Tuesday, January 31, 2017

Treasure Chest Tuesday - 1860 U.S. Census Record for W. B. Ray Household in Tuolumne, California

This week's Tuesday treasure is the 1860 United States Census record for the W.B. Ray and Elijah Picrill households enumerated in Township #2, Tuolumne County, California:


The Ray and Picrill households:



The extracted information for the two households is:

a)  The W. B. Ray household:

*  W.B. Ray - age 20, male, a miner, born in N[ew] Y[orj]
*  Elizabeth Ray - age 21, female, born in England
*  Delia C. Ray - age 4, female, born Cala[fornia]
*  Mary C. Ray - age 2, female, born Cala[fornia]
*  Caroline Ray - age 8/12, female, born Cala[fornia]
*  Jane White - age 13, female, born Australia, attended school

b)  The Elijah Picrill household

*  Elijah Picrill - age 26, male, a miner, $300 in personal property, born Md [Maryland]
*  Lewis B. Pratt - age 33, male, a miner, born N[ew] Y[ork

The source citation for the Elijah Picrill household is:

1860 United States Federal Census, Tuolumne County, California, Population Schedule, Township #2; Page 399, Dwelling #3776, family #3633, Elijah Picrell household, online database and digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com), citing National Archives Microfilm Publication M653, Roll 71.

The explanation of the records for these two households is complicated, and is based on an extensive study of all of the records for these persons:

*  Elijah Pickrell McKnew (1836-1912) deserted from the U.S. Army in 1855, and went to California, and ended up in Tuolumne County in gold country near Tuttletown.  He is the "Elijah Picrill, age 24, born in Md" in the second family.  Evidently, he was using his middle name as a surname for some period of time, at least through June 1860.

*  Jane Whittle (1847-1921) was born in Australia in 1847 to Alexander Whittle and Rachel Morley.  She came to California in late 1851 or 1852 with her mother, sister Elizabeth Whittle and brother Joseph Whittle.  She is the "Jane White, age 13, born Australia" in the first family.  Her father committed suicide in 1853 in Angels Camp, and her mother was last noted in 1859 in Sacramento, California.

*  Elizabeth Ray (1839-1912) is the sister of Jane Whittle, married to her first husband William B. Ray.  William and Elizabeth (Whittle) Ray have three young daughters.

*  Elijah Pickrell McKnew and Jane Whittle married in 1865 in Tuolumne County, California.

So we have a young man aged 24 and a young girl aged 13 residing close by each other in Township #2 in Tuolumne County, California.  Both are not enumerated with their birth names!  The birth places for these two persons are accurate.

Elijah and Jane (Whittle) McKnew are my wife's great-grandparents, through their daughter Edna Catheine McKnew (1884-1974), who married Paul Schaffner in 1906 in San Francisco.

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Copyright (c) 2017, Randall J. Seaver

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