Jean de Brebuef

We know very little of the early years of Jean de Brebeuf. He was born at Conde-sur-Vire on March 25, 1593, fifteen years before the founding of Quebec by Samuel de Champlain in 1608. Brebeuf himself would see this Quebec on June 19, 1625.
At the age of twenty-four, Jean entered the Jesuit novitiate at Rouen, and ill-health seemed to dog one who later would be remem-bered as the most robust of the blackrobes. Such poor health shortened somewhat his course of studies and brought on an early ordination to the priesthood in February 1622. Three years later he sailed off to Canada, a land that would never forget him.
Brebeuf's initial contacts with the Indians he had come to convert to Christianity were with the Algonkian Montagnais close to Quebec. In his first winter in Canada, 1625-1626, he learned something about the Algonkian language and perhaps still more about Indian ways. He was a shrewd observer and learned quickly and well.
We know that in time this affable Norman would become an expert in the Huron language and culture. He would also write long detailed reports that set him apart as Canada's first serious ethnographer.

Longing to do missionary work among the promising Hurons, he left for their country on July 25, 1626. His companions were a fellow Jesuit Anne de None and a Recollet Father Joseph de la Roche Daillon. Anne de None was forced to withdraw in 1627; la Roche Daillon followed suit in 1628; and Brebeuf himself was recalled by his superior to Quebec in June 1629. The occasion was the imminent capitulation of Quebec to the Kirke brothers fighting on behalf of English interests.

THE LONG VOYAGE Paddling their light bark canoes, for hours at a stretch, the Hurons traveled up the St. Lawrence from Three Rivers to the point where this great river met the Ottawa. They then ascended the Ottawa to where it joined, well to the north, the Mattawa which took them to Mud Lake. Further along they crossed large and, at times, rough Lake Nipissing, the region of their friendly allies the Algonkian Nipissings. From the western end of Lake Nipissing they descended the French River until they came to Georgian Bay, a rather large inlet of Lake Huron.
Once they had reached Georgian Bay, the Hurons were back in home waters and at the north-northwest boundary of Huronia.