Tombstone Tuesday ~ Ebenezer Crosby and Sarah Richardson, Chebogue Cemetery, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia

This tombstone was photographed at the Chebogue Cemetery, at Town Point, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia

EBENEZER CROSBY

DIED

Nov, 1863

aged 91 yrs

SARAH RICHARDSON

DIED

Oct. 1823

Aged 47 yrs

CROSBY

Ebenezer Crosby is my 4th Great Grand Uncle, son of Ebenezer Crosby and Elizabeth Robinson.  He was born in 1772 and died on 13 December 1863 in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia.  He married Sarah Richardson, the daughter of Reuben Richardson.  He was the brother of my 4th great grandmother, Rebecca Crosby (b. 1789), who married Comfort Haley (1787 - 1874).  Ebenezer lived to be 91 years old, which was quite a feat in those times!

Ebenezer Crosby, senior was an early settler at Chebogue.  He arrived in Nova Scotia with his parents, Jonathan Crosby and Hannah Hamblin, with the six families that sailed up the coast from Connecticut.  The Crosby family originally lived on Cape Cod, and they are Mayflower descendants.  You can see a blog post with a photo of Jonathan and Hannah Crosby's tombstone in the Chebogue cemetery HERE.

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The URL for this post is
http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2014/07/tombstone-tuesday-ebenezer-crosby-and.html

Copyright (c) 2014, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

Serendipity Week #2 A Civil War Hero

This past week, several interesting emails and comments have led me to make several interesting genealogical breakthroughs in my research.  Today I am focusing on the second story- # 1.) about a painting, 2.)  a Civil War Veteran,  and  3.) a letter between two teenage girl and boy in the 1840s.

Last week I received an interesting email from Michael Collins, the Commissioner of Public Services and Engineering for the City of Beverly, Massachusetts.  He had found my blog stories about my Great Great Grandfather Joseph Edwin Healey and had some information for me that was quite exciting.

I had an 1860 Federal Census from Beverly that listed Edwin Healey as a mariner, living with his wife and family.  In the 1870 census I couldn't find him alive, and his wife Matilda was listed as a widow living alone.  I couldn't find any Joseph Healey serving in the Civil War from Massachusetts, and I thought that perhaps he had died at sea, since there were no death records in Beverly or in the Massachusetts Vital Records.  I had many family members who had died at sea, and they were not found in town or state records. 

However, Mr. Collins said that Joseph Edwin Healey enlisted in the Navy in 1861, and he was killed aboard the USS Mound City at the Battle of Saint Charles, White River, Arkansas in 1862.   As the Public Services Commissioner he said "My quest is to document the veteran squares in the city of Beverly and when I came to Healey Square, I turned up the details here.  The intersection of Cabot and Judson is known as Healey Square.  This is right next to the Cabot Theater.  I hope I have the right person.  If so, you should know that he was honored as a hero.  My goal is to raise awareness of the veterans for whom we have dedicated squares.  In this case I would be replacing the existing wooden sign with a new cast sign.  I hope in the end to have a web page dedicated to each square."

Mr. Collins also sent a photo of Joseph Edwin Healey's civil war tombstone.  I never knew this existed, since I had no death record to point to a cemetery.  He was also buried next to a tombstone that read "MOTHER" (I assume this was Matilda?), and his son and daughter-in-law.  All this was nearby to Healy Square, which, another big surprise, was very close to where the family lived on 43 Bartlett Street in Beverly!  My mother knew her own grandmother, who grew up in this house, and no-one ever spoke about Healey Square being named for a family member!

Mr. Collins has a Veteran's agent, Jerry Guilebbe,  researching the archives in Worcester for the Civil War records.  The cemetery lists Joseph as "lost at sea, GAR".    I was close thinking he was lost at sea, but I never knew he was lost during the Civil War.  On a list of the casualties for the USS Mound City, he appears to have been listed as "Edward Healey", just like on his tombstone.

