DO NOT RELY ON COPIES OF THIS NOTE IN OTHER TREES WITHOUT CHECKING THE ORIGINAL OF THIS NOTE IN MY TREE TO SEE IF I HAVE MADE UPDATES THAT HAVE MADE PRIOR COPIES IN OTHER TREES OBSOLETE.

Special Note 22 Jun 2016 - This note still needs to be gone through again to bring it up to date. The key thing changed today is that Robert Harrison's wife was actually Mary Ward and not Mary (Lake) Ward. The first item added in the 8 Jun 2012 note below is no longer considered accurate.

Special Note 8 Jun 2012 - I had to suspend the work on this note and am not yet able to resume work on it. But there are some significant things that I have learned that override what is written below:

1 - Robert Harrison's wife Mary was born Mary Lake and married a Mr. Ward who died. No documentation of this has yet been found, but family tradition has it that she made sure to tell that her birth name was Lake and not Ward.

2 - The daughters of Sarah (Harrison) Butson, Robert and Mary's daughter, apparently were sent out to be servants when their father remarried. They all lived in Reach Township in Ontario County and all married from there, with two of Mary Jane (Harrison) Lamb's children (one a step child) witnessing two of the Butson girls' weddings. So while they did live in Reach where Mary Jane lived and did clearly keep the connection with her family strong, they do not appear to have actually lived in the Lamb home.

This is not a religious issue with me. I am trying to find out the truth and not to make an argument. I am trying to find as much data as possible and evaluate it and come to the conclusions that the data supports. So if anyone has other data that I have not included here or has any evidence-backed conclusions that conflict with or support my conclusions, I very much want to hear from you, so that I can include it with the rest of the data and determine whether it changes things.

The records and published family trees give varying and often conflicting visions of the children of Robert Harrison and Mary Ward. The records of births in Canada in the 1820's to 1840's do not exist in many cases. Thus census records, marriage records, death records, and grave stone information yield clues about the births but not certainty. The loss of the 1851 Reach Township population census makes this even more difficult. And the records that do survive sometimes conflict with each other. So it is not surprising that researchers working on the family have conflicting representations as well. This research note brings together all that I have found on each child and tries to sift through the evidence and come to conclusions that have clear evidence trails. The key questions are these:

Before examining the children, Robert and Mary require scrutiny of what I know about them.

Robert Harrison was born about 1801 in Ireland. I conjecture that this was in the Protestant area of Northern Ireland, since the 1861 census shows his religion as "U P" (United Presbyterian), which indicates likely ancestry from Scotland and thus Scot-Irish. I have no information about when he came to Canada. But since Mary was not born in Ireland, they must have married in Canada. And the 1861 census explicitly gives the year of their marriage as 1828. So he must have arrived in Canada in or before 1828. Robert died 18 Nov 1865, which is known only through a newspaper article.

Mary was born in Canada about 1801. I know nothing of her parents nor where she was born. I have a tentative hypothesis that she was born in or near Kingston. I do not know if her parents had been Loyalists who moved to Canada from the States, but this is a possibility that cannot yet be ruled in or out. The only evidence that provides Mary's maiden name is the 4 Nov 1910 Reach Township death record of her daughter Mary Jane Harrison, as Mary Jane Lamb, since she married Hiram Lamb. Mary was living when Robert died in 1865. However, she does not appear to be included in the 1871 census, so that she apparently had died by 1871.

I am told that there is a history of the family that was written by Charles Edwin Lamb's daughter Gwendoline (Etty) Lamb, who interviewed her father, that shows Mary's maiden name as Lake and her parents as James and Mary Lake. However this is highly surprising, since it was the same Charles Edwin Lamb who certified on the death record of his mother Mary Jane (Harrison) Lamb that her mother's maiden name was Mary Ward. I have not seen the history that has been passed down. Did he write it before or after his mother's death? Had he discovered new information after his mother's death that led him to conclude that he was wrong about her mother's surname? I would really like to have a copy of this history, in order to evaluate it and understand just how Charles Edwin Lamb came to certify the name Ward for Mary and also to write a history that said that her name was Lake. In either case, the fact that he had identified first names for her parents gives us a bit more information -- if he was correct about them.

