X00213 Find Death/Burial information for Mary Ann Coulson Douglas

One of the challenges I've had is find the death and burial information for Mary Ann Coulson, the first wife of Frederick Gabriel Douglas.

He remarried in 1893, so her death would have been before then. Fortunately, with some creative keyword searching I eventually found the death notice (it had been indexed incorrectly):



She died 16 December 1888, according to the record.

So, that's half of the problem solved but now the next issue is finding a cemetery record. I can't find her in the Greenwood Cemetery listings, which is odd considering that Frederick is buried there and most of the rest of her family. As far as I can tell she lived her whole life in Owen Sound so it would only make sense that she was buried at Greenwood.

I can't find any obituaries or death notices that might give a clue.

So the next steps would be to continue looking for a death notice, and check the burial records for Greenwood and other cemeteries in the area to see if her name was indexed incorrectly

X00256: What happened to Thomas Williams after 1884?

Thomas Williams (b. 1827) was the son of Thomas Williams (cir. 1792-1868) and Sybil Foxwell (1798-1874). He was born 15 March 1827 in Minchinhampton, Gloucester, England. He came over with the family to Canada in 1842. The Williams family first settled in Orillia, Simcoe County but eventually moved to Guelph, Wellington County.

Thomas the younger appears to have remained in Orillia and established himself as a brewer there, following in his father's footsteps.

I've managed to find a few records mentioning him as a brewer prior to 1884 (census records for 1861, 1871 & 1881 and Simcoe County directories for 1878 and 1884-1886). But after that, the trail goes cold.

The Simcoe County volume of the "Whiskey and Wickedness" book series mentions Thomas WIlliams and his brewing operations, but all before 1881.

The last record I've found him in was an 1884-1886 directory of Simcoe County where he was listed as working as a brewer. I have not found him in a later census or a death record. None of the records I've found show him as having married. So if he did get married, he did so after 1881.

There is one possibility - According to Find-a-Grave, there is a gravestone for a Thomas Williams in Orillia who died in 1885, but no other details. It could be that he died in 1885 but the death was never registered (I could not find a death registration for a Thomas Williams who died in Simcoe County in 1885).

Next steps: Contact the Orillia Public Library and see if they can help

Update on marriage date for Adam Smith & Kate Williams Smith

Some time ago, I posted about the marriage date for Adam Smith and Kate Julianna Williams where I concluded that the date of their actual wedding was 23 October 1880.

Since that time I have found some additional information which suggests that I might have the incorrect date.

The first was an article from the Flesherton Advance dated 16 Nov 1930:



The article came out after their golden wedding anniversary celebration and said "As November 23rd was the proper day for the golden wedding anniversary of Mr. and Mrs. Adam Smith..." suggesting that November 23rd was the actual day of the wedding, and that they just had the Golden Wedding celebration on October 23rd. [D04870]

The next was an obituary for Kate Julianne Williams that appeared in the Markdale Standard 28 Nov 1940. In it, the article states that "On Nov. 23rd, 1880 she was united in marriage to Mr. Adam Smith who predeceased her in April 1939". [D05337]



So, based on this new evidence it would appear that 23 Nov 1880 is the more likely date for their marriage.


Sources:
[D04870] "Eugenia," Flesherton Advance, 16 Nov 1930, p. 1, col. 1; digital images(accessed 3 Nov 2018), Grey Highland Newspapers. Rec. Date: 2 Nov 2018. Cit. Date: 3 Nov 2018.

[D05337] "The Late Mrs. Adam Smith," Markdale Standard, 28 Nov 1940, p. 3, col. 3; digital images(accessed 6 Feb 2019), Grey Highlands Historical Newspaper Collection. Rec. Date: 9 Nov 2018. Cit. Date: 6 Feb 2019.

Update on X00121: Who is Ellen Reynolds?

Continuing along the saga of X00121 and the quest to find out who is Ellen Reynolds/Ellen McLeod I took a trip out to Hamilton to do some research.

My first stop was Hamilton Cemetery to see if I could find the gravestone for Ellen Reynolds, and more specifically, if it was located close to the McLeod-Mundy gravestone.

