GENEALOGICAL ABSTRACTS FROM REPORTED DEATHS,
THE NASHVILLE CHRISTIAN ADVOCATE, 1894-1896
By Jonathan Kennon Thompson Smith
Copyright, Jonathan K. T. Smith, 2002(Page 78)
ADDENDA ITEMS
Refer to John W. Chappell, page 47
CHAPTER XV
THE ROBERT CHAPPEL BRANCH - Continued
DICKIE CHAPPELL, OF KENTUCKY.-THE WADES.-THE COMPTONS OF GEORGIAp. 281
DICKIE CHAPPELL OF KENTUCKYIn 1801 there removed from Halifax County, Virginia, to Kentucky, a colony, among the members of which were the Torians, McCartys, and Terrys, among whom were the Torians, McCartys, and Terrys., and accompanying them was a young man named Dickie Chappell. Kentucky was a sparsely settled country then and the section to which this colony went was uninhabited, except by a few of the very early pioneers. They located in the western part of Christian County, which was afterward cut off and organized into Trigg, and there founded the little town of Cadiz, where many of their descendants yet live.
Dickie Chappell was the eldest child of John and Sarah (Dickie) Chappell, and was born in Halifax County, Virginia. March 28, 1782. On June 22, 1810, he married Susan McCarty, whose father was one of the colony which had come from Virginia. She was born in Halifax County, August 15, 1794, and died at Chappell Hill. Tex., August 10, 1855. On arriving in Kentucky, Dickie Chappell taught school for a while, but soon, by industry and economy, accumulating sufficient means to buy a fine tract of 800 acres of land near where the village of Gracie is now located, which he improved for a home. In 1853, some of his children having removed to Washington County, Texas, he concluded to follow them and sold his
_________*[See list of vestrymen of Antrim Parish, Halifax County. Virginia, in the sketch of the Wade family, in the latter part of this chapter.]
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plantation and removed, with his wife and negroes, to that State, and settled near Chappell Hill.* After the death or his wife, he divided the most of his estate among his children, and for the last fifteen years of his life made his home with his son Edward. It was said to have been his daily practice, during his later years, to spend several hours in reading the Bible and other religious works, for he was a devout Christian, and a member of the Methodist Church.**The life of Dickie Chappell was in some respects remarkable, and deserves more than a passing notice. Born in Virginia, just at the close of the Revolution, he lived through eighteen years of the last century and seventy of this, and through the administration of every president from Washington to Grant: he witnessed the birth of a feeble nation and saw it grow and expand, until it became one of the mightiest in the world. He saw something of the devastation caused by the struggle for independence in 1776; heard the booming of the distant cannon in 1812; and lived to see his beloved Southland deluged in the blood of a civil war. On July 1, 1870, at the extreme age of eighty-eight, his soul took its flight, and he passed away without disease or pain, as a little child falling to sleep. It was fitting that one who had thus lived through such varied scenes of strife and conflict should pass away in quiet peace. His life was blameless, and no shadow rests on his memory.
____________*Chappell Hill was founded about 1840 by Robert Wooding Chappell, son of James, who was the uncle of Dickie Chappell. It was named for him, and is in Washington County, (See Chapter XII.)
**I have in my possession a letter written in Halifax County, Virginia, January 4, 1835, by my father (John Chappell, of Missouri) to his brother and sister Jordan and Susannah Compton, of Georgia, in which he refers to a visit he had recently made to his brother Dickie, while on his first trip to Missouri, a journey which he made on horseback, in company with his friend Edward Bruce of Halifax County, and which required three months of constant travel. He says: "I returned from Missouri by brother Dickie's in Kentucky. He has five or six children, owns a splendid plantation, makes large crops every year, and is, perhaps, as happy a man as can be round in a thousand." Again he says, in another letter, written in 1855 "Brother Dickie has lately moved to Texas, He is, as you know, a very old man, and was so well fixed in Kentucky that I think he made a mistake In moving, He moved, I think, to be with his children."
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4. John Wesley Chappell was born March 19, 1824, married Sarah E. Jefferson, May 21, 1845, and died at Cadiz, Ky., June 13, 1895. He never left the county in which he was born, and was, for half a century, engaged in merchandising and banking, by which he accumulated a fortune. He was upright and honest, in all of his dealings and throughout his long life maintained a character unblemished. Physically, he was of marked personality. Over six feet tall, as straightp.284
as an Indian, he was an unusually handsome man, and his strong face, bright black eye, and clean-cut features gave evidence of his energy, determination, and great firmness of character. There were born to John W. and Sarah E. Chappell the following children:I. Emma F., b. January 31, 1848. m. R. W. Majors, who died in 1892, Issue: Charles Dickie, Elizabeth McCarty, Robert Wade, John Wesley, and Winnie Davis. Robert died in 1898.
