Smith Family: Lydia Hinmon was Unlucky in Love

Lydia Hinmon was connected to the Smith/Smull/Munson families by marriage in multiple ways. Every time I read about her, I can't help but feel she was super unlucky with love. Her parents were George Hinmon and Anna Lewis, who originally hailed from New York State and later Erie, Pennsylvania, and then pioneered to Jasper County, Iowa. The two children I was able to locate were George Richard Hinmon (1833-1914) and Lydia (abt. 1839-bef. 1885). George would settle in the Bremer/Chickasaw, Iowa County area and several of his children would intermix with ours.

While still in Concord, Erie, Pennsylvania, Lydia married William C Stuck (05 Aug 1855).  The young couple lived in Albion in Dane County, Wisconsin. In 1860, their only child, Llewellyn Jermiah Stuck was born. He would live in Floyd County, Iowa for a time as an adult, but eventually he and his wife Mary Campbell would live in both Minnesota and Wisconsin. They had many children.

William Stuck fought with the Wisconsin 5th Volunteer Infantry Regiment during the Civil War. He began his service in late May of 1861 and lasted until the Second Battle of Rappahannock Station in Virginia which began 07 Nov 1863. He was injured in battle and died in a Washington DC hospital.

"Pressured by Washington to make another attack on General Robert E. Lee’s army in northern Virginia, and perhaps enjoying the success of his partial victory over Lee at Bristoe Station three weeks earlier, Maj. Gen. George G. Meade ordered an assault against Lee’s infantry along the Rappahannock River on November 7th, 1863. A single pontoon bridge at Rappahannock Station was the only connection between Lee's army and the northern bank of the river. The bridge was protected by a bridgehead on the north bank consisting of redoubts and trenches. Confederate batteries posted on hills south of the river gave additional strength to the position. As Lee anticipated, Meade divided his forces, ordering Maj. Gen. John Sedgwick to the bridgehead and positioning Maj. Gen. William H. French five miles downstream to engage a Confederate line near Kelly’s Ford. To counter this move, Lee shifted a force under Maj. Gen. Robert Rodes to Kelly’s Ford, where they were overwhelmed by French. At Rappahannock Station, Sedgwick’s men skirmished with Maj. Gen. Jubal Early’s Confederates before launching a brutal nighttime bayonet attack. The Federals overran Early’s bridgehead taking more than 1,600 prisoners. Defeated, Lee retreated into Orange County south of the Rapidan River while the Army of the Potomac occupied the vicinity of Brandy Station and Culpeper County. Later in November, before the winter weather ended military campaign season, Meade would attempt one more offensive against Lee at Mine Run." Battlefields.org

Second Battle of Rappahannock Station
(click on image to increase size)

In 1866, she married George Harshman in Jasper County, Iowa. George was a widower with two young sons. The marriage didn't last though. George moved on to Nebraska and died in Scottsbluff in 1898.

The next chapter in Lydia's life was her marriage to widower Francis "Frank" Doole. Doole had a long marriage with Martha Shaw, but she died in 1879. They had five children. Lydia married him the following year in 1880 in Floyd County. Frank, by all accounts was cantankerous and difficult. Some of his shenanigans included plowing up the tombstone the children had placed for their mother and being arrested for running a "Blind Pig. What's a blind pig? In the Midwest, Blind Pigs started in the 1880s and were quite a problem, according to the anti-alcohol crowd. It got its name because some wily proprietor would sell tickets to a back room to see a "blind pig," and the ticket price included a drink." 

The last time Lydia is seen in records is in the 1885 Iowa State Census, when she lived with Frank and his son William. Then, she disappears. Dead? Did she divorce him and move to Wisconsin to be with her son? We don't know. Doole married my great-great aunt Sarah Smith, a lifelong spinster in 1887. She divorced Doole before their deaths.

Hoping to find someone in the Doole or Stuck families who might have the answer.  

Hang Down Your Head, Frank Doole

I have been digging away at various pieces and parts, hither and yon, and took a second look at this fellow who had married three times - two of those times into families that are connected to me.  He seems like less than a pleasant character, but a character for sure.

Lydia Hinmon

Francis Doole was born 20 Jun 1823 in Antrim, Northern Ireland. His wife, Martha Shaw, born in 1825 in Ireland, traveled with him to the United States, arriving 25 Dec 1843 in New York City. They moved to Ware, Massachusetts, where they became US citizens in November of 1854.

Their daughter, Mary Jane, was born in Ware, but by the time the first of their three sons came along in 1854, the family was in Floyd County, Iowa, which is a hop and a skip from both Bremer and Butler counties.

Martha died in 1879 and Frank remarried to Lydia Hinmon Stuck Harshman.

Lydia was born about 1839 to George Richard Hinmon and Anna Lewis in Erie County, Pennsylvania. Her first husband, William Stuck, died during the Civil War. They had been married in 1855 and he died in late 1863. They had one son. She married George Harshman next, in 1866, and it appears that marriage ended in divorce. George seems to have moved on from Iowa, where several Hinmon's had settled and headed West to Nebraska. Lydia then married Francis Doole, widower, on 05 Jun 1880 in Floyd County.

The 1880 Agrigultural Schedule 2 of the Census indicated Doole was fairly successful. He owned 130 acres of farmland in Floyd township and his farm was valued at over $5,000. Just looking at the record, it seemed all was pretty normal.

Things changed - he had fractious relations with his children which culminated in the following event involving the desecration of wife Martha's grave:

I have not discovered whether Lydia died or they divorced, but Doole married my 2xGG William Custer Smith's sister Sarah Jane, a long-time spinster who had spent many years living with her mentally disabled brother and mother and big brother WC Smith and his wife Mary Ann. That marriage occurred in 1887. In 1888, Frank made the news again:

"A "Blind Pig" which has been successfully operated the past two years at Floyd by Frances Doole, was raided and a large quantity of beer and whiskey seized. Doole is in jail at Charles City.

Atlantic Daily Telegraph, Dec 26, 1888, pg 4 Atlantic, IA"

I wasn't able to find out what happened to this case, but perhaps it led to the divorce that followed between Aunt Sarah and Doole. It was a sad situation for Sarah, who had been cared for by her relatives her entire life. She was left without a place to go after the divorce, and ended up residing in the Bremer County Poor Farm and Asylum for the rest of her life, dying there in 1924.

Doole most likely died prior to 1900, since there is no record of him in the 1900 census.

What's a blind pig? In the Midwest, Blind Pigs started in the 1880s and were quite a problem, according to the anti-alcohol crowd. It got it's name because some wily proprietor would sell tickets to a back room to see a "blind pig," and the ticket price included a drink.