The Lemuel Lewis Family of Marion County 

            According to family history, the Lewis ancestors were of Welsh-English descent.  Written family stories say that the immediate family line in America began with Benjamin Lewis, Lemuel Lewis’s father.  Benjamin’s father and mother emigrated from Wales to the Edisto River in South Carolina around 1750.  They had three sons.  Benjamin was born around 1764.  Unfortunately, Benjamin’s parents met untimely deaths when he was around two years old.  He and his brothers were now orphaned and penniless. Benjamin recalled that they were not healthy children and that one of his brothers died.  The surviving brothers were bound out, which was the custom of that period for children in their situation, and never saw one another again.  Benjamin was bound to an Irish lady by the name of Mrs. Berry.  According to a family document, she treated him so badly that the entire neighborhood knew about it.  It was through the talk of their neighbors that a man named John Hill from North Carolina, on business in the area, heard of young Benjamin’s plight and helped him to escape so that he could come live with him.  Just as they entered North Carolina the Revolutionary War broke out.  After two attempts, Benjamin joined the Continental Army at Kinston, North Carolina.  Family records state that in “Clarke’s North Carolina Records” it shows that “Benjamin Lewis enlisted in Evans Co. 10th Regiment North Carolina infantry September 10, 1782”.  Sometime after the war, Benjamin married Celia Martin, the daughter of Highty Martin of Lenoir County, North Carolina.  It was here that they started a family.  Benjamin and Celia had six children – Martin, James, Quinea, Rarity (the only daughter), Lemuel, born September 8, 1804, and William Bryant born in 1808.  While Lemuel was still an infant, the family moved to Robenson County, N.C.  It was here according to Lemuel that he “had his raising”. 

      After leaving North Carolina in 1810, Lemuel’s older brother, Quinea Lewis traveled over 800 miles and settled in the southwestern part of what was to become Marion County, Mississippi.  Today, the community located in this part of the county is known as Shiloh, however at this time this part of the territory was known as the “Waterhole” settlement due to the several small bodies of water in the area at that time. At this time in our nation’s history, a person could buy land in this new frontier from the government for about $1.25 per acre.  The maximum amount of land that could be bought at this price was 640 acres.  It is unknown at this time about how much property Quinea purchased. 

      Along with Quinea came his wife Martha “Patty” Spears Lewis and their children. In 1812, Quinnea built a home with materials that he purchased in New Orleans. They materials were brought over Lake Ponchartrain on a flat boat and then carried by a team of oxen to the house site in Waterhole.  Family history states that it was a “framed building” and most of the construction was done by slave labor.  It is not known if these individuals were brought by Quinnea from North Carolina or were already in the area.

      In 1820, at the age of 16, Lemuel “Lammy” Lewis, Quinea’s second youngest brother, came to Quinea’s home to act as a tutor for his children.  Lemuel had been educated in the schools of North Carolina.  According to a letter Lemuel wrote to his nephew, Rev. William B. Lewis, Lemuel had this to say about his educational background, “He (Lemuel’s father, Benjamin) raised six children…and strove hard to give them a little schooling and succeeded to have them all learn to read, write, and cypher some.  Three months at a time was about as much as we could get to go to one school as he was compelled to have the labor of his children to help make a support.  If every day that I went to school was counted, the whole would not exceed eighteen months, and yet I faired as well in that respect as any of the others.”   Nevertheless, Lemuel was considered one of the first educators of the area and after some time he even taught other children in the Waterhole settlement.  After teaching several years, Lemuel returned to the home of his and Quinea’s parents in Rebecca County, North Carolina around 1821.  He went to help his mother, Celia, after his father had passed away at the age of 57 in November.  About a year later, Celia too passed away at the age of 60 and it was after this that at the age of 22, that Lemuel married Mary “Polly” Williams, the daughter of Giles and Sallie Williams, on Aug. 3, 1826.  She was only 16 at the time.  They proceeded to have four children – Celia, Sarah, Giles W., who was named after his maternal grandfather, and Martha.  Then in 1831, Lemuel returned to the Waterhole settlement with his young family and bought his brother’s Quinea’s place.  Family history states that Lemuel also bought a “rather expensive house” from Dr. Luke Conerly who had purchased it from a gentleman named Mr. January.  He later passed the home on to his son Benjamin, who passed it on to his daughter Beulah.  Lemuel began farming and early census records show that at one time he had about 1000 acres in cotton. 

      It is known that Lemuel did own slaves who worked on the plantation.  According to the “1860 Slave Schedule for Marion County, Mississippi” which was compiled during July 6-7 of that year, Lemuel is recorded as having 17 slaves living in 3 separate households in his care.  No names were listed but some vital information was.  Of these individuals, the adults included a 70-year-old woman, a 35-year-old female, a 30-year-old man, a 28-year-old male, a 17-year-old young woman, a 16-year-old male, and a 12-year-old female.  The children listed consisted of a 7-year-old boy, a 5-year-old male, a 4-year-old boy, two 3-year-old males, a 6-month-old baby boy, two 6-month-old girls, and a two-year-old female.  Not much is known about the lives of these slaves at present with the exception of one, Tom Lewis.  According to a past newspaper article provided with information from his descendants, Tom was a slave owned by Lemuel.  Tom, who knew him as “Lemmie Lewis” worked on his plantation.  Tom’s family history states that he was of Cherokee Indian ancestry and that he had been sold into the Lewis household.  His wife, Jane was of African descent.  The “Census of 1870” seems to support this by listing their children as “mulatto”.  Tom passed away in 1888 and is buried in an old family cemetery in Walthall County along with his family members and modern-day descendants.  There are numerous descendants of this family still living in the Walthall and Marion counties of Mississippi. Two of Tom’s children, Moses and Muryah’s family lines were detailed in the article and a related one.  At this time this is all that is known of this part of the family’s history.

