My Gustave-Lautin Family

This genealogical year has been off to a good start! The mystery of my Martinican ancestors is almost coming to a close (though there is still much to sort out!) Last week the Vieques church records I ordered to the LDS center arrived and I was pumped to search through them.

I knew that my 3rd great grandmother was, as far as I know, one of 7 children. She being the first born and the next 6 in chronological order being: Tomás, Valentina, Areopajita, Dionisio, Alberto Fermin, and Martina Isabel. I had Dionisio's (born in Fajardo), Alberto's (born in Salinas) and Martina's (born in Santa Isabel) birth/baptismal certificates but I didn't have my 3rd great grandmother, María Paulina or Tomás', Valentina's and Areopajita's. Here is a pedigree I made of the Gustave-Lautin siblings and family. 

The Gustave-Lautin Family who immigrated to Puerto Rico

Luckily in the Vieques church records I was able to find both María Paulina's and Tomás' baptism records. My 3rd great grandmother was born on the 15th January 1867 and baptized on 14th February 1867 in Vieques, Puerto Rico. While her brother Tomás (who's picture I found in the passport records) was born in Vieques as well on 28 December 1869 and baptized on 20th February 1870. What I found very interesting is that they both were surnamed "Charles" in these records. Also Tomás' middle name is "Octavio" and my 3rd great grandmother went by Octavia sometimes, so the name might be passed down from another family member! It mentions that the father's name was Gustavo Juan Charles, mixing around the order of the names. The paternal grandparents were listed as Juan Charles and María and the maternal as Eglantina Lotin. This helps me to solidify the Lautin line which I had theorized about in a previous post but had no solid proof. The baptism record helped to show that Juliana was indeed the daughter of a Eglantina Lotin (Eglantine Lautin) and helped to tie up all the loose ends. 

Now, the problem lies with figuring out the origins of Jean Charles Gustave. I fear that his surname might have been "Jean Charles" rather than "Gustave". Yet for now I will believe it is "Gustave" because he signed his name on the two documents I have as "Jean Charles Gustave". It could be plausible that his last name was "Jean Charles"; if his dad was a freed slave who was just named Jean Charles then his son would have taken his whole name as the surname. Which is most likely the origin of Gustave as well. Jean Charles Gustave's parents are listed as Jean Charles Gustave (which could mean he was named after his father or they didn't know the name of his father so they just duplicated his) and his mother appears as María Lucia, María Morianga and sometimes just María. So my guess is that she was Marie for certain but whether she was Marie Lucie or Marie-Ange (probably from Morianga) beats me!

We know Jean Charles Gustave (Juan Carlos Gustavo) appears in the the Catalog of Foreign Residents living in Fajardo in 1874. Juan Carlos Gustavo is listed at the age of 55 making him born circa 1819 and was married and "domestico" meaning he probably didn't work at the time. What's interesting is that there is a "Balbino Gustavo" also listed in the book with the age of 29 making that person born circa 1845. My guess is that the "Balbino" was actually my 4th great grandmother who's middle name was Balbina and she herself was born in 1844, it was probably transcribed incorrectly in the book. 

Here's a image I made from Google maps showing them hopping around Puerto Rico from Vieques, to Fajardo, to Salinas with years attached showing when they were living in those towns. Martina Isabel was born in Santa Isabel for whatever reason but the family lived for the most part in Salinas before spreading out along the southern coast. 

Gustave-Lautin family moving around Puerto Rico

I'm currently stuck on finding more about Jean Charles Gustave. So far I've checked all the towns of Martinique between the years of 1818-1820 for the birth of a Jean Charles Gustave. So far--- no luck! There is a Gustave family living in Ducos (previously known as Trou-Au-Chat) which could be promising though they were there towards the end of the 1800s. Also, there is a Charles Gustave being born in 1821 in Le Carbet to a Marie Olympe, he is the only closest match I have. My guess is that Jean Charles Gustave was of some kind of Mulatto mix born out of slavery (in the 1848 records of the slaves being entered, I found no Gustave-surnamed family that could match). I'm also not 100% sure that he was truly born in 1819. That would make him much older than Julienne, could be possible of course!

