Little bits and pieces of a big history . . .

Our Most Famous Ancestor? (for Carol)

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 15:54:35 -0500

That version was written in 1765, and is found in The history of the colony of Nova-Cæsaria, or New-Jersey: containing, an account of its first settlement, progressive improvements, the original and present constitution, and other events, to the year 1721. With some particulars since; and a short view of its present state. Samuel Smith (J. Parker, 1765), and appears as follows:

"While New York was in the possession of the Dutch, about the time of the Indian war in New England, a Dutch ship, coming from Amsterdam, was stranded on Sandy Hook, but the passengers got ashore - among them was a young Dutchman who had been sick most of the voyage; he was so bad after landing that he could not travel, and the other passengers, being afraid of the Indians, would not stay until he recovered; his wife, however, would not leave him, and the rest promised to send for them as soon as they arrived at New Amsterdam (New York). They had not been gone long before a company of Indians, coming to the water side, discovered them on the beach, and hastening to the spot, soon killed the man and cut and mangled the woman in such a manner that they left her for dead. She had strength enough to crawl to some logs not far distant, and getting into a hollow one lived within it for several days, subsisting in part by eating the excrescences that grew from it. The Indians had left some fire on the shore, which she kept together for the warmth. Having remained in that manner for some time, an old Indian and a young one coming down the beach found her; they were soon in high words, which she afterwards understood was a dispute; the old Indian was for keeping her alive, the other for dispatching her. After they had debated the point awhile, the oldest Indian hastily took her up and tossing her upon his shoulder, carried her to a place near where Middletown now stands, where he dressed her wounds and soon cured her. After some time the Dutch at New Amsterdam, hearing of a white woman among the Indians, concluded who it must be, and some of them came to her relief; the old man, her preserver, gave her the choice to go or stay; she chose to go. A while after, marrying one Stout, they lived together at Middletown among other Dutch inhabitants. The old Indian who saved her life used frequently to visit her; at one of his visits she observed him to be more pensive than common, and sitting down, he gave three heavy sighs; after the last, she thought herself at liberty to ask him what was the matter. He told her he had something to tell her in friendship, though at the risk of his own life, which was that the Indians were that night to kill all the whites, and he advised her to go to New Amsterdam; she asked him how she could get off? He told her he had provided a canoe at a place which he named. Being gone from her she sent for her husband out of the field, and discovered the matter to him, who, not believing it, she told him the old man never deceived her, and that she with her children would go; accordingly at the place appointed they found the canoe and paddled off. When they were gone, the husband began to consider the matter, and sending for five or six of his neighbors, they set upon there guard. About midnight they heard the dismal warwhoop; presently came up a company of Indians; they first expostulated and then told the Indians if they persisted in their bloody designs, they would sell their lives very dear. Their arguments prevailed, the Indians desisted, and entered into a league of peace, which kept without violation. From this woman, thus remarkable saved, is descended a numerous posterity of the name of Stout, now inhabitants of New Jersey. At that time there were supposed to be about fifty families of white people, and five hundred Indians inhabiting those parts."

Everyone and their sister has been writing versions of this story since Smith’s 1765 history (and maybe even before). Scholars have questioned the dates, primarily concluding the shipwreck occurred in or about 1640 rather than 1620, and all the dates are about 20 years too early. They also shed some doubt the account of her role in later relations with the Native Americans. Nevertheless the story of her survival was documented not long after her death by people who knew her and memorialized by Smith in 1765.

One person apparently found enough material to write an entire book about Penelope’s story. The paperback is available at Amazon.

My favorite image related to Penelope is the collage at right, “Penelope Stout lived in a tree,” created by Jen Lowe Designs

The story is that Penelope lived to 110, had 10 children, and over 500 descendants when she died. The internet is full of people descended from Penelope, but I can never tell how many of them descend through multiple lines. Carol is descended from four (yes, four!) of Penelope’s sons, making Penelope Carol’s 11th great-grandmother through sons John and Jonathan, her 10th great-grandmother through son James, and her 9th great-grandmother through son David. And through them all she descends from a woman who lived in a tree.

Founding Fathers

Mon, 4 Jul 2011 09:31:14 -0400

It’s the Fourth of July, time to commemorate our Revolutionary ancestors. This should be easy for me since all but one branch of my family tree were living in the American colonies at the time (the last family came in 1830). But the fact is a large number of those families were Quakers and so did not participate in the fighting. Others, not Quakers, must have been working hard on their farms to feed the armies since they do not show up on the enlisted rolls. I can document only two examples of “founding fathers” in my family tree.

Both come from my father’s side and both lived in Hopewell Township in Hunterdon County, New Jersey. Each served in their own ways.

