Lynch Mob

 

TOF's grandfather's grandmother, Ann Elizabeth Lynch, was born in Burlington VT, in Jun 1847. according to said grandfather, "two days after her parents arrived in America." She was , which tThe travel-savvy Reader will understand that Burlington was no two days travel from any seaport in 1847. Yet, the Liber Baptismorum of Rev Jeremiah O Callaghan confirms the date and place. It is likely that her parents came up the St Lawrence River to Grosse Isle quarantine station by Montreal, thence downLake Champlain to Burlington. 

There were no immigration laws back then. Had there been, the Know Nothings would no doubt have put the Famine Irirsh in cages at the border, The Know Nothings held that, unlike the old immigrants, these new immigrants, being Catholic, could never fit into Anglo-Saxon, Protestant America. TOF's ancestress is thus [in modern lingo] the anchor baby of wetbacks.

The Irish Famine was st its height, and Daniel and Bridget, Ann's parents, no doubt thought it was a good time to get out of Dodge. The Dungarvan food riots were answered by dragoons firing into the crowd. Dungarvan was just down the Waterford coast from Stradbally, where the Lynches lived. The ships on which the 1847 Irish migrated to the border often arrived with typhus fever rampany and enough dead on the voyage that they were called "coffin ships."

The ice on the St Lawrence broke up late that year,and May 1847 “started with ice an inch thick - and the first vessel to arrive, the Syria, arrived at Grosse Isle Quarantine on 17 May. She arrived with 84 cases of typhus fever on board and nine deaths on the voyage. Less than a week later the catastrophe had taken place and was beyond control…. Four days after the Syria, on May 21, eight ships arrived with a total of 430 fever cases.” (Cecil Woodham-Smith, The Great Hunger. 1963)

As many as 10,000 people died of the typhus, including heroic Canadian doctors who stayed to treat them. For Ann to be born in Burlington in early June, 1847, her parents would have had to arrive at Grosse Isle between late May and early June, and been in the thick of things.

Daniel Lynch and Bridget Barry - came from Co Waterford. Family lore named the place Bannalynch. But there is no such locale. There is a Ballylinch in Stradbally Parish. [Stradbally, An Sraid Bhaulle, means "the (one) street town"]. The Tithe Applotment Book (in which occupants of rural properties were assessed to support the Church of Ireland, even if they were Catholic or Presbyterian) does not name any Lynches in Ballylinch, but does list a Daniel Lynch in neighboring Ballinvalloona. (Don't ya luv Irish place names?) But since Ann's father was only a teenager the year of the assessment, this is not him. 

Daniel's age in US Census records put his birth in Jan 1819 and, lo! such a birth appears in the records of Stradbally Parish. Daniel Lynch, born in Jan 1847 to John Lynch and Joann Whitty. But under the Rule of Two {"Where there is one, there is likely another."] we find in Jul 1819 another Daniel Lynch baptized in Stradbally. The parents of the second Daniel are Patrick and Catherine. So which is it to be?

The Irish custom of the time was to name the first-born boy and girl after the father's parents, the second-born after the mother's, and the third-born after the parents themselves. Daniel and Bridget named their first daughter Ann and their first son John, and none of them Patrick (They did christen last daughter  Catherine.) So John and (Jo)ann seem the likely parents. However, the naming custom was only a custom, not a law of nature, so this is an educated guess.

 TOF found a marriage record for John Lynch and Ann Whitty in Feb 1817 in Stheirtradbally Parish. Since Daniel was born in Jan 1819, he was likely their first-born and hence, John's father was likely Daniel, possibly the one listed in the Tithe Applotment Book. Scouring the parish baptisms for Stradbally, we find the following children born to John and Ann: Daniel (1819), Bridget (1822), Mary (1824), and James (1834). The ten-year gap between Mary and James is suspiciously un-Irish, but as it stands, John's parents may have been named Daniel and Bridget. After that, the names of John's children's match those of Daniel jr. But the handwriting in the parish book is horrible and despite finding 28 Lynch baptisms between 1815 and 1835, TOF may have overlooked some!

Ann Lynch Flynn (2nd from right) visiting her son Daniel (r).Others: d/law Tillie, grd/law Blanche (in back) and grandson "Uncle Dan" (kid) with hair!

 

At the Eleventh Hour

... of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, the guns in Europe fell silent at last. The United States built a wall inscribed with the names of 58,220 servicemen killed or missing in the nine years' war in Vietnam, more than twice as many as in three days at Gettysburg. The AEF doughboys engaged the Hun from Oct 21, 1917 to Nov 11, 1918 and suffered 116,516 killed or missing, i.e., about twice as many total as in Vietnam and 13x more on a yearly basis. No wall was ever built for the doughboys and no memorial became official until 2004 -- in Kansas City. A DC memorial was dedicated in 2021.

Pfc Harry F Singley,
304th Eng. AEF

 

Today is the 104th anniversary of the Armistice, an event nearly forgotten now, blended as it has been with veterans of all wars. Harry Singley, 304th Engineers, describes the day in a letter published in the local paper:

"It was on Sept. 26 when the big drive started in the Argonne Forest and I saw all kinds of things that I never witnessed before.  We started out on the night of the 25th.  At 9 o'clock we commenced a tank road and worked our way almost to the German's front line trenches.  At 2:30 one of the greatest of all barrages was opened.  It was said that between 3500 and 4000 guns, some of them of very large calibre, went off at that hour just like clock work.  We worked on this road under shell fire until about 3:45 and then went back until the infantry went over the top at 5 o'clock.  We followed with the tanks.  That is the way the Americans started and kept pounding and pushing ahead until the great day on Nov. 11.  ...

