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Dorothy “Dolly” Rochford Roberts (daughter of George and Lizzie) Click here to view a detailed list of Dorothy and Mack’s descendants. |
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Joyce Young has done extensive research on her grandmother, Dorothy Roberts. Click here to view her research results. |
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Sheila’s (4) Reminiscences, 2006 My mother Dorothy Rochford Roberts (3), third child of George and Lizzie, was the first to survive past infancy. In the early part of the 20th century, losing a child was much more common. George’s brother John (2) and Nellie had six children but only three survived past infancy. Tuberculosis (consumption) ravaged young adults. Perhaps that is why physicians seemed convinced slim, pale Dorothy was at risk. She went to England with her mom, who was pregnant with Betty, born July 17, 1908. Her mom returned to Canada in the fall, and Dorothy stayed with family in Convetry until returning to Canada alone at age seven in the spring! When in grade four, Dorothy could answer questions the grade eight students in the room couldn’t. But the doctor advised against sending her to high school – too hard for a ‘delicate’ child. Just a few months later, she was sent out to work. Hardly easier than school. She soon moved up to bookkeeping and managing the small office of a lingerie manufacturer. Her father George (2) died when she was twenty. She postponed her marriage to Malcolm (Mack) Roberts for several years to help support three siblings still in school. Once married, she easily bore six healthy children in eight years. But her doctor still fretted that she was so thin. Running around after six lively children could be one reason. However, noting her gums seemed inflamed, he advised extracting all her teeth, guessing gum disease could be the culprit. At the age of 41, when she complained of stomach distress and nausea, her doctor felt she lacked sufficient internal fat, so her stomach had dropped, and Xray treatments might help! The cause of the nausea was evident when her seventh child Carole was born six months later. The supreme irony is that outside of her pregnancies, Dorothy scarcely needed medical care until, a lifelong non-smoker, she died at 86 of lung cancer. Medicine is both art and science; fortunately for us, the science has advanced greatly since then. Our family lived in Grandma Rochford’s upstairs flat (4616 Bordeaux) until the fifth child, my sister Marion was due. Grandpa George (2) had purchased the duplex in 1910, just four years after arriving in Canada. My parents saved to buy a four bedroom home in 1936, large enough that they managed to take in a relative of mom’s sister Betty’s husband and her two small children escaping from the war in England. Like everything else, rental homes were scarce. Unfortunately, tight money led to downsizing in 1940 to a three bedroom, one bathroom flat with tenants upstairs to house the eventual seven children and parents! Besides the morning bathroom race, I recall competing with Marion and Brenda to sit first on the stool for mom to braid our hair each morning. We three were always known as the kids. The house was small, but their hearts were big. Every New Year’s Eve, Dorothy’s five siblings and cousins Jim (3), Barney (3), Joe (3), and Harry (3), and their spouses came for a party. Rugs were hauled up for dancing, and later everyone sang around the piano. We children tried to get in on the dancing. The family spent summers at Grandma Rochford’s cottage in Valois until 1936. Mom was pregnant with me in 1933, when sister Eileen, 3 ½ years old, slit her stomach open on a sharp branch as she climbed out of an apple tree. (Eileen also broke an arm sliding down the banister, and the other tripping over a stool before age six.) On September 12, mom saw dad and Aunt Winnie off on the early train, and advised Grandma she was heading in to Montreal on the 9:00 a.m. train. When she told the taxi driver at the train station to take her to the Royal Vic admitting, he grew distinctly nervous! I was born shortly after. From 1936 on, we spent the whole summer on a gorgeous lake near St. Gabriel de Brandon. It was our good fortune that Mom’s brother Mike was director of Camps Orelda and Marian there. Eventually, her brother George and cousin Barney also brought their families there every summer, as well as relatives on the other side of Mike’s and our families. We were related to over fifty people in the area! My fondest childhood memories are of the idyllic times spent there. If we were not on the beach, there were plenty just in the family for softball, touch rugby, etc. Money was tight for a family of nine on one modest salary, but sister Eileen maintains she used to think we were well off because we were the only ones in our neighbourhood to get out of the city for the whole summer. A vivid memory – my brother Jim, cousins Ed and Len - two rowing frantically, one steering. Pulling the boat high on the shore, overturning it, and running off with a 20+ pound muskie. In hot pursuit, an irate farmer from whose illegal net in the river they had “liberated” the fish. Two wrongs make a……? The fish was delish! Also etched in my memory, Marion aged six grabbed my ball and ran out with me in hot pursuit. As she ran across the laneway, a young cyclist knocked her down, breaking her leg. Dad dropped her and mom off at the Royal Vic Hospital and headed back to work. Unfortunately, they wouldn’t put on a cast until Dad returned to sign a permission form! That summer I headed off with five year old Brenda and hauling Marion in a makeshift cart for a picnic in the farmer’s field. I wasn’t yet eight years old. Unexpectedly the cows were let into that field. Convinced the bull was with them, I frantically dragged the wagon, Marion with her cast and Brenda over or under the fence into the next farmer’s field. His cows were between us and the road! Mad dash across and over the fence to the next field and finally safe on the road. “Don’t tell Mom!! Don’t tell Mom!!” I was convinced I must have done something wrong to have gotten us in so much trouble. Carole arrived six years after Brenda. She was mothered, smothered and likely bothered by her older sibs. I recall when I was eleven, dressing Carole in a pretty dress and taking her for a walk on a busy street to show off my beautiful baby sister and discovering to my horror I had forgotten her panties! Of course, she bent down to pick up countless things as I attempted to quick march her back home, flashing her bare bum, and totally humiliating her shy sister. With six daughters, mom learned to sew out of necessity. But during the war, cloth like all goods was scarce. As was money in our house! So mom became very adept at ripping out garments and remaking them into outfits for us. I recall great excitement when a box of used clothing arrived. We would rifle through, deciding what might make a nice skirt or dress for one of us. It was understandably a matter of pride to our parents that, in spite of our straightened circumstances, we all did well at school, achieved to levels never dreamed of, and embarked on satisfying careers. Joyce did well at school and sports, loved dancing and good times. Yet at sixteen she wanted to enter the convent! Mom told her to wait til she was twenty, convinced she’d be planning marriage by then. No such luck! I was devastated as I adored my big sister. Joyce has had a fulfilling life in the CNDs and still works full time at the Bon Secours Museum. Given her experience as a bookkeeper, mom always ended up as treasurer of the CWL. In her sixties, the owner of a small firm convinced her to do his books one day a week, provided he drove her there and back. Living in a senior’s apartment building in her eighties, she had a list of fellow tenants whose income tax she did. She also taught English to one tenant who had never managed to learn it. By 1968 with threats of separation disrupting life in Quebec and affecting its prosperity, most of the family began slowly migrating to Vancouver, beginning with Jim and his family. Mom and dad moved there also after his retirement, but naturally returned to their place in St. Gabriel from May to October. Everyone prospered and enjoy life greatly in the West. Joyce remained in Montreal and we stayed in Ottawa where we were well settled. Dorothy and Mack’s descendants number 7 children, 20 grandchildren, 28 great-grandchildren, and 6 great-great-grand children to date! Sheila Roberts Piccinin |