David J. Berry Sr.

David J Berry is the son of Robert & Elizabeth Cate Berry from Orange County, North Carolina.

Ancestors:

1. Generation Robert and Mary Williamson Berry, Princess Anne County, Virginia.
2. Generation Robert and Elizabeth Cate Berry, Orange County, North Carolina.

David J. Berry was born about 1774 in Orange County, North Carolina. On February 21st 1797 he married Mary Blalock. Mary already had a little girl when they were married. There was a bastardy bond issued against John Leathers in Orange County, North Carolina, on the 23rd of August 1791. (Transcript of bond). David and Mary Blalock Berry raised Elizabeth Leathers Berry as their own child. David and Mary’s first child must have been Sarah “Sally” Berry because she married William A. Cates in Orange County on February 26th 1817. Sally was probably born April 4th 1796. Winifred Berry also married Joshua Norman on September 19 1820 in North Carolina. The rest  of his children married in Georgia.

David and his family lived in Orange County NC until after 1824.  The baby in David Berry’s family was Joshua M. Berry who was born in Orange County, North Carolina, on April 13, 1824. All of David and Mary Blalock’s children were born in North Carolina. David Berry listed in the 1800, 1810,and 1820 Orange County Census’. In September 1821 David and Henry sold a slave girl in Person County. Sometime between 1825 and 1830 David J . Berry and the rest of his family removed to Cobb County, Georgia. William A. Cates and his Wife Sarah Berry Cates had two of their children born in North Carolina and their third child was born in South Carolina in 1822.  So some of his family were already in Georgia when David arrived.

David had inherited a slave but none of the land that his father had owned. The plantation was willed to his younger brother, Henry Berry in 1814. David was the last of Robert and Elizabeth Cate Berry’s children to leave home.  Mary Berry Camp, and John Berry left North Carolina before 1800. Robert Berry Junior’s family and Thomas Berry’s wife and children did not leave North Carolina until after their parents died. Other descendants of the Robert and Elizabeth Cate Berry family did leave North Carolina at different times.

In 1821 bounty land was being made available after the Creek Indians ceded their land to the state. David  Berry may have located in Fayette County, Georgia, near to where the children of James and Mary Camp lived. On November 30th 1858 the State took part of Fayette County and Henry County to form Clayton County, Georgia. Joshua M. Berry, David’s youngest son, lived in Jonesboro, Clayton County,  when he died and is buried there. Joshua M. and Elizabeth Cates Berry had two sons killed at a Jonesboro, Georgia, railroad crossing on October 20th 1921. They were taking a load of produce from their farm into town on their truck when they were struct by a train as they attempted to cross the railroad tracks. Robert I Berry was 53 years old and Joshua Berry Jr. was 54. The two brothers were well respected in the community. They were not killed instantly but both died a short time later in the hospital.

In 2002 Several of us distant cousins had made contact with each other. All of us were researching our individual family lines on the internet . The group you see in the picture were descendants of David and Mary Blalock Berry. I invited  them to come back home to Orange County, North Carolina, and visit with us at our Wiley P. and Ida Ann Wilson Berry Family reunion. Five came from Georgia and two came from Alabama. As far as I know this was the first time any of David Berry’s family had been back home since 1825. It was a real pleasure for me to act as host and show them the old home stomping ground.

This reunion was held in Cullman Alabama in 2005. We made a trip through Tennessee and took the  Natchez Trace from Nashville to the Alabama State line. This was my first visit to the home of a distant cousin who lives at Cypress Inn Tenn. After a short visit with him I visited the Eleanor Reed Cabin for the first time.

When we went to the 2006 Berry/Nix reunion at Roswell Georgia We stayed in a Motel in Florence, Alabama.  We came early so we could visit  Berry , Fayette Alabama where Robert Berry Jr. and his family settled in 1824. This picture was taken at the Willeo Cemetery on Saturday June 10th 2006. Many of David and Mary Blalock Berry’s descendants are buried here.

Children:

1. Elizabeth Leathers Berry – Daughter of Mary Blalock. No marriage info.
2. Sarah Berry b. 4-4-1796 m. William Cates
3. Winifred Berry B. abt 1800 m. Joshua Norman
4. David J. Berry Jr. m. Margarett Erwin 1829
5. Mary Berry b. abt 1806 m. Thomas Howard Barton February 24, 1831
6. Henry Berry b. abt 1810 m. Sarah Roberts
7. George M. Berry b. abt 1810 or 1811 d. 1820
8. Robert Berry b. Aug. 2, 1812 m. Eliza Everett
9. William G. Berry b. 1813/14 m. Jane Beck
10. Thomas Berry b. 1820
11. Joshua M. Berry b. April 13, 1824 m. Elizabeth Cates

Children Detail: