A Mother's Grief ~ Remembering Kenny

Thirty-six years, three months and 30 days ago, I gave birth to my son Kenny. It was one of the most joyous days of my life. 

Kenny and I, October 1980 (personal collection)

Then the unthinkable happened.

Seventeen years, three months and 30 days ago, Kenny died on Wednesday, February 9th, 2000. He was 19 years, 3 months and 30 days old.

It was unexpected. 

There were no final good-bye's or I love you's.

His death shook my world to its very foundations and shattered the windows of my life.

I wasn't sure if I would ever recover from his loss. 

I have screamed, I have cried.

I have asked why him? Why our son? Why must our family endure this tragic loss?

I have grudgingly...

• Accepted that I will never have the answers
• Accepted to cope with my grief
• Accepted that whether I like it or not, LIFE does go on

I miss...

• His smile that was framed with gorgeous dimples
• His laugh
• His voice
• His hugs
• His eyes, so very dark brown like chocolate
• His humor
• The way he always told me he loved me, "Love you, Momma" and with his hand gave me the universal sign for "I love you" in sign language
• The way he teased me for crying when Mr. Spock died in Star Trek: Wrath of Khan  

I have learned...

• That my grief ebbs and flows
• That there are good days and bad days
• That he lives on in my heart until the day my heart stops beating
• That he lives on in my son, David
• That he lives on in my grandson, Easton  
• That he lives on in our memories 
• That he lives on in our hearts  

I love you baby boy, more than words can ever say and I miss you so much.

Yes, you our gone from this world but you are NEVER forgotten.

David and Kenny, September 1999 (personal collection)

This is one of the last pictures taken of my sons together. David is on the left and Kenny is on the right. I wrote about Kenny's death in a four part series in 2015 (and reposted them last year) here on my blog. You can find them at these links Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 and Part 4.

Update For My Post ~ What Else Can I Do to Prove These Are Two Different People?

In August of 2016 I  wrote a post titled What Else Can I Do to Prove These Are Two Different People? Well on 1 January 2017, a woman named Dawn Houston left me a comment on this post. She is Victoria Spradling Kitts's second great granddaughter. I immediately sent Dawn an email asking if she could shed any light on the situation. Here is screen capture of her comment on the post. Dawn has very graciously given me permission to share our "conversations" and we have agreed to keep each other posted on other questions that we do not have answers to just yet.

Dawn's information provided me with a date of death and place of death for Victoria Spradling Kitts, 6 July 1886 in Kanawha County, West Virginia. Unfortunately, my search  for a death register, death certificate, death notice, funeral notice or obituary has yielded no results.

Is it possible that her death was not registered or that the records are missing, incomplete or were lost? Yes. So I conducted searches for a death record of any type at the following websites,  FamilySearch^1,2,  and the West Virginia Culture and History website^3,4. I also conducted a search of Find-A-Grave^5,6 which also yielded no results. My next step was to search Chronicling America⁷, GenealogyBank⁸ and Newspapers.com⁹ looking for a death notice, funeral notice or an obituary and I kept coming up empty handed. These types of notices were not very common in the late 1800's unless your family was prominent in the area but felt it was necessary to my research process.


I took my search to Ancestry's family trees and message boards. The results were not what I had hoped for as few of the online trees were documented and the message boards for  Spradlin/Spradling family of West Virginia only had three entries which were not helpful to me in any way. Next I went to Google and Bing looking for any record type, family tree or message board for Victoria Spradling Kitts between the years 1882 and 1892 that was not related to previous Ancestry searches. Unfortunately what entries did show up were results from Ancestry that I had found previously in my own search of Ancestry's databases. 

I was ready to admit that I had completed an exhaustive search after a full week of scouring every database I could think of with no results but I had one nagging piece of information that I needed to research. In my search for a death record for Victoria, I found a death certificate at the West Virginia Culture and History website¹⁰ for a woman named Pamelia Beatrice Cooper. She died in Charleston, Kanawha County, West Virginia on 12 October 1950. The death certificate gives her date of birth as 11 March 1888.and lists her parents as Thomas Preston and Victoria Spradlin. This would make Pamelia Beatrice just four years younger than my Victoria's daughter Ella Ann Kitts but would also indicate that Victoria did not die in 1886.

I did my due diligence and proceeded the way I always do with any person. I began to research the family of Pamelia Beatrice Preston Cooper. I was able to find a tree on Ancestry^{11, 12} and thankfully it did have records attached to the profiles of Victoria and her husband Thomas S. Preston which gave me leads to follow. I also found Victoria in the 1870¹³ and 1880¹⁴ US Census records in the home of her parents Benjamin F. and Permelia (Howes) Spradlin/Spradling. I have determined that the Victoria in the death certificate below is not the same woman as Victoria Spradling Kitts. 

