A FAMILY REUNION OF SORTS11

 Brigadier General Henry Dunham's family seems to have suffered a
reversal of fortune in the latter half of the 19th century. The General had
commanded forty companies and five regiments at the celebrations
marking the completion of the Bunker Hill Monument (Dunham
Genealogy p167) and his son Henry had been a successful shoe
manufacturer and inventor. The rest of the General's were not quite so
prominent in Abington society.
 
After the younger Henry's death, his widow Ella became embroiled in
lawsuits against shoe manufacturers who'd copied her husband's inventions.
She and daughter Ida appear on the 1910 Federal Census for Holden
in Worcester County, Massachusetts as renting their home but neither
was employed. Perhaps son Harry B. Dunham paid their rent. According
to the Dunham Genealogy he was a doctor in nearby Rutland, Ma.
Younger son Arthur moved to New York and pursued a career as an
electrical engineer. He married and had two sons.

Brackley Cushing Dunham married  Elizabeth Hunt. There was a Hunt
family that were leading shoe manufacturers in Abington but as of yet I
don't know if she was from that line. I do know that Brackley stayed in
the shoe business but it wasn't in management from what I've been able
to find in the Federal Censuses up to 1910. The couple was childless.
Brackley and Emma are not buried in the Henry Dunham family plot.

Emma Annett Dunham  married Richard L Hunt. I've yet to establish any
ties to either the Hunts of Abington or Brackley's wife Elizabeth Hunt.
Emma and her husband lived in Weymouth, Ma. and they too died
without children.

This brings us to Andrew Jackson Dunham. Andrew followed his father
in serving in the military and the inscription on his gravestone tells us he
served "Civil War Three Years 1st Mass Cav, Also Minute Men T
hree Mos."  In other words, Andrew was in the Massachusetts State
Militia , then enlisted in the regular Union Army. I found his record
over at Ancestry.com in U.S. Civil War Soldiers and Profiles, and
with it, this picture:

Andrew J Dunham enlisted on 15April 1862. He'd been married for
seven years  to Mercie Florence Holcomb and their second daughter
was born the week after he enlisted. Upon his return from the war he
went back to work in the shoe business but then something changed.
Although he was listed as still married on the 1880 Federal Census,
Andrew was living alone except for his housekeeper  Amelia Peterson.
He and his wife may have been in the process of getting a divorce
already because his marital status was given as divorced in the
subsequent Censuses up to 1910. In his final years, Andrew turned to
poultry farming and was an officer in a local association of poultry
farmers.

Andrew's gravestone intrigues me. It gives his year of death as 1917
but The Dunham Genealogy says it was 1910. And although he and
Mercie were divorced they are buried together. Was this the triumph
of a determined woman or the decision of their daughters?

But I found something even more interesting about Andrew Jackson
Dunham and I'll discuss that next!

A FAMILY REUNION OF SORTS2

 ((First posted on my West in New England genealogy blog, Nov.2010))

When I got home from the laundromat on Thursday night I started
researching Cornelius Thomas Dunham. I found him on quite a few
family trees on Rootsweb, along with records at FamilySearch
Record Search and Ancestry.com. Matters were complicated by
the existence of a Cornelius Livingston Dunham born in Abington
in March 1823 while the birth record for Cornelius Thomas Dunham
listed his birth as April 1820, not the April 1823 date on the
monument at Mt Cedar Cemetery. ((Cornelius L was the son of
another Cornelius Dunham, and the father of yet another Cornelius.
((It's a New England thing: find a good name and keep using it until
it's all used up.)). Best of all I found an image of the Boston Deaths
registry for August 1895 which had the cause of death (apoplexy)
and the names of  Cornelius T.'s parents, Ezra Dunham (born in
Plymouth) and Polly Cary(born in North Bridgewater).

Using that information I was able to work back to our common
ancestors John Dunham and Abigail Barlow/Ballou. My family
is descended from their son Samuel Dunham, while Cornelius
was descended from Joseph Dunham. Cornelius Thomas Dunham
was my Dad's 6th cousin 3x removed through our Dunham line.
 

There's also a connection through Patience Barrows by way of
my Ellingwood line. My 3x great grandfather John Ellingwood
Jr was married to Rachel Barrows, Patience Barrow's grandniece.

