A Canadian Family

In my first two posts I described some of the steps I had followed in trying to determine who my great-grandmother Elizabeth Doucet’s parents were. After comparing data on all the “Elisabeths” that she could be, I’d arrived at the conclusion that she was probably the daughter of a certain Alexander Doucet of Robertsville and that was as far as I could get.

I also left a note asking anyone who knew more about these Doucets of the Bathurst, New Brunswick area to contact me. Well – as so often happens when we share our family research online – I got lucky and was contacted by someone researching the same lineage – Janice Cushman. Janice is building her son’s line and he descends from Elizabeth Doucet through her son Arthur Legacy, one of my grandfather Adelard Lagace’s brothers. Janice told me that Arthur Lagace immigrated to western Canada – something which was a complete surprise to the hundreds of Lagaces living here in Montreal and back in New Brunswick!

Coming back to Elizabeth – while researching this line  independently, Janice had also arrived at the conclusion that Elizabeth was the daughter of Alexander Doucet of Robertville, but she had one more piece of the puzzle – a copy of Elizabeth Doucet’s death certificate which  proved that Elizabeth’s parents  were Alexandre Doucet and Marie Roy. She’s given me permission to share it with you, so here is an extract with the crucial detail:

As Janice commented in one of her emails “this is still a work in progress“. I agree.  As we try to reconstruct Elizabeth’s life, we have family lore, documentation, tombstone photos, census data etc. from various sources that all seems to fit together – and in fact we have a tentative line all the way back to Sieur Germain de la Verdure.

On the other hand, there are many discrepancies and in particular, I have not untangled what seem to be two Alexander Doucets – one married to a Marie Roy and the other to a Marie Doucet.  From personal experience I know that this is the moment to stop, take a step back and re-evaluate all the data that I’ve collected. This is a major research project and I’m afraid it’ll have to wait till next summer.

Attention:

If you have information on any 19th century Alexander Doucets of the Bathurst area, please contact me!

Related Posts:

Desperately Seeking Elizabeth(1)

Desperately Seeking Elizabeth(2)

A Canadian Family Headstone: Alexandre Doucet (1931) Marie Doucet (1920)