3-3: Robert Guthrie and Francis Fowler
Robert Guthrie & Frances Fowler
Guthrie Family Group 3 · Branch A
Kanawha and Cabell Counties, Virginia · Gallia and Lawrence Counties, Ohio
Robert, about 1778–1855 · Frances, about 1784–1866
View in Guthrie Research Tree →
In 1850 a census taker in Cabell County called on three Guthrie households in succession. First came Preston, with his young family and two grown men, John and James. Next came William and Mary with their children. At the third home he found a Virginia-born farmer named Robert, his wife Frances, and a young woman he recorded as Almida. Across the Ohio River, Lewis Guthrie was keeping a merchant’s household and Edward Guthrie was working as a shoemaker.
Ten years later the census finds Frances on the Ohio side, in Rome Township. Now a widow of 77, she shared James’s home with Almeda and eight-year-old Josephine. Preston and John each lived within two dwelling numbers. Two Ohio deeds name those three men together. Read alongside the censuses, the deeds show how the family continued to live and do business within reach of one another.
Elder John Guthrie of Kanawha is Robert’s probable father. A Botetourt marriage bond entry, Kanawha tax lists, and a tested line through Preston support that placement. Family accounts give Frances’s maiden name as Fowler. Her parents, the date of her marriage, and the identities of the girls in the earliest household are still questions for this branch.
The Family at a Glance
Robert Guthrie
- Birth and parents
- About 1778. He gave Virginia as his birthplace in 1850. Maryland has also been proposed from elder John’s whereabouts. John is his probable father. His mother is unidentified.
- Marriage and work
- Frances Fowler, probably in Virginia, about 1804–1806. The date is estimated. Robert farmed in Cabell County.
- Death and burial
- 17 June 1855, aged 76. Guthrie Cemetery #2, Rome Township, Lawrence County, Ohio.
Frances Fowler
- Birth and parents
- About 1784 in Virginia, from her census ages. Botetourt County is a possible birthplace. The proposed father, William Fowler, still needs a record connecting him to Frances.
- Households
- With Robert Guthrie and Almida in Cabell in 1850. With James, Almeda, and Josephine Guthrie in Rome Township in 1860.
- Death and burial
- 2 February 1866. Her stone at Guthrie Cemetery #2 identifies her as the wife of R. Guthrie.
Children in the family research
The ten entries below include seven named children carried in the family reconstruction, two women whose parents are still under investigation, and one girl inferred from a census count. The order is approximate. Select a name for the evidence and descendants.
| Child | Dates | Spouse and evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Jane Guthrie | About 1804–1806 to after 1870 | Benjamin Johnson. Proposed daughter. |
| John Guthrie | About 1807–1888 | Hannah Ansel. Cabell County and Rome Township. |
| Unidentified girl | Under ten in 1810 | A household count leaves an open place. Kinship unknown. |
| Mary A. Guthrie | 1810–1879, reported | Thomas Alexander Clark. Proposed daughter. |
| James Guthrie | 1812–1902 | Hester Bassett. Farmer in Rome Township. |
| William Guthrie | About 1815 to after 1870 | Mary Marks. Virginia, then Greenup County, Kentucky. |
| Preston Guthrie | 1816–1866 | Eleanor “Ellen” Sprouse. Cabell County and Rome Township. |
| Lewis Guthrie | 1818–1892 | Hannah White, then Arabella Gillette. Merchant and carpenter. |
| Almeda Guthrie | Reported 1819–1892 | Also Almida. A possible Bocock marriage remains open. |
| Edward Guthrie | About 1825, living in 1850 | Martha White. Shoemaker in Lawrence County. |
DNA participation
| Descendant line | Y-DNA | Big Y | Autosomal |
|---|---|---|---|
| Preston Guthrie | ✓ Kit 129769 | ✓ | ✓ |
| William Guthrie | — | — | ✓ |
| John and James Guthrie | — | — | — |
| Lewis and Edward Guthrie | No known continuing male line | Same | — |
| Jane, Mary A., Almeda and the unnamed girl | N/A | N/A | — |
✓ indicates recorded project participation. A dash means no participant is identified in the project notes. Daughters do not transmit their father’s Y chromosome. Autosomal matches suggested Jane as a candidate, although the legacy project roster lists no participant specifically through her.
