I went on to explain that I know nothing about Griffith before he begins showing up in records of Frederick County, Maryland, Washington County’s parent county. I added that I have not found any reliable information about where he was born, who his parents were, or where he may have lived before he settled in Frederick County prior to September 1763.
All of this remains true.
But I’d like now to say more about what I meant when I wrote previously that I was fairly confident that I knew something more about Griffith James’ origins and possibly even the identity of his parents. As I do that, keep in mind another thing I noted in the posting linked at the head of this one: this is that Thomas Dunlap Leonard, a grandson of Griffith James’ daughter Hannah and her husband Thomas Leonard, states in his 1883 “Biography of the Leonards,”[1]
[Thomas Leonard, son of Robert Leonard and Honor Pritchard,] married Miss Hannah James of Maryland about the year 1775. I have no tradition of her parents, except their nationality, they were Welch, but Hannah was born and reared in Maryland.
As my linked posting goes on to say, I read that passage to mean that Thomas D. Leonard thought that Griffith James and his wife Mary were Welsh-born and were the immigrant ancestors of this James family line.
Finally, my initial posting linked above points to a document I only recently discovered, a list of debts compiled in 1759 by Sarah Dorsey Peddycoart for the estate of her husband Nathan Peddycoart in Frederick County, Maryland.[2] That list of debts includes a debt owed by one Griffith James to Peddycoart for one shilling and sixpence due 10 January 1743.
As my linked posting says, if this is “our” Griffith James, then this record would indicate that he was in Maryland, perhaps in Frederick County’s parent county, Prince George’s, by January 1743.
So that’s the sum total of what I actually do know about Griffith James’ earliest days in Maryland, and I’m not even 100% certain that the Griffith James of the January 1743 record is the man found in the Sharpsburg area by September 1763, though I think there’s a good chance that the two men are the same.
These pieces of information present a problem for me as I re-examine what I thought I had previously put together about his background. In a previous posting, I featured an excerpt from an article by Angie May Gill Wallace published in the Marshall Gazette of Petersburg, Tennessee, in 1947.[3] Angelina May Gill was a descendant of Thomas Leonard and Hannah James. In her September 1947 article about the history of the Leonard family of Marshall County, Tennessee, she makes an interesting statement about the ancestry of Hannah James Leonard. She states (see the image at the head of this posting),
Thomas Leonard, second son of Robert Leonard, married Hannah James, of Maryland, who tradition says was a cousin of Anthony Wayne.
The Anthony Wayne to whom Angie Gill is referring is General “Mad Anthony” Wayne (1745-1796) of American Revolutionary fame. Anthony Wayne was born 1 January 1745 at Easttown in Chester County, Pennsylvania, son of Isaac Wayne and Elizabeth Iddings. Turn your attention to Easttown and the Wayne family’s roots there, and you’ll immediately discover something very interesting: this is that the Waynes lived close to, interacted with, went to church with, and are buried near a James family in Easttown. This is the family of Griffith James (1698-1765) and wife Ann.[4]
As W.W. Thomson notes in his history of Chester County, Easttown is part of the original Welsh tract set off by William Penn with a local government using the Welsh language, and was organized as early as 1704.[5] It’s famous, Thomson adds, as the home of the Wayne family, whose immigrant founder Anthony Wayne (1666-1739), an Englishman who had lived in Ireland before emigrating to Pennsylvania, first appears in its assessment roll in 1724.[6]
Easttown is distinct from other parts of the Welsh tract in that its Welsh settlers (and others including the Waynes) were not Quakers but Anglicans. As David Schmidt writes,[7]
The most important distinction between Easttown and its neighboring portions of the wilderness was the Welsh who settled there weren’t Quakers but Anglicans.
The initial Anglican congregation was the area’s best known, St. David’s. Named after the patron saint of the Welsh, this congregation didn’t want to be confused with the other Protestant groups settling throughout the area, including Methodists, Presbyterians, and Baptists.
