Volume 3 Issue 10
October 2003
Home Page and Index

Abstract
Three sons of Allen-III Gentry, are described in detail, namely Shadrack, whose family stayed in Person County, North Carolina; Meshack, whose family spread to Kentucky, Tennessee, and Mississippi; and Abednego, most of whose family remained in Surry (Yadkin) County, North Carolina, but with two sons who ventured on to Missouri and parts beyond.

Introduction
Allen Gentry dictated his will and signed it with his mark on 21 Dec 1801, leaving his property to his wife, Mary, to two daughters, Mary Buchanan and Agnes Whittemore, to three sons, Shadrack, Meshack and Abednego (spelled "Obednigo" in the will), and to one of his grandsons, Shadrack junior, son of Abednego<1>. These children have been briefly described in a Gentry Journal article about Allen (vol 2, issue #9), but we will consider his three sons here in more detail.

A.  Shadrack Gentry, First and Second Generations

Shadrack and his brothers spent almost all of their early life in Lunenburg County, Virginia, where their father, Allen, moved shortly after Shadrack and Meshack were born in Louisa County. Allen was one of the last of his siblings to leave Lunenburg County, selling his property there in 1770. Allen briefly moved to Surry County, North Carolina, where four of his brothers had already settled. It is there that we find the first record for Shadrack in the tax list for 1774. We can infer that he was with Allen in 1772 also when the latter was assessed for two tithes<4>. Shadrack is in a fleeting notation in a Surry County, North Carolina tax list of 1774 and was probably present two years before that when his father Allen was assessed for 2 white polls. Their presence in Surry County, where they did not remain, may have been a "fishing" expedition, looking for possible land at the time when hundreds of back-country North Carolinian "Regulators" abandoned their homes as a result of their defeat by Colonial Government forces in the "War of the Regulation" in 1771.

Fig. 1   Destination Counties in North Carolina,
Coming from Virginia, 1820

Shadrack's family has three points of uncertainty. First and foremost is the identify of the mother of his oldest children — was she Susannah Davis who married Shadrack after a prolonged period of serving as a common-law wife; or was she an older sister of Susannah; or was she someone from a different family. The early life of Shadrack is unusually lacking in references, culminating in no information about his unmarried relationship with the mother of his oldest children. All we know is that her surname was Davis. More will be said about this question below. Two of Shadrack's children are speculative. The Mary who married John "Trew" in 1809, fits neatly into a vacant time slot in the family. There are no other logical Gentry families in Person County to which she could belong at that period of time. The unknown son in the family is suggested to account for one of three male children in Shadrack's family in the 1800 census, born 1790-1800, who was not present in the 1810 or 1820 census.

A chronology of the additional references to Shadrack follows:

Fig. 2   Halifax County, Virginia, and Person County, North Carolina

Allen Gentry and his two sons Shadrack and Abednego appear to have left Caswell County after they were recorded as being there in 1784 and moved north to Halifax County where they were resent in 1789. There is no record of the sale of their property. Shadrack left Halifax County in 1794 and returned to Caswell (now Person) County where he bought property. He spent the rest of his life there, and was included in the Person County census for 1810, 1820, and 1830.

The documents that have survived relating to the settlement of Shadrack's comparatively substantial estate following his death at the age of approximately ninety-six, testify directly to the question of his marriages or lack thereof<7>. The court case that ensued during the administration of the estate do not place the younger children of Shadrack in a very favorable light, inasmuch as they rejected a brother who had been very much a part of Shadrack's family, including serving as surety for the marriage of Shadrack's son, Abednego. Briefly, these younger children, or their heirs, claimed that Simon was not eligible to inherit any of their father's property, because he was an illegitimate son of a mother surnamed Davis, and thus was not a valid heir of Shadrack. Simon acknowledged that he and his sister Sally were children of a mother who may or may not have been married (and he demanded proof that she was not married), but that he at least, had been legally legitimatized by an act of the North Carolina legislature. Unfortunately, we do not know the details of the story's ending, since the court papers do not include the judgment of the court. Simon, at any rate, continued to be a prominent part of the community until his death in about 1868.

