Main content

Roberts Family Genealogical Papers,

Notifications

Held at: Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College [Contact Us]500 College Avenue, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania 19081

This is a finding aid. It is a description of archival material held at the Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College. Unless otherwise noted, the materials described below are physically available in their reading room, and not digitally available through the web.

Overview and metadata sections

Call Number:
RG5.131
Repository:
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Extent:
0.25 linear ft. (2 boxes (and 2 bound volumes))
Language:
English
Preferred Citation:
[Indicate the cited item or series here], Roberts Family Genealogical Papers, RG 5/131, Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Date:
1864-1918 (inclusive)
Creator:
Roberts, Charles, 1846-1902, Roberts, Lucy Branson Longstreth, 1856-1936, and Cope, Gilbert
Form:
genealogies (histories)
Abstract:
This collection consists of unpublished books and papers compiled by Charles and Lucy Roberts on the descendants of Robert Cadwalader of Wales and his children who came to America, settled in Gwynedd Township, and took the surname Roberts. After the death of Charles Roberts in 1902, his widow, Lucy Roberts, hired Gilbert Cope to continue the compilation and put it in useful order with the intention of publication. Cope had family group sheets bound into two large volumes, which he called "Book A" and "Book B", and these form the bulk of this collection. The remainder of the collection consists of related books, notes, papers, and correspondence.

The Roberts family represented in this collection were descendants of Robert Cadwalader of Wales and his children who came to America, settled in Gwynedd Township, and took the surname Roberts.

Charles Roberts (1846-1902) was a Philadelphia Orthodox Quaker who collected genealogical material relating to his family. After his death, his widow, Lucy Longstreth Roberts, hired Gilbert Cope, the noted Quaker genealogist, to put it into useful order with the intention of publication. Individual genealogical forms were compiled, but the work was never published.

Lucy (Branson) Longstreth Roberts was born in 1856 and was a life-long member of Philadelphia Monthly Meeting for the Western District (Orthodox), also known as Twelfth Street MM. She taught in the First Day School and was a founder of the Women's Foreign Missionary Society, which later became the Mission Board of the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting. She was a president of the Friends Historical Association and was active in the Friends' Library, formerly on 16th Street in Philadelphia.

In 1880 she married Thomas Kimber Longstreth, a graduate of Haverford College and also a member of Twelfth Street Meeting. They had one child, William Collins Longstreth, born in 1882. Thomas K. Longstreth died in 1883. Lucy's second marriage, to Charles Roberts, took place at Twelfth Street MM in November 1892. Charles died in 1902, and Lucy Roberts died in 1936.

This collection contains genealogical material on the Roberts family, descended from Robert Cadwalader of Wales and his children who came to America and settled in Gwynedd Township, using the surname Roberts. Family group sheets were collected into two bound volumes by Gilbert Cope. The remainder of the collection consists of two boxes containing duplicate group sheets, related correspondence, family memorabilia, and loose genealogical notes.

The collection has been divided into four series:

  1. Genealogy
  2. Correspondence
  3. Memorabilia
  4. Pictures

Donor: Frank H. Longstreth and W. Thacher Longstreth, 1982

The collection was given by the grandsons of Lucy (Branson) Longstreth Roberts. The papers were discovered in 1981 in the former carriage house of her home, by her grandson, Frank H. Longstreth, and given to the Library by him and his brother, W. Thacher Longstreth, in 1982.

Processed by FHL staff. Formerly cited as Roberts Papers.

