Mary Frances Allen

Brief Life History of Mary Frances

When Mary Frances Allen was born on 15 March 1829, in Amherst, Amherst, Virginia, United States, her father, Thomas Oliver Allen, was 28 and her mother, Mary Garnette Tinsley, was 19. She married Joab W. Whitten on 12 November 1850, in Amherst, Virginia, United States. They were the parents of at least 6 sons and 1 daughter. She lived in Amherst, Virginia, United States in 1860. She died on 12 February 1927, in Pedlar, Amherst, Virginia, United States, at the age of 97, and was buried in Willow, Amherst, Virginia, United States.

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Family Time Line

Joab W. Whitten
1824–about 1862
Mary Frances Allen
1829–1927
Marriage: 12 November 1850
Augustus Devereaux Whitten
1851–1916
Anna Eliza Whitten
1852–1930
Douglas Whitten
1854–
William Thomas Whitten
1856–1940
John Wesley Whitten
1858–1918
Joseph Tinsley Whitten
1860–1948
James Harrison Whitten
about 1862–1953

Sources (51)

  • Mary F Whitton in household of Jacob W Whitton, "United States Census, 1860"
  • Mary F, "Virginia, Bureau of Vital Statistics, Birth Records, 1853-1896"
  • Mary F. Allen, "Virginia Marriages, 1785-1940"

World Events (8)

1830 · The Second Great Awakening

Being a second spiritual and religious awakening, like the First Great Awakening, many Churches began to spring up from other denominations. Many people began to rapidly join the Baptist and Methodist congregations. Many converts to these religions believed that the Awakening was the precursor of a new millennial age.

1844 · Lumpkin's Jail

In 1844 when Robert Lumpkin bought land in Virginia, this would be the spot of the Infamous Slave Jail (or Lumpkin’s Jail). The slaves would be brought here during the slave trade until they were sold. Lumpkin had purchased the land for his own slave business.

1861 · The Battle of Manassas

The Battle of Manassas is also referred to as the First Battle of Bull Run. 35,000 Union troops were headed towards Washington D.C. after 20,000 Confederate forces. The McDowell's Union troops fought with General Beauregard's Confederate troops along a little river called Bull Run. 

Name Meaning

English and Scottish: from the Middle English, Old French personal name Alain, Alein (Old Breton Alan), from a Celtic personal name of great antiquity and obscurity. In England the personal name is now usually spelled Alan, the surname Allen; in Scotland the surname is more often Allan. From 1139 it was common in Scotland, where the surname also derives from Gaelic Ailéne, Ailín, from ail ‘rock’. The present-day frequency of the surname Allen in England and Ireland is partly accounted for by the popularity of the personal name among Breton followers of William the Conqueror, by whom it was imported first to Britain and then to Ireland. Saint Alan(us) was a 5th-century bishop of Quimper, who was a cult figure in medieval Brittany. Another Saint Al(l)an was a Cornish or Breton saint of the 6th century, to whom a church in Cornwall is dedicated.

English: occasionally perhaps from the rare Middle English femaje personal name Aline (Old French Adaline, Aaline), a pet form of ancient Germanic names in Adal-, especially Adalheidis (see Allis ).

French: variant of Allain , a cognate of 1 above, and, in North America, (also) an altered form of this.

Dictionary of American Family Names © Patrick Hanks 2003, 2006.

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