Following the Monocacy Trail

 

If Frederick County, Maryland, was indeed the place where Mathias Ambrose's father was buried, it certainly would also be a place where records on this third great-grandfather of my mother-in-law could be found. Let's see what we can learn about this senior Mathias Ambrose.

Looking first to the Ambrose family history website, we find information on the senior Mathias' arrival in the area. Apparently after immigration, Mathias and his second wife had first settled in Lancaster County in Pennsylvania. Baptismal records for four of the elder Mathias' sons led researchers to speculate that Mathias had moved from the area by about 1738. Their new home? Near a now-lost settlement accessed along the Monocacy Trail following the Monocacy River area of Maryland.

Land records in 1738 confirmed the presence of someone named Mathias Ambrose, likely our Mathias' father. By 1759, the senior Mathias, having acquired several other parcels of land, was noted to have deeded one parcel each to three sons: Jacob, Henry, and Mathias. All three sons sold the land they received by 1761.

In the elder Mathias' will in 1782, he made note that he was giving the entirety of his land holdings to one daughter and her husband, Catherine and John Weller. In excluding the other Ambrose children, their father explained that he had already made provisions for them. The land received by the younger Mathias in 1759 would presumably be the transaction his father was referencing in his will.

Whether our Mathias took the money from his 1761 land transaction and moved directly back to Pennsylvania at that time, I can't yet say. There may yet be more records on the younger Mathias' family to be found in Frederick County, for which I'll be searching.

However, there was one other wrinkle in the story of the Ambrose move from Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, to Frederick County, Maryland, that might be helpful to take into consideration. Tomorrow, we'll delve into the history behind the the place where the Ambrose family had settled, and the events occurring there right during the time the family had decided to make that area their new home.