All My Ancestors

This version of the Carnival of Genealogy asks which 4 ancestors I would invite for dinner, whether we would meet in my time or theirs, and what I would tell them. I can’t hope for my version to be as clever as The Genealogue’s conversation over pizza rolls, but I’ve chosen 4 of my ancestors that I have some questions for. We’ll meet in “my” time and it probably won’t be all that enjoyable an event for them as I plan to quiz them hard!

Jonathan Osborne (c 1771 NC-1826 NC) 3rd great-grandfather
Jonathan’s father Christopher is my brickwall–the family brickwall for over 50 years. I just want to know where he came from and why he didn’t leave deeper tracks. My theory is that if I talk to Jonathan rather than his father Christopher I can find out more about the succeeding generation as well as the preceding one–conservation of resources, don’t y’know? Christopher

I want to know if Jonathan’s brother Christopher had children in his first marriage. I want to know why this Christopher’s mother-in-law, Mary Stutts Furr, disinherited her daughter, Catherine, his wife–did it have anything to do with Christopher’s first marriage or that in 1818 he moved to Alabama with other families to start Valley Creek Presbyterian Church in Dallas County, Alabama?

I want to know if Jonathan and Christopher had another sibling born after their father’s death in 1789–their father says something in his will about his belief that his wife might be pregnant. I also want to know who all his sisters married–there are names like Brown and Smith and Polk among Jonathan’s brothers-in-law and I want to know first names, marriage dates, and where this tribe ended up. Not too much to ask, do you think?

Delilah Jackson Landrum (1780 SC-1870 TX)4th great-grandmother
I’ve written about Delilah before. I first wanted to know here when I read my great Aunt Marge’s memoirs. She was writing about going to a youth camp where there were racial tensions. She was very much for accepting everyone, regardless of color or creed. She was discussing this with her father and he tells her, “You are very much like my Grandmother Delilah.” I found that statement fascinating because as far as I knew, her father, born and reared in Texas, did not have contact with his Grandmother Delilah who lived in Tennessee. On the other hand, she did spend her later years in East Texas with her youngest daughter, so perhaps he did know her. I love her self-possession when she refused to join the frenzy at the revival as I wrote about here. I have lots of questions about her Jackson family back in South Carolina, and I particularly want to know about the “Dutch fan” that her father left her in his 1817 Union County, South Carolina, will.

William Green Ball (1806 NYC-1881 IA) 4th great-grandfather

Dr. Ball is chosen as another bridge between generations. I definitely want to know more about his father–even though he was a young boy when his father died, he must know about his origins, and those of his mother. His parents were married in Baltimore, I think, in 1797, and then his father was a shipwright in New York City. After the death of his father, his mother and family moved to Clark County, Indiana and then some went on to Delaware County, Ohio. His sisters married well–one married twice, first to the district attorney and state congressman, and then to another attorney who was a national congressman. What was the basis of these sorts of alliances? And I also want to know what kind of medical training Dr. Ball went through–I believe he did that while he was living in Indiana, but who was his mentor and how did he come to that profession?

What can Dr. Ball tell me about his wife’s family? Why did they move from Tennessee to Indiana? Who was the minister, John M. Dickey, who appeared on so many of their records? How did his being an abolitionist fit in with their own beliefs?

It was Dr. Ball and his wife who reared their granddaughter Martha Jane after her father was killed enroute to “the West” and then her mother died shortly thereafter. How did they learn of their sons’ deaths? What were the circumstances under which those two sons were moving? Did Dr.and Mrs. Ball plan to join them in the west?

And, finally, what was the impetus for this man to move from New York City to Indiana to Missouri to Iowa to Kansas to Arkansas and then back to Iowa?

Sarah Ann Davis Anderton (1841 AL-1915 OK) Great-great grandmother
I don’t know very much about my Anderton and Davis lines from Alabama. There were about a zillion Anderton families in Marshall County and most of them were named John or James. I believe I have the right line back to a James Anderton, b. Virginia about 1760. This is not work I’ve done myself, but I believe it’s probably correct.

