Protestant Exiles from France/Volume 2 - Book Third - Chapter 27 - Turquand
Turquand.
Turquand is a refugee surname, as to which I am furnished with only one incident. Having concerted their escape with the master of a French smuggling vessel, a considerable band of Huguenots had been waiting for several days, alternately assembling on the shore and returning to hiding-places. At length the vessel stood into the bay. The embarkation of men, women, and children was proceeding, when a king’s ship was signalled as having appeared in the horizon. Great confusion arose; the sailors preparing to weigh anchor, and the fugitives hurrying to embark. When the smuggler sailed, the king’s ship being in pursuit, the Huguenots had been separated, some were on board, some were left behind, some (it was feared) had fallen into the water and been drowned. Monsieur Turquand and his children were left; Madame Turquand was taken safely to England, but her family had no proof of this, and no one on French ground had observed her getting on board. Subsequently Monsieur Turquand escaped, and found himself in London; but there was no clue to the fate of the missing lady, or to her abode, on the supposition that she had been conveyed to England. Nearly a year had passed; Mr. Turquand was introduced to the acquaintance of an English neighbour. The gentleman remarked upon his name, recollected that he had met a lady of the same name at Southampton, and asked, for conversation’s sake, Is she a relation of yours? Monsieur Turquand lost no time in setting out for Southampton, and not without difficulty he had the happiness of discovering Madame Turquand, and of giving thanks for their providential restoration to each other. It should be mentioned that Southampton was not the port agreed upon between the smugglers and the refugees; their vessel, being hotly pursued by the ship-of-war, was unable to land at the first port of the English coast as had been promised, and was obliged to run down the Channel. His family prospered in London; and several members of it have signalized their Huguenot descent by joining the Directorate of the French Protestant Hospital — Leonard Turquand in 1770, Jacques Louis in 1777, the late William in 1825, and another William in 1849. The Annual Register announced the death in King William Street, City, on 28th November 1849, of William Turquand, Esq., of Norwood, Surrey, for upwards of seventeen years one of the Official Assignees of the Court of Bankruptcy.