David Davenport

(c1715? – December 1802)

David Davenport first appears in his father’s will dated 24 May 1735.[1]  The will implies David was of age but not yet married, as he was given the home place with reversion to Martin Davenport Jr. if David died without issue.  Another reason to think David was of age, or nearly so, in 1735 is that the name “David Deavenport” appears once in the records of the merchant Thomas Partridge and Company, as a buyer of cloth on 7 April 1737.[2]  From this record, his apparently had an existing account that had been carried forward from the missing earlier ledger.   Whether this was our David Davenport or his first cousin of the same name is unknown, but whichever David Davenport it was must have been an adult in order to be responsible for his own accounts.

David apparently lived on or near his inherited plantation for the next thirty years.  Although there are no surviving records of Hanover County for the period, he was close enough to three nearby counties to appear occasionally in their records.  (Martin Davenport’s plantation straddled the later Hanover-Louisa county line on opposite side of the North Anna River from Spotsylvania County near the Spotsylvania-Caroline county line.  The half that David Davenport inherited lay in Hanover County.)  From later records, we can infer than his troubles with creditors began early in life, and he may have taken advantage of the ability to move in and out of the nearby county lines to avoid or delay collection of his debts.  A record dated 24 May 1748 indicates he was then living in Spotsylvania County.[3]  But a year later, on 4 July 1749, he was apparently back on the Hanover County plantation.[4]  On 26 January 1751, as a resident of Hanover County, he gave a bond to build a bridge over the East North East Creek in Spotsylvania with his brother William Davenport as his security[5] and three years later was ordered to repair the bridge.[6]  A David Davenport appears in debt cases in Orange County in and in Caroline County over the next few years, but it’s not clear if this was our man.  The 1763 tithables for Hanover County showed David as a resident there, but by 2 April 1765 he was apparently back in Spotsylvania again. Although he appears to have moved to Cumberland County sometime in 1765, he still owned property on both sides of the river in Hanover and Spotsylvania and must have frequently returned there.  Spotsylvania court records show that he was usually absent from the area, but was occasionally found within the county after 1765.

On 26 July 1767, a persistent creditor succeeded in putting David Davenport into the Spotsylvania debtors prison until he satisfied the debt.[7]  David was clearly living in Cumberland  at the time, and evidently was seized while on a trip back to the area.  He apparently left the prison by mortgaging property a month later (see below.)  This was not his only trip to debtors prison; he would be committed three more times in Cumberland County.

At this point it makes sense to mention his marriages.  David Davenport had two wives.  A lengthy court case (see footnote[8]) identifies his first wife as Jane Yarbrough, the daughter of Charles Yarbrough, whom he married sometime in the early 1740s.  That marriage produced a daughter Jane (or “Nanny”) and other, unknown children.  A deposition by Jane’s father, Charles Yarbrough, refers to his Davenport “grandchildren”, implying that there were more than one.  It is not clear when Jane died, but we can infer that it was within a year or two of her husband’s remarriage.

David Davenport then married Molly, the widow of his cousin Stephen Davenport, before 25 June 1765.  There is no direct evidence of this second marriage, but more than enough circumstantial evidence to make the case.  Stephen Davenport was dead by 25 July 1763 when the Cumberland County court ordered an appraisal of his estate.[9]  Three days later, his widow Molly Davenport took a supplemental inventory of the estate.[10]  Two years later, on 25 June 1765, a suit against Molly Davenport was abated “she having married” again.[11]  She continued to be known as Molly Davenport in several supplemental estate records over the next seven years, making it clear that she had remarried to another Davenport.[12]  Her new husband was, without question, David Davenport.  A 1778 deposition in the Yarbrough case (see above) by his brother William Davenport says that David married a second time “about 1765” and moved at that time to Cumberland County.  David Davenport on two occasions mortgaged the slaves listed in Stephen Davenport’s inventory of 1763, indicating that he had title by virtue of the marriage.  Further, he lived on Stephen Davenport’s land for the next twelve years until he was eventually deeded the land by William Davenport, the eldest son of Stephen Davenport.  Molly, his second wife, apparently predeceased him, for she is not mentioned in his will.  Molly had at least three children by her first husband Stephen Davenport:  Stephen Jr., William, and Molly, all of whom were identified in the 1773 will of Thomas Davenport, Stephen’s father.[13]  Molly was still alive in 1790 when she and David Davenport sold land[14], but was dead when he made his will in late 1802.

