BEGATS AND BEQUEATHALS

As the previous posting indicates, Joseph Day Jr. is on the tax list in Botetourt County up to 1804, dropping from the Botetourt tax list in 1805. On 12 June 1804, Joseph and Margaret sold the land on which they had been living in Botetourt, 79 acres on Mudlick Creek that Joseph had bought from his brother Evan Day in February 1802, and at this point, it’s clear they left Virginia for Kentucky.^[1]

In a 6 October 1983 letter to me, Elsie S. Davis, author of Three Generations of Days and Their Wives: Joseph and Margaret Brooks Day, Joseph and Catherine Yarnell Day, John and Lydia Ross Day,^[2] tells me that she thinks Joseph and Margaret moved to Kentucky in 1806 along with Margaret’s sister Sarah and her husband John Lahue. As we’ve seen previously, the Lahues moved from Wythe County, Virginia, to Ohio County, Kentucky, in 1806, and John Lahue begins appearing on the tax list of Ohio County in 1807.^[3] Grayson County, where both the Lahue and Day family then appear, was formed from Ohio and Hardin Counties in 1810. As the posting I’ve just linked also indicates, by 1810, not only were Brooks sisters Margaret with husband Joseph Day and Sarah with husband John Lahue living in Grayson County, but an Ezekiel Harlan/Harlin who was son of the Ezekiel Harlan who married their sister Susanna was also in Grayson County (and see here).

A biography of Joseph and Margaret Brooks Day’s son Isaac E. Day in History of Daviess County, Kentucky, with information supplied by Isaac himself, says that his parents first settled in Hardin County, Kentucky, after leaving Virginia, and two or three years later, were in Grayson County.^[4] I find Joseph Day on the tax list in Hardin County in 1805, the year in which he drops from the tax list of Botetourt County, Virginia, so it’s clear to me the Day family moved from Botetourt County, Virginia, to Hardin County, Kentucky, in 1804 following the sale of their Botetourt County land.^[5] Joseph is taxed again in Hardin County in 1806. I do not find him on the Hardin County tax list in 1807.

By August 1808, the Days were in Ohio County. A 3 August 1808 deed recorded in Hardin County states that on that date, Joseph Day of Ohio County purchased from Jacob Linder Sr. of Hardin County 300 acres on the waters of Short Creek at the head of Bozorth Fork.^[6] The deed states that the tract was “the same place where the said Day now lives,” and that Joseph paid $400 for the land. Note that the Shain cemetery in Grayson County in which Elsie Davis thinks Joseph and Margaret Brooks Day are buried along with several of their children is just southwest of where Short Creek runs south of the nearby town of Short Creek.

The 1808 and 1809 Ohio County tax lists show Joseph taxed on 22 June (1808) and 14 June (1809) for 300 acres on Short Creek acquired from Jacob Linder, and one white male poll and six horses in 1808, eight horses in 1809.^[7] When Grayson County was formed from Ohio and Hardin in 1810, Joseph’s land then fell into the new county and from this time forward, his family appears in Grayson County records, living, I suspect, on the same piece of land he bought on Short Creek from Jacob Linder in 1808 up to Joseph and Margaret’s deaths. Unfortunately, Grayson has suffered record loss, and the county’s deed records begin only in 1896, so it’s difficult to know if Joseph purchased more land in Grayson County at any point. 

But Grayson tax lists from 1810 up to Joseph’s death in 1854 have survived, and they provide a good snapshot of Joseph’s landholdings in that time frame.^[8] He appears on the tax list from 1810 up to 1845 consistently taxed for the same 300 acres on Short Creek. Then in 1845, Joseph’s son Jacob W. Day begins to be taxed for this land, with Joseph listed next to him and with no land credited to Joseph, an indicator that Joseph had turned his farm over to his son Jacob and Jacob was farming it. As we saw in the previous posting, the 1850 federal census enumerates Joseph and wife Margaret in Jacob’s household and it’s likely both died there and are buried in Shain cemetery at Short Creek in Grayson County, as Jacob is.^[9]

