For the complete detailed description of the origins of this family and their movements from Virginia to the Carolinas and other states click here.
The most distant verified ancestor for this family is James Mathews and his wife Jane. James appears as early as 1688 in a Charles City County court order record. He and his wife Jane had at least five children: Thomas, James Jr., Isaac, Charles and Matthew. By the 1740s James and several of his children had moved to that part of North Carolina which would become Halifax County in the area of Little Fishing Creek.
James Mathews died by 1762 and within a few more years his sons Thomas, James Jr. and Isaac would also die. James' son Charles remained in Virginia and died in 1780. Of son Matthew I have not yet been able to determine his fate. James and his sons left behind a large family. Several grandchildren fought in the Revolutionary War, some served as officers and others in the ranks of infantry or cavalry. By and large the family would stay in Halifax County, NC until the late 1700s when they began to move south and west in search of new land to settle after the war.
Of the children of Thomas Mathews most moved to Chatham County, NC, and then later to parts of Georgia and further west.
Of the children of James Mathews, Jr. at least two remained behind in Halifax County, NC while two others moved to Georgia and Alabama.
Of the children and grandchildren of Charles Mathews, who remained in Virginia after the rest of his family moved to North Carolina, most of his children moved west to Tennessee, some to North Carolina and then those eventually went further west.
Of the children and grandchildren of Isaac Mathews, Sr. one or two remained in Halifax County, one (possibly two) moved to Georgia, while the most visible, Isaac Mathews Jr. (my ancestor) settled in Edgefield County, SC. Several of the grandchildren of James Mathews and his sons would briefly stay in Edgefield County before moving on to Georgia or Alabama.
For those wanting a bit more fleshing out of the details of the history of this family please continue reading here.
The first Mathews to set foot in North America may have been Capt. Samuel Mathews of the Virginia Company in 1622 shortly after the founding of Jamestowne. According to Cavaliers and Pioneers, the seminal work on early settlers to Virginia, there were quite a number of Mathews settlers to Virginia between 1622 and 1666 (roughly 50 according to my count although some may be duplicates). Somewhere in those 50 or so may be the ancestor of James Mathews who was the patriarch to a large lineage that permeates into virtually every corner in the United States today. This site attempts to trace the origins of James Mathews and the paths his descendants took.
