Good Reads - French Canadian Sources: A Guide for Genealogists

A six-year collaborative effort of members of the French Canadian/Acadian Genealogical Society, this book provides detailed explanations about the genealogical sources available to those seeking their French-Canadian ancestors.

Good Reads - From the Emerald Isle to the Cream City

The Past Whispers is once again entered in Blogging from A to Z  2020

This years inspiration is 'Good Reads', books about the Irish and French in Canada and the United States. I hope you come back every day for new books to consider.

From the Emerald Isle to the Cream City by Carl Baehr.

Irish-Milwaukee history begins with the first Irish immigrants who arrived during Milwaukee's founding in the mid-1830s. Irish laborers helped shape the city by cutting down bluffs, filling in marshes, digging a canal, and creating streets. They were joined in the late 1840s by more Irishmen who were fleeing the Great Famine and starvation in Ireland.
It's a history populated with heroic figures like Patrick O'Kelly, the city's first Catholic priest and the founder of Milwaukee's first Catholic church; John O'Rourke, the first editor of the Milwaukee Sentinel; and Timothy O'Brien, who emerged as a hero during the cholera epidemics as well as other colorful characters like the scoundrel Robert B. Lynch, kindhearted Hannah Kenneally, the "White Irishman" John White, firefighting hero Patsy McLaughlin, and militia leader John McManman.

And it's a tale of overcoming some of Milwaukee's biggest tragedies: the sinking of the Lady Elgin, which cost the lives of 300 people, most of them from the Irish Third Ward; the Newhall House hotel fire, which took more Irish lives; and finally, the Third Ward Fire, which destroyed hundreds of buildings and scattered the Irish to other parts of the city.

This historical tour captures it all--from the difficulties in adapting to American ways, as seen through events like the Leahey riot and the lynching of Marshall Clark, to the successes, such as the founding of the city of Cudahy by a poor Irish immigrant, the film stardom of Tory Hill's Pat O'Brien and Merrill Park's Spencer Tracy, and the many people who have Milwaukee streets and parks named for them.

From the Emerald Isle to the Cream City describes how the Irish influenced the political, educational, religious, and sports landscape of Milwaukee and their impact on other ethnic groups, overcoming early poverty and bigotry to help make Milwaukee the city that it is today.

Good Reads - A Distinct Alien Race

In the later 19th century, French-Canadian Roman Catholic immigrants from Quebec were deemed a threat to the United States, potential terrorists in service of the Pope. Books and newspapers floated the conspiracy theory that the immigrants seeking work in New England's burgeoning textile industry were actually plotting to annex parts of the United States to a newly independent Quebec. 

Vermette’s groundbreaking study sets this neglected and poignant tale in the broader context of North American history. He traces individuals and families, from the textile barons who created a new industry to the poor farmers and laborers of Quebec who crowded into the mills in the post-Civil War period. Vermette discusses the murky reception these cross-border immigrants met in the USA, including dehumanizing conditions in mill towns and early-20th-century campaigns led by the Ku Klux Klan and the Eugenics movement. 

Vermette also discusses what occurred when the textile industry moved to the Deep South and brings the story of emigrants up to the present day. Vermette shows how this little-known episode in U.S. history prefigures events as recent as yesterday’s news. His well documented narrative touches on the issues of cross-border immigration; the Nativists fear of the Other; the rise and fall of manufacturing in the U.S.; and the construction of race and ethnicity.

Available nationwide.

Les anciennes familles du Québec – Prise 2

The Ancient Families of Quebec

©2017 The Past Whispers
All Rights Reserved

Marie-Joseph Angelique: Remembering the Arsonist Slave of Montreal

 

Marie-Joseph was born in Madeira, Portugal, one of the most important cities of the Atlantic slave trade market. At the age of 15, she was sold and brought to the New World.

