Frances ‘Fanny’ Penniman

Frances ‘Fanny’ (Montresor) (Brush) (Buchanan) (Allen) Penniman (born 4 April 1760, New York County, New York Colony - died 13 Oct 1834 Colchester, Chittenden, Vermont, United States) was an American botanist, and a figure of the American Revolution. She was remembered for her gardening skills and knowledge of botany. It may be that the specimens in the herbaria of Penniman and her daughter were the oldest in the state of Vermont, for the oldest in the herbaria of the University of Vermont are dated 1819.

Historian Hall, quoting from one who knew her well, says "She was a fascinating woman, endowed with an ease of manner which she had acquired from intercourse with the polite society of the day, in which she had been brought up; possessed of a refined taste and many accomplishments."

Family

• Parents: adopted by Crean Brush and his wife, Margaret Schoolcraft
• Married 1) John Buchanan — married 1776 in Vermont, United States
• Married 2) Ethan Allen — married 9 Feb 1784 in Westminster, Windham, Vermont, USA (his 2nd wife)
• Married 3) Jabez Penniman - married 1793 (his 1st wife)

Child of Frances and John Buchanan:

1. unnamed child, died young before 1784

Children of Frances and Ethan Allen:

1. Frances (Fanny) Margaret Allen born 13 Nov 1784, Arlington, Vermont, died 10 September 1819, Montreal, Canada; she was the first in the American colony to convert to Catholicism, and became a nun.
2. Hannibal Montresor Allen born 24 Nov 1787, Sunderland, Vermont, married 1808, Agnes Bodine Low, born 1788, died 1863. Hannibal died 1813, Norfolk, VA.
3. Ethan Voltare (Alphonso) Allen born 24 Oct 1789, in Burlington.

Children of Frances and Jabez Penniman:

1. Hortensia Penniman, who married Judge Brayton of Swanton;
2. Upney Penniman, who inherited the homestead in Colchester;
3. Julietta Penniman, who married Dr. Nathan Ryno Smith, a physician of Baltimore; and
4. Adelia Penniman, who became the wife of Dr. Moody, one of the early physicians of Burlington

Lifesketch

https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/4:1:LCQ6-LF1

"Ethan Allen's second wife. Called Fanny, she was the illegitimate daughter of British military engineer John Montresor and Anna Schoolcraft of Schoharie, New York. To disguise her father her maiden name was sometimes given as Montezuma. Her mother died in childbirth, and Fanny was raised by her aunt Margaret. In 1766 Margaret married a Tory, Crean Brush, who moved the family to Westminster, Vermont in 1776. The same year Fanny, by now a skilled botanist and musician, married John Buchanan, a retired British military officer. Buchanan was killed while fighting as a member of the King's Loyal Rangers, and Fanny's child with him died young. In 1784 Fanny married Ethan Allen, and they settled on a farm in Burlington. The Allens had three children. Hannibal and Ethan attended West Point and became Army officers. Frances Margaret (Fanny) became a nun and lived and worked at a Montreal hospital. After Ethan Allen died in 1789 Fanny and her children moved back to Westminster. In 1793 she married Dr. Jabez Penniman and they moved back to the Allen farm, where Fanny gave birth to three more children. Debts later forced them to give up the farm and return to Westminster. In 1803 Penniman became US Customs Collector for Vermont and the family relocated to Swanton. During the War of 1812 they took up residence in Burlington and Colchester, and Penniman served as Colchester Town Clerk and Chittenden County Probate Judge."

Disputed Origins

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Schoolcraft-69

Nicknamed Fanny, she was the (alleged) illegitimate daughter of British military engineer John Montresor and Anna Schoolcraft of Schoharie, New York. Her maiden name is given as "Montezuma" on her marble table grave in Elmwood Cemetery, Burlington. Supposedly this was an attempt to disguise the name of her alleged father, Col. John Montresor, but colonial Americans were perfectly able to murder French spellings without intent to disguise.

Undocumented stories claim that Fanny's mother "Anna Schoolcraft" died in childbirth and that Fanny was raised by her aunt Margaret Schoolcraft, but the claims for this may arise from attempts to link the account of Fanny's origin to the plot of "Charlotte Temple" (London 1791, Philadelphia 1794) by John Montresor's first cousin Susanna (Haswell) Rowson (1762-1835) (Mrs. Rowson--whose own mother died in childbirth with her--tweaked Montresor's surname into "Montraville" for her sympathetic, remorseful antihero). In real life, there is no evidence that Montresor himself was remorseful for whatever affairs he got into--he is not known ever to have acknowledged Fanny as a daughter, nor does his interminable PCC will make any mention of her.

