Life History

Notes

• ---------------------
  I believe my direct line stems from Isaac Gregory and wife Jemima, to their son Benjamin Gregory and wife Mary Jameson, to their son Jesse Tyler Gregory and wife Mary Argenbright, to his son Nathaniel Gregory and wife Sarah Tribby, to Joseph Hampton Gregory and wife Lina Summers Ham, to Nathan Thomas Gregory, my father.  From Jesse forward, the lines are fairly well documented, but Isaac and Benjamin's connections are tenuous, with very little proof.  We document herein what data we have, and the basis of our assumptions.  The tales are told as nearly in chronological order as possible, with only a few necessary steps out of the timeline in which they occurred.
  --  Nathan Gregory, Gregory Family Origins, https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Nathan_Gregory_Gregory_Family_Origins?id=bBW8BAAAQBAJ&ftm=1
  ---------------------
  
  Jesse Gregory Marriage Bond
  5 April 1814
  Rockingham County, Virginia
  Marriage Bond for Jesse Gregory and Mary Argenbright, daughter of Andrew Argenbright; bond by Jesse Gregory and George Argubright in the amount of $150, in the 38th year of the Commonwealth
  --  courtesy of research of Nathan Gregory, Ancestry.com, on 21 Jan 2009, accessed 11 September 2017
  
  The actual record of marriage reports they were married on 8 April 1814.  Note that the bond had her name spelled Mary Argenbright, but the marriage record spelled it Argabright.
  
  Virginia, Compiled Marriages, 1740-1850
  Jesse Grigory
  Mary Argabright
  Marriage 8 Jun 1814 Rockingham County, Virginia
  
  1840 Federal Census, Bath County, Kentucky, Enumeration Date 1 June 1840, No date on this page, p 31
  Jesse Gregory
  - 1 Male 15-20
  - 1 Male 20-30
  - 1 Male 50-60
  - 1 Female Under 5
  - 2 Females 10-15
  - 2 Females 5-10
  - 1 Female 15-20
  - 1 Female 40-50
  
  ----------------------------
  Jesse's mother was Mary Jamison.  This has been much debated, but I believe that this is accurate.  One strong indication is that he gave his first son the middle name of Jameson, Mary's maiden name.  We also know that Mary had a slave named Nancy, a dowery from her father David Jameson, and who had served as nanny to her children.  Jesse named his second daughter Nancy.
  
  We know Mary Jameson was mother to Charlote Ann Gregory because she appears as the bride's mother on February 20, 1815 when Charlote Ann married her husband Lewis Templeman in Bath County, Kentucky.  Charlote Ann was born, according to several reports, in Prince William County Virginia in 1793, exact date unspecifed.  We know Mary Jamison lived in Prince William County with her husband Benjamin Gregory, where he died in September of 1798.  It is not a huge reach to name Jesse as very likely born in Prince William County.
  
  We believe Jesse and Charlote Ann were brother and sister, partly because Jesse named his frstborn daughter Charlote, and partly because Mary's brother Benjamin Jamison named a daughter Charlote.
  --  A Brief Biography of Jesse Gregory, by Nathan Gregory, https://app.box.com/s/3ak8zx1zxgr3rj98k5p1, accessed 27 November 2019
  ----------------------------
  
  Jesse Gregory 1791 / Mary Argabright ca 1795-1798
  Classification: Query
  
  "I am searching for the father or any brothers or sisters of Jesse Gregory b. 1791 Bath Co. VA married Mary Argabright b. ca 1795-1798.  Jesse and Mary got married in Rockingham Co. VA April 5, 1814.  Their children were Malinda, Martha Jane, Charlotte, Nathaniel, Nancy, John Jameson, Joanna, Juelda, Trinvilla, Caroline, Janetta, and Diana.  Jesse and Mary Argabright Gregory and their children appeared on the KY census 1850 in the Bath / Rowan Counties area of KY.  All the children got married in KY.  Jesse is my GGGG Grandfather."
  --  Larry Wayne Gregory, Ancestry.com Discussion Group, 03 Mar 2002, Edited 11 Apr 2002, https://www.ancestry.com/boards/localities.northam.usa.states.virginia.counties.bath/688/mb.ashx
  
  The 1850 census lists four daughter.  The first was listed as E J.  She matches Joanna by age as reported in genealogies.
  
