Slow to Emigrate: 52 Ancestors 2023 Prompt “Slow”

 Arriving in America Late in Life: Last Sister in Scotland

Mary Ann Robertson: 1864-1947 (Great-grandaunt)

Mary Ann Robertson was the only sister of great-grandmother Jane Ann Robertson, the youngest of William Robertson and Helen Wood’s four children. Born March 21, 1864 in Dundee, Scotland, Mary Ann never married and seems to have lived with her parents in Dundee until their deaths.

However, she didn’t remain in Scotland.  According to Mary Ann’s death certificate, she died in the United States on July 13, 1947 at the age of 84 and 3 months. She apparently was living with her nephew Andrew Aird and sister Jane Robertson Aird at the family home at 2690 Wreford Avenue in Detroit till her death.

So when did she arrive in America? Her death certificate provided a surprising answer.  In response the question of “Length of Stay in this Community”, respondent Andrew Aird reported 26 years. This means Mary Ann emigrated from Scotland around 1921 when she was about 57. That seems a bit old to decide to cross an ocean and settle in Detroit. Why did she choose to emigrate so late in life?  

I searched for verification of her years in America. I found her on the 1940 census living with her sister Jane, along with Jane’s daughter Isabella and son Andrew. However she was not listed on the enumeration for Jane’s household at the time of the 1930 census. So where was she?

A census search found her living with another of Jane’s children, David Aird and his wife and child. Her occupation was listed as “Household helper” so presumably she helped David’s wife.

I searched immigration records and found Mary Ann’s arrival at Ellis Island June 26, 1920 aboard the ship Columbia. According to the arriving passenger list, Mary Ann, listed as Mary Robertson, was 54 years and 10 months of age, and was 5 feet two inches with fair skin, grey hair and grey eyes. She stated that her destination was Detroit, where her sister Jane Aird lived, and her length of stay was “permanent”. 

Curiously, she listed her occupation as “housewife” despite being a life-long spinster. I was surprised that the person she listed as the “nearest relative or friend” back in Scotland was not one of her brothers, but her cousin, Mrs. Jane Watson of 6 Taits Lane, Dundee. The other shock was that she was unable to read or write!

I was left with many questions. Since she claimed to be a “housewife”, I suspected she had cared for her parents as they aged in Dundee. Had she never attended school? Was this why she couldn’t read or write? Or did she just read and write at a very low level?

I decided to go back to Scotland records to see when Mary Ann’s parents died. Did their deaths prompt her decision to join her sister in Detroit? Sadly, neither Family Search nor Ancestry has death records or dates for either William Robertson or Helen/Ellen Wood Robertson. They both appear on the 1871 census. William is a 43 year old “fireman” and Helen is 41. They are living at 17 Ryehill Lane in St. Peter, Forfarshire. They also appear on the 1881 census; at that point William has been promoted to foundry foreman. However, they appear to have died before the 1891 census, which finds Mary Ann living with sister Jane, her husband James Aird, and their four children on Lawrence St. in Dundee. Mary Ann is employed as a factory worker.

Mary Ann is still living with sister Jane and brother-in-law James Aird at the time of the 1901 census. She is listed as working as a jute weaver. I found a second 1901 census record showing Mary Ann boarding with a family named Chalmers, still working as a jute weaver. I suspect both Marys are the same person—she must have moved out after the Aird household completed the census, and before the Chalmers household was interviewed.

I also looked at other family members. Jane and Mary Ann had two brothers, Thomas and James. At the time of the 1871 census, Thomas had already left home and was working as a baker and boarding with at 21 Millers Road with a family near his workplace. He went on to marry and raise a large family with two wives. His first wife, Jessie, died in 1881, so by the time of the 1881 census he was a widower with four children living with his parents, sister Jane and her new husband James Aird, and unmarried sister Mary Ann. Presumably the extended family was providing childcare while he continued to work as a baker. He then remarried to Margaret Smith and moved and moved to Liff and Benvie. I find no records to indicate Mary Ann ever boarded with him.

Her other brother, James Robertson, died suddenly in 1897 at age 38, so he hadn’t been able to assist her over the years. It seems like she had been on her own for many years.Jute weaving involved hard physical labor, and at its height around 1900, 40,000 to 50,000 people were employed in the jute industry in Dundee. Two thirds of those workers were women, as they commanded lower wages than men. Did Mary Ann need to stop working due to an injury or due to the long-term effects of the labor on an aging body? Or did she get laid off as the jute industry began to relocate to India? Did she need to emigrate because she could no longer provide for herself?