A New York Genealogical & Biographical Record article (ca. 1944--will get exact cite when quarantine lifts) by Brig. Frank Montresor Rideout Montresor (1885-1964), ran snippets of a letter (ca. 1763?) from Col. John Montresor in New York to a sister in England that since the (recent?) death of "poor Nancy" he's been "on the common" (non-monogamous). While "Nancy" is indeed a nickname for "Anna" it hardly follows that, in all of New York City, that "poor Nancy" must therefore be "Anna Schoolcraft" and no other, who has perished bearing his never-acknowledged child. Elements of this plot have also been linked to John Burgoyne and others. Fanny's later fondness for romantic fiction leads me to suspect she is the first person responsible for this confusion. She had the motive for it--the urge to protect herself and her mother from embarrassment and worse.

Other accounts claim that Fanny's father was a British officer killed before her birth. This definitely was not the case with Montresor. The list of Margaret's siblings, as seen in Schoharie church registers, does not include an Anna; while "Anna" was sometimes used as a prefix name among Schoharie Germans, as with Margaret's own mother Anna Christina Kemmer/Kämer, Margaret's father was English and the daughters' names in Schoharie registers are not so prefixed. It is just as likely that Margaret was Fanny's mother, as she is labeled on their portraits <Margaret> and (<Fanny>) at the Fort Ticonderoga Museum. While Margaret had no children by her two known husbands, a difficult childbirth could have left her infertile, or one or both husbands could have had such issues.

“Personal memoirs of a residence of thirty years with the Indian tribes on the American frontiers: with brief notices of passing events, facts, and opinions, A. D. 1812 to A. D. 1842.” CREATED/PUBLISHED: Philadelphia, Lippincott, Grambo and co., 1851. Sketches of the Life of Henry R. Schoolcraft. <PDF> page 207.

Biography

Extracted from <Frances Montresor Buchanan Allen Penniman> From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Retrieved 2 May 2022.

• Father: the illegitimate daughter of Capt. John Montresor, a British army engineer .[a]
  • a. There are alternate accounts regarding her name at birth and her father's name. In 1913, The Vermonter wrote that Dr. Samuel Theobald of Baltimore, a great-grandson of Penniman, discovered through church records in Scoharie, New York that her name at birth was Frances Montesque, and that her father was a Monte Montesque.[3] The father's name has alternately been referred to as Montezuma or Montuzan or Montresor.[4]
  • John Montresor at Wikipedia: “Finally, his name appears broadly as the father of Frances, second wife of Ethan Allen. Born to a Mohawk Valley woman on (Ethan Allen would later record) 4 April 1760, Frances was adopted by her mother's later companion, Crean Brush, one-time secretary of the Assembly of the Colony of New York. As to her paternity, when her daughter Frances "Fanny" Allen entered Hôtel-Dieu in 1808, her mother's maiden name was recorded as Montresor. Her tombstone names her Montezuma, while an 1858 history written using family information calls her Frances Montuzan, relating that her father was a British colonel killed in the French and Indian War. Popular opinion makes John Montresor the father of Frances. This has not been in small part due to his role in a popular best-selling novel of the time.”
• Mother: Anna Schoolcraft, died in 1762,[5] or 1766 in childbirth.[1]
• Grandfather: Anna was the daughter of James Calcraft,[b] a veteran British artillerist, who had also served with reputation under the Duke of Marlborough, and came to the United States after the treaty of Utrecht, with the exalted notions of the part he had borne in the field, and of the reign of Queen Anne, under whose banners he had served.[7]
  • b. Penniman's grandfather, James Calcraft, changed the surname at some time to Schoolcraft. [6]
• Aunt / adoptive mother: After Anna's death, her sister, Margaret Schoolcraft,[c] became Penniman's new mother.
  • c. Brush married Margaret Calcraft (Schoolcraft), not Elizabeth as mentioned.[8]
• Adoptive step father: Margaret married Colonel Crean Brush of the British army, and they had one child. Penniman became Brush's step-daughter.[d]. “Brush was yet entirely unscrupulous and a bitter Tory. He was sent as representative from the county to the New York Assembly and was in high repute there. He was one of two who drew up the Governor's proclamation putting a price of £100 on the heads of Ethan Allen and Remember Baker, little dreaming that Allen would live to become the husband of his step-daughter.”
  • d. Crean Brush probably adopted Penniman because Ethan Allen referred to Penniman as "Miss Brush" when he first met her at the Wall residence.[7]
• In early 1777,[5] at the age of 16, Penniman married Capt. John Buchanan, a British army officer who was killed shortly thereafter in service of the King's Loyal Rangers. After her husband's death, she was again living with her mother and step-father.[9]
  • Their only child died before 1784.[1]
• 2nd step father: Colonel Brush died in January 1778.[9] Margaret then married Edward Wall, and with Penniman, the family removed to Westminster, Vermont.
• In 1784, when Penniman was 24, and still Frances Montresor Buchanan, she was living with her sister, Margaret and step-father, Mr. Wall, in Westminster. Gen. Ethan Allen, who had frequent occasion to visit Westminster, decided to marry Frances. Gen. Allen was at this time a widower of 47, with three or four children. They did so on February 16, 1784.
• In 1789, Gen. Allen died suddenly, having been stricken with apoplexy while bringing a load of hay across the Lake from South Hero.[4] Penniman was widowed again at the age of 29, this time with three small children. Financially ill-prepared to look after herself, her three children, and two of Gen. Allen's daughters still living at home,[5] Penniman left Burlington to live in Westminster with Margaret, where she remained until 1792.[1]
  • Fanny Allen (b. 1784; joined a convent of nuns in Montreal[7]),
  • Ethan Voltair Allen (born 1786), and
  • Hannibal Allen (born 1787).[2]
• On October 28, 1793, she married Hon. Jabez Penniman,[2] of Colchester, Vermont. After the marriage, she returned to the northern part of the state. The judge was appointed Collector of Customs by Jefferson and held the office through Jefferson's two terms. They resided first at Swanton, but eventually settled on the river farm in Colchester.[4] To the Pennimans were born four children;
  • Hortensia, who married Judge Brayton of Swanton;
  • Upney, who inherited the homestead in Colchester;
  • Julietta, who married Dr. Nathan Ryno Smith, a physician of Baltimore; and
  • Adelia, who became the wife of Dr. Moody, one of the early physicians of Burlington.
• After Fanny's death in 1834, Jabez Penniman remarried, to the widow Cynthia (Janes) Marvin (1783-1854), of St. Albans, Vermont. He died at Colchester in 1841 and is buried in Elmwood Cemetery, Burlington, beside Fanny, under an equally damaged table grave.

