This post is the first of a series detailing some of the references of and research behind my own family tree. For this endeavor, I am going to ignore details regarding my parents, at least their adult lives. Their names may be given in narratives in order to be able to show lineage, but little else. This is to protect their privacy.
The Guerin Line
Besides being my surname, I’m going to start with the Guerin Line as the mysteries behind their origins is what prompted me to do a deep dive into genealogy. As I’ve stated (ad nauseum, to some), the question of whether we were of Irish or French origin was unanswered and only made more difficult with each oral history chapter. As I discovered, our Guerins are French, and it is now time to prove the pudding via the tasting.
Joseph Henri Philippe Guerin: My Grandfather
Joseph Henri Philippe “Henry” Guerin, my grandfather, was born on 18-Dec-1915 in Lowell, Massachusetts to Henri (Guerin) and Laura Ducharme.
Note well the spelling of the last name. It is correct, a rare occasion as later documents will show. It also calls into question various stories regarding our family’s origins and alternate spellings of our last name. According to the City of Lowell in 1915, my grandfather and great-grandfather’s surnames were “Guerin”. This will change over time and circumstance, especially with regard to my great-grandfather.
It must be said at this time that it is easy to forget that, in pre-digital times, much information was asked and answered and written down by a clerk, secretary, clergyman, census taker, etc. This makes all recorded data, especially name spellings, subject to the literacy and existing knowledge, and predisposition, of the recorder. This factors strongly in genealogical history. For example, quite a few civil clerks of the late 19th and early 20th centuries were of English or Irish descent. The influx of illiterate French-Canadians and their hard-to-pronounce names wreaked havoc on recorded name spellings.
On 27-Aug-1938, my grandparents were married at Ste. Theresa’s Church in Dracut, Massachusetts.
Note the spellings here again. The French priest who recorded this, Rev. Arthur O. Mercier, even added the “accent aigu” over the ‘e’. And, once again, my great-grandfather’s name is listed as “Henri Guérin”. So far, these name spellings seem to make us quite French.
Henry Edward Gearin: My Great-grandfather
On 03-Jun-1911, Henry Gearin married Laura Ducharme in Dracut, Massachusetts. His parents are recorded as George (Gearin) and Ida Butler.
Here is the first of many instances where my great-grandfather goes by his fully-Anglicized name, Henry Gearin. This is not the only instance of this name spelling. His 1917 WWI Draft Registration Card has this spelling.
There is an interesting detail, however. Note that the ‘ea’ of his last name in Box 1 is corrected. It could have been a ‘ue’ prior to the overwriting. Comparing the handwriting between the card and the two signatures, his and the registrars, it looks like the registrar filled out the card. Note the styles of the ‘G’ characters and the occasional ‘E’ in the cursive writing, such as in “Lowell” in Box 2 and the ‘e’ in Greenberg in the registrar’s signature. Regardless of who wrote the information down, the correction in the last name is notable.
The US Censuses of 1920, 1930 and 1940 also show his name as “Gearin”. However, differences in the 1920 and 1930 US Censuses show the need for multiple sources and also give a very strong clue as to my paternal family’s origin.
Both US Census contain information for the Place of Birth for each person’s parents. In the 1920 US Census, Henry’s parents are listed as having been born in Massachusetts. In the 1930 US Census, Henry’s parents are listed as being born in Canada French, aka Québec.
It is at this point where I must relate that, according to oral histories, Henry Gearin neither spoke nor understood French. This observation was one of the underpinnings of the French/Irish mystery. Coupled with the fact that there were Irish Guerins in Massachusetts, and that some of his siblings had Irish spouses, and the waters get murky. However, some of his siblings had French-Canadian spouses. He himself married a French-Canadian woman who, the oral histories explain, was responsible for my grandfather’s French name and his knowledge of the French language. That said, we have documentation that Henry’s parents were born in French Canada. Unfortunately, we also have documentation that says otherwise and the 1940 US Census did not register the birthplaces of people’s parents as the large-scale immigration waves of the late 19th and early 20th centuries had passed and the government was no longer recording such information.
