Mary "Mami" Gray Fariss (Oct 1863 - 19 July 1961)

Mamie sure had an interesting life! Unfortunately, there are a lot of gaps in her records so this is what I have so far. 

She was born in October 1863 in Huntsville, Alabama to John Morgan and Ellen Douglas (Bradford) Fariss right smack dab in the middle of the American Civil War. Twice during the war, Huntsville was occupied by the Union Army. 

The Union monitored Huntsville citizens’ day-to-day activities. Social events were restricted, and citizens were less free to move around the city. Some Huntsville citizens who were known to support the Confederate government were even put in jail. Union officers temporarily lived in the homes of Confederate officers during the occupation. Their wives and household staff cooked, and waited on the military men who they often referred to as “Yankee boarders.” Basic necessities such as food and clothing were scarce during the Civil War. Homes with “Yankee boarders” were fortunate in some ways because they gave the families money, food, and other goods.1

 Her Father: John Morgan Fariss (25 Apr 1831 – 18 Jan 1886)

I’m not sure if her father was in the war, I couldn’t find any records and unfortunately, he died before the first census that recorded veterans. He was a revenue collector so maybe he was exempt because his job was too important. John’s brothers Dewitt and William were both in Company F, 4th Alabama Regiment. Dewitt was KIA in the second Manassas battle on 30 Aug 1862 and it stands to reason his brother was at his side. William survived and stayed in the military until the end of the war. (I have a copy of Dewitt’s service record.) His father Dandridge Fariss, Esq. (wife Harriett Wilson) was prominent in Huntsville history and ran the Southern Advocate newspaper with his brother. He was also a slave owner.

Dandridge and Harriett (Wilson) Fariss

Her Mother: Ellen Douglas Bradford (24 Jan 1840 – 02 Oct 1927)

Mary’s mother came from a long line of military men listed in DAR and Daughters of the Confederacy records. Her father Daniel Morgan Bradford was in the War of 1821 and the Confederate Army. His father William Bradford joined the Continental Army in 1775 at the age of 14 or 15. He was present at the surrender of Charleston and was confined to a prison ship in New Jersey. His father was General Joseph Bennet Bradford who in his younger years served as orderly to General Sumter at the Battle of Guildford Court House in North Carolina. 2 

The 1870s 

In 1870 Mary was 8 years old and living in Huntsville with her family. By this time her father (age 39) was no longer a revenue collector but interestingly was listed as “ex revenue collector” on the census. Ellen was “keeping house” which meant she was a housewife. They had two servants so they weren’t poor. They may have been living with Ellen’s widowed mother because the dollar amount for “value of real estate owned” is listed next to her name; $2K for real estate and 500 ($44K and $11K in 2022) for the personal estate. Unfortunately, the 1880 census doesn’t list street names.

There was a total of seven children in the family: Percy Marshall (1860-1863), Mary, Nelly (1866-1952), Leila Lee (1869-1875), John Morgan Jr (1871-1951), and Hyman Hilzheim “Henry” (1875-1933).

In 1871 her brother John Morgan Jr was born and then four years later in 1875, her sister Leila Lee died at age six. 

The 1880s

Ten years later in the 1880 census, she is still living at home, she was 17 and working as a schoolteacher. The family is living at 215 Clinton Street, Huntsville. I’m not sure where that is, there is a Clinton Avenue in the old section of Huntsville but no 215. It looks like they were on Clinton Street in 1874 as J.M. Fariss paid taxes on the house and a storehouse on Washington Street as the administrator of D.M. Bradford’s estate. The Washington Street store was a grocery store run by William H. Fariss until 1881. Her father was listed as a bookkeeper, her mother was also a schoolteacher, and living with them were Nelly, John, Hyman, and Mary Bradford, Ellen’s widowed mother.

On 5 March 1885, she marries Junnis Edd/Junnis Edward Jackson.  

He paid a $200 marriage bond  (over $6K today) so he had some money. A marriage bond was a monetary pledge or guarantee given to the court by the intended groom and a bondsman to affirm that there was no moral or legal reason why the couple could not be married and also that the groom would not change his mind. What is interesting is that the bond was written up at the same time as the marriage which is odd. Why bother if you were getting married the same day?

Move to Dallas & Split

Sometime after they were married, they moved to Dallas, Texas and a daughter Elinor Antoinette Jackson was born on 17 April 1890. (Birthdate is from census records, I do not have a birth certificate) Her brother Hyman Hilzheim Fariss also lived in Dallas, he was a well-known writer (he died in 1933 from a car accident.) Actually, a lot of Fariss relatives moved to Texas at that time which may have precipitated their move. Another reason for a number of her siblings moving to Texas may have been the death of her father in 1886.

Mary and Junnis seemed to have split up after this and Junnis remarried in 1894 in Oklahoma. Interestingly his second wife was Tessa Cleo GRAY but she was born in Illinois. Sometime around 1931, he moved to Kansas City, Missouri where he died shortly after on June 25, 1932. Tessa lived there until she died in 1964.

This is where Mamie’s life gets interesting...

William Abner Barnes 

In 1898 she is in Denver, Colorado and she married William Abner Barnes on 4 August 1896. Why she was in Denver is unknown. Barnes traveled a lot doing hypnotism demonstrations around the county. He had been based out of Denver for at least 2 years. Also, she’s listed as Fariss, not Jackson (I only have the index, not the marriage record.)

>In the 1900 census they are in Boston, MA. Elinor is erroneously listed as William Barnes’ daughter. It’s obviously because she’s 12 and the census shows they’ve been married only 4 years.

>Now Barnes is an interesting character. He practiced hypnotism and opened the College of Psychology in Boston in 1901. He published Psychology, Hypnotism, Personal Magnetism, and Clairvoya and styled himself as a professor in Psychological and Hypnotic Control.

Horatio Dresser and R. Heber Newton are among the trustees of this explicitly anti-Christian science college which is rather interesting because in 1905 he founded the Christian Psychic Association.

