Joseph Spencer Jr. (1739 - abt. 1827)

Born 11 May 1739 in East Haddam, Middlesex County, Connecticut

Ancestors

Husband of Mary (Jerome) Spencer — married 12 Oct 1758 in Farmington, Hartford County, Connecticut

Descendants

Died about 1827 at about age 87 in Onondaga, Onondaga County, New York, United States

Problems/Questions Profile managers: Michael Spencer [send private message], Frank Vouri [send private message], Casey Clark [send private message], and Valerie Vouri [send private message]

Biography

Joseph's lifetime covers a period that not only saw these Spencers move from East Haddam, Connecticut, and finally settle in central New York State and eastern Pennsylvania, but also included the tumult of the American Revolution, in which two of his sons served as soldiers in the nascent army of the United States.

The question of Joseph Spencer's parentage was a longstanding problem among Spencer genealogists. The central document pertaining to this difficulty is a deed of Farmington, Hartford County, Connecticut, which identifies our Joseph as "Joseph Spencer ye Second of East Haddam" and says he purchased part of a lot from Thomas Stanley of Farmington, who a few months later deeded the rest of this same lot to JOEL SPENCER of East Haddam, son of James Spencer of East Haddam, whose father was William Spencer, son of Ensign Gerard Spencer. Since Joseph was a Spencer from East Haddam, was described as "ye Second" (thereby distinguishing him from another Joseph Spencer of East Haddam, most likely, though not necessarily, his father), and owned one part of a lot in Farmington the other part of which soon after was purchased by Joel Spencer of the East Haddam Spencers, the obvious conclusion would seem to be that our ancestor Joseph was the Joseph Spencer who was born in East Haddam on 11 May 1739, son of Joseph and Rachel (Hungerford) Spencer. Such an identification is a very good chronological fit, and is supported by the fact that two of Joseph and Rachel's daughters married in Farmington and resided there. Thus, Joel Spencer, our Joseph's next-door neighbor in Farmington, would have been first cousin of our Joseph's father.

Nevertheless, writing in The American Genealogist 29:174-191 (July 1953), leading Spencer genealogist Flora S. Clark concluded that Joseph and Rachel's son Joseph "apparently died unmarried before Dec. 24 1764. He was too young to be the 'Joseph Spencer ye Second of E. Haddam' who bought land in Farmington in 1753 and settled there." This would be a fatal objection to the identification of our Joseph as Joseph, son of Joseph and Rachel of East Haddam, for Joseph and Rachel's son Joseph was only 14 in 1753, too young to be able to purchase and own real estate. There the question of our Joseph Spencer's parentage rested for many years, with our Joseph seemingly appearing out of nowhere and, amazingly, with no known genealogical connection to the Spencers of East Haddam and Farmington with whom he certainly had dealings. Yet it seems incredible that our Joseph would not come from the same family as his next-door neighbor Joel, since both men were Spencers of East Haddam who moved to the same lot in Farmington within a few months of each other. (In addition, a 23andMe DNA test of Joseph's male-line descendant Roy Eldon Spencer in 2017 showed that his patrilineage is indeed that of the Four Spencer Brothers, so the genetic test confirms that Joseph's male ancestry certainly traces back to one of the Four Spencer Brothers.)

In 1995, Spencer genealogists Jack T. and Edith Spencer took a new look at the question, systematically examining every recorded Joseph Spencer of that time and geographical area, and thus they excluded every other recorded Joseph Spencer as possible candidates for our ancestor Joseph. They concluded that "Joseph Spencer ye Second" of Haddam and Farmington had to be the same as Joseph and Rachel's son. According to Jack and Edith Spencer, James Shepard of New Britain had erroneously transcribed the dates of the old Connecticut land records that had led Clark to reject the identity of our Joseph with Joseph and Rachel's son. Our Joseph's land purchase in Farmington and a related transaction took place in 1758 and 1759, not 1753 and 1754 -- "In old records, it is very easy to mistake an eight for a three," Jack and Edith Spencer wrote on 16 Sept. 1995 in a letter to Patricia Bray of Eugene, Oregon. Similarly, in old records, the numbers "4" and "9" can also be easily mistaken for each other. Joseph and Rachel's son Joseph attained his majority in 1758, turning 19 years of age, old enough to acquire land and to marry, both of which he apparently did that year.

On 12 Oct. 1758 in Farmington, Joseph married MARY JEROME, born circa 1739 in Farmington, died between 1824 and 1830 in Onondaga, New York, daughter of Zerubbabel and Phebe (Cook) Jerome. Mary joined the Congregational Church of Bristol, Connecticut, on 10 Aug. 1760. Joseph and Mary had four sons and two daughters, all born in Farmington or possibly Burlington, Connecticut.

