DELABORDE (de la Borde, La Borde), JEAN, king’s attorney; b. 1700 or 1701 in the parish of Saint-Germain-le-Vieux, Paris, France; d. 1754 at Louisbourg, Île Royale (Cape Breton Island).

Jean Delaborde issued from a bourgeois family. From his uncle, Jean de La Borde, who had bought the office of billeting officer for the king’s household in 1687, he inherited 21,000 livres in 1719. Little else is known of him before he arrived in Louisbourg in 1739 to assume the posts of king’s attorney at the bailiff’s and the admiralty courts. At the bailiff’s court he replaced Claude-Joseph Le Roy* Desmarest and at the admiralty, Philippe Carrerot, a temporary appointee. The duties for both positions were the same; to hold the admiralty office, which pertained solely to maritime affairs, one had first to be nominated by the admiral of France and then commissioned by the king. The offices were ones of trust, the holders representing the interests of both king and public in seeing that laws were obeyed and justice rendered impartially. The king’s attorney was responsible for investigating and presenting civil and criminal cases to the court for its decision. Before being permitted to exercise his duties Delaborde was required to present to the Conseil Supérieur his commissions and certificates of baptism and good character, and to swear before it an oath of office. He held his posts until the fall of Louisbourg to New England troops in 1745. Four years later Île Royale was restored to France, and in 1750 Delaborde resumed his functions.

Delaborde appears to have been a kind and unobtrusive person. In 1749 he became guardian to the three daughters of Louis Levasseur, lieutenant general of the admiralty court, and at his own expense sent two of them to school at Quebec under the care of the notary Paul-Antoine-François Lanoullier Des Granges. The third, Thérèse, stayed with him in Louisbourg where he appears to have attended to her every need, including lessons from the dancing master, Ducourday Feuillet.

After nearly a year of insanity Delaborde died, and was buried at Louisbourg on 17 Nov. 1754. He had married early in life, but his wife’s name is not known and there is no indication that she ever lived in Louisbourg. His career should not be confused with that of Jean La Borde*, notary, agent of the treasurers-general of the Marine in Île Royale, and attorney general of the Conseil Supérieur of Louisbourg.

T. A. Crowley