Early Oregon Cousins -- Charles Clarence Hayes

Charles Hayes was one of John Howard Bond's younger 1st cousins. His father, Ebenezer Hayes, was a younger brother of John's mother, Huldah (Hayes) Bond. Ebenezer had married later in life after he was 35 and his first wife died. When he remarried at age 43 he married Laura Hill, the 18 year old step-daughter of Priscilla (Hayes) Hill, Ebenezer's youngest sister. Charles was the 4th child of Ebenezer and Laura, born 7 May 1878. He was just 2 months older than John's oldest daughter.

The 1880 census listed him as Clarence Hayes, age 2, in the household of Ebenezer and Laura in Halsey Precinct, Linn County Oregon. He was not listed with his parents in the 1900 census, but in 1905 he was shown as Chas. C., age 26, again in his parents' household in the city of Halsey. The family had moved to Portland, Multnomah County Oregon, by the 1910 census. Charles was living with his parents and he was working as a laborer at odd jobs. His father died in 1911 and Charles was one of the 5 children living with his mother on the 1920 census in Portland where his occupation was laborer in a furniture factory. On the 1930 census he was working as a farmer in the Willamette Precinct in Lane County Oregon.

Charles is not enumerated in the 1940 census since he died 28 Feb 1940, before the census was taken. I found the circumstances of his death to be sad. When I located his death certificate it stated that the cause of death was cerebral hemorrhage, due to traumatic fracture of the skull, due to struck by auto. Some of the other facts on the certificate were revealing. He died at Portland General Hospital where he had been for 3 months. The informant had no records of Charles' birthdate, or birthplace, or occupation or parents. They estimated his age as 56 and gave his address as "transient - no address."

Since his death was due to an automobile accident marked as happening 1 Dec 1939 in Portland Oregon, I thought that it might have been mentioned in a newspaper. When I checked that I found there were a series of articles about the accident and the aftermath involving Charles published in the Oregonian newspaper from Portland, Oregon. It was all so sad.

2 Dec 1939 - Headline: Car Hits Man, Skull Cracked. He was listed as an unidentified pedestrian who was struck while walking near the Jones Lumber Company. They described him as bearded and approximately 55 years old.

4 Dec 1939 - Victim Unidentified. He was described as an elderly bearded man whose skull was fractured when he was struck down by an automobile. His condition was critical. Officers reported that he had been seen walking along the road with one shoe off.

8 Dec 1939 - Unidentified Auto Victim Remains in Coma Here. They repeated the previous information, but added that he was unconscious, but improving.

12 Dec 1939 - Auto Victim Yet Unknown. It was 10 days after the accident and the hospital still did not know who he was. He had not completely regained consciousness and could only mumble responses. They described him as about 50 years old, 5 ft 4 inches tall, slender build, hazel eyes, sandy hair and Van Dyke beard.

14 Dec 1939 - Identity of Traffic Victim Still Puzzles Authorities. With this article the paper published a photo of him. They stated he was slowly improving, though not able to talk.

15 Dec 1939 - Auto Accident Victim Identified. The paper finally could say that the victim was Charles Hayes, 62. His brother, Fred W. Hayes, who lived in Portland, saw the photo, went to the hospital and was able to identify Charles.

29 Feb 1940 - Death Increases '39 Traffic Toll. When Charles died at the hospital it was counted in the traffic deaths from 1939.

I wonder how this affected the rest of the family. He had at least 2 brothers in Oregon and 1 in California.

Early Oregon Cousins - John Tong

John Tong was the son of James J. and Ann (Bond) Tong and the grandson of John and Sarah (Chastain) Bond, so was a 1st cousin of John Howard Bond, my great-grandfather which makes John Tong my 1st cousin 3 times removed.

John was the only son in the family, having 3 sisters: Sarah, Rachel and Rebecca. He was born 5 Feb 1846, probably in Marion County, Iowa, since they were there in 1850. Some researchers show the Tongs coming to Oregon on the Nelson Davis wagon train in 1853 with many of Ann's family. However, I believe the Tongs came a year earlier in 1852 because: on his Donation Land Claim application James stated they had arrived in Oregon Sep 1852 and settled their claim 30 Sep 1852; the family is not on the 1853 Umatilla listing; and in his 1853 journal George Bond (Ann's brother) wrote on 22 Sep "to Fosters a Cros a deep creek to James Tongs." So the Tongs were already settled when the Nelson Davis train arrived.

