So, the genealogist that works in a society verifying the services of American patriots is descended from a Tory as well! There is a lot to wonder about this man, and his family, however, in why they moved to North Carolina, and thereafter, what happened to them? Their descendants are numerous today, but the man who moved his family to North Carolina has an ending that has never been solved. Or has it?
The story surrounding the life of Timothy Perkins, Sr., is certainly an interesting mix of accounts and lore, from his upbringing within an established founding family in Connecticut, to the migration his family made to the then dangerous frontiers of western North Carolina. The mystery of the accounts leave enough air in them that deciphering the truth from fiction becomes extremely difficult at times, while official records only provide occasional benefit of a doubt in varying circumstances. The truth known, today, we still do not know who Timothy Perkins really was, and what his motives were in his migrations or excursions. Was he loyal to the British cause, or was he seeking better opportunity? Many questions rise, and they unfortunately shroud the real mystery behind Perkins: when did he die?
Let us start to back track to what we know about Perkins before he relocated to the southern frontier. Perkins was likely a native of Wallingford, an established community north of New Haven, in Connecticut, though his baptism is recorded in the First Congregational Church records in New Haven. The Perkins family was a well-established name in the New Haven region by the mid-eighteenth century, having made their fortunes through land prospects and local politics. However, the political climate of New England was changing rapidly by the 1760s, first with the close of the French & Indian War that plagued Great Britain with debt, and leading to the rise of taxes in the American colonies, creating resentment towards the mother country. The rebelliousness of many factions of people within the colonies sometimes drove to extreme levels to take matters into their own hands. Some of these factions persecuted those they found to be loyal to the Crown. The restlessness of these parties created fear among parts of New England, among populations who either resented departing from the rule of Great Britain, or populations whose welfare was dependent upon the loyalty to the Crown.
There is reason to believe Timothy Perkins was a loyalist, himself. An unsubstantiated claim is that Timothy and a brother, possibly brothers of Timothy, were tax collectors in Connecticut. With growing resistance to rising taxes on common goods, a career as a tax collector was one of the most dangerous positions a colonist could live in such a hostile climate. Stronger evidence towards Perkins’ loyalist views lay in the will of his father-in-law, Abel Sperry, which was written on 29 January 1776. In it, he lists his daughters Merriam (Miriam) and Lois, as well as a son William, as having “made a remove to North Carolina contrary to my desire.” Leaving one’s home in Connecticut in those days was not an easy process, so there is reason to believe politics played a part in the migration of the Perkins and Sperry families.
The migration happened sometime between 1771 and 1773, southward to what is now Rowan and/or Surry County, North Carolina. The accounts of a Perkins descendant, Ms. Eleanor Baker Reeves, state that Perkins came to settle on a stretch of land where “there has never been any trees,” referred to as “Old Fields.” This stretch of land was located in Wilkes County, North Carolina, in an area where Gap Creek empties out into the South Fork of the New River. By genealogy, Wilkes County had formed in 1777 from Surry County, which had formed from Rowan County in 1770. Today, this area is located in southern Ashe County, near the community of Fleetwood, where present US Highway 221 crosses the New River.
According to Reeves, Perkins made a formal claim to this land ion Wilkes County on 7 April 1778 (it would not become Ashe County until 1799). This is probably land grant fifty-five in Wilkes County in the Gap Creek vicinity, if this claim is true. However, it is possible this grant is confused with the mouth of what is now Old Fields Creek, about a mile upstream from the mouth of Gap Creek, and on the north side of the South Fork of the New River. The transaction shows he “entered four hundred acres of land in Wilkes County on North side of New River beginning at a small branch at or near the upper end of lot. Is called the Coldfields [sic] on groping the said River at the mouth of branch thence East groping Deep Gap Creek thence North including the three improvements and the one whereon the Perkins now lives and the one where on the Royal Porter now lives and the one that the said Perkins Bought of Samuel McQueen for Complimentz.” This transaction, from the records of Wilkes County Court Records, was transcribed, word for word, by Ms. Reeves in the 1970s. What it shows is that Perkins made improvements to the land, which must be made in order to make a legal entry. This suggests Timothy had resided in the area for about two or three years. In either event, this land claim has been disputed with a land claim by Col. Cleveland, later a revolutionary raider in these western frontiers during the American Revolution.
