BEGATS AND BEQUEATHALS

Agnes Whitlock Dodson

1. Agnes Whitlock was born 24 February 1758 in Albemarle County, Virginia. The date and place of birth are inscribed on her tombstone in Steekee cemetery in Loudon, Loudon County, Tennessee.^[2] On 10 February 1780, Reuben Dodson gave bond in Surry County, North Carolina, to marry Agnes Whitlock.^[3] Reuben is thought by a number of researchers to have been the son of Lambeth Dodson, who moved from Richmond County, Virginia, to Halifax County, Virginia, in the 1740s. Reuben was likely born in a part of Halifax County that eventually became Patrick County. He died in Stokes County, North Carolina, on 10 September 1804.^[4] Agnes Whitlock Dodson died 7 January 1855 at Loudon in Roane (later Loudon) County, Tennessee, where she spent her final years living with son Alexander Dodson, and where she’s buried in Steekee cemetery with a tombstone stating her date and place of birth and her place of death.^[5]

As the oldest child and older daughter of Charles and Esther Whitlock, Agnes was named, it seems apparent to me, for Charles’s mother Agnes Christmas Whitlock. As a previous posting states, I suspect the first child (and daughter) of Charles’s brother Thomas Whitlock and wife Hannah Phillips, who married William Hannah and whose given name has not been found, was also named Agnes after Thomas’s mother Agnes Christmas Whitlock.

Alexander Whitlock

2. If a birthdate of 20 May 1760 assigned to Alexander Whitlock by multiple published family trees is correct, then Alexander was likely the second child of Charles and Esther Whitlock, and would have been born in Albemarle County, Virginia. But I should tell you off the bat that I can’t assure you that this date of birth for him is correct, since I can find no source for it, though it’s frequently cited in family trees. There’s a lot I don’t know about this child of Charles and Esther Whitlock, and that I haven’t been able to discover.

As an example of published family trees using the date of birth cited above, see this “discovery person page” for Alexander Whitlock at FamilySearch, which assigns this May 1760 birthdate to him — and the birthdate is replicated on many other family trees published online. One tree after another for this family gives specific birth and death dates for Alexander, his wife Jennet, and their children.^[6]

To repeat: I have yet to find a source cited for these dates in any of these family trees. I suspect — but do not know — that a family bible once existed either for Alexander and wife Jennet or for one of their children, and that these dates were recorded in that bible. If this is correct, I have found no mention anyplace of such a bible.

I have not been able to find enough information about Alexander to tell you whether the preceding birthdate for him is plausible. I have not found him in Stokes County, North Carolina, records. By 1796 and perhaps earlier, he had settled in east Tennessee, where he appears in that year on the tax list in Sullivan County, which adjoins Washington County where Alexander died testate on 9 February 1826 — again, if the published family trees giving that date of death with no source cited have correct information. Alexander’s Washington County, Tennessee, will is dated 31 January 1822, and the will was probated at April court 1826.^[7] Note that the date of the will and of its probate does make the death date of 9 February 1826 possible. 

Since I haven’t found Alexander Whitlock in such Stokes County, North Carolina, records as I’ve searched for him, I suspect he moved from Stokes County over to east Tennessee as a young man. Because of the loss of federal census records for Tennessee from 1790 to 1820, and the loss of almost all east Tennessee federal censuses for 1820, there’s not an extant census record that would allow us to place his birth in at least a range of years. I also do not find Alexander on the North Carolina state census of 1784-7. 

Alexander’s oldest child, his son John, is said by the same family trees that give the preceding birth and death dates for Alexander to have been born 9 September 1792.^[8] These same family trees give Alexander’s wife Jennet, who is named in his will, a birthdate of 19 December 1771 and a death date of 2 April 1825. If the birthdate for John is correct, the couple would appear to have married around 1790. I have not found a maiden surname for Jennet.