He also claimed that he was a hypnotist who induced the killer to confess to a murder in a sensational case that gripped Minneapolis, but there is no proof of his claim.

Mary helped him with his business and they moved around a lot. He was in St. Paul 1984, Rochester NY 1894, Huron, SD 1895, Denver 1896, Boston 1897, Cleveland 1902-03; sometimes just for a visit and sometimes he set up offices.

In Chicago in 1895 there was a newspaper article titled “Hypnotist Barnes is Locked Up” he was apparently in jail for keeping a boy under the influence for 12 hours. It appears that he was living in Chicago at the time. The case was dismissed.

On November 17, 1908, in Boston, MA, Barnes shot himself because his mind was going.

Albert E. Robinson

In April 1910 she was living at 13 Follen Street, Boston, and her future husband Albert E. Robinson is listed as her lodger. Looking at Google maps they are all townhouses and there is no number 13! It goes from 15 to 11, but all the townhouses looked the same. 

15 & 11 Follen St, Boston 

Her 22-year-old daughter is also living with her. (Robinson was born in Vermont, and his parents were born in Canada. He is an inspector at a shoe machinery shop.) They were married a few months later on August 17. Were they living together or did love happen after he moved in as a lodger? 

Massachusetts Marriage Records 

In 1920 they were living at 435, Apt 3, Wethersfield Ave., Hartford, CT. 

Wethersfield Ave, Hartford, CT

From about 1929 to about 1934 they are living at 51 Eastwood Rd, and then in 1935 to 1938 at 19 Maiden Lane, Torrington, CT. City directories show that he was a draftsman. The Maiden Lane house doesn't exist anymore or it's an apartment complex and the Eastwood house is derelict now. 

51 Eastwood Rd., Torrington, CT   

Her husband died on April 26, 1938, in Torrington, he was 66 years old. After he husband died she left the apartment because in the 1940 census she is a lodger with Elizabeth Marvin, a practical nurse at 409 Torrington St. I couldn’t find a relationship between the two. Elizabeth is listed as married but there is no Mr. in the picture. Mary is 69, listed as a widow and “unable to work” and only completed the 8^th grade. The street has been renumbered. 

I cannot find her in Torrington in the 1950 census but she was probably still there because she died in Torrington on July 19, 1961. I also can’t find a gravesite.

  

Huntsville/Madison County Convention & Visitors Bureau

https://www.huntsville.org/blog/list/post/huntsville-alabama-during-the-civil-war/

2 https://www.history.com/topics/american-revolution/battle-of-guilford-courthouse

 

Kate Louetta Buford Peck (1864-1953): A woman shrouded in mystery

 “There was an air of legend and mystery surrounded Kate and survived her but gave no clue to the mystery"  — Granddaughter Mary Louise Schwartz (nee Peck)

Kate Louetta Buford Peck’s life is shrouded in mystery and that’s exactly the way she wanted it.

Kate Buford was born in Kentucky supposedly on 10 March 1864, her father was John Buford and I’m not sure who her mother was. I say supposedly because going through records her birth year was all over the place. The information for census records probably given to the enumerator by the estate manager or her husband but she was likely the source of the misinformation.

In all the record I found on her hardly any of them had the same information on her age, marriage year, where she was from and even where her parents were from:

17 Oct 1883	Marriage to Theodore Gordon Peck in NY City, she was 19 (DOB 1864), he was 35. Information is taken from TGP’s Yale obituary.
1884	NY Index Birth certificate for son Theodore Buford Peck: she is listed as Kitty L. Buford Peck, born in Kentucky
1900	Census: Kate Peck, DOB March 1866 in Kentucky, 5/5 children born, married 19 years (DOM 1881); with that DOB she would have been 15; father born in Kentucky, mother born in Spain (only mention of this anywhere).
1905	NY Census: Listed as Kate, age 38 (DOB 1867)
1915	NY Census: listed as age 54 (DOB 1861)
1910	Census: listed as Katherine, age 46, (DOB 1864), married 27 years (DOM 1883) 5/5 children born; born in New York, father/mother born in New York
1920	Census: listed as Kate L Peck, age 51, (DOB 1869), born in Kentucky, father & mother born in Kentucky
1925	NY Census: listed as Kate, age 61, (DOB 1864)
1930	Census: listed as Kate L, age 65 (DOB 1865), age at marriage 21 (DOM 1886), born in Kentucky, father & mother born in Kentucky
1940	Census: listed Kate L. and Head, age 73 (DOB 1867), widow, grade 8 education, born in New York. (Information given by son Harold).
18 Feb 1953	Death Index, age 88 (DOB 1865), newspaper article has age at 89 (DOB 1864).

 According to her husband’s obituary published by Yale, they were married October 17, 1883, in New York City and she is listed as the daughter of John Buford of Lexington, Kentucky. This is the only reference of a father. This is also the only mention of a marriage date; after an extensive search I found absolutely nothing in the newspapers, even the local paper for Rockland County.

Now here’s the odd part where the timeline just doesn't make sense: Theodore graduated from Yale in 1871 then he went on an expedition to Kansas with Yale right afterwards. His obituary says that he went to work for his father in New York after he came back from the expedition. No mention of being in Covington, KY from 1874-1885 (see ad below). Theodore was in Haverstraw in the 1880 census and his father died the next year, so it would seem strange that he was down in KY that long. It’s just a mystery. Did Kate go up to New York and met Theodore or as the article indicate, he was down there? We probably are never going to know.

And what’s even stranger, Kate had a child around 1883 named Pansy Bailey who later went by Bailey Peck. She was not Theodore’s daughter, even though she took his name, because in newspaper articles she is referenced as a half-sister and a stepdaughter on Theodore G. Peck’s Yale obituary (although his newspaper obituary lists her as a daughter).