I wish I could ask Mary Ann what motivated her to move to America. What a terrifying prospect it must have been to leave behind everything and everyone you knew to travel across the ocean and then travel across several states to reach a sister she hadn’t seen in nearly twenty years. Perhaps fear explains her reluctance to emigrate for so long. While Mary Ann may have been slow to make her decision, she was brave to undertake it at nearly 55 years of age.  

Sources:

Michigan Department of Community Health, Division for Vital Records and Health Statistics; Lansing, Michigan; Death Records. Accessed with Ancestry.com.

The National Archives and Records Administration; Washington, D.C.; Passenger and Crew Lists of Vessels Arriving at and Departing from Ogdensburg, New York, 5/27/1948 - 11/28/1972; Microfilm Serial or NAID: T715, 1897-1957, Description Ship or Roll Number: Columbia. Accessed on Ancestry.com. https://www.ancestry.com/imageviewer/collections/7488/images/NYT715_2787-0047?pId=4036301205

“Beyond ‘Juteopolis’: Dundee’s changing economic landscape.” By Gillian Sharpe. BBC Scotland. 7 July 2013. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-23105283

Research Library Surprise: 52 Ancestors 2022 Prompt “At the Library”

Google Search on Archie Shields Turns Up Surprise Collection of Papers in Library Archives at University of Michigan

Archibald Shields: 1899-1965

 

Great-Uncle Archie Shields (brother of Grandmother May Shields Aird)  turned out to be a man of many surprises. My initial research unearthed his World War I military records, detailing his service with the Canadian Expeditionary Forces. This would have made perfect sense if Archie had been Canadian, but he was born and raised in the United States. How did he end up enlisting in Canada? While trying to solve this puzzle, I conducted a Google search on his name and military unit. To my surprise, the search pulled up his name as the subject of a collection of letters, papers and photographs held in a research library at the University of Michigan! I had to know more!

Passport photo of Archie as a young man

Apparently Archie's letters to family members from his time in the Canadian military were donated to the Manuscripts Division of the William L. Clements library sometime around 2019.  The materials are open for research, so can be requested for viewing and reading at the library. 

Vintage postcard of the William L Clements Library building

The library's information on the collection includes an excellent summary of Archie’s life, as follows:

“Archibald "Archie" Shields was born September 7, 1899, in Hamilton, Ohio, to Jane Mary Seller Pollok (1868-1954) and John Sutherland Shields (1865-1959). Both of his parents were originally from Scotland and resided in Dutch Suriname for a time before immigrating to the United States. Shields had four sisters: Mary "May" Seller Shields (1893-1988), Margaret Sutherland Shields (1896-1993), Bethia Jane Shields (1901-1978), and Ruth Dorothy Shields (1904-1995). In 1916, seeking independence, Shields ran away to Windsor, Ontario, Canada, and joined the 99th Battalion of the Canadian Expeditionary Force. Following the war, Shields studied fruit farming at Michigan State University and worked for several years in Barahona, Dominican Republic. After returning to Detroit, he worked as a salesperson for Hudson's, Kern's, and the Foley Company. Archie Shields married Ruth Harvey Patterson (1904-1994) on July 2, 1928. He died on April 2, 1965, and is buried in North Farmington Cemetery in Farmington Hills, Michigan.”

The library also provided a synopsis of the collection’s contents, which sound absolutely fascinating. Here is the library’s description:

‘This collection is made up of 71 items, including 28 letters written by Archibald "Archie" Shields of Detroit, Michigan, to his parents and sisters while serving in the Canadian Expeditionary Force during World War I. Shields served in France on the Western Front and, while on leave, visited friends and family in Scotland. The remaining materials include documents, ephemera, photographs, printed items, and one VHS tape.

“The Correspondence Series is comprised of 28 letters written by Archie to his parents and sisters during his time in the Canadian Infantry during World War I. The correspondence begins when Shields's battalion mobilized in May 1916. He quartered in London, Ontario, Canada, for several weeks before traveling through Toronto, Montreal, and New Brunswick, to board the troop ship Olympic at Halifax, Nova Scotia. After arriving in England in early June, the battalion was stationed at Otterpool Camp in Kent, where Shields applied for a transfer to become a driver and the 99th Battalion dissolved into the 35th. Towards the end of September, Shields went to France as part of the 21st Battalion. Admitted to the hospital in March 1917 for "swollen glands and sore throat," he became a patient in the 16th General Hospital in France, 1st Southern General Hospital in Birmingham, and Hillingdon House Hospital in Uxbridge. Following his recovery, Shields spent time visiting relatives and family friends in Scotland but was punished upon his return for taking longer leave than approved. He took subsequent leaves to Paris and Scotland. The last of the letters is dated November 5, 1918.

