Richardson Research Questions

If you follow my blog or have visited my website, a major research focus of mine is my Dad's RICHARDSON family.


I've come up with a series of research questions that I am going to focus on for this family.

1. Who were the parents and siblings of Jonathan (I) Richardson? 
2. Where did the Richardson family live before Leyden, Mass.? 
3. What was the name of Jonathan (I) Richardson’s wife? 
4. What other children did Jonathan (I) Richardson have besides Jonathan, John, Joseph, and Daniel? 
5. Was William Richardson (son of John) born in Ontario Co, New York or in Vermont? 
6. Who were the parents of George O Pierce (grandson of William Richardson, son of John)? 
7. What was the name of the wife of George O Pierce? 
1. Request sent to Onondaga Public Library in Syracuse, NY for NYS Vital Records Index lookup for both marriage record and death record. 
2. Received following citations: 
1. Marriage: George O. PIERCE, m. 9 May, 1885, Venice, #5177 
2. Emailed Venice Town clerk for instructions on how to order copy and costs on 3/30/2017. 
3. Death: Hattie Pierce, d. 1 March, 1897, Canadice, #9088 
8. Who were the neighbors of the Richardsons in Lot 70 of Livonia? 
9. When did John Richardson move to Ontario County? 
10. When did the family of Sarah Richardson and Asa Davis discover and convert to Mormonism? 
11. When did John Richardson and his wife Betsey Phillips die? 
12. Where were Jonathan (II) Richardson and Rhoda Thompson during the 1830 census? 
13. How many children did Jonathan (II) Richardson and Rhoda Thompson have? 
14. Is William Harrison Richardson (b. 1814) son of Joseph Richardson and Abigail Fisk the same William Henry Harrison Richardson that died in Lisbon, Juneau Co, Wisconsin in 1874? (Where were his male children born?) 
15. Did William Ryder Powell and Mary Martin actually marry? Did they divorce? Is William Ryder Powell the father of Mary Martin’s son John Powell? 
1. https://familysearch.org/wiki/en/New_York_Vital_Records#Divorce_Records 
16. Was William Ryder Powell prosecuted for horse stealing in Livingston or Allegany County, New York? 
1. Probably in the Supreme Court of either county. 
2. https://familysearch.org/wiki/en/New_York_Court_Records#Types_of_Criminal_Courts

More Martins - Livingston Co, NY

 

The obituary of Thomas Martin of Lima, NY, seen at left, states that his brother was "Malachi Martin, late of this town [Livonia]."

I've been tracing Malachi Martin's family because his daughter Mary married into my Powell family, and as the mother of John Powell (see last week's post "Finding John Powell - 1 possibility down").

The Martin families are Irish Catholics. Thomas Martin, according to his obituary, came to the United States in 1834. I can narrow down Malachi's immigration date to abt 1848, based on church histories in the local county history.

This is a completely different group for me to research. The Irish immigrants on my mother's side are from Northern Ireland and are Presbyterian. Probably they will end up going back to Scotland, if I can figure out their townlands in Ireland. (That's a whole other kettle of fish.)

It has been super interesting to follow these families of Thomases, Williams, Marys, Anns, and Margarets. The Martin family appears to have come from the far northwest of County Tipperary in Ireland. I've been able to find some records for them in Tipperary before coming to America via the irish Family History Foundation website (http://www.rootsireland.ie), though the records there are all extracts, unfortunately.

The town the family is from is at the extreme northwest of County Tipperary. However, when most people think of Tipperary they think of Cashel (well, at least I do.) I love these photos that I took when I was in Ireland. One is of the Rock of Cashel and one is the view from the Rock of Cashel.

I'm having a bit more luck once the family moved to America as there are Roman Catholic church records for the family in Livingston Co, New York. This is my first time working with Roman Catholic records; I can't think of one family that have been RC in my direct line except one, and that one has not been confirmed by records.

Here is an example: the burial record for Mary (Martin) Powell Tone, daughter of Malachi Martin:

19 August 1908: "Mrs Michael Tone was buried in Livonia this morning. She died on the 15th aged about 84 years."

There are a large number of related families in these church records - I've already noticed the ones I know are related to the Malachi Martin family. The Thomas Martin family lived in Lima, and that town's church records are, of course, on another roll of film....

[Citations available upon request.]

Finding John Powell - 1 possibility down

One of my current projects is identifying all the descendants of Jonathan Richardson, the man I call "the progenitor" of my Richardson family in western New York. He came to Ontario Co, NY between 1803 and 1810 with (probably) four sons.

One of those sons, Jonathan (II) Richardson, had a daughter named Rhoda. Rhoda Richardson married Rowland Powell and had at least five children. The second-to-last known child and last son was named William Ryder Powell, and he seems to have a bit of a bad guy. (More on him as a person to come later.)

William Ryder Powell married (or at least had a somewhat long term relationship with) a woman named Mary Martin. Mary Martin was born in Ireland about May 1826, probably in the small parish of Youghalarra in County Tipperary where her known brothers and sisters were baptized. Her parents were Malachi/Malachy Martin and Margaret O'Brien (Brien). I have not been able to find when Mary Martin emigrated to the United States.

Their first child, Mary Adelia Powell, was born in Livonia, Livingston Co, New York, probably around May of 1848 (though her obituary gives her birth date as 22 May 1846, all of the previous records give year of birth around 1848 rather than 1846). This also gives the latest emigration date for Mary Martin as approximately nine months before May 1848 (or 1846) - around July of 1847 or 1845.

