Clark's Admission

Biologically, we have 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great-grandparents, 16 great-great grandparents, 32 great, great, great grandparents and so on to eternity. Some of us are lucky enough to have more than that when extra branches are grafted into our Family Tree. I was one of those fortunate persons. I have two Dads. One is biological and we have reunited and I love him. The other was a gift from God who I was blessed with as the father who raised me and his parents were wonderful people who accepted me as their grandchild, although I was about 3 or 4 when they met me. Their family tree is mine too, even though my DNA test will not connect me to any cousins on that side. 

The little boy to the far right in this photo, on the back row in the suit and the knickers is William Joseph Thompson. He was my grandfather and died in 1992. Seated are his parents, Thomas Jefferson Thompson and Mollie Dennis Thompson. Mollie died July 26, 1917, leaving her children motherless. Her youngest, Tom Jr, was born in 1915. Only Arlie, Cletus and Tom were younger than my grandfather, who was born in 1905. It appears that the youngest was not yet born in this photo, so this photo was made sometime between 1911 and 1914.

Thomas Jefferson Thompson, the man seated with James Arlie Thompson on his knee, was born April 20, 1868 in Anson County and died December 3, 1942 in Albemarle, North Carolina. At some point the family had moved to Montgomery County from Anson and he raised his 12 children on the banks of the PeeDee River in the community of El Dorado, Montgomery County, North Carolina.

Tom Thompson was the son of James Clark Thompson, born in February, 1839 and died in Burke County, North Carolina on March 2, 1913 of senile dementia. He had been admitted to Broughton Hospital on March 25, 1911 with dementia at the age of 72 and died 2 years later there, at the age of 74. Records show that he was admitted 'late in life'. My grandfather was only 6 when his grandfather was admitted to Broughton. I wonder how well he got to know them. As this was about the age my grandfather was in the above photo, this was probably the year that Clark, as he was known, was admitted.

James Clark Thompson was the son of George W. Thompson and Mary Ann Capel. His siblings were Joicy Catherine Thompson, 1837, George Winton 'Wick' Thompson 1845, John Melton 'Jack' Thompson 1849, July A Thompson, 1851, Christine, 1856, Mathew Thomas Thompson, 1858,  Adam 1859 and Mary F. 1862.

He married Margaret "Maggie" Talbert and they had 6 children together: Thomas Jefferson Thompson (1868), Charles M Thompson (1870), Claud (1872), Sophronia (1874), William Battle Thompson (1878) and Adam (1879).

Clark was a Civil War Veteran, having enlisted in Montgomery County on March 1, 1862.

James Thompson
Residence:	Montgomery County, North Carolina
Occupation:	Farmer
Enlistment Date:	1 Mar 1862
Enlistment Place:	Montgomery County, North Carolina
Side Served:	Confederacy
State Served:	North Carolina
Service Record:	Enlisted as a Private on 1 March 1862 at the age of 23. Enlisted in Company F, 44th Infantry Regiment North Carolinaon 3 Apr 1862. Surrendered Company F, 44th Infantry Regiment North Carolinaon 9 Apr 1865 at Appomattox Court House, VA.
Sources:	16

His last wife would be a lady known as Julina or Lina, and they would reside in Albemarle.

Kitty's Admission Papers

In pursuing a lead, sometimes waiting on records are the hardest part. Will they continue the information you need to lay a mystery to rest. Will they lead to more questions than answers? I've had it happen both ways.

I could not find any records in Anson County on why Wincey Catherine Davis, who I have been researching for a while now, was admitted to Broughton State Hospital in Morganton. She was admitted at age 26 and remained there nearly 18 years before dying of TB.
I recently sent for copies of her records, as a relative. She does not have any direct descendents. This is all that was returned.

Her Card:  Cox, Wincy Catherine (26)
                 (Davis)     (Mrs. ?)
Anson Co.              Ad. 8-14-14           Archives
Died 5-22-22

Then the next page: Wincy Catherine Cox, Patient number 3425, Occupation: Housekeeper, Admitted : 8-12-1904, Female, 26 years old, married, Common education, NC, Anson County, 1 attack, Cause: Poor health,  Duration: 4 months, Removal: 5-22-1922 Died of Pulminary Tuberculion  9:30 am. Buried here.

