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| Artist Howard Pyles' illustration of the Burning of Jamestown during Bacon's Rebellion, 1676 |
Our ascent to John Sturdivant (1630-killed 1684), our 8th great-grandfather is: our grandfather, Frank Whitman Raney (1888-1969), married Mary Emma Smith, 1910, Fredonia, KS; great-grandfather, James Samuel Raney (1868-1954), married Nancy Ann Dyson, 1887, Indiana; 2nd great-grandfather; Everett Rainey/Raney (1844-1899), married Nancy Jane Dougan, 1865, Warrick Co., IN; 3rd great-grandfather, James Rainey (1814 - c1868/70) married Milla "Millie" Roberts, 1832, Pulaski Co., KY; 4th great-grandfather James Rainey (c1774 Northampton Co.,NC - 1838/40 White Co, TN) married Martha Parham (c1784 Sussex Co., VA - 1817/20 Pulaski Co., Ky) in 1800 in Sussex County. Her parents, our 5th great-grandparents, Stith Parham (1723 VA - 1793 Sussex Co., VA) and Lucretia Sturdivant (1744 VA - bef. 1793 Sussex Co.), married in 1772. Lucretia's parents, our 6th great-grandparents, Henry Sturdivant (1706 Surry Co, VA - 1772 Sussex Co, VA) married Margaret c. 1725. (The burning of Virginia's courthouses during the American Civil War makes discovering her surname difficult.) Henry Sturdivant's parents, our 7th great-grandparents, Matthew Sturdivant (1672 Charles City Co. VA - 1728 Surry Co. VA) and Sarah Anderson (1673 Charles City Co., VA - 1726 Surry Co., VA), married in 1700. Matthew's father, the subject of this blog, John Sturdivant (c1630 England - killed in 1684 in the future Mecklenburg Co., VA) and Sarah Hallom [widow of Samuel Woodward] married c.1658, are our 8th great-grandparents.
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| County Nottinghamshire, England |
John Sturdivant was born in England about 1630 - possibly in County Nottinghamshire, which had numerous Sturdivants who bore a coat of arms. The earliest record of John Sturdivant in Virginia Colony occurs in 1652, when he and a Christopher Robinson were granted as headrights for the transportation of 12 persons at 50 acres per person, 600 acres in Henrico County (now Chesterfield County). He must have paid for his own "adventure," arriving earlier in Virginia, because a headright of 50 acres for himself is not included. For unknown reasons, Sturdivant and Robinson (dead in 1663) did not develop this 600 acres and in 1671 their ownership patent lapsed. Sturdivant had other interests to attend to.
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| Charles City County, Virginia |
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| Bermuda Hundred. Note Turkey Island |
Hallom survived the Indian Massacre of 1622, HERE, learned the tobacco business and, after his 7 year indenture, married Anne, the Widow Price, about 1630, who must have been left a decent estate for, in 1636, Hallom patented 1,000 acres on Turkey Island for paying for the transport of 20 persons. Daughter Sarah married Samuel Woodward, who had inherited 600 acres from his father, but he died in early1658, leaving her with a son, Samuel, and his estate to administer. John Sturdivant married her shortly thereafter, giving bond and being granted quietus to manage the estate for Samuel Woodward, Jr.
In 1663 Hercules Flood was granted a land patent, the survey of which ran on the south side of Appomattox River, beginning at the line of "Samuel Woodward," running south southeast to "John Sturdivant his lyne, which runneth to the head of Citty Creek." John and Sarah had been neighbors, so wasn't it natural they would marry and work their tobacco holdings as one household? Whether out of love or convenience, they produced five sons, including our 7th great-grandfather, Matthew Studivant (1672-1728). The name City Creek was later changed to Bull Hill Creek and runs north into the Appomattox River at the western boundary of the city of Hopewell. That part of Charles City County became part of Prince George County in 1702/03.
