6. THE FRENCH CONNECTION SO FAR!
So, the key question is:
Who is the father of “Philip
Morter Bap. bet 1655 –1680, Nth Walsham, husband of Catherine Lincolne”? Is it, “Philip Morter Bap 1630, Nth
Walsham, husband of Dorothy” or maybe “An Admiral Mortier, who
fled from France, from the Huguenots, with the help of Admiral Tinker” about
this time i.e. 1700?
I decided a week in France, with my able navigator friend David,
might lead to the answer! Armed with digital camera and video camcorder, we
boarded the ferry at Calais, late afternoon on Sunday 24th Oct’05,
for a ‘French Ancestry Adventure`!
I decided to concentrate on particular Mortier locations
along the banks of the Oise and the Loire.
Our name, Morter comes from Mortar and references to “bricks &
mortar” are not far of the mark, as a lot of our family connections are in the
Building Trade; so it seems, the same in France. There are many places in France that involve `Mortier’, but the
ones I was interested in, were along these rivers. On the relevant maps, I came across 5 main places along the
Loire, and 1 along the Oise, which had Mortier locations, maybe even
‘Chateaus`! On closer inspection,
apart from 1 of these, they were all within 300 kms of Paris. My good French friends, Anne & Bernard
live in Chantilly, 20 kms North of Paris; and were happy for us, to use their
place as a base. French Town Halls, called ‘Mairies` looked after the
Ancestry records of these Mortier locations; so I wrote to each nearest
Mairie a French Standard Letter, before I went.
The
locations are:
1.
MORTIERS nr Crecy
Sur Serre (Tributary of the Oise),
150 kms north of Paris.
2. MORTIER 20
kms south of Nevers on the Loire.
.
3. MORTIERS AUX BOEUFS nr Langeais, 25 kms East of
Tours, on the
Loire.
4. St Nicolas de Bourgueil, Loire vineyard making ‘DOMAINE
du MORTIER’ Wine, 50 kms East of Tours.
5. MORTIERS nr Châteaudun on the Loir
(Trib of Loire), 200 kms SE of Paris.
6. LES MORTIERS nr Nantes is the last
remaining relevant location, on the Loire; to be visited in time!
I was lucky enough to spend the best
part of an afternoon looking through the original archives of the Dept.
of Nievre, in Never. The particular
Commune I was interested in, was the records of Druy-Parigny between 1550 and
1750, which covered Mortier near Never (remember Ursula!). There were no references to Mortier, at
all!
At Bourgueil,
the Mortier Vineyard related solely to the word ‘earth` or the
terrain. http://www.st-nicolasdebourgueil.com/indexang.html
For example ‘Domaine du Mortier`, which was written on their bottles of
wine, referred to the different soil in the estate, that produced the
type of wine e.g. Clay- Light Red, Sand- Rosé etc; nothing to do with
Ancestry! However, I did buy 12
assorted bottles of ‘Domaine du Mortier` wine.
I also noticed, whilst leaving the vineyard, the most spectacular
rainbow that I`ve ever seen; and thought that the wine would have to
suffice as the “Pot of Gold”!
The Mortier location, near ‘Never`, looked more like
a run down farm, nothing like a Chateau!
Even with
all the help from the Mairies, with all the locations, I came up with, as Mr
Morgan would say:
“Not a
shred of evidence connected these Mortier Locations to our family’s Saga about
Admirals Mortier and Tinker.”
However, we had a great week in
France!
Return to Homepage. On to Links to my Line: 1.Robert Morter`s Family Line inc 64-Page Dossier