1824 :: Death of Isabel Davis nee Grant

 

On this date in our family history . . . the 20th day of November . . . in the year 1824 . . . Isabel Davis nee Grant dies in Morgan County, Georgia . . . it is recorded that she is laid to rest in the "Old Davis Cemetery" . . . this Isabel is a 5th great-grandma to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . according to Stevens-Davis and allied families; a memorial volume of history, biography, and genealogy by Marie Walker Wood nee Stevens, it is said that . . .

Isabel Grant was born 13 January, 1759, Halifax County, Virginia, the daughter of Daniel and Elizabeth (Tate) Grant. On 9 January, 1777, she was married in Granville County, North Carolina, to Richard Davis. He served as a private in the War of the Revolution, First North Carolina Regiment. After the war was over, Isabel and Richard settled in Lincoln County, Georgia, moving after two years to Wilkes County. Washington then was little more than a cluster of log houses. Later they moved to Elbert, then to Morgan County, where they lived the remainder of their lives. She died, 20 November, 1824, in Morgan County, Georgia. The grandparents of Isabel were Thomas and Isabel (Richardson) Grant. Her great grandfather was Thomas Grant who immigrated from Scotland.

1899 :: A Well Known Lady Dragged to Death Near Rockdale

TERRIBLE ACCIDENT.

A Well Known Lady

Dragged to Death Near Rockdale.

 

 

 

Austin American-Statesman
Austin, Texas
31 Oct 1899, Tue  •  Page 4

 

Special to The Statesman.

ROCKDALE, Tex., Oct. 30. -- A horrible accident occurred near here Saturday, which resulted in the death of Mrs. W. P. Henry, a well known and most estimable lady, wife of a farmer. She was alone in her buggy, and from some cause her horse ran away. She was thrown from the buggy and her hair coming down, caught in a wheel and winding around the axel of the buggy, Mrs. Henry's neck was broken and she was horribly injured in other ways, having been dragged about two miles. She leaves a husband and several children.

 

 

1898 :: Death of Alvin C. Gove

On this date in our family history . . . the 4th day of September in the year 1898 . . . a widowed Alvin C. Gove dies in Biddeford, York County, Maine . . . also known as Alvan or A. C., DNA is indicating that this man is a 3rd great-grandpa to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . in The Gove Book, it is written of Alvan C. Gove that . . .

Alvan Chadbourne Gove, born at Limington, Me., April 10, 1813. He was a builder and contractor ; removed to Biddeford, Me., in 1847, and resided in 1849 on Hill street, being a butcher. In 1853, he went to California as a miner, and returned [to Maine] in 1863. In 1880, he lived at 53 Water street, Biddeford. Mr. Gove married Mary Susan, daughter of Dea. Samuel Edgerly of Limington Feb. 13, 1836. She was born July 13, 1817 ; and died May 26, 1880. He died at Biddeford, of diarrhoea, Sept. 4, 1898, at the age of eighty-five, and was buried in Greenwood Cemetery.

If the data contained in the previous paragraph is accurate, that means that when Alvin C. Gove developed "gold fever" and left Maine for California ca. 1853, he left his wife home alone with six young daughters [the firstborn daughter had recently married] and a six-year-old son [my 2nd great-grandpa] . . . and it would seem that this Alvin did not return to Maine until about ten years later, which would have been right in the middle of the war between the states.


At various times in the last quarter-century of his life, Alvin is listed as living in Biddeford at 53 Water Street [1875], and then after the death of his wife in 1880, at 83 Clifford Street [1882], 35 Clifford Street [1890], Pool Street [1891], and 35 Clifford Street again [1892]. According to current maps, Water Street turns into Clifford Street which blends into Pool Street, which once led to a beach community known as Beachwood.

About 1890, a group photo was taken at a Gove family gathering which was held at a place mentioned only as Beachwood. This photo would have been taken around the time when Alvin's youngest daughter, Lydia, and her family [the Dudleys] were selling their apothecary business in Biddeford and relocating to Massachusetts. They had been living on Pool street at the time. News clippings from that time period indicate that Alvin's granddaughter, Carrie Gordon, was a frequent visitor with two of her maternal aunts in Biddeford, i.e., in the Dudley and Freeman households.

In the following family photo, Alvin is the gentleman standing in the middle of the back row, wearing the bowler hat.

As mentioned earlier, Alvin and Mary had seven daughters and one son before he left to spend a decade in California. Four of those daughters are in this photo [listed by age] ::

• Josephine Lois Freeman nee Gove [1837–1922]. She had just married when her father left to spend a decade in California in 1853.
• Triphena S Piper nee Gove [1842–1926] She was about 11 when he left.
• Julia Howe Hottel nee Gove [1849–1924] She was about 4 when he left.
• Lydia Murch Dudley nee Gove [1852–1936]. She was only a year old when he left.

