Fabric Diary Years 1921-1954

Inez and baby sister Gladys 1914

     A few years ago I was contacted by a gentleman who had purchased a diary once owned by Inez Worden.   I don't know how to begin figuring out what my relationship to Inez is.  My family tree on Ancestry says she is my second cousin twice removed, but I think we are also what I would call double cousins.  My third-great-grandfather Paul Worden is Inez's grandfather and another of my third-great-grandfathers, James Warner, is Inez's great-grandfather.

     This diary isn't a typical one, rather it's a record of fabrics which I assume were used by Inez in making garments for herself and family members.  The new owner didn't buy the diary because Inez had owned it, he was interested in the fabrics but then he grew curious about Inez and in searching the net for her came across my blog.  The gentleman generously offered to photograph the pages for me and I have to say he outdid himself.  Every single page is photographed and he took the time to do many closeups of the swatches.  He sent me 91 attachments! I can't imagine how long this took him, but needless to say I'm very grateful.

Inez's lacy graduation dress

     As I was doing some organizing in my computer files today I came across those images again.  There isn't much in the way of narration in this diary, but most of the swatches are labeled as to what they were used to construct.  Many were aprons for Inez, her mother and her two younger sisters, along with dresses and skirts, even coats and hats.  In spite of a lack of narration, the diary does tell a story of sorts.  For instance, from the page above I see the fabric Inez wore on her high school graduation day in 1925.  The detailed notes she made indicate two years later she dyed the dress yellow.  I don't know what the 1945 date signifies.

Blue guitar playing dress

     Inez and her sister Gladys, who died tragically at the age of twenty-two after an operation, were members of a band called the Hawaiian Serenaders.  Inez played guitar in the group, and here we see her, "guitar playing dress", and the pink fabric from which she fashioned a lei.

     Below is a sample of the fabric Inez used to make a shirt for her "Pa"

A shirt for Pa

     There are forty one pages filled with swatches; it's interesting seeing the sort of fabrics that were used in the 1930's and early 1950's.  In many instances, Inez went back years later to make a note as to what became of the item made from the swatch, like, "gave to Mother", or, "donated to clothing relief".   Inez lived until 2001, passing away at the age of 96.  Surprisingly, I never met her even though we lived in the same small village.  I'm  willing to bet that over the years our paths crossed while shopping or doing our banking and I would recognize her face, but she was never pointed out to me.  Of the three Worden sisters, none had children so the line has died out, but a wee bit of Inez lives on in this diary.

One More War Of 1812 Veteran

   

     No, this is not turning into a War of 1812 blog, but today was one of those days when I found something completely unexpected so I must blog about it.  Discovering that so many of my ancestors fought in 1812 made me wonder about the Galloway family on my mother's side.  Nearly all the fourth-great-grandfathers on my father's side were in Ireland in 1812, so the soldiers of that era in US military history are necessarily her line.  The grandfather in question is George Galloway.  He is the earliest Galloway I've been able to prove and I know precious little about him.  Most of his information was from the 1850 census of Phelps, New York in which he gave his birth date as 1775 and the place as Massachusetts.

     The first census George appeared in was the 1800 in Vermont with his wife Armina and firstborn son Milo, I'm confident it's my George because Milo claimed birth in Vermont in later census records.  The 1810 census showed the Galloway's living in Brownville, New York in Jefferson County near the Canadian border.  I'm sure I have the right family here, because George's son Russell, in the 1855 New York State census of Arcadia, gave his birth place as Jefferson County, New York in the year 1807.  By 1820 the Galloway's had moved further south to Lyons, New York. They were actually in Wayne County, (then part of Ontario County), in 1819 when George had a letter waiting at the Lyons, NY post office there.  George doesn't appear in the 1830 census though his grown sons do.  He was still in Lyons in March of 1828 when he witnessed the will of his neighbor Caleb Tibbits so it's doubtful he left the area.

       The Newark, NY post office in the town of Arcadia published notice of an unclaimed letter for George in 1837, and the 1840 census places him there in Arcadia where his son Milo was residing.  George's son Russell was in Phelps, NY in 1850 and so were George and Armina although in neither case did they live with their sons.  George died between 1850 and 1855.   That was the full extent of my knowledge of George's life.  I've been having fairly good luck with 1812 ancestors so I thought I'd give George a try. 

