John Finlayson McDonald’s grave stone establishes his birthdate as July 31, 1817. His parents were Angus McDonald and Mary Finlayson of Cumberland County, N. C.

Both Gaelic and English were spoken in the home when John was young, and the members of his family were literate. The census tells us he became a millwright. Millwrights were the engineers of their time, needing skills for working with metal, stone, and wood, and having the knowledge and ability to create the moving parts of the mill. The work required mathematical and engineering knowledge, evidence he had some formal education.

In 1838, when John was age 21, he acquired a farm located between Carthage and Vass. He had 65 acres of land located on both sides of the Lower Little River in Cumberland County, and 100 acres adjoining the Moore County line and his father’s property lines on the river.

In 1848, John F. McDonald bought from Daniel McLeod for $850, 496 acres between Herd and Crain’s Creeks, with enough “land on the North side of Herds Creek as would be necessary for the use of a Mill and overflowing of a pond.” In Branson’s N.C. Business Directories, his name can be found in a list of “Prominent Farmers,” with 500 acres on Crains Creek.

John’s father died before the 1850 census. At that time, his mother lived in the Western Division of Cumberland County on $300 worth of real estate; his three sisters lived with their mother. A millwright named John McDonald, in the neighborhood of 33 years old, lived in the household of a widow with eight children, whose name was Edith Page.

Calculating by age of his oldest son, Angus, John Finlayson McDonald was married to Sarah Strickland around 1857. She was 22 to her husband’s 40 years of age. They had a second son, Malcom Daniel, in 1859, and unfortunately, Sarah died in childbirth. Their infant son was raised by John’s sisters, Sarah, Margaret, and Christian. Angus, their older child, can be found in census records with his father. The family belonged to Cypress Presbyterian Church in Harnett County. John’s mother, Mary Finlayson McDonald, also died sometime between 1850-1860.

John was about 45 years old in 1862, when enlistment for the Confederate Army started. It is likely that he was the John McDonald of Company H of the 6th Regiment, N. C. Senior Reserves, who served in the Civil War until its end in 1865.

About 1866, John married again. Jennet Isabella Patterson was born around 1848 in Cumberland County, and married John, a 49-year-old widower, at about age 18. The Patterson family belonged to Union Presbyterian Church, located between Carthage and Vass, where John became a member.

Their first child, Mary Arabella McDonald, was born in 1867. Their son, Neill Archibald McDonald, was born in 1869. In 1870, their home was in the Greenwood Township of Moore County. John was a millwright whose real estate at that time was valued at $800. Son Angus was age 12 and attended school. The family had neighbors who were farmers, (two who were born in Scotland,) with surnames McDonald, McLean, and Kelly.

Daughter Margaret Anne was born in 1872. Jennet’s father, Neill Patterson, died in 1877.

In 1880, the family, still in Greenwood, included the parents and four children. John was still a millwright, Angus worked as a house carpenter, and Neill was a laborer. John’s son Malcom lived with John’s sister, Christian McDonald, in Cumberland County.

In 1891, Jennet’s mother, Margaret McLean Patterson, died and was buried beside her husband at Union Presbyterian Church.

In 1899, John Finlayson McDonald died and was buried in the Ferguson and McDonald family cemetery near Crain’s Creek. His monument reads: “John F. McDonald; Born July 31–1817. Died February 20–1899. At Rest.” There is a grave to his right marked at head and foot by round field stones, which is the likely resting place of Jennet, who died soon after, in 1901. Their daughter Margaret Ann Hicks and three of her children, as well as their grand-daughter, were later buried in adjacent graves.

Sources:

Alex M. Patterson, Highland Scots Pattersons of North Carolina and Related Families. (Raleigh: Contemporary Lithographers, Inc., 1979), pp. 159-194. Patterson researched the family of John’s second wife, Jennet Isabella Patterson.

1820 U. S. Census; Moore County, N. C., page stamped 298/handwritten 301; NARA Microfilm M33_80.

James Vann Comer, Gone and Almost Forgotten: Crain’s Creek Community, (Sanford: James Vann Comer, 1986), p. 104; census records below.

Son Neill McDonald in 1940 U. S. Census, High Point, Guilford County, N. C., NARA Roll: M-T0627-02921; p. 6B; Enumeration District: 41-90.

1850 U. S. Census, Eastern Division, Cumberland, North Carolina; Roll: 627; Page: 64b; Line Number: 40, Dwelling Number: 1045, Family Number: 1058.

1860 U. S. Census, Moore County, N. C., p. 79; NARA Microfilm M653-906.

Confederate North Carolina Troops: 6th Regiment, North Carolina Senior Reserves, accessed Feb. 1, 2012 at http://www.itd.nps.gov/cwss/regiments.cfm, no date; Weymouth T. Jordan Jr., North Carolina Troops, 1861-1865 : a Roster, Vol. 12, (Raleigh, N.C. : State Dept. of Archives and History, 2004) p. 68.

1870 United States Federal Census, Greenwood Township, Moore County, N. C., p. 34; NARA Microfilm M593-1149.

1880 U. S. Census, Greenwood Township, Moore County, N. C., Enumeration District 133, p. 4D.; NARA Microfilm Roll 973, accessed online at ancestry.com

Visit to cemetery located off County Road 1825, approx. .4 mile from Highway 1, just North of Crains Creek, Moore County, with Lewey Alexander Sr., great-grandson, and William Wilson, great-great grandson, on March 29, 2002. See Findagrave Cemetery ID: 2282051.