In 1701 a Quebec trader in the Blanc Sablon/Brador area, Augustin LeGardeur de Courtemanche, sent one of his men north to trade with the Inuit, and in 1702 Courtemanche had his seigneurie extended north to la baye des Esquimaux [Hamilton Inlet], where Antoine Marsal established a trade and sealing post in 1735. In that year one Louis Basil also acquired a concession to trade out of Chateau Bay. https://gis.geosurv.gov.nl.ca/geofilePDFS/Batch2017/003D_0048.pdf

 François Havy, and his assistant Jean Lefebvre  at the trading company Dugard et Cie. Havy and LeFebvre formed a partnership and two became highly successful merchants in their own right. They experienced a setback when they invested in a sealing station in Labrador with Louis Bazil and Louis Fornel, and retained their interest in it until the 1745 capture of Louisbourg by Anglo-Americans cut them off from it. They lost about a third of their original 100,000 livre investment.

 Louis Fornel Having established himself at Baye des Chateaux and begun a trade with the Eskimos, Fornel, in 1739, applied for a concession in Esquimaux Bayao (Hamilton Inlet). Because the crown would not grant it before he had presented proof of his having explored the bay, Fornel set out in May 1743 from Quebec, and arrived in Esquimaux Bay, which he named Baie Saint-Louis, on 10 July 1743. http://parkscanadahistory.com/series/mrs/207-2.pdf

See Narrative of a voyage by Sieur Louis Fornel to La Baye des Eskimaux 1743. for ref to Antoine Marsal at Cape Charles (see below) when Fornel arived in 1743

, in 1737 Louis Fornel leased Chateau from Basil and was soon established at Cape Charles as well, from whence he
launched a 1743 exploratory voyage which opened up a trade in Hamilton Inlet, at Rigolet and North West River. Still, Cape Charles continued to be regarded as the practical northern extent of activity out of Quebec https://gis.geosurv.gov.nl.ca/geofilePDFS/Batch2017/003D_0048.pdf

Antoine Marsal

in 1702 Courtemanche had his seigneurie extended north to la baye des Esquimaux [Hamilton Inlet], where Antoine Marsal established a trade and sealing post in 1735. In that year one Louis Basil also acquired a concession to trade out of Chateau Bay. https://gis.geosurv.gov.nl.ca/geofilePDFS/Batch2017/003D_0048.pdf

In 1735, Marsal received Cape Charles for nine years, and founded a post “between the
islands and the mainlands””5 of Cape Charles before 1741. In the latter year, Marsal’s men imprudently fired upon some Eskimos, trying to force their withdrawal from an island on which they were encamped. The Eskimos returned in the spring of 1742, and in reprisal burned and pillaged the French post, killing two of the three residents. °
Although Marsal’s lease was renewed and his territory was enlarge to compensate for his losses, his financial resources were inadequate to operate the station. Consequently, in 1750 the lease was given to Captain de Baune, but he
does not seem to have exploited the concession. On Marsal’s return from France in 1754, de Baune’s lease was cancelled, and Marsal was given a new lease for nine years. Marsal reopened the post, making considerable expenditures. After his death, it was granted for five years to his creditors, as compensation for his outstanding debts.’ In 1763, a four year lease was given by Governor Murray to William Brymer. http://parkscanadahistory.com/series/mrs/207-2.pdf

Authorization to Creditors of Marsal to operate Cape Charles, 20 March 1758;

 Sr. Marsal’s post, between the islands and the mainland of cape Charles, which post is distant about six or seven leagues from La baye des Chateaux (and) is the last (most northerly) post established on the coast of Labrador. Sr. Marsal also came on board to invite us to his dwelling. Narrative of a voyage by Sieur Louis Fornel to La Baye des Eskimaux 1743.

