Noted as late as 1726 in a document of Daniel Antoine Jossevel, notary at Moudon. It would appear that he owned land with his brother Denis Samuel at Brenles.
Emigrated to USA, according to the published account in the Recueil des
Généalogies Vaudoises. We identify him with the Frederic Charles Dutoit
whose family is described in the following interesting sketch:
Holcombe, R. J., and Bingham, William H., Compendium of history and biography of Carver and Hennepin Counties, Minnesota (1915), Chicago: Henry Taylor & Co., p. 277:
"Frederick E. Du Toit
"Frederick E. Du Toit, proprietor and publisher of the Weekly Valley Herald, of Chaska, and at the present time (1915) mayor of that city, was born at Harrisville, Lewis County, New York, September 24, 1845, the son of Frederick C. and Eliza
(Gresset) Du Toit, the former a native of Switzerland and the latter of France. They were married in France and came to the Unites States in 1841. In 1855 they became residents of Chaska, which at that time was only a straggling hamlet. The father
was a merchant in the Old Country, and after locating at Chaska he was employed for a time in the store of the Chaska Townsite company.
"He found his duties in the service of the company agreeable and he rendered his employers the best return he could for their confidence by fidelity in the performance of his duties in the store to the full measure of his capacity. But the needs of
the community for men of superior attainments in the public service were great and the supply for the demand was small. Mr. Du Toit was therefore practically drafted into the ranks of official life as deputy clerk of the court and deputy register of
deeds. He was afterward elected clerk of the court and still later registrar of deeds, which latter office he held at his death in 1863, when he was about fifty years of age. The mother died in 1874. Three of their sons, Frederick E., George A. and
Alois, and three of their daughters, Emma, Constance and Lucy, grew to maturity. George A. is president of the Carver County State Bank at Chaska. Alois was associated with his brother Frederick in the publication of the Weekly Valley Herald
until his death at the age of thirty-five. Mrs. Emma Taylor, the present postmistress of Chaska, is the only one of the daughters who is living. Constance was the second and Lucy was the first wife of W. C. Odell. Both have been dead a number of
years.
"Frederick E. Du Toit obtained a grammar school education and early in life began to learn the trade of printer, serving his apprenticeship on the Belle Plaine Enquirer. On September 26, 1861, he enlisted in Company A, Fourth Minnesota
Volunteer Infantry, under Captain, afterward Judge, Baxter, and was mustered out of the service July 9, 1865, at Louisville, Kentucky. In October, 1864, he was promoted second lieutenant of the First Minnesota Heavy Artillery at its organization at
Fort Snelling. He had previously been sergeant of the Fourth Minnesota Regiment, under Col. John B. Sanborn, and had been detailed to come North as a drill master and to send recruits South.
"In 1866 Mr. Du Toit bought the Weekly Valley Herald, of Chaska, of C. A. Warner & Company, and from then until now he has been its owner and editor. With one exception he is the oldest editor in Minnesota who is still working as such at the
head of a newspaper.
"In 1867 Mr. Du Toit helped to organize the Minnesota Editorial Association, which began its activity in St. Paul that year. Only four of the men who helped to start it are now living, Mr. Du Toit, H. A. Castle, Irving Todd and E. H. Cornwell. The
Weekly Valley Herald is an independent Democratic paper, and its editor has taken an active part in the politics of Carver County as a Democrat, but always with the desire and the effort to aid in keeping his party organization true to the
loftiest ideals of public duty. He was elected township clerk in 1868 and afterward county commissioner. In 1872 he was county superintendent of schools and the same year was elected a member of the state House of Representatives. While in that body
he introduced a bill providing for biennial sessions of the legislature.
"In 1874 Mr. Du Toit was elected sheriff of Carver County, and for twenty-one years thereafter he was continued in the public service of the county as the incumbent in that office, and in 1896 he was elected a member of the state Senate, and reelected
in 1902 and again in 1906, serving three full terms, twelve years in all. At the time of this writing (1915) he is mayor of Chaska and president of its Commercial Club. His long record of official life, instead of weakening his hold on the confidence
and regard of the people, has only intensified it and endeared him to them. He is probably the best known man in Carver County, and is certainly one of those most highly and deservedly esteemed.
