When a family left Virginia, it is often a question of whether they all left at the same time, or were staggered in their departure. Consider the family of Jacob Blankenbaker, the son of John Nicholas Blankenbaker, the 1717 immigrant. Jacob had two families, the first of which included Elizabeth, Samuel, Nicholas, Henry, and Thomas. All of these people were to be found in Kentucky later. Did they all leave together? (Jacob was forming a second family when he moved, and they, of course, moved with him.)
First, we can fix the approximate departure of Jacob, and his second wife Hanna Weaver, between the birth of his child, Mary Barbara, recorded in baptismal record in 1798 in Virginia, and his death in 1801. (At this latter time there was another child, only weeks old.)
Probably, the first son of Jacob to go to Kentucky was Nicholas, who was a Revolutionary War veteran. He was in Class 71 of the Culpeper Classes, and was drafted, i.e., he was the selection out of the class. It is believed that he moved shortly after the war to Kentucky. He has no records in Virginia after his military service.
The next son to go to Kentucky was probably Henry, who is not in the 1787 Culpeper, Virginia, personal property tax list. He was a sponsor at the baptism of a child of Joshua Yager, his brother-in-law, in 1785. At this time he was almost 30 years old.
Samuel was a communicant in 1790 (without a wife), at the German Lutheran Church in the Robinson River Valley; however, he was not in the 1787 tax list for Culpeper County. (There is one Samuel there, but that should be his nephew, who was 20 years old). Some say that his first wife, Amy Yager, died in 1788, so there may have been a complicated story here. For example, he and his wife may have gone to Kentucky, where his wife died. He may have then returned to Virginia briefly, made an appearance at the church, and then went back to Kentucky.
The son, Thomas, was having children baptized up to 1798 in Virginia. Comparing the dates for Jacob's move, it appears that Thomas probably went with his father to Kentucky.
The daughter, Elizabeth, married Ambrose Garriott. He was in the 1787 property tax list in Virginia. Except for one very early child in the church records, they left no mark there.
All of the sons, except Nicholas, moved to Jefferson County, KY; Nicholas moved to Shelby County, KY. His daughter, Elizabeth, and her husband, Ambrose, moved to a different county in KY.
Jacob directed in his will that his estate was be divided when the youngest child was 21. Elizabeth, at this time, would have been almost 70 years old, so there was about a fifty-year spread in his children's ages.
(23 Aug 03)
We gratefully acknowledge the work of John Blankenbaker who published over 2,500 Germanna History Notes via the Germanna-L@rootsweb.com email list from 1997 to 2008. We are equally thankful to George Durman (Sgt. George) for hosting the list and republishing the notes via rootsweb.com.