Annie's Marriage Record to Thomas Adams Found

Miracle of miracles! Look what dropped into my lap the other day.

  This brings up a lot of questions about Annie's name. Why was she using the name "Crawford?" It was nice of her to get married on my birthday. More to come later.

Annie Sarah Taylor Wenzel Found! Hallelujah

It really pays to subscribe to a newspaper archive. In this case, I was subscribed to Ancestry.com, but I had not looked recently in the newspaper article area in the catalog. I revisited it.

A few years back, I had found an article that mentioned that Mr. & Mrs. T. W. Adams had visited in Santa Barbara with Mrs. Flora Lieb, who had been a former resident of Oxnard.  In the article it said,  "Mrs. Adams is Mrs. Lieb's mother." This was printed in the Oxnard Courier sometime in 1920. I never could find that article again and so gave up on it, until I found several more articles recently about my mother, Ottilie Lieb, and her sister, Barbara Lieb, attending school in Oxnard and being on the "high grades" list.

An interesting item of note is that Florence's birth record name is "Flora." Her mother must have called her Flora rather than Florence, so I believe it was Annie who had given the information to the Oxnard Courier's stringer. Who else would have called her Flora?

That got me to thinking about the 1920 Census again. William and Florence Lieberknecht were listed in Santa Barbara on W. Ortega St., without their two daughters, and also in Oxnard in a boarding house, this time with both girls. At a closer look at the Oxnard census, an Adams couple were in the same house. They were Thomas W. Adams and Annie S. Adams.

This prompted me to go to the Ventura County Museum and Library to do some more searching in those Ventura County records. I did find more in the Oxnard City Directories and in the Voter Registrations from 1918 up to about 1926. Another article said that the Adams were leaving the city to go to Texas to visit Mr. Adams' son and to recover from rheumatism. Mr. Adams was selling his photo studio.

There were many more articles about the Adams, about my mother traveling alone at age 9 from El Paso, Texas to stay with her grandparents, the Adams, and her subsequent bout with pneumonia. I faintly remember my mother saying she was a sickly child and never got to go anywhere with her family due to various illnesses. In a 1929 voter registration list Annie and Thomas Adams were living in Hueneme. They hadn't gotten very far on their way to Texas.

But now I can't find Annie or Thomas W. Adams anywhere in Texas or in California beyond 1929.

I was able to locate a Thomas Winfield Adams who was born in Gonzales, Texas in 1848, the same age as my Mr. Adams. I have followed him and his family to San Bernardino, CA, to San Diego and to Long Beach, CA. This Thomas was married, his wife, Lizzie, died in 1909 in Long Beach, and he had two sons, Arthur and Ernest. This is suspiciously my same Thomas W. Adams. In the 1920 Census in Oxnard, CA with Annie, Thomas is born in New York, Annie was born in Virginia, although she was really born in Pennsylvania. Florence had listed her mother as having been born in West Virginia in one of her records, so it is Florence who must have given the information to the census taker in 1920 about Thomas and Annie. In previous New York censuses and in her children's birth records, Annie has always said she was born in Pennsylvania. Florence may have guessed at Thomas' birthplace.

Until I can lay Annie to rest, I will still consider her my missing ancestor.

Annie is Still Missing in Action

Nothing has been found on any of the previously posted missing ancestors of mine. It has been 9 months since the last post, so I thought I'd better post something lest you think I have deserted my blog.

I thought I'd post the photo I described before for Annie Taylor Wenzel. It was taken at the Santa Barbara, California breakwater in about 1916. I think I'd better check to see when the breakwater was built, as it may have been after 1916. If the woman is Annie, she would have been only 57 years old. She does look older in this photo. She does look like her daughter, Florence, at the same age, though. The two girls are her granddaughters, Audrey (Ottilie) and Barbara. The year of 1916 is a guess as Audrey looks to be about 8 and was born in 1908. Her sister, Barbara, was born in 1911 and looks to be around 5. Annie's grandfather was MIA James R. Walker, and her father was MIA (George?) Taylor. Annie is still MIA and so are her two ancestors. It must run in the family.

James R. Walker, Missing in Action?

James R. Walker and Sarah A. Rowe lived in Kingston, Ulster Co., NY. They first lived in Saugerties, NY where their first daughter died at age 4 in 1838. She is buried in the Saugerties cemetery. James and Sarah had 4 more children, James R., George W., Carrie, and my 2nd gr-grandmother, Hellen (Ellen). According to the Walker headstone in the Kingston Wiltwyck Cemetery, James R. Walker was born in 1809 and died in 1849, only 40 years old. Census and church records do not reveal anything about him. There is mention of the death of a James Walker in the Kingston poorhouse in January 1849. James R. Walker is mentioned with Sarah in a deed having to do with an inheritance from her father, William Rowe. How did James die and where did he come from? James R. Walker is my missing ancestor.

