John Aird Runs for School Board: 52 Ancestors 2021 Prompt “Voting”

Progressives vs. Conservatives in School Board Race

John Aird: 1919-2005

 

            In 1970, many parents with children attending schools in Montgomery County, Maryland, were concerned about a slate of candidates running for the school board. The four candidates, calling themselves PACE—Positive Action for Children’s Education—were running in opposition to what they saw as “progressive” trends in education. John and Laurel Aird were among those concerned parents, and John Aird decided that he needed to act if the PACE group was to be defeated. He filed to run as a school board candidate.

            PACE was opposed by the Citizens Choice slate, which was comprised of Rosemary Hilberg, the president of the existing board, and two other men, Arthur Korotkin and Pat Dougherty, the only black candidate running. John Aird chose not to align himself with this “progressive” group, choosing to run as an independent instead. According to the local newspaper, the election was “one of the most highly contested and one which could cause the greatest upheaval in the county.”

            I am not sure what “progressive” trends the PACE group opposed, but the late 1960s and early 1970s saw Montgomery County’s population changing, becoming less white and more diverse. I suspect the word “progressive” was in part dog-whistle racism, and in part a reference to larger social and cultural changes including the anti-war movement, environmentalism, and the women’s movement that were being embraced by young people, including middle and high school students in Montgomery County. The local newspaper noted that:

 “Student involvement in political elections reached a head in 10 high schools, which last week endorsed the liberal slate, thereby expressing their approval of Mrs. Hilberg’s methods of operation. The student newspapers editorially endorsed Aird as well. The school papers voiced objection to the PACE slate candidates who call for increased discipline ‘over learning’.”

            John Aird’s oldest son, Steve, was involved in student government at his own high school, so was probably one of the students encouraging support for the more liberal candidates.

            John Aird ended up winning election to the board. Frederick, Maryland’s The News reported that with one third of the precincts reporting, the winners of the four seats were Hilbert, Dougherty and Aird, with only one PACE member gaining a seat, a man named Thomas Cooke.

            School board terms ran for four years, and John served one term, leaving office in 1974. John was a powerful voice on several hot-button issues facing the board. Immediately after his election, John was involved in a strangely contentious issue about the role of the district ombudsman. The Board wanted to have the ombudsman report to the board rather than to the district superintendent. This upset the district employees’ unions for some reason—I think they must have feared the ombudsman could be used to attack teachers or school personnel. John tried to act as an intermediary, crafting some sort of compromise between the two groups. 

In 1972, John was elected as the Board vice president. The News reported on March 4, 1972 that:

“Last month, Dr. John S. Aird, vice president of the Montgomery Board of Education, appeared at a public hearing before the state board of public works. He urged its reconsideration of 12 of the 26 projects in Montgomery’s fiscal 1973 capital budget that were not recommended for funding by the inter-agency on school construction.”

John was also quoted in a Baltimore Sun article on the same topic.

“Dr. John Aird, vice president of the Montgomery County Board of Education, told the public works board he felt the state’s school construction agency was ‘interposing its judgment on priorities submitted by the local boards.’”

The construction issue apparently revolved around a change in laws requiring that new schools contain attached gymnasiums. In the past, Montgomery County schools had been built without gymnasium space. The district wanted to use capital funds to equalize the schools, adding gyms to older buildings. I am guessing, once again, that minority and poorer residents of the school district tended to be assigned to the schools lacking gyms. The state was rejecting the construction requests, arguing that Montgomery County had unused classroom space and didn’t need new buildings and additions. Montgomery County had failed in the past to separate classrooms used for specific activities, such as art, music and shop, from their regular classroom count, so that it appeared their schools were not using classroom space efficiently. Other districts counted only rooms actually being used for class instruction in their classroom count.

During this period, the board was also negotiating compensation for teachers and staff, another contentious issue. Bruce remembers having teachers make snarky remarks about his father during tense times while the teachers were considering a strike. Once again John tried to strike the middle ground, noting that the board’s closed door meetings on the issue were creating suspicion. “The credibility of this body should not be treated this way.” He expressed regret for the conflict that had arisen over the decision to change the way teachers were compensated for extra duties. “Perhaps our approach has been wrong. Maybe we have lost our perspective.”

