Atchafalaya Basin People: Chapter 16

DATE:                        December 10, 1995

INTERVIEWER:      Jim Delahoussaye

LOCATION:              Edward Couvillier’s house on Oxford Loop, Oxford, St. Mary Parish, Louisiana.

COOPERATORS:   Edward Couvillier, Lena Mae Couvillier

 Edward:        Amelia.

JD:      Amelia, she was Couvillier, of course.  You have any idea who she married? 

Edward:        No.

JD:      OK, that’s all right. 

 Edward:        I wouldn’t have the least idea, Jim.  I remember when I was a kid…

JD:      How about your daddy’s brothers, you remember any of them? 

Edward:        He had Uncle Willie…

JD:      Willie?

Edward:        That was a Anslem…that was half brother, now. 

JD:      Anslem.

Edward:        yeah.  And Uncle Pete.  Pete Anslem. 

JD:      Pete Anslem, was another half…

Edward:        And Uncle Joe…

JD:      So that’s how the Anslems get into this family, huh?

Edward:        Joe Anslem.  Uncle Pete, Uncle Willie and Uncle Joe.  And Uncle Bud.  Bud Anslem.  …was my daddy’s half brothers.  And that’s about it.

JD:      Bud.

Edward:        Yeah.  I guess that…that…I don’t know if that was a nickname or what.  …Uncle Bud. 

JD:      That’s ok, that’s ok, now, do you remember any of your momma’s brothers or sisters at all?

Edward:        Yeah.  There was Uncle Henry…

JD:      Henry?

Edward:        I knew more of hers.  Uncle Joe…

JD:      He was of course…they were all Sanders.

Edward:        Sanders. 

JD:      These were all full brothers and sisters.

Edward:        Yeah.  Aunt Elizabeth.

JD:      Elizabeth. 

Edward:        there was Aunt Rose.  Uhhhh…

Lena Mae:     Aunt Emmalena was your momma’s sister, eh?

Ed:      Yeah, Aunt Emmalena

Lena Mae:     And what about your uncle John?  The one that died?

Edward:        That was half.  That was Uncle, the one that lived in,…the one we went and seen up the country up there Momma? 

Lena Mae:     Uncle George.

Edward:        There was Uncle George.  Alberta, his name was Alberta.

JD:      Was it really Alberta? 

Edward:        And Aunt Mary, she was Mary Alberta, that was Momma’s half brother and half sister.

JD:      George Alberta Sanders.

Edward:        …Mary…

JD:      That was half.

Edward:        Half. 

JD:      And…Mary? 

Edward:        Mary.

JD:      Also half?

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      What was her…?

Edward:        Alberta.

JD:      George Alberta, George Alberta…half.  Was that half a Sanders?  In other words…

Edward:        Naw, he was Alberta.

JD:      The last name was Alberta??

Edward:        Yeah, that was his name.

JD:      I had no idea…I never head that before.  His last name was Alberta?

Edward:        Yeah.

Lena Mae:     George Alberta.

JD:      And Mary Alberta, too?

Edward:        Yeah.  That was his sister, his full sister. 

JD:      I never heard of that.  How about John?

Edward:        John?

JD:      John …his half…his half something?  That was a Sanders…

Edward:        Yeah, that was full brother, there. 

JD:      That was full. 

Edward:        Yeah.  He died…I remember him …Uncle John.  …that was the brothers.

JD:      Henry and Joe…

Edward:        Henry, Joe and John. 

JD:      And then Elizabeth, Rose and Emelina…sisters. 

Edward:        [mumbles]  I believe that was all.  Wait a minute, Tom Randal…that was Aunt Rose…

Lena Mae:     You got Aunt Elizabeth? 

Edward:        I’m tryin to figure how A.J. and them….OK, that was the Old Man’s brother’s…[?]  Yeah, OK.  What names you got on there? 

JD:      Your father’s…your father’s brother?  I have, I have all halfs. 

Lena Mae:     All half’s daddy.

JD:      All halfs. 

Edward:        Not A.J.  A.J.’s daddy was full. 

Lena Mae:     A.J. was a Couvillier…

JD:      A.J.? 

Lena Mae:     Wasn’t he?

Edward:        Yeah, OK.  He had a brother named Ozime, the Old  Man. 

JD:      Ozime, hunh?  And that’s full.

Edward:        Yeah.

JD:      So, he was a Couvillier.

Edward:        Yeah…that’s all I can remember…might have more than that.

JD:      So far you have Odelia [?] and Ozime as the two full.  Brother and sister.  One full brother and one full sister.  And we have…we have four half brothers.

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      Willie, Pete, Joe and Bud.

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      These people may never come up, you understand?  They may never come up in any of this.  But, it’s nice if I can go back and see where they fit in. 

Edward:        When you [?],  make that book, put some names in it.  See like some of these people…I might know some of them 

JD:      You mean the pictures like that?  [looking at Comeaux’s book?]

Edward:        I might know some of em.

JD:      Yeah you might.  His, …

Edward:        Like these people here?  Crab fishermen…have a name, you know?  And that way you’d know if you know em.

JD:      Uhunh.  Yeah, that’s right.  OK.  That is good.