White settlement of east Tennessee began in the mid-1700s with settlers from Virginia and North Carolina, along with other states, purchasing or leasing land from the Cherokees, largely in the Watauga Settlement.^[9] The Treaty of Long Island in the Holston on 20 July 1777 confirmed the Watauga cession of 1775 and extended the Watauga boundaries, allowing white settlers into the area bounded on the north by Virginia and on the south by what is now the North Carolina-Tennessee border.^[10] The treaty accelerated migration from the counties of south and southwest Virginia and northwest North Carolina into east Tennessee, since it quelled hostilities between the native peoples whose lands were being encroached on by white settlers.

The North Carolina legislature had already established the Washington District before January 1776.^[11] With the signing of the Treaty of Long Island, North Carolina asserted its jurisdiction over the western lands it held in what’s now Tennessee, and Washington District became a reality.^[12] Isaac Shelby’s campaign against the Chickamaugas in the spring of 1779 resulted in further migration of white settlers into east Tennessee, and in November 1780, North Carolina authorized its Washington County land office (which had been opened in 1777) to enter tracts of land at 40 shillings per 100 acres.^[13] Among the settlers pouring into the area at this point was Colonel John Donelson, father of Rachel Donelson Jackson, who moved from Franklin County, Virginia, two counties north of Stokes County, North Carolina, to Sullivan County in the fall of 1779, settling near Long Island, now Kingsport.

As the discussion of Alexander Whitlock’s sister Agnes above shows, Alexander was not the only child of Charles and Esther Whitlock to end up in east Tennessee. As stated previously, Agnes Whitlock Dodson spent her final years in Roane County where her son Alexander Dodson had moved. Agnes and Alexander’s brother James also moved to east Tennessee before 1797, dying in Grainger County in 1804.

If the 1760 birthdate for Alexander Whitlock stated previously is correct and if he was Charles and Esther Whitlock’s second child, I’d be tempted to ask if he was named for Esther’s father. As the previous posting states, I have not found Esther’s surname. If I were going to play a guessing game about it — and please note that this is entirely conjecture — I’d be inclined to ask if she may have been a Mackey, from the Mackey family of Albemarle County, Virginia, which commonly used the given name Alexander for sons.

William Whitlock

3. William Whitlock was born 4 June 1762 in Albemarle County, Virginia, and died 24 December 1834 in Morgan County, Illinois. That is, this is the birthdate at which I arrive if I subtract his age at death as stated on his tombstone from his date of death — though this is not the date of birth commonly given for William in family trees published in various places including online, and there are also discrepancies in many family trees regarding the date of death stated on his tombstone. Published family trees commonly state that William Whitlock was born 12 May 1761, and they often give his date of death as 2 or 24 December 1833.

William is buried in Whitlock cemetery in Morgan County with a tombstone marker giving his date of death and stating that he was aged 72 years, 6 months, and 20 days at the time of his death.^[14] In the footnote I’ve just provided, I’ve linked to the Find a Grave memorial page for William Whitlock, which has two photos of his tombstone. Note the problems here: the memorial page says that William’s tombstone gives his date of death as 24 December 1833, and calculates his date of birth based on the statement of his age at death as 12 May 1761. 

But both photos of the tombstone obscure the final digit in William’s year of death, and the one photo that has a clearer shot of the year suggests to me that the final digit is worn off. As we’ll see later, William Whitlock died testate in Morgan County, Illinois, with a will dated 24 November 1834 and probated 2 June 1835. William cannot have died in 1833. (There’s also the fact that the virgule part of the digit 4 — the initial slash — is worn off on the tombstone, so that to my eyes unless I look closely at a blown-up photo, the tombstone appears to say that William Whitlock died 21 December 183-. If any of these dates — 24 or 21 December 1833 or 1834 — is used to calculate William’s date of birth by subtracting his age at death as the tombstone gives it, one does not arrive at a birthdate of 12 May 1761.

