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Charles Joseph Hooker is a bit of a mystery. The problem is the state of record keeping in New York in the first part of the 19th century. Try as I might, I can find no birth record for Charles Joseph. Edward Hooker, The Descendants of Rev. Thomas Hooker, identifies him as the son of Joseph Hooker (1786-1820) together with a daughter, Jane Eliza Hooker. E.Hooker has no other information about Charles Joseph, but he does provide more about Jane Eliza, her husband and her children. She named her second son Charles Hooker Sherman.
There is evidence of Charles Joseph later in life. He is in the US Federal Census or 1860 and again in 1880. In 1880 he is registered as divorced. There is, however, no record at all of his ex-wife, Melita Shepherd in that census. Perhaps Charles had married a second time and it is possible that the census recorder made a mistake and that Charles was, in fact, a widower and not a divorcee. He and Melita had a number of children and they are documented.
The difficulty is establishing his paternity. There were more than one Charles Hooker born about the same time in roughly the same area in New York. Since Charles and Melita had a son named Charles J. and since Edward Hooker made very few mistakes in his genealogical research, I choose to believe that Charles Joseph was the son of Joseph Hooker and therefore a direct male ancestor of Neal Hooker.
Charles Joseph and Melita married in Oceola, Livingston County, Michigan about 1844. He was a farmer.
Wives and Children
- Melita Shepherd (1820-1869)
- Eunice 1844
- Horace 1847
- Lewis Cass 1852
- Charles J. 1854
- Henry 1853
- George Washington 1858
- Herbert Roswell 1861