Edward Maurice Jones: Tall Tales

Edward was born July 22, 1849 in Massillon, Stark County, Ohio to Lewis and Elisabeth (Ogden) Jones. Lewis was born in Wales in 1821 and his wife Elisabeth was born in Loudoun County, Virginia in 1825, a daughter of Hugh and Catherine (Bemenderfer) Ogden.

Edward appears with Lewis and Elisabeth in the 1850 census in Bethlehem Township, Stark County, Ohio. Also enumerated in Lewis’s household is a seven-year old girl named Emily, born in Ohio. Lewis and Elisabeth were married February 7, 1847 in Stark County, Ohio, so Emily could have been a child from a previous marriage of Lewis, but I believe it is more likely this Emily is actually Emma Ogden, Elisabeth’s youngest sister.

According to the 1850 census, Lewis was working as a miller. The Tuscarawas River runs through Bethlehem Township up to Massillon, so it is likely that Lewis’s mill was situated somewhere along the river. Elisabeth’s father Hugh worked as a miller as well and it is likely that she met Lewis while he was doing millwork alongside her father. Hugh died on or before January 1847. Elisabeth married Lewis a month later. Her mother Catherine died sometime before 1850.

Edward’s mother Elisabeth died on January 8, 1853, when he was just three years old. It is not known if some of Elisabeth’s Ogden or Bemenderfer relatives may have helped take care of Edward as he was growing up. Even though Edward’s mother and maternal grandparents had died between the years 1847 and 1850, Edward still may have known his great-grandparents, Peter and Susannah (Rahn) Bemenderfer who lived in Carroll County, Ohio. They lived until 1858 and 1862, respectively. Neither Edward nor his father appear in the 1860 census. However, we do know that his father moved to Seneca County, Ohio and Edward moved to Kent, Portage County, Ohio.

During the Civil War, Lewis Jones enlisted in the Union Army on May 28, 1862 as a private in Company H, 87th Ohio Infantry Regiment. Around the same time, Edward, who would have been approximately thirteen, decided to join the Army and lie about his age, the enlistment age for Union soldiers being eighteen. Edward stood six feet tall, unusual for a boy of thirteen, which convinced the officials that he was eighteen or older. However, the truth was revealed when Edward was put in the same regiment as his father. Lewis made Edward return home.

Map of the Atlantic and Great Western Railway, with its connections, 1866, courtesy Library of Congress

While Edward was not old enough to serve in the Army, he still sought to learn a trade. He came to Kent, Ohio when he was fifteen years old, as the Civil War drawing to a close. James B. Miller, the first engine dispatcher for the Atlantic & Great Western Railroad hired him to work. Edward, describing his work history for an article in the Kent Tribune, stated that his first job was “tending switch-letting engines from main to dump track.” He said that his next job was “dumping engines.” After that, his successive jobs were “work[ing] in the round house firing up engines,” working as a “hostler,” and “fir[ing] on the old broad gauge.” He also mentioned that he worked on “the beautiful brass engine No. 26, named in honor of the railroad’s first president, Marvin Kent.”

In the late 1860s, The Atlantic & Great Western Railroad, fell into a receivership and from then was controlled by the Erie Railroad through leases and then ultimately through a full merger in 1941.

Interestingly, in the Kent Tribune article, Edward also claimed to have known President James A. Garfield and often spoke with him during his days working as a canal team driver. This is actually impossible, because Garfield’s canal boat days would have been during six weeks in 1847, two years before Edward was even born! Notably, Garfield’s own biography shares some parallels with Edward’s. Garfield also lost a parent (his father) at a young age while the surviving parent remarried. He also set out on his own working as a young teenager, ultimately raising his status in life through ambition and hard work. These aspects of Garfield’s story must have resonated for Edward enough for him to paint himself into it fictitiously.

Sometime in the 1860s, Edward met Ellen Virginia David, the daughter of Joseph David, a glassblower, and Ann Maria Brown. Ellen also lost her mother at a very early age and her father had also re-married. It is likely that their shared experience of a losing mothers at such a young age was one of things that drew them together. They were married in Portage County on July 22, 1869.