The relationship between Cleveland and Perkins will be described later, but in 1781, a court record shows that Cleveland disputed the ownership of Perkins’ home at the Old Fields. This dispute, from the records of a Mr. Todd Perkins, claims that Cleveland owned a plantation in the same vicinity, of which Perkins later moved to. Later, Cleveland asked Perkins to watch some of his cattle after Perkins moved there, thusly making Timothy an employee of Robert’s. Whatever the circumstances of this story, Perkins lost the court case. This is a possible theory as to why the Perkins family later relocated closer to the Virginia border, as several lines of his descendants later settled in Grayson County, Virginia. Cleveland also put charges against Timothy’s brother, Joseph, who had also settled in the Old Fields area; Cleveland, however, lost this particular case.
Western North Carolina is well-documented for being an area of Tory and loyalist settlement during the years of the American Revolution. The political climate of New England was very tumultuous in the years leading up to 1770, while further south, personal sentiments against the Crown were not as strained or treacherous. This is the accepted hypothesis as to why the Perkins (and Sperry) families might have migrated southward. Generally, the frontier was quiet from activity during a majority of the time of the American Revolution. However, by 1780, the British army and naval fleet had advanced southward, capturing key ports of Wilmington, New Bern, Charleston, as well as inland communities such as present-day Charlotte.
By 1780, the patriotic cause had also spread through the southern colonies, with fervor spreading fast across the Carolina landscapes. Key battles at King’s Mountain and Charleston were important for the patriots. The Whig factions that once chased down Tories and loyalists across the New England countryside also caught up with those residing in the still newly-settled western lands of North and South Carolina. Undoubtedly, the revolution caught up to western North Carolina by 1780, and the Perkins were obliged to take up arms. This was especially true considering the lawlessness and rugged lifestyles of the civilian population: many communities banded together as Whig or Tory sympathizers, continually skirmishing and fighting with each other.
It is known that the Perkins brothers, Timothy and Joseph, had served, to some degree, in Tory service, but what action they fought in or with is still unknown. Both were absent from Tory service on April 14th and 15th in 1781, yet the whereabouts of the brothers on those dates do not discourage the role the Perkins family played in the capture of Colonel Cleveland at that time, apparently at or near the Perkins homestead in Old Fields. According to the accounts of Lyman C. Draper, who published the story Kings Mountain and Its Heroes in 1881, Cleveland was riding to visit his plantation on occasion with his servant, and arrived at the homestead of one of his tenants, Jesse Duncan, near Old Fields, on 14 April 1781, when he was apprehended by the band party of Tory leader and Captain William Riddle. Riddle, bound for the Ninety-Six District in South Carolina from Virginia, had learned of Cleveland’s presence through the Perkins women at the homestead, though it is unknown if Timothy or Joseph were present, nor involved.
According to the story, Riddle and his party strategized stealing Riddle’s horses at his camp in the middle of the night, to where Cleveland would search for them and be ambuscaded by Riddle. Joined by Cleveland at Jesse Duncan’s homestead were neighbors Richard Callaway and John Shirley. Upon discovering his horses were missing, Cleveland and Duncan immediately sought out with pistols, while Callaway and Shirley joined, unarmed. They reached the Perkins homestead, where Riddle’s party had sought for cover in a thicket above the property. The account mentions the Perkins women knew of Riddle’s strategy, and tried to impede the Colonel’s fate by engaging him in conversation. However, while the rest of Cleveland’s company marched on, Riddle’s men started shooting out from the bushes, with Cleveland in attendance of one of the Perkins household. Though many of the shots were “generally shot wild,” Callaway was shot and left for dead, after breaking his thigh, but Shirley and Duncan managed to escape. Cleveland, regionally nicknamed “Old Roundabout” for his hefty girth – he was reported to have weighed some three hundred-fifty pounds – surrendered to Riddle’s party, after trying to seek refuge in Timothy Perkins’ home.
