52 Ancestors 2020 – 8 – Prosperity – Rachel (White) Winslow

With the theme this week of Prosperity, I decided I should look it up in a dictionary. Because I am focusing on siblings of ancestors who lived mostly over a hundred years ago, I chose a dictionary of 1909. The definition given there was: “Successful progress in any business or enterprise; good fortune.” It also listed some synonyms: well-being, weal, welfare, happiness, good luck. Within my self-imposed limits of their birthday being during the week and females during February, I only had 2 choices. So the “aunt” I chose was Rachel (White) Winslow, my 5^th great-grandaunt.

Rachel was one of the few individuals among my relatives who was a twin. She and her brother Thomas were born on the 25^th day of the 12^th month of 1730. But since it was before 1752 and the family were Quakers that translates to the 25^th of February 1730/31.

She was listed as the 7^th child of 13 born to Thomas and Rachel (Jordan) White.

Thomas and Rachel were married in Isle of Wight County, Virginia, in 1719. They moved to Perquimans County, North Carolina, at least by 1724 when Thomas Winslow deeded 330 acres to Thomas White. So this indicates that Rachel was born in North Carolina.

It so happened that Rachel married John Winslow, the son of John the 10^th day of the 3^rd month in 1752 “at the meeting house in the Piney Woods” as recorded at the Perquimans Monthly Meeting. I suspect that she could feel happiness on that day as there were

25 relatives and friends who signed as witnesses to their marriage. In the usual place for the parents signature there is Rachel White, but not Thomas.

It appears that Mrs. Watson Winslow, who wrote a history of Perquimans County in 1931, confused things when she stated on page 428 that Rachel married Benjamin Winslow, the son of John and Esther (Snelling) Winslow. When checking the public trees on Ancestry.com I found there were over 500 trees which have Abigail Rachael White, daughter of Thomas and Rachel, married to John Benjamin Winslow on 10 May 1752. There was listed in the Quaker records an Abigail White who married Benjamin Winslow, but this was in 1770.

There is a question in my mind of why Rachel does not appear in her father's will as it was recorded in the will book C of Perquimans County on page 1. The rest of her family does seem to be included there. In Mrs. Winslow's book on pages 370-371 she includes what she says was a newly discovered copy of Rachel's mother's will, undated and unsigned, which had not been probated. She quotes the entire will and in it she listed the following bequest: “Fifthly I give and bequeath unto my daughter Rachel Winslow, one Small Square table, and one brass Candle Stick, and one negro wench Judah, and one old feather bed and some furniture.” Rachel (Jordan) White died in 1768. In Thomas' will of 1761 his bequests to his wife Rachel included one negro woman named Judah and one square table. Were these what Rachel left to her daughter Rachel?

The Quaker record from Perquimans Monthly Meeting indicated that John and Rachel (White) Winslow had 3 children: Ann born in 1761, John born in 1763 and Samuel born in 1764. It stated that Ann “appears to have been married to John Sanders.” Then it listed 8 children born between 1776 and 1792, the last 2 being twins. Here is another place for prosperity for our Rachel, since she lived until after all 8 of these grandchildren were born.

In the Quaker record the clerk recorded her death in this manner after noting her husband's death of 1801: “Rachel Winslow his wife & mother of these children departed this life 10^th mo. 8^th 1794.”

52 Ancestors 2020 – 7 – Favorite Discovery – Deborah (Hockett) Blair

I wasn't sure how this topic would work for this great-grandaunt of mine, Deborah (Hockett) Blair, an older sister of my Great-grandmother Mary Magdalene (Hockett) Albertson. They were daughters of Francis and Rebecca (Hartley) Hockett. They had 9 other brothers and sisters. I had a bare minimum about Deborah on my genealogy website – joanne skelton.com. It does show Deborah was born 18 Feb 1849 in Henry County, Iowa. She married Albert Dillon about 1868 and they had two children: Ella Kay and Allie May. After Albert died she married Joseph Blair and they had four children: Lawrence Edwin, Henrietta M, Howard and Gale E. She was listed as surviving in her sister Lydia's obituary in Nov 1922.

But when I began researching to discover what more I could learn about her, I did make 3 interesting discoveries.

First was her death certificate which was listed as a source for her death at familysearch Family Tree. I was glad to find documentation for her death, which was 12 June 1925 in Hardin County, Iowa. But I was surprised at the maiden name given for Deborah's mother. It shows her maiden name as Rebecca Larr. It was Rebecca's mother who probably had the maiden name Larr. So this does give me evidence that the Larr name is in the family.

