Hugh S. Beard

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Hugh S. Beard (some families report his name may have been Hugh Samuel Beard and we think that is very possible) was born between 1780 and 1790 in either Eastern Tennessee or in the Valley of Virginia before his parents were in Tennessee.  We feel that he was born in Eastern Tennessee before the territory became the State of Tennessee, as at least one of his children reported North Carolina as his birthplace, and at the time the territory was technically North Carolina property.  Hugh married in Adair County, Kentucky on 4 April 1808 to his cousin, Margaret Hildegard Beard. Margaret was the daughter of Samuel and Rebecca Beard, and she was born between 1787 and 1790 in Eastern Tennessee.  
In 1820, Hugh S. and Margaret Beard were listed in Adair County, Kentucky with five young ones at home, three females and two males.  In 1830 in Adair County, all five of their children were apparently still at home.  By 1840, still listed in Adair County, only one son and one daughter were still home, and this would be John A. Beard and his sister Octavia, as the other children married before 1840.  
One April (the year is smeared on the record) Hugh S. Beard obtained a license for his horse "Powatan".  In March 1843, Milton Beard, eldest son of Hugh S., took the oath and paid 3.00 tax to obtain a license "for his steed horse Powatan".  It is possible that Hugh S. Beard gave the horse to Milton, or that he was incapacitated by that time.  We know that he was gone before the 1850 census, but still alive to sign a court document on 1 January 1844.   In other Adair County records, Hugh S. Beard was in a court action versus his cousin Josiah Beard with papers filed on 10 February 1842. On 25 April 1843, Hugh S. Beard vs Josiah Beard, copy from Hugh to Josiah Beard, agreement reached, fee 19 and a half cents due.  On 1 January 1844, in same case, "H. S. Beard" transferred the "full benefits" of the action to Junis/Junior Caldwell.
By 1850, Hugh's wife Margaret was a widow living in Adair County at age 63.  Her son John A. Beard and daughter Octavia Beard were living in her household, as was her four year old granddaughter Mary L. Stults, the daughter of Luvisa Beard and William Burke Stults.  Margaret's son Milton Beard and his family lived nearby.  
In 1860, Margaret Beard (listed age 70, but probably 73) was living in Adair County in the home of her now married daughter Octavia Beard Stults, the wife of Benjamin B. Stults. Still with Margaret is her granddaughter Mary L. Stults, now age fourteen.
Margaret died after this census and before the 1870 census.  No burial place is known; we suspect she was interred on the Beard lands near her husband Hugh S. Beard.  
The five children of Hugh S. and Margaret Beard:
1.  Parthena/Parthenia Beard was born in Adair County, Kentucky between 1806-1809.  We know that some report her birthday as 13 January 1809, but this is the exact date of her husband's birth and we feel it may be a mistake that she was born the same date.   She married on 11 May 1834 in Adair County to Dewitt Clinton Miller.  Some families report his name as "Clinton Dewitt Miller" but we will stick with the former, as his headstone reads "D. C. Miller" and he was listed on at least two censuses as Dewitt C. Miller.  He was born in Adair County, Kentucky on 13 January 1809.  We do not know who his parents were and the Miller family researchers do not seem to know this important fact, either.  We believe that Dewitt was at least a relative, if not a son, of Joseph H. Miller.  Joseph was involved with Hugh Beard Sr (Major Hugh) when Hugh moved into the Green/Adair county area in 1798.  Look at this record:  24 January 1827, Adair County---Joseph Miller and wife sold to Hugh Beard, late of the state of Tennessee, 299 acres on Russel Creek, patented on 1 November 1798 to Hugh Beard Sr.  (Book F, page 632).  This record tells us that the original land was on Russell Creek, where Hugh's line settled, that this parcel was sold at some point to Joseph Miller, who became a neighbor, and that in 1827 it was sold back to Hugh Beard.  Hugh then paid taxes on this land for several years.  This particular parcel seems to have been traded/bought/sold back and forth between the Miller family and the Beard family several times over many years.  It is obvious that there was a long relationship between these two families, and that it is possible if not probable that Dewitt Clinton Miller was a member of this line of Millers.  Again, we do not know who his parents were, but Joseph Miller and (perhaps) a first wife could be strong possibilities.  At any rate, Dewitt and Parthena were listed in Adair County in 1850.  He was a blacksmith and they had four children living.  We are very frustrated that we have not yet found this family on the 1860 census, and hope for help from anyone who may find them!   We know they were still there, as Dewitt Miller joined the 3rd Kentucky Infantry (Union), Company A in Adair County.  He was a fifty year old private.  In 1870, back from War, Dewitt lived with Parthena and a son and daughter, Adeline and Dudley, next door to Parthena's brother,  John A. Beard and his family.  Parthena Beard Miller died before 1873/4, no doubt in Adair County.  No grave site has been found for her, nor a death date.  Dewitt Miller remarried about 1873 to Sarah Frances Lewis. In 1880, Dewitt and Sarah lived at Creelsborough in Russell County, Kentucky with their two children, Everett and Hattie.  Dewitt was a 71 year old blacksmith.  He died on 10 May 1886 and he was buried at the Mount Carmel Church Cemetery in Adair County.  His headstone was provided by the government for deceased Union Civil War veterans.  Below are the listed children of Dewitt and Parthenia on the 1850 census.  Note that initials were used for all the individuals in this home, and since we have tried and failed to find them in 1860, we do not know the full names of some of the children.  