Also two of his sons-in-law ::

• William Prentiss Freeman [1833–1898]
• Martin Van Buren Hottel [1837–1915]

Also seven of his grandchildren [listed by age] ::

• James Randal Freeman [1854-1894]
• Prentiss A Freeman [1856-1930]
• Caroline L Gordon [1868-1962]
• Beatrice Hottel [1873-1953]
• Grace C Dudley [1875-1952]
• James Freeman Hottel [1876-1973]
• Byron H Dudley [1888-1972]

 Also his granddaughter-in-law ::

• Carrie E Twambley [1854-1919]

 Also his great-granddaughter ::

• Maud M Freeman [1878–1957]

1655 :: Death of Robert Brooke

On this date in our family history . . . the 20th day of July in the year 1655 . . . Robert Brooke dies in Calvert County, Maryland . . . this Robert Brooke is a 10th great-grandpa to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . he is credited with bringing fox hunting to America, and left a written memorandum of his family, and of the time of his settlement in Maryland, i.e. . . .

"The before-named Robert Brooke, Esquire, arrived out of England in Maryland the 29th day of June, 1650, in the 48th year of his age, with his wife and ten children. He was the first that did seat the Patuxent, about twenty miles up the river at Delabrook, . . . In 1652 he removed to Brooke Place, being right against Delabrook ; . . ."

 

He departed this world the 20th day of July, and lieth buried at Brooke Place Manor ; . . . 

Image from
Old manors in the colony of Maryland
by Sioussat, Annie Leakin

1867 :: Death of Kitty Waring

On this date in our family history . . . the 12th day of July in the year 1867 . . . Catherine Ann "Kitty" Waring nee Waring dies at Southampton, home of her son, in St. Mary's County, Maryland . . . according to the DAR "Eye on Elegance" website . . . 

Catherine “Kitty” Waring lived in southern Prince George’s County and married her cousin Edward Gantt Waring before their move to Texas in 1840. In the 1850 slave census, three African-Americans, including two women, lived at the Waring farm [in Liberty County, Texas]. Perhaps they were there to help with the quilt a few years earlier. Edward died in [sic, i.e., before] 1850, and by 1860, Kitty had returned to Maryland.

  
Back in Maryland, Kitty would apparently live out her days in the Southampton home of her son, Dr. James Waring . . . 

This Kitty is a 4th great-grandma to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . 

1943 :: Southampton burns in Maryland

Seventy five years ago, sometime in the month of April in the year 1943, it is said that a Waring family home burned in Maryland . . . that home is pictured in the below collage . . . 

Johnston, Frances Benjamin, photographer. Southampton, Chaptico vic., St. Mary's County, Maryland. Chaptico Vic Maryland St. Mary's County, 1936. to 1937. Photograph. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2017887724/.

This centuries-old home, which had been known to several generations of the Waring family as Southampton, was located near Chaptico in St. Mary's County, Maryland. According to Maryland, a Guide to the Old Line State (1940) . . .

SOUTHAMPTON . . . ancestral home of the Bond family, now a two-and-one-half-story clapboarded house, with a gambrel roof and porches along the front and rear. The ivy clinging to the huge double brick chimneys -- which have a pent between and pent flanking -- is said to have been brought from Kenilworth Castle shortly after SOUTHAMPTON was built by Richard Bond in the seventeenth century. The wall-of-Troy panel above the fireplace is the only carved wall panel remaining. The old witch door has H hinges, a brass lock, and a pendant handle. 

The following news clipping from 1867 mentions that the death of my 4th great-grandma occurred at this residence.

---

DIED. On Friday, the 12th instant, at Southampton, the residence of her son, Dr. James Waring, after a long and painful illness, which she bore with Christian patience and resignation, Mrs. KITTY* WARING, widow of the late EDWARD G. WARING, of Prince Georges county, in the eightieth year of her age. St. Marys Gazette, Leonardtown, Md., Thursday morning, July 25, 1867.

---

And then in 1883, the following news clipping mentions that Kitty's son, Dr. James Waring, dies at the same residence . . .

Many of our readers will be pained to learn of the death of Dr. James Waring, which occurred at Southampton, his residence in St. Mary's county, on Friday, the 19th last. . . . He married a daughter of the late Gov. Thomas, of Maryland, who survives him. . . . Prince George's Inquirer by way of the Saint Mary's Beacon, Leonard Town, Maryland, Thursday, February 8, 1883

In 1896, Kate Eliza (daughter of Dr. Waring) died at Southampton . . . 

