My story and some of my family
I am Anick Cocks daughter of Léo Cocks and Fernande Girard.
First, I have to tell you
my incoming into this world about 49 years ago.
I am the 5th child of the
couple Cocks-Girard. They will
have 11 children and among them nine will survive. My sister Isabelle and my brother Joseph didn’t live
very much. Isabelle lived 23 days
as a blue baby. Joseph had only
one hour so say goodbye to this world.
His birth was induced because he was to big at eight months of
pregnancy, his weight was 10 pounds/4.5 kg.
So, I am the second female
of the couple Cocks-Girard. My by
sister was already 7 years old when I was born at Arvida Hospital. I had also three brothers. Who knows Arvida knows Alcan. This city of Alma is now combined with
the city of Jonquière at Saguenay Lac-St-Jean.
My mother grew up at Jonquiere
in the St-Francois Rang with her seven brothers and sisters. She met her next husband at St-Raymond
of Portneuf at the age of 12 years old for the first time, but of course she
didn’t know that. Then my
mother and my father met again at the age of 18 (they had the same age). There, after only two weeks of
frequentation, that was a big question :
- Léo : Fernande, will you marry me?
- Fernande : Yes, I will.
When my mother got married,
she was hoping to give birth to 15 children. Fifteen children, that is right, but she had only (for her)
11 children because my father died of meningitis at the age of 35 years
old. My mother who have had 12
children, the last one died at two months of pregnancy during the funeral. So, the goal of my mother to have 15
children was not reach. At the age
of 35, she was a widow with 9 children from 13 years to three months. What a job to take care of all the
family. It is the faith in God
that helps her go through that big task.
My father was a lumberjack
and then he worked as a welder at Alcan until his death in August 1963.
I will fill in a picture of
my parent marriage. They were a
great and handsome couple.
My two grand fathers
participated at the World War 1 in 1914-1918. My grand father Pantaleon Girard was a member of the 22nd
Regiment and was sent in Europe to fight the enemy. He obtained four medals among those the one for good service
to the nation. In better time, he
was a traveler and also an electrician also to Alcan at Arvida.
My paternal grand father
Cocks did some tasks for the WW1.
He was a signaler and did some woodwork. He had left his country England in 1908 with his parents. Unfortunately, her mother died on the
boat before she reaches the Canada.
She was 47 years old and she died of intestinal occlusion. They left at the port of Liverpool on
June 25th. Mary Ann
Ager died on June 29th only five days before they got to
Canada. She had funeral at Sea on
the day she died. My great grand
father was 49 and his son (my grand-father) was 20 years old.
If you are looking for
Death at Sea, you have to know that those deaths are reported in the living
country and also in the new country.
There is a repertory named « Deaths at Sea ».
If you are reading that
text and if those names sound familiars to you, do not hesitate to make contact
with me at soon as possible.
So, continuing my story, I
grew up without big events with my five brothers and three sisters. Nothing important occurred during my
childhood and even in my teen-age period.
I was a model student (without joke). However, I was not interested in the reading. I don’t know why I developed that
wonderful world only when I was 9 years old. From that age, my sister and I
went often to the library of our city to borrow books. I am still like that borrowing
books. If I had bought all the
books that I have read, all my walls would be filled of them and I would
certainly be ruined.
Since September 1996, I am
doing genealogical research. I
have discovered things I wouldn’t have knew if I haven’t done those
research. I have no regret. It brings me so much, I am still amazed
by my discoveries.
Now, I have found my great
grand father’s origin Sampson Cyprus COCKS. I still have a lot to do, but there is some hope of finding
more. When I was young, I heard so many stories about
him. First, that he was Irish,
then Scottish, maybe English. I
was so mixed up with that information, that I decided to investigate to know
the truth. Don’t we hear
sometimes that “The Truth is Out there”?
When I was ready, I began
to meet aunts and uncles that today are gone, but I had time to gather some
information.
At 18 years old, I
didn’t know much of my uncles.
Probably because of the death of my father, my mother did meet very much
with her family-in-law. So,
I decided it was time for me to know them. I called my god mother, she was a sister of my father, and
asked her if I could go visit her for the week-end because I wanted to discover
my aunts, uncles and others cousins that were living outside my area. Most of them were living in the
Portneuf Area. We went visit two
uncles and their wives and children, my cousins. I missed and aunt that was known as living encyclopedia of
the family.
After the first contact of
the family, it was almost 20 years until I continued my genealogical work. I got married, had three children. I was a medical secretary and works in
three different hospital in different areas.
