Giving Birth on the Atlantic Ocean

I have two documented cases in my tree of ancestors giving birth on board the ship taking them from Europe to America, one during colonial times, and the other from the late 19th century. It always makes me wonder why a woman would ever travel like this while pregnant, especially during the last trimester. It's not as though travel by ship, even in history, took nine months and she couldn't have known, but in both cases in my tree, it was a matter of the journey taking longer than expected. Not nine months long, but long enough that she could have reasonably expected to have arrived at the destination long before the birth, and maybe even before the last trimester. Maybe it was even a combination of a longer than expected journey and a premature birth. In the second case, I think that may have been likely, because the baby sadly did not survive.

The first case is of a well documented ancestor, Rachel de Forest, the daughter of noteworthy Jesse de Forest, and wife of equally well known Jean/Johannes de la Montagne. While perhaps not exactly famous in mainstream history, Montagne actually has a Society of Descendants, and was a notable figure in colonial New Amsterdam, serving on the New Netherland Council and as First Councillor to both Director Willem Kieft and Director-General Peter Stuyvesant. Jean and his wife Rachel left Holland (Netherlands) for New Amsterdam on 25 Sep 1636 on board the Rensselaerswyck, obviously while Rachel was pregnant. Exactly how far along she was, we can't say for sure, but she gave birth 25 Jan 1637 while at sea, and the reason is probably because the journey wound up taking a surprising 23 weeks, not arriving until 5 March 1637. Normally, at this time in history, the journey across the Atlantic took about 6-12 weeks. It was common for the ship to make several stops in Europe before making the crossing, but this usually only tacked on a few weeks, not the 14 weeks it wound up adding to the trip. If they left in September and the journey was only supposed to take 3 months at most, Rachel might have reasonably assumed they would be in New Amsterdam by or around Christmas, and if she wasn't due until late January, she would have no reason to think she might give birth on board the ship. What went wrong? Why did the journey take so long? 

First, immediately after leaving Holland, the ship hit heavy storms in the English Channel that left them at the mercy of the battering winds and sea swells for a brutal six weeks. During this time, another woman on board actually gave birth as well, though I am not related to her. Anna Van Rotmers had a son she appropriately named "Storm". Though the boy's father's surname was Bradt, Storm later adopted the surname "Vanderzee" which literally means "from the sea". Seems he was quite proud of being born at sea during a brutal storm.

The ship made attempts to dock at either Falmouth or Plymouth in England, and although they got close, the storm ultimately made it impossible to dock. The ship's sails were all badly damaged and it wasn't until November 16th that it finally limped into the harbor of Ilfracombe, in Devonshire, England. 

This wasn't the end of their troubles. Not only did the bad weather continue, making it difficult for the ship to set off again once repaired, but while they waited out the storms in Ilfracombe, the blacksmith (who was being sent to the colony by the Dutch West India Company) argued with his assistant, which resulted in the assistant killing the blacksmith! The ship's officers immediately turned the murderer into the authorities at Ilfracombe, but to be sure they wouldn't leave during the investigation, the authorities moored their ship and removed the rudder. Between this and the weather, they were delayed another eight weeks. 

They finally left England (presumably with no blacksmith or assistant) on 9 Jan 1637 and the crossing of the Atlantic took a mere two months, as expected, but by now, Rachel was much further along than she had originally planned and wound up having her 5th child, Maria, on 25 Jan 1637 while still on board the Rensselaerswyck. Fortunately, both Rachel and Maria survived the ordeal, and Maria went on to marry my 9th great grandfather, Jacob Kip (a clerk for the council Jean served on). By the time they left England though, Rachel must have known that she was nearing her due date, and I wondered why she didn't choose to stay in England for the birth, and catch another ship to New Amsterdam afterwards. Maybe they didn't have the money - they had, after all, already paid for their trip on the Rensselaerswyck and staying in England would mean paying for room and board somewhere, plus the cost of another ship later on, all presumably without income while they waited. Additionally, waiting for the next ship may have meant waiting for months after the birth, not just a few weeks. However terrifying the thought of giving birth on board a ship must have been, it's likely that Rachel didn't have a choice at that point. Fortunately though, her own husband was a physician, so at least he was there by her side to help her through it.

The second case in my tree took place much later in history, in 1880. My 3rd great grandfather, Giovantomaso Scioli, was a poor Italian farmer, who was apparently intent on making sure his first child was born in America, because he and his wife would leave for the US just weeks before she was due to give birth. A risky choice, if you ask me.

After marrying my 3rd great grandmother Lorenza Palladino on 27 Feb 1879 in Monteroduni, Italy, they left a year later for the US on board the SS Australia (shown above, from NorwayHeritage.com) from London, England on 14 Feb 1880, while Lorenza was, of course, heavily pregnant. I do not know when or how they got from Italy to England, but the journey from England to the US should have taken about 1-2 weeks, yet the steamer did not arrive in New York City until 10 Mar 1880, about 3 and a half weeks from when it departed. We know why the ship was delayed, because it was documented in the newspaper as having had engine problems while at sea. Described only as a "disabled engine", it must have been running at only about half the speed it was normally capable of.

In addition, I believe Lorenza may have also given birth prematurely. On 28 Feb 1880, she gave birth to a little girl named after the steamship she was born on, Australia Domenica Scioli, who sadly died a mere 2 days later. In history, infant deaths were not uncommon, even if they weren't premature, but it could help explain how Lorenza wound up giving birth at sea. Let's say she wasn't due for another 5-6 weeks when they left, so a journey that should have only take a week or two, or maybe even three at the most like it did, should have still meant she would safely be in NYC weeks before her due date. Only if the baby was a week or two early would it have been a problem, and unfortunately that's exactly what may have happened. Of course, it's also important to remember that due dates in history weren't as exact as they are today and Lorenza could have thought her due date was later than it actually was.

The idea of giving birth in history seems daunting enough to begin with. Before modern medicine, the leading cause of death among women of child bearing age was child birth. Add to that having to do it on board a ship (pre-stabilizers, which help reduce the motion of the ship), in some cases probably without a doctor or even a midwife present, sounds terrifying. Unless you were lucky enough to marry a doctor like Rachel, the most you could hope for was another woman on board who had experience either giving birth and/or assisting in a delivery to help you through such an uncertain event. When you consider all this, it's a miracle both Rachel and Maria survived in the first case, even with her doctor husband, and that Lorenza survived in the second case, even if Australia Domenica didn't.

