This book examines the Acadians while exiled in France. Based on a tremendous amount of primary source research, Mouhot tells their story in great detail, while he also challenges many previous interpretations and understandings of their experiences in their "homeland."
The Acadian Refugees in France 1758-1785: The Impossible Reintegration?
On May 10, 1785, the Bon Papa, a modest three-master of 280 tons, hoisted its sails at Paimboeuf, France, near Nantes, and headed west. On board were thirty-six families whom the owner of the boat had promised to bring to port. The ship, which arrived at its destination on July 29, 1785--after eighty days on the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico waters--was only the first of seven ships carrying nearly 1,600 Acadians to Spain's Louisiana colony.
Thirty years, almost to the day, before the arrival of Bon Papa in New Orleans, seven or eight times as many Acadians had embarked on ships from Nova Scotia, Canada. Between July 28 and July 31, 1755, the English governor of the colony, Charles Lawrence, as a prelude to the Seven Years' War, made the decision to expel all inhabitants of French origin within his territory. Many of the exiled Acadians were deported to the American colonies, the Caribbean, Britain, or France. Nearly one-third of those deported died from disease or drownings. Those who did survive the journey often struggled to survive and assimilate in their new communities, even in their motherland of France.
This book examines the Acadians while exiled in France. Based on a tremendous amount of primary source research, Mouhot tells their story in great detail, while he also challenges many previous interpretations and understandings of their experiences in their "homeland."
- Publisher : University of Louisiana; English edition (April 24, 2018)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 356 pages / black and white
- ISBN-10 : 1935754750
- ISBN-13 : 978-1935754756
- Item Weight : 1.76 pounds
- Dimensions : 7 x 0.9 x 9.9 inches
JEAN-FRANCOIS MOUHOT was a Post-doctoral Research Fellow at the University of Birmingham, UK, until May 2011. He is currently a Marie Curie Research Fellow at Georgetown University and the EHESS in Paris. He is the author of Les Réfugiés acadiens en France (1758-1785): l'impossible réintégration? (Québec: Septentrion, 2009), Des Esclaves Energétiques: Réflexions sur le changement climatique (Seysel, Champ Vallon, 2011) and co-editor (with Charles-François Mathis) of Une Protection de l'Environnement à la Française? (XIXe-XXe siècles) (Seysel: Champ Vallon, forthcoming 2012). Most recently, he is the joint author, with Matthew Hilton Nicholas Crowson, & James McKay, of The Politics of Expertise: How NGOs Shaped Modern Britain (Oxford, 2012).