Vanishing Point: The Michiganers

The opening photo today, a nod to this week's Sepia Saturday theme, was taken from the front yard of my father's childhood home in Elm, Michigan, looking across the cow-strewn fields where a freight train smokes away down the Pere Marquette railroad...an example of the "vanishing point" effect.

Not all that far away from Elm was the town of Hudson. And Hudson marks a sort of vanishing point for much of my family tree, where the roots disappear back into a darkish history.

The family album has several photos that don't note the subject's name. However, the backs bear the imprint of two photographers in Hudson, Michigan: Fred D. Brown and D.H. Spencer. Members of both the Hale and, predominantly, the Daniels, clans lived in the Hudson area in the late 1800s. (The longtime American English Hales married into the lately arrived English Danielses, who then married into the Scots/Irish Orrs, who then married into the longtime American English Bentleys.)

George Daniels, my great-great-grandfather, first acquired land in Concord, Michigan, near Battle Creek, in 1848.

 The first photo below I am guessing is a contemporary of George Daniels: Lucretia (Johnson) Hale, who was the mother of George's daughter-in-law Martha (Hale) Daniels. I make this guess based on the fact that it's a tintype (this one has no photographer imprint), and the only other such photos like it in the album are of Martha's daughters Louise and Alice, around 1876.  That was two years after the death of Henry Daniels' mother, Ann Twidale Daniels, the other likely candidate for the photo.

Lucretia would have been about 69 that year. Her husband Hiram Hale (a melodious and oddly common name, as it turns out) had been dead since 1861.

I believe the next photo is the same woman a few years later; her snood or scarf seems identical. She looks about ten years older, so if it's now around 1888, Lucretia would be 80. The young Danielses had moved from Lansing to nearby Hudson, where Henry's parents were now living, in Lenawee County, between 1870 and 1880.

It was a goodly sized family living in Concord as of 1850. The following photos, probably taken 20 years later, are possibly Henry H. Daniels' siblings Mary, b. 1837; Robert, b. 1833 MI; Benjamin, b. 1835; and/or William b. 1846. But no solid evidence exists aside from the photographer's location (Hudson being quite nearby) .

This guy looks to be about the right age to be Robert or Benjamin if this was taken in 1876. On the other hand, he bears a resemblance, especially in the mouth, to Martha Hale Daniels. Like George, she had three brothers and a sister: Andrew (b. 1837),  Benjamin (b. 1835), John (b. 1845), and  Alice (b. 1848) ... Still, everyone looked so "down in the mouth" in these portraits, it's hard to tell!

The Captain and the Captain's Wife

Henry H. Daniels was my paternal grandmother's maternal grandfather -- that is, my father's mother's mother's father. There's a nice sort of symmetry about that. He was born in Michigan in 1840, of English immigrants George Daniels (Lincolnshire) and Ann Twidale (Yorkshire). At this point I know very little about his family, but I know the following, thanks to 2nd Michigan Volunteer Infantry web site:

• Henry H. Daniels was residing in Hudson at the outbreak of the Civil War.
• He enlisted, in Hudson, as Sergeant in Company B 2nd Michigan Infantry, on the 10th of May 1861. He was 21 years old at this time.
• He was promoted to Command Sgt. on 25 August 1862 (Acting Aide-de-camp to Colonel Fenton, 1st Brigade). He was transferred on the same day from Company B to Staff.
• He was promoted to 2nd Lieutenant on 17 September 1862. He was transferred on the same day from Staff to Company H.
• He was promoted to 1st Lieutenant on 24 February 1863 (Acting Aide-de-camp 1st Brigade, 1st Div., 9th Corps). He was transferred on the same day from Company H to Company D.
• He was transferred on 27 May 1863 from Company D to Company I.
• He was promoted to Captain on 12 March 1864 of Company C.
• Promoted to Adjutant on 26 March 1864. He was transferred on 29 March 1864 from Company I to Staff.
• He was transferred on 28 July 1864 from Staff to Company C.
• He was discharged for wounds on 05 November 1864 as Aide-de-camp on staff of Colonel Leasure. 

His wife was Martha L. Hale, born around 1842 in New York state.Bentley family lore had it that she was related to the famous American patriot Nathan Hale (1755-1776). However, records are very spotty and inconsistent; it appears that her father, Hiram (1805-1861), was the son of a Nathaniel Hale (b. 1758), and I so far can't get the dots to connect. Oh well! At any rate, she looks a bit dour, doesn't she? But obviously she was in Henry's heart during the war -- and he looks pretty wistful about it (I'm assuming he's getting ready to leave for duty, with his Sergeant's stripes).



