The first Robinson1 in our family that we know about is Isaac Robertson, who was born about 1759 in Connecticut, “on the Connecticut River”. We do not know who his parents were, but we do know that he lived for a while in Coventry, Connecticut. He served in the Revolutionary War as an ensign, an officer. After the War he married Polly Dow, March 23, 1785 in Coventry, Tolland County, Connecticut. He has been described as the “founder” of our Robinson line. His son born Don Alonso Robertson in 1787, probably also in Coventry, would later change his surname to Robinson.
I think it unlikely that Isaac Robertson was a “founder” of the Robinson line — there were other Robinsons/Robertsons living in New England who could have been his parents. I have not found any record of a likely Robertson family, but there was a Robinson family that is very likely to include his ancestors. These Robinsons were descendants of a Rev. John Robinson, born about 1576 in Nottingham, England. Known in England as “Pastor of the Puritans,” he was ousted by the Church of England, moved to Holland in 1608 and died in Leyden, Holland, Netherlands in 1626. He saw the Pligrims off to Plymouth Colony in 1620 and had planned to join them, but was not able to before his death. After his death, according to one source, his wife Bridget (White) Robinson immigrated (on the Mayflower) to Massachusetts in 1629 with their children, Isaac, Mercy, Fear, James and John. That story is is incorrect, Bridget Robinson, Mercy, Fear and James died in The Netherlands, John/Jacob Robinson was a physician in England according to his mother's 1643 will.
However, Rev. John's son Isaac Robinson, who was born 1610, immigrated to New England in 1631 on the ship “Lyon” and settled in Plymouth Colony. Isaac married twice, lived in several Massachusetts towns, and fathered about ten children born between 1637 and 1657, he died 1704 in Barnstable, Massachusetts. When I started this investigation, it seemed to me that the most likely ancestor of our Isaac was Peter Robinson, a son of Isaac Robinson and Mary Faunce, who was born 1655 and lived most of his life on Martha's Vineyard. He died in 1739 and was buried in Windham, Windham County, Connecticut. In Windham County (which would split off Tolland County in 1785) he left numerous male descendants who could have been the father or grandfather of our Isaac Robertson. They included 7 sons and an undetermined number of grandsons. I have recently found it very unlikely that any of these descendants of Peter Robinson, for one reason or another, could have been our Isaac's father. See document Possible Ancestors of Isaac Robinson/Robertson. Updated: 12 Oct 2002. Therefore, my investigation took a different route. I am now rather certain, but cannot prove, that our Isaac Robinson is descended from the immigrant Isaac Robinson, but by a different line. This line explains why he would name a son Zenas Robinson and another son Solomon Robinson. See that reasoning and that line at Possible Ancestors of Isaac Robinson, II. Updated: 17 Dec 2003. I now also believe that the most probable reason that Don Alonzo Robertson changed his name to Robinson was because his father's name had been Robinson, but it was written as Robertson when Isaac enlisted in the Continental Army. For pension purposes he could only prove that Isaac Robertson was a veteran of the Revolutionary War. When that did not matter any longer, his son changed it back.
In the records of Donald L. Horner1 there is a mention of a possible date of birth for Isaac Robinson/Robertson of 1739-49. In the Coventry vicinity between 1739-1749 there are at least seven Robinson men, whose grandfather was Isaac, who are fathering children and naming them. There were several Isaac Robinsons born about that time. In the Coventry records there is a marriage record for Isaac Robinson's marriage to Joanna Colman on Oct. 26, 1775. That's the Isaac who is the son of Peter's son Isaac, not our Isaac.
There also were apparently plenty of Robertsons living in the Coventry area at that time. There are more marriages of Robertsons (15) recorded between 1764-1799 than for Robinsons (4). That may indicate that there were more Robertsons than Robinsons, or just that there was a consistent misspelling.
