MAJOR WILLIAM HENRY, JR., son of William Henry, Sr. and Margaret Isabella McKeown, was born in 1753 in North Carolina, most likely in Anson/Mecklenburg/Tryon/Lincoln (now Gaston County). Earlier, around 1751, his parents had traveled down the Great Wagon Road from Virginia to North Carolina, where they first settled on the west side of the Catawba River in what is now the lower section of Gaston County. By 1764, his family moved a few miles further south to what is now present-day northwestern York County, South Carolina, at a place to become widely known as Henry’s Knob because of the small 1,120-foot mountain on the property. In 1776 in York County, William Henry, Jr. married Rosannah Moore (1757-1813), a daughter of John Moore and Rosannah McCord. They became the parents of eight sons and two daughters, namely, John Henry (b. 1777), Isabella Henry Carroll (b. 1778), Josiah Henry (b. 1779), Robert Henry (u/k), James Henry (1784-1824), J. Malcolm Henry (1786-1854), William Henry III (u/k), Alexander Henry (u/k), Thomas Campbell Henry (1790-1877) and Jane Henry Byers (1792-1884).
As a member of a strongly Scotch-Irish Presbyterian family espousing independence from England, William Henry, Jr. served gallantly as a patriot in the American Revolution during the Southern Campaign. He fought with the local militia at the Battle of Kings Mountain, located near the Henry homestead, on October 7, 1780, and with General Daniel Morgan at Cowpens, South Carolina, on January 17, 1781. Local legend records that on October 6, 1780, the day before the battle at Kings Mountain, two men who turned out to be Tories carrying important messages from British Colonel Patrick Ferguson to General Lord Charles Cornwallis in Charlotte relating to the patriots’ positions, stopped at the Henry home and sought refreshment. They raised suspicion among the Henry family. A subsequent pursuit by William, Jr. and three of his brothers, Malcom, John and Alexander, caused the couriers undue delay. Had the information reached Cornwallis and the main body of the British army earlier, it could have changed the outcome of the battle at Kings Mountain into a British victory, and possibly the tide of history that ended at Yorktown a year later. William Henry, Jr. continued his service in the military and achieved to the rank of major, a designation by which he would thereafter be known.
Major Henry died at Henry’s Knob on September 12, 1807, at age 54, and is buried among other family members in the cemetery at Bethany Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in York County, northwest of Clover, not far from the North Carolina border. Rosannah Henry died five years later, on January 24, 1813, at age 55, and is buried next to her husband.
Contributed by Robert A. Ragan, a descendant, January 1, 2016.
As a member of a strongly Scotch-Irish Presbyterian family espousing independence from England, William Henry, Jr. served gallantly as a patriot in the American Revolution during the Southern Campaign. He fought with the local militia at the Battle of Kings Mountain, located near the Henry homestead, on October 7, 1780, and with General Daniel Morgan at Cowpens, South Carolina, on January 17, 1781. Local legend records that on October 6, 1780, the day before the battle at Kings Mountain, two men who turned out to be Tories carrying important messages from British Colonel Patrick Ferguson to General Lord Charles Cornwallis in Charlotte relating to the patriots’ positions, stopped at the Henry home and sought refreshment. They raised suspicion among the Henry family. A subsequent pursuit by William, Jr. and three of his brothers, Malcom, John and Alexander, caused the couriers undue delay. Had the information reached Cornwallis and the main body of the British army earlier, it could have changed the outcome of the battle at Kings Mountain into a British victory, and possibly the tide of history that ended at Yorktown a year later. William Henry, Jr. continued his service in the military and achieved to the rank of major, a designation by which he would thereafter be known.
Major Henry died at Henry’s Knob on September 12, 1807, at age 54, and is buried among other family members in the cemetery at Bethany Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in York County, northwest of Clover, not far from the North Carolina border. Rosannah Henry died five years later, on January 24, 1813, at age 55, and is buried next to her husband.
Contributed by Robert A. Ragan, a descendant, January 1, 2016.
