Whitfield family of the United States

The Whitfield family was a prominent American political family of the Southern states. The Whitfields formed the American branch of the British Whitfield family - having descended from the British aristocracy, particularly the Earls of Kilmorey and having established colonial residency under Sir. Thomas Whitfield, whom headed East India Trading for the British Empire. In early days of Colonial America, the family emigrated to Virginia in the seventeenth century, particularly, Nansemond County, Virginia from Lancashire, England.[1][2]

This article is about the American Whitfield family. For the British main branch, see Whitfield family. For other uses, see Whitfield (disambiguation).
Whitfield
Current regionUnited States
EtymologyHoit-Feldt, Norse for "white field"
Place of originUnited Kingdom
MembersWilliam Whitfield I
William Whitfield II
William Whitfield III
Henry L. Whitfield
James B. Whitfield
James Whitfield
Nathan Bryan Whitfield
Connected familiesHerring family, Bryan family, Wooten family
DistinctionsPlanters (American gentry)

The family produced many United States Congressmen, Senators and Governors, as well as businessmen and military generals active from the American Revolutionary War and past the American Civil War, with significance during the antebellum period. The family is most connected to the U.S. State of North Carolina, but had extended land ownership, slave trade, business activities and public service to Louisiana, Alabama, Kentucky, Mississippi and Florida.[3]

Background
The Gaineswood plantation home.
Ballroom at Gaineswood.

Born in Lancashire, England, patriarch William Whitfield I moved to Nansemond County, Virginia.[4] In 1770, Whitfield, along with his wife, were killed by the Tuscarora Indians. His son, William Whitfield II purchased Seven Springs, North Carolina from Buckskin Williams, the father of Benjamin Williams, the Governor of North Carolina.[5] During the American Revolutionary War, he served as a Captain of the 6th Virginia Regiment, along with his sons, Needham Whitfield and William Whitfield III who were in the Battle of Moore's Creek Bridge during the revolutionary war. The former was a clerk to Colonel Richard Caswell and the other a private in the Light Horse Cavalry, taking prisoner General McDonald, who was the Commander of the Tories.[6]

Whitfield II was a Dobbs County member to the 1761 and 1762 North Carolina General Assembly held in Wilmington. In 1779 he was a member of Governor Richard Caswell's Council held in New Berne, and a Justice of Peace for Johnston County, North Carolina. He was later a Colonel.[7] Whitfield III in turn, was also appointed Justice of the Peace for Dobbs County in 1778. Along with his son, he was a Director and Trustee for designing and building the town of Wanesboro. He had 29 children[8] and forty of his descendants served in the confederate army during the American Civil war.[4]

This included, Nathan Bryan Whitfield, William III's nephew, who became the Counselor of State for the State of North Carolina and was a State Senator. He was later commissioned to Major General rank to succeed his father for the militia. His son, Dr. Bryan Watkins Whitfield, was pardoned by U.S. President Andrew Johnson on September 12, 1865.[9] Gaineswood, which still stands today, was the most significant remaining examples of Greek Revival architecture in Alabama.[10] was designed and built by Whitfield, beginning in 1843 as an open-hall log dwelling. Whitfield is known to have designed most of the house from pattern books by James Stuart, Minard Lafever, Nicholas Revett and others.[11] Much of the work on the house was executed by highly skilled artisan slaves.[12] Whitfield moved from North Carolina to Marengo County, Alabama in 1834. In 1842 Whitfield bought the 480-acre (1.9 km2) property from George Strother Gaines, younger brother of Edmund P. Gaines.

The library inside the Gaineswood residence.

Much of the work on the house was executed by highly skilled artisan slaves.[12] The grounds had been the site of a notable historic event while owned by George Gaines. When Gaines was serving as the US Indian Agent, he is said to have met with the famous chief Pushmataha, of the Choctaw Nation, under an old post oak tree on what would become the Gaineswood estate. They were negotiating the terms of the treaty that would lead to the Choctaw removal to Indian Territory. The tree became known as the Pushmataha Oak.[13]

Whitfield first named the estate Marlmont in 1843; he renamed it Gaineswood in 1856 in honor of Gaines.[11] The Whitfield family tradition maintained that Gaines' original log house was the nucleus around which Whitfield had the mansion built, and that it was located at the present site of the south entrance hall and office.[12] Gen. Whitfield sold the house to his son, Dr. Bryan Watkins Whitfield, in 1861. The second generation of Whitfields maintained Gaineswood as a residence. Mary Foscue Whitfield inherited the nearby Foscue-Whitfield House in 1861 upon her father's death and used that as a residence as well.[11] For later descendants, post Civil War, the lands and plantations were sold.

The family established the Henry Whitfield House in 1639 in the town of Guilford, Connecticut. Historically, it is Connecticut's oldest house. The house, with its massive stone walls, also served as a fort to protect the community Henry Whitfield, for whom the house was built, was a Puritan minister who had come from England to flee religious persecution The house was remodeled in 1868 and opened to the public in 1899 as the first museum of the State of Connecticut, the Henry Whitfield State Museum. The house was restored in 1902–04 and in the 1930s and was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1997. It was named a State Archaeological Preserve in 2006.

Members
General Nathan Bryan Whitfield, portrait at Gaineswood.
Governor James Whitfield
Justice James B. Whitfield

Others
Governor Henry L. Whitfield

See also

References
  1. Connelley, William Elsey (1923). History Of Kentucky, Volume 5. Nabu Press. p. 914. ISBN 978-1273257155. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  2. Hathaway, James Robert Bent (1900). The North Carolina Historical and Genealogical Register, Volume 1. Retrieved August 12, 2013.
  3. Scarborough, William Kauffman (2006). Masters of the Big House: Elite Slaveholders of the Mid-Nineteenth-Century South. Louisiana State University Press. p. 521. ISBN 978-0807131558. Retrieved April 4, 2006.
  4. The North Carolina Historical and Genealogical Register Volume I
  5. Daughters of the American Revolution. DAR. p. 385.
  6. Whitfield, Emma. Whitfield, Bryan, Smith & Related Families.
  7. Whitfield Record, The North Carolina historical and genealogical register. Vol I, Number 4. 1900. pp. 567–576.
  8. Whitfield, William, Battle of Moore's Creek Bridge
  9. Dr Bryan Watkins Whitfield at Find a Grave.
  10. Gamble, Robert Historic architecture in Alabama: a guide to styles and types, 1810-1930, page 76. Tuscaloosa, Alabama: The University of Alabama Press, 1990. ISBN 0-8173-1134-3.
  11. Marengo County Heritage Book Committee: The heritage of Marengo County, Alabama, page 18. Clanton, Alabama: Heritage Publishing Consultants, 2000. ISBN 1-891647-58-X
  12. ""Gaineswood". "Alabama Historical Commission". Archived from the original on 2007-08-27. Retrieved 2007-09-18.
  13. Hammond, Ralph Ante-bellum Mansions of Alabama, pages 114-120. New York: Architectural Book Publishers, 1951. ISBN 0-517-02075-0
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