A NEW GENTRY FAMILY

by
Willard Gentry

Introduction
It is a constant struggle, with no end in sight at the moment, to attempt the identification of early-generation Gentrys for whom documentation is either fragmentary or missing. These cases tend to divide into two categories: (a) cases where there is only a brief mention of a name and then no further record; and (b) cases where the later family structure may be well established, but there is no clue as to where that family ties into the overall Gentry family tree. In this article we will be visiting examples of both types of problem. We will be discussing here several problem Gentry identifications:

1. A James W. Gentry and wife Annie witnessed a deed in Mercer County, Kentucky in 1789, and there is no clue as to what happened to them or who their family might be. There is no other known mention of a wife Annie as a wife of the earliest generation James Gentrys.
2. A David Gentry is listed in "The Gentry Family of America" (No. 267)<1> as being born in Virginia in 1778. This David moved to Kentucky and then to Chariton County, Missouri, where his descendants, especially a son, Belitha Gentry, are well documented. From which Gentry did David descend?
3. A family group consisting of Mary Gentry Gillispie Boggs, Jefferson Thomas Gentry, and Clifton Gentry, all of whom were married in Madison County, Kentucky<2>, moved from Kentucky to Andrew County, Missouri. These families then parted company and went separately to Richardson County, Nebraska, and to Brown County, Kansas. The parents of this family group, and possible siblings have been suggested but the proposed names are not at all persuasive.
4. An Enoch Gentry and an Elijah Gentry were married in Madison County, Kentucky, in 1803 and 1810 respectively<2>. Enoch died by 1806 the year in which his estate was inventoried. Three of the children of Elijah and his widow have been described in local histories for Morgan County, Indiana, and by descendants<3>, but there is no knowledge of his antecedents. Suggestions as to the identity of these two Gentrys have been made but are doubtful.

We will discuss these four cases in turn to see whether they are related, and if so, how they tie together. We show here a map of Kentucky as of 1810 to help the reader place the various Gentrys in their respective locations.

Counties of Central Kentucky, 1810
(Shaded counties with Gentrys)

1. James Gentry of Mercer County

As indicated above, a James W. Gentry and Annie M. Gentry, witnessed a deed in Mercer County, Kentucky, in 1789<4>. This may have been the same Gentry who is mentioned, without further identification, as having a joint interest in 893 acres of land in 1785 in Fayette County, (eventually part of Kentucky but a part of Virginia at the time.<5>.

This James is unlikely to be the same James Gentry whose estate was inventoried in Madison County, Kentucky, in 1809<6a>. The identity of this latter James has most commonly been said to be a son of David Gentry of Albemarle County, Virginia, and Madison County, Kentucky (a son of David Gentry Sr. and grandson of Nicholas-II Gentry). The fact that David included a son James in his will, which was recorded in 1813<7>, casts doubt on whether the James that died in 1809 was his son or another James.

The fact that the James of Mercer County was married at the time of the 1789 reference leaves upon a wide range of dates for possible children. It also sets some parameters for the date of his own birth, namely, probably before 1769, and the place certainly in Virginia. We will return to James later and discuss possibilities for his connection to the mainstream Gentry family after we consider possible children.

2. David Gentry (GFA #267)

Richard Gentry in "The Gentry Family in America" had this to say about David Gentry and his family:

"Born in Virginia, March 10, 1778, married Jennie, (born in Virginia, Nov. 24, 1780); he is said to have a brother James. He moved to Kentucky and settled on a farm near Crab Orchard about the year 1800. In 1825, he moved, with his entire family, from Kentucky to Chariton Co., MO, and in a few years he was drowned in the Chariton River".

He lists the following children for David and Jennie: Belith (born 1803), John (born 1805), Clarinda (born 1809), Lucinda (born 1811), Sally (born 1813), Nancy (born 1817), William (born 1819), Katie (born 1821), and Rachel (born 1824).

