Genealogy Chat

Hi DET Thanks for the input, however my 2 fam. members are both in the UK, I have looked up the newspapers around at the time most have been bought out, but one The Detroit News I think it was called did write an extra 2 pages about the purple gang as they were robbing newspaper payrolls & bystanders were also getting killed, so newspaper archives are limited I found, I didn't find anything on the Ford garage or even were in Detroit it was. Its unlucky for me that 2 replies were deleted, may have shed some light on the subject, or maybe not. I'll keep looking. If anyone out there is from Detroit & has any sugestions on websites to visit or places I may find new info I will welcome it. Joan

What an interesting story! Hopefully the DC will give a few more details.

Could your Stateside relatives arrange to search newspaper archives, if they have not already done so, both for reports of the robbery and any subsequent obituary? I'm also wondering if Ford still hold employment records about him, or if they published a newsletter/paper where the incident was mentioned?

Hi Gwyn Sorry for not being in touch before now I've been working night's, I had an E-mail from a family member who lives down the country who has been looking into this too, He has been in touch with the Detroit library & somewhere else that keeps B.M.&D. cert.'s, he has got a death cert. no. & is in the process of sending for a copy, he also heard from another fam. member, ''there seem's to be a lot of them coming out of the woodwork!!!'' anyhow this other fam. member said that Thomas had applied for naturalization, & that he was working for the Ford garage company who had just resently opened a new garage in Detroit, ''the yr was 1932 the month June the date the 20th, he & 2 other work mates off the shopfloor were asked to go for the payroll, on returning with it they were forced off the rd, they lost control of the car & crashed it, I do not know who was driving, all 3 were killed by machinegun fire & the payroll was taken''. I have looked up this era in Detroit's history, There was a gang called the purple gang who seemed to be involved with this kind of thing. '' Do you think it would make a best seller!!!'' So it looks like he was staying in the good old U S of A, but still don't know if he got married & had a fam. of his own? Maybe when the death cert. come's it will shed more light on things? or is that being to opinionated! & hopeing for a miricle? Joan

If ths was me researching I would look for information after the supposed shooting date.
It seems strange that he should apply for naturalization if he was intent on returning to UK.
Who would have sent a picture of the bullet-riddled car to the grieving family.? Was that done to underline the fact that he had gone, when in fact he was building a new life for himself.....?

Gwyn

Hi can anyone help? I am trying to find out about a Thomas [Regineld] Lightfoot who went to Canada arriving in May 1926, aged 23yrs he came from Glasson in Cumberland & sailed from Liverpool, he was a farm worker, going to ontario/ottowa. I next found him on a border pass living at an address in Detroit Michigan, at Mrs Jane Platter 16255 Wark/Mark ave, he has put his age as 29yrs 7mhts & no middle name but his fathers name & place of birth is correct, this is in July 1928, we in the family were told he had to come into the USA to get back over to Canada for his ship back to England, The next thing I have found in a Naturalisation card, this was in Sept. 1928, did this mean he was applying for citizenship & not coming back over to England. However the family were informed that he had died in his car while traveling to the port to get his ship, his car had been riddled with bullets & he had been robbed, I was told that there was a photo of the car sent to his parents which no one seems to know of its whereabouts ''probably lost in time'' no one was ever caught for the shooting, guess he was just unlucky in the wrong place at the wrong time'' It is believed he is intumbed in Detroit. can anyone help fill in the blanks date & where he did die, & if his remains are is Detroit? Also if he was going to stay in the USA? if so where was he going the day he died? Had he meet someone or even got married? If he had did he have family ? Interesting to find out & rule a line under him. confused Joan