Cornelius Lezenby and Eliza Wilson, Immigrants
and some of their Ancestors
and Descendants

ALEXANDER G.² LEZENBY (Cornelius ¹) was born at Norristown, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, on December 1849 a son of Cornelius Lezenby and his wife Eliza Wilson .^[1] He died at Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, on 2 December 1903.^[2] He married at Camden on 1 July 1875 LYDIA A. STONE.^[3] She was born at Pennsylvania on September 1846,^[4] a daughter of William Stone and his wife Isabella Morris. She died at Camden on 3 December 1923.^[5]

The fifth of ten children, Alexander was the first of his family to be born in the United States. By the age of 2 he had moved with his family from Norristown to Camden. He lived at Camden the rest of his life. Like his father before him, Alexander was a blacksmith.

In 1870 Alexander was living at Camden with his older and recently married brother John, who was also a blacksmith.^[6]

Alexander and Lydia married in 1875. The 1880 Census reported this young family at 340 Liberty Street, Camden, consisting of Alexander, 31, blacksmith, Lidia, 32, Martha, 3, Ella, 1 month, and Lydia's mother, Isabella Stone, 73, widow.^[7] Their full family was reported at the same address in the 1900 Census:^[8]

This census record also reported that Alexander and Lidia had been married 25 years, and that Lidia had five children, all living. However the 1910 Census would report that she had four children, all living, and I have no information on a fifth child.

Martha completed a year of High School, the other children completed eighth grade.^[9]

Daughter Mattie married within a year of the 1910 Census, and Alexander died in 1903. Widow Lydia, 57, was left with children at home ages 23, 19 and 16. The children all worked, and there is no record of any of these remaining three children ever marrying.

Widow Lydia Lezenby was reported on the 1910 Census at 261 Mount Vernon Street, Camden, with her three adult children. Ella, 29, was a sales lady in a department store; Morris, 26, was a printer for a newspaper; Lydia, 22, was a telephone operator.^[10]

The 1920 Census reported Lydia Lezenby, age 72, at 1303 Park Boulevard, Camden, with her three adult children and one boarder. Daughter Eleanor, 38, was keeping house; son Morris, 36, continued to work as a printer for a newspaper; daughter Lidie, 33, was clerk for a wool broker.^[11]

After their mother's death in 1923, daughters Eleanor and Lydia continued to live at the address on Park Boulevard, where they were reported in 1930. By this time Lidia had become office manager for an insurance company. ^[12] The 1940 Census reported the two sisters at the same address in Camden. Lidie, 54, worked as a clerical adjuster for a fire insurance company; Eleanor, 59, kept house.^[13]

Martha "Mattie" Lezenby married Albert Coombs when she was 24 and he was 22. They had five children, but only two survived infancy. This family lived at Atlantic City, Atlantic County, New Jersey, where Albert was working as a bartender in 1910.^[14] However the 1920 census and future censuses reported him to be a brakeman for the railroad.

After the marriage of Martha to Albert Coombs, the babies arrived at a rapid rate. Vernon, born in January 1902, lived only 5 months. Ten months after Vernon's birth, Henry was born, and he survived. Eleven months after Henry's birth, Albert, Junior, was born, but he lived only three months. Fourteen months after Albert's birth, Alfred was born; he lived four months. In their first six years of marriage, Albert and Martha had welcomed the arrival of four babies, and had mourned the deaths of three of them. It would be ten years before their next child, Eleanor, was born.

The 1930 census reported this family at 1531 Atlantic Avenue, Atlantic City, consisting of Albert, 50, railroad brakeman, Martha, 53, son Henry, 27, driver of an oil truck, daughter Eleanor, 14, in school, and Martha's brother William, who worked in a print shop.^[15]

The 1940 census reported the Coombs family at 1532 Atlantic Avenue, included Albert, 60, a railroad brakeman, and Martha, 62. Harry, 37, who had been unemployed for 70 weeks, was working as a forman for the W. P. A. Eleanor, 24, was a stenographer in a law office. Martha's brother Morris, 57, worked as a printer in a newspaper office.^[16]

