Blog

John C. Stone II, of Greensboro, VT, and Hanover, NH, passed away on August 30, 2022, at his home in Greensboro after a full day of outdoor activity.  John had a passion for mountaineering, sailing, fly fishing, bird hunting, swimming, and golf, spending many days “in the field” including multiple trips to Wyoming’s Wind River Range, New Zealand, Chile, Argentina, Belize, Europe, and the UK. 

John was born on June 20, 1931, in Bronxville, New York, the son of J. Sydney Stone and Mary Rhodes Stone.  He attended Phillips Exeter Academy, class of 1949, where he founded the  Exeter Mountaineering Club led by his favorite teacher, renowned mountaineer Bob Bates. He graduated from Princeton University in 1953.  As a member of the Princeton swim team, John held long-standing records in both the 50 y and the 100 y freestyle.

John served as a Lieutenant JG in the U.S. Naval Reserve, graduating in the top 1% of his class in OCS training in Newport, RI, and serving four years of sea duty as the intelligence officer on the USS Hornet. He began his career as a geologist at Esso Exploration (Exxon) with assignments in Guatemala, England, Nicaragua, and Senegal. In 1970, he pursued a second career in fundraising at Princeton University,  Phillips Exeter Academy,  and the University of Vermont.

John will be remembered forever by his countless friends and family for his humility, storytelling, good humor, and passion for New Orleans jazz, bluegrass, and country music.

John is survived by his wife of 42 years, Marcia Stone, sister Susan Slater, daughter Lisa Stone, son John C. Stone III, daughter-in-law Emily Stone, and four grandchildren, David Wilson, John Charles “Chase” Stone IV, Zachary Wilson, and Sara Margaret “Maggie” Wilson,  in addition to Marcia’s children, John McGill, Jen McGill, and grandchildren: Kira Saligman McGill, Sara Saligman McGill, Micah O’Leary and his “favorite son,” Guinness, his beloved chocolate labrador retriever.

A considerable amount of new data has accumulated, meaning new charts and text regarding both Stone and Rhodes ancestors. I apologize for being so tardy in updating these sites, but I hope you will check in from time to time.

Comments prompted by information seen on family trees at Ancestry.com

I will attempt to create these “Comments” as a “running” post, with additions as new or revised information as seems appropriate. If that fails, there will be successive posts dealing with additional questions from data seen on Ancestry.com. As I have reviewed existing FTs on Ancestry, I see much information that compares favorably with what I have learned in my sixty-five years of research on the Stone family and relatives. But there arise occasional questions and conflicting data.

1. Captain Stone. The name occurs often on Ancestry FTs and warrants some comment. An historian and retired Vice Chancellor of Lancaster University told me some 25 years ago that in his many decades of research he had never known of an individual who was named “Captain” and urged me to check out the leads that I had seen in Somerset. The rest is history.

There were two individuals baptized Captain Stone in Somerset (and a Captain James Stone in London). Neither was ever Captain William Stone or William Captain Stone, although Boyd’s Marriage index incorrectly added “William” to the elder Captain Stone.

Both were descended from Richard Stone 1575 of Clayhanger, Devon – immediately adjacent to Chipstable, Somerset. They were third cousins 2XR but well known to each other, both living in Chipstable during most of their younger years.

Captain Stone 1756 (died aft 1814) was a great, great grandson of Richard Stone 1575 and his second wife Eleanor Slocombe. He was an officer in excise in Somerset and Devon before returning to the Chipstable area in later life.  He married Betty Langbridge in 1786 and they had ten children, the last two in Ashbrittle. (The 9^th child was Asa (female), for whom I have found no further information. She was NOT the wife of a male Stone, as is shown on one or more Ancestry FTs. This Captain’s eldest son Robert Stone 1789 took his family to Tasmania in 1833 and is responsible for thousands of Stone descendants in Australia and New Zealand. His grandson Captain James (baptismal names) Stone was one of the small group of founders of Auckland, NZ in 1841. The late Margaret Coatsworth, his great great granddaughter, wrote an excellent history of the Stone family of New Zealand and in part of Australia. I am aware of additional private papers on these Stone families.

Captain Stone 1784 – 1821 was a 4X great grandson of the same Richard Stone 1575 and his first wife, Emma Sedgeborrow (abt 1579 – 1933). He was the fifth of seven sons born to John Stone 1739 and Elizabeth Sellick 1750.

His older brother William married Ann Webber of Huish Champflower in 1789, but William died in Wiveliscombe in 1804 – the same year as his mother Elizabeth. In 1806, William’s brother Captain Stone married Ann Webber Stone, widow of his older brother. The marriage affidavit specified that “Ann Stone”, Captain’s bride, was a widow.

