Mary was the third child of Thomas and Isabella Wellwood Dougan. She was born on August 15, 1851 in Pollockshaws, Glasgow, Scotland. She immigrated with her family to Canada in 1865 but was living with her sister Margaret Niles’ family in the 1871 Ontario census. In 1872 she immigrated to the US and on September 18, 1872 she married George Kerr in Fall River, Mass.
Mary and George had 8 children, all born in Fall River. William, the first child, was born on July 18, 1873 and died the following year on October 18, 1874. Christina, the first daughter, was born on December 26, 1875. Her birth record does not give her first name – often a name was decided upon later. As she was born the day after Christmas, there likely was further discussion between Mary and George on a name that would honor the season in which her birth occurred. Christina never married, and died on August 14, 1944 in Newport, R.I. where her family had settled in later years.
Isabella, called Bella, was the third child. She was born on March 20, 1877 and died at the age of 22 on July 11, 1899 in Fall River of tuberculosis, called phthisis on her record of death. George, Jr. was born next, on Mar. 3, 1879. He died at a year old on June 27, 1880.
Martha K. Kerr was the fifth child of Mary and George. Martha was born on Apr. 2, 1880. Martha married John Francis Grogan, a jeweller, in Attleboro, Mass. on November 30, 1905. In the 1910 census, Martha and her husband were living with her family. In 1920, they still had no children living with them. Martha died on August 26, 1937 in Newport, R.I.
Mary Kerr, named for her mother, was born on May 24, 1882. She died on the Fourth of July, 1883 in Fall River. Her record of death states simply that she died of convulsions, with no further explanation of the cause. Did a fever cause the convulsions? There were at least 5 cholera deaths within a week of little Mary’s death, all young children – was there an epidemic? So many questions – so few answers…
Alexander Kerr was born on December 4, 1886. Known as Sandy, he married Rachel Brooks in Fall River on his twenty-first birthday in 1907. They presented his parents with their first grandchild, Roger Brooks Kerr, who was born on February 27, 1909 in Newport, R.I. Roger later married and had at least one child. He died on July 22, 1992 in Topsfield, Mass. Sandy and Rachel’s next child was Ruth I. Kerr, born in 1912, also in Newport. Alexander J. Kerr, Jr. was born in Newport on December 17, 1919. He served with distinction in WWII, earning the Bronze Star. Alexander, Jr. later married and had at least 3 children and 6 grandchildren. He died on January 3, 2008 in Rapides, Louisiana. His sister Ruth also predeceased him. His father Sandy died in Jamestown, R.I. on June 3, 1950.
Mary and George Kerr’s last child was a daughter named Sarah A., known as Sadie and listed in the Newport directory as Sarah L., wife of D. Harold Cooley. Sarah was born on December 8, 1888. In the 1910 census she is working as a dry goods saleswoman and boarding with a family in Newport, R.I. She married Dana Harold Cooley in Newport before the 1920 census, most likely about 1913. A son, Dana Vincent Cooley, was born on Jan. 2, 1914 in Newport and later married, though I have no record of children. (Edit: one child was born to the marriage – see comments below) Dana Vincent died at the age of 69 in Newport. Sadie and Dana Harold’s daughter Doris E. was born in 1915, sometime in the late summer. Doris is listed as a telephone operator living at home in the 1934 Newport Directory, but is not listed under her maiden name in the 1936 directory or thereafter. She may have married by 1936 as she would have been 21 years old. I have no further information for Doris. (Edit: see comment below for additional information on Doris)
George Kerr died in Newport on July 2, 1915 at the age of 70, and his wife Mary Dougan died on September 21, 1923 aged 72 also in Newport. Both are buried in Oak Grove Cemetery in Fall River.
© Deborah Ray and archivecookie.com, 2010.
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