It was some life.  I am proud that I went through it, for nobody on the Hill [i.e., Fountain Hill, PA] will have anything on me...  I was a little with sneezing or tear gas.  It made me sick but I remained with the company for I did not like to leave my detachment at any time for if something would happen, I thought, there would be plenty of help.  I felt much better in a few days.  A small piece of shrapnel splinter hit me below the knee.  Otherwise I was lucky. ..."

Cadet Flynn (seated) Older .
brother James was in the Navy

#

TOF's other grandfather, Francis T Flynn (Sr), at eighteen, was in the cadet corps at Catholic University in Washington DC. As he later recalled,

So while I was working on this piece-work job [making artillery shells for the French Army at Ingersoll-Rand], the principal of the high school, Sr. Felicita, called me on the telephone and told me, she said, "I sent your credits to Catholic University and you can be admitted without a College Board or any sort of examination, provided you are voluntarily inducted.

     So this was in the month of June and away I set sail.  I was down at Catholic University then from June until New Years.  ... [W]e were snowed into taking an ME course, because they were short on officers.  They said, "If you take this ME course, you will get to Camp Meade quicker.  The seniors will go first, then the juniors, then the sophomores, et cetera, y'know.  But if you take the mechanical engineering course, you'll see action quicker than you would if you took any other course.  What I really wanted to take was Philosophy and Letters and there was only one guy who held out for that...  He later became a monsignor. 

Note that "you'll see action sooner" was regarded as an enticement. And also that he was really into Philosophy and Letters. Then, when the Armistice broke out, his parents begged him to stay in college. "We'll find the money somehow." But he thought he was much smarter than they -- unlike 18/19-year olds today -- and took the train back home. It was, he thought later, the biggest mistake of his life -- except that he married the Girl Next Door (literally) and produced my father, which from TOF's point of view was of considerable importance.

Sgt. Tommy Flynn

###

Since Armistice Day has become Veterans Day, let's scope out the veterans in my family and the Marge's include the following. Not all have been named.

The Vietnam War

Sgt. Tommy Flynn,
CAC team Papa Three, USMC

My father's cousin lived with villagers in the mountains near Cam Lo just a few miles south of the DMZ, and was severely wounded.  He later wrote a book about his experience, A Voice of Hope. In a review of this book, Joni Bour wrote:

"The idea was to somewhat integrate with the Vietnamese people in order to gain their trust and friendship and ultimately military intelligence that would help us find the bad guys. It sounds good, and at times it was probably very good, because the Vietnamese were helped with schools and sanitation and protection from the Viet Cong. But it was also an extremely dangerous assignment. CAC soldiers lived near a village and survived mostly on their own. It was a small compound that was flooded when it rained and was overrun several times by the Viet Cong. On one such occasion, Mr. Flynn was severely wounded in the face, neck and thigh. He spent weeks in several hospitals and then a hospital ship with his jaw wired shut, before being mistakenly sent back to the war. He was given a choice; he could work in the rear or go back to his CAC squad. He was either a little nuts, or little bit more brave than most of us, because he chose to return to his squad.

###

Joe Flynn was discharged as corporal

World War II

Pfc. Joseph Flynn,
5th Eng. Btn., 5th Marine Division, USMC

My father served on Iwo Jima and in the Japanese Occupation.  The photo on the left is the only time he ever wore dress blues. It was actually a false-front "uniform" used only for the picture.

On Iwo Jima, he went in with the first wave along with his captain. He was to establish battalion liaison and take the word back to his unit.

During the fighting, he had a number of close shaves. In one case, a Japanese shell hit right in front of him while he was bringing anti-tank grenades from the dump to the front, and the explosion lifted him up and sent him hurtling through the air to land on his back. He was totally numb and deaf and thought he was paralyzed. But gradually feeling and hearing returned and when he checked himself, he had not gotten so much as a scratch. He ought to have gotten a Purple Heart, but this was Iwo Jima, and you had to bleed to get such a medal.

He remembers, too, the moment they unfurled that flag atop Suribachi, from the heights of which Japanese snipers had been shooting them in the back as they pushed north. There had been a smaller flag earlier, but the commanding general ordered a larger one that could be seen from every point on the island. The impact of that flag on morale was incalculable, he said.

During the Occupation, he had the dubious privilege of walking through the middle of Nagasaki not long after it was nuked.

Afterward, on two occasions, he was offered the opportunity to be brevetted to officer and sent to OCS. This was because of the initiative he had shown on several occasions during the battle. However, he was anxious to return home and get on with the urgent business of becoming my father before my mother (a/k/a the Sweetheart of the Seventh Fleet) could be tracked down by the aforesaid admirers of her morale-boosting snapshot.
 ###

The Great War
Pfc. Harry Singley,
304th Eng., 72nd "Rainbow" Div., AEF

My grandfather on my mother's side went "Over There" and served in the St. Mihel, Meuse-Argonne Offensive.  This was the offensive in which the famous Lost Battalion was cut off and surrounded. His narrative appears at the beginning of this post. He was a combat engineer, which means he had to build things in the middle of battle. The Great War was the first "industrial strength" war and nobody at the time thought it was the first of a series. They thought it was the "War to End All Wars," so there was still a touch of innocence and idealism about the whole endeavor. None of us grandkids ever heard him talk about his experiences. Like most of the Silent Generation, he was markedly silent on the whole thing.

