A Poem by Florence Leonette [Flagg] Cooke for the Ninth Annual Great Genealogy Poetry Challenge of Bill West (October 4, 2017)

Florence Leonette "Nettie" [Flagg] Cooke (1870 - 1904)

Next month is the "Ninth Annual Great Genealogy Poetry Challenge" conceived and hosted by Bill West of West in New England blog. Under the Challenge rules, a poem submitted for inclusion in the Challenge can "be a poem you or one of your ancestors have written." This post is my submission for the Ninth Annual Challenge and it publishes a poem written by my great grandmother, Florence Leonette Flagg (pictured above as a young adult). "Nettie," as she was always called, is the mother of my maternal grandmother, Ruth Eaton [Cooke] Carpenter.

Nettie had a short life that in many ways was tragic and I believe she turned to poetry to try to express her pain, her hope, and her discovery of respite and beauty when and where she could find it. She wrote numerous poems that are mostly sad, but they must have been cathartic for her given her experiences. I am very lucky and privileged to have several originals of her poetic writings and a few others that were transcribed by her eldest child (my grand aunt, Helen R. [Cooke] Roberts) from now lost originals. The poem in this post is one of the original poems in her handwriting that I now have in my collection.

To possibly understand where Nettie's poem originates, it is necessary to provide some brief context and background about Nettie.

Nettie was born in 1870 to George W. Flagg and his wife, Mary J. ("Jennie") Eaton.  When Nettie was just two and half years old, her mother died at age 26. And then Nettie's father died at age 35 of "phthisis" (an archaic name for tuberculosis) when Nettie was barely nine years old.

By the time of the 1880 federal census, ten-year-old Nettie Flagg was living as a "boarder" in the home of Susannah Stanley (age 69) and her daughter Frances Stanley (age 30) in Attleborough, Massachusetts. She apparently lived with the Stanleys until she married Walter W. Cooke in August 1891 in North Attleborough. She and Walter had known one another since they were children. They were both 21 years old when they married.

Nettie's original handwritten poem is shown below. Precisely when Nettie wrote the poem is unknown, but since she died in July 1904 at age 34, the poem is at least 113 years old. So far as is known, it was never published anywhere before appearing here and being submitted as part of Bill West's Ninth Annual Great Genealogy Poetry Challenge.  

When I Have Time

    By Florence Leonette "Nettie" Cooke 

 When I have time

So many things I'll do

To make life happier and more fair

For those whose lives are clouded with care

I'll help to lift them from their low despair

                                     When I have time

When I have time

Kind words and loving smiles

I'll give to those whose pathway runs thro' tears

Who see no joy in the coming years

In many ways their weary lives I'll cheer

                                        When I have time

When I have time

The one I love so well

Shall know no more these weary toilsome days

I'll lead her feet in pleasant paths always

And cheer her heart with words of sweetest praise

                                       When I have time

When you have time

The one you hold so dear

May be beyond the reach of thy sweet intent

May never know that you so kindly meant

To fill her weary life with such content

                                When you had time

Now is the time

Ah, friend No longer wait

To scatter loving smiles and words of cheer

To those around whose lives are now drear

They may not need you in the coming years

                                 Now is the time

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The photograph and handwritten original of the poem are from the personal collection of the author.

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Copyright 2017, John D. Tew

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How a 53-year-old Letter Between Sisters -- and the Research Path it Provided -- Led to the Discovery of the Probable Reason Behind the Smallpox Death of George Henry Cooke in December 1872

In August 1964, my maternal grandmother, Ruth [Cooke] Carpenter, received a letter from her older sister, Helen [Cooke] Roberts. The letter included information about their grandfather (my great great grandfather), George H. Cooke, as indicated by my grandmother's writing on the envelope for the letter (shown above). The letter was postmarked August 7, 1964 in Pittsfield, Massachusetts where my grand aunt Helen lived.

George Henry Cooke was born November 18, 1843 in Boston, Massachusetts to Russell Cooke and his wife, Mary Vinal Otis. George was the fifth of the seven children of Russell and Mary Cooke (two girls and five boys). George was the third of the five boys.

