4-A: John Guthrey

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Guthrie Family Group 4 · Branch A · Child Page

John Guthrey & Betty Ann Allen

Cumberland County and Halifax County, Virginia

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John gave his birthplace and year when he applied for a Revolutionary pension. The Cumberland marriage bond names Betty Ann Allen. A third record, made in Halifax County after his death, brings the household together. In August 1837 the court identified twelve adult heirs, including daughters under their married names.

The Family at a Glance

John Guthrey

Birth
1760 in Cumberland County, according to his own 1832 pension declaration. The earlier family estimate was about 1759.
Residence and service
Served from Cumberland, including a tour at Guilford Court House. He subsequently settled in Halifax County, Virginia, where he applied for his pension.
Death
17 January 1836, according to the August 1837 Halifax court. He left no surviving widow.

Betty Ann Allen

Marriage
Cumberland bond dated 25 May 1785. William Guthrey gave surety. The bond date need not be the ceremony date.
Family of origin
A proposed connection to Jackson Allen and Elizabeth Davis remains unproved. Her birthplace and birth year are also open.
Death
She predeceased John. Census households alone cannot establish an earlier death year or burial place.

Children of John Guthrey & Betty Ann Allen

The 1837 court counted twelve adult heirs. The order below follows the family reconstruction. The Walton daughter’s forename is disputed.

ChildBirthMarriage & Later Life
Sally King GuthreyAbout 1785A June 1801 marriage entry names Richard Crews. The 1837 minutes call her Sally Crews. King occurs in this generation, but does not establish the surname of Thomas Guthrey’s wife.
Allen GuthreyAbout 1788Married Mary M. Bostick in 1812. Halifax deeds and the later division of his estate trace the family.
William GuthreyAbout 1788, estimatedNamed among the heirs. The 1824 marriage to Sarah Street is attributed to him. Later William entries require identification.
John Guthrey Jr.About 1791Married Edness “Edna” Adams in April 1816. His sister Susan lived in their household in 1850. The mortality schedule places his death in May 1860.
Martha “Patsey” GuthreyAbout 1791Named as Leonard Keeling’s wife in 1837. The marriage index gives 21 July 1816. Check the attribution of children whose reported births precede that entry.
Mary Elizabeth “Eliza” GuthreyAbout 1793Married William Hubbard, then James McCraw. Hubbard’s inventory and the chancery papers identify minor heirs. A common estimated year entered for the children is insufficient evidence of a multiple birth.
Susan A. Guthrey3 April 1799, reportedLived with her brother John and later with her nephew James F. M. Guthrey. The September 1871 death indexes disagree on the day.
Seny GuthreyAbout 1800Named as Seny Guthrey by the court. Married John Tucker in 1843. Tucker had an earlier family. The children in the 1850 household should be assigned from the marriages and his deed of settlement.
Rebecca Guthrey27 December 1800, reportedMarried Archibald H. Rowlett in 1824. She died before his 1859 marriage to her sister Frances. The exact place of Rebecca’s death remains open.
Richard A. GuthreyAbout 1804–05Married Martha Yeates, widow of Thomas Toombs, in 1828. Virginia deeds and Kentucky census records trace the family west. The Toombs children retained interests from their father’s family.
Nancy Guthrey, possibly the Walton heirAbout 1805, estimatedThe marriage index names Nancy and Thomas Walton in November 1823. The 1837 court entry appears to call Thomas’s wife Mary. The identification needs the original marriage papers and a later estate receipt.
Frances “Fanny” Woodson Guthrey11 January 1807, reportedMarried Archibald H. Rowlett, Rebecca’s widower, in Weakley County, Tennessee, in October 1859. Frances was stepmother to Rebecca’s children. The reported death date is 2 January 1884.
Following the next generation

Aunts, nieces and stepchildren. John Jr.’s sister Susan appears in his household and later in that of his son James F. M. Guthrey. Rebecca Rowlett’s sister Fanny later married the widowed Archibald. For Seny Tucker, the deed identifying John Tucker’s children and the date of his first marriage help distinguish his children from Seny’s line.

The Crews and Guthrey marriages. Two Crews daughters married back into the wider Guthrey family. For descendants in these households, a DNA match can follow more than one ancestral route. Use the Crews estates and the Guthrey marriage records to trace each route separately.

