Charles Hudson (abt. 1756 - 1809)

Born about 1756 in Virginia

Descendants

Died 1809 at about age 53 in Cazenovia, Madison Co., New York, USA

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After looking and thinking about this - good ideas at Brickwall, I found Sir John Leverett, Governor of Boston who married a Hannah Hudson, with a descendant in South Carolina. - I'm looking.

• Source: CELeverett Title: A memoir biographical and genealogical, of Sir John Leverett, knt., governor of Massachusetts, 1673-79: of Hon. John Leverett, F.R.S., judge of the supreme court, and president of Harvard college; and of the family generally ... Author: Charles Edward Leverett. Crosby, Nichols & Co. 1856. A Google e-book. CELeverett

Biography

Charles Hudson was born circa 1756 at Virginia. As of 1756, he was also known as Nathaniel Leverett. ^[1]

He married Mehitable Paine, daughter of Joseph Ruggles Paine and Mehitable Gillings, on 4 March 1779.^[2][1]

He died in 1809 at Cazenovia, Madison County, New York.^[1]

Hudson - Leverett Family Story

This material was collected by my grandfather, Herman Willis Smith, his grandmother, Diadama Hudson, daughter of Charles, lived with Herman and told him the story. So it is a fairly direct story.

I have the chair that Herman mentions, it is small and but solid. It is too small to use. - pws May 2013

" It was a few years previous to the outbreak of the American Revolution that a family by the name of Leverett or Leverick (perhaps the spelling is not correct) lived in North Carolina and were the owners of a large plantation with many slaves. The home was so near the Dismal Swamp that the cries of the wild animals in the swamp could be plainly heard at night.

" Nathaniel Leverett, one of the sons, was a slender youth of seventeen years when his parents thought he was tending to develop a case of consumption. It was because of this feeble condition of his health that his parents arranged for him to take a sea trip to Boston Town, Mass. to visit relatives thinking that the change and salt air might improve his health conditions.

" After the young man had gotten well out to sea the vessel was taken by pirates. The crew were murdered and young Leverett with two or three others of the passengers were made slaves. For two years this youth endured this slavery and during the entire time was so absolutely trust worthy that he gained the confidence of the crew to the extent that when they wanted to land at Boston for supplies under the disquise of a British ship they sent him ashore with others to purchase supplies. As this was the opportunity for which he had been working for years he seized upon it and made his escape. Fearing the pirates would hunt him down and kill him he walked all night to get away from Boston. At daybreak in the morning he inquired how far it was to Boston and was told that it was six miles. He walked out to a place called Cole Rain where he secured employment under the assumed name of Charles Hudson --this assumption made so that the pirates could not inquire and learn of his whereabouts. It is not that his mother was a Hudson.

" As near as I have been able to learn it was here that he married Mahitabel Payne, the daughter of an English settler. We have in the family now: stored in the house owned by my mother at Rathbone, N.Y. a chair which the family are supposed to have-had when they began housekeeping. It is certain that it was their property. This is a low wooden bottomed kitchen chair with a high back made of a bow and slender wooden rods like the rungs between the legs were three in number and joined to each other as illustrated. The ends of the two large ones set in sockets bored into the legs.

" Charles Hudson after one or two of his children had been born lived in a log house at Coal Rain Mass. He heard that his father, Mr. Leverett of North Carolina had died and left a plantation and slaves for him in case he should call for them. In March or April he carried wood to the shed by the house and piled it high to last his wife while he should make a trip to North Carolina to look after his inheritance. He walked to Boston to sail, but was caught in a snow storm and belated, so he did not arrive until the vessel had sailed. As vessels sailed only about once in two months for the desired port, he returned to his family. In June he again arranged to sail south and walked to Boston, for some reason he did not sail, probably because or the excitement of the times, for he was just in time to witness the battle of Bunker Hill with the crowds from the roofs of Boston Town. He immediately returned home and arranged with his father-in-law to care for his family and he went to Boston Town and enlisted in a company that was planning to go south. He only enlisted for nine or ten months thinking that when he was discharged he would look after his business. The company was not sent south. Later he enlisted again the same way, but was kept in the north. In this way he served all through the war, probably occasionally writing home; meantime his son Samuel was born in 1781. When the war closed he was paid for ten months service at $8 per month in Continental money and had to pay this whole sum for a pair of shoes to walk home in. It was said that he never drew a pension because he only enlisted on short terms.^[1]

There is a major problem with the story that Charles tried to go back to North Carolina. First the Battle of Bunker Hill was June 17, 1775, 4 years before Charles and Mehitable were married. While it is probably true that Charles served in the revolutionary war, it would have been before his marriage so the story has some problems.

During the 1970's my cousin David Smith spent a lot of time trying to track the Leverett story. His conclusion was that there was no plantation for Charles to go back to and that it was just a story. pws May 2013

Name

Letter from Nathaniel Smith to Herman W. Smith Jan. 3, 1954

"Mr. Lee Bronson of Ashfield, Mass. whom I met last summer wrote me in November saying he had found a record to the effect that Chas Hudson and 20 other persons then living on a parcel of land in Charlemont,on Dec. 11, 1778 petitioned the Gen. Court of Mass. to transfer the land to the town of Buckland, which was done about Apr. 14, 1779. He also says that this parcel was about 3 miles, as the crow flies , from his girl friend's house, meaning Mehitable Paine, whom he married in 1779. These little bits of information which we have should pretty well establish him as the same Chas. Hudson who enlisted from Charlemont earlier in the war."

Sources

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3} History of the Ancestors of my Children as far back as I have been able to learn, by Smith, Herman Willis. 1918. Collection of Philip Wayne Smith Smith-40964.
   • Letter dated Jan. 23 1948 from Herman to Nathaniel; Charles Hudson was born at Albemal Colony Virginia, now North Carolina about 1756, his name was Nathaniel Leverett.
2. ↑ The descendants of John Payn : from England to America by Payne, Clyde William. 1994. Page. 148.

Acknowledgments

• Thank you to Phil Smith for creating WikiTree profile Hudson-2424.