A Calendar, a Cemetery, and October challenge

 

Did anyone else feel like this when they went around the house turning over the page of the calendar to October ???  Where has the time gone?  Why haven't I achieved what I set out to achieve???  

The little ghosts in this picture reminded me of some flourescent or glow-in-the-dark ghosts I had when I was a kid.  You could stick them on your finger and play with them after "lights-out".  Did anyone else have those in the 70s like me?  They were yellow but glowed green in the dark.  I loved those little ghosts.  Ah memories - right - back to scary older me in the 2020s.  

I've always admired Nancy from My Ancestors and Me, who, at the beginning of every month, lists her family's anniversaries.  Have you set up a family calendar somewhere ?  I have mine in Google Calendar.  Here are my anniversaries for October:

1st October    Thomas Case and Maria Muzzlewhite marry in 1838

6th October     My nephew Lewis' birthday

7th October    my sister-in-law's birthday - Happy Birthday Julie! and Alice Duncan's birthday in                         1871- my husband's great-grandmother

12th October    Jane Grieve (nee Leverton's) death in 1921

14th October    my nephew Gene's birthday

18th October    My may-as-well-be nephew (best-friend's son) Ben's birthday

22nd October    my grandson's birthday !

25th October    James Cook and Caroline Jefferies marriage in 1871 - my great-great                                         grandparents 

29th October    my step-niece Chloe's birthday

30th October    my uncle, Edwin Oswald Conner died in 1947

Do you have a birthday book or some other way of recording birthdays?  Mine is a very quaint fairy-themed notebook - a companion one to an Address book I received years ago as a gift. 

Speaking of blogs I admire, I also like Janine Adams blog Organize Your Family History and her 30 X 30 challenge which she sets herself to research for 30 minutes a day for a month. I hope to be able to do more of that this month.

So what has been distracting me from research? Just life I guess and other family history pursuits.

I've been babysitting this cutie a few days a week.  I've also been experimenting with baking which turned out well.

 And I've been trying to work on my heirloom quilt for Caspar....not sure that it will be finished by Xmas eve though.

But, I did make good, with the marvellous encouragement of my sister-in-law Julie, to tick off one of my bucket-list items, which was to go to Toowoomba and see the Carnival of Flowers and visit the Toowoomba Cemetery.

Toowoomba Cemetery

Grave of Ida Claus (nee CATHCART)

This is a big cemetery and my photos don't do it justice.  I must say from the outset that we would not have had half as much success without the assistance of the fabulous women at the Toowoomba and Darling Downs Family History Society which has its home just adjacent to the Cemetery.  They supplied us with a map and looked up the locations of the three graves we wanted to visit - all half an hour before they shut up shop!

The marvelous helpers at Toowoomba and Darling Downs Family History Society

And so we found the graves of the following:

Ida CLAUS (nee CATHCART) died 19 June 1942 aged 46, wife of John Alfred CLAUS and mother of Averil.  Section Pres. 3 Block 14 Allot. 54.  Ida was living at 33 Rome Street when she died.  We did a drive by and found the most beautiful home virtually in original condition.

Ida was the sister of William Carleton CATHCART who died 22nd June 1942 aged 49 leaving his wife  Edna Hall (nee CHADBURNE) and son John. Section C9, Block 8, Allotment 5.  

Edna Hall GIBSON is also buried there so I suspect that Edna re-married after William died.  On the Qld BDM site, searching the indexes of deaths for Edna Hall GIBSON in 1955, we find Edna Hall GIBSON, mother Ellen HADDOCK and father William Henry CHADBURNE.

Grave of William Carleton Cathcart

Sadly I have since realized upon searching the Qld BDM indexes that young John died later that year on 21 August 1942.  Life can be too cruel sometimes.  Poor Edna. 

Isn't that amazing that Ida and William died within a few days of each other?  I thought they must have been in an accident. But no.  I obtained their death certificates and William died of chronic myocarditis which he'd been suffering from for 12 months.  Ida died of anaemia from the stomach cancer she'd been suffering from for 3 years.  She left four children, most of adult age: John Selwyn, Averil Ida, Rita and Gordon.  Very sad for both families.

