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Clendenon Family Papers
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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
Quaker ministers Joel Swayne, Halliday Jackson, and Henry Simmons arrived in 1798 to establish a school for Native Americans at Tunesassa in Cattaraugus County, New York, which was close to the Pennsylvania border. In 1812, Robert and Elizabeth Clendenon left their farm in Drumore, Lancaster County, to answer a call for teachers at the Quaker school. They were accompanied by two daughters, Hannah and Lydia. Son Isaac had married and the other daughters either were teaching or in boarding school. After four years, Robert and Elizabeth returned to Drumore, receiving a certificate together with daughters Ann, Mira, and Lydia from Kennett Monthly Meeting to Little Britain Monthly Meeting, Lancaster County. In about 1826, they moved to Ceres on the border of Pennsylvania and New York State where daughters Hannah King and Abigail Wright had settled with their husbands.
Robert Clendenon (1756-1833) married Elizabeth Battin (1756-1833) at Center Meeting under the care of Kennett Monthly Meeting in 1779. They had twelve children, two sons and ten daughters. Phoebe, the eldest, was born in 1780 and died in 1813. Isaac (1782-1850), the only son to survive to maturity, married Mercy Maule in 1810 under the care of Radnor Monthly Meeting. Daughters Rachel (1783-1856), Sarah (1785-1879) and Elizabeth (1787-1825) became teachers and did not marry. In 1817 Hannah (1789-1861) married John King, son of Francis King, agent for the John Keating real estate group which developed McKean County. Ann (1790-1819) worked as a teacher in Hopewell, Virginia. A second son, James (1793-1795), died in childhood. Abigail (1795-1844) married Asahel Wright in 1825. Lydia (1798-1878) married Henry Chevalier (1801-1892) in 1834. Mira (1799-1875) married Thomas Bell, all of Ceres. Ceres Township, McKean County, in the Northwest corner of Pennsylvania bordering New York, had its roots end of the 18th century with the John Keating Group of investors headquartered in Philadelphia. Francis King, a Quaker from England, was hired to locate a promising property in the undeveloped region of northern Pennsylvania. His son John King (1784-1865) succeeded him at Ceres and married Hannah Clendenon in 1817. John's sister Mary married the Quaker minister Joel Swayne; they later removed to Delaware. Daughter Abigail married another early settler to the area, Asahel Wright. About 1826, Robert and Elizabeth Clendenon purchased property in Ceres, and the family attempted to establish a Quaker meeting. However, the area which was under the care of Muncy Monthly Meeting was remote from established Quaker settlements, with the nearest post office being Jersey Shore on the Susquehanna River, Pennsylvania, and the population couldn't sustain an active meeting. Lydia remained with her parents into their old age and was named the sole heir at her mother's death in 1833. The following year, she married Henry Chevalier, a Swiss immigrant who had participated in the Napoleonic Wars before emigrating to Pennsylvania. A committee of women friends from Muncy Monthly Meeting assigned to visit Friends in Ceres in 1834 reported that the Ceres meeting consisted of 25 members not including four women who had married out of unity. In 1839 Lydia Chevalier and her sister Mira both were disowned from membership for their marriages contrary to Quaker Discipline.
While too distant to participate in active Society membership, the King and Clendenon families adhered to Quaker values. They attended meeting, supported the abolition of slavery, and were said to support the Underground Railroad. Lydia and Henry Chevalier had three daughters: Jane Esther (1836-1856) who married Byron Weed; Marion (1830-1928); and Cornelia (1840-1887) who married Asabel Holcomb, a Civil War veteran. The family papers were preserved by Jane Chevalier Weed's descendants.
The collection contains correspondence, journals, and other papers of the Robert and Elizabeth Clendenon family who served as Quaker missionaries to the Native Americans in Tunesassa, Cattaraugus County, New York, in 1812-1816 and were early settlers of Ceres, McKean County, Pennsylvania. Of special note are the diary and correspondence of Robert Clendenon. The bulk of the correspondence was received by Lydia Clendenon Chevalier and includes two letters dictated by Jacob Johnson, a member of the Seneca tribe whom she met at Tunesassa. Other letters provide insight into the lives of her unmarried sisters who struggled to make a living as teachers. The letters mention family events, Quaker and anti-slavery concerns.
Also included are research material and writing compiled by Dorothy Godfrey Wayman in preparation for her articles on the Clendenon and Chevalier families.
