Chronicles

LEBLANC FAMILIES OF RESTIGOUCHE
By Irene Doyle

        Gawd! The Leblancs! Not an easy family to do a short story on, there are way too many, well maybe not too many but too many for me to deal with them all. They are spread out over the whole country, as much in Restigouche then out west. In 1980 it was noted that there were over 100,000 in Canada

        Lets start at the beginning with Daniel Leblanc, the first of that family to settle in New Brunswick with his wife around 1648-49. He married Francoise Gaudet Mercier around 1650 probably in Port Royal although we have no documents to certify this. At the time of her marriage, Francoise was the widow of an unknown Mr. Mercier and she had a daughter named Marie by him. In an early census of Port Royal we find Francoise with her father Jean Gaudet, her brother and sister Marie and Denis Gaudet are present also. It is beleived that she had other brothers and sisters but in France only two records were found for the above siblings. Daniel and Francoise had seven children; six boys and one girl. One of their sons Etienne became a sailor, left for a trip at sea and was never seen or heard of again. The other five sons married and had large families one of the reason for the many descendants of this family. In August of 1695 we find Daniel Leblanc pledging faithfulness to the King of England.

        Today if you visit the little church in Grand Pre, you will find a list of names of the deported compiled by the English (British) soldiers during the days of the 1755 deportation. The list contains 50 Leblanc names who were deported here and there.

        In the registers of Ste Anne of Risitgouche from 1759 to 1795, we find 22 records under Leblanc. Too many to list here but we can say that they represented at least 13 different families. I must also note here that they were not only Leblanc of the Restigouche area, they are listed as being from Baie Ste Marie and the Baie des Chaleurs in general. The same registers for the years 1842 to 1867 only contain three records of Leblanc, the marriage record of Isaac Leblanc and Marie Johnson daughter of Peter Johnson and Jeanie Clair which took place on April 21, 1857 and the record of the baptism of Guillaume their son on December 9, 1857, at the age of 5 months. The record of the death of Leon Leblanc husband of Marguerite Caissie who died at age 74 on August 5, 1859 is also present. These records are all listed as having taken place in Ristigouche.

        The Leblancs seem to multiply from here on in Restigouche as we go through the Marriages of the Restigouche 1888-1919 we find 64 marriages of men with the name Leblanc and 80 women by that name. The Provincial Archives hold files of births for Restigouche from 1888 to 1905 and we find 67 Leblancs born here.

        Today Campbellton only, has listings in the phone book of approximatly 250 Leblancs and the roots keep spreading across the rest of Restigouche County and the Country....

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