Last week, I thought I had put Daniel Vannoy to bed in the best way that could be done, all things considered, with the amazing breakthrough article, Daniel Vannoy (1752-after 1820), “Lived in the Boundary of the Cherokee Indians” – Say What?. That insight arrived courtesy of Wilkes County, NC historian, Jason Duncan.

Well, guess again, Daniel wasn’t finished yet – even though I thought he was. I swear, that man STILL has a mind of his own!

Now, que Cousin Carol and “Cleanup on aisle 4.”

Cousin Carol and I have been collaborating on and off for at least 30 years, and probably longer. Let’s put it this way, Carol’s now fully adult child was shoving business cards, aka play credit cards, into the disc drive of Carol’s new computer, and disrupted our research at one time. The accompanying pictures of our little “purchaser” were so cute though – how could we not laugh?

Carol did a lot of transcribing old records back in the day and excels at finding extremely obscure information.

Daniel Vannoy is Carol’s ancestor too, so after she read my article last week, she proceeded to see what else she could unearth.

This is not the first time Carol has cleaned up an ancestor after me – or found information that I had missed altogether, or wasn’t available at the time I looked.

Truthfully, I LOVE it when cousins do exactly that. I don’t know if Carol searched differently than I did, used different keywords, had more patience, is simply more skilled, or what, but a few days later, Carol sent me another document that fills in a key piece of Daniel’s life.

Well, in this case, the end of his life.

But like everything else with Daniel, there’s more to the story, and the whole thing is strange.

Really strange!

Daniel’s Death

Using FamilySearch’s full text search, Carol discovered a document that Daniel signed on September 24, 1826, in Fayette County, Georgia, where he left “everything” to one Sarah Evins.

Wait! What?

We left Daniel in Hall County, Georgia in 1820 as an old man.

What is he doing running around Georgia six years later? In a different county? What gives?

Daniel must have been very ill, because this does not read like a normal document – neither a deed or a will.

A deed normally says explicitly what is being deeded, including a land description or the goods involved.

A will normally begins with something like, “I, so and so, being weak of body but sound of mind…” and then goes on to explicitly state exactly what property is being given to various people, even if it is one person.

That’s not how Daniel’s document reads.

After the date, September 24^th, which was a Sunday, this says:

Know all men by these presents that I do this day make over all my property that is now in my possession all that (ever?) will hereafter come to me unto Sarah (Marewere, Murewere, Mureweve or maybe Murewood) Evins.

Signed Daniel Vannoy

Witnesses:

Mathew T. Bishop
Aaron Tilghman
Nancy Tilghman

I wish I could make out Sarah’s “middle” name, which is either her birth surname, or another clue to her identity. I’m guessing, based on the ages of the people involved and a later hint that she was the widow of an Evans male in the area.

The Justice

One of the witnesses, Aaron Tilghman, took himself to find one of the Justices of the Fayette County Inferior Court on October 2^nd to swear a deposition that he saw Daniel sign the document – and that he saw the other two witness sign as a witnesses as well.

Apparently, court was not in session right then, so Aaron sought out and found a justice to witness his deposition. That’s also quite unusual.

Personally came before me James Strawn one of the Justices of the Inferior Court for said county Aaron Tilghman who being duly sworn deposeth and saith that he saw Daniel Vannoy sign seal and deliver the written instrument of writing and that he also signed the same as a subscribing witness and said Matthew T. Bishop signed the same and Nancy Tilghman do so likewise. Sworn to and subscribed before me this 2^nd day of October 1826.

Signed by both Aaron Tilghman and James Strawn J. C.

Recorded October 10th 1826 by Hiram Strawn Clk

October 2^nd was a Monday, so he hadn’t been able to get this taken care of for a week and a day. There was no mention of Daniel being deceased, but neither was he present when the Justice witnessed Aaron’s deposition.

The Witnesses

Aaron Tilghman and Nancy Clecker were married in Fayetteville, Fayette Co., GA on May 11, 1823. Aaron was born in 1785, and Nancy was born about 1803.

Matthew T. Bishop, the third witness, was living in John B. Garrison’s district on the 1826 Fayette County tax list, along with one Evans man.

Aaron Tilghman lived in Libins Wharton’s District on the waters of Beaver Dam, adjoining Oliver. Four Evans men live in that district as well.

There is no Daniel or Sarah anyplace on the Fayette County tax list in 1826.

We don’t know, but I’m presuming that the witnesses lived near Daniel and probably were at his house when he signed the document.

Recording the Document

This document was recorded with the Fayette County Clerk on October 10, 1826.

It appears that they weren’t clear whether this was a will or a deed either.

Here’s the reverse index entry.

In the reverse index, this document is categorized as a will.

Based on the other entries, the “Date Recorded” looks to be the probate date.

October 10^th was a Tuesday.

Unfortunately, the Fayette County Inferior Court records have not been indexed nor have they been included in the FamilySearch full-text AI-assisted search – yet. Hopefully soon. Some Fayette County record viewing is restricted to FamilySearch facilities. The Fayette County property search seems to be nonfunctional. Daniel may still be hiding!

Fayette County probate records are shown beginning in 1823, but the actual records prior to 1827 seem to be for Henry County, and there is no mention of either Vannoy or Sarah Evins/Evans in 1827 or beyond. Very frustrating. I so wanted to have a peek into Daniel’s final years by viewing the inventory of his estate.

Based on the information we do have, Daniel Vannoy was clearly alive but probably knew death was imminent on September 24^th and didn’t know how he was going to leave his worldly possessions to a woman who was not his wife.

This could have been an urgent issue, especially if some of the property normally assumed to be his was actually hers.

The best way to handle the situation? Just give her everything. And that’s exactly what Daniel did in one sentence.

Two Sarahs, One Wife

To be clear, without a will, Daniel’s holdings, whatever they may have been, would have descended to his wife and children, under court supervision. An administrator would have been appointed to handle the inventory and distribution of his assets, after any “just debts” were paid. That’s the normal process. Keep in mind that Daniel left Wilkes County decades earlier owing the court.

Daniel may or may not have known whether Sarah Hickerson Vannoy, his wife, was still living back in Wilkes County, NC. He would either have known or could have assumed that at least some of his children, and probably several grandchildren, were living.

In other words, if Daniel wanted to leave something to someone other than his legal heirs, it had to be in writing and bulletproof. Hence the deposition by Aaron Tilghman in front of a court justice was an attempt at legal armor – anticipating a potential fight.

Does that mean Daniel had something worth fighting for? It might seem so. If all Daniel had was a cow, a legal document might not have been so critical.

Daniel swore his deed/will or whatever it was, and Aaron hightailed it to town to find a justice to take his deposition that he saw Daniel sign, and saw the other witnesses sign too.

Who of Daniel’s Family Was Living?

Would Daniel have known if his wife, Sarah was living or had already passed over?

• In 1812, we know that Daniel was writing back and forth with his brother, Nathaniel, in Wilkes County, NC. We know that Nathaniel was still living in 1826, but he would have been about 76 by then. He died in 1835 in Greenville, SC, living with his daughter, but we don’t know when he made that move. Daniel may or may not have been still corresponding with Nathaniel.
• Daniel’s sister, Rachel, died between 1780 and 1787, so not corresponding with her.
• Daniel’s brother, Abraham, disappeared from the picture about 1770 and probably died.
• Daniel’s brother, Andrew, died in 1809, so Daniel clearly wasn’t corresponding with him either.
• Daniel’s brother, Francis, had migrated to Knox County, Kentucky many years earlier and died in 1822, so Daniel wasn’t writing to him, if he ever had.
• Daniel’s sisters, Hannah and Catherine, who may or may not have married Baker men, may or may not have been living. I’d wager they were not based on the fact that none of the early genealogies mention them other than very briefly in passing, if at all.
• Daniel’s sister, Susannah, who had married John Long, died about 1812, so he wasn’t communicating with her.

Of Daniel’s siblings, we know that most have died. Only Nathaniel is living, for certain, but we don’t know when he moved away, if they maintained their communication, and if Nathaniel would have known about Sarah. Only one of Nathaniel’s children remained in Wilkes County. The frontier beckoned to most of them sooner or later.

Daniel’s wife, Sarah Hickerson, is unquestionably living in 1819 (more about this later) and is probably the Sarah Vannoy who is on the 1820 census, although the age categories appear to be incorrect. What else is new?

Sarah wasn’t the only person with a legal interest in Daniel’s estate. His children did, and if his child had died, their descendants would have shared in their parent’s lawful share of Daniel’s estate.

