Footsteps to the Past

Today I took a drive back in time to walk among the fields that long-ago ancestors once walked. However, these fields were not youthful playgrounds for young boys to lose themselves in childhood games, but battlefields where young boys became men.  As I stood on the edge of the field and looked at the expansive space I tried to imagine what it might have looked like in 1864 during one of the bloodiest battles in American history.

During the Civil War Union armies launched a series of offensives across Virginia known as the Overland Campaign.  Here Gen. Ulysses S. Grant and Gen. Robert E. Lee faced each other with aggressive assaults at Wilderness, Spotsylvania, North Anna River, Totopotomoy Creek, and Cold Harbor.

I began my trip at Cold Harbor battlefield where for thirteen days Union and Confederate armies faced each other. The battlefield still showed the trench lines that separated the opposing forces by 150 yards as they launched massive assaults against each other.  It’s hard to imagine what it might have looked like back then; the smoke-filled field from canon fire, the noise of gun fire piercing the air, the sounds of men injured or dying on the field. Today, it was serene. The air was filled with the sweet smell of late summer sweet grass, the birds tweeting, squirrels busy collecting food for the winter, and crickets chirping.

It was on this battlefield that two of my ancestors, Dustan S. Walbridge and Isaac N. Watts fought on the side of the Union troops against Gen. Robert E. Lee’s Confederate troops. On June 1 and 3, 1864, Gen. Ulysses S. Grant collided with Lee in headlong assaults that resulted in enormous losses for Grant and a fatal injury for Dustan Walbridge.

Lt. Dustan S. Walbridge

Dustan S. Walbridge was born 25 Oct 1832 in Wolcott, Lamoille, Vermont and died 19 June 1864, just 17 days after sustaining a fatal wound in the battle of Cold Harbor.  Dustan served in Company A, 1st Regiment, Vermont Heavy Artillery.  His rank when he enlisted was Private, and his rank the day he died was Second Lieutenant.  During the battle, a mini ball shattered his right arm just above the elbow, splintering the bone. Sergeant Soper applied a cord as a tourniquet which saved Dustan from bleeding to death on the battlefield. Sergeant Soper and another soldier took him to the rear of the field where an amputation was performed. Lieutenant Walbridge was later moved to the Douglas General Hospital in Washington, D.C. where he died from his wounds. Lieutenant Walbridge served his country with honor and saw action in Spottsylvania, North Anna River, Pamunkey River, Hanover Court House, and Cold Harbor battles.  He was regarded by the men in his company as one of the truest soldiers of the many true ones in Company A. His rapid promotion from the rank of Private to that of Second Lieutenant bears testimony of his fidelity to his country.  Lieutenant Dustan S. Walbridge is buried in Peacham Cemetery, Peacham, Vermont.

Sergeant Isaac N. Watts

During the same time that Lieutenant Walbridge was sustaining his fatal wound, his half-brother Isaac N. Watts attached to Battery M, 1^st Regiment of the Vermont Heavy Artillery was also at Cold Harbor. Isaac’s rank in was that of Corporal and rank out, First Sergeant. Sergeant Watts’ regiment fought in some of the most famous battles of the Civil War to include; Spotsylvania, Cold Harbor, Winchester, and Cedar Creek. Isaac was a prolific writer and kept two diaries between 1864 and 1865 about camp life, drills, inspections, duty, marches, and events as they unfolded. However, it was his letters home to his family that gave more detailed descriptions of what life during the Civil War really looked like.

When Isaac mustered out of the army in August 1865 having served since 1863, he wrote of his 22^nd birthday, “I who was the youngest boy, the baby as it were, of the family, am getting to be quite old, and am a dirty, ragged soldier.”  At 22, he felt old and by all accounts had seen and experienced more in those 3 years of battle than a man of 22 today.

Dustan and Isaac were not the only two brothers from the same family that served, their brother Lyman S.

Lyman S. Watts

Watts also served the Union as a civilian.  Lyman was appointed by the office of the U.S. Christian Commission, an office that promoted spiritual and temporal welfare to the men of the army, as a delegate to serve one month in the Union Army.  Lyman had completed his seminary course and was serving as a pastor in Massachusetts when he was assigned to the 20^th Corps in Washington, D.C.  It is here that he spent long days giving sermons, leading prayers, and comforting men. 

As I travelled North from Cold Harbor stopping along the way at each significant battlefield that Dustan and Isaac fought at, I took the time to walk slowly on the fields, touching the ground where so many gave their lives and where these two brothers, my 4^th great uncles served their country, one with his life. 

