John Blankenbaker's Germanna History Notes

Note 765

Most of the warrants and surveys that I have been quoting recently were in Culpeper County, which was created in 1748, and this included the modern counties of Madison and Rappahannock also.  Some of the geographical locations are the Little Fork, the Robinson River Valley, and the Mount Pony settlement.

Zachariah Plancapetler/Plankelbeeler, 30 Apr 1770 ­ 21 May 1770; 50 a. in the Robinson Fork; adj. his own land, Nicholas Wilhoite.  CC: John Garr & John Planeapetler.  Surv. Richard Young.  [Once that we get over the hurdle that the names have not been spelled even reasonably well, we might observe that Zachariah had a son John and a nephew John Garr.  I am not positive where the Fork of the Robinson was located, though I think it was in the upper reaches.  The spelling shows why not too much reliance should be placed on an index.  Sometimes the best thing to do is simply read the whole book.]

Zachariah Plancapetler, 25 Jul 1770 ­ 10 Sep 1770; 27 a. in the Robinson Fork; adj. his own land, Nicholas Yeager.  CC: Zachariah Plancanpetler, Junior & John Plancanpetler.  Surv. Richard Young.  [Zachariah used two sons as chain carriers.]

Mathias Rouse, 4 Oct 1750 ­ 5 Dec 1750; 33 a. on fork of Robinson R., "a hillside near the old German Church"; adj. William Carpenter, decd, John Carpenter, George Utz.  CC: John Carpenter & Nicholas Yager.  Surv. Philip Clayton.  [The "old German Church" is not the building we know as Hebron, as the Hebron Church would have been regarded as "new" in 1750.  Prior to the existing building, there was a log chapel on about the same site.  I have plotted this grant and it lies just to the north of the modern church building.  Apparently this 33 a. fell into the cracks between the Carpenters and Utz and had remained unclaimed.]

[Yesterday, I had reservations about Harmon Miller, and I still do.  They are as follows.  The Miller family left Freudenberg in 1738 with only one son, Matthias, and he probably died en route, as there are no records for him in Virginia.  The next sons are Haman and Harman who were born in the estimated years 1739 and 1741, respectively.  The two are very often confused in the records but are distinct people.  According to the warrant I quoted from in the last note, Harman Miller was a chain carrier in 1749.  He could hardly have been more than ten years old which would seem to preclude his being a chain carrier.  Family researchers say the first record for John Frederick Miller was in the modern Patrick-Henry County area in the spring of 1748.  If he were there in the spring of 1748, how could Harman be in Culpeper Co. less than a year later?  All of this is a little disturbing to me and suggests there is more to the story than I know.]