Laura CARTER - Surrogate Record

I have had several cousins contact me over the last couple of months about the descendants of William Hall 1740-1822 and Rheuhama Andrews or Andremer 1745-1821. I can't remember when I went to Ontario County Records and Archives to look at the Surrogate record of Laura Carter but here is the transcription I made of a small portion of the file. Laura was the granddaughter of William and Rheuhama. She never married and her immediate family predeceased her so her probate records were a gold mine for discovering some of the other descendants. I have added notes as to what I have discovered and what I think are the correct relationships.

To the Surrogate Court of the County of Ontario:

The petition of Samuel SOUTHWORTH and Montgomery S SANDFORD of the village of Geneva in said County of Ontario respectfully shows
That Laura CARTER late of the village of Geneva in said County of Ontario, deceased, died in the said village of Geneva on or about the 5th day of June in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and ninety one being at that time a citizen of the United States and a resident of the County of Ontario. That she died having a last will and Testament, which bears the date - the - 12th day of April 1880 and a codicil thereto, which bears date the 25th day of November A.D. 1890 which affects, or purports to affect both real and personal property, and by which said Last Will and Testament the said decedent nominated and appointed Samuel SOUTHWORTH and Montgomery S SANFORD executors thereof: That the said decedent died possessed of real and personal property in the said County of Ontario, which does not exceed in value about $70,000. and that the following named persons are all the heirs at law and next of kin of the said decedent as far ??? as your petitioners can with - due diligence ascertain. The same and their places of residence are as follows, viz.,

That said decedent left no husband, child, descendant, Father, Mother, brother, sister or any descendant of any sister or brother her surviving. [Laura Carter was the daughter of Dr James Carter and Sarah Hall. She never married. She had a sister Harriet who predeceased her. I do not yet believe there were other siblings]

That as your as your petitioners are informed and believe to be true said descendant left no relatives of her surviving upon her paternal side and that her only surviving relatives are the descendants upon her maternal side. Your petitioners have made diligent inquiry from descendants surviving relatives, known to them, to ascertain the names and residences of said decedents surviving relatives, but cannot ascertain them all. So far ?? as they can ??? them , they are as follows:

Milantha MARSH and Wallace HALL of Phelps, New York only know descendants of John HALL her deceased maternal uncle. [John HALL had 5 children, however I have only learned the names of two, Olney HALL and Milantha HALL MARSH, the youngest. Olney Hall died in 1871 leaving four surviving children: John Edward HALL, William Wallace HALL, Helen Elizabeth HALL BRUSIE, and Mary Jane HALL CORWIN.]

Mary CRITTENDEN, Ypsilanti, Michigan only known descendant of Joseph Hall, her deceased maternal uncle. [Mary Hall b abt 1815 m William Salisbury CRITTENDEN s/o Osee CRITTENDEN & Sarah SALISBURY GLOVER. They lived in Lenawee Co & Jackson Co, MI. Joseph’s other children: Elizabeth d.1879, wife of Erastus BURT – some of her descendants mentioned below; Harriet d. 1876, wife of Sullivan HOLMAN – she was mistakenly listed as Laura’s aunt below; Othniel , not certain when he died, more below.]

Charles HOLMAN, Owasso, Michigan, Hattie WESTON, Alma, Michigan, Laura GARLOCK, Port Gibson, N.Y., Christina DENSMORE, Albion, N.Y., Howard BURT, Newark, N.Y., J. Hall BURT, West Kendall, N.Y., Othniel HALL, residence unknown ???? and other descendants of Harriet HOLMAN her deceased maternal aunt is petitioner unknown. [Charles HOLMAN and Harriet WESTON were children of Harriet HALL & Sullivan HOLMAN. Both Harriet b 1806-1807 & Charles b 1830 are buried in Oakhill Cemetery, Shiawassee Co, MI. Laura GARLOCK, Christina DENSMORE, John Howard BURT & Joseph Hall BURT were chil. of Erastus BURT & Elizabeth HALL. Elizabeth Hall BURT's cemetery record on the Orleans Co genweb page states that she was the daughter of Joseph HALL. Nowhere in the records of Laura CARTER is Elizabeth HALL mentioned. Othniel HALL was the son of Joseph m. Lamira Glover d/o Philander GLOVER & Polly MELVIN. His aunt, Ruhamah Hall, was her step-mother. He was in Lenawee Co, MI by 1840.]

