HERTEL DE MONCOURS (Montcourt), PIERRE, officer in the colonial regular troops; b. at Trois-Rivières on 19 March 1687, the 10th child of Joseph-François Hertel de La Fresnière and Marguerite de Thavenet; d. 28 Feb. 1739.

Pierre de Moncours and his brothers entered the colonial military service. Their education consisted in participating in raiding parties rather than in formal training, and they became particularly adept in relations with the indigenous peoples. In 1731, Moncours’ brother, Zacharie Hertel* de La Fresnière, was sent to build a palisaded fort, later named Fort Saint-Frédéric, at Pointe à la Chevelure on Lake Champlain; Moncours went there in command of the garrison. After suffering some losses in the great Montreal fire of 1734 he was sent to command at Baie des Puants (Green Bay, Wis.). In this region the previous year Nicolas-Antoine Coulon de Villiers had unsuccessfully attempted to exterminate the Fox tribe. Moncours undertook to cooperate with the traders who were at that post, but in 1736 Charles de Beauharnois* de La Boische wrote to the minister, Maurepas, complaining that his appointee at Baie des Puants had disobeyed orders and locked up some traders. The governor recalled Moncours the following year.

On 17 Nov. 1721 at Montreal, Pierre de Moncours married Thérèse, daughter of Paul d’Ailleboust* de Périgny and niece of the famous brothers, Nicolas, Pierre, and Jean-Baptiste d’Ailleboust. From this marriage two children were born, of whom one, Pierre, became an officer in the colonial troops. Hertel de Moncours died on 28 Feb. 1739. His son was killed at Niagara in 1759.

C. C. J. Bond

AN, Col., C^11A, 54, f.134; 65, f.152; D^2C, 222. Provost, “Inventaire de documents,” 595. Gagnon, “Noms propres au Canada français,” 94. Le Jeune, Dictionnaire, II, 297. Tanguay, Dictionnaire, I, 152; IV, 497. P.-G. Roy, Hommes et choses du fort Saint-Frédéric (Montréal, 1946), 158ff. “La famille Margane de Lavaltrie,” BRH, XXIII (1917), 42.