 Abt 1692 - Bef 1770 (~ 78 years)
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| Name |
LOONEY Robert |
| Born |
Abt 1692 |
Ballagilley Farm, Maughold Parish, Isle of Mann, Ireland/England  |
| Gender |
Male |
| Died |
Bef Nov 1770 |
Looney's Mill Creek, Botetourt County, VA |
| Person ID |
I0297 |
Combo |
| Last Modified |
22 Aug 2009 |
| Family |
LLEWELLYN Elizabeth, b. Abt 1696, Sheading, Kirk Lonan, Isla of Man, Ireland , d. 29 Aug 1747 (Age ~ 51 years) |
| Married |
1715 |
Ireland |
| Children |
| | 1. LOONEY Thomas, b. 1718, Sheading, Kirt Lonan, Isle of Mann, Ireland/England , d. 15 Apr 1746, Augusta County, VA (now Rockbridge) (Age 28 years) |
| | 2. JR. Robert Looney, b. 1721, Isle of Man, England , d. Abt Feb 1756, Auguata County, VA (now Rockbridge) (Age 35 years) |
| | 3. LOONEY Daniel, b. 1723, Isle of Mann , d. 19 Nov 1769, Augusta County, VA (now Rockbridge) (Age 46 years) |
| | 4. LOONEY Adam, b. 1725, Ireland , d. 4 Jul 1770, Tyron, Craven County, SC (Age 45 years) |
| | 5. LOONEY Samuel, b. 1727, Kirk Lonan, Isle of Mann, Ireland/England , d. 1760 (Age 33 years) |
| | 6. LOONEY Louisa, b. 1728, Isle of Mann , d. UNKNOWN |
| | 7. LOONEY Absalom Abraham, b. 1729, Isle of Mann , d. 28 Sep 1796, Bluefield, Botetourt Co., VA (Age 67 years) |
| | 8. LOONEY Lucy Jane, b. 1730, Isle of Man, Ireland , d. UNKNOWN |
| | 9. LOONEY John, b. 1732, Isle of Man, England , d. Abt 1817, Tennessee (Age 85 years) |
| | 10. LOONEY Peter Grancer, b. 1734, Philadelphia, PA , d. 8 Feb 1760, Augusta County, VA (Age 26 years) |
| | 11. LOONEY David, b. 1734, Possibly Virginia or Maryland , d. 1 May 1810, Blountsville, Sullivan County, TN (Age 76 years) |
| | 12. LOONEY Joseph B., b. 1740, Looney's Creek, Botetourt County, VA , d. 27 Jul 1816, Roane County, TN (Age 76 years) |
| | 13. LOONEY James (Josiah), b. 1745, Augusta County, VA (Now Rockridge) , d. UNKNOWN |
| | 14. LOONEY Mary B., b. 1746, d. UNKNOWN |
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| Family ID |
F0151 |
Group Sheet | Family Chart |
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| Notes |
- Origin of name: MacGillowney, the Manx form of the early Gaelic name MacGiolla Dhomhnaigh, which was worn down to MacGillowney, and then to Lowney, Lewney, and Looney, according to genealogist David Craine. Robert's birth place (Ballagilley Farm) translates to balla, meaning village, and Gilley, part of their last name.
Lived Looney's Mill Creek of James River in Botetourt Co., VA
Was a Manx Friend (Quaker).
About 1731, Robert and Elizabeth came to America from the Isle of Mann, Great Britain, with their family, settling first in Philadelphia, PA and later in colonial Maryland. In 1739 - 40, they moved west to the new frontier and settled in Augusta County, VA on the James River. There on Looney Creek, Robert and Elizabeth raised their family, established the first ferry crossing of the James River, built a mill, grew crops and raised livestock. Due to the constant conflict between France and England, as well as the threat of Indian attachs, a fort was ordered built in 1755 around the Looney homesite. This fort was named Fort Looney and was at the junction of Looney Creek and the James River. This fort was part of a series of forts ordered built along the frontier to protect settlers and to keep the French from claiming the territory. Fort Looney was visited in 1756 by Col. George Washington, future first president of the United States. The Looney sons were frontiersmen and pioneers. Some fought and died with the British against the French and Indians. Some were killed by Indians during frequest frontier raids on settlers while others helped to explore and expand the frontier boundaries first into southwestern Virginia and eventually into Tennessee Indian Territory. The Looney sons and grandsons fought against the British in the War of Independence.
