Tracing the Family - All the Way Back to 1600s France! EEK!

Edited on March 30, 2010 to correct some details and add a few more:

I have not been posting as much as usual lately, triggered by a sad family event, the loss of a beloved aunt, Lorraine Prondzinski, one of my mother's sisters.  Of seven Jablonski sisters, only two are now living, my mother, Caroline Newton, and Aunt Christine Gonawicka.  I've been busy busy busy doing other things -

Some comments were made at the funeral that reminded me of something that I had begun way back in 1976, during the celebration of USA's 200th birthday - and some misunderstanding that I had undertaken to do a family tree.  Not!  I had done a little writing about the family line - old stories that I remember Dad telling us, but nothing more.

I was raised with tales of the Newton family ancestry.  I don't remember if I've written about this here before, but this is the family history from Grandpa Newton's side, in a nutshell:  We were from France, we came over here sometime in the early 1700s and worked our way up the Mississippi River and eventually settled in northern Wisconsin where we became lumberjacks.  We may have some Cajun blood from our time in Louisiana.  I am not certain, but vague recollection is that we may have been kicked out of France - or left in a big hurry.  Were we criminals - or religious refuges?  I don't know.

Around the beginning of March I signed up at ancestry.com for a short free trial. I found some information there, but ran into a lot of dead-ends. I searched for my father's parents, and my mother's parents. I did not locate any information at all about my mother's parents - not even her birth certificate. Frustration. I was not able to locate anything at all about my grandmother Newton (Ida Belanger) other than a 1930 census record which confirmed information I already knew: she was married to my grandfather, she had (at that time) four children: my father, my Aunt Laurel, my Aunt Faythe, my Aunt Valerie. I found a lot of Newton records, but I had no way of connecting them to my grandfather Frank C. Newton, because I could not find an online record of his birth and so had no names of his ancestors.

I CAN tell you that there are a LOT of Newtons settled in west Texas and many of them have the name Frank or Francis, but I have no idea if they are relatives. 

Today - a day off from work, while I was digging around for my tax records I came across a copy of my father's World World II service records.  Lo and behold, I found more information there than I had found through numerous fruitless searches online at archives.com.

My dad's service records contained two vital items: (1) a birth certificate and (2) his baptismal certificate.  I thus learned from my father's baptismal record that his father, Frank C. Newton, was born in Marinette, Wisconsin on January 2, 1894.  Before, I did not have a place of birth and I had not been able to confirm that his middle initial was "C" as I had found on another record.  Both of my father's records also confirmed that his mother was, indeed, Ida Belanger, who was born in Michigan - also a snippet of information (place of birth) I did not have before.

Following the path of the celebrities on the current program on NBC "Who Do You Think You Are?",  I signed up for a 14 day free trial at ancestry.com. Not having had any previous success tracing my father's family, I decided to try searching for my paternal grandmother, Ida Belanger.

Unbelievably, I hit a gold mine immediately.  Several other people have researched the Belanger (a/k/a Balenger) family line.  I found Ida right away.  The most extensive work appears to have been done by a descendant of Ida Belanger's younger brother, John Belanger, who died in 1950 (before I was born).

I hit paydirt.  Oh my, did I ever!

The family line is very large and begs for other lines to be explored, but tracing back as straight as I can make it, here goes:

My paternal grandmother (the mother of my father, Francis John Newton):
Ida Belanger b. June 4, 1893; d. January 5, 1962
(possibly born in Michigan, although some records indicate Wisconsin;
she died in Hancock, Michigan while visiting family)
m. Frank C. Newton (b. 1/2/1894 in Amberg, WI; d. 6/8/1964 in Racine, WI) sometime before August 17, 1922, when my father (their oldest child) was born, but I don't have an exact date

Parents of Ida Belanger:
My great-grandfather: Edward Balenger, Jr. (also spelled Belanger) b. 1852 to 1855; d - unknown
(born in Scott, Brown County, Wisconsin, USA; died - unknown )
My great-grandmother: Mathilda A. Forsythe b. April 19, 1861; d. June 7, 1943
(born in Wisconsin; died in Racine, Wisconsin)

