The untold story of female immigration to New France

Before the state-sponsored immigration program that sent nearly 800 women known as Filles du Roi to Québec, 262 brave and adventurous women made the journey to New France on their own.  Sent by relatives and religious organizations or enlisting on their own account, these women did not benefit from a paid passage and dowry drawn from the King’s treasury, but they did face the same if not worse hardships and dangers.  Known as the Filles à Marier or “marriageable girls,” they were the first single women to set foot in the colony since its return from the English in 1632.  True pioneers and heroines, they left their homes in France to found new ones in the New World.

This book – the first work dedicated solely to this group of pioneer women – tells their story, collectively and individually. It first examines the much-misunderstood early immigration of women to New France, explaining the need for women in the colony, the difficulties in increasing the population and the unfounded assertions that these women were prostitutes, not pioneers.  The book then includes individual biographies of each of these 262 single women and concludes with a table of arrivals per year, an appendix of supporting documentation (marriage and enlistment contracts and inventories), a glossary, index of husbands and a comprehensive index to the book.

Among the biographies of these courageous pioneer women, you will find:

• Gillette Banne, who was executed with husband Jacques Bertault for poisoning their son-in-law.

• Marguerite Boileau, who was captured by the English in Acadia, brought to Boston as a prisoner and ransomed by her husband, who had escaped earlier.

• Françoise Capel, who may be responsible for the fire that destroyed the Ursuline convent in 1650.

• Louis Guimont (husband of Jeanne Bitouset), the first person miraculously healed at Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré.

• Marguerite Pontonnier, who had a spell cast on her marriage by a jilted lover so they wouldn't have any children.

• Jacquette Vivran, who was killed by lightning.

Excerpts from this book:
Click here to read an excerpt from the Historical Introduction.	Click Here to read the biography of Gillette Banne
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