Week 10 - Name's the same

 Week 10: Name’s the Same


Littleberry Leftwich

I thought the name Littleberry was a strange one when I came across this 5th great grandfather on my great grandma Kirk’s side of the family, but the name seems to be fairly common in the South in the 1800’s. This Littleberry was a son of Augustine Leftwich, who had several sons.  They were a military family with most of the men being of high military rank. 


Littleberry Leftwich was born in Bedford, Virginia in 1757. By the time he died, in 1823, he had a lot of property.  There’s good, bad and ugly in every family tree, and you can probably guess that a man in Virginia with a lot of property in the early 1800’s had slaves.  In his will he names the ones he left to his wife: Mily, Dice, Joe, Bowser, his wife Betsy and her two children Narcissy and Tener.


I don’t have a lot on Littleberry’s military career - it’s hard to sort his records from the other Littleberry’s, but what this Littleberry seemed best known for was his running ability. “He was known as a famed foot racer, and never beaten.” (CAMPBELL COUNTY, VA - HISTORY - Campbell Chronicles and Family Sketches Family Sketches - Leftwich)


This Littleberry had a son named Littleberry and a grandson named Littleberry.  Along the same line of “name’s the same”, Littleberry married a woman named Francis Hopkins when he was 21 years old and a woman named Frances Halley when he was 54. I did not descend from Littleberry the son, but instead from Joel Leftwich, who married Sarah C Adams, then their daughter Wilmoth Waldren Leftwich, who married Michael Debo Jr., then Harriet Thompkins Debo who married Alfred Solomon Stevens. These were grandma Kirk’s parents.

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