Of Daniel’s known children:

• Elijah Vannoy married Lois McNiel about 1809 and had moved to Claiborne County, TN by about 1812. Daniel probably knew that Elijah had pulled up stakes because he was writing to Nathaniel in 1812, but we have no idea if Daniel had any communication with Elijah, or if Elijah heard news through family members back in Wilkes County.
• Daniel’s son, Joel, married twice and became the sheriff in Wilkes County. I’d wager that Daniel was aware of Joel’s position, and perhaps that’s why such painstaking care was taken to be sure that Daniel and his witnesses covered every base possible prior to Daniel’s death.
• We know that Daniel had two daughters born between 1787, but they may have died young. If not, we don’t know who they are.
• We know that Daniel had a daughter born sometime around 1800 who may have been Susanna, and if so, she married George McNiel, and lived to about 1883.
• We know that one daughter, Marthea, was living in 1819 and was at her mother’s house when men came and took her. We don’t know anything else, but if Marthea was alive in 1826, she would have clearly been a legal heir.

What we do know, beyond a doubt, is that Daniel Vannoy and Sarah Hickerson Vannoy never legally divorced. I’d guess you could call their situation a “frontier divorce,” although it’s unclearly if Sarah agreed to that arrangement. If Daniel abandoned his family, had no assets to pay his fine at court, but later acquired assets that he left to someone else – I’d wager his name was mud in both the Vannoy and Hickerson families, and in Wilkes County more broadly.

Death Notification

As I pondered this situation further, I realized that unlike today, when children and parents moved to different locations, they had to depend on unreliable communications, such as letters which could take months to arrive – if ever. Plus, both parties had to be able to read and write.

Bad news didn’t travel fast back then and might not have traveled at all.

Given that Daniel abandoned his family in Wilkes County, lived outside of the boundary of the US on Cherokee lands, and moved to another similar location after 1820, it’s questionable that anyone in Wilkes County, NC or Claiborne County, TN was notified of Daniel’s passing. It seems that Daniel took pains to prevent them from inheriting anything.

Furthermore, the only person who would probably have known anything about Daniel’s past, at least enough to know where and to whom to write – if she even could read and write – was the second Sarah. It was not in second Sarah’s interest to notify Daniel’s family, even if they held any affection for him.

Suffice it to say that the ultimate irony would be if the second non-wife Sarah notified the still-wife Sarah of Daniel’s demise. That would surely have stirred up a hornet’s nest and caused all kinds of questions to be asked about whatever those possessions were that Daniel took such pains to leave to the second Sarah.

I’d wager none of that happened, and as far as his children were concerned, either as Daniel aged and his brothers died or moved, or when he died, communications slowed, then simply stopped. Everyone had gone on with their lives in one way or another. The people he left behind probably thought about him from time to time and assumed he had died, which, of course, was eventually true.

Daniel’s youngest children would never have known him, and his oldest ones would only have retained vague memories from childhood. By 1826, Daniel hadn’t been a part of their lives in more than a quarter century – so there was nothing to miss except for long-ago lost opportunity.

Daniel Had Moved

In 1820, Daniel was living in a household in Hall County, Georgia with four other people over the age of 16. It’s virtually impossible that Daniel owned land prior to 1820, since until 1817, that land belonged to the Cherokee. In 1818, Return J. Meigs, the Indian Agent, petitioned the government, asking for pity for a small list of white “intruders,” Daniel among them.

The Georgia land lottery, which awarded formerly Cherokee and Creek lands in Hall County to whites, took place in late 1820, after the census, so until then, and thereafter unless they won land or purchased it from a lucky winner, the families living there were squatters. The Cherokee people in Hall County had already left or become citizens.

It appears from records that in 1819 and 1820, after the lottery was established by a legislative act, a list of eligible recipients was compiled. According to the Georgia archives, the actual land lottery took place by random drawing at the state capital between September 1 and December 2, 1820.

Lots to be awarded were located in Hall County districts 8-12 and were 250 acres each, with an $18 fee to register the lot.

Daniel’s move to Fayette County probably had to do with the lottery, which would have awarded the Cherokee lands on which he lived to someone else – even if he had been a lottery winner. Winners didn’t get to choose where their land was located. You got what you got.

Fayette County was formed in 1821 from lands taken from the Creek, and the first land lottery there took place in 1821 when the county was formed. There’s no record that either Carol or I could find indicating that Daniel owned land, which he could potentially have either obtained through that lottery, or by purchase after the lottery. Lottery winners still had to pay to register and claim their land, and some winners sold the land because they couldn’t afford the registration fee.

Qualifications for the Land Lottery

Not everyone qualified to put their name in the hat. Qualifications for the drawing included being a US citizen who had been a Georgia resident for at least three years. To register, one had to go to the courthouse and apply.

