A Case for the Parentage of Ruth Foster Sharp Dunham (part 2)
In an effort to break through another brick wall and fill out some empty branches on the tree, I am attempting to determine the birth family of Ruth Foster who married Benjamin Sharp in Pomfret, Windham, Connecticut in 1771. Ruth is named in the records for her 2 marriages and in the probate records for her first husband but her parents are never named. In part 1 of the search for the parents of Ruth Foster, I looked for connections to Benjamin Sharp’s family and then expanded the search to Foster families living in communities near Pomfret and looked for Ruth Foster or other Foster family members.
There was a Foster family living in Ashford, Windham, Connecticut who had several children including Ruth born about 1749/50. There was also a Foster family living in Willington, Tolland, Connecticut with a daughter Ruth born in 1746. Each Ruth fits nicely into the age range of a first marriage in 1771, but there was no further information to be had in the vital records for Ashford or Willington. Part 1 explores the possibility that Ruth was the daughter of Isaac and Abigail Foster who were from Ipswich, Essex, Massachusetts but living in Willington in 1746. The family later removed back to Massachusetts and then New York.
The trail of records for Willington Ruth was inconclusive, but seemed slightly unlikely. The Isaac Foster family moved back to Massachusetts by 1759 and it seemed unlikely that they would have left a 14 year old daughter behind who married 12 years later in Pomfret. I was unable to find any further records about a Ruth Foster who was associated with Isaac and Rebecca Foster or any of their children. It was time to turn to Ashford and look at the Ruth Foster born there.
Ashford Ruth’s parents were Samuel Foster and Judith Knowlton. They were married in Ashford in 1747 and had children Abraham (1748), Ruth, Hannah (1751), and Judah/Judith (1753). Samuel Foster died in November of 1753 about a week after his daughter Judith was born. Samuel’s mother, Ruth Snow Foster, also died in 1753 a few days before Samuel. Samuel left some probate records and Robert Knowlton of Ashford was listed as surety on a bond for Judith being the administrator of Samuel’s estate. Who was Robert Knowlton?
Among the probate papers for Samuel Foster was a notice dated 4 October 1763 that Judith Foster was given an allowance “to bringing up of her youngest child named Judith daughter of said deceased”. There was no mention of Abraham, Hannah, or Ruth in this document. A search for Judith Foster did not yield any helpful results, so Robert Knowlton was my next search. I reasoned that it was possible that Judith could have married again, or been represented by her father or brother in future matters since she no longer had a husband, and that Robert’s name would possibly have been recorded in other records regarding her or her children.
Probate records in Ashford showed that Robert Knowlton had been given guardianship of Judith Foster’s children starting with Abraham on 4 October 1763, and then Hannah on 10 June 1766. Hannah’s record explicitly states that Robert Knoulton/Nolton was her grandfather. The initial search for Ruth and Judith did not get any results, however, paging through the probate files that came after Hannah Foster’s guardianship bond, I did find the guardianship bond for Judith Foster, “a minor of Ashford”, who chose Edward Paine for her guardian on 8 June 1767. Judith’s record included a document from Samuel Foster’s estate that was for “receipts exhibited for settlement of his estate by his widow Judith Foster”. The list must have been filed incorrectly under the younger Judith’s file. A record for guardianship for Ruth Foster was not found in this collection, but a father/daughter relationship was established between Robert Knowlton and Judith Foster Sr.
Following the record trail for Robert Knowlton (Knoulton, Nolton, Knolton,Knotton), the births of five children were recorded at Ashford – Judith was not among them. A record in a different collection of probate records from Windham County was found dated 14 October 1763 and stated that Robert Knotton was allowed to be a guardian to Ruth Foster, a minor of Lebanon. This is most certainly Ruth the daughter of Judith since the rest of her siblings are accounted for and 3 out of 4 of them chose the same Robert Knowlton of Ashford to be their guardian. Why was Ruth living in the neighboring community of Lebanon, New London, Connecticut and why were guardianship papers being filed 10 years after the death of their father? This Ruth was still living and now about 14 years old. She still looked like a possible candidate for the wife of Benjamin Sharp in 1771, but I still had no direct links to the Sharp family.
