Major David Wilson

Submitted by Carolyn G. Smith
CarolySm@aol.com
© 1999

David Wilson moved to what is now Sumner county, Tennessee from Mecklenburg county, North Carolina in 1785. The move probably took place in late fall or early winter as the first record of his being a resident of middle Tennessee can be found in the Davidson County Court minutes in April 1786 when he was listed as a member of a jury.1 September 2, 1785 2 was the last date found for being a resident of Mecklenburg County. One deed made at a later date stated he was of Sumner County. 3
Many dates have been given for the date of his birth, but assuming he was 21 or older when he purchased 215 acres on January 27, 1767 would mean he was born sometime before January 27, 1746. 4
When and where he and his wife, Jane (Jean) 5 married is not known but it was before September 1, 1769 when they sold the 215 acres of land on Coddle Creek in Mecklenburg county.6 Both had earlier witnessed the sale of a mare in 1767 to William Irwyn but their relationship was not stated in that record.
During the years prior to moving to Tennessee, David was very active in North Carolina affairs, serving for six years, from 1778 thru 1784 in the General Assembly as a delegate or representative of Mecklenburg county.
One item in the Mecklenburg county court minutes gives a clue as to how busy he was during the Revolutionary War. In the July 1781 session the following is written "The Court finding by Respective complaints & informations that a Sufficiency of provisions etc, has not been furnished for the Troops etc. Occasioned by the Multiplicity of publick business Mr. David Wilson is necessarily engaged in. Therefore they are obliged & they do hereby nominate and appoint Adam Alexander, Commissioner, for the express purpose of Immediately procuring provisions etc. for the Army..." 7
Another David Wilson also lived in Mecklenburg county at the same time and he was probably the one who married Sarah McConnell, confusing many early researchers. This David remained in Mecklenburg county and died there in 1820. From the time Major David Wilson left Mecklenburg county in 1785 thru 1800, no mention was made of a David Wilson serving in the government in any capacity in Mecklenburg. 8
Soon after he arrived in middle Tennessee until his death in 1804, David Wilson was very active in the affairs of the government, twice traveling back to North Carolina to represent Sumner county regarding ratifying the Constitution of the United States. He also represented Sumner county in the government of The Territory South of the River Ohio, serving as speaker of the house, before the state of Tennessee was created. Besides being appointed a Magistrate he was the registar for Sumner County from 1796 until his death. 9 David also served as a trustee of the Davidson Academy along with Andrew Jackson, Daniel Smith and others. 10
Land grant No. 55, dated April 17, 1786, for 640 acres on Indian Creek and located in Sumner county may have been where he built Wilson's Station. An earlier grant, No. 3, for 2,000 acres was located on the Duck River in Marshall county and in the 1780's was still Indian land according to Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson in a report he wrote to President George Washington for congress in 1791. 11
David received land grant No. 3 for 2,000 acres, November 19, 1784 from the state of North Carolina "For Cirvis and Vallor", located in Middle District at mouth of Caney Spring Branch, North of Duck River. 12 Many other land grants were purchased by David including No. 98 for 4,096 acres located next to the 2,000 acre grant mentioned above and at least one on Bledsoe creek in Sumner. He also received land as payment for surveying others land warrants. All totaled he owned between eleven and twelve thousand acres located in various present day counties, where deeds regarding these grants can be found mainly in the early records of Sumner, Wilson, Davidson, Williamson, Bedford and Marshall counties.
No mention has been found of any members of David's family being killed by Indians except an account of the Indian attack on Greenville Station published in the Knoxville Gazette on May 15, 1793, which occurred on April 27, 1793. William Hall and William Wilson were mentioned as having fought the Indians during that attack. The article also stated that William Wilson had lost a brother and William Hall had lost his father and two brothers. 13 William Hall's father and brothers were all killed in 1787 several years earlier.
William Wilson was a son of Major David Wilson, possible the oldest. No record has been found giving the name of the deceased son. Two possibilities were George Wilson and Archie Wilson, both killed by the Indians prior to the attack on Greenville Station.
George Wilson was killed May 23, 1791 six miles west of present day Gallatin on the road to Nashville. On June 20 George Winchester wrote a report to the secretary of the territory telling of a trail he found leading to the place that Mr. Wilson's son, George, was killed.
Archy (Archibald?) Wilson, a young man in Bledsoe's Company who had volunteered to help protect Ziegler's Station was killed in that attack in June 1792. John Carr visited Zeigler's Station the following day and wrote about Archy's death. 14 Wm Hall later wrote that David Wilson had been killed at Ziegler's Station.
So many families lost one or more members that it would have been unusual for them to have escaped that fate also.
One more role or occupation can be added to the list of duties and services he performed in his life time besides Major, Surveyor, Legislator, Magistrate, County Registar and that is one of a Tavern Owner. On October 4, 1802 David applied for a license to operate a tavern at his dwelling, 15 which was located on a main public road just east of Gallatin. Three months earlier, in July, James Steele had received a license to operate an ordinary [tavern, inn] in Cairo.
David dated his will December 19, 1803 naming his wife Jean and all of his living children or their spouses, son William, son James, son-in-law Zacheus Wilson, my [son-in-law] Jonathan Wilson, my [son-in-law] William Steel, son Zacheus Wilson, son David Wilson, daughter Mary Wilson. Also named in the will were three slaves, Ceaser, Rosie and Nancy. 16
Sometime between the signing of the will and the March session of the county court in 1804 David died. An eight foot granite monument to David Wilson was dedicated in 1951 and placed on the court house lawn in Lebanon, Wilson County, in memory of the man whose name the county was named.

