The Nancy Rakestraw Story

 

Introduction

The first Rakestraw to show up in census records for North Carolina is Nancy Rakestraw, who appears in the Rockingham County census in 1800 as a 27-year-old head of a household of 7 people.  She then appears in the census as head of household for 1810, 1820, 1840, 1850, and 1860 in Rockingham County.  According to the census, she was born in Virginia in 1773.  This story is about Nancy and her children and grandchildren who show up on those census records.

The Rakestraws of Webster County, Kentucky have been stuck for some time trying to figure out who is the father of John Rakestraw (1822-1894) and his brother James (1824-1909).   John and James are well documented but all we know of their father is that he was born in North Carolina.  Our story of Nancy Rakestraw will focus on tying her to the father of John and James.

Background

The Rakestraw family tree begins in England, in Oxfordshire, in a little town called Henley-on-Thames, where there was a parish church called Bix Brand.  In the 1500’s the English began requiring parishes to record births, deaths, and marriages, and we learn of William Raykestrawe (1542-1606), John Rakestraw (1565-1589), John Rakestraw (1587-1658), and William Rakestraw (1624-1662), who married Katheryn Lewin 1617-1692).  William and Katheryn then had a son, William.

William Rakestraw (1653-1718) was a Quaker born in Oxfordshire, who married Grace Wyron (1652-1693).  In 1680 they had a son, Joseph Rakestraw (1680-1700).  In the 1680s William and Grace came to Philadelphia.  Joseph married and had a son, Joseph Rakestraw Jr. (1700-1750), but lost his life in an incident which caused quite a scandal amongst William and the Quakers. The Quaker meeting minutes through the years document much about the Rakestraws and provide not just factual data but interesting insights.

Joseph Rakestraw Jr. (1700-1750) married Sarah Elizabeth Fox (1702-1779), and they had 6 children, one of whom was John Rakestraw (1728-1787).  John Married Elizabeth Evans Kenderline (1732-1787), and they had 12 children.  These children began to move out of Pennsylvania and head south and west.  Jesse Rakestraw (1752-1836) moves to Spartanburg, SC and founds the southern Rakestraw clan.  Another of those children was John Rakestraw (1750-1815), who moved to Virginia.  John married Sarah Sally Beulah Kimble (1755-1853), who was the daughter of William Kimble and Sarah Worthington.John Rakestraw and Sarah Kimble were married in 1771 in Fauquier County, Virginia.  They had a number of children, one of whom was Nancy, born in 1773.  Another child was named Kimble Rakestraw after Sarah’s maiden name.

Rockingham County History

Nancy Rakestraw married William Hickman in 1796 in Fauquier County, Virginia.  Things must not have gone well, as Nancy shows up in the 1800 census for Rockingham County as a 27-year-old and the oldest of 7 people living in her house.  The census did not show the names of everyone in the household until 1850, but in 1850 and 1860 we find out who is living there, and it helps to fill in the pieces.

The actual census forms are available online, and the data is summarized in the table below.  I have made some guesses as to who is living there, based on the names revealed in 1850 and 1860, which track with the earlier information.

In 1819 Nancy Rakestraw bought 12 acres in Rockingham County.  In 1821 she records a Gift Deed, identifying several of her grandchildren by name.  Nancy would appear to be the mother of Mary Polly and Tabitha and Claresy.  Based on the ages below, it appears that Mary Polly was the mother of Anderson Green and James Monroe Rakestraw. Claresy appears to be the mother of Nancy Penelope.  Tabitha had Lucretia, Cynthia, and William.

  

Nancy Penelope Rakestraw was the mother of William Gilbert Rakestraw and John Waddle Rakestraw, although she never married.  Robert Martin Jones was the father of William Gilbert and gave him land in his will.  It is unclear who the father of John Waddle is, but it could be Dr. John Waddle Ellington. 

Nancy Penelope Rakestraw

      John Waddle Rakestraw with his family.

William Gilbert Rakestraw

Here is the census data from Nancy Rakestraw.  Note that I have provided color codes for who I think was living in the house at the time.

The Hickman clan appears to move to Coshocton County, OH around 1821, and they later move further west in Ohio.  In the 1820 census Nancy’s brother Kimble Rakestraw is in the census for Coshocton County Ohio.  In 1830 Kimble Hickman appears in the house next to his Uncle Kimble Rakestraw in the same place.  By 1850 he has moved to Decatur, Iowa where he is buried in 1876.  John Hickman (1800-1879) is in Muskegan, OH in 1850 and then also ends up in Iowa near Kimble where he is also buried.