Edward and Ellen had three daughters: Ada (1870-1918) who married Henry Martin George, Bertha (1873-1913) who married George Joseph Stauffer, and Margueritte (1885-1961) who also married George Joseph Stauffer (after her sister Bertha’s death). According to family lore, while Ellen was pregnant with their daughters, Edward would get a sympathetic morning sickness alongside her.

Edward died from bladder complications in 1924. His obituary described his death as a “shock to the community,” and noted that “[p]hysically for a man of his age, there wasn’t his equal in the entire community. Well along in his 76th year, he could perform many an act that would put others to shame. He had a system for athletic exercise that was equalled by few of his years and kept in the best of physical skill.”

Edward’s obituary described him as a “splendid man and a good citizen. No man stood higher in the service of the road than Edward M. Jones. No man held the confidence of the people of this community to a greater degree… He was a man respected by the people and will be sorely missed in this town.” His funeral at Kent’s Standing Rock cemetery was attended by numerous employees of the railroad.

Edward’s early life must have been difficult, but it is inspiring to hear his story about how he started working on the railroad at a very young age and continued to work with them throughout his life. His boyhood enlistment in the Civil War and his fabrication concerning President Garfield demonstrate that Edward seems to have been willing to bend or exaggerate the truth when it suited him. In any case, he must have loved telling stories.

Gertrude Helen Rodd: A Life of Long Journeys

Gertrude Rodd was born in 1858 in the Hammersmith neighborhood of London, the first child of Thomas Rodd, a mercantile clerk, and his wife Sarah Beauchamp. After Gertrude’s birth, Thomas and Sarah had two more daughters, Kathleen and Ellen. In 1861, while she was very young, Gertrude lived with her maternal grandparents, John and Sarah (Smith) Beauchamp in Isleworth. (1861 census). That same year, Thomas and Sarah were living in Lambeth, Surrey with Kathleen and Ellen. The census lists Thomas’s profession as “Commercial traveler – Irish Provision Trade.” It is possible that Gertrude was sent to live with her grandparents because it was too difficult for Sarah to take care of all three young children on her own, especially if Thomas was traveling for work.

In 1871, Gertrude was living on the Isle of Wight with her paternal grandmother, Martha (Baker) Rodd. They were both working as servants for Eleanor Hughes, a wealthy woman who resided at Layton House on St. Thomas Street in the town of Ryde. Martha was employed as a cook and Gertrude was her assistant.

How and why Gertrude immigrated from England to the United States remains a mystery. According to the United States census records, she arrived in 1871 or 1872, when she would have been thirteen or fourteen years old, and just a short time after she was living on the Isle of Wight with her grandmother. On February 13, 1878, she married William Davidson Fuller in Princeton, Bureau County, Illinois. Her parents remained in England. Sarah died in 1888 and Thomas in 1894. From 1891 to his death, Thomas appears a number of times in London workhouse records, suggesting that he had fallen on hard times financially.

It is possible that Gertrude crossed the Atlantic with her grandmother, Martha, who had left England to live with her son, William James Rodd, in Wentworth, Ontario, Canada. Martha died there in 1880. In 1871, William had been convicted of embezzlement in London (Records of the Old Bailey) and this is likely the reason why he left to start a new life with his wife and children in North America. So far, I have not been able to locate any records of Gertrude emigrating to Canada or living there.

I still am not sure how Gertrude ended up in Bureau County, Illinois. One possible explanation is that she came there with some other relatives, individuals I have not yet been able to identify, and met William D. Fuller while there. William had been living on a farm in Walnut and was the son of James and Margaret (Davidson) Fuller, immigrants from Bobbing, Kent, England and Kelso, Scotland, respectively.

William and Gertrude had seven children: William James, Charles Arthur, Margaret Ellen, James Davidson, Harry Thomas, Frank and Frederick.

Shortly after their marriage, William and Gertrude moved over the county line to Hamilton Township in Lee County. Sometime before 1885, William and Gertrude moved to Marshall Precinct, Clay County, Nebraska. Sometime before 1891, they moved back to Walnut. By 1900, William was no longer in the business of farming and had become a plumber.

