Wednesday, September 19, 2018

Coffin Plate - George Benham M.D.

Coffin or Casket Plate/Plaque

George Benham M.D.

I have had this item in my possession for many years and never gave it much thought. This is a coffin plate for George Benham M.D. Died April 9th 1887, aged 47 years. (Aug. 1840 - April 9, 1887).
He was the husband of Calista Emery Kipp January 30, 1846 to June 13, 1911. [My 1st cousin twice removed. Descended from Richard Titus Kipp, a brother to my great grandfather Benjamin Kipp]
They lived at Princeton, Ontario.


Coffin plates are decorative adornments attached to the coffin that contain genealogical information like the name and death date of the deceased. Generally made of a soft metal like lead, pewter, silver, brass, copper, zinc or tin. The different metals reflect the different functions of the plates, or the status and wealth of the deceased. For a basic funeral, a simple lead plate would be lettered with the name, date of death and often the age of the departed, and nailed to the lid of a wooden coffin.

In the late 1840s the first machine made coffin plates began to appear. At first they were simple shapes stamped out of a flat piece of metal. The industrial manufactured coffin plates of course had no names on them. They were in fact just blanks that were intended to be engraved by someone in the local community such as a jeweller or undertaker. As such the quality of the engraving varies wildly.

In North America the same time that the use of coffin plates was increasing in popularity the practice of removing the plates from the coffin before burial increased. Often the Coffin Plates were never attached to the coffin but displayed on a stand or table next to it. The coffin plates were removed to be kept as mementos by the loved ones of the deceased.

Monday, April 23, 2018

The Thorne-Wilkins Burying Ground

New York Researcher, New York Genealogical and Biographical Society, Vol. 28, No. 4, Winter 2017. Pages 5-8.

This article is about the Thorne-Wilkins Burying Ground at Fort Totten on Willets Point in Bayside, New York.

This is of interest to me as I am a descendant of William Thorn(e) Sr. He is supposed to have landed at Boston about 1629. He was admitted as a freeman at Lynn, Massachusetts Bay Colony on May 2, 1638. He left Lynn early in 1643 for Long Island as one of the followers of Lady Deborah Moody (Gravesend, LI). He was one of the patentees at Flushing, LI in 1645. He was one of the signers of the Flushing Remonstrance of 1657.

I am descended through his son Joseph Thorne (cir. 1642-1727), who married Mary Bowne. Mary Bowne was a daughter of John Bowne (1627-1695) and Hannah Feake (1637-1677). Quakers or the Society of Friends.

Research Sources for your Palatine Ancestors


Research Sources for your Palatine Ancestors



1)   Early Eighteenth Century Palatine Emigration, by Walter Allen Knittle. Baltimore, MD: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1965, reprint of 1937 edition.



2)   Palatine Roots: The 1710 German Settlement in New York as Experienced by Johann Peter Wagner, by Nancy Wagoner Dixon. Camden, ME: Picton Press, 1994.



3)   The Palatine Families of New York: A Study of German Immigrants Who Arrived in Colonial New York in 1710, by Henry Z. Jones. Camden, ME: Picton Press, Third printing 1995. http://www.hankjones.com/



4)   More Palatine Families: Some Immigrants to the Middle Colonies 1717-1776 and their European Origins, plus New Discoveries on German Families Who Arrived in Colonial New York in 1710, by Henry Z. Jones. Privately published 1991. http://www.hankjones.com/



5)   Even More Palatine Families: 18th Century Immigrants to the American Colonies and Their German, Swiss and Austrian Origins, by Henry Z. Jones. Privately published. http://www.hankjones.com/



6)   The Palatine Families of Ireland, by Henry Z. Jones. Privately published. http://www.hankjones.com/



7)   The Book of Names: Especially Relating to The Early Palatines and the First Settlers in the Mohawk Valley, complied and arranged by Lou D. MacWethy. Baltimore, MD: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1985.



8)   Palatine Heads of Families from Governor Hunter’s Ration Lists, June 1710 to September 1714, by Boyd Ehle. See the following website:  http://threerivershms.com/nameshunter.htm



9)   Mohawk Valley in the Revolution: Committee of Safety Papers & Genealogical Compendium, by Maryly B. Penrose. Franklin Park, NJ: Liberty Bell Associates, 1978.



10)   The Palatines of New York State: A complete compilation of the history of the Palatines who first came to New York State in 1708-1722. The Palatine Society, 1953.



11)  Pages from the Past, No. 4, Palatine Historical Background. Palatines to America, 1993.



12)  The Simmendinger Register. Baltimore, MD: Genealogical Publishing Company, 1984.



13)  The Palatines of Olde Ulster, by Benjamin Myer Brink. Saugerties, NY: Hope Farm Press, 2000.



14)  The Irish Palatines in Ontario: Religion, Ethnicity, and Rural Migration, by Carolyn A. Heald. Gananoque, ON: Langdale Press, 1994.



15)  Pennsylvania Mennonite Heritage, Vol. 31, N.4, October 2008.  A tri-centennial celebration of the Palatine Migration of 1708/09.

https://www.lmhs.org/research/lmhs-publications/pa-mennonite-heritage/articles-list/



16)  Palatines to America German Genealogy Society.   http://palam.org/



17)  Montgomery County Department of History and Archives, Old Courthouse, Fonda, NY.  

https://www.co.montgomery.ny.us/web/sites/departments/historian/default.asp


Tuesday, January 2, 2018

Annals of Old Manhattan 1609-1664

Annals of Old Manhattan 1609-1664. Julia M. Colton. New York. 1901.

On p. 157, in the footnote, Hendrick Hendricksen Kipp is mentioned as one of the Council of Nine Men,  appointed by the Honorable Peter Stuyvesant from a group of the "most notable, reasonable, honest and respectable men" chosen by the residents of Manhattan, Breuckelen, Midwout (Flatbush), Amersfoort (Flatlands), and Pavonia.




Books Read or Partially Read in 2017


Books Read or Partially Read in 2017



Origin, by Dan Brown. 2017



Turing’s Cathedral, The Origins of the Digital Universe, by George Dyson. 2012.



The Story of Physics, by Anne Rooney. 2011.



The War Scientists, The Brains behind military technologies of destruction and defense, by Thomas J. Craughwell. 2011.



The Illustrious Dead, The Terrifying Story of How Typhus Killed Napoleon’s Greatest Army, by Stephen Talty. 2009.



Lavoisier in the Year One, The Birth of a New Science in an Age of Revolution, by Madison Smartt Bell. 2005.



A Short History of Nearly Everything, by Bill Bryson. 2004.



Murder as a Fine Art, A True Story of Fraud, Betrayal and Murder Across Two Continents, by Alan J. Bytheway. 2015. [The murder and trial took place near my home town of Princeton, Ontario, Canada.]



Partially Read



The Great Migration Directory, Immigrant’s to New England, 1620-1640, by Robert Charles Anderson. 2015.



Elements of Genealogical Analysis, by Robert Charles Anderson. 2014.



New York Family History Research Guide and Gazetteer, by NYGBS. 2015.



Loyally Yours, 100 Years of the UELAC. Compiled by Frederick Hayward. 2014.