Genealogical Notes From the Ashes of Paris

Henri-Paul-César de Chastellux was a fortunate boy, born to wealth and heir to the title of count.  On his deathbed, his father charged him with carrying on the job of sorting out the family archives, which he did stupendously. He wrote books on his illustrious family, traced his ancestry back to 1146, corrected many mistakes made by other genealogists and historians, had reproductions made of the family portraits, tarted up the chateau, and dropped dead at the age of forty. 

His books on his family are:

• Recherches sur les anciens seigneurs de Chastellux, published in 1868
• Histoire généalogique de la maison de Chastellux, published in 1869

And then there is this:

Notes prises aux archives de l'état-civil de Paris, avenue Victoria, 4, brulées le 24 mai, 1871

The dear man published all of the notes he had made in the Paris archives from civil and parish registrations. The originals were subsequently lost in the burning of Paris by the Paris Commune. He gives over six hundred pages of names, dates, events, relationships, that he had noted for his own research. It is a work of great generosity. For those researching Paris ancestors (admittedly, these are only the rather grand folk related to the count) it could be of use.

 

We offer it here via the generosity of Gallica.

©2011 Anne Morddel

French Genealogy