The Gnarled Tree

In my last post I eluded to a more painful déjà vu that I experience while digging around the family tree.  What I am referring to is a tad bit taboo. The marrying of cousins. I know, the first reaction is like sucking on a lemon or smelling sour milk. Let's just be happy that it occurs less now than it did in the past.

I use an online application that makes a wonderful graphic of my family tree for me as you we have all come to expect it to look.  It's handy.  It gives you a master view at the bottom...so you can see just HOW BIG it is...

The bottom row represents the family of one of my 4 grandparents. ONE. The second row are my great grandparents and my great grandfather's cousins. So ... many ... people. 

Sometimes this program glitches out on me and shows crossed lines and double people where their shouldn't be, which causes me to groan. The issue isn't so much the program as it is my family tree. Let's talk about the Pugh family.

Hugh Pugh and his wife Elizabeth Williams came to Canada in the range of 1835-1840. They came with some of their 15 adult children whom also had children. The number of Pugh's that landed in Pickering township must have been terrifying. Okay I kid a little. The child of theirs that happens to be my 3rd great grandmother Elizabeth Pugh married James T White, the son of some English settlers who had come to the area at the beginning of the 1830's. James White was one of 7 children born to his parents.  Apparently one of the other White children, William White, took a liking to Elizabeth Pugh's sister, Mary Pugh - as they got married sometime around 1850 and had 5 children.  This makes Elizabeth and James White's 8 children and Mary and William White's 5 children: double first cousins. This is part of the reason my tree glitches out when I try to view the Pugh people.   There are other reasons too, though and then this comes to mind:

from meiphoto.com

The number of descendants that come from Hugh Pugh and Elizabeth Williams, at this moment to me, is an  unknown number. What is known to me however, are the instances when some of them would marry each other.  Pickering township wasn't a particularly small place - it had several hamlets, towns, villages - all which had a few Pugh descendant families. So it isn't terribly surprising there was some distantly generational mixing going on, right? I try to tell myself it isn't weird. A rudimentary illustration of what a computer program can't handle...paper to the rescue!!  This is an example of what happens when two families have some intermingling....

C'est Déjà Vu

I used to have frequent bouts of déjà vu - French, for the feeling that you have already experienced something.  If you are interested in some of the theories about what déjà vu might be, a wonderful page on a corner of the internet has some thoughts about the subject. What does this have to do with family history?

Some days doing research I have the feeling. I've seen these names before - this seems familiar. So down that rabbit research hole I go.  A little while ago I got excited at doing some family searching for someone new.  With a little bit of information and a little bit of using a search engine that sounds like Boogle, I was able to establish a tree.  I began to plug away at records and adding people, their marriages, their children and so on. 

One thing I have noticed in the various trees I have put together is that generally families remained in the same regions for many many years. When a member of the family is found to have moved far away I begin to a) check that my information is correct and b) wonder what forces pushed and pulled them so far away from their families.  While working on one branch of this family tree (I'll call M) I found a marriage that took place where the groom's last name was recorded as O'Dougherty and he was listed as having been from Mayo, Quebec.

This was big, to me.  The M tree I was working on wasn't any 'ordinary' tree.  It is for my coworker...okay, my Manager. The branch I had rabbit holed into was on her husbands side and the reason it had become interesting was because a member had moved out of this area to about 350km away at a time when it would not have been a very pleasant trip.  The other half of the big part of this discovery is that my partner happens to be a Doherty, also from Mayo, Quebec. 

I blinked a few times and thought, well maybe this O'Dougherty is some other family in Mayo. My hair isn't blond but I'm beginning to feel a bit like Alice and off I go to figure out who the identity of this O'Dougherty.  I didn't find much except he had various spellings of his last name and later in life dropped the O' (being Irish hasn't always been something to brag about unfortunately).  There were not necessarily any O'Dougherty families in Mayo and the church records have various spellings: O'Dougherty, Dougherty, Dockerty, Doherty. I'm guessing how it was spelled was dependent upon the competency of the writer as well as the thickness of the accent of the speaker who claimed the name. So, relation status: unconfirmed but likely.

But wait, there is more!!

