My maternal third great-grandmother Nancy Woolf married my 3xGGrandpa William James on March 11, 1841, in Cole County, Missouri. See the original record showing their marriage as written in the top upper right-hand corner.
I had to read the whole page several times just to find William and Nancy's names. Here's that same section--but enlarged:
Many records show Nancy's maiden name as "Molf." I don't know anything more about Nancy's parents or where in North Carolina she was born in 1815. William's line came from Barren County, Kentucky. His parents, John Abraham James and Rachael (Bray), were allegedly the first settlers to that part of Cole County that later became Moniteau County, Missouri. All that area once belonged to the Osage Tribe. The government forced them out. Moved them south to what is now northeastern Oklahoma. An oil-rich territory.
Cousin/researcher Barbara Holst Maltby in her book "Follow in His Footsteps: The Adventures of My Father" (about John H. Holst) writes that her Great-Grandfather William James "was a Union man" during the Civil War. The James family was allegedly the only Union family in that neck of the woods. That would be in what is today Morgan County, Missouri. They farmed in the Osage Township. (You Coffee fans will recall that Versailles is also in Morgan County. And no, our family did not pronounce it "Ver-sigh.")
While William and two of his sons were away serving in the Union Army, his wife Nancy was left with the younger children. Alone on the farm. Once when Union soldiers were passing through en route to St. Louis, Barbara Holst Maltby writes:
"...the Gravois River suddenly reached flood stage and the army was unable to cross for three days. The eight thousand men camped on the James farm for that period. General Davis requisitioned all the cattle, all the wheat and corn and other commodities for the Union Army."
Maltby adds that soon after their supplies were taken, Nancy's family came down with smallpox. A horrible illness that spread throughout the county. Of their ten known children, I don't find that any died during the War. They survived smallpox. However, there are two daughters, Hanna and Letitia, whose death dates are unknown. Perhaps they were casualties of the outbreak?
William and Nancy's seventh child was named after Nancy. She later married a Coffee. But that's for another post.