The Saucier Family - Page 9
Following the birth of their first child, Anne, in 1705, their first son and second child, Henri (Henry), was born at old Mobile in 1706, followed by Jean Baptiste on November 27, 1707, Jacques on April 28, 1710, and Francois in 1712. Jacques was the last child born at Mobile to be baptized by Father LaVente as the priest departed for France soon after Jacques was baptized. François most likely was baptized by Father Davion who replaced Father LaVente. It is possibly that other children could have been born to Jean Baptiste and Gabrielle that died shortly after birth, if so; there are no surviving records for them in the Mobile Catholic Church archives to document them. All church records for this period of time show only the five known children of Jean Baptiste and Marie Gabrielle and the two children from her other two marriages.
Life in Colonial old Mobile was quite dismal, with overwhelming poverty, inflation, food shortages and long periods of no pay from France to contend with. Conditions went from bad to worse due to the Indian uprisings, British threats, the shortage of soldiers to man and protect the fort and corrupt financial transactions by the governing body of the colony. All this created an uneasy situation for the settlers. The ongoing feud between Father LaVente and Commandant Bienville only made things worse for the colonists at Mobile. Because of accusations against Bienville of dishonesty and corruption in the Colony, that were made by Father Henry LaVente and Nicholas de la Salle, the French government sent Jean Baptiste D’Artaguiette D’iron from Paris to audit Bienville’s books. Father LaVente, feeling that at least eleven of the thirteen men, who were no longer on the wages of the King, would blame Bienville who had removed them from the Kings payroll, which he did on orders he had received from his superiors in France and from la Salle, would happily testify on the side of inquisitor D’Artaguiette and himself against Bienville. Father LaVente was shocked when seven of those thirteen men stood firmly on the side of Bienville, including our ancestor Jean Baptiste Saucier.
Jean Baptiste Saucier, as a merchant in the colony, was one of those that were scheduled to testify in Bienville’s favor about his conduct of colonial affairs. For some unknown reason Jean Baptiste was never called upon for his testimony in behalf of Bienville. With Bienville exonerated of all charges, the influence and prestige of Father LaVente was waning in the Colony as well as in France. After the episode between Father LaVente and Bienville had subsided, Bienville was no longer afraid of him and was not above issuing threats to deport the priest from the Mobile Colony. Shortly after his failure to have Bienville found guilty, arrested and returned to France, Father LaVente, after being threatened once again with deportation by Bienville, started making plans and arrangements with his superiors in Paris to return to France. Arrangements were made for Father Albert Davion to return to Mobile from the Illinois outpost to replace him as the priest of the Mobile church. In mid 1710 the priest boarded a French ship and set sail for La Rochelle, France, never returning to the Colonies.
Although he already had a comfortable home and successful plantation when they married, Jean Baptiste and Gabrielle had worked hard after their marriage in 1704 to improve their status in the settlement and better support their now growing family. By 1711, after all their efforts and hard work for the past six or so years, they had finally become successful in the settlement. Now, to their dismay they had a huge unexpected change facing them. The settlers had been advised that the settlement was to be relocated down river to a new location because the regular seasonal flooding of the land, inundating the fort, was destroying it and the wooden buildings of the settlement. The relocation of the settlement by Bienville to another location now meant that Jean Baptiste and Gabrielle had to physically pick up and move everything they owned to the new location, including their livestock and equipment. Jean Baptiste due to his importance in the new colony would have been allotted a larger plot of land in the new settlement than his former plot at old Mobile. This move from the old Mobile settlement would have been either by boat or overland, either way it would present many difficult moments and struggles for the family. By late 1712 the settlement’s relocation down river to the present day site of Mobile had been completed and all the buildings along with the fort were all burned, leaving no remnants remaining of the old settlement. Once they completed the move Jean Baptiste and Gabrielle now faced the hardship and challenge of rebuilding their lives and business ventures. Both Jean Baptiste and Gabrielle would likely make many difficult decisions concerning their future, with many disappointments, before their lives returned to some normalcy in the settlement. After a period of time Jean Baptiste, Gabrielle and their children would finally be settled at the settlement with some degree of comfort and their future would be looking somewhat brighter. By now Jean Baptiste would have finished the construction of the families new home, their plantation and main livelihood would be up and running once again. Gabrielle would be caring for their young family and possibly starting her midwife services once again in the settlement as they moved forward to normalize their lives. With the death of Jean Baptiste following within four years after their move to present day Mobile, this writer wonders if the added stress of the move, and the difficulty of having to start over again could have contributed to the early death of Jean Baptiste.