"Small world" occurrences tend to fascinate me so I continued to branch out this particular arm of the tree.  The online application I use allows other users to share pictures and information and crowd source together - this is most helpful when approaching years where records are not available (in Canada that is basically anything newer than 1920's).  I began to come across pictures of these distance cousins in the M tree...when I had the déjà vu.  There was a user name that seemed very familiar.  So I clicked on the name to find out more information as I am want to do.

The user has pictures of my great-great grandparents.Whaaa? Ok, I now need to find out a) how this person is related to me and b) how this person is related to the M tree.

It turns out my cousins (of some variety) married the cousins of my managers husband. This is crazy! Her children's cousins are married to my cousins! If the Doherty connection is to be believed my cousins may also be married to my partner's cousins...I thoroughly worked it out however - in no way are we actually related. I wouldn't be terribly surprised if everyone lived in the same geographical area but this isn't the case. Myself and my family are from 350km west of this city, the cousins that moved away and eventually married into my branches are from 350km west of here as well...but the two are 200km north-south from each other.  In a city of 900 000 people what are the odds I would be working with someone with such a tangible connection?

Stay tuned for my next installment of the case of slightly more painful déjà vu!

Social Media of the Day

When social media was in diapers I was a young 20 something and thought, "why would I want people knowing my business". The irony is that I was the target age group and I didn't start to engage with it until my late 20's and early 30's thinking "this is a great way to keep tabs on people but still being able to maintain my preferred level of introversion".

What does this have to do with family history?  Well one day we may all be memorialized by our online presence. Or, maybe, spreading our social goings on isn't new. Maybe in the past there was another medium besides the word of mouth that spread community news on a weekly basis. What on earth am I talking about?  I am talking about being wrote about in the "social pages". Old timey people were interested in what their neighbors where up to, who was visiting from out of town, why no one had seen ol' Mrs. so-in-so for a few days.

Exhibit 1:

As a researcher of family treasures these little tidbits, to me, are like uncovering a fine piece of silverware from a dusty attic trunk.  It's nice to have I suppose but if it's something you can't or aren't going to use, what's the point?  Indeed, what is the point of telling everyone who reads the newspaper about Fred and his brother visiting their niece and her husband? It's old timey FB, just less visual and no picture of their tea and cookies.

I'm sure these social page editors where not thinking "this will be great someday - their great grand children will really appreciate it!"

Some people made the paper more often then others. On my dad's side of the family it was often nice bits of news about visits and garden parties of the well-to-do.  On my mom's side (who lived in a neighbouring town) it wasn't as pleasant.

Poor Charlie Dadson.  He got picked on in the papers quite a bit and there was nothing flattering about the stories the newspaper chose to tell.

Exhibit 2:

The gist of the story is that my great grandfather was tossed onto the street with his belongs, wife, 3 year old and 1 year old daughter after the landlord claimed he'd not paid his rent.  Seems like a great story for the newspaper!! Why not tarnish a man's reputation on a slow news day - sheesh.  There were a few other mentions of Charlie in the newspaper in the late 30's including one where he lobbied to prevent kids from running around with guns on Sundays after church, as they were apparently want to do.

Not everything I have encountered has been so grim. Here are a few more that make me wonder about these people I will never know but whose blood I share.

(Above: football = soccer)

 

(With just a few more days to go, Merry Christmas to all)

It is interesting to think about the unintended legacy we might be leaving behind...

Sources:

http://news.ourontario.ca/WhitchurchStouffville/search 

http://www.pada.ca/newspapers/

Serving One's Country

Poppy from pintrest.com

As we roll into the fall season the leaves are dropping and the winds are changing.  A yearly remembrance is upon us forever symbolized with the red poppy.

We are moving further and further in time from the first and second world wars and inevitably we will have a diminished tangible grasp on the people who served their country during these two wars. As a child I used to recite the same tired joke my mom used (likely in her childhood as well) about my great grandfather having served in both the first and second wars...

"My great grandfather served...served food!! He was a cook."  While this got more eye rolls than laughs it doesn't seem to be something I am able to forgot. There is another family joke about my great grandfather having signed up for service after two days of marriage...

While g-grandfather Coombs was ruled out of overseas service due to a "split toe" he served at Niagara Falls feeding the troops before they were shipped out for service as he was a baker by trade. During the second world war he served as a cook to the R.C.A.F in Toronto (likely at Downsview not far from his home).

