I’m continuing to peck though the various VA Pryor lines and the records of Pryors in TN who claimed VA ancestry. It’s a challenge. I’m working in chunks so it will be interesting to see if these larger pieces give us the needed information to place people in their rightful family trees.
First, back to the family of Col. Samuel Pryor who married Prudence Thornton. Samuel and Prudence lived in Gloucester County, VA, where it’s agreed by most researchers that their children were: Col. William, John, Thornton, Robert, Luke, Francis, Joseph Sr., Nancy, and Molly. The marriages of Samuel’s children are fairly well-documented.
There are many family trees that show Samuel’s son Joseph Pryor (born 1731) settling in Bourbon County, KY. But before arriving in Kentucky the family lived in Botetourt County, VA, a county very near Virginia’s “wild west” of the 1700’s. Botetourt was situated near the frontier settlements in Greenbrier County and Kanawha County (both counties became part of West Virginia after the Civil War).
The earliest reference I’ve found naming Joseph Pryor in Botetourt Co. is a 1787 deed. The book A Seed-Bed of the Republic may give a clue to Joseph’s origins: “JOSEPH PRYOR, having come from Hanover County into Botetourt, purchased lands on the south side of the James.” The 1787 deed was transcribed as the “north” side of the river, so once one thing is in doubt makes me wonder how much else may be in doubt.
Joseph Pryor was on the 1800 Tax List in Woodford County, KY and counted on the census in Bourbon County in 1810, and deceased by 1813, the year his will was filed.
I suspect this lineage of Joseph Pryor is pretty well known to family history researchers, but what about the other Pryors who were in Botetourt County? In 1783 Joseph Pryor was counted with a Luke Pryor in Captain Preston’s Rangers. We know that they were brothers, confirmed by Luke’s 1785 will. After Luke’s death there is a Susannah Pryor on a deed in 1787 and on a 1796 deed she was referred to as “The Widow Pryor.”
I believe Susannah Pryor migrated to Kentucky about the same time as Joseph. The Holston Methodism, Vol. 1 states that in about 1810 Rev. Francis Poythress was elderly and mentally unstable when he died at the home of his sister Susannah Pryor in Jessamine County, KY. I have in my notes that Luke Pryor, son of Col. Samuel Pryor married Susannah Poythress in Amelia County in 1766. The 1810 Census was written in alpha-order so it’s difficult to tell who were her neighbors and thus who may have migrated to Kentucky with her. It’s possible that Susannah Pryor went to Kentucky about the time her brother-in-law Joseph moved there as they settled in neighboring counties and in 1800 Joseph sold three slaves in Botetourt County, perhaps in preparation of his move to Kentucky. Who else went to KY with Susanna?
I’m thinking we may be able to tie this line of VA and KY Pryors into the Pryors who migrated to Tennessee. Both Joseph and Susannah had moved west by 1800. Joseph died in 1812 and named his children in his will: Joseph, Samuel, William, Richard, Thornton, Edward, Ann Pryor Duvall, Polly, Nancy, and Prudence Pryor Hall. So we can presume these children were alive in 1812. I suspect that some of Joseph’s children went to Tennessee– in 1806 there was unclaimed mail for Samuel Pryor and Thornton Pryor at the Nashville Post Office. I wonder if the letters were ever collected.
I wonder about something else: Did Susannah Poythress and Luke Pryor have children? If they were married in 1766 and Luke died in about 1785 there was almost a 20 year period in which children may have been born. I know I’ve got a long list of Pryors born between 1766 and 1785 in VA who could be their children! Does anyone know if there is a record of Luke and Susannah’s children in either baptisms, deeds, or wills?
