David Forehand: From the Pasquotank to a Tennessee Inheritance

A farm in Guilford, a widow living beyond North Carolina, and a deed signed in Tennessee follow one Forehand family west from the Pasquotank.

In October 1821, a group of Tennessee residents sold sixty acres back in North Carolina. The property lay on the waters of Allamance in Guilford County; the sellers lived in Davidson and Rutherford Counties, hundreds of miles away. Three Forehand men joined four married couples in the conveyance. Several of their names had appeared six years earlier in a court notice concerning the estate of David Forehand. The land and the people together provide a probable connection between David’s Guilford household and the expanding Forehand families of Middle Tennessee. [1821 deed]

David himself had died in 1802. His known westward movement ended in Guilford, where he left a home farm, other land, livestock and a wife named Prudence. To follow the probable continuation of this family into Tennessee, we must begin farther east, near the head of the Pasquotank River.

From Newland to Guilford

On 7 September 1769, Thomas Forehand sold David sixty acres in Newland for £45. The tract came out of a larger holding of 503 acres on the northwest side of the Pasquotank River. Lemuel Forehand witnessed the transaction. Two days later, David witnessed Thomas’s separate conveyance to Lemuel. These were transactions among men who belonged to the same small Forehand neighborhood, and they are an important part of the case for David’s possible place in Thomas’s family. [1769 deeds]

David remained in the coastal records for decades. Tax returns and land transactions place him there through the years of the Revolution and into the new republic. The dated 1789 District 6 return lists David Fourhand with one hundred acres and two white polls, although it does not name the second taxable person. In 1790 he sold fifteen acres to Tulle Vardin. Four years later he conveyed a much larger holding to Lodwick Williams: a principal tract of 125 acres and a twenty-acre addition. Jordan Forehand witnessed both sales. [Coastal records]

The deeds then carry David inland in stages. When he bought 112 acres and 79 poles from Robert Dean on 1 May 1799, the register described him as a resident of “Hartford County,” North Carolina—a spelling reasonably understood as Hertford. The property was in Guilford, on both sides of Allamance. By 14 February 1801, when he purchased another tract on the waters of Polecat from Timothy McCiver, David was expressly described as a Guilford resident. Jordan Forehand was again a witness. [1794–1801 deeds]

We identify the Pasquotank landholder and the Guilford testator with High confidence. The recurring David–Jordan association, the sequence of residence clauses and the later estate title make a strong cumulative case. The records do not give a continuous itinerary or an exact moving day; they give something more useful than a family tradition alone—dated places, transactions and associates. Thomas’s proposed fatherhood is a separate question and remains Possible.

The household David left

David made his will on 6 July 1802. Its most substantial provision concerned Prudence, whose name the manuscript spells “Prudance.” She was to have the use of the sixty acres where he lived, with the improvements, household furniture, livestock and farming property provided for her and the children. A sorrel mare appears among her provisions. These were the means of keeping a household and farm going after David’s death. [1802 will]

Five individually named children—Jordan, Jarvis, Owing, Molley and John—were each left ten shillings. Thomas received a brown colt. David also referred to “my last eight children” as a group. We retain that expression without turning it into a fixed total of thirteen children: the will does not identify all eight or explain exactly how its individual bequests and collective provisions overlap.

In this story, Allen is the son identified with the will’s “Owing.” Allen appears by that name in the later notice concerning David’s estate. This is our working identification across the two records; a literal transcription of the will must still read Owing. Henry, who also appears in the estate notice, is a separate person. [1815 notice]

David directed that other property be sold, including land apart from the home farm and two acres associated with a mill. The executors, Roger Kirkman and Nehemiah Causey, put the instructions into effect. On 1 December 1802 they sold James Rumbley the Pole Cat tract David had acquired from McCiver. On 5 January 1803 they sold Roddy Hannah fifty acres on both sides of Alamance. The deeds identify them as executors acting under David’s will, linking the land he purchased to the estate administered after his death. [Executor deeds]

The will and first executor conveyance establish his death in 1802. A court-minute transcription narrows the interval to 6 July–19 August, when the will was proved. It supplies no exact death day. Prudence survived him by many years: she was still named as his widow in 1815.

North Carolina land, Tennessee families

In May 1815, Jeremiah Fields petitioned the Guilford court concerning a mill. The resulting newspaper notice named Prudence Forehand, widow, and Thomas, Henry, Allen, Jane, Fanny, Nancy, Mastin and Taby Forehand as devisees of David’s estate. They were described as inhabitants of another state. North Carolina land still required their attention after they had left North Carolina. The notice does not say which state had become their home. [1815 notice]

The 1821 deed supplies Tennessee addresses. Thomas and Martin Forehand were among the Davidson County sellers, as were Alson and Fanny Lenton, James and Nancy Rhodes, and William and Phebe Spence. Henry Forehand and Brittain and Jane Spence were specifically identified in the continuation as Rutherford County residents. The acknowledgment proceedings establish the four marriages. The land they conveyed to Jeremiah Field, for $120, remained in Guilford. [1821 deed]

The identification of this group with David’s estate family, and of its sixty acres with the home tract, is Moderate confidence—probable. Several given names recur from the estate proceeding, Field connects the two transactions, and the boundaries return to the neighborhood and boundary lines of David’s earlier Allamance purchase. This is more than a coincidence of acreage. The remaining gap is the absence of a complete intervening title or an express recital naming David as the former owner; the deed itself does not call its sellers his children. Mastin’s possible identity with Martin, and Taby’s with Phebe, also require separate treatment.

