Harriet Ford Ballou (1858 – 1902): One death certificate, two death dates

We genealogists typically think of a death certificate as a pretty definitive source for the date of a person's death. But as with everything else in life, errors can happen.  Here's an example that I recently rediscovered while reviewing some old records.

Death Certificate for Harriet L. F. Ballou. The red boxes highlight the two different death dates. Near the top it says, May 10, 1902. Further down the date of death is given as May 9, 1902.

Harriet L. Ford was my second cousin, three times removed. (See the relationship chart, below.) Our closest common ancestor was Jacob Arnold. She was born and raised in Great Barrington, Massachusetts and married Arthur D. Ballou on November 16, 1892. At the time of their marriage he was a button maker, but he later became a physician. By 1900, they were living in Richland, Michigan.

Harriet died from consumption in May of 1902.  Her husband, being a physician, filled out the certificate of death as both the attending physician, providing information about Harriet's illness and death, and as the informant, providing personal information about Harriet and her family.  The resulting death certificate lists two different dates for Harriet's death.  At the top of the death certificate, it gives the date of death as May 10, 1902.  Later, under "Cause of Death" Arthur Ballou states, "I hereby certify that I attended deceased from May 1900 to May 1902, that I last saw her alive on 5–9 1902, that she died on May 9, 1902 about 4 o'clock a.m."

Perhaps the fact that she passed in the wee hours of the morning confused her husband about the exact date of her death. Or perhaps he was too distraught and exhausted to think through the details. But whatever the reason, we are left with an ambiguous death certificate.

Fortunately, the discrepancy is only one day.  Knowing exactly which date is correct doesn't really matter that much, except that it would satisfy my inner perfectionist.

Harriet Ford was my second cousin, three times removed. The dark lines show the show the relationship between us.

Notes on sources

I found Harriet L. F. Ballou's death certificate on the Seeking Michigan website, a free site with almost a million Michigan death records from the years 1897–1920.

Information about the marriage of Harriet Ford and Arthur Ballou is from the Register of Marriages in Great Barrington, takien from the Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620–1988 collection at Ancestry.com, image 856 of 1282 from Great Barrington : Births, Marriages and Death.

Arthur and Harriet Ballou were listed in the 1900 United States Federal Census in Richland, Montcalm County, Michigan. The census lists Cyrus M. Guild boarding with them. In 1904, he married Harriet's older sister, Mary Ford.

Disambiguating John Arnold of Hartford (1683 – 1741)

John Arnold's gravestone. "Here lies the Body of Serg'nt
John Arnold who Died November the 30th A.D. 1741
Aged 58 years." Photograph by Jim Bancroft, originally
posted to John Arnold's Find A Grave page.

John Arnold died on November 30, 1741 and was buried at Center Cemetery in East Hartford, Connecticut.  His gravestone, shown here, says he was 58 years old at his death.  Simple arithmetic tells us therefore that he was born in 1683 or 1684.  Nevertheless, there are countless online trees that say he was born more than twenty years earlier, in 1662, 1663, or 1664. Similarly, his birthdate in FamilySearch's family tree has been edited multiple times, switching between 1683 and these other dates.

So what's going on here?  The short version is that there was a second John Arnold who was born in about 1663, and researchers have conflated these two people.

In this post, I will explain this in more detail, first by laying out the facts I know about John Arnold, then describing how I think this error originated, and providing enough information about the two John Arnolds to make it clear that they can't be the same person.

Obviously this is good fodder for a blog post. If I can also save other researchers some confusion, all the better!

John Arnold of Hartford

Working backwards from his gravestone, I pieced together some basic information about John Arnold. His will, dated November 14, 1741, provided a starting point. It gave me the name of his wife, Hannah; two sons, John and Henry; three married daughters, Hannah, Mary, and Sarah; and his deceased brother, Henry Arnold. Early Hartford records provided the birth dates for all five of these children along with a third son, Samuel, who died in 1739. The children were born between 1710 and 1722. Earlier than that, the marriage of John Arnold and Hannah Meakins was recorded on January 12, 1709/10.

The fact that John Arnold had a brother, Henry, who predeceased him turned out to be a particularly useful piece of information, and helped me find his parents. Hartford probate records include the will of a Henry Arnold who had two sons, Henry and John. They also have records for the probate of Henry Arnold Jr.  Both estates were probated on the same date, and in both cases administration was granted to John Arnold. Since these facts agree with the information from John Arnold's will, it seems likely that this his family.

The following graphic shows the family of John Arnold based on the information from these records.

The family of John Arnold of Hartford. John Arnold is shown with a heavy outline, along with his parents,
siblings, wife, and children.

Confusion about John Arnold's Birth

I have found no records of John Arnold's life prior to his marriage. So his gravestone is my only evidence of when he was born.  But many other researchers think he was born in the 1660s. Where are they getting their dates from? The confusion seems to come from another John Arnold, who lived in Haddam, about 25 miles south of Hartford on the Connecticut River. 

List of the children of Joseph Arnold with their ages.
From the probate records for Joseph Arnold. Elsewhere on
the page it is labeled, "Jos Arnolds Inventory July 1692."

One of the few records that mentions John Arnold of Haddam is the probate of his father's estate. His father, Joseph Arnold, died intestate on October 22, 1691. On the back of his estate inventory is a list of his children and their ages.  First on the list is "John Arnold 29 years old."  The inventory is dated "July 1692."  So assuming that Joseph's son Arnold was 29 years old in 1692, that would put his birth in 1662 or 1663, matching the mysterious birthdate sometimes associated with John Arnold of Hartford.

Could these two John Arnolds, in fact, be the same person? Perhaps the age on the East Hartford gravestone is wrong. But this seems impossible since the two John Arnolds have different fathers. The father of John Arnold of Hartford was Henry Arnold, and the father of John Arnold of Haddam was Joseph Arnold. Nevertheless, the confusion is understandable, especially if you don't have all of this information.

As an added twist, some of the trees that say John Arnold of Hartford was born in 1662 cite a family bible as a source.  I was curious to see what information was in bible and tracked it down at the Connecticut State Library, paying a few dollars to have it scanned and emailed to me.

The bible itself is an American Bible Society edition printed in 1849. On the family record pages are the births, deaths, and marriages of dozens of people. These names are mostly Arnolds, and the dates are primarily from the 1800s, including some as late as 1890. John Arnold of Hartford is among the earliest names listed in it, The dates for his death and birth match those from his gravestone. Included with the bible are about twenty pages of genealogical writing about the same names that are listed in the bible. This document describes the John Arnold's gravestone in East Hartford. Its author also speculates that the father of John Arnold was Joseph Arnold. ("I think this John to have been the son of that Joseph who...")

Based on this information, I conclude two things about the bible record and the associated notes. First, it was written in the mid-1800s, a century after the lifetime of John Arnold of Hartford. So the information about John Arnold is not first hand knowledge. Second, the owner of this bible didn't have access to any source I haven't already found, and likely had less information. In particular, it seems reasonable to conclude he or she hadn't found the wills and probate records I've described, as those would have refuted the theory that Joseph Arnold of Haddam was the father of John Arnold of Hartford.

Conclusion

There are no surprising conclusions here. But I hope that by spelling out what I have discovered about John Arnold of Hartford (and his namesake in Haddam), I can dispel some of the misinformation about his birth. If nothing else, this will give me something to refer to the next time I have to correct John Arnold's birthdate on FamilySearch.

Notes and Sources

I have not seen the original Hartford records that provide information about the marriage and children of John Arnold of Hartford, but they have been copied and indexed in many places. The marriage of John Arnold and Hannah Meakins appears in:

"Hartford Records," transcribed by Lucius M. Boltwood, New England Historical and Genealogical Register (NEHGR), vol. 13, p. 141, April 1859.

The births of their children are in the Barbour Collection of Connecticut Town Vital Records:

Ancestry.com, "Connecticut Town Birth Records, pre-1870 (Barbour Collection)," Hartford Vital Records 1635–1855, image 9 of 467.

Since the Barbour Collection included a record for the birth of Samuel Arnold in 1720, but Samuel wasn't mentioned in John Arnold's will, I inferred that he had died before the will was written. This was confirmed by finding his gravestone on Find A Grave, showing that he died on November 19, 1739. The genealogical notes in the John Arnold family bible (see below) states that this stone is nearby that of John Arnold.

The wills and probate records related to the two John Arnolds can be found in Charles Manwaring's Digest of Early Connecticut Probate Records.

John Arnold of Hartford:

Charles William Manwaring (ed.), A Digest of the Early Connecticut Probate Records, Vol III, Hartford District, 1729–1750 (R.S. Peck & Co., Hartford, Conn., 1906), p. 381.

Henry Arnold (father of John Arnold of Hartford):

Charles William Manwaring (ed.), A Digest of the Early Connecticut Probate Records, Vol II, Hartford District, 1700–1729 (R.S. Peck & Co., Hartford, Conn., 1904), pp. 459–460.

Henry Arnold Jr. (brother of John Arnold of Hartford):

Charles William Manwaring (ed.), A Digest of the Early Connecticut Probate Records, Vol II, Hartford District, 1700–1729 (R.S. Peck & Co., Hartford, Conn., 1904), pp. 460–461.

Joseph Arnold (father of John Arnold of Haddam):

Charles William Manwaring (ed.), A Digest of the Early Connecticut Probate Records, Vol I, Hartford District, 1635–1700 (R.S. Peck & Co., Hartford, Conn., 1904), p. 401.

The Manwaring transcription of Joseph Arnold's probate includes the list of Joseph Arnold's children and their ages. But it is not clear about the date of the document it is attached to.  Images of the original probate records are available from Ancestry's Connecticut Wills and Probate Records collection. The last page of this record includes the list of ages, excerpted above. Elsewhere on this page is written, "Jos Arnolds Inventory July 1692."

Connecticut, Wills and Probate Records, 1609–1999, online index and images, Ancestry.com, Hartford Probate district > Probate Packets > Antrim–Ayrault > M, 1641–1880 > images 417–423 of 1517.

Finally there is the John Arnold bible record:

"John Arnold of Hartford," Bible & Family Records, Vol 25, pp. 35–56, Connecticut State Library, Hartford, Connecticut. 

Finding a family photo via ArchiveGrid

I recently learned about ArchiveGrid from Lisa Louise Cook's Genealogy Gems. ArchiveGrid is an index of over 5 million archive records, including historical documents such as personal papers, manuscripts, correspondence, etc. The records span over 1,000 different institutions. So you can think of ArchiveGrid as the equivalent of WorldCat but for archives instead of for libraries.  That's particularly apt since ArchiveGrid is a service offered by WorldCat.

In the past I've had some success finding interesting records through archives. So ArchiveGrid sounded like a great tool. Naturally, I clicked through to check it out.  Since I had recently written several posts about my Jarecki relatives, I entered "Jarecki" in the search box. It's unusual enough that I figured I wouldn't be overwhelmed with hits.

This was a good choice.  I got 43 hits, a reasonable number to skim through.  Most of the results were for Jareckis I had never heard of.  But the 7th item on the first page was somebody familiar:

Seymour T. Jarecki search result at ArchiveGrid

Image of Seymour Jarecki found
via ArchiveGrid.

That's the same Seymour Jarecki I wrote about a couple days ago. Clicking on the link, it took me to the Denver Public Library's digital collections, where I found, as promised, a high school picture of Seymour Jarecki.  The page also provided data about the provenance of the picture. It is a studio portrait from an 1889–90 Denver High School album.  Unlike our modern, printed yearbooks, this was a photo album full of mounted pictures of various students.

This picture wasn't an entirely new find. The same image is on Seymour Jarecki's Find A Grave page. But on Find A Grave there is no information about where the picture came from.

So in about five minutes I found some useful information about a relative. I'm sure ArchiveGrid won't always provide such good results, but it's definitely a tool I will keep using!

The Death of Seymour Jarecki—Suicide or Murder?

Headline from The Denver Post, June 30, 1904, p. 1

At 1 a.m. on the morning of June 30, 1904, Dr. Seymour Jarecki left an informal card party at the home of some friends. His wife and young daughters stayed overnight, but he decided to return home for the remainder of the night, in case he was called on to attend a patient.

Shortly before 4am, neighbors of the Jarecki house heard two gunshots. Investigating the disturbance, they found a side door unlocked. This led to a porch, from which they entered the kitchen, and found Seymour Jarecki on the floor, dead from a single gunshot wound to the chest.

On the floor near Jarecki was his revolver, with two discharged cartridges. A search found a bullet hole through the screen around the porch.  The screen was bent outward around the hole indicating that the shot had been fired from within the house.  The bullet that passed through the screen was found lodged in a nearby tree.

Jarecki was dressed in his night clothes, but his bed had not been slept in. The rest of the house similarly undisturbed, and no valuables had been taken.

Artists rendering of the crime scene. The Denver
Post, June 30, 1904, p. 5.

There were powder burns on Jarecki's chest, indicating that the fatal shot had been fired from point-blank range. There were also powder burns Jarecki's left hand and on the index finger of his right hand, suggesting that he had been gripping the gun when it discharged.

These facts led to two different theories to explain Jarecki's death—murder or suicide.

The murder theory went like this; Jarecki heard a noise in the middle of the night. Grabbing his gun, he went to investigate.  Finding an intruder, he fired wildly and missed, the bullet passing harmlessly through the porch screen.  The intruder shot back, killing Jarecki, then fled without robbing the house. This idea was buttressed by the fact that Jarecki had been assaulted and nearly killed six months earlier. That assailant was never found, leading people to speculate that the same criminal was responsible for Jarecki's death.

Supporters of the suicide theory argued that all of the facts could be explained without introducing mysterious assailants. There were powder burns on both of Jarecki's hands because he held the gun against his chest to fire it. As a doctor, he knew exactly where his heart was, so it was no surprise that the single bullet passed through that organ. There were no signs of struggle or robbery because there had been none.  Why the second bullet fired from the porch?  A police officer suggested that when Jarecki first tried to kill himself, the cartridge didn't fire. So he pointed the gun out toward the street to see if it was working.  This time it fired correctly and the bullet passed through the porch screen and into the tree. Then Jarecki held the gun against his chest a second time, pulled the trigger, and fell dead.

Background

Seymour Tilford Jarecki was born on October 15, 1871 in New York City.  His parents were Max and Amelia Jarecki. He was a grandson of Morris Jarecki and a nephew of Kate Jarecki, both of whom I've discussed recently.  That makes him my first cousin, three times removed.

When Seymour was a young boy, his family moved to Denver, Colorado, where his father worked as a cigar maker and held a variety of minor positions in the city government. As a young man, Jarecki returned to New York to study at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, graduating in 1894.

Seymour Tilford Jarecki, c. 1902.
From, Representative Men of Colorado, Rowell
Art Publishing Company, Denver, 1902, p. 100.

The new Dr. Jarecki moved back to Denver and went into practice.  He held positions as a police surgeon in Denver and as an assistant county physician.

In 1898, Seymour Jarecki married Theresa Wisebart. They had two daughters, Clara (b. 1900) and Ruth (b. 1904). 

Prior to his death, there were two other mysterious events in Seymour Jarecki's life.  In June 1895, two months after being appointed police surgeon, he went missing. There was speculation that he had left town after an altercation with his father, or that he had run off with a young lady. Two days later, he reappeared in Denver but offered no details (to newspapers) about where he had gone.

