MORTON > BLEDSOE > KISSEE > JENNINGS (U4)
Kit # 1413. Unknown 1^st wife of Patrick Morton, Sr. > Elizabeth Morton, b. c.1780 + Benjamin Bledsoe, Jr., 1801 in Surry Co, NC > Ufins Bledsoe b. 1805 NC + Arter Kissee in 1826 Pulaski Co, KY, d. 1878 Christian Co, MO > Nancy Jane Kissee b. 1838 Edgar Co., IN + 3^rd Hon. Jesse Jennings, d. 1885 Taney County, MO > Nany “Ufie” Jennings, b. 1876 Taney County, MO + William Wallace Rice	HVR1 Haplogroup	U4
	HVR1 Mutations	16263C
		16356C
		16519C
	HVR2 Mutations	73G
		263G
		315.1C

MORTON > BLEDSOE > KISSEE > JENNINGS
Copyright © December 2003, 2021
Mary Fern Souder

Generation 1: Patrick Morton was enumerated in the 1790 in alphabetized census in Surry County, NC, as follows:

Males: 1 > 16; 3 > 16

Females: 5

Nearby were:

The name of Patrick Morton’s first wife is not known. She was dead by 10 December 1810 when he married Rachel Hammons in Surry County, NC. The witness and bondsman for this marriage were his sons-in law, Benjamin Bledsoe and John Stanley.

North Carolina Marriage Bonds, 1741-1868

Groom: Patrick Morton

Bride: Rachel Hammons

Bond date: 10 Dec 1810

Bond #: 000146480

North Carolina Marriage Bonds, 1741-1868

Witness: Benjamin Bledsoe, (Jr.)

Bondsman: John Stanley

Image Number: 003294

County: Surry

Record #: 01 167

Patrick Morton and his first wife named their firstborn daughter Euphans Morton, and they named their second born daughter Elizabeth Morton, the subject of this study. Elizabeth Morton married Benjamin Bledsoe, Jr., and they named their firstborn daughter Euphins Bledsoe.

Euphan was very a prevalent name for baby girls in Scotland, and was a pet name for Euphemia A brief internet search will find that there were many infant daughters born in Scotland the 1700’s who were named Euphan, and some of them with this same first name were born in the 1600's.

Patrick Morton made his Will on 10 February 1815 in Surry County, NC. He left ½ of his property to his wife, Rachel, and ½ of his property to be divided among his surviving children and one granddaughter. His Will stated that his married daughter, Uphans Stanley, had already received her share, and granddaughter Elizabeth Morton was to receive an equal part of his estate “with my children.” (Perhaps the young Elizabeth Morton was an orphan and her father had already died.) The names of Patrick Morton’s other children were not listed in this Will. The executor of his Estate was Isaac Bledso, brother of his son-in-law, Benjamin Bledsoe. Witnesses to the Will were Thomas Barker and James Davis. There are 18 pages of the Inventory of the Estate of Patrick Morton, but a copy of the actual Probate of the Will (listing names of all the heirs) has not been found.

Morton researchers claim that Patrick Morton and his first wife had six known children:

Euphan Morton, b. 1780 who married John Stanley and died in Knox County, TN

Elizabeth Morton who married Benjamin Bledsoe, Jr., and he died in Martin County, IN

Patrick Morton, Jr., b. ca. 1785 NC, died after the 1850 census where he single was listed as a pauper in Union County, KY

Richard Morton, b. ca. 1787 in NC, who married an Ellis

James Morton, b. cam 1789 in NC, who married Elizabeth Summers

William Morton, b. ca. 1791, b. NC, no further information

Generation 2: Elizabeth Morton was born ca. 1782 and married Benjamin Bledsoe, Jr., on 23 October 1801 in Surry County, NC. Benjamin Bledsoe is an extremely common name, but the man who married Elizabeth Bledsoe was the son of Benjamin Bledsoe, Sr., of Surry County, VA, and his wife, Sarah.

Benjamin Bledsoe, Jr., was mentioned in the will of his father, Benjamin Bledsoe, Sr., which was proved in January Court in 1806 Knox County, KY. Some Bledsoe researchers believe that this is the same Benjamin Bledsoe, Sr., who married Sarah Chew on 10 December 1777 in Orange County, VA.

