GROSENORS' GLENN

July 28, 2012

 

This entry deals with our ancestors in Connecticut and Vermont and the circumstances of their immigration to Ilinois. There was John (17) born in 1711 in Pomfret Ct and his son John (18) born in 1733 also in Pomfret. John(18) married Abigail Davis and they had four children and then Abigail died. John then maried Mollie Lee. They had five more children. Number 7 in the family was John (19) and number 9, the youngest, was our ancestor Parker (19). Around this time a rift developed between father and son, about which I know nothing. John (18) took his children and wife Molly Lee and moved to Windsor, Massachusetts, and later to Wethersford Vermont. In 1804 John (17) died. He left a goodly estate but ruled his son, John(18), out of his will leaving land, instead, to his grandsons John (19) and our ancestor, Parker(19) (These were brothers). When the old man died his son John (18) returned to Pomfret, where he found out he had been left out of the will, but he sold the land by forging his sons' names. The sons, Parker and John, now grown, were notified they had inherited so they traveled to Pomfret to see their inheritance and found another man living on the property. They beat him up and ejected him. He called the law on them and they wound up in the slammer. The forgery came to light. The boys sued their dad, won the case, and with cash in their pockets headed for the frontier in Kaskaskia, Illinois. John took some other feller's wife with him when he left! John (19) remained in the Kaskaskia area, prospered, and became a judge. The brothers both signed the petition which resulted in the separation of Illinois from Indiana and established Kaskaskia as the capital. The first Ilinois State Capital "building" was the upstairs rooms over Fisher's Tavern.

John Grosvenor later bought that building. Parker(19) teamed up with William Boone (Daniel Boone's nephew) and they became the first settlers in what is now Jackson County , Illinois. Be sure to read Parker(19)'s bio on Findagrave...and leave him a flower.