Tag: Munson

Elizabeth “Betsy” (Foster) Munson (1820–1894)

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Elizabeth “Betsy” Foster was born 7 May 1820 in New York, the daughter of Nathaniel Foster and Mary Moore.¹ By the mid-1820s she was in Saginaw County, Michigan, where her father became one of the earliest settlers and built the first sawmill on the Saginaw River.²

She grew up in a pioneer environment as the Foster family established itself along the river in what was then a developing frontier community.

On 1 June 1839, in Bridgeport, she married Henry Munson.³ She was nineteen years old.

A life in the Saginaw Valley

Elizabeth spent her entire married life in Saginaw County. She and Henry first appear together in Bridgeport Township in the 1850 census with their young children.⁴ They remained in the same general area for decades, later settling in Taymouth Township.⁵

She was the mother of a large family:

  • James H. Munson (1840–1881)
  • Mary Emaline Munson (1841–1907)
  • Ransom W. Munson (1843–1853)
  • Frances Jane Munson (1845–1915)
  • Gardner N. Munson
  • Thomas B. Munson (1849–1934)
  • Alice A. Munson (1853–1916)
  • Charles Homer Munson (1855–1928)
  • Sarah E. Munson
  • Henrietta E. Munson (1858–1917)
  • Orrin E. Munson (1861–1929) ⁴⁻⁸

Her son Ransom died in 1853 after drowning in the Cass River, a loss that occurred while the family was still raising younger children.⁹

Through the decades she witnessed the transformation of the Saginaw Valley from a lumber frontier into an established agricultural community.

Daughter of a pioneer

The Foster family’s early arrival in the region was remembered locally. One of her death notices stated:

“She was one of the pioneers of Saginaw county.”²

Another noted her connection to the earliest lumbering history:

“Her father, Mr. Foster, built the first saw mill on the Saginaw river.”³

This identity as a pioneer’s daughter remained part of how she was described at the end of her life.

Later years

Elizabeth was widowed when Henry Munson died 12 December 1886 in Taymouth Township.¹⁰
She continued to live in the township, appearing there in the 1880 census and remaining in the community where she had spent nearly her entire life.⁶

She experienced the deaths of both her husband and her eldest son during her later years.¹⁰⁻¹¹

Death

Elizabeth died 29 March 1894 at Taymouth Township at the home of her son, Charles H. Munson.³ She was 73 years old.²

Her obituary reported that she left:

  • sons Thomas, Orrin, and Charles H. Munson
  • daughters Jane Rivers and Etta Parker

and that she also had a surviving brother, Gardner W. Foster.²

She was buried in Taymouth Township, Saginaw County.¹²

Sources

  1. Birth date calculated from age at death and death record; Michigan death records.
  2. “Fosters,” The Saginaw News, 4 April 1894, p. 5.
  3. “Betsy Munson, wife of the late Henry Munson…,” The Saginaw News, 30 March 1894, p. 6.
  4. 1850 U.S. census, Bridgeport Township, Saginaw County, Michigan.
  5. 1860 U.S. census, Bridgeport Township, Saginaw County, Michigan.
  6. 1880 U.S. census, Taymouth Township, Saginaw County, Michigan.
  7. Michigan vital records for children of Henry and Elizabeth Munson.
  8. Michigan marriage and death records for Munson descendants.
  9. Saginaw County death record, Ransom W. Munson, 1853.
  10. Saginaw County death record, Henry Munson, 1886.
  11. Saginaw County death record, James H. Munson, 1881.
  12. Find a Grave index, Saginaw County, Michigan.

Mary Emaline Munson Wickham (1841–1907)

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A Life Spent in One Place

Mary Emaline Munson was born 30 July 1841 in Richfield, Genesee County, Michigan, the daughter of Henry Munson and Elizabeth “Betsy” Foster.¹ Within a few years the family had moved into Saginaw County, settling in Bridgeport Township along the Cass River, where Mary spent her childhood among a growing circle of brothers and sisters that included her younger sister, Frances Jane.²

She came of age in a household that was part of the earliest wave of permanent settlement in the area. By 1850 she was living with her parents in Bridgeport, in a community still very much in the process of being built.³

Mary Emeline Munson

Marriage and a household of her own

On 26 April 1858, Mary married Reuben Thomas Wickham in Tittabawassee Township.⁴ She was still in her teens, and like many young women of her generation moved directly from her father’s home into one of her own.

The couple remained in Tittabawassee Township for the rest of their lives. By 1860 they were established there with their first child, beginning a pattern of continuity that would define Mary’s story.⁵

Five children were born to Reuben and Mary between 1860 and 1876:

Isadora Wickham
Elizabeth Loella Wickham
William H. Wickham
Ettie I. Wickham
Alice Mary Wickham⁶

All were raised in the same township where Mary herself had grown up.

