Book Shelf: Jamestown People to 1800

Deciding that it's time to take a closer look at my father's Warren lineage and its Virginia roots, I ordered Martha W. McCartney's 2012 book Jamestown People to 1800: Landowners, Public Officials, Minorities, and Native Leaders via Amazon and it arrived this morning.

[Amazon.com]

I already own another book by this author.


© 2018 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Book Shelf: Virginia Immigrants and Adventurers: A Biographical Dictionary, 1607-1635

If you have ancestors who arrived in Virginia in the early years of the colony, Martha W. McCartney provides an excellent place to begin your research.

It's available as new or used from Amazon or you can purchase the e-book through Google.


© 2018 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Limited Time Free Webinar: Pam Stone Eagleson presents "Finding Thomas' Father: an 18th Century Prince William County Virginia Case Study"

Oh boy do I have a few of these types in my ancestry--Virginians in the 1700s:

Thomas Stone left few records when he died in 1791 in Prince William County Virginia. No document or reference names his parentage. Finding Thomas's father took thirty years. Using indirect evidence and helped by technological advances, Thomas's father has been found. Land records make the case. This presentation demonstrates the process of creating a proof argument to identify Thomas's father.

Pam Stone Eagleson presented this Board for Certification of Genealogists (BCG) webinar, "Finding Thomas' Father: an 18th Century Prince William County Virginia Case Study," on January 16, 2018.

Runs 1 hour 23 minutes
Free through January 23, 2018

© 2018 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Gone for Soldiers: Valley Forge Anniversary

It's now 240 years since my paternal great grandfather Abraham Heath (c. 1740-c. 1807) went into winter quarters at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania) with the rest of George Washington's Continental Army.

[March to Valley Forge - William Trego, Philadelphia, 1883. This painting is now in the collection of The Museum of the American Revolution]

My ancestor's term of enlistment in the Virginia Line of the Continental Army ended in February so he didn't spend the entire winter in Valley Forge. You can read about his life after he went home here and learn the terms of his 1807 Warren County, Georgia, will here.

And here's a reminder of how I'm descended from Abraham Heath:

[Ancestry.com]

© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Monday Is for Mothers: Dorothy Moss (About 1655 - About 1718)

This far up my maternal family tree it isn't surprising that we know so little about this 8th great grandmother, especially considering that she lived in Virginia where early records can be scarce.

[Ancestry.com. Virginia, Marriages of the Northern Neck of Virginia, 1649-1800 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012. Original data: Headley, Robert K. Married Well and Often: Marriages of the Northern Neck of Virginia, 1649–1800. Baltimore, MD, USA: Genealogical Publishing Co., 2003.]

When her husband Abraham Stapp made his will in 1710 Dorothy was to retain "all property" during her lifetime so she was alive at that point although it's not clear to me that she still was at the time Abraham's will was probated four years later.*

[Section: Essex County, Wills and Deeds, 1711-1714.

Virginia Colonial Abstracts, Vol. II [database on-line]. Ancestry.com]

Essex County is located on the south side of the Rappahannock River, roughly here:

[Detail from "A New Map of New England New York New Iarsey Pensilvania Maryland and Virginia" 1685.

Source: David Rumsey Historical Map Collection]

Here's how I'm related to Dorothy through her son Joshua:

[Ancestry.com]

I wrote about Dorothy's granddaughter Martha Stapp earlier this year.





*It wasn't uncommon for a man's will not to be changed to reflect later deaths in the family.



© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Working on Wednesday: James Harrod (About 1738 - About 1781) Early Settler in Tennessee

James Harrod* was born in the Colony of Virginia, possibly in Stafford County, around 1738 and married a young woman named Elizabeth "Betsey"** in neighboring Orange County in about 1759. By 1760 the couple had moved to North Carolina where their five known children were born, including their oldest son Barnabeth (or Barnett), one of my paternal fourth great grandfathers, in 1762.

