What do we know of our Taylor ancestors?
My generation's 8th great grandmother (8 GGM) was Anne Taylor b 1660 and married November 2, 1675 at the age of 15 to fifty year old James Greer (8th GGF) in Baltimore. Hmmm...a marriage for whose convenience? Our Anne died May 13, 1716 in Baltimore. One of their children would be John Greer, my 7th GGF.
Ann was the daughter of Arthur and Margaret Hill Taylor (9th GGPs). Margaret, our 9th GGM, has no accurate dates that I have found. Arthur was born in 1648, a bit before his parents, Johnand Margaret Phinney Taylor (10th GGPs) were married August 28, 1649 at St. Mary's Church, Lichfield, Stafford, England. John (10th GGF) was born 1629 and died 1675 in Baltimore.
Arthur, a successful planter, died November 1728.
More on the Greers and adjacent families in the next posting....
11/17/10
When We Were Greers, Part IV
by Glenn N. Holliman
In the early 1700s, our Ancestors Prospered along the Gunpowder River
Much of this article is from Maryland's Early Settlers Book, No. 18 under James Greer. On the Family Lineage
page, one will find new family trees under Greer, Taylor and Day. Please scroll to the bottom of the page for these
three expanded lineages.
By 1688 the marriage of James Greer, first generation Scotsman to Maryland, and Ann Taylor (my generations 8th great grand parents (8th GGP), resulted in the birth of John Greer, Sr (b. between 1682 - 1688). John, Sr. in 1704 married Sarah Day (my generation's 7th great grandparents), the daughter of Nicholas and Sarah Day (my generation's 8th great grandparents) at St. John's Episcopal parish at Joppa, then Baltimore County, now Herford county.
The church was an unpainted log structure, 20 ft by 40 ft that soon, as did most untreated wooden structures, crumbled before the elements. Today, the EdgewoodOfficer's Club of the famous Aberdeen Proving Ground occupies the site.
Days Cove, named after our Day family line, is a backwater bay of the Gunpowder River near Joppatown, Maryland. Our 8thgreat grandfather, Nicholas Day, owned land here near Interstate 95 and Highway 40, the Pulaski Highway. PhotostakenOctober 2010 by Glenn N. Holliman along Highway 40, the Pulaski Highway , south ofJoppatown.
John and Sarah (7th great grandparents), purchased land near her father's plantation, Nicholas Day, along the Great Falls of the Gunpowder River. John's grandfather John Taylor (10th great grandfather), father of Arthur Taylor (9th great grandfather), lived near the ferry along the south side of the Gunpowder.
The old map belows shows Joppa, the Gunpowder, a ferry and the first roads in what is now Herford County, Maryland. The current major port of Baltimore is west of Joppa, not shown on this map.
We know that in 1687, Arthur Taylor sold 75 acres of land from 'Arthur's Choice on the south side of a branch of the Gunpowder River, called Bird Run to James Greer and daughter, AnnTaylor Greer. Bird Run is now the Bird River which flows through a modern suburban mall in Whitemarch, Maryland, not far from Days Cove. Arthur Taylor was the oldest son of oneJohn Taylor. Arthur had acquired the property in 1683. This land will eventually become the site of Joppa, a major port that later disappears and becomes a classic American ghost town.
Ironically, also along the Gunpowder another family, theStansberys, had settled. Stansberys live in and around Baltimore to this day. One of the Stansbery families will treck south in the 1700s, and generations later will result in my grandfather,Charles S. Stansbery, Sr. (1893 - 1957). Charles will marryMayme Osborne, whose grand mother was, yes, one Caroline Greer Wilson (1828 - 1911). My immediate family has deep Maryland roots!
Yes, there are a lot of family names above and it can be confusing. More on these ancestors in later postings....For a Family Tree on Days, Taylors and Osbornes, please go to the Family Lineage Page found on this blog.
11/11/10
A Veterans' Day Salute
by Glenn N. Holliman
U.S. Army, Vietnam 1969
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