AND WAS SHE THE WIDOW OF SAMUEL McCULLY?
November 2018
For almost 25 years now, we've been looking for information on my wife Sally's four-greats-grandfather, Samuel McCULLY, and his so far unidentified wife. We know Samuel died young; we suspect 4-greats-grandmother McCULLY remarried, but also died relatively young. We've been working on a particular hypothesis that might identify her, which is:
HYPOTHESIS: Jane "McCULLOH" married 1st Samuel McCULLY. They had sons William, John and Samuel McCULLY. After Samuel's death, Jane married 2nd [as his second wife] Henry HAYWARD, and had children Catherine, Henry and Matthew HAYWARD.
DISCUSSION: In December 1790 in Windsor, Hants County , Nova Scotia, Jane "McCULLOH" married Henry HAYWARD. Jane died about 1797 in Windsor, after giving birth to three children: Catherine HAYWARD (born 20 Jan 1792), Henry HAYWARD (b. 27 Jul 1794), and Matthew HAYWARD (born 14 Oct 1796). Within a year or so after Jane's death, Henry HAYWARD moved his family across the Bay of Fundy, and before 1803 had settled at Hopewell, Westmorland [now, Albert] County, New Brunswick.
We have been unable to determine Jane's parents or ancestry. Because no record has so far been found of her birth, and no tombstone has been found, we don't know her age when she married Henry Hayward. "McCulloh", the name given on her marriage record (the only original record we have of her name), is almost certainly a misspelling, as that particular rendition of "McCully" seems to have been unknown in Nova Scotia at the time. It was probably a phonetic rendition of one of the names of families known to have been in the area: McCULLOUGH, McCOLLA, or McCULLY. These names, which could all be pronounced "Muh-Cull-uh", had their bases in several families who were apparently not very closely related. However, the spellings were used pretty much interchangeably in deeds, censuses, and other records, spelled "creatively" by the often semi-literate clerks, ministers, and other recorders of the day.
Despite the dearth of information on Jane, we are building a detailed (but still circumstantial) case that she was married first to a Samuel McCULLY, with whom she had three sons. She married Henry HAYWARD after Samuel McCully's death. Below, we review some of this "evidence." We would appreciate hearing from anyone who has information that might help - or hurt - our hypothesis.
1. Samuel McCULLY, possible husband #1 - There were several Samuel McCULLYs in the late 1700s in Nova Scotia. The one we are concerned with, and who may have been the first husband of Jane "McCULLOH" is known only from land deeds in Colchester County. It has been speculated that he was related to the McCullys who came to Colchester County with the McNutt settlers from Northern Ireland, but so far there is no good connection, and he might just as well have been a Loyalist, a discharged British soldier or sailor, or just a later-comer.[See "The Descendants of Samuel McCully" linked above.] He sold land in Londonderry in 1778 that was said to be his by virtue of the "Londonderry grant", but he was not a named grantee at Londonderry. The land he sold appears to be acreage originally granted to John CLARKE, a McNutt emigrant who was later in Hants County, Nova Scotia. If Samuel was not a grantee, he may have bought the land [no deeds found], inherited it [no evidence], or acquired it by marriage [no evidence, so far].
The second record of this Samuel McCULLY is on a purchase of land at Great Village, Colchester County, sometime before 1788. It isn't clear when the purchase actually took place. The deed was recorded in August 1788 in favor of a deceased Samuel McCully's heirs, the grantor [John Mahon] noting that Samuel had bought it some time before his death but the deed had not been recorded. Neither this purchase deed or the sale deed above gave a wife's name, and we don't learn the names of his children until April 1809 when William McCULLY, Samuel's oldest son, sold his interest in the Great Village property to his younger brothers, John and Samuel. At that date, all three were "of Horton" [Kings County, Nova Scotia]. From other records, we have determined that the sons were born ca. 1780 [William], August 1784 [John], and 1786 [Samuel], so in 1809 they were about 29, 25, and 23, respectively. John and Samuel, still "of Horton" in either November 1809 or November 1810 [date on deed obscured], sold the Great Village property and both moved to New Brunswick.
2. THE FIRST COINCIDENCES - Samuel McCULLY died between 1786 (when his youngest son, Samuel, was born) and August 1788 (the date of the posthumous deed registration). In December 1790 - two to four years after the death of Samuel Sr. - Jane "McCULLOH" married Henry HAYWARD in Windsor, Hants County. She was Henry's second wife. Windsor is only a short distance from Horton, where Samuel McCully's three sons were living in 1809. We haven't found any specific records of the McCully sons in the Windsor-Horton area prior but 1809, but there is good reason to believe they were there before 1803 [see below].
3. THE HAYWARD-COPP CONNECTION - Living in Horton at the time of Jane's death was the family of David and Mary [PIKE] COPP. The HAYWARDs and COPPs knew one another; in fact, Abigail COPP (David and Mary's daughter) married George Griffith HAYWARD (Henry Hayward's son by his first wife) about 1797. Both Copps and Haywards left Nova Scotia soon after, and before 1803 had settled at Hopewell, Westmorland [now, Albert] County, New Brunswick.
