Hampton is my great-great grandfather.
At one time, I had his birth year as Abt. 1830. I believe the source for that was a mistaken reading of a census record that caused him to appear a different age than he was. Based on very careful examination of the handwriting in the census records, I am now using the date of 1821. That is based on the 1860 census that shows an age of 39 years. The writing of his age in the census is very poor, and the number 3 in his age of 39 was previously mistaken by me for the number 2, causing me to once believe that his age was 29 in 1860. By looking at other entries in the census, it can be seen that the recorder in some instances formed the number 2 with slight differences from the number 3. Both are relatively open (sometimes showing no obvious middle stroke on the 3), but the 2 was always written with a horizontal line at the bottom. The number showing Hampton’s age does not include the horizontal line at the bottom of the number, so it probably is not a number 2. In my judgment, the 1860 census recorded age is 39.
Based on the age of 39, a lot of past confusion is cleared up. The previously used age of 29 (in 1860) raised questions about the children in Hampton’s home. Some were too old to be his children if he was only 29. The age of 39 makes it possible that all the children are his natural children. His birthplace of Illinois is based on the 1860 census.
Hampton F. Taylor’s first wife is believed to have been Betsy Henderson. Others had shown the marriage date as 19 July 1844. The only marriage record that I could find near that date with names anywhere near the spelling that I show was for H. F. Tailor and L. F. Henderson who were married 19 July 1844[1] in Johnson County, Illinois.
According to the book A History Of Johnson County, by Chapman, dated 1933, Hampton married Betsy Henderson and had children named Thomas, Isabel, Cina, Samuel, Mary, Benjamin, Martha, James, and William. William was born in the same year that Hampton married his second wife, so it is thought that Betsy died in 1854.
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Also, the 1830 census for his father William shows eight children. That combined with the 1840 census showing 2 girls under 10 and one boy under 10, leads me to believe that Hampton is one of the children in the 1830 census. Samuel Taylor was the boy under 10 in the 1840 census.
[1] Illinois marriage index, Johnson County, volume 00B, page 0222
