ALCIE OR ALICE?

Lewis Ellingwood Noyes is buried next to his wife, Lucy Ann (Briggs) Noyes:

and next to him is a much smaller headstone:

The inscription reads:
Alcie L Noyes
Oct 10, 1869

The stone has sunk in the ground so the date of death is mostly obscured.
Before I posted the photograph to Find A Grave I wanted to find that date
so I searched the usual internet sites  for Alcie L Noyes. I couldn't find
amything on Ancestry, Rootsweb or FamilySeaarch for anyone with that
name.  Could this have been an error by the engraver of the headstone?
Then  I googled the name  and found that an Alcie R. Noyes  of Abington had
donated the Samuel Fuller  cradle to the collection at Pilgrim Hall in Plymouth.

So I went back to Ancestry.com and this time took a different tack. I  checked
the Census for Lewis Ellingwood Noyes and his family. On the 1880 Federal
Census I found Lewis, Lucy, a 24 year old daughter Anna and a 10 year old
Alcie who Ancestry had listed as Alice.  Things got much more complicated
on the earlier 1870 Census: Lewis and Lucy's family includes another daughter,
their eldest daughter Charlotte, Anna. and 10 month old twin daughters Alice E
and Alsie L Noyes.

I could find no other record of Alcie, but I found an Alice Noyes on the 1900 Census
with her mother Lucy living on Walnut St in Abington.(Lewis had died in 1896). Alice
was working as  "Ast Librarian". Lucy died in 1903. There is an Alice Noyes on the
1910 Census for Boston working as a governess at The Home for Little Wanderers
who might be the same Alice Noyes.

So, which was it, Alice or Alcie?

Tbere was one more small gravestone near Lewis E. Noyes grave at Mt Vernon
Cemetery but it was hard to read, so I converted the picture
to negative mode:

My transcription:
Alice Ellwood
Dau. of
Lewis E & Lucy A
NOYES
1869-1870

Alice died in infancy, but apparently Alcie lived until at least 1910. Did she take the
name Alice as a tribute to her dead twin? Or was it simply a case of people always
mistaking the name "Alcie" as a mispelling of "Alice" so she decided to go by that
name?

I don't know,and since it's been at least a century since she passed, there's no way I
can "go ask Alice"....or Alcie.

A FAMILY REUNION OF SORTS

I got off to a late start today so I decided to stay close to
home for my Thursday Road Trip and take a walk at
Mt. Vernon Cemetery here in Abington. My parents are
buried there in the Veterans Plot but I never really paid
much attention to the rest of the cemetery on my previous
visits. Today I took a look around after I visited them.

Both the Veterans' Plot and the nearby G.A.R. Civil
War Veterans Plot had been decorated with flags for
Veterans' Day.  I took some pictures of both, then
a nearby family plot drew my attention. In its center
stood a monument with a headless statue seated on the
top. I took a picture and then walked over to see the
inscription on the side. This is what I saw:

It reads:

"Cornelius T. Dunham
April, 1823-August, 1895
`Blessed are the pure of heart,
For they shall see God"


Ann Ball Dunham
September 1823-February (year is illegible)

Cornelia T. Dunham
April 24, 1862-November 8, 1944" 


I was, as we geneabloggers say, gobsmacked. Recently I've
been wrapped up in adding my Dunham ancestors and
collateral lines to my family tree on Ancestry. Chances were
very good that Cornelius was a distant cousin who I just
hadn't found yet in my research. I took more pictures of the
other sides of the monument and the other markers in the
plot for further reference and went off to do my laundry.

Needless to say, I had a lot to think about while at the
laundromat and once I got home, I started researching
Cornelius and his family. As it turns out, there's more 
than the Dunham connection and I'll be blogging next
about what I found. But above all that, I am struck
once more by what I call the "circle game" of my Dad's
family history.

What are the odds that my Dad who was born and raised
in Maine would end up being buried only a few yards away
from his distant unknown cousin in Massachusetts?