Jean Baptiste Saucier died sometime in or around December of 1716; the actual day of his death is unknown as is the cause of his death at the age of forty-two. Jean Baptiste would have been buried in one of the ancient cemeteries of Mobile and today his burial site is still unknown. An inventory of the property of the Jean Baptiste Saucier - Gabrielle Savary estate was made on August 22, 1717. Although, the original inventory has not been located, reference to it is found in official papers dated June 25, 1718, made by the Royal Notary, Jean Baptiste Raguet, at Mobile. The inventory of the property of the estate was presumably lost or misplaced after it was officially registered by the Royal Notary.
Gabrielle Savary, Jean Baptiste’s wife, had received some formal education in France and thus was among the more literate homemakers in the early colony at Mobile. Her ability to read and write would prove to be valuable to the early Mobile settlement, Father LaVente and the church. She witnessed and signed numerous baptismal and other records for Father LaVente and the church at Mobile. She taught her children much of what she herself had learned. As adults, each of her children could sign their names with practiced hands, in clarity and artfully, compared to most colonials. But those abilities were demonstrated less generally by her grand children in the following years.
The early death of Jean Baptiste in 1716 left Gabrielle the task of raising their five children by herself. The oldest child, daughter Anne would have only been about 11 years old, Henri the second oldest child would have been 10 years old, third child Jean Baptiste would have only been around 9 years of age, fourth child Jacques would be around 8 years old at this time and their youngest son, Francois, would have only been about 4 years old at the time of Jean Baptiste’s untimely death at Mobile. Gabrielle, would have undoubtedly been worried now about the future of her young family. This would have weighed heavily on Gabrielle’s mind following Jean Baptiste’s death. The only alternative was for Gabrielle to remarry, in hopes of getting needed support for herself and the children. The single soldiers at the fort provided a number of marriage prospects.
Less than one year after the death of Jean Baptiste, Marie Gabrielle finally made the decision to remarry and accepted the proposal of Pierre Vifvarenne. Marie Gabrielle married Pierre Vifvarenne, a Sergeant in the French Army, at Fort Louis in about 1717. He was a native of Amiens, France. Their only child, a son, Jean Baptiste Vifvarenne, was born at Mobile on February 25, 1719, after his father’s death.
After the death of her second husband had left her once again a widow, now with five young children, and needing support for them, the best thing was for her to once again remarry, and the soldiers at the fort were salaried and could meet her modest needs in the way of support for herself and the children. She married in about 1720 for a third time to Jean Baptiste Sansot, a Corporal in the French Army at the fort in Mobile, and they had one daughter, Jeanne Gabrielle Sansot. Jeanne Gabrielle was born and baptized on October 18, 1721 at Mobile. Shortly after their daughter Jeanne Gabrielle was born she was widowed again. After the death of her third husband, Jean Sansot in 1721, she started making plans to move her family from Mobile to New Orleans and establish their family residence there. The move would have been made sometime between late 1721 and January of 1722 as Gabrielle’s first New Orleans land grant was given in mid January of 1722.
At this point, this writer would like to stress that there were only five (5) “known children” born to the marriage of Jean Baptiste Saucier and Gabrielle Savary at Mobile before his early death in 1716; they were in order of birth: Anne (1705), Henri (Henry) (1706), Jean Baptiste (1707), Jacques (1710) and Francois Saucier (1712). It is always possible that other children were born to them that did not survive infancy, but there are no records in the Mobile church archives for any additional children following the birth of their last child, Francois, in 1712. All five of Jean Baptiste’s children were born at the original old Mobile settlement. The only other two (2) “known children” born to Gabrielle were from her other two marriages; they were Jean Baptiste Vifvarenne (1719) from her second marriage to Pierre Vifvarenne, and Jeanne Gabrielle Sansot (1721) from her third marriage to Jean Baptiste Sansot. Some family trees on the internet have incorrectly listed the two children from Gabrielle’s other marriages as the children of Jean Baptiste Saucier. These two children both went by their father’s surnames and never adopted the Saucier surname at any time during their lifetime. All total Gabrielle had seven (7) known children from her three marriages as listed in this genealogy.
