McDonough ILGenWeb

5.  Ebenezer3 Bishop (John1 William2) "was born the 28th of October and baptized at Longridge by Mr. John Brown the 11th of November, 1792." (My record). Parochial Register: "Ebenezer son to Wm Bishop & Margt Hamilton spouses in Fulshills was born Oct. 28th Baptized Nov. 11th, 1792."

"Ebenezer Bishop, aged 27 years and 5 months and 3 weeks and Margaret Hastie aged 22 years and 9 weeks and 4 days, joined in marriage April 18, 1820. Took up house-keeping at Marraygate Manse, Whitburn, County of Linlithgow, July 21, 1820, removed from Marraygate to Gramstone near Falkirk, County of Stirling in June 1825. Removed from Gramstone to Maddeston, County of Stirling, May 1, 1828 .,. New York, 20th day of July 1833 and left New York 3d of August for Lexington, Ky. and arrived there 24th of August, 1833.” (See Scott memoranda above.) "Ebenezer arrived in Ky. 1833. Settled in Illinois. (Memorandum Book, above.) "Ebenezer died in McDonough Co., Nov. 6, 1860." ("Items," above.) The Ebenezer Bishop Family. Bible, which passed from the possession of George Schuyler4 Bishop to the latter's son Oliver, who now has it, records this death as of November 3, 1859.

The children of Ebenezer3 Bishop and Margaret (Hastie) Bishop were:

      i. A daughter who died at birth, Dec. 11, 1820.

12. ii. William4- Bishop. See below.

      iii. Helen Brown4 Bishop, b. July 6 , 1823, d. Oct. 11 , 1823.

      iv. John Hastie4- Bishop, b. August 30, 1824. Dead before 1862. ("Items") He died in his 23d year, Aug. 10 1847. (Family Bible) '

      v. Ebenezer Brown4- Bishop, b. Oct. 16, 1826, d. at Lincoln, Kansas, 1902. No children.

13. vi. Robert Hamilton4 Bishop. See below.

14. vii. Margaret Hamilton4- Bishop. See below.

15. viii. David Prentiss4 Bishop. See below.

      ix. Agnes Ann4 Bishop, b. at Lexington, Ky. Jan. 19, 1837. She married __ Clark. Children, Ella, Alice, John, Robert and Minnie.

16. x. George Schuyler4 Bishop. See below.

      xi. Helen Brown4 Bishop, b. March 31 , 1846 (Family Bible), m. ____ Campbell. Lived in California. No further information. Years ago I wrote Aunt Helen but got no reply.

Margaret Hastie, my great grandmother, was born February 10, 1798 if we compute from the age of "22 years and 9 weeks and 4 days" at the time of her marriage to Ebenezer bishop on April 18, 1820. Flora Mae (Bishop) Gilbert, in her recital of family history, states that one of the reasons why the family came to America was that the mother did not want her boys to be drafted into the English army and that she walked seven miles into town to purchase the tickets to America. In the later years of her life she made her home with the James Scott family in Clay County, Kansas. Aunt Agnes is my authority that grandfather was very good to her and made his children show her every respect. Uncle John says that her death was possibly due to a fall. The present generation will scarcely comprehend reference to mode of travel in her day. But the family set out in the wagon for a trip to town. I do not know whether this was before the advent of the spring seat that was made for the wagon but even in my day it was common to use kitchen chairs for extra seats in the wagon. So great grandmother was sitting in a chair by the side of one of my aunts also seated in a chair no doubt. Roads in those days were not graded or surfaced. Due to erosion by rain and travel, roads got in bad condition sometimes. On this day the road was muddy and as they went down a hill into a ravine where there was considerable slant to the road, the wagon skidded so that a wheel came against a ridge or embankment with the result that great grandmother was thrown from the wagon. No bones were broken but the shock and the confinement in bed no doubt caused her death. The date of her death, as I have it, was February 19, 1874, which is not the date given in the accounts concerning some of her sons. But I am sure that grandmother had an obituary from which I copied the following: ’'she was descended from a long line of pious ancestors, some of whom were living in the troublesome times of Scotland when sturdy covenanters fought for Christ’s Cross and Cause. Two of her brothers were able and efficient ministers of the Gospel."

Schooling in Scotland

These excerpts from Dr. Bishop's Recollections and Reflections, January, 1845, describe the early education of boys of his class and religion in the Scotland of his day:

I had read the Proverbs of Solomon and the New Testament, and committed the shorter Catechism to memory, under the direction of an old maid, who lived with her aged mother in a house adjoining, by the time I was six years of age . . .

I was, after I had arrived at the age of six years, for three or four years regularly kept at school during the winter months, but was put to constant employment on the farm during the summer and harvest. The school to which I was sent was under the direction of the Church, or as it was called, the Congregation, of which my father was a member, and the Rev. John Brown, son of the John Brown of Haddington was the pastor. The master had no salary except the quarterly fees ... The Scriptures ... was the only reading book; and to be able to read these fluently, and repeat a considerable portion of the Psalms and Brown’s two short catechisms .... was the whole course of instruction for all the scholars.

The boys were in addition taught to write and perform any operation in arithmetic as far as to the end of the single rule of three ... I think I was at the end of the course of instruction as well acquainted with the facts in the Bible history as I am at this day ... To have their children able to read English (we spoke broad Scotch) and to cast up accounts, was with our parents only a secondary object. The great object was the Bible. The Bible history or the sermons of the last Sabbath frequently formed the subject of daily conversation.

In the morning when I left home in 1794, my father had gone abroad before daylight to visit, I think, some sick person and did not return until after the usual time of worship and breakfast. I had of course in his absence performed the daily family worship .and had sung and read in what was called the 'ordinary,' that is, the Scriptures were read regularly through, and the Psalms were regularly sung through.

---

Source: Family history of John Bishop of Whitburn, Scotland, Robert Hamilton Bishop of Oxford, Ohio, Ebenezer Bishop of McDonough County, Illinois; John Scott of Ireland, published in 1951, compiled by Stanley R. Scott and Robert H. Montgomery, pages 25-27.

Extracted by 10 Nov 2019 by Norma Hass