Murphy Status

Since last February or so, I've been trying to track down everybody named Murphy in Union County, Illinois. If you're not sure how the Murphy family fits in with the McKee family, see The Murphy Connection. Finding information has gone well with the occasional stalling.

It's not as daunting a task as it might sound. Until more recent times, Union County was a relatively sparsely populated rural county in Southern Illinois. So I'm tracking a limited number of Murphys. Add a birth place--Tennessee--to the mix and you begin to see patterns form. So when I find a record for a Murphy who is living in Union County but born in Virginia, I can go light on researching this Murphy and concentrate on Murphys born in Tennessee or descendants of Murphys born in Tennessee.

After several months, I can declare that the Tennessee Murphy family is a wild bunch. There are lots of marriages, lots of divorces, several children with "early" birth dates, and lots of drama. I was always able to trace the difficult personalities in the family back to Prudence Murphy. However, I've come to see Pru and any of her activities as just the tip of the ice burg.

Of late I've been working with land records. I bought a book--Family Maps of Union County, Illinois by Gregory A. Boyd, J.D. In the book Boyd plots all of the early land records based on Bureau of Land Management records. The book is handy because I don't have to try to plot locations myself. In addition, because Boyd plots all of the land records, I can spot possible parents of spouses.

Early land records place the Murphy's in three townships:

• T12R1W (Anna) includes land owned by Wilburn Murphy b. Tennessee about 1814...later maps show the area where Wilburn's land was as the Murphy School district. There's also Murphy School Road that runs through the area.
• T12SR1E (Stokes) includes land owned by Wilburn, John (b. Tennessee about 1808), and Williams Murphy (b. Illinois about 1821)...Williams name can be Williams Murphy or Williams Murphey or William Murphy
• T11SR1E (Rich) includes John Murphy

I'm going to continue looking at land and trying to pair them with census records to sort out relationships.

Hiley Murphy--the female found on the 1818 (Federal) through 1855 (state) censuses and most likely the matriarch of the Murphys in Union County--seems to be born about 1770. In 1850, she's living with Williams Murphy. She would have been about 51 at the time of Williams birth...too old to be his mother? Perhaps his grandmother? I'm not sure at the moment.

Anyway that is the state of things with the Murphys at the moment. If I make any earth shattering discoveries, I'll post. In the meantime, it's systematic collecting and interpreting.

John Stanley Pearce (1870-1931) Illinois

My tale of woe today might involve successfully researching a family to whom I am not related. Let me explain. Mary Ann Miles seems to have married a Murphy who disappears, and then she marries a Wesley Greer. Or, Mary Ann Murphy may have married Wesley Greer and she never was a Miles. Or, there may have been something else going on. Wesley and Mary Ann had a daughter, Charlotte "Lottie" Greer...a person whose descendants I have had lots of luck with the past few days. So regardless of whether we're related, I thought I'd share the wealth!

Wesley Greer
b. 1820 Tennessee
d. 1879 Union County, Illinois
m. 30 Sep 1847 Union County, Illinois
Mary Ann Miles or Murphy or perhaps another name...
b. 1826 Illinois
d. Hmmmm...don't know

Child #7 for Greer/Miles
Charlotte "Lottie" Greer
b. Sep 1866 Illinois
d. Hmmmm...don't know
m. 1895ish
John Stanley Pearce...look for records under Pierce too
b. Apr 1870 Illinois
d. 15 May 1931 McClure, Alexander County, Illinois

Child #1 for Pearce/Greer
Clarence Clayton Pearce
b. 25 Dec 1896 McClure, Alexander County, Illinois
d. 6 May 1936 McClure, Alexander County, Illinois (FAG 90077656)
m. 10 Sep 1917 Cape Girardeau, Cape Girardeau County, Missouri
Susie Annabelle Colyer
b. 1900 Sweetwater, Monroe County, Tennessee (FAG 90194356)
d. 20 Feb 1977 Granite City, Madison County, Illinois

Child #2 for Pearce/Greer
David Clyde Pearce
b. 1 Feb 1899 McClure, Alexander County, Illinois
d. 8 Nov 1975 McClure, Alexander County, Illinois (FAG 90195234)
m. 1918
Helen E. Callen
b. 31 Jan 1897 Delta County, Illinois
d. 21 Jun 1927 McClure, Alexander County, Illinois

Check the Find A Grave (FAG) memorials and you'll find obituaries and links to descendants. If you're chasing this family and want me to transfer the memorial, please just Edit the memorials and send me your FAG number. I'll be happy to turn them over to your care.

