Taliaferro Craig Sr. (abt. 1704 - 1795)

Ancestors Descendants

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Will 1.2 Name 1.3 Birth 1.4 Death 1.5 Residence 2 Sources

Biography

Toliver Craig, Sr., first called Taliaferro Craig, (c. 1704-1795) was an 18th-century American frontiersman and militia officer. An early settler and landowner near present-day Lexington, Kentucky, he was one of the defenders of the early fort of Bryan's Station during the American Revolutionary War. It was attacked by the British and Shawnee on August 15, 1782.

Craig and his family were early converts to the Baptist Church in the Colony of Virginia. His sons especially preached their religious views during the 1760s and 1770s. As a young man, his son Rev. Lewis Craig was a Baptist preacher jailed in Fredericksburg, Virginia for preaching without a license from the established Anglican Church, in a case considered important for religious freedom.[1]

Toliver and his sons Lewis and Joseph Craig led 400-600 members of their congregation as "The Travelling Church" into Kentucky in 1781. A younger son, Rev. Elijah Craig, worked with James Madison on state guarantees for religious freedom after the Revolutionary War before following his kin to Kentucky, where he became a successful preacher, educator, and businessman.

Toliver Craig, Jr., became an important landowner in Scott and Logan counties, Kentucky. He was elected as a representative to the Kentucky state legislature.

Biography[edit] Sources disagree about the circumstances of Taliiaferro Craig's birth. According to traditional accounts and his own descendants, Taliaferro was the illegitimate son of Ricardo Tagliaferro, an Italian sea captain, and Jane Craig, a young Scottish woman who traveled with him to the Virginia colony. She was pregnant and Tagliaferro never married her. Craig gave birth to a son she named Taliaferro Craig in 1704. His name was later anglicized to Toliver or Tolliver. Jane Craig never married.

Ricardo Tagliaferro was said to have settled in Virginia, where he later married and had a family. He was said to have a brother there, Robert Tagliaferro (or Taliaferro). The Taliaferro families became distinguished in Virginia.

But, this story about Craig's connection to Robert Tagliaferro may not be accurate. The Robert Taliaferro who was the ancestor of the prominent Taliaferro family of Virginia (later anglicized to Toliver or Tolliver), arrived in Virginia from England in the mid-17th century. His ancestors had been in England for some time, with the first serving as a court musician to Queen Elizabeth I in the 16th century.[2]

Tolliver Craig became a modest farmer and member of the Virginia militia. In 1730, he married Mary (Polly) Hawkins (descendant of John Hawkins), with whom he would have 12 children. Like most people in Virginia, he and his family were largely illiterate. He was presumed to have decent social standing, as the Hawkins family were prominent in Virginia society at the time.[3]

During the 1760s, Craig and his family embraced the Baptist movement. His sons Elijah, Lewis, and Joseph Craig became Baptist preachers. Elijah and Lewis were jailed in Fredericksburg, Virginia for preaching without a license from the Anglican Church. One account had them defended by Patrick Henry, but other historians call that apocryphal.[4]

Craig and his family moved to Kentucky at the end of the Revolution, where he lived with his wife and younger children at Bryan's Station (present-day Lexington). (His sons Elijah and Lewis led the Traveling Church to Kentucky.) When the fort was attacked by a British Canadian and Shawnee raiding party under Captain William Caldwell and Simon Girty, Craig and his wife Polly, although both were elderly, were some of the more well-known defenders. The 66-year-old Mary "Polly" Craig was reported to have led a group of women outside the fort to fetch water from a spring to quench possible burning arrows. Their courage was honored in 1896 by a DAR memorial near the spring.

Craig later became a prominent landowner, purchasing the David Bryan estate from John Bowman.[5] He donated large amounts of land to the Baptist church. He died in Woodford County, Kentucky in 1795.

Toliver CRAIG, Sr.

