X00288: What happened to Caroline Seymore Sanders Williams? Solved!!

Caroline Seymore Sanders was the wife of Isaac Amos Williams. They married 22 Oct 1850 in Guelph, Canada West [D04283]. The family later moved to Lindsay, Victoria, Ontario. Isaac Amos died in 1885 [D03762].

But after 1885, I had no further records on Caroline and so had no idea what had happened to her after 1885. I checked the Ontario death records, but couldn't find her. I checked census records with no results. I even checked the Ontario marriage records to see if she had remarried after 1885, with no luck there either.

So, I put aside that X-file for some time and started researching other members of the family. When I was researching the family of her second daughter, Fanny Sophia Williams and Fanny's husband, Lewis Dyer, I found Caroline living with them in the 1891 census in Uxbridge, Ontario [D05263]. So, I had at least traced her to 1891.

I started looking for the cemetery records for Isaac Amos Williams, figuring that if I found his gravestone, it might give some clues. I knew that he had died in Lindsay, so I had figured that he had been buried there. But I checked all of the usual cemetery sites: Find-a-Grave, Ontario Cemetery Finding Aid, Canadian Headstones, Ontario Genweb Project, BillionGraves, Canadian Gravemarker Gallery and didn't find a thing.

But I had a bit of luck when I did a search on the Ontario Genealogical Society's TONI database. There, I found a cemetery reference for Isaac Amos Williams. It had him listed as being buried in Riverside Cemetery in Lindsay. The name and date matched. So, I contacted the Kawartha Branch of the OGS and they did a look-up for me. Not only was Isaac buried there, but Caroline as well. And the stone inscription indicated that she had died on 7 Apr 1896 at age 70.

With that new knowledge, I did another search of the Ontario death records with just the year and her first name and I managed to find the record. The record had been incorrectly indexed as "Caroline Seymore" [D05298]. I've since submitted a correction request to Ancestry.



Lewis Dyer is the informant on the death record, to further confirm that it is the correct person.

So the X-file now appears to be solved. After her husband died, Caroline moved in with her daughter and son-in-law and likely lived with them until she died in 1896. Now the next step is to see if I can get a photograph of the gravestone.


Sources:
[D03762] Ontario Archives of Ontario, Ontario, Canada Deaths, MS935, Reel 42: 560, 35, 16571; digital image, Ancestry.ca, "Ontario, Canada Deaths," Ancestry.ca (15 May 2018).

[D04283] "Marriages," (Guelph) Guelph Weekly Herald, 22 Oct 1850, p. 3, col. 1.

[D05263] 1891 census of Canada, Ontario, district 102, Uxbridge, p. 30, family 152; RG 31; digital images, Ancestry.ca, Ancestry (accessed 27 Dec 2018).

[D05298] Ontario Archives of Ontario, Ontario, Canada Deaths, MS935; Reel: 81: 355, 19363, 15; digital image, Ancestry.ca, "Ontario, Canada Deaths," Ancestry.ca (19 Jan 2019).

Profile: Lewis Dyer and Fanny Sophia Williams

Profiles: Lewis Dyer [1838-1906] & Fanny Sophia Williams [1853-1924]

Lewis Dyer was born 30 January 1838 in Devonshire, England [D04846, D04848, D04885]. He immigrated to Canada and worked as a dry goods clerk, initially in Uxbridge, Ontario [D04846, D04847, D05263].

Fanny Sophia Williams was born 27 Mar 1853 in Guelph, Wellington, Canada West [D04846, D04848, D04849]. She was the daughter of Isaac Amos Williams and Caroline Seymour Sanders.

She grew up in Guelph [D03763], but later moved with her family to Mount Forest, Wellington [D03788] and then later Port Perry, Ontario County [D04846] where she met Lewis. The two were married on 11 July 1875 in Port Perry, Ontario [D04846]. As a couple, they first lived in Uxbridge, but later moved to Lindsay in Victoria County [D04848].

