Elsie Margaretta Pearce

Tom Wright wrote by email on 15 August 2004:

We visited some sites in Toronto, including the house on Tranby Avenue which belonged to Margaretta (Pearce) and Harry Wilson, and in which my mother was born in 1901. It is now a heritage house on a heritage street.


On 28 August 2004 Tom Wright wrote:

Hi Alan,

I recently referred to my Pearce grandmother as Margaretta. She was, of course, Elsie Margaretta Pearce. We called her Nana.

Nana was born in London in 1875, and came to Canada in her teens. She married harry James Musson Wilson (1857-1914) in Toronto, and at the time of my mother's birth in 1901 they lived at 71 Tranby Avenue, a few blocks north of Queen's Park, the provincial legislature.

Harry was a chief telegraph operator on the railroad. He was a militia sergeant-major in 'A' troop of the Governor-General Body Guard at Humboldt, Saskatchewan in the North-West Field Force during the Riel Rebellion of 1885, and later in the 3rd Canadian Mounted Rifles in South Africa, 1902. He later worked for the firm of Sir Henry Pellatt (Pellatt & Pellatt). He died in Toronto on Nov.21, 1914, when my mother was twelve years old.

Harry was the oldest son of James Wilson (1833-1905) and Emmaline (Musson) Wilson (1835-1913). James was the son of John Wilson (1805-1872) and Eliza Armstrong (1810-1881). John was the son of James Wilson (1769-ca.1854) and Anne Wilson (1777-ca.1855) of Derryhillagh, Ireland.

My research began with a letter written in 1855 by Anne Wilson to her son John who had some time before emigrated to Canada. The letter (see below) shows that her husband James had recently died. Anne was then in her late seventies, and it is clear that most of her children had migrated to Australia. The letter was written from Derryhillagh, a townland in Co. Fermanagh. (I'm working on a contact here.)

It seems that her son John and his wife Eliza (Armstrong) Wilson and their children James, William, Ellen and likely other siblings had migrated, probably to St. Catharines, Ont., some time around 1845 or 1850, or perhaps even earlier.

I know that James Wilson (1833-1905) was in St. Catharines by 1854, because he was then gazetted lieutenant of the First Battalion of the St. Catharines Field Brigade, a militia artillery battery. In 1861 he was gazetted captain, and he was still captain of the Field Brigade during the Fenian Raids across the Niagara River in 1866. James was then a railroad agent for the Grand Trunk Railroad. He married Emmaline Musson (1835-1913) about this time, and the first of their many children, Harry (see above) was born in 1857.

The family appears to have moved to Toronto around 1868, I believe, probably to 118 Portland Street. John, then a customs agent, died of stomach cancer on March 22, 1872. His wife Eliza was living with her widowed daughter, Ellen Tenny, in St. Patrick's Ward, Toronto, when she died July 8, 1881.

James and his large family moved into 5 Widmer St. before 1880, but by 1885 moved to 11 Widmer Street. James was then Assistant Superintendent of the Toronto, Grey and Bruce Railroad. By 1890 he had risen to be Superintendent then Claims Agent for the CPR which absorbed the TG&B RR., and moved into a large family home at 250 McCaul St. Most of his sons were railroad men in some capacity, and boarded in the family home. James lived on at 250 McCaul St. until his sudden death in 1905.

James's family was as follows:
Harry James Musson Wilson (1857 -1914), my grandfather (see thumbnail sketch above).
Henrietta (Ettie) Wilson (b. ca.1858 m. G.W. Murton
James Gustavus Wilson (1860-1936) car distributor with the CPR and foreman for R.G. Maclean.
William Alexander Wilson (1863-1873). I don't know the circumstances of his death.
George B. Wilson (1866- ?) became private secretary to Mayor Urquhart.
Alice Graydon Wilson (1868-1914)
Robert Wallace Wilson (b. 1870, died of war wounds, Jan. 28, 1918)
Frederick G. Wilson (1873-1937), steam heater car department, G.T.R., married Frances Hyatt.
Phillip Hamilton Wilson (b. 1876, killed in Action, Aug. 10, 1918).

I have some interesting documents regarding James and the St. Catharines Field Battery, including land grants for his military service, obituaries for James and his son Harry, photos of 250 McCaul (no longer there) and 71 Tranby (in 2004). Also photos of James, Emmaline, Harry, Nana, and of course my mother. I am seeking more information on the Irish connection and Derryhillagh. I am also in contact with a cousin who may still have the original of the 1855 letter. If he has the original envelope it may give clues to John and James's address in Canada and their home in Ireland. Here's hoping!

Regards,

Tom Douglas Grant Pearce writes 20 November 2010: "Married Harry John Musson Wilson, a telegraph worker, in 1897, in Toronto. In 1911, they were at 71 Granby in Toronto, with Doris, Harvey, Grace, Phillip, Mavis?, and Ernest. Harry was a stockbroker."