ALLENDOM

Part Two

A Brief, Unfinished History Of The Allen-Breaux Family Written For The 1990 Allen Family Reunion

© 1990
Betty Charbonnet Reid Soskin
Ruth Romine Warnie Strange

[Back To Allendom Part One]

Leontine ("Mamma")

Portrait of Leontine Breaux Allen by famed New Orleans photographer Arthur P. Bedou (photograph courtesy Judith Wilson from the collection of Elaine Allen Wilson)

Remembered affectionately as our "Mamma," Marie Leontine is our most recent connecting link, genetically, and the person who is still actively remembered by presently-living family members. She is still dearly loved and influential within the family structure.

According to church records, Mamma was born on February 7, 1846, and was christened in October of that same year. These dates are important since they contradict later entries. We have chosen to accept the church records as valid since other dates are more subject to human error and depend upon memory. The dates given in census documents vary by five years in some cases. Since she lived from 1846 to 1948, she was l02 at the time of her death.

It has been said that Mamma was "five-years-old on the Day of Emancipation." However, if we are to accept the church records as authority, she would have been nineteen on that day.

This also means that where the census record of 1870 gives her age as twenty-one, she would actually have been twenty-five.

This means that she spent all of her adolescent years As a child of a slave parent in the time of slavery, but seems not to have lived the life of a slave. A paradox? This also means that her parents, Celestine and Edouard married at the point when freedom was awarded and that she knew and loved her father as a functioning parent.

In a lovely bit of oral history handed down through the years we learn that she met the man she was to later marry, George Allen, when she was sitting high in a pecan tree watching the Federal (Union) soldiers marching down the road in St. James. It is said that he lifted her from the tree and marched with her perched upon his shoulders!

The young couple married and settled down in the little farmhouse many of us still remember. They lived there along the banks of the Mississippi with another young couple, the Carrs. According to the census data of 1870, George was at that time working as a cook and Mamma is listed as "keeper of the house." Thomas Carr was employed as a coachman while his wife, Lucy, like Leontine, was also listed as a housekeeper. It is probably safe to assume that the two young women were primarily responsible for the farming while the husbands worked away from home. This, then, would be where Mamma became the expert farmer who was able to support her extended family in later years after George's death.

The two young couples apparently shared these living arrangements until their children began to arrive.

Together, George and Leontine produced a family of 13 living children. Though George died a fairly early death (by today's standards), Mamma managed to rear all of her own family and at least 20 others during her long lifetime. She fed, clothed and educated them to the best of her ability -- and -- on an army widow's pension of $90 per month.

Vivian speaks with wonder of how she organized that crew of children of all ages to work the farm, harvest the crops, prepare the meals, clean the little house, etc., etc., etc. In addition it is known that she was the village midwife and "relief" physician as well. She delivered a host of children in her small community. She seems to have delivered many of her grandchildren as well.

One of my own favorite stores about Mamma and her life in St. James has to do with this aspect of her life: Despite her inability to read or write, she acted as an "intern" to the physician who serviced St. James Parish. It seems that he was a kind of "circuit rider" who covered about twelve miles each day. According to custom, each household having someone needing medical attention would place a white towel on the gate as a sign of medical distress.

Despite her inability to read or write; her expertise in matters of medicine and healing was such that Dr. Hymel (white) stopped in to see her on his rounds and briefed her on the cases in her village. It was she who acted as his Nurse Practitioner and was the person he referred patients to in his absence. Incredible!

Leontine is said to have been a tiny lady with waist-length dark hair and an even disposition. She also is said to have been relatively easy-going but "sassy" and well able to hold her own when the occasion demanded. She spoke only French, the language of St. James and her times and place. Though her children became bilingual and spoke both "creole" (a patois of French) and English.

My mother tells of a time when she was a little girl and (apparently) stole an apple from the local fruit vendor. When he descended upon the family in rage, Mamma faced him with eyes flashing, hands on hips and in absolute defense of the guilty child shouted, "...when she shits the money, I'll pay for the fruit!"

English must have come with the advent of soldiers from the northern states and was probably to be attributed to George's appearance into the life of St. James. Wish our generation had not lost the ability to speak in creole; the language disappeared with our parental generation.

"Mamma Stories" are endless, fascinating and contradictory. Vivian remembers that she always walked barefoot (except for church) while Lottie recalls her gaiters (low black slip on shoes with elastic inserts at the sides).

Lottie remembers how Mamma saved up enough money to buy a buggy from the Sears and Roebucks Catalog and how radically this changed the family's social life by making it possible for folks to ride to church in style and to visit surrounding townspeople from time to time. Until that time visiting was done on horseback and was limited by the numbers of potential visitors and the scarcity of steeds.

