Surname:Conrique

The Conrique surname is quite rare and presently carried by less than 200 persons living in Mexico and the United States.

Our family folklore holds that the Conrique name originated in France and was carried to Mexico in the not too distant past; but, genealogical research conducted by this writer through historical writings and diocesan and civil archives in Mexico, indicates that 2 distinct Conrique branches had evolved there by the mid to early 1700's.

One branch, in the state of Jalisco, reflects on its earliest documents in my possession that Francisco Conrrique [sic.], my 5th Great-Grandfather, after becoming widowed from his first wife (Doña María Juana Inez Maldonado Lozano (b. 2 Mar 1727 d. ±1744), married Doña Manuela Gertrudis Hurtado in 1746, leaving no male issue with her. But descendants by his first wife carried-on the Conrique surname and many still reside in Jalisco.

The other branch, documented as growing in the state of Guanajuato, reflects that Nicolas Conrrique[sic.] and Ana de Cuevas y Orosco had a son Joseph Conrique, for whom there is record of his being married in Guanajuato in 1754. Some of his progeny carrying his surname still live in Guanajuato, and a number of them have migrated to California.

More recently, another group was developing in Mexico's Distrito Federal, and has a number of its members still residing there (and some in the U.S.) who are descendants of the 'renamed' Isaac Cohen-Henriquez indicated below.

To wit, Roberto J. Conrique --- who was born in a suburb of Mexico City in 1945 and later migrated to the U.S. and lived in various California cities --- discovered around 1987 that his family was of Cripto-Jewish origin, and further, not at all related to the above families. Rather, he documented that his Great Grandfather Isaac Cohen-Henriquez arrived in Michoacan, Mexico, apparently from Spain or more likely the Caribean, circa 1846, - - - more than 100 years AFTER the above Conrique family(ies) had been established in Mexico.

In Mexico, Isaac Cohen-Henriquez, likely because of on-going persecution in Michoacan, contracted/changed his name to Conrique (COhen-heNRIQUEz), married and had seven children, of which Braulio (Baruch) Conrique was to be Roberto's grandfather. Later, Isaac left those seven children and their mother and eventually married three other women in Michoacan and Jalisco, by whom he had still more children.

Roberto (1945 - 2006) widely published --- and shared with this writer over the years that we knew each-other --- wide-ranging details of his 20- to 30-year genealogical research saga confirming his Sephardic roots and Cohen-Henriquez patronym. And then, the world continued to turn, and Roberto's son (Isaac Conrique) and my grand-daughter (Emily Conrique) are both students at the University of California in San Diego (UCSD), and meet there often.

This writer's continuing research efforts, centered primarily on the spread of the Jalisco branch during the XVIII to XX centuries, have documented more than 600 individuals over 11 Conrique generations, including the more than 250 descendants and family members of my grandfather since his arrival in the Port of Los Angeles, California, in 1920, aboard the Steam Schooner J. B. Stetson, --- with his wife, 8 children, 3 nannies, and voluminous luggage.

Continuing research may reveal that the Guanajuato and Jalisco branches have a common ancestry and might even confirm, at least as it relates to the Jalisco branch, that the surname actually originated in France as chronicled by multiple indicants in our family. (For a partial Jalisco-branch Conrique Pedigree Chart, see ConriqueSurname.pdf at http://nuestrosranchos.com/node/15931 )

Efrain Conrique, San Diego, California, April 2007. [email protected]