5 February 1997 i
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1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1
1.1. Job St. John and his wife Sarah (----) . . . . . . . . .1
1.1.1. Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2
1.1.2. Matthew St. John and his wife Jemima Pelham. . . . .2
1.2. James Lockwood and his wife Mary Norton. . . . . . . . .3
1.2.1. Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .3
2. Samuel St. John. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4
2.1. Birth Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4
2.2. Military Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5
2.3. Marriage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5
2.4. Death Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .5
3. Thankful Lockwood. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6
3.1. Birth Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6
3.2. Second Husband . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6
3.3. Death Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6
4. Family History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6
4.1. Church Affiliation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6
4.2. Migrations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7
4.3. Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7
4.4. Lewis St. John . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8
4.4.1. Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8
4.5. Anna St. John. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9
4.5.1. Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9
4.5.2. Second Husband . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9
4.6. Family Reunions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9
5. Greenfield, New York, and St. Johns. . . . . . . . . . . . 10
6. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Index. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .i
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James Nohl Churchyard
1694 Santa Margarita Drive
Fallbrook, CA 92028-1639
5 February 1997 1
The parentage for both of this couple does not appear in the readily accessible sources. The entry for this family begins on page 511 of The St. John Genealogy {1}. He is shown as an "unclassified" person with no known link to the primary lines of descent shown in the first part of the book. The Lockwood Genealogy {10} does not show the marriage of a Thankful to a Samuel St. John. So her parentage is not explicit.
This article collects information from various sources and proves the proper connections to the immigrant ancestors: Matthias St. John and Edmund Lockwood.
Job St. John[5] (Samuel[4], Matthias[3, 2, 1]) is the probable father of this Samuel St. John, as will be shown. Job was the son of Samuel St. John and his wife Rebecca Olmsted of Cortlandt Manor, Westchester County, New York. His wife was Sarah (----), surname and parentage unknown.
Few records exist documenting this couple's lives. He was a member of the South Salem, New York, church on 28 July 1753. {28} That church was founded 19 May 1752 as a Congregational Church when the site was part of Fairfield County, CT. A later border change put it into Westchester County, NY. In 1763 it changed to Presbyterian.
According to his son's (Matthew) pension affidavit the family moved to New Marlborough, Ulster County, about 1768 or 1769. On 3 June 1773 he and his brother Daniel St. John and the latter's wife (also named Sarah) sold land to Nathan Olmsted. Job St. John is described as of "Newborough, Ulster Co., N. Y." Apparently Job's wife was deceased by this time as her name is not on the deed. {1: 114}
In July 1775 Job St. John and his sons Josiah, Matthew, Noah, and Samuel signed the Marlborough Articles of Association His brother, Ebenezer St. John was also a signer {20a, 21:97}. On 13 August 1777 Job was entered as an exempt in Capt. Jacob Wood's Company, Fourth Regiment, New York militia. This company was centered around northeast Marlborough, near Newburgh {12, 21:110}. Exempts were composed of older or infirm men and were assigned mainly to guard duty.
Under the heading "Residents from 1779 to 1788" he appears as follows: "Nathaniel Kelsey and Job St. John had large holdings north of Milton." This Milton is a suburb of Marlborough {26}.
On 26 November 1785 he notified the Marlborough town clerk that he was holding a stray red heifer of two years old and upward {21:204}. In 1788 he and four of his sons were listed for road work. His assessment was six days work, which reflects a higher than average property standing in the town. {20b} He does not appear on a similar list of 1799, though his brother Ebenezer does.
No wills or letters of administration have been found for this couple.
| i. | John St. John | born 2 February 1750, died in Hamilton County, Ohio, 5 July 1819, married in 1770 Anna Lockwood who died 23 August 1830. |
| ii. | Noah St. John | baptized 9 August 1752, m. Lois Bloomer |
| iii. | Matthew St. John | baptized 7 July 1754 in South Salem, died 28 June 1836, married 1 June 1772 Eleanor Pelham or Pelm {1}. See below for further information on this couple. |
| iv. | Samuel St. John | baptized 24 October 1756 in South Salem. This is the subject of this article. |
| v. | Adam St. John | baptized 19 November 1758, married Sarah (-), served in the Revolution, moved about 1790 to Lamb's Corners, Township of Westerlo, Albany County, NY {35}. |
| vi. | Eunice St. John | baptized 26 October 1760, married ca. 1780 Thomas Kelsey. They removed to Montgomery County, Virginia and then to Dearborn County, Indiana. He died there 30 April 1835, she died there in 1833. They had ten children {22}, {37}. |
| vii. | Joseph St. John | baptized in April 1763 |
The data given in Reference 1 contain several errors, so the following note on this couple is appropriate.
