Transcribed by Kathleen
Hastings Whitlock
November 8, 1951
Following
is a copy of a letter written by the editor to his firend, Dr. M. M. McDonald,
of Cookeville. For the information that
the letter contains, we are publishing it for the benefit of our hundreds and
hundreds of relatives. It is suggested
that the article be clipped and filed away for future reference. Editor.
November 5, 1951
Mr. M. M. McDonald,
Cookeville, Tenn.
Dear Friend:
Your
letter of Nov. 3rd, has come to hand and has been read with
interest. I have some information on
your line of Gregory relatives. Your
grandmother was a Miss Gregory, the daughter of Dobb Gregory, who was killed by
Cal Beasley during the Civil War. Dobb
Gregory was the son of Squire William H. Gregory, a Revolutionary soldier, who
arrived in Smith County in 1791, the first of the family to come to the
county. He settled in the William Nixon
Hollow, about four miles south of Pleasant Shade. Squire Bill, as he was called, was a very fine man, and was the
first man buried on Peyton’s Creek in a store-bought suit of clothing. This was in 1852, and he is buried near the
old home place in the Nixon Hollow. His
grave, so far as I have been able to learn, is unmarked; but it is in the back
side of the little bottom on which sat the old two-story house that stood after
your father, Presley McDonald, was born.
I remember
the old clock quite well and recall that it had been in the family for many
years. If it was the property once of
his great-great-great-grandfather, it was once owned by Squire Bill’s father,
Thomas Gregory, whose will is on file at Carthage. It was made in 1817 or 1818, and was probated in 1827. Thomas Gregory had the following sons and
daughters; Harden Gregory, Squire Bill Abraham Gregory, Old Bry, a daughter, who married a Douglas,
a daughter who married Isaac George, and one son, Thomas Gregory, who died
before his father. This son, Thomas
Gregory, was the father of Mrs. Richard Brown, Mrs. Bazerl Birch, A. J.
Gregory, Gabriel Gregory and Big Tom Gregory.
Big Tom was my own great-grandfather on my father’s mother’s side of the
house.
Squire
Bill’s father, Thomas Gregory, was one of the wealthiest men in Smith County at
the time of his death which took place somewhere before Feb. 22, 1827 when the
estate was finally settled. He left an
estate worth more than $10, 000 cash at that time. He would have been worth today at least $125, 000.
I have not
had time to look up Jimmie and Johnnie Gregory, brothers of your father’s
mother, but I have them and the rest of the number somewhere in my old records. There was a daughter who married a Matherson
and I believe one or two other daughters, whose names I cannot now recall
without looking into the records which are scattered through my books and
papers and which I have not time at present to look up.
The old
Thomas Gregory who died before 1827, had one brother that I know of, John
Gregory, who died in North Carolina, but his widow and Children moved to Smith
County more than 150 years ago. John
had a son,Jeremiah Gregory, who had a son,
Major Gregory, who had a son, Stephen Calvin Gegory,* who had a son,
Thomas Morgan Gregory (Dopher) who had a son, Calvin Gregory, the writer of
this letter. But my grandfather married
his third cousin, Sina Gregory, daughter of Big Tom Gregory, the son of Thomas
Gregory, the brother of John Gregory.
You and I are fourth cousins. I
am slso connected with yur line in another way. My grandmother, Sina Gregory’s mother, was Bettie Gregory,
daughter of old Bry, the brother of Squire Bill, your ancestor. You see the Gregorys sometimes married
kinfolks, which give the writer connection with three lines of the same family.
*Note: It is
evident here he meant Stephen Calvin Gregory instead of Gegory.
The
Gregorys came to Smith County, or rather what is now Smith County, beginning in
the autumn of 1791. They came from the
Hillsboro District of Chatham County, North Carolina, which county is not far
from Raleigh, the capital. They came to
North Carolina from Virginia, and the first Gregory to reach Virginia was
Richard Gregory, who arrived at Jamestown in 1620. I have the name of the ship on which he crossed the Atlantic
somewhere among my papers. The family
came to American shores largely from North Ireland. They originated in Scotland on the shores of Loch Lomond in the
ninth century. The founder of the
family was Gregorious the Third, son of Alpine, king of Scotland from the year
832 till 836. But we are quite sure
that all the royal blood in our veins has long since “run our” and that we are
just ordinary and common folks. We have
had some great men among us, and a lot of others who did not qualify in any way
for greatness. Perhaps you may no know
it, but there is no family that does not or has not had some “black sheep” in
it. We are related to the old Scotch freebooter,
Rob Roy, who lived and perhaps plundered in Scotland hundreds of years
ago. Some of our folks got off on the
wrong foot in various other ways, there being one or two horse thieves of whom
we have “slight knowledge”.
But on the
other hand, the Gregorys have been devoted to the land that they have called
their own, have generally lived among the hills, first of Scotland, later of
Virginia and North Carolina, and still later of Tennessee and Indiana. They have been patriotic and home-loving
citizens; and, in general, have been about as the average family that traces
its ancestry back for a thousand years or more. No man can trace any family back that far and not find any “dead
limbs” on the family tree.
None of
the above is meant to “throw off” on any ancestor, nor do we mean to boast
about the Gregory family. We do not
feel superior in any way to any family that wants to do right and tries to keep
the fires of patriotism, love of country, love of God and love of the right
burning on their altars. The writer is
glad to know something of his line of descent and wishes he knew more. He regrets the exceedingly little knowledge
that practically all the members of the family have of their past history.
Friend
McDonald, if there is anything else that I can tell you about the Gregory
family, please write me and shall try to “dig it up.”
With best
wishes, I am,
Your
friend and brother,
Calvin
Gregory