Guthrie DNA Project Participation

Child lineY-DNABig YAutosomal
Sally KingN/AN/A✓
Allen———
William———
John Jr.——✓
MarthaN/AN/A—
ElizaN/AN/A—
SusanN/AN/A—
SenyN/AN/A—
RebeccaN/AN/A✓
Richard A.GFG4B¹—✓
Walton lineN/AN/A—
FrancesN/AN/A—

✓ marks a documented autosomal line. A dash marks a category without an assigned result in this review. N/A marks a child through whom the Guthrey Y chromosome did not pass. ¹ See the GFG4B explanation in Explore the Research.

Historical Highlights

An open Bible with Virginia land records

The Revolutionary file preserves John’s account of his service. He described service in 1780, a return to the militia in 1781, the battle of Guilford Court House and a later commissary tour. His application was heard in Halifax County, Virginia, in 1832. The county minute book later supplied information a pension payment ledger could not give, including his death date, his surviving children and the fact that there was no living widow.

Family Timeline

  1. 1760John’s own account places his birth in Cumberland County.
  2. 1780–81Virginia militia and commissary service, as described in his declaration.
  3. 1785Marriage bond for John Guthrey and Betty Ann Allen, 25 May.
  4. 1832John appeared in Halifax County, Virginia, on 25 September to claim his pension.
  5. 1835–36A pension payment was collected in September 1835. John died 17 January 1836. The court recorded the estate inventory and sale in July.
  6. 1837–38The August 1837 minutes named the twelve adult heirs. A further account was recorded in April 1838.
Reading the Halifax minutes

Minute Book 7, p. 154, image 459, records evidence given after John’s death. Married names include Crews, Keeling, Rowlett and McCraw. The Walton entry deserves a fresh reading alongside Nancy’s marriage record. The court’s list establishes who was alive at that time. It gives no birth order.

Explore the Research

DNA & the Family Line

Kits 284418 and 835339 belong to genetic subgroup GFG4B. Their submitted lines pass through different wives of the same man, Marion Francis Guthrie, born in 1876. Both share a paternal line with Harris surname matches. Neither result fixes where that paternal line entered the documented Guthrey family. ¹ The kits are shown only under Richard A., the ancestral route attributed to these descendants.

Two Halifaxes and three men named John

Betty Ann Allen’s husband served from Cumberland and later lived in Halifax County, Virginia. Anna Smith’s husband belonged to GFG5, with records in Halifax and Buncombe Counties, North Carolina. A third John, son of William Guthrey and Rebecca Noel, married into the Palmore and Ayres families and died in Buckingham in 1856. Use the spouse, county, pension file and heirs together when assigning a record.

The pension and the twelve heirs

Pension S8642 identifies the Virginia soldier. Payments commenced from March 1831, and the last payment cited in the packet was collected by Giles McCraw in September 1835. Neither date is a death date. The court reported John’s death the following January. The clerk’s Walton entry and the marriage index should be displayed side by side until the daughter’s forename is resolved.

Testing the older Richard line

A documented direct paternal descendant of Gilderoy, or of a different son of John, would provide a comparison independent of Marion Francis. Autosomal matches also travel through allied families. The project notes a Bryant connection among some descendants. An autosomal match by itself cannot place the paternal change in a particular generation.

Reading & Sources

Start with these records

The collections below include records for relatives, neighbors and people with similar names. A link to an index is a finding aid. Identifications depend on the underlying entry. Some images require a sign-in or access through a participating library.

Tree, pension, 1837 court minute and estate papers
Crews and Guthrey estate and property records
John Jr., Tucker, Rowlett and associated families
Halifax probate · catalog, early indexes and will books
Halifax probate · inventories, accounts and divisions
Halifax probate · later will books
Halifax deeds · catalog and early volumes
Halifax deeds · Guthrey, Crews and associated conveyances
Halifax deeds · sales, trusts and family interests
Halifax deeds · later accounts and indexes
Halifax deed books and index pages
Halifax and related property indexes
Later deed indexes and conveyances
Weakley court, LaRue deeds and related records
Most Wanted Documents
  • Obtain the Cumberland marriage bond and an Allen will or deed that names Betty Ann as a daughter.
  • Compare the 1823 Walton marriage with the 1837 minute and a receipt signed by Thomas’s wife.
  • Trace Susan’s September 1871 register entry and distinguish Rebecca Rowlett’s death from her husband’s later marriage.
  • Compare a documented male-line test through a son of John outside the Marion Francis line with the GFG4 and GFG4B profiles.

Continue the Family’s Story

A family Bible beside an open farmhouse door

John’s declaration tells us where he was born and where he served. The Halifax minute supplies the names of the people who outlived him. An heir’s signed receipt might settle the Walton daughter’s name where those two sources leave a question.

Researched & Curated by Ann Guthrie

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