#52 Ancestors 2023 Week 23 So Many Descendants: Francis Whittington

 My genealogical New Year's resolution was to write more about my grandchildren's ancestors on the lines other than mine.  So here goes. 

Francis Whittington is the 7X-great grandfather of my grandchildren Henry and Harper, on their mother's line. 

Francis Whittington, the son of William and Charity Whittington, was born about 1734 in Anne Arundel County MD.  Francis and his brother Thomas married two sisters, Elizabeth and Wilhelmina Powell, the daughters of John Powell and Rebecca Trott.

Francis and Elizabeth Powell were married sometime before 1756 when he was the administrator for the estate of Elizabeth's mother.  They had nine children together, living on Francis's farm at Hall's Hills. Francis Whittington appears in the 1800 Census of All Saints Parish in Calvert County MD with 3 young men and two young women in his household. Elizabeth Whittington died in 1789, Francis in 1807. 

*Rebecca Whittington married Thomas Turner of Calvert County MD and had three daughters with him: Eleanor, Mary, and Elizabeth Turner. Rebecca died before 1821.

*James Whittington married Mary Wood, the daughter of William Wood in 1787.  They had two daughters: Elizabeth, who married James Ward, and Eleanor, who married William P. Hardesty.  James Whittington died in Anne Arundel County MD in 1806.

*William Whittington married a Miss Smith and had four children with her: Rachel Smith Whittington, who married Washington Greene Tuck, Clement Whittington, Mary Whittington, and John S. Whittington, who married Mary Jane Weems. William Whittington died in Annapolis MD in March 1825.

*Francis Whittington Jr. (the 6X-great grandfather of my grandchildren) was born about 1757.  He married Eleanor Turner in 1778.  She was probably the sister of Thomas Turner, above. Francis and Eleanor had six children: Elizabeth, who married Samuel Wood Jr.; Charles, who married Wilhelmina Crandall; Eleanor, unmarried; Francis III, unmarried; Ann, unmarried; and Samuel, (the 5X-great grandfather of my grandchildren). 

*Elizabeth Whittington who married William Turner, probably the brother of Thomas and Eleanor, above. They had six children: Rebecca, who married William Howard; Wilhelmina, who married Clement Chaney and moved to Ohio; Thomas, who married Unknown and had five children; Richard who married Elizabeth Scrivener and died in 1845; William; and Sarah, who married Joseph Griffith.

*Lavinia "Viney" Whittington who married William Stevens in 1781 at St. James Parish in Anne Arundel County MD. They had seven children: John, who married Frances "Fanny" Larrimore and had six children with her; Samuel, who married Margaret Larrimore, the sister of Fanny, above, and had five children with her; (I will just note here that Samuel and Margaret Stevens would also be 5X-great grandparents of my grandchildren, since their daughter Margaret married her cousin Henry Whittington, shown below.)  Joseph; Rachel Ann, who married Samuel Wood and had seven children with him; Richard, who married Priscilla Marquess; Susan, who married William Wood and Lewis Tinges; Francis, who married Sally Jane Collinson and had eight children with her; Mary Ellen, who married James Larrimore, the brother of Fanny and Margaret, above, and three children with him.

*Samuel Whittington, who died unmarried in Calvert County MD in 1806, leaving his estate to his siblings. 

*Araminta "Minty" Whittington, who married James Wood in 1781 at St. James Parish in Anne Arundel County MD. Samuel, who married his cousin, Rachel Ann Stevens, above; Elizabeth who married Joshua Hardesty and Levi Webb; Eleanor who married Mr. Chalk. 

*Benjamin Whittington who had a son Henry Whittington. 

Samuel Whittington, the son of Francis Whittington, the 5X-great grandfather of my grandchildren, was born in Calvert County MD about 1800. He married first Dorothy R. Wood, the daughter of Henry Wood, in 1819. He married secondly Dorothy's sister, Ann Wood, in 1846. He died in Calvert County MD sometime after 1850, when he appears in the census as a widower with nine children.  His signature at the left dates from 1832, when his father-in-law Henry Wood's estate was settled. 

Samuel's children were:

*Rachel Ann Whittington

*Rebecca Whittington

*Catherine Whittington

*Henry L. Whittington (the 4X-great grandfather of my grandchildren) More below.

*Dorothy Jane Whittington, who married first William Fritts in Baltimore MD and had three children with him: William, Hannah, and Samuel; she married secondly William S. Cook and and had two children with him: Charles and Mary.  

*Martin Van Buren Whittington, who married first Ann Medora Crosby and had a daughter with her, Medora Ann Whittington. He married secondly Sarah Catherine Johnson and had a son with her: Elmer Martin Whittington.  He married thirdly Domy Ann Catherine Sheriff and had a daughter and a son, Charles Clemens Whittington with her. Martin Whittington died in Washington DC in 1893. 