I have not found a marriage record for William. According to a number of researchers, he may have married twice, with his first wife being Sarah Jarvis (or Jervis) and that marriage likely taking place in the mid-1780s in Surry (later Stokes) County, North Carolina.^[15] A number of Jarvis men entered land in Surry County in the 1770s and 1780s, and if the William Whitlock found on the 1790 federal census in Surry County is the son of Charles Whitlock — and I think he is — then it’s worth noting that he’s enumerated on the same census page on which several of these Jarvis men are also found.^[16]

Researchers who think William had a first wife Sarah also indicate that Sarah died prior to 1789, and William then remarried to Rosanna Shelton, who is named as his wife in his will and is buried beside him in Whitlock cemetery in Morgan County, Illinois, with a tombstone stating that she died 7 September 1844.^[17] Rosanna is thought to have been born about 1765, probably in Virginia.^[18] William had definitely married Rosanna by 27 October 1801 when his son John was born, since a biography of William’s grandson Judge Herbert G. Whitlock in Portrait and Biographical Album of Morgan and Scott Counties, Illinois states that John Whitlock, father of Herbert, was the son of William Whitlock and Rosanna Sheldon [sic].^[19]

As the previous posting notes, when William Whitlock’s father Charles Whitlock entered 640 acres in Surry (later Stokes) County, North Carolina, on Snow Creek, the land entry stated that the land was next to improvements made by Palatiah Shelton.^[20] And as the posting at the link I’ve just provided also shows, subsequent land records in Stokes County show that Charles Whitlock’s land on Snow Creek joined land owned by John Shelton and James Duncan, and James Duncan (who was chain carrier when Charles Whitlock’s 640 acres were surveyed) married a Shelton wife, Avarilla Shelton. As far as I know, Rosanna Shelton’s parents have not been positively identified, but I’d hazard a guess that she was closely connected to the Shelton families who had land next to the Whitlocks in Stokes County.^[21]

Also discussed in the posting linked at the head of the previous paragraph: in 1797, William Whitlock was taxed in Captain Beasley’s district in Stokes County near his father Charles Whitlock, and he appears on the 1800 federal census in Salisbury District of Stokes County next to his father Charles.^[22]

On 1 January 1802, William Whitlock and his brother John witnessed a deed in Stokes County of land on Snow Creek sold to their brother-in-law William Pruett (the spelling in the deed is Prewett), husband of their sister Mary, by Elections Musick of Stokes County (Stokes County, North Carolina, Deed Bk 4, p. 391).

On 10 November 1804, when his father Charles Whitlock sold Henry Watkins land on Buck Island Creek in Stokes County,William and his brother Charles Whitlock witnessed the deed (Stokes County, North Carolina, Deed Bk. 5, p. 13). By 7 August 1805, William had left North Carolina and moved his family to Kentucky. On that date, he gave power of attorney to Isaac Vernon in Stokes County to sell Williiam Radford 60 acres on south fork of Snow Creek in Stokes (Stokes County, North Carolina, Deed Bk. 5, p. 10). The power of attorney document states that William Whitlock was of the state of Kentucky and was witnessed David Simmonds and William’s brother John Whitlock witnessing. John proved the power of attorney at December court 1805. According to Pam Shelton Anderson, a descendant of this Whitlock line who has done good research on it, William Whitlock is found on the tax list in Adair County, Kentucky, from 1806-1823, and then he’s on the tax list in Russell County, which was formed from Adair, from 1826-9.^[23] William Whitlock is on the federal census in Russell County in 1830.

