Information in the Land Register of Quebec (Registre Foncier du Québec) has been largely untapped by genealogists. Sharon Callaghan recently authored two articles in Connections, the quarterly journal of the Quebec Family History Society—vol. 30, no. 3 (2008) and vol. 31, no. 1 (2009). Sharon penetrated, for family historians, the complexities of the province’s rather unique history of land ownership and methods of accessing the documentation.
The Quebec Family History Society was formed in 1977 and I’ve been a member of QFHS since early days (no. 273). Sharon and fellow member Gary Schroder decided to work out some “real life” examples of land registry tracing. My ancestor John Fraser the farmer became a guinea pig. Not my John Fraser the blacksmith. John the farmer had lived on the River Rouge Road outside St Andrews, Quebec (St-André Est) since 1806.
In order to keep this post to a readable length, I’m merely introducing the Land Register of Quebec. It's a learning exercise for me, because it’s not a particularly easy subject to follow. My Fraser news and documentation, some of it still to come, will have to wait until Part 9.
How would a family historian find the history of occupancy and transactions on an individual property in the province of Quebec? To compare, most of my experience is with historical Ontario land records (say pre-1950). Once you know the name of a rural township with a concession and lot number, you consult the abstract index to deeds for that property. The abstract index is a short-form outline of all registered transactions on that piece of land dating from its original Crown land patent (title deed). Created in county and district land registry offices, southern Ontario abstract indexes were microfilmed by the Genealogical Society of Utah in the 1960s. Thus, they can be viewed at LDS Family History Centers, at the Archives of Ontario in Toronto, or at various smaller archives with selected film copies. Urban properties established in old town plans or subdivisions require somewhat more effort to trace back from a modern address.
Quebec, on the other hand, has a history of French seigneurial land grants, abolished in 1854, which overlapped with the English township land division dating from the 1760s. The present Quebec cadastral system evolved with new surveys from the 1860s and completed in the 1890s. The surveys had to take existing properties into account, but allocated new numbers for them within each cadastre or district.
The key is to identify the relevant cadastre (current land division) of the ancestral residence, and then sleuth with maps, surveys, directories, atlases, and every other possible source to determine a cadastral number for urban or rural land. Municipal offices can assist with if you know a street address.
Cadastral numbers are not the same as previous lot numbers, if indeed there had been a prior lot number. Armed with this special number and presenting yourself at the appropriate land registry office, you’ll be able to access the land register for the relevant property (similar to the abstract indexes mentioned above). The references (actes) in the register can include deeds, surveys, wills, and other notarial records going back to the lot’s cadastral establishment. One lot may require searching more than one number. The land registers began in the 1830s as land offices were set up. Sharon rightly celebrates that this is another way to find genealogically-rich but often elusive notarial documents.
An alternative, if you’ve found the required number(s), is to use the fee-based online database leading to the land register ... if you feel comfortable with the French language. The actes have now been digitized as far back as the oldest cadastre system. You can order a copy of any act from the register no matter its date. See full information on the Natural Resources website.
Before I even fully grasp the handle of this newly opened door, I’m asking, what about pre-1830 records? Ahhh ... think seigneurial document collections! ... a different ball game. The possibilities expand.
20 September 2009
09 September 2009
Historical Toronto: Berkeley Castle and Lost Buildings
"Berkeley Castle" Photograph by BDM 2009.A lovely cluster of old buildings called “Berkeley Castle” has been renovated at the foot of Berkeley Street between The Esplanade and Front Street. They date from the middlish-1800s, including what was once a knitting mill. The present site has a pleasant courtyard and a unique appeal for small business occupants. The current owners have acknowledged some of the history, e.g. “In 1842 the site of Berkeley Castle Yard was occupied by orchards and sat at the water's edge. A formal garden and fairground existed there as well. Joseph Small, who was once mayor of the town, owned the property and built a wharf at the foot of Berkeley street.”
But long before the mid-1800s, I want to go back to when the Town of York was conceived and born. I’m not a historian or an archaeologist, but I have a story.
In 1793 Governor Simcoe selected a new capital for Upper Canada at Toronto Harbour. A muddy little town called York would spring up forthwith. Mind you, parliament was not in session here until 1795. Many officials were reluctant to move from their comfort at Newark (Niagara-on-the-Lake). The parliament buildings, aka Government House, were not completely finished until 1798. Their predominant site was on the east side of Berkeley Street, south of Front (once called Palace) Street. In the 1790s, Berkeley Street was the eastern town boundary.
Meanwhile, a number of plans and surveys existed for the town which occasioned plenty of angst among would-be residents and officers of the Crown. The governor’s office and the land committee were swamped with petitions for building lots and larger estates. Everyone wanted a prime location. Building contractors, carpenters and masons were in great demand from day one. Some properties were being claimed, and structures were being built, before land titles could be confirmed.
My interest was in a man called George Porter who was among the earliest arrivals from Newark in the summer of 1793. He took full advantage of the new opportunities. In his various petitions, Porter described himself as a “former sergeant of militia” or a carpenter. He erected one of the very first houses in the town, a log house on Lot 1, First Block. The lot was between Front and King Streets, bounded on the east by Berkeley and the west by what became Ontario Street (each block had several lots, sometimes of varying sizes, with a front and a back on differing streets).(1) Lots on the First Block along Front Street did not appear to include water lots across the street. Porter also had other irons in the fire, having a grant of land on the Don River and applications for other properties in York and Newark. It’s known that he had a wife and family in York by 1797.(2)
Enter John Small (1746-1831), clerk of Simcoe’s executive council, coming to York to take up his duties—John Small of the infamous 1800 duel which resulted in the death of the attorney-general and overshadowed his entire career (see Dictionary of Canadian Biography). On his arrival, Small decided the perfect spot for his new home was on Lot 1, First Block. He would be mere moments away from his work at Government House. But George Porter had already claimed it. The two men resolved Porter’s prior claim with Small buying him out on 31 August 1795 for $50 and a promise of completing the shingling.(3) They probably knew each other from their neighbouring town lot claims in Newark. Small would live in the house while planning his grand estate, intending for Porter’s house to become his eventual stable.
A lot of things never went smoothly for Small, a bureaucrat whose “work was soon badly in arrears.”(4) It must have been doubly aggravating for him, as the governor’s clerk and a permanent resident, that ownership and title for Town of York land grants often bogged down over conflicting claims—whose name was properly entered for which property by which surveyor or government official. Some lots, like Porter’s, had been allocated by surveyor Alexander Aitken before Simcoe requested surveyor David Smith to make another plan.
By 1805 Small was still trying to establish title to his desirable property whereon he had “his Cellar dug and the Frame for his House brought there 70 by 26 feet and the greatest part of it put together.”(5) Small stated Simcoe himself had initiated the delay for fear Small’s grand house would detract from the parliament building view. Actually, a government reserve had been declared early, perhaps another example of shifting survey boundaries, which may or may not have affected Small’s location. Nevertheless, apparently he eventually clarified his title and built his home.
Town of York, November 1813, from "Sketch of the Ground in Advance and including York, Upper Canada," by George Williams, Library and Archives Canada; as seen in The Town of York, 1793-1815 by Edith Firth, opposite p. lxxxi.With trepidations from an amateur, some discrepancies are noted regarding site locations and other matters, although John Small was not my target interest and each and every known map of old York has not been investigated. I invite comments on the discrepancies.
Small’s home can be seen marked in teal (where I think it is) on the 1813 map of York. The location agrees with both Scadding(6) and Robertson(7), writing later in the nineteenth century, who say Small’s house was on King Street, i.e. facing King rather than Front. That makes sense if he modified his plan so as not to “interfere” with the Government House view. And also probably because Porter’s more modest house occupied a different part of the lot. By now it seems Small had acquired more than one lot in the First Block. But where exactly was Small’s stable, once George Porter’s house? Enquiring descendants would like to know.
Porter’s house could be any of the other buildings shown on the block, but (discrepancy) Firth says the log house was located on the southwest corner of King and Ontario Streets, which would place it in the Second Block.(8) Scadding provides information about Small’s original home, referring to a plan of the grounds.(9) I wonder where that “plan” is now, and what was its date?! The house had a “central portion and two-gable wings somewhat after the fashion of many an old country manor house in England. ... It was one of the earliest domestic erections in York [c. 1794]. When reconstructed at a subsequent period, Mr. Charles Small preserved, in the enlarged and elevated building now known as Berkeley House, the shape and even a portion of the inner substance of the original structure.” Charles Coxwell Small was a son of John Small. Scadding was a bit premature on his completion date (discrepancy), since Small was still facing a partially constructed building in December 1805.
Part of fold-out (1842) map in frontispiece of Toronto of Old by Henry Scadding.So what we see on the 1842 map is a different outline of Small’s house (another discrepancy?)—it now appears to be set back from King Street. We can see the extensive orchards on the south side of Front Street where “Berkeley Castle” now stands. By then the son Charles had effected his renovations and presumably had acquired the water lot south of Front. John Small had a son and a grandson named Joseph Small, neither of whom was a mayor of Toronto (discrepancy) according to a List of Mayors of Toronto but some descendants did become involved in public service and politics. Landfill at the shoreline began in the 1830s and we can see here how the esplanade was being shaped south of the orchard. On the east, the parliament buildings have disappeared, having been burnt down in 1813 during the American invasion. The Small home was demolished in 1925.
My friend George Porter remained in York for a few years, attempting like so many others to acquire additional land grants like his more influential contemporaries. George disappeared suddenly in 1799, leaving a small family in his wake. And leaving scads of questions about his widow’s life after 1799 until about 1823 and where his children were in the interim! Now that’s what I call a mystery.
N.B. See an update on Small and Porter
1. J.G. Chewett, “Plan of the Town of York, Corrected, 1827,”digital image, NMC 16819, University of Toronto Map & Data Library (http://prod.library.utoronto.ca:8090/maplib/digital/NMC16819.jpg : accessed 4 September 2009).
2. Christine Mosser, ed., York, Upper Canada, Minutes of Town Meetings and Lists of Inhabitants, 1793-1823 (Toronto: Metropolitan Library Board, 1984), 21.
3. Upper Canada Land Book F, pp. 359-361 (1805); Library and Archives Canada microfilm C-102. The entry includes copies of Small’s petitions in 1800 and 1801. Edith Firth in The Town of York 1793-1815 adds the details of the price.
4. S.R. Mealing, “John Small,” Dictionary of Canadian Biography, Vol.VI, 1821-1835 (http://www.biographi.ca/ : accessed 6 March 2009).
5. Land Book F, pp. 359-361.
6. Henry Scadding, Chapter 6, "King Street: George Street to the Bridge and Across It," Toronto of Old (1873; reprint Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1987). pp 137-138. Also available on Google Books (http://books.google.ca/).
7. John Ross Robertson, Landmarks of Toronto, Vol. 3 (1898; reprint Belleville, ON: Mika Publishing, 1974), insert p. 95 and p. 96.
8. Edith Firth, The Town of York, 1793-1815 (Toronto: Champlain Society/University of Toronto Press, 1962), 223; citing Ridout Papers at Archives of Ontario.
9. Scadding, p. 138.
02 September 2009
McFadyens Part 9: Footnotes and Fantasies
I know, I’m neglecting the Dougalls and Frasers. Best to concentrate on one project at a time, to get the maximum effort into the story and the mechanics. Strike while the iron’s hot. Stop delaying and dallying with dreamy thoughts that a visit to the Isle of Coll is in my future and will somehow fuse everything together. Just because I saw the McFadyen homestead in River Denys (Cape Breton), doesn’t mean I’ll find a heap of stones in Scotland where my ancestors once lived barefoot and ate turnips. It doesn’t mean I’ll have a huge epiphany or a sea change or something. As I understand it, tourists often fail to grasp local colloquialisms, so they miss the healthy humour of today’s Collachs.
Who, by some reports, tend to party away half the night. This is how they raise money for a new community centre so they can have bigger parties. I'd never get any rest if I went.
Photograph "Arinagour Sunrise," Welcome to Coll (http://www.visitcoll.co.uk/wallpapers.php?g=1&w=1024&h=768). This is what happy Collachs see on their way home after a successful ceilidh.
