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Captain Jonathan's grandchildren: from the Kennebec to Illinois, California and Boston

Captain Jonathan Oaks took his family to Canaan, on the Kennebec, in 1772. His grandchildren scattered much further. The 1906 family register, which follows the immigrant Nathaniel's descendants through four generations, counts a hundred Oaks in the fourth generation and says that while most of them "lived and died like their fathers in the four New England states," about a quarter "made their homes in other states": New York, Illinois, Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Virginia, South Carolina, Rhode Island, Iowa, California and New Brunswick (register, page 26). Captain Jonathan's grandchildren are a large share of that list. What follows is the register's account, with a county history's sketch of Llewellyn Oaks.

Sangerville to Illinois

Captain Jonathan's son Solomon (no. 32) settled at Sangerville in 1808, went to Illinois in 1842 "but returned to die in Maine" (register, page 23). His children went the same way and mostly stayed (register, pages 40-42). Sybil and her husband Isaac Lawrence "went to Illinois about 1848." Olive and Joseph Morgridge went in 1848 and came back to Maine in 1856; after her death he married her sister Morning, who outlived him and, in old age, went to live with her sister Lydia in Illinois. Solomon the younger went to Parkman in 1839 and to Illinois in 1852, "but perhaps returned." Elbridge settled at Flora, Illinois, about 1848. Lydia, widowed in 1850, went to Illinois about 1851 and died at Charles City, Iowa, in 1892.

Owen, born on Oaks' Island at Skowhegan, the island in the Kennebec that carried the family name, moved to Sangerville as a baby and to Illinois about 1845. He died at Belvidere in 1897, aged ninety-two. The register thanks his widow: she "has been a helpful correspondent in a branch of the family where help was sadly needed." Their sister Abigail and her husband Noah Clough went west before 1840; "several of the sons went later to California, one of them taking the mother there after the father's death."

Solomon's brother Levi (no. 30) left a scattered family too (register, page 40). Jonathan went from Parkman to Aroostook before 1831. Cynthia and her husband William Stevens moved to Philadelphia in 1838 and to Ohio in 1846; she died at Rutland, Ohio. Levi the younger's family "left Wellington before 1840, and no further trace has been found." Elizabeth's husband, Henry Follett, died at Sacramento, California, in 1850.

The days of gold

The register ties two sons of Captain Jonathan's son Abel (no. 34) to the California gold years, one more firmly than the other (register, page 43). William Oaks of Orland, Maine, "a prominent citizen, high in Masonry, and colonel of militia," "went to California in 'the days of gold'" and died in 1888. His brother Ebenezer Gardner Oaks "is said to have sought gold in California." Their brother Stephen, a millwright, moved from Sangerville to Brookville, Pennsylvania, in 1837, and Abel became a contractor at Providence, Rhode Island.

Another brother, Simeon, "went south, perhaps to South Carolina, after 1830, to settle some estate, and was never heard of again." The register adds that he "also is one of those suspected of having secured the mythical Oakes fortune," the British reward that family legend gave Captain Jonathan. His wife, Dorothy, died at Portland, Oregon, in 1870.

Another brother, John Ames Oaks, "farmer and Methodist preacher," moved to Garland in 1847 (register, pages 43-44). The register's compiler, Henry Lebbeus Oak, grew up in Garland and remembered him: "a good-natured, hard-working man, who preached and traded horses at intervals," with "a commendable habit of treating the writer as a boy to maple syrup." He adds: "The two families lived in Garland for half a century, neither knowing of any relationship between Oaks and Oak." Henry's uncle was Lyndon Oak of Garland.