David and Jennie and their two oldest children, Belinda and Clarinda, appeared in the Clay County, Kentucky, census for 1810<11>. This would have been some distance from Crab Orchard, Kentucky, where GFA places his home. Crab Orchard is in the eastern corner of Lincoln County, but Clay County is only one county removed from there and David may have resided there for a time either before or after 1810. In 1820, the family appears to have been in Posey County, Indiana, where the census listing for a David Gentry in that year fits the Kentucky David perfectly. By 1830, the family had moved to Chariton County, Missouri, where David is said to have drowned. Various children continued to appear in 1840 and succeeding census records in Chariton County or in neighboring Livingston and Grundy Counties, Missouri. David's children as listed in GFA agree well with census data with the exception that "Belith" is regularly spelled "Belitha". There is some disagreement about where Belitha was born. In the 1850 census for Grundy County, Missouri, his birthplace was listed as Virginia. In 1860, it was listed as Kentucky. The 1880 census report by three of his children was split at two in Virginia, and one in Kentucky. In all cases his wife's birthplace is listed as Kentucky.

It has been very difficulty to identify parents of this David. Based upon his presence in central Kentucky during his years of residence there, the odds greatly favor the possibility that he was a part of the Nicholas-II Gentry family. Yet, that family had so many Davids that it has not been possible to come up with a satisfactory lineage for him. To illustrate this difficulty, consider the following table of descendants of Nicholas-II (we have added the suffixes "-III", "IV", etc. to identify the Davids as to generation with respect to Nicholas the Immigrant).

Sons of Nicholas	Grandsons	Comments
David-III (b. abt. 1724) m(1). abt. 1751 m(2) abt. 1758	Bailey (b. abt. 1753)	Oldest known son, first marriage, David-III could have had other sons before David-IV
	David-IV (b. abt. 1761)	son David-V (b. abt. 1794)
	Richard-IV (b. abt. 1763)	son David-V (b. abt. 1787)
Robert-III (b. abt. 1726)	No Davids but family sufficiently well known to eliminate
Nicholas-III (b. abt. 1728) m(1) abt. 1752	David-IV (b. abt. 1754)	Family moved to NC
	Other children moved to Bullitt County, Kentucky
Benajah-III (b. abt. 1733) m(1) abt. 1760	No Davids, but only one member of family known to have gone to Kentucky -- to Monroe County.
Moses-III (b. abt. 1735) m. abt. 1758	James-IV (b. abt.1767)	Oldest son -- m. 1788, so too late to be father of David-267
	David-IV (m. 1810, KY)	Moses unlikely to have had another son David born before James
Nathan-III (b. abt. 1745)	No members of family left Virginia
Martin-III (b. 1747) m. 1766	No Davids but family sufficiently well known that addition of an unknown David is unlikely

As this chart demonstrates, there are very few places where we can propose the insertion of an unidentified David Gentry. With the proliferation of Davids in the family tree, it is most likely that David's father was also a Gentry who has not been clearly located within that tree. We are going to propose that David was a son of the hitherto unidentified James W. and Annie M. Gentry. Before pursuing this proposal further, we will leave David for the moment and go on to consider other unidentified Gentrys who may have been in the same category as this David.

3. The Mary / Jefferson / Clifton Gentry Family

For many years there have been queries in the genealogy community asking for clues as to the identity of three sibling families that settled in western Missouri, eastern Kansas, and eastern Nebraska. My first contact with them was in 1981 as a subscriber to "Gentry Family Gazette & Genealogy Exchange" (published by Richard H. Gentry). Periodically, this problem was brought up and discussed until the periodical ceased publication in 1997<8>. Queries have continued since then in places such as the Gentry Family Forum hosted by Genealogy.Com. As a result of correspondence interchange, many details of the later life of Mary Boggs of Andrew County, Missouri; Jefferson Gentry of Richardson County, Nebraska; and Clifton Gentry of Brown County, Kansas, have been answered. Up to this point, there has not been a satisfactory answer to the identity of their father.

Briefly, the facts of the case are as follows. These three individuals (and a fourth sister, Lucinda) were siblings, said to be the children of a James Gentry who married an Elizabeth Tatum. The information as to their father comes from a granddaughter of Clifton, Lily White, who lived with her grandparents for many years after her own mother died. In turn that information was passed on to one of the individuals involved in the interchange of queries and answers. Suggestions have been made as to the identity of this James, but none seemed to fit the bill exactly. In all cases, the facts already known about the children of known James Gentry families made it very awkward to add three or four new names of this specific sex and age. The problem I believe is that they were looking in the wrong place, namely Madison County, Kentucky where the children grew up and were married. Instead a James Gentry family that was listed in the 1820 census for next-door Fayette County fits the pattern very nicely.

