LAROQUE  LINEAGE   

  The surname of Laroque is not uncommon in France, particularly in the mountainous regions of the South, where there are many localities named Laroque. In the Middle Ages, it was not uncommon for the surname of an individual, to be that of the place from where he originated.

  The earliest ancestor found of this particular Laroque family (later de Laroque), was Antoine (I) Laroque, bourgeois, a Roman Catholic, born in the mid-15th century, who lived at St. Pons-de-Thomières (Hérault).  

   He became a wealthy merchant, and was appointed Syndic (Procurator) of the town of St. Pons-de-Thomières in 1500, and again in 1515. His descendants married into the most influential local families, and two of them served as Judges in the local judiciary. The family continued in St. Pons-de-Thomières to the 5th generation, becoming extinct in 1695 following the death of Henry de Laroque, Sieur de La Devêze, who left no surviving male heir.

  However,  Jacques (I) de Laroque, a grandson of the founder, established a new family dynasty as Sieur de Lacam, at Roquecourbe near Castres (Tarn). He became a Huguenot, and his descendants continued to the 8th generation living at nearby Puylaurens (Tarn), until in 1815 this branch also became extinct, following the death of Jean-Salomon de Laroque, Baron de Laroque, who left no surviving male heir. 

   No other descendants of this family who still carry the Laroque surname, are known to exist in France today.

 MONTFORT  LINEAGE   

   The ancestor of the Montfort family in Ireland (later de Montfort), is now known to have been Captain Pierre de Laroque, Sieur de Montfort, a Huguenot nobleman who was born on 17th February 1667 in Castres (Tarn). 

    Pierre de Laroque was of the 6th generation of descendants of Antoine (I) Laroque, of St. Pons-de-Thomières (see Laroque Lineage above). Being a younger son, he became a "Gentleman Cadet" in the French Army at the age of 15 years, serving at Breisach (then part of France).

    However, following the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685, he travelled to Berlin, where the following year he joined the Brandenburg Cadets. He saw service with them at the start of the Nine-Years War (1688-97), until he was commissioned a Cornet in Balthassard's Dragoons on 15th April 1690. This Regiment became attached to the army of Victor Amadeus II, Duke of Savoy, during his campaigns in Piedmont (northern Italy).

   In 1695, with the Piedmont campaigns now over, the Regiment passed into the service of the British Army stationed in Flanders, where it became known as the Marquis de Miremont's Regiment of Dragoons. Following the Peace of Ryswick in 1697, the Regiment was eventually sent to Ireland in 1699, where it was disbanded.

   It was on the listed payrolls during these years of military service, that the name of Pierre de Laroque, Sieur de Montfort, became corrupted and abbreviated to that of Pierre (later anglicised to Peter) Montfort, which same has continued to this day.

   Peter Montfort, as he became, married and settled at Bawn, Co. Longford, Ireland, leaving a family whose descendants now reside in England, Ireland, Australia and the United States of America (see [B] above, "The Life and Times of Pierre de Laroque, Sieur de Montfort", for a full account of his life).