THE CONRAD FAMILY

I THINK IT IS TIME TO FILL IN SOME OF C. E. CONRAD’S FAMILY BACKGROUND. CHARLIE CAME FROM A LARGE FAMILY OF VIRGINIA PLANTERS AND HE BECAME THE PIVOT POINT FOR A LARGE EXTENDED FAMILY AS A RESULT. THE CONRAD BOYS’ SUCCESS OUT WEST ALLOWED THEM TO AID AND SUPPORT A VERY LARGE CIRCLE OF FAMILY AND FRIENDS. THE FOUNDATION OF THOSE RELATIONSHIPS IS GIVEN BELOW.

The Conrad family were planters. They owned a modest plantation, Wapping, near Front Royal, Warren County, Virginia. The old home, now called Wapping Farm, is still in existence. Charlie was the third of what would eventually total thirteen children, and did not spend much time at Wapping, as in 1853, his father sold the property, purchasing a larger place on the Shenandoah and nearer to Maryland, mostly in Clarke county, where Charlie spent the rest of his time as a child until the advent of the Civil War. James Warren Conrad and his wife, Maria Sylvia (Ashby) Conrad had thirteen children in all, although they lost some of them at very young ages. The Ashby family looms large in Virginia history, but I will not touch upon them here, if at all. Below are the curricula vitæ for the family.

JAMES WARREN CONRAD. B. 10 Dec 1812, Winchester, VA; d. 18 July 1894, Great Falls, Cascade co, Montana; married 6 May 1846 in Warren co., VA, MARIA SYLVIA ASHBY, daughter of George William Ashby and Mary Martha “Marthy” Churchill, who was b. 20 Oct 1827 Winchester, VA and d. 18 July 1894, Great Falls, Cascade co., Montana. Maria was his second wife, having first married Evaline Self by whom he had a daughter, Sarah, with whom we are not concerned.
    Of the thirteen children that James and Maria had, several died young and did not live to become part of the family history in the West. A daughter, Mary, died at birth, and a son, James Green Sylvester, lived to be only eight years old and died in 1860. Maria also bore James twins, Ernest and Arthur Franklin. Ernest died at birth, and Arthur was but fifteen when he died at boarding school in Fairbault, Minnesota, in 1885.

1. Martha Elizabeth “Mattie” Conrad, b. 12 March 1847, Wapping Plantation, Front Royal, VA. She was married twice. Her first marriage, to a William Hawkins, yielded a son of uncertain name. Little is known of this child. Her second marriage was to Thomas J. Todd on 2 Dec 1880 in Ft. Benton, Choteau co., MT. He died on 29 May 1926 in Choteau, MT. Martha died 29 May 1899. No issue.
2. George William “W. G.” Conrad, b. 3 Aug 1848 at Wapping, and died 6 Mar 1914 at White Post, Clarke co., VA. He married Fannie Elizabeth Margaret Bowen at Poplar Hill, nr. Winchester, VA. Six children from this marriage: William Lee (1877-1888), Maria Josephine (1879-1958), Minnie Atkinson (1881-1950), Winnie A. (1882-?), George Harfield (1883-1953), Arthur Franklin (1885-1953).

He was named for his maternal grandfather, George William Ashby. It was not until shortly after he arrived in Ft. Benton that he switched his name around to William George and was known as W. G. Conrad thenceforth although many an old-timer continued to call him G. W. into the early 1900s. He owned a home at White Post and spent a goodly portion of his time there in Virginia. He was counted twice in U. S. Censuses on two occasions:  the first in 1870 when he was initially recorded at Fort Ashby on the Missouri River at the mouth of French Creek (which was in what was then Dawson co.) in late April and later at Ft. Benton in late July. The second time was the 1900 census. He was counted the first time at Great Falls in early July, then again ten days later at White Post, Virginia. It took longer to complete a census in those days for obvious reasons.

3.    Charles Edward Conrad, b. 20 May 1850 at Wapping. He was married twice. His first marriage was to a Kainai (Blood) woman by the name of Kaiyis. Her parents are currently unknown. She was known to the Piikuni (Southern Piegan or Blackfeet) as Sings-in-the-Middle Woman. She lived primarily at the Conrad home in Ft. Macleod, Canada. They had a son, Charles Edward Conrad, Jr., often referred to as Edward. Just when Kaiyis died is uncertain, but certainly it was before 1880. Charlie married as his second wife Alicia Davenport Stanford on 4 Jan 1881, in Ft. Benton, Montana, with the Rev. Blakiston presiding. They had three children, Charles Davenport Conrad, Catherine Elizabeth Conrad and Alicia Ann Conrad.

