The Huguenots and the Papineaus of Niort

The Huguenots were French Protestants.[1] After Martin Luther began the Reformation in Germany in 1517, his writings were widely distributed throughout Europe. Many French in all regions of the country, including some members of the nobility, became Protestants. The French Protestants, led by John Calvin, soon experienced widespread persecution. In 1562, the Wars of Religion began in France, continuing until 1598. A notorious incident was the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre in 1572, which began with the killing of all the leading Huguenots in Paris and spread throughout France.

King Henry III was a Protestant who became a Catholic in order to ascend the throne ("Paris is worth a Mass"). In 1598, he promulgated the Edict of Nantes, which granted Huguenots religious and political freedom. During the next century intermittent harassment and forcible conversion of Huguenots continued. In the 1660s King Louis XIV began to step up persecution of the Huguenots. In 1685, he revoked the Edict of Nantes. As a result, between 1680 and 1690, some 160,000 Huguenots fled their homeland, while a million and half converted, willingly or otherwise, to Catholicism. Those who fled were largely artisans, merchants, shopkeepers, and cloth-trade workers; few were simple peasants. There was selectivity at work here: the emigrants were disproportionately from the higher and more educated classes and they also were those of stronger faith who were willing to give up everything to maintain their religious practices.

The Protestant areas of France were in the West and South. Our interest is in the former province of Poitou, which alternated between control by the French and the English in the 12^th to 14^th centuries. The port city of La Rochelle and much of its hinterland became largely Protestant, especially after the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre when many of the survivors took refuge there. During the reign of Louis XIII (1610-43) La Rochelle sided with the English who had invaded neighboring Ré Island. Richelieu (later Cardinal) besieged the town and built a vast sea wall to keep out the English. After 15 months’ siege, the town capitulated, three-fourths of its citizens having starved to death.

Upriver, the town of Niort had been built around fortifications of the English Henry II and his son Richard the Lion Hearted. It became a merchant town with a very active port. During the period from before the Edict of Nantes until its revocation, it was a fortified Huguenot stronghold, given special status under the Edict. It developed a very militant community that was a marked target for repression. Baird reports: “There is a cluster of towns east and north of Niort where many of the Huguenot families, transplanted to America, had their origin. Most of these localities are now so insignificant, as to find no place upon ordinary maps. But none was too obscure to be visited by the troops of Louis XIV…in the course of the spring and summer of the year 1681, and it is probable that this little district witnessed at that period, as much of concentrated cruelty and misery, as did any other port of France. The soldiers did not leave one parish to go to another, so long as a single Protestant remained, to be either converted or ruined. Houses were pillaged, women were insulted and tortured, men were beaten; and when driven or dragged to the churches, those who could be persuaded to kneel before the priest, or place their hands upon the Gospel, were reported as converts. Multitudes of the wretched villagers could be seen flying from their homes, toward La Rochelle, or some other place of fancied security; or gathered in groups along the coast, waiting for some means of escape by sea.”[2]

In 1685, campaigns to convert the Huguenots by peaceful or coercive tactics were carried out under the supervision of a local governor of Poitou named Foucault and for Niort named President de Fontmort. The latter is known for having kept Madame de Maintenon informed of his grossly exaggerated success in obtaining the Huguenots’ conversion. She had been born in Niort, daughter of a famous Huguenot poet. After converting, and becoming a violent enemy of her former religion, she became the mistress of Louis XIV and, after the death of the queen, became his second wife.

During the 17^th century, Niort had been badly mauled by fanatics of both religions but managed to become quite prosperous thanks to the Huguenot entrepreneurial skills at craft and trade and thanks to its sizeable trade with the outside world and New France [Canada] in particular. The river, called Sèvre Niortaise, linked its port with that of La Rochelle, main arrival point of the furs and skins of the New World. Through the years Niort developed the specialty craft of producing peau de chamois, a kind of washable leather obtained by tanning the raw skins with fish oil instead of the traditional wood bark extracts used for common leather. On the north side of the city, upriver from the castle, a section of industries was established devoted to this trade, called La Chamoiserie. Today, the place is named Quai de la Regratterie, the word grater referring to the action of scraping to remove the hair from the skin of goats, deer and other animals. In the City Museum there is a section devoted to this important historical craft. The Papineaus in the records are listed only as merchants, however, since Jean Papineau was partner in a chamoiserie in New Oxford, MA, it can be assumed that he was continuing his family’s trade.

