Welcome    Family Paper Dolls    Contact Us

Here's a sample from one family's story:

"Richard Smith MORDEN was born May 10, 1811 in Ameliasburgh Township, Prince Edward County, Ontario. He was one of eight children, and the son of a United Empire Loyalist, John MORDEN, and his wife, Eve BOWMAN. United Empire Loyalists and their children were entitled to grants of land from the Crown, and on February 26, 1840 Richard applied for his, which was approved by Order in Council on March 19th of that same year. Although the location of the land is not shown in the approval documents, we know that Richard actually settled near Bloomfield on Lot 6 in the 3rd Concession (Military Tract), Hallowell Township, Prince Edward County. On March 20 1850, Richard acquired additional land - the south half of Lot 52, also in the 3rd Concession of Hallowell.

When he was thirty-one, Richard married twenty-seven-year-old Lucy BURLINGHAM, the daughter of Ranseller BURLINGHAM and Phoebe BOWERMAN. Lucy's family were members of the Religious Society of Friends, and Richard may have joined her church - in the 1851 census, he, Lucy and the children were listed as Quakers.  But the 1861 census lists the family as Methodist, so it appears that, like many other families in the area, the MORDENS had converted. 

Richard and Lucy had five children: Phoebe Ann MORDEN, born June 6, 1844; Ransler Burlingham MORDEN, born July 9, 1846; Jacob MORDEN, born June 5, 1849; Richard James MORDEN, born about July 19, 1851; and Finley Wilson MORDEN, born in April of 1853.  

Unfortunately, tuberculosis, or consumption as it was called then, hit this family hard. Richard Sr. died of the disease in 1857, just ten days after his forty-sixth birthday. Lucy was left alone to manage the farm and look after the children, who ranged in age from thirteen to four.  Farm life was physically demanding.  The MORDEN farm totaled 221 acres, and 53 of those were planted in crops.  People ploughed with oxen in those days, and even relatively simple tasks like baking bread, doing laundry, or making preserves were big jobs that required a certain amount of physical strength.  Luckily, the family lived next door to Lucy's brother, Reuben, and he helped out, particularly with the farm work, until the children were older.

Young Jacob was the second one in the family to die of tuberculosis. He helped out on the farm as long as he could, but he finally passed away in April of 1871 when he was just twenty-one.  Phoebe Ann died less than a year after her brother, on January 24, 1872, also from TB. She was just twenty-seven, unmarried, and living at home.  Their mother, Lucy, never remarried after her husband's death, although widows typically did in those days. She lived into her mid-sixties but she eventually developed TB as well.  She probably caught it while nursing her husband, Jacob and Phoebe. She died July 29, 1879 at the age of sixty-four.

Three brothers remained: Ransler, Richard, and Finley. Ransler was a handsome man and he married twice; first to Jennie GILBERT and second to Phoebe PALMER.  He had two children, prospered, and lived to a ripe old age. But by the time he was forty, Ransler was the only one left of his entire family. Both his remaining brothers, Richard James and Finley Wilson, died in 1884.

Richard James MORDEN never married, although he may have had a sweetheart. He and Finley owned and worked the family farm in Hallowell together for a number of years. But James died suddenly on June 13, 1884. He was badly injured in a building accident when timbers fell on him and died several hours later as a result of his injuries. He was just thirty-three.  Ironically, at the time of his death, Richard was free from  tuberculosis - or if he had it, he hadn't yet begun to show symptoms. Two facts point to this. First, he was strong enough to work on a construction project, and second, he hadn't yet made a will. His elder brother, Ransler, had to apply to the courts for permission to settle up Richard's estate, which was valued at about $1,500. That would be roughly $28,000 today.

Like Ransler, brother Finley fell in love and married, sometime between 1881 and 1884. His bride was Alice Gertrude NOXON. Alice was born December 30, 1859, and was the daughter of Cornelius NOXON and Phoebe Ann STINSON.  Sadly, poor Alice was left a widow before her twenty-fifth birthday. Like his parents, his brother, and his sister, Finley contracted tuberculosis.  He died November 4, 1884 at the age of thirty-one.  One month before his death, Finley made a will. He left everything he owned to his "beloved wife, Alice G. Morden" including his farm, with the proviso that, if Alice had not sold the farm by the time of her death, it should pass to his elder brother, Ransler."