1853—1914

Magloire Robidoux—a man of mystery; a man of two nations; a man who lived in two different civilizations in North America.  Born in St. Constant, Quebec, Canada on April 13, 1830, he resided in Canada for his first twenty-three years.  Then, leaving a world of modern civilization for his day, he left his homeland of Canada and entered the United States to reside in one of its most uncivilized wildernesses—the Minnesota Territory.

Magloire came to the Minnesota Territory in 1853 by way of the Mississippi and Minnesota Rivers.  There he made his home in the town of Fort Ridgley, which was next to Ft. Ridgley, and was employed by the army at the fort as laborer and carpenter.  At that time most of the pioneers were immigrants from England, Germany and the Scandinavian countries.  There were very few French Canadians in the area; thus, he became acquainted with Hyacinthe Coutourier, Francois Dumerce  (Demers) and Henry Hill.  Unknown to Magloire at that time, all of these men had an influence on his life.  Coutourier became a long-time friend and a brother-in-law; Dumerce became his father-in-law and Hill a business partner. 

His future father-in-law, Francois Dumerce, a trapper and scout for the United States Army, lived nearby at the town of Eight Mile Creek.  By 1857 Eight Mile Creek was a large enough town to have a Justice of Peace to record marriages in the area.  It was in July 1857  that  Madaline  Dumerce and Magloire Robidoux were married with Madaline’s brother Francis as a witness.  The couple lived in the town of Fort Ridgley before moving to the mouth of Hawk Creek, Minnesota.

The couple’s first son, Oliver, was born in 1856 at the town of Fort Ridgley, Minnesota that was near the military fort of Ft. Ridgley. This small fort was in the Southwestern part of the Minnesota Territory along the Minnesota River and was the protector for the settlers in the area.  The family must have moved to Hawk Creek, about fifty miles west of the fort, later that year as their second son was born at the Hawk Creek home in February 1857.  They were the only pioneer family in the area where their only neighbors were the Dakota Indians who lived in a small community across the Minnesota River near the Robidoux cabin.

Feuds were many among the Dakota villages and in one of these Magloire found himself accidentally involved.  One weekend a few of the Dakota men from one village asked Magloire if they could buy a jug of liquor to celebrate a successful hunt.  This he did.  He did not suspect the true reason for the purchase.  The men who bought the jug actually needed the liquor to help them “build up courage in themselves” to commit murder.  They wanted to kill a nephew of one of the neighboring village chiefs as this man was becoming a farmer and taking up “the white man’s ways”.  When some of the villagers from the murdered man foun d out that Magloire had sold the murderers the liquor, they considered him guilty too.  Therefore, the following day they came to the Robidoux cabin, removed all the household goods, held the family captive as they burned the cabin down.  After this experience the family moved to an Indian Agency until tempers between the two villages cooled and it was safe to return.

When Magloire and his family returned to Hawk Creek is unknown, but the cabin had been rebuilt by the time another son, Nelson Ney, was born in 1860.  Things seemed to run smoothly in the area for a couple of years until August 1862.  The Civil War or War Between the States was in progress and in August of 1862 Magloire decided to enlist in the Renville Rangers for ninety days and fight in the Civil War and was on his way to Ft. Snelling at St. Paul, Minnesota.  This ninety-day enlistment in the army would certainly ensure Magloire his citizenship in the United States of America.

Just a few days before the Indian Uprising began Magloire along with a hundred or so men joined the Renville Rangers and were headed for Ft. Snelling to be inducted into the army.   On the way there a messenger from Ft. Ridgley told them to return to the fort as Indians were attacking it.  Upon return, the unit “drove its way through the Indians to the fort and fought with brave conduct and like veterans.” This was the first of five great battles in which Margloire Robidoux participated.  Magloire Robidoux’s military unit, Renville Rangers or First Minnesota Mounted Rangers, were considered heroes in this battle of the 1862 Indian War and the unit was awarded medals and given recognition by President Lincoln.&nbs p; Magloire was very proud of his medal as he wore it at any occasion possible. 