Although it is not certain just what prompted Gabrielle to finally decide to make the move from Mobile to New Orleans, it most probably involved some of the economic and social conditions in the Colony during this time, overpriced food and goods, poor administration, and the general chaos in Mobile. Any of these conditions could have led to her decision. Another contributing factor which would have greatly influenced her decision was the strict regulations relating to retailing and medical practices that displeased Marie Gabrielle, herself a merchant and midwife in Mobile. The occurrence that would have actually caused her to act on that decision would have been the appointment of Madeleine Turpin as the assistant midwife at Mobile in 1720, a position Gabrielle herself had actively sought and anticipated receiving. This huge slight by the Mobile officials would have greatly angered and upset Gabrielle who had worked so hard for the appointment. Now, because of this decision by the Mobile officials to completely overlook her, Gabrielle made the final decision, her mind was completely set and she would definitely make the move to New Orleans with her family.
Gabrielle, after settling her personal affairs in Mobile prepared to move with five of her six surviving children, their household items and livestock on the long tedious journey to New Orleans, at the time, a less populated city than Mobile. Gabrielle was hoping for a better future for herself and her family after the move. Her daughter with Jean Baptiste Saucier, Anne Saucier, born in 1705 had died in about 1718 at around the age of thirteen years at Mobile. It is also thought that Jacques may have remained at Mobile to oversee the family property, most likely the original land grant of his father Jean Baptiste, that the family had previously resided on in Mobile. It is presumed he died at Mobile soon after Gabrielle made the move to New Orleans, sometime before his mother’s death. The five children with her in the move were: Henri Saucier, Francois Saucier, Jean Baptiste Saucier, Jean Baptiste Vifvarenne, and her youngest, Jeanne Gabrielle Sansot. Jeanne Gabrielle Sansot died on May 22, 1726 at New Orleans at the age of four years. Son Jacques Saucier never joined his family at the family residence in New Orleans. Marie Gabrielle moved her family to New Orleans within a year of its becoming the capital of the Louisiana Colony. After establishing the family residence at New Orleans, she remained there for the remainder of her life.
Gabrielle, after the death of her third husband had reverted back to the surname of Saucier, even though she had two other marriages after her first, and became known in New Orleans and the Colony as "the widow Saucier", not using her first name.
In 1726, her economical situation not seeming to improve as hoped, she decided to move to the French colony located at St. Domingue in the Caribbean with her four sons and set up their residency. Her two older sons would have been about twenty years old and nineteen years old at this time and the youngest about seven years old. By moving to St. Domingue she hoped to improve their living conditions and find better opportunities for her sons' futures. After making application to the colonial government to make the move, she sold her slaves, sold her holdings and then paid off her debts. With her debits now paid Gabrielle began preparations to move her family to the island.
The following communications were made in 1726 between the French government in Paris and the Governor of the Louisiana Colony at New Orleans:
“Gabrielle Savary, widow woman, known at New Orleans under the name of Madame Saucier, asks for free passage to go to Key St. Louis or Cap Francois on the coast at St. Domingue, with her family of six children. It should be determined whether this woman and her family are living as free charges of the colony, in which case, they would be given free passage, if, on the contrary, the children may be useful to the Louisiana colony, do not afford them passage to leave, unless they pay”.
Response from New Orleans:
“She works for her living; she has no more than four children, all well reared. There is one who is a cantor at the church, fifteen or sixteen years old, very bright, capable of learning anything he wishes. (Gabrielle’s Church singing son was Francois Saucier.) The oldest (Henri) fishes and hunts for the family’s subsistence. She is a midwife, and in addition, buys and re-sales used retail goods. She has several times asked for financial assistance for the one who serves at the church, but without orders from France, I was not able to give any support. It would be a shame to allow this family, which was born and raised here to leave. If they were advanced some Slaves, her oldest son could take up some land and become established”.
