Surname Saturday: The Thomas Family From Wales

It's off to Wales once again for Surname Saturday, the blogging prompt from GeneaBloggers. We've been to Wales a couple of times before as we explored the roots of the Williams, Price, and James clans before these Thomas folks. Unfortunately for Mom and I the records only go back too short a ways for us, in spite of the old saying that a proper Welshman could recite his ancestry back nine generations. Imagine: if all of our Welshmen could have done so how happy Mom and I would now be!

We're here in the 5th generation back sitting amongst the 2nd great grandmothers.

1. Diane Kelly Weintraub

2. Francis Patrick Kelly 1916 - 2007
3. Virginia Williams, living and loving it!

6. Cambria Williams 1897 - 1960
7. Emma Susan Whetstone 1897 - 1956

12. Daniel Williams 1852 - 1920
13. Jane Price 1862 - 1939

26. William Price 1829 - 1872
27. Diane Thomas about 1832 - 1871
They had these children:
William Henry Price 1852 - 1910.
Benjamin Price 1854 - 1906.
Diane Price 1856 - ????.
13. Jane Price 1862 - 1939.
Ellen Nellie Price 1864 - ????.
James H. Price 1856 - 1933.
Mary Price 1869 - ????
Victoria Price 1871 - ????

54. Benjamin Thomas (1793 - 1846)
55. Hannah Evans (1798- 1868)
Too little is known about this family for our liking. Benjamin Thomas is the founding member of this family and I previously blogged about them all here.
Benjamin and Hannah were born in Wales but we don't know where. They made their way to America in 1838 with the intention that the males work for the George's Creek Coal company. They landed in Baltimore on 11 Sept, 1838 after a voyage of 46 days. Here's the list of their children followed by an image of the  manifest. As you can see there are five able-bodied men willing to go to work as coal miners, or "colliers".
The children are:
John W. Thomas (1817 - ????) Born in South Wales, John married Lucinda Rice on 29 Aug 1846 in Allegany County, Maryland.
Benjamin L. Thomas (1818 - ????) Also born in Wales, Benjamin L. married Catherine Jones on 20 Feb 1840. She also was born in Wales. They both died in Mt. Savage, Allegany, MD.
James Benjamin Thomas (1822 - 1884) Born in Wales. He married Margaret Lewis on 17 June 1840 in Allegany County, MD.
William Benjamin Thomas (1823 - 1885) Born in Wales, he married Elizabeth Lewis, also born in Wales.
27. Diane Thomas (about 1832 - 1871)
Joseph Thomas ( 1835 - 1915) Born in Wales and died in Eckhart, Allegany, MD, he had three wives: Martha Davis, Rebecca Mosser, and Jane Watkins.
Philip Thomas (1836 - 1885) Also born in Wales, he married Ann Davis.
Jane Thomas (1837 b- 1917) Born in Wales, she married Joseph Scott Robertson.
Ann Eliz Thomas (abt. 1839 - ????) Born in Ocean Mines, MD, she married John Howells.
Maria Ellen Thomas (1841 - 1908) Born in Lonaconing, she married John James Anthony.

Well, there you have it. Obviously, Mom and I are not done here! And a new-to-me cousin, Robert, contacted me through Ancestry.com messages and we chatted so now we'll be working on this line together. So much to do, so little time!

Manifest from the Barque Tiberius, landing in Baltimore 11 Sept 1838.

(Photo by me taken in the Frostburg Museum, Frostburg, Allegany, MD, October, 2012.)

 

 

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Treasure Chest Thursday: The Barque Tiberius Brought Them

Last fall when on a trip back east to see Mom and the family, we went to the Frostburg Museum over in the old Hill Street School. Frostburg is the tiny Western Maryland town where Mom and Dad grew up, met, got married and where almost the entirety of the first few generations of my tree come from. So I was excited to see what the museum had and how it might relate to the family.

The first floor was super fascinating and we all roamed around looking at an amazing variety of stuff that we had some familiarity with. There's a small room with a lot of personal family history items relating to some of the families of the town that go way back. The Porters, The Workmen, and the Troutmen families all had genealogies there.

