"Madame" Marie Aioe Dorion Venier Toupin (ca. 1786 – September 5, 1850) was the only female member of an overland expedition sent by Pacific Fur Company to the

Pacific Northwest The Pacific Northwest (sometimes Cascadia, or simply abbreviated as PNW) is a geographic region in western North America bounded by its coastal waters of the Pacific Ocean to the west and, loosely, by the Rocky Mountains to the east. Though ...

in 1810. Like her first husband,

Pierre Dorion Jr. Pierre Dorion Jr. (1782Royot, Daniel''Divided Loyalties in a Doomed Empire.''Newark: University of Delaware Press. 2007, p. 137.–1814) was a Métis fur trapper and interpreter who worked across the modern Midwestern United States and later the Pa ...

, she was

Métis The Métis ( ; Canadian ) are Indigenous peoples who inhabit Canada's three Prairie Provinces, as well as parts of British Columbia, the Northwest Territories, and the Northern United States. They have a shared history and culture which derives ...

. Her mother was of the Iowa people and her father was

French Canadian French Canadians (referred to as Canadiens mainly before the twentieth century; french: Canadiens français, ; feminine form: , ), or Franco-Canadians (french: Franco-Canadiens), refers to either an ethnic group who trace their ancestry to Fren ...

. She was also known as Marie Laguivoise, a name recorded in 1841 at the

Willamette Mission The Methodist Mission was the Methodist Episcopal Church's 19th-century conversion efforts in the Pacific Northwest. Local Indigenous cultures were introduced to western culture and Christianity. Superintendent Jason Lee was the principal leader fo ...

and apparently a variation on ''Aiaouez'', later rendered as ''Iowa''.

Missouri

It is likely that Dorion and Sacajawea knew one another. Peter Stark notes the similarities between the two women in his book ''Astoria'': both women were originally based in the then-small settlement of St. Louis, and they were both wives of interpreters in the burgeoning Missouri fur trade.

Pacific Northwest

Her first husband

was hired by the Pacific Fur Company to join

Wilson Price Hunt Wilson Price Hunt (March 20, 1783 – April 13, 1842) was an early pioneer and explorer of the Oregon Country in the Pacific Northwest of North America. Employed as an agent in the fur trade under John Jacob Astor, Hunt organized and led the gre ...

and a group on an overland expedition to Fort Astoria. Also present were their two young boys, who were probably two and four years old. Dorion gave birth to another child near what is now

North Powder, Oregon North Powder is a city in Union County, Oregon, United States. The population was 439 at the 2010 census. History North Powder was platted in 1885 or 1886 along the Oregon Railroad and Navigation Company rail line, having been a stage stop befo ...

, who died several days later. After reaching Fort Astoria, Dorion and her family returned with a trapping party to the

Snake River The Snake River is a major river of the greater Pacific Northwest region in the United States. At long, it is the largest tributary of the Columbia River, in turn, the largest North American river that empties into the Pacific Ocean. The Snake ...

area. While at a trading post in January 1814, Dorion learned from a scout that her husband and a small trapping party were about to be attacked by a band of

Bannocks The Bannock tribe were originally Northern Paiute but are more culturally affiliated with the Northern Shoshone. They are in the Great Basin classification of Indigenous People. Their traditional lands include northern Nevada, southeastern Oreg ...

.Shirley (1998), pp. 10-13. After traveling three days alone with her two infant children, she found the scene of the attack. Only one of the trappers, LeClarc, was alive, and was moved away from the area on a horse. Despite Dorion's medical attention for LeClarc, he died that evening. There were several horses left by the Bannock warriors and were promptly taken by Dorion back to the small fur trading post. However, upon reaching the post, she discovered the few staff had been killed and scalped. Attempting to reach another safe fur trading station in the Pacific Northwest, one of Dorion's two horses collapsed in the Blue Mountains. She supported her two infants for 50 days during winter. Dorion created snare traps out of the horse manes to provide a supply of mice and squirrels for her family. She additionally smoked the horseflesh, collected frozen berries, and later gathered the inner flesh of trees to prevent her family starving. Near the end of March, Dorion was able to progress west, eventually reaching a

Walla Walla Walla Walla can refer to: * Walla Walla people, a Native American tribe after which the county and city of Walla Walla, Washington, are named * Place of many rocks in the Australian Aboriginal Wiradjuri language, the origin of the name of the tow ...

village, exhausted and short of food. The village leadership provided material support and aided her in getting back to Fort Astoria. Dorion married twice more and had three more children. Her second husband was Louis Venier. With her third husband, Jean Toupin, she settled near

Saint Louis, Oregon Saint Louis is an unincorporated community in the French Prairie area of Marion County, Oregon, United States, about three miles northwest of Gervais, at the intersection of St. Louis and Manning roads. It is part of the Salem Metropolitan Stat ...

