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Author: XSAga235
Surnames: Keasey, Agard
Classification: queries
Message Board URL:
http://boards.rootsweb.com/localities.northam.usa.states.indiana.counties...
Message Board Post:
I have been wondering for many years who was the Mary Keasley who married Theron Agard in
1850, and why I could not find any Keasleys in that part of Indiana at that time. This
note and its response offer me some hope of resolving a mystery which was perhaps spawned
only by a simple misspelling of the name.
However, there are other issues here, like what happened to this marriage? Apparently
Mary did not die, and with absolute certainty, Theron did not die right away. According
to the website Illinois Marriages, Theron Agard married a Minnie Young in Adams County,
Illinois, on 7/3/1959. This was an enduring marriage which produced two sons, one of whom
(William Theron) produced many grandchildren. Theron died 4/23/1892 in St. Louis, after
which Minnie and her sons (William already married) moved to the West Coast where their
descendants live even today.
Theron played very loose with census enumerators and one cannot be sure of his DOB despite
nearly complete census coverage (however notably lacking 1850). He may have been born as
early as 1817. He was the son of a certain Salmon Agard (b. 1784 in CT) who lived from
about 1810 in Delaware of Delaware County, Ohio, then moved around 1840 to Whitley or
Noble County in Indiana. Theron's mother's name was Sallie, and although we do
not know her maiden name or where she came from, Sallie probably married Salmon in
Pennsylvania. She died in Delaware in 1836, and her gravestone can be seen there.
Theron seems to be at home up until 1840. He had sisters and a brother, whose names have
thus far escaped detection. Salmon married for the second or third time in 1844, one
Rebecca Pierce, and we sometimes think that Rebecca may have drawn the line and kicked
Theron out. (Rebecca and Salmon had a late son Salmon a.k.a. Samuel b. 1850.)
Future US President Rutherford B. Hayes, who had grown up in Delaware, tells in his
journal of encountering Theron and two maiden sisters in Cincinnatti in 1851. Hayes had
known the Agards in Delaware, and writes his suspicions that the two maiden sisters (he
does not name them) were scam artists. Hayes does not mention any wife for Theron, which
suggests but certainly does not prove that the marriage to Mary Keasey lasted less than a
year.
I consider myself a student of the Agards, but I am very distantly related to Theron. Our
only common ancestor is the so-called John Agard the Younger (b. 1683 in Boston), son of
the original Agard immigrant. Stephen Agard
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