THROUGH
MOUNTAIN MISTS
Early Settlers of
Their
Descendants...Their Stories...Their Achievements
Lifting the
Mists of History on Their Way of Life
By: Ethelene Dyer Jones
Of the 147 heads of households
recorded in Union County’s
first census in 1834, two were Brown families, David Brown with three
males and
two females and Milton Brown with five males and six females. Of the 903 population recorded at that time,
sixteen had the surname Brown.
Both David and Milton Brown continued
to live in
Then came a surprise. An examination
of the 1850 census revealed that the Brown population had taken a
decided
growth spurt in the decade. The number
of households with a Brown listed had increased to twenty-seven but
only
twenty-one of these were Brown households, for six of the Browns
enumerated
were living in the household of persons not bearing the Brown surname. These were Elliott Brown, age 23, in the home
of Joseph (age 25, b. SC) and Martha Stephens (age 17, b. SC). Franklin Brown (age 23, b. NC) in the
home
of J. E. Purkins (age 38, b. NC) and
Browns noted as heads of households in
the 1850 census were Harmon Brown (35, b. SC), his wife, Sarah (later
listed by
her nickname Sally—age 31, NC) and six children, ages 10 to 9 months: John, Alfred, George, Elisha, Jackson and
Smith Loransey.
Susan Brown (age 64, NC) was evidently
a widow with two children still at home, John (age 21, b. KY) and
Elizabeth
(age 18, b. KY).
Jacob Brown (age 52, b. NC) headed a
household with his wife
G. W. Brown (age 40, b. NC) had a wife
named
Mary Brown (age 45, b. NC) headed a
household with four children still at home, all born in NC: Smith (18), John (16), Josephus (12) and
Sarah (10).
John Brown (68, b. NC) and his wife,
Sally (60, b. NC) had in the house with them a person listed as Betsy
Miller
(22, b. NC).
James Brown (34, b. NC) and his wife
Anner (35, b. NC) had four children who had been born in NC, namely
Mary Ann
(11), Henry (8), Martha (7), and Jesse (5); and little Sarah Jane (3)
and John
(1) had been born since they arrived in
Continuing with listings of 1850 Brown
households in
Next door is John Brown, Sr. (53, b.
NC), his wife, Tempey (57, b. NC) and children James (19, NC) and
Margaret (17,
NC).
Another household has John M. (40, NC)
as its head, making this four in 1840 with John as the head of
household. His wife was named Sarah (39,
b. NC) and
children James (17), William (16), Andrew (14), Willson (12) and Jane
(9), all
born in NC, and John (2) born since the family arrived in
Nathaniel Brown headed a small
household. He was 26, born in NC, with
his wife, Mary Ann (18, b. NC) and their 11-month old child William. Living in their household was James Gallion
(17, b. NC). Could he have been a
brother to Mary Ann?
By 1850, Milton Brown was 54, we learn
that he was born in NC, as was his wife, Kissiah, age 52, and their
very large
family of children numbering nine still at home were all listed as
having been
born in NC. However, this may be a
mistake on the part of the census taker, for Milton Brown had been in
The last of the Brown households noted
in 1850 was headed by R. A. (Romulus A. of the 1840 census, age 37, b.
SC) and
his wife Elizabeth (38, b. NC) with the elder two of their children
born in
NC: Leander 17 and Catharine, 15. The other five children had been born since
the family moved to
Readers who have Brown family ties may be able to link back to some of these early households of Union settlers. Next week we will look at some Brown marriages before 1850 and how the name Brown was linked through wedlock to other early settlers.
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