Author: Vicky Briggs

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Who Shares Your Birthday?

On By Vicky BriggsIn Dixon, Elizabeth Dixon, Irving, Sept 2021Leave a comment

Welcome to the second installation of Who Shares Your Birthday!

September is a very busy month for birthdays in the Briggs family!  I was able to navigate through the family tree and found someone important in our family line whose birthday is today – Elizabeth Jane Dixon. There is a conflict in one record noting her date of birth as September 10th, however, there’s nothing to substantiate that date. So, we’re going to go with today!

Another important September birthday is Stanley Briggs, born on September 24, 1915 – that’s another story for another day (in other words, I’m still working on putting it together!).  In the meantime, let’s get to know Elizabeth, my 3rd great-grandmother through my grandfather, Stanley.

Elizabeth was born September 11, 1831, to parents James Bowman Dixon and Susan Copple.  At that time, the family was living in Shelby County, Indiana, USA.  She was the fourth of 12 children (six boys & six girls).

Briggs Family Tree to Capt W. Irving and Elizabeth Jane Dixon

Census records place Elizabeth in Rochester, Missouri at the age of 19, and then moving to Oregon in 1850.

From a book called Saga of a Seafarer, the Annals of Capt. William Irving, written by Mary Aline Cox (granddaughter of Elizabeth), the pictures below tell a wonderful story of Elizabeth’s journey to Oregon and meeting her husband to be:

Elizabeth married Capt William Irving September 17, 1851, in Portland, Oregon.  They lived in Portland until approximately 1859, when the family moved to Victoria, BC where William began a ship building business.  At the time of the move, the Irvings had four children:  Mary (born Dec. 25, 1852), John (born Nov. 24, 1854), Susan (born Mar. 10, 1857) and Elizabeth (born Dec. 29, 1859).  The birth of their daughter, Nellie (born Nov. 12, 1862), is recorded in Victoria, BC.  Nellie is the last child William and Elizabeth had.

Elizabeth Irving with daughter Mary – circa 1853
Elizabeth Irving – circa 1860

Another excerpt from Saga of a Seafarer:

“In 1859, Capt Irving purchased a lot in New Westminster on one of the most commanding sites in the young city- to-be.  With seaman’s foresight, he naturally chose for his new home a location on a high point of the area.  For many years he lived in splendid isolation on his two-acre holding.

Mr. Simes, noted architect and friend of Captain Irving, designed the home.

The home was ready in 1864.  The following year Captain Irving loaded his family and goods onto the Onward and one calm day steamed from Victoria to New Westminster.”

While living in Irving House, William and Elizabeth continued their life in the community as prominent citizens in the history of New Westminster.  William passed away August 28, 1872, from double pneumonia. 

L-R: Nellie, Susan, Mary, Elizabeth (Mrs. Irving) and Elizabeth Irving

Their daughter, Elizabeth, married Ernest Spencer January 1882.  After their marriage, Ernest and Elizabeth moved down to Oregon, taking her mother, Elizabeth, along with them.  The Spencers, along with the assistance of Elizabeth, helped to build the community of Irvington in Portland, Oregon. 

According to Remington Rand Inc., an Oregon biographical index card notes Elizabeth’s religious preference as Presbyterian and politics as Republican.  On the back of the index card, additional information was provided by Mary Aline Cox of Sacramento, California on Oct. 25, 1960:

“Mrs. Irving returned to Portland to live after the death of William Irving in 1872.  She invested heavily in the Irving dock construction, built on the Irving donation land claim in 1884. The Victoria dock near the Irving dock was another Irving project. She was interested in blooded horses and Shetland ponies and had a substantial interest in the Irvington racetrack which was built in 1893 and closed in 1907.”

To this day, the community is still thriving and continues to honour the founding members of Irvington.  About three years ago, I visited my sister, Cris, in Portland.  We took a walking tour of notable houses in Irvington.  Even found a street named Briggs!  Will certainly visit again.

Elizabeth re-married again in 1889 to Anthony George Ryan.  Unfortunately, it was not a marriage that would last as they would divorce in 1896.  The divorce was granted in the Oregon courts as stated in the Statesman Journal citing habitual gross drunkenness and personal indignities rendering life burdensome on the part of her husband, Anthony.

From Newspapers.com – Statesman Journal
22 Dec 1896 – Page 5

Elizabeth resided with her daughter Elizabeth and son-in-law Ernest, in Irvington, until her death January 8, 1922.

I hoped you enjoyed getting to know Elizabeth – I know I did!  I certainly learned a couple of interesting items especially with respect to her love of horses – who knew!  I know there are a couple of members of our family who has or had a huge passion and love for horses.  I hope they would feel a connection to this ancestor of our family.

