Nottingham Monk (bef. 1720 – 1793) of Northampton County, Virginia, and Bertie County, North Carolina: Probable Wife — Elishea Belote

Will of John Beloat, 3 May 1722, Northampton County, Virginia, Record Bk. XXIII-R, Deeds, Wills, etc., 1718-1725, p. 152

Or, Subtitled: “I give them all my Hogs Corne & meat but if abigaile Should marry then to have no part of ye Hogs”

I’m going to interrupt my series tracking the children of Thomas Brooks (1775-1838) and wife Sarah Whitlock of Wythe County, Virginia, Wayne County, Kentucky, and Morgan County, Alabama, for a moment to share with you some information that connects to a previous series I posted on this blog about an entirely different family, the Monk family of Northampton County, Virginia, and Bertie and Martin Counties, North Carolina. I have promised you a posting on the children of Thomas and Sarah Whitlock Brooks’s daughter Margaret (1803-1855) and husband Ransom Van Winkle, and will return to that series after I discuss this new material I have to share with you.

The Nottingham Ancestry of Strachan Monk (1787-1850/1860): William Nottingham (1669-1719)

Nottingham in Jennings Cropper Wise, Ye Kingdome of Accawmacke Or the Eastern Shore of Virginia in the 17th Century, p. 71
Jennings Cropper Wise, Ye Kingdome of Accawmacke Or the Eastern Shore of Virginia in the 17th Century (Richmond: Bell, Book, and Stationery Co., 1911), p. 71

Or, Subtitled: Silver Clasps, Sidor Presses, and Cows Named Clove

I’ve now posted eleven postings* tracking the ancestry of Strachan/Strahon Monk, who was born about 1787 in Bertie County, North Carolina, and who died between 1850-1858 in Hardin County, Tennessee. About 1805, Strachan Monk married Talitha, daughter of Jesse Cherry (1749-1808) and Elizabeth Gainer (abt. 1761-1836) of Martin County, North Carolina. Between 1810-1820, this couple moved to Tennessee, joining a number of Talitha’s brothers there, who were early land speculators in the daughter state of their native North Carolina.

Two of Talitha’s brothers — Jesse and Isham — settled in Hardin County, as Strachan and Talitha Cherry Monk did, while other of her brothers — Lawrence and Darling, who remained in Martin County, and Daniel, who settled in Haywood County, Tennessee — owned land there. As a previous series of postings about Strachan and Talitha Monk’s years in Hardin County demonstrated, they lived there on land on the Tennessee River loaned to them by Talitha’s brother Daniel (see herehere, and here).

Continue reading “The Nottingham Ancestry of Strachan Monk (1787-1850/1860): William Nottingham (1669-1719)”

Will the Real Strawhorn Monk Please Stand Up? Documenting the Ancestry of Strachan Monk (1787 – 1850/1860), Son of Nottingham Monk and Rachel Strachan (5)

Monk, Nottingham , Share to Heirs, 1830
William Anderson’s 9 March 1830 account as administrator of Nottingham Monk showing distibutive shares paid to Monk’s heirs: Amos Rayner was paid the shares of Monk’s widow Nancy, son Nebuchadnezzar, and daughter Rachel; Thomas Bond received the shair of Monk’s daughter Elizabeth; Strachan/Strahon Monk received a share; and William Anderson received a share on behalf of wife Jennet — original in Monk’s loose-papers estate file, North Carolina archives.

Or, Subtitled: How to Have Fun with Old Estate Records

The loose-papers estate file held by the North Carolina archives for Nottingham Monk is an extensive, genealogically rich collection of documents — 319 items in all. I went through the file some years ago, before such records began to be digitized and made available through websites like Family Search or Ancestry, and had large portions of the file photocopied, making notes on it. For anyone researching this or other Bertie County, North Carolina, families in the late 1700s and early 1800s, the digitized copies of this estate file available at Family Search and Ancestry are a treasure trove of material with valuable information. Continue reading “Will the Real Strawhorn Monk Please Stand Up? Documenting the Ancestry of Strachan Monk (1787 – 1850/1860), Son of Nottingham Monk and Rachel Strachan (5)”

Will the Real Strawhorn Monk Please Stand Up? Documenting the Ancestry of Strachan Monk (1787 – 1850/1860), Son of Nottingham Monk and Rachel Strachan (4)

Monk, Nottingham Receipt, Estate File of John Pender, Bertie
28 December 1802 promissory note by John Pender and Nottingham Monk for a payment to the orphans of James Leggett, from loose-papers estate file of John Pender, Bertie County, North Carolina.

In this posting documenting the ancestry of Strachan/Strahon Monk (1787-abt. 1858), son of Nottingham Monk (abt. 1755-1818) and Rachel Strachan, I’ll begin winding up my account of the life of Nottingham Monk, which I began in two previous postings (here and here). Those discussed his birth about 1755 in Northampton County, Virginia, his Revolutionary service in North Carolina, and his marriage to Rachel, daughter of George and Elizabeth Strachan of Bertie County, North Carolina, between 22 February and 23 November 1786. Rachel had previously married 1) George Kittrell and 2) Benjamin Ward, both of whom died before she married Nottingham Monk. My previous postings also discuss Nottingham Monk’s involvement in the administration of the estate of his father Nottingham Monk elder, who died in Bertie County between 1790 and 20 July 1793. Continue reading “Will the Real Strawhorn Monk Please Stand Up? Documenting the Ancestry of Strachan Monk (1787 – 1850/1860), Son of Nottingham Monk and Rachel Strachan (4)”

Will the Real Strawhorn Monk Please Stand Up? Documenting the Ancestry of Strachan Monk (1787 – 1850/1860), Son of Nottingham Monk and Rachel Strachan (2)

Strachan, Rachel Monk, 17 Dec. 1818 Land Division, Estate File (2)
Division of land of Rachel Strachan Monk, Bertie County, North Carolina 17 December 1818, from her loose-papers estate file held by North Carolina Archives.

Strachan, Rachel Monk, 17 Dec. 1818 Land Division, Estate File (1)

I ended my previous posting about Nottingham Monk (1755/1760 – Feb. 1818) with an account of his Revolutionary War service and the documents this generated. I promised that I’d then tell you about his life from that point to his death, which occurred in Bertie County, North Carolina, between 28 January and 10 February 1818, and I’d then conclude my series about him with a posting examining some key documents from his extensive loose-papers estate file held by the North Carolina Archives. My previous posting was the first in a series building on an initial posting showing you that Strachan (or Strahon and Strawhorn) Monk (1787 – 1850/1860) of Martin County, North Carolina, and Hardin County, Tennessee, was the son of Nottingham Monk and Rachel Strachan. My intent in this series is to trace Strachan Monk’s ancestry, about which quite a bit of totally incorrect information has long been circulated.  Continue reading “Will the Real Strawhorn Monk Please Stand Up? Documenting the Ancestry of Strachan Monk (1787 – 1850/1860), Son of Nottingham Monk and Rachel Strachan (2)”