Besides establishing the degree of relationship between my Dad
and Cornelius Dunham, my research also turned up some other 
interesting facts on Cornelius T. and his branch of the Dunham 
family, such as his wife and children being born in South Carolina,
I'll explore these in the next post

To be continued...

REVEREND EZEKIEL DODGE, MT VERNON CEMETERY, ABINGTON, MA

There are many old gravestones at Mt Vernon Cemetery here in Abington but
there are three in particular that attracted my attention several months ago.
They are near the Perry Mausoleum facing across from the Veterans' lot and
are quite large and weathered.

In fact, only one of them is  readable, and that barely:

I tried converted it to a negative which gave me a better view of the inscription,
and this is what I believe it says:

In Memory of the
Rev, Ezekiel Dodge
Second Minster of Ab-
-ington who was Seized with
an Apoplexy on ye 5th of June
in ye morning & died at ye night in yr
48 of his Age having ye day before
his Death compleated ye 20th year of
his Ministry . Pious & faithful as a Min-
ister well accomplished as a Scholar
truly benevolent as a man & amiable
in all Relations as Husband & Parent
(------) World respected & beloved.

Further investigation online revealed that Rev.Dodge was born in
1722 and died in 1770 so that would fit the 48 years on the
gravestone. I also found that, as is sometimes the case in families
with an accomplished and upstanding parent , Rev Dodge's
son Ezekiel turned out as a rogue and scoundrel.

I did not, however, discover as to whether or not the fatal apoplectic
seizure was caused by something his wayward son had done.

THE PLAN

Today was my usual Thursday off and after running some errands I drove
over to Mt Vernon Cemetery. My plan is to photograph every headstone,
monument and grave marker.It's a big cemetery. So you'll forgive me when
I say it's going to be a monumental task.

I spent part of my visit trying to map out all the roads in the place, Some of
them are named and have "street signs". Others are grass covered and run
down the middle of some of the areas between the paved  roads. So far
I've taken pictures of the sites near South Grove and Vernon Ave and one side
of the first section of Central Ave. Central is the main road that runs throughout
Mt Vernon. I'll post some of the pictures here of course and the older graves
I'll post to Find A Grave. I have some reservations about posting gravestones
from more recent graves but that's a subject for another post.

Meanwhile, here's a photo I took today of a monument I'd shot from a distance
during the winter.

There's a brick base to the urn with an attached nameplate that simply reads
"Wm. F, Barlow Jr."  There are no other markers around the urn and so far I
haven't found anything else about him. It's the only monument of its type in
Mt Vernon and whatever plant once graced the top is long dead.One day I
hope to solve the mystery of who Mr. Barlow was!

MALLARDS, SMOOCHERS, AND MISCREANTS

As I've noted before, Mt. Vernon Cemetery has some areas off the
main access roads and I'm only now able to explore these since the
snow has finally melted. So today on my way to the grocery store
I swung through the cemetery with the idea of visiting one of those
spots and getting some pictures.

 
The area I visited is down below the Center Ave area and contains
some massive trees and graves arranged on three small hills. I
hadn't realized before that there was a small pond concealed by
bushes and a larger one beyond that borders the Frolio School
on the other side. There's several smaller roads running alongside
all three hills and I parked at the intersection of three of them.

As I got out of my car I noticed there were two teenagers in hoodies
down the path on the driver's side of the car.  They glanced back up
the road at me for a second, then one shrugged and passed the joint
they were sharing back to his or her companion.

Well, I decided to take the path in front of my car. I walked a few yards
down and found a pair of mallard ducks in the concealed pond, so I
took their picture. Then I noticed the plot behind me had a rather
elaborate stone wall around it and took a picture of that. But a few yards
down the road I realized there was a car that had been hidden from
view from Center Ave and a young man and woman were engaged in
umm...a little afternoon delight.

I retreated back to my car and went around to the path on the passenger
side which skirted the backside of the small pond. I took a few more
pictures, including one of a family plot that appears to have never been used.
I wondered what had caused that before taking a few more pictures.,

It was at this point I realized that perfhaps the miscreants (the tokers) or the
smoochers might take exception to having someone hanging around taking
pictures and walked back to my car and drove away.

It was only later that I realized that the pair that could have really needed
more privacy were the poor mallards, who at this rate may never start
a family!

THORNS, TREES, & TRAINS

Last Thursday I did my usual routine which now includes a drive through
Mt Vernon Cemetery. While it's a big place it's not huge and there are
areas off the main ones that I'm looking forward to exploring in the
coming weeks. One of them is the hill just across from the Henry
Dunham plot.It overlooks the pond from the other side and the
railroad tracks run by the chainlink fence at the top.

