A Wish Fulfilled: Solomon and Polly Goss’s Graves & sister Mary!

Sometimes I think I have a genealogy angel watching over me.  Recently I have been very blessed.  A cousin found me on this blog and she has been very kind and very helpful.  She went out and found the tombstones of Solomon Goss (Jr.) and Mary (Polly) Coburn Devol Goss!  Next to them was Solomon’s sister Mary Goss!! 

Talk about a genealogical happy dance!

The following tombstone photographs were taken by Pat Stoudt a descendant of Virda Huston Spracklin,* a half-brother to my Amarilla Spracklin Barclay. 

Solomon and Polly are buried in the Burge Cemetery in New London, Henry Co., Iowa.  The book by Jerry Devol that I featured in my post of January 29, 2012 “A Little About Mary “Polly” Coburn Devol Goss!” is not correct.  It states that they were buried in Oskalooska, Mahaska County, Iowa. 

Solomon’s will was probated in Henry Co., Iowa and they are in the 1860 U.S. Census there and it all makes better sense!  See the last post about Solomon Goss (Jr.) estate file.  

The Burge Cemetery is west of New London in Henry County off of Main Street and sandwiched between Oasis Avenue and 257th St.  New London is south of Iowa City and located in the southeastern part of Iowa.

A sign for the Burge Cemetery, Henry Co., Iowa!

Burge Cemetery Sign off 260th

Plaque on the pillar for the Burge Cemetery!

Plaque Pillar - Back Entrance

Overview of the Burge Cemetery!

Overview of Burge Cemetery, Goss Stones!

The three stones stand together!

The Goss Stones!

Find A Grave has a listing for Mary Goss d. 1859, Mary S. Goss d. 1865, Solomon Goss d. 1864 and Harriet M. Goss Maynard the daughter who died 1880.  I think some of the listing is not correct?   http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=cr&CRid=685810  There are no photos of the tombstones at this site.

Solomon Goss (Jr.) stone, apparently it had been reattached?  It is difficult to see the dates it is so close to the ground.   

Solomon Goss the Son of Solomon & Olive Goss

This is a closer look and you can make out 1864!

Close up of Solomon's stone

The next stone is of Mary C. Goss wife of S. Goss.  It is definitely a C, not an S as listed at FindAGrave.

Mary C. Goss (Polly Coburn Devol)

Mary Goss, the sister!

Mary Goss, sister to Solomon and daughter of Solomon & Olive Goss

FindAGrave has her years as 24 yrs.  I think it reads 84 which would be more accurate! Here is a close up! (Click on the photographs and they will be made larger.  Remember to click your back button to return to this post!) 

This gives a death of April 6, 1859.  See my post dated December 18, 2011, “Mary Follows her Brother Solomon Goss to Iowa!”  I did not have this information when I published that post so this is good news.   

Closer Look at Mary Goss' tombstone

 

Mary Goss, the top of the stone. The sister!

Here is another overview of the Burge Cemetery, New London, Henry Co., Iowa:

I would like to thank Pat for taking the time to go to this cemetery and take these great pictures.  It is not easy to photograph tombstones!   I am glad she had fair weather.  It looks like it is well-kept and that is good news!  I wish I could have gone!  I so love to find my ancestors graves! 

Harriett Goss Maynard is also at the Burge Cemetery, she is a daughter of Solomon and Polly Goss. Here is a link to the Iowa Gravestone Photo Project with a picture of her tombstone:

http://iowagravestones.org/gs_view.php?id=225869

The main page for the Burge Cemetery but I am not finding anyone other than Harriett. Iowa Gravestones website:

http://iowagravestones.org/cemetery_list.php?CID=44&cName=Burge

*Virda Huston Spracklin is discussed briefly in the posted dated December 2, 2011 “Sarah and Daniel’s Family, the second Family!  This post is written on my blog: The Barclays of Pine River: The Lives of George and Amarilla Barclay.  I am slowly working my way to revealing more about the full and half siblings of my great-grandmother Amarilla Spracklin Barclay Dawes Urton on the Barclay blog.  A link to this blog is on the right side panel under Blogs I like!

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A Tip:  This website “The Families of Dennis W. Brumm“ has photographs of some of the Burge Cemetery tombstones and a map showing its location, as far as I can tell no Goss are listed.  It is a very nice and worth checking out there is so much more presented there.  Go to the top of the website  and just above the picture is a Find drop down menus and more: 

 http://brumm.com/genealogy/showmap.php?cemeteryID=4&PHPSESSID=c3e93e92c3c24992994b731071eb1146

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Ancestor Outline by Armindo Spracklin

My Aunt Miriam sent to me three pages of an ancestor outline about 1987 with surnames of Spracklin and Goss written on it.  I do not remember how many times I studied it but it was with me for a long time before I jumped in and starting looking for the family.  Survival and life intervened and kept me busy.  I waited too long and started about the end of 1998. The last of my father’s family had passed and I realized I needed to get busy and start the search for family. 

Who is Armindo?  She is the wife of Charles Edward Spracklin.  Charles is a half-brother to my great-grandmother Amarilla Spracklin. 

Aunt Miriam didn’t know who Armindo was, she thought it was Amarilla using another version of her name?