: 2.  M. H. Miller was a daughter born in about 1835 in Kentucky.  She was either married or dead by the 1870 census and we have no further information at this time. Parthenia's mother's name was Margaret Hildegard, so it is possible that was the name of this first daughter.
: 2.  J. M. Miller was a son born about 1837 in Kentucky. He is not on the 1870 census with his parents.  Was his first name John?  Or could it be Joseph, after Dewitt's proposed father?
: 2.  Adeline Miller was a daughter born in 1844 in Kentucky.  She appears on the 1850 census as "M. L.", age five, and on the 1870 census in the home of her parents as "Adeline", age 25.  
: 2.  Dudley Winston Miller, who is sometimes names as "Hugh Dudley Winston Miller", was born on 1 November 1847 in Adair County, Kentucky. He appears on the 1870 Adair County census in his parents' home as "Dudley", aged 22, noted as "disabled".  In 1880 we find the cause of this notation, as he is listed as "ex soldier" with "loss of both legs".  We see from some family stories that he was a soldier in the Civil War at age fifteen and lost both feet due to frostbite contracted in line of duty.  He served with the Thirteenth Kentucky Cavalry, Company A.  He was married to Nancy Elizabeth Miller on 7 January 1873 in Adair County; she was the daughter of Joseph S. and Sarah Ann Bryant Miller of Adair County. She was born there on 3 April 1858. By 1880 Dudley and Nancy had two young children.  By 1900, the family moved to Missouri, where they appear on the census in Union, Daviess County.  They had been married 27 years and had four children at home and another one, son John, living next door.  In 1910 at same, Nancy reports 7 of 12 children living (in 1900 she reported 4 of 4.)  In 1920, the family was farming at Norfolk, Madison County, Nebraska. Dudley passed away on 12 October 1924 in Norfolk.  He is buried at the Prospect Hill Cemetery there.  Nancy lived to be ninety, passing away many years after Dudley, on 24 January 1949 in Beagle, Miami County, Kansas.  She is buried there at the Beagle Cemetery.
1.  Milton Beard was born about 1813 in Adair County, Kentucky.  He married on 30 October 1837 in Green County, Kentucky to Lucy Green. She was born about 1820 in Green County, Kentucky to Davis Green and Mary Bratton.  Lucy and Milton set up housekeeping in Adair County and produced a family of four children.  In March of 1843 Milton licensed his steed, Powatan in Adair County.  On 12 July 1843, he recorded fifty acres on Butler's Creek in Adair County.  On the 1850 census, Milton and Lucy had a daughter and son and lived in Adair County.  In 1860 they were at Munfordville, in Hart County, Kentucky.  They had three children and Milton worked as a woodchopper.  By 1870 they were listed in Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky and had their three youngest at home.  Milton was listed as a laborer, but in 1880, still at Louisville, Milton was a farmer.  He and Lucy had their youngest child still at home at age nineteen.  Milton Beard passed away in Louisville in March 1884.  He was buried at the Cave Hill Cemetery there.  Lucy Green Beard is at rest there as well, with a death date of 26 March 1893 in Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky.  The four children were:
: 2.  Alethea J. "Letha" Beard was born November 1840 in Adair County, Kentucky.  She married William Aaron Wilkerson before 1869.  He was born  in Kentucky 19 January 1843, the son of James and Cynthia Bratton Wilkerson. In 1870, the young couple were living in Ireland, Taylor County, Kentucky with a one monnth old son.  In 1880, they were listed in Munfordville, Hart County, Kentucky with three sons.  It was noted on the census form that Letha had consumption [tuberculosis] at the time.  Letha soon died of the disease.  According to her grave record at Munfordville Cemetery, Hart County, Kentucky, her death date was 29 November 1879, but it could not have been, as she was listed on the 1880 census, ill at the time.  Probably she died on 29 November 1880, right after the census.  William Wilkerson remarried and by 1900, still listed at Munfordville, he and his second wife Addie had raised his three sons and added to the brood.  In 1910 they were still at same.  William died on 17 March 1916 in Hart County. He is also buried at the Munfordville Cemetery.
