Seventh Generation

70. John ASH was born in 1824 in North Carolina. He died in 1896 at the age of 72 in Halifax County, NC. We have no proof that Jesse Ash and Mary Roberts were his parents ... but the fact that he named his only son Albert makes it a reasonable supposition that the only other Albert Ash in North Carolina at that time was his brother.

In both the 1850 and 1860 census, he and his family were identified as "Mulatto" and "Free Inhabitants of Halifax County". The 1860 census lists only he and his children, presumably his wife had died. In 1870, John is living "on the farm" with his new wife Rita Hawkins and youngest daughter Rebecca and a lot of people named Hawkins (Rita relatives?). In the 1880 census, John Ash is identified as a shoemaker living in Faucett Township with his second wife Ritta Hawkins ... the adjacent families are Bowzer and Hawkins.

71. Bathia BOWZER was born in 1826 in Halifax County, NC. She died She died after 1854 and prior to the 1860 US Census.. According to Heinegg in "Free African-Americans of Virginia and North Carolina" the Bowser (also spelled Bowzer) clan originated with a Virginia slave who bought his freedom in 1676. The profusion of Bowser's over the next 150 years makes it impossible to trace Bathia's lineage. There were dozens of free Bowser households in Halifax County in 1830, when Bathia was probably a young girl. Of those households only three had a female under the age of ten. They were Lucky, Isaac, and Charles Bowser ... so it is likely that one of these is her father. This surname is also spelled Bowzer or Bowse.

Her given name is mangled in her children's death certificates, but Bathia is very clearly written in the 1850 US Census. This unusual name in Hebrew means "daughter of Yahweh."

Children were:

	i.	Ann M. ASH was born in 1842 in Halifax County, NC. This is probably the Annie Ashe who married John Bowzer on 1 April 1866.
	ii.	Margaret ASH was born in 1845 in Halifax County, NC. She died on 8 March 1930 at the age of 85 in Weldon, NC. She married a man named Jones, and was a widow at the time of death.
	iii.	Itelia "Tely" ASH was born in 1846 in Halifax County, NC.
	iv.	Nancy ASH was born in 1848 in Halifax County, NC.
	v.	Albert ASH was born in October 1849 in Halifax County, NC. In 1920, he was a 70 year-old farmer living alone in the Franklin District of Southampton County, VA.
35	vi.	Evaline ASH.
	vii.	Rebecca ASH was born in 1854 in NC. She died on 3 June 1942 at the age of 88 in Butterwood Twsp, Halifax Cty, NC. She was a widow at the time of her death. Her age was given as "100" ... an obvious exaggeration. She was buried in Green's Cemetery on June 4. She married a man named Scott.

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