In the 1880s, Louis Taber wrote a series of articles in the FRIEND (Phila.) about the Quakers of Starksboro, Vt. In a short biography of Hannah (Hoag) Battey, in the FRIEND (3 m. 6, 1886): 243-244, he notes: "Narcissa Battey, Hannah's daughter, and Joseph Hoag's granddaughter, . . . married a young man who was a member of the "Smaller Body" in New England. Starksboro Monthly Meeting received from him a certificate in order for the marriage; and gave her in return a removal certificate. For this act of insubordination, Ferrisburg Quarterly Meeting attempted to lay Starksboro Monthly Meeting down. The result was a division. "Not very long after the division, the most of the more conservative Friends removed and settled in and near Hesper, Iowa, and held a meeting. And pretty soon afterward, their old friends and neighbors removed, and settled amongst them, and held another meeting." In another article in the FRIEND (3 m. 21, 1885): 259-260, about Vermont minister Amos Battey, Taber notes: "Sometime after the division in Ferrisburg Quarter, he and his friends removed to Hesper, Iowa. Those composing the other branch [Gurneyite] also removed and settled amongst them, and Starksboro Monthly Meeting was laid down." Hesper is in Winneshiek Co., Iowa. Louis Jones, THE QUAKERS OF IOWA, pp, 70-72, notes that Friends first settled in Winneshiek Co. Iowa, in 1853. In 1855, Salem Quarter (Iowa) of Indiana YM (Gurneyite) set up Winneshiek MM with two preparative Meetings Winneshiek and Springwater. But Jones makes no mention of a Wilburite meeting at Hesper. Does anyone have any information about the Wilburite Friends at Hesper? Farewell, Edsel Burdge Jr.

I had great difficulty running down the dates of existence for the Wilburites in Ferrisburgh Quarterly Meeting in Vermont, so I find this lead very helpful. I would like to know the dates in the Taber article. As to the early Wilburites in Iowa, Hesper MM later became Winneshiek MM. There was a Winnesheik (Wilburite) MM in the 1850s and 1860s: http://www.quakermeetings.com/viewRecord_display?anID=TST2035L and a Red Cedar (Wilburite): http://www.quakermeetings.com/viewRecord_display?anID=TST1549L [both one-line URLs] Later the Ohio YM (Wilburite) established Hickory Grove Quarterly Meeting and a few monthly meetings in eastern Iowa that transferred to Iowa YM (Conservative) in 1918. My Index of Monthly Meetings in North America cites three good sources on the Iowa Wilburites: William Hodgson, The Society of Friends in the Nineteenth Century: a Historical View of the Successive Convulsions and Schisms Therein During That Period (1875), Chapt XIII, p. 226ff; Jones, the Quakers of Iowa (1914), p. 154f; and An Exposition of the Proceedings Which Led to a Separation in Red Cedar Monthly and Salem Quarterly Meetings, with Some of the Reasons Why Friends Pursued the Course They Did (Marion, Iowa 1855). Tom Thomas C. Hill 425 Walnut Street, Suite 1800 Cincinnati, OH 45202 U.S.A. e-mail: tomhill@nuvox.com www.quakermeetings.com -----Original Message----- From: Edsel B. Burdge, Jr. [mailto:ebbpinola@innernet.net] Sent: Wednesday, 23 March 2005 12:19 PM To: QUAKER-ROOTS-L@rootsweb.com Subject: [Q-R] Vermont Wilburites in Hesper, Iowa In the 1880s, Louis Taber wrote a series of articles in the FRIEND (Phila.) about the Quakers of Starksboro, Vt. In a short biography of Hannah (Hoag) Battey, in the FRIEND (3 m. 6, 1886): 243-244, he notes: "Narcissa Battey, Hannah's daughter, and Joseph Hoag's granddaughter, . . . married a young man who was a member of the "Smaller Body" in New England. Starksboro Monthly Meeting received from him a certificate in order for the marriage; and gave her in return a removal certificate. For this act of insubordination, Ferrisburg Quarterly Meeting attempted to lay Starksboro Monthly Meeting down. The result was a division. "Not very long after the division, the most of the more conservative Friends removed and settled in and near Hesper, Iowa, and held a meeting. And pretty soon afterward, their old friends and neighbors removed, and settled amongst them, and held another meeting." In another article in the FRIEND (3 m. 21, 1885): 259-260, about Vermont minister Amos Battey, Taber notes: "Sometime after the division in Ferrisburg Quarter, he and his friends removed to Hesper, Iowa. Those composing the other branch [Gurneyite] also removed and settled amongst them, and Starksboro Monthly Meeting was laid down." Hesper is in Winneshiek Co., Iowa. Louis Jones, THE QUAKERS OF IOWA, pp, 70-72, notes that Friends first settled in Winneshiek Co. Iowa, in 1853. In 1855, Salem Quarter (Iowa) of Indiana YM (Gurneyite) set up Winneshiek MM with two preparative Meetings Winneshiek and Springwater. But Jones makes no mention of a Wilburite meeting at Hesper. Does anyone have any information about the Wilburite Friends at Hesper? Farewell, Edsel Burdge Jr.