He testified in his pension application that he was born 27 June 1754 at Cortlandt Manor, Westchester County. This seems more likely than the December birth date in {1}, given that he was baptized in early July 1754. He moved to New Marlborough, Ulster County, at about 14 or 15 years of age. Presumably he moved with his parents, so this establishes the date of the family's move.
They settled in Lamb's Corners, Westerlo Township, Albany County, NY. This is the intersection (now) of Albany County routes 409 and 403. He received a pension until his death at Westerlo, Albany County on 28 June 1836. The value of the pension was $41.10 per annum.
His widow then applied for a pension on 6 December 1836. She stated that her maiden name was Jemima Pellam, and that they were married 1 June 1772 at Poundridge, Westchester County, by Andrew Mead, a Presbyterian minister. She was 80 years old in 1836, so born about 1756 {25}. By this marriage she had eleven children, six of whom were living in 1836.
Perhaps she misremembered the minister's name: Solomon Mead was the pastor of the South Salem Presbyterian Church from 1752 to 1800 {32}. If so, their marriage should be found in {28}.
James Lockwood[4] (Joseph[3], Edmund[2], Edmund[1]), was the son of Joseph and Margery (Webb) Lockwood. He was born on 15 July 1722 at Stamford, Connecticut. He apparently died between 1777 and 1779 in Westchester County, New York. He married 5 September 1741 at Stamford Mary Norton, daughter of Hugh Norton (further parentage unknown). James Lockwood was appointed administrator of the estate of his brother-in-law Nathaniel Norton on 9 September 1741. The will had been probated at Stamford on the day of the marriage four days earlier.
James Lockwood and his wife Mary Norton were of Stamford on 4 January 1743 (1743/4?) when they sold land there inherited from her brother Nathaniel "that was his father's Hugh Norton" to William King. They were of Old Pound Ridge on 27 November 1755 when they acknowledged the transfer and when the deed was recorded on 29 November 1755. In a deed dated 30 May 1774 he is described as being of the Manor of Cortlandt. He was a member of the Cortlandt Manor committee which heard charges against William Wallace of Salem. His name does not appear on the tax list of 1779, so it is assumed that he died between 1777 and 1779, but no death record, will, or place of burial has been located. Neither he nor his wife appears in the 1790 Census in New York or Connecticut {10}.
| i. | Mary Lockwood | born 3 March 1741/2, baptized with the next four children in a group on 21 June 1758 in St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut |
| ii. | Susannah Lockwood | baptized 21 June 1758. Is she the one who appears as head of a family consisting of two women in the 1790 Census of Poundridge? {18} |
| iii. | Anna Lockwood | baptized 21 June 1758. She is probably the person who married John St. John, the son of Job and Sarah (---) St. John. |
| iv. | Jacob Lockwood | baptized 21 June 1758, probably born about 1750, died 11 January 1816, aged 66 years, buried in the Poundridge cemetery at Murphy's Corners. He is said to have married Mary Pelham (or Pellum). |
| v. | Deborah Lockwood | baptized 21 June 1758 |
| vi. | Lydia Lockwood | baptized 29 June 1760 at St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford. She is said to have married Elisha Pelham (Pellum), perhaps the man of the name who died 22 April 1833 in Ridgefield, Ct. |
| vii. | Thankful Lockwood | baptized in May 1762. She is almost certainly the person who married Samuel St. John in 1781. She should not be confused with the person of the same name who was the daughter of Ephraim Lockwood and his wife Thankful Grummon, baptized 27 April 1746 and who married James Benedict on 25 May 1763 in New Canaan, CT. |
The following subsections detail the research results relative to Samuel St. John. It is shown that his birth date is consistent with that of the son of Job St. John.
The St. John Genealogy attempts to carry the descent of the son of Job and Sarah (----) St. John on by stating that he married Betty (----) who died in Ridgefield, CT, on 27 August 1796 {1: 193}. The only named child of this couple is given as Mary, baptized (no date) in Greenfield, Saratoga Co., New York. As will be shown later, she is the child of Samuel and Thankful (Lockwood) St. John.
Samuel St. John is most likely that person who was baptized in South Salem, New York on 24 October 1756, the son of Job and Sarah (---) St. John. It appears the correspondents from the descendants of this couple provided many erroneous vital statistics. And these errors precluded the correct identification during the compilation of Reference 1.
