For my Wills Cousin's Granddaughter - Paul Benoit, an Acadian in Our Beauvais-Bissonnette Family Tree

I have been writing about my travels this month in the land of Acadia.  A few months ago I purchased a children's book titled Evangeline for Children by Alice Couvillon and Elizabeth Moore with the intention of sharing Longfellow's epic with the children in the family who have at least one Acadian ancestor.

So my first victim is entering 2nd grade in primary school next week.  I am going to try this book out on her.

Second grader at the County Fair with  Painted Face

This second grader has Acadian ancestors in her Beauvais and Bissonnette line.  I am posting her line so other Bissonnette/Bisnett and Beauvais/Bova from Cohoes and Waterford who descended from Celena Beauvais and/or her father Solyme Beauvais may also know how they have an Acadian great grand ancestor.

So if you are a Wills or Bissonnette or Bisnett, start from Celena Beauvais who married Joseph Bissonnette.  If you are a Beauvais or Bova, start from Solyme Beauvais and go back in time to Paul Benoit:

Living daughter (2nd Grader) of

Living Female, who is the daughter of

Living Female, who is the daughter of

William Robert "Bob" Wills 1923-2007, who was the son of

Elizabeth Bissonnette 1880-1936, who was the daughter of

Celena Beauvais 1850-1942, who was the daughter of

Solyme Beauvais 1821-1902, who was the son of

Genevieve Benoit 1799-1832, who was the daughter of

Paul Benoit 1751-1831

who was just four years old when the events in this story of Evangeline occurred.

He probably experienced the Acadian Deportation as a small child.

He was the son of

Geoffroy Benoit 1716-1769

He and his wife were exiled to Lancaster in the Massachusetts Colony

where they lived until they were able to move to Quebec.

He was the son of

Claude Benoit 1686-1743,

he was the son of

Martin Benoit 1643-1714.

Martin was born in France and came to Acadia to start a life with his wife, Marie in the spring of 1671 aboard l'Oranger.

Children's Area at the LeBlanc Reunion
CMA 2014

Below is a recap of the stories written about Acadians in this blog so far.  This list includes some early posts that may not have been well researched but I am reviewing them for accuracy and hope they will "make the cut"!

Acadian Update 2016

Acadians, not Cajuns, in our Families

Acadians in the Mylott-Glode Family

Acadians in the Rivet Family

Acadians in the Wills & Beauvais Family

The Pembroke

Remembering Acadian Ancestors

New Acadia, St-Jacques-de-l'Achigan, Quebec

Images of St-Jacques-de-l'Achigan

Petite l'Acadie in St Jean

Teaching Children about Acadian Ancestors

On the Way to Acadian World Congress 2014

We are the same...

"almost an idiot"

Lord Family of St Jacques de l'Achigan

More Mapping the Route: Québec to Cohoes, Waterford

I am fascinated when I think about how French speaking Quebecers made their way to the Cohoes area in the 19th century. Essentially all the ancestors on this blog: Mylott, Allard, Glode, Rivet, Beauvais, Bissonnette, Guertin (Yetto), Hamel, Lord, LaCasse, Kagle, Guay and St. Hilaire made their way from somewhere in Quebec to the Cohoes - Waterford - Troy area. The powerful waters of the Mohawk River falling over the Cohoes Cataract and the thoroughfare the Hudson River provided made Cohoes and Troy an industrial hub where textiles, iron axes, and brick masonry were manufactured and iron foundries flourished.  Cohoes offered employment - steady employment to French Quebecers whose large families exhausted land resources.  During the 19th century these families poured into mill towns of New England and upstate New York.

Many of the ancestors families of this blog came in similar fashion and similar times and others came in somewhat unique circumstances.  Let's take a look at some of the families, the ancestors and the routes they may have traveled to upstate New York.

TRAIN: Solyme Beauvais and Adele Guay left St Cesaire, Rouville,Quebec and arrived in Cohoes between 1862-1870.

TRAIN: Moise Bissonnette and Julia Kagle came from St Jean sur Richelieu, Quebec and arrived in Cohoes between 1844-1849.

TRAIN: Maxim Rivet and Marie Lord left St Jacques L'Achigan, Quebec and arrived in Cohoes about 1895.

TRAIN: Dedace LaCasse and Marie Louise Amireault came from Joliette, Quebec and arrived in Waterford  about 1898.

TRAIN: Jean Baptiste Guertin, later John B Yetto, baptized in St Hyacinth, Quebec in 1828 was living in Troy by 1860.

TRAIN: Louis St. Hilaire and Elisa Paré from St Patrice de Sherrington/Napierville, Quebec went to Cohoes about 1892.

TRAIN: The parents of Malvina Hamel, the stepmother who raised Claire, Al and Ray Rivet, were Joseph Hamel and Charlotte Josephine Lambert who came from St Cesaire, Rouville, Quebec to Cohoes between 1867-1868.

and the English speaking ancestor....
TRAIN: After emigrating form Cornwall, John Albert Berryman Wills and his wife, Anne Reed, made their way from the area of the Huntington Copper Mine in Bolton, near Lake Memphremagog, Quebec to Port Henry on Lake Champlain between 1868-1870.  It is likely the first part our their journey was on the Canada Pacific Railroad from Newport, Vermont to St Albans, then continuing on the Rutland & Burlington to some port on the eastern shore of Lake Champlain, Vergennes, where they ferried to Westport and Port Henry in Essex County.

Depending on the time period, the trip on trains could be grueling or very grueling!  Quebec families who flooded New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Maine, often traveled the Grand Trunk Railway.  Those who came to Cohoes and upstate New York in the 1850s and 1860s need to negotiate a different route, one that was indirect and perhaps more arduous due to possible transfers in Burlington Vermont, again in Rutland Vermont, Whitehall NY, and Schenectady or Saratoga NY depending on the time period.