The only census that has William Ryder and Mary (Martin) Powell enumerated together is the one from 1850; Mary appears alone with three children in the 1855 New York State census: Mary A, aged 6; William I, aged 4; and Luceria A, aged 2, as well as a cousin, Margaret Hogan. The 1855 census also states that Mary (Martin) Powell had lived in Livonia, New York, for 12 years and that she was an alien. (William Ryder Powell was a natural-born American.) That gives a latest emigration date for Mary Martin as 1842-1843.

In 1860 Mary (Martin) Powell has two children with her in her household: 7-year-old Lucera and 2-year-old John. William appears to have died and Mary Adelia is living in another household working as a domestic. I have not been able to find John in the 1865 New York State census. In 1870 he is living with his mother, Mary, in Livonia, and by 1875 Mary (Martin) Powell has married a man named Michael Tone and John is living in their household, listed as a step-son to Michael Tone. John is enumerated as working on the Erie railroad.

And where is John after that? In the 1900 census, Mary (Martin) Powell Tone's enumeration states that she has had four children and that three are still living. That appears to imply that John Powell is still living.

The web becomes further tangled as the history of William Ryder Powell is examined. According to his obituary, William Ryder Powell was not the nicest of people. He was shot to death (supposedly in self-defence) in 1904 in California. The obituary also states, "He was arrested, tried and convicted [for horse stealing], and our informant is quite sure that his sentence to Auburn prison was for a term of five years. After he got out of prison, which was something like thirty-five or forty years ago, he drifted to California...."  This gives some dates for William Ryder's incarceration at Auburn: released between 1864 and 1869, with a five year sentence, gives his incarceration beginning dates of between 1859 and 1864. However, records for this period at Auburn do not survive. It is, of course, possible, that these dates are off, and maybe as many of five years on either side.

The probate completed in 1904 and 1905 by his daughter, Mary Adelia (Powell) Sheldon, states that her father purchased land in California and was unmarried when he did so, and gives his only surviving heirs as two daughters: Mary Adelia (Powell) Sheldon and Lucera (Powell) Crane (I'll come back to this one, too).

So what happened to John Powell? Was he really William Ryder Powell's son? Where is he in subsequent censuses after 1875?

I thought I had found a candidate - a John H Powell married a woman named Kitty Dempsey in Rochester, NY in 1886. He worked on the railroad, was approximately the right age, and his mother was born in Ireland. I was lucky in that I had already ordered a roll of microfilm from the FHL of Rochester and vicinity church records for another purpose!

On 26 April 1886 John H Powell married Catherine "Kitty" Dempsey at St. Mary's Catholic Church in Rochester, New York. John H Powell was the son of Samuel Powell and Elizabeth Kennedy. Catherine was the daughter of Bernard Dempsey and Catherine Costello.

And there went that hypothesis popped.

So what happened to John Powell? I'm still looking.

I'm also still looking for Lucera (Powell) Crane/Ware too: she signs her name as Lucera Crane in the probate documents, her death certificate gives her name as Lucera Ware, and I can't find anything on her under either name. Supposedly, according to online family trees, she married a man named John Ware and they had two children (before 1904 when she signs her name as Lucera Crane), but I am still trying to follow that up.


[If sources are desired, please comment or send an email. I would be happy to oblige.]

Current workings....

1829 Mentor Twp, Geauga Co, Ohio, personal property tax records. From FHL microfilm.

Two current projects I'm working on. Trying to discover the name of the first husband of Anna (Richardson) Bartholomew Harrington, who married Otis Harrington in 1832 in Geauga Co, Ohio. (Hence the tax records from that county.) It appears that Otis Harrington got his first piece of land in Geauga Co in 1831, so now I am off to land records. I also went looking to see if, when Lake Co was set off from Geauga in 1840, if the family moved or was just "moved" by the change in the county lines.  It appears not - as by 1840 they had moved from Mentor Twp to Willoughby Twp further west. Between land records and tax records I will hopefully be able to pinpoint a year for that move.

Secondly, to use the probate of two siblings who died childless in 1883 and 1891 in Livingston Co, New York to identify the descendants of their other siblings. Jasper and Abigail Powell, brother and sister, never married. At their subsequent deaths, they each had wills that left their estate to some of the children of some their deceased siblings. Right now I am only looking at the original wills and codicils, plus the newspaper announcements listing the heirs, but it appears that perhaps at least one branch of the family was "missed." I'm trying to prove (to myself) that the first wife of Charles Sowersby of Allegany Co, New York, Linn Co, Kansas, and Wright Co, Missouri, was Rhoda Powell, daughter of Stephen Powell and Lodaecy Powell. Lodaecy was the daughter of Rowland Powell and Rhoda Richardson. Stephen Powell's first wife was Lodaecy's sister Rhoda. (What a tangled web we weave!)

However, looking for evidence of that branch led me to a website (http://www.kscourts.org/dstcts/6linnppq.htm) for probate records in Linn County, Kansas.  That lists records for Powell children after, it appears, the death of their mother and remarriage of their father. The website lists a phone number so it looks like I might be making a phone call to Kansas next week!

Other items I have crossed off my top do list: I sent six death certificate applications to the state of Pennsylvania last week. I know it will be awhile before those requests are fulfilled, but they include multiple lines of my mother's family. The problems above are only on Dad's side - trying to follow all those Richardson branches to the present day. I'm hoping that, like on the other lines, I might eventually get living descendants to contact me.

Also have been looking through a pension file from Fold3.com for Phebe Ann (Harrington) Richardson Hayes, who appears to have...not been completely honest with the federal government regarding her remarriage after the death of her first husband Orlando H. Richardson in the Civil War. It appears that both civil and criminal charges were brought against her and two of her witnesses. I have to reread through the whole file again and put it in chronological order, but it is a doozy!

Back to work! (Well, lunch first.)