Tracking Jonathan / John Sexton 1758 - 1835

 compiled by Teresa Martin Klaiber 4/2019

Sexton researchers abound. Many including my children’s family, have a least two different Sexton/Saxton lines.  For years there has been much speculation and assumptions about various Sexton families.  DNA is now helping sort through the confusion but a clean paper trail is also needed in any proper research – without assumption.  We still have lots more work to do. And, yes, there are still assumptions to overcome.

I am posting this chronology, & a bit long-winded explanation, as an aid as we continue following the path in the cow pasture.

Our own research story begins on the property where I am sitting and writing.  We live on property which has been handed down in our Sexton family for generations in Boyd County, Kentucky (a spit from the Carter/Lawrence line).  High on the hill is Klaiber Cemetery, aka Sexton Cemetery, aka Hood Cemetery.  Among those is Mark/Marcus Sexton and Catherine, others including Gallion and field stones. 

Forty-eight years ago, at the birth of my first child, I made my first genealogical research error.  Most researchers start with census, as did I.

The1850 census for Carter County/later Boyd, KY shows Mark 37 born Virginia, Catherine 41 born Virginia, Henry P. 14 born Virginia, Leann Blair 7 born Kentucky, Bartlett Sexton 75, Catherine 71 both born Virginia.  I immediately assumed Bartlett was the father of Mark/Marcus Sexton.  What the 1850 census does not do, is give relationships of household members.   Others made and are still making that assumption which is an error.

Standing in the records room in Louisa, Lawrence County, Kentucky I later found the death record of Mark 22 October 1877 that clearly showed him as the son of Elisha and Tabitha Sexton.  So maybe (another assumption) Bartlett was an uncle? No.

Mark was buried in Klaiber Cemetery.  But not reburied there until November 1893 after Catherine died. Prior to that he was buried at Bell’s Trace in Lawrence County.  The Big Sandy News tells of Powell (HP) Sexton of Garner (where we live) passing thru Bolts Fork (Lawrence County) with the remains of his father who died “sixteen years ago) exhumed and to be buried in the family graveyard beside his wife. 

Research shows Catherine living on Twin Branch in Lawrence County in 1880. Many years of continued research places John Sexton with Revolutionary Pension in that same neighborhood. We have now made several road trips around and thru Bolts Fork and it would be no easy task with a wagon to bring a body back across the ridge to our place.  Folks in that neighborhood say there is an old fieldstone cemetery which is haunted at the end of the lane on Twin Fork. 

Fast forward thru years of document research.

DNA reveals that Catherine wife of Mark Sexton is also maiden Sexton.   My family has two Sexton lines.  Catherine to Bartlett’s DNA suggests her line is through Charles as many suspected for years.  Sorting DNA with two lines is no easy matter.  But DNA tells us that my family has NO Native American blood thru Bartlett’s line.  We have truly enjoyed reading the many theories on wives with Indian heritage. 

DNA for Mark, thru father Elisha, show him as a grandson to John/Jonathan who died in Lawrence County in that Twin Branch area in 1838.    Thus begins unraveling the assumptions of Jno. As being on the Grayson, Russell and Patrick County tax lists at various times.  That is not John of Revolutionary status who died in Lawrence County, Kentucky.

It does explain the small notation found in the James Taylor Adams Collection at Wylie Library, Clinch Valley College stating “On my mothers side it goes back to ….Joseph Sexton, Johnithan (as sp), Elisha…signed by James Madison-Emory”

Chronology of John/Jno. Sexton

1758 14 May John states he was born in LOUDOUN County, Virginia (Pension)

1774 abt Elisha states he is born in NORTH Carolina

1779 Oct 4 resident of Fairfield County SOUTH Carolina – note that       Fairfield was not formed until 1798 from Camden district and he is a resident of Winnsboro.

1790 23 August marries Rebecca MCDANNALD Botetourt County, Virginia and William Sexton is surety.  A William Sexton marries Mary Ewing the same year in Botetourt.

1793 Tax list BATH County, Virginia along with William Sexton

1795 abt John Saxton born in VA dies in Meigs County, OH ASSUMED either in Bath or Greenbrier DNA shows he is s/o John/Jno.

1797 4 Mar William Sexton who died in Vinton Co. OH 1881 called “old Bill” born in Greenbrier DNA indicates s/o Jno.

1798 abt Elizabeth SAXTON born Greenbrier dies in Vinton Co., OH 1886. 

1799 to 1805 appears Greenbrier Tax along with Wm. Sexton/Saxton (Assumed William who goes to Cabell County and married into JORDAN family).  PP tax puts John on Cow Pasture.

1814 moved to Floyd County, KY (Pension information)

1817 Aug 15 Bath Co. VA Will of Elizabeth Sitlington sister of Rebecca McDannald Sexton “to sister Rebecca w/o John Sexton 333.33 in 3 installments, but no money is to go to John sexton or anyone representing him …not wanting any part thereof to be applied to his use.”

1820 Floyd County Census

1822 May 26 John Sexton m. to Susy Collins Merriman McGee bond.

1823-1827 Pike County Tax list

1828 Mar 12 Jerusha Collins marries Joseph BLAIR John Sexton “father” Collins struck out and Sexton written in.

1830 Pike Co Census – with ages of those in household that appear to be Joseph and Jerusha BLAIR

1831 Lawrence County, KY tax list

1834 4 April Pensioned Lawrence County, KY one of wit Archibald Rice which also lives in Twin Branch area.

1835 4 Sep DEATH

NOTES

DNA suggests Isaiah 1813 is a son of Jonathan. 

The 1820 Census of  Floyd County shows 1 male over 45 (John), 1 male 10-16, 2 males 0-10 (Isaiah and Joseph), a female 26 -45 and 2 females 1-10.  Ages indicate this researcher has not identified all in this grouping.

DNA suggests Jonathan could be a brother to Timothy Sexton who married Esther Sisel.  He was in Camden District South, Caroline as early as 1782.  He also appears in Russell County, Virginia for a short time. He died in Morgan County, TN in 1832.

Rebecca McDannald Sexton is mentioned again in the estate of Elizabeth Stitlington as late as 1830. In 1837 the will of Ellender McDanald references 180 acres adjoining the Sexton Place.  This suggests continued court record research in Bath and probably Greenbrier counties.

William Sexton of Bath County gave Power of Attorney to Robert 

McCutcheon to convey 6 acres on Cow Pasture adjoining Robert Sitlington to Thomas Kinkead 12 Oct 1797.

Susy Collins Sexton was still living in 1854 when she received a last pension payment.  To date she has not been located by this researcher either in Carter or Lawrence County, KY.  But in 1848 the Carter County court gave her funds for maintenance. 

Let’s use assumption one more time and go back to that 1850 census in Carter County later Boyd County, KY.  In 1850 she would have been about 70 years of age.  What happened to Joseph and Jerusha Blair?  This researcher cannot locate them in the 1850 either.  Did Joseph and Jerusha have a child Leann that appears in the 1850 census with Mark and Catherine Sexton Sexton?  If so another double lines because Leanna Blair married 21 March 1862 Bartlett Hascue Sexton daughter of Hulda going back the Bartlett Sexton line.

Please feel free to email me at Deliverancefarm@gmail.com

The Mysterious Life of George Page Geer

By Teresa Martin Klaiber, April 2019

My cousins and I adored our Grandmother Page.  Born Clara Page Geer, the daughter of George Page Geer and Clara Kilbourne[1]. She was a strong woman born, as they say, before her time.  She had divorced my grandfather[2], but said she would always love him.  She worked for the American Red Cross with enthusiasm during WWII.  She was a teacher both in public school and at home with her grandchildren.  She loved horses and horse races.  She loved family history and took great pride in her early New England heritage.  She taught me to love research which would define and form, not just a hobby, but, a career in genealogy. Just as I adored her, she would say she had adored her father, as a child.

When I asked her, at an early age, why we called her Page she would smile and say, simply that she was named for her father George Page Geer.   George Page Geer bore the name of the American Progenitor George Geer[3]. She did not know why his middle name was Page, but she loved her name because she loved him. Then her story about her father would unfold. 

She was eight years old when her father had a stroke and she would sit by his bedside while he told her stories about his brothers, a chair factory, and Vermont cooking. She remembered letters from a sister (unnamed) in Oregon but none survived. Her father died before her ninth birthday. 

When asked if there was a picture of her father she replied that the only one had accidently been torn up.  Her most prized possession was a letter dated April 1905 when he wrote her in Parkersburg, WV.  He had gone to Clarksburg selling Singer Sewing Machines and preparing to move there.  He began the letter “My Dear little Pagie” and ending with “…thought good bye darling kisses.”

George Page Geer died 2 February 1913 in Clarksburg, West Virginia, after a second stroke.  Her mother wrote the death date in the Roswell Kilbourne bible along with their wedding date. 

