George Windes' manuscript has been reformatted into the layout used on other pages of the website.
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Enoch Windes 1765-1834 |
born: 1765 in Kershaw County, South Carolina died: 1834 |
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WIFE: Sarah Dumville, married: before 1790 father: Robert Dumvill (c1735-1819) mother: Mary McGill (c1750-1819) cousin: Richard Andrew Dumvill (c1765-1836) born: c1775 children: Joseph Windes (1790-1845/47) Sarah Windes (1793-1850) William A.D. Windes (1795-1868) Samuel P. Windes (1797-1845) Robert Dumville Windes (1799-1867) Susan Windes (b c1807) Enoch Windes (1809-1872) Lydia E. Windes (b 1811) Mary Dumville Windes (1812-1839) |
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The South Carolina Period: Learning a trade after the Revolutionary War Enoch and Sarah's lives in South Carolina have been well documented in the manuscript 'The Windes of Society Hill'. Enoch's parents are also covered extensively, as are his siblings and half-siblings. I won't duplicate that data here, other than to share a couple of quotations from the Texas letters and the partition of property document for Enoch's father. First, the following: "My Uncle Enoch was about seventeen when the old war of '76 ended. He then learned the house carpenter trade." Secondly: "he married … Miss Nell(i)e (Sarah) Dumble (Dumville) … they went to Missouri where he lived a long time." Then from the 1812 partitioning document: "Enoch Winds and Susannah Winds, two of the defendants are residents without the state. Summoned to appear." A young couple had made an important decision. One that would take them from comfortable surroundings in a cultured and settled society and expose them to the the unknown, to possible Indian attacks, to all the inherent dangers of living on the frontier. It's unlikely (except for the mentioned summons) that they ever saw old Society Hill again. The future was in the West and there they would remain all of their days. Before the removal however, a few years were spent amongst their loved ones and their own immediate family was added upon. Here then are the family births in the South Carolina timeframe: |
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Joseph Windes 1790-1845/47 |
father: Enoch Windes (1765-1834) mother: Sarah Windes née Dumville (b c1775) born: 1790 died: 1845/47 notes: Joseph was the first-born of twelve, according to the Texas letters. He would have remembered the family's sojourn in Tennessee and been excited with his first view of the mighty Mississippi. He fought in the War of 1812, had three marriages, and produced a large posterity. He followed his father's sister, Susannah, to Jefferson County, Missouri and lived out his life there, dying around 1845. We have a complete list of his children as a result of a court's partition of property. His burial site is unknown, though possibly at Darby cemetery near Rush Tower. See my manuscript, 'The Windes of Plattin Gap'. |
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Sarah Windes 1793-1850 |
father: Enoch Windes (1765-1834) mother: Sarah Windes née Dumville (b c1775) born: 1793 died: 1850 notes: Sarah may not have been a Windes at all. In the 1960s while researching Enoch Jr. (born 1809), I was told by a local historian that Enoch had married a cousin, Mary Ann Ryan, daughter of Thomas and Sarah Windes Ryan of Apple Grove, Alabama. It was thought that Enoch had come to visit his kin, was offered a teaching job and proceeded to fall in love with his cousin (that he had not been raised around). It is a scenario not unknown in earlier times. Both families did share the same tiny cemetery (Crawford) for the burial of loved ones. Recently though, Sarah has been identified as a Blevens, sometimes listed as Sarah Windes Blevens. The story of Thomas and Sarah's courtship is found in a small book named 'Bonnets and Gloves' in which Sarah's maiden name is listed as Wines. Thomas and Sarah died as a result of an Indian attack in 1850 and are buried at Crawford. |
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William A.D. Windes 1795-1868 |
