Hi you all In regards to the question below, St Jean I. O. would most likly be isle D'Orleans near Quebec City. This parish date from 1688. Upstream on the the St Lawrence to Montreal then south inland on the Richelieu River is St Joseph de Chambly which was opened a bit later in 1706. Boundry did not change its something like 200 miles apart. As a rule, those that settled at Quebec City and the Island of Orleans (1700) went inland to the Beauce/Bellechasse/Dorchester (1800) areas and then took the Canada road to Maine. Bob Chenard has quite a site on this. "The French Connection" Those who arrived to Montreal (1700) went inland to Chambly, or east to Vercheres then up the Richelieu River (1750) to populate this valley. Of course some went west up the St Lawrence. Those families in the Vercheres & St Denis, areas then often migrated to the St Hyacinthe areas.(1780) About 1830 the Chambly and St Hyacinthe folks started going to the Eastern Townships which is where I live. About 1860, with developing train connections, lots went to the New England Textile mills. As early as 1838, folks were leaving Chambly and going upstream to Chicago. Marlene Simmons has a good map of the part of the areas your ancestors left. Take a look at her maps at http://www.virtuel.qc.ca/simmons/acceuil.htm And if you can manage French this is the place to go http://www.toponymie.gouv.qc.ca/default.asp Ths government site is only in French and is even difficult for a native Marcel ---------- > From: Becky Hatton <Bhatton@hplsck.org> > To: ILSTANNE-L@rootsweb.com > Subject: [ILSTANNE] PARISHES AND SITE MAP > Date: March 21, 2000 7:23 PM > > > And especially for Marcel Benoit: > > Marcel, I just discovered this www site last eve. The infor on the parishes > are great but the Site Map for the Parish Location - is very vague - no > details - especially looking from the USA and KS and since my > HATTON/CHARTIER/SHARKEY lines have not been exposed to the > French/Canadian/Catholic influence since my great great grandmother's > childhood. > > My first question and only one at this time - when I viewed the map for > Chambly and for St Jean I.O. - the map looked the same. Is St Jean I.O. > the older parish and was replaced with Chambly, or did boundary lines change? > > This is the www.genealogie.unmontreal.ca site and check these links also: > Denomination in old Quebec > The most frequent first names > The most frequent family names > > Short name > Complete names and variants > Baie-St-Paul