Individual Notes
Note for: John Wesley Tilton, 16 Feb 1795 - 17 Mar 1846
Index
Individual Note: Info from McDonough County 2001 & 2002 Queries http://mcdonough.ilgenweb.net/queries/McDonough_02_query.html
Sun Feb 10 13:38:08 2002 Name: Roy Hughes Email: RoyHughes@aol.com Subject: Richard Tilton
Text of Query: Richard Tilton
HISTORY: Jones, William H, William Tilton: His English Origins and SomeAmerican Descendant s, Haritage Books Inc, Maryland, (1997) pg 145
Note: date and place of death from Joyce M. Smith, PO. Box 66, Trenton,MO 64683.submissio n to Tilton Family journal, Winter 1985, pg 15/16
Individual Notes
Note for: Richard Tilton, 1744 - ABT 1820
Index
Individual Note: HISTORY: Jones, William H, William Tilton: His English Origins and SomeAmerican Descendant s, Haritage Books Inc, Maryland, (1997) pg 115 & 145
Note: date and place of death from Joyce M. Smith, PO. Box 66, Trenton,MO 64683.submission to Tilton Family journal, Winter 1985, pg 15/16
Two Dates for his birth show up 1744 and 1754. Since his father died 1746, the 1744 seems more likely.
Richard Tilton was a Justice, Trustee, Land Owner and Minister. He was an early prominent personality in the history of Flemingsburg, KY, and Fleming County, KY. He was an original Trustee of the Town of Flemingsburg and the first presiding Justice of the Peace of Fleming County (later called county judge) and a Methodist minister who performed many marriages.
Perrin's 1888 History of Kentucky quotes Nimrod Tilton, Judge of Robertson County, Kentucky, as saying his grandfather, Richard Tilton, was a native of Maryland and settled in Mill Creek Valley, near May's Lick, before Kentucky was made a state. He was, he says, a local preacher, a prohibitionist, and a non-slave holder.
In 1792 and through 1805, he paid taxes in Mason County. He paid taxes in Fleming County from 1798 to 1804. In 1797 he was named a trustee of the town of Flemingsburgh.
In 1798 he produced credentials of his Ordination and Communion with the Methodist Episcopal Church.
(The following account is from an October 1950 Flemingsburg, KY, newspaper)
"Tilton of this county was named for a descendant of Richard Tilton. He removed to Illinois in 1819 and died in Washington County, Illinois, in 1824. He was survived by six sons; Enoch, Thomas, John Wesley, Richard Jr., Robert Dorsey, and Jesse Lum; and by four daughters; Elizabeth, Lydia, Sarah and Oleitha."
(The following excerpt is from a biography of Richard T. Hughes which appears in "Portrait and Biographical Album of Whiteside Co., Illinois; Chapman Bros. - 1885)
"His (Richard Tilton's) family included 12 or 13 children; and, after they had attained to the growth if not the years of maturity, they removed to Okaw, the southeastern township of Bond County, on the Kaskaskia River, in Illinois. They were pioneers, and received the full benefit of the poisonous emanations from the low marshes in their vicinity, which resulted in the most terrible mortality. One by one the stalwart sons and fair daughters succumbed, and the parents followed in their turn. Five individuals lay dead in the house at one time. Several recovered, and as soon as was possible, they went back to the old home in Kentucky, leaving a monstrous estate, including thousands of acres, under the control of a lawyer named Robert Turner, through whose chicanery the entire property was wasted, and availed nothing to its rightful owners, the heirs of Richard Tilton. One of the daughters, Oletha, married Samuel Parker, a Methodist divine of distinction, the record of whose labors and abilities are preserved with just pride in the annals of the Church, and who died at New Orleans to which place he had been sent by the Conference"
What was Okaw Township in Bond County, IL, is now Tamalco Township and included part of the adjoining Fayette Co., IL. No land records have been found there for the Tilton "monstrous estate" mentioned above.
Richard Tilton is listed in the 1820 Washington Co., IL federal census. This is the last known public record on Richard Tilton, therefore some researchers have given that place and date as his death facts. There is also the above quoted Flemingsburg, KY, newspaper that states he died in Washington Co., IL in 1824. The basis for the 1824 date is not known.
Richard Tilton had at least five children by his first wife; Elizabeth, Lydia, Thomas O., Enoch, and Sarah. There may have been more if the above historical account is correct, and he in fact had 12 or 13 children.
In April 05, 1790 he married Nancy Lum in Philadelphia. They also had at least five children; Ollietha, John Wesley, Richard C. Jr., Robert Dorsey and Jesse Lum.
Elizabeth, born March 27, 1783, married Allen B. Hughes, a Kentucky-Ohio financier, on December 20, 1800,. They moved to Morgan Co., IL in 1834. Their sons, John A. Hughes and Richard Tilton Hughes were prominent settlers in Morgan and Whiteside Counties, respectively.
Lydia, born March 16, 1786, married James King on October 27, 1809, and their biography is included in The Historical Encyclopedia of Illinois and History of McDonough County, compiled by Dr. Newton Bateman, and Paul Shelby, 1907. It is posted on the McDonough Co., IL GenWeb site.
Nothing is known about Thomas O. Tilton, Enoch Tilton (died in Kentucky on March 17, 1846), and Sarah Tilton (died in Kentucky on July 30, 1863).
Ollietha, (Olethia. Oletha) married Samuel Parker on June 18, 1816 in Mason Co., KY, a Methodist minister. No further information has been found on Samuel.
John Wesley, born February 16, 1795, married Elizabeth Moore on December 30, 1818 in Cynthiana, Harrison Co, KY. He died in Platte Co, MO, on March 17, 1846.
Richard C. Jr. was born August 30, 1799. Nothing more is known about him.
Robert Dorsey was born May 17, 1801, became a doctor and died, on June 23, 1833, fighting a cholera epidemic in Elizaville, KY. He is buried in an unmarked cholera cemetery that can still be located by local residents.
Jesse Lum was born January 29, 1804 and married Rachel Ashcraft. From Nimrod Tilton's (Jesse' son) biography: "Jesse L. Tilton was born in 1806, was a farmer and tanner, and died in 1883"