father: Enoch Windes (1765-1834) mother: Sarah Windes née Dumville (b c1775) born: 1795 died: 19 November 1868 notes: William (Rev. Billy) was the sibling that travelled west into the Missouri wilderness, rather than south down the Mississippi. He'd already established his farm before his parents and younger siblings left to take advantage of Choctaw Indian lands that were opening up. As often happened after a decade or so, his lands were not so productive and he joined the western movement where fresh land, streams and wildlife was readily available. He became a lay preacher for the Methodist church and spent over forty years preaching the gospel. Before 1860 he returned with four unmarried daughters to the settled region where he'd lived as a young husband, apparently without his helpmate. To read the entire story, see my manuscript, 'The Windes of Courtois (court-a-way) Creek'. Several sons of his brother Joseph followed him west, and raised their families nearby after their father's death. William was a private in the War of 1812 and married Miss Nancy, whose surname is unknown (though it may have been Estes). William died on 19 November 1868. He is probably buried at Fairview Cemetery in Crawford County, Missouri. Many of the markers were made of fieldstone and inscriptions have weathered away. His maiden daughters, Eliza and Sarah, are said to have faithfully re-carved the family stones, while they yet remained in the area. William is my great-great-great-grandfather and I wrote an additional manuscript concerning his son John Chatman entitled 'The Windes of Low Wasse'. |
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WIFE: Nancy children: Cynthia Windes (1818-1847) William Lindsay Windes (1823-1900?) Emily Windes (1825-before 1860) John Chatman Windes (1827-1892) Eliza J. Windes (1826-before 1900) Nancy C Windes (1832-1865) Martha Windes (1833-1914) George Windes (b1834) Merritt Windes (b1836) Sarah Windes (1838-after 1910) |
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The Tennessee Period: Bondsman for a Family Wedding Enoch and Sarah probably arrived in Grainger County, Tennessee in 1796. A third son, Samuel P. Windes, is known to have been born there, circa 1797, followed by brother, Robert Dumville Windes, in 1799. Unfortunately no family bible record has survived. However we do find references to Enoch occasionally in the county records. In 1798 he witnessed a land transaction between Noah Jarnigan and his father-in-law Robert Dumville. Enoch is found in a Tennessee tax list in 1799. He was the bondsman for the wedding of his sister-in-law, Ellender Dumville and William Sims in 1803 and witnessed a gift of land between his father-in-Iaw and Mr. Sims in 1804. The last mention I find of Enoch living in Tennessee is in the year 1806. The first settlers in Grainger County arrived in 1785, but it wasn't until 1796 (the same year the Windes and Dumvilles came), that the county was created. The county seat was moved around for a few years, but finally located at a town named Rutledge which today has only a thousand or so residents (in 1830 it had 150 and that was a long time after our families left). It is a very rural place, even today, named after Mary Grainger, the wife of Governor William Blount. A local resident, Andrew Johnson, operated a small tailor shop in Rutledge and later served as our seventeenth president. Here then is the data concerning the known Windes children born while the family sojourned in Tennessee: |
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Samuel P. Windes 1797-1845 |
father: Enoch Windes (1765-1834) mother: Sarah Windes née Dumville (b c1775) born: 1797 died: 1845 notes: Samuel is mentioned as the 'older brother' that helped several members of his large clan. His life is fairly well documented, covered in my manuscript 'The Windes of Union Parish'. Married in 1821 to Dorothea Byrd of Franklin County, Minnesota, he is known to have run for public office at least once. He and 'Dorothy' had three sons: Edward B. (born 1822), Robert W. (born 1823) and Oliver Hazard Perry (born 1824). Samuel died soon after locating his family to Union Parish, Louisiana. He was a slave owner. There is faded stone for him in Liberty Hill Cemetery outside of Farmersville, Louisiana. Two of his sons became weathly. |
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WIFE: Dorothea (Dorothy) Byrd , married: 1821 children: Edward B. Windes (b 1822) Robert W. Windes (b 1823) Oliver Hazard Perry Windes (b 1824) |
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Robert Dumville Windes 1799-1867 |
father: Enoch Windes (1765-1834) mother: Sarah Windes née Dumville (b c1775) born: 1799 died: 1867 notes: Robert was a successful planter and medical doctor. He married well to Eugenia Ferguson, while teaching in Bayou Chicot Louisiana. He started his medical training while yet in Missouri, but had relocated to Louisiana by 1818. He and Eugenia had only two children, Laura, who died young, and Robert Dumville Jr., who served in the Civil War and later published two volumes of poetry. The Windes first had a fine home in Bayou Chicot, but within a decade built their huge 'plantation house' on Watermelon Bayou at the place called Holmesville. Bob Junior never married and left the property to others at his death in 1911. All of the family have nice stones, within iron enclosures, at the old Ferguson Cemetery. They were slave owners and are mentioned in the book: 'Twelve Years a Slave' by Solomon Northup. See: 'The Windes of Bayou Chicot and Holmesville'. |
