The Johannot surname derives from a very old given name, sometimes still encountered in the form of Jeannod. As a surname, Johannot is quite rare. By far the best known example is the dynasty of paper makers of Annonay in the Vivarais region of France (Ardèche).

Paper-Makers of Annonay

The Johannot family came to Annonay in 1634, from Ambert in the Auvergne. Modern scholarship suggests the tax burden in the Auvergne was becoming unbearable, and a flour mill situated in the hamlet of Fayas, just north of the town of Annonay, was available. The brothers Mathieu and Barthélémy Johannot bought the mill at Fayas in 1634 and converted it to a paper mill. At that time, the manufacture of paper involved collecting rags ("chiffon" in French), sorting, grading, and disassembling them, and pounding them to a pulp using hammers driven by water power. This rag paper has retained its fine texture and color for several centuries.

The Johannot family made many improvements in the manufacturing process. Their mill at Fayas, and another nearby, remained in the family until 1936. A mill on the same location is still operating, acquired by a successor to one of Johannot's competitors, the Montgolfier brothers, famous also for their hot air balloons. There is still a special "Johannot paper", and engraved illustrations by descendants Tony and Alfred Johannot are prized by book collectors. (A short biographical sketch of Tony Johannot, with samples of his work, is at http://www.ardennes.com/ricochet/base1/johannot.htm .)

Tragedy Strikes: Destruction of the Temple

Records of the Johannot family begin in 1637 in the protestant church registers at Annonay. There are two sets of these marvelous documents, a beautiful copy prepared for the municipal archives, and an incomplete set of originals. The latter contain signatures of participants and witnesses, and in some cases also additional or different information from the copy. A page at the end of the copy records the destruction of the church in 1685:

"Le 15me jour du mois d'octobre 1685. Le Temple de ceux de la R. P. R. d'Annonay a été démoly jusques aux fondemonts en presence de Monsieur de St. Ruf, Commandant les Dragons du Regiment de Ramont qui n'y laisserent pierre sur pierre."

("The 15th day of the month of October 1685. The Temple of those of the pretended reformed religion of Annonay was demolished down to the foundations in the presence of Monsieur de St. Ruf, commanding the dragoons of the Regiment of Gramont who left not one stone upon another." The abbreviation R.P.R. stands for Religion Prétendue Réformée, the terminology adopted by the Catholic opposition.)

Documents quoted by a researcher on the interrelated LaGrange family show that the repression of Protestants after 1685 was a serious matter. The restored Catholic authorities were able to remove children from parents who refused to participate in the sacraments and teachings of the Catholic church, and hold them in convents, where quite a few died. One elderly couple thwarted the authorities for some time by feigning deafness and ignorance when they were interrogated. People convicted of disrespect toward the Catholic church, by such offences as not removing their hats when a priest passed by carrying the sacraments to the sick, had to pay fines and ask for pardon on bended knee before the altar. Under these circumstances, many families became at least outwardly Catholic; others removed to Switzerland, Germany, Holland, etc. A few risked their lives to remain Protestants "in the desert", as they said. After 1685, it is in the Catholic registers that were find most of the information on the Johannots that remained in Annonay.

Johannot in Exile, in the Refuge, and in the Desert

Several members of the clan undertook commercial ventures in Lyon, Geneva, Frankfort, and elsewhere. As many of them bore the same names, it was difficult to make much headway until we located Daniel Johannot on the internet. His father Louis Johannot of Rolle (Vaud, Switzerland) supplied family information that resolved the problem areas. We have been able to confirm and extend much of this information from the notarial records indexes of Geneva, and the "Registres d'Insinuations" of Annonay.

A Mystery: Who are the Johannot of England?

From time to time, more of the dispersed Johannot family comes to light. At least a couple of them seem to have stayed in Frankfurt, an area that we have not investigated. A Daniel Johannot was among very early immigrants to the Boston area. He was a distiller from La Rochelle; it is not known if he is connected in any way to the Johannots of Annonay.

