Alleghany Historical-Genealogical Society, Inc.

P.O. BOX 817, Sparta, N.C. 28675

President: M.O. Zimmerman				
Vice President: Lorene Sturgill
Secretary: Lou Reid Landreth
Treasurer: Mildred Torney

Vol. 3, No. 3		 	September 1981 			BULLETIN NO. 8

From the President:

	As work on cemeteries and the Museum continues, the Alleghany Historical-Genealogical Society, Inc. has started a history project aimed at collecting and preserving historical information on the County.

	As an initial start on this program, the Society has entered into an agreement with the Hunter Publishing Company for the publication of a book entitled, “Alleghany County Heritage.”  This book will contain historical information on the County and its communities, family history sketches, and a pictorial coverage of families, events and places in the County.  This publication will supplement and expand the material contained in the 1976 Bicentennial History of Alleghany County.  Since many people did not have an opportunity to submit material for that book, now is the time to submit historical information, family history data and pertinent photographs.  Please read the attached flyer for further details.  

	I want to encourage everyone to support this project.  To make it a success, we need you to help spread the word so everyone having roots in the County has an opportunity to participate.  If all our members would send flyers to their friends and relatives who live outside the County,  it would greatly increase the spreading of the information.

	As pointed out in the flyer, the Society will perform no research on family histories.  There will be a committee, however, to answer questions people may have as to the presentation of material.

	We all need to think about preparing our own family histories.  So LETS GET BUSY!

From the Committees:

Cemetery:  Pleasant Fall days are here, so we need to get out and finish up this important phase of our Society’s goals.  We have two large volumes of completed reports with several more to be added.  After this is finished, we need to cite the cemetery locations on maps, furnish information to the State Committee on Abandoned Cemeteries, and decide on a publication format.  So the important thing at this point is to get the survey sheets completed.  Anyone able to help is urged to contact the Secretary!

GENEALOGY:  Following are some obituaries that have been selected form old Church minutes:

MT. UNION BAPTIST ASSOCIATION, September 23, 1876.

		John A. Jones born 4-23-1813, died 5-17-1876    Died with fever.

Fifth Annual Session of the LITTLE RIVER BAPTIST ASSOCIATION, held with Double Springs Church, Ashe County, N.C., Sept. 15-16, 1899.

		Calvin Wyatt born 8-3-1831, died 11-3-1897
			          Married I- Jane Absher 9-6-1849   (3 children)
                                              Married II- Pheby Stamper  12-7-1857  (5 Children)

		John Church born 7-19-1816, died 9-17-1898.
			         Married Delphia Woodie 2-1-1837 (8 children)

		Ailsey Richardson born 4-18-1839, died 6-10-1868.
			Married I- Elijah Blevins 1857 (3 children)
			Married II- Caleb Richardson (1 daughter)

		John W. Moore born 8-15-1878, died 2-30-1899.

		Francis C. Holbrook born 1-12-1833, died 1-2-1899.

LITTLE RIVER BAPTIST ASSOCIATION 1901.

		Nancy Hodge born 3-   -1832, died 1879
                                             Married I- John Edwards at age 17 (1 daughter)
			         Married II – Columbus Dicken

		Mattie C. Larrow died 4-29-1901, 40 years, 8 months and 3 days.  
				Daughter of Elder J. K. and Sarah Baldwin.
				Married Thomas Larrow.

		Solomon S. Stamper born 4-26-1822, died 5-16-1901
		                                 Married Lydia Pruitt 1840 (5 children)
LITTLE RIVER BAPTIST ASSOCIATION 1901 (continued):

	Sarah Ann Richardson born 6-8-1857, died 6-23-1901
Married Alexander Richardson about 16 years before her death (3 children) husband died in 1897.

	Ida Higgins born 12-3-1875, died 7-21-1901
                             Daughter of Brisom and Julia Kirby
                             Married C.T. Higgins 9-26-1896 (1 daughter)

	Linnie B. Davis born 1-3-1884, died 9-22-1900
		    Daughter of Emery and Polly Davis.

	Thoams E. Hendrix born 1-22-1846, died 7-4-1901
			        Son of Ansal and Emma Hendrix
                                            Married Matilda Walker 1867 (12 children)

	Martha Dickens born 2-7-1865, died 2-20-1898
		              Married James Doby (6 children)

	Martha Bartley born 12-18-1863, died 1-25-1900
                                     Married Calvin Todd 2-5-1897 (2 children)

	James Sturgill born 5-28-1816, died 6-22-1901
                                   Married Susan Baldwin 7-25-1837 (9 children)
			Susan died 12-29-1868

GENEALOGY INQUIRIES: 

	Would like to borrow any Church Minutes in 1800’s that has Obituaries.  Please call or write Lorene M. Sturgill.  

	REWARD for the capture and preservation of any photo of James Franklin Roberts, father of Daniel J. Roberts of Elk Spur near Cherry Lane.  Contact John Roberts.

	Anyone doing researching on descendants of Stephen Taylor, son of Samuel Taylor should also write Mr. Roberts at the above address as he has lots of letters and photos.  He also has information on Stamper, Pruitt, Baugess and Bledsoe.

	Jessie Hankins Mitchell, Ohio, is searching for Crouse, Holloway, Woodruff and Hardsack lineage (in that order on the genealogy prepared by Rev. Clayton B. Miller.

MUSEUM: Chairman Roy Crouse and the Museum Committee are still locating items and completing the necessary forms in connection with receiving such items in the Museum.  Additional workshops are planned for clean-up and display of material that has been received.  Recent accessions are:

	Two showcases, donated by Bays Parsons, which will be used for safe and effective display of small items.