Although John did not serve a second term on the board, in May 1977 he was appointed to a Blue Ribbon Commission charged with studying how the school board “is managing its time, relating to the public and using school staff.” The school board selected eleven citizens for the panel, with John named chairman.

John’s experiences are a reminder of the importance of local government officials. We tend to take school board and city council elections for granted; they seem less important than state and federal elections. However, these bodies administer our tax dollars and determine how essential services are administered. The conflicts the school board faced while John was running for and serving in office show how the decisions made by local officials have real world consequences that provoke strong passions.  

Note: When John began writing his memoirs, he stated that he would talk about his service on the school board. Sadly, he never had the chance to write about that period. He brought his memoirs to an abrupt conclusion when he was diagnosed with multiple myeloma. It would have been wonderful to read his personal perspective on running an election campaign and the issues the board faced.

Sources:

The News. Frederick, Md. Issues: Dec. 14, 1970. Dec. 21, 1970. Nov. 2, 1970. Nov. 4, 1970. Feb. 12, 1971. March 4, 1972. May 19, 1977.

Baltimore Sun. Baltimore MD. Issues: Dec. 21, 1971. May 27, 1972.

Sugar Cane Farming in Suriname: 52 Ancestors 2021 Prompt “On the Farm”

Alliance Plantation: Farm Operation and Production
Suriname: 1890s-1950s

 

Previous posts on Alliance Plantation focused primarily on the Shields family and their personal histories while they were running and managing Alliance Plantation. But exactly what was involved in sugar cane production in Suriname in the early 20^th century? What did Alliance produce?

Alliance's location, with the river at the top and the Kreek running parallel to the plantation buildings.

Here is the text of an advertisement that ran in the Surinaamsche Courant en Gouvernements Advertisement Sheet, a Paramariblo newspaper, in issue no. 14, Thursday, April 9, 1879 (translated from Dutch):

“ADVERTISING:

The civil-law notary E. A. CABELL will be present on Tuesday the 30th. September, selling at 9 am:

The sugar plantation ALLIANCE in full operation in the district of Matappica. Approximately 1350 acres with all their buildings, machinery, factories, vessels and the accompanying adjacent grounds, New Acconoribo, large 2000 acres, Sunflower, large 1000 acres, Catharinasburg, large 212 acres, part of the Jonge Bijenkorf, 750 acres, belonging to the estate of Mr H. WRIGHT.

In cultivation are 500 fields of sugar cane.

Population: 195 coolie immigrants, 38 free coolies and Chinese under contract, and 332 uncontracted free workers.

The plantation works with a vacumpan machine and also has a wood sawmill.

The aforementioned plantation and land are now for sale out of hand. Information to be obtained from Mr. A. STIRKING. Paramaribo September 3, 1879.”

The property described in this sale comprised the plantation Alliance, which was purchased by Thomas Shields a little over a decade later. The property description helps to explain the plantation’s name: it was created from the union or alliance of five smaller plantations: Sunflower, New Acconoribo, Catharinasburg, Jonge Bijenkorf, and the original 1350 acres that formed the heart of the plantation.

A man named Knott bought the property in 1879. Thomas Shields originally came to Suriname to work for Knott, running and maintaining the plantation’s sugar mill, the “vacumpan” equipment mentioned in the sale advertisement.

Alliance's sugar mill or factory in 1890

Obviously, the plantation needed a large number of workers to plant and harvest the sugarcane, and to operate the sugar mill. Surinam’s sugar plantations used slaves until 1863, as noted by A. van Tran:

".....the abolition of slavery in 1863 greatly reduced the number of sugar plantations, due to the shortage of labour, and at the beginning of this century there were still only seven plantations in operation, two of which soon fell off. The quintet of factories that remained survived until the crisis that began in 1929, and today are only two left, viz. Marienburg, and Alliance…”

Records show that Hugh Wright, as the previous owner of Alliance, was paid “150,600 guilders for the 508 enslaved people on Plantage Alliance” in compensation for their freedom in 1863. Presumably this money came from the colonial government. By the time Alliance was sold to AK Knott in 1879, owner Wright’s 565 workers were a combination of indentured or “contract” workers described as “coolies” (which suggests they were brought from India) and “uncontracted free” workers, who were probably freed slaves who now worked for wages.

