Friday, January 23, 2009

Thomas A. BROADFOOT


Thomas A. BROADFOOT
Originally uploaded by midgefrazel
Thomas4 A. BROADFOOT (Thomas3, John2, David1) was the fourth child, third son born to Thomas Broadfoot and his wife Margaret Harcomb Broadfoot. [Thomas was my great grand uncle]

This grave tells us he was born Nov. 11, 1862 and died March 8, 1911. This stone is a lovely white color and is rough on all but one side. The location and the dates are correct in Brown's River Bend Cemetery Book.

Tom was born in Creetown, Kirkcudbright, Scotland [1881 Scotland Census] He was the first of his siblings to arrive in America. He came into the port of New York at Castle Garden. His occupation is listed as mason [was an apprentice hewer at 18 in 1881] and he was 20 years old on 2 April 1883 when he sailed from Liverpool, England and Queenstown, Ireland to New York. His passenger list is brief but it looks like it says 2 under the heading steerage. I found this record both at Ancestry.com in the NY Passenger Lists, 1820-1957 and confirmed it at the Castle Garden Web site. Tom's 1900 and 1910 census records both state he came here in 1883.

Luckily for me, Westerly RI has excellent city directories for me to search (at Ancestry.com) to add to the information in the 1900 and 1910 census records of Thomas and his family in Westerly, RI. But, the best piece of information is that Thomas was a monument maker being owner [1901-1902 city directory] with Faverio in the Westerly & Niantic Monument Works.

Thomas married in 1888, Annie Ferguson who arrived here the year before in 1887. Both the 1900 and 1910 census list his status as a naturalized citizen. In his later years, this Thomas was the one that other Broadfoot men who came to America listed as the person they were "going to see".

Learn more about Thomas in the blog post for his wife, Annie.

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