52 Ancestors Week 6 – Mean Aunt Maggie

Maggie Martin Marshall (born 22 Sept 1889) was another one of my grandfather’s sisters.  She was the 3^rd of the 14 children born to Adolphus Burdine Martin and Elizabeth Patience Lee Martin.

 

My mom always said Aunt Maggie was mean, but never told me any stories about her.   If you remember, a few weeks ago I wrote about Florrie Martin Duckett, sister of Maggie and my grandfather.  In a conversation a few years back, Florrie’s daughter, Lydia, confirmed that Aunt Maggie was indeed mean, and she had some stories to back that up:

Story #1  Lydia’s mother, Florrie Martin Duckett, told Lydia that one time Aunt Maggie put a cat on the top of one of those old wood-burning kitchen stoves when the stove was hot.  Florrie said that Aunt Maggie laughed about it because the cat was jumping all over the place, and Aunt Maggie thought it was funny.

Story #2  After Lydia was married, Aunt Florrie came to live with Lydia and her husband.  One time, Aunt Maggie came to visit for a while.  While visiting, Aunt Maggie locked herself in the bathroom and wouldn’t come out.  Lydia and her husband didn’t have a key for the door, so they had to call a locksmith to open the door.

Story #3  During that same visit, Aunt Maggie gathered up all the scissors in the house, including Lydia’s favorite pair of bandage scissors, and hid them.  Lydia said they never did find any of the scissors.

Aunt Maggie married Charlie L. Marshall around 1918. Lydia also told me that Aunt Maggie had at least 5 babies, and all of them died within a few months of being born. I remember that my mother, too, said that all of Aunt Maggie’s babies had died. It sounds like Aunt Maggie was mean before losing all those babies, and I’m sure that losing all those babies didn’t help her disposition any.

She wasn’t all mean, though.  When their mother died in 1937, Maggie sent the poem below to her brother, Joel Daniel Martin (my grandfather).

Aunt Maggie died 27 April 1961 from a stroke.  Her death certificate says she was a widow, but I don’t know when Charlie died.  One of Maggie’s other sisters, Annis Martin DeBruhl, provided the personal information for the death certificate.  Maggie is buried at Hermitage Baptist Church in Camden, South Carolina.

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