Austin SMITH

Abt 1728 - 1817  (89 years)

• Name	Austin SMITH  [2]
  	"Connecticut Ancestry": Austin Smith of Stamford was born about 1728, location still unknown but possibly in Huntington, Long Island, and died "suddenly" at Stamford in 1817 (only the year given), age 89 years. These dates all result from a single entry in the Stamford Congregation Church records, and no other (Connecticut) record of his birth or baptism or death or burial has been found. Wherever necessary to distinguish him from the other Austin Smiths, the qualifier "of Stamford" will be used. Austin Smith married Sarah Knapp at Stamford on 17 August 1752. She was born on 5 June 1730, the daughter of Peter Knapp and his first wife Elizabeth Slason, who were married at Stamford on 30 June 1726. One source gives her date of death as 1817, bur I have been unable to confirm that with any primary records. Her younger half-sister Deborah Knapp married Capt. Amos Smith (of the Henry Smith family), and her cousin Martha Slason married Zephaniah Weed, uncle of Jacob Weed.. He first appeared on the Stamford Grand List of 1754 with a valuation o 26-4-0, and was consistently taxed as a property owner in Stamford from that time until his death. He appeared a witness to several deeds made by nathaniel Seely on 1 January 1761, along with John Knapp, Jr. His association with these people in 1761 may be a clue to his identity, yet to be decoded. Another appearance as witness in 1767 is more straightforward. On 17 March 1767, Caleb Smith, Sarah Smith widow of Amos Smith Deceased, Amos Smith, and Rebecca Brown daughter of Nathan Brown Deceased, all of stamford, sold 6t acres at "Clapboard Hill or Witch Pin Ridge" to Daniel Lockwood. the witnesses were Austin Smith and Abraham Davenport (later Judge and Revolutionary War leader in the connecticut General Assembly). Austin Smith's appearance in this case was probably due to the fact that his wife, Sarah (Knapp) Smith, was half-sister to Deborah Knapp, who had recently married in 1765 Amos Smith (Jr.) one of the grantors. Sometime between 1760 and 1772, Austin Smith was named guardian of one Jesse Weed in Stamford. The only candidate Jesse Weed seems to be the son of Nehemiah Weed, born in 1755. Nehemiah was the same person who was chosen (in 1783) as guardian by Jacob Weed, later to become the husband of a granddaughter of Austin Smith... However, there are serious difficulties with this interpretation. Nehemiah Weed made his will in 1785, and was therefore living long after Jesse would have reached his majority. Furthermore, his son Jesse is presumed to have died young, since he was not named in Nehemiah's will. Nehemiah also had a grandson Jesse Weed, son of Ebenezer Pittit Weed, but this Jesse was born in 1776, and therefore too late to be the subject of this entry. This guardianship is therefore not explained, but may be another key to Austin Smith's identity...... Regardless of his parents or place of birth, our subject Austin Smith left Stamford from the time of his marriage in 1752 until his death in 1817. He was a party to land transactions there in 1753, 1756, 1763, 1767, 1772 and 1784, and is always called Austin Smith of Stamford in those documents. His children were recorded there in birth or baptismal records of 1752, 1753, 1755, 1757, 1759, 1762, 1763, 1765, and 1771. It is quite impossible that such a person could have been "overseer of roads" in Orange County, NY in 1765 and "a few years later" led a company of Orange County Militia as claimed by Mather and his successors. His first appearance in the Stamford land records was when Austin Smith and Sarah his wife sold their right in the Southern Commons or Sequest Land in Stamford on 28 March 1753 to John Waterbury. the right "came down to us from the sd. Sarah's grand father and grand mother John and Mary Slason late of sd. Stamford deceased, & ye right was originally part of Old Mr. John Slason & George Slason & Old Mr. Stephen Holmes right a part of each of their lists in the year 1687". About a month later, on 30 April 1753, Austin Smith was a witness to a deed between Nathaniel Seeley Jr. and John Waterbury, perhaps having also to do with this former Slason and Holmes property. Austin Smith does not appear as a grantee before 1763, and we therefore have no record of exactly where Austin and Sarah Smith were living in Stamford for the first 10 years or so of their marriage. then, on 5 January 1763, Daniel Smith of New Fairfield, Fairfield County, Connecticut sold 13 t acres of land in the Roxbury district of Stamford to Austin Smith for 41 pounds one shilling and seven pence New York money. it does not seem that this was Daniel Smith's homelot, since no dwelling house or barn is mentioned (only appurtneances). The deed was witnessed by John Holly and Nathaniel Knapp and the property was bounded as follows: (W) by Bedford road; (N) by land of the wives of Isaac Weed and Jonathan Whiting: (E) partly by land conveyed this day to Nathaniel Knapp & "Partly by my brother Amos Smith's land,"(S) partly by my own land and partly by Amos Smith. the grantor was therefore Daniel Smith (Joseph, Daniel,Henry) an uncle of Capt. Amos Smith, already mentioned above. Six years later, on 11 March 1769, Austin Smith sold his 13 acre parcel on the Bedford Road at Roxbury for 100 pounds New York Money to timothy Lawrence of Greenwich. the land had been considerably improved, and now included the "dwelling house, bark mill, tan vats and fruit trees thereon." Witnesses of this deed were Abraham Davenport and Ezra Smith (Probably Ezra Smith (Daniel, Henry), since he was not called junior). Austin Smith received his second parcel of land in Stamford from Daniel Smith of New Fairfeld on 2 January 1772. this 26t acre parcel was on the East side of the Mill River below Taunton Saw Mill and on the South side of the Cross Highway, with boundaries as follows: (N) highway; (W) the Mill river; (S) partly by land in the possession of Joseph Webb and partly by Isaac Weed's land; and (E) heirs of Amos Smith, deceased. The 26 t acre parcel was later sold to his sons Austin Smith Jr. and Peter Smith on 9 November 1784. No right of use was reserved, and it may be that Austin Smith Sr. went to live with one of his children at about this time. In the 1790 census, he was shown as a head of family in Norwalk/Stamford (these towns were enumerated together) with only his wife and one other female resident in the household. This listing was immediately adjacent to the listing for his son Austin Smith Jr. Taken together, these records all point to the career of a man named Smith who had some interactions with an established Smith family in Stamford, but did not appear to be a member of that Smith family by birth. No record of a residence for him in any other town is mentioned in these deeds. We have not found any record of his parents or grandparents in Stamford, or any mention of any blood brothers or sisters there. The name "Austin" certainly suggested that a connections with an Austin family existed, but none could be found with the Austins of Stamford. The unique name "Gold" for his first child suggested a connection with someone named Gold or Gould, possibly related on his mother's side, but again, no hint of a connection could be found. Where, then, was his origin? All possible ancestors for Austin Smith in the Henry Smith family of Stamford wee eliminated by an exhaustive analysis of the evidence. For this reason, a possible origin on Long Island for two different Austin Smiths is proposed. The main evidence under consideration is the baptism of "Austine " Smith (a male child) at the Huntington, Long Island Congregational Church on 24 March 1727/28. it was originally thought that this baptism might have been for the "other" Long Island Austin Smith, that is, the one from Smithtown who went to Orange County. However, this now appears unlikely: first, there is no other evidence of that child's parents James and Jerusha (Topping) Smith having any connection with the Huntington Church, and no others of their children were clearly baptized there; and second, james and Jerusha Smith were possibly living as far away as Moriches at this time, a trip of over 33 miles to Huntington. Moreover, there were at least two Jeremiah Smiths, father and son, in Huntington in the early 18th Century. The father (at least) was a member of the Congregational Church where Austin was baptized. Austin Smith of Stamford named a son Jeremiah, and his eldest son gold Smith named his eldest son Jeremiah Smith. Old English tradition was to name the eldest son for the father's father. the family of Jeremiah Smith of Huntington is not well understood and is certainly a candidate for further analysis. Austin Smith's sudden appearance in Stamford as he married Sarah Knapp in 1752 raises the question of his possible connections with Stamford families prior to that time. The answer may be that Sarah Kanpp's mother, Elizabeth Slason (1703-1733), was a sister of John Slason (1695-1778) who married Rebecca Brush, born in Huntington, Long Island one of the several Brush children who accompanied their widowed mother to Stamford from Huntington about 1724 or 1725. John Slason and Rebecca Brush were married some time before 26 october 1722 when their first children was recorded at Stamford. The place of their marriage is not known. With the incentive of discovering a positive connection with Austin Smith of Stamford (unfortunately never found) a detailed study of the origin and relationship of the James and Jeremiah Smith families of Huntington was undertaken and subsequently reported in a major journal article. This study found no reason that Austin Smith of Stamford could not have been the child baptized in Huntington on 24 March 1727/28 but was unable to reach a conclusion regarding this identity...... It is quite unlikely that Austin Smith (Sr.) of Stamford ever served in the Revolutionary War. He would have been 48 years old in 1776 and saw four of his sons go out from their home, leaving him with the family to care for in Stamford. the earliest Revolutionary War record for any member of this family was specifically for "Austin Smith Jr.," with an enlistment in 8 May 1775.... [1]
  Birth	Abt 1728  [2]
  Gender	Male
  Death	1817	Stamford, Fairfield, Connecticut, USA   [2]
  Person ID	I68924	Main Tree
  Last Modified	5 Oct 2017

