A Watchmaker from Leicestershire

• The Leicester Journal, 8 December 1854, covering the Melton Mowbray Petty Sessions held three days earlier, reported that “Leonard Posnett, of Melton, was fined 1s. and costs for assaulting a little lad named Alfred Ernest Allen.”  What, if anything, had a seven-year-old boy done to have provoked such a despicable action?”
• On the death of his father, Richard Allen, in 1857, Silas took over the saddler and harness making business and moved to the nearby 23 King Street. The 1861 Census shows 43-year-old Silas, a master saddler, still living at the same address with his wife, Mary, aged 41, and 13-year-old Alfred, who was apprenticed to a watchmaker.  [William] Charles had died in Canton, China, on 29 December 1858, Walter was seeking his fortune in the Antipodes, and George had disappeared from the historical record. 

• An only child, Harry Franklin, maybe named after Alice’s recently deceased step-brother and son of Alfred Allen, was born in Boston on 13 June 1893. The following year he would have gone with his parents to Roswell, New Mexico, soon after Don Starkweather was appointed the local agent for the Pecos Valley and Northeastern Railway, when the line was extended from the town of Eddy (renamed Carlsbad in 1899), some 70 miles away. Don’s younger brother, George, was a Train Master for the P.V.&.N.E. at the time and no doubt was instrumental in his sibling being offered a position with the company in the much warmer climes of New Mexico.  
• There is no record of Alice bearing any more children and the sad news of her death was reported in the Eddy Current, 10 April 1897, which reads:
• Death of Mrs. Starkweather – The following is from the Roswell Record and refers to the death of the wife of the P. V. Ry. agent of that place.
• No more sincere and universal sorrow has pervaded our community than that caused by the death of Mrs. Alice M. Starkweather, wife of Mr. D. A. Starkweather, which occurred on March 29, 1897, at twelve o’clock. Mrs. Starkweather was born at St John, N.B., January 24, 1864, but had lived in Boston, Mass., for many years before coming to New Mexico. While she resided in Roswell for only about two and a half years, she had endeared herself to many, and a very large circle of friends feel her death a heavy affliction …..  …. Appropriate funeral services were held at the home Wednesday afternoon at two o’clock attended by a large number of friends and family, after which the remains were interred in the South Side cemetery. The sympathy of the whole community goes out to her husband, the dear little boy, the brother and sisters from whom she has gone.  A FRIEND.
• The inscription on the memorial stone reads: “Alice Maud Wife of D. A. Starkweather, Born St. John, N.B. Died 29th Mar. 1897, Roswell, NM.”

• Don A. Starkweather – step-son-in-law of Alfred Allen
• We learn from an announcement in the Carlsbad Current, 16 December 1899, that Don Starkweather did not remain a widower long. Under the heading, Wedding Bells, the Current told its readers that: “Last Sunday, December 3, 1899, Mrs. Mary B. Sharp and D A. Starkweather were united in marriage at El Paso, and on Tuesday arrived here on the P. V. and N. E. train from the south. Mrs. Sharp was a resident of Carlsbad for a number of years and is well known to all as an accomplished lady of unusually ability, evidence by the satisfactory discharge of the important duties of a number of important positions which she has held … Mr. Starkweather is the gentlemanly travelling freight and passenger agent of the Pecos Valley and Northeastern railway company, a position he fulfils most admirably…Mr. and Mrs. Starkweather at once took possession of their pleasant house on Richardson Avenue. Mr. Starkweather was obliged to leave Wednesday for Amarillo on business connected with the railroad – Roswell Register.” 

• The Roswell Daily Record, New Mexico – 11 January 1904
• MRS. MARY B. STARKWEATHER – The Sad News of Her Death Has Been Received in Roswell.
  Many Roswell people will be shocked to learn of the death of Mrs. Mary B. Starkweather, who formerly lived in this city, and has many friends here. The following is from – the Marshall, Texas, Messenger:
  “DIED Mrs. Mary Browning Starkweather, at the residence of her mother Mrs. Annie Brownrigg in this city, at eleven o’clock on the night of Jan. 1st. 1904.
  “Death ever seems a dread visitor, but when his dark presence enters the doorway of a new year and bears away in chill embrace the mortal form we loved so well, it is hard to look behind his dense shadow and perceive with eyes of faith the bright celestial soul of our dear departed. smiling with joy at the resurrection and the glorious freedom from Him.
  “Mrs. Starkweather had been a sufferer from consumption for eleven years prior to her death, having contracted the disease while nursing her husband, who died of it. Shewas a beautiful character, amiable, and yet with will to do what was best, in every move in. life, and with a marvelous courage to bear her up during the slow insidious inroads of her wasting disease When near to death in El Paso, she begged her devoted mother to return with her to the old home of her birth, the sweet scenes of her happy childhood and of her girlhood and young womanhood, where pleasure had served her with a bounteous hand, that the memories of young pleasures were never quite crowded out by the sorrows of maturer years.
  “Miss Mamie Sharp, the young daughter of Mrs. Starkweather, came on from school at Austin, and was with her mother during the last few days of fatal illness, and so with mother, daughter, sisters and brother and other loving relatives to minister to her every need she passed away with a gentle peace which was a blessed respite from the acute suffering of the past few weeks.
  “Unfortunately Mr. Don Starkweather could not make such railroad connections as to be with his beloved wife at the time of her death. Mary Brownrigg. eldest daughter of Mrs. Annie Brownrigg, was born in Marshall, Texas. January 16, 1869. Had she lived she would have been thirty-five years old on the sixteenth instant.
  “Miss Mary Browning married Mr. John F. Sharp in June 1886. Mr. Sharp died in August, 1892. Mrs. Mary Brownrigg Sharp married Mr. D. A. Starkweather in December 1900. Miss Mamie Sharp, the only child of the deceased, survives her.
  “When Mr. Starkweather recently found it necessary for business rea sons to remove to East Deerfield, Massachusetts, and Mrs. Stark weather was preparing to accompany him she suffered from a physical collapse and went to El Paso last April. Mr. Starkweather arrived here yesterday afternoon from East Deerfield, Mass.. and the funeral will be conducted this morning at half past nine o’clock, from the residence of Mrs. Annie Brownrigg. to Greenwood cemetery, with Rev. Dean Bowers, rector of Trinity Episcopal church, of which Mrs. Starkweather was a consistent member, to conduct the funeral service.
  “The Messenger extends heartfelt condolence to the bereaved husband daughter and mother, and to the other members of the family in this, their dark hour of grief.”

