The Orphans

Despite having nine children from three marriages (see The Mysterious Tillman), James Jordan Summers, Lucinda Russel, Rosetta Cole, and Tillman Andrew were short-lived. Tillman lasted the longest, dying (by his own hand) around age 48. Lucinda passed around 45, James Jordan about 38, Rosetta under 25. By 1897, or so, all four parents were dead. And what happened to the orphans? Here are their stories, combined with charts in hopes of simplifying things.

In 1900 William and Mary were living with their Aunt and Uncle.

In 1900 James Jordan and Rosetta (Cole) Summers’s children, William and Mary Elizabeth had moved in with (or been "farmed out" to) their aunt and uncle Amanda and Squire (also, “Esquire”) Mooney in Lisman, Webster Co, Kentucky. Amanda was Rosetta Cole’s sister.

Albert and Mary Elizabeth Craig.
 (Katharyn Silva Belew, Ancestry.com.)

Born 23 Oct 1884, in McLeansboro, Hamilton Co, Illinois, Mary Elizabeth Summers lived only briefly with her aunt and uncle. On 16 Nov 1900 she married William David Keller in Henderson Co, Kentucky, a marriage that ended in divorce in 1910. Mary next married Joseph Eich in Knox Co, Indiana, 5 Nov 1917, and when Joseph died on 13 Jan 1944, she married Albert Granville Craig in 1948. Mary died 22 Dec 1965 in Vincennes, Indiana. Despite three marriages, Mary Elizabeth had but a single child, Carlus Clinton Keller, product of her first marriage.

We know a lot about Mary Elizabeth but almost nothing about her brother, William Summers, who is found in the 1900 census as a nephew living with Amanda and Squire Mooney and is never seen again. That census gives his date of birth as Oct 1881 with Kentucky as his unexpected birthplace.

By the time that Lucinda, the last living parent, died, some of the orphaned descendants were no longer children. Tillman and Lucinda’s three oldest were married, all three in Franklin Co, Illinois—William Andrews to Hester Hutchcraft on 5 Jun 1894, Lewis Robert Andrews to Nancy Ella Kerney on 11 Jul 1895, and Thomas B. Andrews to Marjorie M. Waller on 3 Dec 1896.

By the time their parents had died, the three oldest Andrews were married.

And by 1900, the unmarried Andrews, the three youngest—Lawrence, Nora, and Anna Mae—were living with their married brother Lewis Robert in Northern Twp. Franklin Co. Also living with Lewis Robert in 1900 was his half brother, ten-year-old John William Summers, the youngest of all the offspring. That John William was taken in by Lewis was probably the reason that John and his future wife, Verne, maintained contacts throughout their lives with Tillman’s children and grandchildren. And many of John and Verne's descendants did the same.

The subject of our next blog is where John William Summers and his Andrews half-siblings ended up.

James and Rosetta

Marriage License Cover

The descendants of William K Summers have been extensively researched by Judith (“Judy”) Somers, wife of Dale Somers, William K’s great grandson. (The spelling of the last name was changed.) Before Judy died in 1992, she corresponded with Verne (Crabtree) Summers, wife of James Jordan’s son from his third marriage, John William Summers (see The Mysterious Tillman Andrew), passing on abstracts of Illinois courthouse records. Among the abstracted records were those of James Jordan’s 1879 marriage to Rosetta “Caul” in Hamilton Co. There were two highly questionable things in the abstracts. First was the claim that the records showed this to be James’s second marriage. He had apparently been married once before, but to whom nobody knows. Second was Rosetta’s middle name, transcribed by Judy as “Filone,” and changed by some to “Trilone” or “Frilone.” And it would be interesting to see if Rosetta’s family name was really given as “Caul.” It seems like a good time to take a look at digital copies of the original records, rather than abstracts, and here they are, from the Hamilton Co courthouse.

Marriage License

Marriage Return

The handwriting on the Marriage Return is poor and there are some errors. James’s mother’s name was “Nichols,” not “Nickles.” Rosetta was probably born in Webster Co, Kentucky, not in nonexistent “West Vill Co Ky.” And her family name is given as “Coal,” not “Caul” as transcribed by Judy, nor “Cole,” as given on the Marriage License Cover, which it really was. Of course, that James and Rosetta were Illiterate (as shown in the 1880 Hamilton Co census) did not help.

The Marriage Return does indeed state that with this marriage James had been married “Twice.”  But the bride’s middle name is not “Filone” or “Frilone” or “Trilone.” It is obviously “Freelove.” Why are we so certain, given the overall poor handwriting? In the 1860 census, Rosetta’s parents, Robert and Lucy, were living in Webster Co, Kentucky, next door to another Cole family with a daughter named “Freelove Cole.” The families were almost certainly related, particularly since the 1850 census shows the same Cole family as well as Rosetta’s parents living in Allen Co, Kentucky, along with a large number of other Coles, sixty total. It appears that “Freelove” may have been a family name. The Allen Co Coles originated in Virginia. Various records show that state to be the birthplace of at least three different 18^th- and 19^th-century women bearing the name “Freelove Cole.” And the writing of the name is relatively clear in the Marriage Return.

Lucy Cole's Hamilton Co Marker (Find A Grave).

The digital images of the marriage records show three other things of interest. (1) Rosetta apparently gave her name as “Rosety,” though it does appear as “Rosetta” in the marriage license. (2) She was married in the house of her father Robert, known to live in Knights Prairie Twp, Hamilton Co. (3) The witness was Rubin Dial, the brother of Rosetta’s stepmother, Mary Dial. Prior to Rosetta's marriage, her biological mother, Lucy, had passed away, sometime around 1868, presumably in Hamilton Co, where she is buried.

If you would like free no-strings-attached copies of the marriage documents and my transcriptions, just click on the link below. You don’t need the Dropbox app. If, at this point, you get a “Log in or Sign Up” message just ignore it. Press the download button at the top of the web page. You will then get (another) “Log in or Sign Up” message. Just click “Or continue with dropdown only” at the bottom of that message. You need not log in or sign up. It is not necessary to be a Dropbox user. Leave a comment or send me an email if you have problems.

Marriage Records Download