Whiting Part 8 – Samuel and his sons

Our single, unknown match from the early days of test results (K.I.) has grown into another family full of testers matching me and my siblings: K.I.’s parent, their siblings, and several among the generation descendant to them. We are also able to include their genetic cousins C.B. and M.F. who, due to adoption, could not be assigned any particular place in my, or K.I.’s, tree.

As we fine-tuned our view and scope with the (delayed for this subscriber!) introduction of Ancestry Pro Tools Enhanced Shared Matches, all the Whiting-McCray shared matches above 60 cM, as well as some well-documented and identifiable below that limit, were charted:

The Whiting-Wade matches of P.Br., K.I., etc. (red ovals with yellow highlights) effectively narrowed the Whiting-McCray descendant involved to a descendant of Samuel Fletcher Whiting and his first wife, Sarah E Wade. The two Wade testers had verifiable trees, and this, as well as geographical location, made any other relationship extremely unlikely. That P.Br., et al. had such significant Wade matches and shared with our SFW-proven and known descendants indicated that Sarah E. Wade was also in their ancestor tree.

The lower matches to the elder generation testers (the two noted at level 3 from Whiting-McCray in the far left column), who are not Whiting-Wade descendants also pointed in the same direction in that there was no corresponding line to whom the difference could be attributed; they simply didn’t have that “chunk” to share with the Whiting-Davis or Davis-Whiting descendants.

Then, finally, an Everett French Whiting descendant – though without trees, recent log-in, or response to correspondence – but who could nevertheless be confidently assigned to their position in the tree with Pro Tools shared matches, statistically eliminated EFW as being involved in the paternity of James R Whiting. This descendant had modest cM sharing only with M.F. and C.B. and did not meet Pro Tools criteria to match at all with P.Br., when the hypothesized EFW relationship has a clear designated range of shared centiMorgans (cM).1

Samuel Fletcher’s sons

Samuel Fletcher Whiting and Sarah Wade had two sons survive to adulthood: Lee Roy, born in 1877; and, Clyde Boyd, born in 1889. Both resided in the DeKalb area in 1913 (conception window for James R. Whiting), and within a very short distance of Demma Williams.2

A 1909 Gilmer County mineral rights map of the Cedar Creek, DeKalb District area, including a portion entering into Center District. The red star indicates the location of the Radabaugh Farm; the blue star is the property of Lee R Whiting (including that transferred from Samuel Fletcher prior to his second marriage) and where Clyde B Whiting would have resided ca. 1913; and, the green star indicates the location of the Everett French Whiting family on property under the name of his mother-in-law. The dark long-dash line indicates the DeKalb-Center district boundary. The names underscored in purple are the immediate neighbors of the farm rented by Harvey H Williams and occupied by him and his family (including 19-year-old daughter Demma) on the 1910 census; the exact location of the Williams residence has not been determined. For scale, the route from the mouth of Cedar Creek at the Little Kanawha River to the Sarah M Curry property (green star) is approximately 2.6 miles along the creek bed.

Lee resided with his wife and their two children. His household also included his half-brother Robert, whom Lee cared for after the death of Samuel Fletcher and his second wife, Gertrude Fishback, in 1910 and 1916, respectively. Lee was running the farm, working the timber, and serving as administrator of Samuel Fletcher’s estate after his death in 1910, which was not completed until sometime after 1915.

Clyde had still resided with Samuel Fletcher and Gertrude in the 1910 census as a single 21-year-old. That household also included the two infant children of Samuel Fletcher and Gertrude: Robert (mentioned above) and Mary. It is presumed that after the death of Samuel in October 1910, Clyde resided with Lee for some time, on the Whiting farm, although he would soon be the age of majority (21).

Clyde is next located in Clarksburg, West Virginia. He attended parties described on the society pages of The Daily Telegram in 1914 and 1916; the latter party also lists as an attendee Esta Holt. On his WWI registration card, it is confirmed he was then residing with his elder sister, Jessie Rutherford, at 206 McDowell Street, and working at the glass company. He is listed as single, age 27, which would date the card to about 1916.

An aside: When Clyde’s mother, Sarah Elizabeth Wade, died in 1895, he and the younger children were young, and the elder siblings stepped up to assist in their care. The eldest daughter, Esta, remained in the Samuel Fletcher household along with her husband Bert, and their son. Then, when Samuel remarried in 1905, she took at least one of the younger sisters (Hallie) with her and she and Bert moved to their own home in Glenville. After Samuel died in 1910, and again after his second wife and mother to the two younger children – half siblings to the others, died in 1916, the siblings again gathered those they could care for: Clyde with his sister Jessie; Hallie and her family raised young half-sister Mary; and, Lee and his wife raised young half-brother Robert. (This was despite the will that Gertrude’s brother presented for probate, appointing him as guardian to the two children.) That baby brother Clyde was shortly off to war in the midst of all this upheaval was, no doubt, quite worrisome to the family, and thus these “trench art” mementos Clyde brought home from France have been held in the family for over 100 years:

After his return from the European front during World War I, Clyde is next found on a marriage license application of 9 Feb 1920 to fellow Gilmer County native, Esta May Holt, both of whom now reside in Harrison County. He is 30 years of age and she is 28.

