Author: Nancy

I have been researching my family history since 1999 in my spare time. I have made several trips to local repositories in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Connecticut to do research in addition to using online resources. I even did a trip to Northern Ireland to try to find my Irish roots. I have attended conferences for RootsTech, National Genealogical Society, Federation of Genealogical Societies and Association of Professional Genealogists. Additionally, I have completed the Boston University certificate program for genealogical research as well as the Intermediate Genealogy Research classes at the Genealogical Research Institute of Pittsburg and at the Institute of Genealogy and Historical Research. I love doing genealogy research.

Mary Jane Wakefield Stiles (1831 – before 1888)

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Mary Jane Wakefield was born 10 April 1831 in Randolph, Orange County, Vermont, the daughter of James Wakefield and Lucy L. Wellington.¹ She grew up in a Vermont family that was later divided by westward migration and by the Civil War, in which two of her brothers, Levay and Dana Wakefield, died in Union service.²

She married Wilbur F. Stiles on 15 June 1850 in Roxbury, Washington County, Vermont.³ By about 1851 their first child, Edward Eugene Stiles, was born in Michigan, marking the beginning of the family’s move west, although their daughter Emma Mae Stiles was born in Braintree, Vermont, in 1854.⁴ By 1858 they were again in Michigan, and in 1861 they were living in Albee Township, Saginaw County, where two of their young sons, Ervin and David, died.⁵

In 1864 Mary Jane’s mother purchased land near Sand Lake in Iosco County and established a household there.⁶ By 1870 Mary Jane and her children were living in Grant Township, Iosco County.

On 21 May 1870 her husband died there by suicide, having swallowed poison.⁷ He was recorded in the 1870 mortality schedule, and a notice in the Jackson Citizen reported the death of “William Stiles” near Sand Lake, ten miles west of Tawas City — a location that corresponds to the family’s residence.⁸ The mortality schedule and the Iosco County death record identify him as Wilbur (or Wilber), confirming the identity.⁹

When the 1870 census was taken, Mary Jane appeared as head of household in Grant Township. She was forty years old, born in Vermont, and keeping house. In the home were three of her children: Edward Eugene, working on the farm; Emma; and six-year-old William. Also living with them was George Lawhead, a twenty-five-year-old farm laborer born in New York. The family held real estate valued at $200, and the post office was listed as Tawas.¹⁰

By 1880 Mary Jane had returned to Albee Township, Saginaw County, where she was enumerated as head of household, a widow born in Vermont with both parents also born in Vermont.¹¹ In the previous year she had lost both of her parents.¹²

Her daughter Emma Mae died in Saginaw County on 6 April 1886.¹³ Mary Jane herself died sometime before 1888, when she no longer appears in the records.

Sources

  1. Vermont Vital Records, 1720–1908, birth of Mary Jane Wakefield, Randolph, Orange County, Vermont.
  2. U.S. Civil War service and death records for Levay Wakefield and Dana A. Wakefield.
  3. Vermont marriage record, Roxbury, Washington County, 15 June 1850, Wilbur F. Stiles and Mary Jane Wakefield.
  4. Birth records and later census records for Edward Eugene Stiles; Vermont vital record for Emma Mae Stiles, Braintree, 11 May 1854.
  5. Michigan death and burial records for Ervin Stiles (1861); David F. Stiles deceased before the 1870 census; residence in Albee Township, Saginaw County.
  6. Iosco County land purchase by Lucy L. Wellington, 1864.
  7. 1870 U.S. mortality schedule, Iosco County, Michigan, entry for Wilbur (Wilber) Stiles; Michigan death record, Iosco County.
  8. Jackson Citizen, 31 May 1870, notice of the suicide of “William Stiles” near Sand Lake.
  9. Correlation of mortality schedule and county death record identifying the deceased as Wilbur Stiles.
  10. 1870 U.S. census, Grant Township, Iosco County, Michigan, household of Mary Stiles.
  11. 1880 U.S. census, Albee Township, Saginaw County, Michigan, Mary J. Stiles.
  12. Death records for James Wakefield and Lucy L. Wellington, 1879.
  13. Michigan death record, Emma Mae Stiles, 6 April 1886, Saginaw County.

