Ancestors from England

My cousin Carl Taylor has written a book about the Taylor part of the family where he traces the Taylors and Starbucks back all the way back to England. Both families came to Nantucket Island and settled before coming to the main land. Anyone interested in this can read his book.

My grandpa Taylor was born out of wedlock. When his mother married she married a Drury. Her name was Jermima Taylor. I remember her well. When I was a boy she lived with my great uncle Audie Drury her second son. Many times after church my family would go to their farm for Sunday dinner (lunch). She did not get around very well so she used a cane with a crook. She had some bantam chickens and we would chase them to make her mad. If we got too close to her she would catch us around the neck with the crook of her cane and pull us up close to her and with her boney knuckles go over our head and really work us over. When she was on her death bed my mom and dad took their turn during the week going over to uncle Audie’s house to set up with her at night. We would be at home by ourselves and my dad would come home in time to make our breakfast and get us off to school. On the night she died when my dad started to leave uncle Audie’s house the cat had crawled up the screen door with its back to the house door. When dad open the door the cat squalled and slide down the screen door and my dad almost had a heart attack. You need to know that my father was afraid of dead people. He always said that if he had a flat tire on his car at night by a cemetery he would set in the car until daylight before he try to change the tire.

            My Grandma Taylor’s maiden name was Starbuck. Her dad was an itinerant preacher and had no affiliation with any denomination. Grandpa Daniel Starbuck and Grandma Sarah Gunter Starbuck died before I was born. Grandma Taylor married three times. All of her children were born of her first marriage.  Their names were Floyd, Loy, Lola, Viola, Gladys, Homer, Webby, who died as a baby, and Clara. I am not sure of the order of birth but Floyd was the oldest and Clara was the youngest.

            I do not know the names of her two other husbands except the last one was named Taylor also but no relation to the first husband. Her first husband was a drunk and a womanizer. Grandma told me that many nights she went to sleep with him standing over her bed cursing her. He would leave home and be gone for months at a time and come home and leave after she was pregnant. She finally divorced him when my mother was a small child. My grandmother’s name was Gertie Taylor. Her mother was Sarah Elizabeth Gunter Starbuck who died July 1, 1920. In Sarah’s obituary grandma Taylor’s name is listed as Gertie Roselia. My uncle Homer Taylor who died May 11, 1907 obituary listed his mother as Gertie Starbuck. Her grandchildren put the tombstone at her grave site without contacting my mother and they wrote her name as Gertrude. This upset my mother because she said her name was Gertie not Gertrude. Aunt Gladys confirmed what my mother said. All of the other children were dead at the time of the placing of the tombstone. I have Grandma’s Bible where she wrote the family names and she has her name as Girty. I lived with her during my high school years and we talked much about her family and her marriages. We talked about why she divorced her husband’s. She told me many stories but more on that later.