Edward Poe's Family

Tombstone in Sharon Cemetery near Germantown, Bracken County, Kentucky

Edward Poe was born in 1732 to Patrick Poe and Abigail née Day in Plumstead Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Edward was the third son and fourth child. Edward’s father, Patrick, a tailor, came from Ulster in the early 1720’s and married Abigail in 1728.

In a way, Patrick Poe married ‘royalty’ in Plumstead Twp. of Bucks County. Abigail’s father, Christopher Day, was a large landowner and one of its earlier residents. As a result, Patrick found himself celebrating his marriage ceremony at Christ Church in Center City Philadelphia in 1728.

What’s so notable about Christ Church?

Some 40 years ago Bobbie and I were treated to a Philadelphia history walk by Auntie Charlotte. She took us to all the historic buildings, homes, and churches of our Founding Fathers. To this day I can still remember walking into this one historic church and visiting the pew where Benjamin Franklin sat for services and

standing over his burial plot in the Church cemetery out back. 15 signers of the Declaration of Independence attended services here as did George Washington and Betsy Ross. But who would have ever thought on November 28, 1728 it was Grandma Smith’s 6th g grandfather and grandmother who tied the knot in this historic building and the future witness to our country’s beginning. Today Christ Church opens its doors to 250,000 visitors a year.

Before visiting Edward Poe’s move from Bucks County to the lower Shenandoah, his enlistment in the Virginia 8th Regiment in 1776, we first take a look at the other three ‘historic’ family lines his father and mother and his marriage brought into our ancestry.

Christopher Day Family (died March, 1748, Plumstead Twp., Bucks County, PA

Much of the information about the Day, Poe, and Brittain/Stillwell families of Bucks County, PA comes from devoted family members who have collected documents, Bibles, family stories, and researched history books of Bucks County over many years. We owe much to their drive and tenacity. For the Days we owe a debt of gratitude to James Edward Day, John F. Kennedy’s Postmaster General, who published his genealogy of the Nathaniel Day line in 1959. Grandma Smith’s direct line begins with Matthew, a brother of Nathaniel. Another dogged researcher, and direct descendant of Matthew Day and Edward Poe, was Ruth Hendricks DeVerter of Texas who published her Day, Hendricks, Poe genealogy in 1963. Our own Ohio family expert, Martin Greeley, corresponded with DeVerter regarding the Day family of Clermont County, Kentucky, and Indiana in particular.

Ruth DeVerter Postcard to Martin Greeley in 1962.

As more records are found and put online this additional information provides researchers today with new insights and possible different conclusions than those who came before - such are the challenges of genealogy.

A quick word about James Edward Day. He was born in 1914 in Jacksonville, IL, attended the University of Chicago, and graduated from Harvard Law School. Both his father and grandfather were doctors who served their communities in central Illinois. Day joined the prestigious law firm of Sidley & Austin in Chicago, befriended Adlai Stevenson, became Illinois Insurance Commissioner, and finally associated with Prudential Insurance after he left his position as President Kennedy’s Postmaster General. He remained in the role of Postmaster for two and a half years and left just three months before Kennedy was assassinated. Grandma Smith was a 4th cousin, three times removed of James Edward Day. He died in 1996.

James Day wrote about his ancestor Nathaniel Day who left Bucks County and moved with his family to Virginia. He volunteered for service in the French and Indian War and was reportedly killed in 1754. His wife Susan and son David were captured and killed by Shawnee warriors two years later in 1756 and two daughters who had also been captured were rescued. They were living near the Greenbrier River in an area known today as Pochahontas County, West Virginia.

Christopher Day: (1682-1748) Christopher Day is the known patriarch of two combined families from which Grandma Smith descends - the Day and Poe families. However, Christopher’s early history is not clear three hundred years later.

Many family trees show that he was born and raised in Plumstead Twp. in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. However, there are no historical documents to convincingly substantiate that.

So the first task is to enumerate the historical records of Christopher Day which can be found in the History of Bucks County, Pennsylvania: from the discovery of the Delaware to the present time, by W. W. H. Davis, Ruth Hendricks DeVerter’s Our Pioneer Ancestors: Day and Hendricks Families:, and James Edward Day’s Descendants of Christopher Day.

• The first reference to Christopher Day in the Plumstead area of Bucks County can be found where it is written “…In 1708 they sold fifty acres [ from Thomas Dungan ] to Christopher Day, who passed his life in Plumstead and died in 1748.”

• The next mention of Day in the History of Bucks County mentions that in 1709 the “[Township of Southhampton was a] location and [had] soil which attracted settlers [who] flocked in rapidly and additional names are added [to the list of settlers in Southhampton] that include ……Christopher Day”. Southhampton is at the southern end of Bucks County, while Plumstead lies on the north end.

