Flora G Bancroft (Tilton) A Timeline

 Flora G Bancroft (Tilton) 

My great grandmother wrote a will the year she died. The will is short and reflects how much (or how little she possessed).  

Floras' life was circumscribed by difficulties and some personal tragedies. Born after the end of the Civil War, she lived through the so-called Spanish-American War, World War 1, the "Spanish Flu", the Crash and the Great Depression, and World War 2, dying in 1949. She buried two husbands in her lifetime.
Her father had served in the Civil War. Her  mother died when she was young. 
I am not sure where she was schooled but I'm sure her father made certain she got it (possibly why they moved from the farm?)
 
Like many people of the era she lived nearly her entire life with extended family. This post is a time line of her life events-connecting them to those people I believe she was closest to. After all, what affects our loved ones, affects us,
I believe it relevant information when writing a personal history.

Birth and Youth
Birth - 22 June 1867 in Meadville, PA to Isabell (Bella) Sarah Brinker (d of Sarah Anna Graham and Col. Jacob Brinker of Butler PA) and Peter Sanford Bancroft (1830- 1916) disabled Civil War vet, professor, and editor, born in Colebrook, CT.

Age 7- 1874-Death of her mother Isabell Brinker (born in 1846, three children)

Age 13- 1880- Residence - Butler, Butler, PA Her widower father moved the family to the small city of Butler. Living in town meant she and her brothers were now close to her mother's family and their children (her cousins on the Brinker side).
I imagine she would have spent much time with the girls in the Brinker family.

Marriages
On Oct 16 in 1895 Flora married William Henry Tilton (son of Louisa August Copes and Henry A Tilton.)
Flora filed for her marriage license giv­ing her first name as "Flo."  He was 22 years old and she was 28 years old when they wed.

William Tilton was born in Brooklyn, NY. His family moved to Butler for a job. As an adult, his parents moved from Butler to Detroit, then to California.

Tiltons: Earlier that month, William's sister, Isabella C Tilton, wed Charles Roe in Butler on Oct 2. 
Flora and Isbella (Bella) were friends: Flora's son (my grandfather) was named after Bella's husband Charles. Aunt Bella gave her nephew (Charles Tilton) her engagement ring upon her passing.

Her husband’s brother Clarence A Tilton had married and was divorced, living in Michigan. He subsequently married a divorcee writer Bertha Francis Parker (no children).

Bancroft Siblings: Flora's brothers Earl and Grove were wed already married and living in Butler.
 
Her 30s
In 1899 her brother Grove Graham Bancroft died at age 30, leaving wife Etta (Bowman) and young daughter Irene Bancroft.
She was 32 when she had her first child Henry Addison Tilton, Butler, PA in 1900. The same year her brother's infant son, Sanford Bancroft died ( son of Earl Bancroft & Clara Ryan) died.
And tragically, her (Flora) and William's infant son Henry died in 1901. She was 33.
 
* But in 1902 her 2nd son (and only child) Charles Bancroft Tilton was born at 130 E Cunningham St, Butler, PA. She was 35 that year. 

In 1906 (she was 39) her brother's son 2-year-old Alfred Bancroft (son of Earl Bancroft & Clara Ryan's son) died.
In 1910 she was 43 and lived with her husband, son and father in Butler, PA.

1916 was a bad year: 
Her father Peter S Bancroft died on 17 May 1916 at her home on 318 West Cunningham St, Butler, PA. 

Then less than a month later and a week before 48th birthday, her husband William H Tilton died on June 15, 1916. His obituary ran on Jun 16, 1916. The death certificate states the cause of death as throat cancer (with other cancers).

Her son, my grandfather, was 14 years old the year she was made a widow. 

Her 50s-60s
She remarried a "Pat" (Alexander) Moore who promised to care for her financially. That didn't work out; as soon as her son Charles was out of college in 1926, he found the couple a small hut on the farm he was managing, they were in desperate straits.

Pat Moore died in 1935. The couple had been living with her son and his wife Elizabeth, and their children in Philadelphia. 

She stayed with her daughter-in-law and her three grandchildren while her son was in Europe for World War 2. And when they moved from Philadelphia to north Adams County, PA, she moved with them. 
Flora continued to live with the family till the end of her life, dying 6 July 1949 at 82.

