The Thoughtful Homemaker

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!!