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Bennitt Family History |
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Hello Joyce,
For starters I can only say thanks for such a wonderful
site. I'm am decended from several families in this area and it's been
a great help to confirm or question some of our genealogy. One of my Grandfathers
is David Bennett. He married Mary R. Sawyer ( daughter of Ammi Harrington
Sawyer). His father Josiah Bennitt (name is spelled this way in the post
office records) was the postmaster of Erin according to our family history
and now of course is re-confirmed by your site -
"The post-town of Erin was established early in the history
of the county. The first postmaster, appointed January 2, 1833, was William
D. Stewart. His successors and the dates of their appointments are as follows:
Duncan J. Stewart, June 17, 1837 ; Joshua Baker, October 5, 1847; George
K. McMillan, May 30, 1850; Josiah Bennitt, November 29, 1851; John
Caywood, September 15,
1853..............."
Anyway, I wanted to share part of a letter that was written to my grandparents.
When David Bennett was a young man he met Elizabeth Corwin, they were engaged to be married, but his father Josiah didn't want his son to get married. When David wrote to Elizabeth, his father Josiah who was the Postmaster at Erin, NY, would take Davids letters from the mail and when one came from Elizabeth, Josiah took that also from the mail. Both David and Elizabeth thought neither of them cared for the other anymore.
Later David was on his way to church when he overtook a girl walking and ask her to ride. This girl was Grandma Bennett (Mary Sawyer). After Mary died, one of Grandpa David Bennett aunt's put Grandpa and Elizabeth in touch with one another and they got married. It seems that she had never married and when she thought that Grandpa didn't care anymore. The story goes that she tried to starve herself to death.
My mother told me told me Elizabeth was a wonderful person. She was the only mother Jake knew for he was only two when Grandma Mary died. Aunt Lilly was taken home by Aunt Augusta and brought up by her, after Grandpa married Elizabeth he tried to get Lilly but Aunt Augusta would'nt give her up.
This information received from Minnie Derbyshire granddaughter of Hanna Kimber and Josiah Bennett in a letter to William James Bennett and Josephine Bennett. (William and Josephine are my grandparents but both have since passed away)
I thought someone might want to add this story someplace
on the Erin township history site since your site isn't about 'names' but
the people themselves. :-)
Thanks again for such a wonderful site!
Darla
Subj: Re: Erin Township, Chemung County NY
postmaster family story....
Date: 8/13/2002 4:51:38 AM Eastern Daylight Time
From: stimbert@attbi.com (Darla Stimbert)
To: JoyceTice@aol.com
Hello again,
Could you 'please' correct some information on the end
of that letter? Minnie Derbyshire isn't the daughter of Josiah and Hannah.
She's the granddaughter! I just got an e-mail from someone asking about
it. I just typed in the information as it was given to me. It was nice
though to contact another family member through your site.
Darla
