Andrew Chumbley

The following writing is by Alice Chumbley Lora, a direct descendant and a member of the Chumley/Chumbley Research Group:

ANDREW CHUMBLEY, the eldest son of Robert Chumbley and Elizabeth Betsy Ford, was born about 1803 in Amelia (or Giles) County, Virginia. By 1840 he, along with his brothers John, Lewis and Robert Chumbley were living in Claiborne County, Tennessee, where some of the family stayed and put down roots.

But in the early 1840s, Andrew and his brother Britain [also spelled Britain, Briton, Brittain, Britton] moved to Kentucky and were in the 1850 Pulaski County Census. They and two of Andrew’s sons, William and John J, were buying land and settling their families on land that adjoined the Cub Creek and the Cumberland River, along the border of Russell and Pulaski counties, where they were later joined by their brothers Samuel, Robert Green, James Franklin, Elias Britain, and Martin, along with sisters “Mary” Mahala Ann and Martha A.

Andrew had purchased 100 acres of “vacant and unappropriated lands” for the sum of $2.  Andrew’s eldest son William Chumbley purchased a half-acre lot in the town of Harrison (Now Harrison’s Knob), which is close to Faubush in Pulaski County from John M. Weddle.   Then in 1859, Andrew and his wife Elizabeth, William, and his wife Sarah (Dotson) sold 146 ½ acres of land along the White Oak Creek, Pulaski Co, to one William Vanhoozer for $636.90.  Families who owned adjoining land were the Redmans, the Logans, the Connors and the Norfleets.

On Nov. 30, 1860, William Chumbley purchased more land, this time three tracts of land, totaling 284 acres, from William and Sally McClendon for $500.  This land also lay along the Cub Creek and adjoined lands owned by Solomon Turpin, David Thomas (deceased), and Andrew Grinswett (Grunnset?).  One sidelight of this deed is that William McClendon “reserves to himself one half of a mile…necessary to own a distillery off of said lands.”   Later William Chumbley and his wife Sarah Dotson Chumbley sold rights to “bore, explore, dig, or mine for coal, water, oil or other minerals” on this land in return for one-tenth of all the proceeds made from these minerals.  The Chumbleys were to furnish timber “sufficient to erect derrick” and “wood for running the engines and for the manufactures barrels.”   On March 20, 1865, William paid fifty dollars to Enoch Callicotte for fifty more acres adjoining Andrew Grinswett (Grunnset?) and Smith W. Cain.

On August 12, 1865, Andrew’s sixth son John J. Chumbley also purchased land along the Cub Creek, but this land was on the Russell County side of the creek.  From Jacob and Levanah Royedon he bought over 100 acres of land that adjoined that of Smith W.Cain, George B. McClendon, John Canaday and Ephriam Cain.   This land was strategically placed because John J. and his brother Samuel later married two of Ephriam Cain’s daughters.   However, in October of 1865 John J. needed to borrow $50, so he signed a note to Joseph E. Hays on 140 acres of land, to be void when he repaid the loan. Although many of Andrew’s family settled in Pulaski, Russell, and Casey County, other descendants moved in groups to Kentuckytown, Texas, to Pike County, Indiana, and other places on what was then the frontier; however, many of Andrew’s descendants stayed in Kentucky.