Charles Le Moyne had a family of eleven sons, of whom ten grew to manhood and became figures of prominence in the later history of New France. From Hudson Bay to the Gulf of Mexico their exploits covered every field of activity on land and sea. [Footnote: These sons were: (1) Charles Le Moyne de Longueuil, born 1656, who succeeded his father as seigneur and became the first Baron de Longueuil, later served as lieutenant-governor of Montreal, and was killed in action at Saratoga on June 8, 1729; (2) Jacques Le Moyne de Ste Helene, born 1659, who fell at the siege of Quebec in 1690; (3) Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville, born in 1661, voyageur to Hudson Bay and the Spanish Main, died at Havana in 1706; (4) Paul Le Moyne de Maricourt, born 1663, captain in the marine, died in 1704 from hardships during an expedition against the Iroquois; (5) Francois Le Moyne de Bienville, born 1666, intrepid young border-warrior, killed by the Iroquois in 1691; (6) Joseph Le Moyne de Serigny, born 1668, served as a youth in the expeditions of his brother to Hudson Bay, died in 1687; (7) Louis Le Moyne de Chateauguay, born 1676, his young life ended in action at Fort Bourbon (Nelson or York Factory) on Hudson Bay in 1694; (8) Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville, born 1680, founder of New Orleans, governor of Louisiana, died in Paris, 1767; (9) Gabriel Le Moyne d'Assigny, born 1681, died of yellow fever at San Domingo in 1701; (10) Antoine Le Moyne de Chateauguay, born 1683, governor of French Guiana.] What scions of a stout race they were! The strain of the old Norse rover was in them all. Each one a soldier, they built forts, founded cities, governed colonies, and gave their king full measure of valiant service.
The eldest, who bore his father's name and possessed many of his traits, inherited the seigneury. Soon he made it one of the most valuable properties in the whole colony. The old manor-house gave way to a pretentious chateau flanked by four imposing towers of solid masonry. Its dimensions were, as such things went in the colony, stupendously large, the structure being about two hundred feet in length by one hundred and seventy in breadth. The great towers or bastions were loopholed in such way as to permit a flanking fire in the event of an armed assault; and the whole building, when viewed from the river, presented an impressive facade. The grim Frontenac, who was not over-given to eulogy, praised it in one of his dispatches and said that it reminded him of the embattled chateaux of old Normandy. Speaking from the point of view of the other seigneurs, the cost of this manorial abode of the Longueuils must have represented a fortune. The structure was so well built that it remained fit for occupancy during nearly a full century, or until 1782, when it was badly damaged by fire. A century later still, in 1882, the walls remained; but a few years afterwards they were removed to make room for the new parish church of Longueuil.
Le Moyne did more than build an imposing house. He had the stones gathered from the lands and used in building houses for his people. The seigneur's mill was one of the best. A fine church raised its cross-crowned spire near by. A brewery, built of stone, was in full operation. The land was fertile and produced abundant harvests. When Catalogne visited Longueuil in 1712 he noted that the habitants were living in comfortable circumstances, by reason of the large expenditures which the seigneur had made to improve the land and the means of communication. Whatever Charles Le Moyne could gather together was not spent in riotous living, as was the case with so many of his contemporaries, but was invested in productive improvements. That is the way in which he became the owner of a model seigneury.
A seigneur so progressive and successful could not escape the attention of the king. In 1698 the governor and the intendant joined in bringing Le Moyne's services to the favourable notice of the minister, with the suggestion that it should receive suitable acknowledgment. Two years later this recognition came in the form of a royal decree which elevated the seigneury of Longueuil to the dignity of a barony, and made its owner the Baron de Longueuil. In recounting the services rendered to the colony by the new baron the patent mentioned that 'he has already erected at his own cost a fort supported by four strong towers of stone and masonry, with a guard-house, several large dwellings, a fine church bearing all the insignia of nobility, a spacious farmyard in which there is a barn, a stable, a sheep-pen, a dovecote, and other buildings, all of which are within the area of the said fort; next to which stands a banal mill, a fine brewery of masonry, together with a large retinue of servants, horses, and equipages, the cost of which buildings amount to sixty thousand livres; so much so that this seigneury is one of the most valuable in the whole country.' The population of Longueuil, in the census returns of 1698, is placed at two hundred and twenty-three.