William Morris Lezenby, reported sometimes under his first name and sometimes under his middle name, moved to Atlantic City by 1923,^[17] lived with his sister, Martha Coombs, and never married. He worked as a printer for the Press Union Publishing Company of Atlantic City. By 1946 he was working as secretary-treasurer of the Typographical Union no. 377.^[18] When he registered for the "old man's draft" on 27 April 1942, he was described as 5' 6 ½" tall, 180 pounds, gray eyes, gray hair, ruddy complexion, veins in head visible, second finger on right hand disfigured.^[19]

Eleanor Eliza Coombs, daughter of Albert and Martha (Lezenby) Coombs, was born ten years after her other siblings, when her parents were 36 and 38 years old. She married George Carl Hofmann, a native of Frankfort, Germany, and child of John and Katherine (Schenk) Hofmann. George served in the United States Army throughout World War II, from 16 September 1940 to 8 May 1946, and retired a Lieutenant Colonel. George and Eleanor then lived in the Allentown, Pennsylvania, area, where he worked as a draftsman for Bethlehem Steel Company, 1950 to 1970.^[20]

George Carl "Skip" Hofmann, Jr., son of George and Eleanor Hofmann, graduated from Louis E. Dieruff High School in Allentown, and enlisted in the Air Force, where he was trained as a radar technician. Upon discharge, he worked for forty-two years for Unisys Corporation as a computer technician, then as a manager at their corporate headquarters in Blue Bell, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania.^[21]

Alexander Lezenby and his wife Lydia Stone had the following children:

1. MARTHA³ LEZENBY b. at New Jersey on 22 June 1877, d. at New Jersey on 17 May 1955;^[22] m. about 1900-1 ALBERT D. COOMBS^[23] b. at New Jersey on 10 May 1879, d. at Brigantine, Atlantic County, on 17 May 1965.^[24] Children of Martha and Albert Coombs:
   1. Vernon Sparks Coombs b. at New Jersey on January 1902, d. at Camden on 28 May 1902.^[25]
   2. Henry H. Coombs b. at Camden on 29 November 1902, d. at Brigantine on 2 February 1969.^[26]
   3. Albert D. Coombs b. at Camden County on October 1903, d. at Camden County on 4 January 1904.^[27]
   4. Alfred Coombs b. at Camden County on December 1905, d. at Camden County on 14 March 1906.^[28]
   5. Eleanor Eliza Coombs b. at Atlantic City on 2 October 1915, d. at Pennsylvania on 26 August 1996;^[29] m. on April 1940 GEORGE CARL HOFMANN, Sr. b. at Franfort, Germany on 21 January 1905, d. at Bethlehem, Northampton County, Pennsylvania, on 14 May 1989.^[30] Children of Eleanor and George Hofmann:
      1. George Carl Hofmann, Jr. b. at Salem, Marion County, Oregon, on 5 November 1942, d. at Levittown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, on 13 October 2015; m. Aleta ________. Children of George and Aleta Hofmann:
         1. Timothy Hofmann
         2. George Carl Hofmann III
      2. John R. Hofmann^[31]
2. ELEANOR M.³ LEZENBY b. at New Jersey on May 1880; d. at New Jersey on 16 May 1964.^[32]
3. WILLIAM MORRIS³ LEZENBY b. at Camden on 22 September 1882;^[33] d. at Atlantic City on 17 August 1952.^[34]
4. LYDIA W.³ LEZENBY b. at Camden on 13 June 1885;^[35] d. at New Jersey on 21 March 1966.^[36]

