| SPOUSE | CHILDREN | ||
|---|---|---|---|
|
Sally Rice m. by Jun 1, 1797 Knox Co. TN b. 1781 Knoxville TN d. 1834? Laurens Co. SC |
?daughter b. Apr 8, 1799 Danville KY |
||
|
Wiley's father, John William Harper, and his brother John immigrated from Scotland by
1760 and settled in Orange Co. NC between 1761 and 1763. Wiley's cousin,
Micajah was the son of
John Harper. Wiley's father may have died in 1779 in
Cape Fear NC. |
|||
|
The Harpe cousins, Wiley and Micajah, are believed to have fought under British General Ferguson at
the battle of King's Mountain in 1780.
Map of Western
Carolinas during the Revolution shows location of King's Mt. and Quaker Meadows,
where the Patriots assembled before the battle. |
|||
|
In 1781, the Harpes participated in the Indian attack on the Bluffs Station in
the Cumberland Settlement in Washington Co. NC.
Map of
the Cumberland Settlement in 1780. |
|||
|
Washington Co., previously Washington District, was formed by North Carolina in
1777 and extended west to the Mississippi River, mostly containing land inhabited
by five different tribes of Native Americans, but mostly Cherokee. In 1779, the
Cumberland Settlement was created by the granting of land by the NC government.
In 1783 this settlement was mostly contained in the newly formed Davidson Co. and
surrounded by Indian Lands, and Virginia and Kentucky to the North.
Map of
the Cumberland Settlements showing Forts, known as Stations, in present-day counties. |
|||
|
On Aug 19, 1782 the Harpes were part of a war party of Chickamauga Cherokee
Indians, supported by the British, to the Battle of Blue Licks in Kentucky,
claiming victory over a group of Patriot settlers. For the next dozen years,
they continued to live among the tribe in a village named Nickajack,
which was located near Chattanooga. |
|||
|
On Jun 1, 1797 Wiley married Sally Rice, the daughter of Baptist minister John Rice.
Wiley and his cousin Micajah Harper (known as "Big Harpe")
shared 3 different women as wives while committing crimes between 1797 and 1799.
The women had three children by the pair, including one that was killed by Micajah
for being a bother, and were briefly jailed but were set free and were said to
have lived regular lives afterwards. |
|||
| On Christmas day 1798 Wiley, Micajah Harper, and their three very pregnant women were arrested for the murder of Thomas Langford, whom they met in Crab Orchard KY. They were jailed at Stanford KY and indicted on Jan 4, 1799. After all five were transferred to Danville KY, Maria ("Betsy") had a son at the start of Feb 1799 and Susan had a daughter about a month later. | |||
|
On Mar 16, 1799, the two Harpe fathers escaped leaving their women and two
children behind. On Apr 8, the third woman, Sally, gave birth to a son. The three
women were tried and acquitted. |
|||
|
In Apr 1799, 32 year old Frederick Stump Jr., son of
Frederick Stump became the latest victim of
the outlaws known as the Harpe Brothers. On Apr 22, the Governor of Kentucky
issued a $300 reward "on each of the Harpe's heads" and one of the Harpes,
Micajah, was soon captured by bounty hunters and his
head hung on the Wilderness Trail in Warren Co. KY, where Frederick and his wife,
Anna Maria ("Mary") lived. |
|||
|
The "Harpe brothers" went on the run after bounties were placed on their heads
by the Kentucky Governor but were still able to reunite with their families in
Illinois. They then went on a killing spree that spanned from Knoxville TN to
Kentucky. One of the victims was Micajah's own son
because he was annoying him. They briefly hid out with Samuel Mason's gang in
Cave-In-Rock IL (on the Ohio River across from KY). The Harps were forced by the
gang to leave after they viciously sent a man on a horse off a bluff to their
deaths. The gang was soon forced to leave and headed south [Webster Co. KY,
website]. |
|||
|
In Kentucky, the cousins were tracked down by bounty hunters in Muhlenberg Co. KY
on Aug 24, 1799. Micajah Harper was soon killed by the
husband of one of their victims. |
|||
|
Historical
marker in western KY 3 miles north of Dixon at the place, then along the
Wilderness Trail, where the severed head of Micajah Harpe
was displayed after he was caught and killed nearby. |
|||
|
Wiley, known as "Little Harpe" escaped the bounty hunters in KY and fled down the
Natchez Trace where he hoped to rejoin the Samuel Mason Gang under an alias John
Setton. He continued the crime spree with a Mason Gang member Peter Alston, son
of Philip Alston. |
|||
|
Map of
the Natchez District as it may have looked between 1779 and 1799. |
|||
|
On May 16, 1801 John Stump, twin brother of
the Harpes' victim, married Rebecca Wilkins Hyde (1780-1853) in Davidson Co. TN. |
|||
|
Miss. Territory Governor Claiborne raised the reward for capture of Wiley to $500.
Wiley was finally found in 1804 when he and Peter Alston tried to collect the
reward, now over $2,000, for his head with the head of gang leader Samuel Mason.
He was recognized and the two were imprisoned. |
|||
|
One month after Wiley was executed, on Mar 24, 1804,
John Stump, twin brother of the Harpes' murder
victim in 1799, claimed a lot in Natchez in the Mississippi Territory.
Lot no. 4, Square no. 26 in the town of Natchez was originally granted on Oct 3, 1795
to Louisa Higdon, the wife of
John Wylie. Louisa and John Wylie
deeded the lot to John Stump "of Davidson Co. Tennessee" [McBee, p. 450]. A niece
of John Stump was named Louisa Guice when she was born in 1807. |
|||
|
John Stump's son John and sister Anna's daughter
Louisa were both born after John and Louisa Wylie
deeded a Natchez lot to John Stump after the outlaw Wiley Harpe was
captured and the reward of over $2,000 claimed. The brothers of John Wylie and
John Stump could have been two of his victims. |
|||
|
Sources: Cumberland Compact, original document signed May 13, 1780, Washington County NC, website. Clayton, Prof. W.W., History of Davidson County Tennessee, reprod. 1971 by Charles Elder, Nashville TN. Drake, Doug, Jack Masters and Bill Puryear, Founding of the Cumberland Settlements, The First Atlas, 1779-1804, Warioto Press, 2009, pp. 23, map E7. Imbert, J. Leopold, map maker, Carte des Possessions Angloises... 1777, reprinted by the Museum of the American Revolution from map image at the Norman B. Leventhal Map Center, Boston Public Library. McBee, May Wilson, comp., "Land Claims", in Natchez Court Records, 1767-1805, Book F, p.21, Book D, pp. 450, 458. McBee, May Wilson, comp., Natchez Court Records, 1767-1805, Greenwood MS, 1953, v. 2, p. 450, 541. MS Dept. of Archives & History (MDAH), Jackson MS, rootsweb, Americans Arriving in Spanish-Held Natchez 1780-1790. MSGenWeb, Natchez District 1792 Census Index, comp. by Ellen Pack, website, transcribed and translated from Spanish. North Carolina Land Grants, vol. 2, at Morganton NC Library, p. 6, #1476, transcribed by Lisabeth M. Holloway Oct 9, 1987. Rowland, Dunbar, "1816 Census for Franklin Co. Miss.", taken from The Official and Statistical Register of the State of Mississippi,Centennial Edition, 1917, rootsweb website. Webster Co. KY, "The Story of the Harp Brothers", Hopkins Co. Hist. Soc., website. Wells, Carol, Natchez Postscripts 1781-1798, Heritage Books, pp. 101, 144-5, 151, |
|||