Louise Bercier

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Louise Bercier was born about 1649 at Auvergnac in Poitou, in the diocese of Luçon, the daughter of Jean Bercier and Marie Morel.¹ She came to New France in 1668, accompanied by her uncle Louis Bercier.²

On 15 October 1668 a marriage contract was drawn before the notary Latouche for the marriage of Louise Bercier and Michel Feuillon at Batiscan; neither the bride nor the groom was able to sign.¹ The marriage followed shortly afterward.³

Michel Feuillon, born about 1630 at Saint-Pierre-le-Vieux in Poitou, was the son of René Feuillon and Mathurine Nicou. He was confirmed 1 May 1664 at Cap-de-la-Madeleine and appears in the 1666 census as a volunteer at Trois-Rivières or Cap-de-la-Madeleine.¹

The couple established their household at Sainte-Anne-de-la-Pérade, where the parish registers record their children:

  • Marie-Madeleine, about 1669
  • Michel, about 1671
  • Antoine, about 1675
  • Barbe (Marie-Barbe), about 1680
  • Marie-Louise, baptized 27 January 1681³

Louise Bercier died at La Pérade between the census of 1681 and 21 January 1687.¹

Michel Feuillon died there between 28 October 1698 and 3 March 1699.¹

Her arrival in 1668, the royal assistance she received, and her marriage soon afterward place her among the women sent to the colony under the royal program to establish families in the seigneurial settlements along the St. Lawrence.²

Sources

  1. Peter J. Gagné, King’s Daughters and Founding Mothers: The Filles du Roi, 1663–1673 (Pawtucket, R.I.: Quintin Publications, 2001), 83–84, Louise Bercier.
  2. Yves Landry, Les Filles du roi au XVIIe siècle (Montréal: Leméac, 1992), entry for Louise Bercier.
  3. Québec (Canada), Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), marriage of Louise Bercier and Michel Feuillon, 1668, Batiscan; baptism of Marie-Louise Feuillon, 27 Jan 1681; see also Cyprien Tanguay, Dictionnaire généalogique des familles canadiennes, s.v. “Feuillon.”
  4. Québec, Canada, Notarial Records, 1637–1935, marriage contract of Louise Bercier and Michel Feuillon, 15 Oct 1668, notary Latouche.

Eliza Smith Stiles: Land, Marriage, and Provision for Old Age in Northfield, Vermont

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Eliza Smith was born 2 April 1805 in Brookfield, Orange County, Vermont, the daughter of Abraham Smith and Abigail Blanchard.¹ Her life can be followed through a series of land and vital records that document her movement from daughter, to wife and mother, and finally to a woman whose support in old age was secured by a formal legal agreement.

She married David Stiles Jr. at Brookfield on 12 April 1826.² Their known children included Wilbur F. Stiles, born in 1827, and Sarah M. Stiles, born about 1831.³ By 1836 Eliza and her husband were living in Northfield, Washington County, where her father conveyed land directly to her in her married name.

In that deed, dated 1 February 1836, Abraham Smith of Brookfield granted to “Eliza Stiles of Northfield” one-third of a two-hundred-acre lot. The conveyance specified that the land was for Eliza and “her descendants of her body forever,” and that neither she nor “David her now husband” were to be displaced during their lifetimes. If she left no descendants, the property was to pass to the heirs of her brothers and sisters.⁴ This transfer placed the land in Eliza’s own legal control and established a line of inheritance through her children.

Excerpt of the land transaction between Abraham Smith and his daughter Eliza Smith Stiles as found in the deed book in Northfield, Vermont.

By 23 March 1840 Eliza had married her second husband, Edmund B. Glidden.⁵ The record of her son Wilbur’s land transactions in 1850 provides the clearest evidence that she was still living at that time and had remarried. On 12 October 1850 Wilbur sold land that had been “deeded me this day by Edmund Glidden & Eliza Glidden his wife,” explicitly identifying Eliza under her second married name and confirming her residence in Northfield.⁶

That same day, Wilbur entered into a separate bond in which he obligated himself to support “my said Mother Eliza Glidden during her natural life.” The agreement required him to provide suitable food, clothing, nursing during sickness, and, at her death, “a decent Christian burial and suitable grave stones.”⁷ In exchange, a mortgage secured the performance of these conditions. This document establishes both the mother–son relationship and the arrangement made for Eliza’s care in later life.

From the deed book in Northfield, Vermont

These transactions form a clear chain of property:

  • land granted by Abraham Smith to his daughter Eliza in 1836;
  • land conveyed by Edmund and Eliza Glidden to her son Wilbur in 1850;
  • Wilbur’s mortgage and bond for his mother’s lifetime support in the same year.

Through these records Eliza appears successively as daughter, wife, and mother, each role defined in legal terms.

