2025 Week 44

02 Sunday Nov 2025

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This week I am finishing up the off-spring of John C Cox and his wife Eliza. First up is their son Benjamin Harrison Cox. Benjamin served in the ministry, as did several others in his family. When his sister died, he became guardian for her son Oliver. Census records from 1900-1920 all state he was widowed, and Kester mentions a wife named Elizabeth Reeser. A marriage record was found from 1885 for Benjamin and Bettie Reasor. Her life was cut short just four years later.

It should be noted that Benjamin was referred to as “Elder B.H. Cox” in most newspaper mentions. This is a good reminder to try different naming variations when doing searches for individuals.

Julia Cox, the ninth child of John and Eliza, married Dr. Samuel Smith. They resided in Frankfort, Kentucky. She died in 1885, leaving behind three children. The youngest has been unidentified by name, as far as I can tell. Samuel died in 1892.

Margaret Cox was married to James McDonald and they had one son, James B. He only lived to be eighteen and it is unclear how or why he died, as it was before recording deaths was mandatory. After her husband died in 1905, Maggie lived with her brother Benjamin in the home of their nephew. Her death was rather tragic and indirectly caused that of Benjamin. While sitting by the fire in January, a cinder from the fire escaped the grate and caught her dress on fire. Benjamin and their nephew worked to get the fire out, but she was burned severely. Benjamin had a heart attack shortly after the incident due to all the stress and excitement. Maggie died a few days later due to her injuries.

The youngest of the Cox siblings, Fannie, has been a bit of a challenge to completely document. She married Landon Coleman and they had three sons. Around 1880 or 1881, Landon was involved in some sort of incident which left him disabled and apparently addled to some extent. Fannie received a payout for half of the value of his insurance policy with the Royal Templars of Temperance. Landon was then placed in some sort of institution while Fannie and the boys went to live with her family in Middletown. In 1884, it was reported that Landon returned to Frankfort, hale and hearty, and Fannie also returned. Shortly thereafter, Landon relocated to Shelby County to work in the confectionery business, but no mention of Fannie and the boys was made. Fannie is mentioned as residing in Kansas City in 1891 in her mother’s obituary. Their son Willis was living there in 1900 with his family. He worked for the railroad. Fannie was not listed with the family which would hint that she might be deceased. Landon is living with Fannie’s brother Benjamin in 1900, identifying as a widow in the census.

The Royal Templars of Temperance was a fraternal organization founded in 1870 in Buffalo, New York. Its members attempted to close saloons on Sundays and advocated abstinence. Its members practiced rituals borrowed from Freemasonry.

https://www.viennapedia.org/organizations/royal-templars-of-temperance

Some researchers have attributed a death to a Frances Coleman in Howard County, Indiana in 1896 to Fannie, but that seems a bit far fetched without something more substantial placing her there. Also, I have not seen any documentation calling her “Frances”. At this time, I’ll opt to list her death as after 1891.

Tree Ratings are back! I have 3 from this week to resolve. I have 4949 errors in the tree–372 possible duplicates, 4117 with no documents, 460 other errors.

  • Here’s a new one I haven’t come across before. Both parents were too young to have had a child when the daughter was born. This would indicate that either the parents birth dates are incorrect or the child’s. It could also mean that she wasn’t their child, but a foster child of some sort. As it turns out, she was listed as a “daughter” in the 1920 census, but she carried a different last name, than either of the two parents. At any rate, she is not a blood relation. Based on the criteria I have set for my database, she will be removed.
  • The second person needing an error cleared will be difficult to clear. Web links are not considered sources by the Tree Checker. This distant cousin is still in her teens. I will need to revisit this one at another time.
  • The last error needing cleared also appears to be rather difficult this week. The known residence location, Oklahoma, doesn’t have much available online for marriages or births and nothing was populating from the newspapers. I may need to revisit this one as well.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines from the week ahead.
253 years ago – marriage of John McCullough (5th ggf) and his first wife Margaret Peters
228 years ago – marriage of Margaret McLees (5th ggm) and Isaac Lowe (5th ggf)
207 years ago – birth of James Denis Cardinal (4th ggf)
70 years ago – death of Samuel T. DeMoss Sr (gf)
43 years ago – death of Frank Fielden (ggf)
28 years ago – death Samuel T. DeMoss Jr (RIP Dad. Miss you.)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 26,947 people
End of Week: 26,965 people
Change = +18 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Return to Knox County and start reviewing the family of Benjamin Cox and Elizabeth Shepherd.
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 43

26 Sunday Oct 2025

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This week I have started on the family of John Calhoun Cox and his wife Eliza Garrett. They are documented to have had eleven children. After Ben and Sarah died, John and Eliza lived in their farmhouse in Shelby County. In their later years, they lived with one or more of their children in both Franklin County and Jefferson County.

