Little Girl Lost

I am a genealogy buff. For those of you that share the interest know that using 'buff' is putting it mildly. It is an obsession...

I had hit a huge, thick, tall, wall (since 1996) as to the whereabouts of my father's oldest sister who died from pneumonia in 1903 at the age of 8 months. I couldn't find her anywhere. I felt terrible, really terrible. To think of this baby whose whereabouts were unknown made me very sad.

My dad's parents came from Italy in the last decade of the 19th century. They wanted to be Americans, so no italian was spoken in the home; no stories of the 'old country' were shared. My dad knew very little of his sister- only that she died from pneumonia she had caught going to have her picture taken. Of course it could have been a number of things which caused her pneumonia but that was what (and all) the siblings were told. She had been the oldest so none of them had been born yet to know any differently.

I searched graveyards, parish records and even drove to the (no longer existing) street on which she and my g'parents lived in Philadelphia with no luck. Although... I must say, that as I stood on the grassy spot where at one time the foundation of their home sat, a feeling of connection flooded me. It was very wierd; it had never happened to me before. That was 12 years ago.

Last evening I recieved an e-mail from a woman who saw my search listed on a genealogy forum. She had found information on my aunt, my tiny 8 month old ancestor, and she shared it with me. I went to the site on which the record was available and there she was!

It thrilled me to know that she had been recorded (there are instances when that is not always the case) and now I knew what had happened to her. The reason she was not in any of the cemetaries I had searched was because she had been cremated. According to the record, her ashes had been delivered to their home. Where her ashes went after that I do not know, or maybe I do...

Perhaps the connection I felt as I stood on the old homestead site, was my Aunt Eliza asking me not to give up.

Last night, thanks to the interest of a fellow genealogist, a gift was delivered. It was given to me so I could give it to that little baby girl.

Today... she is not lost and, she is not alone.