My great-great-grandmother Sarah Fox was born in Oxford Township, which is now at the very northern edge of Philadelphia. For years I have wanted to research her and her family, but did not feel up to tackling Philly by myself.
A few months ago, my husband suggested we take an overnight trip to Philly, so that we could spend some time together and so that I could do some research. I jumped at the chance.
We were both able to get a couple days off from work this week, so were able to leave early Tuesday morning and return home on Wednesday evening. It was a wonderful, relaxing, and productive trip. I thank God for my wonderful husband, who braved the horrible Philly traffic to get me to all the places I wanted to visit.
Sarah Fox's mother, Mary Livezey, was a member of the Society of Friends (the Quakers), so the first place we visited on Tuesday was the Friends Historical Society at Swarthmore College, about 10 miles southwest of the city. This library, which was founded in 1871, has the largest collection of Quaker records in the world.
Mary Livezey's family were members of the Abington Monthly Meeting. (I will not go into detail here about the oddities of Quaker society, but think of the monthly meeting as a sort of parish.) Today Abington is a suburb of Philadelphia, just a few miles north of Oxford Township in Montgomery County. Abington was one of the earliest meetings established in this country. Its records date back to the late 17th century.
When a Quaker engaged in some behavior that the other members felt was wrong or immoral, he or she could be "disowned" (that is, barred from membership in the Society). One of the most common reasons for disownment was marrying someone who was not a Quaker, or being married by a minister of another faith (what they referred to as a "hireling" minister). Since Mary Livezey married an Episcopalian, I wondered if she had been disowned. My hope was to find some record of her disownment in the meeting minutes.
Many Quaker meeting records are not indexed, so finding something can be like looking for a needle in a haystack. I was in luck, however. When I told the librarian what I was looking for, she brought me a very detailed name index for the Abington records. When I couldn't find a marriage reference for Mary under her maiden name, the librarian told me to check under her married name. I looked under Mary Fox, and sure enough there was an entry with the abbreviation "dis" (disownment) and also "mos" (married out of society).
There were not just one, but two entries about Mary's "misbehavior" in the records. The first entry appeared in the women's minutes, where it was reported that a committee of 4 women had been appointed to "pay her [Mary] a visit and report their sense to the next monthly meeting." (This was the usual procedure; a committee would visit the "accused" and try to persuade her of the error of her ways. If she repented and made a public apology, she would be welcomed back into membership.)
Apparently Mary was not persuaded, for an entry in the men's minutes reported that the committee of women had produced testimony against her "which after being read and considered was concured with and handed down to Women friends for their approbation...."
Mary was also given a copy of this testimony: "Mary Fox late Livzey hath been guilty of unchastity and hath accomplished her Marriage with a person not in membership with us by the assistance of an hireling Minister...."
According to the report, Mary was "treated with by friends" but "did not appear in a suitable state of mind to condemn" her actions. The members therefore disowned Mary "from any right of Membership with us as a religious Society" until she was ready to publicly admit her "wrongdoing." It seems likely that Mary never had her disownment reversed, for a few years later she was baptized into the Episcopal faith.
In searching through the index to the Abington records, I made another discovery. Apparently Mary was not the first member of her family to be disowned by the membership. Almost 30 years earlier Mary's father, John Livezey, had also been disowned for the same reason.
A report in the meeting minutes of 1794 stated that John had "gone out in his marriage" and had "accomplished the same by the assistance of an hireling Minister, without his Parents consent, with one not in Membership...." However, John must have "seen the error of his ways" and publicly acknowledged his "guilt," for he seems to have been a member in good standing by the time his children were born.
Besides finding the reports of Mary and John's disownments, I also located some birth, marriage, and death records for Mary's family. I just barely scratched the surface of the information available at the Friends library. All in all, though, it was a very productive morning, especially considering that we only spent a few hours there.
This blog has gotten very long, so I'll save the rest of our trip for another day.
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