According to this amended birth record, my great-grandfather was born on 31-Mar-1891 in Lowell, Massachusetts to George (Gearin) and Adele Miron. Instead of making this search easier, we just had four monkey wrenches tossed casually into the works:
- The original name of the registration was Thomas Arthur Gearin
- His mother’s original name was listed as Addie
- On 30-Nov-1953, the record was amended to state that the correct name was Henry Edward and that his mother’s name was Adele Miron
- While Henry’s father’s birthplace is listed as Canada, corroborating the 1930 US Census record, his mother’s birthplace is listed as New York, a possible third option alongside Massachusetts and Canada French, if Ida Butler and Adele Miron are the same person, which is a stretch
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot! This solves nothing and only adds to the confusion. We need to go further back and solve the mystery of Henry’s parents.
Who is George Gearin?
To find George Gearin we need to find a younger Henry Gearin. We find both in the 1910 US Census:
As we saw in Henry’s marriage record, his mother’s name was Ida. According to his birth record and WWI draft card, he was born in 1891. That would make him 20 years old at the time of the 1910 US Census. This entry probably describes the people we are looking for. If so, it shows that George is French-Canadian, as were his parents. However, Ida’s birthplace is listed as “Unknown”, giving a fourth option to her origin.
The 1900 US Census helps us a lot. On Line 65, we find George Gerrin(!):
“Gerrin”? Really? Anyway, here is the information that seemingly ties a lot of loose threads together. Ida’s birthplace is listed as New York, the same as “Adele Miron’s”. Henry’s birthdate is listed as Mar, 1891, the same as we’ve seen in other documents. Interestingly, the 1900 US Census recorded citizenship information and George’s information is listed as his having immigrated to the US in 1859. As we’ll see, this is woefully incorrect and is probably a misunderstanding. Perhaps, George’s family migrated across the border often when he was a child.
As much as I would like to show you the 1890 US Census records, I cannot. 95% of them were destroyed in a fire in the 1920s. The 1880 US Census has some information, though it’s a 20 year leap from the 1900 census.
On Line 36, we find George “Geurin”. This is certainly a departure from “Gearin”, a spelling that has been more or less constant from Henry Edward’s various records through George’s. It is certainly closer to “Guerin”, much closer. Here we see Ida’s birthplace as “NY” (New York) and George’s birthplace as “PQ” (Province of Quebec). Their daughter, Rose, compares favorably with Roseanna’s entry in the 1900 census.
We also see in this census another family of “Geurins”: the family of Celestin and Eli. They are living presumably near each other on Front Street, in Lowell, Massachusetts, a street that no longer exists. Back in the 1880s, it ran along the Merrimack River just west of the Bridge Street Bridge in the Centralville section of the city, where the VFW Parkway runs now. No 12, George’s entry in the census record, can be seen to the east. Celestin’s entry is 18, but there is another 18 listed on the next page of the census, leading me to believe that Celestin is in No 14.
The name Celestin is an interesting, uncommon one. Can we link these two Geurins together?
On 29-Jul-1877, George married Ida Nero in Lowell, Massachusetts. His parents are listed as Celestin & Florence.
And these are the keys we need to see if we can find George’s origins. We have parents: Celestin & Florence. And with Celestin being a family name, the other Celestin might be a brother. We have birth years from the censuses, but they are not aligned. The 1880 US Census gives his age as 23, giving him an approximate birth year of 1857. The 1900 US Census lists his birth as July, 1850. The 1910 US Census lists his age at 50, giving him a birth year of 1860. Finally, his marriage gives his age as 20 in 1877, giving his birth year as 1857. While two entries match, there’s a wide swing at work.
At this point, while we have some pieces of interesting information, and we seem to have solved the French / Irish origin question, it would help if we could actually find some Canadian records for the Guerin clan and get away from of all of the Anglicized misspellings. However, neither George nor either of the Celestins could be found in the 1870 US Census. A check against the 1871 Canada census was equally fruitless, implying that, perhaps, the family was emigrating to the US around this time.
