Vanishing Point: The Michiganers

The opening photo today, a nod to this week's Sepia Saturday theme, was taken from the front yard of my father's childhood home in Elm, Michigan, looking across the cow-strewn fields where a freight train smokes away down the Pere Marquette railroad...an example of the "vanishing point" effect.

Not all that far away from Elm was the town of Hudson. And Hudson marks a sort of vanishing point for much of my family tree, where the roots disappear back into a darkish history.

The family album has several photos that don't note the subject's name. However, the backs bear the imprint of two photographers in Hudson, Michigan: Fred D. Brown and D.H. Spencer. Members of both the Hale and, predominantly, the Daniels, clans lived in the Hudson area in the late 1800s. (The longtime American English Hales married into the lately arrived English Danielses, who then married into the Scots/Irish Orrs, who then married into the longtime American English Bentleys.)

George Daniels, my great-great-grandfather, first acquired land in Concord, Michigan, near Battle Creek, in 1848.

 The first photo below I am guessing is a contemporary of George Daniels: Lucretia (Johnson) Hale, who was the mother of George's daughter-in-law Martha (Hale) Daniels. I make this guess based on the fact that it's a tintype (this one has no photographer imprint), and the only other such photos like it in the album are of Martha's daughters Louise and Alice, around 1876.  That was two years after the death of Henry Daniels' mother, Ann Twidale Daniels, the other likely candidate for the photo.

Lucretia would have been about 69 that year. Her husband Hiram Hale (a melodious and oddly common name, as it turns out) had been dead since 1861.

I believe the next photo is the same woman a few years later; her snood or scarf seems identical. She looks about ten years older, so if it's now around 1888, Lucretia would be 80. The young Danielses had moved from Lansing to nearby Hudson, where Henry's parents were now living, in Lenawee County, between 1870 and 1880.

It was a goodly sized family living in Concord as of 1850. The following photos, probably taken 20 years later, are possibly Henry H. Daniels' siblings Mary, b. 1837; Robert, b. 1833 MI; Benjamin, b. 1835; and/or William b. 1846. But no solid evidence exists aside from the photographer's location (Hudson being quite nearby) .

This guy looks to be about the right age to be Robert or Benjamin if this was taken in 1876. On the other hand, he bears a resemblance, especially in the mouth, to Martha Hale Daniels. Like George, she had three brothers and a sister: Andrew (b. 1837),  Benjamin (b. 1835), John (b. 1845), and  Alice (b. 1848) ... Still, everyone looked so "down in the mouth" in these portraits, it's hard to tell!

The Captain and the Captain's Wife

Henry H. Daniels was my paternal grandmother's maternal grandfather -- that is, my father's mother's mother's father. There's a nice sort of symmetry about that. He was born in Michigan in 1840, of English immigrants George Daniels (Lincolnshire) and Ann Twidale (Yorkshire). At this point I know very little about his family, but I know the following, thanks to 2nd Michigan Volunteer Infantry web site:

• Henry H. Daniels was residing in Hudson at the outbreak of the Civil War.
• He enlisted, in Hudson, as Sergeant in Company B 2nd Michigan Infantry, on the 10th of May 1861. He was 21 years old at this time.
• He was promoted to Command Sgt. on 25 August 1862 (Acting Aide-de-camp to Colonel Fenton, 1st Brigade). He was transferred on the same day from Company B to Staff.
• He was promoted to 2nd Lieutenant on 17 September 1862. He was transferred on the same day from Staff to Company H.
• He was promoted to 1st Lieutenant on 24 February 1863 (Acting Aide-de-camp 1st Brigade, 1st Div., 9th Corps). He was transferred on the same day from Company H to Company D.
• He was transferred on 27 May 1863 from Company D to Company I.
• He was promoted to Captain on 12 March 1864 of Company C.
• Promoted to Adjutant on 26 March 1864. He was transferred on 29 March 1864 from Company I to Staff.
• He was transferred on 28 July 1864 from Staff to Company C.
• He was discharged for wounds on 05 November 1864 as Aide-de-camp on staff of Colonel Leasure. 

His wife was Martha L. Hale, born around 1842 in New York state.Bentley family lore had it that she was related to the famous American patriot Nathan Hale (1755-1776). However, records are very spotty and inconsistent; it appears that her father, Hiram (1805-1861), was the son of a Nathaniel Hale (b. 1758), and I so far can't get the dots to connect. Oh well! At any rate, she looks a bit dour, doesn't she? But obviously she was in Henry's heart during the war -- and he looks pretty wistful about it (I'm assuming he's getting ready to leave for duty, with his Sergeant's stripes).



