Matson Family Research - Amanuensis Monday

The following is from a letter to Miss Elizabeth Cloud Seip from E. Dallett Humphill, Jr. written on May 10, 1903. They were corresponding about their Matson line and Mr. Humphill was sending Miss Seip the results of his research. The research notes are handwritten on heavy legal size paper and contain over 20 pages of data. The letters give some interesting insight into how communications between researchers were conducted before computers!

West Chester, PA

My dear Miss Seip,

    You will find enclosed some data regarding the Matson (or Mattson) family. There can be no doubt, I think, but that they are of Swedish origin, though you will notice one claim to an English descent in the enclosed data. I have had careful searches made of all deeds, wills, and orphans' court proceedings of this (Chester) county. To this I have added all data contained in Philadelphia wills up to 1800, a few records of marriages and extracts from Scharf & Westcott's History of Philadelphia, Futhey and Cope's History of Chester Co. and the Chester Co. Biographical Cyclopedia.

He goes on to list details on the data he is sending and then concludes:

  The mass of data accumulated in this search is so "muddled" that it has been difficult to separate the several families. If you wish further data in any line, please refer to names, dates, and places of record given, as it will be easier for me to find the originals than to go through the notes now before me.

Very Sincerely Yours,

E. Dallett Humphill, Jr.

May 10, 1903

Addressed to Miss Elizabeth Cloud Seip

Baltimore, MD

I posted earlier about my Matson line and some of the brick walls that I've encountered. While I don't have any evidence that my Matson family is connected to this Pennsylvania research, it is interesting to see that they were also reaching some "muddled" brick walls in 1903. The debate over Swedish or English origins continues on today. I also had to laugh about Mr. Humphill finding it easier to go back to the original records than to make sense of his notes. I can relate to that!

Here is the first page of data from Mr. Humphill. I will try to post at least a page a week, so check back if you are interested in the Matson family or early Pennsylvania records.

          #1   Matson family prior to 1700 -
                (Early Swedish settlements)

Nov 14, 1668 Patent - Gov. Lovelace to Audries Matson for 600 rods of land. See recital in deed recorded in Deed Book A page 113; New Castle Co., Del.

March 10, 1670 - Deed of Confirmation - Gov. Lovelace & Ueals Matson for 100 acres on the Delaware, already in the possession of said Ueals.

Nov. 1677 - Recorded in Deed Bk. A, p. 104; Chester Co., Pa. List of Tydables (i.e. taxable persons) returned to the Duke of York's Court at Upland. This list includes the Swedes on both sides of the Delaware.
   Nils Matson, with a family of 3.
   Peter Matson, and Antony(?) Matson.

1677 Patent - to John Mattson, Swen Low and Lacey Dalbo for 300 acres in Schuylkill, at Wiessa - Ruitouk(?), on the west side, opposite Wissahickon. See Scharf & Wesscott's Hist. of Philada., Vol I P. 75.

1678 Patent to John Mattson, of Wyalusing(?), for 25 acres of meadow and marsh land on the east side of Schuylkill. Ibid.

June 19, 1689 Deed - Neals Matson to Henry Jacobson, for 1/2 of the 100 acres on Delaware confirmed to him March 10, 1670. Rec. in D. Bk. A p. 104-5; Chester Co.

1693 "A roll of all the Swedish men, women and children found in New Sweden, now called Pennsylvania, on the Delaware River" sent by Carl Christopherson Springer to Postmaster Oberlin(?) at Stockholm. This list contains 188 (continued on page 2) families and 942 persons, all living on the west side of the river.

Amanuensis Monday – An Amanuensis is a person employed to write what another dictates or to copy what has been written by another. Amanuensis Monday is a daily blogging theme which encourages the family historian to transcribe family letters, journals, audiotapes, and other historical artifacts. Not only do the documents contain genealogical information, the words breathe life into kin – some we never met – others we see a time in their life before we knew them. A fuller explanation can be found here. Amanuensis Monday is a popular ongoing series created by John Newmark at Transylvanian Dutch.

Surname Saturday - Matson

My Matson line is a bit of a mystery. Matson could be of English or Irish origin or a spelling variation of a Swedish name like Mattison or Matheson. I have also seen the name spelled Mattson. The earliest I can trace my Matson roots back is to John Matson, born about 1758 in Loudon County, VA. He married Nancy Ann Clevenger in 1775 in Frederick County, VA and the family migrated to Clinton County, Ohio in 1817.

Mary Ann Matson in 1919

My great-great-grandmother Mary Ann Matson was born in Clinton County, Ohio in 1851 to Asa Matson and Dolly Clevenger.They had 13 children and four of the sons served in the Civil War. Thomas Jefferson Matson and Jares Lewis Matson died in the Civil War. John Franklin Matson was wounded, but survived.

Asa was said to have been a son of John and Nancy Matson, but Nancy would have been 58 years old when Asa was born! I suspect that a generation is somehow missing in the histories that have been passed down.

