Lewis Reeve Sams (1784 – 1856) and his first wife Sarah Fripp (1789 – 1825). Married about 1809. Photos courtesy of Dataw Historic Foundation.
The theme this week is UNEXPECTED. For a long time now, we’ve had beautiful copies of portraits of Dr. Berners Barnwell Sams and his first wife, Elizabeth Fripp. Yet, as you can see above, the same is not true for his older brother Lewis Reeve Sams or his first wife Sarah Fripp. All we have are poor quality black and white portraits. I’ve always hoped we would someday find better portraits. A few weeks ago, I had a eureka moment.
Lewis Reeve Sams (1784 – 1856)
Lewis Reeve was born to William Sams and Elizabeth Hext, the fifth of their seven sons. He was most likely born on Datha Island in the old, orignial house.
Lewis married into the Fripp family about 1809. As you know, both Lewis Reeve and his brother BB believed in large families. BB had 15 children by his two wives, and Lewis, who also had two wives, ‘only’ had 12. Lewis’s first wife, Sarah, and BB’s first wife, Elizabeth, were sisters. This was typical of the time. You married within your level of society amongst families you knew. They might be related, neighbors, or acquaintances.
Frances Yonge Fuller (1800 – 1857)
When Sarah Fripp died in 1825, Lewis waited ten years before marrying again. He wed Frances Fuller, a plantation neighbor in our area of SC’s Lowcountry. Her nephew Robert Fuller owned a plantation next door to Dr. Lewis Reeve Sams, Jr. on St Helena Island. I’m not sure why Lewis Reeve waited so long to remarry. Maybe his sorrow over losing Sarah held him back. In any case, Frances, like Sarah, was Baptist. Her brother, Richard Fuller (1804 – 1876), was the Baptist Church pastor in Beaufort for 15 years. In Volume 1 of History of Beaufort County, Dr. Larry Rowland has a wonderful description of the Fuller’s and Richard in particular [Rowland.] It’s possible that Lewis Reeve and Frances were married either in the Beaufort Baptist Church or at Sheldon Plantation, the country home of the Fullers. They had four children together; three lived into adulthood. For reasons unclear to me, maybe fleeing during the war, they all lived most of their lives in Georgia, where they are buried. Lewis Reeve Sams, his wife Frances, and their two-year-old daughter Charlotte Catherine are buried in the Beaufort Baptist Churchyard.
1635
One last story about Frances. You know from my Week 1 article on Bonham Sams that the the first Sams in the New World arrived from England as early as 1682 [Bond.] The ancestors of Frances came two generations earlier! Her GGG Grandfather, William Fuller, was a passenger on the ship Abigail which sailed from Plymouth, England to Boston, MA arriving on 2 Oct 1635. He died in South Carolina about 80 years before the American Revolution started. William is buried in the Old Saint Andrew’s Parish Church Cemetery, Charleston, SC.
Eureka!
One of my go-to resources when researching these articles is Ancestry.com. A few weeks ago I noticed someone had referenced The Sams Family Tree there. DHF’s Doug Campbell created it many years ago and DHF still maintains it today. This led me to a descendant of the oldest daughter of Lewis Reeve and Frances, Elizabeth Fuller Sams Nash (1836 – 1919). This living relative had posted the pictures below on Ancestry.com. The photos went from Elizabeth Sams Nash to her son Richard Reeve Nash to his daughter Mary Elizabeth Nash Von Glahn to her daughter Mary Elizabeth Von Glahn Jamison to a living family member. Remember that, because there will be a test soon!
I don’t know when these photos were taken, but daguerreotypes weren’t common until the late 1840s. I would like to believe these are the wedding photos of Lewis Reeve and Frances; they are not. They might have been taken on the occasion of Rev. Marion Washington Sams’ (1822 – 1899) marriage to Mary Lucia Duncan (1825 – 1902) in 1847. I have no proof of this, but the relationships, timing, and occasion are right. Think of the journey these original daguerreotypes went on. They must have come into the possession of Elizabeth Sams Nash when her mother died in 1857—then traveled with her to Georgia when she fled Beaufort at the beginning of the Civil War. To have survived four more generations in Georgia is amazing, and a tribute to the memory of Lewis Reeve and Frances. In any case, seeing these reproductions was a eureka moment for me.
I present to you: Lewis Reeve Sams and his second wife, Frances Yonge Fuller. Married about 1835.
Sources
Bond, Lula Duncan Sams – The Sams Family, unpublished draft 1958
Dataw Historic Foundation, History & Learning Center, portraits of Lewis Reeve Sams and Sarah Fripp
Holden, Joel and Riski, Bill – The Sams Family Tree, Ancestry.com, accessed Jun 6, 2020
Jamison, Doug – Public Family History Content on Ancestry.com
Rowland, Lawrence S., Moore, Alexander, Rogers Jr., George C. – The History of Beaufort County, South Carolina, Volume I, 1514 – 1861, 1996, pages 408 – 415
#52Sams Week 23 – Unexpected
[Updated 13 Jun 2020]