MY ROBINSON LINE
After the Revolutionary War and his marriage to Polly Dow, Isaac Robertson was a farmer, probably in the Coventry vicinity, where all of his children, except for their first, were born in Coventry, Tolland County, Connecticut. Their first child was Don Alonzo, born February 5, 1787, and according to his biography he was also born on the Connecticut River. If that is true, then he had to be born in Hartford, Middlesex or New London County, because that is where the river is and was. I think that is probably incorrect and that he, too, was born in Coventry about 20 miles east of the river. According to the Illinois biography of his son George, he was taken as a child of about seven years old to live in Cortland County, New York. He would be seven in 1794, but he had about four siblings born in Coventry, Connecticut, between 1794 and 1805. I think that was also an error, because according to: Goodwin, Cortland County and the border wars of New York, p. 222-3, Isaac came to Cortland County in 1808 and died there in 1811. On page 225, he wrote about Freetown, “Don A. Robertson was the first school teacher.” Don Alonzo could have been teaching school in Freetown as early as 1808 when he was 21.
Probably in Freetown about 1815, Don Alonzo Robertson first married Nancy Cammeron. After the birth of their first child, William, they moved to neighboring Chenango County, where Don Alonzo taught school in the winter months, and farmed the rest of the year. Nancy died there in 1821, possibly from complications of the birth of their daughter Nancy in February 1821.
Betsey Conick/Connick
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The following year, Don Alonzo married Betsey Conick who was from Cortland County. Betsey was the daughter of Martha and William Conick/Connick, who was another Revolutionary War Veteran, and the granddaughter of Elizabeth (Campbell) and James Conick, who also was a Patriot. He was wounded at the Battle of Bunker Hill, and died, July 4, 1775, in a British prison in Boston, Massachusetts. William Conick was actually born in Townsend, Massachusetts, in 1761, but in an area that in 1769 would become part of Raby, now Brookline, New Hampshire. He served in a Vermont regiment in the War and then married and settled in Cortland County, New York, where their children were born.
Betsey Conick became the stepmother of the two children born to Nancy Cammeron, and mother to seven children of her own. After the birth of all but one of their children, in 1837 Don Alonzo sold his land in Chenango County. and took his family to Seneca County, New York, where he continued teaching and farming until they moved to Kalamazoo County, Michigan in 1844. In 1856 they moved again to Illinois, and soon settled in Kankakee County, Illinois. It was about this time that family lore indicates Don Alonzo and his sons changed their name to Robinson.2 By 1863 they had resettled in Grundy County, in Felix Township, where the Don Alonzo was teaching school in Morris, Illinois. Don Alonzo would die in Morris in February, 1871. Betsey would die in 1880 at the home of her son, Charles Robinson, in Mazon Twp., Grundy County, IL.
George Robinson, the 49er
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Their son George Robinson was born November 1824 in Chenango County, New York, and he would be an ancestor to numerous Robinson families from Illinois to the Pacific coast. He was a particularly colorful personality — having caught gold fever at 24, he went to California in 1849, and stayed for about 6 years, having several adventures there, but apparently not finding his fortune, he rejoined the family in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and soon married and settled down in Illinois.
Charles Robinson, born April 12, 1835 in Chenango County, New York, was Betsey and Don Alonzo's fourth son and he is my ancestor. He moved in New York, Michigan and Illinois with his parents and was living in Grundy County, Illinois when his father died in February 1871. Charles took over his father's business at his death and about a month later, March 16, 1871, he married Elizabeth Flanders, who was living with relatives in Grundy County. She was the daughter of Aziba/Azoba/Ziba Flanders and Ruth Rebecca Holden, and had been born February 22, 1843 in Shrewsbury, Rutland County, Vermont.
Elizabeth Flanders lost her hearing as young child, possibly the result of a childhood disease, and from her obituary, “. . . she was deprived of the satisfaction of mingling in public functions, but applied herself diligently to the welfare of her family with the one thought in mind, that each should live as God intended.”
Elizabeth Flanders is a descendant of a long line of Flanders, Holdens, Lawrences, Sawtells and others back as far as the early years of the 14th Century. Some of her ancestors were living in Massachusetts when the Pilgrims arrived in 1620.
Charles and Elizabeth lived in Grundy County for about 22 years. Charles operated a livery business in Morris and owned a farm of eighty acres in Section 10 of Mazon Township. They would have eight children born in Grundy County, six lived to adulthood, one, Millicent (Millie) Robinson, was my grandmother. In the spring of 1893 apparently school chums of Millie signed her autograph album with best wishes in her new home in Iowa.