The oldest of the children we are trying to identify was Mary (also known as "Polly"), born about 1807. Next was a daughter, Lucinda, born about 1814. Jefferson Gentry was born Sep 1818, and Clifton Gentry was born Jul 1821. The three oldest children were with James in the 1820 census. In 1830, there is no corresponding James Gentry, but his widow, Elizabeth, is believed to be the Elizabeth Gentry who was in the Madison County census for that year. Mary had married by then, so only Lucinda, Jefferson, and Clifton were present in the 1830 family. It seems apparent that their father James had died not many years after Clifton was born, probably in Fayette County, and his widow took the orphaned children to Madison County where she may have had relatives.. Jefferson was listed in the age group less than ten years old rather than greater than ten, but this is a minor discrepancy. In 1840, Mary was listed as a single mother along with her mother, Elizabeth, but Lucinda, Jefferson and Clifton have not been found in the census for that year. All four of these children have marriage bonds recorded for them in Madison County<2>, Mary to Wilson Gillispie in 1828, Lucinda to Augustus Pean in 1836, Jefferson to Elizabeth Tillett in 1841, and Clifton to Eliza Jane Guthrie three days earlier than Jefferson, also in 1841. Mary was married again in 1843, to Robert R. Boggs. All four families left Kentucky shortly afterwards and moved to Andrew County, Missouri. There is some mystery connected with the marriages of Lucinda. She divorced her husband, resumed the name Gentry for herself and her children, then married, Eli Cornelison. But a William White is recorded as being the father of at least one of her children who was born in 1840. In 1846, Lucinda "Dianna" (an alternate spelling for "Pean") was married in Madison County to Eli Cornelison, and she may have had to give her married name for this ceremony. How these marriages (or lack of marriages) interconnect is of no concern for the purposes of this article and we will not pursue it further.

Let us now focus on the proposed father of these four children, namely James. There is the possibility of considerable confusion about the name of his wife, Elizabeth. His descendants give the name of his wife as Elizabeth Tatum and estimate the date of marriage as about 1805.. In the Madison County records, a James Gentry married Elizabeth Tudor (or Tuder) in 1799<2>. Could this have been the same James and later generations simply confused Tatum for Tudor? That would be possible, but dates of marriage reinforce the fact that two different James are involved. Because James was living in Fayette County in 1820, it is probable that the years before that were also spent in Fayette County and he was married there even though the family later moved to Madison County. There is only one Gentry marriage record preserved for Fayette County and that was Garland Gentry in 1821. James date of birth has been estimated at about 1782. His son, Jefferson, in 1900 gave James' place of birth as Virginia. Clifton, also in 1900, gave the birthplace as Kentucky.

In connecting this James to the mainstream Gentry descendancy tree, we are faced with the same problem as for David above. There were so many James Gentry living contemporaneously with him that it is difficult to find a possible line of descent that does not already have a James Gentry in their family. We will be presenting a hypothesis that this James was a son of the same James W. and Annie M. Gentry proposed for David, and that he was the James, brother of David, to whom GFA refers. Before doing so, we will once again leave the question hanging and look at two more "orphan" Gentrys.

4. Enoch and Elijah Gentry

Enoch Gentry was married in Madison County, Kentucky, in 1803. His wife was Lucy Lee. The only other mention of Enoch is a report of the inventory of his estate in 1806<6b>. Who was this Enoch? From his marriage date we can estimate his date of birth as roughly 1780. Two sons of David-III Gentry were predominant in Madison County at that time. The older, David Jr, was married once about 1780, then a second time about 1783. It would be possible for Enoch to have been a son of David Jr. and his first wife, but not realistically likely to have been a son of his second wife. Henrietta and one of the many James Gentrys are thought to have been children of this first wife and are mentioned in David's will of 1813. Even if Enoch was a part of this family, he would not have been included in this will because he had already died, The short time interval between marriages of David argues against Enoch being part of this family. David Jr.'s younger brother, Richard, was married in 1784, and the members of his family are known in considerable detail and did not include Enoch. Is Enoch another candidate for being a son of James W. Gentry?