In an April 22, 1727 letter at New Orleans, Messrs. Perrier and De La Chaise wrote to the Directors of the Company of the Indies the following:
“We have not been able to refuse passage to the islands to the widow Saucier and to four of her children, but by talking to her, she gave us the understanding that she sold her slaves to Sieur Perrault and used said money in paying all her debts in preparation of leaving. We would be very glad to get her back, if she remained.
Life in Colonial old Mobile was quite dismal, with overwhelming poverty, inflation, food shortages and long periods of no pay from France to contend with. Conditions went from bad to worse due to the Indian uprisings, British threats, the shortage of soldiers to man and protect the fort and corrupt financial transactions by the governing body of the colony. All this created an uneasy situation for the settlers. The ongoing feud between Father LaVente and Commandant Bienville only made things worse for the colonists at Mobile. Because of accusations against Bienville of dishonesty and corruption in the Colony, that were made by Father Henry LaVente and Nicholas de la Salle, the French government sent Jean Baptiste D’Artaguiette D’iron from Paris to audit Bienville’s books. Father LaVente, feeling that at least eleven of the thirteen men, who were no longer on the wages of the King, would blame Bienville who had removed them from the Kings payroll, which he did on orders he had received from his superiors in France and from la Salle, would happily testify on the side of inquisitor D’Artaguiette and himself against Bienville. Father LaVente was shocked when seven of those thirteen men stood firmly on the side of Bienville, including our ancestor Jean Baptiste Saucier.
Jean Baptiste Saucier, as a merchant in the colony, was one of those that were scheduled to testify in Bienville’s favor about his conduct of colonial affairs. For some unknown reason Jean Baptiste was never called upon for his testimony in behalf of Bienville. With Bienville exonerated of all charges, the influence and prestige of Father LaVente was waning in the Colony as well as in France. After the episode between Father LaVente and Bienville had subsided, Bienville was no longer afraid of him and was not above issuing threats to deport the priest from the Mobile Colony. Shortly after his failure to have Bienville found guilty, arrested and returned to France, Father LaVente, after being threatened once again with deportation by Bienville, started making plans and arrangements with his superiors in Paris to return to France. Arrangements were made for Father Albert Davion to return to Mobile from the Illinois outpost to replace him as the priest of the Mobile church. In mid 1710 the priest boarded a French ship and set sail for La Rochelle, France, never returning to the Colonies.
Although he already had a comfortable home and successful plantation when they married, Jean Baptiste and Gabrielle had worked hard after their marriage in 1704 to improve their status in the settlement and better support their now growing family. By 1711, after all their efforts and hard work for the past six or so years, they had finally become successful in the settlement. Now, to their dismay they had a huge unexpected change facing them. The settlers had been advised that the settlement was to be relocated down river to a new location because the regular seasonal flooding of the land, inundating the fort, was destroying it and the wooden buildings of the settlement. The relocation of the settlement by Bienville to another location now meant that Jean Baptiste and Gabrielle had to physically pick up and move everything they owned to the new location, including their livestock and equipment. Jean Baptiste due to his importance in the new colony would have been allotted a larger plot of land in the new settlement than his former plot at old Mobile. This move from the old Mobile settlement would have been either by boat or overland, either way it would present many difficult moments and struggles for the family. By late 1712 the settlement’s relocation down river to the present day site of Mobile had been completed and all the buildings along with the fort were all burned, leaving no remnants remaining of the old settlement. Once they completed the move Jean Baptiste and Gabrielle now faced the hardship and challenge of rebuilding their lives and business ventures. Both Jean Baptiste and Gabrielle would likely make many difficult decisions concerning their future, with many disappointments, before their lives returned to some normalcy in the settlement. After a period of time Jean Baptiste, Gabrielle and their children would finally be settled at the settlement with some degree of comfort and their future would be looking somewhat brighter. By now Jean Baptiste would have finished the construction of the families new home, their plantation and main livelihood would be up and running once again. Gabrielle would be caring for their young family and possibly starting her midwife services once again in the settlement as they moved forward to normalize their lives. With the death of Jean Baptiste following within four years after their move to present day Mobile, this writer wonders if the added stress of the move, and the difficulty of having to start over again could have contributed to the early death of Jean Baptiste.