Russell & Mary Cooke family circa 1853. From L to R: Russell Cooke; Mary Vinal [Otis] Cooke with son Charles Willis Cooke on her lap; William Russell Cooke with curly hair; Albert Francis Cooke sitting between his mother and sister, Abby Ann Ruth Cooke; Edward Otis Cooke in checkered vest behind Albert; Mary Thomas Cooke standing at right; and George Henry Cooke standing far right in what looks like military-style clothing. 

After having recently rediscovered my grand aunt Helen's 53-year-old letter to her sister -- my grandmother Ruth [Cooke] Carpenter -- I read it closely for more information about my Cooke ancestors and relations. In the letter, Helen refers to their father, Walter Wilson Cooke (1869 - 1944), as "papa." Walter was the only son of George Henry Cooke (1843 - 1872) and his wife Susannah Catherine Appell (1844 - 1906), but George and Susannah had one other child, a daughter named Flora Appell Cooke born in 1868. Flora died at about age 30 in 1899.

George Henry Cooke

Susannah Catherine [Appell] Cooke

Walter Wilson Cooke

My grand aunt's letter, written when she was 72, records many of her recollections about her father and other members of the Cooke family. Some excerpts from her letter will illustrate the nature of the recollections and the genealogy clues they provide for research and verification.

Of her father Walter, Helen wrote, "Papa had curvature of the spine when young & was in a brace for a year - taken out of school & sent to his grandfather's home in Scituate Mass. to recuperate. He used to chin himself in the barn to stretch his spine, etc."

The grandfather of Walter Cooke was Russell Cooke, father of Walter's dad, George Henry Cooke. As the above excerpt also states, the house where Walter was sent to recuperate was Russell and Mary Cooke's home in Scituate, Massachusetts and the home was later owned by "Ed Cooke" a "cousin" of Helen and Ruth's father Walter. Ed was said to be a lawyer and Helen recalls having visited the colonial-style home on "a hill above the railroad depot."

Much of Helen's letter to her sister Ruth is about their grandfather, George Henry Cooke. As the scan of the first page and part of the second page indicate, Helen recalled that George Cooke was a glass engraver who "worked for his uncle." She also reported hearing that their grandmother (George's wife Susannah) had a pension based on George's service in the Civil War -- possibly in Louisiana. George was apparently "very fond" of his brother-in-law -- his wife Susannah's brother, Jacob Appell (who was a doctor). And Helen explains that when there were smallpox outbreaks "in those days" people were "so frightened of small pox that the Doctors sometimes had to bury them." Helen tells her sister Ruth that George "went about with [his brother-in-law, the doctor] a good deal" and then states that George himself died of smallpox "after helping as a volunteer, to take people from a burning building" during a "huge Boston fire" and it was surmised that George contracted the smallpox from one of the victims he helped evacuate from the fire.

My grand aunt Helen's letter provides many intriguing tidbits about my Cooke genealogy, but the question became, "How accurate were her recollections and family stories when she recalled them for her sister at age 72?"

It was fairly easy to find corroboration for one claim in the letter. The recent discovery of the comprehensive two-volume Cook/Cooke genealogy titled "Thomas Cooke of Rhode Island" compiled and published by Jane Fletcher Fiske (Oxford. Massachusetts, 1987) provides a wealth of sourced information about many of my Cooke ancestors and relations.

On page 418 of Volume One of Thomas Cooke of Rhode Island, Ms. Fiske confirms what I have long known about my Cooke genealogy (as the photos and letter support) -- that Russell Cooke married Mary Vinal Otis and that my great great grandfather George Henry Cooke was one of their five sons. But the same entry for the Russell and Mary Cooke family states that Russell was a tailor in Boston before he moved to Scituate, Massachusetts "after 1850" where he farmed, was a storekeeper, and a Deacon of the Congregational Church. The Cooke home was apparently located on the corner of First Parish and Stockbridge Streets in Scituate.

This information supports my grand aunt Helen's recollection that her father Walter recuperated at this grandfather's farm in Scituate after he wore a back brace for a year.

The same genealogy by Jane Fletcher Fiske also provides support for Helen's letter, which states Russell's home in Scituate was later owned by Edward Otis Cooke who was a lawyer.  Edward Otis Cooke was an older brother of George Henry Cooke and so was related to Helen's father Walter -- but not as a "cousin" as Helen states.  Edward Otis Cooke was Walter's father's brother and so was Walter's uncle, not his cousin!