Research for Eliza was pretty straight forward. John, however, is proving to be a little more difficult. Some researchers have assigned a death date of 1869 for John, however, he was still alive in the 1870 census. The 1869 death was for a John Cox who resided in Butler County, so I’m not convinced this is the correct information for Eliza’s husband. Other sources have provided a death date in 1878. This would be consistent with Eliza stating she was a widow in 1880, however, I cannot find any documentation supporting this date either. As for now, it will remain a mystery.

JC and Eliza’s first son, Dr. Henry Clay Cox, married Mary Jane Newland in 1859. Mary Jane died in 1926. Her obituary stated that she lived with her husband until his death in Shelby County and in Crestwood (Oldham County). It later states that she resided with her son Ben and/or his wife for the past thirty-seven years. Could that mean that Henry died around 1889? Also, his mother Eliza passed in 1891. He was not listed as a surviving child of hers at that time. This would be consistent with a ca. 1889 death. I have not found any mention of his demise in the papers and there is nothing on Find-a-Grave. For now, I’ll stick with a death of about 1889.

Daughters Martha and Elizabeth were fairly straight forward to research, but Mary was a little more complicated. She was actually Martha’s twin sister, and the algorithm kept insisting that she was actually Martha. Since Kester’s book named Mary’s husband as Samuel C. Long, I was able to research her through him. Similarly, Ancestry wanted to confuse brothers Willis and Wallace, although they were not twins.

Sarah “Sallie” Cox was slim on the documentation. While the family lived in Franklin County, she apparently married a man by the name of Edward Hancock in 1868. Oddly enough, she was listed with her parents in the 1870 census sans Edward. Sallie died in 1874 but she did have a will. She names her brother Benjamin guardian of her minor son Oliver Hancock.
Oliver was living with his uncle and grandmother in 1880, but he disappears into the ether beyond that. When Oliver was born is also in question. The 1880 census claims he is twelve, but he was not listed in the 1870 census. Was he left out on purpose? Was his age inflated in 1880? This is another question that likely won’t be answered.
It’s unclear if Sallie and Edward separated, divorced or if he actually died. Her death record states she was a widow. Some researchers claim that Edward remained in Franklin County and lived to a ripe old age, but didn’t appear to marry again.

I wasn’t quite able to finish up JC and Eliza’s children this week. There were just so many! I have four left to tidy up then I can move on to JC’s brother Benjamin. Yes, another of the Benjamin Coxes.

Tree Ratings are back! I have 3 from this week to resolve. I have 4948 errors in the tree–372 possible duplicates, 4116 with no documents, 460 other errors.

  • The first error was a potential duplicate. The algorithm postulated that sisters Martha and Mary were the same person. This was debunked by the fact that both girls were listed on the 1860 Census.
  • A distant cousin who needed a citation. Finding documentation for him was difficult, but I did find an obituary for his older brother.
  • Finally, another suspected duplicate. This time, it truly was a duplicate. I confirmed it with several other documents and merged the two records.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines from the week ahead.
97 years ago – marriage of Mathias Keller (2nd ggf) and his 2nd wife Mary Bouvy Bowman
81 years ago – marriage of Dorothy Cardinal (gm) and Francis W Keller (gf)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 26,923 people
End of Week: 26,947 people
Change = +24 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Finish family of John Calhoun Cox and Eliza Garrett; return to Knox County and start reviewing the family of Benjamin Cox and Elizabeth Shepherd.
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 42

19 Sunday Oct 2025

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Finally, we’ve moved on to another of Ben and Sarah Cox’s children…Austin. Austin was child number eight, born in 1799. He spent his adult years in Frankfort, Kentucky, marrying Rebecca Phillips in 1831. In addition to farming, Austin was known to have served as a land surveyor and as a clerk. He was briefly appointed to the role of Secretary of State of Kentucky from February to August 1836 by Governor James Morehead. Austin and Rebecca reportedly had ten children, most of which were daughters.

Nothing unusual cropped up in researching their oldest daughter Elizabeth. Sarah, however, raised a question or two. Kester’s The Other Polks listed Sarah’s date of death as July 25, 1850. Sarah was enumerated in the 1850 US Census. The date Austin’s household was recorded was on September 10, 1850. This would seem to be a discrepancy in the data. Unfortunately, Franklin County, KY, didn’t start recording deaths until 1852. However, careful examination of the instructions for the census state the name of every person whose usual place of abode on the 1st day of June 1850. Furthermore, Sarah’s death was published in The Frankfort Commonwealth on August 6, 1850, supporting the fact that she died on July 25th.