In 1904, William and Gertrude traveled to England, probably to visit relatives on either sides of their families. Their names appear in immigration records on their return passage to New York City. William’s cousins in England would have been somewhat distant, but Gertrude may have been able to visit her sisters Kathleen and Ellen.

Sometime after 1900, William and Gertrude moved with their family to Cuyahoga Falls, Summit County, Ohio. Gertrude’s cousin, Robert James Rodd, a son of her uncle, William James Rodd (mentioned above), was a superintendent at the Falls Rivet and Machine Company, a manufacturer of pulleys, shafting, hangers, rivets and other items. Gertrude’s sons, Harry and Charles, found employment there. William, probably hoping to make his own fortune, decided to become a homesteader in Alberta. He had to become a Canadian citizen to do this and, by 1909, applied for land and had gone out there to live with Gertrude.

Unfortunately, William became ill and the family returned to Ohio. William died at the age of 57 in 1911, according to his obituary “highly esteemed by all who knew him.” Gertrude and her son Frank moved to Alberta to tend to the homestead lands. She probably remained in Canada until 1924 because Frank’s naturalization records indicate that he returned to the United States, settling in Oregon, around that year. Gertrude, however, does not appear in Oregon’s naturalization records.

Gertrude settled in Portland, where she lived with Frank and her daughter Margaret, who had been living in Portland since at least 1920. Gertrude died in Portland in 1937 and was buried at Lincoln Memorial Park.

My grandfather told me that he never met his grandmother and did not know much about her at all. My Aunt Beattie said she knew that one of her grandmothers lived out in Portland and that she would send them candies on their birthdays.

Overall, it is remarkable how independent and adventurous Gertrude was in her life, making a journey across the Atlantic as a young girl and, in adulthood, making moves hundreds and even thousands of miles away in various parts of the United States and Canada. Her life was both fascinating and heartbreaking. What were the circumstances that she could no longer live with her parents? What must have it had been like to lose her husband and then travel thousands of miles away to live out on the Alberta prairie to take care of the homestead lands? Because she lived so far away from other family members, my grandfather never really got to know her and this side of the family had remained somewhat mysterious until I began doing genealogical research. Thanks to existing records, I have been able to assemble this rough outline of the story of her life.

Sources

England Census 1861, 1871

United States Census 1880, 1900, 1910, 1930

Nebraska State Census 1885

Canada Census, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, 1916

Border Crossings from United States to Canada, 1908-1935

New York Passenger Lists 1820-1957

England Birth Records

Bureau County Marriage Records

Oregon Death Index

My Siegel Ancestors: Immigrants from Hesse Cassel in the 1840s

So far I have only been able to trace my Siegel ancestors back two generations. They immigrated to the United States from Hesse Cassel, a region in central Germany, in the early 19th Century. The earliest ancestor I have is John Siegel (probably Johannes). I have no evidence that he or his wife ever immigrated to America, but I have identified four possible children who did: one son: John, and three daughters: Anna Elisabeth, Martha (my ancestor), and Gertrude, all of whom settled in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania.

The town the Siegels originated from was Vockerode, a very small town near what is now Meissner (formerly Abterode), in what was then the Electorate of Hesse. The current county where this town is located is called Werra-Meißner-Kreis. I have not been able to ascertain whether church records exist for this community as yet.

During the 1840s, Hesse Cassel was undergoing a political crisis. Frederick William became the Elector of Hesse in 1847 and enacted several unpopular reactionary policies. This culminated in the Revolution of 1848, reflecting such revolts against autocratic rule that were occurring all over Germany. By the time of the Revolution, it appears that four Siegels had already made their way out of Hesse Cassel and to the United States.

Immigrants in this time and place did not undertake their decision to leave home lightly. Emigration allowed for release of all rights and responsibilities as subjects of the Electorate of Hesse, but for poorer people, making the voyage to the United States probably meant selling everything they had. If they were to return home, they would not have land and livelihood to return to.

