USA > North Carolina > Watauga County > A history of Watauga County, North Carolina. With sketches of prominent families > Part 28
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Dugger Family .- In 1793 or 1794 Benjamin Dugger came to Watauga County from Yadkin Elk, where a creek and moun- tain still bear his name. He entered land on Brushy Fork, near the present Holtsclaw settlement. His children were Selah, who married Laus Goodin; Daniel Dugger; Cora Ann, who married Samuel Burns; Susannah, who married John Whit- tington; Mary, who married John Calihan; David and William Dugger. David Dugger bought out the other heirs. The deed is dated November 1, 1815, and calls for two tracts on Brushy Fork. There were three Dugger brothers who came from Scot- land to Yadkin Elk, having settled for a time near Petersburg, Va., Benjamin, Daniel and Julius. Ben stopped on Brushy Fork, Daniel went to Kentucky and Julius settled in what was then Carter County, Tennessee, near Fish Spring, where some of his descendants still live. It was from the Julius Dugger family that the Dugger forge and the beginnings of Cranberry forge started. David married Margaret Ernest and their children are: Henry, who married a Green; Polly, who married David Howell; Elizabeth, who married Jehiel Smith, and William, who married Unice Munday. William's children were: Henry, who never married; Franklin, who married Martha Presnell; David, who married Mary Munday; Elizabeth, who never married; John, killed in Civil War; William Eben., married Nannie Wil- kerson; Margaret and Mary Jane, not married.
The Eggers Family .- Landrine Eggers came from London to the eastern part of this State first and then to Ashe County. He was born in 1747 and died March 17, 1833. He was mar- ried, first, to a lady whose name has been forgotten, and, second, to Joanna Green, whose family lived near Three Forks Church and were members of that body. Children of first marriage have been forgotten, but those of the second are: Hugh, the date of whose birth and the name of whose wife are not now known, and one daughter, Lydia, who was born December 14, 1791, and married James Swift, who died January 8, 1858, leaving the following children: Franklin, born August II, 1816; Elias, born February 5, 1818; Morgan, born October 23, 1819; James, born December 3, 1821; Martha, born January 1, 1824; Mar- garet, born August 26, 1826; Elizabeth, born June 20, 1828;
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Wilburn, born October 7, 1831; Mary, born March 16, 1833; Rebecca, born April 15, 1835. Hugh's children were: Lan- drine, born September 10, 1805; Malinda, born February II, 1802; Washington, born August 21, 1808; Nancy, born April 15, 1836; Jehiel S., born October 20, 1834; Martha C., born September 27, 1837, and the following, the dates of whose births are unknown: Cleveland, Abner and Joel. Landrine the second married Ellen McBride, daughter of Wm., of Rowan County, born August 5, 1800; died December 5, 1872. The children of Landrine the second were: Brazilla, born June 10, 1825, mar- ried Sarah Isaacs; Ransom, born January 5, 1827, married Rachel Isaacs; Hugh and Sarah, twins, born December 26, 1828, of whom Hugh married Alva Kilby, and Sarah, John Isaacs; Landrine the third, born November 18, 1830; Anna, born July 21, 1832, married Franklin Reese; Richard, born February 1, 1834, married Elizabeth Reese; John, born De- cember 2, 1835, married Martha Stout; Ellen, born January 16, 1839, married Maston Davis. Landrine the third married Sep- tember 7, 1854, first, Sarah Ward, daughter of James Ward, of Watauga River, who was born November 26, 1834, died July 6, 1867. The children of the first marriage were: Sarah Ellen, born May 17, 1862, married Solomon Grogan. Landrine the third's second wife was Mary Potter. They were married March 8, 1868, she having been born March 15, 1831. Their children were: John L., born July 21, 1870, married, first, Alice Greer ; second, Daisy Adams, and, third, the widow Woodring; Omer C., born August 14, 1873, died of diphtheria November, 1887; Luther D., born December 26, 1876, married Emma Jones, daughter of Rev. E. F. Jones, and lives at Post Falls, Idaho; Barton R., born August 17, 1878, died of diphtheria November, 1887; Carroll and Jehiel, twins, born May 30, 1881, died Novem- ber 9, 1887, and were buried in same grave.
