Biographie Cormier Pierre

http://boards.ancestry.ca/surnames.cormier/403.4.1/mb.ashx  

Pierre Cormier's Identity Discovered! - 20 févr. 2012

There has been a breakthrough in the positive identification of Pierre Cormier, the husband of Isabelle Chiasson, which has only come to light this past month. If you will remember, our ancestor Pierre Cormier could not have been the son of Marguerite Cyr and her husband, as this Pierre died in Québec City in 1757 (according to the Notre-Dame Church parish registers).

At the end of January, a document that was located in the Archives of France was sent to the Centre d’études acadiennes in Moncton by a professor from the United States. It turned out to be a sort of census listing of Acadians living at Ile St-Jean (PEI) and the Magdalen Islands (QC) dated September of 1763.

In that document, living at Tracadie, PEI were the newly-wed couple, Isabelle Chiasson and her husband, Pierre (not listed as Cormier) but as Manon. No children were born to the couple yet as none were listed. Their son, Nicolas, ancestor of a branch of the Cormiers at the Magdalen Islands was only to be born the following year at Ile St-Jean on 4 Apr 1764.

According to Stephen White, nor could he have been the Pierre Cormier, son of Marie-Anne Cyr, who was with his brother Jean-François at Fort Beausejour (in August of 1763), a month before this newly-discovered document was created. Nor could have been the Pierre, son of François Cormier and Anne Cyr, who all together were deported to Georgia in 1755. Nor is there a hint that he might have been related to them anywhere through examination of godparents.

Those of us familiar with Acadian nicknames know that “Manon or Nanon” is a nickname for a woman named “Anne or Marie-Anne”, so thus, Pierre would be known as “Pierre à Anne dit Manon”. The only Pierre then who fits this description is Pierre-Poncy Cormier, born and baptized at Beaubassin on 4/5 Dec 1741, the son of Germain Cormier and Anne Gaudet. This couple had removed to Ile St-Jean, where Germain Cormier died when Pierre was about 4 years old, and where his widow remarried Jean Bernard. Because his father had died, this document links him to his mother, Anne Gaudet, and he became known as Pierre à Manon, or as the document clearly states “Pierre Manon & his wife Isabelle Chiasson”. Plus, Pierre’s age in 1763 would make him 22 years old, just right for being eligible for marriage. Additionally, Anne Gaudet’s sister was Marie Gaudet, the second wife of Charlemagne Deveau, also mentioned in this document as living at Port Lajoie (Charlottetown). Another sister was Jeanne Gaudet married to Pierre Poirier living at St. Peter’s, PEI. As Steve explains, “either of these two aunts could have taken him in after his mother’s death, and which would explain how he made Isabelle Chiasson’s acquaintance and married her.”

Thus using all this circumstantial evidence, and being the only Pierre Cormier who fits by process of elimination, our ancestor then is truly Pierre-Poncy Cormier, the son of Germain Cormier (s/o Germain & Marie LeBlanc) and Anne Gaudet (d/o Guillaume & Marie Boudrot).

Dennis Boudreau