Joseph Wideman Raymer (1848 - 1935)

Born 16 Dec 1848 in Pickering Twp, Ontario Co, Canada West

Ancestors

Husband of Martha Mary Wooten — married 5 Dec 1874 in Unionville, York, Ontario, Canada

Descendants

Died 25 Jul 1935 at age 86 in Budapest, Budapest Capital District, Hungary

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Biography

This profile is part of the Raymer Name Study.

Joseph was born in 1848.^[1][2] He is the son of John Raymer and Sarah Wideman. ^[3]

He married Martha Wooten on 05 Dec 1874.^[4][5] He lived in Manchester England before going onto mainland Europe.^[6]

Translation of Letter from Joseph Wideman Raymer to the Editor of the Markham Economist and Sun from the book The Ramer/Raymer Family in Canada.

Berlin, Germany Dec.26,1924 Bei Frau Hemmerman Elbingerstraase 74 111 Trappe No. 55

To the Editor of the Markham Economist and Sun:

Dear Sir: I was a resident of the Markham village of fifty years ago and there must remain in or about Markham a great number of my relatives whom I would like to let know that I am still living and in good health; but am sorry to say that after so many years of toil and hard work,

I still have to do the best I can to make a living for my wife and myself. On the sixteenth of this month I reached the age of seventy-six, and my wife is some ten years younger. I will try to give you a little sketch of my life, though all records were left behind when we left Russia last year in July: we were able to bring nothing away with us but the clothes we wore. I have three children but can hardly tell their ages since the family Bible is lost. There are two boys, Jasper and John, by my first wife, and one daughter Ada May by my second wife. They were all turned out of Russia also, with all money and property taken away by the Russian Soviet Government.

My sons are in the same business as myself, training and driving trotting horses, and as the money is so hard here it is difficult to get a living. John is in Vienna, Austria, and Jasper in Prague, Czecko-Slavia, my daughter is in London, England. They do the best they can to help us a little. The children read and speak three languages - English, German and Russian - as do my wife and I. We would like to come to Canada but are afraid it is too late at our ages, but we are in hopes Germany will improve in our business, as they are buying so many American trotters this year, and as I had sixty years experience with horses, I think this is the best place for us.

A lot of my relatives will say "Why did you leave Canada?" After I married at Markham, Martha Wooten, daughter of David Wooten, we went to Norway, near Toronto on the Kingston Road and started a livery and training stable as the Woodbine trotting track was built at that time. I did very well but was troubled by fever and ague and at last the doctor said I must cross the Atlantic before I would be better.

At that time I was acquainted with a Mr. Simon Beattie who lived in a small town in Scotland named Annan. He then was shipping livestock from Scotland to Canada and taking back trotting and other horses, so I arranged to go back with him. We took with us sixteen horses, most of them trotters. I expected to come back the next year. That was October 1879, but on selling the trotters I agreed to take them to Manchester and train and drive them in the spring of 1880. I rented a track called Abbey Key park in Manchester, and kept the place until 1886, then went to Berlin, Germany where I am now and had first class luck. I went to Russia in 1890. Here after many years I got so much business I had to enlarge. I had a big store with American harness, boots, blankets, wagons and all sorts of things connected with the trotting business. I had to have blacksmiths to shoe the horses and others to repair the harness and wagons - that was a big business alone. Then I built near the track a stable to hold forty-five horses, and leased land twelve miles from St. Petersburg, one hundred acres, and built more stables.

I bought American stallions and the best Russian mares. The business went on until the war broke out. Americans who had property in Armenia sold out everything in Russia and went home rich. But all my property was in Russia. Who thought the war would last so long! I made up my mind to stick it out, but when the Revolution broke out we were finished.

The English who were in our portion thought England would come and help us out but that failed. The Russian Government took everything and turned us out on the street. It was lucky I had a winter house in the town from which they couldn't put us out. I kept going to see the English consul and arrange to get to England and took 24,000 roubles and all our jewellery to put in their hands to take care of until we could get away. One day I went to see the consul and found the building full of drunken soldiers who wanted to see the consul, then they told me to empty my pockets, and a drunken soldier pointed his gun at me. They they led me to the police station and I had to wait a long time there until I was called into a private room with two or three Jewish boys. They asked what I had come there for, and I said I wanted to find that out too. One said "You will be taken out and shot if you give another answer like that." I said I was an Englishman and they had no right to shoot me as I had not done anything wrong, and that I had been brought from the English consuls office. They took all my papers and took me to a room filled with people of all countries. I knew one man who shared his bed and food with me for two days. The third day about one hundred of us were taken out into the street and marched about three miles to the big prison. I saw an Englishman I knew on the way and he went into the same room with me. There were forty-eight of us in a room that was supposed to hold twenty-two.

The first thing they gave us to eat was rotten salt fish soup, which made me sick. All this time my wife and daughter were trying to find out where I had been sent. I sent three post cards before they received one.

Then they did find out where I was, they sent me food. Then I wrote them that I had a companion, an Englishman from Moscow, who had no one to send him food. They sent plenty for us both while I was there but when I got out in about two months my poor friend died with grief and hunger. Now I will tell you how I got out of prison.

My daughter got a position as cashier at the train companies office. The head man there, a Bolshevist certainly, was after her. He at once wanted to give all the food she wanted for her mother and me. She said that she did not want any food, but after I had been in prison about seven weeks, he called her in his office and said "I want to make a proposition to you. Do you want to get your father out of prison?" She said, of course she did and he told her that if she would marry him in eight days after he got me out of prison he would see that I got out.

She was then eighteen and he was twenty-eight. She spoke to her mother, and did not send me word, but told the man the next day that she agreed. He drew up a petition and managed to get my release on the first day of August. My beard had grown so long that my wife did not know me and thought that I was a Jew and I did not know her, for she had been a stout German woman and was then very thin.

