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Individual Record for: Abigail MILLET (female)

Notes:

(Revised 28 Feb 2005 by S. Ells.) NOTES: --- aka MILLIT, MILLER and MILLETT. William [II]'s marriage record is somewhat confused and has been explained variously. But additional records have been found. I do find four (!) VRs confirming that William [II], was married by Rev Alfred Johnson in Freeport on 16-20 April 1791 to Abigail MILLIT (or MILIT or Miller? or Millett??). He was then at least 22y 4m old. At the time, both were declared to be residing in Freeport. This marriage is well- documented by separate VRs of both the intention and the marriage, and by an undated but c.1791 Cumberland County record of the marriage [J.H. Kelley, ed., Marr. Returns Cumberland Co. Prior to 1892, p74]. There was also a town clerk's parentage record of nine of William's children allegedly by this wife. Their first child followed the marriage briskly, on 6 Oct 1791. These nine children had birthdates from 1791 to 1814, the birth of the last known child Isaac [Freeport VR Bk A, p 17, 112, & 261]. (The list omitted one and probably three intermediate daughters, who were born 1799, 1807-8, and 1813.)
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After a hundred years of doubt as to the identity of William's wife Abigail Millit, it now seems probable that K. Marsh of Fairfield, Me. has spotted her. Though no paper record definitely connects her to her parents, she probably is Abigail "Nabby" Millet, baptised at Fourth Parish in Gloucester (Essex Co.) MA on Oct. 25, 1772, daughter of John and Susanah (Emons) Millet of Gloucester. [VRs of Gloucester v1 p472; George Francis Millett, A & D of Thomas Millett of Chertsey, Surreyshire, Eng. to Dorcester Mass. and his wife Mary Greenoway, p58 (publ. 1959, at NEHGS); and Dr. Asa Millet, "Millet Family Genealogy," p161 (c. 1900, at NEHGS Mss A 4741). Her line is John5, Abraham4, Andrew3, Nathaniel2, and Thomas1, who immigrated to Dorchester MA in 1635 (where he may have met 1633 immigrants John and Mary (?) Eells, the first of the Eells line in America). Paul C. Reed & L. Mahler, "The Correct English Origin of Thomas1 Millett of Dorchester, Massachusetts," American Genealogist, 75:2 p93 (April 2000); & see Evelyn Beran's site at <http://wc.rootsweb.com/cgi-bin/ igm.cgi?op=GET&db=sanford-shulsen&id=I10152>. The family settled in Gloucester in the mid-1600s at Kettle Cove. The reason Abigail has been so difficult to identify is that, like Becca Eells, this young, unmarried girl probably left her parents and removed to Freeport to join her elder sister and start a new life. So to explain her presence in Maine, we must track some related Gloucester families as they migrated from Gloucester to the Royalsborough Road (to become the Durham Road) in North Yarmouth (soon to be Freeport) ME. (This was not the first removal from Gloucester-in the 1740s, Gloucester families settled New Gloucester ME, and a Millet from Gloucester MA cut the road from North Yarmouth to the new meeting house.) The following are five family migrations in the 1770s and 1780s to Freeport from Gloucester and Hanover that form the context within which Abigail probably came to Maine.
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First, in 1779, Joseph EDES (1747-1807) of Gloucester is said to have removed from Gloucester to Durham Road in Freeport (then part of North Yarmouth). He probably married in Gloucester Susanah Davis [Gloucester VR v2 p192; and see Burr Cem. records]. They may have had children, for the 1790 Freeport census shows 1 M 16 & older, 2 M under 16, and 2 Fs.
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Second, in 1783, the EELLS family arrived on Durham Road when Jacob WHITE of Abington purchased 100 acres very close to the farm of Joseph Edes. Five years earlier, Jacob had married Hannah Witherell EELLS of Hanover, who was William [II]'s sister. Jacob and Hannah's second child was born in Freeport in 1787. By 1790, the US census for Freeport lists their big household of 2 Ms (16+); 3 Ms under 16; and 4 Fs. One of these males may be William Eells [II], who was about to buy land nearby.
