Documentary Biography Series

Séguin & Larocque

Two Lines, One Marriage

A Picard who settled at Boucherville with a King’s Daughter, and a soldier from Nevers who signed with an X at Contrecoeur. Their sons farmed other men’s land and ran other men’s mills. Their grandchildren married at the mission on the Lake of Two Mountains in 1744 — and from that marriage the line runs on into the Guilbault family.

5Biographies
4Case Studies
1744The Marriage
1823Into the Guilbault Line

Two Families on the West Island

François Séguin dit Ladéroute married the Fille du Roi Jeanne Petit and settled at Boucherville, across the river from Montréal. His son Jean-Baptiste spent his working life on other men’s farms, first at Boucherville and then at Chambly, and died insolvent in Montréal in 1728. Philibert Couillaud dit Roquebrune, a soldier who could not write his name, took land at Contrecoeur and died before 1701 in a parish whose registers had burned. His son Louis was hired out as a young man for eighty livres and a pair of shoes, and became a miller at the west end of the island of Montréal.

The two families met in the western parishes: Sainte-Anne, Île Perrot, Vaudreuil and the mission at the Lake of Two Mountains. In 1739 Charlotte’s brother Pierre and his bride were taken into the house of Philibert Larocque, Louis Couillaud’s brother. In 1744 Jean-Baptiste Séguin’s daughter Charlotte married Louis Couillaud’s son Jean-Baptiste Larocque at the mission. Three of their sons married three sisters, and one granddaughter, Madeleine Rocbrune, married Gabriel Guilbault at Rigaud in 1823.

Two Lines Converging

Séguin dit Ladéroute

Boucherville · Chambly · Montréal

François Séguin1644 – 1701 · Jeanne Petit
↓
Jean-Baptiste Séguin1688 – 1728 · Geneviève Barbot

Couillaud dit Larocque

Contrecoeur · Sainte-Anne · Île Perrot

Philibert Couillaudc.1641 – before 1701 · Catherine Laporte
↓
Louis Couillaud dit Larocquebrunec.1679/89 – 1764 · Madeleine Sabourin
↓   ↓
Charlotte Séguin × Jean-Baptiste LarocqueMarried at the Lake of Two Mountains, 27 January 1744
↓
Joseph Larocque Rocbrune1764 – 1815 · Marie-Josephe Georgeteau dit Jolicoeur
↓
Madeleine Rocbrune × Gabriel GuilbaultMarried at Rigaud, 25 November 1823 · The Guilbault Line

The Biographies and Case Studies

Each line in documentary biography, with the case studies that tested it

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The Séguin Line

François and Jean-Baptiste Séguin dit Ladéroute — Boucherville to Chambly

François Séguin dit Ladéroute

A weaver from Picardy who married the Fille du Roi Jeanne Petit and settled at Boucherville, where eleven children were born. The notarial record follows him from his arrival to the years of illness before his death.

Documentary Biography

The Death That Never Was

Two databases give the same death date in 1704, which looks like corroboration and is one source counted twice. Beneath them the burial act names another man; two daughters’ marriage contracts record him ill in November 1700 and their mother a widow by October 1701.

Case Study

Jean-Baptiste Séguin dit Ladéroute

A tenant farmer at Boucherville and Chambly who could not sign his name, bought land with borrowed card money, and died at Montréal in 1728 owing more than he left. Several of his ten children carried the name west to Vaudreuil and the Lake of Two Mountains.

Documentary Biography

Other Men’s Farms

Twelve notarial acts, found under the names the notary actually wrote — Ceguain, Ceguein, Laderoutte — place him at Boucherville until 1724 and at Chambly from 1725: half-profit tenancies, a debt « a leurs urgentes necessités », and a widow « réduite à l’aumône ».

Case Study
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The Larocque Line

Philibert Couillaud and his son Louis — Contrecoeur to the west end of the island

Philibert Couillaud dit Roquebrune

A Carignan-Salières soldier of the Contrecoeur company who could not read or write — his only surviving signature is an X. The parish registers burned twice, and his life is reconstructed from witnesses, debts and lawsuits.

Documentary Biography

Philibert Couillaud: The Case Study

No birth record, no marriage record, no death record, and a documentary void of fourteen and a half years. Six lines of evidence, from a 1667 land sale to a 1728 dower donation, rebuild a life the registers lost.

Case Study

Louis Couillaud dit Larocquebrune

No baptism, no land, no inheritance. Hired out in 1709 for eighty livres and a pair of beef-hide shoes, he became a miller of the upper island and by 1724 held a house, a barn and twenty cleared arpents on Île Perrot.

Documentary Biography
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Where the Lines Meet

The marriage of 1744 and the generation that followed

Marie Charlotte Séguin dit Ladéroute

Born at Boucherville, eleven when a notary inventoried her dead father’s goods in a rented room on the Place Notre-Dame, married at the mission in 1744. Fourteen children, a move to the rivière du Nord, and a death too sudden for the last sacraments.

Documentary Biography

Three Brothers, Three Sisters

Three of Charlotte’s sons married three Georgeteau sisters, two of them baptized Marie-Josephe. What separates the households is a relationship stated in the act: Thomas as “oncle de l’époux” in 1812, as “frère du défunt” at Joseph’s grave in 1815.

Case Study
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Connected Research

The founding mothers of both lines, and the series they lead into

Jeanne Petit

A King’s Daughter from La Rochelle who married François Séguin dit Ladéroute and raised their children at Boucherville. Founding mother of the Séguin line.

Founding Mother

Marie Gaillard

Fille du Roi and grandmother of Madeleine Sabourin, Louis Couillaud’s wife. Through the Perrier and Sabourin families she stands behind the Larocque line.

Founding Mother

The Guilbault Line

Madeleine Rocbrune, Joseph’s daughter, married Gabriel Guilbault fils at Rigaud in 1823. Their son Évangéliste is Episode 1 of the Guilbault series.

Connected Series

At the Lake of Two Mountains

The mission where Charlotte married and her children were baptized — and where her brothers married daughters of Ignace Raizenne and Élisabeth Nims.

Collection

Every Ancestor Deserves to Be Remembered

Documentary biographies like these follow one life through every record that survives — with the evidence shown at every step.

Explore French-Canadian, Indigenous & Métis Research

Part of the Storyline Genealogy series: Documentary Biographies
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