Person:Philip Earp (1)

From American Genealogy Magazine, Vol. 9, No. 4:
Philip Earp, a son of William Earp and Priscilla Nichols, was born in 1755 in Frederick County, Md., and was a great-grandfather of Wyatt Earp. Philip Earp died in Caswell County, North Carolina in 1810 — he was the father of Walter Earp (1787-1853). Walter Earp was a teacher, lawyer, judge of Illinois Circuit Court, justice of the peace and a licensed preacher in the Methodist Episcopal Church. In 1808 he married Martha Ann Early in Pittsylvania County, Virginia. They removed first to Tennessee and then in 1813 to Kentucky, living in Logan, Butler and Ohio counties. In 1847 they made a final move to Warren County, Illinois. Nicholas Porter Earp was the third child and second son of Walter Earp and Martha Ann Early, and father of the famed Tombstone Earp brothers.

Phillip moved his family from Montgomery County, Maryland, to Pittsylvania County, Virginia, right on the North Carolina border about 1788. His brothers, Josiah and Samuel also moved to Virginia with him. They were on the 1801 tax list. Philip then moved his family to North Carolina. Philip is shown on the 1820, Iredell County, North Carolina, census. Philip served in the American Revolution as a soldier in 3rd Company, Lower Potomac 129, # 39 Battalion, also was in the 6th Company, 29 and 39 Battalion.

In Washington County, Virginia, Phillip Earp records are found under the spelling "irp" circa 1830.

Philip lived in Chatham, North Carolina about 1792-95 and then moved on to Lincoln County, North Carolina and later Iredell County. The crucial census of 1810 for Lincoln county, North Carolina shows his son Walter under his name.

The following document is used as proof for the paternity of Walter Earp. This document is the only one that I know of that ties Philip and Walter together. Other evidence consists of adjacent census records. It is a biography of Peter Asbury Earp who was the grandson of Walter Earp and the oldest child of Lorenzo Dow Earp.

"The varied experiences which have filled the greater part of the life of Peter Asbury Earp, one of Colusa County's (California) oldest settlers. A native of Kentucky, he was born in Ohio County, September 12, 1835, the oldest of eighteen children and the only son who is located in California. He is the representative of a southern family of prominence, his great-grandfather, Phillip Earp, being a native of Virginia, from which colony he served in the revolutionary war. A son, Walter Earp, also a native of Virginia, located in young manhood in Nor th Carolina, thence removing in 1814 to Ohio County, Kentucky. He was a school teacher by profession and was occupied for many years in the primitive schools of the middle west. In 1846, he removed to Monmouth, Warren County, Illinois, where his death occurred at the age of sixty-eight years. A son of Walter Earp, Lorenzo D., a native of North Carolina, attained manhood in his Kentucky home, whence he immigrated to Warren County, Illinois, in 1846. He made that location his home until 1853, when he moved to Jasper County, Iowa, and engaged in farming until his death in the fall of 1893, at the age of 84 years. He was twice married, his first wife being Nancy Storm, a native of Kentucky. Her grandfather, John Storm, was a native of Virginia, whence he immigrated to Kentucky at the time that state was appropriately called the "dark and bloody ground." While hunting near Louisville, he was taken prisoner by the Indians, who took him into Indiana, holding him prisoner for two years, during which period they learned to trust him. His boldness won him life and freedom and the Indians made him a chief, allowing him to go hunting. Watching his chance he escaped across the Ohio River, to his home in Kentucky, where he lived the remainder of his life quietly. His son Peter Storm, a native of Kentucky, married Ann Maria Souders, a native of Maryland and the descendant of an old family. Their daughter, Nancy Earp, died in Illinois, after which her husband again married. He had eighteen children, nine by the first wife and nine by the second, of whom six sons and five daughters are now living."