Allen Family History

Sources of Information: 1. DAR Patriot Index, volume 1, A-F, (Baltimore: GPC, 2003) page 42 (FHL #973 C42da) 2. LDS Ordinance Index 3. Barbour Collection, “Somers, Tolland, Connecticut,” volume 40, page 45 (FHL #974.6 V2wl) 4. Allis Genealogy, #158 (FHL #929.273 Al56ac) 5. Horatio Dana Allis, “Genealogy of William Allis of Hatfield, Mass. and Descendants, 1630-1919,” (Hartford, CT: Art Press, ca 1920), page 32-33 6. Will of Isaac Davis, Berkshire County, Massachusetts Probate Records (FHL #0873481)

Notes:

ROBERT ALLEN RESEARCH REPORT

[marshdavis121304 / 0346] 15 December 2004

The objectives of this research project were to identify the parents of Hannah Marsh, wife of Ezra Leonard, and to prove the parentage of Rebecca Davis, wife of Lemuel Allis. Concerning the Marsh line, at the beginning of this project we knew Ezra Leonard (born 1755) had children Lois, Truman, Prentice, Mervin, and Rachel from 1782 to 1796 at Worthington, Hampshire, Massachusetts. The identity of his wife, Hannah Marsh, was provided by Ancestral File, a genealogical database with no sources proving the information contained therein. We also knew Rachel, Ezra's supposed second wife, died at Worthington in 1792. As there is a gap between the births of Prentice, born 1786, and Mervin, born 1795, it is assumed Hannah died sometime after 1786 and Ezra married Rachel between that time and 1792. He then married Dorcas Brown in 1793. Hannah Marsh We first searched records of Worthington, Hampshire, Massachusetts for the identity of Hannah's parents. We found Joseph Marsh, along with Nathan Leonard and Ebenezer Leonard, was one of the first settlers of Worthington in 1764 [document #1a-d, 2a-n]. Through vital records of Worthington, we found Joseph was born about 1719 [document #6e]. He married a woman named Lydia and had children as late as 1776. Joseph died 24 July 1786 at Worthington. Due to Joseph's birth date and early residence in Worthington, he became a prime candidate for Hannah Marsh's father. As Worthington was not settled until 1764, we thought it likely Hannah was born somewhere else, and came to the area with her father, and later married Ezra there. However, neither Hannah Leonard nor her children were included in Joseph's will, written June 1785 [document #7]. Joseph did mention daughters named Anna/Amey Wright and Elizabeth Leonard, and Nathan Leonard was a witness to the will. We learned Elizabeth was the wife of Ebenezer Leonard [document #8a]. The couple had children at Worthington between 1779 and 1793. Although all of a testator's children are not always included in his will, Joseph's will seemed complete, as it named his wife and many children. The only way Hannah could be Joseph's daughter is if he mentioned the wrong married name for his daughter, Anna/Amey, and it should have been Leonard (which is unlikely), or if Hannah died before Joseph's will was written. This is possible, but the difficulty in this approach is Ezra had a child, Truman, born March 1784 and a child, Prentice, born October 1786. Then, between 1786 and 1795 there is a gap in children, which makes it more likely the death of Ezra's wife and his remarriage took place in those later years. Still, it is possible Hannah was Joseph's daughter and she died before June 1785 and Ezra remarried soon after her death. We found another possibility for Hannah's father was Moses Marsh of Hadley, Hampshire, Massachusetts [document #9], who later came to Worthington [document #10a]. As Moses died testate (with a written will) in 1796, we searched the will for additional clues, but found he mentioned only his wife, Hannah, and named none of his children [document #11]. In Hadley vital records, however, we found Moses did indeed have a daughter, Hannah, born 2 February 1748 [document #12a-b], about seven years before Ezra Leonard was born. This Hannah did not die as a child (in Hadley). We searched marriage records of the same town and found Hannah Marsh married Daniel Marsh, Jr. in December 1781. Both were of Hadley at the time of their marriage. One genealogist claims this Hannah was the daughter of Moses [document #13c], and if this is the case, she cannot be the ancestral Hannah Marsh who married Ezra Leonard. As the vital records of this area appear to be incomplete, however, it is possible there were two individuals named Hannah Marsh in the area. There were definitely other Marsh families having children at the time Hannah was born. For example, Daniel Jr. may have been the son of Daniel Marsh born January 1724/1725 [document #12a], but no birth records were found for this Daniel Marsh's children. As Hannah and Daniel were both of Hadley at the time of their marriage, it became imperative to discover when the Moses Marsh left Hadley and migrated to Worthington. If the family was living in Worthington by 1781, the Hannah Marsh of Hadley was likely not the daughter of Moses. We learned one of Moses sons, Job, married in 1783 [document #12a]. By this time, he was Aof Worthington, even though his bride was of Hadley. We searched church records of Worthington and discovered Moses Marsh and his wife (from Hadley) were received into the Congregational Church of Worthington on 27 June 1783 [document #15a]. This means Moses and his family likely did not come to Worthington before 1783 and the marriage of Hannah Marsh in 1781 in Hadley could very likely be for Moses daughter. It may be of note Ezra Leonard did not have his children baptized until 1799, when he brought all five known children to be baptized on the same day [document #15b]. The Congregational Church was the only church operating in Worthington at this time, but it is possible Ezra attended a church of another faith in a neighboring town or did not attend any church at all. This may be a clue as to why it is difficult to locate his first two marriages. In an effort to locate any other possibilities for Hannah's father, we searched Marsh wills in Hampshire County [document #16]. We found no mention of Hannah in any other Marsh wills. Since we have not yet found proof that the name of Ezra Leonard's first wife was even Hannah Marsh, we searched records of the following town (from about 1773-1783) for Ezra Leonard's marriage: Hampshire County Worthington Hadley Cummington Middlefield Northampton Goshen Hatfield Amherst

