Tuesday, December 31, 2013

Tombstone Tuesday - Katie & May Pendleton

While doing some research at the local library earlier this year, I came across the obituary of the nine-month-old infant daughter of my paternal great, great uncle and aunt Charles Rittenhouse Pendleton and Sarah (Sally) Peeples in the July 2, 1881, issue of the Valdosta Times transcribed in Wayne and Judy Dasher's Wiregrass Obituaries and Death Notices.[1] (I looked in the microfilm copy of the newspaper for that date but must have overlooked it.) Her obituary was written by her father, who was the editor and publisher of the newspaper, as his initials are at the end:

"Our little darling is gone. Budded on earth she will bloom and bear fruit in the garden above. 'Those little garments no more she'll need - Lay them all away - She's gone up the golden ladder - Into the eternal day.' C.P."[2]

What a beautiful tribute! When I looked for Katie's grave on the Sunset Hill Cemetery interactive map, I found Baby May who is buried next to her. I wondered who May belonged to. The closest graves of any Pendletons are to the east and across a cemetery road---those of their grandparents Philip Coleman Pendleton and Catharine Tebeau. Katie's and May's graves seem to be all alone. The cemetery website has May's last name as Pendleton. Several family trees on ancestry.com list a daughter of Charles and Sally named Mary with the same death date as May. I searched for an obituary for May but didn't find one.

Katie Pendleton's headstone
Katie's headstone says:

"Our Darling
Katie,
Infant daughter
of C. R. and S. P.
Pendleton
Born Sept 12, 1880
Died June 25, 1881"

May Pendleton's headstone
On May's headstone shown above is this brief, poignant engraving:

 "Baby May, 
May 29, 1882, 
Came - Went"

The headstones of May (on the left) and Katie (on the right) Pendleton at Sunset Hill Cemetery, Valdosta, GA

Katie's headstone and May's headstone on findagrave.com were much more legible a year ago than they are now and when I took my photos this past May.

How sad to lose one's first two children! Charles and Sally's third child, Charles Rittenhouse, was born on May 15, 1883, almost a year after May's death. He survived into adulthood, and so did the rest of their children Luelle, Philola, Edmund, Carita, Vida, Louis, and Zera.

Catherine

---
[1] Wayne and Judy Dasher. Wiregrass Obituaries and Death Notices Volume 1, The South Georgia Times - April 29, 1868 to September 29, 1869; The Valdosta Times - May 15, 1875 to December 26, 1885. Privately published, 1998. Repository South Georgia Regional Library, Valdosta, Georgia.

[2] See footnote 1 above.

Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Tombstone Tuesday - Killed at the Battle of Chickamauga

I mentioned in my previous post, Tombstone Tuesday - The Knights at Burnt Church, that my sister and I went to the cemetery at Union Primitive Baptist Church (Burnt Church) in Lakeland, Georgia, to visit the graves of our maternal fourth great grandparents William Anderson and Sarah Cone Knight. While we were there, we found the graves of several other members of the Knight family. The grave of Barzilla S. Knight, their grandson, particularly caught my eye:

Headstone of Barzilla S. Knight at the Union Primitive Baptist Church cemetery in Lakeland, Georgia
This is inscribed on the back of his headstone: "In Memory Killed-Battle of Chickamauga" (see below)

The back of the headstone of Barzilla S. Knight at the Union Primitive Baptist Church cemetery in Lakeland, Georgia
Born in 1836 in Ware County, Georgia, Barzilla was the son of Jonathan W. and Frances Staten Knight and nephew of my maternal third great grandmother Sarah Knight Roberts.  He enlisted as a Corporal in the 29th Georgia Infantry, Company K of the Confederate Army in 1861.

1861 Civil War muster roll record of Barzilla Knight
The 29th Infantry was organized at Big Shanty, Georgia, the year Barzilla enlisted. Companies A and G were in the Savannah area and handled the heavy artillery.  The other companies were at Charleston.

In May 1862, Barzilla was promoted to 2nd Lieutenant:

Card File record of Barzilla Knight's promotion to 2nd Lieutenant

Barzilla's muster rolls note where he was and when:  on Sapelo Island in November 1861; Caustons Bluff in May, June, and July 1862; sick and on furlough "near Savannah," August through September 1862;  sick at Camp Young in November 1862; and sick at Camp Clingmans (?) December 1862.  On December 23, 1862, he signed a requisition for 45 blankets.  On February 25, 1863, he signed a requisition for 13 blankets, and on August 21, he signed a requisition for 9 jackets, 21 pairs of pants, 8 cotton shirts, 6 pairs of drawers, and 16 pairs of shoes.

In September 1863, the 29th Regiment was consolidated with the 30th Regiment and which then joined the Army of Tennessee campaign.   The battle of Chickamauga began at sunrise the morning of September 19. Barzilla died that day, the first day of the battle.

Google Earth aerial of the location of the Battle of Chickamauga in north Georgia

Card File Record of Barzilla Knight's death in the battle of Chickamauga on September 19, 1863.
A map on the Civil War Trust website shows the positions of both Union and Confederate troops during the morning of September 19, and there are links to maps of the afternoon fighting on that day and on the following day, September 20.

Total casualties of this battle were estimated at over 34,000 soldiers.  That's hard to fathom.  That's more than half of the population of the town I live in.

