52 Ancestors - Week 7 - Valentine...Nebraska

As I was thinking about Valentine's Day this week, the story of my great grandparents, Isaac Rickell and Ida Ellen Andrews, came to mind. They were early residents of Box Butte County in western Nebraska, Isaac arriving when the area was still part of Dawes County.

Both Isaac and Ida had experienced much loss in their lives by the time they came to western Nebraska when they were both in their twenties. Isaac had lost both of his parents and all five of his brothers and sisters by the time he filed his Declaration of Intention to be come a citizen of the United States on the 6th of October in 1883, a month before his 24th birthday.

Isaac Rickell
Declaration of Intention
Original in Isaac's Personal Papers

Not quite two years later, Isaac appeared at the land office in Valentine, Cherry County, Nebraska, over 300 miles away, to claim a homestead in the future Box Butte County. Perhaps this business card is how he learned about free land. I wonder where he found it. Probably somewhere near his home in Platte County.

Original in Isaac's Personal Papers

The reverse side of the card gives a list of train fares from various places in Nebraska to Chadron. Is Chadron where he met Denis Daly?

Original in Isaac's Personal Papers

I'm not sure what the reverse side of the card means, exactly. Did the X's mark acreages that had already been claimed?

At any rate, Isaac chose the SW 1/4 of Section 14 in Township 27 of Range 50 West. Somehow he traveled over 100 miles from Valentine to Hemingford. Did the land agents go with their prospective homesteaders? Then travel the 100 miles back to the land office in Valentine?

Ida lost her mother when she was a child. After her grandfather, Elias Jones, passed, she came with her grandmother, Annis Cole Jones, in the spring of 1888 to the village of Hemingford in Box Butte County, where an uncle, B. F. Jones, had a general store. The family lived together in rooms over the store.

Isaac and Ida told their daughter, Bertha, about the day they met...when both went to the town well for water. I would love to know more details of their meeting that day at the well and the courtship that followed, but we do know that Isaac carried Ida's pail home for her. For her birthday, in September of 1889, Isaac gave Ida a beautiful red velvet photograph album. And, less than two months later, on Isaac's thirtieth birthday they were married.

Isaac Rickell and Ida E. Andrews
14 November 1889

The Rose is Red

the Violet blue

of all the earth

I love but you

When these lines

you here do see

will you agree

to marry me

If my name you now can guess

write your own

and Ans yes

Could this be how Isaac proposed to Ida? We will never know, but either way, it seems Isaac was quite the romantic soul!

Elias D. and Annis (Cole) Jones

My search for Ida Ellen Andrews' parents had led me to Elias D. and Annis Cole Jones. I first found Elias and Annis in census records a year and a half or so after beginning my search. They were living in Indiana, and census records indicated they had both been born in New York. They were married in St. Joseph County, Indiana 23 July 1840.

The Elias D. Jones household was enumerated in Liberty Township, St. Joseph County, Indiana in the 1850 U.S. census and looked like this:

• Elias D. Jones, farmer, age 31, born N. York, owned real estate valued at $200
• Annis Jones, age 29, born N. York
• Emma Jane Jones, age 6, born Ind.
• Frances M. Jones, age 3, born Ind.
• Caroline A. Jones, age 2 mos., born Ind.

In 1860 the family was still living in Liberty Township and had grown:

• Elias Jones, farmer, age 41, born NY, owned real estate valued at $500 and a personal estate of $150.
• Annis Jones, age 39, born NY
• Emma Jones, age 16, born Ind.
• Frances Jones, age 13, born Ind.
• Caroline Jones, age 10, born Ind.
• Rodger Jones, age 7, born Ind.
• Benjamine Jones, age 5, born Ind.

The image of this 1860 census page in Family Search is very hard to read. If you have an Ancestry subscription, the image there is much better. You can find it here. Both Family Search and Ancestry transcribed the last name as Janes, so initially it was not included in searches for Jones. That is still the case with Family Search. And Ancestry indexed Rodger as Kadgen. If only all census takers had perfect handwriting!

A History of St. Joseph County Indiana, by Timothy Edward Howard (1907) mentions Elias. "Except the cities of South Bend and Mishawaka, (Walkerton) is the largest and most important municipal corporation in St. Joseph County. The town, as it now stands, is a combination of different towns and additions, all united under the name and government of Walkerton. The first of these corporations was that of West Troy, laid out by Elias D. Jones in the southeast part of the northeast quarter of section twenty-three, township thirty-five north, range one west. This town was platted by Mr. Jones December 14, 1854." It seems Elias was a real estate developer.

An 1863 map of St. Joseph County, Indiana, at the Library of Congress shows landowners. The land described above is labeled E. D. Jones. West Troy and Walkerton are in the lower left corner of the map. A. H. Cole owns land adjacent to E. D. Jones. (Annis had a brother Alvah H. Cole.)