Berkshire County Peru Windsor Hinsdale Washington Becket

Hampden County Chester

Franklin County Whately

The marriage of Ezra Leonard was not found in records for any of these towns. Thus, we currently have no proof of the identity of Ezra Leonard's first wife. With this in mind, we turned to other possibilities for Ezra Leonard's wife. The fact he named a child Prentice in 1786 may be a clue as to his wife's maiden name. We found there were individuals with the surname Prentice in Worthington as early as the 1790s and some of these individuals were born in the 1720s [document #17]. Thus, the maiden name of Ezra's wife may actually have been Prentice and not Marsh. Without additional proof of Hannah Marsh's identity, it is difficult to continue a search for her parentage. Her name must first be established, perhaps through additional death or burial records or the records of her children. Records of the above town were also searched for the birth of a Hannah Marsh with no additional results. In summary, both Joseph Marsh and Moses Marsh are possible, but unlikely, parents of Hannah Marsh. There is currently no known proof that the identity of Ezra Leonard's wife was Hannah Marsh, and research should step back to prove her identity before her parentage can be established. Perhaps records of her children or any available land records for the area will aid in this process. Rebecca Davis Research began with tentative birth information for Rebeckah Davis as 20 May 1758 in Stafford, Tolland, Connecticut, daughter of Benjamin Davis and Hannah Lull [research report dated 10 November 2004, page 3]. This seemed probable because Stafford is located just east of Somers, the location of Rebecca's marriage to Lemuel Allis. As her parentage was not yet proven, our primary objective was to prove whether this birth information concerned the wife of Lemuel Allis. As the above information was found through the International Genealogical Index and was not primary source information, we first sought to verify this Rebeckah's birth information through Stafford vital records. As this was not found, we turned to records of the First Congregational Church in Stafford for clues. We searched baptismal records from 1757 to 1772 and did not find a baptism for Rebeckah. We did find, however, Benjamin Davis had three children baptized 20 May 1764: Sarah, Benjamin, and Susanna [document #18]. We also found 10 January 1759 Aan infant of Mr. Benjamin Davis died@ [document #18]. As Rebeckah's baptismal record was not found at Stafford even though she was supposedly born there, and baptismal information for her probable siblings was found in that town, it is very likely the infant who died January 1759 was seven-month-old Rebeckah. If this is true, then Benjamin and Hannah Davis cannot be the parents of Rebecca Davis.
Searching for additional information, we looked at land records for Stafford which concerned the Davis family. We found nothing which mentioned Rebeckah Davis. On the contrary, we found a deed involving Sarah Davis, Benjamin Davis Jr., and Mary Davis of Stafford, who may have all been siblings and children of Benjamin Davis Sr., in 1792, and the fact no Rebeckah was included implies she was not part of the family [document #19]. We did find that the Davis family was involved with persons from Somers, located just west of Stafford [document #20].
We searched the International Genealogical Index for other possibilities for Rebecca Davis birth and parentage and found the following [document #21-24]: Rebeckah Davis, birth: 22 Feb 1761 Mansfield, Tolland, Connecticut; father: Jonathan Davis, mother: Rebeckah Parker [extracted] [southeast of Somers]

Rebeckah Davis, birth: 11 Jan 1763 Killingworth, Middlesex, Connecticut; father: Solomon Davis, mother: Sibel [extracted] [further south of Somers]

Rebeckah Davis, birth: 9 Nov 1763 Middletown, Middlesex, Connecticut; father: William Davis, mother: Abigail [extracted] [south of Somers]

As Somers, Tolland, Connecticut is located in northern Connecticut, we also searched Massachusetts for possibilities [document #25-28]: Rebecca Davis, birth: 14 Dec 1744 Oxford, Worcester, Massachusetts [not far north of Somers]

Rebecca Davis, birth: 11 Nov 1746 Grafton, Worcester, Massachusetts [not far north of Somers]

We have not verified whether any of these possibilities could or could not concern the wife of Lemuel Allis. As most original records apparently spelled the name Rebeckah we have changed the spelling on the family group record. In summary, concerning the line of Rebeckah Davis, we feel she is not the daughter of Benjamin and Hannah Davis of Stafford, Tolland County, Connecticut, because this child probably died young. It appears there were many persons named Rebeckah Davis in the area and in the future we will have to determine which is ancestral through a process of elimination and a search of original records. This project consisted of a thorough examination of compiled and original records in search of the marriage of Ezra Leonard and possible birth and parentage of Hannah Marsh. His marriage was not found and it is imperative the identity of his first wife be determined before her parentage can be established. We eliminated the possibility of Rebeckah Davis parents as Benjamin and Hannah Davis and found other candidates for her parentage which can be verified in the future. It is a pleasure to assist you in researching and documenting your family history. We look forward to continuing research according to your instructions. _2004 Price & Associates Incorporated JMD/mh