[Carolina And Georgia. (to accompany) Atlas Minimus or a New Set of Pocket Maps of the Several Empires, Kingdoms and States of the Known World, with Historical Extracts relative to each. Drawn and Engraved by J. Gibson from the Best Authorities, Revis'd, Corrected and Improv'd by Eman: Bowen Geographer to His Majesty. 1758. Source: David Rumsey Historical Map Collection]

It appears that James and his family traveled west in the early 1770s to settle on land first leased then purchased from the Cherokee Indians along the Watauga River in what is now Tennessee*** and in 1779 he joined a group of 250 (mostly men and boys****) led by James Robertson moving farther west to French Lick on the Cumberland River.

On May 1, 1780, the new settlers signed a document known as the Cumberland Compact which set up "a simple constitutional government." James Harrod's name is found on the 20th line of the first column of the second page.

[Source: CumberlandPioneers.com]

[Jas Harrod signature]

Their settlement, first called Bluff Station and later known as Fort Nashborough (now Nashville), covered about two acres enclosed by a stockade and protected the newcomers from attacks by the Cherokee who rightly viewed their arrival as threatening their traditional hunting grounds.

[Postcard showing first reconstruction (on a smaller scale) of the original fort funded by the Daughters of the American Revolution in the 1930s. Source: Boston Public Library-Tichnor Brothers Postcard Collection]

I haven't been able to discover the date of James Hariod's death--but it's believed that he was killed by Indians during one of their attacks. By 1783 his widow Betsey had married Daniel Hogan, another signer of the Cumberland Compact.



*This is the spelling of his surname used in the Cumberland Compact; later variants include Herod and Herrod. My paternal grandmother Letta Estella Porter Warren Williams Turnbull is his great great great granddaughter.
**Her maiden name is unknown.
***The original English coastal colonies in North America claimed all the lands to the west as far as the Mississippi River.
****Most of their families traveled 1,000 miles by river to join their menfolks, arriving four months later. Presumably Betsey and the children were among them.



© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Memento Mori: James Robert Strait 1949 - 2017

Cousin Jimmy* is the little guy being held up by his half-sister Nancy Lee Peterson (1937-1974), while I'm standing next to Jimmy's half-brother Charles Frederick "Freddie" Peterson, Jr. (1940-2008) in this photo taken sometime in 1950.

[Photo taken on the front lawn of the Currey grandparents' house on 69th Street from my personal collection.]

Jimmy lived across the street and was my most constant playmate until his family moved to Arkansas in 1961 and we lost touch completely. Last year I traced his residence to Virginia and passed the information on to a cousin who had hoped to make contact. This morning I decided to see if there was anything more to learn about him and found this:

James “Jim” Robert Strait, 67, USN, Ret., died suddenly at Lake of the Woods, April 16, 2017. Survivors include a son, two daughters and five grandchildren. 

I shared this sad news with Dad's nephew and his son today.

May you rest in peace Jimmy.



*He was the youngest child of Dad's sister Marguerite and her second husband Roy Strait.


© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

My 7th Great Grandfather Robert Bittle (abt 1720-abt 1795) Was on a Slave Patrol in Southampton County, Virginia

Google Books often provides a limited preview to recently published books, like the one I came across today while searching for my Bittle ancestors in 18th century Southampton County, Virginia, "Lethal Imagination: Violence and Brutality in American History," edited by Michael A. Bellesiles (also available on Amazon).

From page 73:

From these patrol-created files we can learn much about the pattern of violence that slaves experienced in colonial Virginia at the hands of whites who were not necessarily their owners.  The earliest extant notes recording patrol activity come from Southampton County in 1754.  Three patrol groups submitted extensive accounts in that year, listing the days and times they rode and giving details of the slaves they captured. A comparison of the names of patrollers with the names of the plantations visited suggests that the three patrol groups worked as distinct units in different parts of the county and submitted separate reports of their activities.  Multiple patrol groups would have been a necessity in the large and growing counties of Virginia.  Even though Southampton had more white residents than slaves by the mid-1750s, the fact that whites outnumbered blacks did not ease the fears of many Virginia colonists; attempted slave revolts in 1729 and 1730, and rumors of insurrections later in the 1730s must have frightened many whites.  The knowledge that runaway slaves had repeatedly and southern margins of Virginia must have been unsettling, and that knowledge provided a strong rationale for the activities and payment of county slave patrols. 13 