I don’t even have all of Sarah Ann and her husband James’ children all documented. Some of the older daughters stayed in Alabama when they came to Oklahoma after the Civil War. I always have questions about what makes a family move that far to an area that must be unfamiliar to them, not to mention what would possess them to move to the Oklahoma panhandle, aka “No Man’s Land.” Their granddaughter, my grandmother, told me that they did logging back in Alabama–they floated the logs down the river. That kind of work was certainly not a big draw here in Oklahoma. I suppose it was the opening of the land that drew them. They were still in Alabama on the 1900 census, but by 1910, they had “proved up” on their land in Beaver County, Oklahoma. I have their homestead files and they worked hard.

I found this picture of them in a county history, she’s on the left and he’s on the right. One reason she is dear to me is that she doesn’t appear to be “dainty.” And doesn’t he look like the stereotypical Civil War vet?

Sarah Ann is buried out in Blue Mound Cemetery in Beaver County, Oklahoma.

My grandmother told me she really wanted to go back to Alabama but she died before that could happen. Her husband James got his Civil War pension here in Oklahoma– he’d served in the artillery back in Alabama. He was approved and apparently went back to Alabama. Years ago, I sent for his death certificate only to be told that it could not be located. Then a few years ago, I was at Samford Institute in Birmingham, Alabama with some friends. The husband of that group was going out to do some research and I told him if her ran across a tombstone for James Anderton, to be sure to let me know. Amazingly enough, he did. He’s been my genealogical hero ever since. James evidently died in March 1918 and he’s buried in Cochran Cemetery.

Anyway, I have lots of questions for Sarah. Her mother’s maiden name was Campbell–another name I haven’t pursued due to the overwhelming amount of info and my lack of familiarity with records in that part of the country. Her father left all of his 1868 estate, 1450 acres, to his youngest son, Joseph Montgomery Davis, with the proviso that he care for the oldest son, William B. Davis. What were the circumstances that required this sort of care? The will did not stand and the estate was eventually equally divided among the widow and 8 children, including Sarah.

So those are the folks I want to interview, two from the maternal and two from the paternal. I want them to know how much I’ve enjoyed learning more about them and how much I honor their lives and their sacrifices. It’s not surprising that I’ve already written about some of these folks–their lives and times are the targets of some of my greatest curiosity.

I don’t know yet what we’ll have to eat, but I’ll definitely cook. I’ll bet those grandmothers could use the rest.

This is Martha Jane’s aunt Mary, sister of her father John Washington Ball.

and here is another photo of her, which looks like it was taken about the same time.

I think she looks like her father’s daughter. And I also think these photos were taken around the same time. Mary died sometime between 1885 and 1890 at the age of 40 - 45. Her last child was born in 1885 and I don’t know if her death was related to childbirth.

Do you think she looks older here? I need lots more work in the styles and ways of earlier times as portrayed in photographs. I would have guessed she was at least 60 here, and I don’t know if it’s that her life was hard so she does look older or if the styles made women look older, or both.

Mary was likely born in Missouri, though I don’t know where. I believe her family went there from Clark County Indiana about 1842 and then was in Warren County Iowa by 1845. Some of the census records say she was born in Missouri, and I keep finding scraps of info about the “Dr. Ball family” who came to Warren County from Missouri. My initial searches of Wm. Green Ball’s land records did not indicate where he was in Missouri, but then again, when I was looking, I didn’t know he’d been there.

So that’s a lesson learned–I’ll have to go back now and look at those records again to see if there’s a hint of their location in Missouri. They might be in his Indiana records or they might be in the Iowa records–I just know that I’ve used land records before to track down the former residence of a person. Or to prove that the two men in separate counties are the same person. This happened with Dr. Ball himself–I did find records in Iowa of him having been in Montgomery County, Kansas. When these sorts of moves are in between census years and are stays of only 3-4 years, land records are one of the best ways to track them. Deeds will say something like, “Wm G. Ball of Benton County, Arkansas, formerly of this county. . .” in Montgomery County, or perhaps he’s sold the land after he left the county so it’s registered also in Benton County. You have to be a detective, and that’s the addictive part for me.

