Thomas B. King (sometimes listed as Thomas Buchanan King, although I have yet to find a record proving his middle name) was the father of my great great grandfather, John William King. I knew his wife was buried in the Compton Cemetery, Fayette, Ohio after her death in 1911. But where was Thomas buried?
Thomas B. King married Eliza Jane Starkey on November 12, 1880 in Gallia County, Ohio and I found them living in Fayette County, Ohio on the 1900 US Census, living in Union, Fayette, Ohio. Eliza Jane is the mother of eight children, with eight surviving and neither Thomas nor Eliza were literate.
I knew that John Wm. King and his family lived in Indiana and in Muncie during 1938 when my great grandmother, Mazie Mae King, married. While browsing Findagrave to see if any of my King family members were buried in Muncie, I found a Thomas B. King who died in 1912. Because King is a fairly common surname and Thomas is certainly an extremely common given name, I didn’t think much of it.
Later, I took to searching the digital archives on Muncie Public Library’s website for Kings. I found the burial record and the funeral home record for that Thomas King that died in 1912. I figured a peek couldn’t hurt!
To explain the significance of this record, I have to first fill you in on some details on the family of John William King’s wife, Lillie Ann Coder. Lillie Coder was born to George Washington Coder and Mary Swift in Ohio. Mary Swift (born Feb 17, 1883) was the daughter of Elijah Swift and Sarah E. Mongold, she had a younger brother (born in 1885) named Grover Cleveland Swift.
So, when I saw Swift, my eyes just about popped out of my head. I looked more into the life of Grover Swift and found that he was married in 1904 to a girl named Anna King. Thomas B. King was his father-in-law, which is why he paid the funeral home expenses and burial fee at Beech Grove Cemetery.
Resurrecting Memories 