Founding Families
Ebenezer West |  Waite Carr West  |  Increase Jones |  Hannah Bowen Jones  |  William Hill | Elizabeth Hill 
Edward Talbot  |  Sarah "Sally" Martin Talbot  |  ​Absalom P Morse  | Lydia Tallman Morse 
Alfred P White | Huldah Symonds White  |  ​Robert Shaw  |  Jane Talbot Stiles Shaw

Elizabeth “Betsey” Hill
Died December 18, 1845

​A Founding Mother in the Shadows

Elizabeth (Betsey) Hill remains more than a bit of a mystery as a founding mother. No records of her life before establishing herself in Minerva have been located. Similarly, no records of her husband William Hill prior to living in Minerva have been located, which makes tracing her life through William impossible at this time.
Elizabeth gets a few more mentions in our history books than her peers, three instead of one or none. Those entries always refer to her as William’s wife or Warren’s mother. William, of course, has a few more entries which we can use to extrapolate what Elizabeth’s life entailed. The records surrounding Elizabeth and William’s children are also not prevalent, and the ones that do exist are somewhat murky, so tracking her through her children also proves difficult.

Leaving Vermont for the Wilderness

Elizabeth was uprooted from her life in Vermont when her husband, William Sr., moved with her and at least one young son, William Jr., to a settlement just beginning in the Adirondack wilderness. We do not have any records of their lives in Vermont. Tracing the family prior to 1804 has, to date, proved fruitless.
We do not know how old Elizabeth was, what her life in Vermont entailed, or even what she thought about leaving her home. We do know that there was no house waiting for Elizabeth when she arrived. While there was no physical home awaiting them in this new territory, they did have land.
More than two hundred acres awaited them, along with the promise of a new business and a new life. William had been promised the land in return for the building of the mills. That promise would have balanced the worry of leaving the known for the unknown.

A Home at the Four Corners

Elizabeth arrived in what became Olmstedville with her husband and young son sometime around 1804. William’s new grist and sawmill opened circa 1804, which means the family had to have been present by that date.
William built a home for his family at what became the Four Corners, just up the hill from the new mill. Today, Sullivan’s Store sits on the site where the Hill home once stood, and the Minerva Dam, though rebuilt, marks the location of the mills.
Early days at the Four Corners would have been busy while at the same time quiet for Elizabeth. Her home was likely the first building that went up in that location. The mills were just down the hill, and she would have possibly been involved in supporting William’s business.
The next documented family who lived anywhere near Elizabeth was Sarah and Edward Talbot, who arrived in 1810 and built their home and business about a mile or so down the road at the intersection of what is now A.P. Morse Memorial Highway and Irishtown Road. The next documented building at what became the Four Corners was the Dornberg Building, which went up in 1845.
Elizabeth may not have had close neighbors, but the traffic generated by the mills would have livened up her days. People came and went, bringing grain to be ground and logs to be sawn and carrying the finished products away. Her home may have stood in a sparsely settled location, but that did not necessarily mean she lived in isolation.

Raising the Hill Family

Elizabeth’s oldest son, William Jr., was 12 when the family moved to Minerva. Although tracing her children has been difficult, a later Minerva Historical Society account identifies five sons of William and Elizabeth: William Jr. (1791–1828), Reuben (1806–1889), Warren (1809–1892), Ira (1817–?), and Joshua (dates unknown). The couple also reportedly had daughters, although their identities remain more difficult to establish.
Childbirth and childrearing would have taken up a large part of Elizabeth’s days. She was raising a family while William established and operated the mills and the settlement around them slowly grew. She may also have assisted in aspects of the mill operation while keeping the household steady and functioning.

Faith in the Hill Home

The records of the organization of the Minerva Baptist Church in 1807 provide another brief glimpse of Elizabeth, but raise another unanswered question.
William Hill is listed among the charter members, followed by the name Elizabeth Allen. Because many of the names on the list appear in spousal pairs, I have wondered if Elizabeth Allen was actually Elizabeth Hill and whether Allen might have been her maiden name. No other record has been located to support that possibility, however, and Elizabeth’s maiden name remains unknown.
The Hill family's connection to the Baptist Church continued. An April 1809 church record, later reproduced in the Minerva Historical Society Quarterly, records a meeting held “at the house of Brother William Hill,” with William serving as church clerk.
Elizabeth’s home was not simply a family residence but one of the places where members of the young congregation gathered.

The Loom

The Hill household was listed in the 1810 census as owning a loom. That year, 1,884 yards of wool were woven by families owning looms. Six hundred of those yards were woven by the Talbots, leaving 1,284 yards woven by other families.
It is likely that Elizabeth was one of those weavers. Whether she wove only for family use or also produced cloth to sell to other community members, we do not know. The census only mentions the unusually large amount woven by the Talbot family.
It is a small entry in a record, but one that provides another glimpse into the work being done within Elizabeth’s household.

