Person Page 683

John Woodson^{1,2,3,4,5,6,7}

Facts and Notes

• Name:⁸
• Title: Doctor⁹
• Birth: 1586; Devon, EnglandBGO; Devonshire^9,2,5,7
• Education: 1 March 1604; St. John's College, EnglandBG; He was 18 when he matriculated at St. John's College^9,8
• Occupation: After March 1604; Surgeon⁹
• Marriage: 1619; Sarah Winston; EnglandBGO^2,9
• Arrival: April 1619; Jamestown, James County, Virginia, USABGO^3,9
• Anecdote: 1623; See person note^9,10
• Residence: Before February 1623; Flowerdew Hundred, Prince George County, Virginia, USABG; See person note^4,9
• Death: 18 April 1644; Flowerdew Hundred, Prince George County, Virginia, USABG; See person note. Cause of Death: Trauma and injuries suffered during an Indian attack.^9,5,7

• Note: Dr. John Woodson settled at Flowerdew Hundred, or, as it was sometimes called, Piersey's Hundred, on the south side of James River, some thirty miles from Jamestown. He and Sarah were registered there as early as February 1623, so it's almost certain that this was where their two sons, John and Robert, were born in 1632 and 1634, respectively.
  
  Dr. Woodson and about 300 other colonists were killed on 18 April 1644 during an Indian attack on the settlements. According to family tradition, he was returning from a visit with a patient and was killed within sight of his home. The Indians then attacked the house occupied by Sarah, 12-year-old John, 10-year-old Robert, and a visitor named Ligon. Sara hid her two boys to keep them safe; one (John) under a large washtub and the other (Robert) in a hole where they stored potatoes for the winter. Sara then joined Ligon, who was using an old-time gun to great effect, and they successfully repulsed the Indian attack.
  
  The old gun used by Ligon to fend off the attack became renowned in the local area. One resident of Prince Edward County described it as follows: "The gun is, by exact measurement, seven feet six inches in length, and the bore is so large that I can easily put my whole thumb into it. When first made, it was eight feet long, but on account of some injury, it was sent to England to be repaired, and the gunsmith cut off six inches of the barrel." As if to commemorate his bravery on this historic occasion, the name of Ligon was rudely carved upon the stock. The gun is now in the possession of the Virginia Museum and History and Culture in Richmond.
  
  NOTE: The Virginia Museum and History and Culture catalog indicates the Woodson gun is 89 inches (7' 5") long. According to the museum's description, Ligon's name does not appear on the current American maple stock, which, however, is the third one on this weapon and only dates to about 1800. The barrel is much older, possibly from the seventeenth century, although most expert opinion places it as the late rather than the mid-1600s. The lock is no later than 1760, and the other hardware dates to that period. Therefore, only the barrel may remain from a seventeenth-century firearm. Proof marks on the breech are London Gunmakers Guild stamping of 1650-1750. The Woodson gun was designed as a fowling firearm and generally is called a long fowler, used for shooting birds, although it could also be used as a wall-mounted gun. The octagonal-to-round barrel is approximately .80 caliber or 12 gauge, with a slight swell at the breech and a slight flare at the muzzle. The flintlock has an exterior bridle engraved with a floral pattern and is marked "Collicot," the name of a lock maker in Bristol, England, about 1750. The brass furniture of the same date consists of a cast butt plate with a graduated four-step tang, a convex side plate with a tail, an unmarked escutcheon plate at the wrist, a trigger guard, and three ramrod pipes of equal length, with a fourth possessing a tail where the ramrod enters the lower stock. The current stock lacks the decorative comb and bulbous fore-end typical of this pattern of firearm during the early to mid-eighteenth century. The weapon was conserved by Courtney B. Wilson and Associates of Ellicott City, Maryland, in 1995 with gifts from Woodson's descendants.

• Related Pages: Ancestors of Marianna Woodson (#1); Ancestors of Marianna Woodson (#2); Descendants of John Woodson; Notable People

Citations

1. [S436] Woodson, Robert S., Brief Family History of Robert S. Woodson, Woodson, Robert S.. Brief Family History of Robert S. Woodson. Privately held by Mary Jane Reyes, Lorton, Virginia, 2014., NOTE: Robert Woodson states that Middleton Singleton attended Missouri State University in 1847. However, he probably meant the University of Missouri, which was established at Columbia in Boone County in 1839; Missouri State wasn't established until 1905.
2. [S367] Yates Publishing, U.S. and International Marriage Records, 1560-1900, http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=WorldMarr_ga&h=1358326&indiv=try, Source number: 210.000; Source type: Electronic Database; Number of Pages: 1; Submitter Code: TSJ, Record for John Woodson
3. [S488] Ancestry.com, U.S. and Canada, Passenger and Immigration Lists Index, 1500s-1900s, http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=pili354&h=4033862&indiv=try, Place: Virginia; Year: 1619; Page Number: 502, Record for John Woodson
4. [S492] Ancestry.com, Virginia, Compiled Census and Census Substitutes Index, 1607-1890, http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=vacen&h=32871532&indiv=try, Record for John Woodson
5. [S448] Ancestry.com, U.S., Find A Grave Index, 1600s-Current, http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=FindAGraveUS&h=118325710&indiv=try, Record for Dr John Woodson
6. [S461] Edmund West, comp., Family Data Collection - Births, http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=genepoolb&h=4992012&indiv=try, Record for Col Robert Woodson
7. [S362] Online database, Find A Grave, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/67993655/john-woodson, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 02 October 2018), memorial page for Dr John Woodson (1586–18 Apr 1644), Find A Grave Memorial no. 67993655, ; Maintained by Bette Keene Scavone (contributor 46920917) Unknown.
8. [S613] Ancestry.com, Oxford University Alumni, 1500-1886, http://search.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/sse.dll?db=oxfordalum&h=256850&indiv=try, Record for John Wooddeson
9. [S454] Woodson, Henry Morton, Historical Genealogy of the Woodsons and Their Connections, Woodson, Henry Morton. Historical Genealogy of the Woodsons and Their Connections. Memphis, Tennessee: H.M. Woodson, 1915.
   
   A copy of this book is available on Ancestry.com (see http://search.ancestry.com/search/db.aspx?dbid=15304), openlibrary.org (see https://openlibrary.org/books/OL1758627M/Historical_genealogy_of_the_Woodsons_and_their_connections), and Google Books (see http://books.google.com/books/about/Historical_genealogy_of_the_Woodsons_and.html?id=GuhfAAAAMAAJ)., Page 20-22
10. [S846] Virginia Museum of History and Culture, http://museumcatalog.virginiahistory.org/final/portal.aspx?_gl=1*17knztr*_ga*MTEwOTUxMjYzOC4xNjkyODk4NTY3*_ga_KMSS2K2Q0Z*MTY5Mjg5ODU2Ni4xLjEuMTY5Mjg5ODY5NC4wLjAuMA..&lang=en-US, Woodson Musket, Object Number 1929.8, Description