The family of Joseph Day appears on the 1810-1840 federal census in Grayson County.^[10] As we’ve seen, the final federal census on which Joseph and wife Margaret are enumerated is the 1850 federal census in which they appear in the household of their son Jacob several years before Margaret died in 1857 and Joseph in 1854.^[11] Joseph’s death listing in the Grayson County Registry of Deaths for 1854 states that he died on 16 January due to injuries from a fall, that he was born in Botetourt County, Virginia, and that he was aged 86 at the time of his death. As we’ve seen, Joseph’s birth on 1^st day of 6^th month 1768 is recorded in the minutes of the Hopewell Quaker monthly meeting in Frederick County, Virginia, so this tells us that the information about Botetourt as his birthplace is not correct.^[12]

The biography of Joseph and Margaret’s son Isaac E. Day mentioned previously states that the couple had twelve sons and five daughters, including two pairs of twins, one male and one female.^[13] As Elsie Davis notes in the 1994 book she published about this family, identifying all seventeen children is not easy.^[14] Davis, who did extensive research on this family, was able to identify eleven of the seventeen children with more or less certainty; about one name, the name of Joseph and Margaret’s oldest son, she was less certain. Five of the names she was unable to find.

In what follows, I’m relying primarily on information reported by Elsie Davis in her book Three Generations of Days and Their Wives.^[15] More research can be done on these children, I think, particularly in Grayson County tax records, which Davis’s book indicates she did not research thoroughly. Please consider the information I’m offering an outline, then, and not a fully researched report. As Davis also notes, “Complicating the Day picture [in Grayson County] were the children of Joseph’s brothers, Evan and John Day, some of whom moved from Botetourt County, Virginia, in the 1830s and 1840s….”^[16]

The children of Joseph Day and Margaret Brooks were as follows:

a. (John?) Day was born about 1793-4 in Botetourt County, Virginia. Elsie Davis indicates that she was not certain of the given name of Joseph and Margaret’s oldest son, but suspected it was John, after Joseph’s grandfather John Day. I think she may be correct about this and that this son is a John Day whom I first find on the Grayson County tax list in 1814, an indicator he had come of age around 1813-4, a date that fits Elsie’s date of birth for this son. I have no more information about him, though more is probably available in Grayson County records.

b. Daughter Day was born about 1795-6 in Botetourt County, Virginia.

c. Son Day was born 1794-1800 in Botetourt County, Virginia.

d. Son Day: Elsie Davis’s family group sheet for the family lists three unnamed sons whose ages fit, she thinks, among the firstborn of Joseph’s and Margaret’s children, but for which she has no more specific information. She is basing her conclusions on census data.

e. Son Day: ditto.

f. Son Day: ditto.

g. Sarah Day was born 4 December 1801 in Botetourt County, Virginia, and died 9 September 1865 in Pike County, Illinois. On 10 March 1822 in Grayson County, Kentucky, Sarah married David Johnston, son of Larkin and Mary Davis Johnston, a family that had moved from Wythe County, Virginia, to Grayson County, Kentucky. Sarah and her husband David Johnston are buried in the Dorsey-Browning cemetery at Perry in Pike County, along with David’s second wife Sarah Elizabeth Adams.^[17]

Information about Sarah and her family is found in two histories of Pike County, Illinois.^[18] Both state that Sarah was daughter of Joseph and Margaret Day and give her date of death, noting that David Johnston was born in Wythe County, Virginia, and moved his family from Kentucky to Sangamon County, Illinois, in 1826. According to Elsie Davis, a Johnston family bible originally belonging to Sarah Day Johnston records Sarah’s birthdate.^[19] Note that Sarah Day Johnston had an aunt, Ruth Brooks, who went to Sangamon County along with her husband William Greenwood. That family will be discussed in a subsequent posting.

