Jean Perlier I

Jean PERLIER I (1648 – 1688?) was Alex’s 9th Great Grandfather; one of 1,024 in this generation of the Miller line.

Jean Perlier was born about 1648 in La Treamblade, Charante, on the western coast of France. He came from a maritime family and grew up to be a Pilotte de Navire, a title that literally translated means a naval pilot. Back then that meant not only a navigator but the person who actually created the charts. He worked for ship owner Andre Arnaud and married his daughter Marie ARNAUD on 27 Nov 1667 in Temple of La Tremblade, Perche, France.

La Tremblade

During this time there was a great turmoil in France and the Huguenots (French Protestants) were under tremendous pressure. Children were taken from their parents and put into Catholic homes,  parents were persecuted and  frequently put to death.  The Edict of Nantes, decreed by French King Henry IV in 1598 guaranteed full civil rights, freedom of conscience and public worship to the country’s minority Protestants. Gradually, these rights were stripped away until in 1685, Louis XIV revoked the Edict altogether.  It was open season on Protestants including the Perliers.  When the slaughter and persecution began, the Perlier family was ripped apart.  Possibly Jean was at sea, for he managed to flee north to Holland.  He never saw his family again and for many years believed then dead.

La Tremblade

Marie Arnaud was born 24 Nov 1650 in Arvert, Charente Maritim, France. Her parents were Andre ARNAUD (1624-) and Marie GALIHAUT (c. 1628 – )  Andre Arnaud smuggled daughter Marie, Marie’s children, sister Jael and cousin Andre out of the country hidden in wine casks  aboard one of his ships.  It has been told that they hid in hogsheads which had holes bored in them and were stored with the freight in the bottom of the ship until they were out of reach of the inspectors. The first known record of Marie Arnaud in the United States is in 1687 when she appears as a widow on a list of the French Church at Narragansett, Rhode Island.

On the ship Marie met the captain, Pierre Traverrier.  Marie and Pierre were married 4 Jan 1688  in the church at Frenchtown, Narragansett, Rhode Island.  Their marriage was recorded on 20 Apr 1688, in the registers of the old French Church in New York City. Confirmatory evidence in the form of the original marriage-contract in French, existed among the family papers possessed in 1911 by descendants in Vevay, Indiana.   Marie and Pierre had two more children and they lived in Naragansett, Rhode Island, Boston, Massachusetts, and New York City.

From The Magazine of history with notes and queries, Volume 14 July – Dec 1911

The traditions of this family are well preserved, and tell of landed estates in France which were confiscated during the period of religious persecution. It is stated that when the family (? Traverrier) then residing in Bordeaux, decided to seek refuge in another land, they prepared their table set with the family-plate, as for a banquet, with servants at work, and all as usual on such an occasion, whereupon the family going out ostensibly for a drive, forsook everything and boarded a ship in the harbor. The captain (? Traverrier himself) befriended them and hid them in hogsheads or large barrels having some holes in the side for air. The next we hear of them is in America, where their temporary means of support seems to have been a recipe for making perfumery, but the family soon reasserted itself and in a new and more hospitable land than their mother country as then ruled, commenced to work out a new destiny.

Meanwhile with a clear conscience,  thinking that Marie and the boys had died in France, Jean married a Dutch girl and reared another family. The name Perlee as it was pronounced in Holland survives today.

Children of Jean and Marie

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Children of Marie and Pierre Traverrier:

The “widow” Perlier is on the list of church members on March 27, 1687 at Frenchtown, Narragansett, Rhode Island.. The following is Pierre and Marie’s marriage contract: “

Today the 4th of January, 1688, we Pierre Traverrier, ship captain, and Marie Arnaud, widow of Jean (John) Perlier, promise to take each other as husband and wife, the laws of our church being previously observed, we agree to live together in common as husband and wife the rest of our days, and in the case one of us should die, the one remaining shall enjoy in his own right all the wealth the two parties may possess, to dispose of as he may see fit to sell, assign, rent, etc., according as he may judge proper; and in case both of us should die without children from this marriage, we declare the children of the first marriage, who are Andre (Andrew) Perlier and Jean (John) Perlier, our legitimate heirs. Furthermore: I, Pierre Traverrier, give to Marie Arnaud the enjoyment of all my property and pretensions in France, in case the state of affairs should change and the liberty of the Protestant religion should be reestablished, giving her in general all that may belong to me. To all of these articles we have agreed in the presence of Mr. Carre, our minister, depository of this document, and of the witnesses below names. Signed: Pierre Traverrier and Marie Arnaud. On the other side the witnesses: Minister Carre, Jacques Many, Andre Arnaud, and Abraham Dumas.”