Molly was probably the daughter of Martin Slaughter, which would account for the name of her eldest son by the second marriage.  Martin Slaughter was of King William County when he bought two adjoining tracts next to the Davenports on Little Guinea Creek in 1751.[15]  His wife was apparently Jane Elliot, according to a Hanover County record.[16]  Martin Slaughter died, probably in King William for there is no record of a will referenced in Cumberland records, sometime before 1760[17]  and Molly was apparently a heir.[18] 

Now back to David Davenport; he was living in Hanover or Spotsylvania just prior to his second marriage, but evidently moved to Cumberland County to marry Molly Slaughter Davenport.  His trip to debtors prison in Spotsylvania (mentioned above) in 1767 was evidently caused by a trip back to his property there.  David Davenport appears constantly in the Cumberland County court records, beginning on 22 July 1765[19] and continuing through his death in 1802.  He was clearly a contentious individual, for he sued, or was sued by, a long list of relatives and neighbors.  He was also constantly in debt and was regularly and repeatedly sued for nonpayment of debts.  Some of these early suits were apparently over old debts that followed him from Hanover and Spotsylvania, and he obviously preferred court battles to simply paying them off.  Most of the debts were to merchants, some to relatives, and most were relatively small amounts.  His debts were too numerous, and to too many creditors, to be explained simply by poor property management.  My sense is that David Davenport was both pathologically contentious by nature and inclined to live above his means at the expense of his creditors.  The sheriff frequently made token attachments of his possessions during these suits;  some of them – a spice grinder, a pewter spoon, a punch bowl – implying a man living a better life than his taxable possessions would suggest. 

On 26 August 1767, perhaps still in debtors prison in Spotsylvania, David Davenport mortgaged his land to creditors to pay off some of these debts.[20]  Four parcels of land are mentioned in the mortgage:  (1) the Martin Davenport plantation in Hanover County, (2) 398 acres in Louisa County purchased from Benjamin Hubbard, (3) 296 acres in Amherst County purchased from John Atkins[21], and (4) 30 acres in Spotsylvania County purchased from his brother William Davenport.  The creditors were to sell the land after advertising in the Virginia Gazette, and return any leftover land to Davenport after satisfying the debts.  Only the first three tracts were actually advertised.[22]  The third tract did not sell for another forty years.

The first parcel, the land in Hanover County, was described as “whereon Dorothy Davenport, mother of sd. David Davenport resides, being the same tract of land which Martin Davenport deceased, father of sd. David Davenport by his last will and testament devised to sd. Dorothy for life and then to sd. David Davenport”.  [Note that Martin Davenport’s will had devised only half the land to David; he was apparently attempting to mortgage his brother’s half as well.]  The fourth parcel was evidently just across the river, although no Spotsylvania deed was ever recorded for it.  Until David’s move to Cumberland, his brother Martin had apparently lived with their mother Dorothy on the Hanover land.  After David mortgaged the land, his brother apparently moved across the river onto the Spotsylvania property.  What became of his mother is unclear.  No deeds are recorded for the second and third parcels, although he clearly owned both.

The following year on 28 March 1768, David Davenport, still in debt, mortgaged two slaves and household goods.[23]   The suits continued, and he was briefly put into debtors prison in 1771 and again the following year, this time for several months.[24]  While in debtor’s prison in 1771, he mortgaged two more slaves to satisfy the creditor who put him there.[25]  And two years after that, on 23 April 1773 he mortgaged six more slaves and household furniture.[26]  [These included Doll and her children, who he didn’t actually possess, and slaves from the Stephen Davenport estate.]  On 27 April 1778 he mortgaged a mill on Tearwallet Creek.[27]  The suits continued at the same steady pace.  He was put into debtors prison for the fourth and final time in 1782.[28]  In the meantime, he continued his bridge-building, being paid to repair the Great Guinea Bridge in 1779.