Preston’s paternal line matches Guthrie Family Group 3. It supports shared male-line ancestry with the tested families of James and Alexander. Assigning Robert to a particular father within that group also depends on the documentary evidence.
Historical Highlights
The Ohio River explains an apparent contradiction in this family’s records. A Cabell County farmer could appear on a Gallia County tax roll, and sons living on opposite banks could marry in the same Ohio county. By 1840 the census even counted three members of Robert’s household working in navigation. It left their names and jobs unstated.
Follow Frances as well as Robert. The 1850 entry gives her name and age. The 1860 entry places her among three generations in Ohio. Her gravestone supplies the relationship that the early censuses omit. Together these records carry her story sixteen years beyond the last census she shared with Robert.
- 1794
A Guthrie witness at a Fowler marriage
The Botetourt register gives 4 November 1794 as the bond date for Anne Guthrie and Elijah Fowler. It identifies John as Anne’s father and lists James and Robert Guthrie in the security-and-witness column. That wording establishes Anne’s relationship to John. Whether this witness became Frances’s husband is a question of identity. Compiled register, p. 77, image 82.
- 1801–1811
Robert appears on the Kanawha tax lists
The 1801 list counts one white male over sixteen for each of Robert and James. John’s entry counts two and one horse. In 1802 Robert, James, and Alexander appear together as taxpayers. A separate court order excuses elder John from levies because of age and infirmity. The order and the tax list serve different purposes. See the 1802 tax-list image.
Kanawha personal property tax film 007849142 is the reference for further entries in 1806, 1807, 1809, 1810, and 1811. The estimated marriage to Frances falls in these years. A bond or return for their own marriage remains to be found.
- 1810–1825
Four children’s places in the first household
The 1810 Kanawha census indexes the head as Robert Guthrey. It counts a man and a woman aged 26–44, one boy under ten, and three girls under ten. By 1820, Robert Guttery appears at Barboursville in Cabell County. The family-size columns beside his name supply no usable count. 1820 census entry.
Cabell was formed from Kanawha in 1809. On Cabell tax film 007849097, the research identifies 1812 (image 57), 1813 (75), 1814 (92), 1815 (122), 1817 (185), 1819 (219), 1820 (237), 1823 (302), 1824 (325), and 1825 (346). The intervening gaps alone cannot date a move. County formation.
- 1826–1840
A household across the river in Guyan
The project traces Gallia County property taxes between 1826 and 1850. The 1830 census adds a separate piece of evidence for residence. It lists a Robert Guthrie in Guyan Township, Gallia County, Ohio, with twelve people, including a man aged 50–59 and a woman aged 40–49. Both age ranges fit this couple. Only Robert is named. Search the 1830 census collection.
In 1840 a ten-person Robert Guthrie household appears back in Cabell County. It includes a man aged 60–69 and a woman aged 50–59. Five people worked in agriculture and three in navigation on canals, lakes, or rivers.
- 1850
Three neighboring households in Cabell
District 10, dwelling 172, family 176, line 34 begins with Robert, 72, a farmer. Frances, 66, and Almida, 26, follow. All three birthplaces are Virginia. Preston’s household at 170 included John and James. William and Mary occupied 171. Search the 1850 census collection.
In Rome Township, Ohio, Lewis appears as a merchant with Hannah and thirteen-year-old Caroline White. Edward and Martha lived in the McKnight household. The brides in the February marriages were Martha White (Edward, 17 February) and Hannah White (Lewis, 20 February). Rome Township census transcription.
- 1851–1866
Frances in Rome Township and the family graves
John, James, and Preston acquired property together from Robert Holdersby in 1851 and from David C. Skinner in 1860. In the 1860 Rome census Preston is in dwelling 920. James, Almeda, Josephine, and Frances are in 922. John and Hannah are in 923. 1851 deed. 1860 deed.