But I digress. This was supposed to be about my resolve to shape up my McFadyen family history (Ancestors and Descendants of Donald McFADYEN and Flory McLEAN from the Isle of Coll, Scotland, to River Denys, Nova Scotia). The cards are on the table and the iron is in the fire. I confess: I’m a manual, word-processing, do-it-yourself family history writer. The shaping up means checking every footnote, about 200 at last count, for proper standards and consistency. Elizabeth Shown Mills’ Evidence Explained is THE guide, not to mention her QuickSheets for citing online sources. A good footnote/citation checker will pay the greatest attention to each note in sequence. A not-so-good checker, like me, will get distracted by each note and start rummaging through files to see if I missed a nugget or go online to search/add more information or start bugging the relatives again. It gets painful when I find myself subscribing to more databases or waiting for new bits from phone calls and postal mail.
Discipline is absolutely necessary to stop the straying and go with what I’ve got. Otherwise, as all writers and historians know, the job will never end. We want to research, write and edit forever. And let me tell you, I acknowledge that 200 footnotes are a modest pittance compared to the ambitious projects I see other genealogists undertaking. Sigh. Will anyone in my family ever understand why I’m doing this the way I’m doing it?
Then I must check my genealogical numbering system, including all those superscript numbers and when they should be italic or not. My suspicion is that I may have mixed the Register system with the NGSQ system sometimes. You’d think I would have used Numbering Your Genealogy: Basic Systems, Complex Families and International Kin (authors Curran, Crane and Wray, Special Publication no. 64 from NGS, 1999) from the get-go, avoiding this retro situation. Well, this perfect booklet was published way after I’d started my constructing. Too late to wipe it out and start again from scratch.
You can take a car on the ferry from Oban to Coll, but why bother when you can rent a bicycle on an island measuring about 3 miles by 12 miles. I’m only seeking a driver from Edinburgh to Oban who won’t kill us driving on the wrong side of the road. Might as well keep the dream alive.
Who, by some reports, tend to party away half the night. This is how they raise money for a new community centre so they can have bigger parties. I'd never get any rest if I went. Photograph "Arinagour Sunrise," Welcome to Coll (http://www.visitcoll.co.uk/wallpapers.php?g=1&w=1024&h=768). This is what happy Collachs see on their way home after a successful ceilidh.
But I digress. This was supposed to be about my resolve to shape up my McFadyen family history (Ancestors and Descendants of Donald McFADYEN and Flory McLEAN from the Isle of Coll, Scotland, to River Denys, Nova Scotia). The cards are on the table and the iron is in the fire. I confess: I’m a manual, word-processing, do-it-yourself family history writer. The shaping up means checking every footnote, about 200 at last count, for proper standards and consistency. Elizabeth Shown Mills’ Evidence Explained is THE guide, not to mention her QuickSheets for citing online sources. A good footnote/citation checker will pay the greatest attention to each note in sequence. A not-so-good checker, like me, will get distracted by each note and start rummaging through files to see if I missed a nugget or go online to search/add more information or start bugging the relatives again. It gets painful when I find myself subscribing to more databases or waiting for new bits from phone calls and postal mail.
Discipline is absolutely necessary to stop the straying and go with what I’ve got. Otherwise, as all writers and historians know, the job will never end. We want to research, write and edit forever. And let me tell you, I acknowledge that 200 footnotes are a modest pittance compared to the ambitious projects I see other genealogists undertaking. Sigh. Will anyone in my family ever understand why I’m doing this the way I’m doing it?
Then I must check my genealogical numbering system, including all those superscript numbers and when they should be italic or not. My suspicion is that I may have mixed the Register system with the NGSQ system sometimes. You’d think I would have used Numbering Your Genealogy: Basic Systems, Complex Families and International Kin (authors Curran, Crane and Wray, Special Publication no. 64 from NGS, 1999) from the get-go, avoiding this retro situation. Well, this perfect booklet was published way after I’d started my constructing. Too late to wipe it out and start again from scratch.
You can take a car on the ferry from Oban to Coll, but why bother when you can rent a bicycle on an island measuring about 3 miles by 12 miles. I’m only seeking a driver from Edinburgh to Oban who won’t kill us driving on the wrong side of the road. Might as well keep the dream alive.
24 August 2009
McFadyens Part 8: Some Answers
A recent trip to the main Vancouver Public Library on Georgia Street produced an answer about one of my McFadyens. What an architecturally stunning building! They thought of providing a café, a news agent, and a few other shops in the rotunda where serious readers can take a break, stretch their legs and fortify themselves. As my granddaughter-assistant and I munched on panini and wraps, we could observe carrels in use on the floors above. These glass fish bowls were pointed out for granddaughter's encouragement into the exciting world of learning, not to mention genealogy. Wouldn’t you know it? The most prominent corner featured a student busily sleeping on his stack of books. He probably created a slight dip in my curve as granny-the-educator. The only possible drawback in the whole experience might be this city’s curious lack of Tim Horton’s. Nevertheless, when in Rome, do as the Romans ...
My aforementioned (novice) assistant was forthwith plunged into the intricacies of correlating website printouts with microfilm numbers and proved herself adept at reading tiny print on 8mm film boxes. She also shined at quickly catching on to document numbers on the reels, and instantly catching the death date on each frame. I don’t know if this is a good way to train a new generation, but it worked for me.
One of my Hector McFadyens (oh yes, there’s more than one Hector, what did you expect?!) died in Kamloops, BC, in 1944. This Hector is a black-ish sheep and will have a separate post if I can ever uncover the last 20 years before his death. Maybe even if I can’t.
I’m grateful for some answers to my Questions in “McFadyens Part 7” thanks to fellow McFadyenite Ian Scott in OZ. Many interesting Coll projects have bloomed from Australia and are a boon to descendants around the world. Keith Dash maintains the twin websites, Isle of Coll Genealogy and Isle of Tiree Genealogy. Ian Scott is a big contributor to the transcribing and indexing projects on these sites. Not to take away from the many volunteers who also contribute, but these OZ guys have been particularly helpful and patient with me. I am at a disadvantage, probably lamented before, because I don’t have the microfilm parish register at hand.
My Q #1: Were the lists of babies and marriages in the Kirk Sessions then recorded in the Old Parish Register (OPR) for Coll & Tiree?
A: The Kirk Session entries, at least up to 1813, were copied into a (new) parish register at some point when legislation required it. The minister wrote in the parish (of Coll and Tiree) book:
"What is contained in this and fifty three preceding pages is a true copy of the Register of Marriages and baptisms for this part of the Parish of Tyree, being the period for Marriages from 23rd July 1776 to 1st June 1813 and for Baptisms from 14th April 1776 to 26th April 1813 inclusive, copied out in terms of the Act of Parliament, this Register being mixed up with Sessional matters."
Presumably from then on all baptisms and marriages were recorded in a parish book rather than Kirk Session minutes. Or both. Thank you, Ian Scott, for clarifying this.
My Q #2: Are Coll & Tiree OPRs actually included on the IGI (International Genealogical Index)?
A: The answer to this question follows from the above. Yes, we know the LDS microfilm crew did film all the Scotland OPRs. There must be a reason why I can’t find MY five alleged McFadyen baptisms on the IGI. I promise I will not continue this dithering unless some solution penetrates the fog.
Regarding the work of the wonderful OZ guys, on the same library trip we found a Hector from Tiree born about 1819 who died in BC. Oh that he would be mine, sigh, but I’ll get right on it and post it to the Tiree mail list. Let it be known that I consider OZ a term of affection, just in case it has any local unpleasant connotations I don’t know about.
My aforementioned (novice) assistant was forthwith plunged into the intricacies of correlating website printouts with microfilm numbers and proved herself adept at reading tiny print on 8mm film boxes. She also shined at quickly catching on to document numbers on the reels, and instantly catching the death date on each frame. I don’t know if this is a good way to train a new generation, but it worked for me.
One of my Hector McFadyens (oh yes, there’s more than one Hector, what did you expect?!) died in Kamloops, BC, in 1944. This Hector is a black-ish sheep and will have a separate post if I can ever uncover the last 20 years before his death. Maybe even if I can’t.
I’m grateful for some answers to my Questions in “McFadyens Part 7” thanks to fellow McFadyenite Ian Scott in OZ. Many interesting Coll projects have bloomed from Australia and are a boon to descendants around the world. Keith Dash maintains the twin websites, Isle of Coll Genealogy and Isle of Tiree Genealogy. Ian Scott is a big contributor to the transcribing and indexing projects on these sites. Not to take away from the many volunteers who also contribute, but these OZ guys have been particularly helpful and patient with me. I am at a disadvantage, probably lamented before, because I don’t have the microfilm parish register at hand.
My Q #1: Were the lists of babies and marriages in the Kirk Sessions then recorded in the Old Parish Register (OPR) for Coll & Tiree?
A: The Kirk Session entries, at least up to 1813, were copied into a (new) parish register at some point when legislation required it. The minister wrote in the parish (of Coll and Tiree) book:
"What is contained in this and fifty three preceding pages is a true copy of the Register of Marriages and baptisms for this part of the Parish of Tyree, being the period for Marriages from 23rd July 1776 to 1st June 1813 and for Baptisms from 14th April 1776 to 26th April 1813 inclusive, copied out in terms of the Act of Parliament, this Register being mixed up with Sessional matters."
Presumably from then on all baptisms and marriages were recorded in a parish book rather than Kirk Session minutes. Or both. Thank you, Ian Scott, for clarifying this.
My Q #2: Are Coll & Tiree OPRs actually included on the IGI (International Genealogical Index)?
A: The answer to this question follows from the above. Yes, we know the LDS microfilm crew did film all the Scotland OPRs. There must be a reason why I can’t find MY five alleged McFadyen baptisms on the IGI. I promise I will not continue this dithering unless some solution penetrates the fog.
Regarding the work of the wonderful OZ guys, on the same library trip we found a Hector from Tiree born about 1819 who died in BC. Oh that he would be mine, sigh, but I’ll get right on it and post it to the Tiree mail list. Let it be known that I consider OZ a term of affection, just in case it has any local unpleasant connotations I don’t know about.
10 August 2009
August Break
The New Yorker, 11 May 2009; courtesy of a friend-subscriber.(Maybe it was all the cholesterol I devoured a short time ago to celebrate a significant life milestone. Thanks, Barb. Now go hide yourself in France.)
Milestones seem to be hurtling by with no respect for the timing of my research plans, priorities, goals and daily task lists. I've heard there are genealogists who manage their time in a healthy balance of relationships, children, pets, and outside interests while still making progress on the family history or whatever their chosen way of volunteering information and education. Do the rest of us genie workaholics with tunnel vision need a life coach to smell the roses? Or a Dr. Phil consult?
Life milestones mean reviewing the priorities. One must review the priorities regularly. Mine have a sneaky habit of shifting before I know what’s up, something like the contrary milestones. In order to assume control and rectify my balance, I make lists for acting sociable and normal. Speak to my neighbours in the elevator. Go to meetings. See that movie. Stroll the yard sales. Attend parties. Dance at festivals. Ask strangers on the street for wi-fi spots. Invite someone for a glass of red wine. Cancel that if they have a smoke allergy. Make friends with people who think genealogy is a medical accident, ... if they ever think of it at all. To accomplish all this requires memorizing a short list of non-genealogy topics.
In the excitement of committing to healthy normal again, I propose to take time off and visit one of my offspring. Call it spending some time with the living instead of the dead. Give my Scottish correspondents a break. Truthfully, I try to make family visits on a regular basis, but as I said on Facebook, the closest is 1,264 km (785 miles) away. Canada’s east coast, west coast and Europe have to take their turns.
Therefore, no posts for a bit. Not that I’m known for over-activity in this medium. But I always have an ace up my sleeve to prove I’m not a myopic one-trick pony. The elephant in my room is the camel, to mix several metaphors. Good excuse for another photo. Full circle.
Camels in Petra, Jordan; photograph by Francine Mulherin, 2009.
