This is my favorite picture of the older generations of the family. I have no idea when it was taken or where. The younger man holding the dog is William Wickham and the younger lady is either his sister Ettie or his wife Emma. I tend to think it’s his sister. The old couple in the center? Well, some say it’s John Rivers and his wife Francis Jane Munson – they would be the aunt and uncle to William and Ettie. Somehow, I don’t think it’s John and Jane. I think it is more likely to be Reuben Thomas Wickham and Mary Emmaline Munson – the parents of William and Ettie.

Ruben was born in England on April 12, 1831. He immigrated with his mother, Christianna and his brothers John George and Joseph. Ruben’s father Charles had come over prior to the rest of the family.

Ruben’s mother, Christianna is listed as Hannah on the passenger manifest – which could be a nickname. The puzzle is the 10 year old boy named Charles. I know it is not a “typo” for Ruben’s father Charles due to this excerpt from the memorial for Ruben’s mother Christianna:

“They lived for six years in London and then Mr. Wickham came to America to seek a more healthful climate.  Finding that his health improved here he wrote to his wife that he would return to England for her and the children and close up their business there.  She thought it unnecessary for him to come, however, and after writing him to that effect arranged to leave her English home with her three small children.”

The three small children would be John, Ruben and Joseph. It is possible that the 10 year old Charles is a son of Charles (and therefore a half brother of Ruben, John and Joseph) from a previous marriage. But I don’t know for sure. It is also unknown at this time what happened to that 10 year old Charles.

The family came to Michigan on an oxcart after living in New York for a few years. Charles and Christianna would have 2 daughters born in New York about 1836 and 1839. Charles would only live one month after arriving in Tittabawassee Township of Saginaw County Michigan in 1840. Christianna, with 5 small children to care for, re-married on April 14, 1841 to Edward Green – who helped raise her children.

Ruben would live the rest of his life in Tittabawassee Township and Thomas Township. He married on April 26, 1858, Mary Emmaline Munson. Ruben bought 65.03 acres of land in Tittabawassee Township (Lot number 4 of Section 32 inTownship 13 North of Range 3 East) 6 years after his marriage – on April 25, 1864.

Ruben had to provide certain proofs in order to purchase the land under the Homestead Acts. The following is an affidavit made by his brother, Joseph and another gentleman by the name of William Burleson filed on behalf of Ruben.

I LOVE the detail in this document. Ruben had built for his young family a board house that was about 14×16, an addition of about the same size. The house had a board roof and floors, with 3 outside [doors] and 2 windows. It was a comfortable house to live in. He had cultivated about 12 acres of the land, cleared another 3 acres, built a log stable, an outdoor cellar, dug a well and planted a bunch of fruit trees and shrubbery. Not bad for just under 6 years.

Now looking back at my favorite picture (above) – and keeping in mind this description of his house and land – I am convinced that my thought that the old couple was Ruben and his wife Mary is correct.

Ruben died on January 16, 1903 and is buried in Owen Cemetery.

When my great-grandmother Anna passed away in 1914, the children that she had with her husband Bert were taken away from Bert. My grandfather, Raymond, was one of those children – so this fact comes from him. It can be supported in the census records since in 1920 (the first census after Anna’s death) the children are not found with their father, but scattered to the winds. Grandpa spent most of his adult life looking for his siblings. He was able to find all but one – John who was born January 11, 1913 and would have only been 1 year old when his mother died.

 

About 10 years ago, I met a woman who had married into the Hickmott family and had gathered some family history data. In subsequent research – her information wasn’t always accurate (according to her records, I would have been about 20 years older than I am), but it usually proves to be a good starting point. One of the tidbits that she had said that John went to live with his “uncle Ford Riopelle” in Detroit after Anna had died. A clue that needed to be followed up since she had not.

Anna’s father had died when she was just 2 years old. Her mother re-married a man by the name of John Hand. They had children – one of which was Carrie G. Hand. Carrie and Anna are half sisters since they share the same mother. Carrie was born in 1881 and on October 11, 1906 married Andrew J Riopelle. Carrie and Andrew would have a son by the name of Andrew Ford Riopelle – born in 1915 who went by his middle name of Ford. Now, Ford and John would have been cousins – not uncle/nephew. However, Ford’s father, Andrew J Riopelle, would have been an uncle to John. I could see where that “small detail” could be mis-attributed.

I started searching the census for this family.

