| Notes |
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From the Valdo James Smith Research document, The Sudburys of Virginia and Tennessee.
WILLIAM SEINIIIRY_was, like his brothers David and John, probably born between
1747 and 1758 to Ezekiel Sr.'s second wife, Anne. The only known records of his
childhood and adolescence are the 1758 reference to him and his siblings being bound
as apprentices by the local churchwardens, and an additional record, cited by Glenn
Boyd as referencing a further apprenticeship.
William and his brothers David and John would appear to have been the right age to
have fought in the Revolutionary War. However, despite the oral tradition passed
down to Nancy Sudbury Yates (and from Nancy to Valdo Yates Smith) that one of
Nancy's greatgrandfathers fought in the Revolutionary War, the sources listing
Revolutionary War veterans for the state of Virginia do not mention any Sudburys.
William's marriage on July 29, 1784, to_FRANCES DUNNAVANT, is listed in the
book Marriages of Amelia County, Virginia 1735-1815. The record reveals the
interesting fact that Frances was not "given away" by anyone, but instead "wrote her
own consent" to be married. The marriage was witnessed by John Wyley and Clark H.
(last name unknown). Samuel Booker served as surety.
There is also an entry for William in the 1787 Virginia census for Amelia County
(district of George Booker, Tax Commissioner) which simply indicates that a man
named John Archer, Sr. was "charged with" William's tax. Whether this means that
William was a laborer working for Mr. Archer, or that he was somehow disabled, is
unknown. Although it seems that William was not a landowner in 1787, he almost
certainly was by the late 1790s. Glenn Boyd writes of Nottoway County tax records
listing William dated May 12, 1796, May 18, 1797, May 24, 1798, and May 29, 1799.
William apparently died in the year 1800. Glenn Boyd cites an unidentified record
from Nottoway County dated August 11, 1800, which refers to Frances Dunnavant
Sudbury as administratrix of the estate of William Sudbury, deceased. Use of the term
"administratrix" in this context means that William unfortunately died without a will.
Glenn lists an additional record from 1809 indicating that Frances was granted
administration of William's estate, but the date seems clearly wrong, since it is nine
years distant from the earlier reference to William's estate.
Frances Sudbury survived her husband by more than twenty years. According to Glenn
Boyd, Frances's name appears in Nottoway County tax records for the years 1809,
1810, 1814, 1815, 1817, and 1818. Information about Frances can also be garnered
from the U.S. census records for Nottoway County. An entry from 1810 shows her as
one of two women in her household over the age of 45, with five children (two boys
and three girls). The 1820 census record lists, in addition to'Frances, one "free white
male" aged 18-26, two "free white females" aged 16-26, and two "free white females"
under 10 years of age. While the two young women could have been born before
1800, and thus could be Frances's daughters, and the young man, born no earlier than
1794 might possibly be William D. Sudbury, the only one of Frances's known sons
who doesn't have his own separate entry in the 1820 census, the identity of the two
little girls is a complete puzzle.
Glenn Boyd supplies the record which gives the approximate date of Frances's death.
This unidentified source, dated January 1, 1824, recites that administration of Frances
Sudbury's estate was granted to her oldest son, Shadrack Sudbury. Most likely she
died in late 1823.
As far as Frances's ancestry is concerned, more census work needs to be done. Entries
for Hezeldah Dunnavant (head of a family of seven "white souls") and Philip
Dunnavant (two white souls) appear in the First Census of the United States, Amelia
County, Virginia (1782), in the list of the same census taker as recorded the entry for
John Sudbury. Entries for the following "heads of families" appear in the First Census
of the United States, Amelia County, Virginia (1785): Hodge Dunnavant (eleven white
souls), Philip Dunnavant (three white souls), Abner Dunnavant (three white souls),
Estate of Nowell Dunnavant, and Clement Dunnivant (six white souls). Could it be that
Nowell Dunnavant, who apparently died in 1784 or 1785, was Frances's father, and
that she gave her "own consent" to be married as a result of his death or incapacity at
the time of her marriage to William in 1784? Perhaps there might be a will for Nowell
Dunnavant in the Amelia County records.
Unfortunately, we may never know the names of all of William and Frances's three
daughters or their husbands, if any (although there is strong reason to believe that Mary
Polly Sudbury was one of the daughters). Hampering our ability to research these
individuals is the destruction of records that occurred in Nottoway County, where
William's children were raised and, most likely, got married. If marriage records
existed for that period of time in Nottoway County, the names of his daughters would
probably be available to us. Carol McGinnis, in her book Virginia Genealogy:
Sources & Resources, explains the tragedy of the missing records as follows:
During the last week of the Civil War, Federal soldiers "ransacked the [Nottoway
County Clerk's] office, hacking the record books with their sabers and throwing
the mutilated volumes into the horse trough on the square." Three deed books
were destroyed or lost; several of the early order books were badly mutilated, as
were another deed book and a will book. Marriage records [up to 1856] also
were destroyed.
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1752 - 1793 (41 years)