4. THE COPP-McCULLY CONNECTION - Back to Samuel McCULLY's son, John McCULLY: Certainly as late as November 1809 - and possibly as late as November 1810 [the two possible dates of the Great Village land sale] - John was "of Horton", but on 23 March 1811 he was in Westmorland County, New Brunswick, marrying Mary COPP, Abigail [COPP] HAYWARD's younger sister. That implies either a really quick courtship [particularly if the Nov. 1810 date is correct], or else suggests that John knew Mary before she left Horton, and that he may have actually moved to New Brunswick because of her. The Copps had moved to New Brunswick before 1803, when John and Mary were still teenagers, so a fairly long-term acquaintanceship could be surmised. [Another question related to this move: John McCully's brothers both went to Richibucto, Northumberland (now, Kent) County, New Brunswick. John didn't have any other family but them, so why didn't he go with them, instead of striking off "on his own"?]
John and Mary [COPP] McCULLY moved to Sussex, Kings County, immediately after their marriage, buying property there from another of Mary's sisters, Catherine Copp, and her husband James WALLACE. A number of the HAYWARDs moved to Kings County about the same time, including George and Abigail [COPP] HAYWARD and Henry Hayward's three children by Jane "McCULLOH". The families stayed close until John and Mary McCully moved their family to Ohio in 1822. John's younger brother Samuel McCULLY had also joined "the clan" in Sussex, after his preliminary time at Richibucto.
5. THE McCULLY-HAYWARD CONNECTION - None of the close relationships between the Hayward family and the McCullys depend on Jane ["McCulloh"] HAYWARD being the mother of John, William and Samuel McCULLY, and also of Catherine, Henry and Matthew HAYWARD. The COPP-HAYWARD and COPP-McCULLY ties could by themselves have created a McCULLY-HAYWARD tie. However, another piece of information enhances the hypothesis that John McCULLY was the half-brother of the Hayward threesome.
Jane and Henry HAYWARD's sons Henry and Matthew left Kings County about 1820, the same time that the John and Mary (COPP) McCULLY family left for Ohio. We have no evidence that the families traveled together, but in the 1830 census, the families of Henry HAYWARD and Matthew HAYWARD were living in Belmont County, Ohio, not far from the McCullys. After John McCULLY died in 1830, Mary moved their family to Guernsey County, Ohio, where Henry HAYWARD was then living.
[We should also note that, even though John McCULLY was very close to his brother Samuel - they occupied adjacent farms in Sussex, New Brunswick - and Mary (COPP) McCULLY was close to her sisters, none of the other Copps or Haywards appear to left the area with - or about the same time as - John and Mary. Again, this is no proof of a family connection between the McCULLY and HAYWARD children, but, again, the circumstances certainly qualifies as "interesting."
SO, HOW DO WE FIND OUT WHO JANE "McCULLOH" WAS?
- If she was the widow of Samuel McCULLY, we are likely looking for a Jane whose parents were Nova Scotians with ties to both Colchester County and the Windsor-Horton region of Hants and Kings County. They may have been grantees at Londonderry, Nova Scotia. If Samuel was her first husband, then she was likely born around 1760 (twenty years before the birth of her first son). Anybody know any Janes who fit that description?
- If Henry HAYWARD was her first husband, then we are probably looking for a Jane born into one of the McCULLOUGH/McCOLLA families of early Hants or Kings counties. In that case, she might have been born around 1772 (twenty years before Catherine HAYWARD was born). Any candidates?
-If she was neither Samuel McCULLY's first wife, nor Henry HAYWARD's first wife, then it's back to the drawing board!
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AUXILLIARY QUESTION: WAS JANE "McCULLOH" HAYWARD A CLARKE? Since we started this study, we have "wanted" Jane to be a member of John CLARKE's family. John Clarke had originally owned the land at Londonderry, Nova Scotia, that Samuel McCully sold in 1778. Samuel named his second son John: in Scots-Irish families, the second son was often named for the mother's father. John CLARKE had both a daughter and a granddaughter named Jane. John Clarke moved from Colchester County to Hants County. John Clarke and his son John were reportedly among the richest men in Nova Scotia around 1800. When newlyweds John and Mary McCully settled in Sussex, they immediately paid £525 for 950 acres of land. John and his brother Samuel had only realized £170 from the sale of the Londonderry property [£85 apiece if they split 50:50]. They had been fatherless most of their lives - and likely motherless as well, since none of the brothers "remembered" her to their descendants - so it seems odd for John to be this "rich". We have wondered if he might have come into a substantial inheritance or "grubstake", which would have been possible from a rich grandpa like John Clarke.
Information gleaned so far makes it seem unlikely that Jane was the daughter of John Clarke, Sr. Jane, the daughter of John Jr., would have been too young. Still, it is appealing to suspect some CLARKE connection. It does seem likely that Samuel McCully's wife (whoever she was) had ties in both Colchester County and the Windsor-Horton area. What other early Nova Scotia families fit that mold?
Any ideas - thoughts - questions - greatly appreciated. Contact me.
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