While I am sure the Dutch word that Google helpfully translated as “free” had a more nuanced meaning, it does reflect the difficult position of non-free, indentured workers. They could not leave their jobs until their contract was fulfilled, so they were barely better off than slaves, trapped in often miserable conditions under cruel and demanding overseers. There were frequent worker uprisings among the indentured as a result.

Javanese contract laborers on Marienburg Plantation

According to the website SurinamePlantages.com, Alliance grew in size and production under Mr. Knott and during the transition period to Thomas Shields’ ownership:

“The plantation was 642 hectares large, of which 140 hectares produced sugar cane. Alliance produced 314,900 kg vacuum pan sugar, and 33,720 liters of rum. …In 1894, Knott was still the owner of Alliance. The plantation had grown considerably and was now 1,860 hectares large with 192 hectares devoted to sugar cane culture. 760,000 kg vacuum pan sugar and 74,233 liters of rum were produced. That is therefore a doubling of the production compared to 3 years before. There were 662 workers; Alliance was a large plantation.”

Cutting cane at plantation in Suriname approx 1910

The site goes on to explain the labor situation and the growing numbers of contract laborers recruited from Java and India.

“Between 1873 and 1929, Alliance grew into a very large company, recruiting a total of 2016 British Indian and 2,136 Javanese contractors.

The arrival of the immigrants was accompanied by bickering over (too) low wages and poor working conditions. It was inevitable: the aim of the plantation enterprise, especially in the 19th century, was to maximize profits, and one means was to minimize wages with the highest possible labor tax. Already in 1878 there was a strike against these harsh working conditions. The management of the plantation was supported by the government and was repressive: 58 workers were arrested, of which 10 were convicted. Working conditions remained unchanged. In June 1902 - after Alliance's new executive made a pay cut - British Indian worker Jumpa Raigaroo led a strike for better wages and treatment. It again turned out to be a major confrontation with the government. But now the workers were right: wages were increased again and the director replaced. Even now the price was high: 17 workers were sentenced to 6 months hard labor. Three weeks later, the great uprising at Marienburg followed, with 18 dead (including the director) and 39 wounded.”

The plantation grew in size of cultivated land and production under Thomas Shields’ ownership and his son Archie Shields’ management. Dutch researchers wrote that around the turn of the century,

“The plantation covered an area of 1,860 hectares and produced sugar (1,668 tons) and rum (86000 liters). 350 hectares were under cultivation. 828 workers worked on the plantation, including 673 immigrants. A. Shields was the captain.”

Archie Shields at far right, with other government figures. About 1910-20.

The site also noted that the plantation continued to improve the sugar mill equipment. Presumably Thomas Shields’ connections with McConie Harvey, the sugar mill production company he once worked for, helped him keep abreast of innovations in equipment.

“From 1860 to 1953, the sugar-taking Alliance has undergone a continuous process of scaling up and innovation. That the company was successful in doing so is evident from the fact that it was able to survive until 1953, and thus the second to last sugar company of Suriname. (Marienburg was the last). The details of the business operations are not exactly known. Just like the others sugar companies switched to sugar processing at some point using the vacuum pan method, and has been continuously modernized.” (translated from Dutch)

Sugar mill at Marienburg Plantation--similar to Alliance's

Interior of Marienburg sugar mill--similar to Alliance's mill

Thomas Shields’ grandson and granddaughter, Jack McNiven and wife Ruth Shields McNiven, took over management of the plantation in the 1930s when Archie Shields neared retirement. Ruth wrote in a memoir about how the plantation shipped off the sugar it produced. She did not mention rum production; perhaps that had been halted by the 1930s.

“… during much of my time at Plantation Alliance our sugar was shipped with the Norwegian bauxite freighters: the Dalvangen, Vestvangen, Sorvangen, Lindvangen, etc. which, being about three thousand tons, were too big for the Matapica Kreek. Actually, they reversed in the Commewijne and backed up to our stelling, since the kreek was not wide enough for them to turn there… The Captains and their passengers were always welcome guests. The latter were fascinated with this stop at a working plantation, by the glimpses of tropical life afforded them, by the local drinks and dishes we served, the garden of exotic flowers and trees, the vista of the cane fields stretching away to the distant bush ….”

The photo shows the Dalvangen. The other three ships Ruth mentioned were built by the same company and were nearly identical. I am amazed a ship of this size was able to navigate the Commewijne River. The river must have been quite deep to handle a ship with this draft. The Lindvangen was torpedoed by a German U-boat in 1942; luckily the ship’s captain, John Einar Nelson, survived; he was probably one of the captains who enjoyed the McNivens’ hospitality.