     My first search in Ancestry military records brought up a payroll abstract dated September of 1812 from the New York State Militia for a Private George "Galoway", serving in the 76th under Col. Gersham Tuttle; in service at Sackett's Harbor.  Then another abstract, this one dated

August of 1814, still a member of the 76th.  After quite a bit of searching, I discovered the 76th was associated with Jefferson County, New York, Grandfather's place of residence!  What's more, he was the only George Galloway in the area.  The 1810 census shows several other George Galloway's, but two are way down by New York City and one is in Dutchess County.

     This was looking promising, it appeared Grandfather served through the entire war, or most of it at any rate, it ended just six months after the date on that last payroll abstract. What would have made him serve that long?  This was not a popular war, many men never enlisted at all.  The reason, as it so often is, was probably money.  This notice appeared in a Jefferson County, New York newspaper:

Sept. 28, 1810   Newspaper--American Citizen
By order of Hon. Moss Kent, judge for this county of Jefferson.  Notice is hereby given to all the creditors of George Galloway, of the town of Brownville, in the county of Jefferson, an insolvent debtor, that they shew cause, if any they have, before said judge, at his office in the town of LeRay, in the said county of Jefferson, on the first day of November next, why an assignment of the said insolvent's estate should not be made, and he be discharged pursuant to the acts on such case made and provided.  Dated Aug. 31st, 1810.

     George was up to his neck in debt in mid 1810.  During that era one could be thrown into debtor's prison for being unable to pay one's bills.  That line in the news article about being discharged makes me wonder if he had been incarcerated?  Hopefully it was his debts being discharged and not George.  Either way, the militia could have looked like a way to earn some cash.  It may even have erased his debt; neighboring Vermont State forgave minor debtors in exchange for enlisting in order to encourage service in their state militia.  
     
     Given that my George Galloway was the only one in Jefferson County, I do think think the military records are his.  Since he survived the war George wouldn't be found in the pension applications.  Prior to 1871 those were reserved for disabled soldiers and widows of soldiers killed in the service.  Soldier's Compiled Service Records for the War of 1812 are not yet online though an index can be found at Ancestry.  Here's hoping NARA decides to digitize those files soon.

   

The Privates Thomas Garner--Father And Son

     After writing about my fourth-great-grandfather Private Thomas Garner Jr. who fought in the war of 1812, I found myself curious about his father, Private Thomas Garner Sr.  Both men were soldiers fighting England, although their wars were thirty-eight years apart.  The family lived on the island of Martha's Vineyard in the town of Tisbury.  Thomas Jr. was born there but I'm not at all sure where Thomas Sr. was born.  It was probably somewhere in Massachusetts, but I've found no documentation.  I did have the good fortune to come across a book called, "The History of Martha's Vineyard, Dukes County, Massachusetts", by Charles Edwin Banks at Google Books.  Using contemporary letters, rosters and other documents, Dr. Banks put together a detailed picture of  life on Martha's Vineyard at the time of the American Revolution.  I was disappointed to find Thomas Garner in only one spot in the book, a muster roll, but the index contains several entries for a Thomas Gardiner followed by the name Garner in parenthesis. I've seen that before, in the birth record of, "Elizabeth Gardner (Garner)", written just like that. Do they know something I don't?

As I was finishing this post, I found this on Family Search among the index cards to Massachusetts Muster Rolls--they DO know something I don't

     In the book, "Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors in the Revolutionary War",  I found Thomas Garner, a private in the company of Lt. Jeremiah Manter's detachment stationed at Martha's Vineyard 20 November 1776--31 December 1776.  He only served one month and ten days?  Not much of a record, but--if Lt. Manter's company was a detachment, what entity had they been detached from?  The answer was in Dr. Bank's history of the island.  By late 1776 the war wasn't going well for the American side, they needed every man they could get at the front on the mainland so the order went out to disband the island defenses.  On page 354 I found a roster titled, Captain Nathan Smith's Seacoast Company Stationed On Martha's Vineyard 1776, From The 1 Day Of September To The 21 Day Of November.  Thomas "Gardner" was in that roster. 

     After the company was ordered to disband, the island residents were none too happy to be left defenseless.  To appease them, the Massachusetts General Court allowed for a detachment of twenty five men to be selected to remain active on the island.  Thomas Garner/Gardner was among those chosen and went straight from Captain Smith's Company to Lt. Manter's detachment.  It should be noted the original company under Capt. Smith had no soldier named Thomas Garner, it was Thomas Gardner; Thomas was moved from the defunct company to Lt. Manter's it has to be the same Thomas with a slightly different surname.  You would think they could get a name like Garner correct.

