MARTINI FAMILY------A SLAUGHTER IN GEORGIA

The SLAUGHTER Family history begins for us with a ship from England finally reaching its destination on the Atlantic Coast of the American colonies. Although unsure exactly where and when they docked, it was the start of the SLAUGHTER line which debuts in our story in 1735 St. Peters Parish, New Kent County, Virginia Colony, with the birth of John SLAUGHTER.  New Kent County's first official visit had been from Captain John Smith, founder of Jamestown in 1607, who met with Native Americans and organized a friendly feast.
   By the time John reached 22, already a well-to-do farmer and slave owner,  he had fallen for a young woman who also attended St Peters Parish Church, an Anglican congregation near present-day Talleysville, Virgnia. The young woman was  Frances BROTHERS, also age 22, the daughter of a plantation owner and slaveholder. The young couple married in the St. Peters Parish Church in 1757.  Of interest is that a young woman in her 20's also attended their small church, a widow of only a few months, left with two kids and a 15,000 acre plantation......her name was Martha Dandridge Custis....the future Martha Washington, and First Lady of the U.S.  Our newly married ancestors, John and Frances SLAUGHTER, must have known Martha and possibly met George Washington in person. Two years later, in 1759, Martha Custis married George a few miles up the road at her plantation called "the White House", a probably name source for our current Presidential residence.  It is entirely possible that the two couples attended each other's weddings as church peers.    

St. Peters Episcopal Church, built 1701, Talleysville, GA

Martha Dandridge Custis in 1757

     In 1762, while our little family seemingly avoided the hazards of the French and Indian War that raged mostly north of them until 1763, John and Frances SLAUGHTER packed up their two sons, and moved to Cumberland County, Virginia, where they settled  for the next 20 years, and had the remainder of their 11 children together. But the peaceful life would end soon for all colonists.  In the 1760's, the British began a series of taxes on stamps, documents, and trade goods, and passed a law that said American colonists must let British soldiers live in their homes and feed them to offset expenses in England. The colonists, who felt they were being taxed to the limit without any representation in Parliament, began to organize and speak out against the King and Parliament. In 1770 in Boston, British troops facing an angry mob of unarmed colonists, opened fire on them in what became known as the Boston Massacre. Three years later colonists were tossing crates of tea into the waters of Boston Harbor in protest, and in April of 1775, shots were fired in skirmishes at Lexington and Concord. The American Revolution was on.....
                                              

     John SLAUGHTER served during the Revolution as a Private in the Virginia Continental Army, and before the War was over in 1783, his sons Nathaniel, Thomas, and George would also join the fight for freedom. Son Nathaniel SLAUGHTER joined in March of 1777 at the age of 19, and entered the service of George Washington's Virginia Continental Army, in the 10th Virginia Regiment. He fought in the battles of Brandywine and Germantown in the defense of Philadelphia, then spent the winter of 1777 at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. Nathaniel was with Gen. Washington at Monmouth Court House in 1778, and eventually fought the British at Charleston, South Carolina, in 1780, where most of the 10th Virginia Regiment was captured.....all for a little over $6.00 a month. When the Revolution ended officially in 1783, John SLAUGHTER had given the lives of two of his sons, Nathaniel and Thomas, for the cause of freedom. Son George had been in the Cavalry of the Virgina Continental Line as a private, and managed to live through the years of fighting, for which he would get a pension of $21.00 a year.
    With the War over, the 1780's allowed the new American citizens to get back to their routine farming.
Among the children of John and Frances SLAUGHTER born during the revolution, was our next ancestor, Henry G. SLAUGHTER,  in the memorable year of 1776. By the time Henry was 14 in 1790, his parents were plantation owners in Cumberland County, with 10 members of the family living there, along with 10 slaves. For his military service, John SLAUGHTER was awarded a Land Grant in the state of Georgia, as well as being paid for "providing supplies" to the American Army during the War. Once again the family and laborers packed up to move to the next adventure.
                                          

Greene County, Georgia

     The SLAUGHTER family settled in Greene County, Georgia, near present-day Greensboro, where John purchased 287 acres in addtion to his Land Grant in 1795. Life was good for the SLAUGHTER family in Georgia, but shortly after President George Washington left office in 1797, our first known ancestor in this line would finally get to rest. John SLAUGHTER died on a hot and humid summer day on August 5, 1798.  In his will of 1796, he basically left his 365 acre plantation and slaves to his wife Frances, and specified to his children who-got-what after her death. Eighteen slaves were mentioned specifically by name in the Will. His son Henry SLAUGHTER, our direct line, was a co-executor with his brother William, and was given one slave named "Scotland", a horse, saddle, some furniture, a feather bed, and a musket gun. An interim of his estate at one point had the value at over $4800, with about $3500 of that being the slaves. Frances SLAUGHTER died two years later on November 23, 1800, ending the first generation of SLAUGHTERs from Virginia.
     With their parents gone, the eight remaining children would eventually scatter through Georgia, Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Tennessee, and beyond. Our line comes from son Henry SLAUGHTER, who would die a terrible death at the age of only 41, a major player in the first hanging to take place in Jasper County....patience reader.  Sometime around 1798, Henry married  19 year old Frances JONES, or "Fanny" as she was called, and a few years later the young couple moved to Jasper County, Georgia, not far from their beloved Greene County. The reason for the move was simple.....Henry had won property in a drawing of the Georgia Land Lottery of 1805, while his other brothers had come up empty handed, and the land was in today's Jasper County, near what would become the town of Monticello. Soon after their arrival, however, Creek Indians became a matter to be dealt with to the west.

