Maria Matilda Dagg and Johnston Smith

I'm seeking the descendants of Maria Matilda Dagg and her husband, Johnston Smith. Documents show various spellings of Johnston's surname: Smith, Smyth, and Smythe. The spelling on their son Richard Elvin's headstone shows Smith. 

Johnston Smith & Maria Matilda Dagg - wedding photo. Courtesy of Melissa (Anderson) McGill.

If you can contribute information about Maria and/or her descendants, please contact me. Here's as much as I know...

Maria Matilda Dagg (also known as Molly) was the granddaughter of John Culbert and Mary Ward. Maria's parents were Elizabeth "Eliza" Culbert and Richard Dagg.

I haven't yet found a birth certificate to prove Maria's year of birth. I estimate that she was born between 1858 and 1866 in Biddulph Township near Lucan, Ontario, Canada.The 1901 Census gives her birth year as 1858, the 1881 Census says she was born in 1863, and the 1916 Census says she was born in 1866. The book, Toil, Tears & Triumph: A History of Kincardine Township, lists Matilda's date of birth as 1863. So I'm going with 1863, for now.

The year of Maria & Johnston's marriage is also uncertain. On page 198 of the book, Toil, Tears & Triumph: A History of Kincardine Township, their marriage date is written as 1890. However, Maria & Johnston had three children by 1890 so I'm suggesting they must have married around 1885 before the birth of their first child, c1886. 

Maria Matilda (Dagg) Smith

At some point, Maria and Johnston moved from Ontario to Manitoba. Their first child, Emma Jane Smith was born in Ontario circa 1886. However, their second child, Lilly (or Lillie) Smith was born 11 March 1889 in the Rural Municipality of Turtle Mountain, Manitoba. Therefore, Maria and Johnston must have moved to Manitoba sometime between 1886 and early 1889. 

The 1891 Census shows the family, spelled Smyth, still in Manitoba.

By 1903 it seems they've moved back to Bruce County in Ontario. Their son, Richard Elvin Smith's birth certificate clearly shows that he was born in Ontario that year.

Sometime between 1903 and 1911 they moved back to Manitoba. The 1911 Census shows the family in Manitoba. 

Sometime between 1911 and 1916, they packed up and moved to Saskatchewan. The 1916 Census shows them living in the electoral district of Last Mountain, Saskatchewan, and their name is spelled Smythe. 

This seems like a lot of moving around for one family but the documents prove they went from Ontario to Manitoba, back to Ontario, back to Manitoba, and finally to Saskatchewan.

Maria and Johnston had 8 children: 
Emma Jane Smith (c1886-1928)
Lilly Smith (1889-?)
James Wesley Smith (1890-1973?)
Clara Smith (1893-1979)
Ethel Mae "Wilda" Smith (1894-1968)
Laura Smith (1896-1945)
Verna Smith (1898-1982)
Richard Elvin Smith (1903-1970)

Here's what little I know about each of Maria & Johnston's eight children:

EMMA JANE SMITH married Gilbert Harris. Did they have children? Where did they live?

UPDATE: Emma Jane Smith and Gilbert Harris lived in Saskatchewan and had four children: May Emma Harris (1906-?), Verna Leona (Harris) Lakeland (1909-?), Annie Matilda (Harris) Keller (1911-1977), and Elsie Wilda (Harris) Riley (1919-2014).

LILLY SMITH or LILLIE SMITH was born in the Rural Municipality of Turtle Mountain in Manitoba but aside from that, I have no information.

UPDATE: Lilly Smith married Kenneth Mathison/Mathieson (spelling unconfirmed).

JAMES WESLEY SMITH or WESLEY JAMES SMITH signed up for military service in 1916 when he was living in Saskatchewan, and he served overseas during World War One. Wesley's occupation is listed as mason. Did he marry? Did he have children? UPDATE: Wesley Smith did not marry or have children. Family history notes say he died in 1973 but this is unconfirmed.