Archie sold Alliance to the government of Suriname in 1953. At the time of sale, the plantation was described as follows:

On November 12, 1953, the Sugar Company Alliance was sold to the State. Hereby the following lands were transferred:

Lodewijksburg 500 acres

Sporksgift 500 acres

Alderat 340 acres 2 parts of the young beehive 918 acres

Vlaardingen 500 acres

Catharinenburg 212 acres

New: Acconoribo 1000 acres

Sunflower 1000 acres

1 part of Constantia 779 acre. In total 5749 fields or 2466 hectares.

While the Surinamese government originally intended to divide up the plantation into smaller farms to be farmed by Alliance’s former employees, that plan was eventually scrapped. According to the Dutch history of the plantation,

“Instead, by state decree of January 29, 1973, the State Enterprise Alliance instituted as part of the "national companies regulation" (G:B: 1971 no. 181), with….the aim of "planting citrus and other crops on a commercial basis”.

Remains of boiler from Alliance's sugar mill.

Government management has been poor. The citrus farm project has not been profitable. The sugar factory on site fell into disrepair and was torn down. The plantation house and the overseer houses were allowed to crumble. Sugar production has moved to other countries, and is no longer a significant part of Suriname’s economy.

Remains of the foundation of Alliance's sugar mill. 1980s.

Sources:

Surinaamsche Courant en Gouvernements Advertisement Sheet no. 14, Thursday 04-09-1879 no. 107 (N.A.S.)

 Suriname 1900-1940, A. Van Traa, W. van Hoeve; 1St Edition (January 1, 1946), p. 54

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/lbs/person/view/2146646367

https://www.surinameplantages.com/archief/a/alliance

“Vignettes of plantation life” by Ruth Shields McNiven, as quoted in De Suikerplantage Alliance aan de Matapica kreek .aan de uitvloeiing van de Matapicakreek in de Commewijne. Auteur: Philip Dikland, 2003, aangevuld 2004, 2010, 2011.

 

 

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

Down a Rabbit Hole: Tracing a Robertson Great-Grand-Uncle

Thomas Robertson: 1851-?
Albert Cameron Robertson: 1897-1917

 

I often make discoveries about ancestors unexpectedly, while looking for someone or something else. I pull one thread, and a whole set of mysteries unravels. It’s a bit like falling down the proverbial rabbit hole into a whole new world. That happened today, while tracing the Robertson branch of the Aird family.

My husband’s grandfather, Harry Aird, was born to James Aird and Jane Ann Robertson Aird. Jane was the child of Hellen Wood and William Robertson; she was born in Dundee, Forfarshire, Scotland on June 30, 1857. Jane had three siblings, Thomas, James and Mary Ann, and today I decided to search for their death dates, as well as any other information about spouses or descendants I might turn up on the way. Thomas and his children proved to be of special interest.

Jane’s eldest brother, Thomas Robertson, was born around 1851, also in Dundee. He appears on the Scottish census records in 1861, living with his parents. But by 1871, now twenty years old, he was living on his own on Millars Wynd in Dundee as a boarder in the home of Charles Marie and family. Thomas was working as a baker, possibly nearby at William Coupar’s bakery at 51 Perth Road, near the University of Dundee.  

Intersection of Millars Wynd and Perth Road, Dundee, early 1900s

Millars Wynd intersected with Perth Road, which was where a 20 year old nurse by the name of Jessie Galletly lived, caring for someone in the Andrew Hendry home at 245 Perth Rd. Since Thomas and Jessie lived and worked in the same small neighborhood, it’s not surprising that they met. They married sometime between the 1871 census and the birth of their first child, Isabella Anderson Robertson, March 6, 1873.

Three other children quickly followed: Helen or Hellen Wood Robertson, born September 1, 1874; Wilhelmina “Nellie” Robertson, born in 1877, and finally Alexander Robertson, born sometime in late 1879 or possibly early 1880. I discovered all four of these children living with their father Thomas in his parents’ home in Dundee on the 1881 census. Also living there were James and Jane Ann Robertson Aird and their newborn, Isabella Aird. But no sign of Jessie. Obviously something had happened to Thomas’ wife, leaving him a widower with four young children. Perhaps Jessie died giving birth to young Alexander.

