Harriet Harden née Bull (1820 - 1893)

Born 8 Dec 1820 in St. Mary's, MD

Wife of William Oliver Reeder — married 11 Jul 1843 in Leonardtown, St. Mary's, MD

Descendants

Died 24 May 1893 at age 72 in Oakville, St. Mary's, MD

Problems/Questions Profile manager: David Parsons [send private message]

Research Notes

ANCESTRY OF HARRIET BULL, 1820-1893, WIFE OF WILLIAM O. REEDER Excerpt from: Ancestry of the Descendants of Thomas Attaway Reeder of St. Mary’s County, Maryland and A Record of the Descendants of Joseph and Elizabeth Spalding Parsons by William Crocker Parsons (1917-1996) Edited and revised by David Otis Parsons, Spring 2001

The search for information about the ancestry of Harriet Reeder had to start from scratch. None of her living descendants could provide much help. There was an added puzzle for me because I was not sure why she used Harden as her middle name instead of Bull, which had been her original last name. The searching among old records proved extremely interesting and it was fairly soon discovered that far more could be learned about her antecedents than about those of her husband, William O. Reeder. It also became easier to understand why so little had been known by her descendants. Both of her parents had died while Harriet was still a small child and she herself probably had little opportunity to become well informed. It seems likely that her children and grandchildren heard little about their mother’s or grandmother’s interesting ancestors.

Harriet was born in St. Mary’s County, Maryland, on December 8, 1820, the youngest of three daughters of the Rev. George Stuart Bull and his wife, Rebecca Attaway Jordan Bull. George and Rebecca had been married on Thursday evening, May 25, 1815, in Alexandria, Virginia, and had been living in St. Mary’s County somewhere near the head of St. Clements Bay in the vicinity of Dynard or Oakley. As we shall see, Rebecca’s ancestors had lived in this area for quite a few generations. Harriet herself, while still a girl, was to own land along Canoe Nect Creek (or Bond’s Cove).

George Bull was the newcomer to St. Mary’s County. We are quite certain that he was born in Nenagh, Tipperary County, Ireland, probably in the 1780s, and that, like his brother and two sisters, he emigrated to Baltimore shortly after 1800. On Silver Street in Nenagh lived grocer John Bull, possibly the father or grandfather of George Stuart Bull. The Bull family burial plot in the cemetery on Barrack Street contains a handsome gravestone honoring the memory of William H. Bull,1810-1876, his wife Ellen, his son Fred George Bull, 1859-1895, his daughter Susan Bull Harkness, who died in 1922, and a grandson Fred M. Bull, 1896-1944. All of these, may well have been closely related to Harriet Bull Reeder. The Bulls in Nenagh were Protestants and since the name Bull is very rare in Ireland it seems likely that the family in Nenagh had emigrated from England in the 17th or 18th century.

George Bull apparently completed his education and prepared for the ministry after coming with members of his family to live in Baltimore. We have no clue to indicate how he met Rebecca Jordan or when he first visited St. Mary’s County. All we know is that Rebecca and he were married in 1815 and that in August of that year he purchased property in the county from Henry Alston, husband of Ann Jordan, Rebecca’s oldest sister. We know from court records that Rebecca herself owned land near St. Clements Bay, inherited from her father and from an uncle. Presumably George Bull farmed this land during ensuing years. Three daughters were born between 1815 and 1820 - Anna Maria, Rachel Julia and Harriet. Whether their father performed any duties as a clergyman we do not know but it is recorded that he was a subscribing member of the congregation of All Saints Church at Tomakokin in King and Queen Parish. We know also, from National Archives records, that for a few months in 1825, immediately following the untimely death of his 35-year old wife, George Bull served as the postmaster in the village post office at St. Clement’s Bay. That service was very brief because before the year had ended Bull died and left three young orphaned daughters, all under the age of ten.