###

Earlier military engagements in TOF's family don't count.  Great grandfather, Fernand E. O. Cantrel served as a 2nd Cannon Conductor in the 12th Regt. of Artillery, Tonkin Gulf Expedition, 1884, which participated in the Bac Ninh campaign in the First Brigade (de l'Isle) and the Lang Son and Tuyen Quang campaigns in the Second Brigade (de Négrier).  It's possible other Flynncestors participated in the odd Fenian rising or so in Ireland, or in the 1848 republican revolution in Germany or the earlier resistance to French invasions. Cromwell's Council issued an order to apprehend the person of Fiachra O'Flynn in 1648, describing him as armed and dangerous. But none of these qualify for US Veterans Day.

The Flynns arrived in the US after the Civil War and while the Singleys and Schwars arrived a decade earlier, none of them were in it, so far as I know. Nor do we know of anyone involved in the Indian or Spanish-American Wars, so, at this time we turn to the maternal ancestry of the Incomparable Marge!

US Civil War
Pvt. John H. Hammontree,
Co. H, 5th Tenn. Inf., US Vol.

Evacuation of Cumberland Gap

The great-great grandfather of the Incomparable Marge joined the Union Army when Confederates come into East Tennessee and told the fellas there 'you boys better be a-wearing gray come morning' or y'all be hanged.' Well, them hill people didn't cotton to that at-all, and so they lit out that night acrosst the mountains to sign up with Buell's army of the Ohio.  Nine Hammontree cousins signed up for the same company, as was common in those days.

John fought in the Campaigns of Cumberland Gap, Stones River, Chattanooga, Knoxville, and Atlanta. He was shot in the left leg during the attack on Confederate positions at Resaca. He seems to have been returned to duty in time for the Nashville Campaign. After the war, he died of complications stemming from his wound.

Creek War (War of 1812)
Pvt. James Hammontree,
Capt. Duncan's Co. of Col. Bunch's Regiment (2nd Regt., East Tennessee Militia).

Margie's grandfather's grandfather's grandfather fought at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend under Gen. Andrew Jackson in the Creek (Red Stick) War.  This was subsumed into the War of 1812.

Andrew Jackson's official report of the Battle of Horseshoe Bend (27 March 1814) mentions that "a few companies" of Colonel Bunch were part of the right line of the American forces at this engagement. The muster rolls list  some casualties from this battle in the companies led by Captains Moses Davis, Joseph Duncan, and John Houk. Other men from this regiment remained at Fort Williams prior to Horseshoe Bend to guard the post -- provision returns indicate that there were 283 men from Bunch's regiment at the fort at the time of the battle. James' brother William was also at the battle, and his brother Jacob had been in a previous militia regiment. There were a variety of more distant Hammontrees in other theaters of the war.

Later, when James had died, his widow Nancy had a heck of a time trying to collect the pension that was owed her. Bureaucracy is not new.

The Revolution
Pvt. John Hammontree,
Capt. John Mountjoy's Co. of Foot, 10th Virginia, Continental Line.

James Hammontree's great uncle John enlisted in the 10th Virginia at an unknown date and may have seen action with the 10th at Brandywine and Germantown before entering winter quarters at Valley Forge.  In January 1778, he was reported "sick in camp" and he died there on 24 Feb 1778.

Pvt. Harris[on] Hammontree,
Capt. Wm. Cunningham's Co. of Foot, 1st Virginia, Continental Line.

The 1st Virginia has a long ancestry, and exists today as the 276th Eng. Battalion of the Virginia National Guard.  John Hammontree's younger brother Harris Hammontree enlisted in the 1st Virginia on Feb. 12, 1778, after the regiment had gone into encampment at Valley Forge.  In April and June he was reported as "sick," but unlike his older brother, he survived.  He likely participated in the battle of Monmouth in June 1778 after Baron von Steuben had trained them.  Most of the regiment was captured by the British at Charlestown, South Carolina, on May 12, 1780, but Harris may not have been with the regiment at that point.  He was killed by Indians on the Virginia frontier, 25 July 1781.

### 

 

At the Eleventh Hour

... of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918, the guns in Europe fell silent at last. The United States built a wall inscribed with the names of 58,220 servicemen killed or missing in the nine years' war in Vietnam, more than twice as many as in three days at Gettysburg. The AEF doughboys engaged the Hun from Oct 21, 1917 to Nov 11, 1918 and suffered 116,516 killed or missing, i.e., about twice as many total as in Vietnam and 13x more on a yearly basis. No wall was ever built for the doughboys and no memorial became official until 2004 -- in Kansas City. A DC memorial was dedicated in 2021, but is not finished yet.

Pfc Harry F Singley,
304th Eng. AEF

Today is the 103rd anniversary of the Armistice, an event nearly forgotten now, blended as it has been with veterans of all wars. Harry Singley, 304th Engineers, describes the day in a letter published in the local paper:

"It was on Sept. 26 when the big drive started in the Argonne Forest and I saw all kinds of things that I never witnessed before.  We started out on the night of the 25th.  At 9 o'clock we commenced a tank road and worked our way almost to the German's front line trenches.  At 2:30 one of the greatest of all barrages was opened.  It was said that between 3500 and 4000 guns, some of them of very large calibre, went off at that hour just like clock work.  We worked on this road under shell fire until about 3:45 and then went back until the infantry went over the top at 5 o'clock.  We followed with the tanks.  That is the way the Americans started and kept pounding and pushing ahead until the great day on Nov. 11.  ...

