I was brought up with Jeannette, close to her house. I know that she was good, simple and pious, and that she feared God and the Saints. She loved Church and Holy places; she was very charitable, and liked to take care of the sick. I know this of a surety, for, in my childhood, I fell ill, and it was she who nursed me. When the Church bells rang, I have seen her kneel down and make the sign of the Cross.
Isabellette, wife of Gerardin, labourer, of Epinal.
From my childhood I knew the parents of Jeannette; as to Jeannette, herself, I knew her in my youth and as long as she remained with her parents. She was very hospitable to the poor, and would even sleep on the hearth in order that the poor might lie in her bed. She was not fond of playing, at which we, her companions, complained. She liked work; and would spin, labour with her father, look after the house, and sometimes mind the sheep. She was never seen idling in the roads; she was more often in Church at prayer.
I often saw her at confession, for she was my gossip, and god-mother to my son Nicolas. I was often with her, and saw her go to confession to Messire Guillaume, who was then our Curé. When all was well at the château, the Seigneurs and their ladies often came to walk beneath the Ladies’ Tree, on the Sunday of Laetare, which we call ‘the Sunday of the Wells’; and on certain other days, in fine weather, they brought with them the village boys and girls. The Seigneur Pierre de Bourlement and his lady, who was from France, took me there on the said Sunday of the Wells many times in my childhood, with other children. It was the custom to go every year, on this Sunday, to play and walk round this tree. Jeannette went with us, we each brought provisions, and, the meal ended, went to refresh ourselves at the Well. The same thing takes place now, with our children.
Mengette, wife of Jean Joyart, labourer.
My father’s house joined the house of Jacques d’Arc: so I knew her well. We often spun together, and together worked at the ordinary house-duties, whether by day or night. She was a good Christian, of good manners and well brought up. She loved the Church, and went there often, and gave alms from the goods of her father. She was a good girl, simple and pious—so much so that I and her companions told her she was too pious.
Messire Jean Colin, Curé of the Parish Church at Domremy and Canon of the Collegiate Church of Saint-Nicolas de Brixey, near Vaucouleurs.
While Jeanne was at Vaucouleurs, she confessed to me two or three times. It seemed to me, to my knowledge, that she was an excellent girl, with all the signs of a perfect Christian and of a true Catholic; she was fond of going to Church. I saw her at Vaucouleurs, when she wanted to go into France, and saw her mount on horseback; with her were Bertrand de Poulengey, Jean de Metz, Colet de Vienne, horse-soldiers and servants of Robert de Baudricourt.
Colin, son of Jean Colin, labourer.
I heard Durand Laxart say, that she told him he must conduct her to Vaucouleurs, that she wished to go into France, and that she would tell her father she was going to the house of the said Durand to nurse his wife. And this, Durand told me, was done; and then, with the consent of her father, she went to Vaucouleurs to seek Robert de Baudricourt.