Wooten/Cochran puzzle

  I have worked on a brick wall on my Mother's Wooten line for many years!  It is a long story.  If you want to catch up here are links to past blog posts:

http://marshamoses.blogspot.com/2013/10/wooten-in-surry-county-nc.html

The above link takes me to a blog post written in 2013.  One of the pieces of information in this post is the possibility that the surname Jordan may be connected to both Silas Wooten and also to the family of Thomas Ooten/Wooten of Surry County whose widow, Ann Stotts is later found in eastern Kentucky with second husband, John Stotts, and children Silas, Nancy, Jordan, and Levi.  I see an error in this post at the very bottom:  Silas does not witness the estate of River Jordan.  He witnesses someone else's estate and River Jordan is named in the document but is still living.

I am not adding other links today ....if you want to read more, use the search engine on the site with search word Silas.

Oh, Wait.  Here is another blog post that has some incorrect information, but furthers the story:

http://marshamoses.blogspot.com/2014/01/silas-wooten-john-hunt-isaac-williamson.html

Ok.  Today's information.  I have extra time this December as I am in Boston recuperating from a knee replacement.  While cruising on Ancestry I found Shirley Roberts.  Shirley's father and brother are yDNA matches to both Scott Wooten and David Wooten (my yDNA participants for my Wooten line).  This indicates that Shirley and I share an ancestor who had sons who connect to our Wooten/Cochran lines,

So this blog post is about the places where our mutual ancestor might have lived.  Shirley says that her own research has shown the earliest Cockeran ancestors of her father's yDNA matches to have been found in Lunenburg County. Lunenburg encompassed the area that is now Halifax, Pittsylvania, Henry, and area west.  Lunenburg was formed in 1746.  Before that the area would have fallen into Brunswick and before that into ....well it would have just been frontier in the very early days.

Halifax was formed out of Lunenburg in 1752

Remember that Silas P. Wooten enlisted for duty in Halifax during the Revolutionary War.  But it is unclear if he lived in the area or if "everyone" was going to Halifax to enlist in that time period,

The next area of interest is Surry and Wilkes County in NC.  I have long suspected that it could be possible that Silas had lived in that area before the Revolution and I have a good bit of information about that on my blog.  What is new is that in my cruising on Ancestry, I found LOTS of Cockerans/Cochrans in that area in the right time frame.  I was amazed at the number of dna matches I have on Ancestry who have this surname in their tree!

When  I used the names found in Shirley's tree of John Daniel Cockerham b. 1705 in Lunenburg County with a son Moses V. Cockerham b. 1737 in Lunenburg County I found a tree owned by Jennifer Engle that connected Shirley's Cochrans with Surry County, NC. BINGO!  This is exactly what I hoped to find!

Looking at maps I find that this area is just west of Mt. Airy on the NC, Virginia border.  So I believe we are beginning to narrow down places and times our mutual ancestor is most likely to be found.

What is next?  Certainly Moses V. Cockerham is a candidate for our mutual ancestor.  But so is his father.  Or any previous generation....or any of his brothers....no that is not true.  Shirley comes down from Moses.  So if Moses is not shared ancestor it has to be an earlier Cockerham.  So I suppose the next step is to sort out the Cockerham families found in Lunenburg County, Virginia and Surry County, NC.

So this morning I am reading Chapter III in the book: