Mary Ann Hogan: Found

The Hogans

You all have known for many years that I wanted to find Solomon Whittenton’s wife, Mary (I wrote about them here), and discover her heritage. Finally!! With the help of a cousin who discovered me last June, I have got some of the information we were waiting for.

Who They Are

Mary belongs to the Hogan family that in 1850 lived very close to Solomon and his sister Agatha near Jackson, Madison County, Tennessee. You can see on this image that Solomon and Agatha are the second household on the page. Then next door are their father and stepmother and their other siblings. Next are the Kendricks, rich old Jane and her family who owned quite a lot of slaves. Next to them are the Hogans. The father is Marmaduke, born about 1792 in North Carolina, and his wife, Nancy McGregor Hogan, born about 1798 also in North Carolina. They came from Montgomery County, southwest of the places where the Whittingtons were from.

Mary is reported to be 25 years old on this census. This is probably close to the truth; but I think she was actually 24. Her sister Elizabeth is said to be 17; she was probably 15 in reality. The youngest brother, Sandy (Sanders) is reported to be 14; he was probably 12. There were three older brothers, Jonah Calvin (born about 1820), Caswell (born about 1823-4), and Isaiah (born 1825).

Hogan is an Irish surname. As derived from the Irish Gaelic, Ó hÓgáin, it is a diminutive of Og meaning “young.” The Cornish version of the name means “mortal.” The Welsh name Hogyn means “stripling.”

Marmaduke Hogan’s parents are Zachariah Hogan and Celia Bannister. His line goes back four more generations in North Carolina and Virginia before you reach the Irish ancestor, Patrick. The Baxters and Griffins whom they married were also originally from Ireland, all in the Dublin area. The Bannister line isn’t developed yet.

Nancy McGregor’s grandfather came from Perth, Scotland. I don’t know much yet about her mother, Ann Harris, but Harris is a name that occurs frequently in Scotland, as it does in England.

The Evidence
Once I saw on Valerie Whitenton Hart’s death record that her son thought his grandmother’s maiden name was “Hogins” (Valerie is our Mary Jane’s older sister), I started looking for any surnames that had H, G or K, and N with any vowels at all, since pronunciation can vary so much you never know which vowel was originally the right one. I landed on this Hogan family, but I couldn’t see any proof beyond circumstantial evidence that they might be the right family. I didn’t research them particularly, beyond looking to see how many of these families were in Madison County, Tennessee. Then I dropped it as there was so much to do elsewhere.

Like I said, last June I got connected with a descendant of Lillie Read’s half-brother Sam. She gave me a lot of stuff, which I have since been sorting through now and then. Not until this week did I realize that she had this line on Ancestry, and I asked her what the evidence was. She pointed me to where everything was and also gave me information about various DNA tests.

All of the recorded historical evidence is circumstantial, which is why I didn’t trust it alone. The Hogans came from North Carolina, as did the Whittingtons. To be sure, the Hogans were in Montgomery County, southwest of the Whittingtons in Johnston and Wake counties. Before that, the Hogans were in Anson County, next door, which is where they arrived from the area that is now Cumberland County, Virginia, to the north, around 1700 (at the time, that area was contained in Charles City and Henrico counties). Anyway, the same general migration pattern applies to both families. And in fact, the McGregors were first to go to Tennessee from North Carolina, arriving there before 1820.

When the families settled near Jackson in Madison County, Tennessee, there would have been plenty of opportunity for Mary and Solomon to meet and become well acquainted. But here is where things get a little weird.

You all remember that Solomon didn’t behave himself well with the ladies and had an illegitimate child around 1840. It sets a precedent for the next thing that is outside the accepted order of things. I have found that Mary Ann Hogan got married on 19 November 1848 in Montgomery County, Tennessee, probably in Clarksville at the County Courthouse. Frustratingly, the index search engine online requires exact spelling, and I have tried every form for “Whittington” I can think of and haven’t gotten a hit that shows Solomon in the index. So I don’t know the name of Mary’s groom. The index is separated as to brides and grooms. I’ve sent for the full record and will know more once it arrives, but it opens up some big questions.

Is this marriage record the missing proof we need for Solomon’s wife’s true identity?

If Mary Ann Hogan got married to Solomon then, why was she living in her father’s house two years later when the 1850 Census was taken? Was she just visiting when the census taker came and they all confused him as to who lived there?

Why Clarksville when they were all living in Madison County?

Was Valerie Whittenton right in 1900 to say that she was born in March 1849? Or was she born in 1850? She still should have appeared somewhere on the census, whether in her grandfather’s house or her father’s—because she was born in March and the census taker came in November.

If this isn’t the right Mary Ann Hogan, who is this? If it is the right Mary Ann Hogan and she married someone else before Solomon, whoa, that’s going to open up another big can of worms, and then where and when did Solomon and Mary get married?

Stay tuned. I’ll update this with the information I find out on that marriage record when I get it.

In all, the circumstantial evidence is that of Mary Ann Hogan having the right name, being the right age, living in the right place, and of her family following the same migration patterns as did the Whittingtons. Sounds thin, doesn’t it?

Meanwhile, my distant cousin told me that she has been able to create DNA connections with a very high confidence rating that include descendants of Solomon and Mary Whittenton and also descendants of various siblings in the family of Marmaduke Hogan and Nancy McGregor. This was using two different DNA processing companies, and that means almost certainly we have the right Mary Ann Hogan, because DNA is that accurate! Now that I’ve linked the Hogans on my own online tree, I expect I’ll soon be getting the same information from the company I used for my own DNA test.