RMS Olympic in WWI--troop ship that carried Archie to England

“Shields's letters include descriptions of camp life and military training (marksmanship, stretcher bearing, trench digging), requests for parcels, requests and comments on news from home (include fundraising efforts), notes on letters and packages received, comments on friends' and relatives' military experiences, and remarks on his own experiences (including censorship, shelling, and life in the trenches). Envelopes are included with most letters, many with an "Opened By Censor" label attached. Shields wrote some of his letters on YMCA "With His Majesty's Canadian Forces on Active Service" stationery.

Hat pin for Archie's battalion, the 21st Canadian

“The Documents and Ephemera Series contains a worn black wallet with two colorful military uniform bars, a small black flip notebook, three Canadian Expeditionary Force pay books, and items commemorating the installation of a memorial window at St. Paul's Anglican Church in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, in 2007. Contained in the black wallet are a photograph of Archie Shields in uniform, a 1922 10,000 reichsmark note, and a military pass. The black notebook contains names and addresses of acquaintances, military tactics notes, and brief journal entries respecting Shields's time at the front in France until his admission to the hospital in England; in its pocket is a torn scrap of paper with the header "Plantation Alliance, Suriname, Dutch Guyana." Laid into one of Shields's pay books are assorted papers, including a telegram from his Aunt Effie, railway tickets, calling cards (Clarisse Dalouze and Marie Dalouze of Trazegnies, Belgium, and Armand Loutz of Spy, Namur, Belgium), and a postcard from a watch repair shop.”

There are so many wonderful items in this collection that I want to see, read and copy for family records. The library provided so many tantalizing pieces of information--such as Archie’s agriculture studies in fruit propagation that led to work in the Dominican Republic, and his visits to Shields family members in Scotland--that I had not discovered through traditional research. The collection also includes photos that we have never seen. I checked with other family members, and none were aware that Archie’s papers had been donated to the University of Michigan Libraries. I assume one of his children made the donation, but I have no evidence to support my supposition.

Archie Shields later in life...

I am eager to visit the William L. Clements Library at some point to see the collection in person, as the materials are not available online. I am so grateful that I decided to Google Archie’s name! What a wonderful surprise!

Sources:

Archie Shields papers (1916-1918, 2007, bulk 1916-1918). Collection processed and finding aid created by Sara Quashnie, February 2019. Manuscripts Division, William L. Clements Library, University of Michigan.

https://quod.lib.umich.edu/c/clementsead/umich-wcl-M-7108shi?id=navbarbrowselink;view=text

Shields, Archibald. Personnel Records of the First World War, Library and Archives Canada, http://central.bac-lac.gc.ca/.item/?op=pdf&app=CEF&id=B8864-S023. Accessed February 22, 2019

Aird, John Shields. Memoirs of John S. Aird, http://www.steveaird.org/Steve_Airds_Homepage/John_Shields_Aird_files/Memoirs%20of%20John%20S.%20Aird.pdf. Accessed February 20, 2019.

 

The Sutherlands Hop the Pond: 52 Ancestors 2022 Prompt “Branching Out”

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.

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.

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

David Aird-- Fresh Off the Boat to Employed: 52 Ancestors 2021 Prompt “Working”

Working from Day Three In America
David Aird: 1897-1975

 

I was delighted to discover a news clipping about David Aird, my husband’s granduncle, that provided some background on how he came to get a job at the Detroit Free Press. The story was a perfect illustration of how David and his brothers came to America ready to work hard and build a new life, and how they arrived at just the right time to make that dream come true.

David Aird was born September 12, 1897 in Dundee, Scotland to parents James Aird and Jane Ann Robertson Aird. James worked as a cabinetmaker; David was the youngest of seven children. The family lived at 14 Peddie Street in Dundee, just down the street from Jane’s brother Thomas, whose family had lived at 10 Peddie in 1891, and at 12 Peddie after 1901.

Peddie Street in Dundee, early 1900s

According to John Aird’s memoirs, his grandfather James Aird was “evidently quite skilled at his trade, but he became an alcoholic, drank up much of his wages, and the family lived in poverty. They seldom entertained friends at home because [Jane] could not be sure in what condition her husband would come home from work. Sometimes the children had to be sent to retrieve him from the tavern. Eventually his drinking led to cirrhosis of the liver, and he then stopped drinking, but the damage was already done, and in two years he was dead. My grandmother later said those final two years (of sobriety) were the happiest of her life.”

To help support the family while her husband’s earnings were erratic, Jane arranged for the oldest boys to be apprenticed in a trade—James and William as electrician apprentices, and Harry first with a greengrocer and then with a hardware store owner.  William, the oldest son, married in 1904, and soon had a son of his own to support. Looking for new and better opportunities, he left Scotland for America in 1907. He, his wife and little son arrived in New York on May 12, 1907, a year before his father James died back in Scotland.

