Lunenburg, Nova Scotia: 2nd - 5th August, 2013
In the 18th century the Lemprière and Payzant families lived on the Island of Jersey
Before that they had lived in Normandy
In 1747 Marie Lemprière was the godmother of Marie Payzant
In 1753 the Payzants moved to Lunenburg, Nova Scotia
Two families who are decendants of the Lemprière family moved to Nova Scotia in 1970
These were the King and Brownless families
In 2013 decendants of the two families met again!
Lunenburg Harbour
(with kind permission from the Lunenburg Heritage Society)
We celebrated the 260th anniversary of the arrival in 1753 in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, of Louis Payzant (ca. 1695-1756), his wife Marie Anne (née Noget, ca. 1711-1796) and their children.
Louis Payzant was later granted Coveys Island in Mahone Bay. This event was organised for their descendants, who are scattered all over North America.
Raid on Lunenburg (1756)
On May 8, 1756 (during the Seven Years’ War), Maliseet natives landed on Payzant’s island and killed and scalped him.
They also captured Marie Anne and her four children and took them to Québec. The family returned to Nova Scotia in 1760.
The Payzant Family Reunion in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, Canada, August 2013,
for descendants of Louis Payzant (ca. 1695-1756) and his wife Marie Anne Noget (ca. 1711-1796).
The event will be the 260th anniversary of their arrival in the new settlement of Lunenburg.
2013 is also the 260th Anniversary of St. John's Church, Lunenburg, NS, where Marie and Louis Payzant attended church.
Progress Bulletin
21st August 2013
Musique Royale presents
J'irai revoir ma Normandie
The Lemprière and the Payzant family
How the ancestors of Edmund Brownless and the Payzant family twice crossed paths.
Once in the mid-18th century and again in the 20th century!
A musical voyage from Normandy via Jersey to the town of Lunenburg.
with
Barbara Butler, organ and piano
Dodie Layton, flute
Margaret Robertson, mezzo soprano
Edmund Brownless, tenor
Jamie Robertson, guitar
Peter Payzant, viola da gamba
St. John's Church, Lunenburg, Nova Scotia
Saturday, August 3, 2013, 7:30 pm
Programme
The Lemprières and Payzants in Normandy
Une jeune fillette - Jehan Chardavoine (Beaufort, Anjou, 1537-1580)
Tambourin - François-Joseph Gossec (1734-1829)
Entends ma voix fidèle - Noël from Lorraine (Melody: Une jeune fillette)
Une jeune pucelle (for organ) - Michel Corrette (Rouen, Normandy, 1707-1795)
(Melody: Une jeune fillette)
The Lemprières and Payzants in St. Helier, Jersey
1751: Market Place - the unveiling of the statue of King George II
Isabeau s'y promène - French folksong (arr. Margaret Gascoigne)
Süße Stille - George Frederic Handel (1685-1759)
(from: Nine German Arias, London, c. 1725)
Bourée, Minuet I, II (Music for the Royal Fireworks, composed for George II, 1749) - George Frederic Handel
Frankfurt am Main: British proclamation inviting immigrants to Nova Scotia
Von Gott will ich nicht lassen - German hymn (16th cent., Melody: Une jeune fillette)
Von Gott will ich nicht lassen (for organ) - Dieterich Buxtehude (c. 1637-1707)
Nun will der Lenz uns grüssen - German folksong (Melody: Une jeune fillette)
Fantasie Nr. 10 for Transverse Flute without Bass - Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767)
(Director of Music of Frankfurt, 1712-1721)
The Lemprières in England
Air - Samuel Wesley (1766-1837)
Touch me lightly - Tobias Hume (1569-1645)
Whoope doe me no harme - Richard Sumarte (15?? - after 1630)
Tobacco - Tobias Hume
The water is wide - English folksong
Thou art my God, thy righteous will - Francis Drocus Lemprière (1794-??)
(Gt. Gt. Gt. Grandfather of Edmund Brownless)
Gavotte - Samuel Wesley
The Payzant family's voyage to Lunenburg
Je pars pour un long voyage - French folksong
Estennialon dé tsonoué Iesous ahatonnia - Saint Jean de Brébeuf (Condé-sur-Vire, Normandy, 1593-1649)
(The Huron Carol, Melody: Une jeune fillette)
The Pilot - Alexander Stephen Juhan (1765-1845)
(Grandson of Louis and Marie Anne Payzant, born in Nova Scotia)
Tambourin - Johann Adolph Hasse (1699-1783)
J'irai revoir ma Normandie - Frédéric Bérat (Rouen, Normandy, 1801-1855)
I've come from German Lunenburg - Edmund Brownless
Poem by William T. Lindsay, (1863-??), former town clerk and treasurer of the Town of Lunenburg.