Census record, Robertsons and Airds 1881

                

By the next census, Thomas had acquired a new wife, Margaret Smith, and the first two of their eventual four sons had been born, Thomas Smith Robertson in 1887, and William Robertson in 1890. Father Thomas was still working as a baker, and the family was living at 10 Peddie Street, just north of Perth Road.

Peddie Street where family lived in 1890s

By the 1901 census, they had moved to 15 Forest Park Road, still in the same Dundee neighborhood near Perth Road where Thomas had first met and married Jessie. Now the family included the two youngest sons, Albert Cameron Robertson, born in July or early August of 1897, and Norman McLeod Robertson, born June 8, 1900. 

Robertson residences over course of 30 years: 1. Forest Park Dr.; 2. Peddie Rd.; 3. Millars Wynd/Perth

Wilhelmina/Nellie was still living at home, now 25 years old and working as a domestic nurse, while her brother Alex, 21, was employed as a drapery warehouseman. Thomas’ two other daughters, Isabella and Helen, had moved out. I have been unable to locate any further records for Isabella; she may have married, died, or moved somewhere unusual. There are a couple possible records for Helen, but nothing verifiable. The two young women essentially disappear.

15 Forest Park in Dundee today

I have found no 1911 census records for Thomas, Margaret or their four sons. They, like Isabella and Helen, might have mysteriously disappeared but for one important record: the military records for young Albert Cameron Robertson.

Albert enlisted in the army on August 5, 1916 at the age of 18 years and four months, joining the 11^th Battalion of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, otherwise known as the Princess Louise Regiment, which saw action on the Western Front in Europe with the 9^th Scottish Division.

Hatpin for Albert's regiment

Military records show that Albert died April 23, 1917, in the Second Battle of Arras. The British Army suffered 10,000 losses in an attempt to take the high ground near the French city of Arras; Albert was one of those losses.

One of the Argyll & Sutherland battalions in WWI

His army paperwork provided a treasure trove of information. First, he provided two addresses: his family’s home when he enlisted, No. 12 Peddie Street, one building down from where they lived at his birth in Dundee, and the family’s new address in Perthshire, in the Campbells Buildings, a large apartment complex, in the town of Stanley. I’m not sure what caused his family to move there—perhaps his father retired from his bakery job, or lost his job, or perhaps there was some other motivation. But at least I know why I could no longer find them in Dundee.

Albert’s army papers also provided a hint of a rupture between his half-siblings and the rest of the family. He was asked to list all siblings: he wrote he had no sisters, and only three brothers, Thomas, Willie and Norman, all of whom were in the army. Of course in reality he had three half-sisters and a half-brother, but even though there was a section on the form for “Full-blood” and “Half-blood” siblings, he ignored his half-siblings. There’s a story there that, sadly, we’ll never learn.

Albert was awarded the Victory Medal and the British War Medal for his service and ultimate sacrifice in battle. The medals were sent to his father Thomas, who signed for them, so while we have no photos of Thomas, we have his signature from a century ago.

In summary, I failed in my goal for the day: to find death dates and records for Jane Ann Robertson’s siblings. Her oldest brother Thomas’ death date remains a mystery, although I was able to confirm he was still alive in 1918. However, my unsuccessful search for that piece of information led me to some fascinating new discoveries: Thomas’ long-time job as a baker, the decades his family spent in one small neighborhood in Dundee, his two wives and his eight children, and the tragic loss of his young son Albert Cameron Robertson in World War I. After learning so much about Thomas and his family, it’s hard to see the day’s research as a failure!

Now I’ll need to burrow further down my research rabbit hole to find out what happened to Albert’s three soldier siblings: did they make it home from the war or did they die like Albert? Every new discovery always leads to new questions. And who knows—perhaps my research on Thomas Jr., Willie and Norman will lead me to my research Holy Grail: Thomas Robertson’s date and place of death! I can dream!