Patent of concession ratification in favor of Antoine Marsal, trader in Quebec, for land on the North Coast, at a place called Petit-Havre, with the islands and islets in front of the land (n ° 203) 24 June 1751 and Patent of concession ratification in favor of Antoine Marsal, trader in Quebec, for the post of Cape Charles, on the coast of Labrador, which is ceded to him for 9 years (n ° 196) May 1, 1754. http://anom.archivesnationales.culture.gouv.fr

Joseph Roy (Le Roy) – Merchant in Beaumont in the region of Lévis on the south shore of the St.
Lawrence River who operated in 1765 a fur trading and fishery post on the Labrador coast with Pierre
Revol, the latter also a merchant. Joseph Roy appears to have been the son of Jean-Baptiste Roy (Le
Roy) of Beaumont and Anne-Dorotée Guenette born, it appears, in 1731. Source: The Merchants, Ship Owners and Fur Traders of Nouvelle France

RÉVOL, PIERRE, salt smuggler, trader, merchant; b. c. 1714 in France, son of Jacques Révol, a lawyer in the parlement of Grenoble, and Hélène Bastard; d. February 1759 at Gaspé. Pierre Révol, banished from the kingdom of France, arrived in Canada on the king’s ship in 1739. He had received this punishment for having broken the law of the salt tax. His wife was Marie-Charlotte, the daughter of Joseph Roy, who seems to have been successful in the Labrador trade at that time. Révol took part in his father-in-law’s activities and quickly proved to be a skilful though sometimes imprudent trader.

BAZIL, LOUIS, merchant, militia officer; b. 1695 in La Rochelle, France, son of Louis Bazil and Marie-Madeleine Moreau; m. 13 Jan. 1721, at Quebec, Charlotte Duroy; buried 20 Feb. 1752 in Quebec. At the time of his marriage Louis Bazil was engaged in the trade with La Rochelle. There is evidence from the later 1720s that he traded to Martinique and Île Royale (Cape Breton Island) and that he may have built and owned a small trading vessel.

In 1736, perhaps because of good connections, Bazil was granted the concession of a Labrador sealing station at Chateau Bay on the Strait of Belle Isle. Lacking the capital necessary to develop the post, he formed a partnership with three other merchants, François Havy, Jean Lefebvre, and Louis Fornel, who agreed, in exchange for a two-thirds interest in the post, to contribute all the needed investment, including Bazil’s one-third share, which would eventually be repaid them from his portion of the profits. Because of high costs and the marginal success of the seal hunt, the company showed a deficit by 1744, and Bazil was unable to pay his share.

François Havy (1709 – December 12, 1766) was a French merchant who operated in Quebec. Havy managed the Quebec business of the French shipping firm Dugard et Cie. While the company’s Quebec activities were modest when Havy first established the office in 1732, by 1741 he was handling a full fifth of the colony’s imports. They oversaw the construction of six ships for the company.

His assistant was his cousin Jean Lefebvre, with whom he formed a partnership to pursue other business opportunities while retaining their positions at Dugard et Cie. Eventually, Dugard et Cie’s ships were lost to privateers or storms and the firm withdrew from Canada. Lefebvre and Havy’s business grew steadily, as they personally handled cargos and eventually came to own a small ship of their own, the Parfaite Union.

They experienced a setback when they invested in a sealing station in Labrador with Louis Bazil and Louis Fornel, and retained their interest in it until the 1745 capture of the Fortress of Louisbourg by Anglo-Americans cut them off from it. They lost about a third of their original 100,000 livre investment.

In 1756, partly out of a desire to marry (as a Huguenot, he could not do so in Quebec) and partly motivated by the looming threat of the Seven Years’ War, Havy returned to France to oversee the transfer of as much of the business as possible there. When the British captured Quebec in 1759 much of his and Lefebvre’s assets in New France – in mortgages, Canadian paper money, and bills of exchange – were declared worthless by the new government. However, the pair joined with another cousin, François Levesque, as a partner to conclude what business remained, and Levesque carried on as a merchant in British Canada for some time.