The center of a farm family

The 1880 census captures Mary in the busiest years of her life. Her husband was working as a farmer, and the household included two adult daughters, a teenage son, and two young girls. Mary’s occupation was recorded simply as “keeping house,” a phrase that understated the scale of the work required to manage a farm home and family in nineteenth-century Michigan.⁷

This was not a family that moved on in search of new land or new opportunities. Through every census from 1860 to 1900, Mary remained in Tittabawassee Township, surrounded by familiar roads, neighboring farms, and an extended network of Munson and Wickham relatives.⁵⁷⁸⁹

Family ties that remained close

Those connections deepened in the next generation. Mary’s youngest daughter, Alice Mary Wickham, married Gardner Rivers, the son of Mary’s sister Frances Jane Munson. The marriage joined the two Munson sisters’ families even more closely, ensuring that the bonds formed in their childhood home continued into the lives of their children and grandchildren.

Mary also lived to see the passing of her parents—Henry Munson in 1886 and Elizabeth Foster Munson in 1894—events that marked the end of the founding generation of the family in Saginaw County.¹⁰¹¹

Later years and widowhood

After nearly forty-five years of marriage, Mary was widowed when Reuben died on 16 January 1903.¹² The 1900 census, taken only a few years earlier, shows the couple still together in their longtime home, by then the parents of grown children.⁹

Death and burial

Mary died 23 May 1907 in Tittabawassee Township at the age of sixty-five.¹ Her death certificate records the cause as erysipelas, an acute infection that was often fatal in the years before antibiotics.¹

She was buried on 26 May 1907 in Owen Cemetery, beside the husband with whom she had shared her entire adult life.¹⁴ Her obituary in the Saginaw Evening News noted her long residence in the township and the family who survived her there.¹⁵

She had lived her entire adult life in the same community where she began it as a young bride, surrounded by children, grandchildren, and the extended Munson and Wickham families whose histories were inseparable from her own.

Sources

  1. Michigan Death Records, 1867–1950, Mary Emeline Wickham, death certificate, 23 May 1907, Tittabawassee Township, Saginaw County.
  2. 1850 U.S. census, Saginaw County, Michigan, Bridgeport Township, Henry Munson household.
  3. Ibid.
  4. Saginaw County, Michigan, marriage records, Reuben T. Wickham and Mary E. Munson, 26 April 1858.
  5. 1860 U.S. census, Saginaw County, Michigan, Tittabawassee Township, Reuben T. Wickham household.
  6. Michigan birth records, children of Reuben T. and Mary E. Wickham.
  7. 1880 U.S. census, Saginaw County, Michigan, Tittabawassee Township, Reuben T. Wickham household.
  8. 1870 U.S. census, Saginaw County, Michigan, Tittabawassee Township, Reuben T. Wickham household.
  9. 1900 U.S. census, Saginaw County, Michigan, Tittabawassee Township, Reuben T. Wickham household.
  10. Michigan Death Records, Henry Munson, 12 December 1886.
  11. Michigan Death Records, Elizabeth Foster Munson, 29 March 1894.
  12. Michigan Death Records, Reuben T. Wickham, 16 January 1903.
  13. Owen Cemetery, Saginaw County, Michigan, burial record and gravestone, Mary E. Wickham.
  14. Saginaw Evening News, 24 May 1907, p. 10, obituary of Mary Wickham.

Frances Jane Munson Rivers (1845–1915)

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She was born Frances Jane Munson on 7 August 1845 in Bridgeport, Saginaw County, Michigan, the fourth child of Henry Munson and Elizabeth Foster.¹ In the records created during her lifetime, however, she is simply and consistently Jane.

Frances Jane Rivers

At five years old in 1850 she appears in her father’s household in Bridgeport as Jane Munson.² Ten years later, in 1860, she is fifteen and living with her married sister, still Jane.³ She carries that name forward into adulthood, and her own death certificate records her as Jane F. Rivers.¹⁰

The formal name Frances belongs primarily to retrospective records. On the 1945 death certificate of her son Gardner, her maiden name is given as Frances Munson by the informant, his wife Alice (Wickham) Rivers — Jane’s daughter-in-law and also her niece — and the compiled Munson genealogy uses the same form.¹² In the documents created during her lifetime, she is Jane.

Marriage and place

In January 1862 she married John Rivers in Saginaw County.⁴ His life as a French-Canadian farmer rooted along the Cass River has been treated in an earlier post; Jane’s married life unfolded in the same landscape. Bridgeport, Taymouth, and Albee Townships — the locations attached to the Rivers household across four decades — lie within only a few miles of one another. Her world did not expand geographically. It deepened in place.

