The Jardelat family goes back to France, most likely the west coast of France. In Pierre Jardelat’s burial record in 1798 at Arkansas Post, it was recorded that his parents were "of Cape Corentin (?) in Brittiany, European France."1 The question mark was the transcriber’s mark, indicating that the word was hard to decipher. The records were old and written in Spanish. There is a Cape Cotentin in Normandy, next to Brittany and there is a Carentan on Cape Cotentin.
The family records start with Alain Jardelat and Marie Guerique leaving Lorient, Brittany, France, aboard the Gironde, bound for Lousiana. They were listed as laborers going to work in the concessions of Mezieres and Desmarches.
They were living in New Orleans in the 1720s and 1730s. One of their children, Pierre, is recorded in censuses, baptisms, marriages and burials at Arkansas Post, a remote military outpost on the Arkansas River, a thirty-five day trip by boat from New Orleans. The family is in the records there from the 1760s through the 1790s. Some of the family remained in the Arkansas area after the United States purchased the land from France in 1803. Other family members went to New Orleans and beyond.
The name Jardelat is spelled several different ways in various records and documents: Jardala, Jardelas, Jardelet, Jardeler, Jordella, Jardeles, Gerdela, Gardela and Chardellat. Pierre Jardelat's wife was Marie Songy, dit Languedoc, which means she was also known by the surname Languedoc. Songy is sometimes spelled as Saunier, Sonnier, Sogny and Sogne. Names were written down as the recorder heard them and felt they should be spelled.2
