Transcript:Pennsylvania Genealogical Magazine, Vol. 28 (Page 113)

Periodical

Source:Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania. Pennsylvania Genealogical Magazine, Vol. 28, Number 1

Article Title

"The Three Joseph (Van) Gundys" by Mary K. Meyer

Transcribed Text

...that the date 27 January 1765 recited in the body of the above deed was the date Joseph became an interested party in the proceedings - possibly the date of his marriage to the widow, Magdalena - or at least an indication that they were married by that date.

Joseph's son, Jacob, was born 13 October 1765 in Stumpstown (now Fredericksburg), (now) Lebanon County, Pennsylvania. His daughter Catharine, was also born at Stumpstown on 13 December 1767. We do not, however, have proof of the name of their mother but in view of the above she was, in all likelihood, Magdalena (Haldeman) Shonower Van Gundy.

An alleged daughter of Joseph, Margaret, married Frederick Agler and died in Franklin County, Ohio, 10 December 1843, age 80 years. Margaret was therefore born sometime in the 12 month period prior to 10 December 1764. If this Margaret was actually the daughter of Joseph (and there is grave doubt she is), she could not have been the daughter of Magdalena as the latter was still married to her first husband at the time Margaret was born. She would therefore have to have been born to a previous wife.

We have said that Margaret was an alleged daughter of Joseph. We have no proof that such is a fact, only information that seems to have come down through the family through the years. There is good reason to doubt the accuracy of the age/date on Margaret's gravestone. If the inscription is accurate, she would have been about 26 or 27 years at the time of her marriage and about six years older than her husband; she would have been age 52 at the birth of her youngest daughter and even older at the birth of her youngest son.

None of these things is impossible; but it was not commonplace in those time - nor indeed in our own time - for a man of age 21 to marry a woman six or seven years his senior. As a matter of fact, at that time a woman 26 years of age was considered a confirmed spinster and had very little chance of marrying unless to a much older man with a large family that needed care.

As for a woman giving birth after the age of 50, it is not impossible, but it is rare. Dr. Lawrence R. Wharton, an obstetrician at the famed Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, made a study of the subject. In reviewing all medical literature and records available over the past 100 years and checking out every reported case of birth of a child to a woman over fifty years of age, he found only 26 actual cases.

We do find a record of a Maria Margaret, daughter of Joseph and Magdalena County, born 2 September 1770, baptized at the Tabor First Re-...

Sources

• Image: American Ancestors: Pennsylvania Genealogical Magazine, Vol. 28, Number 1, Page 113.
• Transcription: "Ancestors of Samuel J. Davis & Sherry L. Kirk: Information about Joseph Van Gundy" in Genealogy.com