Reference 1 gives his birthdate as 12 August 1760. Differing obituary notices place his birth year in approximately 1749 or 1754 {2, 3}. His son, in applying for a survivors' pension, gives the date of his parents' marriage as 1781. If Samuel was born in 1760, then he married at the age of 21 -- a rather young age. The 1800 census shows his age as "over 45," so he was born in or before 1756. Hence it appears from several different sources that the 1760 birth year in {1} is too late by several years.
That Samuel St. John served in the military during the Revolution is clear: the obituaries state it and his son filed a power of attorney for a pension based on his services {4}. The pension file at the National Archives is labeled R---. It now contains only Lewis St. John's power of attorney. However, in file R9146, pension application of Lois St. John, appears a letter which obviously belongs in file R---. It is by the justice of the peace who certified Lewis St. John's power of attorney and is addressed to Lewis's pension agent. It mentions a deposition that Samuel St. John made to support the pension application of W. M. Baker. It encloses a relevant letter of an heir of Samuel St. John's. Another letter, describing the circumstances of making this deposition -- apparently when the family lived in Greenfield -- is mentioned. Where are this deposition and the letters now? {33}
Family tradition says that he was a captain and that he served at the famous battle of Stony Point. Adam St. John and Samuel St. John were privates and Noah St. John a corporal in Capt. Ostrander's Co., Col. Johnson's Regt., New York militia {9: 461}. A Samuel St. John, of Hadley, Saratoga Co., was an orderly sergeant in Col. Willet's Regiment. Perhaps it is more than coincidence that our Samuel lived near Hadley much later (1800 census).
Could he have been that Capt. St. John who, with others, was appointed to a committee to ensure that no Tories attempted to come back into Bedford after the peace? {19: 423}
The Samuel St. John who was a captain in Col. McKinstry's Regiment in April 1781 at Troy, New York, {9: 538} was not the subject of this sketch. Lt.-Col. John McKinstry, in an affidavit made in Columbia County on 1 March 1808, stated that he appointed a Capt. Samuel St. John, from Stockbridge, Massachusetts, in his regiment, but that the Captain was subsequently detached to a different command. {27}
As mentioned before, the only record of his marriage date is from the affidavit filed by his son Lewis for a revolutionary pension. This states that this couple were married in 1781.
Reference 1 gives his date of death as 8 March 1819. However, References 2, 3, and 4 all concur in stating his death date as 27 September 1819. He died in the Village of Hamburg, Erie County, New York. He is probably buried in the village burying ground which has since had the stones removed and is now a park. No will or letters of administration relative to his estate have been found.
The research results relative to Thankful Lockwood are given in the following subsection. The preponderance of evidence supports her placement as above.
Thankful Lockwood, according to Reference 1, was born 1 March 1764. Again, these data are probably in error. She is almost certainly the daughter of James and Mary (Norton) Lockwood. Their daughter Thankful was baptized in May 1762 at St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut {10}.
She married secondly Simeon Clark, of Clarksburg, Erie County, on 7 September 1828. Simeon Clark was born 17 November 1754 in Wrentham, Massachusetts. According to Reference 13 he settled in the hollow on Eighteen Mile Creek about 1820. He built the grist mill that was still in operation in 1898; he also built a saw mill and a shop for making spinning wheels. He made his will on 19 January 1839 which left all his possessions to his wife Thankful and after her death to her daughter Anna Chadington. His own two daughters and two sons were left with one dollar apiece {24}. He died in Eden on 25 April 1841. The post office with the name of Clarksburg was opened in 1842.
According to Reference 1, she died on 3 October 1843 in Eden, Erie County, New York. However, according to Reference 4 she died on 30 October 1843.
The known history of this family unit is summarized in the following subsections.
Thankful St. John was admitted to the Bedford Presbyterian Church in Bedford, Westchester County, New York, on 4 November 1787 {1}. The baptisms of their daughters Mary and Anna were performed in the Congregational Church of Greenfield, Saratoga County. {7, 8}
The First Presbyterian Church of Orchard Park, Erie County, New York, was organized on 16 January 1817. Thankful St. John was one of the original fourteen members {11}. This church became Congregational and its present records date from that change in 1853 {34}.
Judging from the sparse records, this family first lived in Bedford, Westchester County. There he witnessed an apprenticeship indenture of James Burrell on 18 March 1790 along with Ebenezer Lockwood {30}. The 1790 census of New York lists the family in Poundridge, Westchester County, with one man over 16, two boys under 16, and four females. This is the only listing for a Samuel St. John in the State of New York.
