One Story of Vitaline Lantagne Perusse

I suppose I’m a cynic down deep.  I listened to my mother’s stories about her family but didn’t really believe them.  For one thing, Mom held a lot back.  I didn’t realize she had a sister until I was 21 but I did know that she always got a box of chocolates every Christmas from ‘Beena’.   She told me that one of her uncles who was a carpenter fell through a church floor when he was trying to fix it (can’t confirm that one but there were carpenters in the family), and she said her father was the only one who could read the architectural plans for the new Boys’ Club and install the new curved picture window correctly (can’t confirm that as well).  She empathized with her deceased grandmother who had 17 children but died in an explosion. 

Imagine my surprise when we met her sister Mary and my new aunt started telling more stories of her sisters and brothers.  I knew my mom was the only child of Katie Flynn Perusse but she never told us that her father Ambrose Perusse had a first wife who had five children.   One of the reasons for withholding information could have been that the children from the first family were nearly all adults when Ambrose re-married.  Ambrose’s mother Vitaline Lantagne Perusse did reveal in the 1910 Census that she had had 17 children – 9 were alive at the time of the enumeration.  When I finally had the time to research this I was amazed to find many children born to this couple in Lowell, Massachusetts.   And I was also amazed to see how many different spellings of their names made it into official records (but that’s another blog).   I also discovered that they had lived in a part of Lowell that was originally in Tewksbury, Mass.    

After many years of research I have found a possible 14 children born to this couple and a history of many journeys, probably to find work.   There were journeys from the Lowell area to Fall River, and back at least twice.  There was a trip to St Calixte du Somerset, Quebec, (one child was baptized in St Julie, Laurierville).  Mom had mentioned 3 sets of twins but I couldn’t find evidence of that in any of the birth records which have come to light. 

I really wanted to know if there was an explosion that factored into their lives and, of course, I asked a reference librarian at the Lowell public library.   He immediately pulled the microfilm for me and I was able to read about the explosion of the U.S. Cartridge Company on July 29, 1903, in the early morning hours.  The storage facility was just across the street from a housing development, Riverside Park, in what was then Tewksbury, Mass.   Many things were disturbing in the newspaper articles but I was really surprised that there were munitions stored across a narrow street from a residential district.   

The people who died in the explosion were listed, and my great-grandmother was the first one mentioned.  She died in her home directly across the street – she was about 50 years old.  Her youngest child, Josephine, 14 years old, also died.   My great-grandfather was blown from a ladder a short distance away.  One of his sons was also working nearby and was injured.  They were both carpenters.    Several properties that my great-grandfather owned were destroyed.  In fact, the neighborhood was characterized as a smoking crater.  The speculation was at the time that the weather – it was hot and humid—contributed to the catastrophe.  Nitroglycerin apparently had been dripping from stored dynamite and was saturating  the floorboards.  Something sparked. 

There was some misleading information in one of the reports in the paper which made the search for this family more involved.  But because of this, I discovered that there are a lot of folks named Perusse in Minnesota.  I know now that they are descended from a mutual ancestor of my branch of Perusse but at the time I could find no evidence that my Perusse family ever lived there.  The similarity of names was quite striking.   Relatives gathered from New York, Massachusetts, and Connecticut and I wish that the reporters had listed their names, relationships and home addresses (we can hope). 

Vitaline Lantagne Perusse was buried in Cimitière St Joseph in Chelmsford, Mass. with her daughter Josephine.   Her husband and two more of her children were eventually buried there as well.   There is an interesting monument at the site. 

Vitaline Lantagne was born in Quebec, Canada about 1852.  She married Zephirin Perusse 13 February 1870, in Lowell, Massachusetts.  They were both 18 years old.  He had been born in Bytown, now Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.  Vitaline died 29 July, 1903.  Zephirin died 4 June 1929.  Children: 