My daughter told me how she had got me out, and I told her she must keep her word. They were married, but it was a mistake, and they parted three times in less than three years. I was asked to go back to my farm as foreman to look after the colts and keep things in order. The horses were sick and said that I would take the job if they did not allow their horse-doctor to come near. I stayed two years here and was always trying to get the place back.

The buildings were controlled by what was called the Gubsdalla, and the land by the Bolshevists. I found I could get them back by paying so much money, and living in my best house. If a man lived in his house they could not take it from him. I had all of my papers made out, and then in the winter of 1923 I gave them notice that I would not stay any longer, and they told me to move out of my house in twenty-four hours. I showed them my papers and they could not put me out, but took me to the big court at St. Petersburg. It happened that the judge was a friend of mine, so the decision wan in my favour.

But then the case went to a higher court at Moscow where I know I would lose it. Then we had notice to move, then we were ready to start. I gave me daughter's husband our winterhouse on condition that he would give her a divorce, so everything was arranged and we left by boat from St. Petersburg, and arrived in England on the 15th of July. My daughter got a position as lady's maid easily as she spoke so many languages.

We received twenty-five shillings a week from the relief office in London, and I collected insurance from a London Company. I had insured by life in St. Petersburg with the Equitable American Insurance Co. in the year 1900. I paid the insurance up to 1920. My Insurance Policy was for 10,000 roubles, and the yearly premium on account of my age was 530 roubles, for which I have the receipts. The St. Petersburg office was closed, and I wrote to the company in New York and asked them what they were willing to pay me. They answered that I had to look to Soviet Russia for that, and the matter stands there now. It seems that we will not recover anything from Russia for some time.

I think if Ramsay MacDonald had stayed in power, we might have had something. I had three letters direct from MacDonald saying that all those who were put in prison in Russia would be paid off first. All my claims were put in by me at once, so perhaps it will come right sometime. The English consul here said he would make an application to England to have us sent home to Canada. But have nothing to live on in Canada. I have plenty of relations who are, I think, in good circumstances who could help a little if the truth were put before them. I wrote my brother in Stayner and he sent me a little money this year. I have also corresponded with my oId aunt Anne Barkey of Toronto, but have no answer since the first letter she wrote.

Yours sincerely, Joseph Wideman Raymer ^[7]

Sources

1. ↑ Library and Archives Canada; Ottawa, Ontario, Canada; Census Returns For 1861; Roll: C-1088-1089 Ancestry.com and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1861 Census of Canada [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2009. Appreciation is expressed to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for providing the 1861 Canada Census Index. Canada. "Census returns for 1861." LAC microfilm C-999 to C-1007, C-1010 to C-1093, C-1095 to C-1108, C-1232 to C-1331, M-1165 to M-1166, M-1168 to M-1171, M-556, M-874 to M-878, M-880 to M-886, M-896 to M-900. Library and Archives Canada, Ottawa.
2. ↑ Year: 1871; Census Place: Markham, York East, Ontario; Roll: C-9969; Page: 26; Family No: 94 Source Information Ancestry.com and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1871 Census of Canada [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2009. Appreciation is expressed to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for providing the 1871 Canada Census Index. Original data: Library and Archives Canada. Census of Canada, 1871. Ottawa, Ontario, Canada: Library and Archives Canada, n.d.. RG31-C-1. Statistics Canada Fonds. Microfilm reels: C-9888 to C-9975, C-9977 to C-10097, C-10344 to C-10388, C-10390 to C-10395, to C-10540 to C-10570.
3. ↑ Year: 1871; Census Place: Markham, York East, Ontario; Roll: C-9969; Page: 26; Family No: 94 Source Information Ancestry.com and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1871 Census of Canada [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2009. Appreciation is expressed to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for providing the 1871 Canada Census Index. Original data: Library and Archives Canada. Census of Canada, 1871. Ottawa, Ontario, Canada: Library and Archives Canada, n.d.. RG31-C-1. Statistics Canada Fonds. Microfilm reels: C-9888 to C-9975, C-9977 to C-10097, C-10344 to C-10388, C-10390 to C-10395, to C-10540 to C-10570..
4. ↑ "Ontario Marriages, 1869-1927," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:FMND-YJW : 11 March 2018), Joseph Raymer and Martha M Wootten, 05 Dec 1874; citing registration , Unionville, York, Ontario, Canada, Archives of Ontario, Toronto; FHL microfilm 1,862,897.
5. ↑ Archives of Ontario; Toronto, Ontario, Canada; Registrations of Marriages, 1869-1928; Reel: 19 Ancestry.com and Genealogical Research Library (Brampton, Ontario, Canada). Ontario, Canada, Marriages, 1826-1937 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010. Ontario, Canada, Select Marriages. Archives of Ontario, Toronto
6. ↑ Class: RG11; Piece: 3904; Folio: 102; Page: 34; GSU roll: 1341932 Source Information Ancestry.com and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1881 England Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2004. 1881 British Isles Census Index provided by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints © Copyright 1999 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. All rights reserved. All use is subject to the limited use license and other terms and conditions applicable to this site. Appreciation is expressed to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for providing the 1881 England and Wales Census Index. Original data: Census Returns of England and Wales, 1881. Kew, Surrey, England: The National Archives of the UK (TNA): Public Record Office (PRO), 1881. Images © Crown copyright. Images reproduced by courtesy of The National Archives, London, England.
7. ↑ Raymer, Ross Edmund, Ruth Gillespie Raymer, and Michael Roy Peterson. The Ramer/Raymer Family in Canada: Genealogical and Historical Records, 1809-1998. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998.