Robert White

Robert White (1560-1617)  My 11 times great grandfather.

He was the 7th birth of 10 of which at least 3 siblings didn't live past a year of age.  Robert may have been part of the heritage which said youngest sons should go to the clergy.  His parents were well off, Lady Helen (Ellen) Kirton (Girton) of White of Hill Farrance, Somerset, England and Sir Richard White of Minot, Somerset, England.

Robert married in 1685 to Lady Brygette Allgar (1562-1605).  The youngest of her 8 children was Anna (Rosanna) White Porter, my ancestress (See blog HERE).  Though Robert and Lady Brygette White both died in England, they had a son and 3 daughters immigrate to Windsor Connecticut in the American Colonies.

from http://ancestor.homestead.com/files/Robert_White.htm
"Robert White was born in Essex, England, on Tuesday, June 24, 1561, and died in Essex in 1617.  His name was also spelled Robert Whighte. He was buried in Shalford, Essex, on June 17, 1617.    Bridget Allgar was baptized in Shalford, Essex, England, on Wednesday, March 11, 1562, and died in Shalford after June 24, 1605. They were married in Shalford on Thursday, June 24, 1585. She took the name Bridget White. She is the daughter of William and Margaret (Parye) Allgar.   William Allgar of Shalford, Essex, England died in County Essex, England, in 1575. He was buried in Shalford on August 2, 1575.. His wife was Margaret Parye of England."

" Robert White was a yeoman; that is, he was not a member of the nobility but did own a small amount of land (small compared to a typical nobleman's estate). He was wealthy and appears to have lived in Shalford from his marriage until a few months before his death. Shalford is about two miles south of Wethersfield."

"In his will, Robert White bequeathes 40 shillings to Mr. Richard Rogers, preacher of God's word at Withersfield in Essex. Therefore, it is likely that he was friendly to the non-conformists and attended some of their services. A like bequest to Bartholomew Scrivener, minister of the Church of God in Messing, implies that he was also interested in the established church (or was covering all of the bases). His bequest of 40s to the poor people of Messing and nothing to the poor of Shalford where he is supposed to have lived most of his life, opens the possibility that he was born in Messing."

Sources:

·        Jacobus, Donald Lines, History and Genealogy of the Families of Old Fairfield (reprinted with corrections), Baltimore, Genealogical Publishing Co., 1991 (1930); vol. 1, p. 487.

·        English Origins of New England Families, Series 2, vol. 3: The Children of Robert White of Messing, Co. Essex, England, Who Settled in Hartford and Windsor (Family Tree Maker CD181).

 
He is listed on a Find A Grave site as a

 "Common Ancestor for US Presidents:

Millard Fillmore

US Grant

Stephen Grover Cleveland

Gerald Ford"

His grave site is unknown however.

An ancestor born July 13, 1600, yesterday (!)

Happy birthday to Anna Rosanna White Porter 

 BIRTH 13 JULY 1600 • Shalford, Essex, England 

DEATH 11 MAY 1647 • Windsor, Hartford, Conn

She was the mother of Sarah Porter Judson and great grandmother of Anna Curtiss, wife of  Zachariah Booth, Emigrant to American Colonies.

Daughter of Robert & Bridget (Allgar) White. Sister of three other New England emigrants: John White, Elizabeth (White) Goodwin. & Mary (White) Loomis.

She and John Porter had eleven known children. The Parish records of Shalford & Messing, Essex, England list Anne Whighte baptised July 13, 1600 in Shalford, daughter of Robert Weight. SOURCE: American Genealogical-Biographical Index (AGBI) vol 138, Pg. 460.

And she's one of the few of my ancestors that has a birth date (actually her baptism date) for a great times 10 grandmother!

And I must mention the fact that I lived in Windsor Connecticut in the 1960s, where the Porter family had lived and Anna and her husband died.  I admit I didn't walk the same paths that she did, but I probably drove the same roads that were part of her life.  Just 320 years later!  I must mention that my husband had grown up in the Hartford, Connecticut area in the 1950s and attended a "prep school" named Loomis.  I'm sure it was founded by the same family.

It's fun to look back at any of the New England ancestors, especially those who were in leadership positions, because there are so many records about them, and if they came from a family in England (which most of them did!) who had church records about birth/baptism, marriage and death, then there are lots of records to check.  However, when all the records say a man was married at 4 years of age, and another record at least lets him get to be 27 before marrying, which one am I to believe?  So at this juncture, I've been looking at John Porter's father, and finding some of the dates of his death are based upon a written text (thank heavens I could find and read it) where it says, "John Porter a boy."  So I doubt that this is our ancestor.  I can only do this research for about a half hour at a time, because it really gives me a headache. 

