Revised 2020, Sept. 8, again in Aug.21, 2021. Thank you to FindaGrave member Cindy Wolcott for adding the image of Abigail's reconstructed death record.

There are oddities in her dates. Findagrave says to explain them. We will tell, too, some of her family's "travels and travails"

===================================================
Her death card was a reconstruction. Her stone, the easiest source back then, would be checked. A century after her death, parts would have been eroded.

In her era, stones showed the person's age at death, rather than birth date. (The detail of months and days was something that newspaper funeral notices did not do, which reported years only.) A built-in warning? The New Haven clerk, Mr. Dana, could have filled in her birth date, to the nearest month, using an old undertaker's method (subtracting 24 years, 7 months, from her death date). Instead, her birth date was left blank, maybe as they worried about errors in the months, given that her days of age were not stated.

Using only what's on the card, subtracting age from death dates gives mid-summer of 1791 as her "calculate birth". The chief problem? A much earlier birth date of Jan. 10, 1791, was recorded elsewhere for her. The February death date on the card seems to be too late, throwing off the calculations.

DETAILS. The time was one that previously had too few paper records. The place was one so cold that winter burials could be delayed.

"She was only 29! How sad! What happened?" Maybe whoever lived locally could answer, as long as the curious did not wait a century to ask.

The earlier concern was precision, so legal battles among heirs could rely on them. Are you sure she died in February? was born in January? Is this the right Abigail?

Interest in the cause of death and consequences of long sicknesses also mattered to people. "Could my family catch that?" "Why couldn't the doctors fix it?" "I went to her funeral. She'd been sick such a long time. They couldn't fix it. Her mother guessed that was why she had never agreed to marriage. "

How to fix things, how to reduce causes of death that seemed "unnecessary"? Once records were brought together in one central place, patterns could be detected. Was average age at death going up, as desired? Down, so undesired? Which counties had too many young people dying? Something "unnecessary" was going on? What? Was the cause not enough doctors there? too many accidents by fire? by drowning? by suicide? And so on.

States began to ask their localities to keep better "official" records, signed, dated, with details. In Vermont, they went a step further. They were to send copies of old records to the state, as well. In 1919, a big set was processed this way, including Abigail's.

Thus, in Dec of 1919, a hundred years after Abigail died, a "true copy" was made for her:

===================================================
DEATH RECONSTRUCTED: Image archived at FamilySearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:939V-S6HB-9
===================================================

Name: Hoyt, Abigail
Age at death: 29 years, 7 months [Comment: days missing, stone eroded?]
Date of Death: Feb. 13, 1821
Date of Birth: blank
Reconstruction Date: Dec, 15, 1919 [Comment: over 98 years later!]
Signed by Mr. C. S. Dana, City Clerk, New Haven [Comment: big job, done as well as stones would permit]
===================================================

"True copy" meant no fibbing, not that accurate things were available to copy. Some places had good records. Some did not, some lost in a fire, some used an ink that fades after 20 years, some, etc. Diligent town clerks had staff or volunteers trying to make up for omissions. They walked their cemeteries. Whenever something was unreadable, age was no longer readable on the stone, they might look for infant baptism dates in old church books, might check the old weekly newspapers for funeral notices.

A burial date instead of a death date? It was "better than nothing". Was that used for Abigail?

At least partly readable in 1919 (only days are missing for her age), her stone is now gone or worn blank. The old burying grounds had often doubled as pastures. Cow kicks luckily had not demolished her stone by 1919. More likely, given rivers and hills nearby, there had been flooding at some point, but her stone survived that, too.

WE ARE COLD! We are not limited to what Mr. Dana, City Clerk at New Haven, had. We moderns might find the birth date elsewhere. Someone found Jan 10, 1791, for her, maybe a relative's record, maybe a church record. The problem? The math of "get DEATH, by counting FORWARD from birth" contradicts the math of "get BIRTH, by counting BACKWARD from death".

COUNTING BACKWARDS. A birth date for her, of Jan 10, 1791, came from elsewhere. We double-check card accuracy by using her age on the card in this undertaker's way--

Begin by using just her years of age, to get a a year-long range, from this to that. Subtract 29 years from her burial year of 1821. That gives 1792. Hmm--- can we think smarter to bring that close to Jan. 10, 1791. If her death was truly Feb. 15 as stated, then her birth was no later than February 15, 1792, but it could have been up to a year prior. It could have been anytime after Feb. 15, 1791. Counting back five months from the end gives Julyish, 1791, too far off

The "calculated" birth date is normally reasonable, not this wild an estimate.

