In the days of my youth there was no such thing as one-minute oatmeal. Mum would put the oatmeal in a double boiler and let it cook slowly on the back of the stove during the evening. The next morning she would heat it up and serve it to us piping hot, smothered with brown sugar and drenched in real cream.

Toasters had not made their appearance either. To make toast, Mum would put a slice of home made bread between two wire racks with a handle. Next she placed this in the opened side cover of the stove.

With filled tummies, Cliff and I set out on this warm Saturday morning in May to pick a bouquet of flowers to give to Mum for Mother's Day. Our first stop was under the elm tree by the brook near Bob's gate to check on the blood root.. Below the bridge we spotted red trillium in the alder bushes. There were lots of adder tongues to gather. In the field we picked some bluets. Our final stop was behind the cemetery to add some pink and white ground phlox.

Mum acted as pleased as if we had bought her a dozen red roses from  a Flower Shop. She did a bit of rearranging and placed the flowers in a pickle bottle to serve as a centrepiece for Sunday's dinner.

Speaking of gathering flowers, I wonder if Francoise Marie Jacquelin, better known as Madame La Tour gathered flowers from the hillside near Fort La Tour, Saint John to decorate her dinner table.

In 1640 Francoise, of France had been offered and she accepted a very generous marriage contract by a representative of Charles La Tour. She sailed for Acadia on the L'Amitye de la Rochelle. At Cape Sable, she found La Tour waiting for her and they were married here before proceeding to the fort at the mouth of the St. John River.

Francoise Marie Jacquelin probably left France with dreams in her heart of making a home at the fort with her Governor husband and raising a family in this foreign land but found hardship, adventure and death waiting for her in her attempt to defend her home.

Charles's third wife was Jeanne Motin, the widow of his rival d'Aulnay and from this union five children were born.

Charles La Tour's oldest daughter, Jeanne (born to his Micmac wife), settled at the mouth of the St. John river in the early 1660s with her husband, Martin d'Aprendistiguy, a Basque associate of her father's. They became the Sieur and Dame de Martignon with the grant of a seigneury. The St. John river community of Martinon is a reminder of them.

Fortune & LaTour - The Civil War in Acadia by M. A. MacDonald tells the story of the life of fourteen-year-old Charles La Tour who came in 1606 to join Poutrincourt and Samuel de Champlain at Port Royal, the first European outpost north of Spanish Florida. He determined to make his life there - a life of wandering with a band of Frenchmen and Micmacs, of building forts to maintain the claims of France in America, of rising to become Lieutenant-Governor of Acadia. But it was also a life of war, treachery and survival.

By the way, many of the old families of Acadia can, if they wish, claim kinship with Charles La Tour.

* * *
Query 850
Hutchison - Manzer: Lena White Hutchison, was born on Nov.19, 1854 in Saint John to James Hutchison and Mary Lester Manzer. I need a copy of her birth record as well as her marriage record to James Reid Andrews on Nov.30,1880. Any help will be greatly appreciated as I need these documents to prove lineage.
 -Norma McGuire, 19626 48A Ave., Langley, B.C., V3A 3N7. E-mail norma@telus.net.

Query 851
Squires: I have been searching for the parents of Seth Squires of Westville, New York and  I've come across the Seth Sr and Jr who left Stratford, CT on the Loyalist ship "Union" for Saint John, New Brunswick. The Seth Squires, I am researching was born about 1775 and appears in the 1820 census of New York. I am interested in determining if a Seth Squires from the Loyalist to New Brunswick family returned to the New York state. Any help would be appreciated.
 -Kathleen Baker, 1830 Rt 85, Oakdale, Ct, 06370, USA. E-mail KATHYB@prodigy.net.

Query 852
Titus: I am compiling a comprehensive genealogy of the descendants of John and Benjamin Titus, brothers from Long Island, New York, who came to New Brunswick with the Loyalists in 1783.  They settled first at Washdemoak and later at Jemseg c1790.  Benjamin later removed to Upper Canada in 1800 and settled on the Bay of Quinte.  He left some descendants in NB, namely  children of his eldest son, Silas who married Rachel, daughter of Sgt. Nathaniel Parks in 1794 and lived in the Fredericton-Douglas area. John Titus left a very large posterity. He had one daughter, Elizabeth, wife of Andrew Gunter, progenitor of the New Brunswick Gunters. John Titus also had three sons: Benjamin, Jonathan and John. Benjamin (son of John) had descendants who settled primarily in St. Mary`s parish, now Fredericton North, and in the Portland district of Saint John.  Jonathan had eight sons, seven of whom settled in Hampton parish, Kings County and founded the community of  Titusville.  The youngest, Benjamin (son of Jonathan son of John) remained on the Jemseg.  John Titus (son of John) moved to Oxford County, Canada West in 1830. I have large but incomplete body of data covering ten generations, 1780-1950 and I would appreciate any contributions of data, history, lore, photos. I will be glad to share all data (computer text file.)
 -Greg Haley, 18 Tulip Street, Fredericton, NB, E3C 1L6. E-mail to greghaley1@hotmail.com.

  Ruby is a genealogy buff. Readers are invited to send their New Brunswick genealogical queries to her at rmcusack@nbnet.nb.ca. When E-Mailing please put Yesteryear Families in the Subject line. Please include in the query, your name and postal address as someone reading the newspaper, may have information to share with you but not have access to E-mail. Queries should be no more than 45 words in length.