Mourning Lewis

From the book The Millers of Millersburgh (on Googlebooks):

Chapter VII.

The descendants of Mourning Mills, daughter of Eleanor Morris and Major William Mills.

Mourning Mills married Henry Graves Lewis, son of John Lewis of Albemarle County, Virginia, and his wife, Sarah Taliaferro. Henry G. Lewis was born 1761 and was a twin brother of Mrs. Francis Rhodes Twitty of Rutherford County, North Carolina. He received two bullet wounds at the battle of Cowpens and one with a sword which followed him to his grave. He also fought at the Battle of King's Mountain. A wife of one of his ancestors was a cousin of George Washington. He married Mourning Mills about 1791 and settled in Buncombe County, as it was then known, near Hendersonville, North Carolina, where he died in 1815. His children were William Jones, Sarah Myra, Marville Franklin, Phalby Caroline, Richard Taliaferro, Sophia Melinda, Eliza Eleanor, John de Lafayette, James Madison, Dr. George Walton, and Henry Rufus Lewis.

William Jones Lewis, son of Mourning Mills, was born 1792 in Buncombe County, North Carolina. About 1826 he located in Bausville, Yancey County, North Carolina, as a merchant. About 1829 he married Celia Wilson of Yancey County. He was very generous with his friends. He endorsed notes for them to a large amount and had them to pay, which nearly broke him in his old age. He acted as county clerk for the court in Yancey County for many years. He died in 1853, leaving the following children: Rufus Henry, born 1830; Louisa Mourning, born 1832, who married J. B. Woodfin; Oscar Marville, born 1835; and Mary Eliza Lewis, born 1842.

Sarah Myra Lewis, daughter of Mourning Mills, married Reverend David Hilliard, for many years a Methodist preacher, but he joined the Baptist Church about 1853. He was a soldier in the war of 1812. He resided for some years at Spartanburg, South Carolina. They both died in Asheville, North Carolina; he in 1870, and she in 1871. They had the following children: William Lewis, Ann Eliza, Sarah Maud, Mary Jane, Sophia Melinda, and James Henry Hilliard. Dr. William Lewis Hilliard was born in 1823, married Miss Margaret Love and resided at Asheville. He graduated in medicine after attending lectures in Philadelphia in 1849 and 1850. He once fought a duel with a Mr. Hynes. The difficulty grew out of a political difference. His children were James Robert; Dr. Wm. David; Sam Haywood, who married Miss Mary Justin of Hendersonville, North Carolina; Sarah Maud, who married Fred Hull; Dr. Charles Eugene, who married Miss Mary Craig of Louisville, Kentucky, died about 1890, and left one little boy, Charles, Jr.; Margaret Josephine, called the handsomest woman in Asheville, who married Jack Campbell, a wealthy man of Asheville; Dr. Walter Lee, who never married but died September, 1890; Ida Love, who married Robert Foster of Asheville; and Howard Hilliard. Margaret Josephine had three children, Emily, Hilliard, and Jack Campbell, Jr. Sophia Melinda Hilliard was born 1826, and married William Brem in 1857. She resided at Spartanburg, South Carolina, and is said to be very beautiful as was her mother, Sarah Lewis, and her grandmother, Mourning Mills. Her brother's family (Dr. Wm. Lewis Hilliard) were all extremely handsome. She had two children; William Thomas, who died at the age of fourteen years; and Mamie Louisa Brem, who married Mr. Sheriden of Spartanburg, South Carolina. She had three children, Lynn, William, and Hilliard Sheriden. Mary Jane Hilliard was born in 1828, and died in 1869. James Henry Hilliard was born in 1831 and was postmaster at Asheville in 1858.

Marville Franklin Lewis, son of Mourning Mills, was born in 1796. He merchandised a few years at Greenville Court House, South Carolina. His health becoming impaired, he wound up his business and started to Cuba, but died in 1833, just before reaching the island. He never married.

Phalby Caroline Lewis, daughter of Mourning Mills, was born in 1798, and married Reverend Thomas Craven of Randolph County, North Carolina, in 1812, and resided at Cave Springs, Floyd County, Georgia. They moved from North Carolina to Georgia in 1823. Their children were; Dr. Lewis McKendrick Craven, born 1822, who married Miss C. J. Wooten, and lived at Cave Springs; Sophia Mary, born 1824, who married Rufus Barker, a farmer in Floyd County, Georgia; John Henry, born 1826, who married Nancy Logan; William Mills, born 1828, who married Sarah Dobbins; Caroline Minerva, born 1830, who married James W. P. Ware, a planter; Louisa Orilla, born 1832, who married Dr. A. M. Turner; and Thomas Augustus Craven, born 1835.

