Bohannon Line, from Icy backward

Icy Hall Wright was born to James Thomas (Tee) Hall and Alice L. Bohannon in 1907 in Itawamba Co., MS.  Icy m. Nathan Delmar Wright, b. in 1902 in Woodville, Jackson Co., AL.  They married in 1925 in Alcorn, Claiborne Co., MS.  Nathan died in 1976 and Icy died in 1997 in Memphis, Shelby Co., TN

Alice L. Bohannon, b. Mar 16, 1867 in Burlson, AL, died ?, was married to James Thomas (Tee) Hall, b. Dec. 20, 1866 in Itawamba Co., MS, m. Nov. 25, 1999 in Franklin, Monroe Co., AL, d. Dec. 1915 or Jan 5, 1914 in Burnsville, MS, buried at Whitehurst Cem., MS.

Alice: dau. of:  Bohannon, Louis Alexander, b. May 9, 1845 in Henry Co., GA, d. May 30, 1928 in Maud, Seminole Co., OK, buried at Woff Cem., Seminole Co. OK.,  m. Mary Ann Grant, on Aug. 6, 1865, b.Nov. 16, 1846, GA, d. Jun 30, 1900 in Burlson, AL.

Louis:   son of:  Bohannon, Eli, b. 1815 in Henry Co, GA, d.in Henry Co. GA m.  Elizabeth Mercer, b. 1820 in GA.  Married on Mar. 4, 1841

Eli:          son of:  Bohannon, Beverly B., b. 1798 in Wilkes Co. NC, d. bef. 1860 in Newton, Baker Co. GA.m.  ?, Rachael, b. 1801, SC, d. bef. 1860 in Newton, Baker Co. GA.  m.?

(Bev?)    son of:  Bohannon, William, b. Abt 1775 in Wilkes Co., NC, d. 1815, Clark, GA. m.  ?, Barbara, b. abt. 1777

William: son of:  Bohannon, Duncan, b. Abt. 1752 in Orange Co., VA, d. 1811, Lincoln, GA

Duncan:  son of:  Bohannon, John, b. Abt. 1725 in Orange Co., VA, d. Dec. 1789, Surry, NC, m.  ?, Sarah, b. 1727

Duncan:  son of:  Bohanon, Dunkin (Jr. ?), b. Jan. 17, 1704 in Gloucester, VA, d. 1760 in Orange Co., VA

Son of:  Bohanon, Dunkan (Sr.?) b. Abt. 1675 in Gloucester, VA, d.  Feb/Mar, 1753 in Orange Co. VA, m. Sarah Elliott, b. abt. 1677

Son of:  Bohanon, Duncan, b. Abt. 1649
m. Dudley,  ? , b. abt. 1653

The Signature of Richard Stockton (above)

THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

In Congress, July 4, 1776,

THE UNANIMOUS DECLARATION OF THE THIRTEEN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws of Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the Lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the Protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

JOHN HANCOCK, President

Attested, CHARLES THOMSON, Secretary

New Hampshire
 JOSIAH BARTLETT	(My ancestor, a doctor and a curmudgeon to
			 be proud of, by all accounts)
 WILLIAM WHIPPLE
 MATTHEW THORNTON

Massachusetts-Bay
 SAMUEL ADAMS
 JOHN ADAMS
 ROBERT TREAT PAINE
 ELBRIDGE GERRY

Rhode Island
 STEPHEN HOPKINS
 WILLIAM ELLERY

Connecticut
 ROGER SHERMAN
 SAMUEL HUNTINGTON
 WILLIAM WILLIAMS
 OLIVER WOLCOTT

Georgia
 BUTTON GWINNETT
 LYMAN HALL
 GEO. WALTON

Maryland
 SAMUEL CHASE
 WILLIAM PACA
 THOMAS STONE
 CHARLES CARROLL
    OF CARROLLTON

Virginia
 GEORGE WYTHE
 RICHARD HENRY LEE
 THOMAS JEFFERSON
 BENJAMIN HARRISON
 THOMAS NELSON, JR.
 FRANCIS LIGHTFOOT LEE
 CARTER BRAXTON.