Edmisten Family .- Wm. Wallace Dixon Edmisten was born on Mulberry Creek, Caldwell County, August 29, 1850. He was the son of James Edmisten and Mary Shull, a daughter of Phillip Shull, and they were married September 25, 1848. Their children were W. W. D. and Nancy Carolina, the latter of whom
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married Frank Read. James Edmisten's father was William and his wife was Nancy Garner. William's father was also named William, and his wife was the widow of Blair, born Sudderth, a sister of Abraham Sudderth. Her hus- band, - Blair, was killed at King's Mountain while fighting on the side of the British, and William Edmisten mar- ried her after the Revolution. She was then a young widow, but William had fought at King's Mountain, too, where two of his brothers, who were said to have been officers, were killed, but he and they had fought on the American side. These brothers were from Virginia.
Elrod Family .- The first of this family came from France to Pennsylvania and thence to Davie County, North Carolina. From this State they have spread out to Ohio, Tennessee, Ken- tucky, Virginia and South Dakota, Henry C. Elrod having been governor of the latter State a few years since. Conrad Elrod was the father of William, and died near the present Reformed Church, on the Blue Ridge. He was buried in a hollowed out chestnut log. William married Elizabeth Lowrance, and their children were: Chaney, who married Robert Greene, father of Judge L. L. Greene ; Malinda, who married Asa Triplett ; Henry, who married Sarah Brookshire; Alexander, who married Polly Shearer; Mary, who married Thomas Cook; Ann, who mar- ried Lot Greene; Hardin, who married Temperance Bradshaw; Rachel, who never married, and John, who married Elizabeth Brookshire. Henry Elrod moved to the Watts Farthing place when two years old, traveling over a trail, and having the house- hold articles carried on pack horses for want of a road. He had two children, William and Louisa. William married Chaney Brookshire and Louisa married T. M. Cannon. William remem- bers that when he was eight years old, on September 27, 1856, there was a snow storm in Watauga County. He also remembers when a wagon was a rare sight in this section. He remembers when the buckhorn which had been nailed on the old oak tree on the old Jordan Council place showed through the bark, and when it was entirely covered by the bark. He saw this when he came to the old Musters before the Civil War. Top buggies
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were even rarer than wagons, and James W. Councill had what was probably the first in the county in the fifties. Henry Elrod was conscripted after he had moved in 1857 to the Flat Top Mountain, and taken to Camp Vance, after which he was trans- ferred to Camp Mast, where he was captured. He died in 1885. Alex Elrod was captured by Stoneman, but, pretending to have rheumatism, was allowed to escape.