At page 615 of Volume Two of Thomas Cooke of Rhode Island, Ms. Fiske states that Edward Otis Cooke, son of Russell and Mary Cooke and George Cooke's older brother, was indeed a lawyer and lived in Scituate, Massachusetts.

The Cooke genealogy by Ms. Fiske also provides evidence for the statement in Helen's letter that George Cooke worked as a glass engraver "for his uncle."

At page 419 of Volume One of Thomas Cooke of Rhode Island, Ms. Fiske states that a brother of Russell Cooke (George's father), James Monroe Cook, was "well-known as a manufacturer of stained glass" and "produced work of considerable excellence" according to the History of Suffolk County 3:434. As cited by Fiske, "Advertisements in Boston Directories and those of other areas at that time proclaimed 'Stained and Cut Glass Manufactory by J.M. Cook, at 131, 139, and 141 Congress Street, Boston: Glass for Church Windows in Every Style.'" Thus there is evidence to indicate George H. Cooke might very well have worked in the stained and cut glass industry for the brother of his father -- his uncle James Monroe Cook.

Helen's letter to her sister also stated that their grandfather George H. Cooke served in the Civil War.  This was easily verified by reference to U.S. Civil War Soldier Records and Profiles 1861 - 1865. As shown below, George Henry Cook, a glass cutter from the town of Scituate, Massachusetts enlisted at age 18 in Company L, Massachusetts 3rd Cavalry on November 1, 1861 and mustered out on June 11, 1862. His birth date is shown as November 18, 1843 (which matches the birth date from Fiske and other sources).

This then brought me to try to verify the story my grand aunt Helen wrote about her grandfather, George Henry Cooke, dying of smallpox after helping to evacuate people from a burning building during "a huge Boston fire."

While researching more about Edward Otis Cooke, I came across a source called the Index to Obituary Notices in the Boston Transcript 1900 - 1930, Vol I A - F.  In this particular source at page 571 of 988 is an entry noticing the death of Edward O. Cooke on March 6, 1911. The parenthetical -- "(T. March 7)" in the indexed notice means that publication of the notice was in the Boston Transcript (also known as the Boston Evening Transcript) on March 7, 1872.  The Transcript was a daily afternoon newspaper published in Boston from 1830 until 1941.

Sources such as a Massachusetts Masons membership card confirm that Edward Otis Cooke, lawyer and resident of Scituate, Massachusetts, died on March 6, 1911.

But it was the casual research of the Boston Transcript in Wikipedia that then provided an interesting link to the possible reason for the smallpox death of my great great grandfather, George Henry Cooke, as mentioned in my grand aunt Helen's letter. It seems that the Boston offices of the Boston Transcript were completely destroyed in what is now known as the "Great Boston Fire of 1872." As stated at the Wikipedia article on the fire, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Boston_fire_of_1872, the fire of November 9, 1872 raged for twelve hours and consumed 65 acres and 776 buildings.  While some $74 million dollars of damage was caused, somehow only thirteen people died in the firestorm. [At the Wikipedia link, the reader can view amazing photos of the devastation caused by the fire.]

This quick research led to some additional analysis of Helen's statement in her letter that George Cooke was fond of his brother-in-law, Jacob Appell (who was a doctor) and that George "went about with [Jacob] a good deal." 

The 1860 federal census indicates that George Henry Cooke's future wife, Susannah Catherine Appell did indeed have a brother named Jacob F. Appell, who in 1860 was 20 years old (six years older than Susannah) and was then working as a clerk.

Susannah's brother Jacob was born on December 13, 1840 and his full name was Jacob Franklin Appell. He died in October 1902 in Lake City, Florida where he was an allopathic physician.

And then there is the fact that in 1872 the city of Boston had an outbreak of smallpox. During the 63 year period from 1811 to 1874 the year 1872 had by far the greatest number of smallpox deaths at 738 such deaths that year.  In fact, the next greatest year for smallpox deaths was 1873 at 302 deaths for the year. By the time the outbreak of 1872 was over in the first weeks of 1874, more than 1,000 Bostonians had perished as a result of smallpox. It appears that my great great grandfather, George Henry Cooke, was one of them.

