Information AboutLeroy Pope |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT LEROY POPE | |
| alabama state court judges | |
| alabama lawyers | |
| american farmers | |
| 1765 births | |
| 1844 deaths | |
| people from huntsville, alabama | |
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Pope was born in 1765 in Westmoreland County, Virginia , the son of John Pope and Elizabeth Mitchell. He was educated in his home state, and in 1780 , at the age of fifteen, served in the American Revolution , and was present at the siege and battle of Yorktown . In 1790, Pope and a host of friends and relatives removed to Georgia , and in 1809, was among the first wave of wealthy settlers to Madison County, Mississippi Territory (now Alabama). He acquired a large tract of land which included the highly-sought Big Spring, where pioneer John Hunt had settled in 1805 . Hunt, like many other squatters, could not afford to purchase his land. Owen, 1374-1375. Pope was successful in petitioning the territorial legislature to select his land as the site of Madison County's seat of government. He named the new town Twickenham after the home in England of his distant relative Alexander Pope . In 1811 , the town was renamed Huntsville in honor of the pioneer Hunt. Robey et al, x. LeRoy Pope's mansion, called Poplar Grove, was erected in 1814, in time to entertain General Andrew Jackson on his return home from the Battle Of Horseshoe Bend . It was one of the earliest brick structures in Alabama, and remains a prominent Huntsville landmark atop Echols Hill in the Twickenham Historic District . "The LeRoy Pope Mansion, 1814." Pope was a wealthy and successful planter, and was active in the early government and civic leadership of Huntsville and Madison County. He presided as chief justice of the first county court, and was among the founders of the first Episcopal church in Huntsville, organized in 1830. He was named by the legislature as a commissioner for the Planters' and Merchants' Bank of Huntsville, Alabama's first banking corporation, and for the Indian Creek Navigation Company. Owen, 1375. He was married to Judith Dawson, daughter of Cornelius Dawson and Jane Sale of Amherst County, Virginia . His daughter Matilda Pope married John Williams Walker , who became Alabama's first Senator , and was the mother of LeRoy Pope Walker , Confederate secretary of war and Brigadier General ; Richard Wilde Walker , Confederate States Senator ; Percy Walker , United States Representative ; and several other children. Another daughter, Maria Pope, married Thomas George Percy, Sr., and became the ancestor of such notables as Senator Charles H. Percy of Illinois , Senator LeRoy Percy of Mississippi , poet William Alexander Percy , and author Walker Percy . Owen, 1375; Owen, 1717; Robey et al, 119. Pope died in Huntsville on June 17 1844 , and is buried in Maple Hill Cemetery . Owen, 1375. NOTES REFERENCES
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