My grandmother corresponded several times with her uncle Gardner Talmadge Geer’s family thru the years.  Grandmother Page knew that there was a brother Silas, the sister in Oregon and thru that correspondence that Gardner Talmadge Geer had “disappeared.”  A copy of George Page Geer’s marriage to Clara Kilbourne stated he was born Plattsburgh, Clinton County, New York the son of Edmund and Almira Bartlett Geer.

A good genealogist works from the known to the unknown with documentation.  Sounds simple enough.  Starting with George Page Geer’s death date 2 February 1913 I searched for a death certificate in West Virginia.  To date no death certificate has been located.  The Clarksburg Daily Telegram did publish his death stating that the body would be taken to Ashland, Kentucky for burial.  As a researcher I checked Kentucky for a death certificate without success.  During that time frame if a body was removed from one state to another there should be a Burial Transfer Form. I found those in mass disarray in the basement of the Boyd County Board of Health. Spending hours of sorting and looking at each one – no Burial Transfer Form survives, if there was one.   The Ashland Cemetery Records show that the burial took place 5 February 1913.  As a child my grandmother and I visited the family plot together many times.

George Page Geer was 46 years old, (born 18 July 1855, Plattsburg) when he married and told the officials it was his first marriage. Besides giving his parent’s names, at the time of marriage in 1902, George Page Geer also stated that he was residing in Parkersburg and a carpenter.  From research I know that Parkersburg Chair Company was in business during the time he lived there but to date have found no employment records.  The first city directory we find shows George Page Geer as assistant manager for Singer Sewing Company.  Singer Sewing Company has no records either. 

Using every conceivable method and sound-x George Page Geer, G. P. Geer, etc. cannot be located on the 1900 census in the United States.  Neither does his brother Gardner Talmadge Geer, whose family states he disappeared and is living in Duluth, Minnesota.  Brother Silas, a carpenter is also missing from the census in 1900 but shows up in Michigan with his wife by 1910.  Without going into research detail, I was able to locate The Oregon sister, Mary Elizabeth Geer Heaton living in Douglas County, Oregon in 1900.

Prior to his marriage to my great grandmother, George Page Geer’s life is a complete mystery.  His parents appear on the 1850 Saranac, Clinton County, New York Census.  There are no existing birth records for Plattsburg or Saranac for 1855.  George Page Geer’s parents show up in Shefford, Canada in the 1861 Canadian Census along with Gardner age 15, Silas 13, Tapher 8, Mary 4 and Philip 2. George Page Geer has been left out of the census.  Tapher[4] and Philip do not live to adulthood. 

Brother Silas was the first to move back to the United States showing up in Afton, Minnesota in 1870.  Father Edmund Geer sold his land in 1868 in Shefford, Canada and by 1872 has a homestead in Morrison County, Minnesota.  By then George Page Geer is 17 years of age and could well be out in the world on his own.  His father states that he has four children in 1872 which would include George Page Geer, but not by name.  George Page Geer does not appear on the 1875 Minnesota state census. In fact, he does not appear in any census located to date.  A mysterious life for 46 years.

I have been able to document Edmund Geer’s life in Canada and his pedigree.  A descendent of George Geer first mentioned in this article, Edmund’s grandmother Sarah “Sally” Swan Geer’s own grandmother was Mary Page Woods daughter of Jonathan Page born 24 June 1677 in Watertown, British America[5] and grandson of John Page born in 1586 in Essex England. Page came to America with Winthrop’s Fleet.

While Grandmother Page cherished her April 1905 letter, I can only imagine what she would have thought of the discovery of a letter dated November 1630 when John Rogers wrote John Winthrop, Jr. that John Page of Dedham, his wife and two children were starving “entreating you for Gods sake to provide such a barrell of meale as this money will reach…”[6] 

My grandmother, Clara Page Geer Martin died in 1998 extremely proud of her New England Kilbourne and Geer heritage but never knowing her own name honored another American progenitor, John Page.  As she taught me, I will not give up.  I will continue to research her father and his brothers trying to unravel the mysteries.

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[1] Clara “Callie” Kilbourne b. 19 Jan. 1870 Lawrence Co., OH m George Page Geer 11 June 1902, Ashland, Boyd, KY

[2] Clara Page Geer m. Henry Kautz Martin 27 Dec 1922, Portsmouth, Scioto, OH. Divorced 6 Jan. 1944.

[3] George Geer b circa 1621 Devon, Eng.  1726 New London, CT.

[4] Named for her grandmother Tapher Thomas Bartlett.

[5] Son of John Page and Faith Dunster.

[6] Massachusetts Historical Society. Papers of the Winthrop Family, Volume 2.