Penelope Thompson

Biography of
Penelope Thompson 1816- 1865

By W. Howard Thompson, great-grandson 

It is regrettable that we the descendants of this wonderful mother and loyal wife know so little about her. There is no written record extant of her life. We don't even have a picture of her. The picture shown here is Newel Thompson's concept of what he thought his grandmother looked like, after studying the features of her children. What little we know about Grandmother Penelope is chronicled in her husband Joseph's biography.

William Henry, her oldest son, told his children that his mother had a fair complexion, with blonc hair, and blue eyes. As she grew older she got a little, heavy. He said the family thought she was descended from the Norman people who came to England with William the Conqueror, while Joseph had dark hair and brown eyes, and was believed to have descended from native English stock. Although they both had the surname of Thompson, they were not related.

Early family group sheets, and sources such as the Temple Records Index Bureau, give her birth as 22 March 1816, at Walsall, Staffordshire, England. We have not yet found a record of her christening in the parish records.

As a girl of 19 she married Joseph Lewis Thompson, and bore him eight sons and four daughters. Each of her eleven children who grew to maturity exhibited strength of character, with high moral standards, and a fine sense of duty. They contributed significantly to the communities where they lived, exhibiting leadership, and concern for the common good. They all married and raised good families of their own, thus demonstrating the lasting influence their mother's training had on their lives.

On the marriage entry for Joseph and Penelope, found in the bishops transcripts of the parish of West Bromwich, Staffordshire, England, Penelope signed with an X, and on the four birth certificates we have found for her children, she also signed with an X. We conclude therefore that she never went to school, nor learned to read and write.

She stayed loyal to Joseph, nurturing and caring for their large family, and bore the brunt of the work and inconvenience, as they moved from Birmingham to several different homes in London, then across the ocean to Providence, R. I. thence with the pioneers across the plains, to make a new home in the wilderness. The endless toil, lack of necessities, and exposure finally took its toll, and she gave her life for her family. She was the first to be buried in the Clarkston cemetery.

As her great grandson I express my gratitude to her and say thanks for what she has done to make my life possible, and cast my destiny in this great land of America, where freedom and opportunity are mine. I join all of you, her descendants, in paying tribute, and honoring her name. May God bless her as a mother in this great Thompson family, and crown her a queen in his kingdom forever.