This prompt could lead to a multivolume work covering eight or more generations of farmers, but for this entry, I want to focus on one family — the Clouds. Earlier in the year, I described this branch as “overlooked,” so I began reviewing their FamilySearch lineage and consulting secondary sources. In the process, I discovered a book about the Cloud family and was struck to learn that they were Quakers and among the earliest settlers in William Penn’s Pennsylvania.
The first Clouds in my lineage were William Cloud (1621–1702) and his son Robert Cloud (1656–1717), originally from Wiltshire, England, about 100 miles west of London. The Quakers suffered persecution in England during the mid-1600s, and when William Penn Jr. was granted proprietorship of a large landholding along the Delaware River in the New World, many—including the Clouds—saw an opportunity. William received a land grant in 1681 and likely made the move sometime in late 1682. Whether by design or accident, his land turned out to be located in Delaware rather than Pennsylvania. After several transatlantic crossings, Robert, a shoemaker, also settled in Delaware. For several generations during the 1700s, the family farmed in the Brandywine Hundred, New Castle County, Delaware.
Although the details of their farming operations are not as complete as those of the Barton County farms in the late 1800s, regional histories offer insight into what life was like. The newly cleared land supported fertile fields with a variety of crops. One notable product from these farms was butter, and these Quaker farms became known collectively as the “Butter Belt.” The area’s abundance of natural springs made it possible to build springhouses, where cool water helped preserve butter before it was shipped to market.
Life in the English colonies was changing, however. Robert’s grandson Nathaniel Cloud (1725–1802) married twice outside the Quaker faith, with ceremonies taking place at Holy Trinity (Old Swedes) Church in Wilmington, Delaware. Though Nathaniel remained in the area for life, his descendants—like so many others—were bitten by the migration bug. His son Thomas Cloud (1765–1841) moved first to western Pennsylvania and then to Ohio. The family’s farming tradition continued through Nathaniel (1791–1878) and Samuel (1819–1883), the latter being the father of Mary Ann Cloud, whom we met earlier in the year. From Ohio, the family moved westward again, to Iowa.
This is one rural family among many, with roots in an important center of early English settlement. The Quaker communities were known for their religious tolerance and good relations with Indigenous peoples. Their ideals and experience became part of the social and moral fabric of the English colonies. Philadelphia—the City of Brotherly Love—stood at the heart of these developments, a center of business, trade, education, and eventually, revolution.
Picture:
Quaker Oats company website, https://www.quakeroats.com/, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=53308037
Reference:
Wilson, Raymond H. Sr., The Cloud Family, Houston , TX, 1953.
No comments:
Post a Comment