"Yearning to breathe free"

Thomas Vaughan, born 1850 in Llanfoist, Wales, son of John and Maranah Vaughan, arrived in New York City, 1 June 1886 on the SS Nevada. He arrived in Salt Lake City by the Denver & Rio Grande Railroad on June 8 and settled in Ogden. His wife, Isabella, and seven children, the youngest, my Great Grandfather, George Robert Vaughn, arrived the next Spring, also through New York on the same S.S. Nevada.

The SS Nevada of the Guion line

A Glimpse of John and Elinor's Surviving Son William in 1871

Publication date was 14 October 1871:

I believe this is William Vaughan christened 1830 in Hay, Breconshire, and who died before 1881 when his wife Elizabeth (Betsy) is listed in the Llanfoist Census as "widow." It appears that he was engaged in dredging the Brecon and Monmouthshire Canal and not in the illegal activity.

John and Elinor's first-born child, that we know of, was named William. He died in 1823. It was a common practice to name a child after a sibling that had already died. In fact, John's uncle William (1768-1851), who we believe may have trained him as a butcher, was the third William in that family after two others died as infants.

Historical Novels VERY Closely Related to Our Vaughan Family History

Roman Amphitheater, Caerleon, Newport, Wales, 16 July 2016 

Distancing myself from current politics into the old country and times past, I am rereading the historical novels of Alexander Cordel now that I have been to more of the places and learned a little better how they connect to my family.

Rape of the Fair Country carries the reader through a passionate narrative of the sorrows and joys of the working and non-working Welsh to the Chartist March on Newport. A foreshadowing is presented when the families of Garndyrus (where my Third-Great-Grandfather, John Vaughan 1825, worked) had a holiday in Newport for a singing competition. It's a fictional account. The later march on Newport was not.

I don't know if my family was involved in the Chartist Rising of 1839. Even if they were, and apparently survived, they would not have mentioned it to anyone as it carried a penalty of death or transportation to Australia or Van Diemen's land [that's for my Tasmanian friends].

Some John Lewis Hints to Follow up on

A new clue popped up on FamilySearch.org from the Perpetual Emigration Fund Account Books:

I Don't Believe Elinor Is in the Jacks Valley, Winters Family Cemetery

My wife graciously agreed to take an extra day home from Disneyland and by the long way so that I could visit Jacks Valley, Nevada, again. I tried a number for the Ascuaga Cattle Co. but they said it was the casino that had been sold by Mr. Ascuaga. I started calling US Forest Service offices to see if they had a contact at the Ascuaga Ranch. They passed me to several numbers where I left messages but got nowhere. I called the Curator at the Douglas County Historical Society with whom I had previously corresponded. She suggested that I just try going up to the ranch and explain myself politely to ask for access to the old cemetery.

It worked. The Ranch Manager came out and after I rattled off apologies and numerous names and dates belonging to my family and the history of Jacks Valley, he gave me Mr. Ascuaga's phone number and said that on his authority, we could go up to the old Winters Family cemetery. He said Mr. Ascuaga would be happy to allow us and to talk with me.

We went down the road and parked as directed, then walked up the hill on the wrong side of the fence. Finding a gate, I slipped through then pulled the gate post hard until I could slip the wire loop back over after my wife got through.

It was as beautiful as imagined. In the early evening the light was soft and the view was clear down over Jacks Valley to the larger Carson Valley. Snow was on the highest peaks of the Sierra.

In the Cemetery, by gracious permission of the Ascuaga Ranch

It is a relatively unknown, Mormon pioneer cemetery, or of pioneers who were Mormons as they seem to have left the Church or the Church left them when the call came in 1857 to return to the other side of the Great Basin facing a threat from the U.S. Army. These did not go.

Jacks Valley, Nevada: Yesterday, Today, and Forever

On a typical less-than-busy evening at the North Bountiful Family History Library, I was working on my own family interests and came across a great picture of Jacks Valley, Nevada, from 1939:

Jack's Valley Pony Express Station
With the gracious permission of Sherratt Library Special Collections, Southern Utah University, Cedar City, Utah, which owns the rights.

The photo caused one of those little mental shocks as should be obvious from this photo I took a couple of years ago at almost exactly the same spot:

North end of Jacks Valley, Nevada, looking Northeast from Jacks Valley Rd.. 20 October 2014
In the background against the hills is the Ascagua Ranch, originally established by the Winters Family.

Yeah, pretty weird, right?

Grant & Linda's 2016 Trip Report No. 2

Ebbw Vale: Not Knowing Enough Beforehand

But still ending up in the right place. Maybe it's the deep mysteries of jumbled memory. And it could be the Spirit guiding through my confused ignorance.

There is never enough time. On the last day of opportunity in Wales, I wanted to visit Gwent Archives. I had already been through the indices online and I didn't think they had the documents that I would have liked to review. So, like the boy searching for the lost quarter under the street lamp because the light was better, I looked at some things in close proximity hoping they might give some hint I could follow. It still may be there in the notes I collected from handling original 1840s Vestry Minutes from the adjacent parish, but it may take a concerted effort with my cousin collaborators to sort anything out.

They were most friendly at the Archives. The friendliest yet. But then I was deep up in the industrial valleys of South Wales. The roads aren't too bad either, mostly modern winding around, over, and above most of the industrial tracks and villages of workers' houses tightly squeezed along the valleys, row upon row. The coal mines and iron foundries are gone. Some replaced by other industry. Some just incongruously flat land lying empty in the narrow valleys of mountains.

The guy who checked me in was a real Welsh kidder. Asking if I had a county readers card, I showed him the one I had obtained at the University Archives in Bangor. I'm pretty sure that it's good for all archives under the National Library of Wales, but he said, "Oh, we're not all as fancy as that!" So I signed some day authorization as I gave a general background of what I knew about my ancestors and the sources I've checked. "So, you've done your homework, you have." In response to newspaper accounts about arrests for "drunk and disorderly" he said, "So, you think they were Welshmen, do ya. Sure they weren't the Irish?" I said I was sure pointing out my surname again. He also asked if I was, "from Canada or America?" I didn't correct any geographical certainties thinking Canadians probably appreciate the distinction these days.

The Archives were in a Victorian building of some official stately nature. It is currently County offices but I need to check to see if its origins are offices of the Steel Works. There is a very modern building attached holding the actual archived documents. And there is a beautifully new educational center of a community college nature on the slopes of the mountain behind.

Gwent County Offices and Archives, Ebbw Vale

Modern Archive Storage