David was only ten when his father died in 1908. The family was left impoverished. Jane took in washing to support her children, and soon her children began emigrating one by one to America, following in William’s footsteps. John Aird said that each of them would arrive in America with “a handful of gold coins, required proof that they were not indigent. Once established in the new country, the coins were sent home so that the next brother cold use them to gain entry.” Harry was the first to leave, arriving in New York on November 13, 1910 at age 24. The eldest child, Isabella, followed, arriving July 17, 1911 at age 31, already an old maid. James followed May 2, 1913.

By 1914, the four oldest children were gainfully employed in the Detroit area, and were able to afford to send for their mother and the remaining siblings. Fortuitously, Jane and her children arrived in New York aboard the ship Campania on June 1, 1914, just barely a month before World War I erupted and made sea travel perilous. Sister Jean Aird was 22 years old, Andrew Aird was 19, and young David was 16.

RMS Campania

David described his arrival in the news article, remembering that they arrived on a Monday, and

“Friends met them and took them to Jersey City for Supper. Then they were put aboard a Detroit-bound train.

‘We arrived here (Detroit) Tuesday morning,’ Aird said. ‘That night there was an ad in the paper for a boy to work in the Free Press composing room. William told me how to get to the Free Press. I went down the next day and was hired. I had a job on my second day in Detroit and only my third in the United States.”

David worked for six years as an apprentice in the composing room, learning the linotype machine and other newspaper composition skills. He left the newspaper for a year but returned in 1921 and worked there until he retired. What an amazing story! His siblings had similar experiences, quickly finding gainful employment that provided opportunities for advancement into a middle-class life.

Detroit News Composing Room, painting by James Scripps Booth. Where David Aird worked.

David married Laura Streng on October 17, 1923. He was 26 and she was 24. They had two children, Kenneth, born June 13, 1925, and Marjorie Laura, born February 16, 1934. John remembers that David loved his children.

However, David’s life in America was not perfect. John Aird recalls that David got a reputation in the family as a bit of a mooch, never contributing to summer camping trip supplies or helping with fruit canning, but expecting to share in the products of his siblings’ efforts.

John also wrote:

“Uncle Dave seems to have been basically a weak person. In his middle years, he became addicted to slot machine gambling and loved to tell us how he walked up to a certain machine and put a nickel in it and pulled the lever and at first crack got back so many dollars’ worth of coins.”

John’s mother pulled John aside to explain that Dave’s attempts to repeat that little miracle led to dollars and dollars of losses thereafter. David’s poor wife, Laura, came to talk to John’s parents “about the fact that Uncle Dave was losing so much money at the slot machines that they hardly had enough to live on. She could not even get an accounting of his losses…she would have left him if she could, but had no way of supporting herself and the children without him. She asked my father to have a talk with Uncle Dave and try to straighten him out. Of course it did no good.”

After that point, David and his family pulled away from the other Airds, rarely joining family celebrations or visiting his mother. John and his side of the family knew very little about David, Laura and the children. Presumably David got his gambling problem under control at some point, as he continued to hold his position at the newspaper, and was admired in the community and in the St. Andrews Society enough to receive the award of merit and appreciation from the mayor of Detroit.

David retired from the Detroit Free Press in 1964 after thirty years with the company. He moved to Livonia, Michigan in 1973, and died there on March 12, 1975. Laura preceded him in death.

David’s story of how he got a job three days after arriving in a new country shows that he and his siblings arrived at a very welcoming time for American immigrants. David had no papers, no experience, and no references other than immediate family, yet even so, a large, respectable company like the Detroit Free Press immediately hired him. They trained him in a trade that would support him and his family for his entire life. 

I don’t believe that could ever happen in present-day America. Even the most menial jobs now require some sort of credentials. Companies would never hire a new immigrant today until the immigrant obtained a green card that would permit them to work in the United States. The only businesses that would hire someone fresh off the boat in this day and age would be businesses operating illegally, paying in cash under the table. Those jobs are only the most menial and most dangerous types of labor. And of course now immigrants are looked upon with disdain and anger by a large segment of the American public which makes their lives even more difficult. The “Build the Wall” people speak so disdainfully of how today’s immigrants expect a handout, ignoring the fact that our country now refuses to allow them to legally work. These people forget how just a century ago their own immigrant ancestors had opportunities that our country has now closed off to today’s immigrants. How quickly we forget.

Sources: 

Detroit Free Press, accessed through Newspapers.com

John Aird Memoir