An interesting fact about Austin P. Cox was revealed in the obituary of his daughter Laura Cox Kearns published in the Kentucky Post in 1906. There is an irregular boundary between Kentucky and Tennessee in Simpson County commonly referred to as the “Triangular Jog”. Apparently when the boundary was originally surveyed in 1780, the surveyors could not keep a straight bearing due to several factors present at the time. Several attempts were made to correct the issue and finally it was resolved in 1859 by Austin Cox and Benjamin Peeples. A historical marker identifies the site along US Hwy 31-W at the Tennessee-Kentucky State Line. You can read more about this dispute on the Kentucky Historical Society‘s website.

I was able to complete my research on Austin and Rebecca’s children this week. Interesting facts included:

  • a set of girl twins born in 1835 (Mary and Laura),
  • a couple daughters did not live past their teens (Sarah and Charlotte), and
  • a couple daughters never married (Mary and Rebecca).

One son, Wallace, was listed in Kester’s book but I could not corroborate with any documentation. He died as an infant in 1844.

I will now move forward to child number nine of Ben and Sarah–John Calhoun Cox. John married Eliza Garrett and they had eleven children. A descendant of at least one of those children is a DNA match for me. In the meantime, I’ll do a little clean up of danglers and placenames.

Tree Ratings are back! I have 3 from this week to resolve. I have 5017 errors in the tree–376 possible duplicates, 4142 with no documents, 499 other errors.

  • Up first is a second cousin whose family I think I worked on last week. He needed some citations, as did a couple of his brothers, so I fixed them up.
  • The next was a father-in-law of a distant great uncle. Since I am not keeping in-laws in my database, I have deleted him and his wife.
  • Finally, I have Francoise Bonneau who was born in 1786. She is a distant cousin with no citations. I was able to find one church record–thank you to the Catholic priests of Old Cathedral. There might be more information available in the Canadian records when I am ready to dive into that.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines from the week ahead.
210 years ago – marriage of Elizabeth Staton (4th ggm) and Jonathan McCullough (4th ggf)
200 years ago – marriage of Michael Keller Jr (4th ggf) and his first wife Barbara Klein
177 years ago – marriage of Mary Caywood (3rd ggm) and John S Cox (3rd ggf)
154 years ago – birth of John F Thompson (2nd ggf)
125 years ago – death of Isaac DeMoss (3rd ggf)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,106 people
End of Week: 26,923 people
Change = -183 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Focus on family of John Calhoun Cox and Eliza Garrett
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 41

12 Sunday Oct 2025

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Time to wrap up the family of Jonathan and Rachel Cox. Their youngest daughter was Harriet. She married Thomas Hollingsworth. Thomas served in the Civil War and drew a pension until his death in 1882. Harriet made a widow’s claim at that time, but I didn’t have any better proof for her date of death. Her widow’s pension is not yet available at Fold 3. Only 22% of those have been digitized to date.

A search of the newspapers found an article in 1885 reporting on the annual Old Settlers gathering in the Knox County area. It was published in early August and Harriet was listed on the report from the Necrology Committee. In the following months, there were multiple legal notices in the papers regarding her estate. It would seem that one of her brothers served as administrator. After checking probate records, I was able to determine that she died on July 16, 1885 in Knox County, Indiana.

Of course, not all of Harriet’s children have been so easy to research. The children seemed to go in various directions. Millard married and moved to Wichita. Edward (aka Ellis) headed west and settled in Seattle. After Thomas died, Harriet returned to Knox County, taking Dora with her. John migrated north to Iowa, finally settling in Nebraska after several moves. Benjamin and Mary were elusive. Mary was mentioned in Millard’s obituary as still being alive, but nothing could be found for either sibling.

And with that, we return to Kentucky to research Austin Piety Cox, Ben and Sarah’s eighth child. With his wife Rebecca Phillips, they had ten children, seven of which were daughters. I’ll start Austin’s family next week.

I love maps! They help to tell the story, especially with migration. I found a new (to me) site that has me all giddy about creating maps. It’s called Ultimaps. I am forever wanting to illustrate where certain counties are in relation to others. This site has a blank county map of Kentucky and I can colorize it however I want! I’ve started by shading in the counties where my DeMosses are and where my Cox families are. I do have other lines that came thru Kentucky which I will add later.

