Heavy rains fell in late spring and early summer of 1814 in the eastern part of Missouri Territory. Although no records of rainfall amounts survive for outlying areas, 18 inches fell at St. Louis during May-June, flooding the lower Missouri and the Mississippi. Anecdotes suggest rainfall was even heavier west and south of St. Louis.
The village of St. Michael, in present-day Madison County, lay in a grant between Saline Creek and Village, or Castor, Creek north of present-day Fredericktown. Settlers of French descent founded the town in 1802 after the Spanish authorities granted the site to 13 individuals in 1800. Early residents included Peter Chevalier; Paul, Andrew, and Baptiste Deguire; four Caillot brothers; Lachance; Gabriel Nicollo; and Pierre Variat. Settlers laid out the village in the French manner, with settlers owning a village lot along Saline Creek and farmland lying in adjacent strips out from the village. Settlers farmed and did some lead mining at Mine la Motte, a few miles distant.
From the beginning of the village, spring floods swelled Saline and Village creeks and inundated lower portions of the town. The unusually heavy rains of 1814 culminated one night in June, however. Residents awoke to find the rain-swollen creeks filled to the top of their banks.
Rain continued and the creeks rose all that day. By midnight, many residents began worrying that house foundations would give way. Homeowners already awake or awakened by their neighbors collected their clothing and other belongings and headed to higher ground. Most spent the remainder of the night in temporary shelter as rain continued.
Flooding continued the next day as residents watched foundations of each house in the community loosen and house logs starting to float away. Flood waters eventually carried houses downstream or completely destroyed them in some cases. Finally, the flood waters receded, leaving residents to pick up and decide what to do next.
The threat of additional future floods caused most of the settlers to move the village to a new site on the south side of Village Creek a mile and a half north of the original location. Those whose houses remained mostly intact disassembled the logs and reassembled them at the next village site. A few stubborn individuals rebuilt at their old house sites. Local people used the names “New Village” or “New French Village” for the new site and “Northtown” or “Old Village” for the original site. While settlers continued to move to St. Michael, they avoided building on lower sites. Flooding was a problem periodically in the old town site, however.
The focus of local settlement shifted to the newly established county seat of Fredericktown upon its founding in 1819. Fredericktown was on the opposite side of the creek from St. Michael, and most importantly, on a hill to avoid flooding. Today both village sites for St. Michael are part of Fredericktown.
Six years after the flood, citizens of St. Michael built a church in New Village on land donated by Henry Pratte. The site was subject to some flooding, so in 1827 parishioners disassembled the church and used the stones for a new church building in Fredericktown. The parish enlarged the church later and rebuilt on the same site in 1926. St. Michael the Archangel Parish remains today on the same site where this old church once stood, a remaining reminder of St. Michael village.
