Élie (or Elias) Bouhéreau (1643 – 19 March 1719) was a French

Huguenot The Huguenots ( , also , ) were a religious group of French Protestants who held to the Reformed, or Calvinist, tradition of Protestantism. The term, which may be derived from the name of a Swiss political leader, the Genevan burgomaster Be ...

refugee A refugee, conventionally speaking, is a displaced person who has crossed national borders and who cannot or is unwilling to return home due to well-founded fear of persecution.

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

and the first librarian of

Marsh's Library Marsh's Library, situated in St. Patrick's Close, adjacent to St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, Ireland is a well-preserved library of the late Renaissance and early Enlightenment. When it opened to the public in 1707 it was the first public li ...

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of th ...

Career

Bouhéreau, according to the burial register of the Conformist Huguenot churches in Dublin, was a "distinguished medical doctor and zealous

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

La Rochelle La Rochelle (, , ; Poitevin-Saintongeais: ''La Rochéle''; oc, La Rochèla ) is a city on the west coast of France and a seaport on the Bay of Biscay, a part of the Atlantic Ocean. It is the capital of the Charente-Maritime department. With ...

, very knowledgeable and very highly regarded."Newport B. White, ''An Account of Archbishop Marsh's Library, Dublin'' (Dublin, 1926), p. 15 He was also a scholar, and published a French translation of the third century Christian work '' Contra Celsus''. After the

Revocation of the Edict of Nantes The Edict of Fontainebleau (22 October 1685) was an edict issued by French King Louis XIV and is also known as the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. The Edict of Nantes (1598) had granted Huguenots the right to practice their religion without s ...

Bouhéreau fled to

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. He travelled in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

between 1689 and 1692 as personal secretary of

Thomas Coxe Thomas Coxe (1615–1685) was an English physician. He studied at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, graduating with a BA in 1635 and an MA in 1638. He was among the initial fellows of the Royal Society, but ran into money difficulties in old age. L ...

, the king's envoy to the

Swiss cantons The 26 cantons of Switzerland (german: Kanton; french: canton ; it, cantone; Sursilvan and Surmiran: ; Vallader and Puter: ; Sutsilvan: ; Rumantsch Grischun: ) are the member states of the Swiss Confederation. The nucleus of the Swiss C ...

, and again between 1694 and 1696 as personal secretary to the Marquis de Ruvigny, commander-in-chief of English forces in

Piedmont it, Piemontese , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographics1_title2 ...

. He served in Ireland with Ruvigny (then

earl of Galway Earl () is a rank of the nobility in the United Kingdom. The title originates in the Old English word ''eorl'', meaning "a man of noble birth or rank". The word is cognate with the Old Norse, Scandinavian form ''jarl'', and meant "Germanic ch ...

) when the latter was

Lord Justice of Ireland The Lords Justices (more formally the Lords Justices General and General Governors of Ireland) were deputies who acted collectively in the absence of the chief governor of Ireland (latterly the Lord Lieutenant) as head of the executive branch of ...

, 1697-1701. In 1701 he was made librarian of Marsh's Library. From the time of his first journey in 1689 to his death he kept a

diary A diary is a written or audiovisual record with discrete entries arranged by date reporting on what has happened over the course of a day or other period. Diaries have traditionally been handwritten but are now also often digital. A personal ...

, which is kept in the Library.

Conservation work

Bouhéreau had with him documents from the

Reformed Church of France The Reformed Church of France (french: Église réformée de France, ERF) was the main Protestant denomination in France with a Calvinist orientation that could be traced back directly to John Calvin. In 2013, the Church merged with the Evangel ...

, which he had brought from

to save them from destruction. They were deposited at Marsh's library, the governors stipulating "that they were to be kept until such time as the same shall be demanded by the said Reformed Church." In 1760 John Wynne, the third librarian, expressed himself "apprehensive lest the papists might have access to make bad use of or destroy them." They were finally returned to the Consistory of La Rochelle in 1862. There are still many works in Bouhéreau's collection in the library that deal with French Huguenot history, including the manuscript of Joseph Guillaudeau's ''Journal of What Passed at La Rochelle 1584-1643''.

Personal life

Bouhéreau was married to a cousin, Marguerite Massiot. They had ten children, of whom eight survived.Whelan, 'Marsh's Library and the French Calvinist tradition', p. 219 His son John was ordained a minister, became a

Doctor of Divinity A Doctor of Divinity (D.D. or DDiv; la, Doctor Divinitatis) is the holder of an advanced academic degree in divinity. In the United Kingdom, it is considered an advanced doctoral degree. At the University of Oxford, doctors of divinity are ran ...

and was the first assistant librarian of Marsh's Library.Grace Lawless Lee, ''The Huguenot Settlements in Ireland'' (Westminster, 2001), p. 251 Marguerite died on 22 May 1704. Her death occasioned an emotional entry in an otherwise factual diary.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bouhereau, Elie 1643 births 1719 deaths People from La Rochelle Irish librarians French emigrants to Ireland