Robert’s gravestone reads 17 June 1855, aged 76 years. Some indexes and the local cemetery transcription give 1853. The photograph shows a final 5. Frances’s stone reads 2 February 1866 and identifies her husband as R. Guthrie. Photograph by Diana Guthrie. Compare the Rome Township inscriptions, cemetery RO-6.
Explore the Research
Which records connect the people on either bank of the Ohio? The family accounts below follow the children into their own households. The land references preserve the book, page, and index image so that a similarly named Guthrie can be checked against the deed itself.
Two Roberts and two Fowler marriages
In the 1776 Maryland enumeration, Robert and Esther (Giles) Guthrie had a six-year-old son named Robert. He was born about 1770. Frances’s husband was 72 in 1850 and 76 when he died in 1855. Those ages fit a birth about 1778–1779. The Maryland boy has his own family study. Robert, son of Robert and Esther.
Anne Guthrie’s 1794 bond links elder John with Anne and brings James and Robert into the same record. Their later tax entries strengthen the case for siblings. The father named in the bond is Anne’s. For Frances, William Fowler Sr. has been suggested, and a tree hint supplies additional initials. A Fowler will, distribution, or deed naming Frances as Robert Guthrie’s wife would help identify her parents and explain any relationship to Elijah. John Guthrie family study. Anne and Elijah’s bond entry.
Jane Guthrie and Benjamin Johnson · proposed daughter
Jane married Benjamin Johnson on 7 March 1824 in Gallia County. They appear in Clay Township by 1840 and in Windsor Township, Lawrence County, from 1850 through 1870. Her age, the Ohio location, and a reported autosomal lead prompted the proposed connection. The records cited call her Jane. The fuller names Sarah Jane and Mary Jane and a precise 1871 death in West Virginia still need evidence.
The Johnson research names James Madison, born about 1833 (Mary Ann Farris), Frances, born about 1836 (George W. Huffman), Emily, 1839–1889 (George William McCaffrey), Elizabeth, 1840–1901 (John Wesley Macy), Maria, born about 1842 (John R. Huffman), Harriet Jane, born about 1843, and Nancy E., born about 1846. Three younger household entries from the early census remain unnamed. Thomas Judson, born about 1857, may have been a son or grandson.
John Guthrie and Hannah Ansel
John, born about 1807 in Virginia, was living with Preston in 1850. He married Hannah Ansel in Cabell County on 12 December 1852. Their children were born in Ohio. He farmed in Rome Township and died there on 9 February 1888. Hannah lived until 1900.
Their seven children were Albert Marion, 1853–1907 (Mary Catherine Nash), Emma Adeline (1854–1876), Mahala Ann Catherine (1857–1883), Sarah Jane (1861–1865), Lillie May (1865–1882), Florence (1870–1871), and Zella (1871–1873). Albert outlived both parents. For the daughters’ inscriptions, compare both Guthrie burial grounds, RO-5 and RO-6, in the Rome Township cemetery list.
The unnamed girl in the 1810 count
Robert’s household contained three girls under ten. Jane and Mary A. have been proposed as two of them. Even if both placements are correct, a third girl remains unidentified. The schedule gives her neither a name nor a relationship to the householder.
A later marriage naming a father, or a deed or estate division naming a married daughter, could give this child an identity. The count alone supplies neither a death date nor a reason for her absence from later accounts.
Mary A. Guthrie and Thomas Alexander Clark · proposed daughter
The research profile gives Mary a birth on 11 March 1810 and a marriage to Thomas Alexander Clark on 31 January 1833 in Gallia County. It follows her from Gallia in 1850 to Rome Township in 1860 and 1870, and gives her death as 4 November 1879. The same profile marks her parents unverified.
The Clark profile lists Harriet (born about 1839), Margaret Ann (1841–1914), Hugh A. (1845–1913), James (1848–1930), Thomas Edward (1851–1925), Edmond (born about 1852), and Charles Franklin (1857–1925). Lewis Guthrie conveyed land to a Thomas A. Clark in 1854. Both deed pages are listed below. Identifying the buyer is one test of the proposed family connection.
