Cheesy Grits: The Other Desverney Brother

I was pretty excited to have discovered the very strong possibility that one of Valeria's first cousins on the Thorne side, Arthur Desverney, played with James Reese Europe's Clef Club Orchestra at Carnegie Hall in 1912, 1913, and 1914. I mean, how can you top that?

But if I've learned one thing from doing family history, it's that you never know what you're going to find next. In this instance, it was Arthur Desverney's older brother, Broughum Desverney.

I'll confess to having been lulled by the description of Broughum's occupation in the 1910 census as an "elevator runner" in an office building. Aside from documenting the kinds of occupations available to black men in NYC in 1910, there wouldn't seem to be much to get excited about his occupation.

So I went to my trusty fultonhistory.com website to run a search for "Broughum Desverney" in the New York Age newspaper and got exactly one hit: a front page hit on 30 Mar 1929:

Oh my! The story goes on to say that "...[b]oth the plaintiff and the defendant in the action are well known in the musical world..." with Bertha having a music studio and also at the time being a member of the cast of Ziegfeld's Showboat. Broughum is identified as "a popular member of an orchestra" with the orchestra unidentified.

But Ziegfeld's Showboat? Given the date of 1929, this will have been the original Broadway production of the Jerome Kern classic, which starred Paul Robeson.

Obviously, our Broughum had more going on than just closing the gate, twisting the crank, and then calling out floor numbers. It turns out that he, like his brother Arthur, was a well-known musician who was in addition married to a well-known musician.

The divorce case above: I'm not sure about the legal precedents surrounding it or why it was front page news. Broughum and Bertha, who had married in 1915—not the first time for him—had apparently been living apart for some years, and he had taken up with another sweetie. Bertha sought and got the divorce with the stipulation noted in the headline. I haven't seen any indication that he ever remarried.

The Desverney name must have been money, though, as Bertha held onto it until she died in 1975, a celebrated musician, teacher, composer and all-around cultural icon. Her papers are now in the collection of the Schomburg Center at the New York Public Library.

But back to Broughum. I did find some tantalizing hints about his life:

• The 1 July 1915 New York Age reports that Theodore Wilson (pianist with the Clef Club Orchestra), assisted by Howard Harris (banjoist and tenor) and Broughum Desverney of Al Brown's Original Entertainers Social Club played a successful engagement with Karle Cooke's orchestra at Ulmer Park, Brooklyn. (This isn't the great Teddy Wilson that I'm familiar with, as he didn't get rolling until the 1930s. So who are these other people?)

• His WWI draft registration card from 1917-1918 lists his occupation as "musician" and his employer as "Mr. Eifert" at Stoll's Tavern in Troy, NY.  (Egad, what a commute! Stoll's Tavern must have been really something: Google reports that it later received a mural courtesy the WPA. Wonder what that's about?)

• A request for a passport extension dated 18 January 1926. The application was filed in Budapest, Hungary. Broughum gave his address as the Hotel Royal in Budapest, Hungary. (SAY WHAT?! BUDAPEST?! In 1926?!)

• An October, 1927, ship's passenger list for the S.S. Paris arriving in New York from Le Havre, France.  Cousin Broughum is listed as "Pass. No. 237". (So Broughum did Europe at least once, eh? Shall we consult the histories of African-American entertainers in Europe between the wars to see if we find him? Did he pass some time at Bricktop's, Ada "Bricktop" Smith's famous Parisian watering hole where everybody who was anybody stopped in? Could you have traveled from Budapest to Le Havre without passing through Paris?)

• A 12 Feb 1930 radio listing in the NY Amsterdam News for a program entitled "The Truth About Crime in Harlem" with Charles C. Allison Jr., and with the Connie's Inn Trio with Paul Bass, Carroll Boyd, and cousin Broughum Desverney. (Of course you already knew all about Connie's Inn in Harlem, didn't you? Second only to the Cotton Club, etc.? Playground for white gangsters? Musical stage for Louis Armstrong and Fats Waller? Yes, of course you knew....)

Broughum died in 1940. I don't yet know the circumstances. I haven't yet seen so much as an obituary.

Broughum and Arthur had another brother, Alphonso, and a sister, Viola. Initial indications are that Alphonso died very young, while Viola married a fellow South Carolinian named Jordan and had children. But of course, the "initial indication" for Broughum was that he was an elevator operator, so until I explore them further, all bets are off.

And did Arthur and Broughum have children? It appears that at least Broughum did, and it's clear that Viola did, but I just haven't gotten far enough yet to see what has become of those Thorne descendants.

I'm happy to report, though, that the 1940 census did a sort of make-good on cousin Broughum: his occupation is listed as "artist"; his industry is listed as "art." Can't ask for better.