An ongoing correspondence 3...

The house, it seems was built to be sort of grand at a time, 1780, when there were very few families living in Loonenburg, or what would become first Catskill in 1787, then eventually part of the town of Athens in 1815. Beers (History of Greene County guy) lists the number of families that were known to be living there (Loonenburg) in 1780 at only 46, and the William Groom family is one of them. And let’s not forget times were “iffy” in terms of political stability for the colonies…wasn’t there a war lurking? And the Hudson River Valley a strategic part of the war campaign’s?

I found a copy of the 1790 census, another tingle moment as it is a copy of the original hand signed one. William Groom is listed as head of the household in Katts Kill (Catskill) with 3 white males over 16, 1 white male under 16; 8 White females and children, and from other sources I know there were at least 1, maybe 3 slaves. (slaves were listed on the census, but the old records are missing that part of the page next to Groom) I also know that William, the “head of the family” was born Wilem Groen in 1719, of Dutch parents, Edmond and Antje Groen, making him in his early 60’s when the house was built. He married a Sara Cottington, also born in Albany County in 1720, and between them, they had 4 children, the first, Edward in 1744.

Joseph was the younger son, born in 1748. He married a Rachael Van Loon in 1770, and by 1780 had produced a brood of children, having at that time probably 5 of either 7 or 9 children, depending on which records you are looking at. A guess would be that the 3 white males over 16 were William, Edward and Joseph, as Joseph had no sons at that time. The 8 females could have been the 2 wives, and 6 children. The only problem with that theory is that Edward Groom is also listed separately as a head of household with 3 white males over the age of 16, one male under 16, 7 females and children and 3 slaves.

Assuming it was Joseph’s family who filled the house, when that census was taken, 3 of the children would have been under 10 years of age, the youngest being 3. When Rachael Groom, the mother, died in 1795, Joseph quickly took a new wife, Hannah, Schermerhorn, (married in 1796) and probably with obvious need and reason.

Regardless, they could easily have filled up a house without Edwards’ family, if he did indeed live elsewhere. Joseph’s name does not appear separately on the census, so my guess is he, at age 42 with 7-8 children makes up the inhabitants of the stone house.

I know this is a lot of math, but I really needed to figure out why they would build such a big house unless they either had a lot of people or money. So, I have a head count, but don’t know anything more about them.