Pierre-Jacques Payen De Noyan Et De Chavoy

He was the officer in the colonial regular troops, seigneur, and king's lieutenant in Trois-Rivieres, Quebec. In 1721 he served briefly as commandant of Fort Frontenac in Kingston, Ontario. He made several trips to the pays d'en haut, including one in 1729 when he led the provisioning convoy from Montreal into Michilimackinac (Machinaw City, Michigan) as preparation for the offensive against the Foxes. In 1733 he was scheduled to command at Michilimackinac, but illness kept him from that post. The following year he was assigned to Pointe-a-la-Chevelure (near Crown Point, New York). In 1738 he was appointed to command in Detroit and, following an operation on his left breast, he set out for the post the next spring. In 1746-47 he was commandant of Fort Frederic (near Crown Point, New York), where his influence with the Iroquois (he had previously been adopted by them) proved useful during the war which had broken out in North America in 1744. One report referred to him as "a man of talent." From this period through the 1750s he attended most of the conferences between the governor and the Iroquois. At a meeting in 1756 the Iroquois asked Pierre de Rigaud de Vaudreuil de Cavagnail to "be so good as to give us our son, Mr. De Noyan, as Commandant of Fort Frederic." In 1749 he became Major of Montreal and in March, 1756 king's lieutenant in Trois-Rivieres, while still holding the latter position he was appointed to command again at Fort Frontenac. The post was a supply centre for the western garrisons, but it was in poor condition; Louis-Joseph de Montcalm referred to it as "good for nothing" and its complement of about 60 soldiers as a "feeble garrison." When a force of nearly 3,000 British and American soldiers under Lieutenant-Colonel John Bradstreet and De Noyan worked out an arrangement in which De Noyan was to be exchanged for Colonel Peter Schuyler, and De Noyan was permitted to return to Montreal because of his poor health. Vaudreuil blamed De Noyan for the defeat, claiming that he was too old to fight. Stung by the governor's lack of faith, De Noyan requested retirement, which was granted with a pension in January, 1759. After the surrender of Canada, De Noyan went to France where he was imprisoned at the Bastille from March 1762 to December 1763 in connection with the affaire du Canada. He seems to have been guilty of no more than negligences in checking the inventory of Joseph-Michel Cadet's goods at Frontenac, and he was fined. He died eight years later.

He was one of the better colonial officers in New France. He served with distinction and in 1741 was awarded the Cross of Saint-Louis. As Major of Montreal, king's lieutenant at Trois-Rivieres, and commander of several Western posts, he was effective, useful, and held in high respect by his superiors. Neither his defeat at Frontenac nor his implication in the affaire du Canada should affect this reputation.* Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Oct 15 2018, 19:42:45 UTC