The Sublett Connection

FRANCES SUBLETT LOGAN ONEILL 1818-1906

The Tootles, Fairleighs, Logans, and Weakleys are all connected by having the same great-grandmother, Frances Sublett. She was born in Woodford County, Kentucky, on February 7, 1818, and she died-as"Gran O'Neill-in St. Joseph, Missouri, on March 8, 1906, at the age of eighty-eight. She was the daughter of Lewis Sublett, a soldier in the War of 1812, and Susan Coleman (Strother, Pannill, Dabney, Jennings, Chew, Taylor, Thompson families). He was the son of Lewis Sublett, a soldier in the Revolutionary War who was at the siege of Yorktown and the surrender of Cornwallis, and Mary Trabue (Dupuy, Levilain families). He was the son of Lewis Sublett and Frances McGruder of Chesterfield County, Virginia. He was the son of Peter Lewis Sublett and Martha Martin. He was the son of Abraham Soblet and Susanna DuPuy, who had escaped from France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. Frances Sublett was the product of several generations of marriages between the Virginia English and the French Huguenots.

She was born at the "Ferry House' on the Kentucky River west of the town of Versailles. Members of the Sublett family had operated the ferry from the time of their arrival in these western lands of Virginia to claim the lands awarded them for services in the Revolution. The area became Kentucky in 1792. Frances's elder sister, Mary Sublett, had in 1828 married James Huggins, born in Tyrone, Ireland. (Sons, Lewis Sublett Huggins and William Huggins, were well known in St. Joseph, Missouri.) Huggins brought to meet his wife's family a young friend of his, Thomas Logan, born in Donegal County, Ireland, August 7, 1801, and on March 18, 1834, Frances Sublett and Thomas Logan were married. Logan was the son of John Logan and Jane Shannon, and grandson of another John Logan. The date of his arrival in the United States is not known, but at the time of his marriage, at the age of thirty-two, he was operating a small general store in the town of Shelbyville, Kentucky.

Their first child was a son, John Sublett Logan, born at Shelbyville on June 25, 1836. Two years later, on September 7, 1838, was born a daughter, Mary Logan. Perhaps the little boy (later Dr. John S. Logan of St. Joseph, Missouri) had dim memories of his father who died on April 18, 1840, at the age of thirty-eight and was buried in the old cemetery, now the grounds of the Shelbyville Public Library. The young widow, then aged twenty-two, with the boy of four years and the baby girl of eighteen months, was left with her house, the inventory of Logan's store, and several negro slaves. Logan had no will, so the Court appointed Frances administratrix of his estate, and James Lawrence O'Neill, cashier of the Shelbyville Branch of the Bank of Ashland, as administrator. O'Neill's careful records of the estate are preserved in the courthouse at Shelbyville. They show the total appraisal value of the estate as $11,992. In addition to the real estate, the inventory of Logan's store included fabrics, clothing, boots, shoes, and china. Also listed were:

Negro man 'Halifax' $ 600

Negro woman “Lucy’ 400

Three female children to be freed at age 18 250

Negro girl “Martha' and child 650

Cow 15

On September 16, 1840, Frances married James O'Neill. He became guardian of the five-year-old stepson, Johnny Logan, and on June 16, 1842, his own child, Alice, was born. The Probate records in the Shelbyville Courthouse show the gradual liquidation of the Logan property, as the store inventory was sold off James Lawrence O'Neill was born in Philadelphia on January 12, 1817, the son of Kyron O'Neill born in 1781 in Kilkenny, Ireland, and Catherine Doyle of Wexford, Ireland, whom he had married in 1814. James O'Neill had arrived in Shelbyville in 1838.

The Bank of Shelbyville, still operating, is the successor of the branch of the Bank of Ashland, of which James O'Neill was cashier. The old Minute Books kept in the vault show the beautiful writing of James O'Neill. His reports to the directors on the condition of the Bank start with these items: 'Gold in vault,' 'Notes of other Banks,

Notes of our Bank. There was no Federal Reserve system in those days, and each bank had to maintain its own liquidity.