In March 1893 they moved to West Liberty, Muscatine County, Iowa with six children; Frank C. (19), Millicent Elizabeth (18), Alice Ruth (16), Cora Alfaretta (14), Clarence (Mike) (10) and Fred (Ted) (8). They rented the farm of John Miller, which was west of town in South Prairie and was adjacent to the farm of George W. Deming, two of his sons, and his latest (3rd) wife, Carrie (Rogers) [Hitchcock] Deming.
In September of 1895, George Robinson came to West Liberty from Mazon to visit his brother Charles. The younger children of Charles and Elizabeth went to school in West Liberty. To my surprise, Millicent also attended high school in West Liberty. Apparently she had not been able to complete high school in Grundy County. She graduated with the class of 1896, at age 21. During this time is probably when Millie met William Henry Deming, whom she would marry in 1899. It was also during this time that William Deming's father, George W. Deming, shot himself in the head on his neighboring farm.
Charles Robinson held a sale in West Liberty of his farm stock and equipment in March 1896, and moved into town. This sale was on the weekend after his neighbor, George Deming killed himself. Then, in 1897, when Charles finally sold his farm back in Grundy County, they bought a farm in Iowa Twp. of Cedar County, a few miles east and north of West Liberty. This area was served by the West Liberty Post Office.
Elizabeth (Flanders) & Charles Robinson, on their farm in Cedar County, Iowa.
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Charles died on the farm in 1908 and was returned to Morris, Grundy County, Illinois, to be buried in Sample Cemetery. Elizabeth Robinson lived with her children in West Liberty and tried to live alone in a house on East Sixth St. and another on North Calhoun St. She was living at the home of her daughter, Alice (Robinson) DeForest when she died in October of 1927. She too, was buried in Sample Cemetery in Morris, Grundy County, Illinois.
The six adult children of Charles and Elizabeth all married. Frank Robinson married Edna Cynthia Irwin and they had three daughters (See photo). Alice Ruth Robinson married Charles William DeForest and lived in the West Liberty area (See photo); They had no children. Cora Alfaretta Robinson married Lloyd Alton Winans and they lived in Hanna, Alberta, Canada; Portland, Oregon and Pacific Grove, California. They also had no children, Clarence (Mike) Robinson married Lula Emma Simons in 1906 and, according to my mother, they had no children. However, in the 1920 census of Washington, Iowa, a “daughter,” Ruby (Robinson) Shoemaker, age 22, and her husband, Fred Shoemaker, were living with Mike and Lula Robinson. I now believe that Ruby, born July 30, 1894, was a daughter of Lula Simons and a previous spouse, and she was probably adopted by Clarence Robinson. Fred (Ted) Robinson married Bessie Lee Knox, of eastern Tennessee, and they had two sons, Jack L. and William Robinson. Jack Robinson (who lives in British Columbia, Canada) and I recently exchanged letters, he has three daughters and eight grandchildren, his brother, William, died in 1939 at age 14. Millicent Ellizabeth was the first of the children to marry. In 1899 she married William Henry Deming, who was a son of their neighbor George Deming when they lived in South Prairie, a few miles west of West Liberty.
William Henry Deming &
Millicent Elizabeth Robinson,
their wedding day, March 8, 1899.
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William Deming and Millicent apparently lived for a while after their marriage on William's farm near West Liberty, where their first two children, Kenneth and Laura Grace were born. Early in 1903, William's brothers Charles and Walter left West Liberty to try farming in Kansas. Walter soon returned to Iowa, but Charles remained in Kansas. William and Millicent may have followed Charles to Kansas, because my mother's obituary indicates that she was born 1906 in Kansas. I now know that is incorrect because, I obtained a copy of her 1963 application for a Social Security account number and there she indicates that she was born in Knox City, Knox County, Missouri. That actually makes more sense because, William H. Deming is shown as of La Belle, Missouri, in the obituary for Charles Robinson written in 1908. La Belle is in Lewis County only a few miles east of Knox City. The family apparently moved again to Centralia, Boone County, Missouri, by 1910 when a photo was taken of their home. Their last child, Ralph William was born in 1909, probably in Centralia, Missouri.
