Robert Jameson (1714 - 1786)

Born 25 Dec 1714 in Omagh, Tyrone, Ireland

Ancestors

Husband of Nancy Agnes (Dixon) Jameson — married 24 Nov 1748 in North Stonington, New London, Connecticut

Descendants

Died 1 May 1786 at age 71 in Hanover, Nanticoke, Luzerne, Pennsylvania, United States

Problems/Questions Profile manager: Steven Hall [send private message]

Biography

information from Jamisons Forever Genealogy Website [1]

Robert and Nancy were married in North Stonington, Connecticut. Recorded in "Early Connecticut Marriages as found in Ancient Church Records prior to 1800" First Book Edited by Frederic W. Bailey published by the Bureau of American Ancestry, New Haven, Connecticut.

The birth of the children were recorded Connecticut State Vital Records for Voluntown, Connecticut. They can be found on LDS film #0002927.

Mr. Jamison was not four years old when his parents arrived in America, and a lad of only eleven years when they removed to Voluntown, Connecticut. He married Agnes Dixon, Who came to America in 1726, when three years old, with her father, Robert Dixon, who settled in Voluntown, Connecticut. Here the newly-married young people commenced life together, on the old farm where Mr. Jamison's parents, now deceased, had spent their last days. Twenty years passed in industry and a happy home life. They now had a group of thirteen children, the oldest twenty-one and the youngest less than a year old.

Mr. Jamison was a man of affairs in the town, and highly esteemed for his up-rightness and business ability, and to him was entrusted the administration of the public finances, which were in a depressed condition. Mr. Jamison was chosen town treasure, when by no fault of his----the financial affairs of the town were greatly embarrassed:.... a heavy debt accrued to the government, for which the town treasure, Mr. Robert Jamison, was held responsible. Having no funds to meet this demand, Mr. Jamis0on was arrested and confined in Windham jail. In 1777 a committee was appointed to go to Windham in term of the Superior Court, and get the best advice concerning a trouble for which Robert Jamison is now confined in jail. Isaac Gallup was ordered to take and secured all said Jamison's estate for the use of the town in settling the debt for which he was imprisoned, but in no wise at fault. This imprisonment lasted for two years. When James Gordon was appointed agent to settle with Robert Jamison, now confined in the Windham County Jail, for the colony tax due for said town, and soon effected his liberation.

Robert Jamison, soon after his release, removed to Wyoming Valley, Pennsylvania, with his sons, Robert, William, John, Alexander and Joseph, who gained a permanent home in that beautiful Valley, and were numbered among its most respectable and influential citizens. Among valuable families from Windham County, Connecticut were those of George and John Dorrance, Robert Jamison, Cyrus Kinne of Voluntown, Connecticut, who emigrated to Wyoming Valley on the Susquehanna River.

Mr. Jamison, some years before March 30, 1768, had purchased of Robert Dixson, for nine shillings, one whole share or right in "Purchase of Susquehanna Land Company." The above Robert Dixson was an ancestor of the Honorable Nathan F. Dixson, who in 1839-1842 was a United States Senator from Rhode Island. The charms of the Wyoming Valley were described in verse as follows:

Canaan of Old, as we are told Where it did rain down manna, Wasn't half so good for heavenly food As Dyer makes Susqu'hanna.

The tide of emigration being strongly set in that direction, Mr. and Mrs. Jamison in the autumn of 1776, after the trials of the last few years, were easily persuaded to take advantage of the current, and so set out with all their sons and daughters, except John, the eldest, who had already preceded them, for the land of promise.

They bade a last farewell to their old home and neighbors in Voluntown, Connecticut and with luggage as they could take started for the Wyoming Valley on the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania. They took with them a few articles of household furniture and an agricultural implement or two which they conveyed in a large cart drawn by three yoke of oxen. The sons walked along side, driving the oxen and helping the cart over new and badly opened roads. The daughters, clad in homespun, traveled afoot and drove thirty head of sheep. The journey was performed in about three tedious weeks.

In 1778, he and his family found themselves in the middle of the Wyoming Valley Massacre. The British and Indians killed 300 at the fort near Wilkes-Barre, including one of Robert's four sons that was defending the fort. Those that had survived the original battle and surrendered were tortured and killed in a most gruesome fashion, including women and children. Many were burned alive inside the fort. Captain Bidlack who had been captured was bound, tortured and then thrown into a bonfire and held there by Indians with pitchforks until he died. It was Robert Jamison, Sr's. son Robert Jr. that died at the fort (although it is not known by this writer how his death resulted). While his sons John, William and Alexander Jamison ( the latter of whom may have been at the river fort with his mother as he was only about 14 years of age ), escaped the main fort and joined the rest of their family and their father at another smaller fort near the Susquehanna River, called Shawnee Fort. The entire family, along with Martha Espy Stewart (wife of Captain Lazarus Stewart, who died leading the charge out of the fort against the Indians ) then fled by boat and foot down the Susquehanna River bank to Fort Augusta at Stanbury, Pennsylvania, where they stayed for a few days. Then they proceeded on to Lancaster County , near Harrisburg where they had other family and friends. Martha Espy Stewart was accompanied on this journey by her youngest daughter Elizabeth, who would later marry Alexander Jamison and have a child by the name of Daniel. Two of Robert's son returned to the Wyoming Valley within a short time and two more within a year. The other members of the family didn't return until 1781. Their houses and contents had been burned by the enemy in 1778, but in 1780 and 1781 John Jamison with the help of his brothers erected a large log house on the site of their ruined homes which the families occupied upon their return while the other properties were restored.

