Deviation of the Surname Limppo

Deviation of the Surname Limppo, version 1, January 2004

By Joe Wachter,

Extensive genealogy research has lead to the conclusion that all persons with the surname Limppo are the descendants of Joseph Hubert Limppo and his wife Bessie Mae (Albright) Limppo.

The names of the Children were taken from the Joseph Hubert Limppo Family Register, prepared by Bessie Limppo. It is known that the register is with Beatrice (Limppo) Ott until at least 2004.

1. The Children of Hubert and Bessie Limppo are listed as;

Name	Born	Died
Goldie Viola	April 22, 1901	May 31, 1901
John Richard	June 1, 1902	May 10, 1974
Gladys Leona	March 19, 1905	February 23, 1937
Cloyd	August 1, 1907	February 27, 1909
Alfred Theodore	October 26, 1909	March 1, 1910
Violet Gertrude		May 5, 1946
Faye	April 10, 1913	February 10, 2001
Iva Senondia	January 9, 1915
Alva Kenneth	July 1, 1917
Charles Elsworth (Troy)	December 13, 1918	September 22, 1992
Ernest Russell	July 11, 1921
Paul Elliot	September 9, 1924
Beatrice Virginia	December 28, 1930

Note; When other death dates are determined this document will be updated.

2. We know from census and other records that Joseph Hubert Limppo was the son of Joseph Lindsey Limpo. Notice that his father’s surname was listed in the census and in other records with only one P. The 1880 census of Williamsport, Maryland shows;

Limpo, Joseph L – white – male – 27 years old – laborer – born in NC – Father born in SC – Mother born in SC

Mary M. – white – female – wife - 26 years old – Keeping House – born in Maryland

Myrtle M. – white – female – daughter - 6 years old – born in Maryland

Joseph S. – white – male – son - 1 year old – born in Maryland

Martha A. – white – female 60 years old- mother – divorced – born in SC –

Father born in SC – Mother born in SC

Note; the census taker recorded Joseph's son's middle initial as S – as far as is known it should have been H for Hubert.

We know that Mary M., was Mary Margaret (Poffenburger) Limpo, who married Joseph Lindsey Limpo on June 15, 1872.

We know from other records that Joseph Lindsey was a boatman on the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal.

3. The obituary for Joseph Lindsey Limpo is as follows;

From the Morgan Messenger, Berkley Springs, West Virginia, April 12, 1917

“Limpo – The funeral of Mr. Joseph Limpo was held at Stater’s Chapel, Thursday, April 5^th the services being conducted by Rev. W. M. Maiden.

A brief sketch of his life follows. He was born April 11, 1851 at Salisbury, N.C. and died April 4, 1917, aged 65 years, 11 months and 23 days. His father was a Southern soldier in the Civil War and was killed near the close of the war, after which mother and Joseph, the only child, came north to Hagerstown. Mr. Limpo married June 15, 1872 and moved to Cherry Run in 1898. He converted in 1914 and joined the United Brethren Church at and remained a faithful member to the day of his death.”

Some analysis of the obituary;

Remember that Martha A. Limpo listed herself as divorced in the 1880 census and that she still had the surname Limpo, so she,most likely did not marry anyone after the death of her husband – thus her stated divorce was, most likely, from the man who had been her husband and was the father of Joseph Lindsey Limpo.

I believe, but cannot yet prove, that Joseph L. Limpo moved to Cherry Run because his wife was the daughter of Simon Poffenberger who had owned land there.

Before I leave the subject of Joseph L. Limpo and his wife Mary, I would like to relate this fact. My Aunt Beatrice (Limppo) Ott once asked me how the name “Crothers” fit in the Limppo family history. The answer is that Mary Margaret (Poffenberger) Limpo married Samuel Carothers after the death of Joseph Lindsey Limpo.