James Guthrie and Hester Bassett
Born 31 January 1812, James lived with Preston in 1850. In 1860 he headed the household that included Frances, Almeda, and his niece Josephine. On 19 April 1863 he married Hester Bassett in Lawrence County. James died on 14 July 1902 and Hester on 6 April 1920. The middle name Buchannon appears in trees and awaits a contemporary source.
The family lists Flora (born about 1864), James Bennett, 1867–1936 (Mary E. McDaniel), Franklin Pierce, 1870–1932 (Ruby Wakefield Fulks), an infant who died in March 1873, Emma, 1873–1935 (Alexander Magee), an infant who lived one day in June 1876, and Myrtle Ruth, 1879–1926 (Wilber Beardsley Folks).
William Guthrie and Mary Marks
William married Mary Marks in Lawrence County on 16 May 1841. Their household was in Cabell in 1850, Wayne County, Virginia, in 1860, and Greenup County, Kentucky, in 1870. Their later whereabouts are open. William’s line has documented autosomal project participation.
Their children were Abigail, 1843–1891 (Tilden Welch), Almedia Adeline, born about 1848 (Kelly Furguson), William Henry, 1849–1919 (Lusicana Turk), John Robert, born 1851 (Martha Ann, surname transcribed Turnk), Eustalia Frances, 1853–1892 (Samuel P. Ferguson), and Cordelia Anna, born about 1855 (George Lavender). The branches can be followed into Kansas, Louisiana, and Arkansas.
Preston Guthrie and Eleanor “Ellen” Sprouse
Preston married Ellen Sprouse on 20 September 1846 in Lawrence County. The 1850 Cabell entry gives her name as Elvira. Their household included the twins Mary and Charles, little Frances, and the adults John and James Guthrie. Preston died on 18 August 1866. Ellen died on 9 September 1880. The commonly reported birth date of 29 July 1816 for Preston conflicts with the age in the local cemetery transcription.
Their ten children were Mary Ellen, 1847–1911 (James Dafoe), Charles, 1847–1922 (Mary Jane Brammer), Frances, 1849–1920 (James F. Gardner), Robert R., 1851–1911 (Elizabeth Alice Neff), Warren (1854–1872), Sarah (1855–1865), Allen, 1858–1916 (Sarah E. Munsell), Edmund “Ned,” 1860–1932 (Laura L. Russell, then Edna A. Paxton), Annie, born 1862 (Samuel Jefferson Bell), and Preston, 1864–1931 (Mary J. Singer). The tested paternal descent, kit 129769, runs through this family.
Lewis Guthrie, Hannah White, and Arabella Gillette
Lewis, born 5 April 1818, bought property in Lawrence County by 1846. He married Hannah White there on 20 February 1850. They appear that year with Caroline White, aged thirteen. Hannah died in 1856. On 25 February 1863 Lewis married Arabella, indexed as Arabelle Gillette. The Ohio marriage references are films 000317716 and 000317717, respectively.
Two daughters are recorded from the second marriage, Laura “Lulu” Belle, 1865–1948 (William C. Dryden) and Grace (1867–1950). Both later lived in California. Arabella died in 1870. Lewis, described as a merchant in 1850 and later as a carpenter, died on 21 November 1892.
Almeda Guthrie and the Bocock possibility
Almida was 26 with Robert and Frances in 1850 and Almeda was 38 with James and Frances in 1860. Those ages point to births about 1824 and 1822, respectively. The family date is 6 March 1819. Her reported death is 10 March 1892 in Lawrence County.
In 1870 an Almeda Bocock, a seamstress in the Welsh household in Greenup County, Kentucky, lived beside William Guthrie’s family. The neighbor is a reason to investigate. A marriage or another record tying that woman to Almeda Guthrie would establish a much firmer identification. No children have been traced.
Edward Guthrie and Martha White
Edward, born about 1825, married Martha White on 17 February 1850 in Lawrence County. He was a shoemaker in the McKnight household that year. Martha married William Eckhart on 18 April 1869. Edward’s fate between those records remains uncertain.
