Pension Application
of Harriet Jeffers, daughter of Berry Jeffers: W10145:
Transcribed and
annotated by C. Leon Harris
State of South
Carolina} Fairfield District} SS
On this twenty sixth
day of June in the year of Our Lord One thousand Eight Hundred and
fifty personally appeared in open Court before the
undersigned Judge of the Court of Ordinary in and for the District
aforesaid in the State aforesaid Harriet Jeffers, aged
forty-nine years a resident of Fairfield District in the State of
South Carolina, who being first duly sworn according to law doth on her
oath make the following Declaration in order to obtain the benefit
of the provision made by the Act of Congress passed July
7, 1838 and the subsequent Acts & Resolutions of Congress granting
Pensions to Certain widows, That she is the daughter
and heir at law of Joannis Jeffers deceased who was the widow of
Berry Jeffers deceased, a Revolutionary soldier and who served
as follows, That said Berry Jeffers at the time of the war was
living in what is now Richland District in the State of South
Carolina and about the years 1775 or 1776 enlisted as a private
soldier in the third South Carolina Continental Regiment Commanded by
Colonel William Thomson and in the company of Captain Rich’d Brown,
That in said capacity he served out his full period of
enlistment to
wit three years and as such was a fellow soldier of Gideon and
Morgan Griffin, Allen and Osborne Jeffers
the latter of whom a brother of Declarant’s father was killed in
battle as this Deponent was informed in Charleston South Carolina.
That afterwards he served under General Thomas Sumter Capt. William
Smith’s Company in what was called Sumter’s Brigade, That after
serving as aforesaid he came back to his old neighborhood and on
Twenty third Day of August AD. 1782 he married Joannis, or as she
was often called by the family, Hannah Griffin: That her aforesaid
father Berry Jeffers died about Thirty years ago in Richland
District and her mother the aforesaid Joannis or Harriet Jeffers
remained the widow of said Berry
Jeffers until her death on the sixth: teeth (sic) day of November
A.D. 1844: She further swears that her said mother Joannis Jeffers
died without ever applying for a pension as such widow being very
poor & ignorant as to manner of obtaining it That they were married
by the Rev’d Mr Logue at the time above stated & previous to the
first day of January Seventeen hundred and ninety-four.
Sworn to and
Subscribed on the day and year aforesaid before me}
J. S. Stewart} Harriet
her + mark Jeffers Judge of the Court of Ordinary} for Fairfield
District}
NOTES:
In the file is a paper
stating "Berry Jeffers was born March the 25th day 1750" and giving
dates of marriage and births of children. He was probably a free
black. It is unlikely that he was in Sumter’s Brigade. The pension
applications of Allen Jeffers (S1770) and of Morgan Griffin
(S18844), free blacks with whom he served, suggest that his
three-year enlistment expired during the siege at Charleston. He
would then have been either a prisoner for the rest of the war, or,
more likely, paroled as a civilian. See also the pension
applications of Gideon Griffin (W8877) and Edward Harris (R4649).
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