Secondly I found her Find a Grave entry as Deborah Ann Hockett Blair. It shows that she was buried in Honey Creek Cemetery in New Providence, Hardin County, Iowa. There are links to her parents, 8 of her siblings, her first husband and 6 children.

The third discovery is a mystery. Looking at the familysearch Family Tree it showed one more child than I had already entered on my website, Archie Artell Blair. I am not convinced that he is a child of Deborah. His birthdate is shown as 29 Mar 1899. Since Deborah was born in 1849 she would have been 50 years old, which would be possible but not probable. There was a nine year gap from the previous known child. In the information about Archie or Artell, there is a document showing his mother as Deborah, but there is another which shows Etta. Deborah had a daughter Henrietta aka Etta who was born in Oct 1878, so would have been old enough to be his mother.

I decided to check for Archie on the census of 1900 and try to find who he was living with as a baby. I have not yet found him. Deborah was living in Hardin County, Iowa with her husband Joseph and their two sons, Edwin and Gale. The census taker marked that she had had 4 children, 3 living. The Dillon girls seem to be left out but it does account for the Blair children I have on my website. Henrietta was also living in Hardin County in the household of Seth Hammer, marked as a servant and single. But it does list her as having 1 child, who was living.

Since the 1910 census also asks the question about number of children and number living, I checked both Deborah and Henrietta in 1910. Deborah and Joseph and their son Gale were living with Edwin in neighboring Marshall County, Iowa. There her number

of children is 6, with 5 living. So this matches what I have entered on my website, including both Dillon and Blair children. But what about Henrietta? She was married in Marshall County in 1902 to John Mohler as Etta Blair. She and John are in the 1910 census back in Hardin County with a baby daughter Garnet age 9/12. On the number of children question the census taker wrote down 2, with 2 living. So again I searched for Archie or Artell in the 1910 census. I looked for anyone named Blair, born in 1899 plus/minus 5 years, first in Hardin County, Iowa and then in Marshall County. He does not show up in either of those searches.

He does appear on the 1920 census in the household of John and Etta in Hardin County, as Artell Blair, along with 3 Mohler children and Deborah. With John as the head of household, Deborah is marked as mother-in-law and Artell as brother-in-law. So I still have not solved the mystery. Is there anyone who has further information?

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Remembering boxes of candy my husband gave me for Valentine's Day years ago. 

Some are now on exhibit at the Cottage Grove Museum.

52 Ancestors 2020 – 6 – Same Name – Nancy (Hemphill) Hamilton

I realized that during January I had written about “uncles” in my family, so in February I will attempt to write about some of the “aunts.”

Nancy Jane (Hemphill) Hamilton was one of my 2^nd great-grandaunts. She fits in the “Same Name” category because her first name is the same as her grandmother, Nancy (Patton) Milligan, her maiden name is the same as her father as expected, and her married name is the same as her mother's second husband. This happened because Nancy married her step-brother, John C. Hamilton.

But, let's go back to the beginning. Nancy Jane Hemphill was born on 11 Feb 1837 in Adams County, Ohio. She was the oldest child of John and Elizabeth (Milligan) Hemphill. Her father had been married before, so she had step-brothers. Nancy had 5 more siblings before her father died in 1847. So in the 1850 census in Wayne township in Adams County, her mother Elizabeth was the head of household. Nancy's step-brother David, age 25, was in the household and Nancy, who was now 13, and her 5 siblings, Rachel (who was my ancestor), Mary, John, Elizabeth and William.

It was just the next year when Nancy's mother married a widower William M. Hamilton on 14 Jan 1851. Now Nancy acquired 5 more step-siblings. Then as William and Nancy had children Nancy had some half-siblings. But just to make things a little more confusing Nancy married one of William's children from his first marriage, John Campbell Hamilton, on 29 Aug 1855. Then Nancy's youngest half-brother was born the next year, 1856, just 3 months before her first child was born. So Nancy and her mother, who were now both married to men named Hamilton, had been pregnant at the same time. I wonder if all those named Hamilton living there in Adams County ever got confused about their relationships.

 Nancy and John had 10 more children before they would celebrate their 20^th wedding anniversary, including one set of twins. On the 1860, 1870 and 1880 censuses Nancy and her family were living in Oliver Township in Adams County, Ohio. In 1860 three children were in the household. In 1870 the number of children had increased to nine. They were enumerated between their parents William and Elizabeth and Nancy's sister Mary who was married to David Rhodes. There were ten children in their household in 1880, so the census never shows all eleven at once.

