Lady Margaret Lynch

Jonack "Jonas" Lynch had come to South Carolina from Galaway County, Ireland in 1677 aboard a ship called the "Blessing". He had served as a member of the Commons House of Assembly and received a 600 acre land grant on the south shore of the Cooper River in South Carolina. Jonack married Margaret Johnson and they had three children, Johnson Lynch, Thomas Lynch ( named after his grandfather in Ireland), and Sarah Lynch.

Sarah Lynch married James Belin. On August 16, 1733, Thomas Lynch recorded a Deed of Gift in Christ Parrish, South Carolina Deed Book S on page 171 conveying 1000 acres of land to James and Sarah Belin and their sons Allard Belin and James Belin Jr., all living in Prince George Parrish, South Carolina.

Johnson Lynch married the beautiful Margaret Schulte. The couple had three children, Jonas Lynch, Mary Lynch who married Pierre Peter Robert ( Pierre Robert and Mary Lynch's daughter Margaret Robert married her cousin Allard Belin), and Margaret Lynch who married Colonel Elias Horry Jr.

John Horry, brother of Colonel Elias Horry Jr. was the father of Peter Horry, Lieutenant-Colonel in the Revolutionary War and later Brigadier General in the South Carolina Milita. Peter fought with General Marion " The Swamp Fox ".

Thomas Lynch married Sabina Vanderhorst and they had a son who was named Thomas Lynch after his father.

This son Thomas Lynch born in 1727 at St. James Parrish in South Carolina became a wealthy rice farmer. He served in the Colonial Legislature of South Carolina and represented the Colony in the Stamp Act Congress, heading the committee which drafted the petition to the House of Commons.

Later he was elected to both the First and Second Continental Congresses. Thomas joined Benjamin Franklin and Benjamin Harrison on a committee sent to Cambridge, Massachusetts, to confer with General George Washington upon " the most effectual method of continuing, supporting, and regulating the Continental Army".

Early in 1776 at Philadelphia Thomas suffered a stroke that virtually incapacitated him for futher service. His son Thomas Lynch Jr had accepted a Captaincy in the First South Carolina Regiment of Continentals and to his dismay young Lynch contracted bilious fever. This had rendered him partial invalid.

Although ill himself, Thomas Jr. made the trip to check on his father. His concerned colleagues in South Carolina elected Thomas Jr. to the Continental Congress, probally so he could care for his father and also act officially on his behalf.

At the age of 27 Thomas Lynch Jr. voted for and signed the Declaration of Independence. Thomas was the youngest member in Congress and they were the the only father and son team that served concurrently in the Continental Congress at the same time.

At the end of the year when both men started home, Thomas Sr. had a second stroke and died at Annapolis, Maryland.

Thomas Jr. broken in spirit and physically unable to continue in politics, retired to Peach Tree Plantation his home in South Carolina.

In 1779 he and his wife, heading for southern France in an attempt to regain his health, boared a ship that sank somewhere around the West Indies. The couple died childless.

This is the story of how my great, great, grandmother Mary Lynch Coachman became cousins to Thomas Lynch, signer of the Declaration of Independence, and Peter Horry, Brigadier General in the South Carolina Milita.

Note: The Historical Society in Charlestown, South Carolina, has the Lynch family tree dating back to the 1200's and some fabulous letters Thomas Lynch Sr. wrote to George Washington and others before and during 1776 about the Revolution, previous to his death.

Story written by Byron Walker.......great, great, grandson of Mary Lynch Coachman.

GEDCOM Source

@R1200763942@ U.S. and Canada, Passenger and Immigration Lists Index, 1500s-1900s Ancestry.com Ancestry.com Operations, Inc 1,7486::0 Place: South Carolina; Year: 1670-1677; Page Number: 149 1,7486::3815589