Tree Ratings are back! I have 3 from this week to resolve. I have 5049 errors in the tree–374 possible duplicates, 4176 with no documents, 499 other errors.

  • First this week, is the husband of a distant cousin who I don’t have any references for and I don’t know his first name. Luckily, I found a wedding announcement for them right off the bat!
  • Another spouse of a distant cousin needs some references. Unfortunately, I’m not sure how she became connected to this cousin, because I can find no reference to her in any of his information. She’s been deleted.
  • Finally, a distant cousin without references. Of course, she would have six sisters who were all married and had a ton of kids…all without references. This exercise should make a dent in my errors for next week.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines from the week ahead.
209 years ago – death of George Catt (6th ggf)
194 years ago – marriage of Tamer Pool (4th ggm) and John Butler (4th ggf)
182 years ago – death of Hannah Puckett (5th ggm)
178 years ago – marriage of Francis Roderick (4th ggf) and his 2nd wife Eliza Pea
167 years ago – death of Gesina Brake Sievers (4th ggm)
165 years ago – marriage of Sarah Roderick (3rd ggm) and Robert Thompson (3rd ggf)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,078 people
End of Week: 27,106 people
Change = +28 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Focus on family of Austin P Cox and Rebecca Phillips
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 40

05 Sunday Oct 2025

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This week, my research began with Finetta Cox, daughter of Jonathan and Rachel. According to a newspaper entry by the great-granddaughter of Jonathan, Finetta was born in 1828. The 1830 census does account for one female under the age of five, so this is likely Finetta. However, the 1840 census does not provide for a female between ten and fifteen. This would lead me to believe that Finetta died at some point during the 1830s. No further mention of her has been found and I shall move on.

Alexander Cox is the eighth known child of Jonathan and Rachel. He married Angeline Sartor and they moved to Kansas in the early 1880s. They had seven children who reached adulthood. His obituaries are kind of confusing, especially with respect to his younger children. That could be because they were published in Vincennes and the information was from someone other than the immediate family.

Filling in the details for Alexander and Angeline’s children was fairly straight forward. The only child that was difficult to find information on was their son John. John moved to Stockton, California some time before 1893, when he was listed in the Stockton city directory. The last evidence of John’s whereabouts was in the 1920 census. No obvious death information has been found in Stockton, Knox County or Labette County, the three most obvious places where he might have been laid to rest.

I have one last child of Jonathan and Rachel to review and then I can move on to the next sibling!

Tree Ratings are back! I have 3 errors from last week and 3 from this week to resolve. I have 5057 errors in the tree–374 possible duplicates, 4183 with no documents, 500 other errors.

  • Husband of a 5th cousin was lacking source documents. Using their residence location when her parents died, I was able to pull a few sources from the hints.
  • A dangler who was also suspected to be a duplicate of his brother. He was deleted, removing 2 errors at once!
  • The husband of a distant cousin was also lacking sources. By updating others in the family, I was able to find his first name and supply at least one source.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines from the week ahead.
249 years ago – death of Marie Creely (8th ggm)
217 years ago – death of Benjamin Bonnell Jr (6th ggf)
196 years ago – marriage of Sarah Ireland (4th ggm) and Joseph Reeve (4th ggf)
195 years ago – death of Thomas Butler (5th ggf)
188 years ago – marriage of Elizabeth Moyer (3rd ggm) and James Mattox (3rd ggf)
169 years ago – birth of Samuel T DeMoss (2nd ggf)
155 years ago – birth of Emma Nagele Keller (2nd ggm)
151 years ago – birth of Arely Fielden (2nd ggf)
89 years ago – death of Sarah Winkler DeMoss (2nd ggm)
78 years ago – birth of my mom Phyllis!

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,053 people
End of Week: 27,078 people
Change = +25 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Continue focus on Jonathan P. Cox and family – Harriet Cox
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 39

28 Sunday Sep 2025

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Mykonos, Greece

So, I took another week off from my blog. This time my husband and I went on a cruise in Greece with friends. I didn’t take my laptop, but I did get some genealogy done during our At Sea Days, albeit very little was done on my family tree. My husband showed some interest in his maternal grandmother’s family roots. We didn’t really know all that much about her family. Growing up, the adults had been rather tight-lipped about the family’s origins. We actually learned quite a bit with very little effort. Some of the highlights included:

  • his grandmother had an older half-brother
  • his grandmother had a younger brother who was killed in an automobile accident at age 31
  • we found the Dawes Census Card linking his family to the Chickasaw Tribe on his grandfather’s side of the family.

I’ll work on his tree a little at a time. I have a lot to do on my own.