The same year as his marriage, our ancestor Joseph Spencer made his first land purchase, as discussed above. The deed was abstracted by James Shepard of New Britain in Connecticut Land Records (vol. 10, page 215) as follows:

Thomas Stanley of Farmington deeds to Joseph Spencer, 2nd. of East Haddam, "One piece of land situate in the bounds of Farmington & in the 5th. division of land lying west of the reserved land, containing 50 acres, it being part of the 56th. lot in number in said division which lot was drawn for and laid out on the right of Wm. Judd, formerly of said Farmington, deceased, and said grantee's land is to lie in equal breadth on the south side as to make it precisely 50 acres, and is bound and butted east and west with highways, north by my own land, part of the same lot, and south by lot of Joseph Wadsworth." Deed dated June 1, 1753 [1758] and recorded same day.

As mentioned above, on 6 Nov. 1758 (transcribed by Shepard as "1753") Thomas Stanley deeded the other part of this same lot to Joseph's cousin Joel Spencer of East Haddam. According to Flora Clark, this lot was in what is now the South Chippen Hill district of Bristol, Connecticut, "and is north of the present school house of the west side of the highway." The following year, on 3 Dec. 1759 (transcribed by Shepard as "1754"), Joseph and Joel exchanged deeds with the town of Farmington for highway purposes -- in those deeds they are both styled "of Farmington."

The town records of Wallingford, Connecticut, show that on 27 May 1760 "Joseph Spencer of Farmington" deeded 10 acres in New Cheshire, with house, barn, and joiner shop, to Amos Doolittle of Farmington. Farmington town records show that on 16 May 1765, Joseph Spencer sold to Samuel Adams of Wallingford "The farm where I now dwell and which I lately bought of John Dudley, [which] contains 72 acres," with the dwelling house and barn. The following year, on 20 July 1766, Jonathan Pan sold Joseph Spencer of Farmington 56 acres with the dwelling house, on land now located in the southwest part of Burlington, Connecticut. It was apparently at this time that Joseph and his family moved to Burlington.

In the Bristol Town Records, vol. 1, page 100, is a deed dated 22 Aug. 1785 conveying land in West Britain, Connecticut, from ELAM SPENCER to his "honored father" Joseph Spencer. (Bristol was "set off" from Farmington in 1785, and until 1806 it included West Britain, now called Burlington.) Four years later, on 18 Nov. 1789, Chauncy Gaylord deeded land in Bristol's fifth division to Joseph Spencer and his son MILES SPENCER. (The first husband of Joseph's eldest daughter MAMRE SPENCER was William Gaylord, presumably a kinsman of Chauncy Gaylord.) Also in the Bristol Town Records, vol. 6, page 203, is a deed showing that on 26 April 1798 Joseph Spencer of Bristol conveyed "In consideration of the love and good will that I have and do bear unto my youngest son Joseph Spencer 1/2 of 80 acres" in West Britain along with two other parcels of land. On 24 March 1802, Joseph deeded the other half of the 80 acres to his son Joseph. Also on 24 March 1802, according to the Bristol Town Records, vol. 7, page 142, was the following deed by which the younger Joseph provided a dwelling for his parents:

"Joseph Spencer, Jr. of Bristol to my honored father Joseph Spencer of said Bristol 1/4 part of all the lands I own in the said town of Bristol . . . To have and to hold the above demised premises for and during the full term of the natural life of him, the said Joseph Spencer, and the full term of the natural life of my honored mother, Mary Spencer, to use simply and to improve and to know the full profits and benefits, and further at the decease of them, the said Joseph and Mary Spencer, the heirs of them shall up surrender the premises unto him, the said Joseph Spencer, Jr. without unreasonable waste or destruction."

Joseph and his son Joseph Jr. are both listed in Burlington town records as voters at the time that the town was organized in 1806. That same year, Joseph and his son Joseph moved to Harwinton, Connecticut, where they remained until 1824. However, neither father nor son were enumerated in the 1810 U.S. Census, nor was the father listed in the 1820 U.S. Census, though he and his son were known to have been living together in Harwinton from 1806 to 1824. On 17 June 1806, Joseph Spencer Jr. sold his 70-acre farm and dwelling house in Burlington to Thomas Brooks -- of this deed, Flora Clark notes, "This was the land that Joseph and his wife Mary had a life lease of and there seemed to be no release thereof." Later that year, on 24 Dec. 1806, Harwinton town records show that "Joseph Spencer, Jr. of Burlington" purchased 95 acres with buildings in the southeast part of Harwinton from Benjamin and Hannah Elton -- this land (later known as the Beebe Alfred place) was a little under two miles from the younger Joseph's former home in Burlington. Afterwards, Joseph Jr. and his brother DANIEL SPENCER sold lots in Harwinton to John Smith, and in 1810 Joseph Jr. deeded part of the Beebe Alfred place to his brother-in-law Anson Johnson, husband of Joseph's sister POLLY SPENCER.