Ida and William were the children from Mary Anna GRIEVE's first marriage to William George CATHCART.  

William George CATHCART died 18 August 1898. His parents according to the QLD BDM index are Margaret MILLER and George CATHCART. He is buried in Ipswich Cemetery. 

 

Family Notices (1901, August 24). The Queenslander (Brisbane, Qld. : 1866 - 1939), p. 352. Retrieved October 3, 2021, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article21265650 

 

 

He had two brothers: John and Adam.  Here is John's obituary.

 

PERSONAL. (1921, September 14). The Daily Mail (Brisbane, Qld. : 1903 - 1926), p. 6. Retrieved October 3, 2021, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article213160439

Mary Anna re-married to William TAIT and it is from the TAIT line that my husband and his family are descended.  My best guess is that Ida and William left Brisbane and went to Toowoomba under the care of their CATHCART grandparents but I haven't been able to prove that yet.  

We also found the grave of Ida and William's grandmother and I assume his great-grandfather - Margaret CATHCART (nee MILLER) died 19 February 1899 aged 61 and Adam CATHCART died 5 December 1894 aged 55. 

I cannot find a burial for George CATHCART at this stage although there is a George in the Qld BDM index who died in 1910...no parent's names.

Adam CATHCART's grave is on the left and Margaret on the right.  Other burials in the plot include Margaret Jane aged 4 months died 9 November 1877,

 Here is Margaret's obituary

DEATH OF MRS. GEORGE CATHCART. (1899, February 20). Darling Downs Gazette (Qld. : 1881 - 1922), p. 2. Retrieved October 3, 2021, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article177618773

So a reasonably successful mission.  While I still don't know the complete story of what happened to Ida and William after their father died and their mother re-married in 1899, one can make suppositions.  Ida and William's grandparents died in 1899 (Margaret) and 1910 (George). Ida would have been only about 2 and 1/2 years old when her father died.  William Carleton her brother would have been nearly 6 years old.  

I have found a newspaper article for Ida in 1912 when she won a prize for Bible Class as a Senior

Our Kirchheim Letter. (1912, December 28). Queensland Times (Ipswich, Qld. : 1909 - 1954), p. 2 (DAILY). Retrieved October 3, 2021, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article113062182 

 

 

Mary Anna CATHCART (nee GRIEVE), Ida's mother, married William TAIT in September 1899 but had died by September 1908.  Ida seems to be living or at least going to church in Kirkheim (now known as Haigslea) in this newspaper article from 1912.  

Can you see that there are quite a few Clauses mentioned in that article too?  William and Ida's uncle Adam lived in Toowoomba in 1906, then Roma in 1913 according to the electoral rolls and then back to Toowoomba in 1922.  His brother John was station master at Toowoomba. So why was Ida at Kircheim? 

Pugh's Almanac from 1912

William, Ida's brother, is listed on the 1915 electoral roll as a labourer at Walloon.  I think that Mary Anna's children went to live with her parents (their other grandparents) the Grieves who lived at Walloon.  Somehow the Linnings were connected to the Grieves because when Mary Anna died, her daughter Elsie Coralene from her second marriage went to live with the Linnings I think. 

Advertising (1904, October 1). Queensland Times, Ipswich Herald and General Advertiser (Qld. : 1861 - 1908), p. 14. Retrieved October 3, 2021, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article124419665 

 

 

Andrew Grieves, Mary Anna's father, ran a dairy farm and the FW Linning had a butter factory at Kirchheim.  

MR. F. W. LINNING (1927, November 25). The Week (Brisbane, Qld. : 1876 - 1934), p. 23. Retrieved October 3, 2021, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article187601630

Salvena Grieve also lived at Kircheim. Salvena Grieve was born in 1877.  She was five years younger than Mary Anna, her sister.  Maybe she took the children in.  She does not seem to have married.   

I need to use the skills I learned from my workshop in Queensland Globe to try and plot the Grieves farm in relation to Kirchheim.  

That's all the time I have for now but it's been a good exercise, tidying things up a bit.

How have you been going with your research?