Charity Gorham

Charity Turner was born 18 November 1811, Waitsfield, Vermont (Charity Turner entry, Births, Deaths, Marriages 1779-1857 Waitsfield, 1: 35, Waitsfield Town Clerk, Waitsfield, Vermont)and died 15 June 1887, Perrysville, Ohio (Perrysville Union Cemetery (Perrysville, Ohio; corner of East Bridge and East Church Streets), Charity Gorham, Section 2, row 3, lot 98; read and photographed by Lee Martin, 25 May 2015).  There is no death record in the courthouse and the obituary in the Ashland Press dated 23 June 1887 ("Mrs. Charity Gorham was buried last Friday [17 June 1887].  She was born in Vermont, married to Capt. Gorham in Brooklyn, moved here in 1843 and died in her 71st year.  She was a dear old mother, one of those who never grew aged.  She took part in all literary entertainments that were connected with the church and Sunday school with the enthusiasm of a girl.") stated she was buried the week previous (Charity Gorham obituary, Ashland Press, Ashland, Ohio, 23 June 1887, p. 2, col. 6) and died 48 hours before that based on the inscription on the tombstone.

Not much is known about her, although based on the obituary, she must have had boundless curiosity for religious literature.  I thought often of how they may have met.  Charity have have taken a small sailboat or ferry up Mad River north to the Winooski River, chartered another boat to sail west to Burlington on the shores of Lake Champlain.  From Burlington, she may have sailed down the Hudson River to Brooklyn where she may have met Hezekiah Gorham and married him.  If she did not take a river route, she may have taken a wagon north to Middlesex and ferried to Burlington.

Hezekiah Gorham I

Hezekiah Gorham, I lived in Yarmouth, Massachusetts for part of his life.  He was born 22 September 1807 in Yarmouth and died 18 April 1874, Perrysville, Ohio.  Not much is known other than he was a merchant shipper like his brothers Josiah, Thacher, John, Joseph and Oliver.  He married about 14 October 1833 in New York City.  The problem is New York City marriages were not recorded until about 1847.  The date I gave is approximated subtracting out 9 months from the birthdate from the first born child presuming it was a normal pregnancy.  The first two sons were born in Flushing, New York in the mid-1830s, the third son was born in Baltimore, Maryland, and the rest of the children were born in Perrysville, Ohio, including my Great-Great Grandmother Harriet Eliza Gorham.  The family arrived in Perrysville in 1843 based on Charity Gorham's obituary in the Ashland Press paper in 1887.  Between 1843 and 1850, Hezekiah went West and became a wealthy 49er, but lost most of his money (Abraham J. Baughman, History of Richland County, Ohio from 1808 to 1908: Also Biographical Sketches of Prominent Citizens of the County, 2 volumes (Chicago, Illinois: The S. J. Clarke Publishing, Co., 1908), 2:746).   He appeared in the 1850 census as a 22 year old man, he was much older and worked the mason's trade in addition to farming.

Hezekiah made a Will (Ashland County, Ohio, 5th District Court of Appeals, 3: 326 Hezekiah Gorham Will; Ashland County Probate Court, Ashland, Ohio) requesting his property be sold to take care of debts.  His widow moved to be with her son James and his wife in Perrysville.  Both Hezekiah and Charity are buried in the Perrysville Union Cemetery (Perrysville Union Cemetery (Perrysville, Ohio; corner of East Bridge and East Church Streets), Hezekiah Gorham, Section 2, row 3, lot 99; read and photographed by Lee Martin, 25 May 2015; Jane Ellen Bechtel Fitting, compiler, Perrysville Union Cemetery, Perrysville, Green Township, Ashland County, Ohio: A Revision of "Old Perrysville or Old Presbyterian Cemetery" Records 1812-1966 (Cincinnati, Ohio: private, 1 October 2003), ix, xi, 78, 101, 135).

I hunted for their tombstone through the years and did not find it until recently on Memorial Day last year in 2015 because I searched through the wrong part.  I made the presumption they would be buried near their children close by the large family stone marked "GORHAM," but they are not buried near there.  Instead, both of them are buried in the third row about 10 meters west of the family stone.  The grave next to Hezekiah and Charity's is their young daughter, Lucy T Gorham.  Lucy died as a child and their is no death record for her in the court records.  On the third face of Hezekiah and Charity's stone is the inscription of their daughter Cordelia who is buried next to her parents in the same plot.

The stone is located N 40° 39' 21.1"  W 82° 18' 43" and Hezekiah is the only one on my direct Mayflower line who came to Ohio.  All his siblings lived in died in Massachusetts.  In fact, Hezekiah's parents are buried in Woodside Cemetery in Yarmouth Port, Massachusetts right there on the Cape.

Genographic 2.0

I did the National Geographic's second part of their Genographic Project.  I took the original test about 2008 and transferred the results to Family Tree DNA.  I recently took the second phase in August 2012 and I received the results late December - early January 2013.  According to the results I'm 42% Northern European, 39 % Mediterranean and 17% southwest Asian.  When I saw in my family tree that my paternal 11th great grandfather came from Perigueux, France, the genetic evidence my suggest that although, I would like to verify it with paper records if possible.

Martin origins

I received an email from Mr Doug Miller from the FrenchHeritage discussion group on the family tree DNA site with an attachment of containing the genealogy of Augustin Martin my third Great Grandfather. With the file, I traced the Martin lineage to about 1630 in Perigeux, Aquitaine, France. I used marriage, baptism and burial records from the Drouin collection on Ancestry.com to verify the generations. Now at last I can at least semi-rival the Pilgrim descent even though my ancestor was born about 10 years after the Separatists landed in Massachusetts! I traced both Stephen's line and his wife's line back at least five generations.

     Now since I traced at least to the immigrant ancestor, the next big project is to trace the family further using French sources.  I received a suggestion from Mrs. Anne Morddel to look at Church records in the Limousin region of France.

Pritchard

This is a family portrait of my Great Grandfather Francis Marion Pritchard and his second wife Emeline Augista Starling. In the back left to right are Arthur Pritchard, Ruben, and Orville. In front, left to right, Mary, Francis Marion Pritchard seated, Edward (held by Grandpa), Wallace, Emma Augista (Starling) Pritchard seated, Eunice Marie Pritchard (my Grandmother).

The picture was taken, I'm guessing around 1921 or 1922. Grandma Emma looks pregnant (their last child Berman Cecil was born in 1923). Francis Marion and Emma were married on 04 Dec 1904 at Salt Creek, Hocking, Ohio (Hocking, Ohio, Book of Marriages, J:56, Pritchard-Starlin, 1904; Hocking County Probate Court, Logan).

Martin origins

The research gave me the results and suggests that Austin's name is really Augustine or Augustin. The report suggests Austin was born in Saint-Laurent, Quebec based on the baptismal record and family tradition that states he was born in Chateauguay, Quebec.

Martin origins

I hired a professional genealogist to look into the ancestry of my 3rd great grandfather Austin Martin. The report I received suggests there should be Catholic records at St. Anne parish in Oswego, New York since records go back to the 1830s. I'm hoping there is a record of the marriage that might help elucidate who his parents are and his two wives particularly Jane, his first wife since she is the mother of of my great-great grandfather John Wesley Martin