Prompt: At the Courthouse
Where the Secrets Reside
By Myra Vanderpool Gormley © 2019
Research at courthouses is seldom dull or predicable. You never know what you will find or what morsels of long-hidden or forgotten family secrets might turn up. Here’s a sampling of things I’ve collected from court records about various family members.
Spelling and punctuation are creative and fluid, as well as unedited —for the most part.
ESSEX COUNTY. 23 Sept. 1740.
Esriakim Case and Malachi Vanderpool having in a most contemptious and outragious maner fought and made an assault upon each other in the face and in the presence of the court on motion of Phl.?? Kearney . . .
It's therefore ordered by the Court that the Constables do diligently make search for the said Esriakim Case and Malachi Vanderpool and that they be forthwith taken into custody and comitted into the Goal of the county, and there to remain until they be delivered by a Due Course of the Law."
Malachi V.D. Pool gave bond to behave himself and not to leave the county. Thos Serjant, bondsman.
24 Sept. 1740. Grand Jury indicted Ez. Case and Malachi V. D. Pool for assault.
Both confess, indictment required to furnish bond for good behaiour. —John V. D. Pool is security for Malachi V. D. Pool.
28 Sept. 1742 -- Essex County NJ. Court Records 'C" page 100
—George Smott agt. Malachi Vdp (Case #10c)
Written: September 3 1822—Jasper County, Georgia—Deed Book A, page 60.
Source: Microfilm of the actual Jasper County, Georgia, Deed Book, FHL microfilm #158497.
State of Georgia Jasper County. Know all men by these presents that I, Mordica Hill, of the County and State aforesaid being of sound mind and memory and in my perfect senses and having lost my eyesight and not able to take care of myself nor my property of any kind and being disposed to live with my son-in-law Lewis Peacock and he having agreed to take care of me during life and I feel it my duty to give to him all that I possess both real and personal.
Now know ye that the said Mordica Hill as aforesaid do hereby give grant & bequeath unto the said Lewis Peacock, his heirs and assigns all the real and personal property that I possess that is to say all that tract or parcel of land situate lying and being in the 17th District of original Baldwin but now Jasper County and known by part of lot No. (207?) in the Dist. aforesaid and
containing sixty acres of land more or less together with one Negro woman named Priss about 50 years of age, one sorrel horse, one brown bay mare or filly 2 years old, one cow and calf, and all my hogs, one bed and furniture, and all my working tools of all kings [sic] together with all papers debts dues and demands due me from all persons whatever.
In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and affixed my seal & by making my mark in the presence of the undernamed persons this third day of September 1822.
Signed Mordica (his X mark) Hill
Martin Cochran
William Roberts
Rocheford Mays
Georgia }
Jasper County} Personally came before me William Roberts who being duly sworn deposeth and saith that he saw Mordica Hill assign the within Deed for the purposes within mentioned and he at the same time assigned the same as a witness and saw Martin Cochran & Rocheford Mays assign it also.
Sworn to & subscribed before me this 28th Dec 1822.
Signed : James Ramsey, J.P., and William Roberts
Saline County. The Rev. Wilson Henderson [Sr.] left a will dated 12 September 1847 (probated 15 November 1847). Will Book 1, page 1, in which he mentions his sons: Wilson [Jr.], James, Edward, Davis, and Robert; and his two daughters, Sally Carpenter and Martha Gasaway.
He spelled out specifically what his son James was to receive, towit:
"I give and bequeath to my son James Henderson the following named property, towit: One shirt that he wore partly out at my house, and one log chair and one clevis and bot. that he took possession of and carried away. For--I believe the above named articles to be his share of the estate.”
Cherokee Claims (Shoemake)
State Alabama} Jackson County. 1 Dec. 1853
[some punctuation edited/added]
This day came John A. Shoemake and my mother Anna Shoemake & Eli B Shoemake & John W. Shoemake my sons, before me an acting Justice of the Peace for said county them being Cherokees men and woman claiming the rights of the Cherokee nation under the Treaty of 1835-36 which we never have received the benefit of said treaty and has [sic] never had the opportunity of informing ourselves to the parole (?) until this present time and for the want of our Cherokee friends and information represent us to the government of the United States, which now we will refer to our relations that we are of Parch Corn family and Caty Thorn and the Big Bear and John and James Thorn and Anny Shoemake lived at parchcorns on the Bank of Tennessee River where John fortook [?] his reservation on the path leading to Crowtown, then moved to the place where John Benge took his reservation, now called Bolivar then her & husband John Shoemake moved to the west fork of Crow Creek where they took there [sic] reservation and there lived until dispossed [sic] of by the laws of the country; now she refers to her family her husband deceased the 2nd day of November 1852 which she is entitled to his per capita of all Just Dues under the treaty of 1835-36.