There is one early tithables list for Cumberland, for 1768, and David Davenport appears on it with 3 tithes.  This was probably himself and two older sons, as neither of Stephen Davenport’s sons were 16 by then.  David Davenport appears in the 1782 census with 9 whites, and on the 1768 tax list with one white tithable.  The 1784 census shows 11 whites, and the tax list for the same year again shows a single white tithe.  These households would have consisted of himself and his wife, some or all of the three children of Stephen Davenport, and his own children.  He appears on the tax lists from 1782 through 1802 with varying numbers of slaves (but never many) and one or two horses.

It appears that his entire stay of nearly forty years in Cumberland was spent living on the land of his deceased cousin Stephen Davenport.  Stephen Davenport had purchased 200 acres on Tearwallet Creek in 1756.[29]  When David Davenport married his widow, he moved onto this land.  Since Stephen Davenport had died intestate, the land would have fallen to his eldest son William.  On 9 December 1779, William Davenport (son and heir of Stephen) sold David Davenport the same 200 acres on both sides of Tearwallet Creek “being the land and plantation where sd. David Davenport now lives and being the land formerly belonging to Stephen Davenport dec’d.”  David Davenport later sold small parts of this land in two transactions in 1789 with his son Martin Slaughter Davenport a witness.[30]

By 1800 David Davenport had retained only 125 acres in Cumberland County.  On 10 October 1802 he sold it, “it being the tract where I now live”, to his son Martin Slaughter Davenport.  The day before he gifted 100 acres of his land in Amherst County (which he had mortgaged back in 1767) to his son Glover Davenport.[31]  Two months later he was dead.

David Davenport’s will was dated 6 December 1802, and proved less than a month later on 27 December 1802 in Cumberland County.[32]  He confirmed the gift of the Amherst County land to his son Glover Davenport, and left the rest of that tract to sons Jesse Davenport and Jack Smith Davenport.[33]  The will provided that Glover and Martin Slaughter Davenport were not to share in the estate except to have the land previously deeded to them.  The two remaining slaves were to be divided among three daughters: Dorothy Davenport, Jane Lipscomb Davenport, and Frances Benson Davenport.  The will also mentioned grandson William Bernard McNamar, the son of his deceased daughter Elizabeth McNamar.  Jesse, Martin, and Glover were named executors but only Martin applied for executorship.

Most of his children are easily proven, a few others are highly speculative.  Note the odd gap of nearly fifteen years in the apparent birth years of the second set of children, and the implication that Molly had children over a span of over 25 years; this forces us to consider the possibility of a third wife.  David’s wife was named Molly when he sold part of the land received in 1779, so if there was a third wife she had the same name as the second wife.

1.      Jane (Nanny) Davenport (c1745? - ?) She is proven by the referenced court case to be the daughter of David Davenport and Jane Yarbrough, and the wife of John Wilkinson, Jr.  A deposition in the case implies that she was married to John Wilkinson not long after her father remarried in 1765, implying sh ews perhaps the eldest child of the first marriage.  Although the lawsuit calls her “Nanny”, she was apparently named for her mother.  John Wilkinson Jr.’s wife was named Jane in a 1768 deed[34] and again in a 1774 deed.[35]  They lived in Bedford County when the lawsuit was initiated, but had left Virginia by 1778.  John Wilkinson was dead by 1782, perhaps in the Revolution, while the suit was ongoing.[36]  What happened to Jane is unknown.  David Davenport never did recover the slaves John Wilkinson seized, nor did he sue his daughter after Wilkinson’s death.

2.      Joel Davenport?  He may be another child of the marriage to Jane Yarbrough.  He appears in a Cumberland County debt suit in 1765.[37]   The following year, a judgment was obtained against him and his security David Davenport over a debt incurred in 1763, indicating a year of birth of 1742 or earlier.[38]  He was probably one of his father’s tithes in 1768.  He appears in several Cumberland County records, until disappearing in the early 1770s. 