On July 16, 1896, at Southampton, St. Mary's county, Md., KATE ELIZA, eldest daughter of Ann Maria and the late Dr. James Waring, and grand daughter of the late Gov. James Thomas. A noble woman, gifted with rare intellect cultivated by association and study -- a heart warm, tender, and true -- a spirit of self sacrifice that is learned only in treading the footsteps of Him she served so faithfully. The truest monument to her will be found in the memory of the many to whom her life was a benediction and a comfort. Saint Mary's Beacon, Leonard Town, Maryland, August 6th, 1896

In 1901, Dr. Waring's widow died, also at Southampton . . . 

WARING. -- On November 15, 1901, at Southampton, St. Mary's county, Maryland, ANNE MARIA, in the 84th year of her age, widow of Dr. James Waring, and daughter of the late Governor James Thomas and Eliza Courts Thomas. [Washington D. C. papers please copy.] The Baltimore Sun, Baltimore, Maryland, Thursday, November 28, 1901

---

Then, just two months ago today, the death of another Kitty brings about the mention of Southampton in yet another news clipping . . . 

Catherine Ann "Kitty" Waring Barnes, known all her life as Kitty, passed away peacefully on February 7, 2018. Born in Chicago, Kitty and her family returned to Southampton, the Waring family farm in Chaptico, during the Great Depression. [from her obit]

The Kitty who died in 2018 was apparently living at Southampton when it burned. She is also the Kitty who gifted the DAR with a Lone Star Quilt which once belonged to our Grandma Kitty.

---

Image courtesy C.W. Barnes

<---*This KITTY WARING is the one who is a 4th great-grandma to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . she is also the Kitty who made the quilt referred to above. 

---

The following chart shows the kinship between benotforgot and Dr. James Waring. Note that this chart was generated by Ancestry, and that Ancestry chooses to show him as a 4th great-uncle. But since this Dr. Waring is the brother of my 3rd great-grandma, it makes much more sense to me to refer to him as my 3rd great-grand-uncle.

See also . . .

Tech Tuesday :: Kinship Chart

1843 :: A Vanishing out of Bermuda

175 years ago today . . . on the 23rd day of March in the year 1843 . . . the following news clipping appeared in a Louisiana newspaper . . .

One of the passengers on "the French brig Amanda" was Alexander Lemaire, who is a 3rd great-grandpa to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . the Amanda was never heard from again after leaving Bermuda . . .

P.S. Please do contact me if you happen across a passenger list for this ship. benotforgot at gmail dot com

1844 :: Report of Missing Ship

On this date in our family history . . . the 25th day of February in the year 1844 . . . the following news clipping was published in a New Orleans newspaper . . .

Missing Vessel. -- Letters have recently been received, stating that the French brig Amanda, which put into Bermuda in distress, last February, on a voyage from Texas to Havre, and sailed thence the same month, for her destined port, has not since been heard of. The Times-Picayune, New Orleans, Louisiana, February 25, 1844.

One of the passengers on the brig Amanda (which sailed from Galveston, and was never heard from again) was Alexander Lemaire, who is a 3rd great-grandpa to the Keeper of this family history blog.

P.S. Please do contact me if you happen across a passenger list for this ship. benotforgot at gmail dot com

 

1932 :: When Ghosts Walk in Courthouse Shade

Late in the 20th century, I picked up several vintage copies of Frontier Times at a local used bookstore . . . one of those copies was dated January 1932 . . . as it happens . . . in Lynn, Massachusetts, in January of 1932, a baby girl was born . . . her young Mother had been born in Maine, and her Father in Texas . . . that baby girl was my Mom . . . 
 
One of the articles in that 1932 Frontier Times was entitled "When Ghosts Walk in Courthouse Shade" . . . the "Ghosts" story was written by Vivian Richardson and was originally published in the Dallas Morning News in August of 1931 . . . one of the "ghosts" of San Augustine mentioned in that article is Elisha Roberts, who is a 3rd great-grandpa to my Mom . . . Vivian Richardson quoted an old Texan as saying that "I always think of the San Augustine country as the Valley of the Giants." Vivian went on to say that . . .

I think the deeds of the Giants will live on in the shadow of San Augustine's court house as long as there is a patriarch left to recount them. . . . it is on that ground one may almost always, of a likely afternoon, find the old men talking, and there I found them, that hot, singing July day, and listened reverently. . . . Sam Houston . . . and old Elisha Roberts, the last alcalde under the Mexican regime, could sit all day talking and whitling. I used to think they talked about Tennessee, where they knew each other, but I don't know. Maybe they didn't. . . . Almost every Texan who amounted to anything in the early days at one time either lived or stayed for long periods in San Augustine. . . .

