Bennett
Genealogy and Family History Page

Joseph Bennett, Jr. b May 10, 1732 in New Jersey; died abt 1808 in Pendleton County, (now in WV). Abt 1717, he md Hannah Starnes, who was b. August 4, 1747. Joseph Jr. is the son of Joseph Bennett, Sr. and Mary Vernon.

I have a second marriage for Hannah Starnes; she also md Aaron Vanscoy after death of Joseph Bennett, Jr.

    Children of Joseph Bennett, Jr. and Hannah Starnes:
  1. William Bennett, b September 18 1775 in Pendleton Co., WV He died March 31, 1857 in Lewis County, WV. He married Rebecca McCally on August 4, 1794 in Pendleton County, WV
  2. Jacob Bennett md Rachel Davis, Dec 1, 1810
  3. John Bennett, b 1776;prb died in Ohio; md Jane Wilson
  4. Elijah Bennett, md Barbara Bible [ I'm descended from this line ]
  5. Nary Bennett, b Mar 12, 1770; d 1835 in Lewis Co., WV: md abt 1796 to William Peterson
  6. Phebe Bennett
  7. Hannah Bennett

The following Bennett information is taken from Oren Morton's History of Pendleton County, West Virginia, pp350=351

"William Bennett left Pendleton in 1797 and bought of Colonel George Jackson, a farm at Walkersville on the West Fork of the Monongahela. He did not himself aspire to any office, but seems to have been a man of superior quality. He reared a family of five sons and seven daughters, and reared them well. All the twelve were well educagted, and in part this result is doubtless attributable to James McCauley, his wife's father, who lived with him in Lewis. McCauley had been a captain in the British navy and spoke seven languages fluently. The daughters married into the Spriggs, Alkire, McCray, Keith, Anderson, and Holt families. Two of them married brothers of the name of Holt. These were brothers to the father of a Supreme Judge Homer Holt and grandfather of John H. Holt, recently Democratic nominee for governor of the state. Jonathan M., James, David, Joseph and William, Jr., the five sons of William Bennett were prominent citizens of Lewis and three served in the Legislature. The youngest child of Jonathan M. was the first presecuting attorney of Gilmer, a member of the Virginia Legislature from Lewis, member of the Senate of West Virginia, Auditor of Virginia, and one of the Commissioners appointed by this state to settle the debt question with Virginia. He married a daughter of Captain George W. Jackson, a relative of Stonewall Jackson. William G., the oldest of the two sons and two daughters, has twice been elected Judge of the Eleventh Circuit, serving as a Democrat in a Republican circuit. He was Circuit Judge 16 years and was Democratic nominee for the Supreme Bench. Louis, his brother has been principal of the Glenville Normal School, member of the Legislature, Speaker of the House and Democratic nominee for Governor in 1908. One sister married Dr. Dleming Howell of Clarksburg and the other married a son of ex-Governor Bowie of Maryland.

James married a Miss Clark, a descendanat of one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. One of his sons was a cadet of West Point. The other was elected county clerk of Lewis for three successive terms.

The oldest sons of David went to Missouri, where their children are prominent as educators, physicians, and wealthy farmers. The sons of William and Joseph have also been successful. It is said of William that at the age of 82, he could jump off his feet and crack his heels together three times before he came back to the floor. He left 245 living descendanats. His sons and daughters wrote a beautiful hand and were excellent spellers and grammarians. Letters written by them nearly a century ago are couched in excellent language and display an unusual stock of general information.

In Lewis are also descendants of John, a brother to William, Sr., and in both Upshur and Lewis are other Bennetts who claim relationship and who are superior citizens. One of the Upshsur Bennetts, a well-to-do-man, was recorder of that county shortly after the war. His son, principal of the State Normal School at Fairmont, is a prominent educator. Many of the other Bennetts of the same county took to preaching and served worthily in their respective chruches.

The Pendleton branch settling in Preston procuced E.A. Bennett, at one time Auditor of this state. From the Bennetts settling in Nicholas came the present judge of the Fayette-Greenbrier circuit. Of the branch settling in Gilmer, N----M was a prominet lawyer and in his day a rich man. M.G. Bennett went to the Legislature from Gilmer and Calhoun. The present prosecuting attorney of Gilmer is C.M. Bennett and several very successful physicians from the Nicholas branch."

(Here in West Virginia, I met a cousin of this line and asked about these two spellings. He said, "If you are one of the snooty Bennetts, it is McCally; if one of us ordinary ones, it is McCullough." ) I just spell it as I find it or as it is given to me by others.
Lenora

From a Holt-Bennett History by Margaret Holt Early, the following issue is shown:

WILLIAM AND REBECCA McCALLY BENNETT
  1. Rachel, born 1795, married David Alkire.
  2. Phoebe, born 1797, maried James Keith.
  3. David, born 1799, married Jane Stewart.
  4. James, born 1802, married Matilda Clark
  5. Jospeh, born 1805, married (l) Mary Colmer, (2) Elizabeth Louden, and (3) Sarah Perkins Kincaid.
  6. Hannah, born 1805, married John Anderson
  7. Margaret, born 1806, married Robert McCray.
  8. Elizabeth, born 1807, married James Sprigg.
  9. William, Jr., born 1808, married Jane Rickett.
  10. Rebecca, born 1810, married John Fletcher Wesley Holt.
  11. Abigail Collins, born 1812, married Matthew Holt
  12. Jonathan McCally Bennett, born 1814, married Margaret Elizabeth Jacksonl
    (This was one of the exceedingly political and prominent Bennett lines here in central WV.)
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