ALLARD DE SAINTE-MARIE, JEAN-JOSEPH D’, officer in the colonial regular troops; b. c. 1670 in Provence; m. Marie-Anne de Tour; d. 25 March 1730 at Louisbourg, Île Royale (Cape Breton Island).

Sainte-Marie began his military career in 1686, served in Flanders during the War of the League of Augsburg, and was wounded at Valcour in 1689. In 1698 he became a member of the king’s bodyguard, but in 1701 he sought a post in the colonies and was sent to Placentia (Plaisance) as a lieutenant in the Compagnie de Villemarceau. By 1706 he had married the sister-in-law of the governor, Pastour de Costebelle, whose praise he earned by his work on the Crèvecœur battery. He was promoted captain in 1712 and moved to Louisbourg with his company two years later. While stationed at Placentia and at Louisbourg, Sainte-Marie, like several other officers, engaged in maritime trade related to fishing and coastal shipping; by 1715 he employed 12 fishermen and 7 other men on his boat.

His most important mission during his years at Louisbourg came in 1718, when he was sent to Canso (Canceau) and thence to Boston to protest an English attack led by Captain Smart on Canso in September of that year. During the 1720s he repeatedly offered to raise an artillery company for the Louisbourg garrison, but was unable to gain approval for this project. He was made a knight of the order of Saint-Louis in February 1724, but his hopes of commanding the Royal Battery foundered when this post was garrisoned by detachments rather than a full company. Sainte-Marie seems to have been a steady, conscientious officer with a talent for engineering, but Costebelle also noted that he lacked supporters because of his “excessive thrift.” His son Philippe-Joseph* was also an officer at Louisbourg.

John Humphreys