The four other battles were Stony Lake, Wood Lake, Dead Buffalo Lake and Big Mound from August to December of 1862.  In December 1862 Magloire’s unit was now called the First Cavalry of Minnesota of the United States Army and his volunteer time in the army was extended for one full year.  That company of cavalry was ordered to instill marshal law upon the Dakota Indian Reservations, on its immediate vicinity and the Dakota Territory from the State of Minnesota to the Rocky Mountains.  

While Magloire was fighting at Ft. Ridgley many white citizens of the area were killed and many of the cabins along the Minnesota River were destroyed.  Luckily; Madaline Robidoux received a warning, gathered her four children together and hid in a garden for a time before venturing to Ft. Ridgley by way of the Minnesota River. (One son, Nelson, told the tale of hiding in the turnip patch before running to the river when they saw a canoe with some settlers fleeing down the river.)  The family was no more than a quarter mile away when their home was again destroyed.  The trip itself took nine days of traveling to the fort as moving down the river could only be done at night. During the last four days it started to rain and continued until the party of ragamuffins came to the fort.  There, the soldiers brought them to safety and the family was again reunited.  Magloire’s family stayed at the fort for the rest of the uprising while he served his enlistment in the army.  With the end of the “Indian Uprising” and Magloire’s enlistment complete, the Robidoux family again returned to Hawk Creek and for the third time Magloire built a home for his family.  He finally homesteaded his land in 1864.

A few years later Hawk Creek Township was established and Magloire was elected to the public office of Assistant Clerk of the township in 1867.  He held this office for a number of years before his businesses of farming and real estate forced him to relinquish that office.  His real estate adventure must have been a success for in the early 1870’s a newspaper article describes Magloire’s home as “a cabin of the Frenchman who owned the trading post was comfortable for him and his family of five children”. 

Magloire may have known James J. Hill, the millionaire who owned the Great Northern Railroad, through his cousin, Henry J. Hill of Granite Falls, Minnesota.  Henry Hill was a good businessman and Magloire had many business ventures with him.  One of these ventures was when Henry Hill had land along the south side of the Minnesota River while Magloire had land directly across from him.  This was because there was a mention of future paddleboat and railroad traffic in the area and both men were prepared to sell land to the incoming settlers.  Because Magloire’s farm was next to the Minnesota River and the mouth Hawk Creek, he had it plotted for a town as the railroad was supposed to come through his property .  Due to the geography of the land this became impossible as the hills had too steep of a grade for the trains to get to the river bottoms. 

Besides being a farmer he traded with the Dakota Indians in the area.  With the high cliffs back of the cabin, the family was somewhat isolated from the rest of the pioneers and the Minnesota River provided an excellent means for the Dakota Indians to transport their furs and farm products.  Also, there were few families in the area that spoke French—most of the new pioneers in that area spoke other languages.

Magloire was believed to have built a cabin half up the steep hill on the west bank of Hawk Creek where it met the Minnesota River.  From that vantage point anyone can see up and down the river for about a mile, for at that point the river ran approximately east and west while the creek flowed into it from the north.   The edges of the cliffs sat back from the river about 400 feet and were about 90 feet high with the summit being treeless during the time Magloire lived there.  At the time when Magloire built his cabin there were no roads from the cliffs above to the flat land near the river; thus, river traffic was the most feasible.

Hawk Creek had a 90-foot gorge that left a span between the two sides of the creek of about 300 feet at the top of the two ridges.  There was about a 200-foot flat land area along the river and to the base of the cliffs.  It was on this flat land near the river that Magloire leased some land to a Mr. Roberts with the intention of building a trading post and docking place for the paddleboats that were to arrive weekly.  That was the only trading post in the Upper Indian Agency area and both Indian and white settlers were customers to this establishment.  The success of the trading post and the thought of having a railroad coming to the area probably prompted the thought of establishing a town on Magloire’s land.

The Minnesota River was wide at this point and water flow was gentle most of the time; therefore, the docking of boats was made easy.  According to some stories by early settlers, Magloire had “the perfect boat landing” in the area.  The problem was that there was no way to have the railroad come to the flatland area near the river.  The cliffs were too high and steep and the flatland strip was too narrow for a town and a railroad.  Thus, without having the access of the railroad to the community, the settlers had to seek another location for a town. The location chosen was about ten miles west of Magloire’s property where the land was low and flat near the Minnesota River—the present site of Granite Falls , Minnesota.

