Looking at these names you wouldn't easily see the connection to the people on the other side of this monument who are named Hyde.
The woman on this side who is the Hyde is named Lillian. Now you can see that she married the man named Norval LAMPREY (the "his wife" helps us out here) whose parents are listed above him.
That much I figured out before I took the photo (avoiding the poison ivy).
Lillian's middle initial is given as B. Her mother's maiden name is BRIGHAM. It is a big name in this area. A descendant of that Brigham family was Peter Bent Brigham who was associated with a hospital in Boston (in which my maternal grandfather died). Things just keep snapping into place and this isn't even my family.
Norval was a farmer. Notice that he died before his parents. Lillian was already dead as she died in 1898. So, who was Clarence? Most likely the infant son of Norval and Lillian, right?
On this gravestone, Clarence died in 1896. That is not correct. Clarence died in 1895. This makes me think this gravestone was erected by a Hyde-Lamprey descendant.
I really had to spend time with the Massachusetts Vital Record of Southborough to get a picture of this family. That's when I found out that Norval and Lillian had three children. Clarence had an older brother and a twin sister.
Poor Lillian. Her baby son, Clarence died (of "teething") and then consumption got her. Norval remarried to have a mother for the two remaining children and then, he died. This is a nightmare.
Just to make it creepier, his second wife was born on the same day, the same year in the same town as his first wife. They must have known each other. I hope they were friends because she had to raise the first wife's children.
New England cemetery work can be very sad.
1 comment:
Hi Midge, Sad but very rewarding. There were no antibiotics and epidemics were happening occasionally. TB or Consumption was rampant in some families. Rewarding as the stones do give us a lot of vital information (pun intended). Super nice post today!
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