In 1920 and 1940 there is another “son” listed for Andrew and Carrie by the name of Donald Riopelle who was born in 1913. Yet, in 1930 census – he is not listed. Instead is the following entry:

Donald Hickmott, a nephew, age 17 (making his birth 1913). His age corresponds perfectly with the Donald Riopelle found in the 1920 and 1940 census in this family. So, Donald Hickmott in 1930 is the same person as Donald Riopelle from 1920 and 1940.

Why would he be listed as Hickmott and as a nephew in 1930 when he is listed as Riopelle and as a son in 1920 and 1940? My guess – in 1920 and 1940 Andrew gave the information to the census enumerator and in 1930, Carrie gave the information – giving the more accurate information of his relationship and surname.

I have not been able to find any birth record for Donald Riopelle in 1913 in the Detroit vicinity. I have been unable to find any death record for John Hickmott born in 1913. As far as I can tell, this is the only instance of Donald Riopelle’s name being listed as Donald Hickmott.

Donald died without being married or having children in May 1969, since his gravestone is only inscribed with “son-brother”. He probably is the man with this tombstone in Woodmere Cemetery in Detroit:

So far I have only circumstantial evidence, but I believe that Andrew and Carrie did indeed take in John Hickmott when he was just a year old – but gave him the name of Donald for some reason and probably raised him as their own child. But many questions remain unanswered. What does the J. in Pvt Donald J Riopelle stand for (could it be John)? If he was a Pvt, what military service did he have? There are a couple of different Donald Riopelle in the military records with the appropriate age and birthplace of Michigan. Why did Andrew and Carrie change his name from John to Donald?

If my theory is correct – that John Hickmott is really Donald Riopelle, then that would explain why grandpa never found his brother – he wouldn’t have known about the name change.

I would love to hear from someone who has a connection to this Riopelle family so I can further confirm or deny my theory.

John Rivers Jr is not a direct ancestor – but rather a great-grand-uncle. Or maybe not so great and grand… LOL He is the brother of my great-grandfather, Gardner Rivers.

John was born in 1865 and can be found on the census for 1870 and 1880 living with his family in Saginaw County, Michigan. However, after the 1880 census he seemingly disappears from any official record that I can find.

Probably 10-15 years ago now, I had heard from a cousin who had talked to one of the older generation before she passed and this cousin told me that according to her, John Jr had moved to the Petoskey area and changed his name to Guy Morrison. Also that he had married a woman by the name of Katy and they had twin girls. Oh, and the reason why he moved and changed his name? Well, that’s because he had killed someone and was trying to avoid the law.

I searched for years to find proof of this and was coming up short. I could indeed find a Guy Morrison with wife Katy and twin girls (among other children) in the 1900 to 1940 censuses in the Petoskey area. I could not find Guy Morrison before 1900 though. This seemed to fit the family story – but I still couldn’t say yes, this was definitely him. There wasn’t anything really connecting this Guy Morrison to my John Rivers Jr except the timeframe fit. And well, that’s just not enough to say for sure.

Then in 2016, I finally was able to make some progress. About a week after my uncle’s funeral, I had this overwhelming urge to research John Jr again (my uncle was my dad’s brother – and this is his side of the family). So, I started searching again. And again, I was coming up empty. Then I decided to check his “other” name – Guy Morrison. That’s when I hit the jackpot. Suddenly there was this family tree on ancestry.com that was posted by a descendant of Guy Morrison, and the little bit that was posted, seemed to fit. So, on a long-shot I contacted the owner of the tree. I explained that I had this family legend that John Rivers Jr changed his name to Guy Morrison and a bit about his family in the Petoskey area.  I left out the part about the murder as I didn’t want to scare off the contact. This cousin replied and shared that the family legend was true – she had the same legend (including as I would later confirm the part about murder). This cousin then shared with me one of the only pictures she had of Guy Morrison – which is posted above.

I compared it to some pictures that I had of some of Gardner and his siblings.

I concluded that since the story matched up and there was a similarity in the pictures between Guy/John and Gardner, Burt, Daniel (James Daniel) and Joseph – who all would be brothers and even a bit of similarity between Mary and Guy too (as poor as the pictures are), that John Jr was this Guy Morrison. But I would prefer to have a bit better proof. Well, I would eventually get that too – in 2017 I was checking my AncestryDNA matches and who would show up – this cousin who is Guy Morrison’s descendant. Doing some quick checks to make sure that the DNA didn’t come from a different ancestor, gave me the proof that I was really looking for. John Rivers Jr is Guy Morrison.