Until I began doing my family history I had never realized that there were several others in our tree that had served, particularly in the first war but some in the second.  Some of these men came home, some did not.

Have you checked you family tree for some tangible roots to the past?

Victorian Death Photography

I have been thinking of late that I have been pretty lucky to have my mitts on some historical treasures that have been passed down through the ages.  There are some stories, some physical objects and quite a fair number of pictures (or copies of pictures).  I have taken some of these pictures and lined my staircase with the portraits of people I have never met.  I enjoy thinking about the lives of my ancestors and wondering about the day the photographs were taken.

In my list of mysteries to solve there was a name-unknown child - a sibling of my Great Grandfather Coombs. Shortly after GG Coombs was born his mother died of complications and he was sent to be taken care of by his mother's sister.  He was raised by his aunt and uncle, who by all accounts treat him as their own, but as a result he knew very little about the child that came before him.  GG Coombs had three older sisters and three older brothers, one of the brothers died as a child.  The information that was passed down (along with a couple of pictures of the young family) was that the boy drowned in the Charles river - name unknown.

England has very detailed vital records but that catch is the records cost moola to access (indexes tend to be free but don't tell you very much). I did my best to find a Charles river in England...I did not find one.  I thought, maybe his name was Charles...I found no Charles Coombs born or died within the proper time frame. The little boy did not appear on the census records as he fell in between collection times - a lot can happen in a 10 year gap!! Eventually I narrowed down the birth records to two possibilities, Richard or Oliver.  I settled on Oliver since GG Coombs named one of his daughters Olive.  I had always thought Olive was a weird name for a little girl.

The picture.

I have this picture on my wall.  It took me about 400 days of seeing it, multiple times a day, to realize that it wasn't what I thought it was.

It's hard to tell from the grainy scan but...that little boy in the middle...ya, he's not alive. Suddenly one morning as I was leaving for work it all made sense. The father is holding the boy up, his eyes are closed, mouth agape, most of the kids are not amused. I have my very own Victorian death photograph - creepy!! The one oddity about the picture is that it was taken in what appears to be outdoors - if you search Victorian death photography you will see many many examples of indoor, stiff pose portraits.

Well, that's one mystery solved!

The Murder, the Lepards and the Black Sheep

The Lepards and the black sheep are not literal animals, but they still make for a great story.  The family Lepard, sometimes spelled Leppard or in German Lipphard/Lipphart etc., were black sheep (maybe).

When starting my family research I had some help from scraps of paper and some oral accounts but there seemed to have been some discrepancy about whether we were related to some folks named Lepard.  Thanks to the digitization of records I proved that we are descended from Lepards. My grandmother once asked her mother about the Lepards and her response was some vulgar adage to the effect that we were "no more related than two dogs [visiting] the same fence post". This however was untrue, so why would my great grandmother say such a thing?  Reason number one was that she may not have known that  her maternal grandmother was a Lepard. My great grandmother's mother, Annie Morris, died when my gg was only 3, so there may have been a disconnect from that branch of the family despite Annie's mother - Lavinia Lepard having lived until 1922 when my gg was about 21. The real reason I think for the comment was a distancing from the Lepards.

Why?
Murder.
That's why.

Tree for character reference:

Victim: Roseann Lepard/Leppard. 

Age: 23

Location: mother's house somewhere in Artemesia Township of Grey County (Ontario).

Cause: poison (strychnine)

Accused, tried and executed: Husband, Cook Teets, 52

Purported confessor to Crime: Mother, Roseanne O'Malley Lepard 

My discovery of this information was quite by accident.  When I find someone who has died "youngish", I've taken up the habit of looking at the cause of death.  This is when I came across:

When I discovered the "executed for murder" I went down the research rabbit hole trying to find all the information I could.  While I couldn't find much in the way of digitized newspapers I was able to find an interesting article in a magazine, Canada's History. It was with great delight my employer's library had the physical copy of this magazine and I was able to make a copy and read about the details of this family tragedy.

