Maps

Maps of Acadia

Maps by Kristi Mueller

Acadia

Acadia consisted of substantially all of the land south of the St. Lawrence River and Gulf of St. Lawrence down to the Casco River in Maine.

It included all of modern-day Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and New Brunswick and much of eastern Québec and northern Maine.

Port Royal

When the initial group of French settlers arrived in Acadia in 1604, they settled on St. Croix Island in Passamaquoddy Bay in Maine. This location proved to be a poor choice in that 50% of this initial group perished that first winter - mostly from exposure, scurvy and malnutrition.

The following spring, the survivors relocated to Port Royal, across the Bay of Fundy from Maine. Port Royal was a far better choice than St. Croix Island. It provided in abundance the resources needed to survive: fish, game, wood, and other products. The local Micmac Indians also befriended these early French settlers and helped them to survive.

Beaubassin

Life at Port Royal was good but as the settlement grew, they began to run out of room for new farms. Beaubassin was an area about 100 miles further up the Bay of Fundy. It provided many miles of fertile meadows along the tidal basins and rivers and soon became a popular site for new Acadian settlements.

Beaubassin lies on the Isthmus of Chignecto that connects New Brunswick with Nova Scotia.

Grand Pré

Grand Pré (large meadow) is also about 100 miles north of Port Royal and 50 miles east of Beaubassin. As with Beaubassin, the Grand Pré area provided many miles of fertile meadows along the tidal basins and rivers and soon attracted many new Acadian settlers.

Paspébiac

Paspébiac is a fishing village in Chaleur (warm) Bay in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, just below the Gaspé Peninsula. For many years starting in the mid-1700s, Paspébiac was the North American headquarters for the Robin Company - the largest fishing company operating in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and nearby areas. The Robin Company continued to operate in the area until the mid-1970s.

Chéticamp

Chéticamp lies at the northern end of Cape Breton Island, on the Gulf of St. Lawrence side. The Robin Company established a fishing station there in the 1760s. Initially, the Robins purchased fish from the Micmac Indians but the rich fishing grounds soon attracted several Acadian families to the area.

The Robins built a company store in Chéticamp and invited more Acadian families to relocate there.

A group of seventeen Acadian families moved from Prince Edward Island to Chéticamp in 1786. The Chéticamp Acadians were awarded a 7,000-acre land grant by the Cape Breton government in 1790.

France

Those Acadians deported directly to France from Acadia in the early 1760s and those released from the prisons in England in 1763, settled mostly in France's St. Malo area. The Acadian population in France at this time totaled about 4,000.

The French government and landed nobles, although sympathetic to the plight of the Acadians, saw them as a resource to be exploited. During the next ten years, many relocation plans were attempted with the Acadians - none succeeded.

In 1785, the bulk of the remaining Acadians left France for Louisiana.

THE ACADIANS