{"id":15995,"date":"2014-10-26T10:49:09","date_gmt":"2014-10-26T14:49:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/?p=15995"},"modified":"2014-10-26T21:12:45","modified_gmt":"2014-10-27T01:12:45","slug":"louis-riel-ancestors-basement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/en\/louis-riel-ancestors-basement\/","title":{"rendered":"Did Louis Riel hide in my ancestor’s basement?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"riel<\/a><\/p>\n

Family lore says that my ancestor Joseph Arial had many meetings with Louis Riel in the basement of a hotel he owned. The story might be about a hotel in St. Boniface that may have served as a hide-away for the M\u00e9tis hero and later burned to the ground or it\u00a0may be referring to a hotel owned by his son Joseph Gabriel, who ran his own hotel in Gleichan* (near Cluny), Alberta.<\/p>\n

How does a genealogist go about proving such a story? The family legend might refer only to my great great great grandfather or his son, or it may combine the exploits of both.<\/p>\n

My first challenge was figuring out the timing. Louis Riel was born in the Red River Valley in 1844 and was hanged for treason on November 16, 1885.[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

Then I began searching through the names and dates of my ancestors\u2019 lives.[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

Joseph Arial was the first of my ancestors who left Quebec. He was born in 1812 in St. Roch and died on November 4, 1880 in St. Boniface, Manitoba, where he is buried. His wife was Julie Belleau dit LaRose who was born the year before he was. The two were married in St. Roch on September 4, 1832. St. Boniface is on the south side of the Red River, so the location is correct, although he would have been much older than Riel.<\/p>\n

His son, Joseph Gabriel was married to Marie Sophie Bernard in St. Boniface, Manitoba on August 8, 1887. Their hotel would be too late to have anything to do with Riel. Joseph\u2019s wife is important to my story, however, because her mother was born in 1838 in St. Anne-des-Ch\u00eanes (Oak Point), just down the river from where Riel would be born six years later. Her mother, Sophie Henault Canada was also born in the Red River Valley, so there were roots that went back years. The possibility that Sophie\u2019s parents, Charles-Henault-Canada and Marie Gris, knew Louis Riel\u2019s parents, Julie Lagimodi\u00e8res and Jean-Louis Riel, who were married in the chapel of St. Boniface Cathedral on January 21, 1844 were high.<\/p>\n

That isn\u2019t proof though.<\/p>\n

My next step will be to verify the guests at the marriages of Joseph Gabriel and Marie Sophie and the marriage of Julie Lagimodi\u00e8res and Jean-Louis Riel, but in the meantime, perhaps what happened after Riel\u2019s death will tell us more.<\/p>\n

So far, the only information I have comes from Fred Jones in his story called \u201cBlackfoot Reserve. \u201d He speaks about Gabriel Arial running a hotel. He writes:<\/p>\n

My first impression of Gleichen was when we arrived by way of Calgary from the Blood Reserve. We stayed in the Palace Hotel, owned by a French Canadian named Mr. Gabriel Arial, and I think he built it. Some of the Old Timers seem to think it was originally build of logs, but I had seen parts of it torn down and repaired here and there with no logs under the sheeting, but the rough boards were hand-sawn with the old, long ripsaw, and iron nails were used. The style was what you might call early Western, and no luxuries were provided. The rooms contained a bed, chair, washstand and plain dresser, a big jug full of cold water and a smaller jug, for drinking. If you needed more water you took your jug downstairs and outside, to the well. A kerosene lamp provided light.<\/p>\n

The Arials welcomed us, and were very hospitable. So were the cockroaches and bed bugs, but that was the usual thing in any dwelling in those days. There were no insect repellents, except kerosene and pyrethrum powder and these failed to attain victory. A a standoff was the best to be hoped for, as the walls were hollow and the plaster cracked so the enemy could retreat and fight another night.<\/p>\n

I went to school later with the Arial boys and girls. The hotel was later sold to Brosseau Brothers, and the Arials moved to Edmonton.<\/p>\n

I think we arrived in Gleichen about 1896 or 1897, as the C.P.R. roundhouse was still there and I think it was moved to Calgary in 1898. (As I recount these many events, please consider that they happened over seventy years ago. They may be kind of sketchy and not follow in proper sequence and some that made an impression then, may not have been as important as others that might have been forgotten.)[3]<\/strong><\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Is this Gabriel my grandfather? I don\u2019t know for sure yet, but I think so. My grandfather was called Gabe after his father and he grew up in Edmonton. My grandmother also moved to Cluny as a child and that\u2019s where they met. This Gabriel Arial may also have been a cousin though, so I still have much more verification to do.<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> All the facts about Louis Riel and his life in this story come from Maggie Siggins\u2019 book \u201cRiel A Life of Revolution\u201d Harper Collins, Toronto, 1994.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> For this part, I relied on the handwritten notes of Mary Alice Kite and my grandmother, Ann Marguerite Arial. My grandmother learned how to do genealogy from Mary Alice and she knew my great grandparents personally. She would have confirmed their parents\u2019 and grandparents\u2019 names with them. She also collected photos of the family, which I now have. Few of the people can be easily identified now.<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> The Prairie Hub, by John Julius Martin, Rosebud, Alberta, The Strathmore Standard, 1967, p. 160.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