One story of the old Logan store has been handed down by word of mouth. There was the main store room in front, a partition, and a back room. In the back was kept a former whiskey barrel, now filled with water. A dipper hung beside it and the customers were welcome to step back and have a refreshingly flavored drink of water.

Other children born to Frances and James O'Neill in Shelbyville were: Catherine on June 6, 1844; Virginia on May 28, 1846; and finally a son, James Lawrence O'Neill, Jr., on August 10, 1852. The family group thus consisted of the parents, the two Logan children, and the four O’Neill children, a total of eight.

The discovery of gold in California in 1848 sent its impact around the world and a tremendous movement of population westward began. The principal funnel for this migration was the town of Saint Joseph, Missouri, which had been started as recently as 1843. As a starting point for the West, St. Joseph offered advantages which no other place possessed. The railroads were not to reach that far for another decade, the rivers were the highways, and St. Joseph was the optimum north and west point to which the travelers could go by steamboat before embarking on the hazardous wagon trip across the plains. Merchants were quick to recognize the possibilities, and St. Joseph became the outfitting point where horses, wagons, supplies of all kinds (always whiskey) could be purchased for the trip west. The population in 1848 was estimated as 1900, and reported as 3460 in the federal census of 1850. Estimates of the number of emigrants passing through the town in that year range as high as fifty thousand. The commercial opportunities were great and business was booming. In 1857 a company was organized in St. Joseph to do a banking and insurance business. It was called The Buchanan Life and General Insurance Company, and the capital was $20,000. We do not know just how James O'Neill had the connection, but in 1857 he left his post as cashier of the Bank in Shelbyville, Kentucky, and moved his entire family to St. Joseph by steamboat. In 1858 he took up the post of secretary of the Buchanan Life and General Insurance Company. The family lived in the house at Fifth and Antoine Streets, later enlarged to become Dr. Martin’s “Young Ladies Institute. John Logan was twenty-one; he had attended Kentucky Military Academy and the University of Louisville Medical School; he occasionally slept at the office of the Buchanan Life as night watchman. The negro girl 'Martha' and her child were brought from Shelbyville with the family and she lived to a great age in St. Joseph.

In 1862 James L. O'Neill was elected cashier of the Western Bank of Missouri, succeeding Bela M. Hughes. The president of the Bank was Milton Tootle and its authorized capital was one million dollars. On February 18, 1865, Mr. O'Neill died and in 1867 the Bank went into liquidation.

Again left a widow, at the age of forty-seven, Frances had with her, in a large house, her four O’Neill children. Her oldest son, John S. Logan, had completed his medical education at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia in 1862, and was serving as a contract surgeon with the U.S. Army; her daughter Mary Logan, a noted beauty, had married William Richardson Lykens of Martinsburg, Virginia, a graduate of West Point, and had two small children. So Frances decided to take some boarders. She chose three young men who were active in the business life of the town: Milton Tootle, William G. Fairleigh, and Thomas B. Weakley. Tootle and Fairleigh were partners in the leading mercantile establishment and Weakley was the nephew and partner of the leading banker, Armstrong Beattie. Within the next two years the three O’Neill sisters popularly called “The Three Graces, had married: Virginia on April 4, 1865, to Weakley; Catherine in January 1866 to Tootle; and Alice on October 2, 1867, to Fairleigh. James L. O'Neill, Jr., died in 1873.

In 1872 William G. Fairleigh withdrew from the flourishing business of Tootles & Fairleigh and in 1876 purchased the imposing fourteen-room house at Twenty-seventh Street and Frederick Avenue. There were twenty acres of land with a frontage on Frederick of fifteen hundred feet. The house had been built in 1858 by Mrs. John Scott, who had been the widow of William T. Harris, builder of both the brick house on the southeast corner of Nineteenth and Francis Streets later occupied by Milton Tootle III and the late Hamilton house on the corner of Fifteenth and Francis Streets, as well as the developer of Harris Addition.

Mr. Fairleigh took with him to the large house: his wife, Alice; son, James O'Neill (always known as “Neil) born in 1868; daughter Jennie born 1870; daughter Mary Logan born 1872; and his mother-in-law, Frances O'Neill.