Captain and Ann’s first child was Horatio Stone, born 1806, approximately six months following his parents’ marriage! Captain and family moved to Hertfordshire where Captain was Steward of the farm of Richard Flower (a brewer and farmer) and his son George – co founder of the English Settlement at Albion in 1817/1818.

Horatio Stone became known in Illinois and subsequently in Arkansas as “Ashley” Stone. Why I don’t know. Did he not like the name of Horatio, although he was named after Lord Horatio Nelson, Britain’s most famous admiral and war hero! (Statue on Trafalgar Square). Perhaps the name meant less in America. Or perhaps the immigration officials misunderstood and changed it, or Horatio himself found it awkward or difficult to explain. I was told that the church bells rang annually to honor Lord Horatio Nelson in Huish Champflower, Somerset, where Ann Webber Stone was born. I have failed to find evidence of Ashley’s marriage in Arkansas, but it is known that his children William Ashley Stone and Elizabeth Jane Stone were back in Albion by 1850, where they lived with their Aunt Jane Stone Thread and family. Descendants from Elizabeth Jane’s two marriage have been identified, but I have yet to learn of a marriage or children for William Ashley Stone. New information would be greatly appreciated.

The other children of Captain Stone and Ann Webber Stone included Jane 1809 (married James Thread; buried in their private cemetery in Albion or Bone Gap – which I have seen but forget the location). Then Sarah, who was born in Hertfordshire and baptized in Bramfield in 1814 (married Isaac Smith in Albion), and her brother (the final child), Joseph, baptized in Bramfield in 1816. Joseph’s first wife was Eliza Jane Boner (or Bonner), not Eliza Jane Bond as was incorrectly recorded in an early Edwards County record. Her family bible is in my possession and contains family vital records.

End of this Comments entry: 8/18/2022

More than twenty years ago a fellow Stone researcher from Wellington estimated that Joane Hill aka Hillinge might have been from Runnington, SOM, and the daughter of a Hill with whom he was familiar there. But all these years later we decided to look further and, lo and behold, Joane (Johan) Hill aka Hillinge is duly listed in the PR transcriptions for Wiveliscombe, prepared (with our thanks!) by David Creek and others. She can be found also on FreeReg. Fellow researcher Gareth Bullock found the same information several months ago, and I am only now adding the information to our web page.

Joane was baptized in Wiveliscombe 30 April 1612 – a perfect fit for her marriage to Emanuel Stone in Clayhanger (DEV) in 1635. She was listed exactly as the marriage transcript, i.e. Joane Hill aka Hillinge, father John Hill aka Hillinge or Hellinge. John (1572 – 1645) is shown as married to Judith Yea and having six children: Peter, Joane (Johan), Mary, “Aage” (difficult to read), Richard and William.

Our Hillinge family in the Wiveliscombe transcripts can be taken back two generations and the Yea family four or more generations.

In the succeeding generation, Emanuel’s and Joane’s son Richard Stone 1640 – 1734 several times referred to his close friend Richard Hill of Ashbrittle (in 17c indentures referencing the Venn messuage). I wonder if Richard Hill was kin to Joane/Johan but of the next generation, in other words a relative of Richard Stone by marriage. Still speculation at this point.

One of these days I will upload a new family tree or list of descendants of John Stone alias Hele, ca 1550 or earlier ? – 1588. I apologize for having neglected this family website for so long. The identified Stone generations now total fifteen, but we add even more if we follow the Waldron, Yea and perhaps other families.

Text and data on this website have shown Elinor Slocombe’s baptism as 9 November, 1620. Galen Wilson provided me with a copy of the original Parish Record for that event and date. It clearly reveals that an Elinor Slocombe was BURIED, not baptized, on that date.  Since the wording is very clear, I cannot explain why transcribers (eg. Somerset Bishops’ and other transcriptions, and FreeReg for Milverton), show the event as a baptism. Gradually I may correct this error as I work on the website’s other pages, but keep it in mind when you find reference to Elinor on this website. It is unlikely that we will ever know exactly when or where she was born, but the marriage of an Elinor Slocombe to Richard Stone on 2 Oct 1639 remains adequately documented.   JCS II. 4/28/2020