My next hope is to get the 1870s Catalog of Foreigners (I'm currently trying to get it through the interlibrary loan). The only thing that worries me is that because by 1867 they were already in Puerto Rico, they might not appear in it. Estela Cifre de Loubriel had to have seen their name in some type of document to jot them down in her book- the only thing is which document!!

Hopefully this mystery will be wrapped up soon enough! I wonder if Jean Charles was fixed with French/some European ancestor or just a descendant of slaves. I'll update once I figure out more!

Making Ends Meet!

Last week I was pretty fortunate to be able to search through the Adjuntas church records which were microfilmed by the LDS. I knew that some ancestors in my family through my paternal side lived in Adjuntas for a while thanks to the Census records.

Adjuntas, Puerto Rico- a town nestled in the Central Mountain Range
Picture: Wikipedia

I knew that my great grandfather, Felix Vélez Mercado, was born in Utuado in 1905 but his parents somewhere between 1911 and 1914 moved to Adjuntas and some of the birth records of Felix's brothers and sisters pointed to their parents being naturally from Adjuntas, Puerto Rico. Felix's father, Nicodemus/Nicodemo Vélez Ríos and his wife Domitila Mercado Cruz were a bit of a mystery to me. I didn't have any birth records for them and neither any death record. I knew that they married in 1906 in Utuado, Puerto Rico- but besides that I had nothing.

Utuado, Puerto Rico
Picture: Wikipedia

The Adjuntas church records were able to clear up some things about this side of my family! I was fortunate to find a lot of baptismal and death records in the church documents, which would help to prove some lines and extend others. Nicodemus Vélez Ríos was born in Adjuntas in 1878 to his parents José María Vélez Sepúlveda and Ana Ríos González. I knew that his dad, José María Vélez, was a part of a pretty extensive line of Vélez and Sepúlveda family members that dated back to the 1600s in Puerto Rico and even to towns in Spain. Now that I have confirmed that Nicodemus is the son of José María Vélez, I have been able to solidify that line. Thanks to all the research of those that came before me, I was able to extend some of these lines like I mentioned to the early 1600s. Nicodemus is also the grandson of Bernardina Sepúlveda Roman who I wrote about before, who owned a few slaves in Guaynabo Dulce, Adjuntas, Puerto Rico when the slave census was taken in 1872. My Riós González family is still missing a bunch of ancestors and this is due to the fact that this family probably originated in San Sebastián and those records aren't microfilmed with the LDS so to figure out more I'll probably have to visit the church itself.

My Mercado Cruz line on the other hand had eluded me for a long period of time! Most of the records say that Domitila's father, Cayetano Mercado was born Lares and would end up dying there. Cayetano's wife, Cristina Cruz Pérez was also said to have been from Lares but she was still alive in the 1910 census living in Utuado, Puerto Rico with her daughter.

Surprisingly, Domitila had a few sisters who were born in Adjuntas! Finding the baptism records of these sisters allowed me to extend these lines one generation further. Now I know that Cayetano's parents were Francisco Mercado and María Isabel Cajigas and that Cristina's parents were Francisco Cruz and Gabriela Pérez (she is sometimes written with the last name Gerena). The records state that the Mercado Cajigas family was from San Sebastián while the Cruz Pérez family was from Lares. I've tried to find some of these grandparents' death records in their respective towns as well as in Adjuntas but so far no luck.

I was pretty happy to be able to push the Mercado Cruz line one generation further on the paternal side because I had been struggling with that line for so long now. And hopefully I'll be able to find Domitila's birth certificate which I've also had a hard time locating. Hopefully more will be discovered about this family!

It's also interesting to note that San Sebastián and Lares are actually neighboring towns in Puerto Rico demonstrated below:

Lares, Puerto Rico

San Sebastián, Puerto Rico

A New Year- New Genealogical Resolutions

A New Year Is Here!!