And in honor of Anna (Rosanna) White Porter, the records that I have give her birth, her marriage, and a whole list of children's names.

Burke's American Families with British Ancestry (pg. 2869) says her husband,

John Porter of Windsor Conn, born 1590; emigrated to America from Felsted, Essex, England ca. 1637, to the Massachusetts Bay Colony, later moving to Windsor in 1639; married Anna (who d. 1647) dau. of Robert White, and d, 1648, leaving issue, 1. Samuel, 2. Nathaniel, 3. Eleazar Porter, 4, William Porter (physician.)

Her father, Robert White, left a will, which gives a lot of information about the family in England.  I won't go into his life here, because I might want to feature him in a separate blog sometime.

Anna Rosanna married John Porter of Windsor Connecticut,  and she was the 6th of 8 children of Robert and his wife Brydgette Algar. Source: Descendants of Joseph Loomis in America, and his antecedents in the Old World, pg 104 in Loomis Genealogy.

Anna and John Porter had their first 9 children born in England.  They are listed in records of their baptisms from 1621 to 1637.  One son, Samuel, died at 2 months of age.  This is interesting because the Burke's publication quoted above has him continuing to live, and being the head of a family.  Yes, having lost the first Samuel in 1632, the Porters named another son Samuel who was born in 1635. Source: English Origins of New England Families, Second Series Vol. III, pg. 736.

In the same source, page 732, Anna White Porter and her sister, Mary White Loomis, are described living in homes next to each other in Windsor, CT.

And on page 731, same source, Anna White of Messing (England) is married to John Porter of Felsted on 18 Oct 1620.  That same page talks of Anna's death (as John Porter's wife, in 1647) and her husband's will, when he died in 1648.

Much of the same information is repeated in "Families of Ancient Windsor," under John Porter, Sr.

Though there was a date of death in Windsor CT for Mrs. Porter (her given name wasn't mentioned), her burial is unknown.  Her third child was Sara Porter, who married Joseph Judson, and they were my 9 times great grandparents.  But their story will be for another day.

Richard R. Booth my murdered great grand

NOTE: I am so embarrassed...well Blogger should be! All the comments that have been coming to this site for the last year (and it's not really many) didn't get sent to me as notifications (like I'd asked Blogger to do.) They've been sitting in a folder "awaiting publication" over here, and I never looked at it before today (June 18, 2018) because I was under the impression that I'd be getting emails when people commented.  That used to be the way of Blogger.  Sigh.  I haven't had a chance to answer them, and all those comments were really valuable.  So sorry.

Richard R. Booth was born 23 Sept 1846 in Jackson, Indiana.  He moved from Indiana to Texas with his father, William Lewis Booth, an attorney. The Booth family emmigrated (with William's, brother Charles M.) from western New York state (Farmington, Ontario County) to Indiana and (then in 1849) to Genesee Twp, Whiteside, Illinois, to Hempstead, Waller County, Texas, and Hillsboro, Hill County, Texas.

Present day photos of farm now on Booth homestead, "2nd farmhouse north of SW corner of section 22 on Coleta Rd," Genesee Twp, Whiteside, Illinois

Present day photos of farm now on Booth homestead, "2nd farm north of SW corner of section 22 on Coleta Rd," Genesee Twp, Whiteside, Illinois

Richard also became an attorney...or lawyer.  By 1855 his father had purchased the land for his home and Richard was living in Hillsboro,Texas.

Richard's first wife was Jemima J. Johnson, who gave birth to two children.  When she died the same year as her second child, (1868) Richard didn't long remain a widower with 2 year old WIlliam Lewis, (1866-1940, named after his grandfather.)  On July 20, 1869 he married his second wife, Eugenia Almetta Whitty, in Hillsboro, Texas, where they lived according to the 1870 census.

I think his father William, was living in Hempstead, Texas prior to 1880, though he had returned to Hillsoboro when he died in 1893.  

Richard's son Edwin Whitty Booth was born in 1871 in Hillsboro. The William L. Booth Sr. family home in Hillsboro may have been where Richard was living with his wife and children, but apparently he was working in Hempstead as well.  The top of the following photocopied page names my great-grandmother, Eugenia Almeta Booth, daughter of Richard R. Booth, born in 1873 in Hillsboro, Texas.  They had one other daughter (unnamed) who died at birth in 1875.

