Ontario man's ashes, unclaimed in U.S. for 40 years, finally coming home

The ashes of an Ontario man born in 1883 are finally coming home.

Freeman Barber's ashes were found in a warehouse in upstate New York nearly 40 years ago.

A sheriff from Canandaigua has held on to them all these years – and today he will cross the border to bring the ashes back to Barber's family for burial.

Now retired, Murray Henry said that in 1979, he got a call from a woman who said she had found ashes in an urn while cleaning out the warehouse at her recreational vehicle dealership. 

"The sergeant said, 'There's no crime, there's nothing that covers it, there are no regulations, we don't want the remains here,'" Henry told CBC News earlier this week.

"And that's what I told the lady. But later that day on my way home, I happened to drive right by the RV dealer, so I stopped in and chatted with her, and I ended up taking the urn with the cremated remains home with me."

Henry has kept the urn by his desk ever since.

Freeman Barber's name and date of birth were with the urn in a box.

"I made numerous attempts over the years to try to figure out who he belonged to because I think that was my real motivation. I knew that somewhere there was a family that had somehow lost possession of a loved one," he said.

"But this was before the internet and it just kept coming up with dead ends, and that was the situation until just a couple of months ago."

In March, Henry's wife found Barber's name on a genealogy website.

The site showed a picture of him and his extended family at his parents' 50th wedding anniversary in May 1927. Henry's wife used the family connections available on the website to find one of Barber's living relatives — Laurie Barber, a retired pastor living in Toronto.

"Everything made sense and she sent him an email saying 'we think we have a relative of yours,'" said Henry.

Barber wrote back to confirm he was Freeman's great-nephew and creator of the Barber family genealogical website.

"In a sense, I was awestruck," Barber said. "It's one of those wonders of today's computer."

Barber said his family has a history in Ontario dating back to the 1830s, and that Freeman grew up with his great-grandfather on a farm near Guelph.

Before he married, he enlisted in the Canadian Mounted Rifles in 1902 with the intention of serving in the Boer War, which ended six weeks later.

"I have his spurs here, nickel spurs that he gave to my father that is his namesake," Barber said.

"My dad was [also] Freeman Barber." 

Freeman Barber and his family moved to upstate New York in the 1930s. He died in Canandaigua on April 2, 1967. 

His daughter Audrey and her husband had an RV business, and that may explain how his urn ended up in the warehouse.

Laurie Barber said he is grateful to Henry for the care he has shown to his great uncle over the years.

Henry said he felt as though Freeman was part of the family.

The sheriff, who became ordained as a deacon in the Catholic Church before he retired, said he would often speak to Freeman while writing his thesis.  

"I can remember on more than one occasion sitting back at the desk and saying, 'Freeman I don't have the faintest idea what this book is trying to tell me.' He was just always there. Sometimes you just find yourself just saying, 'excuse me, Freeman, I have to dust.'" 

Laurie Barber said he and Henry connected immediately online.

"He's a Roman Catholic and I am a Baptist retired pastor and we've kind of clicked," Barber said. "This man is very gracious."

Barber has asked Henry to say a few words today at his great-uncle's burial at a cemetery in Stratford.

"We'll gather there and say goodbye and I just think it's a gift," he said.

Henry said he is happy that Freeman is being reunited with his family.

"You know, we have all heard the phrase from scripture 'to everything there is a season,' and it's the season for Freeman Barber to return to his country and to return to his family," Henry said. "And I am not going to feel there is anything missing here. I am just going to feel like Freeman finally got where he should be."

Freeman Barber's ashes will be placed beside his wife, Florence, and son Lester in the Avondale Cemetery in Stratford this afternoon, where an old tombstone with his name on it has been waiting for him.