Pierre Lombard
farmer (1709) 1
of Drakenstein 2
born circa 1658, Pointais in the Dauphiné 3
died 1714 4
will dated 8 January 1709 | | Notes: | His place of birth was given in his will as Pointais in Dauphiné.
Maurice Boucher, in his book French Speakers at the Cape, 1981,
gives the place name as Pontaix in Dauphiné, 'a picturesque little
town on the right bank of the Drôme below Die'.
Pierre Lombard and his wife, Marie Couteau, were apparently
members of the Amsterdam congregation of the Walloon Church
in 1687 when they were part of a small group of refugees from
Dauphiné who took leave of that congregation on 21 December
1687, before sailing for the Cape, possibly on the Borssenburg, a
ship which left Texel for the Cape on 6 January 1688.
This note of their leaving in the church register says that they
were accompanied by 'their mother, Eve', but it does not say which
of the couple's mother she was and no surname is mentioned. Eve,
however, does not seem to have arrived at the Cape. If they did
indeed travel on the Borssenburg she may have stayed behind,
since there were, most unusually, no deaths recorded on that
voyage to the Cape.
Boucher suggests that Pierre Lombard may have been the son of
Antoine Lombard, a farm worker at Aurel, south of Pontaix across
the river, who remained in the district after the revocation of the
Edict of Nantes in 1685.
(The above information from: French Speakers at the Cape,
by M. Boucher, University of South Africa, Pretoria, 1981.)
Both Pieter Lombart and his wife Maria Coutau signed their will of
1709 by making their marks. One assumes, therefore, that they
were unable to write. |
|
