Recently there was a discussion of Mary Blankenbaker, daughter of Christopher and his wife Elizabeth Finks. Again, we have a court case to help us sort things out.
Christopher Blankenbaker died in 1781, leaving his Culpeper County, Virginia, estate to his wife, Christina (Finks) for the rest of her life. Upon her death the estate was to be divided among his three sons, Ephraim, Lewis, and Jonas. In May 1783, Ephraim, the eldest son, died intestate as a minor, without a wife or any direct heirs. Christina stayed around for another 36 years after Christopher died. As long as she was living there was no argument because the farm was hers.
When she did die, in 1815, Lewis, the eldest surviving son felt he should get Ephraim's third of the estate, in addition to the third willed to him by his father. His siblings disagreed. They favored dividing Ephraim's third among the eight surviving heirs. In July 1816, Lewis filed suit against his siblings, to obtain full rights to Ephraim's share. The lower court ruled in favor of the siblings, who were the defendants.
Lewis appealed to the State Supreme Court where he won. In this suit, in 1817, the following people were named:
These "lates" do not mean the person has died. They merely mean that the name was extinguished when they married.
Mary Blankenbaker is said to have been born 29 September 1754. In 1817, she was the wife of Jonas Deer, and was 64 years old. It is dubious whether she married Adam Arbaugh after this date.
This case was uncovered by Gene Dear, who wrote a short note for Beyond Germanna on the case in 1991. Prior to Gene's work, no marriage partner for Mary had been known. It had been tempting to match her with one of the Arbaugh men, even though their ages were not a good match. In view of these court cases, it is extremely unlikely that she married any Arbaugh.
(10 Aug 01)
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.