Elijah Gentry is another Gentry who appeared only briefly in Madison County records. He was married in 1810 to Elizabeth Ware, with no hint of his parentage. That same year, Elijah and Elizabeth were in the 1810 census for Clay County, Kentucky. This was apparently right after his marriage for he is shown with a presumed wife and no children (Elijah was listed as born after 1784, Elizabeth born before). Of interest is the fact that he was listed on the same census page as David Gentry -- the same David as we discussed above. This strongly suggests that Elijah may have been a younger brother of David. A biography of one of Elijah's sons, James W. Gentry<3>, remarks that Elijah and Elizabeth left Kentucky in about 1816 and moved to Harrison County, Indiana.

After Elijah died in 1817, his widow moved to Monroe County, Indiana where she and her sons Lemuel and James lived for many years. In 1840, James and an obvious brother Lemuel appeared in the 1840 census for Monroe County, James with no children and Lemuel with four young children. Both families were present again in the 1850 census for this same county. Lemuel was age 39 at the time, born in Kentucky, and James was 37, also born in Kentucky. Lemuel clearly is the older child of Elijah and Elizabeth to which reference is made in the biography mentioned above.

Assembling a Family for James W. and Annie M. Gentry

We propose a family for James W. Gentry consisting of all of the unconnected Gentrys discussed above, namely, David, James, Enoch, and Elijah. This would give a family as follows:

James W. Gentry – born about 1756, Louisa County, Virginia – married Ann [Unknown] probably about 1777 in Louisa County
James probably died as a young man considering the fact that he appears to have had only four children spaced quite closely together, and also the fact that aside from the reference in Mercer County, nothing more is known of him and he was not included in any early Kentucky tax lists or census records.
	Children of James and Ann (speculation)
i	David Gentry
	– born 10 Mar 1778, Virginia (date taken from GFA) – married "Jennie" [Unknown], about 1801, probably in Kentucky
		– born 27 Nov 1780, Virginia.
		Children of David and Jennie:
	a.	Belitha Gentry, born 19 Mar 1803, Kentucky; married 20 Dec 1827, Clay County, Kentucky, Martha Sandlin (born about 1805).
	b.	John W. Gentry, born 29 Sep 1805; married 15 Dec 1825, Chariton County, Missouri, Nancy McCollum.
	(?)	Son? [Note. The 1810 census for Clay County, Kentucky, for David's family includes three boys under the age of 10, whereas in the 1820 census for Posey County, Indiana, only two of those were present. The third boy may have been a son of David's brother, Enoch, who died in 1806, only three years after he was married.]
	c.	Clarinda Gentry, born 15 Mar 1809;
	d.	Lucinda Gentry, born 13 Jul 1811; married 21 Jan 1830, Chariton County, Missouri, William McCollum.
	e.	Sally Gentry, born 17 Oct 1813 (there are some reports that Sally married John T. Gentry in Missouri).
	f.	Nancy Gentry, born 28 Feb 1817; married 3 Jan 1833, Chariton County, Missouri, Nathan Payne.
	g.	William Gentry, born 27 Jan 1819, Indiana; married Elizabeth Wiles. William died 27 Jan 1865, Mercer County, Missouri.
	h.	Catharine "Katy" Gentry, born 11 Oct 1821
	i.	Rachel Gentry, born 25 May 1824.
	David is said to have died in 1832, by drowning in the Chariton River in Chariton County, Missouri. David appeared in the 1810 census for Clay County, Kentucky, in the 1820 census for Posey County, Indiana, and in the 1830 census for Chariton County, Missouri. Members of the family spread from there to nearby Livingston and Grundy Counties, Missouri.
ii	James Gentry Jr. – born about 1781, Virginia (?) – married about 1805, Fayette County (?), Kentucky, Elizabeth Tatum.
		Children of James and Elizabeth:
	a.	Mary "Polly" Gentry, born about 1807; married (1) 30 Jun 1828, Madison County, Kentucky, Wilson Gillispie; married (2) 7 Dec1843, Madison County, Robert R. Boggs. Mary died 1865, Andrew County, Missouri.
	b.	Lucinda Gentry, born about 1814; first (and second?) marriages uncertain (Madison County records show marriage of Lucinda 14 Jun 1835 to Augustus Pean (various other spellings), then divorced 1843; also possible marriage to William White; last marriage, 10 Oct 1846, Garrard County, Missouri, to Eli Cornelison. Lucinda resumed the Gentry surname for herself and her children after her divorce from Augustus.
	c.	Jefferson Gentry, born Sep 1818, Kentucky; married 23 Sep 1841, Madison County, Kentucky, Elizabeth Tillett (born about Sep 1821, Kentucky). Jefferson died 8 Jul 1902, Dawson, Richardson County, Nebraska.
	d.	Clifton Gentry, born Jul 1821, Madison County, Kentucky; married 20 Sep 1841, Madison County, Elizabeth "Eliza" "Louisa" Jane Guthrie (originally Baker). Clifton died 24 Aug 1901, Padonia, Brown County, Kansas.
	James appears only in the 1820 census for Fayette County, Kentucky. He probably died not long after his son Clifton was born. His widow, Elizabeth, moved to Madison County, Kentucky, and appeared there with all of her remaining family in the 1830 census, and living with her daughter Mary thereafter. Mary, Lucinda, and Jefferson appeared in the 1850 Andrews County, Missouri, census, but Clifton's first census listing was in 1860 in Brown County, Kansas.
iii	Enoch Gentry – born about 1783 – married 1 Feb 1803, Madison County, Kentucky, Lucy Lee. Enoch died about 1806 (estate inventory recorded Jul 1806), Madison County.
iv	Elijah Gentry – born about 1785, Kentucky – married 28 Jun 1810, Madison County, Kentucky, Elizabeth Ware [Elizabeth may have been a sister of Susannah Ware who married Charles Gentry of Clark County, Kentucky, in 1803]
		Children of Elijah and Elizabeth:
	a.	Lemuel K. Gentry, born 12 Jun 1811, Kentucky; married 24 Dec 1831, Morgan County, Indiana, Betsy Ann Arnold (born 1814, Kentucky; died 1883, Indiana). Lemuel died 10 Nov 1863, Monroe County, Indiana.
	b.	James Sams Gentry, born 9 Jan 1813, Kentucky; married 8 Feb 1838, Monroe County, Indiana, Eliza Campbell (born 1822, died 1917). James died 11 Oct 1884, Mount Tabor, Monroe County. [James' biography in Monroe County indicates he was the second of three children of Elijah.]
	c.	Sarah ("Sallie") Gentry, born 17 May 1815, Kentucky; married 14 Jul 1837, John Wesley Burton. Sallie died 28 Sep 1872, Indiana.
	d.(?)	Son ?, Elijah B. Gentry (living with Elizabeth Gentry in Greene County, Illinois, in 1850; age 40?)
	Elijah (Sr.) died about 1817 in Indiana (Harrison County?). He served as a private in the War of 1812 with the Kentucky Mounted Volunteer Militia, Aug-Nov, 1813. He moved from Kentucky to Harrison County, Indiana about 1816. The Elizabeth Gentry who was living in Greene County, Illinois in 1850 may have been his widow, or the names of Elizabeth and Elijah in the household may have only been a coincidence.

This family grouping makes a neat, logical package but how does it relate to the rest of the Gentry mainstream family? To tie it to the other Gentrys we must answer the question of the relationship of the family patriarch here, James Gentry Sr., to the Gentry family, and particularly to all of the family's next door neighbors in Madison County, Kentucky. To do this we need to go back to James' roots which are presumed to be in Louisa County, Virginia.

We can estimate his date of birth from the ages of the rest of James' family. The birth date of his son David is the most solidly established and has been quoted as September 1778. Assuming a marriage date for James a year or two before that, gives a date of marriage of roughly 1776-1777. Then assuming further that James may have been from say eighteen to twenty-three years old at marriage, his birth date would have probably been in the range from 1753 to 1759. Let us say his estimated date of birth was about 1755.