The following notes are photo-copied onto his Ancestry.com pages, and give a source of his lineage back to his great grandfather.  It also tells of how he was shot by a man named  Richard Dilk, of Springfield.  Richard Booth died either on July 29, or May 30, 1879, at age 32, in Hempstead, Waller County,Texas.  I think Richard Dilk was said to have been a man he was prosecuting.  (The notes below give date of death in July, while Ancestry.com gives the May date.)

  

Early notes on Booth genealogy

originally by Anna Booth Calder and then by Laurie Mae Booth Calder.

There are maybe a few mistakes in these written records, since William Lewis Booth is said to have been born in Livingston County, NY, rather than Farmington, Ontario County, NY (as Ancestry lists)  I wish the whole page had been copied also, since many dates kind of slide off the edge.

Texas Index Cards, (a source that kept track of Texas biographies I believe,) said Richard R. Booth had been an "attorney 1876-1878, Waller County and Navarro County Judge."  I wish there was access to whatever biography the index card refers.

At one point in my many years, I held a newspaper clipping which told of the murder of Richard R. Booth, which was in the possession of my Great Aunt Margaret.  I can't find any records from Hempstead archives, nor Hillsboro.  I wonder which publication printed that article. 

William Booth Home, 208 N. Waco St. Hillsboro, TX, purchased land on 12 May 1855, (photo 1993)

Grandma Miller moved a few times

Though she had been born in Hillsboro, Texas, she made her home in San Antonio.  She raised her 4 daughters, and probably her grandchildren as well.

My mother's "grandma" is Eugenia Miller, here with my mother, Mataley (age 5) and 2 of her play mates in San Antonio.

I think of their household.  Eugenia and her husband, Charles Mueller (changed to Miller probably when he arrived in America) and their 4 daughters, living in San Antonio, Texas by 1922.  But they had certainly done a little relocating in the years since their marriage in October, 1896 (in Hillsboro, TX).

Charles probably had a schedule of being out of town for long stretches of time as a conductor on the railway.  He came originally from Mecklenberg, Schwerin, Germany.  I don't have the documents that tell when he arrived in the US, but he apparently was still young and landed with either parents or a brother.  And of course I don't know if he was always a conductor.

When the picture was taken in 1922, the Miller daughters were:
Mozelle Booth Miller, (my grandmom) born 1897 Hillsboro, TX. married first in 1915 in San Antonio.
Rowena Eugenia Miller) born 1900 in Hillsboro, TX, (whose first child was born in 1930 in San Antonio, TX, second child born 1939.)
So after these two babies were born in the Booth family town of Hillsboro, if not the actual household, then there were two more born in different towns.
Dorothy Dain Miller, born 1903 Houston, TX (married late, no children)
Margaret Etha Miller, born 1909 in Smithfield, TX, never married, no children.

My mother came along in 1917, in San Antonio TX, and her father died in1919. then she had a step father from 1924 to __________ when he died.  So when this picture was taken, she and her mother were probably living with her grandma.

I looked up Hillsboro, TX, and it's south of Dallas.  Smithfield is a bit southeast of Austin, which is northeast of San Antonio.  There's a lot of distance between all these locations, which must have been determined by Charles' work needs.

Sometime between 1909 in Smithfield and 1922 when the above picture was taken, the Millers moved to San Antonio.  Wait, there's also Mozelle's marriage in 1915 in San Antonio, so they were probably already there at that time.  Isn't this like doing research just by looking at dates and places?

My mother remembered living with her grandmother, and said she spent a lot of time with her "Aunt Margaret" who was just  8 when my mother was born.  So she was a teenager when this picture was taken.  Guess who got to baby sit!

Note to myself, look up date of step grand-dad Munhall's death.

San Antonio house

Once a good idea is born, it should be fed and nurtured.  How about more 69 year olds in my family tree?

Maybe go back another 69 years, beyond Eugenia Almetta Booth Miller's, my great grandmother's birth 69 years before mine.  The next generation back would have been born in 1804. Perhaps still alive during the Civil War.  Next would be someone born in 1735.  That person would have gone through the Revolutionary War, if they were in America at the time, and lived that long.

I do fortunately have documents copied from the Rogers Family Bible which my grandfather typed by  hand as he copied them.  He made 4 carbons, and gave one to my father.  But those records are of my father's family.  So far I've been looking at just my mother's family.

Look at what a neat tie these people's lives have together...some of whom lived 69 years, and what that year of achievement meant, not to mention all the rest of their interesting lives.  And even just having been born 69 years before me, then 69 years before that person...jumping back through our history.

