My Genealogy Hound

James T. Pettigrew is a son of Mathew L. and Cynthia (Vivion) Pettigrew, and was born on the place where he now lives in Linn Township, Moniteau County, in September, 1835. The grandparents of our subject, George and Jane Pettigrew, removed to St. Francois County, Mo., from Georgia, where they remained but a short time, and then located on the place which the father of James T. settled in the fall of 1816. George was born April 14, 1746, and died March 7, 1818, at the age of seventy-two years; his wife, who was born in 1756, died August 10, 1833, aged seventy-seven years. Of the nine children born to them, Mathew L. was next to the youngest, and was born January 20, 1796, in Georgia. He removed to Missouri with his parents, and subsequently served ninety days in the War of 1812. In the fall of 1816 he entered about 300 acres of land in Moniteau County, upon which he built a small cabin, where the family lived for many years. He cleared a large portion of the farm, and was one of the leading men of the county. November 30, 1818, he married Cynthia Vivion, who was born in Kentucky in 1800, and came to Missouri in an early day. She died April 30, 1875. To this union were born twelve children, viz.: Polly (born October 5, 1818, died in 1850), Jane (born October 26, 1821, deceased), Charles (born October 22, 1823), Louisa (born August 3, 1825), John (born May 12, 1827), Nancy (born March 16, 1829), George W., (born July 11, 1831), William G. (born February 17, 1833), James T. (born September 22, 1835), Melvy Ann (born April 6, 1840, died in 1844), Elizabeth (born October 7, 1842, died August 22, 1878), and an infant (deceased). The father died August 22, 1874, in his seventy-ninth year, an honorary member of the P. of H. The mother was a member of the Baptist Church. James T. Pettigrew was reared on the farm, to which he devoted most of his attention, receiving but a common-school education. At the age of twenty-one he engaged in farming the old home stead, but in the spring of 1860 he moved to the farm where his brother William G. now lives, where he remained about two years, and then moved back to the home place, which he has since cultivated. January 12, 1860, he married Harriet J. Duncan, who was born in what is now Moniteau County in December, 1839, and is a daughter of John and Sebrina A. (Clay) Duncan, natives respectively of Kentucky and Missouri. Nine children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Pettigrew, five of whom are living, viz.: Fannie (wife of K. P. Stevens), Oliver, Jane, Mary and Nellie. Rufus died in March, 1861, aged three months. Roenia died in 1865, aged two years. Clinton died in 1880, aged three years, and Franklin died in 1875, in his eighteenth year.