The details in patrolling journals vary dramatically, depending upon the individual recordkeeper, but broad similarities can be found in all.  Colonial Virginia slave patrols typically rode in groups of four or five, and their journals commence by listing the individuals' names.  "John Brantly & Philip Bran[t]ly & Will[ia]m Grimmer & William Joyner Junr have Rode in the patrole servis the 28th of Septem[ber]" runs a standard patrol entry. 14 

Virtually every patrol report gives specifics about the number of hours worked, with a few presenting precise information about the exact number of hours worked by each man in the group.  In Southampton, John Seuter, Jacob Turner, Simon Harris, Robert Bittle and William Kirby worked precisely 50, 32, 126, 108, and 126 hours, respectively, in an eight-month span.  The patrol reports usually carry the signature of the militia captain, justice of the peace, or court clerk who vouched that the work had been completed faithfully.  Patrols most often worked from sundown to sunup, during the "Negro's day" -- when slaves left their cabins to attend meetings or to travel after their workday ended.  As they patrolled, they encountered both slave men and women.  After an evening's work in October 1754, patroller Bennet Hilsman wrote, "We Patrolers did ketch a negroe man slave belonging to Joshua Barnes & a Negro woman slave and Childe...and she was a Runaway she said."  

Where is the "Dislike" button?  This is one of those things that I don't enjoy finding out, that my ancestor was a member of a slave patrol, in an area later rocked by the Nat Turner Slave rebellion over 70 years later, no less.

This information doesn't surprise me, though, given what I already knew about the area during that time, and my people there either owned slaves or were overseers.

Using the "Search Inside This Book" at Amazon I discovered that footnote 14 was taken from "Patrol returns and lists, 1754-1861, Free Negroes, Slaves and Indians records, Southampton County, LV."

This lead me to the Library of Virginia's website, and A Guide To The Southampton County (VA.) Free Negro and Slave Records, 1754-1860, a non-digitized collection of 3 boxes taken from the Southampton County Circuit Court.

This is a good reminder that most stuff is not online!  I just lucked out that a researcher published the records in their work.

Robert Bittle was an ancestor of my 4th great grandfather, Benjamin "B. R." Biddle.  The William Kirby mentioned in the same sentence in the quote is most likely Robert Bittle's brother-in-law.

© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Working on Wednesday: Abraham Heath (About 1740 - 1807), Revolutionary War Veteran & Planter

Returning home to the region around Surry County after serving his two years with the Virginia Line of the Continental Army my 5X great grandfather reunited with his family which included his young daughter Sallie, my fourth great grandmother.

[Virginia und Maryland. Dominia Anglorum in America Septentrionali. Homann Erben (Firm), Norimbergæ, 1759.

Source: Library of Congress Geography and Map Division Washington, D.C.]

From the existing online records we're not sure when Abraham moved his family to Georgia but, as this land record dated January 2, 1786 shows, he already owned some land in Burke County and this additional 200 acres was "on the Hurricane Branch, Adjoining his own Land and Land of Henry Hayman."

[Georgia, Headright and Bounty Land Records, 1783-1909," images, FamilySearch]

Six month later he was apparently given 550 acres in Wilkes County.

["Georgia, Headright and Bounty Land Records, 1783-1909," images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33SQ-GYLH-3QF?cc=1914217&wc=M617-B38%3A200644801 : 20 May 2014), > image 293 of 448; State Archives, Morrow.]

Here's a 1804 map of Georgia.

[Georgia. Drawn by S. Lewis. D. Fairman sc. (Published by John Conrad & Co., Philadelphia. 1804)

Source: David Rumsey Historical Map Collection.]

[Detail of above]

Unfortunately the federal census records for 1790, 1800 and 1810 are missing, lost sometime before 1830, but Ancestry.com offers The Reconstructed 1790 Census of Georgia (originally published as Substitutes for Georgia's Lost 1790 Census) which lists Abraham Heath on page 166.

[The Reconstructed 1790 Census of Georgia. Ancestry.com]

In 1798 Abraham Heath is listed in a Property Tax Digest for Warren County* as the owner of 14 enslaved persons, nine of whom were subject to taxation.

