Part 3 — The Second Marriage: Vautrin & A Larger Family

 🌼 Part 3 — The Second Marriage: Vautrin & A Larger Family

By her mid-twenties, Mary Ann Maranda dit le Frisé had already lived through what many would call a lifetime of trials — early marriage, the loss of children, migration, and survival under colonial pressures. Yet her story was far from finished.

After her first marriage to Joseph Brulé, Mary Ann entered a second union with Jean Baptiste Vautrin. This marriage would shape the next chapter of her life, expanding her family and carrying her into new territories.

With Vautrin, Mary Ann bore nine children. In a time when survival was never guaranteed, each child represented both hope and vulnerability. Her household must have been alive with the sounds of children’s laughter, the cries of babies, the rhythm of work, and the persistence of a mother’s care.

Unlike the Brulé years, this period brought a measure of stability. Yet challenges were never far away: frequent moves, political changes as the U.S. and Britain asserted control, and the ongoing displacement of Indigenous peoples. Through all of this, Mary Ann’s ability to nurture and raise a large family was an act of resistance in itself.

Her children with Vautrin connected her story to other families and communities, weaving together French Canadian settlers and Indigenous heritage. These ties formed the foundation of many families who would later build their lives in British Columbia.

Even as Mary Ann’s life grew fuller, she carried the weight of her early years — the Catholic Mission, the loss of children, the displacement from her homelands. Yet she kept going, and with each child she brought into the world, she ensured that her people’s spirit would endure.

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✒️ Historical Note: Family & Survival in Colonial Times

Large families were common among both settlers and Indigenous peoples in the 19th century. For Indigenous women married under Catholic authority, raising children became not only a personal duty but also a form of survival. Despite assimilation pressures, cultural memory often lived on through mothers who passed down stories, traditions, and resilience to their children.

Mary Ann’s family — spanning Brulé and Vautrin marriages — reflects this survival strategy. Each surviving child was a thread tying the past to the future, ensuring that despite colonial disruption, Indigenous bloodlines, languages, and histories would not vanish.

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🌿 Reflective Questions

1. What might daily life have looked like for Mary Ann raising nine children with Vautrin?
2. How does the survival of so many children contrast with the losses of her earlier years?
3. In what ways did women like Mary Ann carry culture forward through their families, even under colonial pressures?
4. How do large families reflect resilience in the face of historical trauma and displacement?