 Screen capture  of the death certificate for Pamelia Beatrice Cooper courtesy of http://www.wvculture.org/vrr/va_view2.aspx?FilmNumber=1984147&ImageNumber=961  

With no death register or death certificate (West Virginia did not issue death certificates until 1917) I cannot even begin a search of where Victoria might be buried, however, I do know that her parents and several siblings are buried in Hope Cemetery, 1516-1598 Woodbine Avenue, Charleston, West Virginia. Through phone calls to both the main branch of Kanawha Public Library and the West Virginia State Archives I learned that the cemetery does not have an attendant or clerk onsite and no clue as to where any burial records might be, if they existed in 1886. I am now wondering if Victoria possibly died somewhere else other than West Virginia or whether she is lying in Hope Cemetery in an unmarked grave and any records that may have existed now lost forever.

 

Have I conducted a thorough and exhaustive search for Victoria's date of death? Is there any other record type that I may have overlooked? Do I widen my search to the surrounding states? Your opinions are most welcome!

 

Sources:

 1. West Virginia, Failure to Find Record, 31 January 2017; citing death record search for "Victoria Spradling Kitts, 1860-1886, Kanawha County"; FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : 31 January 2017).  

2. West Virginia, Failure to Find Record, 31 January 2017; citing death record search for "Victoria Spradling Kitts, 1860-1886, all counties"; Family Search (https://www.familysearch.org : 31 January 2017)

3. West Virginia, Failure to Find Record, 1 February 2017; citing death record search for "Victoria Spradling Kitts, 1860-1886, Kanawha County; West Virginia Division of Culture and History (wvculture.org : 1 February 2017). 

4. West Virginia, Failure to Find Record, 1 February 2017; citing death record search for "Victoria Spradling Kitts, 1860-1886, all counties; West Virginia Division of Culture and History (wvculture.org : 1 February 2017).

5. West Virginia, Failure to Find Record, 30 January 2017; citing memorial search for "Victoria Spradling Kitts, 1860-1886, Kanawha County"; Find A Grave, database (www.findagrave.com : 30 January 2017).

6. West Virginia, Failure to Find Record, 30 January 2017; citing memorial search for "Victoria Spradling Kitts, 1860-1886, all counties"; Find A Grave, database (www.findagrave.com : 30 January 2017).

7. West Virginia, Failure to Find Record, 2 February 2017; citing death, funeral and/or obituary notice search for "Victoria Spradling Kitts, 1860-1886, all West Virginia newspapers"; Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Library of Congress (chroniclingamerica.loc.gov : 2 February 2017).

8. West Virginia, Failure to Find Record, 2 February 2017; citing death, funeral and/or obituary notice search for "Victoria Spradling Kitts, 1860-1886, all West Virginia newspapers"; GenealogyBank (https://www.genealogybank.com : 2 February 2017). 

9. West Virginia, Failure to Find Record, 2 February 2017; citing death, funeral and/or obituary notice search for "Victoria Spradling Kitts, 1860-1886, all West Virginia newspapers"; Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com : 2 February 2017).

10. West Virginia Vital Research Records, Death Certificates, database with images, West Virginia Division of Culture and History, (http://www.wvculture.org/vrr/va_view2.aspx?FilmNumber=1984147&ImageNumber=961 : 28 January 2017) entry for Pamelia Beatrice Cooper, 12 October 1950, certificate registered no.  12941 (1937).

11.  "Public Member Trees," database, Ancestry.com (http://person.ancestry.com/tree/84366452/person/34536465844/facts : 2 February 2017), "Neville Family Tree," profile for Thomas S. Preston (1863-1888); submitted by Colette Wilkes, user name: Colette Wilkes, undocumented data updated January 2017.

12. "Public Member Trees, " database, Ancestry.com (http://person.ancestry.com/tree/84366452/person/34536517911/facts : 2 February 2017), "Neville Family Tree," profile for Victoria Spradlin (b.1865); submitted by Colette Wilkes, user name: Colette Wilkes, undocumented data updated January 2017.

13. 1870 U.S. census, Johnson County, Kentucky, population schedule, Paintsville Precinct, Paintsville Post Office, p. 23 (penned), dwelling 155, family 156, Victoria Spradling; digital image, Ancestry.com (https://www.ancestry.com : 2 February 2017), citing National Archives microfilm publication M592, roll 477.

14. 1880 U.S. census, Johnson County, Kentucky, population schedule (1st enumeration), Paintsville,  [enumeration district (ED) 43], p . 141C (stamped), [p. 51 (penned)], dwelling 440, family 444, Victoria Spradlin; digital image, Ancestry.com (https://www.ancestry.com : 2 February 2017), citing NARA microfilm publication T9, roll 477,