The fact that James moved from Virginia to central Kentucky almost surely ties him to the Nicholas-II branch of the Gentry family. Other Gentrys eventually found their way to Kentucky but during the earliest movements, the migration was all by Nicholas' family, in particular by his sons David, Nicholas-III, Moses and Martin. When one looks at James' proposed date of birth and the ages of the Nicholas Gentry children, almost the only possibility is that James was an unrecognized son of David-III. In this journal, we have already discussed one son of David, Bailey, that had not previously been recognized as such<10>. Bailey was first listed in 1769 in Trinity Parish tax lists in Louisa County, Virginia, in his father's household as a taxable individual. Because white males in Virginia were required to be over the age of sixteen to be liable for a poll tax, this suggests Bailey was born about 1753. Bailey left home in 1772 and moved to a different parish in Louisa County, but then dropped from sight after 1774 (presumably died). In the previous journal article we pointed out that the presence of Bailey presumes there was a first wife of David-III Gentry, before Mary Estes whom he married in about1757. The suggested date of birth of James Gentry of Mercer County, conveniently fits into the interval between Bailey's birth and David's second marriage. As a proposed son of David-III, we can label James as James-IV.

James did not appear in any of the Louisa County tax lists although David continued to be listed until 1775 when he moved to Albemarle County. I hesitate to suggest that James was a son of David's second wife, Mary Estes, because her children have been long known and relatively well documented and it would be surprising to find an older son left out of the family. This is not so unusual in the case of a first wife who lived only a few years, witness the situation with Bailey. One possible answer to the absence of James from the tax lists, of course, is that he was simply missed in the enumeration due to the closeness of James' age to the age of tax obligation. Another possible answer to an absence of James from David's household is if James' mother died in childbirth or shortly afterwards, and the care of the infant James fell upon some other family member when David re-married. While not common, such situations certainly occurred from time to time, witness the case of Aaron Gentry of Orange County, Virginia. Aaron married Polly Ogg in November 1801, then after Polly died when their son George was born, the baby was put in the care of Polly's parents. Aaron married Polly's sister, Peggy, in January 1803 and left soon after with Peggy for Tennessee, leaving George behind in Virginia. Such dissociation of James from David's family, if it occurred, could well explain the apparent lack of connection between James and the other Gentrys.

Let us briefly review the movements of the David-III Gentry family. David was born in the vicinity of Stone Horse Creek, Hanover County, Virginia. He accompanied his father, Nicholas-II to an area that was called "Dirty Swamp" in what later became Louisa County. He lived on his father's land grant homestead there, and was given 100 acres of that land to hold in his own name as a gift from his father in 1757. This was probably on the occasion of his marriage to his wife, Mary Estes. Tax records in Louisa County suggest David moved in about 1775 to Albemarle County, the neighboring county to the west, where his brothers Robert and Benajah were already living. He sold his land in Louisa County in 1778 and bought land of his own in Albemarle County the same year (he was probably living with his brother Benajah in the intervening time). By 1787, David's father and youngest brother, Martin, had moved to the same vicinity, and in that year he sold part of his land holdings including one parcel where his son, David Jr. (-IV) was living. It was probably about that time that David's sons David Jr. and Richard moved to Kentucky, and were recorded in a 1788 tax list for Madison County. David Sr. is said to have followed his sons there soon after. There is no mention of a James Gentry living with David at that time. If the one reference to a Gentry sharing in a land grant in Fayette County, Kentucky, in 1785 was James, it means that whether or not he was living with David earlier, he moved west before the rest of David's family.

Kentucky at that time was still claimed by Virginia as a part of its territory, and was organized as Kentucky County, Virginia in 1776 when the first permanent settlements began to appear. In 1780, in the midst of the Revolutionary War, Kentucky County was split into three counties, namely Fayette County (covering the northeast quarter of the state), Jefferson County (the northwest quarter), and Lincoln County (the southern half). Mercer and Madison Counties were in turn formed out of Fayette County in 1786. We have seen that James Gentry was apparently living just to the northwest of Madison County, while the rest of David's family moved into Madison County. They were joined there by David Sr.'s brother, Martin, before 1795. This is evidenced by the fact that he was named as an executor in the will of his father-in-law, Richard Timberlake, in that year.

We have already suggested that James-IV must have died at a relatively young age, based upon the fact that he appeared to have had only a few children, yet born in a short period of time. We propose a scenario where the family split up as children came of age after their father's death and ventured off on their own, leaving behind their family home. David and Elijah moved south to Clay County where they appeared in the 1810 census. Both moved north to Indiana after 1810. James Jr. (and perhaps his mother) remained in the original Mercer County area in what now became Fayette County. For whatever reason he was not included in the 1810 census but appeared in the 1820 census. The fourth son, Enoch, appears to have moved to join his cousins in Madison County at an early age (all David Gentry family members in his generation in Madison County were first cousins through a common grandfather although their grandmothers differed). He found a wife there but died at an untimely age so his name is preserved only in his marriage bond and the inventory of his estate.

