ELIZA SIMS AND TWO LIBRARIES
By Clinton F. Cross
10. Eliza’s Second Marriage
William and Eliza apparently hit it off. On February 5th, 1841,
Eliza married William Tannehill. It was the second marriage for
William, and the second one for Eliza.
William had a number of children by his first marriage; he did not
have any children by Eliza.
In the same year that Eliza married William Tannehill, her
grandmother Judith Cross Sims died. She left a will, which was
signed “her mark.”
Judith Cross Sims owned a great deal of property at the time of her
death. From her probate records, we know what items were sold by her
estate, such as: one secretary, one sideboard, one table, one clock,
one bed of furniture, chinaware, dishes, a pitcher, knife, bottles,
more dishes; a mule, a Bay mare, a colt, six sheep, 32 geese, more
cattle, bushels of wheat, horses, plows, hogs, more than 150 hogs,
one red steer, another red bull, a calf, ten old barrels of plow
gear, a grindstone, two axes, a set of kitchen furniture, nine sides
of bacon, one lard of soap, four stacks of fodder, one bee hive, and
so on.
Meanwhile, back in Eutaw, Alabama, life went on.
In 1842 Joseph Carroll Calhoun met and married Sarah Ann Cross.
Joseph’s mother was William Tannehill’s sister. Joseph’s uncle was
the famous John C. Calhoun, former Vice-President of the United
States.
In 1846 Eliza’s son James Fleming Cross joined the Eutaw Rangers and
with Pleasant Tannehill, William's son, went to Mexico to fight in
the Mexican War.
On January 29th, 1847, all of the produce from William Tannehill’s
plantation was loaded on the steamer “Tuscaloosa.” The “Tuscaloosa”
left the wharf at Mobile, Alabama, about 8:00 o'clock on the evening
of the 29th on its way to Tuscaloosa.
As she proceeded up the Black Warrior River, two of the
“Tuscaloosa’s” boilers exploded. The explosion killed William
Tannehill, many members of the crew, and numerous passengers. The
incident was reported as follows:
The steamer Tuscaloosa left the wharf at Mobile, Alabama, about 8
o’clock on Thursday evening, January 29, 1847, on her way to
Tuscaloosa city, the capital of Alabama; and when she had proceeded
ten miles up the river two of her boilers bursted, by which accident
a number of per passengers and crew were killed and wounded. The
explosion completely tore up the boiler-deck, and shattered the
after-part of the boat below deck considerably. Immediately after
the explosion, the steamer drifted near the shore and grounded, her
stern projecting towards the centre of the river. A line was made
fast on shore, and an attempt was made by pulling in the stern, to
effect a landing for the passengers, but the boat was fixed too
firmly in the bed of the river to be moved in this manner. The
ladies were then lowered by a rope to the lower deck, and from
thence were sent ashore in the yawl. All of them escaped unhurt.
Those of the male passengers who were uninjured saved themselves,
and many of the wounded likewise, by constructing a raft of loose
planks, on which they reached the shore in safety; but when they
arrived at the bank they found it impossible to obtain a dry
footing, as the river had overflowed its customary bounds to the
depth of several inches, which, as the weather was exceedingly cold,
made the landing (if it might be called so) very uncomfortable. In
this state of things the male passengers climbed trees, where they
remained spectators of the burning wreck for about three hours, when
the steamer James Hewitt hove in sight and on coming near the wreck,
sent her yawl to the assistance of the survivors, who were all taken
on board and conveyed back to Mobile. The dead body of Liet. Inge,
one of the passengers of the Tuscaloosa, was also taken up by the
James Hewitt.
LIST OF KILLED—Wm. Tanneyhill, C. Childs, and P.F. Beasley, of
Eutaw; W.R. Hassell, of Greensborough; B. Partier, second clerk;
Thomas Clark, first mate; Arthur McCoy, second engineer; Abraham
Flynn, volunteer for the U.S. Army in Mexico, from Green Co., Ala.,
and several colored deck hands.
BADLY WOUNDED—Capt. E. P. Oliver, not expected to recover; George
Kirk, first clerk, and acting Captain of the Tuscaloosa; Col. Wm.
Armistead, and Capt. Asa White, of Eutaw. The last named gentleman
was badly scalded.
Eliza Harlan Cross Tannehill was once again a widow, with limited
resources, responsible for her own survival and the survival of her
four children.
Soon thereafter Eliza apparently moved with her brother to Noxubee
County, Mississippi. There she met a gentleman by the name of Samuel
Meriwether Dunlap.
11. The Dunlap Family in America
Sam Dunlap was a second generation American. His father was James
Dunlap (born 1759, in Ireland; died 1843, in Eutaw, Alabama) and his
mother was Mary (the author believes “McNeely”).
James Dunlap migrated from Scotland or Ireland to America and
thereafter settled in the Abbeville District, South Carolina. He
married Mary about the time George Washington became President of
the United States. Mary gave him nine children: Joseph, born 1789;
Robert, born after 1790; Sarah (Sallie), born 1795; Samuel Dunlap,
born 1798; John, born 1799; William, born 1801; James Riley, born
1803; Mary S., born about 1807; Elizabeth (Eliza), born about 1813).
All were born in South Carolina.
James and his family moved to Greene County, Alabama in 1818. In
1826 he obtained two land grants from the General Land Office of the
United States, both signed by the President of the United States,
John Quincy Adams, providing him land in what is now Clinton and
Eutaw, Greene County, Alabama. There he and his wife worked and
raised their nine children.
Ebenezer Presbyterian Church in Clinton, Alabama
Cross and Dunlap Families Worshiped Here Before and
After the Civil War
When James moved to Alabama, numerous Indian tribes lived in the
area: the Choctaw, the Chickasaw, and the Alabama inhabiting land
close to his home. The name “Alabama,” incidentally is a Muskogean
Indian word meaning “campsite” or “clearing.” In 1830, however,
President Andrew Jackson began the removal of most of these tribes
to Oklahoma.
Samuel Meriwether Dunlap, James Dunlap’s fourth child, married
Martha Bonds in 1825. She died in 1843. By that time, he had become
a successful merchant.
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