Military-Matthew Henry McClurkin (1761-1847)
I
have many ancestors who fought in various wars, but I believe the on with the
most interesting service record was Matthew McClurkin. I’ve already written
about his brother Archibald and his son James, who both served in the military
themselves, but Matthew deserves his own post.
Matthew was part of a large
Scots-Irish family of covenanters that emigrated from Ballymoney area in
Ireland to Chester County, South Carolina just before the revolutionary war.
Matthew was probably the youngest of five known brothers, Robert, John, Thomas,
and Archibald. When the revolutionary war started Matthew’s father had much of
his livestock confiscated by the British and his brother Thomas was threaten.
The Scots-Irish had a strong distaste for the British aristocracy, which had so
often oppressed them in England, and the Covenanters were even more incensed as
they had been brutally persecuted for years, forcing most of them to move to
Ireland. The McClurkins and their Scots-Irish neighbors rallied to the
revolutionary call and joined the fight. Their covenanter Pastor, Rev William
Martin, was so eloquent in preaching against the British that he was
eventually arrested and held in a British prison. Matthew would have been too
young to join at the beginning of the war, but all four of his older brothers
began fighting for the continental army. Thomas was serving as early as 1775 in
“Snowy Camp” under Captain Abraham Turner.
Probably sometime in 1780
Matthew’s brother Archibald grew sick with Small pox and returned home from the
fighting. While he was still terribly sick in bed Tories in the neighborhood
informed Colonal Tarleton and the Tories under his command that there was a
known rebel in the neighborhood. A Tory, who had once been a friend of the
covenanters, name John Phillips took Archibald from his bed and hung him on a
red Oak tree by the side of the road. This roused the anger of the neighborhood
and doubtless that of the young Matthew, who was about eighteen. He joined the
Continatal army as a volunteer that spring and served under Lieut. Houston and Col.
Sumter. In August he took part in the decisive battle at Hanging Rock, where
the Americans attacked a British outposts. The battle raged for three hours and
many men fainted from the heat, and lack of ammunition made a total victory
impossible. However, in the end, the British lost 192 soldiers and the
Americans lost only 12.
Matthew’s division then marched
to Biggers Ferry on the Catawba River. They were attacked there by British
forces and Matthew was severely wounded on the head. Fifty three years later,
the clerk filing Matthew’s pension application would note that the scar of that
wound was still plainly visible. A wounded Matthew was taken prisoner and
placed in prison in first in Charlotte, North Carolina, and then in Camden,
South Carolina. Matthew sat in these British prisons for over two months, along
with other captured soldiers. Finally their fate was decided. The British
intended to put them on prison ships, and began marching Matthew and the other
prisoners from Camden to Charleston. This prospect would be enough to strike
fear into anyone’s heart. British prison ships were old or damaged ships that
could no longer be used for anything else. Conditions were horrific and more
Americans died of neglect on these ships than were killed in Battle.
Matthew and his fellow prisoners
decided that their only chance was to escape. When they were about sixteen
miles out of Camden they attacked their guards and escaped. They must have been
unarmed and probably bound facing heavily armed British soldiers, deep in
British territory, but somehow they made it out. Matthew did not waste any time
and as soon as he was free enrolled again as a volunteer under Col Sumter.
After fighting under Col Sumter again he was again taken captive and held for
an unknown amount of time. Fortunately, this time Matthew was not put on a
prison boat, but was patrolled and sent home. Soon after his release the war
ended in victory for the Americans.
After the war Matthew married his
cousin Jennet McClurkin. They continued to live in Chester County, South
Carolina and had three children together. Jennet died young and Matthew
remarried to Mary Gaston Elliot, a widow. Matthew and Mary moved to Tennessee
then Indiana, where Matthew applied for a received a pension for his
Revolutionary war serviced. Most of the information about his service comes
from that pension application. Matthew died on May 1st 1847 and was buried
in Preble County, Ohio.
I am also a descendent of Mathew henry McClurkin. His son, Joseph, who was an infant when the family moved from SC to the Ohio side of the Ohio-Indiana territory border in 1803, married Nancy Cook. They moved farther west to Princeton, IN, where they raised a family, their first born being James Cook McClurkin (my gg-grandfather). The three oldest boys enlisted in the Indiana 33rd Volunteer Infantry at the start of the Civil War and the youngest of the three, Will, died from wounds received at the Battle of Thompson's Station (TN). Most of the regiment were captured by overwhelming Confederate forces and shipped east to infamous Libby Prison in Richmond, VA. The two brothers, James and John, were among those exchanged-out and rejoined the war, serving in the Indiana 33rd as part of Sherman's Army of the West. They fought their way though western TN and GA, laying seige to Atlanta ("Gonne With the Wind"). The Indiana 33rd was the first regiment to enter Atlanta after its surrender. They participated in Sherman's March to the Sea, turning north at the coast and coming up behind R.E. Lee before he surrendered to U.S. Grant. James mustered out as 2nd Lieutenant and both brothers returned home to Princeton. John eventually became a physician and James returned to farming. James married Amanda Howe, who had left school to become a war nurse, being the first woman to enter Vicksburg after its surrender. James and Amanda had three children, Elizabeth, Rose, and John. John married a woman named Ann ??? and had two boys, one of whom drowned while a boy in a swimming accident in a river and the other died fairly young from ??; I do not believe these deaths terminated that family line. Elizabeth and Rose both attended college at the Western College for Women, now absorbed into Ohio's Miami University. Elizabeth married a physician in the Army Health Service named Dr. Bahrenburg (sp?) who was sent to the Philippines at the outset of WWI, was captured by the Japanese, and spent the remainder of the war in a POW camp. He survived to come home to Ohio and had 2-3 children. Rose was my g-grandmother and I knew her before she died in 1968 in her mid-80s. Rose married Richard Beatty after his first wife died, leaving him a widower with an adult daughter (Ada). Richard was from Butler County in western PA and at one time operated a pharmacy and dry goods store. He got into oil speculation when oil was discovered in PA/OH/KY/IN/OK and made a lot of money buying and selling oil-land lease, settling in Bowling Green, OH. A Democrat, Richard was twice elected to the Ohio senate and refused a call to run for Lt. Governor. He was appointed to Ohio's 2nd Constitutional Convention to rewrite the constitution. He died in Jan 2020 from the Spanish Flue epidemic. leaving Rose a widow with his only child, Jean Beatty. In 1930 Rose earned the highest score on the civil service test and was appointed Superintendent of the Ohio reform school for girls ("Scioto Village". a.k.a. The Girls Industrial School), just north of Columbus. She was the first woman superintendent of the large complex, and this was aided by the post-depression Progressive movement. Rose left the position in 1939, but not before her daughter Jean married a local young man named Warren Watkins (my grandfather). They had one child, my mother, before they divorced and then Warren, in the Ohio Nat'l Guard, was called-up after Pearl harbor. He served in the medical corp and was also a combat medic in the European Theater, remaining after the war ended as part of the army-of-occupation, eventually returning to Ohio. Their daughter, my mother, married a french speaking Cajun from Louisiana who was stationed at an Ohio air force base and they had three sons, my brothers and me.
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