Andrew Beaty, Sr.

Andrew Beaty, Sr.

Andrew Beaty, Sr. was born in 1758, in Pennsylvania, and died July 19, 1836, in Fentress County, Tennessee. He was a son of John Beaty, Sr., born about 1730, in Ireland, and of Margaret (Montgomery) Beaty, born about 1732-36. It appears that John Beaty, Sr. may have moved with his family to Virginia, sometime after his oldest children were born. Some of them may have been born in Virginia. A John Beaty, Sr. and wife, Margaret (Montgomery) Beaty, were living in Washington County, Va. in 1823. Her father, Thomas Montgomery, had recently died, and one of her sons, Alexander M. Beaty, sold his share of the land left by his grandfather Montgomery to two of his brothers, James Beaty and John Beaty, Jr. for $600. dollars. I don't know whether or not they were the same John Beaty, Sr. and Margaret (Montgomery) Beaty who had lived in Pennsylvania. But they very well could have been the same ones.

Historian Albert R. Hogue stated that 3 Beaty brothers: John. b.1780; David, b.1783; and George, b. 1785; came to Fentress County together from North Carolina. And some persons say that these 3 men were half brothers to Andrew Beaty, Sr.; sons of John Beaty, Sr. by a 2nd wife. But, I have seen no proof of a 2nd wife; and no proof that they actually came from North Carolina. I think that they may have been full brothers to Andrew Beaty, Sr., who was my great-great great-grandfather. So there are disagreements on these points.

However, I think that the following things are pretty well established as facts. Andrew Beaty, Sr. was living in Sullivan County, Tennessee, (which was then a part of North Carolina), when he enlisted in the Revolutionary War. He fought in the Battle of Kings Mountain, which occurred on Oct. 7, 1780, near Charlotte, N.C., and ended as a great victory for the Americans over the British forces there. Our soldiers were mostly frontiersmen from Kentucky, Virginia, Tennessee and North Carolina. After the war, Andrew came back to Sullivan County and married Elizabeth Cooper, d/o John Cooper, who died in 1800, leaving a tract of land there, on Beaver Creek, to his two sons, Andrew Cooper and Thomas Cooper, and to his daughter, Elizabeth (Cooper) Beaty. They sold the 150 acres of land to a William King, a James King and a Samuel Goodson for one thousand dollars.

Andrew Beaty, Sr. and 4 of his brothers, James, William, Alexander and Martin, migrated over to the Wayne-Clinton County, Ky. area, about 1800, or a little earlier. They probably went across southern Virginia, through Cumberland Gap, over the mountains and down Cumberland River. Andrew's wife's brothers, Andrew and Thomas Cooper, probably were with the group. For Hogue states that Thomas Cooper lived on the headwaters of Wolf River for a while before moving on over to western Fentress County. Most of them were there by 1820. Most of Andrew Beaty's children and some of his grandchildren were born in southern Kentucky. His brother, Martin Beaty, stayed on in Kentucky. Two others, James and William, moved on down to Rutherford County, Tennessee. And he had a brother named Thomas, and a sister named Phoebe. Like the John Beaty, Sr. family, the John Cooper family was also from Pennsylvania. It is said that some members from this Beaty family settled Beattyville, Ky. Martin Beaty spent the rest of his life in Kentucky. For some years, he drilled salt water wells between Burkesville and Somerset. And, in 1819, he accidentally struck oil, near Burkesville. But he didn't get credit for it. Forty years later, on Aug. 27, 1859, another man struck oil near Titusville, Pennsylvania and got credit for drilling the world's first oil well. However, Martin Beaty did become a prominent person. As an education official, and in politics. Among other things, he served a term or so as a state senator. He died in 1856, at the home of a daughter, in Owsley County, Kentucky. (See A Century of Wayne County, Kentucky, 1800-1900, by Augusta Phillips Johnson; copyright 1939, Publishers, The Standard Printing Company, Inc., Louisville, Ky.). Martin Beaty stated that he was born in Washington County, Va. (Where that Beaty couple lived. Which is just across the state line from Sullivan County, Tenn., where his brothers, Andrew and James Beaty, had lived. James served in the war, too).

Tim Lee Huddleston stated in his History of Pickett County, Tennessee, that Andrew Beaty, Sr. married a Biter woman, who drew his war pension after he died. But I have seen no proof of it. His pension papers state that he died a widower.

The children of Andrew Beaty, Sr. and Elizabeth (Cooper) Beaty were as follows: William Beaty, b. 1794-96; Alexander Beaty, b. l798; Thomas Beaty, b. 1801; Nancy Agnes Beaty; Andrew Beaty, Jr.; Allen Beaty; Zilpha Beaty; and Abraham Beaty. Their marriages were as follows: William Beaty married Martha Westmoreland; Alexander Beaty married Polly Hull; Thomas Beaty married Jane Mullinix; and Nancy Agnes Beaty married Jonathan Hull. I don't know who the others married. Note: Jonathan Hull and Polly Hull were brother and sister, apparently to Allen Brock Hull, 1811-1891; who was the grandfather of Cordell Hull. Their father was Jesse Hull, b. 1771, who came to what is now Pickett County, Tennessee, from Wilkes County, North Carolina. Just after the Civil War, Cordell Hull's father, William Hull, b. 1840, was involved in a gunfight with Jim Pile and a man named Stepp, and got one of his eyes shot out.

William Beaty and his wife, Martha (Westmoreland) Beaty, moved here to Casey County, Ky. with some of their sons and daughters and their families, about 1861 or a little later. They were the grandparents of Victoria (Wood) Martin and Loretta (Wood) Cooper, who lived down on the ridge below Creston; of John William "Billy" Wood, who lived on Woods Creek; of Claude Beaty, who lives on Barnetts Creek; and of Josephine (Wood) Crockett, who was the grandmother of Ethel Patton. William Beaty, Sr.'s brother, Thomas Beaty, and his wife, Jane (Mullinix) Beaty, were the grandparents of Elizabeth Ann (King) Wright, my grandmother. And William's brother, Allen Beaty, and his wife were the grandparents of Mitchell Buck's wife. So, Mitchell's wife and my grandmother Wright were 2nd cousins to Claude Beaty; and to "Billy" Wood and his sisters, Victoria, Josephine and Loretta. And these all were descendants of Andrew Beaty, Sr. Besides his descendants here in Casey County, Ky., he has several descendants back in Fentress County, and in various other places.

Andrew Beaty, Sr. probably is buried somewhere in Fentress County. Perhaps in the old grownup Joel Beaty Cemetery at Riverton? His son, Thomas Beaty, his granddaughter Elizabeth (Beaty) King, his great granddaughter Mary Jane (Beaty) Beaty, and some other descendants are buried there. His son William Beaty is buried down on the ridge, near the Casey County-Adair County, Ky. line. His granddaughter, Dillery (Beaty) Wood, her daughters Victoria, Josephine and Loretta, and several other descendants, are buried in Hyder Cemetery in the edge of

Adair County. John William Wood and several others are buried in Salem Cemetery, at Rheber, on Tennessee Ridge. And Elizabeth Ann (King) Wright, Mary Saline (Beaty) Buck, and several others, are buried in Whited Cemetery, on Tennessee Ridge, Casey Co.

by Roscoe Hollis Wright
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This page was last updated on 09/13/98.