However, there is another possible explanation for two different maiden names for Robert Harrison's wife. And that is that he may have married twice, both times with a Mary. There is good reason to suspect this was the case. There is a gap of about 9 years between the birth of son James (c 1838) and daughter Caroline (c 1847). And if the first Mary was born about the same time as Robert, she would have been 46 years old at the birth of her daughter Caroline. Of course, an unexpected late pregnancy - although rare - is not unheard of, so that it cannot be ruled out. But the main evidence against two marriages is the fact that the 1861 census shows Mary the same age, 60, as Robert. So even if he had remarried, the second wife would have had the same late pregnancy issue. It may be that there were some lost children, children who died as infants, during the 9 year gap. But by the birth of James, Mary was already about 37 years old. So it would not be surprising that there were no more children between James and Caroline. But the possibility can not be ruled out. However, the hypothesis of a remarriage of Robert seems very unlikely, given Mary's age in the 1861 census.

The earliest documents I have thus far for Robert is the 1 Dec 1851 purchase, recorded 16 Jan 1852, by Robert Harrison (from the original 17 Feb 1843 crown patent grantee Samuel Fowler and his wife) of the 100 acres of the West Half of Lot 26 on Concession 10 of Ops Township in Victoria County.

The next earliest record is the 1851 agricultural census, actually taken in 1852, of Reach Township in Ontario County. (The population schedule that was taken with this agricultural census is lost.) He appears as the owner of 50 acres of Lot 17 of Concession 1 or Reach Township in Ontario County.

It is not inconsistent that he would be living in 1852 in Reach Township while having just purchased 100 acres in Ops Township in 1852. Keep in mind that this was in the dead of Winter, and the land in Ops probably had no buildings in which to live. So the actual move from Reach to Ops probably did not happen until the warmer months of 1852.

Various online trees and queries and web sites have different children for the family. Here are all of those who I have seen as possible children, listed in approximate order of birth with approximate birth years as best as I have been able to establish at this time -- which will all be evaluated with the evidence that follows below.

I suspect that if William and Robert were children, then they were actually born before Caroline, since only James and Caroline were still living with their parents in the 1861 census. Of course, they could also have died by 1861, but the source for them (http://www.cousinconnect.com/d/a/79347) shows no dates of death. It is already surprising that Caroline was born when her mother was about 46 years old. It would be even more surprising if there were even later births of this mother. Nevertheless, in the research for this document, I will pursue the search for William and Robert.

There is a common thread in most of the children and their descendants: they mostly wound up living in Ontario County. The family first settled into Reach Township of Ontario County some time before 1852, when Robert Harrison appears in the agricultural census. Daughter Sarah married Henry Butson from the adjoining Whitby Township in 1852. The main part of the family moved on to Ops Township in Victoria County for several decades. But Mary Jane remained behind in Whitby Township as a hired servant, eventually marrying the widowed Hiram Lamb and settling in Reach Township.

Gradually most of the family moved back to Ontario County, which Mary Jane never left. The first to come, in the 1860's, were the Butson daughters of Sarah, after Sarah had died and her husband remarried. The Butson girls apparently lived with the Lambs, and Mary Jane's daughter Etta witnessed the marriages of two of her cousins.

By 1891, Harriet was living in Scott Township of Ontario County. And eventually Amarilla lived out her last days in Reach Township. So all four of the girls (or their daughters in the case of the deceased Sarah) eventually settled again in Ontario County.

The family began in the Kingston area (Frontenac County) and adjoining Addington and Lennox County (a single county with two names) and spent a couple of decades in Ops Township in Victoria County after living for a while in Ontario County. But it was to Ontario County that most of them eventually returned.

