Finding Heman Williams

Sometimes this blog helps me genealogy by laying out my thought processes, putting the data in a logical order, and creating a coherent narrative from chaos. Sometimes, like in this post, it just serves to document the muddle. Still, there's some hope that the documentation laid out here will make things clearer for someone else, so here goes.

I'm working on Beaver genealogy. I was able to trace my father-in-law's maternal line back a few generations. His great-grandmother was a woman named Minerva J. (Williams) Bradley. According to her death certificate, Minerva's parents were Heman Williams and Emma Jane Hale (1). The certificate also states that she was born in 1872 in Chester, Michigan, but her parents were born in New York. To confuse matters, however, in both the 1900 and 1910 census records, Minerva gave her father's birthplace as Ohio, not New York (2,3). The Ohio birthplace seems correct, at least according to the 1880 U.S. Census for Camden, Lorain County, Ohio, which documented the Williams family consisting of Heman, age 40, born in Ohio; wife Emma J., age 33, born in New York; three children between the ages of 9 and 15 born in Michigan, "Menervia", age 8, born in Ohio; and a younger son (4). The family members who must have provided the information for Minerva's death certificate were probably confused by the fact that her mother was born in New York, and that Heman's family came from New York. In the 1900 census, Heman himself gives his parents birthplaces as New York, but his own birthplace as Ohio (6).

Heman Williams, then, was born around 1840 in Ohio. Tracing him back through the census records, the 1870 Census finds the family in Chester Township, Eaton County, Michigan, next door to a Nelson Williams and his family (5). Heman's wife's name is given as Jane instead of Emma Jane, but it is clearly the same family. Two of the sons from the 1880 census are listed (although the oldest, 5, is shown as born in Ohio, not Michigan), along with an older daughter, Mary, who does not appear in the 1880 census. Again, Heman lists his birthplace as Ohio.

I cannot find him in the 1860 census, but in the 1850 census he was living in Camden, Lorain, Ohio as a 13-year old child in the household of John Williams, 55, born in Massachusetts, and Jane Williams, 49, born in New York (7). Also in the household are six children between the ages of 8 and 22, including Nelson (who we saw later moved to Michigan) and a 10 year old sister, Minerva, clearly the source of Heman's daughter's unusual name. (The source of Heman's unusual name will be discussed below).

Unfortunately, moving back past 1850, we enter a time when census records only recorded the name of the head of household, and did not note ages (except in general categories) or location of birth. However, all of the children listed in the 1850 census were born in Ohio, so the family must have been in the state since 1828. We should be able to find John Williams, Heman's father, in the 1830 and 1840 censuses.

In fact, there are no fewer than 133 possible John Williams households in Ohio in 1830. Looking at Lorain County alone knocks that down to three. The only one whose household fits the known demographics of the family, John H. Williams, is living in Lagrange Township, with one free white male 20-30 (John would have been 25), one free white female 20-30 (Jane would have been around 19), 2 males under 5 and one female 5-10. This seems like a lot of kids for such a young mother, but they wouldn't have to all be theirs. In fact, Jane may have been a second wife. In 1840, there are five John Williamses. John H. Williams is listed as living in "Carmdon" in Lorain County. Such a place doesn't appear to exist, so I would guess this is the same John H. Williams as above, now relocated to Camden, where we know our John Williams was living in 1850. The ages of the family, however, don't perfectly match those known for our Williams family. Besides, as becomes clear below, John's middle initial should be D, not H.

This leads us to some contradictory information from the local histories:

The "History of Lorain County, Ohio", published in 1879 (8), describes Heman's family under the heading "The Township of Camden":

"John D. Williams and his wife, Jane, from the vicinity of Cuyoga Lake, New York, settled upon lots twenty-five and twenty-six, tract eleven, in 1836. Elisha C. now lives upon lot twenty-three, same tract. S.B. is in Kipton village. John W. and Wilson are also residents of the township. Mary Jane lives upon the old place. The only other living member of the family of brothers and sisters is Heman. Albert R. died in 1878. Clarissa and Minerva are also dead."

 The same book, though, describes another Heman Williams who is clearly not our Heman Williams:

"Larkin Williams and family, of a wife and eight children, came from Berkshire county, Massachusetts, in the fall of 1817. He settled on the ridge east of the center...The first doctor to locate in Avon township was Heman, son of Larkin Williams. Dr. Williams is spoken of as a gentleman of fine ability and superior professional attainments....The first death was Lydia M., daughter of Larkin Williams, January 11, 1818. Her remains were the first interred in the cemetery at the center. It is believed that the first post office was established in 1825, and that Dr. Williams was the first post-master." 

The same source mentions that Larkin A. Williams was active in the Baptist church, as were Milo Williams and John Williams, his sons. Larkin also built a school building in 1818.

This is complicated. John D. and his wife, Jane, were the parents of our Heman Williams. But what is their ancestry? Were they related to Larkin Williams and his son, Dr. Heman Williams? The book suggests not, but the primary documentation is hard to pin down.