She refers to her son John A. Shoemake, the only child she has or ever was known to have. She refers to her grandchildren and son’s wife Elizabeth Shoemake, my son’s children now refer to the names and number: John A. Shoemake & Elizabeth Shoemake, his wife; Eli B. Shoemake thire [sic] son & Elizabeth Ann Shoemake thire [sic] daughter, Died on the 8th day of September 1853, and claims her per capita under the treaty of 1835-36 and all Just on the Government and John W. Shoemake and George W. Shoemake & James D .Shoemake ,and William H. Shoemake and James P. Shoemake.
Anna Shoemake aged about 70 years of age and John A. Shoemake aged 50 years. Elizabeth Shoemake, wife of John A. Shoemake, aged about 45 years and William H. Shoemake 29 years of age, and James P. Shoemake, 27 years of age, and Eli B. Shoemake, 26 years of age, and Elizbeth Ann Shoemake, 24 years of age, and John W. Shoemake, 22 years of age.
Elizabeth Ann Shoemake, Deceased, having three children, George W. Shoemake, aged 7 years old, James D. Shoemake, aged 2 years & 11 months lacking 7 days, John E. Shoemake, aged 7 months.
She claims of twelve of the family. They claim under the former treaty of themselves and family which have been debased of their rights in consequence of Siler, the agent, not coming through the country in which we lived which we are able to prove. he said he would not go so far through the country for one or two familys, [sic] this can be proved by Samuel Keys.
Now the said Shoemakes claims for themselves 12 in number the amount due them under the Act of 1835-36 and there [sic] removal and subsistence and also there [sic] per capita which amounted to ninety two dollars & 70 cts apiece when paid to other Cherokees and a balance before the House of Congress of the United States of Eighty five dollars apiece which the petitioners now begs leave to be represented to be attached to that appropriations Bill the under signed Cherokees as duty Bound will Ever pray to the Congress of the United States Recieved [sic] our petitions State of Alabama, Jackson County.
U.S. Western District Court. Catherine Vanderpool was charged with adultery in U.S. Western District of Arkansas (district court) August of 1891 with H.C. Miller. She denied it, and mentions both W. C. Vanderpool Jr. and Sr.
Deposition (extract) (Bankston)
Butts County. 8 June 1859, Isaac Bankston appeared before Thomas J. Saunders, a Justice of the Peace, in and for said county. Isaac a resident of said county. Gives his birth place, thinks he is about 93 years old — his father was named Daniel Bankston and he was the brother of Jacob Bankston who was the father of Elijah Bankston — the deceased husband of Mrs. Elizabeth [née Morris] who lives in this county ...
[ed. she was trying to get widow's Revolutionary War pension].
Says his father, Daniel and his father's brother, Jacob moved from the state of North Carolina and settled in Wilkes County, GA about the beginning or just before the commencement of the Revolutionary War . . . says that Elijah Bankston was older than he [Isaac] . . . says that Andrew Bankston was his father's brother, and he moved to and settled about Beech Island in South Carolina and before the war and that the said Andrew had two sons — named James and Daniel (did NOT have a son named Elijah) . . . that Peter Bankston, the brother of deponent's father moved from North Carolina after the Revolutionary War and settled in Wilkes County, Georgia and that the said Peter had four sons — Larry, Andrew, John and William (did NOT have a son named Elijah) . . .
Signed Isaac Bankston.
1832 Indiana: Guardianship (Vanderpool)
Marion County, Indiana. January Term 1832.
Guardianship of Mary Vanderpool — John Vanderpool appointed guardian of his sister, Mary Vanderpool, about 35 years of age, being an idiot . . . her estate is worth about $150.
—Darlington, Jane Eaglesfield. Marion County, Indiana, Records Miscellanea. Indiana Historical Society, Indianapolis. 1986, p. 37d
