Tressie's Trouble

Frank and Phoebe VanVleet had 7 children. One of these children was my grandmother Ozelma. This story is about Ozelma's sister Tressa Adiline VanVleet . She was born on July 24, 1901 in Oceana County, Michigan. Tressa got married twice, her first marriage to a man named Forest Weaver. At first glance this seems to be a good marriage. The Weavers were a pretty prominent family. Forest was the great grandson of Daniel Weaver, a New York native who established the towns of Fremont (first called Weaverville) and Hesperia, Michigan.


The VavVleet family, with Tressa and Forest to the right (CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE)

My aunt gave me the picture. I asked her who was who, and she identified Forest and said he was Tressa's husband. No other info on that note. When I decided to do more research on Tressa and her 1st husband I didn't find but a marriage record. They were married in Hart, Michigan on June 9, 1921. And next I located them living in Muskegon on Sanford Street in 1922. I learned that she had divorced Forest some time before 1930 and had remarried in 1931 to Rex Swietser and moved to San Diego, California. I was satisfied with that for a while and I left it. One day I became curious about what happened to Forest after the divorce, did he remarry? So I looked for him and found him in the 1930 census for Jackson, Michigan. He was listed as a prison inmate! Wow, what could he have done? Ancestry.com has newspaper images available in their search files and what I found about Forest was quite a shock. I found many papers carried this story, it made national news. My mouth opened in horror thinking, "Holy cow, that could have been Tressa!". 

The murder of Gladys Echardt

When the 1940 census was released last year I tried to find his location, expecting to find him in prison, but he was nowhere. So a search of newspapers again, my suspicion was right...suicide! He hung himself in his cell in October of 1939. Even though his crime was the worst anyone could imagine a person can't help feeling sorry for him because he was clearly ill.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Revolution

In honor of Independence Day I thought it would be fitting to remember ancestors who served in the Revolutionary War. The first person who comes to mind is still a bit of a mystery. Not much is known about this individual other than he lived in Virginia, served in the war, got married to a lady called Peggy (maiden name unknown), had 5 children, and died in what is now the state of Kentucky. He is important to me because I bare his namesake " Golden". His name written was "Golding" and some way within the next generation the name evolved into "Golden". Perhaps the change was based on pronunciation or illiteracy, maybe they just thought it sounded better without the "ing", just a thought. Where William Golding, born in Scotland in April 1760, has no solid proof, only the date can be considered documentation even though nobody has found any birth or christening record at all it is stated by William in his pension application. The application mentions nothing about place of birth or the name of his parents. His place of birth was based on a finding that told of a diary belonging to William's great grandson that said that William was born in Scotland, I have yet to see this diary. He died in Boone, Kentucky on September 6, 1835...end of story, for now. 

    Next is another ancestor by the name of William Burke. Burke was born in Stafford, Virginia in 1752. He enlisted in the sixth regiment of the Continental Army in the spring of 1778 and served until Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown. He died on May 10, 1803 in Farquier, Virginia. 

Here is a link to Findagrave.com for his memorial: William Burke's Memorial . There is a picture there of when William was honored in 1991 for being a member of The Culpeper Minute Men. 

William married Susannah Sweeney in 1778, together they had 9 children.

 

Document For Susannah's Widow Pension

 Susannah collected a widow's pension until her death in 1843. She is buried in the Burke/Shaw Cemetery at Palmer's Crossroads, Farquier County, Virginia. 

The chart above starts with Jesse Lewis Golden and shows where William Golding and William Burke fit into the family line.    Both men mentioned in this blog are my 5th great grandfathers from my father's side.