• In 1714 Christopher and Martha Day were baptized at the Pennepack Baptist Church in northeastern Philadelphia.

• In 1724 the landowners in the Plumstead area were described as seeking Township status, but most are described as “settlers who did not extend far into the woods

• We do know Day was a ‘substantial landowner’ in Plumstead Twp. by “1723 [when he] sold one hundred and fifty acres to John Basset of Philadelphia”.

• Christopher Day is mentioned as one of “twenty inhabitants who petitioned the court in March, 1725 to create the township of Plumstead, since an earlier attempt ten years before had been denied for ‘lack of population’.

• Finally, in Bucks County’s Mercer Museum of Doylestown, PA there is the original copy of his will and his gravestone (see above photo) which was removed from the cemetery confirming his death in 1748.

Therefore, these specific notations leave important questions as to whether or not Christopher Day was born in Plumstead Twp.; he did make multiple land purchases in the early 1700’s; it is suggested he lived in Southhampton Twp. in 1709, and, probably made his way north in the county over a period of some 15 years like many settlers who moved into the northern area of Bucks County allowing Plumstead to be established as a Township in 1725.

The historical record of early Bucks County printed in several studies and research by family genealogists paint a confusing picture of the who, what, when and where of Christopher Day.

I have referenced Ruth DeVerter’s published genealogical research in 3 Books (Our Pioneer Ancestors) and have a copy of Book 2, which focuses on the Day family connection with Patrick Poe’s marriage to Abigail Day in 1728 and subsequent generations. Her Book 1 that focuses on Christopher Day is not easily obtained and I have not read it. A copy can be researched at the LDS Genealogy and Family History Library in Salt Lake City. Therefore, my reference to her genealogy is based on the work and quotations of others. Her genealogy is considered a premier work into the history of Christopher Day and family.

Fortunately, Dr. Ron Stoner, Professor Emeritus of Physics and Astronomy at Bowling Green State University and a direct descendant of Christopher Day and Edward Poe, obtained a copy from his cousin a number of years back.

Here are some of the conclusions he has written about after an examination of DeVerter and other history books regarding Christopher Day and his family. Stoner writes:

“Christopher Day was one of the first settlers in Plumstead Twp. and one of its leading citizens at that time. He was elected assessor and overseer of the poor in 1730. He donated land for the first school in Plumstead Twp and for the first cemetery where he is buried.

“DeVerter says Matthew” [Christopher’s fourth child and executor of his Will] “married Ann ( ? ) about 1748 and had four or five children with her before she died: namely Mark (b. 11/24/1752), John (b. 1/29/1755), Isaac (b. 6/17/1757), Matthew Jr., (b. 12/18/1761) and possibly Asa (b. @1749). In 1770, Matthew Day remarried to Mary Felle, daughter of Felix Felle of Plumstead Twp., by which he had four more children: David, Mary, Joseph, and Sarah.

“In 1771, Matthew Day left Bucks County with his children and new wife to what is a strip of land on the border of Pennsylvania and Maryland that residents then considered to be a part of Baltimore County, Maryland.” According to Stoner, Matthew Day “lived just north of the Mason-Dixon survey in the far southern portion of York County, Pennsylvania. Later the family claimed to be from Maryland.”

Interestingly, I found a notation in John Dyer’s Memorandum from His Diary (1763-1805), published by The Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania in January 1906, dated April 29, 1771 which he wrote: “Mathew Day moves to Maryland". When Mathew left Plumstead Twp. it seems he knew he was heading to Maryland, albeit on the border.

“The new homestead farm of Mathew and Mary (Felle) Day was home to the Day family through the Revolutionary War to sometime before 1800. In the years before the Revolutionary War, Baltimore was a wheat exporting center for the Colonies; even today the area around this old Day farm is a rich, relatively level rural area of orchards and farmland…situated on a plateau between the mountains of Pennsylvania and the Chesapeake Bay to the south and east.”

And we should mention briefly Mathew’s documented second oldest child, John (1755-1816), who was Grandma Smith’s 5th g grandfather. We will return to more thoroughly research John at a later time, but want to include Dr. Stoner’s comments:

“The second connection was the 1776 marriage of John Day, grandson of Christopher and Martha Day to Abigail Poe, granddaughter of Patrick and Abigail Poe (née Day). “ [If you are keeping a family scorecard it could also look like this: John Day, first cousin of Edward Poe, married Edward’s daughter, Abigail.] “Most of the brothers and sisters of John and Abigail (née Poe) Day and their families were pioneer settlers on both sides of the Ohio River east of Cincinnati around 1800. Those on the Ohio side lived near the border of Clermont and Brown Counties; those on the Kentucky side lived in Bracken County, a few miles south of the riverside town of Augusta.”