Eliza was enumerated in the 1850 and 1860 censuses at Northfield in the household of Edmund Glidden.⁸ By 1870 she was living in Vernon, Tolland County, Connecticut, before returning to Northfield by 1880, where she again appears as Edmund’s wife.⁹ Edmund Glidden died at Northfield on 26 June 1884.¹⁰

Eliza died at Northfield on 28 October 1889 at the age of eighty-four years, six months, and twenty-six days. Her death record gives her name as Eliza Stiles, with her maiden name Smith in parentheses, and identifies her parents as Abraham Smith and Abigail Blanchard. The informant was her daughter, Sarah.¹¹ The use of the surname Stiles in the record created by her child reflects the name under which she had first established her household and borne her children.

The records of her life document the continuity of property and family across two marriages and into the next generation. From the land granted to her by her father in 1836, to the 1850 agreement that secured her maintenance in old age, Eliza Smith Stiles can be followed in the legal transactions that defined her place within her family and community.

Sources

  1. Vermont, Vital Records, 1720–1908, Brookfield, birth of Eliza Smith, 2 April 1805.
  2. Vermont, Vital Records, 1720–1908, Brookfield, marriage of David Stiles Jr. and Eliza Smith, 12 April 1826.
  3. 1850 U.S. census, Washington County, Vermont, population schedule, Northfield, household of Edmund Glidden; 1860 U.S. census, Washington County, Vermont, population schedule, Northfield, household of Edmund Glidden.
  4. Orange County, Vermont, Land Records, deed of Abraham Smith to Eliza Stiles, 1 February 1836; transcription in author’s possession.
  5. Vermont, Vital Records, 1720–1908, marriage of Edmund B. Glidden and Eliza Stiles, 23 March 1840.
  6. Washington County, Vermont, Land Records, deed of Edmund Glidden and Eliza Glidden to Wilbur F. Stiles, and deed of Wilbur F. Stiles to Isaac P. Jenks, 12 October 1850; transcription in author’s possession.
  7. Washington County, Vermont, Land Records, bond of Wilbur F. Stiles for the support of his mother Eliza Glidden, 12 October 1850; transcription in author’s possession.
  8. 1850 U.S. census, Washington County, Vermont, population schedule, Northfield, household of Edmund Glidden; 1860 U.S. census, Washington County, Vermont, population schedule, Northfield, household of Edmund Glidden.
  9. 1870 U.S. census, Tolland County, Connecticut, population schedule, Vernon; 1880 U.S. census, Washington County, Vermont, population schedule, Northfield, household of Edmund Glidden.
  10. Vermont, Vital Records, 1720–1908, Northfield, death of Edmund B. Glidden, 26 June 1884.
  11. Vermont, Vital Records, 1720–1908, Northfield, death of Eliza Stiles, 28 October 1889.

Jeanne Françoise Petit

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Jeanne Françoise Petit was born 19 January 1656 in the parish of Sainte-Marguerite at La Rochelle, the daughter of Jean Petit and Jeanne Gaudreau.¹ Orphaned as a young girl, she came to New France in 1672 at about sixteen years of age as one of the King’s Daughters.²

She married François Séguin dit Laderoute at Boucherville on 31 October 1672.³ Their marriage contract had been executed the previous month before the notary Frérot, and both bride and groom signed the document.²

François Séguin had previously served as a soldier in the Carignan-Salières Regiment, the force sent to Canada between 1665 and 1667 to secure the colony; after his service he settled as a habitant.⁴

The parish registers of Boucherville and Pointe-aux-Trembles record the baptisms of their children:

  • Marie-Françoise, baptized 1 November 1674
  • Marie-Madeleine, baptized 16 August 1676
  • Marie-Jeanne, baptized 9 August 1680
  • Pierre, baptized 24 August 1682
  • Simon, baptized 24 September 1684
  • Jean-Baptiste, baptized 10 November 1688
  • Geneviève
  • Joseph
  • another Joseph

Several of the children died young.²

François Séguin was buried at Montréal on 9 May 1704.³ In the will of Pierre de Saint-Ours he was left a gift of fifty livres, which passed instead to his children because he predeceased the testator.²

Jeanne Françoise Petit died 29 March 1733 and was buried the following day at Longueuil.³

Her marriage in 1672 and the large family that followed are typical of the young women who came to the colony under royal sponsorship and formed households in the seigneurial settlements along the St. Lawrence.²