[1798. Ancestry.com. Georgia, Property Tax Digests, 1793-1892 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011. Original data: Georgia Tax Digests [1890]. 140 volumes. Morrow, Georgia: Georgia Archives.]

His name also appeared in Burke County's Property Tax Digest** that same year.

[1798. Ancestry.com. Georgia, Property Tax Digests, 1793-1892 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011. Original data: Georgia Tax Digests [1890]. 140 volumes. Morrow, Georgia: Georgia Archives.]

It was as a resident of Warren County that Abraham Heath made his will on November 23, 1807.

[Administration (Of) Estates and Wills, 1798-1937; Author: Georgia. Court of Ordinary (Warren County); Probate Place: Warren, Georgia. Ancestry.com. Georgia, Wills and Probate Records, 1742-1992 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015.

Original data: Georgia County, District and Probate Courts.]

Signed Sealed published pronounced and declared by --
the Said Abraham Heath as my last will and Testa ------
in the presents of us whose names are hereunto ? -------
this 23'd day of November in this Year of our Lord o---
thousand eight hundred and Seven
                                                                 his
Stephen W Burnley                            Abraham X Heath
Britain Blunt                                                mark
       her
Mary X Garrett
      mark

I'll be taking a closer look at Abraham Heath's will on Friday. It's got a lot of information in it.


*Warren County was created out of parts of Burke, Columbia, Washington, and Wilkes counties in 1793.
**Column headings for this record. (Nice to see that Abraham is the "Reputed Owner")

© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Gone for Soldiers: Abraham Heath (About 1740 - 1807), Soldier (Part VII)

Abraham Heath, a paternal fifth grandfather, must have been very happy to see the end of February 1778 because it marked the end of his two years enlistment in the Virginia Line of the Continental Army. There's no indication that he considered remaining with the army and had probably already left before Baron von Steuben began to drill the troops.

[A Winter Encampment is Valley Forge National Historical Park's official orientation film, currently shown daily in the park theater. It is an overview of the historical events that took place at Valley Forge during the 1777-1778 winter encampment in the American Revolution.]

You can read my earlier posts about Abraham Heath's military service here: Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, and Part VI.

Next time we'll look into Abraham's life after his military service.


© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Monday Is for Mothers: Mary Warren (About 1810 - 1885), Survivor & Matriarch - Part 2, Her Life Between the Records

Mary Warren was born in Virginia in 1810 according to her 1870 and 1880 U.S. Census records. From Jeremiah Warren's probate records we know she and three children were living in Hancock County, Georgia, so Mary would have been about 22.

There is no way to be certain of the date Mary found herself as part of Jeremiah's human property, looking at the census records it could have been by 1830 or even as early as 1820.*

[1820 & 1830 U.S. Census from Ancestry.com]

After Mary was mentioned twice early in Jeremiah's probate records she disappears from direct sight until we find her living near one of Jeremiah's executors, John Graybill, in Smith County, Texas, in the 1870 census.

The simplest explanation for that fact is that Graybill probably transferred Mary to his property sometime after 1837; he was still identified as Jeremiah's executor in Georgia's property tax digest lists for 1840 but only one enslaved person was included in the estate.**

[Detail of Militia District Number: 101; Year : 1840. Ancestry.com. Georgia, Property Tax Digests, 1793-1892 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011. Original data: Georgia Tax Digests [1890]. 140 volumes. Morrow, Georgia: Georgia Archives.]

If that's true Mary (who would have been 30 that year) could be one of two women listed in the 1840 U.S. Census.

Ten years later Mary is probably one of three enslaved women listed in the 1850 Slave Schedule for Hancock County, Georgia, most likely on lines 30 or 31.

[Township : District 101. Ancestry.com. 1850 U.S. Federal Census - Slave Schedules [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2004. Original data: United States of America, Bureau of the Census. Seventh Census of the United States, 1850. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1850. M432, 1,009 rolls.]

[Detail from aove]

Sometime between 1850 and the 1860 U.S. Census John Graybill moved his household to Rusk County, Texas,*** and here it's harder to locate Mary so I'm going to offer several possibilities.