28 July 2009
McFadyens Part 7: The Coll Parish Questions
Those darn Collachs! Some of my frustrations are aired on FaceBook and mailing lists, but I might as well elucidate here. For the record. Notice I’ve included some views of Coll to relieve the monotony between questions. Linda Temple has sent some much appreciated photographs.
In 2007 I had drafted a 19-page McFadyen family history. Today it is over 40 pages, without intensive time spent on it. And that is not following every child of every child. It seems the more the miraculous Internet expands, the more there is to explore—so helpful when distant from the ancestral site. As I go through it to clean up my footnotes, every page presents opportunities for additions. Still, some of the resources at my disposal raise troubling genealogical questions.
Maybe this diversion to my blog will draw some answers. She said, wishfully. Being basically lazy, I hope for answers from those wiser in Scottish ways. Maybe I will have to blog more than once on these questions that painfully bog down the writing.
This year I received several pounds of paper copies of almost the entire Kirk Session minutes for the Isle of Coll. They have serious time gaps from 1733 and quite a few pages of illegible handwriting. The gaps can be explained historically. The incumbent minister, if there was one, had equal duties on the Isle of Tiree or elsewhere, depending on the time period. The handwriting, well ... we know paper was expensive in the olden days and those Presbyterians righteously crammed a lot onto one page.
Truthfully, I have reviewed every page. That’s obvious from the forest of sticky notes flopping off the top and sides of the pile. Have I done anything about it? Ummmm. The proper answer seems to be to create a chart or spreadsheet or database for all the McFadyen mentions. An attempt at family reconstructions. And why would I do that? The answer here must be because they are all more or less related at some historical point and MY people are mostly missing in those church minutes. Some of the others could be siblings of my Donald the Soldier, or even his parents’ generation.
The proceedings of the Kirk elders are liberally interspersed with lists of baptisms and marriages, albeit a few missing pages here and there in my copies, inexplicably. Among the actual minutes are copious references to illegitimate pregnancies, the result of criminal connexion, as the elders liked to say (often abbreviated as crim con which has a nice modern ring to it). Sometimes the guilty parties even agreed to marry, if they were not already married to someone else.
Q #1: Were these lists of babies or marriages in the Kirk Sessions then recorded in the Old Parish Register (OPR) for Coll & Tiree? Maybe the Kirk Session minutes are the only record of them? (Laziness raises its ugly head again; I could be cross-checking these from the wherewithal.)
Q #2: Are Coll & Tiree OPRs actually included on the IGI? I know they have been filmed by the LDS, and thanks to volunteers have been sorted and indexed on collgenealogy.com. Five of MY baptisms do appear on the latter, corresponding to patron submissions on the IGI, which also correspond to information sent to me by a local Coll historian in the early 1980s. But they are missing on the IGI extractions of parish registers (OPRs) regardless of every surname spelling I can come up with.
Next. The Presbyterian Short Catechism aka Westminster Catechism (1674) is important with regard to a complete list of the just under 1,000 inhabitants of Coll in 1776. The newly appointed clergyman visited every household and asked the questions of the faith to guage the local level of piety. His list is duly entered in the Kirk Session minutes.* I learned the catechism is instructional in nature, consisting of 107 questions (imagine what the long version must look like), being especially appropriate for youngsters and the illiterate.
In the 1776 record, adults have both first names and surnames. This applies to husbands and wives and adult children. Under-age children have first names only. Here is where I run into a bit of trouble. Most sources I’ve seen concur that under-age means under the age of seven years. Nevertheless I have a dissenting opinion, from a Coll local historian, that under-age refers to under twelve years of age.
Q #3: You saw it coming: does "under-age" mean children under seven or under twelve? Is there a reliable source to consult/cite?
Next. In that 1776 list, the wives are identified with their birth surnames according to Scottish custom. There are some widows whose households have only under-age children, i.e. the children are mentioned merely as first names.
Q #4: Do the widows bear the surname of their deceased spouse or their birth surname? The question has a direct impact on what surname those underage children were known by.
Four questions. I’m sure I’ll think of more.
* For those with no access to the Kirk Session minutes, the 1776 list is thankfully transcribed at collgenealogy.com.
Photographs:
Top: Coll parish church, Arinagour, Coll; Linda and John Temple.
Middle: Cemetery at Crossapol, Coll; Linda and John Temple.
Bottom: Traigh Hogh, Coll; by fishski at flickr.com.
In 2007 I had drafted a 19-page McFadyen family history. Today it is over 40 pages, without intensive time spent on it. And that is not following every child of every child. It seems the more the miraculous Internet expands, the more there is to explore—so helpful when distant from the ancestral site. As I go through it to clean up my footnotes, every page presents opportunities for additions. Still, some of the resources at my disposal raise troubling genealogical questions.
Maybe this diversion to my blog will draw some answers. She said, wishfully. Being basically lazy, I hope for answers from those wiser in Scottish ways. Maybe I will have to blog more than once on these questions that painfully bog down the writing.
This year I received several pounds of paper copies of almost the entire Kirk Session minutes for the Isle of Coll. They have serious time gaps from 1733 and quite a few pages of illegible handwriting. The gaps can be explained historically. The incumbent minister, if there was one, had equal duties on the Isle of Tiree or elsewhere, depending on the time period. The handwriting, well ... we know paper was expensive in the olden days and those Presbyterians righteously crammed a lot onto one page.
Truthfully, I have reviewed every page. That’s obvious from the forest of sticky notes flopping off the top and sides of the pile. Have I done anything about it? Ummmm. The proper answer seems to be to create a chart or spreadsheet or database for all the McFadyen mentions. An attempt at family reconstructions. And why would I do that? The answer here must be because they are all more or less related at some historical point and MY people are mostly missing in those church minutes. Some of the others could be siblings of my Donald the Soldier, or even his parents’ generation.
The proceedings of the Kirk elders are liberally interspersed with lists of baptisms and marriages, albeit a few missing pages here and there in my copies, inexplicably. Among the actual minutes are copious references to illegitimate pregnancies, the result of criminal connexion, as the elders liked to say (often abbreviated as crim con which has a nice modern ring to it). Sometimes the guilty parties even agreed to marry, if they were not already married to someone else.
Q #1: Were these lists of babies or marriages in the Kirk Sessions then recorded in the Old Parish Register (OPR) for Coll & Tiree? Maybe the Kirk Session minutes are the only record of them? (Laziness raises its ugly head again; I could be cross-checking these from the wherewithal.)
Q #2: Are Coll & Tiree OPRs actually included on the IGI? I know they have been filmed by the LDS, and thanks to volunteers have been sorted and indexed on collgenealogy.com. Five of MY baptisms do appear on the latter, corresponding to patron submissions on the IGI, which also correspond to information sent to me by a local Coll historian in the early 1980s. But they are missing on the IGI extractions of parish registers (OPRs) regardless of every surname spelling I can come up with.
Next. The Presbyterian Short Catechism aka Westminster Catechism (1674) is important with regard to a complete list of the just under 1,000 inhabitants of Coll in 1776. The newly appointed clergyman visited every household and asked the questions of the faith to guage the local level of piety. His list is duly entered in the Kirk Session minutes.* I learned the catechism is instructional in nature, consisting of 107 questions (imagine what the long version must look like), being especially appropriate for youngsters and the illiterate.In the 1776 record, adults have both first names and surnames. This applies to husbands and wives and adult children. Under-age children have first names only. Here is where I run into a bit of trouble. Most sources I’ve seen concur that under-age means under the age of seven years. Nevertheless I have a dissenting opinion, from a Coll local historian, that under-age refers to under twelve years of age.
Q #3: You saw it coming: does "under-age" mean children under seven or under twelve? Is there a reliable source to consult/cite?
Next. In that 1776 list, the wives are identified with their birth surnames according to Scottish custom. There are some widows whose households have only under-age children, i.e. the children are mentioned merely as first names.
Q #4: Do the widows bear the surname of their deceased spouse or their birth surname? The question has a direct impact on what surname those underage children were known by.
Four questions. I’m sure I’ll think of more.
* For those with no access to the Kirk Session minutes, the 1776 list is thankfully transcribed at collgenealogy.com.
Photographs:
Top: Coll parish church, Arinagour, Coll; Linda and John Temple.
Middle: Cemetery at Crossapol, Coll; Linda and John Temple.
Bottom: Traigh Hogh, Coll; by fishski at flickr.com.
22 July 2009
17 July 2009
McFadyens Part 6
Luckily I inherited oodles of old family photographs. Some of them have notes on the back to say who they are. Some of them don’t, and we all know how bad that is. A lot of them were identified for me by parents or grandparents. But a few ancestral lines apparently avoided the photographer as much as they shied away from other kinds of informative records.
“John McFayden,” Winnipeg Free Press, Monday, 2 August 1915, p. 10, digital image, NewspaperARCHIVE (http://www.newspaperarchive.com : accessed 15 May 2009).
This is John McFadyen, my great-grandfather. I know it’s him because it says so right there in the newspaper—even though his name in the caption is McFayden. That’s a common alternate spelling although the pronunciation, to me, seems quite different. The clipping was sent to me ages ago by a well-meaning relative (and I thank you again!) but the newspaper was un-named. A Winnipeg paper was a good bet but how could I cite it? Then I splurged for a subscription to Newspaper Archive <http://www.newspaperarchive.com> because I knew they had Manitoba newspapers extending back into the nineteenth century. When you copy an article into your word-processing program, the OCR (optical character recognition) makes for some amusing “translation.”
John Hector McFadyen was born in Cape Breton in March of 1838, if we believe the 1911 census, and died 31 July 1915 at Oakbank, Manitoba. He came from a family of twelve children born to Hector McFadyen and his wife Jessie McKenzie of River Denys, Cape Breton. “John Hector” distinguished him from his slightly younger brother John Jr. aka “John Lauchlin,” not to be confused with their brother Lauchlin! (Highlanders had their reasons for same names in one family, obscure as they may be to us). Since most of the brothers were seamen, including my John, it’s something of a miracle he made it all the way to Manitoba to become a homestead farmer. Two other brothers drowned on the Grand Banks after he left. John sailed his own boat to Provincetown, Massachusetts, where he married and the first two children came along. By 1874 he was established on a quarter section of rich Manitoba soil at Oakbank, in what would become the Municipality of Springfield.
The two brothers called John, both long removed from the old family base in Cape Breton, were sometimes merged in reminiscences of the next generations. John Lauchie had apparently been smitten with gold fever and rarely visited home again, travelling to many foreign places. He did write letters, some saved by descendants of his youngest sister. And he probably sent photographs, now lost or unidentified. His last letter to Cape Breton came from Singapore on the Malay Peninsula, thus it was assumed he died there, although Sumatra was also mentioned.
John Hector’s obituary says he was survived by all ten children, five sons and five daughters. Little did they know that his youngest son Willie would die a year later in France with the 1st Canadian Mounted Rifles. His son Bob would die five years later in a house fire at Oakbank. That left three sons, none of whom had children—my McFadyen line “daughtered out” as we say. A couple of the surviving sons show promise of real live family black sheep (.. goody ..) for future posts.
I treasure that clipping—the ONLY picture I have of him. Someone, somewhere, once had the original photo. One of the daughters, no doubt.
“John McFayden,” Winnipeg Free Press, Monday, 2 August 1915, p. 10, digital image, NewspaperARCHIVE (http://www.newspaperarchive.com : accessed 15 May 2009).This is John McFadyen, my great-grandfather. I know it’s him because it says so right there in the newspaper—even though his name in the caption is McFayden. That’s a common alternate spelling although the pronunciation, to me, seems quite different. The clipping was sent to me ages ago by a well-meaning relative (and I thank you again!) but the newspaper was un-named. A Winnipeg paper was a good bet but how could I cite it? Then I splurged for a subscription to Newspaper Archive <http://www.newspaperarchive.com> because I knew they had Manitoba newspapers extending back into the nineteenth century. When you copy an article into your word-processing program, the OCR (optical character recognition) makes for some amusing “translation.”
