent of 100£ (livres tournois) for the help he has given Germain's «nephews and nieces», which can only mean Pierre, Germain 2, Marguerite and ___ Doucet. So they are evidently not Germain's children. see p. 23 here. “On luy donnera, je ne luy donne que deux cent livres, mais le secours que je rend à ses nepveux et niepces et tous ceux qui luy touchent va bien à cent livres.”

2) Vachon also presents 6 different dispensations that show that Monsieur Doucet children’s mother was either the sister of Antoine Bourg, or that of Antoinette Landry. (The common denominators are Mr. Doucet and his unknown wife as well as Antoine Bourg and Antoinette Landry.) The following 6 couples were granted dispensations of the 4th degree of consanguinity which means that they were third cousins, and shared great-great-grandparents. However, no blood relationship could be found between them on WikiTree (using the Relationship Finder) when their ancestors were connected to Germain Doucet and his wife (except for Jean Doucet and Anne Bourg who were 2nd cousins twice removed).

See their relationships after connecting Pierre, Marguerite and Unknown Doucet to Monsieur Doucet and Madame Bourg. They now correspond to the dispensations.

• Pierre Pitre & Agathe Doucet
• Charles Guilbeau & Marie-Anne Comeau
• Pierre Doucet & Françoise Comeau
• Jean Baptiste Thibodeau & Marie-Josèphe Doucet
• Jean Doucet & Anne Bourg
• Pierre Richard & Madeleine Doucet

3) Mitochondrial DNA tests made it possible to eliminate the fact that Monsieur Doucet's wife could have been the sister of Antoinette Landry. According to mitochondrial DNA tests of Marguerite Doucet's descendants, the haplotype is T2b7a2. According to mitochondrial DNA tests of Antoinette Landry's descendants, the haplotype is H3a1. So Mr. Doucet's wife cannot be Antoinette Landry's sister, since they do not have the same haplotype.

If we factor in the possibility of a teen-mother being involved, and given the ages, it is quite possible Germain 2 «MIGHT» have been the son of Marguerite Doucet and a Native man, when she was 15 or 16 and then raised by the grandparents. Now no one should add that to their tree or here, but it is a plausible scenario as many others, but would explain why they are considered blood relation in future dispensations. Comment by Denis Savard

Germain was likely adopted by Monsieur Doucet and his wife Madame Bourg at a very early age since he and Marguerite and Pierre were considered siblings in future dispensations.

Notes by Denis Savard, Mothers of Acadia Project, 2023: ^[4]

• The belief that through DNA tests, this person had a Mi'kmaq or Abenaki mother and was either Germain's daughter or adopted, is a wrong interpretation of mt-DNA results. ____ Doucet has not yet been haplotyped through direct descendants yet.

• It is unlikely that she was born in Acadia according to her age, even less from an Abenaki woman as it has been wrongly presented as fact. A native signature is not proven for this profile nor her invented «abenaki» mother.

• Her name is not known through any contemporary records. Some genealogists name her Marie, others Jeanne, but on pure guesswork for convenience.

• She was the wife of Pierre (1) Lejeune, but there is no evidence that she was the mother of Jeanne Lejeune (wife of François Joseph) whose parents remain unknown. Despite the fact no descendants of Jeanne Lejeune dit Briart have tested mt-DNA, a Native signature was attributed to her through her apparent half-siblings. Comment

• White still lists Jeanne Lejeune with no parents, but she is evidently Native according to mtDNA descendants. This belief led many to create a Native wife to Germain Doucet, while he is in fact not known to have any kids, but just a wife (Trahan from records). If he had kids, they went back to France with him in 1654 never to come back. If they did, they left no trace. - (Denis Savard, October 2023)

• Both Doucet brothers are only known to marry once, and neither to a Native women. That was pure speculation from unclear conjuncture.

• 1/3/2023 There are several mentions of Marie Kagijonais [[[Kagijonais-1|Marie Kagijonais (abt.1600-abt.1679)]]] who has been deemed fictional by Stephen White and other Acadian researchers. (Bourque-573 16:48, 3 January 2023 (UTC))

DNA
(FOR REWRITE / DELETION / TRANSFER TO RELATED PROFILES?):

According to Stephen White of the Acadian Studies Centre out of Moncton, New Brunswick, his research, based on a dispensation given for the marriage of Claude Trahan to Anne LeBlanc, leads him to believe that the wife of Pierre Lejeune II was a daughter of Germain Doucet, whose name was unknown (now it is Marie Jeanne). Then we also have to conclude that Germain Doucet had at least two wives and not one, since some of the descendants of his daughter, Marguerite, have tested for the non-Native American Haplogroup T2, yet Jeanne Lejeune dit Briart, who would also be his grand-daughter based on the dispensation, had the Native American Haplogroup A, indicating that her mother, Marie Jeanne, and Marguerite Doucet were half-sisters with different mothers. Therefore, Pierre Lejeune's wife was at least maternally Amerindienne (Metis), or completely Amerindienne. So Marie Jeanne was adopted, as was her brother Germain II. (Source for part of this DNA discussion was the Bra d'Or First Nation study.)

