Elizabeth Ellen Blackburn was born in Sefton, West Derby, Lancashire, in 1870, the third of four
children, to Peter and Ellen Blackburn. Elizabeth's siblings were Robert Neale Blackburn,
Thomas Darwin Blackburn and Alice Jane Blackburn, the youngest. In 1881 they were
living in Great Crosby, West Derby, Lancashire, where Peter was a stationer and
auctioneer, and also the postmaster. In 1903 all four of the siblings, now grown,
emigrated to Canada with their mother Ellen. It is possible that Robert and Alice
were married already at this time and that their spouses emigrated with them, but
that fact has not been established.
What happened in those years between 1881 and 1903? It seems
evident that Peter must have died at some point during that period but we have not found a death
record. All we know is that for some reason the entire family uprooted themselves
from familiar environs and set out for what they surely hoped would be better times
in the Western Territories of Canada. They joined the Barr Colony, a group that
eventually numbered over 2000, to establish new homes in what would become
Saskatchewan.
The Barr Colonists were described as "agriculturists and . . . mechanics and all
came out ready and expecting to work." Many of them undoubtedly fit that description,
but the Blackburns, though they can't have been used to a life of ease, had been
relatively well-educated and associated more with clerical and professional occupations
than agriculture. Robert was an engineer, Thomas an estate agent. Whatever they were
looking forward to in Canada was not farming, though they did both manage to work the land long enough to be granted homesteads.
By 1911, however, Robert was in Regina, listed in the city directory as an engineer.
Their mother Ellen also moved to Regina, and died there
in 1921. Thomas eventually to Victoria, British Columbia,
probably a much more congenial place for him than the prairies of Saskatchewan.
Only Elizabeth and Alice seem to have experienced more typical circumstances for the
Barr Colonists. They married other colonists, lived in sod huts on the prairie,
suffered through frightful winters, bore and lost children.
Alice married a Mr. Chrystie (we believe it was the W. W. Chrystie who is listed as
a passenger on one of the ships carrying the Barr Colonists, and it is possible they
married prior to emigrating). He reportedly went
insane during one of the long isolated winters and died, leaving Alice alone on the
prairie with her dead husband's body until the spring thaw. Alice never remarried, and had no children.
Elizabeth married William Thomas Wallis, a man eight years younger than herself.
William had become a sort of traveling salesman to the Indian tribes in the region
around Moose Jaw, and often took their young son with him on his trips. That son,
my father, recalled that the Indians were fascinated with his light brown curls,
and would run their fingers through his hair, to his mother's horror.
Elizabeth died in 1918 in Lloydminster, Saskatchewan, and is buried there with her
daughter Daisy Darwin and an un-named infant who apparently died before being named.
My father was raised by his grandmother Ellen Blackburn and
then his Uncle Tom Blackburn and Aunt Alice Chrystie in Regina, Saskatchewan, before coming to
the US.