Jean-Baptiste Chardon

Who was Jean-Baptiste Chardon?

Jean-Baptiste Chardon was a French Jesuit missionary to the Indians in Canada and in the Louisiana territory.

Chardon entered the noviciate in the Society of Jesus at Bordeaux on September 7, 1687. He studied at Pau in 1689 and 1690 and taught at the Jesuit college in La Rochelle from 1690 to 1695. He completed his studies at Poitiers in 1695 to 1699.

He arrived in Canada in summer 1699 and learned amerindian language until the end of that year. In 1700 and traveled to the Saguenay country. He soon was named missionary to the Ottawas.

In the following year he joined the western mission headquartered at Mackinac, although he traveled widely. He visited the Foxes, Menominees, Mascoutens, Kickapoos, Ottawas, Potawatomis, and Miamis. In September 1701 he went to Green Bay to aid the venerable Henri Nouvel, who had been nearly forty years on the mission there and was nearly 80 years of age.

In 1711 he was evangelizing the Miamis on the St. Joseph River, temporarily replacing Father Claude Aveneau, who was ill. In 1722 he replaced Father Pierre-Gabriel Marest as superior at Mackinac. According to Marest, he was a missionary full of zeal, with a rare talent for learning languages. He mastered nearly all the languages of the Indians he came in contact with.