II. Thomas Dickie, b. October 6, 1850, d. July 10, 1876. unmarried.
III. Martha S., b. January 21, 1853, m. Captain John C. Dabney, d, January 25, 1886. Issue: Ethel, m. Dr. Blane; Albert, Florence, and Mattie.
IV. John J., b. December 16, 1855, m. Ida Cooper. Issue: James and Sarah, of whom only the former survives. John J. Chappell is a tobacconist in Hopkinsville, Ky.
V. Mary Elizabeth, b. May 31, 1858. m. Jas. E. Gill, of Clarksville, Tenn. She died in 1897, leaving issue: Chappell, Mary, Sarah, James, and Nellie.
VI. Florence, b. September 21, 1861, m. N. C. Headley. Issue: One child, Edward. Mr. Headley is engaged in business in Cadiz.
VII. Edward McCarty Chappell. b. October 15, 1864, d. August 10, 1890. Unmarried.
VIII. Charles A. Chappell, b. November 20, 1868, m. Mattie Wilson. Issue: Philip Edward Chappell, b. in 1896, and Frances Ragan, born May 8, 1898, now dead. The former was named for the compiler of this work. Charles A. Chappell is a member of the firm of Chappell & Torian, of Cadiz, Ky.
A GENEALOCICAL HISTORY 0F THE CHAPPELL, DICKIE AND OTHER KINDRED FAMILIES, by Phil E. Chappell, second printing, 1900.
A personal note. When the present compiler began genealogical research fifty years ago, this book was one of the first genealogies he examined, influencing his own approach to the manner of conveying family history. The copy he so avidly read was loaned to him by a Chappell descendant, Nannie Moore Bateman of McKenzie, Tennessee. The book has a charm all its own, what with its biographical sketches, descriptions of homeplaces and an emphasis on documentation. The pages dealing with John Wesley Chappell reproduced here were taken directly from a copy of the 1900 edition which entered the public domain many years ago. A Chappell descendant appended an account of her own branch of the family to the book and republished it some years ago, however the honor of preparing such a masterful genealogical study really belongs to PHIL E.CHAPPELL!
(Page 79)
Refer to page 44. D. R. McAnally
McAnally, David Rice, D.D., editor of the St. Louis Christian Advocate, was born in Granger Co., Tenn., Feb. 17, 1810. He entered the itinerant ministry in 1831, and preached in Tennessee, North Carolina, and Virginia. In 1843 he was elected president of the East Tennessee Female Institute, at Knoxville, where he remained for eight years. In 1851 he was elected editor of the St. Louis Christian Advocate, in which position he has continued with a slight intermission until the present time. He has written several works: a biography of " Martha Lawrence Ramsay," "Life and Times of Mr. William Patton." "Sunday-School Manual," etc.
CYCLOPAEDIA OF METHODISM by Mathew Simpson, Philadelphia, 1880, pp 570-571
Refer to page 38. N. P. RamseyM
NATHANIEL P. RAMSEY
Nathaniel P. Ramsey was born in Gibson County, Tenn., December 22, 1833. He was the son of Jefferson and Francis Y. Ramsey. The family connection was large and influential, notably as Methodists, having furnished several traveling and local preachers, besides many true and loyal layworkers to our beloved Church.
The subject of this memoir was soundly converted in early life, being in his fifteenth year, and in the same year he became a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. Under a forcible conviction of a divine call to the work of the ministry, Brother Ramsey asked for and obtained license to preach, and was admitted on trial into the Memphis Annual Conference at Somerville Tenn., November 1854; was received into full connection and ordained deacon by Bishop Early, at Jackson, Tenn. in 1856, and ordained elder by Bishop Paine, at Trenton, Tenn., in 1858.
Brother Ramsey at once took a high place in the estimation of his brethren, as will be seen from his appointments about this time. In 1858 he was stationed at Hickman, Ky.; in 1859, at Trenton, Tenn.; in 1860-61, he traveled the Dyersburg Circuit, and in 1862, the Cageville Circuit.
