Joel Thrall is back . . .

. . . in the fall issue of the New England Historical and Genealogical Register for the second and concluding installment, now visible to NEHGS members on line at American Ancestors and to patrons of good genealogy libraries.

His unlikely trajectory -- from pioneer/fugitive from justice to farmer to teacher to doctor to an early death in 1827 -- is not quite complete yet. His great-grandchildren scattered across the continent, but they had to be cut from the journal for space reasons. They will appear, most likely on line, in good time -- as will Joel's dozens of nieces and nephews. He was the oldest of ten children, all of whom have multiple descendants.


" 'Faultless Could I Love Him Less?' Joel S. Thrall and His Descendants in Vermont, Quebec, Ohio, and Texas," parts 1 and 2, New England Historical and Genealogical Register 172, Summer 2018:248-56, Fall 2018:341-52.

Did your ancestor get sent off with a 35-line memorial poem?

My great-grandfather's oldest brother, Joel Thrall (1792-1827), went from Vermont to Quebec to Ohio, where he died outside of Columbus, leaving behind him a mysterious widow (wife #3), a trail of bad debts, a skeleton (in addition to his own), and a 35-line memorial mourning poem.

I knew nothing of this when I set out to write him up. (Beware those dull-seeming relatives!)

The first part of his story is now out in the summer issue of the New England Historical and Genealogical Register, AKA The Journal of American Genealogy. The second and last part (scheduled for fall) follows Joel's son Homer (with wife #1), who became a Methodist missionary in Texas and a Confederate apologist, and his daughter Rachel (with wife #2), whose grandchildren are scattered across Canada and the U.S. She is the source of all of Joel's living descendants, but he was not present at her christening. It seems unlikely that she knew him, but she and half-brother Homer probably met when he paid a flying visit to Quebec in later life (1884).

FYI would-be writers: The Register is not all New England all the time; it is interested in out-migrations as well.

Timothy Bush (1735?-1815?) and Descendants in The Genealogist

Michael Thomas Meggison and R. Andrew Pierce have given the fullest account yet of the prolific family that gave rise to the two US Presidents Bush, in a 73-page article spread across the three most recent issues of The Genealogist. Unpublished work by Elaine Bush Prince helped frame their account. Previous published works focused on the male line of Presidential descent only.

This is the kind of article (or book) that we all more or less dream of writing for our families; sadly, for many of us it remains a dream. Seeing a living, breathing, lengthy example like this may provide the inspiration we need.

The authors begin by discussing the intricate and still unresolved question of Timothy Bush's parentage, where the minimal direct evidence is ambiguous and not enough indirect evidence is yet available to reach a conclusion. Note to interested researchers: "A thorough search of Windham County court records before 1754, including files, might turn up further evidence of him." In his documented later life Timothy lived in Connecticut, Vermont, and western New York.

For Timothy and his wife Deborah House, the article documents ten children, 36 grandchildren, and 122 great-grandchildren. (Female lines are not followed as far as male lines.) Eight of their children married: to Nathaniel Willis Seaver and Abner Chamberlain; Abigail Marvin; Hannah (nee Porter) Preston; Lydia Newcomb; Maria Chamberlain; Cyrus Hamilton; Amy Yeomans; and Lavinia Barnes. Descendants lived in New Hampshire; Maine; Massachusetts; Kansas; New York City; Cleveland; Cincinnati; Philadelphia; San Francisco; Kansas; California (beginning with the Gold Rush); and several counties in Wisconsin, Michigan, Indiana, and Illinois. Various descendants served in the Revolution, War of 1812, and Civil War.

Stories are plentiful. Grandson Rev. George Bush had a stormy tenure in an Indianapolis Presbyterian pulpit in the 1820s. Grandson Obadiah Newcomb Bush died aboard ship en route between Acapulco and Panama in 1851. Great-grandson John E. Roberts died of wounds incurred at the Battle of Gettysburg. An interesting indirect-evidence argument as to the parentage of Lydia Bliss, wife of grandson Timothy Bush, is condensed into a footnote.

There's plenty to learn here even if your family tree has sprouted no Bushes.