John Siegel, son of John Siegel, appears to be the first in the family to emigrate to the United States, judging from the dates and places of his children’s birth in the U.S. census records, he probably emigrated with his wife Martha and two sons between 1843 and 1849. So far, I have been unable to locate John Siegel in the Castle Garden immigration records, but it’s possible that he and his family came through the port of Philadelphia instead.

John appears in the 1850 census in Blakeley Township, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania. This portion of Luzerne County would become part of Lackawanna County when it was formed in 1878. He is enumerated with his wife Martha, son Oswell (probably Frederick) and daughter Elizabeth. John and Martha had six children: Frederick, Elizabeth, Henry, Rachel, William R., and Rosetta. John and Martha appear in the 1860, 1870 and 1880s censuses in Carbondale, Pennsylvania. John worked as a blacksmith. Most of the known descendants of John and Martha are through their son Frederick. His descendants settled in the Carbondale area and spelled their surname– Seigle.

In 1848, Anna Elisabeth, Martha and Gertrude traveled across the Atlantic on the ship Hinna from the port of Bremen, arriving in New York City on April 22. According to the Castle Garden records, Anna was 22 and Martha and Gertrude were both 20. From this, I have surmised that Martha and Gertrude were twins, as they have the same birthday, although Martha claimed to have been born in 1821 and Gertrude’s death record has her being born in 1822. Notably, Martha had a set of twins and her daughter Eva (one of the twins who survived) also had twin boys. Eva’s twins unfortunately died young.

Sometime before or after Anna Elisabeth traveled with her sisters to America, she married William George Schulz, son of Johann Peter and Anna (Braunschweig) Schulz. William was born May 5, 1824 in Weissenbach, a town that would have been about a two hour walk from Vockerode. Anna Elisabeth may have known William while they lived in Germany and could have married him before he left for Pennsylvania. They settled in Dunmore and Scranton and had two children: Louisa Schulz born about 1849 and Henry Frederick Schulz (1854-1918). William and Anna Elisabeth were baptism sponsors for one of Martha Siegel’s sons. A number of descendants of William and Anna Elisabeth are also DNA matches to me on Ancestry.com. Anna Elisabeth died in 1882.

Martha, my ancestor, was born October 20, 1821 or 1822, with her twin sister Gertrude. It is likely that she met her husband, Henry Lussy, in Pennsylvania and married him soon after arriving there. Henry was born in Switzerland on May 17, 1816. The couple had ten children: John, Jacob Edward, Louisa, Henry, George, Adams, Eva, William, Adam and Huldah. The Lussy family resided in Blakely Township and later Dunmore. Henry worked as a miner, a common occupation in that region of Pennsylvania. He died in 1888 and Martha in 1900. Both are buried in Dunmore Cemetery.

Gertrude, Martha’s twin sister, married first George Ingrick or Ingrich sometime before 1849, probably shortly after she arrived in the United States. I have been unable to locate them in the 1850 census. She and George had three children: Henry, Levina Rosa, and Huldah Elizabeth. George was a book peddler according to the 1860 census and he and his family lived in Carbondale at the time, close to John and not far from Anna Elisabeth and Martha in Scranton and Dunmore. It appears that George and Gertrude were members of the First Presbyterian Church in Carbondale because their daughter Huldah was baptized there.

Sometime between 1860 and 1870, George Ingrich died and Gertrude married John Giessler, a miner and later a blacksmith. With John, Gertrude had one son, Nicholas Martin Henry Giessler. John died sometime between 1880 and 1900. Gertrude died January 26, 1906 in Carbondale.

Are you related to John, Anna Elisabeth, Martha or Gertrude Siegel? Are you related to any other Siegels from Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania or Hesse Cassel? I would be interested in hearing from you.

Sources:

Castle Garden Immigration Records

United States Census, 1850, 1860, 1870, 1880, 1900

Pennsylvania and New Jersey Church and Town Records, 1708-1985

Pennsylvania Death Certificates, 1906-1963

Chain Migration and Information Networks, p. 961

Mary Snyder

Mary Snyder was born September 8, 1769 (or 1764) in New Jersey, daughter of Johannes and Rachel Snyder. She married John Bishop, probably in Hunterdon County, New Jersey sometime before 1783.

