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Like most Americans (and many others, I'm sure) "fresh start" defines a LOT of my ancestors.
George Hazlett (1824-1891) was born in Castleblayney, County Monaghan, Ireland, to Scottish Protestant parents who had relocated to northern Ireland. He and his father were policemen, and members of the Protestant Order of Orange. When the potato blight caused a horrible famine, his father took the family and set out for the USA in 1845, when George was 21. His father died on shipboard (what must conditions have been like on those ships?) and George found himself head of the family when they arrived in Chicago after six weeks at sea. Within a few years, George joined other settlers buying inexpensive land in Iowa. He bought wooded land, cleared part of it, built a cabin, installed his mother and younger siblings and set out for the goldfields of California as a "forty-niner."
In California he ran an eating place, made money, and returned to Iowa where he bought more land. He married another Irish immigrant, Jane Whitaker, and they lived their lives in Monona, Iowa, a town they helped establish. George became a schoolteacher. He died at age 66 in the 1891 'flu pandemic.
His daughter Jennie wrote of him, "On his way back from California, with gold in his pockets, young George walked across most the state of Iowa turned away from homes because he looked like a tramp: determined then that no tramp would ever go unfed from his own door. My mother used to say, Pa had a lot of poor relations and he either gave them land outright or sold it to them for about $1.25 an acre, till Ma put a stop to it!"
I'm posting this as part of the 52 ancestors challenge. I'd love to hear about your "fresh start" ancestor!
George Hazlett (1824-1891) was born in Castleblayney, County Monaghan, Ireland, to Scottish Protestant parents who had relocated to northern Ireland. He and his father were policemen, and members of the Protestant Order of Orange. When the potato blight caused a horrible famine, his father took the family and set out for the USA in 1845, when George was 21. His father died on shipboard (what must conditions have been like on those ships?) and George found himself head of the family when they arrived in Chicago after six weeks at sea. Within a few years, George joined other settlers buying inexpensive land in Iowa. He bought wooded land, cleared part of it, built a cabin, installed his mother and younger siblings and set out for the goldfields of California as a "forty-niner."
In California he ran an eating place, made money, and returned to Iowa where he bought more land. He married another Irish immigrant, Jane Whitaker, and they lived their lives in Monona, Iowa, a town they helped establish. George became a schoolteacher. He died at age 66 in the 1891 'flu pandemic.
His daughter Jennie wrote of him, "On his way back from California, with gold in his pockets, young George walked across most the state of Iowa turned away from homes because he looked like a tramp: determined then that no tramp would ever go unfed from his own door. My mother used to say, Pa had a lot of poor relations and he either gave them land outright or sold it to them for about $1.25 an acre, till Ma put a stop to it!"
I'm posting this as part of the 52 ancestors challenge. I'd love to hear about your "fresh start" ancestor!