[Township : Beat 8. Ancestry.com. 1860 U.S. Federal Census - Slave Schedules [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2010. Original data: United States of America, Bureau of the Census. Eighth Census of the United States, 1860. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1860. M653, 1,438 rolls.]

I think the two 52-year-old women listed on lines 13 and 14 are too old to refer to Mary, however the two 51-year-old women on  lines 4 and 8 are possibilities once we look at the Graybill household in 1860.

[Year: 1860; Census Place: Beat 8, Rusk, Texas; Roll: M653_1304; Page: 276; Family History Library Film: 805304. Ancestry.com. 1860 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009. Images reproduced by FamilySearch. Original data: 1860 U.S. census, population schedule. NARA microfilm publication M653, 1,438 rolls. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.]

I believe Camillus Graybill (1832-1899) is the badly scribbled slave owner listed on line 4--he was John Graybill's third son; Graybill's sister Elizabeth A. (the widow of Henry Saunders Jernigan) is obviously the person referred to on line 8. Neither of these people appear to have owned slaves in the previous censuses; I think it's quite possible that their human property came from John Graybill.

By the 1870 U.S. Census**** both John Graybill and Mary Warren were living very near each other in Smith County, just to the west of Rusk County. But does this proximity mean that there was any connection between them?

After John Graybill died in 1875 the inventory of his estate included a list of money he was owed and two of Mary's children are named: Daniel Warren (who had already paid $25 of his $63.36 debt, leaving a balance owed of $28.36) and Keziah Warren who owed "1 account" of $16.00.

[Texas, Probate Court (Smith County); Probate Place: Smith, Texas. Ancestry.com. Texas, Wills and Probate Records, 1833-1974 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015. Original data: Texas County, District and Probate Courts.]

Next time I'll focus on Mary Warren's children to see what we can find out about them in the various records available to us.


*An estimated 30% of slave children were separated from their families before they were ten. You can read more about what life was life for children born into slavery here and here.
**If there was only one enslaved person still remaining on the property Jeremiah had set aside for the benefit of Mary and the rest of the people he hoped could be legally freed one day, it seems likely it would have been either Coleman or John left as a caretaker.
***I had hope to learn when Graybill moved to the state through the Texas Voter Registration Lists, 1867-1869 but his name isn't there, although his son C. Graybill is. But the Smith County records are particularly unhelpful since the entries state that everyone on the list had been in the state for 12 months and in the county for 6 months.
****I covered this census in last week's post here.



© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Gone for Soldiers: Willet Orlando "Richard" or "Dick" Worden (1843 - 1912), Soldier, U.S. - Part 8

This week marks the 153rd anniversary of my great great grandfather Willet O. "Dick" Worden's enlistment in the Iowa Twenty-Fourth Infantry - Company G, the same company from which he had received a disability discharge the previous August at Carrollton, Louisiana after taking part in the Vicksburg Campaign. He had just turned 21.*

[Report of the Adjutant General and Acting Quartermaster General of the State of Iowa. Ancestry.com. U.S., Adjutant General Military Records, 1631-1976 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.

Original data: Various. Sacramento, California: California State Library.]

His 17-year-old brother John Henry Worden (whose name is just below his) had enlisted in the same company the previous month.

Since Dick Worden was a veteran he wouldn't have needed training so was probably sent directly to rejoin his comrade of Company G in Louisiana where it was preparing to take part in General Banks' joint Army/Navy Red River Campaign. Here's what a regimental history says about that period:

The first of the year 1864 found the regiment encamped at Algiers, weather very wet, the mud and water rendering the camp almost impassable to man or beast. Recollections of Helena came forcibly to the men’s minds, but the 14th of January, quarters were obtained in warehouses. The 21st, the command moved, and the next day encamped near the northern shore of Lake Pontchartrain, By Madisonville. This was the most pleasant camp the regiment ever had, after leaving Camp Strong, near Muscatine. It was evacuated on the evening of February 26. The regiment was reviewed by General McClernand at Algiers on the 3d of March, and received the special commendations of that officer.

From Algiers the Twenty-fourth moved by rail to Berwick Bay, and Thence on the 13th joined the Red River Expedition under General Banks.

