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DESCENDENTS OF JOSEPH
SHILLINGTON
Joseph
was born in 1819, in the County of Tyrone, Garry De Travy Parish. He sailed
from Belfast and landed in New York on his 21st birthday, in the year 1840. He
was the youngest member of his family and was accompanied by a cousin. (no
record of who this cousin was) Reaching New York, after eight weeks and three
days, the twosome set out for Upper Canada to meet his brother and,
thereafter, to find land. He took up a homestead farm at the head of Green Bay
in Bedford County, Ontario, a location near the present City of Kingston.
Here, it is reported, he literally chopped his farm out of the woods and
carried his wheat crop on his back to the Mill. He also chopped great piles of
wood for potash burning which was sold in barrels for income. The family
records of Joseph report that his father, a brother of Thomas, had been a
landlord in Ireland but had backed a note for a business partner who had
failed. As a result the father had been forced to pay, and this broke him.
Because of this Joseph had decided to come to Canada to make his own way. His
first home was a log cabin which he built, with the staircase on the outside.
He married Charlotte Bell, ( a relative of the Telephone Bell) and they
settled on his homestead, where thirteen children were eventually born. Like
her husband, Charlotte was of sturdy stock and it is said that she would
sometimes walk up to forty miles to visit relatives. Following the death of
Charlotte in 1882, Joseph married a Mrs. Kitty Bell, who died in 1897. Joseph
passed away in 1904 and is buried in Salem Cemetery.
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