My 2nd great-grandmother through her daughter Jane.
This ancestor biography is set up a little bit differently, and that’s because there isn’t a lot of documentation of her life. So first I’ll tell you what I know for certain, and then I’ll move into some hypotheses based on DNA matches.
The first record Jane Crawford appears on is her marriage certificate. She married George Leary on November 4, 1861, in Chinguacousy Township, Ontario, immediately north of Toronto.
This record says she was born in 1837, but I think that’s a fib. (On the marriage record she is conveniently a year younger than him, but in most future records she is two years older than George.)
It also says she was born in Ireland, lived in Chinguacousy Township at the time of marriage, were by a priest of the Wesleyan Methodist church, and listed her parents’ names as William and Ann Crawford. A witness to her marriage is John Crawford, who is either her brother or uncle. (I’ll return to this theory, too.)
Since she was born in Ireland and popped up in Toronto 25 years later, I searched for immigration records, but haven’t found anything identifiable for her. I think the trick there is to narrow down her arrival year and her birthplace.
George and Jane moved to Hibbert Township, Perth County, Ontario, soon after their wedding. Based on the excerpt from a book I own, they likely moved to join Jane’s brother, John.
Concession XIII, Lot 13
The first owner in the 50’s of the East 50 of Lot 13 was John Crawford, who came from England, but to Hibbert from near Toronto, where his first wife, Mary Jane Graham, died. He later married Isabella Bruce… John Crawford was the first to own the West 50, but George Leary, a native of Lincolnshire, England, who married Jane Crawford, a sister of John Crawford, was the first to live on it.
“A Hibbert Review, County of Perth” by Isabelle Campbell, published by Huron Expositor, Seaforth, Ontario, Originally in 1953, Reprinted 1979.
The couple had six children and remained in Perth County, near the towns of Cromarty and Hensall, for the rest of their lives.
Jane died of a cerebral hemorrhage on April 26, 1903. This record states that she was 69 years old, which puts her birth year at 1834.
So those are the facts of Jane’s life. Now I want to talk about some of the theories I’ve made and am basing my current research on:
As I said before, in most records of them, Jane was listed as at least 2 years older than her husband, who was consistently listed as being born in 1837. She was likely born in 1834 or 1835.
Since she married a few months after the 1861 Canadian census, it follows that Jane could be found living near Toronto in that census. I mean, she and George must have met somewhere, and since he was born in England I don’t think they met before they arrived in Canada.
As you can see above, this Jane Crawford who was working as a servant in the 1861 census in Chinguacousy Township is the right age and religion to be my ancestor. I’m pretty sure this was her but have no way of proving it.
Earlier, I mentioned that the John Crawford who witnessed Jane’s wedding in Chinguacousy Township is either her brother or uncle. I’m not sure because that John is listed as living in Chinguacousy Township at the time of the wedding, but brother John is listed in the same census with his wife and kids in Perth County. Either the marriage record saying John and his family lived near Toronto is wrong or the witness is a different John Crawford than the brother.
Looking through my mom’s DNA matches, I found a few folks of interest that I’d like to research more.
Mom had about 20 hits with a group of people who share DNA with a couple named John Bates and Hannah Draycott. They’re originally from Linton, Derbyshire, England, and they were Mormon pioneers, ending up in Utah and Idaho by 1850. These folks are a bit younger than Jane so they aren’t direct descendants but somewhere along the line they have a common ancestor with either Jane or George Leary.
Mom had 10 hits with descendants of James Stinson and Jennie Smith. These folks are slightly older than Jane Crawford but not in a range where parentage is possible. They come from Northern Ireland, either County Armagh or County Fermanagh. From there they settled in Port Colborne, Welland County, Ontario, and then they were founding settlers of Mosa Township, Middlesex County, Ontario, where they spent the rest of their lives. Being Northern Irish fits with Jane being Wesleyan Methodist. And the excerpt from the book I include seems to indicate that John and Jane emigrated from Ireland to England and then to Canada. All of this is worth looking into.
See Mom? Your DNA test wasn’t a waste of money. LOL
Sources
Canada Censuses
(1861 – 1901)
Hensall Township, Perth County, Ontario, Canada. Accessed on Ancestry.com and Familysearch.org.
Canada, Ontario County Marriage Registers, 1858-1869
Entry for George Leary and Jane Crawford. FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:Q2CB-QL5V).
Exerpt from A Hibbert Review, County of Perth, 1953.
Book by Isabelle Campbell. Printed by the Huron Expositor (Seaforth, Ontario). Reprinted in 1979. Concession XIII, Lot 13. Personal holdings.
Canada, City and Area Directories, 1819-1906. Hibbert, Perth County, Ontario. Accessed on Ancestry.com.
Ontario, Canada, Deaths, 1869-1938
Jane Leary. Perth County, Ontario. Archives of Ontario; Toronto, Ontario, Canada; Collection MS935, Reel 93. Accessed on Ancestry.com.
Assorted photos. From personal files.
Northwest Journals 