Joseph Loranger and John Bougrand were seated around a table in the store of Joseph Loranger playing euchre, when the Indian guide who always accompanied Mr. Lafontain, rode up to the door the morning before the massacre, and announced the approach of Colonel Proctor's army. All dropped their cards without ceremony. Mr. Loranger and Bougrand crossed the River Raisin and traveled through the snow and ice night and day until they reached Sandusky, where their wives were sojourning at the time. Mr. Lafontain rode up the river to avoid meeting any part of the enemy with his guide, then struck a direct route for Detroit, collected his family and crossed over to Canada, remaining there until hostilities ceased.

LAURENT DUROCHER

Was the son of a French Canadian, and was born at the Mission of St. Genevieve, in Mis souri, in 1786. He was educated at the College of Montreal, and came to the River Raisin in 1805. He took part in the War of 1812 under General Hull, and was in the employ of the Government for some years after the war. He was elected clerk of the county of Monroe in 1818, and held the office for nearly twenty years. He was for six years a member of the territorial council, also a member of the convention which framed the first constitution of the State, and after the Territory became a State a member of the legislature. He held the offices of judge of probate, circuit clerk, clerk of the city of Monroe, at various times, and filled with dignity all the positions he was called by the people of the county to serve in. He was, like most of the French settlers upon the "Raisin," an accomplished gentleman, and was the chief legal authority among the French residents.

PETER NAVARRE

Was born in 1785 in Detroit, where his father before him was born, and was the grandson of Robert Navarre, a French officer who visited this section in 1745. No name is more prominent among the early settlers than that of Peter Navarre. In Indian methods of warfare he was thoroughly posted, courageous and

brave, while his bearing was ever that of a "born gentleman." With his brother Robert he erected a cabin twenty miles south of River Raisin, opposite Manhattan, to which he returned after the close of the war and spent the rest of his days. He died in March, 1874, aged eighty-nine years.

Peter and his three brothers, Robert, Alexis and James, tendered their services to General Hull. They were included in the surrender and paroled, though they denied the right to be treated as prisoners of war and at once took an active part for the United States, whereupon General Proctor offered a reward of two hundred pounds for Peter's head or scalp. Until the close of the war he acted as a scout to General Harrison. Peter Navarre and his brothers are referred to in this work in the history of the War of 1812, as those sent by General Harrison from the River Raisin to reconnoiter the British army, and brought news of the approach of General Proctor. On the next page is given a portrait of Peter Navarre in passing through a forest in his favorite char

acter as a scout.

Many of our older citizens well remember the hospitable tavern of "Ma'am Jobin," as it was familiarly called, four miles south of Monroe, on the south bank of Otter Creek. Her husband and Peter Navarre, the Indian scout, upon whose head a large price had been set by the British if captured, were during the War of 1812 taken prisoners by the Indians, bound hand and foot, and were being carried as captives to Malden. Encamping over night on the route, in the morning their bands were loosened for temporary relief, and after breakfasting Mr. Navarre said to Mr. Jobin: "Now is our time. If we reach Malden we will be hung, and I would rather take my chances of being shot than go any further with our captors. You take one direction, I will another." Both immediately ran for their lives; the balls whistled about and above them, but both escaped without injury.

THE BLISS FAMILY.

In the spring of 1814 two brothers, Silvanus and Hervey Bliss, of Royalston, Worcester county, Massachusetts, left the parental home, and the first named his young wife and two

“With knapsacks on their backs

And their spirits were gay, To secure themselves homes

In Michigania.”

Railroads were not known or thought of in those days, and it required several weeks to make the journey on foot, as they were obliged to do. Many incidents occurred to them by the way, some of which were of an exciting character, as it was war time. They at last reached the settlement on the shore of the lake between the Vermillion and Huron rivers, in Ohio. Their feet getting sore and their funds getting low, they concluded to make their homes with the pioneers of the Buckeye State, and soon set. about preparing for the coming of the wife and children, arrangements to bring them and some household goods having been made with a man before leaving Massachusetts. It was late in the summer, however, and not until the hot weather had brought to the newcomers the ague and chill fever, that they were sent for Owing to stormy weather and consequent bad roads, obliging them to lie by several weeks, they did not reach the settlement until winter had set in, when the tired and worn-out wife and mother was informed that her dear husband had died a few weeks before her arrival. Mrs. Bliss was terribly shocked by the sad news, but receiving the sympathy and help of the neighbors and the surviving brother, she in time recovered from the sore bereavement.

The summer following (1815) sickness and death came again to the family, and took from the mother her youngest child, a little boy, aged two years and six months, the other members of the family barely escaping with their lives the ravages of the much dreaded chill fever.

