Happy birthday to Eugenia Witty Booth and grandfather James Whitty

Here's an older post in Eugenia Almetta Witty Booth's honor...Click HERE.
And a not quite as old post HERE.

So this year I am sharing about her family of origin, namely her grandfather James Witty, my 4 times great grandfather.  Since I don't have a birth date for him, I won't be able to celebrate his life on his own birthday. (I started writing about him last spring HERE. But will add several details today.) He was born around 1768, and has several Quaker documents about him and his family from Guilford County, North Carolina - but no birth record.  It could have been lost, or he might not have been a Quaker from birth.

The New Garden Meeting (Guildford County NC) has a beautifully penned introduction, mentioning that it would record births and deaths, and especially work around the 11 lost days in Sept. 1752 (when the calendar moved from Julian to Gregorian according to England finally changing it's calendars). But nobody is mentioned in the introduction itself.  It should also be remembered that until 1752, the Western Christian Feast of the Annunciation, on March 25, also called "Lady Day". was considered the first of the year. And since the Quakers don't use the Roman names of months or days, there was First Month, Second Month, etc.  So I'm not sure (like many genealogists) of when these events actually happened which are recorded as, say, 3rd of Fourth Month, etc (no births or deaths are available now).

James Witty's birth is listed in an index (again hand written) with a number 240 next to it.  This might refer to a page number, or maybe a later microfilm number.

His children's birth's are recorded, as well as early deaths. Only 2 of the 5 may have made it through childhood apparently (at least as far as these records provide). I know 3 died early, and the other 2 don't have dates of death listed on Ancestry.  His wife, Mary, also died around 1792.

See the typed version below...with months listed as left numerals (but again, in Quaker version)

The minutes of the New Garden monthly meeting in 1806 report that James Witty had removed with his family to the visit (?) of the Miami Meeting. (This location is unknown to me, the modern one is in Ohio.)  Since he hadn't followed their proper procedure, another member was going to visit him and make sure everything was alright and report back next monthly meeting.

In the next meeting minutes, a report is made that the Friends who visited James Witty and his family gave a certificate saying all was well with them.

He apparently remarried in 1800 or so to Lucretia Wells (Witty) in Tennessee.  This has no documentation however.  Their first son, George, was indicated to have been born in TN in 1805. But with the notation of the New Garden Meeting of Friends that it was 1806 when his family moved from Guilford County, NC, I question that these 2 events happened in TN.  I also found that his son George had a headstone which said he was born in 1805, but there are newspaper clippings (just found on Ancestry) saying he was the first child born in Limestone County, AL in 1808.

I believe that the records saying both the marriage and the birth were in TN are due to the boundaries of the states being close to one another.  I think it more likely that the marriage was in NC still, but that the birth of George Witty was in their new home along the border of TN and AL.  These are based on the Guildford Quaker document of 1806 about the family moving, and the newspaper clipping.  But there seem to be no records saying that TN was indeed the location of these events.  don't know where they came from.I

Anyway, back to James.  I just found out his second wife was named Lucretia Wells Witty.  All the records on Ancestry had been calling her Elizabeth.  But Lucretia and Elizabeth Well's father's will (James Wells) states Lucretia Witty would receive some money, as well as her sister Elizabeth Riece. That's enough for me to put two and two together and know Elizabeth Wells Riece wouldn't have had a sister named Elizabeth Witty...and there's Lucretia's first name...as of 1775.

So James Witty took off for the frontier of Alabama, with his family, and had a land claim which is mapped.  It's rather confusing, but apparently he was one of the founders of that area, on the border of what eventually became Tennessee.

And while looking at Uncle George Witty's Ancestry site, I found a photo of the Witty Cemetery in Limestone County, Alabama.  It was completely overrun by trees, but the photo of George's headstone looks as if someone might have cleared it out.  I would imagine Grandpa James is also buried there, as well as other Witty's living and dying in that area. (Uncle George was a older brother of my 3 x great grandfather, Carroll Witty (1818-1898) who was born in Limestone, AL, then moved from Alabama to Texas.