♂Augustin Marcotte

Augustin Marcotte (17 November 1796 – 1839) was a landowner of Avoyelles Parish, Louisiana, born at Bayou Rapides while Louisiana was a Spanish colony. He was not baptised until he was five, on the same day as three of his brothers and sisters. In 1826 he received a federal land patent, and a federal land-office^W index lists two more in his name on the same day. He was the great-great-grandfather of Floyd Amatus Delahorne (1922–2014), through his daughter Delphine Marcotte (1824–1900), her son Augustin Delahunt (1845–1915) and his son Jeffrey Delahorne (1899–1929).

Early life

Augustin Marcotte was born on 17 November 1796 at Bayou Rapides, in what is now Rapides Parish, Louisiana, the son of Jean Baptiste Marcotte and Marguerite Tregle. He was baptized on 20 April 1802 at St. Paul the Apostle in Mansura, Avoyelles, by Father Juan Brady, a Carmelite^W, as one of four children of the family baptized together that day. The register was kept in Spanish because Louisiana was still under Spanish administration. A family history written by a descendant describes Father Brady as an Irish priest. The records do not explain why the children were baptized so late or all at once. The register also names his grandparents: on his father’s side Juan Bautista Marcotte and Maria Chatillon, “natives of Canada”, and on his mother’s side Simon Tregle and Margarita Folkes, natives of the German Coast^W of Louisiana, the settlements on the Mississippi above New Orleans.

His father was dead by 16 June 1808, when his succession was opened. The estate’s land in Rapides Parish was sold, and in 1822 six heirs each received an equal share of what was left. The surviving pages of the succession do not clearly name Augustin among them. His mother was also dead by 1816.

War of 1812

The printed roster Louisiana Soldiers in the War of 1812 lists an Augustin Marcot as a fusilier-private and an Auguste Marcotte as a corporal, both in the 5th Regiment (LaBranche’s) of the Louisiana Militia. The index to the federal service records gives the rank as corporal at both induction and discharge. A lineage compilation for Avoyelles families identifies this soldier as the same man.

Marriage and family

On 19 September 1816 Augustin married Celeste Aimee Joffrion in a civil ceremony at Avoyelles before Alexandre Plauché, the parish judge. The act describes him as of full age and the son of the late Jean Baptiste Marcot and the late Marguerite Tregue. He signed “A Marcotte”, while his bride made her mark.

On 1 December 1826 he received a federal land patent through the land office at Opelousas. It was issued under the Act of Congress of 24 April 1820 and signed in the name of President John Quincy Adams. The patent covered the west half of fractional section 25, Township 2 South, Range 4 East, a tract of 83.40 acres. He had acquired the claim as the assignee of William Hays and of John and Francis Fruge. In 1830 he headed a household in Avoyelles Parish. On the census page it was listed two entries away from that of Célestin Joffrion, a man of his wife’s surname.

The records and a family history written by a descendant name five children of the couple: Sallust, Delphine, Fernelius, Odile and Felix. A sixth, Lucien, is probably theirs too. On 20 November 1855 at Avoyelles Fernelius married Marceline Dufour, and his parents are named there as Augustin Marcotte and Celeste Joffrion. Augustin’s widow appears as “Wid. Aug. Marcotte” in the 1850 census of Avoyelles, so Augustin had died by then. A family history written by a descendant says that Augustin died about 1839 in Avoyelles Parish, in his early forties; no record of his death has been found. In March 1840, two of his children married into one family. Delphine married Samuel Dillahunt on 3 March 1840, and sixteen days later Sallust married Samuel’s sister Elizabeth.

Notes

Online family trees have merged him with another Augustin Marcotte, born in 1796, who was baptized at Cap-Santé, Québec. That man was a son of François Marcot and Judith Germain, married Marguerite Côté in 1828 and was living in Canada as late as 1861. Nothing connects the Louisiana man with Québec except the name and the year of birth.

The patent described above is one of several. The index to the federal land-office records lists four patents to an Augustin Marcotte: three dated 1 December 1826, and a fourth of 15 January 1827, in a different township, issued jointly with Pierre Charia. Of the three of that December day, one is the patent described above, in section 25. The other two cover parts of section 26 of the same township: the west half of the northeast quarter with the east half of the northwest quarter, and the east half of the southwest quarter with the west half of the southeast quarter, which by the subdivisions listed come to 160 acres each. Those three are known only from index entries; their acreage is computed from the subdivisions the index lists, and the index does not show whether the same man received all four.

Children of the marriage

The family history written by a descendant lists five children: Salluste, Delphine, Felix, Odile and Ferneleuse (Fernelius). It dates Salluste to 1815 and Delphine to 1825, where the usual dates are about 1822 and 1824.

A transcription of the St. Paul’s register at Mansura, made in 1978 by a certified genealogical records searcher, names Saluste as a son of Auguste Marcotte and Celeste Joffrion. The transcription is secondhand, not the register page itself.

The DNA evidence for Delphine’s line agrees with the family history, but it makes her place among the children probable rather than documented.

The 1855 marriage of Fernelius names his parents as Augustin Marcotte and Celeste Joffrion, written Celiste in that record, in the compiled Louisiana marriage records. The 1850 census gives no relationships, but a Fernelus, 13, lived in the widow’s household.

On 1 September 1855 a family council at Avoyelles, held for the minor children of Joseph Gaillard, deceased, and of Odile Marcotte, now the wife of Martin Dufour, named Felix, Saluste and Fernelius A. Marcotte as the minors’ maternal uncles. The council makes Felix, Saluste and Fernelius Odile’s brothers, and the family history gives both Odile and Felix as this couple’s children.

Lucien Marcotte’s death record of 20 May 1917 at Morrow, St. Landry Parish, gives his age as 97 and names his parents as Augustin Marcotte and Celistine Soredeau. The mother’s name is the one conflict: it is not Celeste Joffrion’s, and the records do not explain the difference. The birth year usually given for him, 1826, does not fit the age at death, which points to about 1820. He is placed with this couple on his father’s name and a DNA sibling-line test, so he is probable rather than documented.