St. David’s Episcopal church at Wayne in Radnor township in Delaware County, to which the family of Griffith James and the Wayne family belonged, dates from around 1700, with an original building for the church having been constructed in 1715. Records of St. David’s church show Griffith James and wife Ann receiving the sacrament at this church on Good Friday, 23 March 1721/2, along with Griffith’s father Thomas James.[8] Records of St. David’s church show Griffith James as a vestryman from 1753 to his death in 1765, as well as a warden in 1755.[9]
On 13 February 1743, Griffith James bought from Reverend Griffith Hughes of Barbados and John Hughes of Merion township, Pennsylvania, a property called Grove Hall in Easttown.[10] Franklin L. Burns notes that Grove Hall was originally called Travelgwn, and was mentioned in a 4 December 1706 deed of Edward Hughes of Easttown to Philip Davies of Easttown. This deed states that Hughes bought the land from Howell James on 19 November 1703, and that James had bought it from John Wood on 16 March 1699. Edward Davies, heir of Philip, sold it to Evan Hughes, and Evan and Ann Hughes then sold it to Griffith Hughes on 20 February 1723.[11] According to Burns, Griffith Hughes was a son of Richard Hughes of Merionethshire, Wales, and was born about 1707. He graduated from Oxford in 1723 and was appointed rector of St. David’s in Radnor township. In 1736, he went to Barbados.[12]
Tax lists for Easttown show Griffith James taxed there in 1747, 1753, 1754, 1756, 1758, 1759, 1760, 1762, always near members of the Wayne family. On the 1764 tax list the year prior to his death, Griffith was taxed next to Michael Wayne, a son of Francis Wayne, who was an uncle of “Mad Anthony” Wayne.
Griffith James died testate at Easttown with a will dated 24 August 1764, probated 28 October 1765.[13] The will names only two heirs, wife Ann, to whom his land and property were to be bequeathed, and his daughter Hannah, who was to have the land and property following Ann’s death. The will made Griffith’s friends Isaac Wayne and John Morris executors, and was witnessed by Lewis Morris, Morris Morris, and Joshua Evans.
The Isaac Wayne witnessing Griffith James’ will was “Mad Anthony” Wayne’s father. On 20 August 1766, Isaac Wayne was also made an executor of the will of Benjamin Weatherby of Tredyffrin township adjacent to Easttown.[14] The will notes that Benjamin Weatherby owned property that had originally belonged to Anthony Wayne (father of Isaac). On 20 July 1773, Benjamin’s son Whitehead Weatherby married Hannah, daughter of Griffith and Ann James. There are traditions in the
As Franklin Burns notes, when Ann James died on 27 October 1773, she left the Grove Hall property to her daughter Hannah, who had married Whitehead Weatherby shortly before her mother’s death.[15] According to Burns, it’s likely that during the Revolutionary War, Whitehead Weatherby was a scout for General “Mad Anthony” Wayne. There are, I’ve been told but have not been able to document, traditions handed down in branches of the Weatherby family that Whitehead Weatherby’s father Benjamin had a daughter or niece who was engaged to Anthony Wayne but died before the couple could marry. On 25 March 1766, Anthony Wayne married Mary Penrose.
As I note above, Griffith James’ father was a Thomas James who is found in the records of St. David’s church to which Griffith James, wife Ann, and the Wayne and Weatherby families also belonged. Thomas James served on the vestry of St. David’s in the years 1725-7 along with Anthony Wayne, the immigrant.[16] On 25 October 1748 at Charlestown in Chester County, Thomas James made a will which was probated 30 November 1748.[17] The will names son Griffith James, bequeathing him £5 and then leaving the rest of Thomas’ estate to wife Gwellian and son John. Gwellian is an alternative spelling of the Welsh given name Gwenllian. The probate document for Thomas’ will states that when the original will was presented to two witnesses, Owen Howell and Nathaniel Davies, they found it torn and understood that Griffith James had torn the will because he was not satisfied with its stipulations.
So scroll back up to the statement published in 1947 by Angie Gill Wallace, a descendant of Thomas Leonard and Hannah James who grew up in Marshall County, Tennessee, knowing many of their other descendants living around their old homeplace outside Petersburg. Angie Wallace states that “tradition says” that Hannah James Leonard, daughter of Griffith and Mary James, was “a cousin of Anthony Wayne.”
