J is For Jailbird

1863 Indictment William Massey for Theft

Olive Tree Genealogy is continuing a new Alphabet Genealogy series of blog posts. I'm not following the usual way of going A-Z surnames.

Instead I will create a one word "tag". Then I will share an ancestor (mine, my husband's, an inlaw's or one of my children's) who fits the tag

Today's letter isJ for Jailbird.

Do you have any ancestors who ended up in prison? I do, but not as many as my husband.

My husband's 3rd great-grandfather William Massey lived in St Mary's Ontario from 1860 until his death in 1865. 

William, a teamster, worked for the newly formed American Express Company which had an office in St. Mary's in the mid 1800s. In 1862 William was charged with stealing over $800.00 from the Company (approximately $20,000.00 now) and arraigned for trial. One of the jurors at his arraignment was non other than Timothy Eaton, founder of Eaton's Company stores.

Read more about William and the lies he told his family to explain his absence while in jail. 

Olive May Peer, born November 1898 in Port Credit Ontario, has a common Peer ancestor with me. Her 3rd great-grandfather Jacob Peer, who I wrote about in the book "The Peer Family of North America" is my 4th. great-grandfather. My grandmother, also named Olive Peer, was Olive May's cousin.

In February 1927 Olive May married Robert Jackson. She could not have known that her husband was using an alias, that his real name was Robert Rodgers, and that her husband would be charged with two counts of bigamy and sentenced to time in jail.
 
Read more about Olive and her bigamist husband.

For something a little lighter, perhaps even humourous read Baa baa blacksheep, have you any cows? My great-grandmother's brothers spent time in jail for stealing a cow! Imagine going to jail in 1901 for a year and a half just for stealing a cow.

To find more exciting and troubling stories of ancestors who have been sent to prison for various crimes ranging from being drunk and disorderly to murder, use the topic "JAIL"  That topic will also bring up lists of prisoners in various jails, and more!

Find Prison Records for Ancestors

1863 Jury William Massey Trial

My husband's 3rd great grandfather William Massey was sent to trial, found guilty and given 6 months at hard labour in the Stratford Ontario Jail. He was found guilty on April 18, 1863. His sentence began December 10, 1863 and he was released June 10, 1864. So William was incarcerated in the Stratford Jail and not in Tennessee fighting for Grant as family legend had told. Sadly William died a year and a half after his release from jail.


Why the Lie?

Our best guess is that a lie was told to his children (ages 3 to 16) when he was imprisoned. Far better to tell the little ones that Daddy was off being a hero fighting a war, then to say Daddy was a thief and was sent to jail. And note MaryAnn's words in a newspaper article "....after spending 6 months in a Federal Hospital he was discharged..." Wow - 6 months - that was his sentence in Stratford Jail! We are just surprised that in such a small town, the gossip didn't make the rounds  for the kids to get wind of! Or did MaryAnn simply make up the story on her own?

We think the jail term may have hastened William's early death. He was 41 when he served his time at hard labour. And it would have been very hard. Conditions at the jail were not good, there was very little ventilation, it was cold in winter and hot in summer. Disease was almost certainly rampant.

So as sad as it is to think of William suffering as he must have, we are delighted to have found yet another bit of detail to help us form our story of this ancestor.

Prison Records Provide the Clues Needed

It was not the non-existent court records suddenly appearing that provided this information. It was the records of the Stratford Jail. They are sparse but they do provide the prisoner's name, age, length of stay in Canada, place of birth, crime and date imprisonment began and ended. The records also provided us with height, colour of eyes and hair, and a few other comments about his character. William has two mentions, the second states that his conduct as a prisoner was good.


Immigration Date Found

The other very welcome bit of information we gleaned from the jail records was that William had lived in Canada for 20 years. This gives us an approximate year of immigration from Ireland. Since ships passenger lists to Canada were not archived before 1865 we had no year of immigration and had previously only known that in 1843 William married Ellen Montgomery in Quebec. But we did not know if he arrived in Quebec as a child (with parents) or as a young man.

Now we know that he was approximately 21 years old when he sailed from Ireland to Canada. Since his wife's family was already in Quebec, and had been for many years, we assume he met her soon after arrival.

Bigamy & Jail: Rachel Eves & Her 4 Husbands

A wedding is supposed to be a joyous occasion. But for Rachel Eves Fardy her many marriages led to trouble. On 19 August 1899 a lurid headline hit The Globe newspaper:

HAMILTON: Mrs. Rachel Faraday Pleads Guilty of Bigamy

 

The Globe (1844-1936); Toronto, Ont. 19 Aug 1899: 20.