François Havy – Merchant in Rouen born in 1709 in the pays de Caux. France. He was present in
Nouvelle France through the Compagnie de Dugard de Rouen from 1730 to 1755. During his stay at
Québec, Havy was associated with 13 different trading companies. A few of those were based at Le
Havre in the Seine-Maritime. Death in 1766 in Bordeaux in the Gironde. Source: The Merchants, Ship Owners and Fur Traders of Nouvelle France

Jean Lefebvre (1714–1760) was a French merchant in Quebec City. He came to Quebec City in 1732 to be the assistant of François Havy, at the trading company Dugard et Cie. Havy and LeFebvre formed a partnership and two became highly successful merchants in their own right. Lefebvre and Havy’s business grew steadily, as they personally handled cargos and eventually came to own a small ship of their own, the Parfaite Union.

Jean Lefebvre first set foot in Canada in 1732. He was only 18 and had come to act as assistant to his cousin François Havy, who was to be Quebec factor for Robert Dugard et Cie of Rouen, France. Like his cousin, Lefebvre was a Huguenot; the law forbade his settling in Canada with wife and family. http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio.php?BioId=35593

They experienced a setback when they invested in a sealing station in Labrador with Louis Bazil and Louis Fornel, and retained their interest in it until the 1745 capture of Louisbourg by Anglo-Americans cut them off from it. They lost about a third of their original 100,000 livre investment.

In 1756, during the Seven Years’ War, Havy returned to France to oversee the transfer of as much of the business as possible there and Lefebvre joined with another cousin, François Levesque, as a partner to conclude what business remained. When the British captured Quebec in 1759 much of their assets in New France—in mortgages, Canadian paper money, and bills of exachange—were declared worthless by the new government. Leveque carried on as a merchant in British Canada for some time.

Jean Lefebvre (Lefèvre) – Merchant with the Compagnie de Dugard de Rouen with a presence in
Nouvelle France from 1732 to 1755. Was associated with François Havy. Formed a company which
traded in the fur sector at the King’s Post, the latter a vast territory on the North Shore of the St.
Lawrence River from about the Saguenay River to the Labrador border. From 1719 to 1740, with his
three sons, he operated fishing stations in Bay of Chaleur, Bay of Gaspé and along the northern tip of
the Gaspé Peninsula at Forillon. During the winter months, the Lefebvres operated from the port of
Louisbourg. Source: The Merchants, Ship Owners and Fur Traders of Nouvelle France

François Lévesque,  merchant, justice of the peace, legislative and executive councillor; probably b. 29 June 1732 at Rouen, France, to François Lévesque and Marie Pouchet; m. 16 Aug. 1769 Catherine Trottier Desauniers Beaubien in an Anglican service at Quebec, and they had nine children; d. 15 Jan. 1787 at Quebec. There is a well-established tradition that Lévesque was converted to Catholicism through his wife’s influence. Nevertheless, his burial certificate is to be found in the Anglican register at Quebec.

Nothing is known of François Lévesque’s early years, except that he came from a Huguenot family, prosperous weavers originally of Bolbec, France. His reasons for leaving that country are also unknown, as is the precise date of his arrival at Quebec. Nevertheless, it seems that before 1756 he joined forces with his two cousins François Havy* and Jean Lefebvre*, who were already established at Quebec as merchants http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/levesque_francois_4E.html

François Lévesque – Merchant in Québec (city) and Rouen. Born in 1732 in Rouen. Son of François
Lévesque and Marie Pouchet. Arrived at Nouvelle France in 1756. In 1769, he married Catherine
Trottier dit Desauniers dit Beaubien. Was associated by marriage with the family of François Havy, a
successful merchant in Nouvelle France. In 1749 Lévesque was present in Québec (city) and was
associated with fellow merchants Guérout, Havy, Trottier Desauniers Beaubien. Lévesque died in
Québec (city) in 1787. Source: The Merchants, Ship Owners and Fur Traders of Nouvelle France