Genealogical Reckoning - Rose and Hoskinson Ancestors

 

Rose Ancestors

Lewis Rose is the next 2nd Great Grandfather I examined for his family's participation in slavery. Lewis, himself, was born in Lawrence County, OH in 1818.  His father, William, had come to Ohio before 1811 when he married Mary Adkins in Gallia County, OH on 14 February 1811. The Rose ancestry before William is poorly documented.  No Wills or tax records have been discovered to suggest William was involved in slavery.  He was 21 or younger when he first arrived in the free State of Ohio. (Well, he considered Ohio his state—though the paperwork wouldn’t catch up until 1953.” Reference: Ohio History).

Lewis's maternal grandfather was Lewis Adkins. Extensive research has been done on Lewis but discovering his ancestry has proven elusive. Similarly, no evidence appears in his records showing any association with slave ownership and Lewis was in Gallia, OH by at least 1813.

Summary: The Rose Ancestors did not appear to have been involved in the institution of slavery.  They were in Ohio well before the Civil War and slavery had been forbidden in the Northwest Territories starting in 1787. A slavery connection may have existed in their deeper roots, but it has currently not been discovered.

Hoskinson Ancestors

Lewis Rose married Sarah Louisa Hoskinson (1839-1927) in Lawrence, OH on June 4, 1873. In the Hoskinson family line there were already some intriguing hints that they were involved in slavery. Sarah Skates Gorsuch in a family document she compiled in 1994 her aunt Janice had revealed stories from her grandmother Sarah. 

Here are portions of those stories Janice recalled and Sarah Gorsuch retold::

  "She (Sarah Hoskinson) came to our house when she was 88 or 89 and stayed until she went to Aunt Annie’s where she died in December of pneumonia. She was jolly, had lots of friends, and was always busy. She knitted - and told us things she wanted us to know. She said she was “Scotch-Irish” (or “Scotch and Irish” ... I don’t know which, but she said ‘Scotch-Irish’), Welsh and Touchibough (pronounced Tuck-e-hoe.)” This is an Indian tribe from Virginia. She also said that we sprang from royalty. Nobody asked her who the royalty was ... we just said, “We’re Americans!”

Another revelation from Janice’s work was this quote concerning what she thought she knew about Sarah Hoskinson's husband and her great-grandfather:

Born at what is now Huntington, WV, Sarah’s father, Johnny Hoskinson, had been from Hoskinsville, PA and came to the Huntington area to claim a section of land. He trusted someone else to take the deed to Richmond, VA, and when the paper never arrived there to be recorded, Johnny lost title to the land. Johnny and his wife, Nellie, were slave owners.

Family stories and recollections can be tainted and can fade with time. In 1994 when Sarah Gorsuch completed her compilation, Jancie had been dead two years at the age of 75. On top of that, Janice was recalling a story from the early 1920s from before she was 10 years of age.  This knowledge was relayed, apparently, in a lightheartedly but with an air of importance by her 88 year old grandmother who was relaying what she knew or thought she knew of her own grandparents. Those grandparents had both died before she was a year old.

So, taking what was said, documented, and passed down, what can we really discover about her?

Sarah's father, John, and grandfather, James, came to Ohio from Pennsylvania before 1830. I have found no clear ancestry prior to her grandfather. Pennsylvania had abolished slavery starting in 1780. It is very unlikely that John or James was ever involved in the practice. Janice or Sarah Gorsuch apparently confused "Johnny", as in Johnny Hoskinson with Jonathan "Nathan" Cardwell as he was married to an Eleanor for which "Nellie" is sometimes used as a nickname.

Sarah's maternal ancestors were slave owners. While Janice or Sarah Gorsuch was confused by the term Tuckahoe it does have a meaning that aligns well with her ancestral origins in America. Tuckahoe was a region and plantation in Goochland/Henrico, VA where Sarah Hoskinson's great-grandmother, Susannah Legrand Cardwell was born in 1721. The LeGrand and Cardwell families were well connected in this region and in possession of multiple and large tracts of land. This connects them to large slave operations in that community by association at a minimum. Susannah is specifically known to have owned slaves between 1782 and 1793 in Charlotte, VA based upon personal property tax records. Slave names identified included: Nancy, James, Hannah, Sam, Jude, Peter, and Susanna

Summary:  While the Hoskinson family was not associated with slavery, Sarah Hoskinson's maternal ancestors did come from a family that was heavily involved in the commerce of Goochland, VA in the early 18th century where slavery was used extensively.  

Unanswered Questions: What influenced these families to venture to Ohio in its earliest days of statehood, where slavery was not going to be part of their future? Was it their convictions? Were they just looking for an opportunity elsewhere? Had they already seen too much slavery?  Were they simply not given the opportunity to participate in the institution because of birth order, marriage choices, or other circumstances? 

One thing for certain, the choices they made as they moved to Ohio and the associated challenges they encountered with property titles were relayed in part as a story of lost wealth and privilege from Sarah Hoskinson Rose's perspective.  Janice’s father, Redmond, thought of the whole of it with moral clarity as he responded to Janice in this way, “One man is as good as another man if he is a good man.”