This book briefly lists the actions of the 2d Infantry...

"This Regiment left Detroit on the 5th of June, 1861 — the first of the three years' Regiments in the field from this State — with an aggregate force on its muster rolls of 1,013, to which 102 had been added previous to the 1st of July. Its first engagement was at Blackburn's Ford, Va., July 18th, 1861. During the winter it lay near Alexandria, Va., and in March was moved under McClellan to the Virginia Peninsula. It took part in the siege of Yorktown; in engagements at Williamsburg, May 5th; at Pair Oaks, May 21st; at Charles City Cross Roads, June 30; at Malvern Hill, July 1; and at Chantilly, September 1. Its casualties at Williamsburg were 17 killed, 38 wounded, and 4 missing; at Fair Oaks, 10 killed and 47 wounded. Major General Israel B. Richardson, who entered the service in this war as commanding officer of the 2d, when it was organized, died in October last, of wounds received in the battle of Antietam, in which he commanded a division of Union forces. On the 30th of November the aggregate of the Second Infantry, present and absent, was 642. It is in Burns' Division off the ninth army corps of the army of the Potomac..."


Here are the Danielses some years later in Cripple Creek. Henry took his daughters Alice and Louise west and joined the mineral rush like his inlaws-to-be the Orrs, in the Colorado mining industry.

There are some great photos on MiningArtifacts.org.

Perhaps surprisingly Henry is buried in Oakland, California, but his grandson Hugh wound up as an Oakland attorney. So there you go.

Finally, I just discovered a distinguished-looking Henry in the gloriously titled "Representative Men of Colorado in the Nineteenth Century: A Portrait Gallery of Many of the Men who Have Been Instrumental in the Upbuilding of Colorado, Including Not Only the Pioneers, But Others Who, Coming Later, Have Added Their Quota, Until the Once Territory is Now the Splendid State." (Rowell Art Publishing Company, 1902 - Colorado - 272 pages) Outside of this honor I can't find evidence of what made him so "instrumental," but I'll take their word for it!

Reference sites include Michigan In the War, Find a Grave, and FamilySearch.

Sepia Lost Uncle #1

In keeping with the Sepia Saturday weekly theme, I present my late Uncle Paul Singer, when he was in the service in the Forties, featuring his "saucer cap."

What's that, you might ask?
From Wikipedia: "A peaked cap, forage cap, barracks cover, or combination cap is a form of headgear worn by the armed forces of many nations and also by many uniformed civilian organizations such as law enforcement agencies. In the United States military, they are commonly known as service caps, wheel caps, saucer caps, or combination covers in the Naval services."

Looking very serious indeed beside the staff cars

Paul was my mother's younger brother.
A relaxed and friendly soul, not to say devil-may-care, he took after his dad Arthur Singer.
Unlike Art, he never seemed to find his calling....

Looking like he has somewhere better to go

Paul was stationed, I believe, at Fort Bragg, California. He was a DJ at the Army base radio station...  

Somewhere I have a 78 RPM record he cut at the studio as a letter home.

Temporarily happy

Soon after his first marriage, his wife left him.  She took their 2-year-old daughter, who, when she was old enough to want to get in touch, was forbidden to contact the Singer family.

Paul with a decorated buddy who looks about 14!

The years passed.
He did this and that through the Fifties and Sixties...
In the early Seventies he tried to start a lobster ranch in Puerto Rico but the government funding failed to come through and he came back to the States disillusioned.
At one point he was selling meat, or possibly fish, from the back of a truck around Los Angeles.

Is that a flight suit? Looks too warm for California!

And then shortly after the last time I saw him in 1979 he left his second wife.
In fact, he left town, without telling anyone where he was going.
We never saw him again.

Pondering his future

Only in the last few years was I able to trace Paul, to find he'd died in 2000, back in L.A., age 76.

I was also able to locate his daughter, now in her 60s, and provide her at last with photos of her long lost father and his parents.

Uncle Paul's daughter and our grandparents, around 1950

Sepia Saturday: Mysterious Foremother

[Original post Feb 18, 2011, revised June 2015]

 Another relative I've been researching is my father's paternal great-grandmother, Elizabeth Blindberry (born in 1813 in New York State, died 1873 in Livonia, Michigan). Alas, I have no photograph of her or her husband.

Tombstone of Elizabeth and husband George Nelson Bentley

Family apocrypha has it that "her family owned the land that the Book-Cadillac Hotel now stands on," in Detroit. If this is true, here's an example of the genealogist's bugbear -- nonstandard spelling. For the owner of that land spelled his name Blindbury -- John Blindbury.

