The Wheat Brothers: Myths and Legends, Part II

See "The Wheat Brothers: Myths and Legends, Part I" for what is known (and unknown) about Zachariah Wheat of Virginia, usually shown as the father of the Wheat brothers, and for the biographical sketch of Samuel Wheat (1787-1866). This post will focus on brothers Benjamin and Josiah. William and John will be the subjects of Part III.

From the list of the Wheat brothers in Wheat Genealogy: A History of the Wheat Family in America (in Ancestry.com's database, North America, Family Histories, 1500-2000):

BENJAMIN--of Kentucky

Most trees give Benjamin's year of birth as 1790, which is a good average date for the birth of all the Wheat brothers. However, having looked a little more closely at the available data (which is not much, to tell the truth), I think he might have been born closer to 1780.

Wheat Genealogy places him in Kentucky, where he certainly may have gone after leaving Virginia, but I have found no documentation for that. He appears on the tax lists of 1811 and 1815 in Madison County, Alabama (Mississippi Territory) and on the 1816 Residents' List.

He was the first of the Wheat brothers to marry in Madison County on 17 August 1812. Every official source I have found for Benjamin's marriage says he married Mary (or sometimes May) Jolly or Jolley. I am sure the differences are due to different transcriptions of the original record.

Many trees show that Benjamin married Mary Gourley. I think the original source of this name is the Biographical Souvenir of the State of Texas, 1889. I have seen at least one tree that suggested that Mary's maiden name was Gourley and that she married a Jolly before marrying Benjamin, but I have seen no evidence for this. I have wondered if the difference is just due to different pronunciations or transcriptions of the names Gourley and Jolly. Some trees show Jeremiah Gurley as the father of Mary; according to the database, North America, Family Histories, 1500-2000 on Ancestry, Jeremiah Gurley of North Carolina had a daughter named Mary. Jeremiah was in Anson, North Carolina, in 1830 and in Madison County, Alabama, in 1840. He died and is buried in Gurley Cemetery in Madison Co. 

I have gone with Jolly in my tree, because that is what can be documented; it's helpful to remember that the authors of the Biographical Souvenir didn't have access to the original records that we have today. I'm trying to keep an open mind--in its favor, the Biographical Souvenir did have access to living people in 1889 who should have known what was true. In my opinion, it's unlikely that Mary was in Madison County by herself in 1812 when she married Benjamin. From the available records it appears that Jeremiah Gourley came to Madison County in the 1830's. So, for me, Jolly it is. 

I have to admit here that I have not seen an original marriage license for Benjamin and Mary, if one exists. I have done the Family Search merry-go-round, looking for original records. There are several lists on which Benjamin and Mary's marriage appears, and FamilySearch has the original images--sometimes original marriage licenses and sometimes transcribed lists of marriages. However, although images are digitized, they are not indexed. I finally figured out Family Search's system of Digital Folder numbers, but when I found that one of the marriage lists was available, and then found Benjamin and Mary on it, it said that the image was unavailable at this time. So frustrating! 

In its biographical sketch of William Wheat, one of the sons of Benjamin, the Biographical Souvenir says that William "is the third of the four children of Benjamin and Mary (Gourley) Wheat, the other three being named--James, John, and Mary. The father, Benjamin, was a native of Virginia, was a substantial farmer and a member of the Primitive Baptist church." With the addition of a note contributed by tali7311 on Ancestry, this is practically the extent of what is known about Benjamin; tali7311 found a reference to Benjamin in the History of Lamar County by A. W. Neville, stating that he served on a Grand Jury in April 1841.

If not for the Biographical Souvenir, I doubt that I would have ever found the names of Benjamin's children, since they were grown and he was deceased by 1850. They were:

• James, born 1814 in Alabama, married Rhoda Boren 26 Apr 1848 in Lamar County, TX. He appears on the 1846 Tax List for Lamar County and on the 1850 Lamar County and 1860 Ellis County censuses. I believe he is the James Wheet who enlisted in Co. F, 1st Regiment, 2nd Brigade, Texas State Troops in August 1863. He enlisted at Tehuacana, Texas, for 6 months. (The Texas State Troops were not part of the Confederate States Army but served under officers in the employ of the State of Texas for the purposes of frontier defense.) James's mother, Mary, age 74 (born 1776), is living with James and his family on the 1850 census. (This is one of the reasons that I believe Benjamin was born much earlier than 1790.) Both James and Rhoda had died by 28 September 1868 when the Bond of Administration for their estate was filed and Rhoda's father, Michael Boren, was named administrator. The probate record on Ancestry is over 100 pages, not because James and Rhoda had such a large estate, but because they left 5 minor children: James H., William Riley, Sarah Eliza, Texanna, and Joseph. It may be unjustified but I don't get a very good impression of Michael; in 1869 he wrote a letter to an Ellis County judge asking for money from the estate to support the children, and the 1870 census shows them farmed out to his neighbors. The names of James, Rhoda, and James H. appear on a memorial at the Boren Cemetery in Reagor Springs, Ellis County, as they are buried in unmarked graves.

James, Rhoda, and James H. listed upper right

• John first appears on the 1850 Lamar County TX census as a Laborer, living with the John Johnson family. In 1850, apparently later in the year, he married E. Turner. On the 1860 census he is head of household in Lamar County with wife Elizabeth, sons Stokeley, age 9, William Todd, age 7, and Travis F., age 5; plus Paschal Turner, age 20, and Matt Turner, age 15. When Travis Fannin Wheat died in 1931, his death certificate said that his parents were John Wheat and Elizabeth Johns(t)on (maiden name). Here's my guess: John was working for Elizabeth Johnson Turner's parents when Elizabeth came home a widow. The 1860 census shows their blended family of five sons, three of theirs and two of Elizabeth's. John enlisted in Co. G., Whitfield's Legion, Texas Cavalry, C.S.A., in Paris TX in March of 1862 for a period of 12 months. The 1880 census, which is the last document in which John appears, shows two grandchildren, Thomas and Sarah Click. Since all of John and Elizabeth's children were sons, I'm not sure to whom these children belong--perhaps one of the sons was widowed and these are children by the wife's previous marriage? 

• William is profiled in the Biographical Souvenir of the State of Texas, 1889. His biographical sketch states that he was born 18 January 1819 in Morgan County, Alabama, and that he came to Texas in 1837, where he lived in Lamar County. (On the 1850 census he is age 31, living with his cousin, William Whitley Wheat, in Grayson Co.) The Souvenir records that he married at age 32 to Adaline Turner, daughter of John Turner of Lamar County, and had ten children: Mary Ann, William Tolbert, Elizabeth, Joseph A., Idella Frances, Charles Carlton, Cora O., Erasmus B., Hester A., and John T., who had passed away in 1858. According to the Souvenir, the family moved to Delta County in 1856,

"in the organization of which he took an active part. There was not a house at that time in the town of Cooper, and deer, bear, and game of all kinds roamed at will over the site of that now populous and thriving county seat, in the laying out of which Mr. Wheat assisted materially. He also served under General Rusk in the campaign against the hostile Indians and aided in protecting the frontier. . . besides being otherwise instrumental in protecting and building up the county. At the outbreak of the late Civil War Mr. Wheat enlisted May 9, 1861, in the Texas State troops and served until the final surrender."

On the last census upon which he appeared, the 1880 census of Delta County, William Wheat was 81.

• Mary was born in 1823 in Alabama and married Israel Boren (no relation to Michael Boren, above, as far as I can tell). Their children were: Washington, Melinda Malvina, Harrison "Jack", Sara Frances, Cortez, Paralee, Josephine, and Robert. On the 1850 census the family is living in Lamar Co. TX. On the 1860 census Israel is a single father, living in Collin Co. TX; it is believed that Mary died in 1855 at the age of 32. Israel married twice more. In 1891 the 75-year-old Israel was living with his granddaughter Crissie, daughter of Sarah Frances; her husband, Noah Nance; and Noah's brother Syd. Apparently without provocation, one morning in April Israel killed Syd Nance with an axe. The only explanation he ever gave was that he thought Syd had made improper advances to Crissie. He pled insanity, was found guilty, sentenced to ten years, and imprisoned at Huntsville State Prison where he died in 1895. 

JOSIAH--of Tiler Co., Texas

Josiah was born 3 September 1779 in Virginia. I think he may be the origin of the belief that the Wheats came from Loudoun County, Virginia. On the 1810 census of the town of Hillsborough (now Hillsboro) in Loudoun County is a name that has been transcribed as Josiah White but could possibly be Josiah Wheat. However, in following up this clue I found an article about Hillsboro that mentioned a founding father of the town named Josiah White. With no Zachariah, Samuel, or Josiah Wheat having been documented as living in Loudoun County, I think we can dismiss that recurring myth of the origin of the Wheat brothers.

Josiah was the second of the brothers to marry in Madison County, Alabama, taking Martha Fletcher as his wife on 15 October 1812. He appears on the 1815 Tax List for Madison County. By 1835 he had sons, John, Brice M., James Edmond, Edmond P., Josiah, Jr., and daughters, Elouise or Elouisa (who is usually recorded as Eliza), Amanda, and Martha.  In 1835 the oldest, John, was 21, and the youngest, Josiah Jr. was 2. There being "quite a talk of Texas," Josiah Sr., age 55, sent his son John to "see what he thought of the new country." 

Those quotes are from a wonderful narrative, Early Texas ("In the year 1835") written by Josiah's grandson, L. M. (Levi Martin) Wheat (1858-1926), in 1922. I first found it attached to Josiah on the tree of Ancestry user rjohnson1672; I don't know if she was the person who first shared it. As you can tell from the dates, Levi was in his 60's when he wrote down the stories he remembered his father John telling him in his youth. I can just imagine him sitting enraptured at his father's knee while John told him about the exciting days in 1830's Texas. As you might expect, Levi as a young boy and as an old man, was much more interested in hunting exploits than in genealogy, but he does include important names, dates, and events.

Here are some of the highlights:

• Josiah lived in northern Alabama, close to "Molton" [Moulton] in Lawrence Co. when he sent John to "see what he thought" of Texas.

• Levi names John's brothers, Brice, James Edmond, and Josiah; Edmond is not listed, although his name is written in the margin of the document, and a couple of the stories feature "Uncle Ed"; James is "Uncle Jim."

• About March 1, 1835, John set out for Texas, accompanied by a neighbor, "old man" Sam Goode. It was possible to travel by rail from a location near to them in Alabama to New Orleans, but I couldn't tell if they actually took the train or just followed the tracks on foot to New Orleans. From New Orleans they took a steamboat north on the Mississippi until they reached "Natches" [Natchez], then they walked from Natchez to Texas, where they turned west at the Sabine River for the town of Jasper. They stayed in Jasper for 2 to 3 months until the middle of May/1st of June. John got a job as a chain carrier, helping survey the area. 

• When they came home in June, everybody in the community came over to hear what John thought of Texas. After making his crop, Josiah began selling everything in preparation for leaving Alabama for Texas. Josiah's family came to Town Bluff [between Jasper and Woodville in Tyler County] in the winter of 1835. Along with several other families, they came by ox wagon, crossing the Mississippi at Natchez. John told Levi that "in crossing the bottom they had a very difficult time, the bottom being wet and muddy. Some days they would cut new roads, prize out their wagons and work all day and when night came they were hardly out of sight of their camp where they had camped the previous night..."

• According to Levi, there were only about 3 white families living in Tyler County at the time, whose names might have been Burke, Nolen, and Hanks. [Wyatt Hanks, an early settler, operated a ferry at Town Bluff as early as 1833.]