Pay dirt was struck in the 1861 Canada Census records, however.
Voila! In 1861, a Célestin Guérin and his family were living in La Prairie, Bas-Canada, in the district of Montréal. His wife’s name was Florence Bisaillon. They had, among their listed children, Célestin and George. This matches our search pattern quite well. Additionally, George is listed as being 4 years old, giving his birth year as 1857, which matches two of the US census information. Surely, we have our match!
Unfortunately, it wasn’t that easy. Généalogie Québec, an excellent source for finding Québecois religious records, did not have a baptismal record for George Guérin. It did have, however, a baptismal record for an Henri Guérin, a name not listed in the census. Henri? Could it be that Henri is an old family name?
So how do we reconcile these differences? Well, the 1861 Canada Census shows that Célestin and Florence had seven children, the latter two having the same age: twins. A search on Généalogie Québec for baptismal records for children of Célestin and Florence reveals seven such records. A match! Let’s compare the names on the baptismal records and their birth dates and compare them against the listed ages on the 1861 Canada Census:
- Marie (b. 01-Oct-1848) (Odile: 13yo in 1861: matches)
- Célestin (b. 21-Feb-1850) (9yo in 1861: off by 2 years)
- Lina (b. 18-Aug-1851) (7yo in 1861: off by 3 years)
- Henri (b. 12-May-1853) (George: 4yo in 1861: off by 4 years)
- Marie Agnès (b. 01-Oct-1857) (Marie: 2yo in 1861: off by 2 years)
- Angelina (b. 23-Mar-1860) (1 yo in 1861: matches)
- Marie Emela: (b. 23-Mar-1860) (Amelina: 1yo in 1861: matches)
While not straightforward, it does seem to be that Henri changed his name to George or that he had two names, such as Henri George. Given the listed dates, it is possible that Henri passed away and that George was born some time between Henri and Marie Agnès, but neither a burial record for a Henri Guérin nor a baptismal record for a George Guérin exists. Given that the listed ages for his siblings were off by a similar amount of time for the 1861 Canada Census, it not beyond the pale for Henri and George to be one and the same person.
One Mystery Solved, Loose Ends and More Stories Ahead
So the Guérins, my Guérins, are French-Canadian, not Irish. However, there is more to the story.
The Guérin brothers were not the only members of the family to emigrate. Célestin Guérin, recorded as Silas Guerin in the 1880 US Census, was living at 14 Davidson Street in Lowell, Massachusetts at the time.
Along with Célestin and Florence were their children: Rosalie, Louisa, (not shown, on following page) Joseph and Peter. Save Rosalie, these children were born after 1860 and outside of the search engine’s reach at Généalogie Québec. A manual search through parish records found the baptismal records for Maria Louisa and Joseph Elzéar Guérin. And Rosalie? Based on her age, she would be Marie Agnès. Henri was not the only child to change his/her name.
The fate of the twins, Angelina and Amelina, is unknown at this time.
As to the fate of the tenement building that housed Célestin (the elder’s) family… it, too, has been lost to time. The site is now a parking lot.
According to the 1880 US Census, the younger Célestin was married. On 24-Feb-1868, he married Hélène Dubuc at Sault-Ste-Louis, present-day Kahnawake, in Québec. Kahnawake is a First Nations Reserve near La Pairie and was known back then for having a mix of First Nations and French Canadian families. Hélène’s parents were Julien (Dubuc) and Basilioque Calestane. As the ‘H’ in French is silent (kinda: it’s really a hard “catch” at the back of the throat, as in “up”), it is easy to see a US census taker writing her name down as “Eli”.
When I discovered these roots and solved the family origin mystery, I realized that I was not done. There were more mysteries to solve and more stories to be told. For instance, who was Ida Nero, aka Ida Butler, aka Adèle Miron? What kind of name is Calestane? It’s not French. It might be a French-ified variant of some other name. First Nations, perhaps? When, where and how did the Guerins / Gearins wind up in Dracut?
Stay tuned. Je me souviens.