William Armstrong Davis
also known as William A. Davis
b. 1859-11-05, Jefferson, Ohio
d. 1931-03-13, Washington County, Ohio
William Armstrong Davis was born 5 November 1859 in Jefferson, Ohio and died 13 March 1931 in Washington County, Ohio, age 71. He was buried at Waterford Cemetery, Waterford, Washington County, Ohio — the same Waterford ground where his great-granddaughter Dorothy Marie Davis Wildermuth would be born sixty-six years after his own birth, on 24 February 1925.
He is Chuck’s maternal great-great-grandfather through the Davis line: William → Homer Edward Davis → Dorothy Marie Davis Wildermuth → Terrie Lee → Chuck.
He was the son of Joseph Davis (1819–1896) and Jane (Armstrong) Davis (1816–1881), both of Jefferson County, Ohio — his middle name, Armstrong, is his mother’s maiden surname carried forward.
A short first marriage, a long widowerhood
William married Victoria Anna Way (b. 1874) at some date before 1900 — the Way-family marriage that brings the Way line of Noble County into the Davis family. Victoria was the daughter of Edward E. Way (1851-1924) and Tacy Elizabeth Matthews (1848-1902), and the eldest granddaughter of the English-immigrant Edward Taylor Way of the Isle of Wight. Their one documented son Homer Edward Davis was born 8 February 1900 at Crooked Tree, Noble County, Ohio. Victoria died on 26 June 1903 at age 29, leaving William a widower with a three-year-old son. He remarried (the GEDCOM records a second household) and raised Homer in Washington County.
The c. 1902 family portrait
The studio close-up of William, Victoria, and toddler Homer that survives in the family papers — preserved in Chuck’s keeping, shared June 2026 — is the only known family portrait of the three together and almost certainly one of the last photographs taken of Victoria before her death. William is at right in the frame — in his early forties, dark suit, thick mustache, plaid bow-tie or cravat — with Victoria at left and Homer at center between them.
He outlived Victoria by twenty-eight years, dying in 1931 when Homer was thirty-one and already the father of his own daughters Mary, Dorothy, and Betty Davis. The Davis-Way marriage that produced Homer lasted only about three years; William’s life afterward ran much longer.
Sources: Eesley/Wildermuth GEDCOM tree (June 2026 trace) — FamilySearch tree ID LRR3-RWV. The c. 1902 family portrait is from Chuck’s keeping, shared June 2026.
