Marytie (Maria) Wendell was the daughter of John J. Wendell and 
Hannah Van Den Bergh.  She was born in Schagticoke, New York 
on 17 September 1786, but apparently lived in Otsego, Otsego 
County at the time she married Elisha Chadwick, who had been 
born in Conneticut.

However, they resided in Petersboro which was a part of 
Smithfield, New York with their four daughters, two of whom 
were probably Susannah and Elizabeth.

The following article concerning Maria Chadwick has to do with 
"settlement".  The system that was used in the early 19th 
century to determine "poor relief" was called settlement.  It 
was based on where you were from, not where you resided when 
the problem arose.  If you did not have settlement where you 
resided, meaning that you had moved from your original 
location you did not have any claims to relief in that 
location.  If you became indigent that town would issue a 
"warning ".  This simply stated that you must return to your 
original home where you might have had settlement.    If you 
were an unwed mother, the place you were located might 
actually transport you there.  

When a woman married she would loose her settlement in her 
hometown, if she removed to another place with her husband 
that had coverture there.    If a man did not provide for his 
wife or family then his settlement would take over.

The following is from "Man and Wife"  A History by Henrik Hartog  
page 128-129.

Overseers of the Poor of the Town of Otsego vs. Overseers of the 
Poor of the Town of Smithfield  5 cow 760 (no doubt court 
file number)

Elisha Chadwick   --   Maria Wendell

"But what if the husband lacked a settlement in any town in the 
state?  Maria Chadwick, originally from Otsego, New York, 
lived in Smithfield, New York with her husband Elisha, who's 
settlement was in Conneticut.

Elisha was a drunkard and did not provide for his wife and 
children and in 1823 had lost their house.

When Maria turned to the charity of her neighbors, the town 
warned her out and ordered her removal to Otsego.  The town 
of Otsego responded that her settlement there was suspended 
during coverture (her marriage).  She remained a member of 
her husbands community.  The law, Otsego argued, should not 
tolerate the dispertion of families.  But Cheif Justice John 
Savage of the New York Supreme Court held that the 
Smithfield's order of removal was right legally, although he 
concluded that it was a close and difficult question.  
Marriage should not put a woman in "worse" position than she 
was in before marriage, should not leave her without 
settlement because her husband had none.  Savage insisted 
that he appreciated the importance of "rights of marriage to 
the individuals concerned and to society.  However, he saw no 
reason why a town should be compelled to support paupers, who 
had a settlement in another "merely to accomodate a vagabond 
intemperate husband with the society of his wife and 
children, whom he had by misconduct reduced to pauperizm.

Maria Chadwick, in asking for relief, revealed that she was no 
longer "under the power and protectiion of her husband", and 
so in order to keep the itinerate poor from acquiring 
effective settlements in their places of residence, and in 
order to give Maria a settlement somewhere in New York, Chief 
Justice Savage ruled against a care of coverture - that a 
wifes place was with her husband within his household.

Maria Chadwick would be returned to Otsego.

With so many family members in that area she and her girls were 
probably provided for, as the Wendell family was a very close 
knit one.

Maria would eventually marry Joshua Gustin/Gustine who was born 
in Rockingham, Vermont and move to Assyria, Berry County, 
Michigan.

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Maria Wendell was the daughter of my 4th great-grandfather John 
J. Wendell and brother of my 3rd great-grandfather Jacob 
Wendell.

Charlott Wells Jones