Assuming that this is the proper connection, my guess is that Elizabeth was John's sister. In those days, the census typically named only the head of the family, particularly ignoring the names of women of all ages. John apparently did have a younger sister who would have been born around the right time. In an attempt to find out about Elizabeth, I dug up what I could about her brother, my great-great granduncle.

Here's an excerpt of a biography published in the succinctly titled History of Detroit and Wayne County and Early Michigan - A Chronological Cyclopedia Past and Present by Silas Farmer (1890).

John Blindbury, of Detroit, was born February 22, 1806, in the town of Lyon [sic], Wayne County, New York, and was the eldest son of Joseph and Mary Blindbury. His father served in the war of 1812. At the age of twelve, Mr. Blindbury lost his mother, who died of consumption, leaving a family of seven children. This loss was a severe blow, and felt the more keenly because the family was, at this time, in straitened circumstances, and the children required a mother's care and experience. At their mother's death, the younger members of the family became the charge of an elder sister. John Blindbury was early trained to hard work. His education was limited; he had only a few months in the year to devote himself to study, and the district schools were far inferior to those of the present day. 

At the age of nineteen, in the year 1825, he emigrated to Michigan. ...Mr. Blindbury purchased eighty acres of land in the town of Southfield, Oakland County; he erected a log house on his purchase, and then sent for his father's family. After seeing them settled, he began chopping [lumber], in the forests of Michigan, at four dollars and a half per acre. Unlike most young men of this day, he considered his time as his father's until he came of age. 

I gather that his father -- I wish the article gave his name to nail it for me -- came along with the children. Joseph Blindbury had remarried by this time and there were several more children from this union. He was to die in Southfield in 1851.

Blindbury's homestead is described in the autobiography of one William S. Balls thusly:
"This was the autumn of 1857 in which we bought a farm in Greenfield on Grand River Avenue not quite six miles from the Detroit City Hall. This property included a two story brick house and one small barn. The front portion (about two acres) was planted to a large variety of fruit including a fine orchard, two grape arbors, pears, cherries, crabapples, a large quantity of currants, etc., all these in bearing. It was a place that Mr. Blindbury, the hotel man, had built and prepared for his own residence as he wished to retire. The rest of the land was mostly uncultivated, about 20 acres of it woods.

Nine months before that time, he gave his father a note to cover the value of his labor during the remaining months. After this, he went to what was then known as the Black River country [in St. Clair County], and entered into the lumbering business, in the employment of A. M. Wadhams. Here he remained about four years, at the end of which time he returned to Southfield, purchased one hundred acres of wild land, erected a log house, and began to clear the land for cultivation. 

He married, December 2, 1831, Maria Rogers, daughter of Moses and Mary "Polly" Rogers, residents of Southfield, and granddaughter of John Rogers, who served throughout the Revolutionary War.

John Rogers

They had three children, none of whom are living [as of 1890]. [Blindbury] remained on the farm for six years; when, owing to poor health, he was compelled to leave it. In 1837 he removed to the Grand River road, eight miles out of Detroit, and opened a small hotel. This proved a very profitable undertaking, as many immigrants were then entering the State. He remained in this place nine years, and then opened another inn, two miles nearer the city, remaining eight years and doing a profitable business. 

In 1844 [Blindbury] was elected Representative of Wayne County in the State Legislature. In 1850 sold the hotel, and erected a dwelling-house near by. About this time he was appointed Marshal of Wayne County. In 1852 he removed to Detroit, and erected what was known for many years as the Blindbury Hotel, on the corner of Washington and Michigan avenues, [later] known as the Antisdel House.

Location of the property

Here are stills from a 1923 Detroit newsreel (check it out!) showing the Antisdel House.


Landmarks of Wayne county and Detroit, by Robert Budd Ross and George Byron Catlin, offers this about the hotel property:
"In 1836, Nathaniel Champ built a house on the northeast corner of Washington and Michigan avenues [in Detroit], and he lived there until 1851. On this property he build the first temperance hotel in Detroit, and was its landlord for several years. Several managers of the hotel succeeded [him] and in 1843, his son, William Champ, became landlord and managed until 1851. The property was then sold to John Blindbury. In 1852, Mr. Blindbury built a hotel on the same site and named it the Blindbury Hotel. J.F. and W.W. Antisdel were afterwards landlords, and in 1870 W.W. Antisdel was in charge. W.A. Scripps afterward became a partner. The house was demolished in 1890."

John Antisdel

Here's an interesting document:  census taker William H. Pattes recorded the employees and residents of the Hotel on June 1, 1860.