3 - The Danger of Being Honored. PS Bancroft

Peter Sanford (PS) Bancroft was the subject of post #1. He went from being a fellow on a farm out in the country, to being a professor, a head of an academy, a Civil War Captain, a journalist and an editor.

One day the little city of Butler sought to honor its Civil War veterans. I am told he was asked to be the guest of honor in Butler at a Civil War Dedication. As it is with most stories I hear, I wasn't paying attention to the date, but to the story. It may have been the unveiling of the Soldiers and Sailors Monument in Butler, (which was as late as 1902) or it may have been 50 years after the war, 1915. PS Bancroft, by now a widower and respected townsman, was gussied up nicely, dressed in his finest clothes that day. He was on the dais, but they wished to place him near the cannon. He obediently moved to it, not realizing their intention was to shoot it off. 

What his immediate reaction was, we don't know (did he jump, or yell?). He remembered that day every day afterward, for the consequence of having a cannon shot at his side was he was totally deaf in his one ear for the rest of his life. So, while the war cost him his arm, being honored for being a soldier & an officer in the war cost him his hearing.

 

Butler PA 1908

 

2 -Flora G Bancroft (wife of William H Tilton) Mother of Charles B Tilton

 “Most people are good-natured as long as nothing is bothering them at the moment.” 

We live in our ancestors’ future, merely read about our ancestors’ lives, but are unshaken by their setbacks or tragedies. Of course, they had to take every day as it came, unaware of the tragedies or the small triumphs ahead. As I read it, Flora Bancroft was thrust into situations beyond her control repeatedly. But she sailed through the storms of life, enjoying the end of her life at her daughter-in-law and son’s (and her three grandchildren) home. 

Flora was the only daughter of Peter Sanford (PS) Bancroft and Bella Brinker. Lucky for me, her son taped his memories in the 1980s, and he included pieces of his childhood memories and her life. From those recordings, it was clear Flora went through a long stretch of rough patches. 

Early Years, the Farm and Loss 

Her father had joined the Union Army and at the first battle, one of his arms was shattered and rendered useless. He remained with the army as a member of the “Invalid Corps” until well after the end of the war. Upon returning to Butler, he married Bella Brinker. 

Flora was born in 1867 to Isabelle S. Brinker (Bella) of an old Butler, PA family. A brother Earl followed in 1868, and Grove in 1869. Flora was only 7 years old when her mother died. Her father (who had married late in life), was now left with a farm and 3 children too young to work it (her brothers were 6 and 5). With a farm, no wife and one arm, he eventually turned from farming to education. This prompted the family to move to Butler, PA. (At this time, post-war, the US economy was in a severe recession.) Although Butler was a city, it was a city in the country. But it had grown, thanks largely its location near Pittsburgh. Several industries started up in Butler (such as the Plate Glass Company). 

Butler - Finding Friends and A Husband 

Story has it that Flora married her husband William H Tilton (a relative newcomer to Butler) “on the rebound” from a would-be boyfriend. 

Flora Bancroft 

Whether that is true, they weren’t particularly compatible. Possibly Flora knew and liked his parents, the respectable Henry A Tilton and Louisa (Copes). His parents, the Tiltons, had moved from New York City. His father had worked in Pittsburgh, then moved to Butler to run the Plate Glass Company. Their son (Flora's husband) William Tilton “clerked” at Plate Glass, but was enamored with hunting and fishing. He was the antithesis of Flora’s own father (who had been a professor, writer, educator). William showed little interest in business as his father had. William seemed content to fish, hunt, smoke his pipe. 

William H Tilton abt 1908

William H Tilton abt 1911

Flora as a young woman 

Her father never remarried. Flora had no sisters. Off the farm and living in Butler, as a young woman, she associated with female relations to her mother's family. She saved a precious photo of the MacNair sisters (who she was related to by marriage). 

A Friend and a Relative 

Her husband's sister was Bella Tilton (one of 3 Tiltons: William and Clarence were the other two). Isabella (or Bella) married Charles Roe, and Flora and her sister-in-law Bella Tilton (Roe) were close, so close that Flora named her son Charles TIlton after Belle's husband. 

Bella Tilton, sister of William

 Her Married Life and Some Losses

Flora had lost her mother, then in 1899, her brother Grove died of Brights disease—leaving a widow and a little girl. He was 29 years old. The following year she and William welcomed a new baby (Henry Addison, 1900), but he died in 1901 at less than a year old—a devastating loss. They went on to have their only child in 1902. Flora named this boy after the husband of her friend and sister-in-law: Charles (after Charles Roe). 

