Guillaume Richard de Lafleur

Abt 1641 - 1690  (~ 49 years)

• Name	Guillaume Richard de Lafleur
  Birth	Abt 1641	Saint-Léger, Charente-Maritime, France   [1, 2]
  Gender	Male
  Death	2 Jul 1690	Bout-de-l'Îsle de Montréal, Québec
  Burial	Pointe-aux-Trembles, Québec   [3]
  Person ID	I8190	Ancestry of PNH, TNH, and others | Ancestor of TNH
  Last Modified	4 Dec 2019

  
  

  Father	Jean Richard
  Mother	Anne Meunier
  Marriage	Bef 1641	Saint-Léger, Charente-Maritime, France   [1]
  Family ID	F3802	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

  Family	Agnès Tessier,   b. Bef 23 Mar 1659   d. Bef 24 Jan 1733 (Age < 73 years)
  Marriage	26 Nov 1675	Montréal, Québec   [1, 3]
  Children	+ 1. Urbain Richard,   b. Bef 25 Mar 1690   d. 10 Aug 1760 (Age > 70 years)
  Family ID	F3844	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
  Last Modified	4 Dec 2019

  
  

• Notes

  From the Dictionary of Canadian Biography: RICHARD, dit Lafleur, GUILLAUME (styled Sieur de La Fleur), soldier of the Carignan-Salières regiment, captain of the Canadian militia, and at one time churchwarden; b. 1641, son of Jean Richard, seedsman, and his wife, Anne Meusnier, of Saint-Léger, bishopric of Saintes, France; d. 1690. A strong family tradition states that Richard was the descendant of John Richards, a Welshman, who, as a member of the king’s bodyguard, assisted the French king, Charles IX, to escape through the back gardens of the palace during the frightful massacre of St. Bartholomew, 14 Aug. 1572. Richard entered the French army as a young man, joining the Carignan-Salières regiment at its formation in 1664. On the last day of May of the following year he embarked for New France with his regiment, as a soldier in the company of Roger de Bonneau de La Varenne, arriving at Quebec on 19 August, after a long and tempestuous voyage. Two years later, when his regiment returned to France, Richard chose to remain in Canada. Shortly thereafter he was appointed sergeant in the Canadian forces, in which rank he accompanied governor Frontenac to Cataracoui where Fort Frontenac was founded in 1673. He remained at the new post as its first commandant when the French returned to Quebec. Richard continued in that capacity until the return of Cavelier de La Salle in 1675, and was still at the fort in September 1677, according to a census of its garrison. Shortly thereafter he was appointed sergeant of the garrison at Montreal. By 1684 he was lieutenant of the vanguard company of that post and later he was captain of militia in the parish of Pointe-aux-Trembles de Montréal, where he had maintained his residence since 1679. Guillaume Richard, dit Lafleur, met a soldier’s death on 2 July 1690, near Bout-de-l’Île de Montréal, when his small party of 25 was overwhelmed by a band of Iroquois warriors. Six days later the bodies of the fallen were buried hurriedly where they fell. In 1694 their remains were exhumed and reinterred in the cemetery of Pointe-aux-Trembles.

  
  

• Sources

  [S38] Genealogy of the French in North America, by Denis Beauregard. Complete version, 2024. [S2180] Dictionary of Canadian Biography., year only. [S2180] Dictionary of Canadian Biography.