By 1870 she was in Taymouth Township with John and their children in a working farm household.⁵ That remained the center of her life for the next thirty years.

Twelve children

In 1900 she reported that she had given birth to twelve children, eight of them living.⁶ That single census column compresses nearly forty years of her adult life.

Those children were:

  • Betsy
  • John Jr.
  • Thomas
  • Gardner
  • Burt Eugene
  • James Daniel
  • Mary Jane
  • Rosa (Rose)
  • Victoria (died young)
  • Leana (died young)
  • Franklin (died young)
  • Joseph⁷

The three who died in childhood are present in the county’s vital records and absent from the later household. The number eight living in 1900 is the official accounting of those losses.

The households she lived in

Jane’s life is always recorded within a family home.

In 1900 she was in Taymouth Township with her husband John and their sons James D. and Joseph, the household still tied to the farm.⁶

1900 Federal Census showing Jane in the Rivers household.

John died on 21 November 1902.⁸

By 1910 Jane was a widow in the household of her son Burt.⁹ The setting had shifted to the next generation’s home, but the structure of her life had not. She remained where she had always been — within the family.

Her death

Jane died 24 March 1915 of bronchial pneumonia in Wayne County, Michigan.¹⁰ The informant on her death certificate was her son Burt, with whom she had been living in 1910.¹⁰ She was returned to Saginaw County for burial in Taymouth Township beside her husband.¹¹

The certificate names her Jane F. Rivers — the everyday name she had carried from childhood, with the formal initial that connected her to the Munson family.

Read in time, not in compilation

If her life is followed through the records in chronological order, the identity is straightforward: Jane as a child in Bridgeport, Jane as a young woman in her sister’s household, Jane as a farmer’s wife in Taymouth and Albee, and Jane as a widow in her son’s home.

Only when the record turns backward — to death certificates of the next generation or to compiled genealogies — does the name Frances reappear. Those works preserved the formal birth name. The contemporary record preserved the name she lived by.

Burial

She was buried in Taymouth Township in the community where she had lived since her marriage more than fifty years earlier.¹¹

Sources

  1. Michigan death certificate, Jane F. Rivers, 24 Mar 1915, giving birth date and parents Henry Munson and Elizabeth Foster.
  2. 1850 U.S. census, Bridgeport Township, Saginaw County, Michigan, Henry Munson household.
  3. 1860 U.S. census, Saginaw County, Michigan, household of [married sister], entry for Jane Munson.
  4. Saginaw County, Michigan, marriage record, John Rivers and Frances Jane Munson, Jan. 1862.
  5. 1870 U.S. census, Taymouth Township, Saginaw County, Michigan, John Rivers household.
  6. 1900 U.S. census, Taymouth Township, Saginaw County, Michigan, John Rivers household.
  7. Michigan birth and death records for the children of John and Jane Rivers; cemetery and obituary records where applicable.
  8. Saginaw County, Michigan, death record, John Rivers, 21 Nov 1902.
  9. 1910 U.S. census, Wayne County, Michigan, Burt Rivers household, entry for Jane Rivers.
  10. Michigan death certificate, Jane F. Rivers, 1915.
  11. Taymouth Township cemetery records; Find a Grave entry for Jane F. Rivers.
  12. Michigan death certificate, Gardner T. Rivers, 1945, naming mother as Frances Munson; informant Alice Rivers; compiled Munson family genealogy.

Alice Mary (Wickham) Rivers

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A Life Rooted in Taymouth

Alice Mary Wickham was born 4 October 1876 in Tittabawassee Township, Saginaw County, Michigan, the daughter of Reuben Thomas Wickham and Mary Emaline (Munson) Wickham.¹ She entered a world already shaped by family. Her father was an English immigrant; her mother was the child of New York pioneers who had helped settle Taymouth Township.²

Alice Mary Wickham

She would never really leave.

A Marriage Within the Family

On 13 June 1897, in nearby Freeland, Alice married Gardner T. Rivers.³
It was a marriage that joined not two different families, but two branches of the same one.

Alice’s mother, Mary Emaline Munson, and Gardner’s mother, Frances Jane Munson, were sisters, making the bride and groom first cousins and both grandchildren of Henry Munson and Elizabeth Foster.⁴

Gardner and Alice Mary Wickham Rivers

In a rural farming community like Taymouth, this was not unusual. Families lived near one another, worked together, attended the same churches and social gatherings, and their children grew up side by side. Alice did not marry a stranger — she married someone who had been part of her world since childhood.