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WIFE: Eugenia Ferguson children: Laura Windes (died young) Robert Dumville Windes Jr. (1830-1911) |
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Ste. Genevieve, Missouri Period: Proprietor of the Inn In the history of Enoch Windes (born 1809), it is stated that his father managed an inn at Ste. Genevieve when the family first arrived. Perhaps it was also in association with his carpenter skills. The original inn in the village still exists and is open for tours. It is called the Green Tree Inn, just off Highway 69, as one enters the old town. It is thought that the Windes arrived in Ste. Genevieve around 1807. Enoch's sister Susannah married there in 1809. The Windes' travels would next take them to a lead mining area approximately fifty miles east of Ste. Genevieve. An outcropping of lead ore had been discovered there by Francis Azor around 1780 and a primitive village had sprung up called Mine au Breton, or Mine of the Breton. After hearing about the rich lead mines in southeast Missouri Territory, Moses Austin, a wealthy Virginia businessman, set out to investigate them. In 1797 he received a grant of 7,153 arpents of land, adjacent to Azor's original grant. The following year he moved his wife and family to the area, where they resided in Durham Hall, which he built and named after his Connecticut birthplace. As a condition of his grant, he was to provide many needed improvements for the area. He and his forty or fifty employees and slaves built bridges, roads, a store, a blacksmith shop, a saw mill, a shot tower, a sheet lead factory and the first reverbatory furnace west of the Mississippi. In 1814 Washington County was formed and Austin donated forty acres on the north side of Breton Creek for the establishment of a county seat. The town was eventually named Potosi after a silver mining town in Bolivia. Mine au Breton and Potosi were consolidated in 1816. For his public improvements of the area, Austin is credited with being Potosi's founding father. Enoch and Sarah Windes came to Potosi before 1819, when they purchased a city lot from Moses Austin, on a main street still important today. Enoch probably worked at his carpenter trade, providing for his growing family. Some of his sons apparently worked in the mining industry. Years later there would be a 'Winds Lead Mine' near Billy Windes' home. Moses Austin is often called the 'Grandfather of Texas'. In 1821 he travelled to San Antonio where he received the first grant for an American colony. After his death later that year, his son Stephen took over the project and moved three hundred families from Potosi to Texas. He became the first state governor and is called the 'Father of Texas'. The state capital is named after him. The Windes sold their city lot in 1821, but are thought to have continued living in the Potosi area till at least 1825. In that year Enoch signed a 'stray book' for a horse, so as to claim it if no one else did. His daughter Susan was also a witness at a wedding in that year. But another move was yet to come for the now aging Enoch and Sarah, even as their older children began marrying and going out into the world to seek their fortunes. In this same time period, there is story that states that Enoch (b1809), the youngest son of Enoch, had a falling out with his father and decided to run away and seek employment in the mining industry. He was twelve years old, so the year was around 1821. He soon got into an altercation at the mine, which ended when he used a shovel on the head of the man who was bullying him. He returned to his family and tried hard to learn the building trade from his father. However, he didn't have the patience for working in the exacting way that his father felt that projects must be finished. He would leave the family hearth again, though it's unclear if that departure was prior to when the senior Windes moved to Mississippi. It is known that he did arrive at the same ultimate destination and began working with his older brother Samuel in getting out timber from the vast forested tracts along the Mississippi River. Sam was thought responsible for saving Enoch's life when he fell ill with fever. Several more daughters and their youngest son (mentioned above) were born to Enoch and Sarah during their twenty year sojourn in eastern Missouri. The known names are: |
