I emailed my daughter to see if she remembered anything from school or the story teller that told the children stories of history and fables. She does not but is going to research on her own. The following is a paste of her email. Interesting.
Sylvia



I'll look through some of my old notebooks from school, but mostly what we were taught was the Dutch history, nothing much about the French side or French history. Also, in colonial days, the name Molly was not always a female - there were men with the nicknames of "Molly".

A quest for knowledge! I love it!

a friend of mine who was a teacher here is currently writing a book with the history of the Dutch side of SXM.
She said the same thing..that there were never any books with the local history.
Molly Smith Pointe is on the french side so maybe we need some historian or information from the french side.

Philippe, I am convinced that mystery picture is NOT SXM.. everyone seems to agree on this at this point

[barcann.livejournal.com]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/27/2009 03:42PM by Barbara1.

Missionaries have traveled the world to spread their message. My belief is the persecuted French clergy helped the Christian ministry. Samuel Edelin, whose wife was Molly Smith, was the father of nine children, they reached New Orleans by way of Guadaloupe and possibly later reach the island of St. Martin. This is not fact! Just an interesting search of truth....

I am going to try to contact Christophe Henock... sure he will know! If I only HAD TIME, I would go to spned a couple of hour at the Marigot's public Library, I am also sure I would find what we are looking for...

Kind Regards,
Philippe



[www.facebook.com]

I have contacted Daniella Jeffrey.
I'll let you know if I hear anything back from her.

[barcann.livejournal.com]

Let's not forget about this post. I have bugged everyone I know and they are all looking for the answer. Just sent a email to local St. Maarten business man, and while he did not know the answer, he said he knew just who to ask. If there is a reply, I will post asap.


Best regards,
Sylvia

Wow, thank you all for persevering. I went by there yesterday &, from the water, it looked like there was a rock/monument on the top of the higher of the 2 hills which, according my map is called "Smith". It just about shows up on google earth, but not too clearly. I guess it's private land, otherwise I'd be tempted to get my hiking boots on!

I haven't heard a thing from any of my sources yet.
I know Philippe could research this but he is just so darn busy.

[barcann.livejournal.com]

I just heard from Daniella Jeffrey who is a well known historian on the french sdie.
she has no idea of the origin of the name but says in her research she will keep it in mind and let me know if she finds anything.

[barcann.livejournal.com]

I have exhausted all my connections. Everyone tells me they know the point but have no idea how it received the name. Even old sailors charts refer to it and advise to stay clear. On Google earth it is referred to as The Grand Case Rocks. And the rocks do appear to be stacked. Why?

Today I was directed to contact Pierre Beauperthuy, owner of the Old House on the way to Orient. It was stated that he is 7Th generation on the Island and a great resource of Island history. I can not find a way to contact him and any information would be greatly appreciated.

One other thing I would like to say is, years ago we knew that my Grandmother was a wealth of information on Island history. We wanted to retain this for our family. So we taped her sitting in her chair and just asked her to tell us stories. The beautiful part is that this has allowed her Great Great Grandchildren to watch and see her.

It may be a wonderful project for someone on the Island to seek out the oldest person still living and make a living history report. It is a project I myself would love to undertake if I could have the time.

It is very sad to me that something or someone is responsible for the naming of this point, and we have lost it.

Best regards,
Sylvia

Sylvia,
If I have time to stop, I will, to see Pierre Beauperthuy, I pass his place almost everyday and know pretty well his familly.
You are so right when ou say "It is very sad to me that something or someone is responsible for the naming of this point, and we have lost it.", but it is the reality of St Martin unfortunatly...

Very very few people keep history and memories alive here. It seems that people do not care about their past and it is what shocked me the most when I arrived, almost 20 years ago...

As you may have noted reading my posts, I am passionated by history and facts, and where ever I live (or lived) in this world, I do (did) my best to learn about it, which is pretty much what I did during all those years on the island, but many many of my questions are still unanswered.

My Mom was the same, so I guess I've got that from her... She came to St Martin way before me and learn about before me... One day she noticed, comparing old maps and more recent ones, that a place was missing on the latest... The place's name was "Petit Fond". Somewhere in the mountain between Grand Case and Baie Orientale. She went around questioning everysingle old person she could find... Majority of them couldn't recall the place, and the very few who did only said " I think I heard that it was... but I am not sure because it so long ago".

And when I say "the place" a mean "the village of Petit Fond" !!!! This village had been leveled down by a huricanne at the begining of 1900's, I beleive in 1925. So it wasn't a "so far back history" or "so long ago" but even that no-one seems to remember or to care.

We went to see Mr. Enock as well as Mr. Petit and questioned about it and asked why nobody tried to find back the ruins and eventually put back the name on the map. The answer was: "nobody remember where it was exactly and we don't think you will find it!For what reason anyway, it doesn't exist anymore"...

My Mom said : "and what if someone find it, will you put back the name on the map?", and she said " we will find it and we will put it back on the map"! And me thinking...Oh noooo ! Here she goes again!... LOL

Here started a loooooong period of "harassement" from her to me LOL!!! Almost everyday she was asking me to pack my back pack and we were climbing the mountains above Orient, litterally making our own path. After few weeks of that, usueless to say that I was fed up with the challenge, because I felt we were never going to find the place in the "jungle"..

Then one day I decided it was going to be the last day and I told her she better find it today or this darn place will stay out of the map LOL... So here we go again clibing the mountain and using for maybe the tenth time, one of the same path that we cut, trying to access an area that we didn't explored yet..

My Mom was walking 20 feet ahead of me, and half way to the area, i asked her if she was thirsty... But since she was walking ahead of me she didn't understood clearly what I asked, so she stoped and turned around to ask me to repeat...

And then I see her face changing, totally stupefied, and she yeld "Do not move anymore! Do not move!"!!!
Allright, I grew up in Africa and used to wild animals, venemous snakes, huges spiders, scorpions, you name it, etc... but useless to say that I kinda freaked out because I couldn't figurate out why I shouldn't move anymore...

Then she take her camera and shot two or three pictures... And I am thinking... Isn't that cute? she love me so much that she just decide to take a picture of her loving son in the midle of the jungle to freeze this historical moment...LOL

Well I wasn't far from reality... She told me then, after pocketing back her camera, "now come towards me for 6 feet, stop, turn around and look on your right in the bush"...

I executed and what I saw in the bush was a grave stone! We were right on Petit Fond cimetery ! We had found the place, and we had passed the place many many time without noticing anything... If it wasn't for my question to her, we would have pass one more time without finding the village.

We walked through the bushes, found the bases of the houses, and some broken poteries, ustensils, etc... you could see that the place was alive once upon the time...

When we said to Mr Petit and Mr Enock that we found it they couldn't beleive it... we show them and now the name of Petit Fond is back on most of the modern map...Unfortunatly they didn't place it exactly where it lay but that's better than nothing...

Well I started that post without even thinking to write a novel about the whole story LOL, but I guess I did and hope I didn't bored anyone!

Kind Regards,
Philippe



[www.facebook.com]

Maybe the Cemetery in Marigot has a headstone bearing Molly Smith's name. Has anyone visited the cemetery lately?

Great Story, Philippe!
Last time I was in the Marigot cemeterie, I was looking for the 2 iguanas that live in there. I never found them. Oh well, I guess I'll have another reason to return to SXM--to find Molly Smith!

Beautiful story Philippe.

wow, that is an incredible story Philippe
Do you have any photographs? I would love to see them..
BTW, did you know that Pierre B's sister Marge is Diederick's cousin?

[barcann.livejournal.com]