Edward:        And all this stuff here [in the book] looks familiar to me, you know? 

JD:      Well, sure it does look familiar to you, I think you probably did it all. 

Edward:        This here…I know that man right there. 

Lena Mae:     Let me see that book, Daddy? 

JD:      Do yall happen to know…have yall ever heard, Rosalee Mayon, Agnes’ mother.  Her parents were Claiborne Mayon and Fannie May Mason?  Do yall know, do yall know at all if they were in the United States … were they born here? 

Edward:        I don’t know Jim. 

JD:      the reason I ask that question is Agnes’ grandparents on the other side – Larnce Sauce and Ophelia Simoneaux were both born in Europe.  One was from France and one from Spain.  And I was curious to know if the other two came from Europe.

Lena Mae:     I don’t know. 

JD:      Let me ask yall another question while I’m on this right here.  Do you think it’s alright to talk to Agnes about this kind of stuff?  Right now?  Or do you think she’s …I’m worried…I thought maybe it would remind her of Myon and stuff, and…

Lena Mae:     No, she likes to talk about Daddy [Myon].

JD:      She does? 

Lena Mae:     She don’t mind talking about Daddy.  Sit down and tell us some stories sometime…

Edward:        Jim?  On the Couvilliers …If you want to know anything about the Couvillier family, go talk to Gloria Ann

Lena Mae:     She’s got books…tryin to make a family tree. 

JD:      All right, help me out, I don’t know that person.  Who’s Gloria Ann?

Lena Mae:     Alvin Marcotte..

Edward:        Alvin Marcotte’s wife, my niece.  Tete and Dan’s daughter. 

JD:      Wait a minute, wait a minute…

Edward:        They got the history on the Couvilliers, her and Darlene [Soule].

Lena Mae:     They tryin to build a family tree, you see.  They got all a that.

Edward:        She can tell you which ones come from overseas, or what. 

Lena Mae:     But that’s gone be on the Couvilliers and Lange side.

JD:      Let me try to find this now…

Edward:        What you mean, on the Lange side?  Noo, on the Couvillier side, ain’t nothing to do with the Langes.  [to JD] you got oth of em, you got Dan and Tete down there somewhere.

JD:      I got Dan Lange married to Viola.

Edward:        Yeah, that’s it, that’s her…their daughter. 

JD:      OK, their daughter is who?

Edward:        Gloria Ann. 

JD:      Where does she live?

Edward:        Baldwin. 

JD:      Baldwin?

Lena Mae:     [looking at the Malcolm Comeaux book]  You know this look like Myrtle’s old camp.   cabin. 

JD:      It is. it’s in there.

Edward:        Where?

JD:      It’s in there, her and her husband are in there. 

Lena Mae:     That’s it, eh?

JD:      Well, it should say it.  I don’t know if it says in on there.  But,  her married name was Bigler, wasn’t it?

Edward:        Yeah.  No, this is Belle River.

JD:      That’s in Belle River? 

Lena Mae:     Daddy, go see.  She say the TV ain’t workin.  I don’t want you messin with my TV.  [speaking to a child in the rom]

JD:      So, she [Gloria Ann Lange] has records, you’re sayin.

Lena Mae:     Yeah, she got all kind of records.

JD:      In Baldwin.  All right.  That’s good.  That’s good.  I’m gonna draw all this up in a chart, that’s gonna show the family. When people came over the levee, or even while they were livin on the houseboats on the other side – there were fifteen houseboats and fifteen families – was there a good bit of marriage between people who lived in the houseboats? 

Lena Mae:     Yeah, Neg and Nine got married. 

JD:      OK, Neg and Nine, that’s one. 

Lena Mae:     Me and Edward got married.

JD:      You and Edward got married.

Edward:        Bootsie and Yank.

Lena Mae:     Yank and Bootsie got married. 

Edward:        Putt and Dot.

JD:      Putt and Dot.

Lena Mae:     Well, they was over the levee when they got married.

JD:      That’s ok, just still in all, just…

Edward:        And Roy, and  Tootsie’s daughter, and  Bernie Louviere’s daughter and Roy Millet’s son had got married too, you see.  So, ah there was a bunch of em. 

JD:      People like Joe [Sauce] and EJ and Russell [Daigle] and them, they found girls in town I guess, huh?

Lena Mae:     Well, no, you see Blue [Anslem] and them was livin in, …

Edward:        They was livin in Calumet.

Lena Mae:     In Calumet. 

Edward:        They come from on the water too. 

JD:      In Calumet?

Lena Mae:     Yeah.

Edward:        You see, Joe, Joe, Joe’s wife and EJ’s wife, well, me and her daddy…their daddy first cousins. 

JD:      Joe’s wife?

Edward:        Joe’s wife and EJ’s wife.  Me and their daddy is first cousins.

JD:      Right, now I have,  what was …what was their maiden name? 

Edward:        Anslem.

JD:      They were Anslem, both of em, both EJ and Joe’s wife …both Anslem?

Edward:        That was Pete Anslem…that was Uncle Bud’s son. 

JD:      Ok, I was about to say, so they come from …no…they weren’t on …those people weren’t on … at Myette Point, though.