If this isn't enough serendipity for one story, it turns out that Mr. Collins worked in the same city department as my Uncle Don (from the story about Beverly's Lynch Park).   His efforts to research and document all the Veteran's Squares in the City of Beverly are a wonderful project.  He also told me "For the last several months I have had my staff scanning cemetery records and creating a database and that helped here.  We are back to the early 1900s.  Should make everyone's life easier when done."  I hope to find out if that database will be available to the public, since Beverly was founded in the early 1600s and there might be hundreds of thousands of descendants interested in that cemetery information!

I hope to get to Beverly soon to see the Healey family plot, visit Healey Square and perhaps see if the local library has any newspaper records of the story behind Great Great Grandpa's Veteran's Square sign.  Thanks to Mike Collins and Jerry Guilebbe, I have found a part of my genealogy that is a nice surprise to my whole family!

Genealogy:

Generation 1: William Hele, born about 1713 in Cornwood, Devonshire, England, died 18 November 1683 in Cambridge, Massachusetts; married on 15 August 1661 to Phebe Green, daughter of Bartholomew Green and Elizabeth Unknown, born about 1629 (one of five wives!)  Four children by Phebe, thirteen children in all. 

Generation 2: Paul Healy, born about 1664 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, died 3 December 1717 in Rehoboth, Massachusetts; married about 1695 to Elizabeth Unknown.  Fourteen children.

Generation 3: Ebenezer Healy, born 21 January 1708 in Rehoboth, Massachusetts, died 14 February 1777 in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia; married first to Grace Bullen, daughter of John Bullen and Sarah Underwood, born about 1727 in Brimfield, Massachusetts. Eight children. 

Generation 4: Comfort Haley, born 1754 in Brimfield, Massachusetts, died 15 May 1821 in Chebogue, Nova Scotia; married on 21 July 1777 to Abigail Allen, daughter of Jeremiah Allen and Eunice Gardner, born 23 July 1753 in Manchester, Massachusetts, died 16 June 1799.  Seven children. 

Generation 5: Comfort Haley, born 9 October 1787 in Chebogue, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, died 3 December 1874 in Chebogue; married on 12 August 1808 in Chebogue to Rebecca Crosby, daughter of Ebenezer Crosby and Elizabeth Robinson, born 19 December 1789 in Yarmouth.  Eleven children. 

Generation 6: Joseph Edwin Healey, born 12 August 1823 in Belfast, Maine or Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, died 19 June 1862, killed when the USS Mound City was sunk at the Battle of Saint Charles, Arkansas; married on 3 February 1848 to Matilda Weston, daughter of Zadoc Weston and Mary Clements, born October 1825 in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, died 19 August 1909 in Beverly, Massachusetts.  Four children.

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Copyright 2011, Heather Wilkinson Rojo
 

Haleys Buried at Chebogue, Nova Scotia- Tombstone Tuesday

Some of the Haley family members buried at the Town Point Cemetery, Chebogue, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia.  This burial ground is located down the road from the Chebogue Congregational Church.  This is a beautiful location, on a point of land surrounded on three sides by the sea.  Unfortunately, the stones are quite weathered because of the ocean air and weather.  The Haley family relocated from Yarmouth, Massachsuetts, on Cape Cod, to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia.

In Memory

Of

Mrs. Abigail Hele

Wife of

Mr. Comfort Hele

Died June 16, 1799

Aged 46 years

Abigail Allen was born 23 July 1753 in Manchester, Massachusetts, and died 16 June 1799 in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia.  She came with her parents, Jeremiah Allen and Eunice Gardner, to Nova Scotia in 1766.  Abigail married Comfort Haley on 21 July 1777, probably in Chebogue. 

In memory of

Mr. Comfort Healy

who died May 15, 1821

Aged 67

Hear what the voice from Heaven proclaims

For all the pious dead

Sweet is the savior of their names

and soft their sleeping bed

Them while ye hearing heart strings break

How sweet my minutes roll

Immortal paleness on my cheek

And glory in my soul 

Comfort Haley was born in 1754 in Brimfield, Massachusetts, and died 15 May 1821 near Chebogue, Nova Scotia.   He was the son of Ebenezer Haley and his second wife, Grace Bullen.  Ebenezer took his family to Nova Scotia in 1762 and settled on Shurliffe's Point. 

