Individual Details

Guillaume Couillard

(11 Oct 1588 - 4 Mar 1663)

Sieur De L'Espinay - 1654.

Events

Birth	11 Oct 1588	St-Servan-sur-Mer, St-Malo, Bretagne, France
Christen	11 Oct 1588	Saint-Servan, Saint-Malo, Ille-et-Vilaine, Bretagne, France
Marriage	26 Aug 1621	Québec, Québec, Canada - Guillemette Hébert
Death	4 Mar 1663	Québec, Québec, Canada
Burial	5 Mar 1663	Hôtel-Dieu de Québec, Québec, Québec, Canada, Nouvelle-France
Reference No		C1998 M578
Life sketch		Guillaume Couillard was born on 11 October 1588 in the parish of Saint-Servan, within the town of Saint-Malo in the Diocese of Saint-Malo, Brittany, France. Brittany, once a semi-independent duchy, had been formally integrated into the kingdom of France in the sixteenth century, though it retained distinct legal and cultural traditions. Couillard’s baptism took place the same day in the local parish church, reflecting the Catholic Church’s central role as the official registrar of vital events. He was the son of André Couillard (1560–1640) and Jehanne Basset (1562–1621). In 1613, Couillard emigrated to Québec in New France, one of the earliest French colonial settlements in North America. Québec, founded by Samuel de Champlain in 1608, was at that time a small fortified trading post on the St. Lawrence River, essential to French interests in the fur trade. The colony relied heavily on alliances with Indigenous nations, both for survival and for access to trade networks. Couillard’s arrival placed him among the early group of settlers who would lay the foundations of the colony’s permanent population. On 26 August 1621, Guillaume Couillard married Marie Guillemette Hébert at the parish of Notre Dame de Québec. Marie was the daughter of Louis Hébert and Marie Rollet, widely recognized as the first permanent European farming family in New France. Through this marriage, Couillard became connected to one of the most prominent families of the colony’s formative years. Their union produced several children, including Marguerite Couillard (1626–1705), whose baptism was also recorded at Notre Dame. The church itself, established in 1621, served as the focal point of civil and religious life in Québec. Couillard’s role in the colony included occupations tied to agriculture and landholding, which were essential to the stability and growth of New France. The survival of the settlement depended not only on trade but also on developing a self-sustaining food supply, to reduce reliance on shipments from France. Couillard’s work as a colonist contributed to this gradual transition. In December 1654, Guillaume Couillard was ennobled at Québec, one of the few settlers in New France to receive such distinction. Letters of nobility, granted by the French Crown, conferred hereditary social status and privileges. Although these letters were later revoked, they were reconfirmed to his sons Charles and Louis in 1668. The act of ennoblement demonstrates the Crown’s interest in rewarding loyalty and service among prominent colonists and in establishing a social hierarchy in the colony that mirrored that of France. Couillard’s life spanned a period of major developments in New France. He witnessed the founding of institutions that shaped colonial society, such as the Ursuline convent and the Hôtel-Dieu de Québec hospital, both established in 1639. These institutions strengthened the religious, educational, and medical infrastructure of the settlement. He also lived through periods of crisis, including conflict with the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Confederacy and difficulties in sustaining the colony’s population due to disease and limited immigration. Guillaume Couillard died on 4 March 1663 in Québec, District of Québec, Canada, New France. He was buried the following day, 5 March 1663, at the Hôtel-Dieu de Québec. Founded by the Augustinian nuns, Hôtel-Dieu was the first hospital established in North America north of Mexico, serving both French settlers and Indigenous patients. His burial at this site places him within the heart of colonial religious and social life. The year of his death coincided with a turning point in the governance of New France. In 1663, the French Crown assumed direct control of the colony from the Company of One Hundred Associates, initiating a period of royal administration under Louis XIV. This marked a new phase in the colony’s development, with increased military, administrative, and financial support from France. Couillard’s life thus bridged the precarious early decades of settlement and the beginnings of more secure royal governance. Through his migration, marriage alliances, agricultural work, and ennoblement, Guillaume Couillard exemplifies the role of early French settlers in shaping New France. His life connected provincial origins in Brittany with the establishment of a permanent French presence on the St. Lawrence River, leaving descendants who carried forward his lineage into the eighteenth century.

Families

Spouse	Guillemette Hébert (1606 - 1684)
Child	Marie-Louise Couillard (1625 - 1641)
Child	Marguerite Couillard (1626 - 1705)
Child	Louis Couillard (1629 - 1678)
Child	Elisabeth Couillard (1631 - 1704)
Child	Marie Couillard (1633 - 1703)
Child	Grégoire Guillaume Couillard (1635 - 1662)
Child	Madeleine Couillard (1639 - 1666)
Child	Nicolas Couillard (1641 - 1661)
Child	Charles Thomas Couillard (1647 - 1715)

Father	Guillaume Couillard (1560 - )
Mother	Elisabeth De Vezin (1562 - )

Endnotes