Loss and a Changing Family

Elizabeth endured loss. In 1828, her oldest son, William Jr., died from an accidental axe injury at the age of thirty-seven. No record has yet been located indicating that he was married or had children. The dangers of frontier labor were never far removed from daily life.
She lost her husband, William Sr., in 1840. By then, Elizabeth had lived in Minerva for more than thirty-five years.
Her son Warren had grown from one of Minerva's native-born children into a man active in the community his parents had helped establish. In 1848, three years after Elizabeth's death, he signed the contract authorizing construction of the first Baptist Church building. The following year he became the first native-born resident of Minerva to serve as town supervisor before moving his family west to Michigan.
Reuben remained in Minerva longer and was still living here in 1850, but by 1860 he too had moved his family to Michigan. Reuben's departure did not end Elizabeth and William's family line in Minerva. Despite the westward migration of Warren and Reuben, descendants of Elizabeth and William continued to live in Minerva into the late nineteenth century.

The Hill Home Endures

The home William built for the family endured long after both William and Elizabeth were gone. Built around 1804, it predated the other documented buildings at the Four Corners by decades.The home William built for the family endured long after both William and Elizabeth were gone. Built around 1804, it predated the other documented buildings at the Four Corners by decades.
John Sullivan purchased the former Hill home in 1920 and established a home and store there. It remained standing until it was lost to fire in 1930, more than a century after the Hill family first settled at the corner. John rebuilt the store, but lost it to fire a second time. He rebuilt again, and that store still occupies the site where Elizabeth’s home once stood.

Explore Elizabeth's World

Questions Unanswered

What We Know
  • Lived in Minerva by c. 1804
  • Raised a large family
  • Five sons are identified: Joshua, William Jr., Ira, Reuben and Warren
  • Hill home hosted a Baptist Church meeting in 1809
  • Hill household owned a loom in 1810
  • Died December 18, 1845 
What We’re Still Searching For
  • Her maiden name (Allen?)
  • Where in Vermont she lived
  • Her birth date and place
  • Identities of her daughters
  • More information about Joshua and Ira
  • Records that mention Elizabeth directly

Life In the Township of Minerva  

Far to the north that well known township lies,
With towering mountains reaching to the skies.
Rocks piled on rocks on their high peaks are seen.
With here and there a feeble shrub between.
No glittering gold those craggy rocks display.
And winter reigns even through the month of May.
And even there for some remain a charm.
That all the rage of winter can't disarm.
The toiler wakes from his last night's repose.
Faces the storm, and shivers as he goes.
To fell the pipe and hunt the timid deer.
To spread the board of the declining year.
At night returned his energies all sped
And sits him down beneath his humble shed,
While his loved partner, all her pains conceal,
With forced delight prepares the scanty meal.
And yet to them kind nature lends her store,
What life requires but never lends them more.
O'er life's rough cliffs with hurried steps, they go.
No time to stop and soothe another's woe.
Oft times they sigh, perhaps a tear may fall.
To see the chance for future bliss so small
Yet in their breasts alternate joys arise,
To know the world has ever large supplies.
And oft they wish and seek and strive to find,
Some spot on earth more friendly to mankind.
But how and when and where they are to go,
To find that spot they never seem to know.
Thus, they are bound to that lean soil, a slave.
With no reward except the narrow grave.
What are the scenes of that old town today?
Not being there, I hesitate to say.
Pure Irish blood that barren region fills.
Minus of Hewitts and human Hills?
Blessed be fates that drove them far from thence.
And taught them once to yield to common sense.

A Marker That Remains

Weathered gravestone of Elizabeth Hill in Gore Cemetery, Minerva, New York, inscribed “Elizabeth, Wife of William Hill, Died Dec 18, 1845.”
Headstone of Elizabeth “Betsey” Hill, Gore Cemetery, Minerva, New York. The stone reads: “Elizabeth, Wife of William Hill, Died Dec 18, 1845.”
Elizabeth died December 18, 1845. Her age remains uncertain. Like so much of her life, her birth date has disappeared from the record.
Elizabeth's story survives in fragments: mentions in Minerva's histories, census records, a church list, the loom recorded in her household, and finally a headstone. Further research may yet reveal more of her origins, but her presence in Minerva's earliest years is unmistakable.
Her stone reads:
Elizabeth
Wife of William Hill
Died December 18, 1845
Of the early Hill family, the only headstones I have been able to locate are Elizabeth’s and that of her son William Jr. No headstone for William Sr. has been found.
Elizabeth mattered. Someone valued her enough to ensure she had a marker that honors her life: a marker that says, I was here. I mattered. I endured.

Sources

  • Find a Grave. “Elizabeth Hill.” Find a Grave, memorial no. 13694601, Gore Cemetery, Minerva, Essex County, New York. Elizabeth Hill Memorial.
  • Minerva Historical Society. Minerva, New York, 1817–1967. Minerva Historical Society, 1967.
  • Minerva Historical Society. “A Minerva Family of 100 Years Ago.” Minerva Historical Society Quarterly, Apr. 1981.
  • Minerva Historical Society. “Ancestors.” Minerva Historical Society Quarterly, Oct. 1981.
  • Minerva Historical Society. “Old Records Preserved.” Minerva Historical Society Quarterly, Jan. 1984.
  • Minerva Historical Society. “Ancestors: Hill/Hewitt.” Minerva Historical Society Quarterly, Apr. 1987.
  • Minerva Historical Society. “Ancestors: Hill.” Minerva Historical Society Quarterly, July 1988.
  • Stone, Sharon. “Hill Family Tree.” Ancestry, Ancestry.com. Hill Family Tree.