Finally, I met my
mysterious aunt. She was 78 years old when I met her for the first time. She was really fascinating. She had a big memory despite that what
I have heard on her. I have some
regret not to have known her sooner.
We got along very well. She
had some documents she allowed me to photocopy. She had also picture of her father and grand father back in
England. It was so interesting
listening to her. She was the one
who told me how her maternal grand father Felix Lavoie was mischievous. He was hospitalized for a long time
because he had a hip fracture. He
liked to smoke a pipe but the nuns at the hospital will not allow him to smoke
each time he wanted. He was
walking with crutch and some time he was hitting people with those crutch. So, the crutch were removed and
replaced by a stick. One day, he
asked to smoke his pipe. The
answer of the nun was no. He was
lay down on his bed. When the nun
kept doing his bed, he grabbed her with his stick, lay down the nun on his
knees and give the nun a big spanking.
He never saw the nun. He
had large hands, so the spanking should have been awful for the nun who was not
able to sit down for a while.
Ouch!
I am doing my research
everywhere possible to find genealogical information :
Family : uncles, aunts, cousins, etc.
- Archives nationales du Canada;
- Archives nationales of
Quebec at Laval
University of Quebec;
- Société de généalogie de
Québec
(databases, BMS 2000, parish registers,
Family books and many others sources of information);
- Many other Genealogical or historical Societies all over the Province of Quebec;
- Cemeteries (on of them is St-Charles de
Quebec with
database);
- Libraries (a lot of
genealogical books : ex: Jette,
le PRDH, etc.);
- LDS Family centers;
(offers a great help to find ancestors);
- Bishop University of
Lennoxville (All
Quebec Protestant archives);
- Places where relatives
have worked (Alcan, Canadian Pacific, Thetford Mines, etc.);
- Bans publications,
Marriage license, etc.;
- Web : Gendex, LDS,
Family Tree Makers, etc. (lot of databases);
- Forum of genealogical
help group of Stéphane Luce on the web;
- etc.
And if I were lucky enough,
I would cross the ocean to visit the Public Records Office of London,
England where I
could find more information to complete my genealogical puzzle. I would love to go back my paternal
ancestry as far as possible to discover if those ancestors were great people,
men of law, men of the church (that happened a lot in the pass), ordinary
people, burglars or corsairs, or else.
My imagination sure works very well when I close my eyes and imagine
some heroic stories, romantics one, sad stories depending on how is my
humor. Don’t worry, I am
always in good mood. I like very
much to laugh, but don’t think that you would find some jokes on my
site. As soon as I heard
jokes, as soon as they are
forgotten. I wonder why some people are able to memorize
them. I can not do that unless I
write them down. I think
that laugh is a good way to stay in good health.
So, going back to my mysterious
aunt, her name was Violet. At each
meeting we had, she was always glad to tell me about her childhood and her
parents. She is now gone also, and
I missed her very much. She was so
charming. I used to bring my
husband with me when I was visiting her.
He played some accordeon music for her. She was dancing all around with
his music. Then we talked and as I
always was curious, I asked her a lot of questions. She was always pleased to answer me. So, we got along very well.
People that are in advanced
age are often very lonely. They
have a big suitcase full of memories and knowledge of any kind. Those people have all my admiration. They have a unique personal
“suitcase” like a unique novel talking of his or her life. Why
don’t you go visit a grand father or grand mother, an aunt or uncle just
to say hello and if they are pleased with you visit, why don’t use that
time for asking some questions of their pass on their families. You could gather information on the
family about history or genealogy.
I did’nt have the
chance to know my father or my four grand parents. They all died before I was born. When I was young, I would visit my friend grand parents,
because I didn’t have any. I
would talk with them. I was so
impressed by oldest people. They
have a live behind them. As I said
earlier, those people are lonely.
They would love to talk of their young time only if they had someone to
listen to them. I know, their
children are busy running their lives.
Old people have lost friends, family member, there life is going
empty. I worked in hospital, I
know that grand-pa and grand-ma are abandoned. Nobody can contest that reality.
I you like genealogy and
history, go visit your old ones, ask them questions. Once, they will be gone. It would be too late to obtain information or
documents. Some of those papers
could be thrown away.
Lately, I called one of my
Aunt. She told me she had paper
she didn’t know who would be interested in. I said : I am,
dear Aunt. I didn’t know you
had such papers.
I have not yet seen those
papers, but I am certain that they would give me some answers that would allow
me to continue my research. I must
meet her soon.
I will have some other
things to talk to you about. As
soon as I made some discoveries, I will let you know.
If you have any comments, please contact me at my email address : anickcocks@videotron.ca
March 25th, 2008.