It is believed that Benjamin Bledsoe, Jr., died before 1830 in Martin County, IN.

Generation 3: Ufins Bledsoe was born 14 October 1805 in Surry County, NC. She married Arter Kissee on 28 November 1826 in Pulaski County, KY, when she was age 21 and he was age 16. (The actual age difference between them was four and one-half years.) The couple had ten children together. Information concerning this generation has a much stronger paper trail because of the biographies for the Kissee family which appear in "A Reminiscent History of the Ozark Region," Goodspeed Publishing Company, 1894, pp. 349-353. Biographies for Arter and Ufins state that parents of Ufins Bledsoe Kissee were Benjamin Bledsoe and Elizabeth Morton, early settlers of Kentucky, and that Arter's parents were Benjamin Kissee and Elizabeth Waddill.

According to the biographies, Arter and Ufins Bledsoe Kissee emigrated from Kentucky to Indiana to Illinois, then returned to the northwest part of Indiana and took up land, living there until 1846. They next went to what is now Christian County, MO, settling on Swan Creek, later moving near Ozark, MO. They next moved to Sparta in Christian County, MO, where she died on 18 February 1878 and he died on 15 August 1887. The obituary for Ufins stated that she was "a worthy member of the Christian Church."

Arter and Ufins Bledsoe Kissee are buried in the Abundance Cemetery in Sparta, Christian County, MO. Photos of their gravestones have been placed on Find A Grave, now maintained by Mark and Kay, and originally created by Larry Merritt on May 19, 2004. See Find A Grave Memorial# 8800961.

Generation 3: Nancy Jane Kissee, daughter of Arter and Ufins Kissee, was born in 1838 in Edgar County, IN. She married four times and had children by each husband.

Her first husband was George Dummitt, whom she married on 18 February 1855 in Greene County, MO. The couple had three sons, Willis, William Arter, and Hiram Dummitt. George Dummitt was killed by Rebels during the Civil War.

Nancy Jane’s second husband was Willis L. Padgett whom she married on 20 January 1867 in Taney County, MO. They had two children, Mary C. Padgett and George M. Padgett, before his death ca. 1871.

Her third husband was Hon. Jesse Jennings, whom she married ca. 1872 in Taney County, MO. Jesse, age 70 and some 36 years her senior, had been a prominent Missouri legislator representing Taney County. He had eight adult children with his late first wife, Hannah Haggy. Jesse and Nancy Jane Kissee Jennings had two children together: Joseph Alexander “Joe” Jennings, born 1873, who married Susan Emma Whitten, and Nancy “Ufie” Jennings, born 1876, who married William “Wallace” Rice.

Jesse Jennings died in 1877 and Nancy Jane married her fourth husband, Joseph Glenn, in 1878. After having one son, Andrew Glenn, born 1879, Nancy Jane died in 1885, leaving three minor children. Family legend is that she died in a corn field in Taney County, MO. Andrew Glenn, age 6 and the youngest child of Nancy Jane, was taken to raise by his Glenn relatives.

Nancy Jane’s children with Jesse Jennings, ages 12 and 9, were taken by Jesse Jennings’s oldest daughter, Agnes “Ann” Jennings and husband James Weston “Jim” Wyatt, who were childless. Family legend is that “Aunt Ann” was a saint, but that Jim Wyatt was cruel, especially to Joe Jennings, and would not let him in the house. Joe had to live in the woods and “Aunt Ann” smuggled food to him and hid it in the wood pile. Many other stories of the difficulty these children had during their childhood were told to their children. Jesse Jennings had been a prominent man of some means, but his children with Nancy Jane Kissee never forgot their difficult childhood and the relative affluence of their adult Kissee half-siblings.

Generation 4: Nancy "Ufie" Jennings married William Wallace Rice on 22 April 1901 in Taney County, MO.

I am deeply indebted to H. Banks McLaurin for his definitive work on the Bledsoe family in the United States; to Marguerite Thomas Workman for her generous collaboration on the Kissee and Jennings families; and to Betty Wicks Uder, long-time Kissee family historian.

The mitochondrial DNA of Participant # 1413 is exceptionally common. As of January 2021 the following matches were reported:

HVR1, HVR2, and Coding Regions = 185 perfect matches, with another 625 close matches.

Last Updated on 7/10/2007, 6/1/2021
By Wallace W. Souder