1. Louis Zephirin Perusse, b. 30 Nov 1870, Lowell; d. 1 May 1922, Lowell

2. Vitaline Perusse, b. 25 Nov 1871, Lowell; d. ? m. Surprenant

3. Zephyrin Adelard Perusse, b. 5 Jan 1873, Fall River, MA; d. before 1929

4. Ambrose (John) Perusse, b. 2 Jan 1874, Lowell; d. 27 July 1955, Lynn, MA

5. Marie-Georgina Perusse, b. 29 July 1877 St Calixte du Somerset, Quebec; d. ?; May have married a Bishop/ Levesque.

6. George Perusse, b. 10 Dec 1879 Lowell; d before 1929

7. Joseph Perusse, b. 26 Dec 1880 Lowell; d. ?

8. Gerry C Perusse, b. March 1882; d. Jan 1912

9. Albert Perusse, b. 6 Dec 1884, Fall River; d. after 1930

10. Marie Delia Perusse, b. 22 July1886, Lowell; d. ?

11. Philias Perusse, b. 28 Aug 1887; d. ?

12. Charles Perusse, b. 5 July 1888 Lowell; d. 10 Aug 1888 Lowell

13. Edward Perusse, ? (his birth date is improbable)

14. Josephine Perusse, b. 20 Oct 1891 Lowell; d. 29 July 1903 Tewksbury, MA.

I now always appreciate Mom’s stories and all the other family stories because there will be a kernel of truth in all of them. 

Sorting the facts about Eva Etta Lindsey Plummer

Eva Etta Lindsey Plummer was my great-grandmother.   Family lore has a scandalous story about her:  supposedly, she ran away from her husband and children with a shoe salesman.   I wanted to find her story and prove or disprove the accepted tale. 

Family records are pretty rare.  There is a typed manuscript at the New England Historic Genealogical Society written by Bernice O Newborg in 1947, The Descendants of Andrew Lindsey of Pembroke, Massachusetts.  Ms Newborg is a descendant  of Andrew Lindsey and this makes her a cousin of Eva Etta Lindsey.  She provides nicknames for some of the children of Ethelbert and Eliza (Stewart) Lindsey (Eva Etta’s parents) which lead me to believe that she may have had some first-hand information about them.  The other slim volume you may come across is Ephraim Lindsey and His Descendants compiled by Mrs L. J. Holbrook (nee Lydia Jane Lindsey), 1904.  She is also a cousin.  The most remarkable feature in this book is the portrait of one Ichabod Lindsey (b. 26 Nov. 1801, d. Sept., 1857) who looks like my brother.  I knew she was writing about my family when I saw the portrait.  Ms Holbrook’s book is decades earlier and doesn’t have a jot about Eva Etta but does sort out some problems with the 19^th Century Lindseys.  There is good preliminary information. 

There are few facts concerning Eva Etta.  I believe she was born on North Haven Island, Maine, in 1882 or 1883.  The State of Maine official birth record will tell you that her birth year was 1883 - the reporting place was Rockland, Maine and her parents were incorrectly listed.   The official report is taken from the town records, of course.   If you are lucky enough to travel to Rockland and get to see the actual entry page in town records, you will see that all of her surviving siblings were reported at the same time.  Her father and her eldest brother both carried the old-fashioned name Ethelbert (sometimes found as Ethel B or just Bert) and these two men were confounded in the written record.  How do I know this?  Official records list Annetta M as her mother, but Annette M Burgin was her brother’s recently married wife.  He and his wife are listed first in the town records so the assumption was made they were the parents of the reported children.  I will get this corrected someday. 

Eva Etta Lindsey was married to Sherman William Plummer on 3 Sep 1898 in Saco, Maine when she was about 16 years old;  Sherman William was 33.  Family history, Vital Records, the 1906 Saco Register, and the 1910 Census support that they had 5 children:

1.        Harry Leroy, 15 July 1900
2.       Sherman Eldridge, 10 May 1902
3.       Catherine Gertrude, 3 March 1905
4.       Clyde Elmer, 4 Jun 1907
5.       Mildred Irene, 23 Sep 1908

The 1920 Census changes this line-up.  Sherman William is living with his mother Mahala (Wadleigh) (Plummer) Hidden, and with his son Sherman E. in Saco, Maine.  Eva Etta, housekeeper to a farmer’s family, is living with her two girls in North Troy, Vermont.   Her girls are listed as boarders in the household.  Her youngest son, Clyde, is living next door to the farming household.  I haven’t found Harry’s whereabouts, yet. 

In 1930, Eva is no longer the housekeeper, she is listed as a boarder in the same household.  Her girls are not with her and Clyde isn’t living next door.  Her sister Nellie is still alive; her mother Eliza can’t be found. 

Eva Etta died in North Troy, Vermont in 1933.   Sherman William is listed as her husband as indeed she was still married to him.  I haven’t found evidence of divorce proceedings from either party although both of them listed divorced or separated as their status on different occasions. 

 So those are the facts of the matter but there is more to the story….