It is now appropriate to consider further the question of Shadrack's marital situation. We observe firstly that Simon's mother was surnamed Davis, the same as Shadrack's wife Susannah Davis. It does not seem probable that these were one and the same person, else the petitioners in the court case were even more selfish in rejecting the claims for inheritance by a son of their own mother, rather than a half-brother. Moreover, there is a question of age of Susannah. To receive the consent of her parents for the marriage implies that she was not of age. If this was true, there was no way that she would have been able to have been the mother of Shadrack's daughter, Sally. The 1810 census lists Susannah's birth as before 1765, but this was probably an erroneous entry.

This writer is inclined to believe that the mother of Sally, Mary and Simon Gentry was an older sister of Susannah. Simon's birth in about 1792 suggests that Simon's mother died in child-birth or shortly thereafter, and that Shadrack moved swiftly to find a new mother for his new-born child. There were many cases of a younger sister following in the marriage footsteps of an older sister in colonial times, so this would be a very common and expected occurrence. The question of why Shadrack did not marry the mother of his first children is beyond us.

In concluding the story of Shadrack, we can observe that his family was one that was satisfied with their surroundings in Person County. All of his children remained in North Carolina and became the forebearers of the Gentrys who still abound today in Person County and its immediate vicinity.

 
B.  Meshack Gentry, First and Second Generations

There have been suggestions, including in "The Gentry Family in America", that Meshack had some daughters as well as these three sons. In particular, a Nancy Gentry who married George Hudspeth in Surry County, North Carolina in about 1803 has been suggested as a daughter of Meshack. George Hudspeth, a son of Ayres Hudspeth of Surry County, was a neighbor of Meshack at the time of the marriage and they participated in a number of interchanges of property. George named one of his sons Meshack and another one, Jordan. The only evidence that bears on this question is the Virginia state tax enumeration for Halifax County that served in lieu of a "census", which lists in 1784, a "Michael" Gentry with 5 members in his family. Since there has been no suggestion of a Michael Gentry living in Virginia, this has commonly been accepted as being a misspelling of "Meshack". While no sex is identified in this reference, the size of the family accounts for Meshack having only three children. Moreover, in the 1800 Surry County census, Meshack is shown with three sons as his only children. The identity of the Nancy above remains a mystery. We may remark further that Meshack's son, Allen was always referred to as "Allen D.", never with the middle name spelled out, and rarely without the initial.

We have no marriage record for Meshack and his wife Ann, but the latter is identified in a Halifax County deed of 1787. The existence and timing of a second wife is more uncertain. In 1840, a law suit against Meshack's son Allen D. Gentry in Monroe County, Tennessee, refers back to an earlier promissory note: "In 1826 or 1827, Allen D. Gentry of Monroe County made a note to his father, Meshack Gentry, who has a new wife." While the wording is somewhat ambiguous, the author has taken the timing of taking a new wife to be in 1826 or 1827, not 1840 when Allen was brought to court. The 1830 Monroe County census lists this wife as being in the same age range as Meshack, that is she was over 80 years old at that time, if the census was correct. Meshack is missing from the 1840 census so there is no check on this possible wife.

Meshack's movements have been unusually well documented in his petition for a Revolutionary War pension, filed in Monroe County, Tennessee, in 1836<10>. His petition for a pension was rejected for lack of documentary proof of commission as a captain and his service in the North Carolina militia. His petition outlines virtually all of the significant events during his life starting with his birth in Louisa County, Virginia, and ending with his departure from North Carolina to Tennessee where he spent 2 years in Greene County, 2 years in Bledsoe County, 2 years in McMinn County, and finally moved to Monroe County.. In 1852, Meshack's son, Allen D., petitioned again for pension benefits as a surviving son, and reported that Meshack had died 4 Jul 1846.

A year-by-year chronology of references to Meshack, other than those in his pension application follows.

