JOHN WILMOT & SARAH MILTON

The last known Wilmot ancestor of Clifford Roy Wilmot is John Wilmot. He was born in England about 1790. I have not found a birth or christening record for him, but there are two places of birth mentioned for him. One is Middlesex, London, England and the other is Spondon, a city of Derby. Spondon, Derby and Middlesex, London are over 160 km's away from each other. There is an LDS FHL film for the Spondon Church of England records for the time period so I will have to order that one. Maybe John Wilmot's parents are only a film away. It is much more difficult to narrow down if and where in Middlesex John could have been born.

It's said that as a young man he worked for the British Navy as a carpenter and finally settled near Kingston, Upper Canada in Pittsburgh Township where he became a farmer. I think it must have been very difficult to farm the land in that area. There is not much top soil and underneath it is very rocky. To get to the dirt, he would have first had to remove a lot of trees. This old fence is near the original Wilmot / Milton land along Highway #2 (originally called the Front Road) in what was Pittsburgh Township.

 1819 John married Sarah Milton. It's not clear where John & Sarah were married. Their marriage day, month and year were not recorded, only their names, his profession of carpenter in the dockyard and her last name. The entry following theirs is from December 1819 so it's safe to assume that they were married before then. John and Sarah's marriage is recorded in the dockyard register of the Anglican Church records in Kingston. I asked the archivist at the Anglican Church Diocese, and she didn't know if the dockyard registered meant they were married on a ship or near the dockyard, or if they were married in the church in Kingston and  a separate register was kept for the dockyard workers. Sarah was the daughter of Thomas Milton and Mehetabel. Since I know who Sarah's parents were I will write more on her family in a different blog entry.

John obtained land from his father-in-law at Lot 4 Concession 1 of Pittsburgh Township. It appears that he had a narrow strip of land just north of the St. Lawrence river, but did not own the land right next too the river. I'm not sure if this is the land that was called Springfield farm, but I do know that the Wilmot's farm was called that at some point.

Their family began shortly after their marriage. Their children were born and baptized on the following dates:

15 Nov 1820 Ann Wilmot baptism 10 Dec 1820 at St. James in Kingston

abt 1822 Edward Wilmot baptism 12 Jan 1823 at St. James in Kingston

22 Sep 1826 Henry Wilmot baptism 22 Oct 1826 at St. James in Kingston

24 Feb 1829 John Wilmot baptism unknown

15 Oct 1831 Sarah Jane Wilmot baptism 13 Nov 1831 at St James in Kingston

abt 1835 Nathanael Wilmot baptism unknown

Just because I don't know the baptisms of John and Nathanael doesn't mean they aren't recorded; we only had a short time in the Anglican Diocese and with all the information to look at we probably missed some members of the families. Unfortunately John is my direct line, so I wish I would have got that date.

The family events are as follows:

 3 Feb 1834 Just two and one half years old daughter, Sarah Jane, dies and is buried in the Milton Cemetery. I don't know from what.

11 Jan 1836 Sarah Milton dies. I think this must have been devastating to this family since the oldest child was barely 15 years old and the youngest was just a baby. Based on the dates, it's possible she died in childbirth with Nathanael.

7 Apr 1838 John remarries to a woman named Elizabeth. On the marriage record her name is Elizabeth Stewart and she's also a widow. I don't know what her maiden name is or if she had any children from her previous marriage. Through correspondence with a descendant of John Wilmot through his daughter Ann, who still lives in Kingston, Elizabeth's maiden name could have been Priest. I don't know when she died but I assume it was before the 1851 census since John is a widow at that time. 

10 May 1842 Ann marries John McLean. They had 10 children:

• 1844 Sarah J
  
• 1845 John William
  
• 1847 Daniel
  
• 1849 Mary Anne
  
• 1852 Margaret
  
• 1854 Elizabeth Ann
  
• 1857 Rose Isabella
  
• 1859 Agnes Emily
  
• 1861 Nathaniel Henry
  
• 1866 Ann Frances
  

abt 1846 Edward marries Eliza Jane Boyd. They had three children:

• abt 1848 John
  
• abt 1851 Sarah Ann
  
• abt Jan 1853 James Boyd
  

12 Jan 1850 Henry marries Ann Ferguson Graham. They had eight children:

• 21 Oct 1850 Isabella McNabb
  
• 8 Apr 1853 Peter Graham
  
• 18 Jul 1855 John Alexander
  
• 4 Oct 1857 Edward  Francis
  
• 19 Apr 1860 Henry Fredrick
  
• 28 Jul 1864 Joseph Nathaniel
  
• 20 Mar 1867 William Albert
  
• 19 Sep 1870 George Lewis
  

Henry was the most famous of all the Wilmot's being an M.P.P. for Frontenac County. He helped abolish tolls for the roads in the Township of Pittsburgh. He was a member of the Kingston Field Battery. He had extensive farming operations and this is a picture of his farm from the book Illustrated Historical Atlas of the Counties of Frontenac, Lennox and Addington, Ontario. I believe this farm would have been along the Abbey Dawn Road. It was said of him that he had some of the finest horses in the Dominion.

