Slavery has allowed many societies to generate income at the expense of the exploited. While the history of slavery is no secret, few Canadians know that their ancestors benefited from this exploitation under the pretense of white superiority. As early as 1629, until its abolition in 1834, Natives and Black people were enslaved by the French and British colonists living in Quebec.

The first individual to be enslaved in New France is believed to be Olivier Le Jeune, an eight-year-old child from Madagascar who was taken into slavery by the Kirk brothers. Olivier Le Jeune died at about 30 years of age as a servant to Guillaume Couillard. The term servant, a translation of the French word domestique, is used here because the institution of slavery was not yet legal* in New France at the time. The document illustrated in Figure 1 is the only religious record available on this Malagasy child. Exhaustive studies of correspondence have made it possible to know his history and origin.

« Le 10 de may mourut a l’hopital Olivier Le Jeune domestique de Monseigneur Couillar après avoir reçu le sacrement de confession et communion par plusieurs fois il fut enterré au cemetiere de la paroisse le mesme jour. »

Which translates to:

“On the 10th of May died at the hospital Olivier Le Jeune servant of sir Couillar after receiving the sacrament of confession and communion he was buried at the cemetery of the parish the same day. “

Figure 1. Olivier Le Jeune: first Black slave that we know of in Quebec
Source: Record 68801, LAFRANCE, GenealogyQuebec.com

Olivier le Jeune is the first proof of slavery in the St. Lawrence Valley. Marcel Trudel, a pioneer in the study of slavery in Quebec, lists 4,185 Native and Black slaves in the Valley from the 17th to the 19th century (Trudel, 2004). These slaves were mainly acquired through alliances with First Nations, and were war prisoners from various enemy nations of the Native groups allied with the French colonists (Rushforth, 2012).

However, this number only counts the slaves that were found in written records. We believe there were approximately 10,000 Native slaves in New France between 1660 and 1760, but we only know the names of 1,200 of them (Rushforth, 2016).

The trace of slaves in the archives can be subtle and difficult to find. Few researchers have tackled the monumental task of identifying them. First, the term slave only started appearing in official documents around 1709, when Intendant Raudot normalized slavery on the territory of Quebec. (Trudel, 1990: xvi). However, priests remained reluctant to use the term. In the parish archives available on PRDH-IGD.com and GenealogyQuebec.com for the period, the word esclave (slave) is only listed 207 times. The term Panis was more commonly used to designate Native slaves. Among these is young Paul, slave of Paul Lecuyer, who resides in Montreal. His baptismal record illustrated in Figure 2 reads as follows:

« Ce jour d’huy dixseptième aoust mil sept cent quatre a esté baptisé paul sauvage de la nation des panis aagé environ de dix ans demeurant en la maison de paul lecuyer habitant de cette parroisse qui dit avoir achepte le dit sauvage pour la premierre fois desdits sauvages panis et aiant este pris esclaves par d’autres sauvages nommés les renards. Il la rachepte deulx et a le dit paul lecuyer este le parain dudit enfant baptisé et sa femme nommée francoise leconte en a este la maraine quy ont promis l’eléver et l’instruire en la foy catholique apostolicque et romaine aiant dessein de le re tenir a leur service tout autant de temps quil plaira a Dieu de disposer de luy a la mareinne signé et le parain a declaré ne seavoir escrire ny signer de ce enquis suivant l’ordonnance. »

Which translates to:

“Today, the 17th august 1704 has been baptized paul savage aged around 10 years old staying in the house of paul lecuyer living in this parish who claims having purchased said savage from the panis savages which had been enslaved by others savages named les renards. He was bought from them and said paul lecuyer is the godfather of the baptized child and his wife named francoise leconte is the godmother who have promised to raise him and instruct him in the faith of the apostolic and roman catholic church and to keep him under their service for as long as God wills. The godmother signed and the godfather has declared not knowing how to write or sign, as is inquired.”

