Gary and Anne Donald Muffley were driving southeast out of
central Indiana when the news of September 11, 2001, was heard on the radio. We
had been researching Retherford ancestry in Bartholomew County.
Charlotte Louise Retherford (1918-1999) married Oscar
William Donald on July 30, 1938, in Seminole, Oklahoma. Her parents were Dewey
Dick Retherford and Mary Gladys Stites. Surnames in Charlotte’s ancestry
include Retherford, O’Bryant (Choctaw ancestry), Harmon, Clark, Ford (Shawnee
ancestry), Hall, Myers, Stites, Buckler, Deavers, Whilden, Townsend, Foster,
Abbot, Foreman, Stote, Underhill, Mattingly, Thompson, Goodrum, Lee, Woodward,
Marshall, Royal (Revolutionary War soldier ancestor in this line), and many
more.
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| OW Donald and Charlotte Retherford Donald |
Careful genealogical and yDNA evidence strongly supports that
this Retherford/Rutherford ancestry derived from the following well-researched Scottish
borders family: www.clanrutherfurd.org/History.aspx
Accounts place Rutherford ancestors in
Scotland shortly after the 1066 Norman Conquest, and it is known that Flemish
people were part of this migration into Britain. The Flemish connection, van
Ruddervoorde, is interesting, and here is more about that: http://genforum.genealogy.com/rutherford/messages/5245.html
There is a connection with the Knights Templar: www.hunthill.4t.com/custom3_1.html Our Retherford line of interest is possibly
distant genetic kin to the 10th Grand Master of the Knights Templar,
Sir Gerard van Ruddervoorde (d. 1189). Ruddervoorde village is near Bruges,
Flanders, Belgium. Sir Gerard reportedly joined the Second Crusade, which got underway
in 1147. It was mostly a Flemish, French, and German affair, which accomplished
little. Sir Gerard reportedly remained in the Holy Land awhile, in the service
of Raymond III of Tripoli. Then Sir Gerard became a Knight Templar. In 1184 he
became the Grand Master.
Lyn Retherford, second cousin of Anne Donald Muffley, had
his yDNA tested through Ancestry-DNA. The medium-resolution STR (Short Tandem
Repeats) yDNA pattern of this grandson of Emery Michael Retherford (brother of ancestor
Dewey Retherford) is a close fit to samples in Haplogroup R1b, Lineage I, subclade
R1b1a2, at www.worldfamilies.net/surnames/rutherford/results and to those in “Family C” at www.familytreedna.com/public/Rutherford
It is likely that there were no unknown Non-Paternal Events
(adoptions, etc.) down the present Rutherford/Retherford line from its intersection
with ancestors of other men in those specific yDNA project groups. Other
samples in this grouping have tested positive (= derived, or mutated) for yDNA SNP
Marker R-M269.
Our Retherford/Rutherford ancestry is reliably traced back
to Julius Rutherford (b. 1756, Virginia). Julius was a grandfather of Jesse
Retherford Sr. (1836-1923). According to several accounts, Julius’ ancestor
John Adam Rutherford was born in 1614 at Hall, Roxburghshire, Scotland. See
Lyn’s tree at http://trees.ancestry.com/tree/123020/person/6022680974
and http://trees.ancestry.com/tree/123020/person/6015686401
(if you have Ancestry.com access). Lyn’s
Ancestry-DNA yDNA pattern is a match (with a bit of manual translation between
the two testing companies) to Family Tree DNA Kit # 90943, a man descending
from Adam Rutherford b. 1614, Roxburghshire. See www.worldfamilies.net/surnames/rutherford/pats
, the “rutherfordcpa” Patriarch entry. The split between rutherfordcpa and Lyn
occurred with sons of William Rutherford (b. 1727, Essex County, Virginia):
Thomas Rutherford (b. 1760) was the ancestor of rutherfordcpa; Thomas’ brother
Julius was the ancestor of Lyn Retherford, and of descendants of Dewey
Retherford. Julius was 6 generations back from Lyn.
Julius Rutherford (b. 1756, Essex County, Virginia; d. 1831,
Anderson County, Tennessee) was reportedly living in Montgomery County in
southwest Virginia at the time of the Revolutionary War. DAR records show him
in the company of Captain Rowland Madison in the regiment of Colonel James
Wood, plus the 4th, 8th, and 12th regiments of
Continental Line. Julius is listed at this Valley Forge (winter 1777-1778) site:
http://valleyforgemusterroll.org/regiments/va12.asp
Private Julius Rutherford, Company of Capt. Rowland Madison, 12th
Virginia Regiment, Scott’s Brigade, Lafayette’s 3rd Division.