It was some life.  I am proud that I went through it, for nobody on the Hill [i.e., Fountain Hill, PA] will have anything on me...  I was a little with sneezing or tear gas.  It made me sick but I remained with the company for I did not like to leave my detachment at any time for if something would happen, I thought, there would be plenty of help.  I felt much better in a few days.  A small piece of shrapnel splinter hit me below the knee.  Otherwise I was lucky. ..."

Cadet Flynn (seated) Older .
brother James was in the Navy

#

TOF's other grandfather, Francis T Flynn (Sr), at eighteen, was in the cadet corps at Catholic University in Washington DC. As he later recalled,

So while I was working on this piece-work job [making artillery shells for the French Army at Ingersoll-Rand], the principal of the high school, Sr. Felicita, called me on the telephone and told me, she said, "I sent your credits to Catholic University and you can be admitted without a College Board or any sort of examination, provided you are voluntarily inducted.

     So this was in the month of June and away I set sail.  I was down at Catholic University then from June until New Years.  ... [W]e were snowed into taking an ME course, because they were short on officers.  They said, "If you take this ME course, you will get to Camp Meade quicker.  The seniors will go first, then the juniors, then the sophomores, et cetera, y'know.  But if you take the mechanical engineering course, you'll see action quicker than you would if you took any other course.  What I really wanted to take was Philosophy and Letters and there was only one guy who held out for that...  He later became a monsignor. 

Note that "you'll see action sooner" was regarded as an enticement. And also that the Pop-pop of TOF was really into Philosophy and Letters. Then, when the Armistice broke out, his parents begged him to stay in college. "We'll find the money somehow." But he thought he was much smarter than they -- unlike 18/19-year olds today -- and took the train back home. It was, he thought later, the biggest mistake of his life -- except that he married the Girl Next Door (literally) and produced my father, which from TOF's point of view was of considerable importance.

Sgt. Tommy Flynn

###

Since Armastice Day has become Veterans Day, let's scope out the veterans in my family and the Marge's include the following. Not all have been named.

The Vietnam War
Sgt. Tommy Flynn,
CAC team Papa Three, USMC

My father's cousin lived with villagers in the mountains near Cam Lo just a few miles south of the DMZ, and was severely wounded.  He later wrote a book about his experience, A Voice of Hope. In a review of this book, Joni Bour wrote:

"The idea was to somewhat integrate with the Vietnamese people in order to gain their trust and friendship and ultimately military intelligence that would help us find the bad guys. It sounds good, and at times it was probably very good, because the Vietnamese were helped with schools and sanitation and protection from the Viet Cong. But it was also an extremely dangerous assignment. CAC soldiers lived near a village and survived mostly on their own. It was a small compound that was flooded when it rained and was overrun several times by the Viet Cong. On one such occasion, Mr. Flynn was severely wounded in the face, neck and thigh. He spent weeks in several hospitals and then a hospital ship with his jaw wired shut, before being mistakenly sent back to the war. He was given a choice; he could work in the rear or go back to his CAC squad. He was either a little nuts, or little bit more brave than most of us, because he chose to return to his squad.

###

Joe Flynn was discharged as corporal

World War II
Pfc. Joseph Flynn,
5th Eng. Btn., 5th Marine Division, USMC

My father served on Iwo Jima and in the Japanese Occupation.  The photo on the left is the only time he ever wore dress blues. It was actually a false-front "uniform" used only for the picture.

On Iwo Jima, he went in with the first wave along with his captain. He was to establish battalion liaison and take the word back to his unit.

During the fighting, he had a number of close shaves. In one case, a Japanese shell hit right in front of him while he was bringing anti-tank grenades from the dump to the front, and the explosion lifted him up and sent him hurtling through the air to land on his back. He was totally numb and deaf and thought he was paralyzed. But gradually feeling and hearing returned and when he checked himself, he had not gotten so much as a scratch. He ought to have gotten a Purple Heart, but this was Iwo Jima, and you had to bleed to get such a medal.

He remembers, too, the moment they unfurled that flag atop Suribachi, from the heights of which Japanese snipers had been shooting them in the back as they pushed north. There had been a smaller flag earlier, but the commanding general ordered a larger one that could be seen from every point on the island. The impact of that flag on morale was incalculable, he said.

During the Occupation, he had the dubious privilege of walking through the middle of Nagasaki not long after it was nuked.

Afterward, on two occasions, he was offered the opportunity to be brevetted to officer and sent to OCS. This was because of the initiative he had shown on several occasions during the battle. However, he was anxious to return home and get on with the urgent business of becoming my father before my mother (a/k/a the Sweetheart of the Seventh Fleet) could be tracked down by the aforesaid admirers of her morale-boosting snapshot.
 ###

The Great War
Pfc. Harry Singley,
304th Eng., 72nd "Rainbow" Div., AEF

My grandfather on my mother's side went "Over There" and served in the St. Mihel, Meuse-Argonne Offensive.  This was the offensive in which the famous Lost Battalion was cut off and surrounded. His narrative appears at the beginning of this post. He was a combat engineer, which means he had to build things in the middle of battle. The Great War was the first "industrial strength" war and nobody at the time thought it was the first of a series. They thought it was the "War to End All Wars," so there was still a touch of innocence and idealism about the whole endeavor. None of us grandkids ever heard him talk about his experiences. Like most of the Silent Generation, he was markedly silent on the whole thing.