Fig 3.   Settlement of Surry County, North Carolina by Gentrys

In addition to the references cited above. Meshack is identified repeatedly in Surry County tax lists, starting in 1796 and ending in 1816<15>. In 1803, 1804 and 1806, Meshack was taxed not only for land and poll tax but also for a cotton mill or gin. Later land references in 1817 and 1819, mention mills and a mill pond, and in 1821, his son Allen D. Gentry sold land that included a grinding mill. It appears that Meshack was involved in both the ginning of cotton and the grinding of grain.

For many of the tax list references, Meshack is included in the same tax district as his brother Abednego and Abednego's son, Shadrack. In 1804 through 1809, Meshack is listed in a district with Pleasant Gentry, after which Pleasant's name no longer appears in Surry County records. Meshack's son Allen D. is included in lists for 1813 to 1817, but always in a district separate from Meshack. Allen D. was also involved in two sales of land on Hunting Creek in 1819 and 1821 (with no indication as to whether he was still a resident of Surry County or had left the county). Meshack's son Jordan is listed in tax lists for 1814 to 1820.

From all of this, we can infer that Meshack left Person County in 1796 and moved to Surry County where he was joined by Abednego in 1807. The tax and land records agree with his pension application statement about leaving Surry County in about 1818 when he moved to Tennessee. It is uncertain as to whether Allen D. accompanied his father to Tennessee, or followed along a few years after the latter's departure from North Carolina.

Children of Meshack
Meshack's son, Pleasant became an independent landowner in 1804, the year he was married, and remained in Surry County until 1809 when he left and moved to Fayette County, Kentucky. He appears in the 1810 Fayette County census along with his wife, one son and a daughter, is missing from any 1820 Kentucky census, then appears again in the 1830, 1840 and 1850 Owen County, Kentucky, census records. Numerous Alnutt families from North Carolina were living in Owen County in 1850, and it appears that Pleasant's initial move to Kentucky was with members of his wife's family. Pleasant's oldest son, John T., is listed in the 1840 Owen County census, and his children were present in 1850, but John was missing, probably dying before that time. Pleasant's second son, Allen, is also present in the 1840 and 1850 Owen County census. Pleasant's other children are believed to have been Polly, Nancy, Elizabeth and Mahala.

Meshack's second son, Allen D, as mentioned above, left North Carolina with his father, or shortly afterwards, settling permanently in Monroe County, Tennessee. He has been described at length in a previous article of this Journal, with many details of his family, and his and their checkered marital life<13>. There is no need to discuss him further here.

The third son, Jordan Gentry, has no marriage bond or other direct reference documenting his marriage, but he almost certainly was married to the Elizabeth Holcomb who was listed as Betsey Gentry in the will of her father, Lawrence Holcomb, in 1823. Jordan was included in Meshack's family in the 1800 and 1810 census. His appearance separately in the Surry County tax lists for the first time in 1814 suggests that he was probably married during the preceding year. While he was not taxed for any land, he may have been living on and farming a portion of his father's land. Jordan was in the 1820 Surry County census with what appears to be two sons and a daughter, but with some other household members who were too old to be members of his own family, but may have been Holcomb relatives. Jordan is missing from any 1830 census, but in 1840 and 1850 he can be found in Itawamba County, Mississippi, records.

Itawamba County, in the northeast corner of the state, was formed in 1836 from territory ceded by the Chickasaw Indians to the State of Mississippi in 1832. The 1850 census indicated that two of Jordan's children were born in Tennessee in about 1831 and 1834, suggesting that the family's move to Itawamba County occurred at about the time that land in Itawamba County became available for settlement. The author has not been able to find any trace of Jordan in any Tennessee records during the period between 1820 and 1840. Two of his children, Lewis and Margaret, were living with Jordan in 1840 and 1850. Of the older children, two sons and a daughter were born within the period from about 1814 to 1820, so the daughter and at least one of the sons was of marriageable age in 1840 and quite likely to be missing from Jordan's family in that year. A second daughter was born between 1825 and 1830, so by 1850 she also would have been of marriageable age and missing from Jordan's family. The author has searched for male Gentrys in Mississippi and neighboring states that were born in North Carolina and were between 30 and 36 years of age, but has not found a match for any potential sons of Jordan. The probable alternative is that hw died of accident or disease before 1840.

