Our first ancestor in Hebron was George McKnight, who served as Lieutenant under John Williams and Alexander Webster in the Charlotte County militia during the Revolution. As an officer, George would have been an educated man, perhaps, or an experienced soldier, or both. John Williams was a doctor, by far the most well educated man in the area and the clear and obvious choice to command the Regiment. Alexander Webster was a lawyer and may also have had prior experience in battle. All three men can be placed in Hebron (then called "Black Creek") as early as 1773. Webster and McKnight received their commissions in late 1775, and the Williams regiment (called the "Dorset Regiment") was commissioned in February, 1776. Thus George was already serving as a military officer before the signing of the Declaration of Independence in July 1776.
The only personal history of George McKnight that I have found was written in 1868 by Asa Fitch, a local (Salem) entomologist (bug guy) who collected local family histories on the side. He created many family histories, each carefully recorded, numbered and cross-referenced in a neat and steady hand. His manuscripts were never published, but were microfilmed and are available in the Bancroft library. Two of the entries are directly related to our family - numbers 1733, which describes George McKnight, and 1734, which describes his son, James. Be forewarned that both paragraphs contain factual errors, but they are enlightening. Number 1733 is transcribed in full here.
" 1733. Old George McKnight of Hebron – Family.
" I gather the following, from Esq. James McKnight, Hebron, March 9, 1868. He says his father James, was the son of George McKnight, who came from Ireland when a boy to Pennsylvania, and there married Jean Beattie, and had three children, James(¶ 1734), Sally (married Joseph Chambers) and Nelly, wife of Andrew Randles a brother of Hugh Randles.
" He emigrated from Pa. to Hebron, before the Revolutionary War, and took up a large tract of land, 1000 acres I think, in the central point of the town, including part of “Pine Hill” – Alex. Webster joining him and taking a similar tract.
" At the time the country was evacuated, on Burgoyne’s invasion, he went back to his old neighborhood in Pa. with his family (see ¶ 225) going, I think, on horseback, and their dog following on after them. They staid there through the winter and returned the next spring. They did not bring the dog back with them, but when they had been back about six months, the dog came back! A most surprising instance of canine attachment and intelligence.
" When the St. Lawrence country began to attract the attention of settlers from this vicinity, his two sons in law and he got the fever to move to Lisbon, where the lands they thought were far more desirable than his land here. He accordingly sold out everything and moved with them to Lisbon. James, his son, declined going there, which offended the old man so that he would not give him a share of his property, but let his favorite daughters and their husbands have it all. All that James, my father, got of the hundreds of acres of his father’s was 77 acres – this being pay that he was legally entitled to for working for his father from the time he was 21, till the removal – which was the farm on which James afterwards passed his days, and his son George now lives.
" But his favorite sons in law became dissipated and spent the old man’s property, and he came back to Hebron before the War of 1812, and father took care of him the rest of his life. He is buried with the rest of the family in the Town Grave Yard.
" I know nothing of the descendants of my uncles, Chambers and Randles, only that a son, George Randles was years ago Captain of a steam boat running from Ogdenburg down the river to Montreal and Quebec."
Asa Fitch Manuscript, paragraph 1733, copied from microfilm in Bancroft Library, Salem NY, 2003, transcribed August 2010.
No comments:
Post a Comment