Edward:        No, Blue and EJ and them, I don’t believe Blue lived at Myette Pt. when they got married. 

Lena Mae:     Blue and EJ?  Well, yeah.

Edward:        Where they lived at?

Lena Mae:     Daddy, they were livin at Myette Pt. when we moved over here, they put they trailer over next to Neg’s. 

JD:      Did you say Pete Anslem?  And that was Blue?

Edward:        Blue’s daddy.

JD:      OK, and, and  Joe’s wife too?

Edward:        Flo, yeah. 

JD:      Were they sisters?

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      They are?

Edward:        uhhunh. 

JD:      I didn’t know that.  I didn’t know they were sisters.  So, there’s quite a few pairs that got together, including yall – because the houseboats were around each other.  So that means that those houseboats must have stuck around together pretty well.

Edward:        Uhhunh.  Well, after everybody moved in there, moved across the levee, that was it.  Before that, you know, people would always move around, but they’d always come back.  They’d move out and come back. 

JD:      Was there anybody that wasn’t welcome to come back?  That moved out?

Edward:        Uhuh.

JD:      Everybody got along pretty well? 

Edward:        Aw, we had lil squabbles every now and then, everybody do that.  Bootsie Millet  and them, he was about the worst one.  Thought he was a big bully out there. 

JD:      Is that right?  But it seemed like, from what I gather from all of this, that throughout all of these moves, early on when yall were livin at Blaise’s Canal on the other side, it seemed like Myon, look like he was,  people kind of collected around him.  Is that , is that,…?

Edward:        Not really.

JD:      Not really?

Edward:        Uhuh.  Until he got kids, [then] some of em stayed around him. 

JD:      Because I understood that he,  he kind of…

Edward:        Like he was a leader?

JD:      Yeah.

Edward:        Naw, uhuh. 

Lena Mae:     Well…everybody…something would happen they’d run to daddy. 

JD:      Well, that’s what I’m talking about, I’m not talking about he told people what to do, that’s not what I mean. 

Edward:        People that lived around here, you know, after we moved in here [to Oxford], but uh…

Lena Mae:     They, they’d all go to daddy, you know, if something …they needed to know somethin, or, somebody get sick or something, or …

JD:      Or there was trouble and they were trying to decide what to do?  They would go and at least find out what he thought.

Lena Mae:     Yeah, they’d find out what he thought, and …

JD:      Now was his…was Agnes’ father the same way, Blaise, did people kind of…?

Lena Mae:     Kind of…

JD:      Go to him for…

Edward:        I didn’t know him…fact I never did see him. 

JD:      You never did?

Edward:        Uhuh.  If I did, I don’t remember. 

JD:      Now your people…your people ….

Lena Mae:     For as getting along with people Jim, we always did get along with people.  Fer as that, there was no problem.  You’d have a few words maybe, and then it would…

JD:      Clear it up?

Lena Mae:     Clear it up.  Forget about it.  Nobody held grudges. 

JD:      Ok.

Edward:        Wasn’t nobody perfect, but…

JD:      Well, yeah.  OK, you, Edward, your family, Albert and Ella, when all this was goin on, all this campboat livin in the Basin and everything was goin on, where was your family livin? 

Edward:        We lived different places, Jim, like I say, people moved.

JD:      But I mean you lived on campboats? 

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      See, that’s something I don’t have.  I don’t have that on tape. 

Edward:        Well, not all my life.  You see, when we lived on Lil Pigeon we was livin in a house.  Then when we moved on Catfish [Bayou], we lived in a house. 

JD:      Because the Basin didn’t rise and fall like it does now?

Edward:        It would rise, the house …was settin on logs, put it on logs, yeah. 

JD:      But it would be that high, it would be safe.  Not like now.

Edward:        Right, and then after Catfish, we moved in a houseboat.  Then we moved – then we moved from Catfish to Keelboat, we moved to Bayou Boutte, we moved to them canals down there, we Canal lived in Young’s, we lived (at) Myette Pt., we lived up the channel.  I mean, that’s what I said, just so many different places…

JD:      I understand, I understand and I want to get information on all that too.

Edward:        We moved up the channel….

JD:      Let’s try to figure out when it was yall moved onto campboats, so, if we could, based on how old you were. 

Edward:        That was in…I guess it was in the early 40s, the beginnin of ’40, ’41, somewheres around there. 

JD:      Let’s see, let’s take it from your age.

Edward:        I was 12 years old….

JD:      I got that the other day on tape, when I was….

Edward:        I started school … was 12 years old, and right after that we moved into a campboat.  Cause I was going to school (when) we was still livi in Catfish in this house. 

JD:      Yeah, and you told me you had to walk across the …thru the swamp to get to the schoolboat

Edward:        It was about ’41, ’42 when we…when we got that camp

JD:      How many of yall moved onto the camp?

Edward:        There was just me and the old man and Momma.

JD:      Just the three of you?

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      Well, where were all these brothers …

Edward:        Well, yeah, Abner was married when we moved on that camp.  Margaret was married, and, …

JD:      OK, so, by the time yall moved onto the campboat….

