The Jones Family’s Intergenerational Connections

1840 Penetanguishene “Half Breed” Petition signatory, Thomas Jones, was one of many members of the Georgian Bay Métis Community who raised a large Métis family grounded in the values of community and connection.

Together, former Drummond Islanders Thomas Jones and Mary Blette dit Sorrelle raised eleven Métis children while living deeply connected to their local community. Four of their children were baptized at St. Ann’s Catholic Church in Penetanguishene, built by members of the local Métis community, instilling service and community-minded values from birth, with the support of Métis loved ones like Charles Vasseur and Josepthe Laronde, who were the godfather and godmother to their son Charles Jones.

Many of the Jones’ children continued deepening their Métis family’s already strong community connections, marrying other Georgian Bay Métis Community members. In 1877, for example, their son, John Jones, married Catherine Boucher, a descendant of the Laramee family. Their youngest child, William Jones, married fellow community member Catherine Desjardins just a few years prior in 1869. 

William’s son, and Thomas’s grandson, John Jones, married Annie Thibeault, whose Métis family roots extended from Georgian Bay to Sault Ste. Marie. A generation later, Thomas Jones’s great-granddaughter, Ida Florence Couture, married Henry Desjardins in 1898, with her great-aunt and wife of William Jones, Catherine Desjardins, serving as a witness, further expanding and supporting intergenerational bonds within their Métis community.

Together, these connections of marriage and support celebrate the strength of Métis kinship, community, continuity, and resilience within the Georgian Bay Métis Community across generations.

See Our Sources

• Jones-Blette dit Sorrelle VMFL

• Penetanguishene Halfbreed Petition, 27 January 1840

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