On the 25th of October, 1859, he was married to Miss Callie McConnell, who died in a few years, leaving a son, Almy, who still survives. On the 26th of April, 1864, he was again married to Mrs. J. D. Waddy. This noble Christian woman was his helpmeet and co-laborer for twenty-six years, able and efficient in all church work, and beloved by all in the various communities in which their lot was cast. On the 1st of October, 1890, she sweetly fell asleep, leaving to share the grief of her husband three sons and three daughters. These still live to honor the name and memory of their beloved father.
During this period Brother Ramsey served some of our best circuits, was eight years presiding elder, on the Paducah and Union City Districts, and spent three years in the Humboldt Station, and four years in the Paris Station.
On December 6, 1893, Brother Ramsey was again married to Miss Mattie H. Waddy. This was an eminently suitable marriage, Miss Waddy being in every way qualified to make his home happy, and to aid him in the work of the Church. She survives him, and has our tenderest sympathy in her great bereavement.
In 1894, Brother Ramsey was stationed in Clinton, Ky. During the year his health became precarious, and finally failed altogether, and those who remember his appearance at our session last year, at Humboldt, know how fearful were the ravages of disease upon his frame. Still he was hopeful. He thought he was getting well, and that he would he able to do the full work of a traveling preacher. The noble brethren of Clinton Station, who loved and honored him almost above all men, asked that he be returned to that charge, and so it was. He was read out, for the last time, to Clinton.
He returned to his work elated with hope, and with the declaration that he expected to do the best work of his life. But, alas! his first effort to preach after his return was disastrous. He gave down completely, and never afterward rallied to any appreciable extent. Then, for the first time, he fully realized his condition, and at the first Quarterly Meeting, December 17, 1894, he surrendered his charge to his presiding elder.
This was an occasion never to he forgotten by those who were present. The Conference was held in his chamber. Propped up in his bed, the pastor read his reports, and answered the questions propounded by the president. At the last, in a few well chosen words, he calmly gave up the work committed to him, and asked, for the sake of the Church, that an efficient man he found to take his place. Turning then to his brethren, he told them of his love for them and those whom they represented, and thanked them for their kindness to himself. Prof. J. C. Dean replied. In a voice husky with emotion, he spoke of the love of the Church for Brother Ramsey as a man and as a pastor, and of their sympathy for him in his affliction, and their deep regret that the relation between them was severed. Then all bowed in prayer. The peace of God descended, and all hearts felt the presence of the Lord.
Removed from the parsonage to the home of his son-in-law, Brother W. C. Porter, Brother Ramsey lingered with his loved ones for awhile, sometimes hopeful, always resigned, exhibiting the graces of a perfected Christian character, and receiving the tenderest care from wife and children and friends, until, on March 12, 1895, his freed spirit went home to God. His mortal remains were taken to Humboldt, Tenn., and there interred, the services being conducted by Doctor W. T. Harris and other brethren who loved him well.
He was a true minister of the gospel. His service was effective service, because he trusted in God. There was a native modesty in the man which was beautified by his self-effacement as a preacher. He "hid behind the Cross," not only in the pulpit, but in all his ministrations to the people, in their homes, on the streets, and even in the exercise of discipline, so that he was always recognized as the messenger of his Lord and Master. He did all the work of a traveling preacher, in whatever place the Church assigned him. Hence he filled any place, and was acceptable anywhere. He was attentive to details, had no slipshod methods. All his work was well and promptly done. He rests from his labors, and his works do follow him.
We mourn his death. We rejoice that he lives, and lives forever!
WARNER MOORE
1895 Minutes of the Memphis [Methodist] Conference, pages 57-58.
Refer to page 33. L. C. Garland
Garland, Landon Cabell, A.M., LL.D., an educator in the M. E. Church South, was born at Lovingston, Va., March 21,1810, and educated at Hampden Sidney College. From 1830 to 1833 he was Professor of Chemistry in Washington College, Va.; held the same chair for two years in Randolph Macon College, and became its president in 1835. He continued at the head of this college until 1846. The following year he accepted a professorship in the University of Alabama, and in 1855 became its president. After 1866 he was Professor of Physics and Astronomy in the University of Mississippi, and is now Professor of Physics in the Vanderbilt University, in Nashville. He has been for many years a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church South, and was selected by the General Conference of 1874 as fraternal delegate to the General Conference of the M. E. Church in Baltimore. He has written for various periodicals, and also a work on "Plane and Spherical Trigonometry."
