Date Published:
April 2005

L’Encyclopédie de l’histoire du Québec / The Quebec History Encyclopedia

Marie-Madeleine Jarret de Verchères

Verchères, Marie-Madeleine Jarret de (1678-1747), heroine, was born on her father's seigniory on the St. Lawrence river, twenty miles below Montreal, on April 17, 1678 , the daughter of François Jarret and Marie Perrot. In October, 1692, when her parents were absent, a band of marauding Iroquois appeared at the fort. Madeleine at once took command, and, with the assistance of her two young brothers, two soldiers, and an old man of eighty, defended the fort for a week, when relief came from Montreal. In September, 1706, she married Pierre-Thomas Tarieu de la Pérade. In her later years she was chiefly distinguished on account of the large number of law-suits in which she engaged. She died on August 8, 1747. See P. G. Roy, Madeleine de Verchères, plaideuse (Trans. Roy. Soc. Can., 1921), and A. G. Doughty, A daughter of New France (Ottawa, 1916).

Source  : W. Stewart Wallace, ed., The Encyclopedia of Canada, Vol. VI, Toronto, University Associates of Canada, 1948, 398p., p. 233.