New York
 WILLIAM FLOYD
 PHILIP LIVINGSTON
 FRANCIS LEWIS
 LEWIS MORRIS

Pennsylvania
 ROBERT MORRIS
 BENJAMIN RUSH
 BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
 JOHN MORTON
 GEORGE CLYMER
 JAMES SMITH
 GEORGE TAYLOR
 JAMES WILSON
 GEORGE ROSS

Delaware
 CAESAR RODNEY
 GEORGE READ
 THOMAS M'KEAN

North Carolina
 WILLIAM HOOPER
 JOSEPH HEWES
 JOHN PENN

South Carolina
 EDWARD RUTLEDGE
 THOMAS HEYWARD, JR.
 THOMAS LYNCH, JR.
 ARTHUR MIDDLETON

New Jersey
 RICHARD STOCKTON
 JOHN WITHERSPOON
 FRANCIS HOPKINS
 JOHN HART
 ABRAHAM CLARK

Annis Boudinot Stockton

1736 – 1801

Wife of  Richard Stockton

Annis Boudinot, who became the wife of Richard Stockton, one of the most prominent young lawyers of New Jersey in 1762, was a woman of far more than ordinary intellectual ability and of a high character and patriotic spirit that made her a fitting companion for the man whose devotion to the cause of independ-ence brought him to his death before his time.

She was of French Huguenot descent, her family having come to America soon after the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1686. Her father, Elias Boudinot, was for a time a silversmith in Princeton and her brother, who bore the same name as their father, studied law in the office of Richard Stockton and married his sister, Hannah Stockton.

Richard Stockton was highly successful in the practice of his profession and had added mate-rially to the large estate he inherited from his father, when he married Annis Boudinot and took her to “Morven,” his handsome Colonial home, near Princeton. “Morven” was known for its hospitality and as a gathering place for some of the brightest minds of the day. They were living here, when Mr. Stockton was elected a delegate to the Continental Congress, and it was here that she performed a service which was made historic. When the British under Cornwallis came to Princeton in 1776, Mrs. Stockton secured and secreted a number of important state papers as well as the rolls and records of the American Whig Society of Prince-ton College, an act for which her name was added as an honorary member of the Society. Congress was then sitting in Baltimore and Mr. Stockton hastened home to conduct his family to a place of safety. He hurried them out of Princeton to Monmouth County, about thirty miles away, and then returning, went to spend the night with a friend, a patriot named Cowenhoven. That night a party of Tories came and arrested the two men. They were dragged from their bed at a late hour and half clad carried away and thrown into prison. Mr. Stockton was first taken to Amboy where he was confined in the common jail, suffering greatly from the cold. From there he was carried to the prison in New York, where he was most inhumanly treated. All the comforts and many of the necessities of life were withheld from him, notwithstanding the delicate condition of his health, and his high and honorable standing as a man. At one time he was left for twenty-four hours without food and then supplied only with the coarsest and not enough of that. Through the efforts of Mrs. Stockton, Congress was informed of these facts, and General Howe was given to understand that unless Mr. Stockton received better treatment in the future, retaliation would be taken on British prisoners. His condition was somewhat improved after that, but it was too late. The seeds had been sown of the dis-ease that was eventually to carry him to his grave. The British plundered his beautiful home, burned his splendid library and papers, and drove off his stock, much of which was blooded and highly valuable. The devastation of his estate, especially all that portion that could in any way be productive, taken together with the depreciation in value of the Continental cur-rency, so embarrassed Mr. Stockton financially that he was obliged to apply to friends for temporary assistance in order to supply his family with the necessaries of life. This caused a depression of spirits from which he never rallied and hastened the ravages of the disease that brought him to an untimely death in 178I, in the fifty-first year of his age.

Mrs. Stockton, who was three years younger than her husband, continued to live at “Morven” until her son Richard was married, when she relinquished her home to him and took up her residence in a house at the comer of Washington and Nassau streets, Princeton. Her youngest daughter, Abigail, lived with her until her own marriage to Robert Field of Whitehill, Burlington County, a brother of the wife of her brother Richard.

Richard Stockton left two sons and four daughters. Richard, the eldest son, born April 17, 1764, became one of the most eminent lawyers of the day. He left a number of children of whom the late Robert P. Stockton was one. The other son was Lucius Horatio, who also became a prominent lawyer and was appointed Secretary of War in 1801, by President Adams.