CYCLOPAEDIA OF METHODISM by Mathew Simpson, Philadelphia, 1880, page 389.
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Refer to page 52. N. R. Marr
NICHOLAS ROWAN MARR.
Nicholas Rowan Marr, son of N. L. and Sarah A. Marr, nee Perkins, was born June 25, 1850, in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. but brought up in Franklin, Tenn. He professed religion in boyhood, and joined the Presbyterian Church with his mother. Later in life he was impressed with the duty of preaching the gospel, but feeling that he could not conscientiously teach the doctrines of the Presbyterian Church, he united with the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, with whose doctrines, government, and usages he was fully satisfied.
In 1885 be joined the Memphis Conference, and in due time was received into full connection and ordained deacon and elder.
Brother Marr was married three times. First, to Miss Mattie Busby, of Texas; next, to Miss Alice Gillespie, of West Tennessee, and finally, to Miss Virginia Butler, of Decatur County, Tenn. She and five children are left to mourn his loss.
The life of our dear, departed brother was characterized by self-denial, self-sacrifice, moral courage and fidelity. He was faithful until death, and would have been faithful unto death. The crowning grace of his character was humility. In honor he preferred others to himself. He was "clothed with humility." Like his Lord, he was "meek and lowly in heart."
As a minister of grace to guilty men, Brother Marr "studied to show himself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed." Industrious, studious and well educated, he made rapid progress in the attainment of sacred and divine knowledge. He was a good theologian, well read in the history of the Christian Church, and especially in the history of Methodism. He preached the gospel in its purity, and with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. God gave him success in winning souls to Christ. At the fourth Quarterly Conference, on his last circuit, he reported seventy-one conversions during the quarter.
His zeal was a flaming fire that burned continually. I met him a few weeks before his death, and noticed that he was looking worn and weary. On inquiry I learned that, in addition to his other labors, he had just preached twenty-two sermons in eight days. As the sainted Summerfield once said, he was the "'slave" of Jesus and the "slave" of his people.
He fell at his post in Hollow Rock, Tenn., on Friday night, November 8, 1895. Thank God, he died in the faith and in the sweet hope of heaven. "Mark the perfect man, and behold the upright, for the end of that man is peace."
WELLBORN MOONEY
Minutes of the Memphis [Methodist] Conference, pages 61-62
Refer to page 10. John P. Taylor
Hon. John P. Taylor, attorney, farmer and surveyor of Clarkton, Mo., was born in Wilson County, Tenn., January 19, 1833, being the son of Joshua and Mary C. (Page) Taylor, natives, respectively, of Virginia and Tennessee. The father resided in Wilson County, Tenn., until his death, which occurred in December l833. John P. Taylor resided in Smith County, Tenn., until he was seventeen years of age and spent his days on a farm. In 1856 he located in Missouri. He read law while in Tennessee, and was admitted to the Obion County bar in 1855. After coming to Missouri, he farmed for a few years and also practiced his profession and was elected county surveyor in 1869 and served in that capacity for eight years. He was then elected prosecuting attorney and held that office for a period of six years. In the fall of 1882 he was elected to, represent Dunklin County in the State Legislature and served one term. He was first married in 1856 to Bettie E. Garrison, who died leaving two children. He married his second wife, Julia A. Jones, in Arkansas. She also died leaving two children. In 1875 Mr. Taylor married his present wife, Mattie J. Blakemore. They have three children: Ibbie, John B. and Katie L. The children by his first wife are Mary A. (Blakemore) and William Y., and those by his second are Lulu (Thomason) and Percy (Mrs. W. T. Brooks). In 1861 Mr. Taylor enlisted as first lieutenant in the State Guards and was promoted to captain. In the year 1863 he joined the Tenth Missouri Cavalry, and was in the battles of Fredericktown and Belmont. In December, 1863, he was taken prisoner in Dunklin County while sick, and held until the close of the war. He is a member of the Masonic and I.O.O.F. fraternities, and is a successful lawyer and farmer.
Goodspeed's HISTORY OF SOUTHEAST MISSOURI, 1888 [Dunklin County], page 1178.
