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Family from Forfar 2.1 
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An area of research regarding the 1840's and 1850's when the Nova Scotia family of John
Scott Sr. (1800-1876) migrated to the Boston area between April 1846 and 1850 is now coming to light. Several events likely encouraged the family to move including the fact that young people were open to new employment opportunities which didn't exist in rural Nova Scotia at the time and led the way for the family to follow. A published narrative has now surfaced from one of those young men John Jr., that shines a light on the move from his perspective as the first son to arrive in Boston - blazing a trail for his father John Sr., his grandmother Jean Dalgity Scott, as well as three of his brothers and a sister. It also explains what happened to the children of John Scott Sr. when their father was widowed twice with a total of seven children.  John Adams Scott (1827-1903) "John Jr." was the young man who described his early years in Nova Scotia and his relocation to Boston where he entered the carriage-Capt. John Adams
        Scottbuilding trade. His initial work within that industry was blacksmithing. He would own his own shop as would his brother Daniel DeWolf Scott (1842-1919). His father worked at various trades within the same industry and it appears from later census records that his particular skill was as a carriage painter. The story comes from a biographical sketch:

“John Adams Scott of John A. Scott & Son carriage builders, Boston, is a native of Nova Scotia; born in Windsor, Hants County, October 20, 1827; son of John and Elizabeth Dill Scott. His father was a native of Halifax and his mother of Windsor, and his grandparents on both sides were of Edinburgh, Scotland. He was reared on farms and educated for the most part in the district school. His mother dying when he was eight years old and the family being broken up, he lived till his fifteenth year on the farm of his father's only sister, attending school during the winter months and upon her death he went to work upon another farm employing his earnings for two years to the cost of finishing his education. In April, 1846, he came to Boston working his passage on a sailing vessel and apprenticed himself to Aaron E. Whittemore of Roxbury, whose shop was on the corner of Warren and Dudley Street where the Hotel Dartmouth now stands, to learn the carriage smith's trade and spring making. Here he remained for two years employing his evenings in the study of book keeping, arithmetic and writing. His employer failing in business he spent the next two years working as a journeyman in Roxbury and Dorchester. Then in October 1851, he entered business for himself in the same shop in which he learned his trade and he has continued on the same street and near the site of the old shop ever since. His works have been repeatedly enlarged and he has for some time been a leading member of the trade. He was president of the National Carriage Builders Association in 1891, and is now (1894) president of the National Carriage Exchange... He was married September 17, 1848, to Miss Sarah Sargent Long of Chester, N.H. They have had three daughters and two sons; Mary Elizabeth, Mildred Orn, Jessie Fremont, John Franklin and William Jackson Scott. The eldest daughter Mary died in September 1874, and Mrs. Scott died December 24 1889.”

-- from Richard Herndon & Edward Bacon’s "Men of progress: one thousand biographical sketches and portraits of leaders in business and professional life, Commonwealth of Massachusetts," published in 1896:


While John Jr. may have started the migration south for the family in April 1846, it seems the migration may have been completed by 1850. It was then that the voyage of the two youngest brothers age eight and ten took place. Born during the second marriage of John Scott Sr. to Catharine Ann DeWolf (1804-1845) in Wolfville, Nova ScScott home in
        Wolfvilleotia.  Documented within a ship's passenger list that suggests they were accompanied by Andrew D. DeWolf a 40 year old merchant and 10 year old Henry DeWolf (possibly relatives of Catharine Ann) who are listed on the passenger list along with the two boys - Daniel DeWolf Scott and Thomas Albert Scott (1840-1911).

We have also found a burial record which we feel is that of the boys' grandmother Jean (Dalgity) Scott. Listed as a widow of David Scott, she died in Boston of "Old Age" on November 1st, 1851 and was buried in Forest Hills Cemetery in Jamaica Plain (Boston) at the age of 85. She resided on Adams Street in Roxbury. According to an 1852 city directory the Scott family home is listed as 40 Adams St., Roxbury, where the eldest of her local grandchildren, John Adams Scott was living with his wife Sarah and baby daughter at that time.

 
The lives of Jean's youngest grandchildren after her son
John Scott Sr. was widowed had remained a mystery. We speculated that possibly Jean assisted with caring for the children. Stories told in letters indicated that those children had vivid memories of their grandmother suggesting she that she may have been a part of their household. From the latest finds this appears to be a correct assumption; that she did move to Boston with the family and lived on Adams St. prior to her death there.

Sarah Jenkins ScottIt came as a surprise when we located records which indicate that after the death of Jean (Dalgity) Scott in 1851 that her son John Sr. married a third time. In 1853 he married Sarah Jenkins (1804-1883) a widow who had nine children and had lost her 50 year old husband on the 10th of February 1852. In the decades that followed, Sarah and John Scott Sr. are recorded as a married couple living with children until the children left home. One of those children appears to have followed John Sr. into the carriage painting trade. Each of the census records covering their marriage show them together and some record him as being born in England (which is correct) and other census takers record Nova Scotia, we know from other researchers that census records which rely on the skills of a variety of people with minimal experience often depend on finding someone at home who will then answer for the whole family. It is quite possible that when John himself would answer he would state England yet others who knew he was from Nova Scotia may have assumed that he was born there rather than having arrived as a toddler aged one. It is also possible he considered himself a Nova Scotian who just happened to be born to Scottish parent in England while his family was stationed at the Royal Artillery base in Woolwich. The continued presence of the Curtis children in each census record confirms that this is the same family headed by Sarah and John Scott Sr. The fact that John Scott Sr. is listed alternately as English-born and a Nova Scotia native can also be seen as added confirmation that this is the same individual since both areas had been part of his past. Roxbury and a life with Sarah was now his future. 
 
