Would appreciate any information on family line of Lewis Elias Marcum and daughter Nettie Marcum of NC, Ky, Ark and Ok. I have great great and great3 uncles who have married into Cherokee lines. However my father John Carter McIlroy said his mother Nettie was 1/2 First Nation from her mother. I can find no information about her mother at all. Nettie married Walter Alexander McIlroy and as a widow married Charles (Charlie) Darius Hawkins. Also anyone out there descendants of Phillip and Mahala (Asher) Marcum please contact me.
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Well, first you can find Nettie in the 1910 Census living in Franklin Co., AR, with Walter. She is listed with a birth year of 1882. Her place of birth, and that of her parents, is listed as “KY.”
So, with these clues, you can filter your search a bit and narrow things down. If you do a search for a first name “Nettie” (or similar), female, born about 1882 in KY with parents from KY, and limit the query to the 1900 Census, Arkansas…this will bring back 27 results (via ancestry.com database). Only one hit looks like it is from Franklin County, Arkansas. This is listed initially as “Nellie Marcum.” But, when you pull up the PDF and look at the original, you’ll notice that the there is a double t with the cross mark too high to be picked up by this system. So, it was erroneously read as “Nellie”…instead of Nettie.
This result hits on all of your elements. This would indicate that here parents were a William Marcum b. abt 1852 KY, and Mary J. Marcum b. abt 1854 KY.
Now, we need a little corroborating documentation confirming this parentage. This 1937 obituary seems to do the trick:
Funeral Services were conducted Wednesday, Dec. 15 for W. M. (Bill) Marcum, age 85 years, who died at the home of his son Lewis Marcum, near Frasier. Burial was in the cemetery at Old Skully or Brashear’s Switch near junction of highway 16 and 23. Rev. Mr. Reed of Combs officiated at the service.
Mr. Marcum was one of the oldest settlers in the northern part of Franklin County. He was buried on his 85th birthday.
He is survived by two brothers, Alfred and Harvey, two sisters, Mrs. “Sis” Ward and Mrs. Marguerite Cox, of Kentucky; three daughters, C. R. (Emilie) Thompkins of Bass, Mrs. C.D. (Nettie) Hawkins of Porter, Oklahoma and Mrs. Lillie Rush of Little Rock…
Now that we have this link, we can look at her parents and grandparents more specifically – these were:
William Marcum (1852–1937) – son of Lewis Elias Marcum (1816–1891) and Mary Jane Bowles (1826–1886)
Mary Jane Allumbaugh (1854–1929) – daughter of William Allumbaugh (1812–1878) and Delilah Kelly (1816–1852)
Most of these lineages are rather easy to trace, going back to colonial Virginia and Carolinian roots, representing White settlers pushing into Kentucky quite early. There doesn’t seem to be any apparent Cherokee connection here, going back quite a ways. Looking at the “Nettie was ½ First Nation from her mother” piece, we can narrow in on Mary Jane Allumbaugh a bit more specifically. Her father’s death certificate gives some good information. His parents were Peter and Sarah (Ross) Alumbaugh. They were married in Madison Co., KY in 1804. This Peter was actually a Junior. He was the son of Peter Allumbaugh Sr, who was a Revolutionary War veteran and early Kentucky settler. There is a lot of info on this family line.
http://revwarapps.org/s36401.pdf
Interestingly, Peter Jr. actually had a “substitute” stand in for him during the War of 1812. See:
Report of the Adjutant General of the State of Kentucky: Soldiers of the War of 1812. Printed by Authority of the Legislature of Kentucky, 1891
https://books.google.com/books?id=WOM_AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA200&lpg=PA200&dq=%22peter+allumbaugh%22+KY+IN&source=bl&ots=o_meYpsdUn&sig=yv2H1anOSwXA4lkJzSR-fvAyfjs&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj8-4vnltbPAhVBNz4KHTQ4AW4Q6AEIQTAH#v=onepage&q=allumbaugh&f=false
Delilah Kelly’s family is similar, going back to colonial roots and early Kentucky settlers. Her father, Andrew, was the son of John Patrick Kelly, an Irish immigrant and Revolutionary War veteran and Anna Hunter, possibly born in Scotland. Some interesting details of that line can be found here:
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=KEL&GSpartial=1&GSbyrel=all&GSst=45&GScntry=4&GSsr=2201&GRid=32166804&
Finally, it appears by your query that you are onto the generally correct Marcum family trail, when you mention Phillip Marcum and Mahala Asher. These were indeed relatives. However, this Phillip was not in your direct lineage. He was William Marcum’s (b. 1852) uncle. This family cluster that moved into Oklahoma in the late 1800s tried to get onto the Cherokee rolls through Mahala’s claimed lineage, not through Phillips’ line of descent (from Thomas Marcum and Mary Wilson). Mahala stated in her 1896 deposition, “my GrandMother was Winie Begley a sister to the old Sizemores and they was always called Cherokee Indians.”
The Sizemore files were notorious during the Dawes Commission era. The lore of Cherokee ancestry was quite strong in many different Sizemore branches, but the entire lot was denied because they could not prove their ancestry from any known Cherokees and were not enrolled as such. Ironically, as frequently as Sizemore family members claimed Cherokee descent at that time period, not a single individual with this surname was enrolled on Dawes.
Hi everyone. My name is Jeff Potts and I’m a great-great-great grandchild of Phillip and Mahala Marcum. They came to Muskogee in 1872 and parts of that first family are still here. My great-grandmother was Ida Marcum, daughter of Thomas Marcum and granddaughter of Phillip and Mahala.
I’m an attorney here in Muskogee – as was Phillip Marcum’s first cousin, Thomas Marcum (not in my direct line). Thomas was one of the first lawyers admitted to the federal court here in Muskogee before statehood. Thomas Marcum was also the Democratic Party Committeeman for Indian Territory. I served in the Oklahoma Legislature in the late 1980s representing Muskogee and Cherokee Counties. A grandson of Thomas Marcum, Thomas Marcum McCombs, also served in the Oklahoma legislature in the 1920s representing Sequoyah County.
Over the years, I have met lots of Oklahoma and Texas cousins – all direct descendants of Phillip and Mahala. Hope to hear from more cousins soon – drop me a note anytime. jeffpottslawoffice@att.net
My sincere apologies for taking so long to thank you for your time and considerate response to my post. Life got in the way of continuing my family search though on board now.
The mystery for me with Nettie is that most family trees have her Mother as either being Mary Jane Morris or Mary Jane Cornett. Never have I heard the name Allumbaugh for her mother’s maiden name. However, her grandmother (Mary) Jane Bowles father was William Anderson Bowles and her mother was Lucy Ann Thomas. Lucy Ann’s first husband was William Allumbaugh. He had around 17 siblings. I didn’t find any mention of he and Lucy Ann having any children. She married William A Bowles in 1821.
Also I knew Phillip was not my direct line however hoping to find any stories related to the Marcum family from his descendants. Also so many of the Marcum men and some of the women married into First Nation families I thought William Christopher may have also. Politically it had gotten dangerous for intermarriages around the time of his marriage. It may have been more than economically reasons he took his family to Arkansas.
Not much info on them once there though I have found a wonderful photo with a group of Oddfellow men with my grandfather and great grandfather amongst the group.
Again thank you for your help and applaud the wonderful service you give to others on your site.
Arohanui