So the first two letters are from Mary to Lizzie. This one is on the same day as Letter 1, Mary to Lizzie but it is Sarah to Lizzie. I believe that Sarah is in Pittsburgh, the same place as Mary but not in the same house. Lets start to work on the people she talks about. Of course they all call everyone “Sister XX” and they are not all biological sisters!
A key line for me is “when we may expect dear father and you.” From our previous research, we have a very strong idea who Lizzie is. She is Elizabeth Fanhestock (1809-1869) born to Peter Fanhestock (1784-1864) and Mary Fanhestock (1784-1866). Her sister is Mary Frances Fanhestock 1813-1897. Sarah, on the other hand, is not a biological sister with these two. Her dates are 1827-1909 and she is married to a brother of Elizabeth and Mary, Franklin Levi Fanhestock 1807-1854. Her parents are Borius Fahnestock (1798-1896) and Sarah Wampler (1797-1869). Sooo, the only father that is alive in 1865 is Sarah’s father Borius. Is he really living with a cousin in Baltimore?
I’ll work through the ancestry census records and see if we can come up with any material that will help us believe this. In the page entitled Who is Lizzy we have displayed the 1850 US census from Baltimore Ward 18 and seen that Levi and his wife Sally are living with his father, Peter. Elizabeth is also there.
By the 1860 census, again displayed in Who is Lizzy, Peter and Mary seem to be in Derick’s house even though Elizabeth is 10 years younger! Levi is gone. He died in 1854. Where did Sally go? The 1860 census for Lancaster PA shows that she and her 9 year old daughter have gone back to live with her parents.
I included the two lines above Borius just to show the birthplace. Those people were not in the same household. Sally is only 31! It is of course possible that she is writing from Lanchester instead of Pittsburgh where we know Mary is. The set of letters have been preserved without envelopes so we can not see the addresses.
Below is 1880 census
Sarah is the 6th name down. She is 52. She is living in the house of her daughter Ada who is married to Thomas Pears who works in Flt Glass Mfr and they have 3 children. There are 2 servant, The first one is 20 and from Germany. The second is 15, her parents are from Ireland and Penna and we presume she is taking care of the 2 year old twins. If you look closely you will see that Sarah is also recorded as having both parents born in Germany but we need to discount this as another recording error.
I have not been able to find any sources for Sally and Ada between 1860 and 1880. I’ll turn my attention to other references in this third letter.
On the second page we have “Sister chiarg has written you of brother Alex”. Sally does have a brother, Alexander Tucker Fanhestock 1833 – 1870. Sally also has two sisters that are alive in 1865: Maria L Fanhestock 1823-1905, Amanda Fahnestock 1830-1877. Alexander has a wife Clara Dalzell who as we have seen could be called “sister”. Alex is counted as near Lancaster PA in both the 1860 and 1870 federal census.
The next line is also interesting: “Sister Clara having gone home…”. Of course this Clara could be Alex’s wife, but it seems strange to put the two lines next to each other? What does gone home mean? It could be back to Lancaster or back to Baltimore or to somewhere else. There just is not another sister Clara in the immediate family. Another line:”Clara’s brother is there”. We are unsure where there is but assume Pittsburgh. Clare Dalzell does have one brother, Thomas K Dalzell 1843-1921.