In the late 1600s, especially on frontiers, during wars, migrations, religious persecution, epidemics, and displacement, people could be:
- born with no surviving record,
- married with no surviving record,
- have children with no surviving record,
- die with no surviving record,
- be buried with no surviving record.
- And not because records were destroyed later.
No matter how many genealogy sites I search, even with the help of AI [more than one – Gemini, Claude, Augure, Copilot, ChatGPT, and a few others] some people just can’t be found. Humans over time, and still today, do everything to hide their identity. People just vanish without a trace. And personally, I don’t blame them.
For example in 1837/38 there was a rebellion in Quebec [Lower Canada at that time]. The rebels lost. Some were executed, others fled to the USA, some simply disappeared into the bush and changed their names and no one challenged their new assumed identities.
Now, I want to step back in time to the late 1600a – in France. There is a religious war raging. Catholics, with the blessing of the King, were attempting to wipe out all protestants [Huguenots]. Churches and communities were demolished and with them their records. People flee the country. It’s a scenario being played out today in too many countries causing worldwide refugee/immigration problems. Nothing new and historically correct.
Young Guillaume Allard dit Longpré being kidnapped
There are two individuals Guillaume Longpré and Jeanne Allard who were living in Quevilly, a suburb town of Rouen, France. The main temple for the Huguenots [Calvinist protestants] was in this town. This was possible because of the Edict of Nantes which ended a long religious war. That Edict of Nantes was revoked on October 22, 1685. All hell broke loose. Another religious war began. The Huguenots fled for their lives. The records and their churches were destroyed in France. Guillaume and Jeanne fled to New England [Boston, Massachusetts]. In 1689 they had a son they named Guillaume. In 1704, while living in the frontier, Guillaume senior and Jeanne disappeared, presumably killed and the young Guillaume was taken to a Mohawk village by Montreal. Sixteen years later, this boy marries a girl named Catherine Bleau. It is there and then when the Longpré family returns to being documented people.
For the record, nothing about New Oxford or Deerfield stories fit any record of these two refugees from France.