Figure 2. Baptism record of Paul, slave of Paul Lecuyer
Source: Record 13744, LAFRANCE, GenealogyQuebec.com

This baptism record shows that young Paul is not mentioned as being the slave of Paul Lecuyer, but only as living in [his] house of and in their service. The priest, however, emphasizes that his godparents, as his owners, will raise him in the Catholic religion, without questioning the legitimacy of the presence of this young Native in the household. This demonstrates the normalization of the practice.

There are no other records mentioning this slave. We cannot find a burial record for this child so far, although his godparents promised to raise him within the Catholic faith; it appears that they did not offer him a burial on Catholic soil. Was he sold? Did he manage to escape his servile condition? These questions, unfortunately, remain unanswered.

Portrait of a Haitian woman, believed to have been the slave of the wife of the Quebec painter François Beaucourt. 1786, Wikimedia Commons

To identify slaves in the records, it is often necessary to use deduction based on the words and innuendos used by the priests. Even when PRDH-IGD identifies an individual as a slave, the word itself is generally not written explicitly in any of the records pertaining to the individual.

For example, let us look at the case of Marguerite Françoise, a young Panis girl baptized at the age of 14, whose baptism is illustrated in figure 3. The priest indicates that she is a savage of the Panis nation. That in and of itself is enough to deduce her slave status (Trudel, 1960). In addition, the last sentence of the baptism record mentions that it is signed by Louise Bizard wife of Mr. Dubuisson, captain of the troops and master of said savage. The mention of master clearly implies that Charles Dubuisson owns Marguerite Françoise and that she has no vocation other than serving Charles Dubuisson and his family.

« Le dixseptieme avril mil septcent dix huit a été baptisée par nous soussigné curé et official de quebec marguerite francoise sauvagesse de la nation des panis agée de quatorze à quinze ans son parain a été sieur charles dubuisson et la maraine dame marie magdelaine dubuisson qui on déclaré ne seavoir signer et en leur place a signé madame louise Bizard epouse de M. Dubuisson capitaine des troupes et maitre de ladite sauvagesse »

Which translates to:

“The 17^th of april 1718 baptized by us undersigned, Marguerite Françoise, savage of the nation of Panis aged between fourteen and fifteen her godfather was sir charles dubuisson and her godmother was marie magdelaine dubuisson both of which declared not knowing how to sign and in their stead signed by Mrs. louise bizard wife of M. Dubuisson captain of the troops and master of the said savage”

Figure 3. Baptism record of Marguerite Françoise, slave of Charles Dubuisson.
Source: Record 64150, LAFRANCE, GenealogyQuebec.com

It is thanks to the use of these terms and innuendos that Marcel Trudel was able to form the Dictionnaire des esclaves et leurs propriétaires in 1990 (revised in 2004), listing 4,185 Black and indigenous slaves who lived in the St. Lawrence Valley. This research was carried out using parish records, but also using patient registers from various hospitals, censuses, notarial records, and other types of documents. Further research in the archives may reveal more and allow us to find the slaves missing from this initial work.

In the next articles of this series, we will discuss the place and living conditions of slaves who lived in Quebec under the French British colonist regimes. This research is based on the discoveries of Marcel Trudel and deepened by my personal research as well as that of my fellow researchers working on the subject.

Cathie-Anne Dupuis
Master’s student in demography and doctoral candidate in history at Université de Montréal and collaborator to the Programme de recherche en démographie historique (PRDH)

*Slavery did exist at that time, the practice of slavery being customary in nature. The standard which guarantees the property of slaves to owners is permitted with the ordinance of Raudot in 1709 (Gilles, 2008).
N.B The word “savage” is only quoted for historical representation, we condemn the use of this word in any other context.

GILLES, D. 2008. La norme esclavagiste, entre pratique coutumière et norme étatique : les esclaves panis et leur statut juridique au Canada (XVIIe – XVIIIe s.) Ottawa Law Review, vol. 40, No.1, p. 73 – 114
RUSHFORTH, B. 2012. Bonds of Alliance, Indigenous and Atlantic Slaveries in New France, Caroline du Nord, University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 406 p.
RUSHFORTH, B. et KAHN, A. 2016. Native American Slaves in New France, Slate, History, Then, again. [en ligne] URL: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/history/2016/01/an_interactive_record_of_native_american_slavery_in_new_france.html (page consultée le 27 octobre 2020)
TRUDEL, M. 1960. L’esclavage au Canada français, histoire et conditions de l’esclavage, Québec, Les Presses Universitaires Laval, 432 p.
TRUDEL, M. 1990. Dictionnaire des esclaves et de leurs propriétaires au Canada français, Québec, Éditions Hurtubise HMH ltée, 490 p.
TRUDEL, M. 2004. Deux siècles d’esclavage au Québec, Québec, Éditions Hurtubise HMH ltée, 405 p.