A North Carolina name near Nashville

Pasquo gives this family movement a wider setting. The community is in Davidson County near Nashville, at the northern end of today’s Natchez Trace Parkway. Historical Highlights of Camden County, published in 1977, recounts a wagon-train migration from northern Camden and Pasquotank in 1797 and includes Forehand and Linton among the participating surnames. It describes the Tennessee settlement’s name as Pasquotank, shortened first to Tank and then to Pasquo. A later Tennessee genealogical publication also preserves the explanation that the name came from Pasquotank families. [Pasquo sources]

That remembered migration helps explain why familiar northeastern North Carolina surnames appear together in Middle Tennessee. The 1977 account gives no individual Forehand names, however, and does not place David or a named child in its wagon train. David’s own records still place him in North Carolina afterward. Pasquo belongs here as the history of a broader movement; the deeds and estate proceedings provide the particular evidence for his family.

Family Ties

Prudence was David’s wife, explicitly named in the will and later described as his widow. Her maiden surname, marriage date and exact birth and death dates are unknown. The records do not establish that she was the mother of every child. She must remain distinct from the earlier Prudence Forehand whose estate was administered in 1751. [Will and family evidence]

Thomas of Newland is David’s possible father. If that connection is correct, Lemuel, Daniel and the older Jarvis—Thomas’s documented sons—belong among David’s brothers. Cornelius belongs one generation farther back through the High-confidence identification of his named son Thomas with the Newland landholder. That strong Cornelius–Thomas identification does not remove the uncertainty in the Thomas–David link. [Parentage evidence]

The children and later beneficiaries are best followed individually. “Named child” below means David’s will explicitly supplies the relationship; “devisee” means a person named as a beneficiary in the 1815 proceeding.

Jordan — named son

Ten shillings in the will. A Jordan witnessed David’s coastal and Guilford deeds; whether each was this named son remains unproved. No Tennessee residence for him is established here.

Jarvis — named son

Ten shillings. His proposed identity with a later western Jarvis remains Possible. He is distinct from the older Chowan Jarvis who died by 12 September 1788.

Allen, written “Owing” in the will — working identification of a named son

Ten shillings under Owing; Allen appears separately from Henry among the 1815 devisees. He does not appear among the inspected 1821 sellers.

Molley — named daughter

Ten shillings. A married surname and western residence have not been established.

John — named son

Ten shillings. Neither the adult Guilford land seller of 1802 nor the later Williamson County John is automatically this son.

Thomas — named son and 1815 devisee

A brown colt in the will. The 1821 Davidson County seller probably continues his record through the estate-associated group.

Henry — 1815 devisee

Probably the 1821 Rutherford County seller. His place among David’s children is inferred from the estate context, rather than an individual son clause in the will.

Jane — 1815 devisee

Probably Jane, wife of Brittain Spence, of Rutherford County in 1821. That marriage is explicit; her identification as David’s daughter rests on the estate connection.

Fanny — 1815 devisee

Probably Fanny, wife of Alson Lenton, of Davidson County in 1821. Her marriage is documented in the deed proceedings; daughterhood is inferred.

Nancy — 1815 devisee

Probably Nancy, wife of James Rhodes, of Davidson County in 1821. Her marriage is documented; her placement as David’s daughter follows the estate evidence.

Mastin and Martin — possible same person

Mastin is the printed name in 1815; Martin is a Davidson County seller in 1821. Their equivalence remains Possible. A much younger Martin, aged thirty-two in a census crop attributed to 1860, belongs to another generation.

Taby and Phebe — possible same person

Taby appears in 1815. Phebe is explicitly William Spence’s wife in 1821. The proposed identification remains Possible; the women may be distinct.

This comparison draws on the 1802 will, 1815 notice and 1821 conveyance. Later namesake comparisons are detailed in the western-family research. It does not turn the eleven sellers in 1821 into eleven children.

Between the Lines

Possibilities, not proven relationships.

The case for Thomas as David’s father begins with geography and association: David was in the same Newland Forehand community, bought part of Thomas’s holding, and appeared with Lemuel in the paired 1769 transactions. Those facts make sonship worth pursuing. They also fit another close family relationship, and the currently examined records have not narrowed those alternatives enough to raise the rating beyond Possible. An inheritance recital or another record expressly connecting David to Thomas’s household would materially strengthen the case.

The western questions need the same attention to generations. In the 1830 Williamson County household, if its sole adult male was the named head John, his age places his birth after 1 June 1800 and by 1 June 1810. To be David’s named son, he would have to have been born by 6 July 1802. That is possible, but this young man cannot also be the adult John who sold land in 1802. Jarvis’s possible western identity likewise needs a connected sequence, rather than a repeated first name. Lambert and Vinson belong to important Tennessee Forehand investigations, but neither is established here as David’s son. [Western identity studies]

What David’s estate already gives us is substantial: a household established in Guilford after years on the Pasquotank, a widow and beneficiaries living outside North Carolina by 1815, and a probable continuation of that family in two Tennessee counties by 1821. The sixty acres on Allamance kept those distant people together in a single transaction. Through it, the history of one North Carolina farm becomes part of the history of the Forehands in Tennessee.