The Ancestors and Cousins of Tracy Lynn DeVault

[S7249] Genealogy prepared by sec3girls (Ancestry.com)
[S6173] Genealogy prepared by Janelle (Walker) Warden (Ancestry.com)
[S9006] Marriage Records - Tennessee, Tennessee Marriages 1796 - 1950 (Family Search)

Family Explorer

Mary E. Crouch^1,2,3

F, #40414, b. about 1850

Parents

Father	Landon Carter Crouch (b. 1819)
Mother	Susan H. Shipley (b. 1827)

Pedigree Link

Family: Solomon P. Hylton

Daughter

Lumecy Belle "Belle" Hylton+ (b. 14 December 1872, d. 23 March 1949)

BASIC FACTS

Mary E. Crouch was born about 1850 in Tennessee. She and Solomon P. Hylton were married on 16 December 1869 in Washington Co., Tennessee.²

Mary E. Crouch had reference number 40716.

Citations

[S7249] Genealogy prepared by sec3girls (Ancestry.com)
[S9006] Marriage Records - Tennessee, Tennessee Marriages 1796 - 1950 (Family Search)
[S6173] Genealogy prepared by Janelle (Walker) Warden (Ancestry.com)

Family Explorer

Landon Carter Crouch¹

M, #40415, b. 1819

Pedigree Link

Family: Susan H. Shipley (b. 1827)

Daughter

Mary E. Crouch+ (b. about 1850)

BASIC FACTS

Landon Carter Crouch was born in 1819.

Landon Carter Crouch had reference number 40717.

Citations

[S6173] Genealogy prepared by Janelle (Walker) Warden (Ancestry.com)

Family Explorer

Susan H. Shipley¹

F, #40416, b. 1827

Pedigree Link

Family: Landon Carter Crouch (b. 1819)

Daughter

Mary E. Crouch+ (b. about 1850)

BASIC FACTS

Susan H. Shipley was born in 1827.

Susan H. Shipley had reference number 40718.

Citations

[S6173] Genealogy prepared by Janelle (Walker) Warden (Ancestry.com)

Family Explorer

Mary Elizabeth Sanders^1,2,3,4,5

F, #40417, b. 17 August 1858, d. 18 December 1947

Parents

Father	Nicholas Denison Sanders (b. 1828)
Mother	Sarah Abby Lankham (b. 1836)

Pedigree Link

BASIC FACTS

Mary Elizabeth Sanders was born on 17 August 1858 in Stonington, Christian Co., Illinois.^6,3,4 She and Robert P. Duncan were married on 15 October 1890 in Christian Co., Illinois.^7,2 She died on 18 December 1947, at age 89, in Taylorville, Christian Co., Illinois.⁴ She was buried in Old Stonington Cemetery, Stonington, Christian Co., Illinois.⁴

Mary Elizabeth Sanders had reference number 40719. She was enumerated on the census in Christian County, Illinois (1910, 1930.) Myrna (Brooks) Hood wrote (given to me by Valerie M. Hudson):

Mary Sanders Duncan, who lived into the 1940s, (she died on 18 Dec., 1947) of course I did know --- as did most of my cousins, I'm sure. I remember "Cousin Mary" as an exceedingly prim and proper old lady, whose Victorian sensibilities I was forever being warned not to offend with my tom-boyish ways. As a result, I seemed to always be terminally tongue-tied in her presence. I seem to recall that I never saw her dressed other than in elegant black, usually an ankle-length gown with a white lace collar. Her legs, what one could see of them (and she would have called them "limbs" if she called them anything at all!) were always encased in black silk stockings. She had a rather mournful way of speaking and her accent that of pure New England. She had one stock comment in her conversation which inevitable came out in response to anybody's relating any kind of negative news --- from a cut finger to a total crop loss for the year: "Wa-al," she would drawl -- "Thaht's tooo bahd," in tones as sadly melancholy as a mourning dove's. There's no question but that she was the "grande dame" of the neighborhood; to commit even the slightest impropriety in her presence was unthinkable.