Smallpox was a highly contagious and often fatal disease which was a real plague in several regions of the world until its eradication in 1979. Its impact on Quebec during its colonial period was discussed in the first part of this article.

An 1802 cartoon of the early controversy surrounding Edward Jenner’s vaccination theory, showing using his cowpox-derived smallpox vaccine causing cattle to emerge from patients. Wikimedia Commons.

Smallpox struck Quebec for the last time in 1885. Almost a century had passed since the conception of the smallpox vaccine, yet vaccination was not widespread among French Canadians despite efforts by governments to encourage or even impose it.

In March 1885, a conductor of the Grand Trunk Railway brought smallpox to Montreal. His bedsheets then infected Pélagie Robichaud, a worker in the laundry room of the hospital where the man was receiving treatment. She was the first to victim of the 1885 smallpox epidemic. Her burial indicates that she passed away in Montreal on April 2^nd.

Source: Image d1p_1101a1007.JPG, Drouin Collection Records (Québec/Fonds Drouin/Mtl/Catholique/Montréal (Basilique Notre-Dame)/1880/1885/Sépultures/), GenealogyQuebec.com

Following the contagion of Pélagie Robichaud, the disease killed several thousand people in 1885 and 1886, with Montreal at the center of the epidemic. Vaccination was imposed on Montrealers, not without resistance: several anti-vaccination riots broke out among the suspicious population.

The anti-vaccine movement had influential figures on its side. Joseph Émery-Coderre, an eminent doctor campaigning against compulsory vaccination, is a notable example. The Catholic Church was called in to convince the reluctant population. Édouard-Charles Fabre, Bishop of Montreal at the time, played a decisive role in garnering public support for the vaccination campaign; he would order the priests of his diocese to do the same.

This crisis arose in a complex political context: it broke out at the same time as the North West rebellion, during which the Métis of the Prairies revolted against the Canadian government. The Métis of Western Canada, who are primarily descended from French Canadians and First Nations, were mostly French-speaking and Catholic, and their rebellion enjoyed considerable support in Quebec.

Its failure, which notably resulted in the hanging of Louis Riel, considerably exacerbated tensions between Francophones and Anglophones in Quebec as well as the distrust of French Canadians towards government directives. John A. Macdonald, then Prime Minister of Canada, is credited with the phrase “[Riel] shall hang though every dog in Quebec bark in his favour.”

Louis Riel and the Métis provisional government. Wikimedia Commons.

French and English-language newspapers were passing the buck, on the one hand evoking the hysteria of English Canadians and on the other hand the uncleanliness of French Canadians. On September 12th, 1885, L’Union des Cantons-de-l’Est, based in Victoriaville, published an article on the alleged ravages of smallpox. Here is the introduction:

” If we were to believe the American newspapers published in English, we would think that smallpox is decimating the good city of Montreal. Practically speaking, our commercial metropolis is currently in quarantine at this time! Many people are suffering, and many more will suffer from this state of affairs. And whose fault is it? It is your city’s press, good people of Montreal. It spread everywhere that smallpox was eating away at you, that the plague was taking on horrible proportions, that the whole city was going to have to go through it. “

Thus, this article accuses English-language newspapers of greatly exaggerating the proportions of the smallpox epidemic, especially since English Canadians seemed to attribute the gravity of the situation to French Canadians:

” Now, as there needs to be a bête noire everywhere, it was imagined that French Canadians must be the originators and propagators of the epidemic. The Montreal Herald accused our conationals of being ignorant, dirty, filthy, etc. This is a big slander! Our French Canadian women are generally clean, industrious, spending three quarters of their time washing and cleaning in their homes. “

However, this article does not reject science and recognizes the shortcomings of the French-Canadian population when it comes to hygiene.