As the new year rang in, I thought about all the things I want accomplished in my life throughout 2013. But I also thought about the genealogical resolutions I would make for this upcoming year. So I decided to come up with some resolutions and wishes (in no particular order) for my genealogical adventure this year! I came up with 13 resolutions +1 for good luck, just in case :)

Resolutions for 2013:

• Discover more about Jean Charles Gustave (Juan Carlos Gustavo), like whether he was from Martinique or Guadeloupe, his parents' names, his background, etc. 
• Extend my branches in Puerto Rico further back. 
• Learn more about my ancestors from Martinique and their lives. 
• Speak to more relatives and collect more stories about my ancestors. 
• Discover more about myself and my family through DNA. 
• Connect with more genetic cousins on 23andme and AncestryDNA.
• Find out more about my 2nd great grandmother Amalia Rivera Rodríguez (Masantini). 
• Find out more about José Avilés and whether his father really was Damià Magraner from Sóller, Mallorca. 
• Look through more Puerto Ricans records at the LDS Family Center. 
• Learn more about my Correa family and their J1/J1e paternal ancestry. 
• Try and figure out my parents' family connection to one another. 
• Find out more about Jewish genetic connections in my family. 
• Read more about the history of Puerto Rico and Spain and their contributing cultures . 
• Discover a new set of ancestors from outside of Puerto Rico. 

Hopefully these resolutions will inspire you to find something new, discover more about yourself or to dig deeper in your family tree and genealogy! There are still 363 days for you to get started :)

PS- Thank you to everyone that has viewed my blog, so far 3000+ views! Hopefully I've helped answer questions or spark interests in your own genealogy! Happy 2013!!

Exploring my Slave Roots in Martinique, Part II

If you haven't read the first part click HERE to read it!

So now I had some new names surrounding Eglantine, Julienne and Pauline. In 1844, there was a Dame Lapierre, née Forget and in 1847, there was a Dame Laroche, née Lapierre. So I turned to David Quénéhervé with this new found information to see what we could figure out. David, who is so awesome, cranked out a bunch of information. He first told me I was really luckily to find these slave records (count my blessings- check! check!). He pointed out that in 1851, when Jean Lautin (Eglantine's son) was born, they were still living on a Monsieur Garnier Laroche's habitation (which I totally forgot about!). With his magic he was able to link me to the Garnier-Laroche family as well as the Lapierre family. At first it was a bit confusing so I created a family tree diagram for them to keep everything organized which I'll post up in a bit. David also found the death certificate for Jean Jacques Catherine Lapierre who passed away in 1845, he was married to Alexandrine Forget. They had a daughter named Rose Hélène Lapierre who married Louis Garnier Laroche. So here we have the two women who appeared in 1844 and 1847. The interesting thing is the death in 1845! This means that when Jean Jacques Catherine Lapierre died he left Eglantine and her daughters to Rose Hélène Lapierre and her husband seeing as how she appears in 1847 to declare the birth of Pauline Lautin. So here is the family tree diagram. I've included other information, such as parents, grandparents, years, etc. to get a better picture of this family:

Updated Famille Garnier-Laroche Lapierre Tree

So here you can see Alexandrine Forget and her daughter Rose Hélène Lapierre who appeared in the birth records of Julienne Malvina and Pauline. The Garnier-Laroche family seems to be well established in Martinique appearing in a book David Quénéhervé forwarded to me titled "209 Anciennes Familles Subsistances de la Martinique". It's in French but hopefully you'll be able to see it and poke around. The line seems to start with Thomas Garnier born circa 1510 in St. Malo (a town found in Brittany, France). Thomas and his wife Jeanne had about 8 children and one of their sons, Thomas Garnier dit Laroche born in 1648 would travel to Martinique, marry there and stay there until his death. The Lapierre side I haven't really looked into too much but hopefully I'll be able to fill in this tree a little more. Even though they aren't my ancestors their family owned Julienne, her sister and mother and so knowing about them would be a way to get a glimpse into their lives. They (at least the Garnier-Laroche) would be considered part of the Béké community in Martinique who were early French settlers in the Antilles.

