Peter Johnstone of Farmville, VA

Peter Johnston/e and Martha Butler – Rogers

Peter ¹ Johnston/e, 10 November 1710 ¹ -6 December 1786. ² Peter was christened 12 November 1710 at Saint Cuthberts, Edinburgh, Midlothian, Scotland. Peter’s father was said to have been a native of the traditional area of origin for Clan Johnston/e; Annandale, Dumfriesshire, Scotland. ³ Peter emigrated from Edinburgh to America in 1726 or 1727 and settled at Osborne’s Landing on the James River in Virginia. ⁴ In 1736 Peter married Margaret Games. ⁵ Margaret died in 1756 in Culpeper County, Virginia. ⁶ On 17/19 March 1761, Peter, aged 50, married Martha Rogers, widow of Thomas Rogers the captain of a merchantman in the colonial service. ¹ Martha was a daughter of John Butler, a merchant on the Appomattox below Petersburg. ⁵ Then in 1765 Peter and family moved to “Cherry Grove,” an estate near Farmville, Prince Edward County. ⁶ Peter was a royalist, ⁷ and a successful merchant and planter. ⁸ He was a member of the established church, but when the presbytery of Hanover proposed building a college in Prince Edward he gave one hundred acres of land on which Prince Edward academy was erected in 1775, and in 1777 the name was changed to Hampden-Sidney college. ⁹ Peter and Martha had at least five sons. ¹⁰ Their eldest son, also named Peter, was intended for the ministry. He was taught by Scottish tutors and then entered Hampden-Sidney College. ¹¹ In late 1779, against his father’s Loyalist feelings, he quit college and ran away with a schoolmate to join Light Horse Harry Lee’s legion. ¹² After the revolution he studied law which mended the relationship with his father. ¹³ Subsequently he became a noted lawyer and judge. ¹⁴ He married a niece of patriot Patrick Henry and was the father of Confederate civil war General Joseph Eggleston Johnston. ¹⁵ The second son of Peter Johnston and Martha Rogers, Andrew, was the great-grandfather of well known historical novelist and suffragette Mary Johnston (21 November 1870-9 May 1936). ¹⁶ Peter was buried at “Longwood” (near Farmville), Prince Edward County, Virginia. ¹⁷ Peter fathered at least six children.

Fanny 2	before 1756 18 11	md 1 Houston; 2 Robert Forsyth (1754-1794) of Fredericksburgh, VA about 1779 19
Peter 2	6 January 1763 20 -8 December 1831 21	md 1 Mary Wood 1788 22 2 Anne Bernard 1828 23
John 2	9 September 1764 24 -about 1765 25	died in infancy 26
Andrew 2	6 March 1767 27 -1811 28	md Anne Owen Nash 9 February 1797 29
Charles 2	28 April 1769 30 -31 January 1833 31	md 1 Letitia Pickett 25 Oct. 1797 2 Elizabeth Prentis Steptoe 13 Feb. 1783 32
Edward 2	15 November 1774 33 -about 1836 34	md Unknown Randolph 35

¹ Helen Johnston, Eight children of the winged spur: their ancestors and descendants, (Birmingham, Alabama: 1980), 812 pages. The subject of this publication is the Peter Johnston (1710-1786) family of Prince Edward County, VA.
² Ibid.
³ Dumfries-Galloway Scots in America. LDS IGI states that Peter was born in Glasgow, Lanark, Scotland.
⁴ Ibid.
⁵ Ibid.
⁶ Ibid.
⁷ Dumas Malone editor, Dictionary of American Biography, (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1933), volume 10, pages 147-148.
^8
9 Dumfries-Galloway Scots in America.
¹⁰ Ibid.
¹¹ Dumas Malone editor, Dictionary of American Biography, (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1933), volume 10, pages 147-148.
¹² Ibid.
¹³ John A. Garraty, Mark C. Carnes, General Editors, American National Biography, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), Volume 12, page162. Peter Johnston biographical sketch was written by Robert M. Ireland (with sources).
¹⁴ Ibid.
¹⁵ James Grant Wilson and John Fiske Editors, Appleton’s Cyclopedia of American Biography, (New York: D. Appleton and company, 1888), volume III, pages 458-460.
¹⁶ The National Cyclopedia of American Biography, (New York: James T. White & Company, 1909), Volume X, page 29. This biography relates Mary’s ancestry.
¹⁷ Helen Johnston, Eight children of the winged spur: their ancestors and descendants, (Birmingham, Alabama: 1980), 812 pages. The subject of this publication is the Peter Johnston (1710-1786) family.
¹⁸ Jennie Forsyth Jeffries, A History of the Forsyth Family, (Indianapolis: Wm. B. Burford Printing, Binding and Stationery, 1920), pages 49-50. This publication refers to Fanny as “Mrs. Fanny Johns[t]on Houston, a widow and aunt of General Joseph E. Johnston.” She married Robert Forsyth of Fredericksburgh, Virginia, who was initially a captain in Light Horse Harry Lee’s legion in 1776 and became a major in 1777. Fanny’s brother Peter Johnston , along with a friend, joined Lee’s cavalry legion in 1779. Peter became a Lieutenant in 1780.
¹⁹ Ibid.
²⁰ John A. Garraty, Mark C. Carnes, General Editors, American National Biography, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), Volume 12, page 162. Peter Johnston biographical sketch was written by Robert M. Ireland (with sources).
²¹ Peter Johnston obituary, Richmond Enquirer, Richmond, Virginia, 20/21 December 1831, page 3, column 6. Also 3 January 1832, page 4, column 3. Thomas Ritchie’s Richmond Enquirer was one of the most influential newspapers in antebellum America. Widely read and discussed, the Enquirer set the standard for southern journalism in the first half of the 19th century.
²² John A. Garraty, Mark C. Carnes, General Editors, American National Biography, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), Volume 12, page162. Peter Johnston biographical sketch was written by Robert M. Ireland (with sources).
²³ Ibid.
²⁹ The National Cyclopedia of American Biography, (New York: James T. White & Company, 1909), Volume X, page 29. This biography relates Mary’s ancestry.
³¹ Charles Johnston gravestone, Salem Cemetery, Botetourt Springs, Virginia.

This page created 10 February 2005.