Jean Baptiste Saucier died sometime in or around December of 1716; the actual day of his death is unknown as is the cause of his death at the age of forty-two. Jean Baptiste would have been buried in one of the ancient cemeteries of Mobile and today his burial site is still unknown. An inventory of the property of the Jean Baptiste Saucier - Gabrielle Savary estate was made on August 22, 1717. Although, the original inventory has not been located, reference to it is found in official papers dated June 25, 1718, made by the Royal Notary, Jean Baptiste Raguet, at Mobile. The inventory of the property of the estate was presumably lost or misplaced after it was officially registered by the Royal Notary.
Gabrielle Savary, Jean Baptiste’s wife, had received some formal education in France and thus was among the more literate homemakers in the early colony at Mobile. Her ability to read and write would prove to be valuable to the early Mobile settlement, Father LaVente and the church. She witnessed and signed numerous baptismal and other records for Father LaVente and the church at Mobile. She taught her children much of what she herself had learned. As adults, each of her children could sign their names with practiced hands, in clarity and artfully, compared to most colonials. But those abilities were demonstrated less generally by her grand children in the following years.
The early death of Jean Baptiste in 1716 left Gabrielle the task of raising their five children by herself. The oldest child, daughter Anne would have only been about 11 years old, Henri the second oldest child would have been 10 years old, third child Jean Baptiste would have only been around 9 years of age, fourth child Jacques would be around 8 years old at this time and their youngest son, Francois, would have only been about 4 years old at the time of Jean Baptiste’s untimely death at Mobile. Gabrielle, would have undoubtedly been worried now about the future of her young family. This would have weighed heavily on Gabrielle’s mind following Jean Baptiste’s death. The only alternative was for Gabrielle to remarry, in hopes of getting needed support for herself and the children. The single soldiers at the fort provided a number of marriage prospects.
Less than one year after the death of Jean Baptiste, Marie Gabrielle finally made the decision to remarry and accepted the proposal of Pierre Vifvarenne. Marie Gabrielle married Pierre Vifvarenne, a Sergeant in the French Army, at Fort Louis in about 1717. He was a native of Amiens, France. Their only child, a son, Jean Baptiste Vifvarenne, was born at Mobile on February 25, 1719, after his father’s death.
After the death of her second husband had left her once again a widow, now with five young children, and needing support for them, the best thing was for her to once again remarry, and the soldiers at the fort were salaried and could meet her modest needs in the way of support for herself and the children. She married in about 1720 for a third time to Jean Baptiste Sansot, a Corporal in the French Army at the fort in Mobile, and they had one daughter, Jeanne Gabrielle Sansot. Jeanne Gabrielle was born and baptized on October 18, 1721 at Mobile. Shortly after their daughter Jeanne Gabrielle was born she was widowed again. After the death of her third husband, Jean Sansot in 1721, she started making plans to move her family from Mobile to New Orleans and establish their family residence there. The move would have been made sometime between late 1721 and January of 1722 as Gabrielle’s first New Orleans land grant was given in mid January of 1722.
At this point, this writer would like to stress that there were only five (5) “known children” born to the marriage of Jean Baptiste Saucier and Gabrielle Savary at Mobile before his early death in 1716; they were in order of birth: Anne (1705), Henri (Henry) (1706), Jean Baptiste (1707), Jacques (1710) and Francois Saucier (1712). It is always possible that other children were born to them that did not survive infancy, but there are no records in the Mobile church archives for any additional children following the birth of their last child, Francois, in 1712. All five of Jean Baptiste’s children were born at the original old Mobile settlement. The only other two (2) “known children” born to Gabrielle were from her other two marriages; they were Jean Baptiste Vifvarenne (1719) from her second marriage to Pierre Vifvarenne, and Jeanne Gabrielle Sansot (1721) from her third marriage to Jean Baptiste Sansot. Some family trees on the internet have incorrectly listed the two children from Gabrielle’s other marriages as the children of Jean Baptiste Saucier. These two children both went by their father’s surnames and never adopted the Saucier surname at any time during their lifetime. All total Gabrielle had seven (7) known children from her three marriages as listed in this genealogy.
