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Transcriber's notes: This history was transcribed from three photocopied
pages of typewritten text, kindly provided to me by Leah Weatherford
of Baldwyn, MS. Portions of the text indicate that it was originally
written on July 8, 1940, by Zadoc Lorenzo Weatherford.
Every effort has been taken to transcribe the text verbatim,
including the original spacing and line breaks.
Richard Warren Blaylock
cousinrichard@slurm.com
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HISTORY OF THE WEATHERFORD FAMILY
William Bazil Weatherford was born on the frontier of Georgia
on February 14, 1806. He died on September 2, 1894 and was buried
at Bexar, Alabama. His father was named William Weatherford and
was probably the son or grandson of one of four or five brothers
who came over from England. The date of their arrival is not
known.
William Bazil Weatherford had five brothers and one sister,
viz: Leander, Jack, Mart, Harris, and Joe, and a sister named
Biddie. She married Tom Heathcock, the father of John Heathcock,
the father of Mandy Weatherford. Leander and Jack Weatherford
(brothers of William Bazil Weatherford) lived and died on
adjoining farms in Limestone County near Athens, Alabama. I
have no history of the other brothers. William Bazil Weatherford's
mother was a Flannagan and lived near Athens, Alabama. William
Bazil Weatherford was married first to Diana Scott, daughter of
Bradford Scott (Franklin County) and to this union was born
four brothers and six sisters, viz: Mart (the eldest), Harris,
Leander Jackson, and Joe. Sisters: Temp, married George
Robinson of Bexar, Alabama; Rachel married Bent West of Hartford,
Arkansas; Mandy, married Curt Blaylock of Monroe, Oklahoma;
Mary, married George Scott of near Hodges, Alabama; Sarah, married
Ben Jones and after his death married Marshal Johnson the father
of Dell and Bazil Johnson; Margaret, married William Tyler and
they had three children when the war broke out about the time of
the Battle of Shiloh. She lived in Illinois at the time of her
death. One of her daughters, Eliza, married Frank Metz. They
had a daughter, Anna, who married a man by the name of George
Schlingman. They lived near Macon, Illinois in 1940. William
Bazil Weatherford was married a second time to a Thornton, and
to this marriage was one child, Adeline, who married Jason P.
Ford of Hamilton, Alabama. William Bazil Weatherford was married
a third time to Bettie Young, mother of Tom Young of Marion County,
Alabama.
William Bazil Weatherford's oldest child, Mart Weatherford,
had four children. One was named Sylvester who lived and died
near Walkers Bridge. Mart Weatherford was a confederate soldier
and was killed in action at Petersburg, Virginia. His wife was
asister to Dock Davis. Joe Weatherford died in prison during
the Civil War. His Wife was a Simmons. He was in the same
Company with Fayette Kennedy.
William Tyler, the husband of Margaret Weatherford Tyler,
brought a load of supplies from some place north for the Union
Soldiers at Shiloh and was given furlough to come back to
Margaret's fathers home on Bull Mountain in Marion County, and on
his way back to rejoin the Union forces was killed in a battle
by the Confederate forces near Belmont, Mississippi.
Leander Jackson Weatherford, the youngest son of William
Bazil Weatherford, was born on Bull Mountain Creek in Marion
County on the place settled by William Bazil Weatherford on
February 8, 1854. He was married to Lucinda Adelia Ritter, the
daughter of Mart Ritter, in about 1873. To this union was born
ten children: Nolen, John Greely, Marcellus, James Harris,
Martin Van Buren, Mosey, and Zadoc Lorenzo. The girls were:
Rachel, Vada, and Vera. Leander J. Weatherford was married a
second time in 1901 to Mrs. Mary Puckett Nicholson and to this
union eight children were born, viz: Bazil, Dewey, Frona, Trannie,
Archie, Carnie, and Gracie. Bazel, Dewey, Mosey, and Marcellus
are dead at the time of this writing, July 8, 1940. There were
eighteen children of Leander J. Weatherford by his first and
second wife. He was married three times subsequent to the deaths
of his second wife, but had no children. He died in 1938 and
was buried in the Ridge Cemetery near Red Bay, Alabama. Of the
eighteen children, some made farmers, some school teachers, and
one, Zadoc L. Weatherford, was a general practitioner of medicine
and lived in Red Bay, Alabama. He served as a Medical Officer
in the World War. He also served one term in the State Senate,
Alabama 1939-1944. There had been one other William Weatherford
who served in the Alabama Legislature. He was also a Captain in
the Confederate Army, as well as a Doctor and practiced his
profession in Franklin County, Alabama. The Doctor William
Weatherford referred to above was the grandfather of John
Weatherford, Harve Weatherford, Eva Weatherford, and Mrs. Phil
Nelson of Vina, Alabama and William Weatherford, deceased, and
Faus Weatherford, Russelville, Alabama, who has been Tax Assessor
for Franklin County for a number of years. The father of the
grandchildren of Doctor Weatherford was named John Weatherford,
the same as Dr. William Weatherford's father who served as
Sherriff of Franklin County for a number of years. William Bazil
Weatherford, the grandfather of Dr. Zadoc L. Weatherford, and
Dr. William Weatherford were first cousins.
It is reported that William Weatherford, the farther of William
Bazil Weatherford, after the death of his first wife (Flannagan)
took unto himself a Choctaw squaw and went west to Oklahoma or
Texas. It is surmised that the Weatherfords in Texas and
Oklahoma came from or near Athens, Alabama, and are descendents
of my great grandfather William Weatherford.
William Bazil Weatherford made his first boat trip when
nineteen years old. He followed boating on the Tennessee River
from Florence to New Orleans, for about ten or twelve years. He
married near Florence, Alabama, or Athens, Alabama. He then
came to Bear Creek and settled near the Chickasaw boundary line.
He lived there until land was opened up by the Government. He then
rode horseback to Pontotoc, Mississippi to the Government Office
where he entered the 160 acres of land on which he reared his
family and which land was left to Lee J. Weatherford. Here
Leander J. Weatherford reared his first family. In about 1901
this land was traded to Jake Webb, and Lee Weatherford moved to
Itawamba County, Mississippi, settling just across the state line
from Red Bay, Alabama, in Mississippi.
Mart Weatherford, brother of William Bazil Weatherford, moved
to some place in Louisiana and reared his family.
The great-grandfather of Dr. William Weatherford, who
practiced medicine in Franklin County, Alabama was one of the
four or five brothers who came over from England. He was a
Baptist preacher and his name was John Weatherford. In the
early days, he and three other men were arraigned in the
Colonial courts for preaching the Bible. Patrick Henry, who
at the time lived sixty miles away, heard of the trial that
was to be and rode this distance horseback to defend these four
preachres, gratis. Patrick Henry's speech was so impressive
that the Judge ordered the Sheriff to set Brother Weatherford
and the other three preachers free, he paying the fine of $25.00,
or five pounds, for the preachers.