John Hector McFadyen was born in Cape Breton in March of 1838, if we believe the 1911 census, and died 31 July 1915 at Oakbank, Manitoba. He came from a family of twelve children born to Hector McFadyen and his wife Jessie McKenzie of River Denys, Cape Breton. “John Hector” distinguished him from his slightly younger brother John Jr. aka “John Lauchlin,” not to be confused with their brother Lauchlin! (Highlanders had their reasons for same names in one family, obscure as they may be to us). Since most of the brothers were seamen, including my John, it’s something of a miracle he made it all the way to Manitoba to become a homestead farmer. Two other brothers drowned on the Grand Banks after he left. John sailed his own boat to Provincetown, Massachusetts, where he married and the first two children came along. By 1874 he was established on a quarter section of rich Manitoba soil at Oakbank, in what would become the Municipality of Springfield.
The two brothers called John, both long removed from the old family base in Cape Breton, were sometimes merged in reminiscences of the next generations. John Lauchie had apparently been smitten with gold fever and rarely visited home again, travelling to many foreign places. He did write letters, some saved by descendants of his youngest sister. And he probably sent photographs, now lost or unidentified. His last letter to Cape Breton came from Singapore on the Malay Peninsula, thus it was assumed he died there, although Sumatra was also mentioned.
John Hector’s obituary says he was survived by all ten children, five sons and five daughters. Little did they know that his youngest son Willie would die a year later in France with the 1st Canadian Mounted Rifles. His son Bob would die five years later in a house fire at Oakbank. That left three sons, none of whom had children—my McFadyen line “daughtered out” as we say. A couple of the surviving sons show promise of real live family black sheep (.. goody ..) for future posts.
I treasure that clipping—the ONLY picture I have of him. Someone, somewhere, once had the original photo. One of the daughters, no doubt.
09 July 2009
Perfect Summers
The 5th edition of the Canadian Genealogy Carnival is all about favourite Canadian vacations. Where did your ancestors like to spend their summer holidays? Did your family enjoy a favourite beach or cottage? Or did your family travel from sea to shining sea? Photographs of these holiday places is encouraged.
When I was a kid, every summer was the favourite vacation. That’s because we left the city behind and drove fifteen miles to our camp for two months. In Northwestern Ontario what we call camps, you call cottages or cabins. Imagine driving only ten or fifteen miles to be in the bush on a lake. However, I’m speaking of a camp on the greatest lake of all, Lake Superior. Amethyst Harbour was the most magical of places for kids.
Our first camp was old before my parents bought it, before the Second World War! It had four bedrooms, a massive iron cook stove and no indoor plumbing. But we never spent much time inside. If we were lucky, the kids had the option of sleeping in a tent in the back yard. Our parents probably thought we actually slept! One night my dad’s friend, a few sheets to the wind as we used to say, broke his ankle tripping over our chamber pot.
The campers’ association hired a summer instructor for swimming, tennis, badminton and baseball. In fact, baseball became a highly competitive sport among teams along the shore. We had regular hikes to nearby areas for picnics and games ... McKenzie pool, McKenzie Falls and Wabang ... Run sheep run! Bonfires and wiener roasts were special events for staying up late. Evening fishing was usually a family event: you would see all the motor boats leaving their docks for the open water to slowly troll for trout. You could wave at your friends but you were supposed to be quiet and not scare the fish away. In those days, 30-pound lake trout were not uncommon.
Every year included a trip in the big boat to Nipigon Bay for the “world famous” Rossport Fish Derby. Being allowed to steer the boat and learn the charts were highlights, although you paid for it by swabbing the decks and polishing chrome.
Otherwise, kids were allowed to run mostly wild and barefoot. We knew every inch of the territory ... the beaches, the cliffs, the old amethyst mines and the surrounding forest. Every age group had a gang and a gaggle of bicycles for the fastest route between points A and B. We would take sleeping bags to deserted Lambert Island, watching incredible shooting stars and aurora borealis all night. We became proficient with our ever-present boats, sometimes venturing across Thunder Bay to lonely Caribou Island. Once, one of those unexpected Lake Superior storms came up before the boats could return. Terrified parents launched their bigger boats for search and rescue but all ended well. Those young lads knew their boats, alright, and they knew Lake Superior. To us, it was just part of the ever-exciting summer adventure.
We built a new camp with mod cons. As kids got older, cars began to replace the bicycles. Nevertheless, no matter what age we were, no-one wanted to miss the annual long-weekend sports days. Now, there are fifth and sixth generation campers returning each summer. Tuska the ancient fisherman is long gone. Lambert Island is populated. But Lake Superior never loses its seductive power and Amethyst Harbour retains its magic for every new generation of kids.
Family photographs, BDM collection.
When I was a kid, every summer was the favourite vacation. That’s because we left the city behind and drove fifteen miles to our camp for two months. In Northwestern Ontario what we call camps, you call cottages or cabins. Imagine driving only ten or fifteen miles to be in the bush on a lake. However, I’m speaking of a camp on the greatest lake of all, Lake Superior. Amethyst Harbour was the most magical of places for kids.
Our first camp was old before my parents bought it, before the Second World War! It had four bedrooms, a massive iron cook stove and no indoor plumbing. But we never spent much time inside. If we were lucky, the kids had the option of sleeping in a tent in the back yard. Our parents probably thought we actually slept! One night my dad’s friend, a few sheets to the wind as we used to say, broke his ankle tripping over our chamber pot.
The campers’ association hired a summer instructor for swimming, tennis, badminton and baseball. In fact, baseball became a highly competitive sport among teams along the shore. We had regular hikes to nearby areas for picnics and games ... McKenzie pool, McKenzie Falls and Wabang ... Run sheep run! Bonfires and wiener roasts were special events for staying up late. Evening fishing was usually a family event: you would see all the motor boats leaving their docks for the open water to slowly troll for trout. You could wave at your friends but you were supposed to be quiet and not scare the fish away. In those days, 30-pound lake trout were not uncommon.
Every year included a trip in the big boat to Nipigon Bay for the “world famous” Rossport Fish Derby. Being allowed to steer the boat and learn the charts were highlights, although you paid for it by swabbing the decks and polishing chrome.
Otherwise, kids were allowed to run mostly wild and barefoot. We knew every inch of the territory ... the beaches, the cliffs, the old amethyst mines and the surrounding forest. Every age group had a gang and a gaggle of bicycles for the fastest route between points A and B. We would take sleeping bags to deserted Lambert Island, watching incredible shooting stars and aurora borealis all night. We became proficient with our ever-present boats, sometimes venturing across Thunder Bay to lonely Caribou Island. Once, one of those unexpected Lake Superior storms came up before the boats could return. Terrified parents launched their bigger boats for search and rescue but all ended well. Those young lads knew their boats, alright, and they knew Lake Superior. To us, it was just part of the ever-exciting summer adventure.
We built a new camp with mod cons. As kids got older, cars began to replace the bicycles. Nevertheless, no matter what age we were, no-one wanted to miss the annual long-weekend sports days. Now, there are fifth and sixth generation campers returning each summer. Tuska the ancient fisherman is long gone. Lambert Island is populated. But Lake Superior never loses its seductive power and Amethyst Harbour retains its magic for every new generation of kids.
Family photographs, BDM collection.
05 July 2009
Camels, Specifically Mongolian
I don’t know about you, but I need a regular camel fix, and it’s been a while. The biggest decision is which one in my growing photo collection to feature each time. There is the close-up of Zou-Zou my runaway camel, but that’s a whole story in itself. A certain cartoon I will save. And a friend sent me her photo of a very unusual baby, which really needs special background information if only I could read Arabic because English websites are not giving it up.
Mongolia is a hotspot for camels of the Bactrian variety. It’s also home to a large part of the Gobi Desert which explains a lot. Before people started mass printing of dumb slogans on T-shirts we used to have a joke about the Gobi Desert Canoe Club. Mongolians are probably still more traditionally tied to a nomadic life than their Bedouin counterparts in the Middle East. Camels are like their staff of life, a multi-tasking beast for transport, food, wool, leather and fuel (dried dung, for those of you have never crossed a cow pasture in the fall). There are deserts and then there are deserts. The Gobi can get very cold in winter.
The wild camel population in the Gobi diminished considerably during the last twenty-five years or so for various reasons—political mismanagement, demand for meat, parasites (I know, the last two do not sit well together). Finally a Wild Camel Protection Foundation was formed to establish protected areas and breeding programs. Thankfully the distinguished patrons are holding up their end with impressive contributions in GBP, since I don't seem to have much in the way of £ lying around.
Brenda has not been to Mongolia to investigate this situation. Yet. But I have a connection.
My daughter the yarn craft merchant was able to obtain “100% Mongolian camel down” through co-ops and agencies who market developing-world crafts ... so clever she is. The name of the wool spinner is right there. Daughter knew I needed a shawl in the office for winter chill and went to work on it. She added her own bits for colour. Some gifts are warm and priceless.
First two photographs courtesy of National Geographic Magazine (http://www.nationalgeographic.com/weepingcamel/thecamels.html). Third photograph BDM.
Mongolia is a hotspot for camels of the Bactrian variety. It’s also home to a large part of the Gobi Desert which explains a lot. Before people started mass printing of dumb slogans on T-shirts we used to have a joke about the Gobi Desert Canoe Club. Mongolians are probably still more traditionally tied to a nomadic life than their Bedouin counterparts in the Middle East. Camels are like their staff of life, a multi-tasking beast for transport, food, wool, leather and fuel (dried dung, for those of you have never crossed a cow pasture in the fall). There are deserts and then there are deserts. The Gobi can get very cold in winter.
The wild camel population in the Gobi diminished considerably during the last twenty-five years or so for various reasons—political mismanagement, demand for meat, parasites (I know, the last two do not sit well together). Finally a Wild Camel Protection Foundation was formed to establish protected areas and breeding programs. Thankfully the distinguished patrons are holding up their end with impressive contributions in GBP, since I don't seem to have much in the way of £ lying around.Brenda has not been to Mongolia to investigate this situation. Yet. But I have a connection.
My daughter the yarn craft merchant was able to obtain “100% Mongolian camel down” through co-ops and agencies who market developing-world crafts ... so clever she is. The name of the wool spinner is right there. Daughter knew I needed a shawl in the office for winter chill and went to work on it. She added her own bits for colour. Some gifts are warm and priceless.
First two photographs courtesy of National Geographic Magazine (http://www.nationalgeographic.com/weepingcamel/thecamels.html). Third photograph BDM.
29 June 2009
Book Review: In the Land of Long Fingernails
Fellow brave hearts and lovers of black humour, listen up. I know you, as well, appreciate literary excellence. Hustle off to your library or bookstore to find Charles Wilkins’ In the Land of Long Fingernails: A Memoir (Toronto: Viking Press, 2008). It might be a revelation for family historians who metaphorically dig up ancestral dirt. Should I mention this also has direct relevance to anyone who is about to die? Which seems to mean all of us.
No, the book is not about ghosts, although it has scary elements. In 1969 Wilkins was a university student who took a summer job as a gravedigger. This was not his first choice to enhance his resumé. Presumably he had hoped to become a kids’ summer camp counsellor or something equally altruistic. Instead he swallowed his disappointment and diligently learned to fit right in as low man on the totem pole at Willowlawn Cemetery. We meet the cast of true characters one would swear came from a latter-day Dickens: the never-sober Scots manager, the grumpy Dutchman, the over-educated Italian and the one-armed Pole. The collective misfits managed to perform the necessaries in a large urban cemetery, preparing gravesites, dealing with funeral managers and interring the coffins. Each employee knew his role. In between such bouts of intensive activity, they found their own rest in favoured grassy spots for a daily bit of mellow meditation.
Maintenance was also a routine part of the schedule. The grounds and the flowering plants were relatively easy. Old sinking plots and stray bones were handled on an ad hoc basis without bothering the management sailing on Cutty Sark. All still pretty straightforward in terms of job description for a young lad. Unless weather, or a union strike, interfered. Yes, both happened in 1969 in Toronto. Flooding rain does not bode well for some of the after-life occupants. Moreover, when the strike curtailed actual burials, we get a graphic visualization of coffins-in-waiting.