Third, by 1787, another EELLS sibling, Lydia, was living in the vicinity (to help her sister Hannah with her July baby?). Lydia, being of "North Yarmouth" (Freeport had not split away), then married in December widower David Hayes and settled a few miles away in that portion of the town that remained North Yarmouth. (We also know that a few months later Rebecca Eells Hunter wrote that appealing letter to young 'Becca Eells (Hannah, Lydia & William [II] Eells' younger sister) in Hanover; the letter urged 'Becca to remove to Freeport and join [and help?] her sisters. William was apparently still in Hanover as of the date of that letter, so perhaps they were to come to Freeport together.)
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Fourth, by 1788 Gideon Day EDES and Susanah (MILLET) Edes, who had been married in Gloucester in 1786 (then apparently resident there), had their first child Sukey-Susanah in Freeport & had settled on the Durham Road. Gideon's brother Joseph [above] had been in Freeport since 1779, and the 1790 Freeport census shows the two brother Edes and their families were living immediately next to each other. Living very close by were Jacob and Hannah (Eells) White. Gideon and Susannah's 1790 census notation shows 1 M 16 & older, 2 M under 16, and 2 Fs. Susanah was Abigail's sister, and they may have also been related by blood to Joseph's wife through the Davises. (Also, Thomas & Hannah [Prince] Millett also lived down the road closer to the village with children who were born after 1787; Thomas was distantly related to Abigail and Susanah Millet (probably 3C1R) and also had been born in Gloucester, so there would have been these additional family connections between Freeport and the Millets of Gloucester.)
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Fifth, in December, 1790, Wm Witherell EELLS [II] bought land in Freeport in the immediate neighborhood of Jacob White family and the Edes families. I speculate that he had used his sister Hannah (Eells) White's house while he scouted out land and earned money, and that Abigail had been staying with her sister Susannah (Millet) Edes. Only three and a half months after the purchase, Wm Eells [II] (at least 22y 4m 12d) & Abigail MILLET (at least 18y 5m 24d) were married, both said then to be of Freeport. Five months and twenty-one days later their first child William [III] was born in Freeport.
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Thus, in the 1780s, I believe that the migration of two male EDES siblings and two female MILLET siblings from Gloucester overlapped the migration of four EELLS siblings from Hanover to the same neighborhood on Durham Road. This, I think, is the explanation of how Abigail Millet came to Freeport, how she met William Eells, and why there is no record in Freeport of her birth or parents. The result of these migrations and the propinquity? Marriages and babies all around.
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It is also persuasive to compare the names of Abigail's children to her family names. She remarkably succeeded in naming her children for herself, for each of her parents, and for five of her seven siblings.
1. William after her brother and husband, etc.
2. Nabby after herself and her grandmother Davis and her aunt Millet
3. Sarah P. (after her mother in law)
4. Lydia (after her husband's sister)
5. Hannah W (probable) (after her husband's sister and grandmother)
6. Mary (or Polly) (after her sister and aunt, etc.)
7. Priscilla (after her husband's sister)
8. Susanah after her mother and her sister (who married Gideon Day Edes)
9. Elmira, b. 1807 No good answer where this name came from. (Cf. Elmira Nichols White, b. 1792, wife of Thos, who was son of Hannah & Jacob White; also cf. Elmira, dau of Gideon Edes, Jr., b. 1823).
10. John (after her father)
11. Priscilla II (see #7 above)
12. Isaac Skillins, after her brother and her uncle Isaac Millet, and her husband's sister Lydia's husband Isaac Skillins.
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There was enough time for her to bear all these children. There were about 23 years between the first and last of Wm_II's up to twelve children. She would have been at least 18y 11m at her first child and at least 41y 7m at the last child Isaac's birth. (Cf., in Freeport a Mary Field Jordan had eighteen children between 1825 & 1853, including 2 sets of twins and one of triplets, over a 28-year span.) I don't believe there is any biological reason that this Abigail could not have had up to 12 children over this age span, though she deserved a medal.