Earl Julius Yarbro 1910-1989 Arkansas, Texas, Missouri

I'm still hacking my way thru the Murphy family. So much has been published online since the last time I tried that after two months I remain in the hitting pay dirt at every turn phase of gathering records. I am surprised since this family was in Union County, Illinois...rural Southern Illinois where I didn't expect to find all that much published online at this point. So much for condescending expectations!

Anyway, I've hit upon an interesting piece of info. A daughter in the Murphy line--Hallie Martha Hasty--married Earl Julius Yarbro...more than once!

First Marriage Record
19 Sep 1928 Kennett, Dunklin County, Missouri

Second Marriage Record
28 May 1968 Liberty County, Texas

So far I've found no record of Hallie and Earl having lived in Texas. They seem to have always lived in Missouri. So what's the story. I'm sure it has to be an interesting one. Here are their vitals.

Earl Julius Yarbro s/o William Yarbro and Dora Unknown
b. 6 Apr 1910 Carpenter, Clay County, Arkansas
d. 8 Mar 1989 Saint Charles, St. Charles County, Missouri
m. well you know this part
Hallie Martha Hasty d/o Thomas Jefferson "Tom" Hasty and Florence Opal Murphy
b. 7 Apr 1910 Independence, Dunklin County, Missouri
d. 30 Sep 2000 Saint Charles, St. Charles County, Missouri

I've sent for Hallie's obituary; however, I can't imagine that it explains the details of the second marriage and the sojourn in Texas. Perhaps someone reading this blog some day can offer details. In the meantime, it remains an amusing mystery...a quirky aside to what people do in their lifetimes.

Murphy

I've been contacted by a DAR volunteer researcher. I didn't realize that the DAR had volunteer researchers. Anyway, the researcher is in pursuit of info on the Murphy line of the family. She's trying to find a Rev. War soldier...helping someone who has hit a brick wall. I've answered some initial questions. I've got to pull documents to provide more info.

I've heard rumors about a lady whose research was confirmed by the DAR; however, I've never gotten  any real info that verifies the event as fact. I wish her luck, because if the DAR research proves for the lady she's working for, she'll prove for me too...and a slew of other female Murphy descendants. So I've got my fingers crossed and I'm saying novenas.

The Murphy Connection

While I was at RootsTech, I bought a copy of Roots Magic. I had to have a learning plan. I decided against importing a gedcom of the McKee family tree because it is a huge file...and mostly complete. It's clean as a whistle but I didn't want to have to try to learn new software on such a large database (almost 2,000 people). Also, I needed to be able to build a file; that is, make entries to the database so that I learned how Roots Magic handles data.

What I decided to do was to begin with the Murphy family. Here's the connection.

• Margaret Susannah McKee married George Ardell Leemon and they had Mary Agnes Leemon.
• Prudence Murphy married Robert Luke and they had James Alexander Luke.
• Mary Agnes Leemon married James Alexander Luke and they had Marguerite Murphy Luke.
• Marguerite Murphy Luke married Peter Dumas Treme and they had James Brice Treme (my father).

The Murphy family moved to Illinois around the time that Illinois became a state in 1818. Later census entries note that many family members were born in Tennessee. I've yet to find a location in Tennessee; however, I haven't tried that hard either.

I decided that the Murphy family was small enough that I could start with them and learn Roots Magic along the way.

So you're going to see me take a break from posting about McKee descendants, while I explore the Murphy line.


Pin It