James Wesley Smith in WWI uniform. Photo courtesy of Ian Westell.

CLARA SMITH. Did she marry? Did she have children? Where did she live?
UPDATE: In 1917 in Winnipeg, Clara Smith married a locomotive engineer named Morley Benson Dempsey (1878-1941). In 1921, they were living in Saskatchewan. Clara and Morley had three children: Glen Dempsey (1919-2004), Alma (Dempsey) Setchell (1921-1984), and another daughter. Clara (Smith) Dempsey died in 1979.

Clara Smith (centre) with her 1st cousins, Catherine Mary "Mayme" Dagg on left, and Lillie Mae/May Westell on right. Photo courtesy of Ian Westell.

ETHEL MAE "WILDA" SMITH married Webber Joshua Balkwill. They're buried in Saint Andrews and Saint James Cemetery in Orillia, Ontario. Did they have children?
UPDATE: Wilda and Webber had a son. Ethel May "Wilda" Smith died in 1968.

LAURA SMITH married Ernest Zachariah Howlett Norman. I wrote about Laura and Ernest, here. Since publishing that blog post, I'm now in touch with the descendants of their only daughter, Eileen (Norman) McEachern.

VERNA SMITH married George Earl McDonald. They lived in Saskatchewan and had 12 children. I have some details about the families of two of those 12 children but I welcome more information.

RICHARD ELVIN SMITH. Did he marry? Did he have children? Where did he live? He is buried in Hanna Cemetery in Hanna, Alberta. Some family trees list him as Alvin Smith but his headstone clearly says Richard Elvin Smith.
UPDATE: Richard Elvin Smith (nicknamed Curly) didn't marry or have children.

If you're a descendant of any of these people or if you can contribute information about them, please contact me at this email address...

Maria Matilda (Dagg) Smith's Family Tree:
Ancestors:
John Culbert & Mary Ward (grandparents)
Elizabeth "Eliza" Culbert & Richard Dagg (parents)
Descendants (Children):
Emma Jane Smith
Lilly Smith 
James Wesley Smith
Clara Smith
Ethel Mae "Wilda" Smith
Laura Smith
Verna Smith
Richard Elvin Smith

Elaine Victoria “Babe” (Hodgins) Dempsey Crosby

A memoir written by her son, Jerome Alexander "Jerry" Dempsey.

Elaine Victoria Hodgins was born 24 May 1903 in Lucan, Ontario, Canada, the youngest of the Hodgins clan, to Sarah Catherine Crawley and Samuel Hill “Red Samuel” Hodgins. Her ten sisters and brothers nicknamed her “Babe”.

The name on her birth registration (above) was Lillie Victoria May Hodgins but the name on her marriage registration was Elaine Victoria Lillian Hodgins.

Babe spent her first 20-25 years living in Lucan and London Ontario, eventually training as a nurse, achieving Registered Nurse (RN) status. 
 

She became an accomplished landscape painter, taking lessons at Springbank Park in London with her close friend, Elsie Byers. Babe travelled on one occasion by train to the Banff School of Fine Arts to be tutored by members of the Group of Seven. A few banks commissioned her to provide landscapes for their annual calendars. I have several of her paintings at my home in Madison, Wisconsin. Her best one—of Springbank Park—is here...

On 11 July 1927, Babe married Harold Jacobs Dempsey in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Harold (born 28 May 1898) was from Neepawa, Manitoba. Harold’s parents, James Alexander Dempsey and Mary Emma Jacobs were both born in Ontario but moved to Manitoba. 

Harold Dempsey was a racehorse breeder, and a furniture dealer who owned Dempsey Furniture Company at 426-50 Talbot Street in London.

Babe and Harold settled in London. A baby girl, born about 1932, died at birth. A son, James Harold “Jim” Dempsey was born in 1934, and son, Jerome Alexander “Jerry” Dempsey was born in 1938. She named me after Jerome Kern, the songwriter, apparently because of her admiration for Jewish people.