Another article written in 1969 it stated that Kate Buford Bailey Peck came into the family after a brief first marriage, from Lexington, KY. I can’t find any record of a marriage. I have ordered Kate and Theodore’s marriage certificate, hopefully it will shed some light.

And to make the story even more farfetched, the wedding announcement for her son states that he’s the paternal grandson of a Sir Herbert Bailey of England. I cannot find any reference to a Sir Herbert Bailey, and what would an English lord be doing in Covington, KY? We do know there was a Herbert Bailey but the Sir part seems a bit much. It may have been a story that Kate passed onto Bailey about her father.

And then there’s the mystery of this article in the Kentucky Post, May 16, 1922. I wonder who was looking for them? It may have been someone from England. Even though the family was known to be private and rarely in the newspaper that can’t be said by the 1922. Their son, Theodore Gordon, Jr. was killed in a famous NYC bombing in 1920 and his widow was a part of high society and was always in the newspapers. Her remarriage to a very wealthy man, Graham Young in 1922 was splashed all over the New York Times and
in every article, she was called Mrs. Theodore G. Peck, Jr.  

On a side note, Bailey wasn’t very truthful about her date and place of birth either.  I do not have an exact date of birth; the KY Archives didn’t have birth records for the county she was born in.

In census records Bailey was born about 1883 in Riverside or Covington, KY, depending on the paperwork. Most of the census records have DOB as 1883 apart from the 1900 census which has DOB Sept 1882 and her name Pansy L Peck. The death index has her DOB abt. 1882.  Her husband’s records at Yale list her as Pansy Bailey, daughter of Theodore G. Peck and her DOB about 1884.

(Her sister Gladys Peck Shepard also has DOB amnesia: passenger arrival records in 1934 have her DOB 23 May 1889 and on her visa for a Brazil trip in 1945 her DOB is 16 July 1890. Both times she was with family members so the trips are accurate.)  

So back to Kate and her cloud of secrecy. At the end of her life, a scandal rocked the family and was splashed across the newspapers — her worst nightmare after a lifetime of secrecy.

At the end of her life her alcoholic son Gordon swindled her out of property and turned into one of the nastiest family probate fights in Rockland Surrogate Court and signaled the end of the Peck Dynasty. His sisters claimed that right after he was released from Rockland State Hospital (a psychiatric hospital) he forced Kate to revoke the power of attorney given to her daughters and write a new will giving him everything.

Also, sometime before her death she fell down the stairs at Samsondale and her son Gordon was too drunk to assist her. It could have been right before her death or long before because she was ill for some time before she died.

The house was in a terrible state, according to the sisters, he told Kate that they were too poor to fix the house and he was paying off her debts, but at the same time he sold her property and kept the funds. The sisters stated that he allowed the house to go into foreclosure and that Gordon stole Kate’s jewels but told Kate that her daughters were stealing them. They also claimed that Gordon said he would poison Kate and burn the house down.

This all started when just before Kate died in 1953. In October of 1952 a cottage on the estate was set afire by arsonists. I’m not sure if anyone was caught. But the interesting note is that Bailey was in the middle of repairing the cottage so she could live there and be close to her mother. We know that Gordon was against this, so the timing of the fire is fishy especially since Gordon had said earlier that he was burn the house down. 

In the end the probate was settled in Gordon’s favor and he inherited a net of $102,000, $1,037,939.78 in 2021 which isn’t a lot of money considering how much money the family was worth when Elias Peck was alive.

When Gordon died in 1959, he left $212,598 to Mary Schwartz and her nephew Theodore G. Peck IV. The property where the house once stood is now a shopping center.

Bailey Peck Molhlan wrote “Such an end to a once proud family. Her shielding her past life all these years and the fact the knowledge is now out — all put together, and no wonder her mind is going.”  The reference to Kate’s past, however, is still a mystery. It sounds like Bailey knew something but took it to her grave.

 

Rev. Warren Bartlett Seabury

 

Note: much of the information and photos I gleamed about Warren were found in the book The Vision of a Short Life: a memorial of Warren Bartlett, written by his father Rev. Joseph Bartlett Seabury. (An online version can be found in the book search section of familysearch.org.)

Cynde’s great-grand uncle lived a short but interesting and fulfilling life as a missionary in China at the beginning of the 20th century. He was a minister and missionary with the Congregational Church (Congregationalism in the United States traces its origins to the Puritans of New England). (1)

Warren was born on Sept. 17, 1877 in Lowell, Massachusetts. The handwritten Massachusetts town and vital records and birth records have Sept 19, but these are transcription errors. Warren put Sept 17 on his passport applications and in a letter home he mentions that “tomorrow is Sept 17, and I will be twenty-one.”

Warren was the oldest surviving child of Rev. Joseph Bartlett Seabury and Martha Daniels Mason. When he was 9 months old, he and his sister Helena Mason Seabury, who was a 18 months older, were both taken seriously ill. Warren survived but Helena died on August. 15, 1878.

From age 8 to 18 he lived in Dedham, MA. He had a fondness for mechanics and purchase a lathe with his own money. He also installed a telephone between his room and that of a friend in the neighborhood. He was also a deeply passionate baseball fan and loved tennis.

After graduating from high school, he passed the preliminaries for admission to Yale, but he decided to enroll at Hotchkiss, a boarding school in Lakeville, CT. It was during this time that he felt a calling to follow in his father’s footsteps and become a minister. Later, many instructors and students of Hotchkiss followed Warren to China.

After Hotchkiss he attended Yale, graduating in 1900, and then Hartford Theological Seminary where he received a Bachelor of Divinity at Hartford in May 1903. He was offered missionary instruction in Europe but decided to take a final year at Yale, studying philosophy and comparative religions. A year later June 9, 1904 he graduated from Yale Graduate School with a Master of Arts. On the same day he was ordained at the First Church in Hartford, CT.