In a conversation with Vivian recently, she mentioned the seven large pecan trees that surrounded the little house. She said that it was the job of the children to gather the pecans each season, sack them for payment for the annual property tax assessment.

Louisiana pecan tree

Vivian also remembers with a smile how Mamma would send her to the store (in secret) with a nickel to buy just a bit of tobacco—which she would then secret in the pocket of her apron and stash in the andiron of the fireplace for Mamma to bring out later in the evening when everyone was in bed. Her pipe was never smoked in the presence of the children; she never smoked during the day or in public, "coarse women to that!".

And the excitement when Aunt Camille purchased the player piano for the family! And how they sat around on Sunday evenings when Mamma "pumped" the piano while Aunt Alice sang "Ave Maria!"

Wish we could get all of those tales on tape while we still can. Take the time, cousins, take the time!

Watched Vivian's face light up the other evening when she got to talking about popcorn balls around the fire, roasting yams in the grate. And "...the barrel of syrup, sack of rice, sack of sugar when the government check came ...."

Having seen that little farmhouse some years ago while on a visit to the South, it is almost impossible to imagine how all of those children—all those families—managed to live in that tiny space—under that little roof in St. James. But one gets the feeling that there was a lot of love spread around and much of it still lingers in the voices of those who still remember.

In the case of my own grandfather, George Allen, III; he married my grandmother, Minétte, when she was a mere fourteen. She lived for a brief period and died when my mother, Lottie, was a tiny seven-month-old baby.

George was Mum's oldest son, and when he returned home to deliver his tiny baby, Lottie was added to the family just a little older than her own baby, Camille, who was two and who was shortly followed by her son, Louis, just three years younger than my mother, Lottie.

George shortly entered into marriage with Desiré Fernandes who bore him four sons and a daughter, Vivian. When Vivian was little more than a year and a half, Desiré died and Leontine's family grew by another five children!

If you're keeping count, in addition to her own thirteen offspring, she was now the acting mother of eighteen! A number of her own children remained in the household after marriage and the beginnings of their own families—Uncle Louíe and his wife, Mariá, raised their own brood under the family roof long after the others had moved away to school, to New Orleans, to Detroit, to Texas, to California, etc. If memory serves, Uncle Louíe and his wife, Mariá had ten of their own.

Sometime within the past ten years, the little house which had served as an "incubator" for the Allens burned to the ground, tragically. With it went much history. (How I would love to have talked with the most recent occupants.)

Upon our own final visit to the site, it was disquieting to note the huge nuclear power plant not too far down the road. It was even more disquieting to be reminded that that stretch of roadway is considered one of the "hottest" areas in the country—cancer alley! Haven't taken a recent count, but I do seem to remember that a high percentage of cancer deaths appears in the records of those family women, especially the women—those beautiful Allen women!

Seven of the Eight Daughters of George II and Leontine Breaux Allen
(Back Row) Leontine (Cutsy), Alice, Isabelle
(Front Row) Celestine (Noon), Louise, Florence, Emily
(Missing From Picture) Camille

George Allen

I'd heard over the years that George Allen was the mulatto son of an English plantation owner and one of his slaves. He seems to rise out of nowhere, though on closer inspection there are hints of high drama, indeed.

If you will look at the map (attached) of Louisiana, you will find a Parish called "Allen" about one Parish away from the Texas eastern border. It was here that our search naturally began. Turns out that this doesn't yield much except that it was established sometime in 1807. However, there does turn out to be a most interesting story of a Civil War General (Medical Corps) who comes originally from Toronto (English!) and who marries into one of the Southâs grand colonial families, the Robinsons of England.

In a book entitled, Colonial Families of the Southern States of America, pp. 452, we find that the daughter of John Robinson of the New Orleans Robinsons marries George William Allan of Moss Park, Toronto, Canada, on April 16, 1846 (the year of Leontine's birth). This makes him a contemporary of our Edouard, Sr. and therefore the proper age. Louisa Matilda is the name of the wife of the man we believe to be our George's slavemaster-father.

What makes for high drama is the fact that the elder George served in the Confederate Army while our George served with the Federal (Union) Army. (For those of our generation who may be a bit uncomfortable with the fact that our forebears of the slave generation may have been house servants, it would serve us well to remember our revolutionary heritage!). How this came about can be easily understood by reading a paragraph from a small booklet from Louisiana Commemorates the Civil War by T. Harris Williams.

