BAUDOIN, GERVAIS, surgeon; b. and baptized 3 Aug. 1686 at Quebec, son of Gervais Baudouin*, surgeon-major of Quebec, and Anne Auber; brother of Michel Baudouin; d. 30 June 1752 and buried 2 July at Quebec.

Gervais Baudoin studied at the seminary of Quebec; then, following in his father’s footsteps, he practised as a surgeon. In 1712 he vainly sought the position of surgeon-major of Quebec; his father had held this position from 1695 till his death in 1700. In 1716 Gervais was residing on Rue Sous-le-Fort, where he had been living since September 1714; indeed, a clause in his marriage contract, signed 2 Sept. 1714 before the notary Pierre Rivet* Cavelier and agreed to by his mother, called upon the latter to lodge and maintain the newly married couple until the following spring. In 1722 he was a churchwarden of the parish of Notre-Dame de Québec.

Baudoin occupied no other public office and devoted himself entirely, it seems, to his profession as a surgeon. He took a few cases to court, two of which were appealed to the Conseil Supérieur. His first lawsuit, from 1730 to 1732, was against his brother Louis and his sister Marie-Anne, widow of Jean-Baptiste Hertel* de Rouville, and concerned a house that had been a legacy from their father. From 1741 to 1744 he again went to court about the inheritance, this time with his sister Marie-Anne, against the claims of Henri Dusautoy who had married Marie-Anne Roussel, Louis Baudouin’s widow. From 1744 till his death Gervais Baudoin lived on Rue de la Montagne, where his surgeon’s consulting-room was located.

On 5 Sept. 1714 he had married Marie-Thérèse Guyon Fresnay, who bore him six daughters and five sons; one of his sons, Charles-Louis, became a priest, and three of his daughters entered religious orders. His second wife was Marthe Marcoux, by whom he had one daughter; when the marriage contract was drawn up before the notary Jacques-Nicolas Pinguet de Vaucour, 20 Nov. 1738, the wife declared she did not know how to sign her name.

Gervais Baudoin died 30 June 1752; on 5 July, three days after his burial, the notary Claude Barolet began the inventory of their joint estate at the widow’s request. Their possessions in furniture, dishes, linen, and other belongings, with the exception of “the bed and bedding belonging to the aforementioned deceased and his widow, which she has claimed by virtue of the clause inserted in her marriage contract,” were appraised at about 1,100 livres. In addition there were two houses, on Rue Saint-Pierre and Rue de la Montagne, the dispensary and its books valued at 245 livres by the apothecary Jean-Jard Boispineau, as well as “surgical instruments and equipment” valued at 259 livres by the surgeon André Arnoux. The estate Gervais Baudoin left behind him was divided up on 25 Aug. 1752; it was a meagre fortune indeed that his profession as a surgeon, which he seems to have practised all his life, had enabled him to build up.

Michel Paquin

ANQ, Greffe de R.-C. Barolet, 2 janv. 1748, 5 juill., 25 août 1752; Greffe de J.-N. Pinguet de Vaucour, 20 nov. 1738; Greffe de Pierre Rivet Cavelier, 2 sept. 1714. “Correspondance de Vaudreuil,” APQ Rapport, 1947-48, 137. Albertus Martin, “La famille Beaudoin,” BHR, XL (1934), 693–700. Recensement de Québec, 1716 (Beaudet), 54, 58. “Recensement de Québec, 1744” (APQ Rapport), 192. P.-V. Charland, “Notre-Dame de Québec: le nécrologe de la crypte,” BRH, XX (1914), 214. Godbout, “Nos ancêtres,” APQ Rapport, 1953–54, 507. P.-G. Roy, Inv. contrats de mariage, I; Inv. jug. et délib., 1717–1760, I, II, IV; Inv. ord. int., II, 164; Inv. testaments, I, 34. Taillemite, Inventaire analytique, série B, I, 215. Ahern, Notes pour l’histoire de la médecine, 42–43. Amédée Gosselin, L’instruction au Canada, 413, 433.