Allen Darious Hamilton, killed in battle, 1791

Happy Memorial Day 2026. I wanted to update everyone on a recent, promising lead regarding the Hamilton father of our common ancestor, John D. Hamilton (born between 1781-85, died circa 1840).

(You may want to grab a cup of coffee for this one. Scroll down if you need to quickly get to the update).

Our John D. Hamilton married Altha Judd circa 1818 in New York state. John and Altha are our oldest documented Hamilton ancestors with a solid genealogy paper trail. They died in central Illinois around 1840, leaving behind nine children ranging in age from 6 to 20 (or 21).

In recent years, we have learned that our John Hamilton was a descendant of Thomas and Lydia (Wing) Hamilton of Rhode Island and Cape Cod, our immigrant Hamilton ancestors. This has been proven through y-chromosome DNA analysis of multiple known direct male descendants of Thomas Hamilton. Yet, there is still no known paper trail connecting that Thomas (born around 1645) to our John (born in the early 1780s), a gap of about 140 years.

We do, however, have strong AncestryDNA evidence that our John had at least one sibling: a brother Joseph Hamilton, born in 1773 in Connecticut (as noted in the 1860 census, or NY as was listed his birth state in the 1850 census). Multiple lines of John and Altha's children's descendants match multiple lines of Joseph's children's descendants. It's pretty conclusive.

During the 1830 census, Joseph and his family were living just a few miles away from John and Altha in western New York. John and Altha left western NY for Illinois around 1830 or 1831. Joseph and his family did the same a few years later, leaving for Michigan around 1836.

With John and Altha apparently dying around 1840, we haven't found any evidence that their children kept in touch with their Uncle Joseph or their Hamilton cousins in Michigan. We would not even have known about them if it were not for AncestryDNA testing.

In virtually all online genealogies (104 on Ancestry.com alone), Joseph's parents are listed as Dr. Joseph Hamilton and Zada Stevens. However, that Dr. Joseph is thought to be a descendant of William Hamilton and Mercy Berry, unrelated contemporaries of our immigrant ancestors, Thomas & Lydia (Wing) Hamilton.

That old colonial immigrant line of William and Mercy (Berry) Hamilton has distinct y-DNA (paternal chromosome) markers and is completely unrelated to our Hamilton line. In my research, I had concluded years ago that the early research on FamilySearch.com that connected our, now, 'Uncle Joseph' to the William Hamilton colonial descendants was wrong. It was based on a very soft paper trail with some big leaps of assumption and wishful thinking.

OK, so what's new? What's the update?

Gloria Hall from Tuscola County, Michigan reached out to me last week. She researches the Civil War Veterans of the county and wanted to know if I had any information or pictures of Joseph's grandson, William Hollis "Hollis" Hamilton (1838-1910), who served in the Civil War. She kindly sent some research on the family from local county archives. In what she sent was this obituary of Hollis Hamilton's older brother, Henry Darious Hamilton (1833-1921).

In that obituary it mentions that his grandfather is Allen Darious Hamilton. Actually, it would have to have been his great-grandfather (this type of mistake would not be uncommon in an obituary of the time).

This is huge.

So, this obituary suggests that Henry Darious Hamilton's line was: Father, Joseph Allen Hamilton, Grandfather Joseph Hamilton (likely Joseph Allen Hamilton, Sr.) and great grandfather, Allen Darious Hamilton.

This tells us: 1) Those 104 family trees on Ancestry.com are definitely wrong, as Joseph Hamilton's father was not Dr. Joseph Hamilton but Allen Darious Hamilton, and 2) Our John Hamilton's father was also likely Allen Darious Hamilton!!

So, this is huge. The obituary also tells us that the Hamilton family memory is that Allen Darious Hamilton was killed fighting Native Americans under General St. Clair.

After the Revolutionary War, Britain ceded the Northwest Territory (everything north of the Ohio River and East of the Mississippi) to the United States, but the Native American tribes (who remained closely allied with and supported by the British) refused to surrender their lands to advancing American settlers. To crush this armed resistance and secure the region, President George Washington ordered Major General Arthur St. Clair to march deep into the hostile territory, construct a chain of forts, and decisively defeat the Miami tribe led by Chief Little Turtle.

The result was the worst and most humiliating defeat of the US Army against Native tribes. Nearly 1/2 of the entire US Army at that time was killed or wounded with very few Native casualties. It's called the Battle of Wabash and this is where the obituary suggests that Allen Darious Hamilton died.

To know beyond any doubt if Allen Darious Hamilton was our John Hamilton's father we need a y-DNA test of one of his living male Hamilton descendants from his son Joseph. I'm working on it... but there are not many and they are so far not responsive.

Links

• The Battle of the Wabash

• St. Clair's Defeat (Wikipedia)

• Video: Stumbling to Disaster - The Battle of the Wabash