Wilkins’ macabre but funny memoir is a head butt with some realities of the death industry but it is always entertaining. (Maybe it’s a Canadian thing?) Lest you think I stand alone in my praise, Wilkins’ totally engaging writing style won him shortlist nominations for the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour and the Trillium Award this year.
Shall we convince ourselves that the intervening forty years have seen improvements or shall we opt for cremation?
No, the book is not about ghosts, although it has scary elements. In 1969 Wilkins was a university student who took a summer job as a gravedigger. This was not his first choice to enhance his resumé. Presumably he had hoped to become a kids’ summer camp counsellor or something equally altruistic. Instead he swallowed his disappointment and diligently learned to fit right in as low man on the totem pole at Willowlawn Cemetery. We meet the cast of true characters one would swear came from a latter-day Dickens: the never-sober Scots manager, the grumpy Dutchman, the over-educated Italian and the one-armed Pole. The collective misfits managed to perform the necessaries in a large urban cemetery, preparing gravesites, dealing with funeral managers and interring the coffins. Each employee knew his role. In between such bouts of intensive activity, they found their own rest in favoured grassy spots for a daily bit of mellow meditation.
Maintenance was also a routine part of the schedule. The grounds and the flowering plants were relatively easy. Old sinking plots and stray bones were handled on an ad hoc basis without bothering the management sailing on Cutty Sark. All still pretty straightforward in terms of job description for a young lad. Unless weather, or a union strike, interfered. Yes, both happened in 1969 in Toronto. Flooding rain does not bode well for some of the after-life occupants. Moreover, when the strike curtailed actual burials, we get a graphic visualization of coffins-in-waiting.
Wilkins’ macabre but funny memoir is a head butt with some realities of the death industry but it is always entertaining. (Maybe it’s a Canadian thing?) Lest you think I stand alone in my praise, Wilkins’ totally engaging writing style won him shortlist nominations for the Stephen Leacock Medal for Humour and the Trillium Award this year.
Shall we convince ourselves that the intervening forty years have seen improvements or shall we opt for cremation?
27 June 2009
Family Picnic
Speak to me, people!!Who are you? Stop horsing around for a minute and give me some clues. Please? If the handsome patriarch in the middle would only tell me his name. I know he’s my ancestor, I just know. Which one is his wife? And who is the lady in widow’s weeds off to his right? Are those Manitoba trees I see in the background? Some of the family resemblances are very strong. What year is this? It’s making me crazy!
19 June 2009
Dougall Part 5
Most genealogists seem to have their beginnings in curiosity about family stories. By now you know I’m an advocate for including them in a family history as long as they are identified as stories. I had very few hand-me-down Dougall ancestral stories.
When the first train in Canada performed its official run (from Laprairie to St-Jean-de-Richelieu) to great public excitement, emigrant ancestor John Dougall was allegedly a witness in the crowd. The Canadian Encyclopedia tells us that John Molson and other Montreal merchants were backers of the new service that opened officially 21 July 1836. It’s possible John Dougall was there. It’s possible some member of his family was there. Not an exciting or particularly mysterious family story!
The story was handed down that the oldest son Thomas Dougall emigrated from Scotland in 1832. Doubtless, Tom’s favourable reports convinced his parents to leave a life of agricultural labour for others and become owners of land in the new world. Up until their leaving, father John worked at different farms in the county as noted in the baptisms of his children in Livingston and West Calder parishes. John Dougall was about 53 years of age when he arrived in Quebec two years later. The saga of finding his baptism was recounted here. His wife Marion Hastie, born in Whitburn parish, Linlithgowshire, (the county of Linlithgow became West Lothian in 1921) was about 43.
Marion Hastie and John Dougall. Undated photograph, but prior to July 1867; in family collection of BDM.
Children of John Dougall and Marion Hastie:
i. Thomas2 Dougall, baptized 16 June 1811 in Livingstone, Scotland. He married Elizabeth Lillie Cameron.*
ii. Margaret Dougall, baptized 22 February 1813 in Livingstone, Scotland; died young.
iii. John Dougall, baptized 6 May 1814 at Livingstone, Scotland; died about 1833 in Scotland.
iv. James Dougall, baptized 21 April 1816 at Livingstone, Scotland. He married Agnes Fenton.*
v. George Dougall, baptized 24 April 1818. He married Agnes Moffat.*
vi. Margaret Dougall, baptized 8 March 1820 in West Calder. She married Donald Loynachen.*
vii. Jean Dougall, baptized 24 September 1822 at Netherlongford, Scotland. She married Murdoch Laing.*
viii. Peter Dougall, baptized 19 September 1824 at Netherlongford, Scotland. He married Catharine Fraser.*
ix. Marion Dougall, baptized 9 September 1826 at Netherlongford, Scotland; died young.
x. Marion Dougall, baptized 12 May 1829 at Bells Quarry, Scotland; never married.*
xi. Helen/Ellen Dougall, baptized 18 January 1832 at Bells Quarry, Scotland. She married John McCunn.*
(* = More information available in the extended family history; some will be followed up here later. Livingston or Livingstone? Both versions appear in assorted records.)
John Dougall brought his entire surviving family to Canada in 1834. Before that, two daughters had succumbed to infant mortality. His son John was said to have been killed in a farm accident involving a horse, a year or so earlier. This family story has more “substance,” but is alas unverified. ScotlandsPeople with its recent extraction of burial records from the old parochial registers has not confirmed this. Nor have searches been productive among West Lothian cemetery stone transcripts, or monumental inscriptions as they are called in the U.K. The recording of deaths and burials has always been less than comprehensive in parish registers; transcription of cemeteries is still a great challenge in Scotland.
None of the Dougall sons remained on the original farm. Thomas went to Chicago and prospered. James moved to the more fertile Eastern Townships. George became a tailor in Montreal. Peter became a blacksmith like his father-in-law, and moved to Renfrew, Ontario.
St Andrews (St-André Est) in Argenteuil County, Quebec, is where my Dougalls and Frasers cross paths. John Dougall took a farm at Beech Ridge above St Andrews. One of my next tasks is to determine the notaries active in the St Andrews-Lachute area during the 1830s to the 1860s. Hopefully there will be a will or a deed to describe exactly where the farm was located. Alternatively, the Quebec Online Land Registry (ACAIQ) is searchable if you know the cadastral number of the property. And how do you learn that? The cadastral number is not a street or rural address; it’s the one allocated to any property for municipal taxation and valuation purposes. It’s one of those catch-22s. You have to know it to find it. Another puzzle to sort out.
My family stories are pretty thin for that first generation! It’s a long time since I made the last of two visits to St Andrews, but I still have the T-shirt to prove it! Visit number one was during the celebration of the tricentenaire (300th anniversary) of the founding of the Seigneury d’Argenteuil.
When the first train in Canada performed its official run (from Laprairie to St-Jean-de-Richelieu) to great public excitement, emigrant ancestor John Dougall was allegedly a witness in the crowd. The Canadian Encyclopedia tells us that John Molson and other Montreal merchants were backers of the new service that opened officially 21 July 1836. It’s possible John Dougall was there. It’s possible some member of his family was there. Not an exciting or particularly mysterious family story!
The story was handed down that the oldest son Thomas Dougall emigrated from Scotland in 1832. Doubtless, Tom’s favourable reports convinced his parents to leave a life of agricultural labour for others and become owners of land in the new world. Up until their leaving, father John worked at different farms in the county as noted in the baptisms of his children in Livingston and West Calder parishes. John Dougall was about 53 years of age when he arrived in Quebec two years later. The saga of finding his baptism was recounted here. His wife Marion Hastie, born in Whitburn parish, Linlithgowshire, (the county of Linlithgow became West Lothian in 1921) was about 43.
Marion Hastie and John Dougall. Undated photograph, but prior to July 1867; in family collection of BDM.Children of John Dougall and Marion Hastie:
i. Thomas2 Dougall, baptized 16 June 1811 in Livingstone, Scotland. He married Elizabeth Lillie Cameron.*
ii. Margaret Dougall, baptized 22 February 1813 in Livingstone, Scotland; died young.
iii. John Dougall, baptized 6 May 1814 at Livingstone, Scotland; died about 1833 in Scotland.
iv. James Dougall, baptized 21 April 1816 at Livingstone, Scotland. He married Agnes Fenton.*
v. George Dougall, baptized 24 April 1818. He married Agnes Moffat.*
vi. Margaret Dougall, baptized 8 March 1820 in West Calder. She married Donald Loynachen.*
vii. Jean Dougall, baptized 24 September 1822 at Netherlongford, Scotland. She married Murdoch Laing.*
viii. Peter Dougall, baptized 19 September 1824 at Netherlongford, Scotland. He married Catharine Fraser.*
ix. Marion Dougall, baptized 9 September 1826 at Netherlongford, Scotland; died young.
x. Marion Dougall, baptized 12 May 1829 at Bells Quarry, Scotland; never married.*
xi. Helen/Ellen Dougall, baptized 18 January 1832 at Bells Quarry, Scotland. She married John McCunn.*
(* = More information available in the extended family history; some will be followed up here later. Livingston or Livingstone? Both versions appear in assorted records.)
John Dougall brought his entire surviving family to Canada in 1834. Before that, two daughters had succumbed to infant mortality. His son John was said to have been killed in a farm accident involving a horse, a year or so earlier. This family story has more “substance,” but is alas unverified. ScotlandsPeople with its recent extraction of burial records from the old parochial registers has not confirmed this. Nor have searches been productive among West Lothian cemetery stone transcripts, or monumental inscriptions as they are called in the U.K. The recording of deaths and burials has always been less than comprehensive in parish registers; transcription of cemeteries is still a great challenge in Scotland.
None of the Dougall sons remained on the original farm. Thomas went to Chicago and prospered. James moved to the more fertile Eastern Townships. George became a tailor in Montreal. Peter became a blacksmith like his father-in-law, and moved to Renfrew, Ontario.
St Andrews (St-André Est) in Argenteuil County, Quebec, is where my Dougalls and Frasers cross paths. John Dougall took a farm at Beech Ridge above St Andrews. One of my next tasks is to determine the notaries active in the St Andrews-Lachute area during the 1830s to the 1860s. Hopefully there will be a will or a deed to describe exactly where the farm was located. Alternatively, the Quebec Online Land Registry (ACAIQ) is searchable if you know the cadastral number of the property. And how do you learn that? The cadastral number is not a street or rural address; it’s the one allocated to any property for municipal taxation and valuation purposes. It’s one of those catch-22s. You have to know it to find it. Another puzzle to sort out.
My family stories are pretty thin for that first generation! It’s a long time since I made the last of two visits to St Andrews, but I still have the T-shirt to prove it! Visit number one was during the celebration of the tricentenaire (300th anniversary) of the founding of the Seigneury d’Argenteuil.
07 June 2009
05 June 2009
Filling in the Dash
Could we have a moratorium on “filling in the dash”? Someone thought up a good catch-phrase and now everyone’s using it and aren’t we getting a little tired of it already?
For the uninitiated, the dash refers to the space between birth and death dates in the conventional display such as you see on a cemetery headstone, e.g., John Smith 1789-1856. The dates of an ancestor’s birth and death. Filling in the dash is a simplified and buzzy way to say no-one wants to read a genealogy (aka family history, family tree) consisting of endless variations of the John Smith 1789-1856 ilk. Therefore, grassroots people, wake up and get serious about spending the extra time and effort to filling in your ancestors’ lives as much as the eras and sources allow.
The message is not new, of course. Genealogists have been exhorting each other for years to add biographical detail and all manner of contemporary community interest to our family histories. Clearly, filling in the dash fills the bill, taking on a life of its own among genealogical speakers, writers and educators. Since I have heard or read filling in the dash about ten-teen times this year alone, I was surprised to learn that it was new to many conference-goers. That probably means it will have a healthy shelf life. I can see the bumper stickers any day now.