As the previous posting notes, James Duncan, the neighbor of Charles Whitlock on Snow Creek in Stokes County who was a chain carrier when Charles’s land on Snow Creek was surveyed in 1778 and who married Avarilla Shelton, also moved from Stokes County, North Carolina, to Adair County, Kentucky, before 1804.^[24] As did the family of William Whitlock, the Duncan family then moved from Kentucky to Illinois, settling in Sangamon County, which borders Morgan County, in which the Whitlocks settled, on the east.^[25] These pieces of information suggest to me that the move of William and Rosanna Shelton Whitlock from Stokes County, North Carolina, to Adair County, Kentucky, and then to Illinois was part of a migration of families from Stokes County that included other Shelton family members in addition to Rosanna, and members of the Duncan family.

According to the previously cited biography of William Whitlock’s grandson Judge Herbert G. Whitlock, William and wife Rosanna made their final move, to Morgan County, Illinois, by 1829 — but as we’ve just seen, William is enumerated on the 1830 federal census in Russell County, Kentucky, so the move to Illinois took place after 1830.^[26] On 26 November 1831, William purchased 80 acres from the federal land office at Edwardsville, Illinois.^[27] The land was the west ½ southwest ¼ of section 26, township 13 north, range 10 west. As previous postings have stated, Margaret Brooks, a daughter of William Whitlock’s first cousin Sarah Whitlock and husband Thomas Brooks, moved from Wayne County, Kentucky, to Morgan County, Illinois, in 1829 with husband Ransom Van Winkle, and Margaret’s aunt Ruth Brooks moved with husband William Greenwood from Cabell County, Virginia (now West Virginia), to Sangamon County, Illinois, in 1824.

William Whitlock made his will in Morgan County on 24 November 1834, naming his wife Rosanna (spelled Roseanna in the will) and sons Luther and Thomas and daughter Sally.^[28] The will makes Thomas executor. William signed the will with witnesses Lewis Shephard and Charles and James D. Reaugh. Charles and James proved the will on 2 June 1835 and on the same day, Thomas Whitlock gave bond with Luther and John Whitlock for execution of the will, with A. Wilson and Stephen A. Douglas as witnesses. Thomas was confirmed as executor on the same day. Stephen A. Douglas is Stephen Arnold Douglas, who serves as both a U.S. senator and representative from Illinois, and as a secretary of state for Illinois as well as a member of the state’s supreme court. He was one of two Democratic nominees for the presidency in 1860, when Abraham Lincoln was elected on the Republican ticket.

Again: note that transcribers of the tombstone of William Whitlock who state that it gives his year of death as 1833 are either misreading the tombstone or the tombstone has an erroneous year of death. The 1833 date cannot be correct given the 1834 date of his will. 

In my next posting, I’ll provide information about Charles and Esther Whitlock’s children James, Thomas, and Mary.

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^[1] The original will is on file with the North Carolina Archives; see also Stokes County, North Carolina, Will Bk. 2, pp. 153-4.

^[2] See Find a Grave memorial page of Agnes Dodson, Steekee cemetery, Loudon, Loudon County, Tennessee, created by Genealogy Friends, maintained by Dawn Curtis, with tombstone photos by Paula Kelsay McFarland and Roane County Heritage Commission.

^[3] The original bond, of which I do not have a copy, is on file with the North Carolina Archives, bond # 000144211. The Works Progress Administration abstracted and indexed original North Carolina bonds held by the state and created an index entitled North Carolina Marriage Bonds, 1741-1868. The original bond spells Reuben’s given name as Reubin and Agnes’s as Agness. This marriage bond is abstracted in the WPA abstracts for Surry County marriage bonds, p. 62, with a digital image of this page at FamilySearch.

^[4] Reuben Dodson’s date and place of death are stated in a petition Agnes made as his widow to Stokes County court in December 1807 regarding the disposition of two tracts of land Reuben died holding in Stokes County, one with 563 acres on Snow Creek and the other with 450 acres on Dan River. The petition is filed in Reuben’s loose-papers estate file held by North Carolina Archives. See also his nuncupative will, 10 September 1804, Stokes County, North Carolina, Will Bk. 2, pp. 58-9.

^[5] See supra, n. 2.