Table from the February 1881 edition of the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal. 

George Henry Cooke died in Quincy, Massachusetts on December 2, 1872 just twenty-three days after the Great Boston Fire of 1872 was brought under control on November 10, 1872. The incubation period for smallpox is on average 7 to 17 days. [For more information on the 1872 smallpox outbreak in Boston see https://forgottennewengland.com/2012/01/13/worries-of-the-past-smallpox-and-bostons-epidemic-of-1872/]

The timing for the possible exposure to smallpox victims in Boston during the Great Fire of November 9- 10, 1872 and the documented death of George Henry Cooke from smallpox about twenty-three days later (see his Quincy death record immediately below) makes the story in Helen's letter quite probable.

The letter from my grand aunt provides a good example of why we genealogists need to read such family documents very carefully and then use the "factual clues" and stories contained in them as starting points for methodical research toward verifying the information contained in such documents. In this case, the information provided by Helen holds up quite well under careful scrutiny and attempts at verification. One glaring error is the relationship between Helen's father Walter Cooke and Edward Otis Cooke.  Helen states that Edward was Walter's cousin when in fact he was the brother of Walter's father George Henry Cooke -- and thus was Walter's uncle, not his cousin. Almost all of the other claims made in Helen's letter are indeed documented as accurate or lead to the conclusion that her information and family stories are most probably true.

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Photos and scans of the August 1964 letter from Helen [Cooke] Roberts are all from the originals in the collection of the author.

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Copyright 2017, John D. Tew

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Who knew . . . but is it true? (December 17, 2016) : The Mayflower; Benjamin Church; King Phillip's War; Anawan Rock; and Me??

Several years ago I was finally able to complete the research and documentation necessary to prove the family lore that held we were Mayflower descendants through my mother's line. The problem had been that while my maternal grandmother maintained that we were descended from Richard Warren of the Mayflower, I was never clear about whether it was through her Cooke line or through the line of her husband, my grandfather Everett Carpenter. [I have blogged previously about how I finally had the "Eureka Moment" when all the pieces of the centuries-old puzzle fell into place and I was accepted by the General Society of Mayflower Descendants. You can see that post from May 23, 2013 here.] As it happens, there are actually two known lines of descent from Richard Warren to me and they both pass through my mother's mother and her Cooke line. 

Tracing in reverse order one of the meandering lines of connection from me to Richard Warren, the path eventually comes to the marriage of Richard Warren's fourth daughter Elizabeth Warren (1616 - 1669) to one Richard Church (1608 - 1668). Richard and Elizabeth Church are my 9th great grandparents.

               Me 

               Shirley Carpenter m. Arnold G. Tew, Jr.

               Ruth Eaton Cooke (1897 - 1979) m. Everett Shearman Carpenter (1891 - 1962)

               Walter W. Cooke (1869 - 1944) m. Florence L. Flagg (1870 - 1904)

               George H. Cooke (1843 - 1872) m. Susannah C. Appell (1844 - 1906)

               Russell Cook (1810 - 1884) m. Mary Vinal Otis (1806 - 1881)

               Benjamin Cook (1768 - 1846) m. Abigail Church (1771 - 1845)

               Ebenezer Church (1726 - 1825) m. Hannah Wood (1734 - 1815)

               Caleb Church (1701 - 1769) m. Deborah Woolworth (1703 - 1733)

               Joseph Church Jr. (1663 - 1715) m. Grace Shaw (1666 - 1737)

               Joseph Church Sr. (1637 - 1711) m. Mary Tucker (1641 - 1710)

               Richard Church (1608 - 1668) m. Elizabeth Warren* (1616 - 1669) 

               * Elizabeth Warren was the fourth child and fourth daughter of 

                     Richard Warren and Elizabeth Walker, his wife.

               

Elizabeth Warren and Richard Church had at least ten children according to the Mayflower Families series. The second son of Elizabeth and Richard Church was Benjamin Church (1639 - 1718), the immediate younger brother and sibling of my 8th great grandfather, Joseph Church Sr.