” The ravages of indifference to reading and science are infinitely more to be feared than those of smallpox in Montreal, whose victims do not exceed a few dozen. “

      

Source: Image 00080.jpg, Drouin Institute’s Miscellaneous Collections (23 – Journaux anciens/L’Union des Cantons de l’Est (Arthabaskaville)/1867-1887/1885/), GenealogyQuebec.com

Also in September 1885, however, remedies and recipes for smallpox were published in L’Union des Cantons-de-l’Est, perpetuating the idea that vaccination was superfluous at best, if not dangerous.

” I remember reading in the (Journal de l’Instruction publique) that the Sarracenia root was an antidote against this disease. Quickly I set to work, I sent my altar boy, a young Montagnais, to fetch me the plant in question, we infused the root, scarcely had they taken two or three potions that they felt sensibly better, the fever disappeared, the pustules dried out, they were out of danger, they did not even bear the marks of smallpox. ”

” When Jenner discovered the cowpox vaccine in England, the world of science wanted to strike lightning upon his head; but when the most learned medical school in the universe, that of Paris, published this recipe for smallpox, it passed without a hitch. It is as infallible as fate and wins in all cases.
Zinc sulphate, 1 grain ; digitalis, 1 grain ; 1 1/2 teaspoon of sugar. Mix with two tablespoons of water. When the mixture is perfect add four ounces of water. Take a teaspoonful every hour. The disease will go away within twelve hours. “

              

Smallpox is a highly contagious and often fatal disease which was a real plague in several regions of the world until its eradication in 1979. It has invaded the French Canadian population on numerous occasions since the start of the colony, wreaking havoc in parishes.

It is under the names of petite vérole or picot(t)e that smallpox is most often designated in Quebec registers. This name of picote originates from the blisters which covered the bodies of the victims.

Illumination presenting a disease which seems to be smallpox, Toggenburg Bible (Switzerland), 1411. Wikimedia Commons.

The parish priest of L’Islet, a village in the historic region of Côte-du-Sud on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River southwest of Quebec City, highlighted the usage of these two terms in a rare note in the margin of a burial record. He registered on August 24th, 1792 the death of Marie Louise Bernier, 19th and “last dead of this disease, that is to say of the petite vérole or picote in Canadian or French terms since October 23rd, 1791”.

Source: Image d1p_51740348.jpg, Drouin Collection Records (Québec/Registres paroissiaux 1621-1876/L/L’Islet (Notre-Dame-du-Bon-Secours)/1790/1792/), GenealogyQuebec.com

Smallpox is the disease involved in the voluntary contamination of enemy First Nations with infected blankets during Pontiac’s War, an initiative reportedly approved by British officer Jeffrey Amherst. This event has been on the news in the past few years as the City of Montreal decided to rename Amherst street to “Atateken”. As smallpox was not present in America before the arrival of the Europeans, it was especially deadly among the Natives, who had no prior immunity.

On May 4th, 1709, Louis Miskouabemich, a man of the Nepissing First Nation, was baptized in Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue. The record says he was 110 years old, which is unlikely but certainly indicates an advanced age. The elder had previously received the ondoiement, a quick ceremony that takes the place of baptism if death is likely to occur before a proper baptism can be organized.

Indeed, Louis “[was] dangerously sick of small pox”. His age and possibly his social position gave him a very advantageous sponsorship: his godfather was none other than Philippe de Rigaud, Marquis de Vaudreuil, who was then Governor of New France. His wife Élisabeth de Joybert held the role of godmother. The couple were absent and represented at the ceremony by a couple of local notables.

Louis Miskouabemich died on June 27th of the same year.

Source: Record 14937, LAFRANCE, GenealogyQuebec.com

Smallpox was known to cause miscarriages and premature deliveries, and increase infant mortality rates. Many of these instances can be found in Quebec registers.