 
C.  Abednego Gentry, First and Second Generations

There is a large gap in time between our proposed dates of birth for Shadrack and Meshack and that for Abednego. It is probable that most of this gap was filled by the birth of his two sisters, Agnes and Mary. If there were any other siblings, the absence of their names in Allen's will would suggest that they died early. References to Abednego's early life are almost non-existent. If our estimate of his date of birth is reasonably correct, if present, he would have not been included in the 1772 and 1774 tax assessments for his father in Surry County because of being underage. North Carolina legislative archives include his signature in 1779 of a petition for the division of Caswell County. But aside from that, a tax reference to him in 1798 in Halifax County, and the reference to him in his father's will, Abednego was a "non-entity" before 1805. The inclusion of a special provision for Abednego's son, Shadrack, in his grandfather's will suggests that this grandson was a particular favorite of Allen's. Abednego was undoubtedly living with and caring for his father, Allen, and his mother, Mary, up to the time of Allen's death. The location of this residence when he died is a matter of some uncertainty despite the fact that Allen referred to himself as "of Halifax County" in his will and the fact that his will was received for probate in that county. This has been discussed in the earlier Journal article on Allen. We can speculate that Abednego's move from Person County to Surry County in 1807 probably occurred after the presumed death of his mother, Mary, when he no longer felt an obligation to care for her.

The limited further references to Abednego are included in the following chronology.

Like Meshack, Abednego was included in tax lists in Surry County on a year-by-year basis, beginning with the list for 1807. The tax list references are not included above or in the references for this article, but may be seen in the Journal article for Allen Gentry and his family<15>. From time to time, besides Abednego, various of his sons appeared progressively in later tax lists, and included Reuben, Shadrack, Allen, William and Abednego Jr.

Abednego's Family
The justification for the name of Abednego's first wife, Elizabeth, lies not in Virginia or North Carolina, but in South Carolina. In Newberry District, South Carolina, in 1799, the will of David Brooks was received for probate, and included provision for dividing his estate between his brother Richard Brooks and his sister, "Elizabeth Gentry, now living in North Carolina". By a process of elimination, we can rule out any Gentry husband for Elizabeth with the exception of Abednego. Fortunately, this matches other vague but unsubstantiated suggestions that his wife was named Elizabeth. From other evidence, David Brooks has been identified as a son of John Brooks who lived in Lunenburg County, Virginia, during and after the time that Allen Gentry's family lived there. It is significant that John Brooks and his two sons, David and Richard were in the same initial Caswell County census of taxable individuals in 1777 as Allen, Shadrack, and Samuel Gentry.

Elizabeth Gentry was identified in the 1810 and 1820 census as having been born before 1765, as would be expected for Abednego's wife. Her place in the family is missing in the 1830 and 1840 census for Surry County, and what appears to be a second wife takes her place. In 1830, this new female is listed as having been born between 1790 and 1800. In 1840, what was probably the same individual was identified as having been born between 1780 and 1790. If indeed this was a second wife, the two census listings can be approximately reconciled if this wife was born about 1790. Of course, this individual (or individuals) could have been someone quite different from a new wife for Abednego, but we have no a priori reason for suggesting this, and common sense suggests a marital relationship.

Abednego's proposed oldest son, Reuben, has been described in a prior Journal article (vol 2, issue #12) along with arguments for his being a part of this family. Reuben appeared in the Surry County tax lists only once, in 1809. His sister, Mary, was also listed that same year and again in 1813. It was presumably at that time that she married Samuel Stokes. The next sister, Nancy, is included in a marriage bond in 1810 for her marriage to her first cousin, Allen D. Gentry. We have already remarked that this family has been discussed in some depth in volume 3, issue #7 of this journal. The identification of Elizabeth, as being a daughter of Abednego, depends upon a comparison of ages of eligible girls as shown in the census listings and the marriage bonds recorded in Surry County in the period between 1810 and 1820. In the latter year, this daughter of Abednego was no longer listed in the census with his family. There is further confirmation of a sort in the letter supposedly written by Samuel Stokes to Nancy Gentry in 1844, in which William Sparks, who married Elizabeth, is said to want to marry Nancy to replace his deceased wife (indicating at least a close family acquaintanceship). Another presumed daughter of Abednego, was present in the 1810, 1820 and 1830 census records, living with the family, but missing in 1840. Whether the absence is due to marriage (for which we have no record) or was due to death, we do not know, but in any case, there is no identification available for her.