Arranged in three series: 1. Correspondence; 2. Clendenon miscellaneous; 3. Dorothy G. Wayman research papers
It was fortuitous that Dorothy Godfrey Wayman (1893-1975), a prominent journalist and author, recognized the significance of the Clendenon papers. Raised in New England, she attended Bryn Mawr College and graduated from Boston School for Social Workers in 1914. In 1915 she married Charles Stafford Wayman. They lived in Japan through the 1923 earthquake. Separated in 1923, Wayman legally resumed her birthname but continued to use Dorothy Godfrey Wayman professionally. With her three sons, she moved to Massachusetts and worked as a journalist for the Boston Globe for 30 years. She published books and articles over her long career and retired to Olean, New York, in 1955 where she joined the staff of St. Bonaventure University. The majority of her papers are deposited in the Library of Congress, ID No.: MSS39834
In 1958, the Library at St. Bonaventure University received the gift of a autobiographical book, Lichen Tufts, published in 1860 By Elizabeth C. Wright which described a journey to the Seneca Indian reservation. The Universsity is located in Cattaraugus County, New York, near the city of Olean and the border with Pennsylvania. Notations inspired the Librarian, Dorothy Godfrey Wayman, to delve into its connection to the Clendenon and Chevalier families, prominent settlers in the area. This led her to family papers that had been saved by descendants. Wayman and the owner, Doris Butler Ronolder, became friends. Confirming their significance, Wayman researched and sorted the papers in preparation for an article and arranged for them to be microfilmed at Friends Historical Library. A version of her article was published in Quaker History in 1965. In 2020, the Clendenon papers together with Wayman's research were given to Friends Historical Library by Mary Ellen Ronolder, Doris's daughter.
Microfilm available in Friends Historical Library. Some of the Clendenon correspondence was published in Quaker History, Vol. 51, No. 1 (Spring 1962) and Vol 54, No. 1, Spring 1965.
Gift of Mary Ellen Ronolder, 2020
The papers were received in two small cartons, one loose-leaf binder and one large archival box with interleaved correspondence. The loose-leaf binder contained primarily the correspondence of the Chevalier/Butler families into the 20th century. Earlier Clendenon papers, correspondence mixed with other materials arranged probably by Dorothy Wayman with her handwritten notes, were stored flat and interleaved. The papers were not arranged in same sequence as the microfilm.
Correspondence has been sorted chronologically as Series 1. Miscellaneous papers sorted as Series 2, and Dorothy Wayman's research and related papers form Series 3.
People
Subject
- Quakers -- New York (State)
- Quakers -- Pennsylvania
- Abolitionists -- Pennsylvania
- Seneca Indians -- New York (State)
- Quaker educators
- Indians of North America -- Education
- Indians of North America -- Missions
- Seneca Indians -- Education
Place
- Publisher
- Friends Historical Library of Swarthmore College
- Finding Aid Author
- Susanna Morikawa
- Finding Aid Date
- May 2021
- Access Restrictions
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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
To "Dear Sister," from Columbiana, Ohio, where she is caring for a friend dying of consumption, hoping to teach. Includes family news.
They expressed appreciation for her letter to their "secluded situation" - their only visitors were local Native Americans. Provisions were short, and some of the men had joined the American army. In reply to their daughter's desire that they return home, Robert wrote that their work was not done. Ann was at school at Moore Hall, Harmony Grove, Chester County. The parents asked that the elder daughters look our for the younger. Fragile. Transcript Quaker History, Vol. 51, No. 1 (Spring 1962).
Shoemaker described exhilaration in Wilmington as people reacted to an American Navy's victory over the British on Lake Erie.
Elizabeth wrote that her teaching position had been eliminated, and she temporarily was teaching in Bucks County. She planned to return to Philadelphia to teach at a school for African American girls under care of Abolition Society.
Ann had visited Bradford where there was much illness. She desribed the death of her sister Phebe and the funeral. Quaker History, Vol. 51, No. 1 (Spring 1962).
Sent "Care of Sarah Janney." "Beloved niece," with words of affection and support. David Grave/Greave married Rachel Battin in 1774. She was the older sister of Elizabeth Battin Clendenon. Both she and her husband were Quaker ministers. After Rachel's death, David Grave married Ruth Cadwallader, also a minister.
He heard from Rachel Clendenon that a flood on the Brandywine had washed out mills. He reported that many Quakers families from the South had emigrated to Ohio upon advise. Few remained in Georgia and the Carolinas where is was necessary to carry arms in in fear of violence.
