Who was JClement

“The people who have left us are never truly gone until there is no one left to remember them.”      Unknown Author

In Colrain, Massachusetts off of Ed Clark Road is a small cemetery known as Christian Hill. Just inside the gate on the right side is a small field stone, roughly cut. Hand carved letters on the face of the stone spell out JClement; there are no other Clements in this small cemetery. There is nothing on the stone that identify this person other than a name.

Let me tell you a little about her; she was born Mary Jane Palmer on April 14, 1845 in Leray, Jefferson Co., New York. Her parents were Lorenzo Palmer and Pamelia Merritt and the family farmed land in what is now Fort Drum New York. 

On March 10,1866 she married Daniel L. Clement, a recently returned Civil War solder who served with the 42nd NY Infantry Regiment.  Daniel joined the Army at 16 years old to fight for his country, and was discharged on June 30, 1865. 

Daniel and Jennie, as she was known all her life, had 6 children; Mattie, Charles, George, Anna, Samuel and Edwin.  They farmed land in North Wilna, New York during their lives together.   Charles and George died very young, Anna died at age 20 of complications of child birth, and her remaining 3 children lived long and productive lives. 

In 1894 Daniel, at the age of 47, died of Brights Disease, Mattie was married and by 1896 was living with her family in Colrain, MA. That left Sam and Edwin who were living with her and farming the land in New York. 

Jennie moved to Colrain just before the turn of the century and began a farm with her two sons and her brother James. 

Around 1905 she returned to New York with her son Edwin; Sam decided to stay behind as he had met Emma Farnum, a weaver who worked at a Colrain Textile mill.  They would be married in later 1905. 

She returned to Massachusetts around 1910, living with her daughter, for a time. Whether it was home sickness or knowing that the end was near, she wanted to return home to New York.  While arraignments were being made with Edwin to get her back home, she died suddenly and was buried in the small  Christian Hill Cemetery, on top of the hill. 

Certainly more could and should be said of a life that lasted 67 years but at least our Great Gandmother is not forgotten

**The image of Jennie Palmer Clement is a pencil and charcoal drawing that her grand son John Edwin Clement Sr.  identified as her several years ago.


Access Jennie Clement's  Find A Grave Memorial  at this link

Sons of the American Revolution SAR

As many people may be aware the Sons of the American Revolution is a lineage base patriotic society for men, the ladies group is known as the Daughter of the American Revolution (DAR).

It is a requirement of both of these organizations that membership can only be granted to direct descendant of a Revolutionary War Patriot. I have been interested in this organization for many year, my only problem with joining was that my direct lineage in my paternal line were loyalist.

Thomas Lake was a farmer in New York State at the time of the Battle of Bennington, his farm was located in the area of the Battlefield. There are records that indicate he was captured and interred in Cambridge New York until after the Battle of Saratoga was won. He was released, like many other loyalist prisoner after the battle and at present It is not clear what Thomas did or where he went until he and his family are found in Canadian Census after the war. It is possible he returned to farming or may have gone to join another fighting unit. It would not be surprising that once the battle was over and the fighting moved else-where that he and his brothers just went back to his farm. With the defeat of the only major British Army in Northeastern New York there would have been nothing to prevent the Lake brothers from returning to the farm or possibly setting out for Canada; Research is actively continuing in this area.

So you can see becoming a member of a lineage patriot group was not really feasible for me, until just recently.

While exploring my maternal line I came across my 4th Great Grandfather Eleazer Whitney, born 1755 in Brookfield, Massachusetts, (Still needs verification) he joined the Continental Army 1777 and served to the end of the war. After the war he made his way to Halifax VT there is 1874 he married Martha Crosier, they settle in an area of the town that would come to be known as Whitneyville. They remained in this area all their lives Eleazer passing on in June 1840 and Martha November 1865.

In 1818 the US Congress passed a law allowing for the payment of pensions to Revolutionary War Soldiers and Eleazer was granted a government pension for his service. The Congress subsequently passed legislation that enabled widows of Revolutionary War soldier to collect the pension of their husband provided they were accepted under the guidelines of the day. Martha was awarded a pension of $88.00 the was eventual raised to $92.00, now one would think that $92.00 a month would be a good some of money for the 1840’s however the payment was yearly and yes only $92.00. She had to keep re-applying the interval is not clear but the pension documents are a wealth of information.

The documents identified that Martha couldn’t write, she signed her name by making “her mark” which was an “X”, In one of these documents her daughter Abigail (Whitney) Farnum signed as a witness. This is significant as the first legal document that identifies the Farnum Family, and creates a genealogical link to the Whitney and Crosier lines. The only other document that I have found to-date is a handwritten piece of paper that looks like it came from and old stock book, it literally fell out of a family bible. This document has no identifying feature to document who wrote it.

This is a work in progress and there are several other avenues to follow I hope to be able to compile it very soon into the application for membership. Will continue to update.

Emma M. Farnum Clement b 1873 d.1977

Emma M. Farnum was born in Halifax, Vermont the daughter of Cyrus Farnum and Miranda Gates. She had 4 sibblings John, Lucy, Henry and May. Of the five Emma was the only one to marry and raise her own family. In 1905 she married Samuel Clement of Croghan New York, the settled in the Halifax, Vermont area and had 4 children of there own, Elmer, John, Doris and Alfred. She lived such a long and full life that our family was fortunate to have been able to know her, she personnelly had met all of her 15 Grandchildren 37+ Greatgrand children and 2 or 3 great great grandchildren, before her passing. To her final days she alway had cookies or fresh donuts waiting for the kids who came on the weekends to visit. Her stamina was unparalelled, and she could remember most facts like they happened yesterday with a clarity that baffled people who witnessed the event and long ago forgot the details. At one point in time someone asked her if she was concerned about nuclear power, as the Rowe Yankee Nuclear Power Plant was just down the Road from her home. Her response was typical of her simple philosophy, "They never bothered me none".

to be continued.......................

