190. Marion Galloway

There's a student named Marion Galloway in the list of Mordecai school students I compiled in the 1990s. She may have been from Halifax County, North Carolina, attended the school from the beginning of 1817 to the end of 1818, and a Robert Galloway is the adult name attached to her account. Not much to go on, but let's see how much more we can learn about her now...

One thought: Marion is not a very common name for the students at the Mordecai school. Mary, Mary Ann, sure, but I don't see other Marions in the list. So I'll definitely check other spellings.

Here's one potential match: Marion Galloway, daughter of Robert Galloway and Mary Spraggins Galloway; her father was a Scottish immigrant and died in 1832. He lived in Rockingham County NC, owned a tavern at Wentworth, and in the 1820 census there are 77 enslaved people recorded at his plantation. In his will, her name is clearly written "Marion" (see snippet from Ancestry).  And she is listed as the wife of James E. Galloway--so she may have married a cousin, or otherwise landed with a matching maiden name and married name. She and her husband were given land in Tennessee, and a dozen enslaved people, in her father's will.

Her husband died in 1833, in Maury, Tennessee, leaving her a young widow with a young daughter, Cornelia, and son, James A. Galloway. James E. Galloway's will is also on Ancestry; here's where she's named ("my dearly beloved wife Marion Galloway"), along with her two children. Her brothers-in-law, Samuel W. Gentry and Reuben A. Gentry, were the will's executors.

The timing, name, class, and locations match up fine; this very well could be a Mordecai student. But I don't have quite enough to feel like this is a definite match.

176, 177, 178. Charlotte Fort (Gorman), Mary Ann Fort (Mason), and Martha Fort (Andrews)

 There are three girls named Fort in the rolls of the Mordecai school that I assembled in the early 1990s:

Charlotte Fort attended the school in both sessions of 1811.

Mary Ann Fort attended the school for three years, from early 1816 until the end of 1818. She was from Hicksford (now Emporia), Virginia, with Lewis Fort as the adult name on her account. She married in 1821.

Martha (or Patsy) Fort attended the school for two years, from early 1810 to the end of 1811.

Mary Ann Fort Mason (1803-1870) I was able to learn about in the early 1990s, because she married someone fairly prominent, and because she was at the school long enough to be mentioned in the Mordecai letters. Rachel Mordecai called her parents (Lewis Fort and Eliza Harris Coleman Fort)  "quite diverting people" and noted that her mother wrote "droll letters". Her planter family held slaves. At age 18, in 1821, she married John Young Mason, whose sister was a Mordecai student. They had at least eight children together, and her husband became a congressman, and an ambassador, and Secretary of the Navy, and Attorney General of the United States--so she was a busy political wife, until he died in 1859, in Paris. At least one of her sons (Simon Blount Mason) served in the Confederate army during the Civil War. She died in 1870, in Virginia.

Now what can some online searching reveal about the other two Fort girls?  Charlotte Ann Fort married John S. Gorman in Wake County, North Carolina in 1818--the age/timing is exactly right for that to be the Mordecai student. AND she had a sister Martha Fort. Aha! So we have them.

Charlotte Ann Fort Gorman (1802-1883), daughter of James Fort and Chloe Powell Fort, married John Spear Gorman in Wake County in 1818. They had at least one child, Annie, in 1832. Charlotte was widowed when J. S. Gorman died in 1836. She died in 1883, aged 81 years.

Martha W. Fort Andrews (1797-1876) was Charlotte's older sister. She married Cullen Andrews Jr. in Wake County in 1816, and they had ten children born between 1817 and 1837. The Andrews family lived in Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama. Her husband died in Texas in 1857. Martha Fort Andrews died in 1876, aged 79, in Columbus, Mississippi.

All three Fort girls were Southern widows in their 60s when they lived through the American Civil War.

