Family Overview

A bit about the Leroux/O'Connor families

The four main branches of my family include:

Leroux - paternal side.

This is one of the of the pioneer Quebec families with the Leroux name extending back to Hubert Leroux who arrived in Quebec circa 1673. Through marriage, our Quebec bloodlines extend back to circa 1637, basically to the founding of Quebec. Some France origin family can be traced back to the late 1400's, and there are quite a few people that have worked on this lineage: most people in Quebec are related in some fashion and there is a wealth of documentation available. A lot of my work in this area is based on research started by Ken Lyons and my brother Gerry, so credit where credit is due - they did a lot of work that I was able to extend, and quite frankly are to thank (or blame?) for my interest in Genealogy. There are branches of the Leroux ancestry that are linked to the people who migrated to the USA in the late 1600’s, which provides branches back to England and Scotland.
The name Leroux is derived from ‘le rouge’ or ‘li rode’ for someone with red hair; possibly also used for a person with a ruddy complexion; originally a nickname

McCann - paternal side.

Of English/Irish roots, I'm working on these now, and oly 4 generations back. The McCanns were likely Irish (speculative and unproven), then moved to the Isle of Man, from there to Whitehaven, Cumberland in England, then to the Blackburn area of Lancashire. My Great Grandparents emigrated from Blackburn, Lancashire in 1907 to work at the cotton mill in Valleyfield, Quebec. I lose track of my Great Grandmother Margaret Watson when I try to find her birth in Ireland. Her marriage certificate only has her fathers name (Samuel Watson) and no place of birth.. I have found two generation further back on the McCann side, and am still working on that. Once they came to Valleyfield, the records are quite spotty (other than Margaret) and they may have had civil and not Catholic records, so tracing them will be a bit harder. We know that Samuel McCann and Bernadette Leroux immigrated to the US in 1917 and raised at least one child (possibly adopted). George Henry may have been in Verdun in 1921 (unproven and not that likely). I can find no trace of Norah Clarke (adopted) after 1911 as either Clarke or McCann. Mary Ann is still in Valleyfield as of 1921.

O'Connor - maternal side.

Irish from Ireland, where tales abound and records are ... well ... pretty much nonexistent. We can trace the O'Connor side back to their arrival in the St. Anicet area around 1837 and we know that they came from Ireland. During a trip to Ireland, thinking that the family came from County Kerry, a member of the Kerry Genealogical Society told me "Well good luck. O’Connor is not exactly an uncommon name here." We have traced some of the Savage line (Catherine Savage married Michael O'Connor shortly after both arrived from Ireland) back one generation in Ireland bring us to the late 1700's.
Gerry Leroux and John Gallagher did most of the work I started with. This is a very confusing branch to look at pre-1800. There was quite a bit of back and forth to the US and every family seems to use the same given names. The Dennis O'Connor name is particularly hard to unravel.
There are various interpretations of the meaning of the name O’Connor: the traditional interpretation is that it means “Champion”, while an alternative is "Descendant of Conchobhair" meaning dog lover – something I can relate to. There are 5 distinct O’Connor clans. At this point we do not know which one we are descended from.

Walsh - maternal side.

Again, Irish from Ireland. This is the branch I'm least familiar with and need to spend more time on.

You can see the common names in our ancestry here.

You can see some of the problems I'm trying to work on here.