Lewis and Fanny had two children, Ethel Verena Seymour Dyer, born 23 Mar 1880 [D05265] and George Harold Lewis Dyer born 26 November 1884 [D05884].

Lewis died 2 May 1906 in Toronto at the age of sixty-eight [D04855] of apoplexy. After Lewis died, Fanny moved in with her daughter and son-in-law [D05268]. She herself died 23 July 1924 at the age of seventy-one [D04849]. They are both buried in St. James Cemetery in Toronto [D04849, D04854]


Sources
[D03763] 1861 census of Canada East, Canada West, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia, Wellington, Guelph, p. 31; RG 31; digital images, Ancestry.ca (accessed 20 May 2018). Rec. Date: 5 Feb 2018. Cit. Date: 20 May 2018.

[D03788] 1871 census of Canada, Ontario, district 35, sub-district e, Mount Forest, p. 49, dwelling 173, family 173; RG 31; digital images(accessed 20 May 2018). Rec. Date: 4 Mar 2017. Cit. Date: 20 May 2018.

[D04846] Ontario Archives of Ontario, Ontario, Canada Marriages, Reel 18: 339, 6765, Dyer-Williams; digital images, Ancestry.ca, "Ontario, Canada Marriages,"(accessed 26 Dec 2018).

[D04847] 1881 census of Canada, Ontario, district 133, sub-district J, Uxbridge, p. 46, dwelling 218, family 229; RG 31; digital images, Ancestry.ca (accessed 27 Dec 2018). Rec. Date: 17 Feb 2018. Cit. Date: 27 Dec 2018.

[D04848] 1901 census of Canada, Ontario, district 120, sub-district C-8, Lindsay, p. 8, family 82; RG 31; digital images(accessed 27 Dec 2018).

[D04849] Ontario Archives of Ontario, Ontario, Canada Deaths, MS940 Reel 16: 2099; digital image, Ancestry.ca, "Ontario, Canada Deaths," Ancestry.ca (27 Dec 2018). Rec. Date: 3 Sep 2017. Cit. Date: 27 Dec 2018.

[D04854] St James Cemetery (Toronto, York, Ontario), C Ravine. Rec. Date: 27 Dec 2018. Cit. Date: 27 Dec 2018.

[D04855] Ontario Archives of Ontario, Ontario, Canada Deaths, MS940, Reel 5: 1269; digital image, Ancestry.ca, "Ontario, Canada Deaths," Ancestry.ca (27 Dec 2018). Rec. Date: 3 Sep 2017. Cit. Date: 27 Dec 2018.

[D04885] Ontario Archives of Ontario, Ontario, Canada Deaths, MS940, Reel 5: 1269; digital image, Ancestry.ca, "Ontario, Canada Deaths," Ancestry.ca (27 Dec 2018).

[D05263] 1891 census of Canada, Ontario, district 102, Uxbridge, p. 30, family 152; RG 31; digital images, Ancestry.ca, Ancestry (accessed 27 Dec 2018). Rec. Date: 30 Sep 2017. Cit. Date: 27 Dec 2018.

[D05265] Ontario Archives of Ontario, MS 929, reels 1-245, MS929, Reel 44: 452, 23008, 19; digital image, Ancestry.com, "Ontario, Canada Births," (27 Dec 2018). Rec. Date: 21 Apr 2017. Cit. Date: 27 Dec 2018.

[D05268] 1921 census of Canada, district 142, sub-district 14, Toronto, p. 24, dwelling 105, family 131; RG 31; digital images, ancestry.com (accessed 27 Dec 2018). Rec. Date: 1 Apr 2017. Cit. Date: 27 Dec 2018.

[D05448] Ontario Archives of Ontario, MS 929, reels 1-245, MS 929 Reel 1-245: 590, 35359, 31; digital image, Ancestry.com, "Ontario, Canada Births," (5 Feb 2019). Rec. Date: 21 Apr 2017. Cit. Date: 3 Feb 2019.