Thursday, April 27, 2017

Seavers in the News - Disputing Sarah A.C. Seaver's Will

It's time for another episode of Seavers in the News, wherein I find a newspaper article about a person with the surname Seaver who has had something interesting printed in a newspaper.

This week's article is from the Baltimore Sun newspaper, dated 28 June 1900:


The transcription of the article is:

"AGAINST MISS SEAVER'S WILL

"She Left $250 Each to Orphans' and Confederate Homes

"A caveat to the will of Miss Sarah A.C. Seaver, who died the 10th of last April, was filed in Orphans' Court yesterday by her cousins, Charles L. Davis, Gilbert A. Davis, James M. Miller, Mary F. Herrick, Charles A. Miller, M.M. Miller, William A. Miller, John O. Miller, Samuel S. Davis and Sarah Anna Gordan, through Willis & Homer, attorneys. Letters on the estate were granted April 17 to James W. Denny and William L. Lyon, who were named as executors.

"The will in dispute was executed December 5, 1898.  It bequeaths $250 each to St. Mary's Catholic Orphan Asylum, the Protestant Orphan Asylum on Stricker street and the Confederate Home at Pikesville.  After the payment of three and a number of other small bequests the residue of the estate is left to Alverda Fullerton Schumacher, Isabella Fullerton, Mrs. Garafilla C. Lyon and Wilhelmina Friedly, friends of the testatrix.

"The value of the estate is about $15,000.  The main allegation against the validity of the will is that Miss Seaver was of unsound mind when it was executed."

The source citation for this article is:

"AGAINST MISS SEAVER'S WILL,Baltimore [Md.] Sun newspaper, online index and digital image, GenealogyBank (http://www.genealogybank.com : accessed 27 April 2017), Thursday, 28 June 1900, page 7.

From the article, I figured that Miss Sarah A.C. Seaver died unmarried, and I found her in my RootsMagic database, born in 1816 in Baltimore, Maryland, the daughter of William Seaver (1782-1821) and Martha (Davis) (Seaver) Bowen (1793-1868).  Then I recalled that I had found information about the murder of her father, William Seaver, in 1821 - see William Seaver Murder Mystery, and Family History Compendium (posted 29 June 2011) for a list of all of the blog posts about this case.  Included is a post about Sarah's will in More Information on the Family of William Seaver (1783-1821) (posted 4 May 2011).  Apparently, Sarah's will was sustained by the Orphans' Court in 1901.

Who were all of the persons who contested the will?  I think they were Miss Seaver's cousins - probably nieces and nephews (and perhaps grand nieces and nephews) of Sarah's mother, who was born Martha Davis in Massachusetts. I easily found the first two of them in the Davis records.

It was fun reviewing the earlier blog posts and trying to figure out who the cousins.  I went down this rabbit hole again!


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