• In 1836, as Levi writes, "Texas and Mexico got into a scrap." John joined Capt. Chesher's Co. in Jasper. Chesher took 125 men to Nacogdoches where Americans had taken possession of the fort. Expecting a battle, they were surprised when the Mexicans surrendered the next morning. Chesher was anxious to join Col. Sam Houston's army at San Jacinto, so he took off with a small company of men, John included, leaving a few to guard the fort at Nacogdoches; rain that had caused the flooding of creeks and rivers delayed them, and they reached San Jacinto the day after the battle. [The fort at Nacogdoches had been dismantled in 1902, which greatly annoyed Levi, writing in 1922. He would be pleased to know that the original stones have been used to reconstruct the fort on the grounds of Stephen F. Austin State University.]

This photograph of the original fort was taken in 1885.

• John related to Levi many stories that were told to him by the victorious Texans, including the capture of Santa Anna, but John himself was a participant in what came next. One of Santa Anna's generals, a man Levi calls "Wool" came to Houston's camp. Boasting that he could "give him a better fight than did Santa Anna," Wool left the camp to go back to his army of 3,000 men near where Dallas now stands. After at first letting him go, Houston thought better of it and sent out a posse to bring him back. John was one of those set to guard Wool; he recalled that the general was "very dignified and insulting, especially to a private," and "that all the soldiers hated him so badly that they wanted some excuse to kill him, but knew it would not do." [This was Adrian Woll, who was "dispatched. . .to the Texan camp as an emissary under the pretext of learning the terms of the armistice, but actually to gain information on the strength, armament, and resources of the enemy," according to the Handbook of Texas.]

• Meanwhile, back at home, Josiah was trying to get out of Texas "on account of Santa Anna coming through the State with his army"; as Levi writes, it was "the time everybody here called the 'runaway scrape.'" Having dug a boat out of a big cypress tree, Josiah, his family, and some neighbors made part of their escape by water and part by land; "...on their march from Jasper to Nacogdoches they would meet men, women and children, some horseback, some in wagons, some walking, barefooted and dear old women tired, worn out, hungry, and almost breathless would invariably ask them if they had any coffee..."

• The war being all over, Josiah and his family came back home, "just below the little Town of Town Bluff, Tyler County." In 1837 John went "land hunting" west of Town Bluff, naming Turkey Creek for the many wild turkeys he found there. They came to the area where Woodville is now. Later, his father would claim 2/3 of a league there and 1/3 on the Neches River; John claimed 1/3 of a league just south of his father's 2/3. Josiah "gave 200 acres of this to build the little town of Woodville." [According to "Brief History of Tyler County," submitted by the Woodville Chamber of Commerce in 1999, "In 1846, settlers in this area held an election to select a county seat and when Josiah Wheat offered 200 acres of his land in the forks of Turkey Creek for a townsite, his offer was accepted."]

• The Wheat families did not move immediately to the new land at Turkey Creek. At first, they cut a trail from Town Bluff to their field, planted corn and then pumpkins. John would make the trip by mule with provisions for one day, shell a "turn" of corn which he put in the corn crib they had built, tie his mule to the crib and sleep in it overnight, then bring two or three bushels back home with him. Along with the dangers of "bear, panther, catamounts. . .and wolves," John also once met a group of about fifty Indians with flintlock rifles on his way back; one unwrapped his rifle from a buckskin, took aim at John, and then inexplicably let him go. 

• In the years from 1837 to 1839 John, Brice, and Jim "hunted a great deal, especially in the winter months." They dug a boat from a cypress, "so large that they could carry everything for a bear hunt." Wearing buckskins and moccasins, the young men would be gone for a month or six weeks. They would hunt, floating the river all the way to Beaumont, where they would trade oil, meat, and skins for groceries--coffee, sugar, and ammunition. In a first mention of "Uncle Ed" [Edmond P.], Levi wrote that he was "too small" [9 or 10] to go with them on the big bear hunts. Much of the rest of Levi's narrative is taken up with hunting stories, the exploits of his uncles with bears, deer, panthers, and alligators. It is clear that Levi was fascinated with these stories and had heard them so many times that he could still tell them with detail over 50 years after he first heard them. 

Josiah Wheat served as a physician for his community in Tyler County. The 1850 census of Tyler County gives the 70-year-old Josiah's occupation as M.D. His wife Martha and 17-year-old son Josiah Jr. are members of his household. He died later that year on 4 June 1850. 

According to Handbook of Texas, Josiah spent his last years in the Dies community, seven miles northwest of Woodville in central Tyler County. The Handbook relates that "The area around Billums Creek and Colmesneil, where Dies is located, is surfaced by a band of blackland soil good for raising cotton. After 1835 Josiah Wheat, an early settler who donated land for the county seat at Woodville, cleared land south of Town Bluff for a farm but traded it soon afterward for land in Dies because he wanted to raise cotton there." 

Josiah and Martha are buried at Pilgrim Rest Cemetery in the Dies community. His marker credits him as "Donor of County Site of Tyler County 1846." 

Josiah and Martha Wheat headstone at Pilgrim Rest Cemetery
Photo contributed by rjohnson1672 to Ancestry.com

Contributed by Patricia Buckley to Findagrave.com

Josiah and Martha Wheat's children:

• John, whose grave is located in the Mount Pisgah Community Cemetery in Woodville. A Texas historical marker at the site reads: "John Wheat. (August 7, 1813 -- April 24, 1889) A native of Lawrence County, Ala. Migrating to Texas in 1835, Wheat located his headright and bounty lands here, and named many Tyler County creeks while hunting bear and other game. A soldier in Texas War for Independence, he guarded a Mexican officer prisoner after Battle of San Jacinto. He donated land for this cemetery, and served as county commissioner in 1852-1854. Married four times, he had several children, and left to descendants many legends of the early days." John's first wife, Mary Jane Durham, was the mother of Levi and others. He had three children with his last wife, Joanna Prescott.

Photo contributed by James Durham to Findagrave

• Elouise/Elouisa, often shown as Eliza in records, married William Rowlett Goode in Lawrence County, Alabama, in 1833. William was the son of Frances Rowlett and "old man" Sam Goode who accompanied John Wheat on his first trip to Texas.

• Brice M., born 8 May 1816, died 1 October 1894, married Frances Peyton Nowlin in 1849. He is buried in the Nowlin Cemetery in Polk County, Texas, where his military headstone reads: "Brice M. Wheat CPL. Bell's Texas Mtd. Vols Mex. War"

Photo contributed to Findagrave by Charla Clark

• James Edmond, born 3 April 1822, died 14 Sep 1898, is buried in the Egypt Cemetery, Colmesneil, Tyler County. He was married to Morrie Elizabeth Risinger, who had been previously married to John Clinton Durham. J. C. Durham didn't die until 1877, so Morrie Elizabeth could not be the Elizabeth that appears with James on the 1850 and 1870 censuses. This has caused me great difficulty in sorting out the documents for James Edmond and brother Edmond P. (see below).

Photo contributed by KLH to Findagrave

• Edmond P., born 14 April 1826, appears on the 1860 and 1870 censuses with wife Elizabeth. An Edmond P. Wheat married Elizabeth Dunham in 1860 in Navarro County, Texas. I got so confused trying to document the life of Edmond P., as he has been consistently confused with his brother, James Edmond (they are two different people), and his wife Elizabeth (possibly Dunham) consistently confused with James's wife, Morrie Elizabeth Risinger Durham. I'm still not sure I have them completely untangled, but I think I do. To make things even more complicated, both James Edmond and Edmond P. had daughters named Mary Jane. Edmond P.'s daughter M.J. appears with him and Elizabeth on the 1870 census, aged 14. 

• Mary Amanda Melvina (yes, she had all those names, although she is usually shown as Amanda), born 20 June 1828, died 23 August 1899 in Hardin County, TX, married Andrew Jackson Richardson. She is buried in the Richardson Cemetery in Warren, Tyler County.

• Martha A., born 29 January 1830, died 20 February 1910. She married Andrew George. She is buried in the Anderson Cemetery in Woodville.

• Josiah Jr., born 5 March 1833, married Nancy H. Snead in 1854 in Tyler County. 

The Wheat Brothers: Myths and Legends, Part I

My cousin, Paul Ming, with whom I share Wheat ancestors, recently emailed me to ask whether I knew the name of the wife of Zachariah Wheat, our oldest Wheat ancestor. Conflicting trees showed her name as Priscilla Reynolds or Priscilla Ridgeway. This was a question I had had myself, and Paul had decided to leave her out of his family history because he couldn't find evidence to support either name. The answer to this question ended up contradicting everything I thought I knew about the origins of my Wheat family and sent me on a quest to discover what happened to the five sons of Zachariah Wheat.

For the record--it is documented that Priscilla Reynolds married Zachariah Wheat in Prince George's County, Maryland, on 4 February 1782. Rowena Hearn Randle, author of Genealogy of the Patterson, Wheat, and Hearn Families, published in 1926, showed the wife of Zachariah Wheat as Priscilla Flagg Ridgeway. She apparently made this mistake by confusing the maiden names of a couple of Priscillas that became Wheat wives; her error has been duplicated in multiple family trees. However, as it turns out, finding the right Priscilla didn't help me or Paul because we had the wrong Zachariah--at least, according to Wheat Genealogy: A History of the Wheat Family in America, a book first published in 1903 and then updated in 1960.

Silas Carmi Wheat, the author of the first edition of Wheat Genealogy, was mostly concerned with his family, descendants of Moses Wheat of Concord, Massachusetts. In 1960 Helen Love Scranton updated the original book with the addition of S. C. Wheat's unpublished material and the descendants of another Wheat family, that of Francis Wheat of Maryland. Many trees that include my Wheats show their descent from Francis Wheat of Maryland, but according to Wheat Genealogy, this is not correct. In fact, my Wheats are included in the chapter titled "Unplaced Families." How had I not seen this before?

Included in the "Unplaced Families" are four fathers named Zachariah: Zachariah Wheat of Prince George's County, Maryland, born in England in the 1750's, died 1792. This has to be the Zachariah who married Priscilla Reynolds. They only had two sons, Jonathan and Thomas. Jonathan had no children, and as far as I can tell, all of Thomas's descendants went to New York and Indiana. Not our Wheats. Zachariah of New Geneva, Pennsylvania (the only Zachariah I can find on the 1790 census), born 1768, had two sons whose names are unknown and Jesse, who ended up in Ohio. Not our Wheats. Zachariah of Kentucky married Betsy Kennedy in 1791; their children, many of whom lived in Adair and Bourbon counties in Kentucky, are documented. Again, not our Wheats.

Then we have Zachariah of Virginia, born about 1750. Of him Scranton says "had sons:

• SAMUEL, 'living in the Indian Nation'
• BENJAMIN of Kentucky
• JOSIAH of Tiler [Tyler] Co., Texas
• WILLIAM, born c. 1785; married Hester Whitley [actually Esther Stephenson, daughter of Elizabeth Whitley Stephenson] and lived in Alabama, in Tennessee, and in 1833 went to Texas
• JOHN, 'went to Kentucky'"

Finally, these are our Wheats. It's just that their father Zachariah doesn't exist. Or at least I can't find him. He should be on the 1790 census because that is just about the time his sons were born; he's not. Not that he's just not in Virginia; he's not anywhere. As I mentioned above, the only Zachariah Wheat on paper in 1790 is in Pennsylvania, and his family is documented. Loudoun County, Virginia, is given as the birthplace of some of the Wheat brothers, but I can find no evidence the family came from there. Paul's daughter, who lives in Maryland, did hands-on research in Loudoun County and never found our Zachariah either. I thought for a time I had found him in Bedford County, Virginia, but that is yet another Zachariah with a documented family.

As Scranton says in her introduction to the chapter in which Zachariah appears: "Among the Unplaced Families in the South, the almost complete lack of dates makes it difficult or impossible to place the members with any degree of confidence." No kidding. Not to mention the numerous Wheat families with the same given names. 