Sources

  1. Upper Brittany, France, Births and Baptisms, 1501–1907, baptism of Jeanne Françoise Petit, 19 Jan 1656, Sainte-Marguerite, La Rochelle.
  2. Peter J. Gagné, King’s Daughters and Founding Mothers: The Filles du Roi, 1663–1673 (Pawtucket, R.I.: Quintin Publications, 2001), 451–52, Jeanne Petit; Yves Landry, Les Filles du roi au XVIIe siècle (Montréal: Leméac, 1992), table entry for Jeanne Petit.
  3. Québec (Canada), Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), marriage of Jeanne Petit and François Séguin dit Laderoute, 31 Oct 1672, Boucherville; baptisms of their children; burial of Jeanne Petit, 30 Mar 1733, Longueuil; see also Cyprien Tanguay, Dictionnaire généalogique des familles canadiennes, s.v. “Séguin.”
  4. The Carignan-Salières Regiment (1665–1667), for the service of François Séguin dit Laderoute.

Emma Mae Stiles (1854–1886)

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Emma Mae Stiles was born 11 May 1854 in Braintree, Orange County, Vermont, the daughter of Wilbur F. Stiles and Mary Jane Wakefield.¹ By 1858 the family had moved to Michigan, where her brother Ervin was born in Davison, Genesee County.² Within a few years they were settled in Saginaw County, the place that would remain associated with Emma for the rest of her life.

On 22 January 1866 Emma appeared before the Saginaw County Board of Supervisors and was paid $1.70 in witness fees, along with her father, Wilbur F. Stiles, and her brother Eugene.³ She was about eleven years old. This entry places her in Saginaw County at that date and shows her participating in a county court proceeding with other members of her family.

Emma married George Washington Lawhead on 31 January 1869 in Albee Township, Saginaw County.⁴

The following year brought a major change. Her father, Wilbur F. Stiles, died in May 1870 in Grant Township, Iosco County. The 1870 mortality schedule records his occupation as carpenter, his birthplace as New York, and the cause of death as suicide by poison.⁵ In the same year Emma and her husband were enumerated in Grant Township, where members of the Stiles family had gone as part of the movement into Michigan’s lumbering region.⁶

Emma became the mother of three children. Her daughter Margaret Jane Lawhead was born 2 July 1872.⁷ A son, Renaldo, was born 16 August 1877 in Albee Township and died there on 14 October 1877.⁸ Her youngest child, Effie M. Lawhead, was born 26 July 1879 in Albee Township.⁹

In 1880 Emma was living in Albee Township with her husband and daughters Margaret and Effie.¹⁰

Emma Mae (Stiles) Lawhead died 6 April 1886 in Saginaw County at the age of thirty-one.¹¹ No burial place has been identified.

Her life spans the migration of her family from Vermont to mid-nineteenth-century Michigan, her childhood in Saginaw County, the move north to Iosco County at the time of her father’s death, and her return to Albee Township, where she spent her married years and where her children were born.

Sources

  1. Birth date and place from Michigan death record of Emma Mae Lawhead, 1886.
  2. Birth of Ervin Stiles, 19 May 1858, Davison, Genesee County, Michigan.
  3. Saginaw Courier, proceedings of the Saginaw County Board of Supervisors, 22 January 1866; witness fees for W. F. Stiles, Emma Stiles, and Eugene Stiles.
  4. Saginaw County, Michigan, marriage record, George W. Lawhead and Emma M. Stiles, 31 January 1869.
  5. 1870 U.S. mortality schedule, Grant Township, Iosco County, Michigan, Wilbur Stiles; cause of death “suicide by poison.”
  6. 1870 U.S. census, Grant Township, Iosco County, Michigan, George W. Lawhead household.
  7. Birth of Margaret Jane Lawhead, 2 July 1872, Michigan.
  8. Birth and death of Renaldo Lawhead, Albee Township, Saginaw County, Michigan, 1877.
  9. Birth of Effie M. Lawhead, 26 July 1879, Albee Township, Saginaw County, Michigan.
  10. 1880 U.S. census, Albee Township, Saginaw County, Michigan, George W. Lawhead household.
  11. Michigan death record, Emma Mae Lawhead, 6 April 1886.

