By the mid 1700s European settlers and their descendants had moved upstream from their early footholds along the estuaries of the Chesapeake, and the population of the Piedmont was growing rapidly, as seen by the number of new counties created in the 1740s and later.
Anselm Clarkson of Louisa was cited as early as 1746 when he was holding land on “the lower side of Cub Creek, on the north side of the Pamunkey.”1 (Pamunkey was an earlier name for the Anna River, and Cub Creek parallels modern US 522 south from US 33.) He was at that location as late as 1759.2 In the 1767 Louisa tithe lists “Ansalem Clarkson” was charged with Julius and 137 acres of land.3
The following year Julius was charged to Mrs Elizabeth Clarkson, indicating that the elder Anselm had died and his widow, Elizabeth was responsible for Julius.4 (Whether the widow’s maiden name was Butts is not documented.) In 1771 Elizabeth Clarkson was charged with 137 acres and one slave named Jammey, but not Julius.5 On 14 Dec 1772 Elizabeth sold her 137 acres in Saint Martin’s Parish to Thomas Jackson.6 In 1748 Thomas Jackson had joined with Anselm Clarkson, Josh. Fox, David Crenshaw, and Jeremiah Glenn to procession land in Fredericksville Parish.7 There was an earlier marriage (1713) in New Kent between David Clarkson to Elizabeth Jackson, so the Jackson who bought the Cub Creek land may have had a familial connection.
A younger (?) Anselm in Louisa (who may have been another son of Anselm and Elizabeth or perhaps a cousin) was charged to Edward Ambler from 1768 to 1773. By 1775 he was an overseer for Charles Dabney.8 In about 1780 he filed a bounty claim.9 He appears in Louisa tax lists of 1780, 1781, and 1782, charged with six tithes, including himself.10 As noted above, “Ansalum” is tallied on the 1787 Louisa tax lists. On 7 Jun 1788, he sold (with the concurrence of his wife, Ann) 200 acres on Dutchman’s Branch to Valentine Meriwether.11 This may have been the Anselm who moved to Kentucky, where he died in Pendleton County, in late 1816 or early 1817, leaving a will which cited a wife named Nancy.12
According to Militia records of Albemarle County, Anselm Clarkson served in “Captain Overton’s Company of Rangers” in 1755 and 1756, becoming a sergeant in 1756. Anselm and other veterans of the Indian wars appeared at proceedings to verify land grant applications held in Louisa County October 11, 1779. His service was “Proved by oath of John Shepperson.” Anselm in turn vouched for other members of the Ranger company. Although he was entitled to 50 acres as a private soldier (1755) and an additional 200 acres as a sergeant (1756), he elected not to take up the land and assigned both warrants to an Anthony Thompson. It is unlikely that he would have been made a sergeant in his teens, so we can estimate his birth to have been around 1730 to 1735.
Peter Clarkson also served in Captain Overton’s Rangers and he received a warrant for 50 acres, which he assigned to a Charles Smith in March 1780, in Albemarle County.13 Two Clarksons married girls from the Smith family (Peter’s son William married Mary, and David wed Phoebe), and a third married a granddaughter (Julius’ son James Minor Clarkson wed Patsy Young Neal, daughter of Elizabeth Smith).
Peter Clarkson was elected to the Vestry of Fredericksville Parish (which embraced Albemarle and part of Louisa Counties) in March 1785 and took office a month later.14
In 1785 John Clarkson joined with 130 other residents of Amherst County in a petition to the legislature that they levy a “General Assessment for Ministers.”15
In the 1787 tax lists of Virginia, we find a Julius in Albemarle among the following Clarksons listed in the District of Commissioner Thomas Garth:16 David, James, John, and Manoah. Near John Clarkson were four Dickerson households, which probably included some of those who were found as neighbors of Julius in Bourbon county a few years later. There were also two Goodmans, four Carrs, one Allphin, and one Ellis; all names which occur in both Clarkson and allied genealogies.