###

Earlier military engagements in TOF's family don't count.  Great grandfather, Fernand E. O. Cantrel served as a 2nd Cannon Conductor in the 12th Regt. of Artillery, Tonkin Gulf Expedition, 1884, which participated in the Bac Ninh campaign in the First Brigade (de l'Isle) and the Lang Son and Tuyen Quang campaigns in the Second Brigade (de Négrier).  It's possible other Flynncestors participated in the odd Fenian rising or so in Ireland, or in the 1848 republican revolution in Germany or the earlier resistance to French invasions. Cromwell's Council issued an order to apprehend the person of Fiachra O'Flynn in 1648, describing him as armed and dangerous. But none of these qualify for US Veterans Day.

The Flynns arrived in the US after the Civil War and while the Singleys and Schwars arrived a decade earlier, none of them were in it, so far as I know. Nor do we know of anyone involved in the Indian or Spanish-American Wars, so, at this time we turn to the maternal ancestry of the Incomparable Marge!

US Civil War
Pvt. John H. Hammontree,
Co. H, 5th Tenn. Inf., US Vol.

Evacuation of Cumberland Gap

The great-great grandfather of the Incomparable Marge joined the Union Army when Confederates come into East Tennessee and told the fellas there 'you boys better be a-wearing gray come morning' or y'all be hanged.' Well, them hill people didn't cotton to that at-all, and so they lit out that night acrosst the mountains to sign up with Buell's army of the Ohio.  Nine Hammontree cousins signed up for the same company, as was common in those days.

John fought in the Campaigns of Cumberland Gap, Stones River, Chattanooga, Knoxville, and Atlanta. He was shot in the left leg during the attack on Confederate positions at Resaca. He seems to have been returned to duty in time for the Nashville Campaign. After the war, he died of complications stemming from his wound.

Creek War (War of 1812)
Pvt. James Hammontree,
Capt. Duncan's Co. of Col. Bunch's Regiment (2nd Regt., East Tennessee Militia).

Battle of Horseshoe Bend

Margie's grandfather's grandfather's grandfather fought at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend under Gen. Andrew Jackson in the Creek (Red Stick) War.  This was subsumed into the War of 1812.

Andrew Jackson's official report of the Battle of Horseshoe Bend (27 March 1814) mentions that "a few companies" of Colonel Bunch were part of the right line of the American forces at this engagement. The muster rolls list  some casualties from this battle in the companies led by Captains Moses Davis, Joseph Duncan, and John Houk. Other men from this regiment remained at Fort Williams prior to Horseshoe Bend to guard the post -- provision returns indicate that there were 283 men from Bunch's regiment at the fort at the time of the battle. James' brother William was also at the battle, and his brother Jacob had been in a previous militia regiment. There were a variety of more distant Hammontrees in other theaters of the war.

Later, when James had died, his widow Nancy had a heck of a time trying to collect the pension that was owed her. Bureaucracy is not new.

The Revolution
Pvt. John Hammontree,
Capt. John Mountjoy's Co. of Foot, 10th Virginia, Continental Line.

James Hammontree's great uncle John enlisted in the 10th Virginia at an unknown date and may have seen action with the 10th at Brandywine and Germantown before entering winter quarters at Valley Forge.  In January 1778, he was reported "sick in camp" and he died there on 24 Feb 1778.

Pvt. Harris[on] Hammontree,
Capt. Wm. Cunningham's Co. of Foot, 1st Virginia, Continental Line.

The 1st Virginia has a long ancestry, and exists today as the 276th Eng. Battalion of the Virginia National Guard.  John Hammontree's younger brother Harris Hammontree enlisted in the 1st Virginia on Feb. 12, 1778, after the regiment had gone into encampment at Valley Forge.  In April and June he was reported as "sick," but unlike his older brother, he survived.  He likely participated in the battle of Monmouth in June 1778 after Baron von Steuben had trained them.  Most of the regiment was captured by the British at Charlestown, South Carolina, on May 12, 1780, but Harris may not have been with the regiment at that point.  He was killed by Indians on the Virginia frontier, 25 July 1781.

###

SSgt M Flynn with Sweet Sharon at
the Caisson Ball. Don't ask.

And that  takes us back to as early as any US Veterans Day is likely to cover. The closest TOF himself came was two years of Army Artillery ROTC, so he knows how to call suppressing fire down on you. However, a wise military classified him 4F. Had they drafted him, two years of ROTC would have made him a corporal.

Happy Mothers' Day, All You Mothers.

In honor of Mothers' Day, TOF will present a parade of Mothers, starting with:

1. The Incomparable Marge, from Tulsa, OK, who is the mother of the TOFsprings, shown here in their cute-and-innocent versions:

Sara, a/k/a Dear in the Headlights

 

Dennis: Wait, What's Going On Here...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
2. Elsie Vera Hammontree (1924-1951) of Quinton, Oklahoma 

Elsie and the Marge

From here on, pictures are few. Elsie was the daughter of....

3. Ora Vanora Harris (1901-1967) was born in Chickasaw Nation. She married one of the innumerable John Hammontrees. She mothered The Incomparable Marge after Elsie died young. Ora's mother was...