Farthing Family .- Dudley Farthing was born in Virginia, April 6, 1749. He was the son of William Farthing and his wife, Mary. Dudley Farthing died in Wake County February 22, 1826. His wife was Annie, daughter of Wm. Watkins and Phœbe, his wife. She was born July 4, 1747, in Virginia, and died February 13, 1812, in Wake County. Their children were : Phobe, born November 15, 1778, and she married John Link, February 3, 1803; Mary, born July 3, 1780, and died March 22, 1826; William, born August 25, 1782, married Polly W. Hally- burton, February 9, 1804; John, born September 26, 1784, mar- ried Lucy Goss, first, who died April 9, 1827, and then Polly Amos; he died February 29, 1868; Reuben, born September I, 1787, married ; died August 14, 1834; Eliza, born February 22, 1790, and died August 3, 1790. The children of the Rev. William W. Farthing were: Dudley, born Novem- ber 29, 1804, married Nancy Mast in 1831; he died July 8, 1895, and she September 22, 1882; Patsy, born December 4, 1805, married Thomas Shearer, an uncle of Robert Shearer ; they moved to Kansas between 1850 and 1855; Nancy was born February 21, 1807, married Joseph Brown and went to Mis- souri; Reuben P., born June 28, 1808, married Sallie Brown, and died December 20, 1889; John Atkins, born July 21, 1809, married, first, Melissa Curtis, and, second, Keziah Farthing ; William Brown, born December 20, 1810, and married Annie Kindle; Edward F., born April 30, 1812, and died May 3, 1812; Thomas, born May 9, 1813, married Ermine Hallyburton ; Annie Watkins, born September 5, 1814, married Wm. Young Farth- ing, father of W. S. Farthing; Harriet, born March 22, 1816, married James Brown, and died May 16, 1897; Mary Hervey, born February 21, 1818, married Hiram McBride, died May 26,
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1869; Abner Clopton, born October 6, 1819, and married Mary Narcissus Farthing; Paul, born April 17, 1821, married Rachel Farthing; he died in a Federal prison at Camp Chase in 1865; Stephen, born January 3, 1823, married Margaret Adams, and died January 25, 1882. Dudley Farthing's wife was Nancy, daughter of John Mast and Susan Harman, and she was born May 18, 1809. Their children were: William Judson, born February 6, 1832, and went to Texas in 1859, where he died unmarried September 10, 1865; Susan, born July 12, 1833, and is yet alive; James Martin, born July 25, 1835, and was killed December 13, 1862, in the battle of Fredericksburg, Va .; Mary White, born January 9, 1837, married Newton Moore in 1860 and died May II, 1914, in Virginia; Thomas Jefferson, born August, 13, 1838, never married, died of pneumonia at Lynch- burg May 21, 1862; John Young, born May 17, 1840, married Polly Farthing; Henry Harrison, born October 7, 1841, mar- ried Sarah Catharine Baker November 29, 1872; Martha B., born August 24, 1843, died in infancy ; Joseph, born August 9, 1844, died in infancy; Lewis Williams, born November 6, 1845, married Nancy McBride, daughter of Hiram; Sarah Carolina, born January 31, 1849, married Warren Greene, first, and then Anderson Cable; Wiley Hill, born March 23, 1850, married Rachel Louisa Farthing, sister of W. S. Farthing, and lives near Blountville, Tenn .; Nancy Emeline, born January 6, 1852, and never married. John Farthing was a brother of Rev. William Watkins Farthing and a son of Dudley the first. He was born in Durham, then in Orange County, July 29, 1812, and in the fall of 1826 came with his brother, W. W., to Beaver Dams, but he lost his wife there and also his brother, W. W. John's first wife was Miss Lucy Goss, and he returned to Durham and married Polly Amos and came back to Watauga in 1831 and settled where Zionville now is, where he owned most of the land. The children by his first wife were: William Young, who mar- ried Ann W. Farthing; Dudley, who married Sarah Wilson ; Sherman, who was killed by a tree near Zionville just before 1840, thus preventing his expected marriage; Nancy, who mar- ried Wm. Ferrall; Rachel W., who married Paul Farthing, a
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son of Wm. F. Farthing; Mary Narcissus, who married Abner C. Farthing, a son of Wm. W. Farthing; Keziah, who married John A. Farthing, who lived where W. S. Farthing now lives; Lucy White, who never married; Anne, who married Caswell King in Wake County, was an infant when her mother died in Watauga, and was taken back by her father, John Farthing, and reared by Keziah Cozart in Wake County. In her old age she came again to Watauga, where she died.
The children by the second marriage were: Reuben, who married Ellen Wilson, first, and then a Miss Harman; Elijah, who married Amanda Oliver; John, who died when nineteen years of age; Sallie, who married John Adams.
John Farthing's father was Dudley Farthing, who died in Wake, his wife having been Annie Watkins, whom he married February 2, 1778. The first Dudley Farthing had, beside Wil- liam Watkins and John, the following children: Reuben, who married a Miss Hargus, his descendants still living in and near Durham.