Their marriage would last nearly forty-eight years.⁵

Building a Home in Taymouth

Alice and Gardner began their married life in Taymouth Township, where most of their children were born:

  • Ernest John (1898–1933)⁶
  • Willard Fay (1900–1981)⁷
  • Edward Joseph (1903–1993)⁸
  • Earl G. (1904–1935)⁹
  • Claude Alvin (1906–1976)¹⁰
  • Adrith Irene (1908–1957)¹¹
  • Loella Jane (1913–2000)¹²
Gardner and Alice with all of their children

Like many farm wives of her generation, Alice’s occupation in the official record was simply “housewife,” but that single word does not begin to describe the work of raising seven children, keeping a home, and supporting a farming household through the first decades of the twentieth century.⁵

Census records place her consistently in Taymouth Township, surrounded by the extended Munson, Wickham, and Rivers families who had settled there in the mid-nineteenth century.¹³

Her life was not marked by long-distance moves or dramatic change. Instead, it was defined by continuity — the same roads, the same community, the same network of relatives — for nearly seventy years.

Joy and Sorrow in the Same Place

The newspapers occasionally caught glimpses of her life.

In October 1936, friends and family gathered to celebrate her birthday.¹⁴
In June 1941, she and Gardner marked their forty-fourth wedding anniversary.¹⁵

The Saginaw News – 7 Oct 1936

These small notices remind us that hers was not an anonymous life. She was known, visited, and celebrated within her community.

But Taymouth also witnessed her losses.

She buried her parents, Reuben in 1903 and Mary Emaline in 1907.²
Most painfully, she buried two of her sons — Ernest in 1933 and Earl in 1935.⁶ ⁹

All of this happened without her leaving the place where she had been born.

The Final Months

Gardner died 13 January 1945 in Taymouth Township.¹⁶
For the first time since her marriage — and, in many ways, for the first time since childhood — Alice was alone.

Her death certificate records that she was a widowed housewife, sixty-eight years old, who had lived in the community for forty-seven years. It gives the cause of death as cardiac degeneration.⁵

She died 23 April 1945 and was buried in Cook Cemetery beside her husband.¹⁷

The medical record describes a chronic weakening of the heart.
The timeline tells another story.

After nearly forty-eight years of marriage — and a lifetime spent in the same close circle of family — Alice lived only three months without him.

A Life Measured in Roots

Alice’s story is not one of travel or reinvention.
It is a story of belonging.

She was:

  • the granddaughter of pioneers
  • the daughter of an English immigrant
  • the wife of her first cousin
  • the mother of seven children
  • a lifelong resident of Taymouth Township

She spent sixty-eight years within the landscape her grandparents had helped settle.

In the end, the record states that her heart failed.
Those who look at the whole of her life — the shared childhood, the long marriage, the losses, and the brief months of widowhood — may read that line a little differently.

Alice Mary (Wickham) Rivers was laid to rest on 24 April 1945 in Cook Cemetery, surrounded by the generations who had made Taymouth their home.¹⁷

She had never truly lived anywhere else.

Sources

  1. Michigan birth records, Alice Mary Wickham, 4 Oct 1876, Tittabawassee Township, Saginaw County.
  2. Death certificates of Reuben Thomas Wickham (1903) and Mary Emaline (Munson) Wickham (1907), Saginaw County, Michigan.
  3. Saginaw County, Michigan, marriage record, Gardner T. Rivers and Alice M. Wickham, 13 June 1897, Freeland.
  4. Munson family relationships demonstrated through vital records and census listings for Mary Emaline (Munson) Wickham and Frances Jane (Munson) Rivers.
  5. Michigan death certificate, Alice M. Rivers, 23 Apr 1945, Taymouth Township, Saginaw County.
  6. Michigan death record, Ernest John Rivers, 9 Feb 1933, Taymouth Township.
  7. Michigan birth record, Willard Fay Rivers, 21 Feb 1900, St. Charles, Saginaw County.
  8. Michigan birth record, Edward Joseph Rivers, 6 May 1903, Taymouth Township.
  9. Michigan death record, Earl G. Rivers, 17 Mar 1935, Saginaw Township.
  10. Michigan birth record, Claude Alvin Rivers, 1 June 1906, Gaines Township, Genesee County.
  11. Michigan birth record, Adrith Irene Rivers, 19 Feb 1908, Gaines, Genesee County.
  12. Michigan birth record, Loella Jane Rivers, 5 June 1913, Burt, Saginaw County.
  13. 1880, 1910, 1920, 1930, and 1940 U.S. census, Taymouth Township, Saginaw County, Michigan, households of Gardner T. Rivers.
  14. The Saginaw News, 7 Oct 1936, birthday gathering notice for Alice Rivers.
  15. The Saginaw News, 17 June 1941, 44th wedding anniversary notice for Mr. and Mrs. Gardner Rivers.
  16. Michigan death certificate, Gardner T. Rivers, 13 Jan 1945, Taymouth Township.
  17. Find a Grave memorials and Cook Cemetery burial records for Gardner T. Rivers and Alice Mary (Wickham) Rivers.