One merely needs to google filling in the dash to see that it didn’t necessarily originate with genealogists. Although it was of passing interest, I decided not to undertake an extended study of its provenance. Suffice to say, perhaps, that personal memoir writers grabbed it back in 2003, sermons have been preached, the Journal of Memory and Language has an incomprehensible 1999 reference and “The Cemetary [sic] Kid” around about 1998 apparently used it somewhere in a New Times Los Angeles article—lengthy with no paragraph breaks—on the website Hollywood Underground. How’s that for superficial research?
But we do have our favourite clichés, don’t we? Begats are still a popular negative. In problem-solving, brick wall has replaced dead end. There are more, which escape me for the moment. Feel free to remind me! With any luck at all, the worn-out family tree will be struck by lightning. Personally, I think genealogists and family historians—labels I scarcely differentiate—are creative enough to make their own unique catch-words.
For the uninitiated, the dash refers to the space between birth and death dates in the conventional display such as you see on a cemetery headstone, e.g., John Smith 1789-1856. The dates of an ancestor’s birth and death. Filling in the dash is a simplified and buzzy way to say no-one wants to read a genealogy (aka family history, family tree) consisting of endless variations of the John Smith 1789-1856 ilk. Therefore, grassroots people, wake up and get serious about spending the extra time and effort to filling in your ancestors’ lives as much as the eras and sources allow.
The message is not new, of course. Genealogists have been exhorting each other for years to add biographical detail and all manner of contemporary community interest to our family histories. Clearly, filling in the dash fills the bill, taking on a life of its own among genealogical speakers, writers and educators. Since I have heard or read filling in the dash about ten-teen times this year alone, I was surprised to learn that it was new to many conference-goers. That probably means it will have a healthy shelf life. I can see the bumper stickers any day now.
One merely needs to google filling in the dash to see that it didn’t necessarily originate with genealogists. Although it was of passing interest, I decided not to undertake an extended study of its provenance. Suffice to say, perhaps, that personal memoir writers grabbed it back in 2003, sermons have been preached, the Journal of Memory and Language has an incomprehensible 1999 reference and “The Cemetary [sic] Kid” around about 1998 apparently used it somewhere in a New Times Los Angeles article—lengthy with no paragraph breaks—on the website Hollywood Underground. How’s that for superficial research?
But we do have our favourite clichés, don’t we? Begats are still a popular negative. In problem-solving, brick wall has replaced dead end. There are more, which escape me for the moment. Feel free to remind me! With any luck at all, the worn-out family tree will be struck by lightning. Personally, I think genealogists and family historians—labels I scarcely differentiate—are creative enough to make their own unique catch-words.
02 June 2009
OGS Conference 2009
Another memorable weekend at the annual OGS (Ontario Genealogical Society) conference is over. Upon reaching home, the organizers and the participants should have been flat on their backs relaxing for at least 24 hours, breathing slowly and not talking. Hopefully not everyone’s bag of bones, like mine, is being sorely held together by spastic muscles. The pathology is endemic at every genealogy conference: lifting, hauling and dragging bags full of purchased books. Prior training would have been good, now that I think of it. Like practising several times a day. Hoisting your car up and down by its rear bumper would be a good start. At Sheridan College in Oakville no-one could complain about missing their daily exercise as we scooted all day long through the halls, tunnels and maze of buildings to find lecture rooms, the Marketplace, coffee and food!
It’s always impossible to be everywhere at once to enjoy all the offerings. My job was to see that the OCAPG (Ontario Chapter Association of Professional Genealogists) display table and “Ask A Professional” free consulting services were running smoothly. Running, anyway. The OCAPG gang rose to the occasion again, despite so many members being program speakers and committed to other tasks. Our consulting schedule soon filled up nicely, but latecomers chatted with whomever was on table duty. If I only knew whether the man with the Irish church register page—written in the strangest Latin I’ve ever seen—found some translation success. In the photo above, Tammy Tipler-Priolo and Hilary Dawson consult, while Alison Hare holds down the table.
Here is OCAPG at work on the panel discussion: “From the Printed Page to the Digital Age: The Professionals’ Perspective.”
Moderator Sharon Murphy and (L to R) Susanna de Groot, Janice Nickerson, Ruth Burkholder, Tammy Tipler-Priolo and Brian Gilchrist.
For a short time I was able to attend part of the graduation program for the National Institute for Genealogical Studies, where Sharon Murphy has replaced me as head of the Canadian Department. It was a pleasure to see some of our OCAPG members receiving certificates of course completion—Margaret Aldridge and Ann Logan. Some graduates have completed certificates for more than one country. Managing Director Louise St Denis called on me to receive an honourary teddy bear which will add some warmth to my camel collection and one Thunder Bay moose.
And GeneaBloggers! Steve Danko .. TA-DA! .. was on hand from San Francisco to receive his PLCGS in Canadian Studies.
Imagine the fun of seeing genealogy friends from years past or distant places: Hank Jones Jr (authority on Palatines and Psychic Roots author from Los Angeles), Stephen Young (Deputy Director, Libraries Division, FHL in Salt Lake City), Elizabeth Briggs (professional genealogist and author, Winnipeg), Gary Schroder (professional genealogist and mainstay of QFHS, Montreal), Glenn Wright (military historian extraordinaire, Ottawa), Dave Obee (Interlink Bookshop and Genealogy Unlimited, Victoria). I’m not forgetting the often charming John D. Reid with a laptop attached to his arms, who probably beat everyone to the blogs at his Anglo-Celtic site. More conference news can be seen there, as well as at Elizabeth Lapointe’s blog.
Grateful thanks to all the OCAPG members who carried the ball.
All photographs by BDM, May 2009.
It’s always impossible to be everywhere at once to enjoy all the offerings. My job was to see that the OCAPG (Ontario Chapter Association of Professional Genealogists) display table and “Ask A Professional” free consulting services were running smoothly. Running, anyway. The OCAPG gang rose to the occasion again, despite so many members being program speakers and committed to other tasks. Our consulting schedule soon filled up nicely, but latecomers chatted with whomever was on table duty. If I only knew whether the man with the Irish church register page—written in the strangest Latin I’ve ever seen—found some translation success. In the photo above, Tammy Tipler-Priolo and Hilary Dawson consult, while Alison Hare holds down the table.
Here is OCAPG at work on the panel discussion: “From the Printed Page to the Digital Age: The Professionals’ Perspective.”
Moderator Sharon Murphy and (L to R) Susanna de Groot, Janice Nickerson, Ruth Burkholder, Tammy Tipler-Priolo and Brian Gilchrist.
For a short time I was able to attend part of the graduation program for the National Institute for Genealogical Studies, where Sharon Murphy has replaced me as head of the Canadian Department. It was a pleasure to see some of our OCAPG members receiving certificates of course completion—Margaret Aldridge and Ann Logan. Some graduates have completed certificates for more than one country. Managing Director Louise St Denis called on me to receive an honourary teddy bear which will add some warmth to my camel collection and one Thunder Bay moose.
And GeneaBloggers! Steve Danko .. TA-DA! .. was on hand from San Francisco to receive his PLCGS in Canadian Studies.
Imagine the fun of seeing genealogy friends from years past or distant places: Hank Jones Jr (authority on Palatines and Psychic Roots author from Los Angeles), Stephen Young (Deputy Director, Libraries Division, FHL in Salt Lake City), Elizabeth Briggs (professional genealogist and author, Winnipeg), Gary Schroder (professional genealogist and mainstay of QFHS, Montreal), Glenn Wright (military historian extraordinaire, Ottawa), Dave Obee (Interlink Bookshop and Genealogy Unlimited, Victoria). I’m not forgetting the often charming John D. Reid with a laptop attached to his arms, who probably beat everyone to the blogs at his Anglo-Celtic site. More conference news can be seen there, as well as at Elizabeth Lapointe’s blog.
Grateful thanks to all the OCAPG members who carried the ball.
All photographs by BDM, May 2009.
24 May 2009
(Almost) Silent Sunday
These doodles appear on the back of an Upper Canada land petition.
Upper Canada Land Petitions, RG 1, L 3, P Bundle 4, no. 70 (1797); LAC microfilm C-2489.
Some bureaucrat was not paying attention at a meeting. Maybe he was on the wrong career path and missed his true calling. Maybe the meetings took place in a pub. If anyone recognizes the suspects, be sure to let me know :-)
Upper Canada Land Petitions, RG 1, L 3, P Bundle 4, no. 70 (1797); LAC microfilm C-2489.Some bureaucrat was not paying attention at a meeting. Maybe he was on the wrong career path and missed his true calling. Maybe the meetings took place in a pub. If anyone recognizes the suspects, be sure to let me know :-)
15 May 2009
Shock and Awe
Notification of an award is a momentous occasion. Receiving a prestigious award may be a once in a lifetime happening.
The National Genealogical Society’s (NGS) 2008 Award for Excellence: Genealogical Methods and Sources was announced 15 May 2009: United Empire Loyalists: A Guide to Tracing Loyalist Ancestors in Upper Canada by yours truly:
“Presented to an individual or nonprofit organization for a specific, significant single contribution in the form of a book, an article, or a series of articles published during the past three years that discusses genealogical methods and sources and serves to foster scholarship and/or otherwise advances or promotes excellence in genealogy.” www.ngsgenealogy.org/cs/competitions
Global Heritage Press now offers a coil bound edition as well as the hard cover version. See hardcover version southeast to the right. http://globalgenealogy.com
Reasonably stable recipients do not respond to the news with a) stunned silence, and b) unseemly babbling. Dignified recipients do not happy dance to the window and shout “YAAHOOOO!!” at bemused passersby heading to the Market around the corner. To be fair, all this was before enough caffeine had percolated into my central neurons. You have to understand part of the shock was not knowing my book had been entered in the competition! Sandra Roberts of Global Heritage Press, my publisher, was much more professional; she seemed certain no-one will call tomorrow to say it was a dreadful mistake.
So now I’m shamelessly blogging. The book took over five years to plan, write, research, assemble and endlessly re-write. Now it is deemed of some beneficial value by qualified genealogists. It was always intended as assistance for UEL descendants, based on my 30+ years of research encounters with their forebears in a sticky time period for sources and evidence. There have been so many misconceptions and misunderstandings about Loyalists among newcomers researching their ancestors and the public in general.
Would you believe, I have no Loyalist ancestors. More’s the pity. But I have a deep affinity for those whom I frequently meet in the zillions of documents I come across. Lifelong learning is a daily experience (aren’t we lucky?) and rarely stays static. That means if I were to put together such a book again, it might look quite different. I’ve already learned more. Then, the irresistible urge to re-write, re-write, re-write a manuscript, requires a firm voice to call “Enough!” (... enough for the moment, enough till the next time ...).
Regrettably I hadn’t planned to attend the NGS Conference in Raleigh, North Carolina, where the award was announced at the banquet. It’s a while since I attended an NGS banquet and I don’t know if award recipients are allowed a few Oscar moments to thank everyone they ever met, including the kiddies and pets, until they weep. If I had been there (in a designer gown chosen by my avatar) I could have expressed my gratitude again —
* to LAC archivist and guru Patricia Kennedy who took time from her pre-Confederation immersion to review sections and send me reams of stuff;
* to Fawne Stratford-Devai who laboured uncomplainingly at nights to format text and difficult illustrations;
* to Alison Hare whose skills and friendship I strained in several sections (but she still speaks to me);
* to all the other Loyalist genealogists who answered my questions;
* to the Roberts team at Global who allowed the whole thing to start on Global Gazette;
* lastly, in lieu of parents, children, and everyone I ever met, dare I thank my camel Abdul for his ever-solid support and promise of adventure.
The National Genealogical Society’s (NGS) 2008 Award for Excellence: Genealogical Methods and Sources was announced 15 May 2009: United Empire Loyalists: A Guide to Tracing Loyalist Ancestors in Upper Canada by yours truly:
“Presented to an individual or nonprofit organization for a specific, significant single contribution in the form of a book, an article, or a series of articles published during the past three years that discusses genealogical methods and sources and serves to foster scholarship and/or otherwise advances or promotes excellence in genealogy.” www.ngsgenealogy.org/cs/competitions
Global Heritage Press now offers a coil bound edition as well as the hard cover version. See hardcover version southeast to the right. http://globalgenealogy.com
Reasonably stable recipients do not respond to the news with a) stunned silence, and b) unseemly babbling. Dignified recipients do not happy dance to the window and shout “YAAHOOOO!!” at bemused passersby heading to the Market around the corner. To be fair, all this was before enough caffeine had percolated into my central neurons. You have to understand part of the shock was not knowing my book had been entered in the competition! Sandra Roberts of Global Heritage Press, my publisher, was much more professional; she seemed certain no-one will call tomorrow to say it was a dreadful mistake.
