Kerenhappuch Turner

A Patriot of the American Revolution for VIRGINIA. DAR Ancestor #: A117148

Kerenhappuch Norman Turner carried dispatches for American patriot forces across enemy British lines when she was in her 50s or 60s. She is most famous for riding from Maryland to North Carolina on horseback to care for her son (or grandson) who was wounded at the Battle of Guilford Court House, North Carolina, in the Revolutionary War. Her monument is erected on the battlefield there (outskirts of Greensboro). She rigged a bucket of water from the rafters of a cabin to allow water to drip on the wound of her son so as to eliminate the infection.

She is said to have died from a broken neck sustained in a fall from her horse while hunting with her grandsons. Whether she was 88 yo or 96 yo when this occurred depends on which record one is looking at. Reportedly (DAR), she knew herself to be a descendant of William the Conqueror.

TMG

links:

• http://www.ronulrich.com/rfuged/nti01479.htm

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Kerenhappuch Norman Turner carried dispatches for American patriot forces across enemy British lines when she was in her 50s or 60s. She is most famous for riding from Maryland to North Carolina on horseback to care for her son (or grandson) who was wounded at the Battle of Guilford Court House, North Carolina, in the Revolutionary War. Her monument is erected on the battlefield there (outskirts of Greensboro). She rigged a bucket of water from the rafters of a cabin to allow water to drip on the wound of her son so as to eliminate the infection.

She is said to have died from a broken neck sustained in a fall from her horse while hunting with her grandsons. Whether she was 88 yo or 96 yo when this occurred depends on which record one is looking at. Reportedly (DAR), she knew herself to be a descendant of William the Conqueror.

In 1765 James Turner and wife Kerenhappuck sold their dwelling and former residence with 100 acres of land to William Lightfoot. This was described as the land Isaac Norman gave James Turner on his marriage to Isaac's daughter. Kerenhappuck. According to their descendants, they moved to Halifax County, Va. Kerenhappuck Nonnan Turner was a heroine of the Revolutionary War. A monument erected in her honor stands in Guilford Battlefield Park, Guilford, North Carolina. The history of the Morhead Family tells of her organizing the hospital corps after the battle of Guilford Courthouse and of how she found her grandson on Guilford battlefleld and nursed him back to health in the New Garden Quaker Meeting House. In her old age, she is said to have spent much time with her daughter on Little River in Richmond County N.C. She rode horseback and hunted with her grandsons. It was on one of these hunts that she was said to have been thrown off and her neck broken.

Issue of Kerenhappuck Norman Turner and James Turner (according to family records)

1. Sarah Turner b.1724 m. James Smith of Charles Co. Maryland. From them. Dr. Jean Stephenson of Washington, D.C. former National Chairman of Genealogical records of D.A.R., is descended. Her grandfather John Smith Napier was trained for a doctor because his great-grandmother Kerenhappuck had asked that he be so educated.

2. Elizabeth Turner m. Joseph Morehead of Fauquier County, VA.

Their grandson was John Motley Morehead, Governor of North Carolina and also a national figure. His home "Blandwood" in Greensboro, North Carolina has been a show place in the state for years.

3. Mary Turner m. Charles Morehead of Fauquier County.

Their son Charles Morehead, m. Margaret Slaughter, went to Kentucky and served in the legislature. His son, Charles Slaughter Morehead, was Governor of Kentucky and four years ir. U. S. Senate. Armistead Morehead’s son, James Turner Morehead, was also Governor of Kentucky and U. S. Senator. A great-grandson of Charles and Mary Turner Morehead was General Simon Bolivar Buckner, U.S.A.

4. Kerenhappuck Turner m. 1759, James Sanford.

Had six children. One of whom was James Turner Sanford, Congressman from Tennessee in l824.

5. James Turner, Jr. born 1757 went to Halifax County, Va. according to tradition. He appears to have married Sarah Irby in 1780. According to some information from North Carolina, he seems to have gone to Montgomery Co. N.C. and lived near his brother-in-law, James Smith, who lived on Smith Mountain in Richmond County, N.C.

Historians are undecided about the exact birth date of Kerenhappuch Norman, but it is assumed that she was born in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, in about 1715. She was the daughter of a well known tobacco planter, Isaac Norman, Jr. and his wife, the former Frances Courtney.