Not caring longer to remain in a climate sounhealthy, Mr. Bliss having in the meantime married the widow of his deceased brother, in company with a neighbor (Mr. David Frary), he removed his family to the River Raisin (now Monroe, Michigan). Arriving there the latter part of April, 1816, he rented a farm of Jerry Lawrence, a short distance above Monroe, and farmed it that season as best he could, not succeeding well, however, on account of the cold weather and early frosts, the summer

season."

The following winter Mr. Bliss, in company with Mr. Frary, still his neighbor and friend, moved his family to the Macon settlement, some thirteen or fourteen miles above Monroe, on the river, opposite the point where the Macon Creek enters the Raisin. Here he built a house and made some improvements, supposing that he was on Government land, which he intended to purchase when in market. He remained there some two years, during which time a number of families had settled about him. He then learned that the Indians had withheld from sale a tract of land known as the "Macon reserve" on the early maps, embracing nine sections, and covering the improvements made by the settlers, who were driven off by the Indians, the log cabins of the squatters serving them as wigwams, and the cleared land for pasturage, raising corn, etc. While living there, in March, 1817, your correspondent, W. W. Bliss, came to them a "stranger, and they took him in; naked, and they clothed him; thirsty, and they gave him drink;" and for the many acts of kindness and care in subsequent years, they are held by him in grateful remembrance.

In the month of June following, Israel Bliss, a younger brother from Massachusetts, came to the settlement at the Macon, and remained with the family until his death, October 23, 1819. Calvin Burnham, a young man from Massachusetts, came to Michigan with his friend, Israel Bliss, and remained with him until his death. Then he returned to Massachusetts and married his (Bliss's) sister, Lucind K., by whom he had three children, and she having died, he married again, and in 1839 removed his family to Blissfield, Michigan, and the next year to Summerfield, Monroe county, same State, where he died some years since, honored and respected by his fellow-men, leaving a wife and several children. Olive, the oldest daughter by his first wife, married Lysander Ormsby, of Deerfield, Michigan. Two daughters by his second wife married two brothers, John and Charles Peters, of Petersburgh, Michigan.

The settlement at the Macon being broken up, Mr. Bliss removed his family to the "Giles neighborhood," some three or four miles down the river and ten from Monroe, where he

i

" on

bought a "squatter's" claim of a man who had built a house and cleared a few acres on a tract of Government land of several hundred acres, which lay between Giles's "French farm" the west and other claims on the east, a part of which he intended to buy when subdivided and in market. But before learning that it had been offered for sale, a man by the name of Martin, "bought from under him" that part of the tract on which he lived, containing one hundred and thirty acres, embracing the improve. ments which he had bought and subsequently made, and requiring him to vacate the same without remuneration for the outlay which he had made.

Mr. Bliss being again without a home for his family, and not caring to leave the neighborhood, as a school had just been started, and a church (Presbyterian) had been organized at Monroe, with which he and his wife had united at the time of its organization (January 13, 1820), bought of said Martin thirty acres of the unimproved land adjoining Giles's farm, on which he built a good hewed log house, and improved the greater part of it, when finding that he had not farm enough to support his family, he sold his place and in June, 1824, bought 132 acres of land some twenty miles up the river, of rich quality and well timbered. To this place the late Colonel Johnson, of Monroe, gave the name of Blissfield. Here in November following Mr. Bliss built a log house, obtaining help to raise it from Petersburgh and Raisinville, ten and twenty miles distant, and to which place he removed his family the following month (December, 1824), having no neighbors for a time nearer than Petersburgh, and no mills, stores or shops nearer than Monroe.

Mr. Bliss in 1835 platted a part of his farm, giving the name of Blissfield to the village. He was a man highly esteemed by his neighbors and those with whom he was acquainted, having held many positions of trust and responsibility in the latter years of his life.

In 1829 he was instrumental in effecting the organization of the First Presbyterian church. of Blissfield, which occurred February 22d of that year, consisting of nine members, including himself and wife.

In March, 1827, he was appointed by Governor Cass a justice of the peace, and at the first township meeting in Blissfield, held in

May following, he was elected a justice by the people, which office he held for a number of years.

In March, 1828, he was appointed postmaster at Blissfield, which office he held at the time of his death, which occurred December 31, 1841, aged fifty-two years. His wife survived

him some seven years.

Mr. Bliss had seven children, five sons and two daughters, and one step-daughter, six of whom are still living.

William W., born at the Macon March 28, 1817; married in Blissfield, Michigan, February 13, 1840, where he now resides, retired from business.

Hiram W., born in Raisinville, Michigan, June 1, 1822; farmer; married October 23, 1842, resides at Deerfield, Michigan.

Whiting G., born in Blissfield, Michigan, November 15, 1827; died in childhood.

Hervey K., born in Blissfield, Michigan, February 11, 1830; farmer; married June 22, 1850, and resides in Adrian, Michigan.

