[Granville-Hough] 16 Oct 2009 - Them Thar Pee Dee River Ancestors

[Trustees for Granville W. Hough]

Date: Fri, 16 Oct 2009 06:23:21 -0700
From: Granville W Hough <gwhough at oakapple.net>
Subject: ThemThar PeeDee River Ancestors - 16 Oct 2009

    Them Thar Pee Dee River Ancestors.

    Great Grandma Nancy (Bowen) Arender could talk quite eloquently 
about the two Whitfield governors of Mississippi.  She had apparently 
met the first one as a lawyer whose practice included Raleigh, and this 
Whitfield had married into the strong Bishop family of Smith and Simpson 
County..  Yes, indeed, she said, we came from William "Billy" Whitfield, 
who was kin to them thar other Whitfields who were governors and 
political leaders of Mississippi.  Grandma Nancy spoke with assurance as 
she had both the family tradition and the belief of the educated ??? 
Whitfield who was the future governor.  (What she did not take into 
consideration was the fact that politicians then, as now, considered 
each cousin they met as a vote they could count.  You could even stretch 
the relationship if you were not sure.)
    By 1814, William "Billy" Whitfield lived in Warren County, and he 
shows up there on tax records, then in 1820 on the census.  By 1830, he 
had moved to Simpson County and was 60 to 70 years old.  This would have 
put him in a suitable age bracket to have served in the Rev. War.  By 
1800, one William Whitfield lived in SC on the Pee Dee River and 
represented his area in the SC state legislature.  This legislator from 
the Pee Dee River is, I believe, our ancestor.  The root stock of the 
Whitfields seems to have been across the border in NC, with some 
branches drifting down the Pee Dee into SC.  Abraham Bowen, Grandma 
Nancy's other grandfather, took the same route, according to her traditions.
    Billy Whitfield was not particularly successful in MS, and must have 
died in Simpson County before 1840.  In trying to identify the name of 
Billy Whitfield's wife from the oral tradition, Uncle Tom Richardson 
came up with the phrase or name, "Nun-No."  That does not equate to any 
known name and it could have been an answer to the question: "Who was 
Billy Whitfield's wife?" and the simple answer, "None Know."  No names 
of Betsey Whitfield's siblings have been recovered.  So we simply do not 
know how we connect to themthar other Whitfields.
    We do know that our earliest Hartley ancestor was also from the Pee 
Dee River.  He was Francis Marion "Frank" Hartley.  Grandma Nancy and 
her Moulder half-brothers was absolutely sure he was of Huguenot 
ancestry, and she and they had the ancestral story of his ancestor 
running out the back door of his home in France while the French 
soldiers of Looee Quartorze broke down the front door.  This ancestor 
kept running until he got to SC, back-packed trade goods to the Indians 
on the Western frontier, and was successful.  In my own research, I 
could not identify Hartley as a Huguenot name, so it was probable that 
the Huguenot ancestor had some other surname.  The Huguenots were strong 
on reading and writing, and Frank Hartley had these skills when most 
others did not.
    In Uncle Tom Richardson's quest for Frank Hartley's parents on the 
1790 census, he thought that the most likely household was that of Sibby 
Hartley, a widow with two sons, who lived across the Pee Dee River from 
Billy Whitfield.  We have not been able to identify her husband.  By 
family tradition, Frank had a brother Charles Hartley who died in West 
Florida (now eastern Louisiana).  If we could find a marriage record in 
SC of a "Sibbee" or "Sibby" ?Somebody? to a Hartley, about the time of 
the Rev War, we might have some answers. 
    It seems Frank Hartley married Betsey Whitfield in Warren County, 
MS, and then lived there several years before moving to Mason Ridge near 
the Ouachita River in Louisiana.  By 1836 he was back in MS into Simpson 
County where Billy Whitfield lived.  By 1850 he lived in Smith County 
near Sylvarena on Leaf River.  His daughter Sarah "Sally" Hartley 
(1822-1886) married Sam Bowen when she was about fifteen years old, and 
had five children before he died..
    The third Pee Dee River ancestor was Samuel "Sam" Bowen (1795-c 
1846).  He told his wife he was born in NC but grew up between the 
Little Pee Dee and Big Pee Dee Rivers in SC (possibly Marion County), 
that his father was Abraham Bowen who had nine children.  His mother, he 
said, was Kizziah Brown.  It is family tradition that Sam Bowen 
backpacked his way to Simpson County from wherever he lived by 1835.   
He hired out to a Mr. Freeman as a teamster and made trips as far away 
as Vicksburg and Mobile.  He moved later into Smith County and was 
buried in Old White Oak Cemetery. 
It is entirely possible that Sam Bowen had a family before he married 
Sallie Hartley in 1837, and there is a bible record of birth of one 
David Bowen before he married Sally.  It is also possible that the 
Whitfields, Hartleys, and Bowens knew each other, or about the other 
families, before they met up again in MS.  Or it may have been a matter 
of common accents and traditions that drew them together.
    It is intriguing to suggest that Billy Whitfield and ??? Hartley 
were member's of Francis Marion's "Swamp Foxes," a famous band of 
guerrilla fighters in the Pee Dee River swamps during the Rev. War.  
Abraham Bowen was too far north in NC to be in that group.  I have seen 
claims by people who say their ancestors fought under Francis Marion, 
but they are almost certainly not documented.  General Francis Marion 
kept no rosters, paid no soldiers, and never disclosed his objective for 
a raid.  In the layers of command, you get down to the Corporal or 
Sargeant who led the squad.  He knew all his men and he gave them a 
rendevous point.  When they got there, they got the next level and next 
rendevous point.  When you got to the last point, General Marion led the 
troops to the objective.  So all one can say is that General Francis 
Marion operated in the Pee Dee River swamps.  The Whitfields and 
Hartleys lived in the swamps.  General Marion's men lived in the 
swamps.  Those who were not part of his operation knew nothing 
whatsoever about them.