So, this has got me to wondering, about the murder part of the story. Who did John Jr kill? Why did he kill this person? I spent some time going through the Saginaw newspapers on Genealogybank.com and so far have come up empty. There’s only one murder in the area that seemingly went unsolved – but that was in 1881 and was an infant who was found alongside a road. Now, in 1881, John Jr would have been about 16.

He married (as Guy Morrison) Constance Wachoviak in Mount Forest, Bay County, Michigan in May of 1893. Constance went by the nickname Katy in later records.

In checking where Mount Forest is – it very well could be that they married on their way to Petoskey area from the Taymouth Township area. So, if the 1881 baby was who John killed, it seems far fetched that he would wait around another 12 years before taking off and changing his name. It just doesn’t make sense.

At this point, I still don’t know who and why John supposedly killed. I would assume the murder went unsolved – or at the very least his name as John Rivers would be associated with the murder as a possible suspect. After all, why else would he change his name and move away to avoid the police? However, I have yet to find any evidence of it. This will require more digging – and I may never find out the details.

William is my second great-grandfather. He was born on September 29, 1837 – probably in Canada. I have not actually found his birth record, but his parents, James and Prudence immigrated from Ireland sometime between 1828 and 1861 – and I believe it was earlier rather than later.

At some point between 1861 and 1868, William immigrated from Canada to Michigan. William was living with his parents in 1861 in Hungerford Township, Canada West (Ontario).

In March of 1868, he was buying land in Michigan.

William was married at least 3 times – although it is not known what happened to the first 2 marriages. The first marriage was to Maloney Jewbar on December 26, 1869, the second to Ann Pethplace on October 25, 1874 and the third to Rosa Susan Smith on November 11, 1882. There was a possible 4th marriage to a Bridget – probably before Maloney – but I have not been able to confirm this.

William and Rosie had 10 children with 8 of them living to adulthood – Rose born in 1882, James born in 1885, Margaret born in 1888, William Nelson born 1891, Archie born 1893, Frank born 1896 and died 1901, Abraham Poisinger born 1897, Emily born 1899, Elizabeth born 1900 and Pearl born 1905 and died 5 months later.

William was no stranger to problems with his neighbors. I ran across several instances where he got into a ruckus with a neighbor or two.

Between 1905, when William and Rosie’s last child died, and 1910 William moved his family to Pense Township in Ontario, Canada. He was once again having problems with his neighbors.

William ended up committing suicide in October of 1913. The following article was found at the bottom of one column and continued at the top of the next column of the New Liskeard Speaker, page 1, October 17, 1913.

 

I remember one time when I went with my parents to put flowers on gravestones at the cemetery and asking my mom who these people were. She would tell me how each person was related – and how she knew that so-and-so was related, but wasn’t exactly sure how. I also remember seeing a couple of gravestones (Orrin Jones and another for William Jones) that we were not putting flowers on and I asked why not since they had the same surname as my grandmother’s maiden name. Her response was she didn’t think they were related, but somehow I had the feeling they were. Little did I know then that my feeling would turn out to be true, although I wouldn’t find that out for about 30 years. It was also probably my first experience with a feeling which I get when researching or visiting areas that ancestors lived in and that would become more pronounced as I worked on my family history years later. But more on that in another post.

I also remember when I had been digging into the family history for a few years and talking to my mom about what information I had finally found on her Hickmott ancestors. She was thrilled with the information that I had found and then started asking me about specific people. One of them was her grandfather – Aaron Jones. I told her that I hadn’t found anything other than his dad was Thomas and frankly I wasn’t gonna look. She gave me a bewildered look and asked why. My response was that it was too common of a name and I really didn’t have anything to go on other than their names. I told her that if something fell into my lap, then I would of course pursue it, but otherwise it’s way too hard to figure out one Jones from another.

Of course every so often I had tried to find more information – but really had not made much progress. Then suddenly one day, when looking at my DNA results on ancestry.com guess what happened. Something fell into my lap.

AncestryDNA has a feature called “New Ancestor Discoveries” where they suggest someone who might be your ancestor. A name appeared there – Sarah Thursa Hibner. The name meant nothing to me, and a quick look didn’t reveal any interesting connections. So, I dismissed it. Then I looked in another area that AncestryDNA developed called “DNA Circles”. The premise of this feature is to look at the public family trees of your DNA matches and propose a possible ancestor based on the DNA connection. Well, guess what, Sarah Thursa Hibner showed up again. Ok, this is getting serious – I really need to check this lady out. So, I started looking at the family trees of those DNA matches. I see that she is the daughter of George Hibner and Emma Groff and her first husband was John Jones and her second husband was Henry Lester. To say that bells started going off in my head was an understatement. Both Groff and Jones are in my family tree. I start digging.

