This web site is for the descendants of Peter Michael Gauthier (born 1888) and Lucie Amelia Michot (born 1888), both of Avoyelles Parish.  Families of descendants are requested to submit your family information to this site so that ours and future generations may know of their history and relatives.

This web site is password protected for the privacy of all living descendants.  Accounts and passwords will be released to descendants only.  Please send an email to family@michelgauthier.com with your family data.

Descendants of the ancestors of Peter and Lucie that are not in our direct line may eventually be shown through the last deceased person.  In other words, we will not list living relatives of ours that are not descendants of Peter and Lucie, unless requested to do so.

Gauthier Background

Hello, my name is Martin Gauthier.  I'm the little guy on the bottom right of the above picture.  I was born in Louisiana as were all of our Gauthier ancestors back to Rene Gauthier who arrived in New Orleans in 1719 from France.  Interestingly, New Orleans was founded in 1716.  Rene's father Michel was born in France as was Rene. 

Our Gauthier ancestors were not Acadians.  Rene, age 18,  came from France to New Orleans on the ship la Marie in 1719.  He served for a land grant company as a scout and eventually translator to the Indians of Louisiana. He died about age 57 on 25 April 1758. His first descendants settled in what is now Rapides and Avoyelles Parishes. 

Many of the present generation of Rene's descendants still reside in Avoyelles and in Rapides with great numbers now located across southern Louisiana, particularly the Baton Rouge and New Orleans metro areas.  Most of the Lafayette area Gauthiers and St. Bernard area Gauthiers and Gautiers are not descendants of Rene. 

Making the connection from Peter Gauthier, born 1888, back to Rene Gauthier, born about 1701, was a 10 year effort.  A number of Gauthier families have a missing connection and so it was with ours.  Often, as in our case it was around the 1860 census and the civil war.  The missing connection was Peter Gauthier's paternal grandparents.  Peter's parents are Michael Gauthier, born about 1856, and Sarah Anne Bettevy, born 1864.  Peter's father, Michael Gauthier died at age 31 or 32.  His wife, Sarah was expecting the child that was named Michel Ross Gauthier.  Michael worked on the large farm owned by his father-in-law Francois Bettevy.  One story has it that Michael was kicked in the head by a mule. 

In any event, our ancestor Peter Gauthier, the fourth of five children, was about 2 when his father died.  And the oldest child Lucinda, was about 10.  So this family was raised without personal knowledge of their father and his family.  And the connection was lost.

Making the Connection

About 1992, my father Ishmael Michel (Pete) Gauthier and I began numerous trips to Avoyelles Parish to churches, cemeteries and towns.  We visited with family and friends to begin tracing our Gauthier lineage.  Ishmael, the oldest of Peter's children, was born in 1910 near Marksville, as was his father Peter Michael Gauthier.  Ishmael is the little boy in the top picture.

No one knew where Peter's father Michael Gauthier was born, who were his parents, nor more than a couple of his siblings.  So began the hunt for Michael that lead to the collection of a vast amount of data.  The skeleton of our findings was published on the Avoyelles Parish Louisiana Genealogy site in September 1997 with a listing of 1551 individuals from 476 Gauthier families and their deceased descendants. 

Yet, after all that research and data collection there was not yet conclusive proof of Michael's parents and siblings.  Every deceased Gauthier that was a descendant of Rene Gauthier who arrived from France in New Orleans in 1718 were in the listing.  The living were not listed because of privacy considerations, yet we had vast quantities of that information too.  Michael's ancestry and siblings remained a mystery although the suspicions were correct.  Then in 1999 a letter arrived that detailed Michael's parents and siblings.  The author of that letter had initiated correspondence a few years before as a result of our Gauthier Family listing in the Avoyelles Parish Louisiana Genealogy site.  This individual found that definitive record. 

The details of Finding Michael continue here.