Tarbox is one of those unique names, worthy of a One Name Study. Most people in the United States with this surname are all descended from John Tarbox, who was settled in Lynn, Massachusetts by the 1640’s.
My 3x great grandfather, George Rogers Tarbox, born 14 December 1818 in New Gloucester, Cumberland, Maine, married Mary Elizabeth Scripture, born 2 Dec 1827 in Mason, Hillsboro, New Hampshire on 29 November 1848 in Nashville, Hillsboro, New Hampshire.
George Rogers Tarbox Mary Elizabeth Scripture
They were the parents of seven children, five of whom lived to adulthood, including my great great grandmother, Nellie F. Tarbox, born 28 June 1856 in Robbinston, Washington, Maine and died 23 December 1927 in Boston, MA. Her mother Mary died on 11 March 1866 and is buried at Calais Cemetery in Calais, Maine. Mary’s cause of death is unknown, but as her last surviving child was born in1863 and she was only 39 when she died, it is possible she died giving birth with neither she nor the baby surviving.
George owned a granite quarry in Red Beach, next to Calais. His sons and son-in-law Charles Vickery all worked as stone cutters and quarrymen. George died 27 January 1895 in Calais and, like many others in my family, is buried at Calais Cemetery.
I was given a treasure trove of old family photos in 1981, including the tintypes above of George and Mary and these below:
Here is my great great grandmother, Nellie, who married Calvin Segee Adams:
Nellie F. Tarbox Adams
Although this photo is from the side, Nellie has the same long oval shaped face as her mother. Nellie had an older sister, Elizabeth (called Lizzie) born 19 July 1851 in Newburyport, Essex, Massachusetts. Lizzie married Charles Vickery and they, too, lived in Calais.
Here are photos that my cousin thought were of Lizzie and Charles when we viewed them together in 1981:
Charles Vickery and Elizabeth Tarbox Vickery
Charles died at the young age of 53 on 22 January 1900 of tuberculosis; Lizzie outlived her sister Nellie by only five months, passing away on 27 May 1928.
Nellie and Lizzie’s youngest brother, Oliver Scripture Tarbox, was born 2 July 1863 in Robbinston and died 15 Jan 1924 in Calais. Oliver was named for his maternal grandfather. Here he is as a child:
Oliver Scripture TarboxOliver married Jenny Mingo, but they had no children. I have no photo of Oliver as an adult, but there is certainly a family resemblance to his brother, Charles:
Charles, born 13 May 1859, married Cleantha (Cannie) Cochran, born 23 April 1864, on 19 Oct 1881 in Milltown, New Brunswick, Canada, right over the border from Calais. They had four children and have numerous descendants today.
Here is Aunt Cannie (on the left) with a friend:
Cannie Cochran Tarbox (left)
Family lore is that Aunt Cannie was the first woman to have cataract surgery at Boston General Hospital, but I have never searched out records to determine if that is true!
The last Tarbox sibling is Horace W. Tarbox, born April 1861 in Robbinston. Horace died on 8 June 1914 of bronchial pneumonia in Sharon, Massachusetts. He married Elizabeth Eugenia Lane about 1880, probably in Calais. She was born 26 June 1859 in Calais and died 9 April 1947, also in Calais.
Horace and Elizabeth moved to Massachusetts shortly after the birth of their daughter, Elsie Venner Tarbox, in September 1881. They lived in Everett and Sharon and possibly in some other towns. I have no photo of Horace to share.
George and Mary Scripture Tarbox had two other children who died young. Mary Elizabeth, their first child, was born 24 Nov 1849, in Newburyport, Essex, MA. She died there on 23 September 1850. The other child they lost was a son, George Rogers Tarbox, born in 1853 in Maine and who died in Calais on 10 July 1864. There are no surviving photos of either of these children.
If there are other descendants of George R. Tarbox who read this post, I would love to share information and photos with you. Please post a comment.
Tomorrow, I will share a few photos of George Tarbox’s brother, Benjamin Franklin Tarbox, and his family.
Hello! My name is Sharon Vickery Chan. I am renewing my genealogy research after 20 years. So very excited to see you have photos!!! And I see some resemblances. I descend from Charles Vickery and Lizzie Tarbox to Charles S. Vickery and Emma J. Brackett to Charles Edward Vickery and Eva Adelaide Holt to my father Robert Stevens Vickery and Helen Pascucci. From Calais to Greenfield NH to Mechanicville NY it seems. I am now near Dallas, TX. I would be interested in swapping info. I am thinking of writing a book on the Vickery line for my family in which I break out chapters according to the times the family lived and adding events and a bit about how people lived where they lived and what was happening around them at that time. I am very interested in learning about any education they received. There is also word going around that there is American Indian/First Nations ancestry on the Vickery side. If this is true, my hypothesis is that it may come through Canada?? At any rate, so very excited to find your blog. Sincerely, Sharon
PS: Dallas and Ft. Worth, TX have many streets and neighborhoods named Vickery. But I think these are Virginia people.