Avery

Transcription of part of a letter from  Edker B. Avery  of St. Paul, Indiana to his niece, Alice (Avery) Guest, undated (likely written about 1940)

"(1)
marrriages
William McDonald  and  Sarah Boyd were married in the State of Pennsylvania in Bedford County on the 15th day of January 1790;  William's age not known, Sarah was 20- years of age the 13th of March following.  The above records are of the father and mother of my grandmother and your great grandmother, Rachel (McDonald) Pence.  //  William McDonald died April 24th, 1815. Sarah (Boyd) McDonald died September 8th 1850 in the 83rd year of her age.  //  Rachel (McDonald) Pence was born March 28th, 1806 and was the 8th child and 4th daughter of a family of  9 children, 5 daughters and 4 sons, of the above parents.  She died here in St. Paul, Indiana in this house, November 7th, 1883. Her husband, Lewis Pence, was born June 15th, 1803, presumably in Ohio as that is where they came from to Indiana. He died June 7th, 1858, here in St. Paul, Indiana. I think the cousin who visited here (Ruth Pence) lived in Springfield, Ohio, but notification of her death was received before Aunt Sarah Feaster died, and since then I have never heard any thing from there or them.  // When I read your letter yesterday evening, I finally remembered that I had grandfather and grandmother Pence's family Bible and that she had the family Bible of her parents left her from a sister who died in Henry county, Indiana, and I got a ladder and found them both in the top shelf of the living room ceiling high press and the dates and records herewith are the result of that search or recall of memory. Have written this with pencil so if I found any errors in checking, they would be more easily erased and corrected. Uncle Ed" 

Notes by DTM:  (1) This document was provided by Avery Guest, son of Alice.  (2) Sarah Boyd  had reached age 82 (in her 83rd year) when she died in 1850.  This means she was born March 13, 1768, and would have been 22 at her marriage.  (3) Lewis Pence  was born in Rockingham Co., Virginia.  (4) Rex Avery, nephew of Edker, lives in the home in the Shelby Co. part of St. Paul where the letter was written.  (5) Sarah (Pence) Feaster, who died in St. Paul in 1908, was Edker's aunt and my great great grandmother.

Submitted by  Don T. Mitchell

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