I have been conducting genealogy research since 2000. I began my research at Clayton House in Houston by pouring over census records on microfilm and in written journals for hours, days and weeks. I expanded my research to include probate and deed records and then death and marriage records. And again, I sat looking at reel after reel of indexes, probates, inventories and court minutes for long hours. Sometime later I obtained an Ancestry.com membership as more digital information became available. I’ve mined many of digital records provided by Ancestry.com, FamilySearch.org, Fold3 and Find-A-Grave.com. I’ve visited research centers in untold counties in Texas and parishes in Louisiana with detailed to-do lists in hand. I found probate records that detailed the sale and emancipation of slaves in my husband’s family tree.
But the most astounding things that I have found while researching my own family tree in Louisiana and Maryland have been from sources that I truly just stumbled on! Last week while searching for Cote Blanche, I stumbled on a pdf that contains the names of enslaved persons owned and mortgaged by a large number of banks in Louisiana including JP Morgan Chase Bank, Citizens Bank of Louisiana and The Second of Bank Kentucky. Included in the document are the names of slaves as well as previous and current slave owners. Conveyance and land records held by The New Orleans Public Library and minute records from Citizens Bank are sources for the transactions included in the pdf.
Included in the listing are the names of my 4th great grandmother Julia Stanton and her children Jolivet Duchane alias Jolivet Pierre and Lelia Delahoussaye. I had discovered my connection to Jolivet and Lelia in 2001 while researching the marriage records at the St Mary Parish Courthouse. I was specifically looking for information on Clarisse Duchane and discovered that 3 women: Clarisse, Esther and Lelia all with the last name of Delahoussaye, were married on the same date, August 24, 1867. Julian Barabin and Charles Hansley were listed as witnesses for 2 of the 3 marriages. The names of the bride and groom were muddled in one instance. Hester or Clarisse Delahoussaye was listed as the bride of Charles Hansley.
I knew that Clarisse was on my family tree, but I had no idea who Lelia and Hester were. I wanted to find out if they were Clarisse’s sisters. I looked up the 3 Delahoussaye women on the 1870 Iberia Parish Census and found Pierre Jolivette and Clarisse with their daughter Rachel, my 2nd great grandmother. Clarisse was reported to have been born in Maryland in 1829. Listed on the same page was St Cyr Delahoussaye. I then found Lelia who was reported to have been born in Louisiana in 1832 and husband Julian Barabin. Listed in Lelia’s household was Julie Stanton who was born 1804 in Maryland. Esther and Charles Hansley were also living in Iberia Parish. Esther’s birthplace was listed as Maryland.
So, I surmised that Clarisse and Esther could be sisters as the birthplace of both was listed as Maryland. I noted that Julia Stanley was also born in Maryland and was old enough to the mother of Clarisse and Esther. But I was confused because she was living in the household of Lelia Delahoussaye Barabin and not one of the other 2 Delahoussaye women.
I next looked at the 1880 Iberia Parish Census and found ninety-year-old Julia Stanton in the household of Jolivette Pierre and Clarisse. She was listed as the mother of Jolivette. I assumed that the census taker had mistakenly listed her as Jolivette’s mother when she was in fact his mother-in-law. The birthplace of Jolivette’s mother was reported as Maryland. Maryland was still listed as Clarisse’s birthplace as was the birthplace of both of her parents. I next looked up Esther Hansley and saw that Maryland was recorded as her birthplace as well as both of her parents. Esther was born in 1835 which means she was born after both Clarisse in Maryland and Lelia in Louisiana. This led me to think that Lelia could not be their sister of the other 2 women who I still thought could be sisters.
I next looked up death records for Clarisse, Esther and Lelia as well as Jolivette. Clarisse’s death certificated listed her mother’s name as Rachel and not Julia. Esther’s death certificate listed only her father’s name–Isaac Scott. But her birthplace was listed as Alabama and not Maryland. I have not been able to find a death certificate for Lelia or Jolivette. Interestingly though, the last name of Clarisse and Jolivette was listed as Duchane on the 1900 census.
So, I’d found the Clarisse’s husband was Jolivette Pierre and not Pierre Jolivet. And that Jolivette Pierre had changed his last name to Duchane sometime between 1880 and 1900. I’d found that he’d served in the Civil War under the alias of Jolivette Pierre.
Despite all of my research, I had been unable to determine if Julia Stanton and Julie Stanley were the same person and which of the women and men were here children. That is until last week, when I stumbled upon the JP Morgan Chase Bank document while looking for information on the Cote Blanch Plantation! Listed on page 62 was a listing of slaves conveyed Oct. 10, 1840 in St Martin Parish to Octave Delahoussaye. Among the slaves were: Dick, Alfred, Thomas, Jim, Isaac, Julie, Edouard, Jolivet, Patsy, Ophelia, Lelia, Maria, Maria, Dickson, Patsy, Sophie, Francisque. I found A Delahoussaye and family; Wm Shephard and Patsy; Dixon Smith and Ophelia all on the same page, page 150B of the 1870 Iberia Parish Census. Julien, Lelia and Julia were listed on page 151A along with St Cyr Delahoussaye.
So, I had my answer! Julia Stanton and/or Julie Stanley was the mother of Lelia Delahoussaye and Jolivet Pierre. Julia was born in either 1790 or 1804 in Maryland and brought to Louisiana where she became the mother of Jolivet and Lelia.
I was researching the Cote Blanch Plantation and the slaves of John Huger and later Thomas Huff and later still William Fellows and somehow stumbled on my Duchane family!! I won’t question the how or why I stumbled on this great resource. I will simply say thank you to the persons who put in the time to find, transcribe and share this awesome document!! I plan to comb through this new information to see what I can see. I know there are other buried treasures out there. I hope to stumble upon every one of them some day!!!
Check out this new gem at https://www.phila.gov/media/20230829122821/Chase-Bank-Slavery-Era-Disclosure.pdf
Best,
My Maryland-Louisiana Roots 