In 1673, John Sturdivant and Henry Blatts patented 3,528 acres on the south side of the Appomattox River for the transport of 71 persons. Originally called Second Swamp, the area is now referred to as the Blackwater District of Prince George County. Sturdivant was becoming a wealthy man - land rich, anyway.
When Sarah's first husband Samuel Woodward sold off 450 acres of his 600 acre inheritance in 1650, Sarah's dower right to her share of the land apparently wasn't clarified; in 1673, as a result of a lawsuit, the court decreed Sarah's dower portion, by marriage now belonging to John Sturdivant, as 200 acres to be surveyed before the current owner of the 400 acres was allowed to have his land surveyed. Legal problems in Virginia Colony mostly involved land, runaway indentured servants, and tobacco, treated as currency . . . until Bacon's Rebellion in 1676, in which John Sturdivant became a participant, nearly losing his life at the end of a rope.
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| Nathaniel Bacon threatening to shoot Governor Berkeley until Berkeley bared his chest and dared him. |
The best account I've read about Bacon's Rebellion is HERE. Read some of the tabs, also. Keep in mind that Nathaniel Bacon, only a recent arrival to Virginia, was first cousin to Governor Berkeley's wife Frances. I'll hazard a reason why our ancestor John Sturdivant involved himself on the side of the rebellion. Perhaps every man had to choose a side that year of 1676, just as their descendants did a hundred years later. The Sturdivants were close neighbors of Bacon, living on what was then the western frontier of Virginia Colony. Fearful of Indian attack, they brooded that they weren't being adequately protected. They had a poor growing year, with drought, a hurricane and flooding, but taxes remained high, paid by large hogsheads of tobacco. We don't know how much tobacco Sturdivant was actually growing, but we know its price had declined.We don't know if he participated in raids on Indian villages and manor houses, or if he was present at the burning of Jamestown, but he must have had a leadership role, for he was exempted from a pardon in a proclamation of Sir William Berkeley of Feb. 10, 1676/7 (the New Year began in March), which was revoked by the King's Commissioners, thereby saving our ancestor from being hanged. A grievance was written by certain landowners in Charles City County (which they gave to commissioners sent by King Charles II to investigate the late rebellion), in which they asked the King's pardon, explained the circumstances of the rebellion and pointed damning fingers at Governor Berkeley and Colonel Edward Hill. John Sturdivant was twice mentioned:
That the s'd Edward Hill covetously minding to enrich himself by the ruin of divers of us His Mats'y's subjects, hath endeavoured most arrogantly to smother, conceal and invallid his Ma'ty late gracious proclamation of pardon, & by menaces and threats extorted divers compositions & Rewards from divers of us (not to inform against them as he said and to procure their pardon) namely from John Tate, Nevett (or Nerrett) Wheeler, John Harrison, John Sturdivant, Thomas Milton, Sara Weekes, John Baxter and his wife, John Higgledy and others although he well knew the s'd persons and every of them were not only absolutely pardoned by the King's proclamation as afore"' but also by Sr Wm. Berkeley's proclamation likewise, and the better to effect this his design causeth one of his creatures or under officer to threaten some with imprisonment but for reading the King's proclamation aforesd which was sent from Swan's Point. And the more to terrify and affrighten his s'd Ma'y subjects unto such composition with him as afore' by the harms done to others in the like case, he the sd Edwd Hill by his interest and prevallency with the s'd Sr William Berkeley procures warrants to be to him directed from the s'd Sr Wm. Berkeley for the seizing and securing ye persons and estates of divers in this county that had (and that he knew had) layd hold off and were pardoned by the Governn't, and the King's proclamations as aforesd, as namely of Thomas Blayton, Robert Jones, Anthony Haviland, Francis Weeks, John Sturdivant and Nevett Wheeler, the two last of which by composition he released or procured their discharge . . .