Sources:

• Liner Transatlantic Crossing Times, 1833 – 1952 (in days), The Geography of Transport Systems
• A Walloon family in America; Lockwood de Forest and his forbears 1500-1848 Vol 1, Westward Again, Pages 75-80.
• Birth of Australia Dominica Scioli, 28 Feb 1880, Register of births at sea of British nationals, 1875-1891, FHL Film Number 1483321, Page 78
• Death of Australia Domenica Scioli, 02 Mar 1880, Register of deaths at sea of British nationals, 1875-1888, FHL Film Number 1483315, Page 92.
• New-York tribune. (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, March 11, 1880, Page 8, Image 8. Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

The Forgotten Witch Trials of Connecticut, 1647-1697

Dramatized depiction of a witch trial

I recently discovered that I had an ancestor involved in the witch trials of Connecticut and of course immediately went to look up more information on this subject. I was very surprised to find that while there are a lot of articles about it around the internet, none came from the popular Wikipedia. (Edit: this has finally now changed - see here). There are only a few books which detail the Connecticut events and fewer still which are dedicated entirely to them. Even history buffs often admit to not knowing about the Connecticut witch trials, in spite of the fact that the very first ones in the colonies occurred in Connecticut. It's safe to say they are greatly eclipsed by the Salem witch trials, which perhaps receive more attention because they occurred over a much shorter time period. Salem was very much a frenzied hysteria with the executions of 20 people within just over a year (February 1692 to May 1693), whereas the trials in Connecticut resulted in 35 cases and just 11 executions over the course of 50 years (1647-1697). Salem certainly deserves the attention it gets, but it should not be at the cost of forgetting other important witch hunts too.

Oddly, the ancestor in question, Christopher Comstock, has his own Wikipedia page, despite the greater trials in which he was involved not having one. Christopher was involved in the witch trials twice, firstly in 1653-1654 when he gave an affidavit about having visited Goodwife Knapp while she was in prison for witchcraft. Knapp was later executed. Secondly, he served on the grand jury investigating witchcraft in Connecticut in September 1692.

One of the reasons these trials kept cropping up was because every time someone was accused of witchcraft, they were pressured to "confess" and name others they knew of who were also witches. According to the author of "The witchcraft delusion in colonial Connecticut," from the moment Knapp was sentenced she "was made the object of rudest treatment, espionage, and of inhuman attempts to wring from her lips a confession of her own guilt or an accusation against some other person as a witch." Just as we might question a terrorist to confess who they are working with, this logic was applied to "witches" too in the 17th century. This is where my ancestor Christopher Comstock comes in. In 1653, Goodwife Knapp, whose first name is lost to history, was in prison in Fairfield for witchcraft. Comstock, along with Thomas Sheruington and Goodwife Baldwin, visited her in her cell where Baldwin questioned her about her fellow "witches". It sounds as though Comstock and Sheruington were merely there as witnesses. Knapp admitted that she knew some, or at least one person who had "received Indian gods that were very bright." Knapp was claiming her innocence so Baldwin asked her how she could know this if she weren't a witch herself, to which Knapp responded that the guilty party had told her so. It appears that Knapp did not reveal the name of the person who told her this though. During another questioning by Mistress Pell, Knapp insisted, "I have sins enough already, and I will not add this [accusing another] to my condemnation."

The court didn't believe her plea of not-guilty, because Knapp was convicted and executed by hanging. She went to the grave pleading her innocence. My ancestor's role in this was minor, he was merely witness to an interview with Knapp as prisoner. His affidavit was not even used at her trial, since it was actually written after the fact, to be used in another case the following year. Unfortunately, there are few details about Knapp's trial, we do not even know the specifics of what she was accused of, who accused her, what the testimonies against her included, etc. Most of what we know about Knapp comes from an investigation after her 1653 execution in which testimonies were given about Knapp's supposed accusations of another, Mary Staples, which is when Comstock wrote his affidavit.

After Knapp's execution, her body was desecrated when several individuals stripped it and searched it for marks of a witch. Mary Staples proclaimed there were no marks on Knapp's body that couldn't also be found on herself, an attempt to claim there were no witch's marks on Knapp's body. Later, Robert Ludlow claimed that just before her execution, Knapp had requested to speak to him privately, during which she told him that Mary Staples was a witch. This seems unlikely given the fact that she wouldn't name anyone under extreme pressure and duress in her cell. Why would she suddenly, on her own accord, decide to accuse Mary Staples, and furthermore, why would she do so privately, with no witnesses, if she wanted it known? It's believed Ludlow took Mary's comments not to mean Knapp had no witch's marks, but that both Knapp and Mary had them and that made Mary a witch too. But the conflict between Ludlow and Staples had been going on since at least 1651 when Ludlow won a law suit against Mary for slander, so Ludlow was likely looking for anyway he could to accuse her of anything else. Mary's husband, Thomas Staples, caught wind of Ludlow's tale, and in attempts to forestall the accusations against his wife, brought suit against Ludlow in 1654 for defamation of character, and there began the investigation in 1654, including Comstock's affidavit. There was also a witness account given by another of my ancestors, Rose Sherwood, then the wife of Thomas Barlow. Rose testified that after Knapp's execution, she was among those women who searched Knapp's body for marks. She claims at first they found nothing unusual, but then upon another look, they did.

Despite several testimonies against Mary Staples, in the end, the court saw reason and ruled in favor of her husband, awarding Ludlow with damages for defamation of character. It did not prevent a later trial against Mary for witchcraft though, in 1692, but Ludlow had left Connecticut by then and Mary was fortunately acquitted.

It is relieving to see that Comstock's affidavit did not contribute to any conviction or execution. He was merely an observer, witness of something Knapp had said, which was later used by others as an attempt to accuse someone else, but it failed. It's hard to say what he thought or felt about it. Comstock is believed to have been born about 1635, which would have made him only 18 at the time he witnessed the questioning of Knapp in 1653. If that's the case, he was quite young and his experiences in these trials must have helped shaped his development into an adult.

What else is known of Knapp is very little. In John Taylor's "The witchcraft delusion", all it says of Knapp herself is that she was "presumably a woman of good repute, and not a common scold, an outcast, or a harridan" and quotes other sources saying "she impresses one as the best woman" and that she was a "just and high minded old lady."