Disproven, as explained above

In the book written by Francois-Edme Rameau de Saint-Pere titled, "Le Canada-Francais Documents sur l'Acadie", he asserts that Pierre Lejeune II who arrived in Acadia as a child married a Mi'kmaq woman. She is believed to be a Doucet (sic: DS). The census of 1686 listed Pierre Lejeune III as being married to Marie Thibodeau and his brother Martin Lejeune as being married to Marie-Jeanne Kagijonias, a Mi'kmaq. After Marie-Jeanne's death, Martin married Marie Gaudet, the daughter of Jehan (Jean) Gaudet and Marie-Jeanne Henry. A 1693 census lists a sister to Pierre, Jr. and Martin named Jeanne, who was married to Francois Joseph, a Mi'kmaq.

According to Rameau de Saint Pere, a Feudal Colony in America, Acadia 1604-1881, Vol 2, p. 318-320, the LeJeune-Briard family was part Metis Native American, and part French. It was a very old family according to the author.The Eastern shores of Acadie have always been a favorite gathering place for the Metis families, where the first one assuredly goes back to the time of the companions of Biencourt, Isaac de Razilly and de LaTour, the early French explorer/settlers.Some of these families were already well into their first or second generation by the time of the 1671 census.

The LeJeune Metis family had settled at Merligouesh (Indian and Metis village located between Cap-de-Sable and La-Heve), because two men from Port Royal had married two of the LeJeune women between 1638 and 1650.In fact, in 1650, Catherine LeJeune, at 17 years of age, married Francois Savoie.Sixteen years earlier, in 1636, her oldest sister, born in 1623, had married Francois Gautherot.

Three of their sons appear to have become "coureurs de bois" with the Indians and Metis:Jean, Francois and Germain Gautherot... These marriages will later be blessed by the Recollets when they come back to Acadia.Jeane Lambert, a woman named LeJeune and perhaps a man named Guildry would have been among them.We will find many of their descendants in the Metis and indian villages.

The LeJeunes will use the surname of Briard:sometimes the surname of their true ancestor, LeJeune; at other times they will assume his surname of Briard which would seem to indicate that their ancestor came from Brie, a region east of Paris.

The consanguinity of the LeJeunes, (called) dit Briard, is sometimes difficult to establish for the reason that many of them will continue to live in Indian and Metis villages; others will settle in Pisiquid, south of the Bassin des Mines.This being said, little remains of the registers from the two parishes of this settlement: Sainte-Famille and l'Assumption.The Acadian ancestor of the LeJeune-Briards had at least three children who reached adulthood: Edmée, Pierre, and Catherine.

The Lejeunes moved several times in subsequent years, first to La Heve in 1686, back to Port Royal in 1698, Petite-Rivere, near La Heve, in 1704, then finally to Pigiguit in 1712. Pierre's younger brother, Martin dit Briard (Labriere), married an Indian woman, Marie-Jeanne Kagijonais, in 1684, then Marie, a granddaughter of Jean Gaudet, at Pigiguit in 1699, where his family settled.

N.B. " A briard is a person which is from Brie, Brie is an area at the east of Paris with the departments (Provinces) of 'Seine et Marne,' 'Val de Marne', 'Essonne', 'Aisne', 'Aube'."This area is the same for not only the Lejeunes, but for Jacob Bourgeois and perhaps Germain Doucet.Often when the name is followed with "dit Briard" or another word which is the name of a town, a region, or an area, it is because the origin of this person."Comments from Francois Roux, Sene, France.

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4} André-Carl Vachon, La colonisation de l'Acadie: 1632-1654, Tracadie, Éditions La Grande Marée, 2022, pp. 60, 64, 101, 134, 142, 229, 286
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3} White, Stephen A., Patrice Gallant, and Hector-J Hébert. Dictionnaire généalogique des familles acadiennes. Moncton, N.-B.: Centre d'études acadiennes, Université de Moncton, 1999, Print. P. 526-527; 1048-1049
3. ↑ Geneviève Massignon. "Les parlers français d'Acadie, enquête linguistique", Librairie Klincksieck, Paris, 1962, 2 tomes, p. 44.
4. ↑ André-Carl Vachon, La colonisation de l'Acadie: 1632-1654, Tracadie, Éditions La Grande Marée, 2022

• http://www.brasdorfirstnation.com/Study/Lejeune_Study.php Bra d'Or First Nation study.

• https://www.acadian.org/genealogy/families/lejeune/ Lejeune Family Information;

• "A Closer Look at the Some of the Records" Acadian-home

• http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/1671_Acadian_Census

• 1686 Census: https://web.archive.org/web/20220518203717/http://www.acadian.org/census1686.html

• 1693 Census https://web.archive.org/web/20220518200116/https://www.acadian.org/census1693.html

• John Austin Young; "The Lejeunes of Acadia and the Youngs of Southwest Louisiana"; John Austin Young, Grand Pere Farm. Pages: 3,9,14

• Rev. Clarence-Joseph d'Entremont; "Histoire du Cap-Sable de l'an mil au Traite de Paris, 1763"; Hebert Publications, Eunice, LA.

• unknown; "Le Canada-Francais; Documents Sur L'Acadie"

• "D'Entremont - "Histoire du Cap Sable, 1763."

• Genealogical Listings for Qalipu Mi'kmaq First Nations complied by Scott Garnier.

• https://www.geni.com/people/Pierre-LeJeune-dit-Briard/6000000003538088363
• http://www.genealogy.com/ftm/l/e/j/Robert-L-Lejeune/GENE1-0002.html