Marie Huguet dit Latour, from L’Ancienne-Lorette, near Quebec City, experienced a tragic end in 1755: “the first picotée who brought it from Quebec City died pregnant her child baptized by the midwife in its mother’s womb”. Her death occurred only 6 months after her marriage. The child, therefore assumed to be highly premature, clearly did not survive as it was ondoyé while still in the womb.

Source: Record 259406, LAFRANCE, GenealogyQuebec.com

Other traces of premature births due to smallpox can be uncovered in the Lachine registers. For example, in 1702, the burial of a child “born last night aged seven months his mother being sick of smallpox and in case of danger he was ondoyé by Jeanne Malteau the midwife”.

Source: Record14627, LAFRANCE, GenealogyQuebec.com

However, the family reconstructions available on PRDH-IGD tell us that the mother, Barbe Brunet, overcame the disease and died in Châteauguay at the respectable age of 74.

A few months after this child’s burial, a woman named Marie Fortin “died last night of smallpox while giving birth to a girl aged six and a half months who was immediately ondoyé by the midwife and then died and was buried in the same grave as her mother”.

Source: Record 14654, LAFRANCE, GenealogyQuebec.com

Smallpox also took an active part in a historic drama, the Expulsion of the Acadians by Great Britain and its American colonies in 1755, during which over 12,000 of them were torn away from their lands. Smallpox developed in certain groups, adding to the scourges of hunger, thirst, cold and other diseases that were already decimating the Acadians.

From the hundreds that reached Quebec, many were severely weakened by smallpox. The numerous burial records marked with “acc” or “acad” in the Quebec City registers, identifying Acadian deaths, are testimonies to this tragedy. The winter of 1757-1758 was particularly deadly.

December 26th to 28th, 1757, Notre-Dame-de-Québec. Note the numerous “Acad” margin notes on these pages of the Québec register.
Source: Image d1p_31431309.jpg, Drouin Collection Records (Québec/Fonds Drouin/QC/Catholique/Québec (Notre-Dame)/1750/1757/), GenealogyQuebec.com

The wandering of Acadians in exile would sometimes last several years, as illustrated by the burial in the cemetery of Saint-Cuthbert of Catherine, “Cadienne [Acadian woman] who died of smallpox after receiving all her sacraments as soon as she arrived in the said parish”, on November 6th, 1769.

Source: Record 440471, LAFRANCE, GenealogyQuebec.com

It appears that smallpox also affected the British army garrisoned in Quebec City. In the registers of Berthierville, formerly called Berthier-en-Haut, we can find this curious record, written in English:

We the undernamed persons do hereby certify that John Mackffee, soldier in the 28^th Regiment and in Captain Darlis (?) Company and Jennet Forah were married and lawfully entered the bond of Matrimony, and that some time after, said Macfee was, by the Providence of God seized with the Small Pox and dyed at Quebec in June 1766
dated at Quebec the 10^th day of September 1766

Source: Record 741600, LAFRANCE, GenealogyQuebec.com

This is followed by a paragraph written in French, which deems this strange act appropriate and authorizes the widow to contract a new marriage if she wishes.

This mortuary record appears to be in a suitable form according to the customs of the troops of this province; even though I do not know the signatures; if the person whose death is attested is the same person with whom the person who presents herself for a new marriage was married, you can regard her as a widow and carry on. Only take care to verify her name as much as you can
in Montreal on May 6th, 1768

Source: Image d1p_1161b0055.jpg, Drouin Collection Records (Québec/Fonds Drouin/B/Berthierville/1760/1766/), GenealogyQuebec.com

10 years later, smallpox played an important role in the failure of the invasion of British Quebec by the American revolutionaries in 1775-1776. An epidemic in the rebel ranks considerably reduced the troops available and forced the abandonment of the project of conquest.

Thus, smallpox periodically affected the inhabitants of Quebec for two centuries with epidemics of varying severity. It struck Quebec for the last time in 1885. Montreal then became the epicenter of a severe epidemic. This crisis and its repercussions, both sanitary and political, will be discussed in the second part of this article.

Marielle Côté-Gendreau
Student and Université de Montréal’s Programme de recherche en démographie historique (PRDH) collaborator.