Cleveland sought to impede capture by taking one of the women present in the household (the story mentions a woman named Abigail Walters), to avoid being shot at by the ferocious Zachariah Wells, the man who reportedly shot Richard Callaway. Riddle stated his intention of taking Cleveland to Ninety-Six, to make a profit off of his capture. Cleveland and his servant were mounted on horses and Riddle’s party swiftly embarked down the New River bed, trying to avoid pursuit by anyone else. They appeased themselves at the farm of the Cutbirth family upriver, but along the way, Cleveland was able to break branches and drop them in the river, leaving a trail that would guide his friends in pursuing Riddle’s party.
In the time frame of the account, it appears that almost two days later, at morning, when Cleveland was being blasted by Riddle’s men for slowing them down on their pursuit, a band of Whigs attacked from the woods, thusly freeing Cleveland of his capture. The Whig attack was led by men gathered up by Cleveland’s brother, Captain Robert Cleveland, and included men Samuel McQueen, Benjamin Greer, John Baker, and William Callaway, the latter two who served as spies. Callaway was brother to Richard, who was slain two days before. At this attack, in a twist of fate, it was William who murdered Zachariah Wells, the assassin of his brother Richard. However, the rest of Riddle’s men, including Riddle and his wife, were able to mount their horses and escape.
Riddle, not long afterwards, tried to surmount an attack in Yadkin Valley at the home of Cleveland’s noted soldiers, the Witherspoon brothers, on King’s Creek. When Riddle raided, one Witherspoon brother, David, hastened, by horse, to the home of Col. Benjamin Herndon, where a party was quickly formed to surprise attack the Tory camp. Witherspoon successfully raided the Tory camp, capturing three members, and either killing or dispersing the others. The three captives included Captain Riddle himself. Riddle and his captured associates were sentenced to death and hung on a tree on a hill just above present day Wilkesboro, North Carolina.
The account of the capture of Colonel Cleveland is an unusually well-documented case of revolution in the frontier lands. It does take into account the Perkins brothers were absent from Tory service in the local militia for those two days in April. However, their whereabouts are unknown. What it does point out is an interesting twist in the story in the role the Perkins women played in the raid: whether it be a Perkins wife or daughter, the fact the women tried to discourage Cleveland’s capture establishes a relationship the family had with Cleveland. It is unclear when Cleveland took Timothy Perkins to court in 1781, but as a respected official and plantation owner in the region, Cleveland obviously had some type of friendship with the Perkins family. Sparing his life shows an interesting case of politics in the Perkins family, where the women may have had mixed feelings about the loyalist leanings of the men in the household.
Though no record has established the service of Timothy or Joseph in around those two days in April, Murtie June Clark, author of Loyalists in the Southern Campaign in the Revolutionary War – Vol. 1 says the brothers possibly served as privates in Captain Benjamin Perkins’ Company of Colonel John Phillips’ Regiment of Jackson’ s Creek Militia from Camden District, South Carolina. This unit is known to have been a Loyalist gathering that served under Lord Rawdon in and around June through July 1781. Though no roster list implicitly lists them as belonging to that particular regiment, it is known that many Loyalist supporters of western North Carolina did take arms in South Carolina around that time. Clark also brings reason to believe the brothers may have served under Captain Joseph McDaniel in Captain Thomas Pearson’s Regiment of the Little River Militia, Ninety Six Brigade, for 34 days, sometime between May 6th and August 5th in 1782.
It is August 1782 when all contemporary sources stop mentioning the name Timothy Perkins. A few have gone on to say that Timothy was likely killed in a skirmish in Ashe County while fighting for the side of the Tories. The location of this skirmish is often noted to be near his home in Old Fields. For as documented as the major raids and battles are from the American Revolution, unfortunately, such skirmishes in the back country often went unrecorded. Whether this skirmish actually happened, and took the life of Timothy Perkins, has yet to be proven. However, the rest of the historical facts from this point on take account of various official records, diary accounts, and statements from descendants of the Perkins family. The validity of the latter two are, without reason, not proven and, therefore, add only to the speculation of what really happened. Will we ever know? It is very doubtful.