To qualify to obtain one draw ticket, the would-be landowner had to:

• Be at least 18
• Or a widow
• Or a family of minor orphans whose father was deceased
• Or a family of one or two orphans whose parents were both deceased

Two tickets went to people who were:

• A married man with a wife or son under 18, or an unmarried daughter
• A widow or orphan whose husband or father was killed in the Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, or an Indian war
• A family of 3 or more orphans whose parents were both deceased
• The child or children of a person in the penitentiary

People ineligible to participate were:

• Any winner of any previous Georgia land lottery
• Anyone in the penitentiary
• Citizens drafted into any of the aforementioned wars but who refused to serve either in person or by substitute
• A tax defaulter or someone who absconded for debt. This might have excluded Daniel, but they would have to have known, and it’s unclear whether this means in Georgia or more broadly.
• Any person who resided upon the lottery territory previous to the extinguishment of the Indian title to the land. This, alone, would clearly exclude Daniel, and may have been why, in 1818, Return J. Meigs was asking for pity on a few “intruders” who had lived there for several years.

There seemed to be a lot of corruption baked into this process. Maybe that explains how the men who were living in Hall County in the 1820 census, before the lottery, are the same families living there after, and generations later.

Regardless, Daniel moved to Fayette County.

That means that my earlier assumption that Daniel was buried at or near Yellow Creek Cemetery in Hall County is wrong. He may have attended the adjacent church, probably attended funerals there, but he’s not buried there himself.

Daniel’s Homestead

Given that the land in Hall County where Daniel lived was part of the lottery, he would have either needed to purchase it from the winner, or move. That meant that Daniel lost any house he had built or any improvements he made on the Cherokee lands where he lived in Hall County, but didn’t own.

Daniel’s cabin may have looked something like this cabin built by a Cherokee in Cave Spring, Georgia, possibly either Avery Vann, a Scottish trader who married a Cherokee woman, or their son, David Vann, who was a sub-chief of the Cherokee people. It’s also possible that Daniel’s home was smaller and one-story.

In a 1908 article in the Atlanta University Press, this cabin was identified to the 1860s in Fayette County. Daniel’s five enslaved people probably lived in a similar structure.

Daniel would have lost all of his improvements, including outbuildings such as barns for livestock. He would have taken his “moveable assets” and literally moved on down the road.

For whatever reason, Daniel selected another area where the Creek people had lost their land to the US government. Given what had just happened in Hall County, I have to wonder why he would do this again.

Fayette County, Georgia

How Daniel chose the next place to move is unknown, but Fayette County was being formed out of lands ceded by the Creek in 1821, just about the time that Daniel would have been trying to figure out someplace to live.

It stood to reason that sometime soon, the lands in Fayette and the other new counties established from Creek land would be coming available in the land lottery, which they did, in 1822.

It’s not like Hall County and Fayette County were next door neighbors. We don’t actually know where in these two counties that Daniel lived, so his move could have been as close as 75 miles, or maybe as far as a hundred. We know it’s in this vicinity someplace.

Daniel didn’t live in Fayette County on Creek land prior to the land being ceded, so maybe he wasn’t excluded from being eligible for that lottery.

Or maybe the reason he moved to Fayette County is because it was newly ceded and he thought it would be mostly vacant. Beginning in 1822, white settlers literally began pouring in, resulting in clashes with the Creek who had not yet removed. It’s also possible that he did win land, or purchased land from a winner.

In 1822, when Fayette was being first settled, Daniel would have been 70 years old.

Fayetteville became the county seat, and Atlanta, in neighboring Gwinnett County, didn’t yet exist. During the Civil War, which began only 35 years after Daniel died, the final chapters of the Battle of Atlanta occurred in Fayette County.

While today, much of Fayette County is urban and suburban, when Daniel selected that location, settlers quickly became cotton planters, leveraging the labor of enslaved people to pick and process the crop. We know from the 1820 census that while Daniel was living on Cherokee lands, he did own 5 enslaved people. One could assume he took them with him.

There is a Georgia 1826 tax list, and there are no records of a Daniel Vannoy, or any Vannoy, or a Sarah Evins, Evans, or anything similar, in any county.

I tried tracking Sarah Evans forward in time, but she is not to be found in the 1830 census either.

Who Was Sarah?

I wish I could decipher Sarah’s middle name in the deed/will that Daniel signed. The closest I can get is perhaps Murwood, but I can’t find any record of a Murwood, or similar, female marrying an Evans male anyplace. I suspect that many of the settlers to that region, perhaps like Daniel, might have been hoping to disappear and not leave many records.

One Sarah Evans appears in the Georgia Tax Digests 1787-1900 for the years 1814, 1815, and 1817 with two enslaved people and no other property. I can’t tell which county, and there’s no way of knowing if it’s the same woman. This might explain part of how there were five enslaved people in Daniel’s household in 1820.