I. Jean Papineau [I], (ca1600-ca 1650) probably m ca 1620, Marie Texier (ca 1600 – 15 Feb 1650).[3] Their son:

II. Jean Papineau [II] (ca 1620-1662, m ca 1650, Elisabeth D’Angincourt (ca 1622-25 Aug 1679, 57 years old at death). Children:

A. Marie Papineau, ca 1639 – Dec 1678. m. -- Brosseau. (Burial of Marie Papineau Brosseau, age 39, at Niort Temple, present Jan Papineau [II], and J. Papineau le jeune [III].)

B. Jean Papineau [III] (ca 1652 – ca 1700), merchant and elder of the church, m 19 Aug 1674, Suzanne Guiet (ca 1655 - ?). Children:

2. Jean Papineau [IV], b 1 Apr 1678, d ca 1707, to Massachusetts ca 1698[4] m Charlotte Bouniot.

6. Jacob Papineau, b 27 Jul 1683. Probably the founder of the British lineage.[5]

10. ca 1690, Michel Papineau, no birth certificate, but renouncement of Protestant religion at Notre Dame, 30 Dec 1707.

From Sunday, 3rd of April 1678 . This same day, after service was baptized by mister [minister] Bossatran, Jean son of Jean Papineau, merchant, and of Suzanne Guiet, of whom was godfather Jean Guiet, merchant and godmother Elisabeth D'Angicourt, spouse of Jean Papineau, merchant and Elder of this church. The Child was born yesterday, and have all signed/ J. Papineau, J. Guiet, Elizabeth Dangicourt. Régistres Protestants de Niort, Généralité de Poitiers, (microfilm 2 Mi 20)

Intended husband: Jean Papineau (merchant), son of Jean Papineau (merchant), Dame Elizabeth D'angicourt.

Clauses of the contract: According to the customs of Poitou; Regime of joint community; The wife-to-be shall live at her husband’s residence.

Contributions by husband-to-be: £800 in merchandise + £100 in furniture + the use for two years of a house located in Niort close to the Château, use abandoned for £100.

Contributions by wife-to-be: will possess sufficient clothing suited for her social standing, £1000 in real estate + £200 in furniture for a total of £1200; £600 of which on the day of the wedding and £600 to remain as her personal possession. Will inherit some of her husband’s possessions according to the custom in Poitou. In case of marriage dissolution, she will recover her £1200 and all her personal possessions, dresses, rings and jewels.

“I could not have received better news than that brought to me by Monsieur le Compte Daubigni, saying that you approved of my conduct toward the religionists, aiming at their conversion. I have tried to persuade them and kindly reason with them so that no one had to complain of any violence.

“I take the liberty of sending you a list of more than six hundred converts. I hope to increase their number and will keep you informed of my efforts since I understand that my work pleased the king and was extremely agreeable to you.”

Jean Papineau [III], Merchant & Elder of Notre-Dame, 30 years old, Sept 16, 1685

Since Jean Papineau III had deposited £460 with Gabriel Bernon in May of that year (discussed below) and his son Jean IV was subsequently to go to Bernon’s Huguenot settlement in North America, we can assume that the above conversions were either made under duress or were not, in fact, ever made.

Most of the Huguenots from western France went to England, primarily the London area. At least 20,000 --and perhaps 50,000--entered England between 1680 and the early 1690s. In general they received a warm welcome from the Crown and Church authorities. Substantial sums were made available as relief or to help those who wished to go on to the North American colonies. There were a number of Huguenot churches, the largest of which, Threadneedle Street, had several thousand members. Some church records remain, and the name Papineau (or variants) appears several times.[7]

The Papineau name is quite common in Canada and many of the present day Papineaus in the United States are descended from them.

