While browsing historic court documents from Weakley County, Tennessee this weekend, I stumbled across answers to questions I did not know I had. In the end, a heartbreaking story of a family that struggled with mental illness emerged.

Rebecca (Deason) Trantham is my 3rd great grandmother. She married my 3rd great grandfather, Robert Floyd Trantham, on May 10, 1855 in Weakley County, Tennessee. In the 1870 census, it is clear that an idyllic life was not meant for them. Robert Floyd, the head of the household, is living with five of his seven children. The youngest child, Effie, is living with her maternal grandparents. Wife and mother Rebecca was not listed as living in either home. I had assumed (logically) that Rebecca had died sometime after Effie’s birth in 1867 and before the 1870 census was taken.

My assumption was wrong.

Tragically, Robert Floyd died around January of 1877. He would have been about 50 years old. His will, which was likely written hastily on a simple piece of paper, was presented in court that same month and was ultimately deemed valid. Absent of legalese, he left his meager belongings to his daughters Notia and Delilah. I can only assume that Robert believed his sons were old enough to fend for themselves and that Effie would be taken care of by her maternal grandparents.

Two months after Robert’s will was vetted before the court, Robert’s father-in-law, John R. Deason, petitioned the court for guardianship of his daughter Rebecca Trantham, a “lunatic”. A wave of sadness and agony swept over me as realized what I had just read. That one word revealed why she was missing in the 1870 census. A “lunatic” was not a clinical diagnosis but simply the court’s method of indicating that the person’s mind was not sound. Clearly, Rebecca needed someone else to make important decisions for her. And because I believed Rebecca had died before 1870, I had stopped looking for her. But I found her again in the 1880 census listed as Rebecca “Bentham” age 40. She is “living” among rows and rows of strangers (other patients) in some facility or asylum in Davidson County, Tennessee.

Later court records revealed that Effie also struggled with mental illness. In 1888, her brother and my 2nd great grandfather, Campbell Jackson, was compensated by the court for transporting Effie to an asylum in Nashville. The court compensated him again when he fetched her home a year later. Effie and Campbell’s sister, Delilah, also battled mental illness according to my mother’s research; and Campbell himself died in an institution in 1935.

I debated whether or not I should share this information in this public forum. But Rebecca and her struggles are my heritage and her story is now part of my own. My paternal grandmother once told me that God never throws anything at you that he knows you cannot handle. I think she was right. The decision to separate Rebecca from her home and her family was probably agonizing. And yet they survived – she survived – and I exist because of it.

Kenfolk: Tranthams
Relation: 3rd great grandmother
Common ancestors: Rebecca’s parents, John R. and Lydia (Turbeville) Deason, are my 4th great grandparents