Thank you Mrs J.P. Jervey !!

For years I worked to identify the father of Dr Adam Clark (1790-1860), husband of Harriet Watson, who lived in Albany County, NY. I had found a few records referring to him as Adam JR, but had also learned that did not necessarily indicate that his father was also named Adam.

Using Albany County land deed indices on American Ancestors, I found numerous land sale transactions for Adam and Harriet, leading me to suspect that Adam Clark of Coeymans/Westerlo was likely his father. Adam Sr was listed in the 1830 Westerlo census between Amos Baker and Simeon Cole. Adam was NOT listed in 1840. In his place between Cole and Baker was  George Baumas and George was recorded as having obtained that land from Adam Clark Jr and wife Harriet in 1837.

That made me search for additional information on Adam Clark of Westerlo, New York and I came upon a reference for a manuscript held at the New York State Library in Albany titled:

        Land Papers of Adam Clark’s farm in Westerlo, Albany County, NY 1810-1848

   

 

That sounded intriguing!  So I contacted the NY State Library and was told there were 58 pages of information that could be scanned for me since I live far from Albany.  The packet contained a hand written document citing inability to maintain his property due to age and infirmity signed by Adam Sr conveying his property to his son Adam Jr, the doctor, in exchange for his lifetime care. BINGO !! That’s more than I was hoping for. 

Additionally there were numerous copies of business papers that I know refer to Adam Jr and his sons who established a leather tannery in Middletown, NY. Adam’s wife Harriet came from a prominent leather tanning family (most especially, her brother-in-law Zadock Pratt and her brother John). The documents name several of Adam and Harriet’s sons and record contracts with John Watson’s NYC firm Thorne, Watson & Co. I think I would have been quite puzzled by these records if I had not already done extensive research on the Watson line.

I was curious about the source of this manuscript and when it had reached the NY State Library.  I was told that their records simply showed it was donated in 1946 by Mrs, J.P. JERSEY. That did not immediately ring a bell, but …. I went back and looked through my records of extended family (I always try to add as much information as I can find on siblings, in-laws, cousins, etc) and found a Mrs J.P. JERVEY who died in 1947, the widow of Brigadier General James Postell Jervey.

She was born Jean Bontecou Webb in 1868, the daughter of Edward Cook Webb, MD and Mary J. Sandford. Her mother’s only brother, Clarence Sandford, married Hattie Clark, the youngest child of Dr Adam Clark and Harriet Watson in 1874.  What is really astounding about Jean Webb Jervey having these family papers is that her aunt Hattie Clark Sandford has died in 1877, 60 years before they were donated !

 

Hattie’s husband Clarence lived until 1923 and it seems he held onto these documents all those years. He never remarried and had no surviving children, so it appears they passed to his niece who kept them and thoughtfully donated them. Thank you Mrs, Jervey, I am truly indebted.

Julia Watson, daughter of Asa and Tenie

Julia was born in Mississippi in 1844 to Rhode Islander Asa Watson (1812-1886) and his wife Ede Tennessee Taylor (1824-1888). Four younger siblings followed: Wheeler Rufus 1847, Henry Duke 1850, Tennessee T 1856, and Lydia 1857.

In 1866 Julia married Confederate Lt Col Peyton Manning, 6 years her senior and a native of Alabama. They had no known children and she was widowed only two years after their marriage when she was 24 years old. Apparently she resumed living with her parents and is listed with them in the Lowndes County census of 1870 and 1880.

After 26 years as a widow, Julia married again in 1894. Her second husband was Dr Burrell Alexander Duncan, a South Carolina native, 9 years her senior who had been widowed 4 years earlier after a 32 year marriage with 3 children. This marriage lasted 6 years until Julia's 1902 death at age 58. Her husband outlived her by 14 years succumbing to a cerebral hemorrhage at age 81 in Missouri where he had been living with his daughter Ann Duncan Blackwell.

Julia had been predeceased by her sister Lydia (childbirth at 21). Both her brothers died in 1911. The youngest sibling, Tennessee, wife of Benjamin L Owen. lived to be 87.

John Watson of RI went to Mississippi with brothers Asa and Rufus

When I posted information in 2013 on Asa and Rufus Watson, I had not yet known that their older brother John also moved to Mississippi. Sons of Capt John Wheeler Watson and his wifeMary Ann, they were born in South Kingstown, RI; John in 1804, Asa in 1812 and Rufus in 1814. Both parents died within a week of each other in March 1829. 

Three years later, and still in RI, John married Mary Knowles, daughter of Robert and Bathsheba. The following year both his wife and their infant son died and are buried in Elm Grove Cemetery with her parents. 

By 1840 John and his 2 younger brothers were in Lowndes County, Mississippi. There is uncertainty as to whether or not the John Watson who married Mary C Pierce in that county in 1839 is John from RI; no further record of Mary has been found. No female was recorded in the Watson household's June 1 census record.

In 1842 John, then 38, married Harriet Lenora Prowell as his second or third wife. She was the 20 year old daughter of David Prowell and Rachel Morris, born in South Carolina. They soon had two children: Mary born 1842 and Thomas Wheeler born 1845. The year after Thomas' birth John died, age 41, leaving his young wife with 2 children under the age of 5. She married again and had 3 more children with Charles Washington Caldwell, a native of Virginia born in 1815. His step-daughter Mary Watson would marry his brother Dr Thomas Joseph Caldwell and lure the rest of family (including her brother Thomas with his family and their half-siblings) to follow them to Lamar, Texas.