Francois Marcelin Alcouffe

[Shona]

Originally Posted by kiterunner

Most French BMD records are available online but you have to know which location to look at since they don't have a national name index.

Would the records include people born in their African colonies?

[kiterunner]

Originally Posted by Shona

Would the records include people born in their African colonies?

Looks like it, for instance:
http://anom.archivesnationales.cultu...itoire=ALGERIE

[Anglosaxon]

Hi , I have written to the bmd in Kampala , but still haven't received a reply . Don't think they will as I have already sent them two e.mails . Maybe I should find out more from the british consulate . Uganda only gained independence in 1962 . so there should be some records .

[Shona]

Would there be records for the period in question held in Uganda? I believe that records of births, marriages and deaths for the time the family were in Uganda would have been held by the Colonial Office which are now at the National Archives in Kew. Ditto with regard to the post-German period for Tanzania.

Timeline from Colonial Office records on Ancestry:

Events are in Kampala. Family recorded as French.

1912 Marriage of Francois Alcouffe and Leona Guillot.
1915 Birth of Frank Emile Marcel Alcouffe
1916 Death of France Alcouffe from dysentery
1917 Birth of Renee Irene Leona Alcouffe. Father is recorded as an engineer.

Leona's surname is Guillon on the birth records not Guillot.

You mentioned that some of the children died of malaria. Could you post details, please, so we can form a clearer picture.

Following the defeat of Germany in WW1, GEA was split up with the British taking responsibility for Tanganika (Tanzania) and Belgium running Rwanda and Burundi. Do you know which of the three countries your father-in-law grew up in?

Being French, GEA wouldn't have been a safe place for the Alcouffe's during WW1.

Also wonder if Francois served in WW1. He was a merchant in 1912, but an engineer when Renee's birth was registered in 1917.

Had a look a couple of Annual Reports on the Ugandan Protectorate. The report published in 1919, stated there were 847 European residents in Uganda. There were no schools for European children in the Protectorate.

The report for 1907 noted there were two marriages, 12 births and four deaths of European residents. Those figures seem v low to me.

[Anglosaxon]

hi , I have contacted kew quite a few times only to be told that francois records would still be held in Uganda . They were not very helpful at all . I will look for for the records of the deaths of two of their children I copied them from ancestry . My father in law was born in German East Africa . In Loshoto his mother was born in Russia of German parents who had moved from Stuttgart in the 1870s and then from Russia to East Africa .. I will post the readings of the hospital deaths when I can find them . thanks

[Shona]

I'm getting a wee bit confused.

I thought the parents of your father-in-law were Francois Marcelline Alcouffe and Leona Guillot/Guillon - both recorded as French.

Loshoto (now in the Tanga area of Tanzania) was known as Wilhelmstal during the German colonial period, which ended following World War 1.

[Anglosaxon]

it is confusing , francois was my father in laws father . Leona was married to him prior to him either marrying again or committing bigamy .so she is the wife at that time . My father I law was born in 1933 in Loshoto but his mother kept her name muller as his surname although francois is the father on the birth certificate . So it is quite confusing .

[Shona]

Could your father-in-law have been illegitimate?

[Anglosaxon]

Yes , there was some talk of francois committing bigamy with my father in laws mother , I'm not sure if they were married are not . I saw my father.in laws birth certificate , and it had his mothers name Mina Muller and Francois name . I have not been able to establish a marriage . I believe Mina went to live with him , but maybe not in Uganda could have been in Tanzania . . There was another child born to francois and Mina . Margeret .she was a few years older , so she was born approx 1929/1930 .

[Anglosaxon]

If Francois was still married when marring Mina yes he would be illegitimate .