Vital Information
| Field | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Full Name | Eugenia Virginia Tesson | Ancestry |
| Born | 1805 | Ancestry |
| Died | Unknown | Ancestry |
| Father | Michael Honore Tesson (1774-1835) | Ancestry |
| Mother | Genevieve Menard | Ancestry |
| Spouse | Joseph LaFleur | Ancestry |
| Children | John (1825), Lelandia (1828), Jean (1829), Marie/Mary (1832), Emelia (1836), Thomas Vital (1838), William (1840), Anna (1841) | Ancestry |
| Siblings | Lucinda Marie Ursula Tesson dit Honore (1796-1868), Marie Regina Tesson (d. 1846), and others | Ancestry |
Their Story
Eugenia Virginia Tesson was born in 1805, the daughter of Michael Honore Tesson (1774-1835) and Genevieve Menard. Her father was part of the Tesson dit Honore family, one of the earliest French colonial families in Missouri. Michael's father Louis Honore Tesson (1733-1807) had fought at the Battle of St. Louis in 1780 as a member of the Spanish militia.
Eugenia's father Michael died on 15 October 1835, when she was thirty years old. She had at least two sisters: Lucinda Marie Ursula Tesson dit Honore (1796-1868) and Marie Regina Tesson (d. 1846). The "dit Honore" attached to Lucinda's name confirms the family's use of this French colonial alternate surname.
Eugenia married Joseph LaFleur and had eight children between 1825 and 1841. The family appears to have remained in Missouri. Her youngest daughter Anna LaFleur (b. 1841) married Walter Hogan Dickinson.
The given name "Eugenia Virginia" is notable: "Virginia" may reflect the Tesson family's connections to the broader colonial network that included Virginia, or it may simply have been a fashionable name in early nineteenth-century Missouri.
Document Sources
| Document | Type | Vault Note |
|---|---|---|
| Ancestry compiled tree | Secondary | Parents, siblings, spouse, children, timeline |