Barrett Ridge, Mississippi
Edmond (Ned) and one of his sisters, Briget, joined other immigrants fleeing the potato famine and went to America in search of a way to provide for their family. On the way over, Briget fell from the boat while sleepwalking and drowned. Ned worked hard when he got to America and sent money home to the family in Ireland. He worked his way south and then moved westward into Mississippi in 1852. Ned married Mary Vina Warren on December 29, 1858 and they settled into a log cabin on a gentle rolling hill near Saltillo. On March 10, 1866 Edmond (Ned) Barrett had made enough money to purchase that land, which became known as Barrett Ridge. Ned and Mary had 11 children, whom they raised in the log cabin on Barrett Ridge. Most of them established homes there and raised their own children on the Ridge.
Winifred Nicholson
In 1924 Nicholson, who believed that she was unable to conceive, joined the Christian Science movement, which was in vogue in Britain at that time. She and Ben eventually had three children: Jake was born in 1927, Kate in July 1929, and Andrew in 1931. By the time of Kate's birth there were tensions in the marriage, and these were exacerbated by the suicide of their close friend, the painter Kit Wood, in August 1930. In 1931 Ben met Barbara Hepworth – whom he later married – and he and Winifred separated. In 1932 Winifred moved with her three children to Paris, and from then until 1936 Ben often visited them there, sometimes with Hepworth. The marriage ended in divorce in 1938, and Ben married Hepworth in November of the same year.