The Thoughtful Homemaker

I think that will be my project the next few months. I will work on finding Leonie. Last year I was looking for the Keiths and did find the family of Elizabeth McLin. This year my focus will be on Leonie’s family. I know a lot about Leonie, but I want to find her missing family, her brothers, her mother, her father. They all disappear about 1865. If you are in my family, you can help me as well. Maybe see something I am missing.

I searched the records of Oise for Leonie’s birth record and could not find her in Oise. Either that is the wrong Louis Charlemagne or Louis moved to another area. Since I could not find any Patri’s in Oise that is very possible. Louis was a merchant so he could have easily moved to an a more urban area. At this time I cannot find the Patri’s (Patry?) I found some in Aisne, France but there is not connection to my family found there. The rumor is that the family came from around Paris so I will try that area.

Before I told you the basic story of my ancestors who immigrated from France. I have a lot of information about them once they arrived to the USA but they remain a mystery back in France. Because many of the records in France have not been indexed like they are here in the USA and in Great Britain it is difficult to find your family without knowing which department your family is from.

After the French revolution in 1790, France was divided into 26 regions: Alsace, Aquitaine, Auvergne, Burgundy, Brittany, Centre, Champagne-Ardenne, Corsica, franche-Comte, French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Languedoc-Roussillon, Limousin, Lorraine, Basse-Normandie, Martinique, Midi-Pyrenees, Nord-Pas-de-Calais, Pays de la Loire, Picardy, Poitou-Charentes, Provence-Alpes-Cote d’Azur, Reunion, Rhone-Alpes, Upper Normandy (Haute-Normandy)

I have a hunch that my ancestor came from the region of Picardy. The next step is to find out the department of the region. The departments are each given a number. I think my ancestor came from Oise which is number 60 in the commune of Choisy-au-Bac. So I would write his birthplace as Choisy-au-Bac, Oise, Picardy, France. I searched on geneanet.org and found that many Dumanets lived in Oise.

Another great website is www.archimaine.fr where you can see original archives online or “Archives en ligne”. You click on the department, (l’oise)- archives, then etat civil. “Anee” means year. You are search actes, tous means all. Then you can see the original documents. They are in alphabetical order which is nice.

If you have anymore tips on French genealogy please let me know!

My great great great grandmother, Leonie Louiza Dumanet, was born in France. Her family came to Tennessee in 1849 and had a tanning business along the banks of the Tennessee River. There were several French and Belgian families opening up tanning businesses, bakeries, etc in the small town of Lobelville, started by the Belgian-Frenchman Henri de Lobel. She was the last of my family to immigrate to America. The next to last was the British Anne Brown who came to Maryland sometime in the 1750s.

Since she was the first person I did a baptism for, I have always been interesting in finding her family in France. Not many French records are indexed at this time and it is difficult to find French information online. So, knowing the first rule of genealogy is to work backwards not forwards, I focused on what I could find out about the family in the United States.

1. Immigration– My mother found the records of the ship Vesta on ancestry.com. Vesta left Le Havre, France on November 9, 1849 and landed in New Orleans, Louisiana. The members of the family listed are Leonie age 5, Eugene 11, Louis 16, her mother, Clara Adele Patri 41, and her uncle Auguste Patri 30. Why is Clara listed with her maiden name? When did her husband immigrate?

2. Land Records- Google Books is a great resource! I found a land record in The River Counties in Google Books mentioning a Louis Domonet and Pierre Eustache buying property in March 1850 in Perry County, Tennessee. I need to go to the Family History Center to get a microfilm of the original land deeds. To find them you go to familysearch.org, then library, put in Perry, Tennessee in place search and find the land deeds I need. I can order them from my local Family History Center straight from Salt Lake City and look at it there.

