Marguerite Richer is known in French as one of the "fille du roi", agreed to travel to the new settlements in North America and marry a settler there in exchange for a 50 pound dowry from the French King. Of the nearly 1000 women who undertook the journey, about 800 made it to Canada.

They made contracts of marriage with the men who had originally settled the New World and usually married within a few days or weeks of the contract signing. Often the women broke the contracts, only to remake them or make new contracts with other men.