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Joshua Howard
Born 1745? Wilkes Co. NC
Died ?Oct 1814 Wilkes Co. NC

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?Father
SPOUSE CHILDREN
Alice "Aylee" Bryan

m. Mar 7, 1789
Rowan Co. NC
b. 1746/53?
Rowan Co. NC

John

b. 1803
Davidson Co. TN
d. 1854
Davidson Co. TN
In December 1772, Joshua Howard was involved with a gang that killed several people traveling down the Mississippi River. This event managed to get recorded in several colonial newspapers. The gang consisted of Ennis [sic] Hooper, Charles Holmes, Joshua Howard, Absalom Hooper, Richard Holloway, and Reason Young. The governors of both New Orleans and British West Florida [1774 Proclamation] tried to capture the culprits, but never managed to get the last three men named. Joshua Howard gave evidence on the crime, and Ennis Hooper and Charles Holmes both were hung by the middle of 1774 [Rivington, New York Gazeteer, Aug 4, 1774].
Joshua Howard was among those who petitioned the British Govt. of West Florida for land on Nov 6, 1776. He was given a warrant for 200 acres on Second Creek in the Natchez District and the receipt for surveying fees was dated Jan. 22, 1777.
In January and October 1779, Second Creek neighbor Absalom Hooper signed Loyalist petitions to the governor of British West Florida. On 27 Oct 1780, he was named in a deposition now held in Seville, Spain. Several others named in depositions in the record series in late 1780 included Joshua Howard, Thomas Holmes, and Phillip Alston, father of John McCoy Alston who in 1795 married Hooper's daughter Sinia.
Neighbor Frederick likely marched over land with his family toward the mountains after the British destroyed is home in Augusta GA and joined the Amos Eaton party that left the NC mountains in Dec 1779 for the Cumberland Settlement. The Eaton party arrived at the beginning of 1780, just a week after the leading James Robertson party of men, horses and dogs. Frederick received one of the Cumberland Settlement's 1,410 Pioneer Land Grants. This part of Washington Co. is now Middle Tennessee.
Frederick Stump was in his fifties when he came to the Cumberland Settlement in Washington Co. NC. He was thought to have famously killed 10 Indians in his native Pennsylvania in Jan 1768, and had been jailed for killing British soldiers in Georgia. After he escaped, he joined the Amos Eaton expedition to Cumberland and claimed land on Whites Creek and helped build Eaton's fort (also called Heaton's Station). He later started a distillery and an inn and tavern, helped improve local roads, and was granted more land in the Whites Creek area. Map of the Cumberland Settlement in 1780.
The land that Frederick Stump claimed bordered that of William White, the eldest son of John White and a private on the NC Continental Line, thereby receiving an original land claim in the Cumberland Settlement in Washington Co. NC, but may never have actually settled on the land. This may be why John Holloway was there in 1780. The claim John Holloway attempted with a James Scott the year before on Long ("Glady") Creek (shown on Map) appears to be the same as Whites Creek which ran through the lands claimed by Frederick Stump, William White, Joshua Howard, and Absalom Hooper, before flowing into the Cumberland River. See Topographical Map showing early land claims in the Whites Creek area [Drake, p. 23 and map E7]. James Scott did receive a land grant but John Holloway never did.
By May 1780, Frederick was with his family in the new Cumberland Settlement in Washington Co. in western NC territory (now TN). Frederick and his son Jacob, along with about 250 other men over the age of 16, signed the Cumberland Compact created May 1, 1780. It was finalized on May 13 and established a provisional government for the isolated area; provided for the election of twelve representatives from the eight stations or forts; provided for a Sheriff, a Clerk, a Militia that required service by all men over age 16, and for the adjudication of causes, the administration of estates, and the awarding of executions. Image of page 2 of the original Compact. The signature, in dutch or german, of "Frederick Stumpf" is tenth down from the top, just below that of "John Holloday". His son Jacob Stump, and William Hood signed after him. Hood was killed by Indians in 1780 or 1781, and by winter of 1780, Jacob Stump was killed while out with his father near their home along Whites Creek.
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.
Joshua Howard arrived in the Cumberland Settlement from the Natchez District by the beginning of 1781. He eventually was assigned Captain of the Freeland's Station on Mar 15, 1783 [Clayton, p. 37].
