Flipside: Brick Wall--Death of Nancy Agnes Cannon Orr McCormick

Amy Johnson Crow has a 52 Ancestors Week blog challenge which I have decided to give a try for the second year.

The prompt for week # 11 (March 12-18) is Brick Wall.

For decades I have been trying to find any information on the death of my maternal great great grandmother, Nancy Agnes Cannon Orr McCormick, the mother of my of maternal great grandmother, Lucinda Bell Orr Frederick.

Nancy's first husband, William Morland Orr died at age thirty-five on February 11, 1849 in Elkrun Township, Columbiana County, Ohio. The Orr Family was living on a farm in Elkrun Township, probably land owned by Nancy's aunt, Jane Fife Cannon.

There were numerous family members in close vicinity to Nancy to assist with the farm and the children, ages twelve, eleven, nine, seven and four.

On the 1850 Ohio census there is a twenty-seven year old farmer, Elijah McCormick enumerated with the family.

Sometime in 1850, thirty-three year old Nancy married twenty-seven year old Elijah. They had a daughter, Arabella McCormick in 1851. Elijah McCormick died at age thirty on September 6, 1853.

On the 1860 Ohio census, son Matthew, is working the farm. By 1870, Nancy and Arabella have moved to a house in New Lisbon Center, Columbiana County, Ohio. Arabella has $900 in real estate, perhaps from the estate of her father. On the 1880 Ohio census Nancy and Arabella are still living in Centre Township, New Lisbon, and Nancy is employed as a tailoress.

Arabella McCormick died at age thirty-eight on or about February 1889. She had an estate probated in April 1889.

Nancy had three known children living in Columbiana County following Arabella's death. Whether she continued to live in New Lisbon or was taken in by her married children is unknown.

By 1900, she was enumerated with her daughter, my maternal great grandmother, Lucinda Bell Orr Frederick, in the Borough of Esplen, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.

And there stood my brick wall for over a decade. When and where did Nancy die and where is she buried. Neither she or Arabella have grave markers.

Then, this year on February 15, I hit a genealogy mother lode. 😀 I was noodling around in my Ancestry newspaper subscription using Alfred Frederick in Pittsburgh newspapers and up came Mrs. Alfred Frederick's mother's death. Eureka!!!

Pittsburgh Weekly Gazette
May 12, 1903
page 6

I was able to track down a website that gave me access to the Esplen record of deaths, unfortunately the years 1901 through 1903 are missing. The death notice was valuable for the date of her death and that her body was transported back to Lisbon and buried there. Her son, Matthew Thomas Cannon is buried in Lisbon Cemetery and my guess is that both Nancy and Arabella are also there without a grave stone.

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