While at Yale his spiritual life further developed when he started thinking about being a missionary. At this time there was a great missionary fever gripping many American universities and Yale was at the forefront with missionaries already established in China.

Another force was the Ecumenical missionary conference he attended in New York in April of 1900:

“One April afternoon in the year 1900, three Yale Seniors, en route to the New York to attend the Ecumenical Foreign Missionary Conference were earnestly engage in conversation. Their proposition – the missionary work of the University concentrated under on the denominational Boards – was germinal but not new…The situation in Peking and the perils of the Boxer outbreak added to the impressiveness, the gravity, the pathos of the hour. With financial support from several Yale Seniors the Yale Missionary idea was crystallizing. With the Boxer massacres and recent martyrdom of Pitkin, a recent graduate of Yale, brought China to the forefront vs Africa.” (3)

Lawrence Thurston, Brownell Gage and Warren received their appointments, and they spent the summer of 1904 preparing and gathering furniture, tools, library books, clothing, etc. They traveled cross country to San Francisco, stopping at various friend’s homes and preaching along the way. On Oct. 1 they sailed from San Francisco on the Gaelic with a stop off in Hawaii. The ship landed in Yokohama, where he left the ship and took a train to Kyoto. He then boarded the steamer at Kobe and continued his journey to Shanghai. He wrote, “At last we reached our first Chinese city, Shanghai, but it was found to be strangely Western.” (2) He was not impressed with the city and left a week later after they bought the supplies they needed.

They settled in Hankow for the winter with Mr. and Mrs. Brownell Gage, who made a pleasant home for him. His letters during this period were full of good cheer and descriptions of the ways and characteristics of the Chinese. He is also spending this time learning the language. “Yesterday, after six hours’ work on the language, I felt as if I never wanted to see another Chinese character. They all seemed like so many chocolate creams left out in the rain.” (2)

On Feb 15, 1905 Warren was sent to Changsha (population 192,000) in the Hunan province arriving on Feb 19 and Gage would follow. At the time Hunan was particularly against missionaries. The local Hunan newspapers were very hostile to missionaries during the Boxer Rebellion (3) fearing that the introduction of the religion of the West would destroy the Chinese ideals of filial piety and patriotism. Warren was being sent to an area that had an anti-foreign spirit, and refused all alliance with the non-Chinese world, but recently attitude was changing there, and several missionary societies were established.

The first few months he stayed with Mr. & Mrs. Gotteberg of the Norwegian mission while looking for supplies and a building not an easy task as the locals would not sell to foreigners.

In early March he was invited by the Changsha Board of Education to teach English at the Bright Virtue School. While he was working at the school, he lived with Mr. Greenwell Fletcher, British Commissioner of Customs. He also became friends with Mr. A.J. Flaherty, the British Consul whom he played tennis with (Warren was an athletic person and enjoyed playing tennis}. 

In May he made his first visit to Kuling for a conference with his associates Gage and Dr. Hume. After the meeting Gage and his wife returned to America, Hume remained in Kuling and Warren returned to Changsha.

By this time, they realized it was impractical to secure land for the college building, so he turned his attention to rent temporary quarters in the city. Early in August 1906 Hume arrived from Kuling and together they found a house to rent for use as a hospital dispensary. By August 19 they were able to purchase a house for the school. The purpose of the school was to provide university education to young men. The school was opened on Nov 16 with some 20 students. At the end of the academic year there were 30 boys at the school.

During 1906 he made two journeys through portions of Hunan and one to Peking. In February he went with a party of 4 to explore portions of the province southwest of Changsha. He visited Paoking, Yungchow, saw the German coal mines and rode on a steam train. They saw a lot of poverty and occasional spite against “foreign devils” he also discovered that many Christian workers away from the open ports suffered many hardships. Late in the summer, with Mrs. Hume’s father, Mr. Carswell, he went to Peking by train. While there he visited the Ming Emperors tombs, visited with other missionaries, and returned three weeks later.

In the early part of 1907, he made this third journey into the heart of the country, this time up the Yuen River to Chenchow in the company of an old college friend.

In 1907 Warren was appointed to represent the Mission at the Centennial Conference in Shanghai. He wrote home gushing about how pleasurable the conference was and the wonders of all the shops, automobiles, in Shanghai (apparently his time in the country changed his tune about the city). While there he stayed at the British Consul and met many noted missionaries and many friends from America. He returned after a week.

During this time, the school was flourishing and the future looked bright, he even joked in a letter home about finding a wife because they were paid more! He was thinking also of returning later to Yale to get his PhD and a projected course of philosophical study, particularly the Sung Philosophy. He was also envisioning a Young Men’s Christian Association and Social Settlement as betterment of the young manhood of his adopted city—a Chinese Yale.

During the hot summer many people went up into the mountains to Kuling. In the past he did not but on the morning of July 10, 1907 he decided the go and left Changsha for Kuling. He had reached a juncture in his work that he felt he could be away for a while and school would not suffer. He spent 13 days in Kuling in the company of Hume, Gage, and others as guest of Mr. & Mrs. Lovell.

On Sunday evening July 28, they sang around the piano, and at half-past nine he retired to write his weekly letter home. When he finished, he placed it on the mantel to be posted the next morning after they were to leave on an excursion to “White Deer College.”

The letter was full of information about a house that he decided to purchase. He writes, “In getting a house of course I am thinking that I can then have a place for you when you come out to see me. Then, if I do not rent it, I can have friends with me, ask some married people to run the house and take me in, or I can have a pleasant company of my own choosing. I am as enthusiastic as a boy over the prospect of a new possession. We shall see! I hope that it can be. With much love to all and with many apologies for being your son and brother!” (2)

The next morning, they were up at 5 a.m.  The day started with a beautiful sunrise but when they got to the Nankang pass they were surrounded by clouds and mist and almost turned back. But the clouds rose, and they could see sunlight in the horizon, so they continued down the mountain. They were frequently rained on and had to ford streams, but they continued with high spirits. After visiting the college, the left to return around 12:30 p.m.

