Thomas Batte, Sr.

Thomas Batte, Sr. was born about 1642 in or near Birdsall, Yorkshire, England, and died after 6 June 1695 in Charles City County, Virginia.

He was a US Southern Colonist who emigrated to Virginia with his father, John Batte, and siblings, after his mother, Martha Mallory, had died.

Family

From https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Batte-58

Thomas Batte married Mary (maiden name unknown).[1]

Note: Richardson shows wife of Thomas Sr. as Mary _____. No clear evidence for either Mary Randolph or Mary Jennings. His five children were by Mary _____, presumably just one of the two.

Thomas and Mary had five children.[1] Thomas has no descendants of the name in Virginia at this day. His only (known) son, Thomas Batte, Junior, having left issue only one daughter. There are, however, many descendants of Thomas Batte, Senior, through his daughters. Those persons of the name of Batte now resident in Virginia are descendants of Captain Henry Batte (a brother of Thomas Batte, Senior) who lived in Charles City County, later Prince George, was a member of the House of Burgesses and a militia officer. The brothers, Thomas and Henry Batte, had two uncles, named William and Henry Batte, who were in Virginia at an earlier date.[4]

Thomas and Mary's children:[5]

1. Thomas Batte, Jr. (c. 1662-1691), m Temperance Browne (one child: Martha);[6] b 1660[7]
2. Martha Batte (1667-post 1717), m Jones, Banister, Cocke[7]
3. Mary Batte m Peter Jones of Charles City County;[6] Mary (b 1669) m Peter Jones, brother of her sister Martha's husband Abraham Wood Jones[7]
4. Amy Batte[6] (b 1671[7]), m Richard Jones[8]
5. Sarah Batte (probably the Sarah Batte m 1697, John Evans, Jr.);[6] (born 1673, probably m John Evans)[9]

Thomas Batte’s Alleged Second Wife

According to William Clayton Torrence, Thomas married twice, his second wife being called Amy, who had married three times before.[5] Weis says the same in The Magna Carta Sureties - he describes Amy as "widow of __Butler, Essex Bevill and Henry Kent."[17] Kathryn Gearhart confusingly and inaccurately states on a Wordpress site that Thomas "married Amy Butler, and then married two more times to Amy then Mary Randolph." No sourcing is given.[18] The suggestion that Thomas married an Amy appears to stem from a confusion with a Thomas Bott who married someone called Amy.[19]

Death and Will

Thomas's will was dated 6 June 1695, so he died after that. It was acknowledged in court on 3 December 1696. In it he:[6]

• left 135 acres to his daughter Martha Cocke
• left the remainder of his land to his daughter Sarah Batte, together with the residue of his personal estate
• left 12d to his grand-daughter Martha Batte, daughter of his son Thomas
• left 10s to his daughter Martha Jones
• appointed Peter Jones (his daughter Martha's husband) sole executor

Biography

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Batts

Thomas Batts was an early settler in Virginia and an explorer of western Virginia.

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https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Batte_Thomas_fl_1630s-1690s

Thomas Batte was one of the first Anglo-Virginians to explore west of the Appalachian Mountains. Born probably in Virginia, he patented almost 6,000 acres of land near the mouth of the Appomattox River in 1668. In September 1671 he and Robert Hallom (or Hallam) set out on a month-long journey from Fort Henry, near the present site of Petersburg. Accompanied by Appamattuck, Saponi, and Totero Indian guides, they headed west across the Staunton River and the Blue Ridge Mountains. Batte and Hallom traveled parallel to the New River as far west as the Tug Fork, seventy-five miles west of the crest of the Appalachians. Their expedition, later known erroneously as the Batts and Fallam Expedition after their names were spelled incorrectly in accounts of the journey, established the first solid British and Virginian claims to the Ohio and Mississippi River watersheds. Batte served as a county court justice during the 1680s. His name last appeared in public records in August 1695.