After Mathew died (@1800) his family had already been on the move west. John had moved to Bracken County, KY @1795 before crossing the Ohio River into the Brown/Clermont County areas. “On the 1799 tax rolls of Bracken County there is good representation of the John Day’s family of brothers and nephews: David, Isaac Sr., Isaac Jr., John, Joseph, and Mark. and their children . Five of John and Abigail’s children not long after 1802 followed their parents and moved from Kentucky to Ohio. Mathew is probably buried in an unmarked grave in Gunpowder Cemetery, near Fawn Grove in York Twp. Mathew’s wife, Mary (Felle), also moved to Bracken County, KY where she died in 1824.

James Edward Day (1914-1996) Introducing the Zip Code during his tenure as Postmaster General (1961-1963)

To conclude our review of the record we have on Christopher Day, we now turn to a combination of the historical record - especially that of James Edward Day - and ‘oral history’. I recently came upon the genealogical website of Joseph Payne of Tennessee who is a descendant of Christopher Day through his son Nathaniel (1716-1754). Here is what Joe has found:

”Day, Christopher Sr - This is the ancestor that many living in East Tennessee by the name of Day are descendants. Stories passed from generation to generation indicate he was born in Yorkshire, England circa 1684. He came to America with his wife Martha, by way of Rhode Island to Plumstead Township, Bucks County, the east most county in Pennsylvania.

“Documentation: “History of Bucks County, Pennsylvania” by James H. Battle Page 570 “Christopher Day and John Dyer bought portions of the Cook Survey – “Christopher Day settled in the township Plumstead in 1708, and resided here until he died 1748.”

“History of Bucks County” P. 572

Joe Payne's Genealogical Website: http://www.joepayne.org/genealogy.htm

“The only burial ground in the township of which traces yet remain is situated on the corner of the tract Christopher Day bought Clarence Dugan in 1708. In his will proved March 25,1748, he gave “ten perches square** for a graveyard forever.” One stone bears the inscription “Christopher Day March 6, 1748.”

Christopher Day and Martha d. by 1753, had six known children as documented in his will “Bucks CO., PA Book 2 p.141” (There may have been others) The children of this marriage were Mathew Sr., Christopher Jr., Abigail, Nathanial Sr. and Ursula.

** A Perch is a measure of length equal to 5 ½ yards.

A few additional comments to add for Nathaniel Day (1716-1754) [an older brother of our Mathew]. Nathaniel’s family line was first presented by his 4th g grandson, James Edward Day (see above photo) in 1959.

NATHANIEL DAY SR. - also Son and Grandson Nathaniel was born in Bucks County, Pennsylvania . Married in Bucks Co circa 1740 to Susan Wylie, daughter of James Wylie. There were five known children. John Sr., David, Sarah, Nathaniel Jr., and Martha.

The first child, John Day Sr., b June 30, 1742, d December 4, 1833, age 92 years, in Jefferson County, Tennessee. Soldier of the American Revolution. Documentation: National Archives File 5-3252.

Nathaniel Sr. died 1754, buried in Day plot set aside by Christopher Day at Nathaniel's death [while fighting in the French-Indian War]. Susan and her family made their home with her father James Wylie at Capon Springs near Winchester, VA before moving to Little Levels, Greenbrier Co., West VA.

In 1756 Susan, her daughters Martha and Sarah, also her son David were taken captive by Shawnee Indians. Captain Fry organized a search party, including John Day Sr. They found Susan and her son David, both were killed, but the two sisters were rescued.

JOHN DAY SR. with John Day Jr.

John Day Sr., the first child of Nathaniel and Susan Wylie Day was born in Bucks Co., PA, June 30, 1742, and died December 4, 1833, in Jefferson Co., TN. He married twice. His first wife was Polly Susan (unknown); his second Ester Drinnon. There are twelve known children. From incomplete records all were thought to be by Polly Susan. They were John Day Jr, Thomas, Jesse Sr, David, Joseph, Levi, Stephen, Mary, Nehemiah, Hannah, Elizabeth and (Hettie) Ester

.

The Day family were known to be skilled wood workers. John and Polly Susan lived for a time in Carroll and Grayson counties VA. Furniture said to have been made by John Day Sr is still to be found in this area.

John Day Sr. moved to Green Co., North Carolina -later Jefferson Co., TN in 1785. In his application for a Revolutionary War Soldier pension (National Archives File No. 5-3252) the affidavits by John Sr. and John Jr. document much of the family history - such as the year he and his family came to Tennessee and his graphic account of the Shawnee Indian attack, pursuit, and the rescue of his sisters.

