Three Dodson Brothers from Virginia to Kentucky
From Volume 5 "History of Kentucky" Judge Charles Kerr, Editor;
William Elsey Connelley, Author of "Eastern Kentucky Papers"; and
E. M. Coulter, PhD, Department of History, University of Georgia. The
American Historical Society, Chicago and New York, 1922
Pages 11-12: The Dodson family of which the Science Hill banker is a representative is of Danish descent. From Denmark it was transplanted to Scotland, and from Scotland to England. One branch of those in Scotland changed the name to Dotson and carried it to Ireland and from Ireland to America. Hence the Dotsons of this country are of the original family of Dodsons but are of immediate Scotch-Irish descent. The Dodsons came from England to America, hence their immediate descent is Scotch-English. They were among the earliest settlers of Virginia at the Jamestown Colony.
From Culpeper County, Virginia, Thomas, Leonard and Robert Dodson moved over the mountains while Kentucky was still a part of the old Virginia. The title to the lands they bought in what is now Madison County was very soon contested, and from there Robert moved to what is now Warren County, Kentucky, where he reared a large family, while Thomas and Leonard Dodson came to what is now Wayne County, making settlement there while Kentucky was still an Indian battle ground.
Leonard took up land in the community known as Cedar Hill. He had two sons,
Eli and Stogdon, Eli moving to Missouri, while Stogdon went to Danville, Indiana, where his family became prominent.
Thomas D. Dodson, the other of the three brothers, saw service as a minute man of the Revolutionary war. His place of settlement in Wayne County was on what is now known as Roily Creek, a tributary to Sinking Creek. Here he
reared. a large family, six sons, named George Teaman, John, Jesse,
James, Rollo C. and Leonard, and five girls : Mrs. John
Robinson, who settled at Danville, Indiana ; Mrs. Thompson, who also went to Danville ;
Mrs. Rheuben Sloan, Mrs. I. Burnett and Mrs. Mathew Denney, all of whom remained in
Wayne County. The two oldest sons, George Teaman and John, were volunteers in the War of 1812 and riflemen in the Battle of New Orleans. From Kentucky they settled at Marion, Missouri. When John left Kentucky for Missouri he had a family of ten boys. The oldest of these,
Ishmael, graduated from the Kirksville Normal School of Missouri, became a Confederate colonel in a Texas Regiment in the Civil war, and was one of the framers of the Texas Constitution.
George Teaman Dodson left two boys in Wayne County, James and Josiah
Dodson,
Josiah settling on what is known as Dry Fork of Sinking Creek, and his sons were Andrew, George, Aaron and Thomas.
James Dodson, the other son of George Teaman, married Manervia Tuttle, settled on Fall Creek, and reared a family of four boys and six girls, the boys being :
Thomas, who moved to Texas ; Josiah, who settled on Meadow Creek: Marshall and
Teaman, who settled on Fall Creek; while the girls were: Rhoda, who married James Morrow and settled on Cumberland River in Wayne County ;
Polly, who married James McCoin, of Edmonson County ; Jane, who married Job Morrow and settled on Cumberland River in Wayne County;
Anna, who never married; Nettie, who married John Dodson and settled in Beach Valley near Monticello;
Neatha, who married Junes Taylor and settled on Cumberland River in Wayne County.
Jesse Dodson, the third son of the Revolutionary hero settled on Sinking Creek. He reared two sons,
Thomas and John. Thomas, who later became known as Big Tom Dodson. had two sons,
Jesse and John, who settled at Wichita, Kansas. John, known as Jack
Dodson, settled at Steubenville and reared three sons, Thomas, John and ?
James, fourth son of Thomas D. Dodson, settled on Sinking Creek and reared one son, known as
Miller George, who also had a son George, called little George.
This brings the family account down to Rollo C, the fifth son of Thomas D Dodson. Rollo C, who died in 1884, spent his life in Wayne County. He settled on what is known as Roily Fork of Sinking Creek. He married
Miss Burnette, sister of Rev. Isom Burnette, a Baptist minister. He reared five sons and four daughters, the sons being
Isom, George, Leonard, Jesse and James. Of the daughters the oldest was Mrs. Carl
Gholson. who settled in Cincinnati, Ohio. Ruth, the second daughter, married Nimrod Morrow, and her
oldest child was Joseph Morrow, who graduated from the Kentucky State University in 1899, later attended the Baptist Theological Seminary at Louisville and became a Baptist minister. The third of the daughters,
Mrs. Elizabeth Denney, is the mother of Jerry Denney, a Baptist preacher.