The 1861 Census of Ops Township in Victoria County is the only record I have found that shows some of the members of the family still together: http://search.ancestry.com/Browse/view.aspx?dbid=1570&path=Canada+West.Victoria.425

Several of the children are already living apart from the family. The page shows three separate families:

Since 1852 was a census year, this is particularly important. As already shown in the discussion of Robert and Mary above, the 1852 agricultural census of Reach Township in Ontario County shows Robert Harrison owning 50 acres on Lot 17 of Concession 1 of Reach Township in Ontario County. This lot is adjacent to Lot 11 of Concession 9 of Whitby Township in Ontario County. Henry Butson's father and brothers appear on Lots 8 and 6 of Concession 9 of Whitby Township in Ontario County (and another brother on Lot 6 Conc 8). Furthermore, the road system leads directly from Robert's lot to one of the Butson lots. In addition, one of the Harrison daughters not appearing in the Ops 1861 census had remained in Whitby Township (Mary Jane, who later married and lived out her live in Reach) when the main part of the family moved to Ops.

Amarilla (29 - c 1832) and her husband John Martin (29) are living near next to his widowed mother and his siblings in Verulam Township of Victoria County (http://search.ancestry.com/Browse/view.aspx?dbid=1570&path=Canada+West.Victoria.456) with their children Irvine (4) and Robert (1).

The religions of the family members deserve consideration. The core family and Harriet's family appear as United Presbyterian. Sarah's adjacent family and Amarilla's more distant family appear as Wesleyan Methodist. It is unclear what Mary Jane's religion was in the 1861 census, since she is shown with the same religion (apparently Church of England) as the family she served. However, in the 1871 census, she also appears as Wesleyan Methodist. So the oldest child remained with the parents' religion (as did the children still living with their parents), but all three of the younger daughters became Wesleyan Methodist.

The earliest solid date for Harriet is that she married in 1846. This is explicitly stated in the 1861 census. I have not found the marriage record. (Many Ontario marriage records from this period have either not survived or have yet to be found.) Her husband was Richard Nugent (also spelled Nugant and Nugeant in various records).

Harriet is the only member of the Harrison family to appear in the 1851 census (which was actually taken in 1852). Since she had married in 1846, she and her husband settled in Manvers Township in Durham County, separate from the rest of the Harrison family who were all in Reach Township in 1851-1852, and the Reach Township 1851/2 census population schedule is lost (althought the agricultural census survives and does show Robert Harrison as noted above).

The 1851/2 census of Manvers Township in Durham County shows Harriet at age 23, which calculates to a birth year of about 1829. This fits perfectly with the explicit marriage year of 1828 that her parents stated in the 1861 census. It makes her age 17 at the time of her 1846 marriage. She appears in the 1851/2 census with her husband Richard Nugent (30, born Ireland) and son Samuel (1, born Canada). They are United Presbyterian in religion.

The 1861 census of Ops Township in Victoria County shows Harriet at age 32, which one again calculates to a birth year of about 1829. Harriet and Richard had re-joined her parents, so that they appear on the same census page. Their children are now Samuel (10), Robert (7), Thomas (5), and John James (3). They remain United Presbyterian in religion.

On Friday, 17 Nov 1865, as reported in the "Lindsay Post" of 24 Nov 1865, Harriet's husband Richard Nugent and her father Robert Harrison got into a fight. The article explicitly identifes Robert as the father-in-law of Richard. This is the only document that definitively provides evidence for Harriet as a child of Robert and Mary Harrison.

The 1871 census of Ops Township in Victoria County shows Harriet at age 43, which calculates to a birth year of about 1828. Her brother James is shown on the second-next page. With her are husband Richard and their children: Samuel (19), Robert (16), Thomas (13), John James (12), Mary (9), Richard (7), Margaret (5), and Joseph (2). They are Presbyterian in religion. Harriet is shown as over 20 unable to write.