Thomas Drake was a Lieutenant in the New Jersey Militia and was at least prepared to fight—I don’t know if he ever had to. His son Enoch Drake served as well, first as a Private in Captain Tucker’s Company, First Regiment, Hunterdon County Militia, and later as a teamster in “Captain Seaman’s Team Brigade,” whatever that was.

Years ago, probably in the 1930’s, a long lost cousin submitted an application to join the New Jersey Sons of the American Revolution based on Thomas and Enoch Drake’s Revolutionary War service. About the same time, my father’s aunt also used the Drake’s service records to join the Daughters of the American Revolution.

While the Drakes joined the militia, another ancestor served as a “civil officer.” Jared Sexton, “Esquire,” was more “well-to-do” so he was one of two men appointed in 1777 to carry out two important responsibilities. One was to somehow get clothing for all the county’s soldiers. The other was to serve on a committee to report the names of anyone in the county loyal to the Crown and thus disloyal to the revolutionary cause.

By mid-1778, the Governor appointed Jared as a Commissioner authorized to sell the confiscated land of Tories. Jared was one of three such Commissioners in Hunterdon County, and the three held “juries of inquiry” (or “inquisitions”) around the county focusing on a long list of their neighbors. It is unclear whether all the persons named were true Tories, or whether they simply failed to enlist in the militia or make some financial contribution. Others have shown a majority of the names on the list were Quakers. After a big final inquisition in Trenton, where the accused were told to show up and plead their case or be considered guilty, Jared and the other commissioners did confiscate the estates of at least some of the loyalists. They sold the property at auction to raise money for the war. Also in 1778, in November, Jared served on a court of appeals that fined militiamen who were delinquent. Apparently if you ran away from your unit they levied fines.

Prominent before the war, Jared Sexton’s work to support the Revolution did not go unnoticed. In 1779 he was elected to the New Jersey legislature, filling the seat of the late John Hart (signer of the Declaration of Independence). When that term ended he became Judge of the Hunterdon County Court of Common Pleas and served there until his death in 1785.

Thomas Drake, Enoch Drake, and Jared Sexton were all buried in the churchyard of the Hopewell Baptist Church. All served in their own patriotic way. But while countless Americans now base their membership in the DAR or SAR on Thomas Drake’s service of one month as a militia lieutenant, I have to argue that Jared Sexton is the one who risked “his life, his fortune, and his sacred honor.” Jared is the one who, at the county level for all to see, confiscated and sold off the houses and farms of Tories. If the Revolution had failed, Jared truly would have lost everything.

Left, the grave of Patriot Thomas Drake
Enoch Drake’s headstone is shown at the top of this article.
Died,on the 23d ult, at his house in Hopewell, in this county, in the forty-eighth year of his age, JARED SEXTON, Esquire, late one of the representatives in general assembly, one of the judges of the court of common pleas, and of the surrogates of the county, in all which offices, and in every other station of life, he conducted in such manner as to deserve and obtain the universal good opinion of his fellow citizens. His remains were interred in the family burying ground, attended by a numerous retinue of weeping friends and relations, who felt and sincerely lamented their loss.
--New Jersey Gazette, Oct 10,1785.

Father’s Day

Sun, 19 Jun 2011 09:29:18 -0400

They always tell you in family history research you should ask all your questions now, while you still have elders around to answer them. It is good advice. But I was too young to understand and so did not ask those questions to my father. He died many years ago when he was only 51 years old.

I can only wonder what he would have told me. His own father (my grandfather) lived to the age of 75 and so could have filled in some gaps. But I did not know grampa Smith very well and only saw him a few times that I can recall, all while I was a child.

It remains unclear what my grandfather could have told me about his father (my great-grandfather), who died at the young age of 47. My grandfather was only 13 years old at the time--far too young to have thought of those big questions and demanded answers.

And what did great-grandfather know of his father's life? My great-great grandfather died in 1890 when his son was 34 years old, married, and away from home.

They all had to know something. My Smith line has been at a brick wall for many years, stuck at that great-great grandfather. It is a lesson that official records only take us so far. Oral tradition--despite the errors and mismatched memories--is a valuable resource in family history research.

So go ask your father some questions!!

It’s a Tong Story

Sun, 24 Apr 2011 09:23:40 -0400

Without any other ideas lately for blog topics, I decided to return to the dangerous Philadelphia blacksmith shop of John Ascough (see Dangerous Work). Dangerous, that was, to his employees.

In the early morning of Monday, August 27, 1849, two of Ascough's apprentices came to the shop on Front Street in the Northern Liberties to start fires in the forges. One, 17 year-old Alexander McConnell, was the "eldest son of an Irish widow lady, living at Germantown." The other, much younger Jonathan Phillips, reportedly "came from the country and had not been living long in town." Reports vary on who had been with the shop longer. Some accounts say McConnell was the new guy, scheduled to be formally apprenticed that week. But other stories claimed McConnell had been with Ascough several weeks and the Phillips boy was the new apprentice. Either way, the two did not get along.