Benjamin Church is my 9th great uncle. He was a very interesting character and Nathaniel Philbrick, author of Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War (New York: Penguin Group, 2006), devotes considerable space in his book to the person and character of Benjamin Church. According to Mr. Philbrick, Benjamin was a thirty-three-year-old carpenter who became "the first Englishman to settle in the southeastern tip of Narragansett Bay at a place called Sakonnet [Little Compton, Rhode Island today], home to the female sachem Awashonks and several hundred of her people." Benjamin was a man who wanted to create his own home from scratch out of what was then wilderness in Indian territory. As Philbrick put it, "Church was a throwback to his maternal grandfather, Mayflower passenger Richard Warren. By Moving to Sakonnet, he was leaving his past behind and beginning anew in Indian country." (Mayflower, p. 233)

It took Benjamin Church little time to realize that his dream of establishing a home at Sakonnet for himself, his wife Alice Southworth, and their two-year-old son Thomas (who were left behind in Duxbury) depended on establishing a good relationship, if not a friendship, with the sachem Awashonks. In time he succeeded in establishing such a friendship with Awashonks that at some point in June 1675 she warned Church that Metacomet, the second son of Massasoit of the Wampanoag's (by then known by his adopted English name of Phillip), was about to start a war with the English colonists. Philip wanted her Sakonnets to join him, and Awashonks wanted Church's advice first. Church advised that she and her people look to Plymouth Colony for protection and promised her he would go to Plymouth to warn the governor and return with instructions. Before he could do so, the predicted war broke out and eventually spread throughout New England. The war -- known today as "King Philip's War -- lasted from 1675 to 1678. More than half of New England towns were at one time or another attacked by Native American warriors and in southern New England more than 1,000 colonists and 3,000 Native Americans were dead.

Benjamin Church became a captain for the first Ranger [1] force in America in 1676 when he was commissioned by Josiah Winslow, the Governor of Plymouth Colony, to form a ranger company during King Philip's War. He was one of the principal leaders among the settlers. Today he is considered the "Father of American Rangers." [See, "United States Army Rangers" at Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army_Rangers#Colonial_period] Church played an active and leading role in the war that Philbrick (Mayflower, p. 357) summarizes as follows . . . 

               [N]o matter how desperately our nation's mythologizers might wish

               it had never happened, King Philip's War will not go away. The

               fourteen bloody months between June 1675 and August 1676 had a

               vast, disturbing impact on the development of New England and,

               with it, all of America.

On August 12, 1676, Church's company of rangers conducted an operation that resulted in the killing of King Philip by one of Captain Benjamin Church's allies -- a Native American named John Alderman. Philip's body was "then butchered in a manner standard with English punishment for treason."[2] The body was drawn and quartered. The war effectively ended soon after the death of King Philip though skirmishes continued in far northern New England into 1678. In the greater part of the war theater in southern New England, the war ended on August 28, 1676 when Captain Benjamin Church succeeded in capturing one of King Philip's chief captains, Anawan, the war chief of the Pocasset people at the site of what is now known as "Anawan Rock" in Rehoboth, Massachusetts. Philbrick tells the full story of the capture of Anawan in Mayflower at pages 338 - 344 and it does not end well for Anawan for he was beheaded while Church was away discussing the possibility of his taking a company to Maine to assist in hostilities against the Abenakis. Church had hoped to turn Anawan to his side as an ally in the fight against the Abenakis, but that was not to be.

Philbrick's closing words about Benjamin Church are as follows (Mayflower, 357-58) . . .

               Out of the annealing flame of one of the most horrendous wars ever fought

               in North America, [Church] forged an identity that was part Pilgrim, part

               mariner, part Indian, and altogether his own. That so many characters 

               from American history and literature resemble him -- from Daniel Boone to

               Davy Crockett to Natty Bumppo to Rambo -- does nothing to diminish the

               stunning originality of the persona he creates in [his] Entertaining Passages

               Relating to Philip's War. That Church according to Church is too brave, too

               cunning, and too good to be true is beside the point. America was destined

               to become a nation of self-fashioned and self-promoting men. What makes

               his story so special, I believe, is that he shows us how the nightmare of

               wilderness warfare might one day give rise to a society that promises liberty

               and justice for all.

