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The Autard Family     The Autard, Autard de Bragard and Hotard Genealogies from the 14th Century         Australia - England - France - Mauritius - Mozambique - Reunion - South Africa - Sweden         This website is the result of 5 years of intensive research as a result of a chance meeting on the Internet with my sister Jacqueline on Thursday the 13th of February 1997. I had not had any contact with Jacqueline since 1963 and had long given up any chance of tracing her. Fortunately she had reverted to her maiden name and a search on the Internet gave me a clue as to how to contact her. I had been trying for several years to trace my father's family and I was more than amazed when Jacqueline told me that our father had thirteen brothers and sisters. I had always believed that our father Jean Emmanuel Autard had been an only child and that after the death of his parents in the early 1920's he had gone to Marseilles in France where he had been brought up by an uncle who was involved in horse racing. My mother knew very little about my father but remembered that he spoke of our surname being longer than it is and that our ancestors had a position of office in Mauritius and that we had Russian blood in us. In 1976 I found a book on the French Nobility in the Johannesburg Reference Library and found my first information on the Autard de Bragard Family. The information was brief but spoke of Balthazard Autard who was ennobled for the defence of the town of Orpierre in 1609 and of his descendants who went to Mauritius and of Louise Helene Autard de Bragard who married Ferdinand de Lesseps the builder of the Suez Canal.  I met with Henri Autard from Mauritius in Johannesburg in 1981 and he had told me that most of the family had emigrated to Australia in the 1970's and on checking with his family they did not know of my father. Two trips to Mauritius in 1985 and 1987 had revealed a couple of graves in Pamplemousses but no knowledge of any family living in Mauritius other than a nun who lived on one of the smaller islands who nobody seemed to know how to contact. I wrote to every Autard family member listed in the Marseilles telephone directory and had several replies none of which shed any light on my father. I had also been trying to find information through St Catherine's and Somerset House in London and well as through James McGill a friend in England who was trying to find out any information from the British Ministry of Defence. I got connected to the Internet at the beginning of February 1997 and was soon searching various Family Name Search Engines with no results!!! I then tried doing a normal search through Alta Vista and was amazed to find about 20 sites that had information pertaining to the name Autard - and one of the first ones related to a Jacqueline Smith Autard who taught dance - I knew it had to be my sister and sent several email that evening to the various colleges and institutions listed. The following morning had yielded no results and I decided to try telephonically. The second college I tried in Bedford in England referred me to the College of Higher Learning which was not listed. They knew Jacqueline as a visiting lecturer but were not prepared to give me her telephone number but gave me an address. We made contact within 10 minutes of my initial call. Having discovered that there had been thirteen brothers and sisters I knew that in all likelihood there must be some family somewhere and I set about trying to find out as much as I could. Thanks to the Internet I was contacted by Sanjit Teelock of Mauritius that following December to say that he had found one of my messages on the Internet and was able to give me my Uncle Guy's and cousin Cyril's telephone numbers in Mauritius. I was contacted about the same time by friends in Durban who had met with one of the brothers from the Catholic Church in Rosehill in Mauritius - Brother Pierre Corisan who also knew of my family!!! Now 7 years later not only have I discovered and met with many of my relatives I have also traced our Autard Family tree back to the early 1300's and most recently through the Lacget Family line back to the Ostrogoth's in 560 in Italy. This website is a tribute to my family and I hope will be of inspiration to all future generations of the family. The information contained herein is based on data collected from various family members, books and the Internet and may contain errors - please assist me in fixing up any information that is not correct or has been omitted. Thanking you for visiting my site and looking forward to any feedback. Kindest regards John Autard Cape Town South Africa         LINKS - The McPhail Family of Barrhead         Updated Friday 06 January 2012