The Wives of Ignatious Nathan Gann:
Because of the limited documentation available for the late 18th century, we have no primary records, which mention Ignatious Nathan's first wife. Although Nathan bought land during her lifetime, he did not sell any while she was alive. Therefore, she does not even appear in a dower release on any deeds.
Many wives in the late 18th and early 19th century are documented through land records (deeds) alone and appear nowhere else. The law in some states stipulated that the wife had a dower right in any property owned during the marriage. When the husband sold a piece of property in some states, for example, the wife was required to appear at the county clerk's office with him. The clerk then took the wife aside and asked her if she was participating in this sale of her own free will and was not being forced in any way to give up her right to her share of that property. This was known as the "dower release" and is found as a separate statement at the end of the body of the actual deed. The release was so common in so many states that it is found occasionally on deeds in states where it was not required, simply because some clerks or sellers did it out of habit. Although not required in early Tennessee, dower releases occasionally appear on some deeds.
Since Nathan's first wife did not appear in dower releases and there are few other records, which would actually list a woman's existence at that time, we have no contemporary record of her name. We have been unable to find a marriage record, although we have carefully calculated when and where the marriage most likely occurred.
Ignatious Nathan grew to manhood in Halifax County, Virginia. According to his statement in his declaration for a pension, we know that he moved to frontier Washington County, North Carolina (now Tennessee), early in 1778. The young Ignatious Gann would have been 18 or 19 at that time.
This was an ideal age for marriage. We think that Ignatious most likely married between his first and second tours of duty in the Revolutionary War. In 1776, he was only 17 when first he enlisted the first time in Halifax County, Virginia, and a 17-year-old newlywed is not likely to be the first person to enlist. On the other hand, in 1778, a young man just married and needing a promising new area with low-cost land as a place to establish a family would be likely to leave settled Halifax County and strike out for the frontier.
Ignatious stated that he had moved to the frontier by March 1778. Therefore, he probably married between the return home (July 1777) from his first enlistment and the move to the frontier (January or February 1778). This date span works well in view of the birth of his first son, John, whom we calculate to have been born probably in the latter half of 1778, in what is now Tennessee.
Henry Howe described the mode of moves over the mountains before roads opened into the new frontier area: "They effected their removals on horses, furnished with pack-saddles. This was more easily done, as but few of these early adventurers in the wilderness were encumbered with much luggage. ... Some of the early settlers took the precaution to come over the mountains in the spring, leaving their families behind, to raise a crop of corn, and then return and bring them out in the fall. This, I should think, was the better way. Others, especially those whose families were small, brought them with them in the spring." This is probably how Ignatious Nathan Gann and his wife came to Tennessee.*
We say this despite the fact that at least one other Gann marriage is known to have taken place in Washington County, in the 1700s. No record exists at the Washington County courthouse for this marriage, either. This was the marriage of Nancy Gann to John Layman. In 1854, Nancy stated in a bounty land application made in Hamilton County, Tennessee, that she and Layman were "...married by Rev. John Doke [Doak], a Minister of the Gospel, in Washington County, Tennessee on the 4th of March 1776." This shows that Gann families, and perhaps others familiar to them, were in Washington County, and that marriages were being performed.
In summary, we believe that Ignatious Gann married first a young woman whose name remains unknown, between July 1777 and February 1778, most likely in or near Halifax County, Virginia. The young couple then moved to the newly settled frontier area that is now Washington County, Tennessee.
As little is known about her death as about her marriage to Ignatious Gann. When married, she was probably about the same age or perhaps one or two years younger than Ignatious. Therefore, she was born about 1760-1762. In view of the birth years of the children-John, Isaac, Anne, George and Thomas-we can speculate about her death. There may have been another child or two who died at an early age between John (1778) and Isaac (1783). This conclusion is based on careful study of the births of the other children and the dates that Ignatious would have been present at home between his several tours of military duty.
The births of the next four children after John occurred close together at intervals of about one to one and one-half years apart. Suddenly, after Thomas's birth (1787), there is a five-year gap before the birth of the next child, Rebecca (1792). Somewhere in those five years, Nathan's first wife most likely died. It is the presence of this noticeable gap and information about the second wife, which point to the existence of the first wife.
Susan, Nathan's second wife, died some time after giving birth in 1808. Had Susan been the first wife, as has long been thought, she would have been about 48 years of age when her daughter, Lucinda, was born in 1808. It is unlikely that she would have been having children at that age.
Thus, Nathan's first wife probably died between 1787 (Thomas's birth year) and 1791 (the year before Rebecca's birth). In view of the very regular spacing of most of the children born to the wife, it is likely that she may have died in childbirth from another pregnancy following Thomas's birth. Since the spacing of her children is so regular, it is probable that she would give birth again around 1788 or 1789. Thus, her death most likely occurred in one of those years in Washington County, Tennessee. We have no information as to a more exact date of death or a place of burial. Ignatious had not yet purchased his farm where he and his other wives were buried at their deaths.
*Henry Howe. Historical Collections of the Great West: Containing Narratives of the Most Important and Interesting Events in Western History-Remarkable Individual Adventures-Sketches of Frontier Life-Descriptions of Natural Curiosities (Cincinnati: Henry Howe, 1853), pp.196-197.
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