52 Ancestors #12: Adelaide Frances Holt Eldredge

Adelaide Holt Eldredge

Adelaide Frances Holt, my great-great-grandmother, was born in
February 1846 in Tolland County, Connecticut and died August
14, 1922 in Tolland, Connecticut.

She was the daughter of Timothy Holt and Almira A. Perkins –
her father’s second wife. His first wife, Thankful Preston,
died in childbirth with her third daughter after giving him
Caroline in 1828, Sophronia in 1832 and Mary in 1835. Timothy
remarried in 1836 and Almira gave him Edwin Pool Holt in 1837,
Oliver Gustavus in 1839 and Adelaide in 1846 when Almira was
twenty-eight years old.

Adelaide, at age 21, married William Hunt Eldredge on October
30, 1867 in Willington, Connecticut. Annie was born in 1867,
Charles William in 1870, Mary Adelaide “Mamie” was born in
1873, Walter Irving in 1880 and Willard Holt (my great-
grandfather) in 1882.

Widowed in 1889, when Willard was seven years old, she
continued to live in Willington, Connecticut, “They lived on
the corner of Pinney Hill and Luchon Roads, in the beautiful
Cape Cod home which still today” until her death in 1922 – and
was buried beside her husband in Willington.

Eldredge Farmhouse today

From “Eldredge Chronicles” – “When William died on Dec. 6,
1889 at the age of 63. His obituary referred to him as a
“respected citizen and a judicious and prosperous farmer who
will be missed by both the family circle and from the walks of
life on which he was a fellow pilgrim.” Their daughter, Mamie
wrote “Willington is no place to make a business of farming.”
We have heard this statement made scores of times, and have
combated its truth so often that it is with no little
satisfaction that we refer to the good management of Charles
Eldredge, who when his father, the late William Eldredge, died
a few years ago, stayed on with his mother and sisters,
instead of leaving for some place where there was more going
on, and kept up the pleasant home life at one of the few
remaining comfortable, roomy, convenient farm houses that have
not gone over into the hands of the foreigner.”