Henry Munson (1818–1886)

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Early Life and Trade

Henry Munson was born 16 June 1818 in Franklin, Delaware County, New York, the son of Daniel Munson and Frances “Fanny” Tolles. According to a biographical sketch published during his lifetime, his father operated a blacksmith shop, and Henry worked there during the winters, learning the trade at a young age.¹ This early training would shape his working life for decades.

At approximately eighteen years of age, Henry left home and traveled west to Fort Defiance, Ohio, where he spent two years engaged in boating and farm labor.¹ This period reflects the common pattern of young men acquiring experience and capital before permanent settlement.

Arrival in Michigan and Marriage

By the late 1830s, Henry had relocated to Saginaw County, Michigan. He was married on 1 June 1839 in Bridgeport to Elizabeth Foster, daughter of Nathaniel and Mary Foster.¹ The marriage marks the beginning of a long association with Bridgeport and Taymouth Townships that would continue for the remainder of his life.

Their first child, James H. Munson, was born in Bridgeport in 1840, followed by Mary Emaline Munson in 1841. Census and vital records indicate that the family remained in Bridgeport through the 1840s and 1850s, during which time Henry balanced farming with blacksmithing.²

Family Growth and Loss

Henry and Elizabeth Munson became the parents of eleven children. Not all survived to adulthood, a reality reflected both in census records and later family documentation. Ransom W. Munson, born in 1843, died in 1853 at the age of nine, reportedly at the Cass River.³ James H. Munson, their eldest son, died in Taymouth Township in 1881 at the age of forty-one.⁴

These losses occurred alongside the steady growth of the family, which included children born in Bridgeport and later in Taymouth Township. The movement of birthplaces within the family mirrors Henry’s gradual transition from Bridgeport into rural Taymouth.

Settlement in Taymouth Township

In the fall of 1861, Henry Munson purchased eighty acres of land in Taymouth Township, Saginaw County, on section 5.¹ This land purchase represents a permanent commitment to the township, coinciding with a period of agricultural expansion in the area during the Civil War era.

Federal census records place Henry in Bridgeport in 1860 and confirm his residence in Taymouth Township by 1870 and 1880.² Over time, his landholdings increased, and by the early 1880s he was reported to own eighty-seven acres.¹

Community Presence and Newspaper Mentions

Henry Munson’s name appears repeatedly in Saginaw County newspapers during the late 1870s, reflecting his continued residence and standing within the community. In 1879, his name was listed among the jurors involved in the murder case arising from the death of Heber K. Ives, in which Allen Barnum was charged.⁵ His appearance in these reports relates specifically to jury proceedings and represents routine civic service rather than personal involvement in the crime itself.

The repeated publication of juror lists across multiple issues explains why Henry’s name appears more than once in connection with the case. Such reporting was typical of nineteenth-century newspapers as trials progressed through examination, jury selection, and court sessions. These references provide valuable confirmation of Henry’s presence and civic participation in Taymouth Township during the period between the 1870 and 1880 federal censuses.

Occupation and Public Identity

Throughout his adult life, Henry Munson was identified as both a farmer and a blacksmith.¹² This dual occupation was common among early settlers and reflects the practical demands of rural Michigan communities, where skilled trades were often combined with agricultural work.

Politically, Henry was identified as a Democrat, a detail included in the 1881 county history.¹ While brief, this note situates him within the civic culture of the township and suggests engagement with local political life.

Later Years and Death

By 1880, Henry Munson was sixty-two years old and residing in Taymouth Township with his family.² The death of his son James in 1881 occurred during this period and would have marked a significant personal loss late in Henry’s life.

Henry Munson died on 12 December 1886 in Taymouth Township at the age of sixty-eight.⁶ He was buried in Taymouth Township Cemetery, where his grave remains among those of other long-standing township residents.

Assessment

Henry Munson’s life is documented across a wide range of contemporary sources, including federal censuses, land records, a published county biography, and local newspapers. Taken together, these records present a clear picture of a skilled tradesman and farmer who followed a well-documented path from New York to Michigan, established landholdings in Taymouth Township, raised a large family, and remained a visible and trusted member of the local community until his death.

The convergence of government records, printed biography, and newspaper accounts makes Henry Munson one of the more thoroughly documented nineteenth-century residents of Taymouth Township and provides a solid foundation for understanding both his life and the broader settlement history of the area.