Richard Stockton’s eldest daughter, Julia, mar-ried Dr. Benjamin Rush of Philadelphia, also a signer of the Declaration of Independence. Susan Stockton, the second daughter married Alexander Cutbert of Canada. Mary married Rev. Andrew Hunter, D.D., who was a chaplain in the Con-tinental Army and a professor in Princeton.

Annis Boudinot was well known throughout the Revolution for her patriotic verse. One of her poems drew a courtly acknowledgment from General Washington to whom it was addressed. Another, Welcome, Mighty Chief, Once More! was sung by the young women of Trenton while Washington was passing through Princeton on his way to his first inauguration.

Mrs. Stockton wrote the following upon the announcement of peace in 1783:

“With all thy country’s blessings on thy head,
And all the glory that encircles man,
Thy deathless fame to distant nations spread,
And realms unblest by Freedom’s genial plan;
Addressed by statesmen, legislators, kings,
Revered by thousands as you pass along,
While every muse with ardour spreads her wings
To our hero in immortal song;
Say, can a woman’s voice an audience gain;
And stop a moment thy triumphal car?
And wilt thou listen to a peaceful strain,
Unskilled to paint the horrid wrack of war?
For what is glory–what are martial deeds–
Unpurified at Virtue’s awful shrine?
Full oft remorse a glorious day succeeds,
The motive only stamps the deed divine.
But thy last legacy, renowned chief,
Hath decked thy brow with honors more sublime,
Twined in thy wreath the Christian’s firm belief,
And nobly owned thy faith to future time.”

Washington sent an answer to this ode and the letter which she wrote enclosing it. Her letter is lost, but we have the ode given above and his reply which is as follows:

ROCKY HILL, Sept. 24th, 1783.
You apply to me, my dear madam, for abso-lution, as though you had committed a crime, great in itself yet of the venial class. You have reasoned good, for I find myself strongly dis-posed to be a very indulgent ghostly adviser on this occasion, and notwithstanding you are the most offending soul alive (that is if it is a crime to write elegant poetry), yet if you will come and dine with me on Thursday, and go through the proper course of penitence which shall be pre-scribed, I will strive hard to assist you in expiating these poetical trespasses on this side of purgatory. Nay, more, if it rests with me to direct your future lucubrations, I shall certainly urge you to a repetition of the same conduct–on purpose to show what an admirable knack you have at confession and reformation; and so without more hesitation I shall venture to recommend the muse not to be restrained by ill grounded timidity, but to go on and prosper. You see, madam, when once the woman has tempted us and we have tasted the forbidden fruit, there is no such thing as checking our appetite, whatever the consequences may be. You will, I dare say, recognise our being genuine descendants of those who are reputed to be our progenitors. Before I come to a more serious conclusion of my letter I must beg leave to say a word or two about these fine things you have been telling in such harmonious and beautiful numbers. Fiction is to be sure the very life and soul of poetry. All poets and poetesses have been indulged in the free and indisputable use of it–time out of mind, and to oblige you to make such an excellent poem on such a subject with-out any materials but those of simple reality would be as cruel as the edicts of Pharaoh, which compelled the Children of Israel to manufacture bricks without the necessary ingredients. Thus are you sheltered under the authority of prescription, and I will not dare to charge you with an intentional breach of the rules of the decalogue in giving so bright a co louring to the service I have been enabled to render my country, though I am not conscious of deserving more at your hands than what the poorest and most disinterested friendship has a right to claim: actuated by which you will permit me to thank you in a most affectionate manner for the kind wishes you have so happily expressed for me and the partner of all my domestic enjoyments. Be assured we can never forget our friend at Morven and that I am, my dear madam, your most obedient and obliged servant,
GO. WASHINGTON.

Source: Wives of the Signers: The Women Behind the Declaration of Independence, by Harry Clinton Green and Mary Wolcott Green, A.B. (Aledo, TX: Wallbuilder Press, 1997). Orignaly Published in 1912 as volume 3 of The Pioneer Mothers of America: A Record of the More Notable Women of the Early Days of the Country, and Particularly of the Colonial and Revolutionary Periods (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons). Pages 132-139. (Some minor spelling changes may have been made.)

Morvan at Princeton NJ

Annis Boudinot Stockton