	A desk made by Sidney Allen while he was in prison, and loaned to us by Mrs. Clyde Delp.

HISTORY: Chairman Clifford Rector reports he’s very excited abut the progress being made by Mrs. Burr Bost and her class at Alleghany High School.  They are handling a portion of family histories as they particularly relate to certain architectural structures that have been sited for recognition in the County.  These young people are enthusiastic and have given a lot of thought and planning for their project as they go about researching and interviewing.

	As we start thinking about the family histories we’ll want to write for the “Alleghany County Heritage” the first place to go for information is the attached flyer.  Then start searching for information on your family members and ancestors.  Many stories will come to mind as you delve into your family’s past.

	Following is a draft of a short historical sketch which may give you some ideas about preparing such sketches on your family.  A sketch should not exceed 2 ½ to 3 pages of double-spaced typing.  You will note that quite a bit can be said in even less space.

DAVID LANDRETH

	David Landreth was an ordinary farmer and land trader and like any of the men of his time he was not educated.  Perhaps he gave more to his county than those officials who held salaried jobs.  He gave his land so that the county seat of Sparta could be established at the juncture of his land with that of James H. Parks and David Evans.  These there gentlemen gave a total of fifty acres of land as the nucleus of a new town and the necessary public buildings and facilities.
	David Landreth was born to John and Elizabeth Landreth on 11 August 1811.  We have no proof of where he was born, where his parents were born or how many children were in the family.  We know only that he had a brother James who was born 11 September 1808 who had property on Glade Creek and who married Rachel Bass from Surry County and had nine children.
	David was married twice, first to Cynthia Duncan by whom he had Celia, John who died at Savannah in the War Between the States, and James Washington who went to Tennessee and is buried in Spring City, Tennessee.  We have not found any record of Cynthia’s birth or death or where she is buried.  It is logical that she would be in the Wagoner-Duncan cemetery behind the new Pipe Factory on Road 1421.  We believe she was a sister to Franklin Duncan. 
	David’s second wife was Rachel Wagoner, born 27 October 1827 and died 27 August 1881.  They had nine children: Elizabeth, Alfred Martin, Allen, Jane, Sarah, David Gordon, Irene, Reid and Perlina.  They lived in a two-story log home at the confluence of Bledsoe Creek and Little River on a small plateau just south of the creek and west of the river.  David had horses and cattle and traded land.  He probably had a sawmill, as one was on the property which later belonged to Alfred Martin.  Information handed down is that he owned up to seven hundred acres of land.  His land ran up Bledsoe Creek approximately to Highway 18 and ran over to the area now occupied by the Community Building and the Court house.  It ran along what is now Road 1172 to the junction with 1173 where it joined the Silas Tedder farm.  Everything east of 1172 to Little River belonged to David until it joined the Tedder holdings.
	The Landreths seem to have been Primitive Baptists.  Rachel, Reid, Perlina and Sarah all died before David and are buried at Union Primitive Baptist cemetery at Whitehead.  David, Martin and his wife and some of their children, are also buried at Union. 
	When Alleghany County was formed in 1858 a survey determined that the approximate geographical center of the county was where the lands of David Landreth, David Evans and James H. Parks came together.  Unfortunately we do not have anything in writing to show what negotiations took place, if any, what arm-twisting, if any.  The first deed by which these gentlemen gave the land to Colonel Allen Gentry, Clerk of the County Court, for the purpose stated, was destroyed by fire.  A second deed was not made until 16 April 1866, Deed Book E or 5, Page 201.
	David Landreth loved his horses.  His daughter Jane, born 1851, also loved horses and was a fearless young girl.  We are told that if stragglers or bushwhackers were rumored she would get on one horse and lead others down behind rocks and trees along the river and creek to hide them.  Later when sons Gordon and Allen were in Kentucky, David made trips there by horse to visit them, once narrowly escaping a hold-up planned for him at the place he had intended to spend the night.  He excused himself for “a little fresh air before turning in” and fled to his steed.
	He wanted all his daughters to have homes and he sold tracts of land cheaply to their husbands.  One daughter died young leaving three small girls and David gave the girls twenty acres of prime land, in the area around what is now the old prison camp.  Intresting history is lost because this man did not read or write.  This may also be the reason that we cannot find engraved tombstones for his parents or his first wife and that there was no family bible.  Many deeds in the Court House are marked with his “X”.
	Unfortunately true history is also lost or distorted by omission.  In Western North Carolina, a History, by John Preston  Arthur, the name of David Landreth is omitted from the list of donors of land for the establishment of the county seat of Sparta, though the deed in the Court House clearly names all three donors and is signed by all there men, (or their X’s).  This book will probably be accepted for hundreds of years as true history of the older days.  

1981	                                                    Lou Reid Landreth
Great Granddaughter
OF INTEREST: The following is an excerpt from a letter written on June 5, 1859 by John A. Jones to Jonathan Stamper and Sinthia Stamper and family:

	“Our County is divided, the name is Alleghany.  The county line is as follows, from the Mulberry gap with the old road to Flint Hill, then to the mouth of Puratory Creek, then down the river to the forks, then north to the Virginia line.  The county seat is not settled on yet.  The name will be Sparta.  We think it will come about the Gap Civil.  The tiems in this country is scarce and the signs of the times, worse.”

	“There is killing frost this morning Bit the most of my corn to the ground.  Corn is worth 75 cents per bushel.  Wheat $1.00……Crops look very well till this frost—it looks like it was ruined.”