In this post, I just want to take a closer look at the individual named Edmund Denson. Who was Edmund and where did he come from? At first, that was all that I knew.
I came across Ed Denson during my research of the Smith family. He had always lived near the Smith family in earlier censuses, and he had lived with the single daughters of Joseph Smith,as a hired hand in another. During that time, he had became the lover of one of them, Terry, and together they had a daughter, Sally. All of that seems very ordinary, however, for the time and place, it was not.
Then I made the online acquantance of a lady in Virginia. We share a very small segment of dna, so small, it could be, should be, impossible or nearly, to figure out our connection. But I believe we have. She's a descendant of Edmond Denson and Terry Smith. I have several genetic connections to descendants of Terry's father, Joseph. Both Joseph's family of Smiths and the family of my ancestor, James O Mauldin, had followed the path of Chatham to Moore to Montgomery Counties in North Carolina. James O. Mauldin was the husband of my mystery ancestor, Mary Smith Mauldin. It is my belief that these two families may be connected.
The story of Edmond Denson is not just a story of one 19th century man in the Southern piedmont. It's the story of an entire designation of people somewhat left out of the history books. It's the story of circumstances that have led to many a face like these as the fad of genetic testing has taken off in the US of Mongrelia. It's the story of our times and those times and what people need to hear. Americans are one soup made of many. One people.
Edmond Denson was a free person of color in the years before emancipation. There were several families and individuals in that category in old Montgomery and Stanly Counties in the first half of the 19th century. They were not rare, and neither were they common. Some were families with a long history of freedom that had came down from Virginia. Others began with just one individual. Some had been slaves, or their forebears had, who had been freed. Others were born free and were of mixed race. Some were Native Americans, members of remnant tribes, that had been decimated, but had not disappeared entirely in other cultures. Some were of other ethnicities entirely, they were just darker than the average settler, and were Mediteranean or Arabic, or other. The census takers had 3 choices to maek on individuals, white, black or Mulatto. Eveyone who didn't fall into the first two categories became the latter.
Edmund Denson was an actual mulatto. He was born to a free white woman - Sarah Denson. His father was a black man- Thomas McLeod. As Thomas doesn't appear until after emancipation, it can naturally be assumed that he was a slave. There were several McLeods in Moore County who owned slaves in the 1850 and 1860 schedules. I believe Thomas might have been the Tom mentioned in the will of on John McLeod, however.
I anticipate the arrival of several documents from archives before I can really start piecing together the Denson family. They appear to be the perfect example of a family tripping over themselves to make sense of something they don't understand, even to the point of creating memorials to an individuals who didn't exist. But that's later.
Edmund Denson was born in Moore County, North Carolina, in the heart of the Scottish sandhills settlement. He's found there first, in the 1850 census, working for the Morrison family, along with Neil McCaskill, who may have been the friend that led him into neighboring Montgomery, where he would spend the remainder of his life.
Edmund in labeled a mulatto here, which was a person of mixed ancestry, which indeed he was. Everyone else in the household was white. He's given a birthyear of 1832 here, making him 18, but that would change.
By 1860, he has relocated to Montgomery County and is now working as a hireling for a young farmer named Angus Muchinson. They are living in the township of Brutons, with the closest Post Office being Macedonia. He still has a birth year of 1832, and is 28 years old.
Terry and Martha Smith were the single daughters of Joseph and Martha McCaskill Smith. Their paretns had passed away sometime between 1860 and 1870 and the daughters had remained in the old homestead. They lived near Auman's Hill, in Hill Township, which is described as the Northeastern section of the County. A transcripton error is made in the age of William Smith here. There was no dash, he was only 8 here, being born in 1852. William was the son of Martha Smith. Ed Denson was a hired helper for the sisters. This census has him younger than he was on the last, which is incorrect. He was probably more around 37 or 38. Edmond must have developed a closer relationship with Terry Smith during this time than that of hired hand.
The relationship between Edmond and Terry did not last long, in fact, in legal terms, it became combative. But Edmond would decide it was time to settle down. He settled down with a girl with a most unfortunate story, Franie Jane Deaton.
In the above marriage license, Edmond Denson names his parent as Thomas McLeod, living, and Sarah Denson, deceased. Franey names her father as unknown, and her mother as Mary Deaton.
Thomas McLeod was indeed still living in 1872, as he appears in the 1870 and 1880 census records of Moore County. This suggests that Edmund kept in touch with his father in some manner, to know he was still alive.
She first appears as a Head of Household in the 1840 census of Moore County. Her mother, Sarah Myrick Denson, died in 1842 and had divorced her father, Bennett (asa Benjamin) Denson in 1816.
In 1880, Edmund and Franie are living with her Aunt, Margaret Deaton Brewer. Margaret was the widow of Aaron Brewer and remained childless. Franie was also living with her Aunt Margaret in 1870, with her toddler, Emily. If you will notice, Mary E. Denson, above, is 11. This is Emily. In the 1880 census, Margaret Deaton Brewer is white. Edmond, Franie and the children are all listed mulattos. However, in the 1870 census, when she is living with her aunt, and in the 1860 census, when she is living with her grandparents, mother and siblings, Franie is white. I have no reason to believe Franie was anything but completely white, and was counted as mulatto, simply from her marriage to Edmund. In fact, her mother Mary is just a few houses up from the Densons, living with another of her daughters, Sidney Deaton Lassiter.
I found a Bastardy Bond for Franie Jane in the Montgomery County Court Records for the year of Emily's birth. In this bond, she was shown as "Franey Brewer". It took a search for Franey Brewer to figure out that Franey Jane Deaton and Franey Jane Brewer was the samer person. It appears she was adopted by her Aunt Margaret and Aaron Brewer. And there were possibly sinister reasons behind that. But that's for another day. Some of the names of the neighbors sounded familiar, that's when I realized that the families were from an area of Montgomery County near the Moore County line, called "Black Ankle". Wikipedia states that Black Ankle is an unincorporated community in the Northeastern corner of Montgomery County. It's only half a mile south of the Randolph County line and 3 miles west of the Moore County line.
There are several stories of how the community got it's name, but the jist of about all of them was that the people there were known for having dirty ankles, whether from working in the mines there, or working with tar and turpentine, among other, more nefarious reasons.
There's a Fort there, a former race track, several defunct gold mines and an ecologically unique bog, in Little River Township.
Closer to Biscoe, was Terry Smith, one of the Smith sisters, daughters of Joseph and Martha Smith, with whom Edmund was living in 1870. Terry and Edmund had had an affair, that resulted in the birth of Edmund's daughter, Sarah, or Sallie.
Oddly, Sallie was born the year that Edmund married Franie. Terry Smith was a white woman, her daughter was designated mulatto, like Edmund.
Terry would not make it to 1900. It is unknown when she died or where she is buried. Her daughter, Sarah, would not marry, but would give birth to 4 children.
Sadly, in the 1910 census, it would show that 2 of her 4 children had died. Her daughter, Betsy Ann Smith, would marry in 1913 at the excruciatingly young age of 14, to Price Ingram Butler. Sarah S. Smith signed in as a witness.
Name:
Sallie Smith
Gender:
Female
Race:
Black
Age:
44y 6m 16d
Marital status:
Single
Occupation:
Housekeeper
Birth Date:
26 Apr 1870
Birth Place:
Montgomery County, North Carolina
Residence Date:
12 Nov 1914
Residence Place:
Biscoe, Montgomery, North Carolina
Death Date:
12 Nov 1914
Death Place:
Biscoe, Montgomery, North Carolina
Burial Date:
13 Nov 1914
Burial Place:
Montgomery County, North Carolina
Cemetery:
C.B. M Leods Cemetery
Sallie died the next year of a Uremic Coma at the young age of 44. Her death certificate said she was buried at C. B. McLeods Cemetery in Biscoe.
It seems rather ironic since her father was a McLeod. The cemetery is beside the road going north out of Biscoe, just before Tarry Church Road. The close street names reflect the familes in the old census records who lived in the area. But Sallie has descendants. Her daughter Betsie lived until 1968 and died in Scotland County.
Franie Deaton Denson didn't make it to 1900, either, but her husband and Sallie's father, Edmund Denson did. He had moved to Randolph County, so probably died there, between 1900 and 1910.
Edmund and Franie had 4 children, including Mary Emily Denson, whom I am not altogether sure was his.
A) Mary Emily Denson b Oct 25, 1868. Married Aaron Siller. B) Nancy C "Nannie" Denson b 1875. Married George W. McCain. C) Fannie E. Denson b 1877. Married Thomas Leach. D) Lucy Ellen Denson b 1800. Married John Wesley McRae and James Handy.
My microscopic look into this family and its origins has not concluded. I'm awaiting documents from archives and have taken a trip to Moore County. Moore is a burned county and many records prior to 1889 were burned, so there's not a massive amount of information there.
Also, the story of Franey's family has a tale of its own to tell. Until then...
Portions of the story of Franie Jane Deaton Brewer Denson have me agasp. I really don't
know what to do with them besides present them.
18th Century Occult Drawing
I asked myself, was I really reading what I was reading? Could I be reading it wrong? So some of it I will just drop here and let the reader decide what they are reading.
Franey Jane Deaton was the daughter of Mary Deaton, a single woman from Little River Township in Montgomery County. I discovered later that the area was known as "Black Ankle".
According to the book, "The Story of Black Ankle, North Carolina and People Around About", by Ruby Odom Perkins,
"The people in this part of the country were nearly all related or "close a kin' as they said. If they became angry with each other, stole from each otherr, or even killed, they wanted to settle the trouble by themselves. Seldom would one tell on the other." She decribes a insular community, barracaded in their own subculture by kinship and the bogs of the Little River, where one small church, Big Oak, served the community, but the community, on a whole, served themselves. They didn't like outsiders and outsiders learned to not like them.
"Outsiders were rocked if they started into that part of the country. Occasionally someone was found dead and the murderer would never be found. So Black Ankle's reputation grew."
Into this community in 1845 or about, was born a little girl named Franey Jane.
In the 1860 census of 'Diffies', Montgomery County, we find the Homestead of William Deaton and his wife, Nancy Allen Deaton. Also in the home is his daughter, Mary "Polly" Deaton, a single woman and her children; Jane 15, Margaret 12, Sydney 10, Betsy 8, and Rena 2, all girls and all fatherless.
The 15 year old was Franie Jane Deaton. A look at the entire page shows an area of family and connected persons. The couple of Aaron Brewer and his wife Margaret was Franie's aunt and sister of Polly Deaton, Margaret Deaton Brewer and her husband, Aaron.
Also on this page is Dorcas Brewer, at home with her parents Micajah and wife. I've touched on her in previous posts. Shortly after this census was taken, Franie Jane moved to the home nearby of her Aunt Margaret and Uncle Aaron, or was removed. She was unofficially adopted by the couple. A jump 10 years into the future will show possibly why.
Nancy Allen Deaton has died, and in 1866, William Deaton remarried to Elizabeth Lassiter. Most of his children surround him, still. A few houses down from William Deaton's home we find his daughter, Margaret Deaton Brewer, and J Deaton, with daughter Emily. This is Franie Jane and her oldest daughter, Mary Emily Denson. As it is a little hard to read, I will list the households:
61 Asa Maner family 62 William Deaton, 65 Elizabeth 65 Jerry 14 Owen Nash? 63 Mima Smith 35 and family 64 Catherine Manes or Maner 40 and family 65 Margaret Brewer 50 (not quite0 Deaton J 22 (Franie Jane) Emily 2 66 Jacob Lassiter 25 and family 67 Mary Deaton (Franey's mother) Bettie 20 Louisa 16 Leatty 12 68 Joseph Deaton 45 Dorcas 33 and family.
What had made Franey Jane a blacksheep of the family?
In the Winter Session of the court of Pleas and Quarters of Montgomery County, North Carolina, Eli Ward, on of the Justices of the Peace for the county declared that it had been brought to his attention that "Frany Brewer a single woman of said county is with child which child when it shall be born will a bastard and may become chargable". He meant that Franey was unmarried and that her child could be a ward or financial disability to the county. He ordered that the sheriff bring her in on the next term of court, which he did. The following document is to follow. I'm going to just drop it here and let the reader decide for themselves what it is saying. It involves the young woman, Franey Jane Deaton/Brewer and William Deaton, her grandfather.
Mary Emily Deaton/Denson was born on October 25, 1868.
Franie Jane Deaton/Brewer would marry in 1872 to Edmund Denson, a man himself born out of wedlock to Sarah Denson, a white woman and Thomas McLeod, a black man.
Franie Jane is seen in her early records, both census and in court as a white woman. If someone in court was not white, it was noted with a "col" for colored. If they were not white on a census, they were given a b for black of m or mu for mulatto. After her marriage to Edmund Denson, Franie is called "mulatto", as was her daughter Emily. Emily is also noted as white in 1870.
In "The Stor of Black Ankle North Carolina and People Around About." by Ruby Odom Perkins, Ms Perkins notes that:
"Several of the women were tried in court for living with negro men, but they just said the men were working for them and usually they were found not guilty. .......the Indian men seemed to have left that part of the country and many of the Indian girls married into white families. If the resulting children resembled white parents, they were called white and if any were like their Indian ancestors, they were called Negros.....In court the dark men were called "clay banks" and in the census they were classified as 'other than white', and of course , to the uneducated people of this section ,all dark folks were called Negroes." Shades of Gray...
The aftermath of the Civil War in Piedmont North Carolina had left a surplus of widows and orphans and a few dispassionate men. Some men had arrived home with pieces missing, both physically and mentally. Others not at all. Some went West, but a few, especially in the Quaker belt of Surrey, Guilford,Randolph and Moore and into northeastern Montgomery County, had escaped service entirely, some due to devout Quaker or Wesleyn Methodist beliefs, but others from a backwoods defience half- caprisious,half -feckless existence. Not my pony, not my show, in other words. They rather chose a world of imperturbation and detached existence in their insular and rustic habitat. But for some the War had came to them.
Gray shaded area is considered the Quaker Belt. The green area was the deserter den during the Civil War.
I found a neighborhood of Montgomery County, that during the mid -to -late 1800's had sort of a moral separation from the rest of the land. Where people openly participated in a lifestyle that other parts of the county found shocking and unethical, while these obscure individuals participated in rather defiantly.
I had touched on the story of Maggie McQueen in my review of the life of her parents, Joseph and Martha McCaskill Smith in my post:
Since that post, I found out a little bit about both Maggie and her parents.
First, I have been reading books by William T. Auman, most specifically, "Civil War in the North Carolina Quaker Belt". I'd known, and some do, that there had been an area in the Uwharries, where Randolph, Moore and Montgomery Counties come together, where a large and growig band of deserters and 'draft dodgers' hung out. Long kept secrets of events that happened during that time are just now beginning to come out. The Smiths, to whom I am somehow genetically tied, were disenters, peace-lovers, and maybe, but not assuredly, Unionists.
Joseph Smith and his wife disappeared between 1860 and 1870. They were, after all, both 58 in 1860 and longetivity was harder to come by in those days. They could have just died of natural caused, but other men in that era, who did not serve in the War, also disappeared in those days.
Home Guards kept the roads hot in the later years of the war. They went farther and deeper into the small mountain range of the Uwharries, looking for deserters and not only that, but demanding of farmers and community families fodder for the war, conscripts, getting younger, and older, all the time. Joseph Smith was 62 in 1864. He did not have a son to give. He'd had a family of girls, for all we know. Dashes that may have been sons in the older censuses were unconnected an unnamed. He only had one, Andrew, who would have only been 13 or 14 by then. Andrew did sign up, near the end of the war, and maybe about that time, as a conscript, and they lied about his age, saying he was 18 and he was taken to Robeson County.
Home Guard killed men and were never brought to justice. Men killed Home Guards and were never found. Joseph was rumoured to be one of these victims. As for his wife, perhaps grief was what took her, if not hard times.
Margaret was the second daughter of the Smith family. Her sister Sarah, was already married in 1850, but not far away. Maggie, 19, would marry this same year to a neighbor, Calvin McQueen, son of Malcolm McQueen, in this heavily Scottish settled area.
One thing I didn't know was that Maggie was young Calvin's second wife, and that he also had a child. His first wife, if they were actually married, was Diza Ann Manness or Maners, as the name is shown both ways. She and Calvin had a daughter together, named Mary Ann. Diza has an incredible story all of her own.
Calvin and Maggie had 4 children: Martha Jane (1855), James A. (1856) Margaret E. (1860) and William Calvin (1861). Only the first and last made it to adulthood.
Calvin had moved his family to Guilford County by 1860, where the transcribers messed up his name. It remained McQueen, lol. They had a number of people living with them, a young man named Scott Dunn and an Indian mother and son.
Name
Calvin McQueen
Age at enlistment
28
Enlistment Date
22 Feb 1862
Private
State Served
North Carolina
No
Birth Date
1834
Sources
North Carolina Troops 1861-65, A Roster
Calvin enlisted in the war in Guilford County in February of 1862, and then died of wounds recieved in battle in July of that same year at Mechanicsville, Hanover County, Virginia.
Margaret and the children returned home to Montgomery County and here in was a another factor that I hadn't known.
In the 1870 census, Martha was her oldest child, William was William Calvin, who would have been more like 8 or 9, but who was the little boy Larkin?
I found the answer just the other day.
In the Bastardy Bonds for Montgomgery County, North Carolina, which was the 19th century answer to child support for illegitimate children, Margaret McQueen was brought to court in 1867 and was charged with having a 'baseborn child", that could be held chargable to the county. She was ordered to name the father of the child. She also gave the exact date of birth for the child, June 4th, 1867, nearly 5 years after the death of Calvin McQueen. The child definately was not his, and this child was Larkin.
D. D. Deaton signed the bond and paid the fees for Maggie, yet she refused to name the father. I have looked through many of these bonds and one fact comes to surface. For the mothers who refused to name the father, two things usually happened. Sometimes a family member would pay the bond for her, a father or brother usually. But sometimes, an odd fellow would up and pay, someone who would not make much sense. These were usually married men, and sometimes they were more well-heeled in society than the poor 'ruined' lass. Everyone knew, it was whispered, that these men were the fathers after all, who promised to pay the fees, and perhaps a bit more, a trust fund of sorts, if the girl just kept her mouth shut. In some unfortunate cases, men like these would end up killing the girl and she'd end up with a ballad in her name, like Naomi Wise, or Patsy Beasley.
1867 was a very busy year for the McQueen and Deaton families of Northeastern Montgomery County, North Carolina. I had been exploring Bastardy Bonds of the era, looking for one in particular and found out a great deal more about dealing with people I had came across in my research.
Looking for the father of Terry Smith's child, Sarah, who was Edmund Denson, I discovered a bastardy bond concerning Franey Jane Brewer (Deaton), who was Edmund Densons future wife. I blogged on her story here: The Devil and Franie Jane
I wrote down a list of Bastardy Bonds that I had came across while searching, whose surnames connected to those I was researching.
I also found one in 1867 for Terry's sister. Margaret Smith McQueen, whose husband, Calvin McQueen had been killed in the Civil War in July of 1862, but who had given birth to a son, Larkin, on June 4, 1867.
The case of Frany Jane Deaton Brewer involved one William Deaton, who had been ordered to court and ordered to pay maintanence for the child of Frany Jane, her oldest daughter, Mary Emily. The clincher was that William Deaton was her grandfather. And he wasn't just signing a bond.
In the case of Margaret Smith McQueen, she refused to name the father, but a D. D. Deaton had came to her defense and paid her bond and court fees. Most of the time the man who paid these bonds, if not a relative of the woman or girl (as some of these were really young), getting her out of jail, were the actual fathers of the infants. Kindly neighbor?, maybe. Married man? Usually. And I blogged on Maggie here:
But there was a third bond involving a McQueen and none other that William Deaton, that very same year. I wonder if I will find more bonds against William Deaton if I keep digging through the whole 2000 pages?
And this was the case of State vs Nancy McQueen Montgomery County North Carolina.
Nancy McQueen, I would discover, was born Nancy Britt, daughter of William Britt (1793-1864) and his wife Catherine Deaton Britt (1784-1880). Yes, children, it appears we are still keeping it all in the family here.
Name:
Joseph Deaton
Home in 1790 (City, County, State):
Montgomery, North Carolina
Free White Persons - Males - Under 16:
3
Free White Persons - Males - 16 and over:
1
Free White Persons - Females:
3
Number of Household Members:
7
It seems one Joseph Deaton, born in 1755 in Deatonville, Amelia County, Virginia who migrated to Montgomery County, North Carolina in its very early years, and married Elizabeth Jordan, daughter of Francis Jordan, was the founder of the Deaton Dynasty of Little River. It is said about Joseph, who was the son of Thomas Deaton Jr of Amelia County, that he settled down at the forks of the Little River, just a few miles east of the modern town of Troy. Francis Jordan was already here, supposedly, so Joseph married his daughter around 1873 or so.
People have claimed Joseph as a Patriot for providing food and supplies to the American army led by George Washington, himself, at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse.
1869 painting of the Friends Meeting House at New Garden by John Collins. Battle of Guilford Courthouse nearby.
Joseph Deaton and Elizabeth Jordan Deaton had 13 children -
1.) Elias Deaton 1783 - 1870 Married Elizabeth Yarborough. 2.) Elizabeth Deaton 1785 - ?. Married James Yarborough. 3.) James Deaton 1787 - 1850. 4.) Oliver Basil Deaton 1788 - 1840 Married Barbara Stewart. Migrated to McNairy County, TN. 5.) Adam Deaton 1790 -1876 6.) John Calvin Deaton 1793 - 1858 Married Catherine Stewart. Migrated to Hopkins County, TX. 7.) Joseph Deaton, Jr. 1796 - 1850 Married Mary McDonald. 8.) Catherine Deaton 1797 -1880 Married William Britt. 9.) Isbell "Ibbie" Deaton 1800 -1894 Married John James Yarborough. 10.) Francis Jordan Deaton 1801 - 1876 Married Rachael Holderness. 11.) William Deaton 1802 -?. Married 1st Nancy Allen, 2nd Elizabeth Lassiter. 12.) Reuben Jordaon Deaton 1805 -1861 Married Nancy Fox. Migrated to Oregon County, MO. 13.) Dison Deaton 1806 -1895 Married Elizabeth A. McQueen. It is said that Joseph Deaton helped found Star Baptist Church and that Dison founded Laurel Hill Church. I'll let you make your own decision about William. The fact was that Nancy Britt McQueen was the niece of William Deaton.
On July 7, 1847, Nancy Britt had married James Batten McQueen, son of Alexander Marcus McQueen and Sallie Ann Batten McQueen. They had 4 daughters: 1) Elizabeth A McQueen b 1848 - 1923. Married Archibald Leach 2) Mary Catherine McQueen b 1850-1910. Never married, had children, however. 3) Nancy E McQueen b 1852-1910 Married Henry Maners or Maness. 4) Sarah Jane McQueen b 1856 -1941 Married John Christian Deaton. James Batten McQueen died March 11, 1855, at the age of 28. According to a family legend, he ostensibly died from the result of a tragic accident. James B. McQueen is buried at Laurel Hill Church.
Sarah Jane McQueen was born posthumously to James Batten McQueen's death. Her marriage was also a cousin marriage as John Christina Deaton was the son of Francis Jordan Deaton and Rachel Holderness Deaton, making him her mother's 1st cousin and her 1st cousin once removed.
John Luther Christian Deaton, known as "L. C", husband of Sarah Jane McQueen
The 1850 census showed a happy young family unit unaware that tragedy would strike in 5 years.
What did Nancy do after her husbands' death? Young and pregnant with 3 small daughters, she must have been in an awful state. It was the mid-1800's, what power did women have? Her husband died intestate, he was so young, how could he have known his days were numbered. It must be noted that neighbors were Valentine Moore, James Poe, Batten's father Alexander McQueen and Wiliam Bruton and Thomas Shaw.
In 1860, Nancy heads her own household as a widow. Notably, she is living next door to her parents, William and Catherine Britt and her 3 single sisters, Talitha, Fanny and Carthena. Her brother, Merriman Britt is on the other side of her. Nancy has moved home to her father's property.
Discernibly missing from the 1860 census was Nancy and Batten's oldest daughter, Elizabeth. Oddly perhaps, she was living with the family of Wilson Wright Williams and his common law wife, Diza or Dicey Maners McQueen Williams. Now, Wilson Williams is a perplexing person himself. He had a connection to Edward Wright and is mentioned in his will. He is seen by both of the surnames Wright and Williams. Diza is the woman mentioned earlies as being the first wife of Calvin McQueen, or perhaps they never married, but they did have a daughter, Mary Ann. Calvin did later marry Margaret Smith, they have records and he did die in the Civil War. The other McQueen in the household, 17 year old Margeret, was the sister of Calvin McQueen. A little confusing, perhaps? Yes, more than a little. To add another twist to the conumdrum, Wilson Wright Williams was not a white man, and is listed as Mulatto while Diza and the McQueen girls were white.
Old House still standing in rural Montgomer County
So that's where the McQueen family was before the Civil War and before Nancy McQueen and William Deaton were dragged into court. 1870 told a different story.
Nancy McQueen was now 43 years old and living with Sarah Jane, the youngest child of she and Batten and now she has a younger child, Flora. Flora A. W. F. McQueen was actually born in 1867, acoording to later records, and was the daughter born to Nancy Britt McQueen and William Deaton, the subjects of the 1867 Bastardy Bond. Some family trees have her listed, nearly laughably, as the daughter of James Batten McQueen, who died 12 years prior to her birth. Now that would have been a long pregnancy. As for Nancy's older daughters:
Elizabeth A. McQueen Leach in her later years.
Elizabeth had married Archibald Leach and was living near the town of Troy in Montgomery County, still.
Mary McQueen was living with her grandmother, Catherine Deaton Britt. Her name was written in as "McQueen Mary". Her maiden Aunts, Valetta and Catherine II, was still in the home and the Greens were another transcription error, as they were an entirely different household and not living with the Britts.
Henry and Nancy McQueen Manness
Nancy Evangeline McQueen is missing from the 1870 census. She would have been about 15 or 16 and possibly living with other family members and misnomered.
However on Janeuary 14, 1877, she would marry Henry Maners or Maness ( the spellings were excruciatingly interchangeable). They would first live near Troy, then move to Sheffields in Moore County for a few decades, before finally settiling down in Randolph County, where Henry would die.
But what about William Deaton, the other person mentioned in the Bond? He had been a married man, having married his first wife, Nancy Allen in 1823. Together, he and Nancy had 10 children: 1) Margaret 1820- after 1880. Married Aaron Brewer. 2) Elizabeth "Betsy" 1823-1900. Married Jackson Deaton, son of Burwell and Patience Melton Deaton. 3) Amanda "Mindy" 1825 -1912 Married Wesley Dunn. 4) Mary "Polly" 1828-1908 Never married. Did have children. 5) Joseph A. 1829-1913 Married Dorcas (or Darcus) Dunn. 6) Elias "Eli" 1830-1863 .Never married. Killed in Civil War. 7) Levi 1832-1893. Married Married Mary Lucinda Hogan. 8) Deborah 1834-1880 Married Martin Alfred Green. 9) Aaron 1835-1906 Married Wincy Hogan. 10) Jemima "Mima" 1837- aft 1900 Married Nathan Alexander Smith. Nancy Allen Deaton died between 1860 and 1862. On May 8, 1862, William remarried to Elizabeth Lassiter.
Name:
William Deaton
Gender:
Male
Spouse:
Elizabeth Lassater
Spouse Gender:
Female
Bond date:
8 May 1862
Bond #:
000084667
Marriage Date:
8 May 1862
Level Info:
North Carolina Marriage Bonds, 1741-1868
ImageNum:
004648
County:
Montgomery
Record #:
01 011
Bondsman:
Aaron Brewer
Witness:
A A McCaskill J
Performed By:
A A McCaskill
His son-in-law, Aaron Brewer was bondsman. So, I wonder what happened between 1862 and 1867 for William Deaton to show up in court on two different bastardy bonds? One with his niece and one with his granddaughter. In 1870, William Deaton seems happily settled and still living his second wife, Elizabeth, but we know better, don't we? Elizabeth had been born Elizabeth Allen, and I believe may have been his sister-in-law. She was the widow of a Joseph or Josiah Lassiter, and had been living in Richmond County before moving to Montgomery. Her husband died about 1856, so she's living in Diffies as a widow and farmer in 1860.
In 1870, she is living with William and her youngest daughter, who is shown as Jervey Deaton, but is really Virginia or "Jenny" Lassiter. Right next door is William Deaton's daughter, Jemima Deaton Smith and Jenny Lassiter ends up marrying Mima's son William Smith. I'm not sure who the 12 year old boy Owen or Oscar, is yet. Possibly one of her grandchildren.
The last census they both show up in is the 1880, and they have one of her grandsons, John Lassiter, living with them. In the same household, but not connected here, but shown as in the same household on the actual census, is Wilson Williams, as a hireling, who was mentioned earlier. The whole neighborhood surrounding them are family or people I've been blogging on lately. Near them is Williams grandson, William Smith and Elizabeth's daughter, Virginia and their family. Not far is her son Joseph Lassiter Jr, married to Williams granddaughter, Sydney and her mother Mary living with them. Next to them is Mary's daughter, Franie Jane and her husband Edmund Denson. There's Levi Deaton and a variety of Hogans and Freeman and Manuses, all intermarried with the Deatons and among themselves. It's a tribe.
1880 is also the last census for Nancy McQueen. She's 53 with a houseful of children. Living with her are her daughter, Mary Catherine and the 4 youngest children are Mary Catherine's. F. A. W. F. McQueen is Flora and her many middle names unknown. She's 14 here. So what happened to Flora, the child of William Deaton and his niece, Nancy Britt McQueen? Her life wa short, but not without love. Flora married at 19 to Frank Green, son of Anderson and Talitha Green.
Together, they had two children: Malcolm A. Green and Fanny Jane Green. Frank then married Margaret Leach and they had one child: James Franklin Green in 1898. Frank then died young also, before 1900. It is unknown where either he or Flora are buried. As for Will Deaton, he supposedly lived until 1891 and is buried somewhere near Laurel Hill Church, if not in it. Times were different. A man of his ilk today would be locked away. Not so with Will Deaton. He lived in a time and a place where it is said that poor families would send children packing during the winter to find someone to live with as their parents couldn't feed them. Children could be seen walking down the road with little bags of clothes. And they call those the good old days...
Mary Deaton, aka Polly, was born along the Little River in Northeastern Montgomery County, North Carolina on February 20, 1828. Polly was the daughter of William Deaton and his first wife, Nancy Allen Deaton. She was the 4th daughter and the only one of their daughters not to marry. That's not to say she didn't have children.
In the 1850 census, Mary was listed as a 19 year old, living in the home of her parents. By then, she had already had 3 children. There was something about her first daughter, Frany Jane. I'm not sure where she was in 1850. Perhaps they had hid her from the cenus taker, but the youngest two girls in this census, Margaret and Sydney, were Polly's daughters.
35 year old Polly above is Mary Deaton, the mother. 15 year old Jane is Franie Jane who married Edmund Denson 12 year old Margaret married Stephen Lassiter and 10 year old Sydney is Sitney or Sidney Nannie Deaton who married Jacob Lassiter; 8 year old Betsy is Mary Elizabeth Deaton who married Alexander Lammonds and 2 year old Rena is Laurena A. Deaton who married William A. McCaskill. The youngest, Leatha Ellen Deaton was on her way. She would marry John T. Freeman.
It all looked rather orderly, but digging deeper, it was anything but. I've already done a post of Polly's oldest daughter, Franie Jane Deaton/ Brewer, who was unofficially adopted by Polly's older sister, Margaret Deaton Brewer.
Franie Jane married unconventionally to Edmund Denson, whose father was black and mother was white. Franie Jane would live the rest of her life as a "mulatto", even though she, and her oldest daugher, were most likely completely white biologically.
The 1860 Census is interesting in that Mary is the only child of William and Nancy Deaton, and all of the younger children are hers.
I have looked through most of the Bastardy Bonds for Montgomery County for the years that Mary's children were being born and not found one for her. Oddly, while everyone else around her were having children out of wedlock, it seemed that Mary Deaton was avoiding prosecution. Of course, there are large gaps in the years sometimes, and Montgomery is a thrice burned county, so they may have been court records regarding Mary that burned up. But 6 children and not one Bond remains?
So taking it in a timeline, I want to explore the interesting lives of Polly's daughters, and yes, 6 children and all girls. Franie Jane will remain the mystery that she is. There is no hint of who her father may have been. But for Margaret, I had seen that some of her descendants had her father as an A. B. Hogan. So, who was A. B. Hogan? I began a search for him and suddenly, I knew why he was getting the blame in 2020 for fathering Polly Deaton's children in the 1850's.
If you will notice, the marriage bond for A. B. Hogan and Marianne Deaton is co-signed by Levi Deaton. Levi Deaton was a son of William Deaton and Polly's brother. So she had gotten married. In 1855, she had already had 5 children. Lurena had just been born. Perhaps she was pregnant again and A. B. Hogan was marrying her to avoid prosecution, but then the child did not make it. Or perhaps he discovered she was untrue, or still tied to some of her previous baby daddy's, but by 1860, Polly was living with her parents and going by the name Deaton, not Hogan. And what about A. B. Hogan?
He had to be one Alexander Hogan. He was the only "A" Hogan male near by of the appropriate age, and he lived right in the neighborhood, in the small sparsely inhabited township of "Hill".
So, in 1858, just 3 years after he married "Marianne Deaton", Alexander Hogan married Martha Jane Freeman, and this time a Henry Crowder was his bondsman.
So, 2 years later in the 1860 census, when Polly and her daughters are living with her parents, Alexander and his bride, Martha Freeman Hogan are living near Hunsuckers Store with their baby boy, Alfred, who sadly didn't make it to grow up.
So, what had happened between 1855 and 1858? I'm waiting on a CD of court cases from Archives for Montgomery County P's and Q's court. Did Polly and Alexander divorce? Did he have the marriage annuled for fraud or some other reason? Or did he just walk away from the whole thing without legal discourse and just commit bigamy? From what I've learned about the ways of the 19th century Uwharrie Mountain people, many of them just lived outside the lines and their "ways" were their own. Who needed a stinking piece of paper?