Edward:        I take it back.  Margaret wasn’t married, cause Margaret and Floyd got married when we was livin in Young’s Canal over there.  Me and Abner and Margaret and the Old Man and Momma.  There was three of us …four…five.

JD:      Five of yall that got on the campboat.

Edward:        Umhmm. 

JD:      And do you remember, I may have asked you this on tape the other day and I may have it, if I do that’s alright, but [the question of] why yall went on the campboat?

Edward:        I wouldn’t know Jim. 

JD:      You just don’t remember.

Edward:        Just don’t remember.  We built the camp and just started movin different places with it, you know. 

JD:      Well, that’s, that’s…

Edward:        I wish we woulda built it anther 10 years sooner and moved where they had a school at where I coulda went…all of us coulda went to school.  I was the only one that went to school a lil bit. 

JD:      How long did you go to school?

Edward:        I went to eighth grade. 

JD:      You did?  You started when you were 12…you started in the first grade?

Edward:        Yeah.  I made two, three grades a year.

JD:      You did?  So, you went…you went like maybe…four years, five years to school?

Edward:        Six, seven years, I guess. 

JD:      Six or seven.

Edward:        Six years.

JD:      And when you quit in the…you quit in the eighth grade?

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      You remember why you quit?

Edward:        That’s the highest they went.

JD:      Oh, that’s the highest…you had to go to another school?

Edward:        Yeah.

JD:      Where was the other school?

Edward:        That woulda been in town.  They didn’t have none out there.

JD:      In town, so you only went to the eighth grade.

Edward:        Eighth grade was the highest they went out there.  That’s as fer as I could go. 

JD:      That was on Keelboat [Pass]?

Edward:        Yeah, Keelboat and Hog Island. 

JD:      There was a school on….?

Edward:        Well, on Hog Island, I didn’t go over there.  They moved the school after I left Keelboat.

JD:      Let me…is there anybody in your bathroom, you think?  Let me shut this off.

[resumed in conversation about who had houses on the levee and who moved to Oxford when the Corps of Engineers made them get off the levee]

Lena Mae:     EJ [Daigle] had his trailer here, I forgot about that.

JD:      In the right here…. [looking at a map]

Edward:        Over here…

Lena Mae:     Over there by Ida’s [Daigle].  Ida’s house, EJ’s trailer, Joe’s trailer, and Neg’s house.  All in a line. 

JD:      Yeah.  That’s a good thing for us to put down…..

Edward:        Russell [Daigle] lived here too.

Lena Mae:     Russell was livin right here…

Edward:        Where?  Yeah, Russell lived right there after me.

JD:      OK, move to Oxford then.  [from the levee to Oxford Circle].  OK, that would be yall, Myon, well, let me go down this list I have down here.  This would be Neg?, Gondolfo, but that would be Frank,  Abner Couvillier….he moved here [Oxford] ?

Edward:        No, he moved right over there, I mean it was right here [down the road from Oxford but not in the Loop where Edward and the rest moved].

JD:      OK, so that’s to Oxford, then [general area]

Lena Mae:     Still Oxford.

JD:      Albert Couvillier?

Edward:        No, no….yeah, Putt [nickname].

JD:      Putt did.  Where was Putt during all these 15 houseboats I have right here [list previously made].  Where was he?

Edward:        He didn’t live on the…with his daddy and them.  Well, he live out there when he was a kid, you see, but after he got married, he got married after he moved back of the levee. 

JD:      But who was his daddy in here [the list]? 

Edward:        Albert, I mean Lester. 

JD:      Lester, Lester was his daddy. 

Edward:        Putt’s daddy. 

JD:      Should I have him on here as one of the people who owned a houseboat out there? Lester?

Edward:        Yeah, yeah. 

JD:      I don’t.  I have Albert Couvillier. 

Edward:        Lester’s on there [the list], should be way at the bottom.

JD:      He should?  Arthur Sanders, Nick Verrett….no, I don’t have Lester Couvillier on here.

Lena Mae:     He was livin here when we moved here.

JD:      But he was in a campboat out there?

Edward:        Yeah, he lived in a campboat at the end too [on the lake end of Myon’s Canal].  And he moved back of the levee, that was Putt’s daddy. 

JD:      And…who was his wife?

JD:      Lula, Lula Meyers.  You got that, I done give it to you three times.

JD:      Here it is.  Right there.  There it is. 

Lena Mae:     Tell you who else you don’t have.  Carol Ann and Elton moved on the levee, Jack and Helen [Sauce]…

Edward:        You not gone to be able to get everybody lived out there…

Lena Mae:     Jack and Helen lived on the levee.

JD:      Ok, Lester, these are Putt’s parents.

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      OK, who else moved here?  Bootsie Millet didn’t, he moved to town didn’t he?

Lena Mae:     Yeah.  To town.

Edward:        Yeah, well they moved to town before we moved over here. 

JD:      Joe Sauce, he didn’t move here.  Jesse Daigle did.

Lena Mae:     Yeah, Joe Sauce moved here.

Edward:        Not Joe….

JD:      Blaise’s brother [Joe].  Miss Grace didn’t here.  Dan Lange…

Edward:        Yeah, they did

JD:      Joe Sanders.  No.  Arthur Sanders did.  Lester Couvillier?