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So, but for the omission of Elmira (and probably Hannah and Priscilla II) from the list of children, everything seemed to be in order in the record of William's married life to Abigail Millet.
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But there are two problems, for the 1895 death record of daughter Elmira (not the last child) states that her mother was "Abigail BARTOL," born on "Cape Ann" (prob. Mass.) [Freeport VR Deaths 1892- 1947 p4 & Portland VR deaths v8 p240; and Me. State Archives d/c]. Who was Abigail Bartol? I have no idea. Though the EellsFH p99 surprisingly agrees that she was William [II]'s first wife and says that she was either the daughter or granddaughter of George Bartol of Freeport, there is no record of an appropriate Abigail Bartol on Cape Ann or in North-Yarmouth-Freeport, including in the Bartol Family Papers at Freeport Historical Society. (The last is puzzling, because these papers were prepared and donated by a branch of the Bartol family who were descendants of both William Eells [I] and George Bartol, and therefore would presumably have known about any such Abigail Bartol married to William Eells [II].)
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Did William marry two Abigails? Or is this reference to a Bartol an aberrant death record of one of Abigail's children, frail evidence (perhaps from an institution is Portland) written more than hundred years after the fact? (Note also that this is the only document that gives William's place of birth as Gloucester though Hanover is more likely.) Does the record actually refer to Abigail Millet, who was born in Gloucester, which is on Cape Ann? One might dismiss this record as only an apparent conflict but for a second problem-there is a gravestone that also suggests that there were two wives named Abigail. The stone next to "Wm W Eells" [II]'s stone in the Eells lot in the Burr Cemetery says "Abigail, wife of William W. Eels, Died Sept 28, 1831 AE. 49." (This date of death is the same as is given in an old Freeport VR Bk A p341 for "Abigail, wife of William W. Ells," though no age at death is given in that VR.) Calculating from the age at death on the stone, her birth date would have been between 29 Sep 1781 and 28 Sep 1782. This is obviously much too young to have been the woman who gave birth to William [II]'s well- documented early children in 1791, 1792, 1795, and 1796. [See legible photos of the now-missing or now-almost-illegible gravestones for William [II] and Abigail.] Thus, the stone is ten to eleven years in apparent error. Would her family have permitted Abigail Millet's gravestone, so much in error, to stand uncorrected in the front rank of the burying ground? But if the stone were for a second wife also named Abigail, would not the inscription have so indicated? Was the stone erected later, after memories had faded? (Cf., Susanah Edes' stone (dau of Gideon Day Edes) in the Burr Cemetery, which appears to be eight years in error.)
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It is a puzzle, for there is no suggestion in town records of an earlier death of a first wife; there is no grave for a first wife; and no paper record (other than in Elmira's much-later death record) of William's marriage to a 2d wife. What of other clues?
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(1.) What of the last child of William [II], who was my ancestor Isaac Skillins Ells? Who does his death record say his mother was? Frustratingly, Isaac's death record just says his mother was "Abigail," with no place of birth [Freeport VR Book C p31]. No help. His 1880 census record does say his mother had been born in Massachusetts, but this could refer to either Abigail.
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(2.) Though I had been aware that Belle and Bert Gee (William [II]'s & Abigail's great-grandchildren) had told my parents in the 1930s that they believed that William [II] had married a Bartol (unspecified whether as first or second wife), until I found Elmira's death certificate I had seen no record, however fragile, to support their opinion.
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(3.) Conflict with the Eells Family History. The EellsFH p99 concluded that William had two wives, named Abigail Millett and Abigail Bartol, but it reversed the order of marriage. It said that Abigail Bartol was William [II]'s first wife, whom he married in 1782. I find this date unpersuasive because William [II] would then have been only about fourteen years old. I also find no record to support the EellsFH's statement [p99, 155] that William [II]'s first daughter Abigail's (b. 1792) middle name was Bartol, which would have lent credence to an early Bartol marriage. And I also find no support for, and four vital records against, the EellsFH's p99 assertions that Abigail Millett was his second wife, who they said was born in 1782 (in order to make her dates consistent with the gravestone) and whom he was supposed to have married in 1805 (without record support, as far as I know, and contra to four VRs). The EellsFH, which gave no sources, chose a break in the regular sequence of children, which occurred between 1803 and 1806, as being the transition between the two wives; this is unsupported and contrary to the parentage VR.