The 1850 census for Washington Township, Clinton County, Ohio shows Asa and Dolly with nine children.

By 1860, Asa is living with several children in the Union Township of Clinton County. Asa's wife Dolly died due to complications of childbirth after their son Asa was born and their daughter Terissa took over the child rearing duties.

On December 10, 1868, Mary married Timothy Creeden in Clinton County. Timothy was born in 1846 in Ireland and another mystery is a notation on their marriage license indicating that they are first cousins. If that is true, maybe it ties into the possible missing generation between John and Asa Matson.

I recently acquired some correspondence dating from the late 1800's to early 1900's that recorded research done on the Matson name. They concluded that the family was from Sweden, but said the family lines were a muddled mess. They also noted that one family member was said to have English origins. It was interesting to see that this brick wall goes so far back! Stay tuned for future posts where I will publish the data in the correspondence.

Surname Saturday - Chilcutt

From a Dictionary of English & Welsh Surnames

Chilcutt is an English surname said to have originated in Derbyshire, England. Some of the many variations are Chillcutt, Chilcoat, Chilcott, Chilcote, and Chilcothe. There are records as far back as the 1600s for Chilcutts in Virginia and Maryland, but the earliest I have traced my Chilcutt family is to John W. Chilcutt, born around 1815 in Maryland, USA.

Pictured above is my great-great-grandmother, Kate Covey Chilcutt in Chestertown, Maryland. She was married to George B. Chilcutt, the son of John W. Chilcutt and Catharine Harmon.

There are 2 marriage licenses for a John W. Chilcutt in Caroline County, Maryland:

John W. Chilcutt & Hester Ann Story 15 Nov. 1837
John W. Chilcutt & Catherine Harmon 2 Sep. 1846

From the 1850 Census of Caroline County, Maryland:
household #1049
John Chilcott 30, carpenter,
Catherine 26,
Mary A. 3, Caroline R. 1, James M. 2/12.

From 1860 Census of Talbot County, Maryland:
household #484, Easton District.
John W. Chilcutt 44, farmer,
Catherine 34,
James 10, Mary 12, Caroline 11, Martha 7, George 5, Charles 4,
Emily 3, Lewis 1, Margaret Lloyd 35, mul., servant.

Descendants of John Chilcutt:

1 John W. Chilcutt b: 1816 in Maryland 
.. +Catherine Harmon b: 1825 in Maryland 
.... 2 George B. Chilcutt b: October 1854 in Talbot County, Maryland 
........ +Kate O. Covey b: Sept. 16, 1861 in Caroline County, Maryland 
                        d: Dec. 19, 1943 in Maryland

.............. 3 Pearl Lena Chilcutt b: March 1885 d: 1953 
.............. 3 Howard Chilcutt b: November 1880 
.............. 3 Walter Chilcutt b: December 1883 
.............. 3 Tiny Chilcutt b: September 1888 
.............. 3 Covey Chilcutt b: 1904 
.............. 3 Ola E Chilcutt b: 1905 

.... 2 James Chilcutt b: 1849 
.... 2 Mary Chilcutt b: 1847 
.... 2 Caroline Chilcutt b: 1848 
.... 2 Martha Chilcutt b: 1852 
.... 2 Charles Chilcutt b: 1855 
.... 2 Emily Chilcutt b: 1856 
.... 2 Lewis Chilcutt b: 1858 

The Chilcutt Family Gathering hosted on MyFamily is a great site to check out if you are researching Chilcutt families.

Follow Friday - Irish Gravestone Photographs

This week Dr. Jane Lyons announced that she had added over 14,000 photographs of Irish gravestones to her From Ireland website and access is free! This is still a work in progress and she says she is only about halfway done with the photos she has taken to date. A search feature and index are in progress too.

The photos are organized in albums by county as follows:

42 albums for Kilkenny county - 4,616 photographs
49 Albums for Laois or Queen's Co. - 6774 photographs
25 albums for counties from Clare, Cork, Kerry, Kildare, Limerick and Offaly. - 2,626 photographs
25 albums of miscellaneous views of places in Ireland.

I've been a member of Dr. Jane Lyon's Ireland Genealogy Email List for a long time and continue to be amazed at the work that Jane does. This latest addition represents work she has done over the past sixteen years. Thanks Jane!

Follow Friday is an ongoing series at GeneaBloggers and was suggested by Earline Bradt of Ancestral Notes.

Follow Friday - Free Irish Genealogy eBooks

Peter J. Clarke's blog on Free Irish Genealogy eBooks is a great site to check out if you have Irish ancestors or are interested in Irish history. He lists books in categories such as Family Histories, Almanacs and Directories, Church history, Irish Diaspora, Journals and many other resources. He has indexed some of the main surnames that are mentioned and features an eBook of the month. All of the books can be read online and many can be downloaded. I can see I'll be spending some time there!

Follow Friday is an ongoing series at GeneaBloggers and was suggested by Earline Bradt of Ancestral Notes.