I recently expanded my spiritual care volunteering to include women who have lost a pregnancy or an infant. (See blog below.). While I was taking seminars and webinars to learn about my new role, I was reminded that my grandmother always mentioned her brother Jacob, who died when he was a child, whenever she listed off her siblings. She always told me that she was one of five; four living and one who died.
I always assumed that Jacob, who had been named for his paternal grandfather, Yankel, my great great grandfather, had died as a young boy. Old enough for my grandmother to remember him. I did not know how Jacob died or how old he was when he died. My grandmother spoke about him as if she knew him. So I figure he was a child of 5 or 6 when he passed.
Now I know she did not know him at all. That the memory she had of him came from her mother, my great grandmother. I can imagine that whenever someone asked her how many children she had, she always remembered and counted Jacob. How could a mother forget her own child? I know now that you never forget the pain of losing a loved one, especially a child. What you can do is to learn to live with it and move forward while remembering.
Jacob has been on my mind lately. So recently, when my distant cousin, Evan W., who is the best genealogy researcher I know started texting documents one day, I realized I could find out what happened. Or rather Evan could. I asked if he was again at the Mormon Center doing research. He was. That was fortuitous for me. I told him about Jacob. Honestly, within minutes I had my answer. I was stunned. And when I looked at the dates on the death certificate, I realized I was looking at documents registered almost exactly 126 years ago.
(Once again thank you to Evan and to Tracing The Tribe group that has helped me so much over the years with my mysteries.)
Evan found first that In the 1900 census the family can be found living in the same apartment building as one of my great grandmother’s sister and her family. Louis and Ray have two living children, two girls one born in 1895 and one in 1898 (my grandmother.). But it also indicated that she had three children, only two living.
Jacob died when he was just over one year old on January 2, 1898, at 4 pm in the afternoon, with the document registered on January 3 (or 8). He was acutely ill for four days, with the doctor making house calls from December 30 until Jacob died on the second.
I cannot imagine starting a new year with the death of a son. She must have been devasted. I can imagine that her sister, who lived in the same building, was there for her. Jacob’s older sister, my great aunt, was only about 18 months old. My grandmother was not even born when he died. In fact, she was born 11 months later in November 0f 1898. So I know for sure she was not remembering him at all. She was repeating what her mother always said. “I have five children, four living and one, Jacob, who passed away.”
The death certificate states that the cause of death was Simple Meningitis, but there was a contributing factor. Poor Jacob had hydrocephalus. This is a condition of extra cerebrospinal fluid on the brain. Now a baby who has this gets a shunt put in that releases the fluid, so that the child survives.
In fact on KidsHealth website it says: “Children often have a full life span if hydrocephalus is caught early and treated. Infants who undergo surgical treatment to reduce the excess fluid in the brain and survive to age 1 will not have a shortened life expectancy due to hydrocephalus.”
But for Jacob this was not an option. His short life was probably difficult for all as the fluids put pressure on his skull and brain. My husband, who is a pediatrician, said that meningitis is common with those who have hydrocephalus. I can imagine the toll his condition had on the family. I assume that his parents knew that he would not live a long life. Jacob was unfortunately doomed to die.
My great grandmother had three children after Jacob died, my grandmother and two more sons. These four children really grew up not knowing Jacob at all. But their mother kept his memory alive. Jacob is buried at Washington Cemetery in New York, where my great grandparents are buried. I am hoping to find his grave. Although Evan told me that often babies had no stones.
My great grandparents married on January 28, 1894. I am writing this blog in memory of their 130th wedding anniversary, and the loss they had right before their fourth anniversary in 1898, when Jacob died. By writing this memory I hope that I am continuing my great grandmother’s wish to keep his memory alive.
zicharonot 