All Winter long I've driven by a small plot at it's left lower corner that was
visible from the road but was unreachable because of the heavy snow. There
are four stones bordering a small extension of the pond and partially entangled
by a large thorn bush. I became curious about it and now that the snow had
melted I took the opportunity to walk in to take some pictures. But when
I did I found myself frustrated. The inscriptions on the gravestones were
facing out towards the road, and they were covered by that impenetrable
tangle of thorns. So for the moment I still don't know the names of those
buried there.

I walked about a bit more heading up the hill as the train went by in time
for me to take a picture. I'd just about reached the fence when I found
a toppled headstone which, when I looked closer, turned out to belong
to another of my Dunham cousins. I took a picture, then noticed there
were three empty stone bases next to it. Were the missing gravestones
victims of vandalism or had harsh New England winters knocked them
over? Charles A Dunham's headstone was nearly covered by dirt and
grass; were his family's markers covered completely? 

I'll check the area out more closely the next time I'm there. And there
be another way to know who was buried there, but I'll blog about that
when I find out for sure.

 

SUMMIT RD , MT VERNON CEMETERY, ABINGTON

Last Thursday I returned to Mt Vernon Cemetery. By now the heavy
snow cover of this past Winter was gone and luckily the grounds were
fairly dry. So at last I had the chance to get out of the car and wander
about with my camera to take pictures.

Mt Vernon is a sprawling cemetery laid out in roads. One of these
is Summit Rd, which is at the southern entrance and, as the name
suggests, at the highest point of the terrain. It's not paved and wasn't
plowed out at all this Winter so this was the first time I'd been able to
walk up it, although I'd taken many photos of the hillside from my
car the past few months.  Most of the gravesites there are among the 
oldest in the cemetery and there's not only a nice view across the interior
of the cemetery but also of the athletic fields at the nearby junior high
and middle schools: (click twice on each picture for best view)

At the top of the hill. Those pine trees on the right are actually on the ground below the hill. 

A gravestone with a bench to match

The view down onto the athletic field from the bench

DRIFTING THROUGH MT. VERNON

This has been one incredible Winter in the Boston area. We've had
over 70 inches of snow in most areas so far, 80 inches in some places,
and we still have two months to go to Spring. It could well be mid to
late April before the last stubborn snowpiles in parking lots finally
melt away!

Once again today I took a drive through Mt. Vernon Cemetery. Many
of the older, smaller gravestones are completely hidden from view by
drifts and only the tops of newer taller headstones poke through out of
the snow. Not even the taller monuments are immune, snow obscuring
their bases in some cases.

I have come to appreciate the wisdom of only plowing out the road around
the perimeter. With the snow so high, it would be terribly easy for some
of the headstones close to the road to be smashed by the plows or be broken
by the weight of the piled up snowbanks.

So for now, I'll have to contine to be patient.  Spring will come eventually, and
it will be that much more the sweeter for having to endure this Winter first.

BLACK & WHITE

Well, at the risk of being repetitious I took a swing through Mt Vernon
Cemetery again today. But this time I had the digital camera set for
black and white. I didn't quite get the play of sun and shadows I'd
hoped for but this was my first time shooting black and white so I
hope to improve my technique with practice.

MT VERNON CEMETERY IN THE SNOW2

Anytime I go out now on my days off from work I take along my camera.,
so today when it turned out the barbershop was closed on Mondays,I
took a drive through Mt. Venon Cemetery again. The snow is still too
deep and the roads still too icy for me to get out and walk it,and I came
in from the rear exit and drove through to the front entrance to get a
different view from my car window.

I don't know about everyone else, but I can't wait for warmer weather
to  melt all this snow. I want to get back to taking my walks!

IF ONLY I WERE A SNOWSHOE RABBIT!

As you can see from the background photo and from the previous post,
it's been a snowy Winter here in Massachusetts so far. The average
snowfall for an entire Winter in the Boston area is 43 inches. We've
already had 40 inches mostly from the last two storms, followed
by a cold spell which has kept melting to a minimum. So for the
present my graveyard jaunts are on hold.

Here's some pictures I took recently on drive thrus after the storms
at Mt. Vernon Cemetery here in Abington to give you an idea of
how long a wait I might have: