The Huguenin family. Do they come from ?
The first appearance of the name Huguenin in France goes back to the year 1292. The Census Parisiorum refers, at that date, to the presence in Paris of a so-called Huguenin le Bourguignon, this name suggesting a Burgundian origin. We can find also, in Burgundy, a certain Hughes Bourgogne, called Huguenin, born in 1260 and dead in 1288. In fact the name HUGUENIN comes probably from the slopes of the Jura mountains where it is still alive and well referenced, particularly in the swiss areas of Neuchatel and La-Chaux-de-Fonds as well as on the french part of the mountains. It is probably from this french part of the so-called "Franche-Comte" that some Huguenin families could have emigrated during the 13th and the 15th centuries to settle in Switzerland, attracted by the freedoms conceded by the landlords of Neuchatel and Valanges to help them to settle and develop the mountain land.
In Switzerland, a large Huguenin family comes from Le-Locle, little town in the higher part of the Neuchatel district and specialised in clockmaking. The known ancestor, named Outhenyn chiez Heuguenin, was a free-burgher and lived here at the end of the 15th century. Counting his descendants still living in Switzerland, those emigrated to the States or to Australia, and others, they are still about 8500 who bear the name, either simple or compound. They are numerous in the United States and also in Holland.
In France, according to the INSEE data, we can find about 3613 persons bearing this name, setting it at the 2158th rank of the most borne french names. This name is frequent in the eastern part of France, particularly in regions such as Lorraine, Champagne-Ardennes, Burgundy and Franche-Comte. Somebodies try to do a connection between the name "Huguenin" and the calling of huguenot given in 1550 by the genevian catholics to the Calvinists. But, the name was living long before this calling and so, the connection is without any fundation. The name derives probably from Hughes, itself coming from Hug , an old germanic name meaning "spirit" or "thought". In France and in Switzerland, the name is present under different forms or variations: Hugounin, Hugounenq, Huguenet, Hugonin, Hugueny, frequently completed by a prefix or a suffix such in Petithuguenin or Huguenin-Virchaux... These double names are very typical of the Neuchatel swiss district and of the french Franche-Comte.
Near the end of the 19th century, a parisian branch of the Huguenin family, by the marriage of Edouard Huguenin, son of Bonaventure Alexis Huguenin, from the french Champagne, was allied with the family Drieu, from Saint-Lo in Normandy. This family is from an old norman ascendance, one of its known ancestor being a man called Drieu Le Normand, born in 1045, and fellow of William the Conqueror in 1066 during the conquest of England. He was still living in 1086 and his descendants in England, by his son Walter Drieu, shall bear the successive names of Drui (1200), Drury (1300) then Drewry after the emigration in North America of Robert Drury, in 1635. This name of Drieu sould come from an old medieval french word meaning "love-token". The Drury were, in medieval England, a very prominent family. They counted 18 Knights, 5 Sheriffs of the Norfolk and Suffolk County and 4 Earl Knights. Some members of the family were councellors of the Kings of England and among the richest families of the Kingdom. (cf. History of the Drury family).
Origins of the Revel family
In the year 1027, it is possible, in a gift done by the Nice viscount family to the Saint Pons Convent, to find mention of "the monastery and the Saint Martin church which are under the castrum named Rocheta, north to the Var river, with his lands, fields and vineyards". From this date, the name of Rocheta, then La Roquette, appears regularly in the official acts of the Nice Viscounty, dependency of the County of Provence.
In these acts, it is possible to find, since the beginning, the names of the first inhabitants of La Roquette, the families Raybaud, Raynaud, Bottin or Verola, which all have parentals links with the Revel family. This one appears, for the first time, at the 17st century, by the name of Jean Revello whose son, Pierre, born the 9st of November 1656 in La Roquette, became in 1686, sindaco of the village jointly with Antoine Mandine. To have access to this official function, the citizens must be "clever, able, literate and in a good physic condition". The part of the sindaco, in the Nice Viscounty, was alike this of the Consuls in Languedoc and Eastern Provence. Two were nominated each year and were presidents of the Community Ordinary Council, made of eight Councillors plus the two Sindaci. The sindaco named and managed the communal worksmen, but he was himself supervised by the Council and must be, at any time, dismissed in case of mistake.
La Roquette-sur-Var
From this moment up to now, the presence of the Revel family is permanently recorded in La Roquette. Apparently they had renounced to any activity of local politics and they did not take a part in the events which suceeded, in the County of Nice, to the french Revolution. However, we can notice the presence of a Joseph Revel at the time of the communal meeting which shall nominate the representatives of La Roquette to the Convention, the Assembly which had to discuss and decide the reuniting of Nice with the french Republic (25th November 1792).
Anew, we can find in the Census of May 1799 (Prairial An VII on the Republican Calendar), Jacques Revel (1758-1802), husband of Anne-Marie Baudoin, who is counted as a La Roquette commoner and taxed for 1 franc and 19 cents. They were not a very rich family.
Then, the Census of February 1805 show us three children of Jacques Revel and Anne-Marie Baudoin, named Antoine François, Claude Maurice and Jean Laurent, who were grown up, after the death of their parents in the year 1802, by the families of Augustin Baudoin, Giletta and Honore Baudoin respectively.
A new Census, in 1827, done by the Sardinian autorities, named anew the three Revel brothers, Francesco, Pietro and Maurizio, but with no mention of an other Revel family resident in La Roquette.
