Hannah and Julia Hauze: A Mother-Daughter Story

 The obituary for Hannah Hauze Smith, my great great grandmother, lists her as “a daughter of the late Mr. and Mrs. Charles Hamilton.” That seems fairly straightforward until you question why Julia’s maiden name was Hauze rather than Hamilton.

Obituary for Julia Hauze Smith

Julia Hauze Smith was, in fact, the daughter of Hannah Hauze and a man named Charles Hamilton, but despite the “Mr. and Mrs.” designation in the obituary, there is no proof they ever married. No definitive clues have been found as to where Charles came from, nor where he went after fathering a child. Was this an affair? Did he die? We don't know.

Hannah Hauze was the daughter of John and Phoebe Rittenhouse Hauze. She was born in 1848 in Black Creek, Luzerne County, PA, so would have been about 19 when her daughter Julia was born.

The 1870 census shows “Julia Ann Hanz” (sic), age 2, living with her grandparents. In 1880 “Julia Hamilton,” age 12, is still living with her grandparents and listed as a granddaughter.  While records for her mother Hannah have not been found for 1870, it was about then that she married Matthew O’Brien. Hannah and Matthew had four children in Pennsylvania before 1878, and ca. 1879 they moved by wagon train to Iowa, following others from the Black Creek area. They left Julia, about 10 years old, behind. Hannah died in Iowa in the early 1890s.

So what of the lives of these two women? According to anecdotal reports, Julia was raised by her grandparents, John and Phoebe Rittenhouse Hauze, with lots of mothering by her aunts. She visited extensively with the Rittenhouse clan in Philadelphia/Germantown. My Aunt Julia (a namesake) told me that it was there at a church picnic that Julia Hauze met her husband-to-be, Daniel Asa Smith. [Note that as they were both from Black Creek, it may just be that a romance was kindled in Philadelphia.] Interestingly, when Daniel Asa and Julia purchased the farm at 728 Walnut Street in Catasauqua in 1905, the deed was in Julia’s name. Where did the $1,500 purchase price come from?

Header for 1905 Property Deed

Certainly not from Julia's mother Hannah, whose life was considerably harder. On the wagon train trip west, many were caught up in an epidemic and died, according to my aunt. Hannah herself became ill and never fully recovered. Life in Iowa was difficult. The families kept in touch, but most of the letters were lost when Julia died. We do have the following poignant letter from Hannah to Julia, written about 1890.

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Stone City [Iowa]

My dear

Well Julia you seem to think that I have forgotten you. You are sadly mistaken for I think of you day and night but you don’t know all the trials and troubles that I have to go through with. We sold our place and bought one acre of land and built us a new house. It is not very large and Hary and Jim and their father all work in the quarries now. I want you to come out here this summer and then you will know how I live. I will give you money to go home again if you don’t like it here. You must not think that I have any thing very grand for I have not so much as one good dress to my name and I shall be fourty two years old next Wensday if I live and I have seen very little pleasure in my life. Now be shure and come out here as soon as you can for we all would like to have you come. I know you and Kate and the boys would like each other. Now I hope you will come for I have thousands to tell you. 

Be sure and write soon and let us know if you are coming out here.

From your mother 

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Hannah must have died within a year or two of this letter. We don't know if Julia, who married in 1890, ever visited. Information about Stone City can be found here.

We know the families stayed in touch in part because about 1955, my grandmother, Ellen Smith Stine, traveled to Iowa to meet family members. We have a photograph of that meeting.

Ellen Smith Stine (right) with her Aunt Nell O'Brien (left)

So questions remain. Where did the money come from to purchase the farm? If anything, Daniel would have had the funds, as his father died in 1903 and left him a share of the estate.

Just as interesting is the question of why Hannah’s existence was unacknowledged when Julia died, and the name of Charles Hamilton preserved? Not only were Julia’s parents listed as “Mr. and Mrs. Charles Hamilton,” but on Julia’s death certificate her father is listed as Charles Hamilton and her mother as “unknown!” [Julia’s son Marvin was the informant.] When the home was cleaned out, correspondence with Hannah's family in Iowa was lost, but a half brother in Ohio (should say Iowa) was acknowledged in the obituary. We have the one letter above, and a portrait identified as Hannah.

Hannah Hauze O'Brien

One bright spot is that in addition to the extended family we have here in Pennsylvania, descendants of Hannah Hauze and Charles Hamilton's only daughter, we also have slightly more distant cousins in Iowa, the children of Hannah and Matthew O’Brien, whom I have "met" while on my genealogical adventure.

Life goes on.