An entry in the Daughters of the American Revolution patriot index gives the following information for DAR Patriot Ancestor #A111309:
Service: NORTH CAROLINA
Rank(s): SECOND LIEUTENANT
Birth: 1747 GUILFORD CO NORTH CAROLINA
Death: 1815 SMITH CO TENNESSEE
Service Description: 1) 2ND REGT
The entry also names his wife as "Martha Elizabeth Brown" and lists children named Dempsey Sutton and James Sutton whom descendants have joined the DAR through. It's important to note that this is not the James Sutton of Lincoln County, North Carolina (1834) who served as a drummer in the 5th regiment in Halifax County, North Carolina c.1780. More on him later.
There was indeed a James Sutton who served in the 2nd North Carolina regiment which was mustered in 1775 in Salisbury, Edenton and New Bern, North Carolina. Salisbury is northeast of Charlotte, while the other two cities are on the eastern shoreline. This James Sutton received a pay voucher for his service in Edenton dated July 24, 1784 and appears in the records of Chowan County (in which Edenton sits) from 1785 until his death in 1826. Without a doubt, he did not die in Tennessee in 1815 as the DAR entry suggests.
So where did this DAR information come from?
Looking at Smith County, Tennessee records, there doesn't seem to be any evidence of a James Sutton who died in 1815; there is however one who died in 1835. This James Sutton was from North Carolina and first patented land in Smith County, Tennessee on April 27, 1814. He bought more land in 1817, 1818, 1827 and 1830. The 1814 patent was actually awarded to Joseph Randolph for military service in 1797, but Randolph declared James Sutton "assignee."
This James Sutton sealed his will on January 6, 1835, naming wife Alsey Sutton and children George Sutton, Edmund Sutton, James Sutton, Dempsey Sutton and Milly Williams. Note that the name Dempsey among his children is consistent with DAR records, so this appears to be the James Sutton the DAR is referring to.
Some more light is shed on this James Sutton by a family legend as told in a letter in 1940, transcribed below.
Transcribed By Vada Sutton
March 9, 1950
The Sutton Family
Below
is a letter we write to Mrs. H. A. Russell, wife of Elder Henry A.
Russell, of Murfreesboro, Tennessee, about ten years ago. Since it is
already written and as time is limited, we are taking the liberty of
publishing it as it was written, for the benefit of others who might be
interested in the history of the family, even though there are several
personal matters contained in the letter, which is as follows:
Lafayette, Tenn., Aug. 3, 1940
Mrs. H. A. Russell
Murfreesboro, Tenn.
Dear Mrs. Russell:
At last I have found that record I made from information given me by your late father James M. Sutton, relative to the history of his family. I put down what he told me largely in the form of a diagram and from it, I will give you most of the information I received from him. If any part of it is not plain, please write me and I will do my best to make it all clear. He told me that the first James Sutton of whom he had any knowledge was a native of Wales, coming to North Carolina about 1650. Four brothers, names unknown, came with him.
This James Sutton had a
son, named James, a grandson bearing the same name, a great-grandson
named James and a great-great-grandson, James, all in a direct line of
descent from the first James Sutton. With this great-great-grandson the
record becomes a little more detailed.
The
great-great-grandson, born in 1736, was a second Lieutenant in the
Revolutionary War, married Elizabeth Brown, weighed 550 pounds when last
weighed and died on Defeated Creek in Smith County in 1836. Three of
his brothers are mentioned, although the name of one of them is
unknown. He left Tennessee for Scottsville, later moving to Indiana
where one of his sons became Governor of that State. Another brother,
Will Sutton, settled in Putnam County, Tennessee. The fourth brother,
John Sutton, had two children, George Sutton and Ann, who married a
Cooper.
This is the entire record I have of the family up to
this point except the family record of the large man, James Sutton,
whose date of birth was in 1736. He married Elizabeth Brown, and the
record shows that he was twice married; but the name of the other wife
is not given, nor is the order of his marriage. However, the children
of his first marriage appear to have been: Colby, George, Abner, Logan
Jonathan, Joel and Oneida. His children by the second marriage were:
Edmund Sutton, James Sutton, Demps Sutton, Mellie and Nellie Sutton.
I
have nothing as to the wives or husbands of any of the children of the
first marriage except George Sutton, who married a Cartwright, an aunt
of Clark Cartwright, a Confederate soldier who died on the head of
Defeated Creek about 25 years ago. George went to Dade County, Georgia,
where he died as a very old man in 1878. He had one son, Leroy Sutton,
who married an aunt of Judge Sam Young, for many years a prominent
citizen of Dixon Springs. Leroy's children were, Howard Sutton, a
Christian Preacher; James Sutton, another son whose name is believed to
have been Will, and a daughter, Harriet.