John Winthrop Jr.

Fast forward to 1692. Salem is in its height of witch trial hysteria and Connecticut isn't far behind, with the trials of six women in Fairfield, all accused by the same servant girl, Katherine Branch. Fortunately, unlike in Salem, none were executed. After Hartford saw the trials of nine people and the executions of four of them in 1662, the Connecticut governor John Winthrop Jr made it necessary for two witnesses for each alleged act of witchcraft to be required for a conviction, rather than only one. This made convictions much more difficult and resulted in no further executions of witches in Connecticut after 1662. Winthrop appears to have been the saving grace of Connecticut, and something of an antithesis to Salem's Cotton Mather, often personally overturning or reversing convictions. He may have been the main reason Connecticut had fewer executions of witches overall than Salem, and none at all during Salem's mass of them in 1692. However, that's not to say the Fairfield trials in 1692 didn't results in any convictions at all. Of the six women accused, three were acquitted, two never went to trial (jury found no bill, meaning there wasn't enough evidence to go to trial), and one, Mercy Disborough, was convicted. She was never executed though, as she was later pardoned. Christopher Comstock was on the jury that convicted Mercy, but also acquitted and found no bill for the other five women. So my ancestor was (partially) responsible for the conviction of Mercy Disborough on the charge of witchcraft, but fortunately not for her death.

An engraving of one floating on water
during ordeal by water (ie, guilty)

Although Katherine Branch made the initial accusation, there were numerous testimonies against Mercy, so it seems she ruffled more than enough feathers, though nothing that should warrant her execution. Most of the accusations were ridiculous to think they could be related to Mercy, including one unnamed young woman prone to seizures who accused Mercy of being responsible for them. Mercy was subjected to being searched naked for marks of the devil, and even to the water test, or ordeal by water. This is the notorious test where one's hands and feet are bound together before being thrown into the water and if they sink, they are considered innocent, and if they float, they are considered guilty. The basis of this was the ridiculous theory that witches floated because they had renounced baptism and therefore were being rejected by the water. Another idea was that witches were supernaturally light weight. In any case, naturally, they were pulled out of the water before they drown, by a rope which was tied to them. The idea that this sort of test meant the individual on trial would die whether found innocent or guilty (drown if innocent, executed if guilty) is a modern misconception. Mercy, along with another accused (Elizabeth Clawson), were tied up and thrown into the water on September 15, 1692, where two witnesses (Abram Adams and Jonathan Squire) claimed they floated like corks, and even when pressed down into the water, they bounced back up. However, this test obviously wasn't the deciding factor in the trials, since although Mercy was convicted, Elizabeth was not, despite both of them floating. That suggests enough people at the time were skeptical of the authenticity of such a test that its results weren't taken into great consideration.

Apart from Mercy Disborough and Elizabeth Clawson, the others who were on trial in Fairfield in 1692, accused by Katherine Branch (a servant of Daniel Wescot/Westcott), included: Mary Harvey, Hannah Harvey, Goody Miller, and Mary Staples, the same Mary Staples whose husband sued Robert Ludlow for defamation of her character and won. Most of the other Connecticut cases took place in other towns, including Windsor, Hartford, Wethersfield, New Haven, East Hampton, Saybrook, Stratford, and Wallingford, though some of them were tried in Hartford instead.

Although the Connecticut cases were spread out over time and saw fewer executions than Salem, they still played an important role in the history of witch trials and should not be forgotten.

Sources:

• The witchcraft delusion in colonial Connecticut, 1647-1697 by John M. Taylor
• Witch-Hunting in Seventeenth-Century New England: A Documentary History 1638–1693, Second Edition by David D. Hall
• The Hanging of Goodwife Knapp 1653 by Laurence A Moran
• Connecticut Witch Trials
• Before Salem - Smithsonian

Also check out:

• Connecticut Witch Trials: The First Panic in the New World by Cynthia Wolfe Boynton  
• Before Salem: Witch Hunting in the Connecticut River Valley, 1647–1663 by Richard S. III Ross
• Escaping Salem: The Other Witch Hunt of 1692 (New Narratives in American History) by Richard Godbeer 
• Witchcraft Trials of Connecticut by Richard G. Tomlinson

An Update on The Tragic Family of James Addison Smith

James Addison Smith with wife Margaret,
and children Olif (left) and Madge (right)

Previously, I talked about my 3rd great uncle James Addison Smith and how his family was plagued with tragedy. His wife, Margaret Catherine Peay, and his daughter Marjory both became morphine addicts, his daughter Mary was schizophrenic, his son Olif died in a train accident, and his daughter Madge (who was also in the same train accident but survived) eloped with a man who also later wound up in a mental institution. You may feel sorry for James, but family legend has it that he was very controlling of his daughters, forbidding them from having boyfriends or even leaving the house without their mother. When Madge eloped, he never spoke to or of her ever again.

But let's start with what information can be confirmed with records. I detailed Mary's schizophrenia in the previous post, so now I will detail the tragic and horrific train accident that took many loved ones from this family.

In the summer of 1894, five year old Olif and three year old Madge Smith had gone with their maternal aunts, Sallie and Daisy Peay, to visit their other maternal aunt, Nannie Maddox (nee Peay), and her husband, James P Maddox in Centertown, Kentucky. Back home in Russellville, a good 50 miles south, Olif and Madge's mother, Margaret, was caring for their 6 month old sister Marjory at the time. Caring for an infant with two young children constantly underfoot was likely stressful, so perhaps Margaret sent them off with her sisters to visit family for a brief break.

Headline from newspaper about the accident

On Saturday, the 23rd of June, they set off home with James P Maddox driving them in a two horse wagon to the nearest railroad station, which was likely in McHenry, Kentucky, about 7-8 miles from Centertown. At 12:30 PM, they came upon a railroad crossing just southwest of McHenry known as Frogtown Crossing. What happened next was the result of a combination of poor planning of the junction, and total disregard for public safety. The road leading up to the crossing was on a hill, making it hard to see the crossing until you were only a few feet from it. In addition, there was a sharp curve to the railroad just before the crossing, making it difficult to see if any train was coming. As if that weren't enough, the railroad tracks had no planks at the crossing of the dirt road, meaning wagon wheels had to be pulled up and over each rail. Perhaps the Chesapeake, Ohio, and Southwestern Railway Company felt the area was so rural, the road was unlikely to see much traffic, making an accident unlikely. In any case, the Smith, Peay, and Maddox families would suffer for that negligence.

