Week #7 Theme is "Outcast"

Although our family tree doesn't show anyone who was shunned or cast out. We have several cases where a parent disapproved of a child’s choice of a mate. We also have a few cases where a child left the home on his own due to a dispute. Every family probably has these stories. I’ll just mention a few here. Charlotte Clark of Kent, England was daughter of a man of military position. John Clark was Steward of Royal Ordnance Hospital, in Woolwich. When Charlotte was in her early 20s, in 1836, she married William Terry, a wheelwright / carriage maker. He was also from Kent, but further east near Dover. I always wondered how they met, as their classes would not have associated (think of Jane Austen novels of the era.) They went to live in Deal, and later sold their carriage making business and migrated to America in 1848. An early letter we have found written by Charlotte's daughter, Amelia, says that Charlotte married against her parents' wishes, and was disinherited by her father, for marrying beneath her station. William and Charlotte had 10 children, 7 of whom lived to marry and have children. They were such an adventuresome family, with descendants pursuing education and business ventures all across our country. We have met (in person and online) cousins from each of those family lines, and are thankful that Charlotte met and married William, our Great Great Grandparents. In my husband's family, we have Rose Marguerite McCool, Gerry's grandmother. Her mother, Anna Roselee Powell McCool, had died in 1893, when Rose was only 14. The next year, her father, John, married a second wife. The older children had left home, but there were 5 children under 10 in the family. Story has it that Rose did not get along with her step mother. She probably had to help keep house and be a nanny to the babies. After about a year, Rose met Jordon Burris, a southerner who worked on the railroad, which didn't set well with her father, a staunch Union veteran. John was also a very strict Presbyterian, and Jordon may not have lived up to the standards John had set for his daughters. After their marriage, Rose was estranged from her father for 30 years, although she remained close to all her siblings who had scattered through several western states. She was able to see him again before his death in 1933. A sad story that is repeated in too many families. But as I am writing this on Valentine's Day, I think that both the young women above married for love, and their marriages stood the test of time.

52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks - Week 8 theme - Courting

SHE SUED HER MOTHER AND LOST...

Court Case - Anna Rosalie Powell McCool vs. Martha Bowley et al

In 1875, Gerry's great grandmother, Rose, a 22 year old wife and mother of 4 (and expecting a fifth),  evidently tried to take claim of what she felt was her rightful inheritance.  We find the following articles in the Davenport Iowa Gazette of Dec. 4, 1875. 

“The trial of the case entitled Anna R. McCool vs. Martha Bowley and Simeon Bowley commenced this afternoon. The case has some interesting features as well as  singular ones.  According to the position of the plaintiff, it appears that she is the daughter of one Joseph Powell, a resident of Cleveland Ohio, who died in 1854, leaving a widow, two daughters and two sons as sole heirs at law. At the time of his death, Powell was in possession of $1,500 in gold and some other property, the value of which is not stated, as no administration was ever laid upon the estate. The widow immediately took possession of the gold and in 1855 married Simeon Bowley;  and in the same year, Mr. and Mrs. Bowley purchased 80 acres of land in Princeton Township, in this county, with part of the $1500 in gold, expended the balance in improving the property and have been in possession of it ever since.  The petition states that she has been reared from childhood without expense to the defendants that she has been married and that her brothers and sister have attained their majority and claim that the Bowleys have simply held the property purchased with the $1,500 in trust for herself and fellow heirs , that she is justly entitled to one fourth part of it, together with a fourth of rents and profits thereof during each year of occupation by the defendants, that the real estate is reasonably worth $4,000, that the rents and profits amount to a large sum, the amount of which she is unable to state; but at any rate, she asks the court that the defendants may be decreed to account to her for  the one fourth she claims, and for such other relief as the court may deem just, and the costs of suit.  The defendants deny that they ever got $1,500 that belonged to Joseph Powell, that they never expended any sum that belonged to said Powell for the property they now own, and declare they have nothing to which the plaintiff can legally lay claim.   D.B. Nash is the attorney for plaintiff and Davison and Lane for the defendants.  The testimony is all by deposition. The case will be submitted this fore noon, probably.” 

 

Davenport Gazette (Davenport, Iowa) December 6, 1875

“District Court - The case of Anna R. McCool vs. Martha Bowley, et al, the chief points of which were stated in Saturday's Gazette was submitted to the court Saturday forenoon.  The court found that the plaintiff is not entitled to the relief prayed and judgment was rendered against the plaintiff for costs.”

 

My notes:   As Rose was expecting her  fifth child in one month from the above case date, I’m sure she couldn’t travel to Iowa from their homestead in Nebraska to plead the case, and we will never know if the charges were true.  The Bowleys had two children together,  who would be half siblings to Rose Anna.   We don’t know if she ever kept in contact with them, or with her own siblings. The name of Simeon Bowley appears on 1886 Princeton Directory as Trustee of the town of Princeton. His son, Joseph (half brother of Rose),  later held offices in farming organizations in Scott County, Iowa.   Anna Rosalie had become mother of eleven children and died at age 39 in 1892.