Marie Lorgueil

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Grande Recrue of 1653

Marie Lorgueil was born about 1638, identified as a native of the parish of Saint-Vivien at Rouen in Normandy, the daughter of Pierre Lorgueil and Marie Bruyère.¹

She came to Montréal on 16 November 1653 aboard the Saint-Nicolas as part of the Grande Recrue. This recruitment, organized in France by Paul de Chomedey de Maisonneuve, brought more than one hundred settlers to Ville-Marie at a moment when the colony was close to collapse from war and depopulation. Many of the men had signed five-year engagements as laborers and land clearers, and the women who came with them married soon after arrival, forming the first permanent farming households of the settlement.¹

She married Toussaint Hunault dit Deschamps at Montréal on 23 November 1654.² No marriage contract has been found for the couple, and neither spouse signed the parish register.¹

Toussaint Hunault, born about 1625 at Saint-Pierre-ès-Champs near Gournay in Picardy, was the son of Nicolas Hunault and Marie Benoist. He had been recruited for Canada in 1653, signing his engagement at La Flèche for five years as a plowman and land clearer at a wage of seventy-five livres per year with an advance of 120 livres. On 24 July 1654, four months before the marriage, he received a land grant from Maisonneuve.¹

The parish registers of Montréal record the baptisms of their children:

  • Thècle dite Thérèse, baptized 23 September 1655
  • André, baptized 3 August 1657
  • Jeanne, baptized 2 November 1658
  • Pierre, baptized 22 November 1660
  • Marie-Thérèse, baptized 12 February 1663
  • Mathurin, baptized 27 December 1664
  • Françoise, baptized 5 December 1667
  • Toussaint, baptized 25 August 1673
  • Charles, baptized 25 July 1676²

Several of the children died young.¹

In the census of 1667 the family appears at Montréal with cleared land and a growing household, part of the first generation of permanent agricultural settlers on the island.³

On 13 September 1690 Toussaint Hunault dit Deschamps was killed by Gabriel Dumont, Baron de Blaignac, a lieutenant of marines. Marie and her children brought suit against Dumont, ceding their rights in the case to the merchant Charles de Couagne in return for 520 livres and the cancellation of a debt owed by Toussaint.¹

As a widow she continued to act in her own name in the notarial records. On 10 November, before the notary Claude Maugue, she executed a transport and retrocession to Charles de Couagne with a cession to Jacques Talebot.⁴

Marie Lorgueil died 29 November 1700 on the Île Sainte-Thérèse and was buried the following day at Varennes.²

Her life is documented in the records of the Grande Recrue, the earliest parish registers of Montréal, the colonial censuses, and the notarial acts that record both her marriage and her activity as a widow.

Sources

  1. Peter J. Gagné, Before the King’s Daughters: The Filles à marier, 1634–1662 (Pawtucket, R.I.: Quintin Publications, 2002), 209, Marie Lorgueil.
  2. Québec (Canada), Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), marriage of Marie Lorgueil and Toussaint Hunault dit Deschamps, 23 Nov 1654, Montréal; baptisms of their children; burial of Marie Lorgueil, 30 Nov 1700, Varennes; see also Cyprien Tanguay, Dictionnaire généalogique des familles canadiennes, s.v. “Hunault.”
  3. Benjamin Sulte, Histoire des Canadiens-Français, 1608–1880, census extract for Montréal, household of Toussaint Hunault and Marie Lorgueil.
  4. Québec, Canada, Notarial Records, 1637–1935, repertory of notary Claude Maugue, 10 Nov., transport and retrocession by Marie Lorgueil, widow of Toussaint Hunault, to Charles de Couagne with cession to Jacques Talebot.

Eleanora D. Gibbs (1854–1914)

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Eleanora D. Gibbs, daughter of Lester Gibbs and Mary Conly, was born 19 February 1854 in Sterling, Cayuga County, New York.¹

By 1860 she was living in Dryden Township, Lapeer County, Michigan, in the household of her uncle, Philo Gibbs, and his wife, Mary Jane.² Her father, Lester Gibbs, was also in the household.² In 1865 she was in Sterling, Cayuga County, New York, in the household of her mother.³ She returned to Lapeer County before her marriage.

On 22 August 1869 she married John T. Wortman in Lapeer County.⁴ In 1870 John and Eleanora were living in Dryden Township in their own household.⁵ The adjacent households were those of her mother, Mary Hilliker, and her paternal grandmother, Abigail Gibbs.⁵

Three children were born to John and Eleanora in Lapeer County:

Melvin David Wortman, 7 May 1873;⁶
Anna E. Wortman, 10 October 1876;⁷
John H. Wortman, 10 October 1878.⁸

John T. Wortman died 11 March 1878 in Dryden.⁹ Their youngest child was born later that year.