20 Apr 1688 – Pierre Traverrier and Marie Arnand received the nuptial benediction from Mr. Carre our minister, the three publications having been previously made according to the form of our church; in witness whereof we have signed. Carre minister, Pierre Traverrier, Marie Arnand, Jacques Many elder, Pierre Bonyot, elder, and secretary, Moise Brun elder.

NOTE BY Mr. E. R. Detraz. — This affidavit seems to be written in a different hand and bears a seal in red wax. The two additional items given below seem to be written in the same hand as the first article above given; that is, in the same hand as the marriage contract, but with a different pen and at a different time, as the date, January 6th, 1690, will show. All these articles are written in the French, on one and the same sheet.

Andre Arnaud was Marie’s cousin and was also a member of the French Church in Narragansett, Rhode Island.

Huguenots were barred from settling in New France, so many Huguenots setted instead in the Dutch colony of New Netherland (later incorporated into New York and New Jersey),  A number of New Amsterdam’s families were of Huguenot origin, often having emigrated to the Netherlands in the previous century. The Huguenot congregation was formally established in 1628 as L’Église française à la Nouvelle-Amsterdam. This parish continues today as L’Eglise du Saint-Esprit, part of the Episcopal (Anglican) communion still welcoming Francophone New Yorkers from all over the world. Services are still conducted in French for a Francophone parish community, and members of the Huguenot Society of America.

Children

2. Peter Perlee

Andre’s descendant Peter Perlee spied for the British. After the war his land in Pennsylvania was confiscated. The Loyalist Peter took his family and moved to Canada, founding the Canadian branch of the family.  Our Parlee ancestors also come from a Loyalist family who were relocated to Canada after the Revolution. (See Nathaniel PARKS)

3. Pierre Traverrier

On the 6th day of January 1689 were baptized by Mr. Carre our minister, Pierre and Marie Magdelenne Traverrier children of Pierre Traverrier and Marie Arnand, presented to baptism to wit, Pierre by Pierre Traverrier his father and Jeanne Drommeau, and Marie Magdelenne by Jacques Many and Magdelenne Filleul, godfathers and godmothers; who declare the said children to be born the last of the year 1688.

Signed Carre minister, Pierre Traverrier, P. Bonyot, elder. Extracted by me the 5th of January, 1690.

Pierre was apprenticed to Peter Chaigneau, cooper, by his mother, who at that time was referred to as a widow, October 21, 1701.

Pierre and Marie had only one child, a daughter, Mary Traverrier who married Henrick Dumont 20 Dec 1743 in Somerset, New Jersey.

The Magazine of history with notes and queries, Volume 14 July – Dec 1911

Wallerand Dumont, a French Huguenot, who was born at Coomen, then in Flanders (now Commines, Department du Nord, France, eight miles north of Lille). He was a cadet (“adelborst “) in a company of soldiers sent by the Dutch West India Company, to Director-General Stuyvesant, in New Amsterdam, in 1657. Wallerand Dumont settled in Kingston, Ulster County, New York, rose to a position of influence, and married Grietje (Margaret) Hendricks, January 13, 1664, by whom he had, among other children, Peter Dumont, who was baptised April 20, 1679, at Kingston, and married, thirdly, November 16, 1711, Jannetje Vechten or Vechte (now Veghte).

Of this union, one child was named Henry or Hendrick Dumont, born March 22, 1717. His will is dated November 4th, 1760. His first wife, to whom he was married December 20, 1743, was Mary (Marie) Traverrier, of Monmouth, called ” the younger,” to distinguish her from her mother, Mrs. Marie Traverrier ” the elder,” wife of Peter Traverrier, junior, and daughter of Renier Rezeau of the Island of Re, near La Rochelle, France, who, as a Huguenot, fled to America, about 1700.

