Categories: Economy, Free People of Color (FPOC), Genealogy, History, Latinité, Migrations, Slavery

I am connected to the Chrétien family in 5 ways. My mother’s sister married a CHRÉTIEN. A cousin married into the CHRÉTIENs. My grandfather’s aunt married a CHRÉTIEN. My grandfather’s grandmother (my 2nd-great-grandmother) had a first cousin who married a CHRÉTIEN. This same grandfather, on the LANDRY side, has a great-great-uncle, who also married a CHRÉTIEN. Chrétien, Judice, Landry, and Malveaux are key surnames/families in this post. Keep them in mind.

As it turns out, all 4 of these CHRÉTIENs are connected, though not necessarily consanguineously (by blood). The CHRÉTIENs of southwest Louisiana all tie to the children of Canadian, Joseph CHRÉTIEN, of Trois-Rivières in Québec, and his wife Magdeleine SAULNIER, an Acadian.

Joseph’s family were bourgeois. He served as a trustee of Église Saint-Landry-des-Opélousas, now called St. Landry Catholic Church, in Opélousas. He was also a planter. The latter occupation is what brought his and his SAULNIER in-laws’ family wealth. Already in 1777, about a decade after Joseph and his SAULNIER in-laws resettled in the nascent District-des-Opélousas (a Spanish-era civil and military jurisdiction), Joseph and Magdeleine owned 6 slaves (5 nègres and 1 sauvagesse). His brother-in-law, Silvain SAULNIER, their neighbor, owned 2 nègre slaves. ¹Regarding Joseph’s service as a church warden, or trustee, see baptism of Pierre CHRÉTIEN, son of Joseph and Magdeleine, who was baptized 1 Nov 1779 at age 2-4 months at the Opélousas District. Joseph is identified as a trustee in the baptism: Église Saint-Landry-des-Opélousas (Opélousas, La.), Registre des Baptêmes vol 1-A, p. 20.

As a sidenote, the 1777 census of the Attakapas and Opélousas districts show many Acadians owning slaves. In the Attakapas, there was Joseph CASTILLE [sic], Jean-Baptiste SÉMÈRE, Claude MARTIN, Jean BÉRARD père (his wife was Acadian), Jean MOUTON, Joseph BROUSSARD, Jean-Baptiste CORMIER, Joseph MARTIN, Dr. Antoine BOURDAT (his wife was Acadian), François SAVOIE, and Cécile PRÉJEAN. At the Opélousas, the following Acadians owned slaves: Michel COMAUT [sic], Joseph CHRÉTIEN and Silvain SOIGNER [sic].²Claude MARTIN served as a trustee of Église Saint-Martin. See his parochial death act, dated 18 July 1798, wherein he is identified as such: Église Saint-Martin-des-Attakapas (St. Martinville, La.), Registre des Sépultures vol 4, #154. To see names of all slaves owned by the parties, click here.

Joseph’s legitimate children with Magdeleine all went on to do even better than their parents. The eldest, Céleste, married Honoré DE LA CHAISE in 1798, from the well known and established elite Creole family of the Tchapitoulas District, the Côte-des-Allemands, and New Orleans. Honoré’s grandfather, for instance, was Charles Frédéric DARENSBOURG, the first commandant of the Côte-des-Allemands, in which position he served for decades. The second daughter, Magdeleine, named for her mother, married Louis JUDICE fils in 1800. Louis came from a long line of military commandants in colonial and provincial Louisiana, on his father’s and mother’s CANTREL sides. All 3 sons that grew to adulthood also married into the NÉDA, DE TERNANT, BRIANT and HALPHEN families, of similar stations as the DE LA CHAISE, JUDICE, DARENSBOURG and CANTRELs.³Céleste CHRÉTIEN married Honoré DE LA CHAISE in Opélousas on 22 Nov 1788. Église Saint-Landry, Registre des Mariages vol 1, p. 72. Magdeleine CHRÉTIEN married Louis JUDICE fils on 7 Jan 1800 in Opélousas, a native of New Orleans, son of Louis JUDICE père and Marie Jeanne CANTEL. Église Saint-Landry, Registre des Mariages vol 1-A, p. 87. Gérard CHRÉTIEN married Basilide DE TERNANT, a native of Pointe-Coupée, on 30 Dec 1822 in St. Martinville. Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Mariages vol 6, #316. François Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN married 2 times. The first was to Marie Thérèse Zoélina HALPHEN, a native of New Orleans, on 26 Dec 1822, at St. Martinville. Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Mariages vol 6, p. 315. The second was to Eléonore Virginie BRIANT, a native of St. Martinville, on 31 Dec 1845, at St. Martinville. Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Mariages vol 8, #278.

