Jeanne Dugas of Acadia

by Cassie Deveaux Cohoon

  Jeanne Dugas

  of Acadia

  by Cassie Deveaux Cohoon

  Copyright © 2013 - Cassie Deveaux Cohoon

  This book is a work of fictionalized history. Most of the characters, places and events depicted are based on historical research, but are dramatized for literary consumption. Some characters are products of the author’s imagination.

  All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Cape Breton University Press recognizes fair dealing exceptions under Access Copyright. Responsibility for the opinions, research and the permissions obtained for this publication rests with the author.

  Cape Breton University Press recognizes the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, Block Grant program, and the Province of Nova Scotia, through the Department of Communities, Culture and Heritage, for our publishing program. We are pleased to work in partnership with these bodies to develop and promote our cultural resources.

  Cover image: From photos by Heidi Moses, Fortress of Louisbourg

  Author photo by Tim Snow

  Cover Design: Cathy MacLean Design, Pleasant Bay, NS

  Layout: Mike Hunter, Port Hawkesbury and Sydney, NS

  eBook development: WildElement.ca

  First printed in Canada

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Cohoon, Cassie Deveaux, 1935-

  Jeanne Dugas of Acadia : a novel / Cassie Deveaux Cohoon.

  Includes bibliographical references.

  ISBN 978-1-897009-71-0

  e-pub 978-1-927492-34-5

  mobi 978-1-927492-35-2

  Cape Breton University Press

  P.O. Box 5300

  Sydney, Nova Scotia B1P 6L2

  Canada

  www.cbupress.ca

  1. Dugas, Jeanne, 1731-1817--Fiction. 2. Acadians--Fiction.

  3. Chétican (N.S.)--Fiction. I. Title.

  PS8605.O379J42 2013 C813’.6 C2013-901290-7

  Jeanne Dugas

  of Acadia

  by Cassie Deveaux Cohoon

  Cape Breton University Press

  Sydney, Nova Scotia, Canada

  Contents

  Prologue

  Part 1

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Part 2

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Part 3

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Part 4

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Part 5

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  What Became of...

  Brief Glossary

  Place names

  About the author

  We did, in my opinion most inhumanly, and upon pretences that in the eye of an honest man are not worth a farthing, root out this poor, innocent, deserving people, whom our utter inability to govern or to reconcile gave us no sort of right to extirpate.

  Edmund Burke (1729-1797)

  British statesman, on the Deportation of the Acadians

  Prologue

  Jeanne felt strange as she twirled gently in her new, and first, French-style gown. Strange but excited, as if the dress were a visible aspect of the changes she felt inside.

  It was the Feast Day of Sainte-Anne, July 26, 1744. Jeanne Dugas and her family were celebrating the completion of her studies at the convent of the Congrégation de Notre-Dame, in Louisbourg on Île Royale. Jeanne was thirteen-and-a-half years old and now considered to be “a proper young lady.”

  The gown was made of beautiful cornflower blue silk and she wore it over a white linen chemise. The tight bodice was closed with fabric bows and the skirt fell over a hoop underskirt. Delicate lace edged the large white collar and the sleeves of the chemise that showed below the blue sleeves of the gown. Her dark brown hair was done up in a chignon and covered with a modest white cap edged in the same lace. A blue and green bead choker complemented the ensemble.

  Jeanne did not have the delicate beauty of her older sister, Angélique – she had a beauty all her own. Her features were strong and pleasing, her look direct and serious. She twirled again and smiled to herself.

  —

  Maman and Jeanne’s stepfather, Monsieur de la Tour, had been very surprised when Jeanne asked for a French-style gown for her celebration. It was what Angélique would have wanted but not, typically, Jeanne. Jeanne had always insisted on wearing traditional Acadian dress – a linen chemise under a dark-coloured vest, a striped linen skirt, a bonnet and often a neck scarf. Maman and Monsieur de la Tour were visibly pleased at Jeanne’s choice for this occasion.

  As plans were being made to celebrate Jeanne’s rite of passage on the Feast of Sainte-Anne, Maman had taken Jeanne to a fashionable boutique just beside Le Billard tavern. It sold fabrics imported from France, along with drawings and patterns for the latest styles worn by the elite in Paris.

  Jeanne’s brother Joseph was obviously pleased with the plans, but he did not tease her. It seemed lately as if he was more often treating her as an adult rather than a little sister. He asked her what colour she had chosen for her gown and, a few days before the big day, he gave her a delicate choker made with small blue and green beads.

  “They tell me this is what fashionable ladies are wearing in France,” he said.

  Jeanne beamed at the sight of the beautiful necklace. It would be perfect with her gown.