She also makes mention of one of the legends surrounding this branch of the Wheats--"it has been reported that he [Zachariah] was one of 5 brothers who came from Ireland before the Revolution, a statement that was doubted by Mr. S. C. Wheat." So apparently Silas Wheat could find no evidence for this legend; I have looked in his book for a mention of it but have decided it must be recorded in the unpublished material that his family gave to Helen Love Scranton. If true, which it probably isn't, it could tie together some of those "unplaced" families, although evidence to verify it probably doesn't exist. It's also good to keep in mind that Silas wrote his book in 1903. For a time he didn't believe that there were any other Wheat families except his own.

So, let's put Zachariah aside for a moment. He may or may not exist. He may or may not have a connection to Francis Wheat of Maryland, especially since Loudoun County, Virginia, is only about 60 miles from St. George's County, Maryland. However, we do know what happened to the Wheat brothers, at least most of them, who are supposed to be his sons, and that is the subject of the rest of this post.

SAMUEL--"living in the Indian Nation"

We begin with my 3rd great-grandfather, Samuel Wheat. Paul and I both recognized right away that "Indian Nation" does not refer to Oklahoma, but probably to Mississippi Territory or Arkansas. It is true that Samuel Wheat lived in both places.

These are the facts we do know about Samuel. His birthdate is derived from his headstone, which records that he was 79 years and 1 day old when he died on 23 November 1866; therefore, his birthdate would be 22 November 1787. Again, many Wheat researchers say he was born in Loudoun, Virginia, although I have not found evidence for this. (Paul's daughter also looked for Samuel in Loudoun County but found no mention of him.) On the 1850 census, which is the first census to ask for place of birth, Samuel reported that he was born in Virginia.

The first mention of him in records that I have been able to find is his marriage on 13 November 1814 in Madison County, Mississippi Territory, to Cynthia Stephenson. Samuel and Cynthia are my 3rd great-grandparents.

Marriage license of Samuel Wheat and Cynthia Stephenson

(I intended to give a history of Mississippi Territory and Madison County AL here, but the history of Madison County is so extensive and important that I decided it needs its own post. Stay tuned for some posts about Ancestral Places--and Sources--for some of the locations that have contributed to my family's history.) 

It's not clear when the Wheats and Stephensons came to Madison County, but it's possible that Cynthia Stephenson's father, Robert, was there before 1809, when a "Squatters' Census" was taken in preparation for opening the area for legal settlement. Governor Robert Williams had proclaimed Madison a new county on 13 December 1808. The illegal inhabitants who registered with government surveyor, Thomas Freeman, were able to remain on the lands they were already occupying in Madison until land sales took place in Nashville in August 1809. A Robert Stinson appears on the 1809 Squatters' Census with 320 acres at Indian Creek (R 2W, T 3, Section 21). He also appears as head of household on the 1809 Madison County census with 1 female over 21, 3 males under 21, and 5 females under 21. This tallies almost exactly with the ages of his family members as we believe them to be in 1809. The Wheats do not appear on either of these lists, so it is probable that Samuel came to Alabama after the lands were open to legal settlement. Of course, we know that he was there by 1814 when he married Cynthia Stephenson. He appears on the 1815 Tax List for Madison County. 

Sometime before 1819 Samuel and Cynthia moved to the next county to the west of Madison, Limestone, which had been established on February 6, 1818. It is possible that this is where Samuel Wheat got his start as a Primitive Baptist preacher. (See my post, "Gimme That Old Time Religion" for more information about the Primitive Baptists.) I am indebted to an Ancestry member with the username "downtownripley" who posted the following comment to a biographical sketch of Samuel Wheat: " Samuel Wheat in Limestone Co. Al: Samuel Wheat joined Round Island Baptist Church by letter in March 1819. He was licensed to preach Sept. 1821. Round Island decided to move to a more distant location and he along with others asked for and was given letters of dismissal August 10, 1822. They were constituted a Church Oct. 5, 1822. He and others withdrew from this Church and were constituted a Church as Baptist Church of Christ known by the name of Poplar Creek. This Church and Round Island are still functioning." 

The Stephensons also moved to Limestone County, as Robert's widow Elizabeth appeared in court there on 25 August 1825 asking for permission to sell his estate and divide his assets among his heirs. Cynthia is mentioned in the petition as an heir who was living out of state, because...she and Samuel had moved again--possibly to Tennessee where daughter Mary Elizabeth was born in 1826 (Elizabeth consistently gives her place of birth as Tennessee) or to Arkansas, where they appear on the 1830 census of Washington County, Arkansas Territory. This is the first census I have found for Samuel; his household consists of 1 male 40-49; 1 female 30-39; 1 male 10-14; 2 males 5-9; 1 female 15-19; and 2 females under 5. 

Samuel Wheat, 1830 census, Washington Co., Arkansas Territory

On the 1840 census the family is living in War Eagle, Madison County, Arkansas, and the household consists of: 1 male 40-49 (Samuel is really more like 53 at this point); 1 female 40-49; 1 male 15-19; 2 males 5-9; 1 male under 5; 1 female 15-19; 1 female 10-14; and 1 female under 5. According to a contribution to Ancestry by user tali7311, "In August 1840 [Samuel] helped organized Shiloh Church of Primitive Baptists, Springdale, Arkansas. Lived at War Eagle until about 1844."

With the exception of the youngest son, George, who was born in 1840, Samuel and Cynthia's family is complete at this point, so I'll list their names here, since they are not all listed on the 1850 census. They are: 

• Joseph, born 1815, who married Malitta (Morgan? Reeves?). His household appears on the 1840 census in War Eagle, Madison County, Arkansas, and on the 1850 census in Milam and Williamson, Texas. Joseph must have died before 2 June 1860, when Malitta appears as head of household on the 1860 census of Bell County, TX. Their last child, Joseph, was born in 1853.
• Sarah Elizabeth, born 1817, who married William Jackson. They married in Arkansas and followed the family to Texas, having 12 or 13 children along the way. This does not surprise me, as I have a million DNA matches to their descendants. If I see the name Jackson in a list of matches, it's almost always a descendant of William and Sarah.
• William Whitley, given the middle name Whitley for his great-grandfather, William Chapman Whitley, born 16 March 1820 in Madison County AL, married Cynthia Maynard. He has his own historical marker at the Hall Cemetery in Howe, Grayson County, TX. It reads: William Whitley Wheat (1820-1890) was born in Alabama to Samuel and Cynthia (Stinson) Wheat. He married Cynthia Ann Maynard, and the couple came to Texas in 1842 to Peters Colony. They moved three years later to what is now Grayson County, settling and raising ten children near Farmington. Wheat was an early cattle drover to northern markets, and he became a respected and successful farmer. He served for many years as Grayson County Commissioner in the 1870s and 1880s and was first presiding present of the Old Settlers Association of North Texas. As such, he worked to ease local tensions in the post-Civil War years. He died 26 November 1890.

• Mary Elizabeth, born 8 February 1826 in Tennessee, married George Washington Cloer Jr. They follow basically the same migration path as Mary Elizabeth's parents. G. W. Cloer died in the Civil War in 1863; most researchers think he was the G. W. Clore who enlisted in the 18th Texas Cavalry in Bell Co. TX in 1862. His youngest son and namesake was born after his death. Samuel Wheat, age 72, is living with George and Elizabeth on the 1860 Bell Co. TX census.
• Martha Jane, born 8 December 1827 in Madison County AL, married Andrew Jackson Edwards in Arkansas. Her husband died in 1878 and is buried in Keller, Tarrant County, TX; Martha died in 1916 and is buried in Garner, Parker County, TX.
• James, born 1830 in Arkansas, appears at age 20 with the family in Milam County TX. I can't find him after that. Ancestry user MarkSheppard67 contributed a Grayson Co. (Pilot Grove) land map from 1853 that shows a tract owned by a James Wheat.
• John, born 1832 in Arkansas, appears at age 18 with the family in Milam County TX. Also can't be located after 1850. Also appears on the Grayson Co. Land Map from 1853.
• Susanna, born 1835 in Arkansas, married William Frederick Ming; they are my 2nd great-grandparents. You can read more about William F. and Susanna in my post, "The Ming Dynasty."
• Samuel, born 1838, appears on the 1850 Milam Co. census with his parents, Samuel and Cynthia. Every reference and hint on Ancestry is for Samuel Dewitt Wheat, his nephew, son of Joseph and Malitta, also born about 1838. Samuel D. appears on the 1850 Milam Co. census with Joseph and Malitta. That would indicate to me that they are two separate people, but I can find no reference to Samuel, son of Samuel and Cynthia, after 1850.
• George, born 1840, appears at age 10 with parents Samuel and Cynthia on the 1850 Milam County census. He can't be the George Lewis Wheat, born 1825, killed by Apaches, or the George C. Wheat, born 1832, living in Arkansas in 1850. Again, I can't find the right George after 1850; numerous trees on Ancestry show Samuel and Cynthia as the parents of George L., George C., or a combination of the two. 

As seen above, Samuel, Cynthia, and family were living in War Eagle, Madison County, Arkansas, in 1840 and in Milam and Williamson District, Milam County, Texas in 1850. However, they must have made a stop along the way in Pilot Grove, Grayson County, Texas, because Samuel helped start a church there in 1847. 

I have known for decades that Samuel and Cynthia were living in Milam and Williamson District, Milam County, Texas in 1850. The problem is--I didn't really know where that was until just a couple of weeks ago. I was searching Ancestry and any other source I could find for Samuel in preparation for this blog post, when I googled his name and found a book online entitled Salado: Frontier College Town by Charles A. Turnbo. That really caught my eye, because I was just in Salado last year. 

Now Salado is a little town--even though it has a college and a reputation as the "Athens of Texas"--and I would probably have never even known about it if it hadn't been for my friend Cecilia. She is familiar with the Temple area because her son once lived there, so when we were planning a trip to Texas, she said she knew a quaint little town with antique and gift shops called Salado, and did I want to go there? Salado is now in Bell County, so I never even had a clue we were in what was once Milam and Williamson District, Milam County.

Without the book catching my eye because I had been in Salado, I would never have discovered that Samuel and Cynthia were some of the very first settlers there. Even when I read the opening page of Chapter 3, "The Settlement of Salado," I still didn't believe the author was talking about my Samuel. Turnbo names Archibald Willingham, who bought 320 acres on Salado Creek in late 1848, as the first white settler in Salado. In addition to Willingham and his family, Turnbo lists these other early heads of household in Salado: Andrew Wilkie, William Bailey, Ira E. Chalk, James M. Cross, Robert S. Elliott, Edward N. Goode, William K. Karnes (and single laborer James Hash), Cornelius B. Roberts, and Samuel Wheat. Still not convinced, I pulled up the 1850 Milam Co. census on Ancestry to the page on which Samuel Wheat's family is the first entry, shown as Family #599. At #601 was Archibald Willingham and his family; #602 was Andrew Wilkie and family; #604 was Ira E. Chalk and family; #605 was William K. Karnes and family and laborer, James Hash; and finishing out the page at #606 was Robert S. Elliott and family. 

I'm still not sure why the census called this Milam County, as Bell County was established in the year of 1850, and the census was taken in October. Bell County, named after the third Texas governor, Peter Hansborough Bell, consisted of 1,000 square miles and 700,000 acres, according to Turnbo. Only 8 miles north of Salado was Nolanville, later to become Belton, county seat of Bell County. I just wish I had known all this before I visited Salado. 

As I mentioned above, Samuel, age 72, widower, is still in Bell Co. in 1860, living with his daughter Elizabeth Cloer and her family. Samuel's occupation is given as "Baptist clergyman." It is apparent that they are living in a ranching area, although it's possible they were living in the town of Belton, listed on the census as nearest post office. I say that because of the variety of cattle-related occupations listed for the neighbors: Stock raiser, Stock trader, Blacksmith, Wagon maker, etc. 