Joshua Howard owned 200 acres on Second Creek in the Natchez District. His petition to the British West Florida Government for the land was dated Nov 6, 1776. The receipt for surveying fees was dated Jan 22, 1777. After the Spaniards took possession of the territory, Howard left the Natchez District for the Cumberland Settlement in an area of far western North Carolina that later became Nashville TN. He returned to Natchez at the end of 1788.
On Oct 3, 1786 Joshua was sued in Davidson Co. Witnesses in the suit were Mildred Alston and Frankey Drumgoole, the wife and daughter of Philip Alston [McBee, p. 592].
On Dec 31, 1788, "Joucha Hayward" arrived in Natchez from "Cumberland/Tennessee", not listed among the flatboats and without family. In a letter dated Mar 2, 1790, from Carlos de Grand-Pré, Natchez, Mar 2, 1790 to Governor Don Estavan Miro, the amount of tobacco was reported by growers of Natchez. A "Joshua Houvard" reported producing 5000 pounds of tobacco [MS Dept of Archives & History, website].
On Mar 7, 1789 Joshua married Aylee Bryan, the daughter of Joseph Bryan (1720-1805) in Rowan Co. NC.
According to the 1792 Spanish Census for Natchez District, a Joshua Howard was a head of household in the District of Second & Sandy Creek, as was "Juan Holladay", both single white males without blacks or slaves. A different translation has a Tonio Howard with 6 whites and 5 blacks on 400 arpents (336 acres) of land in the same area, which was east and south of Natchez.
1895 Map of Natchez from the Ancestral Trackers website, shows the likely routes of the Second and Sandy Creeks in 1792.
Map of the Natchez District as it may have looked between 1779 and 1799.
Map showing Land Holdings in the Second Creek area in 1810 is an enlargement of part of the Adams Co. 1810 Land Holdings Map found on the website of the MS Achives and History. In the center of this map can be seen the land owned by Joshua Howard and other members of the Howard family. Brother John Howard (Jr.) tried to claim 165 acres next to D. Ferguson and R. Sessions on May 29, 1804, the same day that Joshua Howard tried to claim the 200 acres of land had been surveyed for him in 1777. The latter tract would be the land that John Holloway was "improving" and where he was killed.
Unrecorded Land Claims dated Mar 29, 1804 by Joshua and John Howard, indicating the approximate location of their lands on Second Creek, and where "John Holloway" was killed in 1781 while working there [McBee, Unrecorded Land Claims nos. 1470-1, p. 555].
Joshua Howard had become "Conservator of the Peace for the Southern District, Mississippi Territory" by Oct 27, 1798 when two men swore to the truth of statements made re: suit involving Elizabeth Still Lee lending a slave girl Peg to her son-in-law Alexander Freeland in the Summer of 1796. She had made her deposition before Cato West, Howard's counterpart in the Northern District [Ragland p.6].
In the 1816 Franklin Co. MS Census, page 4 (line 17), there is a household headed by "Jonathan Guice" with:
2 males over 20 [Jonathan],
1 male under 20 [son Nathaniel],
1 female over 20 [Anna Stump],
4 females under 20 [daughters Salome, Elizabeth, Barbara, Louisa],
and 10 slaves.
Brother Christopher married Rachel Shute (1787?-1859?). They may have had four children.
Brother Christopher was stabbed on Jul 4, 1821 by a "George Conelins" and died eight days later [1821 Nashville Gazette Death Notice].
Sources:
Adams Co. Mississippi Genealogy & History Network, "1792 Census for Natchez District (under Spanish Government control)", 2009, 1792 Census.
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, Bookseller, Nashville TN, p. 37.
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.
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 1788-1790.
"Natchez District 1792 Spanish Census Index", in USGenWeb, Early Southwest Miss. Territory, Census Index.
North Carolina Land Grants, vol. 2, at Morganton NC Library, p. 6, #1476, transcribed by Lisabeth M. Holloway Oct 9, 1987.
Ragland, M.L., comp., "Holloway Succession Records of St. Helena Parish, LA", Greenwood MS, May 1990, pp. 6, 15-16.
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.
Summerville, James, Southern Epic, Gloucester Point VA, Hallmark, 1996.
USGenWeb Archives, contr. by Houston Tracy Jr., "Deposition of William Wall, 20 Dec 1780", microfilm folio 458-9.
Wells, Carol, Natchez Postscripts 1781-1798, Heritage Books, pp. 101, 144-5, 151,
Will Books 3 and 4, Wilkes County, North Carolina, 1811-1848, The Genealogical Society of "Original" Wilkes County), Will Book 3, "Estate of Joahua Howard", Oct 1814, page 89, 120.