52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks
This year, I’ve decided to participate in “52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks” Genealogical Challenge (#52Ancestors). This is a way of chronicling my ancestors and getting the information out of my filing cabinet and out to friends and family.
If you can add to the information or have your own stories, please feel free to add them in the comments. Who knows, perhaps you’ll help me break through a few of my brick walls.
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#52Ancestors in 52 Weeks
The first challenge theme is "I'd Like to Meet...". While I would like to meet many my ancestors, there are a few that stand out. This one in particular.
WEEK 1 – I'd Like to Meet Barbe HALAY (1645-1695), my 9th Great Grandmother
Barbe Hallay was born 1645, in Chartres, Eure-et-Loir, Centre-Val de Loire, France, the child of Jean Baptiste Hallay and Mathurine Valet.
Barbe Hallay had immigrated as a young girl of about 20 years of age with her family around 1665.
She married Jean Carrier III on 04 November 1670, in Notre-Dame de Québec, Quebec City, Québec, Canada, New France.
They had at least 4 sons (Ignace Phillippe, Louis, Charles, Jean and two daughters, Marie Anne and Louise).
She died in 1696, in Saint-Joseph-de-la-Pointe-à-Lévy, Québec, at the age of 51, and was buried in Saint-Joseph-de-la-Pointe-à-Lévy.
What makes Barbe’s story so fascinating is that it has the rare distinction of being of Canada’s earliest reported 'demon possession caused by witchcraft' case.
Her story has recently been reintroduced thanks to Mairi Cowan, a history professor at the University of Toronto-Mississauga. Her Book “Possession of Barbe Hallay” provides a microhistory of New France in 1660’s and focus’ on Barbe Hallay unique story.
Book Description:
When strange signs appeared in the sky over Québec during the autumn of 1660, people began to worry about evil forces in their midst. They feared that witches and magicians had arrived in the colony, and a teenaged servant named Barbe Hallay started to act as if she were possessed. The community tried to make sense of what was happening, and why. Priests and nuns performed rituals to drive the demons away, while the bishop and the governor argued about how to investigate their suspicions of witchcraft. A local miller named Daniel Vuil, accused of using his knowledge of the dark arts to torment Hallay, was imprisoned and then executed. Stories of the demonic infestation circulated through the small settlement on the St Lawrence River for several years. In The Possession of Barbe Hallay Mairi Cowan revisits these stories to understand the everyday experiences and deep anxieties of people in New France. Her findings offer insight into beliefs about demonology and witchcraft, the limits of acceptable adolescent behaviour, the dissonance between a Catholic colony in theory and the church's wavering influence in practice, the contested authority accorded to women as healers, and the insecurities of the colonial project. As the people living through the events knew at the time, and as this study reveals, New France was in a precarious position. The Possession of Barbe Hallay is both a fascinating account of a case of demonic possession and an accessible introduction to social and religious history in early modern North America.
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