Sarah H.* Freeny ¹

*Is Sarah d/o Thomas Freeny? She is definitely from the line of John Freeny (c1720-c1796), maybe as a granddaughter or great granddaughter. The most likely candidate for her father is Thomas Freeney (c1756-183x). Or she might otherwise be a great granddaughter through one of John Freeny's older sons, brothers to Thomas, viz, Joshua, William or John. More research required but probability is certain that she is of the elder John Freeny's line as either granddaughter or great.

For now, this compiler places her as a daughter of the youngest son of John Freeny, Thomas, as he is the likely candidate given the proximity of where he lived relative to the Elliotts. But one detractor from this hypothesis is that there are no females under age 10 in his household in 1800 Sussex Co. census and Sarah Elliott proclaims her age as 58 in the 1850 census (e.g.; born in 1792). As with many females of the day and the simple fact that the census takers were lax in accuracy, that age could be off by upwards of 10 years. Jacob Elliott was definitely born in 1780-84 so, it is easy to imagine Sarah Elliott born about the same time but her age in 1850 not captured correctly for whatever reason. In 1800, Thomas Freeny DOES have a female age 16-25, suggesting a daughter born 1775-1784 which indeed could be our Sarah (Freeny) Elliott here.

Other circumstantial evidence of the Thomas Freeny as father of Sarah hypothesis is when, on Mar 18 1819, her husband Jacob Elliott purchased land from Thomas Freeny for $2229 that included tracts "Friends Denial", "White Oak" and parts of "Parkers Mistake", "Unkles Advice" and "Collins Adventure". (SxLR-AN36:150) (COMPILER'S NOTE: this land includes most of all of modern Delmar, DE and centrally straddles US13 running about 1/2 mile from there towards Delmar and 1/4 mile from there to the east.)

Jacob Elliott is established as father of Benjamin Elliott via Orphan's Court records of Mar 28 1877 (issued Apr 17 1877) where Benjamin petitioned the court to divid lands of Jacob Elliott that were held as dower by Jacob's wife (Benjamin's mother), Sally H. Elliott - Sally having died on Mar 2 1877. The record lists Jacob/Sally's eleven (11) children as Benjamin; Patsy H. Cordrey (wife of Spencer M. Cordrey); Elenor Melson (wife of John Melson, but she is dead leaving four children - Sally and three others unknown); Solomon M. Elliott; Lovey Hastings (wife of Winder Hastings, but she is dead leaving seven children - Julia A. Gordy, w/o John M. Gordy; Jacob Hastings, Irene Disharoon, Elijah Hastings, Sydney Hastings, Mary Hastings, and Sarah Hastings); Samuel Elliott; Julianna Workman (wife of John Workman); John Elliott; William G. Elliott; Mary Collins (wife of Joseph R. Collins); and Jacob Elliott. The record lays out how the lands are to be divided.

Sarah married Jacob Elliott, son of Samuel Elliott and Ann Freeny, about 1808. (Jacob Elliott was born in 1780-1784 in Sussex Co., DE ^{4 5 6 7 8} and died on 20 Mar 1841 in Sussex Co., DE ³.)