Robert Ruffin Barrow (1798 - 1875)

Born 1798 in Halifax County, North Carolina, USA

Ancestors

Descendants

Died 28 Jul 1875 at about age 77 in New Orleans, Orleans Parish, Louisiana, USA

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Biography

Robert Ruffin Barrow, son of Bartholomew Barrow and Ascension Slatter, was born in Halifax County, North Carolina in 1798. He died in New Orleans and was buried after 28 July 1875 in Girod St. Cemetery, New Orleans, Louisiana.

From Thomas Becnel's The Barrow Family and the Barataria and Lafourche Canal: The Transportation Revolution in Louisiana, 1829-1925:

A heavy investor in the first submarine to sink an enemy ship, the H. L. Hunley, named after its designer, Barrow's brother-in-law, Horace Lawson Hunley. In 1864, the Hunley sank the frigate, S.S. Husatonic in Charleston Bay, South Carolina.

Robert Ruffin Barrow (b. 1798) was a sugar planter and canal operator in Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana. He was the oldest son of Bartholomew Barrow (d. 1852), a merchant at Fishing Creek, Halifax County, North Carolina, and Ascension Slatter Barrow. Bartholomew moved his family to West Feliciana Parish in 1820, where he settled on his estate, Afton Villa. Robert Barrow had two brothers, David Bennett and William Bennett Barrow, both of whom became planters. William lived with Robert until his death in 1842. Barrow (usually referred to as R. R. rather than Robert) owned six Terrebonne Parish plantations: Residence, Caillou Grove, Honduras, Myrtle Grove, Crescent Farm, and Point Farm. In addition, he owned the Oak Grove Plantation in Lafourche Parish; the Locust Grove Plantation in Assumption Parish; the Donaldsonville Plantation in Ascension Parish; and several plantations in Texas. Barrow also operated the Barataria and Lafourche Canal Company Number 2. In 1850 Barrow married Volumnia Washington Hunley, and they had two children, Volumnia Roberta (b. 1854) and Robert Ruffin, Jr. (b. 1858).

In the summer of 1875, be became ill with cholera. 'I was last Tuesday night taken with a very severe attack of cholera morbus,' he stated in a letter dictated to John Bradford Pittman, his manager and Partner. 'It has completely prostrated me. I am unable to walk across the room, or get to the chamber without help, and I am getting worse,' he wrote on July 1. He talked of visiting a friend next week if his health improved, but before signing off, he added, 'I learned you was here the other day and did not call to see me, it looks strange. I can dictate no further now. I do my best to live.'

A New Orleans paper recorded his death:

'Mr. R. R. Barrow , who died on Tuesday, was a native of North Carolina of a very numerous family, who settled in this state many years ago and became large and wealthy planters. Before the war, R. R. Barrow was one of the largest land and slaveholders in the state...He was an original, full of peculiar ideas and indomitable energy and activity in the pursuit of them, and especially zealous in the very new task of trying to reform the party politics and platforms of the country and to direct the tone of the press thereon.'

The brief notice invited friends to the funeral service at his Magazine Street residence at 4 PM on July 28.^[1]

Other marriages

Generated by WikiTree AGC. These marriages look like marriages of other people. Usually these are parent marriages. The following should be removed after relocation to the relevant profiles:

Bartholomew Barrow married Ascension Slatter on 11 May 1797 in Halifax County, NC. The couple had 4 children: Robert Ruffin Barrow, William Bennett Barrow, Martha Barrow and David Bennett Barrow.^[2]

Sources

1. ↑ Thomas Becnel, The Barrow Family and the Barataria and Lafourche Canal: The Transportation Revolution in Louisiana, 1829-1925 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State Univ. Press, 1989).
2. ↑ Marriage of other person: Lewis E. Story, Ancestry of Lewis Edward Story (Ancestry World Tree Project, updated 2/7/2005). Ancestry World Tree Project, updated 2/7/2005: http://awt.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=SRCH&db=lestory&surname=B. Address.

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• This person was created through the import of indygrandma.ged on 02 January 2011