James Jr. died before 1830 when his widow and family were listed in the Madison County census, and in fact probably in the early 1820's not long after his youngest son, Clifton, was born. Presumably it was Elizabeth, James' widow, that moved from Fayette County to Madison County in the interval after 1820 rather than James. There are multiple reasons why this might have occurred. The family remained there until shortly after Jefferson and Clifton were married in 1841 and Mary remarried in 1843 and then all of the family moved to Missouri.

Conclusion
We have presented here a mixture of fact and what can only be said to be guesswork. How much reliance can be placed on the hypothetical relationships that have been suggested? The factual material starts with a James W. Gentry and wife Ann M. Gentry located in Mercer County, Kentucky, in 1789. No reference has ever been found for this couple afterwards nor has anyone identified this James as being one of the other James Gentrys that lived in Kentucky during the next twenty to thirty years. The reference to the couple is sufficiently specific that we have to conclude that they truly existed as a couple separate from all other Gentrys known to live in early Kentucky.

There is also no doubt that a David Gentry family existed essentially as described in GFA and the family's movement from Kentucky to Missouri took place as described. We know that there was an Enoch Gentry who was married in Madison County, Kentucky, and who died there a few years later. We know that there was an Elijah Gentry who also was married in Madison County, and whose later movements and death have been reliably reported by one of his sons. When we come to the family of James Jr. facts blend into strong probabilities. The vital statistics of the four proposed children of this James can be confirmed. These are the marriages recorded for all of them in Madison County, Kentucky, and the location and make-up of each of the individual families as shown in census data from 1850 onwards. Linking them together as siblings in a single family has not been confirmed by any documentary evidence, but supplementary evidence is very strongly in favor of this. As to their relationship to James Gentry Jr., that is guesswork again.

With these facts as our starting point, the guesswork involved in proposing hypothetical relationships has several points in its favor. First and foremost is the fact that there is no reliable evidence that contradicts any of our assumptions. On the other hand there are a number of features that form a consistent set of proposals. One is the estimate of dates of birth of the primary family members which are grouped appropriately both in absolute time and in relationship to each other. A second point is the fact that the residences and census reports for the children of James Sr. are logical and reasonable in view of what we have proposed. The relationships proposed here very neatly get around the problem of excess Davids and Jameses among the early Virginia and Kentucky Gentrys. In no case does any family have any duplication of names. Instead we have, starting with David-III, sons James W., David-IV and Richard-IV. Of these, James W. had sons David and James; David-IV also had sons James and David; Richard also had sons David and James. These are all parallel lines that lived contemporaneously and in close proximity, but none duplicate another. In summary, we have proposed logical answers to questions of identification that have persisted for a long, long time. Not all of the details of what has been proposed may prove to be true in the future, but the majority of the hypotheses appear to this writer to have a strong probability of being valid.

References

2.	Annie Walker Burns, "Record of Marriages and Wills of Kentucky", 1937; and also: Charlotte Ramsey, 1790-1844 Marriage Records of Madison Co., KY (Transcribed and indexed alphabetically from the list compiled by the late Judge W. Rodes Shackelford) URL: <http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~cramsey/madco.html>
	Date of Bond	Individual	Spouse	Comments
	1797  Oct 17	Henrietta Gentry	William Francis	dau / David-III
	1799  Feb 14	James Gentry	Eliz. Tudor / Tuder	son / David-IV
	1803  Feb 1	Enoch Gentry	Lucy Lee	bond. Thos. Gray
	1803  Oct 26	Charles Gentry	Susannah Ware	son / Charles-IV < Robert
	1810  Jun 28	Elijah Gentry	Eliz. Ware	bond. James West
	1828  Jun 30	Polly Gentry	Wilson Gillispie	bond. Lewis
	1836  Jun 14	Lucinda Gentry	August Pean	bond. Jeremiah White
	1841  Sep 20	Clifton Gentry	Eliza Jane Guthrie	bond. Samuel
	1841  Sep 23	Jefferson Gentry	Eliz. Tillett	bond. Robert Boggs