On May 3, 1894, Willis P. Popenoe of Berryton, Kansas, wrote to Louis J. A. Papineau in Canada after reading a newspaper article about the latter renouncing his Catholic faith, citing a family belief that two brothers had come from over the waters, one settling in Canada and one in what became the United States. He said that his father, James, had always claimed that he had relatives in Canada. James had lost his father as a little boy and when going to school was called Popenoe, Papino and Papineau. Willis said that he and his oldest son often used to write their name in the original spelling but finally gave it up.

Louis J A Papineau replied on 10 May 1894 [8] stating that the Canadians all trace their ancestry back to Samuel Papineau, who was born in La Papinieré, a town or parish of Montigny in Poitou (now the Department of Deux Sevres) east of La Rochelle (and north of Niort). He and his family were said to be noble and entitled to the prefix de. Due to persecution some were killed and others fled. Samuel went to Canada as a soldier in 1686 or 1687. In Canada he feigned conversion to Catholicism to avoid the fate of being exiled to Boston or New York. After being released from military service around 1700, he took up farming near Montreal. One of his descendants was Joseph Papineau, 1756-1841, a prominent lawyer and Liberal politician, who acquired the Seigniory of Petit Nation of the Algonquins, consisting of 75 square miles on the Ottowa. His son, Louis Joseph, was Speaker of the Canadian Assembly from 1815 to 1837. He became known as the "Great Rebel" for leading the unsuccessful 1837 Rebellion against the British.

[1] Much of this discussion in based upon Charles W. Baird, History of the Huguenot Emigration to America, 1885, reprinted 1991, by the Genealogical Publishing Co, Baltimore; and Jon Butler, The Huguenots in America, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1983. For the discussion of Niort and the Papineaus there, I am particularly indebted to Jean-Yves Papineau and Renée Macé Papineau of Quebec (papineau.jy@cgocable.ca) who visited the region in Spring 2000 as part of their research on all the Papineaus who came to North America in the 17^th Century.

[2] Baird, op cit, Vol II, pp 54-5.

[3] The details of the Papineaus in Niort are from local research done by Marguerite Morisson of Niort, and Jean-Yves and Renée Macé Papineau. Unless otherwise indicated, where exact dates are given they are from the records of the Protestant Church and registry of Niort, now on microfilm at Poitiers. The Papineaus have also been studying an exhaustive compilation by Minister Rivière titled The Golden Book of the Protestants of Poitou, which says that Jean Papineau, merchant of Niort and Elder of the church, refused to send his numerous children to the Catholic offices and that several of them fled to England in the early 1700s.

[4] This is an estimate since he would be 20 at that time. Elizabeth Gardner Hayward, Jane Hawkes Liddell and Corinne Ingraham Pigott in an appendix to the chapter on New Oxford in Peter Steven Gannon, ed, Huguenot Refugees in the Settling of Colonial America, NY 1985: The Huguenot Society of America, state (p329): “Jean Papineau: New Oxford (1694), Boston (1696), New Oxford (1699)”. They cite no evidence for these dates and I have seen none. They presumably had no information regarding his Niort background.

[5] According to the Publications of the Huguenot Society of London, Vol XI, p 152: 1749, mar. at Eglise de Castle St. in London, Jacob Papineau and Marianne de l’Estang. This could be a second marriage for Jacob, b 1683 or a marriage of his son.

[6] Archives des Deux-Sèvres, in Niort, translated by Jean-Yves Papineau.

[7] Publications of the Huguenot Society of London, Vol XI.

[8] Their letters are in the archives in Quebec City. According to more recent research by Jean-Yves Papineau, a descendant, Samuel grew up as a Catholic; not a Huguenot as later claimed. Part of his reasoning was that Samuel was illiterate and would not have been if he were a Huguenot. A couple of other Papineau immigrants to Canada have also been found. Anthony Papineau (Anthony@papineaufamily.com) has a family database on the Net. He descends from Louis Lamarque and Marie Papineau from Ste. Colombe, Bordeaux, whose daughter Anne m Charles Testard in 1666 in Montreal. Their son took the name Papineau and today there are many descendants with that name. Marie Papineau’s brother, Olivier, became a banker and counselor to the King in La Rochelle and it was probably his son who deposited money with Gabriel Bernon about the same time as the father of our Jean Papineau. So there may be a relationship, not yet established.