Edward:        No.

JD:      Nick Verrett?

Edward:        Uhuh.

JD:      So, the families that moved here then would have been, Couvilliers, Baileys, Sauces, Gondolfos, Daigle Langes and Sanders. 

Edward:        Yeah.

Lena Mae:     Louvieres.

JD:      Louvieres?

Edward:        Arthur Louviere.

JD:      Arthur Louviere did.

Lena Mae:     Arthur’s daddy.  Bernie…they all moved over here. 

Edward:        Bernie Louviere moved over here – but you don’t have Bernie on there I don’t believe.

JD:      Bernie would have been…Arthur Louviere’s brother?

Edward:        Brother. 

JD:      Bernie…Bernie moved out to the levee too?

Edward:        Yeah, Bernie was livin at the levee, then he moved that house over here.

JD:      From the bank?

Edward:        Yeah, unhun. 

JD:      OK, so one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine family names…moved to Oxford.  OK.  Nine family names.

Edward:        Yeah, not counting the kids.

JD:      No, just the family names.  Just Couvilliers, Baileys, Sauces, Gondolfos, Daigles, Langes, Louvieres and Sanders,.

Edward:        You see, Larry lived out there in a trailer on the levee; Bonita lived in a trailer out there at the levee.

JD:      That was all the kids, yeah.

Edward:        Yeah.  That’s what I’m sayin, if you named everybody that moved out there and moved back, man you need a whole….

JD:      Yeah, I don’t need to do all that, just…

Edward:        Mike Sanders lived out there, Annie lived out there, Panhandle [Albert Bailey Jr.]

Lena Mae:     It’s just beaucoup, you know, if you want to go down the line…you know…

JD:      No, I think this is enough.  What I was thinking of was I’m thinking of I’m drawin a blank…those….I’m tryin to think of Elton or somebody like that.  A tall, good lookin fellow that, when yall moved here, he moved up in the front [near the highway].  Right on the corner over there, who was that? 

Lena Mae:     You mean, not in the block?

JD:      Yeah.  Just up in front.

Lena Mae:     That was Abner’s son, Abner…

Edward:        That was Elton.  Elton and Charles. 

JD:      Now, were they…Abner, who was his wife?

Edward:        Liza, you got that too.

JD:      OK, I’m goin to put it down here anyway. 

Edward:        They all live in New Iberia, now. 

JD:      OK, OK, that’s good.  That’s a good start.

Edward:        You get to Neg, there, you get another big start.  Ida give you a coupla pages.

[Phone rings, Lc has a conversation on it]

 JD:     I don’t know if you were….Yeah you were too…I have some tapes, talking to Myon and Agnes next door over there and we were trying to figure out…talking to Myon and Agnes about there parents and their grandparents…is where they lived.  To start off with, where they lived on land, and so on.  And I got a good bit of information about Agnes, and when we were talking about the older people, where they were buried, Myon and Agnes started talking about – Agnes started talking about “the Canal” on Lake Verret.  And…you remember those conversations?  You remember her talking about that?

Lena Mae:     I heard em talk about it years ago.

JD:      Well, they got to talking about what it was, The Canal, that people were buried in a cemetery on the canal, and I asked Myon, I sid, well, what canal you talking about?  He said well it’s really not a canal.  He says there’s a road that goes from Lake Verret to Napoleonville.   And he says on the right side of that road somewhere along there there’s a cemetery and there used to be an old church, and he said that’s where I believe those old people are buried.  Agnes said she thought that too.  So, I was lookin at some maps this week and I was tryin to figure out where could that old church have been, where could that cemetery be and why was this place called a canal when there wasn’t any water.  And I made some real interesting, interesting,  connections to what they were talking about, I think.  Turns out that that highway, that road that Myon was talking about that goes from the lake to Napoleonville, it’s still a highway, it’s now called highway 401, it’s on the map.  But it still left the question, if it’s a highway why did they call it a canal?  Well, I searched one place and another and one place and another and I came up with what I think is the answer.  At one time, it was a canal, where the road is now there was a canal.  And that’s the map [showing one] that tipped me off to it, right here. This is the Atchafalaya Basin in 1863….1863, that a hundred and what?  That’s about almost a hundred and fifty years ago.  That’s what the Atchafalaya Basin looked like.  And these arrows on here point out where the major places were where people moved.  That is, I’m talking about, if you wanted to get, if you wanted to get, let’s say you were in the Mississippi River, and you wanted to get across the Basin to New Iberia, how would you get across that Basin to New Iberia in 1863?  It turns out there were two ways you could cross the Basin in 1863 by water.  One of em was Plaquemine Bayou, so you had to go down the Mississippi…you had to go down the, ….

Edward:        Bayou Plaquemine?

JD:      Yeah.  Bayou Plaquemine.

Edward:        Come out into Grand Lake.

JD:      Yeah, right here.  Here’s Bayou Plaquemine.  You come out of the Mississippi into Bayou Plaquemine and you follow these arrows somehow…Bayou Sorrel, into Grand Lake, down Grand Lake to Charenton.  That’s where Charenton would have been, right there.  So, that was one way to get to Bayou Teche.  And then you would come up Bayou Teche to New Iberia.  [Using the Malcolm Comeaux book here]

Edward:        You see, in 1863 that was all water.