As mentioned elsewhere, Mary did have a husband, rather briefly. She married Robert Duncan (said to have been a minister) on 15 October, 1890. Robert died of typhoid fever on their wedding anniversary four years later. Some nine years after Robert's death, Mary took into her home a nine-year-old niece of Robert's, Donna Duncan. Donna was born on 9 Aug., 1894, in Findlay, Ill. Her father, Martin K. Duncan, had separated from her mother when the couple's four children were young. Lillie, her mother, had gone to California with the two youngest --- Donna and her sister, Pansie. By 1903, the mother's health failed and she sent Donna back to Illinois to live with her relatives. Donna's father was remarried by this time, so Mary Duncan, his sister-in-law, kindly took charge of Donna. Gwen Duncan, who married my father's first cousin, Malcolm Stewart of Moweaqua, was an older sister of Donna's. Malcolm Stewart's mother, born Typhena Brooks -- a sister to my grandfather Charles Brooks -- married as her second husband (and his second wife) the same Martin K. Duncan who was the father of Donna as well as Gwen Duncan, who became Tryphena's daughter-in-law after being her stepdaughter! I know I shouldn't try to describe relationships of this complicated nature - on paper, they never seem to come out right. Suffice it to say, this Martin K. Duncan, brother of Mary Sanders' husband Robert Duncan, father of Gwen and Donna, and second husband of my great-aunt "Pheenie", has been described to me by my father as an utterly despicable character -- "A mean old buzzard", I believe is how he described Duncan. When I inquired as to why Aunt Phennie ever married him, my dad said he didn't know and added, "Anyway, she got rid of him --- divorced him, you know!" [Chalk up two more 19th Century divorces!]

At any rate, Donna Duncan grew up into a spirited and beautiful young lady; no doubt she found the atmosphere of the Garwood-Duncan establishment a bit of a "gilded cage"; it must have been thick with Victorian repression, as well as overstuffed elegance. Perhaps she was happier during her teen years, when she was sent away to school at Monticello Lady's Seminary. Donna died rather suddenly on the 19th of December, 1915, allegedly from and undiagnosed brain tumor. My father, Carl Brooks, who knew Donna very well (they were close to the same age), states that Donna had developed a severe infection of the sinuses in the fall of 1915 --- an infection that quickly worsened, apparently spreading to the lining of the brain, and proved to be incurable in those days before antibiotics. A specialist was called in from Decatur, but he, too, was helpless to find a solution; the solution was still 30 years in the future in the form of penicillin. It's said that the two attending doctors operated on the dying patient as the she lay on her little bed in the downstairs bedroom, as a last desperate measure to locate the suspected brain tumor. As eyewitness, (as I have heard the story, a girl who was hired live-in help at the time) later described the scene as "Blood everywhere -- the mattress was entirely soaked with blood and we later took it out and burned it. It was terrible!" This same young lady was later to hint darkly that Donna's death was a suicide, but I believe she may have been letting her imagination run away with her. My father remembers the occasion very well, and it certainly does appear that Donna died from a raging infection. The death-bed operation, of course, was not only futile, but barbaric when viewed from a present-day perspective.

Although such scenes of horror were not uncommon in those days, I suppose, it must have been nothing short of ghastly for the dying girl and her anxiety-stricken family. Such a sudden and tragic end to her beautiful young niece must have been a cruel blow to the aunt who had raised her. Small wonder I remember as always speaking in melancholy tones.

Roger and Mary's oldest son, Jake Vangeison, now age 12, confided in me during my latest visit to this house (which, of course is his home) that he doesn't like to be in the "front part of the house". "Have you seen ghosts?" I asked him. "Well --- I don't think so," he said, "but I got this creepy feeling when I'm near that bedroom where she died." I have to agree with the lad --- that small front bedroom where Donna Duncan died, which still contains the same little painted bedstead that was hers, is quite capable of eliciting a very strong emotional response from anyone who is more than usually sensitive to such things. If ever an old house was tailor-made to harbor ghosts, this one surely must answer the description.