*     *     *

There is another interesting line of descent that passes through my mother to me, but this one comes via my mother's father, Everett S. Carpenter. Tracing this somewhat less meandering line of descent to a 4th great grandmother and her father and grandfather onto the farm they owned at the time of the American Revolution, the line is as follows . . .

               Me 

               Shirley Carpenter m. Arnold G. Tew, Jr.

               Everett Shearman Carpenter (1891 - 1962) m. Ruth Eaton Cooke (1897 - 1979) 

               Samuel Eber Carpenter (1853 - 1929) m. Sarah Etta Freeman (1858 - 1945)

               Samuel Carpenter (1828 - 1904) m. Ruth Ann Miller (1828 - 1893)

               Joseph Carpenter (1789 - 1880) m. Nancy Mason Bullock (1793 - 1880)

               James Carpenter (1767 - 1812) m. Lucy Bliss (1769 - 1817) -- my 4th great

                    grandmother

               Jonathan Bliss (1739 - 1800) m. Lydia Wheeler (1737 - 1803)

               Ephraim Bliss (1699 - 1778) m. Rachel Carpenter (1699 - 1784) -- my 6th great

                    grandparents

As the descent line above indicates, Ephraim and Rachel Bliss had a son named Jonathan who married Lydia Wheeler. One of the numerous children of Jonathan and Lydia Bliss was Lucy Bliss who married James Carpenter in Rehoboth, Massachusetts on March 6, 1789. Their son Joseph Carpenter married Nancy Mason Bullock and they had 14 children, one of whom was my great great grandfather Samuel Carpenter. Another of their children was Lucy Bliss Carpenter who was named after Joseph's mother Lucy Bliss. Lucy Bliss Carpenter (my 3rd great aunt) married Everett Leprilete Sweet on March 6, 1851.

I posted recently about Lucy Bliss [Carpenter] Sweet and the written Memorial to her compiled by Mrs George St. John Sheffield sometime after Lucy's death on December 13, 1910.  A copy of the Memorial was kindly provided to me recently by my 4th cousin, Neysa [Carpenter] Garrett.  [See, my post of December 13, 2016 here.] It was a portion of the Memorial to Lucy that provided the inspiration for some research that led to this post of previously undiscovered historical connections in my genealogy . . . as will now be revealed below.

On page 2 of the Memorial to Lucy Bliss [Carpenter] Sweet, her lineage to the Bliss family of Rehoboth was summarized and the fact that she got her name from her grandmother, Lucy Bliss, was explained. In the summary of Lucy Sweet's Bliss lineage, it was stated that Lucy's grandmother, Lucy Bliss, was the daughter of Captain Jonathan Bliss; and, in turn, Lucy Bliss [Carpenter] Sweet was the great great granddaughter of Lieut. Ephraim Bliss -- both Jonathan and Ephraim served during the "War of the Revolution."

Most of this Bliss connection through my Carpenter line was previously known to me, but it was the following passages from page 2 of the Memorial (shown and highlighted below) that really caught my attention . . . 

               [Lucy Bliss] was the granddaughter of Lieut. Ephraim Bliss, who, when the

               War of the Revolution broke out, "though seventy-five years old, shouldered

               his musket, and with his two married sons," -- one of them Captain Jonathan

               Bliss, the father of Lucy, -- "marched away, and joined the Continental Army."

               After a year, [Ephraim] was compelled to return home, but a grandson took his place

               to keep the family number intact. His own services were not ended, however,

               for, one day, when working in a distant field, he heard the note of danger sounded

               from the horn always kept on the bench beside the kitchen door, and, leaving his

               plough in the furrow he hastened on his horse to the house, to learn that a 

               messenger had brought news that the enemy were burning a nearby town . . . At

               once [his saddle bags] were thrown over the horse . . . and the horse was turned

               toward the enemy. *  *  * On this Bliss farm was the celebrated Annawan Rock,

               around which cluster Indian legends. It was the lodge of the chieftain of that name,

               who was under-chieftain to the famous King Philip, and the story of his capture is

               one of the thrilling tales of Philip's War. This romantic spot, -- the rock and some land

               surrounding it, -- was deeded to the Antiquarian Society of Rehoboth, by a

               descendant of Lieut. Bliss, "after it had been in the family over two hundred years."  