The sons of Abednego, other than Reuben, present no problem in identification. Shadrack was the grandson of Allen mentioned in the latter's will. Shadrack had two sons, Gardner and Richard. Both died unexpectedly early in life, in Surry County, but Gardner lived long enough to have a family of four sons and three daughters, all of whom can be found in the 1850 Surry County census. Richard died before the 1850 census; his widow, Catherine, and a young daughter moved in with Nicholas Ball (probably her brother) and Catherine remarried in 1850. All of Shadrack's daughters appeared in Surry County marriage bond records<14>.

Abednego's son Allen left Surry County in about 1846, along with a number of his relatives and neighbors — the Brittains and Weathermans in particular — and moved to Nodaway County, Missouri. There he lived to the age of 74, marrying at age 70, a widow, Louisa Martin, whose maiden name was Denny and who had also lived in Surry County. Allen fathered a daughter, Sarah Jane, by her. All the rest of Allen's children were sons, the oldest of whom has never been identified as he did not go to Missouri, or he died before 1850. Of the remaining sons who accompanied Allen to Missouri, John and Thomas died early, William (the great-grandfather of the author) and James died in service in the Civil War, only Alfred, Abednego and Jesse (or "Lee") lived to survive their father<16>.

The two youngest sons of Abednego were William and Abednego Jr. Both names occur in Surry County deeds in which their father sold his remaining land to the boys in anticipation of his death<15>. Abednego Jr. apparently left Surry County abour 1842, and moved to Buchanan County, Missouri. Little is known of his family other than the fact that his wife's first name was Sarah, and the couple had two children, Mary A. and William.

Abednego Sr.'s son, William, lived in Yadkin County (which was created from Surry County in 1850), his entire life. He had three sons, John, Robert and Francis, and three daughters, Polly, Sarah and Nancy. William's tombstone and that of his brother Allen in Missouri, are the only two gravestones of that generation of Gentrys known to still exist. William is buried in the Flat Rock Baptist Church Cemetery in Hamptonville, Yadkin County. All of William's family remained in Yadkin County with many descendants living in the area today<16>.

Conclusion
The three sons of Allen Gentry we have discussed here present interesting contrasts in their apparent life-styles, adventurous outlook, and coverage by contemporary documentation. Like the biblical trio, their names have become by-words among North Carolina Gentrys. We have been able to propose solutions to a number of puzzles as to their life and times, but there are others that will never be answered.

References
1.  Will Books, Halifax County, Virginia

 
2.  Marriage Bond Register, Halifax County, Virginia

 
3.  Marriage Bond Register, Person County, North Carolina

 
4.  Tax Lists, Surry County, North Carolina

 
5.  Tax Lists, Caswell and Person County, North Carolina

 
6.  Deed Books, Caswell and Person County, North Carolina

 
7.  Miscellaneous Records, Person County

 
8.  Family of Shadrack, Second and Third Generations

 
9.  Deed Books, Lunenburg and Halifax Counties, Virginia

 
11.  Reba Bayless Boyer, "Monroe Co. Tenn Records, 1820-1870", Vol 1 Deeds, abstracts compiled by, 1869.

 
14.  Marriage Bond Registers, Surry and Yadkin Counties

 
15.  Deed, Tax List and Census References, Surry County
To avoid unnecessary repetition, please refer to "Journal of Gentry Genealogy", vol 2, #9 (Sep 2002). (For convenience in accessing, right-click on link and open into a new window or tab).

 
16.  Family of Abednego, Third Generation Gentrys

 
10/31/03, Minor additions and revisions, July 2014.