Several arguments can be made against assuming a relationship with the Larkin Williams family:

• John and Jane Williams are buried in Kipton, rather than the cemetery in Avon where the other Williamses, the known descendants of Larkin Williams, are located.
• A surprising number of people were named "Heman" in Lorain County, Ohio. The 1850 Census, where we first see our Heman, has six other men named Heman.
• The book about Lorain County implies they are not related, or at least doesn't mention such a relationship, despite many other mentions of the Larkin Williams family

Several arguments, however, can be made for assuming a relationship to the Larkin Williams family:

• Although the book says John D. came from New York, in the census says he was born in Massachusetts, like Larkin. His wife was born in New York, so they may have lived there for a while before coming to Ohio.
• The book clearly has some inaccuracies. For example, it claims John D. moved to Camden in 1836, but his oldest son, Albert, was born in Ohio in 1828. Furthermore, not all of the children listed in the census are in the book, and at least one child who is in the book isn't listed on the census (although they may have been too old in 1850). In other words, the book itself shouldn't be considered more accurate than other types of documentation.
• Sure, there were a number of men named Heman, but honestly, how common can this name be? It is more parsimonious to believe that our Heman Williams was named for a relative, either the Dr. Heman Williams who was the son of Larkin Williams, or some previous progenitor for whom they were both named.

The reason I'd like to know if our Williamses were related to the family of Larkin Williams is that Larkin's ancestry is fairly well documented going back to the Great Puritan Migration (9).

One detail that might help clarify the situation: in the 1850 census, Heman, his parents, and his siblings are living with an 86-year old woman, born in Massachusetts, named Mary Hemingway. She was later buried in the Williams plot in Camden, where her tombstone shows she died March 22, 1855, at the age of 92 years, 9 months, 17 days (that would give her a birth date of  June 5, 1762) (10) Could she be Jane's mother? John D.'s re-married mother or an aunt? Regardless, she's the next line to follow.

[Update]:  I was able to connect with another researcher, Linda Coltrin, who is interested in Heman's maternal line (see post on Jane Coltrain Williams). Linda has a death certificate that shows John and Jane's oldest son, Elisha C. Williams, was born in Geauga County, Ohio, in 1818. In the 1820 census, there's a John Williams in Perry, Geauga County, Ohio, with one boy under the age of 10, a man 16-26 (our John would have been 25), and a woman 16-26 (our Jane would have been 17). This seems likely to be our family. What really caught my eye, though, were four Williams families in Painesville, Geauga County, Ohio, in the same census. The names of the heads of those households: Rev. Ebenezer, Ebenezer, John, and...Heman. Heman! It may be hard to determine the exact relationship between these Painesville Williamses and our John Williams, but it seems likely.

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References:

1) "Ohio Deaths, 1908-1953," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:X637-WCV : 8 December 2014), Emma Jane Hale in entry for Minerva Jane Bradley, 13 Oct 1925; citing Camdem Twp, Lorain, Ohio, reference fn 58285; FHL microfilm 1,992,681.

2) "United States Census, 1900," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MMDF-CGF : accessed 10 December 2016), Lizzie Bradley in household of George Bradley, Camden & Henrietta Townships, Lorain, Ohio, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) 83, sheet 7A, family 164, NARA microfilm publication T623 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1972.); FHL microfilm 1,241,295.

3) "United States Census, 1910," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:ML84-P99 : accessed 10 December 2016), Elizabeth Bradley in household of George Bradley, Camden, Lorain, Ohio, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) ED 101, sheet 2B, family 47, NARA microfilm publication T624 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1982), roll 1206; FHL microfilm 1,375,219.

4) "United States Census, 1880," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:M89K-DLJ : 14 July 2016), Herman Williams, Camden, Lorain, Ohio, United States; citing enumeration district ED 166, sheet 389D, NARA microfilm publication T9 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.), roll 1042; FHL microfilm 1,255,042

5) "United States Census, 1870," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MHHN-PVV : 17 October 2014), Herman Williams, Michigan, United States; citing p. 8, family 56, NARA microfilm publication M593 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.); FHL microfilm 552,169

6) "United States Census, 1900," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MMDF-3ZH : accessed 10 December 2016), Emma J Williams in household of Heman Williams, Camden & Henrietta Townships, Lorain, Ohio, United States; citing enumeration district (ED) 83, sheet 8B, family 211, NARA microfilm publication T623 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1972.); FHL microfilm 1,241,295.

7) "United States Census, 1850," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:MXQ2-364 : 9 November 2014), Jane Williams in household of John Williams, Camden, Lorain, Ohio, United States; citing family 567, NARA microfilm publication M432 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).

8) From ''History of Lorain County, Ohio'', published in Philadelphia by the Williams Brothers, 1879https://archive.org/stream/historyoflorainc00phil#page/n5/mode/2up/search/Williams

9) https://books.google.com/books?id=L5GPjobXdWoC&pg=PA1619&lpg=PA1619&dq=larkin+williams+massachusetts&source=bl&ots=ywkeqh9cXd&sig=V0G5AnfPZG7OecwwiQStRWWLoNM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi57-7qp-vQAhXIjFQKHZ0KCzoQ6AEIQzAI#v=onepage&q=larkin%20williams%20massachusetts&f=false

10) http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=pv&GRid=28102480&PIpi=49541381

Famous Descendants of Jean Guyon

An article on the famous descendants of Jean Guyon was posted on one of my genealogy sites. As I've discussed in previous posts, most French-Canadians have some shared ancestry, so it's no surprise that those of us descended from the LeFebvres (through the Cunninghams) are also descendants of Jean Guyon. He was, in fact, my 11xgreat-grandfather.