JD:      Well, no this is the way it actually looked in 1863 Edward.  This is the way it actually looked.  This much was water. [still using the Abbot map?].You would look from the town of Charenton to….

Edward:        This is your bank, here…

JD:      No, no, this is the bank right here.

Edward:        That’s what I’m talking about, this is all wooded area.

JD:      That’s all wooded, that’s all the old swamp…that’s all….that’s open water.

Edward:        OK. 

JD:      So you would look from Charenton right here, to here, you’d be looking across at Blue Point.

Edward:        That’s right.  We’d come…I crossed that way before..

JD:      I know, you told me….that would be the distance you were talking about, right across from here, before the levee. See, you were there after the levee but this is actually the way before the levee.

Edward:        No, I was here before the built the levee, now. 

JD:      You were?

Edward:        Yeah.  They build this levee after the 1927 high water – a long time after.

JD:      That’s right, that’s right.  So, what I was sayin is that Bayou Plaquemine… [disturbance with the cockatiel].  Lena Mae, look what I was talking about.  You could come across, if you were in the Mississippi River you could come across in Bayou Plaquemine – that’s one place right there, you could do that.  Or you could keep goin down the Mississippi river until you got to Bayou Lafourche.  It was open then.  You would come thru bayou Lafourche, down Bayou Lafourche like this, and look what happened when you got right here, you could cross by water, now this is 1863, there were no roads, you could cross by water from here [Napoleonville] to Lake Verret.  Guess what that is right there [points to the canal on the map], that line, that’s that damn highway 401.

Lena Mae:     I’ll be damned. 

JD:      Exactly!  Highway 401, and that cemetery is right there, and let me show you what got it for me.  I was starting to, look, if that’s the highway, and that’s the canal…there was a canal!  Now does anybody else remember if there was any kind of a canal, look, what I found.  On the quad maps that we have now, I mean these are the modern, the modern maps of the way it looks like right now.  Here’s Lake Verret, right here, here’s that road, 401, goes all the way to Napoleonville and look at this settlement – Attakapas Canal. 

Lena Mae:     I’ll be darned! 

JD:      The name “Canal”.  Now Myon didn’t remember anything else except “the canal”, but that’s what he remembered, that settlement right there [on the quad map].  Attakapas Canal, it has a church and it has a cemetery, right there. 

Edward:        That’s that road over here? 

JD:      In this sense it’s not a road yet, cause it’s in 1863.  That’s it!  Look, follow it.  Look, follow the curves.  Comes straight up that little line from Lake Verret, look how it does.  Curve over to the right, a big belly, curve down right here, and straight into Napoleonville.

Edward:        Umhm.  See, what I’m lookin at here…you don’t even see the Atchafalaya River up here.

JD:      No, because it’s all in the channel in the lake.

Edward:        This is Morgan City, where it goes around Morgan City…

JD:      Yeah.  That’s right, that’s Morgan City right there.  But I was as excited as all get out when I found that.

Edward:        It don’t even show Hog Island, Cat….

JD:      Yes, it does, it does.  It does, but you have to be able to read…I got em on a different map to show you [Abbot is hard to read].  Where’s Keelboat Pass and Hog Island?

Edward:        And they was below Bayou Chene, now, where…?

JD:      Let me get my bearings, here.  I have other pieces of this map that show the…let me show it to you, it’s there.  There it is.  That’s Hog Island right there.  That ece of land.  On one side it’s Hog Island Pass, on the other side it’s Keelboat Pass. 

Edward:        you mean right…that the land right there? 

JD:      Umhm.  Now look, I expanded this,  I took it and I made this bigger with a photocopy machine.  Now here it is here, let me follow this up…here’s the main channel of the river, right here.  Let me follow it, now, Edward, I got it on that other map, I can show you real well.  I have one marked [a map].  Look and see where I have one with some names on it.  It might be…

Lena Mae:     Right here?

JD:      Yes, yes, yes, that’s it.  It’s one of the expanded ones.  If you come up from here, this is what was left of the lake – now this is modern, this is what the lake looked like in 1969.

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      So, the lake is all filled in by now [1969].  But you come up the main channel…this is the other side of the lake, that’s what was left of the lake in 1969 on the Blue Point side.  You get to Big Pigeon first,

Edward:        No, you should get to…yeah, Big Pigeon.

JD:      Big Pigeon first from down below.  You go up you get to Little Pigeon.

Edward:        Then Bayou Catfish.

JD:      Bayou Catfish is right there.  And there’s Keelboat Pass on one side and Hog Island right there in the middle.  So that’s Hog Island.  Now, this is what it looks like in 1975.  That’s what it looks like in 1975.  There’s Hog Island.  Here’s Keelboat Pass.  Here’s Hog Island Pass.  Here’s Grand Lake.  Here’s Catfish Bayou. 

Edward:        They don’t even show it comin out [out into Grand Lake, like it used to]

JD:      It does not come out anymore.  It does not contact the lake anymore, in 1975.

Edward:        Bayou Cowan?

