Phelps and Foley Families of Virginia and Kentucky
Phelps and Foley Families of Virginia and KentuckyUpdated January 26, 2009 | |
| After over forty years of research, we have found no direct link from Thomas Phelps, Sr. to any immigrating ancestor.We have yet found no link between Thomas Phelps of Albemarle Co., VA who died in 1751 and the Thomas Phelps, Artisan, listed by Captain John Smith as part of the second supply of immigrants to James Towne, (1608). We know that Thomas purchased land from what we assume was his father and mother, John and Mary Phelps in 1736 in what was then Goochland Co., VA.The deed, dated 1736, from John Phelps and Mary Phelps, his wife, to Thomas Phelps, is preserved in Goochland County Will Book 1.One of the witnesses was Wentworth Webb.Wentworth Webb was perhaps a brother to Theodoric C. Webb, witness to the will of Thomas Phelps, Sr., dated 1751.Wentworth Webb had died prior to the first day of Court for the new County of Albemarle (February 28, 1744).One of those named on that date as assessors of his estate was Thomas Phelps, Sr. Thomas Sr., also received a grant of land from King George 11, signed by William Gooch, Lieutenant Governor and Commander in Chief of the Colony and Dominion of Williamsburg; under the seal of said Colony, 28 August, 1746, in the twentieth year of our reign. This land, south of the Fluvanna (James) River was part of a grant to his assumed father John, dated 1725, and later willed to his own son John in his will of 1751.When John and Mary Phelps acquired this land in 1725, it was still part of Henrico County, VA as Albemarle County, VA was formed in 1744 and included Phelps lands south of the Fluvanna.These same lands were later part of Albemarle County and, after 1761 part of Buckingham County, VA. Dr. Ransom B. True, Director of Historical Research For The Association For The Preservation of Virginia, reports that one John Phelps DID receive land in this area, south of the Fluvanna (James River) in 1725.We must assume that this John Phelps was the father of Thomas Phelps,Sr., who later willed his plantation and the Island across from it to our Great Great Great Grandfather, John Phelps.Settlement of the Estate was in 1772, which we assume was when Elizabeth Phelps died. We have stood on the abovementioned lands south of the James River. It is known as New Canton. We even found an old cane in some brush, that we "choose" to believe belonged to one of our ancestors.The highway bridge down river from there is the John Harwell Cocke Memorial Bridge. John Hartwell Cocke was the buider of Bremo Mansion, visible today from the site of Thomas Phelps' Plantation site.During the first day of Court for Albemarle County, while Peter Jefferson, Joshua Fry and Doctor Thomas Walker were busy swearing each other in as officials of the new county, Thomas Phelps was named as an appraiser of the estate of Wentworth Webb, deceased. Why John Phelps, (our John) left Virginia and cast his lot with Daniel Boone, we do not know.It must have taken great courage to make the change from Plantation life to explorer.In reviewing the inventories to the estates of his father, Thomas Sr, and his brother William, we find references to 'wigges, breeches and hoes (hose)' causing one to believe they could at least be gentility of that century. In any case, we know that Thomas Phelps,Jr. and his brother John were both with Daniel Boone at Boonesborough, one of the first fortified settlements in what was to become Kentucky,because their names appear on the old monument at the site of the original Fort and an expanded list of Phelps names appear on the new monument near the reconstructed Fort. This list includes, Thomas, John and eight of Thomas' children.We believe John went back to Virginia for his family about 1880 and brought them back to the Fort.Many of them stayed to settle the new Commonwealth of Kentucky. | |
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