Sources

  1. History of Saginaw County, Michigan (Chicago: Warner, Beers & Co., 1881), biographical sketch of Henry Munson.
  2. 1850, 1860, 1870, and 1880 U.S. Federal Census, Saginaw County, Michigan.
  3. Michigan death records and family documentation for Ransom W. Munson.
  4. Michigan death records for James H. Munson, Taymouth Township, 1881.
  5. Saginaw Herald (East Saginaw, Michigan), 16 October 1879, reporting the death of Heber K. Ives and related proceedings; Saginaw Courier-Herald, 23 October 1879, “The Ives Murder,” listing jurors, including Henry Munson.
  6. Michigan death and burial records for Henry Munson, Taymouth Township, 1886.

Why the Episcopal Church Held the Answer

On By NancyIn American History, Church records, EpicopalianLeave a comment

One of the most surprising lessons in the story of Elnathan, Lydia, and Fanny Tolles is not about war or DNA or probate. It is about churches.

For most people researching early New England families, the default assumption is that the Congregational church holds the records. That works for many families — but not for this one. The Tolles and Clark families belonged to the Episcopal Church, and that single fact explains why Fanny nearly disappeared from history.

Lydia Clark was baptized as an adult at Trinity Church in New Haven in May 1773. Two years later, her daughter Frances was baptized there in March 1775. These were not casual entries. Episcopal parishes kept detailed registers of baptisms, sponsors, and marriages that were entirely separate from the town and Congregational systems.

Meanwhile, in Milford, Daniel Munson was part of the Episcopal world as well. Records from St. George’s Church show him as a subscriber and vestryman in the late 1780s. When Frances married Daniel Munson in 1798, she did so in a community deeply tied to the Episcopal network — and to her Clark relatives.

This is why older genealogists struggled. They searched town records and Congregational church books for Fanny Tolles and found very little. Without Episcopal registers, she looked unattached — a woman with a maiden name but no parents.

Donald Lines Jacobus solved this because he knew where to look. He drew from Trinity Church in New Haven, St. George’s in Milford, and the Plymouth parish records to reconstruct a family that existed almost entirely outside the Congregational system. When those church records were combined with probate law, the picture became clear.

Fanny Tolles did not vanish because her family was unimportant.
She vanished because her family worshiped in the “wrong” church.

And yet, it was those same Episcopal records that preserved her baptism, her name, and her marriage — quietly waiting for someone to connect them.

This is why genealogy is never just about names and dates. It is about institutions, beliefs, and communities — the frameworks that decide which lives are written down and which are forgotten.

For Fanny Tolles, the Episcopal Church kept her story alive long enough for us to finally find it.

Sources

  1. Trinity Church (Episcopal), New Haven, Connecticut, baptismal records, 23 May 1773 (Lydia Clark) and 12 March 1775 (Frances Tolles); abstracted in Donald Lines Jacobus, Families of New Haven, vol. VIII (1932).
  2. St. George’s Church, Milford, Connecticut, vestry and subscription lists, 1786–1788, showing Daniel Munson as a member of the Episcopal Society.
  3. Milford, Connecticut, Marriage Records, 19 March 1798, Daniel Munson and Frances (Fanny) Tolles.
  4. Donald Lines Jacobus, Deacon George Clark(e) of Milford, Connecticut and Some of His Descendants (1949), Clark and Tolles family entries.
  5. Probate of Elnathan and Lydia Tolles, Plymouth (Watertown) District, Litchfield County, Connecticut, 1789–1794.

How DNA Almost Lied to Me

On By NancyIn American History, DNA, genetic genealogyLeave a comment

For most of the twentieth century, the question of who Frances “Fanny” Tolles really belonged to was a paper problem. In the twenty-first century, it became a DNA problem.

Like many genealogists, I had hoped DNA would provide the missing proof. If Fanny was truly the daughter of Elnathan and Lydia Tolles, then I should eventually match people who descend from their other children. And one day, I did.

An Ancestry DNA match appeared who traced their lineage back to another child of Elnathan Tolles — not through Fanny, but through a different branch of the Tolles family. According to Ancestry’s tools, we shared 9 centimorgans on one segment, a tiny match, but one that the Shared cM Project says can fall within the range of sixth cousins. That just happens to be exactly the relationship I would have if Fanny were Elnathan’s daughter.

For a moment, it felt like a breakthrough.

But genealogy is never that simple.

As I began building out that match’s family tree — generation by generation — another surname kept appearing: Mix. It was a name I recognized immediately. I already had Mix ancestors in my own tree. So I followed that line back.

And there it was.

The DNA match and I were not connected by just one line. We were connected by two — one through Tolles, and one through Mix. The Mix connection was older and more robust. That meant the small 9 cM segment could easily come from that shared ancestry instead of from Elnathan Tolles.

