Saturday, December 26, 2015

Thomas Higginbotham sells land to Robert Rose 1751

I started this post and spent so much time on the introduction to why I was writing it, that I ended up publishing the post on its own.....so it is the next post that you might read if you continue to scroll down.

Luan Marks sent me information at my request about a man named Patrick Morrison who was probably born c. 1750.  A woman named Ruth Sammons Nassar who did a great deal of research on family lines that my mother and Ruth shared in the mid 1900s had said that the wife of Solomon Hensley was Elizabeth Morrison and that Elizabeth's father was Patrick.  The Patrick in the below information would have been of a suitable age to have been a father to Elizabeth.

 I decided to work on Luan's information  immediately and added the first fact to the time line that I am working on:

3 June 1751 
Patrick Morrison appeared as a witness on a deed in Albemarle County for sale of 540 acres of land on the Piney River and Piney Woods.This Patrick Morrison would have been at least 16 years old to sign legally as a witness on this deed.
Thomas Higginbotham, son of John and Frances (Riley) Higginbotham was living in Albemarle Co., in 1751, when on June of that year, he conveyed by deed to Robert Rose also of Albemarle, for a consideration of 45 lbs, three messages or tenements . . . Witnesses: John Walker, Robert Green and Patrick Morrison” 
(Albemarle County Deed Book 1, page 378).

I have for a long time been interested in Robert Rose, so I was very excited to see this first item!  






On March 16, 1749, the remarkable planter-minister Robert Rose introduced a new era in Piedmont with the discovery that two canoes lashed together could convey downstream eight or nine hogsheads of tobacco as compared to one hogshead on a single canoe. 

Gotta quit....Christmas stuff.....but fun....afraid I'll loose what I have saved so far if I don't publish.

Ruth Salmons Nassar and Morrison, Hensley, and Webb

This Christmas Season I have been ordering Morrison and Hensley DNA kits and chatting with Luan Marks and Ed Griffith about their mutual Morrison lines.  I hope that Morrison will also be a line belonging to Mom.  Ruth Sammons Nassar had run out of energy or health by the time she began to work on Mom's Hensley line.  She says:  "It has been vexing that I could find so little on the Hensley family and even less on the Webb line.  Lucinda Hensley Salmons was certainly the most colorful and intriguing of my ancestors and I would like to know more about her antecedents, however my research capabilities are now limited and I now compile as much data as I have in order that some future researcher may be aided."

I take this as a personal note from Ruth to me.  I dedicate all of my research on the Morrison, Hensley and Webb lines to this lady who I consider one of my best buddies even though I was never able to actually meet her in person.  When I read her pages, I truly believe that she did all that she could to help me move this research on.  And I hope that I will be able to live long enough to do the same for some future researcher....

In her book about her Hensley family, Ruth seems to take for granted the fact that Solomon Hensley was indeed her ancestor and that his wife was Elizabeth Morrison.  She also places Patrick Henry Morrison as a father for Elizabeth.  I am rereading all of this today in hopes that I will find some source for documentation in the pages that I have missed on previous readings.  I do not believe that Elizabeth's father was Patrick Henry Morrison.  I believe that Cabell County researchers have found some sort of evidence that Elizabeth had father Patrick. ...when in fact it is her grandfather who had name Patrick. They then turn around and connect her to the Cabell County Patrick Henry Morrison that they know.  In truth Ed Griffith explained to me several years ago that the Patrick Henry Morrison that the Cabell County researchers are talking about would have only been 10 years old when Elizabeth was born.