I was going over some information that I received a very long time ago from a cousin. I think it’s always good to go over letters and other items from time to time to see if I find something new that I didn’t notice before.
This time, I read a letter that I’ve had for a while and realized that I did not write down the married name of my 2nd great grandfather’s sister. Just because it was in the letter didn’t make is so; I had to do some investigating. The name was familiar to me – I had written it down, but did not connect it to anyone. Now I had the person, but not much more information.
My findings:
Margaret LLOYD was born in 1856 to Richard and Gwenlilian (ROWLAND) LLOYD. She is my 2nd Great Grand Aunt. She married William BEYNON. William was born 7 Dec 1855 in Wales. I was able to find Census records for Margaret and William in the US. They lived in Braceville, Grundy, Illinois, in the 1900 census. This makes perfect sense as her brother and his family were also there as well as her 1st cousins. The family then moved to the Springfield area before the next census. I have been able account for 8 children.
Their oldest son, William John BEYNON, married Lucy SPIERS on February 14, 1901, in Chicago, Cook, Illinois. Looking into their family, I came to an unfortunate discovery:
My research so far shows 8 children to this couple as well:
Ray 1901-1915 Age 14
Althea 1903-1904 Age 1
Yvonne Spiers 1904-1987 Age 83
Beulah Effie 1906-1930 Age 24
Margaret 1908-1908 Infant
William J 1910-1995 Age 85
John Alfred 1915-1990 Age 75
Betty Lou 1917-1949 Age 32
Out of the eight children that they had, only three lived beyond 32 years old. William and felt the loss of four of those five children that passed, while Lucy lived through all of the deaths. Only the three children that lived to be older than 32 outlived their mother.
Most of the BEYNON Family is buried in Brush Creek Cemetery in Divernon, Sangamon, Illinois.
Our Lineage 
This is the first time I have ever seen a tombstone commemorating all the children who did not live to, or through, adulthood. I think that is a beautiful and dignified way to remember these people whose lives were cut too short. I have seen this family pattern all too often in my own family research — child after child who died too soon. Strangely, I have never come across letters or documents expressing grief for these lost children–grief which must have been immense. Perhaps the grieving parents tried to forget. Heartbreaking.
Personally, I have two uncles who did not live beyond infancy. I found only one written reference, and one word-of-mouth reference. They are not even in the “family tree” any more, and there is no record of their birth dates.
Thanks for sharing, Mariann! This is the first time that I have see it as well and it broke my heart. I, too, thought it was a beautiful way to remember them. I hope that you can one day find some sort of information on them so that you can add them back into the ‘tree’.
I had a completely different blog post planned, but as soon as I saw that stone, I knew that I was going to change direction.