MAJOR WILLIAM HENRY, JR., son of William Henry, Sr. and Margaret Isabella McKeown, was born in 1753 in North Carolina, most likely in Anson/Mecklenburg/Tryon/Lincoln (now Gaston County). Earlier, around 1751, his parents had traveled down the Great Wagon Road from Virginia to North Carolina, where they first settled on the west side of the Catawba River in what is now the lower section of Gaston County. By 1764, his family moved a few miles further south to what is now present-day northwestern York County, South Carolina, at a place to become widely known as Henry’s Knob because of the small 1,120-foot mountain on the property. In 1776 in York County, William Henry, Jr. married Rosannah Moore (1757-1813), a daughter of John Moore and Rosannah McCord. They became the parents of eight sons and two daughters, namely, John Henry (b. 1777), Isabella Henry Carroll (b. 1778), Josiah Henry (b. 1779), Robert Henry (u/k), James Henry (1784-1824), J. Malcolm Henry (1786-1854), William Henry III (u/k), Alexander Henry (u/k), Thomas Campbell Henry (1790-1877) and Jane Henry Byers (1792-1884).
As a member of a strongly Scotch-Irish Presbyterian family espousing independence from England, William Henry, Jr. served gallantly as a patriot in the American Revolution during the Southern Campaign. He fought with the local militia at the Battle of Kings Mountain, located near the Henry homestead, on October 7, 1780, and with General Daniel Morgan at Cowpens, South Carolina, on January 17, 1781. Local legend records that on October 6, 1780, the day before the battle at Kings Mountain, two men who turned out to be Tories carrying important messages from British Colonel Patrick Ferguson to General Lord Charles Cornwallis in Charlotte relating to the patriots’ positions, stopped at the Henry home and sought refreshment. They raised suspicion among the Henry family. A subsequent pursuit by William, Jr. and three of his brothers, Malcom, John and Alexander, caused the couriers undue delay. Had the information reached Cornwallis and the main body of the British army earlier, it could have changed the outcome of the battle at Kings Mountain into a British victory, and possibly the tide of history that ended at Yorktown a year later. William Henry, Jr. continued his service in the military and achieved to the rank of major, a designation by which he would thereafter be known.
Major Henry died at Henry’s Knob on September 12, 1807, at age 54, and is buried among other family members in the cemetery at Bethany Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in York County, northwest of Clover, not far from the North Carolina border. Rosannah Henry died five years later, on January 24, 1813, at age 55, and is buried next to her husband.
Contributed by Robert A. Ragan, a descendant, January 1, 2016.
As a member of a strongly Scotch-Irish Presbyterian family espousing independence from England, William Henry, Jr. served gallantly as a patriot in the American Revolution during the Southern Campaign. He fought with the local militia at the Battle of Kings Mountain, located near the Henry homestead, on October 7, 1780, and with General Daniel Morgan at Cowpens, South Carolina, on January 17, 1781. Local legend records that on October 6, 1780, the day before the battle at Kings Mountain, two men who turned out to be Tories carrying important messages from British Colonel Patrick Ferguson to General Lord Charles Cornwallis in Charlotte relating to the patriots’ positions, stopped at the Henry home and sought refreshment. They raised suspicion among the Henry family. A subsequent pursuit by William, Jr. and three of his brothers, Malcom, John and Alexander, caused the couriers undue delay. Had the information reached Cornwallis and the main body of the British army earlier, it could have changed the outcome of the battle at Kings Mountain into a British victory, and possibly the tide of history that ended at Yorktown a year later. William Henry, Jr. continued his service in the military and achieved to the rank of major, a designation by which he would thereafter be known.
Major Henry died at Henry’s Knob on September 12, 1807, at age 54, and is buried among other family members in the cemetery at Bethany Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church in York County, northwest of Clover, not far from the North Carolina border. Rosannah Henry died five years later, on January 24, 1813, at age 55, and is buried next to her husband.
Contributed by Robert A. Ragan, a descendant, January 1, 2016.
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