Troy Family Page
Welcome to The Troy Family Page, which furnishes historical detail beyond the site index, exploring three generations of Troys in the line of Oin Troy of Ireland.
6. Hannah Matilda Troy (Matthews) --Born Sept.2, 1819. According to her granddaughter, Anna Blann, Hannah Troy, wife of Thomas Matthews and mother of Solomon Matthews, was of Irish descent, as were her parents, Solomon Troy and Margaret Dulin. She and Thomas had three children: Josiah (b.1841), Thomas H.(b.1845) and Solomon Matthews (1850-1936) who married Annie Mënck. Hannah died sometime after 1880. The 1870 Maryland census shows her in Talbot Co. at age 52 and the 1880 census shows her age as 64. Her birth date of 1819 is given in the Troy family bible.
7. Solomon Troy --Born on May 3, 1789 in Talbot Co. MD (The 1850 census states that he was born in Maryland). Two documents were handed down through the family: the Troy family Bible with its death and birth dates, and a page of notes on the Troy family by my grandmother, Anna Matthews Blann, Solomon Troy's great-granddaughter. Anna's notes read: "Solomon Troy and two sisters came to this country from County Cork, Ireland. One sister married a Willis of Oxford, the other a Stuart. Newspapers gave the statement that Miss Mollie Stuart held the record for longest service as Post Mistress in this country." The account coninues:
"The Troy Bible was loaned to the midwife who attended my mother at my birth in 1892. As I grew up I recall her speaking of this lost Bible. In June 1924, Chas. Simpson found the Bible in an old box at Trappe Landing. Since my brother was the only person in this section bearing the Troy name the Bible was brought to my parents, and later given to me because I also had a son named Troy. My mother put me on the trail of a profile of Solomon Troy struck off at a Methodist camp meeting. She said she had last seen it stuck in the back of a picture in Thos. Matthews’ (a cousin) home. Some investigation proved it still there and it was given to me. The paper on which the profile was pasted now gone—but the likeness is in tact. It is pasted in the back of the Troy Bible. " (This image is in the Blann photo album on this website.)
The Troy family Bible, inscribed around 1845, provides the birth date of Solomon Troy and names his wife as Hannah Dulin and his parents as "Oin Troy and Hannah his wife." It also names Hannah Matilda and Henry Troy as children of Solomon and Margaret. There are no Troy households in the 1790 or 1800 Maryland census. Anna's account speaks of three Troy siblings immigrating to America from Ireland and does not mention their parents their accompanying them. However the 1850 census states that Solomon was born in Maryland ca. 1789. Further records research provides a clearer picture of the immigration timeline:
Early Troys: January 13, 1777--A Talbot County Administration Bond lists John Troy as a surety; also, there us an earlier 1753 newspaper entry for John Troy in Annaplois, MD in the Maryland Gazette. In addition, Elizabeth Troy married Solomon Harrison on January 28, 1796 in Talbot Co. MD. These records show the presence of earlier Troys on the Eastern Shore of Maryland and raises the question of whether they are closely related to Solomon Troy. (Elizabeth could be an older sister or cousin of Solomon and John is the right age to be his grandfather.)
1802-Solomon Troy's sister, Mary, is married to James Stewart in Talbot Co. MD. This shows that Mary, and likely others in her Troy family were in Maryland in 1802 and probably since Solomon's birth in 1789. Mary Troy Stewart was born ca. 1782 or earlier, probably in County Cork, Ireland.
ca. 1805--The Talbot Co. Orphan's Court binds Solomon Troy, orphan son of Owen Troy and a minor until he is 16, to apprentice with his brother-in-law, James Stewart, who is responsible for
teaching Solomon to read, write, and cipher and instructing him in the trade of cordwainer (shoemaker) and bootmaker. (Orphan's Court Proceedings T3188/C1897-3: Talbot. Court Records on FamilySearch) The implication is that Solomon's father, Owen has died fairly recently in Maryland, which in turn suggests that the parents emigrated along with their children.
The 1807 will of Solomon Betton from Talbot County, Maryland lists Nancy Troy as a witness, confirming the presence of Solomon's mother in Talbot County
March 1811-- Solomon was an adult witness for the will of Elizabeth Luckey.
Dec. 20, 1814--The Talbot County Debt List (Court Debt Records, C1887-6) confirms the death of Solomon's mother with the words: "Nancy Troy desperate – To making coffin." “Desperate” in 19th-century court accounting meant the debt was considered uncollectible—usually because the person was deceased, insolvent, or without estate. “To making coffin” clearly refers to an expense associated with Nancy Troy’s death, the cost of which was entered as court debt. By this time, Solomon Troy was 25 years old, married with three children, working as a shoemaker. Probably Nancy had lived with Solomon or one of his sisters during the last decade since she does not appear under her name on any census.
Records show Solomon in law enforcement and legal service in Talbot Co. MD as a constable during the 1830s and a Collector of school tax and Estate-related tax in the 1740s. He appears as a Farmer with 200 acres in the 1750 census and still serving as Collector for School Tax in 1854, the last record that clearly shows he is alive.
