Ancestry of
Spencer Tracy

Movie Actor

Caleb Wescott Brown

View famous kin of Caleb Wescott Brown

• • Great-grandfather of Spencer Tracy — 4th Generation
  • Ahnentafel No:
  • 12 
  • Father:
  • Mother:
  •  
  • Birth Date:
  • 3 Oct 1818 
  • Birth Location:
  • Providence, Providence Co., Rhode Island 
  • Christening Date:
  •  
  • Christening Location:
  •  
  • Death Date:
  • 1 Aug 1887 
  • Death Location:
  • Freeport, Stephenson, Illinois 
  • Burial Date:
  •  
  • Burial Location:
  • Freeport City Cemetery, Freeport, Stephenson, Illinois 
  • Spouse Name:
  • Sarah Sands Niles
  • Marriage Date:
  • 3 Jan 1842 
  • Marriage Location:
  • Buffalo, Erie, New York 
  • Child:

  Edward Sands Brown (Ahnentafel No:6 )

  • Notes: 

  • Caleb Brown is somehow related to the famous Brown Family of Rhode Island who are connected to Brown University. He is said to be the last of siblings to die. This consisted of six brothers and one sister. One brother is said to have been robbed and murdered in a hotel in New Orleans at the start of the Civil War. Another was said to have taken sick while studying art in Paris, came home and died. He and his elder brother were partners in New York in a firm called John A. Brown and Co. They did dry-goods commission business for about two years. Then in 1841, they moved to Buffalo, New York and bought a dry goods store there. Caleb left Buffalo for Illinois in 1847. More research is needed to find how Caleb fits into the Brown family of Rhode Island.

    In 1846, Caleb Brown, of Waddams Grove, Stephenson County, Illinois, wrote a letter to the government exposing the Rev. War pension fraud being committed by a Henry Littlefield Niles. The latter was apparently a relation of Caleb Brown's wife Sarah Niles. (See T.A.G. 2002, vol. 77, pp. 98-99)

• Sources for Caleb Wescott Brown

  • ¹ 1929 Illinois Roll of Honor (War Veteran Burials), Record for Caleb W Brown.
  • ² Federal Census, IL, Stephenson County, 1860, Silver Creek, p. 45, Image 3 of 31.
  • ³ Federal Census, IL, Stephenson County, 1850, Buckeye, Image 6 of 31.
  • ⁴ Federal Census, IL, Stephenson County, 1880, Freeport, E.D. 174, p. 35, Image 35 of 46.
  • ⁵ Freeport Journal-Standard (Freeport, Illinois), 18 JUN 1853, p. 12, "Brown's Mill in Silver Creek Township Passes Into New Hands".
  • ⁶ Freeport Journal-Standard (Freeport, Illinois), 02 AUG 1887, p. 4, Obituary for Caleb Wescott Brown.
  • ⁷ Gravestone image at FindAGrave.com, (accessed 08/03/2018).
  • ⁸ The American Genealogist, 2002, Vol. 77, pp. 98-99.
  • ⁹ Foley, Janet Wethy, Early Settlers of New York State: Their Ancestors and Descendants, 1938, Vol. 5, p. 270, Marriage record for Caleb W Brown and Sarah S Niles.