Col. Jonathan Catlett GIBSON

M, b. 17 November 1793, d. 9 December 1849
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3rd great-grandfather of John Kennedy BROWN Jr.
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Sacred to the memory of J C. Gibson, born the 17th of November 1793, died the 6th of December 1849, in the 57th year of his age
     Col. Jonathan Catlett GIBSON, son of Jonathan Catlett GIBSON III and Elizabeth Mallory, was born on 17 November 1793 in Virginia.1,2

During the War of 1812, brothers Jonathan and John GIBSON enlisted in Capt. John Linton's Troop of Cavalry in Lt. Col. Enoch Rennoe's 36th Regiment of Virginia Militia from 21 August 1814 to 7 September 1814 in Orange County, Virginia. Jonathan was a sergeant and his brother John was a lieutenant. They enlisted for a period of 12 days. Jonathan also served in Capt. Jos. R. Gilbert's Company of the 6th regiment of Virginia Militia.

According to the testimony of William Ross of Culpeper County on 11 Nov 1879 in support of Mary W. Gibson's pension claim, "In 1814 when I landed at Norfolk the first person I met was Col. J. Catlett Gibson, who came up to enquire after the 'Culpeper boys.' He was a member of Capt. Gilbert's company, from Prince William Co. Capt. Gilbert was a large, portly man, and a hatter by trade. We boys used to call him 'Old Man Time' because he couldn't keep time. Chas. Fenton Mercer was the major of our regiment. I don't remember the name of the colonel [Lt. Col. Daniel Coleman]. The commander in chief [at Norfolk] was Gen. [Moses] Porter a very wicked man who used to curse all militia men off the face of the earth. Col. Gibson and myself were both in same regt. called out for six months, but served only three months. We were stationed at Camp Nemo 3 miles of Norfolk. Were in Norfolk occasionally and often called out for pickett service at the Pleasure House on Lynnhaven Bay. Col. J. C. Gibson and myself were discharged on 11 May 1814." Note: Pleasure House was a Chesapeake bayside tavern in which Norfolk area sports, satirically referred to by a contemporary as "the Pleasure House crowd," gathered to gamble and drink. Even so, the long popular watering hole also served during the first two decades of the 19th century as a lookout and vantage point on the Chesapeake Bay from which military observers before and throughout the War of 1812 could spy on the hostile activities of the British naval forces in nearby Lynnhaven Bay and off Cape Henry.3,4

At the time of his enlistment in 1814, Jonathan was described as 6 feet tall, with dark brown curling hair, gray eyes, large aquiline nose, and a decided mouth and chin.5

Jonathan married first Martha Dandridge BALL, daughter of Col. Burgess BALL and Frances Ann WASHINGTON, circa 1816 in Virginia. He was an attorney.

Col. Jonathan Catlett GIBSON bought land from Francis S. and Esther Cowne Jones in 1821 in Culpeper County, Virginia. In 1820 Francis S. and Esther (or Hetty, as she was often called) Jones began disposing of their Culpeper property, preparatory to moving to Kentucky, near Bowling Green. In 1821 they sold to Jonathan for $1127 the land on which they resided, 556 acres on the south side of Thornton Gap Road to the line of Jeffries, Norris and Gabriel Jones. Gabriel S. Jones was the witness. [Deed Bk. MM, pg. 437].

Jonathan married second Mary Williams SHACKELFORD, daughter of John SHACKELFORD and Lucy Pendleton Tutt, on 28 December 1824 in Fairfax, Culpeper County, Virginia. Parson Woodville conducted the wedding service.6,7

According to a history of Culpepper County, during Lafayette's visit to America the Marquis was contacted at Montpelier, James Madison's home in Orange County, and invited to Culpepper. As Lafayette had made a point to visit Virginia counties where he and his men had lived and fought during the Revolution, he accepted. "His party, ex-president James Monroe among them, crossed into Culpepper County at Lightfoot's Ford on Crooked Run at mid-morning, August 22, 1825. There, the entourage met with Maj. Jonathan Catlett Gibson and his mounted fifty-man volunteer escort. Virginia Appeals Court Judge John Williams entertained the party at Greenwood, a mile from town, and while the host poured iced apple toddies, Gibson's horses paraded in the front yard."6,8

Col. Jonathan Catlett GIBSON was a member of the Virginia General Assembly. In 1833 he and Capt. Ambrose P. Hill, of later Civil War fame, were appointed to go to Richmond to employ "delaying tactics" to prevent Culpeper county being divided, but they were too late and Rappahannock county was formed. in 1831.9

Col. Jonathan Catlett GIBSON died on 9 December 1849 in Culpeper Courthouse, Virginia, at age 56. The official cause of death shown on the 1850 Mortality Schedule was "paralysis", which was probably the result of a stroke. Death came after an illness of three days.2,10,11 He was buried on 15 December 1849 in St. Stephen's Episcopal Church Cemetery, Culpeper, Virginia. His monument is an upright stone with a pointed top. It reads: "SACRED to the memory of J. C. Gibson, Born the 17th of November 1793, Died the 6th of December 1849 in the 67th year of his age." A separate flat marker reads: "GIBSON: Jonathan Catlett Gibson, 1793-1849. Colonel War of 1812."12,13

The following letter was writeen by his daughter, Lucy Ellen Buckner in August 1918:
My dear Miss Trabue:

I received your letter, it was interesting to me and I read it with pleasure. I wish I could aid you in researches, but am afraid I cannot do so. I am only a member of the Gibson family and by no means a genealogist or predisposed to be an expert in that science. I will, however, give you some particulars of my immediate family which may interest you.