Early in the 1860's, Nancy Allen Deaton died and William Deaton, Polly's father, would marry a widow named Elizabeth Allen Lassiter, the widow of Joseph Lassiter. She may have been some distant relation to his first wife, Nancy Allen, but they were not sisters. They married on May 8, 1862.
Two of Mary's daughters would marry two of her stepmother's sons.
Margaret Ruby Deaton would marry Stephen Lassiter on Nov 18, 1865. He had already married a Sarah Cagle back in 1858.
He's shown with her in 1860, and they did not have any children. All of his children were born of Maggie Deaton.
She's still living in Little River and taking in borders.
Sidney Nannie Deaton married John Jacob Lassiter on March 8, 1869, another son of Elizabeth Allen Lassiter Deaton and her 1st husband, Joseph.
Amazingly, Sidney named her father on her marriage certificate: M Lammonds.
Malcolm Lammonds may have also been the father of Margaret Ruby Deaton .
Malcolm Lammonds is his old age
Malcolm Lammonds was from an old Scottish family, some of the earliest Sandhills settlers. He was a married man, having married Lucinda Kellis in 1846. He also got around, not staying in one place very long, and reportedly had went to Kentucky for a little while anticipating settling there. Finding the "Indian problems" a little much to handle, he quickly returned to NC. If he was the father of Polly's oldest girls, he had developed a zigzag pattern of going between Polly and his wife Lucy, because they seemed to rotate having babies every other year, opposite of the other.
Malcolm was typical of these ancient Uwharrie Mountain men of his era. He married in 1846. If Margaret Deaton was his first child, he was about 21 at her birth. Sidney was born in 1850 and his first known child with his wife Lucinda was in 1852. He had 6 children with Lucinda and she died by 1885. He was 61 years old at that time. His youngest child with her, Rachel, was 21 years old when he married his second wife, Cecelia Lake.
Celia "Lela" Lake Lammonds
He didn't rob the cradle with Cecelia, she was 32 when he married her, but he was 29 years her senior, certainly old enough to be her father. Together, they had 5 more children. Malcolm was 70 when his last child was born. He fathered 11 legitimate children with his two wives and at least one with Polly Deaton, possibly 3 or 4.
The above sheet from the 1870 census of the Little River community shows the family of Polly Deaton, which encompassed most of the sheet. She's in Household 67 with her youngest 3 daughters.
Above her is her daughter Sidney and husband Jacob Lassiter with baby, Millard.
Above Sidney is Mary's sister, Margaret Brewer, now widowed, with Franie Jane, Mary's daughter and her baby daughter, Emily.
Above them is the family of a Catherine Maners.
Above the Maners, is Jemima Deaton Smith, Polly's sister.
Above Mima is their father, William, with his new wife, Elizabeth Lassiter Deaton and her youngest daughter and a mystery 12 year old boy whose name starts with "O".
Another Maners or Maness family heads the page.
During the next decade, the youngest 3 daughters of Polly Deaton would marry.
Mary Elizabeth "Bettie" Deaton would marry on March 28, 1871 to Archibald Lammonds.
Lurena Louisa "Rena" Deaton would marry on August 24, 1871 to W. F. McCaskill.
Leatha Ellen Deaton would marry on March 12, 1876 ot John Thomas Freeman.
Now, going backwards, John Thomas Freeman was the son of William King Freeman and Elizabeth Hogan Freeman. As Alexander Hogan was happily remarried, there was no danger of him being Leatha's father, I don't believe.
W. F. McCaskill was the son of John M. McCaskill and Elizabeth Allen McCaskill...there's that Allen name again.
It's Bettie that has me worried. Several family trees also have her as the daughter of Malcolm Lammonds. However, she left the "father" line blank on her marriage license. She was born not too long after the birh of Sidney, who did identify her father on her marriage license.
Then, when I looked into who the father of Alexander "Sandy" Lammonds was. When I saw he named his father as "Malcolm Lammonds" on his birth certificate, I thought Bettie had married her half-brother. But, No, thank goodness. There were 2 Malcolm Lammonds in Montgomery County.
Sandy was the son of Malcolm "Wagonmaker" Lammonds and his wife, Margaret Leach. I'm sure there's a good chance that the family trees of the two Malcolms collide somewhere back. They may have been cousins, but Bettie and Sandy were not closely related.
By 1880, the babies were rolling in for the Deaton sisters.
Maggie and Stephen were living in the neighborhood, now called "Hill" and were up to 5 children.
Very close to them was Polly's siblings, Aaron Deaton, Mandy Deaton Dunn and Jemima Deaton Smith, as well as her widowed sister-in-law, Margaret. Oddly, or maybe not, Alexander Hogan also lived there in Deatonland.
Their mother, Polly, was now living with Sidney and Stephen Lassiter. It's the same neighborhood, all Deaton land. There's a few Freemans and Wards, but also Alexander Lammonds and wife Bettie, Polly's daughter and her brother, Levi Deaton and her daughter, Franie Jane and her husband Edmund Denson, with Polly's sister, Margaret Deaton Brewer, who took Franie in.
Sidney Nannie Deaton Lassiter
Knowing Bettie lived near her mother still, we leap to Rena's family,
Lurena and her husband, W.F. McCaskill are living in Hollingsworth, which is now considered Candor, among his people. Nearly all of the neighbors are McCaskill's, save a Murchinson and a McLeod.
Leatha, the youngest, is living in Little River Township, neighbors were primarily Leaches, Burroughs and Allens.
Below is the modern construct of Montgomery County Townships. Little River remains, "Hill" became Star and "Hollingsworth" became Biscoe, to my understanding.
By US Census, Ruhrfisch - taken from US Census website [1] and modified by User:Ruhrfisch, Public Domain
Franie Jane Deaton Denson was the first of Mary's daughters to pass away. Neither she, nor her husband, Edmund, made it to see 1900. It is not known exactly when they died or where they were buried. Somewhere in Eastern Montgomery County would be the best guess. Mary outlived her.
Theirs were not the only deaths in the family. Margaret was now the oldest sister in the family. She had been widowed on March 3, 1882, just one year after the birth of her youngest daughter, Margaret "Tishie" Lassiter. She had also lost her firstborn, Elmina, as a child. Her other children were grown and several married. She still had two at home at the turn of the century, Harley and Nancy Caroline.
Sidney, next in line, was also still living in Hill. She still had most of her children living with her and was fortunate enough to have given birth to 12 children with 11 living.
Bettie's family was listed on a page of Lammonds that has nearly faded away to nothing. Below is a photo of her youngest daughter, Alice Missouri Lammonds.
Alice Missouri Lammonds Whitt
Rena and her family are still living among the McCaskills in Hollingsworth. She is listed with having had 15 children and only 10 living. The names are only known of 13. Tombstones record she lost a set of twins in 1879.
Leatha was the one who moved around a bit. In 1900, she and John were living in Alamance County in 1900 and working in the cotton mills with some of their children. They would be found in Moore County ten years later, in Sheffields Township, just across the Montgomery County line. By 1920, they are found in Troy, where they would remain.
Leatha was very fortunate in that she had 6 children and all were living. In fact, none of her children lived extremely short lives, some actually made it into their 90's.
On Leatha's death certificate, her husband, John Thomas Freeman listed her parents as Billy Deaton and Nancy Allen. Those were her grandparents, and if would be next to impossible for Nancy, who was 56 at her birth, to be her mother. She was clearly Mary's daughter and is seen living with Mary as a child and only Mary is listed as her parent on her marriage license. J. T. was getting old by then as well, and would pass away a year after Leatha, so he may have been confused. Her father remains unknown.
As for Polly, she is living with a Britt family, and is a bit older by then than shown.
Polly passed away on February 3, 1908. She is buried in the Lassiter Family Cemetery with her daughters, Maggie and Sidney.
Polly left behind a large number of grandchildren. Despite her and her daughters humble beginnings, her grandchildren included ministers, doctors, business owners, farmers, mill workers and artists. Some of them scattered like the wind, while many of them remained in or near Montgomery County and she still has many descendants there today. Her descendants today identify both as Caucasian and African American, especially those from daughter, Franie Jane, whose husband Edmund Denson had a black father.
As best as I can determine, below is the list of Mary Ann "Polly" Deatons children and grandchildren.
Franie Jane Deaton
Born about 1845 and died before 1900.
Married Edmund Denson
1868 - Mary Emily
1875- Nancy C
1877- Fanny C
1880- Lucy Ellen
Margaret Ruby "Maggie" Deaton
Born April 5 1847 - Died December 30, 1929 Buried in the Lassiter Family Cemetery.
Married Stephen Lassiter.
1866- Elmina
1867-1925 John
1868-1950 Alexander Gordon
1870-1955 William E. "Buddy"
1872-1958 George Washington
1876-1947 Harley Lineberry
1878-1959 Nancy Caroline
1881-1884 Mary Tishie
Sidney Nannie Deaton
Born February 10, 1850 - Died February 5, 1922 Buried in the Lassiter Family Cemetery.
Married John Jacob Lassiter
1870-1928 Millard Filmore
1871-1956 Daniel D.
1873-1904 James Talley
1876-1928 Duncan
1878-1944 Anna L.
1881-1953 Minnie Bertha
1885-1949 Jesse Oscar
1887-1962 Ebbie Lee (male)
1888-1972 Deborah Etta
1890-1916 Sidney Lourena
1893-1921 Jacob Colon
Mary Elizabeth "Bettie" Deaton
Born March 1853 - Died September 26, 1929. Buried in the Lammonds Family Cemetery near Star.
Married Alexander "Sandy" Lammonds.
1872- ? Martha L.
1876-1947 Analiza Mae
1876-1933 David Calvin
1879 - 1918 Bennie Lee
1886- ? Mary E.
1892-1925 Alice Missouri
Lourena Louisa "Rena" Deaton
Born May 10 1854 - June 7 1938. Buried in the McCaskill Family Cemetery in Candor.
Married William Franklin McCaskill 1852-1925
1871-1925 Edward Alexander
1873-1875 James Mathew
1875-1947 John Winston
1878-1936 Burney Lee
1879 Twins- Names unknown, died as infants.
1881-1963 Minerva Victoria
1886-1966 Mary Elizabeth
1888-1955 Daniel Ornan
1890-1964 Elizabeth Margaret Loutisha
1895-1898 Elizabeth Leona
1898-1965 Charles Eller
Leatha Ellen Deaton
Born April 15, 1860 Died September 26, 1939. Buried in Southside Cemetery in Troy.
Chicken of the Woods is a mushroom that grows naturally in the Piedmont and Mountain regions of North Carolina. It is an edible mushroom who got its name from the chiche, "taste like chicken. This common fungus is a polypore, meaning it spreads its spores through small holes, or pores on the underside of it cap. There are various species of Chicken of the Woods. Some feed on dead trees, meaning they are saprotrophic, other species are parsitic and attack living trees causing rot and eventually death. They're also base feeder, prefering the bottom of the trees.They are easily identified by their yellowish orange colors and their stacked growth like houses on a hill.
During the September session of the Superior Court of Montgomery County, North Carolina in the year of our Lord, 1859 and the 83rd year of our Independence, Miss Mary McQueen and Kendrick Stewart had been ordered to appear in court on charges of Bastardy. Mary McQueen had been delivered of a child out of the binds of marriage, which child could be chargeable to, and therefore a burdon upon, the county. Kendrick Stewart had been named the father of the child and together he and Mary Catherine McQueen were required to post a $500 bond for the maintenance of 'said' child.
In the 1860 census, just one year after their court appearance, we find this unusual family grouping.
Mary McQueen has given birth to a little boy named Marquis Lafayette McQueen who is now 7 months old. True to his word, Kendrick Stewart is apparently taking care of his ill-begotten son, and his mother. In a situation we would find appalling today, he has moved the pair into his home with his wife, Sarah Thomas Stewart (or Stuart), whom was his second wife, that he married in 1842. The teenagers, William and Martha, were two of the children from his first marriage to Elizabeth Fersperman. He and Sarah have had 4 of their own, the youngest, James Buchanan "Buck" Stewart only a year old!
Oh my, how Sarah must have felt about this situation! And future patterns may have been a result of her pain and scorn.
So who exactly was Kindred or Kendrick Stewart (or Stuart)?
Born probably in Mecklenburg County, Kindred was an American, and North Carolinian of several generations, but of Scott origins. He was the son of William Everette Stewart and Mary Scarbert Stewart. In February of 1836, he had married Elizabeth Fesperman in Mecklenburg County. She was the daughter of John and Rebecca Fersperman of German origins and her folks were from Cabarrus County originally.
He and Elizabeth would have 3 children: Martha Ann, Lucinda Rebecca and William Everett II. After her death, he returned to Mecklenburg County and married Sarah Stewart.
In the 1850 census, Kindred is listed as a Wagonmaker. I believe they lived in a town, because his near neighbors included Sewell Freeman, Deputy Sheriff and Blacksmith Archibald Lammonds. Skilled craftsmen, professionals and merchants made up most of the neighborhood.
Name:
Kindrod Stewart
Gender:
Male
Age:
35
Birth Year:
abt 1815
Birthplace:
North Carolina
Home in 1850:
Montgomery, North Carolina, USA
Occupation:
Wagon Maker
Industry:
Railroad and miscellaneous transportation equipment
Living with him is his 73 year old father, Everette, also listed as a Wagon Maker for Railroad and misc.transportation equipment. They were professional tradesmen. While Everett lived with Kindred, his inlaws, John and Rebecca Fesperman, parents of his first wife, lived right next to him. Fred is 65 and Rebecca is 54, and he is listed as a Laborer.
The long-suffering Sarah must have been accustomed to compromise. First she married into a ready made family while barely more than a child herself, but she had to live with her husband's former inlaws next door as well, and on top of that, while she is pregnant, her husband has an affair, and then get dragged in to court, just to bring his mistress and her child into live with them.
So how did that situration turn out?
McCallum Family Cemetery, taken by Jerry Haywood for Find-a-Grave
Tragic, I am sad to say. Kindred's father, Everette Stewart died in 1854 at the age of 77. He was buried in the Old McCallum Cemetery west of Candor and off of Lovin Hill Road. This area is in the Uwharrie National Forrest now and very sparsely populated. It must have been a thriving community in its day, perhaps even a town, at the number of various names and tradesmen within them, in the cemetery. There is thought to have perhaps been a church here, the dirt path or road it is down, looks to have been a well-traveled road at one point in time, now abandoned.
Tombstone of Sarah Jane Stewart, age 4, taken by Jerry Haywood for Find-a-Grave
Also in the cemetery are two of Kindred and Sarah's daughters who died as children: Sarah Jane Stewart born on Feb. 16, 1852 and died Oct 25, 1856, aged 4 and Nancy Emeline Stewart, born Sept. 23, 1861 and died Oct. 5, 1863, age 2.
Here, also, we find the tragic end of Marquis Lafayette (McQueen) Stewart. Kindred must have loved his boy as much as he loved his other children. In the end, he had given him his name, Stewart, and buried him with a good marker for this grave in the cemetery with his grandfather and sisters. Marquis was 10 days away from being 4 years old. His date of birth was November 15, 1859 and his date of birth was November 5, 1863. As he died only one month after his half-sister, Nancy Emeline, I wonder if it could have been from a contagious disease they both caught.
After the death of his illegitimate son, Kindred Stewarts responisibility to his son, to Mary McQueen and to the County of Montgomery was over.
Tombstone of Marquis LaFayette Stewart, Age 3, taken by Jerry Haywood for Find-a-Grave
The marriage of Kindred and Sarah seemed not to suffer much. Sarah had given Kindred a son, James Buchanan "Buck" Stewart, the same year that Marquis was born. In fact, as Buck was born on March 5, 1859, Sarah was pregnant when Mary was impregnated by Kindred. Two years later, Sarah would have Nancy, who would tragically pass out just one month before Marquis. Two sons, Jefferson Davis and Benjamin Franklin Stewart, were born in 1863. More on that later. The point is, Sarah not only dealt with Kindred moving his mistress into the home, she continued to have children with him afterward. Modern, liberated women can not fathom the mindset of 19th century women to endure this kind of humiliation and treatment. However, at the time, women were all but completely powerless. Men had all of the freedom, albeit illegal, to pursue who they may and impregnate who they may. It was an entirely different life for women. And still is, to some extent, today.
Paducah in 1889
Sometime between 1877 and 1870, after the close of the Civil War, Kindred would relocate his family with Sarah Thomas to Paducah, Kentucky. Situated at the confluence of the Tennesee and Ohio Rivers, Paducah had been a strategic point during the war, and had been founded due to it's ideal location for and trade and transportation route, by Henry Clark of the infamous Lewis and Clark Expedition.
Here, Kindred is listed as a farmer. He's also said to have been born in Virginia, with Sarah being born in North Carolina. Some how, Benjamin Franklin Stewart was left out of this census.
Fort Massac, a French Colonial Fort built at the confluence of the two Rivers.
Sarah would die in 1872, just after the birth of her youngest child, Murdock. She is buried in Grahamville, Kentucky.
Kindred, now 57, would resettle just across the river in Massac County, Illinois. He would remarry in 1877 to a widow, Mrs. Matilda White.
Name:
Kindred Stewart
Gender:
Male
Spouse Name:
Mrs Matilda White
Marriage Date:
8 Nov 1877
Marriage County:
Massac
Comments:
This record can be found at the County Court Records, Film # 0961837 & 0963668 - 0963669.
In 1880, Kindred and family are living on the Illinois side of the Ohio River in Jackson Precinct, Massac County, Illinois. With him are youngest sons, Benjamin Franklin Stewart, Murdock Martin Stewar and Calvin Johnson Stewart. They are a little off on Murdock's age, as he wasn't born until 1872, Calvin was actually older, having been born in 1867. Also in the home is Matilda's daughter, Mary Caroline White. Matilda had been born Matilda Henley in North Carolina and married John C. White of Illinois. They only had the one child, Mary Caroline.
Kindred Stewart supposedly died in 1888. I have no record of that. I would guess in Massac County, Illinois or if not, in Paducah. Some have him passing away in Moore County, NC and I suppose that is possible, if he returned there, as some of his children did, but not likely. I say this because his step-daughter, Mary Caroline White, married James Wilson Thompson in Massac County, Illinois in January of 1888, the year Kindred supposedly died. In 1900, she and her family are living in Little Prairie, Peniscot County, Missouri, and her mother is living with her. It seems they just traveled down the river. I don't believe in his 60's or 70's, Kindred would have left Matilda to return to North Carolina. Possible but not probable.
A quick synopis of the children of Kindred Stewart to follow:
1) Lucinda Rebecca Stewart 1843-1877, married Daniel McLeod Thomas, 9 children.
In 1870, was in Montgomery, NC. Died in McCraken County, Kentucky.
2) William Everett Stewart 1844-1915 Married Jennett Elizabeth Monroe, 6 children.
In 1880 was in Jackson, Massac, Illinois. Died in Biscoe, Montgomery County, North Carolina.
3) Martha Ann Stewart 1847-1923, Married Willis Hughes, 4 children.
In 1880 was in Woodville, McCraken, Ky, died there in 1923.
4) John Kindred Stewart 1849-1911, married Mary "Mollie" Purcell, 5 children.
In 1880 was in McCracken, KY, also died there.
5) Sarah Jane Stewart 1852-1856. Died in Montgomery County, NC at 4 years old.
6) Daniel Ambers Stewart 1854- 1909, married Charity B Maners, 3 children.
In 1882 was in McCraken, KY, died in Humphrey County, Tenn.
7) Mary Ann Stewart 1856-1872, died in McCracken County, KY. Unmarried. Died as a teenager.
8) James Buchanan "Buck" Stewart 1859-1931. In 1880 was in McCracken County, KY. Married
Nancy Elizabeth Batton in Richmond County, NC in 1844, 2 children. Married 2nd to
Mary Jane "Mollie" Brown in Cumberland County, NC in 1909, 6 children. He moved around.
Buck was in Hamburg, Jackson County, NC in 1900.
He was in Biscoe, Montgomery County, NC in 1910, working as a Beef Market Salesman.
He was in Albemarle, Stanly County, NC in 1920, working in an Aluminum Plant, living on Pine.
As nearly everyone else on Pine Street worked in the Aluminum Plant, I will guess he was actually
in Badin.
He was still on Pine St in 1930, and was the Proprietor of a Cafe at age 71.
He died the next year in Badin, NC at 72 and is buried there.
Willis Hughes and Martha "Mattie" Stewart Hughes
9) Marquis LaFayette (McQueen) Stewart 1859-1863. Died in Montgomery County, NC, almost 4.
Son of Kindred Stewart and Mary McQueen, daughter of Malcolm and Nancy McQueen.
10) Nancy Emeline Stewart 1861-1863. Died in Montgomery County, NC 2 years old.
11) Jefferson Davis Stewart, 1863-?, only shows up in the 1870 census in McCracken County, KY.
12)Benjamin "Ben" Franklin Stewart 1863-1932. Married Lydia Pearl Miller, No children.
In 1880 in Massac, Illinois with father, brothers Calvin and Murdock.
Died in Humphries County, TN.
I have to pause for a minute to reflect on the previous two. Both were born in 1863. Were they
Twins? Jefferson only appears in the 1870 census. Ben appears in the 1880 census, and all
after that until his death. He is absent from the 1870 census. Was he just left out, or, consider
this, could they have been the same person? In 1863, the family would still be in North Carolina.
Naming a son for the President of the Confederacy was a pretty common thing in the 1860's.
But after moving to the Kentucky/Illinois border? Possibly a name change for the boy was
in order. Possible???
13) Calvin Johnson Stewart 1867-1961. Married Missie Pearl Marberry. 11 children.
In 1880 was in Massac County, Illinois with father, brothers Ben and Murdock and stepmother,
Matilda and her daughter, Mary. Died in Humphries County, Tennesee.
14) Murdock Martin Stewart 1872-1924, Married Olema Frazier from Yazoo, MS 2 children.
In 1880 Massac, Ill, in 1910, working as a Turpentine Woods Boss in Washington, FL
In 1920 Houston, Alabama working as an Operator, Fitter in the Turpentine Industry.
Died in Putnam, Florida. Did not show up in 1870 census, not born yet. Age in 1880 incorrect.
Murdock Martin Stewart
Side note, the death records of Murdock Martin Stewart claim he was born on August 5, 1872 in Raleigh, Wake County, North Carolina. Yet in 1870, two years before his birth, his father had already migrated to Paducah, Kansas. Kindred Stewart must have been involved in some kind of industry that involved a great deal of travel.
That was the end of the line for Kindred Stewart. His line goes on, all over the country, and I dare say, world, in 2020. But what about Mary?
Mary first appears in the 1850 census as a teen, living in the home of John and Christian Morrison, a couple whose children had apparently grown and gone, if they indeed had any at all. So, how did I determine this was Mary? First, one must understand that the area of Montgomery County where the McQueens had settled was on the Moore/Mongomery border. The 1860 census, when Mary and child were living with Kindred Stewart, it tells us that Mary was born in 1839. There were 3 other Mary McQueen's in the area in 1850. One was her grandmother, who was 80 years old. Another was her cousin, who was 4, and not old enough to be Mary. The other was Mary Catherine McQueen, daughter of James Batten McQueen and Nancy Britt McQueen, James Batten being a brother to the 4 year old Mary. Mary Catherine was born in 1850, so would not have been old enough to have a child in 1859 either. That left the 15 year old Mary, who was indeed born in 1839 and would have been 20 by 1859 and also an orphan at that time.
There are two connections between this couple and the McQueens. First, in the estate papers of Mary's grandfather, Alexander Murdock McQueen, there are several papers labeled John Morrison vs Admin of Alexdr' McQueen. At this juncture, I am not certain of the connection between Murdock McQueen and John Morrison, but there was one of some sort, wherein John Morrison felt entitled to an inheritance. Perhaps his first wife was a daughter of Murdock who predeceased him. I say this because John had married Christian, his wife in 1850, just 6 years prior. Murdock died in 1831.
Christian Morrsion was Christian McCaskill when she married John Morrison. Now, this couple was up in age. They were in their middle years when they got married, so there was a good possibility that Christian was a widow when she married John Morrison and McCaskill was not her maiden name. That said, Mary's mother was Nancy McCaskill McQueen. There could have also been a family connection there. Christian may have been her aunt. For the moment, I do not know the exact connection between the Morrison's and Mary McQueen, but there were positively two possibilities.
I do not find Mary past the 1860 census, but I do know she was alive until at least 1873, and this is why. Again, the hint lies with John and Christian Morrison.
In 1860, when Mary and her infant son, Marquis, are living with his father, Kindred Stewart, in the home of John and Christian McQueen, Mary's adoptive parents, is another McQueen, 4 year old Isabella, and Isabella has a full story of her own.
Finding her, I somehow knew that she had to have been the daughter of Mary Mcqueen, who would have been 17 when she was born, and that Mary had left her the care the Morrisons, who had raised Mary for half of her life. I don't know who Sarah Isabella McQueen's father was. I don't think it was Kindred Stewart, as she wasn't living with him and Mary and Marquis was.
Neither Sarah Isabell McQueen, or her mother Mary, are to be found in the 1870 census. They may have been living together by then, and just missed, as the Morrisons had passed away by then, or they may have been living in the household of another family and inadvertantly been given the wrong surname. The abundance of the names Mary and Sarah make it impossible to determine that.
But in 1873, in Montgomery County, at the age of 15, Sarah Isabelle McQueen married Neil Nicholson McQueen.
Neil is the youngest son of Alexander Marcus McQueen and his wife Sallie Ann Batten McQueen. Alexander was the brother of Isabelles' grandfather, Malcolm McQueen, therefore making Isabelle and Neil first cousins once removed.
The marriage certificate lists Neil as 23 and the son of Alexander M and Sarah McQueen, father living and mother living and Sarah Isabella McQueen daughter of unknown and Mary McQueen and father unknown and mother living. Therefore we know that on February 27, 1873, Mary McQueen was still living. They have Isabelle as being 18, however, comparing her age at death and in further census records, which match with her being age 4 on the 1860 census, she was 15, no more than 16.
Neil Nickelson and Sarah Isabella McQueen had a long and apparently happy life together and lots of children, as was common for the day. In 1880, they were farming in Montgomery County, Twenty years later, they had moved down to Richmond County.
Isabella reported that she had been the mother of 13 children, with 10 living. She was also literate and could read and write. By 1910, they had returned to the town of Biscoe, in Montgomery County, where they would remain in the 1920 and 1930 censuses, until their deaths. Neil died March 13, 1910, at the age of 61.
Sarah Isabella McQueen McQueen would live another two decades. She spent her last years with her daughter, Lillie McQueen Cagle and above is shown with her little granddaughter, Queen Isabella Cagle.
Sarah Isabelle McQueen passed away on December 6, 1931, at the age of 74. She was laid to rest beside her husband Neil, at Laurel Hill Church. Her death certificate gives her birthdate as May 1, 1857 and that she was born in Montgomery County, the daughter of father "Don't Know" and mother, Mary McQueen. She died of Bright's Disease and the informant was her son, John. So her children knew their grandmother. I wonder where Mary had been hiding.
The 13 Grandchildren of Mary McQueen, Children of Neil N. and Sarah Isabella McQueen were:
1874-1928 James Caspar McQueen, Died in Kannapolis, Cabarrus County, NC.
1875-1875 Baby Boy McQueen
1875-1875 Baby Girl McQueen
1877-1930 Lula McQueen, Died in Montgomery County, NC
1878-1956 Nanny Elizabeth Mc. Brewer, Died in Candor, Montgomery County, NC.
1880-1928 Murdock Alexander McQueen, died in Baltimore, Maryland.
1882-1942 William Butler McQueen, died in High Point, Randolph County, NC
1884-1950 Annie Belle Mc. Leach, died in Troy, Montgomery, NC.
1886-1969 Sarah Jane Mc. Crook, died in Troy, Montgomery, NC.
1889-1990 John Calvin McQueen, died in Lexington, Davidson County, NC.
1894-1968 Cornelia Florence Mc. Gray, died in High Point, on the Guilford County side of it.
1898-1998 Archie Lee McQueen, the third child who died by 1900, besides the twins. Biscoe.
1899-1982 Lillie Mae Mc. Cagle, died in Biscoe, Montgomery County, NC.
A photo of the Lacy Thompson house, last house in the defunct town of Lawrenceville, Montgomery County, NC
The family of Malcolm McQueen was scattered like dust in the wind. His wife, Nancy had obviously died and Malcolm may have been in ill health, himself. He had lost everything he may have had and his younger children had been distributed among family and neighbors.
He didn't live long after 1850, and did not make it to 1860. This is just a critical look at who were probably his children.
Malcolm was one of the sons of Alexander Murdock McQueen and his wife Mary Nickelson McQueen. His family were some of the newer immigrants from Isle of Skye, Scotland, to arrive at the port of Wilmington, NC, to make their way up the Cape Fear River to Chatham County and from there, into Moore and Montgomery Counties.
Murdoch McQueen last appears in the 1830 census of Montgomery County. His will was probated in 1831 in neighboring Richmond County, with several papers included in the husk from Montgomery County, and even summons of individuals from Cabarrus County. There was a suit filed, included in his probate papers by John Morrison vs Daniel McCormack, administer of A. M. McQueen, dated 1837. There was an unknown relationship between John Morrison and the McQueen family, unknown to me at this time, at least. A portion of this suit is shown above.
Name:
Murdock McQueen [Murdoch McQueen]
Home in 1830 (City, County, State):
East of Pee Dee and Yadkin River, Montgomery, North Carolina
Free White Persons - Males - Under 5:
1
Free White Persons - Males - 70 thru 79:
1
Free White Persons - Females - 20 thru 29:
1
Free White Persons - Females - 60 thru 69:
1
Free White Persons - Under 20:
1
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49:
1
Total Free White Persons:
4
Total - All Persons (Free White, Slaves, Free Colored):
4
Some of the older children of Alexander Murdoch McQueen were born in Scotland. Malcolm was born in 1809 in North Carolina. Most likely in Chatham County, but from what I can tell, most of his life was spent in Montgomery County.
Name:
Malcolm Mcquean
Home in 1840 (City, County, State):
East Pee Dee River, Montgomery, North Carolina
Free White Persons - Males - 5 thru 9:
2 Calvin and Alexander
Free White Persons - Males - 30 thru 39:
1 Malcolm
Free White Persons - Females - Under 5:
2 Mary and Sarah
Free White Persons - Females - 30 thru 39:
1 Nancy
Persons Employed in Agriculture:
1
Free White Persons - Under 20:
4
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49:
2
Total Free White Persons:
6
Total All Persons - Free White, Free Colored, Slaves:
6
In 1840, there were 3 households of McQueens in Montgomery County, Alexander, his brother, Elizabeth, his sister who never married, and Malcolm. Malcolm and Nancy had 4 children by then, Margaret, who was born in 1843, was yet to come.
In 1850, Malcolm is counted twice. First, with Nancy and Margaret Jane, where it's stated he was a Laborer, on the 21st of August, 1850, by C.W. Wooley and the second time on September 3, 1850, again by C.W. Wooley, when he and his son, Calvin, were working for A. A. McCaskill. In the first one, notice the order of the inhabitants of the home. Nancy A McQueen is the Head of Household, followed by Margaret J and then Malcolm. I do not believe this is Malcolm's wife Nancy. I believe this is his sister Nancy, as he had one. She has custody of his youngest daughter, Margaret, and Malcolm is boarding. I may be wrong, but this is how I see it. Married women were never the Head of Household, their husband was.
Of his other children, second son, Alexander, is living with Ferebee Wright, widow of Edward Wright, and Wilson Wright/Williams. They're all pretty much in the same neighborhood.
Daughter Sarah, age 10, is living in the household of a 70 year old Nancy McCaskill, possibly her grandmother. Also in the home is laborer, John C. Northcott.
John Morrison's lawsuit against the Administrtor of the Estate of Malcolm's father, Alexander Murdoch McQueen, is included in the probate files. I have not yet determined the relationship between John Morrison and the McQueens. John and his wife Christian were married in 1845 in Montgomery County. At 58 and 47, it was probably not the first marriage for either. Christian was a McCaskill when she married John Morrison. I can't tell if it was her married name or a maiden name. Mary McQueen's mother was a McCaskill. Christian may have been related to Mary or John Morrison may have been related to Mary through a first wife. Much more research will need to be done before any theory can be made feasible.
By 1860, there is no Malcolm and no Nancy and he did not leave an estate record. As for the children, Calvin McQueen would marry a neighbor, Margaret Smith, just days after C. W. Wooley counted him in the 1850 census with his father.
Name:
Calvin McQueen
Enlistment Age:
28
Birth Date:
abt 1834
Birth Place:
Montgomery County, North Carolina, USA
Enlistment Date:
22 Feb 1862
Enlistment Rank:
Private
Muster Date:
22 Feb 1862
Muster Place:
North Carolina
Muster Company:
E
Muster Regiment:
22nd Infantry
Muster Regiment Type:
Infantry
Muster Information:
Enlisted
Casualty Date:
26 Jun 1862
Casualty Place:
Mechanicsville, Virginia
Type of Casualty:
Wounded
Muster Out Date:
27 Jul 1862
Muster Out Information:
died wounds
Side of War:
Confederacy
Survived War?:
No
Title:
North Carolina Troops 1861-65, A Roster
Together, they would have 4 children, Martha, James, Margaret and Calvin. Only the oldest and youngest survived until adulthood. Calvin was killed in the Civil War in 1862. He also had a daugher Mary, with Diza Maners (McQueen). I can not confirm if they were married or not. In a court case, Dizie testified that her oldest daughter, Mary, was the daughter of Calvin McQueen, son of Malcolm.
Calvin McQueen 1832-1862
Calvins widow, Margaret Smith McQueen, would also end up in court in 5 years after his death for giving birth to a child out of wedlock. She testified that this child, her son, Larkin, was the son of a D. D. Deaton. Through the process of elimination, I have determined that D. D. Deaton was most likely Dison Deaton. The only other male "D" Deaton old enough to have been the father of Larkin was a Daniel Deaton, and like Calvin McQueen, had fallen in the Civil War. He was deceased years before the birth of Larkin McQueen.
Alexander McQueen is a bit of a mystery and I will look at him a bit more later.
Alexander McQueen 1836-1870 Mary E McQueen 1839- after 1873 I also blogged on Mary McQueen, who was taken to court on a bastardy bond with Kindred Stewart, an older, married man, who was found living in the household of the Stewart family, wife and all, in 1870 with her child.