Jean Guyon was part of the Percheon Immigration, which came to New France in 1634 from the Perche region. He was very successful, with ten surviving children and (by some estimates) the second-largest number of descendants out of the early French settlers. According to Guyon's wikipedia page, 3/4 of old-line French-Canadians are descended from him. He (or his wife) were also the source of the mutation that caused Friedreich's ataxia in many generations of the family.

Some of his famous descendants include Celine Dion, Camilla the Duchess of Cornwall, and Madonna. Because of the on-going U.S. election, though, I was most interested to see Hillary Clinton on that list. In fact, while we share Guyon ancestry with Secretary Clinton, our relationship is closer. Clinton and I are 9th cousins once removed, through my 8xgreat-grandfather, Mathurin Gagnon.

Harvard Grads

Harvard's oldest surviving building, Massachusetts's Hall
(built long after John Bowers graduated)

While looking for something else, I came across Sibley's Harvard Graduates an 18-volume work detailing the lives all all the early graduates of Harvard University, from its inception (as Harvard College) in 1642. I was fascinated that someone took the time to do such a time-consuming and, frankly, rather useless piece of research, but of course I wanted to know if we had any Harvard grads among our ancestors.

The earliest close relative (although not direct ancestor) I could find was John Bowers, a graduate of Harvard's sixth class, in 1649 (Sibley 1873). He was the son of George and Barbara Bowers of Plymouth (later Cambridge) Massachusetts. After graduation, he moved to Connecticut to take up a parish there. Through the Kinney line, we are descended from George and Barbara Bowers through their daughter -- John's sister -- Ruth Bowers Knowles.

There were several clergymen in our Kinney ancestry, some of whom were likely Harvard graduates, but Sibley's second and third volumes are not readily available on-line, and with classes beginning, I don't have the time to search the other sixteen volumes!
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Sibley, John Langdon. 1873. Sibley's Harvard Graduates, I. Biographical Sketches of Those Who Attended Harvard College in the Classes 1642-1658. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Murder on the High Seas, and all that good stuff

In my previous post on the Cape Cod Calvinist Kerfuffle of 1717-1738, I mentioned Kinney ancestor Joseph Doane, famous for capturing nine pirates fleeing the wreck of the Whydah.  

While researching the Doane line, I came across the dramatic story of the schooner Abigail, which illustrates how dangerous shipping could be in the Cape Cod area in the 18th century (1). It's also a reminder that we're descendants from, essentially, the entire county of Barnstable, Massachusetts, which covers the outer hook of Cape Cod. Or, at least, it's 17th and 18th century inhabitants.

The Abigail was owned by Captain Thomas Nickerson of Chatham, in Barnstable county. [He was my first cousin, 8x removed. His father, Thomas, was the brother of Desire Nickerson, which is both her maiden and married name, my 7xgreat-grandmother.] By the late 1700s, the economy in Barnstable county was focused on fishing and shipping. Captain Nickerson used his schooner to transport cargo between Boston and the outer Cape Cod. 

On November 15, 1772, the Abigail was found by Captain Joseph Doane Jr., himself piloting a schooner from Boston to Chatham, with her distress signal flying. [Joseph Doane Jr. was the son of pirate-hunter Joseph Doane, and therefore my 3rd cousin, 7x removed.] When Captain Doane boarded the vessel, he found the deck awash in blood and the cargo smashed open. Three men were dead, clearly murdered: Captain Nickerson himself, his cousin Sparrow Nickerson [also a relative of ours], and his brother-in-law Elisha Newcomb. [As far as I know, Elisha Newcomb was not related to our family, but I can't find his genealogy.]

There was one survivor, Ansel Nickerson. [Presumably, Ansel was also a cousin of mine, since he was a cousin of the captain, but I haven't found his place in the genealogy (2).] Ansel claimed that at 2am that morning, the crew had seen a topsail schooner heading toward them. Fearing he would be impressed into the British Navy, Ansel tied a rope around himself and let himself hang off the stern of the ship. While hanging, he heard four boats of armed men attack the ship, murder his captain, mate, and a crew-member, and carry off the youngest crew member, a boy of 13 named William Kent Jr. The pirates stole what they could, smashed open a barrel of rum and drank it, then argued about whether to burn the Abigail or just leave her to wreck herself. Luckily for Ansel, they decided to leave her.

Captain Doane carried the distraught Ansel Nickerson back to Chatham, but that was not the end of the story. For reasons that are not clear, the local official, Edward Bacon, Esq., was suspicious of Ansel's story. [I don't know if we're related to Edward Bacon. I can't find information about his family, but I don't know of any connections to a Bacon.] It seems unlikely that Ansel could have murdered four men -- for no known motivation -- without sustaining any injuries himself, but he was sent to Boston where he was tried for murder on the high seas and found not guilty when the jury deadlocked. 

