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m. 10 Feb 1817
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| Born |
20 Sep 1819 |
Botetourt Co., Virginia  |
| Died |
9 Nov 1904 |
Botetourt County, Virginia |
| Buried |
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Wood Family Cemetery, Botetourt County, Virginia |
| Spouse |
Sarah Eleanor Reynolds | F518495936 |
| Married |
19 Oct 1844 |
Botetourt, Virginia |
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| Sources |
- [S107] Family Histories, http://woodsandothers.net/r_no._pages/r250-r299/R266.html.
James Wood was born in Charlotte County, shortly before the family migrated to Botetourt County in the late eighteenth century. He was 24 and still single when his father died in 1814. Joseph Wood?s will [R900] left half of the home farm to James [tracts I1, J1, and J3 of Fig. R002c] and named him a coexecutor of the will. James and his brother Joseph Jr. were also left undivided shares of 450 acres of mountain land ?adjoining their own land which Thomas Wood is to make them a right to.? Presumably James dwelt in the log house that stood at the point labelled ?James Wood house?? in Fig. R002c. He may have built this himself, or inherited it from his father. The building that stood there was passed down through the generations of Woods, and unfortunately burned in May of 1994 (Fig. R253b).
In 1817 James married Elizabeth Crenshaw Davis of Prince Edward County. Elizabeth was the sister of Sarah A. Davis, who in 1816 had married James?s brother Thomas [R252]. James and Thomas and especially their wives were born too late to have known each other in Prince Edward County before Joseph and his family moved to Botetourt County; either the Woods maintained contact and friendship with their old neighbors back east over the years, or these were arranged marriages. (Again, maybe James met Elizabeth at Thomas and Sarah?s wedding.)
James and Elizabeth?s only child, Davis Morton Wood, was born in 1819. The 1820 census of Botetourt County lists the three of them plus 3 male slaves less than 14, 1 female slave less than 14, and 1 female slave between 14 and 25. The 1830 census registered the same three white people, but 18 slaves of all ages.
James and Elizabeth were deeply religious, as many people were in that era. They sent their son to the Botetourt Seminary in Fincastle, grooming him for the ministry (see [R255]). [S083] has preserved letters James and Elizabeth wrote to Davis Morton in Fincastle, and they speak of nothing but religious matters and high expectations.
From the record in the Botetourt County deed books James appears not to have bought and sold land with the fervor many of his contemporaries did, instead steadily farming and improving the land he inherited. However, there is a contradiction to this in WPA of Virginia Historical Inventory No. 293 of Alleghany County, titled ?Wood-Tinsley Home.? The building referred to is or was about a mile SW of Low Moor Va., too far NW of Botetourt County to appear in Fig. R002c. It was a log cottage dating from ~1785-1790. According to the WPA report the building and associated property were sold by T. T. Anderson to Wood (no date given). Then it says that in 1837 James Wood deeded it to Douglas B. Payne (DB3-257), James Wood died intestate, and Davis M. Wood lived there till 1857. Continuing, in an 1857 Court Order Davis M. Wood deeded it to Edward P., William J., and Roderick M. Tinsley (DB5-542), etc. All this seems to be nonsense. However, DB3-257 turns out to be a deed in which on 5/16/1837 Douglas B. and Ann Layne gave (for $1) a tract of Alleghany County Rich Patch land, extending up to the crest of the mountain and the Botetourt County line, to James Wood of Botetourt County [S083]. The deed on the next page, DB3-258, has John T. and Cassandra Anderson similarly giving a tract of Rich Patch land to James Wood on 6/6/1837. Marginal notations on both deeds say ?lifted by D. M. Wood 19 Nov 1849? (i.e., after James?s death), so there is no question of this being a different James Wood. The tracts would have contained iron ore deposits (see [S099]). The two properties appear to have been transferred to James Wood as collateral on a loan.
James Wood died of typhoid fever at a young age (56). Elizabeth died 17 days before he did, of the same infectious disease. Their son wrote an obituary for both [S100] in which he describes their last hours; not surprisingly, the sentiments they expressed were entirely religious in character. It is thought they were buried in the Wood Family Cemetery near Glen Wilton, but no gravestones for them have survived. Recently stones for James and Elizabeth were placed on unmarked graves in the cemetery that are held by family tradition to be their resting places.
Sources: [S077, S083]
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