The surname “du pre” apparently originates in the bucolic French for “from the meadow.” Variants I have seen include: dupree, deupree and depres with or without a space and a capital “P.” The Dutch version seems to come with a final “z” instead of an “s.” See this wikipedia article for more facts on the name du pre wiki.
A Huguenot story…
The family I research were Huguenots–French protestants–who migrated in the early 1700s to the Richmond area of Virginia. This US branch has been well documented by Langley’s extensive Dupre Trail (see link at bottom of the page.).
…hardened in the business of London,
I question the suggestion that Joseph and Mynetta (Lameroux) Dupre are the progenitors of this family. This information is said to have originated with a Dupree family bible and was reinforced with juicy parallels to a South Carolina family of Dupres. This line of reasoning was enough to convince for me for years but, in all that time, I never managed to locate a lick of supportive evidence. A blog post on this site covers my reasoning, supposition and some of the evidence.
Armed with skepticism, I tracked the movement of many of the early Richmond families (this is documented in a blog post) and have come to make a suggestion that the family more likely has its immediate roots in the French refugee neighborhoods of London. Threadneedle Street and Spittalfields appear to have been robust, thriving areas where French refugees established both lives and livelihoods. They worked cloth and traded in wine and other fine continental goods. This was a world unto itself where French was spoken. Families bearing the name “dupre” lived here from the late 16th century. And their churches kept excellent records that give a wonderful cultural view into their customs. I trace out at least one possible path from Jean Despres, a Huguenot silk weaver from Sedan, a silk weaving region of northern France.
woven into the culture of the American South,
Three Huguenot brothers, Thomas, Jean and Louis Dupre arrived in Manakintown, Virginia in 1701, possibly, aboard the Mary Ann, one of four ships that brought Huguenots to America from England. King George granted them land along the James River .
Thomas, the elder brother and top of my line, married Margaret Easley who was among even earlier settlers in Virginia. Over the years, the family migrated mile-by-mile into the deeper South. By the late 1700s, Lewis (Thomas, Thomas) and his children Drury and Daniel lived in South Carolina before they moved to the Northeastern corner of the state of Georgia. Within the next centuries, the family spread to Texas, Alabama, Mississippi and one Dupreem so the story goes, accompanied the Cherokee on the Trail of Tears from Georgia to Oklahoma.
Approx. location, Manakin was on James River near Richmond.
Scrapbook
* The Dupre Trail (in PDF) Volume1 & Volume 2 & Addendum
* A possible dupre lineage to 880 ad
– Significant thanks and credit to Cheryl Kravetz and Bob Dupree