*An earlier version of this story spelled\u00a0Gleichen incorrectly.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Family lore says that my ancestor Joseph Arial had many meetings with Louis Riel in the basement of a hotel he owned. The story might be about a hotel in St. Boniface that may have served as a hide-away for the M\u00e9tis hero and later burned to the ground or it\u00a0may be referring to a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_wp_convertkit_post_meta":{"form":"-1","landing_page":"0","tag":"0","restrict_content":"0"},"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_hide_featured_image":false,"_jetpack_featured_image_duplicate_dismissed":0,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[100],"tags":[511,509,507,508,506,510],"class_list":["post-15995","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-genealogy-ensemble-history-worth-remembering","tag-fred-jones","tag-gabriel-arial","tag-joseph-arial","tag-joseph-gabriel-arial","tag-louis-riel","tag-marie-sophie-bernard","post-wrapper","thrv_wrapper"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2buQs-49Z","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":19746,"url":"https:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/en\/original-arials-of-western-canada\/","url_meta":{"origin":15995,"position":0},"title":"Original Arial Family of Western Canada","author":"Tracey Arial","date":"July 24, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"They sat and stood calmly for the formal portrait. No one smiled. An accompanying photocopy with names scrawled on each person identifies the people. Four chairs in the middle hold Remi, Sophie, Joseph Gabriel and Pete. Billy, Augusta, Joe, Sophie, Aldous, Lucy and Eddy stand behind the chairs. 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My great great great grandparents\u2014Joseph Gabriel Arial Robert Content and Judith\/Julie Belleau-dit-LaRose \u2014both grew up in the neighbourhood. They knew it\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "History Worth Remembering"","block_context":{"text":"History Worth Remembering","link":"https:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/en\/category\/history-worth-remembering\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"1900 overview of St Roche","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/377x300-6800_st-roch_1.jpg?fit=377%2C300&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":18784,"url":"https:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/en\/marie-sophie-henault-canada\/","url_meta":{"origin":15995,"position":2},"title":"Who were Marie Sophie Henault-Canada’s parents?","author":"Tracey Arial","date":"May 16, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Who were Marie Sophie Henault-Canada's parents? My struggle answering this question typifies the trouble I've had researching all of my First Nation ancestors. See my stories about St. Anne and Louis Riel . It\u2019s clear that my four-times great grandmother Marie Sophie (or S\u00e9raphie) Henault-Canada was born in the Red\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Genealogy Ensemble"","block_context":{"text":"Genealogy Ensemble","link":"https:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/en\/category\/history-worth-remembering\/genealogy-ensemble-history-worth-remembering\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Sophie: Manitoba Census 1870","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/SophieManitobaCensus1870-1.jpg?fit=1068%2C348&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/SophieManitobaCensus1870-1.jpg?fit=1068%2C348&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/SophieManitobaCensus1870-1.jpg?fit=1068%2C348&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/SophieManitobaCensus1870-1.jpg?fit=1068%2C348&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/SophieManitobaCensus1870-1.jpg?fit=1068%2C348&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":8923,"url":"https:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/en\/family-history-writing-2014\/","url_meta":{"origin":15995,"position":3},"title":"Family History Writing 2014 Begins!","author":"Tracey Arial","date":"February 1, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Today is the beginning of Family History Writing 2014. 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She\u2019s also created an online forum so that those of us participating can ask questions and share our work with\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Family History Writing"","block_context":{"text":"Family History Writing","link":"https:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/en\/category\/history-worth-remembering\/family-history-writing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"AnneMargueriteMarieHurtubiseArial","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/AnneMargueriteMarieHurtubiseArial.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":17325,"url":"https:\/\/traceyarial.com\/blog\/en\/how-profile-your-ancestors\/","url_meta":{"origin":15995,"position":4},"title":"How to Profile Your Ancestors","author":"Tracey Arial","date":"October 27, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"I've just released the third video in my profile your ancestors series. In this video, I describe how I profiled one of my ancestors in the story Anne Joseph Gourdine's Journey to Canada\u00a0using my story, structure, style, sound process. 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