Generation 5 - Acadian Settlement in Nipisiguit

Michel Pitre

This Michel Pitre, son of Michel & Marie-Josephe Orillon, was born on 20th of June 1763 in Nicolet, Qu�bec. He later moved with his mother and father to Nipisiguit now Bathurst, N.B where he settled with his family and also became a farmer. Michel Pitre married Marguerite Boudreau on June 3, 1789 in Caraquet, N.B.

The Acadian house around 1790 was a wood-framed structure on a basalt fieldstone foundation. A massive hearth, oven and chimney stood at one end of a single room. The walls were partly infilled with clay and the roof was made of birch shingles.

The lot plan from Avenue St-Pierre in West Bathurst shows where our ancestor Michel Pitre and his family were living in 1807.

Michel Pitre, husband of Marguerite Boudreau passed away in Nipisiguit on January 29, 1817.

Marguerite Boudreau

Marguerite was born around 1770. Her parents, Joseph Boudreau and Jeanne Marie Hach�-Gallant were married in Restigouche near the border of New Brunswick on January 7, 1761. Restigouche is now in Quebec on the border of New Brunswick and on the Baie des Chaleurs where many Acadians hid until the end of the war. Her family moved to the Island of Miscou (near Caraquet) sometime before the birth of her brother Jean in 1776. Marguerite Boudreau had seven brothers and sisters.

Her father Joseph Boudreau was the son of Anselme & Marguerite Gaudet, born around 1738, he died at 59 in Bathurst on December 8, 1797. Her mother, Marie-Jeanne Hach� was the daughter of Jacques & Josette Boudreau. Marie-Jeanne Hach� died in Petit-Rocher on February 15, 1825 at the age of 90.

Marguerite Boudreau's marriage to Michel Pitre took place on June 3, 1789 in Nipisiguit [Bathurst] , the same day her sister Rose was married to Dominique Pinet. Both marriages were registered in Caraquet. The parish of St-Peter (later Ste-Famille) was a mission from 1620 and even in 1798 when the first Church was built, baptism, marriages and deaths were registered by passing missionnaries.

Marguerite Boudreau is a descendant of Michel Boudreau and Michelle Aucoin

The following children were born of Michel Pitre and Marguerite Boudreau:

1. Marie Pitre born around May 25, 1790, married Pierre Roi of Joseph & Madeleine Daigle on Feb. 12, 1811 in Bathurst
2. Ang�lique Pitre born around 1793 married Michel Lavigne of Jean & Elizabeth Beaudry on Nov. 15, 1813 in Bathurst.
3. Esther Pitre born November 3, 1794 married 1- Michel Daigle (Widower of second marriage to Mathilde Landry) on April 29, 1822 2- Michel Bazilie Sept. 29, 1838.
4. Ang�le Pitre born Sept. 10, 1795 died in 1800 and was buried Sept. 16, 1800
5. Pierre Pitre born April 13, 1799, in Bathurst married Marie Marguerite Hach� Gallant daughter of Sylvain & Anastasie Lavigne on Oct. 10, 1819
6. Marguerite Pitre born February 14, 1801 married Joseph Hach� son of Michel & Marie Godin on June 14, 1819 in Bathurst
7. Michel Pitre born January 1, 1803 married Luce Hach� on Aug. 21, 1825 in Bathurst
8. Angelle Pitre born August 20, 1804 married Michel Daigle (widower of Marie- Blanche Landry) on January 18, 1825 in Ste-Famille-de Bathurst Parish.
9. Marie Rebecca Pitre born March 3, 1807 in Bathurst, married Tranquille Doucet on May 9, 1826 in Petit-Rocher.

HISTORICAL TIDBITS

Acadian Settlements

The Acadians resettled in groups along the shores of the Golf of St. Lawrence and Baie des Chaleurs as well as in the region of Memramcook, P.E.I. and Nova Scotia. Although their displacement was collective during deportation, these families settled on a more individual basis when they returned. They would then become more prevalent in New Brunswick than in Nova Scotia which had been the cradle of their culture 150 years earlier.

The southern coast of the Baie des Chaleurs will be populated by the French until the end of the 18th century in the villages of Restigouche, Ste-Anne de Bathurst, Caraquet, Shippagan, Tracadie and N�guac.

By the beginning of the 19th Century, the Acadian settlements, situated mostly in the peripheral and rural regions of the Maritimes, become more permanent.