Awww...Peanuts

[jbarry]

(09-05-2025 09:07 AM)RJNorton Wrote:  Thank you to Steve again. Steve writes, " I have a couple of extra things to add to my Joseph Alexander Burroughs post.

- I can't find Joseph Alexander Burroughs, yet, in the 1900 census but I did find him in the 1910 census living in Baltimore.

- In 1883 he had a son named Joseph Cornelius Burroughs who also went into the produce business. I've attached Joseph Cornelius Burroughs WWI draft card and there Joseph Cornelius clearly prefers the "Burroughs" spelling of the surname over the "Burrows" spelling.

Steve, thank you so much. This is awesome work! And thanks to Cliff for getting this started.

[RJNorton]

Thanks to Steve for this additional information. Steve writes, "I have a few more Burroughs/Burrows documents to post to the Forum. They're all obituaries from the Baltimore Sun. I finally found Joseph Alexander Burrows' obituary from December 1931. I also have the obituaries of three of his daughters. Two of the daughters Alice and Mary died in 1907, the same year as his wife Mary did. In fact the daughter Mary died about a week before her mother. Both daughters, like their mother, have a poem in their obituaries seemingly written by Joseph. In 1909 Joseph's daughter Emma died. There was no poem with her obituary, but I did want to point out it mentions a Roman Catholic service, which is interesting since, according to their marriage record, in 1873 Joseph and Mary were married in an Episcopal Methodist Church in Georgetown.

[jbarry]

This is all fantastic work! A question to the forum: Steve raises a good point that signing with an "X" does not automatically imply illiteracy. What are everyone's thoughts for and against this? My take: it's a good indicator of illiteracy, but we can't make the assumption and close research doors that might otherwise glean new details. The consensus has taken it for granted Peanuts was illiterate, perhaps to the detriment of the research. Thoughts?

[Steve]

According to Borroughs' trial testimony:

https://archive.org/details/conspiracytr...6/mode/2up

Booth hit Borroughs with the butt of his knife and kicked him, knocking Borroughs down as Booth was mounting the horse. It's not inconceivable that Borroughs could've been injured/hurt when he was knocked down, more so if he had been holding the horse with his dominant/writing hand.

Considering the circumstances, signing a statement with an "X" soon after isn't particularly strong evidence that Peanut Burroughs was illiterate by itself.