Let’s go slightly back in time to the age of Gettysburg. This is where the family trees and historical references are most important. We are currently talking about the children of Jim Britton and Ala Mary Kenny McClellan.
Martha B. McClellan was born in Denison, Iowa in 1892. However, she would marry her husband, Calvin Roy Holland in January 1915 in Saltcoats, Saskatchewan. Her husband was a Canadian farmer. They would have an abundant number of children between 1915 and 1932. Overall, they would have 11 children. However, each child would have numerous children as well. We wouldn’t talk about each child in depth, but I’ll pick the more important ones as their family is explored.
Surprisingly, the first six children that Calvin and Martha had were daughters. Their names are the following:
Just a few brief notes on a few daughters that there is not much information for. Alice died of diphtheria which is a severe sore throat that caused suffocation. This disease was a deadly plaque that affected children between 1880-1920.
Martha’s third child was Faye Zane Holland. She was born in Bredenbury, Saskatchewan, and married James Henry Sharpe. They were farmers on the Canadian frontier. They had two sons and three daughters. When her husband James passed away in 1984, they had 9 grand children and 2 great-grand children. Another large family for the McClellan-Holland-Sharpe line of descendants.
Martha’s fifth child was Betty Lavine Holland. She married her husband, William John Boles (1920-2015) in 1942. They are both buried in Manitoba, and they had no children together.
Martha’s sixth child was Phyllis Lena Holland. She married in 1939 to her husband Thomas John Marsh (1914-2005). They farmed the Canadian Prairies and there’s not much information that is open to the public. They would have two daughters, Heather Marie (Marsh) Neufield (1940-2012) and Judith Annette (Marsh) Weber (1943-2017). When Phyllis died in 2008, there was 18 grand children and 18 great grandchildren of the McClellan-Holland-Marsh descendant tree.
As a side note, it seems like many people enjoy reading about Jennie Wade and Georgia Wade and their history. This next picture is a letter that was sent back to Martha McClellan after a note she sent to the President of the United States. It seems like President Eisenhower was interested in the family history too.
Sarah Isobel Holland married Roderick Grant (1913-1944) and they married in Saltcoats, Saskatchewan in 1935. Sarah and Roderick would have three children together before he passed away. Their first child, Duncan Roy Grant (1935-2003) would have three sons and two daughters. Another one of her children, Linda Katherine Grant married Robert Wallace Train (1936-2010) but had no children. Her third child, Linda Katherine Grant only lived a year before dying of diphtheria.
Sadly, Sarah’s first husband, Roderick died while he was working on the Canadian Pacific Railroad. He was tending the coal that shot down the chute into the tender. The coal rushed out so violently that he was knocked 12 feet to the ground and was killed.
Sarah remarried a few years later to Albert Charles Marsh. He served within the Canadian Armed Forces during World War II from 1941-1945. When he and Sarah married, they moved from Olds to Vulcan, Alberta, and then to Fort MacLeod in 1967. He was in the trucking business, and he retired in 1988. Around 2001, he passed away. When he passed, he had three children that survived him, and they are, Duncan, Keith, and Larry. He also had 16 grandchildren and 31 great-grandchildren.