It was 12 more years before Nancy died on 1 Nov 1892 at age 55. She was buried in

Locust Grove Cemetery in Franklin Township, Adams County. John was also buried there after his death in 1906

52 Ancestors 2020 – 5 – Far Away – Thomas Elder Patton

Thomas Elder Patton 1783 – 1840

Photo added to Find A Grave by Karen Winters

Thomas Elder Patton was born far away from me here in Oregon in 2020 in space and in time. He was born in Rockbridge County, Virginia on 29 Jan 1783, the son of John and Martha (Sharp) Patton. Thomas was one of eight children, all born in Rockbridge County. They all eventually moved west to Adams County, Ohio. All but Jane, who was listed as idiotic on the 1860 census, were married in Rockbridge County.

Thomas married Jenny or Jane Glasgow 18 Apr 1805. On her memorial page on Find A Grave, it is stated that they moved to Adams County by covered wagon in Oct 1806. I believe that it is this Thomas who was listed on the “Male Enumeration List” in 1807 in Wayne Township. He is also found on the lists there for 1811 and 1815. Scott Township was formed from the north part of Wayne in 1818, so it is reasonable that it is our Thomas who is listed in Scott Township on the lists for 1819, 1823 and 1827. I have always been thankful to the Adams County Genealogical Society for publishing these lists since Ohio does not have surviving census records until 1820. They also published voter lists for 1810, 1811 and 1812. There is a Thomas Patton for each of those years in Wayne Township.

A history of Adams County was published in 1900. I was able to obtain a reprint which had added an index. Thomas Patton has three entries in the index. In the Pioneer Character Sketches there is an entry for Thomas' father John and it says “Thomas Patton, a son, lived and died on West Fork.” (Page 608) In the Biographical Sketches there are two for Thomas' son-in-laws, which mention Thomas: “Thomas Patton, a native of Rockbridge County, Virginia, who settled on the West Fork of Brush Creek.” (Page 682) and “Thomas Patton, a native of Rockbridge County, Virginia, though he emigrated to Ohio, settled on West Fork and died there.” (Page 754) So I checked my reprint of the 1868 Atlas of Ohio and found that the West Fork of Brush Creek was in Scott Township not far from Meigs Township.

I believe that Thomas and his family are on the 1820 census in Meigs Township, as it is an adjoining county to Scott. Since no names other than the head of household are shown on these early censuses I used the children and their ages as shown on Find A Grave and they all match, Thomas and Jenny and the older 6 of their children (3 boys and 3 girls.) In 1830 they are listed in Scott Township with 4 of the older children plus 3 who had been born between 1820 and 1830. The 2 oldest were married and in households of their own by this time.

June 1^st was the official enumeration date for the 1840 census. Find A Grave lists Thomas' death date as 4 Jun 1840. I have not been able to find a census entry for Thomas in 1840, so I suspect the census taker came after his death so did not list him. The household was probably in a state of disorganization at that time so it may be that none of those still living there were counted. Without having the names listed, it would be hard to find them if they were counted.

As I previously stated, there is a memorial page for Thomas on Find A Grave which gives his death date as 4 Jun 1840. It shows his burial place as Tranquility Cemetery but there is no photo of a gravestone. I checked my cemetery booklets from the Adams County Genealogical Society and found that Tranquility Cemetery is located in Scott Township. But neither Thomas or his wife are listed in their book. However my ancestor, Elizabeth (Milligan) Hemphill Hamilton, is shown as buried in Tranquility Cemetery. She was the daughter of Thomas' sister Nancy. So it is likely that Thomas was buried at Tranquility and there was either no stone or it has not survived.

52 Ancestors 2020 – 4 – Close to Home – William Sherman Smalley

When I looked at the birthday calendar for aunts and uncles to choose the subject for this week's blog post, I found that there were only four birthdays this week. So I chose the person who lived the closest to where I live now. The other three lived on the far east coast and William lived in the Midwest: Ohio, Kansas and Nebraska.

William Sherman Smalley was my Great-granduncle, the brother of my great-grandfather, Lafayette Pierce Smalley. But William had 6 more brothers and 5 sisters as their parents, Rachel Ann Hemphill and John Wilson Smalley, had a total of 13 children.

This photo from about 1890 shows 11 of the children as 2 had died fairly young.

