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Archiver > KYCLARK > 2002-07 > 1027984153


From: "ljglenn" <>
Subject: [KYCLARK] John Foster (1784-1855)
Date: Mon, 29 Jul 2002 18:15:01 -0500


I would appreciate any information about John Foster of Clark County, my great-great-great-grandfather. He was born about 1784, and died in 1855. He also had connections to Fayette and Bourbon Counties. (Another John Foster, who married Elizabeth Hill, lived in Clark County during much of this period, but I have no evidence of any relation between them.)

John Foster was married to Jemima Wigginton (1790-1823) in Bourbon County, on March 25, 1812. She was the daughter of Henry and Ann (Vallandingham) Wigginton. (John may have had a previous marriage, but I have no definite information about it.) After Jemima's death in 1823, he married Nancy Schooler (1790-1864) in Bourbon County, on January 3, 1824.

John Foster and Jemima (Wigginton) Foster had six children:

1. James M. Foster (ca. 1815-?). He married Eliza ---, and moved to Texas. Eliza apparently died, and he married a Mary ---. He was a prominent early cattleman in Calhoun County, Texas. (There is a brief biography in the Handbook of Texas Online.)

2. Permelia Foster (1816-ca. 1892). She married Albert G. Collins in Clark County on June 1, 1831. They moved to Missouri, then to Dallas, Texas. (These are my great-great-grandparents.) Unfortunately, three of their sons died due to association with the Sam Bass gang.

3. Orace (or Orice) Foster (1821/22-?).

4. Jemima Foster (ca. 1822/23-?), who married Zachary Herndon in Fayette County on March 16, 1840.

5. another son, name and dates unknown.

6. another son, name and dates unknown.

John and Nancy (Schooler) Foster had at least two children:

1. Thomas P. Foster (1827/28-?), who married Martha ---.

2. John B. Foster (1831/2-?).

Henry J. Foster (ca. 1796-1868), who lived in Fayette County in or near Lexington was John Foster's brother. (Henry married Mildred McCoy in Fayette County on July 14, 1821.)

Elizabeth Foster, who married James Palmer in Bourbon County in 1808, was probably their sister, as John Foster and James Palmer were later associated in a lawsuit.

A man named Henry Foster gave consent for Elizabeth Foster's marriage to James Palmer, at a time when her (presumed) brother Henry would have been too young to do so. So I suspect he was the father of John, Henry, and Elizabeth. Also, a Henry Foster was living in the David's Fork area in 1791, and Henry J. Foster was later associated with David's Fork Baptist Church, suggesting some continuity in the family's living in that area.

I would especially appreciate any information about the ancestry of John Foster.


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