Comfort HALL, Randolph, New York, Harriet BRIGGS residence unknown, Almira SWEET, Oil City, Pa. and others, to petitioner unknown, descendants of Samuel Hall, descendants of Samuel Hall, her deceased maternal uncle. [I think* Samuel’s children were Almira SWEET, Harriet BRIGGS, Comfort HALL, Othinal HALL, William HALL and Romina RAPPOLE. More research nedded.]

Lyman BAKER, Phelps, N.Y., Roswell BAKER, Knowlesville, N.Y., Alice JEFFERY, Tehama, California, Jessie BAKER, residence unknown, Benjamin F MEYERS, Ithaca, Michigan and others, to petitioners unknown, descendants of Persis BAKER her deceased maternal aunt. [Persis HALL m. Roswell BAKER, Sr. Lyman and Roswell Jr. were their sons. Their daughter, Philena BAKER m. John W. MYERS and their children were: Eliza MYERS m. Albert BOVEE; Benjamin F. MYERS, Philena MYERS m. Elijah BOVEE; Susan C. MYERS m. Marshall ISLES; and Mary P. MYERS. I do not know how Alice JEFFERY and Jessie BAKER are related.] [Edited 7 Aug 2009 to add: I now believe that Jessie Baker and Alice Jeffery were daughters of another son of Persis and Roswell Baker, Sr. The Orleans County genweb page lists a Ruel C. Baker, d. 1861, in Tanner Cemetery where other members of the family are buried. I found him on the 1860 in Tehama, Tehama, CA with daughters Alice Baker and Jesse McCutcheon. In 1850 he was in Jackson, Jackson, MI. On the 1870 census I found an Alice Jeffress in Red Bluff, Tehama, CA]

Reuhamma CORBIN, Albion, NY, Evelyn HIBBARD, residence unknown, Hannah CARLISLE, Albion, N.Y. and others, to petitioners unknown, descendants of Tamma Hall GLOVER, her deceased maternal aunt. [Tamesin aka Tamerson Hall m David GLOVER and they had 11 children; Eveline aka Evelyn m Jabez HIBBARD, Louisa m Daniel CARLISLE, Hannah who also m Daniel Carlisle after her sister's death, Orville m Julia CARR, Lewis m Elizabeth SEELIG, Malvina, William m Abigail ??, Rheuma m 1st Elijah SMITH m 2nd Joseph CORBIN, Sr, Reuben m. Charlotte ??, Mentoria and Milton. Evaline & Rheuma settled in Orleans Co, many moved on to Michigan]

Levi GROVER, Porter GROVER, Caroline P WHITNEY whose residences are unknown and others, unknown to petitioners, unknown descendants of Hannah GROVER, her deceased maternal aunt. [Hannah Hall was twice married, 1st to Asa Porter. Caroline P WHITNEY would be a child of this marriage. They had eight children including Caroline, two having died in 1845 and the rest I have not tracked down as yet. Hannah m 2nd Benoni GROVER with whom she at least six more children: Levi, Asa Porter, Thankful, Christina m. Russell BLAKELY,Augustus d. young and Alonzo.]

The descendants of Ruehama GLOVER her deceased maternal aunt, whose names and places of residence are to your petitioners wholly unknown. [Ruhamma m Philander GLOVER as his second wife. Her step-daughter, Lamira, m her nephew , Othniel Hall. See above. Ruhamma & Philander Glover had four children, Wellington A b 1815, Rev. Livingston M, Luther M, & Mary Jane]

Percy COOK, Minard COOK, John COOK whose places of residence are unknown to your petitioners, and other, to petitioners unknown, descendants of Sophia COOK her deceased maternal aunt. [Did they get Sophia and Sybil mixed up or did Sophia also marry a COOK?]

The descendants of William HALL, her deceased maternal uncle, whose places of residence are to your petitioners wholly unknown. [I have found nothing about William Jr. after the family left MA]

[Not mentioned were Abram Hall or Sybil HALL COOK.]

