Louis Liénard de Beaujeu de Villemonde

Louis Liénard de Beaujeu de Villemonde
Louis-Joseph Liénard de Beaujeu de Villemonde
Born	1716-09-16 Montreal, Quebec
Died	1802-06-05 Cap-Saint-Ignace, Lower Canada
Occupation	Army officer; seigneur
Father	Louis Liénard de Beaujeu
Mother	Thérèse-Denise Juchereau de Saint-Denys
Partner	Geneviève Le Moyne de Longueuil Louise-Charlotte Cugnet

Louis Liénard de Beaujeu de Villemonde ((1716-09-16)16 September 1716 – 5 June 1802(1802-06-05) (aged 85)) was a French colonial army officer and seigneur who commanded several frontier posts in New France, including Kaministiquia in present-day Thunder Bay.

Early life and military beginnings

Beaujeu was born on 16 September 1716 in Montreal into a noble family with a strong military tradition. His father was Louis Liénard de Beaujeu and his mother was Thérèse-Denise Juchereau de Saint-Denys. He received a second ensign's commission in the French colonial regular troops in 1732, was promoted to first ensign in 1738, and obtained a lieutenant's commission in 1744. During this period he was posted at Fort Saint-Frédéric near present-day Crown Point, New York, by 1741, and transferred to Fort Niagara near Youngstown, New York, in 1743.

Acadian campaign

In June 1746 Beaujeu sailed with his brother Daniel-Hyacinthe-Marie Liénard de Beaujeu as part of Jean-Baptiste-Nicolas-Roch de Ramezay's expedition to Baie-Verte, New Brunswick. On 22 September 1746 Ramezay sent him to receive orders from the Duc d'Anville, who had arrived from France with forces intended to expel the British from Acadia. Beaujeu took part in the Battle of Grand Pré on 11 February 1747 against Lieutenant-Colonel Arthur Noble. During the campaign he killed a British Catholic soldier, an incident that reportedly weighed on him throughout his life, as recalled by the historian Philippe-Joseph Aubert de Gaspé.

Western posts and Kaministiquia

After marrying Louise-Charlotte Cugnet, daughter of François-Étienne Cugnet, on 18 July 1747 at Quebec, Beaujeu was assigned in 1748 to report on fortifications at Fort Saint-Jean on the Richelieu River. When his wife died in childbirth he was recalled to Quebec. He was promoted to captain in 1751, replacing Pierre Gaultier de Varennes et de La Vérendrye, and received command of Kaministiquia (present-day Thunder Bay, Ontario) and Michipicoton (near the Michipicoten River, Ontario).

On 22 February 1753 he married 17-year-old Geneviève Le Moyne de Longueuil, daughter of Paul-Joseph Le Moyne de Longueuil, at Quebec. By July 1753 he was in command at Michilimackinac (present-day Mackinaw City, Michigan), then transferred to Fort de la Presqu'île (near present-day Erie, Pennsylvania) by October 1753. He returned to command Michilimackinac in May 1754.

Seven Years' War

On 20 July 1755 Beaujeu received the seigneury of Beaujeu on the west shore of Lake Champlain, though royal confirmation was never issued. In July 1756, while posted at Fort Carillon near Ticonderoga, New York, François de Lévis sent him with 100 Canadians and 120 Indigenous fighters to take prisoners between Fort Lydius (Fort Edward) and Fort William Henry on Lake George. He captured six soldiers in an ambush but his Indigenous allies prevented a larger attack; Lévis praised his conduct in correspondence to the governor, Pierre de Rigaud de Vaudreuil.

Beaujeu resumed command at Michilimackinac by 1757 and received the cross of Saint-Louis in February 1759. He reportedly accumulated considerable wealth through trade at Michilimackinac despite regulations prohibiting commandants from engaging in commerce. His wife also faced criticism in October 1759 for allegedly using military transport to ship merchandise from Quebec after its fall, goods suspected of yielding profits of several hundred per cent.

Withdrawal to Illinois

Just before the fall of Montreal in September 1760, Governor Vaudreuil ordered Beaujeu, through Charles-Michel Mouet de Langlade, to withdraw to the Illinois country. He departed in October with four officers and 128 soldiers, wintering near the Great Miami River. The Sauks and Foxes forced his party to trade merchandise worth over 65,000 livres for provisions. By 1761 he had reached Fort de Chartres near Prairie du Rocher, Illinois. He returned to France by the end of 1761, was back at Kaskaskia, Illinois, in 1762, and following the end of the Seven Years' War wintered again at Fort de Chartres in 1763–64, working to encourage Indigenous peoples to end hostilities with the British. By 1767 he was residing in the Mississippi country.

Seigneurial life and the American Revolution

In October 1769 Beaujeu's wife acquired the seigneury of Île aux Grues, Île aux Oies, and adjacent islands from her brother Joseph-Dominique-Emmanuel Le Moyne de Longueuil. Beaujeu built a manor on Île aux Grues and developed the estate. During the American invasion of 1775, Governor Guy Carleton called upon Beaujeu in March 1776, describing him as "that partisan of tried fidelity," to raise a relief force among Canadians along the south shore of the St. Lawrence below Quebec. Beaujeu gathered approximately 150 men, but when his advance guard was captured at a farm in Saint-Pierre-de-la-Rivière-du-Sud, he dispersed the remainder and went into hiding. His son Charles-François Liénard de Beaujeu de Villemonde served in the French navy and fought on the American side during the war.

Financial decline and death

The last quarter-century of Beaujeu's life was marked by mounting debt. By the early 1770s he owed £500 to Jacques Perrault (Perrault l'aîné). In February 1779 he sold his large two-storey house on the Place d'Armes in Quebec. The seigneury was offered for sale in August 1782 but attracted no buyers. In 1784 he borrowed £144 from Samuel Johannes Holland, and in August 1789 sold Île Patience and Île au Canot (the fief of Grandville) to merchant Alexander Wilson for £20. In November and December 1788 he signed petitions opposing merchant-led political reform, and in July 1790 he was granted a provincial captain's rank with half-pay in recognition of his service during the American Revolution. When the brigantine Atlas wrecked off Île aux Grues in October 1790, he sheltered survivors among the island's families. He put the seigneury up for sale again in June 1800 without success.

Beaujeu died on 5 June 1802 at Cap-Saint-Ignace. His estate was so heavily indebted that his heirs renounced the inheritance. The fully settled seigneury was sold at public auction in August 1802 to merchant Daniel Macpherson for £2,100.

External links

• Biography at the Dictionary of Canadian Biography