Like their father, Joseph, Hyppolite, Gérard, and François Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN were agriculturalists and were extremely well read.. Each of the brothers owned cattle ranches on Bayou Nezpiqué, in and around what was then Calcasieu Parish, in addition to plantations on Bayou Têche at La Pointe-Claire, outside of St. Martinville, near Ville-Platte and Opélousas, and on the Mermentau River. In those days, labor was provided by slaves, and each of the brothers shared and owned more than just a few. At his death, Gérard, who was divorced by that point, owned 13 slaves in his own right, in addition to another dozen shared with his brother François Dasincourt. His estate was valued in excess of $100,000 in today’s currency. Dasincourt’s estate was valued at nearly $400,000 in 1858, including 65 slaves. Chrétien Point plantation, located at Sunset, in St. Landry Parish, was owned by Hyppolite, and requires no introduction.⁴Regarding their learnedness, see for instance, Gérard’s last will and testament, and succession, dated 11 Feb 1840, which contained seven hundred volumes of books. St. Martin Parish Court House (St. Martinville, La.), Succession #940. Succession of François Dazincourt [sic] CHRÉTIEN, 15 Dec 1858, SM CH, Successions #1621.

The story of several of these slaves are pertinent. Let’s begin with my uncle-in-law. His grandfather, Simon CHRÉTIEN fils, was the son of two slaves owned by 2 of the CHRÉTIEN brothers. On 10 July 1845, at St. Martinville, François [Dasincourt] CHRÉTIEN purchased a 38*-year-old nègre slave named Levy, from Laurent MALVEAU – nègre libre, both residents of St. Martin Parish. Laurent declared having purchased Levy and the other 11 slaves from the Succession of the late Gérard CHRÉTIEN on 1 April 1845. Levy later appears in Dasincourt’s slave inventory in 1858 as Livy, age 40. Three days earlier, on 7 July 1845, Dasincourt sold to Laurent MALVAU – homme de couleur libre, 16-year-old Simon, later known as Simon CHRÉTIEN and Solomon CHRÉTIEN, my uncle-in-law’s great-grandfather. Lévy may be Simon’s father-in-law, later known as Laurent LUBIN or Laurent LÉVY. Simon’s first wife, Agnès, mulâtresse, also is inventoried in Dasincourt’s 1858 succession with two daughters Corine and Catherine. Evidence does not suggest that Dasincourt or his brothers fathered Simon, even though he carried their surname. After the War of the Rebels, Simon CHRÉTIEN and Célestine LUBIN settled on the upper Têche near present-day Notleyville, then called Petit-Bois.⁵Ibid.; Sale of Slaves, Laurent MALVAU to F.D. CHRÉTIEN, 10 July 1845, SM Ct Hse Conveyances Book 15, p. 279, #10713; Sale of Slave, François CHRÉTIEN to Laurent MALVAU, 7 July 1845, SM Ct Hse Conveyances Book 15, pp. 345-346, #10774).