     There was still more, I re-checked the book of Massachusetts Soldiers to see if  perhaps there might be more about Thomas Garner under the surname Gardner. This is what I found:

 Gardner, Thomas, Martha's Vineyard (also given as Duxbury). Private Capt. Nathan Smith's co. stationed at Martha's Vineyard for defense of seacoast; also return of men enlisted into the Continental Army from Capt. Nathan Snow's co. (South co in Abington) Col. Mitchel's (3d Plymouth Co) residence Martha's Vineyard...

There were many more companies and officers listed in a small time span, searching their names I deduced Thomas Sr. had joined the 14th Massachusetts in the Continental Army.  Amazingly, also included in the book was the reported date of Thomas' death, 14 September 1777!

     Dr. Banks mentioned in his book that many soldiers from the Vineyard joined regiments of the Continental Army on the mainland after the seacoast defenses were dissolved which explains Thomas being all over Massachusetts until his untimely death. As usual, in finding some answers I now have another pressing question, what happened to Thomas?
     

Equal Time For Private Thomas Garner Jr.

Fort Brown in upper left 

     Now that John Vincent's war has been fairly well researched, I'm reminded I failed to do much more than family research for another 4th great-grandfather Thomas Garner Jr.  He too fought in the War of 1812 and this farmer tuned soldier has a story apart from his parents, wife and children.  Born at Tisbury, Massachusetts on January 17th in the year 1773 to Thomas Garner Sr. and Ann Williams, Thomas Jr. was the oldest child in his family.  A sister, Elizabeth, was born at Tisbury 5 October 1776, but I've found nothing more about her.  There were probably other children as well. 

     The Garner home, located on the island of Martha's Vineyard off the coast of Massachusetts, was very exposed to the English navy during the American Revolution.  On several occasions Tisbury was threatened by British sailors who helped themselves to livestock and other provisions.

The Garners moved to the more secure mainland Massachusetts at some point, but tracing Thomas Sr. has proven difficult.  He may or may not be the Thomas Garner enumerated at Marblehead, Massachusetts in 1790.  He's the only Thomas Garner found north of the Carolinas so it could be him;  but a soldier of the Revolution named Thomas "Gardner" from Martha's Vineyard reportedly died in 1777, so perhaps not.  I've seen his name mistakenly spelled Gardner before.  Nothing else is known of the Garners from 1776 until 1797 when Thomas Jr. married Prudence Lamphere, at Hartland, Vermont about one hundred forty miles from Marblehead. 

     Thomas Jr. can be found in the 1810 census about twenty miles north of Hartland in Sharon, Vermont with Prudence, their daughter Lucy and another daughter, probably Clarissa.  When war with England again broke out in June of 1812 Thomas Jr. remained at home in Sharon for nearly two years, not enlisting until 22 March 1814.  After seeking the answer as to why Thomas would suddenly decide to join the army at so late a date, I discovered that two months before he enlisted congress approved a large increase in the cash bounty paid to soldiers with the goal of encouraging enlistments and re-enlistments as well.

     Three months after leaving home Thomas found himself a patient in the hospital at Plattsburgh where he remained for several months, returning to duty in late August; just in time to be present for the Battle of Plattsburgh.  From his application for an invalid pension we learn Thomas was not fully recovered at the time of the engagement but he stated, "...I continued to do duty during the battle".  His regiment, the 31st US Infantry, drew the unenviable assignment of duty in the trenches fronting Fort Brown during the fight but Thomas survived the battle, returning home to Prudence in Vermont.

1812 Cockade and Eagle

     His pension application is an interesting document, full of detail.  It even contains an inventory of the clothing and equipment Thomas was given when he reported for duty; one hat, one coat, one vest, two overalls, three pairs of shoes, one pair of stockings and one of socks, one blanket, one frock, one pair trousers and one pair gaiters, along with a cockade and eagle. 
It includes the testimony of a doctor describing his digestive system as, "much deranged", and that of his captain, Ethan Burnap, who speaks of Thomas Jr. being, "attacked by camp distemper", [dysentery] and relapsing after the Battle of Plattsburgh. Burnap blamed the relapse on exposure to the brutal far northern winter, as the regiment was forced to live in unheated tents until their barracks were completed at the beginning of December.  There are also statements from Thomas Jr.'s two daughters, Lucy and Clarissa providing their married names and addresses.

     At some point after the war Thomas Jr. moved his family to New York State, settling in Summerhill in Cayuga County.  They were there by the time of the 1840 census.  His wife Prudence passed away in Summerhill in December of 1848 and their daughter Lucy Garner Robinson died six months later from consumption, also at Summerhill.