Clyde and Esta, prior to the 1930 census, moved to Streator, Illinois, where a better glass company position was available for Clyde, and they remained there for the rest of their lives.

So, there is evidence that both Lee and Clyde were in the neighboring area to Demma in 1914, and both were, apparently, of biological capability of procreation at that time (Lee’s youngest child with his wife, Hattie, was born in 1911, and Clyde was young man of about 25.)

Clyde and Esta had only one daughter; that daughter had three children, at least one of whom is since deceased, and there is no documentary evidence of any further descendants nor any DNA testers that can be attributed to this union.

Among Lee’s descendants, however, there are several testers, and those shared match numbers were entered into WATO along with the additional Whiting-McCray cousins, including the Whiting-Davis double-cousin relationships, to determine the most likely paternity candidate. Frustratingly, the results indicated “No Possible Hypotheses.”

So, I separated the trees for validation into those documented as Lee’s descendants, the Whiting-Wade descendants, and the Whiting-Davis double-cousin descendants using BanyanDNA. The results indicated proper placement, until we brought in A.B.’s numbers. There had to be an additional or unknown relationship we were missing, so we set that aside for a bit and went back to James.

The Timeline

With no matches appearing to indicate a maternal line relationship, we rough-drafted a tree assuming James had relationships with both Barbara and Sally. Was that possible given the chronology of events? James had been, after all, documented as having been in Virginia in 1950, when the The Virginian-Pilot, and others, reported on his petition for writ. Further, the Suffolk News-Herald of 30 Sept 1962, reporting on a second attempt for writ, had summarized the earlier attempt with:

Court action was put off several times because Whiting was ill, and in August, 1950, it was dropped altogether when he was paroled.

Given our M.F./C.B. mother allegedly born in September 1951, in Richmond, Virginia, we gathered additional evidence in attempt to determine where James was in December 1950.

Record requests were submitted to the Archives and History Library of the State of West Virginia regarding the Moundsville residency of 1935 mentioned in James’ 1940 census record; and, to the Library of Virginia regarding his stint in the Virginia State Penitentiary and any dates of release. An independent researcher was also contracted to obtain the prison register regarding the James R. Whiting, No. 100114, Box 511, Columbus 16, Ohio, (the usual protocol for Ohio State Penitentiary inmate mail), who had written to the Federal court in Norfolk, as reported in the Norfolk Ledger-Dispatch and the Portsmouth Star, Norfolk, Virginia, of 21 Sep 1960.3

The findings, in timeline form, can be summarized as follows:

  • 1914 – February 21 is the overwhelmingly decided birthdate for James R Whiting, although some records reflect he claimed to be five years younger, born in 1919. No official birth record has been located despite extensive search.
  • 1927 – His FBI transcript dated 19 Jul 1938 indicates James served 15 months in the West Virginia State Industrial School for truancy in about 1927. He is not located in the 1930 census of the facility.
  • 1931 – He was arrested in Grafton, Taylor County, West Virginia, on auto theft charges and sentenced to two years in the State penitentiary (Moundsville); inmate #20871; received at the penitiary on 16 Jul 1931 – age 17; marital status is listed as single.
  • 1932 – James was discharged on expiration of sentence on November 19. His discharge paper reports his next relative is Sarah Williams of Fairmont, West Virginia.
  • 1933 – In January, James was arrested in Marion County, West Virginia, on a charge of breaking and entering. His case went before the Grand Jury where he was indicted and subsequently confessed to breaking and entering. He received a term of five years; it is noted he would be eligible for parole consideration on 26 Nov 1933. He was received from the Marion County jail at the State Penitentiary, on March 24, and assigned inmate #23089. He is listed as age 19 and married. He was discharged on 24 Dec 1937 at the expiration of his sentence. His reported next relative is Sarah Williams, 206-10th Street, Fairmont, West Virginia. The intake form further describes his “Eyes Bad,” height as 5’7″, weight as 152, blue eyes, and a “[j]agged scar above and in right eyebrow. Oblique scar upper lip. Tattoo right forearm outer – name Ruth. Tattoo right forearm inner two daggers piercing heart. Tattoo left forearm out initials J W.” No marriage record has been located in West Virginia for James R Whiting, and there has been no further evidence uncovered as to the identity of “Ruth.”
  • 1938 – Arrest in Suffolk, Virginia, for robbery and two charges of attempted murder. He was sentenced to 40 years in the Virginia State Penitentiary.
  • 1950 – Newspaper accounts indicate James was released on parole in August 1950, although the Library of Virginia could not locate a release record during 1950.4
  • 1951 – September – Purported mother of M.F. and C.B. born in Richmond, Virginia, to Barbara Lee Kidd.5
  • 1953 – James R Whiting is arrested in Virginia Beach, Virginia, on June 6, 1953, on a charge of carrying a concealed weapon. “He was convicted June 9, 1953, and was fined $50 and $7 costs. A 30-day jail sentence listed in court records was probably suspended, according to the court clerk.” (Footnote 1, infra.)
  • 1955 – James Whiting, 36, of 1886 E 82nd Street, has been arrested in Cleveland, Ohio, for robbery, six counts, and awaits the grand jury. “Whiting has told police he was addicted to drinking paregoric.”6
  • 1956 – Mr & Mrs James Whiting are listed in birth announcements as parents of a newborn daughter, published Saturday, Feb. 11, 1956, in The Cleveland Press. The DNA match identified as P.Br. has a birthdate of 2 Feb 1956.
  • 1956 – On March 15 it is reported that upon being found guilty of the robbery charges (see above), and being sentenced to the Ohio State Penitentiary for 10 to 25 years, James R Whiting inquired of the court if he could return to Virginia, where he “still has 28 years to serve.”7 His request was declined, and he was received in the Ohio State Penitentiary in Columbus on 19 Mar 1956.
  • 1957 – The Cleveland Press reports that Sally [redacted] Whiting, 22, of 2326 E 22nd St has charged her brother James [redacted], 20, of the same residence, with injuring her 11-month-old child (putting the child’s date of birth in approximately February 1956).8
  • 1960-1962 – Whiting begins filing writs and petitions from the Ohio State Penitentiary, and according to the register, above, a Warrant to Detain was received from the Parole Board in Richmond, Virginia on 28 Mar 1956. James was paroled from the OSP on 6 September 1962. He was returned to Virginia on the parole violation and is, in the VSP register, marked as received the same date, maintaining Prisoner #39926.
Intake photograph of James R Whiting, prisoner number 39926, on his 1962 re-admission to the Virginia State Penitentiary.
  • 1963 – James Whiting was removed to the Nansemond County jail on his pending writ hearing. Initial (January) reports indicated the writ would not be issued, and Whiting would be returned to the penitentiary. Then, with aid of counsel Frank Watkins, the same judge, James C Godwin, ordered his release on Tuesday, May 28, 1963.
  • 1964 – James has returned to Cleveland, Ohio, where he and Sally make application for a marriage license in February.9
  • 1972 – A 15-year-old boy identified as a foster son of “James and Sally Whiting,” and having “three foster sisters and one foster brother,” drowned near Perkins Beach in Cleveland. His residential address was reported as 8393 Bellevue Ave., Cleveland.
  • 1974 – James and Sally are divorced on September 12. The decree lists the grounds as Gross Neglect/Extreme Cruelty with the divorce awarded to Sally. The marriage is described as having a 10-year duration, and four minor children are in the household. The 1974 Cleveland City Directory lists: Whiting James R (Sally A) h8303 Bellevue Av.10
  • 1980 – On December 8, James is arrested on five charges of uttering/forgery and one of receiving stolen property. On December 14, Sally dies at Cleveland Metro Health.
  • 1981 – James entered a plea on the 1980 charges in August 1981, was referred for probation, and the case was closed on December 29, 1981.
  • 1986 – James dies on April 5, reportedly in Weston, Lewis County, West Virginia. (SSDI provides that as last residence.) The ashes of James (and Sally) are interred at Riverside Cemetery, Cleveland, Ohio, on May 3, 1986.11

In careful and exhaustive review of the criminal records and newspaper accounts in the area, there was no direct documentation located as to James R Whiting’s whereabouts in December 1950 (about nine months prior to the birth of Barbara Lee Kidd’s daughter in September 1951). Barbara Lee Kidd had already born two children she attributed to James Garland Purdy, prior to the 1951 birth (also registered with the surname Purdy).