Almond L., born November 27, 1832, in Blissfield; married November 25, 1853; real estate and abstract office business in Adrian, Michigan, where he resides.

Emeline B., born in Raisinville, Michigan, February 24, 1819; married December 13, 1834. Husband a farmer, now deceased; lives with daughter in Adrian, Michigan.

Caroline L., born in Raisinville, Michigan, September 28, 1824; married June 30, 1842, and resides with her son in Blissfield, Michigan.

Delight (the step-daughter), born in Massachusetts September 24, 1811; married in Blissfield, Michigan, November 23, 1826, by Loren Marsh, Esq., a justice of the peace from Monroe, Michigan, one of the first two marriages in Blissfield, both occurring the same day.

The first school in Blissfield was taught by Chester Stuart, late of Monroe, in the winter of 1826-7, for thirteen dollars per month and "board round."

There are very many incidents in the lives of the Bliss family connected with their settlement here, which show what hardships the pioneers endured. They moved here in win. ter, into a log house without floors, doors, windows, chimney, and no stoves, and not even "chinked" between the logs. After putting down a "puncheon" floor of split logs, making doors and putting in windows, cutting and

preparing some wood, etc., occupying some two weeks, Hervey Bliss was obliged to leave his family alone in the woods, no neighbors nearer than ten miles away, and go down to Raisinville to work and pay for help in moving and buy supplies for the family. On his way down he met a company of Indians who came and camped within a few rods of the house, where they remained some two weeks.

THE KEDZIE FAMILY.

History is being made every day, little by little, but mainly by recording events and actions of men in the past, as they are remembered, from the standpoint of the historian. Monroe has a long history, reaching beyond the memory of any now living; and we can only hope to gather fragments showing to coming generations the hopes and fears, the actual trials and troubles attending the settlement of a new country.

William Kedzie and wife, five sons and two daughters, emigrated from Delhi, Delaware county, New York, and came to the "Great West," landing at Monroe, May 14, 1826. The change from a rough, hilly country, well covered with rocks and stones, to one as level as a "house floor," so salubrious as this then was, seemed to them as the Garden of Eden. But when they looked upon the people, heard their strange language, saw their mode of travel as they daily passed with a pony and two-wheeled cart, loaded with a family of six or eight, driving like Jehu, with no tire on their wheels, nor a strap of iron about their vehicle, they looked, but looked in vain, for a smash-down. A four-wheeled carriage was very seldom seen on the streets.

There was then no church building in the village; Protestants worshiped in the old yellow court-house, and Catholics in a log building some two miles up on the north bank of the River Raisin, only distinguished from the log houses in that vicinity by a cross on the gable end and one over the front gate. Mr. Kedzie occupied the farm on the north side of the River Raisin, next east of the Robert Clark farm. A large portion of the land at this time lay unoccupied. From the toll bridge, then kept by Peter P. Ferry (one of the old soldiers under Napoleon, and for many years

after county treasurer of Monroe county), up to the Clark farm, between the road and river, was in commons; also the lands north of the old fort, where Charles Noble then lived, now owned and occupied by Major A. C. Chapman, was in commons, extending a mile back to the woods. The father and sons planted two acres thereof in corn in June after their arrival, and a fine crop was raised. One-half thereof would have been destroyed by the ravenous blackbirds but for the free use of powder and shot. The birds seemed to fancy their farming, for they followed them into Lenawee county, where large bounties checked their destructive habits.

In October of that year the family moved up into the woods, twenty-five miles west of Monroe, and within a county organized at a later date, and until May, 1827, within the jurisdiction of Monroe county. This was a bold push for life a dense forest, a log house without doors or windows to give protection from savage wild beasts who made night hideous with their unearthly howls, and without a neighbor within five miles. With the supply of provisions purchased at Monroe they sought their new home — no light task considering the condition of the roads, without a bridge on river, streams or gullies. The winter was spent chopping twenty-seven acres, and in the spring ten acres were logged and planted to corn. Their crop not only suffered from the blackbirds, but the "coon" lavishly presented his claims for a share, and no little depredations were committed by bears and wolves. Coonhunting was a pastime to the pioneer whose pork barrel ran low, as the meat made a very palatable and rich dish when properly prepared.

That summer four acres more were cleared and sown to wheat, which was reaped with a sickle in July. The following fall the father yielded to the malarial diseases prevailing in the country, notwithstanding the skill of his old friend, Dr. Clark, of Monroe, who stood at his bedside the last six days of his life, ending August 5, 1828, aged forty-seven years.

I leave the reader to conceive what must have been the trials of a widowhood, left with the care of seven children, the eldest under sixteen, with only a beginning made on a new farm in a vast wilderness. She lived, however, to see them all grown to maturity, who,