Motherlines: documenting the women in our family tree.

Genealogy tends to follow back the paternal lines - father and mother to their grandfathers with the grandmothers sometimes only there as "Mrs." or only with a first name without their maiden names. It is interesting to do a "motherline" on the women in the family and since we are coming up on Mother's day I thought I would do just that.

This "motherline" needs their maiden names (which of course is the last name of their father - not their mother). I don't have any families with hyphenated names or with women who kept their own names. However on my paternal grandmother's side I am blessed by being from a culture (French Canadian) where women were often referred to in records by their maiden names (most Canadian census, baptism, marriage and sometimes death records). On my maternal Irish side I have had to rely on very unreliable marriage, baptism and death records to find the elusive maiden name. Even a missing person newspaper ad provided one name. Occasionally in searching census records a researcher can find a relative living with the family who reveals the woman's maiden name especially if the census notes the relationship to the head of house: in-laws, siblings, nephew or nieces, etc.

Mary Margaret Leary at the Lakes of Killarney near where her paternal grandparents lived.

Here are my "motherlines" beginning with my maternal grandmother Kathryn Grace Corbett mother of my mother Mary Margaret Leary.(1907-1994)

• Kathryn Grace Corbett (1873-1860) daughter of Mary Bridget Shea 
• Mary Bridget Shea   (1844-1924) daughter of Mary Agnes Farrell
• Mary Agnes Farrell (1818-1886) daughter of Catherine Supple 
• Catherine Supple (ca.1790-ca.1850) where the line ends somewhere in Limerick Co. Ireland  Her father's name is of Norman origin and found in Limerick from the 13th century. Her mother's name is unknown. Her name is from baptism records of siblings of her daughter Mary Agnes. 

Mary Agnes Farrell and Mary Bridget Shea came to St. Johnsbury, Vermont from Limerick. Some records indicate that Catherine Supple might have immigrated with her son John Farrell to Ohio.

The maiden names are retreived from baptism, some marriage and death records. A missing persons' ad published in the Boston Pilot identified Mary Agnes Farrell's sister Bridget who lived in the same town and made finding her baptism record in Ireland easier. Her mother's maiden name was on the record.

Here is the "motherline" of my paternal grandmother Ida Emma Desrosiers. (on right)

• Ida Emma Desrosiers (Moreau dite Desrosiers) (1873-1924) daughter of Adelaide Raymond (dite Toulouse) 
• Adelaide Raymond (1852-1915) daughter of Salome Dupuis
• Salome Dupuis (1822-1907)  daughter of Marie Montminy 
• Marie Montminy (Montmesnil) (1788-1827) daughter of Francoise Remillard
• Francoise Remillard (1756-1809) daughter of Clothilde Denis (dite LaPierre)
• Clothilde Denis (1740-about 1760) daughter of Marie Jeanne Clement (dite LaBonte)
• Marie Jeanne Clement (1704-1758) daughter of Marie Jeanne Morisset
• Marie Jeanne Morisset (1683-1756) daughter of Jeanne Choret(te)
• Jeanne Choret (1652-1718) daughter of Sebastiene Veillion
• Sebastiene Veillion (1626-1698) ,  daughter of Bernarde Venet
• Bernarde Venet (1599-1657) in Verdille, France where the line ends and whose mother's name is unknown Her name is from her daughter's marriage record in 1647.

Salome Dupuis immigrated to Highgate Vermont Quebec  around 1850 from St. Valentin, Quebec. 

Sebastiene Veillion born in Verdille, Vienne, France immigrated to Beauport Quebec via LaRochelle France where she married in 1647.

The maiden names of all these women come from marriage records as well as baptism records where they are carefully noted. For an explanation of dit names google my blog on that topic.

Chercher la femme! French mothers and grandmothers

On this week before Mothers day I am looking at the matrilineal ancestry in my family tree. On my paternal grandmother's side I can go all the way back to 16th century France in the area around LaRochelle. 

Ida Emma Desrosiers (Moreau dite Desrosiers) 1873-1924 was born in Vermont, a second generation American whose grandparents immigrated from French Canada. In the only fuzzy  picture I have of her circa 1890 she is living with her husband in Canada and expecting their first child. She would have 9 pregnancies and 7 children would survive. She and her husband Paul Marcel Chicoine would move back and forth across the US border until finally settling in Highgate, Vermont in 1906.

Adelaide Raymond (Raymond dite Toulouse) 1852-1916 was born in Highgate, Vermont. Her cousin Virginia Raymond was the grandmother of Ida Emma's spouse Paul Chicoine. She married Joseph Desrosiers (Moreau dit Desrosiers) in 1870. She had at least 12 children between then and 1895. 9 girls and 3 boys.She lived all of her life in the small Vermont town of Highgate in a section called "Frenchtown" because of the number of French Canadian families settled there. Her great grandfather Antoine Raymond and wife Marie Garand had settled there early in the 19th century. Two of their sons Marcel and Julien are in the family tree, making their daughters Adelaide and Virginia cousins.

Virginia Raymond, (Raymond dite Toulouse) 1846-1934 , a large and colorful character known in the family as "Grandma Cook" survived three husbands (Antoine Bouvier, Paul Chicoine and William Cook) and produced a formidable set of French matriarchs that can be seen in this picture of her daughters from the three marriages. She had nine children. seven of whom survived. In interviews for this tree, my father shared that she treated all the children alike so he had trouble figuring out who belong to which father.

