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Note: �b�Research Report
�/b�Mary E. V. Hill
�b�Research Objective:
�/b�The research objective of this report has been to locate records that document the existence of Elijah Flemming / Fleming, his parents, wife and children. My client's family tradition says he was born about 1774 in New Jersey or Pennsylvania and married Maria Magdalena Beck cerca 1796, probably in Philadelphia, his wife's home town. They had two daughters - Rachel, born in 1797 and Sarah, born in 1798 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He died in 1799 in Cumberland County, New Jersey.
�b�Research Findings:
�/b�In the Fall of 2007 I visited the home of H. Norman Grieb in Chestertown, Maryland. In his possession he had the Horace Brewster Shoemaker family bible. The Shoemaker bible is of interest to this research because the second daughter of Elijah Flemming /Fleming and Maria Magdalena Beck, named Sarah Ann Flemming, married Enoch Green Shoemaker in Cumberland County, New Jersey on 15 March 1821. Sarah Ann Flemming Shoemaker was my client's second great grandmother. Sarah Ann Flemming was born 12 Nov 1798 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Maria Magdalena Beck's father, Paulus Beck, died of yellow fever in Philadelphia on 4 Oct 1798. �i�Shoemaker Commentaries�/i� says that Elijah Flemming and his wife Maria Magdalena moved to Bridgeton, Cumberland, New Jersey thereafter to avoid the yellow fever. An interesting account of the yellow fever epidemic in 1798-1799 is found in the journal of Dr. Ephraim Bateman from Cumberland County, New Jersey. His journal entry of August 26, 1799:
�tab�Aug 26th Arrived in Fairton a sloop with 38 passengers which had fled from the City of �tab�Philad, on account of the Fever among which were Mrs. B. Newcomb & Elizabeth Bower �tab�& Family.
To find more about Elijah Flemming/Fleming I needed to establish the identity of his wife. Her baptism record shows the names of her parents, her birth date, and her baptism date. It also establishes that she was born and lived in Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Baptism record of Maria Magdalena Beck in St. Michael's and Zion Lutheran Church in Philadelphia: Maria Magdalena, daughter of Paulus Michael Beck and wife Maria Magdalena was born 11 Jul 1772 and baptized 19 July 1772. The sponsors were the parents.
Maria Magdalena was known by several names including Magdalene, Eleanor and Hannah in her lifetime. �i�Shoemaker Commentaries�/i� says that her brother Paul Beck, Jr., in his will, written in 1840 and proved in 1844, refers to his sister Magdalene Harris, Harris being the surname of her second husband. Paul Beck, Jr., was a very wealthy and successful businessman in Philadelphia and left his sister property. She was Maria Magdalena Beck on her christening record. She was Hanna Flemmings in her marriage record to Johnson Harris on 7 Aug 1806 in Cumberland County, New Jersey. On the 1840 U.S. Census record, she was listed as Eleanor Harris. And in 1850, she is listed as Elinor Harris in the U.S. census. In her will dated 26 Dec 1848 she was Eleanor, widow of Johnson Harris.
I have not been able to locate a marriage for Maria Magdalena Beck to Elijah Flemming or Fleming, searching using her various names and the two spellings of Flemming / Fleming. A search at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, as well as online database searches have not found their marriage. Where was it most likely that they would have been married? The Beck family appears in St. Michael's and Zion Church records in Philadelphia repeatedly in the 1700s. The sister of Maria Magdalena Beck, Anna Maria Beck Diver, was married a second time as a widow in St. Michael and Zion's Church in 1797, and her parents, Paul and Magdalena Beck are mentioned, although her mother had died in 1792. Therefore, St. Michael's and Zion Church appears to be the family church. Why is there no record of marriage there for Maria Magdalene Beck and Elijah Flemming / Fleming? I have also searched other churches in Pennsylvania for their marriage but with negative results.
I have found two sources that identify Elijah Flemming or Fleming as a person separate from his wife. The first is a newspaper article in the Philadelphia newspaper �i�Mail�/i�. The article is "A List of Letters Residing in the Post Office, Philadelphia, June 18, 1792" in which Elijah Fleming is named under the subheading of Valley Forge. It was common in those times to publish in the local newspaper a list of persons with letters awaiting retrieval at the local post office. It was very reassuring to find that an Elijah Fleming did actually exist in Philadelphia in the 1790s. The fact that he was receiving a letter indicates he had persons of interest in his life who did not live in Philadelphia.
The second source was found on Ancestry.com in the �i�Pennsylvania, Septennial Census, 1779-1863�/i� database. He is listed with eleven other cordwainers in Philadelphia, South Ward in 1793. There was possibly a shoe making factory in South Ward, Philadelphia since so many cordwainers are listed together. Again, it was very reassuring to see his name written on the census return, to learn of his occupation, and find that he really did exist in Philadelphia in the time period he would have been alive.