She wrote that she was teaching at a school for African American girls in Philadelphia and reading Paradise Lost. She wondered if John King and sister Hannah were engaged. Ann was teaching school in Hopewell, Virginia. Transcribed in Quaker History
Ann wondered if she did was not receiving letters from the family because Quakers did not support the war tax on postage. Ann was living in Virginia and lonely; she expected her parents to return to Drumore shortly. She had heard that the situation of the Native Americans had improved. Mentioned Abel Townsend, apparently suffering from a chronic illness (tuberculosis?).
His family worshipped at Pike Run Meeting (subordinate to Westland). He noted that the Yearly Meeting at which Elias Hicks and other ministers spoke was well attended. News about Pike Run Friends. He had been injured, but his wife continued her ministry.
Family news. She was attending meetings, their sister Sarah was in Philadelphia with Elizabeth, and Mira and Lydia were with their parents in Drumore.
Elizabeth wrote about her struggle to support herself and being dependent on strangers. She noted that she had an opportunity to see brother Isaac and members of the Maule family.
Includes two poems: "The Wanderer" and "A Traveler's soliloquey"
She had recently attended Yearly Meeting and was very much moved by Friends from New England and an evangelical minister from England.
Visiting family at Radnor and Frankford, she attended various Quaker meetings and noted that their business meetings were very talkative. They visited Ann Bonsall at the Asylum, other friends and family news; she noted business failures in Philadelphia.
A member of the Seneca, Johnson signed the dictated letter with his mark. He related that he no longer lived at Allegheny and had settled at Cattaraugus. He referred to Lydia as his sister and wrote that he wanted his children to be educated but many of his peers did not want white man's education. He accepted the Quaker advice against liquor. Transcribed in Quaker History.
Letter dictated to "My Friend, adopted sister," he wss living in a Quaker house at Tunesassa. Crops had failed, family members were learning skills, his son attended school of Joseph Elkinton. Johnson assured Lydia that he wanted to follow teachings of Quakers to learn white ways and that the chiefs were urging their people not to drink alcohol. He remarked that he was vaccinated. Transcribed in Quaker History
First section written by Elizabeth who was visiting family in the Philadelphia area. She mentioned attending Yearly Meeting with Mira and a meeting held at the Free Quaker meeting house where Frederic Plummer preached non-denominational Christianity. Second author mentioned Lafayette's visit and confided privately that Elizabeth had left teaching and was working at Pennsylvania Hospital
A letter to her sister in which she mentioned preachers including "our worthy Friends Elias Hicks and others" and Priscilla Hunt. She was working at Pennsylvania Hospital for the Insane and described patients under her care; she found them easier to bear than the controversies in the Society. She expressed a "liberal" view of marriage to persons not in membership. Transcribed in Quaker History
Death of her father.
Account of her trip with her brother-in-law John King from Philadelphia via Schuylkill Valley to Ceres, McKean Township
Author was identified by Dorothy Wayman as Lydia Clendenon, describing travel from Drumore to Ceres. Transcribed in Quaker History.
Addressed to Dear Friend. Teaching in Drumore but didn't like it and wanted to return to Bucks County.
Returning to Drumore, she wrote that she found it gloomier than ever with population leaving. She reported on a group of Friends moving westward to Ohio and local weddings and events.
Two handwritten letters. She mentioned president Andrew Jackson (1829-1837) and was not encouraging of Lydia's marrying. A second letter dated only 4th month.
Author was teaching, but struggled financially and with dealing with the children. She remarked on her disagreement with the more zealous missionaries and how the term "infidel" was easily bandied about.
She had been caring for sister Abigail and resumed her "old calling," caring for the sick. Also teaching and paying her debts. Attended Quaker and other denominations' services.
Addressed to "Esteemed friend" with local news, especially the death of many of the elders of the monthly meeting. Farm news and floods along the Conestoga Creek and Susquehanna River with great destruction. He supposed that Clendenon was not successful in establishing a Friends meeting, but also noted that attendance in Little Britain and Drumore meetings was declining.
Business letter in French
An update of local news to "dear friends" which included Sarah, Rebecca and Hannah Clendenon, describing wretched travel while sick from Philadelphia to Huntingdon west of Harrisburg. She visited Pittsburgh "that dirty and disagreeable city," rife with cholera. Described her treatments which included laudanum, spring waters, bleeding, application of cups.