^[6] See, e.g., this entry for Alexander Whitlock at the Geni site, with Douglas L. Whitlock as manager of the page.

^[7] Washington County, Tennessee, Will Bk. 1, p. 160.

^[8] See supra, n. 6. 

^[9] Billie R. McNamara, Tennessee Land: Its Early History and Laws (Knoxville: McNamara, 1997), p. 3.

^[10] Ibid., p. 33; and Oliver Taylor, Historic Sullivan (Bristol, Tennessee: King, 1909), p. 75.

^[11] McNamara, Tennessee Land, p. 32.

^[12] Ibid., p. 34.

^[13] Ibid., p. 36.

^[14] See Find a Grave memorial page of William Whitlock Sr., Whitlock cemetery, Morgan County, Illinois, created by Troutman, with tombstone photos by Harry Whitlock and mrbrtsn.

^[15] See e.g. the 8 April 1998 email of Ralph Sheppard to Peter Whitlock cited in Whitlock Family Newsletter 17,2 (June 1998), p. 9, online at the Whitlock One-Name Study website. 

^[16] 1790 federal census, Surry County, North Carolina, p. 

^[17] See Find a Grave memorial page of Rosann Shelton Whitlock, Whitlock cemetery, Morgan County, Illinois, created by Troutman, with tombstone photos by mrbrtsn and Dave Preston.

^[18] See Pam Shelton-Anderson’s “Ancestors of Pamela Loretta Shelton,” online at Genealogy.  

^[19] Portrait and Biographical Album of Morgan and Scott Counties, Illinois (Chicago: Chapman, 1889), pp. 207-8. John Whitlock’s tombstone states that he was aged 69 years, 3 months, and 2 days, when he died 29 January 1871: see Find a Grave memorial page of John Whitlock, Sheppard cemetery, Jacksonville, Morgan County, Illinois, created by JLM, maintained by Rosemarie Robson, with tombstone photos by Roger Jockisch.

^[20] North Carolina Land Grant File 160, Charles Whitlock, Surry County, North Carolina, grant #159; North Carolina Land Patent Bk. 35, pp. 424-5. Both documents are available digitally at the website of North Carolina Land Grants Images and Data.

^[21] On the Shelton family, see Janice Mauldin Castleman, “The Family of Ralph Shelton (b. 1709-d. 1789) and Mary Daniel (b. 1713-d.c. 1764,” at John W. Lee’s Genealogy; and Mildred Campbell Whitaker, A History of the Shelton Family of England and America (St. Louis: Mound City Press, 1941). Castleman notes that a number of sons of Ralph Shelton, who was born 23 October 1709 in Middlesex County, Virginia, and who died in 1789 in Henry County, Virginia, moved from the Virginia southside to Surry (later Stokes) County, North Carolina. She indicates that the John Shelton (b. 1732) who had land next to Charles Whitlock in Stokes County was a son of Ralph, as was Palatiah Shelton (b. abt. 1736), whose improvements were next to the 640 acres Charles Whitlock entered in Surry County in 1778. 

^[22] 1800 federal census, Stokes County, North Carolina, Salisbury district, p. 585.

^[23] Pam Shelton-Anderson, “Ancestors of Pamela Loretta Shelton.” See 1830 federal census, Russell County, Kentucky, p. 123.

^[24] See Mary Ann (Duncan) Dobson, “Some Duncan Families of Eastern Tennessee Before 1800 – Section I, Continued” at Mary Ann (Duncan) Dobson Genealogy Blog. 

^[25] Portrait and Biographical Album of Sangamon County, Illinois (Chicago: Chapman, 1891), pp. 459-460.

^[26] Portrait and Biographical Album of Morgan and Scott Counties, Illinois, pp. 207-8.

^[27] Illinois Federal Public Land Tract Bk. 343, p. 71.

^[28] Morgan County, Illinois, Will Bk. A, pp. 234-7.