Hannah

relict of

Comfort Haley

d. Jan 17, 1862

Aged 92 yrs

11 mos 13 days

Hannah Ellis was born 4 February 1765 in Chebogue, Nova Scotia, and died 17 January 1862 in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia.  She was the daughter of Ebenezer Ellis and Hannah,  settlers who had removed from Sandwich, Massachusetts. Hannah married Comfort Haley in December 1795 as his second wife.

In Memory of

MARGARET

wife of

Ebenezer Haley

who died 1st July 1828

in the

25th Year of her Age.

Hear what the voice from heaven proclaims

For all the pious ready

Sweet is the savor of their names

And soft their sleeping head

Margaret Hilton was born about 1803, and died 1 July 1828.  She was the first wife of Ebenezer Haley, son of Comfort Haley and Hannah Ellis, and they married on 8 January 1822 in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia.  Margaret was the daughter of Henry Hilton.

Martha,

wife of

Jeremiah Haley

born

16th Aug, 1786

died

22nd Mar, 1852

Martha Shurtliffe was born 16 August 1786, and died 22 Mar 1852, daughter of Henry Shurtliffe.  She married Jeremiah Haley on 1 September 1807, son of Comfort Haley and Abigail Allen. 

Click here for a story I wrote about the Chebogue Town Point Cemetery
http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2010/05/tombstone-tuesday-chebogue-nova-scotia.html

Old Cemetery at Chebogue Town Point, Nova Scotia
GPS coordinates N43 46.61 W 66 05.907

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Copyright 2011, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

Cousins Collaborate ( and more relationships appear!)

Washington Place, Honolulu

Last week Leah, from "Internet Genealogist" and I collaborated on a story that involved our great-great aunts meeting in Hawaii in 1848. Her distant relation, Estelle Charlotte Mott, was a teenaged boarder at my distant relation’s (4x great aunt), Mary L. (Jones) Dominis’s boarding house in Honolulu. This story came about because a third person, Edna Haley Pace, wrote to me about my blog postings on the history of the Dominis family home, Washington Place, in Hawaii. The internet played a big part in putting this together, and of course, Leah and I used our blogs on the internet to write two complementary stories.

Soon after the stories were posted, I received a lot of email, and several were from other bloggers, such as Carol from “Reflections from the Fence”, who told me that her husband was also a Haley descendant. The Nova Scotia Haley/Healy family is part of my and Edna Haley Pace’s family tree. We are all descendants of Comfort Haley, born 1754 in Massachusetts and died 15 May 1821 in Chebogue, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia. My great great grandmother was Mary Etta Healy, Comfort’s great granddaughter.

Also, Barbara Poole, at “Life from the Roots” had a distant relation, Anthony Ten Eyck, who was also a boarder at Washington Place, and in fact, he is famous for having suggested to Mrs. Dominis that her new home in Honolulu looked like Mount Vernon, so she should call it “Washington Place”. This name stuck when King Kamehameha IV agreed with the name and so it went down in history. Anthony Ten Eyck was in Honolulu serving as commissioner to Hawaii for President Polk, until he was replaced by Charles Eames in December 1848.

I have passed along Essie’s memoir to members of the Dominis family, descendants of Mrs. Mary Dominis, and to the curator at Washington Place. The curator wrote “the Mott Diary, a significant document that records and important slice of time…I love it…green shutters, pantelettes, contraband custards and stolen pies!” She also said that the museum has copies of letters of reproach “regarding John Dominis and the young Mott girls…” We can’t wait to see these copies! Another possible blog post in the making!

This story and the internet seem to have been made for each other! Please stay tuned to "Internet Genealogist" as Leah posts the rest of Essie's journal, including more pages about her life in Honolulu in 1848.

My story about Essie and Mrs. Dominis is at http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2010/04/cousins-collaborate-on-genealogy-story.html

Leah's post with the first part of Essie's story in Honolulu is at http://shbwgen.blogspot.com/2010/04/transcription-mott-memoir-part-11.html

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Copyright 2010, Heather Wilkinson Rojo

Cousins Collaborate on a Genealogy Story

Sometimes I will post certain stories from “Nutfield Genealogy” at the website GenealogyWise. This is a social networking website for genealogists. There I had re-posted my series of stories about my 4x great aunt Mary Lambert Jones (1803-1889), who married Captain John Dominis and removed to the Hawaiian Islands. She built an impressive home in Honolulu, and lived there with her little boy, John Owen Dominis, who later became the husband to Queen Lili’uokalani of Hawaii. A few years earlier, her two teenage daughters died whilst at a boarding school in Schenectady, New York. The little girls never saw Honolulu.