What will I attempt to prove? I have already established Perkins as a loyalist and Tory. Unsubstantiated the actual dates of militia service, we do know Timothy did take arms at some point, and likely fought in Tory service against Whigs and patriots. His brother, Joseph, and his brother-in-law, William Sperry, have also been proven as loyalists. We have no surviving legitimate document that specifically mentions the fate of Timothy Perkins. Did he die in a supposed skirmish in the vicinity of his home? Did he retreat to Virginia after that 1781 court case brought against him by Colonel Cleveland? A few other hypotheses will be brought up in a few, but the evidence that mounts from it seems to suggest that Perkins did die sometime around the time frame of late 1782 to early 1783. Let me start to cull through the evidence as to why.
The first strong lead in the case that Perkins died in the 1780s is a probate record from Wilkes County in 1783. This record, now in the State Archives in Raleigh, lists George Morris as being appointed guardian to Gebas Perkins, which undoubtedly is a corruption of Jabez Perkins. Jabez was the third son of Timothy and Miriam Perkins, born in 1764. He was approximately seventeen years old in 1783, thereby most likely was orphaned. However, the definition of an orphan in that time is very different from how it is today. When a son was orphaned in the eighteenth century, it implied that the father was deceased. Because households were patriarchal, this was stated regardless if the mother was still alive or not. By common accounts, the mother was appointed the guardian, unless she remarried, in which case the step father would be the legal guardian. However, it was always at the behest of the new legal guardian as to if the children would remain, and sometimes, independent guardians would be appointed instead.
Certainly, another case for appointing a guardian was to deal with the minor’s interest in inherited real estate of the father’s will and property. Although it is unknown whether the latter was a case for adoption most of the time, it would be highly suspicious to conclude there was a conflict of interest in the property of Timothy Perkins with his sons. I conclude this possible statement because the Perkins were well-known land acquirers, both in New England and in the south. The judicial process for such court rulings in adoption were also surely a hassle, therefore, it could be stated that Jabez was given a guardian because he was a minor without a father. The theory of property acquisition will be revisited shortly.
Jabez (as “Jabish Purkins”) was appointed administrator of his uncle William Sperry and his estate in 1788 in Wilkes County. By 1788, Jabez had been married, to a Nancy Ann Creekmore (the surname is still disputed by modern historians) and had established himself in Virginia. His appointment suggests a relationship that remained after his guardianship changed in 1783. It is known that Jabez was still a minor when he married Nancy. As it has been for centuries, the marriage of minors has always been left with the consent and permission of the parents before enacted. If the parent is not living, then the decision is made in loco parentis (by the legal guardian). What we do not know of is what role Morris played in Perkins’ life, and for how long, for it seems if Jabez and Nancy married as minors, they married the same year of the appointment (1783, or 1784).
If real estate was ever the issue for Jabez’s adoption, then the greed of the Perkins for land was surely enormous. We do know the children of Timothy Perkins owned about 5,000 acres in Grayson County, Virginia, and Ashe County, North Carolina, by 1818. Timothy’s brother, Joseph, owned 4,000 acres himself, in neighboring Watauga County. The patriarchs of the Perkins family in New Haven County, Connecticut, were well known for purchasing acreage, as well as swapping, dividing, and selling land parcels among neighbors and family members. The absence of Timothy’s name in land records after 1781 would suggest Timothy’s death, or mysterious disappearance.
Why are we assuming Timothy, then, might have lived past 1782? In 1976, a Perkins descendant, Dow Perkins, wrote an essay now filed in the Virginia Archives that explains Timothy lived to a great age, dying in 1834, and thusly taking his life to almost one hundred years old. Dow Perkins also had a file in the Wilkes County Library that said his “mostly illegible stone” in the Sturgill Cemetery in Ashe County, North Carolina, establishes his death year of 1834. There are some complications with these facts: there are two known Sturgill cemeteries in Ashe County, one along Helton Creek north of the town of Sturgills (which is now Zion Hill Cemetery), while the second is near the New River, two miles south of Mouth of Wilson, Virginia, in modern day Alleghany County (which split from Ashe County in 1859). The latter, dubbed “Old Sturgill Cemetery,” has, in recent years, a stone that has included the name of a possible second wife for Timothy, Ann Sturgill Perkins. Who is Ann?