Jerry Dempsey and his mother, Elaine "Babe" (Hodgins) Dempsey c1956.

She was a homemaker and Red Cross worker/volunteer throughout the Second World War years.

We lived in a small house at 871 Colborne Street until 1943.

871 Colborne Street, London (south of Grosvenor Street) as it looks many years after the Dempsey family lived here.

In 1943, we moved further north to 1008 Wellington Street where we lived until 1963.

1008 Wellington Street, London (between Huron Street & Regent Street). Photo taken in 2018.

I recall my father, Harold Dempsey being a wonderful athlete and horseman but he disliked city life and business, and the commitment of marriage. He left our family for good about 1948. He died 3 November 1969 in Winnipeg.

Babe began full-time work—often double shifts—as a nurse at St. Mary’s Hospital in the north end of London, as a travellers’ aide worker at the Canadian National Railway (CN) station, and later as a child social worker in Woodstock. She even worked as a waitress for awhile to help pay the mortgage. She also supervised the Sunday school at the church we attended: St. John the Evangelist Anglican Church.

St. John the Evangelist Anglican Church at the corner of St. James Street and Wellington Street; one of the oldest parishes in London.

Our home also served as a boarding house with a fascinating parade of low-income boarders for about 14 years who provided male role models for my brother, Jim and me, and provided a daily source of outrageous humor.

Thanks to my mother’s work ethic, Jim and I never felt deprived of anything throughout our childhood and adolescence. She was dedicated to our welfare, happiness, and college educations.

Her sisters and brothers—including her niece, Elaine (Dauncey) McTavish, named after her—were a very large part of our lives. I recall my really humorous uncles, Bill Hodgins and George Hodgins, who were constantly fixing things around our house, and my favorite aunt, Gladys (Hodgins) Luker, known as Glad.

Babe's sister "Glad"

We spent most holiday celebrations at “Glad’s.” Glad joined us on our special summer vacations consisting of a long weekend in Detroit, with me and a friend at Detroit Tigers ballgames, and Babe and Glad shopping.

Frequent family parties included Uncle George Hodgins on the fiddle, and Babe leading the dancing with the Irish Washerwoman jig.

In the late 1950s, Babe purchased a cottage in Port Stanley, Ontario. Every weekend thereafter there was a constant party with her neighbors and friends.

Port Stanley, south of London on the north shore of Lake Erie

In 1968, Babe married Rayburn “Ray” Crosby (born 1903), a butcher from Woodstock, Ontario. They purchased a small, concrete-block home in Sarasota, Florida and spent winters there. Ray died 7 January 1970 in Florida.

Sarasota, Florida

She was a loving and outrageous grandmother to Jim’s and my children for over 20 years. The grandkids love recalling their hilarious times with “Grammy E”.

Babe worked and volunteered for the American Cancer Society in Sarasota, and she would persuade her wealthy boyfriends to chauffer cancer patients to the blood bank, and take me golfing at their fancy country clubs when I visited.

She was awarded “Woman of the Year” in the 1970s for her volunteer work in Sarasota.

She spent her summers in London at Becher Street near her sister Glad’s, and later in a high-rise apartment on Oxford Street.

She died at her home of heart failure in December 1985 at age 83. Her ashes were buried along with her second husband, Ray Crosby at St. James Cemetery, Clandeboye, north of Lucan. 

My mother lived a very rich life devoted to her family, for sure, but also serving hundreds of less fortunate adults and children in southwestern Ontario and Florida.

ELAINE VICTORIA “BABE” HODGINS' FAMILY TREE:

Ancestors:

John Culbert & Mary Ward (great-grandparents)

Sarah Culbert & Philip Crawley (grandparents)

Sarah Catherine Crawley & Samuel Hill Hodgins (parents)

Descendants (Children):

James Harold “Jim” Dempsey (1934-2017)

Jerome Alexander “Jerry” Dempsey