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Susan Windes b c1807 |
father: Enoch Windes (1765-1834) mother: Sarah Windes née Dumville (b c1775) born: b c1807 notes: Witnessed a wedding in Ste. Genevieve in 1825, just prior to the family moving down river. She married well and eventually lived in Arkansas, on a river plantation with daughter Emily who married Timothy O'Keeffe Lee. In the 1880 census, Susan stated that she was born in Tennessee, her parents in South Carolina. Susan Windes' first husband Robert Wells died prior to 1850 and she then married Mr. Watson, but was shortly widowed again. In 1880 Susan lived with her daughter Emma. Next to them was a black 'Wines' family, possibly former slaves of Susan and her family. Some of Susan's children raised their families in and around Planters Township, Chicot County, Arkansas. Susan's burial site is currently unknown, though probably at Eudora, Chicot County, Arkansas. children: Augustus Wells (probably from a previous marriage of Robert) Lucius Wells Emily Wells (married first, Jacob Hollingsworth Hill (they had one child) and second, Timothy O'Keeffe Lee (they had seven). They lived on a plantation on the banks of the Mississippi River in Arkansas. They once provided shelter when a large steamboat burned at the family dock.) Preston Wells Robert B. Wells Sarah E. Wells William Wells |
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HUSBAND: Robert Wells, a widower, married: (1) 1830/33 born: 8 February 1807 in Amite County, Mississippi died: prior to 1850 notes: Robert Wells was born 8 February 1807 in Amite County, Mississippi. He and his older brother Thomas were both slaves owners and lived next to each other in the 1840 census. His brother's plantation was known as Auburn. Part of the house still stands. The brothers were among the largest land and slave owners in the county. Susan was widowed and left the area before the Civil War, but Thomas and his family remained. Their plantation was in the path of Grant's operations. His slaves were freed and all buildings destroyed except the residence which was used as a hospital. The family had fled and returned to a house denuded of nearly every article of furniture and a farm stripped of all means of cultivating their land. Thomas Wells was for sixty years an elder in the Bethesda Presbyterian Church. Only one of their seven children survived the parents. Later that son was noted as "owning two plantations." Perhaps Thomas bought Robert's after his early death. The Wells brothers lived beside each other. Thomas and wife Cynthia lost many young children. |
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| HUSBAND: Mr. Watson, married: (2) | |
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Enoch Windes 1809-1872 |
father: Enoch Windes (1765-1834) mother: Sarah Windes née Dumville (b c1775) born: 1 July 1809 died: 9 March 1872 notes: See 'The Windes of Apple Grove' booklet. Read also my: 'Addendum to the Windes of Apple Grove'. Nearly all the children of Enoch wrote remembrances of their parents and growing up in Apple Grove. We know that after several youthful adventures, Enoch was encouraged to get an education by his sister-in-law, Dorothy Byrd Windes, who lived in Hinds County. He did just that and eventually started teaching school in a tiny place called Apple Grove, Morgan County, Alabama. He may have had relatives living there. He taught young Mary Ann Ryan and then married her in 1834. They had a large family and some slaves. It is their descendants who pursued education and had notable occupations, both legal and religious. See the manuscripts listed above. Enoch died a few years after the Civil War, in 1872. His wife died five years later. You can view a tribute to their oldest son, Lt. Col. Francis Marion Windes, via the Internet. |
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WIFE: Mary Ann Ryan, married: 1834 died: 1877 oldest son: Francis Marion Windes |
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Lydia E. Windes b 1811 |
father: Enoch Windes (1765-1834) mother: Sarah Windes née Dumville (b c1775) born: 1811 notes: They had a good sized family prior to John Futch's early death in 1850. Their children moved to Louisiana and joined their Uncle Samuel's family. children: George W. Futch (b 1831) Julia A. Futch (b 1833) Robert W. Futch (1836-before 1880) Sarah E. Futch (b 1838) John Thomas Futch (1842-1883) Mary Virginia Futch (b 1844) Harriett Futch (b 1846) Samuel W. Futch (b 1848) |