Widowed and living with her brother-in-law John Broomell. The letter is filled with news of local Quakers and mentioned Mira and Isaac Clendenon.
Sarah asked if Lydia had married. She wrote that cholera was not much in the news which currently was focused on the Abolitionist New York riots. She noted that she found the idea of intermarriage between races to be repugnant.
To cousin with local and family news; she was caring for her mother, noted the yearly meetings
She attended Philadelphia Yearly Meeting and meetings at Muncy. Rachel expressed sympathy for Lydia's living on the frontier.
She had spent six weeks with her sister Mira and family. Rachel avidly followed articles in the abolitionist press and mentioned Lucretia Mott, noting that women were not allowed to attend London Convention. Transcript in Quaker History.
2 incomplete letters, faded. In first, the author related how Drumore had developed since Lydia moved to Ceres, including homes, a store and library which was proposed to host anti-slavery meetings. Second letter in same hand. Elizabeth Bolton, a member of Little Britain MM, was buried in Drumore.
Faded. A dense letter that listed the most prominent Abolitionists in the neighborhood. She wrote the Rachel Smith kept a free produce market, but the products were expensive. Tensions about anti-slavery activities and lectures - the Meeting did not want to be involved.
The author described her visit to Philadelphia and was especially impressed with Laurel Hill Cemetery. Visited Byberry where she commented that the public schools did not allow Black children. Commented that quietist meetings were very opposed to "modern" anti-slavery. At Byberry Meeting, she noted that John Comly was not a supporter of abolition movements and likewise elderly Quaker minisher Edward Hicks who was very frail [died 1849]. Attended abolitionist meetings and was reading abolition press.
Probably written to Lydia; author mentioned sister Abigail. She noted bloomerism and women's rights but was more interested in temperance. She wrote that Susanna Jewett spoke at Nottingham Quarterly meetings and was pro-slavery in her opinions.
A long letter in which she provided an update of many friends and family. She reminisced about attending school at R. Clendenon's in Drumore and mentioned many friends who had moved west to Ohio and Illinois.
Sarah expressed disgust with the quarreling in the Society and also the current violence and burning of property. She mentioned that Joseph and Abigail Walton were going to Cattaraugus to teach the Indians.
An update of family news including someone who was killed by the Mormons. She wrote that she understood that Lydia was an abolitionist, but she was not – she is a Colonialist and would support Blacks returning to Africa. Also, an undated fragment in same hand in which writer wrote that she thought reading abolitionist publications was a waste of time.
Farmer. He mentioned growing temperance movement
Dear cousin. She agreed with Lydia's anti-slavery sentiments and assured Lydia that she would have liked to visit the Chevaliers' log cabin in the forest.
From Mother and Nellie (sister Cornelia)
A long letter in which the author described deaths from consumption, various sectarian controversies - Methodists, New Lights, Quakers
Sarah had been staying with Lydia. The letter was completed by Lydia. She described many visitors, that their father was a road commissioner, and a newcomer to the elder's valley was an anti-slavery and temperance man. The girls were at school.
Long letter in French with typed translation. Updates on family and friends, the region of Cuorcelles, France
Traveling westward, writing a book, sending a dress. The author likely is Elizabeth C. Wright, daughter of Asahel and Abigail Clendenon Wright, who wrote Lichen Tufts from the Alleghanies, published in 1860.
At school. She wrote that any communication between the sexes was strictly forbidden.
Concerning Wise's vehement disagreement with John Quincy Adams in the U.S. House of Representatives concerning abolition. Wise was a fervent secessionist.
Anti-Slavery sentiments, reverse in French may be a poem
To Marion from Cornelia and others.
Also to Aunt Marion and miscellaneous writings
Dear children
Center Meeting. Separated on fold lines.
In French. He was born in 1801.
Birth certificate for Henri Chevalier, Swiss citizen.
Aged 56. Probably written by David Grave, Pike Run, Washington County, Pennsylvania, upon death of his first wife, Rachel Battin Grave (1751-1806?). She was the older sister of Elizabeth Battin Clendenon.
Note by Dorothy Wayman: "Robert Clendenon's Vendu of Property at Drumore, Pa. April 2, 1812 before he left with wife Elizabeth and Daughters Hannah and Lydia for Tunesassa"
Journey to Tunesassa from Frankford, Pennsylvania. See also typed transcript by Dorothy Wayman on microfilm and in Quaker History, Vol. 51, No. 1 (Spring 1962), "Quaker Pioneers in McKean County, Pennsylvania."