Salome Dupuis, (1822-1907) was born in Canada and died in Highgate. She was the mother of Adelaide Raymond by her second husband Julien Raymond.

She lost her first husband Louis Lemelin in 1849 after only 9 years of marriage leaving 5 children under 10.  She married Julien in 1851 in Canada. He was already living in Highgate and had lost his first wife Theotiste Fontaine in 1850 who left him with 7 children under 10. All of this blended family with their 12 children lived in Highgate, VT. Her marriage to Julien Raymond produced at least 8 children more between 1851 and 1865. (This is why my father had trouble figuring out who was not related to him in Highdate!)  Salome is listed in US records as Sally Wells - a translation of her last name Dupuis. Salome's father Antoine Dupuis was the son of a refugee from Acadie (Nova Scotia) expelled by the British in one of the deportations from Grand Pre.  (see Evangeline by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) His father was deported to Connecticut as a young man, married there but returned to New France around 1769 and settled in a small town in the Richlieu valley south of Montreal founded by Acadien refugees. They called the town L'Acadie in honor of their homeland. Her mother was not Acadien but descended from a line of mothers and grandmothers reaching back to the late 16th or early 17th century to Bernarde Venet a native of  Verdille, Charente-Poitou, France, a town near LaRochelle, whose daughter with husband Maixent Veillon,  Sebastiene immigrated to New France.

Sebastiene Vellion 1626 - 1698 Born in Verdille  married Mathieu Choret in the port city of LaRochelle France in 1647 just prior to sailing for New France. Before the time of the marriage on March 4  her parents had evidently moved to LaRochelle and the marriage ceremony was in the large church of Notre Dame de Cogne. Mathieu was a native of LaRochelle. Many  settlers of New France embarked from this seaport. They settled near Quebec City and had at least 7 children. When her husband died  she remarried. Below is a summary of the matrilinial line from Sebastienne down to Salome Dupuis' mother Marie Josephte Montminy (Montmesnil).

Jeanne Choret 1652-1718 married Jean Morisset and settled on the Island of Orleans opposite Quebec city in the St.Lawrence. They had at least 14 children.

Marie Jeanne Morisset 1683-after 1726 married Leonard Clement dit LaBonte (having at least 14 children) in Ste-Famille, (Holy Family) parish on the Island of Orleans (Ile d'Orleans).

Marie Jeanne Clement 1704-after 1731 married Joseph Denys dit LaPierre in St. Michael's parish Bellechasse, Quebec. They had 6 children.

Clotilde Denys dite LaPierre abt 1731-after 1756 married Joseph M. Remillard in Beaumont, Quebec.

Francoise Remillard abt 1756-after 1795 married Pierre Montminny (Montmesnil) in St. Michel, Bellechasse but by the time her daughter Marie Josephte married Antoine Dupuis in 1805 the family was living in L'Acadie. All three of her sisters were married there between 1795 and 1818.

Marie Josephte Montminy (Montmesnil) 1772-before 1831 married Antoine Dupuis in L'Acadie. Salome was the youngest of eight children. Her older brother Antoine also immigrated to the US settling in Detroit. Two of her older sisters married before her in L'Acadie and since her parents appear to have been deceased by 1796 she may have lived with them before her marriage and met Antoine because of that.

How I got started

Kathryn G. Corbett

For over 40 years I have been working on researching my family history but the inspiration for my interest was the influence of my grandmother “Nana” Kate Grace Corbett Leary (1873-1962) who shared with me many family tidbits. She knew her maternal grandparents: Mike Shea (1812-1881) and Mary Agnes Farrell (1815-1888) both born in county Limerick Ireland. She did not remember her father, Dominick Corbett (1837-1877) born in Turkstown, county Kilkenny, who died when she was around 4 nor his mother, Anastasia Grace (1798-1873) who died when Kate was 3 and who probably never saw her granddaughter.

When I was older and studying history I realized that her memory connected me back to the beginning of the 19th century. Although I did not know her husband, as my grandfather died when I was an infant, I did know his sister my aunt Annie, who shared some of that side’s stories with me. A serendipitous discovery of a newspaper clipping from the early 20th century led to more information from his side. Both my mother Mary Margaret Leary and her sister Julia passed down other oral traditions to me.

On my father Elphege Chicoine’s side I did not know his parents, Paul Marcel Chicoine (1870-1921) and Ida Emma Desrosiers (1873-1924) who died before I was born, but from aunts, great aunts and other relatives and from my Dad I collected family memories and histories dating back into the 18th century. I began to understand, especially as I grow older, how many oral cultures consider the story teller an important source of tribal memory and history. From my vantage point here in 2013 I can reach back through the stories and memories to people who lived around the time of the American Revolution.

I do not know how often I will post this blog but I will use some of the research I have collected to highlight the stories of the ordinary people who lived through the larger events of history. Immigration, war, famine swept them up and influenced not only their lives, but those of their descendants. I plan to attach pages for many of the ancestors, the first being one for Nana. I also hope to attach pages for the different locations I have researched where these families lived.

Some of my “brick walls” in research occur in this generation and I do have hope that someone else’s research may shed some light to help me break through them. If in the process I can help another family historian in their search (as others have already helped me) I will be very happy.