Wife: Mary HAWKINS

Birth: 1716, King William Co., VA

Marriage: 1730 - 1732, VA ^[1]

Death: 6 Jan 1804, Georgetown, Scott Co., KY

Father: John HAWKINS

Mother: Mary LONG

Children:

1. John CRAIG, b. 1731; d 15 Aug 1815; m. Sarah "Sallie" PAGE

2. Joyce "Jossie" CRAIG, b. 1733; d. 1813; m. John FAULCONER / FAULNER

3. Lewis CRAIG, b. ca. 1737; d. 1825 or 1828, Bracken Co., KY; m. Elizabeth SANDERS / SAUNDERS

4. Toliver CRAIG, Jr., b. 1740; d. 1819; m. Elizabeth JOHNSON

5. Elijah CRAIG, b. 1743; d. 18 May 1808; m1. Frances SMITH; m2. Ms. TABB

6. Jeremiah CRAIG, b. 1747; m. Lucy HAWKINS

7. Joseph CRAIG, Sr., b. 1747

8. Elizabeth CRAIG, b. ca. 1750

9. Benjamin CRAIG, b. 1751

Most people list these two as their children, but their relationship is not obvious from the will:

. Jane CRAIG, b. 1735; m. John SANDERS / SAUNDERS

. Sarah CRAIG, b. 1743; m. 1765, Manoah SINGLETON

Will

In the name of God, Amen. I, Toliver Craig of Woodford County, being in a low state of health but of perfect disposing mind and memory, calling to mind the uncertainty of this mortal life, do constitue this my last will and testament in a manner and form following:

First and principally I reccomend my soul to God that gave it, and my body to be intered after my death at the discretion of my executors hereafter named.

Secondly and as for the worldy estate the Lord has blessed me with, I lend two negroes named Warnick and Teanor and a horse and a best bed and furniture unto by beloved wife, Mary Craig, during her natural life and after her death to be equally divided among my children hereafter named.

Thirdly I desire that my children all be made equal with the one that received the most of my estate: that is, what it was worth when they received it.

Forthly I desire that the balance of my estate both real and personal be equally divided between my nine children, namely: John Craig, Toliver Craig, Lewis Craig, Joseph Craig, Elijah Craig, Benjamin Craig, Jeremiah Craig, Jossie Faulkner, and Elizabeth Cave.

Fifthly it is my will and desire that my above named children make John Sanders and Sarah Singleton part equal with theirs in property at the praise value.

Sixthly it is my desire that my sons, John Craig, Toliver Craig, and Lewis Craig do execute this my last will and testament.

Witness my hand and seal this fifteenth day of December one thousand seven hundred ninety.

his mark

Toliver X Craig (seal)

Teste:

John Cooke

Anthony Lindsey

Daniel Baldwin

Proved in Woodford County, Kentucky court 5 August 1799

Name

Rev Taliaferro "Toliver" Craig ^[2][3][4]

Birth

Date: 1704#S31 ^[5]

Death

Date: 5 August, 1795 - 1799#S31 ^[6]

Residence

Place: Spotsylvania, Virginia, United States#S31^[7][8]

Sources

1. ↑ #S26 Birth: 1704 in St George parish, Spottsylvania, VA. Death: 1796 in Woodford Co, KY. Marriage: 1732 in Prince Williams Ancestry Family Trees
2. ↑ #S100 Ancestry Family Trees
3. ↑ #S293Ancestry Family Trees
4. ↑ #S110 Ancestry Family Trees
5. ↑ #S27 Birth: 1704 in Spotsylvania, VAAncestry Family Trees
6. ↑ #S86 Death: 1795 in Woodford, KY Ancestry Family Trees
7. ↑ #S114 Residence: 1790 in Woodford County, KY Family Trees
8. ↑ #S295Residence: 1775-1792 in Kentucky, USA Ancestry Family Trees

• Craig, Winchell McKendree. The Craig Family: Genealogical and Historical Notes about the Craigs of America, Fayette County, Ohio, United States, Canada. Rochester, Minnesota: Winchell M. Craig, 1956.

• Faulconer, James Gayle. Thomas Faulconer and His Descendants. Baltimore: Gateway Press, 1984.

• Howard, Virginia Webb. Bryan Station Heroes and Heroines. Lexington, Kentucky: Continental Printing Company, 1932.

