When did Joseph marry Emma?

Because of the lack of official records, it is not always easy to trace marriages in 19^th century Pennsylvania. We know CTR married Maria Ackley on 13 March 1879 and his sister Margaretta had earlier married Benjamin Land on 24 June 1873 because there are newspaper reports for these events.

As the marriage of Benjamin and Margaretta has not yet, to my knowledge, been published on the internet, below is the newspaper cutting from The Pittsburgh Commercial for 25 June 1973:

The Rev. J.M. Crum was from the Plymouth Congregational Church.

But when Joseph Lytle Russell married Emma Hammond Ackley, the sister of his son’s wife, there do not appear to be any extant newspaper announcements.

However, we can narrow down when the event happened, and a recent newspaper discovery narrows matters down even futher, prompting this article.

The starting point is the 1880 census which took place in Pittsburgh on 14 June 1880. It was intended to be a snapshot of events as they were on 1 June 1880. In this document, Joseph and Emma are not yet married. This is well over a year after CTR and Maria were married.

It is not the clearest of writing but it shows four people living together in Cedar Avenue.

*This is difficult to read. It looks a bit like Sister (step) but the correct relationship to the head of the household, CTR, should be Sister-in-Law and later also Step-Mother.

Joseph L has shaved a few years off his age. He was approaching 68 at this point, but only admits to 60.

According to this census return, at the beginning of June 1880 Joseph L and Emma are living at the same address but are still not married.  So their marriage would have to be after the date of the census.

The next month, July, we have now found a reference to them in a news item about the latest vacation hot-spot, Chautauqua Lake. This location would feature later in Watch Tower history with a convention held there (see 1910 Convention Report) but in 1880 it was a vacation destination easily accessible by the railroads from places like Pittsburgh and Allegheny. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette for 27 July 1880 carried a list of visitors to the attractions.

 

A transcript reads:

CHAUTAUQUA CHAT.

Crowding Toward the Lake—Life at Point Chautauqua.

Special Correspondence of the Commercial Gazette.

Point Chautauqua, July 26.—Travel to the lake is increasing, the railroad trains are well filled, and the steamers, both large and small, are constantly plying on the waters of this beautiful lake.

Pittsburgh and Allegheny are well represented here, the following being a few of them: Dr. D. W. Riggs and sisters, Mrs. W. Jarvis, Prof. J. F. Carey, Wm. Yagle and wife, A. Johnston and wife, H. Samson, Rev. J. S. Wrightnour, Mrs. H. D. Reymer and daughter, H. Myers and family, John Hays and wife, D. P. Chapman, J. M. Stoner and wife, W. Shallenberger, J. L. Russell and wife, C. B. Priji, James E. Porter, Mrs. J. C. McCullough and daughter, Charles W. Anderson, Cyrus Pershing, Miss Lida McEldowney, Miss Kate Dickson and Rev. J. S. Hutson and wife.

The head clerk of the Grand Hotel informed me, last evening, that the house was full. And why should it not be? The splendid structure, its tasteful furnishings, its excellent table, its beautiful location and its home-like character, render it specially attractive and popular. The cottages, too, in which excellent accommodations can be obtained at low rates, are rapidly filling up.

We note that the visitors from Pittsburgh and Allegheny include J L Russell and wife. Why would a Pittsburgh merchant leave his business to go on vacation by rail 120-130 miles away? A probable answer would be that this was Joseph and Emma on their honeymoon.

We can reasonably give their wedding date then as at some time in July 1880.

This all fits with other evidence. They were to have one daughter Mabel who was born in September 1881. This information is on her marriage certificate when she married Richard Packard on 30 June 1903. If born in September 1881 then Mabel would have been conceived sometime around December 1880.

It would be interesting to discover who conducted the marriage ceremony for Joseph and Emma, but that information remains allusive. We know that John H Paton conducted the wedding service for CTR and Maria, because one of the newspapers provides the information. Although the 1880 census still lists CTR as a merchant, by now Zion’s Watch Tower had been published for a year so he was increasingly becoming known as a minister of religion. Maybe CTR conducted the wedding for his own father?