Why Katie Fraser McKeigan went from Canada to Kentucky

My first cousin 3x removed was Edinburgh-born Margaret Falconer, about whom I wrote here. She was the eldest daughter of my 2nd great grand-aunt, Ann Smith. While drilling down into the lines of Margaret's children from time to time this year, I came across records and an obituary for Catherine Elizabeth Fraser (1869-1932), her eldest daughter by her second husband, John Fraser, in Louisville, Kentucky. Catherine, or Katie, was also born in Edinburgh, travelling to Manitoba in 1882 with her family.

Wait! What? Now, here was a mystery. How did Katie end up in Kentucky, living at the same address as one W. H. McKeigan, and who was that? Through statutory and newspaper records, learned her story.

Nanaimo Daily News 9 Apr 1895

Catherine (or Katie) married a Nova Scotia man, Daniel McKeigan, in New Westminster, British Columbia on 29 May 1892, when she was 23. She had gone from Manitoba to British Columbia, apparently on her own, leaving her family. I haven't found Catherine on the 1891 Canada census, but her marriage registration notes that her residence at the time of her marriage was still Brandon, Manitoba, where her family then lived. As we know, people were often overlooked in censuses in those days.

Daniel was born on Cape Breton in Nova Scotia and was a miner. Cape Breton is where many Scots who came to Canada settled in the 19th century. He was a miner, working near Nanaimo, on Vancouver Island. How and where Dan and Katie met is a mystery. New Westminster is on the mainland. Nanaimo, where they made their home, then was reached only by ship or ferry.

Katie and Dan quickly had their first child, John Falconer McKeigan, in 1893, and Katie was pregnant again when disaster struck in April 1895. Dan was killed instantly by falling rock in the mine shaft where he was working. The story at the right goes on at some length describing the incident and recovery efforts.

Katie stayed on in Nanaimo after Dan's death, and gave birth to their second son a few months later.  I didn't find Katie and her sons again until the 1916 Prairies census, when they were living in Winnipeg, where Katie ran a boarding house. Katie's eldest son, John, died in 1920 there in 1920. She and William are still in Winnipeg when the 1921 census was done.

But then I found Katie in the 1930 US census in Louisville, Kentucky, and according to that census she arrived there in 1924. She was by then working as a housekeeper at a boys' home. I then found her listed in a few Louisville city directories through the 1920s, which is how I learned that she had gone there from Winnipeg with her son William in 1924.

I was at loss to understand why Katie and William went to Louisville, until I found Katie's 1932 obituary, above. Besides her son, Katie was survived by a brother, Rev J. F. Fraser, formerly of Louisville and then of New York.

Yes, it was one of those lovely a-ha moments we so love in genealogy. J. F. Fraser was Katie's younger brother, John Falconer Fraser, whom I hadn't yet begun to research.

There will be more to come about the Reverend Fraser.

And what of Katie's son, William? He made his home in Louisville, dying there in 1964. I learned more about his life from his obituary, seen below.

Back to Katie's mum, Margaret Falconer Fraser. I'm getting closer to finding out when Margaret and her husband, John Fraser, died, having found them in the 1906 census of the prairie provinces, living in Nanton, Alberta, a farming community, with their youngest son, James D. Fraser (Aside: Alberta statutory records are really the most awful to research).

Louisville Courier-Journal, 4 Feb 1964

The never ending story continues ....







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