Alvah (Orelany) Parsons - First Born

Alvah Parsons, named Orolany Parsons in the 1850 and 1860 census records, was the first born child of Benjamin Parsons and Lydia Bennett. He may even have been born before they were married, as according to the Mortality Schedule of the 1870 census, he was 22 years old in February of 1870, which means he was born before March 1848, and Benjamin and Lydia were married 27 August 1848. But then again, ages are often wrong in census records.

So poor Alvah didn't live long, having drowned at the age of 22. His death is recorded only in the census, and very briefly, telling how but not where he died. Since he was a sailor, it's likely he drowned at sea. There is no record of his burial anywhere, so that may be the case.

Mortality Schedule 1870 Census

It's not known what kind of sailor he was, though he was probably a merchant marine. Below is a picture of the front page of the sheet music for a song, published in 1868, about a man who misses his sweetheart. It depicts a typical sailor of the time. The Library of Congress has information about the music at their website.

Taken from Smithsonian website

This song is still being performed; you can hear it in this YouTube video:

Alvah's sister Etta is also listed on the mortality schedule. She died in November of the previous year of cholera infantum. So Benjamin and Lydia lost two children in the space of three months.

Robert James Tait

Robert James Tait was the son of Ida Etta Cole and James Matthews Tait. Ida was the daughter of Flora Parsons and George W. Cole. Flora was one of Benjamin & Lydia Parsons' 12 children, so Robert James Tait is one of Benjamin Parsons' great-grandsons, and my second cousin, once removed.

Robert was born 19 May 1931 (or 23 June, according to some sources), the 9th of 10 children, in Palmyra, Maine. He lived there until he joined the Army around 1949, ending up in the 7th Infantry Division, 57th Field Artillery Battalion as a Fire Direction and Liaison Operator. He was a PFC when he went to war in Korea. He was wounded in both legs and captured by North Korean soldiers on December 6, 1950. He died of his wounds 15 Feb 1951 in a North Korean POW camp. His remains were not returned until 2000 and not identified until 2013. He was buried in Bar Harbor 5 October 2013 with full military honors. His name is etched into the Korean War Memorial at Mt. Hope Cemetery in Bangor. A Bangor Daily News article tells the story of the repatriation of Robert Tait's remains and can be read here :  "Korean conflict POW’s remains returned to Bar Harbor after 62 years."

Poor Robert had a short life, but he was a part of history. Here is the story of the battle in which Robert was wounded told by one of the men who survived that day, Robert Hammond:

"Went back to Seoul and Inchon, Korea, in September on the Korea Revisit Program sponsored by the Korean government and the Korean Veterans, for American Vets (and others) who fought in the Korean War. 

"Of course, none of the 120 vets in my group recognized anything, as a new super-city with modern freeways and high-rises stands where the old burning and bombed out buildings did when we went through the cities some 47 years ago. 

"Although the guys in my squad were all killed at the Chosin Reservoir, and are still carried as MIA, none of them were in the machine-gunned ambulance that I crawled out of during the early morning hours of December 2, 1950, during the attempted breakout from the East side of Chosin. 

"This is the area where so very many soldiers were lost to the overwhelming numbers of Chinese who fragmented and ultimately destroyed the wounded convoy of trucks trying to reach the Marine position at Hagaru-ri. 

"Although the majority of these men were killed or captured on Dec. 1st or 2nd, due to the great loss of men, reports on their status were not written until Dec. 6th, and that is a date you will see referred to frequently on MIA's and KIA's. 

"For anyone who is interested in knowing what happened to the soldiers of 'Task Force Faith,' on Chosin's East side, I would recommend they they obtain a copy of 'EAST OF CHOSIN' by Roy Appleman. The story of the Marines on the South and West of the Reservoir are told in 'CHOSIN' by Eric Hammel. Both books are eye-openers."

 A more detailed story of the battle can be found on Wikipedia at this address: Chosin.

Sarah A (Sadie J) Cole

Taken from Pittsfield Historical Society website

Sarah A. (Sadie) Cole was the daughter of George W. Cole and Flora A. Parsons. She was born 1 January 1886 and died 25 April 1902 from consumption.

Flora Parsons was Lona Parson's older sister, the sixth child of Benjamin Parsons and Lydia Bennett, so Sarah was my grandmother Emma's first cousin.

