Boggledy Family History: February 2014

Sunday, February 16, 2014

Carrie Asbury, "Floyd Todd's first wife"

There she is, standing on the right* of two older women: tall, young, beautiful. Her outfit is obviously more stylish than the dresses the other women are wearing. It looks newer, too. "Who is this woman?" I asked myself. "What happened to her? Why is her name so hard to remember?"

I dug. I had to find the answer.

She wasn't listed in my family tree--Floyd Todd was Margaret (Gray) Dunn's grandson through her daughter Viola (Dunn) Todd, and only one wife was listed for him, a Susie C. Rawlings. She lived a long time, so I thought she must be a subsequent wife. I found two marriage records with a search for Floyd Todd, one for Carrie Asbury and one for Susan C Rawlings. Success! I found her, and I had a name.

Carrie and Floyd were married on August 25, 1914. Floyd was 22 and Carrie was only 17. I'm guessing this picture was taken in late 1914. Less than six months after her marriage to Floyd, Carrie was taken by appendicitis on February 8, 1915.

What a tragedy! She was so young. In the picture, she looks happy. She was so full of life. Carrie passed away almost one hundred years ago, but I can still taste the excitement she experienced from being a new bride and being out on her own.

Carrie and Floyd's marriage record
Carrie's death certificate

*She is on the left of the picture, but she was standing to the right of the two older women.

Monday, February 3, 2014

William Charles Dunn

Parents: James Andrew Dunn, Betsy Elizabeth Cox
Birth: April 17, 1827
Marriage: May 9, 1857 to Margaret Ann Gray. He was 30 and she would be 19 in a few days. They had 9 children: Edward, Charles Millard, Delia Anita, Molly, Viola, Lethia Alafaire, William Leo, Lloyd L, and Alvie Burton
Death: January 24, 1913 at the age of 85.

As I researched William's life, three things stuck out to me: he was a farmer, he was a homebody, and he cared about detail. On every census, his occupation was listed as farmer, although many of the other farmers that I've researched listed secondary occupations in the occupation field instead. William identified as a farmer. Of all the documents I found for him, none of them showed him being further than 20 or so miles away from the place he was born. He liked being with his family, both immediate and extended. The thing that made me realize that he payed attention to detail was that his birth date was correct on every record that I looked at. Compared to other records that I've looked at from his time period in the South, he was very particular to get this one thing right. I imagine that carried over to other aspects of his life as well.

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William was born in Mecklenburg county, probably just northwest of Charlotte where he lived most of his life. He was the only boy in his family for the first 6 years of his life, with two older sisters and two sisters between him and his next youngest brother. After that, five more sisters came into his family, followed by the two youngest, both boys. The youngest brother was born just a few months before the 1850 census was taken. All this time, it appears that the family was living in Mecklenburg county, northwest of Charlotte.

William met Margaret Ann Gray about 6 or 7 years later, and they were married--or at least they obtained their marriage license--in Gaston county, immediately east of Mecklenburg county. It's about 20 miles from the county seat of Gaston county to Paw Creek, where the family lived, but I'm guessing that William lived closer than the county seat.

William and Margaret stayed in Gaston County for at least three years after their marriage; in 1860, they were living there with their fist child. Sometime before 1870, though, they were back in Paw Creek, Mecklenburg county, next to William's family. They stayed in the area until William passed away in 1913 at age of 85.

References:

1830 Census (father James listed; all that indicates William is the one boy attributed to that family)

1850 Census: