MICHAEL RUSSELL 1792 - 1866 By Doris L. Russell - 1993 Michael Russell, was born in County Tipperary, Ireland and died in 1866, according to the inscription on his tombstone standing there in the Old Catholic Cemetery on the Caribou Road in Fort Fairfield, Maine. A date, a place of birth, and the final resting place of this pioneer man. Michael is named as the first settler in Fort Fairfield Maine , by many local historians. In 1841, a surveyor by the name of Mr. Lowell was sent by the U.S. Government to visit the settlers along the Canadian and U.S. border. He states in a letter that Michael Russell, living in Plantation D had been here the longest, fifteen years. This would make his coming to Maine in the year 1826. The Provincial Archives at Fredericton N.B., contains information on this early settler. Michael Russell is listed as a petitioner asking for public land from the British Crown. The petition asks for 200 hundred acres of land below the Great Falls on the St. John River and adjoining Nathaniel Potter. It also states Michael arrived in Canada in 1819, was married and had one male child. This petition is dated 1822. There is no evidence he settled this land. In old marriage records in the Archives, we know Michael and Phoebe Youmans (Humans as sometime spelled, were married in the parish of Hampton, Kings County N.B., by a Rev. Burns. Baptismal records found at this archives contains information of Michael and Phoebes first two children, John and Mary, baptized in the Fredericton area. These had four sons and five daughters. The oldest son John married Sarah Haggerty in 1843, record at St. Bruno's Church Van Buren, Maine. Sarah Haggerty and John had nine children, Sarah died in 1871. John married again in 1872 Isabel Brown, born in 1839, she was nineteen years younger than John. John and Isabel had six children. He died in 1890. I have been unable to identify his place of burial. Isabel died in 1920, and is buried in the Riverside Cemetery at Fort Fairfield, Maine as are several of her children. In 1839, Mary the oldest daughter married Michael McKenney. There are nine children listed for this family. Michael and Mary died in 1888 and 1898, respectively, and both are buried in Old Catholic Cemetery, near Mary's father, Michael. Thomas the second son was living with his parents in 1850, and unmarried, he is listed as 22 years old and born in Maine. In the 1860 census, Thomas is married, wife's name is Mirinda, her maiden name was Wright. Thomas and Mirinda had fourteen children. I am unable to find any record of Thomas's death, but find in the Fort Fairfield Town Records that Mirinda died in 1897. Sarah Russell married William Lundy at Tobique, now known as Andover, Victoria County N.B. The Lundys had eleven children. William born 1817 in Belfast Ireland, died in l872, and Sarah born in 1825, died in 1888. Both are buried in the Old Catholic in Fort Fairfield, near Sarah's father's plot. I find very little about William and Nicholas Russell, the third and fourth sons of Michael and Phoebe Russell. In 1850 they are listed as living with parents. William was 21 years old. He is not listed in the 1860 census. Civil War pension records states that he died at David's Island N.Y. Nicholas is listed in the 1850 census as 20 years old, he also is living with his parents, Michael and Phoebe. I have not found a record of marriage for Nicholas, he is not listed in the 1860 census. I will include here it is rumored he may been married to a widow, Mary Clark or Mary Malloy. Nancy, born in 1838, married Charles Crabbe in 1858, this is from information I found in the Presque Isle Library. In 1860, family were living on a farm in California Settlement, N.B. There are four children for this family according to the baptismal record at St. Bruno's in Van Buren Maine. Nancy and Charles are not listed in the 1870 census for Victoria Co. in N.B. nor are they in the 1870 census for Maine. Their daughter Anne is living with their Uncle John's family. A son Charles age 15 years is living with a family working as an apprentice. At this time unable to find more on this family. Margaret Russell, born in 1841, married first a widower Danville Bartlette at Fort Fairfield, Maine in 1858. In 1860 they were living in New Brunswick, on a farm next to her sister Nancy and Charles Crabbe. It is mentioned in a Land Grant he, Dan Bartlette sold his farm to Charles Crabbe in 1862. Danville Bartlette, born in 1825, died in 1864 at Baton Rouge, Louisiana. This information comes from Civil War pension records. There were two daughters of this marriage. In 1868 Margaret marries another widower John E. Fields, they have four children, and are living in Carlinford Vic. Co. N.B. in the Victoria County census of 188 Margaret is not mentioned, so assume she has died, the youngest child was born in 1878. John Fields born in 1829 died in 1903, and is buried at the Riverside Cemetery, Fort Fairfield, Maine. JOHN AND SARAH (HAGGERTY) RUSSELL CHILDREN ARE: John B 1844 D 1916 M Betsy Keegan B 1848 D 1898 M 1863 Thomas B 1845 D 1862 Missing in action Civil War Patrick B 1847 D 1865 Wounded in Civil War came home and died Michael B 1848 D 1931 M Isabelle Guiggey B M 1876 Charles W. B 1850 D 1932 M Nancy McNamee B 1850 D 1915 M 1872 Nicholas B 1854 D 1893 M Eliza Brown Mary Jane B 1855 D 1870 Martha B 1860 James B 1856 D young JOHN AND ISABELLE BROWN CHILDREN ARE: Sadie B 1873 D 1908 Rose B 1874 D 1893 Robert B 1875 D 1893 William B 1882 D 1952 Stephen B 1882 D 1916 Samuel B 1880 D 1959 M Helena Toner B 1895 D1939 no family M 190? MARY AND MICHAEL MCKENNEY CHILDREN ARE: Nicholas B 1840 D 1920 M Elizabeth M 1865 D 1872 M Mary Larson B 1850 D 1941 M 1875 Jane B 1843 D 1920 M James Stevens M 2nd T. Peters M 1868 James B 1845 D 1916 M Zipporah Day B 1867 D 1906 M Mrs. Ella Everett Mary Ann B 1845 D 1920 M John Day B 1847 D 1920 John A B 1856 D 1933 M-Mary E. Clarke B 1863 D 1938 M 1880 Phoebe B 1858 D M John McNamee B 1851 D 1924 M 1878 Michael B 1862 D 1920 M Eliza Carroll B 1872 D 1944 M 1887 William B 1864 D M Lucy Russell B 1864 D M 1885