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for a better way of life. To some it offered escape from religious or economic persecution
or slavery; to others escape from starvation, or sheer adventure.
It appears likely that our Daughatry forbears came first to Pennsylvania, down the
Shenandoah valley to settle in Virginia, some coming on to North Carolina, South
Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee and later on into Texas. This trek coincides with that of the
migratory patterns of the Irish and Scot-Irish in the south. Of course, there were
continuing arrivals of Irish immigrants over a long span of years from the early 1600's until
the deluge following the potato famine ca . 1845-1851.
There is no value in listing them here, but we found in our research a multitude of
notes from land records, marriage records, church records, etc. of Daughtrys (with name
variations) beginning in the early 1600's. A few of these include: Thomas Daughtie and
wife in Flourdim Hundred in Virginia, 1619-23: John and James Daughtie in Isle of
Wight, Virginia; a number of Daughtreys in Nansemond County, Virginia through the
early 1700's; a number of wills, deed records, etc. of Daughtry, Daughtree, Daughtrey in
Bertie, Northampton, Sampson and Duplin counties, North Carolina throughout the
1700's
As mentioned elsewhere, we found in Sampson County, North Carolian a veritable
colony of Daughtrys who continue living there on lands granted to their ancestors over
two hundered years ago.
Revolutionary War records reveal the fact that a number of Daughtrys (and variant
spellings), served as valiant soldiers and patriots in the war for independence of their new
country, America.

THE SOUTH

We find the first records of our Daughatry ancestors in Effingham, Sereven,
Bulloch and Emanuel Counties, Georgia, Beginning ca. 1791. It appears highly probable
that at least some of them came from Sampson and Duplin counties, North Carolina; and
we know they settled in this area; some on the Ogeechee river and its tributaries, and some
on the Fifteen Mile Creek. Some of these lands, granted under headright and Bounty
laws, and later, land "won" in the Georgia land lotteries, are to this day in possession of
and being farmed by descendants of our Daughatry pioneers.
In this connection, tradition has it that one John Daughatry received an English
Crown grant of over 2,000 acres in the vicinity of Fifteen Mile Creek in present Candler
County. An exhaustive search of Georgia's original land grant records by the Surveyor
General Department, Georgia Department of Archives and History, failed to locate any
such grant to John Daughtry (or variant spellings). This search was made in 1981.
A volume such as this cannot practically include a complete history of the
formation and development of the States and counties of our ancestors' homes, however
interesting. We have tried to give the highlights and the lineage connection of each
generation relating to us.

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