Ann Sturgill, according to a few sources, was born in about 1794 or 1795, though it is not established if she was from Virginia or North Carolina. According to these same sources, Ann married Timothy around 1812, and had a daughter, Lydia, before Ann died in 1813. All we know about the daughter, Lydia, is that she may have married a man by the surname of Price. This story complicates what we know even further, as there are no records relating Ann to any of the Sturgill (sometimes spelled Stodghill) families in the region. One source, however, places her as the daughter of Francis and Rebecca Sturgill. The “death” in 1813 is believed to have been as a result of childbirth, while the name “Lydia” for a daughter honors an older sister (if she was the daughter of Francis), Lydia Sturgill Parsons. According to the research of Dow Perkins, the daughter was raised by a brother, Francis Sturgill, Jr., who had purchased 2,500 acres of land on Helton Creek in Ashe County, from William Perkins. Lack of any supporting evidence outside of these sources seems to indicate that this Timothy is not our Timothy (Sr.), but possibly his son or a grandson. Indeed, Dow Perkins did claim to find sources listing the Sturgills, and does claim that Timothy Perkins was buried alone in Sturgill Cemetery, but it conflicts with what we do know now, and what I will continue to uncover.
Dow Perkins also argued vehemently about Timothy’s death in 1834 through the diary of a geologist, Dr. Elisha Mitchell, who traveled through and surveyed western North Carolina in 1827 and 1828. In his diary accounts, for the entry of 11 July 1828, Dr. Mitchell stated there was a Timothy Perkins “living on Helton’s Creek with an army of maidens.” Mitchell’s accounts were published in James Sprunt Historical Monograph No. 6 for the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill in 1905, entitled Diary of a Geological Tour, including a footnote that this Perkins was “Ancestor of a number of Perkinses on Helton Creek. All wealthy.” The footnote was not original to the diary, and further arises doubt that this Perkins in the diary is really our Timothy Perkins.
The main argument against Mitchell’s accounts lie in the location of where Perkins is mentioned: Helton Creek. This location is some distance away from Old Fields, where Timothy Perkins is known to have homesteaded. We do not have any land records or transactions that mention Timothy not only owned land in the Helton Creek vicinity, but resided there. Though it is known Perkins owned a considerable amount of land in western and southern Ashe County, there are no records that he sold any of his holdings. Although it is doubtful, it is not impossible, that Perkins may have had land on Helton Creek. The diary does mention younger members of the family, including a Stephen Perkins; this account says Stephen’s grandfather came from Connecticut. The grandfather must be Timothy, as Timothy’s brother, Joseph, is not known to have a grandson named Stephen. However, it does not mention if those individuals are living. Although it cannot be disputed that Mitchell did not meet members of the Perkins family in Helton Creek, these individuals were likely sons and grandsons of Timothy, Sr.
However, it does not answer who Ann Sturgill Perkins was. Was she married to Timothy’s son, Timothy Perkins, Jr.? There is no evidence to suggest, as Timothy is positively known to have been married to Tabitha Anderson. Was this Timothy Perkins a grandson? He could possibly be a grandson of either Timothy or Joseph. Some clues might suggest he is Timothy Perkins, son of Jabez Perkins – third son of Timothy Perkins, Sr. This particular Timothy, by longstanding family traditions, married Mary Ann Sturgeon sometime around 1808 or 1809. As the spelling of names and surnames were frequently corrupted due to dialects, illegibility of written records, and inability to read or write due to the state of the education system in the frontiers at the time, it could be possible that “Sturgeon” could have been confused with “Sturgill,” or vice versa. However, it is believed that Timothy and Mary Ann were married in neighboring Grayson County, Virginia; no marriage record factually proves this union. We do know that Mary Ann was born around 1793 in Virginia, and the first child of this marriage was a daughter. However, records show the daughter’s name was Nancy, not Lydia. Furthermore, in about 1812 or 1813, this family relocated from the region, and settled in Whitley County, Kentucky. According to family records, Mary Ann lived until 1844, dying in either Illinois or Missouri. These theories, created by a few recent historians, are not without error and are highly speculative, but likely a strong clue as to who Ann Sturgill Perkins really was.