Footnotes:

  1. Nashville, April 7, 1786. David Wilson was on a list of jurors to the Superior Court alone with George Winchester, James Winchester, and William Hall. Carol Wells, Davidson County Court Minutes 1783-1792, (Heritage Books Inc: Bowie, MD, 1990) p.52

  2. Mecklenburg County, NC, Deed Vol. 12, p. 520, September 2, 1785. David Wilson sold to John Alison 83 acres. Herman W. Ferguson, Mecklenburg County, North Carolina Genealogical Deed Abstracts Bk. 10 to 14, (Pp: 1990). J.B. Alexander also gave 1785 as the year Major David Wilson moved to Sumner in The History of Mecklenburg County, NC.

  3. Mecklenburg County, NC, Deed Vol. 13, p.721, December 29, 1789. David Wilson of Sumner sold to John Allison 110 acres on east side of Coddle Creek adj. Nathaniel Irwin, and other lands of Alison previously bought from said Wilson. Ferguson, Mecklenburg County Deeds.

  4. Mecklenburg County, NC, Deed Vol. 4, p.41,42, January 27, 1767. H.E. McCulloh sold to David Wilson of Mecklenburg Co., planter, 215 acres adj. William Erwin. Brent H. Holcomb, Mecklenburg County, North Carolina Deed Abstracts 1763-1779, (SHP: Greenville, SC, 1979, 1991 Ed.) p.94

  5. Both names appear on the deeds and in at least one case regarding the same deed in Mecklenbrug county. David and Jean Wilson sold land Nov. 10, 1773. Vol. 8, p. 177-180. Holcomb, Mecklenburg Deed Abstracts. Court records for the July 177_ term, stated David and Jane, his wife, sold on Nov. 10, 1773. Doris Briscoe, Mecklenburg County Court Minutes, Docket Bk I, 1774-1780 (1966: SHP: Greenville, SC, Reprint, 1997) p.6

  6. Mecklenburg county, NC, Deed Vol. 4, p.520,521, September 1, 1769. David Wilson and wife Jane of Mecklenburg sold to Joseph Scott of Orange county 215 acres on south side of Coddle creek a branch of Rocky River, adj. corner of tract where Nathaniel Erwin lives. Holcomb, Mecklenburg Deed Abstracts, p.120

  7. Mecklenburg County Court minutes, April 1781, Bk. 1, p.299. Herman W. Ferguson, Mecklenburg Minutes of the Court of common Pleas and Quarter Sessions 1780-1800, (Pp:1995)

  8. J.B. Alexander, The History of Mecklenburg County, North Carolina 1740-1900, (1902: SHP: Greenville, SC, Reprint 1993) p. 58-65. Lists of members to the General Assembly and County Officers.

  9. Carol Wells, Sumner County Tennessee Court Minutes 1787-1805, (Heritage Books: Bowie, MD, 1995) p.61

  10. David Wilson, Andrew Jackson and other trustees of the academy sold land in 1792. Davidson County, TN Deed Bk. C, p.137. Helen Marsh, Land Deed Genealogy of Davidson County, Tennessee 1792-1797 Vol. I.

  11. Dated Nov. 8, 1791, the report was made to inform the 13th congress as to the amount of land recently ceded to the U.S. by the state of North Carolina which had not been granted or was not claimed by the Indians. Thomas Jefferson stated that two grants, of 2,000 acres each, to Alexander Martin and David Wilson, adjacent to the lands allotted to the officers and soldiers, are not to be reckoned here because they are wholly within the Indian territory, as acknowledged by the treaties of Hopewell and Holton. American State Papers Vol. I, 1789-1809, (Washington, Gales and Seaton: 1832, 1994 ed.) p.24, 4th parag.

  12. State Records of North Carolina, Vol. 24, p.484; Mary Holland Lancaster, The Wilson Family, (unpublished, copy in Sumner County Archives and Tennessee State Archives); See article by Charles D. Rodenbough in "Middle Tennessee Journal of Genealogy and History, Vol. XII, No. 2, p.54 concerning Alexander Martin's grant of 2,000 acres.

  13. Sherida K. Eddlemon, Genealogical Abstracts from Tennessee Newspapers 1791-1808, (Heritage Books: Bowie, MD, 1988)

  14. John Carr, Early Times in Middle Tennessee, (Nashville: Stevenson & F.A. Owen, 1857)p.91 cited in Walter T. Durham's The Great leap Westward; A History of Sumner County Tennessee, (1969, 1993 Reprint) p.108

  15. Wells, Sumner County Court Minutes, p.166

  16. Sumner County Tennessee Will Bk. 1, p.77-79


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