h. Catherine Day was born about 2 October 1803 in Botetourt County, Virginia, and died 26 November 1887 in Grayson County, Kentucky. On 22 April 1802 in Grayson County, she married Henry Litsey, son of John W. and Mary Pirtle Litsey. Catherine and Henry are buried in the Litsey cemetery at Indian Valley in Grayson County, with her tombstone spelling her name as Catherina.^[20] Numerous sources state that Catherine was born in Hardin County, Kentucky, but in my view, she was born in Botetourt County, Virginia, before her family moved to Kentucky. Though the 1850 federal census gives her birthplace as Kentucky, all subsequent censuses from 1860 through 1880 state that she was born in Virginia. I think Catherine was likely named for her grandmother Catherine Yarnall/Yarnell Day.

i. Squire Day was born 8 November 1805 in Hardin County, Kentucky, and died 9 March 1864 in Grayson County, Kentucky. About 1831, probably in Grayson County, he married Elizabeth Clagett, daughter of either John or Henry Clagett and Elizabeth Hayse. This couple is buried in Harrell cemetery at Short Creek in Grayson County.^[21]

j. Mordecai Yarnell Day was born 17 September 1807 in Ohio County, Kentucky, and died 1 August 1886 in Grayson County, Kentucky. About 1831 in Grayson County, he married Susannah Whitely, daughter of John Whitely and Bathsheba Haynes. Mordecai and Susannah are buried in Bratcher cemetery #2 at Yeaman, Grayson County, Kentucky.^[22]

k. Lydia Day was born 4 September 1809 in Ohio County, Kentucky, and died 4 September 1863 in Grayson County. About 1830-1 in Grayson County, she married Caleb Stinson, son of William Stinson and Mary McDaniel. Lydia and Caleb are buried in Miller cemetery at Caneyville, Grayson County, Kentucky.^[23]

l. Elizabeth Day was born about 1811 in Grayson County, Kentucky, and died 1870-1880 in Grayson County. About 1827 in Grayson County, she married Leonard Deweese, son of Benjamin F. Deweese and Anna Anderson. 

m. Jesse Brooks Day was born about 1811 in Grayson County, Kentucky, and died between 1870-1880 in Grayson County. On 7 April 1842 in Daviess County, Kentucky, he married 1) Mary Hazel, and on 22 March 1858 in Grayson County, he married 2) Martha Ann (Brunk) Wheeler, daughter of William Brunk and Catherine Wortham. Family reports state that he had married a wife prior to Mary Hazel whose name is not known and by whom he had no children. Jesse and wife Martha are buried at Shain cemetery, Short Creek, Grayson County.^[24] Jesse was named for his uncle Jesse Brooks (and see also here). 

n. Robert Brooks Day was born 6 March 1813 in Grayson County, Kentucky, and died 12 October 1876 in Grayson County. On 3 October 1839 in Grayson County, he married Frances Matthews, daughter of George Matthews and Elizabeth Moore. Robert was named for his uncle Robert Brooks.

o. Jacob Wallace Day was born 10 September 1815 in Grayson County, Kentucky, and died in Grayson County after 1880. On 10 March 1839 in Daviess County, Kentucky, Jacob married Amy Ann Hazel. Jacob and Amy are buried in Shain cemetery at Short Creek, Grayson County, Kentucky.^[25] The reason that Elsie Davis concludes that Jacob was born on 10 September 1815 is that she thinks he and Isaac E. Day, whose birth on 10 September 1815 is well-established and whose biography states that he was a twin, were one of the two sets of twins Joseph Day and Margaret Brooks had.^[26] The 1850-1870 federal censuses show Jacob born about 1815 or 1816.

p. Isaac E. Day was born 10 September 1815 in Grayson County, Kentucky, and died 1 November 1887 in Daviess County, Kentucky. On 13 January 1842 in Daviess County, he married Paulina T. Roseberry, a daughter of Charles Roseberry. Isaac is buried in Cates cemetery in Whitesville, Daviess County.^[27] Paulina remarried to W.T. Overton following Isaac’s death, and appears to be buried elsewhere with her second husband. 