So now I’m shamelessly blogging. The book took over five years to plan, write, research, assemble and endlessly re-write. Now it is deemed of some beneficial value by qualified genealogists. It was always intended as assistance for UEL descendants, based on my 30+ years of research encounters with their forebears in a sticky time period for sources and evidence. There have been so many misconceptions and misunderstandings about Loyalists among newcomers researching their ancestors and the public in general.
Would you believe, I have no Loyalist ancestors. More’s the pity. But I have a deep affinity for those whom I frequently meet in the zillions of documents I come across. Lifelong learning is a daily experience (aren’t we lucky?) and rarely stays static. That means if I were to put together such a book again, it might look quite different. I’ve already learned more. Then, the irresistible urge to re-write, re-write, re-write a manuscript, requires a firm voice to call “Enough!” (... enough for the moment, enough till the next time ...).
Regrettably I hadn’t planned to attend the NGS Conference in Raleigh, North Carolina, where the award was announced at the banquet. It’s a while since I attended an NGS banquet and I don’t know if award recipients are allowed a few Oscar moments to thank everyone they ever met, including the kiddies and pets, until they weep. If I had been there (in a designer gown chosen by my avatar) I could have expressed my gratitude again —
* to LAC archivist and guru Patricia Kennedy who took time from her pre-Confederation immersion to review sections and send me reams of stuff;
* to Fawne Stratford-Devai who laboured uncomplainingly at nights to format text and difficult illustrations;
* to Alison Hare whose skills and friendship I strained in several sections (but she still speaks to me);
* to all the other Loyalist genealogists who answered my questions;
* to the Roberts team at Global who allowed the whole thing to start on Global Gazette;
* lastly, in lieu of parents, children, and everyone I ever met, dare I thank my camel Abdul for his ever-solid support and promise of adventure.
13 May 2009
10 May 2009
Mother's Day
Although I can’t enter every Carnival of Genealogy, the 72nd seemed rather special:
Mothers! Mother’s Day is right around the corner and this is the perfect time to honor your mother, grandmother, godmother, step mother, den mother, aunt, neighbor, or friend who happens to be a mother. If you’ve written about your own mother for the COG before, consider writing about another mom on your family tree. Let’s make all our moms famous!
My mother died far away at age 57. I was on a different continent at the time and my siblings had to take care of the arrangements. No-one who is over 50 thinks that 57 is “old.” No-one who is under 50 wants to think their mother will die some day. Such were the times and circumstances, I can only remember my overwhelming grief, anxiety and bewilderment pouring out uncontrollably in a washroom at Heathrow airport.
Sometimes I think the younger you are when you lose a parent, you are so stunned you have trouble later remembering the funeral and burial details. Sometimes I think hardly knew the whole person who was my mother. It takes maturity to recognize a mother as an individual, not “just” a mother who only exists in relationship to the me. Much of it I did in hindsight. We are all less than perfect individuals, even mothers and fathers.
Clare was an only child of Latvian descent. She was quite beautiful. Photographs do not capture the distinction of her eyes, one blue and one green. Her parents spoiled her, and also restricted her. She was bright in school—creativity was her forte, in writing and particularly in drawing. Playing the piano and riding horses were other passions. Her heart’s desire to attend art college in Boston or New York, where she had relatives, was strongly vetoed by her father.
So she earned a job as a local newspaper journalist in the 1930s, having to content herself with her language and grammar skills. Nevertheless, in a small town, Clare was relatively sophisticated. Her parents and relatives imbued a then-exotic European influence that suited her spirit.
Marriage and children somewhat stifled her creative side for a while, unless you count sewing and baking. But she found an outlet eventually in art courses and exhibitions. The hiring of maids (remember DPs? “displaced persons”) and kids off to private schools gave her the chance to step outside the motherhood role. As a widow, she re-focused her energy to steer the family business for a while.
Clare had sadness in her life too. Was she mis-matched in marriage? Did she ultimately feel unfulfilled? Did she inherit a genetic predisposition to addiction? She lost her first child. She suffered the poor choice of a second husband.
Mom never knew her children succeeded in their own ways; she never knew all her grandchildren and they didn’t know her. We all lost. I don't want to make her famous. I like to think of her best when she felt happy.
With Chief Walking Buffalo, Banff, 1952; family photograph collection, BDM.
Mothers! Mother’s Day is right around the corner and this is the perfect time to honor your mother, grandmother, godmother, step mother, den mother, aunt, neighbor, or friend who happens to be a mother. If you’ve written about your own mother for the COG before, consider writing about another mom on your family tree. Let’s make all our moms famous!
My mother died far away at age 57. I was on a different continent at the time and my siblings had to take care of the arrangements. No-one who is over 50 thinks that 57 is “old.” No-one who is under 50 wants to think their mother will die some day. Such were the times and circumstances, I can only remember my overwhelming grief, anxiety and bewilderment pouring out uncontrollably in a washroom at Heathrow airport.
Sometimes I think the younger you are when you lose a parent, you are so stunned you have trouble later remembering the funeral and burial details. Sometimes I think hardly knew the whole person who was my mother. It takes maturity to recognize a mother as an individual, not “just” a mother who only exists in relationship to the me. Much of it I did in hindsight. We are all less than perfect individuals, even mothers and fathers.
Clare was an only child of Latvian descent. She was quite beautiful. Photographs do not capture the distinction of her eyes, one blue and one green. Her parents spoiled her, and also restricted her. She was bright in school—creativity was her forte, in writing and particularly in drawing. Playing the piano and riding horses were other passions. Her heart’s desire to attend art college in Boston or New York, where she had relatives, was strongly vetoed by her father.
So she earned a job as a local newspaper journalist in the 1930s, having to content herself with her language and grammar skills. Nevertheless, in a small town, Clare was relatively sophisticated. Her parents and relatives imbued a then-exotic European influence that suited her spirit.
Marriage and children somewhat stifled her creative side for a while, unless you count sewing and baking. But she found an outlet eventually in art courses and exhibitions. The hiring of maids (remember DPs? “displaced persons”) and kids off to private schools gave her the chance to step outside the motherhood role. As a widow, she re-focused her energy to steer the family business for a while.
Clare had sadness in her life too. Was she mis-matched in marriage? Did she ultimately feel unfulfilled? Did she inherit a genetic predisposition to addiction? She lost her first child. She suffered the poor choice of a second husband.
Mom never knew her children succeeded in their own ways; she never knew all her grandchildren and they didn’t know her. We all lost. I don't want to make her famous. I like to think of her best when she felt happy.
With Chief Walking Buffalo, Banff, 1952; family photograph collection, BDM.
08 May 2009
Missing Dead Relatives
One of my past posts commented on an earnest couple of the next generation who underwent a sea change with the birth of their first child. To celebrate the event and hail the new world order, they ditched their family surnames and created a new one. We are told this is being in tune with the planet. Go figure. By the time the baby has grandchildren, a budding family historian could meet a rather high brick wall trying to piece things together. Missing ancestors.
Recently I’ve seen a few stories about missing relatives. More precisely, missing remains—the occasional ancestor who obviously died but can’t be found memorialized in a place of burial. Even with a date and/or place of death, some of them defy being found. These are people who are not buried where you expect them to be, or people who are not buried in a family plot, or people whose kin did not place a marker, or people missing in mortuary records.
It happened in my family. A rare visit this week with cousins reminded me of what occurred when a favourite cousin died a few years ago. The gathering, as funeral things go, was replete with fond reminiscence and renewal of family ties. We knew that on the morrow we would be at the cemetery after the church service. Most of us didn’t know that we would be burying three people! Seems dearest cousin had been storing her parents’ ashes in the cellar next to her stacks of homemade preserves and jams. And I thought I knew her!
Cremation is good. Ashes might be more problematic for the living. The deceased might have made clear wishes to be buried with spouse, parents, children or a specific location. On the other hand, maybe no wishes were spelled out verbally or otherwise. I suppose there could be many reasons why ashes would get carefully set aside or toted around from one home to another. As for the wishes that specify being sprinkled on the ocean or catapulted into space, let’s not go into that in present company.
For something like 50 years my aunt and uncle had waited in dim silence. To this day I don’t know if they were neatly labelled on the shelf like their succulent neighbours. Dignity restored.
Recently I’ve seen a few stories about missing relatives. More precisely, missing remains—the occasional ancestor who obviously died but can’t be found memorialized in a place of burial. Even with a date and/or place of death, some of them defy being found. These are people who are not buried where you expect them to be, or people who are not buried in a family plot, or people whose kin did not place a marker, or people missing in mortuary records.
It happened in my family. A rare visit this week with cousins reminded me of what occurred when a favourite cousin died a few years ago. The gathering, as funeral things go, was replete with fond reminiscence and renewal of family ties. We knew that on the morrow we would be at the cemetery after the church service. Most of us didn’t know that we would be burying three people! Seems dearest cousin had been storing her parents’ ashes in the cellar next to her stacks of homemade preserves and jams. And I thought I knew her!
Cremation is good. Ashes might be more problematic for the living. The deceased might have made clear wishes to be buried with spouse, parents, children or a specific location. On the other hand, maybe no wishes were spelled out verbally or otherwise. I suppose there could be many reasons why ashes would get carefully set aside or toted around from one home to another. As for the wishes that specify being sprinkled on the ocean or catapulted into space, let’s not go into that in present company.
For something like 50 years my aunt and uncle had waited in dim silence. To this day I don’t know if they were neatly labelled on the shelf like their succulent neighbours. Dignity restored.
22 April 2009
Fraser Tangents
Not every previous Fraser post is about my personal ancestors. And neither is most of this one. As background, my buddy Lizzie and I have a common ancestor, one Duncan Fraser (c1783-1867), a blacksmith in Killin, Perthshire. Three of Duncan’s sons were William Fraser, MD (1810-1872), my ancestor John Fraser (1808-????) and her ancestor Donald Fraser (1819-1880). We have a theory that two other sons may have followed their older brothers to Canada.
Another mystery is the identity of a Fraser witness at the 19 June 1800 marriage in Montreal of John Charles and Lucille LeBrun (Fraser blog 30 April 2008). Their daughter Miranda Charles later married Dr. William Fraser in 1840. But who was the Fraser in Montreal in 1800? The signature is very difficult to read, with the first name abbreviated. It begins with Eli ..., seeming to be Elisth. Certainly there were plenty of Scots in Montreal at the time, in the fur trade and other mercantile ventures.
Hence a few reasons for browsing the Drouin collection on Ancestry.ca looking for Fraser marriages (knowing full well that, at present, the database is incomplete for Protestant registers in Quebec). This session did not produce likely-looking results for me, but I did stumble across an intriguing tangent.
At Notre Dame Basilica in Quebec City on 24 October 1842, John Fraser Esq. [Ecuyer], notary of Terrebonne parish, married Dlle. [Demoiselle] Elizabeth Fraser of Quebec parish.(1) Some will get a chuckle that the groom’s surname was indexed in the database as Ecuyer and the bride as Della Elizabeth. I hear moans about outsourcing the indexing. Someone looking for this John Fraser would have a hard time finding him!
The genealogical lore in the entry is fascinating. The impressive parade of witnesses gives definite family clues, merely needing untangling:
* The Hon. John Malcolm Fraser and Hon. John Fraser, uncles
* Henry (G.) Forsyth, cousin
* Louis Marteau, Esq.
* Simon Eliot Fraser, brother
* Magdaline Fraser, sister
* Andrew R. Fraser, cousin
It’s unclear whether each relationship applies to the bride or groom. Moreover, the Bishop of Quebec gave two dispensations for (a) the publishing of banns and (b) second degree of consanguinity—the latter commonly indicating the parties are first cousins (having mutual grandparents) or perhaps uncle and niece.