139, 140, 141. The Easthams (Anne, Eliza, and Mildred)

There are three girls named Eastham in my student rolls for the Mordecai school.  Anne, Eliza, and Mildred Eastham are almost certainly sisters, all from Halifax County, Virginia, all with James Eastham as the adult on their account.  I have Anne and Mildred (Milly) arrived in mid-1814; Anne left after just one session; Mildred stayed for most of the next two years, with their sister Eliza joining her.  Mildred and Eliza both finished at the school at the end of 1816.  James appears in the school ledger through during sessions.

Either Milly or Eliza was ill during August 1816, requiring a visit from their talkative father:  "Miss Eastham I hope has recovered before her father's anecdotes are exhausted.  And I congratulate you on having a visitor that could talk." (Solomon to Ellen, 23 August 1816, Southern Historical Collection)  Julia wrote about the same visit to Samuel Mordecai:  "The best news I can give you is that Miss Eastham, her talkative & goodhumoured father & mother left us on Friday.  She was much better & will I hope soon recover.  Her father must I think be a good man, he has at any rate a very tender heart, he bid us farewell with tears in his eyes & was so much affected that he could hardly speak." (Julia to Samuel, August 1816 [und.], Southern Historical Collection)

A James Eastham was deputy sheriff of Halifax County in 1815; there are a lot of Easthams in Halifax County, but he seems like a good candidate for starters.  The same man was also the county surveyor in 1810.  But his name mostly turns up in legal documents, no family history I can see.

I see a Mildred Hardeman Eastham (1805-1857), who was born in Virginia, married Alfred Hicks Rose (a fellow Virginian) in 1828, had seven children, and died in 1857 in Tennessee (here's her grave).  Her dates are perfect, and we know that a lot of Mordecai-connected families moved west to Tennessee in the 1820s. 

Now, here's a thought:  What if Ann and Eliza are the same person? Their times at the school don't overlap, and if anything it makes more sense if she's one person--it means two sisters, Ann Eliza and Mildred, who were at the school simultaneously, arriving in mid-1814 and finishing in 1816.   I found an Ann Eliza Eastham (1803-1881) who was born in Halifax Co. Virginia, married Thomas J. Spencer in about 1819, had two children, was widowed very young, and died in 1881.  Her dates are perfect for a Mordecai student.

I have no evidence at hand that Mildred and Ann Eliza were sisters, or were Mordecai students--only their dates and place of birth, really.  But I'm intrigued at merging Ann and Eliza Eastham into one student.  Makes more and more sense as I think of it.... any clues from Virginia family historians out there?

137. Elvira W. Dupuy Eggleston (1805-1878)

There's a student named Elvira W. Dupuy in the list of Mordecai school students, compiled by me in about twenty years ago.  I'm seeing her listed as a resident of Virginia, at the school for its last three sessions (mid-1817 to the end of 1818), and with Captain James Dupuy as the adult on the account, appearing in the school ledger in June 1817, November 1817, January 1818, and June 1818.  That seems like a lot to go on!  And Elvira is an unusual enough name, there should be more to find.

And there is.  Elvira Dupuy was born in Nottoway County, Virginia, in October 1805, the youngest child born to Captain James Dupuy (1753-1828) and Mary Purnell Dupuy (1758-1828).   Her father's military rank came from his service during the American Revolution. Her mother was 47 when Elvira was born, and Elvira's only sister Elizabeth (b. 1803) died young--so a girls' school might have seemed like a good idea for a lot of reasons when Elvira was twelve years old.  At age 22, Elvira married fellow Virginian Richard Beverly Eggleston (1797-1853) as his second wife, and the following year both her parents died.  The Egglestons had six children. Her last child was born in 1839, when Elvira was 34; and all of them were born in Virginia.  She was widowed in 1853, age 48; she lived through the Civil War and died in 1878, a few weeks before her 73rd birthday.

Her grandson Joseph Dupuy Eggleston (1867-1953) was a noted educator, president of Virginia Tech and Hampden-Sydney College, as well as Virginia's state superintendent of public schools (1906-1912).

