Today I am beginning to explore the two Lewisburg, Greenbrier County, West Virginia men named Samuel Price (I will call them #1 and #2) who were associated with Black families in Greenbrier County, West Virginia, especially Greenbrier proper and more importantly the very center of town. At first I confused these two men, then wondered if they were father and son (they are not), then wondered if they are related (they do not appear to be). Even today I saw on Ancestry that these two men are being confused though one is many years older than the other. They attach a picture of #2 to the information of #1.
I tried to tempt the Greenbrier Historical Society with this research thinking it might be a good article for their Journal (since it ties in both the Euro-descended and the African-descended communities).
My family members seem to have been tangentially associated with the man who I will call Samuel Price #1 (My DNA matches his descendants) and we definitely were in the employ of Samuel Price # 2 and his family almost until the 1920's working both at his home in town and out with his sisters on the farm.
So before referencing any research at all and beginning with what is floating around in my brain I will tell you what I know about the two. This will change in a few hours. Samuel Price #1 had an enslaved woman Hannah who he later emancipated and set up a household with. In WV any emancipated individual had to leave the State within one year. She, however, never left town andremained there for her lifetime. To me this means that SP # 1 must have been a man of some influence. Hannah's daughter Jemima married the disputed oldest son of Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson.
Samuel Price # 2 came into town from Faqueir as a young man/adult. He became a lawyer, at first a non-secessionist and then strongly aligned with the Confederacy when he thought that was the mood of his constituency. He is often shown with (Hon) for Honorable in front of his name. He was so aligned with the Confederacy that they made him the Lieutenant Governor of the Confederacy. He was jailed by the Union prior to this appointment. My family worked for his family and my uncle John Littleton worked for his sisters in the country (Big Levels). I have had lovely conversations with two descendants. One was actually cared for by Mary Ann Littleton Hughes/Hues and he told me about his great affection for her and about one event where she was so sick that she could not appear at his home for two weeks and he was inconsolable. I am still trying to work out the dates on this. She must have been very very old (her gravestone says she lived until 114y) and he must have also been born very early for her to have been his nanny/caretaker. He told me that the peg that she hung her coat on is still in a room in his house. I have no reason to not believe him. He called me and even invited me to the County Fair but it seems so I that the time is collapsed so much. The women in my family seemed to work in the house in town (also Elvira Hughes/Annie Hughes Woodson/Dora Littleton and even my great grandmother Mary Alice Littleton/Spriggs). A descendant lives in the house now and I hope to be able to drive up and take him to lunch and talk about our mutual information.
And now for the research: (This above part will be changed/clarified as my research proceeds). As for the women who worked for him (Elvira/Annie/Dora/Mary Alice) if you go to the Bolling School and stand in front of it on the little mounded parking lot you will be standing on the land of Mariah and Cook/Dick Littleton who were the parents of or raised these four women. The property was in our family until very recently. Or I may have the property mixed up with the property owned by the shoemaker Banner Allen.
note: if the citation is from wikipedia I will put (wiki) until I have time to add the full citation. Likewise if the information is from ancestry I will put (anc). I do have the newspaper subscription for ancestry so I should be able to get a lot from periodicals.