Michael Thomas Meggison and R. Andrew Pierce, "Some Descendants of Timothy Bush of Connecticut, Vermont, and Western New York," The Genealogist 25 (Spring 2011): 35-55 and (Fall 2011): 233-56, and 26 (Spring 2012): 102-32.

Harold Henderson, "Timothy Bush (1735?-1815?) and Descendants in The Genealogist," Midwestern Microhistory: A Genealogy Blog, posted 4 July 2012 (http://midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com : accessed [access date]). [Please feel free to link to the specific post if you prefer.]

More CG blogging

Cathi Desmarais, CG (SM) of northern Vermont, principal at Stone House Research, has picked an apt name for her new blog: No Stone Unturned, Adventures of a Board-Certified Genealogist in Vermont. As the descendant of at least two early Vermont families, I look forward to learning more about a place that I've only researched, um, amateurishly.

And speaking of up-north genealogy, blogger Paula Stuart Warren, CG (SM) will be doing a "crash course" for newcomers to Minnesota genealogy on Family Tree University Wednesday.

Midwestern genealogy from Vermont!

With some labor I have finally assembled all six installments of the mega-article by Joan A. Hunter, CG, "An Overland Journey from Vermont to Illinois as Recollected by Mary Holton (1793-1874) with a Genealogical Summary," published in Vermont Genealogy (full citations at end of post, back issues available for sale). These New Englanders were long-lived, prolific, and accomplished, so it will come as no surprise that Mary Holton's account occupies the first eight pages, and the genealogical summary the remaining 68! (For those with particular interest in the Holton family, the summary involves the children, grandchildren, and (in child lists) great-grandchildren of Joel Holton5 (1738-1821) of Northfield, Massachusetts and Westminster, Vermont.)

I don't know when I ever would have found this if I hadn't happened across an extra copy of Vermont Genealogy in the Porter County Public Library in Valparaiso, Indiana (which, by the way, does a far better job of making recent issues of regional and national genealogical publications available than many libraries with bigger names). The article covers family members in Massachusetts, Vermont, Maine, Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, California, and Oregon, including early settlers of places as far removed as Ashland, Oregon, and Crown Point, Indiana.

The heart of the story is in McDonough County in west-central Illinois. In the fall of 1835, eighteen Holtons made the 14-week overland journey there from Westminster, the adults being William (son of Joel) and Olive Holton, then in their 60s, and their sons William Jr. and Isaac with their families, ages six months to 64 years. Everyone made it, even though two of the babies were not expected to survive the trip; one account says they would move the baby to see if it was still alive.

Isaac had prepared well ahead of time, having purchased 160 acres in Tennessee Township, McDonough County, in 1833. (The land was in the Military Tract set aside for veterans of the War of 1812; suffice to say that Isaac did not buy it from the original veteran.) In 1849 one branch of the family acquired the first piano in the county, which people came from miles to see.

As any genealogical research will, this one finds facts that don't fit the expected historical generalities. The Holtons did not use the Erie Canal; many of them settled in McDonough, but several went back east and many others later continued on west. In other ways, they are familiar in their enthusiasms: some family members embraced Universalism and Spiritualism; another, whose story is not told or followed, apparently married the utopian experimenter John Humphrey Noyes. Another was memorialized as a founder of the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society. No summary can do justice to these many gathered facts. My main wish is that the article were longer (!), as the author did not make use of the agricultural schedules of the US census.

I am grateful that Vermont Genealogy saw fit to print such a wide-ranging tale, big enough to occupy two entire issues of the magazine if it had been published all at once. It will be a good day when genealogy can support a respected publishing venue that could make an article of this type readily available in one place. Here are the citations for those who choose to seek it out. You won't be sorry.

"An Overland Journey from Vermont to Illinois as Recollected by Mary Holton (1793-1874) with a Genealogical Summary," Vermont Genealogy
10(4):183-209, October 2005
12(3):110-123, July 2007
12(4):164-171, October 2007
13(2):84-96, April 2008
13(3):116-123, July 2008
13(4):174-179, October 2008