Susannah Sukey Griffin

Nickname was recorded as Suckey, (Pronounced Sue kee) which like Sukey was a nickname for Susannah at the time Daughter of Abraham Seay and Naomi 'Amy' Loving F2533.Ged submitted by BillBrink@aol.com, downloaded from Ancestry.com on 16 June 1998. "When she was 25 years old and still unmarried she gave birth to her son Leonard. His father is unknown. Later she married a Griffith [Griffin] who served in the continental army in the Revolutionary War. They had six children. Leonard was sent to live with his uncle." Some sources have her birthplace as Fluvana County, VA and others Goochland County, VA Before her death she received a pension of $80 a month for her husband's Revolutionary war service.

Susannah Seay Griffin is buried on private property next to her son Austen Seay.

The Remaining History of the Children of John and Susannah Griffin It is not known exactly when Susannah Griffin joined her sons in Illinois. My guess it would have been sometime after 1838 when John Griffin Jr. passed away. She would have been in her eighties when for the last time she would have hitched up her skirt and climbed aboard another yet another covered wagon and headed west. Hopefully, this time she just had to travel by wagon to Louisville, Kentucky where she could have caught a steamboat and travel in comfort down the Ohio River to the Mississippi River, up the Mississippi to the Wabash River, and up the Wabash to Terre Haute, Indiana. From there it would have been about a day‟s ride to Clarksville, Illinois and to her new home at her son, Austin Griffin‟s, farm.

The children of John and Susannah Griffin would all get married with some going west to Missouri and Illinois while others remained in Kentucky as stated in the affidavits. Martha Ponton‟s brother, William Ponton, would take his family to Missouri and than in 1829, settle in Texas when it was still a part of Mexico. All four of his children would remain there and his two sons were active in the Texas Revolution.

Their story will be Be discussed in the chapter Far Flung Cousins. John and Susannah's son, James, proved to have the greatest wanderlust. As mentioned, after first moving to Linn City Missouri,1 his family would follow the Oregon Trail out west and settle in Oregon at the time of the 1850 census. He died in 1865 and is buried in the Carlton Cemetery in Yamhill Oregon. This was about the time of the 1849 gold rush in California but we don‟t know if he was a "49‟er." He and his wife, Moran Phillips, were still living in Oregon according to the 1860 census. He was 66 and born in Virginia and she was either 50 or 58 (it is hard to read) and born in Kentucky. They still had one 13 year old son at home who appears to have been born in Missouri (again hard to read).

Austin Griffin would stay in Illinois until his death in 1850 and according to information from the Clark County Genealogical Society was buried on his farm. Nancy Griffin Ryan would pass away in 1863 in Anderson County, Kentucky. Lucy Griffin Wright would die in Holt, Missouri in 1859. Mary „Polly‟ Griffin Driskell would live the longest dying in 1878 in Anderson County, Kentucky at the age of eighty-six. She and her husband Dennis Driskell are buried in the Lawrenceburg Cemetery. The inscription on her tombstone below reads … Mary Wife of Dennis Driskell … Born Jany 8, 1792, Died July 12, 1878. At first I thought the death date might be 1828, but if you compare the number two in the 1772 date with the seven in 1878 it appears the number in the death date is 1878 and not 1828.

1 Virgil. Austin Griffin would stay in Illinois until his death in 1850 and according to information from the Clark County Genealogical Society was buried on his farm. Nancy Griffin Ryan would pass away in 1863 in Anderson County, Kentucky. Lucy Griffin Wright would die in Holt, Missouri in 1859. Mary „Polly‟ Griffin Driskell would live the longest dying in 1878 in Anderson County, Kentucky at the age of eighty-six. She and her husband Dennis Driskell are buried in the Lawrenceburg Cemetery. The inscription on her tombstone below reads … Mary Wife of Dennis Driskell … Born Jany 8, 1792, Died July 12, 1878. At first I thought the death date might be 1828, but if you compare the number two in the 1772 date with the seven in 1878 it appears the number in the death date is 1878 and not 1828. Robert would be elected Justice of the Peace of Edgar County in 1848 and died in 1855. He is buried as shown below in the Auburn Methodist Church Cemetery in Auburn, Clark County, Illinois. His inscription reads: Robert Griffin … Died Aug. 8, 1855 … Age 65 years, 5 months, and 12 days. Leonard Seay would live to be about sixty-eight and he died in Washington County, Kentucky in 1842, two years before his mother would pass away in Illinois. His will is contained in Washington County, Book G p. 314 and I present it here to show what our ancestors accomplished during their lives. Also note how careful he was to treat each child equally, including his daughters, which was very unusual for the times. He did this, perhaps, because he apparently was not entitled to an inheritance himself. Also note the will indicates he left no slaves. I was able to locate his family graveyard on his former homestead in Washington County, Kentucky. Unfortunately the graves of he and his wife, Permelia, are no longer being cared for and it won‟t be too long until they will be unrecognizable. His tombstone is labeled Leonard Sea Sr. As you can see his family spelled the name Seay as Sea. His descendants still spell it that way.

The inscription reads: Leonard Sea Sr. Born Aug 25 1774 Died Sep 27 1842.

Susannah Seay Griffin, the matriarch of our family, would live to be ninety-six years old. She died in 1845. From information I found at the Clark County Genealogy Society in Clarksville she was buried next to her son, Austin, on his farm in Clark County not far from the Edgar County line. The spot is unmarked but reportedly is next to Austin‟s grave. It is now on a private farm. She lived an amazing life when you think about it. She was born in 1749, a subject of King George II; a child on the Virginia frontier during the French and Indian War; she was a young woman during the Revolutionary War and during the overthrow of King George III. She lived under the Articles of Confederation; and saw the approval of the U. S. Constitution. She lived during the presidential administrations of Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, J. Q. Adams, Jackson, Van Buren, Harrison, and Tyler. She bid her husband goodbye as he left to join General Washington in 1776, and saw four of her sons go off to war in 1812, and in addition Robert would become a captain in the Illinois militia during the Blackhawk War. She moved to the Kentucky frontier during the Jeffersonian years, and to the Illinois frontier during the Jacksonian years; and finally would live to see a young Illinois lawyer and state legislator named Abraham Lincoln begin to campaign for an Illinois congressional seat in her district. It surely must have been a remarkable life.

From the Book:

The Descendants of John Griffin & Susannah Seay in the Edgar Co IL Gen Lib in Paris IL & the Fluvanna Co VA Gen Lib in Palmyra VA Lawrence Griffin Providence Village TX 76227 lgriffin01@msn.com* Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Jun 8 2021, 1:55:41 UTC