The History of Penobscot County (1882) carries John Ames's family a generation further, though it does not print his name. Its Garland sketch of Llewellyn O. Oaks says his father was born at Sangerville in 1809, lived at Cambridge, Maine, then five years at Parkman, then Garland, "where he now resides," and married Lucy Ann E. Follett at Wellington in 1829; the other children were Melvina E. and Amelia A. That matches the register's John Ames, born at Sangerville on June 28, 1809, whose wife was Lucy Ann Follett of Wellington and whose three children were Melvina, Amelia and Llewellyn (the register puts the marriage at Parkman, April 1, 1828). Llewellyn, the third child, was born at Cambridge in 1834; "his business has been farming and merchandizing." On December 21, 1875, he married Mary J. Adams, a daughter of Isaac and Lydia (Bryant) Adams, and by 1882 they had had three children: Maud B., Guy M., who had died, and an infant, Claude (page 355).

Daniel's family: Wiscasset, Boston and Charleston

Captain Jonathan's son Daniel (no. 28), a cordwainer of Wiscasset, moved to Boston about 1828, and his children by his first and third wives made their lives in cities (register, pages 37-39).

Samuel became a merchant at Charleston, South Carolina. "Nothing is known of what induced him to settle in the South," the register says. "Suspicious relatives, relying on unfounded rumors of considerable wealth, think he may have obtained the famous grant due his grandfather! He was a prosperous trader, but never rich."

Rachel married three times. Her first husband, Capt. John Christie of Boston, a privateer in the War of 1812, died in Dartmoor prison in England in 1813 (see Oak-line military service). Her second, Peter Garaux, was a "French baker of Boston, who had served under Napoleon, and who entertained Louis Phillippe at his house"; his block of buildings at Garaux Place, 17 Portland Street, went to his stepdaughter, Margaret Christie. Her third was Richard Jennings of Damariscotta or Newcastle.

The children of Daniel's third wife, Deborah Albee, mostly lived in and around Boston. Daniel Lambert Oakes was a sailor who died in the Sailors' Home at Quincy; Moses was a Boston policeman; Asa Hutchings Oakes was a Boston physician, and so was Dr. Thomas Fletcher Oakes, the Civil War surgeon. Their sister Morning, "later 'Marina Kirke,'" was "4 times married—and never a widow." "By some she was called a clairvoyant physician; but it would seem that she simply lived in her later years by selling medicines prepared according to formulae of her brother, Dr. Thomas." Her fourth husband was "Marshall Pike, minstrel, author of the old song, 'Home Again,' which he dedicated to his niece, Charlotte Oakes." The youngest, Francis Garaux Oakes, "was the father of Thomas F. Oakes, the railroad magnate of New York."

The farm that fell into Canada

Electrius Oaks, a son of John Oaks of Exeter (no. 27), was a War of 1812 veteran who farmed at St. Francis, New Brunswick. "When the line was run between the U. S. and Canada his farm proved to be on the Canadian side" (register, page 37). His wife, Henrietta Lavigne, whom the register describes as of mixed French and Native descent, "said to have been an excellent woman," had thirteen children. Most of them married French Canadians; "families of 12 to 18 children are not unusual," the register says, and his descendants are "very numerous and very imperfectly recorded."

The daughters' lines

Captain Jonathan's daughters' families went just as far (register, pages 48-60).

The register calls Mary Sampson's family "the largest branch of the tribe," with 1,200 descendants, "though the record in some lines is far from complete." It counts 541 for Lydia Conant, whose descendants "probably include a greater number of professional and prominent people than any other of the Oak branches," and for Elizabeth Bigelow about 650 on one page and "over 700 names" on another. "It is notable," it adds, "that genealogies have been published for the families of Capt. Jonathan Oak's three oldest daughters—Sampson, Conant and Bigelow" (register, pages 19-20).

What is missing

Except for the Penobscot County sketch of Llewellyn Oaks, every fact here comes from the 1906 register, a compiled family history. Its claims about well-known descendants (Thomas F. Oakes, D. D. Colton, Rosco R. Bigelow, James C. Needham, Marshall Pike and "Home Again") are the register's own; no outside record for them is cited here. The register's compiler could not find the western families of Abigail Clough and Levi Oaks.

Sources