The Sad Story of Edith E. Johnson, an Upper Peninsula Homesteader
Edith E. Johnson was a homesteader in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. She was only 20 years old when she received her late husband’s homestead in 1899, following his death at age 27.
Under the 1862 Homestead Act, a widow received rights to her husband’s homestead if he died before proving up on it. Orphan children could similarly be awarded the family homestead if both parents had died before a patent had been issued by the General Land Office for the land. While Mrs. Johnson’s situation is an example of a widow receiving rights to her deceased husband’s unpatented homestead, there are other circumstances that make her story quite unusual and most unfortunate.
First, let’s meet Mrs. Edith E. Johnson, whose full maiden name was Edith Elizabeth Johnston. Edith was born May 17, 1879, in the small lakeside village of St. Ignace in Mackinac County, Michigan. Her parents were William Johnston and Jane (Hill) Johnston.
When Edith was a young girl, her father filed on a 159.90-acre homestead in Cedar Township in Mackinac County, Michigan. The land was located near St. Ignace, near where Lake Michigan and Lake Huron connect. In the 1880s, land in this region was (and remains today) partly forested but was judged by the land office as principally valuable as agricultural land, thereby qualifying it to be available for homesteading. After living on the land with his family for at least five years and meeting requirements to make improvements and farm part of it, William received title to his homestead on November 23, 1891. In 1892 a young Swedish immigrant, Gustave Johnson, settled on adjacent land that was still unclaimed and available for homesteading. Gustave Johnson formally applied for a 160.10-acre homestead on November 4, 1892 at the U.S. Land Office in St. Ignace, Michigan. But between settling on the land and officially establishing a claim to it, Gustave married William Johnston’s young daughter, Edith.
Edith undoubtedly met her future husband as a result of his settling on land adjacent to her father’s homestead. Yet their marriage at her very young age likely was surprising, if not concerning, to her family. Marriage records of Mackinac County, Michigan report that Edith married September 1, 1892 at Hessel, Michigan, when she was only 13 years old -- an age further confirmed by what is reported on her death certificate as well as being consistent with information in the 1880 and 1900 census. Gustave was 21 when they married in 1892. He was born in May of 1871 in Sweden and died September 11, 1898.
According to his death certificate, the cause of Gustave’s death was “a gunshot wound (accidental) through head.” How the “accident” happened was not further explained on his death certificate or in the homestead file in the National Archives showing that his homestead was patented to his widow, Edith, after his death.
Less than a month before his death, Gustave had been naturalized on August 16, 1898 by the Mackinac County Court at proceedings held in St. Ignace. Becoming a U.S. citizen was required under homestead law to receive a homestead, but his death happened before he could initiate actions to “prove up” on his claim. He would have done that by submitting final proof that he had met all requirements. It would have been accomplished by Gustave providing a sworn statement at the U.S. Land Office in St. Ignace. Also, similar sworn statements of two witnesses would have been required to affirm Gustave’s testimony.
But with Gustave’s untimely death, his young widow, Edith, initiated the same process on October 10, 1898, just under a month after his accident. During her sworn statement made to officials in the Land Office, she described what improvements had been made to the land: “The house was built in May 1892 and he [Gustave] established actual residence at the same time - 1 log house 18 ft. x 14 ft., 1 log barn 18 ft. x 14 ft., Total value about $250.”
Edith also reported that: “It is farming land with some hardwood timber on it,” with “from 1 to 8 acres [cultivated] for 5 seasons.”
Edith further told that she had “2 children” at the time of her husband’s death and that she was age “20,” though the preponderance of other information indicates that more likely she was 19. But her statement also was confusing about citizenship. While she was born in Michigan, she answered “I am not” to a question asking her if “she” were a native-born citizen. Instead, she answered the question as if asked of her late Swedish-born husband, further stating that evidence of her husband’s American citizenship had been submitted.
Previously, Gustave Johnson had stated on November 4, 1892 that: “[my] settlement was commenced August 1892 – that my improvements consist of 1 acre cleared. Log shanty.” That sworn statement is also in the same record packet for this homestead along with Edith’s later statement that settlement commenced in “May” of 1892. (These are examples that sometimes records found in the official homestead casefiles in the National Archives may include certain contradictions or errors.) But in this case, these minor discrepancies did not result in any problems in Edith getting the homestead.
After Edith’s sworn statement and those of her two witnesses were made on October 10, 1898 in St. Ignace at the U.S. Land Office, Edith paid the final $4 fee due for the homestead on October 24, 1898. Rather than returning to St. Ignace to do it, which would have required another long wagon ride, she made payment at the nearby town of Hessel where a Land Office “Receiver” was stationed.
On July 26, 1899, Edith received a patent for the homestead issued by the General Land Office. At that time, she was not only a young widow, but she had a third child born to her after her husband’s death. The 1900 federal census reported that as of June 1, 1900, she was apparently living with her parents in Cedar Township, Mackinac County, Michigan, and that she was the mother of three young children who were also living with her and her parents. When the census was recorded at Edith’s parents’ home on June 29, 1900, it reported information on all people residing there who were alive on June 1, 1900. Although Edith was alive on June 1st, she had died on June 25, 1900 at “age 20” of “pulmonary consumption” (TB) in Cedar Township in Mackinac County, Michigan. While her death was four days before the census taker arrived at her parents’ home to record all the people living there, according to rules set for the 1900 census, Edith was still listed as “alive.”
Edith E. Johnson was granted her 160.10-acre homestead on July 26, 1899 as a widow, but then died less than a year after receiving it. Assuming she left no will, Michigan State law would have required that her property would first go to pay legal debts and the remainder directed for the benefit of her three young children. A guardian would have been appointed for her children, usually a relative or a neighbor - perhaps her father, William Johnston. However, William died on August 30, 1905, also of Tuberculosis, at Cedarville, a small town around 6-10 miles east of his homestead farm in Mackinac County, Michigan. Edith’s mother, who outlived her husband and children, cared for at least one of Edith’s orphan children.
In all, there were no fewer than six deaths of family members connected to Edith E. Johnson besides her own death, with all seven deaths occurring in the 1890s and early 1900s in Mackinac County (Edith, her husband, her father, 2 sisters, and the 2 children of a sister). The tale of this young widow, who received a homestead at age 20, is especially poignant to me from another angle. She is the youngest person I have researched so far to have received a homestead, and the youngest homesteader to have died so soon after getting a homestead, at only age 21.
Edith E. Johnson’s history, though sad, illustrates that stories of actual homesteaders and their experiences help us better understand what homestead life was really like in our nation at different times and in different places. Starting in the 1860s, and lasting for more than a century, around 1.6 million men and women received “free” federal land under a variety of homestead laws beginning with the most remarkable 1862 Homestead Act. Edith E. Johnson was one of them.
