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William Hannibal Martin, known as Hannibal, was the firstborn child of Elza L. and Sarah (Morris) Martin. He was born 20 September 1855 in Cass County, Nebraska. While he was still a toddler (1857), his parents took him in a wagon train to California. The 1860 census shows him in Hot Springs Township of Napa County, California, in the household with his parents and his younger siblings Isaac, Emma, and John. His Morris grandparents and assorted aunts and uncles lived nearby (listed two pages later in the census). Hannibal’s family remained in California only until 1864, when they returned to the Midwest, this time settling in Fremont County, Iowa, across the Missouri River from their earlier home in Nebraska. Hannibal’s Martin grandparents lived there, along with a whole different collection of aunts and uncles. Sadly, less than a year after the family moved to Iowa, Hannibal’s mother died of consumption on 3 September 1865. Two years later, his father remarried, and 12-year-old Hannibal suddenly had a new stepmother, stepsister, and stepbrother. The new blended family lived for a couple of years at Hawleyville, Iowa (on the Page County–Taylor County line), then in 1869 moved about 60 miles down to Richardson County, Nebraska. There Hannibal finished his schooling and grew to adulthood. The 1870 census does show a Hannibal Martin living in the household of “Ellsay Martin” in Richardson County, but the listing misstates the names of some other family members and the ages of all of them. The 1880 census shows 24-year-old Hannibal (as “Hanible”) living with his uncle and aunt, Ambrose and Jane (Martin) Humphrey, in Richardson County. His occupation is listed there as “farm laborer.” Hannibal married Mary Addie Morrison in Richardson County on 15 March 1883. She had been born 4 October 1864, at Anita, Cass County, Iowa, the daughter of John C. and Margaret (Robison) Morrison. However, Mary’s parents had divorced in the 1870s, and her mother had married Hannibal’s uncle Joseph Martin in 1880. Thus Hannibal and Mary had become step-cousins and probably met each other at a family gathering. According to the official marriage record, their wedding was held “at the bride’s parents,” which probably means it was at uncle Joseph’s home south of Falls City. Hannibal and Mary had six children, that we know of:
Their first child, Dorothy, was born in Cass County, Iowa, where they apparently settled shortly after marriage. The Iowa State Census of 1885 shows them living about 5 miles south of Anita, Iowa, in Lincoln Township of Cass County. Several of Mary’s Robison and Morrison relatives were nearby in that township, as was Mary’s mother and her second husband, Hannibal’s uncle Joseph. By 1886, though, Hannibal and Mary had moved back to Richardson County, Nebraska, for that is where their children Leroy and Rose were born, in 1886 and 1889. However, their fourth child, Ray, was born in University Place, Nebraska,* in 1892, so that must have been their home then. Once again, we find that they were living close to Mary’s mother and Hannibal’s uncle Joseph, who also resided in University Place at that time. After just a couple of years, Hannibal and Mary were on the move again, for we find that their daughter Pansy was born at Howell Mountain in Napa County, California, in April 1894. Thus, apparently, Hannibal had brought his family back to the same area where he had spent much of his early childhood. His uncle John Morris had developed a large ranch near Howell Mountain, and his Grandmother Sally Dodge Morris still lived there too. A voter registration list from 1896 shows Hannibal living at Angwin, which is the closest town to Howell Mountain. However, the next voter list, from 1898, lists his residence as St. Helena (also in Napa County), and that is confirmed by the 1900 census. The various voter lists show Hannibal’s occupation as a woodchopper and a farmer, but then the census lists him as a “day laborer.” By 1902, Hannibal and Mary had moved back to Howell Mountain, as the St. Helena Star (14 Feb 1902) reported that a son [Morrison] had been born to them there. Three years later, the Star reported (3 March 1905) that they had sold their home at Howell Mountain. That must be about the time they moved to Bellingham, Whatcom County, Washington. Their daughter Dorothy had gone to Bellingham in 1903 to take a bookkeeping job, had gotten married soon after, and was living there with her husband Pitt Smith and their son Harry (Hannibal and Mary’s first grandchild). Hannibal is listed as a “laborer” in the Bellingham City Directory for 1905–06. The family’s time in Bellingham was mostly a time of sadness. In August 1905 their son Morrison, just 3 years old, died of dysentery and was buried at Bayview Cemetery in Bellingham. The sorrow was relieved somewhat by the marriage of their daughter Rose to Jess Singer in May 1906, but then on 26 April 1907, Hannibal himself passed away due to cerebro-spinal meningitis. He was laid to rest next to little Morrison at Bayview Cemetery. After Hannibal’s death, Mary moved down to San Luis Obispo, California, with her two remaining minor children. There, according to the 1910 census, she found work as a cook, and 17-year-old Ray worked as an electrician for a local utility company. The next official record we have of Mary is the 1920 census, which shows her working as a nurse and living in Los Angeles with four of her grandchildren. However, we know some details of the intervening years from a letter written by Gwendolyn Smith (wife of Mary’s grandson Donn) around 1970. According to this account, by about 1911, Mary, her son Ray, and her daughter Pansy had moved to Santa Barbara, California, and they were joined there by Mary’s other son, Roy, her daughter Dorothy (who had separated from her husband), and Dorothy’s two sons. Mary’s daughter Rose Singer remained in Washington then, but all her other living children had joined her in Santa Barbara. Mary’s house was big enough that she could accommodate this large family and still take in boarders to help meet expenses. Roy, Ray, and Dorothy all had jobs, and Pansy was still in school. Gwendolyn Smith’s letter doesn’t clarify exactly when Mary moved from Santa Barbara to Los Angeles, but it does say that in 1919 Dorothy’s two sons “went to live with their grandmother in . . . Los Angeles while Dorothy worked as a society editor on the Pomona Bulletin.” We also know, from other sources, that Rose’s son Leroy Singer died in Los Angeles in March 1919, Rose herself died there in August 1919, and Rose’s husband died six months later in Knappton, Washington. That is how Mary’s grandson Edgar Singer came to be in her household at the time of the 1920 census. The other children in Mary’s home then were Dorothy’s sons, Harry and Donn Smith (with Donn listed as “William”), and a newborn girl, Isabelle Smith (Dorothy’s daughter, born out of wedlock). Isabelle was adopted about a year later by a Dorothy's friends Harry and Mary (German) Schaeffer; they renamed her Katharine Elizabeth Schaeffer. I know little about the remaining years of Mary’s life. I have not found her in the 1930 census. The 1940 census shows her back in Santa Barbara living with her son Ray and four boarders, and provides the additional information that she had lived at the same address in 1935. That census information was collected in April. Three months later, 8 July 1940, Mary died of cerebral artery thrombosis. Her body was cremated, so there is no grave site for her. If you can suggest any corrections to the information above or provide any further details about the lives of Hannibal, Mary, and their descendants, please contact me at the address shown in the image below:
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