Tuesday, September 22, 2026
Wednesday, September 2, 2026
Hans Kennamer in Alabama
For those who share my descent from Hans and Rachel Kennamer of Marshall County, Alabama, the following links to family history are provided:
Family Search: Hans Kennamer Sr.
The Granddaddy of Alabama Family Reunions
My own descent from Hans Kennamer and Rachel Riley:
1. Their daughter Priscilla married John Lemley and had
2. George Lemley and his first wife had a daughter named
3. Sarah Lemley, who married Bryant Alexander (Sandy) Vann and had
4. William David Vann, who married Martha Burrow and had
5. Lonnie and Mattie Vann. Mattie married Albert McAnally and had
6. Nannie Bea McAnally, who married Samuel Montgomery Hendrix and had children.
My Descent from Certain Immigrants: Nicholas Knapp and William Tuttle
1. Nicholas and Elinor Knapp were the parents of
2. Caleb Knapp, who married Hannah Smith and had
3. John Knapp, who married Anna Ferris and had
4. Peter Knapp, who married Elizabeth Slauson and had
5. Sarah Knapp, who married Austin Smith and had
6. Mary Mercy Smith, who married George Westlake and had
7. Samuel Westlake, who married Elizabeth Reed and had
8. Josiah Westlake (1800-1886), The Innkeeper at Marysville, Ohio
1. Symon Tuttle and Isabel Wells were the parents of
2. William Tuttle, who married Elizabeth (unknown) and had
3. Sarah Tuttle, who married John Slawson and had
4. John Slauson, who married Mary Holmes and had
5. Elizabeth Slauson, who married Peter Knapp (see #4 above)
Tuesday, September 1, 2026
An Axe Murder in Puritan New England
William Tuttle, son of Symon Tuttle and Isabel (Wells) Tuttle, along with his brothers, Richard and John, arrived in the New World aboard the ship Planter in 1635. Now, while his brothers settled in Massachusetts, William and his wife joined the colonists led by John Davenport and Theophilus Eaton and settled in New Haven, Connecticut. Together, William and Elizabeth had children: John, Hannah (Hurd), Thomas, Jonathan, David, Joseph, Sarah (Slawson), Elizabeth (Edwards), Simon, Benjamin, Mercy (Brown), and Nathaniel.
Now, their daughter Sarah had married John Slawson, and the couple had set up residence in Stamford. One evening in November of 1676, John had left before supper to visit a friend, and Sarah and her younger brother Benjamin had quarreled in his absence. Benjamin slammed out of the house, and Sarah asked her daughter to lock the door behind him. However, before she could even close the door, Benjamin returned with an axe! He swung the axe and shouted, "I will take you to be with God!" He continued to savagely pursue his sister into a fireplace and split her head open with one of his blows. Then, realizing what he had done, he fled the house and ran headlong into the forest.
At the trial which followed the evil deed, Benjamin would only say that he was afraid that his sister would kill him. The jury quickly returned a verdict of guilty and declared: "Thou has most wickedly risen up against thy sister Sarah the wife of John Slawson of Stamford . . . and smiteing her with an axe or some other instrument of death thou hast slayne her." He was promptly sentenced to death by hanging. However, before the sentence was carried out, Benjamin bequeathed his estate to his sister Elizabeth Edwards, the grandmother of the famous minister Jonathan Edwards ("Sinners in the Hands of An Angry God")