The only other Wheats in Bell Co. in 1860 are Joseph's widow, Malitta, and her children. By 1860 Susanna had married her first cousin, William F. Ming, and is living back in Grayson County (Pilot Grove), as are several of Samuel's other children. It has long been supposed by Wheat researchers that Cynthia is buried somewhere in Milam County, as she died sometime between 1850 and 1860. Now I wonder: is she buried somewhere in Salado?

Samuel died in 1866 and is buried in Hall Cemetery in Howe, Grayson County. He apparently was living in Grayson County at the time of his death, as you will see from his tombstone inscription. Thank goodness the inscription was recorded, as the stone facade of the tombstone has slidden right off. It says:

In memory of Elder Samuel Wheat, who departed this life 23 Nov 1866, aged 79 years and 1 day. Elder Wheat had been an old-school Baptist from his youth and a Minister of the Cross for 50 years. Standing firm amidst the siftings and schisms among the Churches, the fearless advocate of Virginia immigrated to Alabama, then to Tennessee, then to Arkansas, then to Texas in 1847, making his first discourse to Pilot Grove Church in Grayson County to which he made his last a few days before his death.

 

Contributed to Ancestry by ditz929, 
who gives credit for the photo to
George and Lynn Pollack

 

All you genealogists out there: Don't you wish everybody's tombstone had this much information on it? 

It's ironic that the Primitive Baptists don't believe in missionaries because Samuel lived the life of a missionary, moving from place to place, state to state, preaching his version of the Gospel to some far-flung places where pioneers were just beginning to settle. His DNA has been passed down to hundreds of descendants; I have a slew of matches with whom I share Samuel and Cynthia as common ancestors. 

Well, I intended to move on to the other Wheat brothers, but this post has been so long that I think I'll start working on "The Wheat Brothers, Part II." Stay tuned for the lives of Benjamin, Josiah, William, and John.

The Bermuda Witches

While I was working on the post, "Early Ancestors: The Ming Family," I found a reference to an incident that happened in David Ming's house in Bermuda and led to accusations of witchcraft. I've been keeping that in the back of my mind for a Halloween post, so here it is!

I was in Salem, Massachusetts, in October of 2012. It was a whirlwind weekend trip, sponsored by a student tour company with which I had booked a tour of Washington, D.C. for my middle school students. The opportunity to visit Boston was a wonderful surprise, and I loved it. I have wanted to go back ever since. On the last full day of the trip we were given the choice of re-visiting some of the Boston tour spots on our own or taking a bus trip to Salem. I chose Salem. 

Salem in October is both somber and whimsical. I visited the Salem Witch Trials Memorial, walking by myself among the fallen leaves, reading the names of the 14 women and 6 men executed as "witches" in 1692. Then I walked back to the touristy part of town, where I encountered numerous visitors wearing elaborate witch hats to celebrate Halloween in Salem. I almost bought a hat myself. 

Salem Witch Memorial

Witch hat from Salem

What little I knew about witchcraft trials came from this short trip to Salem. Even though I knew that accusations of witchcraft had been made in Europe and that executions had taken place there, I had no idea of the number or of the geographic extent of them. I have to admit that when I thought of witchcraft trials, I tended to think of Salem rather than of Europe. 

A little research this week turned up the following facts: Although accusations of witchcraft were made in Europe for centuries, the highest number occurred from 1580 to 1630; geographically, they occurred all over Europe, but at different times and among different religious groups; from 1300 to 1850 the numbers of accused and executed ranged from 16,000 accused, almost 7,000 executed in Germany to 300 accused, 46 executed in the Netherlands; by the time the trials took place in Salem, they had largely faded out in Europe.

Interestingly, hardly any persons were tried for witchcraft in Ireland, but a large number were accused in Scotland. In Scotland the Witchcraft Act of 1563 made the practice of witchcraft, or consulting with a witch, a capital crime. James VI of Scotland (who became James I of England and Ireland in 1603) encouraged the trials, as he thought that the storms that he endured while claiming his Danish bride, Anne, had been the result of witchcraft. He set up commissions to hunt down witches and encouraged torture in dealing with accused witches. His suspicion that a particular nobleman was a witch caused the nobleman to flee the country in fear for his life. Eventually, James had doubts and limited prosecutions for witchcraft.

These facts are important to the incidents I am about to describe in Bermuda, as they began in about 1645, almost 50 years before the Salem trials, so they must have been been the result of European, rather than American, influence. During these years Bermuda was still under the administration of the Virginia-based Somers Isles Company, granted a royal charter by King James I in 1615; in 1684 it became an English Crown colony. (Today, Bermuda is designated a British Overseas Territory; since 1949 when Newfoundland joined Canada, Bermuda has been the oldest remaining British colony.)

According to Memorials of the Discovery and Early Settlement of the Bermudas or Somers Islands, 1515-1685 by J. H. Lefroy, published in 1879, "It is not at all improbable that new arrivals from the mother-country, or the Scotch prisoners about this time sold into servitude in Bermuda, may have brought this superstition with them." The years of witchcraft trials in Bermuda seemed to coincide with Governor Josias Forster's last term of office. LeCroy opines that Forster might not be directly responsible for the trials, "But it is certain that he lent himself very readily to it, and took an active part in the persecution of many harmless old women and half-crazy men." To our modern eyes the accusations seem ridiculous and the "trials" by various means downright silly, but keep in mind the consequences of a guilty verdict: death.

From the colonial records published in Lefroy's book, here is the list of accused "witches" in Bermuda from 1651 to 1696:

• Jeane Gardiner. Accused of threatening a mulatto woman who subsequently "was very much tormented, and struck blind and dumb for the space of twoe hours." The record states that "The Gouvenor and counsell was very careful in findinge out the trewth." They did this by calling a jury of women who were instructed to inspect the accused woman's body for marks of the devil; in her mouth they found a "blewe spot wh. being prickt did not bleed," which she was known to have had for 18 years. "For further triall she was tried and throwne twice in the sea. She did swyme like a corke and could not sink." [If you floated, you were a witch. If you sank, you were innocent and dead. Some choice.] "These signes and other stronge evidences in Court condemme her, yet neverthelesse shee would confesse noethinge att her death. Shee was demanded in Court if she could give a reason why shee did not sinke. She answered that she did open her mouth and breathe but could not sinke." She was sentenced to death and executed on the 26th of May, 1651.
• Anne Bowen. Although the record is not clear, she possibly escaped execution because of the "absence of witch marks on her person."
• Elizabeth Midleton. Accused of using "many cursed speeches against a young child age 9 months...after which it fell into strange fitts." She was acquitted.
• Henry Ward. Accused of "consent[ing] with the Devill to bewitch the Turkeyes of Thomas Atkin...which cast them into strong fitts so that they at last died by that diabolical practice." He was cleared by proclamation.
• John Midleton. Brought to trial for "bewitching of a skotsman called John Makeraton," fifteen witnesses gave testimony, mostly against Midleton. It's hard to tell if they just didn't like him, or if they were intimidated by the authorities who might accuse them next. Even his wife [Elizabeth Midleton, above] had accused him of witchcraft previously but at the trial "declareth that she hath no ground to accuse her husband to be a witch."  One of the weirdest testimonies was Robert Priestly's, who saw a strange sight while gathering cattle in the evening near Midleton's house, "a Black creatuer...upon the ground in the shape of a catt but farre Bigger, with eyes like fier, and a tayle near as long as a mans arme." Even poor John began to believe he was guilty. After failing his trial by water, he told the men taking him back to the prison that "he was a Witch & that he knew yt not before." By the time he was executed on May 9, 1653, he had made a list of his sins, which included disobedience to his parents, going to church "for fashion sake," and "making debate between neighbours."
• Christian Stevenson. When asked if he knew of any other witches, John Midleton accused Christian Stevenson and Alice Moore. Many witnesses and more weird testimony. A jury of women found a "devil's mark" in Christian's mouth, which she claimed to have been caused by a "ragged tooth"; the man who filed the tooth for her would not back her up in court. A friend (with whom she had fallen out on occasion) said that Christian had given her a rose which she wore to bed. "And in the night as she was in bedd she felt a perfect hand...which hand did by force pluck her upright in her bed." The next morning she and her children searched for the rose everywhere and couldn't find it. Another woman argued with Christian about payment for a pair of spectacles. Christian called her "plunder mouth & said that she could teare her flesh from her bones," and that very night "her tongue was puld out of her head and hanged out like a beastes tongue." [How did these people come up with this stuff?] She was found guilty of witchcraft and hanged on May 20, 1653.
• Alice Moore.  John Midleton had accused Alice during his trial, stating that "he feared that she was a naughty woman because he saw her in her window in a witches hatt." She was accused of "destroy[ing] the cattell & hogges of Mr. John Waynewright & Thomas Gaplin," found guilty, and executed on May 20, 1653.

In the warrant for the execution of Christian Stevenson, signed by Josias Forester, was the following statement. It's amazing how people can convince themselves that what they are doing is having a positive effect and that they are doing the right thing:

"We the Grand Inquest taking into our consideration how yt hath pleased god upon slight and slender ground being carefully followed upon one person for suspition of witchcraft, what good successe & yssues hath followed upon yt, Therefore wee desire that All such persons as wee have hereunder mentioned may have some careful eyes cast upon them, soe that if yt shall please our god to discover more of them they may be persued after and proceeded agaynst until as David saith, wee have cut of wicked doers from off this Island."