Recall, however, that James Garland Purdy’s mother, Mildred Purdy, was in the business of offering furnished rooms for rent in Richmond12; in fact, in JGP’s arrest records, he alternates between addresses within the block of his mother’s work and Barbara Lee Kidd’s mother’s address. Both of these addresses were within walking distance of the old Virginia State Penitentiary. One can imagine that James R Whiting may have found a room on his own, or, through the prison grapevine, heard from James Garland Purdy about a nearby landlord that may be sympathetic to the recently incarcerated and have found a room in her properties in August 1950, whereupon he happened to meet Barbara Lee Kidd.

By 1952, James Garland Purdy has been released on his latest charges, and is listed as residing at his mother’s Grace Street address on another larceny charge. James Garland Purdy and Barbara marry in March of 1953 and have a child in November of that year, but Barbara sues for divorce in April 1954 which is finalized in September. Barbara heads west, and moves on to a new life, new long-term spouse (by all accounts), and more children. James Garland Purdy is sentenced to 30 years in 1956 as a habitual offender. He gains release, but is arrested again in 1966, after which, his trail goes cold until reports of his death in 2013.

In summary, review of the documentary evidence indicates that James R Whiting was in Richmond, Virginia, in 1950, and in Cleveland, Ohio, by 1955. A BanyanDNA tree visualizing the proposed hypotheses of James R Whiting descendants, with descendants in both the Richmond area and the Cleveland area between Barbara and Sally, indicates all the shared cMs were within 1.4 of the standard deviation for the relationship proposed. The tree was statistically probable and could not be disproven by other evidence.

“3c – James Whiting Descendants” BanyanDNA tree indicating a Chi-Square result of 1.0 and highest SD of 1.4, two at 1.2, and 38 below 1.0. This places P.Br. as James R Whiting’s daughter by Sally; C.B. and M.F. as the children of another daughter of James R Whiting through Barbara Kidd, and half-first cousins to P.B., S.F., and K.I. (who are full siblings). The next generation of testers also exhibit the expected shared centiMorgans to all of the testers as diagrammed. BanyanDNA JSON file for the project, generated 22 Mar 2026, held by the author and contains tree structure, match data, expected cM ranges and probabilities for tree placement for descendants of James R Whiting.
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Footnotes
  1. Blaine T. Bettinger, JD, PhD, “The Shared cM Project Version 4.0 (March 2020),” The Genetic Genealogist (thegeneticgenealogist.com/wp-content-uploads/2020/03/Shared-cM-Project-Version-4.pdf). ↩︎
  2. Year: 1910; Census Place: Center, Gilmer, West Virginia; Roll: T624_1680; Page: 17A; Enumeration District: 0037; FHL microfilm: 1375693 ↩︎
  3. Ledger-Star, September 21, 1960, Page 10. via Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/article/ledger-star-whiting-1960-federal-court-c/151475436/ : accessed March 21, 2026). ↩︎
  4. Correspondence with Library of Virginia Archives Reference Services dated 20 Feb 2026; copy in author’s collection. ↩︎
  5. Virginia Department of Health; Richmond, VA, USA; Virginia, Births, 1912-1923
    Source Information, for SFP born 21 Sep 1951; Richmond, Virginia; Certificate number 1951062692. Ancestry.com. Virginia, U.S., Birth Records, 1912-2015, Delayed Birth Records, 1721-1920 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015. ↩︎
  6. The Plain Dealer, December 21, 1955, Page 6. via Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-plain-dealer-james-whiting-36-1886/160743393/ : accessed March 21, 2026). ↩︎
  7. The Cleveland Press, March 15, 1956, Page 67. via Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-cleveland-press-serve-in-oh-before-v/170027500/ : accessed March 21, 2026). ↩︎
  8. The Cleveland Press, January 17, 1957, Page 1. via Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-cleveland-press/189715175/ : accessed March 22, 2026). ↩︎
  9. The Cleveland Press, February 24, 1964, Page 40. via Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-cleveland-press-whiting-scott-marria/189703118/ : accessed March 21, 2026). ↩︎
  10. Cleveland City Directory, 1974. Cleveland Directory Co., Cleveland, Ohio. Cleveland Public Library, Center for Local and Global History. Image credited to Cleveland Public Library Digital Gallery at https://cplorg.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p16014coll29/id/61264 : accessed March 22, 2026; in possession of author. ↩︎
  11. Find a Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/172043428/sally_ann-whiting: accessed March 21, 2026), memorial page for Sally Ann Scott Whiting (20 Apr 1934–14 Dec 1980), Find a Grave Memorial ID 172043428, citing Riverside Cemetery, Cleveland, Cuyahoga County, Ohio, USA. ↩︎
  12.  Richmond, Virginia, City Directory, 1951. Ancestry.com. U.S., City Directories, 1822-1995. https://www.ancestry.com/imageviewer/collections/2469/images/12089965?pId=684922491 : accessed 23 Mar 2026.  ↩︎

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