Louise Marsolet

Biography

Louise Marsolet’s name appears in records of property management long after her husband’s death. Born at Québec city, on the St. Lawrence River in present-day Canada, in May 1640, she was a daughter of Nicolas Marsolet and Marie Le Barbier. In 1653 she married Jean Lemire, a carpenter who also served as a representative of Québec’s inhabitants.

Their family grew over more than a quarter-century. The family compilation lists sixteen births between 1655 and 1681, with several children dying in infancy or childhood. Among those who survived were daughters Jeanne-Élisabeth, Marie-Madeleine and Louise, and sons Joseph, Jean-François and Jean-Baptiste. The records encompass repeated births and losses as well as the marriages through which the adult children established their own families.

Jean died in October 1684. Louise then appears in transactions made in her own name as his widow. On January 11, 1688 she leased a farm to Charles Ransin before the notary Gilles Rageot. A further act, dated June 3, 1696, names Louise with her brother Jean and sisters Geneviève and Marie-Madeleine in the sale of their rights in the seigneury of Prairies-Marsolet. Their father’s property interests remained part of the children’s affairs nearly twenty years after his death.

She was dealing with a farm and with inherited seigneurial rights during a widowhood that lasted into the next century. Louise died at Québec on April 18, 1712, almost seventy-two years after her birth there.

The burial listing places Louise Marsolet at Basilique-Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Québec, Québec, Capitale-Nationale Region, Québec, Canada.