More mysterious is taking a look at Timothy’s wife, Miriam, in order to suggest a theory as to Timothy’s whereabouts. Details about Miriam are sketchier than that of Perkins; not uncommon for women in those days, considering census records and all legal transactions generally excluded the names of women, unless they were mentioned in a will and probate. Both Ms. Reeves and a Judge Paul M. Perkins, all historians of the Perkins family, seem to conclude that Miriam died at the birth of her last child in 1777; the basis of this account, however, is unknown. This conflicts with the birth of the couple’s (alleged) youngest child, William Perkins, who was born 1 January 1783, as recorded in William’s (or his son, Zachariah’s) family bible. Though no accounts seem to suggest Timothy Perkins was living at the time of William’s birth, it is still possible that William’s birth was posthumous. However, it is also possible William’s birth date in the family bible is also in error.
Strong evidence, however, seems to suggest Miriam remarried, as evidenced by the accounts of a Mr. David A. Sturgill of Alleghany County. It is believed the Miriam that married Daniel Jones by 1796, later settling in Grayson County, Virginia, is the same Miriam Sperry Perkins, and that she lived as late as 1817. Land and marriage records seem to explicitly support this theory: in Grayson County in 1796, the marriage record of Lucy Perkins and Joseph Young lists Lucy as the step-daughter of Daniel Jones. In 1795, an official list shows Daniel living on Fox Creek with a wife named Miriam; this land holding was partially sold in 1796-97, with the deeds signed by both Daniel and Miriam Jones. Daniel was also listed as a surety for the marriage of Catherine Mitchell and William Perkins in 1819 in Grayson County. A deed record from Grayson County shows that this Miriam Jones was living in 1817, while the marriage record for Frances Jones and William Porter in 1823 shows that Daniel Jones was still living. Further evidence tying the Perkins and Jones families together comes from a land deed in Grayson County in 1824. Here, a Hudson Jones and six female Jones, all probably sisters, sold land on Fox Creek to Stephen Perkins, possibly to settle an estate (though it does not state whose estate). This might conclude an administration or settling of the estate of Daniel Jones, leading us to believe he died in late 1823 or 1824, as well as believing Miriam had died before then.
From these land grants and settlements, family historians have seemed to link Daniel Jones as being father to Hudson Jones, while also connecting William Jones, who married Jane Sturgill, and Daniel and John Jones, both of whom relocated to Alleghany County. The latter two brothers married Long sisters (Ellender and Leah, respectively). However, we may seem to conclude that the William Perkins, who Daniel was a surety for in 1819, was actually a grandson of Timothy Perkins, being the son of Jared. Although it has not been proven for sure, the aforementioned evidence seems to surely suggest Miriam, wife of Timothy, had later remarried to Daniel Jones and removed to Grayson County.
What, then, became of Timothy Perkins? Dow Perkins and his cousin Don Perkins, as well as other historians, have thrown around the conclusion Timothy and Miriam divorced. The conclusion that the two divorced seems to support only the idea that Timothy did, in fact, live until 1834. However, this seems highly unlikely, given the common law and the customs that prevailed in the colonies at the time. For a family that originated in New England, divorce was simply not a custom of their upbringing. Also, divorce was an extremely uncommon but lengthy process in the legal process, as opposed to today’s standards. This would bring up, again, the change of guardianship for Jabez Perkins in 1783, as the laws of the time, which still were influenced by those in England, stated the rights of any married woman were subsumed under the rights of her husband. She would only regain those rights if she was widowed, also known as the “femme sole.” The rights, however, were again subsumed if the widow would remarry; this includes guardianship of any children she may have before the “majority of the child” (before the child reaches adulthood). This can explain why Jabez, an “orphan” in 1783, was granted guardianship to a George Morris.
