Putting Hortense to Rest

Sometimes old Newspapers can be our best allies in the search for information on our families. It takes patience and knowledge and a great deal of searching and reading to find the gemstone in the quarry.

I went back to Wadesboro today and then on to Rockingham in Richmond County in search of a number of things. I thought looking through the 1896 editons of the Anson Record, I found this gem in the April 4th Edition.

"Miss Hortense Davis, daughter of Mrs. J. T. Crump, of Cottonville, Stanly County, died last Monday, of pneumonia, aged about 25 years. Miss Davis was married to Mr. Will Stewart, of Monroe, several years ago, but obtained a divorce from him, after which she resumed her maiden name. "

Hortenses tombstone retains her married name. Possibly because of her surviving daughter, Ouissa.

So Hortense did not drown when she threw herself in the river. She caught pneumonia and died.

I still wonder at all of the circumstances that led to her death and to her cousin's insanity. Kitty Davis had returned to Anson County just a few weeks before Hortense had died and married an E. W. Cox from Marlboro County, South Carolina. In Hortenses divorce papers, she claims her husband William R Stewart ran off with her 15 year old second cousin Wincy Catherine "Kitty" Davis. They were found in Chester, Chester County, South Carolina.

Another item I was looking for in Anson or in Richmond Counties, was the marriage license of Edward Cox and Josephine Quick. According to the 1900 census and Edwards death certificate, they had gotten married in 1897, but it does not say where. There was no license in either Anson or Richmond counties. I have also not yet located a divorce decree or annulment of his marriage to Kitty on March 3, 1896. From what I have seen in early divorce proceedings that I have came across, one year is far too quick. Of course, there may have been a terrible discovery about Kitty that caused an annulment. I still need to go a peruse the court proceedings of Anson on microfilm in order to see if anythere there helps solve this mystery.

I recieved the forms to send in for Kitty's paperwork from Broughton State Mental Hospital. I found an "Inquistion of Lunacy" papers in Stanly County for James Clark Thompson, a great-grandfather of my Daddy's, but Anson County had no such item on microfilm and Kitty was not listed in Stanly.

I apparently turned the Richmond County Courthouse on its side and shook it. What did not come out was the marriage of Kitty's husband to his second wife. I wonder if he married her at all. I found land records of his forefathers and hers, but no marriage records between old E. W. Cox and Miss Josephine Quick.

The quest for the mystery of Kitty Davis's tragic life continues. But I find her innocent of killing her cousin. Directly anyways. 

The Mysterious Mr. Cox: Finding Kitty's License

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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.