Recently, I wrote about how Kenneth apprenticed a free boy of color named William Williams. Well, of course I had to find out more about his mother, Fanny Williams! Which led me into an entirely new (for me) area of genealogy: that of “free people of color” in the antebellum South. Fanny Williams deeded her […]
Category Archives: Colorful Characters
Fanny Williams, a “free woman of color,” indentures her eight year old son to Kenneth Bembry.
While running a search on Ancestry yesterday, I found something fun misfiled under “Wm Bembry.” This is a stray account from William Bembry’s estate file, paid by his administrator to a merchant or tavern keeper of some kind. William, it seems, was quite the tippler, putting away many “Drinks” of gin, cider, cordial, and […]
In which my 5th great-grandfather lives life to the fullest.
Where there is a widow there must have been a husband. Did Miles Bembry make a surprise move late in life?
A bastardy bond in Edgecombe, North Carolina.
I found this wanted notice in the Federal Union, a Milledgeville paper, dated 8 September 1831. It gives more details on the murder of Littleton Bryan. Sounds like a nasty business! A Proclamation By William P. Duvall, Governor of the Territory of Florida Whereas it hath been duly shewn to me that JOHN BEMBRY, late […]
I’ve been looking at families associated with the early Bembrys just to see what pops up. While perusing “Descendants of Captain John Wiggins of Martin County, North Carolina” to find out more about John and Maria Wiggins, his wife, I ran across this alternate theory of John Bembry’s disappearance after the death of the Littleton […]
While looking up an estate file for Richard Dicken, father-in-law of Thomas Bembry, I found this court case involving Kenneth Bembry, the wealthiest of the four sons of Miles Bembry. Now I know how he got so rich. Kenneth became guardian (presumably after the death of Elias Bryan) to the three youngest sons of Richard Dicken […]
John Riley Bembry was the great-grandson of the “frolicking” John Bembry. His branch of the family moved to Texas, then Oklahoma, then California. He was a World War One veteran and desert prospector who lived on the land which is now the Mojave Desert National Reserve. John Riley made it his mission to commemorate his fellow […]