Well, after about a year of researching this connection, I am no closer to proving that her mother Emma Groff is related to my great-great-grandmother Emeline Groff. However, that has to be the connection. See, all of the descendants that I have a DNA connection to Sarah are her grandchildren (some great, some great-great) from her second husband Henry Lester. This is why I believe the connection is actually in the Groff line. But in stumbling about to find the actual connection, her first husband John Jones jumped out at me. And of course, because he was jumping out at me, I had to pursue it.

It turns out that John Jones was born in 1838 and died in 1873. He was the son of Orrin Jones and his wife Dorothy Cates. His siblings were Royal (1826-1893), George (1829-?), Thomas J (1830-1893), William (1834 – 1903) who had a wife Harriet and Stephen (1845-1918) who had a wife Nancy. Orrin and William both have headstones in Taymouth Township Cemetery. Now bells are really going off in my head along with a few fireworks.

I’ve known for a while that Aaron’s father, Thomas was born about 1830 and had probably died in 1893 (although I still have to actually prove this). I also knew that  in 1880, when Aaron was about 20 years old, he was living with a Stephen Jones and his family. Aaron was listed as a border – but I had wondered if there was a family connection. Also, I knew that Aaron’s father-in-law, George Lawhead, had hooked up with Harriet Jones – the wife of William Jones (a subject for a different blog post). In addition, in George Lawhead’s civil war pension file, there was an affidavit from Nancy Jones saying she was Harriet’s sister. Nancy Jones is the wife of Stephen Jones. Nancy’s maiden name was Savage – just like Harriet.

See why bells and fireworks were going off? My great-great-grandfather, Thomas belongs to that Jones family. Now, I know that my great-great-great grandfather is Orrin Jones (and his father is Thomas). I know that Aaron was living with his uncle in 1880.

Oh, and that part in my title about “unknown family rumor”? I say unknown because until I started down this rabbit hole, I didn’t know it. I traced the descendants of Sarah Thursa Hibner more into the present and found one Hazel Almarria Morse being her grand-daughter. Sarah had a daughter, Elizabeth with John Jones, and that Elizabeth is Hazel’s mother. Hazel first marries William Judge Hunter. At this point, I wonder if this is the same Hazel Hunter that married my grandpa after grandma died. So I keep checking and sure enough her second marriage was to Raymond Hickmott (my grandfather). So, grandpa, after grandma dies, marries her third cousin, Hazel. I relate this to my sister who said, yeah, she knew that and then goes on to say “I knew grandpa married grandma’s cousin, but didn’t know how they were related.” You see, I only knew that grandpa married Hazel Hunter – I never knew that part about Hazel Hunter and Marie Jones being cousins before. Needless to say, my response to that was “What other family rumors have you not told me?”

You can’t hide things from a genealogist….

Aaron Jones is my great-grandfather. He was born June 25, 1860 – before the state of Michigan started requiring the recording of such information. The date is only known from Aaron’s death certificate.

From his death certificate, we learn that his father was Thomas and that he was married to Margaret with the informant being Oscar. His wife was Margaret Lawhead and they married on February 7, 1886 in Saginaw County, Michigan – probably in either Albee township or Taymouth township, but that info has been lost. Oscar was one of 12 children of Aaron and Margaret. Because of that, I tend to believe the date of birth on the death certificate despite the 1870 census listing Aaron as 12 years old. Most of the other records agree with the 1860 birth year.

Sadly, Oscar didn’t seem to know the identity of his grandmother – Aaron’s mother. That actually would make sense because Oscar was born in 1904. The identity of Aaron’s mother actually comes from the death certificate of Aaron’s brother Matthew Francis Jones.

So, Aaron’s mother was Emmaline Groff (Grofe). Emmaline passed away in 1897 – 7 years before Oscar was born, so certainly possible that Oscar didn’t know her identity. Although I must say it seems a little strange since Aaron seemed to be a family man – one who cared about his family (and it was a large family).

Aaron was a laborer who had bouts of unemployment. On April 15, 1910 he reported on the census that he had been unemployed for 15 weeks. By the 1920 census though he was working for the railroad. He had also taken in the children of a daughter that had recently died (Rhoda Jones married George Reikowsky, but died July 25, 1917).