4. Sadie Frances Holland (1884-1918), who had been born in Louisiana and moved with her parents to Chickasaw Nation in 1898, where the married Charlie Harding Harris. Sadie was the daughter of...

5. Annie Eliza Helms (1861-1939), who had been born in Lee Co., Georgia of North Carolinian parents. She married Henry Thomas Holland in Louisiana, then after his death in the Civil War, moved to Chickasaw Nation.. She was the daughter of...

6. Gatsey Helms (c. 1826 - after 1880) who was born probably in Mecklenburg Co., North Carolina, married Henry Michael Helms there and emigrated to Alabama, then to Georgia.

Further than which, research falters.

TOF, meanwhile, is also the son of a mother; to wit:

1. Rita Marie Singley (1924-1993) a/k/a "The Mut," born in Easton, married Joseph Francis Flynn of P'burg.

Mut, displaying her bona fides as a mother

Her mother was...

2. Helen Myrtle Schwar (1896-1952) a/k/a "Big Mom," born in Nockamixon Twp, Bucks Co, PA, married Harry Francis Singley of Fountain Hill, and moved to Easton.

Big Mom, with her smaller brood: Mut in arms, twins Ralph and Paul below

She was the daughter of....
3. Frances Hungrege (1870-1926) who married Joseph Francis Schwar

Frances: I'll see your five and raise you ten
Big Mom on far right

Born and married in Nockamixon, Bucks Co., she moved to Easton in 1900, She was the daughter of....

4. Magdalena Rieß (1836-1901), born in Niederhausen in the Grand Principality of Baden, emigrated to America in 1852 on the ship Pelican State out of Liverpool for New York City. She settled in the immigrant community in Nockamixon, where she married Conrad Hungege.

Magdalena Riess,
No family shots

She was the daughter of....

5. Franziska Stefan (1799-1856) who lived her whole life in Oberhausen/Niederhausen, Baden [nee Farther Austria]. She was the daughter of...

6. Maria Anna Pflüger (c.1772-1845), whose mother appears to have been 

7. M. A. Schwörer (1729-???) who was the daughter of

8.  Franciska Lang (1710-1771)

At this point, even German record-keeping falters and it may be that some records were lost during the Napoleonic wars. 

This barely touches the mothers of TOF and Marge, who comprise fully half of our ancestry!

Sing a Song of Singleys

The Singleys, of whom my mother was a one, came originally from Oberhausen (now part of Rheinhausen) in the Breisgau of Baden. The Breisgau  is the land between the Rhine and the Black Forest, and was formerly part of Farther Austria, i.e., Hapsburg lands far to the west of Austria. When the Holy Roman Empire was dissolved at the end the Napoleonic kerfufffle, the Breisgau was ceded to Baden..

The name Singley has been spelled with a wonderful diversity, both here and in Baden. Among the variants have been Zengley, Zengli, Zängle, Zangl, Zaengle, Zenglin, Sengla, et al.. Die Zange means "pliers," "forceps," or "tongs." The "-li" ending is the southern German take on the standard German diminutive "-lein" e.g. Hans >Hansl.

 

The first Singley of whom we have definite knowledge was 

Ancestor hunting.

Ancestor hunting is not for the faint of heart, and the further back one goes, the scantier the clues that come to hand. Even the Absolute Monarchs of the Enlightenment did not think to keep track of their subjects in as much detail as the modern Scientific State. If they sought you out at all, it was only for tax purposes, in which case the name of the ratepayer and the acreage occupied was sufficient unto. Vital statistics were the provenance of the churches. Compare, for example, the data scraped for the 1790 Census to that of the 1940 Census. 

But as Aristotle recommended, you start with the more certain and better known and proceed toward the less certain and lesser known.

Mary McGovern Cantrel, my grandmother's mother, had parents named as Matthew McGovern and Catherine Dolan on her death certificate, where it was further stated that she was born in Co. Cavan,Ireland, on 6 Aug 1856. . Lewis' Topographical Dictionary states that the "Kingdom of Glan" in Cavan was inhabited by "a primitaive race of McGoverns and Dolans" who intermarried and made moonshine whiskey.The barony of Tullyhaw in which these lands lay was co-extensive with the kingdom of the ancient McGaurans. 

Happy Mothers' Day, All You Mothers.

In honor of Mothers' Day, TOF will present a parade of Mothers, starting with:

1. The Incomparable Marge, who is the mother of the TOFsprings, shown here in their cute-and-innocent versions:

Sara, a/k/a Dear in the Headlights

 

Dennis: Wait, What's Going On Here...

 However, the I/M is herself the daughter of a mother, and while we have no digitized picture of the two in Madonna-and-child pose, we do have them individualized, as it were:

Rheinhausen

Nearly all of TOF's maternal ancestors came from the villages of Oberhausen and Niederhausen. The names mean "Upper Houses" and "Lowet Houses," with respect to the flow of the Rhein. Oberhausen is upstream. From the German Wikipedia page for Rheinhausen:

Steidinger and Weaver

The ins and outs of family research can be illustrated by two families on TOF's tree; viz., the Steidingers of Easton and the Weavers of Bucks. TOF's great-grandfather, Anthony Singley married a Margaret Weaver in Bucks County; and another ggf, Frank Metzger, married a Lavinia Steidinger, also in Bucks. In addition, Henry Schwar, not a direct ancestor, married Mary Steidinger. Until last week, TOF knew nothing more about them than their names. A short discourse about the research may be instructive.

