Tombstone Tuesday - the Silliman Siblings

GEORGE, son of J.W. & H.M SILLIMAN, DIED Aug 22, 1863

Two weeks ago, while searching for additional Civil War documents associated with my g2grandfather, Jervis Silliman, I discovered he had been married with a family prior to marrying my g2grandmother.  He had a wife and four children, two of whom died in childhood.

The first census record I could find for the family was the 1860 census, which showed Jervis and Harriet (Bartlett) (listed as Julia on the record, for some reason) living next door to Marvel and Eunice (Bartlett) Hayford, Harriet's sister and brother-in-law in Rockford, Wright County, Minnesota.  Harriet had two children at that time, Ida, age 5, born in New York; George, age 4, was listed as being born in Illinois. 


On the 1865 census, George is not listed, but Ida appears again, as do two other daughters, Nettie and Lydia.  In 1870, only Ida and Nettie are still shown on the census.  In 1875, Jervis is living in Rockford at Roberts' Public House with no family at all.  Ida married in the fall of 1870, and, as it turns out, Harriet divorced Jervis in 1873, and moved to Litchfield, Meeker County, where Marvel and Eunice had relocated, taking Nettie with her.

LYDIE E., Dau of J.W. & H.M. SILLIMAN, DIED Oct. 3, 1866, Aged 1 yr 10 m

Elmwood Cemetery is a small but active cemetery in the center of Rockford.  When the cemetery first opened, most families purchased lots, which contained 8 plots each.  George and Lydie must have been among the first to be buried there.  Their big sister Ida and her husband, William Frederick are buried several rows over, along with William's first wife, and their daughter Ione and Ione's husband Floyd H. McCrory.  The cemetery records show that in 1944, Ione deeded the other 6 plots in Jervis's lot back to the cemetery, and paid for permanent upkeep of George and Lydie's graves.  In addition, she paid for permanent upkeep of the Frederick family plot.