3. Census- 29 September 1850
Charles Dumania 44 M France $500 Farmer ($500 does not seem like much, but he had more money than his other French neighbors)
Clary 42 France (This is Clara, now listed as Clara Dumania, notice the phonetic spelling of the French name)
Charles Eugene 16 M France (why was he listed as Louis on the ship records and shouldn’t he already be 17?)
Eugene Peusy 12 M France (is Peusy a misspelled name, his last name?)
Heanry Hanrniesse 6 M (who the heck is this? Is this Leonie?)
Augusta Patry 31 M France Blacksmith
Eastache Piere 39 M France Carpenter $372 (who is this?) (where is baby Adele born in August 1850?)
24 June 1860 Linden, Tennessee
Lewis C. Domonet 54 M Tanning and Farming $5000 $6000 Someone in the home was married that year
Clara A. “” 52 F
Henry E. “” 22 M This must be Eugene. Louis or Charles either moved out or died.
Leono 15 M This is Leonie. The census taker must think the name is Leon and assumed she was a boy.
Adell “” 9 F She is in school.
France Raw 54 M Laborer my favorite misspell- Francois. I do not know who he is.
Hellena Yates 24 F NC (who is this? Wife to Louis or Eugene?)
Uncle Augustus was living close by with his American wife Jane Terry and their daughter Josephine.

4. Slave Records
Lewis C. Dumonet had one 25 year old mulatto slave in his own house. Probably worked with Francois.

I do not know what happened to Leonie’s family.

During the Civil War, Louis Dumanet or Dumonet’s farm was attacked by Union troops and destroyed. Leonie was married but her first husband and children were dead by the end of the war and the Union soldiers shot her brother dead. There is no evidence of her family after 1865. Leonie remarried Samuel Warren in 1866. Adel had an illegitimate daughter, Emma, in 1869 and was living with her Uncle Auguste in 1870. Interesting because my cousin is a single mom whose daughter is also named Emma. Adel got married in 1872 to a Frenchman named Henry Charles Zimmerman.

There are also stories of a brother named Tom. Maybe he was a son of Pierre Eustache’s?

Later there is a court record of Leonie L. W. Dumanet and Clara A. Z. Dumanet trying to get compensated for the damage done to their father’s property during the Civil War. Their names are spelled Dumanet like it was on the passenger list of the Vesta so I believe this is how their name was spelled. This claim had to do with a treaty between the US and France in 1885. The sisters claim the US Army took their father’s property from Jan 31, 1862 - February 25, 1865 in Danville, TN.

In 1916, there is another court case involving the estate of Charles Dumanet. The case was dismissed. I do not know where to find the actual court case in detail. Both Leonie and Adel were alive at this time. The case was referred to the Committee of War Claims. It looks like Adel and Leonie did not get their father’s property back.

I went to my library where you can get Ancestry.com international for free. I found a Louis Charlemagne Dumanet born in 1806 in Choisy-Au-Bac, Oise, France a rural area in the Ile-de-France now the Picardie region. Oise offers their microfilm free online. I went to familysearch.org, then library catalog, places, and found the link to the website so I saw the original document. Unfortunately, no parents are listed. I am currently trying to find Leonie. Remember work backwards! This is the only way that I can prove that this Louis Dumanet is my gggg grandfather.

Wish me luck on my journey!!

I was doing some research on Melusine, an actual mythological being from Anjou and found a weird book “The Dragon Legacy: The Secret of an Ancient Bloodline” by Nicholas De Vere. I was specifically reading about Melusine but as I read on the book got weirder and weirder.

It started out very interesting. I studied linguistics so I saw how he connected words like Vampire to the Turkish “Uber” reminding us that Turkey had at one time a high Gallic population. That is correct. Think Galatians. See the first three letters. Gal then Gallic and in other language Cel- Celtic. So he makes the conclusion that it is possible that a few Gallics words passed into the later Turkish language. He makes his case very well and in conclusion says that Vampire was once a word to describe a seer or an super “uber” person. (uber-oupire-ovpire-vampir-vampire)

Then he went into the word Anjou where the Plantagenet kings come from. He mentions the Egyptian “Ankh” which is used as a representation of Aphrodite. He concludes that around the area of Anjou there were worshipers of a female deity- represented by Ankh. They were the people of Ankh- Ankou- later Anjou. (also Angouleme and the tribe of Andecavi) I thought that was pretty cool and I double checked to make sure his conclusions were not insane and found other books on ancient Celts that don’t say he is wrong, though they have other theories. (no one is really sure about the Ancient Celts as there is not much written about them before the Roman occupation.)