Catherine
---
Sources used:

National Park Service, Civil War, Confederate Georgia Troops, 29th Regiment, Georgia Infantry (http://www.nps.gov/civilwar/search-regiments-detail.htm?regiment_id=CGA0029RI : accessed November 21, 2013)

Compiled Service Records, Barzilla Knight, Confederate Soldiers Who Served in Organizations from the State of Georgia. Carded Records, compiled 1903-1927, documenting the period 1861-1865. Record Group 109.  National Archives, Washington, D.C. Images.  Fold3 (http://www.fold3.com/ : accessed  23 October 2013).

Civil War Trust, Saving America's Battlefields.  (http://www.civilwar.org/ : accessed 23 October 2013).

The Battle of Chickamauga.  Civil War Trust, Saving America's Battlefields.  (http://www.civilwar.org/battlefields/chickamauga.html?tab=facts : accessed 21 November 2013).

Monday, December 2, 2013

Two Husbands for Isabella

While researching for the book that I'm writing about my maternal grandfather William (Will) Liming Redles, I searched for a marriage record for his parents, G. Albert Redles and Isabella Liming, to confirm when they were married.  According to the 1900 census, they had been married for 31 years, which would put the year at about 1869.[1]  I wasn't sure if they had gotten married in Philadelphia (where they lived for many years), in Wilmington, Delaware (where they were living in 1870), or in Mt. Holly, New Jersey (where Will was born in 1873).  (Click on each image below for a larger view.)

The 1900 Burlington County, New Jersey, census for G. Albert and Isabella Redles (dwelling 54) showing that they had been married for 31 years at the time of this census.

I found a Delaware marriage index record on ancestry.com for Rev. G. Alfred Redles and Isabella Sheppard who were married on June 7, 1869.  I thought these names were too much of a coincidence. Since this looks like it's an index record, I thought it possible that the original record was handwritten and was misread, and that "Alfred" should have been typed as "Albert." Or maybe the indexer mistakenly used the first name of the clergyman who performed the ceremony, Alfred Lee.[2]

1869 Delaware marriage record index for G. Alfred Redles and Isabella Sheppard

Both the G. Alfred in the marriage record and Will's father G. Albert were clergymen, and both married a woman named Isabella. G. Albert accepted the position of Assistant Minister of St. Andrews Church in Wilmington, Delaware, in June 1868.  Rev. Alfred Lee, who is noted as the clergyman for the marriage of G. Alfred Redles and Isabella Sheppard in the above record, was the rector of St. Andrews Church where G. Albert was the assistant minister. There is no G. Alfred Redles recorded in the journal of the Diocese of Delaware's convention held on June 2, 1869, just a few days before G. Alfred Redles and Isabella Sheppard were married.[3]

I went back to the census records. Enumerators for the 1910 census were instructed that if a person was married, "inquire whether they have been married before, and if this is the first marriage, write 'M1,' but if this is the second or subsequent marriage, write 'M2' (meaning married more than once)."  In the 1910 census, there is an M1 for G. Albert and M2 for Isabella under Column 8 for marital status. [4] I don't recall seeing this before!
The 1910 Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, census record for G. Albert and Isabella Redles (dwelling 225) showing Isabella's marital status as M2 indicating her marriage to G. Albert wasn't her first marriage.
On familysearch.org, I found a marriage record for Isabella Liming of Philadelphia and Joseph K. Sheppard of Salem, New Jersey, married on March 4, 1862.  There is a death record on familysearch.org for a Joseph K. Sheppard who died in June 1865 of heart disease at the age of 28.  His obituary on genealogybank.com notes that the funeral will be at the home of his mother Ann in Salem, New Jersey. There is no mention of a wife.[5]

Marriage record for Isabella Liming and Joseph K. Sheppard, March 4, 1862, from familysearch.org.
However, I think that I'm on the right track. My great grandmother Isabella Liming was married twice, and I believe that her first husband was Joseph K. Sheppard. I would like to find more evidence, like a marriage record for Isabella and Joseph that lists her parents William and Anna!

Catherine

---

[1]  1900 U. S. census, Burlington County, New Jersey, population schedule, Beverly, p. 3, dwelling 54, family 55, G. A. Redles, digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 30 November 2013), citing NARA microfilm publication T632.

[2]  Delaware Marriage Records, 1744-1912, Rev. G. Alfred Redles and Isabella Sheppard, June 07,1869, digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 30 November 2013), citing Delaware Public Archives, RG 1325, Subgroup 003, series 004, Volume 82, page 247.

[3]  Journal of the Proceedings of the Seventy-ninth Annual Convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the Diocese of Delaware held in Christ Church, Delaware City, On Wednesday, June 2D, 1869.  H. & E. F. James, Wilmington, Delaware, 1869, 15, 25.

[4]  Department of Commerce and Labor, Bureau of the Census, Thirteenth Census of the United States April 15, 1910.  Instructions to Enumerators: Including supplemental Instructions for the Collection of the Statistics of Manufactures and of Mines and Quarries.  Washington: Government Printing Office, 1910, 29; 1910 U.S. census, Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, population schedule, Philadelphia, p. 10A, dwelling 225, family George A. Redles, digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 30 November 2013), citing NARA microfilm publication T624.

[5]  "New Jersey, County Marriages, 1682-1956," index and images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/TH-1-9880-30953-46?cc=1803976&wc=MMVF-D4W:1105263986 : accessed 01 Dec 2013), 004541227 > image 741 of 847;  "Pennsylvania, Philadelphia City Death Certificates, 1803-1915," index and images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.1.1/VK8R-PSL : accessed 01 Dec 2013), Joseph K. Sheppard, 1865; "Died."  Obituary for Joseph K. Sheppard.  Public Ledger, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 30 June 1865, 2, digital image, GenealogyBank.com (http://www.genealogybank.com : accessed 30 November 2013).