Dr. Jarecki appears in the Denver papers again in late December, 1903.  On the 29th of that month, he was found unconscious in his office with a fractured skull.  He had been struck in the head with a large rock. Initial reports said he was in grave condition, but the next day he regained consciousness. He claimed he had been writing at his desk when somebody snuck up behind him. He heard the person at the last moment and started to turn to see who it was, only to be struck and lose consciousness. The police, however, told newspapers that they felt Dr. Jarecki was holding out on them and may have known whoever assaulted him.

The police never found Dr. Jarecki's assailant, and when Dr. Jarecki died in mysterious circumstances six months later, some people speculated that it was the same attacker—somebody who must have had a long-standing grudge against the doctor. One newspaper article speculated that Dr. Jarecki had performed a "peculiar operation" on a young lady and that his attacker and possible murder was her disgruntled husband.

Resolving the case

Despite the newspaper debates about whether Dr. Seymour Jarecki's death was murder or suicide, the police quickly decided it was suicide. A day after the death, a coroner's jury agreed and returned a verdict of suicide. 

Additional circumstantial facts may have swayed the police and jurors.  After the initial police investigation of Jarecki's death, both the family and the coroner were summoned.  When the coroner arrived, both he and the family locked themselves in the house and nobody was admitted for two hours. When investigators were again allowed into the house, they found that the kitchen floor where Jarecki's body lay had been cleaned of both blood and any other evidence. The bed, which initial reports said had not been slept in, had been mussed.  Later in the day, police discovered that the bullet which had lodged in the tree was also removed.  All of this suggested an attempt to cover up details of Jarecki's death and make it look more like murder.

It also turned out that Jarecki had renewed a pair of life insurance policies the day before his death and appeared to be in financial trouble. He had recently asked to borrow $1,000 from his father, and despite appearances of prosperity, he had a large number of debts. When his estate was probated, there was not enough money to cover these obligations and the administrator was forced to sell the house to cover his debts.

Jarecki's family argued forcefully against suicide both before and after the police concluded the case. They claimed that he always left a fired cartridge in his gun since the gun didn't have a safety catch. This way, he didn't have to worry about somebody accidentally pulling the trigger and firing the gun.  Conveniently, this would also mean that Jarecki's gun could only have fired one of the bullets found at the scene of his death.

A boy was also found who said he passed the Jarecki house "on his wheel" shortly before Jarecki's death. He claimed that he had seen two disreputable men loitering outside and shortly later heard the gunshots.  Based on the boy's itinerary, however, the police were able to show that he could not have been at the Jarecki's house until at least 30 minutes after the shots were fired.

Aftermath

In addition to covering all of the different theories about Seymour Jarecki's death, the Denver Post carefully covered the question of Jarecki's life insurance.  He had policies with four different providers for a total $16,600. The terms of one policy didn't cover death by suicide. A second policy only paid one third of its value in the event of suicide. 

Despite the suicide verdict returned by the coroner's jury, one of these policies decided that there was insufficient evidence to conclude that Jarecki had killed himself and paid in full. The second policy initially refused to pay, but Jarecki's widow sued and a jury decided in her favor. They were forced to pay in full on the policy and also cover her court costs.

So what did happen?  Did Seymour Jarecki really kill himself?  The evidence, of course, is all second hand, filtered through the writers and editors of the Denver Post. Their accounts of the various arguments and counter-arguements weren't always clear about the validity of these claims.  Despite these vagaries, I think the evidence was strongly in favor of suicide. I reach this conclusion by applying Occam's razor. All of the evidence from the scene of Jarecki's death could be accounted for by suicide. So there is no need to introduce in intruder or assassin to explain the facts. The lack of any concrete evidence of such an intruder further undermines the murder theory.