Ok, very interesting theories, enough to make all sorts of neat stories. Then the book got weird. He talks about a super race of people kind of like the Nephilim and that these mythical beings were actually Nephilim. They were a higher race of people. Not the first time I read that theory. I have read somewhere that the stories of the Greek Gods are actually stories of the Nephilim. I think it is great as a theory or fun as a fantasy but cannot accept it as fact. Nicholas De Vere does believe and makes sure we know that he is a direct descendant of the ancient overseers of human kind. He calls himself the Prince of the Dragon Court and considers himself to have superior elven blood. He is an expert on “the black arts” and besides magical pursuits, enjoys music.

That knowledge ruined the book for me. If he had left out the “elven blood” he would have ended up with an interesting fantasy book. Read as fiction, the book is wonderful, kind of like the Da Vinci Code. I didn’t read Da Vinci Code as non-fiction and so enjoyed the book. Too bad that many people will take De Vere seriously. (for those history freaks like myself he is actually Tom Weir. The actual House of De Vere died out in 1625 taken over by the Beauclerks descendants of Charles II and Nell Gwynn. Their son married the last De Vere’s daughter.)

Think about that word. Doesn’t that sound like a beautiful word? How I wish humans could go hide in a cave for a few months and just sleeeeeeeeeeep. There would be no cold, no snow to dig, no stupid illnesses, just sleep. I would turn off my phone and just have weird dreams for months. Then in the spring I would be so happy and cheerful because I just skipped over the cold weather.

Or I could just move back to Hawaii.

I had insomnia one night and so I watched the entire first interview of Yoko and John on the Dick Cavett show. I have always heard about it but saw it for the first time. After watching that show I understand now why people so despised Yoko. I know that I really wanted to hear John interview, but almost the entire show was about Yoko, Yoko, Yoko. Yoko has an art exhibit coming up, Yoko has a new album, Yoko has a new book out in paperback, Yoko made a 15 minute movie of a fly crawling on a naked lady. Yeah, John claimed he was behind the movie but the entire film had Yoko making insane high pitched gargling noises in the background. John made another video of a building getting built and again, Yoko’s horrible screeching was in the background. Then they played Yoko’s new single, “Mrs.Lennon” where she sounded like a drunk Asian woman singing Karaoke. Then Yoko showed Dick Cavett a conversation exercise with a stethoscope where she told Dick Cavett that he could touch her where ever he wanted. Even John looked embarrassed.

Yoko was not wearing a bra and a skirt so short you had a view of her underwear the whole time. She talked so much about herself and talked in a flirty slutty way between cigarettes and kept interrupting John. If you think I only hate Yoko because she married a Beatle you are insane. I wasn’t born then and I watched Dick Cavett’s interview with George Harrison which I thought was BORING. George did not do a great job and to me he has the strongest accent. He was definitely more working class than the others. He would just answer in one word answers. It doesn’t help that Dick Cavett is one of the most boring men I have ever seen.

Buy my book! hehehehehehehehehehehehehehhehehe
Touch me anywhere! I AM an open minded woman ya know!!

I looked out of the window and saw this:

Just when I thought the zombie threat was defeated, they came back again in a second form known as strep throat. The zombies go right to the throat and multiply and multiply and you can’t swallow and you freak out thinking you have a tumor or something. At least I did the first and only time I got strep throat two years ago.

Zombies are everywhere. I have to throw away Viki’s toothbrush, re-sanitize everything!

People of the world, please keep yo’ sick kids at home please!!!

I have read once that zombies represent the passing of disease, the spread of death that eats our flesh. Stories of zombies and vampirism (except the ones who sparkle:-)) come from that inner fear of disease that in times past would wipe out entire villages. Today on the USA, death is not as common, but we feel like the walking dead when suffering from the flu or the stomach virus. (probably norovirus)

I heard that my neighbors had just got over the stomach virus. Their kids were healthy and recovered from the illness. My heat went out on Saturday and there was a gas smell. Until the gas company came to check on the gas, the kids stayed at the neighbors house until it was safe. The kids played in the living room but Aron went to the little boys room to play. Earlier that day we went to the library and we played at a McDonald’s playground so those or two other possibilities.