Maddox seemed to be aware of the dangers of the junction, as he came to a stop just before reaching the top of the hill and the railroad. After a moment's pause, the wagon lurched forward, attempting to cross as quickly as possible, though other reports say the horses were spooked and this is why the wagon jumped forward. Regardless, the wagon suddenly halted on the tracks, the wheels stuck on the rails protruding from the ground, just as the eastbound train No. 6 came roaring around the corner so fast the passengers of the wagon didn't have time to jump out.

The collision was a horrific scene. The wagon was obliterated to pieces while the broken and bleeding bodies of both the horses and the wagon's passengers were thrown to either sides of the tracks. Olif had been thrown so high in the air, it's believed he died upon impact with the ground. The Peay sisters, thrown far from the tracks, were killed almost instantly and gasping their last breaths as help arrived. Maddox was unconscious but alive, barely, and suffered for 33 and a half hours before finally succumbing to his fatal wounds. Little Madge, the sole survivor (even the horses perished), had a broken arm and back, and her injuries were severe enough that many feared she would follow her relatives in death. In fact, one newspaper even falsely reported that she had already died. But she defied all the odds and pulled through, attended by the physicians of McHenry.

Settlement of case

The Maddox, Peay, and Smith families filed a law suit against the Chesapeake, Ohio, and Southwestern Railway Co., asking them for $5,000 for each of the passengers who died in the accident. Originally filed with the Circuit Court of Ohio County, the case was transferred to the Federal Court but dismissed in June of 1895 when the parties came to a settlement outside court. The Railway agreed to pay the families $2,500 for each of the deceased, and another $1,975 to the Smith family for the injured Madge. In 1895, $2,500 would have been the equivalent of about $72,800 today. Madge's share would have been worth about $57,500 today, and according to family legend, it was put into a trust which she didn't receive until she turned 21 in 1911. Assuming she gained interest on her trust fund, the amount she inherited might have been much greater.

In 1913, Madge eloped with Harry J Messmann, a 29 year old salesman from Manhattan, New York who came to her father's clothing store, taking her inheritance with her. According to family stories, her over-protective and controlling father was so infuriated by her elopement that he refused to ever speak to her again and the family was forbidden from even saying her name. She was dead to him, but she did write to her mother and sisters.

Married life was ultimately not to bring Madge any happiness though. Though she had at least one child with Harry, a daughter named after herself and her own mother, Margaret, family lore says that when her money from the accident ran out, her husband left her. However, census reports show that in 1930 and 1940, Harry was a resident in Middletown State Homeopathic Hospital - a mental institute. Just like her sister Mary, Madge's husband suffered from a mental illness severe enough to hospitalize him for the rest of his life. Whether he also left her because her money ran out, before he was hospitalized, is unclear. Maybe Madge, too embarrassed to admit the truth of where her husband disappeared to, put it about that he had left her instead. What became of Madge and her daughter after 1920 remains a mystery - I have not been able to find them in the 1930 or 1940 censuses.

I have also not been able to find any records that verify Madge's sister Marjory and mother Margaret were morphine addicts. It's certainly possible, knowing all that their family was put through (both this and not forgetting the story of Mary's schizophrenia), that they might have turned to a drug which would help them forget it all. However, Margaret's death certificate makes no mention of any drug addiction, and the censuses don't report that kind of thing. What the census does tell us is that Marjory was employed as a filing clerk during each census, and according to directory records, all through the 1940s as well. I am not sure how likely it is that one could hold a job with a morphine addiction, but perhaps she did not start until after 1950.

James Addison Smith's obituary notably does not name his
still living schizophrenic daughter, or the daughter who eloped

As for the rumor that James Addison Smith was so controlling that he never allowed his daughters to leave the house without their mother, it may be true. Madge had to elope, and Marjory, Ella, and Mona never married. While the legend goes that he didn't allow them to have boyfriends, it doesn't necessarily mean they weren't allowed to marry, but it does make marriage much more difficult. Only his youngest daughter, Laura Batsel Smith, was married with his approval in 1935 when she was 26. Her wedding announcement in the paper says her father walked her down the isle and gave her away, even hosting the wedding at his home. One wonders if this wasn't something of an arranged marriage, since when would Laura ever have had the freedom to get to know her groom, Edwin Chamberlin? Assuming the story is true, of course. It's a nugget of information my grandmother had collected during her own genealogy research. I know she reached out to a lot of relatives and gathered information from them. The Smith sisters would have been my grandmother's 1st cousins once removed, and several of them would have still been alive when my grandmother was researching, so this information could have come straight from the horses mouth. I know as genealogists we are taught to take family stories with a grain of salt, but we are also told to collect as much first-hand information as we can. So far, all the data and stories my grandmother left behind have turned out to be at least partly true.

On a last note, I noticed that James Addison Smith's obituary in 1941 does not mention his daughter Mary even though she outlived him. I guess in spite of all those years of caring for her, he was still embarrassed by his schizophrenic daughter. Madge is also noticeably not mentioned, and although we don't know for sure she was still alive at the time, her husband is listed in 1940 as still married, not widowed. That is suggestive that she was still alive, which lends credit to the story that her father had disowned her, for her to not be mentioned in his obituary. Whatever his reasons, he obviously disapproved of her marriage and never forgave her for it. What a shame, that with all the tragedies in his life, he would add to it by never forgiving the daughter he nearly lost as a child.