The Eggleston papers at the Virginia Historical Society Library may have more about Elvira and her family.

65, 66, and 67. Ann, Catherine, and Eliza Bullock

Three girls named Bullock are listed as Mordecai students:

Ann Bullock from Warren County (?) attended from early 1816 to the last session with the Mordecais, in late 1818; Richard Bullock is the adult name on her account.

Catherine and Eliza Bullock both attended the Mordecai school in 1809 only. They were probably also from somewhere near Warrenton, because many of the first students at the school were local children.

A Richard Bullock appears throughout the school's ledger for the years Ann attended; there's also mention of a James Bullock in June 1818. There's mention of Ann's father paying a lot of attention (courting) a Mary Turner in 1820 correspondence by the family; and in an 1822 letter from Warrenton, Caroline Mordecai Plunkett reports that "There are several weddings now in agitation among the number is Ann Bullock's she is to be married to a son of Judge Henderson." (Caroline Plunkett to Rachel Lazarus, 7 September 1822, Jacob Mordecai Papers, Duke University)

That last tidbit leads us to Anne E. Bullock Henderson (1804-1883), of Granville County (not Warren), Ashland Plantation, who indeed married Archibald Erskine Henderson (1801-1853) in 1822, in Warren County. Archibald's father was Judge Leonard Henderson (1772-1833), Chief Justice of NC. Archibald was a UNC alumnus, a planter and a magistrate. Their seven children were all born in Granville County, between 1823 and 1845. Looks like she was widowed at age 49, with her youngest child just eight at the time. In 1860, the census finds the Henderson household with 129 slaves.

The other Bullock girls are likely relatives of Anne's, but it's a big family in the area. There's a Catherine Lewis Bullock, b. c. 1802, who married Joseph Newton Sims, himself the grandson of a woman named Sarah Bullock. The wedding was in 1822, in Warren or Granville County. Catherine would have been widowed in 1850, in Louisiana. This Catherine Bullock had at least one son, James Bullock Sims, who was born at Tennessee; and a daughter, Sallie Sims. She also had a sister-in-law named Susanna Sims Burt--and a Susan Sims is listed among the Mordecai students who only attended in 1809, along with Catherine Bullock. So it seems like a decent chance she's the Mordecai student.

61. Margaret Broadfoot Hooper (1801-1880)

Margaret Broadfoot of Fayetteville was at the Mordecai school for a long time--nine sessions, or four-and-a-half years, from mid-1810 to the end of 1814. Her father Andrew Broadfoot, born in Scotland, died in early 1810; her cousin and guardian William Broadfoot paid her tuition and attended examinations in place of a parent. She took music lessons at the school, and the ledger shows an atlas being purchased for her. Because she was with the family so long, the Mordecais kept track of her after she left school, and I already have a lot of the details from their letters and the letters of Lucy Plummer Battle. Margaret Broadfoot was among those who welcomed Rachel Mordecai Lazarus to Wilmington as a new bride in 1821. She married later that year herself, to a newspaper editor named James Hooper, in Fayetteville (she sent Rachel Lazarus a piece of her wedding cake, somehow), and in 1823 she had lost some weight and her "manners [were] more formed" when Rachel saw her. In 1826, she had moved back to Wilmington. She started her own "infant school" in 1831 when her husband's financial condition became "much embarrassed."

In 1845, she was a widow in Chapel Hill staying with a Miss Mallett (one of her husband's cousins married a Caroline Mallett); her old schoolmate Lucy Plummer Battle visited with her there, and reminisced about old school days:

"I called on Tuesday to see Mrs. James Hooper, who is an old schoolmate (Margaret Broadfoot). Of course she did not know me. But as soon as I told her who I was, she seemed very glad to see me. I invited her & Miss Mallett to take tea with me but they could not do so. From her I learned the wearabouts &c of several of my old friends. I enjoyed her society wonderfully." (Lucy Martin Plummer Battle to her husband William, 4 October 1845, Battle Family Papers, Southern Historical Collection)

But by the time of the 1850 census, Margaret was back in Fayetteville, listed as a 50-year-old widow with real estate worth over $10,000. She died in 1880.