Programme Notes
This
concert for the Payzant Family Reunion on August 3, 2013 had as its
inspiration an amazing series of coincidences. It is the story of two
families whose paths have crossed several times over many hundreds
of years. Both families started out in Normandy, and later moved to the
Island of Jersey and then to Lunenburg. The Payzants came to Lunenburg in 1753.
The Brownless family, maternal descendants of the Lemprières,
took another couple of centuries to arrive in Lunenburg. This is a
concert of music influenced by the lives of the two families and their
meetings. Louis Payzant and his family fled Normandy in the 18th century
to pursue a life with more religious freedom on the Island of Jersey.
The Lemprière family had been in Normandy since at least the 10th
century. They were given lands in Jersey in the 14th century for service
to the King of France. Some of the Lemprière family, including John
Lemprière, author of the well-known "Lemprière's Classical Dictionary",
moved to England in the 19th century. Louis Payzant was a merchant and would have certainly
sold clothing to the Lemprière family on the Island of Jersey. In St. Helier, Jersey, Edmund
Brownless' seventh-great Grandmother, Marie Lemprière, was godmother to
Marie Payzant (the fifth child of Louis and Marie Anne Payzant). Marie
Payzant moved to Lunenburg with her parents in 1753. Tonight's
programme includes music from Normandy, Jersey, Germany, England and
Nova Scotia. The programme entitled "J'irai revoir ma Normandie" (I will
return to my Normandy) is taking place in the church which Louis and
Marie Anne Payzant attended. The programme includes melodies that the
first settlers in Lunenburg from France and Germany would have known
so well, such as a French folksong, popular all over Europe, and which
later became a well-known hymn in France and Germany. It was even
translated into the Huron language and is one of Canada's oldest
carols, still very popular today. Rounding off the concert is perhaps
the first modern performance of the song "The Pilot" composed by
Louis Payzant’s grandson, Alexander Stephen Juhan, and the first performance of
"The Lunenburg Song", with words by William T. Lindsay, a former town
clerk and treasurer of Lunenburg and music composed by Edmund Brownless.
Quand tout renaît à l'espérance,
Et que l'hiver fuit loin de nous,
Sous le beau ciel de notre France,
Quand le soleil revient plus doux,
Quand la nature est reverdie,
Quand l'hirondelle est de retour,
J'aime à revoir ma Normandie,
C'est le pays qui m'a donné le jour.
Je pars pour un long voyage
desur la mer
avec mon bel équipage
qui sera mon renconfort
il faut hisser les voiles
grand dieu, quel triste sort
priez pour moi las belle
que je r'vienne au port
Morning Service
Holy Eucharist
with the Payzant Family Reunion in attendance
with special music by
The Choir of St. John's Church, Lunenburg
Soloists
Barbara Butler, Organ
Sunday, August 4, 10:30 AM
St. John's Anglican Church, Lunenburg, Nova Scotia
Thou art my God, thy righteous will
Instruct me to obey;
Let thy good spirit lead and keep
My soul in thy right way.
(Hymn by Francis Drocus Lemprière)
Marie Lemprière
Edmund
Brownless' ancestor, Marie Lemprière, was godmother to one of Louis and Marie Anne's
daughters in 1747 in St. Helier, Jersey, Channel Islands.
Edmund Brownless' Gt. Gt. Gt. Gt. Gt. Gt. Gt. Grandmother, Marie Lemprière (née Esnouf), was godmother to Marie Paisant (Payzant, 1747 - ca. 1783). Marie moved to Lunenburg Nova Scotia in 1753 with her parents Marie Anne and Louis Payzant (Raid on Lunenburg, 1756). In 1764 she married Swiss (and French) musician and teacher John James (Jean Jacques) Juhan (1736-1797) in Nova Scotia and later moved with him to Boston, Charleston and Haiti. Their son, Alexander Stephen Juhan, born in Nova Scotia in 1765, was a composer and musician in the United States. Marie died in Haiti sometime before 1783.
Linda Layton wrote to me: "In Feb. 1747/48, a Marie Lemprière was godmother to Louis & Marie Anne's sixth child, named Marie. (There was a pattern of infants being named after the godmother or godfather.) She was the widow of Jean Lemprière." Linda G. Layton wrote: A passion for survival: The true story of Marie Anne and Louis Payzant in Eighteenth-century Nova Scotia. Nimbus Publishing, 2003.