Hamilton Cemetery is a very large cemetery, but fortunately the McLeod-Mundy gravestone is easy to find because it is located near the cemetery office. It did not take me long to find the stone:



And, yes, it is located very close to the McLeod-Mundy stone; it is in the same location, just one row behind as you can see from this picture:



Now, the location of the stone doesn't prove anything of course, but it does strengthen the argument that Ellen Reynolds is somehow related to John McLeod.

Next stop was Hamilton Public Library to do some newspapers searches. I was hoping to find death notices or obituaries for John McLeod or Ellen Reynolds that might offer some clues, such as listing surviving family members. I checked a number of Hamilton Newspapers from the time period but couldn't find anything for either of them. I did find death notices for John's wife Henriette, but they didn't offer any clues to this puzzle. So I can cross this avenue off the list and it's off to the next actions. As an outside chance, I could check Cobourg papers to see if they picked up the death notices.

Next Steps:
* Look for a marriage between 1861 and 1871 for Ellen McLeod & John Reynolds/Runnals
* Look for a death record or cemetery record for a John Reynolds/Runnals between 1861 and 1871
* Check Cobourg newspapers for death notices obituaries for John McLeod (21 Aug 1889) or Ellen Reynolds (21 May 1902)
* Check for Probate records for John McLeod (1889) to see if Ellen Reynolds is mentioned
* Check Scottish records to see if any connection can be found

X00293: How did Percy J Douglas lose his leg?

I came upon an interesting piece of information while researching Percy J. Douglas, the son of Frederick Gabriel Douglas. According to his WW1 draft registration card, he was excluded from service because he had lost one leg [D05313]:



So, this now has my wondering how that happened. I also thought it was a bit of coincidence in that his father, Frederick died of an injury to his leg two years before. According to Frederick's death record, he died of an injury to the leg by accidentally falling through boards [D01462].



Frederick was working as a boat builder at the time so it is likely that the accident happened at work. The death record lists his date of death as 2 June 1916, but notes that the physician attended to him from 27 May 1916 to 2 June 1916, so it would seem that the accident happened on the 27th of May or earlier.

Initially I thought that two injuries could have been caused at the same time. The WW1 registration was dated 12 September 1918, and Frederick died in 1916, so it might all fit. That being said Fred was in Detroit when the accident happened and Percy was living in Chicago at the time.

But I did some digging in the Owen Sound newspapers and found an obituary for Frederick. The accident happened on May 21, 1916 when he scraped his leg on a piece of board from a boat that he was working on. Eventually, blood poisoning from the wound caused his death. There was no mention of Percy being involved at all [D05345]. So, it is likely just a coincidence.

Next steps:

• Check newspapers to see if I can find an obituary for Percy Douglas to see if it mentions the reason why he was missing a leg

Sources:
[D01462] Michigan Department of State - Division of Vital Statistics, Michigan, Death Records, 1867-1950, 5329; digital image, Ancestry.ca, "Michigan, Death Records, 1867-1950," Ancestry.ca (30 Sep 2018).

[D05313] "U.S., World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918," database and images, ancestry.ca (accessed 31 Jan 2019), Percy John Douglas.

[D05345] "Deaths," Owen Sound Sun, June 2 1916, p. 5, col. 4; digital images(accessed 3 Feb 2019).

X00257 Solved! Who are Peter, James & William Rutherford?

I first found the names of Peter Rutherford (born about 1859), James Rutherford (born about 1860) and William Rutherford (born about 1863) in the 1871 census for Grey County [D01237]. They were living with John Rutherford (1839-1915) and Sophia Amelia Miller (1838-1921), and so at the time I had assumed that the three were the sons of John and Sophia. That is until I did some more research on the family and found the marriage record for John and Sophia, giving a marriage date of 1866 [D03924].

My first thought was that perhaps John had had a previous marriage. But this would be difficult to determine because marriage records in Ontario in the 1850s are difficult to come by. As well, very few newspapers survive from that time period in Grey County.

But eventually, I did manage to luck out and find a mention of John's first wife in his obituaries. Her name was Margaret Spragge and died in 1865 due to a smallpox epidemic that his Owen Sound at the time. I later found that in the Greenwood Cemetery Interment listings [D01131] give her actual date of death as January 5, 1865

Once I knew his first wife's name I was able to find her in the 1861 census [D04003] along with her husband John and her three sons: Peter, James and William to confirm.

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).