I failed to record what paper his obituary was found in and I can’t find it now online. Luckily, I saved a copy.

 

 

Bert Hickmott is my great-grandfather. Relatively little is known about his life, but what is known paints a sad picture. He was born on February 6, 1877 in New Haven Township, Shiawassee County, Michigan, the son of Stephen Hickmott and Eliza Powell.

Bert would marry my great-grandmother Anna Wortman on August 22, 1900. Bert and Anna would go on to have 8 known children – although 3 died as infants (stillborn or just a few days). The family wasn’t doing so well financially when Anna died on February 2, 1914 just 5 days after giving birth to a daughter who was a stillborn. Anna couldn’t stop bleeding, which is what caused her death. Because of the financial situation, after Anna’s death, the children were removed from the household, and as far as I can tell, never saw their father again. One of those children, my grandfather, Raymond, searched most of his adult life for his siblings and found all but one.

Bert would marry again. On April 15, 1917 he married Mary E. Love in Corunna. Mary would die on May 5, 1920. They did not have any children as far as I have found. Bert quickly found another wife, Helen Brass, as they were married on August 8, 1920. I have not found evidence that Bert and Helen had children either.

Bert would die on November 12, 1932 in St. Johns, Michigan of pneumonia. He is buried in Riverside Cemetery in Elsie – an unmarked grave. Helen died a few years later on January 24, 1938 and is also buried in Riverside Cemetery – again an unmarked grave.  Presumably they are buried next to each other.

 

My great-grandmother Anna Wortman was born on October 11, 1876, probably in Dryden, Lapeer County, Michigan. I say probably because that is where her parents, John T. Wortman and Eleanora D. Gibbs were living at the time, although I have not actually found her birth record yet.

Anna’s life was a hard one and filled with sadness. When she was not quite 2 years old, her father John T. Wortman died in March 1878. Her mother Ella would re-marry in August of 1879 a man by the name of John Henry Hand. Her step-father would die in January 1891. Her mother did not re-marry after that and would die a widow in August 1914.

Anna would marry George Conklin on March 25, 1899. The marriage was short lived however, as they divorced on January 16, 1900. George was quite a bit older than Anna as he was 55 years old when they married while Anna was just 22 years old. Coincidentally, George would end up dying on April 22, 1914 – just a couple of months after Anna.

Anna wasn’t alone long after her divorce from George. She married my great-grandfather, Bert Hickmott, on August 22, 1900. This must have been a better marriage for her despite financial and emotional hardships as she and Bert were together until her death on February 2, 1914.

Anna had been pregnant 8 times and 5 of the children survived. The first child, a boy, was stillborn on May 5, 1901. The second child, a girl, was born on February 15, 1902 and died the next day.

Then Anna had 5 successful births in a row – Charles in 1903, Raymond in 1904, Kenneth in 1908, Della in 1911 and John in 1913. Her last child, a baby girl died in-utero on January 26, 1914. Anna never recovered from that birth, passing away 5 days later at the age of 37 years.

After her death, the children were taken from Bert because of the financial situation. My grandfather searched most of his adult life for his siblings and found all but one.

 

Stephen Hickmott was born July 27, 1823 in Horsmonden, County Kent, England. He immigrated to the United States in May of 1851, landing first in New York City and then migrated to Avon Township, Oakland County, Michigan. He was a passenger on the ship Wisconsin that set sail from London on May 20, 1851. He was reportedly a carpenter at this time. Stephen immigrated with his brother James. Another brother, William also immigrated, but he came on a different ship landing in a different area with his family. Stephen and James were single at the time of their immigration.

In April of 1856, he petitioned to become a naturalized citizen of the United States. The immigration process at the time required a 5 year wait after the initial application, but so far no other naturalization records have been found for Stephen. It could be that he had applied initially in New York when he arrived, and the document found in 1856 in Oakland County, Michigan was in reality the “final” paperwork, but I haven’t been able to determine that. Regardless, in 1900 he reported himself as a naturalized citizen.

In August of 1859, Stephen married Eliza J. Powell in Avon Township. The entry is found at the bottom of the page and continued on the top of the next page of the Michigan County Marriage Records 1822-1940 book for Oakland County.

Sometime between 1860 and 1870, Stephen moved his new family to New Haven in Shiawassee County. The community is just north of Owosso. Eliza died there on September 15, 1894. Stephen died on March 15, 1910 in Chesaning in Saginaw County Michigan. He is buried in West Haven Cemetery in New Haven, Shiawassee County, Michigan next to his wife.