John Day established a fort in the Hawksbill Settlement called John Days Fort;, known in 1766 as Fort Cumberland and in 1772 as Kegleys and Prices Fort.

John Day Sr. moved his family from Virginia to Green County, N.C. later Jefferson Co. TN “about four years after Cornwallis was taken” (1785) “and lived here ever since.” documented in National Archives File# 5-3252. This file also contains John Day Jr affidavit confirming the year his family moved from Botetourt Co., VA to Jefferson Co., TN in 1785.

JOHN DAY JR.

“Day John Jr., b. January 31, 1768 in Botetourt Co., VA, later Pocahontas Co., W. VA , d. 1839. John Day Jr. was of the Baptist faith. He was also a skilled worker in wood. He was in demand to organize a “barn raising”. He knew how to size the barn for the farm, how to cut the timbers, including the making of shingles, rafters, cross beams and all the wood parts.

“He also could organize the men for the “barn raising” and the women for the preparation for the food always a big part of these events. He considered it a great honor to be called “Carpenter” although he did much more than shape the wood.

“He also was a busy farmer on his own acreage. He is reported to have said -‘To feed the children, my wife and I, is a dawn to dark job.”

These are a few conclusions we might make based on the records presented above:

1. It is questionable that Christopher Day was born in Plumstead Twp. in 1682. If he was born in America it seems more likely it was somewhere nearer the Philadelphia area.

2. It is just as reasonable to conclude that Christopher Day emigrated to this country from Wales or England in early 1700’s.

3. His family ancestry is probably Welsh or English Baptist - a denomination discriminated against like the Quakers. To support this possible conclusion we have him and his wife Martha baptized in 1714 at Pennepack Baptist Church in Philadelphia. This is keeping with Baptist practice where belief in baptism is appropriate for an adult, when a public proclamation of Christ as Savior can be made, and with full water immersion. There is also the graveyard he left in his will in 1748 which was at first was used by local Baptists in Plumstead Twp. until a local Baptist church and cemetery were built.

4. Christopher Day may have married Martha (Ursula West?) before they emigrated to the Colonies.

5. Christopher and Martha had six children: Abigail b. 1708, Joseph D. b. 1714, Nathaniel b. 1716, Ursula b. 1720, Mathew b. 1721, Christopher b. 1723.

6. Executor of his will was a son, Matthew Day, from whom Grandma Smith is a direct descendant. His daughter Abigail [also a direct ancestor of Grandma Smith] married Patrick Poe, a tailor, on November 28, 1728 who reportedly emigrated from Ulster, Northern Ireland.

7. The “DAY” record will never be complete or perfect. Trying to piece together a family history from 300+ years ago with limited (and sometimes contradictory) documentation is quite difficult. However, the ‘oral history’ passed down from generation to generation in the hills, hollows, and mountains of Virginia and Tennessee to the Day-Payne Family holds potential for future investigation.

COMING SOON: THE BRITTAIN(E) and STILLWELL Family

One of the oldest houses in New York State. First built by Pierre Billou in 1661 on Staten Island, in 1680 his daughter Martha and her husband Thomas Stillwell added an additional structure to the original stone house. This is the last remaining house of the original settlement on Staten Island. Grandma Smith traces her ancestry to the Stillwell family through Edward Poe's wife, Martha Brittain(e), her 6th g grandmother.

Books, Articles, Authors Used for this Post:

Stillwell Family in America, (4 Volumes) by John Edwin Stillwell, M.D. (1853 - 1930, New York City, 1929.

Publications of the Genealogy Society of Pennsylvania, Vol. III, No. 1, January, 1906, Memorandum from the Diary of John Dyer of Plumstead, Bucks Co., PA (1763 thru 1805).

Descendants of Christopher Day of Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Compiled by James Edward Day, 1959.

The History of Bucks County, Pennsylvania: from the Discovery of the Delaware to the Present Time, by William Watts Hart (1820-1910), 1876.

Research by Ruth Hendricks DeVerter, Ann Johnson and Martin Greeley.

Poe Family Research, website (https://www.poegen.net) maintained by William Poe.

Our Pioneer Ancestors, The Day and Hendrix (cks) Families:

Including The Poes and Allied Lines, Book 2, by Ruth Hendricks DeVerter, 1963.

“Days Unforgotten Database”, by Reginald Day, ancestry.com family history.

Joe Payne’s Genealogy Homepage, http://joepayne.org/ genealogy.htm

Poe and Day Ancestors, by Dr. Ronald Stoner, 1996, 9 pages.