Page 7 - News On 7 May 2022 Edition

HAZZARD'S HISTORY NOTES

by Grant Ketcheson
“WE FOUND JOHN WEST'S GRAVESTONE”
This story began in 2017 when a guest-singer at Hazzard's Corners Church summer service asked if we knew anything about
the grave marker of John West, her 3rd great-grandfather. Since he was also a grandfather of mine, I was eager to find the
stone. Fortunately, the lady remembered in what area she had seen it some years before.

It didn't take long to find two pieces of white stone with only a few inches showing above the ground. With a bit of muscle
power, the two halves of a three-foot marker came up from the earth, revealing the gravestone of John West (1796-1873)
“born in the County Armana” (actually Armagh). This simple monument has special significance as it gave us incentive to
begin our on-going cemetery restoration project in 2020.

John West and his wife, Frances Hannah “Fanny” Birchell (1818-1893), came from the village of Loughgall, County Armagh, in
the north of Ireland. It appears that they moved to Canada via England as records in London note the baptism of their
daughter, Sarah Jane, in 1832. It lists the occupation of John West as a policeman. As their second child was born in Canada in
1836, we know that the West family arrived sometime between 1832-36.

There are few details of their journey to Canada but we know that they lived and farmed in Hungerford Township.
Information from the 1850s is sketchy, particularly since Hungerford somehow missed out on Upper Canada's first census in
1851. However, the West family does appear there in the census of 1861. In later years the family moved to Madoc Township.
The 1871 census shows John West owning a farm at Lot 13, Concession 5 (likely John West Jr.) Two of John and Fanny's
daughters married and lived near the West farm. Eliza married Jackson Burris and Jane married Robert Bird.

After John's death in 1873, Fanny lived with her daughter Jane Bird. There is no record of Fanny West in Hazzard's Cemetery.
Since she lived in the community, we believe that she was buried beside her husband, John, but no stone bears her name. The
monument to John Jr. and his wife Hannah Lloyd is located not far from that of John's father.

The tale of the West family has a unique side-story. John B. and Hannah Lloyd's son, John Richard, married Annie Elevier who
was a cheese maker. (Perhaps they met when Annie operated Cold Spring Factory, near the West farm in Madoc Township.)
Annie had already made a name for herself when her entry won a gold medal at the Chicago World's Fair in 1893. Annie taught
her husband and their three sons the art of cheese making. Their oldest son, William, founded Stirling Creamery, a business
still in operation. John and Fanny would have been so proud!

THE ELUSIVE JOHN WEST (1796-1873) THE RESTORED GRAVESTONE
GRAVESTONE OF JOHN WEST AND FRANCES HANNAH BIRCHELL (1819-1893) ONCE AGAIN STANDING TALL