And that is all we know of Kitty's 18 years as a patient. I read that in the early years of Broughton, a large number of female patients were admitted for what was referred to as 'female problems'.  Gynecological conditions, not mental or emotional ones, like miscarriages, troublesome periods, abdominal pain. Others were emotional, like the baby blues, or being overwhelmed from having a large family at a very young age.

As Wincy did not have any children, her problems may have been tied to gynecological issues, perhaps she had gotten pregnant many times and had not been able to carry them. Maybe this had put her in a depression. It's unknown. I believe the last possibilities may lie in the local newspapers of the time, to see if any articles mention anything to do with her or her family that might give me some clues. In the meantime, Kitty remains a mystery. She ran off to Chester County, South Carolina at age 15 with a music teacher, William R Stewart, who was her cousins' husband. She was the daugther of Benjamin Franklin Davis and Julia Sibley Davis. She met E. W. Cox from Marlboro County, South Carolina and married him at age 18. He is shown married to a Josephine Quick in 1897, just a year after he married Kitty in 1896, and living next to his parents in Wolf Pit, Richmond County in the 1900 census. His marriage license to Josephine Quick is not to be found, neither in Richmond or Anson counties and not in South Carolina. Perhaps he didn't marry her at all. The scorned cousin, Hortense Davis Stewart, died 2 weeks after Kitty's marriage to Ed Cox. Then Kitty admitted to Broughton at age 26 to died there at age 42. What short, tragic lives. I want to know why.

The Mysterious Mr. Cox: Finding Kitty's License

 Ye

As the last residence recorded for Wincy Catherine 'Kitty' Davis on her death certificate, before her admitance to Broughton Hospital for the Insane, her residence had been Polkton, in Anson County, North Carolina; so I went to search for her marriage license in Wadesboro, at the R.O.D. office for Anson. I found it. Funny how the solving of one mystery opens the door to another, or several. The marriage license states that Kitty married an E.W. Cox, age 27, son of Silas and Angeline Cox of Marlboro County, SC on March 9, 1896. Just weeks before the mysterious death of her cousin Hortense, who had accused Kitty of running off with her husband Bill Stewart to Chester , SC in her divorce papers just one year prior, 1895. So, that should solve the mystery of who the mysterious Mr. Cox was that Kitty married prior to being commited to Broughton. However... I searched Ancestry.com for EW Cox born around 1869 in Marlboro County. Nothing. Plenty of Coxes. No EW's. Tried looking for Silas and Angeline. There they were in plenty of records, family trees, censuses, city directories, marriage bonds. Silas was born in 1807 and Charlotte Angeline Ivey Cox in 1810. The problem is, not only did they not have a son with the initials E.W, they were too old to have had a son in 1869. Angeline would've been 59 and Silas 62. I don't think that happened.

The one thing Silas did have was a son named W. E. , or William Edward Cox. And I know from experience that quite often, two first names could be come entirely interchangable. Take my ancestor Henry Garner Aldridge, for instance. I've seen his name just as often as Garner Henry Aldridge.

The problem with this theory is that first, the age is all wrong. W. E. Cox was born in April of 1843. In March of 1896, he would be a month shy of his 53rd birthday. I don't think a 53 year old man could pass for 27. Second, he had married Miss Lucy Ann Skipper in 1870. Lucy shows up with him in the Bennettsville Census in 1880, then again in the PeeDee Villiage in Rockingham County in 1900, and then again in the 1910 census with him in Darlington, South Carolina. They did move around a bit and in 1900, they were very close to where Kitty's last known residence, Polkton, Anson County, was before she was committed.

Now, W. E. Cox did have a son named Edward, born in around 1870. Age right, first intial right, and Edward was single in 1896. However, his middle initial was L for Lee, and Silas and Angeline were his grandparents, not his parents. Then, in 1897, the next year, Edward Lee Cox married Josephine Quick. In the 1900 census, Edward and Josephine are living right next to his parents in Richmond County. He died there at the age of 76 on July 22, 1947, in the community of Cordoba, where he was a Tax Lister and Payroll guard at a Cotton Mill.

Did Edward discover something horrific about Kitty and quickly divide himself of her presence, and marry Miss Quick quickly? Or did he file for an annulment or a quick divorce? I will have to check the divorce documents of Anson County for that time period to find out. In the meantime, Kitty's life has become more of a mystery than ever.

