Pension Application of Nancy Hancock Corn widow of Jesse Corn: W909

                        Transcribed and annotated by C. Leon Harris

 

            State of Tennessee}

            Franklin County} SS

            On this the [illegible] day of June 1841 personally appeared before me James Bledsoe – a Justice of the peace in and for the county aforesaid Nancy Corn a resident citizen of the County and State aforesaid, aged seventy eight years agreeable to her Record and after being duly sworn for that purpose on her oath makes the following Declaration in order to obtain the benefit of the provision of the act of Congress of the United States passed July the 7th 1838

            She states that to her undoubted belief founded on things within her own knowledge and part on the information of others that her deceased husband Jesse Corns was a private soldier of the United States of America in the War of the Revolution, and served against the common enemy of his country, that to her belief that he engaged in said service some time probably in the early part of the Revolutionary War, that to her belief he commenced service in Albemarle County State of Virginia and served pursuant to his then engagement some considerable time, she thinks for some years, she has no Documentary evidence of the same, and relies mainly on such matters of evidence as the Rolls of the War office may afford. She has a knowledge of his being in the service from an acquaintance with him previous to his going into the service and from a knowledge of his being absent, and being understood to be in service, at the time (as understood from undoubted neighborhood report) and from corresponding circumstances and the impression that the whole period of their matrimonial union fixed on her mind, the subject of the Revolution and his services being a favorite subject of his social interviews with his friends. That she is as positively impressed with the fact of his services in the Revolutionary war as she is of any fact that she is not an eye witness to.

            She further states that she was married to the said Jesse Corn in Albemarle County State of Virginia that the marriage was celebrated by a minister of the high church of England that she has no record of the marriage but that she has a record of the age of her deceased husband and the age of herself and the ages of the children the issue of their bodies born after their said marriage, she states that calculating from the age of their oldest child Elizabeth, and from the fact that Declarant was married in February, and and her said daughter being born December the 4th 1780 she has no doubt of the correctness of her said husbands record and calculating from her husbands record now in her possession and to her undoubted opinion in the handwriting of her deceased husband she was married in February 1780, the precise day of the month not recollected. She was married by Charles Clay a high church minister in February and to her best calculation in the year 1780 that Record of the ages of her children as set down by her deceased husband in his Bible and as she has no doubt is in his own hand writing is as she believes correct in all respects and she further states that the same his [sic] remained in her possession ever since which family Record of the ages she now taken out of said Bible is made a part of this Declaration and wrote on (Family Record)

She continued the wife of said Jesse Corn from the time of their said marriage until his death, he having died on the 5th day of March 1809 in Patrick County state of Virginia, having died as she believes from having caught cold in consequence of an exposure to cold that operated on him more powerfully owing to his having previously lost one leg Rendering him more susceptible of cold  She further states that she has not intermarried but continues the widow of the above mentioned Jesse Corn. She further states that after she was married to the said Jesse Corn that he served a short tour of service in the hollows of the Yadkin perhaps about one month, which fact she is advised is not (in all probability) of Record in the war office (if however it be found of Record or otherwise appears in evidence she prays this may in all things be considered as an application for a Pension under the act of Congress passed July 4, 1836.

Sworn and subscribed}

this 26th day of          }            Nancy her+mark Corn

June 1841, before       }

me                               [signed] Jas Bledsoe JP

 

The file includes a copy by the Clerk of Fluvanna County VA of the marriage bond by Jesse Corn and Benjamin Hancock dated 25 Feb 1780 for the marriage of Jesse Corn to Nancy Hancock.

 

It includes the family register mention in the declaration, barely legible:

“Jesse Corn was bornd Oct the 31–1753

Nancy Corn was bornd Feby 17–1763

Eizabeth was bornd Decm the 4–1780

John Adam was bornd January 26–1783

Wm Corn was bornd Jan’y 1[?]–178[?]

Jesse Corn Jn’r was bornd March the 11–1787

Mary Corn was bornd August the 8–1789

Samuel Corn was bornd April the 10–1792

Suckey Corn was bornd December the 16–1794

Nancy Corn was bornd April[?] the 7–1797

George Corn was bornd Sept the 30–1799

Dicy[?] Corn was bornd May[?] the 1[?]–1803"

 

Pension certificate says Nancy Corn was inscribed on the pension roll at $60.00 per year commencing 4 March 1848 and ending 17 June 1848, when she died, payable to surviving children: Elizabeth Sharp, Mary Sharp, Nancy McCutchen, John Corn, and Samuel Corn.

 

A typed summary by A. D. Hiller, Assistant to Administrator, dated April 6, 1933, provides the following additional information apparently based on documents no longer in the file:

Jesse Corn served “ apart of the time under Captain Small…” “It also appears that after the Revolution he was a captain and major in the militia in Patrick county, Virginia.”

“Nancy Hancock… was the daughter of John Hancock, who at one time lived in Henry County, Virginia….” “Nancy Corn died June 17, 1848 at the home of her daughter, Mrs. Mary Sharp, near Winchester, Franklin County, Tennessee.”

Elizabeth married Richard Sharp.

Mary married James Sharp who died 12 Aug 1847.

Nancy married George McCutchen.

Dicy married Robert Sharp.

Elizabeth Sharp, Mary Sharp, Nancy McCutchen, John Corn and Samuel Corn lived in Franklin County TN in 1850. Jesse Corn, Jr. lived in Patrick County VA in 1850.