If this is the same Sarah, that really only tells us that she was widowed, and that she and Daniel never married – which we already know.

Of course, the answer to “why not” is that Daniel clearly knew that he was already married. I wonder if Sarah Evins, Sarah-the-second, knew.

The 1827 Land Lottery

The next Georgia land lottery took place in 1827, not long after Daniel’s death, and on the list of winners, we find one Sarah Vannoy who resides in Fayette County. Sarah gives her last name as Vannoy and lists herself as a widow.

One thing that may have helped Sarah is that the requirement that excluded anyone who had previously lived on Indian lands appears to be gone. It’s also not clear if that meant anyone living on any Indian lands, or just the Indian lands being distributed in the current lottery. Regardless, Sarah had no need to be concerned about that, or Daniel’s past debts, and she apparently obtained land. I say apparently, because not all sources agree and the Georgia Archives does not have an online list.

Section 1, District 32, Lot 15 – Vannoy, Sarah – widow – Fayette County, (residence), Hortons (Capt. Dist.) Lee County

Is Sarah claiming to be Daniel’s widow here? It surely appears that way.

Based on this, Sarah was probably substantially younger than Daniel. Daniel was 74 years and 8 months old in October of 1826. Just four months shy of three-quarters of a century. He’s listed on the 1820 census in the “over 45” category. If one of the women in the household is Sarah, then she is probably one of the two females aged 26-44. If she was 44 in 1820, she would have been about 50 when Daniel died.

I sure would like to know what happened to Sarah’s land? It’s possible that she simply sold it, but she still had to live someplace.

I’d further like to confirm that Daniel did not receive any lands in 1822 in Fayette County. Unfortunately, the complete Land Lottery records are only available hardcopy, or at a physical FamilySearch center or affiliated library, and there’s not one close by.

Sarah appears to have won land in Lee County, GA, but their records for this time period no longer exist, so we’ll never know what happened to Sarah’s land, or who her heirs might have been.

Closure for Daniel

At least, now, we have both more information and a wee bit of closure about Daniel.

• We know that apparently Daniel’s wife and final partner were both named Sarah, not that this is confusing or anything.
• We know that the second Sarah (Murwood? Evins), who lived in Fayette County, listed herself as a widow, using the Vannoy surname, in the 1827 land lottery. She clearly thought of herself as Daniel’s wife, or it was beneficial (or maybe less embarrassing) to be his widow.
• We know this cannot be the first Sarah, because in 1826, her name was Evins, with an “M” word for her middle, perhaps her maiden name. Plus, if the original Sarah Hickerson Vannoy was still living, she would not have been a resident of the state of Georgia for three years, and living in Fayette County.
• If the original Sarah Hickerson Vannoy was living in Fayette County, GA, after Daniel abandoned her and their children back around 1800, I’d wager we’d know about it because he would not have died a natural death. Plus, Daniel wouldn’t have needed to sign anything to leave things to his wife and children because that would have happened automatically.
• We know that although Daniel lived in Hall County when the Cherokee ceded the land in 1817, and in 1820, he had moved to Fayette County sometime before 1826.
• I surely wish I could figure out where in Fayette County Daniel lived, because if I could, I might be able to figure out where he is buried. I’d love to take a Google Street View drive down the road where he lived, and to the cemetery where he finally got to rest in peace.
• We may not know where Daniel is buried, but we do know that he was alive on September 24, 1826, although perhaps barely able to whisper his wishes and sign his name one final time. He’s probably still alive on October 2^nd, because if he had already passed, the deed/will document would have been filed that day, in addition to the justice witnessing the deposition of Aaron Tilghman.
• Thanks to Carol’s amazing find, we now know Daniel’s death date within a week, which is downright miraculous, all things considered. He died sometime between October 2nd and 9th, 1826. It’s ironic that we know Daniel’s exact birth date, and very nearly his exact death date, but entire decades of his life are missing about which we have absolutely no information. It’s normally the other way around, with approximate birth and death years, but detailed land records and such.
• By October 10^th, 1826, Daniel’s journey on earth was complete. His funeral had been preached, his body buried, and he had gone on to visit the ancestors on the other side. His will, such as it was, was filed, and the second Sarah began life as Daniel’s “widow.”
• Perhaps the first Sarah began life as Daniel’s widow that day too – except she might not have known, and for her, it wasn’t any different than the last 26 or 27 years had been.

Or, conversely, maybe the first Sarah was at the heard of the line, in front of Daniel’s ancestors, waiting there, on the other side, to have a word with him.

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