Samuel & Mercy (Rice) Watt

Cedar Bluff Cemetery

Cedar Bluff, Alabama

Cherokee County

Mercy (Rice) Espy's headstone.  We don't have a photo of Samuel's headstone.

Samuel Watt was born in Rockingham County (North Carolina) on August 22, 1787.  Mercy Rice was born in neighboring Caswell County (NC), on November 13, 1786.  They married in Caswell County in 1808 and then moved to Cherokee County (Alabama).  They had ten children.  Get this:  Samuel was only 35 years old when he died.  A father of ten children!!  Mercy lived to be 58.  One of her children, Elizabeth, married Robert Marion Espy, who was also from Cherokee County (AL).  At some point, thought, they moved farther south to Barbour County (Alabama), which borders Henry County.  Robert and Elizabeth were the parents of Thomas Franklin Espy, who was the father of John Jolly Espy, Sr., grandfather of Major Watt Espy, Sr., and great-grandfather of Major Watt Espy, Jr. (Watt Espy, the death penalty historian).

Weekly Raleigh Register

Feb 18, 1808

Caswell County (NC)

Cherokee County (AL)

Barbour County (AL)