Magloire must have had a good mathematical mind.  Reviewing his buying and selling habits of land holdings near the Granite Falls, Minnesota area revealed he did a lot of “wheeling and dealing” with land.  He bought land at a low price and sold it at high price or sold portions of his land for more than he paid for the entire piece of land.  Also, portions of land at Hawk Creek were sold and bought back at lower price when the “railroad town” failed to materialize.  Another trick he did was to let his land go back to the county for failure to pay taxes.  When the need came, he would buy back the land and resell it for a profit.&nbs p; After all, why pay taxes on land that wasn’t going to be uses immediately?  Where Magloire got his information as when to buy or sell land and make a profit is still a mystery.  Although records do not indicate how that information was received, it is known that he had business dealings over the years with Henry Hill—and that included his cousin James J. Hill.

Life seemed to be going well when tragedy struck again for Magloire as Madaline died of consumption the day after Christmas in 1871 in Sleepy Eye, Minnesota.  Magloire and his family were probably visiting Madaline’s sister, Rosalie, for the Christmas Holidays.  Rosalie had also married a French Canadian, Hyacinth Coutourier, and his family was living in Sleepy Eye.  Records and newspaper articles in the area of that time state that it was a severe winter and many people died of consumption—or pneumonia. The weather was bad that year as the first snow that stayed on the ground that winter came in October and spring didn’t come until the end of April.  Also, Madaline had lost a son at childbirth in the previous November and the fifty-mile sleigh ride in such cold weather may have contributed to her death.

Magloire was a very independent person for his time.  In fact, at times he just didn’t conform to the normal ways of doing things.  For instance, instead of having some of his family buried in a town or church cemetery, he just created one on his own property.  There he placed his first wife Madaline and his two sons Joseph and Magloire.

Because he could not raise the children and still keep the farm, the children were given neighbors and relatives of his wife.  Oliver and Noah probably stayed with their Aunt Rosalie as there are pictures of the two brothers with their cousin William, son of Rosalie.  Also, there are some pictures addressed to “Aunt Rosalie”.  In Noah’s adult life he returned to Sleepy Eye area with his second wife to visit the Coutouriers.  Where the rest of the children went is unknown during the period that Magloire was widower, but shortly after Magloire married Nancy Lentz in October 1873, most of the children returned home at Hawk Creek.  On his marriage application to Nancy, Magloire listed his residence as Sleepy Eye as he may have returned to his trade as a carpenter while staying with the Coutourier family.

Soon after his second marriage, Magloire moved his family to a farm just south of Granite Falls, Minnesota.  The daughters probably stayed there until they were married.  It seemed that his sons Oliver, Noah and Nelson had other interests and did not follow the rest of the family to the new cabin.  The marriage with Nancy did produce three girls and they, as with the daughters from Magloire’s first marriage, stayed at home until they married.

Surprisingly, the Willmar-Sioux Falls Railroad soon came through the center of Magloire’s farm that he just bought.  Of course, he sold some of his land to the railroad.  Another thing Magloire did well was to lease easements on his Granite Falls property to the railroad company.  He did that twice, making a profit each time before he actually sold a long narrow strip of land to the railroad.

During the next ten to fifteen years Magloire became involved with the social activities in Granite Falls as he lived just a short distance from the city.  The one organization he was proud to be a member of, was the Grand Army of Republic (GAR).  He was a charter member of the Henry Hill Post 136 when it was formed in 1885 and still maintained his membership when the post was renamed the I. O. Russell Post.

Leaving the Granite Falls area, Magloire, at seventy-seven years of age, entered the Minnesota Soldiers Home in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1907 due to ill health.  He resided at the Home until his death in 1914; thus, ending an episode of one of Minnesota State’s most colorful pioneers in the Southwestern area during the 1850s through the 1890s.

Gordon Robideaux (10E3b4g4d3a)

descendant of Magloire's son Nelson Ney