Pierre, son of Charles, son of Philippe Pinet

Ancestor of the great majority of Pinets born in New Brunswick

Research and writing: Celine Pinet

Pierre was the son of Charles dit le jeune, navigator and carpenter, and Mary-Louise Testard dit Paris married in 1723 in Port Toulouse (Cape Breton Island -120 km from Louisbourg).

Pierre was born around 1730 in Port Toulouse, where his family had moved about 1714 from Bassin des Mines (region of Grand-Pré in Truro, NS). He is still in Port Toulouse during the 1752 census of the region. Like his father, Pierre was navigator.

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Fleeing the deportation in Nova Scotia, Pierre moved to Île Saint-Jean (Prince Edward Island). In 1756, he was in Port-Lajoie (Charlottetown, PEI), where he married Marie-Monique Trahan on January 7.

"In 1755, Governor Villejoin was alarmed by the famine threatening Île Saint-Jean because of the great number of refugees who had come to escape deportation. He then encouraged the departure of these Acadians to Quebec. … Once in Quebec and again threatened by famine ... accepted the offer to settle in Bellechasse"(Pierre-Maurice Hébert – Les Acadiens du Quebec)

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Pierre and Monique are in Saint-Charles de Bellechasse (Quebec) in 1757. This is where Monique died in February 1758, after the birth of a stillborn child. The same year, Pierre married Marie-Therese Vienneau dit Michaud. During the census for Quebec in 1762, the couple has a male child under 15 years.

Once in Quebec, "March 21, 1759, before the notary Saillant, Mr. de Péan, Lord of Livaudière, grants Pierre Pinet, Acadian refugee in the parish of Saint-Charles, Boyer River, a land of 3 x 4 acres in the 1st row, south of the lordship of Beaumont, Côte St-Louis, joining on the south-west Joseph Hebert, on the north-east Charles Hebert, there since 2 years and 6 months ... On 25 April 1766, before the notary Claude Louet, Pinet Pierre and Marie-Therese Vienneau, his wife, sell the land to James Forbes, merchant of Saint Charles, Boyer River, with a barn 28 'x 20' covered with straw. "All the details suggest that, for the moment at least, Pinet would retain their home and remain in place. (Adrien Bergeron, Le Grand Arrangement des Acadiens au Quebec)

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In 1769, Pierre Pinet, his in laws, the Vienneau family and other Acadians migrated to the Saint John River (New Brunswick) and settled on the north shore near the river Keswick.

In 1774, settled on the banks of the Saint John River (Fredericton area) were some sixty Acadian families including ... Pierre Pinet married to Mary Vienneau. In the 1783 census of the area, Pierre is mentionned with seven children and has eight acres of cleared land after fourteen years on the spot.

With the arrival of the Loyalists in 1783-84, the Acadians of the Saint John River were quickly surrounded by anglos-Protestants. Uncomfortable in this situation, several families, Pinet, Godin and Thériault moved up to the region of Caraquet where others Acadians have already settled.

On 27 April 1787, Pierre Pinet, his son Dominique Pinet and 10 others including the Godin and Thériault families receive a grant of 2,972 acres of land at Upper Caraquet (Bertrand). These families are the pioneers of the village of Bertrand. Pierre Pinet and his son Dominique settled on the south bank of the South Caraquet River (roughly opposite the Caisse Populaire of Bertrand).

We do not know the exact date of Pierre’s death but we know he died before the marriage of his daughter Euphrosine, June 23, 1792.

Today, we find the descendants of Pierre mostly in the greater Caraquet region. In addition to Bertrand, Pinet families are among the pioneers of Paquetville and Grande-Anse. Some descendants have settled in Quebec, Ontario and New England.

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Other sources:
Arseneau, Georges – Les Acadiens de l’Île (1720-1980)
Dionne, Raoul – La colonisation acadienne au Nouveau-Brunswick (1760-1860)
Pitre, Marie-Claire – Les Pays-Bas, histoire de la région Jemseg-Woodstock sur la rivière Saint Jean pendant la période française (1604-1759)
Recensement de l’Acadie 1752
Thériault, Fidèle – Les familles de Caraquet, dictionnaire généalogique
White, Stephen - généalogiste au CEA