The 1881 census of Ops Township in Victori County shows Harriet at age 50, which calculates to a birth year of about 1831. She and husband Richard are shown with their children: Robert (26), Thomas (24), John James (22), Richard (18). I suspect that there may have been an error in the sequence of pages in the census. The page with the family ends after Richard (http://search.ancestry.com/Browse/view.aspx?dbid=1577&path=Ontario.Victoria+South.Ops.29). However the fifth following page (http://search.ancestry.com/Browse/view.aspx?dbid=1577&path=Ontario.Victoria+South.Ops.31) begins with Joseph Nugent (11) and Matilda (9), who apparently have nothing to do with the family at the end of the page preceding them (Richard and Catherine White). So I believe that the Joseph and Matilda shown on this page were the children of Richard and Harriet. And this is further supported by the fact that the very next family on the page is that of Richard and Harriet's now-married son Samuel.

The 1891 census of Scott Township in Ontario County shows harriet at age 62, which calculates to a birth year of about 1829. Her husband has died, and she is a widow, living with her son Thomas (33) and his wife. They are all Presbyterian in religion. By coincidence, there is an R. B. Harrison living next to them. However, he was born c1844 to English-born parents and so clearly is not a sibling of Harriet.

All indications are that she was born either in late 1828 or in 1829. There is no direct indication yet found in any record of her birthplace, so that it must be surmised from information found for other family members. Since her parents explicitly stated (in the 1861 census) that they were married in 1828, Harriet must have been their first child.

The 1865 newspaper article definitely links Harriet as the child of Robert and Mary, since Robert Harrison is explicity identified as the father-in-law of her husband Richard Nugent. However it is worth examining what the case for this connection would look like without that article. Without the article, there is no document that provides a definitive connection. There is only the circumstance of them being on the same page of the 1861 census and of the right ages. There is also the fact that Harriet's second son was named Robert, which is what would be expected: if the first son was named after the father's father, then the second would be named after the mother's father. But this is really all the evidence that there would have been without the newspaper article, so that it would have been a conjecture to connect Harriet as the daughter of Robert and Mary, based on relatively little evidence.

Mary Jane was particularly important in the family - and also the most unique. When the rest of the family moved to Ops Township in Victoria County in 1861, Mary Jane remained in Ontario County as a 28-year-old single hired servant. She was the last of the four daughters to marry: Harriet married in 1846, Sarah in 1852 (both at age 17), and Amarilla in 1856 (age 23), but Mary Jane did not marry until 1864, at age 31. And she married a widower about 12 years older than her, who had at least 7 children. But most importantly, Mary Jane provided a solid base for the Harrison family in the Lamb family home on Lot 13 of Concession 5 in Reach Township of Ontario County. When sister Sarah became the first of the Harrison children to die and her husband, Henry Butson, remarried, Sarah's four Butson daughters came from Ops Township to live in Reach Township (with Mary Jane's daughter Etta witnessing the marriages of two of her Butson cousins). And though sister Amarilla lived most of her life in Verulam Township of Victoria County, it was at Mary Jane's home in Reach Township that she died in 1919 (after both Mary Jane and her husband Hiram Lamb had passed away in 1910 and 1907 respectively).

The earliest document that I have found for Mary Jane is the 1861 census of East Whitby Township of Ontario County which shows her age 28, which calculates to a birth year of about 1833. She is single and a hired servant in the home of the family of Jacob and Parmilia Smith (apparently one of three hired servants, the others being Margaret Hartwell and Charles Barrowman). Everyone in the house, except the Scotland-born Charles Barrowman are shown with religion E, which could be either Church of England or Episcopalian, which is the same thing.

I have not yet found the marriage record of Mary Jane Harrison and Hiram Lamb, but it was clearly about 1864, and some other trees on the Internet have the specific date of 11 Feb 1864, with the marriage taking place in Reach Township in Ontario County. This was where Hiram Lamb lived on Lot 13 of Concession 5.

