Lewallens in Early Scott Co., TN
Uncle Jehu says that about the time Scott County was organized those pioneers who had come in here had settled along New River and the different creeks. Those old settlers living on Black Wolf Creek beginning at head waters were Andrew Lewallen1, Jackie Potter, Joe Lewallen2, old man Peak (who was a soldier in the Revolutionary war), Hinchie Redman, who lived below where the town of Glen Mary is located and Matthew Davis; those settlers living on Brimstone Creek were Johnnie Triplett, Felin Griffith, Mikey Robbins, Mose Sexton, Harry Bagley, Tim Sexton, Bill Sexton, Zeke Newport and Bailey Buttram; old folks living on Straight Fork beginning at head waters were Delap (who was hung for killing a woman on said creek), Jno L. Smith, Geo. and Drew Smith, Billie and Jessie Bird and Johnnie Shoopman; the pioneers to settle on Buffalo Creek beginning at the mouth were one Ledgerwood, Billie Jeffers, Joshua Duncan, Billie Hughett, Absolum Cross, on Robinson, two Marcums, Tommie Chambers and Ben Dagley; there were only a few on Paint Rock Creek and they were Reynold Lawson (who built the first water grist mill in the county) Louis and Elswick Thompson, Johnnie Carson and Wayne Cotton. The Terry and Chitwood families settled in and around where the towns of Winfield and Oneida are now located.
This court was held in a one room log house, near where Alvis Jeffers’ residence now stands just east of the Town Spring. The house had no floor, nor windows and but one door. There were open cracks on all sides of the house. Benches we made of logs split into, flat sides up and pegs driven in the ends. The house had been used as a “meeting house” where preaching services were conducted. This court was held in the fall of 1850 or 1851, and was in session three days. Judge Alexander was judge, John Lewallen3, sheriff and John L. Smith clerk. Of those who were on the first jury I now recall ——Creekmore, Johnnie Chambers, Absolum Cross, Jimmie Chitwood, Eliga Terry, Felin Griffith and Abe Cross. Among the lawyers present were Dave Young, Horace Maynard, W. Kain, David Cummings and —-McAdo. The lawyers and judge boarded with clerk John L. Smith who lived where Dan Chambers now lives.
In those days, circuit court met only twice a year, once in the spring and once in the fall of the year. This court was held in the log house only twice. Those few who could write made their own ink and wrote with goose quill pens. Horace Maynard was a lawyer and he wouldn’t write with anything else but a goose quill pen. I never saw a lead pencil until after the civil war. During the spring of 1861 David Sharp, who lived two miles below Jacksboro and I, took two droves of hogs to Atlanta, Ga. and sold them. We found the people there in a great cavil over the question of secession or the right of a state to withdraw from the Union. We returned from Atlanta in March. In April a call was made by Jeff Davis for men to fight. He claimed to the Ohio river for the South. Abe Lincoln, President of the United States, also made a call for men to fight for the Union. When Abe Lincoln ran for President in 1860 the people called him a black republican, and he received only one vote in Scott County. That vote was cast by Shade Lewallen4 who lived in Huntsville. In 1862 Shade died of small pox in Huntsville and was buried in what is now an orchard just south of the Baptist church building.
Source: Reminiscences of Pioneer Days in Scott County, Tennessee, Published in the Cumberland Chronicle, Spring of 1904.
- Andrew was the s/o Anderson Llewellyn. ↩
- The reference to Joe is an apparent mistake; this was obviously Joel Llewellyn, s/o Anderson Llewellyn. ↩
- John was the son of Anderson Llewellyn. ↩
- It is unclear who Shade Lewallen really was. Some family histories identified Shade as Andrew L. Llewellyn, already identified in this source, as s/o Anderson Llewellyn. However, Andrew L. Llewellyn d.11/30/1873 and is buried in the Carpenter Cemetery in Scott Co., near Huntsville, TN. ↩
In: Uncategorized · Tagged with: Andrew, Joel, John, Shade, TN