Mary had been living with John Morrison and his wife, Christian McCaskill Morrison, in 1850 when she was 15. John Morrison is listed in the estate papers of her grandfather, Alexander Murdock McQueen, suing the administrator of the estate. Mary had two children: Sarah Isabelle McQueen (1856), father unknown and Marquis Lafayette (McQueen) Stewart (1859-1863).
Sarah Ann McQueen Northcott 1840-1928 In 1850, Sarah Ann McQueen, aged 10, was living with 70 year old Nancy McCaskill, maybe her grandmother. Also living there was a young man a decade older than her, John Calvin Northcott.
A few decades later, in 1873, John and Sarah were married. They settled into marital bliss for a brief spell, but sadly, John Clark Northcott would be deceased before 1880. They did have a son together, Archibald "Archie" Franklin Northcott, born in 1874, a year after the wedding. John Clark Northcott did not leave a will. His death may have been sudden, and the marriage was obviously a short one. He could have died anytime between 1873 and 1880.
A few years later, Sarah Ann was now 35 and widowed with a young son. Fifty year old Flora McCaskill is listed as her Aunt. This was certainly the same Flora McCaskill who was also living in the home of 70 year old Nancy McCaskill in 1850. This adds substance to my idea that Nancy was Sarah Ann's Grandmother. I've not done a great deal of pull apart work on the McCaskills. They were numerous and their propensity for renaming children with the same names as Aunts, Uncles and cousins can lead to a great deal of confusion. Flora was an independent woman, who had a land grant of her own in 1854, on Cabin Creek.
Sarah Ann McQueen Northcott was not finished with her family. In 1885 or 1886, she gave birth to a daughter named Bianca Jane Northcott.. Bianca is sometimes seen as Byancie or some variation of that, so I've just been calling her Beyonce'.
Stock photo of Beyonce Knowles, Ibid.
In 1910, Bianca married Oliver Luther. On their marriage license, his parents are given as Silas and Elizabeth Luther. On Beyonce's, only her mother, Sarah Ann Northcott is listed, with father left blank. Now, looking through family trees, there are multiple descendants of Biancey and Oliver Luther listing her father as John Clark Northcott or Northcutt. I hate to tell them, but they are not Northcotts. A man who died before 1880, and is throughly not seen again, he didn't just abandon them, he disappeared completely, on to another realm..... did not father a child in 1885. A few even have this illusive "Franklin Northcott" as her father. Franklin was her brothers middle name. I sincerely hope her 9 year old brother, at the time, was not her father. And he was not. In fact, a few dilligent researchers have apparently discovered that her father was one Martin Cagle, which makes a great deal of sense, as there were numerous Cagle's in the neighborhood.
I have just made it through the 1840 and 1850 bastardy bonds. I am sure once I get into the 1860's and beyond, I may find some of the clues to the appearance of these mysterious babies. The Scots in this area seemed to have a propensity towards them.
Northcutt Tombstone from Find-A-Grave
Sarah Ann spent most of her widowhood living with her son, Archie. She lived a long life, passing away in 1928 at the age of 88. She is buried at the Macedonia Presbyterian Church, where she was also baptized in her youth, with her son, Archie, who never married.
Archie joined her in 1852, at the age of 77. Archie had amassed a small estate, having no one to spend it on, and left will, leaving everything to his sister, Bianca, her daughters Rosa Bell and Ruby Gray and their children. Sarah Ann McQueen Northcott only had the two granddaughters.
Margaret Jane McQueen Margaret was the youngest daugther of Malcolm and Nancy McCaskill McQueen. She was seen living with Malcolm in one of his two appearances in the 1850 census, living with whom I believe was his sister, not his wife. Both were named Nancy.
Ten years later, she is living with the family of Wilson and Diza Wright/Willams. Diza had a child, Mary Ann, by Margarets brother, Calvin. In places she is listed as a McQueen, but I've not found any documentation that Calvin and Diza were ever legally married. That does not mean that they were not. However, he did marry Margaret Smith in 1851 and have several children with her, and Diza's daughter with Calvin was born about 1853, so it appears to have been more of and affair.
Diza's husband Wilson, and again, I find no proof of a legal marriage in this relationship either. Wilson's surname was interchangibly Wright and Williams. This indicates that most likely, his parents were not married, and he was known by both names.
Also boarding with the Wright-Williams was Elizabeth McQueen, 11. Elizabeth was the daughter of J. B. McQueen and Nancy Britt McQueen and the granddaughter of Malcolms brother, Alexander M. McQueen, Sr. She was therefore Margaret's first cousin once removed.
Another unusual thing about this family grouping is that while Diza was a Caucasian of the area's dominating Scottish ilk, Wilson was a man of color. What color exactly is debatable, as he was most certainly of mixed race. He seemed to be able to cross the colorline quite easily, as well. He may have had some African ancestry, but there is some indication he was part Native American, instead. It's also very likely he was tri-racial. There were, and still are, remnant bands of Native Americas centered in nearby Robeson and Scotland Counties, that would make their way into Montgomery, Moore, and Richmond Counties, primarily, looking for work. They had tried to adopt the European ways of living and farming, to fit in. At the time, they were called Croatan for the most part. Today, they are known as Lumbee, Tuscarora or Haliwa-Saponi. They were a handsome people, and many of these local farm girls would swoon. I've found several instances in my own Stanly County, where a local girl had found love, but not marriage, with one of these Native American migrants.
Lumbee PowWow from Lumbee Tribe Homepage
While in any other place in the South, prior to the Civil War, or even afterwards, this family grouping would have been unheard of, it stirred no stew in this portion of Montgomery County. It was not alone in its existence, and not totally uncommon. For a white woman to marry or live with a non-white man was one thing, but for two young white orphans girls to be placed or to live in their family home as boarders, that was something unseen almost anywhere else in this time frame.
Margaret would never marry, but that does not mean she did not become a mother. On August 7, 1867, she gave birth to a daughter she named Marjorie M. McQueen. Above is the mother/daughter listing in 1880. Margaret is not to be found in 1870. Neither was Mary E. McQueen or Sarah Ann McQueen Northcott or their Aunt Flora McQueen. It seems the 1870 census taker missed an entire neighborhood. Who knows, maybe they wanted to be missed.
Margaret would not make it to 1900, but Marjorie would. Marjorie also never married, but that does not mean she did not become a mother. At the age of 31, Marjorie Magdalene McQueen gave birth to a son she named Theodore. She would raise him in Troy and work as a Cook. Theodore would take care of his mother, then, after he was grown. He married at 22, to Ada Scarboro and they raised a family of 4 children, and lived in Montgomery County.
Marjorie lived to be 81, and truly has one of the saddest death certificates I have ever read. She died of Myocardial Infarction after falling and breaking her hip. She suffered for 14 long days.
Okeewemee School, including Theo McQueen. Shared by Jim Kelly
In summary, Malcolm McQueen died in his 40's and left a scattered array of children whose lives did not lead him to have the abundance of descendants that most 19th century families produced.
The immediate descendants of Malcolm and Nancy McCaskill McQueen were;
1) Calvin McQueen 1832-1862
With Diza Maners McQueen Williams: A) Mary Ann McQueen Rich 1854-1902
With Margaret Smith McQueen B) Martha Jane McQueen Hubbard 1855-1918 C) James Andrew McQueen 1856 - before 1870 D) Margaret E. McQueen 1860 - before 1870 E) William Calvin McQueen 1861-1928
Note: Margaret's son Larkin born in 1867 was not Calvin McQueen's, but by a D.D. Deaton.
2) Alexander Malcolm McQueen 1837-1870. No known children.
3) Mary E. McQueen 1839-1873
A) Sarah Isabelle McQueen McQueen 1857-1931 B) Marquis LaFayette (McQueen) Stewart 1859-1863
4) Sarah Ann McQueen Northcott or Northcutt 1840-1928 A) Archibald Franklin Northcott 1876-1952 B) Bianca Jane Northcott Luther 1885-1962
5) Margaret Jane McQueen 1843- bef 1900 A) Marjorie Magdalene McQueen 1867-1941
Some members of this family may have been buried at the Old Scottish Cemetery just across the county line in Moore County, in the McCaskill Family cemetery, the Laurel Hill Cemetery, or the Macedonia Presbyterian Church Cemetery in unmarked or no longer marked, graves.
The Scottish immigrants into the Sandhills of Montogomery, Moore, Richmond and Scotland Counties in North Carolina were very fond of the name "Alexander". I am not certain if this was because they had a certain affinity for Alexander the Great, or for some other reason. What I do know is that both Malcolm McQueen and his brother Alexander Marcus "Sandy" McQueen, sons of Alexander Murdoch McQueen, both had sons named "Alexander M. McQueen", obviously in honor of their father. These identically named cousins of relatively the same age, make it a little difficult to decipher who was who in the old records. The following is my theory of which Alexander was which.
In 1840, there were only 3 McQueen households, that of 3 siblings, Malcolm, Alexander and their unmarried sister, Elizabeth. So we know that the younger ones to come fit under two roofs, Malcolms family or Alexanders family. Alexander's family (nickname 'Sandy'), was intact. He also left solid records and a family bible, so we know who his children were. Malcolms had been sparsed out to family by 1850.
There were other siblings about of Malcolm and Sandy, other children of Murdoch and Mary Nicholson McQueen. Elizabeth and Nancy never married and remained in Montgomery County. Hugh camped in Chatham and later went west to Texas. Anne married a Street and lived in neighboring Moore County. Daniel spent his time between Robeson and Marlboro County. John settled in Richmond County.
Below is the family of Sandy McQueen in 1850. His son Alexander Jr is 15 years old, born in 1835. His older 3 children, Herbert, Betsy and John Batten McQueen have already struck out on their own.
Alexander (Malcolm) McQueen, born in 1836, is 14, just one year younger than his cousin. In 1850, he is living with Ferebee Wright, the widow of Edward Wright. Also in the home is Wilson Williams, a man who keeps creeping up in the study of these families and who has an interesting story of his own.
I'm not quite sure why the children of Malcolm McQueen were scattered among other households. I do know their mother was deceased and perhaps, their father was ill. He did not live until 1860.
In the other, 25 year old A M McQueen, born in 1835, is working as a carpenter. He's living with a 22 year old Martha J McQueen and 31 year old Daniel McQueen.
Confused yet? I'm about to make it worse.
Name:
Alex M McQuean
Gender:
Male
Spouse:
Martha Semmons
Spouse Gender:
Female
Bond date:
26 Nov 1859
Bond #:
000084921
Level Info:
North Carolina Marriage Bonds, 1741-1868
ImageNum:
007114
County:
Montgomery
Record #:
01 026
Bondsman:
Robert Crowder
Witness:
John McLennan
In November of 1859, just one year before the 1860 census, Alexander M. McQueen married Martha Simmons (misspelled Semmons here). The bondsman was Robert Crowder and witness, John McLennan. So, which grouping did this Alexander and Martha belong to, the 27 year old Mechanic or the 25 year old Carpenter? Oh, and by the way, they both lived in Diffies, as if that helps.
We have 35 year old Alexander McQueen, a Millwright, living in Cocke County, Tennesee, with his wife Susan, and they have a 2 year old daughter, Mary Jane.
So, he had been on his way to Tennesee.
So, what was going on back in Montgomery County, NC? You might ask yourself, did Martha J Simmons, who married an Alexander M. McQueen in 1859, die? And then he married Susan Parker?
No, she did not die, not yet, anyway. Above is Martha McQueen (those transcription errors hard at work again), 30 and her 7 year old son James. Not to far from her is another household:
That of Alexander "Sandy" McQueen Sr. Now, I really can't blame the transcriptionists too bad for this one because the census taker here for 1870 had very sloppy handwriting. 'A M Mclucia' is really 'Alexander Marcus McQueen Sr., his wife, Sarah, and their youngest son, Neil. There's a 7 year old Sarah, who turns out to be their granddaughter, living with them. 1870 is after the Civil War. Linda, age 30, and the children Mandy, Abram, Betsie and Reed, are all listed as black, the first four individuals as white.
In a minute, I will look closer at the two mentioned children, James and Sarah. For the time being, I need to look at an event that seemed to change everything, the Civil War. So, in 1870, we have a 35 year old Alexander McQueen with his wife Sarah and little girl, Martha, 2, living in Tennesee. We have Martha Simmons McQueen living alone with her 7 year old son, James, in Montgomery County. Was one of the Alexanders killed in the Civil War?
Name:
Alex M McQueen
Age:
27
Birth Date:
abt 1835
Enlistment Date:
20 Mar 1862
Enlistment Place:
Orange CH, Virginia, USA
Rank:
Private
Military Unit:
Fourth Infantry
I found an Alexander M McQueen who enlisted in the 4th Infantry a Orange Courthouse, Virginia.
North Carolina Troops 1861-65, A Roster; Southern Historical Society Papers: Appomattox Paroles ANV; Various Cemetery listings on the internet
This 27 year old Alexander McQueen was injured at the Battle of Seven Pines, Virginia. It is said that he Surrendered, survived the War, had been a resident of Rowan County, NC and is buried in Pulaski, Arkansas.
A search for an Alexander McQueen in Rowan County only brings up the above military record. A search for an Alexander McQueen in Pulaski Arkansas brings up Alexander McQueen, born in NC in 1834 and died in Pulaski, Arkansas in 1823.
So, which Alexander McQueen was he?
Let's step back and take a look at the children of Martha Simmons McQueen.
Sarah Ann McQueen, born about 1861, was the daughter of Alexander M. McQueen, Jr. and Martha Simmons, who married in 1859. In 1870, as I've shown, she lived in the household with her grandparents, Alexander McQueen, Sr. wife, Sarah and youngest son, Neil. The name of Sarah Ann McQueen could be as confusing as Alexander, because she had an Aunt, Sarah Ann McQueen, born about 1840, who married John R McQueen, son of John McQueen of Richmond County, a brother of Alexander Sr. They were first cousins. There was also another cousin, whom I mentioned in my post on the children of Malcolm McQueen, named Sarah Ann McQueen, who born about 1839 or 1840, who ended up marrying Neil McQueen, who was in the household with this Sarah Ann in 1870. They were also first cousins. Not only were they not very original, they certainly liked keeping in it the family.
On January 9, 1876, in Montgomery County, NC, this younger Sarah Ann McQueen would marry James Stevens Lake. She was 15 and he was 22, but at least he was not a relative. James Lake was the son of John Frederick Lake and Selina Wright Lake, and an orphan. He'd lost his father in 1863 and his mother in 1865.
On the marriage license, James parents are listed as deceased, however, Sarah Ann's parents, Alex'r and Martha McQueen are both listed as living. The ceremony was conducted by D. Deaton, Justice of the Peace and witnesses were Neil McQueen, Daniel Deaton and a G. L. Jordan.
They wasted no time having children, and Ida Lou Lake was born on September 2, 1878 and her brother, James Alexander Lake came exactly a year later in September of 1879.
Now, where do we find this family in 1880, just a year later? Living with Alexander McQueen and his wife, Sarah, in Saline County, Arkansas. But remember, Sarah Ann was the daughter of Alexander McQueen and Martha Simmons McQueen. The Alexander McQueen who married Susan Parker in McDowell County in 1867 and made his way from there to Tennesee and then down to Arkansas is now listed as the father of Sarah Ann McQueen Lake. She, her husband and two children are living with him. But Martha is back in Montgomery County, living down the way from his father.
So, now two Alexanders have merged into one, but not really. It just appears that Malcolms son Alexander disappeared into thin air. He must have died a young man, possibly in the Civil War. When you add these two in with their cousin, Alexander Joseph McQueen of Richmond County, it gets a little murky in the Civil War records.
I began by thinking one Alexander married Martha and another married Susan, but this was not the case. Neither did Alexander become a widower before remarrying. I do not know if he bothered to get a divorce, or if he just left Martha after the war and committed bigamy. Things were a bit informal sometimes during those years, apparently. He may have just said, "Buh-bye" and didn't look back.
What happened between Alexander and Martha? We may never know, but there may have been one hint in the person of James R. McQueen. While Sarah went to join her father in 1880, her son was even said to be born in Tennesee, James R. stayed in North Carolina. He also left his father's name off of his documents. He may have been angry, or, he may have had another mans genes.
So, the remainder of the story unfolds for only ONE Alexander M. McQueen.
His daughter Sarah appears to have died in Arkansas before 1886. Her husband, James Lake remarried a Cynthia Perkins and has 10 more children.
Alexander and Susanna standing between porch posts. Daniel Lee standing right of Alexander. Unknown female in front of Alexander. William Haywood and wife Nancy by Susanna. Right of Haywood are Frank Ellis and Mittie McQueen-Ellis with four children. Unknown family on left could be Mary Jane Molly and husband John William Lawrence.
Alexander spent the remainder of his life in Pulaski County, Arkansas. He and Susan had a large family of their own and Alexander farmed and ran a mill until his death in 1923. In the 1920 census, at age 87, he is still listed as a Mill Wright.
Their children were;
1868' Mollie' - Mary Jane 1869 Margaret Alice 1870 Elizabeth 1871 Harden Quevnee 1876 Nancy Lourena 1878 Nina Belle 1880 William Haywood 1883 Daniel Lee 1886 Cornelia Ellen
Those who research their family trees need to remember first and foremost, that their ancestors were only human, wretched, fallible, ignoble, indulgent, loving, generous, loyal, emotional, courageous, jealous, unpreditible, steadfast, altruistic, imperfectly perfect human beings.
We have a tendancy to put them on pedestals, are if they were incapable of mistakes, human frailties or emotions. Many were tough and lived through tough times, but while times have changed, human motivation and desires have not.
One thing that has changed is context. It tends to be trendy. What was the norm a hundred, two hundred years ago, can be completely foreign concepts to us now. What it took to survive in the early years of American history, can indeed be, a thing of the past. We can not judge our ancestors on todays standards. They didn't live in our day, they lived in theirs. They lived the life they knew. They did what they did out of either what it took for them to survive in their day, or because they didn't know any other way. Their routines did not mirror ours, neither did their families, neither did their motivations. So, sometimes, finding out things about local people in the 1800's can really be mindboggling, based upon what we think we know, today.
The story of the family of Alexander Marcus McQueen, however, is one unlike any other I've ever came across in my many years of digging into old records and old families of Stanly, Anson, Montgomery and surrounding counties. I'm here to recount it. It began quite as normally as any story in the peopling of North Carolina.
Alexander Marcus McQueen, Sr., was born on August 11, 1799 on the Isle of Skye, Scotland. Supposedly, he left the British Isles as a 3 year old toddler, aboard a ship called "The Duke of Kent" from Liverpool and survived a 3 month journey to the port of Wilmington in North Carolina, arriving late in October of 1802. He was in the company of his parents, Alexander Murdoch McQueen and Mary Nicholson McQueen and his three older sisters, Elizabeth, Nancy and Anne. Helmed by a Captain Thompson, others from his homeland, some no doubt relatives, were also onboard. Among those companions were Kellys, McCaskills, McGillrays, McLeods, McDonalds, Nicholsons and other McQueens.
After arriving in Wilmington, the McQueens at some point would make their way up the Cape Fear River to Fayetteville, then Chatham County, and would eventually settle in Montgomery County, NC on the eastern border with Moore. Four more sons would be born to them in America: Hugh, Malcolm, Daniel and John.
Sandy McQueen, as he would be known, grew up in the eastern Montgomery County sandhills and on November 13, 1823, at the age of 24, he would marry Sarah Ann Batten, aged about 16.
Name:
Alexr McQueen [Alexr M Queer]
Home in 1830 (City, County, State):
East of Pee Dee and Yadkin River, Montgomery, North Carolina
Free White Persons - Males - Under 5:
2
Free White Persons - Males - 30 thru 39:
1
Free White Persons - Females - Under 5:
1
Free White Persons - Females - 5 thru 9:
1
Free White Persons - Females - 20 thru 29:
1
Free White Persons - Under 20:
4
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49:
2
Total Free White Persons:
6
Total - All Persons (Free White, Slaves, Free Colored):
6
He first appears in the 1830 census of Montgomery County as a young man in his 30's with 4 young children, two boys and two girls, all under 9, and a wife in her 20's. He lost his father the very next year, in 1831.
Total All Persons - Free White, Free Colored, Slaves:
9
Ten years later, the family had grown exponentially, as they tended to do in those days. Oddly, although Alexander was named as the Head of Household, he seemed to be missing. The only other McQueens in this census, in Montgomery, were his brother Malcolm, with a wife and 4 young children, and his single sister, Elizabeth. In Elizabeth's household were 3 women, two of middle age and one elderly, and a boy over 10 and under 15. The elderly lady had to be his mother, Mary and the two middle-aged women his single sisters, Elizabeth and Nancy. I don't know who the young boy could have been., Or, where Alexander could have been.
As far as land grants are concerned, he recieved his first one in 1825, at the age of 26, on 'Riches' Creek.
Name:
Alexander McQueen
Issue Date:
26 Sep 1825
Residence Place:
Montgomery, North Carolina, USA
Certificate Number Range:
2410-2639
Description:
Montgomery 2410-2639
He recieved another late in 1844 for 85 acres on the waters of Little River. Things seemed to be progressing along normally.
The 1850 census finds Alexander at 51 and his wife Sarah at 43, with 6 of their 9 children still at home. Also living with them is his mother, Mary. She would pass away in 1859.
There is another Schedule attached to the 1850 census that Alexander McQueen is mentioned in. That was the 1850 Slave Schedule. In 1840 and before, slaves were counted within the family unit, and acknowledged separately by age and gender. In 1850 and 1860, they were listed in a separate schedule by again, just age and gender and color, under the name of the slave owner. In 1850, Alexander had 2 enslaved people in his household, a 19 year old girl and a one year old infant boy, probably the son of the 19 year old girl.
Laurel Hill Baptist Church is a modern, thriving church located on the Troy-Candor Road in Montgomery County, NC in the small community of Candor. It has a very long history, however, with an active congregation of nearly 200 years. It's records can be accessed by request here:
Within these records can be found a peek at the life of Alexander Marcus McQueen and a few of his children. For instance, Sandy was baptized 'at the river' with seven other of the faithful in August of 1852. I am assuming that they were referring to the Little River, probably near its fork with Cedar Creek. Three of his children are mentioned as members in 1852, Elizabeth, Mary Jane and Jr. In September of 1854, Alexander, Sr. has fallen from grace. He is referred to as Brother Sandy and has admitted to drinking too much and asked to be forgiven by his fellow churchgoers. This sort of behavior goes on for awhile. He's acknowledged as a member however, for quite awhile. Sometimes it is difficult to decipher which Alexander is being referred to, but in the 1868 list of members, we can know it is Sandy Sr because his son Alexander, Jr. had married in McDowell County in 1867 and headed on to Tennesee after that.
By 1860, only 3 of his nine children with his wife Sarah, remain in the nest, youngest daughter, Sarah Ann, who is soon to marry her first cousin, John R. McQueen, youngest son Neil, a 'menopause baby', and unmarried son, Daniel. Everyone else has married and are out on their own starting their own families.
Name:Alexr Mcqueen Residence Date:1860 Residence Place:Bruton or Troy, Montgomery, North Carolina, USA Number of Enslaved People:7 All Enslaved People:
In the slave schedules, the number of enslaved people in Alexanders household has increased to 7. The noticeable thing about Alexander's slaves is that unlike most farms who need, for the most part, young men to help with the labor, Sandy only has one woman, a teenaged girl and the rest are small children.
In the actual document of the schedule, Alexanders name and the beginning of his list are located at the bottom of the previous row, the top of this page, above Abram Coggins, falls under the name of Alexander McQueen. If you notice, the 6 year old female and the 17 year old female are listed as "B", for black. The 2 year old male and the 1 year old female are listed as "Mu" for Mulatto, or of mixed race.
The Civil War came and went and miraculously, Sandy lost no sons. He had already lost as son, however, as James Batten McQueen had passed on March 11, 1855 leaving a widow, Nancy Britt McQueen and 4 daughters, Elizabeth Ann, Mary Catherine, Nancy Evangeline, and Sarah Jane.
Despite the fact that Sandy and Sarah had lost no sons, does not mean the area or their family was without any kind of devastation. Montgomery was a divided land. Due to Quaker influence on their northern and eastern borders, Montgomery was full of disenters. It was not much of a plantation economy, unlike Anson and counties further down the PeeDee River into South Carolina. Theres was a War within a War, and the county was known for hiding deserters and unionists.
The census taker for the Candor area where the McQueens lived was an Eli Harris. His handwriting was lax and his diligence lacking, as he seems to have missed half or more of the neighborhood. People show up in 1860 and 1880, but not 1870. Not only that, the later transcriptionists would have problems trying to read his handwriting. Each page must be examined individually. He did however, find the family of Sandy McQueen.
Sandy is now 71, and the born in NC is incorrect. His wife, Sarah, is 55 and the only child to remain at home is Neil, now 21. He will marry soon, to Sarah Isabella McQueen, daughter of Mary E. McQueen, Neil's first cousin and daughter of Sandy's brother, Malcolm. She may or may not have been the daughter of Kindred Stewart. I posted on this family here:
Seven year old Sarah, listed under the name of Neill, was Sandy and Sarah's granddaughter, the daughter of their son, Alexander M. McQueen, Jr and his first wife, Martha Simmons McQueen. Her mother and brother live down the lane from Sandy and Sarah. This youngest Sarah would marry a James Stevens Lake and eventually follow her father to Arkansas.
The other 5 people in the household of Sandy McQueen are former slaves of his who have now been freed, but remain in his home. But they are more than that. The 1870 census is the first in which all of the population of the county was noted by name.
30 year old "Lends" is Linda. 17 year old "Mande" is, I believe, actually Hannah. 6 year old Abram is correct as is 4 year old Betsy or "Bet", as she was later known. 2 year old "Reed" is a transcription error. It actually says "Bud" and his name was Alexander, I am guessing Bud for a nickname.
Abandoned house in Candor, NC
The 1870 census is the last census that both Sandy and Sarah will appear in. Grandchildren gave the date of their marriage as 1823 and the date of death of Sarah Batten McQueen as July 4, 1877.
Sandy outlived her for a brief spell and knew his time was imminent, so on March 7, 1878, he wrote his will. Below is a transcription of that will as shared to Rootsweb.com by a rather anonymous contributor labeled 'scgen'.
Will of Alexander McQueen I Alexander McQueen of the County of Montgomery & State of North Carolina. Being of sound mind and memory, but considering the uncertainty of my earthly existance do make and declare this my last Will and testament in manner and form following:That is to say:First that my executors Shall provide for my body a Deacent Burial Suitable to the wishes of my relations & friends and pay all funeral expenses together out of the money that my first come into their hands as a part or parcel of my Estate. First I give and devise to my youngest son Neil N. McQueen m yentry of Eighty -five acres of land adjoining my old land ,Coggins, Martin, Jordan & others to have and to hold to him & his heirs in fee simple forever. Also, I give & bequeath to him the said Neil N. McQueen his choice of my rifle guns. Second, I give & bequeath to the widow of my eldest son, James McQueen the sum of fifty cents to his children as follows. To Elizabeth Leach five dollars and to Mary McQueen fifty cents & to Nancy Manus fifty cents & to Sarah Deaton the sum of fifty cents .My will and desire is that all the residue of my estate after taking out the devises & Legacies above mentioned shall be soldand the debts owing to me collected & the surplus after havingthe expinses & Legacies shall be equally divided and paid over to my children named below in equal portions share and share alike to them & each & every of them their executors, administrators and assignes absolutely forever.To wit, Elizabeth A. Deaton, Daniel N. McQueen, Mary J. Pitman,John M. McQueen, Alexander M. McQueen, Wm B. McQueen, Sarah Ann McQueen, Neil N. McQueen and lastly I do constitute and appointmy son Neil N. McQueen & my son in law Dison Deaton my lawful Executors to all intents and purposes to execute this my last will and testament according to the true intents and meaning of the same and every part and clause thereof hereby revoking and declaring utterly void all other wills and testaments By me heretofore made in witness whereof I the said Alexander McQueen do hereunto set my hand and seal This 27th day of March 1878. Alex McQueen {seal}Signed sealed published and declared by the said Alexander McQueen to be his last will & testament in the presence of us whoat his request and in his presence do subscribe our names as witnesses thereto.Witnesses:BT Coggin GW Allen
He had provided most for his youngest son, Neil and for the widow, Nancy Britt McQueen, and daughters of his deceased son, James Batten McQueen. Also mentioned, however, were the remainder of his children with his wife, Sarah Batten: Elizabeth McQueen Deaton, Daniel Nickelson McQueen, Mary Jane McQueen Pittman, John Murdoch McQueen, Alexander M. McQueen, Jr., William Butler McQueen, and Sarah Ann McQueen McQueen. But according to his youngest son, Neil, he had left out a great number of his children.
More on the probate of his estate and what I meant by that last statement in my next post.
Information for this post came from records found on ancestry.com and family search. The church records of Laurel Hill Baptist Church. The family records of Lee Koontz of Davidson County, NC. The family tree of James Deaton. Information from files in the Davidson County, North Carolina History Room in the McQueen family file.
In archaeology, is is not always possible to identify bone fragments. The fragments of a leg bone, a jaw with teeth, portions of a broken skull, what can these pieces, without the rest of the skeleton, tell us about an individual, a group, or an event?
Genealogy is akin to finding bone fragments and trying to put them together in such a fashion as to aid in imagining an individual, a family, in the way they were. African American genealogy is more difficult than most. Even after emancipation, finding records of a family's history, an individuals existence, even, is liking digging up bone fragments and trying to make sense of them. While some families were missed in certain censuses, black families were missed more often. Marriages were more often not recorded, and the same goes for deaths. Cemeteries were less likely to be maintained, graves less likely to have been marked. Families were more likely to be shattered and scattered. Fathers, and sometimes mothers too, sometimes had to work more than a walking distance from where they lived, so did not live with the rest of the family. And while all families, especially poor families, suffered the loss of little children from now preventible diseases and sometimes accidents due to parents working in the fields and children being unattended or underattended (a 7 year old minding the baby and it was eaten by a wild hog...I'm serious), black families lost them even more disproportionately. While a white family of 12 children were lucky if 75 percent of them made it to adulthood, black families were lucky if 25 percent of them made it to adulthood. Life was hard for all, but harder for people of color. I say this not from any source or material, but from my own personal experience of just trying to research them.
In Davidson County, North Carolina there exists a most unusual Family Bible. The Bible was the possession of Neil Nicholson McQueen,who was born in 1848 and who died in 1910. Neil was the youngest of the 9 children of Alexander Marcus "Sandy" McQueen and his wife, Sarah Batten McQueen. Neil was somewhat removed from the rest of the family. He was 25 years younger than his oldest brother and a full 8 years behind the next to the youngest in the family, Sarah Ann. Neil was a menopause baby, an afterthought. He was not a grandchild, as some of these much younger tag-a-longs tended to be. Sandy and Sarah were his parents, they were 49 and 41 when he was born, not so unusual.
Neil remained in his parents home until his marriage on February 27, 1873 to his first cousin once removed, Sarah Isabelle McQueen. Sarah Isabelle's mother, Mary, was the daughter of Malcolm McQueen, Neil's uncle and the brother of Sandy McQueen, Neil's father. Got that?
In his family Bible, Neil had recorded the arrival of his Scottish ancestors to America, the births and deaths of his siblings, and the typical family records that were kept in Bibles, a permanent record, in those days. What made Neil's Bible so unusual, is he recorded his whole family in the Bible.
My last post was on the father of Neil McQueen in a post called "The Sins of Sandy McQueen". You can find it here:
The reader may have read it and asked, "What sins?", as Sandy seemed to live a typical 19th century life as a Scottish-American having arrived to North Carolina as a child. Sandy got drunk a few times and was kicked out of the Baptist Church he had joined. Other than that fraility, he seemed so typical, and he was.
Name:
Alexander McQueen
Event Type:
Burial
Death Date:
1879
Burial Date:
1879
Burial Place:
Candor, North Carolina, USA
Church:
Macedonia Presbyterian Church
His death was recorded in the Presbyterian Church, at Macedonia.
But other than that, Sandy appeared to be a steadfast family man. But it depends on what you mean by steadfast.
The orignal copy of the Family Bible of Neil N. McQueen is in the possession of Lee and Kenneth Koontz of Lexington. There's a list of family records compiled by Linda Hendrick Smith in 2001.
In the Bible is recorded the names and statistical dates of the children of Sandy and Sarah Batten McQueen:
Elizabeth Ann "Betsy" McQueen was born 30 August 1824 in Montgomery County and died 3 April 1911 in Montgomery County.
James Batten McQueen was born 8 August 1826 in Montgomery County and died 11 March 1855 in Montgomery County.
Daniel Nichelson McQueen was born 2 February 1828 in Montgomery County and died about 1878 in Arkansas.
Mary Jane McQueen was born 12 Jan 1830 in Montgomery County and died 15 March 1912 in Candor, Montgomery County.
John Murdock McQueen was born 11 January 1832 in Montgomery County and died in (unknown year) in the Beaverdam Community of Richmond County, NC
Alexander Marcus McQueen Jr was born 11 September 1834 in Montgomery County, NC and died 24 April 1923 in Pulaski County, Arkansas.
William Butler McQueen was born 5 October 1837 in Montgomery County, and died about 1906 in Drew County, Arkansas.
Sarah Ann McQueen was born 21 May, 1840 in Montgomery County. Her death was not recorded, however she died in Montgomery County in 1938.
Neill Nickelson McQueen was born 3 November 1848 in Montgomery County and died on March 13, 1910 in same.
The unusual part of the Bible is that Neill had also recorded the birth of his half-siblings, 12 mulatto chldren that his father had with 3 women of African decent, before and after the Civil War, women his father had held in slavery and some he had maintained a relationship with, and had impregnated after emancipation. This is one of those facts you can only confront as "it is what it is". All we can do in our current atmosphere, our present theater, is to speculate and our speculation can only derive from our own mindset, and not theirs. We must simply accept fact as fact. Below is the other list of the "lost" children of Alexander Marcus McQueen:
Children with Hannah:
Smithe b 16 April 1843 Montgomery County, NC Sugoch b 29 August 1861 Montgomery County, NC Emley b 3 March 1864 Montgomery County, NC
Children with Len (Linda) Jerry born 12 Nov 1848 Montgomery County, NC George born 24 April 1852 Montgomery County, NC Moriah born 10 Mar 1894 " " " Hampton born 1 November 1857 " " " Jacob born 20 Feb 1859 " " "
Children with Lea McQueen (notice Lea is the only one whose last name, McQueen, is noted)
Hanner (Hannah) McQuean born 11 May 1861 Abe McQuean born 28 March 1864 Bet McQuean born 1868 Alex McQuean born February 7, 1870 died before 1880 in Montgomery County, NC Cranford MCQuean born 30 January 1871.
