Robert Mosey - From Yorkshire to America

Mosey is an unusual American surname, with no obvious ethnic origin.  But I have learned that it’s English in origin—Yorkshire, to be specific.  My husband’s great-grandfather Robert Mosey was one of his “gateway ancestors”—an ancestor who came from elsewhere to settle in America. 

Robert Mosey (1821-1884) was born in Bishop Wilton, a village in Yorkshire, England, to Richard Mosey and Sibby Johnson Mosey.  From what I’ve been able to find out about Robert’s early history, his parents weren’t the cream of British society by any means… I see a baby born out of wedlock, a conviction for assault, and a “removal order,” for example.  (A removal order occurred when a village sent a poor family back where they came from so that the local church parish wouldn’t have to support them.)  I owe a debt of thanks to Denise Mosey, who still lives in Bishop Wilton, for helping with this information.

Robert eventually came to America (as did his father Richard), probably in the later 1830s.  They both settled in Lorain County, Ohio, where Robert’s father Richard was naturalized and remarried (perhaps twice!) and died in 1872.  Young Robert married a local girl named Elisabeth Bennet in 1842.

The 1850 census finds Robert and Elisabeth in Lorain County with their four children, Robert working as a laborer.  But they continued to move west, probably to find affordable land...  The 1860 census finds them in Elkhart County, Indiana, with seven children (two other sons, Lesven and Daniel, had died).  Robert is a shingle-maker, and the census indicates that he still doesn’t own any land. 

Robert and Elisabeth eventually settled near South Haven in Allegan County, Michigan, where they can be found in the 1870 census.  Now Robert is a farmer and landowner, with land valued at $3,500 and personal property valued at $600.  An 1873 land atlas shows him owning 160 acres.  Quite a progression over twenty years!  He farmed in Allegan County the rest of his life, with several of his sons purchasing farms nearby.

Robert Mosey passed away in Allegan County in 1888, and Elisabeth followed him in death in 1893.  They and six or seven of their eight surviving children were buried at Stephenson Cemetery there.  In a future post I’ll tell more about those eight children who survived to adulthood—Lewis, John, Francis, Jane, Maria, Martha, Richard, and Sarah Elizabeth.

F.I. Wallin - Gateway Ancestor

“How will our children know who they are if they do not know where they came from?”

(author unknown)

I am a fourth-generation American on most branches of my family tree.  The first of my Wallin ancestors to live in America—my “gateway ancestor”—was my great-grandfather Frederick Isadore Wallin (1849-1926)—more commonly known as “F.I.”  

Frederick’s mother died in childbirth while having him.  In Sweden he was a tanner and the son of a tanner—one of the lower occupations on the social scale.  Yet a number of his personal papers survive, and the records say that he “read aloud well” and had a fine tenor singing voice.  He came to America (via Gothenburg, Sweden; Glasgow, Scotland; and Moville, Ireland) on the ship “Anglia” in May of 1871 at the tender age of 21; the ship’s steerage class passenger list was filled with Scots, Irish, Germans, Swedes, and a few Norwegians.  He was a lieutenant in the New York National Guard from 1874 to 1878—when this picture of him was created.  He became a U.S. citizen there and married Christine Bengston/Wennerholm, another Swedish immigrant.  The 1880 census finds them living with their baby son in Jamestown, New York, where Frederick is a store clerk.  But soon the young family went west to Nebraska, where Frederick was a peddler by trade, according to the 1885 Nebraska census.  By 1900 he is a farmer, and he and Christina have seven children—Isadore, Inez, Frederick, Ithel, Aurora, Sture, and Leonard.  Soon afterward he and Christina “moved to town” (Hordville, Nebraska) and built a store.

These words were written by his grandson Robert (my father) about Frederick’s later years:

“Old Frederick never really liked farming.  When his son Sture was 17, Sture wanted to go out on his own; so he told his father that he would finish out the year on the farm, and then help his dad build a store in town during that winter.  (This proposal was prompted by the old man telling Sture that there wasn't enough money for a new ball glove this year, while unloading a gallon of whiskey from the supply wagon.)  So they built the store, with living quarters in the back and twelve rooms upstairs, which made it a hotel.  The guests were traveling salesmen who went by train and would time their routes so as to spend an evening playing cards and having a few nips with F.I.  Let it not be thought that he was a bad man; he was a founder of the Fridhem Lutheran Church in Hordville.  This would have been about 1910, and Gramps ran the place until about 1920.  Later his son Leonard had a store in the same building, but the hotel business went out with the automobile.”

F.I. lived to be 76 and died in 1926; Christina died in 1935.  They are buried at the Fridhem Lutheran Church cemetery in Hordville.

Passage to America

Once you become known as the Official Family Historian, a wonderful phenomenon begins to occur.  Relatives, especially older ones, begin to give you things, saying, “I know you’ll take care of this.  I don’t want it to be thrown out after I’m gone!” 

My Aunt Janet recently left a box with me.  One of the items in the box was this wonderful document—her grandfather’s ticket to America. 

Carl August Peterson (1861-1917) my great-grandfather, came to the United States in 1881.  He first settled in Chicago, where he had a brother, Theodore.  He married Emelia Fryksdal there, and later they went west to Nebraska. 

His passenger contract, written in both Swedish and English, gives these details: 

“The departure from here Goteborg/(Gothenburg, Sweden) will take place in a Royal Mail Steamer on 20 May 1881.  From Gothenburg the passengers are forwarded on steerage place to Hull, and further, never later than twelve hours after the custom house examination, to Liverpool, in third class carriages on the railroad.  With the first steamer belonging to the Cunard Line, the departure from Liverpool will take place never later than eight days from the arrival there.  In the above payment (30 kronor) is included:  Steerage place in the Steamers and third class carriages on the Railroads.  Forwarding of luggage viz: 10 cubic feet, half for children; also good and sufficient food from Gothenburg to the landing place in Amerika [and] free lodgings in Hull and Liverpool.”

Several things stand out to me:

• Firstly, he traveled “steerage” class on the ship (the section near the rudder, which had the cheapest accommodations available) and third class (“emigrant’s class”) on the railroad, which would have gotten him a bench to sit on.  A long way from luxury...  Irish-genealogy-toolkit.com describes steerage as “a dark, noisy, smelly, stuffy deck of large bunk dormitories.”  Even so, a steerage ticket could cost the equivalent of six month’s wages for a laborer. (I wrote about "steerage" here.)

• Secondly, he could take 10 cubic feet of luggage.  Everything else from his old life had to be left behind.  I wonder what he packed? 

• Thirdly, he was provided with “good and sufficient food.”  Can I surmise that it was cold and minimal and plain?  

• I am guessing that the “free lodgings” in Hull and Liverpool were nothing to write home about, either... I've read about those lodging houses in books.

The 1880s were a hard time in Sweden, with crop failures causing food shortages and lack of employment.  Leaving everything he had ever known must have been difficult, but staying where he was must have been the less attractive option.  So, he came to America at the tender age of nineteen, found a job in Chicago, got married, went west to Nebraska, bought some land, and worked hard… and his children became farmers and teachers and nurses and soldiers.  Carl August Peterson, an immigrant I am proud to call my ancestor.