Creek War (1813-1814) Part of War of 1812

     At the end of August, 1813, the Creek Indians attacked and destroyed an American outpost called Ft. Mims. The Creek War, as it was to be called, forced the border county of Jasper to raise a volunteer Army under the command of Major General David Adams.  Henry SLAUGHTER joined the 2nd Georgia Regiment of Militia, listed on the rosters under the command of Colonel James R. Jenkins. A few months later, the Army met the enemy Creeks, called "Red Sticks", near the Tallapoosa River in present Alabama, forcing the Indians to move out. The next year, General Andrew Jackson would win a major victory at Horseshoe Bend, and the Creek War ended, leaving Jackson to deal with the British portion of the War of 1812, which ended in American victory at the Battle of New Orleans.
     When Henry SLAUGHTER returned, he was soon elected to office as a Justice of the Peace in Jasper County, Georgia, a post he held from 1814 to 1817......when our story comes to a shocking and violent moment in the family history. According to the journal of Dr. J. P. Welch of Monticello, in Jasper County, on the afternoon of Oct. 30, 1817, Henry SLAUGHTER and a man named John Castillow (there are several spellings), had been drinking in a pub in Monticello, and began to argue over some issue, probably a judgment Henry had placed on Castillow while Justice of the Peace. They were seen to leave town together on horseback, still arguing as they rode toward their homes. Suddenly, Castillow pulled a knife, leaned over while still on his horse, and sliced Henry SLAUGHTER across the throat.  Henry fell off of his horse, bleeding greatly, and his stead took off running for home. Castillow, the murderer, also fled.  Henry's bloody horse returned home, and soon a search party of friends and relatives went into the night to find him, which they did in darkness. Henry's body was lying in the road, with his hand clenched around his bloody throat. Some time later, John Castillow was caught and brought to trial in Monticello, where the jury found him guilty of murder, and given the sentence "death by hanging".  The fateful day arrived, and a crowd of thousands had gathered from adjacent counties to see the first death sentence carried out in the area's history.  Castillow was brought out dressed head to toe in all white. It was a mile walk from the jail to the hanging spot, and Castillow walked slowly behind his own coffin, pulled on a small cart by a team of oxen. Following a short prayer, Castillow climbed onto the cart and stood atop his own coffin, while the Sheriff placed the noose around his neck. Castillow bid farewell to his wife, children, and friends, then the oxen started forward with the cart, leaving the murderer to swing by the rope until death.

Jasper County, Georgia Courthouse  

     Henry's death had left his Frances a 37-year old widow, with ten childen. For the next 18 years, the Jasper County Court would make sure that Frances would keep the plantation she and Henry had built, along with the slaves who worked the land, for the "maintenance and education" of her minor children. Frances lived until the 1850's in Jasper County, her date of death undiscovered as of yet.
     Our next generation is led by Henry and Frances SLAUGHTER's son Hugh Jones SLAUGHTER, born September 3, 1799 back in Greene County, Georgia, and who grew to manhood in Jasper County, Georgia where his father was murdered when Hugh was just 18 years old.  Around 1818, Hugh married Lucinda SAVAGE, the Georgia born daughter of Jesse SAVAGE and Bersheba HILL.  Within months, Hugh and Lucinda SAVAGE moved to Warren County, Tennessee, along with her parents, and are found living near each other in the 1820 Census.

    

Warren County, Tennessee

  Through the years, Hugh J. and Lucinda would have only one child, Jesse SLAUGHTER, born in 1821 Warren County, Tennessee. The family listed 3 slaves in 1820, 1 in 1830, 1 in 1840, and 3 in 1850....none were listed in 1860 just prior to the start of the American Civil War, and there is no indication that son Jesse served in either Army.  The farm of Hugh and Lucinda in the 1860 Agricultural Census is listed as having 200 acres, with 11 horses, 4 milk cows, 2 oxen, 4 other cattle, 7 sheep, and 15 hogs.   Hugh SLAUGHTER died in 1876, and Lucinda in 1880, both having lived long lives into their 70's.
     Jesse SLAUGHTER married a 14 year old girl, twenty years his junior, named Sarah Lucinda BLAIR, in November of 1858. They would raise seven children over the next thirty years together on their Warren County farm, one of which was our next direct ancestor, Sarah Elizabeth SLAUGHTER.  Sarah was born in 1866 shortly after the end of the Civil War, and married Elkana Thomas CURTIS just a few weeks short of her 22nd birthday.
    So, the SLAUGHTER line came from England, settled in Virginia through the American Revolution, obtained land in Georgia as a reward for military service, and following a tragic murder of one of our direct ancestors, moved to Warren County, Tennessee before 1820, where my mother was born more than a century later.  JOHN SLAUGHTER of Virginia is the 5th Great Grandfather of Anthony MARTINI.