Who knew that there was a historical and genealogical connection between my Cooke/Church line through my maternal grandmother and my Carpenter/Bliss line through my maternal grandfather . . . and that it involved the famous Anawan Rock in Rehoboth, Massachusetts too? The only thing that  remains is definite proof of the Bliss ownership of a farm that once included the land on which Anawan Rock sits and its transfer by deed to the Antiquarian Society of Rehoboth.

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[1]   Rangers were men who were hired by colonial governments on a full-time basis to do reconnaissance and to patrol the boundaries of the colonies to provide early warning of troubles.

[2]  See, Wikipedia, "Benjamin Church (ranger)," https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Church_(ranger)

Photograph of the Mayflower II underway from WikiTree at https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Space:The_Mayflower

The image of an engraving of Benjamin Church from a 19th Century edition of his narrative, Entertaining Passages Relating to Philip's War, is from the author's copy of Nathaniel Philbrick's book Mayflower (p. 234).

The image of Captain Benjamin Church by unknown artist circa 1675 -- New York Public Library,  Stephen Schwarzian Building -- is in the public domain. It was obtained from Wikipedia at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Church_(ranger) 

The image of a 19th Century engraving depicting the capture of Chief Anawan ("Annawon") is from the author's copy of Nathaniel Philbrick's book Mayflower (p. 341).

The photo of the entrance to Anawan Rock is from the website SGC (SouthCoast Ghost): Investigating the Paranormal in Southeast Massachusetts http://southcoastghost.weebly.com/king-phillips-war.html

The fall photo of Anawan Rock in Rehoboth, MA is from the blog Wicked Yankee at http://wickedyankee.blogspot.com/2011/11/anawan-rock-rehoboth-ma.html

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Copyright, John D. Tew

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"A Poem on Little Russell's Passing" (October 17, 2016)

Florence Leonette ("Nettie") Flagg 

Nettie Cooke [nee Flagg] -- b. May 13, 1870 - d. July 20, 1904

Next month is the "Eighth Annual Great Genealogy Poetry Challenge" conceived and hosted by Bill West of West in New England blog. Under the Challenge rules, a poem submitted for inclusion in the Challenge can "be a poem you or one of your ancestors have written." This post is my submission for the Eighth Annual Challenge and it publishes a poem written by my great grandmother, Florence Leonette Flagg (pictured above as a young teen and as an adult). "Nettie," as she was always called, is the mother of my maternal grandmother, Ruth Eaton [Cooke] Carpenter. I posted previously about Nettie where I included another one of her poems, which can be viewed here.

Nettie had a short life that in many ways was tragic and I believe she turned to poetry to try to express her pain, her hope, and her discovery of respite and beauty when and where she could find it. She wrote numerous poems that are mostly sad, but they must have been cathartic for her given her experiences. I am very lucky and privileged to have several originals of her poetic writings and a few others that were transcribed by her eldest child (my grand aunt, Helen R. [Cooke] Roberts) from now lost originals. The poem in this post was written about 1894 when Nettie was twenty-four years old and as the images of the poem below show, this is one of the original poems in her handwriting that I now have in my collection.

To understand where Nettie's poem originates, it is necessary to provide some brief context and background about Nettie.

Nettie was born in 1870 to George W. Flagg and his wife, Mary J. ("Jennie") Eaton.  When Nettie was just two and half years old, her mother died at age 26. And then Nettie's father died at age 35 of "phthisis" (an archaic name for tuberculosis) when Nettie was barely nine years old.

By the time of the 1880 federal census, Nettie Flagg was living as a "boarder" in the home of Susannah Stanley (age 69) and her daughter Frances Stanley (age 30) in Attleborough, Massachusetts. She apparently lived with the Stanleys until she married Walter W. Cooke in August 1891 in North Attleborough. She and Walter had known one another since they were children and they were both 21 years old when they married.

Leonette ("Nettie") Flagg and Walter W. Wilson

Soon after Nettie and Walter married they had their first child, my grandmother's oldest sister, Helen Raeder Cooke born February 21, 1892. Helen was followed by five additional children -- two boys and three girls. Russell was born in 1893. Lois Vinal Cooke was born in 1894. My grandmother, Ruth Eaton Cooke, was born in 1897. Dorothy was born in 1899 and Russell Church Cooke was born in 1902. 