Thomas Batte was born probably in Virginia between 1633 and 1638, the second of three sons of John Batte, who arrived in Virginia in 1621, and his wife, whose first name may have been Dorothy. Very few facts of Thomas Batte's life are known. He married a woman named Mary before 1660. They had three daughters and a son, also named Thomas Batte, who was born about 1661 and died early in 1691. On April 29, 1668, Thomas Batte and his younger brother Henry Batte patented 5,878 acres of land on the south side of the James River below the mouth of the Appomattox River, near the property of Abraham Wood, a member of the governor's Council and the leading Indian trader in that part of Virginia.

Many Virginians of Batte's time believed that the Appalachian Mountains lay at the center of a narrow continent. In 1670 Governor Sir William Berkeley dispatched John Lederer into the wilderness to seek "a passage to the further side of the Mountains." Lederer did not reach the "further side," but his expedition prompted Wood to send out his own exploring party headed by Batte and Robert Hallom, or Hallam, about whom even less is known than about Batte. The only two known copies of Hallom's lost journal of the expedition that were evidently taken directly from the original render Batte's surname as Batts and Hallom's as Fallam.

The Batts and Fallam Expedition, as it has thus erroneously come to be known, departed from Fort Henry, near the present site of Petersburg, on September 1, 1671. The party included Thomas Wood, who was probably Abraham Wood's son, one unidentified servant, and Penecute, or Perecute, an Appamattuck guide. Near modern-day Charlotte Court House they crossed the Staunton River and picked up additional Appamattuck and Saponi guides. By then Thomas Wood had fallen ill and was left behind. They crossed the Blue Ridge about fifteen miles south of where the city of Roanoke was later founded, left their horses with the Totero Indians on the New River near where Radford now is, picked up another guide, and then traveled westward parallel to the New River to present-day Narrows in Giles County on the Virginia–West Virginia border. The most dangerous leg of the month-long journey was the steep climb up 1,200-foot-high East River Mountain. While crossing into what is now southern West Virginia, their food ran out and their Totero guide abandoned them. Sustained by haws, grapes, and two turkeys, they reached the Tug Fork near the modern city of Matewan, West Virginia, on the journey's sixteenth day. There, 75 miles west of the crest of the Appalachians and 260 miles west of the frontier settlements of Virginia, they measured for a tidal effect and convinced themselves that the westward-flowing river was "very slowly dropping." Before turning back they marked trees with their initials, "TB" and "RH."

Batte and Hallom, the first Anglo-Virginians to cross the Appalachians, retraced their steps and reached Fort Henry on October 1, 1671. On their way back they learned that Thomas Wood had died. The expedition neither proved nor disproved the theory that the Atlantic and Pacific oceans were close together. But it established the first solid British and Virginian claims to the Ohio and Mississippi River watersheds, an achievement formally placed on the record when John Clayton (d. 1725) presented a transcript of the expedition's journal to the Royal Society in London on August 1, 1688.

Batte was appointed a justice of the peace of Henrico County in April 1683, and the records of the county's orphan's court mentioned his name several times. By August 1689 he had moved out of Henrico County, perhaps back to the land in Bristol Parish he had patented with his brother in 1668. Thomas Batte's name last appears in the public records on August 5, 1695. He died probably not long thereafter.

Time Line

1633–1638 - Thomas Batte is born sometime during these years, probably in Virginia, the second of three sons of John Batte, and his wife.

1660 - Sometime before this year, Thomas Batte married a woman named Mary. They will have three daughters and a son.

April 29, 1668 - Thomas Batte and his younger brother Henry Batte patent 5,878 acres of land on the south side of the James River.

1670 - Abraham Wood sends an exploring party headed by Thomas Batte and Robert Hallom to seek a passage through the Appalachian Mountains.

September 1, 1671 - Thomas Batte departs Fort Henry with the "Batts and Fallam Expedition."

October 1, 1671 - The Batts and Fallam Expedition returns to Fort Henry.

April 1683 - Thomas Batte is appointed justice of the peace of Henrico County.

August 5, 1695 - Thomas Batte's name last appears in the public records. He probably dies not long thereafter.

