My 64 ~ Researching My 4th Great Grandparents : Thomas Cross, Lucy Hovey, and My Gorham Roots

My 4th great grandfather, Thomas Cross, was born in Ipswich, Massachusetts, and was baptized there on December 20, 1741. He was raised in the village of Bradford (present-day Haverhill) by his mother and father, Thomas Cross and and Sarah Bordman.

He married Lucy Hovey, daughter of Joseph Hovey and Rebecca Stickney, in Bradford, Massachusetts, in November of 1767. Beginning the following year, they began their large family, which numbered 10 children by the time they moved to Gorham, Maine.

Thomas farmed land which was part of Captain Phinney's first settlement in Gorham, and kept a store adjacent to the homestead. Besides farming and running his store, Thomas was appointed a deacon of the First Parish Church in the village, and continued in that capacity until his death. He was also a member of Gorham's Committee to Hire Soldiers during the Revolutionary War, and, as such, is a DAR Patriot (A028166).

McLellan, Hugh Davis, History of Gorham, Maine (Smith & Sale, 1903), p. 173.

All of the Cross sons settled in Portland, Maine, and two of their daughters found husbands there.

Their eldest son, Joseph, married Betsey Duston. They are buried in Eastern Cemetery, Portland, as are sons Thomas, Leonard and Amos Hovey. Leonard and Amos Hovey were part of Captain A.W. Atherton's Company, Lieutenant Colonel Martin Nichols' Regiment of the Massachusetts Militia (District of Maine), which was raised in Portland during the War of 1812.

Daughter Betsey married Captain Jonathan Stevens. They are buried in Pine Grove Cemetery in present-day Falmouth, Maine.

Daughter Sally married Captain Enoch Preble. One of their sons was Real Admiral George Henry Preble of the U.S. Navy, fondly known as "The Father of the American Flag." The Prebles were originally interred in Eastern Cemetery, Portland, but, as space required, and as the attraction of Evergreen Cemetery (on Stevens Avenue) grew, their remains were moved and reinterred in Evergreen.

Daughter Lucy married James Phinney (1741-1834) of Gorham. They are both buried in Eastern Cemetery in Gorham.

Daughter Lois, my 3rd great grandmother, married Allison Libby III, and they are both buried in North Street Cemetery, in Gorham.

Son William married Eliza Stevens, and was a sea captain. In a sad twist of fate, he passed away on the day before his father died, and, as McLellan writes in his History of Gorham, "father and son were borne to the grave on the same hearse." 

Thus were my 4th great grandfather, Thomas Cross, and my 3rd great grand uncle laid to rest in Gorham Cemetery:

Inscription

Here lies

Deac. Thomas Cross

born in Ipswich,

Ms. Nov. 18, 1741.

died Feb. 15, 1819;

having been a Deac. of this

Church 15 years.

Also in the same grave his son,

Capt. William Cross;

born Aug. 21, 1779,

died Feb. 14, 1819.

Remaining verse:

No passing mortals and surviving friends

Regard....eloquence of death

Who more than...angelic tongue

My 4th great grandmother, Lucy Hovey Cross, lived two more years, and is buried beside her husband, and with her two daughters, Rebekah (age 19) and Harriet (age 8).

Inscription

Here lies

Mrs. Lucy Cross

wife of Deac. Thomas Cross

born at Boxford, Ms. Mar. 16,

1748. Died May 21, 1821.

By her side lie their children

Rebekah Cross,

born Jan. 20, 1774,

died Apl. 11, 1794.

And Harriet Cross,

born Oct. 20, 1790,

died Mar. 14, 1798

***

Postscript: From 1978 to 1980, I was the Town Librarian in Gorham, Maine. I attended services and taught Sunday School at First Parish Church, and walked past the Gorham Cemetery on South Street every day on my way to work. Little did I know at the time that my 4th great grandparents were resting just over the wall...

Sources:

Ancestry.com. Maine, Death Records, 1617-1922 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.

Daniel Hovey Association, The Hovey book, describing the English ancestry and American descendants of Daniel Hovey of Ipswich, Massachusetts, 1914.

Daughters of the American Revolution. "GRC National Index." Database. DAR Library. (http://services.dar.org/Public/DAR_Research/search_adb/default.cfm)

Deac. Thomas Cross and William Cross tombstone,  Gorham Cemetery, Gorham (Cumberland County), Maine; photographed by Pamela  Schaffner on 5 July 2012.

Find A Grave, database and images (http://findagrave.com : accessed  16 Feb 2016), memorial page for Joseph Cross (1768-1819), Find A Grave Memorial no. 101640076, citing Eastern Cemetery, Portland, Cumberland County, Maine.

Find A Grave, database and images (http://findagrave.com : accessed  16 Feb 2016), memorial page for Betsey Cross (unknown-1829), Find A Grave Memorial no. 101640062, citing Eastern Cemetery, Portland, Cumberland County, Maine.

Find A Grave, database and images (http://findagrave.com : accessed  16 Feb 2016), memorial page for Thomas Cross (1769-1833), Find A Grave Memorial no. 101640086, citing Eastern Cemetery, Portland, Cumberland County, Maine.

Find A Grave, database and images (http://findagrave.com : accessed  16 Feb 2016), memorial page for Betsey Stevens (1772-1838), Find A Grave Memorial no. 99202084, citing Pine Grove Cemetery, Falmouth, Cumberland County, Maine.

Find A Grave, database and images (http://findagrave.com : accessed  16 Feb 2016), memorial page for Sally Cross Preble (unknown-1848), Find A Grave Memorial no. 99202084, citing Evergreen Cemetery, Portland, Cumberland County, Maine.