Captain Dominis disappeared on a trip to China in 1846. Mrs. Dominis moved into her big mansion home built by her husband in 1847, and lived as a widow. Because she was now deprived of her husband’s substantial income, and she had to support her large home, she took in boarders. Most of the boarders were visiting Americans. One boarder, a Mr. Ten Eyck, suggested the name “Washington Place” for her new home because it looked like Washington’s Mount Vernon.

I’m sure that Mary Dominis missed her homeland, her little daughters and her husband very much. The endless boarders coming and going at Washington Place must have entertained her mind and given her company. Two little girls came to her as boarders in 1848, and their presence at Washington Place must have been quite a blessing. These two girls were Estrella Charlotte Mott (b. 1835) and her sister Eveline (1830-1849).

And so the granddaughter of Essie Mott wrote to me via Genealogy Wise that she had read my post about Mrs. Dominis and Washington Place. Even better, she had a memoir, written by Essie in 1913, reminiscing about her voyage in 1847 and 1848 from her boarding school in New York to Hawaii on the way to reunite with her family in Mazatlan, Mexico, where her father had business. Her journal was 50 pages, and Leah at the blog “The Internet Genealogist” has been patiently transcribing the journal and posting a few pages at a time. Leah is the great niece of the owner of Essie’s journal.

It is definitely serendipity and a blessing that these two women have shared Essie’s journal with me. Through Essie’s stories about her six months at Washington Place I have learned quite a bit about Mrs. Dominis and her son, the then sixteen year old John Owen Dominis. Essie also reminisces about meeting the children at the Royal School, including Prince Alexander and Prince David (Lili’uokalani’s brother, the future King Kalakaua). Essie even attended a reception at the Royal Palace, and mentions some other members of the Hawaiian Royal family. I have also passed along copies of the scanned images of Essie’s journal to Dominis descendants, and to the curator of Washington Place Museum.

I have also learned that not only do I share this story with Leah; we are also Haley/Healey cousins. Essie’s sister, Mary Gertrude Mott (1852-1927), married Comfort Gordon Haley (1838-1910) of Nova Scotia. Comfort was cousin to my 4x great grandfather Joseph Edwin Healy (1823-abt 1860) who removed from Nova Scotia to Beverly, Massachusetts. The power of the internet strikes again!

Washington Place served as the home to the Dominis family for many years. Queen Lili’uokalani served her imprisonment here, and left the home to her heir John Aimoku Dominis. Later, the Dominis family left the home to the state of Hawaii and it served as the Governor’s residence. It is now a museum.

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Please visit Leah’s blog “The Internet Genealogist” at http://shbwgen.blogspot.com/

Leah’s transcription of Essie Mott’s journal, with her arrival in Honolulu is at this link http://shbwgen.blogspot.com/2010/04/transcription-mott-memoir-part-10.html

and a second part of the journal, with more about Mrs. Dominis's house at
http://shbwgen.blogspot.com/2010/04/transcription-mott-memoir-part-11.html

and a third section of Essie's journal, with stories about parties in Honolulu and Prince Alexander http://shbwgen.blogspot.com/2010/04/transcription-mott-memoir-part-12.html

Leah’s genealogy webpage is http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~shbwgen/

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My previous blog postings about Mrs. Dominis:

February 2, 2010 Four John Dominises http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2010/02/chronicling-america-website-part-two.html

February 1, 2010 Chronicling America and Hawaiian Cousins http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2010/02/chronicling-america-and-hawaiian.html

December 7, 2009 Christmas in Hawaii http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2009/12/advent-calendar-christmas-in-hawaii.html

July 27, 2009 Hawaii- The Boston Connection to a Royal Lineage http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2009/07/hawaii-boston-connection-to-royal.html

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Copyright 2010, Heather Wilkinson Rojo
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