When I left off on my own tree, I was working on the children of Harvey Innes Cox and Mary Nicholson. I was down to the last two children–Andrew and Rachel.

Andrew Campbell Cox has been rather difficult to flesh out. He married Minnie Burton in 1897 in Labette County, Kansas. The 1900 census includes an infant daughter, possibly named Iris. A short newspaper blurb later that year, states Minnie Cox was grieving the loss of her young child. There were several legal notices naming Andrew published in local papers a few years later regarding Minnie’s family. The last evidence of Andrew was in his father’s 1912 obituary saying Andrew was in Paris, Texas. No mention of him has been located after that time. Several researchers claim he died in Anchorage, Alaska in 1934, however, no documentation supporting this fact has been located. He was not mentioned in his brother Henry’s obituary in 1929.

Rachel Cox wasn’t nearly as difficult to research, but her husband Otis Morrow was rather elusive by 1910. The 1910 census states that Rachel was married, however, Otis was not in the household. She had four children which lived to adulthood.

Tree Ratings are back! I have 3 errors from last week and 3 from this week to resolve. I have 5055 errors in the tree–372 possible duplicates, 4182 with no documents, 501 other errors.

  • The three from last week all needed sources attached. Two were spouses of distant cousins and the third was a 5th cousin.
  • The first error this week was for an unattached person from the 1840s. I simply deleted her.
  • The second was a little harder to clean up. A Mary Polk listed as the daughter of General Thomas Polk had no sources attached. Ancestry also claimed she was her sister Margaret. Both sisters were mentioned in Polk Family and Kinsmen, however, little information about Mary/Polly was specifically provided. It did mention that she married a Daniel Brown and they had three children who died young.
  • The third was a spouse of a distant cousin who did not have a first name in my tree.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines from last week and the week ahead.
309 years ago – death of John Norton (9th ggf)
274 years ago – birth of Jane Wilson (5th ggm)
266 years ago – birth of James Ireland (6th ggf)
263 years ago – birth of Elizabeth Pea (5th ggm)
262 years ago – death of Jacques Cardinal (7th ggf)
250 years ago – death of Elizabeth Quincy Smith (7th ggm)
238 years ago – birth of John S Cawood (4th ggf)
210 years ago – death of Daniel McLeese (6th ggf)
182 years ago – marriage of James Fielden (5th ggf) and his 2nd wife Jemima Neal
162 years ago – death of Isaac Catt (4th ggf)
157 years ago – birth of Mathias Keller (2nd ggf)
150 years ago – birth of Sarah Butler (2nd ggm)
148 years ago – marriage of Rebecca Coppock (2nd ggm) and Calvin Mattox (2nd ggf)
135 years ago – marriage of Mathias Keller (2nd ggf) and Emma Nagele (2nd ggm)
131 years ago – birth of Emmett Keller (ggf)
124 years ago – death of Richard Bennett (3rd ggf)
76 years ago – marriage of Blanche Cox DeMoss (ggm) and her second husband Coen Robertson
67 years ago – death of Emmett Keller (ggf)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,029 people
End of Week: 27,053 people
Change = +24 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Continue focus on Jonathan P. Cox and family – Finetta Ann Cox
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 37

13 Saturday Sep 2025

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This week I’m starting on the family of Harvey Innes Cox. I’ll get it started, but likely won’t finish it. His parents were Jonathan P Cox and Rachel Tigert Cox. He married Mary Nicholson in Knox County. They had nine kids that I know of. After he served in the Civil War, they picked up stakes and moved to Labette County, Kansas around 1868. This is where they remained until death.

Where exactly is Labette County? It is in the southeastern corner of Kansas, not too far west of Joplin, Missouri. Harvey’s family was mostly located in the Parsons area, in the northern part of the county, but over the years they could be found in the southern towns of Edna and Bartlett.

I have concerns about some of the information out there for Harvey’s descendants and families. His daughter Eliza appears in the 1860 census as a one year old, however, there is no trace of her after that. Some trees, and print books, list an actual date of birth and death, however no sources have yet to be found with this information. I would only hope there is a family bible out there somewhere that contains that information.

There is also erroneous information regarding the family of Benjamin F Cox, Harvey’s son. Benjamin married Etta Pond when she was 19. Some sources claim her maiden name was Stark based on her headstone, but this is incorrect. Benjamin’s obituary claims Etta died before his second marriage, but that is also incorrect. Scouring the newspapers, Etta filed for divorce from Benjamin in February 1916 according to The Times-Journal. It was granted in May. A marriage license for Etta Cox, 51, to William Wright was located in the South Kansas Tribune in January 1918. This was followed by a legal notice in the Parsons Daily Sun on April 21, 1921, where Etta Wright sues a William Wright for divorce. Part of her suit is to return her name to Etta Cox. Prior to 1930 Etta seems to have remarried to Eugene Stark, which explains the Stark name on her headstone. Pulling information from two very different obituaries for Etta ties the two women together.

