PLEASE: LeBlanc in South Dakota

[windyview]

Looking for ANY information about the Felix LeBlanc family. In 1860 Felix was a government worker at Yankton and had a place on the St James. He was married to Anna H and had a son named Felix Jr. IN 1880 he was at Ft Pierre with son Paul J, George Napoleon, Oliver and Albert as well as daughters Emma Annie( Deranleau) Catherine (Deranleau) Charlotte (Daniels) and Mary. They were listed as freighters and herdsmen. In 1885 they are listed as hotelkeepers on the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation. Can anyone help me find out anything about them and their time in South Dakota? Felix is my great great grandfather and I hardly know anything about him except that he was supposedly friends with Jim Bridger according to a newspaper article about Charlie Zabel. Felix is also mentioned in the early history of South Dakota. He or his sons may have taken Native American wives at some point in their lives. We don't know his parents or siblings ...only that he was born in Montreal about 1822. We know his wife Annie H was supposedly Irish. Can anyone help?

[mink]

This ebook

tinyurl.com/7b6eutn

has quite a lot of information about a Felix Lablanc of Yankton. I don't know if it's senior or junior.

[mink]

I meant "Leblanc". Just do a search in the ebook for "Felix Leblanc".

[windyview]

Mink..

Thankyou so so much!!! I appreciate your help more than I can say. I just wish we knew what happened to most of them. We just recently learned that Annie is buried in St Onge but Felix and a little girl Mary and some of the boys are still our lost souls. Thanx again!

[mink]

Is the cemetery where Annie is buried called "St. Onge" or is it somewhere in St. Onge SD? There really is not much else I could find online that is not repeated info but there are mentions in other ebooks, the full texts of which often have spelling anomalies:

www.archive.org/stream/historyofdakotaterr01king/historyofdakotaterr01king_djvu.txt

"About the same time Felix LeBlanc, who had been appointed
blacksmith at the Yankton agency, selected his claim near Mr. Stanage and employed an old Frenchman named LaFevre who was better known as "Old Dakol 1" to open up the farm and improve it. LeBlanc was making $150 a month at the agency and for the time being concluded to run his farm by proxy, though
his wife and children came down to the claim two or three times a year in order to keep within the law's restrictions as to residence, and during these visits Mrs. LeBlanc would do some cooking for the old Frenchman which he did not relish,
as he didn't want any women around. He was an expert cook and a fine tanner and could mc no possible use for a woman on general principles. He was a confirmed bachelor and quite an eccentric character.

SETTLERS DEMAND A LAWFUL GOVERNMENT

In 1859 the question of securing a political organization for the Territory of Dakota was uppermost in the minds of the settlers. (A preceding chapter tells the story of the efforts of the Sioux Falls pioneers.) It will be readily admitted that there would be little incentive to industry and improvement until the settlers
were secure in some form of authorized government that would protect their property and open the avenues for the orderly administration of the law. The Yankton settlers were cordially supported by those of the other settlements along
the Missouri slope. United States Senator Fitch introduced a bill to organize the Territory of Dakota and for other purposes December, 1858, which was referred to the territorial committee, but nothing came of it, the treaty not having been
ratified, and for the same reason a bill presented by Senator James I. Green, February 4. 1859. was not acted upon. In the House of Representatives on the 29th day of January, 1859, Alexander H. Stephens, who was about two years
later elected vice president of the "Confederate States of America," introduced a bill for the establishment of a territorial government in Dakota. This measure got no further than to be referred to the committee.

A Settlers' mass convention was held in the 1 '.ramble store at Yankton on the 8th day of November, 1859, where resolutions were adopted, and a memorial to Congress setting forth the needs of the people was authorized to be drawn up
and circulated throughout the territory for signatures. D. T. Bramble was chairman of the convention, M. K. Armstrong secretary, and J. B. S. Todd, Obed ote and Thomas Frick the committee on resolutions. George D. Fiske. James
M. Stone and 1 aptain Todd composed the committee to draft the memorial. Gen. D. M. Frost, of St. Louis, a heavy stockholder of the "Yankton Land and Town 1 ompany" and head of the firm of Frost, Todd & Co., was present at this meeting and made an able speech in support of the movement while the committee on
resolutions was preparing- its report. Others present were J. R. Hanson, George Pike, Jr., John Stanage, Henry Arend, II. T. Bailey, Enos Stutsman. J. S. Presho, Frank Chapel. Charles F. Picotte, Felix LeBlanc and Lytle M. Griffith. Because this meeting and a similar gathering at Vermillion were the first formal steps
taken on the Missouri slope to secure the organization of the territory, the proceedings are herein given in full as taken down and preserved in the archives of the "Yankton Claim Club"

records.ancestry.com/Felix_LeBlanc_records.ashx?pid=146559678

lists Felix to have been born in 1824 and the names of his children.