• "Fredericksburg Baptist Church", Official Website. Quote: "In 1768, Lewis Craig, John Waller, James Childs, James Reed and William Marsh were imprisoned in the Fredericksburg jail for 4 to 6 weeks." Accessed 2 April 2012.

• Hayden, Robert. William Haydon, Kentucky Adventurer, 1740-1819. Little Rock: R. Haydon, 2000. (pg. 319) ISBN 0-9666756-2-2

• Kegley, F.B. Kegley's Virginia Frontier: The Beginning of the Southwest, the Roanoke of Colonial Days, 1740-1783. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 2003. (pg. 533) ISBN 0-8063-1717-5

• Parker, Anna Virginia. The Sanders Family of Grass Hills: The Life of Lewis Sanders, 1781-1861. Madison, Indiana: Coleman Printing Company, 1966.

• Wagner, Sir Anthony. "The Origin of the Family of Taliaferro", The Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, Vol. 77. Virginia Historical Society, 1969.

• Information obtained by my great uncle when he researched our family tree in Kentucky back in the 19502. Confirmed by researching the websites of others who list the same information.

S31 All of the Above 1 ed by Richard Baldwin Cook Published: Cockeysville, Maryland: Nativa Publishing, 2008.

• Sources quoted in the book include the following:

Betty Huey Tayloy Cook's collected data and her unpublished book

Genealogy of the Huey Family, John L. Huey (1908)

Williams data from Sally Williams Black

Major Lee Utz, "History of the Williams Family" (1941)

James and Nellie Gouge: "History of Grant County Kentucky," Grant County Historical Society (1992), James B. Conrad, editor.

Jewett/Juet infomration: Huguenot Emigration to Virginia and to the Settlement at Manakin-Town, Robert Alonzo Brock (1886, 1962)

Crouch details from Elizabeth Taylor Rubio

William Myrix Williams ancestry and descendants: Maryland Genealogical Society, Maryland members ancestry, www.mdgensoc.org/genealogyfortng

Gouge Family Cemetery: Grant County Cemeteries, compiled by Virgil Chandler, Sr (Grant County Historical Society, 1988).

• Name obtained from a pedigree chart found in the basement of Christina Bohannan Trent.

Toliver Craig's Family

Compiled by Bill Davis

1. Taliaferro "Toliver" Craig born Virginia, married ___ ?? 1730, in Spotsylvania County, Virginia, Mary "Polly" Hawkins, born ___ ?? 1716, King William County, Virginia, (daughter of John Hawkins and Mary Long?) died Jan 6 1804, Craigs Settlement, Clear Creek, KY, buried destroyed Cem.,,

Great Crossings Bapt.Church, Scott Co. Taliaferro died 0 ___ 1795, Woodford County, Kentucky, buried Woodford County, Kentucky.

Family Data Collection - Individual Records

Ancestry.com Source Citation: Birth year: 1705; Birth city: Essex CO; Birth state: VA for Toliver Taliaferro Craig.

Family Data Collection :

Ancestry.com Another birth date for Tallaferro...

Birth listed as 1704 in St. Georgepar, Spottsylvainia, Virginia, USA

Death listed as 1796 in Clear, Woodford, Kentucky, USA.

Marriage listed as 1730 in , Spottsylvania, Virginia, USA

• Arletta Hudson, Kyle Sell, Paula Marksman
• Craig, Lillian K.. Reverend John Craig, 1709-1774 : his descendants and allied families. New Orleans, LA: Accurate Letter Company, 1963
• Masters, Frank M.. A History of Baptists in Kentucky. Louisville, KY: Kentucky Baptist Historical Society, 1952
• Howard, Virginia W.. Bryan Station Heroes and Heroines. Lexington, KY: Press of the Commerial Print Co., 1932
• Wulfeck, Dorothy F.. Hawkins of Virginia, the Carolinas and Kentucky: court records, queries, brief lineages, genealogical notes. Naugatuck, CN: D. F. Wulfeck, 1963.
• Parker, Anna V.. The Sanders Family of Grass Hills. Madison, IN: Coleman Printing Co., 1966.
• Wikipedia contributors, "Toliver Craig Sr.," Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toliver_Craig_Sr. (accessed November 26, 2019).