Tuesday, November 1, 2016

Which Ellen/Nellie Did George William Seaver Marry?

I was reviewing my Ancestry Member Tree Hints this afternoon, and ran into a challenge.

The challenge is:  Who was the wife of George William Seaver (1844-1888), son of William George Seaver and Desire French Simons?

1)  I have a marriage record for George W. Seaver (born Stowe, Vt., age 23, son of Wm.G. and Desire F. Seaver) to Ellen G. Lathrop (born Chelsea, Vt., age 22, daughter of Chauncey and Sarah Lathrop) on 26 September 1867 in Newburyport, Massachusetts:


2)  There is an 1880 U.S. Census record for Nellie S. Seaver (age 36, born VT) with husband George W. Seaver (age 36, born VT) with children Blanche E. (age 10, born DC), Gertrude L. (age 3, born DC) and Alice B. (age 1, born DC).  

3)  There is an 1876 birth record for Gertrude (although there is no given name) in Washington D.C. that says the mother is Nellie S. Lathrop Seaver:


4)  George and Nellie had another child, William Earle Seaver, on 18 January 1889 in Newburyport, Mass.: 


However, George died on 26 July 1888 and is buried in Glenwood Cemetery in Washington, D.C. (there is a Find A Grave memorial).

5)  After George died, Nellie Seaver returned to Washington, D.C. and appears in City Directories from 1891 to 1921 and was in the 1900 U.S. Census (born Mar 1844 in VT) with children Blanche, Gertrude and William.

6)  There is a Find A Grave memorial for Nellie S. Lathrop Seaver which has a death date of 9 March 1925 and links to memorials for her husband and two of her children:


7)  There is a Washington, D.C. Deaths record for Nellie S. Seaver with a death date of 9 March 1925:



This record for Nellie S. Seaver gives a birth year of 1845, a date of death of 9 March 1925, a death place of Kashena, Wisconsin, and parents named Parrish Badger and Nancy Osgood.  Note that an image is available, but only at a Family History Center.

8)  A Sons of the American Revolution application was approved for William Earle Seaver, son of George and Nellie, in 1935  on Ancestry.com:


This notes William's father as George William Seaver (1844-1888), mother as Ellen (Sarah) Maria Badger (1844-1925), with parents Parish Badger and Nancy Osgood.  The birth and death dates for George William Seaver match his known dates, and the dates for Ellen Maria Badger correspond to the Ellen Lathrop birth and the Nellie Seaver death date.

One more hint - Alice B. Seaver's middle name was Badger.

9)  The challenge is:  Was George William Seaver's spouse Nellie G. Lathrop or Ellen (Sarah) Maria Badger?

10)  There is one potential scenario that would explain this challenge:  Perhaps Ellen was adopted by the Lathrops and her birth parents were the Badgers.  This is a scenario that fits all of the facts, assuming that Ellen found out her birth parents names at some point in time.

What other scenarios can you think of to fit the known facts for this family?

What conclusions can be drawn as to the identity of George William Seaver's only known spouse, and mother of his four children, Nellie G. Lathrop?

NOTE:  I haven't shown all of the records, sources or Hints for George and Ellen/Nellie due to space limitations.

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1 comment:

Unknown said...

I agree with your conclusions on this. I have been looking at records for the Badger family, and I came to the same conclusion. There are different records that link Ellen/Nellie to both the Lathrop and the Badger families. I recently came across this posting by someone else:
"Parish Badger, 1867 report of death
Badger13Peter (View posts)Posted:01 Feb 2011 03:28PM Classification: Death Surnames: Badger, Osgood Ancestry.com just listed a report of death of Parish Badger. "1867 Department of State, Washington, April 2nd
Information has been received at this Department from Mr. Thomas T. Gamble, the Vice Consul of the United States at Panama, of the death on the 8th of March last, on board of the the P.M.C. S.S. Co's Steamship "Montana" of Parish Badger, of New Hampshire." He was born in Gilmanton, New Hampshire, in 1794; married Nancy Osgood in 1825; raised 9 children in New Hampshire and Vermont, the youngest born in 1844; joined the Gold Rush and was enumerated on the 1850 U.S. Census in El Dorado County, California; and was listed on the Great Register of San Francisco as a silverplater in 1866."
Apparently when Parish left for California before 1850 some of the children (Ellen being the youngest one, born in 1844, mentioned above)were sent off to live with different people, for I found several of them living with other families, while a couple of the daughters stayed with the mother Nancy. Ellen/Nellie was not on the 1850 or 1860 census with her mother, but there was a Nellie Lathrop listed with Chauncy Lathrop in Chelsea, VT on the 1850 and 1860 censuses. Perhaps, though, Ellen had been able to keep in contact with her mother Nancy Osgood Badger and knew who her birth parents were, and that could explain why some records listed the Lathrops as her parents, while other records listed the Badgers as her parents.