JD:      Bayou Cowan is there, it doesn’t contact the lake either. 

Edward:        Bayou Smith….

JD:      Here’s Little Pigeon.

Edward:        Lil Pigeon still come out.

JD:      Lil Pigeon there, see.  Lil Pigeon got this pass right here.  Now I’m gonna make maps like this,  anyplace yall tell me that there were houseboat communities.  I want to make maps like this and place em ….

Edward:        They was all…. every one of these bayous had people livin in em.

Lena Mae:     Umhm. 

JD:      You can tell then, pretty close, where they were. 

Edward:        Bayou Pigeon, the Burns’s used to live…that’s where we used to live. 

JD:      Now, one thing I’d like to do before I leave it is, before I leave this map…

Edward:        I don’t remember Bayou Pigeon comin out in that,  position. 

JD:      Well, that’s what it does now. 

Edward:        It went more straight in.

JD:      Well, it could be you don’t even notice one of these bayous right here.  Could be you just do this 

Edward:        Umhm.

JD:      Could be you don’t make that big curve, like that.  But if you look at it in,  well, where’s that old, old, map – you can see what Pigeon did on that old map.  There’s Big Pigeon, Lil Pigeon is not, uh…   That’s Lil Pigeon.  Lil Pigeon right there.  So it shows it coming straight out [into the lake]. 

Edward:        Yeah, see it’s more on a slant here [in 1975].  Used to go in right here and they had a big old hill right there in the front, and it would make a turn. It would be straight, it’s goin up the bayou a lil ways, then it would make another left hand turn, after that I don’t know which way it went, then. 

JD:      That’s probably your big left hand turn right there.

Edward:        Yeah, Jesse Burns and them used to live…Jesse Burns lived on that point here.  And we used to live right here in a, in a house.  Big old house on the bank.  And they had another big house up here,  the Fargeys [sp?],  Charlie Fargey, Bill Fargey’s grandpaw…had a great big old house up here on the bank.  They owned all this land, them Fargeys. 

JD:      Still, now?

Edward:        Yeah, still own it.  But we live here, we lived at Pigeon, we lived…Keelboat  [another conversation starts with Danny, Bonita’s husband]

JD:      [to Edward]  mark on here, use your pencil…

Edward:        You mark.

JD:      OK.  Where did…I know that yall told me there was a…a…campboat community on Keelboat, Catfish, Hog Island.  Now show me if you can, do you remember about where those, those houseboats were tied up?  I’m talking about where the bunches were tied up.

Edward:        OK.  See, that’s Flat Lake Pass, right there.  OK, there used to be a little…we’d call it Coal Island, there used to be a lil bayou that went down thru here.  Started about…let me see your pencil, 

JD:      You can mark on here, that’s all right. 

Edward:        It would start about right in here, that lil bayou, and it went on down, and it would come out.  OK, they had people livin here, had people livin here,

JD:      Tied up to the bank?

Edward:        Yeah, well, some of em livin on the bank.   my aunt and them had built a house on the bank. Aunt Lizabeth.  They lived right on this…there was a point right there…they lived right on that point.  And they had houseboats tied there, and we used to live right there.

JD:      On the bank.

Edward:        No, we was on a houseboat.  And they had people livin over here…here’s where they put that, they put that schoolhouse, see, right in here. 

JD:      That’s where the school was?

Edward:        Umhm, and look like they…they call it Deshotel Ditch…

JD:      You see, there’s a ditch that runs right there.

Edward:        OK, you see, that’s what it is.  We used to go into Bayou Persimmon, and that Bayou Persimmon would come down…you see Catfish used to come out here…well it would come out into Catfish.

JD:      That wasn’t Bayou Persimmon right here, I bet you.

Edward:        I don’t think it was that far up.

JD:      See, there’s Catfish right there? 

Edward:        Well, it used to come all the way out though, Jim. 

JD:      What did?

Edward:        Bayou Catfish.

JD:      Yeah, I know, it came all the way down here, but…

Edward:        And, I don’t know what your mileage is in here…

JD:      Oh, I don’t either, but it’s big. 

Edward:        It’s blowed up.

JD:      Well, you know how big Hog Island is.  You know how big Hog Island is, you can see that it’s not as wide as Hog Islan

Edward:        Yeah.  But anyhow, that ditch used to come down and used to hit…we used to call it Bayou Persimmon, and it would come on down into Catfish, and you had all kind of other bayous that forked up in there.

JD:      You can see everything…

Edward:        And we lived, I dunno, it seemed like we was close…we was closer to the lake…you know, I mean, like I’m sayin, what I’m talking about close to,  where we lived to the lake… oh, it might a bin 2000 feet.

JD:      Talking about…

Edward:        On Bayou Catfish.

JD:      Oh, Bayou Catfish.

Edward:        Big old shell hill, all that was shell, you had shell all along that bank…

JD:      That was Indian mounds, you think, those shell?

Edward:        I guess.

JD:      Did yall ever find pieces of, pieces of pots, and stuff.

Edward:        Oh Jim, they had all kinds of stuff.  Back in them days, you didn’t even look for nuttin like that, you know?

JD:      But they did have it mixed in the shell?

