Robichaud Stories

It is generally accepted that our first Robicheau ancestor came from the Poitou region in France, like several other Acadian families. Isaac de Razilly and his cousin Charles de Menou d’Aulnay, who were governors of Acadie, recruited peasants mostly from the south of Loudun area (department of Vienne). Some researchers believe that the Robicheau’s worked at the château de la Bonnetière, in the village of La Chaussée. The name Robichaud has had many spellings throughout history: Robicheau was the most common spelling in France and in early Acadie, while Robichaud is the most common spelling in modern Canada and northeastern United States. In Louisiana, Robichaux and Robicheaux are the most common spellings, while in some areas of Nova Scotia, Robicheau is still in use, and, in France, the name is most often spelled Robuchon or Robichon.

 

According to research being undertaken by Michel-Antoine Goitia-Nicolas, President of the Louisiana Basque Society, the Robichaud could be from the Basque Country. The Basque Country is the name given to the home of the Basque people, a territory between the Ebre River to the Adour River in the western Pyrenees, that spans the border between France and Spain on the Atlantic coast.  

 

The Basque name of the Nive River, which flows into the River Adour, at the port of Bayonne, is Errobi (Pyrenees Atlantic, near the border of Spain). Errobitxo, or Errobicho would mean, in Basque, "small house on the river Errobi." There are Basque Robich’s in Nevada and California and Basque Robichea’s in Texas. According to this hypothesis, Robichauds could have been in America since the time of the Basque cod fishermen and whalers, long before the arrival of the first French.

 

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Emails sent to the author by Michel-Antoine Goitia-Nicolas, President of the Louisiana Basque Society.

http://classes.slis.lsu.edu/wu/7008/sp10/gcoon/Labasco_Website/Labasco_louisiana_names_of_basque_origin.htm

http://www.errobi.fr

 

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Translated from ROBICHAUD, Armand, Maisons ancestrales des Robichaud, Éditions de la Francophonie, Moncton, 2009, p. 21-24.