The new honour spurred its recipient to even greater efforts; he became one of the first gentlemen of the colony, served a term as lieutenant-governor at Montreal, and, going into battle once more, was killed in action near Saratoga in the expedition of 1729. The barony thereupon passed to his son, the third Charles Le Moyne, born in 1687, who lived until 1755, and was for a time administrator of the colony. His son, the third baron, was killed during the Seven Years' War in the operations round Lake George, and the title passed, in the absence of direct male heirs, to his only daughter, Marie Le Moyne de Longueuil who, in 1781, married Captain David Alexander Grant of the 94th British regiment. Thus the old dispensation linked itself with the new. The eldest son of this marriage became fifth Baron de Longueuil in 1841. Since that date the title has been borne by successive generations in the same family.
Of all the titles of honour, great and small, which the French crown granted to the seigneurs of Old Canada, that of the Baron de Longueuil is the only one now legally recognized in the Dominion. After the conquest the descendants of Charles Le Moyne maintained that, having promised to respect the ancient land tenures, the new British suzerains were under obligation to recognize Longueuil as a barony. It was not, however, until 1880 that a formal request for recognition was made to Her Majesty Queen Victoria. The matter was, of course, submitted to the law officers of the crown, and their decision ruled the claim to be well grounded. By royal proclamation, accordingly, the rank and title of Charles Colmore Grant, seventh Baron de Longueuil, were formally recognized. [Footnote: The royal recognition was officially promulgated as follows: 'The Queen has been graciously pleased to recognize the right of Charles Colmore Grant, Esquire, to the title of Baron de Longueuil, of Longueuil, in the province of Quebec, Canada. This title was conferred on his ancestor, Charles Le Moyne, by letters-patent of nobility signed by King Louis XIV in the year 1700.'- (London Gazette, December 7, 1880.)]
The barony of Longueuil at one time included an area of about one hundred and fifty square miles, much of it heavily timbered and almost all fit for cultivation. The thriving towns of Longueuil and St Johns grew up within its limits in the century following the conquest. As population increased, much of the land was sold into freehold; and when the seigneurial system was abolished in 1854 what had not been sold was entailed. An entailed estate, though not now of exceeding great value, it still remains.
No family of New France maintained more steadily its favourable place in the public view than the house of Longueuil. The sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons of the Dieppe innkeeper's boy were leaders of action in their respective generations. Soldiers, administrators, and captains of industry, they contributed their full share to the sum of French achievement, alike in war and peace. By intermarriage also the Le Moynes of Longueuil connected themselves with other prominent families of French Canada, notably those of Beaujeu, Lanaudiere, and Gaspe. Unlike most of the colonial noblesse, they were well-to-do from the start, and the barony of Longueuil may be rightly regarded as a good illustration of what the seigneurial system could accomplish at its best.
These three seigneurs, Hebert, La Durantaye, and Le Moyne, represent three different, yet not so very dissimilar types of landed pioneer. Hebert, the man of humble birth and limited attainments, made his way to success by unremitting personal labour under great discouragements. He lived and died a plain citizen. He had less to show for his life-work than the others, perhaps; but in those swaddling days of the colony's history his task was greater. Morel de la Durantaye, the man-at-arms, well born and bred, took his seigneurial rank as a matter of course, and his duties without much seriousness. His seigneury had his attention only when opportunities for some more exciting field of action failed to present themselves. Interesting figure though he was—an excellent type of a hundred others—it was well for the colony that not all its seigneurs were like him in temperament and ways. Le Moyne, the nearest Canadian approach to the seigneur of Old France in the days before the Revolution, combined the best qualities of the other two. There was plenty of red blood in his veins, and to some of his progeny went more of it than was good for them. He was ready with his sword when the occasion called. An arm shot off by an Iroquois flintlock in 1687 gave him through life a grim reminder of his combative habits in early days. But warfare was only an avocation; the first fruits of the land absorbed his main interest throughout the larger part of his days. Each of these men had others like him, and the peculiar circumstances of the colony found places for them all. The seigneurs of Old Canada did not form a homogeneous class; men of widely differing tastes and attainments were included among them. There were workers and drones; there were men who made a signal success as seigneurs, and others who made an utter failure. But taken as a group there was nothing very commonplace about them, and it is to her two hundred seigneurs or thereabouts that New France owes much of the glamour that marks her tragic history.