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Photo of John Stone Found!

Stone -> Howell

John Stone (1798 – 1877)

I recently received the above photo of our 3x great grandfather, John Stone. This is the first photo I’ve seen of him. This is now the eldest Stone ancestor photo we have. I can count the number of photos we have of ancestors born in the 1700’s on one hand – so this is pretty cool on several fronts.

The photo was provided by 4th cousin Paul Woodrow who writes:

“Attached is the photo of John Stone (original is 2 1/2 in. x 4 in., a carte-de-visite) and the obverse with photographer’s name and several notes. This is in a family album I inherited, and probably originated with my great-grandparents, David McMackon & Susan Stone. Printed below his photo is ‘John Stone, Great Grandfather’.”

John Stone is the first of our Stone ancestors that came to Canada from Ireland. He was born in County Carlow, and immigrated to Canada in 1820 at age 22.

I don’t have the name of the town in County Carlow where John Stone lived in Ireland, but it was likely in or near Tullowphelim, a townland near Tullow and outlined in blue on the map below.

Location of the Tullowphelim townland, County Carlow, Ireland (outlined in blue)

John married Mary Burns in 1826 in Canada. Mary was born in Ferns, Wexford, Leinster. They had 9 children, the eldest of which is our 2x great grandfather Thomas Stone.

John was a town Councillor in Orford in 1842 and Town Warden in 1843. Several mentions of him are noted in “Representative Canadians – A Cyclopedia of Canadian Biography being chiefly men of the Time – 1886” including:

“John Stone was a native of the County of Carlow, Ireland, and came to Canada in 1820, a the age of 22.  He married Mary Burns, on May 3rd, 1826, and settled on a farm in Elizabethtown, in 1834,

“He removed thence to the township of Esquesing, County of Halton, near the village of Adamsville (now Acton). Here the family resided for six years, after which, in 1840,  it went west, settling in the backwoods of the County of Kent, township of Orford.  Here John Stone purchased a bush farm, upon which he wrought and prospered, and died upon the same on November 16th 1877, in the eightieth year of his age.  His widow and one of his sons, A. J. Stone, are still living on the old homestead, near Highgate.

“…were both Episcopalians, but soon after their marriage, became Methodists”

John and Mary are buried together in the Gosnell Cemetery, Orford Township, Kent county, Ontario (near Chatham, Ontario). Paul Woodrow took the photo below of their gravestone. The inscription reads:

“In memory of John Stone who died Nov 16, 1877 aged 79 Y’s & 6 M’S. Mary Burns wife of John Stone died Feb 26, 1899 Aged 92 Yrs 10 Mos. …”



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Betsy Cherry’s Clock

 Cherry -> Spencer -> Stone -> Howell

Peter Howell has this interesting heirloom clock made cir. 1864 in Connecticut by the S.C. Spring company.  This photo below taken by J. Spencer Howell during his last visit in 2010.
According to antiques.com which lists similar clocks:

“The company never issued a catalogue so its hard to know how many styles they made. Most of their clocks were sold to other clock manufacturers, so to find one with the S.C. Spring label in the case is a wonderful ‘find’ indeed…the image on the reverse-painted lower door glass reflects the type of work that was popular in that day…the clock features faux marble columns with gilded sections.”

Of special interest to our family: The clock has penciled service notations inside which often record the date and owner’s name such as “3.10.92 – Cleaned, Mrs. Spencer Stone” (Flora Maude Campbell Stone 1872-1969). Another notation refers to “Mrs. Spencer.” which could be interpreted to mean the aforementioned Mrs. Spencer Stone, but due to the age of the clock this could literally be Mrs. Spencer who was Betsy Cherry (1808-1893) who married William Spencer (1804-1846). Betsy Cherry Spencer outlived her husband William and daughter Adelaide Spencer (1833-1871).  After her daughter’s death, Betsy Cherry Spencer moved in with her widowed son-in-law Thomas Stone and raised her grandson, Spencer Stone (1869-1939) from age 2. (Adelaide Spencer married Thomas Stone (1827-1899) and they had eight children before her death)

So the likely provenance of the clock is: William & Betsy (Cherry) Spencer -> Spencer & Maude (Campbell) Stone -> John E. & Elizabeth (Stone) Howell -> Peter & Lee (Johnson) Howell.

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Thomas & Spencer Stone’s Store in Chatham

Stone -> Howell
 
Darcy McKeough mailed a copy of John Rhodes’ article covering the history of the dry goods store once owned by Thomas and Spencer Stone.

 “It was, along with Eaton’s (Austin’s), one of the two anchor stores of King Street and for nearly 125 years it maintained that status.”

The article appears in the September 15, 2010 issue of “Chatham Today” and can be read by clicking on the image above.

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Matilda Turner

 Turner -> Burk -> Campbell -> Stone -> Howell 

Still trying to find more on Matilda Turner of Tavistock, Devon, England.

Matilda is the mother of Mirrette Burk and grandmother of Flora Maude Campbell Stone (our Granny Stone). She appears in the 1861 Canadan Census, Harwich, Kent County, Ontario as “Matlilda Burk, born England, age 37”.

She also appears in the 1880 US Census in Alameda, California as “M. Burke, White, Female, Age 58, wife, married, b. England, father and mother b. England”

The 1841 England Census shows 4 Turner’s listed in Tavistock: Matilda Turner, F, age 15, b. Devon; Mary Turner, F, age 60, b. outside census county; John Turner,m, age 55, Farmer, b. Devon; Jane Turner, F, age 15, female servant, b. Devon.

Our Matilda could be the one listed in the England Census age 15 (so born cir 1826) but there is no way to tell until we surface more.

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Darcy McKeough’s Stone Charts

Last November, just before Thanksgiving, I received an express delivery package from W. Darcy McKeough – our expert on the Stone line. The package contained 6 very large handwritten charts – the largest two being about 11 ft long! All were ledger sheets taped together. These draft charts represent the result of many many years of work and collectively contain details on 515 descendants of Laurence Stone. I believe Darcy is getting ever closer to his goal of publishing much of his research in book form.

After many keyboarding sessions, I have finally completed merging the data in the charts into my database so they may be viewed online. Here is a report of the complete list of Laurence Stone (b. 1745, England) descendants in our database:

Descendant List (Register format) for Laurence Stone

Once again, we owe Darcy a great debt for sharing his research so generously!