HOOPES Family data

HOOPES, ENGBERG, POWNALL, WORRILAW, SMEDLEY, WILLIAMSON, BANE, THORNBERRY, ROOT, MONTGOMERY

Posted By: Joey Stark
Date: 6/4/2006 at 10:27:00

Letter dated Mar. 3 (13? 23?), 1964, from Mrs. Beulah M. ENGBERG, 1519 Lincoln Blvd., Beatrice, Nebr., granddaughter of Charles HOOPES.

She states that the early part of the HOOPES Family data was secured from the Bucks County, Pa., Historical Society at Doylestown, Pa.. "The rest of it is largely taken from material sent to my mother some fifteen years ago by her cousin, Warner Ellis HOOPES, son of Oliver T. HOOPES. Cousin Warner obtained part of his information from Darlington HOOPES, a well-known lawyer and former legislator of Reading, Pa.. The rest he secured from old family records he found in the home of his parents in Fairfield, after the death of his sister, Hattie HOOPES."

Joshua HOOPES, son of John and Isabel HOOPES of Moorsom, was born in Skelton, Cleaveland, Yorkshire, England. The date of his birth is not known, but an older brother, Robert, was born August 18, 1639. It is thought that Joshua was born a year or two later. He also had a brother Tobias.

Parish records at Skelton show that Joshua (Josias) HOOPES was married first to Ann (An), May 15, 1670. They had four children:

--Daniel HOOPES, baptized May 27, 1672
--Mary (Marey) HOOPES, baptized Mar. 22, 1674
--Margaret HOOPES, baptized Sept. 24, 167(5)
--Christian HOOPES, baptized April 28, 1677.

The first wife, Ann, died and was buried Oct. 20, 1678.

On May 1, 1679, Joshua HOOPES married Isabel (Esbil). He and this wife and his three remaining children (Mary had died and was buried July 16, 1674) came to America in the ship Providence of Scarborough, England, Robert Hopper, master, and arrived in the Delaware River on Sept. 10, 1683. They are believed to have disembarked at Havre de Grace, Maryland. They settled in Makefield Twp., Bucks Co., Penn., and became members of Falls Monthly Meeting of Friends.

The youngest child, Christian, died Feb. 15, 1684, and the second wife, Isabel, died Mar. 20, 1691. Two years later, Joshua HOOPES, according to the Quaker records, married a third time, this wife being Eleanor POWNALL. The wedding took place Nov. 20, 1693.

Joshua was a member of the Provincial Assembly from 1686-1697 inclusive and from 1700-1709 inclusive and again in 1711.

Joshua HOOPES' son Daniel was later given one half of the paternal farm in Makefield, Bucks Co., but he migrated to Chester Co., Penn.. There he bought, on Oct. 5, 1697, one hundred acres of land from Thomas Rouse, who had previously received this land on a patent from William Penn. On May 10, 1697, Daniel HOOPES married Jane WORRILAW. As Daniel HOOPES prospered and his family increased in numbers, he gradually bought more land, all adjacent to his original one hundred acres, until he eventually owned 636 acres of land all in one tract. Much of the present city of West Chester, Penn., is built on land that was a part of the large farm of Daniel HOOPES.

After some years, Daniel HOOPES built a two-story stone house on his original 100 acres of land. As the number of children in his family increased, he built a large addition to his home, completing it in 1740. The sturdy stone house, with heavy beamed ceilings and a huge fireplace which will hold a ten-foot log, still stands and is in use today. The roof was put together with wooden pins, as no nails were available. Wooden pegs in the walls were used for hanging clothes. The house is surrounded by huge old trees that are sturdy and strong like the house. Since Daniel and Jane HOOPES had 17 children, they needed a large, sturdy house. As their sons grew up and married, Daniel built a stone house (smaller than his own) for each one on some part of his large estate.

The original Daniel HOOPES house, known as the old HOOPES homestead, descended from father to son continuously until the last male descendant of that line died in 1906. His wife inherited the house, but upon her death in 1908, the place went to her brother whose last name was SMEDLEY. Descendants of the 17 children of Daniel and Jane HOOPES are very numerous, however, and many of them still live in Chester Co., Penn.. After the old HOOPES homestead passed out of the HOOPES family, an association of the HOOPES clan was made which held an annual meeting at the old family home site. These meetings seem to have been discontinued with the out-break of World War II.

Nathan HOOPES was the fourteenth child of Daniel and Jane (WORRILAW) HOOPES. He was born Jan. 16, 1718, and died Feb. 19, 1803. In 1737, Nathan HOOPES married Margaret WILLIAMSON. A son of this couple was Daniel, born in 1741. In 1762, this Daniel married Elizabeth BANE. The last named couple had a son, Ellis HOOPES, born in 1778. In 1803, Ellis HOOPES married a girl not of the Quaker faith and for this offense he was thrown out of that church.

Ellis HOOPES and wife migrated to Monroe Co., Ohio, and settled near the small town of Beallsville. One of their children, a son named Eli, married Eliza THORNBERRY, also of Monroe Co., Ohio. Eli HOOPES was born Sept. 23, 1808, and his wife, Eliza, was born Jan. 31, 1808. They were married on Dec. 16, 1830.

In 1850, Eli and Eliza HOOPES migrated to Jefferson Co., Iowa, and settled a few miles northeast of Fairfield on a farm. They had the following children, all born in Ohio before they came to Iowa, but reared in Iowa:

--Elizabeth Ann ("Lib").......born Dec. 18, 1831
--Mary Jane.........................born Aug. 15, 1833
--Margaret ("Mag").............born Aug. 24, 1834
--Oliver T. ("Ol")..................born Dec. 24, 1836
--William Harrison ("Tip")..born Mar. 24, 1839
--John Tyler.........................born Feb. 1, 1841
--Henry Clay........................born July 28, 1843
--Ezra Dow..........................born Nov. 9, 1844
--Harriet Rebecca ("Hat")..born Aug. 12, 1846
--Charles.............................born May 24, 1848

(Note: Charles HOOPES and his first wife were the parents of one daughter, Nellie Ivy HOOPES, born Oct. 16, 1869; m. Dec. 31, 1887, Victor Arthur ROOT; d. Dec. 7, 1931. Nellie Ivy and her husband, and their three daughters are all buried in Evergreen Cemetery, Fairfield, Iowa.)

--continuing information from Mrs. ENGBERG: "My grandfather, Charles HOOPES, married secondly his cousin, Mary E. THORNBERRY, who had come from Ohio as a young woman to teach school in Iowa. They had five children:

--Myrtle Iva, born in 1875, died one week later
--Fred Clifford, born Jan. 29, 1877, died in 1908
--Bessie Beatrice, born May 18, 1878, died Feb., 1902
--Junia Etta (my mother), born May 4, 1880 (still living Mar. 23, 1964)
--Charles Merton, born Mar. 18, 1888, lives in Calif.

My mother married Dr. William Perry MONTGOMERY on May 4, 1899. So this roughly traces my descent from the old immigrant, Joshua HOOPES, who came to America in 1683."

*Transcribed for genealogy purposes; I have no relation to the person(s) mentioned.