This book briefly lists the actions of the 2d Infantry...

"This Regiment left Detroit on the 5th of June, 1861 — the first of the three years' Regiments in the field from this State — with an aggregate force on its muster rolls of 1,013, to which 102 had been added previous to the 1st of July. Its first engagement was at Blackburn's Ford, Va., July 18th, 1861. During the winter it lay near Alexandria, Va., and in March was moved under McClellan to the Virginia Peninsula. It took part in the siege of Yorktown; in engagements at Williamsburg, May 5th; at Pair Oaks, May 21st; at Charles City Cross Roads, June 30; at Malvern Hill, July 1; and at Chantilly, September 1. Its casualties at Williamsburg were 17 killed, 38 wounded, and 4 missing; at Fair Oaks, 10 killed and 47 wounded. Major General Israel B. Richardson, who entered the service in this war as commanding officer of the 2d, when it was organized, died in October last, of wounds received in the battle of Antietam, in which he commanded a division of Union forces. On the 30th of November the aggregate of the Second Infantry, present and absent, was 642. It is in Burns' Division off the ninth army corps of the army of the Potomac..."


Here are the Danielses some years later in Cripple Creek. Henry took his daughters Alice and Louise west and joined the mineral rush like his inlaws-to-be the Orrs, in the Colorado mining industry.

There are some great photos on MiningArtifacts.org.

Perhaps surprisingly Henry is buried in Oakland, California, but his grandson Hugh wound up as an Oakland attorney. So there you go.

Finally, I just discovered a distinguished-looking Henry in the gloriously titled "Representative Men of Colorado in the Nineteenth Century: A Portrait Gallery of Many of the Men who Have Been Instrumental in the Upbuilding of Colorado, Including Not Only the Pioneers, But Others Who, Coming Later, Have Added Their Quota, Until the Once Territory is Now the Splendid State." (Rowell Art Publishing Company, 1902 - Colorado - 272 pages) Outside of this honor I can't find evidence of what made him so "instrumental," but I'll take their word for it!

Reference sites include Michigan In the War, Find a Grave, and FamilySearch.

The Cattleman

When I recently received the family photograph album, I was thrilled to see pictures from my father's mother's side, the Orrs, Daniels, and Hales, in a spectacular collection of Daguerrotypes and other mostly formal portraits. 

This week I present my great-great-grandfather Hugh Nelson Orr.

The facts on Hugh are scattered and circumstantial... noted events in his life were:

• He appeared on the census in 1851 in St. Patrick Parish, Charlotte County, N.B. as a 16-year-old New-Brunswick-born son of Samuel and Jane Orr

• He appeared on the census in 1870 in Plattsmouth, Nebraska, as a 34-year-old, wealthy retired farmer with a wife and 3 children.

• He appeared on the census in 1880 in Laramie, Wyoming, as a 46-year-old, with the same wife, 4 daughters, and 1 son. His occupation was listed as stock grower [i.e., rancher] and he listedhis parents as born in Scotland  [they had been in Ireland for at least a couple of generations].

 

The obituary of a “Grandma” Annie Vallery Wright (b. 1846), of Fruitdale, South Dakota, reads in part: “a friend wrote her [in Plattsmouth, Nebraska] from Deadwood [Wyoming territory, now South Dakota] and urged her to “come west.” Within 24 hours after she received the letter she had a chance to ride to the Black Hills with Mr. and Mrs. Hugh Orr in their covered wagon. When the Orr train reached Fort Laramie it was stopped by soldiers. When the waiting group of travelers numbered 100, they were allowed to proceed. The Orr wagon reached its destination in 1876.”

Railroad building on the great plains / drawn by A.R. Waud 

A note from the Web reads:

“Gilbert A. Searight came from the area of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, to Burnet County, Texas, about 1859 and acquired through the courts land left by an uncle, Peter Kerr, to the county for the building of a school. Searight operated a ranch there before and after the Civil War. In 1876 he began his first cattle business, Searight and Orr, with Hugh N. Orr, in Laramie County, Wyoming Territory.”

