September 5, 2007

Published in Wake Forest, NC

            She wrote: “Colonel Ransom Sutherland was born in 1741. In 1786, he purchased several hundred acres in Wake County and eventually added to his estate in excess of 2,000 acres. He named his property Wakefields, a beautiful home in Wake Forest today.

            A stipulation on his original purchase excluded a small area, the site for the grave of the original grantee, Thomas Bell, but there is no visible trace of this today.

            Colonel Sutherland deeded some of his acreage in 1790 to erect a communal house of worship where the Baptist church stands today next to Wakefields.

            Close by is the Wake Forest Golf Club, which is responsible for the maintenance of a small cemetery known as the Mangum Cemetery. There you will find a marker and a monument erected by the local DAR chapter to honor Colonel Sutherland. This was dedicated in 1992 with three Sutherland descendants present, one of whom now rests there not far from the small scattered stones, possible unknown gravesites, which dot the enclosure.

            According to his 1823 will, Colonel Sutherland left his plantation to his daughters, Rebeccah and Lethe. Under North Carolina laws their husbands acquired the titles, and the division of the estate gave Rebecca and her husband, Priestly Hinton Mangum, the land where the golf club stands. Lethe had been widowed and remarried, and she and her husband, John Worsham Harris, inherited land and the Wakefields house. After Lethe’s death, John added a portico to the home as a gift to his new bride, Mourning Person. The Harris family held the property for more than 100 years.

            John Worsham Harris was born in Wake County in 1795, the son of James and Elizabeth Harris, who came to North Carolina from Virginia in 1792. James is said to have held tracts of land that he left to his 12 children. One of these properties he gave to his daughter Eliza as a wedding gift to her and her husband, Samuel Crenshaw. That property stands today and is called Crenshaw Hall. On the grounds, close to the mansion, is the Harris Cemetery, still used by Harris descendants as well as those in the Crenshaw, Crawford and Thompson families.

            Somewhere someone may have see small burial grounds on land these families once owned.

            I would greatly appreciate any assistance in locating the following gravesites:

            -- Colonel Ransom Sutherland, died Aug. 21, 1823

            -- Charity Alston Sutherland, born 1758, died 1811

            -- Rebeccah Hilliard Sutherland, died 1838

            -- Priestly Hinton Mangun, died 1850

            -- Lethe E. Sutherland, died 1828

            -- Jesse Read, Lethe’s first husband, died 1817, and their infant daughter, Mariadue, died 1818

            -- John Worsham Harris, born 1795, died 1872, Lethe’s second husband

            -- Mourning Person Harris

            -- James Harris, died Nov. 13, 1823

            -- Elizabeth Winfree Harris, died July 20, 1847

            -- Elizabeth Sutherland, who married Nicholas Merriwether Lewis. She died at Wakefields in 1812.

            -- Philip or Philemon Sutherland, who died in Petersburg, Va., in December of 1811.

            San Pedro is researching her family’s history for her sons, John and Kevin Harris. If you have any information about the graves, e-mail her at kake1924@hotmail.com or send a note to the Gazette editor at cwpelosi@aol.com