Lavinia Warren
| Lavinia Warren | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
Mercy Lavinia Warren Bump October 31, 1842 Middleborough, Massachusetts |
| Died | November 25, 1919 (aged 77) Middleborough, Massachusetts |
| Resting place |
Mountain Grove Cemetery, Bridgeport, Connecticut 41°10′19″N 73°13′29″W / 41.17189°N 73.22465°W |
| Nationality | American |
| Known for | Circus performer |
| Height | 81 cm (2.66 ft) |
| Weight | 13 kg (29 lb) |
| Spouse(s) |
Charles Sherwood Stratton (1863 - 1883, his death) Count Primo Magri (1885 - 1919, her death) |
Mercy Lavinia Warren Stratton (née Bump, October 31, 1842 – November 25, 1919) was an American proportionate dwarf and the wife of General Tom Thumb.
Warren was born at Middleborough, Massachusetts as Mercy Lavinia Warren Bump, a descendant of a French Catholic family named Bonpasse, of Governor Thomas Mayhew, and five Mayflower passengers: John Billington, Francis Cooke, Edward Doty, Stephen Hopkins, and Richard Warren — New England families which intermarried many times over.
Lavinia and her younger sister Huldah Pierce Warren Bump had a form of proportionate dwarfism (considered to be desirable by sideshows and "museums" of that era owing to its perfectly miniaturized characteristics, with the same proportions as common larger people) caused by a pituitary disorder which seemingly occurs when close relatives (cousins) descended of identically replicating DNA (twins) produce offspring.
Lavinia's parents were 4th cousins, the mother being a 2nd-great-grandchild of married cousins, descended of a twin. The maternal 2nd-great-grandfather of Lavinia's father James Sullivan Bump, Medad Tupper born 1677, was a son of Thomas Tupper and Martha Mayhew. The paternal 2nd-great-grandfather of Lavinia's mother Huldah Pierce Warren, Ichabod Tupper born 1673 who married his cousin Mary Tupper born 1685, was a son of Thomas Tupper and Martha Mayhew. Thomas Tupper was born 16 January 1638 as a twin of Henry Tupper in Sandwich, Barnstable, Massachusetts.
Lavinia's family was a long-established and well-respected New England family. Her childhood was entirely normal for the time.
After a successful career as a well-respected school teacher, which began at the age of 16, Lavinia went to work as a miniature dancing chanteuse upon a Mississippi showboat owned by a cousin. She enjoyed performing, learned of Tom Thumb's success, alongside the rest of the nation, and pursued a performing career as an adult. Under the management of showman P. T. Barnum, she changed her name from Mercy Lavinia Bumpus to Lavinia Warren, the stage name she had previously used while performing on the Mississippi River.
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