Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I thought that at one point as well but I've also seen addresses without the 'h' when I knew it was not the person's work address. Also, this says it indicates the person owns the house: City Directory Abbreviations - The directories themselves tend to just say it means "house".
Well, in any case, it is not an occupational abbreviation.
No, definitely not an occupational abbreviation.
I've also seen "R" used for residence.
There were many different city directory publishers & they may have used different abbreviations.
LOL … he had to go to three. First one died just a few months after arriving in Persia.
The last one outlived him.
I'm actually writing an article on Rev. Wright and his, er, adventures. Kind of a side project before I tackle the book that got me into this Wright thing in the first place. I have some amazing correspondence between the authorities about the murder, the chase after Minas into Turkey, and the trial.
(He got life in prison because despite there being an eye witness, the shah decided there wasn't enough evidence to merit execution. Then, during the cholera epidemic of 1892, when most of the people in Tehran had fled the city, someone bribed the jailer to let him go. And he disappears from history AFIK.)
This story is fascinating. How did you find out about it in the first place?
My cousin & I are researching a lady who worked for Rev. Gallaudet in the 19th century running a home for deaf-mutes. In her will she left money to the daughters of William Hanna Thompson. His father was a missionary.
William Hanna Thompson's mother, Eliza Nelson Hanna, died in Jerusalem within weeks of giving birth to Wm. H. She died of fever, exacerbated by earthquake, civil war, and plague. Her husband had gone to Jaffa & was briefly detained as a spy, twelve days after his return to Jerusalem, Eliza HannaThompson was dead, and he was left with an infant boy, which he named William Hanna Thompson.
Last edited by daliowa; 02-14-2014 at 01:57 PM..
Reason: edit
Have you contacted the owner of the tree on Ancestry that has her in it (Elkins family tree)? It has to be a family member as there are photos of her father Rev. John N Wright, and her brother Rev. John V. Wright. Maybe one of the living relatives would have info on Jennie?
Still, I would not underestimate the importance of having a motherless little girl raised by female relatives of the father. All those other children of missionaries may have also had their mothers as well as their fathers. Sarah was with him because her mother was there.
I wonder how eager a new (Persian?) wife would have been to raise her husband's daughter from a previous marriage? Sons would be different, always considered a respected asset. Also, I wonder if he was worried that the relatives of the dead wife would try to take the girl, so she was better off in the US? There are lots of possible explanations aside from cruel abandonment.
My grandmother was born in the early 1900s and her mother died soon after giving birth. My grandmother went to live with an aunt & uncle, her father's brother and sister-in-law, until she was 3 years old and her father re-married. The brothers stayed with their father, but everyone at the time decided it was best for the widower to raise his sons, while his daughter went to be raised by a woman. It was never an abandonment, or seen that way. It was just how things were.
Excellent point about Sarah.
The new wife was actually an American, who he met while he was bringing Jennie to his family in Ohio. But still, you could well be right.
Then she might have just felt too detached from the new family, who she never met, to spend any time with them later, while her brother lived with them in Persia and the U.S.
You're making me feel better. I'm just a worrying Mom type.
This story is fascinating. How did you find out about it in the first place?
My cousin & I are researching a lady who worked for Rev. Gallaudet in the 19th century running a home for deaf-mutes. In her will she left money to the daughters of William Hanna Thompson. His father was a missionary.
William Hanna Thompson's mother, Eliza Nelson Hanna, died in Jerusalem within weeks of giving birth to Wm. H. She died of fever, exacerbated by earthquake, civil war, and plague. Her husband had gone to Jaffa & was briefly detained as a spy, twelve days after his return to Jerusalem, Eliza HannaThompson was dead, and he was left with an infant boy, which he named William Hanna Thompson.
Those missionaries really were taking their lives in their hands!
My mom had been after me for years to write a book about my great great aunt, who was a female medical missionary. She compiled lots of resources for me over the years while I was too busy raising kids. Then when I started looking over them, I stumbled across the Rev. Wright story.
I learned pretty quickly that COMPLETELY coincidentally, Rev. Wright, having gone to college in the town I grew up in in Ohio, brought his entire family back there to live with him in his retirement. Almost all of them lived and died there, while I was still living there. In fact, Jennie's brother, John, died in a retirement home in 1979, just after I graduated from college and moved away.
Have you contacted the owner of the tree on Ancestry that has her in it (Elkins family tree)? It has to be a family member as there are photos of her father Rev. John N Wright, and her brother Rev. John V. Wright. Maybe one of the living relatives would have info on Jennie?
I'm in contact with another descendant, as the Elkins person last logged on a year ago and I figure I'd probably be waiting a long time. This woman is very helpful, she descends from Rev. Wright's first child from the third family, though, so has no real info on the second family. She's more interested in the info I have on the murder!
There is a great-granddaughter of Rev. Wright and his poor second wife, who I contacted on Facebook, but haven't heard back. Total stranger, etc. etc. When the article is mostly ready I'll send it to her to see if that shakes anything loose.
For anyone interested in reading about Jennie's mother, daughter of Kasha Oshana & Sawa. Married to Rev JN Wright 1885, traveled to US 1888, returned to Persia fall of 1889.
Google books
The Church at Home and Abroad
Volume 8
Page 298
Very basic, and I'm sure you've already thought of it since you noted the alternate of Holliday/Halliday. But when searching records it's good to keep in mind that in door-to-door census records, the census worker may not have written down 100% accurate information. Holliday might be spelled Holiday, Hollyday, Halliday, Haliday, etc. Jeannette might be a more common spelling like "Jeanette," Jennie could wind up being any number of spellings. I've found this to be particularly common in door-to-door census records and immigration records where there may be language or competency barriers on the part of either or both of the people giving/taking information.
A lot of English missionary children were sent to boarding school in England from an early age onwards. English colonial civil servants sent their children to English boarding schools and saw them only every other year or every few years. It was certainly not unusual in those days. In this case it's much more unusual that the father took his son back to Persia instead of leaving him to be raised by family in the United States. Perhaps the father was a bit loco as some missionaries could be.
Perhaps Jennie could have been "adopted" by a spinster aunt who was glad to have a child of her own to raise?
Another point to consider is perhaps Jennie had developmental issues? Was she blind and/or deaf? She could have been sent to a blind/deaf institute in California, which the family deemed to be the best place for her? Try looking for a special home that existed at the time in Menlo Park?
Quote:
Originally Posted by jmqueen
You're correct about many things, but all of the missionaries' children, little girls onward, lived with their parents. The missionaries' jobs were teaching, so the children all went to those schools, along with the lucky lucky Syrian Christians who got to learn English etc. at the price of being endlessly proselytized.
Rev. Wright's oldest child with his third wife, his daughter Sarah, lived there with him, her mother and brothers until he retired in 1910. So … it just seemed unhappy to me.
I'm wrong about many things. But it would still be nice to find Miss Jennie.
For anyone interested in reading about Jennie's mother, daughter of Kasha Oshana & Sawa. Married to Rev JN Wright 1885, traveled to US 1888, returned to Persia fall of 1889.
Google books
The Church at Home and Abroad
Volume 8
Page 298
Yep, that's good stuff. I've used that material in researching the story.
Glad y'all are finding it entertaining! I hope others do, too. I think I'll wrap up my paper on it - 16 pages - and let you know when it's done, even without more details on Jenny. I'd be happy to send it to anyone who asks.
I'd love to get it into a history magazine of some kind, though it's probably too long as is. And all of this is preparatory/practice for writing the book about my GG aunt. To make my mother happy.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