According to the history at http://valleyforgemusterroll.org/regiments/va12.asp
the 12th Virginia had previously fought in northern New Jersey and
in the defense of Philadelphia. Julius’ brother Archibald was in a different
Virginia regiment which was also at Valley Forge. After that winter, the
Continental Army benefited from the military expertise of Baron von Steuben.
Julius married Rhoda in future Knox County, Tennessee, in
1780. This was before the end of the Revolutionary War, and just before the
State of Franklin (east Tennessee) seceded from North Carolina. Quakers moved
into future eastern Tennessee around the end of the Revolution (1782). Eventually,
anti-slavery became a motivation for Quaker migrations away from the South.
Michael (Micajah) Retherford (son of Julius & Rhoda) was
reportedly born in 1800 in future Anderson (then Knox) Co. Tenn. He married Minerva
or Matilda Hall. Their kids Woods and Sampson were born in Tennessee, and kids
Melissa and Jesse Sr. born in Indiana. The move to Indiana would have been
between 1831 and 1834. M. Retherford was in the 1840 census of Sand Creek
Township, Bartholomew County. The family was associated with a Quaker church at
Azalia, Bartholomew County, Indiana. Jesse Retherford Sr. was born in 1836 at
Elizabethtown, Bartholomew County.
In the 1850 census of Sand Creek Township, Bartholomew
County, Jesse (age 14) and his sister Melissa (age 16) were living with the
Richard E. Hall family. Matilda Hall appears to have been their widowed mother.
At Azalea village, near Elizabethtown,
there is a marker regarding the Underground Railroad. The Hall families of the
Sand Creek-Azalia Friends Meeting (Quakers) were involved in helping escaped
slaves reach Canada.
Jesse Retherford Sr. (b. 1836) married Martha Jane Harmon in
1858, and they had 7 kids. During the Civil War Jesse fought for the Union.
Jesse Retherford/Rutherford was listed for Company K of the 24th
Indiana Infantry in Civil War rosters and on his tombstone. The 24th
fought in the Battle of Shiloh (where Confederate ancestor Othaniel Rice was
apparently killed), and was also at the Siege of Vicksburg.
There were several migrations by the Jesse & Martha Jane
Retherford family. They lived in Cowley County, Kansas, according to censuses
of 1900, 1910 and 1920, and at the time of the death of Jesse Sr. in 1923. See www.findagrave.com , Memorial # 33276989.
Jesse Retherford Jr. (b. 1862,
Iowa) was a son of Jesse Sr. & Martha Jane. In 1883, Jesse Jr. married Lydia
Lillie Lee "Anna" O'Bryant (who had definite Choctaw and Shawnee
ancestry, despite the rejection of claims for Native American benefits). They
were in the 1910 census of Mehan Road, Henry, Payne County, Oklahoma. Jess Jr.
and Anna had 11 kids, the younger 8 of whom were with them in that 1910 census.
Dewey Retherford (future father of Charlotte Louise Retherford Donald) was age
13 in that census. Dewey’s sibs were: Paul, Amy Jane, Lucendia Emiline
"Emma", Emery Michael, Rose Alice, Ralph Cephus “Ceaf”, Henry Clay
“Hank”, Clara Barton, Glenna Wynona, and Evelyn Velma “Mima”. Retherfords
buried at Fairlawn Cemetery, Stillwater, Oklahoma: Jesse “Sam” Retherford Jr.,
Anna Lydia O’Bryant Retherford, Fanny Abbie Clark Retherford, and Nathan Robert
“Nate” Retherford. Fanny was the wife of Nate. Nate was a grandson of Woods
Joshua Retherford (a brother of our Jesse Sr.).
In June 2001, Anne and Gary
Muffley visited Donald, Retherford, and Stites locations in Oklahoma. We saw
the ruins of the Jesse Retherford Jr. home on Union Road, southeast of
Stillwater. The storm cellar was called the “Fraidy Hole”.
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| Jesse Retherford Jr. home on Union Road |
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| The Fraidy Hole |
