John Rodgers Sr (1747 - 1836)

Born 25 Jan 1747 in Lunenburg, Virginia

Ancestors

Husband of Margaret Ann (Daugherty) Rodgers — married 30 Jul 1768 in Danville, Boyle, Kentucky

Descendants

Died 30 Aug 1836 at age 89 in Franklin, Williamson, Tennessee, United States

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Biography

John was born in 1747. He passed away in 1836. John and his spouse are buried in the McGavock Family Cemetery at Carlton along with their daughter Sarah Daugherty Rodgers McGavock and two of their sons, Thomas P. Rodgers and James Andrew Rodgers. Their daughter Ann Phillips Rodgers married Sen. Felix Grundy and is buried in the Mount Olivet Cemetery in Nashville, Davidson, Tenn.

In the Tennessee State Library and Archives-McGavock, the Rodgers came to Pennsylvania before 1730. They had settled in the Cub Creek Settlement area in Lunenberg County, Virginia before 1750.

This John Rodgers was the grandson of the Scots-Irish immigrant John Caldwell. John Rodgers was born within 25 miles of the original Caldwell Settlement, married, and raised six children before moving to Kentucky in 1781. ^[1]

Letter John Rodgers wrote to his cousin Elias B. Caldwell (Clerk of the U.S. Supreme Court) dated May 11, 1825. This letter was in the Virginia Magazine for Jan 1911, Vol. 19, p 93 and in Treads of Ancestors pp115-116.

Dear Sir: I acknowledge receipt of your letter of the 18th of March and I thank you for the information therein contained. You cannot conceive what feelings crossed my brain when I heard of so many of my kindred according to the flesh well in this world and to human appearance not forgetful of the next. The accounts you give me of many of my dear people are truly pleasing to me as I am now eldest of all our family and have from my youth up been very curious in collecting all information I could obtain from my oldest relations with regard to our ancestors. I will give you a short sketch of what I know on the subject. It may afford you some amusement in your leisure hours. “Our grandfather emigrated from Scotland soon after King William’s conquest of that place. Our grandfather John Caldwell was born in Ireland and was there married to Margaret Phillips (our grandmother). He remained there till they had 5 children at which time he got 3 of his brothers-in-law (to wit) Moor, Ritchey, and Dudgeon, all of whom I remember well, and one brother-in-law who had married his wife’s sister whose name was Dougherty, grandfather of my wife and of Thomas Dougherty formerly clerk of the lower House of Congress and, of course, known to you. These set sail together and landed in Delaware the very day King George II was proclaimed there. From thence they got up the country to a place in Pennsylvania then called Chestnut Level. Our grandfather, naturally of an enterprising spirit, explored the country southwesterly from a place in Virginia now Albemarle County to which he moved and was soon followed by all his kindred. There he lived some years; there our grandfather died and his oldest son and my mother, his only daughter, were married. They and their companions moved with him to Roanoke River and the fine lands there, explored the country westwardly til he and his followers fixed on a fine level watered spot not 30 miles outside any inhabitants to which place he and his sons and brothers-in-law moved about the year 1742 or 3. They were soon after joined by other friends, mostly from Ireland or Pennsylvania, until they formed a settlement which was known and always called Caldwell settlement for 30 years after. Our grandfather was the first Justice of the Peace and his oldest son the oldest militia officer that was ever appointed under King George II.

“Within 25 miles of that place in that neighborhood I was born and in it was married and had 6 children before I moved to Kentucky in the year 1781. Our grandfather’s children were William, Thomas, David, Margaret, John, Robert and James. My father and grandfather both died in October 1750 just 14 days apart. My mother then married a man by the name of James Mitchell. She had 5 children by each husband. Two of her daughters died in Virginia. The rest all came to Kentucky and have been numerous families. Her son Robert died in Kentucky. William, Thomas, and David Caldwell are all buried in the same graveyard with their father. David’s widow and all that family moved to Kentucky. Uncle John went to South Carolina and died there. Uncle William’s widow and all that family went to South Carolina, also. Our friend, John C. Calhoun is a son of the 2nd daughter of that family. “I enjoy as good health as a man in his 79th year has any good reason to expect of look for, for which I ought to be very thankful to the great Giver of all blessings. My kindred in this section of the country are all well as far as I know. I am sorry to hear of your declining state of health but hope you will be enabled by grace divine to bear it without murmuring thought. Remember me to your wife and children and to your brother Josiah and family. I greet you all as dear relations and although I shall never see any of you in this world I hope to meet you in a future day in a far happier place. How vain are all things here below, yet I feel a desire to hear from you all often whilst I live. On looking over what I have written I see a good many blots and blunders which you will readily excuse. Farewell! Farewell! From your affectionate cousin, John Rodgers.”

John Rodgers served as a Corporal in the Third Va. Regiment, Captain Francis Mercer's Co. 1776-1778. Lived to be ninety years of age and died in Franklin, Tenn. in the home of his son-in-law Randal McGavock and was buried in the family graveyard in Franklin, Williamson Co., Tennessee.

John Rogers was born in Lunenburg Co. Va. and lived there until six of his children were born, after which he moved with his family to near Danville, Ky. in 1781. Here he kept an Inn, called the Half-way House between Danville and Frankfort Ky., and took in travelers. It was here that Felix Grundy met and learned to love Anne Phillips Rodgers, the daughter of John. Felix Grundy married Anne Phillips Rodgers. They lived on Ceder Hill in Nashville, Tenn. in the house known as the James K. Polk Residence.

D.A.R. Lineage Book gives the names of two John Roger's (Rodgers) descendents who went into D.A.R. on his record. They are as follows:

Miss Virginia C. Quigly, b. in Alton, Ill., great-granddaughter of John Reid and Margaret Rodgers his wife, Nat, No. 23,453. Her present address is 74 Buckingham Street, Cambridge, Mass. Evidently she is a descendent of Margaret Martin Rodgers b. 1782 and married William John Reid.

Mrs. Hattie McGavock Cowan, b. in Franklin, Tenn.; wife of George L. Cowan,, and daughter of Colonel John McGavock, Confederate States of America, and his wife Caroline Winder, granddaughter of Randal McGavock and Sarah Daugherty Rodgers McGavock, his wife. Mrs. Cowan's Nat. No. 20,741.

^[2]

Buried at McGavock Family Cemetery. Find-a-grave memorial ID 8313205.

Note: despite genealogical researchers and family articles, this Rodgers family is not the Rogers family of Massachusetts nor is it decended from John Rogers, the fifth president of Harvard University.

Sources

1. ↑ Letter from John Rodgers to Elias Boudinot Caldwell, written about 1825, and reprinted in Virginia Magazine of History and Biography, Vol. 19, pp. 92-94
2. ↑ Typewritten notes by Van Porter Enloe.

• The Tennessee State Library and Archives- McGavoc, Sallay Warner Frazer's Maternial Southern Ancestors For McGavock, Grundy, Caldwell, Phillips, Rodgers, compiled by Stanley Frazier Rose, 2016.

Acknowledgements

• This person was created through the import of JDS_09_17_10.ged on 09 February 2011.