53Ancestors52Weeks Week 7 Theme: Unusual Source. Or, How a Weird Tale Solved a Family Mystery (Harriet Bluett Hurd)

 3 June 1935 Nevada State Journal

  This week's theme is "Unusual Source".  Genealogists use many sources to find out facts about their relatives' lives:  Census reports, birth certificates, death certificates, funeral records and city directories can give up a great deal of information to a family historian and help create a basic outline or timeline of a person's life span. But, these resources can be a little "dry".  How do you add a little personality to the dry facts? 

  One of my favorite resources lately has been local newspapers.  They give wonderful and  personal details that  help make people that lived their lives long ago all the more real.  You can really get a feel for  their personalities, their beliefs, their interests and sometimes even hear things in their own words if they are quoted. You may be really  lucky and get to see a photograph! 

  Using newspaper articles as a resource is not that unusual in genealogical research. But,  newspaper stories can  give up unusual details that might help answer questions that have gone unanswered through the usual methods.   I found out something very unusual from a little snippet  in the Nevada State Journal just the other day, when I was searching for articles about another cousin, Alta Powers.  It was certainly a weird story, but it helped confirm a fact that I thought was true, but couldn't prove with the usual resources. 

  For the last several years I have been researching my Hurd/Bluett families that came from Pennsylvania to California and Nevada in the mid 1800's.  They were a hardy bunch that ended up living in the mining town of Virginia City, Nevada.  My Great Great Great Grandmother was Harriet Bluett Hurd.  She and her husband had a total of 10 children, and she came to the west from Pennsylvania not once, but twice.  The first trip the family made was across the Isthmus of Panama and up the coast to San Francisco, and then by stage to Nevada City, California.  Her husband died in a mine accident in Virginia City in 1876, after the family had gone back to Pennsylvania and made yet another trip back out west to settle in Virginia City.    She lived there with her remaining children until her death in 1893 at the age of 58.  

  I had several nice resources on her life to work from, including 40 years worth of US  census records, census population records from Pennsylvania, and local County birth and death records.  I even found several newspaper snippets about her trips to visit family in Nevada City, and her last illness and eventually her death.  I did not, however, have any records of her place of burial.  I had many records of her children's final resting places, but not hers nor her husbands.  The family story was that she was buried in Virginia City, but no one could locate her actual grave. 

  My mother tells  the story of how she and her uncle and grandmother (my GGG Grandmother Harriet's granddaughter)  drove up to Virginia City, Nevada  from Nevada City, California (a day trip to be sure) in the 50's.  They went to the cemetery trying to find where the grave was.  My mom recounts the story..."I can see all of us tramping around the cemetery with the wild winds whipping the long grass around.  Spooky, especially when you are a kid!"  I too, have been tramping around that cemetery looking for relatives, with no luck.  And yes, the cemetery can be spooky with its constant winds, weeds and sagebrush. 

The Silver Terrace Cemetery Virginia City, Nevada.  From Travel Nevada.

  As I was looking for articles with the name of Alta Powers (I had been researching her story at the time) on Newspapers.com during their latest free weekend,  this headline jumped out at me. GROUND COLLAPSES AS RENO GIRL PUTS FLOWERS ON GRAVE. What? Whose grave? Was she Ok? I didn't even have Harriet Bluett Hurd on my radar that day. As I read on, the article gave the exact relationship to the deceased...her grandmother.  That would have been Harriet Bluett Hurd!  It also gave the location of the grave as "near the old Mexico Mine" in Virginia City.  Well, that would have been very close to the vicinity of the Silver Terrace Cemetery.  The grave was probably over one of the many tunnels from the mine, and the ground gave way.   And, thank goodness, my first cousin 3x removed was ok after the ordeal. 

   Considering that there are hundreds of unmarked graves in this cemetery, and at that time the ground was still under threat of collapsing, I will probably never determine the exact location of her burial.  But, now I do know that she was, in fact, buried in Virginia City in 1893.  Her husband is most likely there, too.  Too bad this very strange and weird story didn't get passed on to my Great Grandmother! 

  

Relationship Reference:  Me->Margaret Hansen Boothby->Harold Hansen->Vere Burrows Hansen->Elizabeth Jane Hurd Burrows->Harriet Bluett Hurd

Alta Powers was the daughter of Hattie Hurd Powers, whose mother was Harriet Bluett Hurd. Harriet was a younger sister of Elizabeth Jane Hurd Burrows.