Smith Ancestry – Remembering the Battle of Vimy Ridge

When Great Britain declared war on Germany in August 1914, its Dominion of Canada automatically entered the fight, inspiring thousands to enlist. Eventually 619,000 Canadian troops joined British and French forces in Europe and quickly earned a reputation for toughness. In April 1915, the Second Battle of Ypres, a massive chlorine gas attack broke the line, but Canadian troops held the Germans until help arrived. Two years into the war at the Battle of the Somme, the 1st Newfoundland Regiment gave their all: after the first day, only 68 of some 800 soldiers survived.

Succeeding where British and French soldiers had failed, the Canadian Corps also captured the strategic point of Vimy Ridge (see the 100th Anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge - Veterans Affairs Canada). Canadian women pitched in too, and more than 3,000 nurses volunteered. The courage of the Canadian soldiers did not go unnoticed, and ultimately 70 received the Victoria Cross for “most conspicuous bravery in the presence of the enemy.”

The Smith Ancestry – England to United States to Canada (second stage) tells the story of how John Caleb Smith (1852-1940) married his second wife Emmeline Deborah Boutilier (1859-1940) in 1881. As their family tree shows, they had 8 children (6 boys and 2 girls). The records indicate that all 6 boys enlisted and served in World War 1 (see Footage - Canada at War).

John Caleb Smith and Emmeline Deborah Boutilier Family Tree

Ernest Milburn Smith, c.1916

Ernest Milburn Smith (our direct line ancestor) enlisted for service in the Canadian Over-Seas Expeditionary Force on December 21, 1915. His three older brothers followed. Horace Mazlin enlisted on March 25, 1916 and Norman Lindsay joined the Canadian Over-Seas Expeditionary Force on April 26, 1916. The WW1 US Draft Registration Card states that Isaac Caleb enlisted on September 12, 1918. 

Malcolm (Mack) Russell Smith, c.1916

Ernest’s younger brother, Malcolm Russell Smith (born in 1896) was the first of the Smith boys to enlist in the Canadian Over-Seas Expeditionary Force on November 29, 1915. Malcolm (known as Mack) was a member of the 10^th Machine Gun Company (Regimental Number 488787).

On August 9, 1917, Mack sent a hopeful letter to his older sister Gladys Bernice about the situation on the front lines in the trenches. Mack's letter states that he had recently seen his younger brother Weldon and that he was well (which proves that Weldon had also enlisted). His letter also says that Ernest (the lucky one) was recovering in a military hospital and made blighty, which means he would probably be sent back to England. He closes by sending his "love to all the children."

Malcolm Smith WW1 letter 1917 (click to enlarge)

On August 21, 1917, less than two weeks after writing that letter, Mack was killed in action in the battle at Vimy Ridge. At only 21 years old, he was buried at Villers Station Cemetery, France. Several online memorials honour his sacrifice, including: Canadian Virtual War Memorial, Canada at War and First World War - Books Of Remembrance.

Malcolm Russell Smith Headstone - 1917

LEST WE FORGET!

Roy Ancestry – How New France disappeared in 1763!

Virtual Museum of New France

Internet sites that address the history of New France are abundant. Lovers of history and professional historians, teachers and students alike, will find numerous avenues of further exploration and research. For example, the Canadian Museum of History list of useful links is lengthy but not exhaustive, and it is periodically enriched and updated.

The Canadian Museum of History provides an online Virtual Museum of New France. In the Heritage Section of the Site, it explains that New France disappeared in 1763, but its legacy persists to this day. The transfer to Great Britain and Spain of the territory occupied and claimed by France brought about a major political transition. The transatlantic networks which until them had animated the French colonies were reconfigured in fundamental ways. The French colonial population nevertheless remained firmly rooted. It did not overnight lose its religion, its customs, or its language. Colonial institutions were restructured, but many of them retained for many years to come the character they had acquired under the French Regime.