COUNTING FORWARD. What would the death date be, if we count forward from her known birth date by 29 years and 7 months. That gives a more reasonable death date, in January, five weeks ahead of what now seems to have been a cold weather burial date in February.

It becomes clear the reconstruction used a burial date. A burial could be delayed five weeks in the days before refrigerated morgues existed? Yes, but the weather had to be cold.

Their town was "up north". No need to bury rapidly, within 2 or 3 days after death, if the season was freezer cold. Delay was required when the ground was too frozen to dig. An unheated storage shed or crypt at the cemetery, would house coffins until there was a run of sunny days and a thaw.
Secondly, cold weather storage allowed time to contact relatives in the next county, giving them a chance to make the trip.

SUMMARY. There is wiggle room. One can say she was born in 1791, in general, or Jan 10, 1791, in particular. Either makes her of the right age to be her parents' daughter (her generation is correct), of the right age to be the closest elder sister to her younger brother Orin Hoyt (her birth order is correct).
=====================================

TRAVELS & TRAVAILS, When stones are not maintained, it's often as the families who once cared so much, loved those buried so much, have left.

SINGLE, INSIDE MOVING FAMILIES. She died single. Her life, however, represented the crossroads of two migrations, from where her parents' families, the Rublees and Hoyts, began, pre-Revolution, to where they would end, by the Civil War, with Vermont crossed in-between.

The first migration? Heading east, her mother Permelia's family, out of the old Dutchess County area of NY. They went to Lanesbororough, Mass., not far south of future Vermont. They were there by her birth. (Until the Revolution ended, it was safer for colonists to wait southward in Lanesboro before trying Vermont. Part of future Vermont was still in the province of NY, by the Great Lakes, easily accessed from British turf in Canada and whatever of the British king's military and loyalists remained in NY. Chief Brant and his tribe, in NY pre-War, would earn land rights later, in Canada post-War. In the meantime, they were allied with those particular local British viewed as better-behaved toward "First Nations" than were some rebel colonists. The loyalist big landowners making promises to the king would go to Canada, as Chief Brant would do

The second migration? Heading north, her father Uriah's family. They went up the Connecticut River and thus uphill from coastal towns on the Connecticut coast, into western Massachusetts. The moving date was sometime between his youngest siblings' births, brother Ezra's birth in Norwalk, CT, in 1770, and that of brother Seymour, in 1774, in Lanesborough. Ezra would report, later, having one back to the coast, held by the hand and told to look down at the burning town that used to be their home. They could have followed the river further, into future Vermont. It paid to wait and avoid the also fired-upon towns along Lake Champlain. They, too, ended in Lanesborough. Her father Uriah was thus taken where Permelia would find him agreeable. The two married there, in Lanesboro.

Abigail's elder brother, Ezra Hoyt, named for Uriah's brother, was born there, before going to Vermont, where her parents then had more children, including Abigail. Their places were in Addison County then, but its boundaries would change, until it matched what is true now.

Abigail's elder brother would be just one of many Ezra Hoyts to marry and be buried in their part of that County, called New Haven, so one wife could remember her hometown back in Connecticut. Her father's brother, uncle Rev Ezra Hoyt, would help found New Haven's first church, noted as Congregational. Some later Hoyts raised in the town would be trained to do either Congregational or Presbyterian services, however, letting their congregations choose whichever form of lay governing they wanted, be it congregations voting directly or elected elders voting on their behalf. Being flexible, the younger Hoyt ministers then had more choices as to future location, once the decision was made to move again.

Her father's blood relatives are known, parents and children's names given together in saved baptismal records and wills. Her relatives on her mother's side had wills and baptismal records survive for many, but not all, given records were lost, apparently while moving. Some things, thus, must bepresumed, based on proximity, meaning in the same places together, plus age differences, of the right age to be father and son, of the right age to be mother and daughter.
Generation is presumable due to age, as seen below.