Samuel E. Clement & Emma M. Farnum

Samuel E. Clement was born 8 Sep 1881 in Croghan, Lewis Co., New York he was the son of a US Civil Union Soldier from New York and farmer Daniel L. Clement and Mary Jane Palmer. In 1894 Daniel Clement died suddenly of Heart and Bright’s disease, with an enlarged liver. This left Sam as the oldest surviving son at age 13; having two brothers Charles F. and George H. that died in 1872 and 1884 respectively. The family consisted of Mattie Clement Herzig the eldest sister who had left home to start her own family, Anna P. Clement, Ira Edwin the youngest; Mary Jane Clement his their mother and Sam.

The eldest daughter Mattie left New York State with her family and settled in the Colrain, Massachusetts area. At some point just before 1900 Mary Jane Clement who by this point was going by the name Jennie Clement, left New York State and moved to Colrain, Ma with her two son’s Sam and Ira Edwin. Jennie’s daughter Annie had married Lorenzo Ashcraft in 1895 she had one daughter and died in 1898. Interestingly enough Lorenzo Ashcraft was born in Brattleboro, Vermont about 45 miles from where Mattie and later Sam would settle to live out their lives.

Jennie did not like living in Massachusetts and wanted to return home to New York, however Sam did not he stayed behind and Ira Edwin return with their mother to the farm in New York.

While in Colrain, he met Emma M. Farnum who was a loom weaver in a textile mill, they married on 6 Aug 1905, and raised their family in the Halifax, VT, Whitingham, VT and ultimately settling permanently on a small farm on Cyrus Stage Road in Rowe, Franklin Co., Massachusetts.

Emma Martha Farnum was actually born Martha Emily Farnum 19 Jun 1873 to Cyrus Farnum and Miranda Gates, she was the second generation of women in her line to live an extremely long life. Her mother was 90 Year old when she passed and Emma was 104 when she died in 1977. Emma was the second of 5 children, and the only one to marry and start a family of her own. Her family's ancestry extended back to before the Revolutionary War and involved some of the founding member of the towns of Halifax and Whitingham, Vermont. The Whitney’s, Crosier’s, and Gates’ were part of her direct family line, many of the descendants of these families still live in both towns to this day.

Sam and Emma had 4 children, Elmer Farnum 1907-1977; Doris Emma 1909-1996; John Edwin 1913-2003; and Alfred Burton 1920-1990. They farmed or worked on farms in and around the towns we have already discussed until 27 July 1952 when Sam had a heart attack and died suddenly at the age of 70. Emma lived the remainder of her considerably long life on the farm in Rowe, Massachusetts with her eldest son Elmer, who after returning from World War II, Italy never really went much further than the area around home, for the remainder of his life. Elmer never married spending most of his time taking care or the few farm animals that were around the Rowe farm.

Jennie Clement made a final trip to Colrain around 1912, she had sold the farm in New York and travelled to Colrain, MA with her son Ira Edwin and his wife Merle Florence Lake. She initially had intended to stay, Ira and Merle return to New York, it is unclear whether Jennie had decided she wanted to go home or she became ill and wanted to return. Whichever the case money was raised to send her back to New York, when she suddenly died on June 13, 1912, she is buried alone in Christian Hill Cemetery in Colrain, MA, her grave sets just inside the gate marked with a field stone marker rough carved, "J. Clement" to this day no other family member has been buried in that Cemetery.

Sam, Emma and now all of their children are gone; John Edwin Clement Sr. was the last of his family to pass on at 89 years of age, my grandfather, left a rich family legacy to preserve, a history that is still incomplete but a history that he helped research, write and more importantly preserve.

New Post referencing Lake Family members

Samuel E. Clement & Emma M. Farnum

Name Scrabble

The most interesting and probably the most mind bending part of genealogy research has been the propensity of the people of old to change their names seemingly at will. Several example of this can be found in the research, the most telling being in the Calder line, my 2X great grandmother is identified on her grave marker in Hillside Cemetery Natural Bridge NY as Christie Ann Lake. In the census of 1860, 1870 and 1880 she is known as Ann Lake, her death record in Black River, NY identifies her as Anna Lake. The most current information that research has provided, leads me to believe that her true name was Christianna Calder born in Scotland in 1840.

The same could be said for my mother’s grandmother, most of her life, some 104 year she went by the name of Emma, very few people even those inside the family knew that her true name was Martha Emily, she is buried in Halifax Center Cemetery in Halifax, VT under the name of Emma M. Clement.

Still another example is Edwin Ira Clement, my mother’s great uncle, He is identified as Edward Ira, Ira Edward, and then just Ed, his true name was Ira Edwin Clement, but preferred “Ed” he married another who subscribed to the game of "Name Scrabble". Her name was Florence Merle Lake, early on she changed it to Merle Florence and went by Merle for the rest of her life time.

So the challenge is to sort out, not only who is who, with records that are sometime faulty or damaged, but then you must contend with players who keep changing the rules on you during the match. Good luck :)