The chances are high that the Garnier-Laroche Lapierre family were the owners of the Lautin seeing as how before and after the abolishment of slavery, the Lautins were living with them. I'm not sure however if they would be the original and only owners. We don't know when Eglantine was brought over a slave, maybe in her 20s, or maybe younger. So Eglantine could have been sold right away to the Garnier-Laroche family. What's interesting which David pointed out is that there might exist a record like a notary or will explaining his (Jean Jacques Catherine Lapierre's) property and the slaves he had and what went to Rose Hélène Lapierre and anyone else. Finding this would be a gold mine! Not only because it would hopefully list the Lautin but also because it might provide a clue to the father of Julienne and Pauline. Also in Julienne's and Pauline's birth certificate it mentions that Eglantine was registered under number 192, in Registry C. If only that existed!! It would be amazing to find out where in Africa Eglantine originated from and see what age she would have arrived in Martinique and whether by herself or with other family. There's so much to learn and still figure out about the Lautin family. But I'm grateful for what has been figured out already and very excited to unravel more about these ancestors from Martinique.

Église Saint-Jean-Baptiste, Rivière Salée (BNPM, Bourgade)

Exploring my Slave Roots in Martinique, Part I

Map of Martinique

Part I

So a lot has happened in these last couple of days! Hopefully this post isn't too longwinded but I want to make sure I have everything written down! So it started on Tuesday, when I figured out that the LDS center I go to, to view microfilm records from Puerto Rico, has records available from Fajardo's church. I headed downtown to see those records because I couldn't wait, there could potentially be someone from my Gustave/Lautin line being baptized in Fajardo. So when I got there I asked for two microfilms, one containing an index of baptisms around the late 1800s and another covering baptisms from the years 1860-1884. The indexes didn't yield any Gustave or Lautin children and I was a bit discouraged, but I decided anyways to check to the baptisms from 1860-1884. Luckily most of the years themselves had indexes so I checked without hesitation. The roll was running out and I was becoming discouraged. The last year indexed was 1881 and it was all or nothing. I looked under "C" for Charles just in case-- nothing. Then I looked at "G" for Gustave/Gustavo-- my heart jumped!! There was a Dionisio Gustavo Gustavo being baptized that year. It had to be my family!! I jotted down the number and head backwards to the folio (page), and there he was! Luckily he matched!

"...nombre de Dionicio a un niño que nació el día nueve de Octubre del año pasado hijo legitimo de Carlos Gustavo y Balvina Gustavo. Abuelos Paternos Carlos y Maria Merianga (Morianga) y los abuelos maternos Pedro Gustavo y Eleantina Loque..." [sic]

So here we got to see the parents which matched and got some grandparents and a new surname! So Carlos Gustavo's parents according to this were Carlos Gustavo (which another document mentioned was him as well, there is some consistency there) and his mother was María Merianga or Morianga. I'm betting the name was warped into something Spanish sounding and that isn't the original spelling as we say with Lotten<Lautin. In the Portail I found some people with the surname Mérange, so it could be something along those lines. Then for the maternal grandparents it mentions Pedro (again) except this time with the surname Gustavo and "Eleantina Loque" which looks super similar to Eglantine Lotten (Lautin). This looks like a mixed formed of Eleuteria and Eglantine which was what another document used. So to me, this is stronger evidence that it wasn't just an error! I was pretty happy with that find, bringing up the number of children from Jean Charles Gustave and Julienne Malvina Lautin to 6! Weirdly a couple of the children don't appear on the 1910 census. (Paulina, Tomás, Alberto and Valentina do appear). What happened to Martina Isabel, Dionisio and Alejandrina (she most likely died in Ponce between 1897-1910).