KEY FOR UNDERSTANDING MOTHER'S FAMILY--
Some things are known, some are presumed--
Her mother, known to be Permelia
Permelia's presumed father, Reuben Robblee

RELATIONSHIPS THAT DEPEND UPON REUBEN (R) AS FATHER--
Permelia's presumed brother (R's known son), Philip Robblee/Rubblee
Permelia's presumed uncle (R's known brother), William Robblee/Rublee
Permelia's presumed cousin (Willian's known child), Keturah Roblea/Ruble (Keturah preferred to be called Catharine/Catherine)

Cousins and siblings who were "best friends" might act as matchmakers. Permelia and Keturah, first cousins, would marry brothers named Hoyt.

When were baptismal records were lost for Reuben's middle children/ This happened around the year he bought land outside of NY, over in Lanesboro, where the Hoyts would be found. Abigail's mother, Permelia, was born in that interval. No one has yet reported a will by Reuben that would make up for lost baptismal records.

Though her mother Permelia lacked one, others of Reuben's children have baptismal records that survived, with Reuben named as their father. Philip, thus, is a known son of Reuben.

Rueben Robblee and William Robblee/Rubblee were known to be brothers, as a father-in-common was named on their baptismal records, back in NY province. Keturah is a known daughter of William, but it's not by her baptism record surviving, but by merit of her being clearly named as a daughter in William's will.

PRESUMPTIONS STRONG, NOT WEAK. The families of cousin Keturah and brother Philip moved together, to the same places, not merely when going from NY to Lanesboro, Mass., but also when going to Vermont. Unlike Keturah, who married a Hoyt, just as Permelia had, Philip did not reside with the majority of the Hoyts in New Haven, VT, but went further, on to Bristol, with Abigail's parents, Permela and Uriah, where they apparently had a corner store and where Uriah served as a justice of the peace.

SURNAME NOTES: Note that Permelia and Reuben were typically Scottish first names. Robblee? Rublee? Ruble? Any Scots and Scotch-Irish in old NY would have been an ethnic minority, as for a long time, they were in or near places connected to the old Dutch "patroons" (giant landlords).

With Dutch/Walloon ancestries instead dominant in eastern NY state, spelling rules could be especially uncertain. People of those majority ancestries did not arrive with last names. Instead, they picked one once here. Their "old country" rules for spelling their surname choices still applied while their Reformed ministers still came from the home country, but deviated later when native speakers were no longer willing to come and minister ot the colonial populations. Note that religion in Scotland and England had been made a national choice, was no longer a local choice, with King James declaring Scotland's religion as Presbyterian. The Presbyterians were reformed (Calvinist). Without ministers of their own once in old NY, they would attend the Dutch Reformed churches, also Calvinist. The two sets, once in the same church, might inter-marry. Over time, other incomers to NY, instead from nearby Connecticut, added British "sound-it-out" rules. This would cause more spelling shifts and more kinds of inter-marriage.

A spelling shift seems to have happened, as Philip, beginning as Robblee, increasingly spelled his surname as Rublee, as he survived censuses through the 1840. Were his sons and grandsons the Rublees to serve from Vermont, in the coming Civil War?

Reuben and Permelia were the most clearly Scottish of the first names seen among the Robblees. The name Keturah was not Scottish, but, like Uriah, Old Testament. Also repeated and common were English names (William).

MISSING STONES. Her and her mother's stones, now missing or illegible, were still readable pre-WW1.

An apparent survey was done for each cemetery, in the early 1900s, in order to send delayed records to the county and state. One pattern was to record names in each cemetery, with the "death place" being that town holding the cemetery, even if the person traveled in to attend the church associated with the cemetery. Burial date could be substituted for a death date found in notices related to funerals, not actual deaths.

Once in Addison County, VT, that branch of the Hoyts to marry Robblees were known to have moved to Bristol, after spending some time in Monkton. How did some come to be buried in New Haven? It was a return. Part of a big family group, there were four Hoyt brothers and their parents and in-laws that came to New Haven, before spreading out. A county historian noted that, when fully there, many Hoyts lived on just one road, Lanesboro Street, named for their last place back in Mass.

Her uncle, Judge Ezra Hoyt, would later be a mover in building a church that would merge two congregations, finding a good minister to be insured by giving his homestead on Lanesboro Street for the church's parsonage. It's thus possible many in the family bought cemetery lots, when "the big push" was made to build a new church, given they lived in the town at the time. They would use the lots later.

How about attendance? Did her own family attend her uncle's church here, despite living one town past? If records survived at the church, they might say.
=========================================