Witheral Latimer to TN
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In reply to:
ancestor of Witheral Latimer
Bill Latimer 9/24/01
Witheral to Tennessee
I would appreciate reactions and corrections to the following from those who have researched the life of Witheral Latimer (1757-1837).It appears to me that Witheral’s move to TN was separate from that of his father Col. Jonathan Latimer and other members of the family.The first of the family to move to TN seems to be Witheral’s sister Borodell, whose husband, Eusebius Bushnell, a surveyor, was a major land speculator in Davidson County, TN, buying and selling land grants.Bushnell’s partner was William Dobbins.The Bushnell’s can be documented in TN as early as 1785.That is the year Witheral’s first wife died.In his application for a military pension to says he himself “removed to Davidson County, NC, now in the state of TN in 1786.”There is evidence that his brother Griswold went with him.I think it is possible he went primarily as a soldier, as well as to seek his fortune far from the sad memories of CT.He may, for example, have been one of the guardsmen taking families from Southwest Point to Davidson County in 1788 (among those in one of these groups was Andrew Jackson).
An indenture dated October 27th, 1788, preserved in the Davidson County, TN Register of Deeds, Vol. 1 (1784-1787), Number 711, records the purchase by “Witherel Latimore” of 228 acres “lying and being in the County of Davidson on the waters of Stones river.” He bought this land from Eusebius Bushnell for $57 dollars.Borodell died the next year and Bushnell left for New Orleans, where he became a speculator for Florida lands.Griswold bought some of Bushnell’s property when he left.
Witherel is also mentioned in the Davidson County Court Minutes for 1788.Nashville was 8 years old and had only around 200 inhabitants.Of this period and place John Buchanan says, “in those years only the hardy and the foolhardy went to the Cumberland.Nashville and the outlying stations were at the back of beyond, isolated, the targets of several thousand hostile Indians determined to wipe them from the face of the earth.”
Col. Jonathan Latimer and his other sons did not arrive until at least the next year, 1789, when they are mentioned in surviving documents.They settled on Station Camp Creek about ten miles north of the Cumberland River and fifteen miles northeast of Nashville (near present Gallatin).Witherel seems to have been somewhat independent of the main family group, holding land in Davidson County nearer Nashville.Records show he served in a different military company than his brothers.He eventually moved to Sumner County, but he seems to have still been in the Nashville area until 1792. In that year he was one of the 15 militia men who held off over 400 Indians in the famous battle of Buchanan’s Station.Evidence for this comes from an eyewitness—and 8 year boy who was there.Then, of course, we have the marriage bond document dated March 21, 1793, still in Davidson County, and co-signed by the big land speculator in Nashville, James Mulherrin (he was another of the 15 at Buchanan’s Station).
It was 1793 when he bought 150 acres from James Godfrey on the Red River, and that is probably when he left the Nashville area. He is first mentioned in the tax records of Sumner County in 1794 under "Captain Young's Company."He became a Justice of the Peace in Sumner County in 1796, a member of the county court, and one of the first Lieutenants in the militia of the new state of TN (Mero District).He also became a ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church.He isn’t in his father’s will—maybe he was so well off by this time his father didn’t think he needed more! He bought more and more land in Sumner County, but moved from there to Bedford County about 1811.But that’s another story.
So—you experienced Latimer researchers.Do I have it right?
More Replies:
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Re: Witheral Latimer to TN
Mary Mitchell 8/14/06
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Re: Witheral Latimer to TN
John Wilson 8/15/06
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Re: Witheral Latimer to TN
Allen Latimer 8/22/09
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Re: Witheral Latimer to TN