  And now the big day was here. Joseph, his wife Marguerite, and their children had arrived to join the others at the de la Tour home. Their brother Charles was here too, on a visit from Grand-Pré. They were all in the parlour waiting for Jeanne. As she walked into the room, Jeanne felt rather than heard a gasp. There was a brief silence, as if they were unsure what to say, or if they should say anything at all. But Joseph could not help himself. “Jeanne, you are beautiful!” he said. She blushed, but she was clearly pleased.

  First they went to the Chapelle Saint-Louis, at the garrison of Louisbourg, to attend a special mass in honour of Sainte-Anne. As the de la Tours and the Dugas walked to the front of the Chapelle, Jeanne could not help but feel proud. She did feel a twinge of guilt as they passed the people crowded at the rear – many of them Acadians and many obviously poor – but today was her day.

  After mass, they h
urried to Le Billard. The owner, Marguerite Dugas the widow Beauséjour, had closed the tavern for the day and invited her relatives and a few Acadian friends for the mid-day dinner. She was the cousin of Jeanne’s late father, Joseph Dugas. Monsieur de la Tour had provided some excellent French wine from his own cellar, and Jeanne had her first glass of grown-up wine. After the meal, they went out into the streets to take in the public celebrations for the remainder of the day and into the evening.

  —

  Returning to the de la Tour home, all agreed that it had been a wonderful celebration of both Sainte-Anne and Jeanne, as well as of the fortunes of war thus far. But Monsieur de la Tour was cautious in his toast to the colony of Île Royale, reminding them of the tensions between France and Britain and that their fate as Acadians hung in the balance.

  Before falling asleep that night, Jeanne reviewed the events of the day in her mind. It was a habit she had formed as a very little girl when she had first become aware that things were not always as they appeared. She knew that there were many layers to life in Louisbourg. The people who so joyously celebrated the Feast Day of Sainte-Anne knew very well that the French and the British were once again at war in Europe. They knew that their happiness and well-being could disappear in a puff of smoke. Still wrapped in the warm glow of her celebration, Jeanne knew that if Louisbourg fell, she and her family would be among those most in peril, no matter what her brother Joseph told her.

  —

  A few days after the celebration, Joseph brought an artist to the house on rue de l’Étang to paint a portrait of Jeanne in her beautiful blue gown. Joseph asked the artist to make the portrait small.

  “So we can carry it easily if we have to leave Louisbourg,” he explained to Jeanne.

  Part 1

  An Acadian

  Family

  Chapter 1

  Sometimes Maman grew annoyed with her when she insisted on the fact that she, Jeanne, was Acadian. Maman had said to her once, “Jeanne, you were born here in Louisbourg, and that means that you are French.”

  “No,” she had replied stubbornly, “if all of you are Acadian then I am Acadian too.”

  It was a question that truly vexed her and brought out her stubbornness and determination, even when she was very little. Joseph, at least, agreed with her.

  “Ah well,” Joseph said, “the Acadians are known for being têtu.”

  “Well, there you are,” she had replied, stamping her foot and wondering why everyone found this so amusing.

  —

  Jeanne Dugas’s forebears were one of the families that founded Acadia in the first half of the 1600s. Europeans had fished the area as early as the late 1400s – Portuguese, Basques, Normans and Bretons. At first they would cross the ocean in the spring, salt their catch of fish on board ship, and return to Europe in the fall without touching land. Later, some of them set up temporary fishing outports on land for the duration of the fishing season, but they always returned to Europe in the fall. When contact was made with the Mi’kmaw people, a profitable trade in beaver fur was also developed, and European countries vigorously sought to exploit these riches.

  In 1604, a certain Pierre du Gua, Sieur de Mons, set sail for that new world. The king of France had given him a grant that bestowed on him exclusive fishing and fur-trading rights over a large territory. The grant was given on the condition that he settle and cultivate the land and convert the Native people to Catholicism. The new colony was referred to as “La Cadie.” One of the men on Sieur de Mons’s two ships was Samuel de Champlain, a navigator and mapmaker.

  They spent their first winter on Île Sainte-Croix in the Baie Française, where they almost perished from scurvy and the cold. The following summer they chose a site on the rivière Dauphin, where they built a comfortable shelter. Most importantly, they became friends with the Mi’kmaq, who welcomed them and taught them how to survive in La Cadie. The Frenchmen learned how to cure scurvy by boiling the bark and leaves of evergreen trees to make a kind of tea. They learned what crops could be grown, how to hunt the animals and how to cope with the climate. They formed an alliance with the Mi’kmaq that would last for more than 150 years.

  At about the same time as Acadia was growing, the British established colonies of their own, farther south along the coast, and the ancient rivalry between France and Britain on the European continent was continued in the new world. Over the next hundred years, the land of Acadia would change hands ten times between the French and the British, either through victory in war or by negotiation. For the British, to have control of Acadia was a strategic ploy. It protected their colonies along the north Atlantic coast and guaranteed the freedom of the shipping lanes for commerce. When the British were in charge, they did not bring in many settlers, at least not in the early days.

