Monday, June 29, 2009
Francis Tucker
Friday, March 13, 2009
Marriage Certificate
More Pictures
Pictures!
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Isaac Pace, Husband to Parthenia Tatum
Monday, March 2, 2009
Tatum to Tathum
Nathaniel was christened on 18 Nov 1599 at Holy Trinity the Less Church, the son of William Tatum and Ellen Kirk who married on 3 Aug 1587 at St. Benet Grace Church in London. [Holy Trinity the Less Church was an Anglican Church in the center of London, near St. Paul's Cathedral. It was started in 1540 and destroyed by fire in 1666 in the Great Fire of London and was not rebuilt. St. Benet Grace Church on Gracechurch St. was also destroyed by the 1666 fire.]
His parents must have died when he was young because he was on a list at Bridewell Royal Hospital records, 27 Feb. 1618/19 of 75 boys and 25 girls who were to go to Virginia. These children were 8-16 years old and had been found "running wild in the streets" of London, "sleeping under stalls", and begging and had been committed to Bridewell, which served as a house of correction. They were mainly homeless waifs though some were probably petty pilferers.
One of the ships that brought these children to Virginia was the "George" which left London March 1619 and arrived in Virginia in May. [In March 1617/18, Pocahontas and her husband and family were scheduled to sail on the "George" back to Virginia, but she became ill from tuberculosis, was taken off the ship at Gravesend and died there. In May her father, Powhatan died--perhaps when he heard the news of his daughter's death--leaving his cruel brother in charge of the tribe.]
One account says that 3 brothers, Augustine, Lawrence, and Nathaneill Tatham sailed from Southhampton, England, on the Good Ship George in 1619 for America via Bermuda. In 1620 this ship landed in New Jersey where Augustine remained and Nathaniel traveled on to Virginia. Nothing is known of Lawrence except that descendants of Nathaniel sometimes gave their children the name Lawrence. [from Meadia Research]
From the Virginia Colonial Record: "So far as can be definitely ascertained, the first in America, Nathaniell Tatham, who immigrated to Virginia and settled in Charles City County." Nathaniel left England in March 1619 and after a 2-month voyage arrived in Jamestown, Va. in May.
He arrived in time to hear about the first representative assembly in the New World which was convened in the Jamestown church on July 30, 1619.
In Feb 1623/24 Nathaniel was living in the West and Shirley Hundred and at Shirley Hundred, Charles City (on the north side of the James River), and was in the muster, 22 Jan 1624/5. He was listed as 20 years old and having come to Virginia in 1619 on the "George."
In 1624 when he was 25 years old, Nathaniel moved from the north side of the James River to the south side.
Charles City was one of the four great corporations set up by the Virginia Company of London in 1618.
In 1634 Virginia was divided into 8 counties with Charles City County being one with its original area intact. Charles City County lay on both sides of the James River.
When he was 39 years old, Nathaniel patented 100 acres of land in Charles City County on Appomattox River, 25 July 1638, for transporting his wife Ann and his daughter Mary Tatum. This would lead us to believe that he went back to England, married, had a child, and brought them to Virginia, giving him claim to a 100-acre tract of land. This land adjoined a 500-acre patent to him which he re-patented 4 Dec. 1641.
An Act of Assembly of 6 Jan. 1639/40 named Nathaniel Tatum, Cheney Boyce, and Anthony Wyatt as a "Viewers of Tobacco" for Charles City for the north side of Appomattox River.
Here is a small timeline of events that were occurring during his lifetime:
1644, April 18: Chief Opechancanough leads Indians in an attack, killing nearly 500 colonists.
1644, October: A resident in Jamestown shoots Chief Opechancanough, a prisoner, in the back.
1651: First Indian Reservation is created near Richmond, Virginia.
1660, March 3: The Virginia Assembly elects Berkeley to Governorship.
1661: Virginia institutionalizes slavery with a law that makes the status of the mother determine slave or free status of the child.
1669: South Carolina founded.
Considering the hardships and dangers of the times, Nathaniel lived to be an old man of about 76 years old. Nathaniel was living as late as 27 Jan. 1675/6 when a deed of gift from Nathaniel Tatum the Elder to his grandson Nathaniel Tatum was recorded in Bristol Parish court.