Your petitioners are unable to state whether any of the heirs at law of said Laura Carter are infants - or persons of unsound mind or ???
Therefore your petitioners pray that the said Last Will and Testament and codicil thereto may be proved and letters of testamentary granted thereon according to law and the above named and described heirs and next of kin of said decedent may be cited to attend the probate thereof: and for such other or further order in relation to the proof of said will and codicil or the service of said citation, as may be just and proper.
Dated July 14th 1891.

Signatures of S SOUTHWORTH
M S SANDFORD

Anna Camfield Carlisle, 5 May 1890

Buchanan Mich.
May 5th, 1890

Dear Ashley your letter came this evening. yes Orville brought the money all right and I wrote you a long letter last Tuesday evening telling you what I had done with ot. I paid Helmick and Mrs. Voorhees and paid up all the grocery bill and got 50 pounds of flour from the mill, and some groceries that we needed, and cloth for Frank and Daniel pants

Today I have taken up the sitting room carpet and Orville whitewashed and then we went to town and got the paper and tomorrow he is going to put it on. he said he was having chills when the came

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but has got over them now and was weighed and finds that he weighs more than he ever did before he went and got some cowslip greens saturday and I thought prehaps you would be home so I kept them for sunday so you would have them we had greens and soup for dinner if the soup was made with watter. Had a letter from your Mother saturday. she is weaving 30 yards of carpet for Aunt Corbin. Bell has a son born April 18 all doing well (William Carlisle Osborn) I told you in the other letter that Hallie had writen that Werter had bought a half interest in a mill. Arlie is going to learn the millers trade. I also wrote you that Mr Boyle had brought us another load of wood and wanted you to do his work the first week in June and if you could not I was to write

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and let him know so he could get some body else. what shall I tell him. Sim was up to see you sunday said prehaps he would go to the Bend this week. I hear that Mr Barman is dead with the same disease that Hat Glover died with. I sent you the paper I suppose you saw in it that Orin Montigan house was burned he is drawing material to build another.

I will write a postal to Parminter.

Now Ashley if you have much of a cold dont stay and get more but come home and stay until you get over it. I think you can afford to come home when the pay day comes any way. I looked for you last saturday. Mr Brant always asks about you when he comes for his bread. Mrs Walters has left her husband and gone to Hills corners. Nell Turner is home again.

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Annie Miller Kelley has a daughter

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Mr Voorhees is working in Niles. goes over with his horse so as to get there at 7 oclock in the morning and starts home about 5 oclock at night. Orville gave Frank a lesson in drawing sunday drew a picture of the old school house worked at it most of the day. Our potatoes are commimg up also the peas, beets, radishes and lettice. your Mother sent Frank a lot more flower seeds he has planted some of them.

It is half past nine, the rest have all gone to ed, all are well.

Good Night.
A Carlisle

I hope you will get this

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Shal I make you some new over shirts or have you bought some.

Aunt Corbin was been Rheuhamah Glover Smith Corbin, sister of Ashely's mother. She lived in Orleans County, NY.

The Belle mentioned was Ashley's half sister, Arabella Carlisle Osborn, who was married to Walter Wilson Osborn. William Carlisle Osborn was their fourth and last child, born 18 April 1890 in Sioux City, IA.

Ashley's sister, Mary Elizabeth Carlisle was married to Werter Rynearson. Their daughter was Hallie. In 1890 they were living in Kansas, either Rooks or Phillips county.

There were Glover's in Buchanan that I have not been able to connect to my mine of Glover's. I wonder if Hat was from that line?

The rest are neighbors that I don't have further information on at this time.

For more see:
Camfield Family Letters
Descendants of Sarah Ann Wisner
Michael Camfield


Carlisle, Sarah Camfield. (Buchanan, MI) to “Dear Ashley”
[Isaac Ashley Carlisle]. Letter. 5 May 1890. Digital Images 1-4.
Privately held by Apple, [ADDRESS FOR PRIVATE USE,]
Snowville, New York. 2009.
[Carlisle Family, Box #1, Correspondence, 1890,
Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan. 2008.]