His daughter, Marie Rezeau (later Mrs. Peter Traverrier, jun.), had a French Testament which is still in the possession of some of her descendants near Cincinnati;

Peter Traverrier, junior, was a son of Pierre Traverrier (or Traversier) senior, a ship-captain of “Masha,” probably intended for Matha, located east of the village of La Tremblade and north of Bordeaux. We find the official record of the marriage of this Pierre Traverrier, senior, and Marie ARNAUD, widow of Jean PARLIER of La Tremblade, 20 April, 1688, in the registers of the old French Church in New York City. Confirmatory evidence in the form of the original marriage-contract in French, exists among the family papers still possessed by descendants in Vevay, Indiana. The traditions of this family are well preserved, and tell of landed estates in France which were confiscated during the period of religious persecution. It is stated that when the family (? Traverrier) then residing in Bordeaux, decided to seek refuge in another land, they prepared their table set with the family-plate, as for a banquet, with servants at work, and all as usual on such an occasion, whereupon the family going out ostensibly for a drive, forsook everything and boarded a ship in the harbor. The captain (? Traverrier himself) befriended them and hid them in hogsheads or large barrels having some holes in the side for air. The next we hear of them is in America, where their temporary means of support seems to have been a recipe for making perfumery, but the family soon reasserted itself and in a new and more hospitable land than their mother country as then ruled, commenced to work out a new destiny.

But let us return to our subject: “les Dumont.” Henry or Hendrick Dumont and Mary Traverrier, “the younger,” his first wife, had a son, Peter Dumont, who was born on Staten Island, New York, October 1, 1744, and died in Vevay, Indiana, in 1821. This Peter Dumont married, October 25, 1770, Mary Lowe, daughter of Cornelius Lowe, son of Albert Lowe, of Dutch descent. Peter Dumont is seemingly identical with Peter Dumont, Captain, Second Battalion, Somerset County, New Jersey. Tradition says he was called from the field by Washington and made a Commissary in charge of military stores at Van Ness’ mills. A descendant possesses his original Commissary’s book of munitions supplied “by order of General Washington.” He (as Peter H. Dumont) was designated by the New Jersey Congress in 1777, to act as one of the Committee of Safety. Tradition says that Washington frequently conferred with him, and that owing to his devotion to the cause of his country, by night work at Van Ness’ mills, he lost his sight. During the last twenty-five years of his life, his faithful wife read to him. The middle initial “H.,” above mentioned, represents his father’s name Henry, there being several Peter Dumonts coexisting in the same vicinity at that period and this was the customary way of distinguishing between them.

The late Senator F. T. Frelinghuysen’s mother, Mrs. Jane Frelinghuysen, made a family record based on information given her orally by her father, Peter J. B. Dumont (born circa 1760, died May 19, 1846), to the effect that Hendrick Dumont’s son, Peter, had a sister “Mary who married a Staats at Albany.” There is, indeed, an official record at Albany of the marriage of one Mary Dumond to Henry Staats, November 15, 1770. The Staats family descended from Abraham Staats, who came from Holland to Albany in 1642. The writer received a genealogical inquiry not so long ago from Mr. P. D. Staats, 210 North Seventh Street, Newark, N. J., whose initials are suggestive of a Dumont family relationship.

Peter Dumont (born 1744) and Mary, his wife, had several children, among them Lydia, born at South Branch of Raritan River, N. J., August 30, 1773, died in Cincinnati, October 29, 1822, having married, June 28, 1792, Captain Moses Guest, of New Brunswick, N. J. They had issue of which further mention will be made in the chapter on the Guest family.

The Dumont family gave some notable characters to the United States. From that same stock were descended Senator Frederick T. Frelinghuysen, his brother Dumont Frelinghuysen, and Governor Peter Dumont Vroom all of New Jersey, Senator Samuel Beekman Dumont of Iowa, and Colonel John Dumont of Indiana whose wife, Mrs. Julia L. Dumont, was an early author and schoolmistress of our new West. One of her pupils, none other than the late Edward Eggleston, contributed a glowing tribute to her character, in Scribner’s Monthly, for March, 1879. General Ebenezer Dumont, son of Colonel John and Julia, his wife, was born in Vevay, Indiana, November 23, 1814; participated in the Mexican War and served in the war of the Rebellion, being engaged in several battles. He organized and led the celebrated pursuit of John Morgan. He was a member of Congress for four years, 1862-1866, and died, April 16, 1871, at his home south of Indianapolis, having just been appointed Governor of the then Territory of Idaho, which office he did not live to assume.

Sources:

http://www.barney.org/family/wga45.html#I8103

http://www.barney.org/family/wga47.html#I8600

http://www.gamblinfamily.org/parlee.html

The Magazine of history with notes and queries, Volume 14 July – Dec 1911

Tales of our forefathers and biographical annals of families allied to those of McPike, Guest and Dumont (1898)