Indian agent, b. St. Nicholas parish near Quebec, Canada. He lived in the upper Mississippi region as early as 1774 and became thoroughly familiar with the tribes there. In 1806 he was appointed U.S. Indian sub-agent for the Sac and Fox along the Mississippi, and in 1808 assumed duties as agent at Prairie du Chien, where he was responsible for the Sac, Fox, Sioux, Winnebago, and Menominee. During the War of 1812 he spent most of his time in St. Louis, but returned to Prairie du Chien after the British evacuated the post, and retained his agency until his death. An exceptional agent, sincerely mindful of the Indians' welfare, he labored for inter-tribal peace and sought to increase the government's knowledge of the tribes with maps of the area and vocabularies of the Sioux and Winnebago languages. Wis. Mag. Hist., 3, 27; Coils. State Hist. Soc. Wis., 11 (1888), 20 (1911); P. L. Scanlan, Prairie du Chien ([Menasha, Wis.] 1937); N. Boilvin Papers.

The Wisconsin Historical Society has manuscripts related to this topic. See the catalog description of the Nicolas Boilvin Letter for details.

View a related article at Wisconsin Magazine of History Archives.

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[Source: Dictionary of Wisconsin biography]