      According to family history, it seems that Lemuel was a very prosperous man.  “The Census of 1860” shows his real estate value at 2,000 and his personal estate value at 10,000.  He profited from large crops and one time during the Civil War, he sold 100 bales of cotton for $1.00 per pound.  With this much property to work it is not known if it was maintained exclusively by slave labor.  One source of information states many early pioneering families worked alongside their slaves in the fields. With Lemuel having such vast crops and roughly only 8 or 9 slaves, according to records, who were the appropriate age to work in the fields it seems that this might be true for this family but no supporting information has been found as of yet.

      Cotton wasn’t the only thing growing on Lemuel’s plantation, so was his family.  After they settled in Waterhole, the Lewis family welcomed Christian, Susan, Margaret, Benjamin Bright, named after Lemuel’s father, Alexander, John, Rosa, and Joseph William, born on Dec. 12, 1850, the last son to be born to Lemuel and Polly.  The baby of the family was a daughter named *Malinda born two years later (there is some confusion as to if Malinda is the 13th child or a granddaughter by the name of Mathilda).  At this time, Lemuel would have been around 48 and Polly 42.  Their thirteen children’s ages ranged between the early 20’s to a newborn. 

      Their children began starting families of their own.  Sarah was the first to marry on Dec. 4, 1846.  She married a schoolteacher by the name of Patrick W. R. McAlpin.  He was the son of Dr. McAlpin and Cathorine Wilkinson McAlpin.  Patrick taught in a log schoolhouse at China Grove.  Celia followed suit by also marrying a schoolteacher by the name of Joseph Smith on Dec. 17, 1850 in Marion County. Martha married Andrew Jackson “A. J.” Brumfield on September 11, 1851.  Giles and Christian both married in 1855.  Giles married first on April 19 to Rebecca Yarborough.  They had seven children – Laura, William, Alice, Ida, Polly, Mattie, and Susan.  Giles’s sister, Christian married Thomas Bickham or Blackburn on September 20. Susan married Jabez Yarborough, a brother of Giles’s wife, Rebecca, and they had 4 sons and 1 daughter.  It seems that perhaps one of their sons, named Benny, possibly after Susan’s brother Benjamin, died at birth on January 10, 1862.  He was buried in the family cemetery in Waterhole.  Margaret married Benjamin Graves. Benjamin B. Lewis married Margaret Sumrall, the daughter of William and Mary Burns Sumrall who were living at this time in the home of Hugh Fortenberry, of the Lee home, one mile south of Foxworth on the west side of the Pearl River.  They had seven children – James Atkinson, Harry Bishop, Thomas Swift, Lemuel, Theodore Berkley, Celia, and Beulah.  Benjamin’s sister, Rosa married an E. Pigott.  John T. married Mary Jane Sumrall, a sister of Benjamin’s wife, Margaret.   They had two children – Hettie and Jodie.  Their daughter Hettie married Jessie Rankin and they had four children.  Only Joseph Warren Rankin survived.  Two of the children died young and their son Horatio died during World War I.   Jodie Jackson Lewis lived a long life as a farmer of the Knoxo community, which was located very close to Waterhole.  He married Ada Lampton and they raised three sons -  Sam, J.D., and Bert.  Jodie’s obituary mentioned that two half-sisters survived him so at some point one of his parents remarried and had more children.  Lemuel and Polly’s youngest son, Joseph married Sarah Ellen Bass, a neighbor of the Lewis family and they had two children.  They were Lammie and Mathilda who married Ellis Pigott.  Alexander never married.  Lemuel and Polly’s youngest child, *Malinda married a Pigott as well, by the name of Elias.

      Besides managing the plantation and a large family, Lemuel held several important offices in the area.  He was a member of the Board of Police for eight years and in 1843 Lemuel was elected Probate Judge.  As Judge of Probate Court he served without interruption for about 23 years.  According to family history, “Lemuel, though not an attorney, was a man of superior intelligence”.  Judge Lemuel Lewis served in parts of Marion, Walthall, and Pike counties in South Mississippi.  Acting as Judge Lewis, he performed several marriages in the area, performed other routine duties, and also settled some large estates in the county, including James Atkinson’s and Samuel G. Foxworth’s.  Also, according to family history, the Lewis family was very active in the early Methodist church of the area.

After Polly passed away on her 54th birthday, April 28, 1864, Lemuel

soon remarried.  In 1865, he married Mary Winborne, daughter of David

Winborne, of Topisaw in Pike County, Mississippi.  In 1867, he moved to Topisaw where he built a new home with Mary.  It seems he had divided his property in Waterhole to his children whom by now were mostly adults themselves.   

      After surviving his second wife and having no children from that marriage, Lemuel returned to Waterhole once again.  He spent his remaining days with his children and after a long life he passed away at the age of 82 on July 16, 1887, in the home of his son Giles who lived in the nearby community of China Grove.  Giles’s home was about seven miles from the home Lemuel had first seen in 1810 and then had returned to settle in 1831, the same old homeplace that he had passed on to his son, Benjamin Bright Lewis.        

*This family history was gathered by Krystal Morgan Graves of Columbia, MS from a variety of sources.  In the fall of 1999 she and her husband Trevor purchased property in the Shiloh community which is located in the western part of Marion County, Mississippi.  The Lewis family cemetery is located on their property.  This is information known as of July 2003.