The formal name I have is Arminda Victoria Ward Spracklin born on 17 June 1883 in New York Mills, Otter Tail, Minnesota and died on 26 July 1955 in Bozeman, Gallatin Co., Montana. She wanted to be buried in the mountains according to a cousin, so her son took her there.  I visited her grave and it is there in the Sunset Hills Cemetery in Bozeman (2010)  but she has no stone!  The cemetery office verified her burial and the caretaker even took us to the gravesite. 

Armindo copied these records from some source but I do not know from whom? I do have a theory?  Charles Edward (Ed) and Armindo lived north of Pine River near my great-grandmother Amarilla.  There will be future posts about this couple along with sources.

Page one places the surnames of Spracklin and Goss together in the marriage of John Andrews Spracklin to Lydia Goss.  They married the 19th of July, 1819 in Washington Co., Ohio. 

Source:  Marriage Records of Washington County, Ohio, Probate Court, V1-3, FHL#0941958.   There are other marriages of the family in this film.   (FHL – Family History Library in Salt Lake City.)

Ancestor Outline page 1

Page 2 is slightly cut off on the left side.  It came to be in this cutoff version.

Page 3 covers the surname of Allgood.  Daniel married twice and his second wife was Sarah Blacketer Allgood.  Emily was the only child that survived in this family and she lived to adulthood, married and had children.  Where Edward, Sarah’s first husband, and the other children are buried I do not know but wonder if they are in unmarked graves in the Titler Cemetery near Marengo, Iowa along with other family.   A lot of the stones in that cemetery are broken and piled under trees and not situated on the graves.  I almost fell when I stepped into a depression in the ground, which was probably a grave. It is mowed but the tombstones are in bad shape. 

See my blog “BJM’s Cemetery Discoveries,” http://bjmcemeterydiscoveries.blogspot.com/search/label/Titler%20Cemetery  I have pictures of the some of the stones from Titler Cemetery featured on that blog. 

Ancestor Outline page 3

I share these three pages with you and ask that you give credit to my Aunt Miriam McDonald for preserving them all these years and to Armindo Spracklin for taking an interest in our family. 

In future posts I will delve into more detail on these families, what I know and don’t know and the connection to the Goss family in Ohio.

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Welcome!

Welcome to this blog about my 4th great-grandfather Solomon Goss. 

Solomon was born near Granville, Massachusetts on June 16, 1754.  He died in Fearing Township, Washington County, Ohio on July 1, 1825.  This blog will cover his ancestors and his descendants.

Granville Town Circle and Public Library 2011

I have been studying and researching Solomon his descendants and ancestors for over 12 years.  That may not seem like a lot, but I have worked on this almost every day during that 10 years.  I left my job at the end of 2000 and recently officially retired.  It has been an intense 12 years.

As you known genealogy is a never-ending quest and one is never done.  You finally find that one clue and it answers some questions and then opens up a whole set of new ones.  So I will do my best to share what I do know and what I don’t know and hopefully it will open a door for someone else.

Solomon Goss is a pivotal ancestor.  By that I mean, if he had not come from Pennsylvania to Ohio my family lines might have been very different.  He left his family and friends in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.  His mother and father were Philip Goss and Mary Kendall Goss.  Mary is buried in the Scott/Waterton Cemetery in Huntington Township, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.  Philip’s parents were Philip and Keziah Cooley Goss and they lived in Brookfield, Massachusetts.  Going back another generation we have Capt. Philip and Judith Hayward Goss who are buried in the Old Indian Cemetery in West Brookfield, Massachusetts.  The next generation back is Philip Goss of Roxbury and Lancaster who married first Hannah Hopkins and second Mary Prescott.

I visited in April 2011 the towns and the cemeteries where Solomon’s ancestor lived and died and wrote about that in my Massachusetts Meanderings and More blog at: 

http://massmeanderings.blogspot.com/

Solomon and Olive (Scott) Goss had eight children of which their youngest daughter Lydia married John Andrews Spracklin.  They moved up to Knox County, Ohio and lived on land that her father deeded to her in 1815. 

John and Lydia had Daniel, along with 8 other children, and Daniel married Elizabeth Keller whose parents were John Keller and Mary Anne Delano. 

We now have a Spracklin marrying into the Goss family and a son of a Spracklin marrying into the Keller and Delano family.  The Goss and Delano families go back to the American Revolution and to Mayflower.  Keller is still a mystery and hopefully one day John’s parents will be discovered.  

Daniel D. Spracklin and Elizabeth Keller had four children and their youngest daughter Amarilla is my great-grandmother.  Amarilla’s life is being featured in my blog:  The Barclay’s of Pine River, The Life of George and Amarilla Barclay:  

http://barclayspineriver.wordpress.com/

There will be some cross posting and a little duplication with my other blogs but I have decided that it works better if I separate out the different family grouping and target them in separate blogs. It makes more sense to me.

Where is Fearing Township?  It is in Washington County, Ohio.  It is north of  Marietta which is located on the Ohio river in the southeastern part of Ohio on the border with West Virginia.   I turn to Wikipedia for a little help in defining this township: 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fearing_Township,_Washington_County,_Ohio

This blog will be a big undertaking and hopefully I will be able to do justice to the families of  Goss, Spracklin, Keller and Delano. 

Come join me!

Hint: Please understand when using a source like Wikipedia, or any source for that matter, it is always good to seek out additional information to verify.     

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