The heritage of New France is omnipresent today. The populations born of seventeenth and eighteenth century migrants continue to blossom, not only in Quebec, but through Canada and certain regions of the United States. With a little genealogical research, the gap between that era and our own is easily narrowed. The heritage of New France also shows through the particularities of the French language as it is still spoken in North America. French and Aboriginal place names, fixed by explorers and pioneers, etch traces of this founding epoch across the continent.

Since the beginning of the twentieth century, New France has also been commemorated in more explicit ways. From the tercentennial of the foundation of the city of Quebec, in 1908, to the two hundredth and fiftieth anniversary of the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, in 2010, solemn ceremonies and historical re-enactments have abounded. Monuments to founding figures and events have proliferated. Many historical sites have been reconstructed and animated through the efforts of governments and devoted lovers of history. New France, as it turns out, has not entirely disappeared.

Portal of New France

A second source of historical information from 1534 to 1763 is the Wikipedia Portal of New France. It explains that New France is the name that France gave to its colonies in North America. The history of New France began with the first attempts at French colonization following the first trip of Jacques Cartier in 1534. From 1604 to 1760, the Kingdom of France gradually expanded its authority over lands inhabited and sometimes settled by Native American populations. Samuel de Champlain founded the town of Quebec on July 3, 1608. It is one of the first permanent European settlements in North American soil and it was the capital of New France for over a century and a half.

This vast territory spanned three distinct regions: Acadia, in what is now Atlantic Canada and part of North Eastern United States, Canada, then comprising only St. Lawrence valley, and Louisiana, which included the Illinois Country, comprising the Mississippi and Ohio river valleys down to the Gulf of Mexico. New France had a low population growth compared to the British American colonies adjacent to its eastern borders. Around 1730, the gap was considerable: the British colonies had about 250,000 people of European origin while there were only 30,000 people in New France. This, in addition to its geographical position preventing the expansion of the British colonies, triggered confrontations. Those became more frequent until the fall of Quebec on September 13, 1759. A year after its capital was captured, New France fell and was dismantled. Parts were ceded to Great Britain while the rest went to Spain.

New France ceased to exist in 1763 when France ceded Canada and its dependencies to Great Britain by signing the Treaty of Paris. Then in 1800, Napoleon Bonaparte returned the vast Louisiana region to France from Spain under the Treaty of San Ildefonso. However, the treaty was kept secret, and Louisiana remained under Spanish control until a transfer of power to France on November 30, 1803, just three weeks before the cession to the United States under the Louisiana Purchase. Today, all that remains to France of this once vast wilderness empire are the little islands of Saint-Pierre et Miquelon, located off Newfoundland, Canada.

Roy Ancestry – France to Canada (Part 7)

New France (Canada) circa 1697

Canada A Country by Consent: New France

The land that is now known as Canada was first home to many different nations of native peoples with distinctly different languages and social organizations. What they shared was a great ability to live with the land and it was only by copying native ideas like the snowshoe, birch bark canoes and pemmican: dried lean meat that the Europeans were able to survive the harsh winters and develop a vast fur trade that eventually spread European influence across the country.

Canada is not a country based on ethnic uniformity like many countries. It is not a country forged by the fires of civil war or wars of unification. It is a country which has evolved and been held together by the agreement and will of the various groups who have helped build it over the years. Canada is a Country by Consent. (View the content of this online project which is organized into 27 chapters, many with an audiovisual introduction. The text is enhanced with additional film clips, interviews, essays by guest historians, hundreds of archival images, satellite maps and definitions.)

Etienne Roy (1690-1749) and Marie LaCasse (1692-1764)

 

Etienne (Stephen) Roy was the first male child in our Roy lineage to be born in Canada (New France). When he was born on April 20, 1690, in Lauzon, Quebec, his father Nicolas Roy (1661-1727) was 29 and his mother, Marie-Madeleine LeBlond (1665-1722) was 24. Etienne was fortunate to have his extended family welcome his birth, including his grandparents, Nicolas LeRoy (1639-1690) and Jeanne Lelièvre (1640-1728), and his great-grandmother, Anne LeMaitre (1617-1718). The joy was short-lived, however, when his grandfather Nicolas LeRoy died a few days later on April 27, 1690 at the age of 50 years.

