Jean-Baptiste POTHIER
Biography

Jean-Baptiste POTHIER (1653 - 1711) — Marie BEAUVAIS (1669 - 1753)

Pioneer Jean-Baptiste Pothier was laid to rest this day, July 11th, 1711, at Trois-Rivières.
Jean-Baptiste was born in Chartres and arrived in New France around 1683. He married Marie (Étiennette) Beauvais in 1688. The couple had twelve children.

The DCB reports that Jean-Baptiste held a wide variety of positions in Québec. Originally a "precentor and schoolmaster," he later became "royal notary, deputy to the fiscal attorney, clerk of court, royal process-server, surveyor, and jailer."

In 1701 Jean-Baptiste replaced the aging notary Séverin Ameau and moved to Trois-Rivières, where the last five of his children were born. Most of his married children remained in the area.

His children's spouses were a diverse group: Joseph-Marie married Josèphe Moète, grand-daughter of Carignan-Salières soldier Pierre Moète de Moras. Son Guillaume left the region for Kaskaskia, where he married a Native woman known as Marie Spachicouacoua. Daughter Louise married Englishman Richare Pré (or Fry), reportedly taken captive during the "Siege of St John's [Newfoundland]". His descendants used the surname Richard.

Grandson Louis Pothier (1731-1779) was a victim in what was possibly the first mass-murder (excluding military operations) to take place in New France. In October of 1779, Louis, his wife and daughter, and at least two others were killed by a group of English deserters. Johanne Pothier included a fictionalized account of the episode in an historical novel (see below).

Jean-Baptiste and Marie-Étiennette have many notable descendants including filmmaker Denis Villeneuve and the late Matthew Perry.

[Sources: PRDH; Dictionary of Canadian Biography; Fichier-Origine [ID# 243382]; "Jean-Baptiste Pothier" Our French-Canadian Ancestors (vol.1, pp.139-144), Gérard Lebel C.S.s.R. (Thomas J. Laforest (tr.)), Palm Harbor, Florida, 1983; 1779: Trois bêtes à sept têtes, Johanne Pothier, 2010]

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