Unofficial "snake flag" of Martinique

Part II

Yesterday, I was looking around the website which I mentioned before called the Portail de la Banque Numérique. There, I found Julienne Malvina's, Pauline's and Eglantine Lautin's actes d'individualités. When you first open the website there is a map of Martinique with a bunch of little dots on different sections of the map. I decided to zoom in on Rivière Salée and see just what these dots meant. Some held pictures of streets, buildings, and other things in the area but the one that caught my attention said "Esclaves Commune" which held records of slaves from 1830-1841. I was excited at first to search for Julienne and Pauline and potentially find their birth certificates seeing as other slaves were being recorded. I was then saddened to see it only covered from 1830-1841 and another section called "Esclavage Greffes" from 1840-1843, I still looked around and read some of the birth certificates. Then it hit me! In the actes d'individualités, it mentions that they were living in Trois Bourgs, section of Rivière Salée. I decided to type Trois Bourgs into the little search engine in the left corner and got hits stating "Commune de Trois-Bourgs (Rivière Salée/ Trois-Ilets)- populations esclave: naissances, mariages, décès. Copie réglementaire du précédent registre¨. I was ecstatic!! The years 1844 and 1847 were there! I crossed my fingers and first searched in 1844, if I found Julienne and not Pauline I could live- Julienne was my direct line and adding another document to her would be exciting (sounds selfish, but at this point I was desperate for something)! I jumped to the back and found an index. Okay, now let's look under J. Jean Baptiste? No. Julie? Maybe? OMG! Julienne dite Malvina!!!! That's her! (That's what ran through my mind when I found her name in the index). I was so happy to have found her record. Here is her record for those francophones, or even non-francophones,who want to check it out:

Julienne dite Malvina- Naissance

I was also able to find Pauline's birth record in 1847! I was happy to see the years were so exact that I was able to find them easily, whereas in Puerto Rico there were many estimated years and dates of births, deaths and marriages-- even for whites. What's interesting is that Julienne is noted as "négresse" which David Quénéhervé (who helped me spark all this) told me that is an indicator for her dad most likely being a black man himself. So this probably means, that a man on the plantation she was born in, was her father. Probably named Pedro seeing as how that's what is being put on records in Puerto Rico. What's interesting that the person who came forward to declare her birth was "...par la Dame Lapierre, née Forget âgée de soixante quatre ans, sans profession, propriétaire de Sucrerie." So we see that the woman was married to a Lapierre and was born with the surname Forget, she was about 64 years old (born circa 1780) and was a owner of a sugar factory. Then in 1847, in Pauline's birth record we see, "...par la dame Laroche née Lapierre, âgée de quarante sept ans, sans profession, propriétaire, domiciliée dans cette commune Rivière Salée...". Hmm, so this woman was BORN a Lapierre circa 1800s  and married a Laroche. Who could these women be? Have I unlocked the family who owned my Lautin ancestors? More in another post...!

What's In A (sur)Name?

The last four days I spent pouring through Puerto Rico's Civil Registry Birth Records from 1894-1908 from Patillas, Puerto Rico in search of my 2nd great grandmother. 3,003 documents later, I haven't found her. The reason why I decided to bite the bullet and search each document one-by-one is because in other documents where she is mentioned, there a surname which she uses which I have yet to see anywhere else in Puerto Rico (including census records). Which prompted me to write this blog post about the surname and hopefully someone with some knowledge of it or a lead could help me out!

Background: 

Some background about my 2nd great grandmother: Her name is Amalia Rivera Rodriguez/Masantini (she goes back and forth between Rodriguez & Masantini) and she was born about 1898-1901 in what the documents state is Patillas, Puerto Rico. Her father was Cruz Rivera Collazo also from Patillas, Puerto Rico and her mother was Luisa Rodriguez/Masantini from Patillas/Maunabo, Puerto Rico. Amalia married Julio Correa Gustavo/Charles on the 9th of March 1919 in Salinas, Puerto Rico. In her marriage certificate she is mentioned as Amalia Rodriguez (pictured below) and the reason being most likely because her parents were never married. 