In due course of time the St. Mary’s County Orphans Court appointed as guardian for the three young girls Samuel Harden of Baltimore, husband of George Bull’s sister, Maria Bull Harden. Until late in the 1830s this guardianship was renewed each year and Anna Maria, Rachel Julia and Harriet grew up in the home of their aunt and uncle. Their aunt Maria Bull Harden was born in Nenagh, Ireland, March 25, 1785, and died in Baltimore in 1844. Her husband Samuel Harden, 1776-1841, was the son of Nicholas Harden, also of Nenagh. Samuel left Ireland in 1801 and came with his brother William to Baltimore. There he achieved success in business and served on the Baltimore City Council. One of his sons, William Harden, became a Methodist minister. His other son, John Summerfield Harden, 1822-1890, became the president of the Western Maryland Railroad. John S. Harden’s daughter Priscilla, 1854-1932, married Upton Beall Sinclair, and their son was the prolific and controversial novelist and reformer, Upton B. Sinclair Jr. Through most of his life author Upton Sinclair maintained friendly ties with more than one of his Reeder cousins. Another daughter of John S. Harden, Maria Harden, married John Randolph Bland, founder of the United States Fidelity and Guaranty Company, father of Richard Howard Bland, 1880-1959, a leader in the business, civic and political life of Baltimore. Harriet Harden Reeder (the name she assumed) apparently felt a very close bond with the two surviving sons of the aunt and uncle who raised her (cousin John S. Harden, two years younger than Harriet, must have been to her like a younger brother); Harden and Reeder children and grandchildren continued a friendly family relationship for many decades.

THE BOND AND ATTAWAY ANCESTRY OF HARRIET REEDER, 1820-1893

At the time of the death of George Bull in 1825, just nine months after the death of his wife, a great-aunt of the three daughters was still living who felt a very deep concern for the welfare of these grandnieces. It was the discovery of the will of Elizabeth Bond that proved to be the key to identifying Harriet Bull Reeder’s mother and her mother’s ancestry.

As may be noted by a close study of the Rebecca Jordan Bull chart on an adjacent page, Elizabeth Bond was a daughter of John and Elizabeth Attaway Bond. Of their ten children she was the last to survive. In 1826 Elizabeth wrote her final will; in 1828 she died and the will was probated. The three clauses of her will which made provisions for members of her family were these:

“I give and bequeath unto my dearly beloved grandnieces, the daughters of the late George S. Bull of St. Mary’s County, Ann Maria Bull, Rachel Julia Bull and Harriet Bull, all my lands and tenements that I may die possessed of - Part of Attaway’s Purchase, Part of Mosely and a part of Church Swamp and all the lands where I now live - to them and their heirs forever, to be equally divided among the three.

“I give and bequeath to my grandniece Anna Maria Bull all my silver plate and my fine metal skillet.

“I give and bequeath the balance of my personal property to my three grandnieces, to wit, Adeline Wheat, daughter of Benoni Wheat of Alexandria, Elizabeth Alston, daughter of the late Henry Alston, and Harriet Wheat, the second daughter of the above Benoni Wheat, to be equally divided among the three of them and their heirs forever.”

By careful study of other wills and court records, it is possible to prove that Elizabeth Bond, this same last surviving child of Elizabeth Attaway and John Bond, was indeed the sister of Rebecca Bond Jordan and the aunt of Rebecca Attaway Jordan Bull. The only problem that developed was the puzzling omission of Rebecca Bond’s name in her father’s will. John Bond’s will, signed and witnessed January 13, 1760, names all of his sons and three daughters: Susanna, Elizabeth and Mary. No mention of Rebecca and no chance that one of the other three may have been Rebecca. Yet, as has been stated already and as Elizabeth Bond’s will clearly indicates, much evidence exists proving that Elizabeth and Rebecca were sisters and both daughters of John Bond. It is safe to conclude that Rebecca must have been born after John Bond wrote his will in 1760. We believe that John Bond’s wife Elizabeth Attaway was still in her teens when the two were married about 1732. She probably would still have been capable of bearing a child twenty-eight years later.

In John Bond’s will are mentioned the same tracts of land that later were in the possession of Elizabeth Bond (his daughter):

“I give and bequeath unto my beloved wife Elizabeth, during the rest of her natural life, all that plantation whereon I now live called Mosley’s, together with that additional part known by the name of Attaway’s Purchase, and at the death of my wife to go to my son John Bond and his heirs forever.”

