Elizabeth Fairlie Donaldson

ELIZABETH FAIRLIE REID (1822-84)

is the second child and oldest daughter of William Reid, Writer in Glasgow, afterwards a farmer at Walworth in Wisconsin, in the United States of America, and his wife Elizabeth Drew. She was born on 25 May 1822 and her baptism was registered at Glasgow. John Gibson and John Nimmo witnessed her baptism. Elizabeth was named after her maternal grandmother [Registrar General for Scotland, New Register House, Edinburgh, Baptismal Register for Glasgow, 1821-25, reference OPR.644/31folio 210 microfilm frame 3768].

UNCLE JAMES DREW

Elizabeth Fairlie Reid and four of her siblings were left a legacy of £1000 by their maternal uncle, James Drew, formerly Writer [lawyer] in Glasgow, and afterwards a resident of Cornwall Terrace, Regents Park, London. In a codicil to his last will and testament dated at London 12 June 1875, James Drew instructed his Trustees to pay: “the sum of one thousand pounds free of legacy duty to each one of the following named children of my deceased sister Mary Reid and the said William Reid namely, Elizabeth Fairlie Reid, Ann Hamilton Reid, Mary Drew Reid, James Drew Reid, and also to the only child (son) of the deceased John Reid eldest son of my deceased sister being five children and one grandson in all of my said sister” [National Archives of Scotland, Register House, Edinburgh, Probate of the Will and Codicils of James Drew, formerly Writer in Glasgow, late of Cornwall Terrace, Regents Park, Middlesex (Non Scottish Court), which was registered on 12 May 1879, reference SC70/6/16, pages 572-73].

MARRIAGE

Elizabeth Fairlie Reid (Otherwise Eliza Reed) married Nathaniel V. Donaldson on 13 August 1842. They were married at Detroit in Wayne County, Michigan, in the United States of America. Her place of birth is recorded as Detroit and her age as twenty-one years, although she was born in Scotland and was not due to celebrate her twenty-first birthday until 22 May in the following year [Michigan, Marriages, 1822-1995, index, FamilySearch] https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/FCZH-12V Nathaniel and Elizabeth had six children, three sons and three daughters.

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Herbert Reid, in his book, "The Reids of Kittochside, Part II," published in 1945 in Glasgow, wrote that "A family of ten [children] were born to William Reid and Mary Drew, eight in Glasgow, before they emigrated. ... William Reid and Mary Drew's youngest daughter, Elizabeth Fairlie Reid, married Judge Nathaniel Donaldson, Milwaukee, and their great-grand-daughter, Elizabeth Fairlie Benton married in 1927 Winthrop Swain. They have two daughters, Caroline, born 1927, and Barbara, born 1929."

Official documentation of Elizabeth Fairlie's birth, which Neil Reid Ford copied (2010, see below) in Glasgow, show that Elizabeth was not William and Mary's youngest daughter, and contradict Herbert Reid's mistaken assertion that she was their eldest.

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Birth: May 25, 1822, Glasgow City, Scotland,
Death: Apr. 7, 1884, Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, USA.

Elizabeth Fairlie Reid Donaldson was the daughter of William Reid and Mary Drew, and the wife of Nathaniel Sykes Donaldson. Death record for Elizabeth shows birth/death dates as shown above. Gravestone dates differ by one year, 1823-1885.

Family links: Spouse:

Nathaniel Sykes Donaldson (1809 - 1883)

Children:

Edwin G. Donaldson (1849 - 1929)
Jessie Elizabeth Donaldson Benton (1853 - 1930)
Charles S. Donaldson (1858 - 1923)

Burial: Forest Home Cemetery, Milwaukee, Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, USA, Plot: Sec. 25, Block 2

Created by: GWC

Record added: Sep 07, 2011

Find A Grave Memorial# 76158834

Source: This text and a photo of a gravestone were downloaded January 29, 2012, from Findagrave.com at http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=76158834

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From a Calendar of Evidence

for the Family of William Reid and Mary Drew

prepared (2010) by Neil Reid Ford:

                   1 

10 June 1820. William Reid in this parish & Mary Drew in

the parish of Eastwood. 2 days.

Source: Registrar General for Scotland, New Register House, Edinburgh, Marriage Register for Cathcart, reference OPR.560/2, frame 445.