This article can also be found in its entirety in the Coleman Democrat-Voice (Coleman, Tex.), Vol. 50, No. 52, Ed. 1 where it was published on Thursday, December 24, 1931 . . .

P.S. . . . it is now after 3 a.m. on the 31st . . . and as I put the finishing touches on this blog post, I sit here waiting for the "super blue moon eclipse" of which it has been written that "this rare celestial event - a blue moon, a supermoon, and a total lunar eclipse - hasn't happened in over 150 years." . . . I will call Mom in a few hours so she can see the eclipse from central Texas . . . seems that even the heavenlies are collaborating to celebrate her 86th birthday!

1895 :: Marriage of Edgar and Berta Mary

On this date in our family history . . . the 2nd day of January . . . in the year 1895 . . . Berta Mary Sharp marries Edgar Henry in Crockett, Houston County, Texas . . . they are the parents of Rubie and George and Frank and Milton and Robert and Oscar and Nellie . . .



Edgar Henry
born 31 January 1872
Old Independence, Washington County, Texas
died 25 June 1950
Rockdale, Milam County, Texas


Berta Mary (Sharp) Henry
born 10 November 1873
Hall Plantation, Houston County, Texas
died 06 December 1955
Rockdale, Milam County, Texas




This Edgar and Berta are maternal great-grandparents to the Keeper of this family history blog . . .

FYI . . . . . . original photo of Edgar and Berta from our family photo collection . . . blank journal page containing the details of their marriage is from a friendship album belonging to Berta Mary . . . linen hanky is from the private collection of benotforgot . . . postage stamp is from the birth announcement for Robert Henry, Jr. mailed to Edgar and Berta by Elizabeth Marilla Henry nee Smith  . . . heritage collage created at mycanvas.com . . . some free graphics from Far Far Hill . . .

1675 :: Birth of Ruth Perley

On this date in our family history . . . the 4th day of June . . . in the year 1675 . . . a baby girl is born in Massachusetts . . . the parents are Samuel Perley and Ruth Trumble . . . and their new daughter is named after her mother . . . this baby girl named Ruth is an 8th great-grandma to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . 

History and Genealogy of the Perley Family
by Martin Van Buren Perley

Published 1906

1599 :: Death of Elizabeth Twyne

On this date in our family history . . . the 20th day of May . . . in the year 1599 . . . Elizabeth Brooke nee Twyne dies somewhere in England . . . and is memorialized in 1603 when her son places a "brass" in the Whitfield Church . . . the wording from this brass is quoted below . . . this Elizabeth is a 12th great-grandma to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . in a letter from Vicar of Whitchurch, he wrote that . . . 

There is a beautiful Brass which I now give you :

PIETATIS OPUS

This grave (oh griefe) hath swallowed up with wide and open mouth
The body of good Richard Brooke of Whitchurch, Hampton South,
And Elizabeth his wedded wife, twise Twentie years and one.
Sweet Jesus hath their souls in heaven, ye ground flesh, skin and bone.

In Januarie, worne with age, daie sixteneth died hee.
From Christ full fifteene hundred years and more by ninety-three;
But death her twist of life in Maie, daie twentieth did untwine,
From Christ full fifteen hundred years and more by ninety-nine.

They left behind them, well to live and grown to good degree,
First Richard, Thomas, Robert Brooke the youngest of the three;
Elizabeth and Barbara and Dorothee the last
All six the knot of nature, love and kindness, keeping Fast.

This toomstone with the plate thereon, thus graven fair and large
Did Robert Brooke, the youngest sonne, make of his proper charge.
A citizen of London State by faithful service Free,
Of Marchant great Adventurers a brother sworne was hee;

And of the Indian Companie, come gain or loss or lim
And of the Goldsmith liverie, All these God gifte to him
This monument of memorie in love performed hee
December thirtie-one from Christ, Sixteen hundred and Three.

Anno Domini, 1603 --

Laus Deo.

St. George's Day

Stray Leaves from a Border Garden By Mary Pamela Ellis Milne-Home


All the Year Round  By Charles Dickens

Sentimental Sunday :: Easter Sunday at Goldfish Pond

On Easter Sunday in the year 1931, our Grandma Elizabeth was at Goldfish Pond with her baby boy . . . a baby girl would join the family the following January . . . that baby girl grew up to be our Mom . . . 

On that long ago Sunday, Elizabeth captured the above snapshot of one of the goldfish, saying that it was "partly out of the pond after a piece of popcorn" . . . this Goldfish Pond was apparently a favorite place for an outing for this little family . . . a few years later the following snapshot was taken . . . 

