Margaret (Neelands) Caldwell (1826 - 1903)

Born 1826 in York, South Carolina, United States

Descendants

Died 1903 at about age 77 in Whitfield, Georgia

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Biography

Margaret Neelands Caldwell (1826-1903) was a pioneer farm wife, an early settler of Whitfield County, Ga., and a mother who singlehandedly raised ten children after her husband perished shortly after the Civil War.

Margaret was born in 1826 (per her tombstone^[1]) in York County, South Carolina, the daughter of Irish immigrant Robert Neelands and his wife Margaret Caldwell Neelands. The 1850 census of York County shows Margaret as age 22 and living with her parents.^[2]

Sometime in the early 1850s she married John Caldwell (the marriage almost certainly took place in York County, although the county kept no marriage records). About 1855 Margaret, her husband, and her husbands' parents moved from South Carolina to McCutchen Cove in Whitfield County, Georgia. The 1860 census of Whitfield County is the only census that shows John and Margaret together as husband and wife; by this time she had borne six children.^[3]

The ten known children of John and Margaret Caldwell were:

• Elizabeth Jane (Bettie) Caldwell (1850-1917), married Melvin V. Hayes
• Abraham Neelands Caldwell (1852-1928), married Julia Elvira Johnson
• Mary Frances Caldwell (1855-1938), married Marcus Armstrong Reed
• Nancy Louise (Nannie/Nan) Caldwell (1856-1936), married John Crawford Jones
• Margarette Malinda (Linda) Caldwell (1856-1938), married Isaac C. Davis
• Leonard Caldwell (1859-Aft.1870)
• Martha A. (Mattie) Caldwell (1860-1887), married Jefferson Davis Wade
• Sarah Ellen Caldwell (1861-1960), married John Willaford Hammontree
• Clementine Sybilla Caldwell (1864-1847), married William Harry Cressman
• James Jonathan Caldwell (1866-1952), married 1) Lenora Nola Williams, 2) Cora Lee Freeman

John served in the Georgia state militia during the Civil War but became diseased and died in 1867, leaving Margaret a widow with ten children. She would not remarry. The family continued to operate John's 160-acre farm, which by 1870 was valued at $500.^[4]

By 1880, only four of the ten children were still living on the farm.^[5] However, all of her children remained in the area after marriage and remained close to the family. In 1900, Margaret, age 74, is enumerated living with her widowed daughter Clementine and grandson Henry.^[6] She passed away in 1903 at the approximate age of 77 and was buried at Dunagan Cemetery in the community of Trickum (Whitfield County), Ga.^[1]

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1} Find a Grave, database and images, memorial page for Margaret Neelands Caldwell (1826–1903), Find a Grave (Memorial ID 42179085 : accessed 26 March 2023), citing Dunagan Cemetery, Rocky Face, Whitfield County, Georgia, USA; Maintained by Jaime Crandell-Stapleton (contributor 46811611).
2. ↑ United States Census, 1850, database with images, (FamilySearch : 23 December 2020), Margaret Caldwell in household of John Caldwell, Yorkville, York, South Carolina, United States; citing family , NARA microfilm publication (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).
3. ↑ United States Census, 1860, database with images, (FamilySearch : 18 February 2021), Margaret Caldwell in entry for John Caldwell, 1860.
4. ↑ United States Census, 1870, database with images, (FamilySearch : 29 May 2021), Margaret Caldwell, 1870.
5. ↑ United States Census, 1880, database with images, (FamilySearch : 13 January 2022), Margaret Caldwell, Trickum, Whitfield, Georgia, United States; citing enumeration district , sheet , NARA microfilm publication T9 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).
6. ↑ United States Census, 1900, database with images, (FamilySearch : 11 March 2022), Margaret Caldwell, 1900.