The public and the courts were not satisfied, so Ansel was tried again, this time by a special Court of the Vice-Admiralty which charged him with piracy and robbery. He was represented by two Boston lawyers, John Adams and Josiah Quincy Jr., who had, two years earlier, successfully defended the British soldiers accused in the Boston Massacre. (And one of whom, of course, later became the president of the United States.) The trial lasted two weeks. Although Ansel was acquitted, something about his story, character, or evidence must have been extremely suspicious, for John Adams himself wrote in his diary, years later, that he was uncertain of his client's guilt or innocence. Ansel eventually moved to the Caribbean. Many of his neighbors remained convinced of his guilt.

Joseph Doane Jr., who had found the Abigail, went on to serve in the Revolution under Captain (later Colonel) Benjamin Godfrey of the Massachusetts militia [my 1st cousin, 9x removed. His father's brother, Moses Godfrey, was my 8xgreat-grandfather].

References:

1. Nickerson, Joseph A., Jr., and Geraldine D. Nickerson. 2008. Chatham Sea Captains in the Age of Sail. The History Press, p. 25-26. Available on-line here: https://books.google.com/books?id=FXgVBAAAQBAJ&pg=PA91&dq=boston+ship+captains&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi7orXDq8TMAhVkIcAKHXLKBuYQ6AEIRjAH#v=onepage&q=Nickerson&f=false

2. http://capecodhistory.us/genealogy/Nauset/i2819.htm

Overview of the Bakers

This is part of a series from the family history book I wrote for my mother's birthday. To see all the posts, click on the "Mom Book" tag at the bottom of this post.

Baker

Casper and Anna Maria Baker (or Becker, depending on how the name is transliterated) were the first of our Baker line to move to the United States. They were from Saxony, according to their census information. Place names in Germany are difficult to interpret. The same town and region names can be used for a variety of different locations, and, of course, the boundaries of those regions could change over time. Saxony, in the period 1820-1860, most likely referred either to the Kingdom of Saxony (an independent member of the German Confederation that included the major cities of Dresden and Leipzig) or the Province of Saxony (a somewhat less coherent region annexed by Prussia and including areas that had previously been part of the Kingdom of Saxony, such as Wittenberg, but also Magdeburg, Halberstadt, and parts of the former territories of Brandenberg and Erfurt.) 

Casper was born on March 18, 1822, and Anna Maria on February 2, 1826. They probably married in Saxony and emigrated together to the United States. They arrived in Dayton, Ohio before 1849, the birth year of their eldest child. Casper was a stonecutter by trade. Casper and Anna Maria had nine children. Their third child, and second daughter, was Appolonia Baker, who, at the age of 18, married John T. Stoecklein. 

Appolonia died at the age of 41, after a long battle with illness. Although the cause of her illness is not known for certain, her descendants have a strong history of biliary cancer. She had three surviving daughters, the youngest of whom, Irene (the future wife of Louis Leyes), was only four when her mother died. 

References:

http://thedeanbeaverblog.blogspot.com/2016/01/appolonia-baker-stoecklein.html

Overview of the Stoeckleins

This is part of a series from the family history book I wrote for my mother's birthday. To see all the posts, click on the "Mom Book" tag at the bottom of this post.

Stoecklein

The Stoeckleins were a Baravian family. The first to immigrate to the United States was Joseph C. Stoecklein, born in 1827 in the village of Stadt Prozelten, in the municipality of Faulbach, Bavaria. Bavaria was in turmoil during the 1830s and 40s. Eventually, political unrest led to the Revolutions of 1848, during which intellectual leaders called for greater freedom and rights for common people. The movement was defeated by the aristocracy, but Bavaria's king, Ludwig I, was forced to abdicate and was replaced by his son, Maximilian II.

The unrest in the German states led to a wave of emigration to the United States. As was common at the time, the citizens of Stadt Prozelten stuck together, even in the New World. Joseph was the first to reach Dayton, Ohio, sometime before 1849. He got a job at a meat-packing plant, wrote back home about his success, and was soon joined by his brothers, his father (his mother had died), and many other inhabitants of the village, including the Zwisler family: Joseph and Maria Dorothy Zwisler, and their daughters Carolina and Magdalena.

Joseph Stoecklein and Carolina Zwisler married on February 18, 1851. Joseph was 24, and Carolina
was 18. Whether or not they had been sweethearts in Bavaria, they no doubt were drawn to each other as familiar faces in a strange land. Joseph and Carolina raised three sons in Dayton. Their eldest, John T., was born in December 10, 1851.

John T. Stoecklein began working as a butcher, following in his father's footsteps. On November 12, 1872, he married Appolonia Baker. They had at least four children, only three of whom survived to adulthood: Cora, Betty, and Irene. John T. and his brother eventually took over their father's butcher shop. His uncles, however, were working in the brewing and saloon businesses, and in 1896, after Appolonia's early death, he opened his own saloon, The Mint.