     One remaining mystery in the story is whether Thomas Jr. married again after his wife Prudence died.  The last census he appeared in is New York State's 1855 census of Summerhill in which can be found Thomas Garner age 84, (really 82), and his "wife" Laney Garner aged 59.  The 1850 census of Summerhill is in terrible condition and Thomas cannot be located in it.  I believe he was there but his entry is among the illegible. It's doubtful, at least to me, that Laney was his wife.  Thomas had severe health problems involving a paralyzed sphincter which caused very disagreeable symptoms and in his pension application he claimed he had no money, I can't believe anyone would have found him an attractive candidate for marriage, but stranger things have happened...

Private John Vincent's One Battle...Maybe

     In last week's blog I lamented the lack of a source to provide me a definitive answer as to which general my fourth-great-grandfather John Vincent served under during his all too short stint in the US Infantry during the War of 1812?  Was it Wilkinson or Hampton, they being the two major generals in the Plattsburgh area?  My guess was Hampton and I guessed right.  

     After a search on JSTOR* I found an article which included the journal kept by General George Izard during the fall and spring of 1813/1814.  Izard joined General Hampton's division in August of 1813, the same month John Vincent joined the army.  It doesn't get much better than an eyewitness account from grandpa's commanding general!  His journal literally spelled it out for me, General Izard noted in an entry on 16 October 1813, "...my brigade, the 2nd, composed of the 10th, 29th, 30th and 31st regiments of Infantry."  John's enlistment record and his widow's pension application both identified his regiment as the 29th Infantry, now I was making progress.

     From the articles and books I've found and now the journal, I have a fair idea of what John's war looked like.  He enlisted on 10 August 1813, by that time the US Army had moved it's headquarters from Plattsburgh, New York to Burlington, Vermont on the opposite shore of Lake Champlain.

      On October 21st, 1813 General Izard marched from Chateauguay Four Corners to Fort Hickory where he, "...found the infantry and moved into the woods".  It would appear infantryman John Vincent was at Fort Hickory in mid October, which was not really much of a fort.  

     It was instead a blockhouse, a stout building with small apertures through which soldiers inside could fire at attackers in relative safety from return fire.  With General Izard's arrival, the division would now march down the Chateauguay River and cross into Canada.  On the 26th of October the Americans came face to face with Canadian soldiers and their Native American allies on the north bank of the river.  The general's journal gives the positions the 29th took during the ensuing fight and other details.  Unless he was ill on that day, John Vincent fought in that battle.  It did not go well.  Mistakenly believing they were outnumbered the US forces retreated and by November 2nd were encamped back at Four Corners.

     Izard's journal entry on 7 November remarks that a number of sick men were sent to Plattsburgh and that of 15 November notes Izard had been ordered to Plattsburgh to settle his men into winter quarters, "We march with a snow storm at our back. Very cold".  Several entries in the journal refer to the brutal northern winter and rampant sickness in the ranks. The following day's entry recounts selecting the sick to be sent to Burlington which possessed a large hospital.  Could one of those men have been John Vincent?  His Army record states he was sick at Burlington when muster was taken there on December 31st.

     I have to wonder why any soldiers were sent to Burlington?  By the time the men to be sent there were chosen, the division was  halfway to Plattsburgh, why send them to Burlington across the lake, a much further distance?

     While I don't know what illness took John's life, dysentery, brought on by bad food, bad water, and bad hygiene, was one of the most common causes of death during the war.  Another fourth-great-grandfather of mine, Thomas Garner, also fought in the War of 1812 and although he survived his bout with the disease, it left him with permanently damaged bowels.  Doctors of the time had no idea how to treat infectious diseases nor did they understand the mechanism through which they were transmitted. 

     John's last days must have been miserable. Sick, cold and many miles from his loved ones, he died at Plattsburgh on February 27, 1814, only six months after enlisting.  Peter Dox, who was also from Saratoga County, testified on behalf of the Widow Vincent for her pension application and told the court he cared for John during his illness and helped to bury him there at Plattsburgh.  John is quite probably among the one hundred and thirty-six unknown solders who were discovered during excavations at the post over the years.  They are honored by a monument in the north corner of the cemetery, but it saddens me to think he died such a lonely death and now rests in obscurity.


*JSTOR is a worthwhile resource for scholarly articles that can be searched and read, (six articles per month), for simply registering. For a fee you get unlimited use and the ability to download text.

     

Of Patience, Family Bibles, And The Internet

     My fourth-great-grandfather John Vincent died during the War of 1812 fought between the newly established United States and England from whom the US had declared it's independence. His death was from disease but I can't help but hope he got to harass the English a bit beforehand.  I've always wondered what prompted John to leave his wife and four young children to enlist twelve days before his youngest child's first birthday in August of 1813?  The answer may well have been money.  That year the fledgling congress authorized increases in both the monthly pay and the cash bounty for soldiers. 

