I love this old will for David Crawford from Amherst Co., VA. Not just that includes a few Pryors, but also I love Crawford’s phrasing about assisting his son Nathan Crawford who was ” setting out in life in a remote and distant country.” Where was Nathan going? Texas? Iowa? California? Maybe Mexico? Nope! In 1801 he was headed to someplace that was remote back then: Shelby County, KY. David Crawford even states it’s Shelby County as big and bright as daylight! I started to ponder. I wondered if who they were, where they were, and who they were with are indicators of who the 2 Pryor men are in this will.
1801 – Jefferson Co., KY Will
David Crawford, 14 Dec 1801 — 20 Sept 1802; 4 Mar 1805.
To sons David and Reuben, land on Harrods Creek; to Nathan, land in Shelby County where he now lives; to daughter Salley Cocke 80 pounds money, money also to daughters Elizabeth Davis and Nancy Jones; to son Charles land bought of Richard Taliaferro adjoining Elias Wells [or Wills]; to sons Nelson and William land in Amherst County, adjoining Buffalo Ridge, granted testator in 1789; to my wife part of land where “I now live,” bought of Robert Johnston and William Haynes; special gift to Nathan “for him not receiving assistance in setting out in life in a remote and distant country”; to son John one half of all lands in Kentucky surveyed by him.
Exec. Sons John, William S., Nelson and Charles [Crawford]
Bondsman: Charles Taliaferro, Nathaniel Warwick
Witnesses: William Pryor, John Pryor, Stella Sullivan.
Codical dated 14 Mar 1802. Land to son William to be sold and “divided among my legatees”; son John to manage estate. Sons David and Reuben to be “given equally as much as my other children.”
Witnesses: William Pryor and John Pryor, Stella Sullivan.
Early Kentucky Settlers: The Records of Jefferson County, Kentucky, Excerpted and reprinted from The Filson Club History Quarterly by Genealogical Publishing Co., Inc. 1988)
I found NATHAN CRAWFORD on the 1810 Census in Shelby County, KY. He was counted very close to VALENTINE ‘VAL’ MERIWETHER, who was christened at St. James Northam Church in Goochland County (remember, that’s where Samuel Pryor married Frances Morton Meriwether).
I found that SALLY CRAWFORD had married Thomas W. Cocke in 1798 in Amherst County. There’s a THOMAS W. COCK on the 1810 census in Campbell Co., VA.
ELIZABETH CRAWFORD married Nicholas C. Davis in 1789 in Amherst Co., VA. — I can’t find them in 1810, but there’s a Nathaniel Davis on the same page of the 1810 Census in Amherst County with JOHN C PRYOR.
RUBEN CRAWFORD is on the 1810 Census in Amherst County — on the same page with William Pryor Sr., Charles P Taliaferro and his brother NELSON CRAWFORD is on the following page. His son CHARLES CRAWFORD is on the 1810 Census in Amherst County — on the same page with Hugh McCabe (yes, the same guy who married John C. Pryor’s sister Sarah in Williamson County, TN).