David & Anna Wilcox
Great-Great Grandparents of Sir Winston Churchill
David Wilcox Headstone Inscription
"In Memory of DAVID WILCOX
who was born in Born at Dartmouth, Mass.
February 11th, 1763 died August 23, 1828"
David Wilcox's birthday is debatable depending on the record, but on his headstone is engraved, "David Wilcox who was born in Dartmouth, Mas, February 11th, 1763." When David was born, his father, William Wilcox Jr, was around 22 and his mother, Sarah Smith, was around 20.
David, his wife, Anna Baker Wilcox, and his family, two children at the time, moved to the Palmyra/Macedon area in 1791. The family worked hard to build themselves a home, a log cabin.
According to "Writings of James Reeves Palmyra's First Historian" Page 103, on December, 13th 1791, David Wilcox acquired the land and deed to "the creek lot No. 33." He gained 100 acres for 75 dollars.
The Wilcox's were one of the first families to settle in the area, and David was one of the first settlers. The farm of where the Wilcox's settled would later be next to the Roger's family's land.
Before the Wilcoxs finished their house, David Wilcox helped to build Webb Harwood's house, the founder of Macedon, which was also the first house built in Palmyra/Macedon.
David Wilcox's profession in the town was a blacksmith and he set up his own shop. As the official Winston Churchill website, states, "The building believed to have been their dwelling was still in existence in 1970, when Anita Leslie, grand-niece of Jennie Jerome, visited Palmyra on a book promotion tour for her life of Lady Randolph Churchill."
David died on August 23rd, 1829, in Macedon, Wayne, New York, United States, at 67, fifteen years after his only wife, Anna. He was buried in Macedon, New York in the Old Baptist Cemetery.
Anna Baker was born on May 29th, 1761, in Sackville, Nova Scotia, Canada. When she was born her father, Joseph Baker, was around 22 and her mother, Experience Martin, was around 21.
Anna was one of the first woman to settle in the wilderness of Palmyra with her family. According to "Writings of James Reeves Palmyra's First Historian" page 25, Anna was crucial in the village to those sick from a disease spread rapidly in the year 1793. The entire female population was unwell, but Anna would go down to the creek to help those infected.
To quote from James Reeves, "Mrs. Wilcox was one of the noblest of the many noble pioneer women, and it was gratifying to know that during the long that followed, the friendship was of that tenderness which suffering and privation only can produce."
Anna was a mother of a confirmed 10 children. (More information on the children below.)
Anna died on December 28th, 1813, in Macedon, New York, at the age of 52, and was buried in Wayne, Macedon, New York, United States in the Old Baptist Cemetery. Her headstone along with David's was moved from it's original position, however, both headstones in present day are next to each other. The Wilcox's footstones are also in the cemetery.
Anna Wilcox Headstone Inscription
"In Memory of Anna, wife of DAVID WILCOX.
who was born in Born at
Novascotia, May 29, 1764, died Dec. 28 1813"
Clarissa Wilcox Hall's headstone located in a fenced in family area at the Palmyra Cemetery. Photo taken by Carl R Wolff on Nov 5th, 2014.
Children of David and Anna
David and Anna were parents of a over eight children. David Wilcox's will mentions his children, William, Joseph, Martin, Hazzard, Sarah (future wife of Dr.Azel Ensworth), Polly, Clarinda and Cynthia; however they also had a daughter named Mary. Mary later married Alva Hendee, making her Mary Wilcox Hendee. The Wilcoxs also had a son named James.
Some records on the Wilcoxs show evidence that David and Anna had possibly eleven children. Not all of their children made it to adulthood therefore information may be limited on some. (Further research is being done)
The following children have findagrave.com accounts (Updated as of 11/14/24)
The Churchill Myth Debunked-No Native American Blood
The tales of Winston Churchill being related to Native Americans is nothing new; Winston himself boosting that he was related to the Iroquois Tribe through his family ties of Jennie Jerome’s maternal grandmother Clarissa Hall. Clarrissa was the child of Winston's Great-Great Grandmother, Anna (Baker) Wilcox and David Wilcox, Winston's Great-Great Grandfather.
In Jennie: The Life of Lady Randolph Churchill, Vol. 1, originally published in 1969, Ralph G. Martin wrote that Anna Baker's, “mother’s maiden name is not recorded in the genealogies” and “is believed to have been an Iriquois [sic] Indian.”
The background and family history of Anna Baker was relatively unknown until recently, when a 1951 transcript of the Baker family tree was discovered. Below is a brief summary of what was written on the transcript according to the official winstonchurchill.org.
"Joseph Baker, born at Jamestown, Rhode Island on 12 February 1738 or 1739, married one Experience Martin in Swansea, Massachusetts on 4 September 1760. Experience Martin was the daughter of Eleazer Martin of Swansea (died 1749) and his wife, also named Experience, who, as a widow, was recorded in a land transaction of 30 March 1776. Circa 1761 Joseph and Experience Baker, together with Joseph’s brother William and two male cousins, George Sherman Sr. and Jr., migrated to Sackville in the newly created British Province of Nova Scotia, where Anna reputedly was born. They were all living at Sackville in 1770, but later returned to New England. The ancestry of Joseph Baker is well documented."
The genealogy of the Baker family is also updated and displayed on findagrave.com.
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The Original "In Jennie: The Life of Lady Randolph Churchill, Vol. 1" from 1969, is available on thriftbook.com for $6, or a reprint from 2007 is avaible on amazon.com for $22
Illustration from Newspaper article, "Messanger; News and View" Tuesday, August 2nd, 1994. Title: "Tracing royal roots; Two Wayne County towns have links to Winston Churchill"
Regarding the geography, whether it was even possible for the Bakers' to interact with the Iroquois is also highly unlikely.
Anna Baker was born in Nova Scotia in May 1761, in an area regarded as the 14th American colony. In these pre-Revolutionary days when Nova Scotia was often regarded as a 14th American colony, the 1748 Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle restored the island of Cape Breton and its mighty Louisbourg fortress to France, and Captain John Gorham was sent by Governor Shirley of Massachusetts to organize Nova Scotia’s defense. In 1749, with the founding of the British fortress of Halifax to counterbalance Louisbourg, Gorham’s assignment was to construct the first outpost fort from Halifax at the mouth of the Sackville River, the chief artery into the interior, to protect the settlement from the French and their allies, the Micmac Indians.
Known as a crack militiaman and a powerful "Indian fighter", John Gorham installed his band of 60 to 100 Rangers, most of them Mohawk from New England, at the new Fort Sackville. By 1761, when Anna Baker was born in Sackville, Gorham had died, and the command rested with his brother Joseph, who undertook some reorganization. The former militia became a unit in the regular army, and a blockhouse was erected. It may have been that Anna’s father, uncle, and male cousins became soldiers in the new command or were attached in another capacity.
To conclude, there is no proof of Native American heritage in the Churchill bloodline.
The Headstones Of The Wilcoxs Have Been Moved From Their Original Location
Before 2021, David and Anna's headstones were moved from their original location. According to an old photo from 1994, David's headstone was toward the back of the cemetery by a lilac bush. Since the photo the headstone has been moved and set upright in it's current location toward the middle of the cemetery. There are no records of when this happened or who did it or even if that was David's original burial place.
According to a 1994 newspaper article about the cemetery and the Wilcoxs,
"Anna Wilcox's grave is located on one side of the cemetery. At the opposite end is her husband, David Wilcox's grave. Kiesinger said she doesn't know if that's the way they were buried or if the tombstones were moved through the years."
The Wilcoxs footstones remain in the cemetery [photos of footstones below] but are no longer upright and currently located in a location of the cemetery were over forty footstones are organized.
Roughly half of the headstones in the cemetery have been moved. This has been confirmed as evidence from old maps and the few photos available.
When headstones were moved happened before the 2021 Girl Scout Project. Again, there are no records of when this happened or who did moved the headstones.
Photo of the cemetery and of David Wilcox's headstone in 1994 from newspaper, "Messanger; News and View" Article: "Tracing royal roots; Two Wayne County towns have links to Winston Churchill".
Very few photographs of the cemetery or headstones exist before the 1990s so all photos are valuable. [If you have any photos or records of the cemetery or people, please click here and follow the prompt of contact information]
More Photos Related to the Anna and David Wilcox:
Top of David Wilcox's Footstone
Sources for this page (Sources are not listed in order of usage)
https://famouskin.com/famous-kin-chart.php?name=17084+david+wilcox&kin=12944+winston+churchill
https://winstonchurchill.org/resources/genealogy/he-had-iroquois-ancestors/
"Writings of James Reeves Palmyra's First Historian" Page 25
"Writings of James Reeves Palmyra's First Historian" Page 103
Newspaper article, From "Messenger; News and View" Tuesday, August 2nd, 1994. Title: Tracing royal roots; Two Wayne County towns have links to Winston Churchill