In March of 1913, the Stoeckleins survived the one of the worst natural disasters in Ohio history. The Great Dayton Flood broke through the levees and sent water up to 20 feet deep through the downtown. Houses were swept away, killing their occupants. Families were stranded on their roofs, some dying during rescue attempts. Gas lines exploded, causing fires that could not be contained because the fire department was unable to navigate the streets. People walked the telegraph and electrical wires to safety, balancing high above the flood waters. 360 people died and 65,000 were driven from their homes. The Mint was in the middle of the flood. Family history says that John T. lost a number of barrels of expensive whiskey to the waters. Undoubtedly there was a great deal of property damage, as well. The business survived, only to close six years later when prohibition banned the sale of alcohol. 

John T. and Appolonia's youngest daughter, Irene, married Louis Leyes on June 2, 1914.

References:

http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Stoecklein-17

http://www.daytonhistorybooks.com/page/page/1566099.htm

(Historical) Representation Matters

While looking through information about the Founding Fathers for the 4th of July, I came across this story of a descendant of Aaron Burr's cousin who reenacted his ancestor's famous duel with Alexander Hamilton for a PBS special. Antonio Burr had previously reenacted the duel with a descendant of Alexander Hamilton. 

Alexander Hamilton had eight children, most of whom survived and had children of their own, so it's no surprise that his direct descendants are numerous. But why is Burr's family represented by a more distant relative? If you look at most documents about his life, they will say he and his wife had one daughter who died as a young adult, and that her only child died before having children of his own. 

But there is substantial evidence that Burr had more than one illegitimate child. He adopted a French boy named Aaron Burr Colombe who is believed to have been his natural child. There is also reasonable documentation that he was the father of John Pierre Burr and Louisa Charlotte Burr Webb, the children of his Indian (as in from India) maid. It is an interesting reflection of the development of racial categories in Colonial America that Burr's (presumed) children considered themselves African-American, although their mother is believed to have been born in Calcutta. They became active in abolitionist causes, and Louisa's son was one of the first African-American novelists. 

As far as I can find, there has been no DNA testing to confirm Burr's patrimony of these three children. Regardless, if there are likely direct descendants of Aaron Burr, it's interesting that none of them were chosen for this reenactment. There are undoubtedly a number of reasons (Antonio Burr is an experienced reenactor, there were no descendants of John or Louisa willing to participate, etc.), but race may have played a part as well. Would PBS have faced a backlash if Aaron Burr was played by a Black man, even if that man was a direct descendant? Historical representations are often fraught with questions that reflect our own social ills more than those of the past. Personally, I think there was a missed opportunity to highlight the messy reality of race and history in the U.S.

4th of July, Genealogy Style

The Declaration of Independence
See the bottom there? Some of our distant relatives signed that.

Fifty-six white men from the Continental Congress signed the Declaration of Independence. Did you ever wonder: who were they, and are we related to any of them? Well, wonder no more. We are not direct descendants of any of the signers, but we have a more distant relationships to at least two:*

Lyman Hall, representative of Georgia. Born in Connecticut, he moved south and lived in South Carolina and Georgia after studying medicine at Yale. His property was burned by the British during the war, and he was accused of high treason. He escaped back to Connecticut, returning to Georgia after the war to serve as governor. He is a third cousin (multiple times removed) from the Kinney line, through our mutual descent from John Walker, one of the early colonizers of Connecticut. Lyman was the great-grandson of John's daughter, Hannah Walker Hall. The Kinneys descended from her sister, Mary Walker Brown Clark.

Robert Treat Paine, representative of Massachusetts. Lawyer, prosecutor (among other jobs, he was assistant prosecutor in the trial of British soldiers for the Boston Massacre), founder of the Academy of Arts and Sciences, Massachusetts attorney general and supreme court judge. He is a third cousin (many times removed) through our common descent from Nicholas Snow and his wife Constance Hopkins, both Mayflower passengers. Robert was the great-grandson of Nicholas's daughter, Mary Snow Paine. Our Kinney line is descended from Nicholas's son, Stephen, named for his mother's father, Stephen Hopkins, another Mayflower passenger.

The 4th of July is also a good day to remind you of the many Revolutionary War soldiers in our family.

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*Note, as with many people of English ancestry, we have certain "gateway ancestors" who connect us back to medieval times. I am not counting relationships through those gateway ancestors here, only closer connections. Also, I'm relying on wikitree.com relationship finder, which is only as good as the family trees that have been entered into its system. There may be relationships that it is not finding because the trees are not complete. I wouldn't be surprised, for example, if we are relatives of Josiah Bartlett, since we are descendants from one Bartlett family in Massachusetts, but wikitree finds no connection.

We are not related to Benjamin Franklin

Benjamin Franklin. To whom we are not related.

As the 4th of July draws near, the Founding Fathers are on our minds. We are related, distantly, to some of them, but alas we are not related to my favorite: Benjamin Franklin. We do, however, have a non-family connection (of a sort).

In my post on the Cape Cod Calvinist Kerfuffle of 1717-1738, I mentioned my eight great-grandmother, Jedidah Smith Osborn. Her grandfather and great-grandfather were both named Thomas Mayhew. They were founders and leaders of the European colony on Martha's Vineyard, and they ran a mission school on the island. They were both fluent in the Wapanoag language and their strong relationships with the Wapanoag community (among other things, they required Europeans to pay an honest price for the land they colonized) kept the island from being pulled into King Phillip's War. By the (admittedly quite low) standards of the day, they were respectful and considerate of the indigenous people.