My cousin married into one branch of CHRÉTIENs, also. Her ex-husband’s great-grandparents are Joseph CHRÉTIEN and Marie DOMINGUE, of Cade, along the St. Martin-Iberia Parish border. Joseph, who was born there on 3 Jan 1891, was a son of Antoine CHRÉTIEN and Marie JEAN-BAPTISTE. Antoine and Marie had married in St. Martinville in 1880, and produced a large family, who still live on their family land in Cade. Unlike Simon CHRÉTIEN above, Antoine actually does descend from Joseph and Magdeleine. His mother, Adèle Antoinette ANTOINE was a négresse slave belonging to Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN. She bore Dasincourt’s nephew, Hyppolite CHRÉTIEN fils, 3 children between 1848 and 1856 – Antoine, Angèle and Adéline. Hyppolite claimed the children, and all 3 went by their father’s CHRÉTIEN surname. The CHRÉTIEN men appear to have had much affection for Adèle: in 1859, the year after François Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN died, his son, who bore the same name as his father and later became the well known district judge in New Orleans, sold Adèle to Laurent MALVEAUX – homme de couleur libre, under the condition that he emancipate Adèle. ⁶Joseph’s birth: Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Baptêmes vol 13, p. 162. Antoine and Marie married on 21 Jan 1880, Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Mariages vol 10, p. 390. François D. CHRÉTIEN to Laurent MALVEAUX, 17 May 1859, SM Ct Hse Conveyances Book 27, pp. 237-238, #3295.

My grandfather’s maternal aunt Marie Idéa VAVASSEUR married François Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN in 1884 at St. Martinville. If you are confused by the same names repeated in this post, then it is justified! But, they are not the same Dasincourts. This François was a legitimate son of Prospère CHRÉTIEN and Henriette Zélime RAMEL. Since Louisiana Creoles customarily passed names down in each generation, this offers you clues as to Prospère’s relationship to the son of Joseph and Magdeleine. In fact, he was Joseph and Magdeleine’s grandson, a natural son of their son François Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN and a négresse slave the latter owned, by the name of Fanny. In 1810, William BRENT, an American, sold Fanny, 14 years old, to Hyppolite CHRÉTIEN at St. Martinville. Fanny bore several nègre children, one, named Babilas ORPHÉ, for Orphé, a nègre slave owned by the CHRÉTIEN brothers.⁷Sale of Slave, William BRENT to Hyppolite CHRÉTIEN, 1 Dec 1810, SM CH, Conveyance Book 6, p 143. Not to be confused with an older Fanny also owned by the CHRÉTIEN brothers: Sale of Slaves, 8 Jan 1817, Thomas THOMPSON to Hyppolite CHRÉTIEN, for 1,400 piastres. St. Landry Parish Court House, Notorial Acts vol 3., #1791. Sale of Slave, John GERVARD to Thomas THOMPSON, 22 Nov 1810, SL CH, Conveyance #17.

But her relationship with Hyppolite’s brother is most pertinent here. In 1820, Hyppolite sold Fanny, then 23, to his brother Dasincourt. Two children were born to their relationship: Prospère and Héloïse CHRÉTIEN, both mulâtres. When Dasincourt had his last will and testament drawn in 1842, articles 6-7 will interest you. “Je veux qu’après ma mort, on donne la liberté à mon mulâtre Prosper, et la vieille négresse Fanny, et ce aussitôt que les formalités voulues pourront être romplies,” in other words: after my death, I want my mulâtre Prosper and the old négresse Fanny, to be emancipated as soon as all required formalities have been met. He goes on, in article 7, to suggest that Héloïse not be emancipated, and that she remains a slave in family’s hands, on account of her constant insults to Dasincourt’s wife, Virginie BRIANT. Dasincourt died in 1858, but Prosper appears as a free man, with his wife, Henriette, their first children, and other relatives, in the 1850 US Federal Census on the Mermentau River plantation, managing his father and uncle’s cattle ranch, food store, and plantation. He ended up owning Héloïse, his sister, and emancipating her and her daughter, Pélagie Léonide JUDICE, whose father was Héloïse and Prospère’s first cousin (Gérard-Dorsily JUDICE, a son of Louis JUDICE and Magdeleine CHRÉTIEN). I will come back to Léonide. Four children were born to Prospère and Henriette’s marriage: Épiphanie CHRÉTIEN, who married Civil War veteran, Niccolò GARBARINI or GARBARINO, a native of Italy; Prival CHRÉTIEN, who married Marie Nina SIMMS; Paul CHRÉTIEN, who married first Mary CARTER of Alabama, and second Estelle GOBERT. The baby was François Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN, born in 1858, named for his paternal grandfather. This Dasincourt married my grandfather’s aunt.⁸Sale of Slave, 31 July 1820, Hyppolite CHRÉTIEN to Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN, SM CH, Conveyances Book 6, p 143. Last Will and Testament, François Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN, 29 March 1842, SM CH, Successions Book vol 15, p. 345, #10774. A fire destroyed civil acts at the Calcasieu Court House, so Niccolò and Épiphanie’s marriage record is gone. But they are consistently referred to as a married couple in various civil and parochial acts in St Martinville. He died 25 Jan 1894 in St Martinville. Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Sépultures vol 6, p. 35. Prival CHRÉTIEN to Marie Nina SIMMS, 3 Dec 1878, Église Saint-Landry, Registre des Mariages vol 2, p. 509. Paul CHRÉTIEN to Mary CARTER, 7 June 1893, Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Mariages vol 11, p. 246. Paul CHRÉTIEN to Estelle GOBERT, 23 March 1920, Jefferson Davis Parish Court House (Jennings, La.), Marriage Book C-D, 1919-1925, p. 90, record C-90. François Dasincourt CHRÉTIEN to Marie Idéa VAVASSEUR, 5 Nov 1884, Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Mariages vol 11, p. 20.

