Catherine Carr Welsh

Last week I wrote about finding the maiden name of my second great grandmother Catherine Welsh. Well I have had another week of Genealogy Happy Dances with finds for John and Catherine Carr Welsh!

I had found John's death certificate on Family Search early this year and I knew by the 1900 Census that Catherine had died prior to 1900 but could not find a death certificate for her that I could say was it. I had one contender but the address was not one I had seen so I could not prove it. But it did say she was buried in Westminster Cemetery and that is where John's said he was buried. A few months ago I found John's burial information on Ancestry using the PA Town and Church records. They include the book, Record of Interments, Westminster Cemetery Co., Philadelphia, PA. So this past Wednesday I took a ride up there to see what I could find.

I found this to be a large cemetery on Belmont Avenue in Bala Cynwyd, just on the border of Philadelphia. So I found the office and went in with my information. I also had found information that the in-laws of my great uncle Patrick McCarry, the Gallagher's, were buried here also. So I wanted to find them. the lady in the office found the card for the plot owned by Timothy Gallagher in section Eleven first. This is a lot consisting of 4 graves and it listed all the burials for the parents and some of their children. I was shown on the map that their graves were about in the middle of section Eleven. The information I had about John was that he was in section Delta. She started to show me where I could find the grave in Delta when I asked her if there was anyone with John ( since I was hoping to find Catherine). She went to find the card for that plot. it was found but there was no John Welsh in there. When I read her the information I had she said that she would look it up with the permit number. She comes back with a record of a plot with 8 graves owned by John Carroll. This was also in section eleven. I found out later that I had mistaken the 11 for ditto marks under Delta that was above. In the book they go back and forth between writing the section as Eleven and 11. Well John was in grave 8 and with him is Caroline Walsh. She thought the Walsh instead of Welsh was a misprint, I also said that his wife's name was Catherine. She said that she wanted to check something else and came back with an index card with the same grave information but the name was Catherine Walsh. She said that since I knew her name to be Catherine that I should go with this. So I found where she was buried but this only gave interment and grave numbers and I was told that she had no way of finding out the dates. And there were no markers to look at! I thanked her for her help and the information and left. Before going home I went to section Eleven and looked around but there was nothing to find.

Last night I decided to look in the Cemetery record book page by page to find her and I did. Catherine died 21 Jun 1896 and it gave her address as 2441 Cresson St., Manayunk, Philadelphia. Looking at the death certificate I had, Cresson St. was the address but the number was 4441 not 2441. There are some other differences like her age but the death date and burial date, 24 Jun 1896 match. So I now finally have her death information.

On to the next problem to be solved!

Finding another Surname in the McCarry Family

Back in April I decided to order some death certificates from Pennsylvania. I have had Grandmom Mccarry's death certificate for years and since I have finally gotten death dates for her brother John and sister Kate I thought I would order them. I was hoping that their's would give me something I had not been able to find, their mother's maiden name! So along with Aunt Katie's husband Joe, I ordered the certificates. Now in Pennsylvania you have to start your wait when you see the check clear your account. So after the check cleared I marked my calendar to expect them around the 7th of August. I was pleasantly surprised when I received an envelope from PA Vitals the beginning of June! That was short lived. When I opened it I found Uncle Joe's death certificate, ok. But they sent me the death certificate for the wrong Catherine Taylor and  notice that they had no record for John Welsh.

Now Aunt Katie died in 1970 and Uncle Joe died in 1962 so they are not in the archived index. But Uncle John died in 1916 so I had looked him up in the index. I found that page was messed up and could not get enough information to find the correct John Welsh. This was why I decided to order his from the state, thinking that they had other ways of finding the record with the index the way it was. Well I was not giving up. I called Harrisburg and told them first that I had received the incorrect certificate for Catherine Taylor and started to explain about the index and John Welsh. The person I spoke to told me to resend the applications and give them any information I had. So I proceeded to write a letter giving all the information I had from the cemetery records and even sent them copies of these along with a copy of the index page indicating which John Welsh's I thought could be correct. I am sure that the vitals people hate seeing requests from me, I always send a lot of copies of information so they have more than enough!

Well the beginning of August I received the correct certificate for Aunt Katie but along with it I receive a notice saying that in order to give me the best possible copy of Uncle John's death certificate it would take another 4 weeks. Well it arrived yesterday! And it was worth the wait. Aunt Katie's had her mother's maiden name as Welsh, that was Aunt Katie's maiden name, and her father's name was unknown. I was thinking that Uncle John's would be the best bet all along because when he died Grandmom McCarry was still alive.  I was right! The informant was my great grandfather, James McCarry and while he had the parents born in Philadelphia not Ireland, Their names were there, John Welsh and Catherine Carr. so I finally have the maiden name for my 2nd great grandmother. Next for her is to find her death information!

Sunday Obituary-Mrs William VanBilliard

Mrs. William VanBilliard.

Althanetta, wife of William VanBilliard, died on Wednesday at SouthBethlehem, aged 44 years. Deceased was a daughter of Charles F. And the late Mary Sounders Seifert and was born at Durham. Besides the husband, a daughter, Mrs. Helen Munsch, of South Bethlehem, and two sons, Charles, of Allentown and Edwin of South Bethlehem, her father and three brothers, Erwin and Edwin Seifert, of South Bethlehem, and Harry of Allentown survive her.

"Althanetta VanBilliard," (Easton) Easton Express, 8 Nov 1912, pg.5.

Althanetta's husband William was the brother of my Great Grandfather George. 

Obituary of William A. VanBilliard

"William S. VanBilliard obituary," (Easton) Easton Express, 

 Tuesday, 10 Jun 1924, p 2, col 2

 

William was my great uncle. Don't you just love the sisters having just their husband's name. Well, Mrs, David O'Donnell is my grandmother, so I know that is his sister Elizabeth. Thank goodness I already knew the married names for my other great aunts. Mrs. Edward Leidig is his sister Tillie(Matilda), Mrs. William Martin is sister Margaret, and Mrs Walter Feldman is sister Mabel.