The Sad Affair of Kitty Davis

Today I just spent a few hours at our local library. Deciding to concentrate on the mystery of Hortense Davis Stewart's short life and mysterious death, shortly after her divorce went through, I went back through the Davis files to see if anything there would give me any hints on her cause of death, her daughters name, who Kitty Davis was exactly or what happened to William after her death. I know well the siblings of my ancestors, and even their children, but had never gone down a generation from that, unless I had cause to. Several individuals descended from our Patriarch Job Davis contributed their trees, down to living individuals. 


Hortense's father Edward Winfield Davis aka Neddy, married late in life, age 56 to be exact, so his children were much younger than their first cousins. Example, Benjamin Franklin Davis, the oldest son of Neddy's brother Henry was born in 1829, while Hortense was born in 1861, 32 years apart, but they were first cousins. 


In the file I discovered a record of Frank Davis' Family Bible. Frank is what Benjamin Franklin Davis was known as. This had been submitted by Luther McIntyre. Two of Frank's daughters, married brothers who were McIntyres's. The McIntyres's, coincidentally, were also members of the Murray family, mentioned in earlier posts. 


The Bible starts with a list of the 14 children born to Frank and his wife Julia Sibley Davis. How many descendants from this family do you think are out there now?


Lula Davis  March 27 1855
Sally Davis   August 1857
Mathew A Davis  December 11 1858
J F Davis  December 2 1860
Thomas Davis   July 3  1865
Mary Davis  December 27  1866
Hart A Davis   January 15  1868
John S Davis   December 8  1870
Mary A Davis  September 21 1872
H. E. Davis   August 18 1874
Nannie Davis  May  6  1876
Kitty Davis  September 15  1878
Susie Davis  March 7 1880
Lillie Mae Davis  May 31 1882


The Bible also has listed that Benjamin Franklin Davis died  December 21 1898 and Julia Sibley Davis died  Feb. 18 1914, and Hart A Davis died August 2 1902.


But there she was ...Kitty Davis. Of course, she was in my family tree already, but not as Kitty. Matching  up the birthdate, Kitty turns out to be Wincey Catherine Davis. 

Sarah Hortense Davis Stewart claims in her divorce papers that her husband, William R Stewart, was having an adulterous affair with Kitty Davis, who as it turns out, is her first cousin once removed. Hortense married in 1891 and by 1894 had been abandoned by W. R. Stewart, with a two year old daughter, who was then found to be teaching music in Chester, Chester County, South Carolina. 


Stepping back at looking at what I have found out so far, Billy Stewart appears to be a cad who has left a trail of broken women. Billy was born in 1868, Hortense in 1869. In 1894, when he is accused of having an affair with Kitty Davis, Kitty, who was born in 1878, was a mere child of 15 or 16. Bill 10 years her senior. In modern America, Bill would have been arrested for indecent liberties with a minor, but in Victorian North Carolina, Kitty would have been considered of marriageable age, many girls married then in their early teens. 


At some point Kitty married a Cox, and her death certificate stated she had lived in Polkton, NC, which is just over the Rocky River in Anson County. Her death certificate is telling and tragic in other ways as well. 


Kitty's Find a Grave Tribute

Kitty died at the age of 43 in Broughton State Mental Hospital. She had been there nearly 18 years, entering at age 25. What happened between her affair with Billy Stewart at 16 and being admitted to an insane assylum at age 25? Who was this Cox that she married? I will have to check the surrounding counties for marriage records for Kitty and Mr. Cox. Anson will be the most likely, as the death certificate said that was her last residence. It also states that she was married, which means Mr. Cox did not go to the trouble to divorce her. She died of pulminary tuberculosis. Probably a chain smoker. I see a vague image of her in my mind, thin, wan, yellowish tint in her skin, legs crossed tightly, smoking like a freight train and twitching nervously. Was this Kitty?


I attempted to gain more information on one family tragedy and came upon another. 


I am waiting on a copy of Hortense Stuart's estate papers and also the official copies of her divorce papers, instead of the ones I photographed from microfilm. I am also going to search for the mysterious Mr. Cox and perhaps a marriage license. Below are some old photos of Broughton State Mental Hospital and the cemetary where Kitty is buried. 

An old post card of Broughton State Mental Hospital in Morganton, North Carolina












The State Hospital cemetery where Kitty Davis lies.