Posted on: Sumner Co. Tn Queries Forum Reply Here: http://cgi.rootsweb.com/~genbbs/genbbs.cgi/USA/Tn/Sumner/11886 Surname: Turner, Meador, Summers, Reed ------------------------- Hi, everyone. My ggggrandparents, Clement Turner and Syntha (Cynthia) Meador, were married in Sumner Co., TN in 1850. They may have had a number of children, but I am certain of only two: John Riley Turner and Mary Clement Turner (1853-1939) (my gggrandmother, who married James Knox Polk Summers in Odessa, MO, in 1872). I know nothing of Clement or Syntha antecedents. For whatever reason, Clement and Syntha clearly didn't last: she, with children John and Mary, went to Odessa, Lafayette Co., MO (about 25 miles due east of Kansas City). Cynthia met widower David Reed (and married him, presumably, but there's no evidence of this) and is with David and her two children plus Reed children (by Reed's first wife -- another Summers!) in the 1870 MO census. Lots of pecularities: there's a Clement Turner in Louisville, KY in the 1850 census (by HIMSELF, just months after the marriage....strange) -- age 25 (reasonable marrying age, right?), and a Clement Turner in the Peoria, IL area in 1860 and a Clement Turner in DesMoines, IA after that, including the 1900 census (married to Sarah) -- all in a logical progression as to age (that is, mostly uniform ten year increments). And I can't seem to find any other Clement Turners in the censuses. I'm trying to be rigorous in my scholarship: for all that this SEEMS right, I've not conclusively ruled out the possibility that there were MULTIPLE Clement Turners. (In other words....perhaps "my" Clement died, leaving Syntha a widow....and the Peoria to DesMoines Clement is an entirely different person.) But here's the rub: James K.P. Summers spent time apart from his wife, Mary Turner Summers, around 1910 in Paris, Edgar Co., IL (far east central Illinois) -- and, interestingly enough (well, interestingly enough to ME, anyway!) I've found references in Paris to a "Clem Turner" (i.e., Mary's father? J.K.P. Summers' father-in-law???) as well as multiple Turner marriages in Edgar County in the late 1800s with the grooms naming "Clement Turner" as father and "unknown" as the mother. (Might Syntha Meador been the mother, perchance? Might the grooms be long lost brothers of my Mary? Why did "Polk" leave Mary in Kansas City and go to live in lil ol' Paris, IL -- possibly with a bunch of Turner in-laws? Go figure, right?) Will exchange info, of course....any help appreciated. Many thanks. Scott Summers