4. From Where Did Martha A. Limpo Come?

The 1860 Census of Lumberton Township, Robeson County, North Carolina, (Page 859) has the following people listed

Name	Age	Gender	Occupation	Born
John Limpo	39	M	Farmer	SC
Martha	38	F		SC
C. (Cornelius)	16	M		SC
W.D (William)	14	M		SC
M. A. (Mary)	14	F		SC
I. (Naomi)	12	F		NC
N. (see note below)	10	M		NC
M. J.	8	F		NC
C. E.	6	M		NC
K.	4	M		NC
M.	1	M		NC

Note; given that Joseph Linsay Limpo's birth date is given as April 11, 1851 in his obituary, his name is not shown on the 1850 census form; and it can be seen that no son of John and Martha A. Limpo is listed with the first initial "J" on the 1860 census form. But remember the family legend; "Grandfather changed his name". So I believe the Male listed with the first initial "N" and being ten years old is Joseph Linsay Limpo I normally would not make such an assumption, but given that all other data about Martha A. and Joseph Linsay Limpo match this family record, I believe the assumption is very likely correct.

While on the subject of Joseph Linsay Limpo's real age;

his obituary states he was born on April 11, 1951,

but the 1880 census lists his age as 27 with an estimated birth year of 1953.

It is known that census takers have often recorded information incorrectly, because of misunderstandings while interviewing the adults of the families, inaccuracies during recording and transcribing, and often they were paid by the number of entries on the census form - so volume of data was considered more important than accuracy.

John Limpo’s personal property is valued at 750 dollars; his land is valued at 1,000 dollars.

The names in parenthesis are derived from the 1850 census, which follows.

Notice that John and Martha and three of the children were born in South Carolina. This is the only known record of a the surname Limpo in North Carolina during that period. There is a family with the surname Limpo that settled in the Minnesota area in 1881, but there is no connection.

The 1850 Census of Lumberton Township, Robeson County, North Carolina, (Page 242) the following people are listed;

Name	Age	Gender	Occupation
John Lupo	30	M	Farmer
Martha	28	F
Cornelius	7	M
William	5	M
Mary	5	F
Naomi	3	F
John	6/12	M

From this census it can be seen that the same family listed with surname Limpo in the 1860 census was listed with surname Lupo in the 1850 census.

To further show the confusion over the right way to spell the family name, the following are the entries in Cornelius Limpo’s (son of John and Martha A. Limpo) Confederate Army records;

Conelius Limpo, Private, Company G, 24^th Regiment, North Carolina Infantry, muster call, March & April 1862, enlisted April 1, 1862, Robeson, county, Present

Conelius Liempo, Private, Company G, 24^th Regiment, North Carolina Infantry, muster call, April 30 to September 1, enlisted April 1, 1862, Period 3 years, present

C. Limpo, Complaint Bronchitis, admitted Aug 19, 1862, Duty Sept 4, 1862 Episcopal Church Hospital, Williamsburg, Virginia

Conelius Lupo, Private, Company G, 24^th Regiment, North Carolina Infantry, muster call, September & October, 1862, absent, sick in hospital at Petersburg, Virginia

Conelius Limpo, Private, Company G, 24^th Regiment, North Carolina Infantry, muster call, November and December 1862, died

Conelius Liempo, Private, Company G, 24^th Regiment, North Carolina Infantry, muster call, September 1862 died

Conelius Liempo, Robeson County, Age 18, died September 17, 1862 of disease at Petersburg, Virginia

C. Liempo, Disease Diphtheria, date of death September 11, 1862, Poplar Lawn Hospital, Petersburg, Virginia

Notice that, due to poor record keeping, the Confederate Army officials could not record Cornelius’ name properly or consistently, they also record two different dates for his dead – September 11 in one instance and September 17 in another.

5. John Lupo’s Lineage

It appears that John Lupo, husband of Martha A., was the son of William Luper and his wife Martha (Pittman) Luper. It has been established by me, and other Lupo family genealogist, that Luper is another derivation of the Lupo surname. John Lupo and Martha A. were born in South Carolina, but later lived and farmed in Robeson County, North Carolina. William and Martha Luper also had lived in South Carolina, had several children there, including a son named John, born about 1820 and then moved to Robeson County, North Carolina. So John, born about 1820 in South Carolina, and about 29 years old in the 1850 census in Robeson County, North Carolina matches many of the criteria for him to be the son of William and Martha Luper. Further, in keeping with the early American tradition of naming one son after one’s father, John and Martha Limpo named one son William. John and Martha Lupo also named daughters after John’s sisters; namely Naomi and Mary.