Sophia Melinda Lewis, daughter of Mourning Mills, was born in 1801, married General Phillip Brittain of Henderson County, North Carolina. General Brittain was a soldier in the War of 1812, and represented Buncombe County in the house in 1810, 1811, 1816, 1817, 1818 and as senator in 1823 and 1824. (See Wheeler's History of North Carolina, page fifty-four). General Brittain was a man of strong mind and constitution, and represented his constituents in various offices. While in the legislature, perhaps his last time, Henderson County was formed and received its name at his suggestion, after old General Henderson, who died a worthy citizen of the state. General Brittain was an industrious, enterprising, public-spirited man. He married Sophia, daughter of a Widow Lewis, reared a large family, and died in 1848, at an advanced age. Their children were; Philip, who died single; Stanhope, residing at Hendersonville, North Carolina, who served as captain of the Home Guards in the War of 1861; Mourning Mills, who married Dr. Joseph Blackstock, and died in Arkansas about 1877, leaving three children; Attilla Delila, who married William Henry, and died in 1860, in Henderson County, North Carolina, leaving four children; James, who died single; Benjamin, residing at Hendersonville, North Carolina, who served as a lieutenant in the Confederate War; Laura H., who married Goodson Carie of Henderson County, North Carolina; Emma Eugenia, who married Morris Allison of Boylston, but had no children; Rebecca, who married Millard G. Jones and resides in Buncombe County, North Carolina; William Gaston, who married Pamelia McDowell, and resides in Spartanburg, South Carolina. Mourning Mills Blackstock left three children: Joseph, Sophia, and Earnest Blackstock, whose post-office is Garden Brook, Arkansas. Attilla Delila Henry's children were: Charlotte, Pat, Sophia, and William Henry. Laura H. Carie's children were Lula, Lela, and Lila Carie. William Gaston Brittain left four children; Eugene, Sophia, Pearl, and Carl Brittain.

Eliza Eleanor Lewis, seventh child of Mourning Mills, was born in 1803, and married Dr. Marville Mills Edney, her cousin, son of Asa Edney, who married Sarah, daughter of Major Wm. Mills. Asa Edney was from Pasquotank County, North Carolina, and was a descendant of Robert Edney, who married the sister of Sir Isaac Newton, philosopher, of England. Dr. Marville Mills Edney was a merchant, farmer and physician and resided at Edneyville, North Carolina. They had twelve children as follows: Lucian; Henry, who married George J. Nix; Sophia A.; Eliza T., who married John A. Burgess; John C, who married Rosa Ann Parlin, daughter of Hiram Parlin, of Henderson County, North Carolina; Emma R.; Mourning S.; Marville; Lewis M.; William Mills; and Edmund Randolph. The children of Rosa Ann Nix were Martha M., James M., Amanda, Sarah, Craivil A., Morrison, and Jane R. Nix.

John de LaFayette Lewis, eighth child of Mourning Mills, was born in 1804, and died single, in 1857, at the home of Columbus Mills, Polk County, North Carolina. He was a very generous, free-hearted man, and very much respected and beloved by all. He was a soldier in the Seminole War in Florida.

James Madison Lewis, the ninth child of Mourning Mills, was born in Buncombe County, North Carolina, in 1810 (now Anderson County). He was librarian and keeper of the state house at Jackson, Mississippi, for many years. He married Leander Perdue, of Madison County, Mississippi, in 1847. They had two children: Mary P., born 1849, and Bancombe, who was born in 1851 and died in 1854. Mrs. Leander Lewis died in Yazoo County, Mississippi, and her remains were interred in the cemetery at Vernon, Mississippi. James M. Lewis was residing in Asheville, North Carolina, in 1886.

Dr. George Walton Lewis, tenth child of Mourning Mills, was born in 1812. He studied medicine and located in Lincoln County, Georgia, where he had an extensive practice for twelve or fifteen years. He married in 1837 in Columbia County, Georgia, Lucy H. Welborn. They had two children, Martha Octavia, born 1840, and Mary George, born 1846. Dr. George W. Lewis died in Lincoln County, Georgia, in 1847, in the meridian of life. As a physician, he was eminent and skillful; as a citizen, neighbor and friend, he was much esteemed for his prudence, charitableness and lofty bearing without ostentation, and as a Christian, he was God-fearing and humble in all the walks of life. None knew him but to love him. His wife and two daughters survived him, and lived near Winfield, Georgia.

The eleventh child of Mourning Mills was Rufus Henry Lewis, who was born in 1814. He was a farmer and married Nancy Goodbred, daughter of John Goodbred, Rutherfordton, North Carolina. They had the following children. John Goodbred, Marville Franklin, Mary W., Richard Taliaferro, Sophia Melinda, Rufus, Henry, Ellen Caledonia, and Jeff Davis Lewis.

All the above about the Lewis family was taken from "Genealogy of the Lewis Family in America," by Wm. Tyrell Lewis.

• Reference: MyHeritage Family Trees - SmartCopy: Jun 7 2018, 23:43:21 UTC