Be able to name all 16 of my great great grandparents

John T. Vaughn and Margaret Woodburn are the parents of my great-grandmother Julia Ann Vaughn. At this point, I don’t know a whole lot about these two GG grandparents, other than their names and that they were lived in Indiana. I do know that one or both of them died when my great-grandmother Julia was fairly young, and then she was sent to Kansas to live with one of her uncles on the Woodburn side of the family. And that is where she met my great-grandfather, Mansir Stewart.

I don’t know that much about this set of GG grandparents, but thanks to the obituary for thier son (my great-grandfather Tom Temple) I do know their names. My great-great grandfather was named John Thomas Temple, and his wife was Jane Temple. The obituary doesn’t mention her maiden name. They homesteaded in Lincoln County Missouri, having moved there from North Carolina in the early 1840s. Once they arrived in Missouri, they suffered a number of tragedies in rapid succession (again, according to this 1916 obituary for their son which I have.) First, the wife Jane died from an illness shortly after arriving in Missouri. They had a daughter who also died from an illness. Then one of their sons drowned. Then , in 1848, the father left on a wagon train to go to California and “was never heard from again”. When he left, he sent the remaining two children (boys aged about 6 and 8) to work and live at his neighbor’s farm. Fortunately, the brothers were able to live with the neighbor until they were adults and got married. Incidentally, the two brothers (James and Tom) married two sisters.

Life was certainly hard back in those days!

Whew! Six of the GGG’s down, ten to go…some of these are going to be very tough!

Until last week, my knowledge of my Dad’s Mother’s Father’s parents was obscure at best. Fortunately, my letter to Dad’s cousin turned up a wealth of information on this side of the family! These GG Grandparents were pioneers/farmers in the state of Wisconsin, having lived previously in Quebec. Their names are Denis (Dionyse) Veilleux and Marie Marguerite Alix.

Regarding Denis and Marguerite (Margaret), in my great Grandfather’s 1938 obituary: “a highly esteemed pioneer couple, whose old home was a few miles away [from my Great Grandfather William Veilleux’s house], west along Apple River on the farm now owned by John O’Martell.”

Great great grandfather Isaac Turner was married to Elizabeth Hawkins.
Birth: 20 Jul 1828 in Charlotte, New Brunswick
Death: 2 Oct 1905 in Little Current, Manitoulin Island, Ontario of Bowel disturbance
Burial: 1905 Mountain View Cemetery, Manitoulin Island, Ontario

Great great grandmother Elizabeth Hawkins.
Birth: Abt 1831 in St. John, New Brunswick
Death: 23 Mar 1896 in Little Current, Manitoulin Island, Ontario of gastritis

Elizabeth was the daughter of William Hawkins and mother to Byron Hawkins Turner. Byron was father to Helen Turner (wife of Charles Chantler Jeffery) whose son was my father Peter Turner Jeffery.

Elizabeth’s maiden name is Nicholls.
I now know all 16 of my great great grandparents.

Now the next step is to complete all 32 of my great great great grandparents!

I have found the following great great grandparents:
Charles Buttle m. Mary Clayton

John Edward Bentley m. Elizabeth Midgley

John Allison m. Elizabeth unknown

George Abel m. Mary Ann Thompson

William Wotton m. Maria Mortimore

Richard Potter m. Maria Treloar

William Henry Windmill m. Rebecca Ann Hawes

James Laver m. Martha Sarah Revening

George Abel I believe is really the father of my great grandmother. I had my doubts before.

Illegitamacy is always difficult to prove but he signed as her father at her marriage and the last of her childrens’ birth certificate says that her maiden name was Abel although the earlier ones say Thompson (the informant is a Ms Abel who says she is aunt to the baby).

Now I just have to find Elizabeth’s maiden name and I’m done.

born March 15, 1817
died March 10, 1889

Married to Edward Jeffery. Mother to Frederick W. Jeffery whose child was Charles Chantler Jeffery whose child was Peter Turner Jeffery whose child was me.

born Jan 12, 1817 in Cornwall, England.
died April 22, 1871

Son of Stephen Jeffery and Anne Mary Gardner of Illogen, Cornwall.

Father of Frederick W. Jeffery whose son was Charles Chantler Jeffery whose son was Peter Turner Jeffery, my birth father.

The second set of my great-grandparents which I have found out quite a lot of information about are named Eliphalet Stewart and Lucy Tilley. (Ohmygosh is “Eliphalet” a unique name or what? Another aside….there are quite a few men from New England with that name and they all seem to be related!)

Anyway, my GG Grandfather Eliphalet Stewart was born in New York state sometime in the early 1800s. His wife, Lucy Tilley, was also born in New York State, and they were married in the town of Grafton, New York on June 5, 1830. According to one biography which I found on the Internet, Eliphalet died in Oklahoma and was reported to be 97 years old when he died. Eliphalet and Lucy had nine children, one of whom was my great-grandfather named Mansir Stewart. They left the state of New York and moved to Kansas sometime before 1850. Lucy passed away in Kansas in 1850.

This is the branch of my family that I can trace back the farthest. Lucy Tilley is also related to the Cutler family, and there were lots of people in that family in the early colonial days.