Before I Forget

Ailsey Willhelm married Jacob Cline in Alabama on September 5, 1849.  Even though a marriage record exists, genealogy geeks find it way more fun to locate a newspaper spread describing the glorious wedding ceremony. 

Or not. I found only a paragraph on page 3. This Huntsville paper doesn't say where they wed or from which county the record was filed. Only that the couple lived in nearby Marshall County. See the third sentence that I clipped from Newspapers.com:  

It was a second marriage for both, as this couple's previous spouses had died. Neither Jacob nor the widow McCulley were spring chickens. Ailsey (how DOES one say that name?) was about 56, and is only identified as "Mrs. McCullouch." And no, I did not spend extra time reading later papers for a retraction of her misspelled name. Papers were (and are) often rife with errors. 

Should any cousins read this, Ailsey was our 4x GGrandfather's little sister, and the daughter of Tobias Wilhelm.

But, hey!  Let's not stop there. What's the news of the day in Huntsville, Alabama? See three clips from The Democrat's front page. Mind you, on the FRONT PAGE:

You saw the motto under the paper's "flag," right?    (stirring background music plays here)

                  "Unawed by the influence of the rich or the great, the People must be heard, 
                    and their rights vindicated."

Fine words for rich white guys. Not so much for females or those enslaved. 

In Madison County, Alabama on 5 Sep 1849 several enslaved people were mentioned in an ad in the Huntsville Democrat paper. Their slave-owner appears to be Richard Pryor. See the article below. 

Knowing this may appear in a Google search, I'm listing the names of the enslaved humans for family historians who may be looking for them:  Rachel aged 34, Nancy aged 45, Judy and child aged 16, Moses aged 10, Amanda aged 7, Patty aged 13, Eliza aged 8.

I hope their descendants can trace back to these seven people.


                  "A married woman or feme covert was a dependent, like an underage child or a slave, 
                  and could not own property in her own name or control her own earnings, except under 
                  very specific circumstances. When a husband died, his wife could not be the guardian 
                  to their under-age children."


#TheyHadNames

John Lee, my paternal 4th GGrandfather, was born in Harford, Maryland in 1772. He next appears in Montgomery County, Tennessee where he married Sarah Morgan in 1808. He moves once more to Stewart County, Tennessee, where he remained until his death in 1852. 

Before the 1850 Federal Census, only names of heads of household were given on census pages. But age and gender were requested of residents within each household.

The 1840 census records John and Sarah Lee's household as:

     White males aged: 10 thru 14: 3.  Aged: 15 thru 19: 1 20 thru 29: 3, 70 thru 79: 1.
     White females aged: 5 thru 9: 1, 15 thru 19: 2, 20 thru 29: 1, 50 thru 59: 1.
     Males enslaved aged 10 thru 23: 2.
     Female enslaved aged 10 thru 23: 1, 24 thru 35: 1, and 36 thru 54: 1. 

Ancestry has John's Will. In this gallery I first placed the whole page, and then cropped two more so readers can better view the fine print:

Among the property John listed be left to his daughters and sons are the names of five humans. Five people who were enslaved. One man, two young boys, and two women uprooted from their home and moved elsewhere after John's probate was settled. 

At the time John's Will was prepared in February of 1852 in Stewart County, Tennessee, their ages and names were given as:

      Frank, aged 25 years,

      Cicero, aged 8 years,

      Harry, aged 5 years,

      Nancy, aged 22 years, and 

      Jane, aged 38 years.

I have stared at those five names wondering if Jane wasn't the mother of Nancy and/or the mother of Cicero and Harry. I looked for Cicero and Nancy in the 1870 census in and around Stewart County. I found several Harrys. I had hoped to find people with these same names/ages living together or near one another. That might indicate a familial relation, stemming from their days on the Lee farm. That's a lot of "mights." 

Considerable effort is made by historians of enslaved culture to compile lists of people once owned by others. Why? Descendants seek names of ancestors. DNA test results coupled with records naming enslaved African-Americans are especially helpful to genealogists. 

        https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/slavery-trail-of-tears-180956968/ 

I hope their descendants can trace back to these five people. #TheyHadNames

Source:  Settlements and Bonds, 1812-1968; Author: Tennessee County Court (Stewart County); Probate Place: Stewart, Tennessee via Ancestry.com. Tennessee, Wills and Probate Records, 1779-2008, Provo, UT, USA

Note to cousins: Sarah and John's son, Josiah, was a dad to my grandmother Esther's maternal grandmother, Anna Lee. Got that?