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HUSBAND: John Futch, married: 27 July 1830 died: February 1850 notes: His parents had a antebellum plantation that stood till recently between Raymond and Utica, Mississippi. John's parents were also members of the Palastine Baptist Church and John joined that church on 7 July 1834. Lydia followed him in 1843. John died in February 1850 of consumption. His parents had a family cemetery on their land, which is now called the Thomas Futch Cemetery. Thomas's first wife Elizabeth Cook died in January 1833. He then married Margaret, widow of John Adam Riser. The Futches and Risers had apparently moved to Hinds County together when it opened up for settlement. Thomas and Adam were both soldiers in the War of 1812 in the Mississippi Militia. The old Thomas Futch Cemetery is apparently now in danger of destruction, according to a local historian. A gravel strip mine operation has opened next to it. The ancient Futch house has already been pulled down and a huge 'trophy' house built in the old Futch pasture by a famed athlete that purchased the property. Lydia's burial site unknown. In 1840, the Hinds County census identified the Futch families as living next door to each other. John and Lydia had numerous children. The early death of John in 1850 caused a family separation with most of the members moving on to Union Parish, Louisiana where Samuel P. Windes' family had relocated. Son John T. went to the Robert Dumville Windes plantation at Holmesville, Louisiana (though he later rejoined siblings at Union Parish). No further data on Lydia has been found, but she possibly remarried. |
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Mary Dumville Windes 1812-1839 |
father: Enoch Windes (1765-1834) mother: Sarah Windes née Dumville (b c1775) born: 1812 died: 1839 notes: Mary never married. She is buried near her brother Robert at Ferguson Cemetery, Bayou Chicot, Louisiana. Mary apparently moved to her brother Robert's stately home at Bayou Chicot, Louisiana after her parents were gone. She died there unmarried in 1839, at age 27, and is buried within the iron enclosures of her brother's family at Ferguson Cemetery . In figuring back her birth year was approximately 1812. Read my manuscript, The Windes of Bayou Chicot and Holmesville'. |
| Before leaving Potosi, it's noteworthy to mention that Moses Austin is buried in the Potosi City Cemetery , under a box type tomb, now covered by a canopy that protects the site. The cracks that appear on the tomb today were made by some Texans in 1938, when (under cover of night) they tried to relocate his body to Texas. They were discovered and sent packing by local residents. | |
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The Hinds County, Mississippi Period: Plantation Life in the Deep South From the story of Enoch Windes (born 1809), I knew that his brother Samuel had lived with family in Mississippi. I searched the census records at the National Archives/Laguna Nigel without success, and eventually copied the index for all names beginning with 'Wi'. I checked the common and not so common spellings: Windes, Wines, Winds, Wyndes, etc. Eventually while reading over that index one last time, my attention was drawn to the name Wims. There were two entries, with the given names of Samuel and Enoch. Could the typist have read Wines as Wims? Could father Enoch have moved close to his son Samuel? A review of the written census confirmed what I suspected. The name was Wines, the ages correct for both son and father. The 1830 census has only the head of household names, but Samuel's household had three sons (the correct and final number) while Enoch had three unmarried daughters, which ties to that family story. It was an exhilarating discovery. And later it would be confirmed by the arrival of two old letters written in Texas 130 years ago (See my manuscript, 'The Windes of Society Hill, South Carolina). The family data presented by Mary Lang McLaughlin states: "Her Uncle Enoch died near Jackson, Mississippi, thirty-six years ago (1838). He was approximately seventy-three years of age." The death date of his wife Sarah Dumville Windes is currently unknown. She is not listed with her son Samuel's family in the 1840 census. Indeed, Samuel and his young family had moved to DeSoto County, Mississippi by then. DeSoto County had been established in 1836 after the Chickasaw Indian land cession of 1832. Later Samuel ran for elective office there. See my manuscript, 'The Windes of Union Parish'. Two of the three remaining daughters and the youngest son of Enoch and Sarah married during the Mississippi sojourn of the family. |