Charles Bancroft Tilton was born in 1902. Although the Tiltons and Bancrofts were educated for that era, they were not wealthy. My grandfather described them as Tiltons were "the genteel poor.” Since her father PS Bancroft was a widower, he lived with his son-in-law and family. At this point, Victorian manners still held sway, an era when adults wished for children to be "seen and not heard." In like pattern, after dinner Flora and William would spend the evening together in one room, while the grandson was banished to a separate room, where apparently is grandfather (PS Bancroft) kept him company. 

Her husband was a smoker of pipes and cigars...and did so often. At some point, when he got quite ill (likely cancer)—an industry magazine ran this announcement: from the: "Tilton Leaves Standard Plate - After 23 years continuous service William H Tilton has resigned his position with the Standard Plate Glass Co at Butler, Pa. Mr. Tilton was at the head of the invoicing department and is regarded as a very efficient office man. He is the son of Henry A Tilton, deceased, who was at one time general manager of the Standard company. " - from the National Glass Budget Weekly Review of the American Glass Industry, July 24, 1915, p. 5 

Loss Upon Loss 

Less than a year after her husband quit working (due to poor health), Flora's father PS Bancroft, got sick and died within 10 days in early May 1916. Her husband’s health was rapidly deteriorating, and a month later, on June 16, 1916, William Tilton died. The summer of 1916, the US had not yet World War I, and Flora lost her mother, a brother, a father, a son, and now her husband. Her son was 13 ½ and in school. She had no real skills nor job training, no means of support. She had no real property to sell. The farm in Meadville, PA, which had belonged to her fathers’ family, had been a casualty of the post-war recession. Flora went to her local dress shop – the same dress shop she used to buy her dresses in— and worked there for a time. 

Remarriage and a Setback 

When she was a widow, a man named Alexander Patrick Moore (Paddy) courted Flora, persisting till she finally agreed to marry him in 1922 (my grandfather was 19 or 20). But the newlyweds didn’t fare well financially (to put it mildly). My understanding is that Flora hoped for some financial security entering into the marriage—and found the opposite. Family lore says Mr. Moore had business setbacks in the early to mid-1920s from which he never recovered, financially. He was also quite traumatized from it, and never fully recovered. Flora insisted her son attend college at some distance from Butler to grow in independence. He attended Penn State (State College) where he had a full scholarship. After Charles graduated in the mid-1920s, he managed a large dairy farm in PA. When he learned his mother and stepfather where in dire straits financially, he convinced the farm owner to allow the Moores to stay for free in the very rudimentary house (little more than a shack) on the farm property. 

"Paddy" Moore and Flora c. 1929

A Loss and A Gain 

In April 1927 Flora's sole remaining sibling, Earl DeHome Bancroft died. In May 1927, her son Charles married the sister of a college friend. He married Elizabeth C Tyson of Adams County, PA. After this point, for the most part wherever Charles and Elizabeth lived, Flora (and "Paddy" Moore) lived with them. They lived together in Westchester, NY and in Philadelphia. During World War 2, when Charles was in the service, Flora moved with the family to Biglerville, PA and other places in Adams County, PA. You might be wondering how the arrangement was? Did the mother-in-law get along with the daughter-in-law? By my mother's reports, yes, there was tranquility in the arrangement. Flora’s final days with the Tiltons were sunny and bright, despite the financial and social upheavals of the mid-20th century with the Depression of the 1930s, and World War II. My grandmother (the daughter-in-law) had nothing but positive memories of her. Flora was absorbed into Elizabeth Tyson's extended family. 

 Flora died in York Springs, Adams County, PA in 1949 in her 82nd year. 