¹Twelth Census of the United States: 1900, population, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, enumeration district (ED) 53, roll 959, p. 11B, houshold 233, Alexander Lezenby family; digital images, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 26 November 2014); NARA microfilm group T623; Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration.
²Evergreen Cemetery, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, Find a Grave, database (findagrave.com : 27 May 2018), Alexander G Lezenby; Created by: Dave B.
³New Jersey Department of State, Division of Archives and Record Management "New Jersey, Marriages, 1670-1980," database, Family Search (familysearch.org : accessed 2011), Camden Co., Lezenby-Stone, 1875.
⁴Evergreen Cemetery, Lydia Stone Lezenby; Created by: Dave B.
⁵Ibid.
⁶Ninth Census of the United States: 1870, population, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, roll 856, p. 459A, household 615, John Lezenby family; digital images, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 1 December 2014); NARA microfilm publication M593, Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration.
⁷Tenth Census of the United States: 1880, population, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, enumeration district (ED) 51, roll 774, p. 304C, household 438, Alexan Lesenberg family; digital images, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 30 November 2014); NARA microfilm publication T9; Record Group 29. National Archives, Washington, D.C.
⁸1900 Census, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, ED 53, roll 959, p. 11B, houshold 233, Alexander Lezenby family.
⁹Sixteenth Census of the United States: 1940, population, Atlantic City, Atlantic Coounty, New Jersey, enumeration district (ED) 1-38, roll 2301, p. 8B, household 240, Albert Coombs family; digital images, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 15 September 2014); NARA microfilm group T627; and Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, enumeration district (ED) 22-108, roll 2396, p. 3B, household 54, Lidie Lezenby family.
¹⁰Thirteenth Census of the United States: 1910, population, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, enumeration district (ED) 27, roll 873, p. 4B, household 83, Lydia Lezenby family; digital images, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 26 November 2014); NARA group T624, Record Group 29. National Archives, Washington, D.C..
¹¹Fourteenth Census of the United States: 1920, population, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, enumeration district (ED) 86, roll 1022, p. 5B, household 114, Lydia Lezenby family; digital images, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 26 November 2014); NARA microfilm record group T625, Record Group 29. National Archives, Washington, D.C.
¹²Fifteenth Census of the United States: 1930, population, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, enumeration district (ED) 63, roll 1322, p. 20A, household 397, Eleanor Maxfield family; digital images, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 2014); NARA microfilm record group T626; Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration.
¹³1940 Census, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, ED 22-108, roll 2396, p. 3B, household 54, Lidie Lezenby family.
¹⁴1910 Census, Atlantic City, Atlantic County, New Jersey, ED 12, roll 867, p. 8B, household 170, Albert Coombs family.
¹⁵1930 Census, Atlantic City, Atlantic County, New Jersey, ED 18, roll 1308, p. 6A, household 104, Albert Coombs family.
¹⁶1940 Census, Atlantic City, Atlantic Coounty, New Jersey, ED 1-38, roll 2301, p. 8B, household 240, Albert Coombs family.
¹⁷Buyer's Guide - 1923 - Atlantic City Directory (N.p.:n.p.n.d.), 701, Morris Lezenby; digital image, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 5 June 2018).
¹⁸Polk's Atlantic City (Atlantic Co., N.J.) Directory, 1946 (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: R. L. Polk & Co., 1946), 462, W, Morris Lezenby; digital image, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 5 June 2018).
¹⁹"Selective Service Registration Cards, World War II: Fourth Registration," digital images, United States, Selective Service System, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 28 February 2015), William Morris Lezenby, Atlantic County, New Jersey, board 9, no. 242; citing Selective Service Registration Cards, World War II: Fourth Registration: Records of the Selective Service System, Record Group Number 147. National Archives and Records Administration..
²⁰"George C Hofmann Sr, 84," obituary, Morning Call, 15 May 1989; Genealogy Bank (genealogybank.com : accessed 19 July 2018), Recent Obituaries. United States, Department of Veterans Affairs, Washington, DC, "Beneficiary Identification Records Locator Subsystem (BIRLS) Death File, 1850-2010," database, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 20 July 2018), George Hofmann, 150092675.
²¹"George Carl Hofmann Jr.," obituary, Bucks County Courier Times, 30 October 2015; Web Edition Articles, Genealogy Bank (genealogybank.com : accessed 19 July 2018), Recent Obituaries.
²²Laurel Memorial Park and Crematory, Pamona, Atlantic County, New Jersey, Find a Grave, digital images (findagrave.com : accessed 3 December 2014), Martha H. Coombs; Created by: Dave B, Photo added by XO.
²³1910 Census, Atlantic City, Atlantic County, New Jersey, ED 12, roll 867, p. 8B, household 170, Albert Coombs family.
²⁴Laurel Memorial Park and Crematory, Pamona, Albert Coombs; Created by: Dave B, Photo added by XO.
²⁵New Camden Cemetery, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, Find a Grave, digital images (findagrave.com : accessed 31 May 2018), Vernon Sparks Coombs; Created by: Dave B.
²⁶Atlantic City Cemetery, Pleasantville, Atlantic County, New Jersey, database, Find a Grave (findagrave.com : accessed 28 September 2015), Henry H. Coombs; Created by: Dave B.
²⁷David Barnett, to Charles A. Maxfield, electronic mail, 19 October 2015, "mark up of Lezenby descendants," privately held.
²⁸Ibid.
²⁹United States Social Security Administration, "Social Security Applications and Claims, 1936-2007," database, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 28 September 2015), Eleanor Eliza Coombs, 138035012.
³⁰"George C Hofmann Sr, 84," Morning Call, 15 May 1989
³¹"George Carl Hofmann Jr.," Bucks County Courier Times, 30 October 2015
³²Harleigh Cemetery, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey, Find a Grave, digital images (findagrave.com : accessed 3 December 2014), Eleanor M Lezenby; Created by: Dave B.
³³New Jersey Department of State, Division of Archives and Record Management, Trenton, New Jersey "New Jersey, Births, 1670-1980," database, Family Search (familysearch.org : accessed 29 May 2018), Camden, Camden County; Wm. M. Lezenby, 1882.
³⁴Laurel Memorial Park and Crematory, Pamona, W. Morris Lezenby; Created by: Dave B, Photo added by Laura Kessler Hershey.
³⁵New Jersey Department of State, "New Jersey, Births, 1670-1980," Camden, Camden County; Eliza Lezenby, 1886.
³⁶Social Security Administration, "U.S. Social Security Death Index," database, Ancestry (ancestry.com : accessed 1 November 2016), Lidie Lezenby, 161-03-5207.

