Does a spinster live in solitude?

I thought a spinster would be someone who lived in solitude, or perhaps she lived with various relatives throughout her life.

So let's explore the life of Lucinda (Cinnie) Booth  (1854-1920), my second great Auntie.
Born in Groesbeck, Limestone County, Texas, on June 8 1954, she was the fourth of six children born to Hannah Conn Booth, second wife of William Lewis Booth. William had a close brother, Charles Marcalus Booth, who had moved with him from NY state to Illinois and then to Texas, but I haven't worked to find many records that connect the families.

 Cinni's youngest sister, the last of Hannah's children, was Anna Booth Attaway, the mother of my two cousins (three times removed) who made hand embroidered and smocked clothes for me and my sister. Here's some info about their lives.

(Above) Hand embroidered blouses by Alice and Gertie Attaway - worn by myself and my little sister, Houston TX,  before we moved to St. Louis that summer.

William Booth had had a first wife, Mary Ann McManus Booth, who left two very young sons when she, as well as her infant daughter, died in 1842.  William married Hannah Conn in Indiana within 7 months.after the loss of Mary Ann. 

Though Cinnie great up in a large family in Hillsboro TX, she was the daughter who didn't marry. Her first entry in a census appears in 1860 when she was 6. Her father's home was the first listed on the census in Hillsboro, TX, and he was an Attorney at Law, with his son Charles studying under him at 20 years old. 

By the 1870 census the household is somewhat smaller, as several of the adult children have married. Cinnie at 15, Charles (30) and Annie (11) are still living in their parent's household. Strangely enough 3 persons are also included, without any last names, John, as laborer, Phillis and their daughter Eliza (10,) as domestic servants. Isn't it likely these are freed slaves? But their racial identifcation is white, and the transcriptionist even called John a lawyer rather than laborer, which the handwriting clearly enough gives.

Isn't it fun to see what happens on census records?

In 1880 for the Hempstead TX census, Cinnie (22) and little sis Annie (18) are in still their parents household. I believe the lawyers came to Hempstead where courts were handling many cases. Charles was married and also a practicing lawyer in Hempstead TX.

My gg-grandfather, Cinnie's elder brother Richard R. Booth had been practicing law also in Hempstead, when he had been killed in 1879. So this census of the WIlliam and Hannah Booth household included his 3 children: Willie 13, Ed 9, and E. A. 7.  Eugenia Almeta Booth was E. A., who became my great grandmother when she married to Charles Herman Miller much later. These grandchildren had lost their mother back in 1875, so they probably had been raised in the William and Hannah Booth household since then.

There were no available 1890 census due to loss to fire.

But Ancestry lists family births and deaths under Cinnie's details. Hannah, her mother died in 1885 back in Hillsboro TX.  Cinnie's half brother, Charles died in 1886.

Her father William Booth died in 1894, in Hillsboro, TX.

 

The William Booth home was still standing in the 1993 when the following photo was taken.

The next census available is 1900, and it finds Lucinda Booth, age 45 as a head of household, living in the Booth family home, 208 N. Waco, in Hillsboro TX, with her nephew Edwin Booth, 29. I go scrambling back to Ancestry to look at her tree. None of her brothers or half brothers had a son, Edwin. Well that's someone I will look for another time!

Interestingly enough, in 1910, there's no listing for 208 N. Waco, but Cinnie (56) is listed as Jinni Booth, a boarder at 206 Waco, living with a family of four with Ray Churchill as the head of the household. His occupation is a laundry marker. I can't find his wife's family which was probably related to her somehow.

No more information is available until the 1920 census, which finds her in Dallas TX. She is listed as Dinni now, (it could have been written Sinni), age 65, and aunt to the family of James O. Wright, 50, a secretary in an oil business. His wife was Ellen L. age 48 and they had 2 children. Who were the Wrights to Cinni?

Uncle Charles (her father's brother) had a daughter named Lucinda Ellen Booth. And she married James O. Wright. Of course she might have changed to her middle name at some time. But they were (at least when the census was taken) the caregivers for Cinni in her old age, after the boarding situation next door to their old home in Hillsboro.

But when she died June 22, 1920 she wasn't in Dallas! She was with her great neice, Allice F. Attaway (my cousin who embroidered my blouses) in El Paso TX. And dear Alice didn't know her year of birth, but knew her birthday, because they had probably just celebrated her 66th on June. 9. Alice was the informant for the death certificate, but also didn't know her grandmother Hannah Booth's name, who had died when she was very young.

From Find-A-Grave: 

"Miss Cinnie Booth was 66 years, 13 days old and a beloved pioneer citizen of Hillsboro. She was born in Grosbeck and moved in early childhood with her parents, Col. Wm L. Booth and wife, Hannah Conn Booth. Cinnie was a cotton buyer for a local firm. She was eulogized by a life-long friend of the family, Captain WM. A. Fields who paid tribute to her noble character. She was buried next to her parents.

She and her father followed the faith of Spiritualism.

She was buried in the Booth family plot in Hillsboro, TX.

A cotton buyer! Well, there's a woman who found something to do with her time. Not very solitary either! 

Sharing with Sepia Saturday, and 52 Ancestors, 52 Weeks on Facebook group, Generations Cafe'.