For Generation 10, I sent the Historian these pages of the Rushton Family Bible. Generation 10 is Phoebe Esther Rushton Spence's parents, Hannah Susan West Rushton and Thomas R. Rushton. (see Spence, Rushton, and West Pedigree charts)
I wrote: Are they legible enough? I am not sure what to try if they are not. I am afraid to take the plastic off them, and I am afraid to scan them, but I can give either one a try.
Hannah Susan West Rushton's birthdate is written in pen as 1838. Then someone drew a 2 over the 8 in pencil. It is hard to see.
The Bible was the most exciting find ever, and my mother and I pored over the pages for days. When we started, we didn't know who anybody was, just about, making it so mysterious and frustrating. What good is a family Bible if you don't know who the people are???
My grandmother Bessie didn't know that her grandmother Susan's first name was Hannah, so that was confusing at first. She couldn't remember her grandfather's name, but confirmed that it was Thomas. That told me that Bessie knew her grandmother very well, but didn't know her grandfather much. Sure enough, we later found that Thomas died when Bessie was 7, but Susan lived until Bessie was married with children.
The names on the top lines are Phoebe's parents, Thomas Rushton and Hannah Susan West Rushton. The people on the left side are Thomas's siblings - he was the oldest. When we first saw it, it looked like a list of siblings, but we had no idea who they were.
This was the best page - we knew somebody! Marked with an X is Grannie, Phoebe Esther, with her birth date. Then my grandmother Bessie knew the others on the list as her aunts and uncles, except Aaron, Cristyann, and Catherine J. But we found that Aaron and Cristyann are listed as died on the Deaths page, so that explains that. And Bessie's Aunt Jane wasn't listed, so we made her Catherine Jane, which later turned out to be right. It was at least 20 years later that I was pleased to find out from her descendants that Sarah's middle name, pelina, is Paulina.
Again, the top two names are Thomas and Hannah Susan. On the left, under Thomas is Mary B. Rushton. I think she is a possible first wife. I don't know who Margaret Coles is. On the right are the birth dates of Thomas & Susan's children:
Sarah Paulina (Aunt Sarah who moved to Iowa)
Abigail Thima (Aunt Abby)
Catherine Jane (Aunt Jane)
Stephen Elijah (killed in mine explosion)
Isaac Levi
Victor Olonzo
Aaron Scholfield
Phoebe Esther (marked with an X)
Martha Letitia (Aunt Marthy)
Cristyann Matilda
Arminia E (Aunt Mini).
This was the most frustrating page - we didn't know anybody but Aunt Marthy, who died of tuberculosis, and Stephen, who was killed in the massive Springhill mine explosion. Our first connected puzzle pieces were Aaron S. and Cristyann who matched from the Births page. But it was another 20 years before we figured out the other Rushtons, and Sarah Campbell is a recent conclusion. I still don't know the others.
On the left are Thomas's siblings Isaac, Elijah, and Sarah, and Elijah's wife Letitia. I don't know the other two. On the right are Thomas's father Isaac, Thomas and Susan's children Aaron, Martha, Stephen, and Cristyann, and Susan's mother Phebe West.
This is the only record of Thomas's father Isaac's death. It was after he died that Thomas's mother Ester moved to Iowa with her other children. The mystery of whether and why he did or did not go too is solved.
On the top, Thomas R. Rushton and Mary B. Rushton are both married on October 25, 1838, I assume to each other. I think Mary B. is his first wife, who probably died without having children. Then Hannah Susan West is married on February 23, 1852 (to Thomas).
This made it look like Thomas was first married to Mary B. But I can't find any Mary B anywhere, and why isn't she on the Death page?
The Historian replied: I included the information from the Rushton Bible; although there are some things we need to add if we are to use it. If you could write a statement concerning your understanding of who the Bible originally belonged to, and how the records came into your possession, that would help. I am a bit worried about using them as "stand alone" proof, because they seem to be reconstructed from memory, rather than being a contemporaneous record. (Examples: Hannah West's birthdate doesn't jibe with the census records, and it lists her by her married name; other records, like Phebe West's death record, list only the year.)
So I replied: I received the pages of the family Bible in the summer of 1978 from my grandmother Bessie Spence Robertson when I became interested in genealogy. She lived with us, so they were in our house, and she kept them, folded, in an old eyeglass case in the junk drawer of the kitchen! She acquired them about 1959 because my cousin was born with a genetic disease and the doctors wanted to know what diseases our family had as far out and back as we could go. So Bessie went about researching our medical genealogy.
I am pretty certain that my grandmother Bessie was given the pages by her sister, Anna Spence Webb, because she was the keeper of all family information and items and lived her whole life in the family hometown, Springhill. Anna would have inherited them from their mother, Phoebe Esther Rushton Spence, who died in 1954. Anna was the only daughter who remained in Springhill, except for an ill daughter who was unmarried and died young - all her possessions would have gone to Anna too.
I believe that Phoebe possessed the Bible pages because:
1) There is an X in pencil next to Phoebe's name in the long list of children born,
2) none of the family genealogists I have met who are descended from Phoebe's siblings know about the Bible,
3) Phoebe's father Thomas R. Rushton lived his last years and died at Phoebe's home, and
4) under Marriages, Phebe Rushton is listed, making it seem like Thomas gave the Bible to Phoebe on the occasion of her marriage. The date given is 1868, which is Phoebe's birth date, not her marriage date (1892). Maybe by then Thomas, age 81, was starting to make mistakes - if he made the entry in 1892, it was his last entry.
I believe that Thomas was the original owner of the Bible. This is because:
1) the most complete list of contemporaneous dates is the list of Thomas and Susan's children
2) Susan consistently told the census takers that she could read but not write
3) there is a list of Thomas's siblings, no dates, not looking contemporaneous (he is the oldest)
4) the deaths, which look more contemporaneous, are of Thomas's father, siblings, siblings-in-law, and children (his mother moved across the country with her other children - none of them are listed). Susan had a sister die in this time period - she is not listed. But Susan's mother is.
5) the last entry is 1891, and by that time Thomas was 80 years old.
I think that Thomas acquired the Bible on the occasion of a first marriage to Mary B. Rushton because they are listed first under Marriages with the same marriage date. Maybe it was a wedding present. But I can't find any evidence of the existence of a Mary B. Rushton, much less a marriage to her. Next, Hannah Susan West is listed with a marriage date. That is the date that Susan and Thomas married, as corroborated with their daughter Phoebe Esther's birth record. Once they married, I think Thomas then entered his new wife's birthdate under Births, since he had his birth date and his possible first wife's birth date on the left hand side.
Susan's birth in the Bible may not be corroborated by year, but it is close, because every census record gives a different year! for Susan's birth, and they are all in the same 5-year period. The day and month are corroborated in the 1901 census, which gives her birth date as Sept. 4, and the 1911 census, which gives her birth month as September.
How is all the other stuff I sent for Generation 10?
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