Parents of Edward Balenger (Belanger), Jr:
My great-great-grandfather: Edward Be'langer b. April 16, 1822 (or possibly in April, 1821 according to another line of research); d. October 26, 1906
(born in St. Michel, Yamaska, Quebec, Canada; died in Gladstone, Delta, Michigan, USA.  Note, another line of research done by another person indicates that Edward Be'langer died in Bay Settlement (Town of Scott), Brown County, WI.  I do know know why there is a discrepancy.)
My great-great-grandmother: Aurelia Marie Francoise Brunette b. October 10, 1831; d. August 30, 1907
(born in Notre Du Rosarie, St. Hyacinthe, Quebec, Canada; died in Gladstone, Michigan, USA)
Married on May 30, 1846 in Green Bay, Wisconsin, USA.  A note about Aurelia Marie's name - another line of research done by another person indicates that her name was Marie-Aurelia Brunette.  This marriage was very fruitful.  According to one line of research I have discovered, Edward Be'langer and Aurelia Marie Brunette had the following children:  Mary b. abt. 1848 in Wisconsin; Joseph b. abt. 1850 in Wisconsin; Edward (my ancestor) b. abt. 1852 in Wisconsin; John b. abt. 1854 in Wisconsin; Louis b. abt. 1859 in Wisconsin; Isaac b. abt. 1862 in Wisconsin; Lucy Theresa b. abt. 1864 in Wisconsin; Alfred b. abt. 1866 in Wisconsin; Margaret b. abt. 1868 in Wisconsin; Michael b. abt. 1868 in Wisconsin (twin of Margaret?); Peter b. abt. 1870 in Wisconsin. 

Lots of Belangers - and I'm probably related to most of them!

Parents of Edward Be'langer:
My great-great-great-grandfather: Jean Baptiste Belanger b. 1787; d. May 12, 1838
(born Yamaska, Quebec, Canada; died in Bay Settlement, Brown County, Wisconsin, USA)
My great-great-great-grandmother Angelique Forcier b. 7/10/1793; d. 1834
(born Yamaska, Quebec,Canada)
Note: I thought that Angelique and Jean Baptiste had only the one child, Edward, who is my particular Belanger and Forcier ancestor.  However, I have found a reference to another son of Angelique and Jean Baptiste: Joseph.  This information also says that Jean Baptiste was in Minnesota for awhile.  I do not have any further information on this Joseph Belanger. 

After Angelique's death in 1834, Jean Baptiste married again - Susanne Bibeau on June 16, 1835 in St. Francis du lac, Quebec, Canada.  Unfortunately, she died on May 12, 1838 in Bay Settlement, Brown County, WI.  Jean Baptiste then married again (marriage #3), Theotiste Rivard-dit-Laglanderie, on February 28, 1841.  She died on September 3, 1857.  But wait - according to one record I have, Jean Baptiste died May 12, 1838 - not his second wife.  So - who actually died on May 12, 1838?  Was it Jean Baptiste and therefore he could not have married wife #3, or was it Susanne Bibeau?

Susanne Bibeau and Jean Baptiste Belanger had two children:  Peter Belanger, b. abt. 1836, and Moyses Belanger, b. abt. 1837.  So, Edward had two half-brothers - and possibly he had one full-blood brother, Joseph (see note above).

No children are listed from the marriage of Theotiste Rivard-dit-Laglanderie and Jean Baptiste Belanger. 

Parents of Angelique Forcier:
My great-great-great-great-grandfather Pierre Francois Forcier b. August 13, 1758; d. 1835
(born in St. Michel)
My great-great-great-great-grandmother: unknown - not listed.  I found her, though, in another family line researched by another person:  Jeanne St. Germain.  They were married in St. Michel in 1785 but I have no further information at this time.
Parents of Pierre Francois Forcier:
My great-great-great-great-great-grandfather Francois Forcier b. April 19, 1724; d. March 17, 1781
???

Parents of Francois Forcier:
My great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather Jacques Forcier b. 1682; d. 1750
My great-great-great-great-great-great-grandmother Jeanne Harel b. 1687; d. 1769

Parents of Jacques Forcier:
My great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather Pierre Forcier b. 1648; d. May 18, 1690
(born St. Aubin, Nantes, Bregagne, France; died in St. Francois Du Lac, Quebec, Canada)
My great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandmother Marguerite Marie Girard b. 1643 d. August 7, 1695
(born Boulogne Sur Mer, Picardie, France; died in Quebec, Quebec, Canada)

Parents of Pierre Forcier:
Guillaume Forcier b. 1623; d. 1690 St. Aubin, France
Sebastienne Gaultier b. 1625; d. 1674 France

and

Parents of Marguerite Girard (my 7x great-grandmother):
Nicolas Girard b. 1610; d. 1671
Francoise Huon b. 1620; d. 1725 (if these dates are correct, she died at 105 years of age).

So - this particular branch of the Belanger a/k/a Balenger line, via Angelique Forcier, who married into the Belanger/Balenger line, can be traced all the way back to Guillaume Forcier b. 1623 and Nicolas Girard b. 1610, in France.

I will see if I can find existing lines tracing the ancestors of Jean Baptiste Belanger.
So much more to learn...