[Detail showing Algiers, Louisiana from LLoyd's new map of the Mississippi River from Cairo to its mouth; New York H. H. Lloyd & Co. (1863?). Library of Congress Geography and Map Division Washington, D.C.]

Next month we'll pick up the story of the Red River Campaign which was later characterized by General Sherman as "one damn blunder from beginning to end."



*He was born on February 4, 1843.

© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Monday Is for Mothers: Mary Warren (About 1810 - 1885), Survivor & Matriarch - Part 1, Her Life in the Records

Mary (who adopted the surname Warren after Emancipation) was one of the seven enslaved people who I first learned about from my fifth great uncle Jeremiah Warren's probate records, first in the Item 10th of his will (unsuccessfully contested by his sister Susan and her husband Joseph Johnson) and then in the inventory of his estate which was done in September of 1832.

I've always wanted to know what happened to those people--were they ever free? Since I didn't find any other mention of them in later probate records available online, it seemed I would never know.

However, thanks to research shared by Marco, one of the descendants, we can trace Mary to Smith County, Texas.

[Family Search.com]

We know the names of her three children from the inventory: Sandal, Rhody and Francis.

[Family Search.com]

[Texas. Published by J.H. Colton & Co. No. 171 William St. New York. Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1855, by J.H. Colton & Co. ... New York (insets) Plan of Galveston Bay -- Plan of Sabine Lake. Source: David Rumsey Historical Map Collection]

The first record naming Mary Warren was in Starrville Beat in Smith County, Texas, in the 1870 U.S. Census. Her age is given as 61 so she was born about 1810 in Virginia. She was definitely the matriarch of the rest of the Warrens whose names that follow hers down the page. Only one of the three children who were named in the inventory is listed here--#27, 48-year-old Rhody Warren.

 [Year: 1870; Census Place: Starrville Beat, Smith, Texas; Roll: M593_1605; Page: 342B; Image: 187862; Family History Library Film: 553104. Ancestry.com. 1870 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009. Images reproduced by FamilySearch. Original data: 1870 U.S. census, population schedules. NARA microfilm publication M593, 1,761 rolls. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.Minnesota census schedules for 1870. NARA microfilm publication T132, 13 rolls. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d. ]

Mary's name is at the top of the page and looking back at the previous one, you can see that she was "Keeping House" for her son 27-year old Daniel Warren, a farm laborer whose personal estate was valued at $220.

 [Year: 1870; Census Place: Starrville Beat, Smith, Texas; Roll: M593_1605; Page: 342B; Image: 187862]

And a significant clue to Mary's presence in Texas is the name of the head of the nearest household: John Graybill who along with Jesse G. Butts had been named executors of Jeremiah's will and put in charge of Mary and the other six people singled out in Item 10th. It's almost certain that Graybill brought Mary and her children to Texas when he left Hancock County, Georgia,

Ten years later Mary was living with her daughter Eliza* and other family members in Precinct 8 in Smith County.

[Year: 1880; Census Place: Smith, Texas; Roll: 1326; Family History Film: 1255326; Page: 304C; Enumeration District: 102. Ancestry.com and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1880 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2010. 1880 U.S. Census Index provided by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints © Copyright 1999 Intellectual Reserve, Inc. Original data: Tenth Census of the United States, 1880. (NARA microfilm publication T9, 1,454 rolls). Records of the Bureau of the Census, Record Group 29. National Archives, Washington, D.C.]

According to findagrave, Mary Warren died in 1885 and is buried in the Warren Chapel Cemetery in Smith County, Texas.

[Find A Grave Memorial# 137497116. Photo: Heather (#46785492)]

Next time I'll use John Graybill's records to see what can be inferred about Mary's life between 1832 and 1870.



*Although Eliza's occupation is listed as "Farming" I didn't find her name in the 1880 Non-Population Schedule for Agriculture.



© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Working on Wednesday: Coleman Warren in Alabama, 1870 & 1880

Of the seven individuals my 3X great uncle Jeremiah Warren hoped to have freed some day, the person with the most uncommon name was Coleman so I decided to search for a Coleman Warren in the 1870 federal census. There turned out to be only one in the whole country. A resident of Lawrence County, Alabama, he was born in about 1804 and like Mary Warren* in Texas, he was born in Virginia. From Alabama marriage records we know that Coleman and Lottie (Wright) were newlyweds, having married on January 11th.