As his friend Brownell Gage reported, “As we started back, I turned and said to Warren: ‘Won’t it be good to get back to the swimming pool and have a plunge? He answered that he did not know whether he would go in or not. He had previously told Hume that he could swim forty or fifty yards. I knew of a perfectly safe pool with a gravel bottom, in a small canyon of the mountain stream which our path followed. When we got to the place…I turned aside from the path to look for the way to this pool.” (2)

In dry weather the pool was shallow but on this day the stream and the cascade were swollen from the rain and the current was running swiftly.

Gage later reported that Warren slipped on a large flat rock fell in and in a moment was carried by the stream over the falls in a sitting position. He came up, struck out two or three strokes and then went under again. Hume had no chance to reach the pool, and besides could not swim, Mann dove over the rock into the pool. He tried to get into the upper pool but was washed down but after a few tries he finally made it. But the current was too strong for him in the upper pool, He was carried around by the circling currents, sucked down a whirlpool and never came up.

Hume and Kemp returned with a rope and Kemp, with the rope around him, dove into the pool below but he also could not get into the upper pool which grew worse with continued rain. After nearly 2 hours they gave up hope and Kemp went up the mountain to Kuling to get help. He came back with 10 people, dry clothes, and food. A large party with ladders, ropes and grappling hooks searched and four hours later found Warren and then Mann. Both the bodies were carried up the mountain on stretchers and were buried together the next morning after a beautiful outdoor service in Kuling.

 Soon after the accident Professor Olin Wannamaker of Canton composed these lines:

WARREN SEABURY AND ARTHUR MANN

(“They were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death they were not divided.”)

They two went down this hills through a stormy dawn
With joyous comrades, laughing in the mist,
Cleaving the windy fog before their steps,
And holding converse as they downward fared.

The storm fog drenched their footing on the stones
The rains came roaring down the mountain streams,
The torrent snatched them, -- and they were no more.

Their souls walked forth across the morning heights,
And past the peaks and up beyond the clouds;
So, while their brethren sought their bodies drowned,
That loving hands might tomb them in the hills,
Christ met them all amazed – in Paradise. 

On Sept 21 there was a memorial service for him held at the First Congregational Church of Wellesley Hills and large number of his friends attended. The ushers were classmates and old-time friends. At the front of the pulpit were two wreaths, bearing the letters A.S.M and W.B.S. There were many speakers from Yale and the missionary world that spoke of his dedication, stewardship, and sense of humor. His father wrote that “his real charm lay in the quiet symmetry of all his gifts. His sense of humor, vivid as it was, blended with his promptness to see and feel the insistence of duty, the responsibility of stewardship, the realities of the future.” (2) A memorial stone was erected in Woodlawn Cemetery in Wellesley, MA where his family is buried. 

Yale Obituary

Bishop Root’s words at the memorial service spoke about his capacity for friendship: 

“The most precious thing about Seabury’s life, to those who knew him in China, is the friendship he called out from the Chinese. He learned the language, I think, distinctly better than most young missionaries learn it; but there was something besides his ability to speak their language which gave him access to the hearts of the Chinese. It has been most truly said that Orientals think a great deal more about what you do than about what you say. They judge what you mean not by your words but by your deeds, and it was the constant manifestation of intelligent sympathy and kindliness, in all his relations, which won for Seabury the confidence of the Chinese.”

Warren’s many letter home are housed in the Archives at Yale and the school that Seabury founded is still going strong, 

Here are some links describing the history of the school:

https://www.yalechina.org/who-we-are (scroll to the bottom of this page to read its history)

Yale and China's Century Old Partnership 

Hotchkiss and China 

Yale Alumni Weekly 1909

Anna Laura Hover

Cindy's maternal great grandmother Anna Laura Hover was born on April 29, 1889 in Olive, New York, a sleepy town in the Catskills west of Kingston, to Darius Winans Hover and Mary Caroline Turner. Although on later paperwork, Laura (as she liked to be called) put Kingston as her birthplace, it does not look like her family ever moved from the area after 1871. Unfortunately, I cannot locate her or her siblings birth records on the New York Index to verify township.

As far as I can tell, they were a comfortable working-class family. Her father had a farm, boarding house, general store and a feed and coal business. Boarding houses were quite common in the Catskills for the New York City vacationers as hotels were not established there yet. On a side note, Darius is distantly related to the original Rockefellers who settled in Germantown N.Y.; the same Rockefellers as John D. Rockefeller although they may not have known this. (1)

Laura had two half siblings, Grace Theodora, and Alfred Miner Hover from her father’s first marriage to Theodora Miner (1848-1867), and seven full siblings with his second wife Mary Caroline Turner (1847-1911). Her siblings were: Elizabeth “Lizzy” Mary (1862-1943), William Morton (1873-1880), Benjamin Loren (1875-1933), Franklin W. (1877-1886), Burton Darius (1879-1908), Edna May Hover (1881-1948), and Eva Ada (1884-possibly 1906 but not verified).

Edna May earned a little notoriety and was in the New York Times when she ran away and eloped with Frank Boice at the tender age of 15. It is nice to know that they were together until her death at age 67 and are buried together in Catskill, NY.

After Darius died in 1904 at age 65 his boarding house was taken over by Lizzie and her husband William and Benjamin took over the store and other businesses.

In the 1900 census the following were living in the boarding house:
Darius W. Hover age 62, merchant and farmer (he was also listed as general merchant, farmer, and retail grocer in other documents)
Mary C., age 54.
Benjamin L, age 25, schoolteacher and his wife Nina E., age 22.
Barton D, age 20, Quarryman.
Anna L, age 11.
The fact that Barton worked in a quarry is another indication that they were not upper-class. Also, this must have been a very large house to house all these people and also be a boarding house. Unfortunately, this area was drastically changed later when a reservoir was created splitting the town in two.