If you are curious about this historical document, you can read "Charles City County Grievances 1676" in Vol. 3, No. 2, (1895) Virginia Magazine of History and Biography HERE
Colonel Edward Hill was Governor Berkeley's main supporter in Charles City County, ordered by Berkeley to seize men, among them Sturdivant, and secure their property. In response to the Grievances claiming Hill had extorted bribes from them to plead their cause with the government, Hill defended himself vociferously before the Commission sent by Charles II, particularly singling out John Sturdivant, saying Sturdivant should be made to swear that he had "been out to gratify my wife for [her] begging for his life" and that he had "made an offer of I know not what" and that he had voluntarily given Hill 5 hogsheads of tobacco out of gratitude.
As for Colonel Edward Hill, of "Shirley," (I637-1700), a 2nd generation Virginian, he was never punished for his alleged corruption before and during the rebellion, but received more honors. Before the rebellion he was commander-in-chief of Charles City and Surry counties and tax collector of the Upper James River. After the rebellion he became Attorney-General (appointed by Governor Chicheley September 27th, I679), member of the Council, treasurer, Speaker of the House of Burgesses in I691, and was appointed in 1697 Judge of the Admiralty Court for Virginia and North Carolina.
Sarah Hallom Sturdivant, along with her two sisters, inherited from their mother Ann Hallom (our 9th great-grandmother) the 1,000 acre tract of land at Turkey Island, Henrico County [see map of Bermuda Hundred above], that their mother had maintained as a life estate. In 1680, she and John Sturdivant executed a deed for Sarah's 1/3 undivided portion of that land to Sarah's son Samuel Woodward from her first marriage, probably as a substitute for the land Woodward inherited from his father that Sarah and John Sturdivant had under cultivation and were living on. Samuel, a merchant, was living in Maryland at the time and simultaneously gave Power of Attorney to, of all people, Col. Edward Hill. Wasn't Hill still the foe of John Sturdivant? Four years only had passed. Stranger things . . . I suppose. In 1791, Sarah's sister, Ann Hollam Gundrey, through her husband John Gundrey of Gloucester County, conveyed a 1/3 undivided interest in this Turkey Island land to Capt.William Randolph. In 1705, Samuel Woodward, then living in Boston, Massachusetts, conveyed his undivided 1/3 share of the land to the same William Randolph. Did Randolph, scion of the famous Randolph family of Curles Neck Plantation, ever acquired the last undivided 1/3 share on Turkey Island?
Another supporter of Nathaniel Bacon was William Byrd I of Westover. He owned 1,200 acres on the James River that after his death became part of the site of modern-day Richmond. He was a fur-trader, and John Sturdivant who, as early as 1673 had received permission from the Court "to entertain Indians," began trading for him. Beaver pelts and deer skins were most desirable.
In April 1684, John and his oldest son, also a John, born 1662, were traveling with four other men back from a successful trading venture with an Indian village in the vicinity of present Petersburg,Virginia. While on the trail through Occaneechee Town (near present Clarksville, Mecklenburg County), close to the Forks of the Dan and Roanoke rivers, they were ambushed by Indians. All were killed and their goods stolen.
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| Roanoke River |
In a letter dated 20 Apr 1684, William Byrd I of Westover wrote from James City to Thomas Grendon of London: "Old Sturdivant, his son, Millner, Shipy, Womacke and Hugh Cassell were all killed by the Indians in their returne from the westward, about 30 miles beyond Ochanechee, what prejudice it is to mee you may guesse, they having made a very advantagious journey."
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| Mecklenburg County, Virginia (note how far south is was from Charles City County), not yet being settled by whites |
Sarah must have stayed on the land until her death about 1690. Oldest son Daniel Sturdivant was appointed administrator of her estate. He and Robert Bolling (husband of our 8th great-aunt in the Stith line) gave security of 20,000 pounds of tobacco. In the 1704 tax list for Prince George County, sons Daniel Sturdivant owned 850 acres, Chichester Sturdivant owned 214 acres, and our 7th great-grandfather, Matthew Sturdivant owned a mere 150 acres. However, Matthew may have had a second line of income, for in 1693, the Charles City County court awarded him 600 pounds of tobacco for killing wolves with gunshot.