The whereabouts of the other children of Timothy and Miriam are not as clear, as to suggest the fate of either individual. Twins Stephen and Gordon Perkins, both born 15 November 1773 in either Rowan or Surry County, North Carolina, were very likely living with relatives in Grayson County throughout the 1790s. Both of these brothers were surely established there by 1800, when Stephen was assessed personal property tax on a tithable and a horse. The eldest surviving son, Jared Perkins, was living in close proximity to his other brothers and his uncle Joseph Perkins, in Wythe and possibly Grayson County, Virginia, in the early 1790s. A “Jerard Pirkins” was assessed personal property tax on the tax lists of Wythe County in 1793, for one tithable, two horses, and no slaves. This Perkins lived in the section of Wythe County that was split to form Grayson County later that year. The earliest mention of fourth son, Aarad Perkins, is his appearance as “Erard Pirkins” in the same 1793 Personal Property Tax Lists for Wythe County, for one tithable, one horse, and no slaves. On 26 September 1796, a land patent was granted to him from the state of Virginia for 269 acres in Grayson County.
It is certain that the fifth son, Timothy Junior, was living with his uncle Joseph Perkins, for he appears with Joseph in the 1793 Personal Property Tax Lists for Wythe County, as well as the 1794 Personal Property Tax Lists for Grayson County. Moreover, it is certain the numerous land grants between 1799 and 1840 for Timothy Perkins are for this son, not the senior Timothy. This Timothy owned 945 acres of land in “Captain Weaver’s District” near Helton Creek, in the 1815 Land Tax List for Ashe County. Timothy sold 100 acres to John Burton of Guilford County, North Carolina, in 1806, while purchased 150 acres from Isaac Holbrook in 1811. Perkins patented an additional 28 acres along Little Helton Creek in Grayson County on 4 February 1815. In 1820, he and his wife, Tabitha, were enumerated in Ashe County, with eight younger individuals, five of them females. The basis for these accounts proves that this Timothy (Junior) was the extensive land owner of lower (northern) Ashe County and southern Grayson County, and very likely the Timothy that was visited by Dr. Elisha Mitchell in 1828. Though conflict exists as to verifying the relationship of the William and Stephen Perkins mentioned in Mitchell’s accounts, it seems highly likely that the Perkins with the “army of maidens” was the younger Timothy. Since this Timothy had elder children that had married by 1820, it is likely some of the household were hired labor, which was not uncommon for such a prosperous family.
Perkins descendants continue to claim they have the accounts that prove Timothy died in 1834, or that he was a casualty of a skirmish sometime in 1782. Since several of these accounts were published later in the nineteenth century, the validity of these sources is troubling and unproven. However, we can reasonably assume that the elder Timothy Perkins’ wife, Miriam, did remarry to Daniel Jones, and live until about the second decade of the nineteenth century. We may never prove what happened to Timothy Perkins, but the mystery of his perish still continues to bring debate across circles of researchers these days. For being the son of one of the largest established families in New England, the possible fact that he was a Tory and loyal to the British crown, and very likely involved in the arms against the patriotic cause, we can only continue to create a fuller picture of life on the frontier during the American Revolution. In the process, we try to recreate, by means of prosopography, the real story by trying to pinpoint the known skirmishes in western North Carolina, and the known land deeds that seem to erase Timothy’s name after 1782. The truth will forever be at the edge of the words we have through surviving records, but what it leaves us is a colorful, somewhat fictionalized (possibly) story of a patriarch that tried to survive his own cause, and ultimately may have become a victim of it.
What do I conclude? Timothy was killed in action, perhaps a skirmish, in the summer or early fall of 1782. Miriam remarried in the late 1780s or early 1790s to Daniel Jones, relocated to Grayson County, Virginia, sometime in the early 1790s, and died there before 1820. Perkins’ eldest sons were able to live on their own accords by 1782 or 1783, while the younger children were likely cared for by Miriam herself, or in the eye of Timothy’s brother, Joseph, for some time. It is already verified that Timothy’s son, Timothy, did grow up with his uncle. It is possible Miriam’s brother, William, may have had a part, too. Who was the Timothy that married Ann Sturgill Perkins? He was very likely an undocumented son or grandson of the elder Timothy.
The Ancestral Clark 