• Goody Brangman.  And in the very next case recorded there actually was a common sense conclusion. It started out as an argument between two women: Goody Stow and Goody Brangman. The complainant was actually Edward Brangman, the husband of Goody Brangman, who accused "widdow Mary Stow [of] some slanderous speeches used against his wife." The charge of witchcraft against Goody Brangman was made because Goody Stow "tooke up a stone and made as though she would throw yt at her, but did not, and Goody Brangman badd her throw yt if she durst and shortly after her finger fell Lame." In addition, Goody Stow "observed goody Brangman did not use to sing in the Church, and that made her thinke she was a witch." Goodwife Stowe acknowledged her "suspitious speeches" and asked both Brangmans to "passe by her offence," which they did. "Goody Stow did promise to lyve quietly by them for the tyme to come." Case closed.
• Elizabeth Page and Jane Hopkins. Captain William White, master of the ship Maieflower, complained to Governor Forster that there were two women passengers on his ship that he "did vehemently suspect to be witches." Evidence was given that Page "being by the compas had her finger over the compas and made it turne Round...and yet never touched yt"; Hopkins "wished that god might showe some signe whether she was a witch or not, and emediately there was a thing in the likeness of a ratt appeared unto them." [A rat on a ship? She must be a witch!] Both women's bodies were inspected by female jurors for devil's marks; Page didn't have any, but Hopkins did. Page was acquitted; Hopkins was executed by hanging on January 5, 1654.
• Grace Bedwell. Accused of afflicting several persons, especially Kate, an Indian woman servant of Robert Powell, she was found not guilty.
• Mistress Miller. Having accused Mrs. Miller of witchcraft, William Haynes "did acknowledge in open court that he had done her & her posterity...great wrong." He asked for forgiveness and was set free; there is no record of what happened to Mrs. Miller.
• Trial of Goodwife Moore. This section of records is dated 1658 and includes testimony against Thomas Moore and his wife. It is unclear if this is the same Alice Moore described above. Evidence was given by Nathaniell Astwood whose servant, John Richards, passed Moore and his wife on a path, and since "had been very yll and is much ympared in his body"; Richards attested that the wife of Thomas Moore "or the divell in her likeness" appeared to him at night in his room. A jury of women could find no devil marks upon the person of Goodwife Moore.
• Goodwife Crockford. Michael Brother was called before the Governor & Councell on October 26, 1658, to answer the complaint of Goodwife Crockford that he had called her a witch. Brothers "confest himselfe to be in drink and forgott what he spoke" and asked Mrs. Crockford for forgiveness, which she gave.
• Nicholas Hon. Accused of witchcraft on December 6, 1659, by Henrie Sims and his wife, he was admonished by the Governor and dismissed.
• William Haynes. Having accused Mrs. Miller (above) of witchcraft, Haynes is himself accused in December 1663. John Place testified that he was "affrighted by the aforesaid Haynes, or his apparition...with a knife in his hand" in his lodging chambers at night. Haynes was found not guilty and acquitted.
• Christian North. Accused in September 1668 by Merian Ward, the widow North went to trial in December 1668; she was acquitted by proclamation.
• Susan Cole. Finally, we have arrived at the case that caught my eye in the first place because the original incident took place in the home of my ancestor. At the time of the incident Susan Cole was actually Susan Bailey, widow, and her marriage prospects were the subject of the argument between her and her accuser, Thomas Holt. On that day the widow Bailey, Thomas Holt, and several others were guests in the home of David Ming. Holt told the widow that he had been told by Roger Waightman that he, Waightman, was going away to New Providence for two years and on his return would be married to the "Widdow Bayly." She "swore by God, that she would terrifie (or torment) him the said Holt for his soe saying." (As she married Robert Cole between the time of the incident and the trial, it is obvious that marrying Waightman was not her plan.) The argument escalated, with Holt replying "That he did warne the said Susan to have a care for if any thing did befall him or any of his, hee would have her fast enough." She retorted that "if she were in another place, shee would set her fist in his jawes; hee made answer [that] he would sett his foote in her back, if she were a better woman than shee is." "...about a fortnight after they had been together in David Ming's house, hee was taken all in his left Shoulder and his left Arme. Since which time he hath bin, and often times is in extreme paine. And cannot follow his Tailery calling, though he be capable of doeing any worke in the grounds or without doors without any paine or misery." (Well--imagine a tailor having pain in his shoulder or arm! Today they would diagnose carpal tunnel syndrome or a rotator cuff injury.) This would be funny, if it wasn't almost tragic. Susan Cole was found guilty and sentenced to death. On June 21, 1671, Governor Sir John Heydon reprieved her from execution and ordered her returned to prison until further orders were given. (Do you suppose she had been taken all the way to the place of execution, only to be told at the last minute she was reprieved? Just wow.) 

Hold on, it's almost over, although one of the worst is yet to come.

• Martha Franklin. Accused of "the Killing, wounding & waste and pineing away" of  "the Hoggs, Sheepe, Cattle, fowles, etc. of Humphrey Coverlie," the burning down of a house of William Duck five years previously, and "speaking daingerous words which causes her to be suspected for witchcrayft," she was found not guilty on May 27, 1672.
• Gillian Abbot and Elizabeth Ward. Abbot was accused by Edwin Mallory, suspected of causing the illness of his daugher Jane; Ward was accused by Captain John Hubbard, Sheriffe, for the unusual "wasting and pining away" of his servant girl. A jury was impaneled to search the women's bodies for marks; the conclusion of the jury was not recorded. Nothing is recorded about their fates.
• Sarah Spencer. Spencer, a widow, was accused by Mrs. Harmon for causing the affliction of her daughter, Sarah. Sarah Spencer was committed to prison until the next court session; nothing is known of her fate.
• Sarah Bassett. The last indictment for witchcraft in Bermuda was against a black servant, Sarah Bassett, accused in 1696 of attempting to poison her master's family. While referred to as a witchcraft case, it actually was carried through the court as a case of petit treason, defined as an offense involving "betrayal (including murder) of a superior by a subordinate." Bassett was executed by burning in June 1730. An author's note explains that the day of Bassett's execution was extraordinarily hot, so that in the black community of Bermuda a hot day was often described as "a regular Sarey or Sally Bassett day." (The author notes that the particulars of this case were contributed to him by Provost Marshal J. Trott from the Quarter Court records for the year 1696. That's 34 years between indictment and execution, but those are the dates recorded in Lefroy's Memorials.)

Some final thoughts: Some tragic things have happened in this world because humans need to understand why things happen, and in the absence of knowledge, they substitute superstition. Something stuck with me from one of the sources I read about the witchcraft trials of the 17th century; motives and effects were more important as evidence because witchcraft couldn't be seen. If harm came to a person or their property (an effect), then someone was to blame. If that someone had a motive for harming the victim, then he or she was definitely in trouble. Add to that the enthusiasm that the neighbors had for making up good stories, and a faulty belief in "devil's marks" as evidence, and you've got yourself some witchcraft trials. Certainly, our modern ideas of evidence are a little more realistic than rats, cats, and witch's hats. While Governor Forster may have congratulated himself for finding out the "trewth," it's hard to have a fair trial when the whole premise behind the accusation is flawed.

Driving with My Dad

My dad died, unexpectedly, 35 years ago today. He was only 57. He died two days after my mother's birthday, October 10, and was buried on mine, October 14. It was traumatic, and still is, but that's not what I want to talk about today.

I think about my dad all the time--when I hear a song he liked or watch a program he would have enjoyed. In this time of political turmoil I wonder which side he would have chosen, and whether we would have discussed/argued or agreed. He was the kindest man in the world, but rather conservative, and we discussed/argued plenty in the turbulent 60's and 70's. I wonder if he would have mellowed, and if, as an adult, I would have been able to make my case without crying.

My dad, probably late 50's, 2717 W. 42nd St.

Lately, I realize that I've been thinking about him a lot while driving. Now that might sound funny, but not when you realize that Daddy was our family chauffeur. If you don't know me well, you might not know that our family was rather atypical. My mother died when I was 3 and my brother was 4 months old. Daddy moved us home with his parents and never remarried, so our family consisted of a grandmother and grandfather in their 60's, my dad, myself and my brother. My granddad died in 1970, but then I married and divorced in the 70's and added one more member to this multi-generational family in 1976--my son, Jason. About the only thing a family spanning 6 decades can do together is drive and eat, so that's what we did. 

Daddy, 1960's, 3319 W. 38th St.

I have written a post about some of our favorite places to eat, Lost Restaurants and Fond Memories. We often would all pile into the car on a Sunday after church and Daddy would drive us to a favorite restaurant in Claremore or Henryetta or Skiatook or Joplin, Missouri. The ride was part of the fun. I learned a lot from my grandmother and my dad on those trips--my grandmother pointing out what crops were growing in fields along the highway or my dad talking politics or philosophy. 

When my brother and I were young, and my maternal grandmother was still living in her house in Dustin, Oklahoma, we took the drive there at least once a month. Usually we stopped in Henryetta at Patty Ann's Restaurant for lunch. When we crossed from Okmulgee County into Hughes County, from a paved road to a gravel road, my brother and I always climbed into the back seat to change our rumpled clothes into something more presentable. We always visited my mom's grave before heading back to Tulsa. I know these trips had to be hard on my dad, and the visit with his in-laws not particularly enjoyable, but this was a trip he made out of respect and remembrance.

Fairview Cemetery, Dustin, Oklahoma

My grandmother quit driving when she had a wreck while I was in junior high, so my dad always took her to shop for clothes or buy groceries. He waited patiently in the car, listening to the radio or reading, until she had finished her errand. He took my brother and me to numerous games, school events, and friends' houses.  He was often the parent who dropped my friends and me off at the skating rink or the shopping center. (I have a feeling that was because he trusted himself more than a friend's parent to get us there safely.) The only thing that made him impatient was when he came to pick me up at somebody's house and had to wait because I wasn't looking for him when he drove up. I remember he got pretty exasperated with me!

Well, I remember one other thing that exasperated him. I had to laugh out loud the other day when I drove right through a pothole on the road near my house. I could just hear my dad saying, "You could not have done a better job of hitting that if you had been aiming at it!" I took driver's ed the summer before my senior year, but Daddy thought he could teach me to drive a stick shift. After I mowed down an iron post filled with concrete in the Park School parking lot, he decided I might do better with an automatic and a driving instructor.

Just last week I realized that I was repeating a habit of my dad's that we used to tease him about. Steering with his left hand left his right hand free to bop to the rhythm of whatever song was playing on the radio. For some reason that embarrassed my brother and me so much! I think it's because my dad was a dancer. He couldn't just sit still when a good song was playing. And now, of course, I do the same thing. 

On a drive in the country, 1980's

I mentioned that my dad was kind. He had a soft heart for abandoned dogs and wild creatures. I remember several times when he stopped to move a slow-moving tortoise to the side of the road. 

Some of the things that my brother and I remember most vividly about our childhood happened on car trips with my dad. We still love to drive. I know that this love of driving is what spurs us to take our historical/genealogical vacations. We are trying to re-create the safe and nourishing environment we felt with my dad at the wheel of our car.

My dad, Jack Smith (1928-1985)

Early Ancestors: The Dixon, Boddie, Crudup, Battle, Sumner, and Hunter Families

I decided to tackle these families in one post, because they are often referred to together, and in my family tree they exist in a web of intermarriage and relatedness. As a reference point, I'm going to start with my ancestor, Mourning Dixon, and take the web both backward and forward to show how these families are connected.

I first mentioned Mourning Dixon in the blog post, The Fowlers, because she starts a long line of women in my family named Mourning. Her granddaughter, Mourning Crudup, married William Fowler in 1800; they were my 4th great-grandparents. Their daughter, Eliza Helen Fowler, married Benjamin Powell; they had a daughter named Mary Mourning Powell who married James Bell in 1866. James and Mary were the parents of my great-grandfather, Thomas Jefferson Bell; his youngest daughter was Cornelia Morning Bell, born 1903. As far as I know, that's where the namesakes of Mourning Dixon in my branch of the family stop, though her name was carried forward through the families of two of her other children, as well.

Mourning Dixon

Mourning Dixon was born 10 November 1722 in Isle of Wight, Virginia. Her parents were Thomas Dixon (bef. 1670-1747) and Penelope (probably Howell.) Shortly after her marriage to John Crudup in Isle of Wight, her husband bought 250 acres of land in Northampton County, North Carolina, and they moved 100 miles southwest from Virginia to North Carolina. Crudup purchased the land from Samuel Williams of Edgecombe County, NC, on 13 March 1745; later, on 18 November 1748, Mourning and John Crudup witnessed Williams's will.

John and Mourning Crudup had four children:

• George, who married Priscilla Thomas on 3 May 1761 in Edgecombe County. His will, dated 21 March 1764, mentions his brother Josiah and his daughter Mary.
• Mary, who married James Ricks on 3 July 1762 in Edgecombe County. They had children: Mourning, born 10 March 1766; Rhoda, born 5 May 1768; and James.
• Chloe, born 1745, who married Nathan Boddie.
• Josiah, who married Elizabeth Battle (my 5th great-grandparents.)

John Crudup died in Halifax County, NC, in 1753. Mourning was the executrix of his estate, according to the inventory of his personal property, dated August 1753. In that same year Mourning married Micajah Thomas on 7 October. They had two children: Bethsheba, born 20 November 1754, died 12 April 1770; and Micajah, Jr., born 3 January 1757. He married Ann Hawkins 7 January 1778, and she died 12 March 1781. The couple had no surviving children. Micajah Jr. represented Nash County in the General Assembly from 1784 to 1787. He died 26 September 1788. Mourning married once more, to James Smith. She made her will as Mourning Smith on 12 May 1778 and died 29 June 1781. Her death date appears in the Thomas family Bible. 