This is my 4th great-grandfather, William Green Ball.

Remember, he’s the one whose mother I finally found not too long ago. We’d always suspected his middle name came from his mother’s maiden name but didn’t know for sure. After all, he had brothers named Jacob Weaver Ball and James Robinson Ball, and those were perfectly good maiden names as well.

He died in Iowa in 1881, and I wish I knew more about when and where this photo was taken. I’ve never seen the original, but there seem to be some other family photos that were taken at the same time. On the 1880 census, he and Elizabeth, his wife, are living down in Benton County, Arkansas. He was born in New York City in 1808, went to Clark County, Indiana after the death of his father about 1818, and then on to Warren County, Iowa by 1848. I suspect he spent some time in Missouri before he went to Iowa but I haven’t dug that part out yet. I do have some indication that he was in Montgomery County, Kansas in between Iowa and Arkansas. He became a part of the community wherever he was, but he also didn’t seem hesitant to move on if he thought there were more opportunities elsewhere.

In Iowa he was a “country doctor,” but he was also one of the founding members of the agricultural society. On occasions he ran for a county office, and his home was sometimes the voting site for the precinct where he lived west of Indianola. His father had been a shipbuilder and both of his brothers remained in New York City. Two of his sons died “crossing the plains,” and he raised one of their daughters, Martha Jane, who was my grandmother’s grandmother. I feel fortunate to have a photo of him. It took me a long time to find it, and sure enough, it proved my theory that you have to track the daughters of the daughters of the daughters–she’s the one who had them. Thanks so much, Kel.

And here’s Grandmother Elizabeth Charlton Ball.

She was born in Tennessee, married in Indiana, and died in Iowa in October, just weeks after her husband. In fact, his obituary of September, 1881, says “he returned to Warren County about 4 weeks ago, with his aged wife, who it is expected will soon follow him to the long sleep.” Sure enough, they both “sleep” in Linn Grove Cemetery in Warren County, Iowa.

That tall marker just to the right of the flag pole is theirs. Her name is on one side and his is on the other.

Through interlibrary loan, I ordered a roll of microfilm from Clark County, Indiana, hoping to find a “local” record of Anne Pamela Green Ball’s death that I’d found in the New York City newspaper.

I haven’t found one yet, but I did find some other information on the family I’ll post in another entry.

Much of the business of the day was printed in those early newspapers. I found lots of advertisements for merchants, minutes of the local medical society, ads for sheriff’s sales for back taxes, a few notices of runaway slaves, and then notices of spousal abandonment– usually the husband writing about the wife. As a child in the late 1950s and early 1960s, I remember seeing notices like “I will be responsible for no debts other than my own” in our small town local newspaper and asking my mom what they were for. She told me it usually meant the people were getting a divorce and this was part of the process.

The earlier matrimonial-distress notices I saw in the Indiana Intelligencer and Farmer’s Friend were much more descriptive. Here’s on from William W. Love, posted 1 January 1822.

Doesn’t he sound pained? I thought this was was a little more dramatic than the others I’d read, but what made it really different was what immediately followed:

I looked up “Replication” at Online Etymology Dictionary, and sure enough, it’s meaning has changed from how we use it most often today. It was formerly a legal term for a reply, “to answer to a legal charge.”

Mary is the only wife I’ve found who published a response. And she’s obviously not shy about answering each of William’s points. Now I’m curious about Mary. As far as I know, she wasn’t one of my relatives, but I’d be proud to be her descendant.

There is, by the way, in the paper about a month later, a statement that Mary has filed for divorce from William. Looks like Mary was indeed free to express her own opinion, despite William’s notice to the contrary.