                   2 

12 June 1820. Mr. William Reid, Writer in the parish of Cathcart, residing in Glasgow, & Miss Mary Drew in this parish registered

for procln. 2 days.

Source: Ibidem, Marriage Register for Eastwood, reference OPR.562/5, frame 1128.

                   3 

22 April 1821. William Reid, Writer, & Mary Drew a law: son John bo: 22d April Wit: The Revd. James Thomson & Dr. John Gibson.

Source: Ibidem, Baptismal Register for Glasgow, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 3621.

                   4 

25 May 1822. William Reid, Writer, & Mary Drew a law: daur. Elizabeth Fairlie bo: 25 May 1822 Wit: John Gibson & John (Thomson).

Source: Registrar General for Scotland, New Register House, Edinburgh, Baptismal Register for Glasgow, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 3768.

                   5 

23 October 1823. William Reid, Writer, & Mary Drew a law: daur. Ann Hamilton bo: 23d Oct: Wit: John Nimmo & John Gibson.

Source: Ibidem, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 3810.

                   6 

16 December 1824. William Reid, Writer, and Mary Drew a law: daur. Mary Drew bo: 16th December. Wit: Dr. John Nimmo, and John Gibson.

Source: Ibidem, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 3904.

                   7 

11 July 1826. William Reid, Writer, & Mary Drew a law: daur. Mary Drew bo: 11th July. Wit: Dr. John Nimmo & Dr. John Gibson. Source:

Source: Ibidem, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 4038.

                   8 

11 July 1829. William Reid, Writer, & Mary Drew a law: son James Drew bo: 11th July. Wit: The Revd. James Thomson & James Drew.

Source: Ibidem, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 4254.

                   9 

20 October 1831. William Reid, Writer, & Mary Drew a law: son William bo: 20th Oct: Wit: Revd. Jas. Thomson & James Drew.

Source: Ibidem, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 4457.

                  10 

15 June 1834. William Reid, Writer, & Mary Drew a law: daur: Agnes. bo: 15th June. Wit: Dr. William Young & John Gibson.

Source: Ibidem, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 4712.

                  11 

7 February 1836. William Reid, Writer, & Mary Drew a law: son William bo: 7th February. Wit: William Young & John Gibson.

Source: Ibidem, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 4902.

                  12 

8 September 1837. William Reid, Writer, & Mary Drew a law: son Robert bo: 8th Sept: Wit: John Gibson & Dr. David Gibson.

Source: Ibidem, reference OPR.644.1/33, frame 5082.

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The following is from an email message Jan. 31, 2012 to Michael R. Delahunt from Patricia A. Cost at pcost@frontiernet.net, who has written extensively about Linn and Morris Benton, and their family:

Morris Benton wrote out a two-page genealogy that I used for my original thesis about the Bentons in 1984. A little bit of information from that genealogy did not appear in the book, but was included in the thesis. Relating to your information, this is what I originally wrote:

Jessie, born in 1846, came from a large Milwaukee family. Her mother, Elizabeth Fairlie Reid, had come to this country from Scotland with two brothers, a sister, and their father to visit relatives. The girls promptly married Americans. The Reid family tree goes back at least to 1567. Jessie's father's family owned a large country house in Cooperstown, New York, where the Donaldson family had lived for nearly 200 years. Jessie's father, Nathaniel S. Donaldson, built a house in Milwaukee and settled his family there. Jessie was born and raised in Milwaukee, apparently the second of nine children.

The sources of this information were an interview with Morris Benton's daughter Caroline (the bit about the daughters "promptly" marrying Americans!), and about 7 pages of notes that Morris Benton made on his family history. A copy of that document is most likely in the "Benton Collection" at RIT. I'm pretty sure that, in the Reid direction, it contains lots of names.

If you want me to try to find that document and send you a copy of it, please let me know! I'm not sure whether Caroline Benton Gregg's son Larry still has the original, but I made a copy of the original in 1984 when I visited Caroline in Milwaukee.

Also see Patricia A. Cost article, "Linn Boyd Benton, Morris Fuller Benton, and Typemaking at ATF," from Printing History, downloaded Jan 2012, p. 33. Number 31–32 (Volume 16, No. 1 and Volume XVI no. 2) 1994. From http://www.printinghistory.org/publications/printing-history/os-art...

Patricia A. Cost also wrote a book on the Bensons published in 2010.