Penniman was buried in the Elmwood Cemetery, Burlington, Vermont with a horizontal stone over her grave. Not far from her resting-place are the graves of Hon. Samuel Hitchcock and wife, Lucy Allen, Penniman's step-daughter. [4]

<Ticonderoga Online Collections>

Set of matching gold earrings and brooch with blue mosaic decorations, depicting Greek/Roman ruins. This jewelry belonged to Frances "Fanny" Allen, wife of Ethan Allen.

References

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frances_Montresor_Buchanan_Allen_Penn...
• “The Vermont Encyclopedia.” edited by John J. Duffy, Samuel B. Hand, Ralph H. Orth. Page 231. <GoogleBooks>
• The Women of the American Revolution, Volume 2. By Elizabeth Fries Ellet. Page 205. <GoogleBooks>
• https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/19910256/frances-buchanan_penniman
• https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Montresor-13
• https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/4:1:LCQ6-LF1
• The Vermonter, Volume 18. April 1914. Page 18. “An Early Vermont Botanist” by Martha Votey Smith. <GoogleBooks>
• “The Schoolcraft Families of Schoharie, NY and Missisquoi County, QC.” By David J. Ellis. (2014) <PDF> page 81.
• 1.Vermont: Cemetery Records, Burlington, Elmwood Ave. cemetery: Frances Montezuma wife of Dr. Jabez Penniman who died Oct 13, 1834 aged 74 years. Formerly wife of Gen. Ethan Allen.
• 2.Web sites for Fort Ethan Allen and the Ethan Allen Homestead Museum, hagiographic biography of Ethan ALLEN by John Pell. [http://www.ethanallenhomestead.org/, http://personalweb.smcvt.edu/thefort/]
• 3.National Archives W4578, micropublication M804, Record Group 15., New York: Jacob Rose Family Record
• https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/19911049/jabez-penniman
• “How Ethan Allen Got Married to a Loyalist” <New England Historical Society> retrieved 2 May 2022. “… After the American Revolution ended, Frances Montresor Buchanan boarded in the home of Stephen Bradley in Westminster, Vt. She chose Westminster because she had inherited large tracts of land there. With her imperious manner and New York wardrobe, she made quite a splash in town. When Ethan Allen came to town, people began to speculate about a match between the two prominent single people. Her friends said if she married General Allen, she would be the queen of a new state. She replied, “If I should marry the devil, I’d be the queen of hell.” …”