canada immigrants – Dusty Roots & Forgotten Treasures

Daniel E Adams – Gunsmith, Soldier, Photographer, Attorney, Skunk Farmer

The Unbelievable Life of Daniel Adams

A gunsmith, soldier, photographer, attorney, and a skunk farmer – it sounds like the start of a joke where the next line should be they walked into the bar. Interestingly enough those are all job titles held at various times by Daniel E. Adams.

On the scale of interesting characters of genealogical research my third great grandfather, Daniel E. Adams, is a jackpot. For the last several weeks I have been slowly pecking away at research on him for this blog…but it seemed the more I dug the more I wanted to dig. His life took many turns that make him an intriguing research subject with countless sources.

Early Life

Daniel E. Adams was born in Canada on 23 February 1832. His parents, Erwin Adams and Charlotte Murray, were of American birth. Shortly after Daniel’s birth, the family moved back south to the United States. Over the next two decades, the family would reside in Illinois and Michigan where most of the family would settle for generations.

Daniel married his first wife, Rachel Hamilton, in Oakland County, Michigan on 23 Sept 1852. There are four known children born to the marriage Flora, Edward Dexter, Arthur Hamilton, and Elmer Eugene. Rachel passed away 5 July 1862 leaving Daniel a widower with four children under the age of 10.

After the death of Rachel, Daniel hired 17-year-old Sarah Ferguson to help care for his children. The two married on 20 September 1863 in Genesee County, Michigan.

American Civil War

On 7 September 1864, Daniel enlisted as a gunsmith in Company G 4^th Michigan Infantry reorganized. According to information he provided at the time he was a veteran of the Mexican American War. During his term of enlistment, he would see combat action in skirmishes across northern Alabama.

On 14 May 1865 the train carrying Daniel’s unit derailed while traveling through Tennessee. The train car he was riding in became detached and jumped from the track. Daniel received injuries in the accident. The Army discharged him a month later in Nashville, Tennessee on 7 June 1865.

After the War

Daniel returned home to his family after his discharge from the Army. The 1870 census shows him at home with his young wife, Sarah, and their rapidly growing family. His profession at the time is listed as a photographer and records show he operated the first photograph gallery in Lapeer, Michigan. He would study law while operating the Mammoth Skylight Gallery. By 1872, he was a practicing attorney.

Daniel and Sarah continued to reside in southern Michigan and their family continued to grow. The two would have eight children together.

Eventually Daniel branched out from practicing law and started farming skunks.

Daniel passed away on 5 April 1906 in Genesee County, Michigan. He is buried in the Smith Hill Cemetery in Otisville, Genesee County, Michigan.

Adams Family Update

Who can resist a skunk farming lawyer?

That was the thought on my mind when I originally set out to research my great great great grandfather Daniel E Adams. All the information I found on his life indicated he was a larger than life type of man and his story screamed to be shared.

As I was researching Daniel E Adams for my blog about him, a distant cousin contacted me. This cousin, Frank Poss III, had in his possession several old family photos of shared relations.

This brings me to my Adams family update. I received copies of photos that previously I had never seen.

Photography was a popular profession not just among the Adams family but also among the Hamilton family. Siblings, Daniel and Emma Adams, married siblings, Daniel and Rachel Hamilton. Daniel and Emma Adams Hamilton would spend a lifetime operating Hamilton photo studios and many of their photographs are still in existence. Several of these photos bear the mark of Hamilton studios.

This photograph is of the five Adams brothers. I suspect it was taken sometime after the end of the Civil War, perhaps as late as when their father, Erwin Adams, died in Lapeer County, Michigan. The fifth brother, Plumer Adams, is not labeled in the photo.

The Family Matriarch

This photo is of Charlotte Murray Adams, the mother of the Adams brothers. She died in 1890 and was buried in Mt Hope Cemetery in Lapeer County, Michigan next to her husband.

I will be adding further updates to this line as I continue researching the Adams family and trying to track them as they moved from Connecticut, to Vermont, onto Canada, out west to Iowa, split into separate fractions with some going west to establish Utah while others eventually settled for generations in Michigan. Stay tuned.

Part Two: Tearing Down Brick Walls – Spence Family Mystery

Looking Closer

As part of discovering my Spence family roots I dug deeper into the events of the world at the time trying to determine what records might exist to help me on my search.

According to the records I have found my Spence forebears were in Ireland until sometime before 1853 when they migrated to Canada. Spence is an ancient Scottish name so it is probably safe to assume my forebears were Protestant Scots living in the Antrim area.

Ireland in the 1840’s

During the 1840’s my Spence ancestors had no doubt began to seek out a better life elsewhere. Historic hostilities between the Catholic and Protestant populations were never ending and starting in 1845 a famine began to sweep the country. Faced with mass starvation and continued violence they joined a flood of people fleeing Ireland. During the period known as the Great Hunger (1845-1852) an estimated 1 million people died due to starvation and disease while another 1 million fled the country.[1]

The Coffin Ships

Faced with the mass death in Ireland I’m sure my ancestors thought the hardest part of their journey was over once they boarded the ship for a new land. It couldn’t be further from the truth. Ship owners were driven by profit not humanity. The vessels carrying the Irish across the Atlantic earned the name of coffin ships.

Unchecked travel between parts of the British Empire prior to 1847 led to massive emigration from Ireland into Canada. In 1847, the last year before tighter regulations shifted the tide of Irish emigrants to the United States, an estimated 100,000 sailed for Canada. 38,000 Irish flooded into the city of Toronto, a city with a population of only 20,000.

The sheer number of available desperate passengers allowed ship captains to load their cargo holds to overcrowding. Unscrupulous captains frequently under rationed their ships leading to starvation and disease spreading in the horrible conditions. It is thought as many as 20% died while crossing the Atlantic. Narratives of the time describe schools of sharks trailing the ships waiting for the bodies of the deceased to be thrown overboard[2].

Ship Fever

Things did not necessarily improve from there for those early Spence ancestors. Passengers arriving from Ireland could expect to be quarantined at Grosse Isle, Quebec. Sick passengers would remain there till death or improvement. Healthy appearing passengers would be allowed to pass on with just a quick glance. Typhoid fever was rampant in the horrible conditions on the ships and quickly spread to epidemic proportions in 1847 in Canada[3]. Poorly supplied and overcrowded communities struggled to fight the medical crisis.

As many as 20,000 died during the typhoid epidemic of 1847. Mass graves holding victims exist in Grosse Isle, Toronto, New Bruswick, Bytown, and Kingston. Many of the dead were never identified and remain recorded in the few records that exist as “unknown”.

A New World

Few passenger manifests were kept of the passengers during this period entering Canada from Ireland. There are many Spence families in Canada by 1851. Without a doubt somewhere in that mass of names lurk my elusive Spence relatives. I suspect the Canadian census of 1851, 1861, and 1871 hold possibly the only chance of providing documentation of this hearty generation who overcame amazing obstacles to get to America. I will have to examine the families in closer detail to determine which Spence may be connected.

Continued in Part Three: Tearing Down Brick Walls – A Spence Family Mystery

Sources:

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffin_ship

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1847_North_American_typhus_epidemic