"Mr. Du Toit was married, in 1882 to Miss Anna M. Kunz, a Carver County lady. They have had three children, of whom Frederick E., Jr., and Gertrude are living and George died in childhood. Throughout his long residence of sixty years in this county
this veteran editor has been earnestly and intelligently interested in its welfare and that of its residents, and he has made every effort to promote their enduring good and wholesome progress that his opportunities have allowed. No undertaking for
the advancement of the county has gone without his active and effective support, and no worthy agency at work among its people for their improvement or the increase of their comfort and happiness has ever lacked his aid. He has been faithful to every
trust and obedient to every call to duty, and the record of his life is one of unselfish and discriminating usefulness."
The Frederick Dutoit family is found in the 1850 census of Diana, Lewis Co., NY under the spelling "Dewtwan", and thereafter in the censuses of Chaska Township, Carver Co., MN, where "DuToit" descendants still thrive today. Also on the 1850 census of
Diana, Lewis Co., NY is another family whose surname is clearly written as "Dewtwan", but the given name of the head of the family is unclear, perhaps "Gustin" or "Gratia", age 56, from Canada, with wife Mary and sons Fred and John. It is almost
certain that this second family must be a close relative of "Fritz". The names, ages, and birthplaces for this census seem unusually unreliable (Frederick's son Alois listed as a daughter "Alice", for example), so we need to examine other records in
hopes of identifying them.
Frederich Dutoit age 26 and his wife Elisa age 20, of Swiss origin, arrived at New York City 06 apr 1844 on the ship Silvie de Grasse from Le Havre.
Catechumen 05 jun 1767 at Bern, where his father was minister. Marc Philippe was then a student of philosophy, presumably at Lausanne, but another source suggests he may have been studying in Bern. He was Professeur d'Eloquence at the Académie de Lausanne from 1775 until his death, and by 1792 held the position of Recteur.
An anonymous work published by H. Vincent (Paris and Lausanne) in 1790 under the title De l'Origine, des Usages, des Abus, des Quantités et des Mélanges de la Raison et de la Foi (3 volumes), with a new edition in 1793 under the pseudonym Keleph ben Nathan (and with a new title, La Philosophie divine appliquée aux lumères naturelle, magique, astrale naturelle, céleste et divine, ou aux immuables vérités que Dieu a révélées), has been attributed to him, for reasons that are unclear at best, under the name "Marc Philippe Dutoit-Mambrini", thus making him the son of the minister Jean Philippe Dutoit-Membrini, who, as far as is known, never married. Another anonymous work attributed, prehaps more reasonably, to the real Jean Philippe Dutoit-Membrini was published in 1800: La philosophie chrétienne exposée, éclaircie, démontrée et appuyée sur l'immuable baze de la révélation ou de la véritable religion pratique, expliquée et rendue à sa pureté primitive. Sermons discours et homélies. / par l'auteur de la Philosophie divine (Lausanne?, 1800, 3 volumes, of which the first continues the "Sermons de Théophile" published in 1764 and widely recognized as the work of Jean Philippe Dutoit-Membrini). A cursory search on Google Books and elsewhere shows that many authors had conflated Jean Philippe Dutoit-Membrini with the professor Marc Philippe Dutoit. The confusion appears to have been resolved, for the most part, toward the end of the 20th Century.
Only mention found so far is a document of Jaques Jaqueri, notary, 08 oct 1629, involving Marguerite Menoz, widow of the late Pierre Dutoit, hoste, and his children Gaspard and Marguerite, by his first wife Catherine Sacquet, with Elie Dutoit, brother of their father.
Catechumen 05 jun 1767 at Bern, where his father was minister. Marc Philippe was then a student of philosophy, presumably at Lausanne, but another source suggests he may have been studying in Bern. He was Professeur d'Eloquence at the Académie de Lausanne from 1775 until his death, and by 1792 held the position of Recteur.