Shortly after the census they moved to Greenfield, Saratoga County. There the family appears on the 1800 Census as follows: 1 male over 45, 1 male 16-26, 1 male 10-16, and 1 male under 10; 1 female 26-45, 1 female 10-16, and 1 female under 10. The family appears in Saratoga County on the 1810 Census with the expected statistics relative to the age of the members. In this Census another Samuel St. John appears in Delaware County as the head of a younger family.
Then, about the time of the War of 1812, the family moved to the township of Hamburg or Eden in Erie County, New York.
| i. | Samuel St. John | m. Mary Eggleston 10 September 1812, Hadley Township, Saratoga Co. He served in the War of 1812 in Buffalo, New York. He died 16 February 1866 and his widow applied for a pension on 1 May 1871, aged 75, and so born about 1796. They lived at Washington, Erie Co., PA. {38} |
| ii. | Lewis St. John | born 13 April 1784, married Margaret Matteson. See below for an account of this family. |
| iii. | Hezekiah St. John | m. and had a son John St. John. |
| iv. | Elizabeth St. John | born 7 July 1791 in Saratoga County, died at Eden, New York 7 March 1865, married firstly John Mills, secondly Dr. William White. |
| v. | Mary St. John | baptized 6 December 1795 in Greenfield, Saratoga County. {7}, married Jeremiah Colvin of East Hamburg. They also lived at Washington, Erie Co., PA {36}. |
| vi. | Clarissa St. John | married Nathaniel Eggleston |
| vii. | Sarah St. John | married Thomas Haggerty |
| viii. | Anna St. John | baptized 29 July 1804, Greenfield, Saratoga County, {8}. Married firstly Welcome Chadderdon, secondly Benjamin Clark. See further account below. |
Lewis St. John was born 13 April 1784, probably in Westchester County, NY. {29} He died at Mill Village, Erie County, PA, on 9 October 1874. {31}
His wife was Margaret Matteson. She was born 13 July 1784 and died 5 April 1855, according to family Bible, aged 69 years 10 months, 5 days. {29} However, the proper reckoning, given her dates, is that she was 70 years, 8 months, and 23 days old. Obviously the information needs further verification.
They were married 18 September 1805. {29} As the St. John family was still living in Greenfield, Saratoga County, NY, at that time presumably that is where the marriage took place.
They must have moved with others of the family after the War of 1812 to Eden, NY. They lived at Washington, Erie Co., PA, in the 1830's {36}. He filed a power of attorney for a pension based on his father's services in 1852 from Crawford County, PA {4} .
| i. | Joseph Smith St. John | born 2 October 1806 |
| ii. | Sarah St. John | born 5 October 1808 |
| iii. | Samuel Lockwood St. John | born 21 December 1810, was killed by falling tree, 5 May 1846 |
| iv. | Lewis M. St. John | born 11 March 1814 |
| v. | Alonzo St. John | born 13 April 1816, died 15 September 1819 |
| vi. | Ina St. John | born 11 August 1818, "deceast this life September 22 1819." |
| vii. | Reuben Green St. John | born 31 July 1820, married Philena Lackey (1822 - 1882) |
| viii. | Orin B. St. John | born 3 December 1822 |
| ix. | Marvin St. John | born 9 May 1825, married Margaret Sherred |
Note that the death date of Samuel St. John, Lewis's father, is 22 September 1819, the same as Ina's and close to the date of Alonzo's death. Perhaps these three died of the same cause and are buried together.
Anna St. John and her first husband are the author's ancestors. As the information given for this family is greatly in error in Reference 1, a brief corrective notice is in order.
Anna St. John was baptized on 29 July 1804 as above noted. She died 25 September 1886 in the Town of Eden, Erie County, New York {17}. Her age is incorrectly noted on the death certificate as 83 years and 3 months. Her father's name is incorrectly noted as John St. John!
She married firstly Welcome Chadderdon before 1820. He is the Wellcome Betts Chadderdon, the son of Abraham Chadderdon and his wife Lydia Stone, who was born in Whiting, Addison County, Vermont on 7 October 1793. {23} He appears on an 1827 tax payers list in the Town of Eden. No further data on him has been found, but he apparently died fairly young. This surname appears in the records several times as Chaddingdon and variants thereof -- apparently the second syllable was not clearly pronounced by these people.
| i. | Sarah Jane Chadderdon | born 5 October 1820, died 21 July 1911, married Adam Young, and moved to Berlin, Wisconsin. |
| ii. | Laura Chadderdon | primary beneficiary of her mother's will |
| iii. | Jacob L. Chadderdon | mentioned in his mother's will |
According to family tradition Sarah Jane (Chadderdon) Young claimed to be a cousin of Millard Fillmore. How this could be has never been clarified.