Edward:        Oh yeah. Umhm.  And even Bayou Smith, that was all shell bank.  Big hills, shells, you know.  On Keelboat and Hog Island, they didn’t have that.  You take Bayou Cowan, that bayou right here, well that was shell bank too. 

JD:      And it was all comin out to the lake at that time.

Edward:        All come out, right into the lake.  Every one of em.  You take all the way…Lil Pigeon, Big Pigeon, Bayou Smith, Bayou Cowan…well Bayou Cowan, Bayou Cowan…

JD:      Bayou Smith right there, what was left of it.

Edward:        Yeah. 

JD:      That used to come out down in here somewhere.

Edward:        Aw yeah.  It was by Lil Pigeon, see? 

JD:      The mouth of Lil Pigeon?

Edward:        Yeah, well, pretty close to it, I mean, it wasn’t close…maybe a mile apart, and then you had Bayou Cowan, then Bayou atfish.

JD:      Let me see your pencil a minute.  You say there was a community…I’m talking about, like…would you say there were ten houseboats tied up…

Edward:        No, well, they had, all along the bayou, it was, you know, one here and maybe two here, different places, you know. 

JD:      All along.  Would you say they’d start up as far up and the point…

Edward:        No, they started right here.

JD:      And they went to where?

Edward:        Way down to this bend right here. 

JD:      About to there?

Edward:        Yeah.  They got a water gauge…I guess it’s still on that bend right there in Bayou Catfish.  Well, that’shere Dushy Mire used to live, right there.

JD:      Now, you said there was one on…there was a campboat community on Hog Island too, where was that?

Edward:        And Jesse Higgins, that was right around here, right around where the school used to be.  And Jesse Higgins, Jesse Higgins lived there, and uh…

JD:      Somewhere in here?

Edward:        Yeah, and you come on down here that’s where people lived there.  Ok, that used to come out on the channel.

JD:      Yeah, it did, look at that. 

Edward:        what they used to call that bayou?  I used to know the name of that bayou.  I went through it many a time.  Alonzo Palmer [sp?] used to live right there on the point. 

JD:      Ok, now, would you say there were houseboats tied up all the way from here….

Edward:        Different spots, you know, not all the way, but you had some livin here, you had some here, and you had some on this side too, both sides.

JD:      Both sides.  Would you say to about right here, there was some…

Edward:        Yeah, yeah.  Umhm.  Right. 

JD:      So, the ones you talking about on Hog Island, you talking about actually in Hog Island Pass.

Edward:        Yeah, umhm.  Right, in Hog Island Pass.  You see, that where Dan and them had a house…

JD:      Dan Lange and them?

Edward:        Yeah, they had a house, and then they put that school up there, right on there.

JD:      That’s where the school was?

Edward:        Yeah, right in that bend there.  And we used to walk from here, we had us a trail, walk through the woods, and come out on Keelboat Pass.

JD:      Where was it you think yall were livin…if you can take a look at Catfish Bayou, what’s left of it right there, you can see i

Edward:        Well, I can’t tell, it, it, look like we was livin further down in here…

JD:      There’s a delta right in here, so could be the mouth was right in here someplace.

Edward:        Yeah, that’s what I say, we was livin pretty close in here, I would think, you know?  And we used to walk across over here and we’d catch a school boat. 

JD:      You’d walk all the way across there?

Edward:        All the way across, it’s three or four miles across there.  And we’d catch a school boat and we’d take it all the way around here and come around and bring us to school.  That was a pretty good little hike.

JD:      You bet. 

Edward:        And, at one time, we walked…from over here, when we lived over here we used to walk across…

JD:      Somebody would take yall across right here?

Edward:        They had a…a skiff for us to pull across to go to school.  Row across, they wasn’t no motor on it. 

JD:      Yall lived on,  on a campboat.

Edward:        Yeah, on a campboat.

JD:      And you would walk across.

Edward:        We lived in a house, over here.  And the Burns’s used to live over here, straight across, they had a big road they cut, we used to walk to them Burns’s.  Lot of times we’d leave here, walk across here, cross the bayou there, and walk all the way across to the Burns’s, spend the day.

JD:      [note to recorder]  Edward’s talking about leaving Keelboat Pass, walking across Hog Island, crossing Hog Island Pass and then walking across the swamp to where they had a place on a, on a…

Edward:        On Atchafalaya.

JD:      The channel?

Edward:        Yeah.  The Burns’s.  Old man Nick Burns.

JD:      Oh, is that where?  Oh is that where Miss Myrtle and them still live?  Right there on Hog Island…not on Hog Island, but across from Hog Island?

Edward:        On the channel, yeah. 

JD:      Is that where Amarada is now?

Edward:        Yeah, that’s probably Amarada still right there, fact it is, you see?  They lived just above.  They lived right here. 

JD:      OK, so I’m goin to put a mark there, says…

Edward:        Pretty close to they house.

JD:      Myrtle is her name, right?

Edward:        Yeah, Myrtle Burns.  Bigler now, but it used to be Burns. 

JD:      OK, Bigler.  OK, very good.

Edward:        You see, years ago…

JD:      Amarada?

Edward:        Yeah.  There was,  Myrtle and them daddy…