Berna,

I still haven’t more fully identified Malinda Massey, the first wife of my great-great grandfather, Alfred Ramsey (b. 1819, MO). They were married by John P. Edinger, Justice of the Peace, German Township, Cape Girardeau County, Missouri, on 24 August 1840. Malinda died in 1848.

I still suspect Malinda was kin to, if not a daughter of, Drury Massey (b. 1797, NC; d. 1865, MO).

If not tied by marriage, I know that Drury Massey and Alfred Ramsey were at least acquainted. In her “Shoe Cobbler’s Kin, Volume II,” Lorena Eaker quotes passages from a journal maintained from 1833 to 1849 by Casper Shell, who was also a Justice of the Peace in Cape Girardeau County. One item on page 100 of the journal reported the following:

“Taken up by Drury Massey before the undersigned Justice of the peace of Lorance township in the county of Cape Girardeau two Black work steers supposedly to be three years old last spring marked in the right ear with a half crop and a split in the left one with a white spot in the forehead and the paint of the right ear. Tone of the other blind in the left eye no other markes nor brands perceivable. Apprased to sixteen dollars by Daniel Crader and Alfred Ramsey. [Signed] Casper Shell, J.P.”

The item was not dated, but other items from the journal around this entry date from 1843 and 1844.

I recently received the Cape Girardeau County Genealogical Society (CGCGS) transcription of the 1850 census for Cape Girardeau County. Having received your 24 April 2002 reply to my 12 December 2001 query about Melinda Massey, I though I’d take a look at the transcription to see if it might hold any hints about the by then late Malinda. The CGCGS transcription lists six Massey households.

Two Massey households appeared on page 438 of the CGCGS transcription:

Dwelling 1385

Massey, Oliver W., aged 28, male, b. MO
Massey, Jane, aged 28, female, b. MO
Massey, Susan Jane, aged 6, female, b. MO
Massey, Matilda, aged 2, female, b. MO
Massey, Jacob M., aged 5/12, male, b. MO
Baze, Jane, aged 17, female, b. MO
Carr, Sarah E., aged 12, female , b. TN
Carr, Susan, aged 4, female, b. TN

Dwelling 1386

Massey, Drury, aged 53, b. male, b, NC
Massey, Susanah, aged 52, female, b. MO
Massey, Winchester, aged 19, male, b. MO
Massey, Jane, aged 17, female, b. MO
Massey, William, aged 15, male, b. MO
Massey, Jacob M., aged 12, b. MO
Massey, Syrilda A., aged 8, female, b. MO
Massey, James C., aged 6, b. MO

The same census page included three “Verden” households. What surprised me was the fact that these Verden households weren’t Verden households at all. They were Virgin households. They included:

Dwelling 1388

Verden, William, aged 45, male, b. GA
Verden, Elizabeth, aged 24, female, b. MO
Verden, Nelson, aged 20, male, b. MO
Verden, Serena, aged 19, female, b. MO
Verden, William, aged 12, male, b. MO
Verden, James, aged 2, male, b. MO
Verden, Nancy, aged 2, female, b. MO
Verden, Elizabeth, aged 8, female, b. MO

Dwelling 1391

Verden, Samuel, aged 59, male, b. GA
Verden, Fanny [Fay], aged 49, female, b. NC*
Verden, William, aged 23, male, b. MO
Verden, John, aged 22, male, b. MO
Verden, Enoch, aged 20, male, b. MO
Verden, Ajeniah, aged 18, male, b. MO
Verden, Syrilda, aged 18, female, b. MO
Verden, Sarah, aged 17, female, b. MO
Verden, George, aged 15, male, b. MO
Verden, Annie, aged 12, female, b. MO
Verden, Angeline, aged 10, female, b. MO
Verden, James, aged 5, male, b. MO
Verden, John, aged 25, male, b. MO
Verden, Anna, aged 30, female, b. NC

*The additions in brackets are mine.