Kerenhappuch Norman married James Turner, the son of a prominent family and also a tobacco planter, in Spotsylvania County in 1733. Deed records show that following the wedding, Isaac Norman gave 50 pounds and 100 acres of his home plantation to his daughter and her new husband.

It was on this land that the first child, a son James Jr. was born in 1732, and he was followed by four daughters – Sarah, Mary, Elizabeth and Susan. The land lay on the banks of the Rappahannock River near the present day town of Remington, and there the two James Turners prospered as tobacco farmers for many years.

The Norman and Turner land became a part of Culpeper County in 1749. The new county was surveyed by George Washington, and it was probably during this time that Kerenhappuch and her family met and became devoted to the man who was to become the father of our country.

These were happy years for James and Kerenhappuch; they raised their children and taught them the skills of riding and hunting; skills which were not just enjoyable but necessary for survival in this frontier land.

In 1765 Kerenhappuch and James sold their home and land and moved to Halifax County, Virginia. James Turner Sr. died there in 1773, and Kerenhappuch was still living there at the time of the Revolutionary War.

During the Revolutionary War, the Turners were ardent Patriots. James Jr. joined the Virginia Militia where he was a Captain. A skilled rider, Kerenhappuch would on occasion carry dispatches for the army, occasionally even through the lines of the unsuspecting British. Kerenhappuch told her son and grandsons that if they were ever wounded, they should get word to her and she would come to their assistance.

Battle of Guilford Court House Captain Turner’s company went south and in March of 1781 the company was posted to guard duties in Guilford County, North Carolina. Guilford Court House was the seat of government for the county and it was toward this site that the 1900-man army of British Lord Charles Cornwallis was marching on March 15, 1781.

Unbeknownst to Cornwallis, a 4400-man army of colonial troops under Major General Nathanael Greene was lying in wait, well hidden in the dense forest foliage.

The ensuing battle was fierce; when it was over more than 27% of the British had suffered injury or death, compared to only 6% for the Americans who claimed victory in the battle. Although neither side gained a decisive advantage, the British loss of troops was so great that it forced them to abandon the Carolinas, and this eventually led to their surrender at Yorktown on October 19, 1781.

Eight members of Kerenhappuch Norman Turner’s family fought in the battle – her son and seven grandsons – and her son received very serious wounds. When word of this reached her, she rode on horseback to the battlefield from her home in Virginia.

Placing her son James Jr. in a log cabin on the battlefield in a crude bed on the floor, Kerenhappuch secured tubs in which she bored holes. These tubs she suspended from the rafters and filled them with cool water from the ‘Bloody Run’ which flows nearby. The constant dripping of water on the ghastly wounds lowered his fever and saved her son’s life. She also nursed other soldiers who were wounded during the battle.

After the war, Kerenhappuch Turner moved with her son James and daughter Sarah Turner Smith to Richmond County, North Carolina, where they lived on the Little River.

In her old age, Kerenhappuch still rode horseback and hunted with her grandsons, and during one of those hunts, she was thrown from her horse and suffered a broken neck.

Kerenhappuch Norman Turner died in 1805 in Richmond County, North Carolina.

http://www.womenhistoryblog.com/2010/11/kerenhappuch-norman-turner....

Kerenhappuch Norman Turner was born in central Virginia about 1733. She was married to James Turner and moved to Maryland sometime before 1775. She is said to have had a son badly wounded at the Battle of Guilford Courthouse. Somehow, Mrs. Turner received word of her son’s injury. Family tradition says that she rode by horseback from Maryland to Guilford Courthouse, where she found her son and nursed him back to health. Her statue, stands near the visitor center at Guilford Courthouse National Military Park.

Its inscription reads:

A Heroine of '76
Mrs. Kerenhappuch Turner
Mother of Elizabeth
The Wife of Joseph
Morehead of N.C. And
Grandmother of Captain
James and of John Morehead
A Young N.C. Soldier Under
Greene, Rode Horse-back from
Her Maryland Home and At
Guilford Courthouse Nursed
To Health A Badly Wounded Son

https://www.ncpedia.org/media/statue-kerenhappuch-norman