This surname is derived from a geographical locality. 'of the laundry'; v. Launder, the officer who superintended the washing department; compare Wardrop (at the wardrobe) and Wardroper (the wardrober). Practically the local form is the same as the official. This surname has crossed the Atlantic and flourishes in the States, although all but extinct in England.

Alice atte Lanendre, Close Rolls, 3 Edward I.

Robert de la Lavendrye, Fines Roll, II Edward I.

The first two following names occur together:

William le Lavender, Somerset, 1 Edward III: Kirby's Quest.

Roger atte Louendrye, Somerset- 1 Edward III: ibid.

(Teutonic) Land-Ruler [Old Teutonic Landríc(h, Landríca (Latinized as Landeric-us)— land, country + *rík-, ruler (as in O.E, ríca = Goth, reik-s] Landric is the Domesday formerly In Anglo-Saxon, a landríca was specifically a ‘lord of the manor,’ ‘land­lord,’ ‘ local magnate.’ Landry is a common French surname (from Teutonic). (Anglo-French-Latin) Landry also = Laundry, q.v.

(French) Descendant of Landry (country, powerful).

Among the surnames of French origin in Louisiana that of Landry is second only to Hébert in frequency. Like the Héberts, LeBlancs, and Broussards, most of today's Landrys in the state trace ancestry to Acadian refugees who came at various times during the last half of the eighteenth century.* So numerous were the early Landry arrivals that the history of the various family lines in Louisiana has proved to be highly complex and difficult to reconstruct with any certainty.

The progenitor of the Landry's of Acadia is problematical.

Many investigators have named one René Landry, native of La Chaussée, Loudun area of west-central France, as the founder of the clan in Acadia, where he arrived ca. 1640 and there married Perrine Bourg.

But Bona Arsenault has suggested that a younger René Landry, who came to Acadia from France with wife Marie Bernard ca. 1659 was the ancestor of most of those who eventually settled in Louisiana.

In any event, at the time of the Expulsion of 1755, the Landrys formed a large group living in various parts of Acadia, mainly at Grand Pré and Pisiguit.

Having first been exiled to various of the British colonies along the Atlantic seaboard, a sizable number of Landrys reached Louisiana during the 1760s. By early 1766 four men of that name were living along the Mississippi River in present St. James Parish, some possibly having arrived the previous year from Halifax.

The bulk of the early Landrys, however, came from Maryland, where a large number had been exiled in late 1755.

At least nine families arrived from there in 1767 and five more the following year, all of whom eventually settled near St. Gabriel in present Iberville Parish and around Ascension de Lafourche des Chetimaches (Donaldsonville) in present Ascension Parish.

A few other Landry families, whose names do not appear in available ship lists, must have arrived as well from Maryland and possibly elsewhere; a census of 1769 indicated that eighteen households were established in the parishes mentioned above.

Ascension Parish, especially, became the main Landry stronghold in Louisiana during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, with the upper Bayou Lafourche in Assumption Parish a close second.

In antebellum times a number of Landrys in Ascension Parish became well-known sugar planters with many slaves on large plantations along the Mississippi River.

One of the most distinguished lines stemmed from one of the Maryland exiles, Joseph Landry (m. Marie-Josephe Bourg), whose sons, Joseph, Jr. dit Belhomme (m. 1775 Isabelle LeBlanc, 1779 Anne Bujol) was named commandant of the Acadians of Ascension Parish.

Joseph, Jr., developed a large indigo plantation (New Hope) above present Donaldsonville, and his six sons from his second wife, Anne Bujol, all became sugar planters in the same area in antebellum days.

The most renowned was the younger son, Jean-Trasimond (m.

1825 Modeste Breaux, widow of his brother, Achille), who was elected lieutenant governor of Louisiana in 1845.

By 1860 he had become a leading slaveholder in the state, with 319 slaves on his 2,600-acre sugar plantation above Donaldsonville.

At the same time his brother, Narcisse (m. 1807 Henriette Blanchard, 1829 Marie Comes) held a total of 222 slaves on his two plantations, one near the family properties above Donaldsonville, the other (Tippecanoe) in St. James.

The Civil War and its aftermath saw the financial ruin of these wealthy families,15 but many of their descendants still remain in Ascension and adjacent parishes.

