In my last couple of blog posts, I have been trying to prove who is George Washington Dailey's parents. My hypothesis is that James and Rachel Dailey are his parents from Frederick County, VA. When we last left George, he was living in a household of Absolom Dailey and his wife Margaret in the 1850 US Census. I was very intrigued to find more information about Absolom.
Determined to find additional information on the Dailey family, my cousin and I planned a trip to Frederick County, VA in October of 2021. She and I had spent the better part of a day in the Archives Reading Room in the basement of the Handley Library in Winchester, Virginia, 100 W. Piccadilly Street, Winchester, Virginia. Let me go off on a tangent for a moment and talk about this library for a moment. This is one of the prettiest local libraries I have ever visited. My cousin and I have visited lots of archives and libraries, but the library building itself was just magical. The library opened in 1913 and was built from funds left by Judge John Handley. As we whisked ourselves away to the basement, I wish I had spent more time in the other parts of the library. What we walked by was gorgeous and reminded me of an old mansion with dark woodwork, art, and a beautiful staircase in the entry. Here is a picture I took of the building below.
Anyway, back to Absolom. I had spent all day in the Handley Library looking at books, files, and microfilm with nothing concrete. It was ten minutes to five o'clock, and I told my cousin I was ready to leave. I was a little burnt out and not finding much. She says, "We have ten minutes to closing time. We might find something. Keep looking." Exasperated, I collapsed myself at the end of an aisle and at a shelf marked, "West Virginia". I perused for a second and grabbed a book called, Index to West Virginia Estates Before 1866, and opened up to the Index page. Fully expecting to find nothing, I was blown away when I found an entry for, none other than, Mr. Absolom Dailey.
The probate record reference was in Hampshire County, WEST VIRGINIA. I think to myself, "West Virginia?" Seriously. Let's do a little geography lesson here for a moment before getting into the details. The location of the Dailey clan to date had been in the tip-top corner of Frederick County, VA based on the cemetery blog post from last time and a few land deeds (we will talk about those in another post). As shown on this first map, you can see four counties all meet in this corner - Hampshire, Morgan and Berkeley in West Virginia and Frederick in Virginia. The Dailey clan lived just above the "F" on the map. After finding the probate for Absolom in Hampshire County and while studying these locations on the map, it made me realize that I need to widen my search for records to any of these four counties. Furthermore, when you think about it, county boundaries are just arbitrary lines drawn, and I learned a valuable lesson about doing some homework pinpointing locations better in the future.
As to not make this blog post too long, let's continue to Part 4 next!
FAN Club Listing (I will continue to add to this)
- John Parlett (bondsman listed on James and Rachel marriage)
- Absolom Dailey (1850 US Census Head of Household)
- Margaret Grove (Wife of Absolom Dailey)
- John Grove (Minister for the marriage of Absolom and Margaret)
Pippenger, Wesley E. Index to West Virginia Estates Before 1866. , 2013. Print.
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