William Bennet Gray

		William Tell Gray, Jr.	(family)
William Bennet Gray
1		Nancy E. Lasey

Spouse

Elizabeth Josephine Caldwell (family)

After 1870

Kentucky

Divorced

8th Oct 1886

Data

Birth

Abt. 1848

Campbell, Kentucky

Notes

As I enter in the source records I've found for William's life, the apparent picture we get, is of a horribly broken family. William is single in 1870. In 1880, he is living alone on his own, but he is listed as a widower. During the intervening time he had started a family with Elizabeth, but, contrary to the census record, she did not die. In fact, some years after 1880, we find her petitioning the court to grant her a divorce, which it does, in 1886. In fact, she outlives William, only to eventually die of a suicide.

William for his part, reappears in Ohio, and starts a family with one Abbie Hoyt. The relationship is said to have started in 1883, and their first child is reported to have been born in 1885.

It seems clear then that William abandoned his family in Kentucky.

However, from Elizabeth's eventual suicide, we can also reason that she is likely not entirely innocent in the relationship either. (High likelihood of depression and thence abusive behavior. Not that I would excuse William for abandoning his children.)

Sources

• "United States, Social Security Numerical Identification Files (NUMIDENT), 1936-2007", database, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:6KQM-M77D : 10 February 2023), Bennett Gray in entry for Emery Atwood Gray, .

• 

  1870 U.S. Census - Grants Lick, Campell County, Kentucky, page 29 of 48

• 

  1880 U.S. Census - Sandsuck, ED 162, Pendleton, Kentucky, Page 512 of 835

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  Elizabeth Gray vs W.B. Gray, 4 Oct 1886

• 

  Elizabeth Gray vs W.B. Gray, 8 Oct 1886