BROCK: to
badger, resider of the swampland
A BRIEF FAMILY
HISTORY
From the first Brock
coming to America, to the present day Brocks now residing all
over the United States and Canada, our family has proven to be
resilient. It is believed that his wife was Cherokee, and that
they lived part of their lives with her People. Their children
were considered Cherokee, both Native American and European.
DNA of descendant males shows their patrilineage was Askenazi
Jewish of Northern Europe.
Aaron Brock, born
abt 1721-32, was also known as Chief Red Bird. Since the Cherokee
traveled mainly between what is now North and South Carolina,
when Aaron moved into Kentucky, he was in fairly new territory.
Aaron and his Indian wife, Susan, lived in a sycamore tree in
Kentucky where there was bountiful hunting. Present day Kentucky
has a wildlife refuge supposedly named after our ancestor, and
that area is known as Red Bird, Kentucky. But, the Indian way
of life was changing, and Aaron and Susan's son, JESSE Brock,
born 1751 in Cumberland Co., Virginia. He married Rebecca Howard,
a girl of English ancestry, and they lived among her people.
Jesse served the Patriot cause in the American Revolution, probably
as a Scout, and later filed a Pension application, stating that
he was drafted into service twice and volunteered for yet a third
term.
Jesse Brock had at
least two sisters, Mahala Susanna (1749-1820) who married Edward
"Ned" Callahan; and Mary "Polly" (1757-1855)
who married Ephraim Washington Osborn(e); and perhaps brothers
James and John
Jesse and his wife,
Rebecca moved between Virginia and the Carolinas, then settling
in Knox Co., Kentucky, by 1798, where their son AMON was a farmer,
the second of eleven children.
Amon was born 1775
in North Carolina. He married his first cousin, Mary "Polly"
or "Molly" Osborn, 1805 in Knox Co., KY. They lived
in the part of Knox Co. which became Harlan Co. and had ten children.
Amon received several federal land grants.
When Polly died in
1853, Amon remarried to Charity Emeline Taylor and had six more
children. During the Civil War, three of Amon's sons served in
the Union army; when Amon died on his way to Indiana taking his
children and wife to safety with his son Ephraim in Indiana.
His sons were nearby and buried him in Pulaski Co., KY.
AARON N. Brock, oldest
son of Amon and Polly, moved by 1843 to Clay Co., KY, and later
was in Leslie Co. when lines changed. He married Barbara Shepherd
in 1837, carried on the family tradition of farming, and was
the father of three Brock sons who came to West Virginia after
the Civil War, including CARLO.
Carlo Brock, born
1852, was the first to bring our family to Wayne Co., West Virginia.
He married Polly Ann Jackson 1872 in Magoffin Co., KY. Their
reason for moving to West Virginia is unknown to us, but he and
his 1st cousin Jordan Brock were here in 1874 marriage. Carlo
unfortunately died in an accident when digging a well in Wayne
Co., when it caved in on him about 1881, leaving his widow and
five children. His oldest son MILLARD Lee Brock was raised in
Wayne County; his mother Polly remarried twice and had six more
children.
Millard was raised
in the area of Wayne Co. known as Lower Gragston Creek, and continued
to live there after his first marriage to Dicy Combs. After Dicy
and Millard's oldest two children, Nellie and Bertha, died from
diphtheria, Dicy herself passed away from the same illness. Millard
married Vina Hicks and proceeded to have eleven more children.
Most of us here today
descend from Carlo, and we still know very little about him.
People today are moving further and further from the areas where
they were born, and more and more family history is being lost.
Let's make sure that we at least record what we presently know
to be fact, and, although the stories may not be true - we need
to pass on those family stories, even if they are more fiction
than fact. Please share your memories.
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