Person:Arline Wells (1)

From: "hkoons" <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> Subject: [WELLS-LONG-ISLAND-L] Genealogy Tour Date: Sat, 26 Aug 2000 08:11:09 -0700 Hi Everyone,My husband and I just got back from a tour of Long Island and Orange County,NY, and Wyalusing, PA. We were tracing my WELLS line down through thegenerations as they migrated westward, starting with William of Southold andending with my grandmother, Arline WELLS, in Wyalusing. What a marveloustime we had, too! Who would have thought that traipsing through cemeteriescould be a fun vacation! Next time, however, we will be better prepared withthick-soled shoes, hoes, trowels, hatchets, and machetes, (some cemeteriesare not very well kept up!) or at least some brushes and charcoal andnewsprint for rubbings.Here is a summary of our tour. I haven't sorted through all the materialsthat we collected yet (15 rolls of film and over 200 Xerox copies!), so thiswill be just an outline.(1) William WELLS (1608-1671)There's nothing new to report about William. Mostly we found information onsubsidiary lines like YOUNGS, VAIL, and MOORE. William's grave in theSouthold Cemetery on Route 25, called The Old Burying Ground, is impressiveand William II is right next to him. The First Presbyterian Church next tothe graveyard is lovely (a newer building, not William's church). We didfind a map on the inside cover of "Whitaker's Southold" (that doesn't getprinted when the book is photoduplicated) that shows that the location ofthe house William was living in when he died is on the other side of YoungsAve., about where a Real Estate office is today (that's appropriate), andnot the bank property as we thought, although he owned that, too.If you stay in Southould over a weekend you can tour an old house called theThomas MOORE House which he never lived in but was built on property ownedby him. There is also a Jeremiah VAIL house at 59405 Main St. a littlefurther up Route 25 that is in private hands. My sister and brother-in-lawwho accompanied us on this tour were especially interested in all the oldhouses on Long Island as they themselves live in a house built in 1762 inConnecticut.Other Southold sites we visited were the Southold Historical Society'sresearch room and gift shop, Founder's Landing (a nice beach!), and Horton'sLighthouse. We also took a side trip to a small cemetery out towards Orientin a place called Brown's Hill. This cemetery is really hard to find, downin a ravine, surrounded by woods. Apparently, the early settlers didn't wantthe Indians to find it, or to know how many of them were dying. It wasraining that day and the cemetery was very muddy and buggy, but we did findthe grave of Jeremiah VAIL Jr, and lots of TUTHILLS.(2) Joshua WELLS (1664-1744)We found Joshua buried in the Cutchogue Cemetery on Route 25 also called TheOld Burying Ground. Amazingly, Joshua's house is still standing on NewSuffolk Lane just south of Rte. 25. Built in 1686, the year he marriedHannah TUTHILL, it was in continuous use by Joshua's descendants until 1857.At the moment it is empty but the good news is that its new owner intends torestore it. It had a major restoration to the Federal style in 1815 so itdoesn't look that old.Nearby on the Village Green of Cutchogue is what they call The Old Housebuilt in 1649 by John Budd at Southold and later moved to Cutchogue. One ofthe owners of this house was my ancestor Joseph WICKHAM. Also grouped withthis house is the Wickham Farmhouse owned by Joseph's descendants and aone-room schoolhouse of a later period.While we were in Cutchogue we also toured the Hallockville farm museum onSound Ave. Although as yet I have found no Hallock's in my ancestry, it wasinteresting to see what an early farm on Long Island must have looked like.(3) Daniel WELLS (1702-1761)Daniel settled on property owned by William in 1661. This is the Aquebogueallotment that caused such a stir in the courts of early Long Island.Litigation went on for several years before a compromise was reached.We found Daniel buried in a cemetery with no name on it off of the MainRoad, but Virginia Wines in her book on Riverhead refers to it as theJamesport Cemetery. This cemetery was full of prickly pear that had beenmowed so it was very low to the ground (where you didn't notice it at first)and everywhere! We got prickles in our hands and feet that took days to getout. A fan palm is starting to grow right in front of Daniel's stone whichis why we wished we had brought garden tools with us. If it gets bigger, itwill destroy the stone.While in Riverhead we spent an afternoon at the Suffolk County HistoricalSociety's museum and library. There we met another WELLS descendant onvacation like ourselves. His name was George Propper, Jr. and his mother wasA.E. WELLS. George was born on a farm on Sound Ave. He has been to Norwichin England to see the Cathedral and has the WELLS Coat of Arms hanging onhis wall. I didn't have the heart to tell him that our William was NOT theson of the Prebendary of Norwich Cathedral.George and his wife happened to be going through a WELLS file of old paperswhen I met them. I asked if I could have a look when they were done. To mysurprise, the file contained the account books of two of Daniel's sons,Daniel and Micah. They were kept around 1770. What a treat!