The Brownes, The Curtises and The Hollands
Written by Hazel Florence Curtis. Submitted to wurm-hastings.com by Shirley Ann Worthen.
NOTE 11:
Written by my grandma, Hazel F. (Browne) Curtis
July 3, 1977
YOUR GREAT, GREAT GRANDPARENTS (BAKERS)
The family of your great, great grandfather, John S. Baker (i.e., his ancestors and descendants are covered by the Baker Genealogy written by Nelson M. Baker, with an addendum added by me. This book has been published and copies can be found at various sources, including the Salt Lake City Genealogical Library.)
I know very little about my Grandma Baker. She and Grandpa were married in Waupaca, Wisconsin in 1866. Her name was Hannah Maria South. She had one brother whom she called Chance. They had lived in the New England states before moving to Wisconsin. I regret that I know so little of her early life.
She was a wonderful person; very quiet, a hard worker and wonderful cook. She knitted mittens, hoods and stockings for all the family. She also pieced many quilts.
I can remember visiting her many times in her homes in Marietta, Dawson and Redwood Falls, Minnesota.
She churned butter in a "barrel churn". She sat beside it and turned a crank and the barrel went round and round. Her cooking was from old New England recipes: baked beans, steamed brown bread and pumpkin pies. She always had a vegetable garden, Rhode Island chickens and lovely flower gardens. She was born on October 12, 1845 and died on September 13, 1935 at the age of 90.
Grandpa Baker joined a Wisconsin Cavalry Regiment in 1863. His brother, Horatio, had joined in 1861 and was Captain of the Regiment. He served for five years and had been taken prisoner. He became very sick and was set free because they thought he would die anyway. He crawled on his hands and knees to the Union Camp and made it to safety, and later regained his health. After the Civil War ended, he was given a job in the Mint in San Franscisco, California. He died in Oregon.
Grandpa became ill during his service in the Civil War and was in a hospital near enough to hear the tramp of soldiers as they marched through on their way to Georgia. In 1911, Grandpa went to Tennessee one summer. He had always wanted to go back and when my father bought some property in Tennessee, he took the opportunity to go back and see the land father had purchased. He had a heart attack while he was back there and died in Tennessee.
YOUR GREAT, GREAT GRANDPARENTS (BROWNES)
My Grandpa Browne was of Holland Dutch descent and I have been told his family moved from the United States to Osnabruck Center in the province of Ontario in Canada. All I know of his family is that he had one brother, Will Browne, who lived at a place called Dickenson's Landing on the Saint Lawrence River, not far from my grandparents' home. I think the name Browne was probably spelled differently when it was a Dutch name.
Grandpa died when he was sixty-five. Grandma lived to be 89.
They had twelve children. They are listed on page two and the story of our visit to Grandma is on pages three to eight.
Addendum, September 18, 1977: I just put another picture in the envelope in the back of this book. It was taken in 1899 shortly after we returned from our visit to our Grandma Browne in Canada. She is your great, great grandma, Sarah Browne.
She was born in Scotland. Her mother was born in England and her father was a Scotch stone mason. Her parents were not too happy that she married a working man. They had five children: four girls, Sarah, Suzannah, Emily and Christine (Tina), and one boy, John. When we visited her in Canada, we also visited all of her surviving sisters, Suzannah (Browne) Green, Emily (Browne) Loucks and Tina (Browne) Sanderson. Tina lived with Emily. She had never married. Grandma Browne had twelve children but the other girls never had a child amongst them.[Note from wurm-hastings: There appears to be slight confusion in the above paragraph. The maiden names listed as (Browne) should be (Sanderson). The eldest Sanderson child, Sarah, married Jacob Elias Browne.]
You will notice how different our clothes were from the ones children wear now.
Mother bought the plaid material for my sister, Ella May's and my dresses in Cornwall, Canada, when we visited Aunt Emily there. She hired a dressmaker in Cornwall to make the dresses, just alike. In those days, little boys dressed in short pants and Lord Fauntelroy jackets and blouses, just as my little brothers were.
GRANDCHILDRENMy grandchildren are growing up fast. [....]