Hello,
To go further with the theme of french wig maker, I want to highlight that this profession was not exclusive to France and there is traces of wig makers in New France.
The first time I ever heard of a wig maker in New France, it was last June (2018) at the museum of Château Ramezay in Montréal. Their exhibition that was in the basement was about a valet-barber-wig maker that I do not remember his name, and his masters Jean-Baptiste-Nicholas-Roch de Ramezay and Louise de Ramezay, the sister Jean-Baptiste-Nicholas-Roch.
Michel Thévenin and I were looking for informations about wig makers for our conference we gave in August for les rendez-vous d'histoire de Québec about the men hairstyle of 18th century. Informed of that project, Sophie Imbeault, who is historian and editor, gracefully gave us a list of wig makers that were claiming back money in declarations of the papers of Canada of Québec and Montréal for the years 1763 and 1764.
In that list, there is many different financials terms that I was not familiar with and require definition for a better understanding of the list. Because of that, I will begin with an explanation of the different types of papers that appear in what the French people call ''L'Affaire du Canada''.
The question of the papers of Canada is maybe the thing that was the more shocking in France after the loss of New France. During the years of wars, papers of money circulated in New France to palliate the lack of metallic usual money. ''Monnaie de carte'', ''ordonnances'' and ''lettres de changes'' were used to pay all needs for the daily colonial life. In the decade that followed the loss of New France, the French crown had look to liquidate the depts they had by using the papers of money and try to refund them.
The ''monnaie de carte'', literally cards of money, was give out by the administrative authorities of the colony (mostly the intendant) with the permission of the king to overcome the lack of singing metal money that was in the Canada. Those papers were something ''in waiting'' of having ''real money''. The ''monnaie de carte'' was intented to be burn when exchange to metal money. In the beginning, those were written on playing cards. In 1674, Jacques Meules was the instigator of using ''monnaie de carte'' in the colony of Canada.
Reproduction of ''monnaie de carte'' of 1714
After, playing cards were substituted by white pieces of cardboard. The ''monnaie de carte'' was having smalls amounts like 7 ''sols'' and 15 ''deniers'', or 15 or 30 ''sols''. It can also have bigger amounts like 3, 6, 12 or 24 ''livres'' (pounds).
''Monnaie de carte'', 1749
The ''ordonnances'' (ordinance may be a good translation) look like they appeared more lately. They were produced at the '' imprimerie Royale'' (Royal prints) in Paris, numbered and signed by the intendant. The ''ordonnances'' were usually having bigger amounts between 20 ''sols'' and 1000 ''livres'' (pounds). The ''ordonnance'' is an obligation of the intendant to pay back the amount he had written on the paper before a determinate date.
''Ordonnances'' and ''monnaie de carte'' circulated among people of the colony and were used as current money, as real metal pieces of money were continualy lacking in New France.
A third type of money of paper was called ''lettre de change''. They were produced by the ''trésorier général'' (general treasurer). This is the only type of money paper that was used on the Old Continent, in contrary of the ''monnaie de carte'' and the ''ordonnances''. In the 18th century Canada, Canadians were meeting the ''trésorier'' to exchange their ''monnaie de carte'' and ''ordonnances'' into ''lettre de change''.
On the left: Ordonnance of 1753; on the right: lettre de change of 1759
All those description to have a better understanding of what colonial French wig makers were owning in the end of the French and Indian War. Here is the list of the wig makers, their names, their city and the amounts of money they were claiming back during this transitional period.
Montréal
Tison, perruquier, Montréal, 2004 livres en ordonnances et 578 livres en lettres de change Eustache Parant, perruquier, Montréal, 1164 livres en ordonnances
Toussaint Rebou père, perruquier, Montréal, 805 livres en ordonnances
Michel Rebou fils, perruquier, Montréal, 803 livres 10 sols en ordonnances
Joseph Pampalon, perruquier, Montréal, 593 livres 10 sols en ordonnances
Pinguet, perruquier, Montréal, 210 livres en ordonnances
Pierre Compain, perruquier, Montréal, 3333 livres en ordonnances
Saint-Jean, perruquier, Montréal, 2125 livres 10 sols en ordonnances
Laviolette, perruquier, Montréal, 3436 livres en ordonnances
Larche, perruquier, Montréal, 4299 livres en ordonnances
Boucherville
Charles Carpentier, perruquier, Boucherville, 380 livres en ordonnances
Québec
Pierre Onel, perruquier de Québec, pour son frère Onel, absent de la colonie, la somme de (24 livres en monnaie de cartes et 852 livres 10 sols en ordonnances) appartenant à ce dernier, 9 avril 1764
Jean-Baptiste Derouvray, perruquier de Québec, 3000 livres en letttres de change, 1230 livres en ordonnances, 5 mai 1764
What is surprising, in my humble opinion, is that most wig makers of that list were living in Montréal despite that Québec was the capital the Canada at the time. I can not explain why. Maybe it is because Montréal was the heart of fur trades and because of the migrations of men made they were having more beards to shave and hair to cut than in the capital... Maybe someone more documented could have a better explanation for this.
For this article, I made my apologies for translating terms I am not familiar with. More essentially, I want to publicly thank the generosity of Sophie Imbeault for her discussion about the papers of Canada. You can read her work about money papers in her article here: La dette de la France: les papiers du Canada (in french). A better description of the differents papers of money is available in this book: 1763. Le traité de Paris bouleverse l'Amérique. (in french)
I hope you enjoyed that article,