  1850 Federal Census, Bath County, Kentucky, 9 August, District 1, page 15 (scan #78), Hse #325, Fam #328
  Jesse Gregory 59 M Farming $1517 Real Estate reported b Virginia
  Mary Gregory 55 F b Virginia
  ** E J Gregory 24 F b Kentucky **
  Caroline Gregory 22 F b Kentucky
  Jennetta Gregory 17 F b Kentucky
  Juelda Gregory 14 F b Kentucky
  Deana Gregory 9 F b Kentucky
  
  Jesse Gregory b 1791, of Bath Co Kentucky [sic], d 1864 Bath Co Kentucky
  Marriage Mary Argabright 1814 Rockingham Co Virginia
  Children:
  Nancy Gregory, b abt 1817 Virginia, married Joseph H Coyle
  John "Jameson" Gregory, b abt 1819, Tennessee, d 1860/1870 Rowan County, Kentucky
  Nathaniel Gregory, b abt 1823, married Mahala Templeman , married Sarah Tribby
  Joanna Gregory, b 1830 Kentucky, married Coleman Brown
  "... other children although the only one I have specific information on is Juelda (9 May 1835-31 Jan 1899, the fourth wife of Thomas Stephens."
  --  Jesse Gregory Family Group Report, author unknown, 15 November 2001, online website no longer active, accessed 6 December 2006
  
  Will of Jesse Gregory
  Will written Mar 2, 1852
  First Codicil Jun 18, 1852
  Second Codicil Apr 6, 1854
  Recorded Feb 8, 1864 Will Book F, v1, pp 130-132
  Bath County Courthouse, Owingsville, Bath, Kentucky
  
  Note that the will was recorded on 8 February 1864.  We would expect that death occurred a few days before, so around 1-2 February 1864.  But the date of death on his grave is February 1863.
  
  ----------------------
  Jesse Tyler Gregory
  Birth Sep 1791 Virginia, USA
  Death Feb 1863 Bath County, Kentucky, USA
  
  Jesse Tyler Gregory came to Bath County in 1818, and bought a farm there. He ran a successful farm, raised 12 children and founded White Oak Christian Church.
  
  I have spent 15 years compiling a massive research document on the Gregory family and their friends, relatives and descendants. It remains incomplete and still very much a work in process, but a “1st Edition” volume is offered for download on Google Books for anyone interested in these families and the history of the area. Simply go to Google Play and Search for "Gregory Family Origins," or go to this URL: https://play.google.com/store/books/details/Nathan_Gregory_Gregory_Family_Origins?id=bBW8BAAAQBAJ
  
  There is also a DNA project and a Facebook Group tied to the research project. We would love to connect with more members of the extended family and expand the project. Contact the author at wa4otjgmail.com for more information.
  
  Spouse Mary Argenbright Gregory (1798 - 1872)
  Children:
  Nathaniel Gregory (1823 - 1873)
  Trinvilla Gregory Robinson (1824 - 1889)
  Sarah Jenettie Gregory Snedegar (1833 - 1900)
  Juelda M Gregory Stephens (1836 - 1899)
  
  Burial Gregory Family Cemetery, Wyoming, Bath County, Kentucky, USA
  GPS (lat/lon): 38.23011, -83.74442
  
  Created by Nathan Gregory Oct 21, 2014
  --  Find A Grave Memorial #137574019, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/137574019
  ----------------------
  
  ----------------------
  Gregorys and Fews in Migration Patterns from the 1700s
  By Orville Boyd Jenkins
  Posted on Ancestry.com 16 October 2017
  
  One factor in reconstructing a family lineage are patterns of movement and migration.  These migration paths are helpful in finding and evaluating records in our Gregory and related Few line.  We see Gregory records in a generational pattern along the migration streams along the tidewater area or valleys southwards and westward.
  
  Westward
  Records are being discovered in the westward line from Philadelphia through Frederick and Hagerstown, Maryland, through what is now West Virginia, still part of Virginia in the era we are looking at, and on to Ohio and Indiana.  Brothers John, Richard and Benjamin Gregory, thought to be sons of Isaac Gregory of Pennsylvania, are mentioned several times in lists of residents of old Frederick County, Virginia, a large area at the northern end of the Shenandoah Valley, also on a common east-west migration route.
  
  Records for a younger Richard Gregory are found in Culpeper County and Fauquier County, Virginia, on this westward path south of the Pennsylvania border.  These two counties were established in 1749, cut out of Orange County, the original huge area from which Frederick County was originally established in 1743.  These counties bordered Frederick County on the east.
  
  Dates and locations of various records match a line of movement from the residence of Richard's likely grandfather Benjamin Gregory of Pennsylvania, into Frederick County, and later back to eastern Virginia in Prince William County, across the Potomac from Washington, DC.  This westward line of migration connects with the great Shenandoah Valley running southwestward along the eastern edge of the Appalachian Mountains in what is now West Virginia.
  
  Records for a Lewis Gregory, who appears to be a son of Benjamin, son of Isaac, are found along this Shenadoah Valley route then across into the part of Virginia that later became Kentucky, one of the areas where Fews and Gregorys come into contact.  This matches the pattern of residence and Gregory-Few marriages in some of these areas along this southward line of migration.  Details are found in individual notes for the Fews and Gregorys.  Gregorys from this lineage moved westward a bit to the part of Virginia that is now northern Kentucky.
  