Note: Lea's children are the only ones given a last name, and the spelling was changed from McQueen to McQuean. Why was this? Was this to give them a unique name of their own, or to distance one branch of the family from another? Also, Alex McQuean is the only one whose death is noted at all.
I've looked through many a Family Bible and never encountered one wherein a man listed all of his father's illegitimate children, never-the-less one wherein the children of former slaves had been entered with the father being their former slave master.The closest I've seen are plantation journals sometimes kept by the lady of the house, the Mistress, if not the Master, which kept track of the births and deaths of the enslaved people much in the way of the registrar of a municipality. But, never in a Family Bible.
I wondered, who were these people and what happed to them.
The first group was fairly easy. In 1870, the following family was still living with Sandy and Sally McQueen. "Lends" was 30. In other places, she is seen as Linda. "Mande" is really Hannah if you look at the actual document, and she is 17. "Betsa" is Betsy and she is 4 and "Reed" really says "Bud" and he is 2.
Abe, Betsy and Cranford are living with "Lea" McQueen. Right above them is Neil McQueen, who kept the bible, their half-brother and below them is the family of Alexander Butler, his wife, Hannah and an 8 month old baby girl called "M. B.", listed as his step-daughter.
Recall the list in the Bible for Lea was Hannah 1861, Abe 1864, Bet 1868, Alex 1870 and Cranford 1871. So Lea's last child with Sandy McQueen was born after that 1870 census. Alex, or Bud, died as a child, so this is the complete list for her, Abe, Bet and Cranford are living with Lea, next door to Neil McQueen's family and right next to them is the newly married Hannah McQueen Butler, Lea's oldest daugther.
Hannah was married in 1878 to Alex Butler. Here, it states she was 22 in 1878, two years later, she is 19 in 1880. So age was fluid, suffice to say, she was a young woman.
And I discovered who the baby named "M. B." was, their daughter Mary Bell Butler Davis. The step-daughter title may have been incorrect. The above is from the death certificate of Mary Bell.
Now, the above enumeration was done in Troy Township on June 5, 1880 by B. F Simmons. Bet and Cranford are listed as the stepchildren of Gilbert Green, head of household.
The previous 1880 enuneration was conducted just 3 days later on June 8, 1880 in Cheeks Creek Township by Calvin Crunch. That's what it looks like, anyway, Calvin Crunch.
In that one, Abe, Bet and Cranford are living with Lea McQueen and listed as her sons and daughter and she is living next to Hannah and Neil. Abe only appears once in this census, but both Bet and Cranford appear twice at vastly different ages. They're not just one off its 12 and 9, which match the birth years in the Bible, compared to 17 and 16. Captain Crunch was way off on that one.
In April of 1880, just a few months before the census, Gilbert Green, aged 60, son of Bob and Sukey Green, married Linda McQueen, daughter of Ruffin McQueen, aged 40.
Weren't Lea and Linda two different people?
Lea Len
Hannah Jerry Abe George Bet Mariah Alex Hampton Cranford Jacob
So which mother belonged to which set of children? I have to look closer into the children for clues.
We've already seen that Hannah McQueen married Alex Butler and on her marriage certificate her mother was listed as "Lee". But the witnesses to the wedding were Neil McQueen (white and youngest son of Sandy McQueen with his wife Sarah Batten McQueen), Hamp McQueen (mixed race and son of Sandy McQueen and "Len" in the Family Bible, and Len McQueen, herself.
So, I might as well go down the list.
Abe has an interesting story and I will give him his own post. He was living still with his father, Sandy McQueen, in 1870 and with Lea, Bet and Cranford in 1880. He was married at least twice, but none of his documents clarify who his mother was.
Betsy or Bet appears in the same households as Abe in 1870 and 1880. I've not yet found anymore mention of her. She may have married after 1880 and changed her name.
Cranford married Cherry Butler. His mother is listed as "Len" on his marriage certificate.
That's the "Lea" list, now over to the "Len" list.
Jerry McQueen was perhaps the most prolific and well- documented of the "bone fragment" children of Alexander McQueen. He was married at least 3 times and fathered a great number of children. He also lived long enough to recieve a death certificate and he lived near to the same area he was born for his entire life.
In both his marriage certificates and his death certificates his mother is listed as "Lindy". His wives were Mariah Morrison, daughter of Harriett James (who might have been a widow), Clarise McCaskill and Mary Jane Ward.
The documents of the second son, George McQueen is of no help. He was married a few times, but the names of his parents were totally omitted. He died in 1910, so no help there either.
Mariah McQueen married Robert Green, the son of Gilbert Green (who would marry 'Linda" McQueen). On her marriage certificate, her mother's name is 'Len'.
Hampton McQueen, born in 1857, married Odelia Blue (and perhaps Hannah McCollum, too, but probably in just a 'relationship' with her), also identified his mother as "Lindy".
The youngest child listed in the Bible under "Len" was Jacob McQueen. He also lists his mother as "Lendy".
As for the woman, Hannah, in the Bible as the mother of Smithe, Sugoch and Emely, there are several women named Hannah in the 1870 and 1880 census records of Montgomery County of the proper age and race to be Hannah, but none named McQueen. I also find no record of her children, but it's also important to note that no last name is given for them, unlike the children of Len (Lindy).
I was able to trace of few of the lost children of Sandy McQueen and will tell of them in further posts.
Neil McQueen was indeed, an unusual man. He not only recorded his white, full siblings in his family bible, but also recognized his half-siblings, the dozen children his father sired with 3 enslaved women, before and after emancipation.
Abraham was a man born in a time that didn't favor him. As such, he did the best he knew how. Above is his death record in Gulf County, Florida. He had grown up working in the turpentine industry and had relocated to Florida doing what he knew how, working in the turpentine industry. This is his story.
Abraham McQueen was born March 28, 1864 near the present town of Candor, in Montgomery County, North Carolina. He is seen in the above census record of 1870, as 6 year old Abram. 71 year old Alexander Marcus McQueen, the head of household, was his father. 55 year old Sarah McQueen was A. M. McQueen's wife, but not Abraham's mother. That would be 30 year old Lends, otherwise seen as Linda or Lindy. 21 year old Neil McQueen was the son of Alexander and Sarah, and 7 year old Sarah was their granddaughter. The other children shown after "Lends" name were also her children and also the children of Alexander McQueen.
Neil McQueen, Abe's half-brother and the youngest son of Alexander M. McQueen with his wife, Sarah, would keep a Family Bible that is still in family hands, and would record, not only the family history of his father's arrival to North Carolina from Scotland as a 3 year old, but also the births of his 8 older siblings. But unlike most Family Bibles from the Reconstruction Era, the Bible of Neil McQueen also recorded the birthdates of his half-siblings. Neil not only made note of the births and deaths of his father's white children with his legal wife, but also of the 12 mixed-race children that Alexander had sired with 3 different women who at one time had been his slaves. Abe had been born at the end of the Civil War, but his full-siblings, Betsy, Bud (Alexander) and Cranford, who would be born in 1871, arrived after emancipation, when their mother was a free woman, but still living in the household of their father and his wife.
Ten years later, in the 1880 census, Abe is living with Lea McQueen, in a separate household, but right next door to his half-brother, Neil McQueen. In the decade that passed, their father Alexander M. McQueen had passed away, making Neil administer of the estate. Neil recieved the Lion's share of the estate, with the 4 daughters of his deceased son, Neil's oldest brother, James Batten McQueen, being mentioned, along with James's wife, Nancy Britt McQueen. In his final words, Alexander had left something to, and had mentioned, the remainder of his nine children with his legal wife, Sarah Batten McQueen, who passed away one year before he did. He had not mentioned Abe, or any of his children born outside of wedlock.
Ginger Cake
Abe was counted as 19 in the 1880 census, but he was really about 16. He may have looked older. He is described in a later newspaper article as being a "bright mulatto", meaning a light-skinned person of mixed ancestry, further described as the color of ginger cake, or a golden -brown, with green eyes. He was slender built, described as "spare", 140 lbs and 5 foot 8 inches tall, and of 'pleasant features', meaning Abe was a good-looking young man.
Mixed race model with green eyes
Also living in the home was his sister Betsy and his baby brother, Cranford McQueen. On the other side of them was his older sister, Hannah, who had married Alexander Butler. So it was an area of family living near to each other. Neil probably ran the same farm his father did and Abe and his siblings were probably laborers there, as laborers were what their profession was listed as at this time.
If there is one thing, besides sandhills and peach trees, that the east side of Montgomery County, and its bordering neighbors, Richmond and Moore are known for, its pine trees. And in the mid to late 1800's, that meant turpentine.
By 1889, Abe had found work at a turpentine distillery owned by James Tompkins. There, he had a violent encounter with one William McPherson, whom I believe came from Richmond County. A warrant for Abe's arrest was issued, as McPherson's injury appeared serious. As Abe was described as 19 in the 1880 census when he was really 16, he was described as 23 in 1889, when he was really 25. Age was fluid.
Abe, knowing he was a wanted man, apparently went into hiding. It's unknown where he hid, possibly with relatives, or he possibly took to the hills and went hiding deep in the Uwharrie Mountains on the western end of the county. William McPherson died, and the Governor issued a warrant for his arrest.
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The Montgomery Vidette Troy, North Carolina31 Oct 1889, Thu • Page 3 A $200 reward was offered for the capture of Abe McQueen, about $5700 in todays funds. The proclaimation claimed that he had either left the state, or had hidden himself very well. He was charged with murder. In addition to describing Abe as a gingercake mulatto with pleasant features, a number of scars, from previous fights, apparently, with knives, were also described. He bore a major scar from his nose across his left cheek, and another on his forehead near his hairline. He also had a knife cut scar across his shoulder. Abe had survived multiple fights it appears.Alchohol was most likely involved. Many problems described in the newspapers of the day began with drunkeness, and these continuous issues are probably what led to the coming era of prohibition.
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The Montgomery Vidette Troy, North Carolina21 Nov 1889, Thu • Page 3So, what became of Abe? His freedom was temporary, as I found that two years later, his case came before the jury. As the assualt occured in October of 1889, and Abe was discovered in Georgia in October of 1890, it appears he remained on the lam for a full year. The below article states that Sheriff Saunders of Montgomery County, left Raleigh for Dalton, Georgia, as Abe had been captured. It is possible he came under the attention of the police there, and afterwards, it was discovered he had a warrant.Dalton is in North Georgia, in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Abe may have headed for the safety of the Blue Ridge in North Carolina, before following them south into Georgia. He looks to have not been there, only seen there, when Sheriff Saunders set out to find him.
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The Atlanta Constitution Atlanta, Georgia25 Oct 1890, Sat • Page 3Talapoosa, Georgia, where Abe was actually picked up, is a little further south than Dalton, in Haralson County. It's located on the Georgia/Alabama border. Abe may have met a girl there, or a group of friends, as you will see later.
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The Wilmington Morning Star Wilmington, North Carolina12 Nov 1890, Wed • Page 3
Abe was jailed in Salisbury, in Rowan County, until his trial. It may have been that the Rowan County jail was more secure, and further away from people who might seek to help break him out. At this point, he was considered a murderer.
When Abe's case finally made it to trial, it all seemed rather anticlimatic. He was granted the right of self-defense and the jury rendered a judgement of 'justifiable homocide". Abe was released, a free man. But he did not stay in North Carolina, he returned to Georgia.
I do not know exactly where Abe met Maggie, but she was born in South Carolina, and their oldest son, Lonnie James McQueen, was born in Georgia in 1897. They were married in 1895, and probably in Georgia. Maggies family was clearly from South Carolina, and 2 year old "James", was her only child. At the turn of the century, the young family is found in the now Ghost Town of Arran, in Wakulla County, Florida. Wakulla is on the Gulf side of Florida in the "Big Bend" streach at Appalachee Bay. Located south of Tallahassee, it remains a very isolated place, very rural and moderately populated.
The couple would have another son, and possibly a daughter as well.
Maggie McQueen would pass away between 1902, when Marion was born, and 1910. The 1910 census shows that Abe is working in what he knows - turpentine- as a Laborere. No, he was not doing the laundry, that's a transcription error. The census tells us that he has worked 12 full months and that he is a widower, meaning his wife, Maggie, is deceased. His boys Lonnie James and Marion live with him and an amazing thing to see is tha he owns his home free and clear, no mortgage. Abe has progresssed a long way since his birth in Montgomery County, NC.
They are now living in Santa Rosa County, Florida. Santa Rosa County, in Florida is located in the Panhandle, still on the Gulf side of Florida. They had moved a little north.
The next decade would prove to be an eventful one for Abe and his sons.
In 1915, Abe would remarry to a younger woman named Beulah May.
Beulah had a daughter named Bertha, who would adopt the McQueen surname and list Abe as her stepfather on her documents, and marriage to a William J. Tasker.
Both of his sons would marry, Lonnie to Mirella "Ella" Dougal (or McDougal), and Marion first to a Nancy Banks and second, to Elnora Brown.
In 1920, Abe's sons have moved to Southport, in Bay County, Florida and have followed their father into the turpentine industry. Marion is boarding with his brother Lonnie and his young family with wife Ella, and oldest daugther, Thelma. Southport is just a little ways down the coast from where they were in 1910.
1920 finds Abe and Beualah, in Jackson County, Florida. There are two little girls living with them, Eunice and Ilena Byrd, who are listed as their adopted daughters. These may have been grandchildren of Beulah, as I haven't found much about her.
Abe has given up working in turpentine, now that he is in his 50's and has bought a farm, now owned free and clear.
Name:
Abe McQueen
Issue Date:
22 Aug 1918
Place:
Jackson, Florida, USA
Meridian:
Tallahassee
Township:
002n
Range:
011W
Aliquots:
E½SE¼
Section:
6
Accession Number:
645631
Document Number:
010736
Original URL:
Descendants of Abraham McQueen, their half-Scottish, half-African ancestor, who was born into slaverly, later became a fugitive, was cleared due to self-defense and moved to Florida to start a familly and ended up becoming a land owner in his own right, should be very proud of this man and the long, hard journey he had made. He bought his farm in Jackson County in 1918, free and clear, no mortgage.
Jackson County is still in the Florida Panhandle, but not on the Gulf, it's surrounded by land. Abe had moved quite frequently, but all within a connected area. I found the below record that shows he may have also had a daughter.
I can't locate Abe and Beulah in the 1930 census, but both were still alive. Abe would pass the next year, in 1931, in Gulf County, Florida, in a rather informal death record. He may have been there on business, or purchasing things for his farm, because Beualah outlived him and I don't believe they had moved.
Name:
Abe Mcqueen
Gender:
Male
Race:
Black
Death Date:
1931
Death Place:
Gulf, Florida, United States
By 1935, Abe's widow, Beulah, was living in Palm Beach.
Abe McQueen made a long journey during his 68 years of life. He was born into slavery, but never knew it as his family was free the next year. His mother, a slave of African ancestry, had raised him in the home of his father, a Scottish immigrant, in Montgomery County, North Carolina. He began working in the turpentine industry, where he would continue to make a living for most of his working career. As a young man, he got into an altercation with another man he worked with that had came to blows. The man ended up dying from his injuries and Abe attempted to flee justice, uncertain of his future, and had fled to Georgia. During the year he spent in Georigia, he may have made some acquatainces and friends. His year as a fugitive would end and he was arrested and returned to North Carolina for trial. It was found justifiable, as he had acted in self-defence and Abe was again a free man. He did not return to North Carolina, but appears to have returned to Georgia. There, he married Maggie, a girl from Georgia and had at least two sons, Lonnie James and Marion. One of his half-brothers in North Carolina had an older son named Lonnie James, so this may be where the name came from.
By the turn of the century, Abe and family were in Florida, where he would remain. Despite moving around quite a bit, he would stay in the Gulf/Panhandle area. By 1910, he owned his own home, free and clear. In 1918, he purchased a farm in Jackson County, Florida withot a mortgage.
Widowed, he would marry a woman named Beulah May with a daughter named Bertha. In middle age, they would adopt two little girls, Eunice and Ilena Byrd. Abe created a good foundation for his two sons and step-daughter.
Panama City, Florida
Lonnie James McQueen (1897 - 1971) would raise his family in Bay County, Florida, first in Southport and then for the remainder of his life, in Panama City. He married Mirella "Ella" McDougal by 1914, and together they had 9 children: Thelma May, Retha, Lonnie Jr., Jenny, John L., Mozell, Osceola, Eldie W. and Ruby M. McQueen. The couple was married for 53 years until Ella's death in 1967. Lonnie worked in lumber and for the International Paper Company, according to City Directories.
Marion McQueen (1901-1970) lived in Gulf County, Florida before settling in Miami. He had 4 sons with his second wife, Elnora Brown McQueen: Harrell, Bonnie, Ezell "Bud", and Marion, Jr.
Marion made a career in the military and worked in his later years in a military store. Both sons had served their country in WWI and WWII.
Jerry McQueen had more than dna in common with his Scottish-born father, Alexander "Marcus" McQueen, a love of the land and an eye for the ladies.
Jerry McQueen was born November 12, 1848 in Montgomery County, North Carolina, in what was called "Holllingsworth District". He was the oldest son of Linda "Len" or "Lindy" McQueen. His mother, Lindy, was a slave, and his father, Alexander "Sandy" McQueen was the Scottish-born man who held her in slavery. The racially mixed Jerry McQueen, was born into slavery, as it did not end until he was a teenager. I believe the below record probably refers to Lindy and Jerry.
Sandy McQueen had a legal wife, Sarah Batten McQueen, who was of his own complexion. Together they had born and raised 9 children. The youngest of those 9 legitimate children was Neil McQueen. Neil was 8 years younger than his youngest full sibling, Sarah. He was also born in 1848, the same year as Jerry. As an adult, Neil McQueen would record the various platitudes of his family in a Family Bible, as was typical of the day. He recorded his grandparents arrival in Wilmington as immigrants from Scotland. He recorded the births and marriages of his siblings. But what was quite unusual for the time, Neil also recorded the birthdates of his mixed-race half-siblings, with his own father listed as theirs. His father had 12 children with three enslaved women, Hannah, Lea and Lindy. Jerry was one of them.
In the 1870 census, the first in which formerly enslaved people are listed by name, Jerry is seen working as a laborer in Mineral Springs, Richmond County.
The Yates family he is working for lives right next door to the family of his half-brother, James Murdock McQueen, so there is the connection to Richmond County.
The very next year, in 1871, Jerry would marry his first wife, Clarice "Clara" McCaskill, daughter of Alexander "Sandy" Morrison and Violet McCaskill. Together, they would have 8 children:
1873: Louisa (or Sarah Louisa) 1876: Cornelius 1879: Sarah (yes another Sarah) 1883: Robert 1887: Eliza Roxanna 1887: Archibald aka "Archie" 1889: Mollie 1889: Stella
In 1880, they are living in the Hollingsworth Township section of Montgomery County, where Jerry grew up. Clarice is also listed as mulatto, so she was, like Jerry, of mixed race. Fifteen year old Calvin Jones is listed as a nephew. Their 3 oldest children have been born. Jerry is a farmer, but the record holds other surprises. Both other children are noted as having attended school and can read and write, and right next door is a McCaskill family and the head of the household, Darions, is only a year older than Clarice. Could he be her brother?
Also nearby is the septigenarian Cager Brewer, who keeps coming up amongst or near the families I have been researching.
Shortly after this census, Jerry McQueen would establish a long-term relationship with Mary Jane Ward. Mary Jane was a granddaughter of Micajah "Cager" Brewer, a child of his daughter Elizabeth Brewer and her husband, Henry Ward. There was another factor in the relationship of Jane Ward and Jerry McQueen, besides the fact she was a single woman and he was a married man. Against all social norms of the era, Jerry McQueen being half Scottish and half African, was a man of color. Mary Jane Ward was of European decent, and white.
It would be really interesting to be able to look back in time and see the dynamics of these relationships. Did the women know about each other? I'm sure the mistress, Jane, must have known about the wife, Clara. Did Clara know Jerry was spending time with Jane? Did he rotate from one to another?
The first child of Jerry McQueen and Jane Ward was a daughter, Alice, born in 1883, the same year as his fourth child with his wife Clarice, Robert.
1887 was a very busy year for Jerry. He had twins Eliza Roxanna and Archibald with wife Clarice, while also fathering a second child, Lillie, with Jane.
Clarice would pass away sometime after the birth of Mollie and Stella in 1891, and before 1893.
Jane also had a child in 1891, Rebecca and a son, Ollie, the next year in 1892. This did not mean that Jerry was now all hers or true to her. The last child of Jerry McQueen and Jane Ward was James Eldridge, born in 1894. And that did not mean their relationship was over.
Jerry married his second wife, Mariah Jones Morrison on May 7, 1894. Mariah was a widow, having been married previously to Robert Benjamin Morrison. She had been born Mariah Jones, the daughter of Charles and Harriett Jones, and with R. B. Morrison had 3 sons who would travel the country.
1) Rev. Theodore Washington Morrison (1881 Goldston, NC - 1956 Lakeland, FL). 2) John Robert Morrison (1883 Goldston, NC to 1960 Alleghany, Pennsylvania). 3) Daniel Arthur Morrsion (1886 Carthage, NC to 1935 Nashville, Tennesee).
Daniel Arthur Morrsion
With Jerry McQueen, Mariah Jones Morrison McQueen would have 3 daughters: 1893 Isabelle, 1896 Mary and 1898 Minnie. Jerry was 50 years old when his last daugther, Minnie was born. He's had 7 children with his wife, Clarice McCaskill McQueen, 5 children with his mistress, Mary Jane Ward and 3 daughters with his wife, Mariah Jones Morrison McQueen.
Name:
Jerry Mcqueen [Len Mcqueen]
Age:
50
Birth Date:
May 1850
Birthplace:
North Carolina, USA
Home in 1900:
Hollingsworth, Montgomery, North Carolina
Sheet Number:
1
Number of Dwelling in Order of Visitation:
17
Family Number:
17
Race:
Black
Gender:
Male
Relation to Head of House:
Head
Marital status:
Married
Spouse's name:
Mariah Mcqueen [Mccaskill]
Marriage Year:
1893
Years Married:
7
The 1900 census of Hollingsworth Township, Montgomery County, North Carolina is very faint and barely legible. From what I have been able to decipher looking at the actual document, I see Jerry McQueen 50, with his wife Moriah 35, having been married 7 years. It appears his mother "Len" might have been living with them. Also listed are Theo W, 17 and John R. 16. Although they are listed under McQueen, these were Mariah's sons and they were actually Morrisons. Daniel Arthur was
Also in the household was Rebecca McQueen 15. Rebecca was, oddly, the daughter of Jerry McQueen by Mary Jean Ward. Then there was Archibald M 13 and Stella, 10 and Mary 4. The illegible names must have been Isabelle and Minnie, and perhaps Mariah's son, Daniel.
Jerry recieved a grant, in December of 1905, for 273 acres in Hollingsworth Township, on both sides of Cabin Creek.
Cabin Creek is located near the Montgomery/ Moore County lines and near the present town of Biscoe.
But despite having remarried and having children with his wife, Jerry had apparently not left Jane alone. She had inherited land from her father, and by some means, it ended up in Jerry's name.
The above court case was in 1908. Jerry was taxed for 273 acres on Cabin Creek the same year.
CLIPPED FROM
The Montgomerian Troy, North Carolina02 Apr 1908, Thu • Page 2 Mariah must have had the last word, as two years later, in 1910, the family had relocated to Florida.
Several of Jerry's children went with them, because they married in Florida and several stayed. Jerry worked as a Cooper in a Naval Store and Florence Evens, (seen here as 'Florena', was Mariah's niece by marriage, her mother being Emma Morrison. Mariah didn't live in Florida for very long. She died May 22, 1911 and is buried in Pensacola, Escambia County, Florida. She was 55 years old. The sons mentioned on her tombstone are her 3 sons by Robert B. Morrison.Jerry returned to North Carolina, fairly quickly it appears. Some of his children remained in Florida and several of them traveled far and wide across the country.
Jerry died on August 6, 1915, of Chronic Nephritis at the age of 73. It was also noted that he had Bright's Disease. The informant on his death certificates name is illegible and not recognizable, "Haddin Kavedbush"is the closest I can get and there is no such person, nor was there a "John" McQueen. Often times, the name John served as an unknown first name, much in the way of "John Doe".
Jerry McQueen had a large family with 3 different women. His relationship with Jane Ward requires closer scrunity and his brother, also of mixed race, married her sister Susan, which was also very unique for the time. The McQueens continue.
Early this spring, we added a couple of tiny flowers to our garden, simply out of curiosity. They grew into bushes of a substantial size, and to the delight of our grandchildren, have certainly lived up to their name, "Butterfly Bushes". On any afternoon in August, we would find them covered in an array of colorful butterflies, predominately Eastern Tiger Swallowtails and the Red Spotted Purple Admirals. Bumble Bees are also very fond of them and I've seen several, but the above little imitator was a new one on me. At first, I wasn't quite sure what he was. He was buzzy and quick, like a hummingbird, but it was still quite evident he was an insect.
I discovered that what he was is a Hummingbird Moth, they come in a variety of colors and patterns and behave quite beelike, but are, indeed, moths. And like the subjects of this post, they were not what they at first appeared to be.
The story begins as most of my most recent have, in the pine forests of Eastern Montgomery County, North Carolina, with a 17 year old laborer named Henry Ward. He's living in the home of his parents, Thomas and Susan Ward, with their large and widespread family.
The Wards seem to have had a long and steady foothold in Montgomery County, with the very first census, 1790, showing both a Thomas and a Phillip Ward. This would not have been Thomas, the father of Henry Ward, as he would have only been 12 years old. The 1790 Thomas is noted as a Senior, though, and there's not a Junior listed as a head of household, so he could have been either the father or uncle of Thomas born about 1778, I have not dug that deep.
Henry's family does show up in 1830, however, in East Pee Dee and in 1840 in West Pee Dee. Thomas had obtained a land grant in 1838 for 138 acres on Ward Creek in Montgomery County. With a creek named for them, it seems to suggest the family had been in that spot for some time.
Wards Creek in Montgomery County, North Carolina lies north of the little whistlestop town of Star, and west of the even smaller community of Ether.
Also living in the same part of the county was another teenager in an equally large family, Elizabeth Brewer, known as "Lizzie", age 15, daughter of Micajah and Rebecca Brewer.
Five years later, the couple were married, on March 20, 1855, by Calvin J. Cochran. In commonly quick succession, two daughters were born into the marriage, Mary Jane Ward, the next year in 1856 and Susan Minerva Ward on April 10, 1859. But tragedy was soon to strike.
In October of 1859, Eli and Reuben Ward, brothers of Henry, were appointed Co-Executors of his estate. Henry, only about 26 years old, had died. The good penmanship shown in his brothers signatures show the Ward brothers to have been well-educated, in script, at least.
The estate of Henry Ward was fairly typical of a young yeoman farmer in the Carolina Piedmont in of the middle 1800's. He had a fair amount of livestock, and a collection of the typical farm implements, and his own tract of land.
Lizzie Brewer Ward, now a young widow with two little girls, a toddler and a newborn, was to recieve a dower of a portion of that tract of land. Sheriff Sanders nominated a "jury of good and lawful men", to determine what her dower would be and named that task were James G. Allen, David Allen, Martin Hunsucker, Zach Burroughs, Joseph Hogan, E. C. Martin, A. P. Leach, E. Leach, James Callicutt, James R. Allen, D. W. Hurley and Dempsey Cagle.
They set aside a 33 acre portion of the property for the dower, that bordered a road, of what name I can't decipher. (Note: I have been informed by someone from around Ether that the road was called "Suggs Road" and is now part of Hwy 220. Further in the estate files, it states that Henry was 'seized or possessed' of a tract of land of about 100 acres adjoining the properties of John Hussey and Henry Freeman, this written in a much clearer penmanship than the preceding pages. This page stated that Elizabeth Ward's dower was to include the dwelling house, 'commonly called the Mansion House', and included the adjacent farm buildings and outhouses.
Another document appears in the sheath, from the January Term of the Court of Pleas and Quarters for 1860, and in this one, Elizabeth Ward must sue her infant daughters for her dower and the supplies to support them. She's also awarded a year's allowance. After that, she is on her own.
Despite having been awarded "the Mansion House', 33 acres of land and a year's allowance, on June 17th of that year when the census taker came around, Elizabeth was found living with her parents, siblings, nieces and nephews and her two little daughters, Jane and Susan. While Jane and Susan are listed as Wards, Elizabeth is counted among the Brewers as if she were never married.
But the packet does not end there and neither does the story. In 1870, Elizabeth is still in residence with her parents. That "Mazer Breuer" is really Micajah Brewer , and the age in the original document is not 28, but 68. Just really bad handwriting there. Living with Micajah and Rebecca are their large group of daughters, Fanny (Phany), Terry (another Terry), Elizabeth, Anneliza (Aklinger), Louisa and Dorcas (Darcus). But where are the grandchildren? It's possible that they were nearby, or in the home and just not counted, but at any rate, the girls are not to be found in 1870.
Not to be found in 1880, is Elizabeth, although her parents, now in their 70's, are still living. Elizabeth would have been about 47 by then, and unless she remarried, a possibility that I've not yet found proof of, it appears she may have been deceased by this date. To note, living nearby are Jerry McQueen and his first wife, Clarice.
As for the girls, Mary Jane is not living in Hollingsworth, with or near her grandparents, but in Hill Township, instead, with her Aunt Dorcas and her cousin, Annette. Annette, by the way, was her double first cousin, as Annette's father was Reuben Ward, Mary Jane's uncle on her father's side.
Now 23 years old, Mary Jane would soon begin a long-term relationship, which would be in violation not only of social norms of the times, but also against the law, but one which also appears to be 'not that uncommon', in this isolated area of Montgomery County.
Between 1883, when her oldest daughter, Alice is born and 1894, Mary Jane Ward maintains an illicit and adulterous relationship with Jerry McQueen and together they have 5 children:
1883 Alice 1887 Lillie 1891 Rebecca 1892 Ollie and 1894 James Elldridge
Although Clarice McCaskill McQueen died about 1894, and Jerry remarried in 1895, it was not to Jane, but instead to a widow from a neighboring county named Mariah Jones Morrison.
Jane's younger sister, Susan Minerva Ward took things one step further. Susan not only took up with a McQueen, she married him. This was Jerry McQueen's younger brother, Jacob F. "Jake" McQueen.
Susan and Jake would have 7 children:
1884 Lillie 1887 Ethel 1888 Chester 1891 Lola 1894 Vina 1894 Jacob "Bud" McQueen, Jr. 1898 Barney
This would make the children of Jane and the children of Susan double first cousins, which carry the same amount of DNA as silbings.
The scandal revolving around the Ward sisters was the fact that while Susan and Jane Ward were obviously of 100 percent European decent, or white, the father's of their children were not. Not only that, but in order to maintain a relationship with the brothers that these sisters loved, they gave up their whiteness and claimed to be black, which they were not.
Jerry McQueen and his brother Jacob were two of the sons of Alexander "Sandy" McQueen, who had migrated to America as a toddler, from Scotland and a woman named Linda or Lindy, who had been his slave. Sandy McQueen had a total of 12 children among 3 enslaved women, which was recorded in a family bible by his youngest son with his legal (and white) wife, Neil McQueen. Neil recorded the exact birthdates of all of his siblings, both white and mixed, half of which were born after emancipation. It was a most unusual and mindboggling occurance.
So Jerry and Jake McQueen were half Scottish and half African (or less), as their mother, Lindy, is also listed as a mulatto, or of mixed race. The children of the combined unions of the Ward sisters and the McQueen brothers would have been 75 percent white and 25 percent (or less) black and would, as adults, take diverging paths.
State of North Carolina, County of Montgomery, Spring Term of Court, 1896
Susanna McQueen
VS
A Leach, Linsy Freeman, J . M. Freeman and G. N. Scarboro
Susanna McQueen above named plaintiff being duly sworn deposes and says :
I That on or about the 1st day of August, 1860 Henry Ward died intestate leaving a tract of land in Hill Township Montgomery County.
II That Susanna McQueen and Jane Ward are the only heirs at law of Henry Ward.
III That on or about the 31st day of March 1880 Susanna McQueen and Jacob McQueen , her husband, executed a deed to A. Leach for thier interest in said tract of land excepting the widow's dower, which deed is attached.
IV That aforesaid deed was executed by the Plaintiff Susanna McQueen while she was a minor under the age of 21 years old and she did not sign said deed willingly, only to satisfy a demand by the grantee, that she would have to go to jail if deed was not signed .
V Therefore the Plaintiff prays that aforesiad deed be declared void, and that she recieves the sum of $50, damages, together with all fees in this action.
Douglass and Dixon, Attorney for the Plaintiff
13 June 1896
A B McCaskilll
This claim was followed by a copy of the actual deed tha was dated March 30, 1880 wherein Jacob McQueen and wife Susanna McQueen sold to Angus Leach for $25, their interest in the "undivided half in a tract of land adjoining John Freeman, Linsy Hussy and others being the tract of land were Jacoob McQueen and wife live containing about 110 acrees beimg the land which descended to the heirs of Henry Ward."
This paragraph was followed by the usual section wherein Susanna McQueen had been interviewed separately and apart from her husband to ensure she was not being coerced into signing the document, as the inheritance was hers, and his only by reference of his marriage to her.
The next page was a recap of the separate interview with Susanna Ward McQueen wherein she had stated that she had signed of her on freewill.
This was followed by the decision of the judge that the suit be dismissed and that the defendants, Angus Leach, Lewis Freeman and G. N. Scarboro and wife, Lillie to recover their costs in this action and Susanna was declared a pauper, unable to give securities. this proceeding was ruled over by Judge Thomas J. Shaw.
The next term of court, held in the fall of 1896, painted a different picture for Susannah.