The 1871 census of Reach Township of Ontario County shows her age 39, which calculates to a birth year of about 1832. She and her husband Hiram Lamb are shown with his and their children: Ira (20), Francis (17), Mary A (14), Hiram (11), Leslie (8), William W (6 - actually John Wesley), Hylday (3 - actually Hulda), Charles (7/12, born Aug 1870). The family is Wesleyan Methodist in religion. This census is of particular interest, since deceased sister Sarah's four Butson daughters apparently went unrecorded in the 1871 census. However, they show up in Reach Township in the 1870's marriage records, with two of their marriages being witnessed by Mary Jane's daugther Etta. So it is not clear when the four Butson girls came from Ops Township to Reach Township: they were definitely in Ops in 1861 and definitely in Reach by Emma Butson's 24 May 1876 marriage.

The 1881 census of Reach Townhip of Ontario County shows her age 49, which calculates to a birth year of about 1832. She and her husband Hiram Lamb are shown with his and their children: Francis (28), Hiram Jr (22), Wm? Leslie (20), John Wesley (16), Etta (13), Charles Edwin (10). The family is "P Meth" [Primitive Methodist?] in religion.

The 1891 census of Reach Township of Ontario County shows her age 58, which calculates to a birth year of about 1833. She is listed simply as Jane, along with husband Hiram Lamb, and his and their children: Hiram (31), Charles (20). Their son Wesley (27) is living next door with wife Lydia (21) and son Clarence (2). The main family religion is Methodist, but Wesley's family is B. C. [Bible Christian - which makes me wonder if Lydia's recorded English origin was really Cornwall].

The 1901 census of Reach Township of Ontario County shows her age 68 with an explicit birth date of 8 Jul 1832. She and husband Hiram are living in the household headed by their unmarried son Charles E (29=8 Aug 1871), so that all in the household are listed with their relation to Charles: brother John W (35=13 Jun 1865), nephew Clarence W (10=9 Apr 1890), nephew Deward? P (7=29 Apr 1893), cousin Mary J Martin (32=17 Sep 1868 - she and Charles would marry 25 Apr 1904). Next door, there is a Thomas Martin (70=30 Oct 1822, Ireland, arrived 1850, English church) with daughter Elizabeth J (50=25 Mar 1851, Ireland, arrived 1850 [yes, it really shows her born Ireland 1851 but arriving in Canada 1850], English church); I do not know if they are related to sister Amarilla Harrison's husband (and Mary Jane Martin's father) John Martin. The Lamb family religion is Methodist.

Mary Jane died 4 Nov 1910 where she lived, on Lot 13 of Concession 5 of Reach Township of Ontario County. Her youngest son Edwin, who now was the head of household for this property, certified her facts on her death record: explicit birth date 7 Jul 1832, born in Frontenac County, age 78 years, 3 months, 28 days, widow, housewife, father Robert Harrison, mother Mary Ward. The nearest post office was at Manchester, which is how Charles recorded his address. The primary cause of her death, under the care of D. Archer, MD, of Port Perry, was Pleuro Pneumonia, of five days duration, with an immediate cause of Heart Failure.

It seems certain that she was born in July, either July 7 or July 8. The 1901 census records 8 Jul and her death record 7 Jul. So it is impossible from these records alone to know which was the correct date. Both give an explicit year of 1832, which does conform better than any other year to her various census ages. In particular, it seems to be 1 year older than Amarilla, which makes Mary Ann the second child and Amarilla the third. But it also raises a problem, since Amarilla was most likely born 15 Jan 1833 (and the evidence for her year seems slightly stronger than 1832 does for Mary Jane's birth year). If Mary Jane was born 7 or 8 Jul 1832, that leaves only 7 months and 10 days (192 days) between the births. This just does not seem likely.

Another way of looking at it is to see the gap between Harriet and Mary Jane. While it is possible that a child was born between Harriet and Mary Jane and then died young, if there were no such child, then we are looking at a gap of about 3 to 3.5 years between Harriet and a Jul 1832 birth for Mary Jane, followed by a 7 month gap between Mary Jane and Amarilla.

Despite the explicit birth years in 1901 and 1910, I suspect that Mary Jane may not really have known her true birth year and that she was in fact born in 1831 and not in 1832. This would give a 2 to 2.5 year gap between her and Harriet and a 1.5 year gap between her and Amarilla.