Although married, Prospère had two additional families. The first was with Marie Arsène FONTENETTE – femme de couleur libre, later wife of Térence FONTENETTE – mulâtre libre, who bore him one son in 1838, named for and recognized by him. The second, which Prospère maintained before and during his marriage to Henriette, was with a slave belonging to his father, named Constance FUSÉLIER – griffe. Constance and her father, Louis FUSÉLIER – mulâtre, both belonged to Dasincourt père. She bore Prospère 5 children: Marie Aglaë CHRÉTIEN, who married Louis GRADENIGO; Amélie CHRÉTIEN, who married Jean-Baptiste-Laurent MALVEAUX; Cadet CHRÉTIEN, who married Bathilde GUILLORY; Mathilde CHRÉTIEN, who married Edmond GUILLORY; and Hyppolite CHRÉTIEN, who married Angèle PRADE/PRATT.⁹Prosper CHRÉTIEN fils to Victorine SIMON, 21 Jan 1868, Église du Sacré-Cœur (Ville-Platte, La.), Registre des Mariages vol 2, p. 1. Marie Aglaë CHRÉTIEN to Louis GRADENIGO, 30 April 1868. Amélie CHRÉTIEN to Jean-Baptiste-Laurent MALVEAUX, 6 Feb 1877, Église Notre-Dame-du-Mont-Carmel – record now at St. Anthony Church (Eunice, La.), Registre des Mariages vol 1, p. 63. Cadet CHRÉTIEN to Bathilde GUILLORY, 4 Jan 1878, ibid. (St. Anthony Church), vol 1, p. 83. Mathilde CHRÉTIEN to Edmond GUILLORY, 19 Dec 1879, Église Saint-Landry, Registre des Mariages vol 2, p. 521. Hyppolite CHRÉTIEN to Angèle PRADE, 16 Feb 1888, Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Mariages vol 11, p. 36.

This latter set of children born to Prospère and Constance are also intricately tied to my family. For starters, Amélie CHRÉTIEN’s mother-in-law was Charlotte NAVARRE-ROCHON. Charlotte was first cousins with my 3rd-great-grandfather, Jean Stéril Narcisse ROCHON (two brothers’ children). Hyppolite’s wife, Angèle, was my 2nd-great-grandmother’s first cousin. Angèle’s father, Jean-Baptiste Adolphe PRADE, and my 3rd-great-grandmother, Charlotte Élisabeth CASTILLO, were siblings (same mother, Henriette dite Agathe DE KERLÉGAND – mulâtresse libre, different fathers). Hyppolite and Angèle produced a large family of 7 children. Four of them married LANDRYs, including 3 sisters and 2 second cousins (see graphic below): Joseph Robert CHRÉTIEN married sisters Louise and Victorine LANDRY, daughters of Aristile LANDRY and Alice JACQUET; Joseph Gaston CHRÉTIEN fathered a son with Louise and Victorine’s sister, Edna LANDRY; Lucille CHRÉTIEN married Ferdinand LANDRY; and Joseph Christophe CHRÉTIEN married Marie Ange Antoinette LANDRY. Antoinette’s father was Louis Luc Victorin LANDRY, a nephew of Aristile LANDRY, and Ferdinand LANDRY was also Aristile’s nephew (his father, Philippe LANDRY was Aristile’s simultaneous brother & first cousin!). ¹⁰Charlotte NAVARRE-ROCHON was born 2 April 1819 to Baptiste NAVARRE-ROCHON and Marie-Thérèse MACARTY – quarteronne libre, both of New Orleans. Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Baptêmes des Gens de couleur vol 7, #285. She married Laurent MALVEAU, III – nègre libre, native of Opélousas, on 9 May 1844, son of Laurent MALVEAU fils and Constance CHRÉTIEN – nègres libres. Ibid., Registre des Mariages des Gens de couleur vol 8, #260.