'G. N. Scarboro aknowledge themselves (sic) indebited to the plaintiff in the above action the sun of $200 to be void on condition that he pays said defendant all such sum as he may be adjudged to pay for costs in asid action."
signed by
G. N. Scarboro
D. B. Batten
Several of the pages in the action seem to contradict each other, others bring to the forefront pages from decades before. The Freemans answered next.
J M Freeman and Lewis Freeman in a statement acknowledged I and II to true, but did not have sufficient knowledge to state whether or not III and IV were true or not , therefore the plaintiff needs proof of the same.
The last paragraph in this page is very telling. There's a 'must read between the lines' moment that reveals their disdain and dismissal of Susanna Ward McQueen and her claims to property.
V "....That they deny that the deed in the fifth order.......is void but that it is a valid deed executed by a SINGLE woman .....these defendants (request) that it be discharged and they recover reasonable costs expended in this action. Allen Jordan D. A. "
The Freemans were basically saying that Susannah Wards selling of interest in her fathers' land was a legitimate deed, however, and although her husband, Jacob McQueen, had signed the deed and was named within the deed, that it was a deed put forth by a single woman, not a married one, because they did not acknowledge her marriage or her husbands right to any land inherited by her.
Next is a copy of Elizabeth Wards petition for a years allowance from 1859, wherein Archibald A. Leach, Justice of the Peace, James Allen, Martin Hunsucker and David Allen were appointed comissioners to lay off a goods and monies for her survival.
This is followed by another numbered page, this one of the testimony of an angry George N Scarboro, who along with his wife, Lillie, was ordered in a previous term of court to pay Susan McQueen $200.
But first, I wondered who exactly was George N. Scarboro?
He had acquired the property that had previously belonged to Henry Ward through his marriage to Lillie, whose father, Angus Leach, had paid the McQueens $25 for the interest in Susannah's share of the undivided property. It must be remembered that of the total property, there remained Jane's share and also, the widow, Elizabeths dower of 33 acres, that was not included ifn Susannah's interest.
This depostiion began: "George N. Scarboro, one of the above named plaintiffs".
And listed by numeral, answers to Susannahs claim. I have recouped her claim in highlight, followed by Mr. Scarboros reply to remind the reader what he is answering to.
I That on or about the 1st day of August, 1860 Henry Ward died intestate leaving a tract of land in Hill Township Montgomery County.
-Susanna
That it is admitted that Henry Ward died intestate, but when and where the defindant has not sufficient knowledge....as to the other facts alledged in the complaint - they are denied.
I That Susanna McQueen and Jane Ward are the only heirs at law of Henry Ward.
Not sufficient knowledge to say.
NoII Not sufficient knowledge.
III That on or about the 31st day of March 1880 Susanna McQueen and Jacob McQueen , her husband, executed a deed to A. Leach for thier interest in said tract of land excepting the widow's dower, which deed is attached.
III Facts as alledged are denied.....that the deed attached is specifically denied....denied that on the said 31st day of March 1880 she was a married woman or had any legal husband to join with her in the execution of the deed.
George Nelson Scarboro is now repeating the claims of the Freemans that Susannah was not legally married. She had married Jacob McQueen, obviously, however, the defendants in this case did not consider the marriage legal, due to the ethinicity of Jacob McQueen. Scarboro, in his added statement that she didn't have a legal husband, insinuates Jacob existed, but that the union was not acknowledged under law, or by hissegment of the community.
IV That aforesaid deed was executed by the Plaintiff Susanna McQueen while she was a minor under the age of 21 years old and she did not sign said deed willingly, only to satisfy a demand by the grantee, that she would have to go to jail if deed was not signed .
IV. Denied
V Therefore the Plaintiff prays that aforesiad deed be declared void, and that she recieves the sum of $50, damages, together with all fees in this action.
V. That according to the facts as alledged in the comoplaint plaintiff is not entitled to recover.....it is admitted that the defendants have been in possession ot the lands referred to sinde 1880....banned by the statute of limitations.
In Summary, G. N. Scarboro is now claiming that Henry Ward died, but he don't know when or where and that he does not know if Jane and Susannah were his only heirs. He denies that Susannah has any rights to the property because he feels she signed the documents willingly and that she is not legally married . He also disregards her claims to the property because his wife's family had been living on it since 1880 and that the statute of limitaions had ran out.
A look at where these parties were in 1880 shows Jacob McQueen on page 2 of Hill Township working for a 40 year old Deborah Leach.
In the actual document, he is Jacob McQueen, not Mack and his birth year, incorrectly transcribed, is given as 1860, not 1868. His actual birth year, as given in the McQueen Family Bible, was 1859, so he was 21, not 12.
Angus Leach and his daughrter, Lilly are listed on page 1 in Hill, and heis a General Merchandise Retailer.
Continuing along, many of the Freemans, including J. M., are listed on page 2, Doras Brewster, an aunt of Mary Jane Ward and Susannah, is listed on page 3, with Mary Jane in her home, Lindsey Hussey is on page 4, along with John, Lewis and Linzy T. Freeman. Reuben Ward and Eli Ward, brothers of Henry Ward, are on page 5, with Mathew Ward, Eli's son, on page 6.
In the April Session of court 1898, we find the case of Jane Ward and Ssan McQueen vs George N and Lillie Scarbobo.
"Agreed by the parties that the defendants in fee of the lands described in the complaint ....sum to be paid to Attorney.
Jane Ward and Susan McQueen being duly sworn says ' that they are unable to give surities or make the deposit required by law and sue as paupers.
And again, a numbered statement:
I) Do not have sufficient knowledge...
II) ....since it is admitted said widow is dead, the are advised and believe that her dower is treated as alledged, ceased with her death...
III Admitted
IV) Defendants are in fact the owers in fee and possession of the property in Hill Township Montgomery County adjoining Lewis Freeman, J.M. Freeman, and others known as the Lindzy T. Freeman lands bounded by stake on the side of the road in Rueben Wards line to J. M. Freemans line to A. Leach and others of 50 acrs more or less.
V) ...don't know what property they refer to ...been in possession of current property where they live for 7 years.
Attached as proof of claims by the Ward sisters was the following document from 1866.
Court of Pleas and Quarters Session Oct 1866
Petition of Mary J Ward and Susan Ward by their Guradian Elizabeth Ward (their mother)
Henry Ward died intestate sometime in the year 1859 leaving his widow Elizabeth Ward and Mary J and Susan M Ward his only descendants. After his death Reuben Ward obtained letters of administration.....amount (of the estate settlement) morethan sufficient to pay debts and funeral expenses.....plea for settlement and to pay your petitioners their distribution.
A. P. Leach appointed commisioner.Mary Jane and Susan Minerva Ward lawful distributees.
Reuben Ward Admin in Commisioners report.
Excepts allowance to administrator, two) bills for taxes paid, 3) Allowance of Commistioner.
After an accounting was given, a disbursement of $36.05 was left for the family.
Other documents attrached were a Guardian bond dated March 2, 1871 and singed by Elizabeth Ward, Micajah Brewer, her father and Larkinn Brewer, her brother, for $100 and an order that the proceeds be put in trust for the girls until they arrived at full age. Elizabeth was appointed Guardian of her daughters.
A second bond was attached signed by Eliazath Ward, A. A. McCaskell and Martin Clgle for $100 dated July 3rd, 1866.
And there is no more of a final resolution to the case.
In the 1900 census, Jane Ward is 40 and living in Hollingsworth Township. She is single.
It tells us that Jane Ward is the head of a household and that she has had one year of education. She is listed as white, and the mother of 5 children, with all of them living. Four of her children are living with her and her daughter, Rebecca, is living with her father, Jerry McQueen. The children living with Jane are listed as white and the daughter livng with Jerry is listed as mulatto.
Jerry McQueen has remarried to his second wife, Mariah Jones Morriosn, however, in 1908, he is added to a lawsuit by D. D Burton against Jane Ward (incorrectly named Ann in the newspaper), over the tract of land Jane had inherited from the estate of her father, Henry Ward.
In the same year, 1900, Susan Ward McQueen is also living in Hollingsworth Township. Unlike her full sister, Susan is listed as black. In reality, Susan was 100 percent of European heritage. Her children were of 25 percnt or less African heritage.
She is said to have had had 8 children , with 7 of them living. They are all living with her except for her oldest daughter, Della. Unlike her sister Jane, Susan can not read or write. She is working as a Day Laborer, as well as her two oldest children, Lillie and Chester, and her 14 year old boarder, Joseph Sims. She is listed as a widow, meaning Jacob McQueen had died. As their youngest son, Barney , was born in 1895, Jacob must have died between 1895 and 1900.
In 1908, Mary Ann is taken to court over her land, in conjunction with Jerry McQueen. He must have been working it. Between then and 1910, Jerry McQueen and his wife, Mariah, move to Florida. a few of Jane's daughters go with them.
Susan is also living in Biscoe, renting a house, and working with 5 of her children and 3 grandchildren. Both sisters are listed as mulatto, by virtue of their children, although both of their parents, Henry Ward and Elizabeth Brewer, were completely white.
During the next decade, most of the children of Jane and Susan would marry and move on with their lives. As their mothers were sisters and their fathers were brothers, these cousins shared the same dna percentages as siblings.
1920 reveals little to no change in location for the sisters.
As for her sister, Susan, she is also living in Biscoe with four of her children. Now 61, Susan and her daughters are working as farm laborers, while her sons are working in a saw mill. Jacob Jr. is driving a team and Barney is a log cutter. Susan is widowed, Vina, or 'Vennie', is divorced and the rest are single. Neighobors include some of her husband Jacob's McQueen relatives and some of Susan's Brewer relatives.
I wonder if they acknowleged or reocognized, the relationships.
1920 would be the last census for both sisters. Mary jane Ward died in 1928, according to the NC archives, exact date notgiven. I have not found a death certificate for her, or know where she was buried. She was about 72.
Name
Susie Ann Mc Queen
Gender
Female
Race
Colored
Age
64y 7m
Marital Status
Widowed
Occupation
Domestic
Birth Date
10 Apr 1859
Birth Place
Montgomery Co., N. C.
Death Date
10 Jan 1924
Death Place
Briscoe, Montgomery, North Carolina
Burial Date
11 Jan 1924
Cemetery
Macadonia Graveyard
Father
Henry Ward
Mother
Lizzie Brewer
Spouse
Jake Mc Queen
Reference ID
fn 828 cn 306
FHL Film Number
4216454
Her younger sisiter, Susan, however, did have a death ceritficate, giving her date of death as January 9, 1924. She died of pnuemonia at the age of 64 after 3 days of suffering. Her date of birth is given as April 10, 1859, just months before her father died. She never knew him.
Susan was buried at Macedonia Presbyterian Church, in the same cemetery as many of those in the nieghborhood she grew up in: Britts, McCaskills, Battens, McQueens, Lammonds, Martins, Dunns, Kellis, Yarboroughs, Smiths , Stewarts and Brewers, including her grandfather, Micajah Brewer.
Macedonia Presbyterian Church near Candor, NC from Find-A -Grave.
From What I can acertain, the following are the children of Mary Jane Ward and Jerry McQueen and Susannah Minerva Ward and husband, Jacob McQueen:
Mary jane Ward 1856-1928.
Relationship with Jerry McQueen 1848-1915.
1) Alice Ward 9 April 1883 - 10 Jan 1972 Moore County. (All born in Montgomery County.)
Married Thomas Person 1882-1964, 11 children: David, Mary Ruth, Sarah Agnes, Roy, Mary Adeline, Sylvan Caroline, Solomon, Cora, Saul, Maggie, Infant son.
2)Lillie Ward 5 Junec 1887 - 31 Jan 1974 in Moore County.
Married Thomas Lee Coddell, 7 children:
Alice, Jerry Clarence, Lillie Inez, William Thomas, Hullen, Guye Tillman, Jerome Ward Coddell.
3) Rebecca Ward McQueen 19 may 1891 - 6 May 1943 Dauphin County, PA.
Married 1st: William Lewis, 2 Children: 1904 - James Edgar Lewis, 1905 Ira James Lewis.
Married 2nd: HJohn Ingram: 2 children: 1907 Clayton Ingram, 1909 Thomas Ingram.
Married 3rd: Henry C. Ingram: 5 children:
1915 Nellie, 1917 John Frederick, 1925 Henry J., 1927 Helen Dorothy Ingram.
4) Ollie L. Ward 5 Dec 1893 - 22 April 1972, Moore County.
Unmarried, no children.
5) James Eldridge Ward 2 Jul 1894 - ?
Married Isabella Robinson- One child; Sebastion.
Susanna Minerva Ward 10 April 1859 - 10jan 1924, Bisoce, Montgomery County, NC.
Married Jacob F. "Jake" McQueen. 7 children:
1) Della McQueen 1879- 1951
Married Daniel M. Evans, 4 chilrdren: 1904 Fleta, 1907 Floyd, 1910 Teed Jacob, 1917 Susan Evans Spencer.
2) Chelsea Luanna "Duck McQueen 11 July 1888 - 14 Aug 1973 Moore County, NC.
Married Rufus D Simmons 11 children: 1903 Lola, 1908 Georgia, 1908 Beulah Mae,1910 Alice, 1912 Lucy Ruth, 1915 David, 1917 Olla, 1919 Annie,1921 Doyle, 1925 Lloyd, 1925 Monnie Mae.
3) Lola McQueen 1891- 9 Feb 1964.
Married Robert Simmons 2 children: 1910 Creel McQueen, 1906 Bernice "Bernie" McQueen 1906 -1991 (from a previous relationship with a Mr. Brown).
4) Vina E. 'Vennie' McQueen 1894 - ?
Married Fred Simmons
Notes on the Simmons Brothers: Rufus, Robert and Fred were sons of Joseph "Joe" Simmons and wife, Francis Byrd Simmons. They grew up in Wolfpit in Richmond County, NC. and moved later to Montgomery County, NC, where they met the McQueen sisters. Fred Simmons ended up in Baltimore with the military. There's no sign of Fred after 1910 and no sign of Vina after 1920.
5) Jacob "Bud" McQueen, Jr. 19 June 1894 - 19 March 1932.
Married Maggie Lenore Dunn 5 children: 1922 Jacob III, 1923 George, 1924 Thomas, 1926 Della Rachel, 1927 John Calvbert,.
6) Barney James McQueen 19 Aug 1898 - 5 June 1966 Candor, NC.
Married Lilly Harris, 4 children: 1914 Jessie, 1922 Ella Mae, 1926 Edward Earl Harris McQueen, 1929 James Roland McQueen.
7) Lillian Ethel McQueen 13 Sept 1899 - 10 Oct 1977 Starke County, Florida.
Married Pate W. Goins - Divorced.
Married Barnie D. McRae: 1 son: Barnie Arthur McQueen (1913 -1941).
The love stories between the Ward sisters and the McQueen brothers was no less than epic. And it was no less than love. Susan Ward married Jacob McQueen and together had 7 children over the course of 20 years, despite the legitimacy of their marriage being questioned and despite facing social ostracization by their neighbors and communities.
Mary Jane Ward did not marry Jerry McQueen, despite sharing a farm and having 5 chilren over the course of 11 years. She acted as his mistress through two marriages of Jerry to other women of his own ilk and skintone.
Both women gave up the class status and socially advantageous benefits of their European heritage and wore the lables of "colored" in their documentation and "mulatto' in the census - for love. The men risked no less than death by maintaining relationships with women outside of their ethnic group during a very intolerant time.
I chose to blog on the story of the Ward sisters because theirs was a bridge that had not been crossed. Ward family reseachers seemed to have listed Henry, his marriage, and his two daughters, but left them hanging like a dangling participal, as if they had disolved into the mist.
The actual descendants of Jane and Susan Ward had only records of them from 1900 on, as if they had dropped from the sky as fully grown adults, never making the connection between the white Ward sisters, daughters of Henry Ward and Lizzie Brewer Ward, and their own Great Grandmothers.
As the Hemaris, or Hummingbird Moth, with it's rapid wingbeat of up to 70 beats per seocond and its long tongue-like proboscis that it uses to reach nectaor deep inside a flower, poses as something, a hummingbird, that it is not, the Ward sisters posed as women of color to match their children and the men they loved.
Records attached to Henry Wards own probate papers show that the Ward sisters were his daughters and the same women that married the McQueen brothers.
Son Ward - That is how he is listed in numerous family trees for Thomas Ward of Ward's Creek in Montgomery County, North Carolina. Family researchers could tell by the dashes in early census records, or in some other manner, that Thomas had a son older than Eli Ward, who was already an adult and had flown the coop by 1850. Many must have thought him dead.
While examining the Probate file of Henry Ward, younger brother of both John and Eli, I had found a short file tacked on to the end of it involving a John Ward. This was the John that the Frankin Auman vs Sadler Tucker was referring to.
A random family tree listing of the wife and children of Thomas Ward
Had I not discovered this lawsuit, filed some 40 years after the approximate date of death of Thomas Ward, I would not have discovered John.
In Montgomery County, NC, the Ward family in 1850, the first year to name all of the inhabitants of a household, looked like this:
And living nearby, was son Eli, who had already married and started his own farmstead. He was also father to 2 year old daughter, Feraby (version of Phoebe) and infant son, Jesse.
How did descendants know there was one missing? Probably from the 1840 census, by then, all of the other children had been born, except for Elizabeth, who was an 'afterthought', one of those babes who come along near menopause, when conception is diminished, but not impossible.
Name:
Thomas Ward
Home in 1840 (City, County, State):
West Pee Dee River, Montgomery, North Carolina
Free White Persons - Males - Under 5:
2 Reuben and Henry (Thomas Y. probably on his way).
Free White Persons - Males - 15 thru 19:
1 Eli
Free White Persons - Males - 20 thru 29:
1 John
Free White Persons - Males - 60 thru 69:
1 Thomas
Free White Persons - Females - Under 5:
1 Margaret
Free White Persons - Females - 5 thru 9:
1 Sarah
Free White Persons - Females - 10 thru 14:
1 Fereby
Free White Persons - Females - 15 thru 19:
1 Mary
Free White Persons - Females - 20 thru 29:
2 Unknown, Not daughters-in-law. Possibly younger sisters of Susan
Free White Persons - Females - 40 thru 49:
1 Thomas's wife, Susan
Free White Persons - Females - 90 thru 99:
1 Unknown Grandmother perhaps
Persons Employed in Agriculture:
6
Free White Persons - Under 20:
7
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49:
4
Total Free White Persons:
13
Total All Persons - Free White, Free Colored, Slaves:
13
The firstborn child was actually Mary, who never married, and John came second, and Eli third.
At the end of the Probate file of Henry Ward in NC archives listings of Probate files for Montgomery County, North Carolina was this interesting one for John Ward. On August 25, 1914, David Ward, Walter Ward, Willis Ashley and Jesse Ashley, of Edgar County, Illinois, had appointed Hiram Freeman of Montgomery County, NC, as their attorney to collect any funds for them " due us from the estate, real or personal, of John Ward, deceased, as heirs at law."
I had been researching the heirs of Thomas Ward at length, and all of the Wards in Montgomery County, NC seemed to lead back to Thomas, and had not came across this John. There was another John, but he was not deceased at this time, and had no 'heirs', that I had found.
Page Two read:
Paris, Illinois May 13, 1916
Mr Hiram Freeman, Ether, NC
Dear Sir,
Mrs. Bessie Walls came in today and signed her receipt for her share of the Ward Estate as she was the last one to sign. I am returning them to you today. David Ward is dead so his Administrator is signing for him. I think you will find them all inclosed (sic).
Respectfully yours,
Paul B. Launer
So David Ward had died between August 25, 1914 and May 13, 1916. I had noticed that in the first document, David Ward was the only one of the four from the first page who had signed with a mark. The other 3 had signed their own names, a sign of having had a better education than David, maybe they were of a younger generation than he.
It was on page 4 of the file that things began to come together.
,
I had already came across the Auman vs Tucker lawsuit, and had been trying to piece together the generational connections of the individuals named within, and what I had managed to determine was that they were descendants of Thomas Ward, Jr., of Montgomery County North Carolina.
When I saw the hiers of John Ward named in the Auman vs Tucker lawsuit, I was led to believe they were referring to a younger John Ward, however, when the County of Edgar in Illinois was mentioned, it opened up an entirely different door. I had found Boy Ward. Sadly, it appears the decendants of John Ward, had not seen the North Carolina probate file from 1914, and over the last 100 plus years, had lost their roots.
Page 4 is where it began to break down the descendants of John, himself, which gave corroborating evidence of who John Ward was.
"This is to certify that I, Hiram Freeman, Have recieved from Edgar Haywood, Clerk of Superior Court of Montgomery County, the sum of $43.52, for the heirs in fact of John Ward, deceased, whose names appear below. The said $43.52, being and representing their interest in certain lands sold by John T. Brittain, Commisioner, in a special proceeding entitled Franklin Auman et als vs Stadler Tucker vs et als, Number 540. The interest of each is as follows:
The shares of interest allowed each one shows a decling range of relation. David Ward held the highest share, 1/4 suggesting perhaps that he was one of four siblings, and perhaps the only one still living. Willis Katie and Jesse Ashley held 1/16 each, suggesting they were of a further relationship to John Ward, perhaps grandchildren, and as they were Ashley's and not Wards, perhaps the children of a deceased daughter. The rest of the list, at 1/28 and 1/24 shares, were even further in a relationship.
The next page clearly states the relationships of these before mentioned heirs and adds more. It also gives additional and crucial information. Paul B Lauler was a Notary of the Public from Edgar County, Illinois who had sworn David Ward, Walter Ward and Willis Ashley in a statement that they were residents of Edgar County and personally had known the late John Ward, who was originally from North Carolina and had lived and died in Edgar. That John Ward had married Jemimia Humble, who had also died in Edgar County, Illinois and that as far as they knew, he'd only been married once. They then named the surviving heirs of John and Jemima Ward. These were not all of his children and grandchildren, etc. These were just the ones who were still living in 1912. It began with David Ward, as son, the only child who outlived their father, apparently. Then were listed Willis Ashley, Jesse Ashley and Katie Ashley, 'children of Jane Ashley, a deceased daughter.' So now I knew that John had a son named David and a daughter named Jane, who had married an Ashley. Next mentioned were David W. Ward, Ollie Cr....?, Walter Ward, Chester Ward, and Sarah Creech, children of Eli Ward, a deceased son of John Ward, deceased. So, I now knew that the 1/28ths interests were grandchildren, not great grandchildren, but that there were more of them. I'd also discovered that John had named a son for his brother, Eli Ward, of Montgomery County, NC. The mystery was Ollie, likely a daughter as the surname was not Ward, but something that started with Cr and declined like a fading heartbeat into death.
Next mentioned were Bertha (B?)all, Mona Taylor, Emma Taylor, children of Nora Taylor, a deceased grandchild of John Ward deceased. Also, Harvey Ashley, Bessie Walls, Ethel Walls, Fred Ashley, Claude Ashley, Lula Ashley, Sadie Ashley, children of Conrea (?) Ashley, a deceased grandchild of John Ward, deceased.
The remainder of the Probate file was all receipts, signed by the descendants of John Ward. They revealed not much more in the way of usable information, except in the verrification that John was indeed, 'Boy Ward', son of Thomas Ward, as it was Johns' share of his father, Thomass' estate that was being divided.
It was also revealed that the only surviving child of John, David, had died during the proceedings, before 1915. There were also receipts to heirs not metioned in the previous pages, and I believed that perhaps these were the children of David, who would not have recieved a share of Johns estate, as they had a living parent.
It was also revealed that some of the heirs were still minors, as Sadie and Luella Ashley were, Luella having not been previously named.
So, now I knew that the missing Ward son was John, that he had married Jemima Humble and that he had at least 3 children, most likely 4, as David had been portioned off one quarter, and that I was looking for the names David, Eli and Jane among those children, and that Jane had married an Ashley. That was quite a bit to go on, and John was easily found.
I first find John and his family in the 1850 census in the town of Morgan in Owen County, Indiana. He is farming and his brother-in-law, George Humble, is helping them out. He has 4 children in the home, David, Thomas B., Eli W. and Jane. The first thing I notice is the 10 year age gap between sons David and Thomas. It almost looks like David could have been by a first marriage, but in the probate files that I had came across in Montgomery County first, David was alive and had informed, as the only living child, that his father had came from North Carolina and that his mother was Jemima Humble. It could have been that children were born between David and Thomas, but had not survived to see 1850.
Owen County, Indiana is located west of center in the middle of Indiana. It was established in 1819 and it was probably because of people known there, or even family who had previously migrated there, that lured John Ward from North Carolina.
In "General History of Owen County, Indiana", by Roger Peterson, he states that most of the early settlers to Owen County came from either southern Indiana, Kentucky and North Carolina, with one group coming from the Winston-Salem area with surnames reminiscent of the Mormons in that area, and another group from Montgomery County, NC.
"The Montgomery County N.C. families containing 18 surnames; Beaman, Langdon, Nichols, Jordan, Haltom etc. settled in the northwest portion of the county. "
The history and report of the area seems rather unremarkable. Mr. Peterson states that the communities were rather isolated to themselves, so the history is best told by the history of the individual communities themselves. In fact, the most remarkable thing about Owen County is in its anomalousness, itself. It seems to have remained so until this day. as of the most recent census, the population of the entire county is a little less than the population of Albemarle, NC, the County Seat of Stanly County, and a small town itself, and Morgan Townships population, named for Morgan families from Montgomery County, NC, is only about 1200 people, with no incorporated towns, only 3 unincorporated communities, once towns; Jordan, Atkinsonville and Beamer, again reflecting immigrants from Montgomery County, North Carolina and one lake with the attractive name of Graybrooke Lake.
A look at the early marriages of Owen County show an 1828 marriage between a James Ward and Miss Jenny Brown and an 1838 marriage between a Willis W. Ward and Susan Jane Foster. Also in 1838, Elisabeth Ward to Jeremiah C. York, Sally Ward to William Holston, Anna Ward to James Baker and in 1837, Nancy Ward to Shadrach Phillips. Many other family names that echo the Uwharrie hills are found in these early records. As these married couples are small in number and the weddings close in range, could they lead to one family, one Ward from Montgomery County who migrated to Indiana prior to John L. Ward? It's possible. More research would be required. Perhaps even the John Ward who shows up in the 1810 census of Montgomery County, NC, before this John was even born.
John and family are still living in Owen County in 1860. Next door are newlyweds, Thomas, and his wfie, Charity and another of Jemimia's brothers, John Humble. Oldest son, David has also married. Eli and Jane are now teenagers and John is working as a cabinet maker.
David Ward had married Artemecia Ann Creech, affectionately known as 'Artie", about 1855. 1860 finds the young family in Washington, Clay County, Indiana.
25 year old David married 14 year old Artie in Clay County, Indiana. Three years after David married Artemecia Creech, his younger brother, Thomas Branson Ward married Charity Creech in Vigo County, Indiana.
Name:
Thomas B Ward
Spouse Name:
Charity Creech
Marriage Date:
28 Jan 1858
Marriage County:
Vigo
At first, it may appear that two Ward brothers married two Creech sisters. Charity and Artemesia Creech were not sisters, but genetically, they were nearly as close. Let's take a close look at the Creech and Jenkins families.
The Pope and Creech families reflect the typical North to South and east to west migration of settlers during the Revolutionary War era of expansion and the years that followed. William Pope II was the son of William Creech Sr. and wife Tryphenia Perkins Creech, who had migrated from Connecticutt to the part of Montgomery County, Virginia that was to become Grayson County. Charity Pope was the daughter of Rev. Elijah Pope who was from the eastern county of Edgecomb and had migrated west across the state. He married Charity's mother, Mary Davis, in the county in which she lived, Rowan, in 1783. From there they progressed even further westward, to the most NorthWestern county of North Carolina, Ashe.
This was the Blue Ridge Mountains, part of the Applachian chain. The above map shows the close proximity of Ashe County, NC and Grayson County, VA. It also shows how close they were to not only Tennesee, but to West Virginia.
The Popes and the Creeches both owned property in North Carolina and Virginia. These neighbors lived right upon the state border. William Creech Jr. married Charity Pope in Ashe County, NC in 1804. William and Charity would not remain on the border, and the birthplaces of their 8 children reflect their migration northwest to Indiana:
1805 Martha "Patsy" Creech born in Grayson County, Virginia.
1808 Elijah Creech born in Lee County, Virginia.
1811 Zilphia Mary Creech born in Ashe County, North Carolina.
1813 Joseph Creech born in Tennessee during the migration.
1817 Phobe Creech born in Crawford County, Indiana.
1820 John B. Creech " " " " ".
1822 Temperance Creech " " " " " ".
1827 Levi D. Creech born in Owen, Clark County, Indiana.
Thomas Jenkins was a Virginian, born in 1780 in Westmoreland County, Virginia to a Revolutionary War veteran, Ezekial Jenkins and wife, Sabina "Sibby" Lewis Jenkins. On September 4, 1804, Thomas, 24 married a 14 year old Kentucky girl, Telitha Elkins, in Jessamine, Kentucky. Their oldest children, daugthers Malinda "Linda" Mira Jenkins, Louisa Susan Jenkins (1806) and Atlantic Oshen Jenkins (1810), were all born in Kentucky, but by the birth of their last child, Thomas Minnion Jenkins in 1825, they had relocated to Morgan County, Indiana.
Cataract Park, Owen County, Indiana
On September 11, 1827, Elijah Creech married Louisa Susan Jenkins in Owen County, Indiana.
On March 14, 1833 Joseph Creech married Atlantic Oshen (yes, pronounced Atlantic Ocean) Jenkins.
Two brothers marrying two sisters, meaning their children were double-first cousins.
Elijah and Louisa, the older pair of siblings, had 13 children:
1828 Malinda
1830 William T.
1831 Lucinda
1833 Telitha
1836 Charity (named for her grandmother)
1839 Louisa Ann (named for her mother, probably)
1840 John Emmanuel (The Jenkins sisters had a brother named Emmanuel)
1841 Martha
1842 Dewitt Clinton
1844 Mary Jane
1846 Elijah Jr.
1848 Levi D.
1851 James Marion
Joseph and Atlantic would have 4 children:
1837 Artemecia Ann
1841 John Bailey
1845 Narcissa D.
1848 Joseph B. II
Atlantic Oshen Jenkins Creech died in 1849 at the age of 39.
On July 18, 1850, Joseph remarried to Susannah Boyd and to this marriage were born 3 children:
1856 Phobe
1858 William Albert
1861 Louisa Eliza
In the 1850 census, Joseph is listed in Clay County, Indiana with his new bride, Susannah, his 4 children by Atlantic, his mother, Charity, and his youngest brother, Levi.
So Artiemcia Creech and Charity Creech were double first cousins and they married brothers David and Thomas Ward, making the children of these two unions....much closer relations than just first cousins.
Grave of Thomas B. Ward, contributed to Find-a-Grave by
John Maxwell.
Tragically, Thomas Branson Ward April 12, 1860 at the age of 22. He was buried at the New Union Carolina Church Cemetery in Morgan Township, Clay County, Indiana. His only child, Louisa Jane Ward, was born 2 months later, in June of that year. His widow, Charity, has her own story. She had other children, attributed in multiple family trees, to Thomas B. Ward. While they carried the surname Ward, they could not have possibly been his. Unless of course Charity concieved them with his ghost.
1870 finds that John L. Ward and wife, Jemima have moved to the community of Riley in Vigo County, Indiana. The only child remaining at home is the youngest, Jane, and of a very marriable age. living right next door is the widowed Charity Ward, their daughter -in-law and 10 year old granddaughter, Louisa.
Vigo County adjoins Clay County, Indiana and is home to Terre Haute. It's located on the westernmost border of Indiana. If you will notice on the below map, Vigo borders Edgar County, Illinois, to the west.
Oldest son, David, is also living in Vigo county with his family, which has now grown to 6 children.
They all lived in the township of Riley, southeast of Terre Haute.
Between 1860 and 1870 came a big upheaval in American society called the Civil War. Davis had served, but enter near the end of the war. Records state he was drafted into the Union Army in October of 1864.
Name:
David Ward
Enlistment Date:
14 Oct 1864
Enlistment Rank:
Private
Muster Date:
14 Oct 1864
Muster Place:
Indiana
Muster Company:
E
Muster Regiment:
57th Infantry
Muster Regiment Type:
Infantry
Muster Information:
Drafted
Muster Out Date:
20 Oct 1865
Muster Out Information:
Mustered Out
Side of War:
Union
Survived War?:
Yes
Residence Place:
Terre Haute, Indiana
Last Known Residence Place:
Quincy, Illinois
Death Date:
8 Jan 1915
Title:
Report of the Adjutant General of the State of Indiana; GAR Dept of Illinois: Death Rolls
David wasn't the only member of the family to get caught up in the war. Younger brother, Thomas had already passed, but Eli Washington Ward also served.
Name:
Eli W. Ward
Birth Year:
abt 1844
Age:
18
Enrollment Date:
22 Jul 1862
Discharge Date:
17 Jun 1865
Place:
Bowling Green, Indiana
Company:
D
Cavalry, Battery, Unit:
6th Cavalry
Regiment:
71
Notes:
Mustered out at Pulaski, Tennessee.
Eli was only 18 when he enlisted, unlike his older brother, David, who was drafted. David, however, was already 30 with an enlarging family. That may have been the difference. Both brothers survived. Eli married to Nancy Jane Thomas in 1870, and was enumerated in the 1870 cenus as a newlywed, also in Vigo County, Indiana.
I do not know what made the family cross the border into Illinois, but they were in a continuous western crawl. By 1880, John, with Jemima, now in his late 60's, was farming in Edgar County, Illinois.
Listed just above him was son, Eli, who now had a house full of children. Just below him, with a Burkett neighbor in between, was their daughter-in-law, Charity, who seems to have hitched a ride to the Ward family, still. She had several younger children in her home.
David had also picked up his family and moved with his parents to Edgar County, Illinois. The Wards seem to have been a very tight-knit bunch. Whatever caused the decision to relocate across the state line, they made it together. Davids' records always clearly state he, and both of his parents, were born in North Carolina. His younger siblings were all born in Indiana. I can't help but think that their were likelysome children born between David and Thomas who didn't grow up. They may have passed during the northwest migration of John and his family, buried perhaps in Tennessee or West Virginia
Eli Ward, now married with children, has a family with names reflective of the probate records.
David, age 9, is David Wayland Ward, the David W. Ward mentioned in The 1912 Probate papers.