The Farthings came originally from Wales to Pittsylvania County, Virginia, from which they went to Person County, North Carolina, where Annie Watkins was reared. The Rev. William Watkins Farthing was a minister and traveled some for the old Missionary Society of North Carolina, which ante- dated the Baptist State Convention, and he was traveling and preaching when he first got acquainted with Watauga County. His sons, Reuben, John A., Abner C. and Stephen J., were ministers, the two youngest having been ordained under author- ity of Bethel and the two elder under that of Cove Creek churches. Rev. J. Harrison Farthing, son of Abner C., is a minister, as are also Calvin S., son of Thomas; Robert Milton, a son of Calvin S., and he preaches in Tennessee, and Rev. L. Whitfield also preaches.
Dudley Farthing was a son of Rev. W. W. Farthing; mar- ried Nancy Mast, a daughter of John Mast, who lived where Finley Mast now lives. He had been a member of the Ashe County court prior to the establishment of Watauga County, having been appointed in 1832 to fill out the term of Abram
DUDLEY FARTHING. Judge of the Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions.
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Vanderpool, and from that time till the Constitution was changed in 1868 he was chairman of the Watauga Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions. He presided with great dignity and adminis- tered his office with sound judgment and ability. No superior court judge who ever came to Watauga County presided over his court with more justness, impartiality or legal learning than Dudley Farthing. He was elected county commissioner after 1868 and became chairman of the board. According to the recollection of his son, Col. Henry H. Farthing, there was reason to suspect that $1,000.00 of the county funds was missing, and Judge Farthing declared that at the next meeting that matter would be investigated. The court house was burned before that meeting and with it all the records except Deed Book F. He was born November 4, 1804, and died July 8, 1895. He was just twenty-two years old when he moved with his father to Watauga County. It is said that when corn was scarce he would not sell it for money, saying that a man with money could get it anywhere, but a man who had no money could get it only where he was known and his needs obvious. He lost little if anything by thus crediting his neighbors in distress. Dudley Farthing lived where Mrs. Susan Farthing lives now, in a frame house built about 1850, three-quarters of a mile southwest from Bethel Church. He and his wife are buried there, Stephen Farthing having inherited the W. W. Farthing home place and objected to additional interments in graveyard above the old home place. There is a graveyard which W. S. Farthing and others have used for burial of their relatives east from the old Farthing graveyard.
Rev. L. Whitfield Farthing was a son of Reuben Pickett and grandson of W. W. Farthing. R. P. Farthing married Sarah Brown, a sister of Thomas Brown, below Three Forks in 1831. Their children were: Thomas Brown, who was born in 1833 and married Celia Greene; William Watkins, who was killed at Brandy Station, Va., in the Civil War; James Hervey, who was born about 1836 and married Lucretia Farthing, but moved West, where they died; L. W., who was born April 18, 1838, and married Nancy Farthing in October, 1866; Joseph
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Elmore, who was born April 18, 1840, and married Mary Har- man; Mary, born in 1842, but never married; Jesse, born in 1844, but died when twenty or twenty-one years of age; John Watts, who was born February 15, 1848, and married Adeline Rivers in 1876.
Rev. Reuben P. Farthing was the son of Rev. William Wat- kins Farthing and his wife, Phoebe. He was born June 28, 1808; married Sallie Brown, and died December 20, 1889. He was early admitted to the ministry of the Baptist Church and preached for nearly all his adult years, literally "without money and without price." He was one of the foremost educators of his day, and did much for the advancement of the religious and educational status of the people of Watauga County. He an- swered every call from all who needed his aid and assistance. His life was one of devotion to duty. When he died the late Major Harvey Bingham paid a tribute to his worth and excel- lence of which any man might well have been proud. This was published in one of our newspapers and is preserved by the family as a sacred memorial of a great and good man, for in it was said that, while not a college graduate, Reuben Farthing was nevertheless a highly educated and very learned man, hav- ing unaided and alone dug out from the classics and from scien- tific books a store of knowledge that was not only abundant, but practical. A distinguished visitor to his home was struck by his erudition, and was surprised to learn that he had acquired it all by dint of hard work and unremitting study.