The trouble began with what seemed harmless jabbing while the two boys washed up before breakfast at the shop. They fought over a towel until the argument became heated. Phillips backed up about 12 feet, grabbed a pair of heavy iron blacksmith's tongs, and threw them at McConnell. The tongs hit McConnell's head so hard they "entered the back of the cranium and stuck fast." McConnell was unconscious on the floor, where he was given first aid before he was rushed to the Pennsylvania Hospital (with the tongs still sticking out the back of his head). Doctors at the hospital removed the tongs, but said he had "a horrid compound fracture of the skull with compression of the brain." Reportedly, his brains were "oozing" out the two holes in his skull made by the two "nippers" of the tongs. There was no hope.

Meanwhile, back at Ascough's blacksmith shop, Jonathan Phillips ran away immediately after McConnell fell. John Ascough joined the Northern Liberties police in an unsuccessful attempt to chase Phillips down. It was not until the next day (Tuesday) that Officer Albright found Phillips in Southwark, arrested him, and brought him to the Northern Liberties Mayor's Office. There, Mayor John F. Belsterling committed the boy to the Northern Liberties lockup and a hearing before Alderman George Erety where he was charged with "a murderous assault on the person of Alexander McConnell." Since McConnell still lingered at the hospital they sent Phillips back to lockup to wait for further developments.

John Ascough went to visit Phillips at the jail and told the Philadelphia Inquirer that the boy was "suffering the most poignant remorse, expressing the deepest regret for the act." Phillips reportedly could not sleep or rest and "declared himself continually haunted by the sight of his victim, with the tongs sticking in his bleeding and gaping wound." On Wednesday morning the Baltimore Sun reported McConnell was still alive in the hospital, but "his final recovery is a matter of doubt." Alexander died the next day, Thursday, August 30th, 1849.

By Friday the 31st there had been testimony before a jury in the case. There it was established that Alexander McConnell was "a very good natured, well-behaved and inoffensive boy," while Phillips was the opposite, "a rather bad youth, disposed to master it over McConnell." The jury heard that on the previous Saturday (Aug 25, 1849) Phillips "was heard to threaten to put a pair of tongs into the head of McConnell" and that is what happened less than 48 hours later. The verdict: "That said Alexander McConnell came to his death by a blow willfully inflicted with a pair of blacksmith's tongs, in the hands of Jonathan Phillips, on Monday morning, August 27, 1849."

Phillips remained in the Northern Liberties jail for more than a month, until finally "committed" by Mayor Belsterling on Thursday, October 4th. From there the boy was sent along with a batch of other prisoners all charged with "trivial offenses" to the court in Philadelphia. But upon arrival there Phillips was "discharged from custody" by mistake. He then disappeared into the city.

It was over a year later, on Thursday November 7, 1850, when Jonathan Phillips was again arrested on a charge of disorderly conduct. When his name was called in the courtroom the clerk recognized him as the missing murder suspect. The next Tuesday, November 12th, 1850, Jonathan Phillips was convicted of manslaughter in the death of Alexander McConnell. About a week later he was sentenced to two years in prison. He was then described as "a fair-haired lad, but 12 years of age."

“This case conveys a solemn lesson to other youths who, from slight causes, give way to violent fits of rage."
--Philadelphia Inquirer, Aug 31, 1849

Sources:

Trenton (NJ) State Gazette, 8/28/1849  
Philadelphia North American, 8/28/1849 
Baltimore Sun, 8/29/1849 
Philadelphia Inquirer, 8/29/1849 
Baltimore Sun, 8/31/2849 
Philadelphia Inquirer, 8/31/1849 
Philadelphia Inquirer, 10/4/1849 
Philadelphia Public Ledger, 11/8/1850 
Trenton State Gazette, 11/14/1850 
Baltimore Sun, 11/23/1850 
Pennsylvania, Philadelphia City Death Certificates 1803-1915 

The site of John Ascough’s Blacksmith Shop today:

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Think Again

Sat, 2 Apr 2011 09:15:15 -0400

You think you know someone. After so many years, you think you know everything there is to know.

I thought I knew everything out my ancestor Lemuel Kessler. Family tradition said he was the son of a blacksmith who migrated from Worms (Germany) to Philadelphia, he was a liquor distributor until the "blue laws" made it too difficult to do such work, and he and his wife for a time ran a rooming house for Wanamaker Department Store employees (presumably at the direction of Wanamaker himself!). Years of research revealed Lemuel was actually the son of a Pennsylvania-born comb-maker, not a German blacksmith. But he did show up as a "liquor dealer" in the 1860 census, a salesman by 1870, and in 1880 the census displayed Lemuel and his family with a long list of roomers who were "clerks in store." He doesn't appear with his family in the 1900 census. We know from his 1901 death notice he was on a business trip when he died. That's about all I knew and, frankly, I wasn't questioning it much as I focused on finding his father's father--always searching for the next branch on the tree.

