Henry Hastings Sibley - Marriage and Family

Marriage and Family

In 1836, Sibley built the first stone house in Minnesota, which is now the Sibley House Historic Site. The home in Mendota overlooked Fort Snelling from across the Mississippi River. Over the winter of 1839-40 he entered a de facto marriage with Red Blanket Woman, granddaughter of a Mdewankonton Dakota chief; a daughter, Helen Hastings Sibley, also known as Wahkiyee (Bird), was born in August 1841. The circumstances of Sibley and Red Blanket Woman's relationship are obscure, but several sources suggest that she remarried a Dakota man, perhaps in 1842, and died in early 1843.

On May 2, 1843, Sibley married Sarah Jane Steele, daughter of General James Steele, commander of Fort Snelling, and his wife Mary (Hume). Sarah Jane's brother was Franklin Steele, a prominent Minneapolis businessman, and her sister Anna Abby Steele married Dr. Thomas R. Potts, who later became the first mayor of St. Paul, Minnesota. For her part, Helen was eventually placed with a missionary family and grew up acculturated to white society in St. Paul; Sibley maintained a congenial and public relationship with Helen until her death in 1859, although this reportedly upset Sarah.

The political boundaries changed so frequently from 1836 through 1862 that, although all of Sibley's white children were born in this house, they were each recorded as having been born in different political units: Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Minnesota Territory and finally, the state of Minnesota. In 1862, the Sibley family moved to St. Paul.