: 2.  William A. Beard was born in Kentucky in 1848.  He died in Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky in June, 1871.  His grave is unmarked and we know of no marriage.
: 2.  Margaret Lucy Beard was born in 1851 in Kentucky.  She is last found living with her parents in 1870 at age nineteen.  No marriage is known of as yet.
: 2.  John Thomas Beard was born in Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky in September 1860.  He lived with his parents on the 1880 census in Louisville and was a nineteen year old railroad brakeman.  On 1 July 1885, he married Mary Pearl Irby in Louisville, Jefferson County,  Kentucky.  She was the daughter of John M. Irby and Jerusha Emily Culp, and she was born in Eugene, Vermillion County, Indiana on 28 May 1865.  Fifteen years later they had four sons and were living in a boarding hotel in Louisville.  John Beard was still a brakeman for the railroad and Mary worked as a dressmaker.  The family eventually moved west to Colorado.  They were in Byers, Colorado when Mary Irby Beard died in April 1914.  She is laid to rest at Fairmount Cemetery in Denver.  We cannot find him on the 1920 census, but John Thomas Beard died in Denver in July 1923 and he is at rest at Fairmount Cemetery with wife Mary.
1.  John A. Beard was born about 1815 in Adair County, Kentucky.  He married Mary A. Bault before 1845 in probably Adair County.  She was born in October 1817 in Giles County, Tennessee, the daughter of William and Margaret Bault.  In 1850, John A. and Mary Beard lived in Adair County, Kentucky next door to his mother, Margaret Beard, the widow of Hugh S. Beard.  John's elder brother Milton lived three homes away from them.  [Be warned, there are people who have put erroneous information about this line and others online.  They have mixed up the numerous John Beards, attached various Beards to erroneous branches, and created havoc.  A simple census search shows how mistaken they are, but some "research" is not backed by fact.]  From 1850 to 1853, John A. Beard did a wonderful thing for the Beard descendents!  He filed a lawsuit and named the heirs of Samuel Beard, his grandfather, and of Hugh S. Beard, his father in the documents.  We believe the lawsuit was a formality needed to clear his title to some land so that he could sell the land once his father died, which was before 1850.  The initial date of the documents was 19 June 1850, and the details of the lawsuit and naming of heirs can be viewed here .   In 1860, listed in the town of Columbia, Adair County, Kentucky, John and Mary had two children, and Margaret Bault, age eighty, born in Germany, lived with them.  This was Mary's mother.  In 1870, still at same, they had three children and lived next door to John's elder sister Parthena Beard Miller, wife of Dewitt Miller.  In 1880, listed at Cane Valley in Adair County, John and Mary had one grown son at home.  John died before 1900, probably in Adair County.  We do not know a burial place yet.  In 1900, Mary Bault Beard was a widow who lived with her widowed sister Elizabeth Sullivan in Adair County.  With her was her grandson John M. Beard, age fifteen.  Mary died after this census, but we have no date. 
: 2.  Desoto Beard was born about 1844 in Kentucky.  He was living with his parents in Cane Valley, Adair County, on the 1880 census, age 29.  Right after this, he married to Alice, last name unknown.  She was born in Indiana about 1853. We next find him on a census in 1910, living in East Columbia, Adair County, Kentucky, married thirty years with six children living, three at home.  In 1920, still in Columbia, he was 78 and listed as working in a planing mill. We find a death record for Desoto stating date of death 12 February 1927 in Adair County.  We do not know any information about Alice.  
: 2.  Lavina Agness Beard was a daughter born on 8 August 1853 in Adair County, Kentucky.   We do not have any further information.