(4) Nathaniel WELLS (1740-1803)Daniel's son Nathaniel moved to Goshen and Wallkill, later calledMiddletown, on the west side of the Hudson River in Orange County, NY, asdid hundreds of other Southold sons and daughters. To drive around that partof NY is very strange for you see everywhere names like VAIL, TUTHILL,COLEMAN, MOORE, MAPES, and many others. We had lunch at HOWELL's Cafe indowntown Goshen while doing research at the Orange County GenealogicalSociety and at the Goshen Public Library nearby. Both, by the way, haveexcellent collections of materials on Orange County and Southold!Nathaniel WELLS married Jerusha WICKHAM and together they settled a farm onland bought by Jerusha's father, Samuel WICKHAM (son of Joseph mentionedearlier). The house they built in Middletown still stands although it is ina very sorry state after surviving a fire in 1996. My husband actuallycrawled under the front porch to take a picture of the stone which has theyear 1775 engraved on it. The house has been turned into a boarding house,but with aluminum siding partially covering the old wood it won't last longunless steps are taken to restore it.We were saddened to see the sorry fate of the graves of our early Middletownancestors, as well. Apparently, when the Presbyterian Church sought toenlarge its building somewhere around 1890, they moved the remains of theearly settlers into one common grave in the large Hillside Cemetery at theend of Mulberry Ave. and just piled the gravestones in a clump over them.Only two WELLS stones were readable, that of Jerusha and the other of aNathaniel C. WELLS (I haven't placed him yet, but I will).(5) Nathan WELLS (1777-1842)This is the generation for which nothing seems to have survived. Nathaninherited his father's farm, but traded it for a farm in nearby Minisink(which we did not visit). Later in his life, when he was stricken withpalsy, he and his wife Sarah COLEMAN moved back to Middletown to live withtheir daughter, Mrs. James MILLS. After her husband's death Sarah went tolive with her son, Dr. Nathan WELLS, of Meshoppen, PA. I could not find thegraves of either Nathan or Sarah.(6) Able Wickham WELLS (1810- after 1880)Able Wickham and his brother Nathan extended the family lines furtherwestward moving to the beautiful valley of the Susquehanna in Pennsylvania.Nathan became a doctor and along with his son, Elmore Horton WELLS, had athriving practice in rural Meshoppen, PA. We found the graves of this Nathanand his son and their families in the Overfield/St. Joachim's Cemetery. Itis located down by the river on Myobeach Rd. off of Route 6 in Meshoppen.Able was in Meshoppen for awhile but later moved to Wyalusing, PA, furtherup the river (and Route 6). We did not find his grave, but that was becausewe didn't know where to look for him. Next trip...An amusing incident occurred while we were in Meshoppen. I had read inHayes' book that Dr. Nathan WELLS had been a founder of the PresbyterianChurch of Meshoppen in 1850. But everyone told us there was no PresbyterianChurch in Meshoppen! Late in the day we stopped in at the library and askedthe librarian the whereabouts of the Presbyterian Church. She startedcalling around to everyone she thought might know the history of the town,but wasn't getting anywhere. Meanwhile my husband went rummaging in the bookstacks and came out with a Commemorative History of Wyoming County for theNew Millenium. In it he discovered that we were standing in the formerPresbyterian Church! After the congregation disbanded, the church buildinghad been turned into a library, then into a bank, and now back into alibrary. There was still a huge vault in the middle of the room. We all hada good laugh at that.(7) William Ney WELLS (1841-1904)William Ney WELLS married into the HOMET family which is quite famous aroundWyalusing. I won't go into the history of that family but I will state thatthe beautiful farm that he and his wife Rachel HOMET kept (and where mygrandmother was born) is being well care for by the current owners. Thelittle one-room schoolhouse where my grandmother and her sister taught thelocal children is still there, too. The day we were there was a spectacularone with a deep blue sky, billowing clouds, and corn as high as...So my WELLS ancestors were farmers right down to the beginning of the 20thcentury. They all lived in places that are beautiful, still largelyunspoiled, and very peaceful. I am so glad that I finally had the chance tosee these places that I had heard so much about while growing up and havebeen avidly reading about since I began doing genealogy. I highly recommendto anyone contemplating a trip to the sites of former ancestors to do so. Itcan be very rewarding.I want to thank John Wells and John Jenkins of this List, who visitedSouthold earlier and shared with me tips on where to go and what to see.Your help was invaluable!Regards,Ann KoonsLos Angeles, CA