Thomas Mallery was born in Meredith, New York, a very rural area in Delaware County near Falls Creek, a feeder stream into the West Branch of the Delaware River. He was the son of the Rev. Lemuel Mallery and Esther Tuttle who had left Plymouth, CT and removed to Meredith, NY to start their family shortly after they were married. Thomas' father Lemuel was an assistant minister at the Meredith Squires Baptist Church where he was given a license to preach. While there in Meredith, his son Thomas was born.

Thomas married Chastina Dunham Belknap, the first born child and daughter of Abel R. Belknap and the Betsy (Homan) White (Homan/Holman her maiden name and White her married name) whose first husband may have died in a logging accident. It is unproven, but believed by some that Betsy was previously married to John White, the son of one of either Capt. Noadiah White or his brother Nathaniel White Jr., both who had sons named John - research is ongoing for her and potentially a dead end, as is her Homan/Holman ancestry.

The Mallery and Belknap families became close friends. The Lemuel Mallery family moved to Pennsylvania on the other side of the river that served as a border that separated the state from New York to settle in a place called Autumn Leaves near Starlight Lake in Buckingham township, in Wayne Co., PA. To the locals, it was known as "Kingsbury Hill". It was there that he took up the logging business. The area was about 5 miles from Hancock, NY as the crow flies, so Hancock was the center of commerce for the families, a place where they could sell their bark (to make tar) and logs for lumber as well as purchase household goods from the general stores.

In the fall of 1817 when Chastina was less than a year old, the family of Abel R. Belknap also moved across the river and settled in Kingsbury Hill, PA very near the home of Lemuel Mallery.

Thomas Mallery and Chastina Belknap started seeing each other and then married. Thomas started working for his father and at first, settled along Balls Creek in Scott, Wayne Co., PA. It was there that Thomas and Chastina's first six children (all daughters) were born. In 1843, after the death of Thomas' father Lemuel, Thomas and Chastina moved a few miles away to a more farming friendly area known as Pleasant Valley nearer to Kingsbury Hill. Thomas had been in the logging business with his father and decided it was time to switch to farming. It was in Pleasant Valley that Thomas built a log home by the forks in the road about a quarter mile west of Lizard Lake (now named Starlight Lake). Here, the next 8 children were born. In 1858, the family moved one mile up the road toward Shehocton Pond to build their next home, but in 1860, Thomas died of a heart attack while Chastina was pregnant with her 15th child. In 1861, Chastina and eight of her children who were still living at home moved to a house about a quarter mile away that became the Mallery family homestead for many years.

Children of Thomas and Chastina (Belknap) Mallery:

1) Celinda Olive Mallery (1834-1913) m. Squire Thomas Whitaker
2) Melissa Jane Mallery (1836-1901) m. Aaron O. Whitaker
3) Adelia Helen Mallery (1837-1869) m. Bennett Hufteln
4) Keziah Elizabeth Mallery (1839-1908) m. Lewis S. Decker
5) Hester Ann Mallery (1840-1878) m1. George W. Haynes (Union soldier - killed in battle); m2. Lafayette Axtell (also a Union soldier in the Civil War)
6) Chastina Marion Mallery (1842-1908) m. Robert Neild
7) George Andrew Mallery (1844-1844)
8) George Addison Mallery (1845-1883) m. Helen Mary Scott
9) Harrison Thomas Mallery (1847-1920) m. Emma J. Ash
10) Emeline Ophelia Mallery (1849-1933) m. Ralph Hankins Morris
11) Osmar Devillo Mallery (1851-1917) m. Edna A. Atwell
12) Brainard Belknap Mallery (1852-1930) m. Belle C. Brooks
13) Ella Maria Mallery (1854-1891) did not marry
14) Rev. Ira Douglas Mallery (1856-1947)m. Anna Elizabeth Gorr
15) Thomas R. Mallery (1861-1930) m. Eliza H. Atwell

Sources: "American Lineage of the MALLERY FAMILY OF WAYNE COUNTY, PA" by Ira D. Mallery and Midred Mallery Tewksbury (compiled and printed by "Press of the Windsor Standard" - 1939) note: also includes genealogy of Abel R. Belknap (grandfather of author, Ira D. Mallery)

Kingsbury Hill Cemetery, Buckingham Township,
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~pawayne/cemetery/kingsbury.htm - Accessed 18 December 2012. - - original note provided by seekerjay]

There is a shared main headstone for Thomas and Chastina as well as their daughter Ella, and son George and George's wife Helen. It is an attractive and somewhat ornate headstone with a carved Bible on top indicating their strong Christian faith.

There are individual grave markers for each, with just their initials, except for Thomas who has a large slate stone to mark the burial spot.