The Kansas\Oklahoma Branch of the Marcotte Family:

his branch begins with Antoine Marcotte (I) of Cap-Santé, son of Jean- François “Petit Jean” Marcotte and Marie-Anne Morissette. Antoine was born 22 Nov 1738, in Cap-Santé, and was married there, in 1765, to Therese Germain. To this couple seven children were born, including a son Antoine (II). This son was married in 1792, at St Léon, Maskinongé, to Marguerite Grenier, daughter of François Grenier and Marie-Louise Chauret (Choret). Antoine and Marie-Louise had seven children born in St. Léon and in Louiseville, including a son also named Antoine. Antoine (III) Marcotte was married in 1813 at St. Léon to Marie Gagnon, daughter of Barthelemi Gagnon and Elisabeth Meunier. It is this Antoine (III) who followed a migration of French-Canadians from Quebec Province to an area in the Kankakee Valley of Illinois, which became known as “Petit Canada” due to the large number of these families who settled there. A brief explanation for the reasons causing this migration may be found in my recent article “The Marcottage of Oklahoma: the French in the Land of the Red Man,” which is included in the current first quarter edition, issue # 111, of the American-Canadian Genealogist Journal.

Antoine and Marie established themselves at the town of Bourbonnais, Illinois with their eight children, who had all been born in Canada prior to 1836. A ninth child, Julia was born in 1840 in Bourbonnais, thus establishing a narrow period for when this branch of the family came to the United States.

Among the children of Antoine (III) was a son Louis Marcotte, born in June 1830 in St. Leon. In Bourbonnais, Illinois, Louis married, in 1851, Julia Messier, daughter of Louis Messier and Thecle Demers, another family which had migrated to le “Petit Canada.” Louis and Julia had eleven children, including my great grandfather Archille. According to marriage and birth records, most of Louis family came to live in Cloud County, Kansas, at some date soon following the American Civil War. There remain, to this day, numerous members of this branch of the Marcotte family, both in and around Bourbonnais, Illinois, and in and near Cloud County, Kansas.

My great grandfather Archille married Caroline Marcotte (daughter of Louis’s cousin Benjamin Marcotte and Philomene Lambert). Archille and Caroline relocated around 1880 – the period of the “Indian and Oklahoma Territories “Land Runs,” which are depicted in the movie “Far and Away,” starring Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman. Archille and Caroline had ten children, including my grandfather Joseph. Most of this family lived their entire life in Oklahoma, but the grandchildren of Archille and especially the great grandchildren have now spread new offshoots of this family to California, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Montana and several other parts of the American West and Southwest.

The genealogy of my branch of the Marcotte family may be found on the internet at www.michaelmarcotte.com

- Michael L. Marcotte, Norman, Oklahoma