You might have guessed due to his first and middle name that William was born during the Civil War. This was in Adams County Ohio and the date was 24 Jan 1864. This creates a little problem since William's father had enlisted in the Union Army 14 Oct 1861 in Adams County and was not discharged until 28 Oct 1864 at Chattanooga Tennessee. I think of William as the AWOL baby. John Wilson Smalley's pension record shows that he was declared absent without leave from 6 Feb 1862 until 3 Aug 1863 when he was arrested and placed in confinement until 31 Dec 1863. See my blog post of 30 Jan 2017: https://joannesgenealogyresearch.blogspot.com/2017/01/john-wilson-smalley-in-civil-war.html

After his father returned from the Civil War, the family moved farther north and by the 1870 census they were in Green Township, Clinton County, Ohio where William was listed as a six year old boy. He was marked as attending school within the year. By 1880 they were in Turkey Creek Precinct, Saline County, Nebraska. Then William was listed as age 16, had attended school with his occupation as farming at home. In 1884 the Wells Chase family moved to Saline County including their 12 year old daughter Nellie. Two months before her 16^th birthday, on 1 Mar 1888, Nellie and William were married there. Nellie was a first cousin to Lafayette's wife, so I have a double relationship with William and Nellie's descendants.

Apparently sometime before he was married, William claimed a homestead in Sherman County, Kansas as did his father and four of his brothers. William's certificate was issued 8 Feb 1892. But they did move back to Nebraska. The obituary for William and Nellie's oldest son, Clyde, states he was born 17 Dec 1890 at Milligan, Nebraska. My 1918 Atlas shows that Milligan was in Fillmore County, just over the line from Saline County. The information about their second son, Lee, states he was born 1 Sep 1892, at Tobias, which was over the line in Saline County. Two more children were born before the 1900 census where they were enumerated in Saline county, Floyd in 1895 and Sarah Fern in 1898. Sometime before 1910 they moved southwesterly about 30 miles to Nuckolls County where the family was listed on the census with their now six children as Raymond was born in 1905 and Mamie in 1907. When the 1920 census was taken only the two younger children were still at home although Floyd with his wife and baby was shown as a separate household in the same dwelling. I was unable to locate William or Nellie in the 1930 census but they were living at 235 Dakota Street in Superior, Nuckolls County, Nebraska on the 1940 census and stated they had been living there in 1935 also. By then William was 76 and Nellie was 68. I learned that William had completed the 8^th grade in school and Nellie 2 years of high school.

William lived almost 4 more years as he died 12 Mar 1944 at age 80 years, 1 month and 18 days. He was buried in Evergreen Cemetery at Superior. It was over 20 years later that Nellie died, 16 Mar 1965, and was buried next to William.

52 Ancestors 2020 – 3 – Long Line – Joseph Kimball

I have chosen to interpret this topic by choosing the sibling from this birthday week who was born the longest time ago.

Joseph Kimball, an 8^th great-granduncle of mine won this contest. Joseph was born a little over 350 years ago on 20 January 1661/62 in Wenham, Massachusetts. Of course at that time it was not a state, but a part of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Joseph was the son of Henry and Mary (Riddlesdale) Kimball. Henry was probably still a teenager when the family immigrated to the Colonies from Rattlesden, Suffolk, England in 1634 on the ship Elizabeth. Henry was the son of Richard and Ursula (Scott) Kimball. So of course they were Joseph's grandparents. They first settled at Watertown and Henry and Mary were married by 1641. They moved to Ipswich about 1646 and then to Wenham about ten years later. My ancestor, Abigail Kimball, was born about 1652 at Ipswich and Joseph was born after they had moved.

It helps when a family history has been written and has been placed online at familysearch.org: The History of the Kimball Family in America. Also on the New England Historic Genealogical Society website, AmericanAncestors.org, there is a sketch for Henry Kimball in the Early New England Families 1641-1700 by Alicia Crane Williams, Lead Genealogist. However there is a conflict in the information given. The family history gives the name of Joseph's wife as Elizabeth Needham. This is the wife shown in the findagrave.com memorial. They probably used the family history. However in Early New England Families, it states “More study is needed re the identification of Elizabeth, wife of Joseph Kimball.” There seems to be some problems with the Needham choice and it suggests she might be Elizabeth Halsey. So at present all I can say is that her name was Elizabeth.

According to the family history, Joseph and Elizabeth had two children born in Boston:

     Joseph born 24 Feb 1701 and died in 1767

     Mary born 27 May1703

My “Uncle Joseph” is said to have died in 1713, as the family history notes that “Administration on the estate of Joseph KIMBALL, mariner, was granted to his brother-in-law, Ezekiel NEEDHAM, 14 Apr 1713.” This is the reason that Elizabeth's name has been given as Needham. But Ms Williams explains that Ezekiel's sister had married someone else, so Ezekiel could be a brother-in-law through other relatives.

When you are researching relatives who lived that long ago, we often use published family histories. However, we must always remember there may be errors. Our goal is to get back as close as possible to the original records, whether or not it is easy to do.