Bright Hardee (abt. 1827 - 1899)

Born about 1827 in Lenior, North Carolina

Ancestors

Descendants

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Biography

Bright Hardee married 1st Miss Morgan, 2nd Mary J. Johnson, 3rd Louise Jones and lived near Clayton, N.C. Bright was born about 1842. Bright is the child of Major Hardee and Elizabeth Mewborn.

A family bible which went for several generations was inherited by Major Hardee, and was given by him in the division of personal property to his eldest Bright Hardee. This Bible remained in the home of Bright Hardee until his death in 1899. After his death this Bible has been lost and with it disappeared much information that relates to the history of the brothers and sisters on the main line of descent to and including Major Hardee. Bright Settled in Lenoir County, near Kinston on the old home place of his father while Major Hardee pushed up into Johnson County, and settled on its northern side on Black Creek. From the divisions of his father's estate Major began to purchase land. This estate must have been of ample proportions for in 1828 he purchased, while he was yet a young man, one hundred and sixty acres of land and again in about 1830 purchased 1200 acres of land, making a total of thirteen hundred and sixty acres of land, located in one tract on Black Creek. He lived in a small house on the first tract until about 1832 to 1835 until his plantation house on the main plantation was completed. This house a typical cotton planters house of the 18th century type, with hugh chimneys at both ends, built of hand sawed wood, well morticed, and held with hand forged nails, is still standing. The graves of he and his first wife, several of his children and their wives, and of the slaves may still be seen in the family burying ground close by. He married Elizabeth Bell second and by her had two children. Major Hardee II died between 7 April 1849 and May term of court of that year, and shortly afterwards his second wife, Elizabeth Bell, with her family of two children, and her brother David Bell and his wife Sallie Hardee Bell, a daughter of Major Hardee by his first marriage, emigrated to Mississippi in company with a party of North Carolina people who were forming a wagon train. This train emigrated to Mississippi and settled a small colony of North Carolinians there.

Source

• "North Carolina Deaths, 1931-1994," database, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:FPXD-4ZJ : 18 July 2017), Bright Hardee in entry for Willis Calvin Hardee, 06 Jan 1933; citing Clayton Twp, Johnston, North Carolina, fn 1612 cn 387, State Department of Archives and History, Raleigh; FHL microfilm 1,943,065.