Flora, Adams County with granddaughters

 

1- PS Bancroft Sees Action

Peter Sanford Bancroft, Professor, Captain, and Editor

Vitals 
Peter Sanford Bancroft 
  B. 24 Dec 1830 Canaan, CT 
  D. 16 May 1916 in Butler, PA 
  M. April, 1865 Isabell (Belle) S Brinker, youngest daughter of Jacob Brinker who was B. 1846 Butler, PA D. 1874 Butler, PA 
 

Children: 
  1 * Flora Gertrude Bancroft 1867-1949 
  2 Earl D Bancroft 1868-1927 
  3 Grove Graham Bancroft 1869-1899 

Peter Sanford (PS) Bancroft was born in Connecticut but moved at 8 years old with his parents, who settled on a farm near in northwest Pennsylvania in Meadville. His father was the Rev. Earl Bancroft, a retired minister and local preacher of the Methodist church. His mother was a daughter of Grove Pinney.
PS Bancroft worked on the farm, attended county schools and then Allegheny College, from which he graduated in 1855 magna cum laude. 

Career 1 - Professor of Greek and Latin
For the next few years he was Professor of Greek and Latin at Madison College (now part of Waynesburg U). 

Career 2 - The Civil War and an Officer 
In September, 1861, he joined the army of the Union and was made Second Lieutenant in Company E, One Hundred Eleventh Regiment, PA Infantry.  

On September 17, 1862, in the battle of Antietam, his right arm was shattered by a bullet. While in hospital suffering from this wound he was promoted to the rank of Captain. 
March 16, 1863, he resigned and was discharged on surgeon's certificate of disability. In Apr. 1863 the U.S. War Department created the "Invalid Corps" made of worthy disabled officers and men who had been in the army. It was variously called Invalid Corps or Veteran Reserve Corps, and Bancroft signed on and he was appointed First Lieutenant in the Veteran Reserve Corps. 
In December he was appointed Captain and later assigned to the Third Regiment of that corps. This appointment was confirmed by the issue of a Captain's commission with 'the advice and consent of the Senate' and signed by President Abraham Lincoln. 

His grandson Charles Tilton had possession of the commissioning signed by Lincoln until he sold it to antiques dealer in the 1900's. Bancroft continued in service with the Invalid/Veteran Reserve Corps until February 1866, nearly a year after the close of the war. 

Captain PS Bancroft, Union Army

Career 3 - Marriage, Family and Farming 
In April, 1865, in his 35th year Bancroft married 19-year-old Bella S. Brinker, youngest daughter of Col. Jacob Brinker, a former sheriff of Butler County and Sarah Ann Graham. They were farming the Meadville farm when Belle (Brinker) Bancroft died in 1874, leaving 3 small children. 

"Belle" Brinker, wife of PS Bancroft

Career 4 - A Widower with a Family, Moving to Town, The Witherspoon Institute 
Within three years of his wife's death, when the youngest was still a small child, PS Bancroft and his family moved to Butler in 1877. In the wake of his personal economic struggles and the nationwide postwar recession, he decided to go into education. 
He took the Witherspoon Academy (a school begun as a Presbyterian school and subsequently run as a Lutheran school), and turned into a non-sectarian private school. The reorganized school was known as the newly re-formed Witherspoon Institute. PS Bancroft was for a number of years Principal (manager and administrator). 
The 1880 Census has the family living with his widowed mother-in-law, Sarah (Graham) Brinker. He was 49, she was 71 or 72.

Career 5 - Newspaper Editor 
While running the Witherspoon Institute, he was also a staunch supporter of the cause for which he fought. While the Civil War was officially over, the disputes leading up to it were still hotly felt in the public area.
PS Bancroft was a member of the (fairly new) Republican Party. In Butler former war veterans who were fellow Republicans felt they needed a publication. Newspapers of this period normally took a political viewpoint as their raison d'être. In March, 1889, he entered newspaper work in the office of The Butler Eagle, and October of 189 [?}, he became associate editor of the Butler County Record.
He worked as the Associate Editor until May 6, 1916, ten days prior to his death, when he was taken ill. Strangely, the newspapers report that in 1915, his son-in-law (with whom he lived) resigned his job to take a job in Utah, and PS Bancroft was planning on moving with them. But sadly, Tilton never moved, he dying before a year had passed from his resignation. Tilton died 15 Jun that year, having outlived his father-in-law by less than one month.
For most of his life in Butler,PS Bancroft lived in a multi-generational home: either with his mother-in-law, or his daughter and her family. At the time of his death at 85, he was living with his daughter Flora, her husband William Tilton, and his grandson, Charles Bancroft Tilton. 

PS Bancroft and grandson Charles Tilton (early 1900s)

 
(See post 3 The Dangers of Being Honored, a recounting being honored in town)