20 Jun 1853 John Wilmot dies and is buried with his wife, Sarah, and their daughter Sarah Jane in the Milton Cemetery.

1 May 1854 Edward's wife, Eliza dies and is buried with their young son, James, in the Cataraqui United Church Cemetery.

2 Nov 1854 Edward remarries to Mary Elizabeth Franklin. They had seven children:

• abt 1855 William James
  
• abt 1857 Marion Elizabeth
  
• 11 Sep 1860 Henry Franklin
  
• 15 Oct 1862 Ada Victoria
  
• abt 1865 Florence Catharine
  
• abt 1869 Margaret Julia
  
• 3 Mar 1869 Mary Sophia
  

abt 1855 Nathanael marries Frances Augusta Patterson. Since it appears that her birthplace is New York, I would not be surprised to find they were married there, however I haven't tried to discover that. They had six children:

• abt 1858 Emily Anne
  
• abt 1862 Caroline
  
• abt 1864 Sarah Catharine
  
• abt 1869 Frances Louisa
  
• abt 1873 John Edwin
  
• abt 1877 Isabel MacDonald
  

abt 1857 John Wilmot (Junior) marries Ann Ross Dunlop. Since they are my direct line details of their life can be read in a separate post.

1 Jul 1888 Henry dies and is buried in the Milton Cemetery. I believe he was still serving as an M.P.P. at the time.

22 Oct 1890 John dies and is buried in the Milton Cemetery.

6 Apr 1897 Edward dies and is buried in the Cataraqui Cemetery.

26 Jan 1898 Ann dies and is buried in the Milton Cemetery.

10 Sep 1900 Nathanael Wilmot dies and is buried in the Cataraqui Cemetery.

6 Jan 1903 Ann's husband, John McLean dies and is buried in the Milton Cemetery.

9 Jun 1905 Edward's wife, Mary Elizabeth dies and is buried in the Cataraqui Cemetery.

18 Mar 1911 John's wife, Ann Dunlop, dies and is probably buried in the Cataraqui Cemetery.

31 Dec 1919 Henry's wife, Ann dies. I don't know where she is buried.

2 Jul 1834 Nathanael's wife, Frances, dies and is buried in the Cataraqui Cemetery.

Through a contact I have in Kingston, she let me know that a man in Kingston was researching the Wilmot family for a publication for the Kingston OGS. He sent me the following that I believe is from a book called Representative Canadians A Cyclopedia of Canadian Biography being chiefly men of the time. Edited by George Maclean Rose, Rose Publishing Co., Toronto, 1886. It was an article primarily written about John & Sarah's son, Henry Wilmot but it has some details about John & Sarah as well.

John Wilmot "came to Canada about 1812, and settled near Kingston in 1821, after having served a long term of years in the Royal navy, and he was engaged in the battles of Anholt and Coppenhagen, under Admiral Nelson. Mrs. [Sarah Milton] Wilmot was a descendant of that illustrious line to which Milton the poet belongs. Mr. Wilmot was on board the man-of-war which towed the Chesapeake and Shannon, after their famous battle, into Halifax."

Interesting details but now the hard part is to to try and prove it. It would seem that the battle of Anholt was between the British and the Danes in 1811. John would have been in his early 20's. So it's possible that he was there.

There are two Battle of Copenhagen articles on the Wikipedia website. One was in 1801 and one was in 1807. Based on John's birth year of 1789, it would make more sense if he was in the 1807 battle but I suppose it's possible that a 12-year-old was working on a ship in 1801. The only reference I find to an Admiral Nelson is in the 1801 battle but that doesn't mean there wasn't an Admiral Nelson in the 1807 battle. The battle of Copenhagen was also between the British and the Danes.

The famous battle of the Chesapeake and Shannon happened in 1813. There is a lot of information on this battle; it seems to be a significant event in the war of 1812 with a song written about the battle. I need to find out what types of records remain from the British Navy and perhaps I can find a record of John Wilmot being involved in these Battles.

I've looked into the genealogy of  John Milton, the poet. His only son died when the child was a year old, so I don't think that Sarah Milton descended from Milton the poet. But after re-reading the quote, it doesn't say she descends from Milton the Poet, but from the same family line. Perhaps that means Sarah Milton descended from John Milton's only surviving brother, Christopher, who appears to have sons and who's descendants are "traceable into the 18th century." Only time will tell.

I'm not sure of the timeline but apparently John McLean (husband of Ann Wilmot) wrote a small blurb in his family bible. I obtained a copy of this blurb while in Kingston. It's a typed transcription of what was in the bible. "The Wilmots are descended from the Duke of Rochester & the Milton's can be traced back to Milton the Poet". It's not clear if John McLean made this statement or the descendants of John & Ann are responsible for this. It also says that the "Wilmots were United Empire Loyalists and awarded 160 acres of land; Sarah Milton Wilmot got her share." And it ends with "This is according to Henry Nathaniel McLean & Mrs D. McLean."

Now, I'm pretty sure that John Wilmot wasn't a United Empire Loyalist since he wasn't born in 1775 but perhaps I need to do some more research on what a UEL was. I've also checked who belongs to the title Duke of Rochester. There are two Wilmot's that belongs to the title of Earl of Rochester, but no duke. The first Earl's name was Henry and the second Earl's name (Henry's son) was John.

It's also interesting that this seperate article talks about Milton the Poet. It does not say that Milton is an ancestor, but that the family line can be traced back that far.