Week 30: In the News

Matilda Ann Miller Dubbs

Matilda Ann Miller Dubbs, my 2x great-grandmother, wasn't in the news often but I was happy to find this article celebrating her milestone birthday in the South Bend Tribune, dated 28 May 1935:

I would love to have been there as an observer to see the ancestors I know from black and white pictures come to life!

Matilda was born on 26 May 1845 in New Paris, Indiana to John David Miller (1812-1902) and Mary Baker (1812-1855).  She was the fifth of seven children born in the Miller family.  When Matilda was just 9 years old her mother died but she and her siblings weren't motherless for long.  Ten months after Mary's death John David married Margaret Lentz and within a few years Matilda gained three half-siblings.  Was life rosy with her stepmother?  One clue that it may not have been is that by age 15 Matilda left the family to get married.

On Valentine's Day in 1861 Matilda married John Dubbs, a 25-year old farmer from a neighboring township in Elkhart County, Indiana.  Eleven months later in January of 1862 Matilda and John's first child was born.  It must have seemed strange to her that her stepmother had a baby a few months later, making her son and her half-brother the same age.

Matilda and John's children in birth order were:

William Benton  (b. 1862)

Margaret Emeline (b. 1864)

Chloe (b. 1866)

Mary (b.1868)   my great-grandmother

Frank (b. 1872)

Charles (b. 1876)

                                            Matilda's children and their spouses about 1901:

Back row:  Mary Dubbs Scott,  Chloe Dubbs Neff,  Jacob Neff,  Desaline Lentz Dubbs (married to William Benton), William O. Scott (married to Mary Dubbs), Margaret Emiline Dubbs Lentz (married to Moses Lentz)     

(Desaline and Moses Lentz were siblings married  to Dubbs siblings.)

Middle row:  Moses Lentz,  John Dubbs,  Matilda Dubbs, William Benton Dubbs

Front row:  Charles Dubbs (unmarried at this time but later married Maude Beagle),  Frank Dubbs (married to Leora Messner),  Leora Messer Dubbs  

                                                   Matilda's grandchildren that same day:

Back row:  Bertha Neff,  Gladys Neff (daughters of Jacob & Chloe),  Blanche Dubbs (daughter of William & Desaline),  Grace Dubbs (daughter of William & Desaline),  Mary Lentz (daughter of Moses & Emma)

Front row:  Angus Cleon Scott (my grandpa, son of William & Mary Scott),  Georgia Dubbs (daughter of William & Desaline),  Donald Dubbs (son of Frank & Leora),  Pauline Lentz (daughter of Moses & Emma)

My unbiased opinion is that A. C. Scott is the most adorable child in the picture.

On 8 May 1905, not many years after these pictures were taken, Matilda's husband John died of heart disease at the age of 69 years.  For the next eleven years Matilda was a widow but she wouldn't stay that way.  John Dubbs had a brother who was seven years younger.  Emanuel Dubbs was an interesting and well-traveled man who had been a Civil War soldier, a manufacturer, a merchant, a buffalo hunter, a judge, and a minister of the Christian Church was widowed himself in 1911.  After losing his wife he moved from Texas back to Milford, Indiana. One thing led to another, and in 1916 Emanuel married Matilda.  They remained together until Emanuel died in 1932.  At 86 years old, Matilda was a widow again.  The couple must have decided that they would each prefer to be buried next to their first loves because Emanuel is buried next to his first wife in Clarendon, Texas and Matilda is buried next to John.

Emanuel & Matilda c. 1930

Matilda outlived two husbands and two of her children.  Her wildly inaccurate obituary stated that she married Emanuel in 1881 after her husband John died.  Wrong!  John died in 1905 and she didn't marry Emanuel until 1916.  

Matilda died of a cerebral hemorrhage on 6 Feb 1939 when she was 93 years old.  Sadly, her death certificate was full of inaccuracies too.  Both her mother and father were born in the United States, but the death certificate stated that they were born in England and Germany respectively.  It also misstated Matilda's birth year as 1844 instead of 1845.  Those errors can be attributed to her daughter Margaret Lentz who was the informant.

Matilda and John's grave is in the Salem Cemetery outside of Milford in Kosciusko County, Indiana.