I need to introduce you to one of Eva Etta’s sisters.  Another child of Ethelbert Lindsey and Eliza Stewart was Elvia Ellen Lindsey born in 1871.  Newborg said her nickname was Nell.   In the 1906 Saco Register she is mentioned at her mother’s entry as E Ellen “m. Allen, Troy, Vt”.  This is partially true.  In 1900 there is a marriage record for a widow Nelly E Linsly Allen, marrying a Richard H Bluett, (b. Ely, Vermont), in Boston, Massachusetts.  I almost discarded this piece of information until I saw her parents were listed as Eliza A Stewart and Athel Linsly.  I’ve seen worse spellings for that name.   In 1910 Nell is enumerated as the wife of Eli N Berry, North Troy, Vermont.  The enumerator noted that she had had 6 children but only 3 were alive in 1910, however, there were no children of hers in the household.  Living with them was her mother, Eliza Stewart Lindsey, and a boarder, Daniel Mandigo,  who would one day be the next door neighbor.  In 1920, Nellie Berry is 50 years old, her husband’s name has morphed to Norman E Berry, her mother is gone but 12 year old Clyde Plummer lives there. 

Newborg listed 4 children for Nellie Lindsey but said they were “all adopted by others”.   This is an interesting piece of information and I’ve used it to speculate on what could have happened.  I think that it’s quite plausible that Nell needed support from her family so her mother joined her between 1906 and 1910.  Then her sister, Eva Etta also made the journey from Saco, Maine, to North Troy, Vermont,  sometime between 1910 and 1920.  She brought her three youngest children with her (which hardly fits with leaving with a shoe salesman in my humble opinion) and needed to make a living…she became the housekeeper to the next door neighbor where she could stay close to her sister and mother. 

I also know that her family wasn’t entirely estranged from her.  After her daughter Mildred married she visited her mother on occasion.  Millie’s oldest daughter, a cousin once-removed from me, was born in Vermont while on a visit, and another daughter remembered visiting a big old farm house with a feather bed that the kids would play on at Grammie Plummer’s house in Vermont. 

This is one of the family stories that I wish I had more….more facts, more text, more speculation,  even more rumors.  Speculation and rumors at least will give you hints as to where to go next to gather more facts.   

 

Who was Joanne Condon?

My mom's family lines were French-Canadian from her dad and Irish from her mom.  Her mother's name was Catherine Flynn; she was always referred to as Katie Flynn even after her marriage to Ambrose Perusse.  I knew as a kid that mom's grandfather was John Joseph Flynn and his wife Maria (pronounced Ma-RI-a) Nash but knew little more than that.  I knew about my grandmother and her sister Mary and I had heard my mother talk about an uncle Joe.   The City Directories for Lynn were the first documents I used to try to find more information and I was able to create a time-line of residences for John Joseph Flynn, morocco dresser, immigrant from Ireland.  I guessed at the marriage date and was happy when (back in the day) the city clerk handed me the ledger for 1885 and I happily examined the pages to discover the correct entry. 

I spent an entire Saturday at the Public Library once looking at microfilms of birth and death records and was able to figure out that John Joseph and Maria had more children than I thought.  Three survived to adulthood but Maria had at least 10 pregnancies from 1885 to 1902 when she died from complications from a stillborn birth.  She was 42.  I realized then that this story was going to be sad and complicated and probably the reason why I'd never heard much of anything of this family. 

I spent some Saturdays just reading the local papers for the span of time of Maria's married life.  The Police Blotter was revealing and I discovered John Joseph had lead a difficult life and spent several sessions in the local jail and at the Poor Farm.  More unhappiness in this family.  One of the archivists at the Massachusetts State Archives unearthed some of the records for me and provided me with photocopies of the "day book" which recorded when inmates wrote or received letters.  John Joseph became seriously ill while at the Poor Farm in 1910 and was transferred to the hospital where six months later he died of exhaustion -- he was 47 years old.   Medical records in Massachusetts are redacted forever but I could have petitioned a judge for access if it weren't for the fact that the archivist assured me that there weren't any medical records.  Too bad since I'd like to have a complete family medical history. 

John Joseph's brother must have been informed of his illness about a month before he died which lines up with a day in October 1910 when Patrick purchased a large burial plot at St Joseph Cemetery in Lynn, Mass.  John Joseph was the first interred (1910).  Patrick Flynn died in 1940 without children so a few years ago I read the documents in his probate docket record hoping to find some evidence of who inherited the plot at St Joseph Cemetery.  There were the typical procedural documents in the probate packet but there was so much more which took some time to digest.  Since Patrick was married I supposed that his wife Catherine (Carew) Flynn would inherit everything but his heirs-at-law included his sister Catherine (Flynn) Hayes and the three surviving children of  my great-grandfather John Joseph: my grandmother Katie Flynn, her sister Mary (Flynn) Burke, and brother John Joseph Flynn II.  In this list was this mysterious stranger... another inheritor.....Joanne Condon, Patrick's half-sister. 

