Understand Lincoln County & Rowan County, NC. Home of the Jenkins

 Like I stated last week, I needed to stop and wrap my head around some of the timeline of records for Lincoln and Rowan County, NC. Land, marriage, and census records seem to be the only records that go back far enough to aid in my search for Lincolnc County. However, Rowan County will have a great deal more information.

What was the timeline for historical records in Lincoln County, NC?

 

Lincoln County, North Carolina Record Dates[edit | edit source]

Information for this chart was taken from various sources, often containing conflicting dates. This information should be taken as a guide and should be verified by contacting the county and/or the state government agency.

Known Beginning Dates for Major County Records[4]
Birth*	Marriage	Death*	Court	Land	Probate	Census
1913	1779	1913	1920	1763	1869	1784
*Statewide registration for births and deaths started in 1913. General compliance by 1920.

Record Loss[edit | edit source]

·        1797 Fire in home, small record loss For suggestions about research in places that suffered historic record losses, see: ·        Burned Counties. By Michael John Neill at 24-7 Family History Circle. ·        When the Records are Gone. By Arlene Eakle at Arlene Eakle's Tennessee Blog. ·        Burned Counties Research in the FamilySearch Research Wiki. ·        List of counties in the United States with Record Loss

Boundary Changes[edit | edit source]

·        1778 Lincoln County was created 14 April 1778 from Tryon County. Tryon County was abolished in 1779. ·        County seat: Lincolnton[5] For animated maps illustrating North Carolina county boundary changes, "Rotating Formation North Carolina County Boundary Maps" (1664-1965) may be viewed for free at the MapofUS.org website. Source: Lincoln County, North Carolina Genealogy • FamilySearch

Though Lincoln became a county in 1778, the lack of records until the mid 1800, makes it difficult to find county records. May need to search Rowan as well. I may need to find other sources such as churches for records.

 

On Family Search Tryon only has one book of wills from 1769-1779. I’ll search that for any Jenkins. There were no Jenkins in the handful of wills that existed.

 

What was the timeline for historical records in Rowan County, NC?

 

Rowan County, North Carolina Record Dates[edit | edit source]

Information for this chart was taken from various sources, often containing conflicting dates. This information should be taken as a guide and should be verified by contacting the county and/or the state government agency.

Known Beginning Dates for Major County Records[4]
Birth*	Marriage	Death*	Court	Land	Probate	Census
1913	1753	1913	1753	1753	1743	1784
*Statewide registration for births and deaths started in 1913. General compliance by 1920.

Record Loss[edit | edit source]

1865 Some of the records were destroyed during the Civil War. For suggestions about research in places that suffered historic record losses, see: ·        Burned Counties. By Michael John Neill at 24-7 Family History Circle. ·        When the Records are Gone. By Arlene Eakle at Arlene Eakle's Tennessee Blog. ·        Burned Counties Research in the FamilySearch Research Wiki. ·        List of counties in the United States with Record Loss

Boundary Changes[edit | edit source]

·        1753 Rowan County was created from Anson County. ·        County seat: Salisbury[5] From the 1750s, up to the time of the American Revolution, Rowan County included most of the frontier area of Western North Carolina. All or portions of the present-day counties of Alexander, Alleghany, Ashe, Avery, Burke, Caldwell, Catawba, Davidson, Davie, Guilford, Iredell, Lincoln, McDowell, Madison, Mitchell, Randolph, Rockingham, Stokes, Surry, Watauga, Wilkes, Yadkin, Yancey fell within its bounds at that time. For animated maps illustrating North Carolina county boundary changes, "Rotating Formation North Carolina County Boundary Maps" (1664-1965) may be viewed for free at the MapofUS.org website.

Also note that Lincoln County was once part of Rowan county, so my research does need to go to Rowan County to find the starts of the Jenkins family in the area.

• North Carolina Probate Records, 1735-1970 
• Rowan 
• Bonds, 1753-1830 

Searching page by page. 

What this tells me is that the early research of the Jenkins may also have to be conducted in Anson and Tryon Counties because of the early boundary changes, so I will need to include those two counties in my research as well. 

