M. 15 Jan 1720 in Longueuil, New France
Wife: Marie-Madeleine Drousson
D. 4 May 1758 in Detroit, New France
The story of Louis Antoine Edeline was typical of many men born in his time and place — in 18th-century Montreal, he found opportunity in the fur trade, and ended up bringing a line of his family to the western frontier.
Louis started out life in Longueuil, New France, born there on September 22, 1690 to Charles Edeline and Jeanne Braconnier, the ninth of their ten children. Both of Louis’ parents were immigrants from France; his father was a farmer and shoemaker, who served the local church as a beadle.
When Louis was 20, his mother and father died, and he was left on his own. He was living near the hub of the fur trading industry, and within a couple of years, he signed up to be a voyageur. The job of a voyageur took great strength and endurance, with workdays that were sometimes 18 hours long. It involved paddling canoes loaded with furs and goods for great distances, and unloading them each night to set up camp. A typical journey took many weeks as the convoys made their way hundreds of miles into the interior of North America. In certain places there was no navigable water, so the men picked up the canoes and carried them. Their destinations were remote and sometimes required that they stayed through the winter before they made the reverse trip back home.
Louis’ earliest known contract is dated October 1, 1713. In it, he committed to the service of one year, traveling during late summer to Fort Detroit, spending the winter, and returning the following summer. For this, he would be paid 200 livres once he came back to the Montreal area. About a year later, he agreed to another contract, only this time he would be paid 300 livres. He likely went on several other expeditions during this period of his life.
Being a voyageur left little time to find a wife, but on January 15, 1720, he finally got married. His bride was Marie-Madeleine Drousson, a woman 30 years of age who also had never been married. Marie-Madeleine was the mother of an 11-year-old daughter born out of wedlock; the father had been a much older married man and the nature of their affair isn’t known. For a time, Louis seemed to settle down in Longueuil and a daughter was born in October. Another came in 1722, and then a son in 1725; both of these children died young. Five years passed before his youngest child was born, another son.
The reason for the gap in ages of Louis’ youngest children was because by 1727, he once again became a voyageur. That year’s contract had him going on an expedition to Michilimackinac, a fur trading outpost where Lake Huron meets Lake Michigan. He also made trips in 1730, 1733, 1734 and 1737 to Detroit. Each of these trips started in late spring and returned in the fall; he made smaller amounts of money than when he spent the winter, but with a family back in Longueuil, it was probably difficult to be away for so long. Then in 1738, he committed to an expedition that would last for three years; he traveled further than ever, to Ouiatenon, a trading post in present-day Indiana. The contract promised him 900 livres for his work, a large sum of money, but he wouldn’t be able to see his family until 1741.
The routes of Louis' journeys to the West.
During the years 1742 to 1745, Louis’ name appeared in the records of Longueuil and Montreal as a witness to several weddings, so it’s known that he lived there for at least part of those years. He was in his early 50s then, but he still wasn't ready to retire from his work, and by 1747, he returned to the West. That year he was serving as a clerk at Fort des Miamis, where on July 3rd, he was paid 196 livres for writing a financial report for an officer named Douville. Fort des Miamis (later known as Fort Wayne) was a military outpost to protect French interests in the fur trading territory. Not long after Louis got paid, Douville and most of his men, presumably including Louis, left the fort to go to Detroit, and while they were gone members of the Huron tribe burned down the fort.
It’s not known if Louis ever returned to the Montreal area. On August 25, 1747, his wife died in Montreal, and most likely he was in Detroit at that time. Louis had two surviving children; his daughter was married, so only his 17-year-old son, Louis Victor, was alone. Two years later, the young man joined his father in Detroit. The two were known to be living on the south shore of the Detroit River between July 26, 1749 and January 26, 1751 (although Louis may have also served at the rebuilt Fort des Miamis for part of 1750). Settlers living at Detroit had an arrangement where they were given land, supplies and provisions in return for a commitment to cultivate a farm, and Louis was one of those who participated in the program.
Within a few years, the world Louis knew came to an end when the British took over most of French America. Detroit wasn’t captured until 1763, but Louis had died on May 4, 1758. His son Louis would soon after move to the remote settlement of Vincennes, Indiana, where he would become a leader in his community.
Children:
1. Marie-Louise Antoinette Edeline – B. 25 Oct 1720, Longueuil, Quebec; D. 25 Apr 1748, Montreal, Quebec; M. Jacques Denis dit Lyonnais (1716-1755), 25 Nov 1743, Montreal, Quebec
2. Marie-Josephe Edeline — B. 21 Jun 1722, Montreal, Quebec; D. (probably) young
3. Antoine Edeline — B. 13 Feb 1725, Longueuil, Quebec; D. 19 Oct 1727, Longueuil, Quebec
4. Louis Victor Edeline — B. 23 Dec 1730, Longueuil, Quebec; D. 28 Apr 1799, Vincennes, Northwest Territory; M. Marie Joseph Thomas (~1743-~1808), 14 May 1759, Fort Detroit, New France
Sources:
“My Ancestry & their descendants plus misc research,” Denis Paul Edeline, RootsWeb.Ancestry.com
Généalogie du Quebec et d’Amérique française (website)
Quebec Catholic Parish Registers, 1621-1979, FamilySearch.org
Online Database of Voyageur Contracts
“Edward Ciccotte Ledger, 1749-1752,” Michigan’s Habitant Heritage, Vol. 29, #3, 2008
