Gary’s Pennsylvania Ancestry: Part 2

In my last Blog, I brought Gary’s Taylor ancestors back to the late 1600’s in Pennsylvania and to Wales before that. Gary so far had one correction which I was easily able to fix. However, now Gary is interested in his Ormsby line,

Florence is Gary’s paternal grandmother. She was the one I called the child bride in the last Blog. Gary thinks Harry had roots in Scotland and Fannie may have been part native American.

Here is a a portion of the death record for Fannie:

This gives some information about her mother and father.

Harry and Fannie got married at a Methodist Church:

Harry was from Media and Fannie was from Springfield when they married in 1887.

Expanding Fannie Palmer’s Ancestry

I’ve started looking at Fannie Palmer, so I might as well continue down her line.

It looks like Fannie was born during the Civil War which was between 1861 and 1865.

Fannie in 1870

Fannie was the older daughter of 8 living in Ward 24 of Philadelphia in 1870. Also in the house was Johanna Palmer – possibly her grandmother. Her dad was a car driver. There was also a ‘driver express’ person living in the house – Lewis Woodward.  Here is Ward 24 to the West of the Schuykill River:

Fannie in 1880

Now Fannie is living with her grandmother in Upper Darby:

Johanna Palmer indicates that she was born in New Jersey. However, her dad was from England and her mom was from Scotland. She would have been born about 1808. It appears that Johanna woujld not be a good candidate for Native American ancestry if this census is correct.

John and Eunice Palmer

Fannie was living with her grandmother in 1880. What happened to her parents? The Media Burial Grounds records show this:

It looks like John passed away and Eunice remarried.

In 1850, Eunice was living in Thornbury, PA:

What About John Palmer?

 

John appeared to be F. John Palmer in the 1870 Census. Other hints at Ancestry refer to a John G. Palmer. I’ll take a look at some other Ancestry trees to see what they show. I found 10 trees with John Palmer. Nine trees showed him as John F. Palmer. Only one tree had parents:

This also showed two other Children that the other trees did not have. This raises some questions. Why was only one researcher able to find John’s parents? Most or all trees had his birth date and place of birth as Upper Darby. Johanna could be right as Fanny was living with her grandmother Johanna in 1880.

City Directories

Perhaps we can find John in the Philadelphia City Directories. Here are a few John’s in the 1860 Directory:

My first choice is John P., carriage driver, 326 Wildey. I don’t see any John F.

Here is 326 Wildey in Fishtown.

This is not near Ward 24. But the family was in Ward 24 in 1870, not 1860, so I picked the wrong directory. As an aside, my great-grandparents (no relation to Gary) lived on Earl St. I couldn’t find an 1870 Directory. Here is 1867:

Here I don’t see a John P or a carriage driver. There is a John Wheelwright, at Fkd av. which I take to be Frandford Ave. This may be the same person, assuming John is still in Philadelphia in 1867.

I can’t find John in 1861:

1866

This is similar to the 1867 Directory. However, I didn’t notice in 1867 that there was a John Coach painter on 2132 Winter. That seems to fit in with the car driver profession also. Here is 2132 Winter Street:

This is also getting us closer to Ward 24. Fannie was born in 1862, so she would have been around by now.

John F Palmer 1873

I did find our mysterious John F in 1873:

I don’t know if W P stands for West Philadelphia or West Powelton:

Perhaps the family was also living here during the 1870 Census.

Back to 1863:

This was thrown in in case it comes in handy some time later. There was a John V., carman.

1874

Where is John F? Is he now a foreman at 131 Dauphin, in West Kensington? Did he die? Did he move out of Philadelphia? Is seems the trail is going cold.

 

1878

There doesn’t seem to be a trace of Gary’s John in 1878 in Philadelphia. The above wheelwright may be the same as the one in the 1866 Directory.

Johanna Palmer

As Johanna is the apparent mother of John, let’s look at her. This Joanna in the 1850 Census looks to be the same person:

That would make John’s father John a paper maker born in 1805 in Pennsylvania. Here Joanna is also said to be born in Pennsylvania, but that may be a mistake. The son John looks to be 9 years old here and one of six siblings. This family lived in Upper Darby in 1850.

1860 Concord Township, PA

There are marks to the right of each of these household members showing that they are all paper makers. It appears that the family moved to Concord from Upper Darby.

1870

I mentioned above that Johanna was living with her son, daughter in law and two granddaughters in Ward 24, West Philadelphia. That means that Johanna got around a bit as she was back in Upper Darby in 1880. This means that Johanna’s husband John likely died between 1860 and 1870.

Before I leave the Palmers, here is one last reference to Johanna as Johanna Scot:

This is from an 1887 book called Genealogy of the Sharpless Family. This gives the other two children. That puts the likely death of John Palmer at 1876 or later.

Eunice Pyle Born 1839 and Family

There is a lot of information about Eunice’s parents in the book excerpt above. The family lived in Thornbury in 1870. All were born in Pennsylvania and all the parents were born in Pennsylvania:

Eunice’s grandfather was Israel Pyle:

William was from a large family.

Here is some more, from a different publication on Sharples:

They had other children. It looks like John broke away from the Quaker Faith.

That brings Gary’s paternal grandmother’s ancestors out like this:

I didn’t see any Native Americans in her ancestry. Gary does have a lot of Quaker ancestors.

Harry G Ormsby, Born 1865 and Ancestors

This is the side Gary thought would go back to Scotland. Here is Harry in 1870.

The family had a servant, which says they may have been relatively well off. Here is the previous page.

Harry’s dad was a gentleman.

George W in 1880

All is not well in 1880 as Harry’s dad has ‘affections of the spleen and liver’. George W is now shown as a lawyer. Less than three years later:

Here are some directions to the vault in case someone would like to visit:

The date of internment was 24 March 1883. Section 7. Lot 17 NW1/4. Then there is a grave number and remarks.

Here is an article from the Chester Times from Tuesday, 20 March 1883:

Harry in 1928

Fast forward 45 years:

More on George W

This is likely George registering for the Civil War:

At the time, he was living in Middletown, Delaware County.

There are only a few tree hints for George at Ancestry. None of them give his parents’ names. One gives a last name for his wife Williamette as:

 

More on Williamette

Williamette died as Williamette Dickeson in 1906. Harry Ormsby was the informant. Her father was listed as William. This appears to be the family in 1850 in Montgomery Township, PA:

William appears to have been a wealthy farmer. Here is a photo that someone posted to their tree of Williamette’s older sister Anna Matilda Steinmetz:

Here’s what I have so far for Florence Ormsby’s ancestors:

Summary and Conclusions

• I was not able to get back very far on the Ormsby Line.
• So far I have found no information that George Ormsby was born in Scotland. If the 1880 Census is correct, both his parents were born in Pennsylvania.
• Ormsby is a name associated with Scotland. There is a family legend of the first Ormsby in Scotland, where Orm was a Viking. Some of the gory battle stories are here.
• I wasn’t able to find any indication of Native American heritage on the Palmer side. It is possible that this could come up on Gary’s DNA test if there is a significant amount of Native American DNA that Gary has inherited.
• Gary has deep roots in Pennsylvania. As a result, many Quaker ancestors have popped up. Also an apparent German ancestor has surfaced in the Steinmetz family.