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I searched the historic Town Cemetery at Raymond, Mississippi, for Windes stones without success. The families lived out of the town. A better guess might be the old cemetery adjacent to the Palastine Baptist Church near Utica, since Lydia Windes was a member of that congregation. The cemetery was created at the same time the church was founded in 1821, the oldest Baptist church in the county. It closed recently in 2004 when the congregation moved to a new location. Another possibility, the Bethesda Presbyterian Church cemetery. The Wells worshipped there. Of course, small family burial grounds were common, e.g. the Thomas Futch family cemetery. A Hinds County historian, Mary Collins Landin, recently stated in a letter to me that there are no Windes/Wines/Winds stones within Hinds County, and thus we will probably never know
the final resting place of Enoch and Sarah Dumville Windes. Enoch and Sarah were those progenitors that followed the advice of John Soule, "Go West, young man and grow up with the country." They bravely set forth into a wilderness and moved quite often, starting over each time. They raised a dozen children. They were true pioneers in that amazing period of exploration between the Revolutionary and Civil Wars in America. We should honour and remember their sacrifice. Occasionally I do visualize them (as an old couple) travelling down the Mississippi on a flatboat toward their last home in Mississippi, their three youngest daughters sitting beside them, with perhaps their impatient son Enoch at the helm … |
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Postscript The narrative history above has identified only nine of the twelve children born to Enoch and Sarah. The History of Enoch Windes (born 1809) states that he was one of twelve children; the youngest of the males. The Texas letters state that there were seven males. My narrative notes five of those, and four of the females. As to the remaining siblings, clues are few. Certainly none are sustainable enough to tie the individuals directly to the family. I will note the possibilities though, with what little data currently possessed: Jacob Wind or Winds: One reference only, found in the 1830 Louisiana census living at Thompson Creek, Feliciana Parish. His age between twenty and thirty, married with two children. He is also known to have been a trumpeter in the War of 1812, for Louisiana Territory. Lindsay C. Winds: Once considered, but now tied firmly to the Hinds family. Elizabeth Winds: Apparently an early marriage in Cole County, Missouri. Born 1804? She married one John Conner in 1824. Additional research is needed on them. "F.P." Winds, who married Lauralee Melissa Overall in Tennessee early on. Although several of the Windes siblings lived beyond the Civil War, tintypes or photographs have yet to be found. There is a photo of Mary Ann Ryan, the wife of Enoch Windes (born 1809). Three of their memorial stones exist and the locations of several of their homes are known (though the buildings have been torn down). In Raymond, Mississippi, a half dozen public and private buildings stand that Enoch and Sarah would have been familiar with. The same is true of Potosi and Ste. Genevive, Missouri. Society Hill has remained a tiny village and several historic buildings in nearby Cheraw, South Carolina, would have been known to the senior Windes. The subscription-built library in Society Hill dates from about the time that Samuel Windes Jr. died. Born and raised between the Revolutionary and Civil War, some family members are known to have seen service during the War of 1812, Joseph and William to name two. It's entirely possible that they were involved in the related uprisings called the Creek Wars. Undoubtedly many sons of the next generation were directly involved in the Civil War, with some thought to have made the ultimate sacrifice. Among those candidates, George and Merritt, sons of William A. Windes, Frances Marion, son of Enoch Windes (1809), Samuel, son of Joseph Windes and possibly sons of Lydia Windes Futch and Susan Windes Wells. |
The information for this page was researched and written by George Windes.
The Windes of Bayou Chicot and Holmesville, Louisiana
The Windes of Society Hill, South Carolina
Photograph of Robert Dumville Windes Jr (1830-1911)
Richard Andrew Dumvill (c1765-1836), cousin of Enoch Windes' wife Sarah Dumville.