The cobbled together version I've read is that, Roseann ran away with Cook Teets to be married in Toronto. Her mother, an Irish - Catholic woman was not impressed at the age difference between the two nor impressed with the fact they were not married in a Catholic ceremony. Just 6 weeks after their return Roseann fell ill and died in her mother's house. Mr. Teets had left his bride at his mother's house the evening prior (after dinner) and she was well.  The story goes that he must have poisoned her since he was in possession of strychnine - a poison commonly used by farmers to poison rats. His motive was the life insurance that had been taken out on her shortly after the time of their marriage. Cook claimed the insurance purchase was at the behest of Roseann (she may have been pregnant and may have wanted to insure some money in the event of her death). Despite Cook being an "old" man who was blind in one eye - he was unable to convince the judge of his innocence and he became the first man hanged in Grey County on December 5th, 1884. He was the 9th and last man hanged that year in Canada.

To complicate the story further the media reported many years later that Roseann's mother later confessed to the crime. It would seem that her mother was a troubled woman.  She was once arrested in the 1890's for attempting (or succeeding) in burning down a neighbour's barn.  The consequence was a sentencing to an insane asylum (historical term, not mine). In 1901 she is reported as an inmate in Toronto and in 1911 she is in a facility in Coburg.  She 1918 she dies at the facility in Orillia (the now infamous Huronia Regional Centre than ran from 1859 until it was closed in 2004).  She was buried in the institution cemetery.

It is a sad end to a sad story. A proud person may not want to share this story and would possibly deny any relation to those involved in such nefarious circumstances. To me it feels like my own personal episode of "who do you think you are".




Sources:
Argyle, Ron. "Reasonable Doubts". Canada's History December 2010 - January 2011, pg 35-39

COOK TEETS HANGED. (1884, Dec 06). The Globe (1844-1936) Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/1532182620?accountid=9894  

 

Paper Trail Existance

In contrast to the story about the secrets of great grandmother Gertrude - there is the paper trail of great grandmother Mary Francis Hutton.  My mom remembers her as a stern and unloving figure. I know her for the trail of records that illustrate the adventures of a woman living in a pre-enfranchisement era.

Mary Francis was born into the middle class of the 1880's in northern England.  Her father was a baker, her maternal grandfather a confectioner rumored to have had his own candy factory. A more fanciful rumor about this branch of the family is that they descend from the same family as the Scottish Poet Robert Burns. I've yet to substantiate this but Robert Burns did have several siblings - so maybe someday I will solve this particular mystery.

What amazes me about MF is the difference in the life she led in comparison to her contemporaries (in my family tree) that were living the rural life in Canada.  1911 I have one great grandmother getting married, having babies (see the post about secrets...) and in England I have another great grandmother living with her sisters, no parents and working as a restaurant waitress.  This may not sound like a big deal but there were four unmarried women holding their own - all working - making their own way in the world.

The family lore that comes with this story is that MF (and likely her sisters) did not like their step-mother.  Their mother Annie had died in 1907 and their father had remarried a few years later in 1909 to a woman much younger than himself.  There was such an age difference in fact, his new bride was only 3 years older than his oldest child. I can see how some young ladies would be annoyed that their step mother is closer to their age than that of their father.  I see this as one reason they may have struck out of their father's home to live their own lives, in a time where women usually went from father's home to husband's home.

These women were also on the adventurous side. On June 29, 1912, just over two months after the sinking of the Titanic, Mary Frances and her sister Margaret set out for Cape Town, South Africa.  Over the next 10 years (all) the girls would travel back and forth from Cape Town to England. They usually traveled two at a time, and sometimes was it one sister accompanied by the eldest child and brother, John Robert Hutton.

The story (I have no facts other than the passenger lists) is that Mary Francis and her sister had a tea room in Cape Town.  The period of time the Huttons were there seems to have been an uneventful one (in terms of the history of South Africa).  The Boer war had been over a decade prior and the Aparthied far off in the future.  In any case, Mary Frances returned to England in the midst the beginning of WWI, arriving in April of 1916 only to ship herself off to Canada in November of the same year. There are no hand me down stories of why she left Cape Town or why she decided to come to Toronto on the verge of winter.

Life in Canada "slowed" her down.  She never traveled back to England or South Africa - unlike her siblings who continued to travel. Within a year of her arrival she was married to a baker who was also English and trying to make his way in the metropolis.  At the time of their marriage in 1917 they were living together - how progressive - but with parents on another continent who is to stop them! By 1920 the children began to arrive, 6 in total over the next 8 years. Maybe her stern and unloving demeanor (at least my mother's perception of it) was a result of some sort of caged bird feeling but I will never know.