52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Week 9 at the Courthouse

In September 2003, my husband and I took a trip to Illinois. Part of our itinerary was a planned visit to the small town in Southern Illinois where his mother’s family had lived since the 1850s. Both of his maternal grandparents had grown up in the same area along with their siblings.  We planned to spend two days in the area.

Our first stop was the cemetery that had been used by both families. The Mound Cemetery is located in a very rural area of Jasper County, Illinois. The only thing other than corn fields in the area is a old wooden church building adjacent to the cemetery. As you drive into the cemetery there is a large gate proclaiming “The Mound Cemetery” in iron letters arching across the driveway.

Jassper County, Illinois
google images

As we walked the cemetery we saw the graves of my husband’s grandparents and great-grandparents. His mother’s only sister is also buried there. Many of the families represented on the tombstones have been associated with the families since the Civil War. We took pictures of the tombstones after cleaning them with some water and a soft cloth. Eventually the heat and mosquitoes prompted us to end our visit.

The second day of our stay in Jasper County we went to Newton, the county seat. The courthouse in Newton is in the middle of the town and sits on an entire city block. The town latterly surrounds the courthouse with businesses on all four sides of the massive old building.

Jasper County Courthouse
Newton, Jasper, Illinois

When I entered the building I was ushered into a back room filled with large old ledgers. These ledgers held the vital records of the people of Jasper County. They held wills and probate records in addition to the land records of the county. There I found some wonderful records. I found a will from 1860 naming my husband’s 2^nd great-grandfather as an executor. It was later amended several times removing him and re-adding him. I wonder what caused the changes.

 It was almost by accident that I found the death record for my husband’s 2^nd great-grandfather Frederick Albert Sempsrott. As I was looking at the index cards I spotted one for “Fredia” and I remember thinking how unusual the name was. Then I looked again. It was actually the death record of Frederick A Sempsrott but the record listed “Fredia Simperott” just one of the many spellings I have encountered for this surname. He is recorded as a white male , age 79, born in Germany, a farmer who had lived in Illinois for about 45 years. He was a widower who died on 28 Nov 1907 of senile pneumonia in Willow Hill Township, Jasper County, Illinois and was buried on 30 November 1907 in the Mound Cemetery. I was truly lucky to have found this record since the name was so far from what is should have been.