I have folders and folders of research on my dearly departed family members, so naturally thought I’d seen it all, so to speak. Just this week, though, I have come across a picture online that has really caught my fancy.
The setting is somewhere in Madison Township, Richland County, IL around 1872. I am intrigued by the table setting, lace cloth and pitchers of water. The grass is rather high, so it’s bound to be summertime, but the women are dressed warmly (as they were wont to do in those days), so maybe spring or fall.
A moment caught in time…A memory that is now shared, 155 years later…
The people were partially identified on ancestry and I felt a little thrill as I saw that my great-great-grandaunt, Margaret Jane McWilliams Walker, called Maggie, is the lady in the center of the picture, holding her daughter, Fanny, who is about two. The gentleman next to her I recognized right away as her husband, Robert Horatio Walker, but I’d never seen a picture of the lady next to him, who is identified as his mother, Abigail Reed Walker. The other two ladies looked familiar to me, as I have seen them in some of my unmarked portraits, but I had to do my due diligence to flesh them out.
Still, I’m not sure, but I think that the woman on the left is Aunt Maggie’s mother, my great-great-great grandmother, Catherine Morrison McWilliams. Going on around the table, on the far right is another of Catherine’s daughters, my 2x great-grandaunt, Hanna Isabelle “Bell” McWilliams, about 17 at the time of this picture–or that’s my best guess, for now…
The Walker/McWilliams Family Saga is rich with color, but I keep finding more info! I think I’ve got it all together now, so we should have the whole story soon. I’ll tell you this: These were some Strong Women….so glad to see their almost-smiling faces…
Stay tuned…
Family Stories 