Another reads:

The November 1, 1878, issue of the Cheyenne Daily Leader newspaper noted doctor Elisha Graham's arrival: "Dr. E. B. Graham, late of Albany, New York, arrived yesterday and will at once enter into the practice of his profession. ...Two of Elisha's new patients were Cheyenne Mayor Hugh N. Orr and former trader John (nicknamed "Portugee") Phillips,10 who owned ranches in eastern Wyoming and western Nebraska. They advised Elisha to invest in cattle and locate them on a bend in the Niobrara River in northwestern Nebraska, where the grass was lush and water abundant... In the spring of 1879, John Phillips and Hugh Orr guided Graham to the site of Agate Springs on the Niobrara River. That summer, Graham followed Orr and Phillips's advice. On August 1, he purchased from Orr 500 head of cattle driven north from Texas on the Western and Jones and Plummer trails to the shipping station at Ogallala, Nebraska. All were marked with the "04" brand, recorded at Sidney, Nebraska.

Around 1863, Hugh had married Emma Erway, who was born in 1846 in Michigan.

Thanks to Howard Emery, an Orr descendant, for much of this textual material. For glimpses of more antiquity, please visit Sepia Saturday!


Below is Hugh's obituary from the Cheyenne Daily Leader. From it I can now guess that the medallion he's wearing in the top photo must be a Templar (Masonic) cross.

Here is an 1874 article listing Hugh as a candidate for county commissioner.

Two years after his death, his family sold his ranch on Chugwater Creek (tributary of the Laramie River), including 320 acres and 220 head of "meat cattle," 65 horses, 440 tons of hay, 8 miles of wire fencing, and various equipment. The copy is hard to read but the price looks like $30, 556.00.

Louise

This week, after a patient wait of 35 years, I received the family photograph album. Although it did not contain the expected Bentley family pictures, it did contain pictures from my father's mother's side, the Orrs, Daniels, and Hales, in a spectacular collection of Daguerrotypes and other mostly formal portraits. This week I present my great-grandmother Louise.

Louise Daniels, born in 1867 or 1868 in Michigan, was the second child, the first girl, of Capt. Henry H. Daniels, of English descent, and Martha Louise Hale, who was reputedly from the line of the famed Nathan hale. Louise was my great-grandmother on my father's side -- his mother's mother.

A second girl, Alice, called Allie, was born in 1870.

In 1887, when she was just 20, Louise, now living in Colorado with her recent husband, prospector Gaylord A. Orr, gave birth to the first of two children, Jessie Louise Orr.

On the left you see Louise and Jessie. On the right you see Jessie in 1910 with her own firstborn, Dorothy Bentley, my father's elder sister.

Here's Louise with, I believe, her father Henry.

Here's the only photo of Louise I had ever seen prior to this week, with a grandson, shortly before her death in 1956, when I was two years old. We never met.

Be sure to visit Sepia Saturday for more antiquity!

Sepia Lost Uncle #1

In keeping with the Sepia Saturday weekly theme, I present my late Uncle Paul Singer, when he was in the service in the Forties, featuring his "saucer cap."

What's that, you might ask?
From Wikipedia: "A peaked cap, forage cap, barracks cover, or combination cap is a form of headgear worn by the armed forces of many nations and also by many uniformed civilian organizations such as law enforcement agencies. In the United States military, they are commonly known as service caps, wheel caps, saucer caps, or combination covers in the Naval services."

Looking very serious indeed beside the staff cars

Paul was my mother's younger brother.
A relaxed and friendly soul, not to say devil-may-care, he took after his dad Arthur Singer.
Unlike Art, he never seemed to find his calling....

Looking like he has somewhere better to go

Paul was stationed, I believe, at Fort Bragg, California. He was a DJ at the Army base radio station...  

Somewhere I have a 78 RPM record he cut at the studio as a letter home.

Temporarily happy

Soon after his first marriage, his wife left him.  She took their 2-year-old daughter, who, when she was old enough to want to get in touch, was forbidden to contact the Singer family.

Paul with a decorated buddy who looks about 14!

The years passed.
He did this and that through the Fifties and Sixties...
In the early Seventies he tried to start a lobster ranch in Puerto Rico but the government funding failed to come through and he came back to the States disillusioned.
At one point he was selling meat, or possibly fish, from the back of a truck around Los Angeles.

Is that a flight suit? Looks too warm for California!

And then shortly after the last time I saw him in 1979 he left his second wife.
In fact, he left town, without telling anyone where he was going.
We never saw him again.

Pondering his future

Only in the last few years was I able to trace Paul, to find he'd died in 2000, back in L.A., age 76.

I was also able to locate his daughter, now in her 60s, and provide her at last with photos of her long lost father and his parents.

Uncle Paul's daughter and our grandparents, around 1950