I shall, God willing, write the narrative of the migration of the Lupo family from Italy, England, to Isle of Wight, Virginia, within the next few months. That migration is a complex, interesting, unique, story.

6. So Why Did Martha A. Leave Robeson County, North Carolina and Make the Long Difficult Journey to Washington county, Maryland?

We know that there are two written explanations of the fate of Martha A. Limpo’s husband. In the 1880 Census of Williamsport, Maryland, Martha, or someone in the family, stated that Martha was divorced. In Joseph Lindsey Limpo’s obituary it is stated that Martha’s husband was in the confederate army and was killed near the end of the Civil War. But I can find no evidence that a John Limpo (or Lupo), from Robeson County, North Carolina, served or was killed as a soldier during the civil war. Further, I find no evidence that Martha applied for, or received, a Civil War Widow’s Pension. North Carolina began granting pensions to confederate veterans and their indigent widows in 1867, later the Confederate pensions were paid by the national government.

There has always been a question about rather or not Martha A. ever remarried. It appears she did not, because in all records about her she is listed with the surname Limpo.

Now back to the question of John Limpo’s fate. It appears he did not die as a soldier in the civil war, I can find no records of that. There have been a few statements made by the offspring of Joseph Hubert Limppo which makes one wonder if John Lupo did in fact die near the end of the Civil War, but not as a result of war. There are some unsubstantiated Limppo family legends concerning the circumstances of John Limpo's demise; however, the legends will not be documented until collaborative information is acquired. I leave open the possibility that John Lupo died about 1864, and his death was not a direct result of the Civil War.

What inspired Martha A. Limpo to flee from her southern North Carolina home and travel, under very difficult conditions, with her 13-year-old son north to Washington Country, Maryland? One possibility is she was fleeing the scene of a mishap. Another is that her marriage had become unbearable and she wanted to get as far away from John Lupo, dead or alive, as possible. Another could have been that she came north to seek her son Cornelius, who was in the Confederate Army; but I doubt that possibility because Cornelius had died two years earlier and she, most likely, would have been informed of his death. Another possibility is that she was very sick of the problems, destruction, and tragedies of the south’s participation in the war and envisioned the northern states to be a refuge. And of course it is possible that all of those circumstances were factors in her journey north.

7. What Happened to the Other Limpo’s of Robeson County, North Carolina?

We know Joseph Lindsey Limpo’s name was carried forward by his son, Joseph Hubert Limppo, but why do we not find other people with the name Limpo in and around Robeson,, county, North Carolina? We know that Cornelius Limpo died at the age of 18, unmarried. And we know that the two daughters of John and Martha might have married and taken their husband’s surname. That leaves only William and John to keep the name and pass it to their offspring. William would have been about 15 and John Junior would have been about 10 years old in 1864. Their fate will be the subject of some future genealogy research.

8. Genealogy is a Thing of the Past!

History is, for the most part, written about events, genealogy is about our forefathers who were born, established families, had adventures and misadventures, and died within the framework of those events,

We were fortunate to know some of our ancestors, but most of them we can only know of by researching, recording, and preserving information about their life and the events of their time. It is my intent to continue, God willing, the genealogy research for several more years and to pass the information to my descendents. A genealogist’s work is never done, there are new discoveries to be made about ancestors, ever more descendents to be recorded, and corrections to be made on data misinterpreted or recorded incorrectly. Within the next few months I intend to write the narrative about the Lupo ancestors from Italy and England, and will send a copy of it to all who request it.

Most genealogist do not work alone, we are reliant on information from many libraries, archives, government sources, other genealogist researching collateral lineages, and most important, related persons who are willing to share data. Any data about related persons is important, and information about the life experiences of our forefathers (and foremothers!) can be intergraded into the linage and narratives which become our, and future generations, legacy. Feel free to make copies of this narrative to pass to relatives, or to other interested parties, or request additional copies from me. This narrative and other genealogy information can be found at my genealogy website – www.viaprocess/viatic.

Please share any data, information, pictures, or personal thoughts concerning our ancestors with me – I treat such information with the utmost respect.

There is an axiom that we do not know who we are until we know where and how we became us.

Sincerely;

Joe Wachter

2131 South Main Street

Burlington, IA 52601

319-752-3206

Viator_US@hotmail.com