The Hyphen Family Lineage

Note: Reseaching Sarah DeWitt

Currently, the last confirmed record I have for Sarah, the eldest child of Clark DeWitt Sr., is as a young teenager in her father's household in the 1860 US Census, where the family was listed as living in Union Twp, Huntington Cty, Indiana. In other searches, I had turned up a marriage record for a Sarah DeWitt to Joseph Smith in Huntington Cty, Indiana, on 20 Sep 1868. The visual record does not give ages, parentage, or specific location for the marriage, so I cannot confirm whether this Sarah is the daughter of Clark DeWitt Sr. and Malinda Ogle.

Interestingly, there is a family consisting of an Ohio-born Joseph F. Smith and an Indiana-born Sarah Smith, of the appropriate age, listed in both the 1870 and 1880 US Census records for Union Twp, Huntington Cty. In both records, Sarah is listed as one year older than Joseph, and in 1880 there are listed with the couple two children (Albert, age four, and Susan, age zero) and three boarders. Of further interest is that one of the boarders is a sixteen-year-old Emma DeWitt, which leads naturally to some speculation that there may be a family connection to the DeWitts for this Smith household.

There appeared to be no indexed record for any member of this Smith family - Sarah, Joseph, Albert, or Susan - in the 1900 US Census in the same location, so I reviewed the entire scanned visual record of that locale (Union Twp, Huntington Cty) for 1900. I found many familiar names and families, but in all twenty-nine pages I failed to find any of these four. If the family was still alive in 1900 - and I find it likely that at least one of the children would be, at least - they may have moved to another area, possibly within the county or possibly elsewhere. (The most likely next place to look may be across the Wells Cty line in the same township.)

On finding the marriage record, I had originally speculated that Sarah may have married the older brother of her sister Rebecca's husband (Jeremiah Smith), but double-checking my files shows that Jeremiah's older brother Joseph was not with the family in the 1860 US Census in Indiana, when he would have been a teenager, suggesting he may have died before that time. He would also have been about four years older than the Joseph in the census listings mentioned above. (This also assumes that the marriage records and the census listings apply to the Sarah in question.)

Sarah is named in the will for her maternal grandfather, David Ogle, as an heir (along with her three siblings, the children of the David's daughter Malinda). David died in 1879 in Delaware Cty, Indiana, so it stands to reason that Sarah DeWitt lived until at least that time.

ADDENDUM: The history text Portrait and Biographical Album of Washington, Clay, and Riley Counties, Kansas gives the biography and family history information for Sarah and her husband Joseph F. Smith, confirming a significant amount of my speculation listed above. It also explains why I was unable to find any record of the family in Indiana after 1880 - they had moved to Kansas, where Sarah died in 1887 and her husband would go on to remarry in 1888. He would survive until at least 1900, as did her son Albert (who was a young widower in Kansas by that time). I have not managed to discover Albert's fate after 1900, nor do I know what happened to his sister after 1880, though she was presumably still alive at the time of the history text's publication in 1890, when she would have been only eleven years old. She was not listed as living with Joseph and his second wife (Amanda) in 1900, but by that time she would have been twenty-one and may well have married.

SECOND ADDENDUM: As described in the notes for Jeremiah W. Smith, I had speculated that Joseph F. Smith was a relative of his by blood, as well as by marriage (as both men were married to daughters of Clark Edward DeWitt Sr. - Jeremiah to Rebecca and Joseph to her older sister Sarah). Further confirmation would seem to be the photo of Sarah and Joseph found in the "Smith" file of the genealogy collection held by Jane Anne Thomas. On the back of the photo, in penciled handwriting I don't readily recognize, is written "Cousin Joe Smith, Mrs. Smith aunt to Mrs. Lewis Thomas, To Mrs. Paul." The handwriting may be that of Lewis S. Thomas, whose wife, Rosanna (Smith) Thomas, was the daughter of Rebecca Ann (DeWitt) Smith, and therefore a niece of Sarah (DeWitt) Smith. The indication of "Joe" as a cousin (presumably of Jeremiah's) certainly seems to substantiate my thoughts on his being related to the other Smiths in my family tree, but does not provide enough information to prove the degree of relationship.

The recipient of the photo, according to the writing on the back, was Merle (Thomas) Paul, daughter of Lewis and Rosanna.