Although it is not certain just what prompted Gabrielle to finally decide to make the move from Mobile to New Orleans, it most probably involved some of the economic and social conditions in the Colony during this time, overpriced food and goods, poor administration, and the general chaos in Mobile. Any of these conditions could have led to her decision. Another contributing factor which would have greatly influenced her decision was the strict regulations relating to retailing and medical practices that displeased Marie Gabrielle, herself a merchant and midwife in Mobile. The occurrence that would have actually caused her to act on that decision would have been the appointment of Madeleine Turpin as the assistant midwife at Mobile in 1720, a position Gabrielle herself had actively sought and anticipated receiving. This huge slight by the Mobile officials would have greatly angered and upset Gabrielle who had worked so hard for the appointment. Now, because of this decision by the Mobile officials to completely overlook her, Gabrielle made the final decision, her mind was completely set and she would definitely make the move to New Orleans with her family.
Gabrielle, after settling her personal affairs in Mobile prepared to move with five of her six surviving children, their household items and livestock on the long tedious journey to New Orleans, at the time, a less populated city than Mobile. Gabrielle was hoping for a better future for herself and her family after the move. Her daughter with Jean Baptiste Saucier, Anne Saucier, born in 1705 had died in about 1718 at around the age of thirteen years at Mobile. It is also thought that Jacques may have remained at Mobile to oversee the family property, most likely the original land grant of his father Jean Baptiste, that the family had previously resided on in Mobile. It is presumed he died at Mobile soon after Gabrielle made the move to New Orleans, sometime before his mother’s death. The five children with her in the move were: Henri Saucier, Francois Saucier, Jean Baptiste Saucier, Jean Baptiste Vifvarenne, and her youngest, Jeanne Gabrielle Sansot. Jeanne Gabrielle Sansot died on May 22, 1726 at New Orleans at the age of four years. Son Jacques Saucier never joined his family at the family residence in New Orleans. Marie Gabrielle moved her family to New Orleans within a year of its becoming the capital of the Louisiana Colony. After establishing the family residence at New Orleans, she remained there for the remainder of her life.
Gabrielle, after the death of her third husband had reverted back to the surname of Saucier, even though she had two other marriages after her first, and became known in New Orleans and the Colony as "the widow Saucier", not using her first name.
In 1726, her economical situation not seeming to improve as hoped, she decided to move to the French colony located at St. Domingue in the Caribbean with her four sons and set up their residency. Her two older sons would have been about twenty years old and nineteen years old at this time and the youngest about seven years old. By moving to St. Domingue she hoped to improve their living conditions and find better opportunities for her sons' futures. After making application to the colonial government to make the move, she sold her slaves, sold her holdings and then paid off her debts. With her debits now paid Gabrielle began preparations to move her family to the island.
The following communications were made in 1726 between the French government in Paris and the Governor of the Louisiana Colony at New Orleans:
“Gabrielle Savary, widow woman, known at New Orleans under the name of Madame Saucier, asks for free passage to go to Key St. Louis or Cap Francois on the coast at St. Domingue, with her family of six children. It should be determined whether this woman and her family are living as free charges of the colony, in which case, they would be given free passage, if, on the contrary, the children may be useful to the Louisiana colony, do not afford them passage to leave, unless they pay”.
Response from New Orleans:
“She works for her living; she has no more than four children, all well reared. There is one who is a cantor at the church, fifteen or sixteen years old, very bright, capable of learning anything he wishes. (Gabrielle’s Church singing son was Francois Saucier.) The oldest (Henri) fishes and hunts for the family’s subsistence. She is a midwife, and in addition, buys and re-sales used retail goods. She has several times asked for financial assistance for the one who serves at the church, but without orders from France, I was not able to give any support. It would be a shame to allow this family, which was born and raised here to leave. If they were advanced some Slaves, her oldest son could take up some land and become established”.
In an April 22, 1727 letter at New Orleans, Messrs. Perrier and De La Chaise wrote to the Directors of the Company of the Indies the following:
“We have not been able to refuse passage to the islands to the widow Saucier and to four of her children, but by talking to her, she gave us the understanding that she sold her slaves to Sieur Perrault and used said money in paying all her debts in preparation of leaving. We would be very glad to get her back, if she remained.