Thomas A. Briggs, Stanley L. Briggs (my grandfather), Elizabeth Irving (nee Dixon) and standing is Mary Briggs (nee Irving)
From Newspapers.com – The News Review
10 Jan 1922 – Pg 1

Sunday Night Family Dinners

On By Vicky BriggsIn Aug 20212 Comments

It’s Sunday!! Well, for most people that work a standard work week of Monday to Friday, they would not be too happy about that (me included). However, growing up I remember Sunday as being the day we would pile into the station wagon and head over to Grandma’s for Briggs’ family dinners.  Although it didn’t happen every Sunday, it did happen quite often.

There are two questions I ask during family member interviews that pretty much brings the same answer: 1) What family traditions have we let lapse that you would like to bring back? and 2) Favourite meal your mother made that would bring back memories if you had it today.

In our family, pretty much every meal we would have at Grandma’s would be roast beef, potatoes and some vegetables (and gravy of course!) apart from Christmas dinner. The other tradition that would happen around birthdays, would be an angel food cake with our favourite candy and/or chocolates in the middle but that’s another blog post for another time!

I know every time I made roast beef, my boys enjoyed it, but I always found it too dry (probably my cooking!).  I haven’t made it for a long time.  My preferred family meal is pork roast with mashed potatoes (maybe gravy), with a medley of cauliflower, broccoli and carrots.  It’s always the meal I like for my birthday dinner!

Traditions have become few and rare.  My boys and I do get together for dinner mostly on holidays or birthdays.  I think it may be something to start doing again at least 2 or 3 times a month.

What are some of your family traditions? Do they include favourite meals?

Also makes me think that it may be time for a Sunday Briggs’ family dinner – who has a house big enough to hold all of us??!!

Grant Briggs

On By Vicky BriggsIn Aug 2021, Grant BriggsLeave a comment
White Rock beach, 2 – 3 years old

Well, it’s finally here! The first video interview of a living family member, not to mention, the oldest living member of the Briggs family – Grant Briggs (my dad!). Although he is the oldest of our family, at times he does tend to act like the youngest!

While interviewing my dad, it was interesting to see how serious he was at times. While I didn’t remind him this was supposed to be fun, I do have to remember that people are not used to doing interviews so it will take a little coaxing to get them to loosen up. I have to admit, I’m not used to doing interviews as well, it is wayyyyy outside my comfort zone. I’m hoping by doing this, other family members will have an insight into some of their family history and what others were like when they were younger and we didn’t know them then.

The questions I asked were given well ahead of time so Dad had plenty of time to prepare. Although this was his first interview for my blog, I’m hoping there will be more. I will be interviewing one of his siblings next, so keep an eye out for that to be posted. In the meantime, have a listen and get to know him a little more. If you think of any questions you would like to ask him, please make a comment and he would be very happy to answer. Or, the alternative, let me know and I can add it to the next time I chat with him.

Thanks to Dad for starting what I hope is a long list of interviews to come. Enjoy!

Video Interview Announcement!

On By Vicky BriggsIn Aug 2021, Briggs2 Comments

Yes, it has been a while since my last post.  In my defence, life has thrown a couple of curveballs making it very difficult to get together to do video interviews.  The interviews could have been done by video conference call but what fun is that!

The first person I wanted to interview I was not able to visit in person for over a year.  As COVID-19 restrictions in BC were lifted during the past month or so, I decided to plan a visit with my parents in 100 Mile House, BC.  Once there, the first of three interviews were done but then 100 Mile House received an evacuation alert.  As both my parents are of an age to have concerns with the forest fire situations, concerns were raised. If ordered to evacuate, they would have been told to go North which they did not want to do.  So, we packed up within an hour and headed South to safety and less smoke in the air.

I was able to complete the other two interviews before my parents returned to their home (hopefully not to be warned to possibly evacuate again).

Next week, the first of the three interviews with my dad, Grant, will be posted. Grant is the oldest of three to Stanley and Irene Briggs. The other interviews will be posted at a later date.  I hope the interview will give everyone a chance to get to know my dad a little bit more than they did before and may help to start conversations or inspire more questions which I’m more than happy to ask in future interviews or call him up and ask him yourself!

In the meantime, let’s take a closer look at the Briggs Family Tree.  Below is a snapshot of the Briggs line going back as far as 1583.  I have found earlier dates, but they have yet to be confirmed and authenticated.  Although some of the dates have not been confirmed, they are pretty close to the majority of the information I was able to find.

As you can see, there are many duplicate names, and some names that are in our family today.  I’m still doing research on more information of the family line.  As you can imagine, there are a lot of documents to go through to verify the information is accurate and pertains to our line.  From Thomas Briggs (1775 – 1840) and onwards, the Briggs’ settled in Canada.  Those before, were from England (so far!).