9 March 1919 in Salinas, Puerto Rico

In 1910, Amalia Rivera is living with her father Cruz Rivera Collazo in Guardarraya, Patillas, Puerto Rico; her father's martial status is marked as (S): Single. By 1920, Amalia is already living in Rio Jueyes, Salinas, Puerto Rico with her husband. Here, she is mentioned as Masantini (picture below): 

1920 Census in Rio Jueyes, Salinas, Puerto Rico

Months later in March her first son, Manuel Correa Rivera (my great grandfather) was born. On his birth certificate Amalia is mentioned as Rivera and her mother was mentioned as Luisa Masantini. (Pictures below):

1920, Amalia Rivera appears on Manuel's birth certificate

My 3rd great grandmother, Luisa Masantini (sometimes appears as Rodriguez)

The name Masantini doesn't appear again until her third child, Modesta Correa Rivera is born in 1927 when it mentions again Luisa, her mother, as Masantini instead of Rodriguez:

Masantini appears again in 1927

Surname

This surname sounds very Italian/Corsican which is why I'm so interested in it, along with other reasons which I'll discuss shortly. I've search the Puerto Rico Records of Foreign Residents, 1815-1845 and no Masantini or variation of the name appears (I've searched Mazzantini/Mazantini as well). So either the person came in after 1845 or before 1815. Equally, the name has yet to appear anywhere else; even in the 3,003 records I searched not once did a Masantini appear. So I decided to do some research into the last name. I tried searching Masantini along with Puerto Rico and again nothing appeared. I remembered that during one of the "Who Do Think You Are" episodes I believe during the first season they used an Italian surname database to figure out where in Italy there name would be from. Giving it a shot, I decided to search in the database for anyone with the last name Masantini in Italy. To my surprise it appeared! A very small amount of Masantini were found in the Tuscany area of Italy, specifically in the Firenze area. Here are some screenshots of the name appearing in Italy.

Masantini as the red dot (1-5) in Tuscany

The area highlighted where the name appears

Masantini appearing in the Toscana (Tuscan) region, specifically in Firenze

Not wanting to jump the gun and assume that I have Tuscany ancestry running through me, I'll wait until I have further proof to help me identify whether or not I am related to a Masantini family coming from Firenze (also known as Florence in English). Interestingly the name also doesn't appear in America according to this database. There's another reason why I became so interested and it deals with my grandfather's genes.

Genetics

With many 3rd party tools, you can easily use the genetic information you have gotten to find out more. I tested my grandfather with 23andme and posted about results earlier in April. While using things such as Gedmatch.com and getting the BGA analysis I've been noticing some interesting things which I don't know if they are pure coincidences or more pieces to this mystery. In the possible populations mentioned in the BGA analysis were Tuscan along with Italian as well as Spain, when I asked if it was safe to assume there was Tuscan in my grandfather's ancestry he mentioned that it was unlikely to be significant. But could it mean that because my grandfather potentially has some Italian that it appeared none the less though not significantly? Equally in one of the cross sections of European populations, he appears smacked in the middle of the Tuscan & Italian populations. Again I could be overestimating it but no one I've tested in my family from both sides fits so neatly or even as near Tuscan/Italian like he does.

Carlos appears within the Tuscan population

Equally his red dot in the map for Europe appears right over the Tuscan part as well instead of near what I would expect, Spain.

Red Europe dot over Tuscany

Lastly, in the Gedmatch MDLP World-22 Oracle it's interesting to note that in the mixed mode population sharing after Puerto Rican the next possible one is Italian_North and equally as interesting Swiss (which I think could be possibility from German influence on his paternal side- another mystery I'm trying to solve).

Italian_North appearing right after Puerto Rican

I could be overestimating this and connecting false coincidental dots to one another just because I keep seeing the words "Italian" and "Tuscan" appearing left and right; or I could be onto something. So for now I'll settle with the former and consider myself crazy :) There are of course many questions to be asked. Could it be possible that this 'potential' Italian ancestry produce these Italian and Tuscan hits on the genetic side? No one else that I've tested in my family (besides occasionally my mother, of course) gets near to Italy or Tuscany, so why just him? Are the Spanish and Italians genetically different enough for these results to be more than just coincidences? 

Hopefully one day I'll have a solid answer as to why he appears so close to the Italian/Tuscan population and whether or not the "Masantini" family has anything to do with it. So until then I'll hope, dream, imagine and think about all the possible outcomes to this mystery! (And if anyone has an answer or could help; they'll be awesome!)