Article in The Decatur Daily about James W. Looney said that Robert and his wife Elizabeth had a total of 14 sons. It also said that n 1734 Robert and Elizabeth were in Philadelphia where they joined an expedition into the Colony of Virginia. The following year he settled on a patent of 294 acres, for which he had to pay the Crown land rent of one shilling a year, on the south bank of the Cohongoronto (upper Potomac) River, probably near present day Hagerstown, MD. By 1739 Robert moved southward through the Shenandoah Valley, finally settling on a grant of 250 acrea on the James River. In 1742 Robert gained another 400 acres in grants, and became one of the most prosperous farmers in the area, with his own mill, orchards, nursery, cattle and horses, and even operated a ferry across what may still be found today not far from Natural Bride - Looney's Mill Creek.
[From The MacGiolla Dhomhnaighs, or MacGillewneys, or Looneys of the Missouri-Arkansas Border, by Donald R. Holliday]
During or near 1731, the first forebear of the Missouri-Arkansas border Looneys immigrated to the British colony of Pennsylvania with his wife and seven sons, entering through the port of Philadelphia. Their eighth son was born in 1734; six more sons and probably one daughter would follow. In 1732, Robert settled on a patent of 294 acres on the Cohongoronta River near present Hagerstown, Maryland (Sayre, NAMA). He maintained possession of that original patent until 1766 when, through power of attorney, he sold the land.
In 1739-40, Robert Looney joined some seventy other families of Friends in moving southward through the Shenandoah Valley to settle a 100,000 acre grant of land on the Opeckan River. Robert settled a tract of 250 acres of land on the James River in what was to become part of Augusta County, and later Botetourt County. He donated lands for the county seat and became an influential man in colonial politics. In 1742 he acquired three grants of approximately 1000 acres of land. Sayre says he became "one of the most prosperous farmers in the area, with his own mill, orchards, nursery, cattle and horses and even operated a ferry across .... Looney's Mill Creek." Goodrich Wilson writes in The Roanoke Times that they had a blacksmith shop and, because of the strategic location of their property where James River flowed around the base of the Purgatory Mountain spur of the Alleghenies and the base of the Blue Ridge, their home became, sort of tavern and trading center .... In 1745, John Buchanan was entertained at Looney's both going and coming on his visits to the New River Settlements. In 1753, the Moravian Fathers, on their way to start their settlements around what is now Winston-Salem, stopped at Looney's to have their wagons mended, their horses shod, their food supplies replenished, and....a large batch of bread baked to their order. In 1756, George Washington crossed the river by their ferry on his way to inspect frontier forts, and the year before the Revolution, Hugh McAden stopped there while he watched the Looneys build a stockade fort for defense against the Indians.
Robert's will, dated September 14th, 1769, was recorded in Botetourt County; it was probated November 13th, 1770.
When war with the French and Indians broke out, Robert, Jr., was among the first to be killed in southwest Virginia: Sunday 15, 1756. James Burke brought word that Robert Looney was killed and that he had himself one horse shot and five taken away by the Shawnee Indians.
Goodrich Wilson also reports that "Peter, another son [the first born in the colonies], a sergeant at Fort Vause, was captured when the fort fell, and was carried off by the Indians. The winter passed; summer came to the Valley. Peter came back from .... as far north as Detroit." Ed Sayle captures the heart of the family's early American military history:
A third son, Samuel, was killed by Indians in 1760, and the home of a daughter, Lucy Jane, was raided and looted by Indians. Robert Looney, mindful of his responsibilities to his family and followers, erected a fort, Fort Looney, one of the fortifications recorded as resisting the Indian and French depredations until the end of the war in 1763 .... But the end of the Indian Wars was not to spare the Looney family. During the American Revolution, two of Robert Looney's sons, Absolem and David were to see duty--Absolem in patriotic service in support of the military forces under General Washington, and David as a Major in the North Carolina Militia. And three of Absolem's sons, like the offspring of his brothers, were to serve in the Virginia Militia, with one dying of gunshot wounds in both legs after his role in the American victory at the Battle of King's Mountain in North Carolina.
Another son, Captain Joseph, was at Yorktown for the British surrender. Absalom, fifth son of Robert and Elizabeth, born about 1729 in the Isle of Man, discovered in 1770 what is yet called Abb's Valley while on a hunting and scouting expedition in southwest Virginia, in what is now Tazewell County. Mary Elizabeth Looney notes that "Absolem...led his family and some followers and founded a settlement at least four years before that noted frontier explorer, Daniel Boone, arrived in the same area to build a fort only six miles from Absolem's homestead." Ab, Captain James Moore and his family, and Robert Poage and his family settled in the valley, but during the early part of the Revolution, with Indian attacks continuing and the militia called to the Continental Army, the Poages abandoned the valley; Ab and his family, at his father's insistance, returned to Fort Looney; and the Shawnee raided the valley and killed or carried off the remaining Moore family. The State Historical Society of Virginia has erected a bronze tablet in memory of the tragedy and to mark the location of Abb's Valley. It is on Route 85, five miles southwest of Pocahontas, Virginia.