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(4.) It would have been physically possible though unlikely for this gravestone-Abigail to have been the sunset wife of father Sgt. William Eells [I], who would have been seventy in 1801 when she became twenty, but the wording and placement of the companion gravestones of William [II] and Abigail seem to rule that out. Sgt. Wm is not known to have remarried.
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(5.) Do census ages tell us anything? Though risky to use (for the people are not identified), in this case these is an interesting pattern. A senior female, whose age is consistent with Abigail Millet's, is present in four censuses from 1800 through 1830. The birth "window" derived from the four census ranges was 1765 to (1770-1775), which includes Abigail Millet's DOB. Now it is true that in one census the age range was broad enough to permit another explanation, and in another census there was another female that could be argued to be a younger wife, but in each of those cases there was a strong counter-argument. And in two of the censuses (1800 and 1830) there is no argument possible. So the simplest, most direct explanation is that the same wife aged with William through 1830.
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What can be done in these circumstances? I have chosen to believe the four official records that support a first marriage to Abigail Millet, despite the opposite conclusion presented in the EellsFH. I retain, however, the EellsFH's birth order of the known children, which is also supported by VRs, to which I add the best available information about birthdates of two recently-discovered probable daughters, Hannah W. and Priscilla [II].
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Was there a second wife and, if so, which wife gave birth to which of the children? I believe that Abigail Millet gave birth to all of William's children and died after 1830 (census), for the following reasons: the discovery of the identify and age of Abigail Millet; the presence of a VR naming her the mother of almost all the children (including two, John and Isaac, who born after Elmira); the similarity of the names of her children to Millet family names (including the last two in the parentage record, John and Isaac); and the consistent pattern of census dates. She probably died on 24 Oct 1831 (per Freeport VR Bk A, p341), for these is no record of another wife. This does not explain Elmira's d/c, other than to say it was in error or referred to a possible adopted child. And it does not explain the inappropriate age at death on the gravestone, other than to say that the stone was in error or, less likely, that the stone referred to a second wife that William married in late 1830 or 1831. Awkward as these explanations are, they are less speculative and less in conflict with the data than, for example, the EellsFH, which created Abigail Bartol as a first wife and allocated the children between first and second wife, all in direct conflict with many VRs. Full resolution of this puzzle will have to await more data.
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The only thing we know for sure about "Abigail" in her post-childbirth years (whoever she was) is that, in a 1820 deed, she released her dower rights as follows: "Abigail Eells wife of said Wm W Eells HER MARK." William's wife Abigail in 1820 could not (or was too ill to) write her name.
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The list of William's children below presents Abigail Millet as the documented first wife and the probable mother of all children, with Abigail Bartol as a speculative second wife. William [II] had the following children probably by his wife Abigail MILLET (The numbers refer to my book):
18 i. William [III] 7G Ells-Ellis-Elles (1791-1869),.
19 ii. Abigail "Nabby" Ells (1792-), .
20 iii. Sarah P. (Sally) Ells (also Eells) (1795-1867), .
21 iv. Lydia Ells (1796-1850), .
21A v. Hannah W. Ells (probable) (1799-1831),
22 vi. Mary (or Polly) Ells (1800-1867).
23 vii. Priscilla Ells (1803-1804?) .
24 viii. Susanah-Susanna Ells (1806-aft 1830?).
25 ix. John Ells (1807-aft 1830)
26 x. Elmira (Almira or Mira) N. Ells (1808-1895).
26A xi. Priscilla Ells (probable) (1813-1834)
27 xii. Isaac Skillins Ells (MY LINE) (1814-1891),.
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