The Shoemaker Connection

As noted in previous posts about exploring Taylor connections in Sussex County, NJ, there is the matter of a certain William Taylor of Amwell, Hunterdon, NJ and his apparent association with a Jacob Shoemaker of Oxford, Sussex, New Jersey. Thanks to a source simply titled The Michael Shoemaker Book (available on ancestry), the connection has become somewhat clearer!

First, recall that there were two places where the Shoemaker-Taylor connection appeared:

• An 1822 Sussex County deed between the entire family of John Summers, Esq. to Jacob Shoemaker of Oxford and William Taylor of Amwell.
• The 1826 will of William Taylor of Amwell where all his estate was to be divided among four Taylors, William, George, James S., and Jabez G. (presumed by me to be his sons) and Jacob Shoemaker of Sussex County. The relationships are not explicitly stated in the will.

Now to the news provided in the newly discovered source. The Michael Shoemaker Book identifies Jacob Shoemaker as having moved some time prior to 1790 to Oxford, Sussex, NJ from Bethlehem, Northampton, PA with his parents (Peter and Elizabeth Magdalena (Maur) Schumacher) where he married Sophia, daughter of William and Mary Taylor of Raritan Twp, Hunterdon, NJ. The Shoemaker couple lived in Oxford, and Jacob dealt extensively in NJ farmlands, and "with his brother-in-law, William Taylor, bought the Taylor homestead in Raritan Twp., NJ for $8,400."

It is entirely worth noting that Raritan twp. was formed in 1838 from portions of the now defunct Amwell Twp.

This connection between the two families explains alot, especially the deed and the will we found. But there's more. More reading of this new source tells us that William Taylor had a son named George (also named in William's will), who is referred to in the source as Capt. George Taylor because of his military service. Well, Capt. George Taylor married Sarah Shoemaker, the daughter of another related Shumacher family in Northamption County, PA. George had quite an interesting life, living in various places in PA before moving with his family in 1823 to Oakland County, MI. There George Taylor died in 1841, and his wife Sarah remarried to Nathan Smith. She died in 1849. She is noted as having been "short with dark hair and spoke a broken English".

So what does all this tell us?

• The connection of Jacob Shoemaker and William Taylor to the Summers family could be utter coincidence, but that connection is nevertheless NOT trivial. By 1825, Margaret Struble, the daughter of JP Struble and Barbara Taylor, married Peter Dodder, and in 1833, Ernest Mann III, the great nephew of John Summers, would marry Margaret Rush. And by the 1840s, both the Dodder's and the Mann's were in Oakland County, Michigan from where our modern family descends.
• The Schumacher family belonged to the Reformed Church of Easton, PA, and since members of that family married into the Taylors, or at least some branch of Taylors, I tend to think they shared the same religion. Which is to say that perhaps THIS Taylor family was not Quaker as we've been wondering.
• At least one member of this Taylor branch also migrated to Oakland County, Michigan, although admittedly the townships where this branch settled are not the same as the townships where our family is known to have settled.

It would seem that the main question remains:  Was THIS Taylor family related to our Barbara Taylor?

More to come!