James d'Laury Lowery, Hateras

Biography

James Lowery /Hateras was born circa 1751 in Robeson County, North Carolina, United States. His parents were James Lowry, of New Kent Fur Trade /Hateras who was the son of Elias d'Laury who was in court for non payment of a debt and then got in worse trouble for hiding tithables in his family.

Spouse of James Lowery wasSarah (Kearsey) Lowery,/ PeeDee, Cheraw, Meherrin.

James married Mary (Sweat) Lowery. Together they had the following children: Clarrissa Sweat Chavis.

James married Sarah (Lowry) Locklear in 1795 in Robeson, North Carolina, USA. Together they had the following children: Daniel Lowery, Sr.; Patty Lowry, Lumbee.

Cheraw, MS Distant Cousin Matching Project to 3 Lumbee Descendant Groups of 100 Plus Cousins Results: 5th Cousin Reason due to the Lowery common ancestry testers who also share Chavis/Shiver commons; is double or more for the Ulapausye'Glover-Moore descendants. Interesting is that the Deese, Dial and Lowery are matching the Cherokee have segments that overlap to the Cheraw, MS area Old Cheraw at 5th cousin level. Lowery for the Pack Lowry lines at 5 - 6 generation cousin distance.at 7cM) cousin matches, triangulations reported to all things Chavis/Shivers,

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The record of the Lowry family in October 1767 --James Lowry was granted a patent for land in Bladen County. Between 1770 and 1772 he bought more than one thousand acres in the county. He was listed with his wife as taxable “Mulates” from 1768 to 1774. In 1779 he owned two slaves, 400 acres of improved land, and 100 head of cattle. He bought and sold land along Drowning Creek in Robeson County. James Lowry owned more than a thousand acres and nine slaves when he died in Robeson County in 1810. He was described by older white residents who remembered him as “well proportioned, fine looking, respectable mulatto. . . characterized by elegance and refinement of manners, tall and commanding in personal appearance, urban, courtly and genteel.” He was married to Sarah Kersey, who was descended from Peter Kersey, a taxable “Negro” in the household of William Hunt of Surry County, Virginia. 

James Lowry’s son Thomas bought 100 acres of land from Ishmael Chavers in May 1804. Another of his sons, James Lowery, Jr., sold two tracts of land to Malcolm Locklear in 1801 and 1807. He was listed in the 1820 census as a “free colored” head of household who owned 9 slaves. Another of James Lowry’s sons was William Lowry, who was listed as “other free” in Bladen County in the 1800 census and “free colored” in Robeson County in 1820. His son Allen Lowry married Catherine Locklear in April 1816 in Robeson County. They were the parents of the legendary Henry Berry Lowry (See below).

The Locklear family originated in Virginia as well. They were early residents of Lunenburg County, Virginia, and Edgecombe County, North Carolina. They were taxed as mixed-race in Bladen and Granville County in the 1760’s. In the 1730s the Locklear family and the Chavis family lived in Edgecombe County, which later was incorporated into Halifax County, North Carolina. In 1770 William Chavis of Granville County charged Thomas Lockery (sic) “Free Negro” with trespass. The latter was identified as “Thomas Lockleer” in the 1780 Granville County tax list. Robert Locklear purchased a plantation in Edgecombe County (later, Halifax County), North Carolina in December 1738. His land adjoined the Roanoke River, Quankey Pocosin, and Chavis’ branch. His son John Loclear bought 100 acres of land on the south side of Gum Swamp and Drowning Creek in 1752. He and his wife were listed as “Mulatto” in Bladen County in 1768. Another son of Robert Locklear was Major Locklear who was living in Bladen County in October 1773 when he was accused of harboring “free Negors and Mullatus living upon the Kings Land” including Edward and Tiely Locklear (his two children).

The above genealogical history is a remarkable story of free African Americans who owned extensive tracts of land and even slaves in colonial North Carolina. However, despite their economic status, whites in the colony did not approve of them. A 1715 law prohibited Negroes, Mulatoes, and Indians from voting for members of the colonial assembly. When this law was revised in 1734 and in 1743 there was no racial restriction, only restrictions on property, residence, and age. Historian John Hope Franklin notes, “There is no conclusive evidence, however, that Negroes voted during the colonial period.” In 1723 North Carolina passed a law that heavily taxed married free African Americans. A group of 31 residents in Granville County signed a petition to repeal the 1723 law, claiming:

That many Inhabitants of the said Counties [Northampton, Edgecombe, and Granville] who are Free Negroes and Mulattoes and persons of Probity and good Demeanor and cheerfully contribute towards the discharge of every public Duty injoined [sic] them by Law. But by reason of being obliged by the said Act of Assembly to pay Levies for their wives and Daughters. . . are greatly Impoverished and many of them rendered unable to support themselves and families with the Common Necessaries of Life.

In 1741 the General Assembly passed another law to prevent “that abominable Mixture and spurious issue . . . by white Men and women intermarrying with Indians, Negroes, Mustees, or Mulattoes: that any man or woman who intermarried with “an Indian, Negro, Mustee or Mulatto man or woman, or any Person of Mixed Blood, to the Third Generation” would be fined fifty pounds....

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Claimant Kits: :

A890455 Elwood Cumbo (James Henry Cumbo, Jones NC and Tuscorora);A633513 Kelvin Oxendine (Cannon Cumbo, Robeson NC) ;F470971 Beth Deese-Wilkins(Lumbee - Cannon Cumbo, Robeson NC and Deese and Parker and Johnson and Richardson) ;A551242 Quessie Cummings Dial. Beth Deese-Wilkins Grandmother; A376075 Becca Kay (Cannon Cumbo, Robeson NC) ; A180006 Luke Alexander(Cannon Cumbo, Robeson NC and Clark) ; F83260 Billy W. Lowry, Jr. (Luke & Beth’s cousin) (Cannon Cumbo, Robeson NC) ;A734921 Robin S. Smith (Luke’s cousin) (Susannah Cumbo Spaulding, Brunswick NC and Clark) Roberson Co. NC. Anderson Country TN A372035 Shirley Cozo Roberson Co. NC. Anderson Country TN T041536 Shirley Cozo - A512798 Charley Lowery ; A156707 John F. Burris T934926 Tom Lowery; T938674 Alexander Willis ; T874360 Sandra Lowery T554799 Becky Burris; T271853 Ben Lowery; A456390 Kyle Moorman

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