The Fairleigh household was a large and active one. Although it was her daughter's home, Frances Sublett O'Neill, as the senior family member, was an important part of it. She lived in her large bedroom on the first floor, a small woman, always wearing one of her little lace caps. Her son, Dr. John Sublett Logan, was a frequent visitor, and she saw much of his family of six boys. Her daughters, Mrs. Tootle and Mrs. Weakley, had their own families and “Gran O'Neill' was a respected part of all their lives. She was a second cousin of Waltus Watkins who had built Watkins Mill near Liberty, Missouri. She occasionally visited there, and they came to St. Joseph to see her.

The youngest Fairleigh child, William G., Jr., was born in 1880, and the two daughters had a double wedding in 1893, Jennie marrying Charles Frederick Enright (parents of Fairleigh Enright), and Mary Logan marrying Randolph Milton Davis (parents of Randolph Davis and Alice McCord). Mr. Fairleigh gave each of his daughters their house, near his own, on Frederick Avenue. Neil Fairleigh married Forestine McDonald (daughter of W. A. P. McDonald and Forestine R. Gower) in 1895, and since Mr. Fairleigh was away from home much of the time because of ill health, the women of the family decided that Neil must bring his bride to the big house. Accordingly, Neil and Forestine moved in and organized their own apartment on the second floor.

The young married couple and the daughters living nearby enlivened the house. It was one of the few houses in St. Joseph large enough for the dances of “The Cotillion Club. Others were the McCord house at Nineteenth and Clay Streets, the John S. Brittain house, and the Dudley M. Steele house, both at Ninth and Faraon Streets. When a dance was planned, furniture would be moved out of several rooms, canvas laid down, waxed, and the floor was ready. Harry Parker often led the Cotillion and the supply of local men was augmented by the steady stream of young men from New England in training for the executive responsibilities of the Burlington Railroad and young military officers from Ft. Omaha.

Mrs. O'Neill was one of the earliest members of the First Presbyterian Church, St. Joseph, and most of her family followed her there. Her daughter, Mrs. Fairleigh, however, became greatly interested in Christian Science. She devoted much time to that and to her various charities, which gave her mother some part in the management of the household. Reaching her eightieth birthday in 1898, she was able to add to the hospitality and enjoyment of the many large family dinners. For Thanksgiving she was apt to suggest that, in addition to the usual turkey, the table have at the other end a roast pig. And if the main dish were ham, she would suggest the addition of another meat. The tradition of a bountiful table was well established. At the family dinners, the children were served at a separate table, and “Gran O'Neill' said they could not eat until after the “white folks' had been served. She always said that little girls were good all the time, while little boys were good until they were six years old. Then they should be locked away in a cage until they were seventeen, when they were again ready for respectable company.

Sadness came to the household in 1900 when Jennie Enright died. Her six-year-old son, Fairleigh Enright, was brought to live with his grandmother, Mrs. Fairleigh, and his great-grandmother, "Gran O'Neill. With so many relatives, the house continued to be an active center, and the next ten years were some of the happiest in the big house.

Frances Sublett Logan O'Neill reached her eighty-eighth birthday in February 1906. One month later, on March 7, she died-very suddenly. The family had had their usual game of cards in the evening, and Mrs. Fairleigh was reading to her mother. She said she felt ill, a doctor was summoned, and in a few hours her heart stopped.

Alice O'Neill Fairleigh died in January 1911, and just a year later her husband, William G. Fairleigh, died. Fairleigh Enright then left St. Joseph for his years at Harvard College and Graduate Business School. In July 1915 the house was taken down, the twenty acres divided into the lots which now make up Fairleigh Place.

So Frances Sublett went through many trials and lived to become the matriarch of a large and influential family group. She was survived by seventeen grandchildren and twenty-two great-grandchildren. “She was a wonderful woman,” said one who lived in the house with her. “She was very able,” said another. “When she spoke, we all jumped.”