   

It is unclear just what the Rakestraw ladies were doing in Rockingham County in the 1830’s but there is an item on the criminal docket from 1831 that lists four of them and bonds them from disorderly conduct.

John Rakestraw was born in 1822 in Tennessee and then marries Ann Trent in 1842 in Webster County, KY.  We have not located him or his brother in the 1830 or 1840 census.  They could have been in Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, South Carolina, or they may have been in Illinois in Williamson County.  We will continue to look for them, but we know that DNA tells us we are related to Nancy.

What does the DNA say?

Ancestry DNA tests can identify genetic matches, and how much DNA you share on which genes.  We then rely on member-supplied family trees to check and see how we are related.  The data below is from those who have both taken the test and who have provided a family tree with Rakestraws on it.  There are many more matches that do not provide a public tree or who do not identify Rakestraw ancestors, and there is much, much more to be explored in terms of the DNA results.  The data below is only the most clear and reliable among those matches, and we will continue to fill in DNA data from matches.

William Gilbert Rakestraw and John Waddle Rakestraw both had families, with William having mostly boys and John mostly girls.  The William Gilbert Rakestraw family cemetery is at Smyrna Presbyterian church in Rockingham County, and many of his children and grandchildren are buried there.  One of his sons was Giles Dallas Rakestraw (1890-1975), who had a son named Charles Garland Rakestraw (1928-2023).  Charles is buried in Stoneville in Rockingham County.

Charles Garland Rakestraw did a DNA test, and I am a match to him.

James Monroe Rakestraw (1815-1872) had a son named Samuel Shrober Rakestraw (1849-1916) who had a son named James Wiley Rakestraw (1875-1949).  James Wiley had a son named Ivan Leslie (1903-1982) who had a son named Fred Rakestraw ((1927-2022) who lived in Missouri.

Fred Rakestraw did a DNA test, and I am a match to him.  Several of his family members have also taken tests, confirming this result. I also connect to James Monroe Rakestraw through other of his offspring.

Anderson Green Rakestraw (1814-1868) had a son named Anderson Walter Rakestraw (1859-1949) who had a son named Charlie F Rakestraw (1883-1973).  Charlie had a son named Joe Frank Rakestraw (1932-1987), and Joe Frank had a daughter named Vanessa.

Vanessa took a DNA test, and I am a match to her.  I also connect to Anderson Green Rakestraw through other of his offspring.

Other DNA matches tie me back to earlier Rakestraw ancestors, descendants of William and Grace who came from England in the 1880’s, including Jesse Rakestraw who moved to South Carolina.

Conclusion:

We believe the father of John and James Rakestraw shows up in the census in Rockingham County in 1800 and 1810 as a young boy, the son of Nancy Rakestraw.  We believe he moved to Tennessee in 1820 or 1821 and had two boys with Morganna their mother.  Sometime afterward the couple split up, with Morganna marrying a Mr. Riddle and moving to Illinois while the father left the picture.  John and James would keep in touch with their mother in Illinois, with James marrying a girl who lived next to her and bringing her back to Kentucky.

The timeline between 1822 and 1842 remains uncertain, and we don’t know where the family was during this time.  We also don’t know the father’s name, although John would be the first guess.

What we DO know with some degree of certainty is that properly speaking we are not Rakestraws.  Three generations of Rakestraw women kept their family name and gave it to their children, raising them without fathers in a home that had a lot going on for some six decades in rural North Carolina.  It is difficult to understand how anyone survived in the wilderness of North Carolina in 1800, much less a 27-year-old female with a house full of children.

The products of this chaotic situation went on to found strong families, whether that be William Gilbert, John Waddle, James Monroe, Anderson Green, or John Rakestraw – these men each appears to have stepped up to their duties as fathers.  The Rakestraws today have strong roots that came from those men, and also from a small group of very strong and independent Rakestraw women who tackled the backwoods of North Carolina together at the founding of our nation.

My name is Jeff Rakestraw, son of Arch, grandson of Thurman, and great-grandson of Josiah Trent Rakestraw, who was the son of John Rakestraw (1822-1894).  My parents were both born in Webster County, KY.  I was born in 1961 in Missouri and have been married since 1982 to Stacy (Ament) Rakestraw.  We have lived in Lake St. Louis, MO since 1997 and we have 3 kids and six grandkids as of July 2024. I recently traveled to Rockingham County with my brother & sister to meet my Rakestraw 5^th cousins.