In other words, the DNA match did not prove what I wanted it to prove.

This is one of the hardest lessons in genetic genealogy: a match can be real, but still be misleading. Small segments, especially those under 10 cM, are easily inherited from distant ancestors and can survive for many generations. When multiple lines connect two people, DNA alone cannot tell you which ancestor supplied the shared segment.

So DNA did not solve the Tolles–Munson question. It simply told me that the two families were tangled together in more than one way.

And that meant I had to go back to something far older — something far more reliable.

I had to go back to the law.

In the next post, I’ll show how a thick, tedious, 66-page probate file did what DNA could not: it quietly but definitively tied Frances “Fanny” Tolles to the parents who raised her.

Sources

  1. AncestryDNA, shared DNA match between the author and a descendant of another child of Elnathan Tolles, showing 9 cM across one segment (author’s private test results).
  2. Shared cM Project 4.0, The DNA Painter, relationship probability tool for centimorgan values, indicating that 9 cM can be consistent with sixth-cousin relationships.
  3. Blaine T. Bettinger, “The Shared cM Project,” The Genetic Genealogist (https://thegeneticgenealogist.com), methodology for interpreting small DNA matches.
  4. International Society of Genetic Genealogy (ISOGG), guidelines on triangulation and multiple ancestral paths affecting DNA interpretation.
  5. Author’s compiled family tree and research notes on the Mix and Tolles families, showing multiple shared ancestral lines.

Frances “Fanny” Tolles: The Girl Who Slipped Between the Records

On By NancyIn American History, Ancestor ProfileLeave a comment

Genealogy often feels like assembling a puzzle — until you discover that one of the most important pieces was never cut to fit. That is what happens with Frances “Fanny” Tolles, the daughter of Elnathan and Lydia Tolles, and the woman who would later become the wife of Daniel Munson.

On paper, Fanny should be easy to find. She was baptized on 12 March 1775, just as the American Revolution was beginning. In the Episcopal records of New Haven she appears as “Frances,” daughter of Elnathan and Lydia Tolles.¹ But after that single entry, she seems to vanish.

Her parents lived in Northbury (later Plymouth), Connecticut, during the war years — a place where church and town records were scattered across jurisdictions and denominations. The Tolles family belonged to the Episcopal Church, not the Congregational churches that recorded most Connecticut vital events. As a result, many of Fanny’s milestones were preserved only in church books, not town ledgers.

Then her family fractured.

Elnathan Tolles died in 1789. Lydia followed in 1793. Their children were still young. Some were placed under guardianship, others went to live with relatives. The probate files confirm their identities as children of Elnathan and Lydia — but they do not track what happened to them afterward.²

This is where Fanny disappears.

By 1798, a Frances (or Fanny) Tolles married Daniel Munson in Milford, Connecticut — a town strongly associated with the Clark family, Fanny’s maternal kin.³ Yet nowhere in the marriage record are her parents named. There is no “daughter of Elnathan” to anchor her identity. She simply appears, gets married, and then moves on.

Later genealogies tried to solve this gap, but not all of them were confident. Early Tolles and Munson researchers knew that Daniel Munson’s wife was named Fanny Tolles, and they knew that Elnathan and Lydia had a daughter named Frances of the right age. But without a clear marriage record naming her parents, some writers hedged, quietly assigning her to Elnathan because she fit — not because a document said so.

That uncertainty lingered for generations.

In modern times, DNA added a new layer. A distant DNA match appeared to descend from another child of Elnathan Tolles, seemingly supporting Fanny’s placement in the family. But further research revealed a second, older connection through the Mix family, meaning the DNA could not be used to prove Fanny’s parentage after all. The evidence was real — but it pointed in two directions.

This is why I have over 64,000 people in my family tree. Not because I like big numbers, but because tiny errors in the 1700s ripple forward into the DNA era.

So who was Fanny Tolles?
Was she truly the daughter of Elnathan and Lydia?
Or was she “assigned” to them because no better answer existed?

To find out, we have to leave church books and DNA charts behind — and turn to something far more powerful: probate law.

Sources

  1. Trinity Church (Episcopal), New Haven, Connecticut, baptismal records, 12 March 1775, Frances Tolles, daughter of Elnathan and Lydia Tolles; abstracted in Donald Lines Jacobus, Families of New Haven, vol. VIII (1932).
  2. Probate of Elnathan and Lydia Tolles, Plymouth (Watertown) District, Litchfield County, Connecticut, 1789–1794, combined estate file, listing their children including Frances.
  3. Milford, Connecticut, Marriage Records, 19 March 1798, Daniel Munson and Frances (Fanny) Tolles; cited in The Munson Record and Milford town records.