Account of Civil War POW

While researching descendants of my ancestors, I came across this interesting story, taken from "A brief history of John Valentine Kratz" by Abraham Fretz, pages 104 - 106:

Alonzo Philip Kratz, born July 26, 1845; died Feb. 12, 1865. At the age of seventeen he enlisted in Doylestown, Pa., on Aug. 8, 1862, as a private in Company F, 128 Regiment Pa., Vol., for nine months in the United States services. The reg't., soon went to the front. His first letter was dated at Camp Wells, Va., Aug. 12, 1862, from which it appears that army life agreed with him, he says: ''We don't get victuals like at home, but what we do get is enough and healthy; soft bread comes this way once a week." After the battle of Antietam he wrote, ''It was a hard fight, and I do not want to get in another like it. The rebels loaded their guns with a large round ball and three buck-shot, these flew around us like hail. We loaded our muskets with a large pointed ball, and it did some execution. A soldier who has once fought for his country, will never forget it, neither should he be forgotten." On Jan. 16, 1863 at Fairfax Station, Va., he says. "Our winter hut is built; it is of logs two feet high. and our tent is the roof: It is a comfortable house that will keep us dry and warm." On Mar. 25, 1863 he wrote from Brook's Station, Va., "We have five weeks yet to serve; we have been in several skirmishes besides the great battle Sept. 17 (Antietam), and there may be another big fight this spring. before our time is out. Gen. Hooker is getting impatient at this inaction. There is some talk among the boys of re-enlisting, but I think I will go home, although I don't believe I shall be satisfied with home life as long as the war is going on." The anticipated battle was Chanecllorsville, through it he passed without a scratch, and was discharged at the end of his term of service with the following certificate. "This is to certify that Alonzo Philip Kratz was one of the most patriotic soldiers in Company F, (commanded by C. K. Frankenfield), always at his post performing a soldier's duty cheerfully, and I can recommend him as the bravest of the brave, in meeting the foe and daring in battle. T. J. Kline. Orderly Sergt., Co., F. V2S Pa.. Yol.  

He came home in June 1868. and seemed glad enough to get back to "God's country again; but the outdoor life of a soldier, who so often slept with the blue vault of heaven for a covering, had completely changed his disposition. It was weeks before he could sleep on a soft bed, and enjoy a good meal. His patriotic spirit finally prevailed. to take up arms again; he always spoke of the Artillery service as being the most agreeable, and least dangerous to life and limb; that he would go in the heavy Artillery next. With this object in view, he went to Philadelphia shortly after New Years day, 1864, and enlisted in Battery D, 112 Regt., Penna. H. A. The regt. was, however, supplied with muskets, and served as the "2 Penna. Provisional Volunteers," there being more demand for that branch than Artillery: and he was promoted to Corporal of Company I. The regiment was mustered as "Veteran". and immediately went to the front leaving behind fifty brave and true men. of which number he was one for detached duty in Philadelphia. After guarding various places in the city for three months, he was sent to his regiment in the field, Apr. 24. 

A letter dated July 8, 1864. near Petersburg, Ya., gives an account of the fierce fighting of the rebels at the Welden R. R.. where they charged the Union lines six deep without breaking it; also that they had blown up two rebel forts, and are mining another and a bigger one, and when ready to explode, they will tight day and night if necessary to capture Petersburg, Va. His last letter from the field, is dated July 17, 1864, in which he says, "have been acting as sergeant for two months, and expect to be promoted to that office, as soon as the captain recovers from wounds received in battle," The coveted promotion never came. He was captured July 29, at the explosion referred to (Burnside's mine), and carried away into captivity. He was confined in the famous Libby prison at Richmond. Va., for a while and then removed to the stockade pen at Danville, Va. The 'last letter'' received from him was written in the latter place, dated Aug 3d, 1864; it was mailed at Old Point Comfort, and did not reach home until October 19, 1864. It was written with a led pencil in two hand writings, the first half was in his writing, which gave the date and circumstances of his capture, and where he was a prisoner. The last half showed unmistakably, that it was erased and written in another hand; this purported to give the comfortable quarters he had, kind treatment he received at the hands of the rebels, and the quantity and quality of healthy food given him. 

After the close of the war it was learned that he was an unwilling guest of rebeldom six months, and died Feb. 12, 1865 of starvation and exposure. He is buried in the National Cemetery at Danville, Va., grave 130, section A., division four. A brave and patriotic life sacrificed for country and flag. Battles he was in: Antietam, Va., Sept. 1862. Chancellorsville, Va., May 1863. Ream's Station, Va., June 1864 (Weldon R. R.). and Burnside's Mine, Va., July 1864. 

Captured by Native Americans

I recently discovered my 7th great grandparents Noah Frederick and Margaretha Becker were attacked and killed by Native Americans and that their son, my 6th great grandfather Thomas Frederick, was abducted by them. This was in 1756 in an area of Pennsylvania near Jonestown, not too far northeast of Harrisburg, in what was then Earl Township, Lancaster County (now Lebenon County, Earl Township defunct). Thomas would have only been four years old so it's difficult to say if he even remembered the event. By one account, two of his siblings were also taken captive, though I have yet to discover their names (if anyone knows them, please leave a comment!). They could not have been with the Natives for more than two years though, since records say they were released to the French Fort Duquesne, which was destroyed and replaced by Fort Pitt in 1758 and later developed into the city of Pittsburgh.

Thomas, now an orphan, apparently grew up under unknown guardianship in Philadelphia where there was no longer threat of Indian attacks. He later returned to the area of his tragic youth where he married Ann Margaret Tibbens in Bethel, Lancaster County in 1774. Two years later, the Revolutionary War broke out and Thomas joined up, fighting for his nation's independence.

An 1860 map of Centre Township, Columbiana County,
Ohio with Frederick lands outlined in red. J. Frederick was
Thomas' son, John. Thomas may have own all three lots.

Later in life, Thomas made a somewhat surprising move out to Lisbon, Centre Township, Columbiana County, Ohio in 1804. This area was only just beginning to be settled, Ohio had been admitted as a state merely one year prior, and so it was still very much the frontier at the time, still susceptible to Indian attacks. For this reason, land was often cheaply or even freely available as an incentive to settle the land. It seems surprising that Thomas, who had been a victim of such attacks as a child, would uproot his settled family and take up this particular risk. However, as a orphan, Thomas probably inherited nothing and had to make his own way in life. We don't know what his situation in Pennsylvania was like, perhaps his family did not have much to live on and maybe the opportunity to freely or cheaply acquire a lot of land was too good to pass up. He and Margaret had a grand total of 12 children together so they had a lot of mouths to feed. Obviously, Thomas' experience as a child did not stop him from taking a chance and moving out to the frontier. It is this kind of courage and initiative on which America is founded.

To read more and view sources, check out my Frederick Family History.

Interesting Clippings #19: Great Train Wreck of 1856

On July 17, 1856, two trains travelling towards each other on the same line collided between the railway stations of Camp Hill and Fort Washington in Whitemarsh Township, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. At the time, it was the deadliest train accident to have ever occurred and the death count was likely over 60.

