Fifth Generation

Most of the family of Captain Joseph Magruder lived in St. Paul’s Parish in what used to be Prince George’s Parish. Joseph Magruder’s father was a vestryman in this parish. There is now a beautiful cemetery there in Rock Creek Cemetery, but I don’t think any of my people are buried there. That is a subject of more research. Joseph Magruder and his first wife, Mary Jackson, baptized their son Samuel Jackson Magruder there. Later many of his children converted to other faiths one of his sons becoming a Methodist minister. His son-in-law later did some preaching for the Methodist Church. The church is
located:

St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Rock Creek Parish
Rock Creek Church Road & Webster Street, NW
Washington, DC 2001

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Robert White Magruder was born in 1788 in Montgomery County, Maryland. He is the youngest child of Catherine Fleming and Captain Joseph Magruder. He married Catherine Jane Offutt in 1809 in Maryland and had a son also named Robert White Magruder. He was a judge and moved the family to Missouri near his older half brother Joseph Magruder II’s family. I need to do more research on this line. One of his descendants was Kitty Colma Magruder Trescott of Missouri.

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Greenbury Magruder was born in 1784 in Montgomery County, Maryland and is the younger brother of my fourth great grandmother, Catherine Magruder Watkins. In 1804, he married  Jane Scott in Montgomery County, Maryland. It is not known if he had any children. According to his mother’s bible he was lost at sea in 1810. I don’t know if he was ever found again. I would have to read this case in the chancery courts:

Date: 1822/02/23
12028: Thomas Watkins vs. Willson Magruder, Greenbury Magruder, and Robert White Magruder. MO. Estate of Joseph Magruder - Finish of Trouble Enough, Bedford Shecanor. Recorded (Chancery Record) 120, p. 145.
Accession No.: 17,898-12028-1/5 MSA S512-15-11849 Location: 1/39/4/

I think this had to do with the freeing of all of Catherine Magruder’s slaves, but I am not sure. I need to do some more research.

The Bukey family claims to be descended from Greenbury Magruder. There is a Greenbury Magruder who marries Elizabeth Hurley, but that Greenbury Magruder is from Virginia and was born in 1813. Is it possible that he is Greenbury Magruder’s son? The Greenbury Magruder line is very confusing. Despite the unusual sounding name, there are other Greenbury Magruders all of them too young to be the son of Captain Joseph Magruder. The Bukeys used this line to join the Sons of the American Revolution. I hope to figure it all out. Maybe a descendent of Greenbury Magruder will see this post and help me out! When I get the chance I would like to go to the DAR library in DC and look this information up. The 1946 Yearbook of the American Clan Gregor Society also has some information on this line. I hope I can solve this confusion soon.

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John Burgess Magruder is the oldest son of Catherine Fleming Magruder and Joseph Magruder. He was born in 1782 in Montgomery County, Maryland one year younger than his sister Catherine.  In 1803, he married Mary (Polly) Beall. They had two children about not much is known. I found this written about him in the Yearbook of the American Clan Gregor Society- “Rev. John Burgess Magruder . . . son of Capt. Joseph Magruder, became a Methodist clergyman, went to Ohio, freed all of the slaves of his mother’s estate and his own, and left no descendants.” His two children must have died young or unmarried. So, John Burgess Magruder must have died in Ohio. I have no death date.

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Catherine Magruder is my fourth great grandmother. She is the daughter of Joseph Magruder and Catherine Fleming. he was obviously named for her mother. She was born in 1781 in Montgomery County, Maryland in an area which I believe is now part of Washington DC. She had three older half sisters and four older half brothers. She also had one older sister, Ann and three younger brothers, John Burgess Magruder, Greenberry Magruder, Robert White Magruder. I know she went to a Presbyterian church around there. When she was 17, on April 6, 1798, she married the 28 year old Thomas Spencer Watkins, who was from Ann Arundel county. He was known as Tommie Watkins and moved to Catherine’s family’s lands in the Rock Creek area. They had four sons, Wilson Lee Watkins (1802-1861), Joseph Magruder Watkins (1806-1884), Greenberry Watkins (1808-1896), and White Watkins. Catherine Magruder Watkins died young at the age of 30 in 1811. Tommie Watkins remarried her cousin, Mary Magruder and had a son Samuel Brewer Watkins. Most of Catherine’s descendants moved to Tennessee. They are talked about in the previous post about my roots in Rutherford County, Tennessee.

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