Less affluent lines of Landrys in Ascension and Iberville parishes included that begun by another Maryland exile, Abraham (m. 1732 Élizabeth Leblanc), whose six sons and most of their descendants settled as small farmers on the Mississippi River: Alexandre (m. 1732 Anne Flan) whose five sons held land near St. Gabriel; Augustin (m. Marie Babin) of Maryland, whose sons Joseph-Ignace (m. 1776 Scholastique Breaux, 1787 Isabelle Breaux) and Mathurin (m. 1779 Perpétue Breaux, 1800 Marie Hébert) settled first at St. Gabriel, then moved across the river on lands in present West Baton Rouge Parish, where their descendants remained through the nineteenth century.

Several Landry families who were first assigned land in the river parishes soon migrated into the Teche country of the Attakapas, where another major center of the clan evolved. The first Landry in the Attakapas was Firmin (m. 1752 Élizabeth Thibodeaux, 1776 Théotiste Thibodeaux), a Maryland exile and widower, who by 1769 or 1770 had taken up land on upper Bayou Vermilion, near Grande Pointe, with his two grown sons Joseph and Saturin; later he obtained a smaller tract on the Teche at Fausse Pointe near present Loreauville.

Son Saturin apparently remained single, but Joseph (m. 1775 Marie-Anne Melançon) settled on Bayou Vermilion, some of their progeny staying in the vicinity of present Lafayette, others migrating into Vermilion Parish.

Two of Firmin's sons by his second wife, Hubert (m. 1800 Euphrosine Legros) and Valentin (m. 1801 Marie Hébert), settled at Fausse Pointe, and most of their descendants remained in the lower Teche area below New Iberia.

Other Landrys who entered the Attakapas from the river parishes included two sons of René (m. 1737 Marie Thériot, 1753 Anne Landry), a Maryland exile-Olivier and Joseph. Sons by René's first wife both settled in the Côte Gelée, west of St. Martinville in the early 1780s. Olivier and wife Marie-Madeleine Hébert (m. 1775) reared six sons, all of whom, including most of their offspring, remained in that area as small farmers for most of the nineteenth century.

Joseph and wife Marie-Rose Melançon (m. 1789) also had six sons, but one, Onésime (m. 1827 Carmélite Landry) left the Côte Gelée to settle in Vermilion Parish.

Despite their large numbers, most Landrys of the Teche and Vermilion areas were slow to move farther westward. In 1850 only two Landry families were censused in Calcasieu Parish, but by 1880 there were 15.

Movement into southeastern Texas probably occurred even later.

As mentioned above, in the 1770s several Landry refugees from Maryland settled on upper Bayou Lafourche; among them: Étienne (m. Marie-Josephe Landry) and his sons Jean-Baptiste and Joseph-Alexandre; Vincent and wife Suzanne Gaudin; and Pierre with wife Marie Landry.

The latter established a sizable plantation near Donaldsonville and by 1791 had acquired 15 slaves.

His son Jean-Baptiste (m. 1806 Marguerite Trahan) was one of the several big antebellum sugar planters of Assumption Parish and in 1860 worked 57 slaves on his 600-acre holding near Brulé St. Martin.

In 1785, ten Landry families who had been taken to France after the Expulsion of 1755 arrived in Louisiana.

At least four, and perhaps more, of these households were given land on Bayou Lafourche, supplementing the Landrys already established there, so that by 1798 more than twenty families of that surname lived along the bayou.

Later, various members of the Landry families in the river parishes migrated to the Lafourche, such as two sons of Joseph dit Cadet (youngest son of Abraham Landry, one of the Maryland exiles)-Joseph-Thadée (m. 1799 Anastasie Dugas) and Jacques-Donat (m. 1803 Genèvieve Stephens). Both settled along the Lafourche near Thibodeauxville, and many of their descendants established homes near Raceland and in Terrebonne Parish.

Moreover, the descendants of some of the 1785 refugees who settled along the Lafourche also had penetrated into Terrebonne Parish by the 1820s and 1840s, some of the grandchildren becoming fishermen at Cheniere Caminada on the Gulf.

Today, however, Landry families in Lafourche and Terrebonne parishes comprise but a small part of the clan in Louisiana