This caught my eye because I had several ancestors near Whitemarsh Township at the time, mostly in nearby townships of Cheltenham, Springfield, and Upper Dublin. I often wonder what my ancestors made of such national news happening practically at their doorstep. Later, in 1901, one of my own relatives would die in a train accident around the same area.

The partial article to the left is a clipping from the New York Daily Tribune on July 18, 1856, which had been printed in the Philadelphia Bulletin the day before. You can read the full article for free from the Library of Congress and you can read more about the Great Train Wreck of 1856 on Wikipedia.

The Ramsey Curse and Happy Endings

Sorry for the lack of posts, I recently had house guests and then my husband suffered a family tragedy. But it's partly for this reason that I want to get back into honoring ancestors and relatives.

Bertha May Ramsey suffered from the
"Ramsey curse" of early deaths in her
family, including herself.

This article is about what I've started calling the "Ramsey Curse" in light of all the premature deaths in this family. My 2nd great grandmother, Bertha May Ramsey, lost her mother when she was only about 10-12 years old. Her father remarried twice and so she had several half siblings. As an adult, Bertha's first husband, George Benton Phillips, also died prematurely leaving her with five young girls to raise on her own in rural Ohio. Not surprisingly she quickly remarried to my 2nd great grandfather, Ralph Springer Pike, and had three more girls. Then Bertha herself died in 1914 when she was only 40 years old and Ralph remarried to Edna Zearley who, according to my great grandmother, resented her stepdaughters and embodied the evil stepmother. Bertha's daughters from her previous marriage were then orphans and what happened to them while they were still minors is still a mystery to me. They might have stayed with their stepfather or gone to live with another relative or they may have even lived in an orphanage, which were still in use at the time. Given that Ralph's new wife resented his own children, it seems unlikely that she allowed his orphaned stepdaughters to stay with them.

The second eldest, Eva M. Phillips, had already been married the year prior to Bertha's death and the eldest, Lela Phillips, was an adult and married a year after her mother's death. But the remaining three, Ester, Ruby and Alice, were still minors and unmarried. Ester and Alice married immediately upon turning 18 which suggests that wherever they were living as orphans was turning them out as they reached the age of majority and their best option was to marry quickly. Ruby Phillips (b. 1899), however, obviously decided to go it on her own and sadly, as a result, she wound up pregnant and unmarried in 1920 when she was 21 years old. She found refuge in the Salvation Army Home Maternity Home and Nursery in Bellevue, near Pittsburgh, which was a home for women like Ruby having a child out of wedlock. It originally aimed to keep mother and child together, a very progressive idea for the times, but they also arranged for adoptions.

Sadly, the fate of Ruby's baby is unknown. It either died or was adopted - as you can see, I don't even know whether it was a boy or girl and I don't know how to find out, I've never done adoption research before (any tips?). But Ruby's story at least has a somewhat happy ending. By 1930, she had become a nurse, probably inspired by those who worked at the Salvation Army home and had helped her when she needed it most. And then in 1937, she finally married at the age of 37 to a man named Thomas C. Russell. When I heard this name, I knew it sounded familiar. See if you can follow this.

Ruby's half-sister, Jennie Lee Pike, had married James Edward Bauer whose mother, Anna Jane Russell, had a half brother named Thomas C. Russell. So Ruby married her half sister's husband's mother's half brother.

Unfortunately, Ruby and Thomas didn't have any children together that I know of so she has no known descendants apart from possibly the baby she gave up. Thomas was 44 when he married Ruby and had been previously married with two children from his first wife so it's possible he was only looking for companionship from his second marriage. Having a child out of wedlock was still very taboo in the 1920s and 1930s and could ruin a woman's chance of ever marrying and having a traditional family. But as I covered in a previous entry, the Russell family was no stranger to scandalous behavior.

I am putting this one out there so Ruby's story gets told - with no legitimate children, she has no one else to remember her and tell her story. And maybe if anyone is researching the genealogy of their parent or grandparent who had a birth mother named Ruby Phillips, they will find this. I have a lot of info on the Ramsey lineage, though granted nothing on the Phillips lineage since I am descended from the Pikes.

Interesting Clippings #11: Remember Your Deceased

The Pittsburgh Press, December 9, 1913.

While I was looking for an obituary in the Pittsburgh Press of my 2nd great grandmother, the one who died of acute alcoholism, I spotted an interested ad beneath the list of death notices in which a photographer was advertising his services to photograph the deceased or floral offerings. It may seem morbid and wildly inappropriate to take a photo of a corpse to us but in history, post-mortem photography was acceptable to society when often, it may be the only photograph of a loved one the family might have. It's popularity decreased in the 20th century with the introduction of "snapshot" cameras like the Kodak Brownie in 1900 which made photography easy and affordable to the masses. So I was a little surprised to see this advertised in 1913 but Wikipedia assures me that formal memorial pictures were still being produced into the 20th century.

On another note, I feel like the genealogy gods are against me today. My 2nd great grandmother Anna Jane (Russell) Bauer died December 7, 1913 in Pittsburgh and I was hoping to find an obituary in the Pittsburgh Press from December 8th or 9th (hence how I found today's interesting clipping), but probably more likely the 8th. Frustratingly, the paper for December 8th and only December 8th, of all days, is missing! The 9th has no obituary for her. I even checked the 10th but by then, there don't seem to be any listings going back as far as the 7th. I actually didn't have high hopes for finding an obituary for Anna, simply because I'm pretty confident she was disowned by her family and died alone. They did not even pay for her to have a headstone. But I thought maybe even the lack of an obituary would give me more insight into just how strongly her family felt about their detachment from her. However, I can't even confirm that there was no obituary since the one paper I need to see is missing!

The Tragic Family of James Addison Smith

James Addison Smith, unfortunately
I don't have any photos of his wife or
children.

James Addison Smith is not one of my ancestors but I am related to him. He was one of the many sons of my ancestors Robert Hawkins Smith and Octavia M. Wood, who I detailed in an earlier post regarding their premarital love letters. I am descended from their son, Robert Louis, James' brother. Descendants of James might be interested to know that this family was plagued with tragedy and scandal. His son Olaf was killed young in a train accident, his daughter Mary suffered from Schizophrenia while his other daughter Marjory and his wife Maggie (Margaret Peay) both became drug addicts, dependent on morphine.