The two Thomases were assisted by Peter Folger (or Foulger). Peter had come to New England in 1635 with his parents, but he was a Baptist and therefore was harder to employ or to integrate into the Puritan society. The Mayhews were more tolerant in this respect, also, than their brethren on the mainland. When Thomas Jr. left for a return trip to England (from which he never returned) he left the mission and school in Peter's hands. Peter later surveyed and then led a European settlement on Nantucket. He married Mary Morrill, with whom he had a number of children, including their second-youngest daughter, Abiah, who married Josiah Franklin and was mother of Benjamin Franklin.

So, although we have no blood relationship with Benjamin Franklin, our families are intertwined, and young Ben no doubt grew up hearing stories about our Mayhew great-grandfathers from his own grandfather.

Overview of the Schuttes

This is part of a series from the family history book I wrote for my mother's birthday. To see all the posts, click on the "Mom Book" tag at the bottom of this post.

Schutte

The first Schuttes in the United States were Joseph and Mena (possibly Maria) Schutte, who arrived in Ohio from Hanover in the 1850s. The short-lived Kingdom of Hanover was conquered by the Prussians in 1866. Even before it was forcibly added to the Prussian empire, the Kingdom of Hanover had been a difficult place to live. Between 1800 and 1825, when Joseph Schutte was born, the region was controlled first by the British crown, then the French, then the Cossacks, then the British again. The economic and political insecurity prompted many Hanoverians to immigrate. In the 1850s, immigrants from throughout the German states were settling in the Midwest, where cheap land tempted immigrants to farmstead.

Unlike many of his fellow immigrants, however, Joseph Schutte was a skilled laborer, a shoe-maker. He set up a shop in Dayton, Ohio, where he and Mena had five children, only two of whom survived to adulthood. Mena, unfortunately, appears to have died at the age of 39 in 1867. Although Joseph remarried, he had no other surviving children. 

Joseph and Mena's eldest daughter, Mary, was born October 9, 1860. As a teenager, she went to work in Mad River Falls township for a German farming family. Either there, or in church, she met Joseph Leyes, whom she married in 1883. Mary's only surviving sibling, Anna Woeste, is buried near her in Calvary Cemetery in Dayton, as are her younger Schutte siblings who did not survive to adulthood.

References:

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~schenot/hecht_leyes/leyes.html

http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Shutte-11

Overview of the Leyeses

This is part of a series from the family history book I wrote for my mother's birthday. To see all the posts, click on the "Mom Book" tag at the bottom of this post.

Leyes

The first Leyes in the United States was John (or Johann) Leyes, who was born September 1, 1824 and arrived in the United States by 1853.He settled in Mad River Township, outside of Dayton, Ohio. Family legend claims he came from the Alsace, a culturally and historically German region in France. However, the documentary evidence suggests he actually came from the Palatinate, an adjacent area to the Alsace but on the German side. "Leyes" is a Rhenish name and in every census John gave his birthplace -- and that of his parents -- as Bavaria or Rhine-Bavaria; his children's death certificates all list their father's country of birth as Germany. It is possible that he originally came from a border area, but I suspect the Alsace legend dates to the 20th century, when many German families tried to distance themselves from their origins during the time of jingoistic nationalism around World War I. 

On December 8, 1853, John married Margaretta Saeger. Margaretta was born around 1835 in Hesse-Darmstadt, the region adjacent to the Palatinate. She came to the United States in 1839 with her parents and brother, but unfortunately her parents died young. By 1850, she was a young orphan and living with another German family. She was raised Lutheran but converted to Catholicism, either at the time of her wedding or sometime after her parents died. After their marriage, John and Margaretta farmed in Mad River Township and had eight children, five of whom survived to adulthood.

John and Margaretta's eldest child, Joseph, was born August 8, 1858. He worked as a farm hand while a young man but eventually found a job as a teamster and moved to Dayton. On May 9, 1883, he married Mary Schutte in Emmanuel Church. Like Joseph, Mary was the daughter of German Catholic immigrants. Joseph and Mary Leyes raised six children and lived to celebrate the 50th anniversary of their wedding.

Joseph and Mary Leyes's second son, Louis, was born September 8, 1889. Like his father, he became a driver, although later in life he was a salesman. Also like his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, Louis was a stalwart member of Dayton's German Catholic community. He married within that community when, on June 2, 1914, he was united with Irene Stoecklein. The couple lived in Dayton, raising two children, including their eldest, Mary Jane Leyes, who married Robert Francis Cunningham on July 9, 1938.

References:

http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~schenot/hecht_leyes/leyes.html
http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Leyes-11

Overview of the Blouins

This is part of a series from the family history book I wrote for my mother's birthday. To see all the posts, click on the "Mom Book" tag at the bottom of this post.