Franklin Family .- Levi Franklin was the father of Lawson A., and resided at what is now Altamont on Linville River when that was a part of Watauga County. His sister married Leroy McCanless, who is now a resident of Florence, Colorado, and a brother of D. Colvard McCanless. Rev. William Colvard Franklin, of Altamont, bears part of his name, and is now about sixty years of age.
Gragg Family .- William Gragg was of Irish descent and set- tled, first, in West Virginia, from which he came with his wife, born Elizabeth Pulliam, to John's River, Caldwell County, soon after the Revolutionary War, in which he had been a soldier
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A History of Watauga County
under Washington, having fought from the first to the last battle of the war. Their children were: John, born September 7, 1781, in Virginia; William, Obediah, Robert, James, Benja- min, Susan and Elizabeth. Of these, John married, first, Eliza- beth Majors, and, second, Susannah Barrier. The children by the first marriage were: Tilmon, John, Tipton, Major, Elisha, Nelson and Hamilton. Those by the second marriage were Harvey, Empsey, Alexander and William Waightstill. There was one daughter by the first marriage, Nicie, and six by the second, Irene, Elvira, Margaret, Eliza and twins, Adeline and Carolina.
William married Celia Boone, a grandniece of Daniel; Obe- diah married Elizabeth Webb; Robert married Rhoda Hum- phrey; James married Nancy Humphrey; Benjamin married Nancy Dyer; Susan married Isaac Green; Elizabeth married Alfred Pritchett.
Tilmon married, first, Hila Layell, and, second, Jane McNeely ; John married a Miss Morris in Georgia; Tipton married Rachel Greene; Major married Celia Wilson, first, and Polly Ollis, second; Elisha married Selina Piercey; Nelson married Violet Greene; Hamilton married, first, a Cobb, then a House, and, third, Martha Strickland, and Harvey married Melinda Mc- Leard. Empsey married Serena Ford, first, and then Susan Barrier; Alexander married Carolina Munday; William W. married Martha McGhinnis, first, and, second, a lady in the State of Washington.
Nicie married James Calloway; Irene married Samuel Bar- rier : Elvira married Wiley Holtsclaw; Adeline married W. W. Pressly; Carolina married Madison Gragg; Margaret married Archibald Qualls; Eliza died young and unmarried.
Greene Family .- From "The Greene Family of Watauga," by Rev. G. W. Greene, we learn that the first Greene to come to America came from Wiltshire, England, to Massachusetts about 1635. His name was John, but he was a Quaker and soon joined Roger Williams in Rhode Island, and from him in the fifth generation sprang Gen. Nathaniel Greene, of the Revolution. Early in the eighteenth century one branch of this family went
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to New York State and settled near Brooklyn, but soon passed on to New Jersey, where many of its members became promi- nent. But about the middle of the eighteenth century Jeremiah Greene came to North Carolina with the Jersey settlers and bought 541 acres of land on the waters of Pee Dee, near Lin- wood. This was about 1762. Jeremiah's son, Isaac, and him- self remained in the Jersey settlement, but "Stephen Greene, who was probably a younger son of Jeremiah Greene, in 1784 settled in the Forks of the Yadkin, and has left in Davie County a large and honorable progeny." Soon after the Revolution three sons and two daughters of Jeremiah Greene left the Jersey Settle- ment and moved to what is now Watauga, then a part of Wilkes. These brothers were Richard, Jeremiah and John, all then mar- ried, as were their sisters, Joanna, to Landrine Eggers, and Sarah, to a man named Wilson. Richard, the eldest, settled at Blowing Rock and was accompanied by his father-in-law, an old man named Sullivan. He brought a tombstone with him and died February 27, 1794. His coffin was hewed out of a poplar tree when the wood was frozen hard. The stone still stands in the graveyard of the German Reformed Church, one mile from Blowing Rock. This is the inscription :
E. E. S 1794.
It will be noticed that the S is upside down. But, according to Mr. Greene's sketch, the inscription is :
F 27 1794.