This is our Mom and her brother, sitting on the edge of Goldfish Pond . . . this would have been mid-1930s . . . mayhaps on another Easter Sunday . . . 

More than three hundred years before the above images were captured on film, that little body of water was known by another name . . . Ingalls Pond . . . 

Near this pond was the home of Edmund Ingalls, one of the founders of Lynn, Essex County, Massachusetts . . . this pond can be seen on the following map . . . towards the right . . . and in the bottom third of the image . . . 

Map of Lynn and Saugus : settled in 1629

On an unspecified day in the month of March in the year 1648 . . . Edmund Ingalls would meet a watery death when the horse he was riding fell through a faulty bridge while crossing the Saugus River on a journey to Boston from his home near Ingalls Pond . . . this Boston Street crossing can be seen in the bottom third of the above map . . . to the far left . . . 


This Edmund Ingalls is said to be the 5th great-grandpa of President James Garfield . . . he is the 7th great-grandpa of American author, Laura Ingalls Wilder . . . and as a result of on-going research regarding the ancestors of our Mom, just this past week this same Edmund Ingalls was revealed to be the 10th great-grandpa of the Mom of the Keeper of this family history blog . . .

The genealogy and history of the Ingalls family in America

Other blogposts regarding the same Edmund Ingalls . . . 

• Barbara Johnson from Wisconsin
• Cow Hampshire
• Historians out & About
• My Maine Ancestry
• Nutfield Genealogy
• Omah's Corner

1920 :: T.W.A. Smith Hopelessly Ill Ends Life

Thursday, February 12, 1920

Smith Family

43 Prospect Street

Biddeford, Maine

T.W.A. Smith, Hopelessly Ill, Ends Life

1955 :: Death of Berta Mary Henry

On this date in our family history . . . it was a winter's Tuesday in the year 1955 . . . the 6th day of December . . . when Berta Mary Henry nee Sharp died at her home on Scarbrough Street in Rockdale, Milam County, Texas . . . her funeral was held on the 7th . . . and her obituary was published in the local newspaper on the 8th . . . this Berta Mary is a maternal great-grandma to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . 

The Rockdale Reporter
December 8, 1955 

Mrs. Edgar Henry dies Tuesday at home here

Mrs. Edgar Henry, 82, died at her home here Tuesday morning after an extended illness.

In September she had an accident that left her with a broken hip for which she underwent surgery. Later due to shock and other complications of her system she became bedridden and the long illness followed.

Mrs. Henry, as Berta Mary Sharp, was born in Houston county, Texas on November 10, 1873, the daughter of Sam and Nellie Lamar [sic] Sharp. She married Edgar Henry and had lived in and near Rockdale for approximately sixty-one years [sic], having in that time formed many close friendships. Her husband preceded her in death June 26, 1950.

Mrs. Henry was a member of the Baptist church.

Funeral services were conducted Wednesday at 2 p.m. from the Chapel of Phillips and Luckey Funeral Home. The officiating ministers were the Rev. M.M. Fulmer of First Baptist church and Rev. Graham Pugh of First Christian church.

Burial was made at Oak Lawn cemetery with six of the grandsons serving as pallbearers.

The survivors are the following six children: George Henry, Mrs. Ruby Christian, Oscar Henry of Rockdale, Milton and Robert Henry of Sinton, Mrs. Nellie Peebles of Lexington; 18 grandchildren, 12 great-grandchildren and a sister, Mrs. Ida Halyard of Crockett, Texas. A son, Frank Henry, died here on July 8, 1952.

1889 :: Photo of Jerusha

On this date in our family history . . . the 2nd day of December . . . in the year 1889 . . . Mrs. A.F. Smith poses for a photo in the studio of Gardner & Philbrick in Biddeford, Maine . . . aka Jerusha Marilla Barker, Mrs. Smith was born in 1841 in Bridgton, Cumberland County, Maine . . . married Atwood Frank Smith in 1857 in Biddeford, York County, Maine . . . and died in 1899 at fifty-eight years of age . . . this Jerusha is a 2nd great-grandma to the Keeper of this family history blog . . . 

Mrs. A.F. Smith

Biddeford

Maine

Dec. 2nd 1889.

$3.00

We Stand at the Head

Our Photographs of all kinds are made bet-

ter if possible than before the rush. Certainly

as durable as any in the State. We make

Cabinets for the extremely low price of

$3 PER DOZEN.

GARDNER & PHILBRICK

131 MAIN ST., BIDDEFORD.

Biddeford Daily Journal, March 24, 1888