Mrs. Mary Simpson, the fourth daughter, had four children, the youngest,
Rhoda, being now in the Baptist Bible Institute at New Orleans training for missionary work.
Isom Dodson, oldest of the sons of Rollo C, settled on the Dry Fork of Sinking Creek, and reared three sons,
Floyd, James and William.
Leonard Dodson, the third son, settled on Sinking Creek, married Elizabeth Tuttle, sister of Ivan Tuttle, and reared a son
George, who in turn had three sons, Elmer, Emory and Leonard, Elmer graduating from the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary at Fort Worth, Texas, in 1918, and is now a Baptist minister.
Jesse Dodson, the fourth son, settled at Frazer, Kentucky and reared a family of three sons and two daughters.
James Dodson, the youngest son, settled in what is known as Wright Valley, near Steubenville, married Harriet Simpson, reared a large family there and later moved to Foss, Oklahoma. His second son,
George, became a Baptist minister, graduating from the Baptist Theological Seminary at Louisville in 1915.
The second son of Rollo C. Dodson was George Dodson, who was born in Wayne County in 1834, settled in Beach Valley near Monticello and spent his active life on that farm, where he died in 1010. He married Dorcas Young, who was born in Wayne County in 1835 and died at Monticello in 1919. They reared a family of two boys and three girls,
John and William being the sons. William died in early manhood unmarried. The daughters were :
Mary, who married Floyd Dodson, son of Isom Dodson, and moved to Texas ;
Ann, who married Bascom Ballou and later moved to Texas with her family ; and
Emma, who married Frank Smith and settled in Beach Valley.
John M. Dodson. oldest of the sons of George, and a grandson of Rollo C, was born at Monticello in 1859, settled in Beach Valley and lived in that one community during his youth and mature years. He is noted as one of the largest land owners and most successful farmers and stock raisers in Wayne County. He has 1700 acres and has done an extensive business with cattle and hogs. He served a term of five years as assessor of Wayne County, is a Democrat, one of the leading members of the Baptist Church and is a Mason.
John M. Dodson married Nettie Dodson, daughter of James Dodson of Fall Creek, above referred to. She was born near Monticello in 1859. Of the five children born to their marriage two. Martin and James T., died in infancy. The three living are :
Marcus Alvin, cashier of the People's Bank of Science Hill; Walter
Cleveland, cashier of the First State Bank of Eubank; and Flora Elizabeth
Jane, a graduate of the Training School of the Baptist Theological Seminary at Louisville and who went as a Baptist missionary to
Canton, China, in August, 1917.
Marcus Alvin Dodson was born at Monticello October 5, 1882, and passed most of his youthful years on his father's farm, attended rural schools, graduated from the Monticello High School in 1900, and in 1904 received the A. B. degree from the Kentucky State College at Lexington. For one year he was a teacher in the graded schools of Bell County, and during part of the year 1905 was a surveyor in the oil fields of Wayne County. Beginning in 1906 he was for a year principal of the graded school of Science Hill, during
1907 was grade school principal at Greenwood, and was principal of the high school at Princeton, Kentucky, in 1908. During 1909 he was head of the department of mathematics at Dixon College at Dixon, Tennessee, and during 1910-11 was professor of mathematics and Latin in the Elk Creek Training School at Elk Creek, Virginia.
In the fall of 1911 Mr. Dodson entered the Peoples Bank of Science Hill as cashier, and has been steadily with that institution, serving it faithfully and promoting to the best of his ability its advancement and success for ten years.
Mr. Dodson is a democrat, a deacon in the Baptist Church, is a past master of Mount Gilead Lodge No. 255, F. and A. M., at Science Hill, a member of Somerset Chapter No. 25, R. A. M., Somerset Commandery No. 31, K. T., Pulaski Lodge No. 75, I. O. O. F., at Somerset and of Crescent Lodge No. 60, K. P. During the World war he was chairman of all local committees for sale of Liberty Bonds and raising of funds for Red Cross purposes, and he deserves not a little personal credit for the successful issue of the later Liberty Loan drives in the Science Hill precinct. Mr. Dodson owns a modern home on Sandford Street. He married in Science Hill in 1907 Miss Lucy Denton, daughter of Alexander and Mary E. (Young) Denton, the latter a resident of Science Hill, where the father died in 1919. He was a retired farmer. Mrs. Dodson attended the State College at Lexington and also
Georgetown College. They have one daughter, Flora Lucille Dodson, born August 4, 1918.