If he is right, then F probably stands for February and 27 for the day of that month on which he died.
The brothers, Jeremiah and John, settled in the middle or the eastern part of the county, while the sisters, Mr. Greene thinks, probably lived nearer the borders of Tennessee, which is true of the one who married Landrine Eggers, at least, and possibly of the other also, according to the Wilson she married. Richard Greene's children were eight in number, the first five of whom had twelve each, two others had ten each, while one had to be contented with seven. Jeremiah Greene, whose wife was Polly Wiseman, an aunt of J. W. Wiseman, of Farmington, had
HON. L. L. GREENE. Judge of the Superior Court.
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eleven children, his oldest son, Isaac, living to be seventy-nine years old. At his death he counted eleven children, 102 grand- children and 100 great-grandchildren. Isaac's son, Solomon, lived to be quite old, eighty-five, and had twenty-one children, 160 grandchildren and 160 great-grandchildren, and two or three of the fifth generation. This was in 1886, and he lived two or three years longer. His eldest sister, Mrs. Elizabeth Norris, was then ninety-two years old. John "Moccasin" Greene with part of his family moved to Mitchell, then a part of Burke, while his brother moved to Rutherford. John "Moccasin" died in Madison County in 1852 when more than ninety years old. The most noted member of the family was Judge L. L. Greene, of the Superior Court, of whom a sketch is given below:
Judge Leonidas L. Greene .- He was born in Watauga County, at Blowing Rock, on the 11th day of November, 1845, and was elected judge of the Superior Court in 1896 and served till his death in 1898. He was a son of Robert Greene and his wife, Chaney Elrod. He was a consummate politician and man- aged party affairs adroitly. On March 1, 1876, he married Martha Horton, a daughter of Col. Jack Horton, who survives hin1. Judge Greene's portrait hangs over the judge's desk in the county court house in Boone. He left two children, Albina, who married Frank Mandefield, of Duluth, and Wilhelmetta, unmarried. Judge Greene was also United States commissioner. He was considered a good lawyer and enjoyed a large practice. He was a good neighbor and well liked.
Greer Family .- Benjamin Greer was a soldier of the Revo- lution. His wife was a Miss Wilcox, and their children were: John, who married Nancy Owen; William, who married Hannah Cartright and died when 103 years of age; Jesse, who married Mary Morris; Thomas, who married a Ketron; James, who married a Hampton; David, who married Nancy Hodges; Samuel, who married Sallie Church; Joshua, who married Jennie Church; Rachel, who married Robert Judd and moved to Ken- tucky; Ann, who married Thomas Holman and went West.
Benjamin Greer married a second time, after the death of his first wife, Mrs. Sallie Atkinson Jones, widow of Thomas Jones,
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who died from a wound received in the Revolution. She reared children by both husbands. They moved to Green River, Ky., where he died in 1810. Samuel Greer has three children living here: Elizabeth Hendrix, now ninety-four years of age; Finley Greer, ninety-two years of age; Riley Greer, ninety years old.
Mary Ray Greer was born September 22, 1813, and died March 26, 1906, at the Critcher hotel. Her grave is in the ceme- tery at Boone. She was the daughter of William Ray, of Elk Creek, above Todd, and the wife of Thomas Greer. Her daughter, Jennie, married J. L. Phillips, while Evelyn became the wife of George Grubb; Martha the wife of Julius Elliott, of Rowan, and Millie the wife of Thos. J. Coffey. Her son, Larkin, was killed in the Civil War. The latter was about to marry Sarah Ferguson, of Meat Camp, when he was at home once during the Civil War on furlough, and was on the way to the magistrate's to be married when they were met by her sister, Martha Ann, who faced them about and prevented the marriage. Sarah afterwards married Zachariah Moretz. Martha Ann never married.
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