Z – ZERO Records for Bessie

Pearl asked: What happened to Josie’s daughter Bessie after she left George’s house?

Bessie was my grandmother Pearl’s niece. Because they were nearly the same age, my grandmother thought of Bessie and her brother Charlie as cousins more than niece and nephew. Josephine, their mother, was my grandmother’s oldest sister. There were 19 years between them.

Josephine’s husband, Charlie Robertson left her when Bessie was five years old and her son Charlie was three. He last appeared in the 1891 city directory. Josephine died between 1891 and the 1900 census. Indiana did not keep death records at the time and there don’t seem to be death lists in the newspapers so I cannot be sure of the exact date. I know she lived long enough to stand in front of her son’s photograph and cry.

Young Charlie doesn’t reappear in the record until 1917 with his draft registration card. He appears to have been drafted and then gone AWOL. He’s also changed his name to Harry Delos Robertson. In 1925 Charlie Jr. aka Harry, married in Michigan. His parents were listed as Charles Robertson and Josie Campbell. He was born 6 Dec. 1888 in Indianapolis. This is our Charles/Harry. He appears in every census after this in Michigan, working as a barber. In his draft registrations he’s described as blond, blue eyed, medium height and build and white. He died in Michigan in 1961.

The father never reappears after 1891. He is no longer in the Indianapolis City Directory as a shoemaker. From the time he and Josephine married in 1887, his address changed every year until he disappeared after 1891.

Although I’ve searched for years, I have been unable to find Bessie after the 1900 census. I’ve searched for Bessie, Betsey and Elizabeth with surnames Campbell (her mother’s maiden name), Reed (Josephine’s family name) and Robertson (Josephine’s married name.), with zero luck.

In 1900, 14 year old Bessie was living in Indianapolis with her grandmother and aunts and uncles. According to the census, everybody was born in Kentucky. Before that, oral history says she was left behind with her mother when the elder Charles left with his son. Was she his daughter? Did he leave her because she was a girl? Was she unable to pass for white? Unless one of Bessie’s descendants reads this post and clues us in, all we know is that she left because George, my grandmother’s oldest brother, was too strict.

An idea has been gnawing at me. The circus… Do you think that may be Bessie in the pink tutu, riding bareback on the brown horse?