During the Revolution, Absalom furnished beef for the Continental Army and served in his brother Joseph's company. After the Revolution, he returned to his valley and prospered. He and his wife, Margaret, had twelve children, five sons and seven daughters. He is reported by Elizabeth Looney to have been killed by Indians while going to the well to draw a bucket of water. Ed Sayle places his death at Dunkard's Spring, Virginia. In his will, dated September 28, 1791 and probated at the June 1796 County Court, Absalom left five shillings each to eleven children and the remainder of his estate to his youngest, Benjamin.
In addition to killing or being killed by Indians, some Looney's also married them. Mary Elizabeth Looney reports at least three such marriages, two in the Robert, Jr. line. The third "married a niece of Enoli, Black Fox, chief of the Cherokees. This Enoli lived and died in Alabama. John [son of niece of Enoli and a Looney?] became a Chief and died here in Washington while in D.C. to sign a treaty with the government. He is buried in Congressional Cemetery.'' She goes on to say, "Samuel Looney of Robert, Jr. is said to have married a grandchild of Pocahontas, but we have never, never, never been able to prove this."
Ab's son Michael moved west to Hawkins County, Tennessee, where he and his wife, Temperence Cross, had ten children between 1781 and 1799 and "where the 1,500 acre farm he acquired at a half-shilling an acre is still held by his heirs." Michael and Tempy's youngest son, John, inherited the home place. A family list compiled in 1905 from cemetary records shows that "[John] and wife, Elizabeth Johnson, are buried in the old Looney graveyard there on the south side of Michael. There are about 120 graves and a row of slaves." Two of Michael and Tempy's grandchildren served in Alabama and Tennessee legislatures. One great-grandchild (son of granddaughter Sally whose parents were Michael and Tempy's second child, Margaret, and Dangerfield Rice) served four terms as governor of Georgia, then was elected to the U.S. Senate. Rachael, eighth child of Michael and Tempy, was in Polk County according to the 1840 census and Dallas County, Missouri according to the 1850 and 1860 censuses. The third child, William, moved to Arkansas in 1802.
Lawrence Dalton writes that William Looney settled the site of Elm Store, Arkansas, near Pocahontas, the first white man to settle on the Eleven Points, as he came here as early as 1802, and entered !,500 acres of land. He brought three negroes with him, and for a number of years was obliged to go to Cape Girardeau, Missouri, 135 miles distant, and be gone for about two weeks, to buy groceries and other necessary articles. Their meat was .... bears, deer, turkeys, etc'. He could not raise hogs on account of bears. Very little farming was done in those days, as from six to ten acres was considered a good crop, and the horses and cattle lived on the cane. A number of years elapsed before there were any settlers besides himself and two brothers named Stubblefield, on this stream, and it was fifteen to twenty miles to the nearest neighbor. He had afl'ne orchard, and made brandy in great quantities, about 1,500 gallons per year.
He married Rhoda Stubblefield, and they had ten children. William, "being an educated man, taught his children at home and thus they became fairly educated." His will is dated March 10th, 1846 and "proved" April 25, 1846. Rhoda died a year later, on April 18, 1847.
Robert Looney's will from C. Waldrop
Written on the date of his death: September 14, 1769
Recorded in Will Book A, page 5, Botetourt County, VA
In the name of God amen September the fourteenth, one thousand seven hundred and sixty-nine. I Robert Looney being very sick and weak in body but of Perfect mind and memory and calling to mind the uncertainty of this life and knowing that all men was born to die once I recommend my soul to God who gave it and my Body to the ground to be buried in a decent manner at the discretion of my Executors nothing doubting but I shall have it again at the Resurrection. As for the worldly Estate that it has pleased God to bless me with I give and bequeath in manner and form the following. I leave my well beloved wife, Elizabeth Luney, and my beloved son, Joseph Luney, to be my sole Executors. Next I leave to my beloved grandson, John Luney, one shilling sterling. All the remainder of my Bodily Estate after my funeral charges and Lawful debts are paid I give and bequesth to my well beloved wife, Elizabeth Luney to Live on and use as she pleaseth During her natural life and then to descend to my beloved son, Joseph, at her death the rest of my children having already got all that I allow to them of my Estate. Signed Sealed and Pronounced in Presents of us
his mark Robert R. Luney (seal)
John Smith
James Crow
Ellinor Crow
John Burton (his mark)
At a court held for Botetourt County the 13th of November 1770 this writing purporting to be the last will and Testament of Robert Looney decd. was Presented in court by Joseph Looney one of the Executors herein named and proved by the oaths of Thomas Crow, James Crow and John Smith and ordered to be recorded and on motion of said Executor who made oath according to Law certificate is granted him for obtaining a probate thereof in due from whereupon he together with Abraham McClelland and John Looney his securities entered into and acknowledged their bond in five hundred pounds conditioned as the Law. Este John May B.B.B.
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