Here is an overview of Denis Savard’s conference (presented at the Richard Meeting of the World Acadian Congress) – Les Richard dit Cadet dit Robichaud as well as his article “The Acadian pioneer forgotten by history and rediscovered by DNA”, which was published in the Acadie Nouvelle on November 9, 2024.
It has been eight years since a “bomb” was dropped in the genealogy of the Robichaud and Richard families. DNA had just shown that a branch of the Robichaud family was not actually descendants of the Robichauds, but of the Richards, from the same line as Michel Richard, known as Sansoucy.
With minimal information regarding the Robichaud and Richard Y-DNA, we only knew that Joseph Robichaud (son of Charles, son of Étienne Robichaud) and his male descendants were actually Richards (Y-DNA Signature: R1b-FT163002) rather than Robichauds (J2-BY63627). Y-DNA is only passed down from father to son and is unchanged from one generation to the next, thus generally following surnames.
In recent years, other Robichauds have received their Y-DNA test results and further research has shown that it is not Joseph Robichaud but rather his father, Charles Robichaud, the supposed son of Étienne Robichaud who is not a Robichaud but a Richard.
At first, we automatically thought of a scandal in the Robichaud and Richard homes. However, the analyses revealed the existence of an Acadian pioneer, who died too young and was forgotten by history.
The new Y-DNA analyses and the research done by Stephen A. White of the Centre d’Étude Acadienne have allowed new hypotheses to be put forward. By analyzing parish registers from Port-Royal, Stephen A. White noted that Charles, like his sister Madeleine, takes the name Cadet rather than Robichaud.
The word cadet is generally used to mean a younger person and not the older ones, which intrigued Stephen A. White. Since Charles and Madeleine were the eldest children of Estienne Robichaud and Françoise Boudrot why use the name Cadet?
By examining the composition of the Robichaud family as it was known in the censuses, we also note that there are at least 3 years between the birth of Charles Robichaud (Cadet) around 1666 and Prudent born around 1669. This analysis would indicate that there were at least two families, and that Charles and Madeleine were born to the same parents and that they are children of a Richard, nicknamed Cadet, since this nickname is also passed on to them. This would therefore indicate that Charles and Madeleine would simply be Francoise Boudrot’s children from a first marriage. After the death of her first husband between 1665 and 1667 (According to the 1678 census, Madeleine was 16 years old and Charles was 12 years old), Françoise would have taken Etienne Robichaud as her second husband around 1668.
In the 1686 census, Françoise Boudrot, being widowed a second time, answers the census. Charles Robichaud, even though he is the eldest son (at 19 years old), is listed last in the list of children of Étienne and Françoise. Children in censuses are usually listed from oldest to youngest, this would be another indication of a child born from a first marriage.
So who was Françoise Boudrot’s first husband? We know from the results of Y-DNA tests that it would be a Richard. Most often, the usual nicknames of “elder” and then “younger” were assigned in official documents. More rarely, “Cadet” is used for the second of the name. “Cadet” is already very rarely used as a nickname and there are not a thousand reasons for it to be used. Françoise Boudrot’s first husband has no reason to carry this nickname with him to Acadia, except to differentiate him from a brother who would also be in Acadia.
Although we do not have absolute proof, the father of Charles and Madeleine Richard dit Cadet dit Robichaud, was most likely called Michel Richard dit Cadet, as opposed to his older brother, Michel Richard dit Sansoucy.
According to André-Carl Vachon, Michel Richard dit Sansoucy landed in Acadia in 1651 and after his military service, married Magdeleine Blanchard around 1656. Again, according to André-Carl Vachon, his brother, Michel Richard dit Cadet would have arrived in Acadia 10 years later around 1661 and married Françoise Boudrot around 1662.
This is a very valid hypothesis. Maybe we will never be able to confirm it 100% without finding other original documents or other discoveries in France from Y-DNA results. Maybe one day.
Sources : Acadie Nouvelle published November 9 2024, Denis Savard, page 28, A.C. Vachon, La colonisation de l’Acadie. / Register research : P. Richard