Madeleine Niel

1652 - 1732  (~ 81 years)

• Name	Madeleine Niel
  Birth	Between 1651 and 1652	Saint-Gervais, Rouen, Seine-Maritime, Normandy, France   [1]
  Gender	Female
  Death	15 Aug 1732  [1]
  Burial	16 Aug 1732	Saint-François-de-Laval, Québec   [1]
  Person ID	I33272	Ancestry of PNH, TNH, and others | Ancestor of TC
  Last Modified	27 Mar 2021

  
  

  Father	Robert Niel,   b. France d. France
  Mother	Anne Lambert,   b. France d. France
  Marriage	Bef 1651	Rouen, Seine-Maritime, Normandy, France   [1]
  Family ID	F19634	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

  Family	Étienne Charles dit Lajeunesse,   b. Bef 11 Jun 1643   d. Bef 16 May 1724 (Age < 80 years)
  Marriage	24 Oct 1667	Trois-Rivières, Québec   [1]
  Children	+ 1. Hélène Charles dit Clement et Lajeunesse,   b. Bef 12 Aug 1678   d. 22 Feb 1752 (Age > 73 years)
  Family ID	F19632	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
  Last Modified	27 Mar 2021

  
  

• Notes

  She was a fille du rois, a "daughter of the king." By 1660 or so it had become apparent that the fledgling North American colony of New France was badly short of marriageable women. To ameliorate this, between 1663 and 1673 the French government recruited respectable young women of limited prospects and, after vetting them for suitability, provided each of them with a small dowry, a chest of clothes, and one-way passage to Quebec. The approximately 800 women who made this journey became known as the "filles du roi", the "daughters of the King." Millions of modern French-Canadians can trace their descent from them, quite often from several.

  
  

• Sources

  [S38] Genealogy of the French in North America, by Denis Beauregard. Complete version, 2024.