Randolph County NC 2- more sites -an early church

Sandy Creek Baptist Church 

Liberty Township; east side Ramseur-Julian Road.

Thanks again to L. McKay Whatley for his blog, (my editing posted here) this one posted on April 12, 2009...link here.

"Sandy Creek Baptist Church is both the oldest organized church and the oldest surviving religious structure in Randolph County. A recognized landmark in religious history, it is noted by the nearby state historic marker as the “Mother of Southern Baptist Churches.” The congregation at Sandy Creek was founded by the “Separate Baptist” minister Shubal Stearns (1706-1771), a Boston native who led a group of eight families into the area in 1755. Most colonial or “Particular” Baptists were members of the Philadelphia Association and advocated a strict Calvinist theology of “what will be, will be.” Separate or “New Light” Baptists broke with this practice and proposed active campaigns to win converts with Sunday Schools, revivals and missionary work. Stearns’ efforts to awaken the religious impulses of the back country were wildly successful, with his original congregation of eight families mushrooming into 606 members by 1770...

Detail of corner notching

"The existing Sandy Creek Church is the third building to house the congregation. The first building burned about 1785, and the second, built across the road, was blown down by a storm. The third, according to strong local tradition, was built in 1826. The log building is approximately 20 by 25 feet in size.

"The log church was weatherboarded in 1870 and covered with asphalt siding in 1953; both coverings were removed in 2007 when several rotten structural timbers were replaced.   It is good to see one of the county’s most important historic landmarks is being well maintained by its congregation.

----------------------

This church was the beginning for many Sandy Creek Baptist Churches across the south. And I found one of the comments to this posting was by a cousin of ours, who had the same Thomas Welbourn as an ancestor through his son William, while our line is through his son Elijah, who was my 4th great grandfather, as I have mentioned several times in the last week.  There are more comments about the movement of this church at the link to Mr. Whatley's blog above.

------------------

And another topic...happy birthday to my great grandfather, William Sandford Rogers, known (according to Poppy, my grandfather) as W. Sam Rogers, born 1850 in Huntsville TX, died May 29, 1879 in same town...at very young age. He's buried in Oakwood Cemetery in Huntsville, TX. 
His widow moved to Galveston, and at times the 2 young children lived with her, and at other times with Aunt A. Luella Rogers Ross and Uncle J. Elmore Ross.  It apparently was the "thing to do" to go by a first initial and a middle name, since W. Sam, A. Luella, and J. Elmore all did it.  Several children of theirs did the same thing.  I wonder what the thinking was behind it.

Maj. Elijah Lige Wilbourn's biography

There's a great story about Maj. Elijah Wilbourn (1763-1819) on my Ancestry tree...given by a Susan W. Batterton in 2013.  She names times that deeds of property changed hands, but I haven't personally seen them.  However, it's an interesting story, so here it is as she published it.

"Born in the Sandy Creek section of Randolph County, NC which was previously in Guilford County, NC
Moved to Union County, SC after perhaps living in Newton County, Georgia first.
When about thirty years old, having been married about five years, he purchased from George Crossley, of Union District, South Carolina, in June 1793, 150 acres of land on Buffalo Creek.
On June 10, 1799 he sold three slaves to William Smith of York County, S.C.
On January 9, 1806, he purchased 320 acres on the southeast side of Fairforest, a branch of the Tyger River at the mouth of Mitchell Creek.
On November 14, 1807, he acquired 300 acres on the east side of Fairforest.
There were several other land transactions including two mortgages on lands to secure sums of money due him.
His estate was administered by his widow and his son William Rowntree Wilbourn.
There is a family tradition to the effect that he served as a major in the Revolutionary War; but no records of such service have been discovered.
There is no known definite record to the effect that the seven Wilbourns who turned up in South Carolina in the 1780's and 1790's were the sons of Thomas Welborn but there is a preponderence of evidence that they were. 
Elijah changed the spelling of the name back to Wilbourn while others used various spellings.
He died in Union County, SC

Elijah was born in 1763 in the area of North Carolina that later was the site of a Revolutionary War battle.  