Interesting to note, sometime in the early 1600s, the spelling of the Briggs name changed from Brigge.  Historical documents show the Brigge name had descendants as early as 1250 in the Yorkshire area of England.  The majority of the descendants found from 1583 to the early 1800s, lived in the Yorkshire area.

As I am able to garner more information and verification of documents, more will be posted on the We Are Family Briggs blog.

As I mentioned in earlier blog posts, I’m hoping to travel to the United Kingdom in about two to three years with the hopes of trying to verify more information that I have found.

Again, if anyone is interested in going through the Briggs ancestry research with me, I would be ecstatic to have someone beside me discovering more about our family! So please let me know if you are interested. Maybe we can travel together as well!

Enjoy and I hope there are some comments regarding the family tree.

Question and Answer Time!

On By Vicky BriggsIn May 20213 Comments

Now that we’re moving along with the We Are Family Briggs blog, the question on my mind over the past couple of weeks is, “What do we want to see, what more information do we want and who do we want it on?” So far, I’ve done a couple of posts but there have not been comments, well with the exception of one (thanks, Dad!). Now I’m going to pose that question to my family. Tell me what you would like to see and learn from this family blog. I have some ideas going and would love to expand on that. Also, it would be great if there was someone that would like to work with me so I can get a different perspective!

I’ll answer the question first! Here’s what I would like to see. Learn more about the Briggs family line and some of its branches (trust me, there’s a lot of branches!!!). There are some interesting people in there (including Capt. Irving – there’s more than one!). Also, where they are from, what they did for work and learn about those areas. I’m even hoping to do some traveling in the future to those places and do more research – distant future.

All of the research I do is on Ancestry.com and then I branch out from there. I also did my DNA which was very telling. My DNA results were 43% England & Northwestern Europe (mainly Devon and Cornwall area), 25% France (my mother’s side), 16% Ireland (surprise!), 8% Scotland and 7% Norway (another surprise!). The results further told that there are some origins in Southwestern Quebec, New York and Vermont French Settlers (again, all my mother’s side).

It seems there’s some great traveling in my future and I can’t wait! Anyone want to come with me??

Everyone’s DNA is different (obviously) but there is one thing we all have in common – the Briggs line. The majority of it stems from Cornwall, England. So, that’s where we’ll start.

Next post will be about the Briggs line and how far back I’ve been able to go so far, along with the places where they’re from.

First though, I would love to see everyone’s answer to my question – What do we want to see, what more information do we want and who do we want it on? Please answer – I really look forward to reading your comments and getting some more ideas – thanks!

Who Shares Your Birthdate

On By Vicky BriggsIn May 2021, Stella HartfordLeave a comment

I thought this would be a fun way to get to know some of our ancestors. Birthdays are always fun (well not so much the older you get!) but even more so when shared with someone else.

May is a great place to start with our first month of birthdays. Our family has a lot of birthdays in May both now and in the past – I don’t know what it is but when you look back nine months from May, it takes us to around September. When I was raising my two sons, I was never happier than when school started in the fall. It was like the “most wonderful time of the year”! There’s a commercial on TV I have seen in the past that came on during the summer about getting ready for the school year – I smiled every time I saw it!

***FUN FACT***

This ancestor may have had that same smile at one time in her life. Her husband was a school teacher. There’s a school and a park that are named after him.

A.H.P. Matthew Elementary School and A.H.P. Matthew Park (located next to the school) in Surrey, BC.

I know I haven’t found all of my ancestors, along with their information, but I can tell you right now there are already eight born in the month of May! I find it even more interesting when I find one that matches one of our current family members. I haven’t found one that shares my birthdate but here’s hoping!!

This ancestor’s birthdate is even more amazing because it is exactly 100 years before the birth of another family member – wow!!

So, grab a cup of coffee, tea or whatever fills your boots, sit down in your comfy chair, sit back, relax and let’s get to know our birthday ancestor!

Stella “Tilla” Evalina Hartford born May 23, 1869, in Haldimand Township, Northumberland County, Ontario to proud parents William and Martha Hartford (nee Tuck). Stella is my maternal great grandmother, mother to my wonderful Grandma Irene.

Family Tree of Stella Hartford

The area where Stella was born was also the birthplace of both her parents, so it seems the family had made the Haldimand, Ontario area their home for many years. She was raised in this area along with 14 siblings. When her mother, Martha, passed away at the young age of 44, her father William, remarried which resulted in another 6 siblings for Stella.