During this same period, on 2 Jan. 1809, "Joseph Spencer of Harwinton" sold 20 acres of land in Burlington to his son "Joseph Spencer, Jr. of Harwinton." This appears to be the last time that the elder Joseph Spencer appears on record, though he is known to have lived for at least another 14 or 15 years. As mentioned above, the elder Joseph Spencer is not listed in the 1810 and 1820 U.S. Census for Harwinton, even though he is known to have been living there in those years. The 1820 U.S. Census lists Joseph Jr. as the head of a household including one male aged 26-45 (himself), one female aged 26-45 (his wife Clarissa), one male aged 16-26 (probably a hired hand), two females aged 10-16, and two females under age 10 (Joseph and Clarissa's four daughters). Again, Joseph Jr.'s parents are known to have been living with him in 1820, yet were not enumerated as members of his household. Of the elder Joseph's absence from records during these years, Flora Clark in Unplaced and Shoemaker Spencers, page 41, says:

"Two deeds dated Jan. 6, 1817 of land in Burlington were given by Joseph Spencer Jr., but all deeds after that date on both the Burlington and Harwinton records having the name of Joseph Spencer do not describe him as Jr. Joseph Sr. was still living with his son Joseph in Harwinton but was probably so infirm as not to attend to any business, hence the son rather prematurely dropped the title Jr. The last deed on Burlington records with the name Joseph is dated Oct. 3, 1824 and is to Philip Gaylord, another brother-in-law. Gaylord's wife was a Johnson and a sister of the wife of Joseph Jr. The last Joseph Spencer deed on the Harwinton town record is Joseph Spencer to Philip Gaylord, 70 acres, his Harwinton homestead, dated Oct. 5, 1824. On the same day said Gaylord deeds the land to Beebe Alfred."

With the 1824 sale of the Spencer homestead in Harwinton, the family undertook the trek from Connecticut -- where our Spencers had lived since 1661 -- out to Onondaga County in central New York, where members of this family afterwards appear on record (although Joseph Jr.'s older brothers Daniel and Elam had previously settled in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania). Clark includes the following discussion of what is known of the end of the lives of Joseph Spencer Sr. and his wife Mary on page 41 of Unplaced and Shoemaker Spencers, as follows:

"When the Burlington land records were found to disclose the fact that the Spencers moved to Harwinton in 1806 and that Joseph the younger signed his name junior in 1817 and without the junior in 1820 it was thought that the elder Joseph died in Harwinton. In searching for the death record, Mr. Wilson, Harwinton's antiquarian, since deceased, reported that Joseph Spencer, Sr. certainly did not die in that town. This is confirmed by the testimony of Street C. Welton who was born Sept. 8, 1816 and now resides in St. Petersburg, Fla. who says he was at the Beebe Alfred place when the Spencers were loading their goods for removal in 1824 and that Uncle Joseph and Aunt Mary went with the rest. The Weltons were grandchildren of Mrs. Mary Jerome Spencer's sister, Ruth Jerome Graves."

Joseph Sr. does not appear in the 1830 U.S. Census, but his grandson Miles Spencer Jr., his son Joseph, and his son-in-law Anson Johnson are listed on the same page of the 1830 U.S. Census for Onondaga, Onondaga County, New York. However, neither Joseph Sr. nor his wife Mary are enumerated in the households of Miles, Joseph, or Anson, and given the fact that Joseph Sr. and Mary would have been about 91 years old that year, most likely they had died in Onondaga County after 5 Oct. 1824 and before 1 June 1830, the formal date of the federal census.

The children of Joseph and Mary Spencer were:

-- MAMRE SPENCER, born 29 Oct. 1759, married twice.

-- DANIEL SPENCER, born 1 April 1761.

-- ELAM SPENCER, born 7 July 1764, married Hannah Deming.

-- MILES SPENCER, born circa 1768, married twice.

-- JOSEPH D. SPENCER JR., born circa 1778, married Clarissa Johnson.

-- POLLY SPENCER, born 23 Jan. 1783, died 28 Nov. 1832, married Anson Johnson.

Sources

• The Spencer Genealogy: Part Two, by Jared L. Olar -- documented and sourced genealogical account of the paternal ancestry of Christina Carlene (Spencer) Olar -- http://freepages.rootsweb.com/~fesschequy/genealogy/Spencer2.html

• DAR Lineage Book. P. 193. https://books.google.com/books?id=i79RrLgIkRsC&pg=PA193&lpg=PA193&dq=george+seymore+spencer+ny&source=bl&ots=apJAbWy6Kv&sig=NDExoJJaVi3ca9Wlp4r2G-7zW8M&hl=en&sa=X&ei=aLM-VcvzBsSZsAXRxYGoDQ&ved=0CDIQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=george%20seymore%20spencer%20ny&f=false

Acknowledgements

Thank you to Michael Spencer for creating WikiTree profile Spencer-5438 through the import of William Spencer_2013-10-04.ged on Oct 4, 2013.