• We know that Don Starkweather had already set plans in motion to resettle in East Deerfield, his hometown in Massachusetts, prior to his second wife’s death. In the event, it wasn’t long before the ‘the popular travelling passenger and freight agent’ found romance.
• The Roswell Daily Record, 27 October 1905 informed its readers that:
• FORMER CITIZEN WEDS – Don A. Starkweather, Once Railroad Agent in Roswell, Married in Massachusetts.
• In Roswell people will be interested in the following announcement of the wedding of Don A. Starkweather, once a prominent citizen here In the capacity of agent for the Pecos Valley and Northeastern, which is taken from a Massachusetts paper: “A very pretty wedding took place Tuesday at Montague City, at 10:30, at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Savage, when their daughter May was united in marriage to Don a (sic) Starkweather, of Greenfield. The ceremony was performed by Rev. P. N. Merriam, of Turners Falls, the double ring service being used. The bridesmaid was Grace E. Savage of Riverside, a cousin of the bride. The bride was gowned in pearl colored voile over pearl colored silk, with white trimmings. The bridesmaid wore white silk muslin. The bride received a large number of presents, including furniture and silverware, among them a silver service. The rooms were prettily decorated in autumn leaves, laurel and cut flowers. After a wedding breakfast Mr. and ‘Mrs. Starkweather left for New York. On their return they will make their home in Greenfield.
• Don and May were to have three sons, Arthur, Charles and Robert. May died in 1940 and was buried in the Union Cemetery, Chatham, Massachusetts. The fate of Don Starkweather remains unknown.
• Harry Franklin Starkweather – step-grandson of Alfred Allen.
• Harry, only son of Don Starkweather and Alice Fletcher, was born in Boston, Massachusetts on 13 June 1893; worked as an assistant chemist for the Crucible Steel Company in Syracuse, New York; was registered for the World War 1 draft on 5 June 1917 and described as being of tall and slender build, with brown eyes, brown hair and “not bald!”; served as a corporal with Company A, 307 Field Signal Battalion, U.S. Army during the war; married Lovina Frost in Oneida, New York, on 6 June 1925; and had one child, Arthur Harry, who was born the following year.

• Harry Franklin Starkweather died 9 January 1965 at Eaton, Madison County, New York, and was buried in the local cemetery where a military-style flagstone marks the spot, which neatly brings the story of Alfred Ernest Allen, his wife, Mary Hamilton Fletcher, and his known step-descendants to an end.

• Notes:
  1. Alfred’s siblings were: William Charles), born 27th October 1844 (died Canton, China, 29 December 1857); Walter Brett, born 15th March 1846 (died Balmain, NSW, Australia, 22 February 1910); and George Frederick, born 1848 (fate unknown).
  2. Census for Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada, 3 April 1871.
  3. Namely, May, born 1861, Laurie E., born 1862, Alice M., born 1864, George L., born 1867.
  4. U.S. Army, Register of Enlistments.
  5. Census of England & Wales, 3 April 1881.
  6. Pension File Claim #395708.
  7. George L. Fletcher, born Canada 1867, only son of George L. Fletcher and Mary Hamilton and Donald A. Starkweather, born 1864, husband of Alice Maud Fletcher, youngest daughter of George L. Fletcher and Mary Hamilton Fletcher.
  8. Pension File Claim #258868.
  9. State of Massachusetts Register of Deaths.
  10. The details of this marriage were verified by William Frith, Clerk of the Peace, of Saint John, N.B. on 9 May 1889 in support of Mary’s claim for a widow’s pension.
  11. The school in District 4 (Greenfield) listed Don Starkweather as one of 15 pupils “not absent or tardy” by the teacher, Miss Emma O. Whitman (The Greenfield Gazette & Courier, 14 July 1873).

• The author extends his sincere thanks to the late Gordon Green, of Queensland, Australia, for generously sharing several important documents taken from Alfred Allen’s U.S. Army pension file.  
   

• Trivia
• Albuquerque Morning Journal, 29 November 1905
• Chased the Trainmaster – Arkansas City, Kansas, Nov. 28 1905 – Late last night Trainmaster [George C.] Starkweather, of the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe railway, who, with three associates, was superintending the clearing of a wreck a short distance from Arkansas City, were attacked by fifty Italian laborers helping with the work, and were compelled to escape on a locomotive. While clearing the track a car turned over and broke an Italian’s leg.  Under the leadership of an interpreter, the Italians started after the Americans, following them into Arkansas City. The Italians were armed with knives and clubs. They were driven out of town by the police.