Olive Ward, 7, is "Ollie" ?, actually Ollie Ward Crum.
Nora Ward, 5, and sadly, is the deceased granddaughter, Nora Taylor.
Walter Ward was also mentioned.
John C and Jane Ward Ashley
Only daughter, Jane Ward, had maarried in May of 1872, in Vigo County, Indiana to John Christopher Ashley. She was about 25 years old. In 1880, Jane's family remained in Edgar County, Illinois.
Jane, known as Jenny by nickname, was not without family nearby. Next door was her Uncle, George Humble and two households away was John B. Creech. There were also Crum families nearby, who had married into the Ward familly.
Edgar County, Illinois was in a state of growth during this era. According to the History of edgar county, John Ward and his sons, David and Eli were listed as taxpayers in Horace township, town of Edgar.
This is where John Ward and his wife, Jemima, spent their last days. Jemima was called away first, on August 22, 1891. She was 75. John followed 4 years later on April 20, 1895. Both were buried in Franklin Cemetery, Pairs, Edgar County.
Tombstone of Jemima Humble Ward
In December 1853, John and Jemina (sic) Ward were granted Letters of Dismissal from the New Union Baptist Church (Carolina church) in Owen Co., Indiana. Records of the church report that Elder John Ward was hired as a minister in 1863 to serve one year.
Portrait and Biographical Album of Vermilion and Edgar Counties, Illinois, p:1028-1029.
Eli Washington Ward was the second child of John and Jemima to pass away. That is why his children were the ones to show up in the 1912 Montgomery County, NC Probate Records. His wife, Nancy passed away in 1903 and Eli followed in 1909. Several of their children appear to have had tragic lives, dying young, divorces and other troubling sings followed them.
The children of Eli Washington Ward and his wife, Nancy Thomas Ward were:
1871-1942 David Waylon Ward
1873-1916 Olive Bryon "Ollie" Bryon Ward Crum
1875-1912 Nora Leora Ward Taylor
1877-1953 Walter Ward
1881-? Chester E. or A. Ward
1884 - 1918 Sarah Ellen Ward Creech.
As the marriage of Sarah Ellen involved a loop back into the Creech family, I wanted to look into that a little closer.
In 1904, twenty- year -old Sarah married James Freeman Creech. Three years later, they would have one daughter, Cloteal Estelle Creech Boyd.
Freeman was the son of Elijah Pope Creech, who married Susan Longus. He was a grandson of Elijah Creech who married Louisa Jenkins. His father, Elijah Pope Creech was therefore a brother of Charity Creech who married Thomas Branson Ward, making Charity his aunt. Artemecia Creech Ward, who married David Ward would have been his triple first cousin once removed, if I've calculated that relationship correctly. Keeping it all in the family, y'all.
Sarah's marriage would not last. She shows up in 1940 with her 3 year old daughter, as divorced. She's working as a servant for the Vance family in Edgar.
Sarah's husband, Freeman, remarries to a Nora Ethel Brown, who has a young son, Earl. Together, they have two more sons.
Sadly, Sarah dies tragically young at the age of 32. She is buried in Edgar.
Jane Ward Ashley was the next of John and Jemima's four children to pass away. She followed her brother Eli, one year later on March 10, 1910, at the age of 62. Jane was buried in the town of Paris, Edgar County, Illinois. She and her husband John Christopher were the source of most of the 'Ashley's" named in the probate papers. They, however, were not the only source, as some of her brothers children would also marry back into the Ashley family.
The 5 children of Jane Ward Ashley and her husband John Christopher were:
1873- 1952 Willis Booth Ashley
1875-1939 James F. Ashley
1879-1880 Carrie B. Ashley (Died as a toddler of Flux).
1882-1952 Jesse Davisd Ashley
1888-1960 Nellie Katherine Ashley Graham
The Ashley Family
David Ward, the oldest sibling, a decade older than his oldest brother, was the last alive. As he had survived unitl the Montgomery County, NC Probate case, none of his children are mentioned, as they fell under his umbrella.
David did write a will, and the executoer was his son J. B. Ward (Joseph). Joseph stated that at the time of his death, Dacvid lived in Horace, Illinois, but had died at Danville, Illinois on January 8, 1915.
His deldegatetees were listed as:
J. B. Ward, son, from Horace, Ill.
Otis Ward, son, from Chrisman, Ill.
Sadie Elkins, daughter, " " "
Emma Scott, daughter, " " " .
Charley Ward, Grandson of Nebraska.
Vernie Ward, Grandson of Chrisman, Ill.
Alva Ward, Grandson of Chrisman, Ill.
David outlived a number of hischildren. Sadly, many of them fell as young adults. The children of David, and his wifeArtie, who died in 1905, were:
1857 - 1877 Edward Wilson Ward. His tomebstone at the Franklin Cemetery in Paris said he was only 19 years, 9 months and 14 days old. What, besides war, would take a young man at the beginning of his adult life?
1859 - bef 1880 Jemima Jane Ward. Janie shows up in the 1860 and 1870 census reocrds. She is probably buried in the Franklin cemetery, too, but her grave site is unknown.
1862-1887 Eli L.Ward. Eli Ward , named for hisUncle, obviously, also died in the prime of his life. He was only 25, but had married, in 1884, to Ella Sims, and had one son, Charles James Ward, the "Charley" that David had mentioned in his will.
1864-1913 John E. Ward. John also predeceased his father, but left heirs. He married EttieWiley in 1894. They had two sons, Vernie and Alva mentioned in the Will were his. He was 49.
1866 - 1931 Joseph B. Ward, the executor of his Father's will.
1868- 1891 Thomas Franklin Ward, another who died young, at age22. No children.
1871 -1927 Sarah Elizabeth 'Sadie' Ward Elkin.
1873- 1949 Otis Bartley Ward.
1877 - 1943 Emma D. Ward Scott.
Below is the Obituart of John E. Ward.
The Paris Daily Beacon, Edgar Co., Illinois, Friday, July 18, 1913, pg 7
JOHN WARD IS CALLED HENCE _____ Well Known Citizen of Near Horace Passes Away On Friday Morning _____ SURVIVED BY WIFE ANN (sic) TWO CHILDREN Also Survived by His Aged Father, Two Brothers and Two Sisters Funeral Sunday Morning at Franklin Church
- Special to the Beacon. - Horace, July 18. - John E. Ward, a well known farmer of Edgar county died at his home three miles east of Horace Friday morning following a long illness . . . .
Mr. Ward was born in Vigo County, Ind., February 16, 1864 and was aged 49 years, five months and two days at the time of his death. He came to Edgar County when young and has since been a resident. He always followed the occupation of a farmer and was quite successful in his calling.
He is survived by his wife and two sons, Vernie and Alva, both residing at home. He is also survived by his aged father, David Ward of Horace and the following brothers and sisters: Joseph, of Horace; Otis of Chrisman; Mrs. Ed Elkins, of Horace; Mrs. Leo Scott of Chrisman.
The funeral will take place from the Franklin church east of Horace at 11 o'clock Sunday morning Rev. Fuson, of Fairbanks, Ind., officiating. Burial will be in the Franklin cemetery.
The Paris Daily Beacon, Monday, March 7, 1910, pg 7 Death of Mrs. Ashley.
Horace, Mar. 7. - Mrs. John Ashley residing near here, passed away at 2:15 o'clock Saturday afternoon, following a severe illness of pneumonia, aged 62 years. The deceased was born in Putnam County, Ind., and has resided in this locality since 1872. The following children survive: Willis(,) James and Kate, all residing in Edgar county; Jesse of Sullivan, Ind., Mrs. Ashley is also survived by one brother David Ward.
The funeral was conducted from the Franklin church at 11:30 o'clock this morning, Rev. Ryan officiating. Interment was made in the adjoining cemetery.
And below, the Obituary for David Ward.
The Paris Daily Beacon, Paris, Edgar, IL, Monday, January 11, 1915, pg 8
David Ward was born in Montgomery Co. North Carolina Feb. 26, 1832 died at the Soldiers' home in Danville, Ill., Jan. 8, 1915 being therefore eighty-two years, ten months, and twelve days old. When a small child he came with his parents to Clay Co., Ind., and lived there until his marriage to Arta Creech Sept. 29, 1855. She having died ten years ago. To this union were born eleven children: Joe of Horace, Sarah Elkins, Otis and Emma Scott of Chrisman, Wilson, Janie(,) Eli, John(,) Frank and two infants having preceded him to the better land. He joined the army Oct. 14, 1864 and was discharged at Victoria, Texas, Oct. 14, 1865. He then return'd to Edgar Co. where he lived the remainder of his life. He was a member of the Baptist church .... Funeral was at the Franklin church Sunday the 10th and the remains were laid to rest in the adjoining cemetery. The funeral was preached by Rev.F. A. Morrow of Tolono, Ill., a former preacher of Horace Baptist church. The services were in charge of Driskell post G. A. R. of Paris of which the deceased was a member.
Sometimes, when coming upon a document, and searching for the people who are mentioned in the document, I discover things that descendants of these people have all wrong. So, sometimes I create a blog post, just to put my evidence out there, for anyone who would cede to find it. Sometimes folks are just happy with their illusion of the truth, and want nothing to change it. That, too, is there right. In this post, I just present the evidence, as I have found it. If anyone wants to use it, fine, if not, fine also, but their dna is not going to match up. This post is one of those cases.
Charity Creech was born in January of 1836 to Elijah Creech and his wife, Louisa Susan Jenkins. She was named for her Grandmother, Charity Pope Creech. Charity Pope's father was the Rev. Elijah Pope, of Edgecomb County, NC. He is mentioned in the will of his mother Olive. I mention this because the name Olive then travels down the line into the Ward family.
Rev. Pope begins a campaign west, and in Rowan County, North Carolina, he met and married Mary Davis, daughter of Jacob Davis, and they proceeded to Ashe County, NC, which borders both Virginia and Tennesee.
It was in Ashe County, NC, that Charity, the daughter of Rev. Elijah and wife Mary Davis Pope, met and married William S. Creech, Jr.
The Creech family were Virginians, from Lee and Montgomery Counties, Virginia, not far from the North Carolina line. By 1830, they were all in Clay County, Indiana. In Indiana, the Creech family encountered the Jenkins family, who hailed from Bourbon County, Kentucky. Elijah Creech, the oldest son and second child of William S. Creech, Jr. and Charity Pope Creech would marry in Owen County, Indiana, that bordered Clay County, to Louisa Susan Jenkins, daughter of Thomas and Talitha Elkins Jenkins, in 1827. Louisa was 19 when she married, and beginning the very next year after her marriage, she and Elijah would bring 13 children into the world, over the course of 23 years, culminating with her last, James Marion, at age 23.
Charity Creech was their 5th child, born in 1836. She was preceded by Malinda (1828), William T. (1830), Lucinda (1831) and Telitha (1833) and was followed by Louisa (1839) , John Eli (1840), Martha (1841), Dewitt Clinton (1842), Mary Jane (1844), Elijah Pope (1846), Levi D. (1848) and lastly, James Marion in 1851.
In the 1850 census, Charity appears as a 13 year old within her very large family, her oldest siblings already married and her very youngest yet to be born.
The family lived in the little town of Liberty in Crawford County, Indiana, and Charity had attended school.
In 1858, at the age of 22, Charity would marry Thomas Branson Ward, son of John and Jemima Humble Ward, who had migrated from Montgomery County, North Carolina to Indiana.
In 1860, the newlyweds were living in Owen County, Indiana, right next door to Thomas's parents, a place Charity would stay, no matter where they moved. The census was taken on the 4th day of June. Charity would have been heavily pregnant, as her first child, Louisa Jane, named for Charity's mother, was born that month.
The joy of her firstborn was short-lived for Charity, because that year she also became a widow.
New Union Carolina Church as photographed by Guenevere Beesley
Thomas Branson Ward died in 1860 at the age of 22 years, 6 months and 7 days. His tombstone declares that he died on April 13. However, the 1860 census for Morgan Township that he was enumerated in is dated June 4th of that year. One of them is obviously incorrect. As I don't believe he was enumerated as a ghost, I believe the mostly likely event is that the stone was erected later, perhaps by his daughter, or even his siblings, and they got the date wrong. Below is his stone , reassembled.
Photographed by John Maxwell
The New Union Carolina Baptist Church is an abandoned church located on the Atkinsonville Road in Morgan Township, Owen County, Indiana. It's location probably marks the general area the John Ward family settled when they first arrived there, around the time of Thomas's death. It's an historic church, an old white frame building with the double doors meant for the separation of men and women. Founded by settlers from North Carolina, common surnames found in the cemetery includes Arant, Barnes, Beaman, Cassida, Corns, Haltom, Jordan, Langdon, Lucas, Query, Randall, Williams and Trent. A history of Morgan Township lists several prominent settlers and families from North Carolina including the Curtis family from Randolph County, NC, Atlas Bray of Chatham County, NC, David Goss of Davidson County, NC and Elias Hubbard of Guilford County, NC. Also several Johnsons and Smiths from Chatham.
Front of Church photographed by April Thomas
The area and the church could not have been more plain, and thus far, Charity's life had been typical of an 18th century midwest farm girl, plain living, large families and early marriage. Now, she was a young widow with a small child. What was she to do?
So far, Charity had been born into a westward moving family of North Carolina, Viriginia and Kentucky natives. She grew up in Crawford County, Indiana, married in Vigo County, Indiana and buried her husband in Owen County, Indiana.
Just kind of wandering around the gates of the midwest. The 1870 census finds Charity Ward and her young daughter, Louisa, back in Vigo County, living in the tiny town of Riley. It was founded in 1836 as part of a canal building project. As of 2010, only 200 people lived in Riley.
Riley, Indiana from Wikipedia
Charity was still livng right next door to John and Jemima Ward, as she had been in the 1860 census with Thomas. She was in a separate household, so maybe in a tenant house on their property. I am sure they saw to her sustenance.
Below Charity and her 10 year old daughter is listed a Baker family, and below them is her brother-in-law, Eli W. Ward and his wife Jane, who are yet to have children themselves.
Up until now, things for Charity have been typical, rather boring, unconsequential. Nothing to blog about, but then, Charity must have met someone. A man, or men, I do not know, but Charity began having children, more children, and this is the reason for this post. In tree after tree, all of Charity's children are attributed to Thomas Branson Ward and true to form, they carry the surname Ward, because that was Charity's legal name. It was if these descendants of Charity found the marriage certificate and without wondering where Thomas may have been, just ran with that. But unless Charity was sleeping with his ghost, those children beyond Louisa could not have been the children of Thomas B Ward. He was not their father.
The 1880 census reveals the tale. Charity has followed the Wards to Edgar County, Illinois. Her daughter with Thomas, Louisa, is now 19. She has 7 year old twins, John and Marietta living with her and a two year old, Nettie M. Ward. Now, Nettie was young enough, she could have reasonably been the daughter of Louisa, who would have been 17 as opposed to Charity being 41 at the time of her birth. The 1880 census was the first to name the relationships of the persons in the household and name Louisa, Marietta and Nettie, all as daughters of Charity and John as her son.
She is still tied to the Ward family as Eli's family and her elderly inlaws are still nearby, despite having moved to a new state and county.
The Baptismal record of Charity's youngest daughter, Nettie, lists father as unknown.
Burial
Event Date:
14 Apr 1882
Event Place:
Edgar, Illinois, United States
Name:
Nettie May Ward
Gender:
Female
Age:
4
Birth Year (Estimated):
1878
Birthplace:
Edgar Co., Ill.
Death Date:
13 Apr 1882
Death Place:
Edgar Tp., Edgar Co., Illinois
Cemetery:
Old Log Cem.
It wasn't long before another tragedy would strike. Charity's youngest, Nettie May, would died at age 4 of a "brain fever", or meningitis, on April 13, 1882. Oddly, if you remember, April 13 was the date and month carved on the stone of Thomas Branson Ward. This is why I believe this date, April 13, may have stuck in the memory of Louisa, Thomas's only child, and she had erected the stone for her father as an adult, years, possibly decades, after his death. Little Nettie May is said to have been buried at the Old Log Cemetery on her death records. It appears this cemetery was abandoned and long forgotten. So somewhere in Edgar Township, Edgar County, Illinois, rests Little Nettie May.
The huge jump ahead between the 1880 census and the 1900 census can see alot happen in a family. It did in many ways for Charity Ward, and in other ways it did not.
In 1900, Charity is still living in Edgar County, Illinois and with her only son, John. However, her closest neighbors are William H. Crum and wife Etta, who turns out to be her daugher, Etta, and William B Ashley and wife Louisa J., who turns out to be her daugther, Louisa. Just above Charity is her brother-in-law, Eli Ward and his family. So it appears that the family did not move in twenty years, just laid to rest John and Jemima, while Charity's daughters married and gathered around her.
That is the last we see of Charity. Whether or not she was buried in the "Old Log Cemetery" with her youngest daughter or in the Franklin Cemetery with most of the Wards is unknown. I find it unusual that Nettie May had a death record in 1882 and Charity doesn't after 1900. So for any other understanding of Charity, we have to move on to her children.
Louisa Jane Ward
Louisa Jane was the daughter of Thomas Branson Ward. She was born the year he died. As he appears on the 1860 census in June, and June seems to be the month Louisa was born, she was born either just before or just after his death. After appearing as a teenager in the 1880 census with her mother and the 3 younger children, Louisa marries the very next year, on March 3, 1881 to Willard B. Ashley, at the age of 20.
You might recall that her Aunt, Jane Ward, the youngest child of John and Jemima Humble Ward, had married John Christopher Ashley. Louisa Jane had married back into the same Ashley family. As a side note, I have looked into the "Schenck" given as Charity's surname in the above record and have decided its probably just an error. She was born a Creech, that is for certain. I looked into the possibility of her marrying a Mr. Schenck in her twilight years but have found no record of such.
The Ashley family hailed from Lincoln County, Kentucky. Led by patriarch James Francis Ashley and wife, Sussanah Server Ashley, they arrived in Illinois in the 1870's. Like the Ward family, most of the Ashleys are buried in Franklin cemetery.
John Francis Ashley
John F. and Susan Ashley had 10 children:
1847 John Christopher - who married Jane Ward
1848 Margaret Lydia
1851 Mary Jane
1853 John Henry Vardum Ashley
1855 Willard Brinton - who married Louisa Jane Ward, niece of Jane Ward.
1857 William Willis
1859 Kossuth H.
1861 Andrew Jackson
1864 Susan Harriett
1867 Frances Ellen aka "Ella"
So there is how the Ashley's are related. Their fathers were brothers, their mothers Aunt and Niece, not double- cousins per se, but still closely related to earch other.
In 1900, Louisa Jane and her family are shown living in Edgar Township, right next to her mother, Charity, her sister, Etta and her family and her Uncle, Eli Ward. She's now actually 40, not 37 as was shown in the census, and she was pregnant. The census was taken on June 21, 1900. Just days later, her last child, a son, Oscar, was born. The census declares Willard and Louisa parents of 8 children, with 7 living. In this way, the 1900 and 1910 censuses gave us a sad, but realistic look at infant mortality of that era. Her first pregnancy, by comparing dates, was twin boys, both William E. and Harvey C. Ashley being born on November 28, 1883. Harvey had survived to bring in the new century, William did not. This made Oscar her 9th child.
The Paris Daily Beacon, Edgar Co., IL, Friday, April 12, 1901, pg 4
VICTIMS OF MEASLES. Two Infants Passed Away on Thursday.
The nine-months-old child of W. B. and Lyda (sic) J. Ashley, died shortly before midnight on Thursday at the family residence, seven miles northeast of this city in Edgar township. The little one had been ill with the measles and the disease resulted in pneumonia, causing death as above stated.
The funeral will be conducted from the residence at 10 o'clock on Saturday morning .... Interment will be made in Franklin cemetery.
Similar Death. The Infant son of Mrs. and Mrs. B. F. Parrish .... similar to that noted above ....
Sadly little Oscar had a short life, and too, encountered one of the deadly diseases of that time that endangered the little ones.
The Paris Daily Beacon, Edgar Co., IL, Monday, October 28, 1901, pg 8
MRS. W. B. ASHLEY DEAD
Mrs. W. B. Ashley, 39, died on Sunday at the family residence, six miles southeast of this city, following a brief illness. The funeral was conducted today and interment was made in the Franklin cemetery near Nevins.
Just 6 months after the death of her infant son, Louisa succombed to an unknown fatal illiness.
Below is the list of the children of Willard B. Ashley and Louisa Jane Ward Ashley, the only biological grandchildren of Thomas B. Ward:
1883- William E. and Harvy C Ashley
1885- Bessie Deal Ashley Walls
1887- Frederick Cleveland Ashley
1889- Maude Ethel Ashley Walls
1891- Claude A. Ashley
1894- Louella Ashley Quinn
1897- Sadella or Sadie Dell Ashley Ward
1900- Oscar Ashley.
As you can see, youngest daughter Sadie married back in to the Ward family. Her husband, Vernie, was the son of John E Ward, son of David Ward.
Sisters Bessie and Maude also married Walls. Cousin marriages were very common in this timeframe. I wonder how much this fact contributed to the child mortality rates. d
I am going to continue along this family branch because I find several family trees confused by the fact that Louisa's widower had married a woman with a similar name to his first, and they have Louisa living on into the 1950's, and she did not. They seem to have missed her death and Willards subsequent remarriage.
The story beyond Laura Jane begins with the 1910 census. Willard, and a Jennie Ashley are living with his children Claude, Luella and Sadie. They've been joined by a two year old Laura Ashley. Also living in the home is an 8 year old named Keiffer Vest and 63 year old Elijah Creech.
Do you recall Elijah Creech? This is Elijah Pope Creech, younger brother of Charity Creech Ward, Laura Janes' Uncle. This may be one of the reasons multiple family trees have merged Laura Jane and Jenny into one person. Elijah Creech is listed as a boarder here. He will live only 2 more years.
And while it is true many 'Janes' in this day and time were nicknamed 'Jenny', there are other hints that this was a different person, even if you had not found a death record or gravesite for Laura Jane. First, look at the category of 'Years Married' in the above listing. It says "4". Willard and Laura Jane had married in 1881, 29 years prior. Second is the presence of Keiffer Vest, the 8 year old child, his relationship to Willard is given as stepson.
So who was Jenny?
In this record it tells us she was born in Illinois about 1870 and that both her parents were also born in Illinois. It also states she was the mother of 5 children with 4 living. Those 4 would include Keiffer Vest, obviously and also 2 year old Laura, perhaps named for Willards deceased wife, if he demanded such a thing. But where were the other two living children?
It would be natural to assume she was a widow, but that was not the case.
Jenny was born Jenny Scott and in 1888, at about 19 years old married a man named Eli Vest. This record gives her father's name as Isaac Scott and her mother as L. Whited, which with research, I discovered was Louisa Whitehead. Jenny was not a widow, as Eli Vest did not die before Jenny married W. B. Ashley, if she married him indeed. They had 4 children and Keiffer, the youngest, stayed with Jenny while the older three, Chester, Meda and Otis, remained with their father. Jenny had the one daughter with Willard Ashley, Laura Naomi, then they too separated, as she went west with her son, but Willard, like Eli Vest, was not dead either.
I was going to do a 'Story within a Sotry on Jenny and her family, but it became lengthy and very interesting. Perhaps she will gain her own. Suffice to say that Jane Scott was not Laura Jane Ashley. Any descendant wanting to understand the reasons for the Vest family separating and Keiffer staying with his mother while the others stayed with their father would probably benefit from looking into the old court records of Edgar County.
The Crum Connection
The Crum connection begins with the marriage of Samuel Crum, form Floyd County, Kentucky, to Rebecca Starkey, from Alabama, on December 19, 1869, in Edgar County, Illinois. They would become neighbors of the Ward and Ashley families.
The couple had 4 children: (1870) Mary Harriett "Hattie" Crum. (1875) William Henry Crum, (1877) Albert Hereford Crum, and (1881), John Samuel Crum.
Mary Harriett Crum would marry another one of the Ashley brothers, James Henry Vardium Ashley, a younger brother of John Christopehr and Willard. The youngest Crum, John Samuel, would never marry. But William Henry would marry Marietta "Etta" Ward, Charity's second daughter.
In 1900, the family is living in Edgar with their 3 daughters, Ada, Lena and Myrtle. If you recall, they were living in the exact same spot with Charity, their Uncle Eli Ward, and Charity's oldest daughter, Louisa Ward Ashley and her family with Willard B. Ashley. They were living on the property first purchased by John Ward from Montgomery County, North Carolina!
Henry died young, sometime before 1910. Why he died or where he was buried is unkonwn. Etta is found working as a Washerwoman in the town of Edgar. Although it says she is the mother of 3 children with 3 living, they are not living with her.
Name:
Ettie Crum
Age in 1910:
36
Birth Year:
abt 1874
Birthplace:
Illinois
Home in 1910:
Edgar, Edgar, Illinois
Race:
White
Gender:
Female
Relation to Head of House:
Head
Marital Status:
Widowed
Father's Birthplace:
Indiana
Mother's Birthplace:
Indiana
Native Tongue:
English
Occupation:
Washerwoman
Industry:
At Home
Employer, Employee or Other:
Wage Earner
Home Owned or Rented:
Own
Home Free or Mortgaged:
Free
Farm or House:
House
Able to read:
Yes
Able to Write:
Yes
Number of Children Born:
3
Number of Children Living:
3
The girls are not living with Henry's mother, Rebecca, who lived unitil 1924. She is widowed and living with her youngest son, John. It is possible that Charity was still living in 1910, as her death date is unknown, and that the girls were living with her, for neither can be found. It's altogether possible that they were just missed. The census was an imperfect function. Living nearby to Etta are Wards, Creeches and Ekins, who were, or had connections to, her own family.
The next 10 years are both tragic and eventful.
Etta would marry (or not) to Albert Hereford Crum, the third of the 4 Crum children. I've not found a marriage record. That does not mean one did not exit, but the names would not change. What is recorded is that on October 23, 1912, Lloyd F. Crum was born to Albert and Etta. Then, on March 11, 1916, another son Elmer Lee Crum, called "Bob"., Etta's last known child, was born.
Her seocnd daughter, Lena, would pass away on July 7, 1914, of unknown causes , at the age of 21.
Terre Haute Tribune, Wed., July 8, 1914, pg 2
MISS LENA CRUM By Special Correspondent
Paris, Ill, July 8. - Miss Lena Crum, 21 years old, died at her home .... at 1 o'clock Tuesday afternoon .... The funeral services were conducted Wednesday morning.
She was buried in the Edgar towwn cemetery, as was most of the fmaily, and probably Charity as well.
Earlier that year, oldest daughter Ada, had married to Claude Brown, on January 19, 1914. Ada would also die young, on August 1, 1919. Claude would remarry to Jessie I Gosnell. She had 4 daughters, though not all by Claude, and an extremely interesting story of her own. There is no indication that Ada Crum Brown and Claude Brown had any children.
The Paris Daily Beacon, Edgar Co., IL, Friday, August 1, 1919, pg 1
MRS. CLAUDE BROWN DIES
Mrs. Claud Brown, 22 years old, died late Firday (sic) afternoon. The surviving relatives are her mother, Mrs. Etta Crum and one sister, Miss Myrtle Crum.
That left Myrtle, the youngest daughter. Myrtle did enjoy a longer life than her sisters. She married first, in 1923, to Robert Edward Kelsheimer, a divorced man. He's shown in the 1920 census living without his first wife, Carrie Perisho. He's living with random working people and she is living with her parents and thier young son. They had a daughter, but she died at about t the age of 7. In 1930, Carrie Perisho Kelshiemer is still living with her parents.
Robert married Myrtle Crum in 1923, but the marriage did not last long. He died of TB in 1928. There were no children..
Terre Haute Tribune, Sunday, February 26, 1928, pg 2
ROBERT E. KELSHEIMER Special To The Tribune
Paris, Ill., Feb. 25 - Robert E. Kelsheimer, 39 years old, died this morning at 5 o'clock at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Elijah Richardson on the Cherry Point road, following an illness of tuberculosis. Mr. Kelsheimer had been in ill health for several months and returned last Saturday from Colorado, where he had been taking treatments in a sanitarium. He was born April 3, 1888, near Brocton, Ill., a son of Mr. and Mrs. C. E. Kelsheimer. He was united in marriage to Myrtle Crum, who survives him, together with his father, one son, Wilbur, one brother Clarence Kelsheimer, Brocton, and one sister, Mrs. Nelle Ferguson, of Chrisman. Fraternally he was a member of the Modern Woodmen of America and the Masonic order. He was a member of the Methodist church. The funeral will be held Monday afternoon at 3 o'clock from the First Methodist church .... burial at the Edgar cemetery.
Myrtle would marry again, this time at age 33, to Charles Heelen, on Macrh 3, 1930. This marriage lasted 9 years unitl Mytles' death in 1939, at the age of 42. She did not have any children with Mr. Heelen, either. Myrtle was buried at St Aloyius Cemetery in Paris, Edgar County, Illinois.
The mystery remains of what Etta did with her girls after she was widowed and also, where Myrtle, now an adult was in 1920. But those are not the only mysteries.
Etta is shown in the 1920 census with her husband / brother-in-law, Albert, their two sons, and a 7 year old Granddaughter, Thelma. Thelma is the same age as Etta's son Lloyd, but who are her parents? Both Ada and Lena would have been old enough to have been her mother, Myrtle on the long shot. Ada married, Lena didn't, but she would have been a Brown, not a Crum. Myrtle would have only been 16 when she was born, and Lena died right after she was born. If I had to vote, I would vote Lena as her mother, perhaps dying in childbirth, but Thelma remains a mystery.
The dynamics had not changed in 1930, ten years later, same place, same station, only the kids were older. Lloyd was now 2 years older than Thelma, instead of the same age, and since they were raising Thelms, she is now listed as a daughter, but none of the family trees list her as a daughter, the first one was right, she was a granddaughter.
Ten more years, Etta is once again a widow. Both sons still live with her and Elmer has married. Thelma is no where to be found, no death reocrds, so she most likely got married and changed her name, but no marriage records either.
Elmer and his wife, Julia Fern Richey had 2 children and along with the mysterious Thelma, those were the only known grandchildren of Etta.
Etta lived to be 82. No where is there any indication given on who her father actually was.
John Z Ward was the only son of Charity Creech Ward. In 1901, one year after he is shown living alone with his mother in Edgar County, Lillnois, John married Nellie Otte. He would not remian in Edgar.
But the young couple did not leave immediately. Their daughter, Geneva, was born in Illinois. John is still working in Edgar in 1910 and his mother is not with him. This is why I believe she died before 1910.
Sometime during the 19-teens, John and family relocated to Arizona. In the 1919 City Directory for Phoenix, he is listed as working as a Machinist. In the 1920 census, the very next year, he states he is working as a laborer at at a cotton Gin.
By 1919, the family has moved to Phoenix, Arizonz and John is working as a machinist. He was off to make a better life for his family, and in the end result, he did relocate them to west coast culture from there on out.
John did not last long after that, he died of a cerebral emoblism, or stroke on August 21, 1921, at the age of 44. On his marriage certificate, where John had given the information himself, he listed only his mother, and no father. On his death certificate the informant, his wife, Nellie, had named his father as John Ward. Now, John was the father of John Z. Ward's mothers', first husband, who died 13 years before John Z. was born. Could Charity have had an affair with her father-in-law? I suppose it was possible, as John didn't die until 1898, however, I find that highly improbable. Having now seen hundreds of life documents from illegitimate children persons from the late 1800's and early 1900's, I find that many, to avoid embarrassment, named an imaginary father, most often the generic 'John', along with whatever surname the deceased carried.
One can imagine, the beleagured Mrs. Nellie Ott Ward, sitting in the coroners office in 1921, being asked to give information on her deceased husband, and the names of his parents being asked. Did the elder John Ward, grandfather of his oldest sister come to mind? Or perhaps in a 'John Doe' moment, she just uttered the overly common, generic John to avoid embarssment of her illeigitimate husband. And yes, I called him illegitimate. Any person born 13 years after the death of his mother's husband, and his mother not having remarried, is illegitimate.
John Z. and Nellie Ott Ward had 1 daughter, Geneva Angeline. Geneva married and had one daughter, in turn, Eva. Their family had moved, after John Z. died, to California. Then, after Geneva married, they moved from the West Coast, back to the East Coast. Geneva died just an hours drive from where family branch patriarch and source of the Ward name, John Ward, was born.
CLIPPED FROM
The Charlotte News Charlotte, North Carolina 10 Dec 1984, Mon • Page 30 In the end of my search, the father of Charity Creech Ward's younger children remain unknown. Perhaps DNA will one day help to solve this mystery.
As 2020 comes to a slow and sluggish end, so has my research reached a slow and sluggish turn. I just recently recieved a packet from the state archives that I had ordered so many months ago, I had completely forgot about them, and had long moved on from that topic. Sometimes when you get stuck in a rut, it's time to move on to something new, or return to a past lead and pick it up again. Very often something new comes about.
So here's to a better 2021! A healthier new year, a happier new year, a more successful research New Year to us all!
I just suffered the loss of a very lengthy post that I had been working on for weeks. What happened, I don't know, the hitting of the wrong key combination, a computer malfunction, who knows. I will return to it and start again, but at the moment I don't have the heart for it.
Instead, I will write briefly on James Murray, who plays a part in this research circle that I recently had begun.
James Murray was the oldest brother of one of my 3rd Great Grandmothers, Priscilla Murray Aldridge, and, in my theory, the key on how a certain group of descendants of a particular wandering gentlemen relate to me.
James was a son of Jesse Murray, Stanly County Murray patriarch, who migrated to this area from counties east and first landed in Anson County, before settiling near the end of Long Creek, just before its mergence into the Rocky River in Stanly County. I had known Jesse Murray to only have two sons, James and Benjamin, as mentioned in a 1845 land division, but Thrulines show that he may have had one or two more. Some may have migrated to other counties, whose descendants have linked themselves to my Jesse, and we are certainly related.
Jesse also had a large collection of daughters, of whom my own GGGreat Grandmother was one of the youngest.
Jesse Murray lies peacefully, now, in the Murray Family Cemetery, a top a ridge overlooking Long Creek in the middle of a cornfield.
