William Allison 1749-1825: Soldier, Farmer

William was the first generation of his Allison clan to be born in the Americas. The year William was born his Ulster Irish father William Allison (1696-1778) acted as Justice of the Peace for Cumberland County,  Pennsylvania. When William Allison was born in 1749 his father, also William, was 53 and his mother, Catherine Craig Allison, was 39. 

Though William lived on the same farm his whole life, he is recorded as having lived in three different counties. His era was a time of change in the Pennsylvania Colony. As the wave of immigrants from Europe moved into the frontier, lands were sold, swapped and divided. Counties were subdivided. Cumberland County was created from a portion of Lancaster County in 1750. Soon after the Revolution in 1784, Cumberland was named Franklin in honor of the popular Benjamin Franklin.

William Allison saw military service in 1775 as a private in the Revolutionary War. According to Virginia Fendrick's, American Revolutionary Soldiers of Franklin County Pennsylvania,  William was 26 years old when he served under Captain William Berryhill and Captain Thomas Johnston 

In 1778 when his father died William inherited the running of his father's farm as well as the care of his mother, Catherine Craig Allison.

He wed Mary McLanahan around 1788, judging from the birth of the first son in 1789.  According to custom, or perhaps lack of imagination they called this son William. The McLanahans were a prominent Presbyterian family in colonial Pennsylvania. The couple had six sons and two daughters: William, Isabella, James, Mary, Joseph, John, Robert and Samuel.

Records show that William added to the family plantation with land swaps and purchases throughout his life. 

 

 Warrants  dated 25 Aug 1786 • Franklin County, Pennsylvania

William Allison died on September 4, 1825, in Greencastle, Pennsylvania at 76 years of age. He is buried at Cedar Hill Cemetery in Greencastle, PA, beside wife Mary McLanahan Allison.

Source: American Revolutionary 

Soldiers of Franklin County, Pennnsylvania, pg 241, Virginia Fendrick

William’s last will and testament lists a considerable amount of property including a distillery, orchards, books, land and slaves.  William deeds his property in a very uneven way giving son James the majority of the estate. The women of the family are duly considered.   The younger sons Robert and Samuel appear to inherit the possibility of nothing, depending on the whim of the executors...

William writes, “it is my sic that twenty eight hundred dollars out of the land specified to be sold is to remain the hands of my executors for the use of my two sons Robert Allison and Samuel Allison to be paid to them or not that is discretionary with my executors. Should the *** it most advisable that they should not receive it …."

Did these sons do something to offend the father? Or are they simply inheriting the disadvantaged position of being last sons? Perhaps we will never know. This will tells us that our 3rd Grandfather Samuel Allison navigated his young life with an illustrious name and three generations of history on the Pennsylvania frontier, having to make his own way with little inheritance to ease his path.