Description
The Helberg Collection consists of three Vermont farm ledgers
(1806-1842); Underwood family Vermont land records (1792-1836); Bliss and
Woodward-Underwood family genealogies; T.J. Edson Iowa and Wisconsin land
records (1856-1867); and, T.J. Edson's Civil War correspondence, other Civil
War papers and pension records (1867-1916).
Background
Five New England families: the Blisses, the Edsons, the Tylers, the
Woodwards and the Underwoods, are represented in this collection. The Bliss
family lived at Fairlee, Orange County, Vermont, while the Tylers evidently
lived and farmed slightly to the north in the vicinity of Bradford (1806-1834).
Nothing is known of their relationship to the other families represented in
this collection save that all apparently originated in the same area of east
central Vermont, for John Underwood Jr. likewise lived and farmed in the
vicinity of Bradford (1819-1841). In the next generation, T.J. Edson fought
with the 38th Iowa Infantry during the Civil War in the course of which he was
stationed at Vicksburg, Miss. and later at Brownsville, Tex. Edson wrote
copiously throughout the War to his family in Iowa. He was married (1858) to
Amine Woodward whose family had intermarried with the Underwoods and had been
friendly with the Blisses. Some members of these families had evidently moved
from Vermont to Johnstown Center, Wisc., where Amine Woodward's family lived,
sometime after 1840.