She first lived in New England, until François Poulin de Francheville, a French businessman, bought her and brought her to his home in Montreal. De Francheville died not long after her arrival, but Marie-Joseph was still owned by his wife, Therese de Couagne. It is she who renamed Marie-Joseph “Angélique,” after her dead daughter.

Unlike the common idea one might have of a slave, Marie-Joseph Angélique had a fiery temper, was stubborn and willful. Not long after her arrival in Montreal, she got involved in a romantic relationship with François Thibault, a white servant who also worked for the Francheville widow. The Montreal community disapproved of this union between a black woman and a white man.

In the midst of winter 1734, the pair intended an escape: they fled together, by night, across the frozen St. Lawrence River. They were hoping to get to New-England and, from there, back to Europe. But bad weather forced them to stop not far from Montreal, and they were quickly discovered by the militia and escorted back to town.

Angélique was sent back to the widow Francheville and her intended escape went unpunished. Thibault, on the other hand, was sent to prison. Angélique continued to visit him during his imprisonment, providing him food and support, despite her mistress’s disapproval. Thibault was released two months later, on April 8th 1734, two days before the fire of Montreal.

The Fire of Montreal

April 10th, 1734, was an exceptionally mild day in Montreal. Around 6:30pm on that Saturday, most of the community was attending the evening prayers. As they were making their way back to their homes, the sentry sounded the alarm: fire! A fire had started on the south side of rue St-Paul.

Chaos ensued. The military tried to tame down the fire, but it got so strong, so fast that it was almost impossible to get close to it. Montrealers, in panic, hoped to enter their burning houses so they could save furniture and belongings from the flames. But a strong wind propagated the fire and not much could be saved: in less than 3 hours, 46 houses were burned, including the hotel-Dieu hospital. Luckily, no one died.

Accusation of Marie-Joseph

Quickly, rumor started that the widow Francheville’s slave Marie-Joseph Angélique and her lover Thibault were responsible for the fire. Many people said that Angélique was in an agitated mood that evening. Others claimed they saw her going up the stairs of the Francheville house minutes before the fire was declared. And the coincidence of the release of Thibault, her lover whom she had tried to escape with not long ago, arose suspicions. Was the pair trying to create a diversion before they would flee again? Was an angry and rebellious Angélique trying to make a statement, because her owner did not accept her love with Thibault and refused to grant her freedom?

Nevertheless, the angry Montrealers, frustrated by their losses, were looking for a scapegoat. The day after the fire, Angélique was arrested, despite the fact that she had firmly denied causing the fire. The authorities searched in vain for Thibault: he had fled and was never seen again in New France.

Trial, Torture and Execution

The arrest of Angélique began an exceptionally long judiciary process. Her trial lasted six weeks, uncommon in New France, where trials lasted no more than a few days.

22 persons – rich and poor, men and women – testified against Marie-Joseph Angélique. All admitted that they did not see Angélique start the fire, but they were unanimously convinced of her guilt. Only her mistress, the widow Francheville, stood up for her slave, persuaded of her innocence.

Despite the fact that everyone wanted her to be guilty, the judge responsible for the case, Pierre Raimbault, reputed for his severe judgments, had nothing solid against Angélique. Nothing, until a new witness appeared out of nowhere, after six weeks of trial: Amable Lemoine Monière, the five-year-old daughter of Alexis Lemoine, a merchant. The little girl swore under oath that she had seen Angélique going to the attic of the Francheville house holding a shovel full of coals, just before the fire.

Amable’s testimony sealed Angélique’s fate: although she kept claiming her innocence, she was condemned to death. She was submitted to the torture of the boot – wood planks bound to the prisoner’s legs, squeezing them and crushing the bones – before her execution, in order to make her name her accomplices. Under torture she admitted the crime, but, begging for mercy and for a quick death, she maintained she was acting alone.

Marie-Joseph Angélique was hanged on June 21, 1734, in front of the burned buildings of Old Montreal. Her body was then burnt and her ashes scattered.

 

©2017 Linda Sullivan – Simpson
The Past Whispers
All Rights Reserved