The church record books for St. John the Baptist of Haycock Run, Bucks Co., were microfilmed back in the day and TOF ran through them at the Easton Public Library Marx Room a number of years ago. Likewise, the Katolische Kirchebuchen of the Gemeinden Ober- und Niederhausen, Kreis Emmendingen, Grandherzogthum Badens had been microfilmed by and available through the Mormon Stake, which TOF consulted while still in Colorado. Both can now be accessed on-line via Ancestry.com.

To begin...

In the Liber Baptismoraum of St. John the Baptist of Haycock Run, we read:

1868 August 11th. Bapt. Sarah J. (n) ex Francisco Metzger et Lvina Stidigner

which gives us the mother’s maiden name. Franz has become Franceso because while he was born in Baden, the book is is Latin. Steidinger was spelled Stidigner; but as Faithful Reader may suspect, Steidinger is a name that can be spelled in a wonderful variety of ways. Lavinia in various documents ia spelled Lovinia, Lovina, and so forth. The way to discover that "Lvina Stidigner" and "Lavinia Steidinge" are the same person is to cross reference. For example, earlier in the same book, TOF found:

Die 16th Novembris 1862 baptizai Israelim Leonam fil. leg. Francisci Metzger et Lowinae Steidinger natus an die 21 Juli 1862.

 The -ae ending is the Latin genetive. The -im and -am endings are accusative. So Israel Leo Metzger, legitimate son of Francis Metzger and Lowinia Steidinger. W was pronounced as V.

So when were she and Frank married? The records for St. John the Baptist are silent. But on line, Lavinia’s obituary (21 Feb 1921) tells us they were wed 11 May 1854 in Bucks Co., moved to S. Bethlehem 5 Feb 1887, and “later” relocated to Fountain Hill.\

Note that "the following children survive: Mrs. Martin Rauschwender of New York, Mrs. James Knight, Mrs. Anthony Singley, Mrs. Charles Oxford, Mrs Charles Clark of Fountain Hill; Jacob and Charles of South Bethlehem. Israel and Lawrence of Fountain Hill. A brother Israel Stadinger of Wilkes-Barre and a half-brother Samuel Werst of Perkasie also survive.

The Singley connection assures us that this Lovina is the same as our Lavinia, as does the existence of a brother named Israel, after whom she named a son.

When located on-line, Lavinia's death certificate, like her obit, fails to name her parents but tells us she was born 19 Aug 1833. Again, no joy in the St. John the Baptist records. Perhaps she was not Catholic.

A search of the 1850 Census, Forks, Northampton, Pennsylvania, four years before she wed Metzger, we discover:

·         Name                               Age        inferred birth year

·         Reuben Dietrich                36           1814

·         Susanna Dietrich               42           1808

·         Levina Steidinger            17           1833

·         Ephraim Steidinger           15           1835

·         Tilghman Steidinger          14           1836

·         Samuel Steidinger               8            1842

·         Mary A Dietrich                  3           1847

·Charles Dietrich                25           1825

There was another Lavinia Steidinger not too far away, Steidinger not being an uncommon name in them thar parts. The names of presumptive brothers, Ephraim and Tilghman, sound Protestant. Catholics tended then to take the names of saints; Protestants like OT names. Tendencies prove nothing, but are only another evidence.

But what’s a gaggle of Steidingers doing in Rueben Dietrich’s house? The simple answer is that Susanna was Lavinia's mother, but married Dietrich sometime between 1842 and 1847. But we don't have Susanna's maiden name nor the paternal Steidinger. The brother, Israe, cannot be found and TOF is reminded how people with multiple names often used them interchangeably. (TOF once discovered in German parish records that Franz Zængle, Josef Zængle, and Anton Zængle were all one person: Franz Josef Anton Zængle!) 

But another baptismal record at John the Baptist explains something. 

 1886 Januarii die vigesimo tertio baptismatem Mariam ad fidem conversam, fil. Tilman Steidinger et Lydiae Klotz, nat. Aprilis die 2ndo 1864.

Mary Steidinger [who later married Henry Schwar] was a convert, the daughter of Lavinia's younger brorther, Tilghman Steidinger. That probably means Frank Metzger might not have wed a Catholic and hence was not recorded in the St. John the Baptist record book. 

Eventually, searching led to the records of St. John’s Lutheran Church in Easton, which revealed that in

Oct 1846 Hieronymous Dietrich married Susana Steidinger, widow.

So was Hieronymous the same as Rueben? Well, if your name were Hieronymous, what would you tell a Census taker? Perhaps Reuben was his middle name?  But Hieronymous is the Latin form of Jerome, and in 1860, Tinicum, Bucks, we find

·         Name                                    Age

·         Jerome Deiterich              50

·         Susanna Deiterich            50

·         Samuel Deiterich              19

·         Maryan Deiterich             13

·         Charles Deiterich              12

·         Martin Deiterich               7

·         Paul Steidinger                  3

·         Susanna Steidinger          1

Tilghman is married and in a separate household. Samuel "Deiterich" is probably Samuel Steidinger from the 1850 Census and Maryan is Mary A. But Charles should have been 2 in 1850 but does not appear there. Neither the 1850 nor 1860 noted the relationships to head of household and TOF has encountered other instances in which housemembers with different names were carelessly transcribed with the head's name. The two youngest Steidingers may have been the children of Samuel, grandchildren of Lavinia.

