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- WFT - Family Archives CD #75, Tree #0553: From James Carten - The Kirkes
Many of us have heard the story of Helene Desportes, the first white child born in New France and how she left Quebec at a young age, returning to France when she was not much older. Inm many cases the only part of the story that we have been told is that she left, "when the Kirke brothers took Quebec". But what was this "taking" of Quebec and who were the Kirke brothers?
As with most of the serious confrontations on this side of the Atlantic, this one was the result of wars waged in Europe. England claimed much of the same lands in the New World as France did. OIn Europe, France was waging all-out war on the Huguenots [Protestants]. It seemed that France and England were opposed to everything about each other and in 1627, war was formally declared. A British fleet was sent to help lift the siege of LaRochelle, the Huguenots stronhold. At the same time, there was much going onconcerning the two countries colonial holdings in the Americas.
Gervais Kirke, a fervently loyal Scotsman an Presbyterian, had married a French woman and raised 5 sons in Dieppe, on the Chanel Coast about 50 miles north of Rouen. This patriarch had always taken interest in affairs concerning North America and his sons may have inherited this interest. Gervais Kirke's sons included David, Louis [refered to as Lewis in most English records], Thomas, john and James. David'd daughter, Mary, was also linked to the New World when she married the intrepid Canadian fur trader, Pierre-Esprit Radisson.
In 1633, Champlain returned to Quebec as the King's commander. This meant he had official support from the French crown. The next year, the 13 yr. old Helene Desportes also returned, and accompanied by her aunt and uncle. Marguerite Langlois and Abraham Martin of the Plains of Abraham fame. That same year, at 14 years of age, Helene Desportes was married to Guillaume Hebert, with whom she had 3 children before being widowed at 19. At 20 years, Desportes married Noel Morin and had 12 more children including the first native born priest and first native born nun in Canada. She died in 1675, thirteen days before her fifty-fifth birthday. [Helene Desportes mother was Francios Langlois, sister of Marguerite].
Reference - American-Canadien Genealogist, Vol. 21, issue 65, Sumner '95' by Donald Chaput and Jim Carten.
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1620 - 1675 (54 years)