Refer to page 23. Isaac C. Garretson
BIOGRAPHICAL DIRECTORY OF THE TENNESSEE GENERAL ASSEMBLY, volume 2 (1861-1901), edited by Robert M. McBride, page 328, carries a biographical sketch of Isaac C. Garretson, stating that he served in the 34th General Assembly [Confederate] of the State of Tennessee, 1861-1863, representing Grundy, Coffee and Van Buren counties; that he had been a merchant, a justice of the peace, chairman of the Grundy County quarterly court for ten years; a few family details [sketchy] and noting that he is buried in Wesley Chapel graveyard near Viola, Tennessee.
Refer to page 4. Mary C. Sevier
SEVIER FAMILY HISTORY by Ann B. Sevier and Nancy J. Madden, 1961, pages 277-279 covers the family group of Elbridge Gerry Sevier (born 1805), grandson of General John Sevier, a prominent early military and public citizen of Tennessee, and his wife, Mary Caroline Brown. On page 278 it is stated that Mary Caroline Brown "died about 1894 Roane County." The existence of this obituary in the NASHVILLE CHRISTIAN ADVOCATE will provide this elusive information. There is considerable information about Mary Caroline Brown Sevier’s father, Major Thomas Brown (1779-1848)and the names of the twelve children of E. G. and Mary C. Sevier are listed.
Refer to page 75. Rev. Boyd W. Fielder
GENEALOGICAL ABSTRACTS OF REVOLUTIONARY WAR PENSION FILES, by Virgil D. White, volume 2, 1991, page 1185 in which the grandfather of Reverend Field, DENNIS FIELDER is listed as Pension File S8476. Fielder served in the Virginia Line during the Revolution. He was born in Goochland County, Virginia, April 21, 1756; enlisted while living in Prince Edward County, Virginia; applied for a military pension in 1832 (successfully); died May 3, 1834.
Refer to page 67. Dr. T. H. Dinwiddie
HISTORY OF CARROLL COUNTY, volume 1, Carroll County Homecoming '86 Historical Book Committee, 1987, page 187 in which it is stated that Dr. Thomas Helm Dinwiddie's grandfather, Lt. James Dinwiddie (1755-1842) wrote in his family Bible that he had "Fought for liberty in Revolutionary War."
(Page 81)
Refer to pages 34-35. A. G. McDougal
Goodspeed's HISTORY OF TENNESSEE (Hardin County), 1887, pages 902-903:
Hon. ARCHIBALD G. McDOUGAL, attorney at law at Savannah, is a native of Cumberland County, N.C. and the son of Alex. and Eleanor (Garrick) McDougal, both of Scotch descent and connected with some of the leading families of Scotland, viz. :the Fergusons, the Garricks the Campbells and the McDougals, all noted clans in days of feudalism and all Highland Scots except the Garricks. The father of our subject was a farmer and blacksmith. He removed from North Carolina to Lauderdale County, Ala., in 1817, and remained there until December 24, 1833 when he removed to Lawrence County and here died in 1843. The mother died in 1854. To them were born a family of eight children, all of whom lived to maturity John, Daniel, Alex., Archibald G., Mary, Nancy, Eleanor and James F. Of these, Dr. James F., Mary (the eldest sister) and our subject are the only ones living. The latter was reared on a farm and received his education in the common schools and from several months training at an academy. He began reading law at home in 1837 and also clerked in a dry goods store. The following year he studied law under the guidance of Judge Valentine D. Barry of Hardeman County. Edwin Polk, Henry Barry and our subject were pupils at the same time. In 1839 and 1840 he practiced law in Hardeman County and in the latter year went to Waynesboro, Wayne County [Tennessee] and practiced in that and adjoining counties. In September 1845 he married Miss Elizabeth Ann East, daughter of Joseph East of Hardin County. She died May 31, 1855 leaving two children: Eleanor (Mrs. Judge E. D. Patterson) and Anna (Mrs. Henry E. Williams). The latter died several years since. Mr. McDougal has been a life-long Democrat and is a citizen of undoubtable worth and much influence in the State. In 1845 he presented Hardin, Wayne, McNairy and Hardeman counties in the State Senate and in 1852 he came to Savannah where he has since resided. In 1857-58 Mr. McDougal represented Hardin, McNairy and Hardeman counties in the State Senate. He was also prominently connected with the forming of the new constitution of 1858 [1870] and was a delegate to that convention.
McDougal's activites in the 1870 Constitutional Convention of Tennessee are given in the JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS OF CONVENTION OF DELEGATES (January 10, 1870), Nashville, 1870; he is listed as the delegate from Hardin County (page 5).
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