Biography: Solomon Troy (1789–after 1854) Born May 3, 1789, Solomon Troy was orphaned as a teenager and apprenticed in 1805 to James Stewart, a Talbot County shoemaker. He became a master shoemaker himself and, in 1837, took Jesse Dobson as his apprentice. Solomon married Margaret Dulin on October 9, 1810, and they had a number of children. According to the Troy Family bible, Solomon and Margaret had nine children: Mary Ann (b.1811), William (b.1812), Margaret (b. 1813), Henry (b.1815), Hannah (b.1819), Huah (b.1821) and (another) Huah (b.1824). Daughter Mary Ann appears in the household of Solomon and Mary Troy on the 1850 census as Mary A. Whorton (age 39) with no husband but two children: Richard Whorton, age 16, and Owen Whorton, age 12. Marriage records show Mary Ann had remarried a Richard Martin in 1841. The 1850 census for Oxford MD shows that Matilda's brother, Henry Troy, was a shoemaker, married to Susan A. (with young daughter, Margaret) and lists Solomon Troy as a farmer (61) married to Mary (49), with 200 acres of land in Talbot Co.
Solomon was also a landowner and civic servant. By the 1830s, he served as a constable, as documented in a probate file where he was paid for serving warrants. From the 1840s through at least 1854, he acted as a county tax collector for the Orphans' Portion of the School Tax—a role requiring him to collect taxes from estates to fund local education. After bearing nine children, including Matilda Troy, Margaret Troy died and Solomon remarried Kisshan Ann (Ann Keziah) Pratt on Oct.6,1836, who bore one daughter, (Francis?) Ann Troy, in 1838, the mother dying a few days later. Solomon was still alive in 1842, when his son, Henry, signed these dates in the Troy bible. The 1850 MD census shows that Solomon lived on to marry a third time; marriage records indicate that he married Mary Hennessy in 1840. Solomon died sometime after 1854 and he is absent from the 1860 census.
8. Owen (Oin) Troy --Owen Troy (ca.1760-ca.1804) is the earliest known male ancestor of the Troy family in Talbot County, Maryland. Though no land, probate, or tax records survive in his name, he is identified in a 1805 court record as the deceased father of Solomon Troy, who was bound out as an orphan apprentice at that time. Based on the absence of earlier records, family oral tradition, and the timing of Solomon Troy's orphan status, it is reasonable to hypothesize that Owen and Nancy Troy emigrated from Ireland—likely County Cork—around the late 1780s or early 1790s with one or two young daughters. They may have arrived in Maryland shortly before Solomon’s birth in 1789. Owen likely died intestate by about 1804. The absence of records suggests he died poor or without property. Nancy Troy (ca. 1762–1814), Owen's wife and mother of Solomon, is named in both the family Bible and in Talbot County court records. In 1807, she appeared as a witness to the will of Solomon Betton, confirming she was alive and legally competent. Her last known record is from December 30, 1814, when Talbot County debt ledgers list a desperate debt "to making coffin for Nancy Troy," indicating she died in poverty and was buried at public expense. Her death marks the last known record of the first generation of Troys in Talbot County. She and Owen are known to have two daughters, one who married a Willis, and the other, Mary Troy, who married James Stewart in Osford, Maryland in 1802. James' 1837 will names his wife Mary Stewart and bequeaths to her his riding carriage and horse, “over and above and exclusive of her lawful dower.” James died in March 1838 followed by his wife in on July 19, 1838 (per their joint tombstone). While there is evidence of other Troys on the Eastern Shore, such as John Troy, who could represent an earlier generation of the family, the emigration from Ireland shortly before Solomon's birth appears the most likely scenario. There is no evidence concerning Owen and Hannah's parents, making them the patriarch and matriarch of the Eastern Shore Troy line passing down through Solomon Troy.
About the Troy Family origins: The Troy family can be traced to Ireland, England and Northern France. In Ireland, the name sometimes appears in old documents as Trehy or O'Trehy, thought by some to be a phonetic rendering of the Irish O'Troighthigh, presumably derived from the Irish word troightheach meaning a "foot soldier". In the 1659 Irish census the name is spelt Trohy. The name also appears in French as de Troye, and has also been gaelicized in Ireland as de Treo. The Troy family, though never too numerous in Ireland, is perhaps most abundant in County Tipperary. One of the oldest place in Ireland associated with the name is "Castle Troy" in Limerick (built during the reign of Henry III (1216-1272) by the O’Briens clan), the town where Henry Troy was Provost in 1197. There is also persuasive evidence of the family name having come to Ireland from France in places such as Troyes, as far back as the Norman Invasion of 1066. The Heugonot Library in London list 21 Troys who fled from France because of Religious persecution in later centuries. Many of these settled in England, but some went on to Ireland, settling in Cork and Kilkenny. The best known Irishman by this name was the Most Reverend Thomas Troy (1739-1823) Archbishop of Dublin.