By 1870 Elias and his family were living in Lincoln Township (Walkerton Post Office). I don't see Lincoln Twp. on the 1863 map. It may have been formed after 1863. Maybe Elias didn't actually move at all. Maybe only the township boundaries changed. This is how his household appears in 1870:

• Elias D. Jones, farming, age 52, born New York, owned real estate valued at $5000, and a personal estate of $391.
• Anice Jones, keeping house, age 49, born New York
• Roger S. Jones, works on farm, age 18, born Indiana
• Benjamine Jones, age 15, born Indiana
• Amanda C. Jones, age 19, born Indiana

Hmmm. Where was Amanda in 1860? Could Amanda C. be the Caroline A. from 1850 and Caroline from 1860? Her age fits. Apparently Emma Jane and Frances M. have left home, perhaps married.

Annis' obituary states as early as  1873 the family settled on Pleasant Ridge, Merrick County (Nebraska). 

And in 1880 Elias and Annis are living in Midland Precinct, Merrick County, Nebraska with son, Roger, head of the household:

• Roger S. Jones, (single) farmer, age 27, born Indiana
• Elias D. Jones, "at home", age 61, father, born New York
• Annis Jones, keeping house, age 59, mother, born New York

 Roger Sherman Jones
Central City, Nebraska

Living nearby are Benjamin Jones and his family, also in Midland Precinct in 1880:

• Benjamin Jones, farmer, age 25, born Indiana
• Mary E. Jones, wife, age 20, keeping house, born Penn.
• Charles M. Jones, son, age 1, born Nebraska

And living not far from Benjamin and Mary are David J. and Elizabeth J. Lehr.

Benjamin Franklin Jones
Central City, Nebraska

Mary Jones

Charlie Jones
Central City, Nebraska

Mr. and Mrs. D. J. Lehr

In 1885 we get a "bonus" because in that year Nebraska, as well as a few other states, took an additional census. An interesting article by the National Archives regarding "The Forgotten Federal Census of 1885" can be viewed here. Thank you, Nebraska, for participating! Because in 1885 in Midland Township, Merrick County, Nebraska, we see this: 

• E. D. Jones, farmer, age 66, born New York
• Annis Jones, wife, age 64, keeps house, born New York
• Ida Andrews, niece, age 19, at school, born Indiana

At last, Ida with the Jones family! I could barely contain my excitement....but wait... niece? What?? I didn't know what to think. It was supposed to say granddaughter. Of course, it is often not that nice and neat. It had taken me years to get this far. It was going to take a few more.

Ida Ellen Andrews Rickell - Part II: Ida's Death Certificate - Will it Reveal Her Parents?

A 1983 copy of Ida's death certificate gives more clues about her life. Her husband, Isaac provided her personal information.

Mrs. Ida E. Rickell, Certificate of Death

He reported that she was born in Indiana, the 20th of Sept., 1865, that her mother's maiden name was M. Jones and her father was J. Andrews. Interesting. Did Isaac not know their full given names? Could he have been guessing about the initials?

Isaac gave Ida this photo album for her birthday before they were married. The album contains several photographs of the Jones family which helped me begin to piece the family together.

"Uncle Frank Jones, My Mothers Uncle" and "Aunt Mary Jones, My Mothers Aunt"
The handwriting is that of Ida's daughter, Bertha

"These two are Brother and Sister"
"Uncle Sherman Jones" and "Grandma R's aunt"

"Charlie Jones, My Mother's Cousin"
and
"Edith Jones, My Mother's Cousin, was holding her Daddys watch."

 And loose in the back of the album I found this memorial card.

Hmmm. Who is D. J. Lehr? A name I hadn't heard before. Or had I? I kept looking. He must be an important person to Ida and Isaac. And, then I noticed this.

Witnesses to Isaac and Ida's Marriage

On 2 Aug 1884, B.F. Jones, a merchant in Central City, Nebr. signed a "Homestead Proof - Testimony of Witness"  for the homestead application of David J. Lehr. Lehr was applying for an additional homestead of 80 acres, adjacent to his original 80 acre homestead where he had lived for 11 years. The digitized document can be viewed here at Ancestry.com with a paid subscription.

And, among the treasure trove of items Ida and Bertha left behind is this 1903 letter Isaac wrote to his "wife and daughter" in care of R. S. Jones, Central City, Nebraska.

Apparently Ida and Bertha were visiting in Central City and would "start" for home in a few days. Isaac mentions "Grandma" and "Sherm".

In 1900, Sherman Jones, a single man born in Aug 1852, was working as a carpenter and living in Central City, Merrick Co., Nebraska. His widowed mother, Annis Jones, born in New York in Feb. 1821, was living with him. Annis was the mother of six children and only two were still living. You can view this census record at Family Search here. It seems the R.S. Jones on the above letter must have been R. Sherman Jones and the Grandma in the letter was likely Annis Jones, Ida's grandmother!

It took me another three years, but in 2015, I found an index of early Merrick County obituaries on a genealogy website. It included a 1906 obituary for an Annis Jones. I was hopeful the obituary would list Ida as Annis' granddaughter. A library assistant at the Central City Public Library was able to locate the obituary.

No mention of Ida. As often is the case with a new discovery, it answers a few questions and raises a few others. It clears up the names of her sons, Benjamin Franklin Jones and Roger Sherman Jones. It seems they commonly used their initials or middle names rather than their first names. Their father was Elias D. Jones. The obituary states Annis had seven children. (The 1900 census showed six.) Elias had died about eighteen years earlier. Annis other children were not named. If Annis was Ida's grandmother, one of the unnamed daughters was Ida's mother.

What next?