Friday, May 27, 2011

Phoebe Bethien Grant Smith Tribble

 
This is my Great Great Grandma Phoebe Bethien Grant Smith Tribble. She was a pretty remarkable woman. She is from the same Grant family as Ulysses S. Grant. They were cousins.

Phoebe had 14 children. Her first husband Christopher Monroe Smith died, and Phoebe seem to move on rather quickly. 

The story goes...Phoebe loaded up the chuck wagon with all the children and all her belonging and married another man. Hill C. Tribble was her next choice. He had 10 children himself. The 2 were married, but the marriage did not last long at all.

The children were of various ages...all 24 of them. The children just could not get along. Fights would break out everyday. Hill C. Tribble was the preacher of the local church, and he help to found a school. He taught at the school and is mention is many documents of the area in West Virginia.

Phoebe got pregnant during her time that was married to Hill, but she could not take all the children fighting. She gathered her items once again, and loaded her chuck wagon and took off. It had been raining, and there were many mudslides in the area. Giant rocks were blocking many of the roadways. Phoebe would get out of the chuck wagon with all the mud. Her boots were heavy with mud, and she was pregnant. She would have to give the horses some extra nudges to get them to do something. She also had to put all the kids to work, and have them help get around each situation that they would stumble upon.

One of the wagon wheels rubbed against the side of a mountain and broke the wheel off the wagon. The family set up camp. They finally found a place to stay, but Phoebe did not marry again. She would have Alda (my great grandmother) pretend that her last name was Smith. All of the census records have her listed as a Smith. Later Alda would learn that she was a Tribble and not a Smith. Alda has on her marriage certificate Alda E. Tribble. 

Genealogy is one of my hobbies. I have been tracking down our family roots since I was young. Family Tree Marker is what I use with Ancestry.com

Could you handle 24 kids?

I am working with Schultz Family and the Peterson Family, so here is the link. 

19 comments:

  1. WOW! This is AMAZING. Thank you for sharing this.

    My ho-ha hurts just thinking about it.

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  2. How interesting! I can only imagine how twenty four children would be overwhelming, especially if there was a lot of fighting!

    Thanks for sharing.

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  3. Hi, Kimberly. Thanks for following my blog. I'm interested in your Italian lifestyle. We spent 5 months in Italy in the 70's, while my dad was on business. I'd love to return for a visit sometime. :)

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  4. I am so happy you linked up. Thanks for showing me a place to look up my family. Have a great weekend.

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  5. It seems that large families were the norm back in the day...my greatgrandmother had 12.

    My youngest sister is pulling her hair out ummm I mean tracing our family tree..LOL...I will tell her about the site you use. Thank you!!!

    Hugs,
    Regi

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  6. That's incredible! I love stories like this; I've been trying to research my family a little bit but I keep hitting roadblocks. Still, I'm going to keep working on it in hopes I find something really great like this!

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  7. Your great great grandmother was some woman! I can't imagine having 14 children, much less 24! And to be strong enough to head out on her own was amazing for the time. My Mom has done quite a bit of work to find the ancestors in our family tree, and it is always great when a little tidbit of information comes with the name.

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  8. What HUGE families people had back then. I CANNOT imagine going through child birth so many times (and without modern medicine). Your great great great GM must have been such a strong woman..what a life she must have lived!

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  9. Phoebe is so cool! Wow- i love that she never felt daunted by the sad stuff that happened. So soooo cool! Sad for the kids- privacy must have never been a word on their dictionaries, must it? Very cool lineage! I'm impressed.

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  10. aww thanks for the love on my page...

    i couldnt handle 24 kids at all. so does that mean your related to Ulysses S. Grant??

    take care!

    Jacqui

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  11. So cool! My husband has a curiousity about geneaology and we never know where to start. I admire your commitment to tracking down the details. What an amazing story. And NO. I could NOT handle 24 kids.

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  12. 24 kids is about 22 too many :) Can you imagine what it must have been like back then? Thank-you for modern conveniences!
    Great story!!

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  13. Next week I am going to give you all some tips on researching your family tree.

    Yes, I am related to Ulysses. This branch goes back to the Mayflower.

    I have found Royalty, and one of our people was a Saint.

    More to come on these Friday Family.

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  14. 24?!!! I'm still trying to handle ONE...
    Great post btw! So nice to hear that you're able to track back your family tree!

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  15. What an incredible story. You come from some very brave stock:-)

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  16. She is quite a woman.

    Two kids already drive me batty! lol I am not sure I"m cut out for 24.

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  17. Wow! What a family! 24 kids...can't imagine. Sounds like she was a strong person... and all those kids makes her SUPER WOMAN!

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  18. Oh my goodness it is difficult to imagine!

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