I’ve found no proof of such a tradition. When I go looking for it, however, I find that, strangely enough, Anthony Wayne’s family lived in Chester County, Pennsylvania, cheek by jowl with another James family using Griffith as a given name, the family of Griffith and Ann James of Easttown. And I find that this James family and the James family were closely connected to each other, attending the same church, appearing in documents of each other’s families, and so on.
These discoveries certainly pique my curiosity. Angie Wallace doesn’t elaboration on what she means by “tradition.” I have to assume that she’s probably citing a tradition handed down among the descendants of Thomas Leonard and Hannah James in Tennessee? If so, what did those descendants know about Hannah James Leonard’s father Griffith James and his roots? Is it purely coincidental that a Tennessee family descended from Griffith James’ daughter Hannah James Leonard thought that there might be a kinship connection between Hannah and Anthony Wayne — when a James family using the given name Griffith was closely connected to the Wayne family from what Anthony Wayne came in Chester County, Tennessee?
And when Hannah James Leonard’s parents Griffith and Mary James named their first child Hannah — and the Griffith James with wife Ann who died in Easttown, Pennsylvania, in 1765 had a daughter Hannah? And when Griffith and Mary James named their next child Gwendolyn — and Griffith James with wife Ann was the son of Thomas and Gwellian (Gwenllian)James?
Yet, the will of Griffith James of Easttown, Pennsylvania, names no son Griffith. Though the will of Thomas James, father of Griffith James of Easttown, apparently enraged Griffith by leaving him a slighting inheritance of £5, so that there was apparently something of a tradition in this James family of fathers using wills to punish errant sons….
If Griffith James of Washington County, Maryland, was the son of Griffith and Ann James of Easttown, Pennsylvania, then it would appear that the Maryland man left home as a young man and had moved to Maryland before September 1763, his father dying in Maryland between August 1764 and October 1765. If the Griffith James owing a debt to Nathan Peddycoart’s estate in Frederick County, Maryland, by January 1743 is the Griffith James that we can definitively place in the vicinity of Sharpsburg by September 1763, and if this Griffith James is the son of Griffith and Ann James of Easttown, then the Maryland Griffith James had left his parents’ home as a very young man
And how to put all this together with the suggestion of Thomas Dunlap Leonard that Griffith James and wife Mary were Welsh immigrants, a suggestion that leads me to think that Thomas D. Leonard believed Griffith and Mary James came to Maryland directly from Wales?
I truly don’t know how to put these pieces of information together — how to square this circle. I’d simply ignore the story of Thomas James and son Griffith James of Chester County, Pennsylvania, and would conclude that it’s a false lead, except for Angie Gill Wallace’s statement that there’s a “tradition” that Hannah James Leonard was a cousin of Anthony Wayne. If that’s, in fact, a tradition that passed down in the Leonard family of Marshall County, Tennessee, descending from Hannah, then surely it has some basis in fact, even if it’s garbled? And if so, can it be purely coincidental that when one begins looking at the life and genealogy of Anthony Wayne, one finds a James family using the given names Griffith and Hannah right there with the Waynes in Easttown, Pennsylvania?
Bottom line: I really know nothing with any certainty about Griffith James with wife Mary except that he was living in the vicinity of Sharpsburg in Frederick (later Washington) County, Maryland, by September 1763. As to his history prior to that, I have tantalizing clues dropped by his descendants Thomas Dunlap Leonard and Angie Gill Wallace, clues that point to some interesting but entirely inconclusive information. I do think that anyone searching for information about Griffith James prior to September 1763 would be well-advised to keep those two clues in mind, because family traditions often turn out to contain important pieces of information, even then those traditions have gotten glossed and garbled over time.
One other piece of information to put onto the chessboard here: on 27 November 1762 in Chester County, Pennsylvania, Griffith James (wife Ann) witnessed the will of Edward Williams of Easttown.[18] The other witnesses to this will were Thomas Rowland and Isaac Hughes. Edward Williams’ estate file shows Edward Jones and Isaac Hughes proving the will on 25 August 1766.[19] There’s no mention of Griffith James in the estate file other than his signature as a witness to the will. On 16 March 1764, a John Williams made his will in Frederick County, Maryland.[20] The will was probated 7 April 1765. In a 24 August 2004 posting to the now defunct Frederick County discussion group at Rootsweb, researcher Kelly A. Secher stated that this John Williams was a son of the Edward Williams who died in Easttown, Chester County, Pennsylvania, in 1766. If that’s correct information, then there definitely appears to have been some migration from Easttown to the part of Maryland in which Griffith James with wife Mary was living by 1763.