: 2.  Synthia/Cynthia A.  Beard  was born in 1861 in Adair County, Kentucky.  On 2 October 1879, she married there to William H. Caffee, the son of Wayne H. Caffee and Lucy Emily Pike.  William was born in Kentucky in 1859.  As newlyweds, they appeared on the 1880 census in Adair County, ages 19 and 18.  Both died before the fact filled 1900 census, however, and their graves are apparently unmarked, probably at the family used cemetery at Mount Carmel in Adair County.  We do not know when Synthia died; her last child was born in 1894.  William died in 1899, according to family.  They had five children.          
: 2.  Susan Elizabeth Beard was born on 7 August 1861 in Adair County.  She died before the 1870 census, burial place unknown.
1.  Octavia Beard was born in Adair County, Kentucky about 1817/8.  Octavia lived with her mother at age thirty in 1850, but married on 22 November 1855 in Adair County to Benjamin Bell Stults.  Benjamin was the son of William Stults and Rhoda Coulter, who had two other sons who married Beard brides.  William Burke Stults married Octavia's younger sister Lucretia on 5 August 1834 and George Wesley Stults married Margaret R. Beard, Octavia's cousin, on 23 December of the same year, 1834. In the mid to late 1840s, a whole passel of Stults families moved from Kentucky up to Macoupin County, Illinois, and Benjamin is found on the 1850 census living with George Stults and his second wife Hoppy.  He was age 26. At some point he returned to Adair County and married there in 1855.  On their first census together in 1860, Benjamin and Octavia lived in Adair County, had two children under three, and lived with Octavia's mother Margaret and niece Mary L. Stults. Civil War came, and Benjamin served as a private in Company G, 13th Kentucky Infantry, Union forces.  Back at home after service, in 1870 he and Octavia lived in Green County, Kentucky with their two children and Octavia's niece Mary Stults still with them.  We wish we knew the "rest of the story" for Octavia Beard Stults.  We do not know when she died.  We do not find the family on the 1880 census yet.  We know that Benjamin Stults is said to have died in Jasper, Jasper County, Missouri on 2 December 1889.  We do not know when he made this move, or if Octavia was with him.  He had several Stults relatives who had migrated to Jasper County.  The two children were:
: 2.  Margaret P. Stults was born in Adair County, Kentucky on 5 October 1857.  In 1870 she was still in the home of her parents but we cannot find her in 1880.  In 1900 she was living and boarding with the Mary Dixon household in Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky.  Mary Dixon was the daughter of William Burke Stults, so she and Margaret were cousins.  Margaret was single all her life.  She died in Louisville on 20 June 1926 at a home for the aged and infirm.  Her death certificate states that she was buried at the Portland Cemetery, and this is probably the one back home in Adair County, Kentucky.
: 2.  Hugh B. Stults was born June 1859 in Adair County, Kentucky.  He was married and had two daughters before he married in 1894 to Elizabeth, last name unknown, who was born in Kentucky in December 1869. In 1900, Hugh worked as a carpenter in Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky and was on the census there with wife Elizabeth, married for six years, and his two daughters by a previous marriage, ages ten and twelve. In 1910 in same, he was still a carpenter.  He and Elizabeth had no children of their own.  His married daughter Maude Robins lived with him, along with her husband and baby son Hugh.  Hugh died on 26 December 1910 in Jefferson County, Kentucky. We have not found a burial place for him or a death date or burial for Elizabeth.