Dear Clara,

This is the first letter I have written to you directly since I usually write to your mother Roxana. The summer will soon be fading and Peacham will once again see its vibrant fall colors. My thoughts however are in April 1881 when upon reading the sad news of the death of your brother Isaac, you wrote a letter to your sister Alice expressing your sorrow. You wrote in your letter that you felt it before you had even read the news that Isaac was already “sleeping in that little silent city”. He is “sleeping” at the top of the hill in the Peacham Cemetery surrounded by his family. I often take walks there stopping to say hello to your mother and visit the other family members sleeping there as well. I touch the headstones and think about each of your lives, wishing I could be that presence looking in and watching each of you in your daily life. I wish I could see Peacham back then and experience the daily comings and goings of life in the village. It seems so far removed from that now.

You expressed the goodness in Isaac. As so many of you left, Isaac was the one that remained. He was, as you put it, “so useful to others”. Until he left for the war, which as I’m sure you know was against his father's wishes, he had always been the dutiful son by his father’s side helping with the farm.

As you expressed your sorrow, I could feel the longing and sadness in your words as you wrote “only Augustus left of the five boys who belonged to our family, I can scarcely realize that they are all gone.” And sadly not long after this letter, Augustus departed this earth as well. It would be the women, like yourself who would endure.

You asked the question, “will our old home where so many have been born, and so many breathed their last, pass into stranger’s hands?”. Sadly yes. The farm sold not long after the death of your brother Daniel Augustus but remains standing, or at least a section of it, today. I had the opportunity and pleasure to see the old homestead, and I was so touched by the presence I felt as I walked into the original 1790 portion of the house. It was as though I could feel you all next to the fireplace, together as a family. Most of your original house was lost but the small cape was lovingly restored and a beautiful addition added. I wonder what you would think of it now, or for that matter what would you think of Peacham now? Would you find it much changed?

The remainder of your letter is general happenings of your life in California, you even mention how you “were all awakened last night by a sharp earthquake shock which seemed to last sometime”. In fact an earthquake did occur on April 10th, 1881 between 2:00 and 2:15 am in the morning.

As they say, life goes on, even after death and as you close your letter you talk of writing letters to other family members, remembering you to family, and being her most affectionate sister.

So as I close this letter, I remain your most affectionate great, great, great granddaughter.

Dear Roxana

Autumn is upon us, and the village is immersed in vibrant deep colors of gold, red and amber.  The mountain maples shine in deep rich colors, the season displays magnificent scenery, and the sun sets to a sky filled with crimson clouds and a painted sky of red and gold.  The days have transitioned to crisp afternoons and cozy cool nights; it’s the time of harvest and abundance as we prepare for winter.

Autumn will quietly deepen and the leaves will burst with intense color over the next few weeks.  Then as softly as it entered it will begin to drift away as the leaves fall to cover the road in what looks like a patchwork quilt.

It is also the time of year that the children start back to school.  In my last letter, I mentioned that my oldest would be leaving home for the first time to attend college.  I found as that day approached that my thoughts were once again on you as you bid farewell to so many of your children one by one.

A mother’s love is a dimension only understood once you enter it and is almost impossible to describe.  How do you describe the perfect combination of the autumn covered mountains to someone who is blind, or a melody that brings you to tears to a person who is deaf?  Its knowing that you will endure the greatest joy and sorrow in your life, and yet, still be willing to enter that realm called motherhood.

Being a mother means that at times we will have the softest touch as we bath our newborn, be brave as we look under the bed for a noise our six year-old said sounded like a monster, be tender as we comfort our teenager who has just suffered a broken heart, and be tough in a way that will contradict our femininity. 

As you watched Martha, your first-born leave home, did you wonder if you could have done more?  Was what you gave her and taught her enough?  Did you question why in that moment you felt your heart swell with pride and admiration for the person they have become, and yet feel a profound sadness and emptiness as you realize that the baby you held in your arms is now walking to the next chapter in their lives?  

How strong a woman you must have been Roxana to endure that moment so many times in a mother’s journey.   I wish I could sit with you right now, share a cup of coffee as we sit on the porch, two mothers, a journey shared by motherhood, more profound as I tell you about your fifth great-grandson and the man he has become.

Your loving great, great, great, great-granddaughter

Dear Roxana

It’s May now in Peacham and the weather has been unseasonable warm lately.  All but the smallest amount of snow remains on the mountains and gone completely from the lower landscape.

The days have gotten longer, which makes early evening walks just perfect.  The trees with their budding leaves, the tulips popping up, and the slopping hills covered in scilla.  The air seems to be filled with the sweet smell of maple, the smoke rising from the sugarhouses.  Being new to the area, we had our first visit to a sugarhouse.  We were introduced to sugar on snow, donuts dipped in warm maple syrup, and hotdogs boiled in the amber syrup and finally maple creamies.

The village corner is slowly coming back to life as the summer resident’s return.  Not to mention the cows after the long winter are filling the pastures with their black and white coats and sounds.  The stray cats in the village are seen wondering around, and the little chipmunks are exploring the yards for nuts they long since buried.