Tilghman Steidinger’s death certificate, filled out by his daughter Mary Schwar, listed ‘don’t know’ as the father and Susahan [sic] Hauser as the mother, so we finally have a family name for the mother. Then, a search for Israel, listed as a brother in Lavinia's obit, produced a death certificate for Israel H. Steidinger of Wilkes-Barre where the parents names were clearly Paul Steidinger and Susan Hauser, both of Bucks County. The two children in Jerome Dietrich's home bore the same names, not likely a coincidence.

 

The direct line is then:

Susanna's Steidinger children were born from 1833 to 42, so her husband Paul should have appeared in the 1840 Census as head of household. (Maybe he could have been in 1830, but that is uncertain.) However, there is no Paul Steidinger anywhere, except for the kid in 1860.

In 1800,  Johan Stetinger lived in Easton with his wife Christiana Dietz. He was the only Steidinger in town. He was still there in 1830, but not in 1840. (Nor in 1810 and 1820!)

In 1810, Georg Stedinger appears with his family in Lower Saucon. He reappears in 1820 and 1830, but not in 1840.

And in 1830, young David Stetinger, son of Johan and Christina appears in Easton., b. 4 Oct 1805 and bapt. 24 Sep 1818 First United Church of Christ Easton and wed Fredrica Kassler 30 Mar 1830 at St John's Lutheran Church. He reappears in 1840 Bushkill Ward, Easton with a single male child.

It is likely that Paul is one of the numerous sons of these people who somehow avoided the Census records. One possibility is that the person filling out Israel Steidinger's death certificare had misheard some family story. That was the only record naming "Paul Steidinger"

As for the half-brother, Samuel Werst, there were in the 1870 Census, as usual, two Samuels Werst. One, aged 26, was working as a farm laborer for Tobias Hinkel in Nockamixon Twp, Bucks Co.  The other, in Lower Saucon was in his fifties. The latter was unlikely to have survived into his hundreds in 1921. The latter would have been 68.

A portion of Nockamixon Twp, from an 1876 map shows the locations of A[nthony] Singley (north of center), S[ebastian] Schware (due south to Marienstein Ch., then southwest), J[oseph] Schware (ssw of S. Schware), and F[rank] Metzger (north on road to first left, then due west). There is also a property northeast of A. Singley off the next road [dotted road] for I. Weaver.

The Weavers are the other family that had been a dead end. There is a record at St. John the Baptist attesting to the marriage of Anthony [Anton] Singley [Zangle] to Margaret Weaver on 19 May 1853; but whence Margaret Weaver, who knew?

One of two possible Margaret Weavers in Nockamixon Twp, 1850, only one was the right age to become Margaret Singley in 1860:
Name                  Age implied birth year
Mary Weaver        46       1804
Margret Weaver  15       1835
Elizabeth Weaver  12       1838
Ann Weaver            7        1843

which means Margaret was 18 when she wed. Her mother was apparently named Mary. the family was scattered across 1860, each in a separate household:

Mary Weaver         (55) housekeeper, alone. Margaret Singley  (25) as the wife of Anton Singley Elizabeth Weaver   (22) as a servant in the household of Simon Raisner Anna Weaver         (17) as a domestic in the householf of Martin Breiner

in addition, I. Weaver appears on the 1876 Nockamixon map and Brice Weaver to the south on the Tinicum Twp. map. These are possible brothers of Margaret.

Working backwards was more difficult, since family members are not named in earlier Censuses and Weavers as plentiful as shad in the Delaware. But in 1840, their ages would have been

Name                  Age in 1840 Census category Mary Weaver        36       =female 30-39 Margret Weaver      5       =female 5-9 Elizabeth Weaver    2       = female  under 5 Ann Weaver            not yet born

A likely candidate in 1840 in Tinicum Twp. would be

Abraham Weaver Home in 1840 (City, County, State):    Tinicum, Bucks, Pennsylvania Free White Persons - Males - 10 thru 14:    2 (two sons gone by 1850?) Free White Persons - Males - 30 thru 39:    1 (Abraham?) Free White Persons - Females - Under 5:     1 (Elizabeth?) Free White Persons - Females - 5 thru 9:     2  (Margaret? plus another married by 1850?) Free White Persons - Females - 30 thru 39:  1  (Mary?)

This seems to match up pretty well with Mary's 1850 family, and no other Weaver family in the county seems to match the age profile.Ten years earlier, we find:

Abraham Weaver Home in 1830 (City, County, State):    Tinicum, Bucks, Pennsylvania Free White Persons - Males - Under 5:        2 (these were the two males 10-14 in 1840) Free White Persons - Males - 20 thru 29:     1 (Abraham? b. 1801-1810) Free White Persons - Females - 20 thru 29   1 (Mary? b. 1801-1810)

But that is as far as it goes. In 1820, Abraham would have been (10-19), probably not a head of household. Without birth, marriage, death records, possibly from the Upper Tinicum Lutheran Church, things cannot be further pinned down. For example, what was Mary Weaver's maiden name? Might it have been Tilghman? Who knows?

The 1782 and 73 Tax Lists lists a Jacob Weaver in Tinicum Twp and no Weavers in Nockamixon. The 1790 census lists Jacob Weaver with 3 males of gun-toting age (16+), eligible for the well-regulated militia, one male less than 16 and 3 females. Townships were not mentioned, but it was probably Tinicum.
         

These two tales illustrate the difficulties of this hobby, where it's all to easy to jump to a conclusion, after which it gets passed around like a head cold among researchers who accept others' family trees on faith