John Spence Sutherland: 1878-1965
The Sutherlands Branch Out Across the Atlantic
I made the mistake of assuming all my husband’s Sutherland
ancestors remained in Scotland, as Margaret Sutherland, my husband’s
second-great-grandmother, did. The family, after all, was quite successful.
They owned an iron forge business and mostly lived in nice homes. Emigration
was usually the choice of families who were struggling to make a living.
However, several of Margaret’s nephews ended up branching out across the
Atlantic to build lives in the United States. Margaret’s nephew, John Spence
Sutherland, was one of those adventurers.
John Spence Sutherland, named for his mother’s father John
Spence, was born on July 4, 1878 to Thomas Sutherland, Margaret Sutherland’s
brother, and his wife Jeanie Spence. He was their second child and their oldest
son. According to the 1881 Scotland census, Thomas was working in his father’s
iron forge business as an iron forger. The family lived at 58 Wellwynd in New
Monkland, Lanarkshire, Scotland. Thomas and Jeanie’s family eventually grew to
include four daughters and three sons (two additional daughters died as
toddlers), and they moved from the Wellwynd home to a fine home at 8 Victoria
Place in Airdrie, a home known as Marchmont.
John’s father, Thomas Sutherland, died June 25, 1904. He was
only fifty years old, so the loss was likely an unexpected shock for his wife
and children. John was only 25 years old, and was left as the head of the
family. His youngest sibling, William Spence Sutherland, was only nine years
old, and even John’s oldest sisters were still unmarried. John had followed his
father into the family business, and as of the 1901 census had been working as
an “iron forgeman”. He probably continued in this position following his
father’s death.
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| Marriage record for John and Isabella, posted on another tree on Ancestry. |
John married two years later on December 21, 1906. His wife,
Isabella Gardner, was 26 years old, and he was 28. A year later their first
son, Thomas Sutherland, was born on October 3, 1907. His birth record lists the
young family’s address as what appears to be “Amberside, Cary Street, Airdrie.”
I can find no record of such an address, so I have probably misread the entry.
John and Isabella’s second son, Andrew, was born April 3,
1909 in Airdrie, but John was not there to witness the birth. He had left
aboard the ship Ionian on January 31, arriving in Boston on February 10, 1909.
He planned to go on to Detroit to find a job. What happened in Airdrie that
motivated him to abandon his wife, however temporarily, just weeks before she
was due to give birth? I would think the family faced some sort of financial
pressure that caused him to act so precipitously. The address on baby Andrew’s
birth record was different than just two years before—the handwriting appears
to say Isabella was living at Greenvale on South Nimmo Street in Airdrie. Did
the family fall on hard times?
John must have found work in Detroit quite quickly, as well
as a place for his family to live, for Isabella and her two sons arrived in
Quebec on July 29, 1909, also aboard the ship Ionian, just five months after
his arrival. Imagine Isabella’s courage, traveling alone with a two year old
and a new baby not yet four months old! The trip, as we see from the
information on John’s naturalization papers, took at least ten days. Ten days
with two tiny children, probably in shared quarters! I feel she must have been
fairly desperate to undertake such a risky, long trip on her own.
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| Passenger list from the Ionian, July 1909 showing Isabella and two sons |
The young family reunited in Detroit, and by the 1910 census
they were living in a rented home at 24 Putnam Street (now the location of
Wayne State University), and John was working as a “steam fitter” at a machine
shop, a job that apparently involves installing piping.
By the 1920 census, the family had grown by one—daughter
Isabella had been born June 29, 1920—and now lived in their own home at 320
King Street in Detroit. While the home no longer stands, similar homes remain
on the opposite side of the street and were large, two-story brick homes—John
was earning a good living to support his family, working as a machinist at an
auto factory. The family also had three boarders sharing their home—all were
machinists like John, so were probably co-workers.
The family’s financial situation had improved even more by
1930. John was now a foreman at the auto factory, and the family had moved to a
more expensive neighborhood, owning a $9500 home at 2564 Elmhurst Avenue. The
family was still there in 1940 as well, although John was now only a
“production man” at an auto factory making a more modest $1200 salary.
John’s World War II draft card provides a little more
information. John worked at the Highland Park Ford factory. The building is
shown below during the war, with a note that Ford changed production at the
facility from cars to tanks to support the war effort. John was probably proud
to serve his country at work even though he was too old at 60 to go to war.
Records relating to the deaths of John and Isabella have
been difficult to locate. I only found John’s Social Security Death Record,
which states he died “Jan. 1965”. John and Isabella’s three children all went
on to lead stable, middle class lives, so John’s choice to branch out from the
life he knew in Scotland to unknown possibilities in a new country seems to
have paid off.
Sometime in the 1920s, John became a naturalized American
citizen. His application for naturalization can be seen below. Becoming a
citizen seems appropriate for a man with a July 4 birthday. Perhaps he was
fated to become an American.
Sources:
Information and document images from Ancestry.com
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