By the time my grandmother was ten years old, her mother and father had lost three children. Russell died about a month shy of his first birthday. Dorothy, who was a special favorite of my grandmother's, died just a month after her sixth birthday of typhoid complicated by a severe ear infection. Russell Church Cooke died just over two months after his second birthday of meningitis. I never heard my grandmother ever mention the fact that she had two brothers and she never told me she had a younger sister named Dorothy. My mother did tell me well into my middle age that her mother always said she would never name a son of hers Russell because both her brothers were named Russell and they died very young. [When my grandmother did have a son, she named him David and I got my middle name after him.]   

My grandmother, Ruth Eaton Cooke (left) and her younger sister Dorothy Cooke (right)

The original handwritten poem below was written in 1894 just after the death of Nettie's first son, Russell Cooke. The poem is now 122 years old. It was preserved by my grand aunt, Helen [Cooke] Roberts, in the envelope shown here. It is inscribed by Helen to explain when the poem was written and why.

Here is Nettie's untitled poem that I have begun calling "A Poem on Little Russell's Passing." It is transcribed immediately after the images of the original handwritten poem. To my knowledge the poem has never been published before or shared outside the family . . . and few in the family have ever seen it before.

A Poem on Little Russell's Passing*

                           By Florence Leonette "Nettie" Cooke (1894)

                                               I sometimes grow weary of waiting

                                               And long for the time to come,

                                              When I shall see my baby,

                                              In that beautiful far off home.

                                              Sometimes when I feel discouraged

                                              And my life seems full of care,

                                              I wonder how long I shall have 

                                             to wait

                                             Before we meet over there.

                                             I wonder if he is happy, 

                                             My dear little baby boy.

                                             If he thinks of Father & Mother

                                             And wants us to share his joy.

                                             At the gate of the beautiful city

                                             In that bright and Heavenly home

                                             Will he be watching and waiting

                                             And longing for us to come?

                                             He was beautiful when he left us,

                                             But will he grow more fair?

                                             Will he grow in Heavenly beauty

                                             And will we know him there?

                                             I wonder sometimes why my baby

                                             Was taken away so soon

                                             Was it because I was straying away

                                             Into the darkness and gloom?

                                             Was the Shepherd trying to call

                                              me back

                                             And I heeded not his cry

                                             Until he took my little lamb

                                             To the home beyond the sky.

                                             Was it in love that He took him

                                              To draw me back to the fold

                                              Because I had grown so careless

                                              And my heart seemed bitter and 

                                              cold.

                                              Ah yes, the lesson was hard to learn

                                              And my heart seemed crushed

                                              with pain

                                              And the time seemed longer than

                                              I could wait

                                              Ere I should see him again.

                                              But one time, ere I closed my eyes

                                              in sleep

                                              I looked out into the night.

                                              And gazing up into the darkened sky

                                              I saw a misty light.

                                              And in the midst of that one bright

                                              cloud

                                              A little star twinkled and shone.

                                              And it seemed to me like a guiding

                                              light,

                                              To lead to that Heavenly home.

                                               And in fancy I saw that little

                                               star,

                                               Was held by my baby's hand

                                               To safely guide me through the darksome

                                               night

                                               To that home in the spirit land.

                                               And in it I read God's lesson to me

                                               That my work is not yet done

                                               So I'll gladly wait

                                               Till someday, sometime

                                               My God and my child will welcome me home.

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All photos are scanned from the originals, which are in the collection of the author.

*Nettie did not provide a title for her poem, so I have taken the liberty of providing one 122 years after she wrote these poignant words. I hope she would approve. 

There are actually two handwritten copies of Nettie's poem following little Russell's untimely death, but one is inexplicably missing the last lines of the next to last stanza as well as all of the final stanza. I have chosen to follow the verse structure and punctuation of the version with the missing lines, but I provide images of the complete poem. For this reason, the transcription does not follow exactly the structure of the complete poem depicted above. 

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Copyright 2016, John D. Tew

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