Such a rich Fraser cornucopia deserved at least a cursory Internet search. Since the two Honourables looked promising, I first looked at the website of the Quebec National Assembly (NAQ) www.assnat.qc.ca/eng/index.html, which has a list of all elected representatives over the years. Hon. John Malcolm Fraser (c1800-1860) was born at Malbaie, son of Malcolm Fraser and his mistress Marguerite Ducros dit Laterreur. John Malcolm inherited part of his father’s Mount Murray estate in 1815 and became a leading figure in Quebec City commerce and politics. In 1827 he married Grace Forsyth, daughter of another Quebec merchant, Henry George Forsyth, originally from Aberdeen, Scotland, in Quebec City’s Holy Trinity Anglican Cathedral. Names of their children are not mentioned, but clearly they would have some Forsyth cousins.
The NAQ site also had an entry for Hon. John Fraser de Berry. Born at Laval 25 November 1816, he was the son of Simon Fraser (a doctor with the 42nd Regiment of Royal Highlanders or Black Watch); died 15 November 1876. John “Fraser de Berry’s” brief bio includes his early studies at Terrebonne and Montreal, with admission to the practice of notary in 1839. He was also prominent in various provincial and other appointments. In the mid-1860s he assumed the de Berry name of his Norman ancestors. He married his cousin Elizabeth Fraser in Notre-Dame-de-Québec parish on 24 October 1842. Aha. This must be our groom.
Next I searched Dictionary of Canadian Biography (DCB) http://www.biographi.ca/. The only relevant Fraser seemed to be a Malcom Fraser (1733-1815) who had a son John Malcom (with no entry in DCB). According to the DCB historian, Malcolm was born in Abernethy, Perthshire, Scotland. After Malcolm’s service in Nova Scotia and Quebec with the 78th Foot regiment (Fraser Highlanders), he retired as a lieutenant and acquired the seigneury of Mount-Murray, Quebec, within the former Malbaie seigneury. In his lifetime he became a large landowner in several areas of Quebec. Of numerous children by two women, three of the sons are named as Simon, Joseph and John Malcolm. The latter looks like the same man who married Grace Forsyth.
Was I getting somewhere? Not leaving well enough alone, I found a delicious potpourri of John Fraser de Berry information on the Clan Fraser Society of Canada website http://www.clanfraser.ca/fraserde.htm. The editor of the piece declares, “John Fraser de Berry spent a lifetime inventing and reinventing his ancestry and genealogy, as evidenced by the following examples from published sources in Quebec.” Then ensues an editorial dissection of various descriptions written by or about the man—autobiographical accounts and obituaries. One of his greatest goals was to revive and head the “New Clan Fraser,” considering all the former Fraser Highlanders who had settled in Quebec. Fraser de Berry was well known for claiming descent from Lord Lovat (Simon Fraser the Jacobite) and being the 58th descendant of Jules de Berry who lived in France in the eighth century AD.
The clan foundational meeting in 1868 and the chief’s impressive lineage prompted a number of humourous letters to The Quebec Morning Chronicle. Separating what appear to be facts from the hogwash, we find that neither John’s father (Simon, 1768-1844) nor grandfather (Malcom, 1733-1815) had any descent at all from Lord Lovat, whose direct line ended with his own execution in 1747. Fraser de Berry adroitly concealed two generations of illegitimacy in his true pedigree. Historians have discounted the de Berry encounter with Charlemagne's court as fable. Nevertheless, Fraser de Berry was Seigneur of Contrecoeur and Cournoyer, a longtime convert to Catholicism, fluently bilingual and counsel for the Quebec Legislative Assembly when he died. His vision of the clan model laid the foundation for the Clan Fraser Society of Canada.
One tangent leads to another. This is what happens to genealogists. It began as a lazy-day exercise and look where it took me. Have I almost forgotten de Berry’s wife Elizabeth Fraser? Elizabeth’s obituary in 1901, quoted on the Clan Fraser website, mentions only a brother William. It seems mutual grandfather Malcolm had five sons: Alexander, Joseph, Simon, William and John Malcolm (no attempt at birth order here). The bride Elizabeth may be the daughter of Alexander, who purportedly had an Elizabeth, William and Madeleine among his children. Thus the Hon. John Malcolm Fraser was the paternal uncle of both bride and groom while the second uncle John is still a puzzle. It will take far more than Internet browsing to untangle and reconstruct these families. If what we see so far is even trustworthy!
(1) Fraser-Fraser marriage, 1842, Notre Dame Basilica register, Quebec City, no. 151, p. 204, “Drouin Collection,” digital image, Ancestry.ca (www.ancestry.ca : accessed 1 April 2009).
Another mystery is the identity of a Fraser witness at the 19 June 1800 marriage in Montreal of John Charles and Lucille LeBrun (Fraser blog 30 April 2008). Their daughter Miranda Charles later married Dr. William Fraser in 1840. But who was the Fraser in Montreal in 1800? The signature is very difficult to read, with the first name abbreviated. It begins with Eli ..., seeming to be Elisth. Certainly there were plenty of Scots in Montreal at the time, in the fur trade and other mercantile ventures.
Hence a few reasons for browsing the Drouin collection on Ancestry.ca looking for Fraser marriages (knowing full well that, at present, the database is incomplete for Protestant registers in Quebec). This session did not produce likely-looking results for me, but I did stumble across an intriguing tangent.
At Notre Dame Basilica in Quebec City on 24 October 1842, John Fraser Esq. [Ecuyer], notary of Terrebonne parish, married Dlle. [Demoiselle] Elizabeth Fraser of Quebec parish.(1) Some will get a chuckle that the groom’s surname was indexed in the database as Ecuyer and the bride as Della Elizabeth. I hear moans about outsourcing the indexing. Someone looking for this John Fraser would have a hard time finding him!
The genealogical lore in the entry is fascinating. The impressive parade of witnesses gives definite family clues, merely needing untangling:
* The Hon. John Malcolm Fraser and Hon. John Fraser, uncles
* Henry (G.) Forsyth, cousin
* Louis Marteau, Esq.
* Simon Eliot Fraser, brother
* Magdaline Fraser, sister
* Andrew R. Fraser, cousin
It’s unclear whether each relationship applies to the bride or groom. Moreover, the Bishop of Quebec gave two dispensations for (a) the publishing of banns and (b) second degree of consanguinity—the latter commonly indicating the parties are first cousins (having mutual grandparents) or perhaps uncle and niece.
Such a rich Fraser cornucopia deserved at least a cursory Internet search. Since the two Honourables looked promising, I first looked at the website of the Quebec National Assembly (NAQ) www.assnat.qc.ca/eng/index.html, which has a list of all elected representatives over the years. Hon. John Malcolm Fraser (c1800-1860) was born at Malbaie, son of Malcolm Fraser and his mistress Marguerite Ducros dit Laterreur. John Malcolm inherited part of his father’s Mount Murray estate in 1815 and became a leading figure in Quebec City commerce and politics. In 1827 he married Grace Forsyth, daughter of another Quebec merchant, Henry George Forsyth, originally from Aberdeen, Scotland, in Quebec City’s Holy Trinity Anglican Cathedral. Names of their children are not mentioned, but clearly they would have some Forsyth cousins.
The NAQ site also had an entry for Hon. John Fraser de Berry. Born at Laval 25 November 1816, he was the son of Simon Fraser (a doctor with the 42nd Regiment of Royal Highlanders or Black Watch); died 15 November 1876. John “Fraser de Berry’s” brief bio includes his early studies at Terrebonne and Montreal, with admission to the practice of notary in 1839. He was also prominent in various provincial and other appointments. In the mid-1860s he assumed the de Berry name of his Norman ancestors. He married his cousin Elizabeth Fraser in Notre-Dame-de-Québec parish on 24 October 1842. Aha. This must be our groom.
Next I searched Dictionary of Canadian Biography (DCB) http://www.biographi.ca/. The only relevant Fraser seemed to be a Malcom Fraser (1733-1815) who had a son John Malcom (with no entry in DCB). According to the DCB historian, Malcolm was born in Abernethy, Perthshire, Scotland. After Malcolm’s service in Nova Scotia and Quebec with the 78th Foot regiment (Fraser Highlanders), he retired as a lieutenant and acquired the seigneury of Mount-Murray, Quebec, within the former Malbaie seigneury. In his lifetime he became a large landowner in several areas of Quebec. Of numerous children by two women, three of the sons are named as Simon, Joseph and John Malcolm. The latter looks like the same man who married Grace Forsyth.
Was I getting somewhere? Not leaving well enough alone, I found a delicious potpourri of John Fraser de Berry information on the Clan Fraser Society of Canada website http://www.clanfraser.ca/fraserde.htm. The editor of the piece declares, “John Fraser de Berry spent a lifetime inventing and reinventing his ancestry and genealogy, as evidenced by the following examples from published sources in Quebec.” Then ensues an editorial dissection of various descriptions written by or about the man—autobiographical accounts and obituaries. One of his greatest goals was to revive and head the “New Clan Fraser,” considering all the former Fraser Highlanders who had settled in Quebec. Fraser de Berry was well known for claiming descent from Lord Lovat (Simon Fraser the Jacobite) and being the 58th descendant of Jules de Berry who lived in France in the eighth century AD.
The clan foundational meeting in 1868 and the chief’s impressive lineage prompted a number of humourous letters to The Quebec Morning Chronicle. Separating what appear to be facts from the hogwash, we find that neither John’s father (Simon, 1768-1844) nor grandfather (Malcom, 1733-1815) had any descent at all from Lord Lovat, whose direct line ended with his own execution in 1747. Fraser de Berry adroitly concealed two generations of illegitimacy in his true pedigree. Historians have discounted the de Berry encounter with Charlemagne's court as fable. Nevertheless, Fraser de Berry was Seigneur of Contrecoeur and Cournoyer, a longtime convert to Catholicism, fluently bilingual and counsel for the Quebec Legislative Assembly when he died. His vision of the clan model laid the foundation for the Clan Fraser Society of Canada.
One tangent leads to another. This is what happens to genealogists. It began as a lazy-day exercise and look where it took me. Have I almost forgotten de Berry’s wife Elizabeth Fraser? Elizabeth’s obituary in 1901, quoted on the Clan Fraser website, mentions only a brother William. It seems mutual grandfather Malcolm had five sons: Alexander, Joseph, Simon, William and John Malcolm (no attempt at birth order here). The bride Elizabeth may be the daughter of Alexander, who purportedly had an Elizabeth, William and Madeleine among his children. Thus the Hon. John Malcolm Fraser was the paternal uncle of both bride and groom while the second uncle John is still a puzzle. It will take far more than Internet browsing to untangle and reconstruct these families. If what we see so far is even trustworthy!
(1) Fraser-Fraser marriage, 1842, Notre Dame Basilica register, Quebec City, no. 151, p. 204, “Drouin Collection,” digital image, Ancestry.ca (www.ancestry.ca : accessed 1 April 2009).
10 April 2009
What Comes With Spring?
The busy season is here. Spring genealogy seminars and conferences have already begun. Planning for them never ends. Everyone I know is doing three or four jobs. Meetings, tasks, thinking, details, memos, reminders, copious amounts of paper being generated, tons of emails and even worse, phone calls.
I needed a camel photograph to calm me down. And keep in touch with my blog.
What a handsome fellow. See you? at the annual Ontario Genealogical Society Conference 29-31 May at Sheridan College in Oakville.
Neil Carey, photographer, fohn.net, “Camel Pictures and Interesting Facts,” (http://fohn.net/camel-pictures-facts/#arabian).
I needed a camel photograph to calm me down. And keep in touch with my blog.
What a handsome fellow. See you? at the annual Ontario Genealogical Society Conference 29-31 May at Sheridan College in Oakville.Neil Carey, photographer, fohn.net, “Camel Pictures and Interesting Facts,” (http://fohn.net/camel-pictures-facts/#arabian).
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