There are about 20 plus graves in this small Family Plot in a little wooded circle atop a hill overlooking Prince Road, and the chances that James Murray is one of them are fairly good. The only legible stone is that of Murray family Patriarch, Jesse Murray, himself, and that is because two of his Great Grandsons erected the monument to him during a more recent era. J. C and A. G Murray (James Clark Murray and Aussie Gold Murray), sons of Annie Jane Murray, she being the daughter of Jesse's daughter, Keziah or "Kizzy" Murray. The two Great Grandsons so honored the official head of the Murray family.
From where my research now stands, James was the second eldest child of Jesse Murray, with his sister, Jane, being the oldest. Jane was a common name in the Murray clan, with Jesse's mother, Jane Pearce Murray, bearing the same name. So, James was born about 1802.
He appears, with his father and his younger brother, Benjamin, on a petition to divide Montgomery County into two, dated 1838. This happened in 1841. He's also on the Division of Property of the Estate of Jesse Murray, dated 1845. Jesse's widow, Elizabeth, is in the 1840 census, as Head of Household, with James on one side of her and Benjamin on the other side of her Oldest Murray daughter, Jane, was not too far away, living near the Burris family. Elizabeth would live until 1853, and is buried, oddly, not with Jesse, but in the Rehobeth Church cemetery.
James appears first in the 1830 census of Montgomery County, in "West Pee Dee" , so he was living in what we now know as Stanly. The family layout appears to be that of a husband and wife in their 20's, with 3 small children, two girls and a boy.
Name:
James Murray [James Morway]
Home in 1830 (City, County, State):
Montgomery, North Carolina
Free White Persons - Males - Under 5:
1 Son born 1825-1830
Free White Persons - Males - 20 thru 29:
1 James
Free White Persons - Females - Under 5:
1 Daughter born 1825-1830
Free White Persons - Females - 5 thru 9:
1 Daughter born 1821-1824
Free White Persons - Females - 20 thru 29:
1 James's wife
Free White Persons - Under 20:
3
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49:
2
Total Free White Persons:
5
Total - All Persons (Free White, Slaves, Free Colored):
5
In 1830, the other two Murray households were his father, Jesse, and his sister Jane, aka "Jincy". Benjamin was not out on his own yet. Neighbors of James at this time were Jacob Efird, William Mays, William Nash, and George Tucker. James, Jane and Jesse seemed to be living in different parts of the County, although still south and west. Jincy is living next to Joshua Burris, by whom she would bear children, but not marry. Jesse was living near John and Nathan Simpson and John Colson. Jesse was probably upon the land near where he is buried, James nearer to the Saint Martin area and Jane near what is now Red Cross.
No. White Persons over 20 Who Cannot Read and Write:
2
Free White Persons - Under 20:
2
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49:
2
Total Free White Persons:
4
Total All Persons - Free White, Free Colored, Slaves:
4
The family setup has now changed. James and his wife are now in their 30's. I believe this is probably the same wife. The oldest daughter may possibly have been married. especially if she was 8 or 9 in the previous census. The younger daugther from the 1830 is MIA and probably not married. Child mortality was very high. The boy could possibly be the same one if he was an infant in the last one, and his age misjudged by a year. A new daughter born between 1835 and 1840 has joined the family.
This is the census where James, Elizabeth and Benjamin are all living in a cluster, no doubt on the Jesse Murray lands. Benjamin would later acquire land closer to the modern community of Aquadale, as it was his land that was purchased for the building of Rehobeth Church.
James appears in a list of people who bought Bibles from the Montgomery County, NC Bible Society Auxillary to The American Bible Society.
James appears to have been battling an illness during the 1840's and loosing his land and his inability to work it.
In the first tax list for the newly minted Stanly County, in 1841, Elizabeth Murray, the widow of Jesse, is said to have had 70 acres on Long Creek, that was probably her dower after Jesse's death, from his property.
Benjamin, the younger son, was taxed for two tracts, 170 acres on Long Creek and 392 acres on Old Hickory.
Just as a note, brother-in-law Richard Poplin, who married Rebecca Murray, one of the older sisters, had 59 acres on Long Creek and Stokes McIntyre, who married Elizabeth Murray, the second oldest sister, below Jane, had 202 acres on Coopers Creek.
In comparison, James Murray was just taxed for one poll, himself, no property.
Just 4 years later, in 1845, Benjamin has 174 acres on Long Creek, 592 on Old Hickory and 232 on Ugly Creek. James is no longer even taxed as a poll, which meant old age or ill health. Since James was in his mid-forties, I would guess it meant poor health.
There exists in the NC Archives, a Vestry Claim Book for the years 1849 - 1854 in Stanly County, for Relief for the Poor.
It listed the elderly and infirm, who was getting paid for their assistance, the term and amount, and occasionally, the reason.
In November 1849, Lee Burleson was taking care of Elizabeth Murray, and indeed, she is listed in his home in the 1850 census. I don't believe there to be any relationship there, as he was taking care of a Rachel Thomas the next year. That year, in 1850, Elizabeth Murray was in the care of Garner Aldridge, her son-in-law, husband of daugther Priscilla.
In May of 1851, Benjamin Murray was paid $18 for taking care of James Murray, and for his funeral expenses.
Just a continuation of this record, in 1851, Benjamin was now taking care of his mother, Elizabeth Murray, while his brother-in-law, Stokes McIntyre, was taking care of his own mother, Judith McIntyre.
In 1852, Benjamin was taking care of both Elizabeth and his sister, Keziah "Kizzie" Murray, who was by 1870 declared an "idiot" or insane, although she had been married, (in 1851 to Jesse Mills) and had born a child, Annie Jane.
In 1853, Benjamin was still taking care of Elizabeth, but now John E. Ross was taking care of Keziah Murray.
The decline in state of James Murray can be glimpsed briefly in the Minutes for the Court of Pleas and Quarters of Stanly County, North Carolina. In May of 1842, James Murray was deemed insolvent and given an allowance of 50 cents. He was given $1.45 for an allowance in August of the same year.
In 1843, he suffered a lawsuit against his property that reads: Executions in favor of Frederick Staton to use of Jame Murray vs Jones Green, Tye L. Turner, vs same, J. F. Stone vs same, two in favor of J. B. Broadway vs same, David C. Lilly vs same, were levied on lands of said defendant, 21 Feby 1843 on which levy vendi exponas issued. Lands of defendant have been sold by Sheriff in favor of Fred Staton and money arising from sale of land in hands of Sheriff be paid prorate to said Staton and others as named above.
So, in thanks to the Fayetteville Observer, a newspaper out of Cumberland County, NC, we know the exact date of James Murray's death, December 16th, 1850. He was only 48 years old. I feel he must have been fairly esteemed in his youth to garner an obituary, albeit a brief one, in a state newspaper. There is no mention of a wife, and no loose Murray widow in the census records to be a possible widow, save one, but who could also have been a daughter. But what of possible children? He did have some.
The 1850 and 1860 census records for Tyson Township, there are a large number of Murray children scattered about the neighborhood. I've spent the last 12 or 13 trying to connect these children to a parent, as all of them were grandchildren of Jesse Murray. Some of them were in the homes of Aunts and Uncles, like Ben Murray, Phoebe Murray Turner, or Sophia Murray Whitaker. Others were in the homes of neighboring families.
Some of these children were called "mulatto". These children were the children of Mariah Murray, who died young, leaving 7 small children, named in her estate records, in which Green Wesley Simpson, a local Sunday School teacher and deacon of Rehobeth Church, who married Garner Aldridges (Priscilla Murray's husband) adopted sister, Margaret, was the Administrator. Albert, Lydia Adeline, Eliza, Mary Ann, William, Wesley and Benjamin, were the children of Mariah Murray and Henry Wilkerson, who was the slave of Jonathan Wilkerson. They had a long term relationship, but were not allowed to marry.
There was Anna Jane, who was the daughter of Keziah Murray, and says soon her death certificate.
There was Solomon and Judith Wilmertha Murray/Burris who were the children of Jane Murray, who never married, and Joshua Christian Burris.
As a note, the Murray sisters were a bit of a wild bunch, often getting into fights and such and the three, Jane, Kesiah and Mariah, had children outside of wedlock.
But there were three: William Russell Murray, born in 1842, after the 1840 census, Edmond C. Murray, born in 1838, and Mary Jane Murray, born in 1844, who was bound out to Charles Cagle and appears in records as his 'apprentice' and of whom it was said he was very fond. These 3 orphaned Murrays were white, and I believe were most likely the children of James, mother unknown. I will look more carefully at these children in future posts. One of them, I've made contact with descendants of before, and we do share small amounts of DNA.
There are two more: A Martha "Patsy" Murray marries Andrew Boone on May 14, 1851. Ironically, this is the same day that Keziah Murray marries Jesse Mills. Andrew Boone was a widower with children who is shown in the 1850 census with his first wife, Jane, who is listed in the mortality schedules of that year. Andrew and Martha move to Alleghany County, NC and have several children of her own. Now, Martha was born about 1830. It's possible she was a daughter of Kizzy Murray, who was born around 1815. A fifteen year old mother is possible. But she also could have been a daughter of James Murray, which I believe is the most likely scenario.
Then there is Winna Julina "Winny" Murray, who married Adam Pless and had one daughter, Elizabeth. She died in 1843 at age 21. Born in 1822, Winny could have been that older daughter of James in the 1830 census. She was also close in age to my Priscilla, so she could have also been James sister, which I believe is the most likely. She died 2 years before the 1845 land division, so would not have been mentioned. The reason being is that my second Great Grandmother, Priscilla's daughter, Frances Julina Aldridge, was reportedly named for her young aunt who died...Winna Julina, as Julina was not a common name. To add to that, Winny was reportedly raised by Daniel Reap and while dying requested her daughter Elizabeth would have been as well. In the 1820's and 1830's, when Winny was growing up, James would have been raising his own children. Jesse would have died, leaving his youngest in limbo, as mothers were not usually seen as guardians.
The short life of James Murray leaves many questions. I will explore these more soon.
There's an old saying about too many irons in the fire. I'm guilty of that, but I haven't abandoned one of my research projects, The Mountains of Stanly County.
Everyone near and in Stanly County, North Carolina knows where Morrow Mountain is, because of the State Park that bears it's name. The park actually encompasses 5 mountains: Morrow, Hattaway, Sugarloaf, Falls and Mill Mountain. These, and the other small mountains in Stanly County are part of the ancient Uwharrie Mountain range, which has weathered many eons.
Some background, genealogical research has taken me to spending lots of dusty time, in old deeds and records. Those records often used landmarks to describe where the particular plot of land was located. They named whose property it connected, or bounded. Often, bodies of water created a boundary, rivers, creeks and branches. Sometimes trees and roads we're named. Once in awhile, a mountain was mentioned.
Growing up in Stanly, I was familiar with a few of the mountains, because of the park, or because the mountain had a road named for it, like Nelson Mountain Road. But most of the time, I would read the deed and see a mountain I'd never heard of.
While that sweet gum mentioned in 1832 is long gone, and the roads, for the most part, have changed or even disappeared, the creeks and the mountains haven't gone anywhere.
It's one of my projects to find them.
Some, like Palmer Mountain, are named on old maps.
In this turn of the century map, Palmer Mountain is located in the town of Palmerville. Palmerville is no longer what you would call a town, but the church, and many of the old houses remain, along with new ones. The road still bears the name, and heads off of Hwy 740 just north of the town of Badin.
A view across Badin Lake towards the east.
Currently, Palmer Mountain is an island. Back before the town of Badin was concieved, a family from which I descend, lived along the Yadkin River, on and around the small mountain, and started a successful business. Before long, the mountain, and a town bore the name of Palmer.
The foot of Palmer Island across the canal.
When the first attempt at building a dam was attempted upriver at Old Whitney, this canal was built around Palmer Mountain. The project would become bankrupt, but would later be restarted sucessfully again by a French Company several years later, but downstream from Palmer Mountain. Badin Lake and the Town of Badin would be founded.
The road across the canal, over the railroad tracks, to Palmer Mountain starting to rise in the front.
Many of the old Palmerville houses are still occupied
Another of the original Palmerville homes still standing
Palmer Mountain still suffers the scars of the Quarry, Gold Mine, Canal and Dam work of it's past. Owned by the family of a former NC State Senator, today it quietly overlooks Palmer Lake and the sleepy old community of Palmerville.
One of the best parts of genealogy and dna genealogy is meeting new cousins. Sometimes you discover that you are related to someone you already knew, but not as a relative. That is the basis of this post.
For several years we had the pleasure of having as neighbors this wonderful young couple. I called them "kids" as they were the same ages of my older children. The husband, I had already known, as he was a schoolmate of my children. They're not kids, obviously, and have a beautiful and growing family of their own.
The story began one day after they were blessed by their second Ginger daughter together, their 5th child. I made a joke to the husband as his Irish roots were showing, insinuating the common misconception that Irish people had a higher ratio of red-haired citizens than most populations. He wanted to know what I meant. I proceeded to give him a mini-lesson on the behavior of recessive genes, using my white German Shepherd as an example.
You see, the father in this family is African American. He could not make a convincing Leprechaun in the school play, let's say. His wife doesn't look particularly Irish either, however, she appears to be of European decent. Having raised German Shepherds for decades, I explained to him that for a recessive gene to appear in an offspring, both parents must be carriers of that recessive gene. As in my White German Shepherd, Coco, who was born to two black and tan parents. His breeder was in an uproar, and hasty to get rid of him, as white dogs are a disqualification in AKC showlines. They're beautiful dogs, very intelligent and loyal, just outside of the realm of breed standards. I found a white Great Grandmother in his pedigree on his mothers side, but on his father's side, I had to go back 10 generations to find a white dog in his pedigree list.
I explained to my neighbor that Ginger traits were a recessive gene, and for him and his wie to have two red-haired, freckle-faced daughters, both he and his wife had to carry it. As red-hair is not a typical African trait, he probably had European roots as well. Many African Americans do.
Well, I semi-forgot about that conversation, but apparently something about it stuck with him. A few months later, as I am about to drink my morning coffee and check the computer, I notice I have a new message on ancestry.com. It's from my neighbor, short and sweet, "Hi Cuz".
Now, fully aware that I am tri-racial, however, it being that I'm 80 percent European, most of my cousins are also European-Americans. And I do know the link to two different groups of my relatives who are considered black, despite being also tri-racial (of mixed European, African and Native American ancestry). One is the sister of my Great Grandmother, as their family were known to be "Indian" and her younger sister married a man whose father was of Scottish heritage and his mother of African heritiage. Then going back one generation, to the mother of these two sisters, she too had a sister, whose children were by an African-American man who had been born a slave. Having cousins pop up not looking anything like me was no surprise. So, I started digging in his tree. Of course, it was a distant connection, so I was not going to find anything in the first few generations. He had done well on his tree, and had it several generations back. Then I found the connection.
He was descended from both Frank and Ben Davis. And I knew exactly who Frank and Ben Davis were. I had came across their names in old deeds between my ancestors and them. I had also read their names in census records, and in wills. See, my mother was a Davis. And I cried.
Before, the connection between myself and my African American cousins was a maternal line, wherein a woman, called Indian, but accepted by society as white and with everything that entailed, had jumped social norms and chose to have children with a man of a darker hue than herself. That was not the case in the connection between myself and my neighbor.
Job Davis, the 4th Great Grandfather for whom I named my blog, was born in Mecklenburg County, Virginia in 1773, migrated to this part of North Carolina at the age of 19 with some relatives and other families, and settled upon the Rocky River in Southern Stanly County, NC. He married a young widow with 4 children who was born the same year in the same county as he was, just a different month, and together they had four more children, all boys.
The Davis Planstation was a sizeable one for the area, and Job even owned property in Anson and Cumberland Counties. And as did most plantation owners did in his day, Job Davis owned slaves.
I first came across the names of Ben Davis and Frank Davis in the wills of Job Davis and his wife, Sarah.
Job Davis passed away on
His will was probated in February of 1853. One portion of it reads'"I leave this place to my wife as long as she lives and everything everything (sic) she, all household and kitchen, shop and tools within be sold, all cattle hogs and horse and nothing sold without her consent."Grammar errors his own, it continued:
"I leave her Dennis, Jim and Jack and Nance and Harriett and Betsey, all divided up".... Jack, but no Ben, not yet.
Probate papers revealed that Job had not mentioned everyone. His next to the youngest, but most dominate and civicly-minded son, Edward Winfield Davis, whom he fondly referred to as "Neddy", was the administrator of the estate. The estate papers are rather lengthy, despite having already distributed several properties to his sons and stepchildren. But they eventually get into the putrid affair of naming people; "The following are the negroes belonging to the Estate of the said Job Davis to wit, Perry, Dennis, Jim, Green, Lucy, Charlotte & child, Columbus, Jack, Mary, Ben, Anna, Austin, John, Dockery, Liz, Fanny & child, Nancy & child, Martha, Bob, Charles, Harriet, Clarissa, John, Bettie, Maria and Frank.The foregoing personal property was left to the widow of Job Davis by his last will and the above negroes, named Dennis, Jim, Jack, Nancy & child, Harriett & Betty were also given to her. The other negroes to be divided as the will directs.
Job Davis died on November 8, 1852. His wife, Sarah, outlived him by 4 years. . . She wrote her will on January 24, 1855, probably due to a decline in health. She lived for another year and a half afterwards, passing away on June 10, 1856. She mentioned all of her living children, including her oldest son, Peter Howell and her only daughter, Charlotte Howell Stancil, who were by her first husband, Richard Howell. The two middle sons of this marriage, Jordan and John W. Howell, had predeceased her. She also mentioned several grandchildren and her 4 Davis sons, E. W., James, Henry and Marriott F. Davis.
In the will, she left the human chattel left her by Job to son Edward Winfield Davis; " To my beloved son Edward Winfield Davis: negroes: Jim, Dennis, Jack, Nancy, Harriett, Sarah, Betty & George."
The next documentation we come in contact with is the 1860 census. While enslaved people were not listed by name, there came with the census a few schedules that can give a glimpse into the breakdown of who were in each new Davis household.
The Probate files of Job Davis listed 29 slaves.
In 1860, his son Edward Winfield Davis reported having 29 slaves. His list was not only the largest in the Davis family, he also had the oldest. Teens and adult males in E.W's list included the ages: 62, 58, 56, 45, 28, 22, 21, 45, 16, 16, 18 and 15. Women: 70, 65, 44, 35, 18, 15, 15. In small children he reported boys aged 3, 2, 2, 1 and 2 months old, in girls; 14, 11, 10 and 2. E.W. Davis was still a bachelor at this point and lived in his parents home. Hampton H. Davis was the son of his brother, Henry and Allen Carpenter was a neighbor.
Henry Davis only listed a 60 year old man. Henry's oldest son, Benjamin Franklin Davis, had 3 slaves, a 28 year old woman and 2 children, probably hers, a 6 year old girl and a 4 year old boy.
James M. Davis, who owned land in both Stanly and Anson County, some inherited through his wife's family, the Lees, also probably had slaves that were part of John Lees estate as well. He reported 14 people, four men: 40, 36, 30 and 20 and women 40, 27, 25 and 17 and five children, boys 9 and 4 and girls 7 and two 2 year olds.
The youngest Davis son, Marriott Freeman Davis, reported 17 slaves, mostly children: Two men, aged 44 and 40 and three women, all three 30 years old. Boys were 15, 7 and 1 while girls were 10, 10, 8, 8, 5, 5 and 1.
Location of Davis Lands, Rocky River, Coopers Creek, Jack's Branch on right., Richardson Creek convergence on other side of the river where the John Lee and George Turner property was.
The next big event that gives us a glimpse into the lives of these families was the Civil War. All of Job Davis's sons seem to have skipped direct combat during the war. Henry died in 1862, and was buried just across the river in the John Lee cemetery, his brother James M. Davis's father-in-law, James was too old and E. W. and M. F. seem to have signe up for the militia, the Home Guard, in which E. W. was a Colonel. Several of the Davis grandsons fought, however, includinge Henry's 4 oldest sons, Benjamin Franklin, John Edward, Hampton Henry and Horton Hampton.
The 1870 census of Stanly County show most of the people listed in the estate papers of Job and Sarah Davis living near and around the 3 surviving Davis sons.
The collective question in our minds are why did they not leave?
They were freed into a landscape devastated by war. The populace had between reduces to a neighborhood of Widows, orphans, the handicapped and the elderly. What soldiers returned, often returned broken men, mentally and physically, sick with missing limbs and crazy from the effects of war. I've come across several stories of men who made it home, but died shortly afterwards, some withing days. Some who made it out alive did not turn homeward, but westward, leaving it all behind, including wives and children.
The slaves were freed, but to what? They owned nothing, not even the clothes on their backs. They didn't know the road, and would find no help upon it. Everyone was as hungry as they were. They would meet varying levels of hostility along the way, even in the North, had they made it. Some tried and made it, many failed, and never made it, disappearing like the wind. It would be the next generations that were more successful in migrations to the cities and to the North.
So the Davis Freedmen did what they knew, they farmed and land records show within a few years they bought their own lands and it was not very many generations at all, that several children and grandchildren from these families found success in the world.
Living next to the youngest Davis son, Marriott Freeman Davis, is the family of Dennis Davis, 70 and Jack Davis, 52. Dennis Davis is not among the two family lines I am looking at here, but he is notable because his name does occur in the Will of Job Davis and the estate papers, and he is among the over 100 people buried still on family lands in the Old Job Davis Cemetery. Not many stones remain, or are legible, but Dennis's is and is remarkable.
" Dennis Davis (died) Febuary 15, 1888 Said to be age 109 years old."
As Dennis was 70 in the 1870 census, and 81 in the 1880 census, he was propably born in 1799 or 1800, making him 89 or around at the time of death, so 109 was a bit of an exageration. He must have looked really old after a hard life. Being 60 or 61 in 1860, Dennis would have had to be living with E. W. Davis at that time, as he was the only one to have a man of that age in his household, which makes sense, as Sarah Winfield Davis left Dennis to E. W. in her will.
Living with Dennis, however, were two children, Atlas and Mary Turner, who may well have been his grandchildren, but as M. F. Davis and his son, Millard, had inherited from George Turner, Marriott's first father-in-law, in his will, the Turners probably originated with M. F. Davis.
Living near James M. Davis were Frank Davis and Ben Davis, both subjects of this post. Also close to James and family were Green Davis, 40, with his large family, another familiar name from the estate papers, but also to be noted are Harry Randall and William Easley, also Jacob and Daniel Turner with their families.
Harry Randall plays a part here, and has a very interesting story within the anuls of Stanly County history. The Turners likely came from the George Turner estate originally.
Edward Winfield Davis, Sheriff, Justice, Mason, Colonel, Whig and Businessman, finally gave up his bachelorhood at the age of 56 and had married Rebecca Hathcock, a child bride. By 1870, their daugther, Sarah Hortense Davis was born. Also living on the old Davis Estate was Horton Hampton Davis, his nephew, and a son of Henry Davis, who had lost his leg in the Civil War. E. W also hosted Mary Hathcock, 16, his sister-in-law and hired Priscilla Legrand and George Crump, both black, as a housekeeper and farm hand, respectively.
Most of the freedmen living around E. W. seemed to have been Crumps, and true to form, a large number of Crumps are buried in the old Job Davis Cemetery. These were people who likely originated with the Stephen Crump family, who were some of the largest cotton producers in the Cottonville area in the years before the War. One of James daughters had married a son of Stephen Crump and E.W's widow, Rebecca, so many years his junior, would also marry a Crump after his death.
Tombstone of Edward Winfield Davis
But now we no longer have to look at the Davis brothers to cull information on Frank and Ben Davis.
Franklin D Davis had serendipitously married Judith "Judie" Easley in December of 1868. Fortunately for us, in this document, Frank named his parents, Jack and Mary Davis. It was probably supposed to have been Jack and Nancy, but Jack may have had a previous wife named Mary. I had mentioned Jack earlier as living next to M. F. Davis. Living with Jack and Nancy (the 'Nance', no doubt, mentioned in Job Davis's will), are Martha, a likely daughter and 4 young children, probably their grandchildren. But of most interest is 89 year old Jincy (Jenny is a transcription error), who was born in 1781 in Virginia. Did Jincy arrive as a child from Virginia when Job, the Floyds and a few other related families arrived in the early 1790's?
Judith Easley was the daughter of Celia Easley and Harry Randle, mentioned earlier. I plan to tell the entire story of Celia Easley and Harry Randle, as best as I can, in another post, although their story has been told before. A quick rundown is that Celia was a free woman of color, therefore, her daughter Judith, was born free. Celia Easley owned her own land and ran her own farm. She was of mixed race, and connected in some fashion to the Miller Easley family (and the rest of this set of Easley's), who lived in Tyson Township in those days. Celia loved and started a family with Harry Randle. Harry Randle was her common law husband. Harry was a slave, and as Celia was free, she was not allowed to marry him. She did, however, buy him and actually used him as collarteral in later loans she took out to run her farm. Being free, all of Celia's children were also born free. She did not live to see the 1870 census, when Harry himself is free, but he did.
In 1870, Frank and Judith Easley Davis are shown living near the James M. Davis family with their firstborn son, John Wesley Davis. It is from this child that my neighbor descended.
The 1870 census finds Ben Davis, the other subject of my search living nearest Marriott Freeman (M. F.) Davis. Also near them are Green Davis, with wife Jane and a family of 10 children; Daniel Turner 22 and wife Sarah, 30, with children, Jacob Turner 30, with wife Lydia and son, John Davis 26, and wife Celia, 20; 70 year old Dennies Davis, with wife Mary, 45 with 6 Davis children and Atlas and Mary Turner, both children; Daniel Davis, 28, with wife Jane, 3 children and a 35 year old Ann Davis living with them; and finally Charles Davis, 29 with wife, Clementine 27, and 4 children.
The Turners no doubt came from the George Turner estate, and from there to M. F. Davis and his son, Millard,as George Turner was Millard's grandfather and had made provisions for the boy in his will. Millard would move west to be a Cowboy, first to the Chicago stockyards, then to Oklahoma and Texas. I am in contact with some of his descendants.
Ben Davis also has an older lady named Lucy Davis in his home who was born in Virginia about 1790. Perhaps she had arrived as a toddler with Job and the Floyds from Mecklenburg County in 1791. Here, he has a wife named Fannie, 45, and a son named Marvel, daughters Eliza and Emaline and a 5 year old, James.
It appears the surviving sons of Job Davis alotted to each head of household a piece of property and provisions to operated their own homestead, within the area of the Davis Plantation. Jack, Frank, Green, Dennis, Daniel, Charles, Benjamin and John were the heads of household, along with a Joseph Turner. Within 6 or 7 years, mortgages were being taken out with loan sharks or loan companies, I'm not sure on how that situation worked. In the summer of 1873, both Frank, (Book 9 Page 13) and his father, Jack, (Book 9 Page 12), took out loans with M. L. Barnhardt of Anson County. They mortgaged their coming crops of corn and cotton. Jack also included one 'red-star' cow and calf, and an unnmaed number of hogs and pig. Frank put up a Spotted Oxen and household and kitchen furniture.
The next year, in August of 1874, Frank (and Dennis in the next deed), took out a mortgage with a company calle Harris and Lanier, (9 -369). Frank would later sell some cows, a cart and other property to a Robert Ross.
A few years later, in 1876, Ben Davis takes out his first mortgage with his sons, Marvel and Daniel Davis, (Book 10 Page 402) to W. H. Hill.
In Book 11 Page 42, Ben mortgages a 'White no name Cow and white yearling" to J. M. Wall along with a crop of wheat.
Fannie, the wife of Ben Davis, must have died before September of 1875, because in that month, the Rev. K. Harris married Ben, now age 62, and a lady named Zilphia Cockram or Cochran, aged 46. The wedding took place at the Harrisville Church in Tyson and was witnessed by Sidney Threadgill, John Colson, and Daniel Curry. I've never heard of a Harrisville Church in this area. There is an area in the County known as Harristown, which lies along Hwy 740 between Badin and New London, and is within Harris Township, but not in Tyson. I wonder if the Cottonville AME Zion Church began as Harrisville Church?
Zilphia did not list any parents, but Ben Davis knew exactly who his parents were: Ben Lee and Hannah Nance. Ben Lee came from the farm of John Lee, the father of James M. Davis's wife, Rowena. There were several Nance households along the Rocky River area, on the Anson side as well, so it appears Ben Davis was very likely born in Anson County. Ben is listed in the 1853 estate file of Job Davis next to "Anna". I wonder if Anna was really his mother, Hannah, and if Job Davis had acquired the two from a Nance. We have such little to go on in African American genealogy.
Zilpha Cochran had her own story. Her parents and past were unknown, but she had a number of children with various fathers. Her known children were:
1852 William M. Cochran by Jacob Cochran who married Harriett Howell 1st and Patsy Lee Christian 2nd.
1854 Harriett by father unknown, who married Daniel Crump, son of Dock Crump and Sarah Threadgill.
1859 Dilsey by Harry Randle, the father of Judith Easley Davis, who married Peter Brooks.
1860 Steve by Dock Crump, father of Harriett's husband, who married Isabell Spruell.
1875 Calvin by William "Buck" Howell, who married Ella Threadgill.
1865 Martha Jane by Unknown, who married 1st John Davis, son of Jack and Nancy and 2nd Ralph Gould.
Frank and Judy are also living in Tyson Township and their family has grown considerably. The 20 year jump between 1880 and 1900 was a big one, but Ben Davis, now 85, made to 1900.
We don't know anything of him after that, however, or where he was buried. He may very well have been buried in the Old Job Davis Cemetery, because there are a lot of stones there that have faded with time, or crumbled into nothingness.
His wife, Zilphia, evidentally passed away in 1908, as the County bought a coffin for her. She was known again as Zilphia Cochran, not Davis. It was her, because the only other one was her Granddaughter, daughter of William M. Cochran, who married a Hudson and was very much alive.
Frank and Judy Davis, being younger, were in the 1910 census, living with a teenaged daughter they had adopted.
Name:
Frank Davis
Age:
72
Birth Year:
abt 1848
Birthplace:
North Carolina
Home in 1920:
Tyson, Stanly, North Carolina
House Number:
Farm
Residence Date:
1920
Race:
Black[White]
Gender:
Male
Relation to Head of House:
Head
Marital Status:
Married
Father's Birthplace:
North Carolina
Mother's Birthplace:
North Carolina
Native Tongue:
English
Occupation:
Farmer
Industry:
Farmer
Employment Field:
Own Account
Home Owned or Rented:
Owned
Home Free or Mortgaged:
Free
In 1920, Frank, now 75, is living alone. His wife, Judy died December 5, 1915, and is buried at the Cottonville AME Zion Church Cemetery. It's a very old church that had its beginnings in the mid1800's.
The address shows Norwood, as Cottonville no longer has a Post Office, as it once did, many moons ago.
Name:
Judie Davis
Cemetery:
Cottonville AME Zion Cemetery
Burial or Cremation Place:
Norwood, Stanly County, North Carolina, United States of America
Frank Davis died on June 23, 1929 in Cottonville, North Carolina.
The history of these Rocky River families are inevititably tied together. Though I am not sure how I am related to my neighbor, I am sure it is through these Davis ancestors. Whether one of the 4 sons of Job Davis, or either Job, himself, are ancestors of Jack or Ben Davis, I can not know. What I do know is we are one family.
Zilphia, also spelled Zelphia, is one of those old melodic names seldom heard any more. It was rare in it's time, akin to Sophia in nature and the woman who bore it had to stand out among the Mary, Martha's and Lizzie's.
Derived from the Hebrew name Zilpah and meaning "Frailty", the name doesn't quite fit the woman I imagine Zelphia Cochran Davis had to have been. Little is known about her, but I've made an attempt, based on what can be found, about what her origins were and who she may have been.
The very first document Zilphia appears in is her 1875 marriage to Ben Davis of the Tyson Community in southern Stanly County, North Carolina. This isn't the giddy wedding of a blushing young adolescent bride and her nervous young groom . Zilphia is 46 and Ben is 62, well into middle age and the autumn of their days. While Ben knows exactly who his parents were; Ben Lee and Hannah Nance, poor Zilphia has no clue. She may have been orphaned at a very early age, or, it being only 1875, just a decade past the Civil War, Zilphia, being African American, was more than likely, like Ben, to have born a slave. And as with many of the unhealed scars on the carcus of American history, she may have taken away from or sold away from, her family as a small child, too young to have even remembered her mothers name.
When you come across a document like this, and pause a minute to let it resonate, what the information, or lack of it, really means, it can open a door to understanding, in a very small way, an ocean of dispiritedness and indignation of a people whose history had been stolen from them. It's like trying to rebuild a house, when all you find are straws, but other, more fortunated people, are finding bricks.
Ben and Zilphia would have no children together, but they both had children. Ben had been married to a woman named Fannie, and together they had 6 known children; Charles, Daniel, Marvel, Elizabeth, Emaline and James Wesley, between 1841 and 1865. Zilphia also had 6 known children, but by different fathers, some unknown, between 1852 and 1865: William M. Cochran by Jacob Cochran, to whom she may have been married, Harriet Cochran by father unknown, Dilsey Cochran by Harry Randle, infamous husband in old Stanly County lore of Celia Easley, from the Cottonville Community, Stephen, or Steve, by Dock Crump, also of Cottonville origins, Calvin by William "Buck" Howell of the same area as the Crumps and Davis's, and lastly, Martha Jane Cochran, father unknown. This places Zilphia firmly in the Cottonville area for at least a good amount of time in her life.
Another clue is the fact that her oldest son, William M. Cochran, names his birthplace as Montgomery County, just across the river.
To study the African American citizens of a certain surname, it often helps to study the other people in the same area of that surname, and this is where I believe Zilphia have been before her marriage to Ben Davis.
In the very early records of Stanly County, there exists a man named Abraham B. Cochran. I've not done a wealth of research on him, but he was a man of some influence and active in the earliest politics of the county. A. B. Cochran was born around September 22, 1802 in Montgomery County, NC and died on September 1, 1844 in the Norwood area of Stanly County, NC. Now, for those who aren't aware, Norwood and Cottonville are both located in the southern part of the county, along the Rocky River before it's conjunction with the PeeDee River, just below Norwood. Montgomery County is just across the PeeDee from Stanly and they were one county until 1841.
The Cochran Cemetery near the river below Norwood. Zoom in not too clear.