As I walk in the evenings, the air is full with crickets and frogs making noise and the dogs seem to enjoy running down the road to explore it all.  It’s turkey season and a neighbor stopped by to show your 5^th great grandson the first kill of the season.  He is excited to get his first.

It will be almost a year since we moved to Peacham and I find that I am looking forward to seeing folks that have been away for the winter and more community events starting again like the summer farmers market.  The market provides a welcome distraction on Thursday afternoons and an opportunity to see all the wonderful fruits, vegetables and crafts that people have been working on through the winter.  And since it’s just outside the back door, it makes getting fresh fruits and vegetables for dinner so convenient.

I was reading your letters recently you wrote to your daughter Martha, after her departure to Michigan.  I find myself about to say goodbye to my first born as he departs for college although not so far as Michigan.  And I wonder how you stood at that dooryard so often to say good-bye?

I go by your place of rest most days now, wonder if you know that at last some kin has returned to Peacham.

Your loving great, great, great, great granddaughter. 

Follow-up on Family Skeletons

I did a little more research and found this interesting, here is a list of the top family secrets.

1.    Illegitimate Children               18%
2.    Changed Names                   14%
3.    Secret Adoptions                  6%
4.    Missing Persons                    6%
5.    Unmarried Parents                6%
6.    Unmarried Grandparents       6%
7.    Links to Royalty                    4%
8.    Convicted Thieves                  3%
9.    Convicted Murderers             2%
10.  Bigamy                                 2%
11.  Other Convicted Criminals         2%

Shaking the Family Tree and Finding Skeletons

By most accounts, genealogy can seem like a rather boring hobby.  We research old documents, census records, marriage, birth and death records.  But for those of us that claim genealogy as our hobby it’s more than just those old records, it’s discovering where we came from, and how those ancestors helped shaped who we are today.

So that was the generic statement and although there is truth in that we also love finding those hidden nuggets of information, those skeletons in the family closet.

Secretly, genealogists get excited when we find “secrets” but we’ve struggled with how to properly document the truth without causing family strife.  We have all been raised on “family” stories, but as most of us can tell you … those stories have been greatly exaggerated and unreliable as they are mostly told from memory and over great periods of time and change along the way.

Over time families have created this ideal past, and finding out about some of those skeletons can often shatter those family illusions and diminish what they perceive as “respectable” family history.

Our ancestors often kept these secrets to keep their family honor and because scandals like illegitimate children, affairs or criminals in the family directly affected all family members.  Family honor determined your worthiness and respectability and your social standing in the communities they lived.  So scandals could really make or break a family in centuries past.

As a family historian I’ve never believed it was my place to highlight family secrets but to try and accurately document the past, both good and bad.  But I will admit I’ve gotten into many conversations that start with, “I was told by my” why haven’t you put that in the family tree?  I document what I can prove with facts.  Those old documents, census records, marriage, birth, death, service records and bible entries.  And on occasion we do make educated conclusions based on those documents.  Take for example, my third great grandmother, she was married 9 Aug 1856 and the birth of their first child was 31 Mar 1857, just seven months after their marriage.  Now I’ve had two kids and I know that pregnancy is 40 weeks or the end of nine months, and since there are no documents or even family record discussing that the baby was born premature, or was “sickly and small” at birth, then I can conclude that she was already pregnant when they married.

I think we are all raised to believe that generations past were these virginal, pious individuals that never had an impure thoughts or action.  And although by today’s standards they had far fewer divorces, illegitimate births, affairs and so on, they were in fact human.  Although it may sound strange to say, I like the idea that they were fallible, that they weren’t these incredible pillars of virtue.

I can tell you that I have many skeletons in my family closet and every one of them adds just a little bit of color to my family tree.  I’ve had mothers execute their sons to keep the throne for themselves, slave owners, abolitionist, suicide, criminals, pre-marital sex, divorce and the list goes on.

But its all a part of history, my history, the good the bad and it all fertilized my family tree.

Tip Toe through the Headstones

When the genealogy bug bites you, you never know just how far it will take you and the things you will do and learn a long the way.  Our family members know that town clerk offices, libraries, and cemeteries are amusement parks to us.

So a few years ago while researching my mother’s family tree, our journey took us to Warsaw, Missouri. 

My mother and I first visited one of the local cemeteries so I could take pictures of our ancestors headstones.  My mother along with our cousin Ruth stood on the outer perimeter of the cemetery while I walked up and down every row of headstones, reading the inscriptions and snapping pictures.

The cemetery was old and many of its head stones dated back to the early 1800s.  The ground in some areas was uneven, and sunken in other areas leaving many headstones leaning or knocked over.  There was one headstone that I took an interest in, the date of death was in the mid 1700s and it was partially leaning over.  Although not an ancestor, I wanted a picture of the headstone because it was so pretty.