I believe I visited Eugenia Booth Miller's house in the 40's when going from Houston to San Antonio to see my grandmother, Mozelle Booth Miller, who I think lived here herself.  I missed ever meeting Eugenia "Grandma" but I understood that she mostly raised my mother since Mozelle was widowed twice while very young.

I remember arriving in San Antonio at night, and the streets had an interesting drainage system, many of which were flooded.  The fun I remember was driving over humps at each intersection, which sent me bouncing (on the back seat) in a moment of weightlessness.  I giggled, and of course my mother harrumphed, which was her usual comment about my father's driving.  But I do remember that ride as being as good as many an amusement park ride later on.  I also remember later during the day, driving right through several inches of water, over some dam or bridge which was flooded as much of San Antonio was at that time.

If not Grandmommy Mozelle, one of the other daughters (Dorothy Dain Miller or Margaret Etha Miller) might have been living in this home still.  Margaret never married so easily could have stayed in the homestead.  Rowena (the 4th sister) had married a man named Rodgers many years before my mother also married a Rogers.  Since it was spelled differently, everyone assumed there was no relationship.  But I've never tried to trace it.  If you go far enough back, spelling got pretty iffy.

I don't remember my great-grandfather, Charles Herman Miller, who may have been still alive when I was born. I believe he had been a conductor on the railroad.  I did find it strange that my grandmother would never travel by train, but only took airplanes or drove to visit people.  I wonder if he had an train accident or told her something that kept her away from trains.  I personally loved travelling by train as a young girl with my mother from St. Louis to go visit my grandmother and her family in San Antonio.

A map of "The Santa Fé Route" and subsidiary lines, as published in an 1891 issue of the Grain Dealers and Shippers Gazetteer.

More ancestors who were Booths

So this book is becoming much bigger!  Whow.  And I thought I wouldn't have much to say.
Here's more about my great grandmother, Eugenia Almetta Booth Miller.

Booth history, hand written by unknown relative, perhaps my Great Aunt Margaret Miller.  (There is a better copy than this in my files, but this gives you an idea how data used to be saved.  I find several interesting bits of information in it.

The man who shot Richard R. Booth in 1879 was Richard (Dilk) Springfield.  I wonder why there are parentheses around Dilk. I also wonder whether he was then tried for this murder, or if he was already on trial for another murder.

And Richard's first wife died the same day she gave birth to her second son, who lived just 4 months himself.  So many women died with complications from childbirth.

Also interesting is that one of the brothers of Eugenia Almeda Booth (my great-grandmother) was named Edwin Whitty Booth, which is one of the names of a famous actor in the Booth family from which John Wilkes hailed.  Edwin and John Wilkes were 2 of 3 illegitimate sons of Junius Booth, who had 9 siblings.

So there might have been some cousins at that point.  Edwin Whitty Booth lived until 1924, so I dare say he would have known of any connection to the theatrical Booths.  I haven't ever noticed his name before, so that's another line of cousins I could chase when I have time.

Named after Eugenia Booth Miller

I was given Booth (when being named after my great grandmother, her maiden name) as my middle name.  A second cousin had already been named Patricia Eugenia, so my parents thought that they should avoid too many similarities.  Her last name was Rodgers, while mine was Rogers.  Lots of similarity already there.

There was a long line of famous Booths in my family, that apparently my mother and father  were proud of in 1942 Dallas, Texas.  They were attorneys and judges in early Texas.  They weren't related (that I could ever discern) to John Wilkes Booth from post-Civil War infamy.

However, when we moved to St. Louis when I was 8, I found out that all the "Yankees" knew about him and I preferred to not tell anyone my middle name and explain all about how we weren't related, which I had quickly asked my parents.  How would you like to be a pre-teen named after an assassin?  It kind of put a damper on fun on the playground for a while!

Eugenia was born after her father, RIchard R. Booth, had remarried, when his first wife had died and he had a 2 year old son.
Eugenia had also been her mother's name, Eugenia Almetta (or Almeda) Whitty Booth.
Richard R. Booth, my great-grandmother's father died when she was 6 years old.  He was shot by a person he was prosecuting in Hempstead, Texas.
Richard R. Booth, incidentally, was the son of Judge William Lewis Booth, who did fight for the Confederacy as a Colonel.

Eugenia, as I noted elsewhere, was a matriarch in my mother's family, raising both her own 4 daughters, and my mother as well.  Her husband was a conductor for the railroad.

The Booth home in Hillsboro, Texas.  I found this picture on Ancestors.com