♀Catherine Williams

Catherine Williams (born about 1817) was the daughter of an Irish-born Wabash County farmer, the wife of Franklin Danforth and the mother of Julia A. Danforth (1848–1930). She was the second great-grand-aunt of Nancy Jane Blanchard (1929–2006), the sister of Sarah Williams (1816–1885), Nancy Jane Blanchard’s second great-grandmother.

Early life

The tree makes her the daughter of George Williams (1784–1861) and Margaret Williams (who died before 1850); the 1851 deed names George as her father but does not name her mother. A compiled census index gives her birthplace as New Jersey, where her father had settled after leaving Ireland. In 1830 George Williams moved his family west to Wabash County, Illinois, when Catherine would have been about thirteen. Her marriage is undated, but it came before August 1848.

Marriage and family

Her husband was Franklin Danforth, who by the same index was born in New York. Their daughter Julia was born in Wabash County on 12 August 1848, and Julia’s death record of 1930 names Franklin Danforth and Catherine Williams as her parents. In the 1850 census a compiled index lists the three of them, with Catherine written as Catharine, in the household of Cyrus Danforth at Wabash Election Precinct. The census does not say how the household’s members were related. A county history published in 1883 records a Cyrus Danforth, Esq., who came from New York state in 1817 and bought a large tract of land at Friendsville.

The gift of land

On 21 September 1851 George Williams deeded Catherine forty acres, the southwest quarter of the northwest quarter of Section 26, Township 1 North, Range 13 West, in Wabash County. The deed recites five dollars and “the natural love and affection he has for her as his daughter”. It was acknowledged the same day before the justice of the peace Henry Mundy, but not filed for record until 6 May 1856; it was recorded on 13 May 1856. No wife appears in George Williams’s household in the 1850 census, and the 1851 deed names Catherine as his daughter.

The tree holds no death date for her. An index of Illinois marriages lists a Franklin Danforth marrying a Mary Dale at Wabash on 12 April 1860; if he is the same man, Catherine had died by then, but that is an inference, not a record.

Notes

Her age and birthplace

The 1850 census index gives her age as 33, which puts her birth between late 1816 and late 1817 and so makes her about the same age as, or a little younger than, Sarah, who was born in Ireland in December 1816. That is a census age and may be a year or two out. Her New Jersey birth also sits uneasily with Sarah’s obituary, which has the family reaching New Brunswick when Sarah was one or two. Julia’s death record gives Catherine’s birthplace as Illinois, which differs from the census index.

Her mother

The 1851 deed does not name Catherine’s mother. Margaret Williams is her mother by the tree, which treats the two daughters as sisters.

Julia’s birth year

The 1850 index gives Julia’s year as 1849 from her age; her death record gives 12 August 1848.