On 3 August 1879, in Dryden, she married John Henry Hand.¹⁰ In 1880 they were living in Dryden Township, where he was a farmer.¹¹ In the household were Melvin, Anna, and John H. Wortman.¹¹ The adjacent household was that of her uncle, Philo Gibbs.¹¹

Two children were born to John and Eleanora (Wortman) Hand:

Carrie G. Hand, 21 April 1881 in Lapeer County;¹²
Ezra Lessia Hand, 27 January 1891 in Lapeer County.¹³

By April 1888 the family was residing at 221 West Kinzie Street in Chicago, Illinois.¹⁴ They later returned to Michigan. John Henry Hand died 30 January 1891 in Lambs, Lapeer County.¹⁵

In 1900 Eleanora was living in New Haven Township, Shiawassee County, Michigan, where she appears in the federal census as head of household.¹⁶ Living with her were her children Anna E., John H., and Ezra L. Hand.¹⁶

By 1910 she was living in Fenton, Genesee County, Michigan, where she appears in the federal census as a widowed head of household.¹⁷ In the household was her youngest son, Ezra L. Hand.¹⁷

Her daughter Anna E. (Wortman) Hickmott died in Owosso on 2 February 1914.¹⁸

Eleanora D. (Gibbs) (Wortman) Hand died 18 August 1914 in Fenton of apoplexy.¹⁹ Her funeral was held at the Fenton Baptist Church, with services conducted by the Rev. Robert Davis.²⁰ She had lived in Fenton for the last fourteen years of her life and was a member of the Baptist church and of the Woman’s Relief Corps.²⁰ She was buried in Oakwood Cemetery, Fenton.²¹

She was survived by one daughter, Mrs. Andrew Riopelle of Detroit; one son, Ezra L. Hand of Fenton; and two sons, John and Melvin Wortman.²⁰ The obituary also names two sisters, Mrs. Lillie Morrow of Holly and Mrs. Hattie New of Detroit.²⁰

Sources

  1. Birth date and place from Michigan death record and census records.
  2. 1860 U.S. census, Lapeer County, Michigan, Dryden Township, household of Philo Gibbs; includes Lester Gibbs and Eleanora Gibbs.
  3. 1865 New York State census, Cayuga County, Sterling, household of Mary Garner.
  4. Lapeer County, Michigan, marriage record, John T. Wortman and Eleanora Gibbs, 22 August 1869.
  5. 1870 U.S. census, Lapeer County, Michigan, Dryden Township, households of Mortimer Hilliker, John Wortman, and Abigail Gibbs.
  6. Michigan birth record, Melvin David Wortman.
  7. Michigan birth record, Anna E. Wortman.
  8. Michigan birth record, John H. Wortman.
  9. Lapeer County, Michigan, death record, John T. Wortman.
  10. Lapeer County, Michigan, marriage record, John Henry Hand and Eleanora Wortman, 3 August 1879.
  11. 1880 U.S. census, Lapeer County, Michigan, Dryden Township, households of John Hand and Philo Gibbs.
  12. Michigan birth record, Carrie G. Hand.
  13. Michigan birth record, Ezra Lessia Hand.
  14. Chicago, Illinois, residence record, 1888, 221 West Kinzie Street.
  15. Lapeer County, Michigan, death record, John Henry Hand.
  16. 1900 U.S. census, Shiawassee County, Michigan, New Haven Township, household of Eleanora D. Hand.
  17. 1910 U.S. census, Genesee County, Michigan, Fenton, household of Eleanora B. Hand.
  18. Shiawassee County, Michigan, death record, Anna E. (Wortman) Hickmott.
  19. Genesee County, Michigan, death record, Eleanora D. Hand, 18 August 1914.
  20. “Mrs. Hand Buried,” Flint Journal (Flint, Michigan), 21 August 1914.
  21. Oakwood Cemetery, Fenton, Genesee County, Michigan; Find a Grave memorial and gravestone.

Eliza J. Powell (1837–1894)

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Eliza J. Powell was born on 14 February 1837 in Michigan, the daughter of John Powell and Deborah Burgess.¹ She was part of the first generation of this family born in the state, while her parents belonged to the earlier group who had settled in Oakland County.

In 1850 she was living with her parents in Pontiac, where she grew up among a large sibling group.²

Marriage in Avon Township

On 14 August 1859, Eliza married Stephen Hickmott in Avon Township, Oakland County.³ Their marriage is recorded in the county marriage register and marks the point at which the Powell and Hickmott families became directly connected.

Two years earlier, in 1857, land in section 30 of Avon Township was recorded in the name of **“E. Hickmott.”**⁴ This entry places Eliza in a land transaction at a remarkably young age and at nearly the same time as her marriage. Whether this reflects property brought into the marriage or a transfer connected with it, it shows her associated with land in her own right.

