A Confusing Ancestry?

Compiled by Don R. Hender



   Some have asked and wondered just how it is that the 'Peter' family would marry so dominantly into the Thomas Hender family of Altarnun. Here is a simplied? pedigree which should help to answer that question. When studied, it well be found that cousins and even inlaws, distant as they may be, are still just family.




Arthur Peter = Mary Stanton                          John Luskey = Mary
b 1644c      | b 1648c                                           |
     ________|                   ________________________________|
    |                           |                                |
John Peter = Rebecca Isaac  John Luskey = Elizabeth Reed  Richard Luskey = Joan Crabb  Thomas Hender = Agnes Evan(s)
b 1671     | b 1672         b 1654      | m 1699          b 1655         | m 1696      b 1662c       | m 1692
     ______|___________________         |____                 ___________|                  _________|
    |                          |             |               |                             |
John Peter=Susannah Daw  Arthur Peter(s)=Mary Luskey  William Luskey=Mary Barriball  Thomas Hender=Elizabeth Northy
1696      |b 1698        b 1703c         b 1704       b 1699        |b 1698          b 1696c      |m 1727
       ___|___________________________                              |_____________               _|
      |                               |                                           |             |
      |                          Edward Peter = Christiana Dingley           Grace Luskey = John Hender
      |                          b 1727       | b 1727c                      b 1730       | b 1733
Richard Peter=Elizabeth Turner        ________|                            _______________|____________
b 1738       |m 1778                 |                                    |                            |
             |                   John Peter = Elizabeth Marten*    Thomas Hender = Sarah Adams  William Hender**
             |                   c20Nov1761 | b 1766c              b 1755        | b 1753
     ________|_________________    Will     |____________                ________|_________
    |                          |                         |              |        |         |
John Peter=Mary Hender  Richard Peter=Grace Hender  Jenny Peter = Thomas Hender  |  William Hender = Elizabeth Rowe
b 1779     b 1779       b 1782        b 1781        b 1796        c27Apr1783     |  b 1788         |
m 9/1803       |                           |                      m July 1817    |                 |              
               |___________________________|_____________________________________|         (My Hender Family)

    Color Key: cousin  uncle/aunt  mainline family

(* Elizabeth Marten is the daughter of John Marten and Elizabeth Hender, which Elizabeth Hender is in turn the
 daughter of Thomas Hender and Joan Reed. And that family is descended from the Hender family of North Hill who
 were likely 'cousins' of the Hender family of Altarnun. Thomas Hender Peter, the son of John Peter and Elizabeth
 (Hender) Marten, was Jenny Peter's brother. Yes Thomas Hender's wife's brother was Thomas Hender Peter because
 his mother was a Hender of North Hill.

** This William Hender was ancestor to William Hender and William Bury Hender, surgeons and doctors-MD, see link.)

John Hender Married Jenny Peter

Note: In parting this already 'confusing pedigree' we should note that Jenny Peter the daughter of Richard Peter and Elizabeth Turner, was christened 11 February 1798. There was another brother named John Hender, also a son of Thomas Hender and Sarah Adams. Sometines he becomes confused by the fact that there was a John Hender of Altarnun, at least he was buried at Altarnun, age 24. That John Hender was not John Hender the son of Thomas Hender and Sarah Adams but in fact the son of Edward Hender and Elizabeth Willcock, whose baptism was 1 February 1795. It was John Hender son of Edward Hender with the burial date of 10 October 1819 and age of 24 at the time, which would make his birth to be 1795 (1819-24=1795). The John Hender son of Thomas Hender and Sarah Adams was christened 23 November 1785, a seeming exact 10 years difference than the other John Hender who had died and was buried in October 1819. The first wife of John Hender, son of Thomas Hender, has not been identified, but she is alluded to in the marriage entry of John Hender, widower and Sadler, married to Jenny Garland Nee Peter, who is shown and explained as a 'widow' named Jenny Garland but with her father thereon being named as 'Richard Peter' on the 6 August 1840 record of North Hill.

And thus it was that John Hender, son of Thomas Hender and Sarah Adams, completed the four corner hat trick of the Hender family siblings who married a 'Peter' by turning it into a 'foursome'. As he married Jenny Garland nee Peter in August 1840. So one would expect they might, him and his wife, to be on the 1841 census, and atually you do where the census recorded has recorded, John Hender as the Sadler as listed on the marriage entry and Jenny is there but in bit of disquise as her name is given as 'Jane' rather than 'Jenny' as one of the common 'nicknames' for the Jenny. Whether Jenny or Jane is the 'proper' given name, th other can be the nickname of the other. On that census their 'one couple' household has 3 servants listed.

But age and fortunes change and by the 1851 census, where Jenny appears as Jenny the wife John Hender, he is listed as 'Pauper/Late Sadler'. All in all they are living in 'Pollyphant of Lewanick', are consistant residence on marriage and both census records of reference. Of course they were both of 'full age' on the marriage entry, listed as 50 and 40 respetively on the 'rounded down' 1841 census and as ages 65 and 53, which match their christening dates of 1785 and 1798 respectively. And it is this now Jenny Hender, 2nd wife of her 2nd husband, John Hender, who is the prolonged living Jenny Hender that continues to appear in various census decade records.


We Are Family

Keep people on a island and confined to the same county, they will begin to marry those who are their own cousins whether distant or near. Such is the case of the four Hender siblings, Grace, Mary, John and Thomas; they all marry a member of the Peter family who is of some relationary cousin to them already in one way or another. Trace the lines and see.

While no current ties are known between Elizabeth Reed the wife of John Luskey my 8th great uncle, and Joan Reed, the wife of Thomas Hender of North Hill, it is certain that my 7th great grandfather was cousin to Mary Luskey who married 'first' into the Peter family as wife of Arthur Peter. Some genealogists make the Hender-Peter marriages of the three children of Thomas Hender and Sarah Adams, that is Mary Hender, Grace Hender, and Thomas Hender into the same Peter family of Richard Peter and Elizabeth Turner, but that just is not correct. The will of John Peter confirms that Thomas Hender did not marry the Jenny Peter, daughter of Richard Peter. As stated in John Peter's will, his daughter Jenny Peter was the wife of Thomas Hender. Thus the Hender children of Thomas Hender and Sarah Adams married into two separate though related Peter families, the family of Richard Peter and Elizabeth Turner furnishing the two brothers John and Richard Peter who married Mary and Grace Hender, and then the daughter of John Peter and Elizabeth Marten is who married Thomas Hender.

Thus the Peter family of North Hill and the Hender family of Altarnun were related cousins and in-laws. They would have known of each other and likely their 'family' ties are that upon which the marriages came about, though exactly how is not known. Much of the failing Luskey family weath had gone to the Hender family through Grace Luskey's marriage to John Hender. And the Hender family of Thomas Hender and Sarah Adams seems to have been as well to do as the Peter and Hender families of North Hill.

NOTE: To see the cousin descendants of the Hender-Peter marriages click HERE. Also, Jenny Peter, sister of John and Richard Peter, did not marry Thomas Hender's brother John Hender as he died at the age 24 in 1819 and the Jenney who married a John Hender the Saddler at North Hill who married Jenney was to Jenney Garland nee PETER, daughter of Richard PETER who was also a widow of GARLAND. They married in 1840 and it is he and she who does appear on the 1841 Census of and only seeming to have been long time married. was prior to that marriage already a 'widower.



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rev. 23 January 2015