Mourning's will was proved in Nash County in July 1781. Again, I find the items of personal property fascinating, with the exception of slaves, which I just find disturbing. When I read the names of people she "gives and bequeaths," I just get a sick feeling in my stomach. Leaving those out, here are some of her bequests:

• To her daughter Chloe, cattle, an English side saddle and bridle, a looking glass, and all "my waring clothes"
• To her son Josiah, cattle, a desk, a feather bed, and furniture
• To her son Micajah, two bed steads, "one dozen and a half" chairs, one table
• To her grandson James Ricks, 25 pounds "proc. money," if he lives to age 21 [Mercy, I had a hard time finding out what "proc. money" was! Because of a shortage of currency, colonies set a value on commodities, like tobacco, used in place of currency, by proclamation, hence "proc. money"]
• To her granddaughter Mourning Ricks, a feather bed, furniture, and 100 pounds proc. money, at age 21 or when she married
• To her granddaughter Rhoda Ricks, a feather bed, furniture, side saddle and bridle

The executors, Nathan Boddie and Josiah Crudup, were to sell the rest of the estate to pay the legacies, and the bequests for the minor grandchildren were to remain in their hands until age 21, or until the girls married. Anything that remained after the legacies were paid was to be divided between Chloe and Josiah. The will was witnessed by Stephen Young, John Biggs, and James Smith.

Descendants of Mourning Dixon through 6 generations

The Dixons

Thomas Dixon (I'm going to call him II) and Penelope Howell were Mourning's parents. Thomas II died in 1747. Most of the information on this family comes from Thomas's will. I first found an abstract of the will in Wills and Administrations of Isle of Wight County, Virginia, 1647-1800 by Blanche Adams Chapman, but I really wanted to see the entire will. I finally stumbled across it on Ancestry in their database, "North America, Family Histories, 1500-2000," which "contains genealogical research privately published in one thousand family history books," the focus being "families from the 18th and 19th centuries, especially those with Revolutionary War and Colonial ties." I really mean I stumbled across it, as Dixon is not indexed in the database but appears as a section in the book, Boddie and Allied Families by John Thomas Boddie, published 1918, which is included in the database. The Dixon section, which includes a transcript of Thomas's will, begins on page 104.

The will was dated 26 April 1746 (Will Book 5, page 141) and was probated 12 January 1748. He gives to his son William "all that land I bought of Godfrey Hunt, it being the same land and plantation whereupon my son Thomas lived." [What happened to Thomas? Thoughts below.] He also gets "appurtenances thereof," plus a feather bed and a chest with lock and key. Son Nicholas (who is also executor, along with his mother Penelope) and daughter Martha (married to Thomas Pearse) are to split 200 acres that Thomas II bought from Benjamin Corbell, with Martha and her husband retaining the part they lived on. Nicholas also gets a feather bed, a chest with lock and key, and a gun. 

Grandson Thomas gets "all that land and plantation whereon I now live," with his grandmother to have "the use and occupation of the said land for her natural life." Penelope also gets Thomas's still, which goes to Nicholas and William after her death, "both to have the benefit alike only my desire is that it shall stand upon my son William's plantation..." [I'm guessing a still is just what I think it is.] The remaining part of his estate was to be divided equally among his wife and children: "Nicholas and William, Martha, wife to Thomas Pearse, Penelope, wife to Joseph Bullock, Mourning, wife to John Crudup, and Patience, wife to Jonas Shivers."

So what happened to son Thomas (III), whose former plantation goes to son William? At first, I thought that he must have died, leaving a son Thomas for whom Thomas II provided in his will. However, that doesn't appear to be the case. Some descendants show him living in Isle of Wight until his death in 1764. Another Thomas Dixon wrote a will in Isle of Wight in 1791, leaving bequests to wife Penelope, sons William and Murphy, and daughters Betsey, Penelope, Mary, and Martha, although that could just as easily have been the grandson Thomas who inherited Thomas II's "land and plantation," or someone else altogether. Others point to a Thomas Dixon who died in Edgecombe County, NC, in 1790, leaving bequests to sons Thomas and William, grandsons Nicholas, Hickman, and Thomas, and daughters Elizabeth and Jemima. This Thomas left his lands and plantation to his grandson William, son of William. 

Any of these could be Thomas III, and I can certainly see why it's confusing to researchers to find the same names in the same places in succeeding generations and try to pinpoint to which family they belong. I'm sure for those that are descendants of Thomas III there are land or court records that could help them figure it out. I still think it's weird that Thomas III isn't even mentioned in Thomas II's will, except as the former resident of the plantation that Thomas II leaves to William.

In addition to his own will, Thomas II appears in several other records of Isle of Wight County, beginning in 1712 when he was witness to the will of Benjamin Beal. In 1724 he bought land. On 20 March 1731 he witnessed the will of John Howell. Early genealogical histories give no maiden name for Thomas II's wife, Penelope, but many researchers think it likely that she was Penelope Howell, daughter of John Howell and Elizabeth Surbey. The will of John Howell that Thomas Dixon witnessed was also witnessed by Thomas's son-in-law, Joseph Bullock. In his will Howell left bequests to his wife; his brother William; James, Samuel, and Martha Howell; and "daughter Penelope." 

Thomas II's year of birth is given as before 1670, as that was the year that his father, Thomas I, died. Thomas I left a widow, Marie, and sons Thomas II and Henry. The appraisal of Thomas I's estate was signed by Henry Martin, "who married the relictt of Thomas Dixon 25 October 1670." That was fast work! Henry and Marie had a son that they also named Henry. "On the 3rd day of the 5th month of 1678" William Boddie gave a gift of cattle to all three of Marie's children. Marie has been identified by researchers as the sister of William Boddie. 

When Boddie and Allied Families was published in 1918, the author wrote that Thomas Dixon I was "possibly the first of this family in Virginia." Since that time, a few researchers have tried to push that back a generation. I have seen both the names Adam Dixon and Nicholas Dixon put forth as candidates for the first Dixon in Virginia. While I have not done the research myself, I tend towards Nicholas for the simple reason that that given name, along with Thomas, appears over and over in the Dixon family. 

In 2018 the file manager for the Dixon Surname Project prepared a transcript of the Dixon research of Bill Murphy that resides at the Joyner Library at East Carolina University. You can see it here. Murphy proposed that Nicholas Dixon was the first ancestor of the Dixon family in Virginia. 

"He first appears in October, 1646, when he is one of three persons transported to Virginia by Thomas Babe of Upper Norfolk County. He must have either brought some wealth with him into Virginia or have achieved a fair measure of wealth in a short time for almost two years in later, in November, 1648, he is granted 300 acres in Nansemond County for transporting six people to Virginia." 

Murphy repeats the family legend told to him by a descendant that the Dixons came from the Scots border country via England and then to Virginia "for religious reasons, they being members of the Quaker Religion." Nicholas is "known" to have had at least four children (no proof given): Nicholas, John, William (died 1677 Isle of Wight VA; md. Frances), and Thomas. There was indeed a William Dixon of Isle of Wight who appointed his wife Frances as executrix of his estate by his will, dated 9 April 1677.

Also see Murphy for his take on Thomas III and his descendants.

The Boddies

If it weren't for genealogists named Boddie, we wouldn't be so well-informed about the early history of Virginia and the South. From Elijah Boddie who wrote a "short manuscript history" of the Boddie family in 1840 to his nephew, John Thomas Boddie, who wrote Boddie and Allied Families in 1918 to John Bennett Boddie who contributed over 30 volumes of Southern genealogy in the 20th century, authors named Boddie have contributed genealogical information to the family researcher for over 100 years. In fact, many of their works are still available to genealogists and many of them are now online.  

The Boddies are also definitely in the web of families surrounding my ancestor, Mourning Dixon. But are they my direct ancestors? I'm not sure. As I mentioned above, many researchers identify the wife of Thomas Dixon I as Marie/Mary Boddie, sister of William Boddie. Much is known about William Boddie, but not so much about Marie. 

John and Mary (Haeward) Boddie of Ingatestone, Essex, are often named as the parents of William and Mary. John  was buried in Ingatestone, Essex, on 11 August 1640, leaving a widow, Mary, who was granted Letters of Administration to his estate on 4 September 1640. John and Mary had five children, the two oldest being William, baptized 1633, and Mary, baptized 18 May 1635. John was connected to the Mildmay family through his mother. Sir Thomas Mildmay and Sir Henry Mildmay were shareholders and officers of the London Company of Virginia, an organization dedicated to bringing settlers to Virginia. 

Both John Thomas Boddie and John Bennett Boddie made the tentative connection between William Boddie of Essex and William Boddie of Virginia, but neither of them made the same claim about Mary, as far as I can see, and she was not listed with William, wife Ann, daughter Mary, and Mary's future husband, John Browne, on the list of the 56 transportees to Virginia for which William received a grant of 3,350 acres in 1665. 

The identification of Mary/Marie Dixon Martin as William's sister Mary probably stems from William's gift of cattle to Marie Martin's three sons in 1678. However, records indicate that William gave cattle to many children of his tenants because God had encouraged him to do so "by his good spirit in my heart." This statement of heartfelt generosity; the wording of the date in the Quaker way, "3rd day of the 5th month"; the fact that he didn't own slaves; and connections with the Quaker community in Isle of Wight have persuaded researchers that William was Quaker, at least for about ten years of his life.

William's history has given me a good background for understanding Isle of Wight and the community around William's home there, but I don't think it has convinced me that Marie Dixon Martin was William's sister. Maybe eventually I will find something that persuades me. For now I have just not found any evidence that the mother of my Thomas II was a Boddie. To find my family's connection to the Boddies, I'll have to move several generations forward. 

In Isle of Wight William and his wife Anna settled on Cypress Creek where it ran into Pagan River about 20 miles from Jamestown. With its view of the James River Valley the location was "admirably situated for a beautiful home." Anna, with whom he had daughter Mary, was his first wife. His second wife, Elizabeth, was the mother of John and Elizabeth. John, born about 1685, married Elizabeth Thomas, and died in March 1720, leaving two minor sons, William and John. 

William, the eldest, married Mary Bennett, daughter of William Bennett. Sometime in or before 1734 William and his family, including brother John, moved to Bertie Precinct, Albemarle County (which later became Northampton County), North Carolina. John Bennett Boddie explained their move: 

"Their land in Virginia which was patented by their grandfather in 1661, had been tilled for 75 years. Tobacco was the equivalent of money in those days and a better quality of tobacco could be grown in North Carolina than in Isle of Wight...The population of North Carolina was then about ten thousand. A strong tide of migration was in process towards this province, as shown by the fact that the population by 1750 had increased by 45,000."

William was an officer in the Colonial Militia for 20 years, participating in a conflict between England and Spain in 1748 and in the Indian War of 1754-55 against the French. In his short history of the Boddie family, written 5 March 1840, Elijah Boddie says that William Boddie's wife, Mary, died of measles and left William a widower with five children, four sons and a daughter, several years before his death. He never remarried. His oldest son was Nathan, born 22 February 1732, before the family left Virginia. And here is our family's connection to the Boddies: Nathan Boddie married Chloe Crudup, daughter of John and Mourning (Dixon) Crudup.  

Nathan's grandfather, William Bennett, who had moved to North Carolina about the time that William and John Boddie did, bought land in Edgecombe County on Peach Tree Creek in 1742. By 1758 Nathan and Chloe were already living on this land, known as Rose Hill, as William Bennett's will of 17 July 1758 gives "my grandson Nathan Boddie my plantation whereon he now lives in Edgecombe Co." Nathan continued to accumulate land and eventually bought over 5,000 acres in Edgecombe, Wake, and Nash counties. 

But it is Nathan's involvement in the movement toward American independence that I find most interesting. In 1774, along with Elisha Battle (more about him later), Nathan was elected to the Edgecombe Committee of Safety. Their duties were to "gather together all available forces to prevent Loyalist uprising and and repel any possible invasion." Nathan represented Edgecombe County in the Provincial Congress of North Carolina which met at Halifax 4 April 1776 and declared for independence, the first legislative body in any of the thirteen colonies to do so. 