  
  

  Family	Sarah KNAPP,   b. 5 Jun 1730, Stamford, Fairfield, Connecticut, USA d. 1817 (Age 86 years)
  Marriage	17 Aug 1752	Stamford, Fairfield, Connecticut, USA   [2, 3]
  Children	+ 1. Gold SMITH,   b. 14 Oct 1752, Stamford, Fairfield County, Connecticut d. 20 Apr 1832, Stamford, Fairfield, Connecticut, USAr (Age 79 years)   2. Austin SMITH, Jr.,   b. 20 Dec 1753, Stamford, Fairfield County, Connecticut d. 9 Dec 1846, Schroeppel, Oswego County, New York (Age 92 years)   3. Peter SMITH,   b. 2 Aug 1755, Stamford, Fairfield County, Connecticut d. 5 Jun 1837 (Age 81 years)   4. Mary SMITH,   c. 10 Apr 1757, St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut + 5. Elizabeth SMITH,   c. 18 Feb 1759, St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut bur. 10 Jul 1837, Stamford, Connecticut (Age ~ 78 years)   6. Zenas SMITH,   c. 3 Aug 1760, St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut   7. Isaac SMITH,   c. 7 Apr 1762, St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut d. 1845, New Canaan, Connecticut (Age ~ 82 years)   8. Sarah SMITH,   c. 25 Dec 1763, St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut   9. Phebe SMITH,   c. 23 Jun 1765, St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut   10. Hannah SMITH,   c. 16 Feb 1769, St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut  [Birth]   11. Jeremiah SMITH,   c. 29 Dec 1771, St. John's Episcopal Church, Stamford, Connecticut
  Family ID	F27777	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
  Last Modified	10 Aug 2012

  
  

• Sources

  [S4917] Connecticut Ancestry 2008 February Vol. 50 No. 3. [S4914] Alfred Averill Knapp, M.D., "Nicholas Knapp Genealogy" Part One & Two, (Winter Park Florida 1953). [S03428] The Barbour Collection of Connecticut Town Vital Records: Stamford.