Daniel Munson (1745-1827)

On By NancyIn American History, Ancestor Profile, Revolutionary WarLeave a comment

When we think of patriotic service during the American Revolution, it is easy to picture soldiers on the battlefield. Yet independence was secured just as surely by men who stayed home and kept their communities functioning during uncertain and dangerous times. One such patriot was Daniel Munson of Milford, Connecticut.

Born on April 4, 1745, in Stratford, Connecticut, Daniel Munson’s early life was shaped by loss. Orphaned as a small child, he was raised within an extended family that valued responsibility and public duty. As an adult, Daniel settled in Milford, where he married Mary Sears and raised a large family while becoming deeply involved in the civic life of the town.

During the Revolutionary War, Milford’s stability depended on capable local leadership. In 1781 and 1782—critical years as the war drew toward its conclusion—Daniel Munson stepped forward to serve the town in two important civil offices: tything man and surveyor of highways. These were not ceremonial positions. They required time, authority, and a willingness to enforce the laws that kept daily life running smoothly.

As surveyor of highways, Daniel was responsible for overseeing the maintenance of local roads—vital routes used for transporting food, supplies, and militia. In a coastal town like Milford, good roads were essential to both commerce and defense. At the same time, his role as tything man placed him in charge of maintaining public order, enforcing Sabbath laws, and addressing disorderly conduct. In a period marked by shortages, political tension, and social strain, this work helped preserve the moral and civil structure of the community.

Daniel Munson’s patriotism did not end with the war. He remained an active citizen for decades, serving his church, managing land and property, and contributing to Milford’s growth well into the early years of the new republic. He lived to see the nation he helped support take firm root, passing away in Milford on October 27, 1827, at the age of eighty-two.

Today, Daniel Munson’s story reminds us that the Revolution was sustained not only by muskets and marches, but by ordinary citizens who accepted responsibility when their communities needed them most. His recognized patriotic service stands as a testament to the power of civic duty—and to the enduring legacy of those who quietly helped build a nation.

Sources:

Full text of “1637-1887, the Munson record : a genealogical and biographical account of Captain Thomas Munson (a pioneer of Hartford and New Haven) and his descendants”, https://archive.org/stream/16371887munsonre02muns/16371887munsonre02muns_djvu.txt

Full text of “Encyclopedia of Connecticut biography, genealogical-memorial; representative citizens” – Internet Archive, https://archive.org/stream/encyc09unse/encyc09unse_djvu.txt

Daniel Munson, Ancestor No. A082998, Daughters of the American Revolution (DAR) Genealogical Research System, Washington, D.C.; patriotic service credited as tything man (1781) and surveyor of highways (1782), Milford, Connecticut; service sourced to Mullen, Connecticut Town Meeting Records, vol. 1, pp. 575–576.

Mary Emeline Munson Wickham

On By NancyIn Ancestor ProfileLeave a comment

I have often said that my family tree is not tree shaped. Sometimes I’ve described it as a wreath, or as a tumbleweed (hence the name of this blog). Well, Mary Munson was both my 2nd great-grandmother and my 2nd great-grand aunt. Yes, you read that right. She was both my great-grandmother and my great-grand aunt. Her obituary has that tell-tail sign.

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Saginaw News, May 24, 1907, page 12

Yes, she had a daughter “Mrs. Rivers” who lived in Swartz Creek at the time and a sister “Mrs. Rivers” who lived in Taymouth Township. Mrs. Rivers – the daughter – was born Alice Mary Wickham and was married to her first cousin, Gardner Rivers. Mrs. Rivers – the sister – was Frances Jane Munson who was married to John Rivers and they were Gardner’s parents. Keeping it all in the family… lol.

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Ruben Wickham, wife Mary E. Munson Wickham, and children William H. Wickham and Etta Wickham

Mary and Frances Jane were 2 daughters of Henry Munson and his wife Elizabeth “Betsy” Foster. An uncle of Mary and Frances Jane, Gardner W Foster was the first white child born in Saginaw County and is who the village of Fosters is named after.

Mary died May 23, 1907 from Erysipelas. According to Wikipedia, Erysipelas is a skin infection caused by a bacteria. Wikipedia also states:

This disease is most common among the elderly, infants, and children. People with immune deficiency, diabetes, alcoholism, skin ulceration, fungal infections, and impaired lymphatic drainage (e.g., after mastectomy, pelvic surgery, bypass grafting) are also at increased risk.

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It is probable that she was diabetic and/or had cardiac issues. Evidence for this comes from her picture, obituary and death certificate. No, none of them directly state this, but it is likely – especially since both issues run in the family – her daughter Alice, grandson and great-grandson all died of heart issues. Her great-grandchildren – my dad and uncle both had diabetes (as do I).