 

Sources:

Photo of Millars Wynd and Perth Rd, Dundee.http://www.leisureandculturedundee.com/photopolis/millars-wynd-and-perth-road-dundee

K, British Army World War I Service Records, 1914-1920 for Albert Cameron Robertson. Ancestry.com.

https://www.ancestry.com/imageviewer/collections/1219/images/30974_185764-01093?pId=1651322

Information and photos, Battle of Arras. https://military.wikia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Arras_(1917)

Correcting the Record for Louise A Shields: 52 Ancestors Prompt “Changes”

Time for Changes to the Tree and Changes in Family Attitudes

Louise Annie Kinnear to Louise Antoinette Pool: 1872-74 to 1975

 

According to the tree I had assembled for my husband’s family, his great-granduncle Archibald Shields married a Dutch/Javanese woman by the name of Louise Annie Kinnear. My information on Louise was minimal. I had no birth records or parents’ names for her, and I had no marriage record for Archibald and Louise. The only records I found for Louise were from the period after her marriage—the first record she appears on is the birth record for Archie and Louise’s eldest daughter in 1909. Louise appears only on records as Louise A. Shields—her middle name and maiden name never appear.

So how did I come up with the name Louise Annie Kinnear? I confess, with shame, that I had just copied that maiden name from several other Ancestry trees, including the one managed by my brother-in-law, who is a careful researcher. None of those trees had links to any records that would verify “Annie” or “Kinnear”.

So I shouldn’t have been surprised when I discovered another Ancestry tree that provided a very different name for Louise. That tree, apparently managed by a direct descendant of Archie and Louise Shields, listed her as Louise Antoinette Pool, born in Padang, Sumatra, Dutch East Indies. Despite all these new details, there were no records attached to the tree that would verify the information.

Padang, Sumatra around 1900

I faced a conundrum. I lacked documentation for either maiden name. Should I just assume, since it looked like this new tree was managed by a direct descendant, that he or she had more accurate information, and change my tree to match? I tried searching both names in Ancestry with no result.

I then turned to my old friend Google. And lo and behold, the name Louise Antoinette Pool turned up a match in the archives on the island of Jersey. The Jersey court records include her will. While the will itself cannot be accessed online, the indexed description provides some essential information, reading:

“Will and Testament of Louise Antoinette Shields, widow of Archibald Shields, of Sous Les Arbres, St. Peter’s Valley, St. Peter and formerly of Aintree, College Hill, St. Helier. Dated 25/08/1959. [Includes two closed documents]”

This is verification that Louise’s correct maiden name was Louise Antoinette Pool. I already knew that Archie and Louise had retired to the island of Jersey when he quit managing Alliance Plantation in Suriname. Everything matched up to the data I already had. I quickly made changes to my Ancestry tree, providing correct information and a screenshot of the Jersey Archive index entry.

So what else do we know about Louise? And how much of what we supposedly know is as inaccurate as the surname “Kinnear”?

Archie and Louise apparently married in Suriname around 1907, following the death of Archie’s father Thomas in 1905. I have no information about how or where they met. Their first child, Margaret Sutherland Shields, was born October 13, 1909 in Paramaribo. Their second child was born in January 1912 in Lambeth, London, during one of the family’s regular visits to Great Britain. They named her Euphemia Louise Shields. Their third daughter, Bethia Delphine Shields, was born in 1913 in Paramaribo.

The Shields family on steps of Alliance Plantation house, supposedly taken in 1903, but woman at bottom is Margaret Shields, who only came out after husband's death in 1905. Likely taken around 1907. I believe Louise and Archie are the two people standing. 

The family spent most of their time living at the Alliance Plantation house. They were an attractive family. The girls grew up with their cousins, James Allan Smith and Bethea Elizabeth Smith, the children of Archie’s nephew James Laing Smith. Young James was the same age as Archie’s youngest daughter Bethia, and Bethea Smith was a year younger.

Louise at left with her three daughters, Margeret, Effie, and Bethia. Marguerite Smith and her children James and Bethea at right. Around 1915 or 1916.

Archie and Louise spent some time living on Bay Street in St. Michael, Barbados. At some point, Archie acquired property on Jersey and retired there, although he continued to travel to Suriname until at least the 1950s when the plantation was sold to the Suriname government. It is unclear where Archie and Louise’s daughters were educated.

Archie died on Jersey in 1962 at age 98. Louise died in 1975; she was between 100 and 103 years old, depending on her actual birthdate.

So that comprises the facts about Louise. But what stories and impressions do we have from other family members?

