Robert Trumbull II and His Descendents
By Freda Trumbull (1894-1990)
(7th child of Robert)
born 1807
married Mary Murcock
died 22 February 1854
Children of Robert and Mary: Lydia; Emma Jane; Anna Mary
Robert Trumbull, the youngest child in the Trumbull family, was born in 1807. This birth was not registered and we know neither the month nor the day. All that has been learned about him has come from old letters and the Geneva Book.
At the time of his birth, his sisters were all in the teens, his oldest brother was twenty and the younger brothers seven and four. It is likely that, as a baby, Robert received a great amount of love and attention. He may have had delicate health from the beginning.
Robert evidently had no interest in farm life as he grew into manhood. With six older sisters and brothers, he had an opportunity to learn much from them, and he probably had all the education the settlement provided in the first quarter of the nineteenth century. He attended the University of Vermont at Burlington and graduated from that institution, having prepared himself to become a teacher.
From an old letter we learn that Robert II was living in Albany, New York, in 1834, and teaching in a school of higher learning in that city. Somewhere between his graduation and the time he left Albany in 1853 to come to Northwood, he was married to a widow, presumably named Wallace, since she had a young daughter whose name was Maggie Wallace.
To this union three daughters were born: Lydia, Emma Jane, and Anna Mary. If he was married when he went to Albany, the children could have all been born, educated, and departed for California before their father had left that city.
In the fall of 1850, the Reverend J.B. Johnston entered upon the project of establishing a female seminary, distinct from the college, and erecting a suitable building. It was to be known as “Geneva Female Institute”, a school for young ladies. The plan was well received by influential people, and during the year of 1851, the large seminary building was erected in the eastern end of the village of Northwood.
The new building was a three storied brick structure, containing thirty-seven rooms. It was soon filled with an unusually large, refined class of young ladies and put under the special care of the talented teacher Mrs. Margaret Wylie Milligan Sloane, wife of Geneva College President, J.R.W. Sloan. Mrs. Sloane served the seminary for three years and it may have been her recommendation and influence that brought her uncle Robert Trumbull to the school where he assumed the principalship in 1853. His work was terminated in 1854 when he died of consumption. His niece, Mrs. Sloane, also died that same year. Robert’s body was buried in the Northwood cemetery, the first of the family to be interred there. His tombstone stands in line with that of his brother James and his sister Nancy.
Robert’s widow married later, choosing a minister for her third husband.
Meanwhile, Robert’s daughters, all living in the southern part of California had married. It could be that their names found in an old letter were arranged in accordance with their age, but this is not certain. Lydia married a Professor Stevenson, who was a teacher in Occidental College. Lydia died in Long Beach, California. Emma Jane married a man by the name of Ferguson and they had a daughter whom they named Mary. Mary graduated from Normal College in San Jose. Anna Mary became the wife of a man who bore the name of Moffet. There is no record of any other descendants besides Mary Ferguson.
Mary Ferguson married a Leo Schneider, and no further trace of her has been recorded.
Maggie Wallace married a man named Campbell and had a son whom she named Elliot. She spent her last days in her son’s home in San Francisco.