Mary Ryland Smith was born January 25, 1896 in Logan County, Kentucky to James Addison Smith and Margaret "Maggie" Peay. Sometime between the ages of 14 and 24, her family moved to Tennessee. This would have probably been around the same time she started experiencing symptoms of Schizophrenia since it's onset typically occurs during late adolescence or early adulthood. Initially, the family lived in Memphis but by 1930, they had moved to Nashville and so it was at the Central State Hospital for the Insane in Nashville on Murfreesboro Pike that Mary finally found herself by 1935. Presumably, her parents had grown too old to care for her (they were in their 70's) or perhaps her mental condition had deteriorated beyond what they could handle.

Central State Hospital for the Insane, courtesy
Asylum Projects

The Central State Hospital for the Insane is what it was known as when Mary died in 1957 but it was previously named the Tennessee Hospital for the Insane and after Mary's time there, Middle Tennessee Mental Health Institute. After 1963, it was also home to the Tennessee Neuropsychiatric Institute. And it had originally been called the Tennessee Lunatic Asylum when it was at a different location on what is now Twelfth Avenue South and Division Street. It had been plagued by financial problems almost from it's opening in 1840 and so it was rebuilt on Murfreesboro Pike in 1851, long before Mary was admitted. It moved locations again in 1995 to Stewarts Ferry Pike and the building on Murfreesboro Pike was demolished in 1999, a Dell computer assembly plant now sits there. The image immediately below is labelled "Central Hospital for the Insane" which is the nearest name to what is was called when Mary died, and that suggests this was how it looked while she lived there. Further below is an image which may have been how the building looked prior to modifications and expansions.

Central State Hospital for the Insane, probably how it looked at the time
Mary lived there, courtesy Asylum Projects

In 1940, the hospital was home to 1788 patients and at least 133 staff, of which only three were nurses. Most staff were attendants but there were also several superintendents, two cooks, a baker, many staff who worked in the laundry department, one night watchman, two stenographers, a telephone operator, an accountant, a few clerks, general workmen, and more. There were three physician assistants, a couple of student interns, and presumably physicians too, although they are not listed on the census.

Tennesse State Hospital for the Insane, possibly
a pre-modified version on Murfreesboro Pike.
Courtesy Library of Congress.

Mary suffered from what was then known as a chronic undifferentiated type of Schizophrenia, now simply known as undifferentiated type which means that the patient shows two or more of the symptoms of all three of the main types of Schizophrenia - paranoid, disorganized, and catatonic - but none prominently enough to categorized it as any one type in particular. This meant Mary probably had some delusions or hallucinations, disorganized speech or behavior and/or may have been catatonic at times.

In my grandmother's genealogy notes, Mary is described as having "went crazy". Though a common, if outdated term, it probably referred to the fact that Mary was likely quite normal as a child and at least in her early teens. She may not have even developed symptoms until her early 20's so it's easy to say she "went crazy" rather than "was crazy", even if it seems to wrongly suggest something drove her to it rather than being a medical condition. It must have been distressing for a family to watch a loved one deteriorate before their eyes and be helpless to stop it. Her parents were obviously devoted to looking after her themselves since they refused to institutionalize her until they were in their 70's, though knowing that her mother Maggie was a drug addict, much of the responsibility may have fallen on James. In fact, Maggie's drug addiction may have been the only way she could cope with her daughter's tragic fate.

The layout of Central State Hospital for the Insane
on Murfreesboro Pike, courtesy Asylum Projects.
Click image to enlarge.

Two of their other daughters, Ella and Mona, remain unmarried and living with them well into their 30's, perhaps because they too dedicated themselves to caring for their sister and perhaps their mother. According to my grandmother's information, it was because James was very protective and controlling of his daughters and wouldn't let them out of the house without their mother and they weren't allowed to have boyfriends.

A third daughter Marjory, also an addict and also never married, lived at the family home into her 40's, perhaps initially to look after her sister only to succumb to her mother's fate. She did manage to complete two years of college and consistently work as a file clerk, though at various locations, first a railroad company, then a hardware store, and finally a manufacturing company. In 1940, she was working 44 hours a week, 52 weeks a year and making an annual $720. Today, this would be about $22,000. So perhaps her addiction occurred later in her life because it seems unlikely that she could hold a job with so many hours as an addict.

Ella was a proofreader, though it's difficult to tell how much she was making since she appears to have been unemployed for much of year when the census was taken. She had resumed work (40 hours a week) by this point but had only been back for 4 weeks time and made $68 in that time. Theoretically, if she worked 52 weeks out of the year at that rate, she'd make $884 annually. That's about $27,000 today.

Mona was a copy holder, someone who read an original document aloud for a proofreader (who reads the proof copy) and calls attention to errors. In 1930, she and her proofreader sister Ella were both working at a printing company so perhaps they worked together. However, by 1940, Mona was no longer working. By this point, Mary was already living in the institute so Mona was not staying home to care for her.

I do not think any of the these three daughters, Marjory, Ella, and Mona, ever had children (certainly Mary did not) but James and Maggie did have three other children, Madge Smith (b. abt. 1890), James Addison Smith Jr. (b. abt. 1901), and Laura Smith (b. abt. 1909), who may have so I'm listing their details in case any descendants Google them and find this useful. Madge manage to escape her father's oppressive rules by running away with a salesman she met at her father's store. Her father disowned her but she kept in touch with her mother and sisters. I'm not sure what happened to Laura, she either died or somehow managed to escape the house since she was no longer living there in 1940.

Mary died in the State Hospital on June 4, 1957 of a Cerebral Hemorrhage when she was 61 years old. There was no contributing or underlying cause listed on her death certificate which means her death was unrelated to her mental illness.

I must admit that I don't have documented evidence of the other tragedies of this family. I'm not even sure the drug addictions would have been documented to begin with, it may have been information that was passed down generations since I got this info from my grandmother. Margaret died in 1954 and there is no mention of her addiction as a contributing cause of death. Olaf's train accident though should be documented somewhere and I have searched but not found anything yet. I will update this if that changes and if anyone knows anything more about it, please let me know!