Archie and Louise’s niece, Ruth Shields McNiven, included Louise as a character in a story she wrote in high school about life on Alliance Plantation in Suriname. The way Louise is described is quite unflattering. She blithers on about people coming to tea and the need to roll the tennis courts while Archie is discussing serious problems with the plantation’s workers which eventually erupt into a worker uprising. Louise repeatedly demands that she be allowed to order expensive English dresses to keep up with other women in her and Archie’s social set, and the story ends with her getting her gowns.

Ruth’s description of her many years later was a little kinder, but still indicated that Archie’s extended family weren’t very fond of Louise. She told John and Laurel Aird that when Archie brought his new bride home to Ellangowan, the Shields family home in Scotland, Archie’s mother was upset, wondering why he couldn’t have married a good Scots lassie? Ruth’s further comments on Louise were recorded by Laurel as follows:

“ Aunt Louise was half Javanese. Her father was an officer in the Dutch Army. She was brought up in a convent. Attractive. Lived to be 100 on Isle of Jersey. Much younger than he. She made Uncle Archie jealous by flirting.”

John Aird’s memoirs contain his memories of the Shields family’s assessment of Louise:

“As a matter of fact, Grandpa Shields’ brother Archie married a Javanese woman, who was referred to as Aunt Louise. I once saw a picture of her as a mature woman, from which it was obvious that she would have been very attractive in her youth. Anecdotes about Aunt Louise suggested that she was very conscious of her station and also that the family were careful to make sure that her status did not encroach on their own. She must have had a difficult time of it in some respects. There apparently were some children from that union, who were taken to Scotland when their father retired there, and they lived near London for a time after his death, but the family later lost track of them and no one seemed to know (or to care) what became of them.”

John’s summary is repugnant, and reflects the bigotry of the extended Shields family. It is also inaccurate. John Aird’s grandfather attended his mother’s 100^th birthday party in 1937, and Archie and Louise were also in attendance, as is obvious from this portion of John Sutherland Shields’ letter to his family:

“Uncle A. and Aunt Louise came across Monday with the 11 A.M. boat. Dick and I went down to meet them. They are both looking very well; Louise much improved, looking almost younger and stouter than ever and a very healthy color, bright eyes and lots of talk. Aunt B. and E. too are very well.”

So obviously the extended family knew exactly where Archie, Louise and their daughters were, at least during John Shields’ lifetime. Ruth seems to have kept in touch as well, and presumably the Smith cousins, who grew up with Archie and Louise’s daughters, kept in touch with the girls.

But apparently racism kept some of the Shields family from accepting Louise and her daughters as real members of their family. I shudder at John’s casual comment that she was “referred to as Aunt Louise”, as if that were merely a courtesy title granted to a “fancy woman” or something. She WAS their Aunt Louise. And the idea that Archie’s daughters “were taken to Scotland when their father retired there”, implies the family thought they ought to have been left behind in Suriname with their “kind” or something. Louise isn’t even mentioned as having accompanied Archie and their daughters. For goodness sake! They were a family! Of course they moved to Jersey with their father! Families live together!

Aintree, College Hill, St. Helier, Jersey: Louise and Archie's first home on Jersey.

It is just stunning to be faced with the Shields’ family’s bigotry.  It is so disturbing to read that they worried that Louise's ethnicity would drag down their own social standing. John’s phrasing and word choice show he had, likely unintentionally and without awareness, picked up on his extended family’s disdain and repugnance for Archie’s half-caste (I use this phrase only in the context of the time period—it is a horrible way to describe people now, of course) wife and daughters, and channeled it in his writing. I want to emphasize that John never exhibited any sign of racism himself as an adult; he was uniformly kind and accepting of everyone. This reflects another type of “Change”, the theme of this post: the younger generations of the family began, thankfully, to move past the casual bigotry of the early twentieth century.

It would have been fascinating to ask Louise what she thought of Archie’s family and their treatment of her and her daughters. I’m sure it would have been enlightening and disturbing. She deserved better. At least now her real maiden name is in the family tree.

 

Sources:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3c/COLLECTIE_TROPENMUSEUM_De_Padangrivier_te_Padang_Sumatra%60s_Westkust_TMnr_60003520.jpg

https://catalogue.jerseyheritage.org/collection/Keywords/archive/content.person.name/Shields,%20Louise%20Antoinette,%20n%C3%A9e%20Pool

Memoirs of John Shields Aird: 10 November 1919-09 October 2005. Pg. 28.