| Notes |
- Robert G. Rumsey was 4 months old in the census taken November 1850, Cass Tp, Fulton Co, Ill. In the 1860 census of Lee Tp, Fulton Co, he was 11, and in 1870 was 20. He gave his age as 28 on his marriage certificate in December 1879, which is one year off. The birth given in the 1900 census as May 1852 was two years short of his age. And the date of 16 May 1853 was shown on the family group sheet sent by Mrs. Dorothy Gordon (DG), the year probably taken from the copy of the census she saw, though presumably the day and month are correct. This sheet gave his birthplace as Bushnell, McDonough Co, just across the town and county line from Lee Tp, Fulton Co, where the Rumseys lived a little later. However, they were in Cass Co in the 1850 census, so Robert was probably born there.
In 1860, before Ocie Sexton was born, Thomas and Jane Sexton were in Lee Tp, Fulton Co. Among their seven children was Allen aged 7, later known as Wiley A. The only member of the family spotted in either Lee or Bushnell in 1870 was Emma who was 1 in 1860 and 10 in 1870, with Allen and Jennie Sparks. Ocie was not found in 1870. Mrs. Gordon reported that Ocie Ann was in Harris Tp at age 9, working for Robert & Anna Kays. (Marjorie R.Bordner ed.- Fulton Co.Heritage [1985])
Mrs. Dorothy Gordon wrote me in Sept 1983: "Robert G. Rumsey and my grandfather Wiley Sexton [Allen W., brother of Ocie Ann] left Fulton Co, Illinois, together to find work. They left from Bushnell, McDonough County, Illinois. My grandmother and [her] little girl (age 15 months) [so this must have been about 1878 - JR] stayed with her parents in Bushnell. The men found work on the Burlington Northwestern Railroad at Friend, Nebr. which was the end of the line at that time as it was extending West. They then sent for my grandmother and baby and she went from Bushnell to Friend, Nebr. and she was accompanied by Wiley's sister Ocie Sexton. Ocie was the youngest of 11 Sexton children, she was quite small when orphaned. Later, Ocie Ann Sexton and Robert G. Rumsey married. Wiley Sexton and Robert G. Rumsey took out homesteads in Holt County Nebr. near the now defunct town of Dustin, Nebr. The Rumseys had 11 children. [She listed only 10.] Robert G. tried farming and then ran a ferry on the Niobrara river (as we hear his father before him did on the Mississippi - but this is only hearsay and where it took place is unknown to the family.)
"I was related to Mrs. Robert Rumsey by blood. My father, son of Wiley Sexton, grew up with his cousins, the Rumsey family. After WW I my father turned to farming in S.D. and there was only letter contact except for a few visits by some of the Rumseys. Then in 1948 Robert G. Rumsey's youngest son Andrew Jackson Rumsey and his family moved to Hot Springs [S.D.]. He and his wife live here yet, one daughter lives 30 miles away...
"His oldest sister, I am doing this from memory - I think it was Mary, [she was the next to oldest - JR], came to Robert G.'s funeral. At that time she lived in S.D. but I have not found her in the census at all so maybe they moved on. It seems that Robert G. left Illinois in rather a huff under the impression that he had been cheated out of something that belonged to his parents, family ties were pretty well cut and the only time any of the Robert G. Rumsey branch of the family saw any of their Rumsey kin was when this one sister came to the funeral."
The marriage certificate of R. G. Rumsey and Ocie Sexton, a copy of which DG sent me, gave his age as 28, Ocie's as 18, and named the parents of each. Her brother A. W. Sexton (grandfather of DG) was one of the witnesses; others were C. B. Wilkins and L. M. Scott.
In the 1880 census of "N" Precinct, Seward Co, Neb, there were three families living together. First were Henry C. and Martha E. Wilson, both 33, and their 8 month old son. Next were Allen W. and Cora Sexton, aged 27 and 24, and their two dauughters Bessie 3 years and May one month old. Third were Robert G. and Ocie Rumsey, aged 27 and 18, and their month old daughter Minnie.
In 1900 Robert G. Rumsey was in Dustin Tp, Holt Co, Neb, a farmer aged 48. Ocie A. was 38, and they had been married 21 years. One of their nine children had died, the rest were all still at home - Minnie 20, Zoa I. 18, Charles L. 15, Jessie J. 12, Louis A. 8, Oscar A. 6, Rossie R. 4, and Elmer L. 1 year old. (Andrew J. was not yet born.) There are discrepancies between the film copy and the copy in Lincoln, Neb, used by DG, in her typed version. The film has for Robert: his birth 1852 in Ohio, and birthplaces of his parents as
"Unknown." DG's copy has Robert's birth as 1853 in Illinois, and his parents in NY - these places being the correct ones. For Ocie, the film has her birthplace correctly as Illinois, her parents' as Ohio. DG's version had her father born in Virginia, her mother in Washington, DC.
On 24 May 1905, Robert G. Rumsey received a Government Patent, "pursuant to the Act of Congress approved the 20th of May, 1862. To secure Homesteads to actual Settlers on the Public Domain, and the acts supplemental thereto." It was located in Holt County, Neb, described as the "North west quarter of Section ten in Township thirty three North of Range fourteen West of the sixth Principal Meridian in Nebraska, containing one hundred and sixty acres" , (rec. Vol 11:34). The map from a 1904 Atlas (xerox provided by DG) shows this to be two sections south and one east of the Sexton farm on which is located the cemetery where Sextons and Rumseys are buried. DG was told in the County Court House at O'Neil, that the Rumseys lost their homestead, and after Robert's death Ocie Ann bought it back. But on the map it is listed in the name of O.A. Rumsey, so it was apparently in her name before Robert's death in 1907.
Recollections of Vesta Adams, whose family had purchased the Sexton farm on which the cemetery is located, tell that: "In 1918 came the flu epidemic. We had a beautiful, warm fall, and then the sickness. Jess Rumsey was buried on a beautiful Sunday in early October. There was no public gathering for his funeral--just a few men met and dug his grave in the Sexton Cemetery, then they brought his body in a Model T Ford truck. Only two memebers of his family were able to come, and his brother Oscar asked Father to say a prayer, and then the grave was closed. Another brother, Ross, was buried about a week later." (Before Today - A history of Holt County, Nebraska. Centennial Edition, by Nelly Snyder Yost (1976), p.437 - copied by DG)
Ocie's parents were named again on her death certificate, giving both of their birthplaces as Illinois. Ocie's birthplace in Illinois did not specify where. Ocie always claimed to have been born in Bushnell, McDonough Co, but there is a good chance she was born in neighboring Lee Tp, Fulton Co, where the Sextons had their home in 1860, the year before Ocie was born. After her parents died, she was raised by relatives in McDonough Co. Ocie was blind for several years before she died, but for the last 14 years of her life was well cared for by her daughter Zoa in California. She was mentally alert until the day she died. (DG) [2]
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1850 - 1907 (57 years)
[1, 2] 
: Address
: Location
: City/Town
: County/Shire
: State/Province
: Country
: Not Set
