Arrrrgh! It's coming up soon...

If you always wanted to surround yourself in 18th century Liverpool, Nova Scotia, but you don't want to spend a lot of time immersed in the Diaries of Simeon Perkins... well, there's an app for that.

No, not really.

But there is a really fun event in Liverpool, NS at the end of June that celebrates the early privateer era that the town is known for: http://www.privateerdays.ca/  This year it will be held from June 30th to July 3rd. The photos below are from a 1990 trip to NS to discover our roots and celebrate Pop's 80th birthday.

Wedding performed during Privateer Days celebration.

Beautiful house in Liverpool

Privateer Days reenactment participants - the Militia

Halls Harbor on the North Shore

My nephew standing on a rock in the river - Mill Village, NS -
the Mack family lived here - Samuel owned a lumber mill

South Shore of Nova Scotia - maybe Port Medway, maybe not.

Oh, and the best souvenir... (aside from the photos and memories of our trip of course)

Samuel Mack 1736-1783, Port Medway, NS
Oldest gravestone in Old Port Medway Cemetery

There should be an app for it though. See you there?

C'mon everybody say it with feeling...

Arrrgh!
.
.
.

We have a new addition to our family!

No, not that kind.

The previously living kind - the new-to-us and previously unknown kind.

Minnie Mailman Mack has an older sister Martha Mailman by their father William and Isabella (Martha's mother, but possibly not Minnie's mother). I have to go back to 1849 Mill Village or Charleston, NS records to figure this one out.

Martha's marriage record lists William and Caroline as her parents; but her death certificate lists her mother as Isabella _______ of Mill Village, NS. This would explain why William and Caroline's older children were about Caroline's own age.

Martha married William Gibbons of Mill Village in 1868 (1) and in 1871 they are living in Port Medway, NS. William is 28 and working as a Carriage Maker, Martha is 21, and they have one child Isobel who is 2 yrs old. William's heritage is Irish and Martha's is German, though both were born in NS. (2)

In 1891, William and Martha are living in Liverpool, NS with their family of six children: Isabella, John, William, Gertrude, Frank and P. Annie. (3) In the next year they will move to Boston, Massachusetts in the US.(4)

William Gibbons disappears from records sometime in 1896-97. I haven't found a death record for him in either MA or NS. Martha died on September 25, 1913. She is buried in Everett, MA at Woodlawn Cemetery (5) . Their daughter Gertrude is also buried in Woodlawn Cemetery. (6)

This might be a clue as to why Minnie and Burton moved to Massachusetts.

Genealogy research is peculiar. One often finds the individual pieces of information totally by chance. You have to examine it and see where it fits. Sometimes it doesn't fit just right and it has to hang out in space and time until the piece that connects it to the big picture of the family comes along.

Martha was like that. Fortunately it only took a couple of days to place her into the Mack family. I hope she is resting comfortably now.

(1) Nova Scotia Historical Vital Records
(2) 1871 Canadian Census for Queens Co, Nova Scotia
(3) 1891 Canadian Census for Queens Co, Nova Scotia
(4) Boston Passenger and Crew Lists, 1820-1943, 16 April 1892 and 21 August 1892.
(5) Commonwealth of Massachusetts death certificate, Martha Mailman Gibbons
(6) Commonwealth of Massachusetts death certificate, Gertrude Martha Gibbons

Remarks on a passing

This is the passage in it's entirety:

Monday, Oct. 13th - I hear that Mr. Samuel Mack of Portmedway Dyed last Saturday. He has been a long time Sick. The water is raised So that Some of the Sawmills are like to go this day.

That's it. Samuel Mack is my 4th great grandfather Pop > Harold > Burton > John > Solomon > Samuel > Ebenezer > John).

The passage is from Simeon Perkins Diary 1780-1789, specifially 1783, page 202.

Simeon Perkins immigrated to Liverpool, Nova Scotia about 1760 from Norwich, CT. He became a magistrate for the local court; the head of the local militia during the American Revolution until age got the better of him; a keeper of accounts for all the trading that went on in Liverpool, NS and beyond; and a keeper of the comings and goings of the ships, cargo and people in the area.

His voluminous output is priceless in terms of interesting reading material, but is also genealogically important - particularly for our family, as there are so few records back then beyond births, marriages, deaths and land records.

Except for our friend Mr. Perkins, who did fortunately have business dealings with Mr. Samuel Mack, Mr. William Cahoon, Captain Ephraim Dean and many more prominent men of Liverpool, NS.

Thank you Mr. Perkins!