What Do We Know about Mary’s Siblings and Their Families?
I’ve been researching Mary’s five siblings and have come up with some information about each of them. They are Calvin, Caswell, Isaiah, Elizabeth, and Sanders. We’ll start with the eldest and get to the youngest last.

Jonah Calvin Hogan has a birth record in Montgomery County, North Carolina, but all that is available online is the index that doesn’t give the date. Still, other records support us in thinking he was born about 1820. No other record uses the “Jonah” given name; he apparently went by Calvin exclusively. The U.S. 1820 Census for Montgomery county was burned up in a fire in 1835, so we can’t see the family composition then. In 1830 Calvin appears as a checkmark in the age 10–14 column. In 1840 he appears in the age 15–19 column, although we expect him to be 20. In 1850 he has his own household and is age 30.

While still in North Carolina, Calvin married a woman named Mary who was born about 1822. Their children are Atlas (1842), James (1844), Sarah E (1846), and Zachariah (March 1850). Atlas was born in North Carolina; the rest of the children in Tennessee, probably in District 17 of Madison County where they were living when the census was taken. Two more daughters were added to the family: Mary Lou in 1852 and Frances in 1857.

I can’t find any record about Calvin after that census. There are other Calvin Hogans, but none matches him. His eldest son Atlas served in the Civil War, and interestingly, changed sides. He started out in the 13th Regiment Arkansas Infantry, Company I when he was 18 years old, entering as a private and being captured when he was a sergeant and sent to prison in Indiana. There he apparently made a deal and entered the Union Army on 10 September 1864 in the 21st Regiment Indiana, Company F, 1st Heavy Artillery Unit. He served with them until they got to Florida in 1865 and was mustered out 27 July 1865. Back in Madison County, Tennessee, he soon got married to a Miss Sarah J.E. Stephenson.

Next comes Mary Ann’s brother Caswell Hogan. He was born in Montgomery County, North Carolina, in about 1824. The 1830 census shows he is age 5–9. In 1840 he is age 15–19. In 1850 he appears with his wife and two children and is reported to be 27 years old. In 1860 he appears with his family on the census and is 36 years old.

Caswell married Jane Johnson in 1845 in Madison County, Tennessee. Jane was about the same age as Caswell, born in North Carolina, and went by the nickname Jennie. They had the following children in Tennessee: Amanda (1846), William (1849), Thomas A (1852), Christopher Columbus “Lum” (1855), Elizabeth (1856), and Robert Merida (1858). Right after Robert Merida was born, the family moved to Craighead county, Arkansas. Cas was a farmer, and both he and Jennie were illiterate according to the 1860 Census. Cas died in 1863 in Conway, Arkansas. Jennie lived until 1896.

The next sibling for Mary Ann is her brother Isaiah, who is next to her in age. He was reportedly born 27 August 1825 in Montgomery County, North Carolina. The 1830 Census has him in the “Under 5” age group. In 1840 he was put in the 5–9 age group, and in 1850 he’s 25 years old, living in Madison County, Tennessee with his wife, Sally, who is the same age. Then Sally must have changed her name, because in 1860 he’s married to Lucy, and they have three children: James (1852), Susan (1855), and Hiram (1858). They live in Ripley County, Missouri, but little Hiram was born in Arkansas, so they must have tried living there between Susan’s and Hiram’s births. When the Civil War started, Isaiah chose to join the Union side in the 24th Regiment Missouri Infantry, Company G. He was either captured and sent to Andersonville, Georgia, and then sent home to die, or he was killed in a battle; it is not clear which record belongs to him. At any rate he died 28 January 1863 in Van Buren, Carter county, Missouri, and his widow, Sarah, applied for a military pension the next month, which was granted.

After Mary Ann comes her sister, Elizabeth, born in the 1830s. Her age varies so much in the records that it’s hard to know exactly when she was born. In 1840 she was reported as under 5; but in 1850 she was supposedly 17. Then in 1860 she was 25. She married Thomas Smith (a native of Ireland who was born about 1821 and who had immigrated to Arkansas) soon after 1860 and had four children: William Burns Smith (1862), Allice (1864), Thomas (1865), and Edward (1868). Elizabeth was said to be 36 in 1870, so perhaps her birth year was 1834 or 1835. Nothing further is known yet of her life; she is said to have died in Faulkner county, Arkansas, in 1880.

The youngest of the siblings is Sanders Hogan, born between 1836 and 1838. The 1840 Census shows him in the Under 5 group; in 1850 he is said to be 14 years old, but ten years later he is said to be 22. Of course he moved with his parents from North Carolina to Tennessee and then to Arkansas. Nothing further is known of him. His actual name may have been Alexander, since Sanders is a common nickname or short form of that name. There are many Alexander Hogans, but again, I don’t know what happened to our Sander, or “Sandy” as he is called on the 1860 Census.

The Hogan family was not a particularly long-lived family. The father, Marmaduke, lived over 75 years, but his wife, Nancy, was only around 56 or 57 when she died. Calvin was about 40 when he disappeared from all records. Caswell died at the age of about 40. Isaiah died at the age of 37. Elizabeth was around 44 when she died. Sanders could have lived a long time, but he disappeared from records at the age of 22. Mary Ann lived the longest that we know of; she was around 60 when she died.

What’s Next
I’m going to explore Mary Ann’s ancestors and try to discover when each family arrived in America. I’ll update you with what I find.