  Southward
  Gregorys are found along the Shenandoah Valley which runs southwestward from Hagerstown to Bristol, Virginia/Tennessee, on the border, on through Jefferson and Cocke County, which were all one area of North Carolina, then East Tennessee (current I-81 to I-40 to Knoxville) in the 1700s and early 1800s and on toward Cherokee and contiguous counties in Alabama.
  
  We find Gregorys that appear to be from two different lineages who followed the Shenandoah or similar route from Philadelphia-Baltimore through Virginia into Tennessee, our line through the easterly route of the named east Tennessee counties, the other a bit more westerly, with members of both lines in Kentucky.
  
  These two lines seem to be connected to the same line from Pennsylvania and northern Virginia.  But there are indication of one or two separate migration streams in the same areas.  Early sources are not clear on these lines, and similar names in what may be different lineages seem to have been confused in some genealogies.
  
  I have been through all these areas and explored these lines of migration so have these in mind as I read through records and watch for connections and clues.
  
  Westward Ho
  Gregorys in the line of James Henry Gregory and Rachel Lewis are found in those counties of Tennessee from Jefferson-Cocke on to Knox, McMinn (where we find both these Gregorys, with apparently no crossover), Franklin, etc, in the westward migration route.  Gregorys of our lineage also seem to have moved northwestward through the mountain passes toward Louisville.
  
  Fews and Gregorys are connected in the states of Virginia, Kentucky (which was originally part of Virginia colony), North Carolina and Tennessee (which was originally part of North Carolina Colony) in several generations.  The Fews in North Carolina apparently followed the westerly route over the Smokies into Tennessee into Jefferson County, Tennessee, and surrounding counties where they connected again with the Gregory lineage.  We find them in the family of Francis Marion Few from North Carolina Jefferson County, Tennessee, where his daughter Letha married Andrew Jackson Gregory, my great great grandfather's brother.
  
  Crossflow
  Traffic went both ways along those Midwestern routes over a period of two centuries.  Fews moved into the Louisville, Kentucky, area from Indiana (across the Ohio River.  Gregorys and Fews also moved from eastern Tennessee into Kentucky.
  
  Great migrations northward occurred in the 1920s and later because of extensive floods along the Mississippi, destroying much of the Delta South.  The depression added to this exodus northward.  Midwestern droughts accelerated movement to California.  Further industrialization in the next two decades and after WWII accelerated this migration northward and westward.
  
  The geographical indicators are not only contiguous counties, but similarly in the counties along these common natural migration routes, which also reveal patterns of the same family decade to decade and generation to generation.  These patterns match the same kinds of patterns we find in ethnic investigations all over the world.
  ----------------------
  
  Connections between the Gregory line descended from Benjamin Gregory of Pennsylvania & Prince William Co, Virginia, with descendants in northern Kentucky & eastern Tennessee and the Gregory of Rappahannock or Kng William counties has not been determined.

Sources

• 1. Ancestry Trees
• 2. Ancestry Comments
• 3. 1840 Federal Census, Bath County, Kentucky
  • 1 June 1840, No date on this page, p 31
• 4. Ancestry Discussion Boards
• 5. Find a Grave Memorial Registry
• 6. Family Group Report
• 7. Virginia, Compiled Marriages, 1740-1850
• 8. Kentucky Wills
• 9. Nathan Gregory
  • Location: https://www.nathangregoryauthor.com/genealogy;
• 10. 1870 Federal Census, Grant County, Kentucky
  • 1 September, Mount Zion Precinct, P O Mount Zion, page 2, Hse/Fam #8
• 11. 1860 Federal Census, Grant County, Kentucky
  • 6 July, P O Stateley Run, page 77, Hse/Fam #526
• 12. 1850 Federal Census, Morgan County, Kentucky
  • 13 August, no page #, Hse/Fam #256
• 13. 1860 Federal Census, Rowan County, Kentucky
  • 12 July, PO Morehead, page 14, Hse #98, Fam #99
• 14. Kentucky, Death Records, 1852-1964
• 15. Kentucky, Birth Records, 1847-1911
• 16. 1850 Federal Census, Bath County, Kentucky
  • 26 July, District 1, page 121 (scan 61), Hse #106
• 17. 1860 Federal Census, Fleming County, Kentucky
  • 10 August, District 1, PO Elizaville, pages 236, Hse #846, Fam #757
• 18. 1870 Federal Census, Fleming County, Kentucky
  • 9 July, Poplar Plains Precinct, PO Poplar Plains, page 38, Hse #767, Fam #761
• 19. 1850 Federal Census, Bath County, Kentucky
  • 9 August, District 1, page 15 (scan #78), Hse #325, Fam #328
• 20. Jessee Gregory Family Group Report, 2001