After 1910, they moved back to the West Liberty area and resided in the Downey community, in Cedar County, just north of West Liberty, until 1920 when they moved to a farm east of Iowa City. They apparently gave up farming and soon moved into town, by 1924, when Ralph died in a hit-and-run sledding incident3, William and Millie Deming lived at 112 S. Dodge, Iowa City, Iowa. In Iowa City, William worked as storekeeper-manager of the University of Iowa stores until his retirement about 1940.
William and Millie's 2nd daughter, Hazel Leona Deming, married Alson Emmons Braley, in Iowa City in 1931. He received MD from the State University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa, 31 May 1931. I was their first child and was born December 11, 1936, in Iowa City. My father served his internship and residency at SUI, and was a prominent Ophthalmologist in Detroit, Michigan, New York City and New Jersey. My sister, Janet, was born in Detroit in 1939, and our brother William in 1941. Our father served as an MD in the Navy during World War II, and was discharged with the rank of Lt. Commander. In 1950 he returned to Iowa City, as Head of Ophthalmology Department at University Hospitals there 1950-1967. After 1967, he was in private practice in Iowa City until his retirement in 1976. He made major contributions to development of corneal transplant surgery and the creation of the national Eye Bank Network. Both he and Hazel died in 1993, he in West Branch, she in Iowa City.
From left: me, Millie, Alice (Robinson) DeForest4, Hazel (Deming) Braley holding Janet Braley, West Liberty, Iowa, Summer 1940.
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Grandma Deming (Millie) died in 1945, and about 1947, against his children's wishes, William married (no record found?) a second time to a person whom I now know was Elizabeth Miller. About 1950 William Deming began to develop a dementia that was thought to be Alzheimer's Disease and his behavior became very difficult for his children to accept. The problems became worse, and about 1957 he was placed in a nursing home in Kalona, Washington County, Iowa, where he died in 1962.
Alson Deming Braley
PS: There is another Robinson line in my ancestry; the story above is of my mother's ancestry.
My father's mother was Evelyn Emmons, and her mother was Esther Lena Robinson. Esther was the daughter of a Norwegian immigrant, Evan Roarson Naeset, who changed his name to Ivan Robinson in Minnesota sometime after 1870. In the Norwegian patronymic naming convention, he was Evan, son of Roar, of the farm/community of Naeset (his father was Roar Jensson of Naeset). Other Norwegians changed their names by adopting a form of their farm/community name, i.e. Naeset, as their surname. By Americanizing his name Ivan Robinson changed the way his descendants would be named in the future. He had 10 children, 5 of which were male and sired many Robinsons in the Minnesota, Wisconsin & Iowa area.
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- Elizabeth Ann (Horner) Gurr is a descendant of Don Alonzo Robinson and Betsey Conick through their son, George Robinson and Maryette Dickinson. Liz has been very helpful and most generous in sharing her work, the work of her sister, Nata (Horner) Garbett, and most importantly the extensive work of their father, Donald Leigh Horner, Sr., on our Robinson family line.
- The idea that Don Alonzo Robertson changed the family name to Robinson about 1856 is not borne out by the several censuses in which he appears. There is no 1810 census available for Cortland County, but the so-called 1810 Census Substitute Index has a listing for Dan A. Robertson. Both Isaac Robertson and his wife Polly Robertson had died by about 1815, and in the 1820 Census of Freetown, Cortland County, Don Alonzo is Don A. Robinson. He is either Don A. or D. A. Robinson in all following censuses; 1830 German Twp., Chenango County, New York; 1840 Tyre Twp., Seneca County, New York; 1850 Kalamazoo Twp., Kalamazoo County, MI. By the 1860 census when he is in Pilot Twp., Kankakee County, IL, he had been using the name Robinson for about 40 years.
- For more information please see my Deming Family Story: Deming
- I had originally indentified her as Ferne (Robinson) Sullivan, a niece of Millicent. However, thanks to Teresa (Enderle) Ozzello, a niece of Ferne Sullivan, who actually showed this photo to her mother, Helen Enderle, and Ferne, I now know that she is Alice Ruth (Robinson) DeForest, Millicent's sister and my mother's Aunt.
