Elder John Parker

Someone has linked the Elder John Parker and his siblings (Daniel Parker; Thomas Parker; Susanne Daughhetee and Francis Parker) of Parker yDNA FamilyGroup #05 with Thomas Parker 1768-1846 born Hampshire Co., VA and died in Todd Co., KY of Parker yDNA FamilyGroup #18. Only 5 of 25 yDNA markers match and 23 of 25 need to match to prove a relationship.

• Reference: Wikipedia
• Reference: Wikipedia

Elder John Parker (1758–1836) was an American settler and Predestinarian Baptist minister who immigrated to Texas before the Texas Revolution. He was killed during the Fort Parker massacre in 1836, along with several members of his family, and others of the "Parker clan".

Parker was born on September 6, 1758 in Baltimore County, Maryland. His family moved to Virginia while Parker was young, and in 1777, at age nineteen, he left home to fight in the American Revolution. Two years later, in November 1779, he married Sarah "Sallie" White before returning to war. After returning home in Virginia, the Parkers' first child, Daniel Parker, was born on April 6, 1781. Other children soon followed.

About 1785, Parker moved his family to Georgia in search of opportunities for a better life. In 1803, he once again moved the family, including Sallie, eight children, Daniel's wife, Martha "Patsey" Dickerson, and their daughter. They settled near Nashboro (present Nashville), Tennessee. By 1817, their family had grown to eleven children, many of whom had married and had children of their own. The family then moved to Illinois.

In 1824, Sallie died, and in 1825, Parker married the widow Sarah "Sallie" Duty, who had several daughters who had married into the Parker clan. At age seventy-five, Parker and most of his family moved to Texas in 1833.

During 1835, some of Parker's sons built a fort on the head-waters of the Navasota River, near present Groesbeck in Limestone County, Texas. Parker's Fort was built as protection for the families who all had land grants located on the frontier of what was then called the Comancheria.

On May 19, 1836, Parker and other members of the Parker clan were killed at the Fort Parker Massacre. He was initially captured and died after his genitals were removed and he was scalped. His wife was seriously wounded but eventually recovered.

He was grandfather of Cynthia Ann Parker, mother of the famous Chief of the Comanches - Quanah Parker.

Birth: Sep. 15, 1758 Maryland, USA Death: May 19, 1836 Limestone County Texas, USA

Founder of Fort Parker. He helped build the Parker Fort where he was one of the five that was killed during the Indian raid. He is buried under an oak tree in a mass grave approximately one and one half miles from the fort. Today, the area is known as the Fort Parker Memorial Park, and many relatives of the families are interred there too. (bio by: Helen L. Smith Hoke)

Family links: Spouses:

1. Sarah Pinson Parker (1758 - 1836)*
2. Sarah White Parker (1759 - 1824)*

Children:

1. Daniel Parker (1781 - 1844)*
2. John Parker (1782 - 1831)*
3. Mary Jane Parker Kendrick (1785 - 1846)*
4. Benjamin F.W. Parker (1788 - 1836)*
5. Isaac Parker (1793 - 1883)*
6. Phoebe Parker Anglin (1796 - 1863)*
7. James William Parker (1797 - 1864)*
8. Nathaniel Parker (1799 - 1855)*
9. Silas Mercer Parker (1804 - 1836)*
10. Susannah Parker Starr (1807 - 1875)*

Calculated relationship*

Burial: Fort Parker Memorial Park Groesbeck Limestone County Texas, USA Plot: Mass Grave

Edit Virtual Cemetery info [?]

Created by: Helen L. Smith Hoke Record added: May 12, 2003 Find A Grave Memorial# 7433560

Fort Parker massacre

The Fort Parker massacre was an event in 1836 in which members of the pioneer Parker family were killed in a raid by Native Americans.Today these peoples are variously denominated Native Americans, First Americans, First Nation, and American Indians. On the Texas frontier in 1836, they would have simply been designated Indians.

History

Fort Parker was founded about two miles (3 km) west of present-day Groesbeck, Limestone County, Texas, USA by ElderElder - an ordained Baptist minister John Parker (1758–1836), his sons, Benjamin, Silas and James, plus other members of the Pilgrim Predestinarian Baptist Church of Crawford County, Illinois. Led by John and Daniel Parker, they came to Texas in 1833."The descendants of Elder John Parker were a strange and often brilliant family who may have changed the course of Texas and western history. Their obsession with religion and their desire for land took them from Virginia to Georgia, Tennessee, Illinois and finally Texas...From their line...came...Quanah Parker, last of the great Comanche war chiefs - and first of their great peace leaders." - Jo Ann Powell Exley Daniel's party first settled in Grimes County, then later moved to Anderson County near present-day Elkhart. Elder John Parker's group settled near the headwaters of the Navasota River, and built a fort for protection against Native Americans. It was completed in March of 1834. Fort Parker's 12 foot (4 m) high log walls enclosed four acres (16,000 m²). Blockhouses were placed on two corners for lookouts, and six cabins were attached to the inside walls. The fort had two entrances, a large double gate facing south, and a small gate for easy access to the spring.Fort Parker State Park was created in 1935, and a replica of the fort was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps in 1936 Most of the residents of the fort were part of the extended family of John and Sarah (Duty) Parker.