Dwelling 1392

Verden, Hugh A., aged 28, male, b. MO
Verden, Mary [May], aged 38, female, b. MO
Verden, Sophia A., aged 8, female, b. MO
Verden, Frena C., aged 7, female, b. MO
Verden, James H., aged 5, male, b. MO
Verden, Amanda J., aged 4, female, b. MO
Verden, David, aged 2, male, b. MO
Verden, Lina, aged 1, female, b. MO
Verden, John, aged 25, male, b. MO
Verden, Anna, aged 30, female, b. NC

Dwelling 1387 included this Steppe [Stepp] household:

Steppe, James, aged 53, male, b. NC
Steppe, Lucinda, aged 20, female, b. MO
Steppe, Sarah, aged 16, female, b. MO
Steppe, Nancy, aged 15, female, b. MO
Steppe, James W., aged 14, b. MO
Steppe, Emily, aged 10, female, b. MO

Samuel and Fanny Virgin are my great-great-great grandparents. Their son Enoch Virgin is my great-great grandfather. His first wife was Sarah Stepp, who I assume was the 16-year-old daughter of James Stepp noted above. Sarah (Stepp) Virgin died in September 1858. In July 1865, Enoch Virgin married Elizabeth (Shearen or Shearing) Crites, the widow of Andrew Crites and a mother of four. Enoch and Elizabeth Virgin had three more children, including my great grandmother, Missouri Belle Virgin, who married John Madison Owens. John and Belle Owens’ daughter was my grandmother, Stella Jane (Owens) Ramsey.

In 1850, Enoch Virgin’s older brother, John Virgin (John Virden in the CGCGS census transcription), was head of a household in nearby Dwelling 1378:

Virden, John, aged 23, male, b. MO
Virden, Sarah [Crites], aged 23, female, b. MO
Virden, Mary E., aged 2, female, b. MO
Virden, James W., aged 1, male, b. MO

The Virgin homeplace was northeast of Zalma, in a part of Cape Girardeau County that would be ceded to Bollinger County in 1851. I assume this cluster of Massey- and Virgin-occupied dwellings was near Zalma.

Besides the Oliver Massey and Drury Massey households, the other Massey households in Cape Girardeau County in 1850 were:

Dwelling 330

Massey, Herwood [Sherwood?], aged 37, male, b. NC
Massey, Sarah, aged 34, female, b. TN
Massey, Sarah Ann, aged 14, female, b. TN
Massey, Martha J., aged 12, female, b. TN
Massey, Elizabeth, aged 10, male, b. MO
Massey, James, aged 9, male, b. MO
Massey, Alexander, aged 7, male, b. TN
Massey, Herod, aged 5, male, b. TN
Massey, Susan, aged 3, female, b. MO
Massey, Mary, aged 1, female, b. MO

Dwelling 1506

Massey, John, aged 31, male, b. MO
Massey, Susan, aged 31, female, b. MO
Massey, Elizabeth, aged 8, female, b. MO
Massey, Drury, aged 4, male, b. MO
Massey, Christopher L., aged 1, male, b. MO

Dwelling 1897

Massey, Joseph H., aged 32, male, b. TN
Massey, Mary, aged 41, female, b. KY
Tucker, Priscilla E., aged 18, female, b. MO
Massey, Joseph, aged 12, male, b. MO
Massey, Nancy J., aged 12, female, b. MO
Massey, William N., aged , male, b. MO
Massey, Rhuben H, aged 5, male, b. MO
Massey, George W., aged 1, male, b. MO

Dwelling 1919
Massey, Lemuel, aged 18, male, b. MO
Massey, Nancy, aged 15, female, b. NC
Fulton, Elisha, aged 22, male, b. NC
Massey, Susan F., aged 19, female, b. MO
Massey, Mary, aged 6/12, female, b. MO

By 1860, after the creation of Bollinger County, there were only two households in Cape Girardeau County headed by a Massey or containing a Massey resident:

Dwelling 1405

Massey, A.B., aged 45, male, b. TN
Massey, Juda, aged 40, female, b. TN
Massey, Martha A., aged 21, female, b. TN
Massey, Joseph D., aged 15, male, b. TN
Massey, Eliza H., aged 13, male, b. TN
Massey, Wm. M., aged 10, male, b. TN
Massey, Charles H., aged 5, male, b. TN

Dwelling 1719

Campbell, Robert, aged 40, male
Campbell, Caroline, aged 30, female, b. TN
Campbell, Sarah E., aged 12, female
Campbell, Eliza A., aged 8, female
Campbell, Mary E., aged 7, female
Campbell, Martha, aged 5, female
Campbell, Frances, aged 3, female
Campbell, Robert, aged 1/12, male
Massey, Wm., aged 22, male, b. TN

I still have no clue about Malinda Massey’s parents. Perhaps the above will jog someone’s memory. Meanwhile, I’ll be working to figure out if the Ramsey and Virgin families knew each other well long before my grandfather Clarence Paul Ramsey married Stella Owens.

Clete Ramsey