In 1860, Eliza and Stephen were living in Avon Township, beginning their married life there.⁵

Move to Shiawassee County

By the mid-1860s the family had moved to New Haven Township in Shiawassee County, where Eliza spent the remainder of her life.⁶ It was there that she raised her children:

  • Melvin, born 1864⁷
  • Frank, born 1866⁸
  • William, born 1869⁹
  • James, born 1871¹⁰
  • Frederick Stephen, born 1874¹¹
  • Bert, born 1877¹²

Her only known child to die young was James, who lived just over a year.¹⁰

Eliza appears with her family in New Haven Township in both the 1870 and 1880 census, in the household of her husband, where the rhythm of her life is recorded in the ages and birthplaces of her children.⁶,¹³

Daughter of John Powell and Deborah Burgess

While Eliza’s adult life was centered in Shiawassee County, her parents remained in Oakland County. Both died in 1886.¹⁴ Their deaths closed the Pontiac chapter of the family in which Eliza had been raised.

Death and burial

Eliza died on 15 September 1894 in New Haven Township.¹⁵ She was buried the following day in West Haven Cemetery.¹⁶ That cemetery became the burial place for multiple members of the Hickmott family and remains the physical location most closely associated with her life.

Her place in the family

Eliza’s story is told almost entirely through the standard records of the nineteenth century — census entries, a marriage record, a death record, and the cemetery where she was buried. Within those records she can be followed from her parents’ household in Pontiac to her own home in New Haven Township.

Sources

  1. Michigan Death Records, 1867–1950, Eliza J. Hickmott, 1894.
  2. 1850 U.S. census, Oakland County, Michigan, Pontiac, household of John Powell.
  3. Michigan County Marriages, 1822–1940, Stephen Hickmott and Eliza Powell, 14 Aug 1859, Avon Township, Oakland County.
  4. Avon Township, Oakland County, Michigan, land record, 1857, “E. Hickmott,” section 30.
  5. 1860 U.S. census, Oakland County, Michigan, Avon Township, household of Stephen Hickmott.
  6. 1870 U.S. census, Shiawassee County, Michigan, New Haven Township, household of Stephen Hickmott.
  7. Birth record of Melvin Hickmott, 5 Aug 1864, Avon Township, Oakland County, Michigan.
  8. Birth record of Frank Hickmott, 22 Jun 1866, New Haven Township, Shiawassee County, Michigan.
  9. Birth record of William Hickmott, 27 Jan 1869, New Haven Township, Shiawassee County, Michigan.
  10. Death record of James Hickmott, 15 Sep 1872, New Haven Township, Shiawassee County, Michigan.
  11. Birth record of Frederick Stephen Hickmott, 24 Mar 1874, New Haven Township, Shiawassee County, Michigan.
  12. Birth record of Bert Hickmott, 6 Feb 1877, New Haven Township, Shiawassee County, Michigan.
  13. 1880 U.S. census, Shiawassee County, Michigan, New Haven Township, household of Stephen Hickmott.
  14. Death record of John Powell, 31 Dec 1886, Pontiac, Oakland County, Michigan; Deborah Burgess Powell, Michigan death record, 1886.
  15. Michigan Death Records, 1867–1950, Eliza J. Hickmott, 15 Sep 1894.
  16. West Haven Cemetery, New Haven Township, Shiawassee County, Michigan; Find A Grave Index, memorial for Eliza J. Hickmott.

Suzanne Betfer

On By NancyIn Ancestor Profile, Fille a MarierLeave a comment

Suzanne Betfer (Bedfer, Bedford, Botfaite) was born in England, probably at Gloucester, about 1629, the daughter of Gilbert Bedford and Anne Bonne.¹ She was the widow of the merchant Jean Serne when she came to New France.

She arrived at Québec in 1649 and married Mathieu Hubou dit Deslongschamps there on 28 September 1649.² Their marriage contract was executed 25 August 1649 before the notary Audouart; Suzanne did not sign the document.¹

Mathieu Hubou, a master armorer, had been baptized 5 March 1626 in the parish of Saint-André at Mesnil-Durand in Normandy, the son of Nicolas Hubou and Madeleine Moulin. He was in Canada by 1641, when he is recorded at Sillery.¹

The parish registers of Québec record the baptisms of their children:

  • Athanase, baptized 20 November 1650
  • Mathieu, baptized 11 August 1652
  • Jean, baptized 9 August 1654
  • Geneviève, baptized 18 April 1656
  • Anne, baptized 8 August 1658
  • Jacques, baptized 2 May 1660
  • Nicolas, baptized 22 July 1662
  • Charles, baptized 9 September 1664³

