My
Huff/Pharis/Carter cousin Barbara challenged me to research 15 families living
in close proximity on the 1850 census of Jackson County, Tennessee. This is the
third family in the series: Caleb Roberts, his wife Sally Huff, and their
children, Simon, Nancy, Nathan, James (Polk), Amy/Anna, and Lucinda. The
families enumerated on either side of them are William and Elizabeth (Pharis)
Lambert and Samuel and Lucinda (Hardcastle) Huff.
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| 1850 census, Jackson County TN |
This
family is of particular interest to me because Caleb Roberts was the brother of
my 2nd great-grandfather Stephen Roberts, and Sally Huff is thought
to be the sister of my 2nd great-grandmother Elzina Huff. As I
research this family, let’s see if I can find documents that support those
conclusions.
First,
what information can I cull from the 1850 census? Caleb Roberts is generally
given a birth year of 1810. On this census he is age 42, making his birth year
about 1808. His occupation is farming. Sarah (Sally) is 34 and has indicated
that she cannot read or write. Simon, age 10, has attended school in the past
year, but that column is not marked for any of the other children. Nancy is age
9, Nathan is 7, James is 5, Amy is 3, and Lucinda is 8 months. All were born in
Tennessee.
Comparing
families from census to census is always enlightening and sometimes confusing. Sometimes
the names and dates are so different that you wonder if you have the right
family. However, once I found the 1840 census for Caleb’s family, it was pretty
straightforward. (I almost didn’t find it and wouldn’t have if I hadn’t been
scrolling through the District 15 enumeration for Jackson County. Because
Caleb’s name was abbreviated as “Robts,” he didn’t show up in a search of the 1840
census for Jackson County.) Caleb’s family in 1840 consisted of 1 male age
20-30, 1 female age 20-30, and 1 male under 5.
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| 1840 census, Jackson County TN |
By
1860 Caleb and Sally had added two more children to their family and lost two. This
time Caleb was 58 and Sally was 44. Simon was 20, Nathan was 16, Polk (James)
was 15, Anna (Amy?) was 13. The two additions to the family were Caleb, age 6,
and Joshua, age 3. Missing are the oldest daughter, Nancy, and the youngest
from the 1850 census, Lucinda. While it appears that Lucinda must have died, I
think that Nancy had married and was still living in Jackson County.
A
search in Jackson County for a Nancy, born about 1841, turned up one result in
District 15 in 1860: Family #114 consisted of Mat J. Anderson, age 26, his wife
Nancy D., age 19, and daughter Arcadia, 2 months. In 1870 M.J. Anderson with
wife Nancy is again enumerated in District 15, Jackson County, as Family #120.
Children enumerated are Aaron B., age 10; A.B. (female), age 8 (Arcadia?);
Elizabeth, age 6; William, age 4; and Mat J., age 2. Family #121 is Mat’s father
Jubal, age 78. Family #122 is Samuel and Lucinda (Hardcastle) Huff.
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| 1870 census, Jackson Co. TN, Mat & Nancy (Roberts) Anderson |
The 1870 census is one of those ones that make you wonder if you are even talking
about the same family. The head of household is L.C., age 60. His wife Sarah is
55—amazing how they get closer in age as the years go by! They are living in
District 3. Nathaniel (Nathan?), age 25, and wife Leah, and J.P. (James Polk),
age 23, and wife Mary, had both married within the year and were living with
the young men’s parents, along with their brother Josiah (Joshua?), age 12. (Nathan
married Leah Spurlock, and James Polk married Mary Ann Haley, so this is no
doubt the right family, even with the discrepancies in birth dates and names.)
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| 1870 census, Jackson County TN L.C. & Sarah Roberts |
The
1880 census shows five related Roberts (enumerated “Roberds”) families living
right in a row in District 11. Josiah, age 22, has married Penelope (Hargis),
and they have a 1-year-old daughter Dora. Nathan and Leah have two children,
Drury and Lee. Living with them is their ne’er-do-well uncle (my 2nd
great-grandfather), Stephen Roberts. (Fairly definitive proof that Caleb and
Stephen were, in fact, brothers.) Caleb, age 69, and Sarah, age 61, are living
alone. Simon, with his wife California, have 5 daughters and 1 son, ranging in
age from 13 to 3. James K. (Polk) and Mary also have 6 children, ages 9 to 2
months.
Amazingly
enough, Caleb was still living when the 1900 census was taken. He was 90 years
old (I guess he finally settled on a birth year of 1810) and resided with his
oldest son Simon, still in Jackson County.
Since
lack of records and DNA evidence have brought into question the parents of
Elzina Huff, I have begun to question everything that has been said about the
Huff sisters. Most researchers of the family have accepted the fact that
Roberts brothers (Caleb and Stephen) married Huff sisters (Sally and Elzina),
but I’ve never found evidence for the common parents of Sally and Elzina, or
even the fact that Huff was their last name.
That’s
why I was pleased to find the death certificate of Nathan A. Roberts on Family
Search, the LDS site. He died on 9 July 1920 at the age of 76. The death
certificate lists his parents as Calab Roberts and Sallie Huff.
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| Death certificate of Nathan A. Roberts |
Then I found a death
certificate for “Joe Sire” Roberts. Surely this is supposed to be Josiah. (You
have to love our ancestors, their hillbilly drawls, and lack of spelling
skills!) The certificate states that he was born on 3 September 1852 in Jackson
County and died 23 April 1943. The informant for the certificate was Cora
Roberts, who was a daughter of Josiah Roberts, according to the 1910 census in
Jackson Co. On this census Josiah’s wife is not the Penelope of the 1880
census, but a woman named Dona Denson whom he married in 1888. According to
Joe Sire’s death certificate, his father was “Kaylep” Roberts and his mother
was Sallie Holleman! What the heck?
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| Death certificate of Josiah "Joe Sire" Roberts |
Just
for the record, I have absolutely no DNA matches with Holleman descendants. My
matches with the Huffs have to come from somewhere. For now I’m choosing to
believe that Sally Huff was Caleb’s wife and that she and my Elzina had some
kind of connection—either as sisters, half-sisters, or even cousins. So, until
I find out differently, Elzina was a Huff married to Stephen Roberts, who was
definitely the brother of Caleb.
And,
you know what? I do have a large DNA match to Brenda, who is a descendant of
James K. (Polk) Roberts, son of Caleb and Sally. And I have another large DNA
match to Ed, who is a descendant of Nathan A. Roberts, son of Caleb and Sally. Because
some of those segments match those of Huff descendants not related to the
Roberts, I know that I have Huff DNA. Now if I could just figure out how Elzina
got that name.
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| James K. "Polk" and Mary Ann (Haley) Roberts photo borrowed from my Brenda cousins |