The whole family seems to be buried together, which is helpful: Margaret Broadfoot Hooper's dates are 1801-1880; her mother's name is given as Hetty Coit or Hetty Mumford (1776-1820); James Hooper's dates (1797-1841) indicate that Margaret became a widow in 1841, at age 40. She seems not to have had any children.

Some extra items about Margaret's husband: James Hooper's grandfather was William Hooper, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence from North Carolina. His brother Thomas married another Mordecai alumna from Fayetteville, Eliza Donaldson, in 1825, but Eliza died within six months of the wedding. James Hooper's stepfather was Joseph Caldwell, the first president of UNC.

54. Eliza Bradley

A student named Eliza Bradley attended the Mordecai school for one session, the first part of 1811. She is mentioned as being from Wilmington, with Richard Bradley as the adult on her account. A Richard Bradley also appears in the Mordecai's ledger making a payment in February 1812.

In a letter from Rachel Mordecai Lazarus to Caroline Mordecai Plunkett dated 17 May 1821 at Wilmington (Southern Historical Collection), we read that "Eliza Bradley (Mrs. Hill) has the same lovely eyes we used to admire, and is quite a pleasing woman." In another letter dated 27 August 1827 (same writer, same library, this time to Ellen Mordecai), that "Mrs. Hill (E Bradley) confined but a fortnight lay with the rain dripping on her, changed repeatedly, the house shaking & roof vibrating with the wind, kitchen afloat, children climbing on the bed & crying for something to eat, when to cap the climax the door blew off its hinges & for some hours two persons were obliged to hold it up by main force, neither man nor tool to be had...Mr. Bradley's house surrounded by water & in danger of being carried away, salt works much injured." So Eliza's former teacher knew her in her married life in Wilmington, well enough to know her circumstances in a bad storm.

Turning to the genealogical web to fill in more details: Miss Eliza Rebecca Bradley (1800-1866) was daughter of Richard Bradley, Esq. (1759-1834, a bank officer) and his first wife Rebecca Green (c1770-c1805). She was very young when her mother died, and soon had a stepmother, Eliza Claudia Yonge, and eventually nine half-siblings. Eliza was sent to the Mordecai school when she was 10, but after just one session she returned to the family. She married Dr. John Hill (d. 1847) on 15 May 1817, in Wilmington. As the letter by Rachel Lazarus suggests, she had quite a few children by 1827: this website lists ten children born to her. Eliza was a widow at 47, and died at 66. By blood and/or by marriage, Eliza Bradley Hill would have been kin to much of Wilmington's elite, including the DeRossets, the Greens, the Browns, the Wrights, the Swanns, the Lords, and the Jones families.

Why did she come to school and leave so quickly? I think I found the answer! Her first cousin was Mary Brown. Mary Brown married Alexander Calizance Miller (d 1831*), the Mordecai school's mysterious and dashing music instructor. This was a blow to the Mordecais, professionally and personally (Ellen Mordecai, in particular, tearfully confessed a crush on the Frenchman). The wedding was in July 1811. So Eliza might well have returned to Wilmington for the wedding, and not returned to school afterwards, given the awkward feelings that might exist toward the Bradley-Brown-Green-Wright clan right at the moment.

*For more on this man, see William E. Craig, "The Mysterious Frenchman: Alexander Calizance Miller in America, 1797-1831," Lower Cape Fear Historical Society Bulletin 29 (October 1985): 1-6.

47. Eliza Ann Bowell (1802-1865)

There is a student named Eliza Bowell in the rolls of the Mordecai school. She attended for three sessions, 1816 and the first half of 1817. The adult name that may be attached to her account is Abner F. Bowell, and she's linked to Fayetteville.