In 1777 he was elected a member of the First General Assembly of North Carolina, representing Edgecombe County in the House of Commons. He presented a bill in November 1777 to divide Edgecombe County and to form Nash County, which passed with amendments. He was elected to the Senate from Nash County and took his seat on 8 August 1778, serving continuously until the end of the War in 1781. In 1779 he was on the commission that selected Raleigh as the capital of North Carolina.

Chloe Crudup, daughter of John and Mourning (Dixon) Crudup, was born in 1745 and married Nathan Boddie about 1762. Their three oldest children were sons Bennett, Elijah, and George, followed by five daughters, Temperance, Mary, Basheba, Elizabeth, and Mourning. Chloe died 16 September 1781. Nathan died 7 December 1797. Both are buried at Rose Hill, which is near present day Nashville, North Carolina.  

Nathan & Chloe Boddie memorial at Rose Hill
Photo provided by Findagrave by Helen Sharpe

The house at Rose Hill, the oldest part of which may have been built by Nathan for his son and heir, George, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982. George became the head of the family when Bennett and Elijah both died while their children were still minors.  The children and widowed mothers of Bennett and Elijah came to live at Rose Hill, along with George's seventeen children by two wives. Mourning Boddie married James Hilliard "in the back room of her brother George's house." The house remained in the ownership of George's descendants until the 1930's when it was sold. In 1979 the house came back into the family when it was purchased by descendant Ben Mayo Boddie. It is now a conference and wedding venue.

The Crudups

I wish I had more to tell about the colonial history of the Crudups, because I have always been fascinated with this odd surname. According to John Thomas Boddie in Boddie and Allied Families, the earliest known Crudup in America came from Wales in the 1700's. Josiah Crudup adds another to my list of ancestors from Wales, which now appears as its own category, separate from England, in Ancestry DNA's ethnicity estimate. According to the new estimate, I have 10% Welsh ancestry and my brother has 21%. We both have visited Wales, and for both of us it felt like coming home.

We know that Josiah Crudup died sometime before 1760, as his widow Mary made her will in Halifax County, North Carolina, on 1 February 1760. As we saw above, her son, John Crudup, had died in 1753. Mary's will reads, "I give to my grandchildren, Mary, Cloe, and Josiah, being the children of John Crudup, deceased to each five shillings to be raised and paid out of my estate." To grandson George, who was also the executor, she gave the rest of her estate. (Interesting aside: A Nicholas Dixon was witness to her will.)

We have already met John Crudup; his wife, Mourning Dixon; and their children, George, Mary, Chloe, and Josiah. Josiah Crudup is my 5th great-grandfather, so I'd like to focus this section on him and his line. But first, one more mention of George, because it relates to Josiah. In 1764 George makes his will and leaves "to my brother, Josiah Crudup the plantation where I now live [probably in Halifax County, as that is where the will was made] with two hundred fifty acres of land belonging more or less." He also leaves Josiah "all my stock," "all my clothes of what kind soever they be," and "all the plantation utensils." 

Josiah married Elizabeth Battle on 28 November 1767. She was the daughter of Elisha and Elizabeth (Sumner) Battle. (More about the Battles and Sumners later in this post.) Josiah and Elizabeth settled on Little River in Wake County about 1784. He purchased a total of 625 acres from William Wilder Jr. that year. He appears on the 1790 census with two sons and five daughters. According to a biographical sketch of son Josiah in NCPedia, the senior Josiah was a Baptist minister.

The children of Josiah and Elizabeth, as reported in Boddie and Allied Families, are: Temperance (who married a Lockhart); John; Mourning (my 4th great-grandmother, who married William Fowler); Bethsheba (who married Bullard Foster); Chloe (who married James B. Lee); George (who married Leah Ellis); Elizabeth (who married Cullen Andrews); Josiah (who married 1st, Mary Ann Brickell, and 2nd, Mary E. Boddie); and Mary Louisa (who married Solomon Ruffin Perry).  

Apparently Josiah Sr. died in late 1818 or early 1819 without making a will, leaving his estate to be administered by Dr. Jeremiah Battle. The inventory and sale of his estate was reported on 23 and 24 April 1819.   Six of his children (Temperance is not mentioned) later petitioned the Court of Pleas in Wake County, contending that sons Josiah Jr. and John had both received "from [their] father in his lifetime by way of advancement a much greater & larger amount of property than a child's part or distributive share of said father's estate." 

John, who was now deceased, had apparently gone off to Tennessee with several of his father's slaves, and the other children wanted to be recompensed for their share of the value of the slaves. The court calculated an aggregate amount, composed of the value of sibling Josiah's advancement and sibling John's slaves, and ordered on 6 January 1823 that the six petitioning children should receive $1,415.80 each. Jeremiah Battle, administrator of Josiah Sr.'s estate, had to pay the court costs. 

While Josiah Jr. is not my line, he is probably the most well-known of the Crudups, and he also brings up an interesting connection. He married Mary E. Boddie, who was the daughter of George Boddie (You'll remember him. He's the one that raised his brother's children plus 17 of his own.) Mary was George's daughter by his second wife, Lucy Williams. 

Like his father before him, Josiah Jr. was a Baptist minister. He was educated at Dr. William McPheeter's academy in Raleigh and studied theology at Columbian College (now George Washington University) in Washington, D.C. He was elected to represent Wake County in the state senate in 1820 but was unable to finish his term because the Constitution of North Carolina prohibited practicing ministers from holding office. He was elected to Congress the following year and served one term from 1821-1823. He lost the election in 1823 but ran again in 1825, losing by only a few votes to Willie P. Mangum. Crudup was such a popular minister that Mangum attributed his win to a heavy rainstorm that prevented his opponent from attending a meeting at which they were both supposed to speak. 

After losing this election, Crudup returned to preaching and farming in Granville County (now Vance), never again seeking public office, although he was a representative to the constitutional convention of 1835. He built a home in the Tripartite style (originally a two-story central section with flanking one-story wings) in the 1830's, which was added to by succeeding generations of Crudups. The house still stands close to U.S. 1 between Kittrell and the Tar River. Although it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979, it has not been restored and is in bad condition. 

The Josiah Crudup House

 

Although he was a large slaveholder, Crudup did not favor secession and opposed Lincoln in 1860 because he feared that Lincoln's unpopularity in the South would contribute to an increase in the numbers of those voting to secede. In his application for pardon after the Civil War, he stated that he owned about 160 slaves and was worth $20,000. Several sources mention that all his slaves stayed with him voluntarily after the war, which they attribute to his kindness to them. I hope that's true, but it may just as easily have been because they had nowhere else to go.

If you have heard the name Crudup at all, it is probably because of actor, Billy Crudup, and you may have wondered if he is a descendant of this family. Yes, he is a descendant of the very Josiah Crudup whose life I have just outlined. It was in a GQ interview with Crudup that I learned something that was surprising to me. It appears that the name that everybody, including me, has been pronouncing CRUD-up is actually pronounced CREW-dup!

The Battles

Just like the Boddies, the Battles have a book that tells the story of their family, The Battle Book: A Genealogy of the Battle Family in America, which includes "Memoirs of the Battle Family to 1820," by Dr. Jeremiah Battle. From Raleigh, NC, on July 19, 1820, Dr. Battle wrote: "At the request of yourself [William Sumner Battle from the Georgia branch of the family] and several of our common relatives, I now proceed to the task of putting down such an account of our family as my information may enable me." Much of the information for this section comes from The Battle Book and Dr. Jeremiah Battle's 1820 account of the family.

John Battle was the first of this family in America, having been born in Yorkshire, England, and coming to Virginia in 1654 with his family and a group of neighbors and relatives that included the Sumners and the Hunters. He first settled on the west bank of the Nansemond River in what is now Nansemond County. On 14 December 1654 he received a royal patent for 200 acres from the Governor of the Colony of Virginia. On 25 September 1663 he secured additional grants from the Royal Governor, Sir William Berkeley, which included 640 acres of land located on the Paspetank (now Pasquotank) River in North Carolina. His wife was named Elizabeth; their children were William (my 7th great-grandfather) and Alsey, who died young. John died about 1690.

William was born in North Carolina on Paspetank River in 1682. When his father died, his guardians returned him to his former home on the Nansemond River in Virginia, where he lived the rest of his life. He married Sarah Hunter (1684-1769), daughter of William Hunter. Their children were: William Battle II, John, Sarah, Mary, and Elisha (my 6th great-grandfather). William and Sarah raised the two youngest children of their son John, Priscilla and Jesse, after John died in 1740. William Battle died in 1749. Sarah lived to see both grandchildren grown and married. 

Elisha Battle was born 9 January 1723 in Nansemond County and at the age of 18 married Elizabeth Sumner. As reported by his grandson, Dr. Jeremiah Battle, "After having two children born, he moved to Tar River about 16 miles above Tarboro. He lived chiefly by agriculture. The country being then new, he could raise stock, hogs particularly with great ease, which enabled him to purchase lands on both sides of the river adjoining him, sufficient to settle all his sons." 

On 17 August 1747 he purchased 400 acres in Edgecombe County on the north side of Tar River. This and succeeding purchases of land made up Cool Spring Plantation (near the present town of Rocky Mount) to which Elisha and his family moved in late 1747 or early 1748. He was appointed justice of the peace in 1756, retaining this position until forced by old age to give it up in 1795. By 1759 he was serving as a justice for the Edgecombe County court, and in 1760 he was appointed to a commission to lay out the town of Tarboro.

He was elected to represent Edgecombe in the colonial House of Commons and first appears in the records of that assembly in December 1773. He was named chairman of Edgecombe's committee of safety and represented Edgecombe in the provincial congresses that met in Halifax in April and November of 1776. 

Once an independent state government was established, he represented Edgecombe County in the state senate 1777-1781, 1783, and 1785-1787. During the constitutional convention, convened in Hillsborough in 1788, he voted to postpone adoption of the federal Constitution until amendments were added that secured and reserved the rights of the individual states.

Elisha and Elizabeth had eight children: Sarah, who married 1st, Jacob Hilliard, and 2nd, Henry Horn; John who married Frances Davis; Elizabeth who married Josiah Crudup and whom we have already met; Elisha who married Sarah Bunn (Dr. Battle's parents); William who married Charity Horn; Jacob who married Mrs. Penelope Edwards (formerly Langley); Jethro who married Martha Lane; and Dempsey who married Jane Andrews.

Elisha Battle died 6 March 1799 and was buried on the family plantation. His is the only stone in the graveyard. This headstone was erected by descendant George Gordon Battle in 1935. 

From Findagrave, photo by Walter Raleigh Terry, Jr.

I was particularly taken with what Jeremiah Battle had to say about his grandfather, his father, and his Uncle Dempsey. About his father he wrote, 

"He has always been very strong and hearty and is greatly beloved by his neighbors and children who have always revered and respected him. He has always been of a cheerful disposition, and courteous and obliging in his manner to all his friends and neighbors. He is known for his plainness of speech when in conversation, more so than all of his brothers, but he can argue better than any of them. His mind is inclined to religion, tho he has never made a profession." 

This is particularly endearing, especially when you compare it to his description of his grandfather. 

"He was bold and free to reprove or censure sin and impudence, not only in his family but among his neighbors, who never took it ill, but felt it a privilege that belonged to his standing in society. It is believed he contributed greatly towards rendering his the most moral and correct neighborhood of any then known to us."

But I particularly admire Jeremiah's Uncle Dempsey, because he seems to have given thoughtful consideration to what it meant to him to be a Christian.