The death certificate for John Scott Sr. has always contained a mystery. There are three options to indicate marital status at time of death: if the individualJohn
        Scott was single, married or widowed. He was clearly marked as married. This fact did not match what we knew about the widower but this had never been an issue until I was presented with the marriage record of an individual named John Scott recorded as being married for the third time to Sarah Jenkins. The names of his parents and his birth place were all consistent with what we know about John. At first this news came as a major surprise and initial disbelief that the John Scott named in the record was the same individual. I questioned the researcher for more details and in examining those details as well as census records for the period concluded that his death certificate was accurate and that he was a married man at the time of his death and not a widower. Census records confirmed that he was residing with Sarah by 1855 and that his sons were living together in the household of their older, married brother. We were also able to confirm that the death certificate which indicated he was married is the correct death record as it matches his gravestone where he is buried within a family plot along with his Scott relatives (children, their spouses and his grandchildren) at Forest Hills Cemetery in Jamaica Plain. From these records we learn that the third marriage to Sarah Jenkins was the longest marriage of his life at 23 years. His first marriage had lasted 12 years and the second only 6 years, prior to being widowed.

New
        Jerusalem Society - BostonWe learn from their marriage certificate that their wedding took place at a New Jerusalem Society church conducted by Pastor Thomas Worchester. The New  Jerusalem Society became established in Boston with 12 members in 1818, inspired by the writings of the Swedish noble and scientist Emanuel Swedenborg, who wrote of his vivid mystical experiences in great detail and published works of theology divergent with official Lutheran doctrine of his era. Despite the resulting challenges he faced Swedenborg's work attracted the attention of many and followers formed societies which eventually became churches to carry on his work. A directory from 1843 indicates that Thomas Worchester served a congregation of 236 in Boston and that the Society met in the hall in Phillips Place. The New Church is the term currently associated with the Swedenborgian denomination; which still remains a small denomination (just 100 congregations in the US), and continues to innovate with new technology in sharing the published works of Swedenborg as well as connecting members and seekers without access to a local group.

Sarah Curtis and her first husband John Curtis had both joined the Society on January 2, 1832 when she was 28 years old. Their names are included in the full list of members which was published in A Sketch of the History of the Boston Society of the New Jerusalem, in 1863. The list gives Sarah's married name (Mrs John Scott) next to her prior name; it does not include John Scott as having formally become a member himself. Like many church congregations that are made up of both adherents and members, it is possible they continued to attend the church they were married in, but no information has been found to confirm that.

John Sr. was father to five (three sons and two daughters) by his first marriage to Elizabeth Dill; he also had two sons through his marriage to Catharine Ann DeWolf. He now became step-father to five more sons and four daughters which were aged 28 to 10 - a total of 16 individuals. Of the seven in the original two families all married and through them he had 34 direct grandchildren. Of those that survived to reach adulthood there were 21
John Scottmarriages and a total of 29 great-grandchildren born. This generation also faced challenges with things like tuberculosis and among the individuals which survived there were 17 marriages. Over the next three generations the family slowly began to grow with 36 babies born to the fifth generation, 60 to the sixth generation and 89 to the seventh generation, to date. Those 89 individuals are all great-great-great-great grandchildren of John Scott Sr. and includes the generation of the author's grandchildren. As the connection of John Scott Sr. to his step-children and their descendants was just discovered in early 2018 it will take further research into this side of the family through his third marriage to Sarah (Jenkins) Scott to better describe their history. An early look at four of Sarah's nine children indicate that they had families of 2, 3, 6, and twelve for a total of 23 grandchildren.

The 1855 Massachusetts State Census provides an answer to the composition of the main family groups, with John Jr. who had been the first to arrive in the Boston area in 1846 living in Ward 5, Roxbury with his wife Sarah Sargent (Long) Scott and their two daughters age five and two, as well as his half-brothers Daniel DeWolf Scott and Thomas Albert Scott who were age 13 and 15 respectively.

The family of his father John Scott Sr., was also living in Roxbury but in Ward 1 in 1855 with his new wife Sarah (Jenkins) Scott and six of the nine children including three daughters (aged 19, 15 & 10), and three sons (aged 30, 17 & 12). The next census five years later in 1860 shows that the Scott-Curtis family still had six children at home although the composition changed with one daughter moving back home and one son having left the home. Meanwhile John Jr.'s family had seen both Daniel DeWolf Scott and brother Thomas Albert move out of their brother's home and the arrival of two babies adding another young daughter and son to the growing family. With four youngsters under 10 it is not surprising to see that a 20 year old Irish domestic named Mary Honerly was part of the family as well. It also appears that Sarah (Long) Scott's 22 year old sister (or possibly a cousin) was living in the household as an individual named Mary Long who worked as a bookbinder is listed as living in the household - all of which paints the picture of a very busy home.