That night the heater was fixed and I was looking forward to having a relaxed evening. Then Aron ran to my room and laid down. A couple of minutes later he threw up all over my bed. I cleaned him up and laid him on a plastic mattress I had on the floor and slept on his bed. I refused to let him sleep next to me. He did great throwing up in the toilet. But it had happened. This virus was in my house.

The next day I woke up with a terrible stomach ache and was real dizzy. The kids missed school because I was so exhausted and was afraid that they would all get sick too. I was scared that I wouldn’t be able to take them. A friend brought us dinner and everyone ate fine. Even Aron who seemed to be better.

I felt fine and got Jon ready for school. The next morning Viki complained of her stomach hurting so I kept her home just in case. I felt fine. Then after Jon went to school I had terrible chills and dizziness so I slept for a while. I then woke up and threw up.

WHHAARRRRBLLLGHAARBBBBLLLLLLLLL!!!!

I was so sick that I laid on the bathroom floor on my dirty laundry covered by a dirty towel. Aron then came to me at my worst and said, “Mommy, I pooped!” So out of desperation I called a friend to take the kids. I just moaned out words too weak to talk.

While the kids were at her house, Jon Jon had a huge appetite. He ate almost fifteen bagel bites. He then threw up too.

WHAARBBBLLLGARRBBBLL!!

Uh oh! This virus was more contagious than I thought. Jon Jon threw up the longest. At the end of the night I thought we were done. I thought the monster had finally left. We ate at Chick-fil-A and laughed and giggled like a happy family finally at the end of a horror story.

Ha, ha, ha no!!! That night at midnight I threw up EVERYTHING I ate. I didn’t make it to the toilet and threw up in my garbage can. . . . but I felt SOOO much better.

Then an hour later, Viki threw up.

I was tired. Aron was wanting too much attention so I asked if he could play at a friend’s house. Now her son is infected. The lady who watched my kids on Tuesday also got it as well as one of the girls she babysits. That girl didn’t have a chance though. Not only was she being chased by the evil viral zombies from my family, but a kid on her bus threw up in her hair. It was destiny!

I still feel like a zombie. I have trouble concentrating and lose my temper quick. I feel exhausted too. I do have all of my weapons of war and am currently disinfecting the house desperately trying to kill those microscopic zombies, for a virus is living, but not REALLY living and eats off of your living cells.

THEY’RE COMING FOR YOUR WHITE BLOOD CELLSSSS!!!

(alcohol does not work on norovirus-” How to kill norovirus: Clean all possibly contaminated surfaces with a chlorine bleach solution. Use 1/3 cup of bleach in 1 gallon of water for non-porous surfaces (toilets, sinks, countertops). Use 1 2/3 cups of bleach in 1 gallon of water for wooden floors and other surfaces that could absorb vomit splatters.”

One thing I am sooooo sick of is that whenever there is a disaster of some sort and Pat Robertson, Rush, or somebody generally hated by the media shares their opinion, the media takes that person’s opinion and SHOCK it becomes news. With Rush however, it is usually taken out of context and Pat Robertson is an old man who has his opinions, so what? It is not like he isn’t doing what he can to help people in Haiti. He is sending aid.

Rush never said to not donate to Haiti. He said to donate to relief organizations and that these NGOs do a much better job than government aid. Where is he wrong?

People who are progressive say things to get on my nerves, but I just ignore them. But, we can’t let Rush or Pat say anything! It is easier to say “see this is why Conservatives are scary, they have no compassion” even though that is not true. Government running things is the opposite of compassion. FEMA screwed up Katrina. That is a government problem. Do you think Obama would have handled Katrina better? I certainly don’t think so. It would have interrupted date night with Michelle!

Ok, now to my point. Haitians have had a crappy government for years. Now is the chance for a revolution! They should attack the president and his cronies and a better government take over. This is their chance. I hope they take it or to be honest I don’t think their country will ever recover.