I am considering Amarilla next because there is a slight preponderance of conflicting evidence that she was the next child and not Mary Jane. Since I have no information on the parents of Robert and Mary (Ward) Harrison, I do not know if his mother was Harriet and hers was Amarilla, but that certainly is something that would not have been surprising.

Other trees give an exact marriage date of 1 Apr 1856, but I have found no marriage record yet. (Many Ontario marriage records from this period have either not survived or have yet to be found.) The 1901 census gives her oldest son Irvine's birthdate as 16 Mar 1857.

The 1861 census of Verulam Township of Victoria County is the earliest record and solid date that I have for Amarilla. Her age is 29, which calculates to a birth year of about 1833. She and her husband John Martin are living in a 1.5 story log house with their children: Irvine (4), Robert (3) and Eva (1). The family is Wesleyan Methodist in religion.

The 1871 census of Verulam Township of Victoria County shows her age as 37, which calculates to a birth year of about 1834. She and her husband John Martin are living with their children Irvine (14), Robert (12), Margret (10) - not sure if this is the Eva from the 1861 census or a different child), Eliza (7), John (5), Mary Jane (3), and William (1). They are Wesleyan Methodist in religion.

The 1881 census of Verulam Township of Durham County shows her age as 48, which calculates to a birth year of about 1833. She and her husband John Martin are living with their children: Irvin (24), Robert (22), Margaret (20), Eliza (17), John (15), Mary Jane (13), William (11), James (9), Seragh Anne (7), Harriet (5). The family is Methodist in religion.

The 1891 census of Verulam Township of Victoria County shows her age as 57, which calculates to a birth year of about 1834. There is a problem with this census -- both at the time and with the images as they now are on Ancestry. At the time, someone apparently gave the census taker erroneous information: though Amarilla was older than John, their ages are both given as 57, and though Amarilla was born in Ontario, her birthplace is given as Quebec. The Ancestry image problem is that the family begins at the end of the page on one image (http://search.ancestry.com/Browse/view.aspx?dbid=1274&path=Ontario.Victoria+South.Verulam.6), but the next image in Ancestry's files is a page from Waterloo County and not the image with the rest of the family. I have reported this to Ancestry but have not heard from them yet that the problem is resolved. She and John (and everyone else on this page of the census) are Methodist in religion.

In the 1901 census of Verulam Township of Victoria County shows her age as 68 with an explicit birth date of 15 Jan 1833. She is widowed and living with her widowed son Irvine (44=16 Mar 1857) and his children John C. (12=16 May 1888) and Violet E. (4=21 Dec 1896). They are all Methodist in religion.

Amarilla died 21 Feb 1919 on Lot 13 Concession 5 of Reach Township of Ontario County -- her sister Mary Jane Lamb's home. Her age is given as 87 years, 1 month and 6 days, which calculates to a birth date of 15 Jan 1832. The informant was W. M. ?Lascher? (I cannot read the last name, and it does not match any of the family that I have yet encountered.) She died six weeks after fracturing a limb. While this may look like her coming to her deceased sister Mary Jane's home for her last year, it really was more likely that the home was now that of her own daughter Mary Jane Martin who had married her (Mary Jane Martin's) first cousin, Mary Jane (Harrison) Lamb's son Charles.

There is real conflict about her birth year, although the month and day do seem to have been 15 Jan. The explicit reference while she was alive gives the year as 1833, so that I am inclined to believe that. An error of a year in her age on her death record could account for the date on that record. 1833 also conforms more with all the ages for her on the censuses than does 1832. So I believe that Amarilla's birth was most probably 15 Jan 1833, making her the third child in the family, after Harriet and Mary Jane.

Sarah was the first of the children to die, sometime in the period 1861-1867. This predates the 1870 birth of Charles Edwin Lamb, who was the main source of the the family history that has passed down. So he had no experience of Sarah. And his only experience of her daughters, his cousins was when he was very young, since they had all moved away by the time he was 10. So this has apparently led to the omission of Sarah from Charles Edwin Lamb's account of the family, even though his older sister and half-brother witnessed the marriages of two of Sarah's daughters, so that they clearly were aware of their cousins.