John served in the Continental Army. Tradition holds that he was present George Washington’s crossing of the Delaware River on Christmas 1776 and at the Valley Forge winter encampment from December 19, 1777 to June 19, 1778. A John Bishop appears as a private on a muster roll in Captain John Polhamus’s company of First Regiment of New Jersey Troops, having enlisted on November 16, 1776. Indeed, there was a Sergeant Major John Bishop who appears on the roll of the 1st New Jersey Regiment at Valley Forge, which was part of Brigadier General William Maxwell’s brigade. He fell ill in May 1778. John also appears with the rank of Ensign on a Revolutionary War roll dated 1783 in Captain Aaron Ogden’s Company, New Jersey Regiment. The rolls states that John enlisted on February 1, 1779.

After the war, Mary moved with her husband and children to the Narrows in Pike County, Pennsylvania and later to Bethany Borough, Wayne County, Pennsylvania. John worked as a carpenter by trade and built the first frame house in Dyberry Township for William Schoonover and helped build Bethany’s first courthouse and jail. In 1802, John was in charge of carrying the mail from Bethany to Stroudsburg, a journey of a few days at the time. He appears on a list of taxables in Dyberry Township in 1804.

Mary had at least nine children with John: Harvey, John, William, Hiram, Rachel, Henry, Jacob, David, and Hettie. I descend from Rachel who married Elijah Schoonover.

Mary’s husband died sometime between 1810 and 1820, most likely in Wayne County. There is a John Bishop who appears in Mount Pleasant Township in the 1810 census. Mount Pleasant Township is situated just to the northeast of Bethany and Dyberry. I do not believe that John Bishop is the John Bishop who appears in Marbletown, New York and do not think he died in Esopus, New York in 1812. This appears to be another John Bishop. However, it is likely that our John Bishop died some time between 1810 and 1820 in Wayne County, Pennsylvania.

Mary appears in the 1820 census in Dyberry Township. She is listed as a female over the age of 45. Three males are listed along with her, probably three of her sons. Mary does not appear individually in the 1830 census in Wayne County, perhaps because she was living in the household of one of her children at that point. William Bishop appears in Palmyra Township with a female in her 70s in his household. This would be slightly older than Mary, but none of the other children have a female in Mary’s age range in their household. She died on March 12, 1834.

The identity of Mary’s parents eluded me for years. Her name is relatively common and I hadn’t been able to find a Mary Snyder born in the mid-1700s in New Jersey that I could definitively say was her. Genetic genealogy has made it possible to narrow down the Snyder family to which she was linked and I was ultimately able to find a family Bible record confirming this connection.

It actually was not until my mother took a DNA test on Ancestry that I was able to find DNA matches that helped reveal the Snyder family that Mary belonged to. Viewing my mother’s test, I found several DNA matches that I was able to identify how they fit into the family tree. I found one match who was a descendant of John Bishop and Mary Snyder. This match had several other DNA matches in common with my mother. I started browsing the online trees for the matches and noticed that a number of them had Snyders in their family trees. Some of these matches were descendants of Peter Snyder who was born 1721 and died about 1778 in Amwell Township, Hunterdon County, New Jersey and his wife Lenah.

I thought Peter and Lenah could potentially be the parents of Mary since they would have been the right age. At least now I had a clue as to the Snyder family to which Mary belonged as well as a location: Amwell Township. I googled Peter Snyder and Amwell Township and happened upon this wonderfully detailed blog post from Goodspeed Histories. On this post, the author tells the story of Jacob Peter Sniter and how he ended up purchasing land in Amwell Township. He married Elizabeth Lott and had six children with her: Catharina, Anna, Johannes, Peter (who married Lenah), Elizabeth and Christopher.

At first I thought that Peter and Lenah might be Mary’s parents. Researching some of the online trees, I found that they had a daughter born in 1757, but she married a William Dilts. I next turned to Johannes as a potential candidate for Mary’s father.

