Reeves, Joseph Cameron

Summary

Father: George Reeves
Mother: Elizabeth Doughton

Birth: Oct 1822,probably in Ashe County, North Carolina
Birth Source: Census

Death: 20 Jan 1893, Douglas County, Nebraska
Death Source: Photo of gravestone in Brittin Cemetery, Elkhorn, Nebraska

Spouse1: Elizabeth Evans

Narrative

Children of Joseph Cameron Reeves and Elizabeth Evans:

1. William Reeves, b. 1847
2. George Reeves, b. 1848
3. Mary Margaret Reeves, b. 1853
4. Thurston Preston L. Reves¹, b. 1855
5. Josephine Reeves, b. 1857

In 1850 at age 28, Cameron is listed in the census of that year in a Madison County, Iowa household with his mother and siblings; however, he is also recorded in that 1850 census with his wife and oldest children in what appears to be the home of his mother-in-law Hannah Evans in Benton, Osage County, Missouri.

By the 1885 Nebraska Census, Cameron is recorded with a wife named Elizabeth but she is approximately 20 years younger than his previous wife and the mother of his children. It may have been a mistake made by the census enumerator but it is definitely Cameron Reeves, son of George Reeves and Elizabeth Doughton.

Elizabeth Evans Reeves lived until after 1900 and is listed in the Omaha, Nebraska city directory of 1895 as the widow of J. C. Reeves. In the 1900 census of Omaha, Douglas County, Nebraska, the widowed Elizabeth Reeves is living in the home of her daughter Josephine Williams who is also widowed.

The biography of Cameron's brother Preston Reeves in The Illustrated History of Nebraska, Cameron Reeves was mentioned as the first sheriff of Douglas County, Nebraska.

Research Notes

¹The name Thurston for a male child born in 1854 appears to have simply been an error made in the 1870 census taker's listing of children. There are no other sources of the name Thurston for a child of Cameron Reeves. The Nebraska marriage record of Preston L. Reeves, born 1854-5, lists his parents as J. C. Reeves and Elizabeth Evans which indicates that the name Thurston was a census error and that male child was actually Preston..

Sources

Illustrated History of Nebraska by Albert Watkins, pub 1913
1846 Iowa Census - Polk County, Iowa
1850 Census - Madison County, Iowa
1850 Census - Benton, Osage County, Missouri
1870 Census - Omaha, Douglas County, Nebraska
1885 Nebraska Census - Omaha, Douglas County, Nebraska
1900 Census - Omaha, Douglas County, Nebraska (Elizabeth Reeves, widowed)
Nebraska, Marriage Records, 1855-1908, online database at Ancestry.com (marriage of Preston L. Reeves)
Find A Grave, photo of gravestone in Brittin Cemetery, Elkhorn, Nebraska