Wednesday, I visited the Kentucky History Center in Frankfort, with two specific goals in mind.  I have tried to find a copy of the book Daybreak on Old Fortification Creek by Glenn Hodges.  It is a history of the John Lewis family – specifically John Lewis, the son of John Lewis and Elizabeth Brown, and grandson of Vincent Lewis and Ann Longworth of Loudoun County, Virginia; and his wife, Hannah Lewis, daughter of William Joseph Lewis and Catherine Jennings Linton (my Captain John Linton’s sister), and granddaughter of Vincent Lewis.  Yes, John Lewis, Jr., and wife Hannah Lewis were first cousins.

Kentucky was quite a call for the inhabitants of Loudoun County, Virginia, and especially for the Lewis, Linton, Mason, Hancock and Berkeley families that make up my lines.  John Lewis, Jr., was surveying in Kentucky about 1780, and finally moved his family in 1799.  The Mason family was in Nelson County in the 1790’s.  Captain John Linton and his children and grandchildren moved to Washington County in 1818, although several sons had come to Kentucky earlier.

One of the Lewis family members I am very interested in is William Linton Lewis, son of William Joseph and Catherine Linton Lewis – and nephew of Captain John Linton.  I was introduced to this man through Dorothy Thrawley, a lovely woman and exceptional genealogist, with whom I corresponded in the 1970’s and 80’s.  She told me of the horse hair trunk that William Linton Lewis used to carry important papers, and that it is now in the collection of Duke University.  Ritchey and I visited Duke University, made a few copies of the old letters and other paper in the collection – and the copier stopped working!  We must return.

My second goal was to find more information about Ritchey’s Thomas Jewell who married Grissell Fletcher about 1640.  Thomas Jewell arrived from England in the Planter in April 1635.  He settled in Braintree, Massachusetts.  Lands were assigned him December 24, 1639-40, for three heads – bringing that many settlers to the new world.  He and wife Grissell had the following children:  Joseph, born February 24, 1642; Thomas, December 27, 1643; Hannah, December 27, 1643; Nathaniel, February 15, 1648; Grissell, born January 19, 1651; and Mercy, born February 14, 1653.  Thomas died in 1654, and Grissell, with six very young children, quickly married Humphrey Griggs.  After Griggs death she married John Burney, Henry Kibbe and John Burge.  Interesting that they lived in Braintree – the home of John and Abigail Adams.  Could later descendants possibly have met the famous Adams?

Ritchey and Linton are camping in the White Mountains of New Hampshire later this year.  How could they just ‘happen’ to choose a campsite, nine miles from a cemetery in Whitefield, where John Jewell, Ritchey’s fourth great-grandfather is buried?  He wanted to be found!

My goals were accomplished.  But, of course, they just lead to other goals!  Happy researching!