I discovered that Johannes married a Rachel, which I thought intriguing since Mary had a daughter named Rachel. I initially collected some information from online trees on Ancestry that I was able to find and eventually found that he did in fact have a daughter named Mary. Interested to see if any of the children ended up following the same migration path as Mary, I tried to compile what I could about them from online trees. On FamilySearch, I actually found a link to a Bible record from the family of Jacob Snyder. In it he recorded the deaths of his sisters and one of them listed was Mary “Bishop.” This record helped me establish that Mary Snyder’s parents were extremely likely to be Johannes Snyder and Rachel.

There are now some new mysteries in the Snyder family that I would like to solve. First of all, what was Rachel’s maiden name? Johannes was only a boy when his father purchased land in Hunterdon County, so it is likely that Rachel came from a family that settled there as well. Also, I would like to find out what became of Johannes and Rachel after they moved away from Amwell Township. Apparently neither Johannes nor any of his siblings were interested in keeping the land that their father had purchased. Nevertheless, I was thrilled to break through this brick wall and identify Mary’s parents with the help of DNA.

Sources:

Phineas Goodrich, History of Wayne County, Pennsylvania (Haines & Beardsley: Honesdale, Pa.), 1880

Alfred Matthews, History of Wayne, Pike, and Monroe Counties, Pennsylvania, (R.T. & Peck Co., Philadelphia 1886), pp. 493-94, 597

Jacob and Margaret Snyder Family Bible Records, available at https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3Q9M-CSG6-8961-G?i=32

1810 Census, Wayne County, Pennsylvania

1820 Census, Wayne County, Pennsylvania

1830 Census, Wayne County, Pennsylvania

Goodspeed Histories

The Parents of Keziah Dailey Cushman

Who was Keziah Dailey/Dayley/Daily?

My ancestor Keziah Dailey (also spelled Daily or Dailey) was born March 20, 1769 in Thompson, Connecticut. She was the wife of Joshua Cushman. They married on March 26, 1789 in Charlestown, New Hampshire and subsequently moved to Litchfield, Herkimer County, New York; Sherburne, Chenango County, New York; and finally to Villenova, Chautauqua County, New York, where they both died: Joshua on February 2, 1858 and Keziah, a few months later, on May 15, 1858. They are buried together in Villenova Cemetery.

Joshua and Keziah had the following children:

Phila Cushman b. 28 SEP 1788 in Vermont, d. 1866 Roscoe, Winnebago County, Illinois, married William Guile

Benjamin Cushman b. 17 JUN 1791 in Litchfield, Herkimer County, New York, d. 1877 in Hamilton, Madison County, New York, married Emily A. Emory

Rhoby Cushman b. 28 FEB 1794 in Litchfield, Herkimer County, New York, d. 26 MAR 1850 in Hamilton, Madison County, New York, married Henry Wells

Polly Cushman b. 29 JUN 1796 in Sherburne, Chenango County, New York, d. February 1838 in Brookfield, Madison County, New York, married Jonas Palmer

Sarah “Sally” Cushman b. 3 AUG 1798 in New Hampshire, d. 23 OCT 1834 in Sherburne, Chenango County, New York, married Alfred Sabin

Hiram Cushman b. 3 AUG 1799 in Litchfield, Herkimer County, New York, d. 22 MAR 1894 in Wisconsin; married Lucinda Lee

Abram Cushman b. 8 AUG 1801 in Sherburne, Chenango County, New York, d. 1883; married (1) Mary Calkins, (2) Eliza Plum

Paul Cushman b. 7 MAY 1805 in Sherburne, Chenango County, New York, d. 25 MAY 1879 in Villenova, Chautauqua County, New York; married Amy Tripp

Mason Hatfield Cushman b. 12 MAR 1807 in Sherburne, Chenango County, New York, d. 1893; married (1) Malissa Sophia Parker, (2) Malissa Livia Beach

