Abel Pearson was born on July 24, 1767 in Chester, Pennsylvania. He is Walt’s 4th great-grandfather.

We don’t have a lot of information about Able and his wife Anne, as there are a fair number of families linked together that may not be relations. I am having to piece together bits of information to try to make a picture. It seems most likely that his parents were Benjamin and Margaret Evans Pearson.

Benjamin and Margaret were married in Pennsylvania, where that started their family. They moved to South Carolina. Abel married his wife Anne McClure in South Carolina in 1793. I wrote more about Anne in this post.

I found Benjamin’s will and it lists several children, including a son named Abel. It talks about the land that Benjamin owned and how that property was to be divided. Among his sons listed were the names of William, Samuel, Robert, Joseph, John and Enoch.

The 1820 census for Miami County, Ohio, lists several Pearsons, including a Robert and a John. You can find tax records for that time period that list Enoch, Abel, Robert and John. So these are things that make me suspect that this is the correct family.

Abel and Anne moved to Ohio around 1806. They had land there where Abel farmed. They had 7 children between 1794 and 1810. Anne died on January 30, 1812. It appears that Abel remarried on December 25, 1817. His new wife was listed as Polly (on some records Peggy) Buffington. I have also seen the name Mary Buffington. Abel and Polly had 2 children.

Abel died March 7, 1830 in Miami County, Ohio. He is buried in Union Cemetery in Ludlow Falls, Ohio, but has no headstone.

The family line descending from Abel.

Uncertainty in research

When you start to get back in the records this far, it is easy to get off track. There aren’t a lot of records to use. Census of this time do not list the full family only the head of household and the ages of all occupants. So it is necessary to do some deduction to try to see if this is the correct family. Are the ages and sexes of the children listed about correct? Are there other families in the area that fit parents or siblings of the person you are researching?