Holly Springs Meeting, Randolph County, North Carolina
| John Barker | Mary Osborn | |
|---|---|---|
| Birth | 7 April 1771 Guilford County, North Carolina |
3 February 1770 |
| Marriage | 26 May 1791 | |
| Death | 3 April 1849 | 18 May 1825 |
More than one hundred fifty years had passed since John Barker died. I came to the burial ground not expecting to find a tombstone. None of his stories survived the six generations that separate us. All that I know of him comes solely from research my brother, father and I have done.
In 1820, John Barker owned more than a thousand acres of land along Richland and Bachelor’s Creeks in Randolph County, North Carolina. He had twelve children, the twelfth being David, the son through which I am descended. As his sons became men, he divided his land among them. His wife, Mary, died when he was fifty-four. He married Ruth Mendenhall a few years later and spent the remainder of his life with her. In his will he bequeathed David seventy-five acres of land, including a mill, on the condition that he provide his step-mother sufficient firewood for as long as she lived.
The reason I didn’t expect to find a marker was partly age, not knowing whether or not a modest monument would survive, and partly because he was Quaker. He was a member of the Holly Springs Meeting and Quakers kept excellent genealogical records in the minutes of their monthly meetings as a memorial rather than erecting expensive stones.
They didn’t want to encourage ancestor worship.
oops.
Bartholomew Barker, Poet 
YOUR jOHN bARKER IS MY ANCESTOR. THANK YOU FOR YOUR POST
LikeLike
I think these might be ancestors of mine and would love to know if you might have information linking them. I have seen sites that mention these two people as the parents of a John R. Barker, born about 1813 in Rockingham, Richmond County, N.C. and died after 1880, Crooked Creek, Bollinger County, Missouri. This John R. Barker was married to a Sarah Whittemore. One of their children was a James Henry “Jim” Barker who fought for the Union in the Civil War. Do you have any information that might show that these are indeed John R. Barker’s parents? I’d love to compare notes!
LikeLike
From the Hinshaw abstracts of Quaker records, John & Mary Barker had a son named John, born in 1809 in the Holly Spring Monthly Meeting, Randolph County NC. He was the seventh of nine children. In 1828 he married Mary Wells of Cane Creek Monthly Meeting, daughter of Benjamin and Dorcas Wells. Somehow he made his way to Westfield Monthly Meeting in Hamilton County Indiana, probably before 1834, where he had nine children from 1829 to 1847, none of them named James Henry or Jim.
Sorry, I don’t think he is the John R. from your ancestry. I’ll email more details to you soon.
LikeLike
I have recently began to search for John R Barker and wife Sarah Whittemore they were married in ROCKINGHAM COUNTY NC, NOT the city “Rockingham” in Richmond co nc, Richmond co is abt 3 hours from Rockingham co is in western nc right below the va. line. wentworth is the country seat there.
LikeLike
Have you found John R. Barker’s parents in your searches?
LikeLike
I have not been able to find John R. Barker’s parents in my search, either. This is the same John R. married to Sarah Whittemore. Some other researchers on ancestry.com listed John Barker and Mary Osborn as his parents, but I now think this was in error.
LikeLike
That’s the problem with ancestry.com, unless the researcher cites a source, the information has to be considered suspect.
LikeLike