[hermin1]

laBlanc in french means white. the laBlancs also went by the surname Provencalle.

[mink]

Not the family of Felix Leblanc. Louis Provencalle of the St. Peter's area [near Fort Snelling] was, for some reason, called "Leblanc", although Provencalle was his actuall surname. [My keyboard does not have the French "c" with the little hook at the bottom.] Here's an article about him:

collections.mnhs.org/MNHistoryMagazine/articles/20/v20i03p259-268.pdf

Regardless, this whole family was known as both Provencalle and Leblanc. It was, I suppose one of those "dit" names. Rocque was known as "Laframboise" or "Strawberry". In a memoir he wrote, Indian Agent Taliaferro referred to "Laframboise Rocque" as if that was the
man's actual first name--which we know it was not.

[hermin1]

Is it possible he went back to Canada?

[hermin1]

mink: SD Death Index lists a Mary leBlanc that died in April,1958 ,
Roberts,SD

[mink]

This ebook, "Past & Present of Sioux City and Woodbury County, Iowa" [page 65] mentions a Felix "Lablanc" and his wife, Anna. Could they be the same couple? A man named Lefevre, same as the man who sat on Leblanc's land claim for him at Yankton, is also mentioned. Same typos as most "full text" versions of ebooks.

"There were a number of Frenchmen on the
Sioux above Bruguier's and it is hard to tell
just when they came. Henry Ayotte was at
one time a partner of Bruguier and lived with
him on the Sioux, came here as early as 1853.
He bad been one of Fremont's guides across the
continent. He was a small, wiry, active man
and was called Blue Eyes. He lived about
here for a few years. He at one time kept a
ferry across the Sioux near Bruguier's. Bru-
guier is said to have given Ayotte one of his
squaw wives.

Paul Paquette came here about 1852 or 1853
and settled near where the Big Sioux bridge
now is and entered land mostly north of the
road and kept a ferry near where the bridge
is, which was much used. He had been a fur
trader up the river and was till his death a resi-
dent on his farm. His American widow and
children are still living in Sioux City.

Gustav Pecaut was one of the early promi-
nent so-called Frenchmen, though he was born
in Switzerland on the French speaking side
July 19, 1826; he came to America with his
sister when fourteen years old and was up the
Missouri river with fur traders for many years.
Was at Fort Benton four years. He was at
times mail carrier for the Fur Company be-
tween their forts and was shot by the Indians
several times; he carried three shot in his hip
and was hit in his nose with the gun wad and
shot through one leg with an arrow. He came
down to Sioux City in 1852 or 1853, and had
a claim on the Sioux just above Paquette's. He
was at Leonnais some in the winter of 1854-5
helping the surveyors, and he staked out a claim
across the river in Nebraska and with Thomas
L. Griffey laid out the town of Covington and
lived there several years. lie married Chris-
tina Held, July lit, 1859, sister of the Held
brothers, Germans, who were early settlers in
Sioux City and later up the Floyd. Pecaut
moved to Sioux City in 1874 and lived there
till he died, December 29, 1901, a prosperous
and much respected citizen. He left a family
of eight boys and five girls.

Peter Dcon and Felix LaBlanc and his wifo
Anna for a time lived on the Sioux, 1ml prob-
ably after 1855, and sold to Miles Coffey.

Fardina Gondrou or Ferdinand Gondrow
and his wife Anastasia were living near the
Sioux bridge before 1856.

Joseph Jucttc before 1850 lived on the Sioux
at Riverside Park and sold his claim to Bru-
guier.

John Lafevre lived near the Sioux, but prob-
ably came later."

Is it possible Felix Leblanc lived in Iowa before SD? Too
bad it doesn't say just when Felix Lablanc sold out to Miles
Coffey.

[mink]

Yes, I think it was the same couple. Reading further in the ebook, I notice that more than one of the Sioux City Frenchmen mentioned made his way to Fort Pierre or vice versa. Here is one, a man named Letellier:

"Louis Letellier was one of the most prom-
inent of the early French and was identified
with the city of Sioux City. He was born
March lit, 1827, at Beaumont, Ballechasse
County, Canada, twelve miles from Quebec.
His father was a well educated man and his son
received a fairly good education, lie tii-st
some in a ship yard and at carpenter work. He
left Canada for the United States August 15,
1845, going to New York and then West to
Buffalo, and worked there two years, then to
Detroit and from there went to St. Louis, was
sick there with fever and ague and for his
health in the spring of 1850 hired to the Fur
Company with Fli Bedard for a year, to go to
Fort Pierre as a carpenter, going up by steam-
boat. He staid there two years and then was
sent to Fort Union and in the summer of 1852
was sent with a trading party to the Blackfeet
Indians and was reported drowned..."

