Spragues on the 1830 & 1840 census for Murray, Orleans County, NY

I was searching through my old files and found a spreadsheet that a “cousin” had done on the Sprague family in Murray, Orleans County, New York. I couldn’t find her excel file — it must be on my external hard drive which I don’t have connected at the moment. But I did find this gem from the 1830 census.

On it, you can see two John Sprague (s) listed. The top one has a male in the 40 to 50 age group. I believe that is John Sprague, born 17 Apr 1783 in Connecticut. He has 5 male children, under the age of 20, and 1 female child in her 20’s. The John Sprague who is lower down was born 21 Dec 1805 in Vermont, and has 1 male child under 5, and 1 female under 10, and a teen female, with one in her 20’s.

Since I haven’t found any complete lists of the older John’s children, and have been finding them by accident on later census, death records, proximity in cemeteries, etc. Here is my guesswork on some of the possible children,

(1) John Sprague b. 21 Dec 1806 Winhall. VT (the lower John, my line) d. 4 Feb 1890, Vernon, WI

(2) Diantha Sprague b. 15 May 1808 Winhall, VT

(3) Unnamed Deceased Male twin b. 15 May 1808 d. 18 May 1808 Winhall, VT

(4) Female 1810 (census)

(5) Thomas Sprague b. ~1819 NY (Orleans County?)

(6) Samuel C. (Clark?) b. 1822 NY

(7) Eli D. Sprague b. 27 Mar 1827 NY  d. 4 Sep 1908 Barry Co. MI

(8) Mary Ann Sprague b. 27 Mar 1827 NY  d, 22 Nov. 1910 Barry Co., MI

(9) Arah J. (Jesse?) b. 1828 NY

The names of Thomas, Eli and Clark have been listed as sons of John Sprague, who was the son of another John Sprague, b. 1735 Malden, Middlesex, MA and moved to Killingly, Windham, CT with his father and siblings. That John is on the census for Killingly in 1790. Without vital records, I am trying to build a connection between all these “Johns” by location and the fact that families tended to move together.

I’ll post more on the 1840 census. My theory is that John Sprague’s  (Jr.) wife died leaving him with small children, so he moved back in with his father.

Diantha Unknown married John Sprague, Winhall, Vermont

Diantha and John Sprague had at least two sets of twins. Their first son, John Sprague, my great, great, great grandfather was born in Winhall, VT in December 1806. By May 1808, Diantha was giving birth to twins: a daughter they named Diantha and an unnamed son who died within days. They had more children, but by that time they had moved to Holley, town of Murray, Orleans County, New York.

I haven’t found John and Diantha’s marriage certificate, and both John and Diantha’s death certificates were not found in the Michigan vital records. They had moved to Middleville, town of Thornapple, Barry County, Michigan, and are buried in Mount Hope Cemetery.

But I found one of their other children, Eli D. Sprague’s death record in Michigan. It listed both parent’s names: John Sprague and Diantha TURNER. I have a maiden name at last!! Time to start digging again.

The maiden name for Diantha Sprague is TURNER. Finally found it!