Stella “Tilla” Evaline Hartford (date unknown)

At the age of 16, Stella married Alfred Henry Portaire Matthew January 13, 1886, in Campbellville, Ontario. Alfred was 21 and his profession is noted as school teacher. By reading through some of the documents I have located, I believe Alfred was also a house carpenter whether it be by profession or a hobby. It was one of the notable items that came up throughout census documents. I think it depended on where they were living at the time and the jobs he was able to find.

Alfred and Stella Matthew (date unknown)

Stella and Alfred started their family in their hometown of Haldimand. There are a couple of town names that come up in census and other records, but they are all in the same area – Campbellville, Belleville and Cobourn, to name a few.  Stella and Alfred had the first of their children in July 1887, Alberta May. 

March 1891 census records indicate their home was in Cobourg, Ontario. Birth records of their son, William Henry Harry, place the young family in Victoria, BC, in May of 1893.  I have been unable to find any records of their move across the country between March 1891 and May 1893, although it does seem they didn’t stay in Victoria long.  Birth records indicate their daughter Beatrice Aileen (Aunt Lena to me!) was born September 1894 and places the family in Cloverdale, BC.

Here’s a move out of the blue! Somewhere between March 1901 and January 1903, the family had taken residence in Quindaro, Kansas, USA.  Quindaro has a unique history in the underground railroad development.  It is a remarkably interesting read and worthwhile your time:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quindaro_Townsite

The area where Alfred and Stella lived, had a lot of people with occupations in the same fields of construction as indicated in the census.  Alfred’s occupation is listed as “house carpenter”.  The March 1905 Kansas State Census, lists Alfred and Stella along with eight of their children.  As well, there are a couple of records noting Ernest Alfred (eighth child) as being born in Kansas City and having immigrated to Canada with naturalization sometime in 1905.

It seems when the family returned to Canada, they resided in Victoria for a short period of time as John Thomas Herbert’s birth records (ninth child) indicated he was born in Victoria, December 1905.

Okay, I have to interject here as I am trying to picture what travel would have been like in the late 1800s and the early 1900s.  Not only did the young family of five (three young children) travel across Canada sometime between 1891 and 1893, but they also then traveled from Cloverdale to Quindaro, Kansas sometime during 1901 and 1903 with six young children and then came back to Victoria in 1905 with seven children! I am assuming this was all done by train but who knows. Still, just think about it…..I don’t even want to!  Although in those days, they probably didn’t travel with a full house of furniture and lots of personal items maybe just bringing along family heirlooms, a small wardrobe and necessaries.  Still, the thought of “wrangling” all the young ones seems a little daunting to me.

Okay, back to more traveling.  The family moved from Victoria back to the BC Mainland with the birth of their youngest, Irene Stella (my grandma!), noted birthplace in Cloverdale in 1908.  1911 census indicates the family lived in New Westminster where Stella was laid to rest June 23, 1922, at the young age of 53.

Top row: Frankie (Francis), Lottie (Charlotte), May (Alberta); Next row: Lena (Beatrice), Alfred, Tilla Stella), Laura; Next row: John, Ernie; Sitting: Harry (William), Stan.

By researching Stella’s life, she seems to me to be an extraordinarily strong woman of her time which I believe has been carried on throughout our family.  My Grandma Irene was only 14 when her mother passed and was raised by her older sisters not marrying until she was 29 (that’s a story for another day).

Stanley, Irene, Tilla, John & Laura

I hope you have enjoyed our journey with Stella and her family (who are all a part of our family!).

If you have anything to add to Stella’s journey, please leave a comment and don’t forget to like the post.

I look forward to seeing everyone’s comments – thanks!

Take care and stay safe, everyone.

Welcome to my blog!

On By Vicky BriggsIn Apr 20214 Comments

A blank screen can put a halt to try pushing the words in your mind down through your fingertips in order to form words and begin typing. This is more so when having to write about yourself and why you have chosen to do something as monumental as starting a blog!

Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought I would be doing a blog. I am not the best of writers. By doing some research on starting a blog, it turns out you do not have to be a good writer, but just have a passion to share something you have discovered. It is like having a chat or conversation……..

With that in mind, conversations will be a part of this blog mixed with some ancestral findings. We are going to learn about family members that are still among us and those that have left us. So, if you are a part of my family, be prepared to have a conversation with me! I hope that you will, please??

I am looking forward to getting to know each of you as part of our family and as individuals – I’m so excited!!

During the next month or so, I will be posting little tidbits to get your curiosity going in preparation for our first conversation and learn about all the lines of our ancestry. My hope is you may learn something you did not know.

I look forward to going on this journey with my family and hope you are as well!

To get started, here is a picture of my little family – me with my sons Jeremy and Dale. It was taken almost 10 years ago and yes, we have all changed! Hoping to get a new one done soon and will post as soon as I do.