A Great Newspaper Find and Tips for Searching

In the spring of 2005 I ran across the following:

From Geneva Advertiser 19 June 1894

(Abstracted from classified Legal Notices)

Malantha Marsh, Wallace Hall and Lyman Baker, Phelps, N. Y.
Mary Crittenden, Ypsilanti, Mich.
Charles Holman, Owasso, Mich.
Hattie Weston, Alma, Mich.
E. Burt Garlock, Jefferson City, Missouri
Cyrus Garlock, Mary C. Garlock, W. F. Garlock, Port Gibson, N. Y.
Christina Densmore and Reuhama Corbin, Albion, N. Y.
Howard Burt, Newark, N. Y.
J. Hall Burt, West Kendall, N. Y.
Harriet Briggs, Jamestown, N. Y.
Almira Sweet, Oil City, Pa.
Roswell Baker, Knowlesville, N. Y.
Alice Jeffery, Tehama, Cal.
Benjamin F. Myers, Ithaca, Mich.
Hannah Carlisle, Sioux City, Iowa
Othniel Hall, Comfort Hall, Jessie Baker, Evelyn Hibbard, Porter Grover, Caroline P. Whitney, Percy Cook, Minard Cook, John Cook, and all others, heirs at law and next of kin of LAURA CARTER, deceased.

Ann Lawson, Augusta, N. Y.
Caroline Field, Geneva, N. Y.
Mary E. Tulett, Anna W. Tulett, Laura L. Tulett and Clarence E. Tulett, all of the Town of Fayette, N. Y.,
who are interested, as creditors, next of kin, heirs at law, legatees, or otherwise, in the estate of LAURA CARTER. late of the town of Geneva, Ontario County NY.

Some kind soul had transcribed this and put it on the web for me to find! I have bolded the two names that jumped out at me, two of my great-grand-aunts, daughters of David Glover and Tamesin Hall. I had no idea who Laura Carter might be but I noticed several other Hall's and there was Roswell Baker who had been in my tree for years as an unrelated person that I knew was somehow tied to the Carlisle family.

From this small item in an old paper I was eventually able to fill in several generations of the descendants of of Capt. William Hall and Reuhama Andrews/Andros. I never would have looked at the will of Laura Carter had I not found this one small mention in an old newspaper.

The draw back to newspaper research is that you find out very few good things. Happy items make the paper far less often than sad times. Births merit a quick line - son born to, weddings and anniversaries get a nice write up if the family submitted the information. But mostly you find death notices, accident reports and arrests. All of these are wonderful for filling in and untangling family lines but often make me sad.

Since finding this I have been hooked on newspaper searches. The newspaper article above was transcribed. Here are some tips for searching old newspapers online:

• When searching old papers be sure to use every conceivable spelling of a surname.


• Search by known addresses. In my husband's family some of the family homes were passed down through the family for 100 years. You may find spelling variations this way that otherwise wouldn't occur to you.


• Be sure to put your search terms in quotes, ie: "500 Carbon". Do not include St., Ave., or Rd. as sometimes they may have been spelled out and other times omitted.


• The optical readers that search engines use sometimes get hung up on old and faded type so use creative searches. 500, 506, and 509 may all look the same to the search engine. When looking for articles about my Hollington family I found twice as many articles by changing the i to l - Holllngton. Interchange a, e, and o to generate more hits. Try interchanging the number 0 and the letter o.


• Try search first by given and surname, then add a middle initial, add the middle name and then begin again with surname and given name, etc.


• In small town papers search for just a surname with various spellings. This can have big payouts in in city papers. Most of the Grabowski's in Syracuse are related but when searching just by surname I restrict the number of years I'm searching to making sorting through all of the hits manageable.


• If you still do not find the marriage notice or obituary you are seeking you can try searching for terms like were wed, wedding, death, funeral, etc but restrict the dates of the search as much as possible. I have had only limited success searching this way.

A slightly different version of this post first appeared at The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree on 2 January 2006. Since that time I have learned how to create links ;-), I no longer have a subscription to NewspaperArchive.com and wish I could afford it again, and I have added some more tips for searching.