Thus Sarah is a very special case among the children. She was dead by the time most of the next generation were old enough to remember. And her four daughters moved away by the mid-1880's -- after they apparently moved to Reach Township of Ontario County about 1868 where were apparently taken in by either or both of their Aunt Mary Jane (Harrison) Lamb or their Uncle William Butson after Sarah Harrison's husband Henry Butson remarried in Jan 1868. So even Sarah's daughters were outside the personal experience and developed memory of their younger cousins - Charles Edwin Lamb, in particular. Thus the consideration of Sarah challenges the account left by Charles Edwin Lamb and requires more documentation than for the other sisters.

The first document I have found for Sarah is the 1861 census, since the 1851/2 population census of Reach Township is lost. After the fact records provide some dates for events in her life prior to 1861. Her marriage with Henry Butson is explicity given as 1852 in the 1861 census. No records have yet been found for the births of her first two daughters, Mary Jane and Emma, who were born about 1854-1855. She may have lost some children, since there is a gap after that until the 29 Aug 1859 birth of daughter Susanna in Ops Township in Victoria County, which is known from Susanna's 1862 baptism (Methodist).

The 1861 census of Ops Township in Victoria County shows her age as 26, which calculates to a birth year of about 1835. She appears with her husband Henry Butson and their daughters: Mary Jane (7), Emily (6), Susan (2). The family is Wesleyan Methodist in religion. They are the immediate next family after the Harrison family. The family of sister Harriet (Harrison) Nugent is further up the page.

The 10 Nov 1862 Methodist baptism in Ops Township of Victoria County of her daughters Susanna and Sarah is the next record but does not give her age nor maiden name. In fact, it really does not even verify that Sarah (the mother) was still alive.

I have found no other contemporary records of Sarah. The next thing that is known is that her husband, a widower, remarried with a widow in Reach Township in Ontario County 3 Jan 1868. So Sarah had died sometime between 2 Jul 1861 and 3 Jan 1868. Her widowed husband Henry Butson's new family appears in the 1871 census of Verulam Township in Victoria County, but Sarah's four daughters are not living with their father and his new wife: the children in the home are those from the new wife's first marriage and two new half-brothers of Sarah's daughters. In fact, I have been completely unable to locate Sarah's four daughters in the 1871 census, so that I suspect that they were living a life with no real home but were instead moving from one Aunt or Uncle's home to another.

As noted above, since Sarah died and her daughters moved away, the family history that relied on the memory of Charles Edwin Lamb has omitted them, since Charles Ediwn Lamb was not born until 1870, at least 3 years after Sarah had died, and since he was still a child when his older Butson cousins had moved away, so that he had no personal experience of Sarah and very little personal experience of her daughters, although his older siblings clearly did know their cousins, since they witnessed two of their marriages.

In addition, there are no specific documents that explicitly show Sarah as the daughter of Robert and Mary Harrison. The same could be said of Harriet, if it were not for the 1865 newspaper article about her husband and father. The point here is that the norm of the records of the period was that maiden names of mothers were extremely rare. Mary, the mother of all of these children, only appears with her maiden name in the death record of her daughter Mary Jane (and even that maiden name is disputed by the family history that passed down from Gwen Lamb). So the absence of a definitive document proving that Sarah was the daughter of Robert and Mary is the norm and not the exception. Thus the relationship can only be determined through the accumulated weight of the indirect evidence. And as it turns out that weight is considerable and shows a strong and close connection of Sarah and her daughters to the rest of the family over the course of several decades and in both Ontario and Victoria counties.

The population schedule of the 1851 census (which was actually taken in 1852) for Reach Township of Ontario County has not survived, but the agricultural census has survived. The 1851 population census is crucial to the Harrison family history for a lot of reasons, since it was probably the only record that showed almost all of the children -- including Sarah -- still living with their parents. But that record is gone. What does survive in the agricultural census is the record of Robert Harrison owning ?? acres on Lot ?? of Concession 1.