Mr. Blindbury was brought up a Methodist, but never united with any church. He held very liberal views on religious subjects. His life was exceedingly upright. In politics, he was always allied with the Democratic party. Mr. Blindbury died on the 1st of March, 1867, leaving a comfortable estate to his widow, whom he made his sole executrix. His life was eventful, and was marked by hard work, energy, and perseverance. His labors were finally crowned with success; and he stands before us in his works, as a representative pioneer of Michigan.



The Antisdel was lauded as "The most home-like hotel in Detroit; well kept, strictly temperance, and worthy of the large patronage it receives."

Eventually it made way for the famous Book-Cadillac Hotel at the heart of Detroit. There are some great old photos of it here.

 All this is well and good, but I still don't know anything about Blindbury's sister Elizabeth, my great-great grandmother, other than she married George Bentley, of nearby Livonia, probably in 1836 at the age of 23. They proceeded to have children: Mary (b. 1837), , Margaret (1843), Susanna (1846), Charlotte (1848), , Charles (1853), and William (1865) when Elizabeth was 52! She only lasted eight years after that.

...Be sure to check out Sepia Saturday at Blogspot!

Sepia Bureaucracy

Crawling back through the centuries via offical documents.

1893: The Parcel Map

This Wayne County, Michigan, parcel map shows the land holdings of my great-grandfather John Bentley, as well as those of familes who would marry into the Bentleys (and vice versa), including Chillson, Rohde, and Bredin. Many of these names are familiar to me through the humorous autobiographical poems of my dad's, as his school friends and neighbors.


1865: The Ship's Log

Great-great-grandfather William Bredin arrives from Ballymagroarty, Ireland, with his family.


The Census

Great-great grandfather George Bentley's family appears in the Livonia, Michigan, census. In nine years, son John will marry immigrant Maggie Bredin.


1843: The Deed

Great-great-grandfather Nelson had moved about 1835 to Livonia from New York, preceding his brothers and parents. (His forebears had arrived in Rhode Island in the mid-1600s following the Puritans.) George met his wife-to-be, Elizabeth Blindberry (from Ireland), in Detroit, and purchased this land west of Detroit.

Now the paperwork fades away for a couple of long centuries...until...

The Will

In 2005 my son and I visited Elstow and Ampthill, Bedfordshire -- the ancestral home of my Bentleys (at least as far back as anyone can trace via definitive records). In the County Archives I amazingly managed to find the Last Will of Mary Bentley (d. 1632), grandmother of the famous religious writer John Bunyan. Here's a copy.

Dictionary of National Biography,” London: Smith, Elder, & Co,, 1886:

“The will of John Bunyan's maternal grandmother, Mary Bentley (d. 1632), with its "Dutch-like picture of an Elstow cottage interior two hundred and fifty years ago," proves (J. Brown, Biography of John Bunyan, to which we are indebted for all these family details) that his mother "came not of the very squalid poor, but of people who, though humble in station, were yet decent and worthy in their ways."

In the name of God, Amen. This 27th day of June 1632 I, Mary Bentley,
of Elvestoe (Elstow) in the county of Bedford, widow but being sick in body but of perfect mind and memory I thank my heavenly father. I do make this my last will and testament in manner and form following that is to say first I bequeathe my soul unto almightyGod my Maker in whom I hope to be saved through Jesus Christ my Savior and my Body be buried in the churchyard of Elstow aforesaid.
Item, I give and bequeath to John Bentley, my son one brass pot, one little table, and all painted cloths about the house and the standing bed in the loft.
Item, I give to my daughter Margaret the joined stool in the chamber and my little [???]
Item, I give to my daughter Rosse the joined form in the chamber and a hogshead and the tumblestole.
Item, I give to my daughter Elizabeth the little kettle and the big platter, a flaxin sheet and a flaxin pillowbeare, a trundle bed and a copper in the chamber and the [???].
Item, I give to my daughter Annie my best [???], my best cuffe, my gowne, my best petticoat, the presse in the chamber, the best bolster and blanket and the coffer above and the kettle, the mortar and pestle, platter, and the other trundle bed, a harden sheet and pillow beare.
Item, all my other goods and chattels whatsoever I unbequeathed I give and bequeath to my daughter Mary whom I appointed to be soul executrix of this my last Will and testament whom I will se honestly buried and my burial discharged in witness whereof I have hereunto set my and and seal the day and year above written.
In presence of John Welle, Clerk The Mark of Mary Bentley The Mark of Margerie Jaques, widow (Latin) The Will proved Oct. 6, 1632

More of my genealogy, FWIW