Title: Oakley-Hawley Family Papers
Inclusive Dates: 1766-1951

Call Number: Wis Mss QM

Quantity: 2.6 c.f. (6 archives boxes and 3 volumes)

Repository:

Wisconsin Historical Society, Division of Library, Archives, and Museum Collections

Archival Locations:

Wisconsin Historical Society (Map)

COLLECTION MAY BE STORED OFF-SITE: see catalog entry to request materials and for additional information.

Abstract:

Papers relating to a lengthy genealogical study apparently initiated by William D. Hawley of Malden, Massachusetts, about 1870, and continued by Mary Oakley Hawley of Madison, Wis. Much of the correspondence consists of intra-family letters dealing with the collection of genealogical data on the Oakley, Hawley, Hough, Shriver, Scidmore, Queen, Benedict, Church, Atwood, Sherman, and other related families. Four volumes consist of final tabulations of the collected data. A few letters written by Eliza R. Scidmore, author of Jinrikisha Days in Japan and other works on the Far East, are included, as are two diaries she kept during her travels in the Orient, 1900-1901 and 1912-1916, and the manuscript of an unpublished novel, “I, Anastasia.” Early documents include a report of the tax assessors of Northampton, Massachusetts, 1766; deeds to land in Massachusetts and New York, 1789; promissory notes, receipts, a few family letters, and photostatic copies of vital statistics recorded in family Bibles. A volume dated 1805 contains the ritual of Free Masonry as recorded by J. Church.

Language: English

URL to cite for this finding aid: http://digital.library.wisc.edu/1711.dl/wiarchives.uw-whs-wis000qm

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In general the collection consists of the genealogical research of the Oakley, Hawley, Hough, Atwood, Church, Sweeney, Queen, and Benedict families from about 1854 to 1951, with various documentary genealogies extending from the 17th century B.C. in Spain and Scotland, 9th century A.D. in France, 11th century in England, and 17th century A.D. in Italy. The collection also includes some genealogical data concerning other collateral (or suspected collateral) lines--Sweet, Shriver, Brewster, Kinney, Brooks, Martin, Dean, Gray-Copp, Whiting, Sheets, Frye, Vandervoort, Valkenburgh, Pinney, Manning, Hawthorne, Duke, Thomas, Howard, Rice, Woods, Abbott, Miller, Barbour, Jerningham, Brent, Barrett, Harper, Hills, Reis, Curtis, Fairbanks, MacDaniel, Briggs, Sheman, French, Fauconnier-Faulkner, Gates, Vilas, Grange, Burr, Woodhull, Maya, Pell, Hibbard, Proportion (?), Sinclaire, etc.

A number of the family lines are supported by early Colonial documents and various published genealogies and pictures, some of which can be found in this collection or in the Wisconsin State Historical Library. Information which may be found in the Library includes: Scrapbooks...by Mrs. F.W. Oakley and Mrs. Cynthia Oakley; Hawley Record...; and Genealogy... by William Dickinson Hawley.

There is a considerable amount of information contained in either the correspondence or genealogical files of this collection concerning prominent members of the various families; e.g. Violette Oakley, artist, is represented herein as w=is Eliza Ruhamah Scidmore, author. Included in this collection is information concerning her part in obtaining the Japanese cherry trees for Washington, D.C. and her winning of a Japanese award for her writing during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905.

Considerable information concerning George H. Scidmore, an American Consul in Japan and China in the early twentieth century, is found herein, and there are a few diplomatic papers included, such as a Congressional Resolution allowing Mr. Scidmore to accept an award from the Japanese government for saving a citizen of Japan. Two diaries are included, kept by his sister Eliza R. Scidmore, and they cover periods spent in China, Japan, and India in the first decade of the twentieth century. Mr. J.C. Hawley was supervisor of certain provinces in the Philippine Islands during the term of President Taft, and he served later with the Council of National Defense in 1918. Horace S. Oakley served in Athens and Italy, receiving the Equestrian Order from the Crown there, and he is responsible for a great deal of the later genealogical research, along with Mary Hough Oakley Hawley.

There are a number of articles written by members of the family, on such topics as early Colonial Tory history, Oriental events, and Wisconsin history. The Atwood portion of the collection consists mainly of the Scrapbooks included with the collection.

The correspondence, extending from 1870 to 1951, is, of course, arranged chronologically, but there are separate files for the main family lines in which no chronology could be maintained.

Acquisition Information

Presented through Gilbert Doane, Madison, Wisconsin, May 1953 and February 11, 1954.

	Correspondence
Box   1	1870-1921 August
Box   2	1921 September-1931
Box   3	1932-1951
Box   3	Miscellaneous genealogies and papers
Box   4	Genealogies of the Oakley, Hawley, Sweeney, and Church families
Box   5	Genealogies of the Hough, Shriver, Scidmore, Benedict, and Queen families Physical Description: 4 folders
Box   5 Volume   6	Memory Book of locks of children's hair
Box   5 Volume   9	Scidmore diary, 1900-1901
Box   5 Volume   10	Scidmore diary, 1912-1916
Box   5 Volume   11	J. Church's manuscript copy of Masonic rites
Box   5 Volume   12	Genealogy of the Hawley family
Box   5 Volume   13	Genealogical scrapbook of and notes on the Hough, Sherman, and Oakley families
Box   6 Volume   1	Genealogy of the Church-Hawley family, 1684-1941
Box   6 Volume   2	Genealogy of the Oakley, Sherman, Sweeney, and Shriver families
Box   6 Volume   3	Genealogy of the Queen-Hawley family, 1933
Box   6 Volume   4	Scrapbook of Alice C. Hawley, 1860-1921
Box   6 Volume   5	Genealogy of the Church family, 1202 - 1951
Box   6 Volume   7	Scrapbook of David Atwood
Box   6 Volume   8	Scrapbook of the Scidmore, Sweeney, and Hough families
Box   6 Volume   14	“I, Anastasia,” a biographical novel in three parts by E. R. Scidmore
Volume   15-17	Family Bibles