It wasn't so--Letellier was alive. He sure got around
and that wasn't the end of his story.

[hermin1]

According to records, Felix's son Paul J. was born in 1861 in Iowa. Allegedly, Felix left Fort Pierre,after 1881(don't know the exact year) and settled on the Iowa Side of the Big Sioux River.but I was unable to find him in Iowa in the Censuses for 1880-1910.
Felix was in Iowa in 1860, and he was single at the time.
_____________correction:
He was listed by himself in the 1860 June,1860 US Census for Sioux City,Woodbury,Iowa.
________________
correction;
it was Felix;s son Felix that is listed with him and anna in that 1860 Census done in Sept. 1860 . it lists son felix born Iowa.Please forgive my blooper.apparently so was paul born in Iowa.

[mink]

Well, the next child after Paul, Catherine, seems to have been born in 1862 at Fort Randall in the Dakota Territory. As all the other children were also born somewhere in the same territory, that was the end of Iowa for awhile. It looks like Felix returned but I, myself, have found nothing about that Say, Hermin, how do you get that image to show up under your posts? You can private message me about that, if you like.

[hermin1]

Mink: Mike Denney found this for me on the Net. it is what's called an Avatar.
click on your username and look in your profile, for Avatar.then scroll down to select the one you want.

[hermin1]

mink and windyview: the 1881 Canadian Census for Montecalm,Quebec,Canada lists
Felix la Blanc at age 59 born Canada,laborer Catholic, and wife Philomene LaBlanc age 61 french,born Canada.could this be your Felix? Reference is www.familysearch.org

what is interesting is in the 1860 Census done in Sept. for the Yankton Agency,Dakota Terr.
there is Felix,with wife annie and son Felix, and a Fernclay LaBlanc age 37, wife Susan(born Ireland),and son William LaBlanc less than 3 months old. could these two men have possibly been related?

[windyview]

mink and hermin.. you guys are amazing.. Thank you so much for what you have found so far. I only have time today to answer a couple of questions that you have asked. Anna is buried by herself, as far as we know, in Heaven's Gate Cemetery in St. Onge, SD. Her stone says 1904 death date. We are not sure why she was there. I say that because in the 1885 SD census she was in Stanley County on the Reservation there. 15 years later she was in Fergus Falls Montana in the 1900 census with daughter Emma Annie and son in law Aursene Deranleau and their family. She is listed as widowed; so in those 15 years Felix (or Phelix as it has been spelled a couple of times) died. Did he also go to Montana? Did he die on the way to Montana? Did he indeed go back to Canada? I wish I knew. As far as Mary she was on the 1880 census I believe she was either 3 or 7. She isnt listed on the the 1885 census. However there is a family story with no details that she died early from some childhood disease. I notice that on the 1880 census her sister charlotte had measles at the time of the census. As you found out Felix probably did live in Iowa for a time as son Felix Jr who was born in 1860 was listed born in Iowa as was Paul J on the 1880 census. I have found in some of my research that sometimes the early territory women crossed the river to have their children in Iowa. Maybe it seemed more civilized or else they had friends or relatives there? Fenclay LeBlanc was named as a "near" relative of Felix in one of the ebook accounts , whatever "near" might be:) It is curious to me because Susan (Fenclays wife) was born in Ireland. Anna too was said to be born in Ireland tho the 1860 census says Canada and an e book account says Michigan. Family word of mouth says Ireland. as does the 1880 census. She was said to have had a sister and that they were orphaned upon arrival here and placed in wealthy homes as servants. She supposedly met Felix in New York as a result of this. Is Susan her sister? I wish I knew that too Mink as far as Felix's return to Iowa later... I will come back another time , somewhere I have some land descriptions that place him very close to Iowa but not quite in it, it seems like it was canon or something like that but I'm really not positive. Again thank you both so very much. You have found as much and more in two weeks than I did in 2 years. You are so appreciated.

[mink]

Windyview, you're welcome. I don't know Hermin--just met him [?] her recently, myself, but I suspect he enjoys playing "history detective" as much as I do. Hermin does a good job but I'm sorry we couldn't discover what happened to Felix. Someday you might. In my own research, I have more than once thought there was nothing more to learn--and then--voila!--a new document. Just keep searching on the Web. I've noticed long ago that not all the same sites pop up using the same keywords on Google. But that doesn't mean they won't at some later date.

[hermin1]

windyview:Try Canton,SD. It's in Lincoln county. right acrss the Big Sioux river from Iowa border.
You probably know too, that the surname is also spelled LaBlanc .that is how I was able to find him in the censuses after 1860.
given the census you mention that shows Annie in Montana, then Felix must have died before 1900. is it possible, they separated , he returned to Canada,remarried, and died there before 1900?
did you check the 1885 and 1895 South Dakota State Censuses?