[Year: 1870; Census Place: Township 7 Range 7, Lawrence, Alabama; Roll: M593_22; Page: 89B; Image: 150538; Family History Library Film: 545521. Ancestry.com. 1870 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009. Images reproduced by FamilySearch. Original data: 1870 U.S. census, population schedules. NARA microfilm publication M593, 1,761 rolls. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.]

I don't know what connection to Coleman there was, if any, of the next household headed by Lucy Warren who was 45 and born in Alabama. There was an enslaved woman with that name in Jeremiah's estate who was described as "aged" in the 1837 appraisal of Jeremiah's slaves** so this Lucy can't be that person.

That same year Coleman Warren's name (#5 below) appeared in the Federal Census Non-Population Schedule for Agriculture so we know a bit more about what his 20-acre tenant farm was like. 

[Census Year: 1870; Census Place: Township 7, Lawrence, Alabama; Archive Collection Number: M279; Roll: 27; Page: 3; Line: 1; Schedule Type: Agriculture. Ancestry.com. U.S., Selected Federal Census Non-Population Schedules, 1850-1880 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.]

As of June 1, 1870, five years after emancipation, the personal estate of $10 (also listed on the census) represented the value of his farm equipment and he owned a horse, a mule, two milk cows and two "other cattle" as well as six pigs all of which were valued at $140.***

[Detail of above]

Ten years later Coleman and Lottie's were still in Lawrence County, Alabama, and their household had expanded to include a 4-year-old daughter Jane, George who was 5, and a 10-year-old adopted daughter G.A. Chenault.

["United States Census, 1880," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-9YB6-96RP?cc=1417683&wc=QZ2W-DMM%3A1589394746%2C1589394779%2C1589394776%2C1589396018 : 24 December 2015), Alabama > Lawrence > Moulton > image 15 of 27; citing NARA microfilm publication T9 (Washington, D.C.:

National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.).]

The agricultural schedule in 1880 was much more detailed, giving us a clearer view of what Coleman's farm was like and even get an idea of what the family's diet was like.**

Fifteen years after Emancipation Coleman Warren was modestly successful as a hard-working tenant farmer, able to support his wife and their child along with a grandson and an adopted daughter. And he was a free man.

But the question remains--do these records refer to Jeremiah Warren's slave Coleman whom in 1832 he hoped would be freed some day? Sadly I don't think so.

It would be a great story but there's a serious problem. There happened to be a wealthy, slave-owning Warren family living in Lawrence County headed by Thomas Jackson Warren (1831-1906) who has no known connection to my Warren ancestors in Georgia and I think it's far more likely that this Coleman had formerly been his human property.

[Year: 1860; Census Place: Southern Division, Lawrence, Alabama; Roll: M653_12; Page: 914; Image: 272; Family History Library Film: 803012. Ancestry.com. 1860 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009. Images reproduced by FamilySearch. Original data: 1860 U.S. census, population schedule. NARA microfilm publication M653, 1,438 rolls. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, n.d.]

Coleman Warren died sometime between 1880 and 1900 when his widow Hattie was residing in the Lawrence County household of her daughter Lottie Jane and her husband Henry Gibson. She died in 1933.

*The identification of this Mary Warren as one of those seven people was made by her descendant Marco who had traced her back to John Graybill, one of Jeremiah;s executors, and shared his discovery with us.
**That Lucy formed part of Jeremiah's sister Mary (Polly) Warren.
***There's a problem with the second page of this schedule. When the enumerator turned the page to enter the rest of the information he got his lines mixed up and Coleman is clearly not the farmer referred to on line 10. Forty bales of cotton on 20 acres of land? No. But I can't be sure if Coleman was left out completely or if his totals are on line 4.

[ Ancestry.com. U.S., Selected Federal Census Non-Population Schedules, 1850-1880 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA:

Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.]

****All the 1880 images are from Ancestry.com U.S., Selected Federal Census Non-Population Schedules, 1850-1880 [database on-line]. I've enlarged only those sections of the schedule that relate to Coleman's farm.






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