Jessie Maria Sperry, was named for her Aunt Jessie Scott who had died
six years before in 1889. Like her cousin
Jessie Helen Scott
of Novato, California the two girls were named for the young aunt who had
died of tuberculosis at the age of 16. Jessie Maria's mother had lost three
of her sisters, as the Scott family of Ste Croix, NS watched the disease kill
three young women before it ran its lethal course.
Jessie Maria Sperry, arrived into the household of Ada Tuzo (Scott) and
Lemuel Charles Sperry in Petite Riviere in 1895 on October 16th. Lemuel's
roots were deep in Lunenburg County on the South Shore of Nova Scotia. When
his own father was a teenager, the 1838 census indicates that there were
eight Sperry households in the county (51 individuals) and when Lemuel became
a teenager, in 1870 there were sixteen Sperry families in his immediate area.
Lemuel and Ada operated a general store in the village long known just
as "Petite". Ada had lived in Halifax and Ste Croix as a child learning
music and painting among the other skills of a 19th century farm life. Arriving
in Petite Reviere, she found those musical skills led her to become the organist
of Wesley Methodist Church (now Wesley United Church).
Do you have information that
could be helpful in correcting or adding to the contents of HomePort
? We appreciate your comments, suggestions and additions.