  So it was really the French who settled and developed the colony of Acadia. In the 1640s, they began a system of dykes to drain the salt marshes near Port Royal and turn them into rich farmland. In the 1670s, a new community was settled in Grand-Pré in the Minas Basin area and another system of dykes put in place. Other communities followed.

  When the French were in control, they had their own authorities. There was a governor, the military and of course the clergy. When the British were in control, the French elites had to leave, but the British, without a large influx of their own settlers, were dependent on the Acadians for locally grown food and meat. By and large, the two peoples accommodated each other. A system of Acadian deputies was created, whereby a delegate from each Acadian community was charged with dealing with the British governor, receiving orders and making the Acadians’ needs known. The success of this system sometimes depended on the disposition of the British governor, but it worked well for some time.

  By the early 1700s, Acadia had been under the control of the French since the signing of the Treaty of Bréda in 1667, and this period was a kind of golden age for the French settlers. They prospered for generations and were now their own people – Acadians.

  The French settlers would originally have come from different areas of France, perhaps have spoken different dialects, have worn different styles of clothing, have had different loyalties. But over time they had become one people: Acadians, a colony of farmers who owned their own land. They were prosperous in a way they could not have been in France. And they had a certain amount of freedom, whether ruled by France or Britain.

  —

  Then, in 1710, the British recaptured Port Royal, and the Treaty of Utrecht, signed in 1713, handed over all of Acadia to the British; the English renamed it Nova Scotia. The French retained Cap Breton and Île Saint-Jean, together renamed the colony of Île Royale.

  France also lost its fishing settlement in Placentia, Newfoundland, and proceeded to establish a fishing outport on Île Royale with some French fishermen and entrepreneurs from Placentia and Saint-Pierre et Miquelon. They named the new outport Louisbourg after the French king. The French authorities encouraged Acadians to emigrate to Île Royale.

  Chapter 2

  Jeanne’s parents, Joseph Dugas and Marguerite Richard, were both Acadians – he born in Port Royal in 1690, she in Grand-Pré in 1694. They met in Grand-Pré and were married there in January 1711. Their first son, Charles, was born in December of the same year.

  Joseph Dugas was a landowner, carpenter, caboteur or coastal navigator and trader. He was one of a new class in Acadia, owning land, but not tied to it to earn a living. With his own schooner he could move about independently. Carpentry was also a portable trade, and a respected one.

  Joseph was one of the young Acadians who worried about the political situation, and his fears were confirmed when Port Royal fell to the English in the autumn of 1710. The mother country, France, had sent very little assistance to the Acadians for that battle, and Joseph was bitter but realistic. Unlike his parents’ generation, he did not believe that the Acadian settlers would now continue to pros
per under British rule.

  Joseph’s family was a prominent, close-knit one and he considered himself a man of some substance. But he had told Marguerite of his misgivings about the political situation before they married and warned her that if she joined her life to his, she must be prepared to follow him. And now, he was determined to leave Acadia, a decision not as difficult for him as for those restricted to farming.

  —

  In 1714, twenty-four-year-old Joseph made arrangements to leave his land in the care of relatives in Grand-Pré before setting sail on his two-masted schooner, the Sainte-Anne, to resettle his family on Île Royale. With him were his wife and their two little sons Charles and Joseph fils, the latter still an infant at his mother’s breast. Joseph also persuaded his father, Abraham, to leave with him. The French authorities were offering a stipend to Acadian settlers to encourage them to move to Île Royale and Joseph Dugas accepted it, leaving his property in Acadia under the care of his brother, Abraham fils.

  Their destination was Port Toulouse, on the southeast corner of Île Royale, on the neck of land that separated the Bras d’Or Lake from the Atlantic Ocean. An earlier French settlement, known as Saint-Pierre, had flourished there in the 17th century, but was destroyed by fire and abandoned. The area had some farmland and, although it was not as rich as that of Acadia, it had attracted some farmers. Joseph knew the area well because of his activities as a caboteur. As the fishing outport at Louisbourg grew to become the capital of Île Royale in the following years, Port Toulouse also grew into an important community, attracting farmers and fishermen, navigators, coastal traders, shipbuilders and loggers.

  Many years later, Marguerite would confess to her daughter Jeanne that when she arrived at Port Toulouse on a cool, grey, overcast day in June of 1714, her heart sank. Living conditions were clearly not what she had been used to in Acadia – now called Nova Scotia. The few habitations were very primitive, consisting of simple vertical log construction, nothing like the solid houses they were used to in Grand-Pré. Most of them were one storey; just a few were a storey-and-a-half. Some had fenced-in yards where farm animals were kept and a few vegetables and herbs were grown. The habitations were close to the water’s edge and a cold dampness penetrated both the houses and their inhabitants.