Clinton Colburn and Alberta Ripley, my great-grandparents, came from rural northern Nova Scotia, Canada —specifically, the little farming and timber town of River Philip. Settled in the 1770s, the town is still populated by its immigrant families. They were Methodists from Yorkshire, England, who acquired land grants to settle this “wild” area.
The two 21-year-olds came to the US in 1889 as a couple. An apartment in this Smith Hill neighborhood house in Providence, Rhode Island, was their first home. There’s a interesting mystery as to how they started their family. The Colburns had children in 1890, 1891, and 1894, but got married in 1895. Huh? I found the record. Their marriage took place in Boston, not in Providence, by a Justice of the Peace in May 1895. At that time Alberta was pregnant with her fourth child. Had they run away from Canada? I’ve found no Canadian marriage record. Why the wait?
Whatever the family scandal or plan, the Colburns assimilated seamlessly into their new life in America—much more quickly than my many Irish Catholic relatives. By the time of their vows, they were living in their own new home, built by Clinton, who, by then, was a successful carpenter. Later, a true marriage scandal erupted when their daughter Edna (my grandmother) eloped with John Lynch (my grandfather). The Colburn’s Protestant middle-class life was rocked by a Catholic son-in-law. The damage was never fully repaired.
Visiting the Relatives 