My Genealogy Hound

Jesse Pennington, an enterprising farmer of Linn Township, Moniteau County, is a native of Patrick County, Va., and was born in 1833. His parents were Jefferson B. and Edith (Bedford) Pennington, the former a native of Patrick County, Va., and the latter born in Stokes County, N. C. Jefferson B. Pennington was born in 1806, and was a son of Isaac Pennington, who was of English descent, and was a prominent physician of Baltimore and Philadelphia. He was a member of the Dunkard Church, and during the Revolutionary War gave up his property rather than enter service, as it was against his religious principles. He died in Patrick County, Va., at an advanced age, and his wife, who lived to be very old, removed with the family to Indiana, and thence to Missouri about 1840. Jefferson B., with his wife, mother and three children, located in Indiana in 1833, where they lived six years, and then settled in Moniteau County, Mo. In 1838 they removed to near Jamestown, Cole County, where he conducted a large farm until 1858, when he purchased the place upon which his son Jesse now lives. Jefferson B. was a school teacher by profession, and followed teaching some thirty-five years. He was twice married, his first wife (the mother of our subject) dying about 1850. Of the ten children born to this union two died in infancy, and William died at Helena, Ark., at the age of thirty-one years, from rheumatism contracted while serving in the army. Those living are Nancy, Jesse, Isaac, Jefferson, Christopher, Marion and John. The father afterward married Clara Ann Viles, by whom he also had ten children, five of whom are living, as is also the mother. Jefferson B. Pennington served as justice of the peace of Linn Township twenty-five years, and at the time of his death, which occurred in April, 1885, he was a member of the Baptist Church. The maternal grandfather of our subject was Jesse Bedford, who was a native of England, and was a gunsmith by trade. He lived in Stokes County, N. C., until 1833, when he removed to Missouri, where he died at an advanced age. He had a family of seven girls and seven boys, three of whom are now living: Washington, John, and Mary, wife of Joshua Nelson. Jesse Pennington was but six years old when his parents settled in Missouri. He was reared on the farm, and received a limited common-school education. When eighteen years old he commenced work for himself, but lived with his parents until 1856. In the latter year he went overland with an ox team to California, returning home two years later by way of New Orleans. May 25, 1858, he married Rebecca Dearing, who was born in Stokes County, N. C., in 1832, and removed to Missouri with her parents in 1838. After marriage Mr. Pennington located three-quarters of a mile east of where he now lives, making the removal in 1863. To Mr. and Mrs. Pennington have been born six children, viz.: Amanda L., Emma, wife of William Harris; Mary E., Oliver, Maggie (deceased) and an infant, also deceased. The parents are members of the Baptist Church.