A. B. has a family cemetery south of Norwood towards the Forks of the River near current Piney Point Golf Course. Here he peacefully lies, along with a daughter who died as a little girl, Eliza E. Cochran, who died in 1841 at age 6. There are maybe 25 other people buried her, most without stones, or mostly illegible stones, one with MMC, another with dates of birth and death (1811-1884) and no name. It can easily be acertained that he lived close by at the time of his death in 1844. Perhaps Zilphia was there at the time. Abraham's widow at the time of this death (it seems there was possibly a first wife, too) was Mary M. Lilly Cochran, daughter of Edmund Lilly and Mary Marshall Lilly. Talk about movers and shakers, the Lilly and Marshalls were two of the most prominent families in the Stanly, Montgomery and Anson County areas, especially in the areas where the rivers, and the counties, came together, which was the happening area in the very earliest years of its settlement.
Zion Church in Montgomery County where the Gaines family are the first markers on the right.
Shortly after the death of A. B. Cochran, Mary Marshall Lilly Cochran married James Lowe Gaines (1802-1862), son of James Gaines and Rebecca Lowe Gaines of Culpepper County, Virginia and to Montgomery County, NC via the Cumberland and Moore route. Mr. Gaines was a widower and solidly within Mary's social status group in the Fork Community. They would have 5 more children together: Julia Frances, Cornelia Ann, Sarah Jane, Eliza Lilly and William H. In the 1870 census, Mary M. Lilly Cochran Gaines, is found with these and her 2 surviving youngest daughters by A. B. Cochran, Martha Louise and Mary Catherine, in Montgomery County. There is error in the census, as (Martha ) Louisa and (Mary) Katey, were Cochrans, and not Gains.
It was my belief that Zilphia Cochran and possibly Jacob, were slaves of Abraham B. Cochran and then moved with Mary and her little girls, across the river to Montgomery County. The household from Agga Gains, down to Henry Shankle are named as "Household Servants" and by race are black. However, Zilphia Cochran is not in this list. She's not to be found in 1870 at all. It can be readily known that Agga, Anson, Lucinda, Martin and Jane Gains had been slaves of James Gaines. Henry Shankle was probably from the "Shankletown" area of the Forks neighborhood south of Norwood and had been hired on as farm labor.
Backing up, in 1850, James L Gaines is listed in the family, with some of his children by his first wife, Martha Louisa and Mary Catherine Cochran listed with their proper names and their correct surname, and the oldest three of his five children with Mary M. Lilly Cochran Gaines.
In 1860, the family is listed as being in "Zion", which is some miles out of modern Mount Gilead, within the area of the Montgomery house and not very far from the Deberry House. Edmund L. Deberry was enumerated near the Gaines in 1850. So was Joseph Melton, who was from a Stanly County family, and we also the area of Montgomery County where he lived, so it gives me a general area of where the Gaines family were located.
1860 neighbors were Ballards, Lilly's and Mortons, including the familiar names of Dominic Morton and George Washington Thompson.
James Lowes Gaines died on September 29, 1862 at the age of 60.. Because of his status in the upper echelons of society, we know not only when he died, but what from and where he was buried.
Name:
Col James Lowe Gaines
Birth Date:
1802
Birth Place:
Moore County, North Carolina, United States of America
Death Date:
29 Sep 1862
Death Place:
Montgomery County, North Carolina, United States of America
Cemetery:
Zion Methodist Cemetery
Burial or Cremation Place:
Mount Gilead, Montgomery County, North Carolina, United States of America
Has Bio?:
Y
Buried at Zion Methodist Church, that puts him squarely in the nieghborhood known as "PeeDee" now scarely, yet and at a later time from him. He had attained the rank of Colonel and was by trade an attorney, and his awrded him a very loquacious and excessively adulating obituary.
Lord Have Mercy, I need a sweet tea, a church fan and a settee ready after that one.
Name:
Mary Gaines
Gender:
Female
Race:
White
Marital Status:
Widowed
Estimated Birth Year:
abt 1813
Birth Place:
North Carolina, USA
Age:
67
Death Date:
Jan 1880
Cause of Death:
Consumption
Census year:
1880
Census Place:
Peedee, Montgomery, North Carolina, USA
Mary Lilly Cochran Gaines died of Consumption in 1880. She, too, had earned a complimentary obituary in the statewide newspapers, yet notice the subtle differences. James's focused on his career and public service, Mary's focused on her piety and who her family was.
So Colonel Gaines died of Palsy, or a paralysis, and Mrs. Gaines died of Consumption, or tuberculosis, yet, I can find no clue of what Zilphia Cochran died of or where she is buried. There is no documentation of where she was before her marriage to Ben Davis. Yet, if she followed Mary M. Lilly Cochran Gaines to Montgomery County, might she have been mentioned in the estate papers of Col Gaines? The war had just begun.
So, I endevoured to look into the estate files of Colonel Gaines, wherein I found a number of familiar names. First that of G. W. Seigler, who I had recently posted on, born in Anson County and who would later migrate south to Arkansas and Texas. He bought $400 worth of sheep and $179 in corn from the state, among other things.Col. Gaines held notes on my G. Great Uncle, Edward Winfield Davis of Stanly County, along with several other Stanly County citizens like Stephen Crump and Baldy Henderson Carter.
Precisely in the middle of Colonel Gaines nearly 40 pages of Probate papers I found the 'Division of Negros', where the human chattel of the Gaines estate had been given a value and divided into lots, with the lots divided equitiably among his heirs; his older children by his first marriage and his widow and her young children. No matter how many times I've come across such documents, it chills me to the bone to think a price can be put on a human being, however, these documents are all we have sometimes to determine who these people were, and to try to approximate their ages. The monetary labels seem to be assigned based on 'work equity'. Young healthy people were the most valueable, older people with health problems lost value, young children had future value, but a high risk of succombing to a host of childhood diseases and accidents, younger women had a higher value of being able to create more children. As distasteful and upsetting as the thought of it is, history must not be destroyed, but used to understand the past, and not to repeat it. Such were the times they lived in. As can be detracted from his Obituary, Colonel Gains was not an evil man, he was considered a great man of his time, a well-respected man. He was simply a wealthy man, a man with lots of property, and in this era, a man with lots of property needed lots of people to work it. Wealthy people still today, use poorer people to build their wealth, but now, instead of just providing meager clothing, food and shelter, and not being allowed to leave, the individual is given meager wages, and is allowed to leave at any point, at their own risk of not having food or shelter.
Before the Division, it was noted that 3 people were currently in the home and in the concerns of the widow, Mary Lilly Cochran Gaines; "Two old and diseased negros named Bill and Jesse and one negro woman named Pinky". Mary seemed to be concerned with and wanted in her care, the two elderly men. Pinky was not described as old, and may have just been particularly close to Mary over her life. Perhaps Pinky was a "Lilly", having followed Mary from her parents home.
Lot One in the Gaines probate consisted of "Rob $1100. Lydia and child $1200, and Mary $250". These were alotted to James elder son, Edmond. Just from this, it appears Rob was a young man in his work prime, probably less than 25, Lydia a young woman in her childbearing years, with and infant, and Mary, a little girl, probably Lydia's daughter. Not too long ago, I had read an article by a journalist who had access to the journals of a large antebellum plantation, that had kept note of the births and deaths of all of the people on the plantation. It was surprising how many young men died in their prime, many accidental deaths, many injured by equipment, even 'kicked in head by mule'. Twenty-five seemed to be an average life expectency. Children died of 'teething' and childbirth took many a young woman. Also to be noted was the injection of 'by his own hand', or suicide.
Lot 2) Martin $1200, Jenny $750 and Ben $650.
Lot 3) Jim $1200, Rosetta $550, Calvin $450, Austin $350 - to Harriett, a daughter of James Lowe Gaines by his first wife, Sarah Shaw Gaines.
Lot 4) Martin $1000 (another Martin), Lucinda $1200, Becca $250, Malinda $100.
Lot 5) Chris $1000, Nancy and child $1250, Delphia $400 - to lot added Jesse, infirm and diseased, $200 deducted for maintenance of Jesse.
Here, we see Jesse, as not valued, but to a negative amount, to provide for his medical care and doctor visits.
Below is the census listing for Christmas "Chris" Gaines in 1880, which gives his year of birth as 1834. In 1863, he would have been 29 years old. His wife's name was Sallie Ann Christian. There were Christians who lived in the same general area of the county as the Gaines.
Lot 6) Ralph $1100, Lean and child $1200, Wash $350 - to lot is added Bill, infirm and diseased, $200 deducted for his maintenance and care.
Lot 7) Mason $1200, Ellen $500, Lewis $750.
Below is another look at some of the people listed in these lots. This is the Rev. Mason G. Gaines just 7 years later in the 1870 census. He was 25 years old when he was evaluated at $1200. His wife Lucinda was in Lot 4 and was valued at $1200 at age 21, his daughter Delphia was in Lot 5, valued at $400 at 5 years old, daughter Patsy would be listed in Lot 8 at $300, around 3 years old.
Rev. Gaines is an example of the meteoric rise some people made after slavery. Just 10 years later, 17 years after he is listed as a $1200 slave, Rev. Gaines is in neighboring Moore County as an "Ambassador".
He dies in Lee County, NC in 1927 of pnuemonia at the age of 86 and left an enduring legacy. When you think about it, some of our Grandparents were born around 1927. It's 2021, there are people still living born in 1927. They could have known people born into slavery. This reiterates how recent this really is , just afew generations. the scars have not healed.
Mason outlived his wife Lucinda. He reamrried in 1891 to Caroline Smith Allen. He named his parents, old "infirm" Jesse and Becca, mentioned in Lot 4 at $250, an old woman, no doubt. Could Jesse even have imagined the respected and status his son would attain? I doubt it.
Lot 8) Willie $850, Lucy and child $1300, Patsy $300.
Lot 9) Adam $1100, Cora $750, Henry $500, Dill $100.
But no Zelphia. I wondered if Delphia could have bee Zelphia, but no, she was an entirely different person. I wondered if some of them were Zelphia's children Was Willie, William? Was Dill, Dilsey? It was possible, but since Zelphia was a Cochran, maybe she wasn't considered part of the Gains estate. The estate was settled by Mary Gaines, John A. Lilly, (who had been the executor of A. B. Cochran), J. H. Montgomery, W. J. Bruton, and D. R. Cochran, (any relation?).
Backing up, I revisited A. B. Cochran in 1840, the last census before his death.
Name:
Abraham B Cochram[Abraham B Cochran]
Home in 1840 (City, County, State):
East Pee Dee River, Montgomery, North Carolina
Free White Persons - Males - 30 thru 39:
1 A. B. Cochran
Free White Persons - Females - Under 5:
1 Eliza
Free White Persons - Females - 20 thru 29:
2 Mary M. Lilly Cochran
Slaves - Males - Under 10:
4
Slaves - Males - 10 thru 23:
1
Slaves - Males - 24 thru 35:
1
Slaves - Females - Under 10:
2 Zilphia age 6?
Slaves - Females - 24 thru 35:
2
Persons Employed in Agriculture:
5
Persons Employed in Commerce:
1
Free White Persons - Under 20:
1
Free White Persons - 20 thru 49:
3
Total Free White Persons:
4
Total Slaves:
10
Total All Persons - Free White, Free Colored, Slaves:
14
In 1840, only one of his 4 children had been born and she would died 2 years later and is buried in the Cochran Cemetery. And he had 10 slaves. Zilphia, born about 1834, would have been 6.
Abram B. Cochran had lived in Stanly County upon his death. By visiting his cemetery, I could tell that A. B. Cochran had lived in Allenton, one of the earliest towns in the county, that is now primarily under water, due to the daming of the river. What was his property is now a lakeside community, some permanent residents, others vacation homes. You can see the water from the cemetery in between the houses. The estate file for A. B. Cochran in Stanly County is meager and doesn't offer up a lot of information. There is mention of the widow, and John A. Lilly and James M. Lilly, but not much more. Remember, Mary was a Lilly, so these were her brothers.
That is when I decided to look at D. R. Cochran, who was mentioned in the Gaines file. Turns out, he was David Randolph Cochran, Abram's younger brother. I actually took a quick dip into the whole, well-documented Cochran gene pool.
The Montgomery County Cochran Dynasty was began by one Abraham Cochran, born in 1757. The son of Jacob Cochran (Cockerham) and wife, Mary Ingles Cochran, he appears in the 1784 census of Montgomery County, NC. The family supposedly originated in Brunswick County, Virginia, but deeds mentioning Joseph, Jacob, William and Thomas Cockerham in Anson County, along features that exist in Montgomery County, as early as 1758 and 1759. So Abraham very well could have been born in Montgomery County.
He married Tamar Bruton, daughter of Samuel Bruton and Mary Branch, the Brutons being another prominent and dominant family in the Mount Gilead area of Montgomery County. Tamar was also born in Virginia about 1757, so they were both 20 when they married around 1777.
This couple had 3 children who made it to adulthood (known children): Mary Sarah , who married James Poer, Elizabeth, who married William B. Coggins, and David, who married Catherine Butler. These 3. though few, were very prolific. David, the only son, had 10 children. Abram (or Abraham) Bruton Cochran was the eldest.
Abraham Cochran, the first, died in 1818 and his son David died the next year in 1819. The children of Davis and Catherine were:
1802-1844 Abraham B. Cochran - married Mary M. Lilly.
1803-1893 Joshua Butler Cochran - married Sarah McNeil, was a banker in Charlotte, NC, moved with McNeils to Tennesee, then Missouri, then Angelina, Texas.
1804-1859 Terry Emily Cochran- married Archibald Munroe, moved to Clay County, Alabama.
1806-1864 William Bryant Cochran - Died in Franklin County, Tennesee.
1808-1891 Tamar Cochran =-married 1st Samuel David Pemberton, married 2nd, Spencer Haltom.
1810- ? George W. Cochran - married 1st Elizabeth, married 2nd Julia, moved around quite a bit, Tennessee, Missisppi and lastly in Lonoke County, Arkansas.
1812-1864 David Randolph Cochran, never married, Moved around out west, came home and died in Montgomery County, NC.
1814-1892 Louisa Cochran - Married Neil Bethune Gillis.
1815-1882 Patrick Jackson Cochran aka "PJ", married Mary Elizabeth Thomapson. Died in Angleina, Texas.
1817-1885 Calvin Jones Cochran- Married Mary Ann Tomlinson, remained in Montgomery County, NC.
1919-1864 Atlas Jones Cochran - Married Mary Harriett "Polly" Allen, Died in Gordonsville, Virginia.
The Cochrans lost several sons, including their youngest, to the Civil War. Atlas was born the year his father died. Catherine was left with a full family of small children. Atlas's widow remained in Montgomery County.
David Randolph Cochran seems quiate the character. He was said to have had wild red hair, much like that of his Grandfather, Abraham Cochran. Red hiar must have ran in the Cochran line. From the Family History by Rose Cochran McLean, published long before I was ever born, comes this tidbit of history, David Randolph Cochran "went to the southwest and spent his early years fighting Indians. He came home at the beginning of the Civil War, enlisted as an Officer, had a row with his Commanding Officer - a fight. David resigned from his Company, came home and organized a Company. He was put in command ofCamp Shaftner near High Point, NC. He was Captain of the 34th Regiment, Co. K. Dr. Whit Brookshire of Pekin was one of his men, and he told me many tales of his fiery red-headed Captian. He said that David Cochran loved to fight- the hotter it got, the better he liked it- said his men adored him and would follow him to the ends of the earth. He died in 1864 and is buried in the Cochran cemertery four miles north of Troy. He never married."
Below is a page from the estae files of D. R. Cochran. His heirs were his siblings, his nieces and nephews of his dead siblings.
But I noticed something strange when looking in the Montgomery County Estate files for Cochrans, there were two files for A. B. Cochroan, one dated 1847 and the other dated 1867. Having familiarized myself with the Cochran crew, I knew A. B. Cochran was Abram B. Cochran, so I looked...and I found Ziliphia. Not only Zilphia, but her mother and siblings listed as her mother and her siblings.
242 Deed Book 14
James L. Gaines to A.B. Cochran
State of N Carolina, Whereas, in a certain petition depending in the court of equity for the county of Montgomery, wherein Abraham B. Cochran, David Cochran, William Cochran & other heirs at law of David Cochran Sr. Dec’sd, were petitioners for the sale of the said David Cochran Sr. dec’sd lands, of Spring Term 1835 of sd court a decree of sale was made (as by reference to the records of the sd court will fully and at large appear) of the following tracts or parcels of land, situated and bounded as follows, the first tract lying in Montgomery County as are all the following tracts on the East side of Little River on both sides of Howard’sbranch Beginning on a white oak Joseph Parsons’ corner & runs with his line North 70 deg. East 80 poles to a stake then So 87 deg. East 112 poles to a hickory then No. 2 deg. West 124 poles to a small hickory David Cochran’s corner then with sd Cochran’s line So 64 deg. W 267 poles to the beginning containing sixty six acres more or less. The third tract beginning at a hickory near Wm Bruton’s line on the E side of a branch & on the North side of Big Creek & runs thence So 33 deg. E 32 poles to his corner then So 57 deg.-- 160 poles to a white oak, then So 33 deg. E 30 poles to Will Bruton’s line, then E with & beyond sd Bruton’s line 130 poles to WillCupples’ line, then No 45 deg. E 40 poles, then E 172 poles then No 27 deg. W 184 poles, then south 81 deg. W 160 poles then So 40 deg. W 26 poles to the beginning containing two hundred & fifty acres. The third tract comprising several tracts the first beginning at Aaron Poer’s line on the So side of Ridges Creek & runs down the various courses of sd creek to the till oak, and then a due west to the river, then down sd river a south direction to the mouth of Ridges Creek & then a south direction to the corner on a Spanish oak the beginning corner of the old hundred acre survey on the bank of Little River below the mouth of Ridges Creek, then So 73 deg. E 46 poles, then No 53 deg. E to Ridges Creek containing one hundred & fifty acres & second tract adjoining the above beginning in Henry Humble’s line and runs thence No 17 deg. E 61 poles to a post oak, then So 80 deg. E 20 poles to DavidPoer’s line, then So 51 deg. E 20 poles to his corner, then No 53 deg. E 231 poles to Thompson’s line, then with his line So 64 poles, then So 64 deg. W 267 poles to the beginning containing fifty acres the last mentioned tract containing two hundred acres, one half acre excepted at the graveyard, (this is the Cochran & Poer Graveyard) The fourth tract comprising several tracts, the first on both sides of Ridges Creek beginning at a post oak on the top of a hill and runs E 127 poles 243 to a pine, then So 127 to a corner, then W 127 poles, then No 127 poles to the beginning containing one hundred acres. The 2nd adjoining the above beginning at a post oak in his line beginning corner of his 100 acre survey and runs with his first line E 43 chains to a pine amongst two pine pointers then No 48 deg. E 22 chains & 50 links to a white oak, amongst one red oak & two hickory pointers, then No 22 deg. W 9 chains, then So 65 deg. W 31 chains & 50 links with JamesButler’s line to the beginning containing fifty acres. The third tract adjoining the above beginning at the second corner of his old survey on Ridges Creek at a dog wood and runs South 121 poles to Wm Ozier’s line. With and beyond his line E 40 poles to Haywood’s & Cupples’ line of their big survey, then No 210 poles, then W 36 poles, then So 22 deg. E 36 poles, then South 48 deg. W 88 poles, then W 40 poles to the beginning containing one hundred and fifty acres, the 4th tract adjoining the above beginning at a red oak on the W side of a big hill and on the E side of Big Creek and runs No 15 deg. W 20 chains & 36 links to a pine, then No 28 deg. E 8 chains to a red oak. Then No 63 deg. W 16 chains to a pine sd to be James Gibson’s line, then South 70 deg. W 30 chains, then So 22 Chains & 60 links then E 41 chains & 90 links to the beginning containing one hundred acres, the 5th tract adjoining the above beginning at a pine Wm Ozier’s old line and runs South 39 deg. W 80 poles to Wm Bruton’s line, then with his line South 120 poles, then No 39 deg. W 80 poles then No 120 poles to the beginning, containing fifty acres, the last above mentioned five tracts containing four hundred & fifty acres. The 5th and last tract lying on the half-mile branch of Ridges Creek beginning at a Spanish oak Sampson Seller’s corner & runs with sd Seller’s line No 65 deg. E 130 poles to Joel Green’s corner, then No 30 deg. E 108 poles to a stake, then Sough 42 deg. E 78 poles to KatherineCochran’s old corner of a 50 acre survey granted to Henry Frazer, with the last and known line of sd survey So 67 deg. W 267 poles to the beginning containing thirty acres, and in pursuance and (illegible) to sd decree Jas L. Gainey clerk and master of sd court having advertised time & place of sale, as required by the decree aforesaid did on the 30th day of April 1835, upon the aforementioned tract-or parcel of land to sale when and where Abraham B. Cochran became the purchaser by being the last & highest bidder therefore, at the sum of seven hundred and thirty dollars this indenture Witnesseth that the sd James L Gaines clerk & master in equity as aforesaid for and in consideration of the aforementioned sum of seven hundred & thirty dollars to him in hand paid by sd Abraham B. Cochran, the receipt whereof is hereby acknowledged doth hereby 244
Bargain & sell, alien (?), convey and confirm the above described premises with all and singular the hereditaments thereunto belonging or in any way appertaining to him the sd Abraham B Cochran, his heirs and assigns forever to have and to hold to his and their only proper use and be hoof and the sd James L. Gaines clerk & master in equity as aforesaid doth hereby covenant and agree to and with the sd Abraham B. Cochran that he will warrant and forever defend the title to the land herein before described with its appurtenances to him the sd Abraham B. Cochran his heirs and assigns forever, so far as he is enables to do selling and conveying under the decree of the court of equity as aforesaid & no further. In witness whereof the sd James Gaines clerk and Master in Equity as aforesaid hath hereunto set his hand and seal the 29th day of June A.D. 1837 - sealed and delivered in
James L. Gaines
Clerk & Master in Equity
For Montgomery County
Montgomery County Court, January 1840, then the deed was acknowledged and registered in the court.
Nat Knight, Clerk
It seems the Lames Lowe Gains and Cochran connection was extensive, and A. B.Cochran, despite having moved to Allenton, had extensive ancestorial holdings in Montgomery still.
The 1867 file was just referring to the children, who were now adults. The 1846 file was where the meat was.
" 1846 A B Cochran of Montgomery County, NC... John A. Lilly, Admin. vs
James M. Liully & James C. Andrews
Court of Pleas and Quarters Jany 1846
James L. Gaines and wife Mary, Mary Catherine Cochran and Martha Louisa Cochran
Ex Parte - Petetion for Division of negroes...viz Jesse, Beck and her 4 children viz Martin, Mason, Jones and Ralph. Aggy & her four children viz Wallace, Zilphia, Tony and Sarah. Maria and her two chlidren, Jimmy and Sam. Calvin W. Wooley administrator.
G.L. Barringer, John LIvingston, and Thomas B. Scarboro be appointed as freeholders to divide... Mc and ML Cochran infants under 21. John A. Lilly appointed Gaurdian Ad litem.
Another page added values to the names, as in the Gaines estate files: Some of the names being the same people, just 16 years younger. Rebecca $295 (wife of Jesse and mother of Maritn and Mason, $245 in 1862),
Martin $150, Mason $290,Jones $225, Ralph $100 & Jesse $150 (he must have had an ailment already), Aggie $335 (Ziphia's mother), Zilphy $360 (age 12), Tony $350, Sarah $190, Mariah $375, Jinny $225, Sam $125, Wallace $450 Total; $3620.
Time to back up agian and look at the documents I had already came across, like the 1870 census with Mary Lilly Cochran Gaines in it.
In the above census, I now know that Agga Gains is actually Aggie Cochran, Lucinda is Lucinda "Sinda" Cochran, one of two daughters Aggie had after the death of A. B. Cochran. Jane, who is shown as one in the actual census, was the daughter of Lucinda. Martin was a Gains, and the son of old Jesse and becca, brother to Rev. Mason GL. Gaines. We know what became of poor Martin. Anson, Susan was Aggie's daughter,too.
This was 1870, the year we do not find Zilphia. Aggie's other 3 children mentioned in the A.B. Cochran probate papers, Wallace, Toney and Sarah, were not to be found in 1870, or 1880. Toney may have migrated away, or died, as life was dangerous and short in the mid-1880's, especially for enslaved people, and especially for men. Sarah probably had married, but to whom?
The only child of Aggie's born before 1844, besides Zilphia, that I find any trace of, was Wallace. He had a daughter.
Adeline Lilly had been born about 1854. She was the daughter of Wallce Cochran and Sophia Lilly, both seemingly dead by 1870, and most definately dead before 1876, when she married at age 22. She names both parents as deceased.
In 1870, Adeline Lilly was living with the Martin Lilly family as a housekeeper. In 1876, she would marry him and become the mother of the house. They lived right next to James M. Lilly, the brother of Mary Marshall Lilly Cochran (Gaines). Martin Lilly and Adelines's mother, Sophia, had been slaves of James M. Lilly.
Martin shows up in the 1900 and 1910 census records as a widower, living on Blalock Ferry Roaod in the Pee Dee Community of Montgomery County. He dies in 1914 and is buried at the Mount Zion AME Zion Church, which is located near the Old Zion Church where the Gains family and other prominent names in the community are buried. In all likelihood, Adeline Lilly Lilly is buried there as well. She has descendants, therefore so did Wallace, from this one child.
I looked to the 1870 and 1880 cencus records of Montgomery and Stanly Counties to see who remained in the area in the Gains and Cochran familes. Many had died, and many in both the white and black Cochran and Gains familes had migrated off.
Starting in PeeDee Township, Swift Island Post Office, we have the widow Mary Gaines ( Mary M. Lilly Cochran Gaines, her two Cochran daughters, now in their 20's, and her 5 Gaines children. Living with them are Aggie Cochran, her daughters Lucinda and Susan and her Granddaughter, Jane. Also Martin Gaines, son of Old Jesse and Becca, and a man named Henry Shankle. Martin dies of Typhoid Fever in 1879. Not too far away is the Mason Gaines family, Mason who moves east and becomes a very well respected Minister of the Gospel. He is 32, his wife Lucinda, 28, and their 3 children, Delphia, Patty and James. Delphia was mentioned in the 1866 estate papers of James Lowe Gains. Mason and Martin were brothers.
Also in the neighborhood is Nelson Christian, 45. Nelson ends up later marrying Sallie Ann Gaines, a daughter of Mariah Cochran and Warrne Marshall., Mariah being one of the 3 'Mothers' in the Probate records of Abraham B Cochran, besides Rebecca and Aggie. Mariah will be mentioned several times in this discourse. Nelson is living with his first wife, Jone aka Joice, and their many children, but also in the household are several Gold Miners, Including 3 young Cochran boys, Calvin, 20, Reuben, 13 and Dick, 14.
Now, both Zilphia and Mariah had sons named Calvin. The moniker "Cavin Jones" ran in both the white and black Cochran families. He must have been a worthy figure back in the family line somewhere. Zelphia's Calvin was born in 1861 and would mary Mary Ella Threadgill. Mariah's Calvin was born in 1853 and would marry Sarah Christian. As Zephia's Calvin would only be 9, and most likely living with her, and she was missed in this census, this is probaly Mariah's Calvin. At17, he wuld be much more likely to be mistaken for 20. Reuben and Ralph, there are no more records of. As Mariah was born in 1830, these were probably her sons, as well. Mining was intensily dangerous. These poor young boys probably died in an accident, if not of disease.
In Mount Gilead Township is the Adam and Sarah Gains family and their 6 children. Also, in Mount Gilead is Mariah Cochran, now 40, and her younger children, Harriett, Sidney and George. Harriett and Mariah's daughter Sallie Ann Gains Christian, were also daughters of Warren Marshall, making them whole sisters of Calvin. Mariah's Harriett, not to be confused with Zilphia's Harriett, married James Haywood. Son Sidney, son of Wade Ledbetter, married Pattie Barringer and youngest son, George,son of Ben Bruton, married Adeline Dillamonte, whose parents had been slaves of old Henry Dillamothe, a French prospector and Land Baron.. Mariah, herself, would marry later in life, past her child-bearing years, to Addison Boggan, and on the marriage certificate, named her parents as Samuel and Sarah Wilson. It's unknown where Mariah was born or how she ended up in the Cochran household.
The only Cochran family in Troy Township was that of C. J. Cochran. Calvin Jones Cochran, Sr., the last surviving son of old David Cochran, was the next to the youngest. He had survived the Civil War, when his younger brother, Atlas, had not. David lost several sons in the Civil War era, and others had migrated West. Only C. J. remained. At 53, he had gained a young wife, Mary and had two small sons, John H. and Calvin Jones, Jr.
One of the family of former slaves of James Lowe Gain, that of James and hsi wife, Lydia, had moved across the river into Stanly County and were living in Center (Norwood) Township. They were in the company of several Deberry and Snuggs families, all freedmen.
But ther most telling, in terms of the life of Zilphia Cochran was the presence of Louis Gaines, age 17, in the household of James Davis, My 5th Great Uncle. Zilphia would marry Ben Davis, a slave of James Davis's father, Job Davis, whom I believe had ended up in the household of James Davis before emanicipation. Also near the aJmes Divis household was that of Harry Randle, who would beocme the father of one of Zilphia's children. Might Zilphia have followed Louis Gaines into Stanly County?
Name:
Zilpha Davis[]
Age:
50
Birth Date:
Abt 1830
Birthplace:
North Carolina
Home in 1880:
Tysons, Stanly, North Carolina, USA
Dwelling Number:
62
Race:
Black
Gender:
Female
Relation to Head of House:
Wife
Marital Status:
Married
Spouse's Name:
Benjamin Davis
Father's Birthplace:
North Carolina
Mother's Birthplace:
North Carolina
Occupation:
Keeping House
Sick:
Well
Cannot Read:
Yes
Cannot Write:
Yes
Zilphia, now 46 had married Ben, 62, in 1875. Here they are, above, in the 1880 census, Ziphia's first.
Back in Montgomery County, in Pee Dee, was Mary Catherine Cochran, as head of household, daughter of A. B. Cochran and Mary M. Lilly Cochran Gaines. She and her sister, Martha Louisa were still unmarried, although in their later 30's. Half-sisters, Julia Frances Gaines, Sarah J. and Eliza L, also lived with them. 19-year-old Mary Gaines lived with them as a servant, with her infant daughter, Hattie. Next to them was the James and Lydia Gaines family, who had move back across the river from Norwood, perhaps to help the sisters take care of the estate.
On the next page is Zilphia's siser, Susan Gaines, her 10 year old daughter, Jane, and a 5 year old child named Mary Lilly, identified as a cousin. I do not know who Mary Lilly's parents were., but a number of Lillys lived nearby.
Going on ahead, we find Calvin Cochran, 25, his wife Sallie, 24 and son, Samuel, 2. This is the older Calvin, son of Mariah Cochran and Warren Marshall. Closeby to Calvin is Frank Stacy, who in two years will father a son with Aggie's youngest daughter, Zilphia's sister, Lucinda. not far away is the Christmas/Christian Gaines family, aka "Chris" or "Chico"
Near Chris is Aggie Cochran, now 71 and being named as a 'Cochran', and not "Gaines". Living with her is her daughter, Lucinda, now 22. These are Zilphia's mother and youngest sister.
Still in PeeDee, we find Culpepper Watkins, a white landowner. He and his wife, Sarah, have 7 children, all boys, but also in the home are 7 servants and among those are Dill Cochran and Calvin Cochran. These two are children of Zilphia. On the next, and last, page, we find Malinda Gaines, 65, mentioned in the estate files, but missed in 1870, aged 65. Next to her is Charles Robinson, aged 22, white and in his home is 10 year old Travis Gaines.
In Mount Gilead Township, nearby to Pee Dee, we find Sidney Cochran, now 35, with his wife Patsy, 30 and their 3 month old son, Charlie. Also living with him is his mother, Mariah, 60. Two houses down the list we find George Cochran, said to be 14, living with Laura Barringer.
The descendants of David Cochran in Montgomery County, were dwindling. In Hill Township we find two of his grandsons, David Calvin Cochran and his family, and George Cochran, 30, and his family. In Hill Township is 56 year old Mary H. Cochran, widow of Atlas Jones Cochran,and her two children Wincy Ann and Atlas Jones Cochran, Jr. Besides the unmarried daughters of Abraham, that was all who were left by 1880 of the white Cochrans.
The Turn of the Century
The twenty years between 1880 and 1900 seem to have been peaceful ones for Zilphia's family. Chilren were raised, grnadchidren came along, and Ben Davis and Zilphia led a simple farming life in Cottonville, as they grew older.
But Zilphia is not the only one to live to see athe dawn of a new Century, her mohter, Aggie Cochran also lived to see the new millenium arrive, as old as she is.
Aggie had joined Zilphia across the river, in Stanly County. She and her youngest daughter, Lucinda, had taken up residence in Center Township, and Lucinda had given birth to a son, her only child, and named him Wallace, after her oldest brother. Aggie is listed as havng had 8 children with 4 livng. We know she was the mother of Wallce, Zilphia, Toney, Sarah, Susan and Lucinda, that's 6, but who was her other living child?
Zilphia and Ben lived not too far away, in Tyson Township. Neither of them would make the 1910 census. Ben, 85, most likely died within a year or two of this census. I say that because when a payment was made by the county for Zilpha's coffin, as a part of expenditures for paupers, she was referred to as 'Zilphia Cochran' and not Davis. Because of this expenditure, we know that Zilphia, herself , died in April of 1908.
Ben and Zilphia were both probably buried in the Cottoville AME Zion Church cemetery at Cottonville, NC, because so many close to them or involved in theier lives were. Remember the Gaines Probate papers mentioning Old Jesse, Old Bill and a girl named Pinky going to James Lowe Gains's widow, Mary M. Lilly Cochran Gaines?. Pinky lived a very long life of 108 years and is buried in this cemetery.
The rest of Zilphia's story can be surmised by looking at the lives of her children and siblings. That will be another tale.
She had six known chilren:
1852: William M. Cochran
1854: Harriett Cochran Crump
1859: Dilsie Cochran Brooks
1860: Steve (Cochran) Crump
1861: Calvin Cochran
1865: Martha Jane Cochran Davis Gould
Zelphia was the daughter of Aggie Cochran (Gains) and father unknown. She had 5 known siblings and 2 unknown: Wallace, Toney, Sarah, Susan and Lucinda.