Find A Grave, database and images (http://findagrave.com : accessed  16 Feb 2016), memorial page for Lucy Phinney (unknown-1863), Find A Grave Memorial no. 119022309, citing Eastern Cemetery, Gorham, Cumberland County, Maine.

Find A Grave, database and images (http://findagrave.com : accessed  16 Feb 2016), memorial page for Lois Cross Libby (1784-1860), Find A Grave Memorial no. 117092715, citing North Street Cemetery, Gorham, Cumberland County, Maine.

Find A Grave, database and images (http://findagrave.com : accessed  16 Feb 2016), memorial page for Leonard Cross (unknown-1867), Find A Grave Memorial no. 101640079, citing Eastern Cemetery, Portland, Cumberland County, Maine.

Find A Grave, database and images (http://findagrave.com : accessed  16 Feb 2016), memorial page for Amos Hovey Cross (1788-1842), Find A Grave Memorial no. 101640061, citing Eastern Cemetery, Portland, Cumberland County, Maine.

Fulk, Dori, comp.. Bradford Massachusetts Vital Records to 1850 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2000.

"George Henry Preble," (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Henry_Preble).

Lois Libby tombstone, North Street Cemetery, Gorham (Cumberland County), Maine; photographed by Pamela  Schaffner on 7 August 2013.

McLellan, Hugh Davis, History of Gorham, Maine (Smith & Sale, 1903).

Mrs. Lucy Cross, Rebekah Cross, and Harriet Cross tombstone, Gorham Cemetery, Gorham (Cumberland County), Maine; photographed by Pamela  Schaffner on 5 July 2012.

Pierce, Josiah, A history of the town of Gorham, Maine (Portland, Maine, Foster & Cushing, 1862).

Preble, George Henry, Genealogical sketch of the first three generations of Prebles in America, with an account of Abraham Preble the emigrant, their common ancestor, and of his grandson Brigadier General Jedediah Preble, and his descendants (D. Clapp and Sons, 1868).

Records of the Massachusetts volunteer militia called out by the governor of Massachusetts to suppress a threatened invasion during the war of 1812-14. Published by Brig. Genl. Gardner W. Pearson, the adjutant general of Massachusetts, under a resolve of the General court,  (1913), p. 241 : accessed 16 Feb 2016. Private Leonard Cross and Private Amos Hovey Cross in Captain A.W. Atherton's Company, Lieutenant Colonel Martin Nichols' Regiment. Massachusetts Militia; District of Maine. On April 16, 1814. Raised at Portland; digital images, www.hathitrust.org (http://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/009833259).

Gorham, My Gorham ~ Sentimental Sunday

Nearly 35 years ago, I returned to Maine with a newly-minted Master's Degree in Library Science from Illinois, and no prospect of employment. I moved back in with my folks (sound familiar?) in South Portland and started watching the want ads.

It wasn't long before I landed the position of Town Librarian in nearby Gorham, and moved into an apartment over a real estate office. I was the first Librarian ever to be hired who wasn't from Gorham, so, naturally, the earth shivered a little. At 23, I was younger than anyone who worked for me, and I thought I'd died and gone to heaven.

Baxter Library as it looked when I worked there
1978-80

Baxter Memorial Library 2012

I made many wonderful friends in my two years in Gorham, led a Junior Girl Scout troop (ever tried winter camping and had to be dug out?), and taught Sunday School at the Congregational Church.  

What I didn't realize back then was that Gorham was the home of my Libby and Cross ancestors, and I was walking right by their graves on my way to work.

Naturally, this called for a return to Gorham this past week, and my day began north of the center of town, at the North Street Cemetery, just past Phinney Lumber on the way to Sebago Lake.

Here are buried my 4th Great Grandparents, 

Allison Libby (1757-1816) and his wife Sarah (1760-1849).

This Allison Libby, the middle of three generations of Allison Libbys, 

fought in the Revolutionary War.

Feeling triumphant at discovering these two gems, I drove into town to stop into the Historical Society, where I was met by Brenda Caldwell. She and I had started our professional lives at about the same time in Gorham, Brenda as the Town Clerk (the first female), and me as the Town Librarian. We reminisced and enjoyed several laughs thinking about how the Town has changed, and assisted another Find-A-Grave volunteer who dropped in.

I walked back to my car, which I had parked next to the cemetery just off the main juncture, alternatively known as the South Street Cemetery and, as I prefer to call it, the "Old Burying Ground."  

Here rest some of Gorham's first settlers (the ones that aren't buried on Fort Hill), including my 4th Great Grandparents, Deacon Thomas Cross  (1741-1819) and his wife Lucy (1748-1821).

Here lies

Deac. Thomas Cross

born in Ipswich,

Ms. Nov. 18, 1741.

died Feb. 15, 1819;

having been a Deac. of this

Church 15 years.

Also in the same grave his son,

Capt. William Cross;

born Aug. 21, 1779,

died Feb. 14, 1819.

No passing mortals and surviving friends

Regard....eloquence of death

Who more than...angelic tongue

"Capt. William Cross died Feb. 14, 1819, the day preceding the death of Dea. Thos. Cross, and father and son were borne to the grave on the same hearse."

 ~ McClellan, History of Gorham, Maine.

Here lies

Mrs. Lucy Cross

wife of Deac. Thomas Cross

born at Boxford, Ms. Mar. 16,

1748. Died May 21, 1821.

By her side lie their children

Rebekah Cross,

born Jan. 20, 1774,

died Apl. 11, 1794.

And Harriet Cross,

born Oct. 20, 1790,

died Mar. 14, 1798

First Parish Church (left)
where my 4th Great Grandfather was a Deacon for 15 years,
and where,
159 years later,
I attended church and taught Sunday School