The family of Benjamin Amos 1748-1814

 We're going to back up a little here, to the last of the Amos family that I plan to write about.  Benjamin Amos is the brother of Robert Amos, the subject of my post a couple of weeks ago.  Benjamin and Robert (and others) are the sons of James and Hannah Clarke Amos.  Robert's son Robert, the subject of last week's post, married Elizabeth Amos, who is the daughter of the Benjamin Amos I'm following today.  (Robert and Elizabeth are first cousins.) The usual facts of children of one family using the same first names is doubly complicated when the two are from the same family, and I cannot say for certain that I am assigning their children to the correct family.  There are, for instance, multiple uses of the names James, William, Benjamin, John, Joshua, Elizabeth, Ann, and so on throughout the families descending from the immigrant William and his wife Ann.  

Benjamin, as stated, is the son of James and Hannah Clarke Amos and was born in 1748 in Harford County, (then known as Baltimore County), Maryland.  He married Sarah Bussey, the daughter of Edward and Mary (widow Pendergrass, maiden name still uncertain but possibly Hayes) Bussey.  Benjamin died before November of 1814, in Harford County.  He is one who stayed at or near the homeplace his entire life, unless he is the Benjamin who is a soldier in the Revolutionary War.  He was the right age, but there were other Benjamins, also, who would have been cousins to this Benjamin.  We do know that Harford County saw skirmishes and was not far from many of the battles in Pennsylvania, so it is more than possible that our Benjamin was involved.

Benjamin and Sarah had three daughters who are relatively well researched, and two sons who are not.  I'm not sure that the sons are theirs, or that they lived to adulthood, if they are, but I will include whatever brief hints I've found in this post.

Elizabeth was their first born, in 1774.  She married Robert Amos, son of James and Hannah Clarke Amos. Their children are Martha (our ancestor), Sarah, Benjamin, Mary Ann, Elizabeth, Ellen, James, Corbin, Anna, and Robert.

Mary is also reported to have been born in 1774, May 24, to be exact.  This is a bit confusing.  I don't have a marriage date for Benjamin and Sarah, other than "about 1772."  So was Elizabeth a twin to Mary, or are these christening dates, and was Elizabeth possibly born a little earlier than 1774?  I'm still looking for records.  At any rate, Mary married John Way, whose parents are still a mystery.  Their children are Sarah, William, John, Hannah, and Robert.  Mary died in 1853 in Harford County.

Ann was born in 1779 and died in 1849 in Harford County.  She married Abel Anderson, the son of Thomas and Hannah Davis Alderson.  Their children are Lucretia, John, Sarah, Benjamin, Jane, James, Abel, Thomas and Elizabeth.  

Now, for the boys.  Note that there is plenty of time between the births of Mary and Ann for a child or even children to have been born.  One son may be James.  If there was a James born to this couple, he may be the James who married Hannah Lee and had children Mary, David, William, Elias and Oliver.  This is a mighty big if" and "may" and needs to be proven or disproven.  

It has also been suggested that there was a son Joshua.  I have no idea when he was born or whether he survived infancy, if in fact this is a child to Benjamin and Sarah.  

We do know, then that Benjamin and Sarah had at least 24 grandchildren.  Although some of the grandchildren stayed in or near Harford County, others moved west as the country grew, as was also true of the grandchildren of Robert and Martha McComas Amos.  Our country, and our heritage, was growing into something William and Ann Mauldin Amos would not have recognized.