Traces of the family are also known in England, where at least one paper maker named André Johannot was active near St. Mary's Cray in Kent in the early 1700's. We have not yet determined how he connects to the rest of the family. The is also a Pierre Johannot in the same area. The Johannot in England are generally credited with making significant technical improvements in the production of paper there. It is possible that some members of the family remained in the Auvergne when the rest of the family moved to Annonay, that some settled elsewhere in the Vivarais, with the result that the baptism of this André is not recorded at Annonay, where the records seem to be nearly complete. It is interesting that André married one Marguerite Fleureton at Horton Kirby, Kent in 1693 -- Fleureton or Floreton is name found in early records at Annonay, and at least two men of this surname are cited as paper makers in that area before 1685. Marguerite seems to be the daughter of the Anthoine Floreton who married Claudine Crozet in 1657 in Annonay. This Anthoine , whose sister Sibille had married one of the original Johannot brothers, was a paper maker as well, from the area around Voiron near Grenoble. At least 5 of his children are known, first in England from about 1690, then in Prenzlau and Magdeburg, Germany. We have included information about these Johannot relatives in hopes that someone can provide further information. We also found traces of André Leorat b. 1666, a Johannot descendant himself, as he passed through Frankfort in 1687 on his way to London, another paper maker. We have even wondered if André Leorat might have adopted his mother's name in order to find a job in England, and thus became the Andrew Johannot of Eynesford, Kent! Eventually, we hope to prove the true origins of the English Johannot. Of the Fleureton family, we find them credited with the establishment of the "first" paper factory in the duchy of Brandenburg, and it appears that they must have learned their trade from the Johannot, since the occupation of the Fleureton family prior to their connection with the Johannot was that of tailor.

One Branch Survives

The only remaining branch known to carry the name today was the one that came to Morges (Vaud, Switzerland), where they appear in sometimes bewildering numbers in the church records after 1700. In 1734, one of them, Jean Prudent Johannot (1689-1755), was granted citizenship in the Commune of Echandens on 08 feb 1734, with his four sons. The Lettre de Bourgoisie is still preserved by the family.

Allied Families Aplenty

It has been possible to make considerable progress on some of the ancestral families connected to Johannot. Information on these families has been included in this chapter, though it results in some duplication. One of the more interesting lines took some time to track down. At a Johannot baptism in Morges, Switzerland, in 1716, the sponsors included Etienne Riou of London and Matthieu La Brunie of Geneva. Eventually, evidence of two different Etienne Riou's from the Vivarais was located in publications of the Huguenot Society of London, and a pedigree of one of them published in England was located as well. Our Etienne Riou and his uncle Matthieu Riou alias LaBrune became naturalized English citizens. The will of Matthieu reveals he had a sister Isabeau who married a man named Cros -- our ancestors Elizabeth/Isabeau Riou and Jaques Cros! The will also reveals that the Cros family had a daughter who married Matthieu "Janot", evidently our ancestors Matthieu Johannot and Magdelaine Cros! The published pedigree also noted the existence of a portrait of the immigrant Etienne Riou, and helped us locate his descendants still in England.

We were amazed to discover confirmation of the published Riou pedigree. The Registres d'Insinuations preserved at Annonay contain contracts and similar documents that were registered at the royal court there. Among these we found the marriage contract of Paul Peyrot and Jeanne Roux, widow of Jean Riou, containing the names of many relatives, including the parents of Jeanne Roux and the father of the late Jean Riou. The one missing grandparent, the mother of Jean Riou, turned up among the few surviving baptismal records of the protestant congregation at Vernoux (only the years 1675 and 1682 survived).

The Johannot family prospered in Annonay; they tended to marry well. Most of the connected families were well represented in the professional classes: merchants, lawyers, doctors, etc., with the result that they were careful to record their marriage contracts, testaments, and "donations among the living", through which they assured that their assets would stay within the family. The local notaries registered some of these contracts with the royal bailiff in Annonay, whose records constitute the many volumes of "registers of insinuations". Careful reading of the "insinuations" will eventually reveal much more about these families.