In 1756 the Deep River section in which the Welborn/Wilbourns lived was part of Rowan County, NC. In 1770/71 it became a part of Guilford County, and in 1779 was included in Randolph County, NC.
Guilford County was formed in 1771 from Rowan and Orange Counties. The former Orange/Rowan dividing line runs north-south through the center of Guilford. Guilford County also included what is now Randolph County until 1779, and Rockingham County until 1785.
The Battle of Guilford Courthouse took place on March 15, 1781, when the armies of General Nathanael Greene and Lord Cornwallis clashed at a site northwest of the present center of Greensboro. This battleground is now a National Military Park.
Source:Susan W. Batterton on Ancestry 2013.


His father Thomas died when he was 14 in April of 1778.  I'll post about his being in the Regulator Movement in North Carolina quite a while before the American Revolution broke out.

Elijah's mother, Esther Robinson Robertson Wilbourn,  has presence in the Randolph County NC 1790 census (which I just discovered) living with 1 male, 2 females and 8 slaves. She also is on a census in 1779 under her own name in Randolph County, NC (probably after having just been widowed.)  It is interesting that all of the other Ancestry trees have mixed up her husband's death date and place with her own.  This census of 1790 clearly shows she didn't die at the same time. And several of these bizarrre trees say she was born in California in 1735.

Though Elijah married Mary (Molly) Roundtree Wilbourn in 1788 in Union District SC, he still had a listing in the 1790 census in Randolph County NC, but was in SC for the birth of his first daughter in 1791.

The 1800 census has him in Union District SC. Some of his children are given that as the place of their births, and some in Spartanburg County SC.  There were (probably) 10 children. 

More Welborns, Wilbournes or Wilborns related to me

To continue looking at where the children of my fourth great grandparents ended up, all born in Union District, SC to Maj. Elijah Wilbourne and Mary Molly Roundtree Wilbourne. (Yes there are spelling variations...and some first names confusion as well.
Yesterday we looked briefly at :

1. Martha Patsy Wilbourne Hayes (1791-1875)
2. Sabra Ann Wilbourne Gibbs (1792-1864)
3. Dorcas Lucinda Wilbourne Nance (1793-1875)
4. William Rountree Wilburn (1796-1878)5.  Nancy Wilbourne Nance (1800 - between 1860-70),
6. Mildred Roundtree Wilbourne Pruet (1801-1874)
7. James Rogers Wilbourn (1804-?)

The remaining children on my list are:

8. William Sanford Wilbourn (1803-1874) d. Panola MS or Huntsville, Walker, TX  - First, would a family name another son William with just a different middle name? Second, when I look at the hints on Ancestry, some of them are for Sanford, who lived and died in Texas. And some of them are for William who lived in MS.  So now to sort through them, and perhaps remove the William on this Sanford's name. That's my first thought.  But it won't be my first action!  I'm wondering if the "William" of MS stuff off of my Ancestry tree should be just Sanford's name.  Argh!

Oh goodie goodie, the other Ancestry trees are about evenly divided as to whether he died in TX or MS.  There is a grave and a wife's grave in MS.  That makes a good case for Sanford Wilbourn.  Now I'll look for some documents that give him William as well.  The only document that MIGHT be him, is a 1860 Census of Panola MS, Pleasant Mount post office. where he is S. Wilbourne age 56 (thus a birth in 1804, and has listed names of his family, Nancy 46, Ada 22, J.T. 19, Sidus 16, Lamar 14, Alice 11 and Sanford Wilbourne 4 (probably Jr.)  He's a farmer in that census, with a personal estate valued at $69,000.  There are a lot of other docs for Sanford, including a probate record in MS.  There's even a picture of him (no William in the name). I think I'll keep William in parentheses with a question mark for now.

Now let's see if any documents exist for the Sandford Wilbourne (spelled in any way) in Huntsville TX (besides having same birth and death dates according to all those trees!)  Nope, the same records of his 3 censuses in MS, and a Georgia Marriage doc, and then Find a Grave in MS with the date and description missing as to place, but it's the Web: Mississippi Index.  So I think it was not likely he died in Huntsville TX.