In the 1905 N.Y. State census the family were living in three different locations in the area:
Burton D., age 25, Olive Bridge Rd, Olive, Ulster, NY.
Lillian G, his wife, age 22.
Donald W., son.

Benjamin L., 30 Brodheads, Rd, Olive, Ulster, NY.
Mina (sp), his wife, age 27.
Grace, daughter, age 3.

Hoover (sp), Mary C, 59, head (does not give an address but I am assuming she is still in the boarding house).
Anna L. 16, daughter.

By the 1910 census daughter and son-in-law William and Lizzie have taken over the boarding house and Mary and Laura are living with them.
Hover, Mary C, age 63, widow
Hover, Laura, age 20, single

Somewhere during this time, she met Theodore Gordon Peck, Jr. How? I have no idea. They were definitely not in the same social circles. The Pecks were very wealthy and lived on an estate in West Haverstraw, almost 70 miles south of Olive. Plus, at the time, Theodore was at Yale and I cannot find any record of Laura going to university. So, my only guess is that he was on vacation in Catskills and they somehow met.

But met they did, and they were married on May 14, 1910 in Kingston, NY. Interestingly I could not find any marriage announcements in the newspapers, even in the local Kingston newspaper. As I mention below this seems to be the norm with the Pecks.

In the 1915 census Theodore and Laura were living on the Peck estate with his parents, brothers Harold and Gordon. Theodore was listed as an insurance broker.

Their son Theodore Gordon Peck III was born on Sept. 12, 1914 in West Haverstraw. Sometime between 1914 and 1917 the family moved to Englewood, N.J. probably to be closer to his work in the city, and it was there on June 18, 1917 that Mary Louise Peck was born. They did not live there long; the 1920 census shows them living in Orangetown N.Y. and Theodore was working as an insurance broker on Wall Street, a job that led to tragedy.

On Sept. 16, 1920 Theodore was walking past the J.P. Morgan building:

The lunch rush was just beginning as a non-descript man driving a cart pressed an old horse forward on a mid-September day in 1920. He stopped the animal and its heavy load in front of the U.S. Assay Office, across from the J. P. Morgan building in the heart of Wall Street. The driver got down and quickly disappeared into the crowd.

Within minutes, the cart exploded into a hail of metal fragments—immediately killing more than 30 people and injuring some 300. The carnage was horrific, and the death toll kept rising as the day wore on and more victims succumbed. (2)

Theodore died on September 29, of blunt force trauma and severe burns. The anarchists responsible for the bombing were never caught. This website has photos and lists of the victims. 

Again, much like his marriage, there was not much coverage in the paper from the family. There was a small article in the NY Times (with wrong information about Laura's father) about his death but the obituary the family placed was rather underwhelming:

PECK – At the Post-Graduate Hospital, Wednesday, Sept. 29, from injuries received in the Wall St. explosion Sept. 16, Theodore G. Peck, Jr., husband of Laura Hover Peck, son of Theodore G. and Kate J., Peck of Samsondale, West Haverstraw, N.Y. Interment at convenience of family. 

I have noticed with the Peck family that this is not an unusual occurrence, they were not in the newspaper often, obituaries were short, and wedding announcements were a rarity. This was rather unusual considering how prominent the family were. Usually, they only made it in the paper when they died or there was some sort of tragedy. This was about to change by Laura.

On Nov. 6, 1921 there was a small announcement in the papers that Laura was engaged to Graham Youngs who was from an old, prominent, wealthy Long Island family. They were married on January 9, 1922 at the Church of the Heavenly Rest Episcopal Church in New York City. She was given away by her late husband’s father.

Laura and Graham split their residences between 1120 5th Ave. in Manhattan, a very gorgeous apartment building across the street from Central Park, and Via del Lago, Palm Beach, near the soon-to- be-built Mar-a-Lago home of Marjorie Merriweather Post.

View from their apartment building overlooking Central Park.

Youngs was a stockbroker in New York City but by 1935 he was basically retired (he was listed as a special partner in the NY Stock Exchange firm of Stokes, Hoyt & Co.) and they divided their time between New York City and Palm Beach.

He had been in the military; he was an enlisted man in the U.S. Army First Cavalry Division from 1900 to 1912. After leaving the US Army he was immediately accepted into the NY National Guard as a First Lieutenant; by the end of WWI, he had been promoted to Major. He served stateside in WWI and officially retired from the National Guard in 1941.

During this time, Graham and Laura went on a lot of cruises, there’s records of them being in Panama, the Bahamas, and various Caribbean islands. As much as they liked to cruise, it seems fitting that Graham died at sea on the cruise ship SS Franconia on June 27, 1937. They were just starting a six-week cruise to the North Cape.

SS Franconia, courtesy of State Library New South Wales

He is buried at the family plot in Youngs Memorial Cemetery in Oyster Bay, Long Island. Youngs Memorial Cemetery is also the resting place for Teddy Roosevelt and his family. Graham's death must have been a shock for Laura as he was only 59 and in good health.

Youngs will was filed soon afterwards and Laura received the bulk of his estate. He also set up trusts for his stepchildren Mary Louise and Theodore, and several articles of personal jewelry went to Mary’s husband Mortimer Seabury. A small amount went to a cousin, Edgar G. Youngs. Later there seemed to have been an issue with the trustees of his will, Lutkins and Robinson, as they took his heirs including the cousin to court in 1944. I could not find out any other information besides the newspaper listing.

I think that he was fond of his stepdaughter Mary Louise. Besides leaving a sizable trust to her, he was her biggest defender during a minor scandal involving a costume she wore for a charity fundraiser ball that was deemed too risqué by society matrons, although the costume was not too risqué to post in the newspapers! The article was plastered in papers all over the country, but prominent was a section where Graham came to the defense of his stepdaughter. I do not know if he had much interaction with his stepson, who was away in boarding school and university during this period.