In 1783 and 1784 the Yankee and Pennamite War continued to rage and Robert Jamison's family suffered much along with the other Connecticut settlers in this regard as aforesaid. On May 13th and 14th, 1784 at least one hundred and fifty families were dispossessed of their homes, robbed of their property, and driven into the wilderness by soldiers with bayonets. This happened to Robert entire family including Abigail and the other widows and their children. They were not allowed to use the river or the roads for their departure, but were required to go through the Lackawanna "Great Swamp" a total of 80 miles to the next inhabited place. It is said that upwards of 500 women and children were required to travel the muddy trail, cross rivers and swamps without shelter and on foot. many took sick and died. Robert Jamison and his family after spending about a month in the wilderness near the Delaware River, quietly returned to his home. However, he was captured and jailed in the guard house at Fort Wilks - Barre. Not withstanding his age, he was "kept bound and closely confined" for a number of days. During which time, his wife Agnes who was sick and bedridden from the wilderness trek, was " hoved out of the house in her bed by a party of assassins by Colonel Armstrong's orders" along with Abigail and her children. In October 1784, and after being thrown out of her home because she was attempting to take food to her jailed father-in-law Robert, Abigail journeyed 60 miles to Easton, Northampton County to lodge with the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania a complaint against her prosecutors. When asked by the presiding judge, the Honorable George Bryan, whether she had an attorney, she replied that "all the Aldens are lawyers. I will attend to my own case". After presenting her case, the judge ordered a warrant for the arrest of Captain Petterson who was the leader of the prosecutors and she was eventually awarded a judgement against him and others. however, the judgement was never collected as the Connecticut settlers reached a settlement with the Pennsylvania Government that allowed them to keep their land provided they swear allegiance to Pennsylvania, which they did.

NOTE: Robert and most of his sons were farmers with guns and served in the militias fighting the British and the Indians during the Revolutionary War as well as in the referenced Pennamite Wars. Historian Charles Miner commented that among Wyoming Valley pioneers, the Jamison Family were "second to none in respectability, service and suffering.

This biography was auto-generated by a GEDCOM import.^[1] It's a rough draft and needs to be edited.

Name

Name: Robert /Jameson/^{[2][3][4][5][6]}

Birth

Birth:

Date: 25 DEC 1714

Place: Omagh, Tyrone, Ireland^[7][8][9]

Birth:

Date: 25 DEC 1711

Place: Omagh, County Tyrone, Ulster, Ireland^[10]

Found multiple copies of BIRT DATE. Using 25 DEC 1714

Death

Death:

Date: 01 MAY 1786

Place: Hanover, Luzerne, Pennsylvania^[11][12][13]

Death:

Date: 01 MAY 1786

Place: , , Connecticut, USA^[14]

Found multiple copies of DEAT DATE. Using 01 MAY 1786Array

Burial

Burial:

Place: Presbyterian graveyard, Hanover, Pennsylvania^[15][16][17]

Marriage

Husband: Robert Jameson

Wife: Agnes Nancy Dixson

Child: John Jameson

Relationship to Father: Natural

Relationship to Mother: Unknown

Marriage:

Date: 24 NOV 1748

Place: North Stonington, New London, Connecticut^[18]

Sources

1. ↑ Jameson-748 was created by Steven Hall through the import of hall steve_2014-06-29.ged on Jun 29, 2014. This comment and citation can be deleted after the biography has been edited and primary sources are included.
2. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for John Jameson
3. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for Robert Jameson
4. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for Rosanna Irwin
5. ↑ Source: #S288 Page: Ancestry Family Trees
6. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for John Jameson
7. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for John Jameson
8. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for Robert Jameson
9. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for Rosanna Irwin
10. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for John Jameson
11. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for John Jameson
12. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for Robert Jameson
13. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for Rosanna Irwin
14. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for John Jameson
15. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for John Jameson
16. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for Robert Jameson
17. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for Rosanna Irwin
18. ↑ Source: #S217 Page: Database online. Data: Text: Record for Robert Jameson

• Esther Littleford Woodworth-Barnes, Alicia Crane Williams, Mayflower Families Through Five Generations - Descendants of the Pilgrims Who Landed at Plymouth, Mass December 1620 (Vol. 16 pt. 3) ([Plymouth, Massachusetts]: General Society of Mayflower Descendants

• Mayflower Society Application Database: "Community Trees," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/2:2:QVQG-87G : accessed 13 December 2022), entry for Robert Jameson; "Mayflower Pilgrim Genealogies" file (2:2:2:MMXD-DP8), submitted 24 February 2020 by FamilySearch.

• Source: S217 Author: Ancestry.com Title: Public Member Trees Publication: Name: The Generations Network, Inc.; Location: Provo, UT, USA; Date: 2006; Repository: #R19

• Source: S288 Title: Ancestry Family Trees Publication: Name: Online publication - Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com. Original data: Family Tree files submitted by Ancestry members.; Repository: #R27 NOTEThis information comes from 1 or more individual Ancestry Family Tree files. This source citation points you to a current version of those files. Note: The owners of these tree files may have removed or changed information since this source citation was created.

• Will of John Jameson (d.1734 Voluntown): Connecticut. Probate Court (Windham District) 1719-1744, Family History Library, Film 5930, Image Group 7627148, Vol 1, p. 8, 88, 89 Estate Dispersal (p 88, 89: Image 486):https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-992K-Y74?i=485&cat=610804 Will Inventory (p 8: Image 444): https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-992K-YW5?i=443&cat=610804