Still, Lemuel Kessler is a rare enough name there was no reason not to find out more. I knew of one other Lemuel Kessler in the records who showed up in the Ohio Valley while mine was in Philadelphia. And I was frustrated by a Lemuel O. Kessler (or L.O. Kessler) in New York who inserted himself into my searches of New York records (my Lemuel died in Pine Hills, New York in 1901 while on a business trip) and New Jersey records because the other Lemuel purchased and sold real estate in Bayonne and that area. The NY Lemuel (Lemuel O) was also charged with perjury once in Philadelphia so he had a tendency to muddle my results there as well.

I don't know what it was that suddenly made me question my assumptions about Lemuel Kessler. Whatever it was, a week ago I went back to his newspaper death notice and re-read it. The announcement did not say he was on a business trip--rather, it said "Mr. Kessler had been spending considerable time in New York of late, where he was interested in building operations." I then went back to the 1900 census and looked at Lemuel O. Kessler living in Westchester County, New York. He was born the same year as my Lemuel, in Pennsylvania, occupation "builder," and a roomer in a boardinghouse. He was listed as a widower. His wife, Mary Elizabeth Kessler, was back in New Jersey in 1900 listed as married but her husband was no where to be seen.

Next, I looked in the newspaper real estate section at the properties Lemuel O. purchased in/near Bayonne, NJ, and Yonkers, NY in the late 1890's. Turns out some of it was later sold (by Lemuel before he died) to his son in law, while his widow Mary E. sold the remainder after his 1901 death. So, all along, this Lemuel O. I'd rejected was actually my guy, I just rejected him because he didn't fit the picture I expected--or the picture I wanted to see.

Over the next 12 hours after "seeing the light," I traced Lemuel back through time in Philadelphia. Newspapers and city directories (yes, I'd reviewed them all before but with a closed mind). They now revealed the career of a man who was willing to work hard and take risks to support his family, but who didn't always have the best of luck.

Lemuel's career began around the time he got married in 1858-1859. He first appears in the City Directory in 1859 as a liquor dealer, and is variously described as a liquor agent, salesman, or "rectifier" (distiller) until 1871. But the problem that drove Lemuel from this business wasn't as much any local regulation as it was his relationship with East-coast businessman-politician-criminal George Mountjoy. Mountjoy was the target of several Federal investigations for avoiding the revenue laws (taxes on liquor). Lemuel’s partnership with Mountjoy went too far when both were arrested in April 1868. The charges against Lemuel must have been dropped for only Mountjoy went to trial. He was found not guilty that time, but Mountjoy was arrested again in 1869, convicted, and sent to prison for a while. In July 1868 the Philadelphia Public Ledger carried a notice of the dissolution of the partnership of George Mountjoy and Lemuel O. Kessler.

What next? Lemuel found another entrepreneurial partner, Thomas or William Corney. In early 1872 the two were named on a patent for a fountain pen. Later that year, as "Kessler & Co.," they purchased a New Jersey complex called the Prallsville Mills. The Prallsville venture could have been Lemuel's big break. But of course nothing went right for this guy. In 1874 the mill burned. After, it appears Kessler & Co. sold at least part of the complex (the mills) and continued to operate the quarries. Sources list Lemuel through the 1870's as associated with stone, quarries, and contracting (stone). But the property sale after the fire was contentious. Lemuel was sued in New Jersey by a man named W.A. Ballie over a mortgage deal in 1875. The same Ballie came over to Philadelphia and lodged the perjury charge against Lemuel. The charge was ultimately dismissed in early 1880 but perhaps the damage was done. Lemuel's stone career was over.

Within months of the perjury charge Lemuel and his family were operating a boarding house at 1405 Locust Street in Philadelphia. Actually, his wife Mary E. ran the boarding house and appeared in the City Directory herself from 1880-1882. Lemuel appeared only once, with the occupation "mining"(?). In 1883 they moved to a house at 2016 N. 13th where Lemuel was listed as a "contractor" for the next ten years. He was there every year except 1883 when Mary was there identified as a "widow." Something was wrong. They all disappeared from Philadelphia in 1894 and reappeared in Merchantville, New Jersey, in 1897. But judging by his real estate dealings, Lemuel may have been in New York since 1895 or even earlier.

Whether or not I ever discover Lemuel's precise movements after 1894 I have learned something from this experience. You may think you know someone, but you may have to think again!

Philadelphia Public Ledger, July 6, 1868
The announcement at right says that as of July 1st, “the copartnership heretofore exiting between” Mountjoy and L.O. Kessler under the firm of Mountjoy & Kesser “is this day dissolved by mutual consent.” It further says all debts of the firm will be paid by Mountjoy.