News of Refugees From the South

Newspaper Article Concerning Joel Francis DeLamirande and His Wife

Joel Francis DeLemeron was tried for treason against the Confederate Government a month after the Hangings. His "crime of treason" involved helping a few of the wives of men involved with the peace party.

Here is some of Diamond's account of the DeLemeron Case, pages 406 - 414
De Lemeron's Case, Fall Term, November 1862
State of Texas against Joel Francis DeLemeron, a citizen of Cooke County, Texas
Charged with treasonable and Traitorous acts against the Confederate Government
A Confederate spy, Dr. George Bradly, went to the home of Joel F. DeLemeron for the purpose of finding the whereabouts of Ware & Boyles.
Joel DeLemeron said that he was French.
DeLemeron told Bradly (confederate spy) that he had "gone to Mrs. Ware's contrary to orders from Southern men and had repaired her wagon" and that he "had loaned Mrs. Boyles his horse under the cloak of being hired from the old widow lady living with him, and that he intended to assist them."
(Ware and Boyles belonged to the Peace Party, and had ran away, and Joel De Lamirande was assisting their families to get to Missouri. He had been told by the Southern men, that he could NOT give aid to the women.)
In the trial, Bradley also said that DeLemeron gave "instructions in the arts of war" and proposed that they "make our way to the Northern army, then stationed on the North Fork of the Canadian River."
DeLamirande was found guilty of treason and sent to life in the Penitentiary.

Refugees From The South

Terrible Sufferings of Women and Children

The Union Sentiment in Texas

The following newspaper article was published in the Milwaukee Daily Sentinel on 14 Sep 1863. The article is referring to an article published in the St. Louis Union on the 5th of the month. Below the copy of the newspaper is a transcription. Be sure to note just how Joel DeLemeron got out of jail! We like his wife a lot -- she had spunk! The newspaper article does not mention Mrs. DeLemeron's given name. Joel Francis DeLamirande and wife have not been found in other records yet.
Note: This article spells the surname DeLamirande.

Click on the newspaper article to enlarge it. Transcription below.

Milwaukee Daily Sentinel, 14 Sep 1863

REFUGEES FROM THE SOUTH  Terrible Sufferings of Women and Children

The Union Sentiment in Texas.  

The St. Louis Union of the 5th instant publishes the following:

"The drill room at police headquarters, last evening, presented a scene in which the deplorable results and miseries entailed by the rebellion were exhibited in a vivid light. Several families, including three male members and the rest women and children numbering twenty, were ranged on the benches. They were fugitives from Arkansas and Texas, having been driven from their homes in consequence of having avowed Union sentiments....
Among the party was a woman named DeLamirande, who came all the way on foot to Springfield from Granville (Gainesville), Cooke County, Texas bringing with her a little girl about two years of age. She had experienced trouble enough to have borne down a dozen less resolute women. The history given by this woman was thrilling. She relates that in Cook County, last fall, seven Union men were hung and two were shot. Her husband, whose name was Joel Francis de Lamirande, was tried for treason against the Confederate Government, and sentenced to the penitentiary for life. His wife moved an appeal, and while he was still in jail she contrived a scheme to effect his release. She procured a saw and auger and contrived to get them into her husband’s cell. He soon bored out, and giving her directions to make her way towards the North, while he would go to Mexico and get out on the seaboard, where he would join the first Northern troops he met with and fight until the end of the war – then he would join her.
Her husband was born in St. Louis, and when four years old was taken to New York. At the age of seventeen he joined the army and went to Mexico. He afterwards settled in Mexico, where he married the woman who gave this information, about eight years ago. Mrs. De Lamirande was born and raised in Morgan county, Illinois and went to Texas quite young. They acquired a competence, and had one thousand dollars in gold laid up when the war broke out.
After her husband’s escape she was threatened with hanging and escaped in the night taking a horse, which she sold for money enough to pay her expenses on the way to Missouri and has ten dollars left. She traveled part of the way with a man named York who stopped at the Ribedeaux. In reply to our question whether York was a good Union man, she replied, ‘Why, mister, he was a Union man from the word jump."
On her route she passed through the Indian nation. She says that she has seen so much trouble that sometimes she can’t retain her right mind. In answer to a question, she said there was a ‘right smart Union feeling in Texas, but they dar’nt own it.’ In Collin county there were over three hundred Union people ‘laying out’ for our troops to come."

BlogNote: With a name like DeLemeron, it not surprising that there are many different spellings: DeLamirande, DeLemeron, DeLimerind, DelaMirand.  We have decided to go with the spelling in Diamond's Account of the Hangings and the McCaslin Book, which is DeLemeron.

Related Post:
Another News Article about the Heroic Escape of the DeLemeron Family