Cathryn Carroll wrote: > > Hiiii!!! I am researching one of your distant cousins--Catherine > Hoffpauir from Rayne Louisiana. I am trying so hard to find out why your > ancestor MARIE CHARLOTTE PERILLARD would have come to Louisiana....Could > she have actually come alone? Could she maybe be the first Marie > Charlotte listed (with a different birthdate) who married in 1757 and > 1761 in Canada? Was there family in Acadia at the time and could Marie > have been caught in Great Expulsion? > > Also I was curious how you got the marriage date...Were Thomas and Marie > Charlotte married in New Orleans. > > Thank you for any help you can render with this mystery. > > Cathy Carroll Cathy (and anyone else interested), Many of Thomas Hoffpauir's descendants who follow genealogy consider his wife, Marie Charlotte Perrillard (by whatever spelling), to be the same person that Tanguay (volume 6 p. 304) lists as one of the children of Nicholas Perrilard and Catherine Papineau. However, in my opinion we have yet to find the real proof that the person we know to be Thomas' wife is the same person listed in Tanguay. There is some circumstantual evidence, but nothing really compelling. For instance, I would like to see some reference to Thomas' wife being from Montreal, since we know Nicholas' daughter was born there. But I've seen no such reference.... only references to her being from New Orleans. From the New Orleans references we conclude that Thomas and Marie were in New Orleans, and probably married there, and that their marriage records were destroyed when the Cathedral burned. Now if you think about it, that's really quite a "stretch". I've personally looked through N. O. census and city directories, any available church or convent records, and any other material available at the libraries, and I've never found a reference to either of them. I've also looked at the records available for the "German Coast" families.... nothing there either. Now in my opinion, just because we can't find the record, doesn't mean that she isn't really the right person. Since I don't have any other candidate for his spouse, she remains my choice.... because I need some name to try to search for. If I ever find out she is not the right person, then I'll change her ancestry.... but for now, it's a case (for me at least), of this is my "best guess". Now, as to the "other" daughter of Nicholas with the same name..... this is one of the most troubling parts of this whole thing. many of his children were called "Marie", but it seems extreemly unlikely that he would have given two children the name Charlotte, particularly since both of them appear to have survived infancy. Here again, lack of any evidence to the contrary, I'm inclined to accept what Tanguay says, even though I consider it unlikely. Now maybe he has a "confirmation" date (3 Apr 1744) mixed up with a birth date, and there was only one child with that name, born on 4 Mar 38/39, and then confirmed on 3 Apr 44. The age seems about right for something like that, but again, this would just be speculation. Also, there are two recorded marriages for the first Marie Charlotte in Montreal.... it would be very useful to find out what became of both of those husbands. As to the date of marriage for Marie Charlotte and Thomas.... that is just an estimate, based on the dates of birth we have for their three children. I have seen no real reference that gives the date of their marriage. Finally, I know there are at least two other subscribers to the Hoffpauir mail list who are researching the ancestry of Thomas and Marie Charlotte, and probably a lot more people who are not researching it, but are very interested in the questions it presents. Therefore, I encourage anyone with information they want to share on this issue to post to the mail list. It would really be great if we could find Thomas' ancestors, and "prove" Marie Charlotte's. -- Charlie Hoffpauir Yes, there is a HOFFPAUIR mail list, hosted by ROOTSWEB http://web.wt.net/~charlieh/ http://www.familytreemaker.com/users/h/o/f/Charles-R-Hoffpauir/ http://www.parsonstech.com/genealogy/trees/choffpauo/thomas.htm