Amanuensis Monday: Will of Nehemiah Newans

Amanuensis Monday

What's an Amanuensis, you say? It's a copyist: someone who sits like a crazy person squinting their eyes and probably ruining eyesight to read that old document hand-written so very long ago and type it out. We do because we love:) 

 

 

One of my very favorite ancestors to write about is Nehemiah Newans (1740 - 1820), and you can see more about him using the page tab above where you'll find a rough time line of his life. (And don't even look at the nasty source citations: I need to fix that and can do better. It's on the list.)

He's one of my Revolutionary War ancestors and there was a little book his great grandson, Thomas F. Myers (1841 - 1920), had printed that's fascinated me for quite a while. You can see that book by clicking the tab above. The family has looked to it as gospel but in digging around I found that Nehemiah Newans did not die in the last battle of the Revolutionary War but instead never returned to his wife, Catherine Kepplinger Newans and small son, Thomas Newans, in York, Pennsylvania. Instead he made a life for himself as a stone mason in upstate New York... and with a new wife, Mary Newans! And in the will he mentions a second son, Elias Thompson. What's up with that and a different last name of Thompson?! Hey, it's not for me to pass judgement... I just hope to get to the bottom of some of it as I go along:)

Today, I want to take another look at his will. Here it is, below and my shot at a transcription, below that.

I Nehemiah Newans of the town of Canandaigue in the County of Ontario and State of New York do make and ordain this my last will and testament in a manner and form following - (vis) I direct that all of my just debts should be paid out of my potential (?) estate if it should be sufficient thereof and if not that such part of my real estate be sold as will be sufficient there for at the election of my executors___________
All the rest and residue of my estate both real and personal as shall remain after my debts are paid I give and bequeath unto my well behaved wife Mary Newans to have and to hold the same to all and enjoy during her natural life and the remainder of all such estate after her decease shall invest in the heirs of my sons Elias Thompson and Thomas Newans  And I do hereby constitute (?) and appoint Moses Atwater Esq of Canandaigue afore said my sole executor of this my last will and testament. Hereby (?) all other and former wills by me made _____________
In witness thereof I have here unto set my hand and seal this twenty third of March in the year of Lord one Thousand eight Hundred and twenty. _________

Nehemiah Newans (seal)

Signed sealed published and declared in the presence of us by the said Testator Nehemiah Newans as and for his last will and testament in the presence of us who subscribe our names as witnesses thereto in the presence of the said testator

Canandaigue 23 March 1820  _______________

Thomas Beals
Chester Loomis
E. S. Cobb

When I check online trees, Nehemiah Newans' wife's name is all over the place. I use that as a bellwether to decide how well the researcher has done their homework.

I'm still practicing my transcribing skills and it's a work in progress, but it's improving. The first time around this project was really hard for me, but this time around it was easier and that allowed me to focus on acuracy.


Ananuesis Monday is a weekly blogging prompt from GeneaBloggers. You can find the whole week's list of prompts here. Thanks, GeneaBloggers for being you!!

Kris "Kringle" Comes Early

Remember a while back when I didn't find a surname board on RootsWeb Mailing lists and message boards? No? What say, you have a life??

OK, so the surname I didn't find was Newans and that's one of my Revolutionary War ancestors that I've been digging around for. So I volunteered to be the administrator for the Newan/s board. And whatta ya know, a researcher named Kris popped up and contacted me!

Now Kris is no run-of-the-mill amateur genealogist (like myself:) She's a real researcher working on her graduate thesis and is presently focusing on foodways in western New York state. She noticed the RootsWeb post to the Newan/s board and the connection to Ontario County and in particular, Canandaigua, NY.

So she and I have been back and forth and the really interesting thing is that she's opened my eyes to the importance of agriculture in the very early 1800s. She even reminded me that in the 1820 census two individuals living with Nehemiah Newans were agricultural workers. Must say that I'd been thinking of him as a stone mason, which he was. But Kris pointed out that almost everyone in the area at that time was involved in ag. There were even ag fairs!

Even more flesh is being put on his bones: he had a thriving business as a stone mason with apprentices, and Kris thinks they might have been Italian as many were at that time. He had a wife and son living with him. He owned property, which included at least four good sized lots in the center of Canandaigua. And he was also engaged in agriculture and the household had two individuals just for that purpose.

Amazing what we find out if we just go look! Thanks Kris for your gift of a deeper understanding of my ancestor!