I actually made more progress than I thought I would on this family this week. Three of the sons–Henry, and the twins Jonathan and Simon–appear to have never married so there wasn’t much drama to try and unfold. Two of the daughters–Eliza and Irene–seem to have died as small children so there was little to be found about them. The 1900 census mentions that Mary Nicholson Cox had 12 children, however, I have not been able to account for two of them. There does seem to be a significant gap between Harriet (b. 1851) and Henry (b. 1855). Researchers on FamilySearch have indicated there was a baby born in January 1853, however, no source is provided. The gap between Benjamin and Irene is likely due to Harvey being away at war for three years, so I would not expect a child to be hidden there.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines the week ahead.
281 years ago – death of Louise Arrivee Cardinal (8th ggm)
258 years ago – birth of Lydia Smith (6th ggm)
242 years ago – death of Rev. William Smith (7th ggf)
228 years ago – marriage of Mary Gott (5th ggm) and John Squires (5th ggf)
193 years ago – birth of Benjamin Coppock (3rd ggf)
193 years ago – death of Richard Puckett (5th ggf)
179 years ago – death of George Boord (6th ggf)
148 years ago – marriage of Joseph E Cardinal (3rd ggf) and Elisabeth Carrie, his 2nd wife

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,020 people
End of Week: 27,029 people
Change = +9 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Continue focus on Jonathan P. Cox and family – Harvey Innes Cox
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek

2025 Week 36

07 Sunday Sep 2025

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Sally Cox. She was the first daughter born to Jonathan Piety Cox and Rachel Lemen Tigert. There really isn’t much, if any information on her existence. Robertine Cox Dees, the great-granddaughter of Jonathan and Rachel, named Sally as their daughter born in 1822.1 It would seem that Sally possibly died as a small child. She cannot be accounted for in the 1830 Census. There is only one female between the ages of five and nine identified and that likely references her sister Mary who was born in 1824. Other researchers, including Ancestry’s hints, try to attribute this Sally to one who married David Huff in 1842 in Hancock County, Kentucky. While that Sally’s father’s name was also Jonathan, it must be remembered that Jonathan was a popular Cox family name. It is not very likely that after Jonathan and Rachel moved the family north to Knox County in 1823ish, that they would have married her off to someone in a county they were not native to some distance away.

That said, all I can and will say about Sally is that she was born circa 1822, probably in Shelby County, Kentucky.

Moving on, Mary J Cox certainly has a few more details to consider. I have a couple DNA matches through her as well. There also seems to be some confusion between this Mary and another Mary who resided in Warrick County, Indiana during the same time period. The DNA algorithms are trying to attribute Warrick County Mary as a daughter of JP. She likely is descended through another branch of my Cox line. I’m sure there will be more on that later.

Mary married her distant cousin Isaac Polk. They had nine children together before her death in 1859. Isaac married a second time, however, I will research those three daughters at a later date. Mary and Isaac’s son Benjamin Franklin Polk served as county treasurer for one term in the 1880s. The family mainly resided in northern Knox County as prominent farmers and livestock growers. Both Jeanette and Henrietta were married to Ellis Hill, although not at the same time. A common ailment leading to death in this family was Bright’s Disease, an old school term for a general group of kidney diseases.

Revisiting a question from a couple weeks ago regarding Benjamin Cox, son of Jonathan and Rachel…nothing concrete was found regarding the parents of the Benjamin Cox in Montgomery County. No land records in Montgomery County were found indicating where Benjamin might have resided at the time of purchase. The Find a Grave memorial does include an obituary which states that Benjamin arrived in Montgomery Co in 1853, and he is attached to a William and Ida Cox from the Lexington, KY area. The 1880 census states his parents were born in England which is inline with information available on William and Ida.

A will for Jonathan Piety Cox was not found, so whether or not Benjamin was still alive in 1874 when JP died cannot be determined. However, I think it can be surmised that JP’s son did not move to Montgomery County and marry Mary Srader.

