Anderson Lewallen
Anderson Grant Lewallen (1764-1829) is believed to have been the first settler of the Black Wolf Creek area that later became the Glenmary and Coal Hill area in southern Scott County. He is the forefather of most Lewallens in Scott County today.
See Also: Scott County Lineage Project
See Also: Glenmary, Tennessee
Biography
Born around 1764, Anderson Grant Lewallen was the son of Daniel Alexander Lewallen (1742-1785) and Mary Burkes (1753-1785). He married Lydia “Lucy” Rice in Prince Edward, Virginia, on June 8, 1784. They were married by Rev. Robert Foster.
Daniel Alexander Lewallen, Anderson’s father, was a Revolutionary War veteran from Virginia who served in the Regiment of Virginians. Anderson’s great-grandfather, Daniel Lewellyn Sr., migrated from England to Virginia colony in the mid 1600s.
Anderson and Lucy had 16 children: Zachariah Lewallen (1785-1885), Thomas Lewallen (1786-1787), Wiley Lewallen (1786-1860), Anderson Rice Lewallen (1786-1862), Baby Boy Lewallen (1787-1787), Thomas Lewallen (1788-1789), Baby Girl Lewallen (1790-1790), Mary Lewallen (1792-1792), Rebecca Lewallen (1793-N/A), Rev. Andrew Leutian Lewallen (1793-1873), Anderson Lewallen (1800-1862), Mary “Polly” Lewallen (1892-N/A), Joel Davis Lewallen (1805-1888), William Lewallen (1809-1897), John Columbus Lewallen (1812-1896).
John Lewallen, Anderson’s youngest son, was the first sheriff of Scott County.
Anderson Lewallen was the third-great-grandfather of U.S. Congressman John J. Duncan Sr., who also served as mayor of Knoxville. He was the fourth-great-grandfather of U.S. Congressman John J. “Jimmy” Duncan Jr. He was also the great-grandfather of John Goad, Scott County’s 10th sheriff, who presided over the county’s only legal hanging.
Move to Scott County
The exact date of Anderson Lewallen’s move to Tennessee is not known. Some genealogists speculate that he moved with his father about the time of the Revolutionary War; however, Daniel Alexander Lewallen died in Prince Edward, Virginia. Furthermore, Anderson and his wife, Lucy, were married in Prince Edward, Virginia on June 8, 1784, after the war ended. The move to Tennessee would not have occurred until sometime after that, and likely not until after 1800.
Joel Lewallen, one of Anderson’s sons, later told census enumerators that he was born in Wake County, North Carolina, in 1803. That places the move to Tennessee after 1803. In 1814, Andrew Leutian Lewallen married Malinda Elizabeth Davis in Kingston, Tennessee. That places the move to Tennessee sometime between 1803 and 1814.
When Anderson Lewallen and his family moved to Black Wolf Creek, the area was part of Anderson County, Tennessee. Morgan County, Tennessee, was not founded until 1817, and Scott County was not founded until 1849.
The family settled near the Coal Hill/Campground area, on the Black Wolf Creek.
Death
Anderson Lewallen died in 1829 and was buried at the Old Lewallen Cemetery near Black Wolf Creek. His grave was marked for many years by a fieldstone, but a commercial stone was later placed by his descendants. His wife, Lucy Rice, was buried at the cemetery in 1833.
It should be noted that a picture floating around the internet that is purportedly Anderson Lewallen almost certainly isn’t. The oldest known surviving photograph from the United States was taken in 1839, 10 years after Lewallen’s death.