In that small room a couple of document facsimile were presented in glass cases. I took a close look and then with the permission of the docent, photographed them. I noticed the ship's list from the Barque Tiberius and knew it fit into our family's history but just as I was puzzling out where and who, one of our group drew my attention away to some other item, equally fascinating. It was like that all day! A wealth of relevant items to look at and consider in the ongoing process of understanding the world my ancestors inhabited. It was hard to take it all in and we plan to go back when I visit next time.

Back home and months later I'm sitting thinking, hey what about that Barque Tiberius? So I googled it and found a link to a transcription of the manifest and some very interesting notes which you can see here. Seems that it sailed from New Port, Wales to Baltimore, Maryland, and arrived in Baltimore 11 September 1838. Then I read the top of the manifest:

A List of Passengers on board of the American Barque Tiberias of Boston U.S., whereof George Sears, is Master, bound from New Port to Baltimore, U.S., burthen 299 tons Reg.

Columns represent: Name, age and occupation. The intention of all is George's Creek Co.* except Mary Bannista who is for Baltimore.
 

On board are three people who interest me to the max! They are:
Diana Thomas (1832 - 1871), my 2nd great grandmother, who was only 6 years old.
Benjamin Thomas (1793 - 1846), age 45, a collier (miner), and his wife,
Hannah (Evans) Thomas (1798 - 1968) age 40. Together, they are my 3rd great grandparents.

Holy-moley!! Seeing that just stops me in my tracks. Imagine! Benjamin with his entire family, all ten of them, confined to a small ship of just 299 tons, making their way for 46 days to cross, to the George's Creek Coal fields in a place they have never been to or seen. And with an infant child, Jane.

There's another Thomas family on board and in some way, I do hope they were connected, these two Thomas families, so as to be able to share the great adventure of their lives.

I feel for this family and don't have many details of their existence at hand which I can share with you. I do know that mine work was hard and dangerous. But I also know that the George's Creek Coal fields were the richest in the state, or adjoining states too at that time, and the miners who worked it prospered.  They raised large well-fed families and eventually purchased their own homes. Their children had good educations and they prospered as well.

Mom found one mention of Benjamin and Hannah in a small publication, The Lonaconing Mining Journal, 1837 - 1840, which is the recording journal of the mine manager. It was transcribed by Katherine Harvey about 1976. In it is recorded that Benjamin and Hannah were making merry and drinking on a Sunday evening at someone else's home, and arrested for being drunk! Here's the story. On Sundays, and after a long hard week of work, someone in the community opened their home to serve as a public house, a pub. Bars were outlawed by the mining company who kept an iron hold on the morals of their workers. It did not serve their best interests to have hungover miners working on Monday morning. So it seems that off went Benjamin and Hannah to have some downtime with neighbors. And they got caught by the mining company!

Also on the link, and written by Patricia Thomas, whose husband is also a direct descendant of Benjamin and Hannah is the following:

The Barque Tiberias appears to have left Wales on 31 June 1838 and is 109 feet long. The voyage took 46 days to cross from Newport, Wales to Baltimore, Maryland. The names of 76 passengers appear on the manifest. A cargo of 3,689 pieces of railroad iron was also on board. Most were men (and their families) hired as colliers (miners) due to mass recruiting by the George's Creek Coal and Iron Company in Allegany County, Maryland.

I thank Patricia Thomas for this paragraph, above.

In the Frostburg Museum, The ships register of the Barque Tiberius!

My 3rd GGF Benjamin Thomas and 3rd GGM Hannah Thomas on the Barque Tiberius roster along with my 2nd GGM Diane Thomas.

The Frostburg Museum now residing in its permanent home at the Hills Street School in Frostburg Maryland. There is much local history within its walls!

Mom and Brother look at her high school graduating class photo on display at the Frostburg Museum while our docent, Ralph, looks on.

Treasure Chest Thursday is a blogging prompt of GeneaBloggers. Find out more here.

The URL for this post is: http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2013/02/treasure-chest-thursday-barque-tiberius.html