John Patterson Book now available

The new book on John Patterson is available for purchase. See this page for more details.

Wes

Elijah Chastain - Father of 23 or More

Elijah Chastain was my 4X-Great-Grandpa. He was born in 1776 in Buckingham Co, VA and died in 1853 in Gilmer Co, GA. His daughter Rebecca Chastain was born in 1799 and she was his 3rd child - of 21 (at least). She married George Patterson in the early to mid 1820's and they were my 3X-Great-Grandparents. 

(3/26/24 update: at least 22 children)

(4/10/24 update: 23+ children)

Elijah Chastain and 3rd wife Catherine Carson, ca. 1850. Photo courtesy of Connie Cordell

Elijah was a character. I know he had multiple children (each) by his first two wives during the same two or three year period beginning in 1800. By 1803 he was officially married the second time to Anna Middleton. His first wife, my ancestor, was Hannah Adams. This first marriage ended in divorce. Many have said the second marriage did too, but I can't find anything about Anna after 1810, including no children born to Elijah between 1810 and 1820. I think Anna may have died around 1810 or soon thereafter, but I just don't know for certain. (4/10/24 update: Elijah had at least two children born after 1810 with Anna - Artemesia was born in 1812 and James Witt was born in 1813).

John Patterson book update

 I am making my final editing pass on this book on John Patterson of Jenkins Branch, Buncombe Co, NC.

Plan to be sending it to the publisher in the next week or two hopefully. I think we can get it published in March or in April at the latest.

This has been a work in progress for 40 years! 

Wes

Coming Soon - Book on John Patterson

I am still on target for finishing up the book on John Patterson in the next month or so. Hopefully by April 1st we could be going to print. 

John Patterson of Jenkins Branch, Buncombe County, North Carolina is the current working title. 

This has been a fun project to work on. Getting all my notes and documentation and photos and charts and maps updated, double checked, assembled in one place... it's been a long time coming. All previous attempts were just too large in scope. Once this is published, I can then branch off and focus on various lines, such as one specific child of John, or perhaps John's brother Robert Patterson, or their father, Thomas Patterson of Clarks Fork, and one day HIS father, Robert Patterson of Linville Creek. 

First draft of John's book is complete. I'm now going through and filling in a few gaps, and sourcing pieces missed in the first pass. Then I'll finish up the bibliography and the index and send off to editors for reviewing. 

More coming soon!

Wes

I Can't Even Imagine

In writing this book on John Patterson of Jenkins Branch, I've been doing a lot of census verification and other census lookups and updating my documentation on many families. In the process of doing so, there have been numerous families from the mid to late 1800's that went through terrible heartache in the number of children they lost at young ages. One family in particular I'd like to highlight here.

William Jefferson Kincaid (1843-1909)

William Jefferson Kincaid was born 01 Aug 1843 in Union Co, GA and died 15 Dec 1909 in Cherokee Co, GA. He was the son of James (Jim) Kincaid and Martha Denton Chastain. William was also the grandson of William D. Kincaid and Amy Jane Patterson (daughter of John Patterson and Margaret Black). William was also the grandson of Benjamin Franklin Chastain and Rebecca S. Denton. Both of those grandparents were children of Rev. War Patriots, John Chastain and Samuel Denton, respectively.

William himself was a veteran of the Civil War. He served in the CSA, 2nd Regiment, GA Infantry, Co E. He and so many other relatives and neighbors were swept up in that major conflict. Following the war, he married Mary Adeline Ragsdale Robinson in 1866. She was born in Jan 1845 in GA and died after 1900.

The 1900 census is a unique census in that it documented the number of children a woman had given birth to in her lifetime, and then how many of her children were still living. In her case, she had given birth to 12 children, but only four were still living in 1900.

I know that four of their children lived to adulthood. And I know that many died as infants. But to realize that eight children died as young children or infants, is staggering to me. I cannot begin to image what that was like to deal with.

Make me more grateful for my life of ease, relatively speaking.

Wes