John Bond’s oldest son John, who inherited his father’s plantation after his mother died, did not marry. At the time of the death of our ancestor Justinian Jordan in 1789, John Bond was appointed guardian for the six children of Justinian and Justinian’s wife Rebecca Bond, who had died very nearly the same time. Records of the Orphans Court state that he was uncle of the six children, brother of their mother. John appears to have served in the role of guardian from that time until his death in 1802. Shortly after his death his sister Elizabeth Bond petitioned the St. Mary’s County Land Commission to determine the exact boundaries of the land which John Bond, who died intestate, had owned. In this petition it is noted that “John Bond, late of St. Mary’s County, deceased, died intestate, possessed in fee of the three following tracts or parcels of land lying and being within said county - to wit, Mosley’s, Attaway’s Purchase and Bond’s Purchase, and that the legal representatives of the said John Bond are Elizabeth Bond, sister of the said John, Ann Wilson Alston, Elizabeth Mills Jordan, Mary Napler Jordan, Townshend Jordan and Rebecca Attaway Jordan, children of Rebecca Jordan, deceased sister of the said John.” The commission granted the petition; the land in question was measured accurately and was equally divided between Elizabeth Bond and the five living children of Rebecca Bond Jordan and her husband Justinian. The land had been surveyed November 9, 1805, and the Land Commission awarded 135 acres to Elizabeth Bond and 136 acres to the five heirs of Rebecca Bond Jordan.

As further proof of identification of the children of Rebecca Bond and Justinian Jordan there is on record in the County Courthouse the statement of the payments and disbursements in the estate of Justinian Townshend Jordan (September 30, 1817) and the balance due at that time to his heirs. Distribution of this balance was made as follows: to Ann W. Allstan - $210.61; to Elizabeth M. Neale - $210.61; to Mary N. Wheat - $210.61; and to Rebecca A. Bull - $210.61.

It should be noted that sometime before 1817 the only son, Justinian Townshend, must have died, and the other daughter, Harriet, apparently died before 1805. There is evidence to believe that all of the six children of Justinian and Rebecca Bond Jordan must have been born during the 1780s and that our ancestor, Rebecca Attaway Jordan, the youngest child, must not have been more than one year old when both parents died within months of each other. How very strange that this tragic family situation was to be repeated thirty-six years later. No wonder that Elizabeth Bond, through her will, did all she could to provide for her beloved grandnieces, the grand-daughters of her youngest sister, Rebecca Bond Jordan.

As indicated earlier, the father of Rebecca and Elizabeth and John Bond was Captain John Bond, who married Elizabeth Attaway shortly before the fall of 1732 and who died in the first or second month of 1760. From 1736 until 1758 Captain Bond served repeatedly as one of the St. Mary’s County justices. He had been named executor of the estate of his young wife’s father, John Attaway, who died in November 1732, having bequeathed to “my daughter Elizabeth Bond my dwelling plantation Mosley, with an addition called Attaway’s Purchase, also one slave named Bess, two feather beds and matching furniture and one fourth of the rest of my personal belongings.” In his will John Attaway appointed his son-in-law John Bond “executor of my estate and guardian and tutor of my three youngest daughters, Judith, Mary and Sarah Attaway, and to have the managing of their estates till they come of age.”

Biography

Name: Harriet Harden née Bull. ^{[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]} Born 8 DEC 1820. St. Mary's, MD. ^{[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]} Died Age: 72. 24 MAY 1893. Oakville, St. Mary's, MD. ^[1] Buried 1893 All Faith Episcopal Church Cemetery, Huntersville, St. Mary's, MD. ^[1] Race ^{[2] [4] [6]} Residence Age: 29. 1850 District 3, St Mary's, MD. ^[3] 1850 District 3, St Mary's, MD. ^[1] Age: 58; Marital status: Married; Relation to Head of House: Wife. 1880 Hillville, St Marys, Maryland, USA. ^{[2] [1]} Age: 50; CannotRead: Y; CannotWrite: Y; Occupation: Keeping House. 1870 District 6, Oakvile, St Marys, Maryland, USA. ^[4] Age: 39; Occupation: W. 1860 District 6, Oakville, St Marys, Maryland, USA. ^[5] Age: 50; CannotRead: Y; CannotWrite: Y; Occupation: Keeping House. 1870 District 6, Oakvile, St Marys, Maryland, USA. ^[6] Photo: (M1507). File .

