Caldwell County MO Archives History .....CATHCART FAMILY OF BRECKENRIDGE AND GOMER TOWNSHIPS 
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File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by:
Karen Walker khw4@yahoo.com September 4, 2008, 4:25 pm

THE CATHCART FAMILY OF BRECKENRIDGE AND GOMER TOWNSHIPS
	Narrators:  Mrs. Ida Smylie and Wm. Guffey

     The Cathcart family is one of the earliest ones in eastern Caldwell 
county.  They came in the early forties.  They had lived in Livingston county 
to the east of Caldwell for a short time, before crossing into Caldwell 
county.  The original settlers were Joseph B. Cathcart and his wife, Elsie 
Guffey, both of Tenn.  They settled south of Breckenridge on the so called 
Austin farm buying it from the U.S. Government.  There were 9 children of this 
pioneer couple.  The eldest girl was Margaret Jane, who was born 1846 in 
Caldwell county at the Cathcart homestead.  She was the last of the 9 to die, 
passing away 1934 at the home of her daughter in Hamilton, Mrs. Ida Smylie.
     Margaret Jane's mother died 1863 and she was buried among her own people 
in the Guffey cemetery in the same community where Guffeys and Cathcarts had 
settled.  That left Margaret Jane with the youngest brother to bring up.  In 
1865, the father took his family of children back to Ills., Adams County where 
they had once lived on the way west.  In 1866, Margaret Jane married Dr. 
Robert Keeney, a practicing physician there.  They had 4 children:  Joseph H. 
Keeney of Hamilton (who married Susie Peabody and is the father of Harley 
Keeney), John B. Keeney of Arizona, W.O. Keeney of Chillicothe and Mrs. Vernon 
Smylie (Ida).  After Dr. Keeney's death 1885, Mrs. Keeney brought her children 
back to Caldwell co. to be with her people.  In 1899, she married Archie 
Stephenson's father of the county.
     An older brother of Mrs. Margaret Jane Stephenson was John N. Cathcart 
who was born 1844 in Livingston county, before the Cathcarts and the Guffeys 
came into Caldwell county.  He returned to Caldwell county from Ills.  In 
1869, he married Elizabeth Pawsey, (pronounced Paw-see) daughter of J.W. and 
Nancy Pawsey, Mr. Pawsey being an Englishman who had settled during the 60s in 
this county.  John N. Cathcart had four children William Frederick, Alta 
Mabel, Bessie Belle, Mary Catherine.  Their home was in the Gomer township, 
where Mr. Cathcart owned a very large and valuable farm.
     Interview  1934.


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