Sarah was Flora and George's sixth child, after Linwood B, Bessie J, George H, Henry M, and Ida M. She was probably born in Burnham, Maine. In 1900 she was still living there with her parents and five of her six siblings. Linwood had moved out by then, but to where is not clear since I can find no record of his address at that time. Sarah was in school then, at age 14, but by age 16, when she died, she was working as a mill hand in a mill in Pittsfield.

There were three woolen mills operating in Pittsfield at the turn of the 20th century: Pioneer, Riverside, and Waverly. Pioneer is pictured above, Riverside below.

It's possible her death from consumption (either tuberculosis or pneumonia) was due in part to her work in the woolen mill, but it could also have been from being infected by her brother Linwood, who had died from tuberculosis in December of 1901.

Both she and her brother Linwood are buried in the plot with the parents in Pittsfield Village Cemetery.

Here is a poem written in 1916 by Sarah Norcliffe Cleghorn, entitled, "The Golf Links":

The golf links lie so near the mill
That almost every day
The laboring children can look out
And see the men at play.  

Taken from Pittsfield Historical Society website

Fred Asher Wentworth

Fred Asher Wentworth was the son of Harriet Parsons and Albert Noyes Wentworth. Harriet was Lona Parson's sister and Albert was James Carver Wentworth's brother, so Fred and my grandmother, Emma Wentworth, were first cousins--in fact, double cousins, as my mother likes to say. I don't know if they ever met.

Fred was born 21 September 1887 in Belfast, where his parents lived. By 1910 he was living in Clinton with his parents and two siblings, Carrie and Alton. He was a laborer at odd jobs and could read and write.

He married Lilla Mearle Cookson 25 May 1910. They had two children together: Leon Merton and Phyllis Beatrice.

In June of 1917 he registered for the draft. He was living at 9 Connor Avenue, Fairfield, at the time. The building no longer stands having been replaced with a little house that was built in 1950.

His WWI draft registration form shows he was of medium height, medium build, with light brown hair and gray eyes. It also says he was bald at the young age of thirty. (It never occurred to me that my thin hair might come from both sides of the family.) He was working as a laborer for the Waterville, Fairfield and Oakland Railway, an electric railroad. Here is a picture of the streetcar in operation:


Waterville, Fairfield & Oakland Railway

Stephen Plocher wrote a history of Waterville that contains information about the railroad:

The Waterville and Fairfield Railway began a streetcar service between the two communities in 1888. The first cars were each pulled by six horses, but within a few years the system was converted to run on the newly available electric power. Another electric trolley service opened in 1903, the Waterville and Oakland Railway; the two railways consolidated in 1911. The fare for the half-hourly service was five cents

By 1920 Fred was a foreman on the railroad and had his two children, Leon and Phyllis. He owned his house at 9 Connor Avenue but with a mortgage.

By 1930 he was a car repairman for an electric railroad (probably the WF&O), his house was worth $1500, and he owned a radio.  Next door, at 7 Connor Avenue, lived his father and mother and brother Alton. His 18-year-old son, Leon M., was a loom cleaner for a cotton mill, probably the Lockwood Manufacturing Company, a textile mill that was built in 1873 and lasted until 1955.  Below is a postcard from around 1920 showing the massive factory.

Lockwood Mills c. 1920, taken from Wikimedia Commons

In 1940, the Fred Wentworths were still living in their house, but it was worth only $1400 by then, which I suppose is not too bad considering they'd been through a depression. Fred was a carpenter (maybe because by this time the railroad was out of business) and his daughter Phyllis was working for a shirt factory as a sewer, although she worked privately, according to the census. I wonder if this means she was outsourced?  If so, she was probably better off, considering factory working conditions.

No doubt Phyllis worked for the C.F. Hathaway Shirt Company, which had been making shirts in Waterville since 1837. In fact, the company stayed there until 2002, when they finally moved operations overseas.  Here is a postcard taken from E-Bay's website, showing the factory as it was circa 1912:

By 1940, Fred's son Leon was married with four little children. He lived in Fairfield, too, at 28A Island Avenue; he was working as a street construction crew member.

I've lost track of Fred after this, except to note that he apparently died in 1958, although exactly when I haven't been able to determine.