Suzanne Betfer was confirmed at Québec on 10 August 1659 at about thirty years of age.¹

After an interval of fourteen years, she gave birth to a daughter, Madeleine, baptized 16 January 1678 at Pointe-aux-Trembles and buried there on 8 February 1678.³ Her son Athanase died between the 1667 and 1681 censuses.¹

Mathieu Hubou dit Deslongschamps served as procureur fiscal for the seigneury of Montréal from 3 April 1677 until 23 February 1678. He died at Lachine on 31 October 1678 and was buried 2 November at Pointe-aux-Trembles.³

Suzanne Betfer died at Lachine between 25 November 1688 and 29 May 1694.¹

Her life in New France is documented in the parish registers and notarial records of Québec, Pointe-aux-Trembles, and Montréal from the time of her marriage in 1649 until her death in the last decade of the seventeenth century.

Sources

  1. Peter J. Gagné, Before the King’s Daughters: The Filles à marier, 1634–1662 (Pawtucket, RI: Quintin Publications, 2002), 63, Suzanne Betfer.
  2. Québec, Canada, Notarial Records, 1637–1935, marriage contract of Suzanne Betfer and Mathieu Hubou dit Deslongschamps, 25 Aug 1649, notary Guillaume Audouart.
  3. Québec (Canada), Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), marriage of Suzanne Betfer and Mathieu Hubou dit Deslongschamps, 28 Sept 1649, Québec; baptisms and burials of their children; burial of Mathieu Hubou, 2 Nov 1678, Pointe-aux-Trembles.
  4. Cyprien Tanguay, Dictionnaire généalogique des familles canadiennes depuis la fondation de la colonie jusqu’à nos jours, s.v. “Hubou.”

Anne Talbot

On By NancyIn Ancestor Profile, Filles du Roi, King's DaughtersLeave a comment

Anne Talbot was born 31 July 1651 and baptized the following day in the parish of Saint-Maclou in Rouen, Normandy, the daughter of Eustache Talbot, a master brewer, and Marie de Lalande.¹

She came to New France in 1670 at about nineteen years of age. Yves Landry notes that she brought with her goods valued at 300 livres for her dowry and received the King’s gift of 50 livres. He also records a marriage contract dated 13 September 1670 before the notary Becquet for a proposed marriage to Jean Barolleau which was later annulled, and that she did not know how to sign her name.²

She married Jean Gareau dit Saint-Onge at Boucherville on 2 November 1670.³ A marriage contract for the couple had been executed the previous month before the notary Frérot.² Gagné identifies Jean Gareau as a native of La Rochelle, the son of Dominique Gareau and Marie Pinard.⁴

The couple established their household at Boucherville, where the parish registers record their children over nearly three decades:

  • Marie, baptized 10 November 1671
  • Pierre, baptized 1 May 1673
  • Anne, baptized 6 January 1675
  • Madeleine, baptized 15 March 1677
  • Prudent, baptized 18 September 1678 and buried 20 September 1678
  • Jean, baptized 3 November 1679
  • Jacques, baptized 26 February 1682
  • Dominique, baptized 30 January 1684
  • François, baptized 14 February 1686
  • Anne, buried 24 November 1687
  • Marguerite, baptized 18 April 1692
  • Marie-Louise, baptized 27 April 1693
  • Suzanne, baptized 8 March 1695
  • Geneviève, baptized 16 May 1698⁵

Jean Gareau was buried at Boucherville on 6 June 1713.⁵

Anne Talbot died there on 4 August 1740 and was buried in the parish of Sainte-Famille at Boucherville.⁵

Her life in New France is documented in the parish and notarial records of Boucherville from the time of her marriage in 1670 until her burial in 1740.

Sources

  1. Parish register of Saint-Maclou, Rouen, for the baptism of Anne Talbot.
  2. Yves Landry, Les Filles du roi au XVIIe siècle (Montréal: Leméac, 1992), 217, Anne Talbot.
  3. Québec (Canada), Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), marriage of Anne Talbot and Jean Gareau dit Saint-Onge, 2 Nov 1670.
  4. Peter J. Gagné, The King’s Daughters and Founding Mothers (Pawtucket, RI: Quintin Publications, 2001), entry for Anne Talbot.
  5. Québec (Canada), Vital and Church Records (Drouin Collection), baptisms and burials of the children of Jean Gareau and Anne Talbot; burial of Jean Gareau, 6 June 1713; burial of Anne Talbot, 4 Aug 1740; see also Cyprien Tanguay, Dictionnaire généalogique des familles canadiennes, s.v. “Gareau.”