Denis  GAUDET

"Older son Denis, by his first wife, born probably at Martaize, France, in c1625, married Martine Gauthier at Port-Royal in c1645. They had five children, including two sons, Pierre l'aîné and Pierre le jeune, who married daughters of Jean Blanchard. Denis's three daughters married into the Vincent, Daigre, Fardel or Fardelle, and Aucoin families. Denis died at Port-Royal in October 1709, in his mid 80s. Older son Pierre l'aîné moved his family to Chignecto in the 1690s. He and his wife Anne Blanchard had nine children. Later in that decade, he helped pioneer the Acadian settlement on Rivière Petitcoudiac in present-day southeastern New Brunswick. Along with Pierre Thibodeau, who founded the nearby Chepoudy settlement, Pierre l'aîné defied the claim of the seigneur of Chignecto, Michel Le Neuf de la Valliere et de Beaubassin, that the Chepoudy and Petitcoudiac settlements were part of his seigneury. Gaudet and Thibodeau won their case before the colonial council at Port-Royal. Their defiance of a powerful Acadian seigneur helped weaken the hold of the local nobility on these sturdy Acadian habitants. Pierre l'aîné's son Abraham of Chignecto was a hero of Queen Anne's War; in 1711, he set up an ambush that captured a messenger from the English garrison at Annapolis Royal. After looking at land on Île Royale, today's Cape Breton Island, in 1714 and living for a time on Île St.-Jean, today's Prince Edward Island, in the early 1720s, Abraham took his family to the St. Lawrence River valley decades before Le Grand Dérangement; most likely his exploits in the recent war encouraged him to place as great a distance as possible between himself and the British authorities at Annapolis Royal. Pierre l'aîné's younger brother Pierre le jeune and his wife Marie Blanchard remained at Port-Royal and had 10 children there. "