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This Story from Donat Rossignol

I am 88 years old and I am going to write about my life with the best of my knowledge.

I was born March 5, 1898 in Frenchville, Maine and Yvonne was born on April 20, 1904 in Frenchville, Maine too.

My father was Joseph Rossignol, Sr. who was also born in Frenchville, Maine on March 17, 1863. He died on March 17, 1922 at the age of 59 year old.

My mother was Geneviene Dupere, she was born in 1860 and died January 7, 1950 at the age of 90.

My father's family consisted of five (5) sons and three (3) daughters, who were all born in Maine. They are:
Mary married to Bosse
Napalone married to 
Joseph Jr. married to ? and she died then remarried to Edith ??
Wilfred married to 
Leon married to
Donat married to Yvonne Hebert
Albert married to 
Annie (Violet) married to
Flove (Albert) married to

I remember from the age of 6 yrs old when my brother Albert was 2 yrs younger than me and he was wearing a dress at that time.

I started to go to school during the summer but at that time there was no school in the winter because it was to cold. I remember going to school with Leon, my brother and Annie, my sister. We walked one mile to school and some times we came home for dinner, do the dishes and walk back to school.

At the ages of 12, I milked the cows, fed the pigs and we were all very happy because we had a good father and mother.

I went to school until I was 14, then I started to work on the farm and sometime I worked for the neighbors like Mr. Joseph Collin. I remember when we had to use a block and tackle to lift the hay and straw to the upper parts of the barn.

Later, I was taken out of school to work the farm. Sometimes I planted potatoes and the neighbors paid me with green apples and my dinner. Sometimes we were paid 25 cents a day.

I want to pause here and take time to tell you about the church. We lived 6 miles from the church and I went to church in a horse drawn wagon. Before mass we abstained from food and water until communion time. Mass was at 10am and sometimes at 1pm and we had no water or meal from midnight the day before mass.

We could not go to mass often because all nine of us could not go to mass at the same time. We had to take turns to go to mass on Sundays.

I made my First Holy Communion when I was 7 years old and my Confirmation at the age of 12.

When I was a small boy my father bought a pair of shoes for me once a year to go to church in the summer. The rest of the time I walked barefoot or wore old shoes to work on the farm. The older shoes were shoes which were worn during the winter months. These were shoes my father made himself with the skin from cows. He took the leather to Van Buren for tanning and then he made leather shoes. My mother made the short pants, stockings and mittens from wool. We were happy. The meat we ate came from the farm but we had to buy molasses, sugar and beans for 9 children.

When I was 18 years old, I was drafted into the Army during the 1st World War but I was not heavy enough and too small to be drafted.

In 1918 I had to have an appendix operation in New Brunswick, Canada which was the nearest hospital to go to for an operation. I was very sick for two weeks after the operation. I came back home from the hospital about a month after my brother Joseph's wife died from Influenza. So my sister, Flove and I, at the age of 18, went to take care of Joseph's children for 6 months.

After Joseph got married to Edith, I lived with them all summer and returned home in the fall to work on my father's farm.

My father deeded the land to me and he asked me to live with him. I was about 21 years old at that time. I lived with him on the farm until I was 24 years old.

In 1921, I went to the hospital in Bangor, Maine for one week. Then I went to Waterville to see my uncle and cousins. I worked 6 months in a restaurant making hot dogs and sandwiches. In the fall I went back home again because my father was sick and later he died on March 17, 1922. My brother Albert was married in May 1922.