Thomas Batts,1 Thomas Woods and Robert Fallows having received a commission from the honourable Major General Wood for the finding out the ebbing and flowing of the Waters on the other side of the Mountaines in order to the discovery of the South Sea accompanied with Penecute a great man of the Apomatack Indians and Jack Weason, formerly a servant to Major General Wood with five horses set forth from the Apomatacks town about eight of the clock in the morning, being Friday Sept. 1, 1671. That day we traveled above forty miles, took up our quarters and found that we had traveled from the Okenecheepath due west.

References

• https://www.ancestry.com/family-tree/tree/67061038/family?cfpid=262...
• Judge/Explorer: http://www.carolana.com/Carolina/Explorers/thomasbatts.html https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Batte_Thomas_fl_1630s-1690s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Batts#cite_note-:22-2
• http://www.tngenweb.org/pre1796/batts-1671.html
• Reference: Find A Grave Memorial - SmartCopy: Jan 9 2021, 18:52:16 UTC
• https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Batte-58 cites

1. Douglas Richardson. Magna Carta Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 4 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham, 2nd edition (Salt Lake City: the author, 2011), Vol. III, p. 123, MALLORY 14.iii.b, Google Books
2. Douglas Richardson. Royal Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families, 5 vols, ed. Kimball G. Everingham (Salt Lake City: the author, 2013), Vol. II, p. 314, CORNWALL 19.ii
3. J W Clay. Dugdale's Visitation of Yorkshire, with additions, Vol. I, William Pollard, 1899, p. 354, Internet Archive
4. West Yorkshire, England, Church of England Baptisms, Marriages and Burials, 1512-1812, Ancestry.co.uk and linked parish register image: the transcript mistakenly lists the last name as Boswell; the image is clear that his father was John "Bat of Okewell"
5. William Clayton Torrence. Henrico County: Virginia: Beginnings of Its Families: Part III in 'The William and Mary Quarterly', Vol. 24, No. 4 (April 1916), p. 269, JSTOR - account (free) required
6. Transcript of will : Library of Virginia, Digital Collections, http://digitool1.lva.lib.va.us:8881/R/-?func=dbin-jump-full&object_... Pages 100-199, image 21 of 100 (may not be viewable on mobile devices)
7. Virginia Webb Cocke. Cocke and Cousins, Vol. II, printed for the author in 1974, p. 3, Familysearch (image page 17)
8. William Clayton Torrence. Henrico County, Virginia: Beginnings of Its Families: Part I in 'William and Mary College Quarterly', Vol. XXIV, No. 2, 1915, pp. 140-141, Internet Archive
9. Explorations beyond the Mountains in 'The William and Mary College Quarterly', Vol. XV, 1907, pp. 234ff, Internet Archive
10. William Clayton Torrence, Henrico County, Virginia: Beginnings of Its Families: Part I, p. 132, Internet Archive
11. Transcript of the will of Colonel John Farrar in The Farrar Family (continued) in 'The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography', 1893, pp. 424-426, Internet Archive
12. Review of Institutional History of Virginia in the Seventeenth Century by Philip Alexander Bruce (published by G P Putnam's Sons, 1910) in 'The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography', Vol. XIX, 1911, p. 222, Internet Archive
13. Notes for Thomas Batte, accessed 21 March 2022
14. Notes for Thomas Batte, accessed 21 March 2022: citing Louis H Manarin and Clifford Dowdy, The History of Henrico County, University Press of Virginia, 1984, p. 60, Google Books
15. Mary Louise M Hutton (compiler). Seventeenth Century Colonial Ancestors of Members of the National Society Colonial Dames XVII Century, Vol. 1, Genealogical Publishing Company, 1976, p. 18, Ancestry
16. See for instance this tree on Ancestry, accessed 21 March 2022
17. Frederick Lewis Weis, with additions and corrections by Walter Lee Sheppard Jr and William R Beall. The Magna Carta Sureties, 1215, 5th Editioin, Genealogical Publishing Company, 1999, p. 143 (line 109/16)
18. Kathryn Gearhart. Allied Families in Henrico and Charles City: The Batte Family, web, accessed 21 March 2022
19. '1671 and other interesting things', Ancestry.com, accessed 21 March 2022