Despite my conclusion on this one point, there are still plenty of unanswered questions about Dr. Seymour Jarecki's life and death.  What happened when he was assaulted in his office?  Was that in any way connected to his death?  And if his death was suicide, why did he kill himself? Was it for financial reasons, as the newspaper accounts implied? Was it depression?  Or was it something else?  As is so often the case, no matter how much you learn about a relative, the know facts always lead to more questions.

Seymour Jarecki was my 1st cousin, 3 times removed. The heavy lines in this figure trace our relationship.

Notes and Sources

Nearly all of the information in this post was taken from the archives of The Denver Post at GenealogyBank.com. Here are the specific references for the key information:

Dr. Jarecki goes missing:

"Jarecki is Missing," The Evening Post, June 14, 1895, p. 2.

"Jarecki Returns," The Evening Post, June 17, 1895, p. 4. 

Marriage of Seymour Jarecki and Therese Wisebart:

"Some Notable Events in Social Circles," The Denver Evening Post, June 18, 1898, p. 5.

The assault on Dr. Jarecki in his office:

"Doctor Jarecki, County Physician, Whose Skull was Crushed in by an Unknown Assailant, Suddenly Recovers Consciousness," The Denver Post, December 29, 1903, pp. 1, 5. 

"Police are at Work on a Secret Theory," The Denver Post, December 30, 1903, pp. 1, 5.

"No Light on Mystery," The Denver Post, December 31, 1903, p. 14. 

Dr. Jarecki's death, and the investigation:

"Shrouded in Deep Mystery is the Killing of Dr. S. T. Jarecki. Was it Suicide? Or Murder?," The Denver Post, June 30, 1904, pp. 1, 5.

"All Family Attended Party Last Night," The Denver Post, June 30, 1904, pp. 1, 5. 

 "Almost Killed Last December," The Denver Post, June 30, 1904, p. 1.

"Wife is sure he was Slain by a Burglar," The Denver Post, June 30, 1904, p. 5.

"Theories as to the Killing," The Denver Post, June 30, 1904, p. 5. 

"Grief of Parents," The Denver Post, June 30, 1904, p. 5.

"Working out the Theory of Suicide," The Denver Post, June 30, 1904, p. 5. 

"Who Killed Dr. Jarecki? What was the Motive? Police Anxiously Inquire," The Denver Post, July 1, 1904, pp. 1, 10.

"Certain Jarecki was Assassinated," The Denver Post, July 1, 1904, p. 1. 

"Evidence Points to Murder Theory," The Denver Post, July 1, 1904, p. 2. 

"Murder, Insist Relatives--Suicide, say the Police," The Denver Post, July 2, 1904, pp. 1, 5. 

"Dr. Jarecki was Murdered in his Kitchen, so a New Clew Indicates," The Denver Post, July 3, 1904, pp. 1, 7. 

 "Seek Solution in Office Assault," The Denver Post, July 3, 1904, p. 7.

"Jarecki could have had Money from Friends if he had Asked,"  The Denver Post, July 3, 1904, p. 7.

Jarecki's estate:

"Jarecki Estate Assets are Less than Debts," The Denver Post, April 10, 1906, p. 6.

Tracking Seymour Jarecki's life insurance:

"Jarecki's Insurance," The Denver Post, July 1, 1904, p. 2.

"Will Refuse to Pay Policy," The Denver Post, August 15, 1904, p. 2; Conservative Life Insurance Company decides not to pay its $5,000 policy on Dr. Seymour Jarecki. 

"Widow of Dr. Jarecki Receives Insurance Money," The Denver Post, August 20, 1904, p. 3; Woodmen of the World decides to pay its $3,000 policy on Seymour Jarecki.

"Jarecki's Death in Federal Court," The Denver Post, January 28, 1905. p. 14; case against Conservative Life Insurance Company. 

"Holds Jarecki was Murdered," The Denver Post, June 15, 1905; jury decides against Conservative Life Insurance Company, forcing them to pay it's $5,000 policy plus court costs.