Antoine Paquette or Pacquet was a French Canadian, perhaps of Métis ancestry, who was born about 1793. His parentage is uncertain and disputed. In 1821 Antoine was posted at the Red River Colony, where Winnipeg, Manitoba, now stands. He may have been a member of the de Meuron regiment that was hired to protect Fort Douglas, although that is uncertain. A document from around that time listed him as carpenter.
In 1822 Antoine married Augustine Marchand, who had recently emigrated with her parents to the Red River Colony. The couple had six children: Celestine (b. 1823), Julia (b. 1824), Adelaide (b. 1825), Augustine (b. 1828), Edward Louis (b. 1829), and Louis Constant (b. 1831).
The family stayed at the Red River Colony until a devastating spring flood hit in 1826. Then they left the colony along with most of the remaining Swiss emigrants and made a long overland journey to Fort Snelling near what is now Minneapolis, and then down the Mississippi River to St. Louis.
There, they almost certainly heard talk of mining opportunities in northwestern Illinois, along the Fever River (now the Galena River) and points farther north in Michigan Territory (now Wisconsin). Colonel Henry Gratiot, the newly appointed United States agent for the Winnebago Indians, had only recently traveled from St. Louis to Galena to establish a new outpost among the mines. After Augustine's sister Méline was married in St. Louis in February 1827, the family traveled back upstream to Galena, and from there into the interior toward the lead mining district in what would become southwestern Wisconsin.
According to one family account, the family came by covered wagon to the area near Shullsburg, where land was being offered for homesteading at $1.25 an acre and time payments. Antoine built a cabin on Gratiot's Hill, close to a spring. Indeed, the name of Antoine Pacquet can be found in the 1830 federal census just five lines below that of Henry Gratiot.
There are differing accounts of Antoine's death, which probably occurred in 1832. One says that he went out to the spring for a bucket of water on a stormy night and suffered a fatal heart attack. A different story holds that Antoine went out in a blizzard to get wood or coal and never returned. The next morning he was found frozen and half-buried in a snow bank between Gratiot Grove and Shullsburg, having lost his way back to the cabin.
In 1822 Antoine married Augustine Marchand, who had recently emigrated with her parents to the Red River Colony. The couple had six children: Celestine (b. 1823), Julia (b. 1824), Adelaide (b. 1825), Augustine (b. 1828), Edward Louis (b. 1829), and Louis Constant (b. 1831).
The family stayed at the Red River Colony until a devastating spring flood hit in 1826. Then they left the colony along with most of the remaining Swiss emigrants and made a long overland journey to Fort Snelling near what is now Minneapolis, and then down the Mississippi River to St. Louis.
There, they almost certainly heard talk of mining opportunities in northwestern Illinois, along the Fever River (now the Galena River) and points farther north in Michigan Territory (now Wisconsin). Colonel Henry Gratiot, the newly appointed United States agent for the Winnebago Indians, had only recently traveled from St. Louis to Galena to establish a new outpost among the mines. After Augustine's sister Méline was married in St. Louis in February 1827, the family traveled back upstream to Galena, and from there into the interior toward the lead mining district in what would become southwestern Wisconsin.
According to one family account, the family came by covered wagon to the area near Shullsburg, where land was being offered for homesteading at $1.25 an acre and time payments. Antoine built a cabin on Gratiot's Hill, close to a spring. Indeed, the name of Antoine Pacquet can be found in the 1830 federal census just five lines below that of Henry Gratiot.
There are differing accounts of Antoine's death, which probably occurred in 1832. One says that he went out to the spring for a bucket of water on a stormy night and suffered a fatal heart attack. A different story holds that Antoine went out in a blizzard to get wood or coal and never returned. The next morning he was found frozen and half-buried in a snow bank between Gratiot Grove and Shullsburg, having lost his way back to the cabin.
Antoine Paquette or Pacquet was a French Canadian, perhaps of Métis ancestry, who was born about 1793. His parentage is uncertain and disputed. In 1821 Antoine was posted at the Red River Colony, where Winnipeg, Manitoba, now stands. He may have been a member of the de Meuron regiment that was hired to protect Fort Douglas, although that is uncertain. A document from around that time listed him as carpenter.
In 1822 Antoine married Augustine Marchand, who had recently emigrated with her parents to the Red River Colony. The couple had six children: Celestine (b. 1823), Julia (b. 1824), Adelaide (b. 1825), Augustine (b. 1828), Edward Louis (b. 1829), and Louis Constant (b. 1831).
The family stayed at the Red River Colony until a devastating spring flood hit in 1826. Then they left the colony along with most of the remaining Swiss emigrants and made a long overland journey to Fort Snelling near what is now Minneapolis, and then down the Mississippi River to St. Louis.
There, they almost certainly heard talk of mining opportunities in northwestern Illinois, along the Fever River (now the Galena River) and points farther north in Michigan Territory (now Wisconsin). Colonel Henry Gratiot, the newly appointed United States agent for the Winnebago Indians, had only recently traveled from St. Louis to Galena to establish a new outpost among the mines. After Augustine's sister Méline was married in St. Louis in February 1827, the family traveled back upstream to Galena, and from there into the interior toward the lead mining district in what would become southwestern Wisconsin.
According to one family account, the family came by covered wagon to the area near Shullsburg, where land was being offered for homesteading at $1.25 an acre and time payments. Antoine built a cabin on Gratiot's Hill, close to a spring. Indeed, the name of Antoine Pacquet can be found in the 1830 federal census just five lines below that of Henry Gratiot.
There are differing accounts of Antoine's death, which probably occurred in 1832. One says that he went out to the spring for a bucket of water on a stormy night and suffered a fatal heart attack. A different story holds that Antoine went out in a blizzard to get wood or coal and never returned. The next morning he was found frozen and half-buried in a snow bank between Gratiot Grove and Shullsburg, having lost his way back to the cabin.
In 1822 Antoine married Augustine Marchand, who had recently emigrated with her parents to the Red River Colony. The couple had six children: Celestine (b. 1823), Julia (b. 1824), Adelaide (b. 1825), Augustine (b. 1828), Edward Louis (b. 1829), and Louis Constant (b. 1831).
The family stayed at the Red River Colony until a devastating spring flood hit in 1826. Then they left the colony along with most of the remaining Swiss emigrants and made a long overland journey to Fort Snelling near what is now Minneapolis, and then down the Mississippi River to St. Louis.
There, they almost certainly heard talk of mining opportunities in northwestern Illinois, along the Fever River (now the Galena River) and points farther north in Michigan Territory (now Wisconsin). Colonel Henry Gratiot, the newly appointed United States agent for the Winnebago Indians, had only recently traveled from St. Louis to Galena to establish a new outpost among the mines. After Augustine's sister Méline was married in St. Louis in February 1827, the family traveled back upstream to Galena, and from there into the interior toward the lead mining district in what would become southwestern Wisconsin.
According to one family account, the family came by covered wagon to the area near Shullsburg, where land was being offered for homesteading at $1.25 an acre and time payments. Antoine built a cabin on Gratiot's Hill, close to a spring. Indeed, the name of Antoine Pacquet can be found in the 1830 federal census just five lines below that of Henry Gratiot.
There are differing accounts of Antoine's death, which probably occurred in 1832. One says that he went out to the spring for a bucket of water on a stormy night and suffered a fatal heart attack. A different story holds that Antoine went out in a blizzard to get wood or coal and never returned. The next morning he was found frozen and half-buried in a snow bank between Gratiot Grove and Shullsburg, having lost his way back to the cabin.
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