Anna St. John married secondly her stepbrother, Benjamin Clark. This could not have been before 1837 when his first wife was killed by a rolling log. And it was probably after the 1839 will of his father which left her the residue of her stepfather's estate. In 1866 they were living about two miles south of the Village of Hamburg on the road to Eden. No children of this second marriage are known.
The family held reunions for many years and maintained an active family association. Printed souvenirs were issued commemorating these occasions {14, 15, and 16}. These attest to the fine sentiments of the age but unfortunately lack in substantive historical value. They do mention names of the various individuals involved, but in a haphazard fashion.
Other families of the St. John surname were resident in this village in Saratoga County during the period of 1790-1810. Was this coincidence or was it a joint migration by near relatives to take up new land together?
First, Captain John St. John was born in Ridgefield, CT on 11 April 1753, served in the Continental Army during the Revolution, moved to Greenfield afterward and died there 22 October 1825. He was the son of Samuel and Sarah (Wallace) St. John. His widow's will was dated 12 July 1838 and probated in 1839. Although apparently eligible to join the Society of the Cincinnati he did not and no successor has represented him in the Society. If the conclusions of this study are correct then John St. John was a first cousin of our Samuel St. John.
One of Capt. John St. John' brothers, James St. John, moved to Milton in Saratoga County. His wife was Jerusha Thomas. He served in the Revolution before moving to Milton, New York, where he died in February 1829, aged 92.
Another St. John associated with Greenfield was Adam Leach St. John, born in Albany County in 1781, died in Minnesota in 1870. He was the son of Matthew St. John and Jemima Pellam mentioned above. He married Eleanor Fergusson and had many children, several of whom are mentioned in connection with Greenfield: Elizabeth St. John, whose husband Moses Wood died in Greenfield Center; Jemima St. John, whose husband Pickett Wood died in Greenfield Center; and Eliza St. John who married Nelson Wood and had a son Lewis Wood living in Greenfield about 1900. If the conclusions of this study are correct then Adam Leach St. John was a nephew of our Samuel St. John.
5 February 1997 i
Samuel St. John and his wife Thankful Lockwood
[The numbers are the page numbers on which the names occurred in the original ASCII plaintext version of this file; links on numbers go to the point where the corresponding page began in the text file.]
Baker, W. M. 5 Reed, Linda St. John 12
Benedict, James 4 Sherred, Margaret 8
Bloomer, Lois 2 St. John, 8
Burrell, James 7 Adam 2
Chadderdon, Abraham 9 Adam Leach 10
Jacob L. 9 Anna 8
Laura 9 Bert 11, 12
Sarah Jane 9 Clarissa 8
Welcome 8, 9 Daniel 1
Wellcome Betts 9 Ebenezer 1
Cincinnati Eliza 10
Society of the 10 Elizabeth 7, 10
Clark, Benjamin 8, 9 Eunice 2
Simeon 6 Hezekiah 7
Colvin, Jeremiah 7 James 10
Eggleston, Mary 7 Jemima 10
Nathaniel 8 Job 1
Fergusson, Eleanor 10 John 2
Fillmore, Millard 9 Captain John 10
Gerstenberger, Violet 12 Joseph 2
Grummon, Thankful 4 Lewis 7, 8
Haggerty, Thomas 8 Lois 5
Helck, Catherine R. 12 Mary 7
Kelsey, Nathaniel 1 Matthew 2
Thomas 2 Matthias 1
King, William 3 Noah 2
Lackey, Philena 8 Samuel 1, 4
Lockwood, Anna 2, 3 Sarah 8
Deborah 4 Stone, Lydia 9
Ebenezer 7 Swanson, Sharon 12
Edmund 3 Thomas, Jerusha 10
Ephraim 4 Wallace, Sarah 10
Jacob 4 William 3
James 3 Webb, Margery 3
Joseph 3 White, Dr. William 7
Lydia 4 Wood, Capt. Jacob 1
Mary 3 Lewis 10
Susannah 3 Moses 10
Thankful 1, 4 Nelson 10
Matteson, Margaret 7, 8 Pickett 10
McKinstry, Lt.-Col. John 5 Young, Adam 9
Mead, Andrew 3
Solomon 3
Mills, John 7
Norton, Hugh 3
Mary 3
Nathaniel 3
Olmsted, Nathan 1
Rebecca 1
Pelham, Eleanor 2
Elisha 4
Mary 4
Pellam, Jemima 3
Peterson, Bertha 10
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