Polly Daniels Randall: 52 Ancestors 2020 Prompt "Where There's a Will..."

Polly Daniels Randall: 1774-1851

Samuel Daniels:1733-1823

            My fourth great-grandmother Polly Randall was a bit of a mystery. I only had records for her following her marriage to my fourth great-grandfather Israel Randall. I believed her maiden name was Daniels, but who exactly were her parents, and how could I verify that any potential parentage was correct? She had lived in Vermont, but I could find no birth records for her. Did that mean she was born elsewhere? Census data from that era did not list any family names other than the head of the household. So what records could I find? To my delight, a search of Vermont’s probate records produced a will that settled my Polly Randall quandary once and for all.

            Polly Daniels was born April 5, 1774 in Rockingham County, New Hampshire to parents Samuel and Elizabeth Noble Daniels. She was the seventh of their twelve children who survived to adulthood. I have found no record of her marriage to Israel Randall; they married at some point before their daughter Sally Randall was born in 1792. They had one other surviving child, Israel Randall Jr., born in 1806.

            Polly’s father wrote a will in 1808. By that time, all his daughters were married and out of the house, and all the sons but one had moved away and started families of their own. Only son Abram, the youngest son, still lived at home with his parents, along with his wife and children. 

"To my daughter Polley Randal one Cow."

            According to the will, written in 1808, Polly and her five sisters were to receive one cow apiece. Five of their six brothers were to receive the paltry sum of $2 apiece, except for one lucky brother, Abram, who was the recipient of the bulk of Samuel’s real estate and farm implements, and part of the house. In addition, Samuel’s “beloved wife Elizabeth” was to inherit one third of the estate and would have a life interest in half of the family home—the easterly half, to be precise. Abram would be residing in the other half of the house.

Will provisions for beloved wife and fortunate son Abram

            Abram, the youngest of Samuel’s sons, was also named as executor of Samuel’s estate, and was given the task of distributing the bequests to his siblings and mother. This raises so many questions. According to the additional probate documents, the farm was eventually sold at auction for $1100, so the disparity between what Abram was to receive and what his siblings received was quite dramatic. How did the others feel about this “favorite son”? How did Abram feel about his father’s plans? The will wasn’t a secret in the family; two of Samuel’s other sons, John and Solomon, had witnessed the will. I would imagine there was a certain amount of bitterness at the way the property was distributed, unless Samuel had provided the other five sons with money or property when they reached their majority and started their own homes.

Whatever the terms of the will, fate made them irrelevant. Samuel had been intent on providing for the care of his wife after his death, but on December 11, 1808, just months after he wrote the will, Elizabeth died. 

Shockingly, the favored youngest son Abram also died less than five years later, on March 20, 1813. He was only 35, and one record mentions he died “of a sudden”. This would indicate a sudden event like a stroke or heart attack.

Abram's headstone in Vermont

Obviously Samuel should have written a new will following these tragedies, but apparently he failed to do so. When he died on May 25, 1823, his estate went to probate, but little was done for nearly two years. The only copy of the 1808 will had apparently been carried to Canada by Samuel’s eldest son Solomon when he emigrated to Quebec with his family. Once the will was located, the probate court was forced to send an attorney to Quebec to retrieve the document and get an affidavit from Solomon, who was one of the will witnesses, as to its authenticity. The attorney then had to travel back to Vermont, a trip that probably took weeks. He presented the will to the court in 1825, two long years after Samuel’s death.

Since the son Samuel wanted to be executor was dead, the court appointed a new executor, who appraised the property, including 112 acres of land, at $1409. 

Assets of Samuel's estate

There were also claims or debts against the estate, including an $860 claim from Abram Daniels’ estate. Since the will had given the bulk of the property to Abram and his heirs, this apparently comprised his heirs share.

Claims against Samuel's estate

The executor auctioned off Samuel’s farm for $1,100; the buyer was a man called Stevens. Where did Abram’s widow and children go? Were they still living in Samuel’s house? Was the house included as part of the farm sale, or was it part of the property Abram’s estate claimed? It isn’t clear from the probate files.

            Following the sale, the executor distributed the proceeds. He paid out the “legacies” of $2 apiece for the five sons. In addition, he spent $15 per daughter to provide for the one-cow-per-daughter legacy. It isn’t clear if he gave each woman the cash equivalent of a cow, or if he actually purchased six cows at $15 each, and presented them with the animals. Surely some of the women did not live on farms; how could they provide for a cow? I just imagine them answering a knock on the door to find a man with a cow standing outside. Once again, the five surviving sons must have felt a little hurt by the contrast between their sisters’ $15-per-person inheritance and their measly two dollars.

            Samuel’s will leaves me with a lot of intriguing questions, but it settled one thing for certain: Polly Daniels Randall’s parentage. Since Samuel carefully listed each of his six daughters’ married names in the will, I know for certain that the woman in my family tree known as Polly Randall was indeed the daughter of Samuel and Elizabeth Noble Daniels, and the sibling to eleven other Daniels children.

Where there’s a will, there’s a way…to verify parentage!