Paul Mondou (IV), Edesse's Brother.

His First Marriage.

Our great-uncle Paul was born on 11 August 1813 in LaPrairie. As a young man he followed his father Paul's footsteps and trained to become a cooper. His life was to take a few twists and turns, though some key records are missing to definitively tie up the loose ends in his story.

He married the 21-year old Céleste Saint-Aubin dit Benjamin in La Nativité-de-la-Bienheureuse-Vierge-Marie-de-La Prairie on 19 January 1836. He was 23. Their daughter Hermenegilde was born the following year on 17 February 1837, though she died two years later.

The couple left Canada for Burlington, Vermont, USA. The 1840 US census lists only the heads of households, but Paul Mandou is named and a box indicating a young son is checked. Napoleon had been born around 1839. No birth records were located for his children, but the next decennial census in 1850 reveals: Alexander (about 1842), Joseph (about 1844), Celesta (about 1846) and Orvis (born in July 1850). His family still resided in Burlington. Paul Mandon was a cooper, 37 and wife Celeste was 36, both born in Canada. The two older boys were in school. It appears Celeste's sister Louisa, 50, was living with them.

It is here in the story that he seems to have left one life (and wife) and acquired another.

Celeste Mondo appears in 1860 US census in Champlain, New York, about 60 miles north of Burlington. She claims to be 40, born in Canada. No mention is made of Paul. Of her children, Napoleon, 21, was a day laborer, Alexander was 19, Joseph, 16 and Celeste 14. Orvis, who should have been 10 is also missing. An online tree regarding the Saint-Aubin family asserts Celeste died in Rouses Point on 3 June 1863. The U.S. Civil War Draft roll at Rouses Point in 1863 includes Napoleon Mondo, 25, and Alexander Mondo, 23. Joseph Mondo, 20, enlisted from there on September 8th.

A Change in Career.

But what of Paul? In his memoir Glimpses of the Life and Times of A.V.H. Carpenter the author relates a story about a Paul Mondou who was the agent for the steamboat line out of Burlington. The boats navigated through Lake Champlain.

In this telling he reminds his readers that in July 1852 the steamboat Henry Clay exploded in the Hudson River and burned. Around 80 of its passengers perished in the fire or drowned trying to escape it. According to the tale, Paul approached an older woman soon after the tragedy attempting to sell her a ticket on his line. Despite his "polite manner natural to him and to his countrymen in general" she was outraged, fearing that such boats were death traps, blowing up without any explanation.

Paul listened to her recital with perfect composure, and then earnestly assured her that they had found means of remedying such difficulties, as they had introduced the practice on his line of boiling the water before they started and hence there was no occasion for having so hot a fire as to cause the boilers to blow up.

The interaction so amused Mr. Carpenter that he proceeded to offer Paul a position with his line, the Vermont Central.

A Second Marriage.

In an unsourced online tree his second life emerges with news of a marriage to Emily Bowen, daughter of Nathan and Roxcina Bowen in Île de Montréal on 11 March 1852. In later census records the following children were associated with the couple: Flora, born 1851 in Ohio, Marian born 1854 in Vermont, Nellie (Ellen) born 1856 in Canada, and Harriet (Hattie) born either 1858 Vermont or 1859 in Muscatine, Iowa.

In this scenerio, Paul would have left (divorced) Celeste just after the 1950 census and birth of their son Orvis. Emily's daughter Flora was born in the same time period as Orvis.

Paul Mondou is named in an 1856 ad for Vermont & Central Railroad as being a ticket agent at 65 & 63 Commissioner Street in Montréal. (This was about the same time his sister Edesse Mondou and her husband Narcisse Petelle lived in the city.) The text in the ad reads, "N. A. Bowen and Napoleon Mondou will be in attendance at the Principal Hotels, and on board the 'Iron Duke,' on the departure of the Trains, for the purpose of furnishing Passengers with Tickets and Information." N.A. Bowen, his father-in-law, Emily's father? Napoleon Mondou, his oldest son with Celeste?

His home address in the 1856-57 Lovell's Montréal city directory is at 85 Sanguinet. The following year in the Lovell Canada Directory for 1857-58 the home address is 14 Chenneville street. N. Mondou also is listed as working as an agent for Vermont Central R. R., working out of his dad's office at 63 Commissioner st. Paul apparently had a brief stint in July 1857 with the North & South Railroad and Steamboat Line as an ad encourages travelers to "avoid the heat & dust of rail-roads" and book passage on the boat. Neither Paul nor Napoleon is listed in Canadian directories after 1858.

Move On Down the Line.

As stated earlier, Celeste and the children appear in the 1860 census in Champlain. Paul, 47, and Emily, 30, are by this time in Milwaukee where he continued as a railway agent. They had an 18 year old servant living with them. Soon they moved to Chicago where daughters Emma (or Emily) and Carrie were born in 1862 and 1869 respectively. Paul is listed in the 1862 Chicago City Directory as a ticket agent for the M S & N I Railroad and in 1867 with the St. Paul and Prairie du Chien out of Milwaukee. The family lived at 202 Milwaukee according to that city's directory.

Helping His Siblings Migrate to the US.

Paul and Emily moved to Wauwatosa, Wisconsin in time for the 1870 census where they owned a home valued at $2,000. Daughter Mary had married Corey Strong and the young couple lived with her parents.

July of the following year, Paul's sister Edesse Mondou, her husband Narcisse Petelle, and their children moved to the Milwaukee area. Their youngest brother Siméon is named in an 1871 Milwaukee Sentinel ad for the Goodrich Transit Company, a passenger steamship line; the city directory mentions he boarded with his brother Paul at 476 Pierce.

Though Edesse's family settled in Bay View, Siméon returned to Montréal. City directories during 1874-76 reveal Paul was at 381 Greenbush in Milwaukee, close to where a number of French families resided. He was the passenger agent for the Chicago & Milwaukee & St Paul R'y. Soon thereafter he removed himself to Chicago.

Highest Praise.

Paul was highly regarded by his peers and his customers who wrote thank you letters for the kindly and gentlemanly manner in which we have been treated by you… Everyone of us felt you took a personal interest in us… But he could be firm: At Milwaukee another pick pocket was discovered on the train, but Paul Mondou, of the C. M. & St. P. railway, who was accompanying the party, snatched the fellow and walked him off on his ear, giving him in charge of the police.

His offices were at 63 Clark Street in Chicago though they resided in Ravinia. His success was such that he is named in the 1890 The Chicago Blue Book of Selected Names of Chicago and Suburban Towns.

In his 1890 memoir, A.V. Carpenter said, "He is a universal favorite among all classes of travelers… and numbers his friends by the thousand, as almost everyone in the eastern states and the Dominion of Canada has kind recollections of him… He has brought up a large family of children creditably … it was a red letter day for the world when Paul made his advent, for he has made more hearts glad than has been the fortune of most people having more worldly means with which to accomplish it."