, on the

French Prairie French Prairie is located in Marion County, Oregon, United States, in the Willamette Valley between the Willamette River and the Pudding River, north of Salem. It was named for some of the earliest settlers of that part of the Oregon Country, Fr ...

. It was here that she began to be known as "Madame" or "Madame Iowa". One of her two eldest sons, Jean Baptiste, joined the

Oregon Rifles The Oregon Rifles was the first military force organized for the protection of Oregon Country in the Pacific Northwest of North America. Shortly after the Whitman Massacre, Oregon Governor George Abernethy communicated to the legislature his con ...

and fought in the Cayuse War.

Death and legacy

Dorin lane st louis oregon by andrew parodi lec

After Dorion Venier Toupin died on September 5, 1850, she was buried inside the original

log Log most often refers to: * Trunk (botany), the stem and main wooden axis of a tree, called logs when cut ** Logging, cutting down trees for logs ** Firewood, logs used for fuel ** Lumber or timber, converted from wood logs * Logarithm, in mathe ...

Catholic church in Saint Louis. When the church burned down in 1880 and the current church built, the location of Dorion's grave was forgotten and remains unknown to this day. It was only when the church register was translated from French into English many years after the original church burned down that it was learned that Dorion had been buried there. There is no record of why she received this honor instead of being buried in the nearby cemetery, but church burial requires special dispensation and may have indicated that Dorion was especially devout. Among the places memorializing Dorion are two parks: Madame Dorion Memorial Park at the mouth of the Walla Walla River near Wallula, Washington, and Marie Dorion Park, a

Milton-Freewater, Oregon Milton-Freewater is a city in Umatilla County, Oregon, United States. The city received its current name in 1951 when the neighboring rival cities of Milton and Freewater voted to merge. The population was 7,151 at the 2020 census. It is part of ...

city park near the foothills of the Blue Mountains. The Dorion Complex residence hall at

Eastern Oregon University Eastern Oregon University (EOU) (officially designated as Oregon’s Rural University) is a public university in La Grande, Oregon. It was formerly part of the Oregon University System, since dissolved. EOU was founded in 1929 as a teacher’ ...

is in La Grande. There is a plaque noting the place near North Powder where she likely gave birth. Hers is also one of the 158 names of people important to Oregon's history that are painted in the House and Senate chambers of the

Oregon State Capitol The Oregon State Capitol is the building housing the state legislature and the offices of the governor, secretary of state, and treasurer of the U.S. state of Oregon. It is located in the state capitol, Salem. Constructed from 1936 to 1938 ...

. Her name is in the Senate chamber. St. Louis, Oregon, has a street named after her, Dorion Lane. Oregon author Jane Kirkpatrick wrote the ''Tender Ties'' trilogy of

historical novel Historical fiction is a literary genre in which the plot takes place in a setting related to the past events, but is fictional. Although the term is commonly used as a synonym for historical fiction literature, it can also be applied to other ty ...

s based on Dorion's life. The individual titles in the series are ''A Name of Her Own'', ''Every Fixed Star'', and ''Hold Tight the Thread''. On May 10, 2014, the

Daughters of the American Revolution The Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) is a lineage-based membership service organization for women who are directly descended from a person involved in the United States' efforts towards independence. A non-profit group, they promote ...

held a service at Saint Louis Catholic Church dedicating a historical marker in Dorion's honor.

References

Works cited

* * *

External links

* *
"Marie's Descendents"
from the ''Brooks Historical Society Newsletter'' April 2011

from Oregon Pioneers {{DEFAULTSORT:Dorion, Marie 1780s births 1850 deaths 19th-century Native Americans Burials in Oregon Indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest Iowa tribe American Métis people People from Marion County, Oregon Year of birth uncertain