A Hail and Farewell from My Ancestors

Ancestral research is one of my favorite pastimes.  I got bit by the ancestry bug a few years back, right after I finished my Masters Degree and had a little more time on my hands to explore new things.  I was talking to my brother Mark on the phone one day and we were discussing our maternal grandmother Minnie Hart.  Minnie died when our mother was only two years old and we know very little about her.  Even after years of dogged research, she continues to be a woman of mystery. Some of the things that Mark told me that day got me hooked on delving into our family history.

Once I embarked upon researching my family history, other areas of mystery emerged.  One of those areas involved my paternal grandfather Douglas H. West's family.  The Wests emigrated from somewhere in Ireland to the Channel Islands in the early 1850s.  Mark paid a woman to do some research in Guernsey and she produced some good results. However, the Wests left Guernsey in the early 1860s and nobody knew where they went.  The general consensus in our family was that they went to Austrailia, but there was no proof of this anywhere.

So, I dug into censuses, ship passenger lists and everywhere imaginable looking for my West ancestors. I did this for months on end and finally struck pay dirt.  My grandfather Douglas H. West boarded the R.S.S. Olympic back in the early 1900s to come to the United States.  On the ship passenger records, he listed his destination to be his Uncle Thomas Kent's home on Park Avenue in Hoboken, New Jersey.  None of us had ever heard of any Kent family, but it turns out that his aunt Mary West married a man named Thomas Kent and they settled with their 8 children in Hoboken.

This was a huge discovery as it also lead to the fact that my great-great grandparents John and Alice Hussey West also went to the US and settled in Hoboken, New Jersey.  They both died there and are buried in Holy Name Cemetery in Jersey City. 

I continued to research the Kents to find out more about them, which lead me to contact a woman on Ancestry.com by the name of Ann Kent Dennis.  I contacted Ann because she had a Thomas Kent in her family tree who had lived in New Jersey.  After talking with her, it became apparent that she was my g-g-uncle Thomas West Kent's daughter, which made her my 4th cousin. At that time, she was 91 years old and surfing the internet!  What an amazing woman!  Anyway, Ann and I corresponded periodically and traded information, but some time had passed since I had heard from her.    Here is a picture of Ann and her father Thomas back in the 1930s:

Thomas West Kent, Ann Kent Dennis and Aunt Lillian Rayfield Tabor - August 11 - 1936

Well, I received an email from her granddaughter Erin yesterday telling me that Ann had died on Tuesday, November 22, 2011.  This resulted in a hail to Erin, a cousin I didn't know about and a farewell to my dear Cousin Ann.  Rest in Peace, Ann!

Erin and I are comparing notes now.  I sent her a bunch of information that she didn't know and pictures that she didn't have.  She is going to use these pictures in a slideshow at Ann's funeral service, which is wonderful!  Meanwhile, Erin has some pictures and old documents that were in her grandmother's effects that I really think are going to help me learn more about my family.  Ancestral research can be tedious and frustrating sometimes, but moments like this make it all worth it! 

Meanwhile, going back to work this week was brutal after being on Thanksgiving holiday in Sedona!  I have been dragging badly and cannot wait until the end of the week.

We had a very nice dinner tonight, part of which we got from the Omaha Steak Company:

Dinner Tonight:  Baked Potato with Sour Cream, Filet Mignon and Brussel Sprouts

Until tomorrow . . .