Blouin

Like the LeFebvre dit Boulangers, the Blouin family has deep roots in Québec. The first Blouin in New France was Émery "Médéric" Blouin, born April 23, 1640 in  St Pierre d'Etusson, Deux-Sèvres, Poitou-Charentes,France, which is in western France, near La Rochelle. He came to New France in 1665 and married Marie Carreau on November 30, 1669, in La-Visitation-de-Notre-Dame, Château-Richer, Canada. They farmed in Saint-Jean, Île-d'Orléans, and raised a family of 14 children. His descendants married into families whose roots were even deeper in New France, including descendants of  Hélène Desportes, who, in 1620 was the first European child born in Québec. The LeFebvre line is descended from Hélène through her first marriage to Guillaume Hébert.  The Blouins are descended from the children of her second marriage, to Noël Morin. 

One notable Blouin ancestor was Jean Nicolet de Belleborne, who came to Canada in 1618. He was a coureur des bois, one of the young men sent by Samuel de Champlain to live among local communities, learn their languages and customs, and, most importantly, negotiate trade alliances that helped France and prevented the British and Dutch from getting a piece of the fur trade. Jean Nicolet first lived among the Algonquin-speaking people of Allumette Island. In 1620, he was asked to live among the Odawa and Algonquin people of Lake Nipissing. He lived there for nine years with his wife, Jeanne, a Nipissing woman. The Blouin line married the descendants of their daughter, Madeleine Euphrosine Nicolet, who traveled widely with her father before he took her to Québec so she could have a French education. Jean Nicolet is best known as the first European to cross Lake Michigan. He reached Green Bay, Wisconsin, in 1634, believing he was on the way to China through the Northwest passage. He traveled all the way down the Wisconsin River, nearly reaching the upper Mississippi before he turned back.

The first Blouin to arrive in the United States was Ombeline Blouin. Born in Saint-Anselme, Quebec, in 1848, she married Louis LeFebvre dit Boulanger in 1870 and moved with him first to Maine and then to Minnesota. She lived the rest of her life on the upper Mississippi. Her grave is less than two miles from Nicollet Ave., a major thoroughfare in Minneapolis named for her distant ancestor.

References:

http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Besloin-1

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Nicolet

http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Blouin-149

Were the Leyeses Alsatian? [Updated]

My 3xgreat-grandfather was Johann (or John) Leyes. He was born in the 1820s and immigrated to Ohio by 1853. Growing up, I heard the family story that the Leyeses were from the Alsace. Multiple branches of the family believe this to be true, so it should be taken seriously (1). That shared story, however, contradicts the primary documents we have about the family origins.

Location of Alsace

First, a bit of history. The Alsace is a region of France that borders Germany and Switzerland and has a unique Germanic cultural and linguistic identity. It's political history is complex. Prior to the 17th century, it was part of the Holy Roman Empire, which is a fancy way of saying it was part of a complex and shifting web of alliances that is too complicated to summarize in one blog post. By the end of the 17th century, however, the Alsace was was solidly part of France (with a few border changes and regional quirks). From 1871-1918, it was part of Germany, but after World War I it was returned to France. Except for its brief occupation by Nazi Germany, the Alsace has remained part of France since.

The Alsace is on the western bank of the upper Rhine, and Leyes is a Rhenish name (that is, a name characteristic of German communities along the Rhine) (2). But, of course, the Alsace isn't the only region along the upper Rhine and family legend isn't the only information we have about the origins of the Leyeses. Several times during his life, John Leyes or his children were asked about his place of birth and he always gave a location in Germany.

1860 U.S. Census, John "Lias" gave his birthplace as Bavaria, Germany (3)

1870 U.S. Census, John Leyes gave his birthplace as Bavaria (4)

1880 U.S. Census, John Leyes gave his birthplace as Rhine Bavaria. He gave the same answer when asked for the birthplaces of his parents. His children were also asked to give the location of their father's birth. Each one said Rhine Bavaria, including his grown son, Joseph, who was living in another household. (5)

Although this is less direct evidence, three of his children had John's place of birth listed on their death certificates. In each case, it was "Germany".

Location of the Palatinate

At his most specific, John Leyes gave his birthplace as Rhine Bavaria. Such a place does not, alas, exist, per se. It most likely refers to the Palatinate, also known as Rhineland-Palatinate or Rhineland-Pfalz. Rhineland-Palatinate is the German province immediately north of the Alsace. It was part of the Holy Roman Empire until the end of the 18th century, at which time it was briefly controlled by France. However, from 1814 until 1871, the time during which John was born and lived in Europe, most of what is today the Palatinate was under Bavarian rule. In other words, it was Rhenish (or Rhine) Bavaria, a term that occurs on many of maps from the time (6).

If it weren't for the family story about the Alsace, I would assume the Leyeses were simply from Rhineland-Palatinate, but since the two areas are so close together, it is possible that the shifting and complex political situation left a family with Alsatian ethnic identity inside the borders of Germany. Regardless of their identity as Alsatian (or not), it's pretty clear their original location was in Germany, not France.