Origins of the Pages family
The presence of the Pages families, in the country of Gevaudan, at the feet of the Margeride mountains, is recorded since the 17th century. The familial branch comes from Rieutord-de-Randon, a big village eighteen kilometers north of Mende, at a height of 1140 meters. More exactly, in 1797, was born Jean Baptiste Pages, son of Jean Pages and Anne Chamatou, in the hamlet of Moulhet, at 1220 meters high on the slopes of the Signal-de-Randon, a mount of a total height of 1550 meters. From his marriage with Marie Boulet, were born at least two children, Rosalie and Jean Antoine who were the ancestors of the now existing branchlets of the Pages family. The name of Pages, from languedocian origin, refers without doubt to a status of free countryman living in an important village or a snall town (from the latin word pagus).
Rieutort de Randon (Lozere)
Jean Antoine Pages, born in Rieutort-de-Randon the 27th of December 1836 and dead in Mende the 24th of July 1916, was the son of Jean Baptiste Pages and Marie Rose Boulet. He was a shepherd and noneducated when he went to the war with the French imperial army against the Austrian army. In Italia, he took part to the battle of Solferino (24 June 1859) where he lost his leg. He was operated in the hospital which was set up, after the battle, in the "Chiesa Maggiore" de Castiglione delle Stiviere near Padua. It is during a visit to this hospital where were nursed about 9000 wounded soldiers that the Swiss Henri Dunant, seeing this human pain, decided to create the charitable society which became the Red Cross Society (you could find in these pages the description, in french, made by Dunant of the battle of Solférino).
The "Chiesa Maggiore" in Castiglione delle Stiviere
Back to his village after the war, Jean Antoine Pages learned to read and was allowed a public office in the Post service. He began to work in the town of Saint Germain de Calberte (Lozere France) and finished his career as a Postmaster in Anduze and Mende (Lozere).
Jean Antoine Pagès & Marie Adèle BalMayer
The 8th of January 1863, Jean Antoine Pages had married Marie Adele BalMayer, born in Mende (Lozere) the 26th of November 1842. She was the daughter of Antoine Bernard Balmayer and his wife Enimie Bonicel. The grand-father of Marie Adele, Jean Antoine Balmayer, born in 1781, came, as other families of the same name Balmayer ( sometimes called Balmaguier, Balmayé or Balmaié), from villages of the Tarn valley, on the boundaries of Aveyron, Lozere or Gard, or from the nearby "Causses" mountains. Some says that these families came from the parisian region and were moved to Languedoc by order of the ancient kings of France. At the end of the 19th century these families were very frequent in the villages of Mostuejouls (Aveyron), Auxillac (Lozere) and Saint Jean-du-Gard (Gard). The meaning of the name is discussed but it comes probably from a germanic root and could mean "wolfmaster".
The origins of the Laquière family
The presence of theLaquiere family (the name comes probably from the languedocian word "quer" whose meanig is rock), in the town of Pamiers (Ariege France), is proved by the birth, in 1625, of the first known Laquiere who became, in 1658, "Consul" of the town. Other Consuls bearing the same name, were recorded in 1665, 1670 and 1676 all being "citizens, merchants and landlords".On of them, Antoine Laquiere, born in 1680 in Pamiers, moved in 1705 to the town of Foix where he married Jeanne Sere. They had three children whose the first son, named Volusien Laquiere and born in 1713, married Marie Juvenel. The 3rd of January 1741 is born their son, Jean Baptiste Laquiere, dead in 1814, who was Consul of Foix and King Councillor. A street in Foix bears his name.
Jean Baptiste Laquiere and his wife Francoise Beaufort reared five children. The first of them, named also Jean Baptiste Dominique Laquiere, born in 1763 and dead in 1837, married in Foix Marguerite Borel and they had also five children. One of those, Theodore Zephyrin, born in Foix in 1813, has been the founder of the algerian branch of the family.
Above the town, the castle of the Counts of Foix
Theodore Zephyrin Laquiere was a soldier and took part in the conquest of Algeria where he landed the 5th of May 1636 with the 24th Infantry Regiment. After these campains he became Captain and was decorated of the Legion d'Honneur. He has been one of the first officers engaged in the Offices for Arab Affairs. At the beginning of the years 1850, he married Anne Lapasset, sister of the future General Ferdinand Auguste Lapasset. He retired in Algiers and dead in 1901.
His son Emmanuel Laquiere, born in 1855 and dead in 1920 in Algiers, made a brilliant military career in North Africa and achieved it with the rank of General.
The General Emmanuel Laquière
From his descendance, we can note a son, Raymond Laquiere, born in 1888 in Algiers and dead in 1973. He was a politician and the Mayor of Saint Eugene, little town near Algiers. He was also President of the Algerien Deputy Chamber and took an important political place in the post-war Algeria. His brother, Maurice Laquiere, born in Algiers in 1892 and dead in Palma-de-Majorque (Balearic islands) in 1966, was a prominent barrister, President of the Bar and nan of letters. He was married with Marie-Marguerite Koch and reared three children, one daughter Nelle, and two sons, Jean Maurice Emmanuel and Jacques.
Maurice Laquiere and his family in 1938
(Nelle, Jean, Jacques and their parents)
A painting of the Laquiere summer house in La Madrague
(Guyotville Algérie)
