Elizabeth Fraser 'Lizzie' Gaull

I can't say that I could ever explain the connection that I felt while growing up with Lizzie Gaull and, I can't explain it now. I never met my great grandaunt, whose full name was Elizabeth Fraser Gaull, but when looking through old family photo albums as a child, she and her husband were identified to me as Eddie and Lizzie Christie. 

Lizzie was born in June 1899 at Cairnley, Monymusk, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. She was a younger sister to my great grandmother, Jessie McKenzie Gaull - in fact, she was 17 years younger. Their father, John Gaull and his wife Harriet McKenzie, had their first child in 1879 and their last, number thirteen,  in 1904, a span of 25 years. My great grandmother Jessie was number two and Lizzie was number eleven.

After Jessie, her husband Alexander Shand Hadden and their children, including my grandfather John Gaull Hadden, left Scotland in 1923 for Canada, the only real opportunity for sharing family events and occasions was through letters and photos. Although I know of no letters that survived, fortunately many of the photos did find their way into albums that are still in the family today. In February 1928, Lizzie married Edward 'Eddie' Christie and when later that same year, Lizzie gave birth to the her and Eddie's first child, a son named Edward Alexander Christie, the event of the baby's christening was shared with the family in Canada. The photo above is one of the photos from that occasion, showing Eddie and Lizzie Christie with their son.

Oddly, there was another photo that I later realized was from the same happy occasion showing an infant 'laid out' on the seat of a chair. For many years when I was young, I thought it was the picture of a child's funeral. It was a bit of a relief when I realized it was cousin Edward Alexander Christie as an infant sleeping during his christening party!