Two Missing Children: 1890 Census is Accused!
When one hears the words “Amber
Alert!” it means that there is a child missing.
When one is doing family history research, we don’t hear those words but
a silent “Amber Alert!” may be in the records we research. The “Amber Alert!” I found was in the 1900
Census of Mayfield, Lapeer County, Michigan.
There were two missing children that had been born to Alice Goodale Arms,
daughter of Elijah Goodale, my husband’s third great uncle.
The
first clue that the children were missing lies within this census record. The circled numbers in the census record
under the columns: Number of children born to this mother (5) and
number of living children (5) show that Alice bore five children. However, a closer look at this census reveals
only three children--Gertrude (born in 1887), Harrison (born in 1889), and
Justin (born in 1891) who is listed on the following page. So who
and where are the two missing children?
According to this census, the parents, Alice and Horace, had been
married for 14 years, with three
children born, starting in 1887—every two years—and ending in 1891 with
Justin’s birth. So the two missing
children could not have been born to Horace and Alice prior to the birth of
Gertrude; and if they were born after Justin, then why are they not included
with the family in the 1900 Census?
Taking this first clue, my next step was to
check the Michigan birth records to see if I could find the other two children
born to Alice and Horace Arms. I found
the birth records for Gertrude, Harrison, and Justin but no other record of
children born to Alice and Horace. Alice
was thirty-three years old when Gertrude was born, so it seemed possible that
this could have been a second marriage for her.
I then checked the Michigan marriage records for a record of Horace and
Alice’s marriage, hoping there would be some indication that she was a widow or
had a previous married name.
A
marriage record for an Alice Goodale Wood to Charles Horace Arms in 1886 was
the second clue in my search for the missing children. Obviously, Alice had married someone with the
surname Wood prior to her marriage to Horace Arms. Again, I checked the Michigan marriage
records but could not locate a marriage record for an Alice Goodale married to
a Wood. So I had to come up with another
alternative.
Searching the Lapeer County 1880
Census for an Alice Wood, I found an Alice, aged 27, and John Wood, living next
door to Elijah Goodale. This became clue number three. The couple had three children Herbert, age
17, Frank, age 14, and Elmer, age 4. Could this be Alice Goodale Wood, daughter of
Elijah Goodale? The age was right. However,
Alice was too young to be the mother to Herbert and Frank, but there was a
possibility that she could be the mother of Elmer, who was ten years younger
than the other two. It seemed likely
this was a second marriage for John Wood. However, one can’t make assumptions or play
the guessing game when it comes to the science of family history research. All possible records need to be
searched. The next puzzle was tos to find
out the maiden name for Alice Wood, wife of John Wood.
Clue number four came about when,
for the second time, I searched the Michigan birth records, this time using
John and Alice Wood as the parents. Alice Wood’s maiden name of Goodale was
listed on the birth record as the mother of two boys, Elmer and Clinton, one
born in 1875 and one born in 1881, in Lapeer County, Michigan. So Elmer was the first of the missing
children and Clinton the second. Four
clues later and all five children born
to Alice Arms had now been accounted for, Elmer and Clinton by Alice’s first
husband John Wood, and Gertrude, Harrison, and Justin by Alice’s second
husband, Horace Arms.
In a formal investigation to find
missing children, every clue needs to be searched and used as evidence before
one is found guilty! The same is true of family history
research. Gathering as many pieces of
evidence possible will make for a better case. I found several more pieces of evidence that
all pointed to the fact that Elmer and Clinton were the two missing children of
Alice Goodale Wood Arms. The evidence
follows.
First, the 1910 Census of Mayfield,
Lapeer County, Michigan was evidence that showed Alice had been married
twice. The circled “M2” means that she
had been married two times. This is
additional proof that Alice had married prior to her marriage to Horace.
Second, the California Death
Index, which lists the maiden name of the deceased’s mother, provided evidence
of the recorded maiden name of Goodale for both Elmer and Clinton Wood who both
passed away in California.
The third piece of evidence was the 1894 Michigan State Census which showed
Clinton Wood living with the Arms family in Mayfield and Elmer Wood, age 18,
was listed in the same town but working and living with a different family. This places the two Wood boys either within
or near the Arms family.
Lastly, a search of several census
records, dating from 1910 to 1940, showed that Elmer Wood and Justin Arms,
half-brothers, both lived in Coos County, Oregon as did Frank W. Wood, older
half-brother of Elmer. Family members tend to migrate to the same
general area and these census records provide further evidence to the familial connections
between the children of Alice Arms.
All of the records searched
and pieces of evidence obtained from these records point a guilty finger at the
1890 Census which, because it had been destroyed in a fire and is no longer
available to researchers, had hidden the two missing children of Alice
Arms. Clinton and Elmer would have been
aged nine and fifteen and most likely living at home that year and there would
have been no mystery surrounding the two missing children recorded in the 1900
Census. Based upon this evidence, I find the 1890 Census guilty!