A lot of progress was made this week, including the pruning of several unattached branches in the tree. Next week I will continue with the descendants of Harvey Innes Cox.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines the week ahead.
362 years ago – birth of Anna Shepard (9th ggm)
202 years ago – death of Jane Wilson (5th ggm)
130 years ago – birth of Ethel Thompson (ggm)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,336 people
End of Week: 27,020 people
Change = -316 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Continue focus on Jonathan P. Cox and family – Harvey Innes Cox
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek
  1. “Indiana Genealogy, Answers #638” The Indianapolis Star, 2 Jun 1929, page 74, newspapers.com. ↩︎

2025 Week 35

31 Sunday Aug 2025

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This week I am focusing my research on John Lemen Cox, son of Jonathan Piety Cox and Rachel Lemen Tigert. He was born in Shelby County, Kentucky, but lived out the rest of his life in Knox County, Indiana. He died in November 1900.

Among the many documents available for John is the 1880 plat map. I have always been fascinated with maps and comparing how things change over time. Having grown up in Knox County, I’m always curious as to where an ancestor’s land was located compared to today’s landmarks. I will say up front that my photoshopping skills are incredibly basic. I have taken the plat map for Washington Township and overlaid it on the map from Google, using the Price Cemetery and the town of Bruceville to line things up.

I was initially curious about the railroad that runs through Bruceville and snakes across the bottom of the image. That was the Indianapolis and Vincennes Railroad which has since been dismantled. What I did wonder was if it ran along the same path as State Road 67. Some sources mention that SR 67 was laid in the railroad bed in some places. That doesn’t seem to be the case in Washington Township, but may be so further north.

I was then curious as to where John L Cox’s farm was. Newspaper accounts state he lived on this farm for 65 years! He had several sections of land which are in the red rectangle. There is a small dot near the middle top of the rectangle indicating where the residence was. Closer examination reveals that SR 67 cuts through the middle of John’s land, and his property appears to be a stone’s throw from the Knox County Fairgrounds! How very cool is that?

The review of John’s family was fairly straight forward as I already had a lot of documents collected for them. John was married twice. He had three sons with his first wife, including a set of twins. After her death, he married Naomi Steen and together they had six children who lived to adulthood. Among his children was John Crittenden Cox, elected sheriff in Knox County from 1899 to 1900.

Most of John’s nine children never married. Of those that did, there were only four grandchildren produced. Interestingly, Caroline and James, both who never married, made each other the primary beneficiaries of their estates. Caroline died first in March 1936, leaving almost everything to James. James died later that year in September. Both of them made provisions that if the other predeceased them, their respective estates moved to one of their named nieces.

Caution was necessary when researching James. There was another James Cox who was of similar age who also lived in Knox County. He was born in 1858 and died in 1935. This alternate James had been married and had several children. Some sources confuse the two men.

This week Ancestry gave me three new errors to resolve. I have 5170 errors in the tree–376 possible duplicates, 4235 with no documents, 559 other errors.

  • BUMMER! The tree score is gone. I don’t know if that is a temporary change or not. They are having a sale on the ProTools until Tuesday. I’ll pass for now

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines the week ahead.
289 years ago – death of Nathaniel Bunnell Jr (9th ggf)
245 years ago – birth of Catherine Catt (5th ggm)
225 years ago – birth of Rebecca Wilks (4th ggm)
183 years ago – marriage of Rebecca WIlliams (4th ggm) and William Briscoe (4th ggf)
181 years ago – death of Phillip Catt (7th ggf)
177 years ago – death of Joshua Frost (4th ggf)
45 years ago – death of Magdelena Kaiser Keller (ggm)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,307 people
End of Week: 27,336 people
Change = +29 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Continue focus on Jonathan P. Cox and family – Sally Cox
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek
  • September 6th – FS Full Text Search at library of Benjamin F Cox (1819-?)

2025 Week 34

24 Sunday Aug 2025

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Let’s talk Benjamins–Benjamin Coxes, that is. I have ten of them. Let’s sort them out.