Etienne Roy Profile

Etienne married Marie LaCasse on November 18, 1709, in Beaumont, Quebec when he was 19 years old and was 17 years old. (Source: Quebec Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), 1621-1967 Record for Etienne LeRoy. Beaumont (St-Étienne) > 1692-1796, 67. 2nd entry.)

Etienne Roy and Marie LaCasse church marriage record 1709

Marie LaCasse was born on June 19, 1692, in Lauzon, Quebec to Marie-Francoise Bazin, age 19, and Joseph LaCasse, age 22. The LaCasse family records (shown below) indicates that she was the oldest of 15 children – 11 girls and 4 boys. From an ancestry lineage perspective, it is noteworthy that three of the LaCasse girls (Marie, Marie-Francoise and Marie-Angelique) married Roy boys (Etienne, Louis and Jean-Baptiste, respectively).

As the following ancestry tree shows, Etienne and Marie had 10 children in 22 years from 1711 to 1733. This included 6 girls and four boys to carry on the Roy family name. Their third son, Pierre Roy (1725-1764), continues our family heritage.

Etienne Roy and Marie LaCasse Family

Ancestry records show that Etienne Roy died on December 3, 1749, in St. Vallier, Quebec, when he was 59 years old and was buried there. At that time, Etienne and Marie had been married 40 years. Marie LaCasse died on January 5, 1764, in St. Vallier, Quebec, when she was 71 years old. For reference purposes, the vital records for Etienne and Marie are available online and include guidance on how to read French documents.

Roy Ancestry – France to Canada (Part 6)

Our Roy Family – Three Generations emigrating from France to Canada

 

The Roy Ancestry – France to Canada (Part 1) notes that the ancestors of the Roy family have many stories to tell. According to the records, three generations of that family crossed the Atlantic Ocean in May 1662 aboard the sailing ship The Garden of Holland. The story of the first generation, Louis LeRoy (1611-1661) and Anne LeMaitre (1617-1718) is told in Roy Ancestry – France to Canada (Part 2).

 

The emigration from France to New France (Canada) and the commemoration of our first Roy ancestors to come to Canada are discussed in the Roy Ancestry – France to Canada (Part 3). The adventures of the second generation, Nicolas LeRoy (1639-1690) and Jeanne Lelièvre (1640-1728) are told in the Roy Ancestry - France to Canada (Part 4). An overview of the third generation of our French-Canadian ancestors, Nicolas Roy (1661-1727) and Madeleine LeBlond (1665-1722) is provided in Roy Ancestry – France to Canada (Part 5).

 

French-Canadian Man

French-Canadian Woman

 

 

Roy Family History in St Vallier, Bellechasse, Quebec

 

The home where Nicolas Roy lived (Saint-Vallier, Quebec) continued to house future generations of the Roy family to this day. Photos of the home were taken recently by one of the Roy family and are shown below. Photos of the St Vallier village and surrounding area are available online (St Vallier Images on Google Search). A brief history of St Vallier is also available online, in French (Histoire de Saint-Michel et de Saint-Vallier). In 2013, St Vallier celebrated its 300^th anniversary (1713-2013).

Montmorency Falls (near Roy Ancestral Home)

Our Roy family lineage follows from the eldest son of Nicolas Roy, Etienne Roy (1690-1749) who was the first male Roy born in Canada. He began a long line of Roys in Canada: Pierre (1725-1764), Francois (1763-1829), Féréol (1802-1883), Isidore (1835-1904), Gaudias (1863-1921), Alcide (1891-1939) and my father, Emile Roy (1914-1992).

 

Roy Ancestral Family Home - front

Roy Ancestral Family Home- Back