The Mystery of Emily Morse (Moss) Pegoda

(This is an old post I had started on 23 Sep 2012 but failed to post for some reason. The information is a bit dated now, but I felt it worthwhile to post.)

Part of my ancestry contains a curiously unique surname: Pegoda. If you know a Pegoda (spelled exactly like that), especially one that lives in Texas, there is a 99.99% chance I am related to them. So, recently, I decided to focus my research on the Pegoda family. Such a unique name sure makes weeding out non-relatives easy - they are all related to me!

While researching the Pegoda lines, I have luckily solved one of the long standing mysteries in my family. It was a minor mystery about the first wife of my 3rd great-grandfather John Pegoda, but nonetheless it was a mystery. And, it was a mystery to my part of the family, but apparently not to at least a few others in the distant family.

After John Pegoda immigrated to the United States in 1851 and settled in Walker County, Texas, he married a woman named Emily Morse on 17 Oct 1852 in Walker County. But, we should first note that her surname might not be Morse. When we first see John and Emily together in the 1860 United States census with their 3 children (Nancy, Mary Frances, and John), there is a curious older woman living with them by the name of Nancy Moss who the record states was born in Indiana. Since the record states that Emily was born in Illinois, I have assumed that Nancy is Emily's mother. No guarantees, but a relatively safe assumption given their relative ages and almost identical surnames - Morse and Moss. I have not been able to trace Nancy and Emily back to the 1850 census with any surname: Moss, Morse, Morris, etc. So, there is another remaining mystery (they never really end do they?). As we will see, some of the new evidence I have found also points to the Moss surname. [NOTE: Since Sep 2012 I have learned of new evidence that points to Emily being of the Mass family - see my book "The Pegoda Family in America" for more information.]

Now, by the 1870 census, Emily has vanished along with the 3 children she had with John, and John has remarried to another woman named Nancy McGraw (my 3rd great-grandmother) and had new children. And, this is the mystery I have solved. (Since solving it, I have finally come across at least two other people who had put these pieces together. It was just not readily available on the internet - only in ancestry.com family trees.)

I have always believed that Emily died, and probably also the three children. This belief was rooted in a note in a Walker County, Texas history book stating that John and "his wives" were buried in unmarked graves in Bath (Possum Walk) Cemetery in Walker County. Although I have not found Emily Morse's grave yet, I do not believe this is true, especially not how I thought - with Emily dying in the 1860s. John is likely buried there with his second wife Nancy, but probably not his first wife. Why? Emily did not die in the 1860s.

In the 1870 census there is an Emilie Pegodie (yes, that spelling would throw a wrench in searching by an index) in Trinity County, Texas. (Searching with soundex is beautiful, isn't it?) Her age and place of birth are a little off from the 1860 census, but there are two children with her: Nannie and Fannie, nicknames for Nancy and Frances. And, their ages and birth places are perfect. Little John is missing, but it is very possible to lose a child in 10 years during that time period.

Emily lives on until after the 1900 census often living with her daughter Frances. I believe she is buried somewhere in Robertson County, Texas as this was her last known place of residence. I find it very unlikely that after almost 40 years of separation in different locales that Emily would be buried back in Possum Walk Cemetery with her ex-husband and his second wife.

Apparently John and Emily divorced, although unfortunately the census records never confirm this. I have not checked for a divorce record in Walker County, but it seems someone would have mentioned it before now. Perhaps the record does not exist or is archived (as some are in Walker County).

So, what started all of this? The death certificate for John and Emily's daughter Mary Frances from 1949. Old death certificates are powerful genealogy tools! It states her parents as "Mr. Pegoda" and "Emma Moss." We always knew from the 1860 census that John and Emily had children. I thought they vanished off the face of the earth. But, when I found Frances' death certificate, I knew that was not true. So, she had to be somewhere in 1870. And I found her. With her mother. In Trinity County, Texas.

Mystery solved!

And, through all of this, I have finally been able to locate the immigration record for John Pegoda. I knew it existed, but I had never located it. One of the two people who had already put these parts of the Pegoda family together had a link to it.