Soon the settlers were making their homes and farming the land. Several had built cabins on their farms, and used the fort for protection. Peace treaties were made with surrounding Native American chiefs. Perhaps the Fort Parker inhabitants expected that other tribes would honor the treaties as well.

On May 19, 1836, a large party of Native Americans, including Comanches, Kiowas, Caddos, and Wichitas,various stories relate differences in the size of the raiding party and the makeup of the tribes attacked the inhabitants of Fort Parker. Around mid-morning, riders appeared under a white flag, and Benjamin Parker went out to talk to them. He was killed, and before the fort's gates could be closed, the raiders rushed inside. Five were killed, some were left for dead, two women and three children were captured, and the rest escaped into the wilderness.killed were Samuel Frost, Robert Frost, Benjamin Parker, John Parker, and Silas Parker; captured were Elizabeth Kellogg, Cynthia Ann Parker, John R. Parker, Rachel Plummer, and James Pratt Plummer One of the captives was a nine-year-old girl, Cynthia Ann Parker, daughter of Silas and Lucinda (Duty) Parker. Cynthia Ann lived with the Comanches for nearly 25 years. She married Comanche chief Peta Nocona and was the mother of three children, including Quanah Parker. In 1860, she was among a Native American party captured by Texas Rangers. She was identified by her uncle, Isaac Parker, and returned to her family. Cynthia Ann never readjusted to the Anglo society, and died at the age of 43 in 1870. Quanah Parker became a leader among the Quahadi Comanches. After most of the Comanches and other tribes on the Staked Plains were defeated, Quanah Parker and his group surrendered to authorities and was forced to an Indian reservation in Oklahoma Territory. He was made chief of all the Comanche tribes on the reservation.

Fort Parker inhabitants on May 19, 1836

Elder John Parker and 2nd wife, Sarah Duty

Benjamin Parker James W. Parker and wife, Martha (Patsey) Duty Rachel Parker and husband, L. T. M. Plummer James Pratt Plummer Sarah Parker and husband, Lorenzo Nixon James Wilson Parker another son of James & Martha Silas Parker and wife, Lucinda Duty Cynthia Ann Parker John Richard Parker Silas Parker, Jr. Orlena Parker Elisha Anglin Abram Anglin Seth Bates Silas Bates G. E. Dwight and wife Dwight children David Faulkenberry Evan Faulkenberry Samuel Frost and wife Robert Frost other Frost children Elizabeth Duty Kellogg (dau. of Sarah Duty Parker) Oliver Lund

Children of Ann Parker & Nathaniel Parker

Children currently associated but unproven are:

1. Moses Parker born 1744.
2. Daniel Parker born 1750
3. Elder John Parker born 1758,
4. Susannah Parker born 1762-64; died 1816 Estill County, KY.; married John Haughettee, Estill County, KY.
5. Francis Parker ????

Founder of Fort Parker. He helped build the Parker Fort where he was one of the five that were killed during the Indian raid. He is buried under an oak tree in a mass grave approximately one and one half miles from the fort. Today, the area is known as the Fort Parker Memorial Park, and many relatives of the families are interred there, too. (bio by: Helen L. Smith Hoke)

Founder of Fort Parker. He helped build the Parker Fort where he was one of the five that was killed during the Indian raid. He is buried under an oak tree in a mass grave approximately one and one half miles from the fort. Today, the area is known as the Fort Parker Memorial Park, and many relatives of the families are interred there too.

• Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Nov 20 2019, 1:27:18 UTC

  ---

Elder John Parker as he was known was born in Maryland in 1758. It is unknown with certainty who his parents were. As a young man he fought in the American Revolution. As a young man he moved to the Culpepper County Virginia area and married Sarah "Sally" White thee in November of 1779. John and Sally had 13 children together. After the 3 youngest children were born in culpepper county the family moved to Elbert county, Georgia about 1785. they would have 9 children in Georgia before moving to the area of now Nashville Tennessee (know as Nashboro at that time) in 1803. Around 1817 the family moved again to the area of Crawford/Coles County Illinois. The family rose to prominence in Illinois the oldest son Daniel became a well known baptist preacher and was elected to the illinois State Senate. In 1833 John and his family looked at moving again this time to the new frontier of Texas. Johns son led the intial group to Texas in 1833 where he secured land grants for the family from what was then still Mexico. The land was in what wass known as the "Comancheria" near present day Groesebeck, Texas. Several of Johns son built a fort on the land in beginning in 1833. In the fall of 1835 John joined his sons in Texas at Ft Parker. Sally had died in Illinois in 1824 and John had remarried to the widow, Sarah Pinson Duty (who was the mother of 2 of his sons wifes). On May 19, 1836 in the early morning hours the Fort was attacked by a band of Comanche and Kiowa Indians. John was killed at the fort along with is sons Benjamin and Silas as well as Samuel and Robert Frost. Several women and children were captured including an 8 year old Cynthia Ann Parker, johns granddaughter whose father Silas was killed that day at the Fort. She would spend 25 years living with the Comanche, marry a Comanche chief named Peta Nacona and her oldest child, Quanah would eventually become the last chief of the Comanche IndiansHe is not actualy buried under the oak tree in a mass grave approximately one and one half miles from the fort, this is simply a memorial marker to him and the others that died at Ft Parker. He was never properly buried in a marked grave as the survivors of Ft Parker were running for their lives hiding in the Navasota river bottoms afraid the Comanches were going to come find them and finish them off. Today the Descedants of Elder John Parker (he was a preacher in the primitive baptist church and they called their ministers Elder rather than Reverend hence his title as Elder John) meet annually at nearby Ft Parker State Parker for a family reunion. John has many descendants from his 13 child and 100 grandchildren, including the Comanche blood descendants of Quanah Parker who honor his memory at the annual reunionThis Bio written by Scott Nicholson, great great great great great grandson of Elder John Parker who is the Chairman of the annual Parker Family Reunion held at Ft Parker State Park near Groesbeck, Texas. for more information you may contact him through his find a grave account or on the facebook group fr the parker family called ParkerReunionPS: please note that Phoebe Parker Hassell is Johns daughter, the Phoebe Parker Anglin listed here is not his daughter. I have tried to get the owner of the find a grave account for Phoebe Anglin to correct this mistake but they have refused and I cant remove the link showing her as his daughter only they can.

~
THE PARKER FAMILY
The patriarch of the Parker family in Texas was John Parker, who was born in 1758 in Baltimore, Maryland, and served in the American Revolution. He married Sarah White. Their first child, Daniel, was born in 1781 in Culpeper County, Virginia. The family then migrated to Elbert County, Georgia, whence the entire family migrated around 1803 via Tennessee to Cole County, Illinois, where Daniel's son, John N. was born in 1810. (Note: the correct name is Coles county, IL)
Both the Elder John and his eldest son were Baptist preachers and, when in March 1833 the entire family again decided to migrate, this time to Texas, they were faced with the dilemma of worshiping as Baptists in a province where Catholism was the only legally acceptable religion. The Elder Daniel Parker sought to circumvent the law by establishing a Baptist church in Illinois and bringing its members into Texas. Elder John Parker "was one of seven charter members of Pilgrim Church which was constituted in Crawford County, Illinois, July 26, 1933, as a Primitive (or Predestinarian) Baptist presbytery, for the express purpose of colonizing in Texas, then part of Mexico".
Since the patriarch John was now 75 years old, his son Daniel led the migration (consisting of 25 wagons of Parkers, kinsmen, and neighbors) from Illinois to Texas. The Pilgrim Predestinarian Church was built "on the north side of the bluff of the Harrison Fork on Bayou Blue" near present-day Elkhart, Anderson County, Texas, where the Elder Daniel and his family settled.
The Elder John Parker, together with his sons Silas, James W., and Benjamin, settled farther west on the Navasota River near present-day Groesbeck, Limestone County, Texas. It was here on 19 May 1836 that several hundred Indians, mostly Comanche and Kiowa, attacked the settlers of Fort Parker. The Elder John, his wife, and his sons Benjamin and Silas were among those slain. Two of the children of Silas Parker, 8-year-old Cynthia Ann and her brother John, were carried away by the Indians. By Comanche Chief Peta Nacona, Cynthia Ann (called Naduah by the Comanches) became the mother of three children, the eldest of whom was Quanah Parker who was to become the last great Comanche chief and lead the tribe in its final bitter struggle with his mother's people.
On 17 October 1835 Elder Parker had proposed the formation of the Texas Rangers. In 1860 Cynthia Ann together with Prairie Flower, one of her two daughters, was recaptured by the Texas Rangers under the leadership of Captain Sul Ross and returned to her surviving family members, but her years with the Comanches had left her more comfortable with her captors than with her family. Her brother John never returned to his family. One would not with to disregard the very real anguish and grief of their family; however, the deeper tragedy is that these two individuals, through no volition of their own, lived their lives on the fringes of two widely divergent cultures. They could never be entirely accepted into or trusted by either culture. Source: "Branches and Acorns" SWTGS Quarterly Vol. II, No. 1, p. 7-9 - September 1986 -- Extracted from the family records of Member Cynthia Buchanan, Daniel Webster Parker's granddaughter, SWTGS Member Cynthia Buchanan.]* Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Feb 24 2023, 22:15:39 UTC

GEDCOM Note

Founder of Fort Parker. He helped build the Parker Fort where he was one of the five that was killed during the Indian raid. He is buried under an oak tree in a mass grave approximately one and one half miles from the fort. Today, the area is known as the Fort Parker Memorial Park, and many relatives of the families are interred there too.