Who was this?  Unfortunately, there wasn't one more jot of information about Joanne Condon in any of the other documents in the packet other than the assertion that she lived in Cambridge, Mass.  I have been looking for her for a long, long time.  Census records, Directories, Sacramental Records at the Catholic Archives, the extracted IGI, Irish records, published family trees have been mined for any piece of information.   I've managed to find lots of interesting stuff about the Carews and allied families and my grandmother and her brother but nothing substantial on Joanne Condon.  I don't even know how she was Patrick's half-sister .... obviously a parent remarried but which parent and was Condon her birth name or married name?  Was she born in the States or in Ireland or somewhere else?  Did her parents immigrate?  I don't know her birthday, deathday, or if she was married.  I can't assign her one thing a genealogist needs to know.

I've let some time pass since I looked at this material....I think you have to do that with the brickwalls -- you have to be patient and re-charge your interest.  Let it rest and maybe someone somewhere will add to a database or transcribe one more record so you can dig into fresh information with renewed energy and interest.  I've also learned to get the story out to other researchers which is a new addition to my toolkit.  The story might be sad and revealing or a bit uncomfortable but it might spark some recognition in a long-lost cousin. 

So yesterday, I returned to the Probate Registry and browsed each index book from 1885 to 1960 searching for a woman named Joanne Condon.  Found one.  Ordered the packet.  Waiting.

Getting Started

The ancestor stories in my family are well-hidden.  It is akin to digging for buried treasure to unearth just the names and relationships of some of them.  Getting more information...making stories... is as rare as a Viking treasure trove.  And then there are the complications of a search.  You know what I am talking about...looking up origins of names; or deciphering handwriting; or puzzling over an entry in an inventory (what is a wemble?; a kidder?).  Have you had to learn how to read a map?  Find a cheat sheet so you can read a church record in Latin?  That's all part of genealogy research. 

 I can only trace my mom's maternal line (my umbilical line so-to-say) to my great-grandmother but on mom's paternal line we can travel back through New France to the Ile-de-France; Normandy; the Ile de Ré; Perche and many other interesting geographic areas.  My unknown grandmothers all carried the haplogroup J1C2 and that's all I know right now. 

On Dad's paternal line the family story travels back to the first settlers of Newbury, Hampton, Dover and other places in New England (and back to Olde England, of course) but the folks on his maternal line came from the environs of Manchester, England, in the early days of the Industrial Revolution.  There were many, many people there named Potts and Schofield who came to America.  There are probably many there still who are cousins.  Maybe I'll get to sort them out someday. 

My family name is Plummer -- English in origin and not that common -- but some of you will say that there is The Plumer Genealogy by Sidney Perley to help.  But wait, I had to prove that my name with one 'm' or two 'm's is the same family.  The Perley book has an autograph of Francis Plumer which was taken from an inventory he compiled in 1653,  and he signed his name with one m.  He scribed a line over the single M.  Somewhere buried in my memory was the tidbit that a tilde (~) over a single letter meant that the writer was intentionally abbreviating a double letter.  (I still don't know where that came from...Chicago Manual of Style?)  Plus, Perley was consistent with the single M throughout the book although the alternate spellings can be found in Census lists, deeds, inventories, directories, even my birth certificate.  Enough water has passed under the bridge and I'll take the name spelled either way. 

Genealogy is certainly not a cut-and-dried endeavor.  I find it challenging and sometimes exciting.  My line (unknown to me at first) in Perley's book ends at a man named Eldridge Plumer, 1818 - 1897.  Of course, when I was trying to research Eldridge I kept running into the 4 or 5 men named Elbridge Plummer also born in southern Maine about the same time.  This lead me to Elbridge Gerry, 1744 - 1814), former Governor of Massachusetts and 5th Vice-President of the US and then glimmers of memories of Mr Ruddock's history class emerged.  We learned about gerrymandering and Democratic-Republicans long before I got the history bug and then the genealogy bug. 

I want to share some of my family stories and some stories of the process of evaluating this information because, you know what I'm going to say, the journey is as important as the destination and sometimes the treasure is hidden very well.