"His temper and sympathetic heart abhorred war, but lest it should be his duty, he thought it best to do his part in supporting them without murmuring. During the [War of 1812] when the President adopted his retaliatory measures, in a conversation between us on the subject, I found his sensibility could not bear abuses of humanity daily practiced in war. He suggested and urged me to write to the President to release those British prisoners, then doomed to die for our American brethren who were taken by the British and threatened with death. He expressed himself at some length on the inconsistency of the practices of war-makers with the Christian religion, on which points he and I agreed perfectly, and I was at length induced to write Mr. Madison a letter on the subject."

 That would be James Madison, 4th President of the United States.

The Sumners

The most famous member of the Sumner family would be described as a "war-maker," I guess, although Uncle Dempsey might have given him some leeway for the larger principle of American independence. Jethro Sumner (Jr.) participated in the American Revolution, serving under George Washington in the Philadelphia campaign and spending the winter of 1777-8 in Valley Forge with Washington's army. He was commissioned as a Brigadier General by the Continental Congress in 1779. 

The first of our Sumner line in America is probably not known. Our first verifiable ancestor is William Sumner who settled in Nansemond County in 1691. It's possible that he could have lived in Isle of Wight, where he is said to have had a "manor plantation," before moving to Nansemond. The name of William's wife is unknown, but we know of at least six children: Jethro, John, James, William Jr., Dempsey, and Barsheba, all born about 1703-1712.

Jethro was married to Margaret Sullivan. They were the parents of the Revolutionary War Jethro. Jethro Sr. died in 1752. John, who married Elizabeth (maiden name unknown; some trees say Blanchard), was my 7th great-grandfather. James married Mary Blanchard; probate records in Chowan County mention the estate of James Sumner, deceased about 1750, with executors Mary and Luke Sumner. William Jr. married Bridget Sullivan and died in Chowan in the 1730's. Dempsey (also mentioned below) married Martha Baker. He represented Chowan in the House of Commons in 1744-45 and again in 1757-59. Dempsey died in 1779 in Gates County. Nothing more than her name is known of Barsheba.

John Sumner made his will in Chowan County, North Carolina, on 18 April 1754. He is obviously the same John who was born and lived in Nansemond County, which confused me until I discovered that southern Nansemond County became Chowan County in 1728. John was appointed a vestryman of St. Paul's Church in Edenton (Chowan Co.) on 3 April 1738, at the same time his brother Dempsey was appointed church warden. On 10 July 1750 both John and Dempsey were appointed Justices of the Peace. I'm a little disappointed that I didn't know my ancestor, John Sumner, lived in Edenton when I visited there a few years ago. At the time I was just looking for my Ming ancestors.

The children of John Sumner were: Jacob; William; Moses; Samuel, who married Martha "Patty" Alston; Elizabeth, my 6th great-grandmother, who married Elisha Battle in Nansemond County in 1742 and died in Edgecombe County, NC, on 19 January 1794 (her children are listed in the Battle section); and Joseph, who married Anna (maiden name unknown) and "signed, sealed, published, and declared" his will in Edgecombe County on 11 January 1783, witnessed by Elisha Battle, Jethro Battle, and Dempsey Battle. Descendants of Joseph through his son, Joseph Jr., migrated to Jackson County, Alabama.

John's will is typical for wills of the South in this time period: lots of people being bequeathed and inherited, horrific and obviously appearing completely normal to the parties involved. Leaving out those bequests, John left half his plantation "and half the houses thereunto belonging" to his wife Elizabeth and the "plantation whereon I now live," including 500 acres, to his son Samuel, "he not disturbing his mother." Samuel also gets a bunch of other stuff: "two feather beds and their furniture," four iron pots, a walnut desk, a large oval table, "one of my large looking glasses," cattle, sheep, and money. In addition, John willed to Samuel "all my shop of Smith Tools and my Still and Pitch Kettle." 

Son William gets the land purchased from Joseph Stallings, Gregory Stallings, and John Knight. Son Jacob gets the land on the west side of Orapeak Swamp "together with my Mill Dam and Liberty to build a Mill." Son Joseph gets the land purchased from Abraham Odum at Tar River. Son Moses gets "all my land purchased of Webb in Bertie County." In addition to slaves, daughter Elizabeth was willed a gold ring and 25 pounds in cash, "Virginia currency." All the sons got thirty pounds sterling. 

New and Correct Map of the Province of North Carolina, 1733, by Edward Moseley
The highlighted label on Orapeak Creek says Sumners M. (Mill?)

The will was proved in January 1755. Son Samuel and wife Elizabeth appeared and were qualified and appointed as executors. 

The Hunters

The Battles were pretty much connected to all the families we've discussed in this post, but specifically to the Hunters through the marriage of William Battle to Sarah Hunter in Nansemond County about 1710. Sarah was the daughter of William Hunter who came to Virginia in 1685. Much of my information about the Hunter family comes from the website, The Hunters of Nansemond, researched and written by Hunter M. Cole, 6th great-grandson of William Hunter, in collaboration with Martha Rester; an article, "William Hunter of Nansemond County, Virginia," presented to the Gates County Historical Society by Harold Mott in 1994; and the website, The Jacob Hunter Memorial Trust, Jacob Hunter being a Revolutionary War soldier and descendant of William. 

An origin for William Hunter is not definitive, but researchers have focused on a couple of locations: Alnwick in Northumberland and North Riding in Yorkshire. The odds seem to be tending toward the town of Ingleby Greenhow in North Riding, where Nicholas Hunter and Ellen Wood married in 1637 and had a son, William, in 1653. The clincher seems to be a connection there to the Rountree family, since William was transported to Virginia by Charles Rountree. Another conundrum has been the coincidence of given names among the Hunters of Nansemond County and a William Hunter and wife Rebecca of Massachusetts; researchers have shown that the William of Nansemond and the William of Barnstable are not the same person.

As mentioned above, in 1685 Charles Rountree transported seven persons, including William Hunter, to the "Upper Parish of Nansemond by the Cypress Swamp." Rountree's land patent, dated 4 November, lists the transportees as: "Willm. Hunter, Nicho. Hunter, Joane Hunter, Rebecka Hunter, Charles Rountree, Robert Rountree, John Sayer." Since Nicholas's will mentions his wife Rebecca, some genealogists have speculated that Joane was William's wife, but no documents have been found to prove this. Some researchers believe that this Nicholas Hunter was William's brother; Rebecca could be his sister, as the William of Yorkshire had a sister by that name. William, identified as a "weaver," was granted a patent on 21 April 1695 for "200 acres on the eastward side of the main cypress swamp that runs out of Bennetts Creek" for bringing four slaves to the colony. William would later leave this tract to his son Robert. 

In another patent granted on 25 April 1702 he gained 240 acres adjoining his tract in Upper Parish. To this land he transported five persons: "Wm. Hunter & his wife & his daughter Alice & his son Nicho. Hunter [and] Mary Cohon." He left this land to his son Nicholas. William is mentioned in other land transactions: as a witness on 19 October 1700 when Nicholas Stallings sold a tract on Bennetts Creek to Robert Rountree; when a land patent dated 7 November 1700 assigned 481 acres adjacent to his land in Upper Parish to John Moor; and when a patent granted on 14 June 1714 to William Sumner records that William Hunter owned land adjacent to Sumner's 68 acres in the "Up. Par. of Nansemond County at a place called Gordon's Marsh at Orapeak." (See how these families are linked?) 

On 8 June 1699 William was named as one of the twelve justices of the quorum in Nansemond County. He continued to serve as "clerk," or justice of the peace from 1702-1714. He appears on a list of magistrates and militia officers of Nansemond County in 1702, enumerated on the Quick Rent Roll of 1704 with 800 acres as Captain William Hunter. 

William had four sons, William, Isaac, Nicholas, and Robert, and daughter Sarah. 

• William, wife Ann and daughter Alice came to Virginia in 1701. In his will proved 18 January 1732 in Chowan County, he left his water mill in Nansemond County to sons William and Ephraim. 
• Isaac married Elizabeth (maybe Parker) and lived in Chowan County. In 1749 he made a claim for serving 3 years as reader at the Episcopal Church at Constant's Chapel. In his will of 17 April 1752 he mentions sons Elisha, Jacob, Jesse, Isaac, Daniel, daughters Elizabeth Perry, Alice Perry, Hannah Riddick, Rachel Walton, Sarah Hunter, and children of daughter Joan. (This makes me wonder again if Joan/Joane was the name of his mother.) In his will he left substantial property to his children. Witnesses to Isaac's will were Moses Sumner, Samuel Sumner, and John Sumner.
• Nicholas and his wife Rebecca came to Virginia in 1685 with his father William. He is listed on the Quit Rent Rolls of 1704 with 190 acres. He was Justice of the Peace in both Onslow and Carteret counties. He died in Carteret County in 1749; Rebecca died in 1785.
• Robert married Elizabeth Bryan Whitmel, widow of Col. Thomas Whitmel. He was a vestryman of St. Paul's Church in Edenton in 1738-40. He died in Bertie County in 1753; in his will of 3 Jun 1753 he left much of his estate to his son Moses. 
• Sarah, my 7th great-grandmother, married William Battle. Their children are listed in the section on the Battles. If you remember, William and Sarah brought the two youngest of their son John's children to Nansemond County when he died in 1740. Priscilla married Benjamin Faucette, and Jesse married Susannah Faucette, Benjamin's sister. William died in 1749, but Sarah lived on until 1769 and saw both grandchildren married. 

Hunters (and related Parkers and Perrys)
on 1733 map of North Carolina

In 1728 the border between Virginia and North Carolina was redrawn, and William Hunter's land in southern Virginia was now in Chowan County, later Gates County, North Carolina. On today's maps, the old Hunter tracts would be near the town of Sunbury. William's will, probably written at about this time, no longer survives, but evidence of it exists in other documents. On 17 March 1729 Nicholas Hunter and his wife Rebecca transferred 120 acres received in William's will to their son William. In an indenture dated 16 February 1742 William's son Robert sold his brother Isaac a tract of land that Robert had been given in William's will. 

Mourning Crudup

We started with Mourning Dixon, my 6th great-grandmother, and we're going to end with Mourning Crudup, my 4th great-grandmother.

Mourning Crudup (1781-1852) provides the evidence that all these families are connected. Here's how:

• On her father's father's side she is a Crudup. From her oldest Crudup ancestor in America, Josiah, who died in 1760, she descends through John (1712-1753) and Josiah (1748-1819).
• On her father's mother's side she is a Dixon. Her possibly oldest ancestor in America was Nicholas Dixon, who died sometime after 1648, when he was granted land in Nansemond County, Virginia. Her 2nd great-grandfather, Thomas Dixon I, died after 1670, the year his son, Thomas Dixon II, was born. Her paternal grandmother was Mourning Dixon (1722-1781).
• It's possible that she is a Boddie through her 2nd great-grandmother, Mary/Marie, if Mary was indeed the sister of William Boddie. Her other family connection with the Boddies is through her sister Chloe, who married Nathan Boddie (1732-1797).
• On her mother's father's side she is a Battle. From her oldest Battle ancestor in America, John, she descends through William (1682-1749), Elisha (1723-1799), and her mother, Elizabeth, born 1749.
• Her great-grandmother on her father's side is Sarah Hunter (1684-1769), whose father was William Hunter, possibly born in Ingleby Greenhow, Yorkshire, in 1650, died in Chowan County, North Carolina, in 1729.
• On her mother's mother's side she is a Sumner, descending from William, born in Isle of Wight, Virginia, in 1645, through John (1698-1755), and Elizabeth (1724-1794). 

From their first migrations across the ocean, these ancestors moved from Isle of Wight and Nansemond counties in Virginia to various counties in North Carolina and onward to the west. Mourning Crudup, born in Wake County, North Carolina, married William Fowler there in 1800 and died at her home on Fowler Hill in Henry County, Tennessee, in 1852.