There was an Abner F. Bowell who died in Fayetteville in 1827, age 50. He turns up in the 1820 US Census as a head of household in Fayetteville, with eleven free white people in the home: a boy under 16, three boys 16-18, three men 16-26, a man 26-46 (probably Bowell himself), and a girl 10-16, a woman 16-26, and another woman 26-45. All the adult males in the household may be explained by Bowell being a shop owner, perhaps a printer, who housed his employees and apprentices. This family historian links the surname Bowell with Bowles/Boles in North Carolina. She also mentions an Eliza Bowell who married a man named Ochiltree.

Taking that lead: This family historian has Eliza Ann Bowell (1802-1865), daughter or niece of Abner Bowell of Fayetteville, marrying Archibald Ochiltree (1793-1832), in 1818. She was widowed at thirty, and seems to have moved to Texas later in life, to be with one or more of her children. Looks like she may have had a son Hugh Ochiltree (1820-1891) who was born in NC, but was a lawyer and community leader in Madison, Texas. (Here's a picture of Hugh.) Ochiltree County, Texas, on the Oklahoma border, is named for Hugh's cousin (Eliza's nephew?) William Beck Ochiltree (1811-1867), who was also born in Fayetteville. The DAR record for Hugh Ochiltree's daughter Arabella Ochiltree Bancroft (1870-1924) has "Eliza A. Powell" as his mother.

So.... Eliza Ann Bowell was a Fayetteville girl, born 1802. She went to school in Warrenton when she was 13-14, for a year and a half, then married at 16 to Archibald Ochiltree. They had at least one child before Eliza was widowed 1832, at age 30. She may have moved to Texas and died there in 1865.

42. Martha Bond (1796-1845)

There was a student named Martha Bond in the rolls of the Mordecai school. She was there for three terms, starting summer 1810 and staying through the end of 1811. I don't have a hometown or adult's name attached to her name.

Seems like that should be a pretty dead end for further exploration, but just to be sure, searched out a "Martha Bond" in NC around the right age. And I found one! Martha Bond, daughter of James Bond (1760-1812) and Mary Hoskins (1767-1831), married David Small in 1822. Her parents married in 1787, and she was the third of their six children, which likely lands her birth year in the mid-1790s--very plausible for a Mordecai student in 1811. What makes this Martha Bond Small a very likely candidate is her family connections... Mary Hoskins, born in Chowan County NC, was kin to the Blount/Blunt family (see previous entry). Three of Mary's siblings married people named Blount.

The North Carolina Historical Register has Martha Bond Small as mother of six: Jane E. Small (1829-1873), William B. Small (1831-1854), Mary Frances Small (1831-1835), David Small (1833-1866), Edmund Small (1835-1862), Thomas M. Small (1837-1909). She died a widow in 1845. Three of her sons were in the CSA; one died in the war; one died afterwards from an illness contracted in the army; and the youngest survived as a disabled veteran ("His lameness is very perceptible in walking").

Remembering that some Marthas were called "Patsy" or "Patsey" in her place and time, I also searched Pats(e)y Bond Halls... sure enough, there's mention of her marriage to David Small as "Patsey Bond," married by an Obadiah Small in Chowan County. These sources have her marrying in 1826 or 1828, which might match better with her children's birth dates. Someone in Edenton owns (or at least owned) the family bible of David and Martha Small, which shows her as born 8-14-1796. (And David Small as slightly younger, born 11-13-1796.)

So to sum it all up: Martha "Patsey" Bond was born 1796, the third child of her parents. She went to the Mordecai school just before she turned 14, and stayed until she was 15. Soon after she left school, her father died, in February 1812. Martha married when she was about 30, and had six children before she was widowed; one of her daughters, Mary Frances (possibly a twin?), died at age 4. Martha Bond Small died in 1845, age 49. When she died, her youngest sons were 10 and 8.