Uncovered Stories, Episode 3: The Revolutionary Ruthey Jackson Letter

Connecting the Docs: True Stories from the Old North State

Welcome back to the final series of Season 4, “Uncovered Stories.” In this series, you’ll hear about incredible records that archivists uncovered during work assigned for other, sometimes unrelated projects. These discoveries add new significant research topics to collections held by the State Archives for decades and shine a light on people and subjects upon which previous collection guides did not focus.

In the last episode of the series, host John Horan welcomes Digitization Archivist Caitlin Martell and former Connecting the Docs intern and current Assistant Oral Historian Annabeth Poe to discuss an overlooked letter from one of the Archives’ private collections. Caitlin found the letter, written in 1781, while digitizing documents about John Williams, a Granville County lawyer and Continental Congress delegate, for America’s 250th anniversary. The letter caught her eye because within a series of letters about troop rations and political movements, it had an unusual author with an unusual request. A dying Hillsborough woman named Ruthey Jackson was asking Williams to take in her daughter Nancy, who was the result of an affair with one of North Carolina’s most famous Revolutionary War generals. Join us as we discuss the letter, reveal Nancy’s father, and investigate what happened to Ruthey, Nancy, and the other characters in this 1700s soap opera.

From the Archives

The Letter: PC.176.1: John Williams Papers, 1772-1781 [digitized, pages 65-66], https://digital.ncdcr.gov/Documents/Detail/john-williams-papers-1772-1781/425265?item=425574.

21.111.48, 49, and 52: Special Agents’ Reports on Claims, Vol. XI, British Records Series (Microfilm z.5.149N from PRO Series T 79/84, 85 & 88).

CR.044.101: Apprentice Bonds and Record, Granville County (Boxes 1-4).

CR.044.102: Bastardy Bonds and Records, Granville County (Boxes 1-4).

CR.044.510: Guardian Bonds, Granville County, 1758-1927.

CR.044.801: Wills, 1749-1968, Granville County.

CR.073.101: Apprentice Bonds and Records, 1780-1905, Orange County (Boxes 1-3).

CR.073.102: Bastardy Bonds and Records, 1782-1908, undated, Orange County (Boxes 1-3).

CR.073.301: Minute Docket, Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions, 1752-1868.

CR.073.801: Wills, 1752-1968, Orange County.

MF-C.012.80001: Brunswick County Wills, 1764-1954.

"North Carolina Probate Records, 1735-1970, Orange County, Deeds, 1753-1793, Vol. 1 & 2,
images, accessed through FamilySearch.

"North Carolina Probate Records, 1735-1970, Orange County, Land Records, 1778 and 1779-1795,
images, accessed through FamilySearch.

US Census Bureau, 1790 United States Federal Census, New Hanover County, Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010, images reproduced by FamilySearch (accessible through the Archives).

US Census Bureau, 1800 United States Federal Census, Granville County, Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010, images reproduced by FamilySearch (accessible through the Archives).

Secondary Sources

Samuel Ashe, Biographical History of North Carolina Volume III, Greensboro, NC: Charles L. Van Noppen Publisher, 1906, page 129.

Mrs. John C. Bernhardt, “Burton, Robert,” North Carolina Encyclopedia (NCPedia), 1979, revised November 2022, https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/burton-robert.

Louise Littleton Davis, Nashville Tales, Gretna, LA: Pelican Publishing Co., 1981.

M.M. Edmonds, “Williams, John,” North Carolina Encyclopedia (NCPedia), 1996, https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/williams-john.

Marjoleine Kars, Breaking Loose Together: The Regulator Rebellion in Pre-Revolutionary North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2002.

Ransom McBride, “Claims of British Merchants,” North Carolina Genealogical Society Journal 9, no.3 (1983); 156; 11, no. (1985); 29.

John F. Reed, “Nash, Francis,” North Carolina Encyclopedia (NCPedia), 1991, https://www.ncpedia.org/biography/nash-francis.

Steven E. Siry’s Liberty’s Fallen Generals: Leadership and Sacrifice in the American War of Independence, Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2012.