The Land 35

Michael, Francis and Peter Cheverie, presumably brothers, with their long-lived grandfather, Donald, are listed among the early Catholic settlers of Little Pond Parish. In 1812, the brothers had each leased 100 acres of land on Lot 56 from agent, Edward Abel. These 977 year leases asked a yearly rental of five pounds sterling, payable the first day of May, and had a clause which stated that at the expiration of the lease (2799 A.D.!) they or their heirs would deliver up the premises in good and tenantable repair.

Michael, Francis and Peter Cheverie had been born and brought up in Little Pond but they did not settle there. Perhaps the rent was the problem. On August 20, 1813, we find Francis Cheverie, son of Pierre Chevary and of Marguerite Laroque, being described as of Lot 44 when he married Martine Longepee, daughter of Louis Longepee of Souris. (He could be a brother of Souris’ first John Longaphie and living with him).

Father Beaubien, a visiting missionary priest from Rustico offered Mass and performed the marriage ceremony in the little Rollo Bay Chapel, not far from the shore. The wedding breakfast and dance on a hot August day was one of the first held in Souris and it was possibly one of the best remembered for Peter Cheverie, age 47, father of the groom, collapsed and died. Father Beaubien could not stay beyond the next day for he had other commitments so hurriedly someone made a casket, and others dug a grave.

The wedding celebration turned into a wake that night with little sleep for anyone. The funeral mass next morning was in the Rollo Bay Chapel, too small to hold all the congregation. The record states that Peter Cheverie was buried in Fortune in the presence of Joseph Pitre, Michael Chevary (likely his brother) and “others who did not know how to write”. St. Alexis Church and cemetery at Lower Rollo Bay had been consecrated the year before by Bishop Plessis. In his record, he referred to the location as “For- tune” so possibly, in the same wide use of the place name, Father Louis Beaubien made this entry too.

Peter Cheverie’s widow, Ursule Landry, was not the mother of the three Souris brothers, Francis, Peter and Michael and so was possibly a second wife. Ursule, evidently much younger than her late husband, Peter, after- wards married Charles Mullion of Little Pond and eventually moved to Souris River where Mullion, with a better education than most of his neigh- bours, served the community as catechist and layreader. According to a descendent, Charles Mullion earlier in life had deserted from the French Navy at Louisbourg, fleeing to the Island where his first wife died leaving one daugher Sophia Mullion who married Lawrence Cheverie.“

Francis LaVie

Another early settler, Francis LaVie (spelled also Levee and Levie) was also directly from France, fleeing from compulsory service in the army. He, too, so family tradition says, came by way of Louisbourg, a stowaway on a ship which came into Georgetown. He made his way to Little Pond and eventually to Souris. Here he stayed at the home of Francis Cheverie and married his host’s sister, Margaret. The couple were given half of the Francis Cheverie farm.

The LaVie farm was hardly big enough to divide among a large family so it is easy to understand why four sons of the family were brought up as master mariners. Three of them commanded ships sailing at different times from dif- ferent ports and made entries at Halifax Custom House all on the same day!15