Tuesday, April 5, 2011

Absconding Cousin








According to Gov. John Reynolds his father Robert was persuaded, by glowing reports of New Spain which he heard from neighbors in Knox County, TN, to migrate to that area. Knox County Court Records give an alternate reason.
"Of a certain Robert Reynolds at a court of pleas and quarter sessions of Knox County...who has since absconded is now (as your petitioner is informed) in the Spanish Dominions..."
When the family arrived in the Spanish Dominions they found out they would be required to 
convert to Catholicism. They were Ulster Protestants and could never agree to such a thing.

So the family settled in Illinois Country, east of the Mississippi, instead. The area west of the Mississippi was the Spanish Dominion.


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