Online maps are available that can clarify passenger train routes which disappeared long ago or were taken over by D&H.  Below are just a few from 1849  demonstrating the lines between Rutland, Whitehall and Saratoga.  From Rutland it was possible to make a connection to the Saratoga & Washington Line running to Whitehall, Saratoga Springs, Ballston Spa and eventually Cohoes OR the Troy-Rensselaer & Rutland Line that ran from Castleton, Vermont through Rupert, Cambridge, White Creek, Eagle Bridge, Hoosick to Lansingburg.

 1849 railroad map

Below is another map published in a book describing the proposed Lebanon Springs Railroad 1866

Describes railroad routes to Montreal

The Whitehall Train Station

The Whitehall Train station many years after our ancestors passed through

AND THEN THERE WERE THE CANALERS....

CANAL BOAT: Ancestors of Alex Glode and Angeline Allard, including Paquet, Allard, Duvernay, Beaudry, and Lalonde moved across the northern border to Champlain NY in the first half of the 19th century probably to farm the level lands there. Eventually, they became canalers along the Champlain Canal from Chazy to Whitehall and to Waterford, NY where they ultimately settled between 1890 and 1900.

CANAL BOAT: Robert Mylott, (Milot) baptized in 1832 in Vercheres, Quebec made his way from the Richelieu Valley, possibly St Jacques-le-Mineur Quebec to Whitehall NY in the 1840s. He was a very young man at the time. How he exactly made this trip we will never know although in an earlier post I made a guess. His grandson, Benjamin Mylott, a canaler eventually came to Waterford where he raised his family.

Solyme Beauvais who Brought his Family Across the Border from Québec to Cohoes

Salim, Solyme Beauvais, 1821- 1902, was the father of at least nine children including my great grandmother, Celena Beauvais.  Originally from the Richelieu Valley, two of Solyme Beauvais' great grandfathers were soldiers in the Seven Years War (The French and Indian War in North America).  His paternal great grandfather was Joseph Xavier Beauvais who came from Champagnole, France to Québec to fight in the Regiment Languedoc.  His maternal great grandfather was Jean Jacques Dubord dit St Chaume, a member of the Regiment Guyenne, who died at the end of the conflict.

We have limited but valuable information about Solyme Beauvais starting with his baptism record below:

Baptism Record

The baptism record is from St Joseph's Church in Chambly on July 1st, 1821.  The curé (priest) at St. Joseph's records his name Salim, the legitimate child of Jean Baptiste Beauvais and Geneviéve Benoit and he was born that morning.
In 1832, when he was only eleven, his mother, Geneviéve Benoit, died at the age of 32 years.  His father remarried later that year.

****

Then on January 25th,  1841 there is the marriage record of Solyme Beauvais to Adele Guais dit Castonquais at St Cesaire in Rouville.  It tells us that Solyme's mother, Geneviéve is deceased but his father Jean Baptiste is alive. Adele's parents are Jean Guais dit Castonguais and Mare Angelique Delmasse. The fathers of the bride and groom are "cultivateurs" or farmers.

Adele Guais dit Castonguais was also the great grandchild of a soldier who came from France to fight in the Seven Years War.  That soldier was Martin Delmasse who fought in the Guyenne Regiment. She was also the great-great-great-granddaughter of Joseph Payan dit St.Onge, L'Admital de Lac Champlain

Marriage

****

Next is the 1851 census of lower Canada.  Something strange happens here that only human error can explain. Solyme Beauvais, his wife Adele Guais and their three children are captured twice in the 1851 census.

Here is one, followed by a closer view

the detail

Here is the other with a closer view

the detail

In the first image Solyme, Adele and their three girls: Mathilde 10, Cordelia 6, and Celenie are living with or in close proximity to Adele's parents Jean Guais/Guay and Angelique Delmasse. In the second larger image, Solyme and Adele with the same children are not in proximity to the Guais/Guay parents/grandparents.

****

Then  in September 1855, Soylme is listed as a witness at the funeral and burial for his mother in law Angelique Delmasse at St Cesaire, Rouville.

****

In 1861, the Canada Census finds Solyme and Adele in Rouville with seven children ranging from 1 year old to 18 yeas old.

the detail

****

On August 11th, 1862 Solyme and Adele's daughter Mathilde married Noel Tetreau in St.Cesaire. Solyme is present according to the church record.

****

Nine years later, the US Federal 1870 Census captures the family in Cohoes. It is an interesting example of an enumerator/census taker with English as his first language, listening and figuring out how to spell a name that sounds different than anything he has ever encountered.  He hears the French name "Beauvais" and writes "Boovah".  The spelling variations continued through to today, some of Solyme's descendants spell their surname Bova, Bovah, Bove, Bovee, Beauvais.  Solyme's given name turns into "Silliam".

the detail

We may safely conclude Solyme brought his family from Québec to Cohoes between the 1861 census of Canada and the 1870 US Federal Census.  Perhaps the family moved after the marriage of  Matilde in August 1962 but we cannot be certain. Solyme may have made the train ride north alone from Cohoes to St.Césaire for the wedding because the marriage document does not mention the presence of Adele, Mathilde's mother.  Perhaps Adele remained in Cohoes with the children.
The last child in the family group is "Adolphine" who was born in Quebec in 1863....probably  it was after Adolphine's birth when the family moved.

The Take Away....If you  believe "Silliam Beoovah" is indeed the one and same as "Solyme Beauvais",  you can believe the Solyme Beauvais family was established in Cohoes by the 1870 census.