"...In the spring of 1862, a powerful Federal Naval Squadron commanded by Farragut appeared in the Gulf and ran by Forts Phillips and Jackson defending the entrance to the Mississippi river. Defeating a Confederate naval force in a spirited clash, Farragut ran up the river to New Orleans and forced its surrender on May 1. The City was almost defenseless because the Confederate Government had expected the attack to come up the river instead of from below. Farragut then proceeded to Baton Rouge, which surrendered on May 9th. For the rest of the war the Federals held the Southern Parishes. Baton Rouge marked the practical northern limit of the occupation. An attempt by the Confederates to recover the Capitol failed (The Battle of Baton Rouge, August 5, 1862); the Federals abandoned the town but returned to it later."

Admiral Farragaut's Gunboat Fleet on the Mississippi near New Orleans (sketch from Harpers Weekly, 1862)

This means, then, that the War may well have to George, somewhere in the South. He undoubtedly did not, however, come from St. James Parish or he and Leontine would certainly have met during their childhood or adolescence. He could have grown up on an English-owned plantation in or around New Orleans since that was the home of his father's wife.

We do know that he was with the Union Army since Leontine lived as a pensioned widow and, to our knowledge, few if any non-whites served with the Confederacy. We have sent for his military records but don't expect them until sometime after the completion of this paper. Through those documents we will acquire the time and place of his birth and possibly, the names of his parents as well. At that time we can either confirm much that is speculation at this point.

We know little else about him except that he was light brown skinned with "crinkly" hair, and is remembered as resembling his grandson, Lloyd (son of George Allen III) in physical type.

Those who still remember seemed to see him as "angry and brooding", a figure whose photograph hung in the parlor of the farmhouse in St. James. (Does anyone have that picture still?) We know that his death brought little anguish and some measure of relief (if the stories around this are reliable). He seems to have left little of himself but a stream of children. George fades into the background of the remarkable and colorful Leontine.

These facts seems to hold little real truth, though, since there is no accounting for some interesting anomalies: Why did all of the children speak his language as their primary tongue? Would this have meant that his influence was greater than the meager facts would indicate, or, were these such tumultuous times in St. James that the takeover of Northern (English) culture destroyed everything in its way? It is hard to imagine how this family—without the benefit of later technological advances -- radio, video, greater mobility—moved from one language to another in a single generation. And, in a family where the dominant parent spoke only French, the language change seems the more dramatic.

We will continue to probe and in time will flesh out more of the truth, I'm sure.

Certificate of Death of Leontine Breaux Allen
January 31, 1948

Army Discharge Certificate of George Allen
October 10, 1863

Pension Declaration of George Allen
February 27, 1893
Indicates U.S. Army Service from July 10, 1863 to October 10, 1863

For The Future

(Written, you must remember, in the early 1990's)

The recent acquisition of an old map of Louisiana (courtesy of cousin, Donald Therence, son of Annabelle LeBeouf and Vernon Therence, Sr.; daughter of Marie Isabelle Allen LeBeouf Warnie, and—etc., etc., etc.,) suggests that there is still much to explore.

An entirely new approach opened up with a glance or two at the map (appended) since it is clear that those names of plantation owners in the 1830-50 census microfilms turn up now to be the names of townships of Louisiana. The evolution is evident.

I can also recall visiting St. James as an adolescent. The Greyhound bus driver used Mamma's house as the destination. All I had to say was that I was going to visit "Ma'am George" and the bus stopped next to the levee and in front of her house. This, then, is the obvious genesis of geographical names and the method by which they become fixed. See how many familiar names you can find on the map.

We do hope that this early attempt at tracing our genealogy will spark an interest in others of us so that the youngest family members will gain a sense of being a part of the continuing family entity which reaches back in time as far as imaginations will take them. And that they can then project themselves into a future that, together, we will shape. What wondrous things we mortals
be!

Ruth and I are intrigued enough to have planned another visit to the Mormon Temple Archives in order to fit even more pieces of this human puzzle together. The Quest for Allendom has only just begun and is in full progress.

An exciting side trip may well be an exploration of the All-Black town of Allentown which was established after the Civil War in Central California. Do you suppose ... ?

There are also some interesting "side trip connections" that need exploration:
a) It is rumored that Andrew Young (yes,that Andrew Young) is a member of the Allen Clan through Aunt "Noon" and Uncle Sam.

b) ...and we all know about the obvious connection between
Louisiana's Senator Breaux? And,

c) hearing some of the family history of Debbie Allen and Phyllicia Rashad suggests a strong connection through their father who hails from the same general Area of Louisiana.

This suggests a fertile field of discovery for the next family "sleuth" to explore.

As for me, I've already started work on the Charbonnets whom I discovered in the Census of 1850 as owning a plantation in St. John The Baptist Parish (right next door to St. James), et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, . . . .

Most sincerely

Betty Reid Soskin (nee Charbonnet)
©1990