Pierre de Villiers, Ecuyer, Seigneur de Chantemerle, Conseiller de Roi et Juge, Magistrate, et Eechevin / Squire, Lord of Chantemerle, Councillor of the King, Judge and Magistrate, and Mayor

[page18] Guillaume de Villiers, Ecuyer, Lord of Groix and St. Remy and Princay, was a Peer in 1535, echevin-conseiller Receiver of Taxes, Mayor in 1552 and echevin in 1557.

Louis de Villiers, Ecuyer, Lord of Compaire and of Chantemerle, was President in the election of Niort, echevin, Mayor and Capitaine in 1579.

Pierre de Villiers, Ecuyer Lord of Chantemerle, Councillor of the King, Judge and Magistrate,Eechevin and Mayor

If we now turn to Tielman Nieuwoudt de Villiers's interesting "Tableau" we will see that two branches are named - Branche de St. Jean d'Angely et de l'Afrique, and the Branche de Chantemerle are listed separately. Pierre de Villiers of the Chantemerle branch, is said to be Lord of Chantemerle, Peer of Niort in 1625, Mayor of that town in 1630, then echevin, and was replaced in that post on 27th June 1631. He was also elected councillor of the King in that election.

Pierre de Villiers of the Branche de St. Jean d’Angely et de l’Afrique is said to have been an ex-echevin of St. Jean d’Angely before his death on 27th June 1631. He was replaced in that office by Philippe Gogain (vide Nadaud) nobleman of Limousin. He was married in the big Temple at La Rochelle on 10th April 1611, to Isabelle Rochet of an old noble family of St. Jean d’Angely.

It would seem to me that Pierre de Villiers of the Chantemerle Branch, and Pierre de Villiers of the St. Jean d’Angely Branch, are one and the same person. Fortunately I have further proof for this contention.

Through the good offices of my kind and helpful friends at Niort, I was able to acquire ‘Memoires de La Societe de Statistique, Sciences et Arts du Departement des Deaux-Sevres, 2me Serie – Tome V, 1865 Niort’. On page 45 I found the following:

1628 – Philippe Gougain, ecuyer, Seigneur de La Berregone, conseiller et elu pour le roi en l’election de Niort, pair et Procureur-Syndic de la Commune, etait, echevin en 1640.

1630 – Pierre de Villiers ecuyer, Seigneur de Chantemerle conseiller du roi et Juge- Magistrat de l'election, echevin du Corps de Ville.

[page 19] The next interesting finding follows. I verified that Pierre de Villiers married Isabelle Rochet on 10th April at La Rochelle. Monsieur de la Fosse, who found the record, told me that it was indeed new information to him in the long, long hunt which has been kept going for many years by worrying queries on my part. No marriage contract could as yet be found for Pierre and Isabelle de Villiers of La Rochelle.

I have written to the living descendants of the late historian George McCall Theal but without any fruitful result. I was advised to write to the Rektor Magnificum at Leiden University, Holland, where Colenbrander wrote his Afkomst der Boeren, which was based on Christoffel Coetzee de Villiers's work. I also asked whether anyone in Holland knew who the parents of the three De Villiers brothers were.

I was given the interesting information that in studying photostatic information about all Huguenot families who fled to Holland they came across the information that a certain Jean de Villiers married Elisabeth Sicault in the Reformed Church at the Neuve Ville, La Rochelle 1658.

The reader will note that the time and place for my supposition are correct. In the Tableau the dates of birth of Pierre and Abraham de Villiers are given as vers (about) 1657 and 1659, whereas that of Jacques de Villiers is definitely given as 1661, a date which corresponds with the age given by him in his will of 1719.

Source: A history of the De Villiers family by Daniel Peter De Villiers (1960)

https://familysearch.org/tree/person/LH28-DPZ/details?spouse=KLGV-MK7