     Thanks to the pension application filed by John's widow I've learned quite a bit about him, but it hasn't been easy.  Another thing I've found is there is a dearth of information on that war.  It's not for nothing that the conflict is often referred to as the forgotten war.  From surviving documents I've learned where John enlisted and in what regiment, learned the names of his captains and other officers, but I've been mostly unsuccessful in finding anything like a history of his regiment.  Nor does there seem to be any source that would tell me which of two generals his known officers served under, Wilkinson or Hampton, but I'm leaning towards Hampton.

     Once one gets away from the New England states, information from that period is very difficult to come by and John's war was mostly fought in New York.  John's son Thomas is next in my line and while I know he died as a young adult, there are no sources to indicate the cause. One needs a lot of patience and perseverance to put together a picture of the ancestor's life during that era.  Luckily though, sometimes patience is rewarded.

     Thomas' sister Janet Vincent was the youngest child of John.  An infant when he left Saratoga County she would have no memories of her father.  Being a female she presented the extra challenge of tracing a woman whose surname changed at her marriage.  The break came with viewing an application to a lineage society which included the information that Janet's mother Mary Clement Vincent had married again after John's death in 1814.  Her new name was Mary Howland which opened the door to not only the aforementioned pension application, but eighty-two year old Mary Howland herself in the 1860 census of Butler, NY in the home of  "Jenett" Witherel.  Janet had been found!  She also appears in her mother Mary Howland's pension application as does her husband Darius Witherel.  Or Wetherel, or Wetheral, or ... it's one of those names whose spelling is a challenge.

     The census of 1850 also shows Mary in her daughter's household along with a young man named Ray Witherell who is not with the family in any other census.  Who was he?  It would have been easy to believe he was Janet and Darius' son but that couldn't be assumed.  The answer to that question came several months later in a family bible at the top of the right hand page.

     Ray was in fact the son of Darius' brother John.  The bible also shows "Jennett" Vincent wife of Darius, the birth of their son Hadley and barely visible above Hadley's name can be seen the faded words, infant daughter... 1840 died the sa...  A local history of Butler, NY mentioned Darius being a wealthy farmer and the fact he and Janet were parents to four children only one of whom reached adulthood, Narcissa who was born in 1851.

     So I keep searching the internet hoping for newly digitized records because patience is something I have plenty of when it comes to genealogy.

1812 Pension Files, Some Headway But Still Taking Ridiculously Long

    

     I continue waiting for those War of 1812 pension files.  The work seems to be progressing, as of today there are 2,211,532 digitized pages, 648 more than yesterday -- but who's counting?  We are up to the surname Rowe so hopefully by the end of the month or early November we may see the S surnames beginning to come online.  Unfortunately I'm waiting for the V surnames.  The S and T names may take awhile but I'm hopeful by early next year I will be able to look at the Vincent applications.

     A few years ago when digitizing had virtually stopped  I ordered my fourth great-grandfather John Vincent's file from NARA.  It confirmed his regiment was the 29th NY Infantry and his enlistment date of 10 August 1813.  It also answered many questions like the date of his death, 27 February 1814, and revealed he died at Plattsburgh, NY of disease.  I'm waiting to get a look at the other Vincents who appear in the pension index.  Specifically John I. Vincent who was probably the John Vincent from Halfmoon in Saratoga County, NY who enlisted a year after my John.  Many Ancestry family trees have John I. married to Mary Clement, but he wasn't.  Mary Clement married my John Vincent.  That was spelled out in the pension file I ordered which was in the widow Mary's name.  It contained the date of their marriage at Halfmoon and witnesses including Mary's brother John Clement.  

     Also, John I. was named in his father Jeremiah's will written in 1821, seven years after my John's death in an Army hospital during the frigid northern New York winter.  The few account I've found of conditions in the Army camp that winter of 1814 paint an abysmal picture, terrible weather with much illness among the soldiers.

     I may well be disappointed by the file when I finally lay eyes on it if it even exists.  I know John I. survived the war and pensions based on service rather than death or disability were not granted until 1871 when he would have been quite elderly or deceased, but I'm hoping there may be some clue in those files as to who my John was; like where he was born and who his parents were.  Both John Vincent's were living in Saratoga County, NY when they enlisted and were quite possibly related.  Or perhaps an unknown brother had a file?  As noted above, I will probably be disappointed but I have to check.  I've exhausted every other record I can think of to search...