External Files

• File M1507 File: C:\Users\David\Documents\Family Tree Maker\Cousins and Allies Media\Harriet Bull Reeder.jpeg Format: jpg. Harriet Bull Reeder. 11122018 10:43:57 AM.
• External File: M1507 File: C:\Users\David\Documents\Family Tree Maker\Cousins and Allies Media\Harriet Bull Reeder.jpeg Format: jpg Harriet Bull Reeder 11/12/2018 10:43:57 AM
• File M607 File: C:\Users\David\Documents\Family Tree Maker\Cousins and Allies Media80 United States Federal Census - William Oliver Reeder.jpg Format: jpg. 1880 United States Federal Census - William Oliver Reeder. 6142017 10:58:21 AM. Year: 1880; Census Place: Hillville, St Marys, Maryland; Roll: 515; Family History Film: 1254515; Page: 139A; Enumeration District: 141.
• File M608 File: C:\Users\David\Documents\Family Tree Maker\Cousins and Allies Media50 United States Federal Census - Harriet Bull.jpg Format: jpg. 1850 United States Federal Census - Harriet Bull. 6142017 10:59:52 AM. Year: 1850; Census Place: District 3, St Mary's, Maryland; Roll: M432_296; Page: 261A; Image: 280.
• File M644 File: C:\Users\David\Documents\Family Tree Maker\Cousins and Allies Media70 United States Federal Census - William George Reeder.jpg Format: jpg. 1870 United States Federal Census - William George Reeder. 6292017 1:04:54 PM. Year: 1870; Census Place: District 6, St Marys, Maryland; Roll: M593_594; Page: 672A; Image: 52141; Family History Library Film: 552093.
• File M694 File: C:\Users\David\Documents\Family Tree Maker\Cousins and Allies Media60 United States Federal Census - William Oliver Reeder.jpg Format: jpg. 1860 United States Federal Census - William Oliver Reeder. 752017 9:00:48 PM. Year: 1860; Census Place: District 6, St Marys, Maryland; Roll: M653_479; Page: 195; Family History Library Film: 803479.
• File M838 File: C:\Users\David\Documents\Family Tree Maker\Cousins and Allies Media70 United States Federal Census - Harry O Reeder.jpg Format: jpg. 1870 United States Federal Census - Harry O Reeder. 8112018 5:48:39 PM. Year: 1870; Census Place: District 6, St Marys, Maryland; Roll: M593_594; Page: 672B; Family History Library Film: 552093.

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5} Source: S62 Database online. Record for Thomas Attaway Reeder Link: http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=pubmembertrees&h=1096780043&indiv=try
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3} Source: S66 Year: 1880; Census Place: Hillville, St Marys, Maryland; Roll: 515; Family History Film: 1254515; Page: 139A; Enumeration District: 141 Record for William O. Reeder File Link: http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=1880usfedcen&h=35687769&indiv=try
3. ↑ ^{3.0 3.1 3.2} Source: S185 Year: 1850; Census Place: District 3, St Mary's, Maryland; Roll: M432_296; Page: 261A; Image: 280 Record for Harriet Reeder File Link: http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=1850usfedcenancestry&h=17882075&indiv=try
4. ↑ ^{4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3} Source: S33 Year: 1870; Census Place: District 6, St Marys, Maryland; Roll: M593_594; Page: 672B; Family History Library Film: 552093 Record for Henry O Reder File Link: http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=7163&h=23646093&indiv=try
5. ↑ ^{5.0 5.1 5.2} Source: S175 Year: 1860; Census Place: District 6, St Marys, Maryland; Roll: M653_479; Page: 195; Family History Library Film: 803479 Record for Harriet Reeder File Link: http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=7667&h=54025445&indiv=try
6. ↑ ^{6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3} Source: S33 Year: 1870; Census Place: District 6, St Marys, Maryland; Roll: M593_594; Page: 672A; Family History Library Film: 552093 Record for Harriot Reder File Link: http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=7163&h=23646735&indiv=try

• Source: S175 Ancestry.com 1860 United States Federal Census Publication: Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2009; NOTE1860 U.S. census, population schedule. NARA microfilm publication M653, 1,438 rolls. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.
• Source: S185 Ancestry.com 1850 United States Federal Census Publication: Name: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2009; NOTESeventh Census of the United States, 1850; (National Archives Microfilm Publication M432, 1009 rolls); Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29; National Archives, Washington, D.C.
• Source: S33 Ancestry.com 1870 United States Federal Census Publication: Name: The Generations Network, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2003; NOTE1870
• Source: S62 Ancestry.com Public Member Trees Publication: Name: The Generations Network, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2006;
• Source: S66 Ancestry.com and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints 1880 United States Federal Census Publication: Name: Ancestry.com Operations Inc; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2005; NOTETenth Census of the United States, 1880. (NARA microfilm publication T9, 1,454 rolls). Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29. National Archives, Washington, D.C.