I have also found two family records that identify Elijah Fleming as the husband of Maria Magdalena Beck. The first is a pedigree chart found in the research papers of H. Norman Grieb, a second cousin of my client, of Chestertown, Maryland. This pedigree lists Elijah Fleming, born 18 July 1774 in Bridgeton, Cumberland County, New Jersey and gives his death date as 1799. The pedigree lists his wife as Eleanor Magdalene Beck and says they were married in about 1797.
The second source is the book �i�Descendants of Jeremiah Carter�/i� which is available online. The following is the description of the wife of Edward Carter, Rachel Flemming, eldest daughter of Elijah Flemming and Eleanor Beck:
�tab�Edward Carter was born July 20, 1787 in Carterville, near Chester, Chester County, �tab�Pennsylvania and died May 03, 1875 in Carterville, near Chester, Chester County, �tab�Pennsylvania. He married Rachel Flemming June 18, 1812, daughter of Elijah Flemming �tab�and Eleanor Beck. She was born March 13, 1797 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and died �tab�December 01, 1874 in Cartertown, near Chester, Chester County, Pennsylvania.
Rachel Flemings married Edward Carter in Cumberland County, New Jersey, where he had gone to work. It is interesting to note that in this biography of the Carter family Elijah's surname is spelled with two "m"s. That is true also of the second marriage record of his wife in 1808 in Bridgeton, Cumberland County, New Jersey where she is listed as Hanna Flemmings.
I have not been able to locate a death record for Elijah Flemming except for the above mentioned entry in the genealogy records of H. Norman Grieb. Flemming died at age 25.
There are a number of Flemming or Fleming families in Salem, Cumberland and Gloucester Counties, New Jersey. However, there are also several Fleming or Flemming families in Philadelphia in the late 1700s. Was Elijah Fleming from Philadelphia or from Salem or Cumberland or Gloucester County, New Jersey? Since Elijah Fleming had a letter to pick up in Philadelphia in 1792, and because he chose to bring his wife and daughters to Salem or Cumberland County, New Jersey, in 1798 just after his second daughter was born, I believe he may have been from New Jersey and had gone to Philadelphia as a cordwainer according to the Pennsylvania, Septennial Census, 1793 where he is listed as a cordwainer.
I have searched extensively in New Jersey and Pennsylvania for more information on Elijah Fleming or Flemming. In 2010, I visited the historical society of Hunterdon County in Flemington, New Jersey where I copied a number of records concerning the Samuel Fleming family. This family came to New Jersey from Ireland in the 1700s. There was a descendant in Flemington named Elijah Fleming, born about 1812, who lived and died in Flemington. However, I did not find anything that connected our Elijah Fleming/Flemming to the Flemington Fleming families.
So far, none of these leads have established parentage for Elijah Fleming/ Flemming. It is amazing to see how much new information is becoming available all the time on the Internet. My suggestion to the client is that I continue to search the various genealogy-related database websites regarding the Fleming family because new information is being added all the time. I also need to try to find out more about the various Fleming or Flemming families in southern New Jersey because that is where Elijah Fleming/Flemming fled to and where his wife stayed after his death.
See sources in the PDF version of this document.
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Eleanor Magdalena Beck is listed as "Hanna" Flemmings in the marriage record of her in 1806 to Johnson Harris. I know this is my grandmother because I have a teaspoon with her initials on it. She is the person who married Johnson Harris.
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: �u�<http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?rank=1&gsfn=Elijah&gsln=Flemming&gsby=&gsb2co=2%2cUSA&gsb2pl=41%2cPennsylvania&gsdy=&gsd2co=1%2cAll+Countries&gsd2pl=1%2c+&sbo=1&sbor=&srchb=r&prox=1&ti=0&ti.si=0&gss=angs-c&pcat=36&h=592592&recoff=9+10&db=PASeptennialCensus&indiv=1>�/u�
Pennsylvania, Septennial Census, 1779-1863 Record for Elijah Flemming
Philadelphia > Philadelphia South Ward > 1793 > 6
Elijah Flemming - cordwainer - 1793
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Cordwainer
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Cordwainer statue on Watling street, in the Cordwainer ward of the City of London.
A cordwainer (or cordovan) is a shoemaker/cobbler who makes fine soft leather shoes and other luxury footwear articles. The word is derived from "cordwain", or "cordovan", the leather produced in C�rdoba, Spain. The term cordwainer was used as early as 1100 in England.[1] Historically, there was a distinction between a cordwainer, who made luxury shoes and boots out of the finest leathers, and a cobbler, who repaired them. This distinction gradually weakened, particularly during the twentieth century, when there was a predominance of shoe retailers who neither made nor repaired shoes.
In London, the occupation of cordwainers was historically controlled by the guild of the Worshipful Company of Cordwainers. There is a Cordwainer ward of the City of London, which is historically where most cordwainers lived and worked.[1]
Until 2000, there had been a Cordwainer's Technical College in London. For over a hundred years the college has been recognised as one of the world's leading colleges for training cobblers and leather workers. The college produced some of the worlds' leading fashion designers, such as Jimmy Choo and Patrick Cox. Cordwainer's College was absorbed into the London College of Fashion in 2000. The shoe design and accessories departments are still titled "Cordwainer's at London College of Fashion".
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