My Genealogy Hound

SAMUEL OSBORNE CODINGTON, a manufacturer and contractor of Fredonia, was born at Geneva, Ontario county. New York, December 20, 1847, and is the eldest son of John S. and Bertha (Monroe) Codington. He was educated at Edinboro State Normal school, and is now a member of the firm of Sly & Codington. He is a master mason of Forest lodge. No. 166, F. and A. M., and on September 17, 1878, united in marriage with Mary Stanley, of Fredonia.

His father, John S. Codington, was born at Geneva, N. Y., September 12, 1824, is an architect and contractor, and has been superintendent of two divisions of the A. & G. W. R. R., married Bertha Monroe April 16, 1846, by whom he had six children: Clara (Irvin), Samuel O., Acie B., Ada, Theodore and John: and removed to Ohio in 1874. John S. Codington is a son of Samuel O. Codington (grandfather), who was born at Newburg, March 17, 1791, married Martha White, January 11, 1818, and died May 23, 1844. He was the contractor who built the first frame building at Geneva; was a Free Mason and his father, William Codington (great-grandfather), was a sea-captain who died many years ago. Captain William Codington was a descendant of Sir William Codington, the first governor of Rhode Island, who was born in Lincolnshire, England, in 1601, came in 1630 to Rhode Island, where he became the founder of the Codington family of this country, and where he died November 1, 1678. The name of Codington is found on the records of England as far back as the thirteenth century.

Samuel O. Codington’s mother, Bertha (Monroe) Codington, was born in Auburn, N. Y., April 3, 1827, and her father, Ansel Monroe (maternal grandfather), was an officer in the State prison at that place, and was last at Green Bay in the “Patriot War” of 1837. Her grandfather, Major John G. Perry, was killed at Queenstown in 1812, and one of her great-grandfathers, a General Busch, of the German army, was killed in a battle during the reign of Napoleon Bonaparte, and his widow and children came to America.

Samuel O. Codington’s wife, Mary (Stanley) Codington, only child of Caleb and Cordelia (Crane) Stanley, was born at Fredonia, where she received her education at the academy of that place. Her father, Caleb Stanley, was born at Herkimer, N. Y., December 25, 1813, came in 1835 to Fredonia, where he married Cordelia E. Crane on September 19, 1844, and where he died, June 22, 1884. He was a son of Isaac Stanley, a merchant, who was born in Coventry, Conn., May, 1775, married Tiney, daughter of Jeremiah Smith, a merchant of Albany, on October 3, 1802, and died in Ohio, October 22, 1849. Isaac Stanley was a son of Hon. Caleb Stanley, born July 31, 1741, married Martha Robinson, July 9, 1772, and represented Coventry in 1784. His father, Caleb Stanley, was born at Hartford, Conn., May 25, 1707, came as a clothier to Coventry, where he married Hannah, daughter of Deacon Joseph Olmstead, and died June 28, 1789. He was a son of Caleb Stanley, who was born September 6, 1674, married Hannah Spencer, May 16, 1696, was secretary of Connecticut in 1709, and died January 4, 1712. His father, Captain Caleb Stanley, was born in March, 1642, and married Hannah, daughter of John Cowles. His father, Timothy Stanley, was born in England in 1602, settled at Hartford, Connecticut, in 1636, was a selectman in 1644, and died in 1648. The Stanley family, whose armorial bearings are three stags’ heads, gold on field argent, bend azure, with motto “Sans Changer,” had its origin as follows: Two Norman knights who came with William the Conqueror in 1066 were Adam and William De Alditheley, who married Arabella and Joanne, daughters of the Saxons, Sir Henry and Thomas de Stoneley. William received as his wife dower the manor of Thalk, which he exchanged with Adam for the manor of Stoneley, in Staffordshire, and in honor of his lady and the great antiquity of her family, assumed the surname of Stanley, and became the recognized founder of the Stanley family.

Mrs. Codington’s mother, Cordelia E. (Crane) Stanley, was the eldest child of Henry and Eliza (Cassety) Crane, was born at Eaton, N. Y., July 4, 1823, was educated at Fredonia and Eaton academies, married, September 19, 1844, to Caleb Stanley, of Fredonia, and died February 9, 1878. Her father, Henry Crane, was born at Weathersfield, Conn., November 23, 1785, made several voyages as supercargo to the West Indies, married in 1817 Eliza, daughter of Col. Thomas Cassety, one of the prominent and most highly educated men in the State, and in 1835 came to Fredonia, where he died March 9, 1857. He was a Royal Arch Mason, and his parents were Captain Curtis and Elizabeth (Palmer) Crane. Captain Crane in the early part of his life was a sea captain during the Revolutionary war, and was for seven years connected with the commissary department. He afterward removed to Eaton, N. Y., where he died.