The Sill Mothers
No book about the Sill family would be complete if it did not contain at least a few words about our ancestors wives/mothers. Unfortunately, a few words is all I can write about many of them as not much was recorded about women in the old family histories.
"There was never a great man who had not a great mother."
Olive Schreiner
Joanna Sill was the wife of John, who came from England. Not much is known about her. She may have come from Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England, as she was mentioned in the will of someone from that town. However, in that will she was called Mrs. John Sill, no mention of her maiden name was made. I have seen her maiden name recorded as Banning, but the submitter of that information could not come up with any documentation. The exact dates of Joanna's birth and death are not known. Her will was presented for probate in October of 1671, so she likely died that same year. The location of her gravesite is also unknown.
Sarah Clark was born February 18, 1643 in Milford, Conn. She was the daughter of George and Sarah Clark who came to America from England sometime between 1632 and 1639. Prior to her marriage to Joseph Sill she was married to Reinold Marvin, of Lyme, Connecticut. She had five children from her first marriage who would have been half-brothers and half-sisters to our ancestor Joseph Sill 2nd. These children from her first marriage, named John, Reinold, Samuel, Mary, and Sarah, grew up to get married and have many descendants. Sarah died February 17, 1715 and is buried in the "Sill Enclosure" of the Duck River Cemetery in Old Lyme, Connecticut.Phebe Lord was born in 1688 in Lyme, Connecticut. She was the daughter of Richard and Elizabeth (Hyde) Lord. She was a descendant of Thomas and Dorothy (Bird) Lord, who came to Newtown, Massachusetts from England in 1635 aboard the ship Elizabeth and Ann. Due to the strict lifestyle they found in Massachusetts, the Lord family left with the Rev. Thomas Hooker in 1636 to become some of the original settlers of Hartford, Connecticut. Phebe died January 4, 1774. She is buried in the "Sill Enclosure" of the Duck River Cemetery in Old Lyme, Conn.
Dorcas Bennett was born in 1733 Newton, Connecticut. She was the daughter of Abraham and Christian (Botsford) Bennett. She was a descendantof James and Hannah (Wheeler) Bennett who came to America from England sometime before 1639. Dorcas died October 3, 1757, one day after the birth of their son Elijah. She is buried in Sherman, Connecticut.
Chloe Barnes was born in 1762 in Pawling, New York. She was the daughter of William and Deborah (Griswold) Barnes. She was a descendant of Thomas and Jane (Goodnow) Barnes who came to America aboard the Speedwell in 1656. She was a descendant of Edward Fuller, who came to America on the Mayflower. Like Phebe Lord mentioned above, she was also a descendant of Thomas and Dorothy (Bird) Lord who came to America in 1635. Chloe's great great grandmother Mary Lord was the sister of Richard Lord, who was the father of Phebe Lord . That means Chloe was the third cousin, once removed, of her husband Elijah Bennett Sill. Chloe died sometime during or after 1823, the exact date is not known. Like her husband Elijah Bennett, she is also probably buried in the burying ground near North Gulford, New York.
Margaret McNitt was born March 20, 1793 in Salem, New York. She was the daughter of John and Eleanor (Smiley) McNitt. She was a descendant of Alexander and Sarah McNitt who came to America from Ireland in 1720. The family lived in Massachusetts until 1769, when they moved to Salem, New York. This is where Margaret was born in 1793. Margaret died in November of 1875 and is buried in the Baptist Church Cemetery in Franklinville, New York.
Charlotte Emily Harper was born September 28, 1846 in Avon, Wisconsin. She was the daughter of Montgomery and Angelina (Parshall) Harper. She was a descendant of James and Jeanette (Davis) Harper who came to Casco Bay, Maine from County Derry, Ireland in 1720. Sometime between 1842 and 1844, our branch of the Harper family moved to Avon, Wisconsin, where Charlotte was born. Charlotte is not listed with her family in the 1870 census. She was only 23 years old and not yet married to Nelson Sill. She could have been living somewhere else or perhaps been briefly married to someone else at that time. Her name is recorded in the 1880 census as "Emma". Other records I have seen of her refer to her as Em, Emma, or Emily. The only reference to her name being Charlotte is found in census records where she was still living with her parents. Charlotte died September 21, 1914 at Salem, Missouri and is buried at the Cedar Grove Cemetery in that town.
Edna Alfreda Freedlund was born April 12, 1883 in Rockford, Illinois. She was the daughter of John and Emma (Lilja) Freedlund who came to America from Sweden in the 1870's. The family originally settled in Rockford, Illinois. In 1894 he moved his family to Avon, Wisconsin and became a farmer. John rented the land he farmed from Ole T. Dustrude. The Dustrude farm was right across the road from Nelson Sill's property. That is how Edna met Nelson Alexander Sill. In 1903 the family moved again, this time to Sherwood, Wisconsin.
While Edna's son Arthur was still a baby, she was hit by lightning. Apparently she was holding Arthur while sitting in the house in Avon when lightning struck nearby and entered the house and hit her. She was struck again sometime in the early 1940's. Once again she was inside. This time lightning came in through an open window and hit her while she was sewing. One of Edna's hobbies was shoe collecting. She collected souvenir shoes from the places she visited. Eventually friends of the family started getting shoes for her collection as well. The collection was eventually passed to her son Nelson Allen and then to her grandson John Nelson, both of whom have added shoes to the collection. The collection continues to grow and currently contains hundreds of shoes. In December of 1930, Edna served on a jury in Rockford, Illinois. This is significant as it was the first jury in Winnebago County, Illinois that allowed women to serve. Edna died November 25, 1963 in Belvidere, Illinois and is buried in the Willwood Cemetery in Rockford, Illinois.
I only recently learned that Edna and Nelson had four children. Edna told her daughter-in-law Vida Sill, after the birth of Vida's son Milton, "Now you have the same number of children as I had. Two girls and two boys." The quote was shared with me by my father John Nelson Sill, who heard it from his mother Vida. Apparently there was a daughter who was stillborn. The name, date of birth, and place of burial are all unknown to me at this time. I have heard that Edith Viola Sill remembered her sister being buried "in a white dress, under the apple tree". I assume the tree is at the farm in Missouri, but in reality, it could be just about anywhere.
Vida May Johnson was born October 13, 1910 in Leaf River, Illinois. She was the daughter of John and Stella (Kuntzelman) Johnson. John's father John D. Johnson came to America from Germany in 1868. The Kuntzleman family is descended from Bartolomai Kuntzelman who came to America from Germany in 1741. Her family moved from Leaf River to Freeport and then to Roscoe, where they became neighbors of the Sills. She went to school with Arthur's brother Allen. When she was old enough, she drove to school in a Model A Ford.
Although she was the wife of a farmer and the mother of six children, Vida still found time to be a nurse as well. She worked as a nurses aide starting in about 1958 and became a Licensed Practical Nurse on September 2, 1966. Her hobby was knitting, and for years she produced many beautiful afghans, as well as uncountable numbers of hats, slippers, wash cloths, and Raggedy Ann and Andy dolls for her family and friends. Many afghans were produced for the Ladies Circle of the Roscoe United Methodist Church, of which she was a member. These afghans were sent to missions all around the world. Vida also loved music. Nearly every time we visited her, she had her radio on, tuned to a local country and western station. Vida died May 22, 1996 in Beloit, Wisconsin and is buried in Sunset Memorial Gardens in Rockford, Illinois.