Robert Knowlton left a detailed will when he died in 1774 and two of his children born at Ashford were named (the other three were previously deceased) as well as five additional children including a Judith Sharp. Since I already knew that Robert had a daughter Judith who married a Foster, the odds of him having a second child called Judith were very small. The record definitely reads “daughter” and not granddaughter or niece, so unless the clerk transcribed the will incorrectly, Judith Sharp must be Judith Foster. None of Judith’s children were named.
The Knowlton and Foster families were living in the county of Windham since at least 1727. The Barbour Collection has an index of marriages for Ashford and there is a record of Judith Knowlton (Nolton) who married Solomon Sharp on 3 March 1763. Solomon Sharp was the father of Benjamin Sharp who married Ruth Foster in 1771 in Pomfret. This was the type of family connection I had been searching for, however there was still no explicit statement that Judith Knowlton Foster’s daughter was the Ruth Foster that married Benjamin. The 1763 marriage does answer the question of why Robert Knowlton was assigned guardian to the children starting in fall of that year. Robert was legally protecting the legacy of the heirs of Samuel Foster until they reached full age.
Ashford Ruth seems to be the most likely candidate for the wife of Benjamin Foster based on the direct family relationship and the long family ties to Pomfret. The residence at Lebanon in the 1763 guardian bond is something I hoped to resolve. This community is about 28 miles from Pomfret. There were a handful of Foster families living in Lebanon at about that time, but they are very distantly related to Ruth’s family. I also searched all of Judith Knowlton Foster Sharp’s siblings and none of them were reported as settling in Lebanon – although several remained at Ashford. I went through all of Samuel Foster’s siblings and they mostly remained in Massachusetts with none settling in Lebanon or areas nearby.
It seems unlikely that Ruth was living with her mother in Lebanon since Judith married in Pomfret and Abraham’s bond dated just 10 days before Ruth’s states he was “of Ashford” so I am left with the conclusion that Ruth was most likely living with family in Lebanon for some reason just after her mother remarried. The home of the combined families of Judith and Solomon Sharp must have been packed to the rafters with Solomon bringing seven children and Judith bringing her four. Solomon and Judith added three more children to the home in 1764, 1765, and 1768. It seems likely that some of the children would have been placed with relatives, even if intermittently, to help out with farm work or child minding especially as the older children married and began to have families of their own.
The online family trees were once again of little use. Many people have assigned Samuel and Judith Foster as the parents of Ruth, but few if any have connected Judith Nolton as the same woman who married Solomon Sharp. If a second marriage is recorded at all, Judith is treated as separate woman. None of the trees I could find had any new sources or anecdotes about why they assigned this Ruth Foster to be Benjamin’s wife.
My instinct is that Ashford Ruth is the correct person who married Benjamin Sharp in 1771. There is a definite family tie and I know for sure that this Ruth was alive in 1763 when her grandfather became her guardian. Her grandfather lived until 1774, so would have been living at the time of the marriage when Ruth’s inheritance would have passed to her husband. All four of Samuel Foster’s children would have reached the age of 20 by the time of Robert Knowlton’s death.
In the end, I can’t really be sure based on the evidence available at online databases. Ruth of Willington may well have returned to Pomfret for some reason and married Benjamin Sharp in 1771. Perhaps a Ruth Foster that I have yet to find is our bride. It seems unlikely that I will ever have an iron clad piece of evidence for the parents of Ruth Foster who married Benjamin Sharp in Pomfret in 1771, but I never give up hope. New records are being digitized all the time and there may just be a piece of paper in an archive, attic, bible, or historical society that will finally solve the mystery. Maybe someday I can take a trip to Connecticut and put boots on the ground and explore some repositories that have yet to be digitized.
WitzEnd Family History 