HUGUENOT INFLUENCE 



207 



Loss of 

 Identity 



Paul Kevere, who was the trusted messenger of the Boston 

 patriots on the night before the conflict at Lexington. 

 There is no name of traitor in all the list, though many 

 of them, owing everything to Eugland and regarding her 

 as their deliverer, could not see it right to rebel against 

 her authority, and remained on the Toiy side. 



ni 



It is all the more singular that Palfrey did not recog- * 

 nize the Huguenot influence upon the Puritan life, since 

 he knew of their presence. In his " History of New Eug- 

 land " he makes the extremely conservative statement that 

 at least one hundred and fiftj^ Huguenot families came to 

 Massachusetts after the Eevocatiou in 1685. He makes 

 no account of those already here, nor of those who did 

 not come directly from France, nor of those who kept 

 coming from time to time, even dowu to 1776. Nor does 

 he take account of the number who have names that 

 seem to be English or Dutch, but which are French trans- 

 lated, as in the case of some of the Duboises, living in • 

 Leyden, who allowed themselves to be called Van den 

 Bosch, and came to America under that name. Gerneau ' 

 became Gano in English mouths, and at last the owners 

 of the name let it go at that. Thus Erouard became 

 Heroy, Bouquet is now spelled Bockee, Tissau became 

 Tishew, and Fleurri is hid in Florence. Olivier has been 

 confused with the English Oliver, and Bm-po was origin- • 

 ally Bonrepos. Nor was the assent to this distortion due 

 to ignorance on the part of the Frenchmen ; for Bonrepos 

 was a learned pastor of the French church in Boston, and 

 the refugees were generally of the higher and culti- 

 vated classes of their native land. 



The merchants of the Huguenot seaports of France French-sv 

 were already familiar with the New England seaports, 

 and fled to Boston and Salem when the time of peril came. 

 Many of them found shelter in neighbouring countries be- 

 fore coming to America, and sometimes for that reason . 