My father was Col. Jonathan Catlett Gibson, he enlisted in Orange Co. in a company and fought in the war of 1812, and with his regiment, saw the Capitol burned and helped to drive the British from Washington. At the close of the war, he studied law in the office of his brother John Gibson, in the little city of Dumfries in Prince William Co., Va. This indicates that the two names were considered in England separate and distinct and the same iteration occurs in many families in the United States.

It pleases me to know that the name of Jonathan descended from the Bishop's Brother, who certainly showed a friendly interest in our family. If my brother, Col. Jonathan Catlett Gibson (a Civil War veteran), claimed to have seen the letters (there were three of them) he certainly did as it was no secret in the family. Unfortunately they were burned in my fathers office in the Civil War. They would have been of no worldly value as the Bishop had married, but we would have prized them as heirlooms. Many valuable presents were sent to our family by the Bishop's descendants. I handled his prayer book he used in his last days. My brother had it.

In every generation, since I could remember, there have been Jonathans as I told you my father was Jonathan Catlett Gibson, my brother was Jonathan Catlett Gibson and his grandson of the same name is now Lieutenant in our Army in France.

I have always known we were connected with the families of Taylors, Harrisons, Pendletons, Eustaces, Catletts and others, but as I have led the life of a busy housekeeper on a farm, I have provided no data to record their marriages; if I had they would have been destroyed during the Civil War. The Gibson family is one of the largest in this country.

I would not be surprised if I were to go to the Island of Madagascar to find a descendant of the Gibson family there. The immediate descendants of the Gibson family as they came from England were large and wealthy planters. To that class General Washington and his wife belonged. The next generation were comfortable farmers and good livers; to that class my father belonged, he was also a successful lawyer. His first wife was Martha Dandridge Ball, a near relative of the Washingtons. She died and left two daughters, Frances Ann and Martha Dandridge, named for Washington's wife.

My father then married Mary Williams Shackleford, who had twelve children. I am the second child of the last wife, now very old (91); the rest are all dead.

I have written you a gossiping letter. Hoping that if not satisfactory, it will be agreeable.

I am yours truly,

Lucy E. Buckner.14
Last Edited=19 Mar 2021

Children of Col. Jonathan Catlett GIBSON and Martha Dandridge BALL

Children of Col. Jonathan Catlett GIBSON and Mary Williams SHACKELFORD

Citations

  1. [S39] John Winterbottom, Genealogies of Virginia Families.
  2. [S376] Rootsweb, online https://sites.rootsweb.com, LiRae W. Sullins <e-mail address> 21 Oct 2000.
  3. [S678] "Virginia Militia in the War of 1812, Vol. II" , pg. 648.
  4. [S773] Jonathan C. Gibson, Pension File, Widow's Certificate-WC27541, Pension claim filed in 1879 by widow, Mary W. Gibson, Testimony of William Ross of Culpeper Co., Virginia.
  5. [S773] Jonathan C. Gibson, Pension File, Widow's Certificate-WC27541, Pension claim filed in 1879 by widow, Mary W. Gibson.
  6. [S375] O. D. and Penny Linder, The Gibsons, pg. 242.
  7. [S435] Mary Louise Davis Poirier, "Descendants of J. C. Gibson", Compiler is a descendant of Aylette Hawes and Anna Burt Buckner.
  8. [S410] Eugene M. Scheel, Culpepper-- A Virginia County's History Through 1920, pg. 91.
  9. [S410] Eugene M. Scheel, Culpepper-- A Virginia County's History Through 1920, pg. 362.
  10. [S527] Culpeper County Genweb, online http://ftp.rootsweb.com/pub/usgenweb/va/culpeper/, "1850 Mortality Schedule for Culpeper County, Virginia," accessed 13 Mar 2004.
  11. [S773] Jonathan C. Gibson, Pension File, Widow's Certificate-WC27541, Pension claim filed in 1879 by widow, Mary W. Gibson, Mary W. Gibson in pension appl. lists his DOD as 9 Dec 1849.
  12. [S527] Culpeper County Genweb, online http://ftp.rootsweb.com/pub/usgenweb/va/culpeper/, Cemeteries: St. Stephen's Episcopal Church Cemetery. Accessed 13 Mar 2004.
  13. [S572] Donna Stevens Boyd, St. Mark's Parish Register, pg. 77, the year is listed as 1847, but that may be misread from the tombstone.
  14. [S1107] Letter, Lucy Ellen Gibson to Miss Trabue, 1918, The letters were submitted by Joanne Pezzo (joannepezzo08) 20 Sep 2014.
  15. [S376] Rootsweb, online https://sites.rootsweb.com, Eric Nielson <e-mail address> 21 October 2000.

Information on this site has been gathered over many years from many sources. Although great care has been taken, inaccuracies may exist. Please contact [email protected] with corrections or questions..