Includes extract from an address of the Reverend Jeremiah Hume; also "Copied for Ann Clendenon a Short account of Ruth Ann Rutter," etc. Note on back cover requesting Elizabeth to take it to town "if it gets to read," signed by L[ydia?] Clendenon. Ann died in 1819, Elizabeth in 1825.
"When little hand shall press thee," copied from Lord Byron
Fragment of Will of Elizabeth (1787-1825) with personal bequests to her parents and siblings, including to her "dear sick sister Ann." Ann died that year, Elizabeth recovered and died in 1825.
"Account of the grain raised by Asahel Wright on John King's land harvested 1826" In two parts. Also single sheet with list (of property owners?) in Glenn which includes Henry Chevalier. Transcribed in Quaker History.
"I know not by whom." Copy of Greaves account, 1822, of man who was converted to Quakerism by Priscilla Hunt.
Will of Elizabeth [Battin] Clendenon which designates daughter Lydia her sole heir. Transcript in Quaker History.
They were married in the manner of Friends, but not under care of a Quaker meeting. Witnesses include sister Mira Bee and her husband who also married outside of Quaker Discipline. Both were disowned for disunity by Muncy Monthly Meeting
Certifying his appointment to purchase property in Ceres.
Within leather wallet with small soft-cover
Collection of verse, removed from leather wallet with small soft-cover. Also undated poem in French and postmarked envelopes addressed to Mrs. H. J. Butler, Kansas, 1935
Signed Mira C
Short handwritten draft addressed to Congress of the United States. It petitioned for the immediate abolishment of slavery as well as the interstate slave trade. In support of Jonathon Walker, abolitionist, arrested for attempting in 1844 to aid the escape of slaves in Florida. Included in partial booklet with pages removed, accounts and other miscellaneous notes. [Asahel Wright?]
Purchase of a tract of land.
Concerning a farm, Ceres.
"Allies de Colombier/ 14 mars 1871"
Concerning sheep
Copy of poem Fare Thee Well, handwritten copy of a hymn, fragment of letter, essay on Josephine, wife of Napoleon; fragment
Salary adjustment, Glenn, Pennsylvania. Miscellaneous subscriptions, etc.
In an envelope addressed to Marion Chevalier, Glenn, McKean County
He was the husband of Imogene Weed, granddaughter of Jane Esther Chevalier.
Saved by R. Weed.
Notes on Clendenon and related family members. Correspondence with Doris Ronolder concerning loan of papers and with Dorothy Harris, Assistant Director of Friends Historical Library, concerning microfilming of a selection of the papers.
Release signed by Doris Butler Ronalder to Dorothy G.Wayman to copy, arrange, and publish family papers. Typed draft of article McKean County Pioneers. An edited version was published in Quaker History, Vol. 51, No. 1 (Spring 1962).
Quaker History, Vol. 51, No. 1 (Spring 1962) and Vol 54, No. 1, Spring 1965.
Draft titled "The Red Tin Box"
New York: 1860. The donation of this book was announced by St. Bonaventure Library in 1958 with an invitation to provide information about the author. This led Dorothy Wayman, Librarian, to the book's connection with the Clendenon family. The frontispiece of the book is inscribed "To my dear little cousin Marion Chevalier with the love of Lib." Elizabeth was the daughter of Asahel and Abigail Clendenon Wright and a poet. The book is a collection of nature essays and poetry.
A history of the settlement and development of Ceres established by Francis King as an agent for John Keating. Written by a granddaughter
Cartes de visite and tintypes, only a few labeled: Ethel Holcomb, Aunt Sara Clendenon, Eliza King, Elizabeth Wright, Harry Holcomb, Julian Holcomb and presumably Asahel Holcomb, veteran of the Civil War in dress uniform. Asahel Holcomb married Cornelia Chevalier (1840-1887), youngest daughter of Lydia Clendenon and Henry Chevalier.
Cartes-de-visit of Henry and Lydia Clendenon Chevalier, tintype of Marion Chevalier and reproduction pphotograph. In family's oral history, the Red Tin Box (used to store the letters and documents) was brought to America by Henry Chevalier.
Includes a story about Lydia Clendenon Chevalier written by one of her descendants.
Includes announcement of the donation of the book "Lichen Tufts from the Alleghenies" and obituaries of Dorothy G. Wayman.