Solomon Wood Cushman b. 26 DEC 1808 in Sherburne, Chenango County, New York, d. after 1880, probably in Villenova, Chautauqua County, New York; married Nancy Finette Caston

Julia Ann Cushman b. 11 JUL 1811 in Sherburne, Chenango County, New York, d. 15 APR 1888 in South Dayton, Cattaraugus County, New York; married Emerson Doane

Cynthia G. Cushman b. 4. JUL 1813 in Sherburne, Chenango County, New York, d. after 1875, probably in Hanover, Chautauqua County, New York; married George Dorothy

Origins of the name Keziah

New Englanders in the 18th century were fond of Old Testament names. Keziah is one of the rarer choices, but it shows up in New England genealogies from time to time. Keziah appears in the book of Job as one of Job’s three daughters.

Mayflower ancestry of husband

Joshua Cushman is a Mayflower descendant. The Cushmans were not on the Mayflower itself, but were descended from Robert Cushman, who helped organize the voyage. His descendants intermarried with the Allertons, Howlands, Soules and other passenger families. Accordingly, Joshua’s ancestry is very well documented.

Joshua and Keziah appear in the main books on Cushman genealogy, but Keziah’s parents were not identified in any of them. Her ancestry remained a mystery to me for several years.

Keziah’s Birthplace

Census records provide conflicting information about Keziah’s birthplace. In the 1850 census, her birthplace is given as Connecticut, but given as Massachusetts in the 1855 New York census, the last census taken before Keziah’s death. Several of her children were alive in 1880, but they gave conflicting information to the census taker as to their mother’s state of birth. In that census, Hiram and Julia said Keziah was born in Vermont, Abram said she was born in New York, while Mason and Solomon said she was born in New Hampshire,

Because Joshua and Keziah were married in Charlestown, New Hampshire, I figured that was the most promising place to look for her parents. I looked in vain and for Dailey families in histories of Charlestown and surrounding towns and counties there as well as in adjoining Vermont. There was a Dailey family who lived in New Hampshire in the 1700s, but I could not connect them to Charlestown and never found a record of a Keziah.

Keziah’s birthplace became clearer when I discovered a Revolutionary War pension for which Keziah gave testimony. I had been operating under the hope that Keziah’s father had been in the Revolutionary War. There were some Dailey soldiers from New Hampshire, so I searched for “Keziah Cushman” in a Revolutionary War pension database on Fold3 to see what results I would find. What it yielded was a pension application for Phineas Chamberlain. Keziah provided testimony of Phineas’s Revolutionary War service. In her testimony, she stated that she knew Phineas when she lived in Litchfield, Herkimer County, New York and that she was born in Thompson, Massachusetts, “about 20 miles from Boston.”

Thompson, Connecticut

Next, I began looking for Thompson, Massachusetts. I looked at a map, but could not really find anything within 20 miles of Boston or anywhere else in the state of Massachusetts. However, there is a Thompson, Connecticut, located in the extreme northeast corner of the state. Thompson is actually more than 20 miles from Boston, but I figured it might be worth exploring.

I looked for records of Daileys in Thompson. I did not come up with Keziah Dailey, but I was able to find two possible candidates for Keziah parents by searching for marriages in the records of the Thompson Congregational Church that took place within a few years of Keziah’s birth. I found the following candidates: Samuel Daley who married Olive Bellows on June 27, 1753 and Abraham Daley who married Mary Nichols on November 9, 1757.

Identifying Keziah’s Parents

I decided to take a look for other Daileys in the census records in Herkimer County, New York. In the 1800, in Litchfield, there was an Abraham Daley and Abraham Daley Jr. I figured Abraham was a strong candidate for Keziah’s father since she lived in the same location for a time and also had a son named Abram.

My theory was further bolstered by research into Mary Nichols, the wife of Abraham Dailey. Mary had a sister named, Keziah who married John Converse. This couple at some point moved from Thompson to Charlestown, New Hampshire where they died. They may have been living there when Keziah married Joshua in 1789. Accordingly, I am fairly confident that Abraham Dailey and Mary Nichols are the parents of Keziah Dailey Cushman.