Atlantic City Cemetery, Pleasantville, Atlantic County, New Jersey. Database. Find a Grave. findagrave.com : 2015.

Barnett, David. "mark up of Lezenby descendants." Electronic mail to Charles A. Maxfield. 19 October 2015. Privately held.

Bucks County Courier Times. Levittown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. 30 October 2015.

Buyer's Guide - 1923 - Atlantic City Directory. N.p.: n.p., n.d.. Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2018.

Evergreen Cemetery, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey. Find a Grave. database. findagrave.com : 2018.

Harleigh Cemetery, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey. Find a Grave. Digital images. findagrave.com : 2014.

Laurel Memorial Park and Crematory, Pamona, Atlantic County, New Jersey. Find a Grave. Digital images. findagrave.com : 2014.

Morning Call. Allentown, Lehigh County, Pennsylvania. 15 May 1989.

New Camden Cemetery, Camden, Camden County, New Jersey. Find a Grave. Digital images. findagrave.com : 2018.

New Jersey Department of State, Division of Archives and Record Management, Trenton, New Jersey. "New Jersey, Births, 1670-1980." Database. Family Search. familysearch.org : 2018.

________. "New Jersey, Marriages, 1670-1980." Database. Family Search. familysearch.org : 2011.

Polk's Atlantic City (Atlantic Co., N.J.) Directory, 1946. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: R. L. Polk & Co., 1946. Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2018.

United States Department of the Census. Ninth Census of the United States: 1870, population. Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2014.

________. Tenth Census of the United States: 1880, population. Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2014.

________. Twelth Census of the United States: 1900, population. Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2014.

________. Thirteenth Census of the United States: 1910, population. Digital images. Ancestry ancestry.com : 2014.

________. Fourteenth Census of the United States: 1920, population. Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2014.

________. Fifteenth Census of the United States: 1930, population. Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2014.

________. Sixteenth Census of the United States: 1940, population. Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2014.

United States, Department of Veterans Affairs, Washington, DC. "Beneficiary Identification Records Locator Subsystem (BIRLS) Death File, 1850-2010." Database. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2018.

United States, Selective Service System. "Selective Service Registration Cards, World War II: Fourth Registration." Digital images. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2015.

United States Social Security Administration. "Social Security Applications and Claims, 1936-2007." Database. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2015.

________. "U.S. Social Security Death Index." Database. Ancestry. ancestry.com : 2016.