Newspaper account of March 4, 1886:

AN HISTORICAL HOUSE BURNED

“Mrs. Frances Sublett O'Neill of St. Joseph grew up in Woodford County, Kentucky, and still owns property there. The following is taken from the “Woodford Sun.’

“On the night of the 22nd of February the beautiful little city of Versailles, in Woodford county, Ky., was visited by a disastrous conflagration, in which seven buildings were devoured by the hungry flames, aggregating a loss of $15,000. Among the number was the old stone building occupied by J. D. Bona and Hayes & Shannon. It was known as Ducker's corner, and was owned by Mrs. Frances O'Neill, of St. Joseph, who has an insurance policy thereon for $3,000. It was one of the first houses ever erected in Versailles, and was the oldest house in town at the time of the fire. The precise date of its erection is unknown, but Mr. John Amsden has heard it said that it was built in 1782, and Judge W. E. Ashmore, one of the oldest citizens of Versailles, says his father attended dances there when a young man.

“At any rate it was undoubtedly built before the year 1800, and the stone work was done by Thomas Metcalf & Bro. Thomas Metcalf afterwards was Governor of the state of Kentucky, and was known as the 'stone hammer governor.

“Henry Clay's mother once kept a hotel there, and the place was used as a tavern for many years. On his last visit to America the Marquis de Lafayette was a guest of the house, and spent a night under its roof and addressed the citizens of Versailles from the building.

“There is a tradition that a quart bottle of whiskey was placed under the corner stone, and it has been anxiously searched for by connoisseurs in that article. It would be quite valuable if found, being over 100 years old.' '

MRS. MARY SUBLETT HUGGINS

1810-1897

Newspaper Account of January 24, 1897:

A NOTABLE LADY

A Brief History of the Late Mrs. Mary Huggins.

"Mrs. Mary Huggins died January 20, 1897, at 5:15 p.m. in her 87th year. She was the mother of Lewis and William Huggins, and was the sister of Mrs. Frances O'Neill and an aunt of Mrs. William G. Fairleigh, Mrs. Kate Tootle, Mrs. Virginia Weakley and Dr. John S. Logan.

“Mrs. Huggins was born in Woodford county, Ky., July 12, 1810. She married Mr. James Huggins in the year 1828. He was a finely educated and cultured gentleman, a successful merchant and manufacturer of rope and bagging in Versailles and Louisville, Ky. He moved with his family to St. Joseph, Mo., during the year 1858, and died here in the spring of 1864. They had eight children, six of whom died when quite young.

"Mrs. Mary Huggins was the daughter of Lewis Sublett and Susan Coleman of Woodford county, Ky. Her father, Lewis Sublett, was a soldier in the war of 1812, and her grandfathers, Thomas Coleman of Orange county, Va., and Lewis Sublett of Chesterfield county, Va., were soldiers in the revolutionary army. Her great-grandfather, Pierre Lewis Sublett, was born in Germany, in 1686, and came to America with his father and mother, Abraham and Susan Soblet, and landed at Jamestown, Va., June 23, 1700, after a thirteen weeks' passage from London. Abraham Soblet and wife were French Huguenotts, who escaped from France to Germany, after the revocation of the edict of Nantes, where they resided fourteen years, when they removed to England, where they lived two years, and from there came to America.

"They settled at Manakintown, in King William's Parish, Powhatan county, on the James river, eighteen miles west of Richmond, Va. Abraham Soblet was one of the vestrymen of the First English church, established in King William's Parish, and his son James, was the clerk of the parish. Mrs. Huggins in her youth united with the Presbyterian church, under the preaching of the Rev. John Hall, a celebrated revivalist, in Versailles, Ky., and ever since had been a consistent member. She was an ideal woman and mother, a woman of fine sense and more than ordinary intellectual powers, with a tender, loving heart; was tidy, managing and industrious, a woman of rare excellence and possessed the glorious faculty of self-help. Her life was crowned with charity, purity, and love and her relatives and friends were devoted to her. The world to her was bright, and full of sunshine and beauty. She was blessed with two kind, devoted, loving sons, who made her home the sweetest place on earth to her.’