*Samuel Edward Whittington, who married Amanda Fields in 1860.  He served in the Union Army during the Civil War and later moved to Ashland County OH where he died in 1910.  He had four children: Thomas S. Whittington, William F. Whittington, Samuel Edward Whittington Jr. and Hester Dorothy Whittington. 

*William F. Whittington, the son of Samuel's second wife, Ann, was born about 1846.

Henry L. Whittington (the 4X-great grandfather of my grandchilden) was born in Calvert County MD 26 April 1828. I have written previously about my search to find information about Henry. He married first in 1855, his cousin, Margaret A. Stevens, the daughter of Samuel Stevens and Margaret Larrimore, above. They had six children:

*Mary Miranda Whittington, who married Thomas Dorsey Loudenslager and had five daughters with him: Clara, Lillian, Buelah, Edna and Maude.  Mary died in 1937 in Ellicott City MD.

*Samuel Whittington

*Sarah E. Whittington

*Joseph James Whittington Sr. (the 3X-great grandfather of my grandchildren) More Below.

*Agnes Whittington

*George F. Whittington, who married Florence Adele King in Baltimore MD in 1890 and had a daughter Carrie Whittington with her. George died in Baltimore MD in 1906.

Henry L. Whittington married secondly Matilda Elizabeth Cole about 1870 and had two daughters with her:

*Florence M. Whittington, who married William J. Neisser and had six children with him: George, Mary Virginia, Carroll, Florence, Annabelle, and Emma. She married secondly George Norris Page. She died in Baltimore MD in 1862.

*Francis Vivian Whittington, who married John Frederick Eckert in Baltimore in 1894.  They had seven children: John Frederick Jr., Agnes, Bertha, Matilda, William, Howard and Mildred. Francis died in Baltimore in 1916.

Henry L. Whittington died in Baltimore MD in 1904 and his buried in Baltimore Cemetery. 

Joseph James Whittington Sr. (the 3x-great grandfather of my grandchilden) was born in Calvert County MD 31 January 1865. He married Florence B. Thompson, the daughter of James Thompson and Margaret Kingsley, in Baltimore MD in 1886. Joseph is shown in the picture at the right on the far right side of the group. Joseph and Florence had five children:

*J. Rankin Whittington, died in infancy.

*Margaret Elizabeth "Maggie" Whittington (the 2X-great grandmother of my grandchildren.) More Below. 

*Arthur Hurst Whittington married Annie C. Cunningham and had a son, Arthur Jr. 

*Joseph James Whittington Jr. married Myrtle Steiner and had two children: Margarite and Joseph James III.

*Mary Lucy died in infancy.

Joseph James Whittington Sr. died in Baltimore MD in December 1935 and his buried in Loudon Park Cemetery. 

Margaret Elizabeth "Maggie" Whittington (the 2X-great grandmother of my grandchildren) was born in Baltimore MD 23 November 1889.  She married Calvin Embert Jones Sr. in Baltimore MD in 1907. They had three children: Evelyn, who married John Englerth; Margaret, who died in infancy; Calvin Embert Jones Jr. (the great-grandfather of my grandchildren). Maggie Whittington Jones died in Baltimore MD in 1972. She is buried in Loudon Park Cemetery with her husband. 

I'm going to stop here because the line moves away from the Whittingtons.  I plan another blog later about the Jones ancestors of my grandchildren. 

#52Ancestors 2019 Week 9 At the Courthouse: Settling the Estate of William Wood

#52 Ancestors 2019 Week 9 At the Courthouse: Settling the Estate of William Wood

Chancery Court has turned out to be one of my best resources as a genealogist.  This is where disputes over estates go to be settled, and that often means that the decedents's family is spelled out in detail for several generations.  That was definitely true in the case of William Wood of Anne Arundel County MD.

William Wood was born in St. James Parish, Anne Arundel County MD 14 April 1734.  He died in Anne Arundel County MD sometime before December 1805, according to this notice from the Maryland Gazette.  And, since Henry Wood and Thomas Sullivan are the administrators, rather than the executors of his estate, he didn't leave a will.  So no luck there in getting information about his family, except that Henry and Thomas are probably related to him.

As you might imagine, there are many men named William Wood in Anne Arundel County, so sorting out their connections or lack of connections is a real challenge.  Fortunately for me, the particular William Wood I was interested in left property that needed to be sold in order to settle his estate.  This involved a long list of his heirs.  Yeah!  The notice below, which appeared in the Maryland Gazette, naturally inspired me to go down to the State Archives and find the original court papers in order to get more detail.

