Page 53 - Fortier Family History

Bigaouette Family History By David Bigaouette (my 2nd cousin once removed) Transcribed from French using Google Translate, so expect some odd grammar and syntax errors. The first “Bigaouette” actually started out as Claude Thomas. When you search “Bigaouette” on the Internet, you can read a short tale of our “Bigaouette” origin. I was able to confirm this tale from David Gosselin's Genealogical Dictionary of the families of Charlesbourg, which dates from 1906. The book speaks of the history of our Bigaouette ancestor without being too detailed. It says "According to tradition preserved in the family". So someone has documented the family over time so that it appears on the Internet. Even today, we do not know who is the author. What does this story tell us? Claude Thomas was born in Dover, New Hampshire, New England, about 1680. Claude is the son of John Thomas, a cloth merchant, and Anne Leza (various spellings), both of England. This leads us to believe that our first ancestors were English. The city of Dover had to undergo several raids of the Amerindians of New France. Everything was happening in circumstances of Native alliances with the Crowns. The intention was to make make people flee from their homes. The Natives who raided New Hampshire were Abenakis who lived on the east coast of America and in Quebec at Odanak. According to the story, the young Claude age 8 or 9 years was kidnapped by these Native Americans and then brought back to the Quebec City area, a journey of about 300 kilometers on foot. Claude was adopted by an Abenaki woman named “Biga8ete” who cared for and “adopted” him. It was a Native American custom to replace family members that had died during raids on the Whites. They had to walk from Dover to Odanak. It is said that it was for the sake of gratitude to this woman that Claude took the name "Bigaouette" as his family name. From there the beginning the Thomas said (dit) Bigaouette. He would have decided to use the name during the end of his life, because Bigaouette does not appear on his marriage certificate, but on acts of notaries later. (\[JMF\]This is my comment: Some sources allege he was baptized Catholic before he got married in 1706, and that is when he added “dit Bigaouette” to his surname “Thomas”. It may not be on his marriage record but it may be on his bapstism record) Claude lived with this "Bigaouette" woman for ten years in one of the Abenaki villages of the Lorettte region. Around 1698, Claude was “ransomed” by the French authorities. His name appears on the list of released English captives. In accepting his release, Claude Thomas becomes a Catholic, because it is a criteria to be subject of the French King. According to a document, Claude will not get his naturalization until 1753 officially, which is weird. This automatically prevents him from going to trade in New England. There is no evidence that Claude did any research to find his biological parents. It is said that there was a colonial tension between the French and the English at that time. To be seen as the ''enemy '' would be a risk for Claude. He worked as a maid for a judge in Quebec until his marriage with Marie-Anne Villeneuve at Charlesbourg in November 1706. Of their union will be born fourteen children between 1709 and 1731. Unfortunately, 8 children out of 14 will die soon after their birth. Claude Thomas died aged 84 in 1761. As for the name “Bigaouette”, one must know that the word is the interpretation of a scholar. It is therefore a distortion of an original Abenaki word or sound. It should be noted that many Native American tribes gave names to people according to their appearance or attitude they own or reflect. In searching the meaning in an Abenaki-English dictionary, I realized that «Biga» is the equivalent of «Bika». I picked up three words that have potential to explain Bigaouette's definition: «Bikawid» meaning to have a curved back, «Bikawé» meaning someone with a double speech, and «Bikawagta» meaning someone who has wrinkles on its face. These are just suppositions. One would have to ask an Abenaki language specialist for confirmation. In the old notary acts, we can see that the name Bigaouette changed a lot over time. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Bigaouette was written in several ways: Bigaouet, Bigahouet, Biganhoit, Bigaouait, Bigaouaite, Bigaouest, Bigaoüette, Bigarouette, Bigauwhette, Bigawet, Bigawhaitte, Bigeloette, Bigayait, Bigayoit, Bigonette and Bigouavet. We even make mistakes until the 19th century: in the census of 1881 we can read Bijavoite. If the word Bigaouette