Louise Dechêne - People, State, and War under the French Regime in Canada

MCGILL-QUEENS FRENCH ATLANTIC WORLDS SERIES

Series editors: Nicholas Dew and Jean-Pierre Le Glaunec

The French Atlantic world has emerged as a rich and dynamic field of historical research. This series will showcase a new generation of scholarship exploring the worlds of the French Atlantic including West Africa, the greater Caribbean region, and the continental Americas from the sixteenth century to the mid-nineteenth century. Books in the series will explore how the societies of the French Atlantic were shaped and connected by trans-oceanic networks of colonialism, how local and indigenous cultures and environments shaped colonial projects, and how the diverse peoples of the French Atlantic understood and experienced their worlds. Especially welcome are histories from the perspectives of the enslaved and dispossessed. Comparative studies are encouraged and the series will accept manuscript submissions in English and in French. Original works of scholarship are preferred, though translations of landmark books in the field will be considered.

Le monde atlantique franais est devenu un domaine de recherche riche et dynamique au sein de la discipline historique. La prsente collection a pour vocation daccueillir une nouvelle gnration douvrages explorant les espaces de lAtlantique franais y compris lAfrique de lOuest, la grande rgion des Carabes et les Amriques continentales du dbut du XVIe sicle jusquau milieu du XIXe sicle. Les uvres qui y sont publies explorent de quelles manires les socits de lAtlantique franais sont faonnes et relies par les rseaux transocaniques issus du colonialisme, de quelle manire les cultures locales et leurs environnements influencent les projets coloniaux, et comment les divers peuples de lAtlantique franais comprennent et exprimentent leurs mondes. Les ouvrages donnant la parole aux esclaves ou aux acteurs traditionnellement domins sont particulirement bienvenus, tout comme les recherches compares. La collection est ouverte aux manuscrits rdigs en anglais ou en franais, de prfrence des monographies originales, ainsi quaux traductions de livres ayant marqu le domaine.

1 Architecture and Urbanism in the French Atlantic Empire

State, Church, and Society, 16041830

Gauvin Alexander Bailey

2 Flesh Reborn

The Saint Lawrence Valley Mission Settlements through the Seventeenth Century

Jean-Franois Lozier

3 Power and Subsistence

The Political Economy of Grain in New France

Louise Dechne

4 Fruits of Perseverance

The French Presence in the Detroit River Region, 17011815

Guillaume Teasdale

5 The Cry of Vertires

Liberation, Memory, and the Beginning of Haiti

Jean-Pierre Le Glaunec

6 People, State, and War under the French Regime in Canada

Louise Dechne

LOUISE DECHNE

Edition prepared by Hlne Par, Sylvie Dpatie, Catherine Desbarats, and Thomas Wien

Translated by Peter Feldstein

McGill-Queens University Press

Montreal & Kingston London Chicago

McGill-Queens University Press 2021

Originally published in French as Le Peuple, ltat et la guerre au Canada sous le Rgime franais ditions du Boral 2008

ISBN 978-0-2280-0676-3 (cloth)

ISBN 978-0-2280-0677-0 (paper)

ISBN 978-0-2280-0721-0 (ePDF)

ISBN 978-0-2280-0722-7 (ePUB)

Legal deposit third quarter 2021

Bibliothque nationale du Qubec

Printed in Canada on acid-free paper that is 100% ancient forest free (100% post-consumer recycled), processed chlorine free

This book has been published with the help of a grant from the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, through the Awards to Scholarly Publications Program, using funds provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the National Translation Program for Book Publishing, an initiative of the Roadmap for Canadas Official Languages 20132018: Education, Immigration, Communities, for our translation activities.

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts. Nous remercions le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Title: People, state, and war under the French regime in Canada / Louise Dechne.

Other titles: Peuple, ltat et la guerre au Canada sous le Rgime franais. English

Names: Dechne, Louise, 19282000, author.

Series: McGill-Queens French Atlantic worlds series ; 6.

Description: Series statement: McGill-Queens French Atlantic worlds series ; 6 | Translation of: Le peuple, ltat et la guerre au Canada sous le Rgime franais. | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20210160411 | Canadiana (ebook) 20210160497 | ISBN 9780228006763 (cloth) | ISBN 9780228006770 (paper) | ISBN 9780228007210 (ePDF) | ISBN 9780228007227 (ePUB)

Subjects: LCSH: CanadaHistoryTo 1763 (New France) | LCSH: Canada History, Military. | LCSH: CanadaMilitiaHistory. | LCSH: Militia movements Qubec (Province)History. | CSH: CanadaHistory, MilitaryTo 1800. | CSH: CanadaSocial life and customsTo 1763.

Classification: LCC FC226 .D4213 2021 | DDC 971.01dc23

This book was typeset in 10.5/13 Sabon.

Thomas Wien

Thomas Wien

Hlne Par

Sylvie Dpatie and Catherine Desbarats

Catherine Desbarats

TABLES

FIGURES

Thomas Wien

Louise Dechne did not live to see this book to completion, for she died on 1 July 2000 at the age of seventy-one. Three days before that, she was still dictating the broad outlines of the conclusion to her daughters, Genevive and Julie. People, State, and War under the French Regime in Canada is part of a broader study of relations between the Canadian colonists and the Ancien Rgime administration. She had embarked on the project after completing her dissertation, submitted in 1973 and published the following year as Habitants et marchands de Montral au XVIIe sicle. The next task was to complete another (in her mind, much more important) part of the analysis, concerning the military sphere. In retirement, this became the focus of her incessant labours. She had become, in her words, a homebody, a euphemistic reference to being confined to her apartment by emphysema. And so the dining room became her point of departure for a series of archival journeys, back in time to the French regime, and this book was the result.

If she had had a few more months, Dechne would have further revised certain chapters, especially the last, which was left in draft form. She would have added material to the historiographic portion of the introduction and written a lengthier conclusion than the ones found in her earlier works.

But the scope of the study goes beyond the militiamen to include the whole population of a colony at grips with perpetual war and its exigencies. Even when the enemy was not at the remote outposts, let alone at the city gates, defending the colony imposed a burden in terms of work brigades