Tuesday, May 05, 2015

Tombstone Tuesday: Three others died young

Photo by Brian Zoldak, 2014, used with permission
Infant Sons and Daughter
"three others died young"
Row #1, Grave #308-10-010, GPS 41.41686 N - 71.97180 W

(Transcript from Hale Survey)
Gallup, infant son of Ebenezer & Ellen,died Sept. 29, 1853,
 Gallup, infant son of Ebenezer & Ellen, died Dec 21, 1855,
 Gallup, infant daughter of Ebenezer & Ellen, died Apr. 3, 1866
 (Note: daughters date of death on the stone is 1860)

When photographing and transcribing gravestones in a family cemetery like this one, it is important not to skip over the babies or young children's gravestones. Examining and researching them can help with the story of the family life. In this case, this gravestone as broken and repaired as it is now was may have been erected some time after the infants were buried here and quite probably when the named children died. 

As this family of mother and father and children has no living descendants it can be used as a teaching example and looked at in a bit of depth. So many infant graves are not marked with stones or have stones with inscription, we are lucky to have this much information.

The first compiled Gallup genealogy, compiled by John Douglas Gallup in 1893 is in the public domain at Google Books. The below section is a crop of page 116.

The mother of these children has her maiden name of FARLEY recorded here as FOLEY and the volume only gives the births and deaths of named children. As the father died in 1894 and his wife died in 1899, they were both still living at the time of publication. 

BUT, did the compiler live in Connecticut at the time of data gathering? No,he did not. He went from New York to Massachusetts during his adult years. So he must have has correspondence from a family member to get the information for this family.



3 comments:

Colleen G. Brown Pasquale said...

Midge, that's a sad tombstone. How does a couple move on with the loss of three babies?

Preservationist said...

All very true Midge. That poor tombstone's been to hell and back. Ouch!

Midge Frazel said...

They coped by having two more that died. Stay tuned...