 

Jenkins Big-Y DNA results

 I really wished I had something more to report, but I don't. My weeks have been full of helping my husband build his shop and not with a lot of research. I did get the Big-Y results, but I'm still trying to wrap my head around all of this information. There is no clear answers in the data, so it is going to require a lot of research and possibly building out other trees to understand the connections.

I need to find all Jenkins in Lincoln County, NC and create their trees. I will start on Family Search with Lincoln County, NC Wills and Probates 1735-1970 North Carolina Probate Records, 1735-1970; https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:37SQ-2964-8T9?cc=1867501&wc=32LT-6TL%3A169766601%2C170752501

 

• Elijah Jenkins - Devise, Polly Jenkins - Date of probate 1805 - does not list book and page - File no - IJK
• Joseph Jenkins - Devise, Hugh Jenkins - Date of probate 1821 - No book or page - File no. IJK.
• Hugh Jenkins - Devise, Susannah Jenkins - Date of probate 11/1835 - Book 1, Page 354.
• J.C. Jenkins - Devise, Barbara Jenkins - Date of Probate 9/14/1880 - Book 4, page 228.
• Barbara E Jenkins - Devise, Blair E Jenkins - Date of Probate 6/30/1903 - Book 5, page 235
• William E Jenkins - Devise, Alice Jenkins - Date of probate 4/3/1941 - Book 9, page 97.

 

The last two are really too late in time to be of much help, so I am marking them off of my list. I will however find the Wills/Probates of the first four and transcribe them.

• Elijah Jenkins - Devise, Polly Jenkins - Date of probate 1805 - does not list book and page - File no - IJK.
• Joseph Jenkins - Devise, Hugh Jenkins - Date of probate 1821 - No book or page - File no. IJK.

 

These two records do not exist in the digital files online. I will likely have to find time, haha, to go look at microfilm.

• Hugh Jenkins - Devise, Susannah Jenkins - Date of probate 11/1835 - Book 1, Page 354.

 

https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:37SQ-29XQ-F99?i=440&wc=32LJ-N38%3A169766601%2C170758801&cc=1867501. Two pages download to be transcribed later. This one is encouraging. He also lists his brother David and a nephew. This will start a family tree for sure.

• J.C. Jenkins - Devise, Barbara Jenkins - Date of Probate 9/14/1880 - Book 4, page 228.

 

North Carolina Probate Records, 1735-1970; https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:37SQ-296J-MX9?cc=1867501&wc=32LT-GPX%3A169766601%2C170783501.

 

Still not sure who J.C. Jenkins is. I’m sure I will discover him as I research descendants of Hugh Jenkins. Hugh however, I have previously researched and I have a transcription of his probate in 1835 that I did years ago. Now that I have a will, this will create a more complete picture. I’m going to start with him and transcribe the will. I suspect that he may be the MRCA I am looking for and that it is one of his descendants that is the father of M.O. Jenkins. I will start with Hugh. Fortunately, because I already did extensive research on him on down to his grandson Joseph, years ago, they are already in my tree and I can keep adding. 

 

From Hugh’s will I can determine the following relationships

 

Hugh Jenkins d. 1835 m. Susannah	Margaret (Jenkins) Froneberger	David Jenkins (dcs’d)
		William Jenkins
		Mary Jenkins

 

Margaret and David are Hugh’s siblings. William and Mary are David’s youngest children.

 

Other researchers have this Hugh Jenkins married to Mary Rhymes, maybe a first wife, but according to his will his wife’s name was Susannah. There is also the possibility that there were two Hugh Jenkins that died in 1800. One in Rowan County and one in Lincoln County. At this point I know the one in Lincoln County was married to Susannah. When I get to Rowan County, I may find the other Hugh Jenkins whose wife is Mary Rhymes. 

 

From the Will and Probate of J.C Jenkins who died in 1880 in Lincoln County, NC i can determine the following family.

1. J. C. Jenkins d. 9 August 1880, m. Barbara. 

They had the following children:

a.               Blair Jenkins

b.               Susan Jenkins m. S Harris Hopkins, of Baltimore, MD

c.               Alice Jenkins

d.               Hugh Jenkins

e.               Elizabeth Jenkins

f.                Addie Jenkins

 

The last four were still minors in 1880 when J C Jenkins died.

 

What was the timeline for historical records in Lincoln County, NC? I think this is the next thing I need to study and wrap my head around in order to take this study further.