Drury Daniel

Time for my next installment for the year and this time it is from my Daddy’s side of the family.  The man I will be talking about this time is from my Papaw, Aubrey David Beard’s side of the family and he was Aubrey’s great-grandfather and my third great-grandfather.  This man’s name was Drury Daniel and he was born in about 1809 in Rowan County, North Carolina son of Peter Daniel and Sarah Lofton.  I know he had a brother named John T. Daniel who was born in about 1819 and died sometime after 1850, and a sister named Susannah Daniel Clark who was born in about 1807 and died before 1880 in Arkansas, but other than these two sibling, I do not know the names of any others.  I do know there may have been at least one other brother and three other sisters though.  Drury’s parents are on the 1830 census in Fayette County, Tennessee and they have 2 males and 3 females all under the age of 20, but unfortunately I do not know who one of these males and the three females were, but more than likely they were Drury’s brother and sisters.

Drury’s parents were married March 28, 1803 in Rowan County, North Carolina and sometime after 1820 and before 1830, they had moved to Tennessee and were living in Fayette County.  The Daniel family were all farmers for the most part and so was Drury.  Back then you would have to clear the land, watch out for Indians and hope your crops did well or you would starve to death.  My grandfather, Drury Daniel married for the first time in Tennessee in about 1827 to Sarah Gaines when he was 18 and she was 17 years old.  Sarah may have been the daughter of Joseph V. Gaines and a mother with a possible last name of Graves who were from Orange County, North Carolina but who ended up in Jackson County, Tennessee.  Drury and Sarah became the parents of at least seven children before Sarah died in about 1844 in Bedford County, Tennessee.

The seven children of Drury and Sarah were: Mary Melvina Daniel Chadwick 1828-1911, John Daniel 1831-before August 1861, James Albert Daniel 1832-1914, Peter R. Daniel 1835-before 1865, Joseph M. Daniel 1838-before January 1869, Martha Ada Daniel Chadwick 1840-1908 and Jane Waxter Daniel Arnold 1843-1908.  The three boys who died in the 1860’s, I believe all died from the effects of their service during the Civil War, though I can’t find anything yet to substantiate that so far.  I don’t have a lot of pictures for this family, but I do have one each of Mary Melvina Daniel and her husband, Rev. John Louther Chadwick, Martha Ada Daniel and her husband William King Chadwick and Jane Waxter Daniel and her husband, James Henry Arnold and they are the following.  John and William Chadwick were brothers, sons of Matthew Chadwick and Charity Elizabeth King.

Drury Daniel married second to Catharine Margaret Gaines in about 1846 in Tennessee and who I believe was possibly a younger sister to Sarah Gaines, Drury’s first wife.  Catharine became my third great-grandmother and Drury and Catharine became the parents of at least eight children.  Catharine died sometime after March 1861 and before June of 1865 probably in Crittenden County, Kentucky.  I wish I could find the actual marriage dates for Drury to Sarah and to Catharine, so I could know for certain whose children are whose.  Uncle Bud’s death certificate says his mother was Sarah Gaines not Catharine and the other death certificates for some of the other children of Catharine state the parents’ names are unknown so that doesn’t help me either.

The eight children of Drury and Catharine were: Dr. Drury Marion Daniel 1847-1935, Francis James ‘Bud’ Daniel 1849-1928, Thomas Jefferson Daniel 1852-1902, Collin Graves Daniel 1855-1882 (my direct line), Newton W. Daniel 1856-1938, William Gaines Daniel 1857-after 1870, Melton H. Daniel 1859-1869 and  Sarah Catherine Susannah Nancy Emily Daniel Chadwick 1861-1942 (Can you believe that long name?  By the way, her husband was a nephew to her two older half-sisters, husbands.).  Again, I don’t have many pictures for this part of my family, but I do have this one of Uncle Bud.

Drury next married two more times and he apparently never had any children with either one of these ladies and their names were: Mrs. Susan Varnoy Johnson on June 22, 1865 in Crittenden County, Kentucky and then Mrs. Nancy C. Bates Davis Rushing on October 4, 1867 in Crittenden County, Kentucky.  I believe Susan probably died before October 1867, but Nancy and Drury must have been divorced, because she isn’t living with Drury in 1870, she is living with one of her Rushing step-sons and she doesn’t die until after 1880.

For the final time, Drury Daniel gets married again in Arkansas, possibly Izard County since that is where he was living in 1880.  This time he marries Julia Ann Taylor in about 1875.  Julia had, had a daughter out of wedlock named Melinda C. Taylor Bone Turner 1872-1968, who Drury raised.  Drury and Julia had at least three children together before Drury passed away.  These three children were: Stephen Grant Daniel 1876-1943, Ulecia Daniel 1879-before 1882 and Charlie Daniel 1881-???? (I know he lived to adulthood, and lived in Newport, Arkansas but I haven’t found his death date yet.).  Julia remarried on July 22, 1890 in Izard County, Arkansas to Joseph Moneyham who was 23 years older than her, Drury Daniel had been 37 years older than Julia.

Drury had a lot of children, at least eighteen, that I know of for certain, between three different wives, Sarah, Catharine and Julia, and he helped raise at least one step-child.  No wonder he never had any money and worked from dawn to dusk farming, he had to feed a lot of mouths, can you even imagine?

I didn’t know when Drury Daniel died for certain or where until I received the following information, from Betty McCollum on the Izard County Board on the internet: “Vickie, when I began reading your comments about Drury Daniel, I kept thinking that sounded familiar.  So, I checked my records and in Down Memory Lane #2, Mrs. Clara Twilley Tate states: "Elsie Coleman, Robbie Condrey's mother, I'm not sure if the next one was born between Elsie and my brother Alfred or not, but they had a baby that died and it's buried over there in the field on the Warnett place.  This was just recently sold and it had been in the family since it was patented and the patent was signed by President Buchanan.  There's three graves over there.  An old man, Uncle Dewey Daniels is buried back there, and his baby, and then my little brother was buried back there."  I believe the man she refers to as Dewey Daniel, was probably your Drury Daniel.  Also in Carroll Hayden's Cemetery Record Book for Izard County, Arkansas he lists Dewey Daniels (unmarked), and Baby Daniels (child of Dewey and Julia Daniels) unmarked.  Carroll got this information from Mrs. Twilley's statement.”  So I now know where Drury was buried as well as his and Julia’s little girl, Ulecia Daniel, just wish I knew the dates for certain.  I know Drury died after the 1880 census was taken in June that year and before Julia gets remarried in July of 1890.

Drury started off in North Carolina, moved to Tennessee crisscrossing that state as a young man, then on to Crittenden County, Kentucky and Izard County, Arkansas going back and forth between these last two states a few times, before passing away in Izard County, Arkansas.  We tend to think that people would not have done that kind of thing back in those days because of so many different reasons, but it happened so much and why some of these people did it we will probably never know.  As my Papaw Fraley use to say, “Some people just have itchy feet”.