Back in the geneological saddle again

It's been some time since I posted any information about the Porters. At the family gathering after Christmas in Dallas, Richard suggested I start publishing family biographies. Here's one about Mary Bowen--our earliest matriarch. She was born some 30 years before the American Revolution, so lived during very interesting times. If you have any questions or suggestions of what you'd like to see on this blog, let me know at jantweiler@msn.com/

MARY BOWEN'S GRAVESTONE UP CLOSE
(The best that we could tell, it reads:

Sacred to the memory of Mary Bowen Porter Wife of Wm. Porter Mother to eight sons and five daughters

William Bowen Campbell, governor of Tennessee

We visited his plantation, which is staffed with guides in period costumes demonstrating life in the 1800s. He related to the Porters through his aunt who just happens to be our G7-grandmother, Mary Bowen Porter.

Mary Bowen 1748, mother of Reese Porter

Mary Bowen, born in Augusta County VA 1748

was the mother of our Reese Porter and the wife of William Porter Jr.

She was the daughter of John Bowen and Mary (McIlhaney) Bowen. The name Bowen was Welsh and was a derivative of an old Welsh name "Ap Owen" meaning "son of." The Owens and Bowens are from the family.

She drew a military pension for knitting wool socks for the soldiers at the pivotal Battle of Kings Mountain which turned the tide of the Revolutionary War. After the death of her husband in 1804, she and five of her sons, including our Reese, migrated southwest into southern Tennessee where she lived until her death in 1820. We dug her headstone out of the mud and scraped it off enough to read "mother of nine sons and five daughters". She is our GGGGGGGrandmother.