East Tennessee is part of Appalachia. At the end of the French and Indian War, colonists began drifting into the area. In 1769, they first settled along the Watauga River. During the Revolution, the Overmountain Men defeated British loyalists at the Battle of Kings Mountain. The State of Franklin was formed in the 1780s, but never admitted to the Union.
He married Mourning Hogg. Mourning was the daughter of Gideon Hogg.
Abraham and Mourning's children may have included:
John Denton (1769, married Mary Moore, daughter of James Moore),
Sarah Denton (1770, married Francis Kendall),
Elizabeth Denton (1772, married James Moore),
Isaac Denton (1774, married Rebecca Etheridge),
Nancy Denton (1776, married Samuel A. Moore),
Samuel Denton (1777)
Abraham Denton (1778, married Polly Moore, daughter of Thomas Moore),
Jeremiah Denton (1779, married Elizabeth Griggs),
Elijah Denton (1782, married Sarah Huff),
Margaret Denton (1782, married Jesse Moore son of James Moore),
Agnes Denton (1785, who married Garret Moore, son of Thomas Moore), and
Martha Denton (1787, married Cornelius Clancey).
At first the family lived in Virginia in the Tom's Brook area. After Abraham's father died in 1774, they moved to the Watauga settlement, which was located in what is now Washington County, Tennessee. Abraham was one of five grantees to 150 acres lying in the Fork of Big Pigeon and French Broad River.
On August 25, 1780, Abraham Denton was on the jury in the Washington County, Tennessee court. That same court fined John Chisum, Esq. for striking and beating Abraham Denton in the court yard and disturbing the peace and decorom of the court. The court also gave Abraham permission to build a grist mill on Sinking Creek.
In 1784, Abraham was a delegate to the convention in Jonesborough that led to the formation of the state of Franklin.
About 1786 the family moved west into Tennessee. They settled where the Big Pigeon River flows into the Nolichucky.
A grist mill is a building where a miller grinds gain into flour.
from Some of the Descendants of Rev. Richard Denton by Edythe Johns Rucker Whitley
It is both interesting and informative to read in full the sketch of H. [Holland] Denton as found in the J. S. Denton records]
The Great Grand father [Abraham Denton, 1700] and Great Great Mother [Mary Odell] of the undersigned came from France [sic.] to the United States (as I learned from my father) many years before the commencement of the Revolutionary War and settled in North Carolina (if I ever learned their names I don't now remember them).
As to the number of children they had, if I ever knew I don't now remember, only as to my Grandfather, Abraham Denton and Joseph Denton, and a sister of theirs that married a man by the name of Tipton.
My Grandfather Abraham Denton [1726] was a full blooded Frenchman, married to Mourning Hogg, who was of Scotch descent. They had several children, to-wit:
John Denton,
Isaac Denton,
Jeremiah Denton (my father),
Abraham Denton
Samuel Denton and
Elijah Denton, and several daughters, to-wit
Sally (who married ? Kendall, who was Alex. Kendalls, Grandfather),
Nancy (who married Samuel A. Moore, Denton Moore’s father),
Agness (who married Garret Moore),
Margaret (who married Jessee Moore),
Martha (who married Clancey),
who John Denton married I dont remember.
Isaac Denton married Rebecca Etheridge [sic.],
Jeremiah (my father) married Elizabeth Griggs,
Abraham Denton married Polly Moore.
I dont remember who Samuel Denton married,
Elijah Denton married Sally Huff.
As I learned from my father, my Grandfather Abraham Denton was a Captain in the Revolutionary War, that sometime after the War and in the early settlement of East Tennessee, my Grandfather and family moved from the Northern part of N. C. with others of the Denton family to E. Tenn, and some years thereafter my Grandfather and family moved to the Cumberland River Country and settled in the uplands of what is now in Clay County, near the Ky. line.
My father and mother, Elizabeth Griggs, married about 1805 and soon thereafter removed to White County and settled on the place where they lived up to date of their deaths. My mother died 4 July 1828. My father died in 1847. I think in Sept. I dont remember the date of father or mothers birth. My recollection is my father was 66 years old, but dont remember mothers, but think she was several years younger than father. They had eleven children....