After Graham's death Laura threw herself into the Palm Beach social scene. Before his death they were not in the Palm Beach Post often, after his death, Laura was listed very often. She both attended and gave many parties during this time.

On December 12, 1939, the Palm Beach Post had an article in the society pages:

Capt. Richard Drace White, who was at the Everglades Club for a few days, entertained with a dinner Sunday night at Brazilian Court, having as his guests Mr. and Mrs. Clinton Sibley Dow and their houseguest, Mrs. Graham Youngs: Mr. and Mrs. Emile Schmidt with Dr. John Emauz, president of the Bank of Portugal at Lisbon and Cyril Baikoff of Paris.

This is probably the first time that White, a widower, and Laura met.

Capt. Richard Drace White, originally from Missouri, was an 1899 graduate of the Naval Academy, served in the Spanish American War. He was wounded in action on August 18, 1918 while commanding the USS Orizaba. After the war he served as a naval attaché in various European embassies. He retired from the Navy in 1934 and was the Federal Supervisor of the New York Harbor and usually called Captain. He was recalled to duty for WWII and served the Navy in intelligence work in Lisbon, retiring again thereafter with the rank of Rear Admiral.

They were married on June 12, 1945 and lived at his house in Redding Ridge, CT. I do not know how long they dated between meeting in 1939 and marrying six years later.

However, it was obviously not a good marriage because they were divorced less than a year later on April 19, 1946 in Arkansas. At first, I was confused why they were divorced in Arkansas, but two things became clear with further research: Arkansas was a quickie divorce state at the time (3) and White was living in Arkansas when he died in 1953 so he may have been living there. Laura was not mentioned in his obituary.

Laura died on May 12, 1957, and White is not mentioned in her obituary either. She had reverted to Youngs after the divorced. In her death she went back to her roots. She is buried at the Wiltwyck Cemetery in Kingston NY.

(1) https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Transactions_of_the_Rockefeller_Fami/IZpPAAAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=darius%20hover page 138

(2) https://www.fbi.gov/history/famous-cases/wall-street-bombing-1920

(3) Interested states still competed for the migratory divorce trade. Nevada, Idaho, and Arkansas engaged in a “veritable trade war … each vying for out-of-state clients for its divorce courts.” https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/law-and-history-review/article/nofault-divorce-reform-in-the-1950s-the-lost-history-of-the-greatest-project-of-the-national-association-of-women-lawyers/89AF1985E15EE93178450E5B6A02AF14

Cornelius Whitehead, the First Whitehead in America

Cornelius was born on June 6, 1834  in an area of Manchester, England called Newton Heath. It was formerly a farming area but following the Industrial Revolution the principal industries were mining and textile. He was the son of William Whitehead (1795-1847) and Mary Chadderton (1797-1876). I was only able to find one sibling, John (1823-1861) but considering his parents were 39 and 37 when he was born, and they were married in 1817, I am sure there were older siblings. According to their marriage banns neither of them could read or write.

His family were in the textile business, his father and grandfather were  silk weavers. His great grandfather was John a weaver as well but there were numerous John Whiteheads in Newton, so I have not been able to narrow him down. I have also had issues tracking down his maternal side; I do know that her was parents were John and Sarah and that John was also a weaver.

Cornelius was baptized at All Saints Anglican Church in Newton Health on July 7, 1834.

In 1847 when Cornelius was 13 his father died, aged 42. A year later his mother married Joseph Wilde at St. Mary, St. Denys and St. George Cathedral in Manchester. She was 6 years older than him and both were listed as widowed on the banns. Joseph was a weaver, and they were both living in Newton.

I am not sure if it was a good marriage. A Joseph Wilde was living with his daughter’s family in 1871 but no wife is listed. He was listed as married, not a widower. And, sometime before her death in 1876 Cornelius moved his mother to America. It is hard to tell when she arrived, she is not listed on the 1870 US census, but I cannot find her in any English census after they were married. The only proof I have that Mary lived in Lawrence is that she is buried with her son. Joseph Wilde died in 1878 in Newton Heath.

Cornelius immigrated to America in 1855. His paperwork shows he was a colorist. Later paperwork states color mixer. He was listed as a chemist on his death certificate and his wife’s obituary noted that he owned a dye manufacturing company in Medford, MA.

In the 1860 census he is living in a boarding house in Lawrence and his occupation is listed as operative. I am not sure what that is, but assuming some sort of factory work in the textile industry. Quite a few men in the boarding house have the same occupation.

On Nov. 18, 1862 he married Phoebe Ann Hall in Lawrence. His occupation is listed as color mixer. I am not sure which church they were married in, but it was probably Grace Episcopal Church in Lawrence.

Phoebe was the daughter of James and Alice Hall and she was born in Manchester. She immigrated when she was 17 in 1861. It would not be unusual for her to be from the same city as Cornelius. Lawrence was the center of the textile industry and there was a sizable English population who sought work in the mills where they were given choice jobs by the American factories on account of their shared linguistic heritage and close cultural links. Phoebe’s sister and brother also immigrated and at one point her sister was living with Cornelius and his wife.

He was a Mason and belonged to the Grecian Lodge, Lawrence, MA. He was initiated on Sept. 13, 1965, passed on Jan. 19, 1866, and Raised on March 16, 1866.

Sometime around 1861 his brother John died. Family folklore is that he drowned while trying to save a boy’s life; the boy survived, he did not. However, I cannot find any proof of this story. Then sometime between 1865 and 1968 his wife Ann Sellers died, and their three children, Mary, Emily and John were sent to live in America, probably with Cornelius. There are conflicting dates on when they arrived, Mary had 1865 and 1868 on later census records. There is naturalization oath paperwork for a John Whitehead that has 1865, the birth city is right however the date of birth is a few years off. I cannot find any passenger lists that has all three of them on it. I do know that in 1870 John and Emily are living with Mary who married George Moses Marslin the year before. I have no idea where they were living before that.

