Mary Rankin Young
Mary Rankin (before 1760
– 1788)
and her husband John Young
Compiled and copyrighted by Linda
Sparks Starr May 2010
Mary was the youngest daughter of George
Rankin and his wife Martha;
she may have been their youngest child. She is the only member of
the Rankin family (besides her mother the widow) who is mentioned in the will of Robert
Stephenson. She
received a black colt plus the same proportion as his grandchildren
in the division of his residuary estate. Her legacy from her
father's will was a child’s part of the movables plus
five pounds and then five pounds more to be levied in equal parts from
the legacy given to her brothers William and John.
Additionally, George provided his younger children with an education.
Mary was not quite a teen-ager when her step-father died August 1772.
As with most colonial era women, his will is the last mention of Mary
in records until her marriage to John Young 5 September 1785. Her
brother James was surety on the marriage bond. [Chalkley vol. II
p. 285; Vogt citing Marriage Bk p. 362; Prichard p. 20]
John and Mary had one child, reportedly a son named James Rankin
Young. Mary’s death in 1788 is on record, but where
she and John were then living is not documented. Two years later
John Young petitioned the Augusta County Chancery Court for
indemnification. Basically he felt he was not receiving the full
legacy coming to Mary from her father’s estate. Although a
specific statement of fact is not available, we can reasonably assume
George’s heirs were dividing his estate. Three of the seven
children died between 1787 and 1790 – Thomas, Mary and John
– and William was making plans to leave Virginia.
Young’s
complaint was
directed toward the two executors of the 1760 will of George Rankin,
namely Thomas Patterson and Samuel Henderson. Henderson was
deceased by 1790 so the executors of his estate were named
co-defendants with Patterson. Patterson and the executors of
Henderson’s will countered with a suit essentially claiming Young
had no basis for filing a suit against them. Although the order of events is
unclear, the surviving executor, Thomas Patterson, appears to have
answered the first summons by submitting the list of items Mary
had received
from the estate during her lifetime. The total came to more than
£57. The Justices
were
not happy about Patterson’s non-appearance at the December
Court. They responded with a summons for the bodies of both executors
to be at the March Chancery Court session to answer possible contempt
charges. Deputy Sheriff Thomas Young executed the summons on Patterson,
but noted on the reverse side:
"Henderson not inhabitant of this
County, Rankin not an Inhabitant of this world." The suit
and counter suit appear to have dragged on for some time. Thomas
Patterson’s deposition
in answer to Young’s complaint is dated only 1793. The
Court’s decision is not recorded in the papers located in this
file.
That’s the extent of the known facts for Mary (Rankin) Young and
her husband John. My concern is that previous researchers may
have linked the wrong “John Young” as husband of this Mary
Rankin. Jessamine (Young) Wooton’s book is the source most often
cited by these earlier researchers. To my knowledge Wooton never
specifically says John Young’s wife was the daughter of George
Rankin died 1760. But her birth and death dates for
John’s first wife are very close to those for George’s
daughter Mary. Citing Wooten, RANKIN family researchers say
John’s parents are Samuel Young and his wife Jane. Perhaps
their son John did return to Virginia in 1785 and met and married
George Rankin’s daughter Mary. Otherwise, it’s difficult to
reconcile the dates of movement of the Samuel Young family and the
known facts of this Mary Rankin’s husband.
Wooton writes that John’s father, Samuel Young, sold his Augusta
County inheritance in 1762 and was in the Holston Valley in Tennessee
by 1768. Her estimated birth year of 1759 for John leaves little
doubt but that he accompanied his parents. Samuel is then reported to
have followed other family members to Fayette County Kentucky sometime
after 1790. The place of death for George’s daughter, Mary
(Rankin) Young, is most often shown as Fayette County, Kentucky;
sometimes a question mark is added. Researchers continue that John
married his second wife, Cynthia McCullough, in Fayette Co. in
1790. However, one researcher (also citing Wooton) says
John’s marriage to Cynthia occurred in Washington County,
Virginia. In 1790 the area that was Washington County, Virginia
and Fayette County, Kentucky had once been part of Augusta County. My
point: even though the residence of this YOUNG family is given as
Augusta County, they didn’t necessarily live near the family of
George Rankin.
If those researchers making the leap “Samuel’s son John is
the husband of George’s daughter, Mary Rankin” is correct,
the marriage connections between two RANKIN families is intriguing. But in
my opinion, researchers need to first truly identify the husband of
this Mary Rankin, before jumping into the implications that connection
might suggest.
SOURCES
Augusta County Chancery Suit Young
vs Patterson, dated Nov. 1793, is located in Draw 448 Judgment.
Katherine Bushman noted on the copies of the original sent to LSS this
is not the same as Office Judgment. Transcription of the record
came from the files of Henry Rankin Jr. who did not identify the
transcriptionist. It comes down to three men: Henry’s
father Henry Rankin Sr.: Henry Jr. himself; or A. M.
Prichard. Other images are from the copy of original in hands
LSS. Chalkley’s abstract of this record appears vol.
1 page 401.
Chalkley, Lyman, compiler. Chronicles
of the Scotch-Irish Settlement of Virginia in three
volumes.
http://www.rootsweb.com/~chalkley
Prichard, A. M. compiler.
Rankin Relations 1948.
Vogt, John & Kethley Jr., T. William compilers. Augusta County Marriages 1748 – 1850.
1986.
Wooton, Jessamine Young, author. John Young: Kentucky Pioneer and his Kin
Huntsville, AL
Home: http://homepages.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~lksstarr/
Linda Sparks Starr copyright (c) 2010