Gallaudet Oliver

Notes:

He is said to have been in Harrison County, Virginia in 1810; Muskingham County, Ohio in 1820; Licking County, Ohio by 1823; and Putnam County, Ohio by 1850.

We have seen no direct evidence for the parentage of Gaulladet Oliver, but many unsourced trees place him as a son of Samuel Oliver (1757-1819) and his wife Lydia, and we're inclined to find that plausible. Samuel Oliver, who is known to have had eight sons, was a son of Reuben Oliver and Esther Gallaudet. Reuben Oliver died in 1774. After his death, his wife Esther (Gallaudet) Oliver was granted administration of his estate by the court of Kent County, Delaware. Esther died in New Rochelle the following year, and subequently her brother-in-law Joseph Oliver took her younger children to Delaware and raised them there. Eldest son Samuel Oliver was obviously not one of those "younger children," but he did fight on the Delaware line in the Revolution. Gallaudet Oliver's Find a Grave page asserts that he was born in Kent County, Delaware in 1785.

Gallaudet Oliver married Mary Ann Bogard in 1803 in Randolph County, Virginia (now West Virginia); Samuel Oliver died in 1819 in Lewis County, Virginia (now West Virginia), just one county over. As a descendant of the eminent Huguenot Gallaudet family of New Rochelle, Gallaudet Oliver would have been of exactly the right social class to marry a descendant of early New Amsterdam families such as Mary Ann Bogard. And while onomastics are clinching proof of nothing, it is pretty hard to imagine how you wind up being named "Gallaudet Oliver" without being closely descended from Reuben Oliver and Esther Gallaudet.

To the last sentence above: We think Gallaudet Oliver is most likely a son of Samuel Oliver, eldest child of Reuben Oliver and Esther Gallaudet, rather than any of Samuel's brothers, for the following reasons. Second son Gaulladet Oliver (1759-1846) had a son named Paul Gallaudet Oliver (d. aft. 1887), and is thus unlikely to have also had a son named Gallaudet Oliver. Third son Elisha Oliver does not seem to have married. And fourth son Thomas Oliver was born in 1770 and did not marry until 1791, making him an unlikely father for Gallaudet Oliver who is said to have been born about 1785.

Gallaudet married Mary Ann Bogard on 31 Dec 1803 in Randolph County, Virginia. Mary (daughter of Cornelius Bogard and Sarah) was born on 8 Jul 1785. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

1. Anore Catherine Oliver was born on 9 Feb 1805; died on 23 May 1883; was buried in Wyatt Cemetery, Franklin Township, Grundy, Missouri.

Other Events and Attributes:

• Alternate birth: 15 Sep 1757

Notes:

Among the witnesses to his baptism was Jacque Parcot. His great-great grandfather Pierre Gendron (d. 1717 in New Rochelle) was probably a brother-in-law of Pierre Parcot, the original Huguenot Parcot immigrant to Westchester; it seems likely that association with the Parcot family persisted down several generations.

"Samuel Oliver served in the Delaware line as a private during the Revolutionary War. He was placed on the U.S. pension roll Mar 22, 1819 to receive from Sept. 7, 1818 $96 per year. He had received $71.20 at his death, June 3, 1819. He married Lydia ——. They had 8 sons and 1 daughter. They lived in Lewis Co., Virginia where he owned property. This property he and his wife sold to Abraham Casper in 1818." [Account of the Gallaudet Family, citation details below]

Samuel married Lydia. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Reuben married Esther Gallaudet in 1756. Esther (daughter of Pierre Elisée Gallaudet and Magdalaine Gendron) was born before 5 Nov 1738; was christened on 5 Nov 1738 in Dutch Church, Staten Island, Richmond, New York; died in 1775 in New Rochelle, Westchester, New York. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

On 10 Dec 1774 the court of Kent County, Delaware granted letters of administration to Esther, widow of Reuben Oliver.

Notes:

He is said to have been in New Rochelle as early as 1711, although Account of the Gallaudet Family (citation details below) notes that if so he would have had to arrive late in the year, as he was a witness at the marriage of his sister Marie Gallaudet to Renee Boudet of Bellvard in 1711 at the Parish Church of St. Gelais. St. Gelais is about 47 miles northeast of La Rochelle. The first actual mention of him in surviving New Rochelle town records is from 1722. He was naturalized a citizen of the New York colony in 1726. No records exist placing him in New Rochelle after 1732. The record of his daughter Esther's baptism on Staten Island in 1738 is his last appearance in any record. He was a "chirurgien", a surgeon, and addressed as "docteur."

His first wife was named Jan; we know nothing of her origins, birth date, or death date.

His name appears on a bronze plaque at New Rochelle erected to the memory of the early Huguenot settlers. There is also a brass tablet at the Church of Saint Esprit in New York City inscribed to the memory of Pierre Elisee Gallaudet and his mother Margaret Prioleau.

His great-grandson Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet (1787-1851), along with Laurent Clerc and Mason Cogswell, co-founded the first permanent institution for the education of the deaf in North America, and he became its first principal. When opened on April 15, 1817, it was called the Connecticut Asylum (at Hartford) for the Education and Instruction of Deaf and Dumb Persons, but it is now known as the American School for the Deaf. Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet's son Edward Miner Gallaudet (1837-1917) was the first president of the Columbia Institution for the Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb and Blind in Washington, D.C., now known as Gallaudet University.

Pierre married Magdalaine Gendron. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also called Joshua Gallaudet. He was preceptor and 'procurateur fiscal' for the family of Desnier d’Olebreuse who were, in the late 1600s, leaders of the Huguenot party in the province of Saintonge and Annis. In 1685 he renounced the Catholic Church and joined the Huguenot cause.

Josue married Margaret Prioleau. Margaret (daughter of Elisee Prioleau and Renée Roccas) died after 1699 in Prin-Deyrançon, Deux-Sèvres, France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

He may have been a brother of Francoise Gendron, who was in New Rochelle in 1698, wife of Pierre Parcot, himself probably a descendant of another Pierre Parcot who was a Huguenot refugee from Marennes, France (25 miles from La Rochelle) to London, and an "Ancien of the Temple" in Soho about 1671.

His will of 16 Jan 1717 was written in French.

Isaac married Marie JousseaumeSt. Pierre, Mauzé-sur-le-Mignon, Deux-Sèvres, France. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Said to have been a member of the "petite noblesse", the minor aristocracy.

Notes:

Pastor from 1649 to 1663 at Exoudun, near La Mothe-Saint-Héray, in Deux-Sèvres.

Elisee married Renée Roccas. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Also spelled Rochas.