Person:Robert Worthington (2)

Early Land Acquisition in Virginia

Acquisition of Land in Virginia:

• Page 278 - Robert Worthenton, 1,873 acres, on the old Mingo Path on the Waters of Reccoon Creek. May 10, 1774. [Abstract of Land Grant Surveys, 1761-1791, Augusta & Rockingham Counties, Virginia, by Peter Cline Kaylor, pg. 94-95].

Records in Virginia

• [Estate Record] Miller, Elizabeth. Admr.: Robert Worthington, 10 November 1750. [Abstracts of Wills, Inventories, and Administration Accounts of Frederick County, Virginia, 1743-1800, by J. Estelle Stewart King, pg. 1]. [Note: the relationship between Robert Worthington and Elizabeth Miller is undetermined].

Notes

From: "Thomas Worthington Father of Ohio Statehood", by Alfred Bryon Sears:

"Soon after her husband's death, Mrs. Worthington married a farmer of the locality, Samuel Brittain, and the children were made his wards. He treated Robert harshly and in 1740 bound him out to a severe master. As a result, the boy run away to Philadelphia, where he worked until he was eighteen. Returning to the Valley in 1748 to receive his patrimony, he took up farming, surveying, and land-dealing in his own right. A tireless worker, he was soon able to buy the reversionary claims to most of his six hundred acres from his nephew Bobby, who, after a period of prosperity as a speculator in Valley lands, seems to have dissipated his holdings rapidly. In 1752, Bobby sold 700 acres to Lawrence Washington, and in 1754, he sold Piedmont (Quarry Bank) and 1,279 acres of land, which was perhaps all he owned by that time, to Charles Dick.(7) Years later, Mrs. Brittain told her grandson Thomas that Bobby had drifted West penniless, but since he had received L2,200 from Dick for the Piedmont estate, she was either in error or he owned many debts.Having had little schooling, Robert secured a tutor for himself and soon became proficient in his studies, especially in mathematics, which he needed for surveying. He sometimes worked with George Washington as a chain carrier in the lower Valley, where the latter was employed as surveyor by Lord Thomas Fairfax.(8) They often stayed at Fairfax' splendid mansion, Green Courts, thirteen miles southwest of Winchester. The bachelor lord's five and a half million acres between the Rappahannock and the Potomac and an approximately equal area in and beyond the Shenandoah Valley itself gave them plenty to do. Washington was Robert's junior by two years; both served Virginia in Braddock's campaign, and were lucky to get back home alive. George Washington himself had a farm on Bullskin Creek. Harewood, Samuel Washington's home, lay next to Worthington's, between Bullskin Creek and Evitts Run. In 1759, Robert married Margaret Mattews, and Irish lass form Fredericktown, Maryland. For marrying outside the Quaker communion he was "disowned" by the Hopewell Friends Meeting. By diligent effort he and his wife built up an impressive estate near the present Charles Town. They called their home, a stone house halfway between Quarry Bank and the Washington estate at Altona, the Manor House, and finished out their lives there; they also owned a town house in the village of Martinsburg, which they called the Mansion House. Robert invested in several tracts of Ohio country land and at his death owned at least a score of slaves. Worthington took no part in Lord Dunmore's War, and that in spite of the fact that he owned at least 2,170 acres of frontier land (the "Potato Garden") on Raccoon Creek in western Pennsylvania. He had purchased this tract from William Crawford in 1772 for one hundred sixty pounds in Virginia currency, and it was very advantageously located on the Mingo Path in the area west of Pittsburgh, only seven mile form the Ohio River. He also owned a tract of perhaps sixteen hundred acres west of the Ohio on Yellow Creek (Columbiana County, Ohio). It is likely that his Quaker training made him fundamentally a man of peace, especially when it came to despoiling the Indians, with whose plight, it is reasonable to believe, he was sympathetic. On the other hand, with the coming of the Revolution, Captain Worthington was not slow to espouse the patriot cause. He and Captain William Darke hurried east to offer their services to Washington upon his appointment as commander of the Continental Army. Of his services we have no record. However, we do know that four years later Worthington was back home endeavoring to raise a troop of cavalry, chiefly at his own expense, when death overtook him in 1779, at the age of forty-nine. His wife died the next year, leaving six children: Ephraim, Martha, Mary, William, Robert and Thomas-the last a boy of six (born July 16, 1773)"

Robert Worthington was disowned by Hopewell Meeting for marrying outside the faith

Robert Worthington became an Episcopalian father was Quaker

Will: July 30, 1779, drawn by local Episcopal minister Rev Daniel Sturges

Citations

http://familytreemaker.genealogy.com/users/w/h/i/ANNE-W-WHITE/BOOK-0001/0003-0020.html

http://family.gradeless.com/worthington.htm

1. ↑ ^1.0 1.1 Sara McAnally. Knox.ged.

   Date of Import: Feb 3, 2000

2. ↑ ^2.0 2.1 Sara McAnally. Knox.ged.

   Date of Import: Feb 4, 2000