Gilley/Crawford Family Pictures

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(These pictures will enlarge if clicked on.)

James Gilley, James Henry Hayse, Rufus  Buster Crawford, Mary Davis Gilley, Susan Eleanor Gilley Crawford holding Trevo Crawford,Lannie Crawford and Molly Hayse McDuffey.jpg (1561277 bytes)

Picture sent in by Niki Lee from Lewiston, Idaho ndlee69@hotmail.com
Left to right are James Gilley, James Henry Hayse, Rufus "Buster" Crawford, Mary Adline Davis Gilley (widow of John B Gilley), Susan Eleanor Gilley Crawford holding Trevo Crawford, child in front of her is Lannie Crawford, and to the far right is Mary Frances "Mollie" Hayse McDuffey. Photo was taken about 1903-04 at the Gilley place, which I think is near Boonsville. Mary Adline Davis Gilley is my gr-gr-grandmother.

Mary Ann Elizabeth Gilley Barfield PS jpg.jpg (4442903 bytes)   Gilley 1.jpg (508566 bytes)
  Gilley 2.jpg (359897 bytes)   Gilley 3.jpg (348458 bytes)

I am attaching four photos here. The one of Mary Ann Elizabeth Gilley Barfield is my great grandmother and she was born in 1876 so I am dating this photo to about 1882.
The other three are mystery photos. My theory on these women is that they might be three older sisters of my great grandmother. I showed these to a person recently who pointed out that none of them look like they are even related to each other and I have to concede that point. I have photos of two other sisters to my great grandmother so I know what they looked like and none of these three are either of them. It is interesting, however, that those two sisters didn't look remotely like each other, either, and at least one of them bore absolutely no resemblence to photos I have of my great grandmother in later years.
However, one of the reasons I think might point to them being related is that it appears that the photos were all taken in the same place. Each one of these people are seated in a chair that has fringe under one arm. In one of them you really can't see any fringe because there is so much damage to that part of the photo, but the arm of the chair does look similar. I have no idea if my gr gr grandparents owned such a chair or if this belonged to the photographer.
I also believe these photos might have been taken at the same time because of the hair combs each of the three older girls has in her hair. I did a little research on those types of combs and found out that these were in fashion in the 1870's and early 1880's. Whether or not the combs belonged to the girls or were props provided by the photographer is anyone's guess. Then there are the lacy looking neckerchiefs tied around the necks of each of the older girls. I couldn't find any reference to this practice at all and I Googled a lot of images of tintypes from this era and didn't find anything similar.
I obtained these tintypes from a woman in California who sent them to me in 2010. They were all in a leather pouch that had belonged to my great uncle, Lonnie Barfield, so I tend to believe that whoever they were, they were related to my family. They could be Gilleys, Barfields or Davises. I have to believe that Lonnie wouldn't have kept them all his life unless they were family. Could be a bunch of relatives got together one day and lined up to get their photograph taken. They didn't necessarily have to all be sisters. They could have been cousins, too.
One thing needs to be mentioned here....each of these four images here are tintypes and I have the originals. I only recently found out that tintypes are "flipped" images. So what you see as the right side of a person's face, etc., is actually the left side. Also, "Gilley 3" was very, very faded and slightly out of focus so that is the reason it doesn't quite "fit" with the overall look of the other ones. I adjusted it as much as I could to better show detail but this is about the best I can do for now. And you can probably see that "Gilley 2" young woman is, well, rather cross-eyed. That could be a clue perhaps to her identity.
Because there are so many blemishes on these images, and it takes so long to remove all those speckles, I decided that I would just clean up the faces for now and if someone who sees them and recognizes one as "Great Aunt Fannie" or some such thing and would like a fully restored copy, I will be happy to do that for them. And of course, I will "flip" them so they reflect accurately which side of the image is correct. Of course, I am hoping that someone can identify who these young women are.
My candidates for who they might be are: Sarah Eveline Gilley Thedford who died in 1883, Melissa Jane Gilley Hayse who died in 1891, and Frances Odus Gilley Stricklin who died in 1893.

James Wilcox Walker, wife Rebecca Emily Gilley and 7 oldest children.jpg (375454 bytes)

This photo is of James Wilcox Walker, and his wife (and my great grandmother's sister) Rebecca Emily Gilley, and their seven oldest children. If I have it all figured right, this would have been taken right after the birth of Buford Weldon Walker in 1901.
The other children are (in order of their birth) Jesse, John, James, Vera, Ellena, Dewey and the baby Buford. The original photo is in a cabinet card which gives the name of a photographer in Decatur, Texas.
One sort of interesting note to this photo is the boy on the far right, whom I figure is James, appears to be wearing a dress of some sort. That portion of the photo is not only slightly out of focus but has quite a bit of speckling and other blemishes so it isn't really clear. He seems to be wearing a suit jacket like the other two boys but if you look down it looks like he has on a pleated skirt. I know it was common at that time for little boys maybe up to the age of 2 or 3 to wear little dresses but I can't imagine why a boy of 8 or 9 would be wearing something like this. Anyway, that's just a side note to this photo....

Gilley Home - 1999.jpg (511189 bytes)

Gilley History - 1999.jpg (511252 bytes)

This picture and article are from the Bridgeport Index 1999. Click on them and they will enlarge big enough to read.