1.  Luvisa Beard was born in Adair County, Kentucky about 1820.  She married at a young age on 5 August 1834 in Adair County to William Burke Stults, the eldest son of William Stults and Rhoda Coulter. William was born 16 January 1810 in Adair County, Kentucky. William and Luvisa had two sons before the 1840 census in Adair County.  A daughter was born to them on 5 October 1844 in Adair County, and it is very possible that Luvisa died of childbirth related causes, as William Burke Stults remarried on 15 July 1845 in Adair County.  The infant daughter was named Mary Luvisa, therefore until proven wrong, we are reporting her mother's name as Luvisa, not Levica, as some families report.  We do not know of a burial place.   William Stults took his new wife and his two sons by Luvisa Beard to MacCoupin County, Illinois in 1848.  Here several members of the Stults family had settled.  The youngest child and only daughter, Mary Luvisa Stults, apparently remained with her grandparents in Adair County.  She is listed on the 1850 census at age four, living in Adair County with her grandmother Margaret Beard and others of the Beard family.  On the same census in MacCoupin County, Illinois, William and his new wife Lucretia Janes Stults lived with his two sons by Luvisa Beard, and a one year old son.  They were in the midst of many of William Stults' relatives, including George Wesley Stults, who had married Margaret Beard, a cousin of Luvisa Beard, who also died young in Adair County in 1847. William Stults raised a large family in Illinois and was found on the 1860 and 1870 censuses there, listed as a wagon maker.  In 1880, he and other Stults men had moved their homes to Mineral, Jasper County, Missouri, where William worked in a wagon shop.  He died, probably in Jasper County, on 2 December 1889.  We do not know where he is buried there.  His three children with Luvisa Beard were:
: 2.  William Hugh Stults was born on 7 June 1838 in Kentucky.  He married on 29 March 1863 in Macoupin County, Illinois to Mary Jane Naylor.  Mary Jane was born on 15 November 1842 in Kentucky.  We do not know her parents' names.  In 1870 William worked as a blacksmith and they had five children, living in Macoupin County, Illinois. In 1880 Hugh and Mary lived at Fayette County, Illinois and had eight children.  On 6 February 1900, Mary Jane Stults died in Illinois, and William Hugh was listed as a widower on the census that year in Fayette County, Illinois with several of his children still at home.  William Hugh Stults passed away 16 May 1903 in Fayette County, Illinois.  Both are buried at the Macinturff Cemetery there.  
: 2.  John A. Stults was born 24 February 1839 in Adair County, Kentucky.  He was raised in Kentucky and then Illinois.  On 17 May 1866 he married in Champaign County, Illinois to Margaret C. Miller.  She was bon 3 January 1844 in Tippecanoe, Carroll County, Indiana. We do not know the names of her parents.  We cannot find the couple on the 1870 census, but we know from historical accounts that he moved his family to Jasper County, Missouri in 1875. In 1880 John was listed as a wagon maker in Mineral, Jasper County, Missouri.  He and Margaret had two children.  A history published in 1883 states that he was a wagon maker for 23 years and in mercantile business around Oronogo, Missouri and "building up a grod trade" in 1883.  Although we cannot find John, Margaret Miller Stults is listed in the 1900 census as a "widow" who lived in Teller County, Colorado.  She was 55 and her son Richard lived with her at age 17.  We cannot find her in 1910 unless she is the Margaret Stults, widow of John, who is listed as a roomer in the city directory of Sheridan, Wyoming.  In 1920 Margaret C. Stults lived in Denver, Colorado as a widow, born in Indiana.  Meanwhile, John A. Stults lived back in Illinois on the 1910 census.  He lived with a family in Bear Grove, Fayette County and worked as a carpenter.  The census listed him as an uncle to the householder.  He died in Illinois on 29 December 1921.  No death or burial site is found yet for Margaret.
: 2.  Mary Luvisa Stults was born in Adair County, Kentucky on 5 October 1844.  She was apparently left behind with her grandparents when her mother died and her father moved up to Illinois.  She appears on the 1850 and the 1860 censuses with her widowed maternal grandmother, Margaret Beard, in and amongst many of this Beard family in Adair County.  Her grandmother was dead before the 1870 census and we do not know what home Mary was in, but on 16 May 1871, she married in Green County, Kentucky to Zachariah Taylor Dixon.  He was the son of Hezekiah and Rosana Lewis Dixon, born about 1848-1850 in Adair County.  We cannot find Mary and Zachariah on the 1880 census.  Zachariah passed away before 1900, when Mary Luvisa was living as a widow in Hokes, Jefferson County, Kentucky with her two younger sons.  Her eldest child was married and also listed on the same page. Mary's cousin Margaret Stults, daughter of Benjamin and Octavia Beard Stults, lived in this home as well.  Mary and Zachariah Dixon had eight children, for when the 1900 census taker asked this question, Luvisa was recorded with three of eight children still living.  Mary Stults Dixon remarried on 7 July 1912 in Clark County, Indiana to Benjamin Franklin Sanders.  She was 67 years old; he was 68 and had been married three times before Mary.  He died on 28 June 1919 in Fairdale, Jefferson County, Kentucky and was buried in the Sanders Family Cemetery in Fairdale.  Mary Sanders died on 23 June 1928 in Louisville, Jefferson County, Kentucky.  She was interred at the Pennsylvania Run Cemetery in Jefferson County.