The 1850 census showed the James Tong family next door to the Solomon Bond family, both in Marion County Iowa. John was listed as John N, age 5. By 1860 the family had settled in Clackamas County Oregon in Rock Creek Precinct and John was age 14. The name Tong is sometimes difficult to research because the handwritten capital T is misread as an L, so it is indexed incorrectly. But in the BLM General Land Office records of the James and Ann Tong Donation Land Claim, their name is misread as Toug so required a little more work to find. His claim appears to be near what is now (2017) the unincorporated community of Clackamas.

It was near the end of 1868, 10 Dec, when John married Nancy Ann Heater in Marion County Oregon. But they were living in Marshfield precinct Clackamas County in 1870 next to his sister Sarah who was married to George Wise. It must have been soon that John settled his homestead because he received the patent 11 Nov 1875. His father James received a patent for a homestead the same day and his land joined John's on the north, 160 acres each. It seems likely that James had sold his Donation Land Claim and filed for the homestead to be next to his son. They are on the same page in the 1880 census for Clackamas County, still in Marshfield precinct. John's sister, Rachel Emma who was married to Jacob Scott, was also living there.

By the 1880 census John and Nancy had 4 children: Stephen, Nettie, Earl and Mary. They had 3 more children in the next 10 years: Fletcher, Marion and Rachel. The 1900 census shows the family living in Damascus precinct of Clackamas County, but this is probably the same location as before. It was between the 1880 and 1900 census when John's mother died in 1884, then John's father was committed to the Hawthorne Asylum in July of 1887. James died there in that October.

Sometime after 1900 John's family moved to Portland, Multnomah County Oregon, where his wife Nancy died 31 Jan 1909 and was buried in Multnomah Park Cemetery. John had 4 of his children still living at home in the 1910 census and his daughter Mary and her husband Edwin Plasket were living with him in 1920. John died 6 May 1922 in the Oregon City Hospital and was buried next to Nancy. His obituary states that John was survived by all 7 of his children.

  

Early Oregon Cousins - James E. Monroe

James Edward Monroe was the son of one of my favorite "aunts," Rebecca (O'Neal) Monroe. She was the youngest sister of Commodore Perry O'Neal and lived with his family for awhile in Iowa and then settled near him when they moved to Oregon.

I am uncertain how many children were in the Monroe family, especially due to the loss of the 1890 census. But from the surviving censuses and various obituaries, there were at least 12 children. James was number 6 of that list, so he would definitely qualify as a middle child.

James was born in May 1873 after the family had arrived in Lane County Oregon He was almost 25 years old when he married Delphia Gillis on 27 Apr 1898 in Lane County. It was less than 6 months later when James' father died. Within 2 years, James and Delphia had moved north and appeared on the 1900 census in Colfax, Whitman County Washington. By then they had a 9 month old daughter, Gladys. Also living in their household of his 10 year old niece, Myrtle Marketta.

Trying to follow James after this has been a puzzle to me. In 1918 he registered for the World War I Draft from Portland, Multnomah County Oregon. He was unemployed and gave his nearest relative as Margaret R Monroe, living in a hotel in Tacoma, Washington. This could be his mother since her name was Rebecca Margaret. In 1920 James is living in a boarding house with a wife named Birdie. He was employed as a truck driver for a coal company. His sister Birdie and her husband John Pinard are living in the same boarding house and he also was a truck driver for a coal company. James and Birdie are in a 1921 city directory for Tacoma with his occupation as laborer. James died on 9 Jun 1923 in Portland Oregon. His obituary does not list among his survivors a wife, but does list a daughter, Gladys Costa, as well as his mother and 10 brothers and sisters. I can't find where he was buried.

What happened to Delphia and Gladys? I found Gladys in the 1910 census living in Spokane Washington with her Gillis grandparents. From her father's obituary, she apparently married someone named Costa. There is a Delphia Hayes, wife of Albert, who died 13 Apr 1931 in Spokane Washington, who has the correct parents. It looks like I need to continue researching this family.