In neighboring Amherst County were David, James, John and John, Jr. A William was found in Goochland and "Ansalum" in Louisa. Further afield were John in Richmond City, Thomas in Norfolk, and Joseph in Surry.17 (John of Richmond was probably the same person who had been named executor of his father-in-law, Joseph Bridgewater’s will in 1762.18 Also in 1787, David Clarkson was "reported as refusing to give in list of taxes" along with five others in Augusta County.19
In the Heads of Families at the First Census (which substitutes for the missing census data), only Peter Clarkson is listed in Albemarle.20
Many of the Piedmont Clarksons joined the great migration to Kentucky and other new lands following the Revolution, and others followed after the turn of the century, but some remained in Albemarle and neighboring counties. Census data reflect the patterns:
Returns from 1800 are lost, but by 1810 those found in Albemarle included Lucy, Peter, Manoah, Julius, John, Reuben, and two Jameses. Another James was counted in nearby Nelson. James F. was in Campbell, and another James in Essex.21 “Anslem” was in Amherst.22
The 1820 tally found James (two) and Manoah in Albemarle, James L. [sic] in Campbell, James in Nelson, and another James in Chesterfield.23
By 1830 James, John, Julius W., Reuben, and Lucy were in Albemarle, James in Nelson, and another James in Buckingham.24
Early Virginia — Kentucky
Notes:
1 14 May 1746 (Deeds A: 221-222.); 23 Feb 1749 ((Deeds A: 341) in Rosalie Edith Davis, Louisa County Deed Books A and B 1742-1759 (Bellevue, WA: Rosalie E. Davis, 1976), 27, 46.
2 Deeds B: 328-330. Ibid., 147.
3 Rosalie Edith Davis, Louisa County, Virginia, Tithables and Census, 1743-1785 (Manchester, MO: Heritage Trails, 1981), 5.
4 Ibid., 8.
5 Ibid., 11.
6 Louisa Deeds D-1/2: 426-427. Davis, Louisa County Deed Books C, C1/2, D and D1/2, 1759-1774 (Manchester, MO: Rosalie E. Davis, 1977), 140.
7 Rosalie Edith Davis, Fredericksville Parish Vestry Book, 1742-1787 (Manchester, MO: Heritage Trails, 1981), 11. Since the "metes and bounds" method of describing property relied on noting sometimes transient natural features (such as "a large oak tree") to establish property lines, members of the local parish vestry were required from time to time to go out and inspect the boundaries in person.
8 Davis, Louisa Tithables, 8, 11, 15, 20, 27, 35.
9 Janice L. Abercrombie and Richard Slatten, Index to the Virginia Revolutionary "Publick" Claims County Booklets (Athens, GA: Iberian Books, 1992), 50.
10 Davis, Louisa Tithables, 50, 52, 97.
11 Louisa Deeds F: 352.
12 Pendleton Wills C: 249. Dated Nov 1816, proven June 1817. Abstract posted on Clarkson Genforum by Crystal Dingler 19 Jun 2000.
13 Lloyd DeWitt Bockstruck, Virginia’s Colonial Soldiers (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1988), 291, 299.
14 Cited on US GenWeb.
15 Davis, Fredericksville Parish Vestry Book, 1: 130; 2: 51. See also William Meade and Jennings Cropper Wise, Old Churches, Ministers and Families of Virginia (Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1966 [1861]), Part L.
16 Netti Schreiner-Yantis and Florence Speakman Love, The 1787 Census of Virginia (Springhill, Virginia: Genealogical Books In Print, 198-), 136 ff. (The Virginia tax commissioners of 1787 did not count white females nor white children under 17. They did, however, tally stud horses and wheeled vehicles.)
17 Schreiner-Yantis and Love, 1787 Census, 170, 183, 1089, 849, 937. It is possible that that some duplicate names may indicate that one person owned land in more than one county, not that there were more than one person with the same name.
18 Henrico Wills 5: 1881. Joseph Bridgewater named his daughter, Susannah Clarkson, in the document dated 18 May 1762.
19 17 Jul 1787. Augusta Order Book No. XX, 347. Transcript on US GenWeb.
20 He was charged with seven white souls, one dwelling, and 2 other buildings.
21 AIS abstract of the 1810 Federal Census. Lucy Morton had married Peter’s son David, about whom little is known (see Woods, 167); she might have been a widow by this time.
22 1810 Amherst, 278. He was overlooked by AIS.
23 AIS abstract of the 1820 Federal Census.
24 AIS index of the 1830 Federal Census.