Isaac’s biography states that he went to Daviess County in the spring of 1839, settling in Boston precinct and first working on the farm of Creed Burton, then clerking in Burton’s store in Boston.^[28] In the summer of 1841, he went to Knottsville and assisted in opening a store there, then returned to Burton in the fall of that year. He was then appointed constable by the county court and acquired a farm of 105 acres in Boston precinct, increasing it to 130 acres.

q. Rebecca W. Day was born 17 February 1818 in Grayson County, Kentucky, and died 12 February 1902 at Horse Cave in Hart County, Kentucky. On 14 January 1836 in Grayson County, she married Davis Litsey, son of John W. Litsey and Mary Pirtle. Rebecca and Davis are buried in Shain cemetery at Short Creek in Grayson County.^[29] Note that Rebecca and her sister Catherine married Litsey brothers.

According to Elsie Davis, a Day family researcher with whom she corresponded told her that Rebecca was a twin, but Elsie Davis could find no other daughter of Joseph and Margaret Brooks Day matching Rebecca in age.^[30] In a 22 May 1993 letter Elsie Davis sent me, she told me that in researching the Day and Yarnell families a number of generations back, had found no instances of twins. This led her to conclude that the gene for twins runs in the Brooks line.  For previous discussions of this genetic pattern to twinning in the Brooks line, see here and here. James Brooks, Margaret Brooks Day’s older brother, had twin children, and, as I’ve noted previously, it seems possible that James and his sister Margaret were themselves twins.

As we’ll see when we discuss the family of Jesse Brooks, brother of James and Margaret, he had a son John who had twin children. As I’ve also indicated, Mark Jefferson Lindsey, son of Dennis Lindsey and Jane Brooks, had twin sons. Jane Brooks Lindsey was a niece of Margaret Brooks Day. Elsie Davis also noted in her May 1993 letter to me that Margaret Brooks Day’s daughter Sarah had two daughters who both gave birth to twins.

In a 5 May 1993 letter to me, Elsie Davis told me that because the name Margaret Elizabeth runs through family lines descending from Margaret Brooks Day, she thought it was possible that Margaret Brooks Day had the middle name Elizabeth. If this is the case, I have found no document stating this, and I have found absolutely no documents giving Joseph Day a middle name Powell that is now being widely circulated in trees for this family found online.

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^[1] Botetourt County, Virginia, Deed Bk. 8, pp. 433-4.

^[2] Three Generations of Days and Their Wives: Joseph and Margaret Brooks Day, Joseph and Catherine Yarnell Day, John and Lydia Ross Day (Coronado, California: E.S. Davis, 1994).

^[3] Ohio County, Kentucky Tax List, 1807 (unpaginated), digitized at FamilySearch site. See also James Houston Le Hue and Edith Foster, Peter Lehew of Front Royal, Virginia, and Some of His Descendants (Elburn, Illinois, 1967), p. 212; and Grayson County, Kentucky’s genealogical society journal The Silent 13,1 (January 1992), pp. 14-15, transcribing a 1992 letter of Charles Craig of Fort Lauderdale, Florida.

^[4] History of Daviess County, Kentucky, Together with Sketches of Its Cities, Villages, and Townships, etc. (Chicago: Inter-State, 1883), p. 530.

^[5] Hardin County, Kentucky, Tax Bk. 1805, p. 6; available digitally at FamilySearch. Joseph is taxed for 1 white male poll (over 21) and 3 horses; ibid., 1806, p. 9.

^[6] Hardin County, Kentucky, Deed Bk. D, pp. 40-1. The deed is also recorded in Ohio County, Deed Bk. AA, pp. 279-280.

^[7] Ohio County, Kentucky Tax Bk. 1808, p. 5; available digitally at FamilySearch; ibid., 1809, p. 7.

^[8] Grayson County, Kentucky, tax books, 1810-1875, are available digitally at FamilySearch.

^[9] 1850 federal census, Grayson County, Kentucky, p. 60B (dwelling/family 816; 19 September).