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SAMUEL PRICE #1
1834 ----- He had enslaved Hannah Grant but had freed her and despite the law she stayed in the County. It appears that her enslaver SP #1 developed a strong affection for her such that he emancipated her and may have lived with her as if they were husband and wife. Also may have had children with her. Her WILL appears in the Greenbrier County Will Book - Vol 2-3, page 25, 5/10/1834, WHAT IS VERY IMPORTANT AND REFLECTED IN THE WILL IS THAT BY NOW HER DAUGTHER JEMIMA GRANT PRICE (WOODSON) HAD BEEN MARRIED TO A MAN NAMED THOMAS. THOMAS HAD ASSUMED THE SURNAME WOODSON B/C HE WAS REALLY THOMAS JEFFERSON WHO HAD RUN OFF FROM VIRGINIA AND WHO THEN AND ALWAYS WOULD CLAIM TO BE THE OLDEST CHILD OF PRESIDENT THOMAS JEFFERSON AND SALLY HEMINGS. But going back to the WILL, it says that she (Hannah, the declarant) was a free woman of color, she appointed the afore-mentioned Thomas Corbin Woodson, her son in law, to oversee her grant of land in Ohio to her grantee - a young person named Shelton Brock. She notes that Thomas had been married to her daughter Jemima Grant Price (so this definitely shores up the Price connection but leaves the question as to how the Woodson comes into the picture - important to me b/c my family's involvement with both # 1 and # 2 involve women named Woodson) At any rate, she leaves ten dollars cash to both of her grandchildren - Matildson (make sure she does not mean Matilda's son) Woodson and Louis Woodson of Ohio. Then once all of that is distributed she directs the balance of her estate to be divided between her children Fanny Leach & (she says Marmer Woodson but it is thought that this is Jemima Woodson) & Moses Grant.
note: SP #2 does not even get to Lewisburg until 1837 and by then Hannah and SP # 1 had had a a life together and Hannah's WILL was three years past being probated.
SAMUEL PRICE # 2
1805 -- He was born in Faquier County, Va. on 7/28/1805 (wiki) the child of ______________ & ___________.
1834 ----- He appears in a list of persons applying for letters in Alexandria, DC which was reported in the Alexandria Gazette. Not absolutely sure this was him but the lady below him is Margaret Price.
1837 ----- In 1837 he moved to Lewisburg (from the National Register of Historic Places blurb (NRHP)). Note that (wiki) has him coming into Lewisburg in 1838. The NRHP says that he first occupied the house at in 1838, about a year after he arrived in town. On 2/6/1837 he married Jane Stuart Price (1810 - 8/14/1873).
1845 ----- His son John Stuart Price was born (1845 - 1892)
1847 ----- His daughter Sallie Lewis Price Preston was born ( 1847 - 8/1/1882)
1850 ----- His son Samuel Lewis Price was born (1850 - 1930). 1850 Census - Slave Schedule - He is enslaving 11 individuals - adults and children (undoubtably some of my family) b/c they end up working for the family many years after emancipation.
1862 ----- He had been anti-secession but b/c a Confederate sympathizer largely b/c that was the leaning of his Constituents and in 1962 he was arrested by Union Troops and jailed in Charleston;
1963 ----- In 1863 he became the Lt. Governor of Confederate Virginia (NRHP & wiki)
1870 ----- His sisters appear on the 1870 Census in Big Levels and my uncle, John Littleton (1840 - 1892), is their worker. On this they have him as a White Male (either they observed him and thought he was or no one bothered to explain). My impression is that he was associated with the sisters for a very long time. At the time of the 1870 Census Priscilla was 58 and Mary A. was 63. As far as I know, my uncle John never married and never had any children. At the time of the census in 1870, uncle John was 30 so he was working for much more elderly ladies.
In 1876 he became a WV State Senator (wiki).
1877 ----- Staunton Speculator - 6/12/1877 - On the 6th instant, in Lewisburg, WV, at the residency of the bride's father, Hon Samuel Price, by Rev. M.C. Lacy, Mr. John Alfred Preston & Miss Sallie L. Preston.
1884 ----- He died on 2/25/1884 at Lewisburg and is buried at the Stuart Burying Ground at Stuart Manor (wiki). Martinsburg Independent - Saturday 3/01/1884, DEATH OF EX-GOV PRICE - 2/25/1884, congestion of the brain, he had been active in the Presbyterian Church. His sister Priscilla died on 9/14/1884 and his sister Mary A. died in 1889. The website Find a Grave has a photo of his tombstone which I will not reproduce here.
1889 ----- Around 12/188 his will was probated. The Will shows a tiny bit about his family life -- He had 2 horses and possibly a horse wagon; bee stands, some cows, calves, and a steer; stacks of hay, and lots of tools.
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His home still stands at 224 Court Street, Lewisburg and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places (wiki)
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