Pierre de Chauvin de Tonnetuit (born c. 1550, died 1603) was a French naval and military captain and a lieutenant of

New France New France (french: Nouvelle-France) was the area colonized by France in North America, beginning with the exploration of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence by Jacques Cartier in 1534 and ending with the cession of New France to Great Britain and Spai ...

who built at

Tadoussac Tadoussac () is a village in Quebec, Canada, at the confluence of the Saguenay and Saint Lawrence rivers. The indigenous Innu call the place ''Totouskak'' (plural for ''totouswk'' or ''totochak'') meaning "bosom", probably in reference to the t ...

, in present-day

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

, the oldest and strongest surviving French settlement in the Americas.

Background

Fishermen from Brittany, Normandy, the Basque country, who came ashore in

Acadia Acadia (french: link=no, Acadie) was a colony of New France in northeastern North America which included parts of what are now the Maritime provinces, the Gaspé Peninsula and Maine to the Kennebec River. During much of the 17th and early ...

during the summer months to dry their fish, found that they could carry on profitable trade with the Indians, exchanging axes, knives, pots and cloth for furs. In that epoch, only the rich men in Paris could afford a beaver robe, that could be bartered for an axe, knife or other sharp objects. With such profits possible, many fishermen and their backers turned to the fur trade, which was not only far more profitable but also easier to carry out. Such a lucrative trade also attracted the attention of some gentlemen of the court who had influence with the king. The king had the power to grant monopolies, the sole right to trade in certain commodities, but the monopolies were granted in return for favours rendered to the

crown of France France was ruled by monarchs from the establishment of the Kingdom of West Francia in 843 until the end of the Second French Empire in 1870, with several interruptions. Classical French historiography usually regards Clovis I () as the firs ...

Life

Pierre de Chauvin de Tonnetuit was born in

Dieppe Dieppe (; Norman: ''Dgieppe'') is a coastal commune in the Seine-Maritime department in the Normandy region of northern France. Dieppe is a seaport on the English Channel at the mouth of the river Arques. A regular ferry service runs to Newha ...

Normandy Normandy (; french: link=no, Normandie ; nrf, Normaundie, Nouormandie ; from Old French , plural of ''Normant'', originally from the word for "northman" in several Scandinavian languages) is a geographical and cultural region in Northwestern ...

, of a wealthy merchant family. In 1583, he served under Admiral Aymar de Chaste in the

Azores ) , motto =( en, "Rather die free than subjected in peace") , anthem= ( en, "Anthem of the Azores") , image_map=Locator_map_of_Azores_in_EU.svg , map_alt=Location of the Azores within the European Union , map_caption=Location of the Azores wi ...

. In 1589, Chauvin was captain of the important

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 ...

garrison at

Honfleur Honfleur () is a commune in the Calvados department in northwestern France. It is located on the southern bank of the estuary of the Seine across from le Havre and very close to the exit of the Pont de Normandie. The people that inhabit Honf ...

. By 1596, Chauvin had developed an interest in commercial and maritime enterprises. He now owned four vessels (the Don-de-Dieu, the Espérance, the Bon-Espoir, and the Saint-Jean), and he was regularly engaged in the

North American fur trade The North American fur trade is the commercial trade in furs in North America. Various Indigenous peoples of the Americas traded furs with other tribes during the pre-Columbian era. Europeans started their participation in the North American fur ...

and cod fishery of Canada and Newfoundland. A

Calvinist Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Ca ...

, he had given illustrious service in the wars against the League and was soon rewarded with a position of influence in the new king’s court. Chauvin, along with

François Gravé Du Pont François Gravé (Saint-Malo, November 1560 – 1629 or soon after), said ''Du Pont'' (or ''Le Pont'', ''Pontgravé''...), was a Breton navigator (captain on the sea and on the "Big River of Canada"), an early fur trader and explorer in the N ...

, obtained a fur trading monopoly for

in 1599 from King

Henri IV Henry IV (french: Henri IV; 13 December 1553 – 14 May 1610), also known by the epithets Good King Henry or Henry the Great, was King of Navarre (as Henry III) from 1572 and King of France from 1589 to 1610. He was the first monarc ...

Tadoussac

Chauvin embarked from Honfleur in the early spring of 1600, with his four ships and the intended colonists, Gravé as his partner and lieutenant, and

Pierre Du Gua de Monts Pierre Dugua de Mons (or Du Gua de Monts; c. 1558 – 1628) was a French merchant, explorer and colonizer. A Calvinist, he was born in the Château de Mons, in Royan, Saintonge (southwestern France) and founded the first permanent French sett ...

. Against the advice of Gravé, Chauvin chose Tadoussac as his destination. Basque and Norman whalers were already using

as a stopping point. Strategically situated on the north shore of the

St. Lawrence River The St. Lawrence River (french: Fleuve Saint-Laurent, ) is a large river in the middle latitudes of North America. Its headwaters begin flowing from Lake Ontario in a (roughly) northeasterly direction, into the Gulf of St. Lawrence, connecting ...

, at the junction with the

Saguenay River __NOTOC__ The Saguenay River () is a major river of Quebec, Canada. It drains Lac Saint-Jean in the Laurentian Highlands, leaving at Alma and running east; the city of Saguenay is located on the river. It drains into the Saint Lawrence River. T ...

, and adjacent to a harbour, Tadoussac had long been a Montagnais summering place for barter and, for half a century, a fur trading and fishing resort for Europeans. However, with the arms they received, the Montagnais had ousted the

Iroquois The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of First Nations peoples in northeast North America/ Turtle Island. They were known during the colonial years to ...

from the region and were soon to be visited by a revenge of equal horror and driven far into the interior. Tadoussacc was to suffer; and as allies of the Montagnais, and soon of the

Algonquins The Algonquin people are an Indigenous people who now live in Eastern Canada. They speak the Algonquin language, which is part of the Algonquian language family. Culturally and linguistically, they are closely related to the Odawa, Potawatomi, ...

and

Hurons The Wyandot people, or Wyandotte and Waⁿdát, are Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands. The Wyandot are Iroquoian Indigenous peoples of North America who emerged as a confederacy of tribes around the north shore of Lake Ontario w ...

too, all enemies of the Iroquois, the French and their fur trade were distressed for many years. The area was ill fitted for settlement because of the rugged terrain and poor soil, and because of the cold in winter. A house was built at Tadoussac, which Champlain saw and described as being "twenty-five feet long by eighteen wide and eight feet high, covered with boards with a fireplace in the middle," encompassed by a wattle palisade and a ditch. Champlain's map of Tadoussac in 1608, depicts the structure on the east bank (ncmf) of a stream that enters the harbour; underneath are the words "abitasion du Cappn chauvain de lan 1600" (habitation of Capt. Chauvin of the year 1600). After the colonists were settled, Chauvin and his companions devoted their energies to the traffic in pelts until the autumn, when they sailed for France with a cargo of beaver and other furs. At Tadoussac they left 16 men to face the unknown northern winter; only 5 survived, who owed their lives to Indian hospitality. Chauvin sent only one vessel, the ''Espérance'', to the Saguenay the following spring but did not sail himself. Chauvin died in 1603 after two years of successful trading, and he was briefly succeeded by Aymar de Chaste.

Legacy

The Poste de traite Chauvin Historical Museum is a replica of Chauvin's original house in Tadoussac. The museum hosts exhibitions on the themes: prehistory, encounters, trading, oil trade and trading posts.

References

External link