François DUMAS, mason – the main DUMAS ancestor

François DUMAS, a mason, is the main ancestor of the Dumases of New France, and probably of the whole North-American continent.

François DUMAS, who was born around 1642 to François DUMAS and Anne ROLLIN, came from Nanteuil-en-Vallée, a city located in the Angoumois region (nowadays in the Charente département). He probably came to New France in 1664 together with his uncle Gabriel, as a hired man of merchant Claude CHARRON DE LA BARRE. It is not known on which ship both Dumases crossed the Atlantic, but it was most likely on L'Ange blanc de Flessingue, which landed in Québec on 23 June 1664.

On the 23rd of January 1667, sometime before the end of his appointment, he signed a three-year lease – with effect as from April the 25th – for a piece of land located on Orleans Island, property of Claude CHARRON, with more than eight cleared acres and two oxen. His future being thus secured, he signed before notary Gilles RAGEOT, on the 5th of July, a marriage agreement with Marguerite Foy, a twenty-year-old "fille du Roi" who had landed in Québec a few days previously. The daughter of Pierre FOY and Catherine BLANCHARD, Marguerite came from L'Hermenault, a village located in the surroundings of Fontenay-le-Comte, in the French Vendée region.

While cultivating more than one piece of land on Orleans Island, François DUMAS kept working as a mason. He built some chimneys on Orleans Island, and did masonry jobs on some houses of Québec city, as some contracts indicate.

François DUMAS and Marguerite FOY had seven children, among which two sons and three daughters got married and left a numerous posterity.

François DUMAS died in Saint-Laurent (Orleans Island) on the 24th of February 1714 from "an indigestion which lasted four hours" and was interred the same day. His wife Marguerite died on the 12th of January 1718 and was interred in Saint Jean (Orleans Island).

Possible links

The marriage agreement

François DUMAS' family

The land owned or lived on by François DUMAS

François DUMAS' masonry contracts

The "Filles du Roi"