Spencer County, Tennessee Genealogy
Spencer County was created as part of the abortive, short-lived State of Franklin in March 1786.[1] It was created out of parts of Greene and Sullivan counties, and seems to have included at least the present area of Hawkins County. It was probably named after Samuel Spencer, a judge in North Carolina.[2]The Franklin statehood effort collapsed by 1789. This county existed only briefly, its legality is questionable, and little trace remains.
In 1786 the North Carolina legislature reconstituted a parallel-county of Franklin's Spencer County and called it Hawkins County. It was known by both county names while Franklin's statehood efforts lasted.[2] Now the land on which the lost county of Spencer County was located is known as Hawkins County, Tennessee. By the 1790 census of the Southwest Territory (proto-Tennessee) the County of Hawkins also included parts of modern Clayborne, Hancock, Union, Grainger, Hamblen, Anderson, Knox, Jefferson, Roane, and Loudon counties.[3]
Boundary Changes
In 1796 the land of former Spencer County, then Hawkins County became part of the new State of Tennessee.
"Map of Tennessee County Formations 1777-1985"
Sources
- ↑ “State of Franklin” in The Tennessee Encyclopedia of History and Culture at http://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/imagegallery.php?EntryID=F061 (accessed 27 June 2010).
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Robert M. McBride, "Lost Counties of Tennessee," East Tennessee Historical Society's Publications 38 (1966): 4-6.
- ↑ William Thorndale, and William Dollarhide, Map Guide to the U.S. Federal Censuses, 1790-1920 (Baltimore: Genealogical Publ., 1987), 314.