Their daughters followed different households. Josephine (1852–1914), later wife of David Thorne Hoover, lived with James and her grandmother Frances in 1860 and remained with James in 1870. Viola Augusta (1855–1935), later wife of William Penn Trumbo, lived with Martha and her stepfather in 1870. Josephine’s residence with relatives is consistent with her mother still being alive.
Cabell County, Virginia · deed indexes and record images
Grantees, film 008588766, images 362–364 of 531. Grantors, film 008588666, images 259–261 of 402. A surname or initial is a starting point for identifying the parties. Grantee index. Grantor index.
- 1840 · John Hamman to James Guthrie and others as beneficiaries, 400 acres. Book 7, p. 514.
- 1847 · James White and others to William Guthrie, 100 acres. Book 9, p. 300.
- 1848 · John Hannon to James H. Guthrie and others as beneficiaries, 200 acres. Book 9, p. 455.
- 1852 · William Guthrie to James H. Guthrie as beneficiary. Book 10, p. 484.
Lawrence County, Ohio · the deed notebook, 1841–1868
Index to Conveyances, volumes 1–2, film 07900697, covering deed books 1–33. The G entries begin at image 79 in volume 1 and image 339 in volume 2. Below, 13:354 means deed book 13, page 354. The entries for James H., D.Z., D.Q., and Truman are retained for comparison. Their initials and transactions should be followed separately from James, son of Robert and Frances. Lawrence County deed catalog.
- Index image 82. 1841, Nathaniel Burton to James H., 8:591. 1842, James H. to William Rose, 9:145.
- Index image 83. 1846, James Haskeill Jr. to Lewis, 10:403. 1849, Lewis to John Lloyd, 11:570. Andrew Stormont to J.H. and D.Z., 11:530. John Tiernan to Lewis, 11:563. David Miller to Lewis, 12:62. 1850, John McIntyre to Lewis, 12:329.
- Index image 84. 1851, Elijah S. Carder to J.H., 13:63. Henry James to J.W. and D.Z., 13:352. Robert Holdersby to John, James, and Preston, 13:354. 1852, Joel Bown, by administrator, to James, 14:64. 1853, James H. to Lanty Rucker, 14:452.
- Index image 85. 1853, Washington County sheriff to Lewis, 14:415. 1854, James H. to Joseph and John M. Sanders, 15:95. Lewis to Thomas A. Clark, 15:542. Lewis to Thomas A. Clark, 15:543. James H. to R. Powell, 15:637.
- Index image 86. 1856, D.Z. and James H. to Uriah Hague, 16:480.
- Index image 87. 1859, Columbus Bowen to James, 19:292. 1860, David C. Skinner to James, John, and Preston, 20:83. 1861, George W. Kennedy to J.H. and D.Z., 20:196.
- Index image 339. 1863, Lewis to Richard Morrison, 21:303.
- Index image 341. 1868, heirs of D.Q. to Truman, 26:53. Executor and heirs of D.Q. to Truman, 26:55.
- Index image 342. 1868, D.Q.’s heirs to Truman, 26:53. D.Q., by executor and heirs, to James H., 26:55. James H. to J.M. and Lucy O. Hannan, 26:56.
Two full deeds name the three co-grantees. Holdersby deed, book 13, p. 354. Skinner deed, book 20, p. 83.
The two gravestones at Guthrie Cemetery #2
The damage across the lower part of Frances’s marker passes through the age inscription. Her name, her husband’s initial, and the date above it are legible. The county compilation identifies this burial ground as RO-6 and lists Preston and Eleanor here as well. Rome Township cemetery readings.
What a family paper could tell us
We can locate Frances in James’s home down to the dwelling number, yet her own wedding date and her parents’ names remain open. A Fowler estate paper naming a married daughter would tell us more about her early life than another copy of the family tree. For Jane Johnson and Mary Clark, a receipt signed as an heir, an obituary naming a sibling, or a deed explaining a family interest could answer a different question about each woman.
The family research draws on the earlier Guthrie study, Rachelle Child’s work on the Virginia families, and Diana Guthrie’s cemetery photographs. Descendants who can identify a family Bible, letter, or original record are invited to share its wording and where it can be found.
Researched & Curated by Ann Guthrie