Immigrants and Native Americans

(my grandparents Ida Emma Desrosiers and Paul Marcel Chicoine)

My father Elphege Bernard Chicoine's roots are deep in French Canada. His ancestors started to immigrate from France early in the 17^th century with the earliest being Abraham Martin (for whom the plains of Abraham near Quebec city are named) who arrived around 1619. Abraham died in 1665 which was around when the first Chicoine, Pierre may have arrived in New France. Pierre was born about 1632 in Chaunay-sur-Lathan, a town near Angers in the Indre-et-Loire region of France. Pierre is mentioned in the 1666 census of Montreal as a servant who by 1678 has received the title to Bellevue under the feudal system in place at the time. In 1670 Pierre married a Madeleine Chretien, originally from Paris, who was about 10 years his junior. She had arrived as one of the “Daughters of the King” : imported brides from France who were imported to civilize the frontier settlement. A number of these women appear in my father’s family line which will be the subject of a future blog.

Pierre and Madeleine had 10 children, 7 girls and 3 boys but only two of their sons had children to carry on the Chicoine name and it is from those sons: Pierre and Paul that most Chicoine families in the US are descended. (Another Chicoine line, so far unconnected with this line, is found on the Gaspe peninsula)

Dad was born in Bedford, province of Quebec but his parents were both born in the US and his family had been going back and forth across the Canadian border since the early 19^th century. Although he spoke French at home, his schooling was in the US in English after the family immigrated in 1906 to Highgate, Vermont. Dad never lost the French Canadian accent.

The earliest record of a Chicoine ancestor in US so far is the marriage of Jean Baptiste Chicoine and Marguerite Beaulac (Desmarais dite Beaulac) before a Justice of the Peace in 1822 in Swanton Vermont. Marguerite’s mother Marguerite Gray was possibly full or half Native American. Jean Baptiste is a mystery man since my father was convinced that he also had some native blood. On a baptism record for Jean Baptiste’s daughter Eulalie, his father served as godfather  (also Jean Baptiste Chicoine) and is identified as the grandfather of the child, his wife Archange Valade is listed as the godmother but not the grandmother of the child. Jean Baptiste appears to have been born before his father married Archange and his baptism record has not been located.  It is entirely possible that he might have had a native mother since the Chicoine’s did some fur trapping. Swanton, where the marriage took place, was home to the Abenaki people.

Signature of Jean Baptiste Chicoine

Jean Baptiste learned how to write his name in US and his signature on sacramental records is “John Chiquoine” (see image).  Jean Baptiste also kept ties to his only surviving sibling Emilie Chicoine Gosselin who lived in Vercheres near Montreal. . The family traveled to Vercheres from Vermont in 1826 so that his sister and her husband could serve as godparents to his daughter Marie Emilie. The family appears to have returned to Canada in the 1830’s settling around Henryville but by the 1840 US census they are again in Vermont and Jean Baptiste is  listed as John Chequin or Chiquin. The same census lists Dad’s maternal and paternal grandmothers’ families (they were cousins) Marcel Raymond and his brother Jules Raymond under their “dit” names (perhaps another blog topic – in brief an alias used by French Canadian families) as Marshall and Jules Toulouse. Based on birthplace of their children the couple appear to have moved at least once during the 1840’s to Canada and returned to Vermont for birth of Dad’s grandfather Paul in 1846 and his brother Anselm in 1848 but by 1848 daughter Marguerite is born in Henryvile.  By 1851 Jean Baptiste  is working as a blacksmith in Henryvile.  He died there in 1867. The 14 Chicoine children appear to have settled not only in Canada and Vermont but also in Kankakee county, Illinois.