The following materials, originally part of the collection, have been removed and recatalogued:

  1. Descendants and Ancestors of George DeCou and Margaret Haskell Daniels DeCou, compiled by Frances Branson deCou, printed West Hartford, CT. Sept. 1, 1970. Catalogued in book catalogue.
  2. Copies of pictures originally published in Historical Collections of Gwynedd, by Howard M. Jenkins, 1884 edition, and Welsh Founders of Pennsylvania, by Thomas Allen Glenn, 1911. They are oversize, and have been removed to oversize picture files. Pictures include: Plymouth Meeting House; "Coed-Y-Foel", home of Edward Foulke near Bala, Wales, from which he moved to Pennsylvania, 1698 (2 copies); Residence of Joseph Roberts (restored), near Gwynedd, Pa. (2 copies); Cadwalader Roberts (1777-1871); Charles Roberts (1784-1845) (2 copies); Elihu Roberts (1813-1885) (2 copies); Solomon W. Roberts (1811-1882) (2 copies)

People
Subject

Publisher
Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
Finding Aid Author
FHL staff
Finding Aid Date
1983
Sponsor
Encoding made possible by a grant by the Gladys Kriebel Delmas Foundation to the Philadelphia Consortium of Special Collections Libraries
Access Restrictions

Collection is open for research.

Use Restrictions

Friends Historical Library believes all of the items in this collection to be in the Public Domain in the United States, and is not aware of any restrictions on their use. However, the user is responsible for making a final determination of copyright status before reproducing. See http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0/.

Collection Inventory

"Book A" and "Book B," large bound volumes, not boxed.
Box 1
Collection administrative correspondence, original checklist.
Box 1
Duplicate copies of family group sheets as bound in Books A and B.
Box 1
Notes on Roberts family, ca. 1864.
Box 1
Scope and Contents

By Charles Roberts, born 1784, grandfather of the compiler. Copied by Charles Roberts.

Genealogy of Robert Cadwalader in Wales, by Thomas Allen Glenn, 1909.
Box 1
Scope and Contents

Includes related correspondence

Coat of Arms of Roberts family,.
Box 1
Scope and Contents

Includes brief biography of Charles Roberts.

Physical Description

small copy

Loose genealogical notes on a variety of families allied with the Roberts line.
Box 2
Physical Description

folder

Printed genealogy of the Roberts family.
Box 2
Scope and Contents

Taken from Howard M. Jenkin' Historical Collections Relating to Gwynedd, 1884 edition.

Physical Description

paper bound copy

Latin exercise book of Charles Roberts with the genealogy of the Woodnutt family of New Jersey in the middle pages.
Box 2
Physical Description

bound ledger

Loose sheets with lists of parents and children.
Box 2
Physical Description

in folder

Loose family group sheets.
Box 2
Physical Description

in folder

Clippings, obituaries.
Box 2

Letters to Charles Roberts, 1881-1900, and n.d.
Box 2
Letters to Lucy B. Roberts, 1918 and n.d.
Box 2
Scope and Contents

re: Branson and Antrim families.

Fragment of letter to "Dear Sister", written from Pittsburgh during the presidency of James Buchanan, 1856-1860.
Box 2
References to letters between Gilbert Cope and Lucy B. Roberts concerning this collection.
Box 2
Scope and Contents

Actual letters are part of the Cope Collection at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania.

Radnor Monthly Meeting Minutes relating to the marriage of Cadwalader Roberts and Ellin Humphrey, 1714.
Box 2
Physical Description

ms. copy

"A dream drempt the 10th of the 8th month 1800 by Edward Roberts in the twenty ninth year of his age.".
Box 2
Physical Description

manuscript

Card announcing the marriage of Charles H. Roberts and Mary Armstrong, 1897.
Box 2
Blueprint plan of Roberts Hall, Haverford College.
Box 2
Scope and Contents

This building was constructed in 1902 in memory of Charles Roberts.

Certificate of marriage, for William C. Longstreth and Nella Thatcher Cameron, Washington, D.C., 4/21/1917.
Box 2
Memorial Minutes of First Presbyterian Church of Germantown, on death of William Morris Longstreth, a Ruling Elder., 12/13/1918.
Box 2
Advertisement for a debenture bond in Philadelphia.
Box 2
Lists of addresses.
Box 2

Gwynedd Meeting House.
Box 2
Job. Roberts (1757-1851).
Box 2
Charles Roberts (1784-1845).
Box 2
Joseph Foulke (1786-1863).
Box 2
Solomon W. Roberts (1811-1882).
Box 2

Print, Suggest