OK, I'm sorry to have bothered your time, going through all this.  I'm sorry I had to take my time doing it also.

9. Elijah Wilbourn (1810-1878 ) d. Panola Mississippi. He's also buried in the same Fredonia Methodist Church cemetery which has a seven page list of graves where 27 Wilbourns are listed who are buried there!  Here's a photo of Elijah and his wife.

 

Written on back: Major Elijah Wilbourn, Jr. 10th child, 4th son of Major Elijah Wilbourn and his wife Mary Roundtree Wilbourn.  Elijah Jr. was born in Union County, South Carolina. He married Eliza Duggan.
And Elijah had a son named William Sanford Wilbourn, 1853-1935! But on my list of children, I only had him as the 9th child, so perhaps there's another daughter that I've missed, according to the notation on the back of the photo saying 10th child.

10. Jane Wilburn Bishop 1811-@1890. d. Panola MS  She also married in Newton GA where one of her siblings also had nuptials. She may have died before 1890, as her grave marker has no dates, but her husband died in 1880. She was buried in Rose Hill Cemetery, Sardis, Panola County, MS where her husband had his grave. Her name is engraved on the stone, but no dates.  Several Ancestry trees say she died in 1890, and others say she was alive as of 1850...I'm going to the 1890 guess.

11. Elizabeth Wilborn Robinson, 1812-1888, buried at Putnam Baptist Ch Cemetery, Buffalo, Union County, SC.

The conclusion is how many remained in SC? 3
Mississippi?  4
Alabama? 1 (possibly) 1 certain
Georgia? 1
Texas? 1

And remember Elijah Sr. stayed in SC while his wife moved to MS (perhaps after he died)

More wandering great uncles and aunts - The Wilbournes

My Wilbourne relations...
I've skipped over Sabra Ann Wilbourne Gibbs, and yet she, and her family are just as much my relatives as those Gibbs that I've been talking about in SC.

So there were 11 brothers and sisters?
They were all born in Union Dist. SC, and then they may have stayed there, or moved to other states.
Let's see:

My 4th great grandparents were Maj. Elijah Wilbourne (1763-1819) and
his wife: Mary Molly Rountree Wilbourne (1772-1851)

Incidentally, Elijah's father Thomas Welbourn was a member of the Regulator movement in North Carolina before the Revolutionary War. (Source: Find a Grave site for Mildred Roundtree Welborn Pruet.)  I'll have to post about that another time.

Children :
1. Martha Patsy Wilbourne Hayes (1791-1875) d. in Pendleton, Anderson Cty, SC

2. Sabra Ann Wilbourne Gibbs (1792-1864) d. in Walker Cty, TX

3. Dorcas Lucinda Wilbourne Nance (1793-1875) d. in Pendleton, Anderson Cty, SC

4. William Rountree Wilburn (1796-1878) d. Panola County, MS in,Fredonia cemetery, Como MS married according to his grave inscription "In memory of my husband." but no other records of his wife.

Wilbourn plot at Fredonia Ch, Como MS more details below

5.  Nancy Wilbourne Nance (1800 - between 1860-70), d. Muskogee County GA

6. Mildred Roundtree Wilbourne Pruet (1801-1874) d. Clay Co, Alabama

7. James Rogers Wilbourn (1804-?) d. Y, Somme, Picardy, France (I don't understand this place, as several other siblings including females have this suggested as place of death on SOME Ancestry trees.) He lived in Newtown GA in 1840 with a household of 7, but there's no listing of wife or children (yet). He also is listed in 1860 in an Agricultural census, in So. Division, Talladega, Alabama.  I think I'll change his place of death to Alabama after 1860.  It's my tree. And there's nothing to support his dying in France on an unknown date.  It wasn't until 1917 or so that the Somme was a dying place for many young men.  I wish I know who the Rogers was that his middle name reflects.

(0)  Martha Patsy Wilbourn, (1801-?) this is a duplicate listing, with a wrong date, so now it is merged with the one above.

I'll continue this family's post tomorrow...dividing it up seems like a good idea, first because I've taken way too much time on it already, and second, because I need to give these great aunts and uncles good attention and not rush through.