Guillemette Hebert (1608 - 1684)
10th great-grandmother of June
Elizabeth Couillard (1631 - 1704)
daughter of Guillemette Hebert
Joseph Guyon (1649 - 1712)
son of Elizabeth Couillard
Angelique Guyon (1677 - 1718)
daughter of Joseph Guyon
Marie Angelique Letourneau (1697 - 1765)
daughter of Angelique Guyon
Marie Madeleine Leboeuf (1731 - )
daughter of Marie Angelique Letourneau
Jean Baptiste Gervais I (1753 - 1809)
son of Marie Madeleine Leboeuf
Jean Baptiste Gervais II (1776 - 1811)
son of Jean Baptiste Gervais I
Jean Baptiste Gervais III (1811 - 1887)
son of Jean Baptiste Gervais II
Jean Baptiste Gervais IV (1832 - 1916)
son of Jean Baptiste Gervais III
Achille Ovila Gervais (1886 - 1980)
child of Jean Baptiste Gervais IV
Gladys Gervais (1915 - 1996)
daughter of Achille Ovila Gervais
Barbara June Agla (1942 - )
daughter of Gladys Gervais
HÉBERT, GUILLEMETTE (Couillard de Lespinay), daughter of
Louis Hébert and Marie
Rollet, m
. Guillaume Couillard de Lespinay 26 Aug. 1621 at Quebec; b. in Paris or Dieppe
c. 1606; d. 20 Oct. 1684 at Quebec
and was buried there the following day. On Louis Hébert’s death, his daughter Guillemette and her husband Guillaume Couillard inherited half the estate. Guillaume Couillard became the head of the family, as his wife’s brother Guillaume was still a minor. Up to 1632, the Hébert house on the brow of the cliff was the only private dwelling in Quebec. Farther up along the edge was
Champlain’s little wooden fort, and directly below it, on the shore, was the Habitation with the small Recollet chapel beside it. The only other buildings in the settlement were the convents of the Recollet and Jesuit orders on the St. Charles River, a mile away beyond dense woods. Guillemette and her mother were frequently alone on their property for Couillard was often on the river and the servant, Henri, whom the Héberts had brought from France, was murdered by the natives the same year that Louis Hébert died (1627).
Like her parents, Mme Couillard was interested in Indian children and was often godmother at their baptisms. After the English captured Quebec in 1629, she received into her home
Charité and
Espérance, two of the three Indian girls, protégées of Champlain, whom he had hoped to take to France with him. When
David Kirke refused permission for the journey, the girls asked to be sent to Mme Couillard. They must have formed part of a cosmopolitan household, for it contained also
Olivier Le Jeune, a black boy from Madagascar brought up the river by the English, sold to Olivier Le Baillif, and given by him to the Couillard family. Guillemette and her mother arranged for his religious instruction and he was baptized in 1633. By 1648 the Couillards had other servants and ten children, a lively – entries in the
Journal des Jésuites would suggest even an unruly – ménage. At the marriage of the third daughter, Élisabeth, in November 1645, there were two violins in the chapel, a thing never before heard in Canada. The early 1660s, however, brought bereavement to Mme Couillard. Two sons, first Nicolas, aged 20, then Guillaume, aged 27, and her nephew
Joseph Hébert fell victim to the Iroquois, 1661–62, and in March 1663 her husband died.
Being rich in land (the Héberts owned property other than their original homestead), Mme Couillard jointly with her husband had made various gifts for charitable and religious purposes: to the church in 1652, and to the Hôtel-Dieu in 1655 and 1659. As a widow, she sold to Bishop
Laval* in 1666 the land for the “petit séminaire.” Her disposal of this valuable property (the fief of Sault-au-Matelot), on which her father had first established himself, met with strong objections from the younger generation. The litigation begun by these prospective heirs was to continue generation after generation, even into the 20th century.
Saddened no doubt by the dissensions in her family, and somewhat infirm in body, she withdrew to the convent of the Hôtel-Dieu, where, as a boarder, she spent her last years. In 1678, when her father’s bones were re-interred, she had herself carried to the Recollet chapel to witness the ceremony. She died in October 1684, “aged 78 years or thereabouts,” and was buried beside her husband in the chapel of the Hôtel-Dieu. At that time her descendants numbered over 250. The number at the present day could hardly be estimated.
Ethel M. G. Bennett There are brief references to Mme Couillard in Sagard,
Histoire du Canada (Tross); Champlain,
Works (Biggar); and in the records of the Jesuits. Sons and servants are mentioned in the
Journal des Jesuits (
see: JR (Thwaites),
passim). Chrestien
Le Clercq, who was in Canada 1673–87 and who often talked with her, gives details of her later life (
see: First establishment of the faith (Shea),
passim). For more complete information consult Azarie Couillard Després,
Histoire des seigneurs de la Rivière-du-Sud et leurs alliés canadiens et acadiens (Saint-Hyacinthe, 1912);
Louis Hébert: premier colon canadien et sa famille (Lille, Paris, Bruges, 1913; Montréal, 1918); “Louis Hébert et ses descendants,”
BRH, XX (1914), 281–85; and
La première famille française au Canada.
Revisions based on:
Bibliothèque et Arch. Nationales du Québec, Centre d
’arch. de Québec, CE301-S1, 26 août 1621, 21 oct. 1684.