3.  (a)

Charles Blanchard, editor "Counties of Morgan, Monroe and Brown, Historical and Biographical", F. A. Bailey & Co., Chicago, Publishers, 1884, p.615. Contains a biography of James S. Gentry, son of Elijah Gentry. "James S. GENTRY, an old settler, as well as an enterprising farmer and stock-raiser of this county, was born on January 9, 1813, in Kentucky, and is the second of three children given to Elijah and Elizabeth (WARE) GENTRY, natives of Tennessee and Virginia, and of English and Scotch origin, respectively. James S. was reared on a farm, attended school in Indiana about eleven months, and so learned to read and cipher. His parents brought him into Indiana in 1816, and settled in Harrison County. About 1817, his father died, and his mother moved, first to Lost River, Orange County, in 1822, and then to Morgan County, and, about 1838 or 1839, James S. entered eighty acres of land, where he now lives, and to which he has added, until the number of acres amounts to 253, all cultivated, with residence, out-buildings and orchard. On February 8, 1838, Mr. Gentry married Eliza, daughter of Joseph and Mary (GRAHAM) CAMPBELL, of Monroe County. Her parents came here in 1818, and her mother drew a silver medal for being the oldest settler represented at the old settlers' meeting, August 9, 1883. By this union, Mr. GENTRY had the following children; William C., Lemuel K. (deceased), Norman J., Mary J. (COSNER), Joseph P., James M., David D. and Thomas H. Two of Mr. GENTRY's sons, William C. and Lemuel K. were in the late war...."

(b)

"Gentry Family Gazette & Genealogy Exchange" (GFG&GE) vol 7, p.77-79 (May 1989), Contribution by Ruth Gentry Weaver, Lawrenceville, GA.

4.	"Kentucky Court of Appeals Deed Book, Vol IV"
	1789  Jun 23	Mercer Co. KY   (just west of Madison Co.)
	James W. Gentry and Annie M. Gentry witnessed deed of land.

5.	Willard Rouse Jillson, "Old Kentucky Entries and Deeds", Genealogical Publishing Co., Baltimore 1978.   (Index of grants and other entries by Virginia prior to separation of Kentucky)
	1785  Jul 28	p.102    Fayette Co. Entries (1782-1794)	Bk(4-212)
	Gentry & McCullock 893 ac water source = none
	[Note. Kentucky was divided from Virginia in 1792. First consisted of three counties, 1780-1784: Jefferson = northwest quarter; Fayette = northeast quarter; Lincoln = south half.]

6.	Madison Co. Will Book A - Inventories of Estates
(a)	1809  Aug 7		Bk A-497	James Gentry
		1 cow, 4 hogs - only livestock Shoemakers tools and equip Numerous debits and credits to and from various individuals Total value of estate £281
(b)	1806  Jul 4		Bk A-214	Enoch Gentry
	Inventory returned 7 Jul 1806			Total value £92

7.	Charles M. Franklin, "Madison Co. Kentucky Wills and Estates 1785 - 1813", publisher Heritage House, Indianapolis, IN, 1986
	p. 16	Gentry, David (Will Book A-740)    Recorded 6 Dec 1813
		Wife	Jane Gentry
		Son	James Gentry
		Daughter	Henrietta Gentry
		Son	Pleasant Gentry

8.	Examples of correspondence and queries relative to James Gentry family: (note extended range of time).
	>  GFG&GE, 2, 56 (Feb 1981) -Opal G. Sutherland, Wichita, Kansas
	>  loc. cit. 3, 106-7 (Sep 1984) - Christine Gentry, Long Beach CA
	>  loc. cit. 5, 29 (Sep 1985) - Arlene G. Dague, Davenport, Iowa
	>  loc. cit. 5, 66-67, (July 1986) - Christine Gentry, Long Beach, California
	>  Gentry Family Genealogy Forum, (URL:<http://genforum.genealogy.com/gentry>)          3 Nov 1998 - from Jim Philpott
	>  loc. cit., 2 Jul 2004 - from Barbara Calkin

10.	Willard Gentry, "Two 'New' Gentrys Identified"
	Journal of Gentry Genealogy, Vol 1, #5 (May 2001)

14 Mar 2011

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