Note: Lydia (Ayars) Duncan took three of her daughters to California: Gwen, Donna and Pansie. Gwen and Donna returned to Illinois shortly after the 1900 Census was taken. Gwen married Malcolm Stewart and Donna went to live with Mary Elizabeth (Sanders) Duncan. Pansie remained in California where she lived and died.

Citations

[S4392] Email from Debra (Adams) Arnold dated August 13, 2010
[S8926] Marriage Records - Illinois "Illinois Marriages 1851 - 1900 (Ancestry.com)
[S1606] 1930 Census, Illinois, Christian County
[S3987] Death Records - Illinois, Deaths and Stillbirths 1916 - 1947 (Ancestry.com or LDS)
[S773] 1910 Census, Illinois, Christian County
[S6844] Genealogy prepared by mvangeison84 (Ancestry.com)
[S4378] Email from Dawn (Adams) Arnold dated September 3, 2010

Family Explorer

Alexander James Anderson¹

M, #40418

Pedigree Link

Family: Ida Lillian Speights

Daughter

Viola Sanders Anderson+ (b. 29 September 1895, d. 29 April 1976)

BASIC FACTS

Alexander James Anderson had reference number 40720.

Citations

[S6826] Genealogy prepared by moe155 (Ancestry.com)

Family Explorer

Ida Lillian Speights¹

F, #40419

Pedigree Link

Family: Alexander James Anderson

Daughter

Viola Sanders Anderson+ (b. 29 September 1895, d. 29 April 1976)

BASIC FACTS

Ida Lillian Speights had reference number 40721.

Citations

[S6826] Genealogy prepared by moe155 (Ancestry.com)

Family Explorer

Riley Ray Ellis¹

M, #40420

Pedigree Link

BASIC FACTS

Riley Ray Ellis and Nell Mae "Nellie" Hunt were married before 2008.²

Citations

[S11435] Obituary - Nell Mae "Nellie" (Hunt) Ilderton-Ellis
[S6826] Genealogy prepared by moe155 (Ancestry.com)

Family Explorer

James Gray Stewart^1,2

M, #40421, b. 1840

Pedigree Link

Family: Tryphena Margaret "Phena" Brooks (b. 29 February 1860, d. 31 March 1948)

Son	Malcolm Wayne Stewart+ (b. 23 May 1885, d. 18 January 1941)

BASIC FACTS

James Gray Stewart was born in 1840.² He and Tryphena Margaret "Phena" Brooks were married before 1885.

James Gray Stewart had reference number 40723.

Citations

[S4392] Email from Debra (Adams) Arnold dated August 13, 2010
[S6445] Genealogy prepared by Kathleen Cormack (email address)

Family Explorer

William Cleveland Lee^1,2

M, #40422

Pedigree Link

Family: Bertha L. Unknown

Daughter

Alberta B. Lee+ (b. about 1911)

BASIC FACTS

William Cleveland Lee had reference number 40724.

Citations

[S1447] 1920 Census, Tennessee, Sullivan County
[S1944] 1930 Census, Tennessee, Sullivan County

Family Explorer

Bertha L. Unknown^1,2

F, #40423

Pedigree Link

Family: William Cleveland Lee

Daughter

Alberta B. Lee+ (b. about 1911)

BASIC FACTS

Bertha L. Unknown had reference number 40725.

Citations

[S1944] 1930 Census, Tennessee, Sullivan County
[S1447] 1920 Census, Tennessee, Sullivan County

Family Explorer

Child White¹

F, #40424

Parents

Father	Robert Joseph White (b. 25 October 1883, d. 24 March 1976)
Mother	Effie Edith Miller (b. 20 March 1886, d. 3 April 1930)

Pedigree Link

Citations

[S4980] Find A Grave (Internet), Source Medium: Book

Family Explorer

Fred Strang^1,2

M, #40425

Pedigree Link

BASIC FACTS

Fred Strang and Jessie Bynum "Jess" Massengill were married before 30 October 1962.¹

Citations

[S9532] Obituary - Beulah D. (Massengill) Arrants
[S12398] Social Security Death Index, Source Medium: Book