3.      Elizabeth Davenport (? – by1802) She was dead by the time her father made his will, and her son William Bernard McNamar (or McNemar) is named in the will.  The only McNamar I’m able to find is a William McNemar in Hanover County, who appears on the Hanover County tax lists 1787-99.  If Elizabeth was his wife, it seems likely she was a child of the first marriage. 

4.      Glover Davenport (? - ?)  Its not clear whether he was a child of the first marriage or a young son of the second marriage.  Either way, he does not appear in any Cumberland records and was not a taxable to his father in the late 1780s or 1790s.  He may have been one of his father’s tithes in 1768 who left he county soon after.  He was living in Powhatan County when his father deeded him the land in Amherst County.  He appears in the 1801 tax list of Powhatan.  There were several Glover Davenports, but this one seems to disappear form Virginia records.  He and his two brothers who inherited the Amherst County land did not appear in 1809 to contest its sale.

5.      Jesse Davenport (c1765 – 1814)  It appears that Jesse was a year or two older than Martin, but there is a possibility they were twins.  On 22 May 1786, the court cited David Davenport for failing to list his sons Jesse and Martin as tithables (defined as age 21 at that time). [39]  Whether both had turned 21 at the same time or not is unclear.  Jesse first appears less than four months later when he was paid as a witness.[40]  He appears on the tax lists of Cumberland beginning in 1787, and married Elizabeth Hobson there on 24 November 1794.  By 1795 he was, like his father, being regularly sued over his debts and, like his father, was contracted to build bridges.[41]  He remained in Cumberland County and died there in 1814.  His will is dated 3 January 1814 and was proved two months later.  The 1810 census shows him (age 26-45) with one male and three female children.  A later deed record identifies the surviving children as Thomas, Edward, Fanny, and Catherine.   [Thomas is age 38 in 1850, thus born after the 1810 census.]  Elizabeth did not remarry, and is in the 1850 Cumberland census as age 77.

6.      Martin Slaughter Davenport (1765/6 – 1851/2).  He was probably the eldest child of the second marriage, named for his mother’s father.  Martin was executor of his father and, after cleaning up the estate, moved to Georgia.  See separate page.

7.      Dorothy Davenport (c1780 – aft1850)   She also appears in some records as “Dorothea”.  There is no guardianship noted in the Cumberland records, implying she was over 21 at her father’s death.  She was of age when she married a neighbor named Jesse Dowdy in Cumberland County on 4 July 1804, with her brother Martin as security.  Jesse Dowdy died sometime before 1821, but Dorothy Dowdy was still in Cumberland County as late as 1843[42] and is in the 1850 household of her son, listed as age 70.

8.      Jack Smith Davenport (c1781? - ?)  He was apparently named for his cousin (Jack Smith Davenport, the son of David’s brother John Davenport, who died in the Revolution in early 1781).  That suggests he may have been born in late 1781, since he was apparently of age by late 1802.  He has been confused with another cousin of about the same age, also named Jack Smith Davenport.  He is said to have gone to Georgia as well, and married Lucy Barksdale.

9.      Jane Lipscomb Davenport (c1783 – ?) She was a minor but over 16 at her father’s death, choosing Joseph Bradley as her guardian on 28 February 1803.[43]  She apparently married her guardian’s son, John Bradley, sometime before 27 May 1805 when a dispute over the slaves devised to the three daughters named Joseph Bradley, Jesse Dowdy, and Frances Davenport as the interested parties.[44]  She was not in Cumberland at the time.  [She is erroneously thought by many to have been the Jane Davenport who married Thomas Davenport in 1799, but that is obviously not the case.]

10.  Frances Benson Davenport (c1784 - ?) On the same day as her sister, she went to court to name Martin S. Davenport as her guardian.[45]  She was evidently of age by 27 May 1805.[46]  She apparently accompanied Martin to Georgia and seems to the same person who married Smith Davenport in Oglethorpe County, Georgia on 17 January 1807.  She appears in the 1840 census of Houston County.  Smith Davenport died in Houston County 29 February 1840 at the age of 64, according to his obituary.[47]