The LANDRY connection continues. Léonide JUDICE, mentioned above, daughter of Héloïse CHRÉTIEN and Gérard-Dorsily JUDICE, married my 3rd-great-grandfather’s half-brother, Charles LANDRY – quarteron libre. Interestingly, Charles LANDRY was the name of the two half-brothers. They shared the same father, Joseph LANDRY, a native of Nantes, France, son of Acadian refugees René LANDRY and Marguerite BABIN. Their mothers were different. Épiphanie and Niccolò’s daughter, Marie-Thérèse GARBARINO, married Gabriel LACASE. Gabriel was a son of Jean LACASE, a Frenchman, and Élisabeth Clara LANDRY – quarteronne libre. Clara and Charles LANDRY (Léonide’s husband) were siblings.¹¹Léonide JUDICE to Charles LANDRY, 27 June 1865, Église Saint-Martin, Registre des Mariages vol 9, #374. Charles’s mother was Aimée DE LA HOUSSAYE – mulâtresse libre.

By now, you’re likely wondering why the MALVEAUx appear so consistently in the CHRÉTIEN and LANDRY web. Well, I have already mentioned that Jean-Baptiste-Laurent MALVEAUX married Amélie CHRÉTIEN, and his mother was from my family. There’s a second connection: my mother’s brother married into a family, the SÉMÈREs, that once belonged to JBL and Amélie. After the war, her antecedents used the SÉMÈRE surname, but her grandfather, Eusaire, for reasons unclear, abandoned that surname for MALVEAUX. Neither Eusaire, nor his father, grandfather, or great-grandfather (see graphic below) were consanguineously MALVEAUx. Their only relationship to the MALVEAUx was through slavery. They were slaves of JBL and Amélie. If any of you watched PBS’s Finding Your Roots, the episode with Suzanne MALVEAUX, you’ll recall that Skip GATES introduced to Suzanne that her/our family owned slaves, and were themselves people of color. It shocks many people, and creates rifts sometimes, also. But history is history and we cannot undo it. We should not have to speak for what our ancestors did or did not do, either. They walked in their own footsteps, experienced life that we today do not know, and were part of a socioeconomic system of material wealth, that at that time was guaranteed through agriculture and slave ownership. It’s no different from Americans (everyone in the west) living in comfort with materials that have been manufactured on the backs of extremely impoverished people in Asia and other parts of the Americas. No household in the west is without something produced by people today working in sweatshops, and who do not benefit monetarily from the proceeds of their labor. Xenophobia, particularly anti-Hispanic, is raging in the U.S. today, but those same Hispanics that Americans have come to despise, and want out, are the very ones literally putting food on all of our tables through their slave-like labor in meatpacking districts, on fruit farms, and beyond.

Slavery is what enriched the CHRÉTIENs, LANDRYs and SÉMÈREs, who were Canadian and Acadians, and descendants of them. Their story – our story – could never have existed without slavery. It’s the story that Cajunists run from, but Cajun identity and the Cajun narrative would not exist had slavery not existed, because the people Cajunists run from are a product of slavery and consanguineous relationships to them, as is the cuisine and music that Cajunists hold so dear to them and claim comes from Nova Scotia. I would not exist, because my mother, her father, and all of my family, going back several generations, would not exist had it not been for slavery. Slavery tied us to all these families in complex ways, because my family’s plantations literally neighbored those of the CHRÉTIENs and MALVEAUx at La Pointe-Claire outside of St. Martinville. A true “new world” story, one shared by all of us, Cajuns and Cajunists included.

– Christophe Landry