William Wood owned several large properties in Anne Arundel County: Broughton Ashley, Hunt's Mount, and Carter Bennett. He died without a will in May of 1804 and his heirs want to sell the property in order to distribute the estate among William's many heirs, conveniently listed in the bill of complaint.  Basically, the older heirs are suing the younger heirs to get consent for the sale. This is not really because of a dispute, but to protect the rights of the minors.

So here is the bounty of information about William's heirs:

His children:

• John Wood (the eldest)
• Henry Wood
• Samuel Wood
• Robert Wood
• Sarah Sullivan
• Mary Whittington
• Dorothy Sunderland
• Richard Wood (who apparently left Maryland some nine years before this suit and hasn't been heard from since)

His grandchildren:

• Margaret and Cassandra, daughters of deceased son William Wood
• Elizabeth,Eleanor and Sarah (acutally Samuel), children of deceased son James Wood
• Benjamin, John, Rhody and Susanna Whittington, children of deceased daughter Susanna, wife of William Whittington
• Susanna, Samuel, Anne and Wilfred Parrot,the children of deceased daughter Anne, wife of Richard Parrott

Note that the grandchildren only come into play here because their parent, a child of William Wood is deceased. 

By 1806, when the estate is finally settled, each child (or their respective children) gets $416.55 as his or her share.  The final settlement also reveals a little more information about the spouses of the married daughters.

So, altogether, definitely worth the trip to the Archives. 

The Estate of Samuel Whittington: Gotta Love Those Court Cases

When Samuel Whittington died in Calvert County MD in 1806, he had no children and left no will.  So to ordinarily, he wouldn't be of much interest to a family historian.  But in Samuel's case, the ultimate settlement of his estate, some twenty years later, resulted in a Chancery Court case that laid out several generations of the Whittington family, a veritable gold mine of genealogical information.

By plotting out the complex explanation of Samuel's heirs, I was able to trace an extended family tree for the Whittingtons of Calvert and Anne Arundel Counties.  And, because a couple of his heirs were involved in other suits, I could make even more connections between the Whittingtons and the Woods family, in the process finding a solution to a long-standing brick wall.

In 1827, when the court case was filed, Samuel's three brothers, William, Francis and James had all died intestate as had his sisters, Elizabeth and Rebecca, both of whom were married to men named Turner.

His sisters Lavinia (who married William Stevens) and Araminta (the widow of James Wood) were still living.

Because all these heirs were dead, the plaintiffs needed to name all the heirs of the heirs.  Genealogical Heaven!

William Whittington's heirs (all of age in1827) were Clement, John S., Rachel (who married Washington Green Tuck) and Mary.  The fact that there were all over 21 allows me to calculate some parameters for their birth dates: the children of William Whittington were all born before 1806.

The heirs of James Whittington were:
Eleanor who married William P. Hardesty (died intestate before 1827)
Elizabeth who married John Ward (died intestate before 1827)

Eleanor Hardesty's heirs (all infants under the age of 21) were:
John James Hardesty
William Thomas Hardesty
Joseph Henry Hardesty
Mary Ann Elizabeth Hardesty
Susan Rebecca Hardesty

The heirs of Francis Whittington were:
Francis
Charles (died by 1827, left children Maria, Ellen, Lewis and Sarah Ann, all infants)
Elizabeth Wood (died intestate by 1827, left a daughter Eleanor Wood, an infant of Baltimore MD)
Samuel
Ann
Eleanor
William (died by 1827, left daughter Drusilla)

The heirs of Rebecca Turner were:
Elizabeth who married John Hollingshead
Eleanor who married John Winfield
Mary who married Mr. Dalrymple (both of whom are dead by 1827, leaving as heirs Eleanor Gibson, John Dalrymple and William Dalrymple)

The heirs of Elizabeth Turner were:
William
Thomas who was dead by 1827 leaving Elizabeth, Richard, John, Mary Ann, Thomas and Ann as his heirs. 
Richard
Sarah who married Joseph Griffith
Wilhelmina who married Clement Chaney
Rebecca who married William Howard.  Rebecca was dead by 1827 leaving as heirs Elizabeth who married James Forsyth, Rebecca who married Walter Crosby, Peggy who married James Cox, Eleanor who married Mr. Gibson, Mary, the widow of Mr. Dew, Sally, Matilda and Willy Ann and infants  Mahala and Sophia.

See what I mean?  A gold mine.  And reading through all the documents in the original case file led to many more details of marriages and deaths.  After that, a search of marriage records and census records allowed me to fill in details for at least some of these folks.

Ultimately, I was able to show that the Samuel Whittington shown above as the son of Francis Whittington, was the same person who married Dorothy Wood and whose father I had been searching for for quite a while.

Overall, Chancery Court cases like this are worth reading through every last page and making very careful notes because they are full of information.

The document below shows the distribution of Samuel Whittington's estate in 1827.