MARIN DE LA PERRIÈRE, CLAUDE (occasionally called Marin de La Malgue), trader; baptized 28 Oct. 1705 at Montreal, son of Charles-Paul de Marin* de La Malgue and Louise Lamy; d. before 28 Sept. 1752.

By 1727 Claude Marin de La Perrière was trading to the pays d’en haut, occasionally in partnership with Louis Hamelin. In 1733 his trade focused on the Nipigon post (near the mouth of the Nipigon River), and from 1738 to 1741 he and his maternal cousin Louis-Césaire Dagneau Douville de Quindre leased the Michipicoton post (near Michipicoten Harbour, Ont.) from Pierre Gaultier de Varennes et de La Vérendrye.

His trade shifted in 1741 to the Saint-Joseph post (probably Niles, Mich.). Marriage on 30 Dec. 1737 to Marie-Madeleine Regnard Duplessis, née Coulon de Villiers, had given him connections with that location. She had lived there for a number of years when her father Nicolas Antoine Coulon* de Villiers was the commandant, and in 1745 her brother Nicolas-Antoine was in charge of the post. Following his marriage, Marin apparently resided during at least part of the year at Saint-Joseph. He and de Quindre, often as partners, carried on business there and also began trading heavily from Montreal to Michilimackinac. The company was particularly active in 1743 and 1744; for example, in March 1743 it provided supplies for 60 Ojibwas and Ottawas who were going southward from Michilimackinac to fight the Chickasaws. Business declined during 1745–48 as a result of the War of the Austrian Succession. During the summer of 1747 Marin served as temporary commandant at Saint-Joseph. By negotiating with the local Potawatomis he foiled an Iroquois attempt to lure them away to the English interest.

By September 1747 Marin and de Quindre had moved to Michilimackinac, probably for business reasons. Their partnership apparently ended when de Quindre went to settle at Detroit in 1749. Marin did little trading in the two following years, but in 1752 he hired several engagés to go to Michilimackinac. He died that summer. Since an inventory of goods belonging to him at Michilimackinac includes no household articles, it appears he was residing elsewhere at the time of his death. No children survived him. His wife, who had outlived two husbands, married Joseph Damours Des Plaines in 1754.

David A. Armour

AN, Col., C^11A, 117, ff.3, 13–14, 434, 437, 438, 439, 442, 444, 457, 461, 463; 118, ff. 142, 230. Chicago Historical Society, Otto L. Schmidt coll., II, 311. French regime in Wis., 1727–18 (Thwaites), 483. Illinois on the eve of Seven Years’ War (Pease and Jenison), xxiv. “Mackinac register of baptisms and interments – 1695–1821,” ed. R. G. Thwaites, Wis. State Hist. Soc. Coll., XIX (1910), 22. NYCD (O’Callaghan and Fernow), X, 139. “The St. Joseph baptismal register,” ed. George Paré and M. M. Quaife, Mississippi Valley Hist. Rev., XIII (1926–27), 209, 220–22. Dictionnaire national des Canadiens français (1608–1760) (3v., Montréal, 1965), I, II. Massicotte, “Répertoire des engagements pour l’Ouest,” APQ Rapport, 1929–30; 1930–31. Tanguay, Dictionnaire.