Whatever Happened to Annie Taylor Wenzel?

Annie Sarah (Or Sarah Annie) Taylor married Peter Wenzel in Dutchess County, New York about 1879. This is the Annie who was born in Safe Harbor, PA about 1862 to Hellen Walker Taylor and the unknown Mr. Taylor (George or Harrison?). Annie and Peter Wenzel had about 8 children, at least three survived; my grandmother Flora (Florence Sarah) being one of the first was born in 1882 in Poughkeepsie, New York, and the others were Carrie, who married Patrick Morris, and George. Florence left home at about age 19 with William Carl Lieberknecht and was living in Jersey City, New Jersey where my mother, Ottilie, was born in 1908. Florence and William along with Ottilie were in Detroit, MI in 1910 and in 1911 arrived in Los Angeles setting down (so to speak, but not for long) in Santa Barbara where Barbara was born in the "Anapamu House." I have a photo of Ottilie and her sister, Barbara in Oxnard with a woman who looks like Florence and may be her mother, Annie. They are on the breakwater about 1916, and Ottilie looks to be around 8 years old. The woman could be Annie as she looks very much like Florence had looked at the same age.

So, did Annie travel to California in 1916 with or to visit her daughter, Florence? I am unable to find a death record in NY or a burial place for Annie. What happened to her? She does not appear in the 1910 NY Census. Peter is shown as a widower. They had a legal separation in the 1890s. Annie is my missing ancestor.

It's The Wrong George Taylor!

Well, I did send for the pension file for this George Taylor who served in the 120th NY Infantry, Co. K. I really wanted this George as he was born in Ireland and would have been the Irish connection I had wanted to find This George had a wife, Ann Maria. They married in 1854 and lived in New York City. This George had enlisted in Roundout in Ulster Co., a village next to Kingston and Saugerties where my family lived. It was a long shot, but sometimes you have to kill off a lot of possibles to end up with the one that fits the bill.

It's back to the drawing board and another investment of funds to order just one more file. If George had deserted, he would not have qualified for a pension nor would have his wife and child qualified. If he was missing in action, I don't know how a wife's application would have been treated. I need to find the book in our Sahyun Library that lists denied pension applications. That's the next step I will take.

George Taylor, a Civil War Casualty?

George Taylor was listed as working in an iron works in Kingston, Ulster County, New York before the Civil War began. The supervisor of the iron works would have been George's wife's uncle, William H. H. Rowe.

There is a George Taylor who enlisted in the 120th New York Infantry, Company H and is shown as "missing" in regimental reports published in the Kingston newspaper. This regiment's soldiers were mostly from Kingston, New York.

In the 1860 PA Census, George's wife, Ellen (Hellen) is shown living with her uncle, William Rowe, in Safe Harbor, PA. He is shown as the iron works supervisor. Ellen is married but no husband for her is shown, neither is her baby, Annie, who in later censuses states she was born in 1859 in Safe Harbor, PA.

One reason why I like George, is that Annie named a son George, although she also had an Uncle George, Ellen's brother. Another reason is that George worked with Ellen's uncle in Kingston at the iron works there.

Ellen's two brothers, James R. Walker and George W. Walker were both in the 120th Regiment out of Kingston. They were in different companies and were both wounded and captured in the Battle of the Wilderness near Spotsylvania, VA and spent time in Andersonville Prison but were paroled.

In the 1865 Kingston, NY state Census, Ellen (really Hellen) is shown with her daughter, Annie, age 6. Hellen is a widow, and they are living with Hellen's mother, Sarah Walker, who is also a widow.

Is George Annie's father and Hellen's husband? What ever happened to George, if that was his name? I will spring for the cost of obtaining this George's military record. Hellen never applied for a widow's pension, nor did George ever apply for a pension. This is strange because Annie certainly was a minor if George died in the war. Hellen's mother, Sarah Rowe Walker, owned property in Kingston, so perhaps Hellen did not need the pension for her daughter or herself.

Things already done:

1. Searched for a marriage record for Hellen/Ellen Walker and Mr. Taylor in Kingston, NY

2. Searched for baptismal record for Annie in PA. She was baptized in Kingston, NY at about age 5.

3. Searched for George Taylor in Ulster Co. State and Federal censuses.

4. Emailed a person who had access to various iron works' records in Phoenixville and possibly Safe Harbor and vicinity with no response.

5. Looked at prisoner lists at Libby and Andersonville prisons. No mention of George Taylor.

Things to do:

1. Find and review the list of workers at the Kingston Iron Works and follow other workers.

2. Study the regimental history of the 120th NY Infantry.

3. Order the military record for George Taylor in Co. H, 120th NY Infantry.  Done. Not my George. 

Update: Annie says her father is Harrison Taylor in the 2nd marriage license application to Thomas W Adams.