Pierre Gagnon

Biography

Pierre Gagnon was born at Château-Richer, on the north bank of the St. Lawrence downstream from Québec city in present-day Québec, Canada, on November 28, 1728 and baptized the following day. He was the son of another Pierre Gagnon and Marie Charrier. On April 20, 1751, he married Marguerite Dassylva at Château-Richer; he was twenty-two and she was eighteen.

The children named in the family record span more than twenty years. Bernard was born in 1752, near the beginning of the marriage, and Louis in 1774. Other children included Joseph-Marie, Marguerite, Jean-Marie, Marie-Louise, Élisabeth, Pierre and Marie-Anne. Their marriages joined the household with the Simard, Clément, Rémillard and other families.

Later records place the family in the Maskinongé region near the north shore of Lake Saint-Pierre, a broad stretch of the St. Lawrence. Marguerite was buried at Maskinongé in May 1784; Pierre's burial took place at Saint-Léon-le-Grand on February 20, 1812. He was eighty-three and had survived his wife by nearly twenty-eight years. A separate compilation places his death on the preceding day.