^[10] Grayson County, Kentucky, 1810 federal census, p. 241; ibid., 1820, p. 134; ibid., 1830, p. 302; ibid., 1840, p. 145.

^[11] For the 1850 federal census listing, see supra, n. 9. Margaret’s death record is in Kentucky State Historical Society and State Archives, Grayson County, Kentucky, Registry of Deaths 1857, in Kentucky Birth, Marriage, and Death Records, 1852-1910, digitized at Ancestry. Joseph’s death record is in ibid., 1854, also digitized at Ancestry.

^[12] Hopewell Friends’ Monthly Meeting Minutes, A Record of Births and Burials of Friends Belonging to Hopewell Meeting, Marriages 1758, p. 24; original records held by Friends Historical Library, Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania; available digitally at Ancestry.

^[13] History of Daviess County, Kentucky, p. 530.

^[14] Three Generations of Days and Their Wives, p. 2.

^[15] Ibid., pp. 4-30.

^[16] Ibid., p. 4.

^[17] See Find a Grave memorial pages of Sarah Day Johnston and David Johnston, Dorsey-Browning cemetery, Perry, Pike County, Illinois. Both were created by Bill S. and both have photos of their tombstones by Kathy Robinson.

^[18] History of Pike County, Illinois: Together with Sketches of Its Cities, Villages and Townships, etc. (Chicago: C.C. Chapman, 1880), p. 495; and Jess M. Thompson, The Jess M. Thompson Pike County History: As Printed in Installments in the Pike County Republican, Pittsfield, Illinois, 1935-1939 (Pittsfield, Illinois: Pike County Historical Society, 1967), pp. 358-9.

^[19] Davis, Three Generations of Days and Their Wives, p. 1.

^[20] See Find a Grave memorial pages of Catharina Day Litsey and Henry Litsey, Litsey cemetery, Indian Valley, Grayson County, Kentucky, both created by VirJean Potter Bozarth and maintained by Rene M. “Kinnick” Coffelt, with tombstone photos by Macy L. Purcell.

^[21] See Find a Grave memorial page of Squire Day, Harrell cemetery, Short Creek, Grayson County, Kentucky, created by VirJean Potter Bozarth and maintained by SeekingFamily, which provides a biography of Squire Day including his dates of birth and death.

^[22] See Find a Grave memorial page of Mordecai Yarnell Day, Bratcher cemetery #2, Yeaman, Grayson County, Kentucky, created by VirJean Potter Bozarth and maintained by Laura Stults Polk, which provides biographical information.

^[23] See Find a Grave memorial pages of Lydia Day Stinson and Caleb Stinson, Miller cemetery, Caneyville, Grayson County, Kentucky, created by VirJean Potter Bozarth and maintained by Mayflower Pilgrim 332, with tombstone photos by Russell Perkins (for Lydia) and Georgia Smith (for Caleb).

^[24] See Find a Grave memorial page of Jesse Brooks Day, Shain cemetery, Short Creek, Grayson County, Kentucky, created by Debra O’Neill.

^[25] See Find a Grave memorial page of Jacob Wallace Day and Amy Ann Hazel Day, created by VirJean Potter Bozarth and managed by Find a Grave (Jacob) and Seeking Family (Amy). Amy’s page has a tombstone photo by Sue Fetzer.

^[26] See History of Daviess County, Kentucky, p. 530.

^[27] See Find a Grave memorial page of Isaac E. Day, Cates cemetery, Whitesville, Davies County, Kentucky, created by Carol Kaye, with a tombstone photo by Carol Kaye.

^[28] History of Daviess County, Kentucky, p. 530.

^[29] See Find a Grave memorial pages of Rebecca Day Litsey and Davis Litsey, Shain cemetery, Short Creek, Grayson County, Kentucky; Rebecca’s page was created by Debra O’Neill with tombstone photos by ckeisling; Davis’s page was created by VirJean Potter Bozarth and is managed by SeekingFamily, with a tombstone photo by ckeisling.

^[30] Davis, Three Generations of Days and Their Wives, p. 3.