If the Leyeses weren't from the Alsace, then why did that story pass down through the family? I think there are two plausible (and not mutually exclusive) hypotheses: 1) The Leyeses were ethnically Alsatian, although they did not live in the area that was considered the Alsace, at least within the generation before they emigrated to the United States; and/or 2) during the period of jingoistic nationalism around World War I, many German-Americans sought to distance themselves from their heritage. Anti-German sentiment was strong and dangerous; German-Americans were killed by mobs, they were banned from joining the Red Cross or holding prestigious public positions, German town and street names were changed, doctors began treating "liberty measles" for heaven's sake (7). Many German-Americans denied their heritage completely. For example, Friedrich Trump, best known to us as Donald Trump's grandfather, was born in Rhineland-Palatinate, but in the early 20th century his family claimed to be from Sweden (7). It would not be surprising if the Leyes had shifted their homeland a bit to the southwest in response to those same pressures.

[UPDATE - June 14, 2016]

The more I look into the name "Leyes", the more convinced I am that the Leyeses were ethnically Alsatian, although they did not live in the French province of the Alsace. I'm basing this entirely on the modern/recent historical distribution of the name. Here are two maps showing the distribution of the name in Germany and in France. The German map is based on modern phone book records, while the French map is based on historical census data.

The distribution of the surname "Leyes" in modern German
telephone books, from http://www.verwandt.de/karten/absolut/leyes.html
The region with the highest concentration of Leyeses is Saarpfalz-Kreis

The distribution of the surname "Leyes" in France, based on census
records, from http://www.geopatronyme.com/cgi-bin/carte/nomcarte.cgi?nom=Leyes&submit=Valider&client=cdip.
The region with the highest concentration is Bas Rhin.

Note that the name is rare and only really found in one area: the Alsace (in France) and the provinces adjoining the Alsace in Germany. My guess is, then, that it is an "Alsatian" name. Honesty compels me to add, though, that the data behind these maps is weak. The webpages don't give details because they want you to buy access to their database, so I can't vouch for their reliability.

References:
1) http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~schenot/hecht_leyes/leyes.html

2) http://www.ancestry.com/name-origin?surname=leyes

3) Year: 1860; Census Place: Mad River, Montgomery, Ohio; Roll: M653_1014; Page: 216; Image: 9; Family History Library Film: 805014

4) "United States Census, 1870," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:M6LZ-CZR : accessed 16 May 2016), John Leyes, Ohio, United States; citing p. 46, family 326, NARA microfilm publication M593 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.); FHL microfilm 552,747.

5) "United States Census, 1880," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:M8SQ-G5S : accessed 15 May 2016), John Leyes, Mad River, Montgomery, Ohio, United States; citing enumeration district ED 170, sheet 640C, NARA microfilm publication T9 (Washington D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.), roll 1052; FHL microfilm 1,255,052.

6) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Palatinate_(region)#Bavarian_rule

7) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-German_sentiment#United_States

8) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Trump

Overview of the LeFebvres

This is part of a series from the family history book I wrote for my mother's birthday. To see all the posts, click on the "Mom Book" tag at the bottom of this post.

LeFebvre dit Boulanger

The LeFebvre dit Boulangers trace their origins back to the beginning of New France and the settlement of Québec. The first of our line in New France was Claude LeFebvre dit Boulanger, born in 1648 near Paris. Claude was confirmed November 11, 1665, in Québec city. It is not clear if his parents accompanied him to the colony. Claude worked for a man named Jacques Bilodeau on the  l'Île d'Orléans. On October 28, 1669, Claude married Marie Arcular, who was born in Paris in 1651. She came to Québec as a "fille du roi", literally "daughter of the king". Filles du roi were young women, most of whom were poor or orphans, who were given dowries and free transportation to New France by the crown, in the expectation that they would marry one of the many single men in the colony.

Given the LeFebvre's deep history in Canada, there are too many ancestors to name, including a number of filles du roi, colony leaders, and important land-owners. The descendants of Claude and Marie married into families with even earlier ties to the colony, including the descendants of Louis Hébert. Louis and his wife, Marie Rollet, were the first European farmers in Québec. Louis was an apothocary and noted horticulturalist in Paris when he was recruited by his friend, Samuel de Champlain, to bring his skills to the new colony in 1617. He had previously accompanied Champlain to Port-Royal, Acadia (now Nova Scotia) in 1606. Louis's son, Guillaume, married Hélène Desportes, who is believed to be the first European child born in the new colony, in 1620. Their daughter's descendants eventually married into the LeFebvre line.

The LeFebvres first moved to the United States in the late 1800s, as part of a large migration of French-Canadians out of Québec, where rising populations were making land and jobs scarce. Leon LeFebvre, and his new bride, Ombeline Blouin, moved to Lewiston, Maine, shortly after they were married in 1870. Lewiston was known for its "Little Canada" neighborhood, where immigrants could find a French-speaking Catholic church and school for their children. Lewiston was undergoing an economic boom and Leon was able to find a job as a millwright. They had six children in Maine, and in 1886 moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota, another major mill town, so Leon could find work. Leon and Ombeline lived the rest of their lives in Minneapolis.

Leon and Ombeline's youngest daughter, Marie-Anne Medora LeFebvre, married Frank Cunningham before 1910. They, too, made their home in Minneapolis, where they raised their two children.

References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_H%C3%A9bert
http://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Lefebvre-879
http://niche-canada.org/2014/11/26/lewiston-maines-little-canada-revealing-the-cultural-intentions-of-french-canadian-migrants/
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GRid=57401112