Besides these two couples - both headed by a John (Jr. & Sr.) each married to a wife named Sarah Scott - there were other branches of the same Scott family in Boston.

James Sterling Scott (1833-1920) another son of John Sr. had worked the carriage-making trade beginning in 1850 in his brother's shop handstitching leather and cloth but found the work a strain on his health and thus while still single and healthy he made the move to Illinois for the fresh air of farm life. By 1860 he was established there as a farmer and had married Henrietta "Retta" Sutton. His sister Sarah Ann Scott (1830-1889) who
remained in Boston had married Sylvester Danforth Waugh, a clerk who later became a milkman. They eventually had five children during and after the Civil War.

By 1860 the youngest of John Sr.'s family, Daniel DeWolf Scott and Thomas Albert Scott were on their own, T. Albert worked as a mail agent and by 1870 at the age of 30 he married; he worked his way up and retired as an accountant, but
because he and his wife Amelia had no children, his Will outlined the names of all of his nephews and nieces, which was helpful in this research. His memory as a family member - Uncle Albert - who was helpful and generous to other lives on.

Daniel DeWolf ScottIn 1861 a 19 year old Daniel D. Scott found himself caught up in the machinery of war as an enlisted member of the 32nd Regiment Mass Volunteer Infantry during the Civil War. Like his older half-brother Capt. John Adams Scott and is brother-in-law Sylvester Danforth Waugh, he chose to join the war effort. Brother John was recognized for his role in organizing Company F 4th Massachusetts Cavalry Regiment and rising from Private to Captain. Young Daniel like many Civil War enlistees faced a change-of-heart, or possibly like many who left the US during the Vietnam War felt it was a matter of conscience to avoid killing others, and turned his eyes north to Canada. Officially he was a deserter and that constituted a capital offence which was punishable by death. Yet both sides in the Civil War faced unusually high rates of desertion especially as the war ground on. The Union Provost Marshal General estimated that nearly a quarter of a million men had been absent from their units sometime during the war. The Confederacy especially at the end faced equally high desertion rates as word of the advancing opponents reached soldiers from family members. While many deserted, some did return and were accepted back. For Daniel, separated from his family in Boston, that return would take him a decade. Daniel married at the age of 21 in Canada, and would return with his family to Boston and the carriage building trade a decade later in 1872 when he moves his young family from Nova Scotia to Boston.

For Daniel the decision to remove himself from the middle of a situation which demanded he kill fellow Americans and seek escape to live in peace elsewhere may have been easier since he was born in Nova Scotia and still had both Scott and DeWolf relatives there. We don't know the exact reason why he chose Pugwash, a coastal community rather than the lush agricultural areas he was born near in Wolfville, where a half-brother David Scott far
med nearby in Ste. Croix as well as a half-sister Jane Dill (Scott) Sterling living a few miles away in Meander. We do know that there was an extensive DeWolf family holding of land in Pugwash area which is recorded as a land grant by government and he may have been able to connect with maternal relatives or learned of opportunities through them. His grandfather Daniel DeWolf after whom he was named had died in 1837 before young Daniel was born but other relatives were established members of the most prominent family in Wolfville. The family was numerous but also highly regarded and thus the renaming of the community was in honour of the DeWolf family. Daniel DeWolf the grandfather had served both as a member of the Nova Scotia House of Assembly and as Justice of the Peace. Tax records indicated that he was assessed for the highest amount of tax in the county. The DeWolf family name is still very visible today, but we do not know what connections were maintained with maternal family relatives once young Daniel left as child.

Daniel DeWolf ScottWe know that it was in
1850 that Daniel DeWolf Scott at age eight travelled with his brother Thomas Albert Scott (age 10    ) from Wolfville to Boston on the schooner Albatross. It is likely that Andrew D. DeWolf a 40 year old merchant and 10 year old Henry DeWolf, listed as well were relatives of their deceased mother, Catharine Ann DeWolf, and possibly they were ensuring the Scott boys travelled safely from Wolfville Harbour to their destination in Boston where they would meet their father and their Scott relatives If this theory is correct then the older generation had gone ahead and final move in 1850 likely consolidated the family once again after the initial migration which had begun south in 1846.

We can only speculate as to why Pugwash, on the northern coast of Nova Scotia was Daniel's destination for his return trip 12 years later; we do know clearly the outcome of that trip and that young Daniel quickly found a bride from nearby Port Phillip and married her in Pugwash on the 15th of October 1863. He was 21, his bride was 20 year old Abigail "Abbie" McNutt (1843-1933). Eventually they had five children, four of which achieved adulthood. He was a young man who when faced with the horrors of war, sought peace and for that he likely faced both prejudice and the judgement of others - yet as a mature man he was a pillar of the community and an American citizen who was deeply loyal to his family.

The story continues with
A Family From Forfar - The Third Generation.
A Family From Forfar - Index


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