Ezra Sackett

Ezra Sackett, whose parents have not been identified, is thought to have been born in Connecticut^G in say 1760.¹ He died of ague, probably in Mount Carmel, Wabash County, Illinois^G, in about 1820.¹ His wife may have been named Catherine.¹ She may also have died of ague in Mount Carmel^G in about 1820.¹
     Evidence for this family is found in a memoir written in 1894 by Catherine Francis Hotchkiss and now in the possession of Sackett Family Association member Bery Bryan. No historical records have so far been found.
     Catherine Hotchkiss was Ezra's granddaughter and she referred in her memoir to a diary kept by her mother Mary Sackett (Ezra's daughter).
     According to her memoir, Catherine was taken in 1819, when a small child, with her parents Seymour and Mary (Sackett) Hotchkiss, and grandparents Ezra and (Catherine?) Sackett, from Butternuts (now Gilbertsville), New York, to Mount Carmel, Illinois, the family travelling west by riverboat on the Ohio River.
     The memoir records that Catherine Hotchkiss was left an orphan after her father Seymour died on the way, and her mother Mary dying soon after arrival. The memoir suggests that other Sackett family members were also in the party, many of them succumbing to fever in 1820.¹
Who was Ezra Sackett?
Although supporting historical records have not yet been found, Ezra's daughter's diary, as quoted in his granddaughter's memoir, does provide some clues.
     Based on his probable place of birth and approximate age, he could have been the Unnamed Sackett, born in New Haven in 1766 to Jonathan Sackett and Mary Ford. However, it is not known that the child was male, nor whether it survived infancy or childhood.