[1] Thomas Dunlap Leonard, “Biography of the Leonards,” 1883 manuscript circulated as a typescript among Leonard family members and researchers, whose current provenance is not known.
[2] Frederick County, Maryland, Inventory Bk. A1, p. 459.
[3] Angie May Gill Wallace, “History of Marshall County Families,” Marshall Gazette (19 September 1947), p. 3.
[4] Griffith James’ dates of birth and death are from his burial record in the register of St. David’s Episcopal Church, Radnor township, Chester County, Pennsylvania: see Henry Pleasants, The History of Old St. David’s Church, Radnor, Delaware County, Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: John C. Winston, 1915), p. 279. The burial record states that Griffith James died 3 October 1765.
[5] W.W. Thomson, Chester County and Its People (Chicago and NY: Union History Company, 1898), p. 871.
[6] See John W. Jordan, Colonial and Revolutionary Families of Pennsylvania, vol. 1 (New York and Chicago: Lewis, 1911), pp. 1321-.2
[7] David Schmidt, “Celebrating Easttown’s 300th,” at the website of Lower Merion Historical Society.
[8] See Records of St. David’s P.E. Church of Radnor, Pennsylvania, 1706-1859, p. 45, a transcript of original church records at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, available digitally at FamilySearch (but under lock and key). Henry Graham Ashmead, History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: L.H. Everts & Co., 1884), indicates that many of the Welsh families who settled Radnor township came there as Episcopalians (though other sources indicate they were often “Friendly,” i.e., well-disposed to the Quakers, who assisted them in settling in Pennsylvania), and wished to have Episcopal services as early as 1700 (p. 679).
[9] Pleasants, History of Old St. David’s Church, p. 150; see also See Records of St. David’s P.E. Church of Radnor, Pennsylvania.
[10] Franklin L. Burns, “Travelgwn,” History Quarterly of Tredyffrin Easttown Historical Society 3,4 (October 1940), p. 97, available online at the Society’s website.
[11] Ibid.
[12] Ibid.
[13] Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, Will Bk. N, p. 449. I have checked the decedents’ index to Chester County estates, 1716-1810, compiled by Chester County Historical Society, without finding any listing of an estate for Griffith James. Though Griffith James’s will indicates that Hannah was a minor when he died, I do not find any record of an orphans’ court or guardianship proceeding for her in either Philadelphia or Chester County, nor is there a listing for the settlement of the estate in any Philadelphia or Chester County records I can find.
[14] Chester County, Pennsylvania, Will Bk. D, pp. 594-5. On the Anthony Wayne property acquired by Benjamin Weatherby, see John Smith Futhey and Gilbert Cope, History of Chester County, Pennsylvania, with Genealogical and Biographical Sketches (Philadelphia: Everts, 1881), p. 172.
[15] Burns, “Travelgwn,” p. 99. Burns’ death date for Ann James — 3 October 1765 — is incorrect. Her burial record in the register of St. David’s church states that she died 27 October 1773, aged 77. It’s Griffith James who died 3 October 1765. Ann James was alive on 6 October 1773 when she and Whitehead Weatherby placed an ad in the Pennsylvania Gazette, stating that a horse had been stolen from Whitehead Weatherby’s stable in Easton [sic], Chester County (p. 6)
[16] Records of St. David’s P.E. Church of Radnor, Pennsylvania, pp. 47, 72, 76; Pleasants, History of Old St. David’s Church, p. 324; and Futhey and Cope, History of Chester County, Pennsylvania, p. 274.
[17] Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania, Will Bk. G, p. 353.
[18] Chester County, Pennsylvania, Will Bk. D/4, pp. 588-590.
[19] Chester County, Pennsylvania, Loose-Papers Estate Files no. 2290.
[20] Frederick County, Maryland, Will Bk. 33, pp. 241-2.
BEGATS AND BEQUEATHALS 