Signature of Edward B. Walker Genealogy of Edward B. Walker
1756-1838, Duplin County, North Carolina - Sullivan, Claiborne, Hancock Counties, Tennessee

 

Edward B. Walker Family Bible


Originally, there were at least two Edward B. Walker family Bibles. The original and most important one, which presumably contained contemporaneous records of the births of the children and could have even included information about Edward, Jane, and some of their relatives, is missing but may exist.

In Jane (Horn) Walker's attempt to get a pension, both she and her son Jonathan explained that Edward had had a family Bible but had given it to a daughter who have moved to Indiana. The statements do not indicate which daughter had the Bible, but most likely the daughter was Susannah, who married Thomas Fitzpatrick Jones and moved to Greene County, Indiana, sometime between 1832 and 1834. If this Bible still exists, it probably was passed down to her descendants.

Before that first Bible was given away, Edward apparently began to copy the family information into another Bible, with the copying being finished by his son Jonathan. The family record pages, or at least some of them, were torn from the Bible and sent as part of Jane's pension application, and they remain on file at the National Archives. Images of them are below. The Bible itself was also sent but was returned in 1877 to Jane's grandson Johnathan, son of Edward, Jr. That Bible is also missing, and whether it contained any additional family information is unknown.

What Has Been Found

Two sets of family Bible records were sent as part of the pension process; apparently, when Jane filed her first application for a pension, Jonathan made a copy of the record and sent the copy. Later, when questions were raised about the record, Jonathan sent the pages torn from his father's last Bible. The Pension Office suggested that both sets of records came from the same Bible, which may well be true; Jonathan said that he had copied the records but did not say onto what. Neither the publisher nor publication date of the Bible is known at this time, but, in any case, the family record is known not to be contemporaneous to the births of the children.

Below are images and transcriptions of the 6 leaves from the two family records still on file at the National Archives. The leaf numbers are assigned by me based on the order the pages appear on microfilm and have no other significance. There are some minor discrepancies between the two, most of which can be resolved with a little analysis. Some of the records are easier to read on the microfilm. Leaves 3 and 4 appear to be from the second submission; although, except for the third leave, no direct indication is given.

The scans below are scans of prints from the microfilm and are not always readable because of some old water damage to the paper. The transcriptions were made directly from the microfilm, which is somewhat easier to read.

Analysis of Record

In summary, the following dates for Edward's children can be determined from the two sets; dates thought to be incorrect are explained at the bottom of this page and shown in italics here.

Child
Leaf 1
Leaf 2
Leaf 3
Leaf 4
Leaf 5
Leaf 6
Joseph
06/26/1791
06/26/1791
06/26/[?]
William
05/15/1792
05/15/1792
Edward
09/07/1795
09/07/1795
Martha
11/05/1797
John W.
10/20/1801
10/20/1801
Samuel
01/31/1802
01/30/1803
Jonathan
03/01/1805
06/04/1805
06/02/1805
Henry Horn
08/16/1807
08/16/1807
Susanna
11/05/1809
[?]/05/1809
Margaret
04/15/1812
04/15/1812
Elizabeth
05/30/1815
05/30/1815


Three different dates are given for Jonathan. The March date can probably be ignored since the other two are both in June. Since leaf 3 is supposedly the oldest, the date used at the moment is 4 June 1805; however, 2 June 1805 may be correct, especially as leaf 5 seems to have a correct date for Samuel, the other conflict.

The birth date for Samuel is given as 31 January 1802 on leaf 4 and 30 January 1803 on leaf 5. In this case, leaf 5 is more likely correct as the 1802 date would place his birth just two months after the previous child. Of course, he could have been born 31 January 1803 as well. More exotic theories that would allow Samuel to have the 1802 date, such as him having a different mother, seem far-fetched at best.

There is no ambiguity in the birth dates for Martha, but the date bears discussion. When Annie Walker Burns requested a copy of the pension while in the process of writing her book in 1929, she received a letter which summarized the record, and it included a birth date of 9 November 1797 for Martha. That date has often been used as her correct birth date, probably because the typed letter, which was microfilmed along with the pension, is much easier to read than the Bible records. However, the date, specifically 5 November 1797, is quite clear, and, because of a typo, the wrong date has been used for Martha for decades.

Henry's name also bears discussion. Although he is occasionally seen as Henry W. Walker, the same pension office clerk gave his middle initial as "N or M", presumably from leaf 3, the initial seems to more likely be an "H". Leaf 6 gives a full middle name of "Horn", his mother's middle name. That same clerk called her "Horne or House", although in no case does it actually look like "House" in the documents. Every use other than this Bible record in the pension was wrutten by a justice of the peace or other person transcribing what Jane said, not Jane herself as she was not able to write. In other words, the one use of "Horn" on leaf 6 is the only known instance in which a family member wrote the word "Horn"; although of course the spelling of his middle name could be different from her maiden name, the spelling "Horn" is probably the spelling of choice by the family for Jane's maiden name.

In addition, within the depositions themselves, Jonathan mentions a child who died as an infant was not included in the Bible record. He gives no details other than that the child was born before he was. However, there is a logical break in birth order, and the child was probably born about 1797. The stray entry for Susan Emaly was for his own daughter; there is an additional unreadable entry under that one which may have been another of his children.

Images

Leaf 1

Joseph Walker was born June the 26th in the year of our lord 1791

William Walker was born in the year of our lord May the 15th in the year of 1792

Edward Walker was born September the 7th in the year of our lord 1795

Leaf 2

Elizabeth Walker was born May the 30th in the year of our lord 1815

Jonathan Walker was born March the 1st in the year of our lord 1805

Susan[?] Emaly was born March the 7th in the year of our lord 1831 [or 1837]

Leaf 3

Register A: Jonathan Walker exhibit

Jonathan Walker was born June the 4th in the year of our lord 1805

Henry H. Walker was born August the 16th in the year of our lord 1807

Susanna Walker was born November the 5th in the year of our lord 1809

Margaret Walker was born Aprile [sic] the 15th in the year of our lord 1812

Elizabeth Walker was born May the 30th in the year of our lord 1815

Leaf 4

Joseph Walker was born June the 26th in the year of our lord 1791

William Walker was born May the 15th in the year of our lord 1792

Edward Walker was born September the 7th in the year of our lord 1795

Martha Walker was born November the 5th in the year of our lord 1797

John W. Walker was born October the 20th in the year of our lord 1801

Samuel Walker was born January the 31st in the year of our lord 1802

Leaf 5

John Walker was born in the year of our Lord October the 20th 1801

Samuel Walker was born January the 30th in the year of our Lord 1803

Jonathon Walker was born in the year of our Lord June the 2nd 1805

Marget Walker was born in the year of our Lord ["March the" scratched out] Aprile [sic] the 15th 1812

Leaf 6

Joseph Walker was born the 26th of June in the year of our lord [unreadable]

Henry Horn Walker was born August the 16th in the year of our lord 1807

Susanna Walker was born [unreadable] 5th in the year of our lord 1809

All original material © 2007-9 by Phillip A. Walker or by cited authors. Submissions are welcome. Reuse allowed under limited conditions. Page last modified Sunday, 09-Sep-2018 13:19:40 MDT .