page_title: King's Daughters
section_title: Rumours and legends
hierarchical_section_title: King's Daughters / Rumours and legends
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: L'arrivée des jeunes filles françaises à Québec, 1667English: The Arrival of the French Girls at Quebec, 1667.
context_page_description: The King's Daughters is a term used to refer to the approximately 800 young French women who immigrated to New France between 1663 and 1673 as part of a program sponsored by King Louis XIV of France. The program was designed to boost New France's population both by encouraging male colonizers to settle there, and by promoting marriage, family formation and the birth of children. While women and girls certainly immigrated to New France both before and after this time period, they were not considered to be filles du roi, as the term refers to women and girls who were actively recruited by the government and whose travel to the colony was paid for by the king. They were also occasionally known as the King's Wards.
context_section_description: The idea that the filles du roi were prostitutes has been a rumour ever since the inception of the program in the 17th century. It seems to have arisen from a couple of misconceptions, both contemporary and modern, about immigration to French colonies in the New World. The first of these, which took root long before the first fille du roi emigrated, was that Canada was a penal colony. While there were two campaigns in the mid-16th century that involved the immigration of French criminals to Canada in exchange for their records being expunged, they were both short-lived. These programs resulted in little more than setting a precedent for viewing Canada as a place where those "of questionable morality" could be sent for one reason or another.
  The popularisation of the idea that the filles du roi in particular were prostitutes can be traced to an account by the Baron de Lahontan of his time in New France; several earlier sources made the same assertion, including Saint-Amant, Tallement des Réaux, and Paul LeJeune. In his account, Lahontan refers to the filles du roi as being "of middling virtue", and wrote that they had emigrated in the hopes of religious absolution. As early as 1738, Claude Le Beau countered his portrayal in an account of his own journey to New France, as did Pierre François Xavier de Charlevoix in his 1744 work.
  Out of nearly 800 filles du roi, only one, Catherine Guichelin, was charged with prostitution while living in Canada, after she was abandoned by her husband. She appeared before the Sovereign Council of New France under the charge of carrying out "a scandalous life and prostitution" on 19 August 1675. Her two children were "adopted" by friends, and she was banished from Quebec City. She was reported to have turned to prostitution after her husband, Nicholas Buteau, abandoned the family and returned to France. She later gave birth to many children out of wedlock. Guichelin had at least two marriage contracts cancelled. She also wed twice more after returning to Sorel, Quebec, then Montreal.
  The ships carrying the filles du roi would travel up the Saint Lawrence River, stopping first at Québec, then at Trois-Rivières, and lastly at Montréal. Because the prettiest of the girls would have the easiest time finding a husband, many of the immigrants settled in Québec, the first port of call.
caption: The Arrival of the French Girls at Quebec, 1667. Watercolour by Charles William Jefferys
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