Dear Anonymous, let me first start by stating that there are a lot of Actons out there! Wow! Secondly, I am very excited. Just as I was finishing up, or thought I was, I came across something very intriguing and am hoping you might contact me in the future, although I know you posted your query quite a long time ago...one of your ancestors might me tied into my tree, very loosely and tenuously, but a surname in common popped up and I will explain later. First of all, to answer your question and to make an admission...I only did some preliminary poking about as I am only a beginner and I only gleaned my information from easy sources and also from other family trees on Ancestry.com. Some are verifiable and some you will have to dig around yourself, OK? But they did match for me and that is my disclaimer. My sources were 1860 through 1920 US Federal Census Records, Missour Marriage Records 1805-2002; 1850 US Federal Census Records; and Ancestry.com Family trees. A very tentative story if you follow these sources is as follows:
A fellow named Sydney O. Acton is born on Nov. 22, 1814 in Maryland. Don't know anything about him except that there is a child named David born in 1846 in Ohio. The 1850 Census Shows Sydney making his living as a shoemaker but living with a farmer and his four his four young chidren at the time of the census. Other census show him as a farmer. Sydney O. Acton died on Nov. 22, 1903 and was most likely buried at Maple Park Cemetery, Springfield, Greene County, Missouri (Find A Grave). He had two wives during his lifetime. The first wife was Isabelle Grose and this is the one that my be tied to my family tree). She was born in 1838 in Indiana. I was uable to find death date for her but estimate it to be sometime between 1880 and 1897 (last census and next marriage of Sydey). Isabelle Grose's parents were Daniel Grose and Celia Nation She may or may not have been the mother of David, but most likey is. I was unabe to determine his mother for sure as I could not find a marriage record or his birth record, but Sydney is his father. Sydney and Isabelle had other children as well: Lorenzo O. Acton (b.1853); Mary Acton (b. 1861); Arilla Acton (b. 1859). Later in life Sydney married Mrs.Mary J. Brown (b. 1833). They were married Oct 2, 1897.
David Acton was born in Ohio in 1846. He also had two wives. His first wife was Awilda and their child was Oliver Acton (b. 1877).
His second wife was Sarah E Roller (1859-1942). Together the had the following children: Viola Action;Allie B Aton; John Washington Acton (1887-1963; Elmer J Acton (1889-?)
I hope this helps get you started and that it doesn't come too late! Good luck with your search!