So I tried to position myself close to the headstone on the uneven ground to get a good picture.  The ground felt very soft, but it wasn’t wet so I thought it would be fine to stand directly in front of the headstone to get a good shot.  As I was lining up the picture I suddenly felt my right leg sink just beyond my knee in the ground.  In what seemed like forever, I had visions of something or someone pulling my leg into the ground, or worse that my toes might touch something squishy.  Logically I knew that wasn’t going to happen, but what is it about cemeteries and graves that can give even the biggest bravest person goose bumps?

I was scrambling to get my leg out of this hole, and the more I pulled the more it seemed to feel tight which only lead to my mind now thinking of every Stephen King movie I had seen.  I finally got my leg out and looking around I see my mother and Ruth standing there oblivious to my Stephen King moment.  I dusted off my leg and continued walking up and down the rows, this time not so close to the headstones and staying on even ground.

As the trip continued I didn’t think anything could top my moment of falling into a grave … boy was I wrong.  Ruth so kindly arranged for us to go on to the property of a local that owned the land that my ancestors once owned and where the old family cemetery plot was still standing.

It was the middle of summer in Missouri, hot and we were in the middle of high brush and scrub.  I was dressed in shorts; tennis shoes and t-shirt as was my mother and Ruth warned us that they have these little ticks called seed ticks that get everywhere so be careful.

I honesty don’t think we were thinking of those little seed ticks, after all we lived in Texas where the ticks are the size of beetles.  We were more interested in seeing these old family graves and headstones.  

After hours of moving brush around to get pictures of the headstones and trying to identify all the family members buried there we returned to Ruth’s house.  We were hot and dusty and suddenly starting remembering those seed ticks.  My mother now was convinced that there must be some on her so she took a shower.

They say that when it’s your loved ones that there isn’t anything we wouldn’t do for them. So not true!  I found the limit to which I would not go for my mother.  After she got out of the shower she was convinced she might have a seed tick in a rather private area, and she informed me I needed to look.

It was in that moment that I knew I found my limit.  She will not be going with me again!

But my quest for genealogy will go on … just maybe a little more careful about uneven ground and Missouri in the summer.

Request for Proposals

If you are not currently aware, the Peacham Community Housing (PCH) is looking at a sale or long term lease of the old Science building on the Academy/Peacham green.

Please take the time to review this document and become informed as to what the PCH is looking to do.

Peacham Community Housing is currently seeking responses to a Request for Proposals for the adaptation or reuse of the Science Building Apartment located on the Academy Green in Peacham.

Rogers Hill Cemetery

“A family tree can wither if nobody tends its roots.”

Genealogy as a hobby often means spending hours in front of a computer screen, hours in a library, shifting through dusty old documents and planning vacations around town clerk office hours and cemeteries near by.

When I first visited the Peacham area last year, I spent most of my time driving around looking for cemeteries where ancestors were buried.  This often meant getting lost on roads I wasn’t familiar with, stopping at little country stores to ask directions and cursing at my GPS for not knowing every back road.

On one particular day I was in search for the Rogers Cemetery in Newbury.  I wanted to find the grave of Lieutenant Josiah Rogers.  Josiah was born in 1747 and was one of the pioneers of Newbury.  He settled on what was later known as “Rogers Hill.”  He served in the Revolutionary War and died in 1828.

It was getting dark but I was determined to find this cemetery, so I continued to follow the directions that the man at the hardware store gave me to follow.  A turn here, a left there and finally I found it.  So I jumped out of the car with my camera and proceeded to walk around the cemetery looking at headstones, hoping to find Josiah’s.

The cemetery is surrounded on all sides by tall trees, which made the area a little darker, as the sun was setting.  I was near the last few rows of headstones and had not yet found his grave.  It was fall so I was bending down to sweep the autumn colored leaves from around the headstones to read some of the inscriptions. 

I will admit that although I don’t frighten easily, being in a cemetery after dark is not high on my list.  So as the sun was almost gone, I was determined to find his grave.  The cemetery was alone on a road going up a hill, a lone house across the street and I found my mind running with thoughts of all those horror movies I saw as a kid, like Friday the 13^th and Texas Chain Saw Massacre.

Suddenly something jumped from the leaves from behind a headstone and run into the trees.  I jumped back screaming it looked HUGE!  Ok in reality it was probably a squirrel but for that split second as I screamed I could have sworn it was much bigger.

I quickly covered my mouth with my hand and then removing it started apologizing to the headstones for jumping back on them and screaming.  Realizing that I had just screamed over a little (HUGE) squirrel and then apologized to people who had been buried for well over a hundred years, I started laughing.

I thought to myself, I must be a true genealogist to be out here, alone, in an area I don’t know, in a cemetery at dark, searching for an ancestor that died in 1828.

I did in the end find his headstone.