Sources:

• "Tennessee Lunatic Asylum." (2013) In Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture, Retrieved March 5, 2013, from Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture: http://www.tennesseeencyclopedia.net/entry.php?rec=1337
• Ancestry.com. Tennessee, Death Records, 1908-1958 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011. http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=2376&enc=1
• Ancestry.com. 1910 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2006.
• Ancestry.com. 1920 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2010. Images reproduced by FamilySearch.
• Ancestry.com. 1930 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2002.
• Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.
• "Types of Schizophrenia." WebMD. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Mar. 2013. http://www.webmd.com/schizophrenia/guide/schizophrenia-types
• "Schizophrenia, ( Undifferentiated Type )." PsyWeb.com. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 Mar. 2013. http://www.psyweb.com/mdisord/SchizoDis/undtype.jsp
• Measuringworth.com. "Measuring Worth - Measures of worth, inflation rates, relative value, worth of a dollar, purchase power." 1892. Web. 5 Mar 2013. http://www.measuringworth.com/uscompare/
• Asylumprojects.org. "Nashville State Hospital Image Gallery - Asylum Projects." 2011. Web. 6 Mar 2013. http://www.asylumprojects.org/index.php?title=Nashville_State_Hospital_Image_Gallery
• Loc.gov. "Tennessee State hospital for the insane. Near Nashville." n.d.. Web. 6 Mar 2013. http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2003662356/

Every Record Tells a Story

Recently, as I previously mentioned, a bunch of death certificates I'd ordered months ago finally arrived and as I gleefully analyzed them, I found them to be full of revelations, one of which was actually a little emotionally moving.

As I've mentioned before, my grandfather, known to me as "Pop", grew up without his own father in his life. According to Pop, after his parents divorced, his father (James Edward Bauer I) remarried to a woman who did not want anyone in her family or social circle to know her husband had previously been married and even had children. Divorce was still taboo in those days (the 1930s) so she forbade her new husband from seeing his children, at least in public. Pop recalls that he was told not to acknowledge his own father if he happened to run into him in a public place. Of course, James didn't have to go along with this, he could have told his wife that he was going to be a part of his children's lives whether she liked it or not. He chose to abandon them instead. 

By 1940, Pop's mother had remarried and moved to Philadelphia with her children. This probably made having a relationship with his father, who was still living in Reading, all the more difficult even after he divorced the evil stepmother sometime around 1950. It wasn't until after James remarried for the third and final time to a kindly woman named Alma in 1951 that the gap between father and son began to bridge. Apparently, Alma was the driving force behind their reconciliation but despite this, Pop and his father never grew particularly close and so we didn't know much about this branch of our tree. Some bridges just can't be rebuilt.

Some time ago, I discovered that James' abandonment of his family had deeper roots. Thanks to census records, I had found that James' own parents, Edward William Bauer and Anna Jane Russell, had separated but this time it was the father the children stayed with. This prompted all sorts of questions with unknown answers. Why did they separate? Why did the children stay with their father Edward? Did this somehow impair James' ability to be a good husband and father? I tried to remind myself that separation and divorce were not completely unheard of even in the very early 20th century and that it could have just been "irreconcilable differences" that drove Anna and Edward apart. It didn't necessarily mean Anna wasn't still involved in her children's lives. But in my experience it's usually difficult to find a woman who would so readily give up custody of her children unless something much darker drove or force her away. 

Today, I finally got a look at Anna's death certificate. I actually had to order two because I wasn't sure when she died and the Pennsylvania Department of Health Death Indices don't give you much information to go on. I was actually worried neither of them would be the record I was looking for but when I saw Anna's father clearly listed as Robert Russell on one of them, I knew I had the right Anna. 

And then, there is was . . . cause of death: Acute Alcoholism. She was 31 years old.

Acute Alcoholism as cause of death for 31 year old Anna.
A sad death following her sad existence living alone in a
boarding home for the last 4-5 years of her life.

Poor James. The poor family. Anna's drinking must have been so severe that either her husband banished her from their home or she left on her own accord, knowing she was no longer fit to be a good wife or mother.  Of course, it's possible her drinking began after the separation, in her loneliness and anguish over the loss of her children. During this time period, it would not be unusual for the courts to rule in favor of the father regarding custody, which is probably why so many women stayed in unhappy marriages, so they wouldn't lose their children. And acute alcoholism I believe refers to alcohol poisoning, not organ failure due to long term consumption of alcohol, so she may not have necessarily been drinking for very long. However, a key factor is in the contributing cause of death on Anna's death certificate. It's hard to read but my mom and I worked out that it was probably menorrhagia nonpuerperal and that she'd be suffering from it for 42 days. Menorrhagia refers to menstrual bleeding and nonpuerperal means it was unrelated to pregnancy or giving birth. In other words, she was having a 42 day period which my mom, an RN, explained could have been happening because the alcoholism was making it difficult for her blood to clot. This supports the idea that she had been drinking for some time.

Another supporting factor on the record is that the informant was Anna's stepmother. By this point, her father was still alive and she was technically still married to Edward. Legally, he was her next of kin and often it is the next of kin who reports the death. Yet neither her husband or father were willing to report it. Could it have been that they were too grief stricken to serve as the informant? Yes, it's possible. But combined with the fact that Anna had been living on her own in a boarding house for the last 4-5 years of her life, it is certainly indicative that neither of the men in her life wanted anything to do with her.

This was further supported by the fact that I later discovered there was never a headstone erected at her burial place in Homewood Cemetery (it was not stolen or deteriorated, it just never existed). Her family were not so destitute that they could not have afforded a small, humble headstone so it must have been that they simply didn't care enough to pay for one. It's clear that by the time she drank herself to death alone in a boarding house, she had already been dead to her family for some years and it seems mostly likely the reason for that would be her drinking.

And when I realized all this, I think I sat here for a good five minutes and just contemplated what that meant for each member of the family and how it can't be a coincidence that the child of an alcoholic mother who abandoned her children by drinking herself into an early grave would grow up to abandon his own.

I have never thought very favorably of my great grandfather for his utter failure as a father to my Pop but I do now have some sympathy for him. It doesn't excuse what he did but it does make it a bit more understandable. He wasn't just a deadbeat dad, he was also the child of a deadbeat alcoholic mother and the two are inseparable. However, I don't think I'll be crying him a river anytime soon. After all, my Pop was also the child of a deadbeat dad and he turned out to be such a devoted husband and father, he was actually in danger of smothering his family!

Every record tells a story. Though not every record tells a story with quite the impact of one like this, it will give you some insight into your ancestor's lives and sometimes perhaps even of those closer to you.