The Maryland frontier militia during the French and Indian War was commanded by Capt. John Dagworthy. Richard, James and Isaac were three Marylander Scaggs who enlisted in the militia on 9 October 1757. They participated in the Forbes Expedition to capture Fort Duquesne, a French fortress on the site of present-day downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. This was the same fort that Gen. Edward Braddock failed to capture in 1755 when his command was annihilated by the French and Indians.
Skaggs researchers working thorough 17th century records may encounter the time-waster Capt. Thomas Stegge (a.k.a. Stagge, Stagg, Stegg). In 1651 he was sent to America by the English Crown to subdue the colonies of Virginia and Maryland. He was lost in an Atlantic storm on his return to England. He left a son, Thomas Stegge Jr., who died c. 1671 without male issue.
I've written a lot about Zachariah Skaggs, about how he was not the father of Old Peter, about how he is frequently confused with a much younger Zachariah, etc. Skaggs family Y-DNA testing has determined that Zachariah was closely related to the William Scaggs of the New River Valley of Virginia who married Esther.
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| Montgomery County, Virginia |
The Skaggs Y-DNA project has been hard at work testing male volunteers who descend along different Skaggs family lines. Two volunteers have both tested as having the R-FT14580 haplogroup. One of the testers is a documented descendant of the Scaggs who settled the Maryland Eastern Shore in Talbot and Kent Counties. The second tester is a descendant of the Ohio pioneer Skaggs family with known roots in Maryland. These results show that the Ohio pioneer Skaggs are related to the Maryland Eastern Shore Scaggs, with details below the fold.
Old Peter Skaggs had a wife, Martha, whose last name has been described as Cothron, Catherine, Cohun, etc. Below the fold is a photocopy of Rev. Richard Whitt's minister return for Montgomery County, Virginia in 1788 that shows Peter Skaggs married to Martha C____?
In a recent post regarding the Long Hunters I referenced two deeds from 1769 where James Skaggs Sr. deeded land to two sons, Henry and James Skaggs Jr. I think it's worth looking at one of these two deeds in detail since Skaggs ancestors were involved with several important historical figures from the New River area of Virginia when these deeds were signed.
During the American Revolution the Virginia legislature passed laws that required an oath of allegiance to the State. Free men of age of majority were required to make the following oath:
"We whose names are hereunto subscribed do swear or affirm that we renounce and refuse all allegiance to George third King of Great Britain, his heirs successors and that, I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to the Commonwealth of Virginia as a free and independent State and that I will not at any time do or Cause to be done any matter or thing that will be make known to some one Justice of the Peace for the said State all treasons or traitorous Conspiracies which I now or hereafter shall known to be formed against this or any of the United States of America."In 1777 Montgomery County mustered the militia and required the oath. The result is an interesting list of declared revolutionaries that is useful to family historians.
There's been a recent flurry of research activity for the Skaggs family in 17th century America. I think it might be a good time to recap what has been discovered about the Skaggs family in the new world prior to 1750. Below the fold is a chronological timeline for the Skaggs family in the new world.
There's been a flurry of recent activity researching early Skaggs in the Northern Neck counties of Virginia. A 1731 record has been found of a Charles Skaggs in Stafford County, Virginia witnessing the signing of a will. This Charles was likely born prior to 1711 making him a contemporary with James Skaggs, father of the Long Hunters and the Aaron Scaggs from Maryland who married Susannah Hyatt.
I was recently made aware of three 17th century records involving Skaggs in Old Rappahannock County, Virginia. To my knowledge the only Skaggs records found to date in Virginia from the 17th century are the Cavaliers and Pioneers records for Richard Scaggs and Thomas Scaggs immigration. These new records below may be a clue to bridge Skaggs genealogy from the Richard and Thomas Scaggs immigration in the 1650s to various Skaggs genealogies traced back to the early 1700s.
A researcher recently shared an interesting 1695 deed from Essex County, Virginia that contains a clue about a "Scaggs Plantation" in that county. John Webster granted a tract of land in Essex County (previously Rappahannock County) to Edmond Roberts except for 100 acres lying on the south side of Browne's Branch commonly called Scaggs Plantation. The transcribed deed follows.
Results are back from a Y-DNA test for a descendant of Zachariah Skaggs. The Zachariah descendant had a different Y-DNA haplogroup than both Old Peter and Old Solomon Skaggs, meaning Zachariah couldn't have been either the father or brother of Old Peter Skaggs or his brother Old Solomon. They were likely related, but not from the same immediate family.
There has been an interesting development in the Skaggs Y-DNA project. Descendants of Old Peter Skaggs and his legendary brother, Old Solomon, have been found to have the same Y-DNA haplogroup, R-BY99605.
From the vault of hideous medical experimentation: the hanging of John H. Skaggs and the attempt to use electrical current to return him from the dead. This horrible story is a real historical Frankenstein episode from the backwoods country of the Missouri boot-heel of 1870.
Here's a bit of a mystery that requires some research...where were the Long Hunter Skaggs from 1755 to 1768? We have deeds, land surveys and road construction orders involving James Skaggs Sr., the father of the Long Hunters, from the late 1740s to 1754 in Augusta County, Virginia. Then a gap of silence until 1769 when James Sr. appears on two deeds with sons Henry and James Jr. Why the information gap from 1755 to 1768?
Calvin Skaggs is the President of Lumiere Productions, a documentary production company in New York City. He has directed or produced more than 30 films for cinema and television. He's a descendant of one of the Long Hunters, as shown below the fold.
Recently I put up a post about Leonard Scaggs and his relationship to Skeggs families. The Skaggs DNA project had a documented descendant of Leonard test and the results of course were very interesting.
I've usually stayed away from writing about the Long Hunter Skaggs since they are the most documented branch of the Skaggs family. I've rarely felt I could add anything new to the discussion about these guys, with a few exceptions. However, there is some new research regarding Henry Skaggs that deserves attention.
William Scaggs married Susannah Brashears in Lawrence County, Tennessee 14 February 1828. Susannah came from the South Carolina Brashears family and was born there about 1805. After his 1828 marriage William disappears from the record. Where did he go? Who was this guy?
There is a family legend amongst Skeggs that descend from Leonard of Frederick County, Maryland that Isaac Skaggs immigrated through the port of Salem, New Jersey from London, England sometime in the 1700s and settled in Salem County. I never paid much attention to this legend since no evidence of Skaggs have been found to date from eighteenth-century New Jersey. Until now.
Leonard Scaggs (a.k.a. Skaggs, Skeggs) was the progenitor of several American families known today mostly as Skeggs. We currently don't know much about him prior to his appearance in the 1800 U.S. census in Frederick County, Maryland, however, he is the common ancestor of several Skeggs families across the United States and is important to us in understanding how the Skaggs, Scaggs and Skeggs families were structured just after the American Revolution.
A while back I posted a question about a James Skaggs who was referred to in the minutes of the Big Blaine Baptist Church in Lawrence County, Kentucky back in 1825.
There is an excellent website for persons interested in the Skaggs family history called Manx Family History. It has a lot of great information about the various Skaggs family lines based on DNA testing. For example, the Old Peter Skaggs line is described here. Other Skaggs lines are shown below the fold.