I was curious. I wanted to know more about Rachel. Why was her husband in the Home for Incurables? It was established in Hamilton Ontario in 1890 as St. Peter’s  Home for Incurables and cared for patients suffering from dementia or other chronic ailments.

An interesting tidbit is that her second husband was also a bigamist and was using the aliases of George Mavery and George Smith.

To give Rachel a voice and to tell her story I needed to find out more. A search of historic newspapers found several more articles that provided clues to further research.

After her short prison sentence was done, Rachel married two more times - to Frank Van Norman and then to Elias Slote. Her life was full of tragedy and challenges, from the deaths of two sons to the suicide of one husband and the chronic illness of her first.

Bigamy & Jail is Rachel's story - the story of a young woman enduring endless hardships yet finding the strength to go on, all the while doing the best she can to protect her children.

Got a Blacksheep Ancestor in New South Wales?

The State Archives and Records NSW website has published Gaol Photographs on their site. This is a must-see if you have ancestors living in New South Wales, Australia between 1870 and 1930.

There are 20 New South Wales prisons with a total of 199 volumes containing details of over 46,000 prisoners. Best of all there is a searchable index. 

The website tells us that the records consist of:

"The Gaol Photographic Description Books contain a photograph of each prisoner and the following information: number, prisoners' name, aliases, date when portrait was taken, native place, year of birth, details of arrival in the colony - ship and year of arrival, trade or occupation, religion, standard of education, height, weight (on committal, on discharge), colour of hair, colour of eyes, marks or special features, number of previous portrait, where and when tried, offence, sentence, remarks, and details of previous convictions (where and when, offence and sentence). "

Thanks to the headsup from 46,000 New South Wales Mugshots 1870-1930 Go Online

Earliest Mugshots of Blacksheep Ancestors

I don't know about you but I'm fascinated by Blacksheep Ancestors. I have quite a few of my own!


A historian claims to have found the oldest mugshots in the world. The photos were taken by the deputy governor of Derby Gaol in Derbyshire England from 1857 on.
I've written about these fascinating ancestors previously at

Who's Got Blacksheep Ancestors?

The Tragedies Behind Blacksheep Ancestors

If you're looking for places to search for your Blacksheep Ancestors, see the following websites

Blacksheep Ancestors

New York Prison Records 1797-1931 Online

Online: Kingston Penitentiary inmate history description ledgers

List of Prisoners in York (Toronto) Jail 1814

Photos of Child Criminals 1870s


Black Sheep, Good Sheep

See the mugshots at Historian claims to have found the oldest criminal mugshots 'in the world'

Who's Got Blacksheep Ancestors?

Blacksheep ancestors. We all love 'em. Let's be honest - there's something exciting and intriguing about having a bad boy or bad girl in our family trees. What constitutes a blacksheep ancestor though? It ranges from someone who sold booze without a licence to a murderer.

So without discussing the human tragedy aspect of an unsavory character's influence on family members, let's have some fun and list our blacksheep!

Here is my list of blacksheep ancestors

New Netherland (New York)

* 1657 & 1658: 8th great grandparents Jan and Dirckien Van Alstyne were fined on several occasions for selling beer to the Indians, and he was fined for selling brandy "after the ringing of the bell and during the sermon".
* 1657 & 1658: 8th great-grandmother Dirckje Van Alstyne taken to court several times for monies and goods owed and not paid
* 1659: 8th great-grandmother Dirckje Harmens Boertgen charged with theft of goods from a home
* 1682 : 9th Great-grandfather Albert Andriessen de Noorman aka Bradt charged with "behaving improperly before the young people" in an indecent way. Also charged that year with assaulting a neighbour with a knife
* 1685: 9th Great-grandfather Albert Andriessen de Noorman aka Bradt charged with starting fires and threatening his son. His other sons were ordered to confine Albert or "remove him from town"

Ontario Canada

* 1869. Great-grandfather Alexander McGinnis charged with assault
* 1879. Great-grandfather Alexander McGinnis sentenced to jail for selling liquor without a license.
* 1895. Great-grandfather Stephen Peer the victim of an axe attack by a neighbour and involved in a lengthy court case
* 1901: Great-grand-uncles Albert and Herman Vollick sentenced to 18 months in Kingston Penetentiary for stealing a cow
* 1916: Grand-uncle Ernest Simpson court martial for "having allowed a prisoner under his charge to escape" (found not guilty)

My daughter-in-law's interesting criminal ancestors (so far!) are:

*1672: Trois Rivieres Quebec. Her 11th great-grandmother Gillette Bonne, wife of Jacques Bertault hung for poisoning then beating her son-in-law to death

I am going to make a list of my husband's blacksheep ancestors and have him post it on his blog (AncestorsAtRest.blogspot.com) for fun! Meantime why not visit my son's website Blacksheep Ancestors.