Judging by ages LtoR back row: William, Frederick, Edmund
Front row: Cornelius, Phoebe & Walter
Photo curtesy of Allen Atwell (via Ancestry) 

Their first child William was born March 26, 1864. William would later marry Mary Lizzie Kay in Dover, New Hampshire. He was a sketch maker. They had two children Philip Kay Whitehead (1890-1969) and Mary Chadderton Whitehead (1897-1976). Mary Lizzie Kay died on January 28, 1900 from a tumor. William than married Eliza Ann Yapp on April 10, 1901. William died in 1916 at the age of 51. William, his two wives, son, and daughter-in-law are buried together in Bellevue Cemetery, Lawrence, MA. 

In 1866 his son Frederick James Whitehead (1866-1947) is born. He seems to have followed his brother William to New Hampshire. His occupation is listed as engraver on his marriage certificate and in the 1920 census he is a foreman engineer in the print work. He married Ena Veille Foster (1866-1946) and they had 2 children Allison F. Whitehead (1902-1994) and Frederick Gale Whitehead (1905-1992). I originally thought that William and Frederick were in the printing business but there are textile engravers and sketch artists, so I would assume that they were also in the textile business. Frederick died in 1947 and buried in the Bellevue Cemetery with his wife. Allison's name is also on the tombstone but no death date. Allison never married and Frederick was a teacher. I'm not sure where Frederick is buried but he ended up in California. He was married twice. 

1n 1868 his son Edmund Hall Whitehead (1868-1948) was born in Lawrence. He married Camilla Mansur on Sept 15, 1892 and had two children with her, Warren Mansur Whitehead (1893-1977) and Virginia L. Whitehead (1910-2005). You will note that Warren is much older. Edmund was a traveling salesman at the time of the marriage, but I am not sure in what industry. Camilla died on January 15, 1914 of cancer and on Christmas Day 1915 Edmund married Ella May Snow. One odd note, Edmund is not mentioned in Camilla’s obituary, it just lists her parents. There was a newspaper article in 1902 about a party to celebrate their 10th anniversary and in the 1910 census they are living at 15 Lowell St, Wakefield, MA and he is a salesman in the cracker industry, so they were together. The children are living with them, Warren was 16 and a machine operator in an organ factory and Mary was just born. On a side note, that he was a cracker salesman struck me as funny but apparently crackers were a big business in the area, Medford was famous for its crackers and rum. Edmund died on June 14, 1948 in Boston, MA. and I am not sure where he is buried.

In the 1870 census Cornelius and his family are living in a house with 9 other people, it seems to be owned by James Ashworth and his family, but I do not see any relationship with Cornelius, so I am guessing it is a boarding house. His wife’s sister is living there as well and working as a weaver. Another woman, Sara Merchant is also living there but again, cannot find a connection. 

Cornelius became a US citizen in 1871. There wouldn’t be any naturalization paperwork for his wife, in those days wives automatically got their citizenship with their husband.

In 1880 his last son Walter Whitehead was born. This is my friend Cindy's branch, Walter is her great-grandfather. Walter married Edith Elizabeth Leavens, daughter of the wealthy furniture store owner William Leavans on June 14, 1094. Walter graduated from MIT as a chemist but put that aside to work in his father-in-law’s business, eventually working his way up to president of the furniture company. They had three children, Cindy’s grandmother Barbara Whitehead (1905-1990), William Leavens Whitehead (1910-1991) and Walter Whitehead Jr. (1913-1987). He died in 1955.

That his son married into a wealthy family and he was a councilman for the city of Lawrence in 1881 and 18821 indicates that Cornelius had finally “made it.” From this point on he buys a house and starts making trips back to England. I believe that he was working at the Old Pacific Print Works in Lawrence, a big sprawling factory.

This is a book at the Smithsonian of textile samples collected by Cornelius from the Old Pacific Print Works and donated by his son Frederick. I believe that is Cornelius’ handwriting.
https://collection.cooperhewitt.org/people/18060785/collaborators/18056265/

In 1887 Cornelius traveled to England with his son Frederick. They arrived in Liverpool on June 2, 1887 and came back to Boston on August 18, so it was a short trip, maybe for business.

Sometime before 1890 the family moved to Medford, a town 25 miles south of Lawrence. In the 1890 directory Cornelius is living at 14 S. Park, Medford and he is listed as a chemical manufacturer. The business was located at the rear of 65 Riverside Ave, Medford which is now unfortunately an apartment building. I saw a boiler inspection report for Cornelius in the city of Medford where it was noted the building was used for chemicals. The inspection report doesn’t list the name of the business. I have emailed the Medford Historical Society to see if they had any information. I could not find the house either on a map.

In 1899 he again went on a trip to England, this time with son Walter. They left Boston on July 2, 1899 and returned on Sept 22.

99 Park St, Medford

On the 1900 census he is living at 99 Park Street, Medford. He owns this house, and it is not mortgaged, and has a housekeeper, another indication that he is doing well. On the census, there is no occupation listed for him. Walter, age 19, is also living with them and attending MIT.

Cornelius passed away on Sept. 4, 1907 in Medford, MA from cancer of the bladder.
His occupation was listed as chemist on his death certificate. Of note, his mother’s maiden name is erroneously listed as Cladderton on the death certificate. He is buried in the Bellevue Cemetery in Lawrence, MA along with his wife and his mother. There does not appear to be an obituary for him that I could find.

In 1910 his wife Phoebe was living with her son Frederick James Whitehead in Dover, New Hampshire. In 1912 she is living on her own at 22 Dudley, Medford about a block away from her son Walter. She died on September 20, 1916 in Medford and is buried with her husband.

Phoebe's House 

1 Dorgan, M. B. (1924). History of Lawrence, Massachusetts: With War Records. United States: The author. https://www.google.com/books/edition/History_of_Lawrence_Massachusetts/wIQlAQAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0