Originally, there were at least two Edward
B. Walker family Bibles. The original and most important
one, which presumably contained contemporaneous records
of the births of the children and could have even included
information about Edward, Jane, and some of their relatives,
is missing but may exist.
In Jane (Horn) Walker's attempt
to get a pension, both she
and her son Jonathan
explained that Edward had had a family Bible but had
given it to a daughter who have moved to Indiana. The
statements do not indicate which daughter had the Bible,
but most likely the daughter was Susannah, who married
Thomas Fitzpatrick Jones and moved to Greene County,
Indiana, sometime between 1832 and 1834. If this Bible
still exists, it probably was passed down to her descendants.
Before that first Bible was given away, Edward apparently
began to copy the family information into another Bible,
with the copying being finished by his son Jonathan.
The family record pages, or at least some of them, were
torn from the Bible and sent as part of Jane's pension
application, and they remain on file at the National
Archives. Images of them are below.
The Bible itself was
also sent but was
returned in 1877 to Jane's grandson Johnathan, son
of Edward, Jr. That Bible is also missing, and whether
it contained any additional family information is unknown.
What Has Been Found
Two sets of family Bible records were sent as part
of the pension process; apparently, when Jane
filed her first application for a pension, Jonathan
made a copy of the record and sent the copy. Later,
when questions
were raised about the record, Jonathan
sent the pages torn from his father's last Bible.
The Pension Office suggested
that both sets of records came from the same Bible,
which may well be true; Jonathan said that he had copied
the records but did not say onto what. Neither the publisher
nor publication date of the Bible is known at this time,
but, in any case, the family record is known not to
be contemporaneous to the births of the children.
Below are images and transcriptions of the 6 leaves
from the two family records still on file at the National
Archives. The leaf numbers are assigned by me based
on the order the pages appear on microfilm and have
no other significance. There are some minor discrepancies
between the two, most of which can be resolved with
a little analysis. Some of the
records are easier to read on the microfilm. Leaves
3 and 4 appear to be from the second submission; although,
except for the third leave, no direct indication is
given.
The scans below are scans of prints from the microfilm
and are not always readable because of some old water
damage to the paper. The transcriptions were made directly
from the microfilm, which is somewhat easier to read.
Analysis of Record
In summary, the following dates for Edward's children
can be determined from the two sets; dates thought to
be incorrect are explained at the bottom of this page
and shown in italics here.
Child
Leaf 1
Leaf 2
Leaf 3
Leaf 4
Leaf 5
Leaf 6
Joseph
06/26/1791
06/26/1791
06/26/[?]
William
05/15/1792
05/15/1792
Edward
09/07/1795
09/07/1795
Martha
11/05/1797
John W.
10/20/1801
10/20/1801
Samuel
01/31/1802
01/30/1803
Jonathan
03/01/1805
06/04/1805
06/02/1805
Henry Horn
08/16/1807
08/16/1807
Susanna
11/05/1809
[?]/05/1809
Margaret
04/15/1812
04/15/1812
Elizabeth
05/30/1815
05/30/1815
Three different dates are given for Jonathan. The March
date can probably be ignored since the other two are
both in June. Since leaf 3 is supposedly the oldest,
the date used at the moment is 4 June 1805; however,
2 June 1805 may be correct, especially as leaf 5 seems
to have a correct date for Samuel, the other conflict.
The birth date for Samuel is given as 31 January 1802
on leaf 4 and 30 January 1803 on leaf 5. In this case,
leaf 5 is more likely correct as the 1802 date would
place his birth just two months after the previous child.
Of course, he could have been born 31 January 1803 as
well. More exotic theories that would allow Samuel to
have the 1802 date, such as him having a different mother,
seem far-fetched at best.
There is no ambiguity in the birth dates for Martha,
but the date bears discussion. When Annie Walker Burns
requested a copy of the pension while in the process
of writing her book in 1929, she received a letter which
summarized the record, and it included a birth date
of 9 November 1797 for Martha. That date has often been
used as her correct birth date, probably because the
typed letter, which was microfilmed along with the pension,
is much easier to read than the Bible records. However,
the date, specifically 5 November 1797, is quite clear,
and, because of a typo, the wrong date has been used
for Martha for decades.
Henry's name also bears discussion. Although he is
occasionally seen as Henry W. Walker, the same pension
office clerk gave his middle initial as "N or M",
presumably from leaf 3, the initial seems to more likely
be an "H". Leaf 6 gives a full middle name
of "Horn", his mother's middle name. That
same clerk called her "Horne or House", although
in no case does it actually look like "House"
in the documents. Every use other than this Bible record
in the pension was wrutten by a justice of the peace
or other person transcribing what Jane said, not Jane
herself as she was not able to write. In other words,
the one use of "Horn" on leaf 6 is the only
known instance in which a family member wrote the word
"Horn"; although of course the spelling of
his middle name could be different from her maiden name,
the spelling "Horn" is probably the spelling
of choice by the family for Jane's maiden name.
In addition, within the depositions themselves, Jonathan
mentions
a child who died as an infant was not included in
the Bible record. He gives no details other than that
the child was born before he was. However, there is
a logical break in birth order, and the child was probably
born about 1797. The stray entry for Susan Emaly was
for his own daughter; there is an additional unreadable
entry under that one which may have been another of
his children.
Images
Leaf 1
Joseph Walker was born June the 26th in the year
of our lord 1791
William Walker was born in the year of our lord
May the 15th in the year of 1792
Edward Walker was born September the 7th in the
year of our lord 1795
Leaf 2
Elizabeth Walker was born May the 30th in the
year of our lord 1815
Jonathan Walker was born March the 1st in the
year of our lord 1805
Susan[?] Emaly was born March the 7th in the
year of our lord 1831 [or 1837]
Leaf 3
Register A: Jonathan Walker exhibit
Jonathan Walker was born June the 4th in the
year of our lord 1805
Henry H. Walker was born August the 16th in the
year of our lord 1807
Susanna Walker was born November the 5th in the
year of our lord 1809
Margaret Walker was born Aprile [sic] the 15th
in the year of our lord 1812
Elizabeth Walker was born May the 30th in the
year of our lord 1815
Leaf 4
Joseph Walker was born June the 26th in the year
of our lord 1791
William Walker was born May the 15th in the year
of our lord 1792
Edward Walker was born September the 7th in the
year of our lord 1795
Martha Walker was born November the 5th in the
year of our lord 1797
John W. Walker was born October the 20th in the
year of our lord 1801
Samuel Walker was born January the 31st in the
year of our lord 1802
Leaf 5
John Walker was born in the year of our Lord
October the 20th 1801
Samuel Walker was born January the 30th in the
year of our Lord 1803
Jonathon Walker was born in the year of our Lord
June the 2nd 1805
Marget Walker was born in the year of our Lord
["March the" scratched out] Aprile [sic]
the 15th 1812
Leaf 6
Joseph Walker was born the 26th of June in the
year of our lord [unreadable]
Henry Horn Walker was born August the 16th in
the year of our lord 1807
Susanna Walker was born [unreadable] 5th in the
year of our lord 1809