5/2/2020: I still don’t have (and don’t expect to find) a baptism for Elinor/Eleanor Slocombe. But since this original post (immediately above), Galen has discovered in the UK Archives the abstract of a 1671 court case involving plaintiffs William Slocombe the elder, William Slocombe the younger, Eleanor Stone  and Richard Stone. We suggest that those four plaintiffs are (1) Eleanor’s father William and (2) her brother William, (3) Eleanor Slocombe Stone herself (daughter and sister of William Senior and William Junior), and Eleanor’s son Richard Stone. Eleanor’s husband Richard Stone 1575 – 1653 had died by the time of this legal case, and her son Richard 1640 – 1678 seems a logical person to have been involved in the dispute. A less likely possibility for the identity of Richard Stone would be Eleanor’s step grandson Richard Stone 1640 – 1733, roughly the same age as Richard 1640-1678. Indeed, after the death of Eleanor’s son Richard in 1678  and then his wife Thomazine in 1684, the elder Richard 1640 – still very much alive – was a party to several indentures relating to his cousins of Venn Farm – i.e the children of Richard and Thomazine and their heirs. There also two documents within the Cheffins auction collection of Stone family papers which appear to be mortgage or loan agreements between Eleanor Stone and a William Slocombe. We now know quite a bit more about the family of the second wife of Richard Stone 1575, but not where or when Eleanor was born and baptized. Somerset Parishes with Slocombes include Crowcombe, Milverton, Wiveliscombe, Huish Champflower, and others. Our Slocombe family appears likely to have been of Crowcombe.

I wish to thank fellow research friends who have confirmed without doubt that the first wife of Richard Stone (1575 – 1653 was Emma “Sedgeburrow” (abt 1579 – 1633), who married Richard in 1599 and was buried in Clayhanger in 1633 .  There are several spellings in the records for this family surname, but Sedgeburrow or Sedgeborrow are the most common, and many of them are found in Chipstable, Somerset, the Stone family parish (along with Clayhanger, Devon) for centuries. Even though Emma Sedgeborrow and Richard Stone were married in Burlescombe, I have found no other evidence of that family around that parish. It is highly likely that the Stones would have known the Sedgeborrows. I suggest that Emma was living in or perhaps “in service” in Burlescombe at the time of her marriage. When one looks at Chipstable, however – and recognizing that the availability of early parish records in Chipstable is zero to poor prior for the 18th century and earlier, is is surprising how many Sedgeborrows can be identified in 17c Chipstable records on FreeReg, and in some David Cheek transcripts.  From a study of those records, a reasonable line of descent including Emma can be constructed. While I recognize that this version cannot be proven, it seems reasonable and I present it below:

Sedgeborrow Family Estimated

I now believe that the father of Richard Stone circa 1575 – 1653 was not John Stone alias Venne, who wrote a no-longer-available  will in Chipstable in 1617, but rather John Stone of the Hele farm in Clayhanger who died in 1588. His will likewise is no longer available, but it is stated clearly that administration of the will was assigned to his natural son Richard Stone.

 

Thanks to visitors to this website, after more than twenty years of research focused on Somerset and Devon, the identity of Richard Stone’s first wife (my 9X GGM) is known! First, a parish record image for the 1633 burial of “Emmin”, wife of Richard Stone was found and sent to me. Second, a marriage record from Burlescombe, Devon, identifies the marriage of “Ricardus Stone” and “Emma Sedgeborrow” on May 10, 1599. The spellings of Emma’s name – both given and surname – are difficult to read and I have chosen Emma Sedgeborrow as closest to what we would use today. I will prepare a new Descendancy Chart for Richard.

As of 8/17/2022 I intend to maintain this “blog” as a running document, as I perceive problems with data on family trees seen on Ancestry.com.

A number of family trees on Ancestry.com deal with the Stone families of Somerset and Devon, England. Two in particular contain incorrect ancestry for Robert Stone and his wife Elizabeth Hill, some of whose descendants immigrated to Tasmania, Melbourne and New Zealand. I note the discrepancy in the Sullivan Tilley FT and the Stone NZ FT. Robert Stone’s birth is estimated at 1676 in these trees but was probably closer to 1665 – 1670. There is abundant documentation on Robert Stone’s life on this website. I recommend viewing the Stone descendants chart and especially the Cheffins Auction documents. There are many documents regarding the history of this family. Also look at the Wills and Indentures on this website for more documents about the Stone family. The AUS and NZ Stones do not connect to the Stones of Yarcombe, Devon. The common ancestor of all of these Stones was Richard Stone ca 1575 of Clayhanger, Devon.

There is additional information on Ancestry Tree discrepancies in the Stone page on this website.

Please leave comments on this site if you wish more information or would like to discuss further.

The STONE FAMILY  OF CHIPSTABLE documents from the July 2013 auction at Cheffins of Cambridge can be viewed on this website and on the Dartmouth College Library website. They are also available for viewing at the Somerset Heritage Society, the Devon Heritage Society (Devon Records Office) and the Devon Family History Society.  Many other surnames are involved in the documents. Abstracts of the documents are provided in this website and at the Dartmouth College library website. We will be grateful for expanded abstracts and full transcriptions. Please leave a COMMENT on this site if you are willing to provide abstracts or transcriptions. For access to the documents and the Dartmouth College website images, click STONE FAMILY, then STONE DOCUMENTS, then Cheffins.