4. James Green Sylvester Conrad, b, 9 November 1852 at Wapping; died 10 Aug 1860.

5. Mary Conrad, b. 6 Jun 1854; d. 6 Jun 1854.

6. Jonathan “John” Howard Conrad, b. 15 Jun 1855 on the Conrad farm in Clarke co. Virginia; d. 27 Nov 1928, Seattle, King co., Washington. Known as John Howard or sometimes just John, he died a pauper.
He married first, Mabel Barnaby (1858-1939), the daughter of the prominent Rhode Island businessman and politician, Jerothmul Bowers Barnaby (1830-1889), and Josephine A. Reynolds (ca. 1836-1891). They were married 17 Dec 1884, Providence, Rhode Island, in a lavish and very expensive wedding that was the talk of the town and rated a full page in the Providence newspaper. This marriage ended in scandal and divorce with accusations of infidelity on both sides and set the society pages of Helena, Montana, ablaze. The divorce was final on 26 Sept 1893 in Helena. Before the divorce, they had three children, two girls and a boy. The son, Barnaby Conrad, went with his mother back to Rhode Island after the divorce. Two of his descendants, Barnaby Conrad, II (1922-2013) & Barnaby Conrad III, are very active published authors and artists. Barnaby II. spent time as a bullfighter and later wrote several books about bullfighting as well as other subjects. Barnaby III has published his account of delving into his family history in Ghost Hunting in Montana (Collins, 1994).
He married second Nellie Elizabeth Robertson 15 March 1910 in Muscatine, Muscatine co., Iowa. They had one child, a son, John Howard Conrad, Jr., b. 1911.

7. Anna Maria “Nannie” Conrad, b. 11 March 1857 on the Conrad farm in Clarke co., Virginia; d. 17 September 1888, Ft. Benton, Montana Terr. She married Joseph Amos Baker, son of Isaac Gilbert Baker, the co-founder of I. G. Baker & Co., Charles & W. G.’s employer and later business partner. Joseph and Anna had one child, a daughter, Mary Ashby Mitchell Baker. Father and daughter dedicated a stained glass window in her memory in the Episcopal church in Ft. Benton.

8. Joseph Hunter “Joe” Conrad, was born 18 Mar 1859 on the Conrad farm in Clarke county, Virginia and died 9 Dec 1894 in Los Angeles, California, where he is buried in the Angeles Rose Dale Cemetery. 

    He came to Ft. Benton  9 June 1879 aboard the I. G. Baker & Company steamer Red Cloud with several other members of his family, including his parents. He was employed by his older brothers for a while at the I. G. Baker store in Benton. He was given his middle name in honor of his uncle, John Hunter. He married Jodie Murphy in December of 1884 and they had two children, girls: Mary Josephine Conrad (1885-?) and Lucille A. Conrad (1887-?).

9. Mary Blanche “Mollie” Conrad. She was born 22 Feb 1861, in Virginia, probably on the Conrad farm in Clarke county, and died in 1911. She married one of her brothers’ business associates, Charles W. Price (1844-?) 23 Oct 1881 at Ft. Benton, Montana Territory. They had three children, Howard Conrad Price (1882-?), Warren Edward Price (1864-1906) and Charles W. Price, Jr.

        Among other ventures with the Conrads, Mr. Price was a major investor in the Conrad-Price Cattle Company.
Charles and Mollie moved in 1905 to Saskatchewan to live with their son Howard, who had moved to a ranch there in 1901 and started a family.

10. Warren Ashby “Ashby, Ash” Conrad. Also called W. A. Conrad; b. 5 Oct 1864, Warren co., VA to James Warren Conrad and Maria S. Ashby and d. 16 May 1922, Kalispell, Flathead co., MT. W. A. Conrad arrived in Benton aboard the Red Cloud, 9 June 1879, along with his parents and the balance of his siblings, including Joseph Hunter Conrad. Although only 15 at the time, he was given a job as a clerk in the Benton store of I. G. Baker & Co. by his older brothers, C. E. & W. G. Conrad. He later moved to Kalispell and worked as Head Cashier in the Conrad National Bank. 

11. Alice Agnes “Lillie” Conrad. Born 2 March 1868 on the Conrad property in Clarke co., Virginia. 

    She came to Ft. Benton, Montana with the rest of her family, arriving  9 June 1879 aboard the I. G. Baker & Company steamer Red Cloud. She met Dr. Francis Joseph Adams there and married him in Ft. Benton on 28 Oct 1891. They moved to Great Falls shortly thereafter. She died 6 April 1941 and is buried in Highland Cemetery, Great Falls, Montana. One child, a daughter, Mary Margaret Adams (1885-?).

12.    Ernest Conrad, b. 28 July 1870, d. 28 July 1870. Twin to Arthur Franklin Conrad, below.

13.   Arthur Franklin Conrad. The youngest sibling of C. E. Conrad, Arthur was born 28 July 1870 in Warren co., Virginia and died 31 March 1885 in Fairbault, Minnesota, where he was attending Shattuck School, a boarding school very popular with Montana families and which his brother, Warren Ashby Conrad, also attended for a while. Arthur was one of a set of twins, the other twin, Ernest, having died at birth.
The youngest child of one of Arthur’s uncles, Geo. Wm. Conrad (aka W. G. Conrad) was born later in the same year Arthur died (1885) and so W. G. and his wife named their child after him. 

Posted 3/1/23.  

©2023, Richard L. Hardesty