  • Benjamin Cox #1 (1757-1829) – This Benjamin is the granddaddy of them all, literally. He’s married to Sarah Piety.
  • Benjamin F Cox #2 (1804-1887) – This Benjamin Cox is the son of Benjamin #1. He was married first to Elizabeth Shepherd, then to Lucinda Williams. He spent his adult years in Knox County, Indiana.
  • Benjamin Cox #3 (1771-?) – This Benjamin is the son of John Cox, older brother of Benjamin #1. He was born in Maryland. He would be a cousin to #2.
  • Benjamin Cox #4 (1841-?) – This Benjamin is a grandson of Benjamin #1, through his son John Calhoun Cox.
  • Benjamin F Cox #5 (1819-?) – This Benjamin Cox is another grandson of Benjamin #1, this one through Jonathan Piety Cox. He is the focus of this week’s research.
  • Benjamin F Cox #6 (1820-1845) – This Benjamin Cox is yet a third grandson of Benjamin #1, a son of Gabriel Cox.
  • Benjamin Ballard Cox #7 (1869-?) – This Benjamin Cox is the great-grandson of Benjamin #1. He is descended through Isaac Cox and William Benjamin Cox.
  • Benjamin Franklin Cox #8 (1852-1905) – This Benjamin Cox is another great-grandson of Benjamin #1, descended through Gabriel and his son Thomas P Cox. He married Minnie Martin and lived in the Knox County, Indiana area.
  • Benjamin Franklin Cox #9 (1862-?) – This Benjamin Cox is also a great-grandson of Benjamin #1, descended from Jonathan Piety Cox and Harvey Innes Cox.
  • Benjamin Cox #10 (?-?) – This Benjamin Cox is the son of Friend Cox. This would make him a cousin of Benjamin #1.

That’s quite a collection of Benjamins. Unfortunately, I’m having a bit of difficulty with Benjamin #5. He appears to have left home by 1850–he was thirty years old–and was not listed near the family in the census. Someone on FamilySearch mistook him for someone fifteen years his junior so that relationship needed to be severed in the tree. Kester reports in his family history of the Polks that #5 married Patsy Shepherd. I can’t seem to find a marriage record for them and without an actual citation documenting this fact, I’m not sure where exactly to start looking. Benjamin #2 did marry an Elizabeth Shepherd in 1834, but #5 would have been too young to be party to that union.

Ancestry is trying to convince me that #5 moved to Montgomery County in central Indiana, married Mary Srader and raised his family there. While not completely out of the question, I haven’t found any evidence indicating that this is #5. To the best of my knowledge, I do not have any DNA matches connecting this line to my own. Of course, this would be pushing the limits of autosomal DNA matches.

Before I commit to #5 having married Mary Srader, I want to try and find something to substantiate the familial tie. I should try to locate a will for Jonathan Piety Cox in Knox County in 1874. Since court records for this county are restricted on FamilySearch, I will need to explore this more during my next visit to the library in a few weeks. Montgomery County newspapers around 1880 aren’t readily available online, so I am unable to find a death notice.

Also of concern is the spelling of Benjamin with an “e” on the end. This is not consistent with the spelling of Benjamin in my Cox family. This may be of no concern or it could be a significant detail. The 1880 Census states that B.F. Cox’s parents were born in England. #5’s parents were born in Kentucky. The more I look at this, the more I am convinced that the Montgomery County man is not the one I’m searching for. I will table research for Benjamin until September 6th. If I cannot find anything, I will add this to my to-do list for my next trip to Salt Lake City.

For now I’ll move on to the next child of JP and Rachel…John Lemen Cox.

This week Ancestry gave me three new errors to resolve. I have 5170 errors in the tree–376 possible duplicates, 4235 with no documents, 559 other errors.

  • A grand daughter of Harvey Innes Cox with no sources. I haven’t gotten to this family yet, but I have now updated them.
  • A 7th cousin with no sources attached. Could not locate one that was definitively him.
  • A 5th cousin with no sources attached. He was named in his grandmother’s obituary.

This week in the past…
I’d like to take an opportunity to celebrate the anniversaries of births, marriages, and deaths of my bloodlines the week ahead.
302 years ago – birth of Nicolas Cardinal (6th ggf)
263 years ago – death of Jean Creely (8th ggf)
261 years ago – birth of Jacob Pea Jr (6th ggf)
245 years ago – death of Francis Moore (8th ggf)
229 years ago – birth of Michael Keller Jr (4th ggf)
199 years ago – death of Jerome Creely (6th ggf)
192 years ago – death of Johannes Korz (5th ggf)
168 years ago – marriage of Mary Sievers (3rd ggm) and Henry Gravel (3rd ggf)
159 years ago – marriage of Mary Briscoe (3rd ggm) and Richard O. Bennett (3rd ggf)

Goals and progress…
Beginning of Week: 27,557 people
End of Week: 27,307 people
Change = -250 persons
Tasks for coming week:

  • Continue focus on Jonathan P. Cox and family – John Lemen Cox
  • Review the information in The Other Polks to see if there is anything I don’t already have
  • Continue data mining on Ben Cox and Sarah Piety
  • Confirm the data from Polk Family and Kinsmen has been added for this family and page numbers are noted for easier citation adding
  • Review Coxes of Cox Creek
  • September 6th – FS Full Text Search at library of Benjamin F Cox (1819-?)