Logan Sutton never married, but was a bachelor farmer on Peyton's Creek, owning six slaves and 1,000 acres of land. He left home with a drove of horses and was never heard from again. Colby is the only one whose descendants were given to me by your father. He had two children. Wilkerson and Bernettie Sutton. Wilkerson married Barbara Wix, and Bernettie married the father of Aunt Bide Russell. Wilkerson's children were: James, married a daughter of Levi Shoulder; David Colby Sutton, married Celia J. Austin; Jane Sutton, married Sherd Bailey; Mary Sutton, married Sam Shoulders; and one daughter whose name I do not have. The offspring of James Sutton and the Shoulders woman, if any, is unknown to me. David Colby and Celia J. Austin were the parents of Christian, Sallie, Eveline, James D., Clark, Philander and Cora Sutton. Jane became the mother of two sons, Joe and Thomas Bailey. Mary became the mother of one son, Matthew Shoulders.
***
There is a second source, possibly written around the same time, as follows:
The fifth family to settle on Defeated Creek was that of James Sutton, who was a soldier of the Revolution. He was a very large man, his vest being large enough to button around two average sized men. We have seen the big vest and know about its size from our own observation. He settled on a tract of land now a part of the old Lon Knight farm, and built a house toward the creek from the present Knight home. James moved to Smith County Tennessee with much of his family probably between 1800 and 1811. He settled on Defeated Creek. Defeated Creek was named after a battle where Indian Warrior, Hanging Maw, attacked and defeated a survey party in 1786. We are not sure how the town of Difficult was named.
***
Given that it names him as father of several of the children who appear in his 1835 will, the above letter appears to refer to the documented James Sutton of Smith County who died in 1835, a supposed Revolutionary War veteran. However, census records indicate he could not have fought in the Revolution. In the 1830 US Census of Smith County, Tennessee, James Sutton is listed as age 60-69 (b.1770s), as is his wife. Since the 1820 census shows he was born before 1775, we can place his birth between 1770 and 1775. He was not born in 1747 as the DAR states, nor was he 100 years old as family lore stated, and several of the older children attributed to him in the above letter are probably not his. Since his son George (named in his will) was born in 1790 per both family tradition and census accounts, James Sutton was likely born right around 1770.
This makes him too young to be the father of Colby Sutton, who was married in 1805 in Rutherford County, North Carolina (with James Sutton as bondsman, per county marriage bonds) before moving to Smith County, Tennessee. And of course, it makes him far too young to have fought in the Revolutionary War, calling his "patriot ancestor" status into question.
The evidence suggests that the above family lore confused James Sutton of Tennessee (c.1770-1835) with his likely father, James Sutton (1751-aft.1834) of Lincoln County, North Carolina.
This senior James Sutton evidently served in the Revolution, and gave an affidavit to that end as an 83-year-old man living in Lincoln County, North Carolina in 1834. This may be where the lore about James Sutton in the Revolution came from in the above letter.
In his Revolutionary War pension application, James Sutton of Lincoln County, North Carolina gave his birth as occurring in April 1751 in Granville County, North Carolina. He self-reported living in Halifax County, North Carolina from before 1776 to 1780 and Rutherford County, North Carolina from 1780 to 1805, when he finally settled in Lincoln County.
He testified that between 1778 and 1780 he served in the Granville County regiment under Capt. William Gill. Evidently, there was indeed a James Sutton who appears in Capt. Gill's muster during this period, but he was listed as a deserter shortly after his service began; James claimed he did not desert but was taken prisoner by loyalists. Regardless, the government was unimpressed by his application and he was not approved for a pension.
The crucial link between James Sutton of Lincoln County, North Carolina and the one in Smith County, Tennessee is Colby Sutton (c.1785-c.1838), who is likely son of the former and brother of the latter, given that he married in Rutherford County in 1805, which is where the senior James Sutton lived at the time, and later appears in the 1820 and 1830 US census in Smith County, Tennessee. Colby also appears with Abner Sutton (1770s-1848) in the 1820 US census of Smith County, who is likewise named as a son of James Sutton "by his first marriage" in the above family letter.
The DAR seems to have accepted flawed information that genealogists sourced from this letter of 1940, naming a Revolutionary War ancestor James Sutton with wife Elizabeth Brown (having evolved into Martha Elizabeth Brown by the time the DAR application was made) and a son named Dempsey Sutton. We know the DAR record of his death (1815) is false because James Sutton named a son Dempsey in his will 20 years later, and there is no evidence of a second Dempsey Sutton in Tennessee (there was a Dempsey Sutton in Lincoln County, North Carolina, but he was a whole generation older). Rather than one 100-year-old, 550-pound beast of a man with two wives and two sets of children born over thirty or more years, the above family lore likely refers to father-and-son James Suttons from North Carolina.
It is clear that the Lt. James Sutton of the 2nd NC regiment is not the ancestor of the Smith County, Tennessee Suttons, although descendants may still qualify for the DAR given that they probably do still descend from a James Sutton who served during the war. In any case, they should take a second look at patriot ancestor A111309.
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