William Skaggs, the eldest son of James "The Long Hunter" Skaggs applied for a military pension in 1832 for service during the American Revolution. In that pension application William stated that he was born in North Carolina. "...the said Skaggs further states that he was born in the state of North Carolina the County he does not remember; it was near a place called the horse pasture as he learned from his mother..." Where was Horse Pasture?
The Skaggs Y-DNA project has been working diligently testing male volunteers who descend along different Skaggs family lines. Volunteers have been tested from the branch of the Skaggs family that consists of descendants of "Hunting" Henry Skaggs and Aaron Skaggs who married Sarah Lyon. This branch traces back to southern Maryland in the early 1700s and we've decided to call it the Aaron Skaggs branch because of the number of men named Aaron in the family lines.
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?
